by John Meaney
“Heptomino Two. Stable.”
Another pattern, deeper blue: cobalt, perhaps. The dots were moving, but holding the same general position.
“Acknowledged. Tumbler, are you holding?”
Third pattern.
“All quadrants secured.”
“May I?” Tom leaned over Skolnar’s shoulder, indicating a triconic lattice.
“Go ahead.”
He pointed, and the information unfurled: durations and vectors, battle plans and probability-weighted contingency tactics, dependencies and alternatives mapped in detail.
Behind Tom, Elva murmured: “Too far.”
They were in a wide, elliptical chamber with outward-curving walls: pink-white nacre, which under ordinary circumstances would have shimmered; tiny silver-winged statues in decorative nooks. Normally genteel-looking, the place was shrouded in shadows, glowclusters deactivated. Around the room’s edges, seven, no, eight support staff moved, working at their displays. None of them paid attention to Tom.
He checked the teams’ itineraries.
“For Fate’s—” he began, but stopped as he realized that Skolnar, pale and intense, was concentrating on his eyes/ears-only data being lased to his retinae, coherence-resonated on his timpani.
Tom’s eyelids flickered.
Fragments of Sun Tzu’s Art of War flashed in his mind’s eye, triggered partly by intuitive understanding, partly by the beginnings of a metavector analysis which mapped real-world attributes quantitatively into tactical predicates.
“You can’t afford to lose all three team leaders,” he said.
Skolnar turned round and glared. “We won’t.”
Tom glanced at Elva. She knew: they had advanced too far, too fast.
It was Tom’s first chance to observe command-and-control on a paramilitary op, and so far his reaction was ambivalent. The comms links seemed first class—femtosecond-bursts of minimal data, by line-of-sight, then bounce-relays—but the intelligence background info’s validity was unknown, lacking probability analysis, while the actual manoeuvring was without finesse.
The teams had two objectives between them: to duplicate arachnargos-manufacturing femtospores from the growth site, and plunder the business-history archives for shipment data. Twin targets alone suggested high-risk complexity.
Tiny white spheres bloomed in the display.
“Security forces,” said Elva.
Not like you to mention the obvious.
It was a sign of her nervousness.
Tom had not met Skolnar before, but he shared Elva’s lack of confidence in him. In the display, there were white clusters above and below the target volumes, as well as on the flanks. Some tunnels were still clear. But were the apparent escape routes real or decoys?
“Rajesh is in the relief group.” Elva pointed to a small, blue cluster off to one side, waiting to move in and help the primary teams to escape. “With six Brown Panther enforcers.”
“Raj—? Oh, Dr Sukhram. Fate.”
Confused voices echoed in the elegant chamber, a cacophony of tactical confusion as all three teams came under attack at once.
“Heptomino Two, executing gamma-reversal.”
“Tumbler; we’re under—”
“Heptomino One, it’s not looking—”
“Fate damn it!”
“—heavy fire, returning—”
“—not have the objective. Repeat. Objective not attained.”
“Tumbler, Tumbler.” Skolnar. “Move to your—”
Skolnar choked as Tom’s fist, gripping his tunic, twisted his collar into a tourniquet-like hold.
“Cut comms,” Tom said.
Skolnar’s eyes bulged. Some of the support staff reacted as Skolnar struggled futilely, but Elva was faster than them all. Graser pistol out, she gave the order in a calm, icy voice. “Do what he says. Cut it.”
Comms fell silent. The tactical holodisplay shivered into stillness.
“Ah,” Skolnar gasped as Tom released his grip.
“Sorry.” Tom shook his head. “I had to get your attention quickly.”
“Mad bastard ...” Rubbing his throat, Skolnar glared at Tom, then looked around for support.
“Your communications were compromised.” Tom gestured at the display. “Couldn’t you tell?”
“What?”
“The security forces were too well co-ordinated, and they shouldn’t have anticipated Heptomino One’s manoeuvre.”
Still holding his throat, Skolnar shook his head and waved the support team back to work, though the update-feeds were gone. But some of them, galvanized by Tom’s words, were already delving into tac-modelling phase-spaces, working furiously.
“How could you tell?” Skolnar addressed Elva, who was returning her graser pistol to the sticky-tag on her hip.
“I couldn’t.”
“But—”
“I trust Tom implicitly.” She looked at Tom and shrugged.
Progress on the egalitarian front. Tom would have smiled, but he was carefully watching Skolnar. First time Elva hasn’t used my title in company.
“Without comms, they’ll revert to working as autonomous cells,” he said to Skolnar. “Am I right?”
“Er, yes. That’s standard.”
“Good. Then they’ll have a chance.”
Elva was examining the static complex of mapped tunnels and caverns. “What about Rajesh’s group? Any way we could give them coded instructions to help the others?”
Skolnar spun in his seat, looked intently at the schematic, then at Tom.
“I want them back alive.” He swallowed, his expression serious. “Tell me what to do, Tom, and I’ll do it.”
“Well”—Elva gave a half-smile—”that’s a start, anyway.”
Blood-red arterial transparent tubes hung in the vast cavern system. Tens of kilometres in extent, the ceilings glowed skylike, peach and orange. Here and there, great sweeping pillars of cream and gold connected ceilings to cavern floors.
Free-floating drones looked like insects. In the transport tubes, dimly glimpsed shadows moved.
“I like it here,” Tom murmured to Elva.
“Very impressive.” It was Elva’s first visit to Lady V’Delikona’s demesne. “Oh, here comes Jak. I’ll cover for you while you’re gone.”
They were on a wide balcony, halfway up the statuette-encrusted cavern wall, overlooking a small piazza across which several Lords and their retinues were walking briskly.
“My Lord?” Jak seemed slightly out of breath. “I’ve done my prep for the trade meeting, but I’d rather run over my conclusions beforehand.”
“I trust you, Jak. Go with your instincts.”
“But—”
“Just a quick look.” Tom was wearing a heavy silver bracelet. He held out his hand so that Jak could insert an infocrystal into the bejewelled socket. “This is your summary?”
The triconic lattice was small, and Tom scanned rapidly, drilling just one level in on each major point.
“Looks good to me.” He gestured the display away, and held out his hand for Jak to remove the crystal.
“I’m a bit unsure about the presentation . . .”
“You’ve got Felgrinar, haven’t you? Elva, why don’t you attend as well? Offer some moral support.”
“My Lord.”
Tom nodded in dismissal then, and watched as Elva and Jak went inside together. The corridor, glowing gold and royal blue, led to a suite of conference halls. Though he had missed this year’s Convocation—and the first anniversary of his elevation to Lordship—Tom had no real excuse for missing these local-demesne discussions. They were much smaller than a Convocation; still, there were plenty of people around. A short absence would not be noticed.
He used a servitors’ tunnel, moving quickly, to head out of the conference complex. As he walked, he took off his brocade-trimmed cape, reversed it, and fitted it once more around his shoulders. It was now dark grey and a little shabby.
Tuneable smartfabric
would have been easier, but he could not take the chance of a sensor web noting the presence of smart-tech.
Crimson wings unfurling, flames licking—
Holoflash. He stopped abruptly.
He had come out into a labyrinthine knot of spiralling ramps and transparent-walled tunnels in which stevedores and cargo pods and drones moved through an intricate dance of loading and unloading, departing and arriving. Beyond a small group of people, a lone woman watched silver ovoid cargo vessels being kicked from launch platforms into scarlet-filled transport tubes. Like pulsing blood, the scarlet fluid spat the transport vessels along the tubes.
She moved only slightly, but Tom picked up the gesture and walked up. He stopped nearby, head turned away from her.
“To your right, high up,” she murmured, “there’s an arrival.”
“I see it.” The shadowy outline was sliding into view.
“Take a stroll up that ramp”—the tiniest motion of her chin—”to watch. It’s due to depart empty. Be on board.”
“I—“
But she had already turned away and was walking with tiny, mincing steps towards the nearest exit.
Clangs and shaking. Tom sat with his back against the wall, arm clenched around his knees, hoping this was not going to be too rough.
Jolt. Then a rocking sensation as the cargo vessel stabilized in the flux, followed by a sudden tug of acceleration which rolled Tom over like a lightball.
Then the trajectory smoothed out, and Tom laughed out loud, surprising himself.
The invitation, sent to the higher echelons of LudusVitae but specifying Tom by name, had followed soon after the botched attempt at raiding the arachnargos-manufacturing complex. Though the mission’s objectives had not been achieved, Tom’s primary goal had: every cell member had returned alive.
Not a deliberate test, of course, but his performance seemed to have triggered some decision among the Strontium Dragons’ unknown leaders.
Abrupt deceleration. Tom tumbled, unhurt, across the cold deck. Then a side hatch melted open. Cold air flooded in.
He had been half expecting to exit straight into the red transport fluid, but this was an ordinary-looking depot: devoid of people, perhaps two dozen vessels being shunted into or out of tangled tubes. Stepping out, he brushed off his cloak as the vessel behind him sank back into its tube and moved on to a holding-volume.
There was a soft whisper of sound and Tom turned.
Ten tunnel-fighter types. Shaven-headed and stocky, or slender with triple-braided hair, all had the stony expressions of syndicate footsoldiers, or 49s. At their rear stood an older man with short-cropped grey hair, a dark scar across one cheekbone.
One of them, eyes half-lidded, clenched his callused fists. Dying to try out for real the techniques he had drilled in for years.
Primary target.
Immature and uncontrolled: Tom would go for him first. But the grey-haired man looked calm, almost dozing—real trouble. No illusions here. Tom could not defeat the whole group.
The grey-haired man moved. “This way, please.”
“After you.”
“Hello, Tom.”
The slender, somewhat frail-looking figure on the chair had long hair and a narrow black moustache, but recognition was instantaneous.
“Zhao-ji!”
They clasped wrists.
Zhao-ji’s eyes were as dark and fearless as they had ever been, and his grip was surprisingly strong, given his appearance. But Tom was aware of his own greater strength and physical ability, and a little ashamed of his surge of pleasure.
A chair moved into position for Tom, but he ignored it as Zhao-ji spoke. “Someone special to see you.” Zhao-ji gestured, and there was a hint of sapphire blue glowing inside his left wrist, on his prominent veins. He tugged down his cuff.
Slowly, from a curtained alcove, a golden filigree cage floated into the chamber.
“Oh, my Fate!”
Inside the cage was a white neko with sea-green eyes, large and comfortable. The filigree wound itself back as Tom reached inside. “Paradox! How are you, boy?”
The feline blinked lazily as Tom rubbed behind his ears.
“Just so you know,” said Zhao-ji, “that he’s been in good hands.”
“I can see that.” Tom grinned as Paradox purred: a soft steady motorlike buzz deep in his throat.
But we’re not just old friends, Zhao-ji and I. He withdrew his hand; the cage closed up. This is a negotiation, and we’re just beginning.
“The last time we were supposed to meet, I got a little held up.”
Zhao-ji could not help glancing at Tom’s left shoulder. “We heard about it. Petyo—remember him?—knew you’d been captured. He had some pretty scathing things to say about Algrin, as I recall.” He looked carefully at Tom, as though worried about giving offence. “Uncle Pin tried to use his influence, but with a Lady decreeing the sentence ...”
“I know.” Tom sat down in the vacant chair.
“He did try, though. Used up a lot of guanxi.”
Debts of honour: Tom recalled the term from evening conversations in the Ragged School’s deserted dorm.
Zhao-ji shifted position, and again Tom caught a glimpse of shining blue inside his wrist.
“I wonder”—Tom leaned back in his chair, casually crossing his legs—”how Kreevil Dilwinney fared.”
Trapped in the floating blue liquid; tendril growing from his body—
A small smile grew on Zhao-ji’s face.
“You’ve grown subtle, Tom, over the years. Kreevil ... I do know how Petyo fared.”
“Thank you, my friend. What happened to Petyo?”
“He worked for us . . . until he chose to forget his obligations.”
Tension tightened inside Tom. “I sense that you, too, have achieved a great deal.”
“And now we have a chance to work together.”
A short laugh. “Who’d have thought it?”
“It’s something of a paradox”—Zhao-ji smiled briefly—”that we, you and I personally, can achieve so much. Neither you nor I have that much power inside our respective organizations, but we can influence them enormously.”
Meaning . . . what? That Tom could help Zhao-ji achieve his ambitions?
No. More to it than that.
“You know our traditions, I gather,” Zhao-ji continued. “At times, when it becomes necessary, open warfare—or something close to it— must be engaged in.”
“When defeat is otherwise inevitable.”
“Or when the chance of victory is high.”
Tom nodded. “You think something major is going to happen?”
“Don’t you?”
Silence.
From his cage, Paradox complained: mrrghaow.
Zhao-ji snapped his fingers as two hard-eyed youths entered. “Take Paradox out. Give him fishblock and cream.”
The youths left with the cage floating between them.
Tom watched them leave. “You can’t take a chance on his getting loose?” Not quite a question.
“Not here. In ... At home, he has the run of the place.”
“Ah.”
“Not that he runs much nowadays. Getting lazy. Not like you, I hear.”
“Maybe.” Tom sat upright. “So what would persuade LudusVitae that your people should play a greater role in any . . . forthcoming action?”
“Information.”
A pause, waiting for Tom to ask: What kind of information?
When he remained silent, Zhao-ji nodded, carefully adjusting his cuff, and said, “We know where the Oracles come from.”
~ * ~
51
NULAPEIRON AD 3414
“Strangle me.”
The woman went for the small man’s collar, arms straight as she applied a loose grip.
“OK, like this.” He hooked his arms around hers in a complicated motion and twisted; her hands lost their grip. “Then elbow.” He turned and leaned sideways for the strike.
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