Terminal World

by Alastair Reynolds

  ‘We’re flying over it now, and we’re still alive,’ Quillon said. ‘But we’re just animals as well. There’s no reason why birds, insects and mammals couldn’t follow us in.’

  ‘They will, given time. In a few years, they’ll have colonised this entire jungle, so long as the Bane doesn’t snap back, and the world doesn’t freeze over. But that just means there’s a new Deadening somewhere else. When the shift happened, it was death for millions of creatures. They wouldn’t have had time to escape, even if they had the instincts to start moving.’ Curtana paused. ‘The Deadening’s an omen. It’s the last warning, when all your instruments have lied and you’ve somehow remained immune to the onset of zone sickness. It’s telling you to turn back now, while you still can.’

  One by one the engines rattled back into life and Painted Lady began to move again. With her motors roaring, it should have been impossible to tell that the forest was dead. But now that Quillon knew what was below, now that he was aware of the profound absence of higher life beneath that dark canopy, he swore there was a sinister quietness lapping at the edge of his thoughts, a ravenous absence seeking to swallow everything into its own all-consuming silence.

  He returned indoors and busied himself with matters medical.

  The Deadening was a narrow margin, never wider than fifteen leagues. By the middle of the morning they had passed all the way across it, into what - according to the maps - was the beginning of the Bane proper. Quillon had watched as the foliage thinned out from dense dark canopy to an impoverished, bleached scrub, and soon only pockets of tenacious green persisted amidst a landscape of dead, biologically inert soil and bare, bone-coloured rocks. The green pockets were the hardiest mosses and lichens, their simple, robust biologies able to keep them alive when more complicated organisms failed. But even they could only push so far into the zone of lifelessness, and eventually even these basic organisms could not sustain themselves. They grew warped and atavistic, and then not at all. The landscape changed to rock and dust, totally bereft of living things. It was not a desert, for in the many lakes and pools there was an abundance of fresh water, gleaming back at them under the blue sky with mirrored purity. But there was nothing that could make use of that water, so even the shorelines were devoid of life. Had normal conditions prevailed, the crew would already have been dying in the most wretched way imaginable.

  No one had yet come to him with any complaints, and Quillon was as certain as he could be that he was free from symptoms of zone sickness. His mind was clear, his recall and concentration excellent, his coordination acute. And yet there was something: the faintest twinge of nausea, a lingering tightness at the base of his throat. Unless it had something to do with the motion of the airship it could only be psychosomatic.

  Quillon allowed himself to believe that - provided external conditions remained stable - there was no reason for it to worsen. On this matter, at least, there were grounds for cautious optimism. The clocks and gauges in Painted Lady’s chart room were obstinate in their conviction that the airship was still passing through perfectly normal airspace. No hint of a change-vector had yet been detected.

  Quillon was as fond of the chart room as he was of Gambeson’s library back on Purple Emperor. The windowless, vibration-proofed, brown-veneered room, with its caged birds, shelves of ticking instruments, whirring springs and weights, scratching pen-traces and slowly winding paper rolls was a place of lulling, hypnotic ease. As often as not one of the other crew members was present, doting on the birds, taking down readings or making some tiny adjustment to one of the glittering mechanisms, but Quillon’s intrusions were tolerated, and he was grateful for the company himself. He passed many hours in technical conversation with the crew, fascinated by the subtle principles embodied in their instruments.

  It was not difficult to build a device that would detect the transition to a lower-state zone, the kind that normally infested the Bane. Finely meshed gears would bind up as microscopic tolerances became unworkable. Clocks would slow and then stop. So, too, would the pistons and other precise moving parts in Painted Lady‘s internal-combustion engines, rendering the motors inoperable. Such failures warned of biological changes that could be expected as the zone transition intensified. It was considerably more difficult to build instruments that could register transitions in the other direction. Painted Lady’s chugging engines would keep working even if she drifted into a zone where they were technologically obsolete. But for the ship’s passengers, the effects could be just as unpleasant as if the change was in the other direction. Humans were adaptive organisms, and from the earliest stages of foetal growth their nervous systems had developed under the influence of the prevailing zone. By the time they reached adulthood, their minds had become highly attuned to its characteristics. Hereditary factors played a role as well, since many individuals were descended from chains of ancestors who had only ever lived in the same conditions. Over time, each habitable zone had selected for those best able to function and reproduce within it.

  The chart room contained a few instruments capable of registering higher-grade transitions, but they were staggeringly complicated and correspondingly difficult to maintain and operate. As such, they were accorded both respect and a certain degree of disdain, like attention-seeking divas in an opera company. Experienced crew preferred to put their faith in the caged zebra finches, which had been raised in Swarm and would stop singing - and eventually drop off their perches - long before human beings sensed a zone transition. The chirruping of the birds seemed to accord perfectly with the tick and whirr of the instruments.

  And all was well. The birds were active, the readouts all perfectly normal. The accuracy of the clocks was constantly being cross-checked against readings taken aboard the other airships, flashed over by heliograph. So far there had been no hint of change across the entire formation, from Painted Lady to Swarm to the trailing airship. Had the Bane retreated by only a hundred leagues, there would have been clear evidence of that by now. It must have shifted at least one hundred and fifty leagues and perhaps further - a reshaping of the entire hemispheric geography.

  By the early part of the afternoon, they had pushed far enough into the Bane that even the Deadening had retreated to a dismal grey-green strip on the horizon. The monotonous landscape of rock and water rolled underneath like a loop of film being played over and over again, or so it seemed to Quillon after spending only a few hours on the observation deck. A forest could be monotonous as well, but it was the monotony of abundance rather than absence. This was a world stripped to the bones, the skull poking through the face.

  Swarm did not slow once the sun had set, even though they were travelling into unknown territory without the benefit of even the sketchiest of charts. When the sun had still been up, Painted Lady had climbed to nearly the limit of her operational ceiling, allowing the horizon to be scrutinised for any obstacles - weather systems or mountain ranges - that would have to be steered around. Balloons, some with automatic cameras and some with spotters aboard, were raised on long tethers to gain even more altitude.

  But the clear air had revealed nothing troubling, and so the decision had been taken to push ahead at normal speed, relying solely on gyroscopic and celestial fixes to maintain a constant heading. If the atmosphere on the craft had been tense during the daylight hours, it reached a state of acute apprehension in darkness. The devices in the chart room were now under constant, nervous observation. Since the finches were asleep at night, their cages cloaked with black fabric, they were of no use in detecting a zone transition. The crew were therefore entirely reliant on the more temperamental and tricky-to-calibrate gauges. And, of course, their own physiological responses. Thus far the readings had continued to be flat, conditions unchanging, but there was a palpable sense that things had to alter at some point. Quillon registered it in the gravely resigned expressions he saw on the officers’ faces when they came and went, conveying the latest readings to the bridge. They were like men waiting to sail o
ff the edge of the world.

  Quillon never allowed himself to be anything but busy. He was glad that he had packed and delivered the crate before Spatha’s interruption, because many of the supplies and reagents inside it would surely have been destroyed when the vorg broke loose. He waited to hear what the final toll of the damage would turn out to be, and in the meantime occupied himself by preparing further batches of medical-grade Serum- 15, ready to be delivered to the city. When he had no choice but to leave some chemical process running, he did what he could to help with the business of chart-making. There were not enough spare hands on Painted Lady to man all the survey cameras or make all the accompanying log entries, and Curtana’s crew welcomed such assistance as he was able to offer. The stereoscopic survey equipment was easy to use once the rudimentary principles had been demonstrated to him. Thereafter he had loaded and exposed hundreds of plates, noting the airship’s position and altitude by reference to the chart-room instruments, so that each dual exposure could be related to the hand-drawn maps being compiled at the same time. He concentrated on those ground features that were in some way noteworthy: the larger lakes, striking patches of mineral discoloration, or prominent outcroppings of rock that might one day form navigational landmarks, should crossing the Bane ever become commonplace.

  But no measurements could be made at night, and there was a practical limit to how much work could be done in the laboratory before his own tiredness began to overcome him. When he had done all he could, and the airship was travelling in darkness, he found Curtana on the bridge. Meroka was manning the heliograph station, Agraffe at her side as she sent and received transmissions. Quillon peered into the night and made out the twinkling flicker of one of the sending ships, and it looked as distant and unreachable as the furthest star.

  ‘There’s good news and there’s not-so-good news,’ Curtana said, making a small course adjustment before locking the wheel.

  ‘I’ll go with the good news first.’

  ‘Ricasso says he’s salvaged more than he expected to from the laboratory. Some of the Serum-15 was destroyed, along with supplies of the other stuff we need to refine it, but it could have been worse. He’s lost almost all the Serum-16, but that’s moot: without the vorgs, he had no way of going beyond it.’

  ‘And the vorgs?’

  ‘Located and neutralised. None of them survived Nimcha’s storm. But if Ricasso wants any more, he’s going to have to start from scratch.’

  ‘At least we have the Serum-15. How much did we manage to save, including the flasks I brought here?’

  ‘About two-thirds. We won’t be saving quite as many Spearpointers as we hoped, but as I said, it could have been worse.’

  ‘I suppose so,’ Quillon said. ‘And if it had been an accident, I could almost accept it. But we didn’t have to lose any of that medicine. Spatha and his supporters should pay.’

  Curtana gave him a sly look. ‘Coming round to the idea of the death penalty, are you?’

  ‘I didn’t say that. But he should be held accountable for the lives we won’t save in Spearpoint, not just the people killed by the vorgs. What was the final toll, by the way?’

  ‘Four. We found two more bodies, both harvested. And we almost lost another man in the search, simply because it’s dangerous crawling around inside an airship.’

  ‘Four people dead to make a point about Ricasso.’

  ‘Spatha will be held accountable, I assure you. And the plates definitely prove he was in the laboratory - your innocence is not in doubt.’

  ‘Nor my true identity, I suppose, or Nimcha’s.’

  ‘Swarm knows. And most of them are ready to accept you - or will, given time. Patience - they’re only human, Quillon.’

  ‘You mentioned not-so-good news.’

  Her face tightened, as if she had allowed herself to forget about it until then. ‘It was inevitable, I suppose. Under other circumstances Ricasso would have stripped the dissenting ships and crewed them with loyalists, men and women he knew he could rely on. But even if that was an option now, it wouldn’t be a permanent solution. He’s got Spatha, and a handful of his supporters, but how many others are lurking out there, unsuspected, waiting for another chance to rebel? The Bane was a test, I suppose. If you’re with Ricasso, you’ll follow him all the way to the other side, come what may. If not ...’ She trailed off, something catching in her throat, before she gathered her composure. ‘Ricasso’s given them the option of leaving, and at least twenty captains are already lined up to steer away. If they don’t want to sail with us, they can take their ships and the fuel, guns, food and medicines they have aboard and do what they will, provided they keep out of Swarm’s way. And by that Ricasso means he doesn’t want to see even a glimmer of one of those ships on the horizon. Because if he does, Swarm will engage.’

  Quillon thought of these beautiful, dandified ships tearing into each other like so many cannibalistic vorgs.

  ‘It’s that serious?’

  ‘Spearpoint betrayed us in our hour of need. And now Swarm is betraying itself. That’s almost worse. No, no almost about it. It makes my blood boil that they’d even consider this.’

  ‘You weren’t exactly all sweetness and light about crossing the Bane,’ Quillon said.

  ‘No, I wasn’t. But then I committed to it.’ Curtana unlocked the wheel, ready to make another tiny adjustment to their heading. ‘That’s the difference. I committed. And now I’m going to see this through to the bitter fucking end.’

  ‘Amen to that,’ Meroka said.

  Dawn revealed a few clouds on the horizon, but no mountains or hills, and certainly nothing to suggest that Swarm had crossed more than a hundred leagues during the hours of darkness. It was as if they had stopped, and were only now resuming progress. Quillon needed the reassurance of the chart-room staff before he was ready to accept, at least on an intellectual level, that they were still on schedule. On the main chart - the one that was being amended as they completed the crossing - an inked blue line showed their progress to date, cutting across an otherwise empty blankness. A scattering of surface features had been drawn in along the line and on either side of it, but at its widest this strip of mapped terrain was no more than fifteen leagues wide. If anything, the strip only served to emphasise how little of the Bane they would have seen by the time they crossed back over the Deadening.

  Still, progress had undoubtedly been made. They had completed nearly half of the crossing without incident, and from both a technical and medical standpoint there was little immediate cause for concern. Painted Lady and the other ships were running well; the crews and the citizens were healthy, and those incidents of incipient zone sickness reported to Quillon could be safely ascribed to psychosomatic effects. Quillon had even found his own symptoms retreating as time passed, and the reality of crossing the Bane began to seem less outrageous. It was, after all, just territory.

  Quillon came indoors from the balcony. He had been studying Swarm through binoculars, counting ships as best he could.

  ‘The dissenters are still with us,’ he said. ‘Either that, or my sums are off.’

  ‘For now,’ Curtana said, ‘but Ricasso’s ultimatum still stands. I think they’re just biding their time, weighing the pros and cons. Strike off on their own and they can do things their way. But then every decision they make has to be theirs and theirs alone - they can’t rely on the technical and navigational expertise of the hundred and more other ships.’

  ‘Out here, with no reference points, I don’t blame them for being cautious.’

  ‘Damn their caution. We’re doing something new here - of course it’s frightening. That’s the point.’

  ‘You’ve changed your tune.’

  ‘If Spatha achieved anything, it’s to make me realise that we need Ricasso more than ever. He was right all along. And we’re forging a path here that others will follow. One day, if the tectomorphic shift is permanent, this crossing will be perfectly routine. There’ll be way stations and signal pos
ts. There’ll be accurate maps and weather forecasts. There may even be the beginnings of a larger civilisation. Things don’t have to be so fragmented from now on.’

  ‘Be careful,’ Quillon said. ‘That sounds dangerously like optimism.’

  He spent the morning fussing with the medicines, examining the crew-members, exposing more stereoscopic photographs, and then joined the others for a short lunch. They were on light rations so there was nothing sumptuous about it. When he arrived, Meroka and Curtana were already sitting at the table, talking about something in raised voices that stopped as soon as he came in through the door. They hadn’t been arguing.

  ‘Did I interrupt?’

  ‘Just telling Meroka that if she doesn’t like life in post-reconstruction Spearpoint - and who could honestly blame her if she doesn’t? - I’m sure we could always find her something to do in Swarm. Even if it didn’t involve shooting things.’

  ‘Spoilsport,’ Meroka said, in mock woundedness. ‘At least let me blow up some shit.’

  ‘I’m sure we’d be able to find some ... shit ... for you to blow up,’ Curtana said, voicing the word as if she was holding it in mental tongs, at a distance.

  ‘Little Miss Sky-Princess is starting to thaw,’ Meroka said triumphantly. ‘Cursing would do her a world of good, don’t you think, Cutter? Get shot of some of that tension of hers. Girl walks around like she’s got a steel rod jammed up her ass. Fine, she’s a captain and all - got to keep up appearances. But that can’t be good for you your whole life. Bit more time with me and we’ll have her profaning enough to make Fray blush.’

  ‘It’s good to have objectives in life,’ Quillon said. It was, he thought, remarkable that Meroka and Curtana had found not only common ground but also the beginnings of something that looked like friendship. He supposed he should not have been too surprised; despite their wildly different backgrounds, both women were possessed of a streak of uncommon independence, albeit one that had manifested itself in wildly different forms.