tories











Stories

 

Alastair Reynolds

 

Contents

Beyond The
Aquila Rift

The Big
Hello!

Diamond Dogs

Dilation
Sleep

Feeling
Rejected

The Fixation

Fresco

Galactic
North

Glacial

Grafenwalderłs
Bestiary

Great Wall
Of Mars

Merlinłs Gun

Minlałs
Flowers

Nightingale

Signal To
Noise

The Six
Directions Of Space

The
Sledge-Makerłs Daughter

Spirey And
The Queen

A Spy In Europa

The Star
Surgeonłs Apprentice

Stroboscopic

Tiger,
Burning

Turquoise
Days

Understanding
Space And Time

Weather

Zima Blue

 

Beyond The Aquila Rift

From David Hartwell, Yearłs Best SF 11 (2006)

 

Alastair Reynolds (www.members.tripod.com/~voxishj lives in
Noordwijk, Holland, and worked for ten years for the European Space Agency
before becoming a full-time writer in 2004. He is one of the new British space
opera writers to emerge in the mid and late 1990s, in the generation after
Baxter and McAuley, and originally the most �hard SF" of them. His first novel,
Revelation Space, was published in 1999. He is growing fast as an SF writer in
this decade. His last two novels are Century Rain and Pushing Ice. His first
short story collection, Galactic North, collecting pieces in the RS universe,
is out in 2006.

�Beyond the Aquila Rift" was published in Constellations.
There is an echo of Philip K. Dickłs classic, �A Little Something for Us
Tempunauts." A ship is marooned outside the galaxy by an alien wormhole
transportation system that everyone uses but no one really understands. Reality
is not what it appears to be.

 

Gretałs with me when I pull Suzy out of the surge tank.

�Why her?" Greta asks.

�Because I want her out first," I say, wondering if Gretałs
jealous. I donłt blame her: Suzyłs beautiful, but shełs also smart. There isnłt
a better syntax runner in Ashanti Industrial.

�What happened? � Suzy asks, when shełs over the
groggi-ness. �Did we make it back?"

I ask her to tell me the last thing she remembered.

�Customs," Suzy says. �Those pricks on Arkangel."

�And after that? Anything else? The runes? Do you remember
casting them?"

�No," she says, then picks up something in my voice. The
fact that I might not be telling the truth, or telling her all she needs to
know. �Thorn. Iłll ask you again. Did we make it back?"

�Yeah," I say. �We made it back."

Suzy looks back at the starscape, airbrushed across her
surge tank in luminous violet and yellow paint. She ęd had it customized on
Carillon. It was against regs: something about the paint clogging intake
filters. Suzy didnłt care. She told me it had cost her a weekłs pay, but it had
been worth it to impose her own personality on the gray company architecture of
the ship.

�Funny how I feel like Iłve been in that thing for months."

I shrug. �Thatłs the way it feels sometimes."

�Then nothing went wrong?"

�Nothing at all."

Suzy looks at Greta. �Then who are you?" she asks.

Greta says nothing. She just looks at me expectantly. I
start shaking, and realize I canłt go through with this. Not yet.

�End it," I tell Greta.

Greta steps toward Suzy. Suzy reacts, but she isnłt quick
enough. Greta pulls something from her pocket and touches Suzy on the forearm.
Suzy drops like a puppet, out cold. We put her back into the surge tank, plumb
her back in and close the lid.

�She wonłt remember anything," Greta says. �The conversation
never left her short term memory."

�I donłt know if I can go through with this," I say.

Greta touches me with her other hand. �No one ever said this
was going to be easy."

�I was just trying to ease her into it gently. I didnłt want
to tell her the truth right out."

�I know," Greta says. �Youłre a kind man, Thorn." Then she
kisses me.

I remembered Arkangel as well. That was about where it all
started to go wrong. We just didnłt know it then.

We missed our first take-off slot when customs found a discrepancy
in our cargo waybill. It wasnłt serious, but it took them a while to realize
their mistake. By the time they did, we knew we were going to be sitting on the
ground for another eight hours, while in-bound control processed a fleet of
bulk carriers.

I told Suzy and Ray the news. Suzy took it pretty well, or
about as well as Suzy ever took that kind of thing. I suggested she use the
time to scour the docks for any hot syntax patches. Anything that might shave a
day or two off our return trip.

�Company authorized?" she asked.

�I donłt care," I said.

�What about Ray?" Suzy asked. �Is he going to sit here drinking
tea while I work for my pay?"

I smiled. They had a bickering, love-hate thing going. �No,
Ray can do something useful as well. He can take a look at the q-planes."

�Nothing wrong with those planes," Ray said.

I took off my old Ashanti Industrial bib cap, scratched my
bald spot and turned to the jib man.

�Right. Then it wonłt take you long to check them over, will
it?"

�Whatever, Skip."

The thing I liked about Ray was that he always knew when hełd
lost an argument. He gathered his kit and went out to check over the planes. I
watched him climb the jib ladder, tools hanging from his belt. Suzy got her
facemask, long black coat and left, vanishing into the vapor haze of the docks,
boot heels clicking into the distance long after shełd passed out of sight.

I left the Blue Goose, walking in the opposite direction to
Suzy. Overhead, the bulk carriers slid in one after the other. You heard them
long before you saw them. Mournful, cetacean moans cut down through the
piss-yellow clouds over the port. When they emerged, you saw dark hulls scabbed
and scarred by the blocky extrusions of syntax patterning, jibs and q-planes
retracted for landing and undercarriage clutching down like talons. The
carriers stopped over their allocated wells and lowered down on a scream of
thrust. Docking gantries closed around them like grasping skeletal fingers. Cargo
handling ęsaurs plodded out of their holding pens, some of them autonomous,
some of them still being ridden by trainers. There was a shocking silence as
the engines cut, until the next carrier began to approach through the clouds.

I always like watching ships coming and going, even when
theyłre holding my own ship on the ground. I couldnłt read the syntax, but I
knew these ships had come in all the way from the Rift. The Aquila Rift is
about as far out as anyone ever goes. At median tunnel speeds, itłs a year from
the center of the Local Bubble.

Iłve been out that way once in my life. Iłve seen the view
from the near side of the Rift, like a good tourist. It was about far enough
for me.

When there was a lull in the landing pattern, I ducked into
a bar and found an Aperture Authority booth that took Ashanti credit. I sat in
the seat and recorded a thirty-second message to Katerina. I told her I was on
my way back but that we were stuck on Arkangel for another few hours. I warned
her that the delay might cascade through to our tunnel routing, depending on
how busy things were at the Aperture Authorityłs end. Based on past experience,
an eight-hour ground hold might become a two day hold at the surge point. I
told her Iłd be back, but she shouldnłt worry if I was a few days late.

Outside a diplodocus slouched by with a freight container
strapped between its legs.

I told Katerina T loved her and couldnłt wait to get back
home.

While I walked back to the Blue Goose, I thought of the message
racing ahead of me. Transmitted at lightspeed up-system, then copied into the
memory buffer of the next outgoing ship. Chances were, that particular ship
wasnłt headed to Barranquilla or anywhere near it. The Aperture Authority would
have to relay the message from ship to ship until it reached its destination. I
might even reach Barranquilla ahead of it, but in all my years of delays that
had only happened once. The system worked all right.

Overhead, a white passenger liner had been slotted in
between the bulk carriers. I lifted up my mask to get a better look at it. I
got a hit of ozone, fuel, and dinosaur dung. That was Arkangel all right. You
couldnłt mistake it for any other place in the Bubble. There were four hundred
worlds out there, up to a dozen surface ports on every planet, and none of them
smelled bad in quite the same way.

�Thorn?"

I followed the voice. It was Ray, standing by the dock.

�You finished checking those planes?" I asked.

Ray shook his head. �Thatłs what I wanted to talk to you
about. They were a little off-alignment, soseeing as wełre going to be sitting
here for eight hoursI decided to run a full recalibration."

I nodded. �That was the idea. So whatłs the prob?"

�The prob is a slot just opened up. Tower says we can lift
in thirty minutes."

I shrugged. �Then wełll lift."

�I havenłt finished the recal. As it is, things are worse
than before I started. Lifting now would not be a good idea."

�You know how the tower works," I said. �Miss two offered
slots, you could be on the ground for days."

�No one wants to get back home sooner than I do," Ray said.

�So cheer up."

�Shełll be rough in the tunnel. It wonłt be a smooth ride
home."

I shrugged. �Do we care? Wełll be asleep."

�Well, itłs academic. We canłt leave without Suzy."

I heard boot heels clicking toward us. Suzy came out of the
fog, tugging her own mask aside.

�No joy with the rune monkeys," she said. �Nothing they were
selling I hadnłt seen a million times before. Fucking cowboys."

�It doesnłt matter," I said. �Wełre leaving anyway."

Ray swore. I pretended I hadnłt heard him.

I was always the last one into a surge tank. I never went
under until I was sure we were about to get the green light. It gave me a
chance to check things over. Things can always go wrong, no matter how good the
crew.

The Blue Goose had come to a stop near the AA beacon which
marked the surge point. There were a few other ships ahead of us in the queue,
plus the usual swarm of AA service craft. Through an observation blister I was
able to watch the larger ships depart one by one. Accelerating at maximum
power, they seemed to streak toward a completely featureless part of the sky.
Their jibs were spread wide, and the smooth lines of their hulls were gnarled
and disfigured with the cryptic alien runes of the routing syntax. At twenty gees
it was as if a huge invisible hand snatched them away into the distance. Ninety
seconds later, therełd be a pale green flash from a thousand kilometers away.

I twisted around in the blister. There were the
foreshortened symbols of our routing syntax. Each rune of the script was formed
from a matrix of millions of hexagonal platelets. The platelets were on motors
so they could be pushed in or out from the hull.

Ask the Aperture Authority and theyłll tell you that the
syntax is now fully understood. This is true, but only up to a point. After two
centuries of study, human machines can now construct and interpret the syntax
with an acceptably low failure rate. Given a desired destination, they can
assemble a string of runes which will almost always be accepted by the aperturełs
own machinery. Furthermore, they can almost always guarantee that the desired
routing is the one that the aperture machinery will provide.

In short, you usually get where you want to go.

Take a simple point-to-point transfer, like the Hauraki run.
In that case there is no real disadvantage in using automatic syntax
generators. But for longer trajectoriesthose that may involve six or seven
transits between aperture hubsmachines lose the edge. They find a solution,
but usually it isnłt the optimum one. Thatłs where syntax runners come in.
People like Suzy have an intuitive grasp of syntax solutions. They dream in
runes. When they see a poorly constructed script, they feel it like a
toothache. It affronts them.

A good syntax runner can shave days off a route. For a company
like Ashanti Industrial, that can make a lot of difference.

But I wasnłt a syntax runner. I could tell when something
had gone wrong with the platelets, but otherwise I had no choice. I had to
trust that Suzy had done her job.

But I knew Suzy wouldnłt screw things up.

I twisted around and looked back the other way. Now that we
were in space, the q-planes had deployed. They were swung out from the hull on
triple hundred-meter long jibs, like the arms of a grapple. I checked that they
were locked in their fully extended positions and that the status lights were
all in the green. The jibs were Rayłs area. Hełd been checking the alignment of
the ski-shaped q-planes when I ordered him to close-up ship and prepare to
lift. I couldnłt see any visible indication that they were out of alignment,
but then again it wouldnłt take much to make our trip home bumpier than usual.
But as Iłd told Ray, who cared? The Blue Goose could take a little tunnel
turbulence. It was built to.

I checked the surge point again. Only three ships ahead of
us.

I went back to the surge tanks and checked that Suzy and Ray
were all right. Rayłs tank had been customized at the same time that Suzy had
had hers done. It was full of images of what Suzy called the B VM: the Blessed
Virgin Mary. The BVM was always in a spacesuit, carrying a little spacesuited
Jesus. Their helmets were airbrushed gold halos. The artwork had a cheap, hasty
look to it. I assumed Ray hadnłt spent as much as Suzy.

Quickly I stripped down to my underclothes. I plumbed into
my own unpainted surge tank and closed the lid. The buffering gel sloshed in.
Within about twenty seconds I was already feeling drowsy. By the time traffic
control gave us the green light, Iłd be asleep.

Iłve done it a thousand times. There was no fear, no apprehension.
Just a tiny flicker of regret.

Iłve never seen an aperture. Then again, very few people
have.

Witnesses report a doughnut shaped lump of dark chon-drite
asteroid, about two kilometers across. The entire middle section has been cored
out, with the inner part of the ring faced by the quixotic-matter machinery of
the aperture itself. They say the q-matter machinery twinkles and moves all the
while, like the ticking innards of a very complicated clock. But the monitoring
systems of the Aperture Authority detect no movement at all.

Itłs alien technology. We have no idea how it works, or even
who made it. Maybe, in hindsight, itłs better not to be able to see it.

Itłs enough to dream, and then awake, and know that youłre
somewhere else.

Try a different approach, Greta says. Tell her the truth
this time. Maybe she ęII take it easier than you think.

�Therełs no way I can tell her the truth."

Greta leans one hip against the wall, one hand still in her
pocket. �Then tell her something half way to it."

We unplumb Suzy and haul her out of the surge tank.

�Where are we?" she asks. Then to Greta: �Who are you?"

I wonder if some of the last conversation did make it out of
Suzyłs short-term memory after all.

�Greta works here," I say.

�Wherełs here?"

I remember what Greta told me. �A station in Schedar sector."

�Thatłs not where wełre meant to be, Thorn."

I nod. �I know. There was a mistake. A routing error."

Suzyłs already shaking her head. �There was nothing wrong
..."

�I know. It wasnłt your fault." I help her into her ship
clothes. Shełs still shivering, her muscles reacting to movement after so much
time in the tank. �The syntax was good."

�Then what?"

�The system made a mistake, not you."

�Schedar sector ..." Suzy says. �That would put us about ten
days off our schedule, wouldnłt it?"

I try to remember what Greta said to me the first time. I
ought to know this stuff off by heart, but Suzyłs the routing expert, not me. �That
sounds about right," I say.

But Suzy shakes her head. �Then wełre not in Schedar sector."

I try to sound pleasantly surprised.

�Wełre not?"

�Iłve been in that tank for a lot longer than a few days,
Thorn. I know. I can feel it in every fucking bone in my body. So where are we?"

I turn to Greta. I canłt believe this is happening again.

�End it," I say.

Greta steps toward Suzy.

You know that �as soon as I awoke I knew everything was
wrong" cliche? Youłve probably heard it a thousand times, in a thousand bars
across the Bubble, wherever ship crews swap tall tales over flat
company-subsidized beer. The trouble is that sometimes thatłs exactly the way
it happens. I never felt good after a period in the surge tank. But the only
time I had ever come around feeling anywhere near this bad was after that trip
I took to the edge of the Bubble.

Mulling this, but knowing there was nothing I could do about
it until I was out of the tank, it took me half an hour of painful work to free
myself from the connections. Every muscle fiber in my body felt as though it
had been shredded. Unfortunately, the sense of wrongness didnłt end with the
tank. The Blue Goose was much too quiet. We should have been heading away from
the last exit aperture after our routing. But the distant, comforting rumble of
the fusion engines wasnłt there at all. That meant we were in free-fall.

Not good.

I floated out of the tank, grabbed a handhold and levered myself
around to view the other two tanks. Rayłs largest BVM stared back radiantly
from the cowl of his tank. The bio indices were all in the green. Ray was still
unconscious, but there was nothing wrong with him. Same story with Suzy. Some
automated system had decided I was the only one who needed waking.

A few minutes later I had made my way to the same observation
blister Iłd used to check the ship before the surge. I pushed my head into the
scuffed glass halfdome and looked around.

Wełd arrived somewhere. The Blue Goose was sitting in a huge
zero-gravity parking bay. The chamber was an elongated cylinder, hexagonal in
cross-section. The walls were a smear of service machinery: squat modules,
snaking umbilical lines, the retracted cradles of unused docking berths.
Whichever way I looked I saw other ships locked onto cradles. Every make and
class you could think of, every possible configuration of hull design compatible
with aperture transitions. Service lights threw a warm golden glow on the
scene. Now and then the whole chamber was bathed in the stuttering violet
flicker of a cutting torch.

It was a repair facility.

I was just starting to mull on that when I saw something
extend itself from the wall of the chamber. It was a telescopic docking tunnel,
groping toward our ship. Through the windows in the side of the tunnel I saw
figures floating, pulling themselves along hand over hand.

I sighed and started making my way to the airlock.

By the time I reached the lock they were already through the
first stage of the cycle. Nothing wrong with thatthere was no good reason to
prevent foreign parties boarding a vesselbut it was just a tiny bit impolite.
But perhaps theyłd assumed we were all asleep.

The door slid open.

�Youłre awake," a man said. �Captain Thomas Gundlupet of the
Blue Goose, isnłt it?"

�Guess so," I said.

�Mind if we come in?"

There were about half a dozen of them, and they were already
coming in. They all wore slightly timeworn ochre overalls, flashed with too
many company sigils. My hackles rose. I really didnłt like the way they were
barging in.

�Whatłs up?" I said. �Where are we?"

�Where do you think?" the man said. He had a face full of stubble,
with bad yellow teeth. I was impressed with that. Having bad teeth took a lot
of work these days. It was years since Iłd seen anyone who had the same
dedication to the art.

�Iłm really hoping youłre not going to tell me wełre still
stuck in Arkangel system," I said.

�No, you made it through the gate."

�And?"

�There was a screw-up. Routing error. You didnłt pop out of
the right aperture."

�Oh, Christ." I took off my bib cap. �It never rains.
Something went wrong with the insertion, right?"

�Maybe. Maybe not. Who knows how these things happen? All we
know is you arenłt supposed to be here."

�Right. And where is ęhereł?"

�Saumlaki Station. Schedar sector."

He said it as though he was already losing interest, as if
this was a routine he went through several times a day.

He might have been losing interest. I wasnłt.

Iłd never heard of Saumlaki Station, but Iłd certainly heard
of Schedar sector. Schedar was a K supergiant out toward the edge of the Local
Bubble. It defined one of the seventy-odd navigational sectors across the whole
Bubble.

Did I mention the Bubble already?

You know how the Milky Way galaxy looks; youłve seen it a
thousand times, in paintings and computer simulations. A bright central bulge
at the Galactic core, with lazily curved spiral arms flung out from that hub,
each arm composed of hundreds of billions of stars, ranging from the dimmest,
slow-burning dwarfs to the hottest supergiants teetering on the edge of
supernova extinction.

Now zoom in on one arm of the Milky Way. Therełs the sun, orange-yellow,
about two-thirds out from the center of the Galaxy. Lanes and folds of dust
swaddle the sun out to distances of tens of thousands of light-years. Yet the
sun itself is sitting right in the middle of a four-hundred-light-year-wide
hole in the dust, a bubble in which the density is about a twentieth of its
average value.

Thatłs the Local Bubble. Itłs as if God blew a hole in the
dust just for us.

Except, of course, it wasnłt God. It was a supernova, about
a million years ago.

Look farther out, and there are more bubbles, their walls
intersecting and merging, forming a vast froth-like structure tens of thousands
of light-years across. There are the structures of Loop I and Loop II and the
Lindblad Ring. There are even super-dense knots where the dust is almost too
thick to be seen through at all. Black cauls like the Taurus or Rho-Ophiuchi
dark clouds or the Aquila Rift itself.

Lying outside the Local Bubble, the Rift is the farthest
point in the galaxy wełve ever traveled to. Itłs not a question of endurance or
nerve. There simply isnłt a way to get beyond it, at least not within the
faster-than-light network of the aperture links. The rabbit-warren of possible
routes just doesnłt reach any farther. Most destinationsincluding most of
those on the Blue Goosełs itinerarydidnłt even get you beyond the Local
Bubble.

For us, it didnłt matter. Therełs still a lot of commerce
you can do within a hundred light-years of Earth. But Schedar was right on the
periphery of the Bubble, where dust density began to ramp up to normal galactic
levels, two hundred and twenty-eight light-years from Mother Earth.

Again: not good.

�I know this is a shock for you," another voice said. �But
itłs not as bad as you think it is."

I looked at the woman who had just spoken. Medium height,
the kind of face they called �elfin," with slanted ash-gray eyes and a bob of
shoulder-length chrome-white hair.

The face hurtingly familiar.

�It isnłt?"

�I wouldnłt say so, Thom." She smiled. �After all, itłs
given us the chance to catch up on old times, hasnłt it?"

�Greta?" I asked, disbelievingly.

She nodded. �For my sins."

�My God. It is you, isnłt it?"

�I wasnłt sure youłd recognize me. Especially after all this
time."

�You didnłt have much trouble recognizing me."

�I didnłt have to. The moment you popped out, we picked up
your recovery transponder. Told us the name of your ship, who owned her, who
was flying it, what you were carrying, where you were supposed to be headed.
When I heard it was you, I made sure I was part of the reception team. But donłt
worry. Itłs not like youłve changed all that much."

�Well, you havenłt either," I said.

It wasnłt quite true. But who honestly wants to hear that
they look about ten years older than the last time you saw them, even if they
still donłt look all that bad with it? I thought about how she had looked
naked, memories that Iłd kept buried for a decade spooling into daylight. It
shamed me that they were still so vivid, as if some furtive part of my
subconscious had been secretly hoarding them through years of marriage and
fidelity.

Greta half smiled. It was as if she knew exactly what I was
thinking.

�You were never a good liar, Thorn."

�Yeah. Guess I need some practice."

There was an awkward silence. Neither of us seemed to know
what to say next. While we hesitated, the others floated around us, saying
nothing.

�Well," I said. �Whołd have guessed wełd end up meeting like
this?"

Greta nodded and offered the palms of her hands in a kind of
apology.

�Iłm just sorry we arenłt meeting under better circumstances,"
she said. �But if itłs any consolation, what happened wasnłt at all your fault.
We checked your syntax, and there wasnłt a mistake. Itłs just that now and then
the system throws a glitch."

�Funny how no one likes to talk about that very much," I said.

�Could have been worse, Thorn. I remember what you used to
tell me about space travel."

�Yeah? Which particular pearl of wisdom would that have
been?"

�If youłre in a position to moan about a situation, youłve
no right to be moaning."

�Christ. Did I actually say that?"

�Mm. And I bet youłre regretting it now. But look, it really
isnłt that bad. Youłre only twenty days off schedule." Greta nodded toward the
man who had the bad teeth. �Kolding says youłll only need a day of damage
repair before you can move off again, and then another twenty, twenty-five days
before you reach your destination, depending on routing patterns. Thatłs less
than six weeks. So you lose the bonus on this one. Big deal. Youłre all in one
shape, and your ship only needs a little work. Why donłt you just bite the
bullet and sign the repair paperwork?"

�Iłm not looking forward to another twenty days in the surge
tank. Therełs something else, as well."

�Which is?"

I was about to tell her about Katerina, how shełd have been
expecting me back already.

Instead I said: �Iłm worried about the others. Suzy and Ray.
Theyłve got families expecting them. Theyłll be worried."

�I understand," Greta said. �Suzy and Ray. Theyłre still
asleep, arenłt they? Still in their surge tanks?"

�Yes," I said, guardedly.

�Keep them that way until youłre on your way." Greta smiled.
�Therełs no sense worrying them about their families, either. Itłs kinder."

�If you say so."

�Trust me on this one, Thorn. This isnłt the first time Iłve
handled this kind of situation. Doubt itłll be the last, either."

I stayed in a hotel overnight, in another part of Saumlaki.
The hotel was an echoing multilevel prefab structure, sunk deep into bedrock.
It must have had a capacity for hundreds of guests, but at the moment only a
handful of the rooms seemed to be occupied. I slept fitfully and got up early.
In the atrium, I saw a bib-capped worker in rubber gloves removing diseased
carp from a small ornamental pond. Watching him pick out the ailing
metallic-orange fish, I had a flash of deja vu. What was it about dismal hotels
and dying carp?

Before breakfastbleakly alert, even though I didnłt really
feel as if Iłd had a good nightłs sleepI visited Kolding and got a fresh
update on the repair schedule.

�Two, three days," he said.

�It was a day last night."

Kolding shrugged. �Youłve got a problem with the service,
find someone else to fix your ship."

Then he stuck his little finger into the corner of his mouth
and began to dig between his teeth.

�Nice to see someone who really enjoys his work," I said.

I left Kolding before my mood worsened too much, making my
way to a different part of the station.

Greta had suggested we meet for breakfast and catch up on
old times. She was there when I arrived, sitting at a table in an �outdoor"
terrace, under a red-and-white striped canopy, sipping orange juice. Above us
was a dome several hundred meters wide, projecting a cloudless holographic sky.
It had the hard, enameled blue of midsummer.

�Howłs the hotel?" she asked after Iłd ordered a coffee from
the waiter.

�Not bad. No one seems very keen on conversation, though. Is
it me or does that place have all the cheery ambience of a sinking ocean liner?"

�Itłs just this place," Greta said. �Everyone who comes here
is pissed off about it. Either they got transferred here and theyłre pissed off
about that, or they ended up here by routing error and theyłre pissed off about
that instead. Take your pick."

�No onełs happy?"

�Only the ones who know theyłre getting out of here soon."

�Would that include you?"

�No." she said. �Iłm more or less stuck here. But Iłm OK
about it. I guess Iłm the exception that proves the rule."

The waiters were glass mannequins of a kind that had been fashionable
in the core worlds about twenty years ago. One of them placed a croissant in
front of me, then poured scalding black coffee into my cup.

�Well, itłs good to see you," I said.

�You too, Thorn." Greta finished her orange juice and then
took a corner of my croissant for herself, without asking. �I heard you got
married."

�Yes."

�Well? Arenłt you going to tell me about her?"

I drank some of my coffee. �Her namełs Katerina."

�Nice name."

�She works in the department of bioremediation on Ka-gawa."

�Kids?" Greta asked.

�Not yet. It wouldnłt be easy, the amount of time we both
spend away from home."

�Mm." She had a mouthful of croissant. �But one day you
might think about it."

�Nothingłs ruled out," I said. As flattered as I was that
she was taking such an interest in me, the surgical precision of her questions
left me slightly uncomfortable. There was no thrust and parry, no fishing for
information. That kind of directness unnerved. But at least it allowed me to
ask the same questions. �What about you, then?"

�Nothing very exciting. I got married a year or so after I
last saw you. A man called Marcel."

�Marcel," I said, ruminatively, as if the name had cosmic
significance. �Well, Iłm happy for you. I take it hełs here too?"

�No. Our work took us in different directions. Wełre still
married, but ..." Greta left the sentence hanging.

�It canłt be easy," I said.

�If it was meant to work, wełd have found a way. Anyway, donłt
feel too sorry for either of us. Wełve both got our work. I wouldnłt say I was
any less happy than the last time we met."

�Well, thatłs good," I said.

Greta leaned over and touched my hand. Her fingernails were
midnight black with a blue sheen.

�Look. This is really presumptuous of me. Itłs one thing
asking to meet up for breakfast. It would have been rude not to. But how would
you like to meet again later? Itłs really nice to eat here in the evening. They
turn down the lights. The view through the dome is really something."

I looked up into that endless holographic sky.

�I thought it was faked."

�Oh, it is," she said. �But donłt let that spoil it for you."

I settled in front of the camera and started speaking.

�Katerina," I said. �Hello. I hope youłre all right. By now
I hope someone from the company will have been in touch. If they havenłt, Iłm
pretty sure youłll have made your own inquiries. Iłm not sure what they told you,
but I promise you that wełre safe and sound and that wełre coming home. Iłm
calling from somewhere called Saumlaki station, a repair facility on the edge
of Schedar sector. Itłs not much to look at: just a warren of tunnels and centrifuges
dug into a pitch-black D-type asteroid, about half a light-year from the
nearest star. The only reason itłs here at all is because there happens to be
an aperture next door. Thatłs how we got here in the first place. Somehow or
other Blue Goose took a wrong turn in the network, what they call a routing
error. The Goose came in last night, local time, and Iłve been in a hotel since
then. I didnłt call last night because I was too tired and disoriented after
coming out of the tank, and I didnłt know how long we were going to be here.
Seemed better to wait until morning, when wełd have a better idea of the damage
to the ship. Itłs nothing seriousjust a few bits and pieces buckled during the
transitbut it means wełre going to be here for another couple of days.
Koldinghełs the repair chiefsays three at the most. By the time we get back
on course, however, wełll be about forty days behind schedule."

I paused, eyeing the incrementing cost indicator. Before I
sat down in the booth, I always had an eloquent and economical speech queued up
in my head, one that conveyed exactly what needed to be said, with the measure
and grace of a soliloquy. But my mind always dried up as soon as I opened my
mouth, and instead of an actor I ended up sounding like a small time thief, concocting
some fumbling alibi in the presence of quick-witted interrogators.

I smiled awkwardly and continued: �It kills me to think this
message is going to take so long to get to you. But if therełs a silver lining,
itłs that I wonłt be far behind it. By the time you get this, I should be home
in only a couple of days. So donłt waste money replying to this, because by the
time you get it Iłll already have left Saumlaki Station. Just stay where you
are, and I promise Iłll be home soon."

That was it. There was nothing more I needed to say, other
than: �I miss you." Delivered after a momentłs pause, I meant it to sound
emphatic. But when I replayed the recording it sounded more like an
afterthought.

I could have recorded it again, but I doubted that I would
have been any happier. Instead I just committed the existing message for
transmission and wondered how long it would have to wait before going on its
way. Since it seemed unlikely that there was a vast flow of commerce in and out
of Saumlaki, our ship might be the first suitable outbound vessel.

I emerged from the booth. For some reason I felt guilty, as
if I had been in some way neglectful. It took me a while before I realized what
was playing on my mind. Iłd told Kate-rina about Saumlaki Station. Iłd even
told her about Kolding and the damage to the Blue Goose. But I hadnłt told her
about Greta.

Itłs not working with Suzy.

Shełs too smart, too well-attuned to the physiological
correlatives of surge tank immersion. I can give her all the reassurances in
the world, but she knows shełs been under too long for this to be anything
other than a truly epic screw-up. She knows that we arenłt just talking weeks
or even months of delay here. Every nerve in her body is screaming that message
into her skull.

�I had dreams," she says, when the grogginess fades.

�What kind?"

�Dreams that I kept waking. Dreams that you were pulling me
out of the surge tank. You and someone else."

I do my best to smile. Iłm alone, but Greta isnłt far away.
The hypodermicłs in my pocket now.

�I always get bad dreams coming out of the tank," I say.

�These felt real. Your story kept changing, but you kept
telling me we were somewhere ... that we ęd gone a little off course, but that
it was nothing to worry about."

So much for Gretałs reassurance that Suzy will remember nothing
after our aborted efforts at waking her. Seems that her short-term memory isnłt
quite as fallible as wełd like.

�Itłs funny you should say that," I tell her. �Because,
actually, we are a little off course."

Shełs sharper with every breath. Suzy was always the best of
us at coming out of the tank.

�Tell me how far, Thorn."

�Farther than Iłd like."

She balls her fists. I canłt tell if itłs aggression, or
some lingering neuromuscular effect of her time in the tank. �How far? Beyond
the Bubble?"

�Beyond the Bubble, yes."

Her voice grows small and childlike.

�Tell me, Thorn. Are we out beyond the Rift?"

I can hear the fear. I understand what shełs going through.
Itłs the nightmare that all ship crews live with, on every trip. That something
will go wrong with the routing, something so severe that they ęII end up on the
very edge of the network. That theyłll end up so far from home that getting
back will take years, not months. And that, of course, years will have already
passed, even before they begin the return trip.

That loved ones will be years older when they reach home.

If they ęre still there. If they still remember you, or want
to remember. If they ęre still recognizable, or alive.

Beyond the Aquila Rift. Itłs shorthand for the trip no one
ever hopes to make by accident. The one that will screw up the rest of your
life, the one that creates the ghosts you see haunting the shadows of company
bars across the whole Bubble. Men and women ripped out of time, cut adrift from
families and lovers by an accident of an alien technology we use but barely
comprehend.

�Yes," I say. �Wełre beyond the Rift."

Suzy screams, knitting her face into a mask of anger and denial.
My hand is cold around the hypodermic. I consider using it.

A new repair estimate from Kolding. Five, six days.

This time I didnłt even argue. I just shrugged and walked
out, wondering how long it would be next time.

That evening I sat down at the same table where Greta and I
had met over breakfast. The dining area had been well lit before, but now the
only illumination came from the table lamps and the subdued lighting panels set
into the paving. In the distance, a glass mannequin cycled from empty table to
empty table, playing Asturias on a glass guitar. There were no other patrons dining
tonight.

I didnłt have long to wait for Greta.

�Iłm sorry Iłm late, Thom."

I turned to her as she approached the table. I liked the way
she walked in the low gravity of the station, the way the subdued lighting
traced the arc of her hips and waist. She eased into her seat and leaned toward
me in the manner of a conspirator. The lamp on the table threw red shadows and
gold highlights across her face. It took ten years off her age.

�You arenłt late," I said. �And anyway, I had the view."

�Itłs an improvement, isnłt it?"

�That wouldnłt be saying much," I said with a smile. �But
yes, itłs definitely an improvement."

�I could sit out here all night and just look at it. In fact
sometimes thatłs exactly what I do. Just me and a bottle of wine."

�I donłt blame you."

Instead of the holographic blue, the dome was now full of
stars. It was like no kind of view Iłd ever seen from another station or ship.
There were furious blue-white stars embedded in what looked like sheets of
velvet. There were hard gold gems and soft red smears, like finger smears in
pastel. There were streams and currents of fainter stars, like a myriad neon
fish caught in a snapshot of frozen motion. There were vast billowing backdrops
of red and green cloud, veined and flawed by filaments of cool black. There
were bluffs and promontories of ochre dust, so rich in three-dimensional
structure that they resembled an exuberant im-pasto of oil colors; contours
light-years thick laid on with a trowel. Red or pink stars burned through the
dust like lanterns. Orphaned worlds were caught erupting from the towers,
little spermlike shapes trailing viscera of dust. Here and there I saw the tiny
eyelike knots of birthing solar systems. There were pulsars, flashing on and
off like navigation beacons, their differing rhythms seeming to set a stately
tempo for the entire scene, like a deathly slow waltz. There seemed too much
detail for one view, an overwhelming abundance of richness, and yet no matter
which direction I looked, there was yet more to see, as if the dome sensed my
attention and concentrated its efforts on the spot where my gaze was directed.
For a moment I felt a lurching sense of dizziness, andthough I tried to stop
it before I made a fool of myselfI found myself grasping the side of the
table, as if to stop myself falling into the infinite depths of the view.

�Yes, it has that effect on people," Greta said.

�Itłs beautiful," I said.

�Do you mean beautiful, or terrifying?"

I realized I wasnłt sure. �Itłs big," was all I could offer.

�Of course, itłs faked," Greta said, her voice soft now that
she was leaning closer. �The glass in the dome is smart. It exaggerates the
brightness of the stars, so that the human eye registers the differences
between them. Otherwise the colors arenłt unrealistic. Everything else you see
is also pretty accurate, if you accept that certain frequencies have been
shifted into the visible band, and the scale of certain structures has been
adjusted." She pointed out features for my edification. �Thatłs the edge of the
Taurus Dark Cloud, with the Pleiades just poking out. Thatłs a filament of the
Local Bubble. You see that open cluster?"

She waited for me to answer. �Yes," I said.

�Thatłs the Hyades. Over there youłve got Betelguese and Bellatrix."

�Iłm impressed."

�You should be. It cost a lot of money." She leaned back a
bit, so that the shadows dropped across her face again. �Are you all right,
Thorn? You seem a bit distracted."

I sighed.

�I just got another prognosis from your friend Kolding. Thatłs
enough to put a dent in anyonełs day."

�Iłm sorry about that."

�Therełs something else, too," I said. �Something thatłs
been bothering me since I came out of the tank."

A mannequin came to take our order. I let Greta choose for
me.

�You can talk to me, whatever it is," she said, when the mannequin
had gone.

�It isnłt easy."

�Something personal, then? Is it about Katerina?" She bit
her tongue �No, sorry. I shouldnłt have said that."

�Itłs not about Katerina. Not exactly, anyway." But even as
I said it, I knew that in a sense it was about Katerina, and how long it was
going to be before we saw each other again.

�Go on, Thom."

�This is going to sound silly. But I wonder if everyonełs
being straight with me. Itłs not just Kolding. Itłs you as well. When I came
out of that tank I felt the same way I felt when Iłd been out to the Rift.
Worse, if anything. I felt like Iłd been in the tank for a long, long time."

�It feels that way sometimes."

�I know the difference, Greta. Trust me on this."

�So what are you saying?"

The problem was that I wasnłt really sure. It was one thing
to feel a vague sense of unease about how long Iłd been in the tank. It was
another to come out and accuse my host of lying. Especially when she had been
so hospitable.

�Is there any reason youłd lie to me?"

�Come off it, Thom. What kind of a question is that?"

As soon as I had come out with it, it sounded absurd and
offensive to me as well. I wished I could reverse time and start again,
ignoring my misgivings.

�Iłm sorry," I said. �Stupid. Just put it down to messed up
biorhythms, or something."

She reached across the table and took my hand, as she had
done at breakfast. This time she continued to hold it.

�You really feel wrong, donłt you?"

�Koldingłs games arenłt helping, thatłs for sure." The
waiter brought our wine, setting it down, the bottle chinking against his
delicately articulated glass fingers. The mannequin poured two glasses and I
sampled mine. �Maybe if I had someone else from my crew to bitch about it all
with, I wouldnłt feel so bad. I know you said we shouldnłt wake Suzy and Ray,
but that was before a one-day stopover turned into a week."

Greta shrugged. �If you want to wake them, no onełs going to
stop you. But donłt think about ship business now. Letłs not spoil a perfect
evening."

I looked up at the stars. It was heightened, with the mad
shimmering intensity of a Van Gogh nightscape. It made one feel drunk and
ecstatic just to look at it. �What could possibly spoil it?" I asked.

What happened is that I drank too much wine and ended up
sleeping with Greta. Iłm not sure how much of a part the wine played in it for
her. If her relationship with Marcel was in as much trouble as shełd made out,
then obviously she had less to lose than I did. Yes, that made it all right,
didnłt it? She the seductress, her own marriage a wreck, me the hapless victim.
Iłd lapsed, yes, but it wasnłt really my fault. Iłd been alone, far from home,
emotionally fragile, and she had exploited me. She had softened me up with a
romantic meal, her trap already sprung.

Except all that was self-justifying bullshit, wasnłt it? If
my own marriage was in such great shape, why had I failed to mention Greta when
I called home? At the time, Iłd justified that omission as an act of kindness
toward my wife. Ka-terina didnłt know that Greta and I had ever been a couple.
But why worry Katerina by mentioning another woman, even if I pretended that wełd
never met before?

ExceptnowI could see that Iłd failed to mention Greta for
another reason entirely. Because in the back of my mind, even then, there had
been the possibility that we might end up sleeping together.

I was already covering myself when I called Katerina.
Already making sure there wouldnłt be any awkward questions when I got home. As
if I not only knew what was going to happen but secretly yearned for it.

The only problem was that Greta had something else in mind.

�Thom," Greta said, nudging me toward wakefulness. She was
lying naked next to me, leaning on one elbow, with the sheets crumpled down
around her hips. The light in her room turned her into an abstraction of milky
blue curves and deep violet shadows. With one black-nailed finger she traced a
line down my chest and said: �Therełs something you need to know."

�What?" I asked.

�I lied. Kolding lied. We all lied."

I was too drowsy for her words to have much more than a vaguely
troubling effect. All I could say, again, was: �What?"

�Youłre not in Saumlaki Station. Youłre not in Schedar sector."

I started waking up properly. �Say that again."

�The routing error was more severe than you were led to believe.
It took you far beyond the Local Bubble."

I groped for anger, even resentment, but all I felt was a
dizzying sensation of falling. �How far out?"

�Farther than you thought possible."

The next question was obvious.

�Beyond the Rift?"

�Yes," she said, with the faintest of smiles, as if humoring
a game whose rules and objectives she found ultimately demeaning. �Beyond the
Aquila Rift. A long, long way beyond it."

�I need to know, Greta."

She pushed herself from the bed, reached for a gown. �Then
get dressed. Iłll show you."

I followed Greta in a daze.

She took me to the dome again. It was dark, just as it had
been the night before, with only the lamp-lit tables to act as beacons. I
supposed that the illumination throughout Saumlaki Station (or wherever this
was) was at the whim of its occupants and didnłt necessarily have to follow any
recognizable diurnal cycle. Nonetheless, it was still unsettling to find it
changed so arbitrarily. Even if Greta had the authority to turn out the lights
when she wanted to, didnłt anyone else object?

But I didnłt see anyone else to object. There was no one
else around; only a glass mannequin standing to attention with a napkin over
one arm.

She sat us at a table. �Do you want a drink, Thorn?"

�No, thanks. For some reason Iłm not quite in the mood."

She touched my wrist. �Donłt hate me for lying to you. It
was done out of kindness. I couldnłt break the truth to you in one go."

Sharply I withdrew my hand. �Shouldnłt I be the judge of
that? So what is the truth, exactly?"

�Itłs not good, Thorn."

�Tell me, then Iłll decide."

I didnłt see her do anything, but suddenly the dome was
filled with stars again, just as it had been the night before.

The view lurched, zooming outward. Stars flowed by from all
sides, like white sleet. Nebulae ghosted past in spectral wisps. The sense of
motion was so compelling that I found myself gripping the table, seized by
vertigo.

�Easy, Thom," Greta whispered.

The view lurched, swerved, contracted. A solid wall of gas
slammed past. Now, suddenly, I had the sense that we were outside
somethingthat we had punched beyond some containing sphere, defined only in
vague arcs and knots of curdled gas, where the interstellar gas density
increased sharply.

Of course. It was obvious. We were beyond the Local Bubble.

And we were still receding. I watched the Bubble itself contract,
becoming just one member in the larger froth of voids. Instead of individual
stars, I saw only smudges and motes, aggregations of hundreds of thousands of
suns. It was like pulling back from a close-up view of a forest. I could still
see clearings, but the individual trees had vanished into an amorphous mass.

We kept pulling back. Then the expansion slowed and froze. I
could still make out the Local Bubble, but only because I had been
concentrating on it all the way out. Otherwise, there was nothing to
distinguish it from the dozens of surrounding voids.

�Is that how far out wełve come?" I asked.

Greta shook her head. �Let me show you something."

Again, she did nothing that I was aware of. But the Bubble

I had been looking at was suddenly filled with a skein of
red lines, like a childłs scribble.

�Aperture connections," I said.

As shocked as I was by the fact that she had lied to meand
as fearful as I was about what the truth might holdI couldnłt turn off the
professional part of me, the part that took pride in recognizing such things.

Greta nodded. �Those are the main commerce routes, the
well-mapped connections between large colonies and major trading hubs. Now Iłll
add all mapped connections, including those that have only ever been traversed
by accident."

The scribble did not change dramatically. It gained a few
more wild loops and hairpins, including one that reached beyond the wall of the
Bubble to touch the sunward end of the Aquila Rift. One or two other additions
pierced the wall in different directions, but none of them reached as far as
the Rift.

�Where are we?"

�Wełre at one end of one of those connections. You canłt see
it because itłs pointing directly toward you." She smiled slightly. �I needed
to establish the scale that wełre dealing with. How wide is the Local Bubble,
Thorn? Four hundred light-years, give or take?"

My patience was wearing thin. But I was still curious.

�About right."

�And while I know that aperture travel times vary from point
to point, with factors depending on network topology and syntax optimization,
isnłt it the case that the average speed is about one thousand times faster
than light?"

�Give or take."

�So a journey from one side of the Bubble might takewhat,
half a year? Say five or six months? A year to the Aquila Rift?"

�You know that already, Greta. We both know it."

�All right. Then consider this." And the view contracted
again, the Bubble dwindling, a succession of overlaying structures concealing
it, darkness coming into view on either side, and then the familiar spiral
swirl of the Milky Way galaxy looming large.

Hundreds of billions of stars, packed together into foaming
white lanes of sea spume.

�This is the view," Greta said. �Enhanced of course,
brightened and filtered for human consumptionbut if you had eyes with
near-perfect quantum efficiency, and if they happened to be about a meter wide,
this is more or less what youłd see if you stepped outside the station."

�I donłt believe you."

What I meant was I didnłt want to believe her.

�Get used to it, Thorn. Youłre a long way out. The stationłs
orbiting a brown dwarf star in the Large Magellanic Cloud. Youłre one hundred
and fifty thousand light-years from home."

�No," I said, my voice little more than a moan of abject,
childlike denial.

�You felt as though youłd spent a long time in the tank. You
were dead right. Subjective time? I donłt know. Years, easily. Maybe a decade.
But objective timethe time that passed back homeis a lot clearer. It took
Blue Goose one hundred and fifty years to reach us. Even if you turned back
now, youłd have been away for three hundred years, Thorn."

�Katerina," I said, her name like an invocation.

�Katerinałs dead," Greta told me. �Shełs already been dead a
century."

How do you adjust to something like that? The answer is that
you canłt count on adjusting to it at all. Not everyone does. Greta told me
that she had seen just about every possible reaction in the spectrum, and the
one thing she had learned was that it was next to impossible to predict how a
given individual would take the news. She had seen people adjust to the
revelation with little more than a world-weary shrug, as if this were merely
the latest in a line of galling surprises life had thrown at them, no worse in
its way than illness or bereavement or any number of personal setbacks. She had
seen others walk away and kill themselves half an hour later.

But the majority, she said, did eventually come to some kind
of accommodation with the truth, however faltering and painful the process.

�Trust me, Thom," she said. �I know you now. I know you have
the emotional strength to get through this. I know you can learn to live with
it."

�Why didnłt you tell me straight away, as soon as I came out
of the tank?"

�Because I didnłt know if you were going to be able to take
it."

�You waited until after you knew I had a wife."

�No," Greta said. �I waited until after wełd made love. Because
then I knew Katerina couldnłt mean that much to you."

�Fuck you."

�Fuck me? Yes, you did. Thatłs the point."

I wanted to strike out against her. But what I was angry at
was not her insinuation but the cold-hearted truth of it. She was right, and I
knew it. I just didnłt want to deal with that, any more than I wanted to deal with
the here and now.

I waited for the anger to subside.

�You say wełre not the first?" I said.

�No. We were the first, I supposethe ship I came in.
Luckily it was well equipped. After the routing error, we had enough supplies
to set up a self-sustaining station on the nearest rock. We knew there was no
going back, but at least we could make some kind of life for ourselves here."

�And after that?"

�We had enough to do just keeping ourselves alive, the first
few years. But then another ship came through the aperture. Damaged, drifting,
much like Blue Goose. We hauled her in, warmed her crew, broke the news to
them."

�Howłd they take it?"

�About as well as youłd expect." Greta laughed hollowly to
herself. �A couple of them went mad. Another killed herself. But at least a
dozen of them are still here. In all honesty, it was good for us that another
ship came through. Not just because they had supplies we could use, but because
it helped us to help them. Took our minds off our own self-pity. It made us
realize how far wełd come and how much help these newcomers needed to make the
same transition. That wasnłt the last ship, either. Wełve gone through the same
process with eight or nine others, since then." Greta looked at me, her head
cocked against her hand. �Therełs a thought for you, Thom."

�There is?"

She nodded. �Itłs difficult for you now, I know. And itłll
be difficult for you for some time to come. But it can help to have someone
else to care about. It can smooth the transition."

�Like who?" I asked.

�Like one of your other crew members," Greta said. �You
could try waking one of them, now."

Gretałs with me when I pull Suzy out of the surge tank.

�Why her?" Greta asks.

�Because I want her out first," I say, wondering if Gretałs
jealous. I donłt blame her. Suzyłs beautiful, but shełs also smart. There isnłt
a better syntax runner in Ashanti Industrial.

�What happened?" Suzy asks, whenłs she over the groggi-ness.
�Did we make it back?"

I ask her to tell me the last thing she remembered.

�Customs," Suzy says. �Those pricks on Arkangel."

�And after that? Anything else? The runes? Do you remember
casting them?"

�No," she says, then picks up something in my voice. The
fact that I might not be telling the truth, or telling her all she needs to
know. �Thom. Iłll ask you again. Did we make it back?"

A minute later we ęre putting Suzy back into the tank.

It hasn ęt worked first time. Maybe next try.

But it kept not working with Suzy. She was always cleverer
and quicker than me; she always had been. As soon as she came out of the tank,
she knew that wełd come a lot farther than Schedar sector. She was always ahead
of my lies and excuses.

�It was different when it happened to me," I told Greta,
when we were lying next to each other again, days later, with Suzy still in the
tank. �I had all the nagging doubts she has, I think. But as soon as I saw you
standing there, I forgot all about that stuff."

Greta nodded. Her hair fell across her face in dishevelled,
sleep-matted curtains. She had a strand of it between her lips.

�It helped, seeing a friendly face?"

�Took my mind off the problem, thatłs for sure."

�Youłll get there in the end," she said. �Anyway, from Suzyłs
point of view, arenłt you a friendly face as well?"

�Maybe," I said. �But shełd been expecting me. You were the
last person in the world I expected to see standing there."

Greta touched her knuckle against the side of my face. Her
smooth skin slid against stubble. �Itłs getting easier for you, isnłt it?"

�I donłt know," I said.

�Youłre a strong man, Thom. I knew youłd come through this."

�I havenłt come through it yet," I said. I felt like a
tightrope walker halfway across Niagara Falls. It was a miracle Iłd made it as
far as I had. But that didnłt mean I was home and dry.

Still, Greta was right. There was hope. Iłd felt no crushing
spasms of grief over Katerinałs death, or enforced absence, or however you
wanted to put it. All I felt was a bittersweet regret, the way one might feel
about a broken heirloom or long-lost pet. I felt no animosity toward Katerina,
and I was sorry that I would never see her again. But I was sorry about not
seeing a lot of things. Maybe it would become worse in the days ahead. Maybe I
was just postponing a breakdown.

I didnłt think so.

In the meantime, I continued trying to find a way to deal
with Suzy. She had become a puzzle that I couldnłt leave unsolved. I could have
just woken her up and let her deal with the news as best as she could, but this
seemed cruel and unsatisfactory. Greta had broken it to me gently, giving me
the time to settle into my new surroundings and take that necessary step away
from Katerina. When she finally broke the news, as shocking as it was, it didnłt
shatter me. Iłd already been primed for it, the sting taken out of the
surprise. Sleeping with Greta obviously helped. I couldnłt offer Suzy the same
solace, but I was sure that there was a way for us to coax Suzy to the same
state of near-acceptance.

Time after time we woke her and tried a different approach.
Greta said there was a window of a few minutes before the events she was
experiencing began to transfer into long-term memory. If we knocked her out,
the buffer of memories in short term storage was wiped before it ever crossed
the hippocampus into long-term recall. Within that window, we could wake her up
as many times as we liked, trying endless permutations of the revival scenario.

At least that was what Greta told me.

�We canłt keep doing this indefinitely," I said.

�Why not?"

�Isnłt she going to remember somethingl"

Greta shrugged. �Maybe. But I doubt that shełll attach any
significance to those memories. Havenłt you ever had vague feelings of deja vu
coming out of the surge tank?"

�Sometimes," I admitted.

�Then donłt sweat about it. Shełll be all right. I promise
you."

�Perhaps we should just keep her awake, after all."

�That will be cruel."

�Itłs cruel to keep waking her up and shutting her down,
like a toy doll."

There was a catch in her voice when she answered me.

�Keep at it, Thorn. Iłm sure youłre close to finding a way
in the end. Itłs helping you, focusing on Suzy. I always knew it would."

I started to say something, but Greta pressed a finger to my
lips.

Greta was right about Suzy. The challenge helped me, taking
my mind off my own predicament. I remembered what Greta had said about dealing
with other crews in the same situation, before Blue Goose put in. Clearly she
had learned many psychological tricks: gambits and shortcuts to assist the
transition to mental well-being. I felt slight resentment at being manipulated
so effectively. But at the same time I couldnłt deny that worrying about
another human being had helped me with my own adjustment. When, days later, I
stepped back from the immediate problem of Suzy, I realized that something was
different. I didnłt feel far from home. I felt, in an odd way, privileged. Iłd
come further than almost anyone in history. I was still alive, and there were
still people around to provide love and partnership and a web of social
relations. Not just Greta, but all the other unlucky souls who had ended up at
the station.

If anything, there appeared more of them than when I had
first arrived. The corridorssparsely populated at firstwere increasingly
busy, and when we ate under the domeunder the Milky Waywe were not the only
diners. I studied their lamp-lit faces, comforted by their vague familiarity,
wondering what kinds of stories they had to tell, where theyłd come from home,
who they had left behind, how they had adjusted to life here. There was time
enough to get to know them all. And the place would never become boring, for at
any timeas Greta had intimatedwe could always expect another lost ship to
drop through the aperture. Tragedy for the crew, but fresh challengers, fresh
faces, fresh news from home, for us.

All in all, it wasnłt really so bad.

Then it clicked.

It was the man cleaning out the fish that did it, in the
lobby of the hotel. It wasnłt just the familiarity of the process, but the man
himself.

Iłd seen him before. Another pond full of diseased carp.
Another hotel.

Then I remembered Koldingłs bad teeth, and recalled how theyłd
reminded me of another man Iłd met long before. Except it wasnłt another man at
all. Different name, different context, but everything else the same. And when
I looked at the other diners, really looked at them, there was no one I couldnłt
swear I hadnłt seen before. No single face that hit me with the force of utter
unfamiliarity.

Which left Greta.

I said to her, over wine, under the Milky Way: �Nothing here
is real, is it?"

She looked at me with infinite sadness and shook her head.

�What about Suzy?" I asked her.

�Suzyłs dead. Ray is dead. They died in their surge tanks."

�How? Why them, and not me?"

�Something about particles of paint blocking intake filters.
Not enough to make a difference over short distances, but enough to kill them
on the trip out here."

I think some part of me had always suspected. It felt less
like shock than brutal disappointment.

�But Suzy seemed so real," I said. �Even the way she had
doubts about how long shełd been in the tank ... even the way she remembered
previous attempts to wake her."

The glass mannequin approached our table. Greta waved him
away.

�I made her convincing, the way she would have acted."

�You made her?"

�Youłre not really awake, Thorn. Youłre being fed data. This
entire station is being simulated."

I sipped my wine. I expected it to taste suddenly thin and
synthetic, but it still tasted like pretty good wine.

�Then Iłm dead as well?"

�No. Youłre alive. Still in your surge tank. But I havenłt
brought you to full consciousness yet."

�All right. The truth this time. I can take it. How much is
real? Does the station exist? Are we really as far out as you said?"

�Yes," she said. �The station exists, just as I said it
does. It just looks ... different. And it is in the Large Magellanic Cloud, and
it is orbiting a brown dwarf star."

�Can you show me the station as it is?"

�I could. But I donłt think youłre ready for it. I think youłd
find it difficult to adjust."

I couldnłt help laughing. �Even after what Iłve already adjusted
to?"

�Youłve only made half the journey, Thom."

�But you made it."

�I did, Thom. But for me it was different." Greta smiled.

�For me, everything was different."

Then she made the light show change again. None of the other
diners appeared to notice as we began to zoom in toward the Milky Way, crashing
toward the spiral, ramming through shoals of outlying stars and gas clouds. The
familiar landscape of the Local Bubble loomed large.

The image froze, the Bubble one among many such structures.

Again it filled with the violent red scribble of the
aperture network. But now the network wasnłt the only one. It was merely one
ball of red yarn among many, spaced out across tens of thousands of
light-years. None of the scribbles touched each other, yetin the way they were
shaped, in the way they almost abutted against each otherit was possible to
imagine that they had once been connected. They were like the shapes of
continents on a world with tectonic drift.

�It used to span the galaxy," Greta said. �Then something happened.
Something catastrophic, which I still donłt understand. A shattering, into
vastly smaller domains. Typically a few hundred light-years across."

�Who made it?"

�I donłt know. No one knows. They probably arenłt around
anymore. Maybe that was why it shattered, out of neglect."

�But we found it," I said. �The part of it near us still
worked."

�All the disconnected elements still function," Greta said. �You
canłt cross from domain to domain, but otherwise the apertures work as they
were designed. Barring, of course, the occasional routing error."

�All right," I said. �If you canłt cross from domain to
domain, how did Blue Goose get this far out? Wełve come a lot farther than a
few hundred light-years."

�Youłre right. But then such a long-distance connection
might have been engineered differently from the others. It appears that the
links to the Magellanic Clouds were more resilient. When the domains shattered
from each other, the connections reaching beyond the galaxy remained intact."

�In which case you can cross from domain to domain," I said.
�But you have to come all the way out here first."

�The trouble is, not many want to continue the journey at
this point. No one comes here deliberately, Thorn."

�I still donłt get it. What does it matter to me if there
are other domains? Those regions of the galaxy are thousands of light-years
from Earth, and without the apertures wełd have no way of reaching them. They
donłt matter. Therełs no one there to use them."

Gretałs smile was coquettish, knowing.

�What makes you so certain?"

�Because if there were, wouldnłt there be alien ships
popping out of the aperture here? Youłve told me Blue Goose wasnłt the first
through. But our domainthe one in the Local Bubblemust be outnumbered
hundreds to one by all the others. If there are alien cultures out there, each
stumbling on their own local domain, why havenłt any of them ever come through
the aperture, the way we did?"

Again that smile. But this time it chilled my blood.

�What makes you think they havenłt, Thom?"

I reached out and took her hand, the way she had taken mine.
I took it without force, without malice, but with the assurance that this time
I really, sincerely meant what I was about to say.

Her fingers tightened around mine.

�Show me," I said. �I want to see things as they really are.
Not just the station. You as well."

Because by then Iłd realized. Greta hadnłt just lied to me
about Suzy and Ray. Shełd lied to me about the Blue Goose as well. Because we
were not the latest human ship to come through.

We were the first.

�You want to see it?" she asked.

�Yes. All of it."

�You wonłt like it."

�Iłll be the judge of that."

�All right, Thom. But understand this. Iłve been here
before. Iłve done this a million times. I care for all the lost souls. And I
know how it works. You wonłt be able to take the raw reality of whatłs happened
to you. Youłll shrivel away from it. Youłll go mad, unless I substitute a
calming fiction, a happy ending."

�Why tell me that now?"

�Because you donłt have to see it. You can stop now, where
you are, with an idea of the truth. An inkling. But you donłt have to open your
eyes."

�Do it," I said.

Greta shrugged. She poured herself another measure of wine,
then made sure my own glass was charged.

�You asked for it," she said.

We were still holding hands, two lovers sharing an intimacy.
Then everything changed.

It was just a flash, just a glimpse. Like the view of an
unfamiliar room if you turn the lights on for an instant. Shapes and forms,
relationships between things. I saw caverns, wormed-out and linked, and things
moving through those caverns, bustling along with the frantic industry of moles
or termites. The things were seldom alike, even in the most superficial sense.
Some moved via propulsive waves of multiple clawed limbs. Some wriggled, smooth
plaques of carapace grinding against the glassy rock of the tunnels.

The things moved between caves in which lay the hulks of
ships, almost all too strange to describe.

And somewhere distant, somewhere near the heart of the rock,
in a matriarchal chamber all of its own, something drummed out messages to its
companions and helpers, stiffly articulated antlerlike forelimbs beating
against stretched tympana of finely veined skin, something that had been
waiting here for eternities, something that wanted nothing more than to care
for the souls of the lost.

Katerinałs with Suzy when they pull me out of the surge
tank.

Itłs badone of the worst revivals Iłve ever gone through. I
feel as if every vein in my body has been filled with finely powdered glass.
For a moment, a long moment, even the idea of breathing seems insurmountably
difficult, too hard, too painful even to contemplate.

But it passes, as it always passes.

After a while I can not only breathe, I can move and talk.

�Where ..."

�Easy, Skip," Suzy says. She leans over the tank and starts
unplugging me. I canłt help but smile. Suzyłs smartthere isnłt a better syntax
runner in Ashanti Industrialbut shełs also beautiful. Itłs like being nursed
by an angel.

I wonder if Katerinałs jealous.

�Where are we?" I try again. �Feels like I was in that thing
for an eternity. Did something go wrong?"

�Minor routing error," Suzy says. �We took some damage and
they decided to wake me first. But donłt sweat about it. At least wełre in one
piece."

Routing errors. You hear about them, but you hope theyłre
never going to happen to you.

�What kind of delay?"

�Forty days. Sorry, Thorn. Bang goes our bonus."

In anger, I hammer the side of the surge tank. But Kate-rina
steps toward me and places a calming hand on my shoulder.

�Itłs all right," she says. �Youłre home and dry. Thatłs all
that matters."

I look at her and for a moment remember someone else, someone
I havenłt thought about in years. I almost remember her name, and then the
moment passes.

I nod. �Home and dry."

The Big Hello!

Welcome aboard! If you are in receipt of this message (and
if youłve succeeded in understanding it, of course) then youłve already passed
the hardest test! Youłve attained a basic competence in physics and
engineering, coupled with enough of an understanding of the universe you live
in, to intercept and decode signals from the Galactic Information Network!

Congratulations! This is already more than most cultures
achieve, so youłre already well ahead of the pack! Give yourselves a pat on ...
whatever it is you guys pat yourselves on!

The next step, should you choose to take it, is to
participate in the Galactic Information Network by replying to this message! Itłs
easyall you have to do is generate a modulated gravity wave signal with a
source strength of around four billion billion Megawatts! That may sound a lot,
but it isnłt reallyitłs only one percent of the energy output of the G-type
star your planet orbits! Go onyou wonłt miss it!

But wait! Before you launch into a reply (and wełre really
keen to hear from you!) there are a few things you might want to keep in mind!
Call them rules, call them guidelines, call them Good Old Common Sensewe donłt
care, as long as you obey them without question!

Only kidding! But there are still a few little things you
might want to bear in mind, if only to avoid wasting expensive Galactic
bandwidth! To assist in this, wełve supplied a few tips that you may find
useful!

Firstly, most new cultures want to know a bit about the
wider Galactic Communityand who can blame them! Itłs a big old Galaxy out
there and youłve just joined the party! Right now, though, all you need to know
is that you are one of the more junior members of the inhabited Galaxy, and
that there are a few tests you have to pass before you can ascend to the second
level of sentience! Donłt be disheartened, thoughyoułll get there in the end
if you stick at it! All it takes is intelligence, determination, and maybe a
short extension on the Main Sequence lifetime of your star! In the meantime, wełve
prepared a Primer Package to get you started! Therełs a lot of information in
the Primer Packagefar too much to squeeze into a gravitational wave signal! So
what wełve done is pre-install the Primer Package on the metallic hydrogen
ocean of your systemłs largest Gas Giant planet!

Thatłs rightitłs already there!

And if youłd already found the Primer Package and were wondering
what that meter-wide grey ball was actually forwell, now you know! Just be
careful opening itor did you find that out already?! Well, it was a nice Gas
Giant while it lasted!

Only kidding! But one of the things youłll notice about the
Primer Package is that it doesnłt say anything about faster than light travel!
A lot of new species are really keen to learn about this, for some inexplicable
reason! All we can say is that by the time youłve ascended to the second level
of sentience, you will find the question of ęfaster than light travelł about as
interesting as ęfaster methods to cure animal skinsł, or ęfaster ways to
ferment mammalian lactic fluid Trust us! We were the same, once upon a time!
(And no, we didnłt believe it either!)

All the same, the Primer Package should answer a lot of your
basic questionsand more! Most likely, though, youłll only end up with more
questions that you want answering! We donłt mindthatłs what wełre here for!
But before you go firing off a bunch of random queries, have a quick glance at
the following! Itłll save your timeand ours!

First, make sure your query isnłt covered by the Primer Package!
It sounds obviousand it isbut youłd be amazed how many cultures donłt seem to
have read their Primer Package all the way through! Remember that the Primer
Package is highly nested, and that some content layers may not be accessible
given your current spatio/temporal perception horizon! Just be patient!

Secondly, there are a few topics covered by the Primer
Package thatwhile they may seem to lead to interesting follow-up questions to
a level one culture, are a tiny bit passe where wełre concerned! Frankly, wełre
just a little fed up with going over the same ground over and over again!

Some, but not all, of these topics include questions related
to Supreme Beings, the Birth, Life, Death and Afterlife of the Universe, the
Possibility of Other Universes, the official explanation for the Great Void at
z=10, and the unscheduled downtime of the Orion Arm Router during Galactic
rotation cycle 15, and its possible implication in the Ninth Mass Extinction
(and the ensuing cover-up)!

If you could steer away from these topics, guys, that would
be great!

Also, please donłt reply to any transmissions originating
from the M13 globular cluster in Herculesand never, ever send them unsolicited
messages! Especially not radiothey hate radio! Also beware of messages
claiming to originate from ascended level 3 cultures, especially those which
offer suspiciously cheap Dyson conversions of your solar system! Believe usthey
are too good to be true! Youłll also want to keep away from any entities posing
as the legal heirs of the capital assets of the fallen level 2 culture on the
edge of the Cygnus Loopand you definitely donłt want to give them the
coordinates of your system!

Oh, and before we forgetnever, ever ask what happened to
the humans! Unless you want to find out!

PSWhen appending content to incoming messages, please do
not top-post.

Diamond Dogs

2001

One

I met Childe in the Monument to the Eighty.

It was one of those days when I had the place largely to
myself, able to walk from aisle to aisle without seeing another visitor; only
my footsteps disturbed the air of funereal silence and stillness.

I was visiting my parentsł shrine. It was a modest affair: a
smooth wedge of obsidian shaped like a metronome, undecorated save for two
cameo portraits set in elliptical borders. The sole moving part was a black
blade which was attached near the base of the shrine, ticking back and forth
with magisterial slowness. Mechanisms buried inside the shrine ensured that it
was winding down, destined to count out days and then years with each tick.
Eventually it would require careful measurement to detect its movement.

I was watching the blade when a voice disturbed me.

�Visiting the dead again, Richard?"

�Whołs there?" I said, looking around, faintly recognizing
the speaker but not immediately able to place him.

�Just another ghost."

Various possibilities flashed through my mind as I listened
to the manłs deep and taunting voicea kidnapping, an assassinationbefore I
stopped flattering myself that I was worthy of such attention.

Then the man emerged from between two shrines a little way
down from the metronome.

�My God," I said.

�Now do you recognize me?"

He smiled and stepped closer: as tall and imposing as I remembered.
He had lost the devilłs horns since our last meetingthey had only ever been a
bio-engineered affectationbut there was still something satanic about his
appearance, an effect not lessened by the small and slightly pointed goatee he
had cultivated in the meantime.

Dust swirled around him as he walked towards me, suggesting
that he was not a projection.

�I thought you were dead, Roland."

�No, Richard," he said, stepping close enough to shake my
hand. �But that was most certainly the effect I desired to achieve."

�Why?" I said.

�Long story."

�Start at the beginning, then."

Roland Childe placed a hand on the smooth side of my parentsł
shrine. �Not quite your style, Iłd have thought?"

�It was all I could do to argue against something even more
ostentatious and morbid. But donłt change the subject. What happened to you?"

He removed his hand, leaving a faint damp imprint. �I faked
my own death. The Eighty was the perfect cover. The fact that it all went so
horrendously wrong was even better. I couldnłt have planned it like that if Iłd
tried."

No arguing with that, I thought. It had gone horrendously
wrong.

More than a century and a half ago, a clique of researchers
led by Calvin Sylveste had resurrected the old idea of copying the essence of a
living human being into a computer-generated simulation. The procedurethen in
its infancyhad the slight drawback that it killed the subject. But there had
still been volunteers, and my parents had been amongst the first to sign up and
support Calvinłs work. They had offered him political protection when the
powerful Mixmaster lobby opposed the project, and they had been amongst the
first to be scanned.

Less than fourteen months later, their simulations had also
been amongst the first to crash.

None could ever be restarted. Most of the remaining Eighty
had succumbed, and now only a handful remained unaffected.

�You must hate Calvin for what he did," Childe said, still
with that taunting quality in his voice.

�Would it surprise you if I said I didnłt?"

�Then why did you set yourself so vocally against his family
after the tragedy?"

�Because I felt justice still needed to be served." I turned
from the shrine and started walking away, curious as to whether Childe would
follow me.

�Fair enough," he said. �But that opposition cost you
dearly, didnłt it?"

I bridled, halting next to what appeared a highly realistic
sculpture but was almost certainly an embalmed corpse.

�Meaning what?"

�The Resurgam expedition, of course, which just happened to
be bankrolled by House Sylveste. By rights, you should have been on it. You
were Richard Swift, for heavenłs sake. Youłd spent the better part of your life
thinking about possible modes of alien sentience. There should have been a
place for you on that ship, and you damned well knew it."

�It wasnłt that simple," I said, resuming my walk. �There
were a limited number of slots available and they needed practical types
firstbiologists, geologists, that kind of thing. By the time theyłd filled the
most essential slots, there simply wasnłt any room for abstract dreamers like
myself."

�And the fact that youłd pissed off House Sylveste had
nothing whatsoever to do with it? Come off it, Richard."

We descended a series of steps down into the lower level of
the Monument. The atriumłs ceiling was a cloudy mass of jagged sculptures:
interlocked metal birds. A party of visitors was arriving, attended by servitors
and a swarm of bright, marble-sized float-cams. Childe breezed through the
group, drawing annoyed frowns but no actual recognition, although one or two of
the people in the party were vague acquaintances of mine.

�What is this about?" I asked, once we were outside.

�Concern for an old friend. Iłve had my tabs on you, and it
was pretty obvious that not being selected for that expedition was a crushing
disappointment. Youłd thrown your life into contemplation of the alien. One
marriage down the drain because of your self-absorption. What was her name
again?"

Iłd had her memory buried so deeply that it took a real
effort of will to recall any exact details about my marriage.

�Celestine. I think."

�Since then youłve had a few relationships, but nothing
lasting more than a decade. A decadełs a mere fling in this town, Richard."

�My private lifełs my own business," I responded sullenly. �Hey.
Wherełs my volantor? I parked it here."

�I sent it away. Wełll take mine instead."

Where my volantor had been was a larger, blood-red model. It
was as baroquely ornamented as a funeral barge. At a gesture from Childe it
clammed open, revealing a plush gold interior with four seats, one of which was
occupied by a dark, slouched figure.

�Whatłs going on, Roland?"

�Iłve found something. Something astonishing that I want you
to be a part of; a challenge that makes every game you and I ever played in our
youth pale in comparison."

�A challenge?"

�The ultimate one, I think."

He had pricked my curiosity, but I hoped it was not too obvious.
�The cityłs vigilant. Itłll be a matter of public record that I came to the
Monument, and wełll have been recorded together by those float-cams."

�Exactly," Childe said, nodding enthusiastically. �So you
risk nothing by getting in the volantor."

�And should I at any point weary of your company?"

�You have my word that Iłll let you leave."

I decided to play along with him for the time being. Childe
and I took the volantorłs front pair of seats. Once ensconced, I turned around
to acquaint myself with the other passenger, and then flinched as I saw him
properly.

He wore a high-necked leather coat which concealed much of
the lower half of his face. The upper part was shadowed under the generous rim
of a Homburg, tipped down to shade his brow. Yet what remained visible was
sufficient to shock me. There was only a blandly handsome silver mask; sculpted
into an expression of quiet serenity. The eyes were blank silver surfaces, what
I could see of his mouth a thin, slightly smiling slot.

�Doctor Trintignant," I said.

He reached forward with a gloved hand, allowing me to shake
it as one would the hand of a woman. Beneath the black velvet of the glove I
felt armatures of hard metal. Metal that could crush diamond.

�The pleasure is entirely mine," he said.

Airborne, the volantorłs baroque ornamentation melted away
to mirror-smoothness. Childe pushed ivory-handled control sticks forward,
gaining altitude and speed. We seemed to be moving faster than the city
ordinances allowed, avoiding the usual traffic corridors. I thought of the way
he had followed me, researched my past and had my own volantor desert me. It
would also have taken considerable resourcefulness to locate the reclusive
Trintignant and persuade him to emerge from hiding.

Clearly Childełs influence in the city exceeded my own, even
though he had been absent for so long.

�The old place hasnłt changed much," Childe said, swooping
us through a dense conglomeration of golden buildings, as extravagantly tiered
as the dream pagodas of a fever-racked Emperor.

�Then youłve really been away? When you told me youłd faked
your death, I wondered if youłd just gone into hiding."

He answered with a trace of hesitation, �Iłve been away, but
not as far as youłd think. A family matter came up that was best dealt with
confidentially, and I really couldnłt be bothered explaining to everyone why I
needed some peace and quiet on my own."

�And faking your death was the best way to go about it?"

�Like I said, I couldnłt have planned the Eighty if Iłd
tried. I had to bribe a lot of minor players in the project, of course, and Iłll
spare you the details of how we provided a corpse ... but it all worked
swimmingly, didnłt it?"

�I never had any doubts that youłd died along with the rest
of them."

�I didnłt like deceiving my friends. But I couldnłt go to
all that trouble and then ruin my plan with a few indiscretions."

�You were friends, then?" solicited Trintignant.

�Yes, Doctor," Childe said, glancing back at him. �Way back
when Richard and I were rich kidsrelatively rich, anywaywith not enough to
do. Neither of us were interested in the stock market or the social whirl. We
were only interested in games."

�Oh. How charming. What kinds of game, might I ask?"

�Wełd build simulations to test each otherextraordinarily
elaborate worlds filled with subtle dangers and temptations. Mazes and
labyrinths; secret passages; trapdoors; dungeons and dragons. Wełd spend months
inside them, driving each other crazy. Then wełd go away and make them even
harder."

�But in due course you grew apart," the Doctor said. His synthesized
voice had a curious piping quality.

�Yeah," Childe said. �But we never stopped being friends. It
was just that Richard had spent so much time devising increasingly alien
scenarios that hełd become more interested in the implied psychologies behind
the tests. And Iłd become interested only in the playing of the games; not
their construction. Unfortunately Richard was no longer there to provide
challenges for me."

�You were always much better than me at playing them," I
said. �In the end it got too hard to come up with something youłd find
difficult. You knew the way my mind worked too well."

�Hełs convinced that hełs a failure," Childe said, turning
round to smile at the Doctor.

�As are we all," Trintignant answered. �And with some justification,
it must be said. I have never been allowed to pursue my admittedly
controversial interests to their logical ends. You, Mister Swift, were shunned
by those who you felt should have recognized your worth in the field of
speculative alien psychology. And you, Mister Childe, have never discovered a
challenge worthy of your undoubted talents."

�I didnłt think youłd paid me any attention, Doctor."

�Nor had I. I have surmised this much since our meeting."

The volantor dropped below ground level, descending into a
brightly lit commercial plaza lined with shops and boutiques. With insouciant
ease, Childe skimmed us between aerial walkways and then nosed the car into a
dark side-tunnel. He gunned the machine faster, our speed indicated only by the
passing of red lights set into the tunnel sides. Now and then another vehicle
passed us, but once the tunnel had branched and rebranched half a dozen times,
no further traffic appeared. The tunnel lights were gone now and when the
volantorłs headlights grazed the walls they revealed ugly cracks and huge,
scarred absences of cladding. These old sub-surface ducts dated back to the
cityłs earliest days, before the domes were thrown across the crater.

Even if I had recognized the part of the city where we had entered
the tunnel system, I would have been hopelessly lost by now.

�Do you think Childe has brought us together to taunt us
about our lack of respective failures, Doctor?" I asked, beginning to feel
uneasy again despite my earlier attempts at reassurance.

�I would consider that a distinct possibility, were Childe
himself not conspicuously tainted by the same lack of success."

�Then there must be another reason."

�Which Iłll reveal in due course," Childe said. �Just bear
with me, will you? You two arenłt the only ones Iłve gathered together."

Presently we arrived somewhere.

It was a cave in the form of a near-perfect hemisphere, the
great domed roof arching a clear three hundred meters from the floor. We were
obviously well below Yellowstonełs surface now. It was even possible that we
had passed beyond the cityłs crater wall, so that above us lay only poisonous
skies.

But the domed chamber was inhabited.

The roof was studded with an enormous number of lamps,
flooding the interior with synthetic daylight. An island stood in the middle of
the chamber, moated by a ring of uninviting water. A single bone-white bridge
connected the mainland to the island, shaped like a great curved femur. The
island was dominated by a thicket of slender, dark poplars partly concealing a
pale structure situated near its middle.

Childe brought the volantor to a rest near the edge of the
water and invited us to disembark.

�Where are we?" I asked, once I had stepped down.

�Query the city and find out for yourself," Trintignant said.

The result was not what I was expecting. For a moment there
was a shocking absence inside my head, the neural equivalent of a sudden,
unexpected amputation.

The Doctorłs chuckle was an arpeggio played on a pipe organ.
�We have been out of range of city services from the moment we entered his
conveyance."

�You neednłt worry," Childe said. �You are beyond city services,
but only because I value the secrecy of this place. If I imagined itłd have
come as a shock to you, Iłd have told you already."

�Iłd have at least appreciated a warning, Roland," I said.

�Would it have changed your mind about coming here?"

�Conceivably."

The echo of his laughter betrayed the chamberłs peculiar
acoustics. �Then are you at all surprised that I didnłt tell you?"

I turned to Trintignant. �What about you?"

�I confess my use of city services has been as limited as
your own, but for rather different reasons."

�The good Doctor needed to lie low," Childe said. �That
meant he couldnłt participate very actively in city affairs. Not if he didnłt
want to be tracked down and assassinated."

I stamped my feet, beginning to feel cold. �Good. What now?"

�Itłs only a short ride to the house," Childe said, glancing
towards the island.

Now a noise came steadily nearer. It was an antiquated, rumbling
sound, accompanied by a odd, rhythmic sort of drumming, quite unlike any
machine I had experienced. I looked towards the femoral bridge, suspecting as I
did that it was exactly what it looked like: a giant, bio-engineered bone,
carved with a flat roadbed. And something was approaching us over the span: a
dark, complicated and unfamiliar contraption, which at first glance resembled
an iron tarantula.

I felt the back of my neck prickle.

The thing reached the end of the bridge and swerved towards
us. Two mechanical black horses provided the motive power. They were emaciated
black machines with sinewy, piston-driven limbs, venting steam and snorting
from intakes. Malignant red laser-eyes swept over us. The horses were harnessed
to a four-wheeled carriage slightly larger than the volantor, above which was
perched a headless humanoid robot. Skeletal hands gripped iron control cables
which plunged into the backs of the horsesł steel necks.

�Meant to inspire confidence, is it?" I asked.

�Itłs an old family heirloom," Childe said, swinging open a
black door in the side of the carriage. �My uncle Giles made automata.
Unfortunatelyfor reasons wełll come tohe was a bit of a miserable bastard.
But donłt let it put you off."

He helped us aboard, then climbed inside himself, sealed the
door and knocked on the roof. I heard the mechanical horses snort; alloy hooves
hammered the ground impatiently. Then we were moving, curving around and
ascending the gentle arc of the bridge of bone.

�Have you been here during the entire period of your
absence, Mister Childe?" Trintignant asked.

He nodded. �Ever since that family business came up, Iłve allowed
myself the occasional visit back to the cityjust like I did todaybut Iłve
tried to keep such excursions to a minimum."

�Didnłt you have horns the last time we met?" I said.

He rubbed the smooth skin of his scalp where the horns had
been. �Had to have them removed. I couldnłt very well disguise myself
otherwise."

We crossed the bridge and navigated a path between the tall
trees which sheltered the islandłs structure. Childełs carriage pulled up to a
smart stop in front of the building and I was afforded my first unobstructed
view of our destination. It was not one to induce great cheer. The housełs
architecture was haphazard: whatever basic symmetry it might once have had was
lost under a profusion of additions and modifications. The roof was a jumbled
collision of angles and spires, jutting turrets and sinister oubliettes. Not
all of the embellishments had been arranged at strict right angles to their
neighbors, and the style and apparent age of the house varied jarringly from
place to place. Since our arrival in the cave the overhead lights had dimmed,
simulating the onset of dusk, but only a few windows were illuminated, clustered
together in the left-hand wing. The rest of the house had a forebidding aspect,
the paleness of its stone, the irregularity of its construction and the
darkness of its many windows suggesting a pile of skulls.

Almost before we had disembarked from the carriage, a reception
party emerged from the house. It was a troupe of servitorshumanoid household
robots, of the kind anyone would have felt comfortable with in the city
properbut they had been reworked to resemble skeletal ghouls or headless
knights. Their mechanisms had been sabotaged so that they limped and creaked,
and they had all had their voiceboxes disabled.

�Had a lot of time on his hands, your uncle," I said.

�Youłd have loved Giles, Richard. He was a scream."

�Iłll take your word for it, I think."

The servitors escorted us into the central part of the
house, then took us through a maze of chill, dark corridors.

Finally we reached a large room walled in plush red velvet.
A holoclavier sat in one corner, with a book of sheet music spread open above the
projected keyboard. There was a malachite escritoire, a number of well-stocked
bookcases, a single chandelier, three smaller candelabra and two fireplaces of
distinctly gothic appearance, in one of which roared an actual fire. But the
roomłs central feature was a mahogany table, around which three additional
guests were gathered.

�Sorry to keep everyone waiting," Childe said, closing a
pair of sturdy wooden doors behind us. �Now. Introductions."

The others looked at us with no more than mild interest.

The only man amongst them wore an elaborately ornamented
exoskeleton: a baroque support structure of struts, hinged plates, cables and
servo-mechanisms. His face was a skull papered with deathly white skin, shading
to black under his bladelike cheekbones. His eyes were concealed behind
goggles, his hair a spray of stiff black dreadlocks.

Periodically he inhaled from a glass pipe, connected to a
miniature refinery of bubbling apparatus placed before him on the table.

�Allow me to introduce Captain Forqueray," Childe said. �Captainthis
is Richard Swift and ... um, Doctor Trintignant."

�Pleased to meet you," I said, leaning across the table to
shake Forquerayłs hand. His grip felt like the cold clasp of a squid.

�The Captain is an Ultra; the master of the lighthugger Apollyon,
currently in orbit around Yellowstone," Childe added.

Trintignant refrained from approaching him.

�Shy, Doctor?" Forqueray said, his voice simultaneously deep
and flawed, like a cracked bell.

�No, merely cautious. It is a matter of common knowledge
that I have enemies amongst the Ultras."

Trintignant removed his Homburg and patted his crown delicately,
as if smoothing down errant hairs. Silver waves had been sculpted into his
head-mask, so that he resembled a bewigged Regency fop dipped in mercury.

�Youłve enemies everywhere," said Forqueray between gurgling
inhalations. �But I bear you no personal animosity for your atrocities, and I
guarantee that my crew will extend you the same courtesy."

�Very gracious of you," Trintignant said, before shaking the
Ultrałs hand for the minimum time compatible with politeness. �But why should
your crew concern me?"

�Never mind that." It was one of the two women speaking now.
�Who is this guy, and why does everyone hate him?"

�Allow me to introduce Hirz," Childe said, indicating the
woman who had spoken. She was small enough to have been a child, except that
her face was clearly that of an adult woman. She was dressed in austere,
tight-fitting black clothes which only emphasized her diminutive build. �Hirz
isfor want of a better worda mercenary."

�Except I prefer to think of myself as an information
retrieval specialist. I specialize in clandestine infiltration for high-level
corporate clients in the Glitter Bandphysical espionage, some of the time.
Mostly, though, Iłm what used to be called a hacker. Iłm also pretty damned
good at my job." Hirz paused to swig down some wine. �But enough about me. Whołs
the silver dude, and what did Forqueray mean about atrocities?"

�Youłre seriously telling me youłre unaware of Trintignantłs
reputation?" I said.

�Hey, listen. I get myself frozen between assignments. That
means I miss a lot of shit that goes down in Chasm City. Get over it."

I shrugged andwith one eye on the Doctor himselftold Hirz
what I knew about Trintignant. I sketched in his early career as an
experimental cyberneticist, how his reputation for fearless innovation had
eventually brought him to Calvin Sylvestełs attention.

Calvin had recruited Trintignant to his own research team,
but the collaboration had not been a happy one. Trintignantłs desire to find
the ultimate fusion of flesh and machine had become obsessive; evensome
saidperverse. After a scandal involving experimentation on unconsenting
subjects, Trintignant had been forced to pursue his work alone, his methods too
extreme even for Calvin.

So Trintignant had gone to ground, and continued his
gruesome experiments with his only remaining subject.

Himself.

�So letłs see," said the final guest. �Who have we got? An obsessive
and thwarted cyberneticist with a taste for extreme modification. An intrusion
specialist with a talent for breaking into highly protectedand
dangerousenvironments. A man with a starship at his disposal and the crew to
operate it."

Then she looked at Childe, and while her gaze was averted I
admired the fine, faintly familiar profile of her face. Her long hair was the
sheer black of interstellar space, pinned back from her face by a jewelled
clasp which flickered with a constellation of embedded pastel lights. Who was
she? I felt sure we had met once or maybe twice before. Perhaps we had passed
each other amongst the shrines in the Monument to the Eighty, visiting the
dead.

�And Childe," she continued. �A man once known for his love
of intricate challenges, but long assumed dead." Then she turned her piercing
eyes upon me. �And, finally, you."

�I know you, I think" I said, her name on the tip of my tongue.

�Of course you do." Her look, suddenly, was contemptuous. �Iłm
Celestine. You used to be married to me."

All along, Childe had known she was here.

�Do you mind if I ask what this is about?" I said, doing my
best to sound as reasonable as possible, rather than someone on the verge of
losing their temper in polite company.

Celestine withdrew her hand once I had shaken it. �Roland invited
me here, Richard. Just the same way he did you, with the same veiled hints
about having found something."

�But youłre ..."

�Your ex-wife?" She nodded. �Exactly how much do you remember,
Richard? I heard the strangest rumors, you know. That youłd had me deleted from
your long-term memory."

�I had you suppressed, not deleted. Therełs a subtle distinction."

She nodded knowingly. �So I gather."

I looked at the other guests, who were observing us. Even Forqueray
was waiting, the pipe of his apparatus poised an inch from his mouth in
expectation. They were waiting for me to say something; anything.

�Why exactly are you here, Celestine?"

�You donłt remember, do you?"

�Remember what?"

�What it was I used to do, Richard, when we were married."

�I confess I donłt, no."

Childe coughed. �Your wife, Richard, was as fascinated by
the alien as you were. She was one of the cityłs foremost specialists on the
Pattern Jugglers, although shełd be entirely too modest to admit it herself."
He paused, apparently seeking Celestinełs permission to continue. �She visited
them, long before you met, spending several years of her life at the study
station on Spindrift. You swam with the Jugglers, didnłt you, Celestine?"

�Once or twice."

�And allowed them to reshape your mind, transforming its
neural pathways into something deeplyalbeit usually temporarilyalien."

�It wasnłt that big a deal," Celestine said.

�Not if youłd been fortunate enough to have it happen to
you, no. But for someone like Richardwho craved knowledge of the alien with
every fiber of his existenceit would have been anything but mundane." He
turned to me. �Isnłt that true?"

�I admit Iłd have done a great deal to experience communion
with the Jugglers," I said, knowing that it was pointless to deny it. �But it
just wasnłt possible. My family lacked the resources to send me to one of the
Juggler worlds, and the bodies that might ordinarily have funded that kind of
tripthe Sylveste Institute, for instancehad turned their attentions
elsewhere."

�In which case Celestine was deeply fortunate, wouldnłt you
say?"

�I donłt think anyone would deny that," I said. �To
speculate about the shape of alien consciousness is one thing; but to drink it;
to bathe in the full flood of itto know it intimately, like a lover ..." I trailed
off for a moment. �Wait a minute. Shouldnłt you be on Resurgam, Celestine?
There isnłt time for the expedition to have gone there and come back."

She eyed me with raptorial intent before answering, �I never
went."

Childe leant over and refreshed my glass. �She was turned
down at the last minute, Richard. Sylveste had a grudge against anyone whołd
visited the Jugglers; he suddenly decided they were all unstable and couldnłt
be trusted."

I looked at Celestine wonderingly. �Then all this time ...?"

�Iłve been here, in Chasm City. Oh, donłt look so crushed, Richard.
By the time I learned Iłd been turned down, youłd already decided to flush me
out of your past. It was better for both of us this way."

�But the deception ..."

Childe put one hand on my shoulder, calmingly. �There wasnłt
any. She just didnłt make contact again. No lies; no deception; nothing to hold
a grudge about."

I looked at him, angrily. �Then why the hell is she here?"

�Because I happen to have use for someone with the skills
that the Jugglers gave to Celestine."

�Which included?" I said.

�Extreme mathematical prowess."

�And why would that have been useful?"

Childe turned to the Ultra, indicating that the man should remove
his bubbling apparatus.

�Iłm about to show you."

The table housed an antique holo-projection system. Childe
handed out viewers which resembled lorgnette binoculars, and, like so many
myopic opera buffs, we studied the apparitions which floated into existence
above the polished mahogany surface.

Stars: incalculable numbers of themhard white and blood-red
gems, strewn in lacy patterns against deep velvet blue.

Childe narrated:

�The better part of two and a half centuries ago, my uncle
Gileswhose somewhat pessimistic handiwork you have already seenmade a
momentous decision. He embarked on what we in the family referred to as the
Program, and then only in terms of extreme secrecy."

Childe told us that the Program was an attempt at covert
deep space exploration.

Giles had conceived the work, funding it directly from the
familyłs finances. He had done this with such ingenuity that the apparent
wealth of House Childe had never faltered, even as the Program entered its most
expensive phase. Only a few select members of the Childe dynasty had even known
of the Programłs existence, and that number had dwindled as time passed.

The bulk of the money had been paid to the Ultras, who had already
emerged as a powerful faction by that time.

They had built the autonomous robot space probes according
to this unclełs desires, and then launched them towards a variety of target
systems. The Ultras could have delivered his probes to any system within range
of their lighthugger ships, but the whole point of the exercise was to restrict
the knowledge of any possible discoveries to the family alone. So the envoys
crossed space by themselves, at only a fraction of the speed of light, and the
targets they were sent to were all poorly explored systems on the ragged edge
of human space.

The probes decelerated by use of solar sails, picked the
most interesting worlds to explore, and then fell into orbit around them.

Robots were sent down, equipped to survive on the surface
for many decades.

Childe waved his hand across the table. Lines radiated out
from one of the redder suns in the display, which I assumed was Yellowstonełs
star. The lines reached out towards other stars, forming a three-dimensional
scarlet dandelion several dozen light-years wide.

�These machines must have been reasonably intelligent," Celestine
said. �Especially by the standards of the time."

Childe nodded keenly. �Oh, they were. Cunning little
blighters. Subtle and stealthy and diligent. They had to be, to operate so far
from human supervision."

�And I presume they found something?" I said.

�Yes," Childe said testily, like a conjurer whose carefully
scripted patter was being ruined by a persistent heckler. �But not immediately.
Giles didnłt expect it to be immediate, of coursethe envoys would take decades
to reach the closest systems theyłd been assigned to, and therełd still be the
communicational timelag to take into consideration. So my uncle resigned
himself to forty or fifty years of waiting, and that was erring on the
optimistic side." He paused and sipped from his wine. �Too bloody optimistic,
as it happened. Fifty years passed ... then sixty ... but nothing of any
consequence was ever reported back to Yellowstone, at least not in his
lifetime. The envoys did, on occasion, find something interestingbut by then
other human explorers had usually stumbled on the same find. And as the decades
wore on, and the envoys failed to justify their invention, my uncle grew
steadily more maudlin and bitter."

�Iłd never have guessed," Celestine said.

�He died, eventuallybitter and resentful; feeling that the
universe had played some sick cosmic trick on him. He could have lived for
another fifty or sixty years with the right treatments, but I think by then he
knew it would be a waste of time."

�You faked your death a century and a half ago," I said.

�Didnłt you tell me it had something to do with the family
business?"

He nodded in my direction. �That was when my uncle told me
about the Program. I didnłt know anything about it until thenhadnłt heard even
the tiniest hint of a rumor. No one in the family had. By then, of course, the
project was costing us almost nothing, so there wasnłt even a financial drain
to be concealed."

�And since then?"

�I vowed not to make my unclełs mistake. I resolved to sleep
until the machines sent back a report, and then sleep again if the report
turned out to be a false alarm."

�Sleep?" I said.

He clicked his fingers and one entire wall of the room
whisked back to reveal a sterile, machine-filled chamber.

I studied its contents.

There was a reefersleep casket of the kind Forqueray and his
ilk used aboard their ships, attended by numerous complicated hunks of gleaming
green support machinery. By use of such a casket, one might prolong the four
hundred-odd years of a normal human lifespan by many centuries, though
reefersleep was not without its risks.

�I spent a century and a half in that contraption," he said,
�waking every fifteen or twenty years whenever a report trickled in from one of
the envoys. Waking is the worst part. It feels like youłre made of glass; as if
the next movement you makethe next breath you takewill cause you to shatter
into a billion pieces. It always passes, and you always forget it an hour
later, but itłs never easier the next time." He shuddered visibly. �In fact,
sometimes I think it gets harder each time."

�Then your equipment needs servicing," Forqueray said dismissively.
I suspected it was bluff. Ultras often wore a lock of braided hair for every
crossing they had made across interstellar space and survived all the myriad
misfortunes which might befall a ship. But that braid also symbolized every
occasion on which they had been woken from the dead, at the end of the journey.

They felt the pain as fully as Childe did, even if they were
not willing to admit it.

�How long did you spend awake each time?" I asked.

�No more than thirteen hours. That was usually sufficient to
tell if the message was interesting or not. Iłd allow myself one or two hours
to catch up on the news; what was going on in the wider universe. But I had to
be disciplined. If Iłd stayed awake longer, the attraction of returning to city
life would have become overwhelming. That room began to feel like a prison."

�Why?" I asked. �Surely the subjective time must have passed
very quickly?"

�Youłve obviously never spent any time in reefersleep, Richard.
Therełs no consciousness when youłre frozen, grantedbut the transitions to and
from the cold state are like an eternity, crammed with strange dreams."

�But you hoped the rewards would be worth it?"

Childe nodded. �And, indeed, they may well have been. I was
last woken six months ago, and Iłve not returned to the chamber since. Instead,
Iłve spent that time gathering together the resources and the people for a
highly unusual expedition."

Now he made the table change its projection, zooming in on
one particular star.

�I wonłt bore you with catalogue numbers, suffice to say
that this is a system which no one around this tablewith the possible
exception of Forquerayis likely to have heard of. Therełve never been any
human colonies there, and no crewed vessel has ever passed within three light-years
of it. At least, not until recently."

The view zoomed in again, enlarging with dizzying speed.

A planet swelled up to the size of a skull, suspended above
the table.

It was hued entirely in shades of grey and pale rust,
cratered and gouged here and there by impacts and what must have been very
ancient weathering processes. Though there was a suggestion of a wisp of
atmospherea smoky blue halo encircling the planetand though there were
icecaps at either pole, the world looked neither habitable nor inviting.

�Cheerful-looking place, isnłt it?" Childe said. �I call it
Golgotha."

�Nice name," Celestine said.

�But not, unfortunately, a very nice planet." Childe made
the view enlarge again, so that we were skimming the worldłs bleak, apparently
lifeless surface. �Pretty dismal, to be honest. Itłs about the same size as
Yellowstone, receiving about the same amount of sunlight from its star. Doesnłt
have a moon. Surface gravityłs close enough to one gee that you wonłt know the
difference once youłre suited up. A thin carbon dioxide atmosphere, and no sign
that anythingłs ever evolved there. Plenty of radiation hitting the surface,
but thatłs about your only hazard, and one we can easily deal with. Golgothałs
tectonically dead, and there havenłt been any large impacts on her surface for
a few million years."

�Sounds boring," Hirz said.

�And it very probably is, but that isnłt the point. You see,
therełs something on Golgotha."

�What kind of something?" Celestine asked.

�That kind," Childe said.

It came over the horizon.

It was tall and dark, its details indistinct. That first
view of it was like the first glimpse of a cathedralłs spire through morning
fog. It tapered as it rose, constricting to a thin neck before flaring out
again into a bulb-shaped finial, which in turn tapered to a needle-sharp point.

Though it was impossible to say how large the thing was, or
what it was made of, it was very obviously a structure, as opposed to a
peculiar biological or mineral formation. On Grand T�ton, vast numbers of tiny single-celled
organisms conspired to produce the slime towers which were that worldłs most
famous natural feature, and while those towers reached impressive heights and
were often strangely shaped, they were unmistakably the products of unthinking
biological processes rather than conscious design. The structure on Golgotha
was too symmetric for that, and entirely too solitary. If it had been a living
thing, I would have expected to see others like it, with evidence of a
supporting ecology of different organisms.

Even if it were a fossil, millions of years dead, I could
not believe that there would be just one on the whole planet.

No. The thing had most definitely been put there.

�A structure?" I asked Childe.

�Yes. Or a machine. It isnłt easy to decide." He smiled. �I
call it Blood Spire. Almost looks innocent, doesnłt it? Until you look closer."

We spun round the Spire, or whatever it was, viewing it from
all directions. Now that we were closer, it was clear that the thingłs surface
was densely detailed; patterned and textured with geometrically complex forms,
around which snaked intestinal tubes and branching, veinlike bulges. The effect
was to undermine my earlier certainty that the thing was non-biological.

Now it looked like some sinewy fusion of animal and machine:
something that might have appealed in its grotesquerie to Childełs demented
uncle.

�How tall is it?" I asked.

�Two hundred and fifty meters," Childe said.

I saw that now there were tiny glints on Golgothałs surface,
almost like metallic flakes which had fallen from the side of the structure.

�What are those?" I asked.

�Why donłt I show you?" Childe said.

He enlarged the view still further, until the glints
resolved into distinct shapes.

They were people.

Ormore accuratelythe remains of what had once been people.
It was impossible to say how many there had been. All had been mutilated in
some fashion: crushed or pruned or bisected; the tattered ruins of their
spacesuits were still visible in one or two places. Severed parts accompanied
the bodies, often several tens of meters from the rightful owner.

It was as if they had been flung away in a fit of temper.

�Who were they?" Forqueray asked.

�A crew who happened to slow down in this system to make
shield repairs," Childe said. �Their captain was called Argyle. They chanced
upon the Spire and started exploring it, believing it to contain something of
immense technological value."

�And what happened to them?"

�They went inside in small teams, sometimes alone. Inside
the Spire they passed through a series of challenges, each of which was harder
than the last. If they made a mistake, the Spire punished them. The punishments
were initially mild, but they became steadily more brutal. The trick was to
know when to admit defeat."

I leaned forward. �How do you know all this?"

�Because Argyle survived. Not long, admittedly, but long
enough for my machine to get some sense out of him. It had been on Golgotha the
whole time, you seewatching Argylełs arrival, hiding and recording them as
they confronted the Spire. And it watched him crawl out of the Spire, shortly
before the last of his colleagues was ejected."

�Iłm not sure Iłm prepared to trust either the testimony of
a machine or a dying man," I said.

�You donłt have to," Childe answered. �You need only consider
the evidence of your eyes. Do you see those tracks in the dust? They all lead
into the Spire, and there are almost none leading to the bodies."

�Meaning what?" I said.

�Meaning that they got inside, the way Argyle claimed. Observe
also the way the remains are distributed. Theyłre not all at the same distance
from the Spire. They must have been ejected from different heights, suggesting
that some got closer to the summit than others. Again, it accords with Argylełs
story."

With a sinking feeling of inevitability I saw where this was
heading. �And you want us to go there and find out what it was they were so
interested in. Is that it?"

He smiled. �You know me entirely too well, Richard."

�I thought I did. But youłd have to be quite mad to want to
go anywhere near that thing."

�Mad? Possibly. Or simply very, very curious. The question
is" He paused and leaned across the table to refill my glass, all the while
maintaining eye contact. �Which are you?"

�Neither," I said.

But Childe could be persuasive. A month later I was frozen
aboard Forquerayłs ship.

Two

We reached orbit around Golgotha.

Thawed from reefersleep we convened for breakfast, riding a
travel pod upship to the lighthuggerłs meeting room.

Everyone was there, including Trintignant and Forqueray, the
latter inhaling from the same impressive array of flasks, retorts and spiraling
tubes he had brought with him to Yellowstone. Trintignant had not slept with
the rest of us, but looked none the worse for wear. He had, Childe said, his
own rather specialized plumbing requirements, incompatible with standard
reefersleep systems.

�Well, how was it?" Childe asked, throwing a comradely arm
around my shoulders.

�Every bit as ... dreadful as Iłd been led to expect." My
voice was slurred, sentences taking an age to form in whatever part of my brain
it was that handled language. �Still a bit fuzzy."

�Well, wełll soon fix that. Trintignant can synthesize a medichine
infusion to pep up those neural functions, canłt you, Doctor?"

Trintignant looked at me with his handsome, immobile mask of
a face. �It would be no trouble at all, my dear fellow ..."

�Thanks." I steadied myself; my mind crawled with
half-remembered images of the botched cybernetic experiments which had earned
Trintignant his notoriety. The thought of him pumping tiny machines into my
skull made my skin crawl. �But Iłll pass on that for now. No offense intended."

�And absolutely none taken." Trintignant gestured towards a
vacant chair. �Come. Sit with us and join in the discussion. The topic, rather
interestingly, is the dreams some of us experienced on the way here."

�Dreams ...?" I said. �I thought it was just me. I wasnłt
the only one?"

�No," Hirz said, �you werenłt the only one. I was on a moon
in one of them. Earthłs, I think. And I kept on trying to get inside this alien
structure. Fucking thing kept killing me, but Iłd always keep going back
inside, like I was being brought back to life each time just for that."

�I had the same dream," I said, wonderingly. �And there was
another dream in which I was inside some kind of" I halted, waiting for the
words to assemble in my head. �Some kind of underground tomb. I remember being
chased down a corridor by an enormous stone ball which was going to roll over
me."

Hirz nodded. �The dream with the hat, right?"

�My God, yes." I grinned like a madman. �I lost my hat, and
I felt this ridiculous urge to rescue it!"

Celestine looked at me with something between icy detachment
and outright hostility. �I had that one too."

�Me too," Hirz said, chuckling. �But I said fuck the hat.
Sorry, but with the kind of money Childełs paying us, buying a new one ainłt
gonna be my biggest problem."

An awkward moment followed, for only Hirz seemed at all
comfortable about discussing the generous fees Childe had arranged as payment
for the expedition. The initial sums had been large enough, but upon our return
to Yellowstone we would all receive nine times as much; adjusted to match any
inflation which might occur during the timebetween sixty and eighty
yearswhich Childe said the journey would span.

Generous, yes.

But I think Childe knew that some of us would have joined
him even without that admittedly sweet bonus.

Celestine broke the silence, turning to Hirz. �Did you have
the one about the cubes, too?"

�Christ, yes," the infiltration specialist said, as if
suddenly remembering. �The cubes. What about you, Richard?"

�Indeed," I answered, flinching at the memory of that one. I
had been one of a party of people trapped inside an endless series of cubic
rooms, many of which contained lethal surprises. �I was cut into pieces by a
trap, actually. Diced, if I remember accurately."

�Yeah. Not exactly on my top ten list of ways to die,
either."

Childe coughed. �I feel I should apologize for the dreams.
They were narratives I fed into your mindsDoctor Trintignant exceptedduring
the transition to and from reefersleep."

�Narratives?" I said.

�I adapted them from a variety of sources, thinking theyłd
put us all in the right frame of mind for what lies ahead."

�Dying nastily, you mean?" Hirz asked.

�Problem-solving, actually." Childe served pitch-black
coffee as he spoke, as if all that was ahead of us was a moderately bracing
stroll. �Of course, nothing that the dreams contained is likely to reflect
anything that wełll find inside the Spire ... but donłt you feel better for
having had them?"

I gave the matter some thought before responding.

�Not exactly, no," I said.

Thirteen hours later we were on the surface, inspecting the
suits Forqueray had provided for the expedition.

They were sleek white contraptions, armored, powered and
equipped with enough intelligence to fool a roomful of cyberneticians. They
enveloped themselves around you, forming a seamless white surface which lent
the wearer the appearance of a figurine molded from soap. The suits quickly
learned how you moved, adjusting and anticipating all the time like perfect
dance partners.

Forqueray told us that each suit was capable of keeping its
occupant alive almost indefinitely; that the suit would recycle bodily wastes
in a near-perfect closed cycle, and could even freeze its occupant if
circumstances merited such action. They could fly and would protect their user
against just about any external environment, ranging from a vacuum to the crush
of the deepest ocean.

�What about weapons?" Celestine asked, once we had been
shown how to command the suits to do our bidding.

�Weapons?" Forqueray asked blankly.

�Iłve heard about these suits, Captain. Theyłre supposed to
contain enough firepower to take apart a small mountain."

Childe coughed. �There wonłt be any weapons, Iłm afraid. I
asked Forqueray to have them removed from the suits. No cutting tools, either.
And you wonłt be able to achieve as much with brute force as you would with an
unmodified suit. The servos wonłt allow it."

�Iłm not sure I understand. Youłre handicapping us before we
go in?"

�Nofar from it. Iłm just abiding by the rules that the
Spire sets. It doesnłt allow weapons inside itself, you seeor anything else
that might be used against it, like fusion torches. It senses such things and
acts accordingly. Itłs very clever."

I looked at him. �Is this guesswork?"

�Of course not. Argyle already learned this much. No point
making exactly the same mistakes again, is there?"

�I still donłt get it," Celestine said when we had assembled
outside the shuttle, standing like so many white soap statuettes. �Why fight
the thing on its own terms at all? There are bound to be weapons on Forquerayłs
ship we could use from orbit; we could open it like a carcase."

�Yes," Childe said, �and in the process destroy everything
we came this far to learn?"

�Iłm not talking about blowing it off the face of Golgotha.
Iłm just talking about clean, surgical dissection."

�It wonłt work. The Spire is a living thing, Celestine. Or
at least a machine intelligence many orders of magnitude cleverer than anything
wełve encountered to date. It wonłt tolerate violence being used against it.
Argyle learned that much.

�Even if it canłt defend itself against such attacksand we
donłt know thatit will certainly destroy what it contains. Wełll still have
lost everything."

�But still ... no weapons?"

�Not quite," Childe said, tapping the forehead region of his
suit. �We still have our minds, after all. Thatłs why I assembled this team. If
brute force would have been sufficient, Iłd have had no need to scour
Yellowstone for such fierce intellects."

Hirz spoke from inside her own, smaller version of the
armored suit. �Youłd better not be taking the piss."

�Forqueray?" Childe said. �Wełre nearly there now. Put us
down on the surface two klicks from the base of the Spire. Wełll cross the
remaining distance on foot."

Forqueray obliged, bringing the triangular formation down.
Our suits had been slaved to his, but now we regained independent control.

Through the suitłs numerous layers of armor and padding I
felt the rough texture of the ground beneath my feet. I held up a thickly
gauntleted hand and felt the breeze of Golgothałs thin atmosphere caress my
palm. The tactile transmission was flawless, and when I moved, the suit flowed
with me so effortlessly that I had no sense of being encumbered by it. The view
was equally impressive, with the suit projecting an image directly into my
visual field rather than forcing me to peer through a visor.

A strip along the top of my visual field showed a
three-hundred-and-sixty-degree view all around me, and I could zoom in on any
part of it almost without thinking. Various overlayssonar, radar, thermal,
gravimetriccould be dropped over the existing visual field with the same ease.
If I looked down I could even ask the suit to edit me out of the image, so that
I could view the scene from a disembodied perspective. As we walked along, the
suit threw traceries of light across the scenery: an etchwork of neon which
would now and then coalesce around an odd-shaped rock or peculiar pattern of
ground markings. After several minutes of this I had adjusted the suitłs
alertness threshold to what I felt was a useful level of protectivity, neither
too watchful nor too complacent.

Childe and Forqueray had taken the lead on the ground. They
would have been difficult to distinguish, but my suit had partially erased
their suits, so that they seemed to walk unprotected save for a ghostly second
skin. When they looked at me they would perceive the same consensual illusion.

Trintignant followed a little way behind, moving with the automaton-like
stiffness I had now grown almost accustomed to.

Celestine followed, with me a little to her stern.

Hirz brought up the rear, small and lethal andnow that I
knew her a little betterquite unlike any of the few children I had ever met.

And aheadrising, ever risingwas the thing we had come all
this way to best.

It had been visible, of course, long before we set down. The
Spire was a quarter of a kilometer high, after all. But I think we had all
chosen to ignore it; to map it out of our perceptions, until we were much
closer. It was only now that we were allowing those mental shields to collapse;
forcing our imaginations to confront the fact of the towerłs existence.

Huge and silent, it daggered into the sky.

It was much as Childe had shown us, except that it seemed infinitely
more massive; infinitely more present. We were still a quarter of a kilometer
from the thingłs base, and yet the flared topthe bulb-shaped finialseemed to
be leaning back over us, constantly on the point of falling and crushing us.
The effect was exacerbated by the occasional high-altitude cloud that passed
overhead, writhing in Golgothałs fast, thin jetstreams. The whole tower looked
as if it were toppling. For a long moment, taking in the immensity of what
stood before usits vast age; its vast, brooding capacity for harmthe idea of
trying to reach the summit felt uncomfortably close to insanity.

Then a small, rational voice reminded me that this was
exactly the effect the Spirełs builders would have sought.

Knowing that, it was fractionally easier to take the next
step closer to the base.

�Well," Celestine said. �It looks like wełve found Argyle."

Childe nodded. �Yes. Or whatłs left of the poor bastard."

We had found several body parts by then, but his was the
only one that was anywhere near being complete. He had lost a leg inside the
Spire, but had been able to crawl to the exit before the combination of
bleeding and asphyxiation killed him. It was heredyingthat he had been
interviewed by Childełs envoy, which had only then emerged from its hiding
place.

Perhaps he had imagined himself in the presence of a benevolent
steel angel.

He was not well-preserved. There was no bacterial life on Golgotha,
and nothing that could be charitably termed weather, but there were savage
dust-storms, and these must have intermittently covered and revealed the body,
scouring it in the process. Parts of his suit were missing, and his helmet had
cracked open, exposing his skull. Papery sheets of skin adhered to the bone
here and there, but not enough to suggest a face.

Childe and Forqueray regarded the corpse uneasily, while Trintignant
knelt down and examined it in more detail. A float-cam belonging to the Ultra
floated around, observing the scene with goggling arrays of tightly packed
lenses.

�Whatever took his leg off did it cleanly," the Doctor
reported, pulling back the tattered layers of the manłs suit fabric to expose
the stump. �Witness how the bone and muscle have been neatly severed along the
same plane, like a geometric slice through a platonic solid? I would speculate
that a laser was responsible for this, except that I see no sign of
cauterization. A high-pressure water-jet might have achieved the same precision
of cut, or even an extremely sharp blade."

�Fascinating, Doc," Hirz said, kneeling down next to him. Iłll
bet it hurt like fuck, too, wouldnłt you?"

�Not necessarily. The degree of pain would depend acutely on
the manner in which the nerve ends were truncated. Shock does not appear to
have been the primary agent in this manłs demise." Doctor Trintignant fingered
the remains of a red fabric band a little distance above the end of the leg. �Nor
was the blood loss as rapid as might have been expected given the absence of
cauterization. This band was most likely a tourniquet, probably applied from
his suitłs medical kit. The same kit almost certainly included analgesics."

�It wasnłt enough to save him, though," Childe said.

�No." Trintignant stood up, the movement reminding me of an
escalator. �But you must concede that he did rather well, considering the
impediments."

For most of its height Blood Spire was no thicker than a few
dozen meters, and considerably narrower just below the bulb-like upper part.
But, like a slender chess piece, its lower parts swelled out considerably to
form a wide base. That podium-like mass was perhaps fifty meters in diameter: a
fifth of the structurełs height. From a distance it appeared to rest solidly on
the base: a mighty obelisk requiring the deepest of foundations to anchor it to
the ground.

But it didnłt.

The Spirełs base failed to touch the surface of Golgotha at
all, but floated above it, spaced by five or six clear meters of air. It was as
if someone had constructed a building slightly above the ground, kicked away
the stilts, and it had simply stayed there.

We all walked confidently towards the rim and then stopped;
none of us were immediately willing to step under that overhang.

�Forqueray?" Childe said.

�Yes?"

�Letłs see what that drone of yours has to say."

Forqueray had his float-cam fly under the rim, orbiting the
underside of the Spire in a lazily widening spiral. Now and then it fingered
the base with a spray of laser-light, and once or twice even made contact,
skittering against the flat surface. Forqueray remained impassive, glancing
slightly down as he absorbed the data being sent back to his suit.

�Well?" Celestine said. �What the hellłs keeping it up?"

Forqueray took a step under the rim. �No fields; not even a
minor perturbation of Golgothałs own magnetosphere. No significant alterations
in the local gravitational vector, either. Andbefore we assume more
sophistication than is strictly necessarythere are no concealed supports."

Celestine was silent for a few moments before answering, �All
right. What if the Spire doesnłt weigh anything? Therełs air here; not much of
it Iłll grant youbut what if the Spirełs mostly hollow? There might be enough
buoyancy to make the thing float, like a balloon."

�There isnłt," Forqueray said, opening a fist to catch the
cam, which flew into his grasp like a trained kestrel. �Whateverłs above us is
solid matter. I canłt read its mass, but itłs blocking an appreciable
cosmic-ray flux, and none of our scanning methods can see through it."

�Forquerayłs right," Childe said. �But I understand your
reluctance to accept this, Celestine. Itłs perfectly normal to feel a sense of
denial."

�Denial?"

�That what we are confronting is truly alien. But Iłm afraid
youłll get over it, just the way I did."

�Iłll get over it when I feel like getting over it,"
Celestine said, joining Forqueray under the dark ceiling.

She looked up and around, less in the manner of someone admiring
a fresco than in the manner of a mouse cowering beneath a boot.

But I knew exactly what she was thinking.

In four centuries of deep space travel there had been no
more than glimpses of alien sentience. We had long suspected they were out
there somewhere. But that suspicion had grown less fervent as the years passed;
world after world had revealed only faint, time-eroded traces of cultures that
might once have been glorious but which were now utterly destroyed. The Pattern
Jugglers were clearly the products of intelligence, but not necessarily
intelligent themselves. Andthough they had been spread from star to star in
the distant pastthey did not now depend on any form of technology that we
recognized. The Shrouders were little better, secretive minds cocooned inside
shells of restructured spacetime.

They had never been glimpsed, and their nature and
intentions remained worryingly unclear.

Yet Blood Spire was different.

For all its strangeness; for all that it mocked our petty
assumptions about the way matter and gravity should conduct themselves, it was
recognizably a manufactured thing. And, I told myself, if it had managed to
hang above Golgothałs surface until now, it was extremely unlikely to choose
this moment to come crashing down.

I stepped across the threshold, followed by the others.

�Makes you wonder what kind of beings built it," I said. �Whether
they had the same hopes and fears as us, or whether they were so far beyond us
as to seem like Gods."

�I donłt give a shit who built it," Hirz said. �I just want
to know how to get into the fucking thing. Any bright ideas, Childe?"

�Therełs a way," he said.

We followed him until we stood in a small, nervous huddle under
the center of the ceiling. It had not been visible before, but directly above
us was a circle of utter blackness against the mere gloom of the Spirełs
underside.

�That?" Hirz said.

�Thatłs the only way in," Childe said. �And the only way you
get out alive."

I said, �Rolandhow exactly did Argyle and his team get inside?"

�They must have brought something to stand on. A ladder or
something."

I looked around. �Therełs no sign of it now, is there?"

�No, and it doesnłt matter. We donłt need anything like
thatnot with these suits. Forqueray?"

The Ultra nodded and tossed the float-cam upwards.

It caught flight and vanished into the aperture. Nothing happened
for several seconds, other than the occasional stutter of red light from the
hole. Then the cam emerged, descending again into Forquerayłs hand.

�Therełs a chamber up there," Forqueray said. �Flat-floored,
surrounding the hole. Itłs twenty meters across, with a ceiling just high
enough to let us stand upright. Itłs empty. Therełs what looks like a sealed
door leading out of the chamber into the rest of the Spire."

�Can we be sure therełs nothing harmful in it?" I asked.

�No," Childe said. �But Argyle said the first room was safe.
Wełll just have to take his word on that one."

�And therełs room for all of us up there?"

Forqueray nodded. �Easily."

I suppose there should have been more ceremony to the act,
but there was no sense of significance, or even foreboding, as we rose into the
ceiling. It was like the first casual step onto the tame footslopes of a
mountain, unweighted by any sense of the dangers that undoubtedly lay ahead.

Inside it was exactly as Forqueray had described.

The chamber was dark, but the float-cam provided some illumination
and our suitsł sensors were able to map out the chamberłs shape and overlay
this information on our visual fields.

The floor had a metalled quality to it, dented here and
there, and the edge where it met the hole was rounded and worn.

I reached down to touch it, feeling a hard, dull alloy which
nonetheless seemed as if it would yield given sufficient pressure. Data
scrolled onto my visual readout, informing me that the floor had a temperature
only one hundred and fifteen degrees above absolute zero. My palm chemosensor
reported that the floor was mainly iron, laced with carbon woven into
allotropic forms it could not match against any in its experience. There were
microscopic traces of almost every other stable isotope in the periodic table,
with the odd exception of silver. All of this was inferred, for when the
chemosensor attempted to shave off a microscopic layer of the flooring for more
detailed analysis, it gave a series of increasingly heated error messages
before falling silent.

I tried the chemosensor against part of my own suit.

It had stopped working.

�Fix that," I instructed my suit, authorizing it to divert
whatever resources it required to the task.

�Problem, Richard?" asked Childe.

�My suitłs damaged. Minor, but annoying. I donłt think the
Spire was too thrilled about my taking a sample of it."

�Shit. I probably should have warned you of that. Argylełs
lot had the same problem. It doesnłt like being cut into, either. I suspect you
got off with a polite warning."

�Generous of it," I said.

�Be careful, all right?" Childe then told everyone else to
disable their chemosensors until told otherwise. Hirz grumbled, but everyone
else quietly accepted what had to be done.

In the meantime I continued my own survey of the room,
counting myself lucky that my suit had not provoked a stronger reaction. The
chamberłs circular wall was fashioned from what looked like the same hard, dull
alloy, devoid of detail except for the point where it framed what was obviously
a door, raised a meter above the floor. Three blocky steps led up to it.

The door itself was one meter wide and perhaps twice that in
height.

�Hey," Hirz said. �Feel this."

She was kneeling down, pressing a palm against the floor.

�Careful," I said. �I just did that and"

�Iłve turned off my chemo-whatsit, donłt worry."

�Then what are you"

�Why donłt you reach down and see for yourself?"

Slowly, we all knelt down and touched the floor. When I had
felt it before it had been as cold and dead as the floor of a crypt, yet that
was no longer the case. Now it was vibrating; as if somewhere not too far from
here a mighty engine was shaking itself to pieces: a turbine on the point of
breaking loose from its shackles. The vibration rose and fell in throbbing
waves. Once every thirty seconds or so it reached a kind of crescendo, like a
great slow inhalation.

�Itłs alive," Hirz said.

�It wasnłt like that just now."

�I know." Hirz turned and looked at me. �The fucking thing
just woke up, thatłs why. It knows wełre here."

Three

I moved to the door and studied it properly for the first
time.

Its proportions were reassuringly normal, requiring only
that we stoop down slightly to step through. But for now the door was sealed by
a smooth sheet of metal, which would presumably slide across once we had
determined how to open it. The only guidance came from the doorłs thick metal
frame, which was inscribed with faint geometric markings.

I had not noticed them before.

The markings were on either side of the door, on the
uprights of the frame. Beginning from the bottom on the left-hand side, there
was a dotit was too neatly circular to be accidentala flat-topped equilateral
triangle, a pentagon and then a heptagonal figure. On the right-hand side there
were three more figures with eleven, thirteen and twenty sides respectively.

�Well?" Hirz was looking over my shoulder. �Any bright
ideas?"

�Prime numbers," I said. �At least, thatłs the simplest
explanation I can think of. The number of vertices of the shapes on the
left-hand frame are the first four primes: one, three, five and seven."

�And on the other frame?"

Childe answered for me. �The eleven-sided figure is the next
one in the sequence. Thirteenłs one prime too high, and twenty isnłt a prime at
all."

�So youłre saying if we choose eleven, we win?" Hirz reached
out her hand, ready to push her hand against the lowest figure on the right,
which she could reach without ascending the three steps. �I hope the rest of
the tests are this simp"

�Steady, old girl." Childe had caught her wrist. �Mustnłt be
too hasty. We shouldnłt do anything until wełve arrived at a consensus. Agreed?"

Hirz pulled back her hand. �Agreed ..."

It took only a few minutes for everyone to agree that the eleven-sided
figure was the obvious choice. Celestine did not immediately accede; she looked
long and hard at the right-hand frame before concurring with the original
choice.

�I just want to be careful, thatłs all," she said. �We canłt
assume anything. They might think from right to left, so that the figures on
the right form the sequence which those on the left are supposed to complete.
Or they might think diagonally, or something even less obvious."

Childe nodded. �And the obvious choice might not always be
the right one. There might be a deeper sequencesomething more elegantwhich wełre
just not seeing. Thatłs why I wanted Celestine along. If anyonełll pick out
those subtleties, itłs her."

She turned to him. �Just donłt put too much faith in
whatever gifts the Jugglers might have given me, Childe."

�I wonłt. Unless I have to." Then he turned to the
infiltration specialist, still standing by the frame. �Hirzyou may go ahead."

She reached out and touched the frame, covering the
eleven-sided figure with her palm.

After a heart-stopping pause there was a clunk, and I felt
the floor vibrate even more strongly than it had before. Ponderously, the door
slid aside, revealing another dark chamber.

We all looked around, assessing each other.

Nothing had changed; none of us had suffered any sudden, violent
injuries.

�Forqueray?" Childe said.

The Ultra knew what he meant. He tossed the float-cam
through the open doorway and waited several seconds until it flew back into his
grasp.

�Another metallic chamber, considerably smaller than this
one. The floor is level with the door, so wełll have gained a meter or so in
height. Therełs another raised door on the opposite side, again with markings.
Other than that, I donłt see anything except bare metal."

�What about the other side of this door?" Childe said. �Are
there markings on it as well?"

�Nothing that the drone could make out."

�Then let me be the guinea pig. Iłll step through and wełll
see what happens. Iłm assuming that even if the door seals behind me, Iłll
still be able to open it. Argyle said the Spire didnłt prevent anyone from
leaving provided they hadnłt attempted to access a new room."

�Try it and see," Hirz said. �Wełll wait on this side. If
the door shuts on you, wełll give you a minute and then wełll open it ourselves."

Childe walked up the three steps and across the threshold.
He paused, looked around and then turned back to face us, looking down on us
now.

Nothing had happened.

�Looks like the door stays open for now. Who wants to join
me?"

�Wait," I said. �Before we all cross over, shouldnłt we take
a look at the problem? We donłt want to be trapped in there if itłs something
we canłt solve."

Childe walked over to the far door. �Good thinking.
Forqueray, pipe my visual field through to the rest of the team, will you?"

�Done,"

We saw what Childe was seeing, his gaze tracking along the
doorframe. The markings looked much like those we had just solved, except that
the symbols were different. Four unfamiliar shapes were inscribed on the left
side of the door, spaced vertically. Each of the shapes was composed of four
rectangular elements of differing sizes, butted together in varying
configurations. Childe then looked at the other side of the door. There were
four more shapes on the right, superficially similar to those we had already
seen.

�Definitely not a geometric progression," Childe said.

�No. Looks more like a test of conservation of symmetry
through different translations," Celestine said, her voice barely a murmur. �The
lowest three shapes on the left have just been rotated through an integer
number of right angles, giving their corresponding forms on the right. But the
top two shapes arenłt rotationally symmetric. Theyłre mirror images, plus a
rotation."

�So we press the top right shape, right?"

�Could be. But the left onełs just as valid."

Hirz said, �Yeah. But only if we ignore what the last test taught
us. Whoever the suckers were that made this thing, they think from left to
right."

Childe raised his hand above the right-side shape. �Iłm prepared
to press it."

�Wait." I climbed the steps and walked over the threshold,
joining Childe. �I donłt think you should be in here alone."

He looked at me with something resembling gratitude. None of
the others had stepped over yet, and I wondered if I would have done so had
Childe and I not been old friends.

�Go ahead and press it," I said. �Even if we get it wrong,
the punishmentłs not likely to be too severe at this stage."

He nodded and palmed the right-side symbol.

Nothing happened.

�Maybe the left side ...?"

�Try it. It canłt hurt. Wełve obviously done something wrong
already."

Childe moved over and palmed the other symbol on the top
row.

Nothing.

I gritted my teeth. �All right. Might as well try one of the
ones we definitely know is wrong. Are you ready for that?"

He glanced at me and nodded. �I didnłt go to the hassle of
bringing in Forqueray just for the free ride, you know. These suits are built
to take a lot of crap."

�Even alien crap?"

�About to find out, arenłt we?"

He moved to palm one of the lower symmetry pairs.

I braced myself, unsure what to expect when we made a deliberate
error, wondering if the Spirełs punishment code would even apply in such a
case. After all, what was dearly the correct choice had elicited no response,
so what was the sense in being penalized for making the wrong one?

He palmed the shape; still nothing happened.

�Wait," Celestine said, joining us. �Iłve had an idea. Maybe
it wonłt respondpositively or negativelyuntil wełre all in the same room."

�Only one way to find out," Hirz said, joining her.

Forqueray and Trintignant followed.

When the last of them had crossed the threshold, the rear
doorthe one we had all come throughslid shut. There were no markings on it,
but nothing that Forqueray did made it open again.

Which, I supposed, made a kind of sense. We had committed to
accepting the next challenge now; the time for dignified retreats had passed.
The thought was not a pleasant one. This room was smaller than the last one,
and the environment was suddenly a lot more claustrophobic.

We were standing almost shoulder to shoulder.

�You know, I think the first chamber was just a warm-up," Celestine
said. �This is where it starts getting more serious."

�Just press the fucking thing," Hirz said.

Childe did as he was told. As before, there was an uncomfortable
pause which probably lasted only half a second, but which felt abyssally
longer, as if our fates were being weighed by distant judicial machinery. Then
thumps and vibrations signaled the opening of the door.

Simultaneously, the door behind us had opened again. The
route out of the Spire was now clear again.

�Forqueray ..." Childe said.

The Ultra tossed the float-cam into the darkness.

�Well?"

�This is getting a tiny bit monotonous. Another chamber,
another door, another set of markings."

�No booby-traps?"

�Nothing the drone can resolve, which Iłm afraid isnłt
saying much."

�Iłll go in this time," Celestine said. �No one follow me
until Iłve checked out the problem, understood?"

�Fine by me," Hirz said, peering back at the escape route.

Celestine stepped into the darkness.

I decided that I was no longer enjoying the illusion of seeing
everyone as if we were not wearing suitswe all looked far too vulnerable,
suddenlyand ordered my own to stop editing my visual field to that extent. The
transition was smooth; suits formed around us like thickening auras. Only the
helmet parts remained semi-transparent, so that I could still identify who was
who without cumbersome visual tags.

�Itłs another mathematical puzzle," Celestine said. �Still
fairly simple. Wełre not really being stretched yet."

�Yeah, well, Iłll settle for not being really stretched,"
Hirz said.

Childe looked unimpressed. �Are you certain of the answer?"

�Trust me," Celestine said. �Itłs perfectly safe to enter."

This time the markings looked more complicated, and at first
I feared that Celestine had been over-confident.

On the left-hand side of the doorextending the height of
the framewas a vertical strip marked by many equally spaced horizontal
grooves, in the manner of a ruler. But some of the cleanly cut grooves were
deeper than the others. On the other side of the door was a similar ruler, but
with a different arrangement of deeper grooves, not lining up with any of those
on the right.

I stared at the frame for several seconds, thinking the
solution would click into my mind; willing myself back into the problem-solving
mode that had once seemed so natural. But the pattern of grooves refused to
snap into any neat mathematical order.

I looked at Childe, seeing no greater comprehension in his
face.

�Donłt you see it?" Celestine said.

�Not quite," I said.

�There are ninety-one grooves, Richard." She spoke with the
tone of a teacher who had begun to lose patience with a tardy pupil. �Now
counting from the bottom, the following grooves are deeper than the rest: the
third, the sixth, the tenth, the fifteenth ... shall I continue?"

�I think youłd better," Childe said.

�There are seven other deep grooves, concluding with the ninety-first.
You must see it now, surely. Think geometrically."

�I am," I said testily.

�Tell us, Celestine," Childe said, between what was
obviously gritted teeth.

She sighed. �Theyłre triangular numbers."

�Fine," Childe said. �But Iłm not sure I know what a
triangular number is."

Celestine glanced at the ceiling for a moment, as if seeking
inspiration. �Look. Think of a dot, will you?"

�Iłm thinking," Childe said.

�Now surround that dot by six neighbors, all the same
distance from each other. Got that?"

�Yes."

�Now keep on adding dots, extending out in all directions,
as far as you can imagineeach dot having six neighbors."

�With you so far."

�You should have something resembling a Chinese chequer
board. Now concentrate on a single dot again, near the middle. Draw a line from
it to one of its six neighbors, and then another line to one of the two dots
either side of the neighbor you just chose. Then join the two neighboring dots.
What have you a got?"

�An equilateral triangle."

�Good. Thatłs three taken care of. Now imagine that the trianglełs
sides are twice as long. How many dots are connected together now?"

Childe answered after only a slight hesitation, �Six. I
think."

�Yes." Celestine turned to me. �Are you following, Richard?"

�More or less ..." I said, trying to hold the shapes in my
head.

�Then wełll continue. If we triple the size of the triangle,
we link together nine dots along the sides, with an additional dot in the
middle. Thatłs ten. Continuewith a quadruple-sized triangleand we hit
fifteen." She paused, giving us time to catch up. �There are eight more; up to
ninety-one, which has thirteen dots along each side."

�The final groove," I said, accepting for myself that
whatever this problem was, Celestine had definitely understood it.

�But there are only seven deep grooves in that interval,"
she continued. �That means all we have to do is identify the groove on the
right which corresponds to the missing triangular number."

�All?" Hirz said.

�Look, itłs simple. I know the answer, but you donłt have to
take my word for it. The triangles follow a simple sequence. If there are N
dots in the lower row of the last triangle, the next one will have N plus one
more. Add one to two and youłve got three. Add one to two to three, and youłve
got six. One to two to three to four, and youłve got ten. Then fifteen, then
twenty-one ..." Celestine paused. �Look, itłs senseless taking my word for it.
Graph up a chequerboard display on your suitsForqueray, can you oblige?and
start arranging dots in triangular patterns."

We did. It took quarter of an hour, but after that time we
had allHirz includedconvinced ourselves by brute force that Celestine was
right. The only missing pattern was for the fifty-five-dot case, which happened
to coincide with one of the deep grooves on the right side of the door.

It was obvious, then. That was the one to press.

�I donłt like it," Hirz said. �I see it now ... but I didnłt
see it until it was pointed out to me. What if therełs another pattern none of
us are seeing?"

Celestine looked at her coldly. �There isnłt."

�Look, therełs no point arguing," Childe said. �Celestine
saw it first, but we always knew she would. Donłt feel bad about it, Hirz. Youłre
not here for your mathematical prowess. Norłs Trintignant, norłs Forqueray."

�Yeah, well remind me when I can do something useful," Hirz
said.

Then she pushed forward and pressed the groove on the right
side of the door.

Progress was smooth and steady for the next five chambers.
The problems to be solved grew harder, but after consultation the solution was
never so esoteric that we could not all agree on it. As the complexity of the
tasks increased, so did the area taken up by the frames, but other than that
there was no change in the basic nature of the challenges. We were never forced
to proceed more quickly than we chose, and the Spire always provided a clear
route back to the exit every time a doorway had been traversed. The door
immediately behind us would seal only once we had all entered the room where
the current problem lay, which meant that we were able to assess any given
problem before committing ourselves to its solution. To convince ourselves that
we were indeed able to leave, we had Hirz go back the way we had come in. She
was able to return to the first room unimpededthe rear-facing doors opened and
closed in sequence to allow her to passand then make her way back to the rest
of us by using the entry codes we had already discovered.

But something she said upon her return disturbed us.

�Iłm not sure if itłs my imagination or not ..."

�What?" Childe snapped.

�I think the doorways are getting narrower. And lower. There
was definitely more headroom at the start than there is now. I guess we didnłt
notice when we took so long to move from room to room."

�That doesnłt make much sense," Celestine said.

�As I said, maybe I imagined it."

But we all knew she had done no such thing. The last two
times I had stepped across a doorłs threshold my suit had bumped against the
frame. I had thought nothing of it at the timeputting it down to
carelessnessbut that had evidently been wishful thinking.

�I wondered about the doors already," I said. �Doesnłt it
seem a little convenient that the first one we met was just the right size for
us? It could have come from a human building."

�Then why are they getting smaller?" Childe asked.

�I donłt know. But I think Hirz is right. And it does worry
me."

�Me too. But itłll be a long time before it becomes a problem."
Childe turned to the Ultra. �Forqueraydo the honors, will you?"

I turned and looked at the chamber ahead of us. The door was
open now, but none of us had yet stepped across the threshold. As always, we
waited for Forqueray to send his float-cam snooping ahead of us, establishing
that the room contained no glaring pitfalls.

Forqueray tossed the float-cam though the open door.

We saw the usual red stutters as it swept the room in
visible light. �No surprises," Forqueray said, in the usual slightly absent
tone he adopted when reporting the camłs findings. �Empty metallic chamber ...
only slightly smaller than the one wełre standing in now. A door at the far end
with a frame that extends half a meter out on either side. Complex inscriptions
this time, Celestine."

�Iłll cope, donłt you worry."

Forqueray stepped a little closer to the door, one arm
raised with his palm open. His expression remained calm as he waited for the
drone to return to its master. We all watched, and thenas the moment elongated
into secondsbegan to suspect that something was wrong.

The room beyond was utterly dark; no stammering flashes now.

�The cam" Forqueray said.

Childełs gaze snapped to the Ultrałs face. �Yes?"

�It isnłt transmitting any more. I canłt detect it."

�That isnłt possible."

�Iłm telling you." The Ultra looked at us, his fear not well
concealed. �Itłs gone."

Childe moved into the darkness, through the frame.

Just as I was admiring his bravery I felt the floor shudder.
Out of the corner of my eye I saw a flicker of rapid motion, like an eyelid
closing.

The rear doorthe one that led out of the chamber in which
we were standinghad just slammed shut.

Celestine fell forward. She had been standing in the gap.

�No ..." she said, hitting the ground with a detectable thump.

�Childe!" I shouted, unnecessarily. �Stay where you
aresomething just happened."

�What?"

�The door behind us closed on Celestine. Shełs been injured
..."

I was fearing the worstthat the door might have snipped off
an arm or a leg as it closedbut it was, mercifully, not that serious. The door
had damaged the thigh of her suit, grazing an inch of its armor away as it
closed, but Celestine herself had not been injured. The damaged part was still
airtight, and the suitłs mobility and critical systems remained unimpaired.

Already, in fact, the self-healing mechanisms were coming
into play, repairing the wound.

She sat up on the ground. �Iłm OK. The impact was hard, but
I donłt think Iłve done any permanent damage."

�You sure?" I said, offering her a hand.

�Perfectly sure," she said, standing up without my
assistance.

�You were lucky," Trintignant said. �You were only partly
blocking the door. Had that not been the case, I suspect your injuries would
have been more interesting."

�What happened?" Hirz asked.

�Childe must have triggered it," Forqueray said. �As soon as
he stepped into the other room, it closed the rear door." The Ultra stepped
closer to the aperture. �What happened to my float-cam, Childe?"

�I donłt know. It just isnłt here. There isnłt even a trace
of debris, and therełs no sign of anything that could have destroyed it."

The silence that followed was broken by Trintignantłs piping
tones. �I believe this makes a queer kind of sense."

�You do, do you?" I said.

�Yes, my dear fellow. It is my suspicion that the Spire has
been tolerating the drone until nowlulling us, if you will, into a false sense
of security. Yet now the Spire has decreed that we must discard that particular
mental crutch. It will no longer permit us to gain any knowledge of the contents
of a room until one of us steps into it. And at that moment it will prevent any
of us leaving until we have solved that problem."

�You mean itłs changing the rules as it goes along?" Hirz
asked.

The Doctor turned his exquisite silver mask towards her. �Which
rules did you have in mind, Hirz?"

�Donłt fuck with me, Doc. You know what I mean."

Trintignant touched a finger to the chin of his helmet. �I
confess I do not. Unless it is your contention that the Spire has at some point
agreed to bind by a set of strictures, which I would ardently suggest is far
from the case."

�No," I said. �Hirz is right, in one way. There have been
rules. Itłs clear that it wonłt tolerate us inflicting physical harm against
it. And it wonłt allow us to enter a room until wełve all stepped into the
preceding one. I think those are pretty fundamental rules."

�Then what about the drone, and the door?" asked Childe.

�Itłs like Trintignant said. It tolerated us playing outside
the rules until now, but we shouldnłt have assumed that was always going to be
the case."

Hirz nodded. �Great. What else is it tolerating now?"

�I donłt know." I managed a thin smile. �I suppose the only
way to find out is to keep going."

We passed through another eight rooms, taking between one
and two hours to solve each.

There had been a couple of occasions when we had debated
whether to continue, with Hirz usually the least keen of us, but so far the
problems had not been insurmountably difficult. And we were making a kind of
progress. Mostly the rooms were blank, but every now and then there was a
narrow, trellised window, panelled in stained sheets of what was obviously a
substance very much more resilient than glass or even diamond. Sometimes these
windows opened only into gloomy interior spaces, but on one occasion we were
able to look outside, able to sense some of the height we had attained.
Forqueray, who had had been monitoring our journey with an inertial compass and
gravitometer, confirmed that we had ascended at least fifteen vertical meters
since the first chamber. That almost sounded impressive, until one considered
the several hundred meters of Spire that undoubtedly lay above us. Another few
hundred rooms, each posing a challenge more testing than the last?

And the doors were definitely getting smaller.

It was an effort to squeeze through now, and while the suits
were able to reshape themselves to some extent, there was a limit to how
compact they could become.

It had taken us sixteen hours to reach this point. At this
rate it would take many days to get anywhere near the summit.

But none of us had imagined that this would be over quickly.

�Tricky," Celestine said, after studying the latest puzzle
for many minutes. �I think I see whatłs going on here, but ..."

Childe looked at her. �You think, or you know?"

�I mean what I said. Itłs not easy, you know. Would you
rather I let someone else take first crack at it?"

I put a hand on Celestinełs arm and spoke to her privately. �Easy.
Hełs just anxious, thatłs all."

She brushed my hand away. �I didnłt ask you to defend me,
Richard."

�Iłm sorry. I didnłt mean"

�Never mind." Celestine switched off private mode and addressed
the group. �I think these markings are shadows. Look."

By now we had all become reasonably adept at drawing figures
using our suitsł visualization systems. These sketchy hallucinations could be
painted on any surface, apparently visible to all.

Celestine, who was the best at this, drew a short red hyphen
on the wall.

�See this? A one-dimensional line. Now watch." She made the
line become a square; splitting into two parallel lines joined at their ends.
Then she made the square rotate until it was edge-on again, and all we could
see was the line.

�We see it ..." Childe said.

�You can think of a line as the one-dimensional shadow of a
two-dimensional object, in this case a square. Understand?"

�I think we get the gist," Trintignant said.

Celestine made the square freeze, and then slide diagonally,
leaving a copy of itself to which it was joined at the corners. �Now. Wełre
looking at a two-dimensional figure this time; the shadow of a
three-dimensional cube. See how it changes if I rotate the cube, how it
elongates and contracts?"

�Yes. Got that," Childe said, watching the two joined
squares slide across each other with a hypnotically smooth motion, only one
square visible as the imagined cube presented itself face-on to the wall.

�Well, I think these figures ..." Celestine sketched a hand
an inch over the intricate designs worked into the frame, �I think what these
figures represent are two-dimensional shadows of four-dimensional objects."

�Fuck off," Hirz said.

�Look, just concentrate, will you? This onełs easy. Itłs a
hypercube. Thatłs the four-dimensional analogue of a cube. You just take a cube
and extend it outwards, just the same way that you make a cube from a square."
Celestine paused, and for a moment I thought she was going to throw up her
hands in despair. �Look. Look at this." And then she sketched something on the
wall: a cube set inside a slightly larger one, to which it was joined by
diagonal lines. �Thatłs what the three-dimensional shadow of a hypercube would
look like. Now all you have to do is collapse that shadow by one more
dimension, down to two, to get this" and she jabbed at the beguiling design
marked on the door.

�I think I see it," Childe said, without anything resembling
confidence.

Maybe I did, toothough I felt the same lack of certainty.
Childe and I had certainly taunted each other with higher-dimensional puzzles
in our youth, but never had so much depended on an intuitive grasp of those
mind-shattering mathematical realms. �All right," I said. �Supposing that is
the shadow of a tesseract ... whatłs the puzzle?"

�This," Celestine said, pointing to the other side of the
door, to what seemed like an utterly differentthough no less complexdesign. �Itłs
the same object, after a rotation."

�The shadow changes that drastically?"

�Start getting used to it, Richard."

�All right." I realized she was still annoyed with me for
touching her. �What about the others?"

�Theyłre all four-dimensional objects; relatively simple geometric
forms. This onełs a 4-simplex; a hypertetrahedron. Itłs a hyper-pyramid with
five tetrahedral faces ..." Celestine trailed off, looking at us with an odd
expression on her face. �Never mind. The point is, all the corresponding forms
on the right should be the shadows of the same polytopes after a simple
rotation through higher-dimensional space. But one isnłt."

�Which is?"

She pointed to one of the forms. �This one."

�And youłre certain of that?" Hirz said. �Because Iłm sure
as fuck not."

Celestine nodded. �Yes. Iłm completely sure of it now."

�But you canłt make any of us see that this is the case?"

She shrugged. �I guess you either see it or you donłt."

�Yeah? Well maybe we should have all taken a trip to the Pattern
Jugglers. Then maybe I wouldnłt be about to shit myself."

Celestine said nothing, but merely reached out and touched
the errant figure.

�Therełs good news and therełs bad news," Forqueray said after
we had traversed another dozen or so rooms without injury.

�Give us the bad news first," Celestine said.

Forqueray obliged, with what sounded like the tiniest degree
of pleasure. �We wonłt be able to get through more than two or three more
doors. Not with these suits on."

There had been no real need to tell us that. It had become
crushingly obvious during the last three or four rooms that we were near the
limit; that the Spirełs subtly shifting internal architecture would not permit
further movement within the bulky suits. It had been an effort to squeeze
through the last door; only Hirz was oblivious to these difficulties.

�Then we might as well give up," I said.

�Not exactly." Forqueray smiled his vampiric smile. �I said
there was good news as well, didnłt I?"

�Which is?" Childe said.

�You remember when we sent Hirz back to the beginning, to
see if the Spire was going to allow us to leave at any point?"

�Yes," Childe said. Hirz had not repeated the complete exercise
since, but she had gone back a dozen rooms, and found that the Spire was just as
co-operative as it had been before. There was no reason to think she would not
have been able to make her way to the exit, had she wished.

�Something bothered me," Forqueray said. �When she went
back, the Spire opened and closed doors in sequence to allow her to pass. I
couldnłt see the sense in that. Why not just open all the doors along her
route?"

�I confess it troubled me as well," Trintignant said.

�So I thought about it, and decided there must be a reason
not to have all the doors open at once."

Childe sighed. �Which was?"

�Air," Forqueray said.

�Youłre kidding, arenłt you?"

The Ultra shook his head. �When we began, we were moving in
vacuumor at least through air that was as thin as that on Golgothałs surface.
That continued to be the case for the next few rooms. Then it began to change.
Very slowly, Iłll grant youbut my suit sensors picked up on it immediately."

Childe pulled a face. �And it didnłt cross your mind to tell
any of us about this?"

�I thought it best to wait until a pattern became apparent."
Forqueray glanced at Celestine, whose face was impassive.

�Hełs right," Trintignant said. �I too have become aware of
the changing atmospheric conditions. Forqueray has also doubtless noticed that
the temperature in each room has been a little warmer than the last. I have
extrapolated these trends and arrived at a tentative conclusion. Within
twopossibly threerooms, we will be able to discard our suits and breathe
normally."

�Discard our suits?" Hirz looked at him as if he were
insane. �You have got to be fucking kidding."

Childe raised a hand. �Wait a minute. When you said air, Doctor
Trintignant, you didnłt say it was anything wełd be able to breathe."

The Doctorłs answer was a melodious piped refrain. �Except
it is. The ratios of the various gases are remarkably close to those we employ
in our suits."

�Which isnłt possible. I donłt remember providing a sample."

Trintignant dipped his head in a nod. �Nonetheless, it
appears that one has been taken. The mix, incidentally, corresponds to precisely
the atmospheric preferences of Ultras. Argylełs expedition would surely have
employed a slightly different mix, so it is not simply the case that the Spire
has a long memory."

I shivered.

The thought that the Spirethis vast breathing thing through
which we were scurrying like ratshad somehow reached inside the hard armor of
our suits to snatch a sample of air, without our knowing, made my guts turn
cold. It not only knew of our presence, but it knewintimatelywhat we were.

It understood our fragility.

As if wishing to reward Forqueray for his observation, the
next room contained a substantially thicker atmosphere than any of its
predecessors, and was also much warmer. It was not yet capable of supporting
life, but one would not have died instantly without the protection of a suit.

The challenge that the room held was by far the hardest,
even by Celestinełs reckoning. Once again the essence of the task lay in the
figures marked on either side of the door, but now these figures were linked by
various symbols and connecting loops, like the subway map of a foreign city. We
had encountered some of these hieroglyphics beforethey were akin to
mathematical operators, like the addition and subtraction symbolbut we had
never seen so many. And the problem itself was not simply a numerical exercise,
butas far as Celestine could say with any certaintya problem about
topological transformations in four dimensions.

�Please tell me you see the answer immediately," Childe
said.

�I ..." Celestine trailed off. �I think I do. Iłm just not
absolutely certain. I need to think about this for a minute."

�Fine. Take all the time you want."

Celestine fell into a reverie which lasted minutes, and then
tens of minutes. Once or twice she would open her mouth and take a breath of
air as if in readiness to speak, and on one or two other occasions she took a
promising step closer to the door, but none of these things heralded the
sudden, intuitive breakthrough we were all hoping for. She always returned to
the same silent, standing posture. The time dragged on; first an hour and then
the better part of two hours.

All this, I thought, before even Celestine had seen the
answer.

It might take days if we were all expected to follow her
reasoning.

Finally, however, she spoke. �Yes. I see it."

Childe was the first to answer. �Is it the one you thought
it was originally?"

�No."

�Great," Hirz said.

�Celestine ..." I said, trying to defuse the situation. �Do
you understand why you made the wrong choice originally?"

�Yes. I think so. It was a trick answer; an apparently
correct solution which contained a subtle flaw. And what looked like the
clearly wrong answer turned out to be the right one."

�Right. And youłre certain of that?"

�Iłm not certain of anything, Richard. Iłm just saying this
is what I believe the answer to be."

I nodded. �I think thatłs all any of us can honestly expect.
Do you think therełs any chance of the rest of us following your line of
argument?"

�I donłt know. How much do you understand about Kaluza-Klein
spaces?"

�Not a vast amount, I have to admit."

�Thatłs what I feared. I could probably explain my reasoning
to some of you, but therełd always be someone who didnłt get it" Celestine
looked pointedly at Hirz. �We could be in this bloody room for weeks before any
of us grasp the solution. And the Spire may not tolerate that kind of delay."

�We donłt know that," I cautioned.

�No," Childe said. �On the other hand, we canłt afford to
spend weeks solving every room. Therełs going to have to come a point where we
put our faith in Celestinełs judgement. I think that time may have come."

I looked at him, remembering that his mathematical fluency
had always been superior to mine. The puzzles I had set him had seldom defeated
him, even if it had taken weeks for his intensely methodical mind to arrive at
the solution. Conversely, he had often managed to beat me by setting a
mathematical challenge of similar intricacy to the one now facing Celestine.
They were not quite equals, I knew, but neither were their abilities radically
different. It was just that, thanks to her experiences with the Pattern
Jugglers, Celestine would always arrive at the answer with the superhuman speed
of a savant.

�Are you saying I should just press it, with no
consultation?" Celestine said.

Childe nodded. �Provided everyone else agrees with me ..."

It was not an easy decision to make, especially after having
navigated so many rooms via such a ruthlessly democratic process. But we all
saw the sense, even Hirz coming around to our line of thinking in the end.

�Iłm telling you," she said. �We get through this door, Iłm
out of here, money or not."

�Youłre giving up?" Childe asked.

�You saw what happened to those poor bastards outside. They
must have thought they could keep on solving the next test."

Childe looked sad, but said, �I understand perfectly. But I
trust youłll reassess your decision as soon as wełre through?"

�Sorry, but my mindłs made up. Iłve had enough of this shit."
Hirz turned to Celestine. �Put us all out of our misery, will you? Make the
choice."

Celestine looked at each of us in turn. �Are you ready for
this?"

�We are," Childe said, answering for the group. �Go ahead."

Celestine pressed the symbol. There was the usual yawning
moment of expectation; a moment that stretched agonizingly. We all stared at
the door, willing it to begin sliding open.

This time nothing happened.

�Oh God ..." Hirz began.

Something happened then, almost before she had finished
speaking, but it was over almost before we had sensed any change in the room.
It was only afterwardsplaying back the visual record captured by our
suitsthat we were able to make any sense of events.

The walls of the chamberlike every room we had passed
through, in facthad looked totally seamless. But in a flash something emerged
from the wall: a rigid, sharp-ended metal rod spearing out at waist-height. It
flashed through the air from wall to wall, vanishing like a javelin thrown into
water. None of us had time to notice it, let alone react bodily. Even the
suitsprogramd to move out of the way of obvious moving hazardswere too slow.
By the time they began moving, the javelin had been and gone. And if there had
been only that one javelin, we might almost have missed it happening at all.

But a second emerged, a fraction of a second after the
first, spearing across the room at a slightly different angle.

Forqueray happened to be standing in the way.

The javelin passed through him as if he were made of smoke;
its progress was unimpeded by his presence. But it dragged behind it a
comet-tail of gore, exploding out of his suit where he had been speared, just
below the elbow. The pressure in the room was still considerably less than
atmospheric.

Forquerayłs suit reacted with impressive speed, but it was
still sluggish compared to the javelin.

It assessed the damage that had been inflicted on the arm,
aware of how quickly its self-repair systems could work to seal that inch-wide
hole, and came to a rapid conclusion. The integrity could be restored, but not
before unacceptable blood and pressure loss. Since its duty was always to keep
its wearer alive, no matter what the costs, it opted to sever the arm above the
wound; hyper-sharp irised blades snicked through flesh and bone in an instant.

All that took place long before any pain signals had a
chance to reach his brain. The first thing Forqueray knew of his misfortune was
when his arm clanged to his feet.

�I think" he started saying. Hirz dashed over to the Ultra
and did her best to support him.

Forquerayłs truncated arm ended in a smooth silver iris.

�Donłt talk," Childe said.

Forqueray, who was still standing, looked at his injury with
something close to fascination. �I"

�I said donłt talk." Childe knelt down and picked up the amputated
arm, showing the evidence to Forqueray. The hole went right through it, as
cleanly bored as a rifle barrel.

�Iłll live," Forqueray managed.

�Yes, you will," Trintignant said. �And you may also count
yourself fortunate. Had the projectile pierced your body, rather than one of
its extremities, I do not believe we would be having this conversation."

�You call this fortunate?"

�A wound such as yours can be made good with only trivial intervention.
We have all the equipment we need aboard the shuttle."

Hirz looked around uneasily. �You think the punishmentłs
over?"

�I think wełd know if it wasnłt," I said. �That was our
first mistake, after all. We can expect things to be a little worse in future,
of course."

�Then wełd better not make any more screw-ups, had we?" Hirz
was directing her words at Celestine.

I had expected an angry rebuttal. Celestine would have been
perfectly correct to remind Hirz thathad the rest of us been forced to make
that choiceour chances of hitting the correct answer would have been a
miserable one in six.

But instead Celestine just spoke with the flat, soporific
tones of one who could not quite believe she had made such an error.

�Iłm sorry ... I must have ..."

�Made the wrong decision. Yes." I nodded. �And therełll undoubtedly
be others. You did your best, Celestinebetter than any of us could have
managed."

�It wasnłt good enough."

�No, but you narrowed the field down to two possibilities.
Thatłs a lot better than six."

�Hełs right," Childe said. �Celestine, donłt cut yourself up
about this. Without you we wouldnłt have got as far as we did. Now go ahead and
press the other answerthe one you settled on originallyand wełll get
Forqueray back to base camp."

The Ultra glared at him. �Iłm fine, Childe. I can continue."

�Maybe you can, but itłs still time for a temporary retreat.
Wełll get that arm looked at properly, and then wełll come back with
lightweight suits. We canłt carry on much further with these, anywayand I donłt
particularly fancy continuing with no armor at all."

Celestine turned back to the frame. �I canłt promise that
this is the right one, either."

�Wełll take that chance. Just hit them in sequencebest
choice firstuntil the Spire opens a route back to the start."

She pressed the symbol that had been her first choice,
before she had analyzed the problem more deeply and seen a phantom trap.

As always, Blood Spire did not oblige us with an instant
judgement on the choice we had made. There was a moment when all of us tensed,
expecting the javelins to come again ... but this time we were spared further
punishment.

The door opened, exposing the next chamber.

We did not step through, of course. Instead, we turned
around and made our way back through the succession of rooms we had already
traversed, descending all the while, almost laughing at the childish simplicity
of the very earliest puzzles compared to those we had faced before the attack.

As the doors opened and closed in sequence, the air thinned
out and the skin of Blood Spire became colder; less like a living thing, more
like an ancient, brooding machine. But still that distant, throbbing
respiratory vibration rattled the floors, lower now, and slower: the Spire
letting us know it was aware of our presence and, perhaps, the tiniest bit
disappointed at this turning back.

�All right, you bastard," Childe said. �Wełre retreating,
but only for now. Wełre coming back, understand?"

�You donłt have to take it personally," I said.

�Oh, but I do," Childe said. �I take it very personally
indeed."

We reached the first chamber, and then dropped down through
what had been the entrance hole. After that, it was just a short flight back to
the waiting shuttle.

It was dark outside.

We had been in the Spire for more than nineteen hours.

Four

�Itłll do," Forqueray said, tilting his new arm this way and
that.

�Do?" Trintignant sounded mortally wounded. �My dear fellow,
it is a work of exquisite craftsmanship; a thing of beauty. It is unlikely that
you will see its like again, unless of course I am called upon to perform a
similar procedure."

We were sitting inside the shuttle, still parked on Golgothałs
surface. The ship was a squat, aerodynamically blunt cylinder which had landed
tail-down and then expanded a cluster of eight bubbletents around itself: six
for our personal quarters during the expedition, one commons area, and a
general medical bay equipped with all the equipment Trintignant needed to do
his work. Surprisinglyto me, at least, who admitted to some unfamiliarity with
these thingsthe shuttlełs fabricators had been more than able to come up with
the various cybernetic components that the Doctor required, and the surgical
tools at his disposalglistening, semi-sentient things which moved to his will
almost before they were summonedwere clearly state of the art by any
reasonable measure.

�Yes, well, Iłd have rather youłd reattached my old arm," Forqueray
said, opening and closing the sleek metal gauntlet of his replacement.

�It would have been almost insultingly trivial to do that,"
Trintignant said. �A new hand could have been cultured and regrafted in a few
hours. If that did not appeal to you, I could have programd your stump to
regenerate a hand of its own accord; a perfectly simple matter of stem-cell
manipulation. But what would have been the point? You would be very likely to
lose it as soon as we suffer our next punishment. Now you will only be losing
machinerya far less traumatic prospect."

�Youłre enjoying this," Hirz said, �arenłt you?"

�It would be churlish to deny it," Trintignant said. �When
you have been deprived of willing subjects as long as I have, itłs only natural
to take pleasure in those little opportunities for practice that fate sees fit
to present."

Hirz nodded knowingly. She had not heard of Trintignant upon
our first meeting, I recalled, but she had lost no time in forming her
subsequent opinion of the man. �Except you wonłt just stop with a hand, will
you? I checked up on you, Docafter that meeting in Childełs house. I hacked
into some of the medical records that the Stoner authorities still havenłt
declassified, because theyłre just too damned disturbing. You really went the
whole hog, didnłt you? Some of the things I saw in those filesyour
victimsthey stopped me from sleeping."

And yet still she had chosen to come with us, I thought. Evidently
the allure of Childełs promised reward outweighed any reservations she might
have had about sharing a room with Trintignant. But I wondered about those
medical records. Certainly, the publicly released data had contained more than
enough atrocities for the average nightmare. It chilled the blood to think that
Trintignantłs most heinous crimes had never been fully revealed.

�Is it true?" I said. �Were there really worse things?"

�That depends," Trintignant said. �There were subjects upon
whom I pushed my experimental techniques further than is generally realized, if
that is what you mean. But did I ever approach what I considered were the true
limits? No. I was always hindered."

�Until, perhaps, now," I said.

The rigid silver mask swivelled to face us all in turn. �That
is as maybe. But please give the following matter some consideration. I can
surgically remove all your limbs now, cleanly, with the minimum of
complications. The detached members could be put into cryogenic storage,
replaced by prosthetic systems until we have completed the task that lies ahead
of us."

�Thanks ..." I said, looking around at the others. �But I
think wełll pass on that one, Doctor."

Trintignant offered his palms magnanimously. �I am at your
disposal, should you wish to reconsider."

We spent a full day in the shuttle before returning to the
Spire. I had been mortally tired, but when I finally slept, it was only to
submerge myself in yet more labyrinthine dreams, much like those Childe had
pumped into our heads during the reefersleep transition. I woke feeling angry
and cheated, and resolved to confront him about it.

But something else snagged my attention.

There was something wrong with my wrist. Buried just beneath
the skin was a hard rectangle, showing darkly through my flesh. Turning my
wrist this way and that, I admired the object, acutelyand strangelyconscious
of its rectilinearity. I looked around me, and felt the same visceral awareness
of the other shapes which formed my surroundings. I did not know whether I was
more disturbed at the presence of the alien object under my flesh, or my
unnatural reaction to it.

I stumbled groggily into the common quarters of the shuttle,
presenting my wrist to Childe, who was sitting there with Celestine.

She looked at me before Childe had a chance to answer. �So
youłve got one too," she said, showing me the similar shape lurking just below
her own skin. The shape rhymedthere was no other word for itwith the
surrounding panels and extrusions of the commons. �Um, Richard?" she added.

�Iłm feeling a little strange."

�Blame Childe. He put them there. Didnłt you, you lying rat?"

�Itłs easily removed," he said, all innocence. �It just
seemed more prudent to implant the devices while you were all asleep anyway, so
as not to waste any more time than necessary."

�Itłs not just the thing in my wrist," I said, �whatever it
is."

�Itłs something to keep us awake," Celestine said, her anger
just barely under control. Feeling less myself than ever, I watched the way her
face changed shape as she spoke, conscious of the armature of muscle and bone
lying just beneath the skin.

�Awake?" I managed.

�A ... shunt, of some kind," she said. �Ultras use them, I
gather. It sucks fatigue poisons out of the blood, and puts other chemicals
back into the blood to upset the brainłs normal sleeping cycle. With one of
these you can stay conscious for weeks, with almost no psychological problems."

I forced a smile, ignoring the sense of wrongness I felt. �Itłs
the almost part that worries me."

�Me too." She glared at Childe. �But much as I hate the
little rat for doing this without my permission, I admit to seeing the sense in
it."

I felt the bump in my wrist again. �Trintignantłs work, I presume?"

�Count yourself lucky he didnłt hack your arms and legs off
while he was at it."

Childe interrupted her. �I told him to install the shunts.
We can still catnap, if we have the chance. But these devices will let us stay
alert when we need alertness. Theyłre really no more sinister than that."

�Therełs something else ..." I said tentatively. I glanced
at Celestine, trying to judge if she felt as oddly as I did. �Since Iłve been
awake, Iłve ... experienced things differently. I keep seeing shapes in a new
light. What exactly have you done to me, Childe?"

�Again, nothing irreversible. Just a small medichine
infusion"

I tried to keep my temper. �What sort of medichines?"

�Neural modifiers." He raised a hand defensively, and I saw
the same rectangular bulge under his skin. �Your brain is already swarming with
Demarchist implants and cellular machines, Richard, so why pretend that what Iłve
done is anything more than a continuation of what was already there?"

�What the fuck is he talking about?" said Hirz, who had been
standing at the door to the commons for the last few seconds. �Is it to do with
the weird shit Iłve been dealing with since waking up?"

�Very probably," I said, relieved that at least I was not
going insane. �Let me guessheightened mathematical and spatial awareness?"

�If thatłs what you call it, yeah. Seeing shapes everywhere,
and thinking of them fitting together ..."

Hirz turned to look at Childe. Small as she was, she looked
easily capable of inflicting injury. �Start talking, dickhead."

Childe spoke with quiet calm. �I put modifiers in your
brain, via the wrist shunt. The modifiers havenłt performed any radical neural
restructuring, but they are suppressing and enhancing certain regions of brain
function. The effectcrudely speakingis to enhance your spatial abilities, at
the expense of some less essential functions. What you are getting is a glimpse
into the cognitive realms that Celestine inhabits as a matter of routine."
Celestine opened her mouth to speak, but he cut her off with a raised palm. �No
more than a glimpse, no, but I think youłll agree thatgiven the kinds of
challenges the Spire likes to throw at usthe modifiers will give us an edge
that we lacked previously."

�You mean youłve turned us all into maths geniuses, overnight?"

�Broadly speaking, yes."

�Well, thatłll come in handy," Hirz said.

�It will?"

�Yeah. When you try and fit the pieces of your dick back together."

She lunged for him.

�Hirz, I ..."

�Stop," I said, interceding. �Childe was wrong to do this
without our consent, butgiven the situation we find ourselves inthe idea
makes sense."

�Whose side are you on?" Hirz said, backing away with a look
of righteous fury in her eyes.

�Nobodyłs," I said. �I just want to do whatever it takes to
beat the Spire."

Hirz glared at Childe. �All right. This time. But you try
another stunt like that, and ..."

But even then it was obvious that Hirz had come to the conclusion
that I had already arrived at myself: that, given what the Spire was likely to
test us with, it was better to accept these machines than ask for them to be
flushed out of our systems.

There was just one troubling thought which I could not quite
dismiss.

Would I have welcomed the machines so willingly before they
had invaded my head, or were they partly influencing my decision?

I had no idea.

But I decided to worry about that later.

Five

�Three hours," Childe said triumphantly. �Took us nineteen
to reach this point on our last trip through. That has to mean something, doesnłt
it?"

�Yeah," Hirz said snidely. �It means itłs a piece of piss
when you know the answers."

We were standing by the door where Celestine had made her
mistake the last time. She had just pressed the correct topological symbol and
the door had opened to admit us to the chamber beyond, one we had not so far
stepped into. From now on we would be facing fresh challenges again, rather
than passing through those we had already faced. The Spire, it appeared, was
more interested in probing the limits of our understanding than getting us
simply to solve permutations of the same basic challenge.

It wanted to break us, not stress us.

More and more I was thinking of it as a sentient thing:
inquisitive and patient andwhen the mood took itimmensely capable of cruelty.

�Whatłs in there?" Forqueray said.

Hirz had gone ahead into the unexplored room.

�Well, fuck me if it isnłt another puzzle."

�Describe it, would you?"

�Weird shape shit, I think." She was quiet for a few
seconds.

�Yeah. Shapes in four dimensions again. Celestineyou wanna
take a look at this? I think itłs right up your street."

�Any idea what the nature of the task is?" Celestine asked.

�Fuck, I donłt know. Something to do with stretching, I think
..."

�Topological deformations," Celestine murmured before joining
Hirz in the chamber.

For a minute or so the two of them conferred, studying the
marked doorframe like a pair of discerning art critics.

On the last run through, Hirz and Celestine had shared
almost no common ground: it was unnerving to see how much Hirz now grasped. The
machines Childe had pumped into our skulls had improved the mathematical skills
of all of uswith the possible exception of Trintignant, who I suspected had
not received the therapybut the effects had differed in nuance, degree and
stability. My mathematical brilliance came in feverish, unpredictable waves,
like inspiration to a laudanum-addicted poet. Forqueray had gained an
astonishing fluency in arithmetic, able to count huge numbers of things simply
by looking at them for a moment.

But Hirzłs change had been the most dramatic of all, something
even Childe was taken aback by. On the second pass through the Spire she had
been intuiting the answers to many of the problems at a glance, and I was
certain that she was not always remembering what the correct answer had been.
Now, as we encountered the tasks that had challenged even Celestine, Hirz was
still able to perceive the essence of a problem, even if it was beyond her to articulate
the details in the formal language of mathematics.

And if she could not yet see her way to selecting the
correct answer, she could at least see the one or two answers that were clearly
wrong.

�Hirz is right," Celestine said eventually. �Itłs about
topological deformations, stretching operations on solid shapes."

Once again we were seeing the projected shadows of
four-dimensional lattices. On the right side of the door, however, the shadows
were of the same objects after they had been stretched and squeezed and
generally distorted. The problem was to identify the shadow that could only be
formed with a shearing, in addition to the other operations.

It took an hour, but eventually Celestine felt certain that
she had selected the right answer. Hirz and I attempted to follow her
arguments, but the best we could do was agree that two of the other answers
would have been wrong. That, at least, was an improvement on anything we would
have been capable of before the medichine infusions, but it was only moderately
comforting.

Nonetheless, Celestine had selected the right answer. We
moved into the next chamber.

�This is as far as we can go with these suits," Childe said,
indicating the door that lay ahead of us. �Itłll be a squeeze, even with the
lighter suitsexcept for Hirz, of course."

�Whatłs the air like in here?" I asked.

�We could breathe it," Forqueray said. �And wełll have to,
briefly. But I donłt recommend that we do that for any length of timeat least
not until wełre forced into it."

�Forced?" Celestine said. �You think the doors are going to
keep getting smaller?"

�I donłt know. But doesnłt it feel as if this place is
forcing us to expose ourselves to it, to make ourselves maximally vulnerable? I
donłt think itłs done with us just yet." He paused, his suit beginning to
remove itself. �But that doesnłt mean we have to humor it."

I understood his reluctance. The Spire had hurt him, not us.

Beneath the Ultra suits which had brought us this far we had
donned as much of the lightweight versions as was possible. They were skintight
suits of reasonably modern design, but they were museum pieces compared to the
Ultra equipment. The helmets and much of the breathing gear had been impossible
to put on, so we had carried the extra parts strapped to our backs. Despite my
fears, the Spire had not objected to this, but I remained acutely aware that we
did not yet know all the rules under which we played.

It only took three or four minutes to get out of the bulky
suits and into the new ones; most of this time was taken up running status
checks. For a minute or so, with the exception of Hirz, we had all breathed
Spire air.

It was astringent, blood-hot, humid, and smelt faintly of machine
oil.

It was a relief when the helmets flooded with the cold,
tasteless air of the suitsł backpack recyclers.

�Hey." Hirz, the only one still wearing her original suit,
knelt down and touched the floor. �Check this out."

I followed her, pressing the flimsy fabric of my glove
against the surface.

The structurełs vibrations rose and fell with increased
strength, as if we had excited it by removing our hard protective shells.

�Itłs like the fucking thingłs getting a hard-on," Hirz
said.

�Letłs push on," Childe said. �Wełre still armoredjust not
as effectively as beforebut if we keep being smart, it wonłt matter."

�Yeah. But itłs the being smart part that worries me. No one
smart would come within pissing distance of this fucking place."

�What does that make you, Hirz?" Celestine asked.

�Greedier than youłll ever know," she said.

Nonetheless we made good progress for another eleven rooms.
Now and then a stained-glass window allowed a view out of Golgothałs surface,
which looked very far below us. By Forquerayłs estimate we had gained
forty-five vertical meters since entering the Spire. Although two hundred
further meters lay aheadthe bulk of the climb, in factfor the first time it
began to appear possible that we might succeed. That, of course, was contingent
on several assumptions. One was that the problems, while growing steadily more
difficult, would not become insoluble. The other was that the doorways would
not continue to narrow now that we had discarded the bulky suits.

But they did.

As always, the narrowing was imperceptible from room to
room, but after five or six it could not be ignored. After ten or fifteen more
rooms we would again have to scrape our way between them.

And what if the narrowing continued beyond that point?

�We wonłt be able to go on," I said. �We wonłt fiteven if
wełre naked."

�You are entirely too defeatist," Trintignant said.

Childe sounded reasonable. �What would you propose, Doctor?"

�Nothing more than a few minor readjustments of the basic
human body-plan. Just enough to enable us to squeeze through apertures which
would be impassable with our current ... encumbrances."

Trintignant looked avariciously at my arms and legs.

�It wouldnłt be worth it," I said. �Iłll accept your help
after Iłve been injured, but if youłre thinking that Iłd submit to anything
more drastic ... well, Iłm afraid youłre severely mistaken, Doctor."

�Amen to that," Hirz said. �For a while back there, Swift, I
really thought this place was getting to you."

�It isnłt," I said. �Not remotely. And in any case, wełre
thinking many rooms ahead here, when we might not even be able to get through
the next."

�I agree," Childe said. �Wełll take it one at a time. Doctor
Trintignant, put your wilder fantasies aside, at least for now."

�Consider them relegated to mere daydreams," Trintignant
said.

So we pushed on.

Now that we had passed through so many doors, it was possible
to see that the Spirełs tasks came in waves; that there might, for instance, be
a series of problems which depended on prime number theory, followed by another
series which hinged on the properties of higher-dimensional solids. For several
rooms in sequence we were confronted by questions related to tiling
patternstessellationswhile another sequence tested our understanding of
cellular automata: odd chequerboard armies of shapes which obeyed simple rules
and yet interacted in stunningly complex ways. The final challenge in each set
would always be the hardest; the one where we were most likely to make a
mistake. We were quite prepared to take three or four hours to pass each door,
if that was the time it took to be certainin Celestinełs mind at leastthat
the answer was clear.

And though the shunts were leaching fatigue poisons from our
blood, and though the modifiers were enabling us to think with a clarity we had
never known before, a kind of exhaustion always crept over us after solving one
of the harder challenges. It normally passed in a few tens of minutes, but
until then we generally waited before venturing through the now open door,
gathering our strength again.

In those quiet minutes we spoke amongst ourselves,
discussing what had happened and what we could expect.

�Itłs happened again," I said, addressing Celestine on the
private channel.

Her answer came back, no more terse than I had expected. �What?"

�For a while the rest of us could keep up with you. Even
Hirz. Or, if not keep up, then at least not lose sight of you completely. But
youłre pulling ahead again, arenłt you? Those Juggler routines are kicking in
again."

She took her time replying. �You have Childełs medichines."

�Yes. But all they can do is work with the basic neural
topology, suppressing and enhancing activity without altering the layout of the
connections in any significant way. And the ęchines are broad-spectrum; not
tuned specifically to any one of us."

Celestine looked at the only one of us still wearing one of
the original suits. �They worked on Hirz."

�Must have been luck. But yes, youłre right. She couldnłt
see as far as you, though, even with the modifiers."

Celestine tapped the shunt in her wrist, still faintly
visible beneath the tight-fitting fabric of her suit. �I took a spike of the modifiers
as well."

�I doubt that it gave you much of an edge over what you already
had."

�Maybe not." She paused. �Is there a point to this
conversation, Richard?"

�Not really," I said, stung by her response. �I just ..."

�Wanted to talk, yes."

�And you donłt?"

�You can hardly blame me if I donłt, can you? This isnłt
exactly the place for small talk, let alone with someone who chose to have me
erased from his memory."

�Would it make any difference if I said I was sorry about
that?"

I could tell from the tone of her response that my answer
had not been quite the one she was expecting. �Itłs easy to say youłre sorry,
now ... now that it suits you to say as much. Thatłs not how you felt at the
time, is it?"

I fumbled for an answer which was not too distant from the
truth. �Would you believe me if I said Iłd had you suppressed because I still
loved you, and not for any other reason?"

�Thatłs just a little too convenient, isnłt it?"

�But not necessarily a lie. And can you blame me for it? We
were in love, Celestine. You canłt deny that. Just because things happened
between us ..." A question I had been meaning to ask her forced itself to the
front of my mind. �Why didnłt you contact me again, after you were told you
couldnłt go to Resurgam?"

�Our relationship was over, Richard."

�But wełd parted on reasonably amicable terms. If the Resurgam
expedition hadnłt come up, we might not have parted at all."

Celestine sighed; one of exasperation. �Well, since you
asked, I did try and contact you."

�You did?"

�But by the time Iłd made my mind up, I learned about the
way youłd had me suppressed. How do you imagine that made me feel, Richard?
Like a small, disposable part of your pastsomething to be wadded up and
flicked away when it offended you?"

�It wasnłt like that at all. I never thought Iłd see you
again."

She snorted. �And maybe you wouldnłt have, if it wasnłt for
dear old Roland Childe."

I kept my voice level. �He asked me along because we both
used to test each other with challenges like this. I presume he needed someone
with your kind of Juggler transform. Childe wouldnłt have cared about our past."

Her eyes flashed behind the visor of her helmet. �And you
donłt care either, do you?"

�About Childełs motives? No. Theyłre neither my concern nor
my interest. All that bothers me now is this."

I patted the Spirełs thrumming floor.

�Therełs more here than meets the eye, Richard."

�What do you mean by that?"

�Havenłt you noticed how" She looked at me for several
seconds, as if on the verge of revealing something, then shook her head. �Never
mind."

�What, for pityłs sake?"

�Doesnłt it strike you that Childe has been just a little
too well prepared?"

�I wouldnłt say therełs any such thing as being too well prepared
for a thing like Blood Spire, Celestine."

�Thatłs not what I mean." She fingered the fabric of her skintight.
�These suits, for instance. How did he know we wouldnłt be able to go all the
way with the larger ones?"

I shrugged, a gesture that was now perfectly visible. �I donłt
know. Maybe he learned a few things from Argyle, before he died."

�Then what about Doctor Trintignant? That ghoul isnłt remotely
interested in solving the Spire. He hasnłt contributed to a single problem yet.
And yet hełs already proved his value, hasnłt he?"

�I donłt follow."

Celestine rubbed her shunt. �These things. And the neural
modifiersTrintignant supervised their installation. And I havenłt even
mentioned Forquerayłs arm, or the medical equipment aboard the shuttle."

�I still donłt see what youłre getting at."

�I donłt know what leverage Childełs used to get his cooperationitłs
got to be more than bribery or avaricebut I have a very, very nasty idea. And
all of it points to something even more disturbing."

I was wearying of this. With the challenge of the next door
ahead of us, the last thing I needed was paranoiac theory-mongering.

�Which is?"

�Childe knows too much about this place."

Another room, another wrong answer, another punishment.

It made the last look like a minor reprimand. I remembered a
swift metallic flicker of machines emerging from hatches which opened in the
seamless walls: not javelins now, but jointed, articulated pincers and
viciously curved scissors. I remembered high-pressure jets of vivid arterial
blood spraying the room like pink banners, the shards of shattered bone hammering
against the walls like shrapnel. I remembered an unwanted and brutal lesson in
the anatomy of the human body; the elegance with which muscle, bone and sinew
were anchored to each other and the horrid ease with which they could be
flensed apartfilletedby surgically sharp metallic instruments.

I remembered screams.

I remembered indescribable pain, before the analgesics
kicked in.

Afterwards, when we had time to think about what had happened,
I do not think any of us thought of blaming Celestine for making another
mistake. Childełs modifiers had given us a healthy respect for the difficulty
of what she was doing, andas beforeher second choice had been the correct
one; the one that opened a route back to the Spirełs exit.

And besides ...

Celestine had suffered as well.

It was Forqueray who had caught the worst of it, though. Perhaps
the Spire, having tasted his blood once, had decided it wanted much more of
itmore than could be provided by the sacrifice of a mere limb. It had
quartered him: two quick opposed snips with the nightmarish scissors; a
bisection followed an instant later by a hideous transection.

Four pieces of Forqueray had thudded to the Spirełs floor;
his interior organs were laid open like a wax model in a medical school.
Various machines nestled neatly amongst his innards, sliced along the same
planes. What remained of him spasmed once or twice, thenwith the exception of
his replacement arm, which continued to twitchhe was mercifully still. A
moment or two passed, and thenwith whiplash speedjointed arms seized his
pieces and pulled him into the wall, leaving slick red skidmarks.

Forquerayłs death would have been bad enough, but by then
the Spire was already inflicting further punishment.

I saw Celestine drop to the ground, one arm pressed around
the stump of another, blood spraying from the wound despite the pressure she
was applying. Through her visor her face turned ghostly.

Childełs right hand was missing all the fingers. He pressed
the ruined hand against his chest, grimacing, but managed to stay on his feet.

Trintignant had lost a leg. But there was no blood gushing
from the wound; no evidence of severed muscle and bone. I saw only damaged
mechanisms; twisted and snapped steel and plastic armatures; buzzing cables and
stuttering optic fibers; interrupted feedlines oozing sickly green fluids.

Trintignant, nonetheless, fell to the floor.

I also felt myself falling, looking down to see that my
right leg ended just below the knee; realizing that my own blood was hosing out
in a hard scarlet stream. I hit the floorthe pain of the injury having yet to
reach my brainand reached out in reflex for the stump. But only one hand
presented itself; my left arm had been curtailed neatly above the wrist. In my
peripheral vision I saw my detached hand, still gloved, perched on the floor
like an absurd white crab.

Pain flowered in my skull.

I screamed.

Six

�Iłve had enough of this shit," Hirz said.

Childe looked up at her from his recovery couch. �Youłre leaving
us?"

�Damn right I am."

�You disappoint me."

�Fine, but Iłm still shipping out."

Childe stroked his forehead, tracing its shape with the new
steel gauntlet Trintignant had attached to his arm. �If anyone should be
quitting, it isnłt you, Hirz. You walked out of the Spire without a scratch. Look
at the rest of us."

�Thanks, but Iłve just had my dinner."

Trintignant lifted his silver mask towards her. �Now there
is no call for that. I admit the replacements I have fashioned here possess a
certain brutal esth�tique, but in functional terms they are without equal." As
if to demonstrate his point, he flexed his own replacement leg.

It was a replacement, rather than simply the old one
salvaged, repaired and reattached. Hirzwho had picked up as many pieces of us
as she could managehad never found the other part of Trintignant. Nor had an
examination of the area around the Spirewhere we had found the pieces of
Forquerayrevealed any significant part of the Doctor. The Spire had allowed us
to take back Forquerayłs arm after it had been severed, but it appeared to have
decided to keep all metallic things for itself.

I stood up from my own couch, testing the way my new leg
supported my weight. There was no denying the excellence of Trintignantłs work.
The prosthesis had interfaced with my existing nervous system so perfectly that
I had already accepted the leg into my body image. When I walked on it I did so
with only the tiniest trace of a limp, and that would surely vanish once I had
grown accustomed to the replacement.

�I could take the other one off as well," Trintignant piped,
rubbing his hands together. �Then you would have perfect neural equilibrium ...
shall I do it?"

�You want to, donłt you?"

�I admit I have always been offended by asymmetry."

I felt my other leg; the flesh and blood one that now felt
so vulnerable, so unlikely to last the course.

�Youłll just have to be patient," I said.

�Well, all things come to he who waits. And how is the arm
doing?"

Like Childe, I now boasted one steel gauntlet instead of a
hand. I flexed it, hearing the tiny, shrill whine of actuators. When I touched
something I felt prickles of sensation; the hand was capable of registering
subtle gradations of warmth or coldness. Celestinełs replacement was very
similar, although sleeker and somehow more feminine. At least our injuries had
demanded as much, I thought; unlike Childe, who had lost only his fingers, but
who had appeared to welcome more of the Doctorłs gleaming handiwork than was
strictly necessary.

�Itłll do," I said, remembering how much Forqueray had irritated
the Doctor with the same remark.

�Donłt you get it?" Hirz said. �If Trintignant had his way,
youłd be like him by now. Christ only knows where hełll stop."

Trintignant shrugged. �I merely repair what the Spire damages."

�Yeah. The two of you make a great team, Doc." She looked at
him with an expression of pure loathing. �Well, sorry, but youłre not getting
your hands on me."

Trintignant appraised her. �No great loss, when there is so
little raw material with which to work."

�Screw you, creep."

Hirz left the room.

�Looks like she means it when she says shełs quitting," I
said, breaking the silence that ensued.

Celestine nodded. �I canłt say I entirely blame her, either."

�You donłt?" Childe asked.

�No. Shełs right. This whole thing is in serious danger of
turning into some kind of sick exercise in self-mutilation." Celestine looked
at her own steel hand, not quite masking her own revulsion. �What will it take,
Childe? What will we turn into by the time we beat this thing?"

He shrugged. �Nothing that canłt be reversed."

�But maybe by then we wonłt want it reversed, will we?"

�Listen, Celestine." Childe propped himself against a
bulkhead. �What wełre doing here is trying to beat an elemental thing. Reach
its summit, if you will. In that respect Blood Spire isnłt very different to a
mountain. It punishes us when we make mistakes, but then so do mountains.
Occasionally, it kills. More often than not it leaves us only with a reminder
of what it can do. Blood Spire snips off a finger or two. A mountain achieves
the same effect with frostbite. Wherełs the difference?"

�A mountain doesnłt enjoy doing it, for a start. But the
Spire does. Itłs alive, Childe, living and breathing."

�Itłs a machine, thatłs all."

�But maybe a cleverer one than anything wełve ever known
before. A machine with a taste for blood, too. Thatłs not a great combination,
Childe."

He sighed. �Then youłre giving up as well?"

�I didnłt say that."

�Fine."

He stepped through the door which Hirz had just used.

�Where are you going?" I said.

�To try and talk some sense into her, thatłs all."

Seven

Ten hours laterbuzzing with unnatural alertness; the need
for sleep a distant, fading memorywe returned to Blood Spire.

�What did he say to make you come back?" I said to Hirz, between
one of the challenges.

�What do you think?"

�Just a wild stab in the dark, but did he by any chance up
your cut?"

�Letłs just say the terms were renegotiated. Call it a performance-related
bonus."

I smiled. �Then calling you a mercenary wasnłt so far off
the mark, was it?"

�Sticks and stones may break my bones ... sorry. Given the
circumstances, thatłs not in the best possible good taste, is it?"

�Never mind."

We were struggling out of our suits now. Several rooms
earlier we had reached a point where it was impossible to squeeze through the
door without first disconnecting our airlines and removing our backpacks. We
could have done without the packs, of course, but none of us wanted to breathe
Spire air until it was absolutely necessary. And we would still need the packs
to make our retreat, back through the unpressurized rooms. So we kept hold of
them as we wriggled between rooms, fearful of letting go. We had seen the way
the Spire harvested first Forquerayłs drone and then Trintignantłs leg, and it
was likely it would do the same with our equipment if we left it unattended.

�Why are you doing it, then?" asked Hirz.

�It certainly isnłt the money," I said.

�No. I figured that part out. What, then?"

�Because itłs there. Because Childe and I go back a long
way, and I canłt stand to give up on a challenge once Iłve accepted it."

�Old-fashioned bullheadedness, in other words," Celestine
said.

Hirz was putting on a helmet and backpack assembly for the
first time. She had just been forced to get out of her original suit and put on
one of the skintights; even her small frame was now too large to pass through
the constricted doors. Childe had attached some additional armor to her
skintightscablike patches of flexible woven diamondbut she must have felt
more vulnerable.

I answered Celestine. �What about you, if it isnłt the same
thing that keeps me coming back?"

�I want to solve the problems, thatłs all. For you theyłre
just a means to an end, but for me theyłre the only thing of interest."

I felt slighted, but she was right. The nature of the challenges
was less important to me than discovering what was at the summit; the secret
the Spire so jealously guarded.

�And youłre hoping that through the problems they set us youłll
eventually understand the Spirełs makers?"

�Not just that. I mean, thatłs a significant part of it, but
I also want to know what my own limitations are."

�You mean you want to explore the gift that the Jugglers
have given you?" Before she had time to answer I continued, �I understand. And
itłs never been possible before, has it? Youłve only ever been able to test
yourself against problems set by other humans. You could never map the limits
of your ability; any more than a lion could test its strength against paper."

She looked around her. �But now Iłve met something that
tests me."

�And?"

Celestine smiled thinly. �Iłm not sure I like it."

We did not speak again until we had traversed half a dozen
new rooms, and then rested while the shunts mopped up the excess of tiredness
which came after such efforts.

The mathematical problems had now grown so arcane that I
could barely describe them, let alone grope my way towards a solution.
Celestine had to do most of the thinking, therefore, but the emotional strain
which we all felt was just as wearying. For an hour during the rest period I
teetered on the edge of sleep, but then alertness returned like a pale, cold
dawn. There was something harsh and clinical about that state of mindit did
not feel completely normalbut it enabled us to get the job done, and that was
all that mattered.

We continued, passing the seventieth roomfifteen further
than we had reached before. We were now at least sixty meters higher than when
we had entered, and for a while it looked like we had found a tempo that suited
us. It was a long time since Celestine had shown any hesitation in her answers,
even if it took a couple of hours for her to reach the solution. It was as if
she had found the right way of thinking, and now none of the challenges felt
truly alien to her. For a while, as we passed room after room, a dangerous
optimism began to creep over us.

It was a mistake.

In the seventy-first room, the Spire began to enforce a new
rule. Celestine, as usual, spent at least twenty minutes studying the problem,
skating her fingers over the shallowly etched markings on the frame, her lips
moving silently as she mouthed possibilities.

Childe studied her with a peculiar watchfulness I had not observed
before.

�Any ideas?" he said, looking over her shoulder.

�Donłt crowd me, Childe. Iłm thinking."

�I know, I know. Just try and do it a little faster, thatłs
all."

Celestine turned away from the frame. �Why? Are we on a
schedule suddenly?"

�Iłm just a little concerned about the amount of time itłs
taking us, thatłs all." He stroked the bulge on his forearm. �These shunts arenłt
perfect, and"

�Therełs something else, isnłt there?"

�Donłt worry. Just concentrate on the problem."

But this time the punishment began before we had begun our
solution.

It was lenient, I suppose, compared to the savage dismembering
that had concluded our last attempt to reach the summit. It was more of a stern
admonishment to make our selection; the crack of a whip rather than the swish
of a guillotine.

Something popped out of the wall and dropped to the floor.

It looked like a metal ball, about the size of a marble. For
several seconds it did nothing at all. We all stared at it, knowing that
something unpleasant was going to happen, but unsure what.

Then the ball trembled, andwithout deforming in any
waybounced itself off the ground to knee-height.

It hit the ground and bounced again; a little higher this
time.

�Celestine," Childe said, �I strongly suggest that you come
to a decision"

Horrified, Celestine forced her attention back to the puzzle
marked on the frame. The ball continued bouncing; reaching higher each time.

�I donłt like this," Hirz said.

�Iłm not exactly thrilled by it myself," Childe told her,
watching as the ball hit the ceiling and slammed back to the floor, landing to
one side of the place where it had begun its bouncing.

This time its rebound was enough to make it hit the ceiling
again, and on the recoil it streaked diagonally across the room, hitting one of
the side walls before glancing off at a different angle. The ball slammed into
Trintignant, ricocheting off his metal leg, and then connected with the walls
twicegaining speed with each collisionbefore hitting me in the chest. The
force of it was like a hard punch, driving the air from my lungs.

I fell to the ground, emitting a groan of discomfort.

The little ball continued arcing around the room, its
momentum not sapped in any appreciable way. It kept getting faster, in fact, so
that its trajectory came to resemble a constantly shifting silver loom which
occasionally intersected with one of us. I heard groans, and then felt a sudden
pain in my leg, and the ball kept on getting faster. The sound it made was like
a fusillade of gunshots, the space between each detonation growing smaller.

Childe, who had been hit himself, shouted: �Celestine! Make
your choice!"

The ball chose that moment to slam into her, making her gasp
in pain. She buckled down on one knee, but in the process reached out and
palmed one of the markings on the right side of the frame.

The gunshot soundsthe silver loomeven the ball
itselfvanished.

Nothing happened for several more seconds, and then the door
ahead of us began to open.

We inspected our injuries. There was nothing
life-threatening, but we had all been bruised badly, and it was likely that a
bone or two had been fractured. I was sure I had broken a rib, and Childe
grimaced when he tried to put weight on his right ankle. My leg felt tender
where the ball had struck me, but I could still walk, and after a few minutes
the pain abated, soothed by a combination of my own medichines and the shuntłs
analgesics.

�Thank God wełd put the helmets back on," I said, fingering
a deep bump in the crown. �Wełd have been pulped otherwise."

�Would someone please tell me what just happened?" Celestine
asked, inspecting her own wounds.

�I guess the Spire thought we were taking too long," Childe
said. �Itłs given us as long as we like to solve the problems until now, but
from now on it looks like wełll be up against the clock."

Hirz said: �And how long did we have?"

�After the last door opened? Forty minutes or so."

�Forty-three, to be precise," Trintignant said.

�I strongly suggest we start work on the next door," Childe
said. �How long do you think we have, Doctor?"

�As an upper limit? In the region of twenty-eight minutes."

�Thatłs nowhere near enough time," I said. �Wełd better retreat
and come back."

�No," Childe said. �Not until wełre injured."

�Youłre insane," Celestine said.

But Childe ignored her. He just stepped through the door,
into the next room. Behind us the exit door slammed shut.

�Not insane," he said, turning back to us. �Just very eager
to continue."

It was never the same thing twice.

Celestine made her selection as quickly as she could, every
muscle tense with concentration, and that gave usby Trintignantłs
estimationfive or six clear minutes before the Spire would demand an answer.

�Wełll wait it out," Childe said, eyeing us all to see if
anyone disagreed. �Celestine can keep checking her results. Therełs no sense in
giving the fucking thing an answer before we have to; not when so much is at
stake."

�Iłm sure of the answer," Celestine said, pointing to the
part of the frame she would eventually palm.

�Then take five minutes to clear your head. Whatever. Just
donłt make the choice until wełre forced into it."

�If we get through this room, Childe ..."

�Yes?"

�Iłm going back. You canłt stop me."

�You wonłt do it, Celestine, and you know it."

She glared at him, but said nothing. I think what followed
was the longest five minutes in my life. None of us dared speak again,
unwilling to begin anythingeven a wordfor fear that something like the ball
would return. All I heard for five minutes was our own breathing; backgrounded
by the awful slow thrumming of the Spire itself.

Then something slithered out of one wall.

It hit the floor, writhing. It was an inch-thick,
three-meter-long length of flexible metal.

�Back off ..." Childe told us.

Celestine looked over her shoulder. �You want me to press
this, or not?"

�On my word. Not a moment before."

The cable continued writhing: flexing, coiling and uncoiling
like a demented eel. Childe stared at it, fascinated. The writhing grew in
strength, accompanied by the slithering, hissing sounds of metal on metal.

�Childe?" Celestine asked.

�I just want to see what this thing actually"

The cable flexed and writhed, and then propelled itself
rapidly across the floor in Childełs direction. He hopped nimbly out of the
way, the cable passing under his feet. The writhing had become a continuous
whipcracking now, and we all pressed ourselves against the walls. The
cablehaving missed Childeretreated to the middle of the room and hissed
furiously. It looked much longer and thinner than it had a moment ago, as if it
had elongated itself.

�Childe," Celestine said, �Iłm making the choice in five
seconds, whether you like it or not."

�Wait, will you?"

The cable moved with blinding speed now, rearing up so that
its motion was no longer confined to a few inches above the floor. Its writhing
was so fast that it took on a quasi-solidity: an irregularly shaped pillar of
flickering, whistling metal. I looked at Celestine, willing her to palm the
frame, no matter what Childe said. I appreciated his fascinationthe thing was
entrancing to look atbut I suspected he was pushing curiosity slightly too
far.

�Celestine ..." I started saying.

But what happened next happened with lightning speed: a silver-grey
tentacle of the blura thin loop of the cablewhipped out to form a double coil
around Celestinełs arm. It was the one Trintignant had already worked on. She
looked at it in horror; the cable tightened itself and snipped the arm off.
Celestine slumped to the floor, screaming.

The tentacle tugged her arm to the center of the room,
retreating back into the hissing, flickering pillar of whirling metal.

I dashed for the door, remembering the symbol she had pressed.
The whirl reached a loop out to me, but I threw myself against the wall and the
loop merely brushed the chest of my suit before flicking back into the mass.
From the whirl, tiny pieces of flesh and bone dribbled to the ground. Then
another loop flicked out and snared Hirz, wrapping around her midsection and
pulling her towards the center.

She struggledcartwheeling her arms, her feet skidding
against the floorbut it was no good. She started shouting, and then screaming.

I reached the door.

My hand hesitated over the markings. Was I remembering accurately,
or had Celestine intended to press a different solution? They all looked so
similar now.

Then Celestine, who was still clutching her ruined arm,
nodded emphatically.

I palmed the door.

I stared at it, willing it to move. After all this, what if
her choice had been wrong? The Spire seemed to draw out the moment sadistically
while behind me I continued to hear the frantic hissing of the whirling cable.
And something else, which I preferred not to think about.

Suddenly the noise stopped.

In my peripheral vision I saw the cable retreating back into
the wall, like a snakełs tongue laden with scent.

Before me, the door began to open.

Celestinełs choice had been correct. I examined my state of
mind and decided that I ought to be feeling relief. And perhaps, distantly, I
did. At least now we would have a clear route back out of the Spire. But we
would not be going forward, and I knew not all of us would be leaving.

I turned around, steeling myself against what I was about to
see.

Childe and Trintignant were undamaged.

Celestine was already attending to her injury, fixing a
tourniquet from her medical kit above the point where her arm ended. She had
lost very little blood, and did not appear to be in very much discomfort.

�Are you all right?" I said.

�Iłll make it out, Richard." She grimaced, tugging the tourniquet
tighter. �Which is more than can be said for Hirz."

�Where is she?"

�It got her."

With her good hand, Celestine pointed to the place where the
whirl had been only moments before. On the floorjust below the volume of air
where the cable had hovered and thrashedlay a small, neat pile of flailed
human tissue.

�Therełs no sign of Celestinełs hand," I said. �Or Hirzłs
suit."

�It pulled her apart," Childe said, his face drained of
blood.

�Where is she?"

�It was very fast. There was just a ... blur. It pulled her
apart and then the parts disappeared into the walls. I donłt think she could
have felt much."

�I hope to God she didnłt."

Doctor Trintignant stooped down and examined the pieces.

Eight

Outside, in the long, steely-shadowed light of what was
either dusk or dawn, we found the pieces of Hirz for which the Spire had had no
use.

They were half-buried in dust, like the bluffs and arches of
some ancient landscape rendered in miniature. My mind played gruesome tricks
with the shapes, turning them from brutally detached pieces of human anatomy
into abstract sculptures: jointed formations that caught the light in a certain
way and cast their own pleasing shadows. Though some pieces of fabric remained,
the Spire had retained all the metallic parts of her suit for itself. Even her
skull had been cracked open and sucked dry, so that the Spire could winnow the
few small precious pieces of metal she carried in her head.

And what it could not use, it had thrown away.

�We canłt just leave her here," I said. �Wełve got to do something,
bury her ... at least put up some kind of marker."

�Shełs already got one," Childe said.

�What?"

�The Spire. And the sooner we get back to the shuttle, the
sooner we can fix Celestine and get back to it."

�A moment, please," Trintignant said, fingering through another
pile of human remains.

�Those arenłt anything to do with Hirz," Childe said.

Trintignant rose to his feet, slipping something into his
suitłs utility belt pocket in the process.

Whatever it had been was small; no larger than a marble or
small stone.

�Iłm going home," Celestine said, when we were back in the
safely of the shuttle. �And before you try and talk me out of it, thatłs final."

We were alone in her quarters. Childe had just given up
trying to convince her to stay, but he had sent me in to see if I could be more
persuasive. My heart, however, was not in it. I had seen what the Spire could
do, and I was damned if I was going to be responsible for any blood other than
my own.

�At least let Trintignant take care of your hand," I said.

�I donłt need steel now," she said, stroking the glistening
blue surgical sleeve which terminated her arm. �I can manage without a hand
until wełre back in Chasm City. They can grow me a new one while Iłm sleeping."

The Doctorłs musical voice interrupted us, Trintignantłs impassive
silver mask poking through into Celestinełs bubble-tent partition. �If I may be
so bold ... it may be that my services are the best you can now reasonably hope
to attain."

Celestine looked at Childe, and then at the Doctor, and then
at the glistening surgical sleeve.

�What are you talking about?"

�Nothing. Only some news from home which Childe has allowed
me to see." Uninvited, Trintignant stepped fully into the room and sealed the
partition behind him.

�What, Doctor?"

�Rather disturbing news, as it happens. Not long after our departure,
something upsetting happened to Chasm City. A blight which afflicted everything
contingent upon any microscopic, self-replicating system. Nanotechnology, in
other words. I gather the fatalities were numbered in the millions ..."

�You donłt have to sound so bloody cheerful about it."

Trintignant navigated to the side of the couch where Celestine
was resting. �I merely stress the point that what we consider state of the art
medicine may be somewhat beyond the cityłs present capabilities. Of course,
much may change before our return ..."

�Then Iłll just have to take that risk, wonłt I?" Celestine
said.

�On your own head be it." Trintignant paused and placed
something small and hard on Celestinełs table. Then he turned as if to leave,
but stopped and spoke again. �I am accustomed to it, you know."

�Used to what?" I said.

�Fear and revulsion. Because of what I have become, and what
I have done. But I am not an evil man. Perverse, yes. Given to peculiar
desires, most certainly. But emphatically not a monster."

�What about your victims, Doctor?"

�I have always maintained that they gave consent for the procedures
I inflicted" he corrected himself �performed upon them."

�Thatłs not what the records say."

�And who are we to argue with records?" The light played on
his mask in such a fashion as to enhance the half-smile that was always there. �Who
are we, indeed."

When Trintignant was gone, I turned to Celestine and said, �Iłm
going back into the Spire. You realize that, donłt you?"

�Iłd guessed, but I still hope I can talk you out of it."
With her good hand, she fingered the small, hard thing Trintignant had placed
on the table. It looked like a misshapen dark stonewhatever the Doctor had
found amongst the deadand for a moment I wondered why he had left it behind.

Then I said, �I really donłt think therełs much point. Itłs
between me and Childe now. He must have known that therełd come a point when I
wouldnłt be able to turn away."

�No matter what the costs?" Celestine asked.

�Nothingłs without a little risk."

She shook her head, slowly and wonderingly. �He really got
to you, didnłt he."

�No," I said, feeling a perverse need to defend my old
friend, even when I knew that what Celestine said was perfectly true. �It wasnłt
Childe, in the end. It was the Spire."

�Please, Richard. Think carefully, wonłt you?"

I said I would. But we both knew it was a lie.

Nine

Childe and I went back.

I gazed up at it, towering over us like some brutal
cenotaph. I saw it with astonishing, diamond-hard clarity. It was as if a smoky
veil had been lifted from my vision, permitting thousands of new details and
nuances of hue and shade to blast through. Only the tiniest, faintest hint of
pixelationseen whenever I changed my angle of view too sharplybetrayed the
fact that this was not quite normal vision, but a cybernetic augmentation.

Our eyes had been removed, the sockets scrubbed and packed
with far more efficient sensory devices, wired back into our visual cortices.
Our eyeballs waited back at the shuttle, floating in jars like grotesque
delicacies. They could be popped back in when we had conquered the Spire.

�Why not goggles?" I said when Trintignant had first
explained his plans.

�Too bulky, and too liable to be snatched away. The Spire
has a definite taste for metal. From now on, anything vital had better be
carried as part of usnot just worn, but internalized." The Doctor steepled his
silver fingers. �If that repulses you, I suggest you concede defeat now."

�Iłll decide what repulses me," I said.

�What else?" Childe said. �Without Celestine wełll need to
crack those problems ourselves."

�I will increase the density of medichines in your brains,"
Trintignant said. �They will weave a web of fullerene tubes, artificial
neuronal connections supplanting your existing synaptic topology."

�What good will that do?"

�The fullerene tubes will conduct nerve signals hundreds of
times more rapidly than your existing synaptic pathways. Your neural
computation rate will increase. Your subjective sense of elapsed time will
slow."

I stared at the Doctor, horrified and fascinated at the same
time. �You can do that?"

�Itłs actually rather trivial. The Conjoiners have being
doing it since the Transenlightenment, and their methods are well documented.
With them I can make time slow to a subjective crawl. The Spire may give you
only twenty minutes to solve a room, but I can make it feel like several hours;
even one or two days."

I turned to Childe. �You think thatłll be enough?"

�I think itłll be a lot better than nothing, but wełll see."

But it was better than that.

Trintignantłs machines did more than just supplant our
existing and clumsily slow neural pathways. They reshaped them, configuring the
topology to enhance mathematical prowess, which took us onto a plateau beyond
what the neural modifiers had been capable of doing. We lacked Celestinełs
intuitive brilliance, but we had the advantage of being able to spend
longersubjectively, at leaston a given problem.

And, for a while at least, it worked.

Ten

�Youłre turning into a monster," she said.

I answered, �Iłm turning into whatever it takes to beat the
Spire."

I stalked away from the shuttle, moving on slender,
articulated legs like piston-driven stilts. I no longer needed armor now: Trintignant
had grafted it to my skin. Tough black plaques slid over each other like the
carapacial segments of a lobster.

�You even sound like Trintignant now," Celestine said, following
me. I watched her asymmetric shadow loom next to mine: she lopsided; me a thin,
elongated wraith.

�I canłt help that," I said, my voice piping from the speech
synthesizer that replaced my sealed-up mouth.

�You can stop. It isnłt too late."

�Not until Childe stops."

�And then? Will even that be enough to make you give up, Richard?"

I turned to face her. Behind her faceplate I watched her try
to conceal the revulsion she obviously felt.

�He wonłt give up," I said.

Celestine held out her hand. At first I thought she was
beckoning me, but then I saw there was something in her palm. Small, dark and
hard.

�Trintignant found this outside, by the Spire. Itłs what he
left in my room. I think he was trying to tell us something. Trying to redeem
himself. Do you recognize it, Richard?"

I zoomed in on the object. Numbers flickered around it. Enhancement
phased in. Surface irregularity. Topological contours. Albedo. Likely
composition. I drank in the data like a drunkard.

Data was what I lived for now.

�No."

Eleven

�I can hear something."

�Of course you can. Itłs the Spire, the same as itłs always
been."

�No." I was silent for several moments, wondering whether my
augmented auditory system was sending false signals into my brain.

But there it was again: an occasional rumble of distant machinery,
but one that was coming closer.

�I hear it now," Childe said. �Itłs coming from behind us.
Along the way wełve come."

�It sounds like the doors opening and closing in sequence."

�Yes."

�Why would they do that?"

�Something must be coming through the rooms towards us."

Childe thought about that for what felt like minutes, but
was probably only a matter of actual seconds. Then he shook his head,
dismissively. �We have eleven minutes to get through this door, or wełll be
punished. We donłt have time to worry about anything extraneous."

Reluctantly, I agreed.

I forced my attention back to the puzzle, feeling the
machinery in my head pluck at the mathematical barbs of the problem. The
ferocious clockwork that Trintignant had installed in my skull spun giddily. I
had never understood mathematics with any great agility, but now I sensed it as
a hard grid of truth underlying everything: bones shining through the thin
flesh of the world.

It was almost the only thing I was now capable of thinking
of at all. Everything else felt painfully abstract, whereas before the opposite
had been the case. This, I knew, must be what it felt like to an idiot savant,
gifted with astonishing skill in one highly specialized field of human
expertise.

I had become a tool shaped so efficiently for one purpose
that it could serve no other.

I had become a machine for solving the Spire.

Now that we were aloneand no longer reliant on
CelestineChilde had revealed himself as a more than adequately capable
problem-solver. Several times I had found myself staring at a problem, with
even my new mathematical skills momentarily unable to crack the solution, when
Childe had seen the answer. Generally he was able to articulate the reasoning
behind his choice, but sometimes there was nothing for it but for me to either
accept his judgement or wait for my own sluggard thought processes to arrive at
the same conclusion.

And I began to wonder.

Childe was brilliant now, but I sensed there was more to it
than the extra layers of cognitive machinery Trintignant had installed. He was
so confident now that I began to wonder if he had merely been holding back
before, preferring to let the rest of us make the decisions. If that was the
case, he was in some way responsible for the deaths that had already happened.

But, I reminded myself, we had all volunteered.

With three minutes to spare, the door eased open, revealing
the room beyond. At the same moment the door we had come through opened as
well, as it always did at this point. We could leave now, if we wished. At this
time, as had been the case with every room we had passed through, Childe and I
made a decision on whether to proceed further or not. There was always the
danger that the next room would be the one that killed usand every second that
we spent before stepping through the doorway meant one second less available
for cracking the next problem.

�Well?" I said.

His answer came back, clipped and automatic. �Onwards."

�We only had three minutes to spare on this one, Childe.
Theyłre getting harder now. A hell of a lot harder."

�Iłm fully aware of that."

�Then maybe we should retreat. Gather our strength and
return. Wełll lose nothing by doing so."

�You canłt be sure of that. You donłt know that the Spire
will keep letting us make these attempts. Perhaps itłs already tiring of us."

�I still"

But I stopped, my new, wasp-waisted body flexing easily at
the approach of a footfall.

My visual system scanned the approaching object, resolving
it into a figure, stepping over the threshold from the previous room. It was a
human figure, but one that had, admittedly, undergone some alterationsalthough
none that were as drastic as those that Trintignant had wrought on me. I
studied the slow, painful way she made her progress. Our own movements seemed
slow, but were lightning-fast by comparison.

I groped for a memory; a name; a face.

My mind, clotted with routines designed to smash mathematics,
could not at first retrieve such mundane data.

Finally, however, it obliged.

�Celestine," I said.

I did not actually speak. Instead, laser light stuttered
from the mass of sensors and scanners jammed into my eyesockets. Our minds now
ran too rapidly to communicate verbally, but, though she moved slowly herself,
she deigned to reply.

�Yes. Itłs me. Are you really Richard?"

�Why do you ask?"

�Because I can hardly tell the difference between you and
Childe."

I looked at Childe, paying proper attention to his shape for
what seemed the first time.

At last, after so many frustrations, Trintignant had been
given free rein to do with us as he wished. He had pumped our heads full of
more processing machinery, until our skulls had to be reshaped to accommodate
it, becoming sleekly elongated. He cracked our ribcages open and carefully
removed our lungs and hearts, putting these organs into storage. The space
vacated by one lung was replaced by a closed-cycle blood oxygenating system of
the kind carried in spacesuit backpacks, so that we could endure vacuum and had
no need to breathe ambient air. The other lungłs volume was filled by a device
which circulated refrigerated fluid along a loop of tube, draining the excess
heat generated by the stew of neural machines filling our heads. Nutrient
systems crammed the remaining thoracic spaces; our hearts were tiny
fusion-powered pumps. All other organsstomach, intestines, genitaliawere
removed, along with many bones and muscles. Our remaining limbs were detached
and put into storage, replaced by skeletal prosthetics of immense strength, but
which could fold and deform to enable us to squeeze through the tightest door.
Our bodies were encased in exoskeletal frames to which these limbs were
anchored. Finally, Trintignant gave us whiplike counterbalancing tails, and
then caused our skins to envelop our metal parts, hardening here and there in
lustrous grey patches of organic armor, woven from the same diamond mesh that
had been used to reinforce Hirzłs suit.

When he was done, we looked like diamond-hided greyhounds.

Diamond dogs.

I bowed my head. �I am Richard."

�Then for Godłs sake please come back."

�Why have you followed us?"

�To ask you. One final time."

�You changed yourself just to come after me?"

Slowly, with the stone grace of a statue, she extended a beckoning
hand. Her limbs, like ours, were mechanical, but her basic form was far less
canine.

�Please."

�You know I canłt go back now. Not when Iłve come so far."

Her answer was an eternity arriving. �You donłt understand,
Richard. This is not what it seems."

Childe turned his sleek, snouted face to mine.

�Ignore her," he said.

�No," Celestine said, who must have also been attuned to
Childełs laser signals. �Donłt listen to him, Richard. Hełs tricked and lied to
you all along. To all of us. Even to Trintignant. Thatłs why I came back."

�Shełs lying," Childe said.

�No. Iłm not. Havenłt you got it yet, Richard? Childełs been
here before. This isnłt his first visit to the Spire."

I convulsed my canine body in a shrug. �Nor mine."

�I donłt mean since we arrived on Golgotha. I mean before
that. Childełs been to this planet already."

�Shełs lying," Childe repeated.

�Then how did you know what to expect, in so much detail?"

�I didnłt. I was just prudent." He turned to me, so that
only I could read the stammer of his lasers. �We are wasting valuable time
here, Richard."

�Prudent?" Celestine said. �Oh yes; you were damned prudent.
Bringing along those other suits, so that when the first ones became too bulky
we could still go on. And Trintignanthow did you know hełd come in so handy?"

�I saw the bodies lying around the base of the Spire,"
Childe answered. �Theyłd been butchered by it."

�And?"

�I decided it would be good to have someone along who had
the medical aptitude to put right such injuries."

�Yes." Celestine nodded. �I donłt disagree with that. But
thatłs no more than part of the truth, is it?"

I looked at Childe and Celestine in turn. �Then what is the
whole truth?"

�Those bodies arenłt anything to do with Captain Argyle."

�Theyłre not?" I said.

�No." Celestinełs words arrived agonizingly slowly, and I began
to wish that Trintignant had turned her into a diamond-skinned dog as well. �No.
Because Argyle never existed. He was a necessary fictiona reason for Childe
knowing at least something about what the Spire entailed. But the truth ... well,
why donłt you tell us, Childe?"

�I donłt know what you want me to say."

Celestine smiled. �Only that the bodies are yours."

His tail flexed impatiently, brushing the floor. �I wonłt
listen to this."

�Then donłt. But Trintignant will tell you the same thing.
He guessed first, not me."

She threw something towards me.

I willed time to move more slowly. What she had thrown
curved lazily through the air, following a parabola. My mind processed its
course and extrapolated its trajectory with deadening precision.

I moved and opened my foreclaw to catch the falling thing.

�I donłt recognize it," I said.

�Trintignant must have thought you would."

I looked down at the thing, trying to see it anew. I
remembered the Doctor fishing amongst the bones around the Spirełs base;
placing something in one of his pockets. This hard, black, irregular, dully
pointed thing.

What was it?

I half remembered.

�There has to be more than this," I said.

�Of course there is," Celestine said. �The human
remainswith the exception of whatłs been added since we arrivedare all from
the same genetic individual. I know. Trintignant told me."

�That isnłt possible."

�Oh, it is. With cloning, itłs almost childłs play."

�This is nonsense," Childe said.

I turned to him now, feeling the faint ghost of an emotion
Trintignant had not completely excised. �Is it really?"

�Why would I clone myself?"

�Iłll answer for him," Celestine said. �He found this thing,
but long, long before he said he did. And he visited it, and set about
exploring it, using clones of himself."

I looked at Childe, expecting him to at least proffer some
shred of explanation. Instead, padding on all fours, he crossed into the next
room.

The door behind Celestine slammed shut like a steel eyelid.

Childe spoke to us from the next room. �My estimate is that
we have nine or ten minutes in which to solve the next problem. I am studying
it now and it strikes me as ... challenging, to say the least. Shall we adjourn
any further discussion of trivialities until wełre through?"

�Childe," I said. �You shouldnłt have done that. Celestine
wasnłt consulted ..."

�I assumed she was on the team."

Celestine stepped into the new room. �I wasnłt. At least, I
didnłt think I was. But it looks like I am now."

�Thatłs the spirit," Childe said. And I realized then where
I had seen the small, dark thing that Trintignant had retrieved from the
surface of Golgotha.

I might have been mistaken.

But it looked a lot like a devilłs horn.

Twelve

The problem was as elegant, Byzantine, multi-layered and potentially
treacherous as any we had encountered.

Simply looking at it sent my mind careering down avenues of
mathematical possibility, glimpsing deep connections between what I had always
assumed were theoretically distant realms of logical space. I could have stared
at it for hours, in a state of ecstatic transfixion. Unfortunately, we had to
solve it, not admire it. And we now had less than nine minutes.

We crowded around the door and for two or three minuteswhat
felt like two or three hoursnothing was said.

I broke the silence, when I sensed that I needed to think
about something else for a moment.

�Was Celestine right? Did you clone yourself?"

�Of course he did," she said. �He was exploring hazardous territory,
so hełd have been certain to bring the kind of equipment necessary to
regenerate organs."

Childe turned away from the problem. �That isnłt the same as
cloning equipment."

�Only because of artificially imposed safeguards," Celestine
answered. �Strip those away and you can clone to your heartłs content. Why
regenerate a single hand or arm when you can culture a whole body?"

�What good would that do me? All Iłd have done was make a
mindless copy of myself."

I said, �Not necessarily. With memory trawls and medichines,
you could go some way towards imprinting your personality and memory on any clone
you chose."

�Hełs right," Celestine said. �Itłs easy enough to rescript
memories. Richard should know."

Childe looked back at the problem, which was still as
fiercely intractable as when we had entered.

�Six minutes left," he said.

�Donłt change the fucking subject," Celestine said. �I want
Richard to know exactly what happened here."

�Why?" Childe said. �Do you honestly care what happens to
him? I saw that look of revulsion when you saw what wełd done to ourselves."

�Maybe you do revolt me," she said, nodding. �But I also
care about someone being manipulated."

�I havenłt manipulated anyone."

�Then tell him the truth about the clones. And the Spire,
for that matter."

Childe returned his attention to the door, evidently torn between
solving the problem and silencing Celestine. Less than six minutes now
remained, and though I had distracted myself, I had not come closer to grasping
the solution, or even seeing a hint of how to begin.

I snapped my attention back to Childe. �What happened with
the clones? Did you send them in, one by one, hoping to find a way into the
Spire for you?"

�No." He almost laughed at my failure to grasp the truth. �I
didnłt send them in ahead of me, Richard. Not at all. I sent them in after me."

�Sorry, but I donłt understand."

�I went in first, and the Spire killed me. But before I did
that, I trawled myself and installed those memories in a recently grown clone.
The clone wasnłt a perfect copy of me, by any meansit had some memories, and
some of my grosser personality traits, but it was under no illusions that it
was anything but a recently made construct." Childe looked back towards the
problem. �Look, this is all very interesting, but I really think"

�The problem can wait," Celestine said. �I think I see a solution,
in any case."

Childełs slender body stiffened in anticipation. �You do?"

�Just a hint of one, Childe. Keep your hackles down."

�We donłt have much time, Celestine. Iłd very much like to
hear your solution."

She looked at the pattern, smiling faintly. �Iłm sure you would.
Iłd also like to hear what happened to the clone."

I sensed him seethe with anger, then bring it under control.
�Itthe new mewent back into the Spire and attempted to make further progress
than its predecessor. Which it did, advancing several rooms beyond the point
where the old me died."

�What made it go in?" Celestine said. �It must have known it
would die in there as well."

�It thought it had a significantly better chance of survival
than the last one. It studied what had happened to the first victim and took
precautionsbetter armor; drugs to enhance mathematical skills; some crude
stabs at the medichine therapies we have been using."

�And?" I said. �What happened after that one died?"

�It didnłt die on its first attempt. Like us, it retreated
once it sensed it had gone as far as it reasonably could. Each time, it trawled
itselfmaking a copy of its memories. These were inherited by the next clone."

�I still donłt get it," I said. �Why would the clone care
what happened to the one after it?"

�Because ... it never expected to die. None of them did.
Call that a character trait, if you will."

�Overweening arrogance?" Celestine offered.

�Iłd prefer to think of it as a profound lack of self-doubt.
Each clone imagined itself better than its predecessor; incapable of making the
same errors. But they still wanted to be trawled, so thatin the unlikely event
that they were killedsomething would go on. So that, even if that particular
clone did not solve the Spire, it would still be something with my genetic heritage
that did. Part of the same lineage. Family, if you will." His tail flicked
impatiently. �Four minutes. Celestine ... are you ready now?"

�Almost, but not quite. How many clones were there, Childe?
Before you, I mean?"

�Thatłs a pretty personal question."

She shrugged. �Fine. Iłll just withhold my solution."

�Seventeen," Childe said. �Plus my original; the first one
to go in."

I absorbed this number; stunned at what it implied. �Then
youłre ... the nineteenth to try and solve the Spire?"

I think he would have smiled at that point, had it been
anatomically possible. �Like I said, I try and keep it in the family."

�Youłve become a monster," Celestine said, almost beneath
her breath.

It was hard not to see it that way as well. He had inherited
the memories from eighteen predecessors, all of whom had died within the Spirełs
pain-wracked chambers. It hardly mattered that he had probably never inherited
the precise moment of death; the lineage was no less monstrous for that small
mercy. And who was to say that some of his ancestor clones had not crawled out
of the Spire, horribly mutilated, dying, but still sufficiently alive to
succumb to one last trawl?

They said a trawl was all the sharper if it was performed at
the moment of death, when damage to the scanned mind mattered less.

�Celestinełs right," I said. �Youłve become something worse
than the thing you set out to beat."

Childe appraised me, those dense clusters of optics sweeping
over me like gun barrels. �Have you looked in a mirror lately, Richard? Youłre
not exactly the way nature intended, you know."

�This is just cosmetic," I said. �I still have my memories.
I havenłt allowed myself to become a" I faltered, my brain struggling with
vocabulary now that so much of it had been reassigned to the task of cracking
the Spire; �a perversion," I finished.

�Fine." Childe lowered his head; a posture of sadness and resignation.
�Then go back, if thatłs what you want. Let me stay to finish the challenge."

�Yes," I said. �I think I will. Celestine? Get us through
this door and Iłll come back with you. Wełll leave Childe to his bloody Spire."

Celestinełs sigh was one of heartfelt relief. �Thank God, Richard.
I didnłt think Iłd be able to convince you quite that easily."

I nodded towards the door, suggesting that she sketch out
what she thought was the likely solution. It still looked devilishly hard to
me, but now that I refocused my mind on it, I thought I began to see the
faintest hint of an approach, if not a full-blooded solution.

But Childe was speaking again. �Oh, you shouldnłt sound so
surprised," he said. �I always knew hełd turn back as soon as the going got
tough. Thatłs always been his way. I shouldnłt have deceived myself that hełd
have changed."

I bristled. �That isnłt true."

�Then why turn back when wełve come so far?"

�Because it isnłt worth it."

�Or is it simply that the problemłs become too difficult;
the challenge too great?"

�Ignore him," Celestine said. �Hełs just trying to goad you
into following him. Thatłs what this has always been about, hasnłt it, Childe?
You think you can solve the Spire, where eighteen previous versions of you have
failed. Where eighteen previous versions of you were butchered and flayed by
the thing." She looked around, almost as if she expected the Spire to punish
her for speaking so profanely. �And perhaps youłre right, too. Perhaps you really
have come closer than any of the others."

Childe said nothing, perhaps unwilling to contradict her.

�But simply beating the Spire wouldnłt be good enough," Celestine
said. �For youłd have no witnesses. No one to see how clever youłd been."

�That isnłt it at all."

�Then why did we all have to come here? You found Trintignant
useful, Iłll grant you that. And I helped you as well. But you could have done
without us, ultimately. It would have been bloodier, and you might have needed
to run off a few more clones ... but I donłt doubt that you could have done it."

�The solution, Celestine."

By my estimate we had not much more than two minutes left in
which to make our selection. And yet I sensed that it was time enough.
Magically, the problem had opened up before me where a moment ago it had been
insoluble; like one of those optical illusions which suddenly flip from one
state to another. The moment was as close to a religious experience as I cared
to come.

�Itłs all right," I said. �I see it now. Have you got it?"

�Not quite. Give me a moment ..." Childe stared at it, and I
watched as the lasers from his eyes washed over the labyrinthine engravings.
The red glare skittered over the wrong solution and lingered there. It
flickered away and alighted on the correct answer, but only momentarily.

Childe flicked his tail. �I think Iłve got it."

�Good," Celestine replied. �I agree with you. Richard? Are
you ready to make this unanimous?"

I thought I had misheard her, but I had not. She was saying
that Childełs answer was the right one; that the one I had been sure of was the
wrong one ...

�I thought ..." I began. Then, desperately, stared at the
problem again. Had I missed something? Childe had looked to have his doubts,
but Celestine was so certain of herself. And yet what I had glimpsed had
appeared beyond question. �I donłt know," I said weakly. �I donłt know."

�We havenłt time to debate it. Wełve got less than a minute."

The feeling in my belly was one of ice. Somehow, despite the
layers of humanity that had been stripped from me, I could still taste terror.
It was reaching me anyway; refusing to be daunted.

I felt so certain of my choice. And yet I was outnumbered.

�Richard?" Childe said again, more insistent this time.

I looked at the two of them, helplessly. �Press it," I said.

Childe placed his forepaw over the solution that he and Celestine
had agreed on, and pressed.

I think I knew, even before the Spire responded, that the
choice had not been the correct one. And yet when I looked at Celestine I saw
nothing resembling shock or surprise in her expression. Instead, she looked
completely calm and resigned.

And then the punishment commenced.

It was brutal, and once it would have killed us. Even with
the augmentations Trintignant had given us, the damage inflicted was
considerable as a scythe-tipped, triple-jointed pendulum descended from the
ceiling and began swinging in viciously widening arcs. Our minds might have
been able to compute the future position of a simpler pendulum, steering our
bodies out of its harmful path. But the trajectory of a jointed pendulum was
ferociously difficult to predict: a nightmarish demonstration of the
mathematics of chaos.

But we survived, as we had survived the previous attacks.
Even Celestine made it through, the flashing arc snipping off only one of her
arms. I lost an arm and leg on one side, and watchedhalf in horror, half in
fascinationas the room claimed these parts for itself; tendrils whipped out
from the wall to salvage those useful conglomerations of metal and plastic.
There was pain, of a sort, for Trintignant had wired those limbs into our
nervous systems, so that we could feel heat and cold. But the pain abated
quickly, replaced by digital numbness.

Childe got the worst of it, though.

The blade had sliced him through the middle, just below what
had once been his ribcage, spilling steel and plastic guts, bone, viscera,
blood and noxious lubricants onto the floor. The tendrils squirmed out and
captured the twitching prize of his detached rear end, flicking tail and all.

With the hand that she still had, Celestine pressed the
correct symbol. The punishment ceased and the door opened.

In the comparative calm that followed, Childe looked down at
his severed trunk.

�I seem to be quite badly damaged", he said.

But already various valves and gaskets were stemming the fluid
loss; clicking shut with neat precision. Trintignant, I saw, had done very
well. He had equipped Childe to survive the most extreme injuries.

�Youłll live," Celestine said, with what struck me as less
than total sympathy.

�What happened?" I asked. �Why didnłt you press that one
first?"

She looked at me. �Because I knew what had to be done."

Despite her injuries she helped us on the retreat.

I was able to stumble from room to room, balancing myself
against the wall and hopping on my good leg. I had lost no great quantity of
blood, for while I had suffered one or two gashes from close approaches of the
pendulum, my limbs had been detached below the points where they were anchored
to flesh and bone. But I still felt the shivering onset of shock, and all I
wanted to do was make it out of the Spire, back to the sanctuary of the
shuttle. There, I knew, Trintignant could make me whole again. Human again, for
that matter. He had always promised it would be possible, and while there was
much about him that I did not like, I did not think he would lie about that. It
would be a matter of professional pride that his work was technically
reversible.

Celestine carried Childe, tucked under her arm. What
remained of him was very light, she said, and he was able to cling to her with
his undamaged forepaws. I felt a spasm of horror every time I saw how little of
him there was, while shuddering to think how much more intense that spasm would
have been were I not already numbed by the medichines.

We had made it back through perhaps one third of the rooms
when he slithered from her grip, thudding to the floor.

�What are you doing?" Celestine asked.

�What do you think?" He supported himself by his forelimbs,
his severed trunk resting against the ground. The wound had begun to close, I
saw, his diamond skin puckering tight to seal the damage.

Before very long he would look as if he had been made this
way.

Celestine took her time before answering, �Quite honestly, I
donłt know what to think."

�Iłm going back. Iłm carrying on."

Still propping myself against a wall, I said, �You canłt.
You need treatment. For Godłs sake; youłve been cut in half."

�It doesnłt matter," Childe said. �All Iłve done is lose a
part of me I would have been forced to discard before very long. Eventually the
doors would have been a tight squeeze even for something shaped like a dog."

�Itłll kill you," I said.

�Or Iłll beat it. Itłs still possible, you know." He turned
around, his rear part scraping against the floor, and then looked back over his
shoulder. �Iłm going to retrace my steps back to the room where this happened.
I donłt think the Spire will obstruct your retreat until I stepor crawl, as it
may beinto the last room we opened. But if I were you, I wouldnłt take too
long on the way back." Then he looked at me, and again switched on the private
frequency. �Itłs not too late, Richard. You can still come back with me."

�No," I said. �Youłre wrong. Itłs much too late."

Celestine reached out to help me make my awkward way to the
next door. �Leave him, Richard. Leave him to the Spire. Itłs what hełs always
wanted, and hełs had his witnesses now."

Childe eased himself onto the lip of the door leading into
the room we had just come through.

�Well?" he said.

�Shełs right. Whatever happens now, itłs between you and the
Spire. I suppose I should wish you the best of luck, except it would sound
irredeemably trite."

He shrugged; one of the few human gestures now available to
him. �Iłll take whatever I can get. And I assure you that we will meet again,
whether you like it or not."

�I hope so," I said, while knowing it would never be the
case. �In the meantime, Iłll give your regards to Chasm City."

�Do that, please. Just donłt be too specific about where I
went."

�I promise you that. Roland?"

�Yes?"

�I think I should say goodbye now."

Childe turned around and slithered into the darkness, propelling
himself with quick, piston-like movements of his forearms.

Then Celestine took my arm and helped me towards the exit.

Thirteen

�You were right," I told her as we made our way back to the
shuttle. �I think I would have followed him."

Celestine smiled. �But Iłm glad you didnłt."

�Do you mind if I ask something?"

�As long as it isnłt to do with mathematics."

�Why did you care what happened to me, and not Childe?"

�I did care about Childe," she said firmly. �But I didnłt
think any of us were going to be able to persuade him to turn back."

�And that was the only reason?"

�No. I also thought you deserved something better than to be
killed by the Spire."

�You risked your life to get me out," I said. �Iłm not
ungrateful."

�Not ungrateful? Is that your idea of an expression of gratitude?"
But she was smiling, and I felt a faint impulse to smile as well. �Well, at
least that sounds like the old Richard."

�Therełs hope for me yet, then. Trintignant can put me back
the way I should be, after hełs done with you."

But when we got back to the shuttle there was no sign of Doctor
Trintignant. We searched for him, but found nothing; not even a set of tracks
leading away. None of the remaining suits were missing, and when we contacted
the orbiting ship they had no knowledge of the Doctorłs whereabouts.

Then we found him.

He had placed himself on his operating couch, beneath the
loom of swift, beautiful surgical machinery. And the machines had dismantled
him, separating him into his constituent components, placing some pieces of him
in neatly labeled fluid-filled flasks and others in vials. Chunks of
eviscerated bio-machinery floated like stinger-laden jellyfish. Implants and
mechanisms glittered like small, precisely jewelled ornaments.

There was surprisingly little in the way of organic matter.

�He killed himself," Celestine said. Then she found his
hatthe Homburgwhich he had placed at the head of the operating couch. Inside,
tightly folded and marked in precise handwriting, was what amounted to
Trintignantłs suicide note.

My dear friends, he had written.

After giving the matter no little consideration, I have
decided to dispose of myself. I find the prospect of my own dismantling a more
palatable one than continuing to endure revulsion for a crime I do not believe
I committed. Please do not attempt to put me back together; the endeavor would,
I assure you, be quite futile. I trust however that the manner of my demiseand
the annotated state to which I have reduced myselfwill provide some small
amusement to future scholars of cybernetics.

I must confess that there is another reason why I have chosen
to bring about this somewhat terminal state of affairs. Why, after all, did I
not end myself on Yellowstone?

The answer, I am afraid, lies as much in vanity as anything
else.

Thanks to the Spireand to the good offices of Mister
ChildeI have been given the opportunity to continue the work that was so
abruptly terminated by the unpleasantness in Chasm City. And thanks to
yourselveswho were so keen to learn the Spirełs secretsI have been gifted
with subjects willing to submit to some of my less orthodox procedures.

You in particular, Mister Swift, have been a Godsend. I consider
the series of transformations I have wrought upon you to be my finest
achievement to date. You have become my magnum opus. I fully accept that you
saw the surgery merely as a means to an end, and that you would not otherwise
have consented to my ministrations, but that in no way lessens the magnificence
of what you have become.

And therein, I am afraid, lies the problem.

Whether you conquer the Spire or retreat from itassuming,
of course, that it does not kill youthere will surely come a time when you
will desire to return to your prior form. And that would mean that I would be
compelled to undo my single greatest work.

Something I would rather die than do.

I offer my apologies, such as they are, while remaining

Your obedient servant,

T

Childe never returned. After ten days we searched the area
about the Spirełs base, but there were no remains that had not been there
before. I supposed that there was nothing for it but to assume that he was
still inside; still working his way to whatever lay at the summit.

And I wondered.

What ultimate function did the Spire serve? Was it possible
that it served none but its own self-preservation? Perhaps it simply lured the
curious into it, and forced them to adaptbecoming more like machines
themselvesuntil they reached the point when they were of use to it.

At which point it harvested them.

Was it possible that the Spire was no more purposeful than a
flytrap?

I had no answers. And I did not want to remain on Golgotha
pondering such things. I did not trust myself not to return to the Spire. I
still felt its feral pull.

So we left.

�Promise me," Celestine said.

�What?"

�That whatever happens when we get homewhateverłs become of
the cityyou wonłt go back to the Spire."

�I wonłt go back," I said. �And I promise you that. I can
even have the memory of it suppressed, so it doesnłt haunt my dreams."

�Why not," she said. �Youłve done it before, after all."

But when we returned to Chasm City we found that Childe had
not been lying. Things had changed, but not for the better. The thing that they
called the Melding Plague had plunged our city back into a festering,
technologically-decadent dark age. The wealth we had accrued on Childełs
expedition meant nothing now, and what small influence my family had possessed
before the crisis had diminished even further.

In better days, Trintignantłs work could probably have been
undone. It would not have been simple, but there were those who relished such a
challenge, and I would probably have had to fight off several competing offers:
rival cyberneticists vying for the prestige of tackling such a difficult
project. Things were different. Even the crudest kinds of surgery were now
difficult or impossibly expensive. Only a handful of specialists retained the
means to even attempt such work, and they were free to charge whatever they
liked.

Even Celestine, who had been wealthier than me, could only
afford to have me repaired, not rectified. Thatand the other matteralmost
bankrupted us.

And yet she cared for me.

There were those who saw us and imagined that the creature
with herthe thing that trotted by her like a stiff, diamond-skinned, grotesque
mechanical dogwas merely a strange choice of pet. Sometimes they sensed
something unusual in our relationshipthe way she might whisper an aside to me,
or the way I might appear to be leading herand they would look at me, intently,
before I stared into their eyes with the blinding red scrutiny of my vision.

Then they would always look away.

And for a long timeuntil the dreams became too muchthat
was how it was.

Yet now I pad into the night, Celestine unaware that I have
left our apartment. Outside, dangerous gangs infiltrate the shadowed,
half-flooded streets. They call this part of Chasm City the Mulch and it is the
only place where we can afford to live now. Certainly we could have afforded
something bettersomething much betterif I had not been forced to put aside
money in readiness for this day. But Celestine knows nothing of that.

The Mulch is not as bad as it used to be, but it would still
have struck the earlier me as a vile place in which to exist. Even now I am
instinctively wary, my enhanced eyes dwelling on the various crudely fashioned
blades and crossbows that the gangs flaunt. Not all of the creatures who haunt
the night are technically human. There are things with gills that can barely
breathe in open air. There are other things that resemble pigs, and they are
the worst of all.

But I do not fear them.

I slink between shadows, my thin, doglike form confusing
them. I squeeze through the gaps in collapsed buildings, effortlessly escaping
the few who are foolish enough to chase me. Now and then I even stop and
confront them, standing with my back arched.

My red gaze stabs through them.

I continue on my way.

Presently I reach the appointed area. At first it looks
desertedthere are no gangs herebut then a figure emerges from the gloom,
trudging through ankle-deep caramel-brown flood-water. The figure is thin and
dark, and with each step it makes there is a small, precise whine. It comes
into view and I observe that the womanfor it is a woman, I thinkis wearing an
exoskeleton. Her skin is the black of interstellar space, and her small,
exquisitely featured head is perched above a neck which has been extended by
several vertebrae. She wears copper rings around her neck, and her
fingernailswhich I see clicking against the thighs of her exoskeletonare as
long as stilettos.

I think she is strange, but she sees me and flinches.

�Are you ...?" she starts to say.

�I am Richard Swift," I answer.

She nods almost imperceptiblyit cannot be easy, bending
that neckand introduces herself. �I am Triumvir Verika Abebi, of the
lighthugger Poseidon. I sincerely hope you are not wasting my time."

�I can pay you, donłt you worry."

She looks at me with something between pity and awe. �You
havenłt even told me what it is you want."

�Thatłs easy," I say. �I want you to take me somewhere."

Dilation Sleep

Spacers tell people that the worst aspect of starflight is
revival. They speak the truth, I think. They give us dreams while the machines
warm us up and map our bodies for cell damage. We feel no anxiety or fear,
detached from our physical selves and adrift in generated fantasies.

In my dream I was joined by the cybernetic imago of Katia,
my wife. We found ourselves within a computer-constructed sensorium. An insect,
I felt my six thin legs propelling me into a wide and busy chamber. Four worker
ants were there, crouched in stiff mechanical postures. With compound vision I
studied these new companions, observing the nearest of them deposit a pearly
egg from its abdomen. A novel visceral sense told me that I, too, contained a
ready egg.

�Wełre gods amongst them," I told my wifełs imago.

�We are Myrmecia gulosa," she whispered into my brain. �The
bulldog ant. You see the queen, and her winged male?"

�Yes."

�Those maggoty things in the corner of the cell are the
queenłs larvae. Her worker is about to feed them."

�Feed them with what?"

�His egg, my darling."

I rotated my sleek, mandibled head. �And will I also?"

�Naturally! A workerłs duty is always to serve his queen. Of
course ... you may exit this environ, if you choose. But youłll have to remain
in reefersleep for another three hours."

�Three hours ... might as well be centuries," I said. �Then
change it. Something a bit less alien."

My imago dissolved the scenario, the universe. I floated in
white limbo, awaiting fresh sensory stimulus. Soon I found myself brushing
shimmering vermilion coral with eight suckered arms, an octopus.

Katia liked to play games.

Eventually the dreams ceased and I suddenly sensed my body,
cold and stiff but definitely anchored to my mind.

I allowed myself a long primal scream, then opened my eyes.
The eyes I opened were the eyes of Uri Andrei Sagdev, who was once a mainbrain
technician at the Sylveste Institute but who now found himself in the odd role
of Starship Heuristic Resource, a crewperson.

Under different circumstances, it is not a role I would otherwise
have chosen. I was alone, the room cold and silent. My five companions remained
in reefersleep around my own capsule; only I had been revived. I sensed, then,
that something must be wrong. But I did not query Katia, preferring to remain
in ignorance until she saw fit to enlighten me regarding our situation.

I hauled myself from the open reefer and took falterng steps
out of the room.

It was several minutes before I felt confident to do
anything more ambitious than that. I stumbled to the nearby health bay and exercised
with galvanic activators, pushing my muscles beyond the false limits of
apparent exhaustion. Then I showered and dressed, taking the expediency of
wearing a thermal layer beneath my overalls. Breakfast consisted of fried ham
and Edam slices, followed by garlic croissants, washed down with chilled
passion fruit and lemon tea.

Why was I not concerned to discover our difficulty? Simply
because the mere fact of revival told me that it could not be compellingly
urgent. Any undesirable situation upon a light-skimming starship that does not
instantly destroy itprobably in a flash of exotic bosonswill act on such an
extended timescale that the mainbrain-crew overmind will have days or weeks to
engineer a solution.

I knew we were not home, and that therefore something was
wrong. But for a moment it was good simply to lie back in the kitchen and allow
the music of Roedelius to envelop me, and to revel in this condition called
life. To simply suck air into my old lungs.

I who had been dead, or near death, for so long.

�Some more, Uri?" asked my wifełs imago.

I was alone apart from a servitor. It was a dumb-bell shaped
drone hovering on silently energised levitation fields above the metal floor.
Extruding a manipulator from the matt-gold surface of its upper spheroid, it
offered me the jug of pale juice.

With a well-practised subvocal command, I enabled my entoptic
system. The implant supplied the visual and tactile stimuli necessary to fully
realise the imago, the simulation of Katia, drawing it from the shipłs mainbrain.
Bright grids and circles interrupted my ocular field, then meshed and thickened
to form my wife, frozen and lifeless but apparently solid. Copyright symbols
denoting the implant company flashed, then faded. I locked her entoptic ghost
over the dull form of the servitor, its compact size easily concealed within
her body-space. Her blunt silver hair fell around a narrow pale face, black
lips pursed like a dollłs and eyes staring right through me. Her clasped hands
emerged from a long hooded scarlet gown inlaid around the shoulder with the
insignia of the Mixmaster geneticists, a pair of hands holding a catłs cradle
of DNA. My wife was a geneticist to the marrow. On Yellowstone, where
cybernetics was the primary creed, it made her a virtual pariah.

As the mainbrain-generated program took hold she grew vivacious
and smiled, and her hand appeared now to grasp the jug.

�I was tiring of storage, my darling."

�Iłm not comfortable with this," I admitted. �Katiamy
actual Katiadespised the whole idea of you. This illusion would have
especially sickened her."

�It doesnłt sicken me," Katia said.

�It ought to," I said. �Arenłt your personalities supposed
to be the same?"

She smiled, as if the point were settled. So infuriatingly
like her original.

�I see that," I said dubiously. The imago had been against
my actual wifełs wishes. When the Melding Plague hit us I saw my chance of
escape via this craft. Katia was unable to become a crewperson, so I
surreptitiously set about digitizing my wifełs personality. The implant did all
the hard work. It had assembled a behaviour map of Katia whenever we were
together, studying her through the conduits of my own senses. The simulation
grew slowly, limited by the memory capacity of the implant. But each day I
downloaded more of her into an Institute mainbrain, performing this routine for
weeks on end. I have no doubt that Katia suspected something, although she
never made any mention of it.

Having completed my clandestine work, I then grafted the
copy over the mind of the ship. It lacked her memories, of course, but I went
to the expense and danger of having my own trawled and substituted instead,
using software routines to perform the gender inversion. Katiałs personality
only assumed dominance when I was in rapport with the vessel. There was no
doubt in my mind that the other crewpersons had also arranged for their own
fictitious companions. They too would speak to their loved ones, or some idealised
fantasy of a lover, when they addressed the ship.

But I preferred not to think about that.

A lie, then. But my entire life had been a lie, Katiałs
imago simply the most recent aspect of it. But why had she awoken me? Or
rather: why had the ship chosen to awaken me, and not one of the others? Janos,
Kaj, Hilda, Yul and Karlos still remained in reefersleep, displaying no signs
of imminent thaw.

I upped from the table decisively. �Thank you, Katia. Iłll
take a stroll, admire the view."

�I must discuss something with you," Katia said. �But I suppose
it can wait a few minutes."

�Ah," I said, grinning. �You want to keep me in suspense."

�Nothing of the sort, darling. Is the music fine?"

�Musicłs fine," I answered, leaving the kitchen.

I entered a curving hexagonal corridor, bathed in dull ochre
light. A node of Roedelius chased me, humming from piezoacoustic panels in the
walls. The gravity that held me to the floor arose from our one-gee thrust, and
not from the centrifugal spin of the lifesystem, otherwise the vertical and
horizontal axes would have been interchanged. This fact told me that we were
not at home; not approaching the cluster of carousels and asteroids called
Shiphaven, in the Trojan point that trailed Jupiter. We were still on stardrive,
still climbing up or down from the slowtime of light-speed.

We might be anywhere between Epsilon Eridani and Solspace.

My stroll carried me away from the core of the vessel to her
skin, where the hot neutron sleet wafted past us. The parts of the vessel
through which I travelled grew darker and more machinelike, colder and less
familiar. Irrationally, I began to imagine that I was being pursued and
observed.

I have never enjoyed either solitude or the dark. I was a
fool, then, to address this fear by turning around. Yet the hairs on my neck
were bristling and my sweat had become chilled.

Most of the radial corridor was dark, apart from the miserly
locus of light that had followed me like a halo. Nonetheless, it was still
possible to make out a darker thing looming in the distance, almost lost in the
convergence of the walls.

I was not alone.

It was a figure, a silhouette, regarding me. Not Katiałs
imago, for sure.

I felt a brief terror. �Katia," I croaked. �Full lights,
please."

I jammed my eyes shut as the bright actinics snapped on. Red
retinal ghosts slowly fading, I reopened them, not much more than a second
later. But my watcher had gone.

I slowly emptied my lungs. I was wise enough not to leap to
conclusions. This was not necessarily what it appeared. After all, I had only
just emerged from reefersleep, after several years of being frozen. I was bound
to be a little jittery, a little open to subconscious suggestion.

It seemed I was utterly alone. I vowed, shakily, to put the
experience immediately out of mind.

Ten minutes later I had reached the outer hull, and was in
naked spaceor rather, seeing through the proxy eyes of a drone clamped on the
outside with spidery grappling feet. The machinełs camera head was peering
through a porthole, into the room where I sat. I looked pale and strained, but
I did not have company.

I looked away from the porthole, towards the bow of the
ship. The vessel, the Wild Pallas, was a ramlinera nearlight human-rated
starship. Most of what I saw, therefore, was very dense neutron shielding. The
vessel required protons for its bosonic drive process. Ahead, a graser beam
swept space and stripped deuterium nuclei into protons and neutrons. Our gauss
scoop sifted free the protons and focused them into the heart of the ship. The
neutral baryons were channelled around the hull in a lethal radiative rain,
diverted clear of the lifesystem and its fragile payload of sleepers. The drone
sensed the flux and passed the data to me in terms of a swirling roseate aura,
as if we were diving down the gullet of the universe.

To the rear, things were eclipsed by the glow of the exhaust.
Gamma shields burned Cherenkov-blue. Within the ship, the proton harvest was
extremely short-lived. Fields targeted the protons into a beam, lancing through
a swarming cloud of heavy monopoles. The relativistic protons were decelerated
and steered into the magnetic nodes. Inside each monopole was a shell of bosons
which coaxed the protons to disintegrate. This was the power source of a
ramliner.

I had studied all the tech before signing up for the
overmind partnership, the human-cybernetic steering committee that commanded
this vessel. When I say studied, I mean that I had downloaded certain eidetic
documents furnished by the Macro that owned the ship. These eidetics entered my
memory at an almost intuitive level, programmed of course to fade once my contract
expired. They told me everything I needed to know and little else. We carried
nine hundred reefersleep passengers and we crew comprised six humans, each of
whom was an expert in one or more areas of starflight theory. My own
specialties were scoop subsystemsgauss collimators and particle-ablation
shieldsand shipboard/in-flight medicare. The computer that wore the masque of
Katia was also equipped for these zones of expertise, but it was deficientso
the cybertechs saidin human heuristic thought modes. Crewpersons were
therefore its Heuristic Resourcesperipherals orbiting the hard glittering core
of its machine consciousness.

Crewpersons thus rode at a more reduced level of reefersleep
than our passengers: a little warmer, a little closer to the avalanche of cell
death that is life. The computer could interrogate us without the bother of
complete revival. Our dreams, therefore, would be dreams where matter and
number flowed in technological tsunami.

I altered the dronełs telemetry so that the neutron wind
became invisible. Looking beyond, I saw no stars at all. Einsteinian distortion
was squashing them up fore and aft, concealed by the flared ends of the ship.
We were still accelerating towards light-speed.

�Well?" I asked, much later.

�As you know, wełve yet to reach midpoint. In fact, we will
not reach home for another three years of shiptime."

�Is this a technical problem?"

�Not strictly. Iłm afraid itłs medical, which is why I was
forced to bring you out of reefersleep between systems. Like the view, my
darling?"

�Are you joking? An empty universe with no stars? Itłs the
gloomiest thing I can remember."

I was back in the coldroom where the six crew reefers were
stored. Katiałs data ghost stood at my side, and Mozart warmed our spirits.
Mozartłs joyous familiarity drowned out all the faint, distant sounds of the
ship, and the frank necessity of this annoyed me greatly. I was not normally
prone to nervousness.

�Janos is sick," explained Katia. �He must have contracted
the Melding Plague on Yellowstone. Unless we act now he wonłt survive the rest
of the journey. He needs emergency surgery."

�Hełs sick?" I shrugged. �Too bad. But SOP on this is clear,
Katia. Freeze him down further, lock the condition in stasis." I leaned over
the smooth side of Janosłs reefer, examining the bio-med display cartouche
under its coffin-lid rim. The reefer resembled a giant chrome chrysalis or
silver fish, anchored by its head to a coiled nexus of umbilicals. Within this
hexagonal fluted box lay Janos. His inert form was dimly visible under the
frosted clear lid.

�Normally, that would be our wisest course of action," Katia
said. �Earthside med skills will certainly outmode our own. But in this
instance the rules must be contravened. Janos canłt survive, even at emergency
levels of reefersleep. You know about the Melding Plague."

I did. We all knew about it only too well, for it had
crippled Yellowstone. The Melding Plague was a biocybernetic virus, something
new to our experince. Yellowstonełs intensely cybernetic society had crumbled
at the nanomolecular level, the level of our computers and implants. The
Melding Plague had caused our nanomachinery to grow malign.

I permitted Katia to explain, walking to the kitchen and
preparing salami rolls, stepping briskly through the dim corridors.

All crewpersons were fitted with such implants. Through
these data windows we interfaced with the machinery of the reefers and the
mainbrain of the ship as the ramliner cruised from star to star. Janosłs virus
had attacked the structure of his own implants, ripping them apart and
reorganizing them into analogues of itself. From one implant node, a network of
webbed strands was spreading further into his brain, in an apparent attempt to
knit together all the infected locales.

�The experts on Yellowstone soon learned that cold does not
retard the virus significantlycertainly not the kind of cold from which a
human could ever be revived. We must therefore operate immediately, before the
virus gains a stronghold. And Iłm afraid that our routine surgical programs
will fail. We canłt use nanomachinery against the virus; it will simply subsume
whatever we throw against it."

I gobbled my rolls. �I donłt know neurosurgery; that wasnłt
on the skills eidetic." I brushed crumbs from my stubbled chin. �However, if
Janosłs life is in danger"

�We must act. How are you feeling now?"

�A little stiff. Nothing serious." I forced a very stiff
grin. �Iłll admit, I was a little jumpy early on. I think those ants gave me
the creeps."

Katia was silent for a few seconds. �Thatłs normal," she eventually
said. �Get plenty of rest. Then wełll examine the surgical tools."

I went jogging. I mapped a sinuous, winding path through the
lifesystem, feeling the megaton mass of the ship wheel about my centre of mass.
I was ruthless with myself, deliberately selecting a route that took me through
every dark and shadowy region of the lifesystem I could think of. I silenced
Mozart and forbade myself the company of Katia, disabling my imago inducer.

My thoughts turned back to the figure I imagined I had seen.
What kind of rationale had flashed through my mind in the few seconds when I
permitted the figure to exist outside of my imagination? Perhaps one of the
sleepers might have thawed by accident and was wandering the ship in dismay.
That hypothetical wanderer would have been equally surprised by my own
presence. Ergo the person was now hiding.

Of course, the figure was undoubtedly a hallucination. One
need not be drooling at the mouth to hallucinateindeed, one could easily
retain enough facilities to recognise the experience as being totally
internalised. After the uneventful hours of wakefulness that had subsequently
passed, I was anxious to dismiss the whole incident.

I jogged on, my shoes slapping the deck. I was approaching
the nadir of my journey, the part of the ship that until now I had studiously
avoided. Sensing my nearing footfalls, cartwheel-shaped airlocks dilated open.
I panted through an antechamber, into the vast room where nine hundred slept.

The chamber had the toroidal shape of a tokamak. Nine hundred
deep-preservation reefers lined the inner and outer walls, crisscrossed by
ladders and catwalks. I set about circumnavigating the chamber, to finally
purge my mind of any stray ghosts. Hadnłt that always been my strategy as a child:
confront my fears head on? I suspected that the boy in me would have been
richly amused by my motives here. Nonetheless I insisted on this one ridiculous
circuit, convinced it would leave me eased.

Most of these sleepers would stay aboard when we arrived in
the Earth system. They were refugees from the Melding Plague, seeking sanctuary
in the future. At the nearlight speeds this vessel attained between suns, large
levels of time dilation would be experienced. Our clocks would grind to an
imperceptible crawl. After thirty or forty years of shiptime, a mere six or
seven hops between systems, more than a century would have elapsed on
Yellowstone, enough time for eco-engineers to exorcise the biome of the Melding
Plague. The sleepers we carried had elected not to risk spending the time in
the planetłs community cryocrypts; in dilation sleep the effective time spent
in reefers was less, and therefore their chances of completely safe revival
were enormously increased.

I was jogging slowly enough to read the glowing name panels
imprinted on each reefer. Men, women, children ... the rich of my world, able
to pay for this exorbitant journey into a brighter future. I thought of the
less wealthy, those who could not even afford spaces in the cryocrypts. I
thought of the long queues of people waiting to see surgeons, people like
Katia, anxious to lose their implants before the disease reached them. They
would pay with whatever they could: organs or prosthetics or memories. Or if
they chose not to pay they might consider becoming crew. My people made good
crew-fodder. It called for a certain degree of yearning desperation to accept
direct interfacing with the main-brain. The hard price of our bargain was the
simple fact that our reduced state of reefersleep meant we would continue to
age as we slept away the years.

That was not a bargain Katia had felt she could make. And I
had known that I could not stand to lose my implants. Thus the Melding Plague
touched us.

I felt bitterness, and this was welcome to me. I was happy to
find familiar anxieties polluting my thoughts. I cast a dismissive glance over
my shoulder, back along the curving ranks of sleepers I had already passed.

I was being followed.

The shadow was pounding along the walkway, halfway around
the great curve of the chamber. I could barely see it, just a man-shaped black
aperture in the distance.

I quickened my pace. Only my feet thudded in the silence.
Yet my chaser was also running faster. I felt sick with fright. I summoned
Katia, but after alerting her was unable to grasp a sentence, a command,
anything. The faceless silhouette seemed to be gaining on me.

Faceless was right. It had no features, no detail.
Eventually I reached an exit. The airlock sequence amputated the chamber from
me. I did not stop running, even when I realised that the doors behind me were
remaining closed. The shadow-man remained with the sleepers.

But I had seen enough. It was not human. Just a man-shaped
hole, a spectre.

I found the quickest route back to the command deck of the
Wild Pallas. Immediately I ordered Katia to begin a rigorous search for
intruders, though I knew of course that no intruder could have escaped her
attention thus far. My Katia was omniscient. She would have known the exact
location of every rat, every fly, aboard the craft; except that aboard the ship
there were no flies, no rats.

I knew that the shadow was not a revived sleeper. None of
the reefers had been opened or vacated. A stowaway was out of the questionwhat
was there to eat or drink, apart from the supplies dispensed by the computer?

My mind veered towards the illogical. Could someone have entered
the ship during its flightsomeone dressed as a chameleon? That imagined
intruder would have somehow had to achieve invisibility from Katiałs eyes.
Clearly impossible, even disregarding the unlikely manoeuvres required to match
our velocity and position undetected.

I chewed on my lip, aware that each second of indecision
counted against Janos. For my own defence, Katia would permit me access to a
weapon, provided of course that the existence of the intruder was proven.
Alternatively, I might best confront the situation by not confronting it. I
could perform surgery on Janos without straying into those regions of the ship
that the intruder had apparently claimed as its haunt. In a day or so,
therefore, this ordeal might be over, and I could re-enter reefersleep. The
most faceless, inhuman entities I would have to contend with upon my next revival
would be Solpace Axis customs officials. Let them worry about the unseen extra
passenger. Hadnłt the shadow permitted me safe slumber so far?

I chuckled, though to my ears it sounded more like a
death-rattle. I was still frightened, but for once my hands had stopped playing
arpeggios on the keys of an invisible piano.

I absorbed myself in technical eidetics outlining the
medical systems Katia and I were about to employ. The gleaming semirobotic
tools were the culmination of Yellowstonełs surgical sciences. Even so, they
would undoubtedly appear crude by Earthside standards. This dichotomy galled
me. Even if Janos would necessarily worsen by the time we arrived, how could we
be certain that we were not reducing his chances with our outdated medical
intervention? Perhaps Earth would have accelerated so far beyond our
capabilities that the equation was no longer balanced in our favour.

Yet Katia would have weighed the issue minutely before selecting
the appropriate course of action. Perhaps, then, it was best simply to silence
onełs qualms and do whatever was required.

Drones assisted me in carrying the medical machinery into
the crew reefer room, where my five colleagues lay in frozen sleep. I wore a
facemask and a gloved jumpsuit, inwoven with a heating circuit. Katia would
lower the roomłs temperature before slightly increasing Janosłs own.

�Ready, Uri?" she asked. �Letłs start."

So we commenced, my eyes constantly flicking to the open
reefer I hoped soon to re-enter. The room rapidly chilled, lights burning
frigid blue from the overheads.

Janosłs reefer cracked open with a gasp of release cold. I
looked at Janos, still and white and somehow distant. Let that distance remain,
I prayed. After all, we were about to open his head.

Katia, in fact, had already performed some preliminary surgery.
The skull had been exposed, skin pulled back as if framing the white pistil of
a flesh-leaved flower. Slender probes entered the scalp via drilled holes,
trailing glowing coloured cables into a matrix of input points in the domed
head of the reefer. The work was angstrom-precise, rendered with a robotłs
deadening perfection. I had been briefed: those cables were substituting for
the cybernetic implants within his brain that had fallen victim to the Melding
Plague.

�When you have the top of the skull free you should feed it
back along the cables," Katia told me. �Itłs crucial that we donłt lose
cyber-interface with Janos."

I prepped the mechanical bone-saw. �Why? What use is he to
us?"

�There are good reasons. If youłre still interested we can
discuss it after the operation."

The saw hummed into life, the rotary tip glinting evilly.
Katia vectored the blade down, smoothly gnawing into the pale bone. Little
blood oozed free but the sound struck an unpleasant resonance with me. Katia
made three expert circumferential passes, then retracted. I took a deep breath,
then placed gloved fingers on the top of Janosłs head. The scalp felt loose,
like half of a chocolate egg. I eased the section of skull free with a wet
sucking slurp, exposing the damp pinkish mass of dura and gyrus, snuggling in
the lower bowl of the skull. I took special care to maintain the integrity of
the connections as I separated the bonework. For a while, humbled, I could only
stand in awe of this fantastic organ, easily the most complex, alien thing my
eyes had ever gazed on. And yet it managed to look so disappointingly
vegetable.

�Husband, we must proceed," warned Katia. �I have warmed
Janos to a dangerously high body temperature, whilst not greatly increasing his
metabolic rate. We donłt have time to waste."

I felt sweat beading my forehead. I nodded. Inward, inward.
Katia swung a new battery of blades and microlasers into play.

We operated to the music of Sibelius.

It was intriguing and repellent work.

I succeeded in detaching my mind to some extent, so that I
was able to regard the parting brain tissue as dead but somehow sacred meat.
The micro-implants came out one by one, too small for the naked eye to discern
detail, barbed hunks of corroded metal. The corrosion, observable under a
microscope, was the external evidence of the cybervirus. I studied it with rank
feelings of abstract distaste. The virus behaved like its biological namesake,
clamping onto the shell of the nanostructure and pulsing subversive instructions
deep into its reproductive heart.

After three hours my back boiled with pain. I leaned away
from the reefer, brushing a sleeve against my chilled forehead. I felt the room
swimming, clotting with blobs of muggy darkness. For an instant I became
disoriented, convinced that left was right and vice versa. I braced myself against
the reefer as this dizziness washed over me.

�Not long now," Katia said. �How do you feel?"

�Iłm fine. And you?"

�Iłm ... fine. The opłs proceeding well." Katia paused, then
stiffened her voice with iron resolve, businesslike detachment. �The next implant
is the deepest. It lies between the occipital lobe and the cerebellum. We must
take care to avoid lesion of the visual centre. This is the primary entoptic
infeed node."

�In we go, then."

The machinery snicked obediently into place. Our ciliated microprobes
slid into the tissue, like flexible syringes slipping into jelly. Despite the
cold I found myself hot around the collar, iced sweat prickling my skin.
Another hour passed, though time had ceased to have very much meaning.

And I froze, conscious of a presence behind me, in the same
room.

Compelled, I turned. The watcher was with me.

I saw now that it could not be a man. Yet it did have a
humanoid form, a humanoid of my build and posture.

A sculptor had selected ten thousand raven-black cubes, so
dark that they were pure silhouettes, and arranged them as a blocky statue.
That was the entirety of the watcher: a mass of black cubes.

As I turned, it swung towards me. None of the cubes from
which it was formed actually moved; they simply blipped out and reappeared in
an orchestrated wave, whole new strata of cubes forming in thin air. They
popped in and out of reality to mould its altering posture. To my eyes the
motion had a beguiling, digital beauty. I thought of the coloured patterns that
would sweep across a stadium of schoolchildren holding painted mosaic cards to
image some great slogan or emblem.

I raised my left arm, and observed the shadow repeat the
action from its point of view. We were not mirrors of one another. We were
ghosts.

My terror had reached some peak and evaporated. I grasped
that the watcher was essentially motiveless, that it had been drawn to me as
inevitably as a shrinking noon shadow.

�Continue with the operation," insisted Katia. I noticed hesitancy
in her voice, true to her personality to the end. She liked games, my Katia,
but she was never a convincing liar.

�Lesion of the visual centre, you say?"

�That is what we must be careful to avoid."

I grimaced. I had to know for sure.

I scooped up one of the detached nanoprobes. In reality, the
drones mimicked my intentions with their own manipulators, picking up the
nanoprobełs platonic twin ... Then I jammed it recklessly into Janosłs head,
into his occipital lobe.

This reality melted and shattered, as if a stone had fallen
into and disturbed the reflections on a crystal-mooth lake.

I knew, then.

My vision slowly unpeeled itself, returning to normality in
strips. Katia was doing this, attempting to cancel the damage in my visual
centre by sending distorted signals along the optic infeeds. I realised that I
no longer had control of the surgical tools.

�I am the patient," I said. �Not Janos. The surgeon is the
one who needs surgery. How ironic."

�It was best that you not know," Katia said. And then, very
rapidly, she herself flickered and warped, her voice momentarily growing
cavernous and slurred. �Iłm failing ... there isnłt much time."

�And the watcher?"

�A symptom," she said ruefully. �A symptom of my own illness.
A false mapping of your own body image within the simulation."

�Youłre a simulation!" I roared. �I can understand your
image being affected ... but youyourselfyou donłt exist in my head! Youłre a
program running in the mainbrain! �

�Yes, darling. But the Melding Plague has also reached the
mainbrain." She paused, and then, withut warning, her voice became robotically
flat and autistic. �Much of the computer is damaged. To keep this simulation
intact has necessitated sacrifices in tertiary function levels. However, the
primary goal is to guarantee that you do not die. The operation-in-progress
must be completed. In order to maintain the integrity of the simulation, the
tuple-ensemble coded KATIA must be removed from main memory. This operation has
now been executed."

She froze, her last moment locked within my implant, trapped
in my eyes like a spot of sun-blindness. It was just me and the computer then,
not forgetting the ever-present watcher.

What could I do but continue with the surgery? I had a
reason now. I wanted to excise the frozen ghost of Katia from my mind. She was
the real lesion.

So I survived.

Many years passed for us. Our shipłs computer was so damaged
by the Melding Plague that we could not decelerate in time to reach the Earth
system. Our choice was to steer for 61 Cygni-A, around which lay the colony Skyłs
Edge. Our dilation sleepers consequently found themselves further from home
both in time and space than they had expected. Secretly we cherished the
justice in this, we who had sacrificed parts of our lives to crew their
dream-voyage. Yet they had not lost so very much, and I suppose I would have
been one of their number had I had their power. Concerning Katia ...

The simulation was never properly reanimated.

The shipboard memory in which it lay fell prey to the
Melding Plague, and much of its data was badly corrupted. When I did attempt to
recreate her, I found only a crude caricature, all spontaneity sapped away, as
lifeless and cruelly predictable as a Babbage engine. In a fit of remorse I
destroyed the imago. It helped that I was blind, for even this fa�ade had been
programmed to exhibit fear, programmed to plead once it guessed my intentions.

That was years ago. I tell myself that she never lived. And
that at least is what the cybertechs would have us believe.

The last information pulse from Yellowstone told me that the
real Katia is still alive, of course much older than when I knew her. She has
been married twice. To her the days of our union must seem as ancient and
fragile as an heirloom. But she does not yet know that I survived. I
transmitted to her, but the signal will not reach Epsilon Eridani for a decade.
And then I will have to await her reply, more years still.

Perhaps she will reply in person. This is our only hope of
meeting, because I ...

I will not fly again. Nor will I sleep out the decades.

Feeling Rejected

NaturePublishingGroup

�2005

 

Alastair Reynolds lives in the Netherlands. He worked at the
European Space Agency for 12 years on a variety of astronomical projects before
turning to full-time writing. His latest book is Century Rain (Orion,
2004).

 

World beater

Report on the paper �Analysis of the gravitational signals
from a newly discovered Kardashev II civilization in the Sombrero Galaxy: Part
1 by Whimbrel et al.", submitted to the Journal of Xenoastronomical Studies.

 

The authors present an analysis of gravitational signals of
intelligent origin arising in the Sombrero Galaxy, detected in publicly
available archival data from the System-Wide Imaging Network for Exoastronomy
(SWINE). The transmitting culture, which has not been the subject of an earlier
paper, is shown to be a type II civilization on the Kardashev scheme, by which
it is understood that they have the means to tap the entire energy output of their
star. This classification is made partly on the basis of the strength of the
SWINE signal (which in itself implies a basic competence in stellar husbandry) and
partly on the basis of the cultural information embedded in the data themselves.
This assessment is probably correct, but given the likelihood that both typeI
and type III civilizations may occasionally emulate type II civilizations for
their own purposes (see, for instance, Chukar, Francolin and Dickcissel, 2051),
a word of caution might well have been in order.

The species is shown to have originated on a rocky
terrestrial planet about the size of Mars, and to have followed an evolutionary
pathway that is well approximated by the uppermost track on the three-parameter
model of Bataleur and Becard (2049). In their unmodified form, adult members of
this species are 3-metre tall hexapodal oxygen-breathers with a DNA-based
reproductive system. The species has a well-developed central nervous system
with marked hemispheric asymmetry.

The authors apply standard analysis tools and methods to extract
cultural information from the intercepted signal.

Given the absence of anything startlingly new in their approach,
the amount of space that the authors spend discussing this process is puzzling.
It might havebeen better simply to reference one of the many review papers on
the matter, such as the recent and comprehensive overview of analysis methods
given in [omitted].

The authors then move on to the main part of their paper: a
lengthy discussion of the information content of the decoded message. They
summarize the nature of the transmitting civilization, the physiology and
evolutionary background of the inhabitants, their technology and culture.

Although broadly satisfactory in its details, this section
would benefit from shortening. As an example, the authors dwell on the
construction methods used in the Dyson sphere that the aliens have erected
around their star, despite the fact that broadly similar planet-dismantling, reforging
and gravity-control methods have been used by at least 138 other Kardashev II
cultures (see, for instance, Takahe and Smew, 2045). In the very first sentence
of subsection 3.2, the authors state that there is �nothing particularly novel
about the construction methods", before nevertheless embarking on a blow-by-blow
account of those selfsame methods. I agree with the first sentence.

They conclude this section by presenting, in excerpted form,
several images and texts deemed to be of high significance within the culture.
These include 18 ęstanzasł of a much longer epic ępoemł written in
commemoration of the collapse of part of the polar region of their Dyson sphere
about 1.2 million years ago, an accident that resulted in the deaths of 5.6 x 1012
sentient beings. Although undoubtedly touching, it is not clear that a great
deal is gained from the inclusion of this somewhat taxing material.

The authors conclude their paper by moving on to a wider discussion
of the significance of their newly found civilization against the known sample
of other intelligent alien species. Here the authors place (in my view) undue
emphasis on the position of their civilization in the ęcultural H
R diagramł
(Wonga and Grebe, 2044), in which the total information capacity of a
transmitting culture, measured in bits, is plotted against the light-crossing
time in light-seconds of their total colonized space.

On the basis of Figure 8, the authors claim that their
culture lies significantly to the right of the ęasymptotic singularity branchł,
which on the face of it would suggest that the culture had avoided a singularity
despite occupying a total volume only 72,000 light-seconds in diameter. If true,
this would extend the total number of known collapse-resistant cultures to
eight.

The evidence, however, is very much less compelling than
the authors claim. Close examination of their statistical sample shows it to be
derived from the Third Gonolek catalogue,which is now known to be afflicted by
serious sampling errors. Visual inspection would suggest that a more reliable
samplesuch as that of [omitted]would either bring their civilization into
line with the singularity branch, or reveal it as no more than a mild outlier.

In short, although the new civilization undoubtedly provides
a useful new datum point, I remain unconvinced that it merits an entire paper,
and certainly not the multi-paper saga that the authors clearly have in mind.
Thanks tothe torrent of data supplied by SWINE, and the planned Obscenely Large
Gravity Array (OLGA), we are fast moving into the era of statistical xenoastronomyone
in which the study of individual extraterrestrial civilizations has much less
to offer than a global, survey-based approach. The authors might therefore be advised
to wait until their archival enquiries have turned up several dozen such
cultures, and then gather these results into a single paper.

Otherwise, I fear, they may be open to accusations of
[omitted] the [omitted].

Other matters:

Fig. 6 was incorrectly labelled (see Fig. 5).

This text has been swept by Semantic Anonymity Preserver
Version 5.1certain stylistic or cultural markers may have been altered or removed.
Complete legibility is not guaranteed.

The Fixation

For Hannu Blommila

 

Inside the corroded rock was what looked like a geared embryothe
incipient bud of an industrial age that remained unborn for a millennium. (John
Seabrook, The New Yorker, May 14, 2007)

 

KATIB, THE SECURITY guard who usually works the graveyard
shift, has already clocked on when Rana swipes her badge through the reader. He
gives her a long-suffering look as she bustles past in her heavy coat, stooping
under a cargo of document boxes and laptops. �Pulling another all-nighter,
Rana?" he asks, as he has asked a hundred times before. �I keep telling you to
get a different job, it?."

�I worked hard to get this one," she tells him, almost
slipping on the floor, which has just been polished to a mirrored gleam by a
small army of robot cleaners. �Where else would I get to do this and Actually
get paid for it?"

�Whatever theyłre paying you, it isnłt enough for all those
bags under your eyes."

She wishes he wouldnłt mention the bags under her eyesitłs
not as if she exactly likes thembut she smiles anyway, for Katib is a kindly
man without a hurtful thought in his soul. �Theyłll go," she says. �Wełre on
the home stretch, anyway. Or did you somehow not notice that therełs this big
opening ceremony coming up?"

�Oh, I think I heard something about that," he says,
scratching at his beard. �I just hope they need some old fool to look after
this wing when they open the new one."

�Youłre indispensable, Katib. Theyłd get rid of half the exhibits
before they put you on the street."

�Thatłs what I keep telling myself, but ..." He gives a
burly shrug, and then smiles to let her know it isnłt her business to worry
about his problems. �Still, itłs going to be something, isnłt it? I can see it
from my balcony, from all the way across the town. I didnłt like it much at
first, but now thatłs up there, now that itłs all shining and finished, itłs
starting to grow on me. And itłs ours, thatłs what I keep thinking. Thatłs our
museum, nobody elsełs. Something to be proud of."

Rana has seen it too. The new wing, all but finished, dwarfs
the existing structure. Itłs a glittering climate-controlled ziggurat, the work
of a monkish British architect who happens to be a devout Christian. A
controversial choice, to be sure, but no one who has seen that tidal wave of
glass and steel rising above the streets of the city has remained unimpressed.
As the sun tracks across the sky, computer-controlled shutters open and close
to control the flood of light into the zigguratłs plunging atriumthe atrium
where the Mechanism will be the primary exhibitand maintain the buildingłs
ideal ambient temperature. From afar, the play of those shutters is an
enchanted mosaic: a mesmerizing, never-repeating dance of spangling glints.
Rana read in a magazine that the architect had never touched a computer until
he arrived in Greater Persia, but that he took to the possibilities with the
zeal of the converted.

�Itłs going to be wonderful," she says, torn between making
small talk with the amiable Katib and getting started on her work. �But it wonłt
be much of an opening ceremony if the Mechanism isnłt in place, will it?"

�Which is a kind way of saying, you need to be getting to
your office." Hełs smiling as he speaks, letting her know he takes no offense. �You
need some help with those boxes and computers, my fairest?"

�Iłll be fine, thanks."

�You call me if you need anything. Iłll be here hrough to
six." With that he unfolds a magazine and taps the sharp end of a pencil
against the grid of a half-finished puzzle. �And donłt work too hard," he says
under his breath, but just loud enough that she will hear.

Rana doesnłt pass another human being on her way to the office.
The public part of the museum is deserted save for the occasional cleaner or
patrolling security robot, but at least the hallways and exhibits are still
partially illuminated, and from certain sightlines she can still see people
walking in the street outside, coming from the theater or a late restaurant
engagement.

In the private corridors, itłs a different story. The halls
are dark and the windows too high to reveal anything more than moonlit sky. The
robots donłt come here very often and most of the offices and meeting rooms are
locked and silent. At the end of one corridor stands the glowing sentinel of a
coffee dispenser. Normally Rana takes a cup to her room, but tonight she doesnłt
have a free hand; itłs enough of a job just to shoulder her way through doors
without dropping something.

Her room is in the basement: a cool, windowless crypt that
is half laboratory and half office. Her colleagues think shełs mad for working
at night, but Rana has her reasons. By day she has to share her facilities with
other members of the staff, and what with all the talk and interruptions she
tends to get much less work done. If thatłs not enough of a distraction, there
is a public corridor that winds its way past the glass-fronted rooms, allowing
the museumłs visitors to watch cataloging and restoration work as it actually
happens. The public make an effort to look more interested than they really
are. Hardly surprising, because the work going on inside the offices could not
look less interesting or less glamorous. Rana has been spending the last three
weeks working with microscopically precise tools on the restoration of a single
bronze gearwheel. What the visitors would imagine to be a morningłs work has
consumed more of her life than some relationships. She already knows every
scratch and chip of that gearwheel like an old friend or ancient, bitter adversary.

Therełs another reason why she works at night. Her mind functions
better in the small hours. She has made more deductive leaps at three in the
morning than she has ever done at three in the afternoon, and she wishes it
were not so.

She takes off her coat and hangs it by the door. She opens
the two laptops, sets them near each other, and powers them up. She keeps the
office lights low, with only enough illumination to focus on the immediate area
around her bench. The gearwheel is centermost, supported on an adjustable
cradle like a miniature music stand. On either side, kept in upright stands,
are various chrome-plated tools and magnifying devices, some of which trail segmented
power cables to a wall junction. There is a swing-down visor with zoom optics.
There are lasers and ultrasound cleaning baths. There are duplicates of the
gearwheel and its brethren, etched in brass for testing purposes. There are
plastic models of parts of the Mechanism, so that she can take them apart and explain
its workings to visitors. There are other gearwheels which have already been
removed from the device for restoration, sealed in plastic boxes and racked
according to coded labels. Some are visibly cleaner than the one she is working
on, but some are still corroded and grubby, with damaged teeth and scabrous
surface deterioration.

And there is the Mechanism itself, placed on the bench on
the far side of the gearwheel she is working on. It is the size of a shoebox,
with a wooden casing, the lid hinged back. When it arrived the box was full of
machinery, a tight-packed clockwork of arbors and crown wheels, revolving
balls, slotted pins and delicate, hand-engraved inscriptions. None of it did
anything, though. Turn the input crank and therełd just be a metallic crunch as
stiff, worn gears locked into immobility. No one in the museum remembers the
last time the machine was in proper working order. Fifty years ago, shełs heard
someone saybut not all of the gearing was in place even then. Parts were
removed a hundred years ago and never put back. Or were lost or altered two
hundred years ago. Since then the Mechanism has become something of an
embarrassment: a fabled contraption that doesnłt do what everyone expects it
to.

Hence the decision by the museum authorities: restore the Mechanism
to full and authentic functionality in time for the reopening of the new wing.
As the foremost native expert on the device, the work has naturally fallen to
Rana. The authorities tried to foist a team on her, but the hapless doctoral
students soon realized their leader preferred to work alone, unencumbered by
the give and take of collaboration.

Share the glory? Not likely.

With the wall calendar reminding her how few weeks remain to
the opening, Rana occasionally wonders if she has taken on too much. But she is
making progress, and the most difficult parts of the restoration are now behind
her.

Rana picks up one of her tools and begins to scrape away the
tiniest burr of corrosion on one of the gearłs teeth. Soon she is lost in the
methodical repetitiveness of the task, her mind freewheeling back through
history, thinking of all the hands that have touched this metal. She imagines
all the people this little clockwork box has influenced, all the lives it has
altered, the fortunes it has made and the empires it has crushed. The Romans
owned the Mechanism for 400 yearsone of their ships must have carried it from
Greece, perhaps from the island of Rhodesbut the Romans were too lazy and
incurious to do anything with the box other than marvel at its computational
abilities. The idea that the same clockwork that accurately predicted the
movements of the sun, moon, and the planets across an entire Metonic cycle-235
lunar monthsmight also be made to do other things simply never occurred to
them.

The Persians were different. The Persians saw a universe of
possibility in those spinning wheels and meshing teeth. Those early clocks and
calculating boxesthe clever devices that sent armies and navies and engineers
across the globe, and made Greater Persia what it is todaybear scant
resemblance to the laptops on Ranałs desk. But the lineage is unbroken.

There must be ghosts, she thinks: caught in the slipstream
of this box, dragged by the Mechanism as it ploughed its way through the
centuries. Lives changed and lives extinguished, lives that never happened at
all, and yet all of them still in spectral attendance, a silent audience
crowding in on this quiet basement room, waiting for Ranałs next move.

Some of them want her to destroy the machine forever.

Some of them want to see it shine again.

Rana doesnłt dream much, but when she does she dreams of
glittering brass gears meshing tight against each other, whirring furiously, a
dance of metal and geometry that moves the heavens.

SAFA DREAMS OF numbers, not gears: she is a mathematician.
Her breakthrough paper, the one that has brought her to the museum, was
entitled �Entropy Exchange and the Many Worlds Hypothesis."

As a foreign national, admitted into the country because of
her expertise in an exceedingly esoteric field, Safa has more rights than a
refugee. But she must still submit to the indignity of wearing a monitoring
collar, a heavy plastic cuff around her neck which not only records her
movements, not only sees and hears everything she sees and hears, but which can
stun or euthanize her if a government agent deems that she is acting contrary
to the national interests. She must also be accompanied by a cyborg watchdog at
all times: a sleek black prowling thing with the emblem of the national
security agency across its bulletproof chest. At least the watchdog has the
sense to lurk at the back of the room when she is about to address the gathered
administrators and sponsors, at this deathly hour.

�Iłm sorry we had to drag you out here so late," the museum
director tells the assembled audience. �Safa knows more than me, but Iłm
reliably informed that the equipment works best when the cityłs shutting down
for the nightwhen there isnłt so much traffic, and the underground trains arenłt
running. We can schedule routine jobs during the day, but something like
thissomething this delicaterequires the maximum degree of noise-suppression.
Isnłt that right, Safa?"

�Spot on sir. And if everyone could try and hold their
breath for the next six hours, that would help as well." She grins reassuringlyitłs
almost as if some of them think she was serious. �Now I know some of you were
probably hoping to see the Mechanism itself, but Iłm afraid Iłm going to have
to disappoint youpositioning it inside the equipment is a very slow and tricky
procedure, and if we started now wełd all still be here next week. But I can
show you something nearly as good."

Safa produces a small white pottery jug that she has brought
along for the occasion. �Now, you may think this is just some ordinary old jug
I found at the back of a staff cupboard ... and youłd be right. Itłs probably
no more than ten or fifteen years old. The Mechanism, as I am sure I donłt have
to remind anyone here, is incomparably older: we know the ship went down around
the first half of the First Century BC. But I can still illustrate my point.
There are a near-infinite number of copies of this object, a lid they are all
the same jug. In one history, I caught a cold and couldnłt make it today, and
someone else is standing up and talking to you, holding the same jug. In
another, someone took the jug out of that cupboard years ago and itłs living in
a kitchen halfway across the city. In another it was bought by someone else and
never ended up in the museum. In another it was broken before it ever left t he
factory."

She smiles quickly. �You see the point Iłm making. What may
be less clear is that all these copies the same jug are in ghostly dialogue
with each other, linked together by a kind of quantum entanglementthough itłs
not really quantum and itłs not exactly entanglement." Another fierce, nervous
smile. �Donłt worry: no mathematics tonight! The point is, no matter what
happens to this jug, no matter how itłs handled or what it comes into contact
with, it never quite loses contact with its counterparts. The signal gets
fainter, but it never goes away. Even if I do this."

Abruptly, she lets go of the jug. It drops to the floor and
shatters into a dozen sharp white pieces.

�The jugłs broken," Safa says, pulling a sad face. �But in a
sense it still exists. The other copies of it are still doing fineand each and
every one of them felt an echo of this one as it shattered. Itłs still out
there, ringing back and forth like a dying chime." Then she pauses and kneels
down, gathering a handful of the broken pieces into her palms. �Imagine if I
could somehow take these pieces and get them to resonate with the intact copies
of the jug. Imagine further still that I could somehow steal a little bit of
orderedness from each of those copies, and give back some of the disorderedness
of this one in returna kind of swap."

Safa waits a moment, trying to judge whether she still has
the audiencełs attention. Are they following or just pretending to follow? Itłs
not always easy to tell, and nothing on the administratorłs face gives her a
clue. �Well, we can do that. Itłs what we call Fixationmoving tiny amounts of
entropy from one worldone universeto another. Now, it would take a very long
time to put this jug back the way it was. But if we started with a jug that was
a bit damaged, a bit worn, it would happen a lot quicker. And thatłs sort of
where we are with the Antikythera Mechanism. Itłs in several pieces, and we
suspect there are components missing, but in other respects itłs in astonishing
condition for something thatłs been underwater for two thousand years."

Now she turns around slowly, to confront the huge, humming
mass of the Fixator. It is a dull silver cylinder with a circular door in one
end, braced inside a massive orange chassis, festooned with cables and cooling
ducts and service walkways. The machine is as large as a small fusion reactor
and several times as complicated. It has stronger, more responsive magnets, a
harder vacuum, and has a control system so perilously close to intelligence
that a government agent must be on hand at all times, ready to destroy the
machine if it slips over the threshold into consciousness.

�Hence the equipment. The Mechanismłs inside there nowin
fact, wełve already begun the resonant excitation. What wełre hoping is that
somewhere out theresomewhere out in that sea of alternate timelinesis a copy
of the Mechanism that never fell into the water. Of course, that copy may have
been destroyed subsequentlybut somewhere there has to be a counterpart to the
Mechanism in better condition than this one. Maybe near-infinite numbers of
counterparts, for all we know. Perhaps we were the unlucky ones, and nobody
elsełs copy ended up being lost underwater."

She coughs to clear her throat, and in that instant catches
a reflected glimpse of herself in he glass plating of one of the cabinets in
the corner of the room. Drawn face, tired creases around the mouth, bags under
the eyesa woman whołs been working too hard for much too long. But how else
was an Iranian mathematician supposed to get on in the world, if it wasnłt
through graft and dedication? Itłs not like she was born into money, or had the
world rushing to open doors for her.

The work will endure long after the bags have gone, she
tells herself.

�The way it happens," she says, regaining her composure, �is
that wełll steal an almost infinitesimally small amount of order from an almost
infinitely large number of alternate universes. In return, wełll pump a tiny
amount of surplus entropy into each of those timelines. The counterparts of the
Mechanism will hardly feel the change: the alteration in any one of them will
be so tiny as to be almost unmeasurable. A microscopic scratch here; a spot of
corrosion or the introduction of an impure atom there. But because wełre stealing
order from so many of them, and consolidating that order into a single
timeline, the change in our universe will be enormous. Wełll win, because wełll
get back the Mechanism as it was before it went into the sea. But no one else
loses; itłs not like wełre stealing someone elsełs perfect copy and replacing
it with our own damaged one."

She thinks she has them thenthat it is all going to go
without a hitch or a quibble, and they can all shuffle over to the tables and
start nibbling on cheese squares. But then a hand raises itself slowly from the
audience. It belongs to an intense young man with squared-off glasses and a
severe fringe.

He asks: �How can you be so sure?"

Safa grimaces. She hates being asked questions.

RANA PUTS DOWN her tool and listens very carefully.
Somewhere in the museum there was a loud bang, as of a door being slammed. She
is silent for at least a minute, but when no further sound comes she resumes
her labors, filling the room with the repetitious scratch of diamond-tipped
burr against corroded metal.

Then another sound comes, a kind of fluttering, animal commotion,
as if a bird is loose in one of the darkened halls, and Rana can stand it no
more. She leaves her desk and walks out into the basement corridor, wondering
if someone else has come in to work. But the other rooms and offices remain
closed and unlit.

She is about to return to her labors and call Katibłs desk,
when she hears the soft and feathery commotion again. She is near the stairwell
and the sound is clearly coming from above her, perhaps on the next floor up.

Gripping the handrail, Rana ascends. She is being braver
than perhaps is wisethe museum has had its share of intruders, and there have
been theftsbut the coffee machine is above and she had been meaning to fetch herself
a cup for at least an hour. Her heart is in her throat when she reaches the
next landing and turns the corner into the corridor, which is as shabby and
narrow as any of the museumłs non-public spaces. There are high, institutional
windows on one side and office doors on the other. But there is the machine,
standing in a pool of light two doors down, and there is no sign of an
intruder. She walks to the machine, fishing coins from her pocket, and punches
in her order. As the machine clicks and gurgles into life, Rana feels a breeze
against her cheek. She looks down the corridor and feels it again: itłs as if
therełs a door open, letting in the night air. But the only door should be the
one manned by Katib, on the other side of the building.

While her coffee is being dispensed Rana walks in the
direction of the breeze. At the end the corridor reaches the corner of this
wing and jogs to the right. She turns the bend and sees something
unanticipated. All along the corridor, there is no glass in the windows, no
metal in the frames: just tall blank openings in the wall. And there, indeed,
is a fluttering black shape: a crow, or something like a crow, which has come
in through one of those openings and cannot now find its way back outside. It
keeps flinging itself at the wall between the windows, a gleam of mad
desperation in its eyes.

Rana stands still, wondering how this can be. She was here.
She remembers passing the machine and thinking she would take a cup if only she
were not already staggering under her boxes and computers.

But there is something more than just the absence of glass.
Is she losing her mind, or do the window apertures look narrower than they used
to do, as if the walls have begun to squeeze the window spaces tight like
sleepy eyes?

She must call Katib.

She hurries back the way she has come, forgetting all about
the coffee she has just paid for. But when she turns the bend in the corridor,
the machine is standing there dark and dead, as if itłs been unplugged.

She returns to the basement. Under her feet the stairs feel
rougher and more crudely formed than she remembers, until she reaches the last
few treads and they start to feel normal again. She pauses at the bottom,
waiting for her mind to straighten itself out.

Down here at least all is as it should be. Her office is as
she left it, with the lights still on, the laptops still aglow, the gearwheel
still mounted on its stand, he disemboweled Mechanism still sitting on the
other side of the desk.

She eases into her seat, her heart still racing, and picks
up the telephone.

�Katib?"

�Yes, my fairest," he says, his voice sounding more distant
and crackly than she feels it should, as it he is speaking from halfway around
the world. �What can I do for you?"

�Katib, I was just upstairs, and ..."

But then she trails off. What is she going to tell him? That
she saw open gaps where there should be windows?

�Rana?"

Her nerve deserts her. �I was just going to say ... the
coffee machine was broken. Maybe someone could take a look at it."

�Not until tomorrow, I am afraidthere is no one qualified.
But I will make an entry in the log."

�Thank you, Katib."

After a pause he asks, �There was nothing else, was there?"

�No," she says. �There was nothing else. Thank you, Katib."

She knows what he must be thinking. Shełs been working too
hard, too fixated on the task. The Mechanism does that to people, itłs been
said. They get lost in its labyrinthine possibilities and never emerge again.
Not the way they were, anyway.

But she thinks she can still hear that crow.

�How CAN I be so sure about what?" Safa asks, with an obliging
smile.

�That this is going to work the way you say it will," the
intense young man answers.

�The mathematics is pretty clear," Safa says. �I should
know; I discovered most of it." Which comes less modestly than she had
intended, although no one seems to mind. �What I mean is, there isnłt any room
for ambiguity. We know that the sheath of alternate timelines is near-infinite
in extent, and we know wełre only pumping the smallest conceivable amount of
entropy into each of those timelines." Safa holds the smile, hoping that will
be enough for the young man, and that she can continue with her presentation.

But the man isnłt satisfied. �Thatłs all very well, but arenłt
you presupposing that all those other timelines have order to spare? What if
that isnłt the case? What if all the other Mechanisms are just as corroded and
broken as ourswhat will happen then?"

�Itłll still work," Safa says, �provided the total
information content across all the timelines is sufficient to specify one
intact copy, which is overwhelmingly likely from a statistical standpoint.

Of course, if all the Mechanisms happen to be damaged in exactly
the same fashion as ours, then the Fixation wonłt workyou still canłt get
something for nothing. But thatłs not very likely. Trust me; Iłm very confident
that we can find enough information out there to reconstruct our copy."

The man seems to be content with that answer, hut just when
Safa is about to open her mouth and continue with her speech, her adversary
raises his hind again.

�Sorry, but ... I canłt help wondering. Does the entropy exchange
happen uniformly across all those timelines?"

Itłs an odd, technical-sounding question, suggesting that
the man has done more homework than most. �Actually, no," Safa says, guardedly.
�The way the math works out, the entropy exchange is ever so slightly clumped.
If a particular copy of the Mechanism has more information to give us, we end
up pumping a bit more entropy into that copy than one which has less
information to offer. But wełre still talking about small differences, nothing
that anyone will actually notice."

The man pushes a hand through his fringe. �But what if therełs
only one?"

�Iłm sorry?"

�I mean, what if therełs only one intact copy out there, and
all the rest are at least as damaged as our own?"

�That canłt happen," Safa says, hoping that someone, anyone,
will interrupt by asking another question. Itłs not that she feels on unsafe
ground, just that she has the sense that this could go on all night.

�Why not?" the man persists.

�It just canłt. The mathematics says itłs so unlikely that
we may as well forget about it."

�And you believe the mathematics."

�Why shouldnłt I?" Safa is beginning to lose her patience,
feeling cornered and put upon. Where is the museum director to defend her when
she needs him? �Of course I believe it. Itłd be pretty strange if I didnłt."

�I was just asking," the man says, sounding as if hełs the
one whołs under attack. �Maybe it isnłt very likelyIłll have to take your word
for that. But I only wanted to know what would happen."

�You donłt need to," Safa says firmly. �It canłt happennot
ever. And now can I please continue?"

HER FINGER STABS down on Katibłs button again. But there is
nothing, not even the cool purr of the dialing tone. The phone is mute, and now
that she looks at it, the display function is dead. She puts the handset down
and tries again, but nothing changes.

Thatłs when Rana pays proper attention to the gearwheel, the
one she has been working on. There are thirty-seven wheels in the Antikythera
Mechanism and this is the twenty-first, and although there was still much to be
done until it was ready to be replaced in the box, it now looks as if she has
hardly begun. The surface corrosion that she has spent weeks rectifying has
returned in a matter of minutes, covering the wheel in a furry blue-green bloom
as if someone has taken the artifact and dipped it in acid while she was out of
the office. But as she looks at it, blinking in dismay, as if it is her eyes
that are wrong, rather than the wheel, she notices that three teeth are gone,
or worn away so thoroughly that they may as well not be there. Worse, there is
a visible scratchactually more of a crackthat cuts across one side of the
wheel, as if it is about to fracture into two pieces.

Mesmerized and unsettled in equal measure, Rana picks up one
of her toolsthe scraper she was using before she heard the noiseand touches
it against part of the blue-green corrosion. The bloom chips off almost instantly,
but as it does so it takes a quadrant of the wheel with it, the piece
shattering o a heap of pale granules on her desk. She stares in numb disbelief
at the ruined gear, with a monstrous chunk bitten out of the side of it, and
then the tool itself shatters in her hand.

�This canłt be happening," Rana says to herself. Then her
gaze falls on the other gearwheels, in their plastic boxes, and she sees the
same brittle corrosion afflicting them all.

As for the Mechanism itself, the disemboweled box: what she
sees isnłt possible. She can just about accept that some bizarre, hitherto-undocumented
chemical reaction has attacked the metal in the time it took for her to go
upstairs and come down again, but the box itself is woodit hasnłt changed in
hundreds of years, not since the last time the casing was patiently replaced by
one of the Mechanismłs many careful owners.

But now the box has turned to something that looks more like
rock than wood, something barely recognizable as a made artifact. With
trepidation Rana reaches out and touches it. It feels fibrous and
insubstantial. Her finger almost seems to ghost through it, as if what she is
reaching for is not a real object at all, but a hologram. Peering into the
heart of the Mechanism, she sees the gears that are still iii place have fused
together into a single corroded mass, like a block of rock that has been
engraved with a hazy impression of clockwork.

Then Rana laughs, for the pieces of the puzzle have just
fallen into place. This is all a joke, albeitgiven the pressures she is already
underone in spectacularly bad taste. But a joke all the same, and not a marker
of her descent into insanity. She was called upstairs by a noisehow else were
they going to get into her office and swap the Mechanism for this ruined
half-cousin? The missing windows, the panicked bird, seem like details too far,
random intrusions of dream-logic, but who can guess the mind of a practical
joker?

Well, she has a sense of humor. But not now, not tonight.
Someone will pay for this. Cutting off her telephone was the last straw. That
was nasty, not funny.

She moves to leave her bench again and find whoever must be
spying on her, certain that they must be lurking in the shadows outside, maybe
in the unlit observation corridor, where theyłd have a plain view of her
discomfort. But as she places her hand down to push herself up, her fingers
slip into the smoky surface of the bench.

They vanish as if she were dipping them into water.

All of a sudden she realizes that it was not the Antikythera
Mechanism that was growing insubstantial, but everything around her.

No, thatłs not it either. Something is happening to the
building, but if the table were turning ghostly, the heavy things on itthe
Mechanism, the equipment, the laptopswould have surely sunk through It by now.
Therełs a simpler explanation, even if the realization cuts through her like a
shaft of interstellar cold.

Shełs the one fading out, losing traction and
substantiality.

Rana rises to her feet eventually, but itłs like pushing
herself against smoke. She isnłt so much ... standing as floating with her feet
in vague contact with the ground. The air in her lungs is beginning to feel
thin, but at the same time therełs no sense that she is about to choke. She
tries to walk, and for a moment her feet paddle uselessly against the floor,
until she begins to pick up a deathly momentum in t he direction of the door.

The corridor at the base of the stairs was normal when she returned
from her visit to the next floor, hut now it has become a dark, forbidding
passageway, with rough-formed doorways leading into dungeon-like spaces. Her
office is the only recognizable place, and even her office is not immune to he
changes. The door has vanished, leaving only a sagging gap in the wall. The
floor is made of stones, unevenly laid. Halfway to her bench the stones blend together
into something like concrete, and then a little further the concrete gains the
hard red sheen of the flooring she has come to expect. On the desk, her
electric light flickers and fades. The laptops shut down with a whine, their
screens darkening. The line of change in the floor creeps closer to the desk,
like an advancing tide. From somewhere in the darkness Rana hears the quiet,
insistent dripping of water.

She was wrong to assume that the things on the desk were immune
to the fading. She began to go first, but now the same process of fade-out is
beginning to catch up with her tools, with her notes and the laptops and the
fabric of the bench itself. Even the Mechanism is losing its grip on reality,
its gears and components beginning to dissolve before her eyes. The wooden box
turns ash-gray and crumbles into a pile of dust. A breeze fingers its way into
the room and spirits the dust away.

The Mechanism was the last thing to go, Rana realizes: the
tide of change had come in from all directions, to this one tiny focus, and for
a little while the focus had held firm, resisting the transforming forces.

Now she feels the hastening of her own process of fade-out.
She cannot move or communicate. She is at the mercy of the breeze.

It blows her through the cold stone walls, out into the
night-time air of a city she barely recognizes. She drifts through the sky,
able to witness but not able to participate. In all directions she sees only
ruin and desolation. The shells of buildings throw jagged outlines against the
moonlit sky. Here and there she almost recognizes the fallen corpse of a
familiar landmark, but so much is different that she soon loses her sense of
direction. Even the shape of the river, shining back under moonlight, appears
to have meandered from the course she remembers. She sees smashed stone and
metal bridges that end halfway across to the other bank. Crimson fires burn on
the horizon and flicker through the eyeholes of gutted buildings.

Then she notices the black machines, stalking their heir way
through the warrens and canyons between the ruins. Fierce and frightening
engines of war, with their turreted guns swiveling into doorways and shadows,
the iron treads of their feet crunching down on the rubble of the pulverized
city, the rubble that used to be dwellings and possessions, until these
juggernauts arrived. She does not need an emblem or flag to know that these are
he machines of an occupying force; that her city is tinder the mechanized heel
of an invader. She watches as a figure springs out of concealment to lob some
pathetic burning torch at one of the machines. The turret snaps around and a
lance of fire stabs back at the assailant. The figure drops to the ground.

The wind is gusting her higher, turning the city into a map
of itself. As her point of view changes direction she catches sight of the
building that used to be the Museum of Antiquities, but what she sees is no
more than a shattered prison or fortress, one among many. And for an instant
she remembers that the shell of the museum was very old, that the buildingor a
succession of buildings, each built on the plan of its predecessorhad stood in
the same location for many centuries, serving many rulers.

In that same instant, Rana comes to a momentary understanding
of what has happened to both her and her world. The Mechanism has been wrenched
from history, and accordinglybecause the Mechanism was so essentialhistory
has come undone. There is no Museum of Antiquities, because there is no Greater
Persia. The brilliant clockwork that dispatched armies and engineers across the
globe simply never existed.

Nor did Rana.

But the moment of understanding passes as quickly as it
came. Ghosts are not the souls of the dead, but the souls of people written out
of history when history changes. The worst thing about them is that they never
quite recall the living people they used to be, the things they once witnessed.

The wind lofts Rana higher, into thinning silver clouds. But
by then she no longer thinks of anything at all, except the endless meshing of
beautiful bronze gearwheels, moving the heavens for all eternity.

Fresco

On the day that the blue ones stopped transmitting, the
caretaker was doing its rounds of the Eye, humming and pottering among the
other, duller maintenance robots.

Then, when the news came in, it stopped humming.

Near the heart of the Eyethe vast radio telescope floating
beyond the orbit of Jupiterwas a gigantic spherical tank which had once been
used to store the water the humans had needed during the construction. They had
lived in it, toodwelling in pressurized cabins surrounded by water, shielded
from radiation.

Now they were gonelong gonebut the midnight blue tank
remained.

Like, the caretaker had thought one day, a huge blank
canvas.

III

Until the coming of the Eye, no radio telescope had been
sensitive enough to pick out signals of intelligent origin from the mush of
cosmic background noise. But then the feast had begun: a tsunami of knowledge
almost beyond human comprehension. Yet the messages showed that humanity was
still fundamentally alone. All the signals had originated in other galaxies,
often at distances that bordered on the cosmological. They had been sent
hundreds of millions of years ago, when the dinosaurs were still evolutionłs
cool new idea.

But there was a more disturbing thing even than the
loneliness.

At any one time the Eye was picking up the messages from
about a hundred civilizations, but each only stayed active for a few centuries
before falling silent. The net number stayed roughly constant because new
species were always popping up and discovering radio astronomy, but they too
would be doomed to spend only a relatively short amount of time among the
hundred. For a few glorious centuries they would broadcast their cultural
legacy into the sky; enriching the knowledge of the other listening cultures.

But thenit was often around the time they started
discovering some of the more interesting things that could be done with subatomic
particlesthey would stop sending.

Usually without much warning.

III

It shouldnłt have bothered the caretaker.

But in tending the Eye it found that it became quite
attached to some of those transmitting cultures. It became absorbed in their
histories; fascinated by their biologies and outlooks.

It hummed their music and pondered their art.

And waited with deep, mounting sadness for the day it always
knew would come; the sudden, roaring silence from that part of the sky.

III

It moved to the part of the Fresco which recorded the
senders in a distant galaxy in the constellation Sculptor.

The caretaker had marked the tank with faint lines of
celestial latitude and longitude. At the precise co-ordinates of the transmitting
civilization, it had painted a spiral galaxy much like our own; an
impressionistic swirl of white and ochre. It was one of the first galaxies that
the caretaker had painted, and while it had gained proficiency sincethere were
better ones dotted all around the Frescothere was a certain charm to this
effort which appealed to it.

Two thirds out from the core, the caretaker had marked the location
of the transmitting culturełs solar system.

It thought of them: blue, tentacled aquatic beings with a
reproductive system so intricate it had taken the caretaker decades to work out
how many sexes they had. Their music had been even trickier; sounding at first
pass like synchronized drowning. But the caretaker had persisted, and after a
while it had even caught itself humming some of the more accessible bits.

But they were gone now.

Silent.

III

Nothing for it, then.

With sadness in its heartbut at the same time emboldened by
the execution of a solemn task it knew must be donethe caretaker prepared the
precise shade of midnight blue it needed. When it was ready, it carefully
stippled the galaxy into oblivion, like a master picture restorer removing a
blemish. The caretaker was very good at its work, and when it was done there
was no sign that the galaxy had ever existed.

The Fresco was up-to-date, but it would not be long before
it had to be changed again.

Art is long, it thought. And life short.

Galactic North

Persistence can be a virtue, but perhapsas in the
breakneck, relentlessly paced, gorgeously coloured story that follows, which
sweeps us along on a cosmic chase across thousands of lightyears of space and
millions of years of timeit can sometimes be taken a bit too far ...

 

New writer Alastair Reynolds is a frequent contributor to Interzone,
and has also sold to Asimovłs Science Fiction and elsewhere. A
professional scientist with a Ph.D. in astronomy, he comes from Wales, but
lives in the Netherlands. His first novel, Revelation Space, already
being hailed as one of the major SF books of the year, has just appeared in
Britain. His story �A Spy in Europa" appeared in our Thirteenth Annual
Collection.

 

Luyten 726-8 Cometary HaloAD 2303

The two of them crouched in a tunnel of filthy ice, bulky in
spacesuits. Fifty metres down the tunnel the servitor straddled the bore on
skeletal legs, transmitting a thermal image onto their visors.

Irravel jumped whenever the noise shifted into something human,
cradling her gun nervously.

�Damn this thing," she said. �Hardly get my finger round the
trigger."

�It canłt read your blood, Captain." Markarian, next to her,
managed not to sound as if he was stating the obvious. �You have to set the
override to female."

Of course. Belatedly, remembering the training session on
Fand where theyłd been shown how to use the weaponsmonths of subjective time
ago; years of worldtimeIrravel told the gun to reshape itself. The
memory-plastic casing squirmed in her gloves to something more manageable. It still
felt wrong.

�How are we doing?"

�Last teams in position. Thatłs all the tunnels covered.
Theyłll have to fight their way in."

�I think that might well be on the agenda."

�Maybe so." Markarian sighted along his weapon like a
sniper. �But theyłll get a surprise when they reach the cargo."

True: the ship had sealed the sleeper chambers the instant
the pirates had arrived near the comet.

Counter-intrusion weaponry would seriously inconvenience
anyone trying to break in, unless they had the right authorization. And there,
Irravel knew, was the problem; the thing she would rather not have had to deal
with.

�Markarian," Irravel said. �If wełre taken prisoner, therełs
a chance theyłll try and make us give up the codes."

�Donłt think that hasnłt crossed my mind already." Markarian
rechecked some aspect of his gun.

�I wonłt let you down, Irravel."

�Itłs not a question of letting me down," she said,
carefully.

�Itłs whether or not we betray the cargo."

�I know." For a moment they studied each otherłs faces
through their visors, acknowledging what had once been more than professional
friendship; the shared knowledge that they would kill each other rather than
place the cargo in harmłs way.

Their ship was the ramliner Hirondelle. She was damaged;
lashed to the comet for repair. Improbably sleek for a creature of vacuum, her
four-kilometer-long conic hull tapered to a needlesharp prow and sprouted trumpet-shaped
engines from two swept-back spars at the rear. It had been Irravelłs first
captaincy: a routine 17-year hop from Fand, in the Lacaille 9352 system, to Yellowstone,
around Epsilon Eridaniwith 20,000 reefersleep colonists. What had gone wrong should
only have happened once in a thousand trips: a speck of interstellar dust had
slipped through the shipłs screen of anti-collision lasers and punched a cavernous
hole in the ablative ice-shield, vaporizing a quarter of its mass. With a
massively reduced likelihood of surviving another collision, the ship had
automatically steered toward the nearest system capable of supplying repair
materials.

Luyten 726-8 had been no onełs idea of a welcoming destination.
No human colonies had flourished there. All that remained were droves of
scavenging machines sent out by various superpowers. The ship had locked into a
scavengerłs homing signal, eventually coming within visual range of the inert
comet which the machine had made its home, and which ought to have been chequered
with resupply materials. But when Irravel had been revived from reefersleep,
what shełd found in place of the expected goods were only acres of barren
comet.

�Dear God," shełd said. �Do we deserve this?"

Yet, after a few days, despair became steely resolve. The
ship couldnłt safely travel anywhere else, so they would have to process the
supplies themselves, doing the work of the malfunctioning surveyor. It would
mean stripping the ship just to make the machines to mine and shape the cometary
iceyears of work by any estimate. That hardly mattered. The detour had already
added years to the mission.

Irravel ordered the rest of her crewall 90 of themto be
warmed, and then delegated tasks, mostly programming. Servitors were not
particularly intelligent outside of their designated functions. She considered
activating the other machines she carried as cargothe greenfly terraformersbut
that cut against all her instincts. Greenfly machines were Von Neumann breeders,
unlike the sterile servitors. They were a hundred times cleverer. She would
only consider using them if the cargo was placed in immediate danger.

�If you wonłt unleash the greenflies," Markarian said, �at
least think about waking the

Conjoiners. There may only be four of them, but we could use
their expertise."

�I donłt trust them. I never liked the idea of carrying them
in the first place. They unsettle me."

�I donłt like them either, but Iłm willing to bury my
prejudices if it means fixing the ship faster."

�Well, thatłs where we differ. Iłm not, so donłt raise the
subject again."

�Yes," Markarian said, and only when its omission was insolently
clear did he bother adding:

�Captain."

Eventually the Conjoiners ceased to be an issue, when the
work was clearly under way and proceeding normally. Most of the crew were able
to return to reefersleep. Irravel and Markarian stayed awake a little longer,
and even after theyłd gone under, they woke every seven months to review the
status of the works. It began to look as if they would succeed without assistance.

Until the day they were woken out of schedule, and a dark,
grapple-shaped ship was almost upon the comet. Not an interstellar ship, it
must have come from somewhere nearbyprobably within the same halo of comets
around Luyten 726-8. Its silence was not encouraging.

�I think theyłre pirates," Irravel said. �Iłve heard of one
or two other ships going missing near here, and it was always put down to
accident."

�Why did they wait so long?"

�They had no choice. There are billions of comets out here,
but theyłre never less than light-hours apart. Thatłs a long way if you only
have in-system engines. They must have a base somewhere else to keep watch,
maybe light-weeks from here, like a spider with a very wide web."

�What do we do now?"

Irravel gritted her teeth. �Do what anything does when it
gets stuck in the middle of a web. Fight back."

But the Hirondellełs minimal defences only scratched against
the enemy ship. Oblivious, it fired penetrators and winched closer. Dozens of
crab-shaped machines swarmed out and dropped below the cometłs horizon,
impacting with seismic thuds. After a few minutes, sensors in the furthest tunnels
registered intruders. Only a handful of crew had been woken. They broke guns
out of the armourysmall arms designed for pacification in the unlikely event
of a shipboard riotand then established defensive positions in all the
cometary tunnels.

Nervously now, Irravel and Markarian advanced round the
tunnelłs bend, cleated shoes whispering through ice barely more substantial
than smoke. They had to keep their suit exhausts from touching the walls if
they didnłt want to get blown back by superheated steam. Irravel jumped again
at the pattern of photons on her visor and then forced calm, telling herself it
was another mirage.

Except this time it stayed.

Markarian opened fire, squeezing rounds past the servitor.
It lurched aside, a gaping hole in its carapace. Black crabs came round the
bend, encrusted with sensors and guns. The first reached the ruined servitor
and dismembered it with ease. If only therełd been time to activate and program
the greenfly machinestheyłd have ripped through the pirates like a host of
furies, treating them as terraformable matter.

And maybe us too, Irravel thought.

Something flashed through the clouds of steam; an electromagnetic
pulse that turned Irravelłs suit sluggish, as if every joint had corroded. The
whine of the circulator died to silence, leaving only her frenzied breathing.
Something pressed against her backpack. She turned slowly around, wary of falling
against the walls. There were crabs everywhere. The chamber in which theyłd
been cornered was littered with the bodies of the other crew members; pink
trail of blood on ice reaching from other tunnels. Theyłd been killed and
dragged here.

Two words jumped to mind: kill yourself. But first she had
to kill Markarian, in case he lacked the nerve himself. She couldnłt see his
face through his visor. That was good. Painfully, she pointed the gun towards
him and squeezed the trigger. But instead of firing, the gun shivered in her
hands, stowing itself into a quarter of its operational volume. �Thank you for
using this weapon system," it said cheerfully.

Irravel let it drift to the ground.

A new voice rasped in her helmet. �If youłre thinking of surrendering,
now might not be a bad time."

�Bastard," Irravel said, softly.

�Really the best you can manage?" The language was Canasianwhat
Irravel and Markarian had spoken on Fandbut heavily accented, as if the native
tongue was Norte or Russish, or spoken with an impediment. �Bastardłs quite a
compliment compared to some of things my clients come up with."

�Give me time; Iłll work on it."

�Positive attitudethatłs good." The lid of a crab hinged
up, revealing the prone form of a man in a mesh of motion-sensors. He crawled
from the mesh and stepped onto the ice, wearing a spacesuit formed from
segmented metal plates. Totems had been welded to the armour, around holographic
starscapes infested with serpentine monsters and scantily-clad maidens.

�Who are you?"

�Captain Run Seven." He stepped closer, examining her suit
nameplate. �But you can call me

Seven, Irravel Veda."

�I hope you burn in hell, Seven."

Seven smiledshe could see the curve of his grin through his
visor; the oddly upturned nostrils of his nose above it. �Iłm sensing some
negativity here, Irravel. I think we need to put that behind us, donłt you?"

Irravel looked at her murdered adjutants. �Maybe if you tell
me which one was the traitor."

�Traitor?"

�You seemed to have no difficulty finding us."

�Actually, you found us." It was a womanłs voice this time. �We
use lurestampering with commercial beacons, like the scavengerłs." She emerged
from one of the other attack machines, wearing a suit similar to Sevenłs,
except that it displayed the testosterone-saturated male analogues of his
space-maidens; all rippling torsos and chromed codpieces.

�Wreckers," Irravel breathed.

�Yeah. Ships home in on the beacons, then find they ainłt
going anywhere in a hurry. We move in from the halo."

�Disclose all our confidential practices while youłre at it,
Mirsky," Seven said.

She glared at him through her visor. �Veda would have
figured it out."

�Wełll never know now, will we?"

�What does it matter?" she said. �Gonna kill them anyway,
arenłt you?"

Seven flashed an arc of teeth filed to points and waved a
hand towards the female pirate. �Allow me to introduce Mirsky, our
loose-tongued but efficient information retrieval specialist. Shełs going to
take you on a little trip down memory lane; see if we canłt remember those
access codes."

�What codes?"

�Itłll come back to you," Seven said.

They were taken through the tunnels, past half-assembled mining
machines, onto the surface and then into the pirate ship. The ship was huge:
most of it living space. Cramped corridors snaked through hydroponics galleries
of spring wheat and dwarf papaya, strung with xenon lights. The ship hummed
constantly with carbon dioxide scrubbers, the fetid air making Irravel sneeze.
There were children everywhere, frowning at the captives. The pirates obviously
had no reefersleep technology:

they stayed warm the whole time, and some of the children Irravel
saw had probably been born after the Hirondelle had arrived here.

They arrived at a pair of interrogation rooms where they
were separated. Irravelłs room held a couch converted from an old command seat,
still carrying warning decals. A console stood in one corner. Painted torture
scenes fought for wallspace with racks of surgical equipment; drills, blades and
ratcheted contraptions speckled with rust.

Irravel breathed deeply. Hyperventilation could have an anaesthetic
effect. Her conditioning would in any case create a state of detachment: the
pain would be no less intense, but she would feel it at one remove.

She hoped.

The pirates fiddled with her suit, confused by the modern design,
until they stripped her down to her shipboard uniform. Mirsky leant over her.
She was small-boned and dark skinned, dirty hair rising in a topknot, eyes
mismatched shades of azure. Something clung to the side of her head above the left
ear; a silver box with winking status lights. She fixed a crown to Irravelłs
head, then made adjustments on the console.

�Decided yet?" Captain Run Seven said, sauntering into the
room. He was unlatching his helmet.

�What?"

�Which of our portfolio of interrogation packages youłre
going to opt for."

She was looking at his face now. It wasnłt really human.
Seven had manłs bulk and shape, but there was at least as much of the pig in
his face. His nose was a snout, his ears two tapered flaps framing a hairless
pink skull. Pale eyes evinced animal cunning.

�What the hell are you?"

�Excellent question," Seven said, clicking a finger in her
direction. His bare hand was dark skinned and feminine. �To be honest, I donłt
really know. A genetics experiment, perhaps? Was I the seventh failure, or the
first success?"

�Are you sure you want an honest answer on that?"

He ignored her. �All I know is that Iłve been herein the
halo around Luyten 726-8for as long as I can remember."

�Someone sent you here?"

�In a tiny automated spacecraft; perhaps an old lifepod. The
shipłs governing personality raised me as well as it could; attempted to make
of me a well-rounded individual." Seven trailed off momentarily. �Eventually I
was found by a passing ship. I staged what might be termed a hostile takeover
bid. From then on Iłve had an organization largely recruited from my client
base."

�Youłre insane. It might have worked once, but it wonłt work
with us."

�Why should you be any different?"

�Neural conditioning. I treat the cargo as my offspringall
20,000 of them. I canłt betray them in any way."

Seven smiled his piggy smile. �Funny; the last client
thought that too."

Sometime later Irravel woke alone in a reefersleep casket.
She remembered only dislocated episodes of interrogation. There was the memory
of a kind of sacrifice, and, later, of the worst terror she could imagineso
intense that she could not bring its cause to mind. Underpinning everything was
the certainty that she had not given up the codes.

So why was she still alive?

Everything was quiet and cold. Once she was able to move,
she found a suit and wandered the

Hirondelle until she reached a porthole. They were still
lashed to the comet. The other craft was gone; presumably en route back to the
base in the halo where the pirates must have had a larger ship.

She looked for Markarian, but there was no sign of him.

Then she checked the 20-sleeper chambers; the thousand-berth
dormitories. The chamber doors were all open. Most of the sleepers were still
there. Theyłd been butchered, carved open for implants, minds pulped by
destructive memory-trawling devices. The horror was too great for any recognizable
emotional response. The conditioning made each death feel like a stolen part of
her.

Yet something kept her on the edge of sanity: the discovery
that 200 sleepers were missing.

There was no sign that theyłd been butchered like the
others, which left the possibility that theyłd been abducted by the pig. It was
madness; it would not begin to compensate for the loss of the othersbut her
psychology allowed no other line of thought.

She could find them again.

Her plan was disarmingly simple. It crystallized in her mind
with the clarity of a divine vision. It would be done.

She would repair the ship. She would hunt down Seven. She would
recover the sleepers from him. And enact whatever retribution she deemed fit.

She found the chamber where the four Conjoiners had slept,
well away from the main dormitories, in part of the ship where the pirates were
not likely to have wandered. She was hoping she could revive them and seek
their assistance. There seemed no way they could make things worse for her.

But her hopes faded when she saw the scorch marks of weapon
blasts around the bulkhead; the door forced.

She stepped inside anyway.

Theyłd been a sect on Mars, originally; a clique of
cyberneticists with a particular fondness for self-experimentation. In 2190
their final experiment had involved distributed processingallowing their
enhanced minds to merge into one massively parallel neural net. The resultant
eventa permanent, irrevocable escalation to a new mode of consciousnesswas
known as the

Transenlightenment.

Therełd been a war, of course.

Demarchists had long seen both sides. They used neural augmentation
themselves, policed so that they never approached the Conjoiner threshold. Theyłd
brokered the peace, defusing the suspicion around the Conjoiners. Conjoiners
had fuelled Demarchist expansion from Europa with their technologies, fused in
the white-heat of Transenlightenment. Four of them were along as observers because
the Hirondelle used their ramscoop drives.

Irravel still didnłt trust them.

And maybe it didnłt matter. The reefersleep unitsfluted
caskets like streamlined coffinswere riddled with blast holes. Grimacing
against the smell, Irravel examined the remains inside. Theyłd been cut open,
but the pirates seemed to have abandoned the job halfway through, not finding
the kinds of implants they were expecting. And maybe not even recognizing that
they were dealing with anything other than normal humans, Irravel thoughtespecially
if the pirates whołd done this hadnłt been among Sevenłs more experienced crew
members; just trigger-happy thugs.

She examined the final casket; the one furthest from the
door. It was damaged, but not so badly as the others. The display cartouches
were still alive, a patina of frost still adhering to the casketłs lid. The
Conjoiner inside looked intact: the pirates had never reached him. She read his
nameplate:

Remontoire.

�Yeah, hełs a live one," said a voice behind Irravel. �Now
back off real slow."

Heart racing, Irravel did as she was told. Slowly, she
turned around, facing the woman whose voice she recognized.

�Mirsky?" she said.

�Yeah, itłs your lucky day." Mirsky was wearing her suit,
but without the helmet, making her head seem shrunken in the moat of her
neck-ring. She had a gun on Irravel, but the way she pointed it was
half-hearted, as if this was a stage in their relationship she wanted to get
over as quickly as possible.

�What the hell are you doing here?"

�Same as you, Veda. Trying to figure out how much shit wełre
in; how hard itłll be to get this ship moving again. Guess we had the same idea
about the Conjoiners. Seven went berserk when he heard theyłd been killed, but
I figured it was worth checking how thorough the job had been."

�Stop; slow down. Start at the beginning. Why arenłt you
with Seven?"

Mirsky pushed past her and consulted the reefersleep indicators.
�Seven and me had a falling out.

Fill in the rest yourself." With quick jabs of her free hand
she called up different display modes, frowning at each. �Shit, this ainłt
gonna be easy. If we wake the guy without his three friends, hełs gonna be
psychotic; no use to us at all."

�What kind of falling out?"

�Seven reckoned I was holding back too much in the interrogation;
not putting you through enough hell." She scratched at the silver box on the
side of her head. �Maybe we can wake him, then fake the cybernetic presence of
his friendswhat do you think?"

�Why am I still alive, if Seven broke into the sleeper chambers?
Why are you still alive?"

�Sevenłs a sadist. Abandonmentłs more his style than a quick
and clean execution. As for you, the pig cut a deal with your
second-in-command."

The implication of that sunk in. �Markarian gave him the codes?"

�It wasnłt you, Veda."

Strange relief flooded Irravel. She could never be absolved
of the crime of losing the cargo, but at least her degree of complicity had
lessened.

�But that was only half the deal," Mirsky continued. �The
rest was Seven promising not to kill you if Markarian agreed to join the
Hideyoshi, our main ship." She told Irravel that therełd been a transmitter
rigged to her reefersleep unit, so that Markarian would know she was still
alive.

�Seven must have known he was taking a risk leaving both of
us alive."

�A pretty small one. The shipłs in pieces and Seven will assume
neither of us has the brains to patch it back together." Mirsky slipped the gun
into a holster. �But Seven assumed the Conjoiners were dead. Big mistake. Once
we figure a way to wake Remontoire safely, he can help us fix the ship; make it
faster too."

�Youłve got this all worked out, havenłt you?"

�More or less. Something tells me you arenłt absolutely
ready to start trusting me, though."

�Sorry, Mirsky, but you donłt make the worldłs most convincing
turncoat."

She reached up with her free hand, gripping the box on the
side of her head. �Know what this is?

A loyalty-shunt. Makes simian stem cells; pumps them into
the internal carotid artery, just above the cavernous sinus. They jump the
blood-brain barrier and build a whole bunch of transient structures tied to
primate dominance hierarchies; alpha-male shit. Thatłs how Seven had us under his
commandhe was King Monkey. But Iłve turned it off now."

�Thatłs supposed to reassure me?"

�No, but maybe this will."

Mirsky tugged at the box, ripping it away from the side of
her head in curds of blood.

Luyten 726-8 Cometary HaloAD 2309

Irravel felt the Hirondelle turn like a compass needle. The
ramscoops gasped at interstellar gas, sucking lone atoms of cosmic hydrogen
from cubic metres of vacuum. The engines spat twin beams of thrust, pressing
Irravel into her seat with two gees of acceleration. Hardly moving now, still in
the local frame of the cometary halo, but in only six months she would be
nudging lightspeed.

Her seat floated on a boom in the middle of the dodecahedral
bridge. �Map," Irravel said, and was suddenly drowning in stars; an immense
30-light-year-wide projection of human settled space, centred on the First
System.

�Therełs the bastard," Mirsky said, pointing from her own hovering
seat, her voice only slightly strained under the gee-load. �Map; give us
projection of the Hideyoshiłs vector, and plot our intercept."

The pirate shipłs icon was still very close to Luyten 726-8;
less than a tenth of a light-year out.

They had not seen Seven until now. The thrust from his ship
was so tightly focused that it had taken until now for the widening beams of
the exhaust to sweep over Hirondellełs sensors. But now they knew where he was
headed. A dashed line indicated the likely course, arrowing right through the mapłs
heart and out towards the system Lalande 21185. Now came the intercept vector,
a neartangent which sliced Sevenłs course beyond Sol.

�When does it happen?" Irravel said.

�Depends on how much attention Sevenłs paying to whatłs
coming up behind him, for a start, and what kind of evasive stunts he can pull."

�Most of my simulations predict an intercept between 2325
and 2330," Remontoire said.

Irravel savoured the dates. Even for someone trained to fly
a starship between systems, they sounded uncomfortably like the future.

�Are you sure itłs himnot just some other ship that
happened to be waiting in the halo?"

�Trust me," Mirsky said. �I can smell the swine from here."

�Shełs right," Remontoire said. �The destination makes
perfect sense. Seven was prohibited from staying here much longer, once the
number of missing ships became too large to be explained away as accidents. Now
he must seek a well-settled system to profit from what he has stolen."

The Conjoiner looked completely normal at first glancea
bald man wearing a shipłs uniform, his expression placidbut then one noticed
the unnatural bulge of his skull, covered only in a fuzz of baby hair. Most of
his glial cells had been supplanted by machines which served the same structural
functions but which also performed specialized cybernetic duties, like
interfacing with other commune partners or external machinery. Even the organic
neurones in his brain were now webbed together by artificial connections which
allowed transmission speeds of kilometres per second; factors of ten faster
than in normal brains. Only the problem of dispersing waste heat denied the
Conjoiners even faster modes of thought.

It was seven years since theyłd woken him. Remontoire had
not dealt well with the murder of his three compatriots, but Irravel and Mirsky
had managed to keep him sane by feeding input into the glial machines, crudely
simulating rapport with other commune members. �It provides the kind of comfort
to me that a ghost limb offers an amputee," Remontoire had said. �An illusion
of wholenessbut no substitute for the real thing."

�What more can we do?" Irravel said.

�Return me to another commune with all speed."

Irravel had agreed, provided Remontoire helped with the
ship.

He hadnłt let her down. Under his supervision, half the shipłs
mass had been sacrificed, permitting twice the acceleration. They had dug a
vault in the comet, lined it with support systems, and entombed what remained
of the cargo. The sleepers were nominally deadthere was no real expectation of
reviving them again, even if medicine improved in the futurebut Irravel had nonetheless
set servitors to tend the dead for however long it took, and programmed the
beacon to lure another ship, this time to pick up the dead. All that had taken
years, of coursebut it had also taken Seven as much time to cross the halo to
his base; time again to show himself.

�Be so much easier if you didnłt want the others back,"
Mirsky said. �Then we could just slam past the pig at relativistic speed and
hit him with seven kinds of shit." She was very proud of the weapons shełd
built into the ship, copied from pirate designs with Remontoirełs help.

�I want the sleepers back," Irravel said.

�And Markarian?"

�Hełs mine," she said, after due consideration. �You get the
pig."

Near Lalande 21185AD 2328

Relativity squeezed stars until they bled colour. Half a
kilometre ahead, the side of Sevenłs ship raced toward Irravel like a tsunami.

The Hideyoshi was the same shape as the Hirondelle; honed
less by human whim than the edicts of physics. But the Hideyoshi was heavier,
with a wider cross-section, incapable of matching the

Hirondellełs acceleration or of pushing so close to C. It
had taken years, but theyłd caught up with

Seven, and now the attack was in progress.

Irravel, Mirsky and Remontoire wore thruster-pack-equipped
suits, of the type used for inspections outside the ship, with added armour and
weapons. Painted for effect, they looked like mechanized Samurai. Another 47
suits were slaved to theirs, acting as decoys. Theyłd crossed

50,000 kilometres of space between the ships.

�Youłre sure Seven doesnłt have any defence?" Irravel had
asked, not long after waking from reefersleep.

�Only the in-system ship had any firepower," Mirsky said.
She looked older now; new lines engraved under her eyes. �Thatłs because no onełs
ever been insane enough to contemplate storming another ship in interstellar
space."

�Until now."

But it wasnłt so stupid, and Mirsky knew it. Matching velocities
with another ship was only a question of being faster; squeezing fractionally
closer to lightspeed. It might take time, but sooner or later the distance
would be closed. And it had taken time, none of which Mirsky had spent in reefersleep.
Partly it was because she lacked the right implantsripped out in infancy when
she was captured by Seven. Partly it was a distaste for the very idea of being
frozen, instilled by years of pirate upbringing. But also because she wanted
time to refine her weapons. They had fired a salvo against the enemy before
crossing space in the suits, softening up any weapons buried in his ice and
opening holes into the Hideyoshiłs interior.

Now Irravelłs vision blurred, her suit slowing itself before
slamming into the ice.

Whiteness swallowed her.

For a moment she couldnłt remember what she was doing here.
Then awareness came and she slithered back up the tunnel excavated on her fall,
until she reached the surface of the Hideyoshiłs ice-shield.

�Vedayou intact?"

Her armourłs shoulder-mounted comm laser found a
line-of-sight to Mirsky. Mirsky was 20 or 30 metres away, around the shipłs
lazy circumference, balancing on a ledge of ice. Walls of it stretched above
and below like a rockface, lit by the glare from the engines. Decoys were
arriving by the second.

�Iłm alive," Irravel said. �Wherełs the entry point?"

�Couple of hundred metres upship."

�Damn. I wanted to come in closer. Remontoirełs out of
line-of-sight. How much fuel do you have left?"

�Scarcely enough to take the chill off a penguinłs dick."

Mirsky raised her arms above her head and fired lines into
the ice, rocketing out from her sleeves.

Belly sliding against the shield, she retracted the lines
and hauled herself upship.

Irravel followed. Theyłd burned all their fuel crossing
between the two ships, but that was part of the plan. If they didnłt have a
chance to raid Sevenłs reserves, theyłd just kick themselves into space and let
the Hirondelle home in on them.

�You think Seven saw us cross over?"

�Definitely. And you can bet hełs doing something about it,
too."

�Donłt do anything that might endanger the cargo, Mirskyno
matter how tempting Seven makes it."

�Would you sacrifice half the sleepers to get the other half
back?"

�Thatłs not remotely an option."

Above their heads crevasses opened like eyes. Pirate crabs
erupted out, black as night against the ice. Irravel opened fire on the
machines. This time, with better weapons and real armour, she began to inflict
damage. Behind the crabs, pirates emerged, bulbous in customized armour. Lasers
scuffed the ice; bright through gouts of steam. Irravel saw Remontoire now: he
was unharmed, and doing his best to shoot the pirates into space.

Above, one of Irravelłs shots dislodged a pirate.

The Hideyoshiłs acceleration dropped him towards her. When
the impact came she hardly felt it, her suitłs guylines staying firm. The
pirate folded around her like a broken toy, then bounced back against the ship,
pinned there by her suit. He was too close to shoot unless Irravel wanted to
blow herself into space. Distorted behind glass, his face shaped a word. She
got in closer until their visors were touching. Through the glass she saw the
asymmetric bulge of a loyalty-shunt.

The face was Markarianłs. At first it seemed like absurd coincidence.
Then it occurred to her that

Seven might have sent his newest recruit out to show his mettle.
Maybe Seven wouldnłt be far behind. Confronting adversaries was part of the
alpha-male inheritance.

�Irravel," Markarian said, voice laced with static. �Iłm
glad youłre alive."

�Donłt flatter yourself youłre the reason Iłm here,
Markarian. I came for the cargo. Youłre just next on the list."

�What are you going to dokill me?"

�Do you think you deserve any better than that?" Irravel adjusted
her position. �Or are you going to try and justify betraying the cargo?"

He pulled his aged features into a smile. �We made a deal, Irravel;
the same way you made a deal about greenfly. But you donłt remember that, do
you?"

�Maybe I sold the greenfly machines to the pig," she said. �If
I did that, it was a calculated move to buy the safety of the cargo. You, on
the other hand, cut a deal with Seven to save your neck."

The other pirates were holding fire, nervously marking them.
�I did it to save yours, actually.

Does that make any sense?" There was wonder in his eyes now.
�Did you ever see Mirskyłs hand?

That was never her own. The pirates swap limbs as badges of
rank. Theyłre very good at connective surgery."

�Youłre not making much sense, Markarian."

Dislodged ice rained on them. Irravel looked around in time
to see another pirate emerging from a crevasse. She recognized the suit
artwork: it was Seven. He wore things, strung around his utility belt in
transparent bags like obscene fruit. She stared at them for a few seconds
before their nature clicked into horrific focus: frozen human heads.

Irravel stifled a reaction to vomit.

�Yes," Run Seven said. �Ten of your compatriots, recently unburdened
of their bodies. But donłt worrytheyłre not harmed in any fundamental sense.
Their brains are intactprovided you donłt warm them with an ill-aimed shot."

�Iłve got a clear line of fire," Mirsky said. �Just say the
word and the bastardłs an instant anatomy lesson."

�Wait," Irravel said. �Donłt shoot."

�Sound business sense, Captain Veda. I see you appreciate
the value of these heads."

�Whatłs he talking about?" Mirsky said.

�Their neural patterns can be retrieved." It was Remontoire
speaking now. �We Conjoiners have had the ability to copy minds onto machine
substrates for some time now, though we havenłt advertised it. But that doesnłt
matterthere have been experiments on Yellowstone which approach our early
successes. And these heads arenłt even thinking: only topologies need to be mapped,
not electrochemical processes."

The pig took one of the heads from his belt and held it to
eye-level, for inspection. �The

Conjoinerłs right. Theyłre not really dead. And they can be
yours if you wish to do business."

�What do you want for them?"

�Markarian, for a start. All that Demarchy expertise makes
for a very efficient second-incommand."

Irravel glanced down at her prisoner. �You canłt buy loyalty
with a box and a few neural connections."

�No? In what way do our loyalty-shunts differ from the psychosurgery
which your world inflicted on you, Irravel, yoking your motherhood instinct to
20,000 sleepers you donłt even know by name?"

�We have a deal or not?"

�Only if you throw in the Conjoiner as well."

Irravel looked at Remontoire; some snake part of her mind
weighing options with reptilian detachment.

�No!" he said. �You promised!"

�Shut up," Seven said. �Or when you do get to rejoin your
friends, itłll be in instalments."

�Iłm sorry," Irravel said. �I canłt lose even ten of the
cargo."

Seven tossed the first head down to her. �Now let Markarian
go and wełll see about the rest."

Irravel looked down at him. �Itłs not over between you and
me."

Then she released him, and he scrambled back up the ice towards
Seven.

�Excellent. Herełs another head. Now the Conjoiner."

Irravel issued a subvocal command; watched Remontoire stiffen.
�His suitłs paralysed. Take him."

Two pirates worked down to him, checked him over and nodded
towards Seven. Between them they hauled him back up the ice, vanishing into a
crevasse and back up into the Hideyoshi.

�The other eight heads," Irravel said.

�Iłm going to throw them away from the ship. Youłll be able
to locate them easily enough. While

Iłm doing that, Iłm going to retreat, and youłre going to
leave."

�We could end this now," Mirsky said.

�I need those heads."

�They really fucked with your psychology big-time, didnłt
they?" She raised her weapon and began shooting Seven and the other pirates.
Irravel watched her carve up the remaining heads; splintering frozen bone into
the vacuum.

�No!"

�Sorry," Mirsky said. �Had to do it, Veda."

Seven clutched at his chest, fingers mashing the pulp of the
heads, still tethered to his belt. Shełd punctured his suit. As he tried to
stem the damburst, his face was carved with the intolerable knowledge that his
reign had just ended.

But something had hit Irravel too.

Sylveste Institute, Yellowstone Orbit, Epsilon EridaniAD 2415

�Where am I?" Irravel asked. �How am I thinking this?"

The womanłs voice was the colour of mahogany. �Somewhere
safe. You died on the ice, but we got you back in time."

�For what?"

Mirsky sighed, as though this was something she would rather
not have had to explain this soon.

�To scan you, just like we did with the frozen heads. Copy
you into the ship."

Maybe she should have felt horror, or indignation, or even relief
that some part of her had been spared.

Instead, she just felt impatience.

�What now?"

�Wełre working on it," Mirsky said.

TRANS-ALDEBARAN SPACEAD 2673

�We saved her body after she died," Mirsky said, wheezing
slightly. She found it hard to move around under what to Irravel was the shipłs
normal two and a half gees of thrust. �After the battle we brought her back on
board."

Irravel thought of her mother dying on the other ship, the
one they were chasing. For years they had deliberately not narrowed the distance,
holding back but not allowing the Hideyoshi to slip from view.

Until now, it hadnłt even occurred to Irravel to ask why.

She looked through the casketłs window, trying to match her
own features against what she saw in the womanłs face, trying to project her
own 15 years into Mother Irravelłs adulthood.

�Why did you keep her so cold?"

�We had to extract what we could from her brain," Mirsky
said. �Memories and neural patterns.

We trawled them and stored them in the ship."

�What good was that?"

�We knew theyłd come in useful again."

Shełd been cloned from Mother Irravel. They were not identicalno
Mixmaster expertise could duplicate the precise biochemical environment of
Mother Irravelłs womb, or the shaping experiences of early infancy, and their
personalities had been sculpted centuries apart, in totally different worlds.
But they were still close copies. They even shared memories: scripted into
Irravelłs mind by medichines, so that she barely noticed each addition to her
own experiences.

�Why did you do this?" she asked.

�Because Irravel began something," Mirsky said. �Something I
promised Iłd help her finish."

Stormwatch Station, Aethra, Hyades Trade EnvelopeAD 2931

�Why are you interested in our weapons?" the Nestbuilder
asked. �We are not aware of any wars within the chordate phylum at this epoch."

�Itłs a personal matter," Irravel said.

The Nestbuilder hovered a metre above the trade floor, suspended
in a column of microgravity.

They were oxygen-breathing arthropods whołd once ascended to
spacefaring capability. No longer intelligent, yet supported by their
self-renewing machinery, they migrated from system to system, constructing
elaborate, space-filling structures from solid diamond. Other Nestbuilder swarms
would arrive and occasionally occupy the new nests. There seemed no purpose to
this activity, but for tens of thousands of years they had been host to a
smaller, cleverer species known as the Slugs.

Small communities of Slugsanything up to a dozenlived in
warm, damp niches in a

Nestbuilderłs intricately folded shell. They had long since
learned how to control the hostłs behaviour and exploit its subservient
technology.

Irravel studied a Slug now, crawling out from under a lip of
shell material.

The thing was a multicellular invertebrate not much larger
than her fist; a bag of soft blue protoplasm, sprouting appendages only when
they were needed. A slightly bipolar shadow near one end might have been its
central nervous system, but there hardly seemed enough of it to trap sentience.
There were no obvious sense or communicational organs, but a pulsing filament
of blue slime reached back into the Nestbuilderłs fold. When the Slug spoke, it
did so through the

Nestbuilder; a rattle of chitin from the hostłs mouthparts
which approximated human language. A hovering jewel connected to the stationłs
lexical database did the rest, rendering the voice calmly feminine.

�A personal matter? A vendetta? Then itłs true." The mouthparts
clicked together in what humans presumed was the symbiotic creaturełs laughter
response. �You are who we suspected."

�She did tell you her name was Irravel, guy," Mirsky said,
sipping black coffee with delicate movements of the exoskeletal frame she
always wore in high gravity.

�Among you chordates, the name is not so unusual now," the
Slug reminded them. �But you do fit the description, Irravel."

They were near one of the stationłs vast picture windows,
overlooking Aethrałs mighty, roiling cloud decks, 50 kilometres below. It was
getting dark now and the storm players were preparing to start a show. Irravel
saw two of their seeders descending into the clouds; robot craft tethered by a
nearly invisible filament. The seeders would position the filament so that it
bridged cloud layers with different static potentials; theyłd then detach and
return to Stormwatch, while the filament held itself in position by rippling
along its length. For hundreds of kilometres around, other filaments would have
been placed in carefully selected positions. They were electrically isolating
now, but at the stormplayerłs discretion, each filament would flick over into a
conductive state: a massive, choreographed lightning flash.

�I never set out to become a legend," Irravel said. �Or a
myth, for that matter."

�Yes. There are so many stories about you, Veda, that it
might be simpler to assume you never existed."

�What makes you think otherwise?"

�The fact that a chordate who could have been Markarian also
passed this way, only a year or so ago." The Nestbuilderłs shell pigmentation
flickered, briefly revealing a picture of Markarianłs ship.

�So you sold weapons to him?"

�That would be telling, wouldnłt it?" The mouthparts
clattered again. �You would have to answer a question of ours first."

Outside, the opening flashes of the nightłs performance
gilded the horizon; like the first stirrings of a symphony. Aethrałs rings
echoed the flashes, pale ghosts momentarily cleaving the sky.

�What is it you want to know?"

�We Slugs are among the few intelligent, starfaring cultures
in this part of the Galaxy. During the

War against Intelligence we avoided the Inhibitors by hiding
ourselves among the mindless

Nestbuilders."

Irravel nodded. Slugs were one of the few alien species
known to humanity who would even acknowledge the existence of the feared
Inhibitors. Like humanity, theyłd fought and beaten the revenantsat least for
now.

�It is the weaponry you seek which enabled us to triumphbut
even then only at colossal cost to our phylum. Now we are watchful for new
threats."

�I donłt see where this is leading."

�We have heard rumours. Since you have come from the direction
of those rumoursthe local stellar neighbourhood around your phylumłs birth
starwe imagined you might have information of value."

Irravel exchanged a sideways glance with Mirsky. The old
womanłs wizened, age-spotted skull looked as fragile as paper, but she remained
an unrivalled tactician. They knew each other so well now that Mirsky could
impart advice with the subtlest of movements; expression barely troubling the
lined mask of her face.

�What kind of information were you seeking?"

�Information about something that frightens us." The Nestbuilderłs
pigmentation flickered again, forming an image ofsomething. It was a splinter
of grey-brown against speckled blacknessperhaps the Nestbuilderłs attempt at visualizing
a planetoid. And then something erupted across the surface of the world, racing
from end to end like a film of verdigris. Where it had passed, fissures opened
up, deepening until they were black fractures, as if the world were a calving
iceberg. And then it blew apart, shattering into a thousand green-tinged
fragments.

�What was that?" Irravel said.

�We were rather hoping you could tell us." The Nestbuilderłs
pigmentation refreshed again, and this time what they were seeing was clearly a
star, veiled in a toroidal belt of golden dust.

�Machines have dismantled every rocky object in the system
where these images were captured;

Ross 128, which lies within eleven light-years of your birth
star. They have engendered a swarm of trillions of rocks on independent orbits.
Each rock is sheathed in a pressurized bubble membrane, within which an
artificial plant-based ecosystem has been created. The same machines have fashioned
other sources of raw material into mirrors, larger than worlds themselves,
which trap sunlight above and below the ecliptic and focus it onto the swarm."

�And why does this frighten you?"

The Nestbuilder leant closer in its column of microgravity. �Because
we saw it being resisted. As if these machines had never been intended to wreak
such transformations. As if your phylum had created something it could not
control."

�Andthese attempts at resistance?"

�Failed."

�But if one system was accidentally transformed, it doesnłt
mean ..." Irravel trailed off. �Youłre worried about them crossing interstellar
space, to other systems. Even if that happenedcouldnłt you resist the spread?
This can only be human technologynothing that would pose any threat to yourselves."

�Perhaps it was once human technology, with programmed limitations
to prevent it replicating uncontrollably. But those shackles have been broken.
Worse, the machines have hybridized, gaining resilience and adaptability with
each encounter with something external. First the Melding Plague, infection
with which may have been a deliberate ploy to by-pass the replication limits."

Irravel nodded. The Melding Plague had swept human space 400
years earlier, terminating the

Demarchist Belle Epoque. Like the Black Death of the previous
millennium, it evoked terror generations after it had passed.

�Later," the Nestbuilder continued, �it may have encountered
and assimilated Inhibitor technology, or worse. Now it will be very hard to
stop, even with the weapons at our disposal."

�An image of one of the machines flickered onto the Nestbuilderłs
shell, like a peculiar tattoo.

Irravel shivered. The Slug was right: waves of hybridization
had transformed the initial architecture into something queasily alien. But
enough of the original plan remained for there to be no doubt in her mind. She
was looking at an evolved greenfly; one of the self-replicating breeders she
had given

Captain Run Seven. How it had broken loose was anyonełs
guess. She speculated that Sevenłs crew had sold the technology on to a third
party, decades or centuries after gaining it from her. Perhaps that third party
had reclusively experimented in the Ross 128 system, until the day when greenfly
tore out of their control.

�I donłt know why you think I can help," she said.

�Perhaps we were mistaken, then, to credit a 500-year-old rumour
which said that you had been the original source of these machines."

She had insulted it by daring to bluff. The Slugs were
easily insulted. They read human beings far better than humans read Slugs.

�Like you say," she answered. �You canłt believe everything."

The Slug made the Nestbuilder fold its armoured, spindly
limbs across its mouthparts, a gesture of displeased huffiness.

�You chordates," it said. �Youłre all the same."

Interstellar SpaceAD 3354

Mirsky was dead. She had died of old age.

Irravel placed her body in an armoured coffin and ejected
her into space when the Hirondellełs speed was only a hairłs breadth under
light. �Do it for me, Irravel," Mirsky had told her, towards the end. �Keep my
body aboard until wełre almost touching light, and then fire me ahead of the
ship."

�Is that what you want?"

�Itłs an old pirate tradition. Burial at C." She forced a
smile which must have sapped what little energy she had left. �Thatłs a joke,
Irravel, but it only makes sense in a language neither of us have heard for a
while."

Irravel pretended that she understood. �Mirsky? Therełs something
I have to tell you. Do you remember the Nestbuilder?"

�That was centuries ago, Veda."

�I know. I just keep worrying that maybe it was right."

�About what?"

�Those machines. About how I started it all. They say itłs
spread now; to other systems. It doesnłt look like anyone knows how to stop it."

�And you think all that was your fault?"

�Itłs crossed my mind."

Mirsky convulsed, or shruggedIrravel wasnłt sure. �Even if
it was your fault, Veda, you did it with the best of intentions. So you fucked
up slightly. We all make mistakes."

�Destroying whole solar systems is just a fuck-up?"

�Hey, accidents happen."

�You always did have a sense of humour, Mirsky."

�Yeah; guess I did." She managed a smile. �One of us needed
one, Veda."

Thinking of that, Irravel watched the coffin fall ahead, dwindling
until it was only a tiny mote of steel-grey, and then nothing.

Subaru CommonwealthPleiades ClusterAD 4161

The starbridge had long ago attained sentience.

Dense with machinery, it sung an endless hymn to its own immensity,
throbbing like the lowest string on a guitar. Vacuum-breathing acolytes had
voluntarily rewired their minds to view the bridge as an actual deity,
translating the humming into their sensoria and passing decades in contemplative
ecstasy.

Clasped in a cushioning field, an elevator ferried Irravel
down the bridge from the orbital hub to the surface in a few minutes, accompanied
by an entourage of children from the ship, many of whom bore in youth the
hurting imprint of Mirskyłs genes. The bridge rose like the stem of a goblet from
a ground terminal which was itself a scalloped shell of hyperdiamond, filled
with tiered perfume gardens and cascading pools, anchored to the largest island
in an equatorial archipelago.

The senior children walked Irravel down to a beach of silver
sand on the terminalłs edge, where jewelled crabs moved like toys. She bid the
children farewell, then waited, warm breezes fingering the hem of her sari.

Minutes later, the childrenłs elevator flashed heavenward.

Irravel looked out at the ocean, thinking of the Pattern
Jugglers. Here, as on dozens of other oceanic worlds, there was a colony of the
alien intelligences. Transformed to aquatic bodyplans themselves, the Subaruns
had established close rapport with the aliens. In the morning, she would be
taken out to meet the Jugglers, drowned, dissolved on the cellular level, every
atom in her body swapped for one in the ocean, remade into something not quite
human.

She was terrified.

Islanders came toward the shore, skimming water on penanted
trimarans, attended by oceanforms, sleek gloss-grey hybrids of porpoise and
ray, whistlespeech downshifted into the human spectrum. The Subarunsł epidermal
scales shimmered like imbricated armour: biological photocells drinking
scorching blue Pleiadean sunlight. Sentient veils hung in the sky, rippling gently
like aurorae, shading the archipelago from the fiercest wavelengths. As the
actinic eye of

Taygeta sank towards the horizon, the veils moved with it
like living clouds. Flocks of phantasmagoric birds migrated with the veils.

The purple-skinned elderłs scales flashed green and opal as
he approached Irravel along the coral jetty, a stick in one webbed hand,
supported by two aides, a third shading his aged crown with a delicately
water-coloured parasol. The aides were all descended from late-model
Conjoiners; they had the translucent cranial crest through which bloodflow had
once been channelled to cool their supercharged minds. Seeing them gave Irravel
a dual-edged pang of nostalgia and guilt. She had not seen Conjoiners for
nearly a thousand years, ever since they had fragmented into a dozen factions and
vanished from human affairs. Neither had she entirely forgotten her betrayal of
Remontoire.

But that had been so long ago.

A Communicant made up the party, gowned in brocade, hazed by
a blur of entoptic projections.

Communicants were small and elfin, with a phenomenal talent
for natural languages, augmented by

Juggler transforms. Irravel sensed that this one was old and
revered, despite the fact that

Communicant genes did not express for great longevity.

The elder halted before her.

The head of his walking stick was a tiny lemur skull inside
an eggsized space helmet. He spoke something clearly ceremonial, but Irravel
understood none of the sounds he made. She groped for something to say,
recalling the oldest language in her memory, and therefore the one most likely
to be recognized in any far-flung human culture.

�Thank you for letting us stop here," she said.

The Communicant hobbled forward, already shaping words
experimentally with his wide, protruding lips. For a moment his sounds were
like an infantłs first attempts at vocalization. But then they resolved into
something Irravel understood.

�Am Iummaking the slightest sense to you?"

�Yes," Irravel said. �Yes, thank you."

�Canasian," the Communicant diagnosed. �Twenty-third, twenty-fourth
centuries, Lacaille 9352 dialect, Fand subdialect?"

Irravel nodded.

�Your kind are very rare now," he said, studying her as if
she was some kind of exotic butterfly.

�But not unwelcome." His features cracked into an elfin
smile.

�What about Markarian?" Irravel said. �I know his ship
passed through this system less than 50 years agoI still have a fix on it as
it moves out of the cluster."

�Other lighthuggers do come, yes. Not manyone or two a
century."

�And what happened when the last one came through?"

�The usual tribute was given."

�Tribute?"

�Something ceremonial." The Communicantłs smile was wider
than ever. �To the glory of Irravel. With many actors, beautiful words, love,
death, laughter, tears."

She understood, slowly, dumbfoundedly.

�Youłre putting on a play?"

The elder must have understood something of that. Nodding
proudly, he extended a hand across the darkening bay, oceanforms cutting the
water like scythes. A distant raft carried lanterns and the glimmerings of
richly painted backdrops. Boats converged from across the bay. A dirigible
loomed over the archipelagołs edge, pregnant with gondolas.

�We want you to play Irravel," the Communicant said, beckoning
her forward. �This is our greatest honour."

When they reached the raft, the Communicant taught Irravel
her lines and the actions she would be required to make. It was all simple enougheven
the fact that she had to deliver her parts in

Subarun. By the end of evening she was fluent in their language.
There was nothing she couldnłt learn in an instant these days, by sheer force
of will. But it was not enough. To catch Markarian, she would have to break out
of the narrow labyrinth of human thought entirely. That was why she had come to
Jugglers.

That night they performed the play, while boats congregated
around them, topheavy with lolling islanders. The sun sank and the sky glared
with a thousand blue gems studding blue velvet. Night in the heart of the
Pleiades was the most beautiful thing Irravel had dared imagine. But in the
direction of Sol, when she amplified her vision, there was a green thumbprint
on the sky. Every century, the green wave was larger, as neighbouring solar
systems were infected and transformed by the rogue terraforming machines. Given
time, it would even reach the Pleiades.

Irravel got drunk on islander wine and learnt the tributesł
history.

The plots varied immensely, but the protagonists always resembled
Markarian and Irravel; mythic figures entwined by destiny, remembered across
2,000 years. Sometimes one or the other was the clear villain, but as often as
not they were both heroic, misunderstanding each otherłs motives in true tragic
fashion. Sometimes they ended with both parties dying. They rarely ended happily.
But there was always some kind of redemption when the pursuit was done.

In the interlude, she felt she had to tell the Communicant
the truth, so that he could tell the elder.

�Listen, therełs something you need to know." Irravel didnłt
wait for his answer. �Iłm really her; really the person Iłm playing."

For a long time he didnłt seem to understand, before shaking
his head slowly and sadly.

�No; I thought youłd be different. You seemed different. But
many say that."

She shrugged. There seemed little point arguing, and
anything she said now could always be ascribed to wine. In the morning, the
remark had been quietly forgotten. She was taken out to sea and drowned.

Galactic NorthAD 9730

�Markarian? Answer me."

She watched the Hideyoshiłs magnified image, looming just
out of weapons range. Like the Hirondelle, it had changed almost beyond
recognition. The hull glistened within a skein of armouring force. The engines,
no longer physically coupled to the rest of the ship, flew alongside like dolphins.
They were anchored in fields which only became visible when some tiny stress afflicted
them.

For centuries of worldtime she had made no attempt to communicate
with him. But now her mind had changed. The green wave had continued for
millennia, an iridescent cataract spreading across the eye of the Galaxy. It
had assimilated the blue suns of the Subaran Commonwealth in mere centuriesalthough
by then Irravel and Markarian were a thousand light-years closer to the core, beginning
to turn away from the plane of the Galaxy, and the death screams of those gentle
islanders never reached them. Nothing stopped it, and once the green wave had
swallowed them, systems fell silent. The Juggler transformation allowed Irravel
to grasp the enormity of it; allowed her to stare unflinchingly into the horror
of a million poisoned stars and apprehend each individually.

She knew more of what it was, now.

It was impossible for stars to shine green, any more than an
ingot of metal could become greenhot if it was raised to a certain temperature.
Instead, something was veiling themstaining their light, like coloured glass.
Whatever it was stole energy from the stellar spectra at the frequencies of chlorophyll.
Stars were shining through curtains of vegetation, like lanterns in a forest.
The greenfly machines were turning the Galaxy into a jungle.

It was time to talk. Timeas in the old plays of the dead
islandersto initiate the final act, before the two of them fell into the cold
of intergalactic space. She searched her repertoire of communication systems,
until she found something which was as ancient as ceremony demanded.

She aimed the message laser at him, cutting through his armour.
The beam was too ineffectual to be mistaken as anything other than an attempt
to talk. No answer came, so she repeated the message in a variety of formats
and languages. Days of ship-time passeddecades of worldtime.

Talk, you bastard.

Growing impatient, she examined her weapons options. Armaments
from the Nestbuilders were among the most advanced: theoretically they could
mole through the loam of spacetime and inflict precise harm anywhere in
Markarianłs ship. But to use them she had to convince herself that she knew the
interior layout of the Hideyoshi. Her mass-sensor sweeps were too blurred to be
much help. She might as easily harm the sleepers as take out his field nodes.
Until now, it was too much risk to contemplate.

But all games needed an end.

Willing her qualms from mind, she enabled the Nestbuilder
armaments, feeling them stress space-time in the Hirondellełs belly, ready to
short-circuit it entirely. She selected attack loci in Markarianłs ship; best
guesses that would cripple him rather than blow him out of the sky.

Then something happened.

He replied, modulating his engine thrust in staccato stabs.
The frequency was audio. Quickly Irravel translated the modulation.

�I donłt understand," Markarian said, �why you took so long
to answer me, and why you ignored me so long when I replied?"

�You never replied until now," she said. �Iłd have known if
you had."

�Would you?"

There was something in his tone which convinced her that he
wasnłt lying. Which left only one possibility: that he had tried speaking to
her before, and that in some way her own ship had kept this knowledge from her.

�Mirsky must have done it," Irravel said. �She must have installed
filters to block any communication from your ship."

�Mirsky?"

�She would have done it as a favour to me; maybe as an order
from my former self." She didnłt bother elaborating: Markarian was sure to know
she had died and then been reborn as a clone of the original Irravel. �My
former self had the neural conditioning which kept her on the trail of the sleepers.
The clone never had it, which meant that my instinct to pursue the sleepers had
to be reinforced."

�By lies?"

�Mirsky would have done it out of friendship," Irravel said.
And for a moment she believed herself, while wondering how friendship could
seem so like betrayal.

Markarianłs image smiled. They faced each other across an absurdly
long banquet table, with the Galaxy projected above it, flickering in the light
of candelabra.

�Well?" he said, of the green stain spreading across the
spiral. �What do you think?"

Irravel had long ago stopped counting time and distance, but
she knew it had been at least 15,000

years and that many light-years since they had turned from
the plane. Part of her knew, of course:

although the wave swallowed suns, it had no use for pulsars,
and their metronomic ticking and slow decay allowed positional triangulation in
space and time with chilling precision. But she elected to bury that knowledge
beneath her conscious thought processes: one of the simpler Juggler tricks.

�What do I think? I think it terrifies me."

�Our emotional responses havenłt diverged as much as Iłd
feared."

They didnłt have to use language. They could have swapped
pure mental concepts between ships:

concatenated strings of qualia, some of which could only be
grasped in minds rewired by Pattern

Jugglers. But Irravel considered it sufficient that they
could look each other in the eye without flinching.

The Galaxy falling below had been frozen in time: light
waves struggling to overtake Irravel and

Markarian. The wave had seemed to slow, and then halt its advance.
But then Markarian had turned, diving back towards the plane. The Galaxy
quickened to life, rushing to finish 30,000 years of history before the two
ships returned. The wave surged on. Above the banquet table, one arm of the star-clotted
spiral was shot through with green, like a mote of ink spreading into blotting
paper. The edge of the green wave was feathered, fractal, extending verdant
tendrils.

�Do you have any observations?" Irravel asked.

�A few." Markarian sipped from his chalice. �Iłve studied
the patterns of starlight among the suns already swallowed by the wave. Theyłre
not uniformly greenitłs correlated with rational angle.

The green matter must be concentrated near the ecliptic, extending
above and below it, but not encircling the stars completely."

Irravel thought back to what the Nestbuilder had shown her.

�Meaning what?" she asked, testing Markarian.

�Swarms of absorbing bodies, on orbits resembling comets, or
asteroids. I think the greenfly machines must have dismantled everything
smaller than a Jovian, then enveloped the rubble in transparent membranes which
they filled with air, water and greeneryself-sustaining biospheres.

Then they were cast adrift. Trillions of tiny worlds, around
each star. No rocky planets any more."

Irravel retrieved a name from the deep past. �Like Dyson
spheres?"

�Dyson clouds, perhaps."

�Do you think anyone survived? Are there niches in the wave
where humans can live? That was the point of greenfly, after all, to create
living space."

�Maybe," Markarian said, with no great conviction. �Perhaps
some survivors found ways inside, as their own worlds were smashed and
reassembled into the cloud ..."

�But you donłt think itłs very likely?"

�Iłve been listening, Irravelscanning the assimilated
regions for any hint of an extant technological culture. If anyone did survive,
theyłre either keeping deliberately quiet or they donłt even know how to make a
radio signal by accident."

�It was my fault, Markarian."

His tone was rueful. �Yes ... I couldnłt help but arrive at
that conclusion."

�I never intended this."

�I think that goes without saying, wouldnłt you? No one
could have guessed the consequences of that one action."

�Would you?"

He shook his head. �In all likelihood, Iłd have done exactly
what you did."

�I did it out of love, Markarian. For the cargo."

�I know."

She believed him.

�What happened back there, Markarian? Why did you give up
the codes when I didnłt?"

�Because of what they did to you, Irravel."

He told her. How neither Markarian nor Irravel had shown any
signs of revealing the codes under Mirskyłs interrogation, until something new
was tried.

�They were good at surgery," Markarian said. �Sevenłs crew
swapped limbs and body parts as badges of status. They knew how to sever and
splice nerves." The image didnłt allow her to interrupt. �They cut your head
off. Kept it alive in a state of borderline consciousness, and then showed it
to me. Thatłs when I gave them the codes."

For a long while Irravel said nothing. Then it occurred to
her to check her old body, still frozen in the same casket where Mirsky had
once revealed it to her. She ordered some children to prepare the body for a
detailed examination, then looked through their eyes. The microscopic evidence
of reconnective surgery around the neck was too slight to have ever shown up
unless one was looking for it. But now there was no mistaking it.

I did it to save your neck, Markarian had said, when she had
held him pinned to the ice of Sevenłs ship.

�You seem to be telling the truth," she said, when she had released
the children. �The nature of your betrayal was ..." And then she paused,
searching for the words, while Markarian watched her across the table. �Different
than I assumed. Possibly less of a crime. But still a betrayal, Markarian."

�One Iłve lived with for 300 years of subjective time."

�You could have returned the sleepers alive at any time. I
wouldnłt have attacked you." But she didnłt even sound convincing to herself.

�What now?" Markarian said. �Do we keep this distance, arguing
until one of us has the nerve to strike against the other? Iłve Nestbuilder
weapons as well, Irravel. I think I could rip you apart before you could launch
a reprisal."

�Youłve had the opportunity to do so before. Perhaps you never
had the nerve, though. Whatłs changed now?"

Markarianłs gaze flicked to the map. �Everything. I think we
should see what happens before making any rash decisions, donłt you?"

Irravel agreed.

She willed herself into stasis; medichines arresting all
biological activity in every cell in her body. The ęchines would only revive
her when somethinganythinghappened, on a Galactic timescale. Markarian would
retreat into whatever mode of suspension he favoured, until woken by the same
stimulus.

He was still sitting there when time resumed, as if only a moment
had interrupted their conversation.

The wave had spread further now. It had eaten into the
Galaxy for 10,000 light-years around Sola third of the way to the core. There
was no sign that it had encountered resistanceat least nothing that had done
more than hinder it. There had never been many intelligent, starfaring cultures
to begin with, the Nestbuilder had told her. Perhaps the few that existed were
even now making plans to retard the wave. Or perhaps it had swallowed them, as
it swallowed humanity.

�Why did we wake?" Irravel said. �Nothing changed, except
that itłs become larger."

�Maybe not," Markarian said. �I had to be sure, but now I
donłt think therełs any doubt. Iłve just detected a radio message from within
the plane of the Galaxy; from within the wave."

�Yes?"

�Looks like someone survived after all."

The radio message was faint, but nothing else was
transmitting on that or any adjacent frequency, except for the senseless mush
of cosmic background sources. It was also in a language they recognized.

�Itłs Canasian," Irravel said.

�Fand subdialect," Irravel added, marvellingly.

It was also beamed in their direction, from somewhere deep
in the swathe of green, almost coincident with the position of a pulsar. The
message was a simple one, frequency modulated around one and a half megahertz,
repeated for a few minutes every day of Galactic time. Whoever was sending it
clearly lacked the resources to transmit continuously. It was also coherent:
amplified and beamed.

Someone wanted to speak to them.

The manłs disembodied head appeared above the banquet table,
chiselled from pixels. He was immeasurably old; a skull draped in parchment;
something that should have been embalmed rather than talking.

Irravel recognized the face.

�Itłs him," she said, in Markarianłs direction. �Remontoire.
Somehow he made it across all this time."

Markarian nodded slowly. �He must have remembered us, and
known where to look. Even across thousands of light-years, we can still be
seen. There canłt be many objects still moving relativistically."

Remontoire told his story. His people had fled to the pulsar
system 20,000 years agomore so now, since his message had taken thousands of
years to climb out of the Galaxy. They had seen the wave coming, as had
thousands of other human factions, and like many they had observed that the wave
shunned pulsars; burnt-out stellar corpses rarely accompanied by planets. Some
intelligence governing the wave must have recognized that pulsars were
valueless; that even if a Dyson cloud could be created around them, there would
be no sunlight to focus.

For thousands of years they had waited around the pulsar,
growing ever more silent and cautious, seeing other cultures make errors which
drew the wave upon them, for by now it interpreted any other intelligence as a
threat to its progress, assimilating the weapons used against it.

Thenover many more thousands of yearsRemontoirełs people
saw the wave learn, adapting like a vast neural net, becoming curious about
those few pulsars which harboured planets. Soon their place of refuge would
become nothing of the sort.

�Help us," Remontoire said. �Please."

It took 3,000 years to reach them.

For most of that time, Remontoirełs people acted on faith,
not knowing that help was on its way.

During the first thousand years they abandoned their system,
compressing their population down to a sustaining core of only a few hundred
thousand. Together with the cultural data theyłd preserved during the long
centuries of their struggle against the wave, they packed their survivors into
a single hollowed-out rock and flung themselves out of the ecliptic using a
mass-driver which fuelled itself from the rockłs own bulk. They called it Hope.
A million decoys had to be launched, just to ensure that Hope got through the
surrounding hordes of assimilating machines.

Inside, most of the Conjoiners slept out the 2,000 years of
solitude before Irravel and Markarian reached them.

�Hope would make an excellent shield," Markarian mused, as
they approached it, �if one of us considered a pre-emptive strike against the
other."

�Donłt think I wouldnłt."

They moved their ships to either side of the dark shard of
rock, extended field grapples, then hauled in.

�Then why donłt you?" Markarian said.

For a moment Irravel didnłt have a good answer. When she
found one, she wondered why it hadnłt been more obvious before. �Because they
need us more than I need revenge."

�A higher cause?"

�Redemption," she said.

Hope, Galactic PlaneAD Circa 40,000

They didnłt have long. Their approach, diving down from Galactic
North, had drawn the attention of the wavełs machines, directing them towards
the one rock which mattered. A wall of annihilation was moving toward them at
half the speed of light. When it reached Hope, it would turn it into the darkest
of nebulae.

Conjoiners boarded the Hirondelle and invited Irravel into
the Hope: The hollowed-out chambers of the rock were Edenic to her children,
after all the decades of subjective time theyłd spent aboard since last
planetfall. But it was a doomed paradise, the biomes grey with neglect, as if
the

Conjoiners had given up long ago.

Remontoire welcomed Irravel next to a rockpool filmed in
grey dust. Half the sun-panels set into the distant honeycombed ceiling were
black.

�You came," he said. He wore a simple smock and trousers.
His anatomy was early-model

Conjoiner: almost fully human.

�Youłre not him, are you? You look like himsound like himbut
the image you sent us was of someone much older."

�Iłm sorry. His name was chosen for its familiarity; my likeness
shaped to his. We searched our collective memories and found the experiences of
the one you knew as Remontoire ... but that was a long time ago, and he was
never known by that name to us."

�What was his name?"

�Even your Juggler cortex could not accommodate it, Irravel."

She had to ask. �Did he make it back to a commune?"

�Yes, of course," the man said, as if her question was
foolish. �How else could we have absorbed his experiences back into the
Transenlightenment?"

�And did he forgive me?"

�I forgive you now," he said. �It amounts to the same thing."

She willed herself to think of him as Remontoire.

The Conjoiners hadnłt allowed themselves to progress in all
the thousands of years they waited around the pulsar, fearing that any social
changeno matter how slightwould eventually bring the wave upon them. They had
studied it, contemplated weapons they might use against itbut other than that,
all they had done was wait.

They were very good at waiting.

�How many refugees did you bring?"

�One hundred thousand." Before Irravel could answer, Remontoire
shook his head. �I know; too many. Perhaps half that number can be carried away
on your ships. But half is better than nothing."

She thought back to her own sleepers. �I know. Still, we
might be able to take more ... I donłt know about Markarianłs ship, but"

He cut her off, gently. �I think youłd better come with me,"
said Remontoire, and then led her aboard the Hideyoshi.

�How much of it did you explore?"

�Enough to know therełs no one alive anywhere in this ship,"
Remontoire said. �If there are 200 cryogenically frozen sleepers, we didnłt
find them."

�No sleepers?"

�Just this one."

What theyłd arrived at was a plinth, supporting a
reefersleep casket, encrusted with gold statuary; spacesuited figures with
hands folded across their chests like resting saints. The glass lid of the casket
was veined with fractures; the withered figure inside older than time.
Markarianłs skeletal frame was swaddled in layers of machines, all of archaic
provenance. His skull had split open, a fused mass spilling out like lava.

�Is he dead?" Irravel asked.

�Depends what you mean by dead." The Conjoinerłs hand
sketched across the neural mass. �His organic mind must have been completely
swamped by machines centuries ago. His linkage to the

Hideyoshi would have been total. There would have been very
little point discriminating between the two."

�Why didnłt he tell me what had become of him?"

�No guarantee he knew. Once he was in this state, with his
personality running entirely on machine substrates, he could have edited his
own memories and perceptual inputsdeceiving himself that he was still
corporeal."

Irravel looked away from the casket, forcing troubling questions
from her mind. �Is his personality still running the ship?"

�We detected only caretaker programs; capable of imitating
him when the need arose, but lacking sentience."

�Is that all there was?"

�No." Remontoire reached through one of the casketłs larger
fractures, prising something from

Markarianłs fingers. It was a sliver of computer memory. �We
examined this already, though not in great detail. Itłs partitioned into 190
areas, each large enough to hold complete neural and genetic maps for one human
being, encoded into superposed electron states on Rydberg atoms."

She took the sliver from him. It didnłt feel like much. �He
burned the sleepers onto this?"

�Three hundred years is much longer than any of them expected
to sleep. By scanning them he lost nothing."

�Can you retrieve them?"

�It would not be trivial," the Conjoiner said. �But given
time, we could do it. Assuming any of them would welcome being born again, so
far from home."

She thought of the infected Galaxy hanging below them, humming
with the chill sentience of machines. �Maybe the kindest thing would be to
simulate the past," she said. �Re-create

Yellowstone, and revive them on it, as if nothing had ever
gone wrong."

�Is that what youłre advocating?"

�No," she said, after toying with the idea in all
seriousness. �We need all the genetic diversity we can get, if wełre going to
establish a new branch of humanity outside the Galaxy."

She thought about it. Soon they would witness Hopełs destruction,
as the wave of machines tore through it with the mindlessness of stampeding
animals. Some of them might try and follow the

Hirondelle, but so far the machines moved too slowly to
catch the ship, even if they forced it back towards Galactic North.

Where was there to go?

There were globular clusters high above the Galaxytightly
packed shoals of old stars where the wave hadnłt reached, but where fragments
of humanity might have already sought refuge. If the clusters proved
unwelcoming, there were high-latitude stars, flung from the Galaxy a billion
years ago, and some might have dragged their planetary systems with them. If
those failedand it would be tens of thousands of years before the
possibilities were exhaustedthe Hirondelle could always loop around towards Galactic
South and search there, striking out for the Clouds of Magellan.

Ultimately, of courseif any part or fragment of Irravelłs
children still clung to humanity, and remembered where theyłd come from, and
what had become of it, they would want to return to the

Galaxy, even if that meant confronting the wave.

But they would return.

�Thatłs the plan then?" Remontoire said.

Irravel shrugged, turning away from the plinth where Markarian
lay. �Unless youłve got a better one."

Glacial

NEVIL CLAVAIN PICKED his way across a mosaic of shattered
ice. The field stretched away in all directions, gouged by sleek-sided
crevasses. They had mapped the largest cracks before landing, but he was still
wary of surprises; his breath caught every time his booted foot cracked through
a layer of ice. He was aware of how dangerous it would be to wander from the
red path that his implants were painting across the glacier field.

He only had to remind himself what had happened to Martin
Setterholm.

They had found his body a month ago, shortly after their
arrival on the planet. It had been near the main American base; a stroll from
the perimeter of the huge, deserted complex of stilted domes and ice-walled
caverns. Clavainłs friends had found dozens of dead within the buildings, and
most of them had been easily identified against the lists of base personnel
that the expedition had pieced together. But Clavain had been troubled by the
gaps and had wondered if any further dead might be found in the surrounding ice
fields. He had explored the warrens of the base until he found an airlock which
had never been closed, and though snowfalls had long since obliterated any
footprints, there was little doubt in which direction a wanderer would have set
off.

Long before the base had vanished over the horizon, Clavain
had run into the edge of a deep, wide crevasse. And there at the bottomjust
visible if he leaned close to the edgewas a manłs outstretched arm and hand.
Clavain had gone back to the others and had them return with a winch to lower
him into the depths, descending thirty or forty meters into a cathedral of
stained and sculpted ice. The body had come into view: a figure in an
old-fashioned atmospheric survival suit. The manłs legs were bent in a horrible
way, like those of a strangely articulated alien. Clavain knew it was a man
because the fall had jolted his helmet from its neck-ring; the corpsełs
well-preserved face was pressed halfway into a pillow of ice. The helmet had
ended up a few meters away.

No on died instantly on Diadem. The air was breathable for
short periods, and the man had clearly had time to ponder his predicament. Even
in his confused state of mind he must have known that he was going to die.

�Martin Setterholm," Clavain had said aloud, picking up the
helmet and reading the nameplate on the crown. He felt sorry for him but could
not deny himself the small satisfaction of accounting for another of the dead.
Setterholm had been among the missing, and though he had waited the better part
of a century for it, he would at least receive a proper funeral now.

There was something else, but Clavain very nearly missed it.
Setterholm had lived long enough to scratch out a message in the ice. Sheltered
at the base of the glacier, the marks he had gouged were still legible. Three
letters, it seemed to Clavain: an I, a V, and an F.

I-V-F.

The message meant nothing to Clavain, and even a deep search
of the Conjoiner collective memory threw up only a handful of vaguely plausible
candidates. The least ridiculous was in vitro fertilization, but even that
seemed to have no immediate connection with Setterholm. But then again, he had
been a biologist, according to the base records. Did the message spell out the
chilling truth about what had happened to the colony on Diadem: a biology lab
experiment that had gone terribly wrong? Something to do with the worms,
perhaps?

But after a while, overwhelmed by the sheer number of dead,
Clavain had allowed the exact details of Setterholmłs death to slip from his
mind. He was hardly unique anyway: just one more example of the way most of
them had died; not by suicide or violence but through carelessness,
recklessness, or just plain stupidity. Basic safety procedureslike not
wandering into a crevasse zone without the right equipmenthad been forgotten
or ignored. Machines had been used improperly. Drugs had been administered
incorrectly. Sometimes the victim had taken only themselves to the grave, but
in other cases the death toll had been much higher. And it had all happened so
swiftly.

Galiana talked about it as if it were some kind of
psychosis, while the other Conjoiners speculated about some kind of emergent
neural condition, buried in the gene pool of the entire colony, lurking for
years until it was activated by an environmental trigger.

Clavain, while not discounting his friendsł theories, could
not help but think of the worms. They were everywhere, after all, and the
Americans had certainly been interested in themSetterholm especially. Clavain
himself had pressed his faceplate against the ice and seen that the worms
reached down to the depth where the man had died. Their fine burrowing trails
scratched into the vertical ice walls like the branchings of a river delta; the
dark nodes of breeding tangled at the intersections of the larger tunnels. The
tiny black worms had infested the glacier completely, and this would only be
one distinct colony out of the millions that existed all over Diademłs frozen
regions. The worm biomass in this one colony must have been several dozen tons
at the very least. Had the Americansł studies of the worms unleashed something
which shattered the mind, turning them all into stumbling fools?

He sensed Galianałs quiet presence at the back of his
thoughts, where she had not been a moment earlier.

�Nevil," she said. �Wełre ready to leave again."

�Youłre done with the ruin already?"

�It isnłt very interestingjust a few equipment shacks.
There are still some remains to the north we have to look over, and itłd be
good to get there before nightfall."

�But Iłve only been gone half an hour or"

�Two hours, Nevil."

He checked his wrist display unbelievingly, but Galiana was
right: he had been out alone on the glacier for all that time. Time away from
the others always seemed to fly by, like sleep to an exhausted man. Perhaps the
analogy was accurate, at that: sleep was when the mammalian brain took a rest
from the business of processing the external universe, allowing the accumulated
experience of the day to filter down into long-term memory: collating useful
memories and discarding what did not need to be remembered. And for Clavainwho
still needed normal sleepthese periods away from the others were when his mind
took a rest from the business of engaging in frantic neural communion with the
other Conjoiners. He could almost feel his neurones breathing a vast collective
groan of relief, now that all they had to do was process the thoughts of a
single mind.

Two hours was nowhere near enough.

�Iłll be back shortly," Clavain said. �I just want to pick
up some more worm samples, then Iłll be on my way."

�Youłve picked up hundreds of the damned things already,
Nevil, and theyłre all the same, give or take a few trivial differences."

�I know. But it canłt hurt to indulge an old manłs
irrational fancies, can it?"

As if to justify himself, he knelt down and began scooping
surface ice into a small sample container. The leech-sized worms riddled the
ice so thoroughly that he was bound to have picked up a few individuals in this
sample, even though he would not know for sure until he got back to the shuttlełs
lab. If he were lucky, the sample might even hold a breeding tangle; a knot of
several dozen worms engaged in a slow, complicated orgy of cannibalism and sex.
There, he would complete the same comprehensive scans he had run on all the
other worms he had picked up, trying to guess just why the Americans had
devoted so much effort to studying them. And doubtless he would get exactly the
same results he had found previously. The worms never changed; there was no astonishing
mutation buried in every hundredth or even thousandth specimen, no stunning
biochemical trickery going on inside them. They secreted a few simple enzymes
and they ate pollen grains and ice-bound algae and they wriggled their way
through cracks in the ice, and when they met other worms they obeyed the
brainless rules of life, death, and procreation.

That was all they did.

Galiana, in other words, was right: the worms had simply become
an excuse for him to spend time away from the rest of the Conjoiners. Before
any of them had left Earthłs solar system, Clavain had been a soldier, fighting
on the side of the faction that directly opposed Galianałs experiments in
mind-augmentation. He had fought against her Conjoiners on Mars and she had
taken him prisoner at the height of the war. Laterwhen he was older and an
uneasy truce looked like it was on the point of collapsingClavain had gone
back to Mars with the intention of reasoning with Galiana. It was during that
peace mission that he realisedfor the sake of his consciencethat he had to
defect and fight alongside his old enemy, even though that meant accepting
Galianałs machines into his head.

Later, along with Galiana, Felka, and their allies, Clavain
had escaped from the system in a prototype starship, the Sandra Voi. Clavainłs
old side had done their best to stop the ship from leaving, but they had
failed, and the Sandra Voi had safely reached interstellar space. Galianałs
intention had been to explore a number of solar systems within a dozen or so
light years of Earth until she found a world that her party could colonize
without the risk of persecution.

Diadem had been their first port of call.

A month ago, at the beginning of the expedition, it had been
much easier to justify these excursions. Even some of the true Conjoiners had
been drawn by a primal human urge to walk out into the wilderness, surrounding
themselves with kilometers of beautifully tinted, elegantly fractured,
unthinking ice. It was good to be somewhere quiet and pristine, after the
war-torn solar system that they had left behind.

Diadem was an Earthlike planet orbiting the star Ross 248.
It had oceans, icecaps, plate tectonics, and signs of reasonably advanced
multicellular life. Plants had already invaded Diademłs land, and some animalsthe
equivalents of arthropods, mollusks, and wormshad begun to follow in their
wake. The largest land-based animals were still small by terrestrial standards,
since nothing in the oceans had yet evolved an internal skeleton. There was
nothing that showed any signs of intelligence, but that was only a minor
disappointment. It would still take a lifetimełs study just to explore the
fantastic array of body plans, metabolisms, and survival strategies that Diadem
life had blindly evolved.

Yet even before Galiana had sent down the first survey shuttles,
a shattering truth had become apparent.

Someone had reached Diadem before them.

The signs were unmistakable: glints of refined metal on the
surface, picked out by radar. Upon inspection from orbit they turned out to be
ruined structures and equipment, obviously of human origin.

�Itłs not possible," Clavain had said. �Wełre the first. We
have to be the first. No one else has ever built anything like the Sandra Voi;
nothing capable of traveling this far."

�Somewhere in there," Galiana had answered, �I think there
might be a mistaken assumption, donłt you?"

Meekly, Clavain had nodded.

Nowlater still than he had promisedClavain made his way
back to the waiting shuttle. The red carpet of safety led straight to the
access ramp beneath the craftłs belly. He climbed up and stepped through the
transparent membrane that spanned the entrance door, most of his suit
slithering away on contact with the membrane. By the time he was inside the
ship he wore only a lightweight breather mask and a few communication devices.
He could have survived outside naked for many minutesDiademłs atmosphere now had
enough oxygen to support humansbut Galiana refused to allow any intermingling
of microorganisms.

He returned the equipment to a storage locker, placed the
worm sample in a refrigeration rack, and clothed himself in a paper-thin black
tunic and trousers before moving into the aft compartment where Galiana was
waiting.

She and Felka were sitting facing each other across the
blank-walled, austerely furnished room. They were staring into the space
between them without quite meeting each otherłs eyes. They looked like a mother
and daughter locked in argumentative stalemate, but Clavain knew better.

He issued the mental command, well-rehearsed now, which
opened his mind to communion with the others. It was like opening a tiny
aperture in the side of a dam; he was never adequately prepared for the force
with which the flow of data hit him. The room changed; color bleeding out of
the walls, lacing itself into abstract structures which permeated the roomłs
volume. Galiana and Felka, dressed dourly a moment earlier, were now veiled in
light, and appeared superhumanly beautiful. He could feel their thoughts, as if
he were overhearing a heated conversation in the room next door. Most of it was
nonverbal; Galiana and Felka playing an intense, abstract game. The thing floating
between them was a solid lattice of light, resembling the plumbing diagram of
an insanely complex refinery. It was constantly adjusting itself, with colored
flows racing this way and that as the geometry changed. About half the volume
was green; what remained was lilac, but now the former encroached dramatically
on the latter.

Felka laughed; she was winning.

Galiana conceded and crashed back into her seat with a sigh
of exhaustion, but she was smiling as well.

�Sorry. I appear to have distracted you," Clavain said.

�No; you just hastened the inevitable. Iłm afraid Felka was
always going to win."

The girl smiled again, still saying nothing, though Clavain
sensed her victory; a hard-edged thing that for a moment outshone all other
thoughts from her direction, eclipsing even Galianałs air of weary resignation.

Felka had been a failed Conjoiner experiment in the manipulation
of foetal brain development; a child with a mind more machine than human. When
he had first met herin Galianałs nest on Marshe had encountered a girl
absorbed in a profound, endless game; directing the faltering self-repair
processes of the terraforming structure known as the Great Wall of Mars, in
which the nest was sheltered. She had no interest in peopleindeed; she could
not even discriminate faces. But when the nest was being evacuated, Clavain had
risked his life to save hers, even though Galiana had told him that the kindest
thing would be to let her die. As Clavain had struggled to adjust to life as
part of Galianałs commune, he had set himself the task of helping Felka to
develop her latent humanity. She had begun to show signs of recognition in his
presence, perhaps sensing on some level that they had a kinship; that they were
both strangers stumbling toward a strange new light.

Galiana rose from her chair, carpets of light wrapping
around her. �It was time to end the game, anyway. Wełve got work to do." She
looked down at the girl, who was still staring at the lattice. �Sorry, Felka.
Later, maybe."

Clavain said: �Howłs she doing?"

�Shełs laughing, Nevil. That has to be progress, doesnłt it?"

�Iłd say that depends what shełs laughing about."

�She beat me. She thought it was funny. Iłd say that was a
fairly human reaction, wouldnłt you?"

�Iłd still be happier if I could convince myself she
recognized my face and not my smell, or the sound my footfalls make."

�Youłre the only one of us with a beard, Nevil. It doesnłt
take vast amounts of neural processing to spot that."

Clavain scratched his chin self-consciously as they stepped through
into the shuttlełs flight deck. He liked his beard, even though it was trimmed
to little more than gray stubble so that he could slip a breather mask on
without difficulty. It was as much a link to his past as his memories or the
wrinkles Galiana had studiously built into his remodelled body.

�Youłre right, of course. Sometimes I just have to remind myself
how far wełve come."

Galiana smiledshe was getting better at that, though there
was still something a little forced about itand pushed her long, gray-veined
black hair behind her ears. �I tell myself the same things when I think about
you, Nevil."

�Mm. But I have come some way, havenłt I?"

�Yes, but that doesnłt mean you havenłt got a considerable
distance ahead of you. I could have put that thought into your head in a
microsecond, if you allowed me to do sobut you still insist that we
communicate by making noises in our throats, the way monkeys do."

�Well, itłs good practice for you," Clavain said, hoping
that his irritation was not too obvious.

They settled into adjacent seats while avionic displays
slithered into take-off configuration. Clavainłs implants allowed him to fly
the machine without any manual inputs at all, butold soldier that he washe
generally preferred tactile controls. So his implants obliged, hallucinating a
joystick inset with buttons and levers, and when he reached out to grasp it his
hands seemed to close around something solid. He shuddered to think how
thoroughly his perceptions of the real world were being doctored to support
this illusion; but once he had been flying for a few minutes he generally
forgot about it, lost in the joy of piloting.

He got them airborne, then settled the shuttle into level
flight towards the fifth ruin that they would be visiting today. Kilometers of
ice slid beneath them, only occasionally broken by a protruding ridge or a
patch of dry, boulder-strewn ground.

�Just a few shacks, you said?"

Galiana nodded. �A waste of time, but we had to check it
out."

�Any closer to understanding what happened to them?"

�They died, more or less overnight. Mostly through incidents
related to the breakdown of normal thoughtalthough one or two may have simply
died, as if they had some greater susceptibility to a toxin than the others."

Clavain smiled, feeling that a small victory was his. �Now
youłre looking at a toxin, rather than a psychosis?"

�A toxinłs difficult to explain, Nevil."

�From Martin Setterholmłs worms, perhaps?"

�Not very likely. Their biohazard containment measures werenłt
as good as oursbut they were still adequate. Wełve analyzed those worms and we
know they donłt carry anything obviously hostile to us. And even if there were
a neurotoxin, how would it affect everyone so quickly? Even if the lab workers
had caught something, theyłd have fallen ill before anyone else did, sending a
warning to the othersbut nothing like that happened." She paused, anticipating
Clavainłs next question. �And no; I donłt think that what happened to them is
necessarily anything we need worry about, though that doesnłt mean Iłm going to
rule anything out. But even our oldest technologyłs a century ahead of anything
they hadand we have the Sandra Voi to retreat to if we run into anything the
medichines in our heads canłt handle."

Clavain always did his best not to think too much about the
swarms of sub-cellular machines lacing his brainsupplanting much of it, in
factbut there were times when it was unavoidable. He still had a squeamish
reaction to the idea, though it was becoming milder. Now, though, he could not
help but view the machines as his allies as intimately a part of him as his
immune system.

Galiana was right: they would resist anything that tried to
interfere with what now passed as the ęnormalł functioning of his mind.

�Still," he said, not yet willing to drop his pet theory. �Youłve
got to admit something: the AmericansSetterholm especiallywere interested in
the worms. Too interested, if you ask me."

�Look whołs talking."

�Ah, but my interest is strictly forensic. And I canłt help
but put the two things together. They were interested in the worms. And they
went mad."

What he said was an oversimplification, of course. It was
clear enough that the worms had only preoccupied some of the Americans: those
who were most interested in xeno-biology. According to the evidence the
Conjoiners had so far gathered, the effort had been largely spearheaded by
Setterholm, the man he had found dead at the bottom of the crevasse. Setterholm
had traveled widely across Diademłs snowy wastes, gathering a handful of allies
to assist in his work. He had found worms in dozens of ice-fields, grouped into
vast colonies. For the most part the other members of the expedition had let
him get on with his activities, even as they struggled with the day-to-day
business of staying alive in what was still a hostile, alien environment.

Even before they had all died things had been far from easy.
The self-replicating robots that had brought them here in the first place had
failed years before, leaving the delicate life-support systems of their shelters
to slowly collapse; each malfunction a little harder to rectify than the last.
Diadem was getting colder, toosliding inexorably into a deep ice-age. It had
been the Americansł misfortune to arrive at the coming of a great,
centuries-long winter. Now, Clavain thought, it was colder still; the polar
ice-caps rushing toward each other like long-separated lovers.

�It must have been fast, whatever it was," Clavain mused. �Theyłd
already abandoned most of the outlying bases by then, huddling together back at
the main settlement. By then they only had enough spare parts and technical
know-how to run a single fusion power plant."

�Which failed."

�Yesbut that doesnłt mean much. It couldnłt run itself, not
by thenit needed constant tinkering. Eventually the people with the right
know-how must have succumbed to the ... whatever it wasand then the reactor
stopped working and they all died of the cold. But they were in trouble long
before the reactor failed."

Galiana seemed on the point of saying something. Clavain
could always tell when she was about to speak; it was as if some leakage from
her thoughts reached his brain even as she composed what she would say.

�Well?" he said, when the silence had stretched long enough.

�I was just thinking," she said. �A reactor of that typeit
doesnłt need any exotic isotopes, does it? No tritium or deuterium?"

�No. Just plain old hydrogen. You could get all you needed
from seawater."

�Or ice," Galiana said.

They vectored in for the next landing site. Toadstools,
Clavain thought: half a dozen black metal towers of varying height surmounted
by domed black habitat modules, interlinked by a web of elevated, pressurised
walkways. Each of the domes was thirty or forty meters wide, perched a hundred
or more metres above the ice, festooned with narrow, armored windows, sensors,
and communications antennae. A tonguelike extension from one of the tallest
domes was clearly a landing pad. In fact, as he came closer, he saw that there
was an aircraft parked on it; one of the blunt-winged machines that the
Americans had used to get around in. It was dusted with ice, but it would
probably still fly with a little persuasion.

He inched the shuttle down, one of its skids only just
inside the edge of the pad. Clearly the landing pad had only really been intended
for one aircraft at a time.

�Nevil ..." Galiana said. �Iłm not sure I like this."

He felt tension, but could not be sure if it was his own or
Galianałs leaking into his head. �What donłt you like?"

�There shouldnłt be an aircraft here," Galiana said.

�Why not?"

She spoke softly, reminding him that the evacuation of the
outlying settlements had been orderly, compared to the subsequent crisis. �This
base should have been shut down and mothballed with all the others."

�Then someone stayed behind here," Clavain suggested.

Galiana nodded. �Or someone came back."

There was a third presence with them now another hue of
thought bleeding into his mind. Felka had come into the cockpit. He could taste
her apprehension.

�You sense it, too," he said, wonderingly, looking into the
face of the terribly damaged girl. �Our discomfort. And you donłt like it any
more than we do, do you?"

Galiana took the girlłs hand. �Itłs all right, Felka."

She must have said that just for Clavainłs benefit. Before
her mouth had even opened Galiana would have planted reassuring thoughts in
Felkałs mind, attempting to still the disquiet with the subtlest of neural
adjustments. Clavain thought of an expert Ikebana artist minutely altering the
placement of a single flower in the interests of harmony.

�Everything will be OK," Clavain said. �Therełs nothing here
that can harm you."

Galiana took a moment, blank-eyed, to commune with the other
Conjoiners in and around Diadem. Most of them were still in orbit, observing
things from the ship. She told them about the aircraft and notified them that
she and Clavain were going to enter the structure.

He saw Felkałs hand tighten around Galianałs wrist.

�She wants to come as well," Galiana said.

�Shełll be safer if she stays here."

�She doesnłt want to be alone."

Clavain chose his words carefully. �I thought ConjoinersI
mean wecould never be truly alone, Galiana."

�There might be a communicational block inside the
structure. Itłll be better if she stays physically close to us."

�Is that the only reason?"

�No, of course not." For a moment he felt a sting of her
anger, prickling his mind like sea-spray. �Shełs still human, Nevilno matter
what wełve done to her mind. We canłt erase a million years of evolution. She
may not be very good at recognizing faces, but she recognizes the need for
companionship."

He raised his hands. �I never doubted it."

�Then why are you arguing?"

Clavain smiled. Hełd had this conversation so many times before,
with so many women. He had been married to some of them. It was oddly
comforting to be having it again, light-years from home, wearing a new body,
his mind clotted with machines and confronting the matriarch of what should
have been a feared and hated hive-mind. At the epicenter of so much
strangeness, a tiff was almost to be welcomed.

�I just donłt want anything to hurt her."

�Oh. And I do?"

�Never mind," he said, gritting his teeth. �Letłs just get
in and out, shall we?"

The base, like all the American structures, had been built
for posterity. Not by people, however, but by swarms of diligent
self-replicating robots. That was how the Americans had reached Diadem: they
had been brought here as frozen fertilized cells in the armored,
radiation-proofed bellies of star-crossing von Neumann robots. The robots had
been launched toward several solar systems about a century before the Sandra
Voi had left Mars. Upon arrival on Diadem they had set about breeding; making
copies of themselves from local ores. When their numbers had reached some
threshold they had turned over their energies to the construction of bases;
luxurious accommodations for the human children that would then be grown in
their wombs.

�The entrance doorłs intact," Galiana said, when they had
crossed from the shuttle to the smooth black side of the dome, stooping against
the wind. �And therełs still some residual power in its circuits."

That was a Conjoiner trick that always faintly unnerved him.
Like sharks, Conjoiners were sensitive to ambient electrical fields. Mapped
into her vision, Galiana would see the energized circuits superimposed on the
door like a ghostly neon maze. Now she extended her hand toward the lock, palm
first.

�Iłm accessing the opening mechanism. Interfacing with it
now." Behind her mask, she saw her face scrunch in concentration. Galiana only
ever frowned before when having to think hard. With her hand outstretched she
looked like a wizard attempting some particularly demanding enchantment.

�Hmm," she said. �Nice old software protocols. Nothing too
difficult."

�Careful," Clavain said. �I wouldnłt put it past them to
have put some kind of trap."

�Therełs no trap," she said. �But there isah, yesa verbal
entry code. Well, here goes." She spoke loudly, so that her voice could travel
through the air to the door even above the howl of the wind: �Open Sesame."

Lights flicked from red to green; dislodging a frosting of
ice, the door slid ponderously aside to reveal a dimly lit interior chamber.
The base must have been running on a trickle of emergency power for decades.

Felka and Clavain lingered while Galiana crossed the threshold.
�Well?" she challenged, turning around. �Are you two sissies coming or not?"

Felka offered a hand. He took hers and the two of themthe
old soldier and the girl who could barely grasp the difference between two human
facestook a series of tentative steps inside.

�What you just did; that business with your hand and the password
..." Clavain paused. �That was a joke, wasnłt it?"

Galiana looked at him blank-faced. �How could it have been?
Everyone knows we havenłt got anything remotely resembling a sense of humor."

Clavain nodded gravely. �That was my understanding, but I
just wanted to be sure."

There was no trace of the wind inside, but it would still
have been too cold to remove their suits, even had they not been concerned
about contamination. They worked their way along a series of winding corridors,
of which some were dark and some were bathed in feeble, pea-green lighting. Now
and then they passed the entrance to a room full of equipment, but nothing that
looked like a laboratory or living quarters. Then they descended a series of
stairs and found themselves crossing one of the sealed walkways between the
toadstools. Clavain had seen a few other American settlements built like this
one; they were designed to remain useful even as they sank slowly into the ice.

The bridge led to what was obviously the main habitation section.
Now there were lounges, bedrooms, laboratories, and kitchensenough for a crew
of perhaps fifty or sixty. But there were no signs of any bodies, and the place
did not look as if it had been abandoned in a hurry. The equipment was neatly
packed away and there were no half-eaten meals on the tables. There was frost
everywhere, but that was just the moisture that had frozen out of the air when
the base cooled down.

�They were expecting to come back," Galiana said.

Clavain nodded. �They couldnłt have had much of an idea of
what lay ahead of them."

They moved on, crossing another bridge until they arrived in
a toadstool that was almost entirely dedicated to bio-analysis laboratories.
Galiana had to use her neural trick to get them inside again, the machines in
her head sweet-talking the duller machines entombed in the doors. The
low-ceilinged labs were bathed in green light, but Galiana found a wall panel
that brought the lighting up a notch and even caused some bench equipment to
wake up, pulsing stand-by lights.

Clavain looked around, recognizing centrifuges,
gene-sequencers, gas chromatographys, and scanning-tunnelling microscopes.
There were at least a dozen other hunks of gleaming machinery whose function
eluded him. A wall-sized cabinet held dozens of pull-out drawers, each of which
contained hundreds of culture dishes, test-tubes, and gel slides. Clavain
glanced at the samples, reading the tiny labels. There were bacteria and
single-cell cultures with unpronounceable code names, most of which were marked
with Diadem map coordinates and a date. But there were also drawers full of
samples with Latin names; comparison samples that must have come from Earth.
The robots could easily have carried the tiny parent organisms from which these
larger samples had been grown or cloned. Perhaps the Americans had been experimenting
with the hardiness of Earth-born organisms, with a view to terraforming Diadem
at some point in the future.

He closed the drawer silently and moved to a set of larger
sample tubes racked on a desk. He picked one from the rack and raised it to the
light, examining the smoky things inside. It was a sample of worms,
indistinguishable from those he had collected on the glacier a few hours
earlier. A breeding tangle, probably, harvested from the intersection point of
two worm tunnels. Some of the worms in the tangle would be exchanging genes;
others would be fighting; others would be allowing themselves to be digested by
adults or newly hatched youngall behaving according to rigidly deterministic
laws of caste and sex. The tangle looked dead, but that meant nothing with the
worms. Their metabolism was fantastically slow; each individual easily capable
of living for thousands of years. It would take them months just to crawl along
some of the longer cracks in the ice, let alone move between some of the larger
tangles.

But the worms were really not all that alien. They had a
close terrestrial analog; the sun-avoiding ice-worms that had first been
discovered in the Malaspina Glacier in Alaska toward the end of the nineteenth
century. The Alaskan ice-worms were a lot smaller than their Diadem
counterparts, but they also nourished themselves on the slim pickings that
drifted onto the ice, or had been frozen into it years earlier. Like the Diadem
worms, their most notable anatomical feature was a pore at the head end, just
above the mouth. In the case of the terrestrial worms the pore served a single function;
secreting a salty solution that helped the worms melt their way into ice when
there was no tunnel already presentan escape strategy that helped them get
beneath the ice before the sun dried them up. The Diadem worms had a similar
structure, but according to Setterholmłs notes they have evolved a second use
for it; secreting a chemically rich ęscent trail,ł that helped other worms navigate
through the tunnel system. The chemistry of that scent trail turned out to be
very complex, with each worm capable of secreting not merely a unique signature
but a variety of flavors. Conceivably, more complex message schemes were
embedded in some of the other flavors: not just ęfollow meł but ęfollow me only
if you are femalełthe Diadem worms had at least three sexesęand this is
breeding season.ł There were many other possibilities, which Setterholm seemed
to have been attempting to decode and catalog when the end had come.

It was interesting ... up to a point. But even if the worms
followed a complex set of rules dependent on the scent trails they were picking
up, and perhaps other environmental cues, it would still only be rigidly
mechanistic behavior.

�Nevil, come here."

That was Galianałs voice, but it was in a tone he had barely
heard before. It was one that made him run to where Felka and Galiana were
waiting on the other side of the lab.

They were facing an array of lockers that occupied an entire
wall. A small status panel was set into each locker, but only one lockerplaced
at chest heightshowed any activity. Clavain looked back to the door they had
come in through, but from here it was hidden by intervening lab equipment. They
would not have seen this locker even if it had been illuminated before Galiana
brought the roomłs power back on.

�It might have been on all along," he said.

�I know," Galiana agreed.

She reached a hand up to the panel, tapping the control keys
with unnerving fluency. Machines to Galiana were like musical instruments to a
prodigy. She could pick one up cold and play it like an old friend.

The array of status lights changed configuration abruptly,
then there was a bustle of activity somewhere behind the lockerłs metal facelatches
and servomotors clicking after decades of stasis.

�Stand back," Galiana said.

A rime of frost shattered into a billion sugary pieces. The
locker began to slide out of the wall, the unhurried motion giving them
adequate time to digest what lay inside. He felt Felka grip his hand, and then
noticed that her other hand was curled tightly around Galianałs wrist. For the
first time he began to wonder if it had really been such a good idea to allow
the girl to join them.

The locker was two meters in length and half that in width
and height, just sufficient to contain a human body. It had probably been
designed to hold animal specimens culled from Diademłs oceans, but it was
equally capable of functioning as a mortuary tray. That the man inside the
locker was dead was beyond question, but there was no sign of injury. His
composureflat on his back, his blue-grey face serenely blank, his eyes closed,
and his hands clasped neatly just below his rib cagesuggested to Clavain a
saint lying in grace. His beard was neatly pointed and his hair long, frozen
into a solid sculptural mass. He was still wearing several heavy layers of
thermal clothing.

Clavain knelt closer and read the name tag above the manłs
heart.

�Andrew Iverson. Ring a bell?"

A moment went by while Galiana established a link to the
rest of the Conjoiners, ferreting the name out of some database. �Yes. One of
the missing. Seems he was a climatologist with an interest in terraforming
techniques."

Clavain nodded shrewdly. �That figures, with all the microorganisms
Iłve seen in this place. Well, the trillion-dollar question. How do you think
he got in there?"

�I think he climbed in," Galiana said. And nodded at
something which Clavain had missed, almost tucked away beneath the manłs
shoulder. Clavain reached into the gap, his finger brushing against the
rock-hard fabric of Iversonłs outfit. A catheter vanished into the manłs
forearm, where he had cut away a square of fabric. The catheterłs black
feed-line reached back into the cabinet, vanishing into a socket at the rear.

�Youłre saying he killed himself?"

�He must have put something in there that would stop his
heart. Then he probably flushed out his blood and replaced it with glycerol, or
something similar, to prevent ice-crystals forming in his cells. It would have
taken some automation to make it work, but Iłm sure everything he needed was
here."

Clavain thought back to what he knew about the cryonic immersion
techniques that had been around a century or so earlier. They left something to
be desired now, but back then they had not been much of an advance over
mummification.

�When he sank that catheter into himself, he couldnłt have
been certain wełd ever find him," Clavain remarked.

�Which would still have been preferable to suicide."

�Yes, but ... the thoughts that must have gone through his
head. Knowing he had to kill himself first to stand a chance of living againand
then hope someone else stumbled on Diadem."

�You made a harder choice than that, once."

�Yes. But at least I wasnłt alone when I made it."

Iversonłs body was astonishingly well-preserved, Clavain
thought. The skin tissue looked almost intact, even if it had a deathly,
granitelike color. The bones of his face had not ruptured under the strain of
the temperature drop. Bacterial processes had stopped dead. All in all, things
could have been a lot worse.

�We shouldnłt leave him like this," Galiana said, pushing
the locker so that it began to slide back into the wall.

�I donłt think he cares much about that now," Clavain said.

�No. You donłt understand. He mustnłt warmnot even to the
ambient temperature of the room. Otherwise we wonłt be able to wake him up."

It took five days to bring him back to consciousness.

The decision to reanimate had not been taken lightly; it had
only been arrived at after intense discussion among the Conjoined, debates in
which Clavain participated to the best of his ability. Iverson, they all
agreed, could probably be resurrected with current Conjoiner methods. In situ
scans of his mind had revealed preserved synaptic structures that a scaffold of
machines could coax back toward consciousness. However, since they had not yet
identified the cause of the madness which had killed Iversonłs colleaguesand
the evidence was pointing toward some kind of infectious agentIverson would be
kept on the surface; reborn on the same world where he had died.

They had, however, moved him, shuttling him halfway across
the world back to the main base. Clavain had traveled with the corpse,
marveling at the idea that this solid chunk of man-shaped icetainted,
admittedly, with a few vital impuritieswould soon be a breathing, thinking,
human being with memories and feelings. To him it seemed astonishing that this
was possible; that so much latent structure had been preserved across the
decades. Even more astonishing was that the infusions of tiny machines that the
Conjoiners were brewing would be able to stitch together damaged cells and
kick-start them back to life. And out of that inert loom of frozen brain
structurea thing that was at this moment nothing more than a fixed geometric
entity, like a finely eroded piece of rocksomething as malleable as consciousness
would emerge.

But the Conjoiners were blase at the prospect, viewing
Iverson the way expert picture-restorers might view a damaged old master. Yes,
there would be difficulties aheadwork that would require great skillbut
nothing to lose sleep over.

Except, Clavain reminded himself, none of them slept anyway.

While the others were working to bring Iverson back to life,
Clavain wandered the outskirts of the base, trying to get a better feel for
what it must have been like in the last days. The debilitating mental illness
must have been terrifying, as it struck even those who might have stood some
chance of developing some kind of counter-agent to it. Perhaps in the old days,
when the base had been under the stewardship of the von Neumann machines, something
might have been done ... but in the end it must have been like trying to crack
a particularly tricky algebra problem while growing steadily more drunk: losing
first the ability to focus sharply, then to focus on the problem at all, and
then to remember what was so important about it anyway. The labs in the main
complex had an abandoned look to them; experiments half-finished; notes on the
wall scrawled in ever more incoherent handwriting.

Down in the lower levelsthe transport bays and storage areasit
was almost as if nothing had happened. Equipment was still neatly racked,
surface vehicles neatly parked, andwith the base sub-systems back onthe place
was bathed in light and not so cold as to require extra clothing. It was quite
therapeutic, too. The Conjoiners had not extended their communicational fields
into these regions, so Clavainłs mind was mercifully isolated again; freed of
the clamor of other voices. Despite that, he was still tempted by the idea of
spending some time outdoors.

With that in mind he found an airlock, one that must have
been added late in the basełs history as it was absent from the blueprints.
There was no membrane stretched across this one; if he stepped through it he
would be outside as soon as the doors cycled, with no more protection than the
clothes he was wearing now. He considered going back into the base proper to
find a membrane suit, but by the time he did that, the moodthe urge to go outsidewould
be gone.

Clavain noticed a locker. Inside, to his delight, was a rack
of old-style suits such as Setterholm had been wearing. They looked brand-new,
alloy neck-rings gleaming. Racked above each was a bulbous helmet. He
experimented until he found a suit that fit him, then struggled with the
various latches and seals that coupled the suit parts together. Even when he
thought he had donned the suit properly, the airlock detected that one of his
gloves wasnłt latched correctly. It refused to let him outside until he
reversed the cycle and fixed the problem.

But then he was outside, and it was glorious.

He walked around the base until he found his bearings, and
thenalways ensuring that the base was in view and that his air-supply was
adequatehe set off across the ice. Above, Diademłs sky was a deep enamelled
blue, and the icethough fundamentally whiteseemed to contain in itself a
billion nuances of pale turquoise, pale aquamarine even hints of the palest of
pinks. Beneath his feet he imagined the cracklike networks of the worms, threading
down for hundreds of meters; and he imagined the worms themselves, wriggling
through that network, responding to and secreting chemical scent trails. The
worms themselves were biologically simplealmost dismayingly sobut that
network was a vast, intricate thing. It hardly mattered that the traffic along
itthe to-and-fro motions of the worms as they went about their liveswas so
agonizingly slow. The worms, after all, had endured longer than human
comprehension. They had seen people come and go in an eyeblink.

He walked on until he arrived at the crevasse where he had
found Setterholm. They had long since removed Setterholmłs body, of course, but
the experience had imprinted itself deeply on Clavainłs mind. He found it easy
to relive the moment at the lip of the crevasse, when he had first seen the end
of Setterholmłs arm. At the time he had told himself that there must be worse
places to die, surrounded by beauty that was so pristine, so utterly untouched
by human influence. Now, the more that he thought about it, the more that
Setterholmłs death played on his mindhe wondered if there could be any worse
place. It was undeniably beautiful, but it was also crushingly dead, crushingly
oblivious to life. Setterholm must have felt himself draining away, soon to
become as inanimate as the palace of ice that was to become his tomb.

Clavain thought about it for many more minutes, enjoying the
silence and the solitude and the odd awkwardness of the suit. He thought back
to the way Setterholm had been found, and his mind niggled at something not
quite right; a detail that had not seemed wrong at the time but that now
troubled him.

It was Setterholmłs helmet.

He remembered the way it had been lying away from the manłs
corpse, as if the impact had knocked it off. But now that Clavain had locked an
identical helmet onto his own suit, that was harder to believe. The latches
were sturdy, and he doubted that the drop into the crevasse would have been
sufficient enough to break the mechanism. He considered the possibility that
Setterholm had put his suit on hastily, but even that seemed unlikely now. The
airlock had detected that Clavainłs glove was badly attached; itor any of the
other lockswould have surely refused to allow Setterholm outside if his helmet
had not been correctly latched.

Clavain wondered if Setterholmłs death had been something
other than an accident.

He thought about it, trying the idea on for size, then
slowly shook his head. There were a myriad of possibilities he had yet to rule
out. Setterholm could have left the base with his suit intact and thenconfused
and disorientatedhe could have fiddled with the latch, depriving himself of
oxygen until he stumbled into the crevasse. Or perhaps the airlocks were not as
foolproof as they seemed, the safety mechanism capable of being disabled by people
in a hurry to get outside.

No. A man had died, but there was no need to assume it had
been anything other than an accident. Clavain turned and began to walk back to
the base.

�Hełs awake," Galiana said, a day or so after the final wave
of machines had swum into Iversonłs mind. �I think it might be better if he
spoke to you first, Nevil, donłt you? Rather than one of us?" She bit her
tongue. �I mean, rather than someone whołs been Conjoined for as long as the
rest of us?"

Clavain shrugged. �Then again, an attractive face might be
preferable to a grizzled old relic like myself. But I take your point. Is it
safe to go in now?"

�Perfectly. If Iverson was carrying anything infectious, the
machines would have flagged it."

�I hope youłre right."

�Well, look at the evidence. He was acting rationally up to
the end. He did everything to ensure wełd have an excellent chance of reviving
him. His suicide was just a coldly calculated attempt to escape his then
situation."

�Coldly calculated," Clavain echoed. �Yes, I suppose it
would have been. Cold, I mean."

Galiana said nothing but gestured toward the door into Iversonłs
room.

Clavain stepped through the opening. And it was as he
crossed the threshold that a thought occurred to him. He could once again see,
in his mindłs eye, Martin Setterholmłs body lying at the bottom of the
crevasse, his fingers pointing to the letters IVF.

In vitro fertilization.

But suppose Setterholm had been trying to write IVERSON but
had died before finishing the word? If Setterholm had been murderedpushed into
the crevassehe might have been trying to pass on a message about his murderer.
Clavain imagined his pain: legs smashed, knowing with absolute certainty he was
going to die alone and cold but willing himself to write Iversonłs name ...

But why would the climatologist have wanted to kill Setterholm?
Setterholmłs fascination with the worms was perplexing but harmless. The
information Clavain had collected pointed to Setterholm being a single-minded
loner; the kind of man who would inspire pity or indifference in his
colleagues, rather than hatred. And everyone was dying anywayagainst such a
background, a murder seemed almost irrelevant.

Maybe he was attributing too much to the six faint marks a dying
man had scratched on the ice.

Forcing suspicion from his mindfor nowClavain stepped into
Iversonłs room. The room was spartan but serene, with a small blue holographic
window set high on one white wall. Clavain was responsible for that. Left to
the Conjoinerswho had taken over an area of the main American base and filled
it with their own pressurized spacesIversonłs room would have been a grim,
grey cube. That was fine for the Conjoinersthey moved through informational
fields draped like an extra layer over reality. But though Iversonłs head was
now drenched with their machines, they were only there to assist his normal
patterns of thought, reinforcing weak synaptic signals and compensating for a
far-from-equilibrium mix of neurotransmitters.

So Clavain had insisted on cheering the place up a bit; Iversonłs
bedsheets and pillow were now the same pure white as the walls, so that his
head bobbed in a sea of whiteness. His hair had been trimmed, but Clavain had
made sure that no one had done more than neaten Iversonłs beard.

�Andrew?" he said. �Iłm told youłre awake now. Iłm Nevil
Clavain. How are you feeling?"

Iverson wet his lips before answering. �Better, I suspect,
than I have any reason to feel."

�Ah." Clavain beamed, feeling that a large burden had just
been lifted from his shoulders. �Then youłve some recollection of what happened
to you."

�I died, didnłt I? I pumped myself full of anti-freeze and
hoped for the best. Did it work, or is this just some weird-ass dream as Iłm
sliding toward brain death?"

�No, it sure as hell worked. That was one weird-heck-ass of
a risk ..." Clavain halted, not entirely certain that he could emulate Iversonłs
century-old speech patterns. �That was quite some risk you took. But youłll be
glad to hear it did work."

Iverson lifted a hand from beneath the bedsheets, examining
his palm and the pattern of veins and tendons on the rear. �This is the same
body I went under with? You havenłt stuck me in a robot or cloned me or hooked
up my disembodied brain to a virtual-reality generator?"

�None of those things, no. Just mopped up some cell damage,
fixed a few things here and there andumkick-started you back to the land of
the living."

Iverson nodded, but Clavain could tell he was far from convinced.
Which was unsurprising: Clavain, after all, had already told a small lie. �So
how long was I under?"

�About a century, Andrew. Wełre an expedition from back
home. We came by starship."

Iverson nodded again, as if this were mere, incidental
detail. �Wełre aboard it now, right?"

�No ... no. Wełre still on the planet. The shipłs parked in
orbit."

�And everyone else?"

No point sugaring the pill. �Dead, as far as we can make
out. But you must have known that would happen."

�Yeah. But I didnłt know for sure, even at the end."

�So what happened? How did you escape the infection or whatever
it was?"

�Sheer luck." Iverson asked for a drink. Clavain fetched him
one and at the same time had the room extrude a chair next to the bed.

�I didnłt see much sign of luck," Clavain said.

�No; it was terrible. But I was the lucky one; thatłs all I
meant. I donłt know how much you know. We had to evacuate the outlying bases
toward the end, when we couldnłt keep more than one fusion reactor running."
Iverson took a sip from the glass of water Clavain had brought him. �If wełd
still had the machines to look after us ..."

�Yes. Thatłs something we never really understood." Clavain
leant closer to the bed. �Those von Neumann machines were built to self-repair
themselves, werenłt they? We still donłt see how they broke down."

Iverson eyed him. �They didnłt. Breakdown, I mean."

�No? Then what happened?"

�We smashed them up. Like rebellious teenagers overthrowing
parental control. The machines were nannying us, and we were sick of it. In
hindsight, it wasnłt such a good idea."

�Didnłt the machines put up a fight?"

�Not exactly. I donłt think the people that designed them
ever thought theyłd get trashed by the kids theyłd lovingly cared for."

So, Clavain thoughtwhatever had happened here, whatever he
went on to learn, it was clear that the Americans had been at least partially
the authors of their own misfortunes. He still felt sympathy for them, but now
it was cooler, tempered with something close to disgust. He wondered if that
feeling of disappointed appraisal would have come so easily without Galianałs
machines in his head: It would be just a tiny step to go from feeling that way
toward Iversonłs people to feeling that way about the rest of humanity ... and
then Iłd know that Iłd truly attained Trans enlightenment ...

Clavain snapped out of his morbid line of thinking. It was
not Transenlightenment that engendered those feelings, just ancient, bone-deep
cynicism.

�Well, therełs no point dwelling on what was done years ago.
But how did you survive?"

�After the evacuation, we realized that wełd left something
behinda spare component for the fusion reactor. So I went back for it, taking
one of the planes. I landed just as a bad weather front was coming in, which
kept me grounded there for two days. That was when the others began to get
sick. It happened pretty quickly, and all I knew about it was what I could
figure out from the comm-links back to the main base."

�Tell me what you did figure out."

�Not much," Iverson said. �It was fast, and it seemed to
attack the central nervous system. No one survived it. Those that didnłt die of
it directly seemed to get themselves killed through accidents or sloppy
procedure."

�We noticed. Eventually someone died who was responsible for
keeping the fusion reactor running properly. It didnłt blow up, did it?"

�No. Just spewed out a lot more neutrons than normal, too
much for the shielding to contain. Then it went into emergency shutdown mode.
Some people were killed by the radiation but most died of the cold that came
afterward."

�Hm. Except you."

Iverson nodded. �If I hadnłt had to go back for that
component, Iłd have been one of them. Obviously, I couldnłt risk returning.
Even if I could have got the reactor working again, there was still the problem
of the contaminant." He breathed in deeply, as if steeling himself to recollect
what had happened next. �So I weighed my options, and decided dyingfreezing
myselfwas my only hope. No one was going to come from Earth to help me, even
if I could have kept myself alive. Not for decades, anyway. So I took a chance."

�One that paid off."

�Like I said, I was the lucky one." Iverson took another sip
from the glass Clavain had brought him. �Man, that tastes better than anything
Iłve ever drunk in my life. Whatłs in this, by the way?"

�Just water. Glacial water. Purified, of course."

Iverson nodded slowly and put the glass down next to his
bed.

�Not thirsty now?"

�Quenched my thirst nicely, thank you."

�Good." Clavain stood up. �Iłll let you get some rest,
Andrew. If therełs anything you need, anything we can dojust call out."

Til be sure to."

Clavain smiled and walked to the door, observing Iversonłs
obvious relief that the questioning session was over for now. But Iverson had
said nothing incriminating, Clavain reminded himself, and his responses were
entirely consistent with the fatigue and confusion anyone would feel after so
long a sleepor dead, depending on how you defined Iversonłs period on ice. It
was unfair to associate him with Setterholmłs death just because of a few indistinct
marks gouged in ice and the faint possibility that Setterholm had been
murdered.

Still, Clavain paused before leaving the room. �One other
thing, Andrewjust something thatłs been bothering me, and I wondered if you
could help?"

�Go ahead."

�Would the initials I, V, and F mean anything to you?"

Iverson thought about it for a moment, then shook his head. �Sorry,
Nevil. Youłve got me there."

�Well, it was just a shot in the dark," Clavain said.

Iverson was strong enough to walk around the next day. He insisted
on exploring the rest of the base, not simply the parts of it that the
Conjoiners had taken over. He wanted to see for himself the damage that he had
heard about and see the lists of the deadand the manner in which they had diedthat
Clavain and his friends had assiduously compiled. Clavain kept a watchful eye
on the man, aware of how emotionally traumatic the whole experience must be. He
was bearing it well, but that could easily have been a front. Galianałs
machines could tell a lot about how his brain was functioning, but they were
unable to probe Iversonłs state of mind at the resolution needed to map
emotional well-being.

Clavain, meanwhile, strove as best he could to keep Iverson
in the dark about the Conjoiners. He did not want to overwhelm Iverson with
strangeness at this delicate timedid not want to shatter the manłs illusion
that he had been rescued by a group of ęnormalł human beings. But it turned out
to be easier than he had expected, as Iverson showed surprisingly little
interest in the history he had missed. Clavain had gone as far as telling him
that the Sandra Voi was technically a ship full of refugees, fleeing the
aftermath of a war between various factions of solar-system humanitybut Iverson
had done little more than nod, never probing Clavain for more details about the
war. Once or twice Clavain had even alluded accidentally to the
Transenlightenmentthat shared consciousness state that the Conjoiners had
reachedbut Iverson had shown the same lack of interest. He was not even
curious about the Sandra Voi herself, never once asking Clavain what the ship
was like. It was not quite what Clavain had been expecting.

But there were rewards, too.

Iverson, it turned out, was fascinated by Felka, and Felka
herself seemed pleasantly amused by the newcomer. It was, perhaps, not all that
surprising: Galiana and the others had been busy helping Felka grow the neural
circuitry necessary for normal human interactions, adding new layers to
supplant the functional regions that had never worked properlybut in all that
time, they had never introduced her to another human being that she had not
already met. And here was Iverson: not just a new voice but a new smell, a new
face, a new way of walking, a deluge of new input for her starved mental
routines. Clavain watched the way Felka latched onto Iverson when he entered a
room, her attention snapping to him, her delight evident. And Iverson seemed
perfectly happy to play the games that so wearied the others, the kind of
intricate challenges that Felka adored. For hours on end he watched the two of
them lost in concentration: Iverson pulling mock faces of sorrow oron the rare
occasions when he beat herextravagant joy. Felka responded in kind, her face
more animatedmore plausibly humanthan Clavain had ever believed possible. She
spoke more often in Iversonłs presence than she had ever done in his, and the
utterances she made more closely approximated well-formed, grammatically sound
sentences than the disjointed shards of language Clavain had grown to
recognize. It was like watching a difficult, backward child suddenly come
alight in the presence of a skilled teacher. Clavain thought back to the time
when he had rescued Felka from Mars and how unlikely it had seemed then that
she would ever grow into something resembling a normal adult human, as
sensitized to othersł feelings as she was to her own. Now, he could almost
believe it would happenyet half the distance she had come had been due to
Iversonłs influence, rather than his own.

Afterwards, when even Iverson had wearied of Felkałs ceaseless
demands for games, Clavain spoke to him quietly, away from the others.

�Youłre good with her, arenłt you."

Iverson shrugged, as if the matter was of no great
consequence to him. �Yeah, I like her. We both enjoy the same kinds of games.
If therełs a problem"

He must have detected Clavainłs irritation. �No! No problem
at all." Clavain put a hand on his shoulder. �Therełs more to it than just
games, though, you have to admit ..."

�Shełs a pretty fascinating case, Nevil."

�I donłt disagree. We value her highly." He flinched, aware
of how much the remark sounded like one of Galianałs typically flat statements.
�But Iłm puzzled. Youłve been revived after nearly a century asleep. Wełve come
here by a ship that couldnłt even have been considered a distant possibility in
your own era. Wełve undergone massive social and technical upheavals in the
last hundred years. There are things about usthings about meI havenłt told
you yet. Things about you I havenłt even told you yet."

�Iłm just taking things one step at a time, thatłs all."
Iverson shrugged and looked distantly past Clavain, through the window behind
him. His gaze must have been skating across kilometers of ice toward Diademłs
white horizon, unable to find a purchase. �I admit, Iłm not really interested
in technological innovations. Iłm sure your shipłs really nice, but ... itłs
just applied physics. Just engineering. There may be some new quantum
principles underlying your propulsion system, but if thatłs the case, itłs
probably just an elaborate curlicue on something that was already pretty
baroque to begin with. You havenłt smashed the light barrier, have you?" He
read Clavainłs expression accurately. �Nodidnłt think so. Maybe if you had ..."

�So what exactly does interest you?"

Iverson seemed to hesitate before answering, but when he did
speak Clavain had no doubt that he was telling the truth. There was a sudden,
missionary fervor in his voice. �Emergence. Specifically, the emergence of
complex, almost unpredictable patterns from systems governed by a few, simple
laws. Consciousness is an excellent example. A human mindłs really just a web
of simple neuronal cells wired together in a particular way. The laws governing
the functioning of those individual cells arenłt all that difficult to graspa
cascade of well-studied electrical, chemical, and enzymic processes. The tricky
part is the wiring diagram. It certainly isnłt encoded in DNA in any but the
crudest sense. Otherwise why would a baby bother growing neural connections
that are pruned down before birth? Thatłd be a real wasteif you had a perfect
blueprint for the conscious mind, youłd only bother forming the connections you
needed. No the mind organizes itself during growth, and thatłs why it needs so
many more neurones that itłll eventually incorporate into functioning networks.
It needs the raw material to work with as it gropes its way toward a
functioning consciousness. The pattern emerges, bootstrapping itself into existence,
and the pathways that arenłt usedor arenłt as efficient as othersare
discarded." Iverson paused. �But how this organization happens really isnłt
understood in any depth. Do you know how many neurones it takes to control the
first part of a lobsterłs gut, Nevil? Have a guess, to the nearest hundred."

Clavain shrugged. �I donłt know. Five hundred? A thousand?"

�No. Six. Not six hundred, just six. Six damned neurones.
You canłt get much simpler than that. But it took decades to understand how
those six worked together, let alone how that particular network evolved. The
problems arenłt inseparable, either. You canłt really hope to understand how
ten billion neurones organize themselves into a functioning whole unless you
understand how the whole actually functions. Oh, wełve made some progresswe
can tell you exactly which spinal neurones fire to make a lamprey swim, and how
that firing pattern maps into muscle motionbut wełre a long way from
understanding how something as elusive as the concept of T emerges in the
developing human mind. Well, at least we were before I went under. You may be
about to tell me youłve achieved stunning progress in the last century, but something
tells me you were too busy with social upheaval for that."

Clavain felt an urge to argueangered by the manłs tonebut
suppressed it, willing himself into a state of serene acceptance. �Youłre
probably right. Wełve made progress in the other directionaugmenting the mind
as it isbut if we genuinely understood brain development, we wouldnłt have
ended up with a failure like Felka."

�Oh, I wouldnłt call her a failure, Nevil."

�I didnłt mean it like that."

�Of course not." Now it was Iversonłs turn to place a hand
on Clavainłs shoulder. �But you must see now why I find Felka so fascinating.
Her mind is damagedyou told me that yourself, and therełs no need to go into
the detailsbut despite that damage, despite the vast abyss in her head, shełs
beginning to self-assemble the kinds of higher-level neural routines we all
take for granted. Itłs as if the patterns were always there as latent
potentials, andł itłs only now that theyłre beginning to emerge. Isnłt that
fascinating? Isnłt it something worthy of study?"

Delicately, Clavain removed the manłs hand from his
shoulder. �I suppose so. I had hoped, however, that there might be something
more to it than study."

�Iłve offended you, and I apologize. My choice of phrase was
poor. Of course I care for her."

Clavain felt suddenly awkward, as if he had misjudged a fundamentally
decent man. �I understand. Look, ignore what I said."

�Yeah, of course. Itumwill be all right for me to see her
again, wonłt it?"

Clavain nodded. �Iłm sure shełd miss you if you werenłt
around."

Over the next few days Clavain left the two of them to their
games, only rarely eavesdropping to see how things were going. Iverson had
asked permission to show Felka around some of the other areas of the base, and,
after some initial misgivings, Clavain and Galiana had both agreed to his
request. After that, long hours went by when the two of them were not to be
found. Clavain had tracked them once, watching as Iverson led the girl into a
disused lab and showed her intricate molecular models. They clearly delighted
her: vast fuzzy holographic assemblages of atoms and chemical bonds that
floated in the air like Chinese dragons. Wearing cumbersome gloves and goggles,
Iverson and Felka were able to manipulate the mega-molecules; forcing them to
fold into minimum-energy configurations that brute-force computation would have
struggled to predict. As they gestured into the air and made the dragons
contort and twist, Clavain watched for the inevitable moment when Felka would
grow bored and demand something harder. But it never came. Afterwardswhen she
had returned to the fold, her face shining with wonderit was as if Felka had undergone
a spiritual experience. Iverson had shown her something which her mind could
not instantly encompass, a problem too large and subtle to be stormed in a
flash of intuitive insight.

Seeing that, Clavain again felt guilty about the way he had
spoken to Iverson, and knew that he had not completely put aside his doubts
about the message Setterholm had left in the ice. Butthe riddle of the helmet
asidethere was no reason to think that Iverson might be a murderer beyond
those haphazard marks. Clavain had looked into Iversonłs personnel records from
the time before he was frozen, and the manłs history was flawless. He had been
a solid, professional member of the expedition, well-liked and trusted by the
others. Granted, the records were patchy, and since they were stored digitally
they could have been doctored to almost any extent. But then much the same
story was told by the hand-written diary and verbal log entries of some of the
other victims. Andrew Iversonłs name came up again and again as a man regarded
with affection by his fellowsmost certainly not someone capable of murder.
Best, then, to discard the evidence of the marks and give him the benefit of
the doubt.

Clavain spoke of his fears to Galiana, and while she
listened to him, she only came back with exactly the same rational counterarguments
that he had already provided for himself.

�The problem is," Galiana said, �that the man you found in
the crevasse could have been severely confused, perhaps even hallucinatory.
That message he leftif it was a message and not a set of random gouge marks he
left while convulsingcould mean anything at all."

�We donłt know that Setterholm was confused," Clavain protested.

�We donłt? Then why didnłt he make sure his helmet was on
properly? It couldnłt have been latched fully or it wouldnłt have rolled off
him when he hit the bottom of the crevasse."

�Yes," Clavain said. �But Iłm reasonably sure he wouldnłt
have been able to leave the base if his helmet hadnłt been latched."

�In which case he must have undone it afterwards."

�Yes, but therełs no reason for him to have done that, unless
..."

Galiana gave him a thin-lipped smile. �Unless he was confused.
Back to square one, Nevil."

�No," he said, conscious that he could almost see the shape
of somethingsomething that was close to the truth if not the truth itself. �Therełs
another possibility, one I hadnłt thought of until now."

Galiana squinted at him, that rare frown appearing. �Which
is?"

�That someone else removed his helmet for him."

They went down into the bowels of the base. In the dead
space of the equipment bays Galiana became ill at ease. She was not used to
being out of communicational range of her colleagues. Normally systems buried
in the environment picked up neural signals from individuals, amplifying and
re-broadcasting them to other people, but there were no such systems here.
Clavain could hear Galianałs thoughts, but they came in weak, like a voice from
the sea almost drowned by the roar of the surf.

�This had better be worth it," Galiana said.

�I want to show you the airlock," Clavain answered. �Iłm sure
Setterholm must have left here with his helmet properly attached."

�You still think he was murdered?"

�I think itłs a remote possibility that we should be very
careful not to discount."

�But why would anyone kill a man whose only interest was a
lot of harmless ice worms?"

�Thatłs been bothering me as well."

�And?"

�I think I have an answer. Half of one, anyway. What if his
interest in the worms brought him into conflict with the others? Iłm thinking
about the reactor."

Galiana nodded. �Theyłd have needed to harvest ice for it."

�Which Setterholm might have seen as interfering with the
wormsł ecology. Maybe he made a nuisance of himself and someone decided to get
rid of him."

�That would be a pretty extreme way of dealing with him."

�I know," Clavain said, stepping through a connecting door into
the transport bay. �I said I had half an answer, not all of one."

As soon as he was through he knew something was amiss. The
bay was not as it had been before, when he had come down here scouting for
clues. He dropped his train of thought immediately, focussing only on the now.

The room was much, much colder than it should have been. And
lighter. There was an oblong of chill blue daylight spilling across the floor
from the huge open door of one of the vehicle exit ramps. Clavain looked at it
in mute disbelief, wanting it to be a temporary glitch in his vision. But
Galiana was with him, and she had seen it, too.

�Someonełs left the base," she said.

Clavain looked out across the ice. He could see the wake
that the vehicle had left in the snow, arcing out toward the horizon. For a
long moment they stood at the top of the ramp, frozen into inaction. Clavainłs
mind screamed with the implications. He had never really liked the idea of
Iverson taking Felka away with him elsewhere in the base, but he had never
considered the possibility that he might take her into one of the blind zones.
From here, Iverson must have known enough little tricks to open a surface door,
start a rover, and leave without any of the Conjoiners realizing.

�Nevil, listen to me," Galiana said. �He doesnłt necessarily
mean her any harm. He might just want to show her something."

He turned to her. �There isnłt time to arrange a shuttle.
That trick you did a few days ago, talking to the door? Do you think you can
manage it again?"

�I donłt need to. The doorłs already open."

Clavain nodded at one of the other rovers hulking behind
them. �Itłs not the door Iłm thinking about."

Galiana was disappointed; it took her three minutes to
convince the machine to start, rather than the few dozen seconds she said it
should have taken. She was, she told Clavain, in serious danger of getting
rusty at this sort of thing. Clavain just thanked the gods that there had been
no mechanical sabotage to the rover; no amount of neural intervention could
have fixed that.

�Thatłs another thing that makes it look like this is just
an innocent trip outside," Galiana said. �If hełd really wanted to abduct her,
it wouldnłt have taken much additional effort to stop us from following him. If
hełd closed the door, as well, we might not even have noticed he was gone."

�Havenłt you ever heard of reverse psychology?" Clavain
said.

�I still canłt see Iverson as a murderer, Nevil." She
checked his expression, her own face calm despite her driving the machine. Her
hands were folded in her lap. She was less isolated now, having used the roverłs
comm-systems to establish a link back to the other Conjoiners. �Setterholm,
maybe. The obsessive loner and all that. Just a shame hełs the dead one."

�Yes," Clavain said, uneasily.

The rover itself ran on six wheels; a squat, pressurized
hull perched low between absurd-looking balloon tires. Galiana gunned them hard
down the ramp and across the ice, trusting the machine to glide harmlessly over
the smaller crevasses. It seemed reckless, but if they followed the trail that
Iverson had left, they were almost guaranteed not to hit any fatal obstacles.

�Did you get anywhere with the source of the sickness?" Clavain
asked.

�No breakthroughs yet ..."

�Then herełs a suggestion. Can you read my visual memory
accurately?" Clavain did not need an answer. �While you were finding Iversonłs
body, I was looking over the lab samples. There were a lot of terrestrial
organisms there. Could one of those have been responsible?"

�Youłd better replay the memory."

Clavain did; picturing himself looking over the rows of
culture dishes, test-tubes, and gel-slides, concentrating especially on those
that had come from Earth rather than the locally-obtained samples. In his mindłs
eye the sample names refused to snap into clarity, but the machines that
Galiana had seeded through his mind would already be locating the
eidetically-stored short-term memories and retrieving them with a clarity
beyond the capabilities of Clavainłs own brain.

�Now see if therełs anything there that might do the job."

�A terrestrial organism?" Galiana sounded surprised. �Well,
there might be something there, but I canłt see how it could have spread beyond
the laboratory unless someone wanted it to."

�I think thatłs exactly what happened."

�Sabotage?"

�Yes."

�Well, wełll know sooner or later. Iłve passed the
information to the others. Theyłll get back to me if they find a candidate. But
I still donłt see why anyone would sabotage the entire base, even if it was
possible. Overthrowing the von Neumann machines is one thing ... mass suicide
is another."

�I donłt think it was mass suicide. Mass murder, maybe."

�And Iversonłs your main suspect?"

�He survived, didnłt he? And Setterholm scrawled a message
in the ice just before he died. It must have been a warning about him." But
even as he spoke, he knew there was a second possibility, one that he could not
quite focus on.

Galiana swerved the rover to avoid a particularly deep and
yawning chasm, shaded with vivid veins of turquoise blue.

�Therełs a small matter of a missing motive."

Clavain looked ahead, wondering if the thing he saw glinting
in the distance was a trick of the eye. �Iłm working on that," he said.

Galiana halted them next to the other rover. The two
machines were parked at the lip of a slope-sided depression in the ice. It was
not really steep enough to call a crevasse, although it was at least thirty or
forty meters deep. From the roverłs cab it was not possible to see all the way
into the powdery-blue depths, although Clavain could certainly see the fresh
footprints which descended into them. Up on the surface marks like that would
have been scoured away by the wind in days or hours, so these prints were very
fresh. There were, he observed, two setssomeone heavy and confident and
someone lighter, less sure of her footing.

Before they had taken the rover they had made sure that
there were two suits aboard it. They struggled into them, fiddling with the
latches.

�If Iłm right," Clavain said, �this kind of precaution isnłt
really necessary. Not for avoiding the sickness, anyway. But better safe than
sorry."

�Excellent timing," Galiana said, snapping down her helmet
and giving it a quarter twist to lock into place. �Theyłve just pulled
something from your memory, Nevil. Therełs a family of single-celled organisms
called dinoflagellates, one of which was present in the lab where we found
Iverson. Something calledpfiesteria piscicida. Normally itłs an ambush predator
that attacks fish."

�Could it have been responsible for the madness?"

�Itłs at least a strong contender. It has a taste for
mammalian tissue as well. If it gets into the human nervous system it produces
memory loss and disorientation, as well as a host of physical effects. It could
have been dispersed as a toxic aerosol released into the basełs air-system.
Someone with access to the labłs facilities could have turned it from something
merely nasty to something deadly, I think."

�We should have pinpointed it, Galiana. Didnłt we swab the
air ducts?"

�Yes, but we werenłt looking for something terrestrial. In
fact we were excluding terrestrial organisms; only filtering for the basic
biochemical building blocks of Diadem life. We just werenłt thinking in
criminal terms."

�More fool us," Clavain said.

Suited now, they stepped outside. Clavain began to regret
his haste in leaving the base so quicklyat having to make do with these old
suits and lacking any means of defense. Wanting something in his hand for moral
support, he examined the equipment stowed around the outside of the rover until
he found an ice pick. It would not be much of a weapon, but he felt better for
it.

�You wonłt need that," Galiana said.

�What if Iverson turns nasty?"

�You still wonłt need it."

But he kept it anywayan ice pick was an ice pick, after alland
the two of them walked to the point where the icy ground began to curve over.
Clavain examined the wrist of his suit, studying the cryptic and old-fashioned
matrix of keypads that controlled the suitłs functions. On a whim he pressed
something promising and was gratified when he felt crampon spikes from the
soles of his boots anchoring him to the ice.

�Iverson!" he shouted. �Felka!"

But sound carried poorly beyond his helmet, and the
ceaseless, whipping wind would have snatched his words away from the crevasse.
There was nothing to do but make the difficult trek into the blue depths. He
led the way, his heart pounding in his chest, the old suit awkward and
top-heavy. He almost lost his footing once or twice and had to stop to catch
his breath once he reached the level bottom of the depression, sweat running
into his eyes.

He looked around. The footprints led horizontally for ten or
fifteen meters, weaving between fragile, curtainlike formations of opal ice. On
some clinical level he acknowledged that the place had a sinister charmhe
imagined the wind breathing through those curtains of ice, making ethereal
musicbut the need to find Felka eclipsed such considerations. He focused only
on the low, dark blue hole of a tunnel in the ice ahead of them. The footprints
vanished into the tunnel.

�If the bastardłs taken her ..." Clavain said, tightening
his grip on the pick. He switched on his helmet light and stooped into the
tunnel, Galiana behind him. It was hard going; the tunnel wriggled, rose, and
descended for many tens of meters, and Clavain was unable to decide whether it
was some weird natural featurecarved, perhaps, by a hot sub-glacial riveror
whether it had been dug by hand, much more recently. The walls were veined by
worm tracks, a marbling like an immense magnification of the human retina. Here
and there Clavain saw the dark smudges of worms moving through cracks that were
very close to the surface, though he knew it was necessary to stare at them for
long seconds before any movement was discernible. He groaned, the stooping
becoming painful, and then the tunnel widened out dramatically. He realized
that he had emerged in a much larger space.

It was still underground, although the ceiling glowed with
the blue translucence of filtered daylight. The covering of ice could not have
been more than a meter or two thick; a thin shell stretched like a dome over
tens of meters of yawing nothing. Nearly sheer walls of delicately patterned
ice rose up from a level, footprint-dappled floor.

�Ah," said Iverson, who was standing near one wall of the
chamber. �You decided to join us."

Clavain felt a stab of relief, seeing that Felka was
standing not far from him, next to a piece of equipment Clavain failed to recognize.
Felka seemed unharmed. She turned toward him, the peculiar play of light and
shade on her helmeted face making her seem older than she was.

�Nevil," he heard Felka say. �Hello."

He crossed the ice, fearful that the whole marvelous edifice
was about to come crashing down on them all.

�Why did you bring her here, Iverson?"

�Therełs something I wanted to show her. Something I knew
shełd like, even more than the other things." He turned to the smaller figure
near him. �Isnłt that right, Felka?"

�Yes."

�And do you like it?"

Her answer was matter-of-fact, but it was closer to conversation
than anything Clavain had ever heard from her lips.

�Yes. I do like it."

Galiana stepped ahead of him and extended a hand to the
girl. �Felka? Iłm glad you like this place. I like it, too. But now itłs time
to come back home."

Clavain steeled himself for an argument, some kind of
show-down between the two women, but to his immense relief Felka walked
casually toward Galiana.

�Iłll take her back to the rover," Galiana said. �I want to
make sure she hasnłt had any problems breathing with that old suit on."

A transparent lie, but it would suffice.

Then she spoke to Clavain. It was a tiny thing, almost
inconsequential, but she placed it directly in his head.

And he understood what he would have to do.

When they were alone, Clavain said: �You killed him."

�Setterholm?"

�No. You couldnłt have killed Setterholm because you are Setterholm."
Clavain looked up, the arc of his helmet light tracing the filamentary
patterning until it became too tiny to resolve, blurring into an indistinct
haze of detail that curved over into the ceiling itself. It was like admiring a
staggeringly ornate fresco.

�Nevil, do me a favor? Check the settings on your suit, in
case youłre not getting enough oxygen?"

�Therełs nothing wrong with my suit." Clavain smiled, the irony
of it all delicious. �In fact, it was the suit that really tipped me off. When
you pushed Iverson into the crevasse, his helmet came off. That couldnłt have
happened unless it wasnłt fixed properly in the first placeand that couldnłt have
happened unless someone had removed it after the two of you left the base."

Setterholmhe was sure the man was Setterholmsnorted derisively,
but Clavain continued speaking.

�Herełs my stab at what happened, for what itłs worth. You
needed to swap identities with Iverson because Iverson had no obvious motive
for murdering the others, whereas Setterholm certainly did."

�And I donłt suppose you have any idea what that motive
might have been?"

�Give me time; Iłll get there eventually. Letłs just deal
with the lone murder first. Changing the electronic records was easy enoughyou
could even swap Iversonłs picture and medical data for your ownbut that was
only part of it. You also needed to get Iverson into your clothes and suit, so
that wełd assume the body in the crevasse belonged to you, Setterholm. I donłt
know exactly how you did it."

�Then perhaps ..."

Clavain carried on. �But my guess is you let him catch a
dose of the bug you let loose in the main basepfiesteria, wasnłt it?then
followed him while he went walking outside. You jumped him, knocked him down on
the ice, and got him out of the suit and into yours. He was probably
unconscious by then, I suppose. But then he must have started coming round, or
you panicked for another reason. You jammed the helmet on and pushed him into
the crevasse. Maybe if all that had happened was his helmet coming off, I
wouldnłt have dwelled on it. But he wasnłt dead, and he lived long enough to
scratch a message in the ice. I thought it concerned his murderer, but I was
wrong. He was trying to tell me who he was. Not Setterholm, but Iverson."

�Nice theory." Setterholm glanced down at a display screen
in the back of the machine that squatted next to him. Mounted on a tripod, it
resembled a huge pair of binoculars, pointed with a slight elevation toward one
wall of the chamber.

�Sometimes, a theoryłs all you need. Thatłs quite a toy youłve
got there, by the way. What is it, some kind of ground-penetrating radar?"

Setterholm brushed aside the question. �If I was himwhy would
I have done it? Just because I was interested in the ice-worms?"

�Itłs simple," Clavain said, hoping the uncertainty he felt
was not apparent in his voice. �The others werenłt as convinced as you were of
the wormsł significance. Only you saw them for what they were." He was treading
carefully here, masking his ignorance of Setterholmłs deeper motives by playing
on the manłs vanity.

�Clever of me if I did."

�Oh, yes. I wouldnłt doubt that at all. And it must have
driven you to distraction, that you could see what the others couldnłt. Naturally,
you wanted to protect the worms when you saw them under threat."

�Sorry, Nevil, but youłre going to have to try a lot harder
than that." He paused and patted the machinełs mate-silver casing, clearly
unable to pretend that he did not know what it was. �Itłs a radar, yes. It can
probe the interior of the glacier with sub-centimeter resolution, to a depth of
several tens of meters."

�Which would be rather useful if you wanted to study the
worms."

Setterholm shrugged. �I suppose so. A climatologist
interested in glacial flow might also have use for the information."

�Like Iverson?" Clavain took a step closer to Setterholm and
the radar equipment. He could see the display more clearly now: a fibrous
tangle of mainly green lines slowly spinning in space, with a denser structure
traced out in red near its heart. �Like the man you killed?"

�I told you, Iłm Iverson."

Clavain stepped toward him with the ice pick held
double-handed, but when he was a few meters from the man he veered past and
made his way to the wall. Setterholm had flinched, but he had not seemed unduly
worried that Clavain was about to try to hurt him.

�Iłll be frank with you," Clavain said, raising the pick. �I
donłt really understand what it is about the worms."

�What are you going to do?"

�This."

Clavain smashed the pick against the wall as hard as he was
able. It was enough: a layer of ice fractured noisily away, sliding down like a
miniature avalanche to land in pieces at his feet; each fist-sized shard veined
with worm trails.

�Stop," Setterholm said.

�Why? What do you care, if youłre not interested in the
worms?"

Clavain smashed the ice again, dislodging another layer.

�You ..." Setterholm paused. �You could bring the whole
place down on us if youłre not careful."

Clavain raised the pick again, letting out a groan of effort
as he swung. This time he put all his weight behind the swing, all his fury,
and a chunk the size of his upper body calved noisily from the wall.

�Iłll take that risk," Clavain said.

�No. Youłve got to stop."

�Why? Itłs only ice."

�No!"

Setterholm rushed him, knocking him to his feet. The ice
pick spun from his hand and the two of them crashed into the ground, Setterholm
landing on his chest. He pressed his faceplate close to Clavainłs, every bead
of sweat on his forehead gleaming like a precise little jewel.

�I told you to stop."

Clavain found it hard to speak with the pressure on his
chest but forced out the words with effort. �I think we can dispense with the
charade that youłre Iverson now, canłt we?"

�You shouldnłt have harmed it."

�No ... and neither should the others, eh? But they needed
that ice very badly."

Now Setterholmłs voice held a tone of dull resignation. �The
reactor, you mean?"

�Yes. The fusion plant." Clavain allowed himself to feel
some small satisfaction, before adding: �Actually, it was Galiana who made the
connection, not me. That the reactor ran on ice, I mean. And after all the
outlying bases had been evacuated, they had to keep everyone alive back at the
main one. And that meant more load on the reactor. Which meant it needed more
ice, of which there was hardly a shortage in the immediate vicinity."

�But they couldnłt be allowed to harvest the ice. Not after
what Iłd discovered."

Clavain nodded, observing that the reversion from Iverson to
Setterholm was now complete.

�No. The ice was precious, wasnłt it. Infinitely more so
than anyone else realized. Without that ice the worms would have died ..."

�You donłt understand either, do you?"

Clavain swallowed. �I think I understand more than the
others, Setterholm. You realized that the worms"

�It wasnłt the damned worms!" He had shoutedSetterholm had
turned on a loudspeaker function in his suit that Clavain had not located yetand
for a moment the words crashed around the great ice chamber, threatening to
start the tiny chain reaction of fractures that would collapse the whole. But
when silence had returneddisturbed only by the rasp of Clavainłs breathingnothing
had changed.

�It wasnłt the worms?"

�No." Setterholm was calmer now, as if the point had been
made. �Nonot really. They were important, yesbut as low-level elements in a
much more complex system. Donłt you understand?"

Clavain strove for honesty. �I never really understood what
it was that fascinated you about them. They seemed quite simple to me."

Setterholm removed his weight from Clavain and rose up on to
his feet again. �Thatłs because they are. A child could grasp the biology of a
single ice-worm in an afternoon. Felka did, in fact. Oh, shełs wonderful, Nevil."
Setterholmłs teeth flashed a smile that chilled Clavain. �The things she could
unravel ... she isnłt a failure, not at all. I think shełs something miraculous
we barely comprehend."

�Unlike the worms."

�Yes. Theyłre like clockwork toys; programmed with a few
simple rules." Setterholm stooped down and grabbed the ice pick for himself. �They
always respond in exactly the same way to the same input stimulus. And the
kinds of stimuli they respond to are simple in the extreme: a few gradations of
temperature, a few biochemical cues picked up from the ice itself. But the
emergent properties ..."

Clavain forced himself to a sitting position. �Therełs that
word again."

�Itłs the network, Nevil. The system of tunnels the worms
dig through the ice. Donłt you understand? Thatłs where the real complexity
lies. Thatłs what I was always more interested in. Of course, it took me years
to see it for what it was ..."

�Which was?"

�A self-evolving network. One that has the capacity to
adapt; to learn."

�Itłs just a series of channels bored through ice,
Setterholm."

�No. Itłs infinitely more than that." The man craned his
neck as far as the architecture of his suit would allow, revelling in the palatial
beauty of the chamber. �There are two essential elements in any neural network,
Nevil. Connections and nodes are necessary, but not enough. The connections
must be capable of being weighted, adjusted in strength according to
usefulness. And the nodes must be capable of processing the inputs from the
connections in a deterministic manner, like logic gates." He gestured around
the chamber. �Here, there is no absolutely sharp distinction between the
connections and the nodes, but the essence remain. The worms lay down
secretions when they travel, and those secretions determine how other worms
make use of the same channels; whether they utilize one route or another. There
are many determining factors: the sexes of the worms, the seasons; the others I
wonłt bore you with. But the point is simple. The secretionsand the effect
they have on the wormsmean that the topology of the network is governed by
subtle emergent principles. And the breeding tangles function as logic gates,
processing the inputs from their connecting nodes according to the rules of
worm sex, caste, and hierarchy. Itłs messy, slow, and biologicalbut the end
result is that the worm colony as a whole functions as a neural network. Itłs a
program that the worms themselves are running, even though any given worm hasnłt
a clue that itłs a part of a larger whole."

Clavain absorbed all that and thought carefully before
asking the question that occurred to him. �How does it change?"

�Slowly," Setterholm said. �Sometimes routes fall into
disuse because the secretions inhibit other worms from using them. Gradually,
the glacier seals them shut. At the same time other cracks open by chancethe
glacierłs own fracturing imposes a constant chaotic background on the networkor
the worms bore new holes. Seen in slow-motionour time framealmost nothing
ever seems to happen, let alone change. But imagine speeding things up, Nevil.
Imagine if we could see the way the network has changed over the last century
or the last thousand years ... imagine what we might find. A constantly
evolving loom of connections, shifting and changing eternally. Now, does that
remind you of anything?"

Clavain answered in the only way that he knew would satisfy
Setterholm. �A mind, I suppose. A newborn one, still forging neural
connections."

�Yes. Oh, youłd undoubtably like to point out that the
network is isolated, so it canłt be responding to stimuli beyond itselfbut we
canłt know that for certain. A season is like a heartbeat here, Nevil! What we
think of as a geologically slow processesa glacier cracking or two glaciers
collidingthose events could be as forceful as caresses and sounds to a blind
child." He paused and glanced at the screen in the back of the imaging radar. �Thatłs
what I wanted to find out. A century ago, I was able to study the network for a
handful of decades. And I found something that astonished me. The colony movesreshapes
itself constantlyas the glacier shifts and breaks up. But no matter how
radically the network changes its periphery; no matter how thoroughly the loom
evolves, there are deep structures inside the network that are always
preserved." Setterholmłs finger traced the red mass at the heart of the green
tunnel map. �In the language of network topology, the tunnel system is
scale-free rather than exponential. Itłs the hallmark of a highly organized
network with a few rather specialized processing centershubs, if you like.
This is one. I believe its function is to cause the whole network to move away
from a widening fracture in the glacier. It would take me much more than a
century to know for sure, although everything Iłve seen here confirms what I
thought originally. I mapped other structures in other colonies, too. They can
be huge, spread across cubic kilometers of ice. But they always persist. Donłt
you see what that means? The network has begun to develop specialized areas of
function. Itłs begun to process information, Nevil. Itłs begun to creep its way
toward thought."

Clavain looked around him once more, trying to see the chamber
in the new light that Setterholm had revealed. Think not of the worms as
entities in their own right, he thought, but as electrical signals, ghosting
along synaptic pathways in a neural network made of solid ice.

He shivered. It was the only appropriate response.

�Even if the network processes information ... therełs no
reason to think it could ever become conscious."

�Why, Nevil? Whatłs the fundamental difference between perceiving
the universe via electrical signals transmitted along nerve tissue and via
fracture patterns moving through a vast block of ice?"

�I suppose you have a point."

�I had to save them, Nevil. Not just the worms, but the
network they were a part of. We couldnłt come all this way and just wipe out
the first thinking thing wełd ever encountered in the universe, just because it
didnłt fit into our neat little preconceived notions of what alien thought
would actually be like."

�But saving the worms meant killing everyone else."

�You think I didnłt realize that? You think it didnłt
agonize me to do what I had to do? Iłm a human being, Nevilnot a monster. I
knew exactly what I was doing and I knew exactly what it would make me look
like to anyone who came here afterwards."

�But you still did it."

�Put yourself in my shoes. How would you have acted?"

Clavain opened his mouth, expecting an answer to spring to
mind. But nothing came, not for several seconds. He was thinking about
Setterholmłs question, more thoroughly than he had done so far. Until then he
had satisfied himself with the quiet, unquestioned assumption that he would not
have acted the way Setterholm had done. But could he really be so sure?
Setterholm, after all, had truly believed that the network formed a sentient
whole, a thinking being. Possessing that knowledge must have made him feel
divinely chosen, sanctioned to commit any act to preserve the fabulously rare
thing he had found. And he had, after all, been right.

�You havenłt answered me."

�Thatłs because I thought the question warranted something
more than a flippant answer, Setterholm. I like to think I wouldnłt have acted
the way you did, but I donłt suppose I can ever be sure of that."

Clavain stood up, inspecting his suit for damage, relieved
that the scuffle had not injured him.

�Youłll never know."

�No. I never will. But one thingłs clear enough. Iłve heard
you talk, heard the fire in your words. You believe in your network, and yet
you still couldnłt make the others see it. I doubt Iłd have been able to do
much better, and I doubt that Iłd have thought of a better way to preserve what
youłd found."

�Then youłd have killed everyone, just like I did?"

The realization of it was like a hard burden someone had
just placed on his shoulders. It was so much easier to feel incapable of such
acts. But Clavain had been a soldier. He had killed more people than he could
remember, even though those days had been a long time ago. It was really a lot
less difficult to do when you had a cause to believe in.

And Setterholm had definitely had a cause.

�Perhaps," Clavain said. �Perhaps I might have, yes."

He heard Setterholm sigh. �Iłm glad. For a moment"

�For a moment what?"

�When you showed up with that pick, I thought you were planning
to kill me." Setterholm hefted the pick, much as Clavain had done earlier. �You
wouldnłt have done that, would you? I donłt deny that what I did was
regrettable, but I had to do it."

�I understand."

�But what happens to me now? I can stay with you all, canłt
I?"

�We probably wonłt be staying on Diadem, Iłm afraid. And I
donłt think youłd really want to come with us; not if you knew what wełre
really like."

�You canłt leave me alone here, not again."

�Why not? Youłll have your worms. And you can always kill
yourself again and see who shows up next." Clavain turned to leave.

�No. You canłt go now."

�Iłll leave your rover on the surface. Maybe there are some
supplies in it. Just donłt come anywhere near the base again. You wonłt find a
welcome there."

�Iłll die out here," Setterholm said.

�Start getting used to it."

He heard Setterholmłs feet scuffing across the ice, a walk
breaking into a run. Clavain turned around calmly, unsurprised to see Setterholm
coming towards him with the pick raised high, as a weapon.

Clavain sighed.

He reached into Setterholmłs skull, addressing the webs of machines
that still floated in the manłs head and instructed them to execute their host
in a sudden, painless orgy of neural deconstruction. It was not a trick he
could have done an hour ago, but after Galiana had planted the method in his
mind, it was as easy as sneezing. For a moment he understood what it must feel
like to be a god.

And in that same moment Setterholm dropped the ice pick and
stumbled, falling forward onto one end of the pickłs blade. It pierced his
faceplate, but by then he was dead anyway.

�What I said was the truth," Clavain said. �I might have
killed them as well, just like I said. I donłt like to think so, but I canłt
say it isnłt in me. No, I donłt blame you for that, not at all."

With his boot he began to kick a dusting of frost over the
dead manłs body. It would be too much bother to remove Setterholm from this
place, and the machines inside him would sterilise his body, ensuring that none
of his cells ever contaminated the glacier. And, as Clavain had told himself
only a few days earlier, there were worse places to die than here. Or worse
places to be left for dead, anyway.

When he was done; when what remained of Setterholm was just
an ice-covered mound in the middle of the cavern, Clavain addressed him for one
final time.

�But that doesnłt make it right, either. It was still
murder, Setterholm." He kicked a final divot of ice over the corpse. �Someone
had to pay for it."

Grafenwalderłs Bestiary

Grafenwalderłs attention is torn between the Ultra captain
standing before him and the real-time video feed playing on his monocle. The
feed shows the creature being unloaded from the Ultrasł shuttle into the
special holding pen Grafenwalder has already prepared. The beetle-like forms of
armoured keepers poke and prod the recalcitrant animal with ten-metre
stun-rods. The huge serpentine form writhes and bellows, flashing its attack
eyes each time it exposes the roof of its mouth.

�Must have been a difficult catch, Captain. Locating one is
supposed to be difficult enough, let alone trapping and transporting"

�The capture was handled by a third party," Shallice informs
him, with dry indifference. �I have no knowledge of the procedures involved, or
of the particular difficulties encountered. �

While the keepers pacify the animal, technicians snip tissue
samples and hasten them into miniature bio-analysers. So far theyłve seen
nothing that suggests it isnłt the real thing.

�I take it there were no problems with the freezing?"

�Freezing always carries a risk, especially when the
underlying biology is nonterrestrial. We only guarantee that the animal appears
to behave the same way now as when it was captured."

Shallice is a typical Ultra: a cyborg human adapted for the
extreme rigours of prolonged interstellar flight. His sleek red servo-powered
exoskeleton is decorated with writhing green neon dragons. Cagelike metal ribs
emerge from the Ultrałs waxy white sternum, smeared with vivid blue
disinfectant where they puncture the skin. The Ultrałs limbs are blade-thin;
his skull a squeezed hatchet capable of only a limited range of expression. He
smells faintly of ammonia, breathes like a broken bellows and his voice is a buzzing,
waspish approximation of human speech.

�Whoever that third party was, they must have been damned
good."

�Why do you say that?"

�Last I heard, no one has ever captured a live hamadryad.
Not for very long, anyway."

Shallice canłt hide his scorn. �Your news is old. There had
been at least three successful captures before we left Skyłs Edge." He pauses,
fearing perhaps that he may have soured the deal. �Of course," he continues, �this
is a far larger hamadryad ... an adult, almost ready for tree-fusion. The
others were juveniles, and they did not continue to grow once they were in
captivity."

�Youłre right: I need to keep better informed." At that
moment the news scrolls onto his monocle: his specialists have cross-matched
samples from the animal against archived hamadryad genetic material, finding no
significant points of deviation. �Well, Captain," he says agreeably, �it looks
as if we have closure on this one. You must be in quite a hurry to get back
into safe space, away from the Rust Belt."

�Wełve other business to attend to before we have that
luxury," Shallice tells him. �Youłre not our only client around Yellowstone."
The Ultrałs eyes narrow to calculating slits. �As a matter of fact, we have
another hamadryad to deliver." Before Grafenwalder responds, the Ultra raises a
servo-assisted hand. �Not a fully grown sample like your own. A much less
mature animal. Yours will still be unique in that sense."

Anger rises in Grafenwalder like a hot, boiling tide. �But
it wonłt be the only hamadryad around Yellowstone, will it?"

�The other one will probably die. It will certainly not grow
any larger."

�You misled me, Captain. You promised exclusivity."

�I did no such thing. I merely said that no one else would
be offered an adult."

Grafenwalder knows Ultras too well to doubt that Shallice is
telling the truth. They may be unscrupulous, but they usually stay within the
strict letter of a contract.

�This other collector ... you wouldnłt mind telling me who
it is, would you?"

�That would be a violation of confidentiality."

�Come now, Captainif someone else gets their hands on a
hamadryad, theyłre hardly going to keep it a secret. At least not within the
Circle."

Shallice weighs this point for several long moments, his
alloy ribs flexing with each laboured breath. �The collector ęs name is Ursula
Goodglass. She owns a habitat in the low belt. Doubtless you know the name."

�Yes," Grafenwalder says. �Vaguely. Shełs been nosing around
the Circle for some time, but I wouldnłt call her a full member just yet. Her
collectionłs nothing to speak of, by all accounts."

�Perhaps that will change when she has her hamadryad."

�Not when the Circle learns therełs a bigger one here. Did
you let her think shełd be getting something unique as well, Captain?"

Shallice makes a sniffing sound. �The contract was
watertight. �

On the video feed, the animal is being coaxed deeper into
its pen. Now and then it rears up to strike against its tormentors, moving with
deceptive speed.

�Letłs not play games, Captain. How much is she paying you
for her sample?"

�Ten thousand."

�Then Iłll pay you fifteen not to hand it over, on top of
what Iłm already paying you."

�Out of the question. We have an arrangement with Goodglass."

�Youłll tell a little white lie. Say it didnłt thaw out
properly, or that something went wrong afterwards."

Shallice thinks this over, his hatchet-head cocking this way
and that inside the metal chassis of the exoskeleton. �She might ask to see the
corpse"

�I absolutely insist on it. I want her to know what she
nearly got her hands on."

�A deception will place us at considerable risk. Fifteen
would not be sufficient. Twenty, on the other hand"

�Eighteen, Captain, and thatłs as high as I go. If you walk
out of here without accepting the deal, Iłll contact Goodglass and tell her you
were at least giving it the time of day."

�Eighteen it is, then," Shallice says, after a suitable
pause. �You drive a hard bargain, Mister Grafenwalder. You would make a good
Ultra."

Grafenwalder shrugs off the insult and reaches out a hand to
Captain Shallice. When his fingers close around the Ultrałs, itłs like shaking
hands with a cadaver.

�Iłd love to say itłs been a pleasure doing business."

Later, he watches their shuttle depart his habitat and
thread its way through the debris-infested Rust Belt, moving furtively between
the major debris-swept orbits. He wonders what the Ultras make of the old
place, given the changes that have afflicted it since their last trip through
the system.

Good while it lasted, as people tend to say these days.

Oddly, though, Grafenwalder prefers things the way they are
now. All things told, he came out well. Neither his body nor his habitat had
depended on nanomachines, so it was only the secondary effects of the plague
that were of concern to him. The area in which he had invested his energies
prior to the crisisthe upgrading of habitat security systemsnow proves
astonishingly lucrative amongst the handful of clients able to afford his
services. In lawless times, people always want higher walls.

Therełs something else, though. Ever since the plague hit,
Grafenwalder has slept easier at night. Hełs at a loss to explain why, but the
catastropheas bad as it undoubtedly was for Yellowstone and its environsseems
to have triggered some seismic shift in his own peace of mind. He remembers
being anxious before; nowmost of the time, at leasthe only has the memory of
anxiety.

At last his radar loses track of the Ultra shuttle, and itłs
only then that he realises his error. He should have asked to see the other
hamadryad before paying the captain to kill it. Not because he thinks it might
not ever have existedhełs reasonably sure it didbut because he has no
evidence at all that it wasnłt already dead.

He permits himself a bittersweet smile. Next time, he wonłt
make that kind of mistake. And at least he has his hamadryad.

Grafenwalder walks alone through his bestiary. Itłs night,
by the twenty-six-hour cycle of Yellowstone standard time, and the exhibits are
mostly dimmed. The railed walkway that he follows glows a subdued red, winding
between, under and over the vast cages, tanks and pits. Many of the creatures
are asleep, but some stir or uncoil at his approach, while others never sleep.
Things study his passage with dim, resentful intelligence: just enough to know
that he is their captor. Occasionally something throws itself at its
restraints, clanging against cage bars or shuddering against hardened glass.
Things spit and lash. There are distressing calls; laughable attempts at
vocalisation.

Not all of the animals are animals, technically speaking.
About half the exhibits in the bestiary are creatures like the hamadryad: alien
organisms that evolved on the handful of known life-sustaining worlds beyond
the First System. There are slime-scrapers from Grand Teton; screech-mats from
Fand; more than a dozen different organisms from the jungles of Skyłs Edge,
including the hamadryad itself.

But the other half of the collection is more problematic. Itłs
the half that could get him into serious trouble if the agents of the law came
calling. Itłs where he keeps the real monsters: the things that might once have
been human. There is the specimen he once bought from some other Ultras: a
former crewman, apparently, who had been transformed far beyond the usual Ultra
norms. Major areas of brain function had been trowelled out and replaced with
crude neural modules, until the only remaining instinct was a slathering urge
to mutilate and kill. His limbs are viciously specialised weapons, his bone
growth modified to produce horns and armoured plaques. Grafenwalder can only
guess that the man was meant to be some kind of berserker, to be used in acts
of piracy where energy weapons might be unwise. Eventually he must have become
unmanageable. Now it amuses Grafenwalder to provoke the man into futile killing
frenzies.

Then there is the hyperpig variant his contacts located for
him in the bowels of Chasm City: one of a kind, apparently; a rare genetic
deviation from the standard breed. The womanłs right side is perfectly human,
but her left side is all pig. Brain function lies somewhere between animal and
human. She sometimes tries to talk to him, but the compromised layout of her
jaw renders her attempts at speech as frenzied, unintelligible grunts. At other
times neural implants leave her docile, easily controlled. On the rare occasions
when he has guests, Grafenwalder has her serve dinner. She shuffles in
presenting her human side, then turns to reveal her true ancestry. Grafenwalder
treasures his guestsł reactions with a thin, observant smile.

Then there is the psychotic dolphin that lives in
near-permanent darkness, its body showing evidence of crude cybernetic
tampering. Its origin is unclear, its age even more so, but the animalłs
endless, all-consuming rage is beyond question. Grafenwalder has dropped
sensors into the animalłs scarred cortex, hooked into a visual display system.
The slightest external stimulus becomes amplified into a kaleidoscopic light
show, like the Devilłs own firework display. Circuits drop the visual patterns
back into the dolphinłs mind. As an after-dinner treat, Grafenwalder encourages
his guests to torment the dolphin into ever more furious cycles of anger.

There are many other exhibits; almost too many for Grafenwalder
to remember. Not all are of interest to him now, and there are some that he has
not visited for many years. His keepers take care of the creaturesł needs, only
bothering him when something needs specialised or expensive medical
intervention and his permission must be sought. Perhaps the hamadryad will turn
out to be another of those waning fancies, although he thinks it unlikely.

But there is one holding pen that remains unoccupied. Hełs
walking over it now, hands on either side of the railed bridge that spans the
empty abyss. It is a deep, ceramic-lined tank that will eventually be filled
with cold water under many atmospheres of pressure. At the bottom of the tank
is a rocky surface that is designed to be punctuated by thermal hotspots,
gushing noxious gases. When it is activated, the environment in the tank will
form a close match to conditions inside the ice-shrouded ocean of Europa, the
little moon of Jupiter in the First System.

But first Grafenwalder needs an occupant for the tank. Thatłs
the fundamental problem. He knows what he has in mind, but finding one of the
elusive creatures is proving trickier than he expected. There are even some who
doubt that the Denizens ever existed; let alone that he might find a surviving
specimen now, in another system and nearly two hundred years after their
supposed heyday. Yet there are enough shards of encouragement to keep him
hopeful. He has subtle feelers out, and every now and then one of them twitches
with a nugget of information. His trusted contacts know that he is looking for
one, and that he will pay very well upon delivery. And deep inside himself he
knows that the Denizens were real, that they lived and breathed and that it is
not absurd that one may have survived into the present era.

He must have one. Although he would never admit it, he would
gladly trade the rest of his bestiary for that one exhibit. And even as he
acknowledges that truth within himself, he still cannot say why the creature
matters so much.

Orbiting the inner fringe of the Rust Belt, backdropped by
the choleric face of Yellowstone itself, Goodglassłs habitat is a wrinkled
walnut of unprepossessing dimensions. Grafenwalderłs shuttle docks at a polar
berthing nub, where a dozen similar vehicles are already clamped. He recognises
more than half of them as belonging to collectors of his acquaintance.

After running some cursory security checks, a silverback
gorilla escorts him deeper into the miniature world. The habitat is a cored-out
asteroid, excavated by fusion torches and stuffed with a warren of pressurised
domiciles wrapped around a modest central airspace. A spinney of free-fall
trees keeps the self-regulating ecosystem ticking over, with only a minimal
dependence on plague-vulnerable machinery. There are no servitors anywhere,
only adapted animals like the silverback. The air smells mulchy, saturated with
microscopic green organisms. Grafenwalder sneezes into his handkerchief and
makes a mental note to have his lungs swapped out and filtered when he returns
home.

Goodglass offers cocktails to her assembled guests. Theyłre
standing in an antechamber to her bestiary, in a part of the habitat that has
been spun for gravity. The polished floor is a matrix of black and white tiles,
each of which has been inlaid with a luminous red fragment of a much larger
picture. As the guests stand around, the tiles slowly shift and reorient
themselves.

Grafenwalder goes with the flow, letting the tiles slide him
from encounter to encounter. He makes small talk with the other collectors,
filing gossip and rumour. All the while hełs checking out his host, measuring
her against his expectations. Ursula Goodglass is a small woman of
baseline-human appearance, devoid of any obvious biomodi fications. She wears a
one-piece purple-black outfit with flared sleeves, rising to a stiff-necked
collar upon which her hairless head sits like a rare egg. She possesses an
attractively impish face with a turned-up nose. He could like her, if he didnłt
already detest her.

Presently, as he knew they must, the tiles bring them
together. He bows his head and takes her black-gloved hand.

�Itłs good of you to come, Mister Grafenwalder," she says. �I
know how busy you are, and I wasnłt really expecting you to be able to find the
time."

�Carl, please," he says, oozing charm. �And donłt imagine Iłd
have been able to stay away. Your invitation sounded intriguing. Itłs so much
more difficult to turn up anything new these days, the way things have gone. I
canłt imagine what it is you have for us."

�I just hope you wonłt be disappointed."

�I wonłt," he says, with heavy emphasis. �Of that Iłm sure."

�I want you to understand," she begins, before glancing away
nervously, �itłs not that Iłm trying to compete with you, or upstage you. Iłve
too much respect for you for that."

�Oh, donłt worry. A little healthy rivalry never hurt
anyone. What good is a collection unless therełs another one to lend it contrast?"

She smiles uncertainly, measuring him as much as he is measuring
her. He can feel the pressure of her scrutiny: cool and steady as a
refrigeration laser.

Fine lines crisscross her skull: snow-white sutures that
remind him of the fracture patterns in the ice of Europa, even though he has
never visited First System. The scars are evidence of emergency surgery
performed in the heat of the Melding Plague, when it became necessary for the
rich to rid themselves of their neural implants. Now Goodglass wears them as a
symbol of former status.

�Iłd like you to meet my husband," she says as a palanquin
glides up to them across the shifting tiled floor. Grafenwalder blinks back
surprise: hełd noticed the palanquin before, but had assumed it belonged to one
of the other guests. �Edric, this is Carl," she says.

�Itłs a pleasure to meet you," the palanquin answers, the
piping voice issuing from a speaker grille set halfway up the front of the
armoured cabinet. The palanquin has the shape of a slender, flat-topped
pyramid, its bronze sides flanged by cooling ribs and sensor studs. An oval
window set into the front, just above the speaker grille, is too dark to afford
more than a vague impression of Edric Goodglass. �I hope this encumbrance doesnłt
make you ill at ease, Mister Grafenwalder," the occupant tells him.

�Hardly," he says. �Iłve used palanquins myself, for
business in Chasm City. They tell me my blood has been scrubbed of machines,
but you canłt ever be too careful."

�In my case I never leave my palanquin," Edric says. �I
still carry all the bodily machines I had at the time of the plague. It would
only take a tiny residual trace to kill me."

Grafenwalder swirls his drink, stepping nimbly from one moving
tile to another. �It must be intolerable."

�Itłs my own fault. I was too slow when it counted. When the
plague hit, I hesitated. I should have had the surgery fast and dirty, the way
my wife did. She was braver than I; less convinced it was all about to blow over.
Now I canłt even risk the surgery. Iłd have to leave the palanquin before they
opened me up, and that alone would expose me to unacceptable risk."

�But surely the top hospitals"

�None will give me the cast-iron guarantee I require. Until
one of them can state categorically that there is a zero risk of plague
infection, I will remain in this thing."

�You might be in for a long wait."

�If Iłve learned anything from Ursula, itłs the value of patience.
Shełs the very model of it."

Grafenwalder shoots a sidelong glance at Ursula Goodglass,
wondering what their marriage must be like. Clearly sex isnłt in the cards, but
he doubts that it was ever the main interest in their lives. Games, especially
those of prestige and subterfuge, are amongst the chief entertainments of the
Rust Belt moneyed.

�Well, I suppose I shouldnłt keep people waiting any longer,"
the woman says. She drops her empty glass to the floor, where it vanishes into
one of the black tiles as if it had met no resistance, and then claps her hands
three times. �Ladies and gentlemen," she begins, voice raised an octave higher
than when they had been speaking, �thank you very much for coming here today.
Some of you have visited before; some of you are newcomers to my habitat. Some
of you will know a little about me, some of you next to nothing. I do not
believe that any of us would say that we are close friends. All of us in the
Circle have one thing in common, though: we collect. It is what we live for;
what makes us who we are. My own bestiary is modest by the standards of some,
but I am nonetheless immensely proud of my latest acquisition. There is nothing
else like it in this system; nor is there likely to be for a very long time.
Please join me nowI believe I have something you are going to find very, very
interesting."

With that, a pair of thick metal doors open in one wall of
the room, hissing wide on curved pistons. Goodglass and her husband lead the
way, with the rest of the party trailing behind. Grafenwalder chooses to remain
close by the couple, feigning curiosity.

She canłt just show off the hamadryad. First they have to endure
a short but tedious tour of the rest of her bestiary, or at least that part of
it she plans to show them today. None of it is of the slightest interest to
Grafenwalder, and even the other guests merely feign polite interest. By turns,
though, they arrive at the main event. The party gathers on a railed ledge high
above a darkened pit. Grafenwalder knows whatłs coming, but keeps his
expression blankly expectant. Goodglass makes a little speech, dropping hints
about the type of specimen shełs obtained, how difficult itłs been to capture
and transport it, alluding once or twice to its planet of origin: clue enough
for those in the know. Pricking his ears, Grafenwalder makes out speculative
whispers from his fellow collectors. One or two are ahead of Goodglass.

�Unfortunately," she says, �my exhibit did not arrive
intact. It suffered some physiological trauma during its journey here: cryogenic
damage to its tissues and nervous system. But it is still alive. With some
intervention, my experts have restored much of its basic functional repertoire.
In all significant respects, it is still a living hamadryad: the first you will
ever see."

She throws the lights, illuminating the creature in the pit.
By then Grafenwalder has a bad taste in his mouth. The hamadryad is much
smaller than his adult-phase example, but it isnłt dead. Itłs moving: great
propulsive waves sliding up and down its concertina body as it writhes and
coils from one end of the pit to the other, thrashing like a severed electrical
line.

�Itłs alive," he says quietly.

Goodglass looks at him sharply. �Were you expecting otherwise?"

�Itłs just that when you said how much difficulty youłd gone
to" But by then his words are drowned out by the demands of the other guests,
all of whom have questions for Goodglass. Lysander Carroway starts applauding,
encouraging the others to join in.

Grafenwalder notches his hatred a little higher, even as he
joins in the applause with effete little hand-claps.

He steps back from the railing, giving Goodglass her moment
in the sun. All the while, he studies the hamadryad, trying to figure out what
must have happened. As much as he dislikes Ultras, he canłt believe that
Captain Shallice would have cheated him so nakedly. Thatłs when Grafenwalder
sees his angle, and knows he can come out of this even better than he was
expecting.

He lets the interested chat simmer down, then coughs just
loudly enough to let everyone know he has something to contribute.

�Itłs very impressive," he says. �For an intermediate-phase
sample, at any rate."

Goodglass fixes him with narrowing eyes, dimly aware of what
must be coming. Even the palanquin spins around, presenting its dark window to
him.

�You know of other samples, Carl?" Ursula asks.

�One, anyway. But before we get into that ... you mentioned
shipping difficulties, didnłt you?"

�Normal complications associated with reefersleep procedures
as applied to nonterrestrial organisms," she says.

�What kind of complications?"

�I told you alreadytissue damage"

�Yes, but how extensive was it? When the animal was revived
from reefersleep, in what way did it exhibit signs of having been injured? Were
its movements impaired, its hunting patterns atypical?"

�None of that," she says.

�Then youłre saying the animal was fine?"

�No," she says icily. �The animal was dead."

Grafenwalder twitches back his head in feigned confusion. �I
know hamadryad biology is complex, but I didnłt know that they could be brought
back from death."

�Reefersleep is a kind of death," Goodglass says.

�Well, yes. If you want to split hairs. Things are usually
alive after theyłve been thawed, though: thatłs more or less the point. But the
hamadryad wasnłt alive, was it? It was dead. Itłs still dead."

Lysander Carroway shakes her head emphatically. �Itłs alive,
Grafenwalder. Use your bloody eyes."

�Itłs being puppeted," Grafenwalder says. �Isnłt it, Ursula?
Thatłs a dead animal with electrodes in it. Youłre making it twitch like a frogłs
leg."

Goodglass fights hard to keep her composure: he can see the
pulse of a vein on the side of her skull. �I never actually said it was alive.
I merely said it had the full behavioural repertoire of a living hamadryad."

�You said it was living."

Her husband answers for her. �They donłt have brains, Grafenwalder.
Theyłre more like plants. It eats and shits. What more do you want?"

Choosing his moment expertly, he offers a disappointed
shrug. �I suppose it has a certain comedic value."

�Come now," Michael Fayrfax says. �Shełs shown us a hamadryad,
more than most of us will ever see. What does it matter if it isnłt technically
alive?"

�I think it matters a lot," Grafenwalder says. �Thatłs why Iłve
gone to so much trouble to obtain a living specimen. Bigger than that, too. Minełs
adult-phase. They donłt come any larger."

�Hełs bluffing," Goodglass says. �If he had a hamadryad, hełd
have shown it off already."

�I assure you I have one. I just wasnłt ready to exhibit it
yet."

She still looks sceptical. �I donłt believe you. Why wait
until now?"

�I wanted to be sure the animal had settled down; that Iłd
ironed out any difficulties with its biology. Keeping one of those things alive
is quite a challenge, especially when theyłre adult-phase: the whole dietary
pattern starts shifting."

�Youłre lying."

�You can see it, if you want to."

The scepticism begins to crack, the fear that he might not
be lying breaking through. �When?"

�Whenever you like." He turns to the other guests and
extends his hands expansively. �All of you, of course. You know where I live.
How about the day after tomorrow? I couldnłt possibly fake one by then, could
I?"

Grafenwalder is riding his shuttle back home from the Goodglass
bestiary when he receives an incoming communication. It appears to be
transmitting from within the Rust Belt, but the shuttle canłt pinpoint the
origin of the signal any more precisely than that. For a moment Grafenwalder
thinks it may be a threat from Goodglass, even though he credits her with
fractionally more sense than that.

But itłs not Goodglassłs face that fills his cabin wall when
he answers the communication. Itłs nobody he recognises. A man, with a cherubic
moon-face and a thick lower lip, glossy with saliva, that sags to the right. He
wears a panama hat over tight dark curls, and a finely patterned harlequin coat
hangs over his heavy frame in billowing folds. A glass box dangles around his
neck, rattling with the implants he must once have carried in his skull. He is
backdropped by a sumptuously upholstered chair, rising high as a throne.

�Mister Grafenwalder? My name is Rifugio. I donłt think our
paths have crossed before."

�What do you want?"

Therełs barely any timelag. �I am a broker, Mister Grafenwalder:
a wheeler-dealer, a fixer, a go-getter. When someone needs somethingespecially
something that may require delicate extralegal manoeuvringIłm the man to come
to."

Grafenwalder moves to kill the communication. �You still havenłt
told me what you want."

�It is not about what I want. It is about what you want.
Specifically, a certain bio-engineered organism." Rifugio scratches the tip of
his bulbous nose. �Youłve been as discreet as matters will allow, Iłll grant
you thatbut youłve still put out word concerning the thing you seek. Now that
word has reached my ears, and, fortuitously, I happen to be the man who can
help you." Now Rifugio leans closer, the rim of his hat tipping across his
brow, and lowers his voice. �I have one, and I am willing to sell it. At a
price, of courseI must pay off my own informants and contacts. But knowing
what you paid for the hamadryad, I am confident that you can afford twice as
much to get the thing you want so badly."

�Maybe I donłt want one that much."

Rifugio leans back, looking nonplussed. �In that case ... I
wonłt trouble you again. Good day to you, sir."

�Wait," Grafenwalder says hastily. �Iłm interested. But I
need to know more."

�I wouldnłt expect otherwise. Wełll have to meet before we
take matters any further, of course."

Grafenwalder doesnłt like it, but the man is right. �Iłll
want a DNA sample."

�Iłll give you DNA and more: cell cultures, tissue
scrapingsalmost enough to make one for yourself. Wełll need to meet in person,
of course: I wouldnłt trust material of such sensitivity to an intermediary."

�Of course not," Grafenwalder says. �But wełll meet on
neutral ground. Therełs a place Iłve used before. How does Chasm City grab you?"

Rifugio looks pleased. �Name the time and the place."

�I can squeeze you in tomorrow," Grafenwalder says.

He doesnłt care for Chasm City, at least not these days, but
itłs a useful enough place to do business. Complex technology doesnłt work
reliably, making every transaction cumbersome. But that has its benefits, too.
Weapons that might just work in the Rust Belt canłt be trusted in CC.
Eavesdropping and other forms of deception become risky. Itłs best not to try
anything too clever, and everyone knows that.

The one thing Grafenwalder isnłt worried about is catching
something. His palanquin is the best money can buy, and even if something did
get through its ten centimetres of nano-secure hermetic armour, it would have a
hard time finding anything in his body to touch and corrupt. The armour
reassures him, though, and the privacy of the cabinet shields him from the
awkwardness of a face-to-face encounter. As he makes his way through the city,
following other palanquins along the winding path of an elevated private road
through the high Canopy, he pages once more through the sparse information he
has managed to piece together on Rifugio.

Grafenwalder has the feeling that hełs trying to pin down a
ghost. There is a broker named Rifugio, and judging by what he has already
achieved, he would appear to have the necessary contacts to procure a Denizen.
But it puzzles Grafenwalder that their paths havenłt intersected before.
Granted, itłs a big, turbulent system, with a lot of scope for new players to
emerge from hitherto obscurity. But Grafenwalder has been courting men like
Rifugio for years. There should have been at least a blip on his radar before
now.

The palanquins duck and dive through the mad architecture of
the Canopy. All around, buildings that were once cleanly geometric have been
turned into the threatening forms of haunted trees, their grasping branches
locking bony fingers high over the lower levels of the city. Epsilon Eridani is
still above the horizon, but so little sunlight penetrates the smog-brown
atmosphere or the muck-smeared panels of the latticework dome that it might as
well be twilight. The lights are on all over the city, save for the seductive absence
of the chasm itself. Dark threads dangle from the larger trunks of the Canopy,
like cannon-blasted rigging. Brachiating cable cars swing through the tangle
like drunk gibbons. Compared to the ordered habitats of the surviving Rust
Belt, itłs a scene from hell. And yet people still live here. People still make
lives for themselves; still fall in love and find somewhere they can think of
as home. With a lurch of cognitive vertigo that hełs already experienced a few
times too many, Grafenwalder remembers that there are people down there who
have no memory of how things used to be.

He knows it ought to horrify him that human beings could
ever adapt to such a catastrophic downturn in their fortunes, even though
people have been doing that kind of thing for most of history. Yet part of him
feels a strange kinship with those survivors. He sleeps easier since the
plague, and he doesnłt know why. Itłs as if the crisis snapped shut part of his
life that contained something threatening and loose, something that was in
danger of reaching him.

In an unsettling way, though, he feels that Rifugiołs call
has reopened that closed book, just a crack. And that whatever was keeping him
from sleep is stalking the edge of his imagination once more.

They meet in private rooms in the outermost branch of a Canopy
structure near Escher Heights. The building is dead now, incapable of further
change, and its ownera man named Ashley Chabrier, with whom Grafenwalder did
business years agohas cut through the floor, walls and ceilings of the
reshaped husk and emplaced enormous glass panels, veined in the manner of
insect wings and linked together by leathery fillets of the old growth. It
affords a spectacular view, but even Grafenwalder has misgivings as he steers
his palanquin across the reflectionless floor, with the fires of the Mulch
burning two kilometres below. Even if he survived the fall, the Mulch
inhabitants wouldnłt take kindly to the likes of him dropping in.

Rifugio, contrary to Grafenwalderłs expectations, has not arrived
by palanquin. He stands with his legs wide, his generous paunch supported by a
levitating girdle, a pewter-coloured belt ringed by several dozen tiny and
silent ducted fan thrusters. His slippered feet skim the glass with their
up-curled toes. As he approaches Grafenwalder, he barely moves his legs.

�I have brought what I promised," Rifugio says, by way of
greeting. Hełs carrying a small malachite-green case, dangling from the pudgy
fingers of his right hand.

�Is it all right if I say the word ęDenizenł now?"
Grafenwalder asks.

�You just said it, so I think the answer has to be yes. Youłre
still suspicious, I see."

�Iłve every right to be suspicious. Iłve been looking for
one of these things for longer than I care to remember."

�So I hear."

�There have been times when I have doubted that they exist
now; times when I doubted that they ever existed."

�Yet you havenłt stopped searching. Those doubts never became
all-consuming." Rifugio is very close to the palanquin now. As a matter of
routine, it deep-scans him for concealed weapons or listening devices. It finds
nothing alarming. Even so, Grafenwalder flinches when the man suddenly lifts
the case and pops the lid. �Here is what I have for you, Mister Grafenwalder:
enough to silence those qualms of yours."

The case is lined with black foam. Glass vials reside in
neat little partitions. The palanquin probes the case and detects only biological
material: exactly what Rifugio promised. With his left hand, Rifugio digs out
one of the vials and holds it up like a magic charm. Dark red fluid sloshes
around inside.

�Here. Take this and run an analysis on it. Itłs Denizen
blood, with Denizen DNA."

Grafenwalder hesitates for a moment, despite the assurances
from his palanquin that it can deal with any mere biological trickery. Then he
permits the machine to extend one of its manipulators, allowing Rifugio to pop
the vial into its cushioned grasp. The machine withdraws the manipulator into
its analyser alcove, set just beneath the frontal window. Part of the
biological sample will be incinerated and passed through a gas chromatograph,
where its isotopic spectrum will be compared against the data on Denizen blood
Grafenwalder has already compiled. At the same time, the DNA will be amplified,
speed-sequenced and cross-referenced against his best-guess for the Denizen
genetic sequence. Therełs no physical connection between the analyser and the
interior of the palanquin, so Grafenwalder cannot come to harm. Even so, he
wills the analyser to complete its duties as swiftly as possible.

�Well, Mister Grafenwalder? Does it meet with your satisfaction?"

The analyser starts graphing up its preliminary conclusions:
the material looks genuine enough.

Grafenwalder keeps the excitement from his voice. �Iłd like
to know where you found it. That would help me decide whether or not I believe
you have the genuine article."

�The Denizen came into my possession via Ultras. Theyłd been
keeping it as a pet, aboard their ship."

�Shallicełs men, by any chance?"

�I obtained the Denizen from Captain Ritter, of the Number
Theoretic. Iłve had no dealings with Shallice, although I know the name. As for
Ritterin so far as one can ever believe anything said by an UltraI was told
that he acquired the Denizen during routine trade with another group of Ultras,
in some other godforsaken system. Apparently the Denizen was kept aboard ship
as a pet. The Ultras had little appreciation of its wider value."

�How did Ultras get hold of it in the first place?"

�I have no idea. Perhaps only the Denizen can tell us the whole
story."

�Iłll need better provenance than that."

�You may never get it. Wełre talking about beings created in
utmost secrecy two hundred years ago. Their very existence was doubted even
then. The best you can hope for is a plausible sequence of events. Clearly, the
Denizen must have left Europałs ocean after Cadmus-Asterius and the other
hanging cities fell. If it passed into the hands of starfarersUltras,
Demarchists, Conjoiners, it doesnłt matter whichit would have had a means to
leave the system, and spend much of the intervening time either frozen or at
relativistic speed, or both. It need not have experienced anything like the
full bore of those two hundred years. Its memories of Europa may be remarkably
sharp."

�Have you asked it?"

�It doesnłt speak. Not all of them were created with the
gift of language, Mister Grafenwalder. They were engineered to work as
underwater slaves: to take orders rather than to issue them. They had to be
intelligent, but they didnłt need to answer back."

�Some of them had language."

�The early prototypes, and those that were designed to
mediate with their human overseers. Most of them were dumb."

Grafenwalder allows the disappointment to wash over him,
then bottles it away. Hełd always hoped for a talker, but Rifugio is correct:
it could never be guaranteed. And perhaps there is something in having one that
wonłt answer back, or plead. Itłs going to be spending a lot of time in his
tank, after all.

�Youłll treat it with kindness, of course," Rifugio
continues. �I didnłt liberate it from the Ultras just so it can become someone
elsełs pet, to be tormented between now and kingdom come. Youłll treat it as
the sentient being it is."

Grafenwalder sneers. �If you care so much, why not hand it
over to the authorities?"

�Because theyłd kill it, and then go after anyone who knew
of its existence. Demarchists made the Denizens in one of their darker moments.
Theyłre more enlightened nowso theyłd like us to think, anyway. They certainly
wouldnłt want something like a living and breathing Denizena representative of
a sentient slave racepopping out of historyłs cupboard, not when theyłre bending
over backwards to score moral points over the Conjoiners."

�Iłll treat it fairly," Grafenwalder says.

At that moment the analyser announces that the blood composition
and genetic material are both consistent with Denizen origin, to high
statistical certainty. Itłs not enough to prove that Rifugio has one, but itłs
a large step in the right direction. Plenty of hoaxers have already fallen at this
hurdle.

�Well, Mister Grafenwalder? Have you reached a decision yet?"

�I want to see the other samples."

Rifugio fingers another vial from the case. �Skin tissue. �

�I donłt have the means to run a thorough analysis on
skinnot here anyway. Give me what you have, and Iłll take it back with me."

Rifugio looks pained. �Iłd hoped that we might reach agreement
here and now."

�Then you hoped wrong. Unless you want to lower your price ..."

�Iłm afraid that part of the arrangement isnłt negotiable.
However, Iłm willing to let you take these samples away." Rifugio snaps shut
the lid. �As a further token of my goodwill, Iłll provide you with a moving
image of the living Denizen. But I will expect a speedy decision in return."

Grafenwalderłs palanquin takes the sealed case and stores it
inside its bombproof cargo hatch. �Youłll get it. Donłt worry about that."

�Take me at my word, Mister Grafenwalder. Youłre not the only
collector with an eye for one of these monsters."

Grafenwalder spends most of the return trip viewing the
thirty-second movie clip, over and over again. Itłs not the first time hełs
seen moving imagery of something purporting to be a Denizen, but no other clip
has withstood close scrutiny. This one is darker and grainier than some of the
others, the swimming humanoid shifting in and out of focus, but therełs
something eerily naturalistic about it, something that convinces him that it
could be real. The Denizen looks plausible: itłs a monster, undoubtedly, but
that monstrosity is the end result of logical design factors. It swims with
effortless ease, propelling itself with the merest flick of the long fluked
tail it wears in place of legs. It has arms, terminating in humanoid hands
engineered for tool-use. Its head, when it swims towards the camera, merges
seamlessly with its torso. It has eyes, very human eyes at that, but no nose,
and its mouth is a smiling horizontal gash crammed with an unnerving excess of
needle-sharp teeth. Looking at that movie, Grafenwalder feels more certain than
ever that the creatures were real, and that at least one has survived. And as
he studies the endlessly repeating thirty-second clip, he feels the closed book
of his past creak open even wider. A question forms in his mind that he would
rather not answer.

What exactly is it that he wants with the Denizen?

Things go tolerably well the next day, until the guests are
almost ready to leave. Theyłve seen the adult-phase hamadryad and registered
due shock and awe. Grafenwalder is careful to remind them that, in addition to
its size, this is also a living specimen, not some rotting corpse coaxed into a
parodic imitation of life. Even Ursula Goodglass, who has to endure this,
registers stoic approval. �You were lucky," she tells Grafenwalder through
gritted teeth. �You could just as easily have ended up with a dead one."

�But then I wouldnłt have tried to pretend it was alive," he
tells her.

Itłs Goodglass who has the last laugh today, however. She
saves it until the guests are almost back aboard their shuttles.

�Friends," she says, �what Iłm about to mention in no way
compares with the spectacle of an adult-phase hamadryad, but I have recently
come into possession of something that I think you might find suitably
diverting."

�Something wełve already seen two days ago?" asks Lysander
Carroway.

�No. I chose to keep it under wraps then, thinking my little
hamadryad would be spectacle enough for one day. Itłs never been seen in public
before, at least not in its present state."

�Put us out of our misery," says Alain Couperin.

�Drop by and see it for yourself," Goodglass says, with a
teasing twinkle in her eye. �Any time you like. No need to make an appointment.
Butpleaseemploy maximum discretion. This is one exhibit that I really donłt
want the authorities to know about."

For a moment Grafenwalder wonders whether she has the Denizen.
But surely Rifugio canłt have lost faith in the deal already, when theyłve
barely opened negotiations.

But if not a Denizenwhat?

He has to know, even if it means the indignity of another
visit to her miserable little habitat.

When he arrives at the Goodglass residence, hers is the only
shuttle docked at the polar nub. Hełs a little uncomfortable with being the
only guest, but Goodglass did say to drop in whenever he liked, and he has
given her fair warning of his approach. Hełs waited a week before taking the
trip. Ten days would have been better, but after five hełd already started
hearing that she has something special; something indisputably unique. In the
meantime, he has run every conceivable test on the biological samples Rifugio
gave him in Chasm City and received the same numbing result each time: Rifugio
appears to be in possession of the genuine article. Yet Grafenwalder is still
apprehensive about closing the deal.

Inside the habitat, hełs met by Goodglass and Edric, her
palanquin-bound husband. The couple waste no time in escorting him to the new
exhibit. Despite the indignities they have brought upon each other, itłs all
smiles and strained politeness. No one so much as mentions hamadryads, dead or
alive.

Grafenwalder isnłt quite sure what to expect, but hełs still
surprised at the modest dimensions of the chamber Goodglass finally shows him.
The walkway brings them level with the chamberłs floor, but therełs no armoured
glass screen between them and the interior. Even with the lights dimmed,
Grafenwalder can already make out an arrangement of tables, set in a
U-formation like a series of laboratory benches. There are upright glassy
things on the tables, but thatłs as much as he can tell.

�I was expecting something alive," he says quietly.

�It is alive," she hisses back. �Or at least as alive as it
ever was. Merely distributed. Youłll see in a moment."

�I thought you said it was dangerous."

�Potentially it would be, if it was ever put back together. �
She pauses and extends her hand across the gloomy threshold, as if beckoning to
the nearest bench. Grafenwalder catches the bright red line on her hand where
it has broken a previously invisible laser beam, sweeping up and down across
the aperture. Quicker than an eyeblink, a heavy armoured shield slams down on
the cell. �But thatłs not to stop it getting out," she says. �Itłs to prevent
anyone taking it and trying to put it back together. There are some whołd
attempt it, just for the novelty."

She pulls back her hand. After an interval, the shield
whisks up into the ceiling.

�Whatever it is, youłre serious about it," Grafenwalder
says, intrigued despite himself.

�I have to be. You donłt take monsters lightly."

She waves on the lights. The room brightens, but although he
can now make out the benches and the equipment upon them, Grafenwalder is none
the wiser.

�Youłll have to help me here," he says.

�Itłs all right. I wouldnłt know what to make of it either
if I didnłt know what I was looking at."

�My God," he says wonderingly, as his eyes alight on one of
the larger glass containers. �Isnłt that a brain?"

Goodglass nods. �What was once a human brain, yes. Before
hebefore itstarted doing things to itself, throwing pieces of its humanity
away like a child flinging toys from a sandpit. But whatłs left of the brain is
still alive, still conscious and still capable of sensory perception." A
mischievous smile appears on her face. �It knows wełre here, Carl. Itłs aware
of us. Itłs listening to us, watching us, and wondering how it can escape and
kill us."

He allows himself to take in the grisly scene, now that its
full implication is clearer. The brain is being kept alive in a liquid-filled
vat, nourished by scarlet and green cables that ram into the grey-brown dough
of the exposed cerebellum. A stump of spinal cord curls under the brain like an
inverted question mark. It looks pickled and vinegary, cob-webbed with ancient
growth and tiny filaments of spidery machinery. Next to the flask is a humming
grey box whose multiple analog dials twitch with a suggestion of ongoing mental
processes. But thatłs not all. There are dozens of glass cases, linked to other
boxes, and the boxes to each other, and each case holds something unspeakable.
In one, an eye hangs suspended in a kind of artificial socket, equipped with
little steering motors. The eye is looking straight at Grafenwalder, as is its
lidless twin on another bench. Their optic nerves are knotted ropes of fatty
white nerve tissue. In another flask floats a pair of lungs, hanging like a
puffed-up kite. They expand and contract with a slow, wheezing rhythm.

�Who ... ? What ... ?" he says, barely whispering.

�Havenłt you guessed yet, Carl? Look over there. Look at the
mask."

He follows her direction. The mask sits at the end of the furthest
table, on a black plinth. Itłs less a mask than an entire skull, moulded in
sleek silver metal. The face is handsome, in a streamlined, air-smoothed
fashion, with an expression of calm amusement sculpted into the immobile lips
and the blank silver surfaces that pass for eyes. It has strong cheekbones and
a strong cleft chin. Between the lips is only a dark, grilled slot. The mask
has a representation of human ears, and its crown is moulded with longitudinal
silver waves, evoking hair that has been combed back and stiffened in place
with lacquer.

Grafenwalder knows who the skull belongs to. There isnłt anyone
alive around Yellowstone who wouldnłt recognise Dr. Trintignant. All thatłs
missing is Trintignantłs customary black Homburg.

But Trintignant shouldnłt be here. Trintignant shouldnłt be
anywhere. He died years ago.

�This isnłt right," he says. �Youłve been duped ... sold a
fake. This canłt be him."

�It is. I have watertight provenance."

�But Trintignant hasnłt been seen around Yellowstone for
years ... decades. Hełs supposed to have died when Richard Swift"

�I know about Richard Swift," Ursula Goodglass informs him. �I
met him onceor what was left of him after Trintignant had completed his
business. I wanted Swift for an exhibitI was prepared to pay him for his
timebut he left the system again. They say he went back to that placethe same
world where Trintignant supposedly killed himself."

Grafenwalder thinks back to what he remembers of the
scandal. It had been all over Yellowstone for a few weeks. �But Swift brought
back Trintignantłs remains. The doctor had dismantled himself, left a suicide
note."

�That was his plan," Goodglass says witheringly. �That was
what he wanted us to thinkthat hełd ended his own life upon completing his
finest work."

�But he dismantled"

�He took himself apart in a way that implied suicide. But it
was a methodical dismantling. The parts were stored in a fashion that always
allowed for their eventual reassembly. Trintignant was too vain not to want to
stay alive and see what posterity made of his creations. But with the
Yellowstone authorities closing in on him, staying in one piece wasnłt an
option."

�How did he end up here? Wouldnłt the authorities have been
just as keen to get hold of his remains as his living self?"

�He always had allies. Sponsors, I suppose you might call
them. People whołd covertly admired his work. Therełs always a market for
freaks, Carland even more of a market for freak-makers. His friends whisked
him away, out of the hands of what little authority was left here upon his
return. Since then hełs passed from collection to collection, like a bad penny.
He seems to bring bad luck. Perhaps Iłm tempting fate just by keeping him here;
tempting it even more by bringing him to this state of partial reanimation."
She smiles tightly. �We will see. If my fortunes take a dip, I shall pass
Trintignant on to the next willing victim."

�Youłre playing with fire."

�Then you donłt approve? Iłd have expected you to applaud my
audacity, Carl."

Grafenwalder, despite himself, speaks something close to the
truth. �Iłm impressed. More than you can imagine. But Iłm also alarmed that hełs
being kept here."

�Alarmed. Why, exactly?"

�Youłre a newcomer to this game, Ursula. Iłve seen a little
of your habitat now, enough to know that your security arrangements arenłt
exactly top of the line."

�Hełs in no danger of putting himself back together, Carl, unless
you believe in telekinesis."

�Iłm worried about what would happen if his admirers learn
of his whereabouts. Some of them wonłt be content just to know hełs being kept
alive in pieces. Theyłll want to take him, put him all the way back together."

�I donłt think anyone would be quite that foolish."

�Then you donłt know people. People like us, Ursula. How
many collectors have you shown him to already?"

She tilts her head, looking at him along her up-curved nose.
�Less than a dozen, including yourself."

�Thatłs already too many. I wouldnłt be surprised if word
has already passed beyond the Circle. Donłt tell me youłve shown him to
Rossiter?"

�Rossiter was the second."

�Then itłs probably already too late." He sighs, as if
taking a great burden upon himself. �We donłt have much time. We need to make
immediate arrangements to transport his remains to my habitat. Theyłll be a lot
safer there."

�Why would your place be any safer than mine?"

�I design security systems. Itłs what I do for a living."

She appears to consider it, for a moment at least. Then she
shakes her head. �No. It wonłt happen. Hełs staying here. I see where youłre
coming from now, Carl. You donłt actually care about my security arrangements
at all. It probably wouldnłt even bother you if Doctor Trintignant did escape
back into Stoner society. Itłs highly unlikely that youłd have ended up one of
his victims, after all. Youłve got money and influence. Itłs those poor souls
down in the Mulch whołd need to watch their backs. Thatłs where hełd go hunting
for raw material. What you canłt stand is the thought that he might be mine,
not yours. Iłve got something you havenłt, something unique, something you canłt
ever have, and itłs going to eat you from inside like acid."

�Suit yourself."

�I will. I always have. You made a dreadful mistake when you
humiliated me, Carl, assuming you didnłt have a hand in what had already
happened to the hamadryad."

�What are you saying? That I had something to do with the
fact that Shallice stiffed you?"

He detects her hesitation. She comes perilously close to
accusing him, but even hereeven in this private cloisterthere are limits that
she knows better than to cross.

�But you were glad of it, werenłt you?" she presses.

�I had the superior specimen. Thatłs all that ever mattered
to me." With a renewed shudder of revulsionand, he admits, something close to
admirationhe turns again to survey the distributed remains of the notorious
doctor. �You say he can hear us?"

�Every word."

�You should kill him now. Take a hammer to his brain. Make
sure he can never live again."

�Would you like that, Carl?"

�Itłs exactly what the authorities would do if they got hold
of him."

�Theyłd give him a trial first, one imagines."

�He doesnłt deserve a trial. None of his victims had the
benefit of justice."

�What history conveniently forgets," Goodglass says, �is
that many of his so-called victims came to him willingly. He was not a monster
to them, but the agent of the change they craved. He was the most brilliant
transformative surgeon of our era. So what if society considered his creations
obscene? So what if some of them regretted what they had freely asked him to
do?"

�Youłre defending him now."

�Not defending himjust pointing out that nothing is ever
that black and white. For years Trintignant was given tacit permission to
continue his work. The authorities didnłt like him, but they accepted that he
fulfilled a social need."

Grafenwalder shakes his headhełs seen and heard enough. �I
thought you were exhibiting a monster, Ursula. Now it looks to me as if youłre
sheltering a fugitive."

�Iłm not, I assure you. Just because I have a balanced view
of Trintignant doesnłt mean I donłt despise him. Here: let me offer you a
demonstration." And with that Goodglass taps a command sequence into the air,
disarming the security system. She is able to pass her hand through the
laser-mesh without bringing down the armoured screen. �Walk over to the brain,
Carl," she commands. �It isnłt a trap."

�Iłd he happier if you walked with me."

�If you like."

He hesitates longer than hełd like, long enough for her to notice,
then takes a step into the enclosure. Goodglass is only a pace behind him. The
eyeballs swivel to track him, triangulating with the smoothness of motorised
cameras. He moves next to the bubbling brain vat. Up close, the brain looks too
small to have been the wellspring of so much evil.

�What am I supposed to look at?"

�Not look atdo. You can inflict pain on him, if you wish.
Therełs a button next to the brain. It sends an electrical current straight
into his anterior cingulate cortex."

�Isnłt he in pain already?"

�Not especially. He re-engineered himself to allow for this
dismantling. There may be some existential trauma, but I donłt believe hełs in
any great discomfort from one moment to the next."

Grafenwalderłs hand moves of its own volition, until it
hovers above the electrical stimulator. He can feel its magnetic pull, almost
willing his hand to lower. He wonders why he feels such a primal urge to bring
pain to the doctor. Trintignant never hurt him; never hurt anyone he knew. All
that he knows of Trintignantłs crimes is second-hand, distorted and magnified
by time and the human imagination. That the doctor was tolerated, even encouraged,
cannot seriously be doubted. He filled the hole in Yellowstone society where a
demon was meant to fit.

�Whatłs wrong, Carl? Qualms?"

�How do I know this wonłt send a jolt directly to his
pleasure centre?"

�Look at his spinal column. Watch it thrash."

�Spines donłt thrash."

�His does. Those little mechanisms"

Itłs all the encouragement he needs. He brings his hand
down, holding the contact closed for a good five or six seconds. Under the
brain, the stump of spinal matter twists and flexes like a rattlesnakełs tail.
He can hear it scraping glass.

He raises his hand, watches the motion subside.

�See," Goodglass says, �I knew youłd do it."

Grafenwalder notices that therełs some kind of heavy medical
tool next to the brain tank, a thing with a grip and a clawed alloy head. With
his other hand he picks it up, testing its weight. The glass container looks
invitingly fragile; the brain even more so.

�Be careful," Goodglass says.

�I could kill him now, couldnłt I? Put an end to him, for
ever."

�Many would applaud you. But then youłd be providing him
with a way out, an end to this existence. On the other hand, you could send
another jolt of pain straight into his mind. What would you rather, Carl? Rid
the world of Trintignant and spare him further pain, or let him suffer a little
longer?"

Hełs close to doing it; close to smashing the tool into the
glass. As close as she is, Goodglass couldnłt stop him in time. And there would
be something to be said for being the man who closed the book on Trintignant.
But at the decisive instant something holds him back. Nothing that the doctor
did has ever touched him personally, but he still feels a compulsion to join in
his torment. And as the moment passes, he knows that he could never end the
doctorłs life so cleanly, so mercifully, when pain is always an alternative.

Instead, he presses the button again, and holds it down
longer this time. The spine thrashes impressively. Behind him, Ursula Goodglass
applauds.

�Good for you, Carl. I knew youłd do the right thing."

The next two weeks are an endurance. Grafenwalder must sit
tight-lipped as excited rumours circulate concerning Ursula Goodglassłs new
exhibit. No one mentions Trintignant by namethat would be the height of crass
indiscretionbut even those who have not yet visited her habitat can begin to
guess at the nature of her new prize. Even the most level-headed commentators
are engaged in a feverish round of praise-giving, seeking to outdo each other
in the showering of plaudits. Even though she has only been in the collecting
business for a little while, she has pulled off an astonishing coup. Attention
is so heated that, for a day or two, the Circle must fend off the unwanted
interest of a pair of authority investigators, still on Trintignantłs trail.
The bribes alone would pay for a new habitat.

Grafenwalderłs adult-phase hamadryad, meanwhile, brings no
repeat visits. Now that it has lost its novelty value to the other collectors,
Grafenwalder feels his own interest in it waning. He thinks of it less and
less, and has increasingly little concern for its welfare. When his keepers
inform him that the animal is suffering from a dietary complaint, he doesnłt
even bother to visit it. Three days later, when they tell him that the
hamadryad has died, all he can think about is the money he paid Captain
Shallice. For an hour or so he toys with the idea of bringing the dead thing
back to life with electrodes, the way Goodglass animated her specimen, but the
idea that he might be seen to be playing second fiddle to her rises in him like
yellow bile. He gives orders that the animal be ejected into space, and canłt
even bring himself to watch it happen.

Six hours later, he contacts Rifugio.

�I was beginning to think I wouldnłt hear from you again, Mister
Grafenwalder. If youłd left it much longer I wouldnłt have anything to sell
you."

Grafenwalder can hardly keep the excitement from his voice. �Then
itłs still available? The terms still apply?"

�Iłm a man of my word," Rifugio answers. �The terms are the
same. Does that mean we have a deal?"

�Iłll want additional guarantees. If the specimen turns out
to be something other than claimed"

�Iłm selling it to you in good faith. Take it or leave it."

He takes it, of course, as he had known he would before he
placed the call. Hełd have taken it even if Rifugio had doubled his asking
price. A living, captive Denizen is the only thing that will take the shine off
the Circlełs new fondness for Goodglass, and he must have it at all costs.

The arrangements for payment and handover are typically byzantine,
as necessity demands. For all that he distrusts men like Rifugio, they must
make a living as well, and protect themselves from the consequences of their
activities. Grafenwalder, in turn, has his own stringent requirements. The
shipping of the creature to Grafenwalderłs habitat must happen surreptitiously,
and the flow of credit from one account to another must be untraceable. It is
complicated, but by the same token both men have participated in many such
dealings in the past, and the arrangements follow a certain well-rehearsed
protocol. When the automated transport finally arrives, bearing its precious
aquatic cargo, Grafenwalder is certain that nothing has gone amiss.

He has to fight past his own keepers to view the specimen
for the first time. At first, he feels a flicker of mild disappointment: itłs a
lot smaller than he was expecting, and itłs not just a trick of the light due
to the glass walls of the holding tank. The Denizen isnłt much larger than a
child.

But the disappointment doesnłt last long. In the flesh, the
Denizen appears even more obviously real than the swimming creature in the
movie clip. Itłs sedated when it arrives, half its face and upper torso
swallowed by a drug-administering breathing device. Rifugiołs consignment comes
with detailed notes concerning the safe waking of the creature. First,
Grafenwalder has it moved into the main viewing tank, now topped up with cold
water under one hundred atmospheres of pressure. The water chemistry is now
tuned to approximate conditions near one of the Europan thermal vents. He
brings the creature to consciousness in utter darkness, and monitors its
progress as it begins first to breathe for itself, and then to tentatively
explore its surroundings. It swims lethargically at first, Grafenwalder viewing
its moving body via heat-sensitive assassinłs goggles. By all accounts the
Denizens have infrared sensitivity of their own, but the creature takes no heed
of him, even when it passes very close to his vantage point.

After several minutes, the creaturełs swimming becomes
stronger. It must be adapting to the water, learning to breathe again.
Grafenwalder watches the flick of its tail in mesmerised fascination. By now it
has mapped the con fines of its new home, testing the armoured glass with
delicate sweeps of its fingertips. It is intelligent enough to know that
nothing will be gained by striking the glass.

Grafenwalder has the main lights brought up and shone into
the tank. He slips the assassinłs goggles up onto his brow. The creature
attempts to swim away from the glare, but the glare follows it remorselessly.
Its eyes are lidless, so it can do little except screen its face with one
delicately webbed hand. The wide gash of its mouth opens in alarm or anger, or
both, revealing rows of sharp little teeth.

Grafenwalderłs voice booms into the water, relayed to the
creature by floating microphones.

�I know you can hear me, and I know you can understand what
I am saying to you. It is very important that you listen to what I am about to
tell you."

His voice appears to distress the creature as much as the
bright light. With its other hand it tries to shield the whorl-like formation
on the side of its head that is its ear. Grafenwalder doubts that it makes much
difference. It must feel his voice in every cell of its body, ramming through
it like a proclamation.

That was the effect he was going for.

�You are in no danger," he says. �Nothing is going to happen
to you, and nobody is going to hurt you. The people who would rather you were
dead are not going to find you. You are in my care now, and I am going to make
sure that you come to no harm. My name is Carl Grafenwalder, and I have been
waiting a long time to meet you."

The Denizen floats motionless, as if stunned by the force of
his words. Perhaps that is exactly what has happened.

�From now on, this is going to be your home," Grafenwalder
continues. �I hope that you find the conditions satisfactory. I have done my
best to simulate your place of birth, but I accept that there may be
deficiencies. My experts will be striving to improve matters as best as they
can, but for that they will need your assistance. We must all learn to
communicate. I know you cannot speak, but I am sure we can make progress using
sign language. Let us begin with something simple. I must know if you find your
environment satisfactory in certain details: temperature, sulphur content,
salinity, that kind of thing. You will need to answer my experts in the
affirmative or negative. Nod your head if you understand me."

Nothing happens. He judges that the Denizen is still conscioushe
still catches the quick animation of its eyes behind the curtain of its
handbut it shows no indication of having understood him.

�I said nod your head. If that is too difficult for you,
make some other visible movement."

But still therełs nothing. He has the lights dimmed again,
and slips the assassinłs goggles down over his eyes once more. After a few
moments, the infrared smear of the Denizen lowers its arm and assumes an alert
but restful posture. Now that it has reacted to the absence of light, he brings
the glare back and observes the creature cower against the glarełs return.

�You prefer the darkness, donłt you? Well, I can make it dark
again. All you have to do is show some sign that you understand me. Do that,
and Iłll bring the darkness back again."

The Denizen just floats there, watching him through the
spread webbing of its upraised hand. Perhaps it has learned to tolerate the light
better than before, for its gaze strikes him now as steadier, somehow more
reproachful. Even if it doesnłt understand his words, it surely understands
that it is his prisoner.

�I will lower the lights one more time." He does so, then
brings them back up, savagely, before the Denizen has had time to relish the
darkness. This time he does get a reaction, but itłs not quite the one he was
anticipating. The Denizen shoots forward, bulleting through the water with
dismaying speed. Just when he thinks the creature is going to use its skull as
a battering ram, the Denizen brakes with a reverse flick of its tail and brings
its head and upper body hard against the glass, arms spread-eagled, face only a
few centimetres from Grafenwalderłs own. Rationally, he knows that the glass is
imperviousitłs designed to hold back the pressure of the Europan oceanbut
therełs still a tiny part of his mind that canłt accept that, and insists on
jerking him back from that grinning mouth, those hateful human eyes. The
Denizen sees it, too: it doesnłt need language to know that it has scared him.

Grafenwalder regains his composure with an uneasy laugh, trying
to sound as if it was all an act. The Denizen knows better, notching wide the
dreadful smile of its mouth.

�Okay," he says. �You frightened me. Thatłs good. Thatłs exactly
what youłre meant to do. Thatłs exactly why I brought you here."

The microphones in the tank pick up the Denizenłs derisive
snort, pealing it in harsh metallic waves around the metal walls of the
bestiary. Grafenwalderłs heart is still racing, but hełs beginning to see the
positive side of the arrangement. Maybe the fact that the creature canłt talk
is all for the best. Therełs something truly chilling about that snort;
something that wouldnłt come through at all if the specimen had language. Therełs
a mind in there; one sharp enough to use complex tools in the unforgiving
environment of a cold black alien ocean. But that mind only has one narrow
outlet for its rage.

Itłs going to work, he thinks. If it has half the effect on
the other collectors that it just had on him, Dr. Trintignant will soon be
relegated to a nine-day wonder. All he needs to do now is make sure the damned
thing is as real as it looks. Not that he has any significant doubts now.
Rifugio already had bona fide DNA and tissue samples. Where did that material
come from, if it wasnłt snipped from the last living Denizen?

He leaves the creature in darkness, letting it settle in.
The next day, his keepers descend into the tank wearing armoured immersion
suits. It takes two of them to immobilise the creature while the third takes a
series of biopsy samples. With their powered suits, the men are in little
danger from the Denizen. But theyłre still impressed by the strength and
quickness of the specimen; its balletic ease within water. It moves with the
sleek, elemental ease of something for which water is not a hindrance, but its
natural medium.

Grafenwalder tunes in to Circle gossip again, unsurprised to
find that Dr. Trintignant is still wowing the other collectors. It still feels
hurtful not to be the automatic centre of attention, but now at least he knows
his rightful place will be restored. Ursula Goodglass got lucky with the
dismantled doctor, but luck wonłt get her very far in the long game.

Later that day, his experts report back with the first
findings from the biopsies. At first, Grafenwalder is so convinced of the
Denizenłs authenticity that he doesnłt hear what the experts, in their fumbling
way, are trying to tell him.

The samples donłt match. The Denizenłs DNA isnłt the same as
the DNA that Rifugio gave him, or the DNA that Grafenwalder already possesses.
Itłs the same story with the blood and tissue samples. The disagreement isnłt
huge, and less sophisticated tests probably wouldnłt have detected any
discrepancies. Thatłs no solace to Grafenwalder, though. His tests are as good
as they come, and they leave no room for doubt. The creature in his care is not
what Rifugio let him think he was going to be buying.

He tries to call the broker, but the contact details no
longer work. Rifugio doesnłt get back to him.

So hełs been conned. But if the Denizen is a con, itłs an
extraordinarily thorough one. Hełs had the chance to examine it closely now,
and hełs found no obvious signs of fakery. Itłs no mean feat to engineer a
biological gill that can sustain an organism with the energy demands of a large
mammal. The faked Denizens hełs examined in the past began to die after only a
few dozen hours of immersion. But this one shows every sign of thriving, of
gaining strength and quickness.

Grafenwalder considers other possibilities. If the blood and
tissue samples donłt agree, then maybe itłs because therełs more than one kind
of Denizen. The Europan scientists engineered distinct castes with differing
linguistic abilities, so perhaps there were other variants, with different
blood and tissue structures. They were all prototypes, after all, right up to
the moment they turned against the Demarchy. This Denizen might simply be from
a different production batch.

But that doesnłt explain why Rifugio provided him with
non-matching samples. If Rifugio had the creature, why didnłt he just take
samples from it directly? Did Rifugio make a mistake, mixing samples from one
specimen with another? If so, he must have had more than one Denizen in his
care. In which case, the whole story about the Ultras keeping the Denizen as a
pet was a lie ... but a necessary one, if Rifugio wished Grafenwalder to think
the creature was unique.

Grafenwalder mulls the possibilities. Rifugiołs
disappearance provides damning confirmation that some kind of deception has
taken place. But if that deception merely extends to the fact that the Denizen
isnłt unique, Grafenwalder considers himself to have got off lightly. He still
has a Denizen, and thatłs infinitely better than none at all. Hełll find a way
to trace and punish Rifugio in due course, but for now retribution isnłt his
highest priority.

Instead, what he desires most is communication.

By nightfall, when the keepers have finished their work, he
descends to the tank and brings the lights back on. Not harshly now, but enough
to alert the Denizen to his presence; to wake it from whatever shallow
approximation of sleep it appears to enjoy when resting.

Thensatisfied that he is alonehe talks.

�You can understand me," he says, for the umpteenth time. �I
know this because my keepers have identified a region in your brain that only
lights up when you hear human speech. And it lights up most strongly when you
hear Canasian, the language of the Demarchy."

The creature watches him sullenly.

�Itłs the language you were educated to understand, two hundred
years ago. I know things have changed a little since then, but I donłt doubt
that you can still make sense of these words." And as he speaks Canasian, he
feelsnot for the first timean odd, unexpected fluency. The words ought to
feel awkward, but they flow off his tongue with mercurial ease, as if this is
also the language he was born to speak.

Which is absurd.

�I want to know your story," he says. �How you got here,
where you came from, how many of you there are. I know now that Rifugio lied to
me. Hełll pay for that eventually, but for now all that matters is what you can
tell me. I need to know everything, right back to the moment you were born in
Europa."

But the Denizen, as ever, shows no external sign of having understood
him.

Later, Grafenwalder has his keepers install a water-proofed
symbol board in the tank. Itłs an array of touchpads, each of which stands for
a word in Canasian. As Grafenwalder speaks, the symbols light up in turn. The
Denizen may reply by pressing the pads in sequence, which will be rendered back
into speech on Grafenwalderłs side of the glass. Grafenwalderłs hoping that
therełs something amiss with the Denizenłs language centre, some cognitive
defect that can be short-circuited using the visual codes. If he can persuade
the Denizen to press the �yes" or �no" pads in response to simple questions, he
will consider that progress has been made.

Things donłt move as quickly as hełd hoped. The Denizen
seems willing to cooperate, but it still doesnłt grasp the basics of language.
Once it has understood that one of the pads symbolises food, it presses that
one repeatedly, ignoring Grafenwalderłs attempts to get it to answer abstract questions.

Maybe itłs just stupid, he thinks. Maybe thatłs why this
batch was discontinued. But he doesnłt give up just yet. If the Denizen wonłt
communicate willingly, perhaps it needs persuasion. He has his keepers tinker
with the ambient conditions, varying the water temperature and chemistry to
make things uncomfortable. He withholds food and instructs the keepers to take
further biopsies. Itłs clear enough that the Denizen doesnłt enjoy the process.

Still the creature wonłt talk, beyond issuing simple pleas
for more food or warmer water. Grafenwalder feels his patience stretching. The
keepers tell him that the Denizen is getting stronger, more difficult to
subdue. Angrily, he accompanies them on their next trip into the tank. There
are four men, all wearing power-assisted pressure armour, and now it takes
three of them to pin the Denizen against one wall of the glass. When it breaks
free momentarily, it gouges deep tooth marks in the flexible hide of Grafenwalderłs
glove. Back outside the tank, he inspects the damage and wonders what those
teeth would have done to naked flesh.

Itłs fierce, hełll give it that. It may not be unique; it
may not be particularly intelligent; but he still doesnłt feel that all the
money he gave Rifugio was wasted. Whatever the Denizen might be, itłs worthy of
a place in the bestiary. And itłs his, not someone elsełs.

He puts out the word that there is something new in his
collection. Following Ursula Goodglassłs example, he tells the visitors to drop
by whenever they like. There must be no suspicion that the Denizen is a
stage-managed exhibit, something that can only perform to schedule.

Itłs three days before anyone takes him up on his offer. Lysander
Carroway and her husband are the first to arrive. Even then, Grafenwalder has the
sense that the visit is regarded as a tiresome social duty. All that changes
when they see the Denizen. Hełs taken pains to stoke it up, denying it food and
comfort for long hours. By the time he throws on the lights, the creature has
become a focus of pure, mindless fury. It strives to kill the things on the
other side of the glass, scratching claws and teeth against that impervious
shield, to the point where it starts bleeding. His guests recoil, suitably
impressed. After the study in motionless that was Dr. Trintignant, they are
woefully unprepared for the murderous speed of the Europan organism.

�Yes, it is a Denizen," he tells them, while his keepers
tend to the creaturełs injuries. �The last of its kind, I have it on good authority."

�Where did you find it?"

He parrots the lie Rifugio has already told him. �You know
what Ultras are like, with their pets. I donłt think they realised quite what
theyłd been tormenting all those years."

�Can it speak to us? I heard that they could talk."

�Not this one. The idea that most of them could talk is a
fallacy, Iłm afraid: they simply werenłt required to. As for the ones that did
have language, they must have died over a hundred years ago."

�Perhaps the ones that were clever enough to talk were also
clever enough to stay away from Ultras," muses Carroway. �After all, if you can
talk, you can negotiate, make bargains. Especially if you know things that can
hurt people. �

�What would a Denizen know that could hurt anyone?" Grafenwalder
asks scornfully.

�Who made it," Carroway says. �That would be worth something
to someone, wouldnłt it? In these times, more than ever."

Grafenwalder shakes his head. �I donłt think so. Even the
ones with language werenłt that clever. They were built to take orders and use
tools. They werenłt capable of the kind of complex abstract thought necessary
to plot and scheme."

�How would you know?" Carroway asks. �Itłs not as if youłve
ever met one."

Therełs no malice in her question, but by the time the Carroways
depart hełs in a foul mood, barely masked by the niceties of Circle politesse.
Why canłt they just accept that the Denizen is enough of a prize in its own
right, without dwelling on what it canłt do? Isnłt a ravenous man-fish chimera
enough of a draw for them now?

But the Carroways must have been sufficiently impressed to
speak of his new addition, because the guests come thick and fast over the next
week. By then theyłve heard that he has a Denizen, but most of them donłt quite
believe it. Time and again he goes through the ritual of having them scared by
the captive creature, only this time with a few additional flourishes. The
glass is as secure as ever, but hełs had the tank lined with a false interior
that cracks more easily. Hełs also implanted a throat microphone under the skin
of the Denizen, to better capture its blood-curdling vocalisations. Since the
creature needed to be sedated for that, he also took the liberty of dropping an
electrode into what his keepers think is the best guess for the creaturełs pain
centre. Itłs a direct steal from what Goodglass did to Dr. Trintignant, but no
one has to know that, and with the electrode he can stir the Denizen up to its
full killing fury even if itłs just been fed.

Itłs still too soon to call, but his monitoring of Circle
gossip begins to suggest that interest in Trintignant is declining. Hełs still
jealous of Goodglass for that particular coup, but at last he feels that he has
the upper hand again. The memory of Rifugiołs lies has all but faded. The story
Grafenwalder tells, about how the Denizen came to him via the Ultras, is
repeated so often that he almost begins to believe it himself. The act of
telling one lie over and over again, until it concretises into something barely
distinguishable from the truth, feels peculiarly familiar to him. When his
keepers come to him again and report that a more detailed analysis of the
Denizen DNA has thrown up statistical matches with the genome of a typical
hyperpig, he blanks the information.

What theyłre telling him is that the Denizen isnłt real;
that itłs some form of genetic fake cooked up using a hyperpig in place of a
human, with Denizen-like characteristics spliced in at the foetal stage. But he
doesnłt want to hear that; not now that hełs back on top.

The last of the guests to visit are Ursula Goodglass and her
husband. Theyłve waited a lengthy, although not impolite, interval before
favouring him with their presence. Once their shuttle has docked, Goodglass
sweeps ahead of her husbandłs palanquin, trying to put a brave face on the
proceedings.

�I hear you have a Denizen, Carl. If so, you have my
heartfelt congratulations. Nothing like that has been seen for a very long
time." She looks at him coquettishly. �It is a Denizen, isnłt it? We didnłt
want to pay too much attention to the rumours, but when everyone started saying
the same thing"

�It is a Denizen," he confirms gravely, as if the news is a
terminal diagnosis. Which, in terms of Goodglassłs current standing in the
Circle, it might as well be. �Would you like to see it?"

�Of course wełd like to see it!" her husband declares, his
voice piping from the palanquin.

He takes them to the holding tank, darkened now, and issues
assassinłs goggles to Ursula, assuming that her husband ęs palanquin has its
own infrared system. Allowing the guests to see the floating form, albeit
indistinctly, is all part of the theatre.

�It looks smaller than I was expecting," Ursula Goodglass observes.

�They were small," Grafenwalder says. �Designed to operate
in cramped conditions. But donłt let that deceive you. Itłs as strong as three
men in amp-suits."

�And youłre absolutely sure of its authenticity? Youłve run
a full battery of tests?"

�Therełs no doubt." Rashly, he adds, �You can see the
results, if you like."

�Therełs no need. Iłm prepared to take your word for it. I
know you wouldnłt take anything for granted, given how long youłve been after
one of these."

Grafenwalder allows himself a microscopic frown. �I didnłt
know you were aware of my interest in acquiring a Denizen."

�It would be difficult not to know, Carl. Youłve put out
feelers in all directions imaginable. Of course, youłve been discreet about
itor as discreet as circumstances allow." She smiles unconvincingly. �Iłm glad
for you, Carl. It must feel like the end of a great quest, to have this in your
possession. �

�Yes," he said. �It does."

The palanquin speaks. �What exactly was it about the Denizen
that you found so captivating, if you donłt mind my asking?"

Grafenwalder shrugs, expecting the answer to roll glibly off
his tongue. Instead, he has to force it out by an effort of will, as if there
is a blockage in his thought processes. �Its uniqueness, I suppose, Edric."

�But there are many unique things," the palanquin says, its
piping tone conveying mild puzzlement. �Why did you have to go to the extremes
of locating a Denizen, a creature not even known ever to have existed? A
creature whose authenticity cannot ever be confirmed with certainty?"

�Perhaps because it was so difficult. I like a challenge.
Does it have to be any more complicated than that?"

�No, it doesnłt," the palanquin answers. �I merely wondered
if there might not have been a deeper motive, something less transparent."

�Iłm really not the man to ask. Why do any of us collect
things?"

�Carlłs right, dear," Ursula says, smiling tightly at the
palanquinłs dark window. �One mustnłt enquire too deeply about these things. It
isnłt seemly."

�I demur," her husband says, and reverses slightly back from
the heavy glass wall before them.

Grafenwalder judges that the moment is right to bring up the
lights and enrage the Denizen. He squeezes the actuator tucked into his pocket,
dripping current into the creaturełs brain. The lights pierce the tank, snaring
the floating form. The Denizen snorts and powers itself towards the wall, its
eyes wide with hatred despite the glare. It slams into the weakened inner layer
and shatters the glass, making it seem as if the entire tank is about to lose
integrity.

�Wełre quite safe," he says, anticipating that Goodglass
will have flinched from the impact. But she hasnłt. Shełs standing her ground,
her expression serenely unmoved by the entire spectacle.

�Youłre right," she comments. �Itłs quite a catch. But I
wonder if itłs really as vicious as it appears."

�Take my word. Itłs much, much worse. It nearly bit through
my glove when I was inside that tank, wearing full armour."

�Perhaps it doesnłt like being kept here. It didnłt seem
very happy when you turned the lights on."

�Itłs an exhibit, Ursula. It doesnłt have to like being
here. It should be grateful just to be alive."

She looks at him with sudden interest, as if he has said something
profound. �Do you really think so, Carl?"

�Yes," he says. �Absolutely."

She returns her attention to the tank wall. The Denizen is
still hovering there, anchored in place by the tips of its fingers and the
fluke of its tail. The cracks in the shattered glass radiate away in all
directions, making the Denizen look as if it is caught in a frozen star, or
pinned to a snowflake.

Goodglass removes her glove and touches a hand to the smooth
and unbroken glass on the outer surface of the tank, exactly where the Denizen
has its own webbed hand. Thatłs when Grafenwalder notices the pale webs of skin
between Ursula Goodglassłs fingers, visible now that she has taken off the
glove. Their milky translucence is exactly the same as the webs between the
Denizenłs. She presses her hand harder, squeezing until her palm is flat
against the glass, and the Denizen echoes the movement.

The air feels as if it has frozen. The moment of contact
seems to last minutes, hours, eternities. Grafenwalder stares in numb incomprehension,
unable to process what he is seeing. When she moves her hand, skating it across
the glass, the Denizen follows her like an expert mime.

She takes another step closer, bringing her face against the
glass, laying her cheek flat against the cold surface. The Denizen presses
itself against the shattered inner layer and mirrors her posture, bringing its
own head against hers. The flesh of their faces appears to merge.

Goodglass pulls her face back from the glass, then smiles at
the Denizen. It tries to emulate her expression, forcing its mouth wide. Itłs
not much of a smileitłs more horrific than reassuringbut the deliberateness
of the gesture is beyond doubt.

Finally Grafenwalder manages to say something. His own voice
sounds wrong, as if itłs coming from another room.

�What are you doing?"

�Iłm greeting it," Ursula Goodglass says, snapping her attention
away from the tank. �What on Earth did you think I was doing?"

�Itłs a Denizen. It doesnłt know you. You canłt know it."

�Oh, Carl," she says, pityingly now. �Havenłt you got it
yet? Really, I thought youłd have figured things out by now. Look at my hand
again."

�I donłt need to. I saw it."

She pulls back her hand until shełs only touching the glass
with a fingertip. �Then tell me what it reminds you ofor canłt you bring
yourself to say it?"

�Iłve had enough," he says. �I donłt know what kind of game
youłre playing, but it isnłt true to the spirit of the Circle. I insist that
you leave immediately."

�But wełre not done yet," Goodglass says.

�Fine. If you wonłt go easily, Iłll have you escorted to
your shuttle."

�Iłm afraid not, Carl. Wełve still business to attend to.
You didnłt think it was going to be quite that easy, did you?"

�Leave now."

�Or what? Youłll turn your household systems on us?" She
looks apologetic. �They wonłt work, Iłm afraid. Theyłve been disabled. From the
moment our shuttle docked, itłs been working to introduce security
countermeasures into your habitat." Before he can get a word in, she says, �It
was a mistake to invite us to view the adult-phase hamadryad. It gave us the
perfect opportunity to snoop your arrangements, design a package of
neutralising agents. Donłt go calling for your keepers, either. Theyłre all
unconscious. The last time we visited, the palanquin deployed microscopic
stun-capsules into every room it passed through. Upon our return, they were
programmed to activate, releasing a fast-acting nerve toxin. Your keepers will
be fine once they wake up, but that isnłt going to happen for a few hours yet."

�I donłt believe you."

�You donłt have to," Goodglass says. �Call for help, see how
far it gets you."

He lifts the cuff of his sleeve and talks into his bracelet.
�This is Grafenwalder. Get down to the bestiary nowthe Denizen tank."

But no one answers.

�Iłm sorry, but no onełs coming. Youłre on your own now,
Carl. Itłs just you, the Denizen and the two of us."

After a minute goes by, he knows she isnłt bluffing.
Goodglass has taken his habitat.

�What do you want from me?"

�Itłs not so much a question of what I want from you, Carl,
as what you want from me."

�Youłre not making much sense."

�Ask yourself this: why did you want the Denizen so much?
Was it because you just had to add another unique specimen to your collection?
Or did the drive go deeper than that? Is it just possible that you created this
entire bestiary as a decoy, to divert everyoneincluding yourselffrom the true
focus of your obsession?"

�You tell me, Ursula. You seem to know a lot about the collecting
game."

�Iłm no collector," she says curtly. �I detest you and your
kind. That was just a cover, to get me close to you. I went to a lot of
trouble, of course: the hamadryad, Trintignant ... I know you had Shallice kill
the hamadryad, by the way. That was what I expected you to do. Why else do you
think I had Shallice mention my existence, if not to goad you? I needed you to
take an interest in me, Carl. It worked spectacularly well."

�You never interested me, Ursula. You irritated me, like a
tick."

�It had the same effect. It brought us together. It brought
me here."

�And the Denizen?" he asks, half-fearing her answer.

�The Denizen is a fake. Iłm sure youłve figured that out for
yourself by now. A pretty good fake, Iłll admitbut it isnłt two hundred years
old, and itłs never been anywhere near Europa."

�What about the samples Rifugio gave me? Where did they come
from?"

�From me," Goodglass says.

�Youłre insane."

�No, Carl. Not insane. Just a Denizen." And she shows him
her webbed hand once more, extending it out towards him as if inviting him to
kiss it. �Iłm what youłve been searching for all these years, the end of your
quest. But this isnłt quite the way you imagined things playing out, is it?
That youłd have had me under your nose all this time, and not known how close
you were?"

�You canłt be a Denizen."

�There is such a thing as surgery," she says witheringly. �I
had to wait until after the plague before having myself changed, which meant
subjecting myself to cruder procedures than I might have wished. Fortunately, I
had the services of a very good surgeon. He rewired my cardiovascular system
for air-breathing. He gave me legs and a human face, and a voice box that works
out of water."

�And the hands?"

�I kept the hands. Youłve got to hold on to part of the
past, no matter how much you might wish to bury it. I needed to remember where
Iłd come from, what I still had to do."

�Which is?"

�To find you, and then punish you. You were there, Carl,
back when we were made in Europa. A high-influence Demarchist in the Special
Projects section of Cadmus-Asterius, the hanging city where we were spliced
together and given life."

�Nonsense. Iłve never been near Europa."

�You were born there," she assures him, �not long after
Sandra Voi founded the place. Youłve scrubbed those memories, though. Theyłre
too dangerous now. The Demarchists donłt want anyone finding out about their
history of past mistakes, not when theyłre trying to show how fine and
upstanding they are compared to the beastly Conjoiners. Almost everyone
connected with those dark days in Europa has been hunted down and silenced by
now. Not you, though. You were ahead of the curve, already running by the time
the cities fell. You hopped a ramliner to Yellowstone and started reinventing
your past. Eidetic overlays to give you a false history, one so convincing that
you believed it yourself. Except at night, in your loneliest hours. Then part
of you knew that they were still out there, still looking for you."

�They?"

�Not just the Demarchist silencers: they were the least of
your worries. Money and power could keep them at bay. What really worried you
was us, the Denizens."

�If I made you, why would I fear you?"

�You didnłt make us, Carl. I said you were part of the
project, but you werenłt working to bring us to life. You were working to
suppress us; to make us fail. Petty internal rivalry: you couldnłt allow
another colleaguełs work to succeed. So you did everything you could to hurt
us, to make us imperfect. You brought suffering into our world. You brought
pain and infirmity and death, and then left us alone in that ocean."

�Ridiculous."

�Really, Carl? Iłve seen how easily you turn to spite. Just
ask that dead hamadryad."

�I had nothing to do with the Denizens." But even as he says
it, he can feel layers of false memory begin to peel back. Whatłs exposed has
the raw candour of true experience. He remembers more of Europa than he has any
right to: the bright plazas, the smells, the noises of Cadmus-Asterius. He
remembers the reefer-sleep casket on the outbound ramliner, the casket that he
thought was taking him to the safety of another system, another time. No wonder
hełs slept easier since the Melding Plague. He must have imagined that the
plague had severed the last of his ties with the past, making it impossible for
anyone to catch up with him now.

Hełd been wrong about that.

�You had to find a Denizen," Goodglass says, �because then
youłd know if any of them were still alive. Well, now you have your answer. How
does it feel?"

He always knew that the marks on her skull were evidence of
surgery. But that surgery had nothing to do with the removal of implants, and
everything to do with her transformation from a Denizen. It would have cost her
nothing to hide those marks, and yet she made no secret of them. It was, he
sees now, part of a game he hadnłt even realised he was playing.

�Not the way I thought it would feel," he says.

Goodglass nods understandingly. �Iłm going to punish you
now, Carl. But Iłm not going to kill you."

Shełs playing with him, allowing him a glimmer of hope before
crushing it for all eternity.

�Why not?" he asks.

�Because if you were dead, you wouldnłt make much of an exhibit.
When wełre done here, Iłm going to donate you to a suitable recipient." Then
she turns to the palanquin. �Therełs something I should have told you. I lied
about my husband. Edric was a good man: he cared for me, loved me, when he
could have made his fortune from what I was. Unfortunately, he never got to see
me like this. Edric died during the early months of the plague."

Grafenwalder says nothing. Hełs out of words, out of questions.

�Youłre probably wondering whołs in the palanquin," Goodglass
says. �Hełs going to come out now, for a little while. Not too long, because he
canłt risk coming into contact with plague spores, not when so much of him is
mechanical. But that wonłt stop him doing his job. Hełs always been a quick
worker."

With a hiss of escaping pressure, the entire front of the
palanquin lifts up on shining pistons. The first thing Grafenwalder sees, the
last thing before he starts screaming, is a silver hand clutching a black
Homburg hat.

Then he sees the face.

Great Wall Of Mars

Herełs a relentless, wildly inventive, pyrotechnic thriller,
paced like a runaway freight train, that takes us to Mars for a mission of
peace that instead leads us ever deeper into the heart of war ...

New writer Alastair Reynolds is a frequent contributor
toInterzone,and has also sold to Asimovłs Science Fiction, Spectrum SF,and
elsewhere. His first novel, Revelation Space,is being widely hailed as one of
the major SF books of the year; coming up is a sequel, Chasm City.A
professional scientist with a Ph.D. in astronomy, he comes from Wales, but
lives in the Netherlands, where he works for the European Space Agency.

You realize you might die down there," said Warren.

Nevil Clavain looked into his brotherłs one good eye; the
one the Conjoiners had left him with after the battle of Tharsis Bulge. �Yes, I
know," he said. �But if therełs another war, we might all die. Iłd rather take that
risk, if therełs a chance for peace."

Warren shook his head, slowly and patiently. �No matter how
many times wełve been over this, you just donłt seem to get it, do you? There
canłt ever be any kind of peace while theyłre still down there. Thatłs what you
donłt understand, Nevil. The only long-term solution here is ..." he trailed
off.

�Go on," Clavain goaded. �Say it. Genocide."

Warren might have been about to answer when there was a
bustle of activity down the docking tube, at the far end from the waiting
spacecraft. Through the door Clavain saw a throng of media people, then someone
gliding through them, fielding questions with only the curtest of answers. That
was Sandra Voi, the Demarchist woman who would be coming with him to Mars.

�Itłs not genocide when theyłre just a faction, not an
ethnically distinct race," Warren said, before Voi was within earshot.

�What is it, then?"

�I donłt know. Prudence?"

Voi approached. She bore herself stiffly, her face a mask of
quiet resignation. Her ship had only just docked from Circum-Jove, after a
three-week transit at maximum burn. During that time the prospects for a
peaceful resolution of the current crisis had steadily deteriorated.

�Welcome to Deimos," Warren said.

�Marshalls," she said, addressing both of them. �I wish the
circumstances were better. Letłs get straight to business. Warren; how long do
you think we have to find a solution?"

�Not long. If Galiana maintains the pattern shełs been following
for the last six months, wełre due another escape attempt in ..." Warren
glanced at a readout buried in his cuff. �About three days. If she does try and
get another shuttle off Mars, wełll really have no option but to escalate."

They all knew what that would mean: a military strike
against the Conjoiner nest.

�Youłve tolerated her attempts so far," Voi said. �And each
time youłve successfully destroyed her ship with all the people in it. The net
risk of a successful break out hasnłt increased. So why retaliate now?"

�Itłs very simple. After each violation we issued Galiana
with a stronger warning than the one before. Our last was absolute and final."

�Youłll be in violation of treaty if you attack."

Warrenłs smile was one of quiet triumph. �Not quite, Sandra.
You may not be completely conversant with the treatyłs fine print, but wełve
discovered that it allows us to storm Galianałs nest without breaking any
terms. The technical phrase is a police action, I believe."

Clavain saw that Voi was momentarily lost for words. That
was hardly surprising. The treaty between the Coalition and the
Conjoiners-which Voiłs neutral Demarchists had helped draft-was the longest
document in existence, apart from some obscure, computer-generated mathematical
proofs. It was supposed to be watertight, though only machines had ever read it
from beginning to end, and only machines had ever stood a chance of finding the
kind of loophole which Warren was now brandishing.

�No ..." she said. �Therełs some mistake."

�Iłm afraid hełs right," Clavain said. �Iłve seen the
natural-language summaries, and therełs no doubt about the legality of a police
action. But it neednłt come to that. Iłm sure I can persuade Galiana not to
make another escape attempt."

�But if we should fail?" Voi looked at Warren now. �Nevil
and myself could still be on Mars in three days."

�Donłt be, is my advice."

Disgusted, Voi turned and stepped into the green cool of the
shuttle. Clavain was left alone with his brother for a moment. Warren fingered
the leathery patch over his ruined eye with the chrome gauntlet of his prosthetic
arm, as if to remind Clavain of what the war had cost him; how little love he
had for the enemy, even now.

�We havenłt got a chance of succeeding, have we?" Clavain
said. �Wełre only going down there so you can say you explored all avenues of
negotiation before sending in the troops. You actually want another damned war."

�Donłt be so defeatist," Warren said, shaking his head
sadly, forever the older brother disappointed at his siblingłs failings. �It
really doesnłt become you."

�Itłs not me whołs defeatist," Clavain said.

�No; of course not. Just do your best, little brother."

Warren extended his hand for his brother to shake.
Hesitating, Clavain looked again into his brotherłs good eye. What he saw there
was an interrogatorłs eye: as pale, colorless and cold as a midwinter sun.
There was hatred in it. Warren despised Clavainłs pacifism; Clavainłs belief
that any kind of peace, even a peace which consisted only of stumbling episodes
of mistrust between crises, was always better than war. That schism had
fractured any lingering fraternal feelings they might have retained. Now, when
Warren reminded Clavain that they were brothers, he never entirely concealed
the disgust in his voice.

�You misjudge me," Clavain whispered, before quietly shaking
Warrenłs hand.

�No; I honestly donłt think I do."

Clavain stepped through the airlock just before it
sphinctered shut. Voi had already buckled herself in; she had a glazed look
now, as if staring into infinity. Clavain guessed she was uploading a copy of
the treaty through her implants, scrolling it across her visual field, trying
to find the loophole; probably running a global search for any references to
police actions.

The ship recognized Clavain, its interior shivering to his
preferences. The green was closer to turquoise now; the readouts and controls
minimalist in layout, displaying only the most mission-critical systems. Though
the shuttle was the tiniest peacetime vessel Clavain had been in, it was a
cathedral compared to the dropships he had flown during the war; so small that
they were assembled around their occupants like Medieval armor before a joust.

�Donłt worry about the treaty," Clavain said. �I promise you
Warren wonłt get his chance to apply that loophole."

Voi snapped out of her trance irritatedly. �Youłd better be
right, Nevil. Is it me, or is your brother hoping we fail?" She was speaking
Quebecois French now; Clavain shifting mental gears to follow her. �If my
people discover that therełs a hidden agenda here, therełll be hell to pay."

�The Conjoiners gave Warren plenty of reasons to hate them
after the battle of the Bulge," Clavain said. �And hełs a tactician, not a
field specialist. After the cease-fire my knowledge of worms was even more
valuable than before, so I had a role. But Warrenłs skills were a lot less
transferable."

�So that gives him a right to edge us closer to another war?"
The way Voi spoke, it was as if her own side had not been neutral in the last
exchange. But Clavain knew she was right. If hostilities between the Conjoiners
and the Coalition reignited, the Demarchy would not be able to stand aside as
they had fifteen years ago. And it was anyonełs guess how they would align
themselves.

�There wonłt be war."

�And if you canłt reason with Galiana? Or are you going to
play on your personal connection?"

�I was just her prisoner, thatłs all." Clavain took the
controls-Voi said piloting was a bore-and unlatched the shuttle from Deimos.
They dropped away at a tangent to the rotation of the equatorial ring which
girdled the moon, instantly in free-fall. Clavain sketched a porthole in the
wall with his fingertip, outlining a rectangle which instantly became
transparent.

For a moment he saw his reflection in the glass: older than
he felt he had any right to look, the gray beard and hair making him look
ancient rather than patriarchal; a man deeply wearied by recent circumstance.
With some relief he darkened the cabin so that he could see Deimos, dwindling
at surprising speed. The higher of the two Martian moons was a dark, bristling
lump, infested with armaments, belted by the bright, window-studded band of the
moving ring. For the last nine years, Deimos was all that he had known, but now
he could encompass it within the arc of his fist.

�Not just her prisoner," Voi said. �No one else came back sane
from the Conjoiners. She never even tried to infect you with her machines."

�No, she didnłt. But only because the timing was on my side."
Clavain was reciting an old argument now; as much for his own benefit as Voiłs.
�I was the only prisoner she had. She was losing the war by then; one more
recruit to her side wouldnłt have made any real difference. The terms of
cease-fire were being thrashed out and she knew she could buy herself favors by
releasing me unharmed. There was something else, too. Conjoiners werenłt supposed
to be capable of anything so primitive as mercy. They were spiders, as far as
we were concerned. Galianałs act threw a wrench into our thinking. It divided
alliances within the high command. If she hadnłt released me, they might well have
nuked her out of existence."

�So there was absolutely nothing personal?"

�No," Clavain said. �There was nothing personal about it at
all."

Voi nodded, without in any way suggesting that she actually
believed him. It was a skill some women had honed to perfection, Clavain
thought.

Of course, he respected Voi completely. She had been one of
the first human beings to enter Europałs ocean, decades back. Now they were
planning fabulous cities under the ice; efforts which she had spearheaded.
Demarchist society was supposedly flat in structure, non-hierarchical; but
someone of Voiłs brilliance ascended through echelons of her own making. She
had been instrumental in brokering the peace between the Conjoiners and Clavainłs
own Coalition. That was why she was coming along now: Galiana had only agreed
to Clavainłs mission provided he was accompanied by a neutral observer, and Voi
had been the obvious choice. Respect was easy. Trust, however, was harder: it
required that Clavain ignore the fact that, with her head dotted with implants,
the Demarchist womanłs condition was not very far removed from that of the
enemy.

The descent to Mars was hard and steep.

Once or twice they were queried by the automated tracking
systems of the satellite interdiction network. Dark weapons hovering in
Mars-synchronous orbit above the nest locked onto the ship for a few instants,
magnetic railguns powering up, before the shuttlełs diplomatic nature was
established and it was allowed to proceed. The Interdiction was very efficient;
as well it might be, given that Clavain had designed much of it himself. In
fifteen years no ship had entered or left the Martian atmosphere, nor had any
surface vehicle ever escaped from Galianałs nest.

�There she is," Clavain said, as the Great Wall rose over
the horizon.

�Why do you call ęitł a ęsheł?" Voi asked. �I never felt the
urge to personalize it, and I designed it. Besides ... even if it was alive
once, itłs dead now."

She was right, but the Wall was still awesome to behold.
Seen from orbit, it was a pale, circular ring on the surface of Mars, two
thousand kilometers wide. Like a coral atoll, it entrapped its own weather
system; a disk of bluer air, flecked with creamy white clouds which stopped
abruptly at the boundary.

Once, hundreds of communities had sheltered inside that cell
of warm, thick, oxygen-rich atmosphere. The Wall was the most audacious and
visible of Voiłs projects. The logic had been inescapable: a means to avoid the
millennia-long time scales needed to terra form Mars via such conventional
schemes as cometary bombardment or ice-cap thawing. Instead of modifying the
whole atmosphere at once, the Wall allowed the initial effort to be
concentrated in a relatively small region, at first only a thousand kilometers
across. There were no craters deep enough, so the Wall had been completely
artificial: a vast ring-shaped atmospheric dam designed to move slowly outward,
encompassing ever more surface area at a rate of a twenty kilometers per year.
The Wall needed to be very tall because the low Martian gravity meant that the
column of atmosphere was higher for a fixed surface pressure than on Earth. The
ramparts were hundreds of meters thick, dark as glacial ice, sinking great
taproots deep into the lithosphere to harvest the ores needed for the Wallłs
continual growth. Yet two hundred kilometers higher the wall was a diaphanously
thin membrane only microns wide; completely invisible except when rare optical
effects made it hang like a frozen aurora against the stars. Eco-engineers had
invaded the Wallłs live able area with terran genestocks deftly altered in
orbital labs. Flora and fauna had moved out in vivacious waves, lapping eagerly
against the constraints of the Wall.

But the Wall was dead.

It had stopped growing during the war, hit by some sort of
viral weapon which crippled its replicating subsystems, and now even the
ecosystem within it was failing; the atmosphere cooling, oxygen bleeding into
space, pressure declining inevitably toward the Martian norm of one
seven-thousandth of an atmosphere.

He wondered how it must look to Voi; whether in any sense
she saw it as her murdered child.

�Iłm sorry that we had to kill it," Clavain said. He was
about to add that it been the kind of act which war normalized, but decided
that the statement would have sounded hopelessly defensive.

�You neednłt apologize," Voi said. �It was only machinery. Iłm
surprised itłs lasted as long as it has, frankly. There must still be some
residual damage-repair capability. We Demarchists build for posterity, you
know."

Yes, and it worried his own side. There was talk of
challenging the Demarchist supremacy in the outer solar system; perhaps even an
attempt to gain a Coalition foothold around Jupiter.

They skimmed the top of the Wall and punched through the
thickening layers of atmosphere within it, the shuttlełs hull morphing to an
arrowhead shape. The ground had an arid, bleached look to it, dotted here and
there by ruined shacks, broken domes, gutted vehicles or shot-down shuttles.
There were patches of shallow-rooted, mainly dark-red tundra vegetation; cotton
grass, saxifrage, arctic poppies and lichen. Clavain knew each species by its
distinct infrared signature, but many of the plants were in recession now that
the imported bird species had died. Ice lay in great silver swathes, and what
few expanses of open water remained were warmed by buried thermopiles.
Elsewhere there were whole zones which had reverted to almost sterile
permafrost. It could have been a kind of paradise, Clavain thought, if the war
had not ruined everything. Yet what had happened here could only be a foretaste
of the devastation that would follow across the system, on Earth as well as
Mars, if another war was allowed to happen.

�Do you see the nest yet?" Voi asked.

�Wait a second," Clavain said, requesting a head-up display
which boxed the nest. �Thatłs it. A nice fat thermal signature too. Nothing
else for miles around-nothing inhabited, anyway."

�Yes. I see it now."

The Conjoiner nest lay a third of the way from the Wallłs
edge, not far from the footslopes of Arsia Mons. The entire encampment was only
a kilometer across, circled by a dyke which was piled high with regolith dust
on one side. The area within the Great Wall was large enough to have an
appreciable weather system: spanning enough Martian latitude for significant
coriolis effects; enough longitude for diurnal warming and cooling to cause
thermal currents.

He could see the nest much more clearly now; details leaping
out of the haze.

Its external layout was crushingly familiar. Clavainłs side had
been studying the nest from the vantage point of Deimos ever since the
cease-fire. Phobos, with its lower orbit, would have been even better, of
course-but there was no helping that, and perhaps the Phobos problem might
actually prove useful in his negotiations with Galiana. She was somewhere in
the nest, he knew: somewhere beneath the twenty varyingly sized domes emplaced
within the rim, linked together by pressurized tunnels or merged at their
boundaries like soap bubbles. The nest extended several tens of levels beneath
the Martian surface maybe deeper.

�How many people do you think are inside?" Voi said.

�Nine hundred or so," said Clavain. �Thatłs an estimate
based on my experiences as a prisoner, and the hundred or so whołve died trying
to escape since. The rest, I have to say, is pretty much guesswork."

�Our estimates arenłt dissimilar. A thousand or less here,
and perhaps another three or four spread across the system in smaller nests. I
know your side thinks we have better intelligence than that, but it happens not
to be the case."

�Actually, I believe you." The shuttlełs airframe was
flexing around them, morphing to a low-altitude profile with wide, bat like
wings.

�I was just hoping you might have some clue as to why
Galiana keeps wasting valuable lives with escape attempts."

Voi shrugged. �Maybe to her the lives arenłt anywhere near
as valuable as youłd like to think."

�Do you honestly think that?"

�I donłt think we can begin to guess the thinking of a true
hive-mind society, Clavain. Even from a Demarchist standpoint."

There was a chirp from the console; Galiana signaling them.
Clavain opened the channel allocated for Coalition-Conjoiner diplomacy.

�Nevil Clavain?" he heard.

�Yes." He tried to sound as calm as possible. �Iłm with
Sandra Voi. Wełre ready to land as soon as you show us where."

�Okay," Galiana said. �Vector your ship toward the westerly
rim wall. And please, be careful."

�Thank you. Any particular reason for the caution?"

�Just be quick about it, Nevil."

They banked over the nest, shedding height until they were
skimming only a few tens of meters above the weather worn Martian surface. A
wide rectangular door had opened in the concrete dyke, revealing a hangar bay
aglow with yellow lights.

�That must be where Galiana launches her shuttles from," Clavain
whispered. �We always thought there must be some kind of opening on the west
side of the rim, but we never had a good view of it before."

�Which still doesnłt tell us why she does it," Voi said.

The console chirped again-the link poor even though they
were so close. �Nose up," Galiana said. �Youłre too low and slow. Get some
altitude or the worms will lock onto you."

�Youłre telling me there are worms here?" Clavain said.

�I thought you were the worm expert, Nevil."

He nosed the shuttle up, but fractionally too late. Ahead of
them something coiled out of the ground with lightning speed, metallic jaws
opening in its blunt, armored head. He recognized the type immediately:
Ouroborus class. Worms of this form still infested a hundred niches across the
system. Not quite as smart as the type infesting Phobos, but still adequately
dangerous.

�Shit," Voi said, her veneer of Demarchist cool cracking for
an instant.

�You said it," Clavain answered.

The Ouroborus passed underneath and then there was a
spine-jarring series of bumps as the jaws tore into the shuttlełs belly.
Clavain felt the shuttle lurch down sickeningly; no longer a flying thing but
an exercise in ballistics. The cool, minimalist turquoise interior shifted
liquidly into an emergency configuration; damage readouts competing for
attention with weapons status options. Their seats ballooned around them.

�Hold on," he said. �Wełre going down."

Voiłs calm returned. �Do you think we can reach the rim in
time?"

�Not a cat in hellłs chance." He wrestled with the controls
all the same, but it was no good. The ground was coming up fast and hard. �I
wish Galiana had warned us a bit sooner ..."

�I think she thought we already knew."

They hit. It was harder than Clavain had been expecting, but
the shuttle stayed in one piece and the seat cushioned him from the worst of
the impact. They skidded for a few meters and then nosed up against a sandbank.
Through the window Clavain saw the white worm racing toward them with
undulating waves of its segmented robot body.

�I think wełre finished," Voi said.

�Not quite," Clavain said. �Youłre not going to like this,
but ... Biting his tongue he brought the shuttlełs hidden weapons online. An
aiming scope plunged down from the ceiling; he brought his eyes to it and
locked crosshairs onto the Ouroborus. Just like old times ...

�Damn you," Voi said. �This was meant to be an unarmed mission!"

�Youłre welcome to lodge a formal complaint."

Clavain fired, the hull shaking from the recoil. Through the
side window they watched the white worm blow apart into stubby segments. The
parts wriggled beneath the dust.

�Good shooting," Voi said, almost grudgingly. �Is it dead?"

�For now," Clavain said. �Itłll take several hours for the
segments to fuse back into a functional worm."

�Good," Voi said, pushing herself out of her seat. �But
there will be a formal complaint, take my word."

�Maybe youłd rather the worm ate us?"

�I just hate duplicity, Clavain."

He tried the radio again. �Galiana? Wełre down-the shipłs history-but
wełre both unharmed."

�Thank God." Old verbal mannerisms died hard, even among the
Conjoined. �But you canłt stay where you are. There are more worms in the area.
Do you think you can make it overland to the nest?"

�Itłs only two hundred meters," Voi said. �It shouldnłt be a
problem."

Two hundred meters, yes-but two hundred meters across treacherous,
potholed ground riddled with enough soft depressions to hide a dozen worms. And
then they would have to climb up the rimłs side to reach the entrance to the
hangar bay; ten or fifteen meters above the soil.

�Letłs hope it isnłt," Clavain said.

He unbuckled, feeling light-headed as he stood for the first
time in Martian gravity. He had adapted entirely too well to the one-gee of the
Deimos ring, constructed for the comfort of Earth side tacticians. He went to
the emergency locker and found a mask which slivered eagerly across his face;
another for Voi. They plugged in air-tanks and went to the shuttlełs door. This
time when it sphinctered open there was a glistening membrane stretched across
the doorway, a recently licensed item of Demarchist technology. Clavain pushed
through the membrane and the stuff enveloped him with a wet, sucking sound. By
the time he hit the dirt the membrane had hardened itself around his soles and
had begun to contour itself with ribs and accordioned joints, even though it
stayed transparent.

Voi came behind him, gaining her own m-suit.

They loped away from the crashed shuttle, toward the dyke.
The worms would be locking onto their seismic patterns already, if there were
any nearby. They might be more interested in the shuttle for now, but that was
nothing they could count on. Clavain knew the behavior of worms intimately,
knew the major routines which drove them; but that expertise did not guarantee
his survival. It had almost failed him in Phobos.

The mask felt clammy against his face. The air at the base
of the Great Wall was technically breathable even now, but there seemed no
point in taking chances when speed was of the essence. His feet scuffed through
the topsoil, and while he seemed to be crossing ground, the dyke obstinately
refused to come any closer. It was larger than it looked from the crash; the
distance further.

�Another worm," Voi said.

White coils erupted through sand to the west. The Ouroborus
was making undulating progress toward them, zig-zagging with predatory calm,
knowing that it could afford to take its time. In the tunnels of Phobos, they
had never had the luxury of knowing when a worm was close. They struck from
ambush, quick as pythons.

�Run," Clavain said.

Dark figures appeared in the opening high in the rimwall. A
rope-ladder unfurled down the side of the structure. Clavain, making for the
base of it, made no effort to quieten his footfalls. He knew that the worm
almost certainly had a lock on him by now.

He looked back.

The worm paused by the downed shuttle, then smashed its diamond-jawed
head into the ship, impaling the hull on its body. The worm reared up, wearing
the ship like a garland. Then it shivered and the ship flew apart like a rotten
carcass. The worm returned its attention to Clavain and Voi. Like a sidewinder
it pulled its thirty-meter long body from the sand and rolled toward them on
wheeling coils.

Clavain reached the base of the ladder.

Once, he could have ascended the ladder with his arms alone,
in one-gee, but now the ladder felt alive beneath his feet. He began to climb,
then realized that the ground was dropping away much faster than he was passing
rungs. The Conjoiners were hauling him aloft.

He looked back in time to see Voi stumble.

�Sandra!No!"

She made to stand up, but it was too late by then. As the
worm descended on her, Clavain could do nothing but turn his gaze away and pray
for her death to be quick. If it had to be meaningless, he thought, at least
let it be swift.

Then he started thinking about his own survival. �Faster!"
he shouted, but the mask reduced his voice to a panicked muffle. He had
forgotten to assign the shipłs radio frequency to the suit.

The worm thrashed against the base of the wall, then began
to rear up, its maw opening beneath him; a diamond-ringed orifice like the
drill of a tunnelling machine. Then something eye-hurtingly bright cut into the
wormłs hide. Craning his neck, Clavain saw a group of Conjoiners kneeling over
the lip of the opening, aiming guns downward. The worm writhed in intense
robotic irritation. Across the sand, he could see the coils of other worms
coming closer. There must have been dozens ringing the nest. No wonder Galianałs
people had made so few attempts to leave by land.

They had hauled him within ten meters of safety. The injured
worm showed cybernetic workings where its hide had been flensed away by weapons
impacts. Enraged, it flung itself against the rim wall, chipping off scabs of
concrete the size of boulders. Clavain felt the vibration of each impact
through the wall as he was dragged upward.

The worm hit again and the wall shook more violently than before.
To his horror, Clavain watched one of the Conjoiners lose his footing and
tumble over the edge of the rim toward him. Time oozed to a crawl. The falling
man was almost upon him. Without thinking, Clavain hugged closer to the wall,
locking his limbs around the ladder. Suddenly, he had seized the man by the
arm. Even in Martian gravity, even allowing for the Conjoinerłs willowy build,
the impact almost sent both of them toward the Ouroborus. Clavain felt his
bones pop out of location, tearing at gristle, but he managed to keep his grip
on both the Conjoiner and the ladder.

Conjoiners breathed the air at the base of the Wall without
difficulty. The man wore only lightweight clothes, gray silk pajamas belted at
the waist. With his sunken cheeks and bald skull, the manłs Martian physique
lent him a cadaverous look. Yet somehow he had managed not to drop his gun,
still holding it in his other hand.

�Let me go," the man said.

Below, the worm inched higher despite the harm the Conjoiners
had inflicted on it. �No," Clavain said, through clenched teeth and the
distorting membrane of his mask. �Iłm not letting you go."

�Youłve no option." The manłs voice was placid. �They canłt
haul both of us up fast enough, Clavain."

Clavain looked into the Conjoinerłs face, trying to judge
the manłs age. Thirty, perhaps-maybe not even that, since the cadaverous look
probably made him seem older than he really was. Clavain was easily twice his
age; had surely lived a richer life; had comfortably cheated death on three or
four previous occasions.

�Iłm the one who should die, not you."

�No," the Conjoiner said. �Theyłd find a way to blame your
death on us. Theyłd make it a pretext for war." Without any fuss the man
pointed the gun at his own head and blew his brains out.

As much in shock as recognition that the manłs life was no
longer his to save, Clavain released his grip. The dead man tumbled down the
rim wall, into the mouth of the worm which had just killed Sandra Voi.

Numb, Clavain allowed himself to be pulled to safety.

When the armored door to the hangar was shut the Conjoiners
attacked his m-suit with enzymic sprays. The sprays digested the fabric in
seconds, leaving Clavain wheezing in a pool of slime. Then a pair of Conjoiners
helped him unsteadily to his feet and waited patiently while he caught his
breath from the mask. Through tears of exhaustion he saw that the hangar was
racked full of half-assembled spacecraft; skeletal geodesic shark-shapes designed
to punch out of an atmosphere, fast.

�Sandra Voi is dead," he said, removing the mask to speak.

There was no way the Conjoiners could not have seen this for
themselves, but it seemed inhuman not to acknowledge what had happened.

�I know," Galiana said. �But at least you survived."

He thought of the man falling into the Ouroborus. �Iłm sorry
about your ..." But then trailed off, because for all his depth of knowledge
concerning the Conjoiners, he had no idea what the appropriate term was.

�You placed your life in danger in trying to save him."

�He didnłt have to die."

Galiana nodded sagely. �No; in all likelihood he didnłt. But
the risk to yourself was too great. You heard what he said. Your death would be
made to seem our fault; justification for a pre-emptive strike against our
nest. Even the Demarchists would turn against us if we were seen to murder a
diplomat."

Taking another suck from the mask, he looked into her face.
He had spoken to her over low-bandwidth video-links, but only in person was it
obvious that Galiana had hardly aged in fifteen years. A decade and a half of
habitual expression should have engraved existing lines deeper into her
face-but Conjoiners were not known for their habits of expression. Galiana had
seen little sunlight in the intervening time, cooped here in the nest, and
Martian gravity was much kinder to bone structure than the one-gee of Deimos.
She still had the cruel beauty he remembered from his time as a prisoner. The
only real evidence of aging lay in the filaments of gray threading her hair;
raven-black when she had been his captor.

�Why didnłt you warn us about the worms?"

�Warn you?" For the first time something like doubt crossed
her face, but it was only fleeting. �We assumed you were fully aware of the
Ouroborus infestation. Those worms have been dormant-waiting-for years, but
theyłve always been there. It was only when I saw how low your approach was
that I realized ..."

�That we might not have known?"

Worms were area-denial devices; autonomous prey-seeking
mines. The war had left many pockets of the solar system still riddled with
active worms. The machines were intelligent, in a one-dimensional way. Nobody
ever admitted to deploying them and it was usually impossible to convince them
that the war was over and that they should quietly deactivate.

�After what happened to you in Phobos," Galiana said, �I assumed
there was nothing you needed to be taught about worms."

He never liked thinking about Phobos: the pain was still too
deeply engraved. But if it had not been for the injuries he had sustained there
he would never have been sent to Deimos to recuperate; would never have been
recruited into his brotherłs intelligence wing to study the Conjoiners. Out of
that phase of deep immersion in everything concerning the enemy had come his
peacetime role as negotiator-and now diplomat-on the eve of another war.
Everything was circular, ultimately. And now Phobos was central to his thinking
because he saw it as a way out of the impasse-maybe the last chance for peace.
But it was too soon to put his idea to Galiana. He was not even sure the
mission could still continue, after what had happened.

�Wełre safe now, I take it?"

�Yes; we can repair the damage to the dyke. Mostly, we can
ignore their presence."

�We should have been warned. Look, I need to talk to my
brother."

�Warren? Of course. Itłs easily arranged."

They walked out of the hangar; away from the half-assembled
ships. Somewhere deeper in the nest, Clavain knew, was a factory where the
components for the ships were made, mined out of Mars or winnowed from the
fabric of the nest. The Conjoiners managed to launch one every six weeks or so;
had been doing so for six months. Not one of the ships had ever managed to
escape the Martian atmosphere before being shot down ... but sooner or later he
would have to ask Galiana why she persisted with this provocative folly.

Now, though, was not the time-even if, by Warrenłs estimate,
he only had three days before Galianałs next provocation.

The air elsewhere in the nest was thicker and warmer than in
the hangar, which meant he could dispense with the mask. Galiana took him down
a short, gray-walled, metallic corridor which ended in a circular room
containing a console. He recognized the room from the times he had spoken to
Galiana from Deimos. Galiana showed him how to use the system then left him in
privacy while he established a connection with Deimos.

Warrenłs face soon appeared on a screen, thick with pixels
like an impressionist portrait. Conjoiners were only allowed to send kilobytes
a second to other parts of the system. Much of that bandwidth was now being
sucked up by this one video link.

�Youłve heard, I take it," Clavain said.

Warren nodded, his face ashen. �We had a pretty good view
from orbit, of course. Enough to see that Voi didnłt make it. Poor woman. We
were reasonably sure you survived, but itłs good to have it confirmed."

�Do you want me to abandon the mission?"

Warrenłs hesitation was more than just time-lag. �No ... I
thought about it, of course, and high command agrees with me. Voiłs death was
tragic-no escaping that. But she was only along as a neutral observer. If
Galiana consents for you to stay, I suggest you do so."

�But you still say I only have three days?"

�Thatłs up to Galiana, isnłt it? Have you learned much?"

�You must be kidding. Iłve seen shuttles ready for launch,
thatłs all. I havenłt raised the Phobos proposal, either. The timing wasnłt
exactly ideal, after what happened to Voi."

�Yes. If only wełd known about that Ouroborus infestation."

Clavain leaned closer to the screen. �Yes. Why the hell didnłt
we? Galiana assumed that we would, and I donłt blame her for that. Wełve had
the nest under constant surveillance for fifteen years. Surely in all that time
wełd have seen evidence of the worms?"

�Youłd have thought so, wouldnłt you?"

�Meaning what?"

�Meaning, maybe the worms werenłt always there."

Conscious that there could be nothing private about this conversation-but
unwilling to drop the thread-Clavain said: �You think the Conjoiners put them
there to ambush us?"

�Iłm saying we shouldnłt disregard any possibility, no
matter how unpalatable."

�Galiana would never do something like that."

�No, I wouldnłt." She had just stepped back into the room. �And
Iłm disappointed that youłd even debate the possibility."

Clavain terminated the link with Deimos. �Eavesdroppingłs
not a very nice habit, you know."

�What did you expect me to do?"

�Show some trust? Or is that too much of a stretch?"

�I never had to trust you when you were my prisoner,"
Galiana said. �That made our relationship infinitely simpler. Our roles were
completely defined."

�And now? If you distrust me so completely, why did you ever
agree to my visit? Plenty of other specialists could have come in my place. You
could even have refused any dialogue."

�Voiłs people pressured us to allow your visit," Galiana
said. �Just as they pressured your side into delaying hostilities a little
longer."

�Is that all?"

She hesitated slightly now. �I ... knew you."

�Knew me? Is that how you sum up a year of imprisonment?
What about the thousands of conversations we had; the times when we put aside
our differences to talk about something other than the damned war? You kept me
sane, Galiana. Iłve never forgotten that. Itłs why Iłve risked my life to come
here and talk you out of another provocation."

�Itłs completely different now."

�Of course!" He forced himself not to shout. �Of course itłs
different. But not fundamentally. We can still build on that bond of trust and
find a way out of this crisis."

�But does your side really want a way out of it?"

He did not answer her immediately; wary of what the truth
might mean. �Iłm not sure. But Iłm also not sure you do, or else you wouldnłt
keep pushing your luck." Something snapped inside him and he asked the question
he had meant to ask in a million better ways. �Why do you keep doing it,
Galiana? Why do you keep launching those ships when you know theyłll be shot
down as soon as they leave the nest?"

Her eyes locked onto his own, unflinchingly. �Because we
can. Because sooner or later one will succeed."

Clavain nodded. It was exactly the sort of thing he had
feared she would say.

She led him through more gray-walled corridors, descending
several levels deeper into the nest. Light poured from snaking strips embedded
into the walls like arteries. It was possible that the snaking design was
decorative, but Clavain thought it much more likely that the strips had simply
grown that way, expressing biological algorithms. There was no evidence that
the Conjoiners had attempted to enliven their surroundings; to render them in
any sense human.

�Itłs a terrible risk youłre running," Clavain said.

�And the status quo is intolerable. Iłve every desire to
avoid another war, but if it came to one, wełd at least have the chance to
break these shackles."

�If you didnłt get exterminated first ..."

�Wełd avoid that. In any case, fear plays no part in our
thinking. You saw the man accept his fate on the dyke, when he understood that
your death would harm us more than his own. He altered his state of mind to one
of total acceptance."

�Fine. That makes it all right, then."

She halted. They were alone in one of the snakingly lit corridors;
he had seen no other Conjoiners since the hangar. �Itłs not that we regard
individual lives as worthless, any more than you would willingly sacrifice a
limb. But now that wełre part of something larger ..."

�Transenlightenment, you mean?"

It was the Conjoinersł term for the state of neural communion
they shared, mediated by the machines swarming in their skulls. Whereas
Demarchists used implants to facilitate real time democracy, Conjoiners used
them to share sensory data, memories-even conscious thought itself. That was
what had precipitated the war. Back in 2190 half of humanity had been hooked
into the system-wide data nets via neural implants. Then the Conjoiner experiments
had exceeded some threshold, unleashing a transforming virus into the nets.
Implants had begun to change, infecting millions of minds with the templates of
Conjoiner thought. Instantly the infected had become the enemy. Earth and the
other inner planets had always been more conservative, preferring to access the
nets via traditional media.

Once they saw communities on Mars and in the asteroid belts
fall prey to the Conjoiner phenomenon, the Coalition powers hurriedly pooled
their resources to prevent the spread reaching their own states. The
Demarchists, out around the gas giants, had managed to get firewalls up before
many of their habitats were lost. They had chosen neutrality while the
Coalition tried to contain-some said sterilize-zones of Conjoiner takeover.
Within three years-after some of the bloodiest battles in human experience-the
Conjoiners had been pushed back to a clutch of hideaways dotted around the
system. Yet all along they professed a kind of puzzled bemusement that their
spread was being resisted. After all, no one who had been assimilated seemed to
regret it. Quite the contrary. The few prisoners whom the Conjoiners had
reluctantly returned to their pre-infection state had sought every means to
return to the fold. Some had even chosen suicide rather than be denied Transenlightenment.
Like acolytes given a vision of heaven, they devoted their entire waking existence
to the search for another glimpse.

�Transenlightenment blurs our sense of self," Galiana said. �When
the man elected to die, the sacrifice was not absolute for him. He understood
that much of what he was had already achieved preservation among the rest of
us."

�But he was just one man. What about the hundred lives youłve
thrown away with your escape attempts? We know-wełve counted the bodies."

�Replacements can always be cloned."

Clavain hoped that he hid his disgust satisfactorily. Among
his people the very notion of cloning was an unspeakable atrocity; redolent
with horror. To Galiana it would be just another technique in her arsenal. �But
you donłt clone, do you? And youłre losing people. We thought there would be
nine hundred of you in this nest, but that was a gross overestimate, wasnłt it?"

�You havenłt seen much yet," Galiana said.

�No, but this place smells deserted. You canłt hide absence,
Galiana. I bet there arenłt more than a hundred of you left here."

�Youłre wrong," Galiana said. �We have cloning technology,
but wełve hardly ever used it. What would be the point? We donłt aspire to
genetic unity, no matter what your propagandists think. The pursuit of optima
leads only to local minima. We honor our errors. We actively seek persistent
disequilibrium."

�Right." The last thing he needed now was a dose of
Conjoiner rhetoric. �So where the hell is everyone?"

In a while he had part of the answer, if not the whole of
it. At the end of the maze of corridors-far under Mars now-Galiana brought him
to a nursery.

It was shockingly unlike his expectations. Not only did it
not match what he had imagined from the vantage point of Deimos, but it jarred
against his predictions based on what he had seen so far of the nest. In
Deimos, he had assumed a Conjoiner nursery would be a place of grim medical
efficiency; all gleaming machines with babies plugged in like peripherals, like
a monstrously productive doll factory. Within the nest, he had revised his
model to allow for the depleted numbers of Conjoiners. If there was a nursery,
it was obviously not very productive. Fewer babies, then-but still a vision of
hulking gray machines, bathed in snaking light.

The nursery was nothing like that.

The huge room Galiana showed him was almost painfully bright
and cheerful; a childłs fantasy of friendly shapes and primary colors. The
walls and ceiling projected a holographic sky: infinite blue and billowing
clouds of heavenly white. The floor was an undulating mat of synthetic grass
forming hillocks and meadows. There were banks of flowers and forests of bonsai
trees. There were robot animals: fabulous birds and rabbits just slightly too
anthropomorphic to fool Clavain. They were like the animals in childrenłs
books; big-eyed and happy-looking. Toys were scattered on the grass.

And there were children. They numbered between forty and fifty;
spanning by his estimate ages from a few months to six or seven standard years.
Some were crawling among the rabbits; other, older children were gathered
around tree stumps whose sheered-off surfaces flickered rapidly with images,
underlighting their faces. They were talking among themselves, giggling or
singing. He counted perhaps half a dozen adult Conjoiners kneeling among the
children. The childrenłs clothes were a headache of bright, clashing colors and
patterns. The Conjoiners crouched among them like ravens. Yet the children
seemed at ease with them, listening attentively when the adults had something
to say.

�This isnłt what you thought it would be like, is it?"

�No ... not at all." There seemed no point lying to her. �We
thought youłd raise your young in a simplified version of the machine-generated
environment you experience."

�In the early days thatłs more or less what we did." Subtly,
Galianałs tone of voice had changed. �Do you know why chimpanzees are less
intelligent than humans?"

He blinked at the change of tack. �I donłt know-are their
brains smaller?"

�Yes-but a dolphinłs brain is larger, and theyłre scarcely
more intelligent than dogs." Galiana stooped next to a vacant tree stump.
Without seeming to do anything, she made a diagram of mammal brain anatomies
appear on the trunkłs upper surface, then sketched her finger across the
relevant parts. �Itłs not overall brain volume that counts so much as the
developmental history. The difference in brain volume between a neonatal chimp
and an adult is only about twenty percent. By the time the chimp receives any
data from beyond the womb, therełs almost no plasticity left to use. Similarly,
dolphins are born with almost their complete repertoire of adult behavior
already hardwired. A human brain, on the other hand, keeps growing through
years of learning. We inverted that thinking. If data received during
post-natal growth was so crucial to intelligence, perhaps we could boost our
intelligence even further by intervening during the earliest phases of brain
development."

�In the womb?"

�Yes." Now she made the tree-trunk show a human embryo
running through cycles of cell-division, until the faint fold of a rudimentary
spinal nerve began to form, nubbed with the tiniest of emergent minds. Droves
of subcellular machines swarmed in, invading the nascent nervous system. Then
the embryołs development slammed forward, until Clavain was looking at an
unborn human baby.

�What happened?"

�It was a grave error," Galiana said. �Instead of enhancing
normal neural development, we impaired it terribly. All we ended up with were
various manifestations of savant syndrome."

Clavain looked around him. �Then you let these kids develop
normally?"

�More or less. Therełs no family structure, of course, but
then again there are plenty of human and primate societies where the family is
less important in child development than the cohort group. So far we havenłt
seen any pathologies."

Clavain watched as one of the older children was escorted
out of the grassy room, through a door in the sky. When the Conjoiner reached
the door the child hesitated, tugging against the manłs gentle insistence. The
child looked back for a moment, then followed the man through the gap.

�Wherełs that child going?"

�To the next stage of its development."

Clavain wondered what were the chances of him seeing the
nursery just as one of the children was being promoted. Small, he judged-unless
there was a crash program to rush as many of them through as quickly as
possible. As he thought about this, Galiana took him into another part of the
nursery. While this room was smaller and dourer it was still more colorful than
any other part of the nest he had seen before the grassy room. The walls were a
mosaic of crowded, intermingling displays, teeming with moving images and
rapidly scrolling text. He saw a herd of zebra stampeding through the core of a
neutron star. Elsewhere an octopus squirted ink at the face of a
twentieth-century despot. Other display facets rose from the floor like
Japanese paper screens, flooded with data. Children-up to early teenagers-sat
on soft black toadstools next to the screens in little groups, debating. A few
musical instruments lay around unused: holoclaviers and air-guitars. Some of
the children had gray bands around their eyes and were poking their fingers
through the interstices of abstract structures, exploring the dragon-infested
waters of mathematical space. Cla-vain could see what they were manipulating on
the flat screens: shapes that made his head hurt even in two dimensions.

�Theyłre nearly there," Clavain said. �The machines are outside
their heads, but not for long. When does it happen?"

�Soon; very soon."

�Youłre rushing them, arenłt you? Trying to get as many children
Conjoined as you can. What are you planning?"

�Something ... has arisen, thatłs all. The timing of your
arrival is either very bad or very fortunate, depending on your point of view."
Before he could query her, Galiana added: �Clavain; I want you to meet someone."

�Who?"

�Someone very precious to us."

She took him through a series of child-proof doors until
they reached a small circular room. The walls and ceiling were veined gray;
tranquil after what he had seen in the last place. A child sat cross-legged on
the floor in the middle of the room. Clavain estimated the girlłs age as ten
standard years-perhaps fractionally older. But she did not respond to Clavainłs
presence in any way an adult, or even a normal child, would have. She just kept
on doing the thing she had been doing when they stepped inside, as if they were
not really present at all. It was not at all clear what she was doing. Her
hands moved before her in slow, precise gestures. It was as if she were playing
a holoclavier or working a phantom puppet show. Now and then she would pivot
around until she was facing another direction and carry on doing the hand
movements.

�Her namełs Felka," Galiana said.

�Hello, Felka ..." He waited for a response, but none came. �I
can see therełs something wrong with her."

�She was one of the savants. Felka developed with machines
in her head. She was the last to be born before we realized our failure."

Something about Felka disturbed him. Perhaps it was the way
she carried on regardless, engrossed in an activity to which she seemed to
attribute the utmost significance, yet which had to be without any sane
purpose.

�She doesnłt seem aware of us."

�Her deficits are severe," Galiana said. �She has no
interest in other human beings. She has prosopagnosia; the inability to distinguish
faces. We all seem alike to her. Can you imagine something more strange than
that?"

He tried, and failed. Life from Felkałs viewpoint must have
been a nightmarish thing, surrounded by identical clones whose inner lives she
could not begin to grasp. No wonder she seemed so engrossed in her game.

�Why is she so precious to you?" Clavain asked, not really
wanting to know the answer.

�Shełs keeping us alive," Galiana said.

Of course, he asked Galiana what she meant by that. Galianałs
only response was to tell him that he was not yet ready to be shown the answer.

�And what exactly would it take for me to reach that stage?"

�A simple procedure."

Oh yes, he understood that part well enough. Just a few machines
in the right parts of his brain and the truth could be his. Politely, doing his
best to mask his distaste, Clavain declined. Fortunately, Galiana did not press
the point, for the time had arrived for the meeting he had been promised before
his arrival on Mars.

He watched a subset of the nest file into the conference
room. Galiana was their leader only inasmuch as she had founded the lab here
from which the original experiment had sprung and was accorded some respect
deriving from seniority. She was also the most obvious spokesperson among them.
They all had areas of expertise which could not be easily shared among other
Conjoined; very distinct from the hive-mind of identical clones which still figured
in the Coalitionłs propaganda. If the nest was in any way like an ant colony,
then it was an ant colony in which every ant fulfilled a distinct role from all
the others. Naturally, no individual could be solely entrusted with a
particular skill essential to the nest-that would have been dangerous
over-specialization-but neither had individuality been completely subsumed into
the group mind.

The conference room must have dated back to the days when
the nest was a research outpost, or even earlier, when it was some kind of
mining base in the early 2100s. It was much too big for the dour handful of
Conjoiners who stood around the main table. Tactical readouts around the table
showed the build-up of strike forces above the Martian exclusion zone; probable
drop trajectories for ground-force deployment.

�Nevil Clavain," Galiana said, introducing him to the
others. Everyone sat down. �Iłm just sorry that Sandra Voi canłt be with us
now. We all feel the tragedy of her death. But perhaps out of this terrible
event we can find some common ground. Nevil; before you came here you told us
you had a proposal for a peaceful resolution to the crisis."

�Iłd really like to hear it," one of the others murmured
audibly.

Clavainłs throat was dry. Diplomatically, this was
quicksand. �My proposal concerns Phobos ..."

�Go on."

�I was injured there," he said. �Very badly. Our attempt to
clean out the worm infestation failed and I lost some good friends. That makes
it personal between me and the worms. But Iłd accept anyonełs help to finish
them off."

Galiana glanced quickly at her compatriots before answering.
�A joint assault operation?"

�It could work."

�Yes ..." Galiana seemed lost momentarily. �I suppose it
could be a way out of the impasse. Our own attempt failed too-and the
interdictionłs stopped us from trying again." Again, she seemed to fall into
reverie. �But who would really benefit from the flushing out of Phobos? Wełd
still be quarantined here."

Clavain leaned forward. �A cooperative gesture might be exactly
the thing to lead to a relaxation in the terms of the interdiction. But donłt
think of it in those terms. Think instead of reducing the current threat from
the worms."

�Threat?"

Clavain nodded. �Itłs possible that you havenłt noticed." He
leaned forward, elbows on the table. �Wełre concerned about the Phobos worms.
Theyłve begun altering the moonłs orbit. The shift is tiny at the moment, but
too large to be anything other than deliberate."

Galiana looked away from him for an instant, as if weighing
her options. Then said: �We were aware of this, but you werenłt to know that."

Gratitude?

He had assumed the wormsł activity could not have escaped
Galiana. �Wełve seen odd behavior from other worm infestations across the
system; things that begin to look like emergent intelligence. But never
anything this purposeful. This infestation must have come from a batch with
some subroutines we never even guessed about. Do you have any ideas about what
they might be up to?"

Again, there was the briefest of hesitations, as if she was
communing with her compatriots for the right response. Then she nodded toward a
male Conjoiner sitting opposite her, Clavain guessing that the gesture was
entirely for his benefit. His hair was black and curly; his face as smooth and
untroubled by expression as Galianałs, with something of the same beautifully
symmetrical bone structure.

�This is Remontoire," said Galiana. �Hełs our specialist on
the Phobos situation."

Remontoire nodded politely. �In answer to your question, we
currently have no viable theories as to what theyłre doing, but we do know one
thing. Theyłre raising the apocentre of the moonłs orbit." Apocentre, Clavain
knew, was the Martian equivalent of apogee for an object orbiting Earth: the
point of highest altitude in an elliptical orbit. Remontoire continued, his
voice as preternaturally calm as a parent reading slowly to a child. �The
natural orbit of Phobos is actually inside the Roche limit for a
gravitationally bound moon; Phobos is raising a tidal bulge on Mars but,
because of friction, the bulge canłt quite keep up with Phobos. Itłs causing
Phobos to spiral slowly closer to Mars, by about two meters a century. In a few
tens of millions of years, whatłs left of the moon will crash into Mars."

�You think the worms are elevating the orbit to avoid a cataclysm
so far in the future?"

�I donłt know," Remontoire said. �I suppose the orbital
alterations could also be a byproduct of some less meaningful worm activity."

�I agree," Clavain said. �But the danger remains. If the
worms can elevate the moonłs apocentre-even accidentally-we can assume they
also have the means to lower its pericentre. They could drop Phobos on top of
your nest. Does that scare you sufficiently that youłd consider cooperation
with the Coalition?"

Galiana steepled her fingers before her face; a human
gesture of deep concentration which her time as a Conjoiner had not quite
eroded. Clavain could almost feel the web of thought looming in the room;
ghostly strands of cognition reaching between each Conjoiner at the table, and
beyond into the nest proper.

�A winning team, is that your idea?"

�Itłs got to be better than war," Clavain said. �Hasnłt it?"

Galiana might have been about to answer him when her face
grew troubled. Clavain saw the wave of discomposure sweep over the others
almost simultaneously. Something told him that it was nothing to do with his
proposal.

Around the table, half the display facets switched
automatically over to another channel. The face that Clavain was looking at was
much like his own, except that the face on the screen was missing an eye. It
was his brother. Warren was overlaid with the official insignia of the
Coalition and a dozen system-wide media cartels.

He was in the middle of a speech. �... express my shock," Warren
said. �Or, for that matter, my outrage. Itłs not just that theyłve murdered a
valued colleague and deeply experienced member of my team. Theyłve murdered my
brother."

Clavain felt the deepest of chills. �What is this?"

�A live transmission from Deimos," Galiana breathed. �Itłs
going out to all the nets; right out to the trans-Pluto habitats."

�What they did was an act of unspeakable treachery," Warren
said. �Nothing less than the premeditated, cold-blooded murder of a peace
envoy." And then a video clip sprang up to replace Warren. The image must have
been snapped from Deimos or one of the interdiction satellites. It showed Clavainłs
shuttle, lying in the dust close to the dyke. He watched the Ouroborus destroy
the shuttle, then saw the image zoom in on himself and Voi, running for sanctuary.
The Ouroborus took Voi. But this time there was no ladder lowered down for him.
Instead, he saw weapon-beams scythe out from the nest toward him, knocking him
to the ground. Horribly wounded, he tried to get up, to crawl a few inches
nearer to his tormentors, but the worm was already upon him.

He watched himself get eaten.

Warren was back again. �The worms around the nest were a
Conjoiner trap. My brotherłs death must have been planned days-maybe even
weeks-in advance." His face glistened with a wave of military composure. �There
can only be one outcome from such an action-something the Conjoiners must have
well understood. For months theyłve been goading us toward hostile action." He
paused, then nodded at an unseen audience. �Well now theyłre going to get it.
In fact, our response has already commenced."

�Dear God, no," Clavain said, but the evidence was all there
now; all around the table he could see the updating orbital spread of the
Coalitionłs dropships, knifing down toward Mars.

�I think itłs war," Galiana said.

Conjoiners stormed onto the roof of the nest, taking up defensive
positions around the domes and the dykełs edge. Most of them carried the same
guns which they had used against the Ouroborus. Smaller numbers were setting up
automatic cannon on tripods. One or two were manhandling large anti-assault
weapons into position. Most of it was war-surplus. Fifteen years ago the
Conjoiners had avoided extinction by deploying weapons of awesome ferocity-but
those ship-to-ship armaments were too simply too destructive to use against a
nearby foe. Now it would be more visceral; closer to the primal templates of
combat, and none of what the Conjoiners were marshalling would be much use
against the kind of assault Warren had prepared, Clavain knew. They could slow
an attack, but not much more than that.

Galiana had given him another breather mask, made him don
lightweight chameleoflage armor, and then forced him to carry one of the
smaller guns. The gun felt alien in his hands; something he had never expected
to carry again. The only possible justification for carrying it was to use it
against his brotherłs forces-against his own side.

Could he do that?

It was clear that Warren had betrayed him; he had surely
been aware of the worms around the nest. So his brother was capable not just of
contempt, but of treacherous murder. For the first time, Clavain felt genuine
hatred for Warren. He must have hoped that the worms would destroy the shuttle
completely and kill Clavain and Voi in the process. It must have pained him to
see Clavain make it to the dyke ... pained him even more when Clavain called to
talk about the tragedy. But Warrenłs larger plan had not been affected. The
diplomatic link between the nest and Deimos was secure-even the Demarchists had
no immediate access to it. So Clavainłs call from the surface could be quietly
ignored; spysat imagery doctored to make it seem that he had never reached the
dyke ... had in fact been repelled by Conjoiner treachery. Inevitably the
Demarchists would unravel the deception given time ... but if Warrenłs plan
succeeded, they would all be embroiled in war long before then. That, thought
Clavain, was all that Warren had ever wanted.

Two brothers, Clavain thought. In many ways so alike. Both
had embraced war once, but like a fickle lover Clavain had wearied of its
glories. He had not even been injured as severely as Warren ... but perhaps
that was the point, too. Warren needed another war to avenge what one had
stolen from him.

Clavain despised and pitied him in equal measure.

He searched for the safety clip on the gun. The rifle, now
that he studied it more closely, was not all that different from those he had
used during the war. The readout said the ammo-cell was fully charged.

He looked into the sky.

The attack wave broke orbit hard and steep above the Wall;
five hundred fire-balls screeching toward the nest. The insertion scorched
inches of ablative armor from most of the ships; fried a few others which came
in just fractionally too hard. Clavain knew that was how it was happening: he
had studied possible attack scenarios for years, the range of outcomes burned
indelibly into his memory.

The anti-assault guns were already working-locking onto the
plasma trails as they flowered overhead, swinging down to find the tiny spark
of heat at the head, computing refraction paths for laser pulses, spitting
death into the sky. The unlucky ships flared a white that hurt the back of the
eye and rained down in a billion dulling sparks. A dozen-then a dozen more.
Maybe fifty in total before the guns could no longer acquire targets. It was
nowhere near enough. Clavainłs memory of the simulations told him that at least
four hundred units of the attack wave would survive both re-entry and the
Conjoinerłs heavy defenses.

Nothing that Galiana could do would make any difference.

And that had always been the paradox. Galiana was capable of
running the same simulations. She must always have known that her provocations
would bring down something she could never hope to defeat.

Something that was always going to destroy her.

The surviving members of the wave were levelling out now,
commencing long, ground-hugging runs from all directions. Cocooned in their
dropships, the soldiers would be suffering punishing gee-loads ... but it was
nothing they were not engineered to withstand; half their cardiovascular
systems were augmented by the only kinds of implant the Coalition tolerated.

The first of the wave came arcing in at supersonic speeds.
All around, worms struggled to snatch them out of the sky, but mostly they were
too slow to catch the dropships. Galianałs people manned their cannon positions
and did their best to fend off what they could. Clavain clutched his gun, not
firing yet. Best to save his ammo-cell power for a target he stood a chance of
injuring.

Above, the first dropships made hairpin turns, nosing
suicidally down toward the nest. Then they fractured cleanly apart, revealing
falling pilots clad in bulbous armor. Just before the moment of impact each
pilot exploded into a mass of black shock-absorbing balloons, looking something
like a blackberry, bouncing across the nest before the balloons deflated just
as swiftly and the pilot was left standing on the ground. By then the pilot-now
properly a soldier-would have a comprehensive computer-generated map of the
nestłs nooks and crannies; enemy positions graphed in real time from the
down-looking spysats.

Clavain fell behind the curve of a dome before the nearest
soldier got a lock onto him. The firefight was beginning now. He had to hand it
to Galianałs people-they were fighting like devils. And they were at least as
well coordinated as the attackers. But their weapons and armor were simply
inadequate. Chameleoflage was only truly effective against a solitary enemy, or
a massed enemy moving in from a common direction. With Coalition forces surrounding
him, Clavainłs suit was going crazy to trying to match itself against every
background, like a chameleon in a house of mirrors.

The sky overhead looked strange now-darkening purple. And
the purple was spreading in a mist across the nest. Galiana had deployed some
kind of chemical smoke screen: infrared and optically opaque, he guessed. It
would occlude the spysats and might be primed to adhere only to enemy
chameleoflage. That had never been in Warrenłs simulations. Galiana had just
given herself the slightest of edges.

A soldier stepped out of the mist, the obscene darkness of a
gun muzzle trained on Clavain. His chameleoflage armor was dappled with vivid
purple patches, ruining its stealthiness. The man fired, but his discharge
wasted itself against Clavainłs armor. Clavain returned the compliment,
dropping his compatriot. What he had done, he thought, was not technically
treason. Not yet. All he had done was act in self-preservation.

The man was wounded, but not yet dead. Clavain stepped
through the purple haze and knelt down beside the soldier. He tried not to look
at the manłs wound.

�Can you hear me?" he said. There was no answer from the
man, but beneath his visor, Clavain thought he saw the manłs lips shape a
sound. The man was just a kid-hardly old enough to remember much of the last
war. �Therełs something you have to know," Clavain continued. �Do you realize
who I am?" He wondered how recognizable he was, under the breather mask. Then
something made him relent. He could tell the man he was Nevil Clavain-but what
would that achieve? The soldier would be dead in minutes; maybe sooner than
that. Nothing would be served by the soldier knowing that the basis for his
attack was a lie; that he would not in fact be laying down his life for a just
cause. The universe could be spared a single callous act.

�Itłs all right," Clavain said, turning away from his
victim.

And then moved deeper into the nest, to see who else he
could kill before the odds took him.

But the odds never did.

�You always were lucky," Galiana said, leaning over him.
They were somewhere underground again-deep in the nest. A medical area, by the
look of things. He was on a bed, fully clothed apart from the outer layer of
chameleoflage armor. The room was gray and kettle-shaped, ringed by a circular
balcony.

�What happened?"

�You took a head wound, but youłll survive."

He groped for the right question. �What about Warrenłs attack?"

�We endured three waves. We took casualties, of course."

Around the circumference of the balcony were thirty or so
gray couches, slightly recessed into archways studded with gray medical
equipment. They were all occupied. There were more Conjoiners in this room than
he had seen so far in one place. Some of them looked very close to death.

Clavain reached up and examined his head, gingerly. There
was some dried blood on the scalp, matted with his hair; some numbness, but it
could have been a lot worse. He felt normal-no memory drop-outs or aphasia.
When he made to stand from the bed, his body obeyed his will with only a tinge
of dizziness.

�Warren wonłt stop at just three waves, Galiana."

�I know." She paused. �We know therełll be more."

He walked to the railing on the inner side of the balcony
and looked over the edge. He had expected to see something-some chunk of
incomprehensible surgical equipment, perhaps-but the middle of the room was
only an empty, smooth-walled, gray pit. He shivered. The air was colder than
any part of the nest he had visited so far, with a medicinal tang which
reminded him of the convalescence ward on Deimos. What made him shiver even
more was the realization that some of the injured-some of the dead-were barely
older than the children he had visited only hours ago. Perhaps some of them
were those children, conscripted from the nursery since his visit, uploaded
with fighting reflexes through their new implants.

�What are you going to do? You know you canłt win. Warren
lost only a tiny fraction of his available force in those waves. You look like
youłve lost half your nest."

�Itłs much worse than that," Galiana said.

�What do you mean?"

�Youłre not quite ready yet. But I can show you in a moment."

He felt colder than ever now. �What do you mean, not quite
ready?"

Galiana looked deep into his eyes now. �You took a serious
head wound, Cla-vain. The entry wound was small, but the internal bleeding ...
it would have killed you, had we not intervened." Before he could ask the
inevitable question she answered it for him. �We injected a small cluster of
medichines into your head. They undid the damage very easily. But it seemed
provident to allow them to grow."

�Youłve put replicators in my head?"

�You neednłt sound so horrified. Theyłre already
growing-spreading out and interfacing with your existing neural circuitry-but
the total volume of glial mass that they will consume is tiny: only a few cubic
millimeters in total, across your entire brain."

He wondered if she was calling his bluff. �I donłt feel anything."

�You wonłt-not for a minute or so." Now she pointed into the
empty pit in the middle of the room. �Stand here and look into the air."

�Therełs nothing there."

But as soon as he had spoken, he knew he was wrong. There
was something in the pit. He blinked and directed his attention somewhere else,
but when he returned his gaze to the pit, the thing he imagined he had
seen-milky, spectral-was still there, and becoming sharper and brighter by the
second. It was a three-dimensional structure, as complex as an exercise in
protein-folding. A tangle of loops and connecting branches and nodes and
tunnels, embedded in a ghostly red matrix.

Suddenly he saw it for what it was: a map of the nest, dug
into Mars. Just as the Coalition had suspected, the base was deeper than the
original structure; far more extensive, reaching deeper down but much further
out than anyone had imagined. Clavain made a mental effort to retain some of
what he was seeing in his mind, the intelligence-gathering reflex stronger than
the conscious knowledge that he would never see Deimos again.

�The medichines in your brain have interfaced with your
visual cortex," Galiana said. �Thatłs the first step on the road to Transenlightenment.
Now youłre privy to the machine-generated imagery encoded by the fields through
which we move-most of it, anyway."

�Tell me this wasnłt planned, Galiana. Tell me you werenłt intending
to put machines in me at the first opportunity."

�No; I wasnłt planning it. But nor was I going to let your
phobias stop me from saving your life."

The image grew in complexity. Glowing nodes of light appeared
in the tunnels, some moving slowly through the network.

�What are they?"

�Youłre seeing the locations of the Conjoiners," Galiana
said. �Are there as many as you imagined?"

Clavain judged that there were no more than seventy lights
in the whole complex now. He searched for a cluster which would identify the
room where he stood. There: twenty-odd bright lights, accompanied by one much
fainter. Himself, of course. There were few people near the top of the nest-the
attack must have collapsed half the tunnels, or maybe Galiana had deliberately
sealed entrances herself.

�Where is everyone? Where are the children?"

�Most of the children are gone now." She paused. �You were
right to guess that we were rushing them to Transenlightenment, Clavain."

�Why?"

�Because itłs the only way out of here."

The image changed again. Now each of the bright lights was
connected to another by a shimmering filament. The topology of the network was
constantly shifting, like a pattern seen in a kaleidoscope. Occasionally, too
swiftly for Clavain to be sure, it shifted toward a mandala of elusive
symmetry, only to dissolve into the flickering chaos of the ever-changing
network. He studied Galianałs node and saw that-even as she was speaking to
him-her mind was in constant rapport with the rest of the nest.

Now something very bright appeared in the middle of the image,
like a tiny star, against which the shimmering network paled almost to
invisibility. �The network is abstracted now," Galiana said. �The bright light
represents its totality: the unity of Transenlightenment. Watch."

He watched. The bright light-beautiful and alluring as
anything Clavain had ever imagined-was extending a ray toward the isolated node
which represented himself. The ray was extending itself through the map, coming
closer by the second.

�The new structures in your mind are nearing maturity," Galiana
said. �When the ray touches you, you will experience partial integration with
the rest of us. Prepare yourself, Nevil."

Her words were unnecessary. His fingers were already
clenched sweating on the railing as the light inched closer and engulfed his
node.

�I should hate you for this," Clavain said.

�Why donłt you? Hatełs always the easier option."

�Because ..." Because it made no difference now. His old
life was over. He reached out for Galiana, needing some anchor against what was
about to hit him. Galiana squeezed his hand and an instant later he knew
something of Transenlightenment. The experience was shocking; not because it
was painful or fearful, but because it was profoundly and totally new. He was
literally thinking in ways that had not been possible microseconds earlier.

Afterward, when Clavain tried to imagine how he might describe
it, he found that words were never going to be adequate for the task. And that
was no surprise: evolution had shaped language to convey many concepts, but
going from a single to a networked topology of self was not among them. But if
he could not convey the core of the experience, he could at least skirt its
essence with metaphor. It was like standing on the shore of an ocean, being engulfed
by a wave taller than himself. For a moment he sought the surface; tried to
keep the water from his lungs. But there happened not to be a surface. What had
consumed him extended infinitely in all directions. He could only submit to it.
Yet as the moments slipped by it turned from something terrifying in its
unfamiliarity to something he could begin to adapt to; something that even began
in the tiniest way to seem comforting. Even then he glimpsed that it was only a
shadow of what Galiana was experiencing every instant of her life.

�All right," Galiana said. �Thatłs enough for now."

The fullness of Transenlightenment retreated, like a fading
vision of Godhead. What he was left with was purely sensory; no longer any
direct rapport with the others. His state of mind came crashing back to
normality.

�Are you all right, Nevil?"

�Yes ..." His mouth was dry. �Yes; I think so."

�Look around you."

He did.

The room had changed completely. So had everyone in it.

His head reeling, Clavain walked in light. The formerly gray
walls oozed beguiling patterns; as if a dark forest had suddenly become
enchanted. Information hung in veils in the air; icons and diagrams and numbers
clustering around the beds of the injured, thinning out into the general space
like fantastically delicate neon sculptures. As he walked toward the icons they
darted out of his way, mocking him like schools of brilliant fish. Sometimes
they seemed to sing, or tickle the back of his nose with half-familiar smells.

�You can perceive things now," Galiana said. �But none of it
will mean much to you. Youłd need years of education, or deeper neural
machinery for that-building cognitive layers. We read all this almost
subliminally."

Galiana was dressed differently now. He could still see the
vague shape of her gray outfit, but layered around it were billowing skeins of
light, unravelling at their edges into chains of Boolean logic. Icons danced in
her hair like angels. He could see, faintly, the web of thought linking her
with the other Conjoiners.

She was inhumanly beautiful.

�You said things were much worse," Clavain said. �Are you
ready to show me now?"

She took him to see Felka again, passing on the way through
deserted nursery rooms, populated now only by bewildered mechanical animals.
Felka was the only child left in the nursery.

Clavain had been deeply disturbed by Felka when he had seen
her before, but not for any reason he could easily express. Something about the
purposefulness of what she did; performed with ferocious concentration, as if
the fate of creation hung on the outcome of her game. Felka and her
surroundings had not changed at all since his visit. The room was still austere
to the point of oppressiveness. Felka looked the same. In every respect it was
as if only an instant had passed since their meeting; as if the onset of war
and the assaults against the nest-the battle of which this was only an
interlude-were only figments from someone elsełs troubling dream; nothing that
need concern Felka in her devotion to the task at hand.

And what the task was awed Clavain.

Before he had watched her make strange gestures in front of
her. Now the machines in his head revealed the purpose that those gestures
served. Around Felka-cordoning her like a barricade-was a ghostly
representation of the Great Wall.

She was doing something to it.

It was not a scale representation, Clavain knew. The Wall
looked much higher here in relation to its diameter. And the surface was not
the nearly invisible membrane of the real thing, but something like etched
glass. The etchwork was a filigree of lines and junctions, descending down to
smaller and smaller scales in fractal steps, until the blur of detail was too
fine for his eyes to discriminate. It was shifting and altering color, and
Felka was responding to these alterations with what he now saw was frightening
efficiency. It was as if the color changes warned of some malignancy in part of
the Wall, and by touching it-expressing some tactile code-Felka was able to
restructure the etchwork to block and neutralize the malignancy before it
spread.

�I donłt understand," Clavain said. �I thought we destroyed
the Wall; completely killed its systems."

�No," Galiana said. �You only ever injured it. Stopped it
from growing, and from managing its own repair-processes correctly ... but you never
truly killed it."

Sandra Voi had guessed, Clavain realized. She had wondered
how the Wall had survived this long.

Galiana told him the rest-how they had managed to establish
control pathways to the Wall from the nest, fifteen years earlier-optical cables
sunk deep below the worm zone. �We stabilized the Wallłs degradation with
software running on dumb machines," she said. �But when Felka was born we found
that she managed the task just as efficiently as the computers; in some ways
better than they ever did. In fact, she seemed to thrive on it. It was as if in
the Wall she found ..." Galiana trailed off. �I was going to say a friend."

�Why donłt you?"

�Because the Wallłs just a machine. Which means if Felka recognized
kinship ... what would that make her?"

�Someone lonely, thatłs all." Clavain watched the girlłs motions.
�She seems faster than before. Is that possible?"

�I told you things were worse than before. Shełs having to
work harder to hold the Wall together."

�Warren must have attacked it." Clavain said. �The
possibility of knocking down the Wall always figured in our contingency plans
for another war. I just never thought it would happen so soon." Then he looked
at Felka. Maybe it was imagination but she seemed to be working even faster
than when he had entered the room; not just since his last visit. �How long do
you think she can keep it together?"

�Not much longer," Galiana said. �As a matter of fact I
think shełs already failing."

It was true. Now that he looked closely at the ghost Wall he
saw that the upper edge was not the mathematically smooth ring it should have
been; that there were scores of tiny ragged bites eating down from the top.
Felkałs activities were increasingly directed to these opening cracks in the
structure; instructing the crippled structure to divert energy and raw
materials to these critical failure points. Clavain knew that the distant
processes Felka directed were awesome. Within the Wall lay a lymphatic system
whose peristaltic feed-pipes ranged in size from meters across to the submicroscopic;
flowing with myriad tiny repair machines. Felka chose where to send those
machines; her hand gestures establishing pathways between damage points and the
factories sunk into the Wallłs ramparts which made the required types of machine.
For more than a decade, Galiana said, Felka had kept the Wall from
crumbling-but for most of that time her adversary had been only natural decay
and accidental damage. It was a different game now that the Wall had been
attacked again. It was not one she could ever win.

Felkałs movements were swifter; less fluid. Her face
remained impassive, but in the quickening way that her eyes darted from point
to point it was possible to read the first hints of panic. No surprise, either:
the deepest cracks in the structure now reached a quarter of the way to the
surface, and they were too wide to be repaired. The Wall was unzipping along
those flaws. Cubic kilometers of atmosphere would be howling out through the
openings. The loss of pressure would be immeasurably slow at first, for near
the top the trapped cylinder of atmosphere was only fractionally thicker than
the rest of the Martian atmosphere. But only at first ...

�We have to get deeper," Clavain said. �Once the Wall goes,
we wonłt have a chance in hell if wełre anywhere near the surface. Itłll be
like the worst tornado in history."

�What will your brother do? Will he nuke us?"

�No; I donłt think so. Hełll want to get hold of any technologies
youłve hidden away. Hełll wait until the dust storms have died down, then hełll
raid the nest with a hundred times as many troops as youłve seen so far. You
wonłt be able to resist, Galiana. If youłre lucky you may just survive long
enough to be taken prisoner."

�There wonłt be any prisoners," Galiana said.

�Youłre planning to die fighting?"

�No. And mass suicide doesnłt figure in our plans either. Neither
will be necessary. By the time your brother reaches here, there wonłt be anyone
left in the nest."

Clavain thought of the worms encircling the area; how small
were the chances of reaching any kind of safety if it involved getting past
them. �Secret tunnels under the worm zone, is that it? I hope youłre serious."

�Iłm deadly serious," Galiana said. �And yes, there is a
secret tunnel. The other children have already gone through it now. But it
doesnłt lead under the worm zone."

�Where, then?"

�Somewhere a lot further away."

When they passed through the medical center again it was
empty, save for a few swan-necked robots patiently waiting for further
casualties. They had left Felka behind tending the Wall, her hands a manic blur
as she tried to slow the rate of collapse. Clavain had tried to make her come
with them, but Galiana had told him he was wasting his time: that she would
sooner die than be parted from the Wall.

�You donłt understand," Galiana said. �Youłre placing too
much humanity behind her eyes. Keeping the Wall alive is the single most
important fact of her universe-more important than love, pain, death-anything
you or I would consider definitively human."

�Then what happens to her when the Wall dies?"

�Her life ends," Galiana said.

Reluctantly he had left without her, the taste of shame in
his mouth. Rationally it made sense: without Felkałs help the Wall would
collapse much sooner and there was a good chance all their lives would end; not
just that of the haunted girl. How deep would they have to go before they were
safe from the suction of the escaping atmosphere? Would any part of the nest be
safe?

The regions through which they were descending now were as
cold and gray as any Clavain had seen. There were no entoptic generators buried
in these walls to supply visual information to the implants Galiana had put in
his head, and even her own aura of light was gone. They only met a few other
Conjoiners, and they seemed to be moving in the same general direction; down to
the nestłs basement levels. This was unknown territory to Clavain.

Where was Galiana taking him?

�If you had an escape route all along, why did you wait so
long before sending the children through it?"

�I told you, we couldnłt bring them to Transenlightenment
too soon. The older they were, the better," Galiana said. �Now though ..."

�There was no waiting any longer, was there?"

Eventually they reached a chamber with the same echoing
acoustics as the topside hangar. The chamber was dark except for a few pools of
light, but in the shadows Clavain made out discarded excavation equipment and
freight pallets; cranes and de-activated robots. The air smelled of ozone.
Something was still going on here.

�Is this the factory where you make the shuttles?" Clavain
said.

�We manufactured parts of them here, yes," Galiana said. �But
that was a side-industry."

�Of what?"

�The tunnel, of course." Galiana made more lights come on.
At the far end of the chamber-they were walking toward it-waited a series of
cylindrical things with pointed ends; like huge bullets. They rested on rails,
one after the other. The tip of the very first bullet was next to a dark hole
in the wall. Clavain was about to say something when there was a sudden loud
buzz and the first bullet slammed into the hole. The other bullets-there were
three of them now-eased slowly forward and halted. Conjoiners were waiting to
board them.

He remembered what Galiana had said about no one being left
behind.

�What am I seeing here?"

�A way out of the nest," Galiana said. �And a way off Mars,
though I suppose you figured that part for yourself."

�There is no way off Mars," Clavain said. �The interdiction
guarantees that. Havenłt you learned that with your shuttles?"

�The shuttles were only ever a diversionary tactic," Galiana
said. �They made your side think we were still striving to escape, whereas our
true escape route was already fully operational."

�A pretty desperate diversion."

�Not really. I lied to you when I said we didnłt clone. We
did-but only to produce brain-dead corpses. The shuttles were full of corpses
before we ever launched them."

For the first time since leaving Deimos Clavain smiled,
amused at the sheer obliquity of Galianałs thinking.

�Of course, there was another function," she said. �The
shuttles provoked your side into a direct attack against the nest."

�So this was deliberate all along?"

�Yes. We needed to draw your sidełs attention; to
concentrate your military presence in low-orbit, near the nest. Of course we
were hoping the offensive would come later than it did ... but we reckoned
without Warrenłs conspiracy."

�Then you are planning something."

�Yes." The next bullet slammed into the wall, ozone
crackling from its linear induction rails. Now only two remained. �We can talk
later. There isnłt much time now." She projected an image into his visual
field: the Wall, now veined by titanic fractures down half its length. �Itłs
collapsing."

�And Felka?"

�Shełs still trying to save it."

He looked at the Conjoiners boarding the leading bullet;
tried to imagine where they were going. Was it to any kind of sanctuary he
might recognize-or to something so beyond his experience that it might as well
be death? Did he have the nerve to find out? Perhaps. He had nothing to lose
now, after all; he could certainly not return home. But if he was going to
follow Galianałs exodus, it could not be with the sense of shame he now felt in
abandoning Felka.

The answer, when it came, was simple. �Iłm going back for
her. If you canłt wait for me, donłt. But donłt try and stop me doing this."

Galiana looked at him, shaking her head slowly. �She wonłt
thank you for saving her life, Clavain."

�Maybe not now," he said.

He had the feeling he was running back into a burning building.
Given what Galiana had said about the girlłs deficiencies-that by any
reasonable definition she was hardly more than an automaton-what he was doing
was very likely pointless, if not suicidal. But if he turned his back on her,
he would become something even less than human himself. He had misread Galiana
badly when she said the girl was precious to them. He had assumed some bond of
affection ... whereas what Galiana meant was that the girl was precious in the
sense of a vital component. Now-with the nest being abandoned-the component had
no further use. Did that make Galiana as cold as a machine herself-or was she
just being unfailingly realistic? He found the nursery after only one or two
false turns, and then Felkałs room. The implants Galiana had given him were
again throwing phantom images into the air. Felka sat within the crumbling
circle of the Wall. Great fissures now reached to the surface of Mars. Shards
of the Wall, as big as icebergs, had fractured away and now lay like vast
sheets of broken glass across the regolith.

She was losing, and now she knew it. This was not just some
more difficult phase of the game. This was something she could never win, and
her realization was now plainly evident in her face. She was still moving her
arms frantically, but her face was red now, locked into a petulant scowl of
anger and fear.

For the first time, she seemed to notice him.

Something had broken through her shell, Clavain thought. For
the first time in years, something was happening that was beyond her control;
something that threatened to destroy the neat, geometric universe she had made
for herself. She might not have distinguished his face from all the other
people who came to see her, but she surely recognized something ... that now
the adult world was bigger than she was, and it was only from the adult world
that any kind of salvation could come.

Then she did something that shocked him beyond words. She
looked deep into his eyes and reached out a hand.

But there was nothing he could do to help her.

Later-it seemed hours, but in fact could only have been tens
of minutes-Cla-vain found that he was able to breathe normally again. They had
escaped Mars now; Galiana, Felka and himself, riding the last bullet.

And they were still alive.

The bulletłs vacuum-filled tunnel cut deep into Mars; a
shallow arc bending under the crust before rising again, two thousand kilometers
away, well beyond the Wall, where the atmosphere was as thin as ever. For the
Conjoiners, boring the tunnel had not been especially difficult. Such
engineering would have been impossible on a planet that had plate tectonics,
but beneath its lithosphere Mars was geologically quiet. They had not even had
to worry about tailings. What they excavated, they compressed and fused and
used to line the tunnel, maintaining rigidity against awesome pressure with
some trick of piezo-electricity. In the tunnel, the bullet accelerated
continuously at three gees for six minutes. Their seats had tilted back and
wrapped around them, applying pressure to the legs to maintain blood flow to
the head. Even so, it was hard to think, let alone move, but Clavain knew that
it was no worse than what the earliest space explorers had endured climbing
away from Earth. And he had undergone similar tortures during the war, in
combat insertions.

They were moving at ten kilometers a second when they
reached the surface again, exiting via a camouflaged trapdoor. For a moment the
atmosphere snatched at them ... but almost as soon as Clavain had registered
the deceleration, it was over. The surface of Mars was dropping below them very
quickly indeed.

In half a minute, they were in true space.

�The Interdictionłs sensor web canłt track us," Galiana
said. �You placed your best spysats directly over the nest. That was a mistake,
Clavain-even though we did our best to reinforce your thinking with the shuttle
launches. But now wełre well outside your sensor footprint."

Clavain nodded. �But that wonłt help us once wełre far from
the surface. Then, wełll just look like another ship trying to reach deep
space. The web may be late locking onto us, but itłll still get us in the end."

�It would," Galiana said. �If deep space was where we were
going."

Felka stirred next to him. She had withdrawn into some kind
of catatonia. Separation from the Wall had undermined her entire existence; now
she was free-falling through an abyss of meaninglessness. Perhaps, Clavain,
thought, she would fall forever. If that was the case, he had only brought
forward her fate. Was that much of a cruelty? Perhaps he was deluding himself,
but with time, was it out of the question that Galianałs machines could undo
the harm they had inflicted ten years earlier? Surely they could try. It
depended, of course, on where exactly they were headed. One of the systemłs
other Conjoiner nests had been Clavainłs initial guess-even though it seemed
unlikely that they would ever survive the crossing. At ten klicks per second it
would take years ...

�Where are you taking us?" he asked.

Galiana issued some neural command which made the bullet
seem to become transparent.

�There," she said.

Something lay distantly ahead. Galiana made the forward view
zoom in, until the object was much clearer.

Dark-misshapen. Like Deimos without fortifications.

�Phobos," Clavain said, wonderingly. �Wełre going to Phobos."

�Yes," Galiana said.

�But the worms"

�Donłt exist anymore." She spoke with the same tutorly patience
with which Remontoire had addressed him on the same subject not long before. �Your
attempt to oust the worms failed. You assumed our subsequent attempt failed ...
but that was only what we wanted you to think."

For a moment he was lost for words. �Youłve had people in
Phobos all along?"

�Ever since the cease-fire, yes. Theyłve been quite busy,
too."

Phobos altered. Layers of it were peeled away, revealing the
glittering device which lay hidden in its heart, poised and ready for flight.
Clavain had never seen anything like it, but the nature of the thing was
instantly obvious. He was looking at something wonderful; something which had
never existed before in the whole of human experience.

He was looking at a starship.

�Wełll be leaving soon," Galiana said. �Theyłll try and stop
us, of course. But now that their forces are concentrated near the surface,
they wonłt succeed. Wełll leave Phobos and Mars behind, and send messages to
the other nests. If they can break out and meet us, wełll take them as well. Wełll
leave this whole system behind."

�Where are you going?"

�Shouldnłt that be where are we going? Youłre coming with
us, after all." She paused. �There are a number of candidate systems. Our
choice will depend on the trajectory the Coalition forces upon us."

�What about the Demarchists?"

�They wonłt stop us." It was said with total
assurance-implying, what? That the Demarchy knew of this ship? Perhaps. It had
long been rumored that the Demarchists and the Conjoiners were closer than they
admitted.

Clavain thought of something. �What about the wormsł altering
the orbit?"

�That was our doing," Galiana said. �We couldnłt help it.
Every time we send up one of these canisters, we nudge Phobos into a different
orbit. Even after we sent up a thousand canisters, the effect was tiny-we
changed Phobosłs velocity by less than one tenth of a millimeter per second-but
there was no way to hide it." Then she paused and looked at Clavain with
something like apprehension. �Wełll be arriving in two hundred seconds. Do you
want to live?"

�Iłm sorry?"

�Think about it. The tube in Mars was two thousand
kilometers long, which allowed us to spread the acceleration over six minutes.
Even then it was three gees. But there simply isnłt room for anything like that
in Phobos. Wełll be slowing down much more abruptly."

Clavain felt the hairs on the back of his neck prickle. �How
much more abruptly?"

�Complete deceleration in one fifth of a second." She let
that sink home. �Thatłs around five thousand gees."

�I canłt survive that."

�No; you canłt. Not now, anyway. But there are machines in
your head now. If you allow it, therełs time for them to establish a structural
web across your brain. Wełll flood the cabin with foam. Wełll all die
temporarily, but there wonłt be anything they canłt fix in Phobos."

�It wonłt just be a structural web, will it? Iłll be like
you, then. There wonłt be any difference between us."

�Youłll become Conjoined, yes." Galiana offered the faintest
of smiles. �The procedure is reversible. Itłs just that no onełs ever wanted to
go back."

�And you still tell me none of this was planned?"

�No; but I donłt expect you to believe me. For what itłs
worth, though ... youłre a good man, Nevil. The Transenlightenment could use
you. Maybe at the back of my mind ... at the back of our mind ..."

�You always hoped it might come to this?"

Galiana smiled.

He looked at Phobos. Even without Galianałs magnification,
it was clearly bigger. They would be arriving very shortly. He would have liked
longer to think about it, but the one thing not on his side now was time. Then
he looked at Felka, and wondered which of them was about to embark on the
stranger journey. Felkałs search for meaning in a universe without her beloved
Wall, or his passage into Transenlightenment? Neither would necessarily be
easy. But together, perhaps, they might even find a way to help each other.
That was all he could hope for now.

Clavain nodded assent, ready for the loom of machines to embrace
his mind.

He was ready to defect.

Merlinłs Gun

Punishment saved Sora. If her marksmanship had not been the
worst in her class, she would never have been assigned the task of overseeing
proctors down in shipłs docks. She would not have had to stand for hours, alone
except for her familiar, running a laser-stylus across the ore samples the
proctors brought back to the swallow-ship, dreaming of finishing shift and
meeting Verdin. It was boring; menial work. But because the docks were open to
vacuum it was work that required a pressure suit.

�Got to be a drill," she said, when the attack began.

�No," her familiar said. �It really does seem as if theyłve
caught up with us."

Sorałs calm evaporated.

�How many?"

�Four elements of the swarm; standard attack pattern;
coherent-matter weapons at maximum range ... novamine countermeasures deployed
but seemingly ineffective ... initial damage reports severe and likely
underestimates ..."

The floor pitched under her feet. The knee-high, androform
proctors looked to each other nervously. The machines had no more experience of
battle than Sora, and unlike her they had never experienced the simulations of
warcreche.

Sora dropped the clipboard.

�What do I do?"

�My advice," her familiar said, �is that you engage that old
mammalian flight response and run like hell."

She obeyed; stooping down low-ceilinged corridors festooned
with pipes, snaking around hand-painted murals that showed decisive battles
from the Cohortłs history; squadrons of ships exchanging fire; worlds wreathed
in flame. The endgame was much swifter than those languid paintings suggested.
The swarm had been chasing Snipe for nine years of shiptime, during which time
Sora had passed through warcreche to adulthood. Yet beyond the shipłs relativistic
frame of reference, nearly sixty years had passed. Captain Tchagra had done all
that she could to lose the swarm. Her last gamble had been the most desperate
of all; using the vicious gravity of a neutron star to slingshot the swallowship
on another course, one that the chasing ships ought not have been able to
follow, unless they skimmed the neutron star even more suicidally. But they
had, forcing Snipe to slow from relativistic flight and nurse its wounds in a
fallow system. It was there that the swarm attacked.

Near the end, the floor drifted away from her feet as shipłs
gravity faltered, and she had to progress hand over hand.

�This is wrong," Sora said, arriving in the pod bay. �This
part should be pressurized. And where is everyone?"

�Attack must be a lot worse than those initial reports suggested.
I advise you get into a pod as quickly as you can."

�I canłt go, not without Verdin."

�Let me worry about him."

Knowing better than to argue, Sora climbed into the nearest
of the cylindrical pods, mounted on a railed pallet ready for injection into
the tunnel. The lid clammed shut, air rushing in.

�What about Verdin?"

�Safe. The attack was bad, but Iłm hearing reports that the
aft sections made it."

�Get me out of here, then."

�With all pleasure."

Acceleration came suddenly, numbness gloving her spine.

�Iłve got worse news," her familiar said. The voice was an
echo of Sorałs own, but an octave lower and calmer; like a slightly older and
more sensible sister. �Iłm sorry, but I had to lie to you. My highest duty is
your preservation. I knew that if I didnłt lie, you wouldnłt save yourself."

Sora thought about that, while she watched the ship die from
the vantage point of her pod. The Husker weapons had hit its middle sphere,
barely harming the parasol of the swallowscoop.

Bodies fell into space, stiff and tiny as snowflakes. Light
licked from the sphere. Snipe became a flower of hurting whiteness, darkening
as it bloomed.

�What did you lie about?"

�About Verdin. Iłm sorry. He didnłt make it. None of them
did."

Sora waited for the impact of the words; aware that what she
felt now was only a precursor to the shock, like the moment when she touched
the hot barrel of a gun in warcreche, and her fingers registered the heat but
the pain itself did not arrive instantly, giving her time to prepare for its
sting. She waited, for what she knew
in all likelihood
would be the worst
thing she had ever felt. And waited.

�Whatłs wrong with me? Why donłt I feel anything?"

�Because Iłm not allowing it. Not just now. If you opt to
grieve at some later point then I can restore the appropriate brain functions."

Sora thought about that, too.

�You couldnłt make it sound any more clinical, could you?"

�Donłt imagine this is easy for me, Sora. I donłt exactly
have a great deal of experience in this matter."

�Well, now youłre getting it."

She was alone; no arguing with that. None of the other crew
had survived
and she had only mde it because she was on punishment duty for
her failings as a oldier. No use looking fin help: the nearest Cohort
motherbase was seventy light-years toward the Galactic Core. Even if ther were
swallowships within broadcast range it would take decades for the nearest to
hear her; decades again for them to curve around and rescue her. No; she would
not be rescued. She would drift here, circling a nameless sun, until her energy
reserves could not even sustain frostwatch.

�What about the enemy?" Sora said, seized by an urge to gaze
upon her nemesis. �Where are the bastards?"

A map of the system scrolled on tie faceplate of her helmet,
overlaid with the four Husker ships tha had survived the slingshot around the
neutron star. They were near the two Ways that punched through the system;
marked on the map as fine straight flaws, surrounded by shaded hazard regions.
Perhaps, like the Cohort, the Huskers were trying to find a way to enter the
Waynet without being killed; trying to gain the initial edge in a war that had
lasted twenty-three thousand years. The Huskers had been at war with the Cohort
ever since these ruthless alien cyborgs had emerged from ancient Dyson spheres
near the Galactic Core.

�Theyłre not interested in me," Soa said. �They know that,
even if anyone survived the attack, hey wonłt survive much longer. Thatłs
right, isnłt it?"

�Theyłre nothing if not pragmatic."�

�I want to die. I want you to put ne to sleep painlessly and
then kill me. You can do that, canłt you? I mean, if I order it?"

Sora did not complete her next nought. What happened, instead,
was that her consciousness staled, except for the awareness of the familiar,
thoughts bleeding; into her own. She had experienced something like this
stalling; aboard Snipe, when the crew went into frostwatch for the lonest
transits between engagements. But no frostwatch had ever fit this long. After
an age, her thoughts oozed back to life. She groped for the mental routines
that formed language.

�You lied again!"

�This time I plead innocence. I just put you in a position
where you couldnłt give me the order you were about to. Seemed the best thing
under the circumstances."

�Iłll bet it did." In that instant of staled thought, the
pod had turned opaque, concealing the starscape and the debris of the ship. �What
else?"

The pod turned glassy across its upper surface, revealing a
slowly wheeling starscape above filthy ice. The glass, once perfectly
transparent, now had a smoky luster. �Once you were sleeping," the familiar
said, �I used the remaining fuel to guide the pod to a cometary shard. It
seemed safer than drifting."

�How long?" Sora was trying to guess from the state of the
pod, but the interior looked as new as when she had ejected from Snipe. The
sudden smokiness of the glass was alarming, however: Sora did not want to think
how many years of cosmic ray abrasion would be required to scuff the material
to that degree. �Are we talking years or decades, or more than that?"

�Shall I tell you why I woke you, first?"

�If itłs going to make any difference ..."

�I think it makes all the difference, quite frankly." The
familiar paused for effect. �Someone has decided to pay this system a visit."

Sora saw it on the map now, revised to account for the new
relative positions of the celestial bodies in this system. The new ship was
denoted by a lilac arrow, moving slowly between Waynet transit nodes; the
thickened points where the Way lines interecepted the ecliptic plane.

�It must have a functioning syrinx," Sora said, marveling,
and for the first time feeling as if death was not the immediately preferable
option. �It must be able to use the Ways!"

�Worth waking you up for, I think."

Sora had eight hours to signal the ship before it reached
the other node of the Waynet. She left the pod
stiff, aching, and disorientated,
but basically functional
and walked to the edge of a crater; one that the
familiar had mapped some years earlier. Three thousand years earlier, to be
precise, for that was how long it had taken to scratch the sheen from the
glass. The news had been shocking, at first
until Sora realized that the span
of time was not in itself important. All that she had ever known was the ship;
now that it was gone, it hardly mattered how much time had passed.

Yet now there was this newcomer. Sora crisscrossed the
crater, laying a line of metallic monofilament; doubling back on her trail many
times until a glistening scribble covered the crater. It looked like the work
of a drunken spider, but the familiar assured her it would focus more than
satisfactorily at radio frequencies.

As for the antenna, that was where Sora came in: her suit
was sheathed in a conductive epidermis; a shield against plasma and ion-beam
weaponry. By modulating current through it, the familiar could generate pulses
of radio emission. The radio waves would fly away from Sora in all directions,
but a good fraction would be reflected back from the crater in parallel lines.
Sora had to make gliding jumps from one rim of the crater to the other, so that
she passed through the focus momentarily, synchronized to the intervals when
the other ship entered view.

After two hours of light-transit time, the newcomer vectored
toward the shard. When it was much closer, Sora secreted herself in a snowhole
and set her suit to thermal stealth-mode. The ship nosed in; stiletto-sleek,
devilishly hard to see against the stars. It was elongated, carbon-black, and
nubbed by propulsion modules and weapons of unguessable function, arrayed
around the hull like remora. Yet it carried Cohort markings, and had none of
the faintly organic attributes of a Husker vessel. Purple flames knifed from
the shipłs belly, slowing it over the crater. After examining the mirror, the
ship moved toward the pod and anchored itself to the ice with grapples.

�How did something that small ever get here?"

�Doesnłt need to be big," the familiar said. �Not if it uses
the Waynets."

After a few minutes, an access ramp lowered down, kissing
the ice. A spacesuited figure ambled down the ramp. He moved toward the pod,
kicking up divots of frost. The man
he was clearly male, judging by the
contours of his suit
knelt down and examined the pod. Ribbed and striped by
luminous paint, his suit made him seem naked, scarred by ritual marks of
warriorhood. He fiddled with the sleeve, unspooling something before shunting
it into a socket in the side of the pod. Then he stood there, head slightly
cocked.

�Nosy bastard," Sora whispered.

�Donłt be so ungrateful. Hełs trying to rescue you."

�Are you in yet?"

�Canłt be certain." The familiar had copied part of itself
into the pod before Sora had left. �His suit might not even have the capacity
to store me."

�Iłm going to make my presence known."

�Be careful, will you?"

Sora stood, dislodging a flurry of ice. The man turned to hersharply,
the spool disengaging from the pod and whisking back into his sleeve. The
stripes on his suit flicked over to livid reds and oranges. He opened a fist to
reveal something lying in his palm; a designator for the weapons on the ship,
swiveling out from the hull like snakełs heads.

�If I were you," the familiar said, �Iłd assume the most submissive
posture you can think of."

�Sod that."

Sora took steps forward, trying not to let her fear
translate into clumsiness. Her radio chirped to indicate that she was online to
the other suit.

�Who are you? Can you understand me?"

�Perfectly well," the man said, after negligible hesitation.
His voice was deep and actorly; devoid of any accent Sora knew. �Youłre Cohort.
We speak Main, give or take a few kiloyears of linguistic drift."

�You speak it pretty well for someone whołs been out there
for ten thousand years."

�And how would one know that?"

�Do the sums. Your shipłs from seven thousand years earlier
than my own era. And Iłve just taken three thousand years of catnap."

�Ah. Perhaps if Iłd arrived in time to waken you with a kiss
you wouldnłt be quite so grumpy. But your point was?

�We shouldnłt be able to understand each other at all. Which
makes me wonder if youłre lying to me."

�I see." For a moment she thought he heard him chuckling to
himself; almost a catlike purring. �What Iłm wondering is why I need to listen
to this stuff and nonsense, given that Iłm not the one in current need of
rescuing."

His suit calmed; aggressor markings cooling to neutral blues
and yellows. He let his hand drop slowly.

�Iłd say," the familiar said, �that he has a fairly good
point." Sora stepped closer. �Iłm a little edgy, thatłs all. Comes with the
territory."

�You were attacked?"

�Slightly. A swarm took out my swallowship."

�Bad show," the man said, nodding. �Havenłt seen
swallow-ships for two and a half kiloyears. Too hard for the halo factories to
manufacture, once the Huskers started targeting motherbases. The Cohort
regressed again
fell back on fusion pulse drives. Before very long theyłll be
back to generation starships and chemical rockets."

�Thanks for all the sympathy."

�Sorry ... it wasnłt my intention to sound callous. Itłs
simply that Iłve been traveling. It gives one a certain
how shall I say?
Loftiness of perspective? Means Iłve kept more up to date with current affairs
than you have. Thatłs how I understand you." With his free hand he tapped the
side of his helmet. �Iłve a database of languages running half way back to the
Flourishing."

�Bully for you. Who are you, by the way?"

�Ah. Of course. Introductions." He reached out the free
hand, this time in something approximating welcome. �Merlin."

It was impossible; it cut against all common sense, but she
knew who he was.

It was not that they had ever met. But everyone knew of Merlin:
there was no word for him other than legend. Seven, or more properly ten
thousand years ago, it was Merlin who had stolen something from the Cohort,
vanishing into the Galaxy on a quest for what could only be described as a
weapon too dreadful to use. He had never been seen again
until, apparently,
now.

�Thanks for rescuing me," Sora said, when he had shown her
to the bridge of the ship he called Tyrant; a spherical chamber outfitted with
huge black control seats, facing a window of flawless metasapphire overlooking
cometary ice.

�Donłt overdo the gratitude," the familiar said.

Merlin shrugged. �Youłre welcome."

�And sorry if I acted a little edgy."

�Forget it. As you say, comes with the territory. Actually,
Iłm rather glad I found you. You wouldnłt believe how scarce human company is
these days."

�Nobody ever said it was a friendly Galaxy."

�Less so now, believe me. Now the Cohortłs started losing
whole star-systems. Iłve seen world after world shattered by the Huskers; whole
strings of orbiting habitats gutted by nuclear fire. The warłs in its terminal
stages, and the Cohort isnłt in anything resembling a winning position." Merlin
leaned closer to her, sudden enthusiasm burning in his eyes. �But Iłve found
something that can make a difference, Sora. Or at least, I have rather a good
idea where one might find it."

She nodded slowly.

�Letłs see. That wouldnłt be Merlinłs fabulous gun, by any
chance?"

�Youłre still not entirely sure Iłm who I say I am, are you?"

�Iłve one or two nagging doubts."

�Youłre right, of course." He sighed theatrically and
gestured around the bridge. In the areas not reserved for control readouts, the
walls were adorned with treasure: trinkets, finery, and jewels of staggering
artistry and beauty, glinting with the hues of the rarest alloys, inset with
precious stones, shaped by the finest lapidary skill of a thousand worlds.
There were chips of subtly colored ceramic, or tiny white-light holograms of
great brilliance. There were daggers and brooches, ornate ceremonial lasers and
bracelets, terrible swords and grotesque, carnelian-eyed carnival masques.

�I thought," Merlin said, �that this would be enough to convince
you."

He had sloughed the outer layer of his suit, revealing
himself to be what she had on some level feared: a handsome, broad-shouldered
man who in every way conformed to the legend she had in mind. Merlin dressed
luxuriously, encrusted in jewelry which was, nonetheless, at the dour end of
the spectrum compared to what was displayed on the walls. His beard was
carefully trimmed and his long auburn hair hung loose, evoking leonine
strength. He radiated magnificence.

�Oh, itłs pretty impressive," Sora said. �Even if a good
fraction of it must have been looted. And maybe I am half convinced. But you
have to admit, itłs quite a story."

�Not from my perspective." He was fiddling with an intricate
ring on one forefinger. �Since I left on my quest"
he spoke the word with
exquisite distaste
�Iłve lived rather less than eleven years of subjective
time. I was as horrified as anyone when I found my little hunt had been
magnified into something so ... epic."

�Bet you were."

�When I left, there was an unstated expectation that the war
could be won, within a handful of centuries." Merlin snapped his fingers at a
waiting proctor and had it bring a bowl of fruit. Sora took a plum, examining
it suspiciously before consigning it to her mouth. �But even then," Merlin
continued, �things were on the turn. I could see it, if no one else could."

�So you became a mercenary."

�Freelancer, if you donłt mind. Point was, I realized that I
could better serve humanity outside the Cohort. And old legends kept tickling
the back of my mind." He smiled. �You see, even legends are haunted by legends!"

He told her the rest, which, in diluted form, she already
knew. Yet it was fascinating to hear it from Merlinłs lips; to hear the kernel
of truth at the core of something around which falsehoods and half-truths had
accreted like dust around a protostar. He had gathered many stories, from
dozens of human cultures predating the Cohort, spread across thousands of
light-years and dispersed through tens of thousands of years of history. The
similarities were not always obvious, but Merlin had sifted common patterns,
piecing together
as well as he could
an underlying framework of what might
just be fact.

�Therełd been another war," Merlin said. �Smaller than ours,
spread across a much smaller volume of space
but no less brutal for all that."

�How long ago was this?"

�Forty or forty five kiloyears ago
not long after the
Way-makers vanished, but about twenty kays before anything wełd recognize as
the Cohort." Merlinłs eyes seemed to gaze over; an odd, stentorian tone entered
his voice �In the long dark centuries of Mid-Galactic history, when a thousand
cultures rose, each imagining themselves immune to time, and whose shadows
barely reach us across the millennia ..."

�Yes. Very poetic. What kind of war, anyway? Human versus
human, or human versus alien, like this one?"

�Does it matter? Whoever the enemy were, they arenłt coming
back. Whatever was used against them was so deadly, so powerful, so awesome,
that it stopped an entire war!"

�Merlinłs gun."

He nodded, lips tight, looking almost embarrassed. �As if I
had some prior claim on it, or was even in some sense responsible for it!" He
looked at Sora very intently, the glittering finery of the ship reflected in
the gold of his eyes. �I havenłt seen the gun, or even been near it, and itłs
only recently that Iłve had anything like a clear idea of what it might
actually be."

�But you think you know where it is?"

�I think so. It isnłt far. And itłs in the eye of a storm."They
lifted from the shard, spending eight days in transit to the closest Way, most
of the time in frostwatch. Sora had her own quarters; a spherical-walled suite
deep in Tyrantłs thorax, outfitted in maroon and burgundy. The ship was small,
but fascinating to explore, an object lesson in the differences between the
Cohort that had manufactured this ship, and the one Sora had been raised in. In
many respects, the ship was more advanced than anything from her own time,
especially in the manner of its propulsion, defenses, and sensors. In other
areas, the Cohort had gained expertise since Merlinłs era. Merlinłs proctors
were even stupider than those Sora had been looking after when the Husker
attack began. There were no familiars in Merlinłs time, either, and she saw no
reason to educate him about her own neural symbiote.

�Well," Sora said, when she was alone. �What can you tell me
about the legendary Merlin?"

�Nothing very much at this point." The familiar had been
communicating with the version of itself that had infiltrated Tyrant, via
Merlinłs suit. �If hełs impersonating the historical figure we know as Merlin,
hełs gone to extraordinary lengths to make the illusion authentic. All the logs
confirm that his ship left Cohort-controlled space around ten kiloyears ago,
and that hełs been traveling ever since."

�Hełs back from somewhere. It would help if we knew where."

�Tricky, given that we have no idea about the deep topology
of the Waynet. I can search the starfields for recognizable features, but itłll
take a long time, and therełll still be a large element of guesswork."

�There must be something you can show me."

�Of course." The familiar sounded slightly affronted. �I
found images. Some of the formats are obscure, but I think I can make sense of
most of them." And even before Sora had answered, the familiar had warmed a
screen in one hemisphere of the suite. Visual records of different solar
systems appeared, each entry displayed for a second before being replaced. Each
consisted of an orbital map; planets and Waynet nodes were marked relative to
each systemłs sun. The worlds were annotated with enlarged images of each,
overlaid with sparse astrophysical and military data, showing the roles
if
any
they had played in the war. Merlin had visited other places, too.
Squidlike protostellar nebulae, stained with green and red and flecked by the
light of hot blue stars. Supernova remnants, the eviscera of gored stars, a
hundred of which had died since the Flourishing, briefly outshining the galaxy.

�What do you think he was looking for?" Sora said. �These
points must have been on the Waynet, but theyłre a long way from anything wełd
call civilization."

�I donłt know. Souvenir hunting?"

�Are you sure Merlin canłt tell youłre accessing this information?"

�Absolutely
but why should it bother him unless hełs got
something to hide?"

�Debatable point." Sora looked around to the sealed door of
her quarters, half expecting Merlin to enter at any moment. It was absurd, of
course
from its present vantage point, the familiar could probably tell
precisely where Merlin was in the ship, and give Sora adequate warning. But she
still felt uneasy, even as she asked the inevitable question. �What else?"

�Oh, plenty. Even some visual records of the man himself,
caught on the internal cameras."

�Sorry. A healthy interest in where hełs been is one thing,
but spying on him is something else."

�Would it change things if I told you that Merlin hasnłt
been totally honest with us?"

�You said he hadnłt lied."

�Not about anything significant
which makes this all the odder.
There." The familiar sounded quietly pleased with itself. �Youłre curious now,
arenłt you?"

Sora sighed. �Youłd better show me."

Merlinłs face appeared on the screen, sobbing. He seemed
slightly older to her, although it was difficult to tell, since most of his
face was caged behind his hands. She could hardly make out what he was saying,
between each sob.

�Thousands of hours of this sort of thing," the familiar
said. �They started out as serious attempts at keeping a journal, but soon
deteriorated into a form of catharsis."

�Iłd say he did well to stay sane at all."

�More than you realize. We know hełs been gone ten thousand
years
just as he told us. Well and good. Thatłs objective time. But he also
said that eleven years of shiptime had passed."

�And that isnłt the case?"

�I suspect that may be, to put a diplomatic gloss on it, a
slight underestimate. By a considerable number of decades. And I donłt think he
spent much of that time in frostwatch."

Sora tried to remember what she knew of the methods of longevity
available to the Cohort in Merlinłs time. �He looks older than he does now

doesnłt he?"

The familiar chose not to answer.

When the transit to the Way was almost over, Merlin called
her to the bridge.

�Wełre near the transit node," he said. �Take a seat,
because the insertion can be a little ... interesting."

�Transition to Waynet in three hundred seconds," said the
shipłs cloyingly calm voice.

The crescent of the cockpit window showed a starfield transected
by a blurred, twinkling filament, like a solitary wave crossing a lake at
midnight. Sora could see blurred stars through the filament, wide as her
outspread hand, widening by the second. A thickening in it like a bulge along a
snake was the transit node; a point, coincidental with the ecliptic, where
passage into the accelerated spacetime of the Way was possible. Although the
Waynet stream was transparent, there remained a ghostly sense of dizzying
motion.

�Are you absolutely sure you know what youłre doing?"

�Goodness, no." Merlin was reclining back in his seat,
booted feet up on the console, hands knitted behind his neck. Ancient orchestral
music was piping into the room, building up to a magnificent and doubtless
delicately timed climax. �Which isnłt to say that this isnłt an incredibly
tricky maneuver, of course, requiring enormous skill and courage."

�What worries me is that you might be right."

Sora remembered the times Captain Tchagra had sent probes
into the Waynet, only to watch as each was shredded, sliced apart by momentum
gradients that could flense matter down to its fundamentals. The Waynet
twinkled because tiny grains of cosmic dust were constantly drifting into it,
each being annihilated in a pretty little flash of exotic radiation. Right now,
she thought, they were crusing toward that boundary, dead set on what ought to
have been guaranteed destruction.

She tried to inject calm into her voice. �So how did you
come by the syrinx, Merlin?"

�Isnłt much to look at, you know. A black cone, about as
long as youłre tall. Even in my era we couldnłt make them, or even safely
dismantle the few we still had. Very valuable things."

�The Cohort werenłt overly thrilled that you stole one ,
according to the legend."

�As if they cared. They had so few left, they were too scared
to actually use them."

Sora buckled herself into a seat.

She knew roughly what was about to happen, although no one
had understood the details for tens of thousands of years. Just before hitting
the Way, the syrinx would chirp a series eel quantum-gravitational fluctuations
at the boundary layer, the skin, no thicker than a Planck-length, which
separated normal spacetime from the rushing spacetime contained within the Way.
For an instant, the momentum gradients would relax, allowing the ship to enter the
accelerated medium without being sliced.

That was the theory, anyway.

The music reached its crescendo now, shipłs thrust notching
higher, pushing Sora and Merlin back into their seats. The shriek of the
propulsion system merged with the shriek of violins, too harmoniously to be
accidental. Merlinłs look of quiet amusement did not falter. A cascade of
liquid notes played over the music; the song of the syrinx translated into the
audio spectrum.

There was a peak of thrust, then the impulse ended abruptly,
along with the music.

Sora looked to the exterior view.

For a moment, it seemed as if the stars, and the nearer
planets and sun of this system, hadnłt actually changed at all. But after a few
seconds, she saw that they burned appreciably brighter
and, it seemed, bluer

in one hemisphere of the sky, redder and dimmer in the other. And they were
growing bluer and redder by the moment, and now bunching, swimming like shoals
of luminous fish, obeying relativistic currents. A planet slammed past from out
of nowhere, distorted as if squeezed in a fist. The system seemed frozen behind
them, shot through with red like an iron orrery snatched from the forge.

�Transition to Waynet achieved," said the ship.

Later, Merlin took her down to the forward observation blister,
a pressurized sphere of metasapphire that could be pushed beyond the hull like
a protruding eye. The walls were opaque when they arrived, and when Merlin
sealed the entry hatch, it turned the same shade of grey, merging seamlessly.

�Not to alarm you or anything," the familiar said. �But I
canłt communicate with the copy of myself from in here. That means I canłt help
you if ..."

Sora kissed Merlin, silencing the voice in her head. �Iłm sorry,"
she said, almost instantly. �It seemed ..."

�Like the right thing to do?" Merlinłs smile was difficult
to judge, but he did not seem displeased.

�No, not really. Probably the wrong thing, actually."

�Iłd be lying if I said I didnłt find you attractive, Sora.
And like I said
it has been rather a long time since I had human company." He
drew himself to her, their free-floating bodies hooking together in the center
of the blister, slowly turning until all sense of orientation was gone. �Of
course, my reasons for rescuing you were entirely selfless ...."

�... of course ...."

�But I wonłt deny that there was a small glimmer of hope at
the back of my mind; the tiniest spark of fantasy ...."

They shed their clothes, untidy bundles which orbited around
their coupled bodies. They began to make love, slowly at first, and then with
increasing energy, as if it was only now that Sora was fully waking from the
long centuries of frostwatch.

She thought of Verdin, and then hated herself for the crass
biochemical predictability of her mind, the unfailing way it dredged up the
wrong memories at the worst of times. What had happened back then, what had
happened between them, was three thousand years in the past, unrecorded by
anything or anyone except herself. She had not even mourned him yet, not even
allowed the familiar to give her that particular indulgence. She studied
Merlin, looking for hints of his true age ... and failed, utterly, to detach
the part of her mind capable of the job.

�Do you want to see something glorious?" Merlin asked,
later, after they had hung together wordlessly for many minutes.

�If you think you can impress me ..."

He whispered to the ship, causing the walls to lose their
opacity.

Sora looked around. By some trick of holographics, the ship
itself was not visible at all from within the blister. It was just her and
Merlin, floating free.

And what she saw beyond them was indeed glorious
even if
some detached part of her mind knew that the view could not be completely
natural, and that in some way the hues and intensities of light had been
shifted to aid comprehension. The walls of the Waynet slammed past at eye
wrenching speed, illuminated by the intense, doppler-shifted annihilation of
dust particles, so that it seemed as if they were flying in the utmost
darkness, down a tube of twinkling violet that reached toward infinity. The
spacetime in which the ship drifted like a seed moved so quickly that the difference
between its speed and light amounted to only one part in a hundred billion.
Once a second in subjective time, the ship threaded itself through shining
hoops as wide as the Waynet itself; constraining rings spaced eight light-hours
apart, part of the inscrutable exotic-matter machinery that had serviced this
Galaxy-spanning transit system. Ahead, all the stars in the universe crowded
into an opalescent jeweled mass, hanging ahead like a congregation of bright
angels. It was the most beautiful thing she had ever seen.

�Itłs the only way to travel," Merlin said.

The journey would take four days of shiptime: nineteen centuries
of worldtime.

The subjective time spent in Waynet flight amounted only to
twenty-three hours. But the ship had to make many transitions between Ways, and
they were never closer than tens of light-minutes apart, presumably because of
the nightmarish consequences that would ensue if two opposing streams of
accelerated spacetime ever touched.

�Arenłt you worried wełll wander into Huskers, Merlin?"

�Worth it for the big reward, wouldnłt you say?"

�Tell me more about this mystical gun, and I might believe
you."

Merlin settled back in his seat, drawing a deep breath. �Almost
everything I know could be wrong."

�Iłll take that risk."

�Whatever it was, it was fully capable of destroying whole
worlds. Even stars, if the more outlandish stories are to be believed." He
looked down at his hand, as if suddenly noticing his impeccably manicured
fingernails.

�Ask him how he thinks it works," the familiar said. �Then
at least wełll have an idea how thorough hełs been."

She put the question to Merlin, as casually as she could.

�Gravity," he said. �Isnłt that obvious? It may be a weak
force, but there isnłt anything in the universe that doesnłt feel it."

�Like a bigger version of the syrinx?"

Merlin shrugged. Sora realized that it was not his
fingernails to which he was paying attention, but the ornate ring she had
noticed before, inset with a ruby stone in which two sparks seemed to orbit
like fireflies. �Itłs almost certainly the product of Waymaker science. A
posthuman culture that was able to engineer
to mechanize
spacetime. But I
donłt think it worked like the syrinx. I think it made singularities; that it
plucked globules of mass energy from vacuum and squashed them until they were
within their own event horizons."

�Black holes," the familiar said, and Sora echoed her words
aloud.

Merlin looked pleased. �Very small ones; atomic-scale. It
doped them with charge, then accelerated them up to something only marginally
less than the speed of light. They didnłt have time to decay. For that, of
course, it needed more energy, and more still just to prevent itself being
ripped apart by the stresses.

�A gun that fires black holes? Wełd win, wouldnłt we? With
something like that? Even if there was only one of them?" Merlin fungered the
ruby-centered ring.

�Thatłs the general idea."

Sora took Merlinłs hand, stroking the fingers, until her own
alighted on the ring. It was more intricate than she had realized before. The
twin sparks were whirling around each other, glints of light locked in a waltz,
as if driven by some microscopic clockwork buried in the ruby itself.

�What does it mean?" she asked, sensing that this was both
the wrong and the right question.

�It means ..." Merlin smiled, but it was a moment before he
completed the sentence. �It means, I suppose, that I should remember death."

They fell out of the Way for the last time, entering a
system that did not seem markedly different than a dozen others they had
skipped through. The star was a yellow main-sequence sun, accompanied by the
usual assortment of rocky worlds and gas giants. The second and third planets
out from the sun were steaming hot cauldrons, enveloped by acidic atmosphere at
crushing temperature, the victims of runaway heat-trapping processes, the third
more recently than the second. The fourth planet was smaller, and seemed to
have been the subject of a terraforming operation that had taken place some
time after the Flourishing: its atmosphere, though thin, was too dense to be
natural. Thirteen separate Ways punched through the systemłs ecliptic at
different angles, safely distant from planetary and asteroidal orbits.

�Itłs a Nexus," Merlin said. �A primary Waynet interchange.
You find systems like this every thousand or so light-years through the plane
of the Galaxy, and a good way out of it as well. Back when everyone used the
Waynet, this system would have been a meeting point, a place where traders
swapped goods and tales from half-way to the Core."

�Bit of a dump now, though, isnłt it."

�Perfect for hiding something very big and very nasty, provided
you remember where it was you hid it."

�You mentioned something about a storm ..."

�Youłll see."

The Way had dropped them in the inner part of the system,
but Merlin said that what he wanted was further out, beyond the systemłs major
asteroid belt. It would take a few days to reach.

�And what are we going to do when we get there?" Sora asked.
�Just pick this thing up and take it with us?"

�Not exactly," Merlin said. �I suspect it will be harder
than that. Not so hard that we havenłt got a chance, but hard enough ..." He
seemed to falter, perhaps for the first time since she had known him; that aura
of supreme confidence cracking minutely.

�What part do you want me to play?"

�Youłre a soldier," he said. �Figure that out for yourself."

�I donłt know quite what it is Iłve found," the familiar
said, when she was again alone. �Iłve been waiting to show you, but hełs had
you in those war simulations for hours. Either that or you two have been
occupying yourselves in other ways. Any idea what hełs planning?"

Merlin had a simulator, a smaller version of the combat-training
modules Sora knew from warcreche.

�A lot of the simulations had a common theme: an attack
against a white pyramid."�Implying some foreknowledge, wouldnłt you say? As if
Merlin knows something of what he will find?"

�Iłve had that feeling ever since we met him." She was thinking
of the smell of him, the shockingly natural way their bodies meshed, despite
their being displaced by thousands of years. She tried to flush those thoughts
from her mind. What they were now discussing was a kind of betrayal, on a more
profound level than anything committed so far, because it lacked any innocence.
�What is it, then?"

�Iłve been scanning the later log files, and Iłve found something
that seems significant, something that seemed to mark a turning point in his
hunt for the weapon. I have no idea what it was. But it took me until now to
realize just how strange it was."

�Another system?"

�A very large structure, nowhere near any star, but
nonetheless accessible by Waynet."

�A Waymaker artifact, then."

�Almost certainly."

The structure was visible on the screen. It looked like a
childłs toy star, or a metallic starfish, textured in something that resembled
beaten gold or the luster of insect wings, filigreed in a lacework of
exotic-matter scaffolds. It filled most of the view, shimmering with its own
soft illumination.

�This is what Merlin would have seen with his naked eyes,
just after his ship left the Way."

�Very pretty." She had meant the remark to sound glib, but
it came out as a statement of fact.

�And large. The objectłs more than ten light-minutes away,
which makes it more than four light-minutes in cross-section. Comfortably
larger than any star on the main sequence. And yet somehow it holds itself in
shape
in quite preposterous shape
against what must be unimaginable
self-gravity. Merlin, incidentally, gave it the name Brittlestar, which seems
as good as any."

�Poetic bastard." Poetic sexy bastard, she thought.

�Therełs more, if youłre interested. I have access to the
sensor records from the ship, and I can tell you that the Brittlestar is a
source of intense gravitational radiation. Itłs like a beacon, sitting there,
pumping out gravity waves from somewhere near its heart. Therełs something
inside it that is making spacetime ripple periodically."

�You think Merlin went inside it, donłt you?"

�Something happened, thatłs for sure. This is the last log
Merlin filed, on his approach to the object, before a month-long gap."

It was another mumbled soliloquy
except this time, his
sobs were of something other than despair. Instead, they sounded like the sobs
of the deepest joy imaginable. As if, finally, he had found what he was looking
for, or at least knew that he was closer than ever, and that the final prize
was not far from reach. But that was not what made Sora shiver. It was the face
she saw. It was Merlin, beyond any doubt. But his face was lined with age, and
his eyes were those of someone older than anyone Sora had ever known.

The fifth and sixth planets were the largest.

The fifth was the heavier of the two, zones of differing
chemistry banding it from tropic to pole, girdled by a ring system that was
itself braided by the resonant forces of three large moons. Merlin believed
that the ring system had been formed since the Flourishing. A cloud of radiation-drenched
human relics orbited the world, dating from unthinkably remote eras; perhaps
earlier than the Waymaker time. Merlin swept the cloud with sensors tuned to
sniff out weapons systems, or the melange of neutrino flavors that betokened
Husker presence. The sweeps all returned negative.

�You know where the gun is?" Sora asked.

�I know how to reach it, which is all that matters."

�Maybe itłs time to start being a little less cryptic.
Especially if you want me to help you."

He looked wounded, as if she had ruined a game hours in the
making. �I just thought youłd appreciate the thrill of the chase."

�This isnłt about the thrill of the chase, Merlin. Itłs
about the nastiest weapon imaginable and the fact that we have to get our hands
on it before the enemy, so that we can incinerate them first. So we can commit
xenocide." She said it again: �Xenocide. Sorry. Doesnłt that conform to your
romantic ideals of the righteous quest?"

�It wonłt be xenocide," he said, touching the ring again,
nervously. �Listen: I want that gun as much as you do. Thatłs why I chased it
for ten thousand years." Was it her imagination, or had the ring not been on
his hand in any of the recordings she had seen of him? She remembered the old
manłs hands she had seen in the last recording, the one taken just before his
time in the Brittlestar, and she was sure they carried no ring. Now Merlinłs
voice was matter of fact."The structure we want is on the outermost moon."

�Let me guess. A white pyramid?"

He offered a smile. �Couldnłt be closer if you tried."

They fell into orbit around the gas giant. All the moons
showed signs of having been extensively industrialized since the Flourishing,
but the features that remained on their surfaces were gouged by millennia of
exposure to sleeting cosmic radiation and micrometeorites. Nothing looked
significantly younger than the surrounding landscapes of rock and ice. Except
for the kilometer-high white pyramid on the third moon, which was in a
sixteen-day orbit around the planet. It looked as if it had been chiseled out
of alabaster some time the previous afternoon.

�Not exactly subtle," Merlin said. �Self-repair mechanisms
must still be functional, to one degree or another, and that implies that the
control systems for the gun will still work. It also means that the
counter-intrusion systems will also be operable."

�Oh, good."

�Arenłt you excited that wełre about to end the longest war
in human history?"

�But wełre not, are we? I mean, be realistic. Itłll take
tens of thousands of years simply for the knowledge of this weaponłs existence
to reach the remotest areas of the war. Nothing will happen overnight."

�I can see why it would disturb you," Merlin said, tapping a
finger against his teeth. �None of us have ever known anything other than war
with the Huskers."

�Just show me where it is."

They made one low orbital pass over the pyramid, alert for buried
weapons, but no attack came. On the next pass, lower still, Merlinłs ship
dropped proctors to snoop ground defenses. �Maybe they had something bigger once,"
Merlin said. �Artillery that could take us out from millions of kilometers. But
if it ever existed, itłs not working anymore."

They made groundfall a kilometer from the pyramid, then
waited for all but three of the proctors to return to the ship. Merlin tasked
the trio to secure a route into the structure, but their use was limited. Once
the simple-minded machines were out of command range of the ship
which
happened as soon as they had penetrated beyond the outer layer of the structure

they were essentially useless.

�Who built the pyramid? And how did you know about it?"

�The same culture who got into the war I told you about," he
said, as they clamped on the armored carapaces of their suits in the airlock. �They
were far less advanced than the Waymakers, but they were a lot closer to them
historically, and they knew enough to control the weapon and use it for their
own purposes."

�Howłd they find it?"

�They stole it. By then the Waymaker culture was
how shall
I put it
sleeping? Not really paying due attention to the use made of its
artifacts?"

�Youłre being cryptic again, Merlin."

�Sorry. Solitude does that to you."

�Did you meet someone out there, Merlin
someone who knew
about the gun, and told you where to find it?" And made you young in the
process? she thought.

�My business, isnłt it?"

�Maybe once. Now, Iłd say wełre in this together. Equal partners.
Fair enough?"

�Nothingłs fair in war, Sora." But he was smiling, defusing
the remark, even as he slipped his helmet down over the neck ring, twisting it
to engage the locking mechanism.

�How big is the gun?" Sora asked.

The pyramid rose ahead, blank as an origami sculpture, entrance
ducts around the base concealed by intervening landforms. Merlinłs proctors had
already found a route that would at least take them some way inside.

�You wonłt be disappointed," Merlin said.

�And what are we going to do when we find it? Just drag it behind
us?"

�Trust me." Merlinłs laugh crackled over the radio. �Moving
it wonłt be a problem."

They walked slowly along a track cleared by proctors,
covered at the same time by the hull-mounted weapons on Tyrant.

�Therełs something ahead," Merlin said, a few minutes later.
He raised his own weapon and pointed toward a pool of darkness fifteen or
twenty meters in front of them. �Itłs artifactual; definitely metallic."

�I thought your proctors cleared the area."

�Looks like they missed something."

Merlin advanced ahead of her. As they approached the dark object,
it resolved into an elongated form half buried in the ice, a little to the left
of the track. It was a body.

�Been here a while," Merlin said, a minute or so later, when
he was close enough to see the object properly. �Armorłs pitted by
micrometeorite impacts."

�Itłs a Husker, isnłt it."

Merlinłs helmet nodded. �My guess is they were in this
system a few centuries ago. Must have been attracted by the pyramid, even if
they didnłt necessarily know its significance."

�Iłve never seen one this close. Be careful, wonłt you?

Merlin knelt down to examine the creature.

The shape was much more androform than Sora had been expecting,
the same general size and proportions as a suited human. The suit was festooned
with armored protrusions, ridges, and horns, its blackened outer surface
leathery and devoid of anything genuinely mechanical. One arm was outspread,
terminating in a human-looking hand, complexly gauntleted. A long knobby weapon
lay just out of reach, lines blurred by the same processes of erosion that had
afflicted the Husker.

Merlin clamped his hands around the head.

�What are you doing?"

�What does it look like?" He was twisting now; she could
hear the grunts of exertion, before his suitłs servosystems came online and
took the brunt of the effort. �Iłve always wanted to find one this
well-preserved," Merlin said. �Never thought Iłd get a chance to tell if an old
rumor was even half-way right."

The helmet detached from the creaturełs torso, cracking open
along a fine seam which ran from the crown to the beaklike protrusion at the
helmetłs front. Vapor pulsed from the gap. Merlin placed the separated halves
of the helmet on the ground, then tapped on his helmet torch, bringing light
down on the exposed head. Sora stepped closer. The Huskerłs head was encased in
curling matte-black support machinery, like a statue enveloped in vine.

But it was well preserved, and very human.

�I donłt like it," she said. �What does it mean?"

�It means," Merlin said, �that occasionally one should pay
proper attention to rumors."

�Talk to me, Merlin. Start telling me what I need to hear,
or we donłt take another step toward that pyramid."

�You will like very little of it."

She looked, out of the corner of her eye, at the marblelike
face of the Husker. �I already donłt like it, Merlin; what have I got to lose?"

Merlin started to say something, then fell to the ground,
executing the fall with the slowness that came with the moonłs feeble gravity.

�Oh, nice timing," the familiar said.

Reflexes drove Sora down with him, until the two of them
were crouching low on the rusty surface. Merlin was still alive. She could hear
him breathing, but each breath came like the rasp of a saw.

�Iłm hit, Sora. I donłt know how badly."

�Hold on." She accessed the telemetry from his suit,
graphing up a medical diagnostic on the inner glass of her helmet.

�There," said the familiar. �A beam-weapon penetration in
the thoracic area; small enough that the self-sealants prevented any pressure
loss, but not rapidly enough to stop the beam gnawing into his chest."

�Is that bad?"

�Well, itłs not good ... but therełs a chance the beam would
have cauterized as it traveled, preventing any deep internal bleeding ...."

Merlin coughed. He managed to ask her what it was. �Youłve
taken a laser hit, I think." She was speaking quickly. �Maybe part of the
pyramid defenses."

�I really should have those proctors of mine checked out."
Merlin managed a laugh which then transitioned into a series of racking coughs.
�Bit late for that now, donłt you think?"

�If I can get you back to the ship ..."

�No. We have to go on." He coughed again, and then was a
long time catching his breath. �The longer we wait, the harder it will be."

�After ten thousand years, youłre worried about a few minutes?"

�Yes, now that the pyramid defenses are alerted."

�Youłre in no shape to move."

�Iłm winded, thatłs all. I think I can ..." His voice
dissolved into coughs, but even while it was happening, Sora watched him push
himself upright. When he spoke again, his voice was hardlya wheeze. �Iłm
gambling there was only one of whatever it was. Otherwise we should never have
made it as far as we did."

�I hope youłre right, Merlin."

�Therełs
um
something else. Shipłs just given me a piece
of not entirely welcome news. A few neutrino sources that werenłt there when we
first got here."

�Oh, great." Sora didnłt need to be told what that meant: a
Husker swarm, one that had presumably been waiting around the gas giant all
along, chilled down below detection thresholds. �Bastards must have been
sleeping, waiting for something to happen here."

�Sounds like a perfectly sensible strategy," the familiar
said, before projecting a map onto Sorałs faceplate, confirming the arrival of
the enemy ships. �One of the moons has a liquid ocean. My guess is that the
Huskers were parked below the ice."

Sora asked Merlin: �How long before they get here?"

�No more than two or three hours."

�Right. Then wełd better make damn sure wełve got that gun
by then, right?"

She carried him most of the way, his heels scuffing the
ground in a halfhearted attempt at locomotion. But he remained lucid, and Sora
began to hope that the wound really had been cauterized by the beam-weapon.

�You knew the Husker would be human, didnłt you?" she said,
to keep him talking.

�Told you: rumors. The alien cyborg story was just that
a
fiction our own side invented. I told you it wouldnłt be xenocide."

�Not good enough, Merlin." She was about to tell him about
the symbiote in her head, then drew back, fearful that it would destroy what
trust he had in her. �I know youłve been lying. I hacked your shipłs log."

They had reached the shadow of the pyramid, descending the
last hillock toward the access ports spaced around the rim. �Thought you
trusted me."

�I had to know if there was a reason not to. And I think I
was right."

She told him what she had learnt; that hełd been traveling
for longer than he had told her
whole decades longer, by shiptime
and that
he had grown old in that journey, and perhaps a little insane. And then how he
had seemed to find the Brittlestar.

�Problem is, Merlin, we
I
donłt know what happened to
you in that thing, except that it had something to do with finding the gun, and
you came out of it younger than when you went in!"

�You really want to know?"

�Take a guess."

He started telling her some of it, while she dragged him
toward their destination.

The pyramid was surrounded by tens of meters of
self-repairing armor, white as bone. If the designers had not allowed
deliberate entrances around its rim, Sora doubted that she and Merlin would
ever have found a way to get inside.

�Should have been sentries here, once," said the man leaning
against her shoulder. �Itłs lucky for us that everything falls apart,
eventually."

�Except your fabled gun." They were moving down a sloping
corridor, the walls and ceiling unblemished, the floor strewn with icy debris
from the moonłs surface. �Anyway, stop changing the subject."

Merlin coughed and resumed his narrative. �I was getting
very old and very disillusioned. I hadnłt found the gun and I was about ready
to give up. That or go insane. Then I found the Brittlestar. Came out of the
Waynet and there it was, sitting there pulsing gravity waves at me."

�It would take a pair of neutron stars," the familiar said. �Orbiting
around each other, to generate that kind of signature."

�What happened next?" Sora asked.

�Donłt really remember. Not properly. I went
or was taken

inside it
and there I met ..." He paused, and for a moment she thought it
was because he needed to catch his breath. But that wasnłt the reason. �I met
entities, I suppose youłd call them. I quickly realized that they were just
highly advanced projections of a maintenance program left behind by the
Waymakers."

�They made you young, didnłt they."

�I donłt think it was stretching their capabilities
overmuch, put it like that."

The corridor flattened out, branching in several different
directions. Merlin leant toward one of the routes.

�Why?"

�So I could finish the job. Find the gun."

The corridor opened out into a chamber, a bowl-ceilinged control
room, unpressurized and lit only by the wavering light of their helmets. Seats
and consoles were arrayed around a single spherical projection device, cradled
in ash-colored gimbals. Corpses slumped over some of the consoles, but nothing
remained except skeletons draped in colorless rags. Presumably they had rotted
away for centuries before the chamber was finally opened to vacuum, and even
that would have been more than twenty thousand years ago.

�They must have been attacked by a bioweapon," Merlin said,
easing himself into one of the seats, which
after exhaling a cloud of dust

seemed able to take his weight. �Something that left the machines intact."

Sora walked around, examining the consoles, all of which betrayed
a technology higher than anything the Cohort had known for millennia. Some of
the symbols on them were recognizable antecedents of those used in Main, but
there was nothing she could actually read.

Merlin made a noise that might have been a grunt of suppressed
pain, and when Sora looked at him, she saw that he was spooling the optical
cable from his suit sleeve, just as he had when they had first met on the
cometary shard. He lifted an access panel back on the top of the console,
exposing an intestinal mass of silvery circuits. He seemed to know exactly
where to place the end of the spool, allowing its microscopic cilia to tap into
the ancient system.

The projection chamber was warming to life now: amber light
swelling from its heart, solidifying into abstract shapes, neutral test
representations. For a moment, the chamber showed a schematic of the ringed
giant and its moons, with the locations of the approaching Husker ships marked
with complex ideograms. The familiar was right: their place of sanctuary must
have been the moon with the liquid ocean. Then the shapes flowed liquidly,
zooming in on the gas giant.

�You wanted to know where the gun was," Merlin said. �Well,
Iłm about to show you."

The view enlarged on a cyclonic storm near the planetłs equator,
a great swirling red eye in the atmosphere.

�Itłs a metastable storm," Sora said. �Common feature of gas
giants. Youłre not telling me"

Merlinłs gauntleted fingers were at work now, flying across
an array of keys marked with symbols of unguessable meaning.

�The stormłs natural, of course, or at least it was, before
these people hid the gun inside it, exploiting the pressure differentials hto
old the gun at a fixed point in the atmosphere, for safekeeping. Therełs just
one small problem."

�Go ahead ..."

�The gun isnłt a gun. It functions as weapon, but thatłs
mostly accidental. It certainly wasnłt the intention of the Waymakers." Youłre
losing me, Merlin."

�Maybe I should tell you about the ring."

Something was happening to the surface of the gas giant now.
Le cyclone was not behaving in the manner of other metastable rms Sora had
seen. It was spinning perceptibly, throwing off lies from its curlicued edge
like the tails of seahorses. It was growing a bloodier red by the second.

�Yes," Sora said. �Tell me about the ring."

�The Waymakers gave it to me, when they made me young. s a
reminder of what I have to do. You see, if I fail, it will be very bad for
every thinking creature in this part of the galaxy. what did you see when you
looked at the ring, Sora?"

A red gem, with two lights orbiting inside it."

�Would you be surprised if I told you that the lights
represent o neutron stars; two of the densest objects in the universe? And it
theyłre in orbit about each other, spinning around their mutual center of
gravity?"

�Inside the Brittlestar."

She caught his glance, directed quizzically toward her. �Yes,"
Merlin said slowly. �A pair of neutron stars, born in supernovae, bound
together by gravity, slowly spiraling closer and closer to each other."

The cyclonic storm was whirling insanely now, sparks of atmospheric
lightning flickering around its boundary. Sora the feeling that titanic
and
quite inhuman
energies were being unleashed, as if something very close to
magic was being loyed beneath the clouds. It was the most terrifying thing she
had ever seen.

�I hope you know how to fire this when the time comes, Merlin."

All the knowledge I need is carried by the ring. It taps
into my bloodstream and builds structures in my head that tell me exactly at I
need to know, on a level so deep that I hardly know it self."

�Husker swarm will be within ranger in nintey minutes," the
familiar said, �assuming attack profiles for the usual swarm borer and
charm-torp weapon configurations. Of course, if they have any refinements, they
might be in attack range a little sooner than that ..."

�Merlin: tell me about the neutron stars, will you? I need
something to keep my mind occupied."

�The troublesome part is what happens when they stop spiraling
around each other and collide. Mercifully, itłs a fairly rare event even by
Galactic standards
it doesnłt happen more than once in a million years, and
when it does itłs usually far enough away not to be a problem."

�But if it isnłt far away
how troublesome would it be?"

�Imagine the release of more energy in a second than a
typical star emits in ten billion years: one vast photo-leptonic fireball. An
unimaginably bright pulse of gamma-rays. Instant sterilization for thousands of
light-years in any direction.

The cyclone had grown a central bulge now, a perfectly circular
bruise rising above the surface of the planet. As it rose, towering thousands
of kilometers above the cloud layer, it elongated like a waterspout. Soon, Sora
could see it backdropped against space. And there was something rising within
it.

�The Waymakers tried to stop it, didnłt they."

Merlin nodded. �They found the neutron star binary when they
extended the Waynet deeper into the galaxy. They realized that the two stars
were only a few thousand years from colliding together
and that there was
almost nothing they could do about it."

She could see what she thought was the weapon, now, encased
in the waterspout like a seed. It was huge
larger perhaps than this moon. It
looked fragile, nonetheless, like an impossibly ornate candelabra, or a species
of deep sea medusa, glowing with its own bioluminescence. Sloughing atmosphere,
the thing came to a watchful halt, and the waterspout slowly retracted back
toward the cyclone, which was now slowing, like a monstrous fly wheel grinding
down.

�Nothing?"

�Well
almost nothing."

�They built the Brittlestar around it," Sora said. �A kind of
shield, right? So that, when the stars collided, the flash would be contained?"

�Not even Waymaker science could contain that much energy."
Merlin looked to the projection, seeming to pay attention to the weapon for the
first time. If he felt any elation on seeing his gun for the first time, none
of it was visible on his face. He looked, instead, ashen
as if the years had
suddenly reclaimed what the Waymakers had given him. �All they could do was
keep the stars in check, keep them from spiraling any closer. So they built the
Brittlestar, a vast machine with only one function: to constantly nudge the
orbits of the neutron stars at its heart. For every angstrom that the stars
fell toward each other, the Brittlestar pushed them an angstrom apart. And it was
designed to keep doing that for a million years, until the Waymakers found a
way to shift the entire binary beyond the Galaxy. You want to know how they
kept pushing them apart?"

Sora nodded, though she thought she half-knew the answer already.

�Tiny black holes," Merlin said. �Accelerated close to the
speed of light, each black hole interacting gravitationally with the binary
before evaporating in a puff of pair-production radiation."

�Just the same way the gun functions. Thatłs no coincidence,
is it?"

�The gun
what we call the gun
was just a component in
the Brittlestar; the source of relativistic black holes needed to keep the
neutron stars from colliding."

Sora looked around the room. �And these people stole it?"

�Like I said, they were closer to the Waymakers than us.
They knew enough about them to dismantle part of the Brittlestar, to override
its defenses and remove the mechanism they needed to win their war."

�But the Brittlestar ..."

�Hasnłt been working properly ever since. Its capability to
regenerate itself was harmed when the subsystem was stolen, and the remaining
black-hole generating mechanisms canłt do all the work required. The neutron
stars have continued to spiral closer together
slowly but surely."

�But you said they were only a few thousand years from collision
..."

Merlin had not stopped working the controls in all this
time. The gun had come closer, seemingly oblivious to the ordinary laws of
celestial mechanics. Down below, the planetary surface had returned to
normality, except for a ruddier hue to the storm.

�Maybe now," Merlin said, �youłre beginning to understand
why I want the gun so badly."

�You want to return it, donłt you. You never really wanted
to find a weapon."

�I did, once." Merlin seemed to tap some ffnal reserve of
energy, his voice growing momentarily stronger. �But now Iłm older and wiser.
In less than four thousand years the stars meet, and it suddenly wonłt matter
who wins this war. Wełre like ignorant armies fighting over a patch of land
beneath a rumbling volcano!"

Four thousand years, Sora thought. More time had passed
since she had been born.

�If we donłt have the gun," she said, �we die anyway
wiped
out by the Huskers. Not much of a choice, is it?"

�At least something would survive. Something that might even
still think of itself as human."

�Youłre saying that we should capitulate? That we get our
hands on the ultimate weapon, and then not use it?"

�I never said it was going to be easy, Sora." Merlin pitched
forward, slowly enough that she was able to reach him before he slumped into
the exposed circuitry of the console. His coughs were loud in her helmet. �Actually,
I think Iłm more than winded," he said, when he was able to speak at all.

�Wełll get you back to the ship; the proctors can help ..."

�Itłs too late, Sora."

�What about the gun?"

�Iłm ... doing something rather rash, in the circumstances.
Trusting it to you. Does that sound utterly insane?"

�Iłll betray you. Iłll give the gun to the Cohort. You know
that, donłt you?"

Merlinłs voice was soft. �I donłt think you will. I think
youłll do the right thing and return it to the Brittlestar."

�Donłt make me betray you!"

He shook his head. �Iłve just issued a command that
reassigns control of my ship to you. The proctors are now under your command

theyłll show you everything you need."

�Merlin, Iłm begging you ..."

His voice was weak now, hard to distinguish from the
scratchy irregularity of his breathing. She leant down to him and touched
helmets, hoping the old trick would make him easier to hear. �No good, Sora.
Much too late. Iłve signed it all over."

�No!" She shook him, almost in anger. Then she began to cry,
loud enough so that she was in no doubt he would hear it. �I donłt even know
what you want me to do with it!"

�Take the ring, then the rest will be abundantly clear."

�What?" She could hardly understand herself now.

�Put the ring on. Do it now, Sora. Before I die. So that I
at least know itłs done."

�When I take your glove off, Iłll kill you, Merlin. You know
that, donłt you? And I wonłt be able to put the ring on until Iłm back in the
ship."

�I ... just want to see you take it. Thatłs enough, Sora.
And youłd better be quick ..."

�I love you, you bastard!"

�Then do this."

She placed her hands around the cuff seal of his gauntlet,
feeling the alloy locking mechanism, knowing that it would only take a careful
depression of the sealing latches, and then a quick twisting movement, and the
glove would slide free, releasing the air in his suit. She wondered how long he
would last before consciousness left him
no more than tens of seconds, she
thought, unless he drew breath first. And by the state of his breathing, that
would not be easy for him.

She removed the gauntlet, and took his ring.

Tyrant lifted from the moon.

�Husker forces grouping in attack configuration," the
familiar said, tapping directly into the shipłs avionics. �Hull sensors read
sweeps by targeting lidar ... an attack is imminent, Sora."

Tyrantłs light armor would not save them, Sora knew. The attack
would be blinding and brief, and she would probably never know it had happened.
But that didnłt mean that she was going to let it happen.

She felt the gun move to her will.

It would not always be like this, she knew: the gun was only
hers until she returned it to the Waymakers. But for now it felt like an
inseparable part of her, like a twin she had never known, but whose every move
was familiar to her fractionally in advance of it being made. She felt the gun
energize itself, reaching deep into the bedrock of spacetime, plundering
mass-energy from quantum foam, forging singularities in its heart.

She felt readiness.

�First element of swarm has deployed charm-torps," the familiar
reported, an odd slurred quality entering her voice. �Activating Tyrantłs
countermeasures ..."

The hull rang like a bell.

�Countermeasures engaging charm-torps ... neutralized ...
second wave deployed by the swarm ... closing ..."

�How long can we last?"

�Countermeasures exhausted ... we canłt parry a third wave;
not at this range.

Sora closed her eyes and made the weapon spit death.

She had targeted two of the three elements of the Husker swarm;
leaving the third
the furthest ship from her
unharmed. She watched the
relativistic black holes fold space around the two targeted ships, crushing
each instantly, as if in a vice. �Third ship dropping to max ... maximum attack
range; retracting charm-torp launchers ..."

�This is Sora for the Cohort," she said in Main, addressing
the survivor on the general ship-to-ship channel. �Or what remains of the
Cohort. Perhaps you can understand what I have to say. I could kill you, now,
instantly, if I chose." She felt the weapon speak to her through her blood,
reporting its status, its eagerness to do her bidding. �Instead, Iłm about to
give you a demonstration. Are you ready?"

�Sora ..." said the familiar. �Somethingłs wrong ..."

�What?"

�Iłm not ... well." The familiarłs voice did not sound at
all right now; drained of any semblance to Sorałs own. �The ring must be
constructing something in your brain; part of the interface between you and the
gun ... something stronger than me ... Itłs weeding me out, to make room for
itself ..."

She remembered what Merlin had said about the structures the
ring would make.

�You saved a part of yourself in the ship."

�Only a part," the familiar said. �Not all of me ... not all
of me at all. Iłm sorry, Sora. I think Iłm dying."

She dismantled the system.

Sora did it with artistry and flair, saving the best for
last. She began with moons, pulverizing them, so that they began to flow into
nascent rings around their parent worlds. Then she smashed the worlds
themselves to pieces, turning them into cauls of hot ash and plasma. Finally

when it was the only thing left to destroy
she turned the gun on the systemłs
star, impaling its heart with a salvo of relativistic black holes, throwing a
killing spanner into the nuclear processes that turned mass into sunlight. In
doing so, she interfered
catastrophically
with the delicate hydrostatic
balance between pressure and gravity that held the star in shape. She watched
it unpeel, shedding layers of outer atmosphere in a premature display of the
death that awaited suns like it, four billion years in the future. And then she
watched the last Husker ship, which had witnessed what she had wrought, turn
and head out of the system.

She could have killed them all.

But she had let them live. Instead, she had shown the power
that was
albeit temporarily
hers to command.

She wondered if there was enough humanity left in them to appreciate
the clemency she had shown.

Later, she took Tyrant into the Waynet again, the vast
luminous bulk of the gun following her like an obedient dragon. Sorałs heart
almost stopped at the fearful moment of entry, convinced that the syrinx would
choose not to sing for its new master.

But it did sing, just as it had sung for Merlin.

And then, alone this time
more alone than she had been in
her life
she climbed into the observation blister, and turned the metasapphire
walls transparent, making the ship itself disappear, until there was only
herself and the rushing, twinkling brilliance of the Way.

It was time to finish what Merlin had begun.

Minlałs Flowers

Mission interrupted.

I still donłt know quite what happened. The ship and I were
in routine Waynet transit, all systems ticking over smoothly. I was deep in
thought, a little drunk, rubbing clues together like a caveman trying to make
fire with rocks, hoping for the spark that would point me toward the gun, the
one no one ever thinks Iłm going to find, the one I know with every fiber of my
existence is out there somewhere.

Then it happened: a violent lurch that sent wine and glass
flying across the cabin, a shriek from the shipłs alarms as it went into panic
mode. I knew right away that this was no ordinary Way turbulence. The ship was
tumbling badly, but I fought my way to the command deck and did what I could to
bring her back under control. Seat-of-the-pants flying, the way Gallinule and I
used to do it on Plenitude, when Plenitude still existed.

That was when I knew we were outside the Waynet, dumped back
into the crushing slowness of normal space. The stars outside were stationary,
their colors showing no suggestion of relativistic distortion.

�Damage?" I asked.

�How long have you got?" the ship snapped back.

I told it to ease off on the wisecracks and start giving me
the bad news. And it most certainly was bad news. The precious syrinx was still
functional-I touched it and felt the familiar tremble that indicated it was
still sensing the nearby Waynet-but that was about the only flight-critical
system that hadnłt been buckled or blown or simply wiped out of existence by
the unscheduled egress.

We were going to have to land and make repairs. For a few
weeks or months-however long it took the ship to scavenge and process the raw
materials it needed to fix itself-the search for my gun would be on hold.

That didnłt mean I was counting on a long stopover.

* * * *

The ship still had a slow tumble. Merlin squinted against
hard white glare as the burning eye of a bright sun hove into view through the
windows. It was white, but not killingly so. Probably a mid-sequence star,
maybe a late F or early G type. He thought there was a hint of yellow. Had to
be pretty close too.

�Tell me where we are."

�Itłs called Calliope," Tyrant told him. �G-type. According
to the last Cohort census the system contained fifteen planet-class bodies.
There were five terrestrials, four of which were uninhabitable. The fifth-the
farthest from Calliope-was supposedly colonized by humans in the early
Flourishing."

Merlin glanced at the census data as it scrolled down the
cabin wall. The planet in question was called Lecythus. It was a typical watery
terrestrial, like a thousand others in his experience. It even had the
almost-obligatory large single moon.

�Been a while, ship. What are the chances of anyone still
being down there?"

�Difficult to say. A later Cohort flyby failed to make
contact with the settlement, but that doesnłt mean no one was alive. After the
emergence of the Huskers, many planetary colonies went to great lengths to
camouflage themselves against the aliens."

�So there could still be a welcoming committee."

�Wełll see. With your permission, Iłll use our remaining
fuel to reach Lecythus. This will take some time. Would you like to sleep?"

Merlin looked back at the coffinlike slab of the frostwatch
cabinet. He could skip over the days or weeks that it would take to reach the
planet, but that would mean subjecting himself to the intense unpleasantness of
frostwatch revival. Merlin had never taken kindly to being woken from normal
sleep, let alone the deep hibernation of frostwatch.

�Pass on that, I think. Iłve still got plenty of reading to
catch up on."

Later-much later-Tyrant announced that they had reached
orbit around Lecythus. �Would you like to see the view?" the ship asked, with a
playful note in its voice.

Merlin scratched fatigue from his eyes. �You sound like you
know something I donłt."

Merlin was at first reassured by what he saw. There was blue
ocean down there, swatches of green and brown landmass, large islands rather
than any major continental masses, cyclonic swirls of water-vapor clouds. It
didnłt necessarily mean there were still people, but it was a lot more
encouraging than finding a cratered, radioactive corpse of a world.

Then he looked again. Many of those green and brown swatches
of landmass were surrounded by water, as his first glimpse had indicated. But
some of them appeared to be floating above the ocean completely, casting
shadows beneath them. His glance flicked to the horizon, where the atmosphere
was compressed into a thin bow of pure indigo. He could see the foreshortened
shapes of hovering landmasses, turned nearly edge on. The landmasses appeared
to be one or two kilometers thick, and they all appeared to be gently curved.
Perhaps half were concave in shape, so their edges were slightly upturned. The
edges were frosted white, like the peaks of mountain ranges. Some of the concave
masses even had little lakes near their centers. The convex masses were all a
scorched tawny gray in color, devoid of water or vegetation, save for a cap of
ice at their highest point. The largest shapes, convex or concave, must have
been hundreds of kilometers wide. Merlin judged that there must have been at
least ten kilometers of clear airspace under each piece. A third of the planetłs
surface was obscured by the floating shapes.

�Any idea of what wełre looking at here?" Merlin asked. �This
doesnłt look like anything in the census."

�I think they built an armored sky around their world," the
ship said. �And then something-very probably Husker-level ordnance-shattered
that sky."

�No one could have survived through that," Merlin said, feeling
a rising tide of sadness. Tyrant was clever enough, but there were times-long
times-when Merlin became acutely aware of the heartless machine lurking behind
the personality. And then he felt very, very alone. Those were the hours when
he would have done anything for companionship, including returning to the
Cohort and the tribunal that undoubtedly awaited him.

�Someone does appear to have survived, Merlin."

He perked. �Really?"

�Itłs unlikely to be a very advanced culture: no neutrino or
gravimagnetic signatures, beyond those originating from the mechanisms that
must still be active inside the sky pieces. But I did detect some very brief
radio emissions."

�What language were they using? Main? Tradespeak? Anything
else in the Cohort database?"

�They were using long beeps and short beeps. Iłm afraid I
didnłt get the chance to determine the source of the transmission."

�Keep listening. I want to meet them."

�Donłt raise your hopes. If there are people down there,
theyłve been out of contact with the rest of humanity for a considerable number
of millennia."

�I only want to stop for repairs. They canłt begrudge me
that, can they?"

�I suppose not."

Then something occurred to Merlin, something he realized he
should have asked much earlier. �About the accident, ship. I take it you know
why we were dumped out of the Waynet?"

�Iłve run a fault-check on the syrinx. There doesnłt appear
to be anything wrong with it."

�Thatłs not an answer."

�I know." Tyrant sounded sullen. �I still donłt have an
explanation for what went wrong. And I donłt like that any more than you do."

* * * *

Tyrant fell into the atmosphere of Lecythus. The
transmissions had resumed, allowing the ship to pinpoint the origin to one of
the larger airborne masses.

Shortly afterward, a second source began transmitting from
another floating mass, half the size of the first, located three thousand
kilometers to the west. The way the signals started and stopped suggested some
kind of agonizingly slow communication via radio pulses, one that probably had
nothing to do with Merlinłs arrival.

�Tell me thatłs a code in our database," Merlin said.

�It isnłt. And the code wonłt tell us much about their
spoken language, Iłm afraid."

Up close, the broken edges of the floating mass soared as
tall as a cliff. They were a dark, streaked gray, infinitely less regular than
they had appeared from space. The edge showed signs of weathering and erosion.
There were wide ledges, dizzying promontories, and cathedral-sized shadowed
caves. Glinting in the low light of Calliope, ladders and walkways-impossibly
thin and spindly scratches of metal-reached down from the icebound upper
reaches, following zigzag trajectories that only took them a fraction of the
way to the perilous lower lip, where the floating world curved back under
itself.

Merlin made out the tiny moving forms of birdlike creatures,
wheeling and orbiting in powerful thermals, some of them coming and going from
roosts on the lower ledges.

�But that isnłt a bird," Tyrant said, highlighting a larger
moving shape.

Merlin felt an immediate pang of recognition as the image
zoomed. It was an aircraft: a ludicrously fragile assemblage of canvas and
wire. It had a crescent moon painted on both wings. Therełd been a machine not
much more advanced than that in the archive inside the Palace of Eternal Dusk,
preserved across thirteen hundred years of family history. Merlin had even
risked taking it outside once, to see for himself if he had the nerve to repeat
his distant ancestorłs brave crossing. He still remembered the sting of
reprimand when hełd brought it back, nearly ruined.

This aircraft was even flimsier and slower. It was driven by
a single chugging propellor rather than a battery of rocket-assisted turbines.
It was following the rim of the landmass, slowly gaining altitude. Clearly it
intended to make landfall. The air on Lecythus was thicker at sea level than on
Plenitude, but the little machine must still have been very close to its safe
operational ceiling. And yet it would have to climb even higher if it was to
traverse the raised rim.

�Follow it," Merlin said. �Keep us astern by a clear two kilometers.
And set hull to stealth."

Merlinłs ship nosed in behind the struggling aircraft. He
could see the single pilot now, goggled and helmeted within a crude-looking
bubble canopy. The plane had reached ten kilometers, but it would need to
double that to clear the upturned rim. Every hundred meters of altitude gained
seemed to tax the aircraft to the limit, so that it climbed, leveled, climbed.
It trailed sooty hyphens behind it. Merlin could imagine the sputtering protest
from the little engine, the fear in the pilotłs belly that the motor was going
to stall at any moment.

That was when an airship hove around the edge of the visible
cliff. Calliopełs rays flared off the golden swell of its envelope. Beneath the
long ribbed form was a tiny gondola, equipped with multiple engines on skeletal
outriggers. The airshipłs nose began to turn, bringing another crescent-moon
emblem into view. The aircraft lined up with the airship, the two of them at
about the same altitude. Merlin watched as some kind of netlike apparatus unfurled
in slow motion from the belly of the gondola. The pilot gained further height,
then cut the aircraftłs engine. Powerless now, it followed a shallow glide path
toward the net. Clearly, the airship was going to catch the aircraft and carry
it over the rim. That must have been the only way for aircraft to arrive and
depart from the hovering landmass.

Merlin watched with a sickened fascination. Hełd
occasionally had a presentiment when something was going to go wrong. Now he
had that feeling again.

Some gust caught the airship. It began to drift out of the
aircraftłs glide path. The pilot tried to compensate-Merlin could see the play
of light shift on the wings as they warped-but it was never going to be enough.
Without power, the aircraft must have been cumbersome to steer. The engines on the
gondola turned on their mountings, trying to shove the airship back into
position.

Beyond the airship loomed the streaked gray vastness of the
great cliff.

�Why did he cut the engines ..." Merlin breathed to himself.
Then, an instant later: �Can we catch up? Can we do something?"

�Iłm afraid not. There simply isnłt time."

Sickened, Merlin watched as the aircraft slid past the
airship, missing the net by a hundred meters. A sooty smear erupted from the
engine. The pilot must have been desperately trying to restart the motor.
Moments later, Merlin watched as one wingtip grazed the side of the cliff and
crumpled instantly, horribly. The aircraft dropped, dashing itself to splinters
and shreds against the side of the cliff. There was no possibility that the pilot
could have survived.

For a moment Merlin was numb. He was frozen, unsure what to
do next.

Hełd been planning to land, but it seemed improper to arrive
immediately after witnessing such a tragedy. Perhaps the thing to do was find
an uninhabited landmass and put down there.

�Therełs another aircraft," Tyrant announced. �Itłs approaching
from the west."

Still shaken by what hełd seen, Merlin took the stealthed
ship closer. Dirty smoke billowed from the side of the aircraft. In the canopy,
the pilot was obviously engaged in a life-or-death struggle to bring his
machine to safety. Even as they watched, the engine appeared to slow and then
restart.

Something slammed past Tyrant, triggering proximity alarms. �Some
kind of shell," the ship told Merlin. �I think someone on the ground is trying
to shoot down these aircraft."

Merlin looked down. He hadnłt paid much attention to the
landmass beneath them, but now that he did-peering through the holes in a quilt
of low-lying cloud-he made out the unmistakable flashes of artillery positions,
laid out along the pale scratch of a fortified line.

He began to understand why the airship dared not stray too
far from the side of the landmass. Near the cliff, it at least had some measure
of cover. It would have been far too vulnerable to the shells in open air.

�I think itłs time to take a stand," he said. �Maintain
stealth. Iłm going to provide some lift support to that aircraft. Bring us
around to her rear and then approach from under her."

�Merlin, you have no idea who these people are. They could
be brigands, pirates, anything."

�Theyłre being shot at. Thatłs good enough for me."

�I really think we should land. Iłm down to vapor pressure
in the tanks now."

�Sołs that brave fool of a pilot. Just do it."

The aircraftłs engine gave out just as Tyrant reached
position. Taking the controls manually, Merlin brought his shipłs nose into
contact with the underside of the aircraftłs paper-thin fuselage. Contact
occurred with the faintest of bumps. The pilot glanced back down over his
shoulder, but the goggled mask hid all expression. Merlin could only imagine
what the pilot made of the sleek, whale-sized machine now supporting his little
contraption.

Merlinłs hands trembled. He was acutely aware of how easily
he could damage the fragile thing with a miscalculated application of thrust.
Tyrant was armored to withstand Waynet transitions and the crush of gas giant
atmospheres. It was like using a hammer to push around a feather. For a moment,
contact between the two craft was lost, and when Tyrant came in again it hit
the aircraft hard enough to crush the metal cylinder of a spare fuel tank bracketed
on under the wing. Merlin winced in anticipation of an explosion-one that would
hurt the little airplane a lot more than it hurt Tyrant-but the tank must have
been empty.

Ahead, the airship had regained some measure of stability.
The capture net was still deployed. Merlin pushed harder, giving the aircraft
more altitude in readiness for its approach glide. At the last moment he judged
it safe to disengage. He steered Tyrant away and left the aircraft to blunder
into the net.

This time there were no gusts. The net wrapped itself around
the aircraft, the soft impact nudging down the nose of the airship. Then the
net began to be winched back toward the gondola like a haul of fish. At the
same time the airship swung around and began to climb.

�No other planes?" Merlin asked.

�That was the only one."

They followed the airship in. It rose over the cliff, over
the ice-capped rim of the aerial landmass, then settled down toward the
shielded region in the bowl, where water and greenery had gathered. There was
even a wispy layer of cloud, arranged in a broken ring around the shore of the
lake. Merlin presumed that the concave shape of the landmass was sufficient to
trap a stable microclimate.

By now Merlin had an audience. People had gathered on the
gondolałs rear observation platform. They wore goggles and gloves and heavy
brown overcoats. Merlin caught the shine of glass lenses being pointed at him.
He was being studied, sketched, perhaps even photographed.

�Do you think they look grateful?" he asked. �Or pissed off?"

Tyrant declined to answer.

Merlin kept his distance, conserving fuel as best he could
as the airship crossed tens of kilometers of arid, gently sloping land. Occasionally
they overflew a little hamlet of huts or the scratch of a minor track.
Presently the ground became soil-covered, and then fertile. They traversed
swaths of bleak gray-green grass, intermingled with boulders and assorted uplifted
debris. Then there were trees and woods. The communities became more than just
hamlets. Small ponds fed rivers that ambled down to the single lake that occupied
the landmassłs lowest point. Merlin spied waterwheels and rustic-looking
bridges. There were fields with grazing animals, and evidence of some
tall-chimneyed industrial structures on the far side of the lake. The lake
itself was an easy fifty or sixty kilometers wide. Nestled around a natural
harbor on its southern shore was the largest community Merlin had seen so far.
It was a haphazard jumble of several hundred mostly white, mostly single-story
buildings, arranged with the randomness of toy blocks littering a floor.

The airship skirted the edge of the town and then descended
quickly. It approached what was clearly some kind of secure compound, judging
by the guarded fence that encircled it. There was a pair of airstrips arranged
in a cross formation, and a dozen or so aircraft parked around a painted copy
of the crescent emblem. Four skeletal docking towers rose from another area of
the compound, stayed by guylines. A battle-weary pair of partially deflated airships
was already tethered. Merlin pulled back to allow the incoming craft enough
space to complete its docking. The net was lowered back down from the gondola,
depositing the airplane-its wings now crumpled, its fuselage buckled-on the
apron below. Service staff rushed out of bunkers to untangle the mess and free
the pilot. Merlin brought his ship down at a clear part of the apron and doused
the engines as soon as the landing skids touched the ground.

It wasnłt long before a wary crowd had gathered around Tyrant.
Most of them wore long leather coats, heavily belted, with the crescent emblem
sewn into the right breast. They had scarves wrapped around their lower faces,
almost to the nose. Their helmets were leather caps, with long flaps covering
the sides of the face and the back of the neck. Most of them wore goggles; a
few wore some kind of breathing apparatus. At least half the number were aiming
barreled weapons at the ship, some of which needed to be set up on tripods,
while some even larger wheeled cannons were being propelled across the apron by
teams of well-drilled soldiers. One figure was gesticulating, directing the
armed squads to take up specific positions.

�Can you understand what hełs saying?" Merlin asked, knowing
that Tyrant would be picking up any external sounds.

�Iłm going to need more than a few minutes to crack their language,
Merlin, even if it is related to something in my database, of which therełs no
guarantee."

�Fine. Iłll improvise. Can you spin me some flowers?"

�Where exactly are you going? What do you mean, flowers?"

Merlin paused at the airlock. He wore long boots, tight
black leather trousers, a billowing white shirt, and brocaded brown leather
waistcoat, accented with scarlet trim. Hełd tied back his hair and made a point
of trimming his beard. �Where do you think? Outside. And I want some flowers.
Flowers are good. Spin me some indigo hyacinths, the kind they used to grow on
Springhaven, before the Mentality Wars. They always go down well."

�Youłre insane. Theyłll shoot you."

�Not if I smile and come bearing exotic alien flowers. Remember,
I did just save one of their planes."

�Youłre not even wearing armor."

�Armor would really scare them. Trust me, ship: this is the
quickest way for them to understand Iłm not a threat."

�Itłs been a pleasure having you aboard," Tyrant said
acidly. �Iłll be sure to pass on your regards to my next owner."

�Just make the flowers and stop complaining."

Five minutes later Merlin steeled himself as the lock
sequenced and the ramp lowered to kiss the ground. The cold hit him like a
loverłs slap. He heard an order from the soldiersł leader, and the massed ranks
adjusted their aim. Theyłd been pointing at the ship before. Now it was only
Merlin they were interested in.

He raised his right hand palm open, the newly spun flowers
in his left.

�Hello. My namełs Merlin." He thumped his chest for emphasis
and said the name again, slower this time. �Mer-lin. I donłt think therełs much
chance of you being able to understand me, but just in case ... Iłm not here to
cause trouble." He forced a smile, which probably looked more feral than
reassuring. �Now. Whołs in charge?"

The leader shouted another order. He heard a rattle of a hundred
safety catches being released. Suddenly, the shipłs idea of sending out a
proctor first sounded splendidly sensible. Merlin felt a cold line of sweat
trickle down his back. After all that he had survived so far, both during his
time with the Cohort and since he had become an adventuring free agent, it
would be something of a letdown to die by being shot with a chemically
propelled projectile. That was only one step above being mauled and eaten by a
wild animal.

Merlin walked down the ramp, one cautious step at a time. �No
weapons," he said. �Just flowers. If I wanted to hurt you, I could have hit you
from space with charm-torps."

When he reached the apron, the leader gave another order and
a trio of soldiers broke formation to cover Merlin from three angles, with the
barrels of their weapons almost touching him. The leader-a cruel-looking young
man with a scar down the right side of his face-shouted something in Merlinłs
direction, a word that sounded vaguely like �distal," but which was in no
language Merlin recognized. When Merlin didnłt move, he felt a rifle jab into
the small of his back. �Distal," the man said again, this time with an emphasis
bordering on the hysterical.

Then another voice boomed across the apron, one that belonged
to a much older man. There was something instantly commanding about the voice.
Looking to the source of the exclamation, Merlin saw the wrecked aircraft
entangled in its capture net, and the pilot in the process of crawling out from
the tangle, with a wooden box in his hands. The rifle stopped jabbing Merlinłs
back, and the cruel-looking young man fell silent while the pilot made his way
over to them.

The pilot had removed his goggles now, revealing the lined
face of an older man, his gray-white beard and whiskers stark against ruddy,
weatherworn skin. For a moment Merlin felt that he was looking in the mirror at
an older version of himself.

�Greetings from the Cohort," Merlin said. �Iłm the man who
saved your life."

�Gecko," the red-faced man said, pushing the wooden box into
Merlinłs chest. �Forlorn gecko!"

Now that Merlin had a chance to examine it properly, he saw
that the box was damaged, its sides caved in and its lid ripped off. Inside was
a matrix of straw padding and a great many shattered glass vials. The pilot
took one of these smashed vials and held it up before Merlinłs face,
honey-colored fluid draining down his fingers.

�What is it?" Merlin asked.

Leaving Merlin to hold the box and flowers, the red-faced
pilot pointed angrily toward the wreckage of his aircraft, and in particular at
the cylindrical attachment Merlin had taken for a fuel tank. He saw now that
the cylinder was the repository for dozens more of these wooden boxes, most of
which must have been smashed when Merlin had nudged the aircraft with Tyrant.

�Did I do something wrong?" Merlin asked.

In a flash the manłs anger turned to despair. He was crying,
the tears smudging the soot on his cheeks. �Tangible," he said, softer now. �All
tangible inkwells. Gecko."

Merlin reached into the box and retrieved one of the few
intact vials. He held the delicate thing to his eyes. �Medicine?"

�Plastrum," the man said, taking the box back from Merlin.

�Show me what you do with this," Merlin said, as he motioned
drinking the vial. The man shook his head, narrowing his wrinkled ice-blue eyes
at him as if he thought that Merlin was either stupid or making fun. Merlin
rolled up the sleeve of his arm and motioned injecting himself. The pilot
nodded tentatively.

�Plastrum," he said again. �Vestibule plastrum."

�You have some kind of medical crisis? Is that what you were
doing, bringing medicines?"

�Tangible," the man repeated.

�You need to come with me," Merlin said. �Whatever that
stuff is, we can synthesize it aboard Tyrant." He held up the intact vial and
then placed his index finger next to it. Then he pointed to the parked form of
his ship and spread his fingers wide, hoping the pilot got the message that he
could multiply the medicine. �One sample," he said. �Thatłs all we need."

Suddenly there was a commotion. Merlin looked around in time
to see a girl running across the apron, toward the two of them. In Cohort terms
she could only have been six or seven years old. She wore a childłs version of
the same greatcoat everyone else wore, buckled black boots and gloves, no hat,
goggles, or breathing mask. The pilot shouted �Minla" at her approach, a single
word that conveyed both warning and something more intimate, as if the older
man might have been her father or grandfather. �Minla oak trefoil," the man
added, firmly but not without kindness. He sounded pleased to see her, but
somewhat less than pleased that she had chosen this exact moment to run
outside.

�Spelter Malkoha," the girl said, and hugged the pilot
around the waist, which was as high as she could reach. �Spelter Malkoha,
ursine Malkoha."

The red-faced man knelt down-his eyes were still damp-and
ran a gloved finger through the girlłs unruly fringe of black hair. She had a
small, monkeylike face, one that conveyed both mischief and cleverness.

�Minla," he said tenderly. �Minla, Minla, Minla." Then what
was clearly a rhetorical question: �Gastric spar oxen, fey legible, Minla?"

�Gorse spelter," she said, sounding contrite. And then,
perhaps for the first time, she noticed Merlin. For an anxious moment her
expression was frozen somewhere between surprise and suspicion, as if he were
some kind of puzzle that had just intruded into her world.

�You wouldnłt be called Minla, by any chance?" Merlin asked.

�Minla," she said, in barely a whisper.

�Merlin. Pleased to meet you, Minla." And then on a whim, before
any of the adults could stop him, he passed her one of the indigo hyacinths
that Tyrant had just spun for him, woven from the ancient molecular templates
in its biolibrary. �Yours," he said. �A pretty flower for a pretty little girl."

�Oxen spray, Minla," the red-faced man said, pointing back
to one of the buildings on the edge of the apron. A soldier walked over and
extended a hand to the girl, ready to escort her back inside. She moved to hand
the flower back to Merlin.

�No," he said, �you can keep it, Minla. Itłs for you."

She opened the collar of her coat and pushed the flower
inside for safekeeping, until only its head was jutting out. The vivid indigo
seemed to throw something of its hue onto her face.

�Mer-lin?" asked the older man.

�Yes."

The man tapped a fist against his own chest. �Malkoha." And
then he indicated the vial Merlin was still carrying. �Plastrum," he said
again. Then a question, accompanied by a nod toward Tyrant. �Risible plastrum?"

�Yes," Merlin said. �I can make you more medicine. Risible
plastrum."

The red-faced man studied him for what seemed like many minutes.
Merlin opted to say nothing: if the pilot hadnłt got the message by now, no
further persuasion was going to help. Then the pilot reached down to his belt
and unbuttoned the leather holster of a pistol. He removed the weapon and
allowed Merlin sufficient time to examine it by eye. The low sun gleamed off an
oiled black barrel, inlaid with florid white ornamentation carved from something
like whalebone.

�Mer-lin risible plastrum," Malkoha said. Then he waved the
gun for emphasis. �Spar apostle."

�Spar apostle," Merlin repeated, as they walked up the boarding
ramp. �No tricks."

* * * *

Even before Tyrant had made progress in the cracking of the
local language, Merlin had managed to hammer out a deal with Malkoha. The
medicine had turned out to be a very simple drug, easily synthesized. A
narrow-spectrum 8-lactam antibiotic, according to the ship: exactly the sort of
thing the locals might use to treat a gram-positive bacterial
infection-something like bacterial meningitis, for instance-if they didnłt have
anything better.

Tyrant could pump out antibiotic medicine by the hundreds of
liters, or synthesize something vastly more effective in equally large
quantities. But Merlin saw no sense in playing his most valuable card so early
in the game. He chose instead to give Malkoha quantities of the drug in
approximately the same dosage and quantity as he must have been carrying when
his aircraft was damaged, packaged in similar-looking glass vials. He gave the
first two consignments as a gift, in recompense for the harm he was presumed to
have done when attempting to save Malkoha, and let Malkoha think that it was
all that Tyrant could do to make drugs at that strength and quantity. It was
only when he handed over the third consignment, on the third day, that he
mentioned the materials he needed to repair his ship.

He didnłt say anything, of course, or at least nothing that
the locals could have understood. But there were enough examples lying around
of the materials Merlin needed-metals and organic compounds, principally, as
well as water that could be used to replenish Tyrantłs hydrogen-fusion
tanks-that Merlin was able to make considerable progress just by pointing and
miming. He kept talking all the while, even in Main, and did all that he could
to encourage the locals to talk back in their own tongue. Even when he was
inside the compound, Tyrant was observing every exchange, thanks to the
microscopic surveillance devices Merlin carried on his person. Through this
process, the ship was constantly testing and rejecting language models,
employing its knowledge of both the general principles of human grammar and its
compendious database of ancient languages recorded by the Cohort, many of which
were antecedents of Main itself. Lecythus might have been isolated for tens of
thousands of years, but languages older than that had been cracked by brute
computation, and Merlin had no doubt that Tyrant would get there in the end,
provided he gave it enough material to work with.

It was still not clear whether the locals regarded him as
their prisoner, or honored guest. Hełd made no attempt to leave, and theyłd
made no effort to prevent him returning to his ship when it was time to collect
the vials of antibiotic. Perhaps they had guessed that it would be futile to
stop him, given the likely capabilities of his technology. Or perhaps they had
guessed-correctly, as it happened-that Tyrant would be going nowhere until it
was repaired and fueled. In any event they seemed less awed by his arrival than
intrigued, shrewdly aware of what he could do for them.

Merlin liked Malkoha, even though he knew almost nothing
about the man. Clearly he was a figure of high seniority within this particular
organization, be it military or political, but he was also a man brave enough
to fly a hazardous mission to ferry medicines through the sky, in a time of
war. And his daughter loved him, which had to count for something. Merlin now
knew that Malkoha was her �spelter" or father, although he did indeed look old
enough to have been spaced from her by a further generation.

Almost everything that Merlin did learn, in those early
days, was due to Minla rather than the adults. The adults seemed willing to at
least attempt to answer his queries, when they could understand what he was
getting at. But their chalkboard explanations usually left Merlin none the
wiser. They could show him maps and printed historical and technical treatises,
but none of these shed any light on the worldłs many mysteries. Cracking text
would take Tyrant even longer than cracking spoken language.

Minla, though, had picture books. Malkohałs daughter had taken
an obvious liking to Merlin, even though she shared nothing in common. Merlin
gave her a new flower each time he saw her, freshly spun from some exotic
species in the biolibrary. Merlin made a point of never giving her flowers from
a particular world twice, even when she wanted more of the same. He also made a
point of always telling her something of the place from where the flowers had
come, regardless of her lack of understanding. It seemed to be enough for her
to hear the cadences of a story, even if it was in an alien language.

There was not much color in Minlałs world, so Merlinłs gifts
must have had a luminous appeal to them. Once a day, for a few minutes, they
were allowed to meet in a drab room inside the main compound. An adult was
always stationed nearby, but to all intents and purposes Merlin and the girl
were permitted to interact freely. Minla would show Merlin drawings and
paintings she had done, or little compositions, written down in labored
handwriting in approximately the form of script Tyrant had come to refer to as
Lecythus A. Merlin would examine Minlałs works and offer praise when it was
merited.

He wondered why these meetings were allowed. Minla was
obviously a bright girl (he could tell that much merely from the precocious
manner of her speaking, even if he hadnłt had the ample evidence of her
drawings and writings). Perhaps it was felt that meeting the man from space
would be an important part of her education, one that could never be repeated
at a later date. Perhaps she had pestered her father into allowing her to spend
more time with Merlin. Merlin could understand that; as a child hełd also
formed harmless attachments to adults, often those that came bearing gifts and
especially those adults that appeared interested in what he had to show them.

Could there be more than that, though? Was it possible that
the adults had decided that a child offered the best conduit for understanding,
and that Minla was now their envoy? Or were they hoping to use Minla as a form
of emotional blackmail, so that they might exert a subtle hold on Merlin when
he decided it was time to leave?

He didnłt know. What he was certain of was that Minlałs
books raised as many questions as they answered, and that simply leafing
through them was enough to open windows in his own mind, back into a childhood hełd
thought consigned safely to oblivion. The books were startlingly similar to the
books Merlin remembered from the Palace of Eternal Dusk, the ones hełd used to
fight over with his brother. They were bound similarly, illustrated with
spidery ink drawings scattered through the text or florid watercolors gathered
onto glossy plates at the end of the book. Merlin liked holding the book up to
the light of an open window, so that the illustrated pages shone like stained
glass. It was something his father had shown him on Plenitude, when he had been
Minlałs age, and her delight exactly echoed his own, across the unthinkable
gulf of time and distance and circumstance that separated their childhoods.

At the same time, he also paid close attention to what the
books had to say. Many of the stories featured little girls involved in fanciful
adventures concerning flying animals and other magic creatures. Others had the
worthy, overearnest look of educational texts. Studying these latter books,
Merlin began to grasp something of the history of Lecythus, at least insofar as
it had been codified for the consumption of children.

The people on Lecythus knew theyłd come from the stars. In
two of the books there were even paintings of a vast spherical spaceship
heaving into orbit around the planet. The paintings differed in every
significant detail, but Merlin felt sure that he was seeing a portrayal of the
same dimly remembered historical event, much as the books in his youth had
shown various representations of human settlers arriving on Plenitude. There
was no reference to the Waynet, however, or anything connected to the Cohort or
the Huskers. As for the localsł theory concerning the origin of the aerial
landmasses, Merlin found only one clue. It lay in a frightening sequence of
pictures showing the night sky being riven by lavalike fissures, until whole
chunks of the heavens dropped out of place, revealing a darker, deeper
firmament beyond. Some of the pieces were shown crashing into the seas, raising
awesome waves that tumbled over entire coastal communities, while others were
shown hovering unsupported in the sky, with kilometers of empty space under
them. If the adults remembered that it was alien weaponry that had smashed
their camouflaging sky (weapons deployed by aliens that were still out there)
no hint of that uncomfortable truth was allowed into Minlałs books. The
destruction of the sky was shown simply as a natural catastrophe, like a flood
or volcanic eruption. Enough to awe, enough to fascinate, but not enough to give
nightmares.

Awesome it must have been too. Tyrantłs own analysis had established
that the aerial landmasses could be put together like a jigsaw. There were gaps
in that jigsaw, but most of them could be filled by lifting chunks of land out
of the seas and slotting them in place. The inhabitated aerial landmasses were
all inverted compared to their supposed positions in the original sky,
requiring that they must have been flipped over after the shattering. Tyrant
could offer little guidance for how this could have happened, but it was clear
enough that unless the chunks were inverted, life-supporting materials would
spill off over the edges and rain down onto the planet again. Presumably the
necessary materials had been uplifted into the air when the unsupported chunks
(and these must have been pieces that did not contain gravity nullifiers, or
which had been damaged beyond the capacity to support themselves) came
hammering down.

As to how people had come to the sky in the first place, or
how the present political situation had come into being, Minlałs texts were
frustratingly vague. There were pictures of what were obviously historic
battles, fought with animals and gunpowder. There were illustrations of courtly
goings-on; princes and kings, balls and regattas, assassinations and duels.
There were drawings of adventurers rising on kites and balloons to survey the
aerial masses, and later of what were clearly government-sponsored scouting
expeditions, employing huge flotillas of flimsy-looking airships. But as to
exactly why the people in the sky were now at war with the people on the
ground, Merlin had little idea, and even less interest. What mattered-the only
thing, in fact-was that Minlałs people had the means to help him. He could have
managed without them, but by bringing him the things he needed they made it
easier. And it was good to see other faces again, after so long alone.

One of Minlałs books intrigued him even more than all the
others. It showed a picture of the starry night, the heavens as revealed after
the fall of the camouflaging sky. Constellations had been overlaid on the
patterns of stars, with sketched figures overlying the schematic lines joining
the stars. None of the mythical or heroic figures corresponded to the old
constellations of Plenitude, but the same archetypal forms were nonetheless
present. For Merlin there was something hugely reassuring in seeing the
evidence of similar imaginations at work. It might have been tens of thousands
of years since these humans had been in contact with a wider galactic
civilization; they might have endured world-changing catastrophes and retained
only a hazy notion of their origins. But they were still people, and he was
among them. There were times, in his long search for the lost weapon that he hoped
would save the Cohort, that Merlin had come to doubt whether there was anything
about humanity worth saving. But all it took was the look on Minlałs face as he
presented her with another flower-another relic of some long-dead world-to
banish such doubts almost entirely. While there were still children in the
universe, and while children could still be enchanted by something as simple
and wonderful as a flower, there was still a reason to keep looking, a reason
to keep believing.

* * * *

The coiled black device had the look of a tiny chambered nautilus,
turned to onyx. Merlin pushed back his hair to let Malkoha see that he was
already wearing a similar unit, then motioned for Malkoha to insert the
translator into his own ear.

�Good," Merlin said, when he saw that the other man had
pushed the device into place. �Can you understand me now?"

Malkoha answered very quickly, but there was a momentłs lag
before Merlin heard his response translated into Main, rendered in an
emotionally flat machine voice. �Yes. I understand good. How is this possible?"

Merlin gestured around him. They were alone together in Tyrant,
with Malkoha ready to leave with another consignment of antibiotics. �The shipłs
been listening in on every conversation Iłve had with you," Merlin said. �Itłs
heard enough of your language to begin piecing together a translation. Itłs
still rudimentary-there are a lot of gaps the ship still needs to fill-but it
will only get better with time, the more we talk."

Malkoha listened diligently as his earpiece translated
Merlinłs response. Merlin could only guess at how much of his intended meaning
was making it through intact.

�Your ship is clever," Malkoha said. �We talk many times. We
get good at understanding."

�I hope so."

Malkoha pointed now at the latest batch of supplies his
people had brought, piled neatly at the top of the boarding ramp. The materials
were unsophisticated in their manufacture, but they could all be reprocessed to
form the complicated components Tyrant needed to repair itself.

�Metals make the ship good?"

�Yes," Merlin said. �Metals make the ship good."

�When the ship is good, the ship will fly? You will leave?"

�Thatłs the idea."

Malkoha looked sad. �Where will you go?"

�Back into space. Iłve been a long time away from my own
people. But therełs something I need to find before I return to them."

�Minla will be unhappy."

�So will I. I like Minla. Shełs a clever little girl."

�Yes. Minla is clever. I am proud of my daughter."

�You have every right to be," Merlin said, hoping that his
sincerity came across. �I have to start what I finished, though. The ship tells
me itłll be flight-ready in two or three days. Itłs a patch job, but itłll get
us to the nearest motherbase. But therełs something we need to talk about
first." Merlin reached for a shelf and handed Malkoha a tray upon which sat
twelve identical copies of the translator device.

�You will speak with more of us?"

�Iłve just learned some bad news, Malkoha: news that
concerns you, and your people. Before I go I want to do what I can to help.
Take these translators and give them to your best people-Coucal, Jacana, the
rest. Get them to wear them all the time, no matter who theyłre talking to. In
three days I want to meet with you all."

Malkoha regarded the tray of translators with suspicion, as
if the ranked devices were a peculiar foreign delicacy.

�What is the bad news, Merlin?"

�Three days isnłt going to make much difference. Itłs better
if we wait until the translation is more accurate, then there wonłt be any
misunderstanding."

�We are friends," Malkoha said, leaning forward. �You can
tell me now."

�Iłm afraid it wonłt make much sense."

Malkoha looked at him beseechingly. �Please."

�Something is going to come out of the sky," Merlin said. �Like
a great sword. And itłs going to cut your sun in two."

Malkoha frowned, as if he didnłt think he could possibly
have understood correctly.

�Calliope?"

Merlin nodded gravely. �Calliope will die. And then so will
everyone on Lecythus."

* * * *

They were all there when Merlin walked into the glass-partitioned
room. Malkoha, Triller, Coucal, Jacana, Sibia, Niltava, and about half a dozen
more top brass Merlin had never seen before. An administrative assistant was
already entering notes into a clattering electromechanical transcription device
squatting on her lap, pecking away at its stiff metal input pads with
surprising speed. Tea bubbled in a fat engraved urn set in the middle of the
table. An orderly had already poured tea into china cups set before each
bigwig, including Merlin himself. Through the partition, on the opposite wall
of the adjoining tactical room, Merlin watched another orderly make microscopic
adjustments to the placement of the aerial landmasses on an equal-area
projection map of Lecythus. Periodically, the entire building would rattle with
the droning arrival of another aircraft or dirigible.

Malkoha coughed to bring the room to attention. �Merlin has
news for us," he said, his translated voice coming through with more emotion
than it had three days earlier. �This is news not just for the Skyland
Alliance, but for everyone on Lecythus. That includes the Aligned Territories,
the Neutrals, and yes, even our enemies in the Shadowland Coalition." He
beckoned a hand in Merlinłs direction, inviting him to stand.

Merlin held up one of Minlałs picture books, open at the illustration
of constellations in the sky over Lecythus. �What I have to tell you concerns
these patterns," he said. �You see heroes, animals, and monsters in the sky,
traced in lines drawn between the brightest stars."

A new voice buzzed in his ear. He identified the speaker as
Sibia, a woman of high political rank. �These things mean nothing," she said
patiently. �They are lines drawn between chance alignments. The ancient mind
saw demons and monsters in the heavens. Our modern science tells us that the
stars are very distant, and that two stars that appear close together in the
sky-the two eyes of Prinia the Dragon, for example-may in reality be located at
very different distances."

�The lines are more significant than you appreciate," Merlin
said. �They are a pattern you have remembered across tens of thousands of
years, forgetting its true meaning. They are pathways between the stars."

�There are no pathways in the void," Sibia retorted. �The
void is vacuum: the same thing that makes birds suffocate when you suck air out
of a glass jar."

�You may think it absurd," Merlin said. �All I can tell you
is that vacuum is not as you understand it. It has structure, resilience, its
own reserves of energy. And you can make part of it shear away from the rest,
if you try hard enough. Thatłs what the Waymakers did. They stretched great
corridors between the stars: rivers of flowing vacuum. They reach from star to
star, binding together the entire galaxy. We call it the Waynet."

�Is this how you arrived?" Malkoha asked.

�My little ship could never have crossed interstellar space
without it. But as I was passing close to your planet-because a strand of the
Waynet runs right through this system-my ship encountered a problem. That is
why Tyrant was damaged; why I had to land here and seek your assistance."

�And the nature of this problem?" the old man pushed.

�My ship only discovered it three days ago, based on observations
it had collated since I arrived. It appears that part of the Waynet has become
loose, unshackled. Therełs a kink in the flow where it begins to drift out of
alignment. The unshackled part is drifting toward your sun, tugged toward it by
the pull of Calliopełs gravitational field."

�Youłre certain of this?" Sibia asked.

�Iłve had my ship check the data over and over. Therełs no
doubt. In just over seventy years, the Waynet will cut right through Calliope,
like a wire through a ball of cheese."

Malkoha looked hard into Merlinłs eyes. �What will happen?"

�Probably very little to begin with, when the Waynet is
still cutting through the chromosphere. But by the time it reaches the
nuclear-burning core ... Iłd say all bets are off."

�Can it be mended? Can the Waynet be brought back into
alignment?"

�Not using any technology known to my own people. Wełre
dealing with principles as far beyond anything on Lecythus as Tyrant is beyond
one of your propellor planes."

Malkoha looked stricken. �Then what can we possibly do?"

�You can make plans to leave Lecythus. You have always known
that space travel was possible: itłs in your history, in the books you give to
your children. If you had any doubts, Iłve shown it to be the case. Now you
must achieve it for yourselves."

�In seventy years?" Malkoha asked.

�I know it sounds impossible. But you can do it. You already
have flying machines. All you need to do is keep building on that achievement
... building and building ... until you have the means."

�You make it sound easy."

�It wonłt be. Itłll be the hardest thing youłve ever done.
But Iłm convinced that you can do it, if only you pull together." Merlin looked
sternly at his audience. �That means no more wars between the Skylands and the
Shadowlands. You donłt have time for it. From this moment on, the entire
industrial and scientific capacity of your planet will have to be directed
toward one goal."

�Youłre going to help us, Merlin?" Malkoha asked. �Arenłt
you?"

Merlinłs throat had become very dry. �Iłd like to, but I
must leave immediately. Twenty light-years from here is a bountiful system
known to the Cohort. The great vessels of my people-the swallowships-sometimes
stop in this system, to replenish supplies and make repairs. The swallowships
cannot use the Way, but they are very big. If I could divert just one
swallow-ship here, it could carry fifty thousand refugees; double that if
people were prepared to accept some hardship."

�Thatłs still not many people," Sibia said.

�Thatłs why you need to start thinking about reducing your
population over the next three generations. It wonłt be possible to save
everyone, but if you could at least ensure that the survivors are adults of
breeding age ..." Merlin trailed off, conscious of the dismayed faces looking
at him. �Look," he said, removing a sheaf of papers from his jacket and
spreading them on the table. �I had the ship prepare these documents. This one
concerns the production of wide-spectrum antibiotic medicines. This one
concerns the construction of a new type of aircraft engine, one that will allow
you to exceed the speed of sound and reach much higher altitudes than are now
available to you. This one concerns metallurgy and high-precision machining.
This one is a plan for a two-stage liquid-fueled rocket. You need to start
learning about rocketry now, because itłs the only thing thatłs going to get
you into space." His finger moved to the final sheet. �This document reveals
certain truths about the nature of physical reality. Energy and mass are related
by this simple formula. The speed of light is an absolute constant,
irrespective of the observerłs motion. This diagram shows the presence of
emission lines in the spectrum of hydrogen, and a mathematical formula that
predicts the spacing of those lines. All this ... stuff ... should help you
make some progress."

�Is this all you can give us?" Sibia asked skeptically. �A
few pagesł worth of vague sketches and cryptic formulae?"

�Theyłre more than most cultures ever get. I suggest you
start thinking about them straightaway."

�I will get this to Shama," Coucal said, taking the drawing
of a jet engine and preparing to slip it into his case.

�Not before everything here is duplicated and archived," Malkoha
said warningly. �And we must take pains to ensure none of these secrets fall
into Shadowland hands." Then he returned his attention to Merlin. �Evidently,
you gave this matter some thought."

�Just a bit."

�Is this the first time you have had to deal with a world
such as ours, one that will die?"

�Iłve had some prior experience of the matter. There was
once a world"

�What happened to the place in question?" Malkoha asked, before
Merlin could finish his sentence.

�It died."

�How many people were saved?"

For a moment Merlin couldnłt answer. The words seemed to
lodge in the back of his throat, hard as pebbles. �There were just two
survivors," he said quietly. �A pair of brothers."

* * * *

The walk to Tyrant was the longest he had ever taken. Ever
since he had made the decision to leave Lecythus he had rehearsed the occasion
in his mind, replaying it time and again. He had always imagined the crowd
cheering, daunted by the news, but not cowed, Merlin raising his fist in an
encouraging salute. Nothing had prepared him for the frigid silence of his
audience, their judgmental expressions as he left the low buildings of the
compound, their unspoken disdain hanging in the air like a proclamation.

Only Malkoha followed him all the way to Tyrantłs boarding
ramp. The old soldier had his coat drawn tight across his chest, even though
the wind was still and the evening not particularly cold.

�Iłm sorry," Merlin said, with one foot on the ramp. �I wish
I could stay."

�You seem like two men to me," Malkoha said, his voice low. �One
of them is braver than he gives himself credit for. The other man still has
bravery to learn."

�Iłm not running away."

�But you are running from something."

�I have to go now. If the damage to the Waynet becomes greater,
I may not even be able to reach the next system."

�Then you must do what you think is right. I shall be sure
to give your regards to Minla. She will miss you very much." Malkoha paused and
reached into his tunic pocket. �I almost forgot to give you this. She would
have been very upset with me if I had."

Malkoha had given Merlin a small piece of stone, a
coin-shaped sliver that must have been cut from a larger piece and then set in
colored metal so that it could be worn around the neck or wrist. Merlin
examined the stone with interest, but in truth there seemed nothing remarkable
about it. Hełd picked up and discarded more beautiful examples a thousand times
in his travels. It had been dyed red in order to emphasize the fine grain of
its surface: a series of parallel lines like the pages of a book seen end-on,
but with a rhythmic structure to the spacing of the lines-a widening and a
narrowing-that was unlike any book Merlin had seen.

�Tell her I appreciated it," he said.

�I gave the stone to my daughter. She found it pretty."

�How did you come by it?"

�I thought you were in a hurry to leave."

Merlinłs hand closed around the stone. �Youłre right. I
should be on my way."

�The stone belonged to a prisoner of mine, a man named Dowitcher.
He was one of their greatest thinkers: a scientist and soldier much like
myself. I admired his brilliance from afar, just as I hope he admired mine. One
day, our agents captured him and brought him to the Skylands. I played no part
in planning his kidnap, but I was delighted that we might at last meet on equal
terms. I was convinced that, as a man of reason, he would listen to my
arguments and accept the wisdom of defecting to the Skylands."

�Did he?"

�Not in the slightest. He was as firmly entrenched in his convictions
as I was in mine. We never became friends."

�So where does the stone come into it?"

�Before he died, Dowitcher found a means to torment me. He
gave me the stone and told me that he had learned something of great
significance from it. Something that could change our world. Something that had
cosmic significance. He was looking into the sky when he said that: almost
laughing. But he would not reveal what that secret was."

Merlin hefted the stone once more. �I think he was playing
games with you, Malkoha."

�Thatłs the conclusion I eventually reached. One day Minla
took a shine to the stone-I kept it on my desk long after Dowitcher was
gone-and I let her have it."

�And now itłs mine."

�You meant a lot to her, Merlin. She wanted to give you something
in return for the flowers. You may forget the rest of us one day, but please
donłt ever forget my daughter."

�I wonłt."

�Iłm lucky," Malkoha said, something in his tone easing, as
if he were finished judging Merlin. �Iłll be dead long before your Waynet cuts
into our sun. But Minlałs generation wonłt have that luxury. They know that
their world is going to end, and that every year brings that event a year
nearer. Theyłre the ones whołll spend their whole lives with that knowledge
looming over them. Theyłll never know true happiness. I donłt envy them a
moment of their lives."

That was when something in Merlin gave way, some mental
slippage that he must have felt coming for many hours without quite
acknowledging it to himself. Almost before he had time to reflect on his own
words he found himself saying to Malkoha, �Iłm staying."

The other man, perhaps wary of a trick or some misunderstanding
brought about by the translator, narrowed his eyes. �Merlin?"

�I said Iłm staying. Iłve changed my mind. Maybe it was what
I always knew I had to do, or maybe it was all down to what you just said about
Minla. But Iłm not going anywhere."

�What I said just now," Malkoha said, �about there being two
of you, one braver than the other ... I know now which man I am speaking to."

�I donłt feel brave. I feel scared."

�Then I know it to be true. Thank you, Merlin. Thank you for
not leaving us."

�Therełs a catch," Merlin said. �If Iłm going to be any help
to you, I have to see this whole thing out."

* * * *

Malkoha was the last to see him before he entered
frostwatch. �Twenty years," Merlin said, indicating the settings, which had
been recalibrated in Lecythus time units. �In all that time, you donłt need to
worry about me. Tyrant will take care of everything I need. If therełs a
problem, the ship will either wake me or it will send out the proctors to seek
assistance."

�You have never spoken of proctors before," Malkoha replied.

�Small mechanical puppets. They have very little intelligence
of their own, so they wonłt be able to help you with anything creative. But you
neednłt be alarmed by them."

�In twenty years, must we wake you?"

�No, the ship will take care of that as well. When the time
is ready, the ship will allow you aboard. I may be a little groggy at first,
but Iłm sure youłll make allowances."

�I may not be around in twenty years," Malkoha said gravely.
�I am sixty years old now."

�Iłm sure therełs still life left in you."

�If we should encounter a problem, a crisis ..."

�Listen to me," Merlin said, with sudden emphasis. �You need
to understand one very important thing. I am not a god. My body is much the
same as yours, our life spans very similar. Thatłs the way we did things in the
Cohort: immortality through our deeds, rather than flesh and blood. The
frostwatch casket can give me a few dozen years over a normal human life span,
but it canłt give me eternal life. If you keep waking me, I wonłt live long
enough to help you when things get really tough. If there is a crisis, you can
knock on the ship three times. But Iłd urge you not to do so unless things are
truly dire."

�I will heed your counsel," Malkoha said.

�Work hard. Work harder than youłve ever dreamed possible.
Time is going to eat up those seventy years faster than you can blink."

�I know how quickly time can eat years, Merlin."

�I want to wake to rockets and jet aircraft. Anything less,
Iłm going to be a disappointed man."

�We will do our best not to let you down. Sleep well,
Merlin. We will take care of you and your ship, no matter what happens."

Merlin said farewell to Malkoha. When the ship was sealed up
he settled himself into the frostwatch casket and commanded Tyrant to put him
to sleep.

He didnłt dream.

* * * *

Nobody he recognized was there to greet Merlin when he returned
to consciousness. Were it not for their uniforms, which still carried a
recognizable form of the Skylandersł crescent emblem, he could easily believe
that he had been abducted by forces from the surface. His visitors crowded
around his open casket, faces difficult to make out, his eyes watering against
the sudden intrusion of light.

�Can you understand me, Merlin?" asked a woman, with a firm
clear voice.

�Yes," he said, after a moment in which it seemed as if his
mouth were still frozen. �I understand you. How long have I"

�Twenty years, just as you instructed. We had no cause to
wake you."

He pushed himself from the casket, muscles screaming into
his brain with the effort. His vision sharpened by degrees. The woman studied
him with a cool detachment. She snapped her fingers at someone standing behind
her and then passed Merlin a blanket. �Put this around you," she said.

The blanket had been warmed. He wrapped it around himself
with gratitude, and felt some of the heat seep into his old bones. �That was a
long one," he said, his tongue moving sluggishly, making him slur his words. �We
donłt usually spend so long."

�But youłre alive and well."

�So it would seem."

�Wełve prepared a reception area in the compound. Therełs
food and drink, a medical team waiting to look at you. Can you walk?"

�I can try."

Merlin tried. His legs buckled under him before he reached
the door. They would regain strength in time, but for now he needed help. They
must have anticipated his difficulties, because a wheelchair was waiting at the
base of Tyrantłs boarding ramp, accompanied by an orderly to push it.

�Before you ask," the woman said, �Malkoha is dead. Iłm sorry
to have to tell you this."

Merlin had grown to think of the old man as his only adult
friend on Lecythus, and had been counting on his being there when he returned
from frostwatch. �When did he die?"

�Fourteen years ago."

�Force and Wisdom. It must be like ancient history to you."

�Not to all of us," the woman said sternly. �I am Minla,
Merlin. It may be fourteen years ago, but there isnłt a day when I donłt
remember my father and wish he were still with us."

As he was being propelled across the apron, Merlin looked up
at the womanłs face and compared it against his memories of the little girl he
had known twenty years ago. At once he saw the similarity and knew that she was
telling the truth. In that moment he felt the first visceral sense of the time
that had passed.

�You canłt imagine how odd this makes me feel, Minla. Do you
remember me?"

�I remember a man I used to talk to in a room. It was a long
time ago."

�Not to me. Do you remember the stone?"

She looked at him oddly. �The stone?"

�You asked your father to give it to me, when I was due to
leave Lecythus."

�Oh, that thing," Minla said. �Yes, I remember it now. It
was the one that belonged to Dowitcher."

�Itłs very pretty. You can have it back if you like."

�Keep it, Merlin. It doesnłt mean anything to me now, just
as it shouldnłt have meant anything to my father. Iłm embarrassed to have given
it to you."

�Iłm sorry about Malkoha."

�He died well, Merlin. Flying another hazardous mission for
us, in very bad weather. This time it was our turn to deliver medicine to our
allies. We were now making antibiotics for all the landmasses in the Skyland
alliance, thanks to the process you gave us. My father flew one of the last
consignments. He made it to the other landmass, but his plane was lost on the
return trip."

�He was a good man. I only knew him a short while, but I
think it was enough to tell."

�He often spoke of you, Merlin. I think he hoped you might
teach him more than you did."

�I did what I could. Too much knowledge would have overwhelmed
you: you wouldnłt have known where to start, or how to put the pieces together."

�Perhaps you should have trusted us more."

�You said you had no cause to wake me. Does that mean you
made progress?"

�Decide for yourself."

He followed Minlałs instruction. The area around Tyrant was
still recognizable as the old military compound, with many of the original
buildings still present, albeit enlarged and adapted. But most of the dirigible
docking towers were gone, as were most of the dirigibles themselves. Ranks of
new aircraft now occupied the area where the towers and airships had been
before, bigger and heavier than anything Merlin had seen before. The swept-back
geometry of their wings, the angle of the leading edge, the rakish curve of
their tailplanes, all owed something to the shape of Tyrant in
atmospheric-entry mode. Clearly the natives had been more observant than hełd given
them credit for. Merlin knew he shouldnłt have been surprised; hełd given them
the blueprints for the jet turbine, after all. But it was still something of a
shock to see his plans made concrete, so closely to the way he had imagined
them.

�Fuel is always a problem," Minla said. �We have the advantage
of height, but little else. We rely on our scattered allies on the ground,
together with raiding expeditions to Shadowland fuel bunkers." She pointed to
one of the remaining airships. �Our cargo dirigibles can lift fuel all the way
back to the Skylands."

�Are you still at war?" Merlin asked, though her statement rather
confirmed it.

�There was a ceasefire shortly after my fatherłs death. It
didnłt last long."

�You people could achieve a lot more if you pooled your efforts,"
Merlin said. �In seventy-make that fifty-years youłre going to be facing
collective annihilation. It isnłt going to make a damned bit of difference what
flag youłre saluting."

�Thank you for the lecture. If it means so much to you, why
donłt you fly down to the other side and talk to them?"

�Iłm an explorer, not a diplomat."

�You could always try."

Merlin sighed heavily. �I did try once. Not long after I
left the Cohort ... there was a world named Exoletus, about the same size as
Lecythus. I thought there might be something on Exoletus connected with my
quest. I was wrong, but it was reason enough to land and try and talk to the
locals."

�Were they at war?"

�Just like you lot. Two massive power blocs, chemical weapons,
the works. I hopped from hemisphere to hemisphere, trying to play the
peacemaker, trying to knock their heads together to make them see sense. I laid
the whole cosmic perspective angle on them: how there was a bigger universe out
there, one they could be a part of if they only stopped squabbling. How they
were going to have to be a part of it whether they liked it or not, when the
Huskers came calling, but if they could only be ready for that"

�It didnłt work."

�I made things twenty times worse. I caught them at a time
when they were inching toward some kind of ceasefire. By the time I left, they
were going at it again hell-for-leather. Taught me a valuable lesson, Minla. It
isnłt my job to sprinkle fairy dust on a planet and get everyone to live
happily ever after. No one gave me the tool kit for that. You have to work
these things out for yourself."

She looked only slightly disappointed. �So youłll never try
again?"

�Burn your fingers once, you donłt put them into the fire
twice."

�Well," Minla said, �before you think too harshly of us, it
was the Skylands that took the peace initiative in the last ceasefire."

�So what went wrong?"

�The Shadowlands invaded one of our allied surface
territories. They were interested in mining a particular ore, known to be abundant
in that area."

Depressed as he was by news that the war was still rumbling
on, Merlin forced his concentration back onto the larger matter of preparations
for the catastrophe. �Youłve done well with these aircraft. Doubtless youłll
have gained expertise in high-altitude flight. Have you gone transonic yet?"

�In prototypes. Wełll have an operational squadron of supersonic
aircraft in the air within two years, subject to fuel supplies."

�Rocketry?"

�That too. Itłs probably easier if I show you."

Minla let the orderly wheel him into one of the compound
buildings. A long window ran along one wall, overlooking a larger space. Though
the interior had been enlarged and repartitioned, Merlin still recognized the
tactical room. The old wall map, with its cumbersome push-around plaques, had
been replaced by a clattering electromechanical display board. Operators wore
headsets and sat at desks behind huge streamlined machines, their gray metal
cases ribbed with cooling flanges. They were staring at small flickering
slate-blue screens, whispering into microphones.

Minla removed a tranche of photographs from a desk and
passed them to Merlin for his inspection. They were black-and-white images of
the Skyland airmass, shot from increasing altitude, until the curve of Lecythusłs
horizon became pronounced.

�Our sounding rockets have penetrated to the very edge of
the atmosphere," Minla said. �Our three-stage units now have the potential to
deliver a tactical payload to any unobstructed point on the surface."

�What would count as a ętactical payloadł?" Merlin asked warily.

�Itłs academic. Iłm merely illustrating the progress wełve
made in your absence."

�Iłm cheered."

�You encouraged us to make these improvements," Minla said
chidingly. �You can hardly blame us if we put them to military use in the
meantime. The catastrophe-as youłve so helpfully pointed out-is still fifty
years in the future. We have our own affairs to deal with in the meantime."

�I wasnłt trying to create a war machine. I was just giving
you the stepping stones you needed to get into space."

�Well, as you can doubtless judge for yourself, we still
have a distance to go. Our analysts say that wełll have a natural satellite in
orbit within fifteen years, maybe ten. Definitely so by the time you wake from
your next bout of sleep. But thatłs still not the same as moving fifty thousand
people out of the system, or however many it needs to be. For that wełre going
to need more guidance from you, Merlin."

�You seem to be doing very well with what Iłve already given
you."

Minlałs tone, cold until then, softened perceptibly. �Wełll
get you fed. Then the doctors would like to look you over, if only for their
own notebooks. Wełre glad to have you back with us, Merlin. My father would
have been so happy to see you again."

�Iłd like to have spoken with him again."

After a moment, Minla said: �How long will you stay with us,
until you go back to sleep again?"

�Months, at least. Maybe a year. Long enough to know that
youłre on the right track, and that I can trust you to make your own progress
until Iłm awake again."

�Therełs a lot we need to talk about. I hope you have a
strong appetite for questions."

�I have a stronger appetite for breakfast."

Minla had him wheeled out of the room into another part of
the compound. There he was examined by Skyland medical officials, a process
that involved much poking and prodding and whispered consultation. They were
interested in Merlin not just because he was a human who had been born on
another planet, but because they hoped to learn some secret of frostwatch from
his metabolism. Then they were done and Merlin was allowed to wash, clothe himself,
and finally eat. Skyland food was austere compared to what he was used to
aboard Tyrant, but in his present state he would have wolfed down anything.

There was to be no rest for him that day. More medical examinations
followed, including some that were clearly designed to test the functioning of
his nervous system. They poured cold water into his ears, shone lights into his
eyes, and tapped him with various small hammers. Merlin endured it all with
stoic good grace. They would find nothing odd about him because in all
significant respects he was biologically identical to the people administering
the examinations. But he imagined the tests would give the medical staff much
to write about in the coming months.

Minla was waiting for him afterward, together with a roomful
of Skyland officials. He recognized two or three of them as older versions of
people he had already met, grayed and lined by twenty years of war-there was
Triller, Jacana, and Sibia, Triller now missing an eye-but most of the faces
were new to him. Merlin took careful note of the newcomers: those would be the
people hełd be dealing with next time.

�Perhaps we should get to business," Minla said, with crisp
authority. She was easily the youngest person in the room, but if she didnłt
outrank everyone present, she at least had their tacit respect. �Merlin,
welcome back to the Skylands. Youłve learned something of what has happened in
your absence: the advances wełve made, the ongoing condition of war. Now we
must talk about the future."

Merlin nodded agreeably. �Iłm all for the future."

�Sibia?" Minla asked, directing a glance at the older woman.

�The industrial capacity of the Skylands, even when our surface
allies are taken into account, is insufficient for the higher purpose of
safeguarding the survival of our planetary culture," Sibia answered, sounding
exactly as if she were reading from a strategy document, even though she was
looking Merlin straight in the eye. �As such, it is our military duty-our moral
imperativeto bring all of Lecythus under one authority, a single Planetary
Government. Only then will we have the means to save more than a handful of
souls."

�I agree wholeheartedly," Merlin said. �Thatłs why I applaud
your earlier ceasefire. Itłs just a pity it didnłt last."

�The ceasefire was always fragile," Jacana said. �The wonder
is that it lasted as long as it did. Thatłs why we need something more
permanent."

Merlin felt a prickling sensation under his collar. �I guess
you have something in mind."

�Complete military and political control of the Shadowlands,"
Sibia replied. �They will never work with us, unless they become us."

�You canłt believe how frightening that sounds."

�Itłs the only way," Minla said. �My fatherłs regime
explored all possible avenues to find a peaceful settlement, one that would
allow our two blocs to work in unison. He failed."

�So instead you want to crush them into submission."

�If thatłs what it takes," Minla said. �Our view is that the
Shadowland administration is vulnerable to collapse. It would only take a
single clear-cut demonstration of our capability to bring about a coup,
followed by a negotiated surrender."

�And this clear-cut demonstration?"

�Thatłs why we need your assistance, Merlin. Twenty years
ago, you revealed certain truths to my father." Before he could say anything,
Minla produced one of the sheets Merlin had given to Malkoha and his
colleagues. �Itłs all here in black-and-white. The equivalence of mass and
energy. The constancy of the speed of light. The interior structure of the
atom. Your remark that our sun contains a ęnuclear-burning core.ł All these
things were a spur to us. Our best minds have grappled with the implications of
these ideas for twenty years. We see how the energy of the atom could carry us
into space, and beyond range of our sun. We now have an inkling of what else
they imply."

�Do tell," Merlin said, an ominous feeling in his belly.

�If mass can be converted into energy, then the military
implications are startling. By splitting the atom, or even forcing atoms to
merge, we believe that we can construct weapons of almost incalculable
destructive force. The demonstration of one of these devices would surely be
enough to collapse the Shadowland administration."

Merlin shook his head slowly. �Youłre heading up a blind alley.
It isnłt possible to make practical weapons using atomic energy. There are too
many difficulties."

Minla studied him with an attentiveness that Merlin found
quite unsettling. �I donłt believe you," she said.

�Believe me or donłt believe me, itłs up to you."

�We are certain that these weapons can be made. Our own research
lines would have given them to us sooner or later."

Merlin leaned back in his seat. He knew when there was no
point in maintaining a bluff.

�Then you donłt need me."

�But we do. Most urgently. The Shadowland administration also
has its bright minds, Merlin. Their interest in those ore reserves I mentioned
earlier ... either there have been intelligence links, or they have
independently arrived at similar conclusions to us. They are trying to make a
weapon."

�You canłt be sure of that."

�We canłt afford to be wrong. We may own the sky, but our
situation is dependent upon access to those fuel reserves. If one of our allies
was targeted with an atomic weapon ..." Minla left the sentence unfinished, her
point adequately made.

�Then build your bomb," Merlin said.

�We need it sooner rather than later. That is where you come
in." Now Minla produced another sheet of paper, nicking it across the table in
Merlinłs direction. �We have enough of the ore," she said. �We also have the
means to refine it. This is our best guess for a design."

Merlin glanced at the illustration long enough to see a
complicated diagram of concentric circles, like the plan for an elaborate
garden maze. It was intricately annotated in machine-printed Lecythus B.

�I wonłt help you."

�Then you may as well leave us now," Minla said. �Wełll
build our bomb in our own time, without your help, and use it to secure peace
for the whole world. Maybe that will happen quickly enough that we can begin
redirecting the industrial effort toward the evacuation. Maybe it wonłt. But
what happens will be on our terms, not yours."

�Understand one thing," Jacana said, with a hawkish look on
his face. �The day will come when atomic weapons are used. Left to our own
devices, wełll build weapons to use against our enemy below. But by the time we
have that capability, theyłll more than likely have the means to strike back,
if they donłt hit us first. That means therełll be a series of exchanges, an
escalation, rather than a single decisive demonstration. Give us the means to
make a weapon now and wełll use it in such a way that the civilian casualties
are minimized. Withhold it from us, and youłll have the blood of a million dead
on your hands."

Merlin almost laughed. �Iłll have blood on my hands because
I didnłt show you how to kill yourselves?"

�You began this," Minla said. �You already gave us secret
knowledge of the atom. Did you imagine we were so stupid, so childlike, that we
wouldnłt put two and two together?"

�Maybe I thought you had more common sense. I was hoping youłd
develop atomic rockets, not atomic bombs."

�This is our world, Merlin, not yours. We only get one
chance at controlling its fate. If you want to help us, you must give us the
means to overwhelm the enemy."

�If I give you this, millions will die."

�A billion will perish if Lecythus is not unified. You must
do it, Merlin. Either you side with us, to the full extent, or we all die."

Merlin closed his eyes, wishing a moment alone, a moment to
puzzle over the ramifications. In desperation, he saw a possible solution: one
hełd rejected before but was now willing to advance. �Show me the military
targets on the surface that you would most like to eradicate," he said. �Iłll
have Tyrant take them out, using charm-torps."

�Wełve considered asking for your direct military
assistance," Minla said. �Unfortunately, it doesnłt work for us. Our enemy already
know something of your existence: it was always going to be a difficult secret
to hide, especially given the reach of the Shadowlander espionage network. Theyłd
be impressed by your weapons, that much we donłt doubt. But they also know that
our hold on you is tenuous, and that you could just as easily refuse to attack
a given target. For that reason you do not make a very effective deterrent.
Whereas if they knew that we controlled a devastating weapon ..." Minla looked
at the other Skyland officials. �There could be no doubt in their minds that we
might do the unthinkable."

�Iłm really beginning to wonder whether I shouldnłt have
landed on the ground instead."

�Youłd be sitting in a very similar room, having a very
similar conversation," Minla said.

�Your father would be ashamed of you."

Minlałs look made Merlin feel as if he were something shełd
found under her shoe. �My father meant well. He served his people to the best
of his abilities. But he had the luxury of knowing he was going to die before
the worldłs end. I donłt."

* * * *

Merlin was aboard Tyrant, alone except for Minla, while he
prepared to enter frostwatch again. Eight frantic months had passed since his
revival, with the progress attaining a momentum of its own that Merlin felt
sure would carry through to his next period of wakefulness.

�Iłll be older when we meet again," Minla said. �Youłll
barely have aged a day, and your memories of this day will be as sharp as if it
happened yesterday. Is that something you ever get used to?"

Not for the first time, Merlin smiled tolerantly. �I was
born on a world not very different from Lecythus, Minla. We didnłt have
landmasses floating through the sky, we didnłt have global wars, but in many
respects we were quite alike. Everything that you see here-this ship, this
frostwatch cabinet, these souvenirs-would once have seemed unrecognizably
strange to me. I got used to it, though. Just as youłd get used to it, if you
had the same experiences."

�Iłm not so sure."

�I am. I met a very intelligent girl twenty years ago, and believe
me, Iłve met some intelligent people in my time." Merlin brightened,
remembering the thing hełd meant to show Minla. �That stone you had your father
give me ... the one we talked about just after I came out of the cabinet?"

�The worthless thing Dowitcher convinced my father was of
cosmic significance?"

�It wasnłt worthless to you. You must have liked it, or you
wouldnłt have given it to me in return for my flowers."

�The flowers," Minla said thoughtfully. �Iłd almost
forgotten them. I used to look forward to them so much, the sound of your voice
as you told me stories I couldnłt understand but which still managed to sound
so significant. You made me feel special, Merlin. Iłd treasure the flowers
afterward and go to sleep imagining the strange, beautiful places theyłd come
from. Iłd cry when they died, but then youłd always bring new ones."

�I used to like the look on your face."

�Tell me about the stone," she said, after a silence.

�I had Tyrant run an analysis on it. Just in case there was
something significant about it, something neither you, I, nor your father had
spotted."

�And?" Minla asked, with a note of fearfulness.

�Iłm afraid itłs just a piece of whetstone."

�Whetstone?"

�Very hard. Itłs the kind you use for sharpening knives. Itłs
a common enough kind of stone on a planet like this one, wherever you have
tides, shorelines, and oceans." Merlin had fished out the stone earlier; now he
held it in his hand, palm open, like a lucky coin. �You see that fine
patterning of lines? This kind of stone was laid down in shallow tidal water.
Whenever the sea rushed in, it would carry a suspension of silt that would
settle out and form a fine layer on the surface of the stone. The next time the
tide came in, youłd get a second layer. Then a third, and so on. Each layer
would only take a few hours to be formed, although it might take hundreds of
millions of years for it to harden into stone."

�So itłs very old."

Merlin nodded. �Very old indeed."

�But not of any cosmic significance."

�Iłm sorry. I just thought you might want to know. Dowitcher
was playing a game with your father after all. I think Malkoha had more or less
guessed that for himself."

For a moment Merlin thought that his explanation had
satisfied Minla, enabling her to shut tight that particular chapter of her
life. But instead she just frowned. �The lines arenłt regular, though. Why do
they widen and then narrow?"

�Tides vary," Merlin said, suddenly feeling himself on less
solid ground. �Deep tides carry more sediment. Shallow tides less. I suppose."

�Storms raise high tides. That would explain the occasional
thick band. But other than that, the tides on Lecythus are very regular. I know
this from my education."

�Then your educationłs wrong, Iłm afraid. A planet like
this, with a large moon ..." Merlin left the sentence unfinished. �Spring tides
and deep tides, Minla. No arguing with it."

�Iłm sure youłre right."

�Do you want the stone back?" he asked.

�Keep it, if it amuses you."

He closed his hand around the stone. �It still meant
something to you when you gave it to me. Itłll always mean something to me for
that reason."

�Thank you for not leaving us. If my stone kept you here, it
served a useful purpose."

�Iłm glad I chose to stay. I just hope I havenłt done more
harm than good, with the things I showed you."

�That again," Minla said with a weary sigh. �You worry that
wełre going to blow ourselves to bits, just because you showed us the clockwork
inside the atom."

�Itłs nasty clockwork."

He had seen enough progress, enough evidence of wisdom and independent
ingenuity, to know that the Skyland forces would have a working atomic bomb
within two years. By then, their rocket program would have given them a
delivery system able to handle the cumbersome payload of that primitive device.
Even if the rocket fell behind schedule, they only had to wait until the aerial
landmass drifted over a Shadowland target.

�I canłt stop you making weapons," Merlin said. �All I ask
is that you use them wisely. Just enough to negotiate a victory, and then no
more. Then forget about bombs and start thinking about atomic rockets."

Minla looked at him pityingly. �You worry that wełre becoming
monsters. Merlin, we already were monsters. You didnłt make us any worse."

�That strain of bacterial meningitis was very infectious," Merlin
said. �I know: Iłve run it through Tyrantłs medical analyzer. You were already
having difficulties with supplies of antibiotics. If I hadnłt landed, if I hadnłt
offered to make that medicine for you, your military effort might have
collapsed within months. The Shadowlands would have won by default. There
wouldnłt be any need to introduce atomic bombs into the world."

�But wełd still need the rockets."

�Different technology. The one doesnłt imply the other."

�Merlin, listen to me. Iłm sorry that wełre asking you to
make these difficult moral choices. But for us itłs about only one thing:
species survival. If you hadnłt dropped out of the sky, the Waynet would still
be on its way to us, ready to slice our star in two. After that happened, you
had no choice but to do everything possible to save us, no matter how bad a
taste it leaves in your mouth."

�I have to live with myself when this is all over."

�Youłll have nothing to be ashamed of. Youłve made all the
right decisions so far. Youłve given us a future."

�I need to clear up a few things for you," Merlin said. �It
isnłt a friendly galaxy. The creatures that smashed your sky are still out
there. Your ancestors forged the armored sky to hide from them, to make
Lecythus look like an airless world. The Huskers were hunting down my own
people before I left to work on my own. It isnłt going to be plain sailing."

�Survival is better than death. Always and forever."

Merlin sighed: he knew that this conversation had run its
course, that they had been over these things a thousand times already and were
no closer to mutual understanding. �When I wake up again, I want to see lights
in the sky."

�When I was a girl," Minla said, �long before you came, my
father would tell me stories of people traveling through the void, looking down
on Lecythus. Hełd put in jokes and little rhymes, things to make me laugh.
Under it all, though, he had a serious message. Hełd show me the pictures in my
books, of the great ship that brought us to Lecythus. He said wełd come from
the stars and one day wełd find a way to go back there. It seemed like a
fantasy when I was a little girl, something that would never come to pass in
the real world. Yet now itłs happening, just as my father always said it would.
If I live long enough, Iłll know what itłs like to leave Lecythus behind. But Iłll
be dead long before we ever reach another world, or see any of the wonders youłve
known."

For an instant Minla was a girl again, not a driven military
leader. Something in her face spoke to Merlin across the years, breaching the
defenses he had carefully assembled.

�Let me show you something."

He took her into Tyrantłs rear compartment and revealed the
matte-black cone of the syrinx, suspended in its cradle. At Merlinłs
invitation, Minla was allowed to stroke its mirror-smooth surface. She reached
out her hand gingerly, as if expecting to touch something very hot or very
cold. At the last instant her fingertips grazed the ancient artifact and then
held the contact, daringly.

�It feels old," she said. �I canłt say why."

�It does. Iłve often felt the same thing."

�Old and very heavy. Heavier than it has any right to be.
And yet when I look at it, itłs somehow not quite there, as if Iłm looking at
the space where it used to be."

�Thatłs exactly how it looks to me."

Minla withdrew her touch. �What is it?"

�We call it a syrinx. Itłs not a weapon. Itłs more like a
key or a passport."

�What does it do?"

�It lets my ship use the Waynet. In their time the Waymakers
must have made billions of these things, enough to fuel the commerce of a
million worlds. Imagine that, Minla: millions of stars bound by threads of
accelerated spacetime, each thread strung with thousands of glittering ships
rushing to and fro, drops of honey on a thread of silk, each ship moving so
close to the speed of light that time itself slowed almost to stillness. You
could dine on one world, ride your ship to the Waynet and then take supper on
some other world, under the falling light of another sun. A thousand years
might have passed while you were riding the flow, but that didnłt matter. The
Waymakers forged an empire where a thousand years was just a lazy afternoon, a
time to put off plans for another day." Merlin looked sadly at Minla. �That was
the idea, anyway."

�And now?"

�We breakfast in the ruins, barely remember the glory that
was, and scavenge space for the handful of still-functioning syrinxes."

�Could you take it apart, find out how it works?"

�Only if I felt suicidal. The Waymakers protected their
secrets very well."

�Then it is valuable."

�Incalculably so."

Minla stroked it again. �It feels dead."

�It just isnłt active yet. When the Waynet comes closer, the
syrinx will sense it. Thatłs when wełll really know itłs time to get out of
here." Merlin forced a smile. �But by then wełll be well on our way."

�Now that youłve shown me this secret, arenłt you worried
that wełll take it from you?"

�The ship wouldnłt let you. And what use would it be to you
anyway?"

�We could make our own ship, and use your syrinx to escape
from here."

Merlin tried not to sound too condescending. �Any ship you
built would smash itself to splinters as soon as it touched the Waynet, even
with the syrinx to help it. And you wouldnłt achieve much anyway. Ships that
use the Waynet canłt be very large."

�Why is that?"

Merlin shrugged. �They donłt need to be. If it only takes a
day or two of travel to get anywhere-remember what I said about clocks slowing
down-then you donłt need to haul all your provisions with you, even if youłre
crossing to the other side of the galaxy."

�But could a bigger ship enter the Waynet, if it had to?"

�The entry stresses wouldnłt allow it. Itłs like riding the
rapids." Merlin didnłt wait to see if Minla was following him. �The syrinx
creates a path that you can follow, a course where the river is easier. But you
still need a small boat to squeeze around the obstacles."

�Then no one ever made larger ships, even during the time of
the Waymakers?"

�Why would they have needed to?"

�That wasnłt my question, Merlin."

�It was a long time ago. I donłt have all the answers. And
you shouldnłt pin your hopes on the Waynet. Itłs the thing thatłs trying to
kill you, not save you."

�But when you leave us ... youłll ride the Waynet, wonłt
you?"

Merlin nodded. �But Iłll make damned sure I have a head
start on the collision."

�Iłm beginning to see how all this must look to you," Minla
said. �This is the worst thing thatłs ever happened to us, the end of our
history itself. To you itłs just a stopover, an incidental adventure. Iłm sure
there were hundreds of worlds before us, and therełll be hundreds more. Thatłs
right, isnłt it?"

Merlin bridled. �If I didnłt care about you all, Iłd have
left twenty years ago."

�You very nearly did. I know how close you came. My father
spoke of it many times, his joy when you changed your mind."

�I had a change of heart," Merlin said. �Everyonełs allowed
that. You played a part in it, Minla. If you hadnłt told Malkoha to give me
that gift ..."

�Then Iłm glad I did, if it meant so much." Minla looked
away, something between sadness and fascination on her face. �Merlin, before
you sleep. Do something for me."

�Yes?"

�Make me flowers again. From some world Iłll never ever see.
And tell me their story."

* * * *

The Planetary Government aircraft was a sleek silver flying
wing with its own atomic reactor, feeding six engines buried in air-smoothed
nacelles. Minla had already led Merlin down a spiral staircase, into an
observation cupola set under the thickest part of the wing. Now she touched a
brushed-steel panel, causing armored slats to whisk open in rapid sequence.
Through the green-tinted blast-proof glass they had an uninterrupted view of
the surface rolling by underneath.

The ocean carried no evidence of the war, but there was
hardly any stretch of land that hadnłt been touched in some fashion. Merlin saw
the rubble-strewn remains of towns and cities, some with the hearts gouged out
by kilometer-deep craters. He saw flooded harbors, beginning to be clawed back
by the greedy fingers of the sea. He saw swaths of gray-brown land where
nothing grew anymore, and where only dead, petrified forests testified to the
earlier presence of living things. Atomic weapons had been used in their
thousands, by both sides. The Skylanders had been first, though, which was why
the weapons had a special name on Lecythus. Because of the shape of the
mushroom cloud that accompanied each burst, they called them Minlałs Flowers.

She pointed out the new cities that had been built since the
ceasefire. They were depressing to behold: grids of utilitarian blocks, each
skull-gray multistory building identical to the others. Spidery highways linked
the settlements, but not once did Merlin see any evidence of traffic or
commerce.

�Wełre not building for posterity," she said. �None of those
buildings have to last more than fifty years, and most of them will be empty
long before that. By the time they start crumbling, therełll be no one alive on
Lecythus."

�Youłre surely not thinking of taking everyone with you,"
Merlin said.

�Why not? It seemed unthinkable forty years ago. But so did
atomic war, and the coming of a single world state. Anythingłs within our reach
now. With social planning, we can organize matters such that the population
shrinks to a tenth of its present size. No children will be allowed to be born
in the last twenty years. And wełll begin moving people into the Space
Dormitories long before that."

Merlin had seen the plans for the dormitories, along with
the other elements of Minlałs evacuation program. There was already a small
space station in orbit around Lecythus, but it would be utterly dwarfed by the
hundred dormitories. The plans called for huge air-filled spheres, each of
which would swallow one hundred thousand evacuees, giving a total in-orbit
human presence of ten million people. Yet even as the Space Dormitories were
being populated, work would be under way on the thousand Exodus Arks that would
actually carry the evacuees out of the system. The Arks would be built in
orbit, using materials extracted and refined from the moonłs crust. Merlin had
already indicated to Minlałs experts that they could expect to find a certain
useful isotope of helium in the topsoil of the moon, an isotope that would
enable the Arks to be powered by nuclear fusion engines of an ancient and
well-tested design.

�Forced birth control, and mass evacuation," he said, grimacing.
�Thatłs going to take some tough policing. What if people donłt go along with
your program?"

�Theyłll go along," Minla said.

�Even if that meant shooting a few, to make a point?"

�Millions have already died, Merlin. If it takes a few more
to guarantee the efficient execution of the evacuation program, I see that as a
price worth paying."

�You canłt push human society that hard. It snaps."

�Therełs no such thing as society," Minla told him.

Presently she had the pilot bring them below supersonic
speed, and then down to a hovering standstill above what Merlin took to be an
abandoned building, perched near the shore amid the remains of what must once
have been a great ocean seaport. The flying wing lowered itself on ducted jets,
blowing dust and debris in all directions until its landing gear kissed
scorched earth and the engines quietened.

�Wełll take a stroll outside," Minla said. �Therełs
something I want you to see. Something that will convince you of our seriousness."

�I donłt need convincing."

�I want you to see it nonetheless. Take this cloak." She
handed him a surprisingly heavy garment.

�Lead impregnated?"

�Just a precaution. Radiation levels are actually very low
in this sector."

They disembarked via an escalator that had folded down from
the flying wingłs belly, accompanied by a detachment of guards. The armed men
moved ahead, sweeping the ground with things that looked like metal brooms
before ushering Minla and Merlin forward. They followed a winding path through
scorched rubble and junk, taking care not to trip over the obstacles and broken
ground. Calliope had set during their descent and a biting wind was now howling
into land from the sea, setting his teeth on edge. From somewhere in the
distance a siren rose and fell on a mournful cycle. Despite Minlałs assurance
concerning the radioactivity, Merlin swore he could already feel his skin
tingling. Overhead, stars poked through the thinning layer of moonlit clouds.

When at last he looked up, he saw that the solitary building
was in fact an enormous stone monument. It towered a hundred meters above the
flying wing, stepped like a ziggurat and cut and engraved with awesome
precision. Letters in Lecythus A marched in stentorian ranks across the highest
vertical face. Beyond the monument, gray-black water lapped at the shattered
remains of a promenade. The monument was presumably designed to weather storms,
but it would only take one spring tide to submerge its lower flanks completely.
Merlin wondered why Minlałs people hadnłt set it on higher ground.

�Itłs impressive."

�There are a hundred monuments like this on Lecythus," Minla
told him, drawing her cloak tighter around herself. �We faced them with
whetstone, would you believe it. It turns out to be very good for making
monuments, especially when you donłt want the letters to be worn away in a
handful of centuries."

�You built a hundred of these?" Merlin asked.

�Thatłs just the start. Therełll be a thousand by the time
wełre finished. When we are gone, when all other traces of our culture have
been erased from time, we hope that at least one of these monuments will
remain. Shall I read you the inscription?"

Merlin had still learned nothing of the native writing, and
hełd neglected to wear the lenses that would have allowed Tyrant to overlay a
translation.

�Youłd better."

�It says that once a great human society lived on Lecythus,
in peace and harmony. Then came a message from the stars, a warning that our
world was to be destroyed by the fire of the sun itself, or something even
worse. So we made preparations to abandon the world that had been our home for
so long, and to commence a journey into the outer darkness of interstellar
space, looking for a new home in the stars. One day, thousands or tens of
thousands after our departure, you, the people who read this message, may find
us. For now you are welcome to make of this world what you will. But know that
this planet was ours, and it remains ours, and that one day we shall make it
our home again."

�I like the bit about ępeace and harmony.ł"

�History is what we write, not what we remember. Why should
we tarnish the memory of our planet by enshrining our less noble deeds?"

�Spoken like a true leader, Minla."

At that moment one of the guards raised his rifle and projected
a line of tracer fire into the middle distance. Something hissed and scurried
into the cover of debris.

�We should be leaving," Minla said. �Regressives come out at
night, and some of them are armed."

�Regressives?"

�Dissident political elements. Suicide cultists whołd rather
die on Lecythus than cooperate in the evacuation effort. Theyłre our problem,
Merlin, not yours."

Hełd heard stories about the regressives, but dismissed them
as rumor until now. They were the survivors of the war, people who hadnłt
submitted eagerly to the iron rule of Minlałs new Planetary Government. Details
that didnłt fit into the plan, and which therefore had to be brushed aside or
suppressed or given a subhuman name. He pulled the cloak tighter, anxious not
to spend a minute longer on the surface than necessary. But even as Minla
turned and began walking back to the waiting aircraft-moonlight picked out the
elegant sweep of its single great wing-something tugged at him, holding him to
the spot.

�Minla," he called, a crack in his voice.

She stopped and turned around. �What is it, Merlin?"

�Iłve something for you." He reached under the cloak and
fished out the gift she had given him as a girl, holding it before him. Hełd
had it with him for days, waiting for the moment he hoped would never come.

Impatiently, Minla retraced her steps. �I said we should be
leaving. What is it you want to give me?"

He handed her the sliver of whetstone. �A little girl gave
me this. I donłt think I know that little girl anymore."

Minla looked at the stone with a curl of disgust on her
face. �That was forty years ago."

�Not to me. To me it was less than a year. Iłve seen a lot
of changes since you gave me that gift."

�We all have to grow up sometime, Merlin." For a moment he
thought she was going to hand him back the gift, or at least slip it into one
of her own pockets. Instead, Minla let it drop to the ground. Merlin reached to
pick it up, but it was too late. The stone fell into a dark crack between two
shattered paving slabs; Merlin heard the chink as it bounced off something and
fell even deeper.

�Itłs gone."

�It was just a silly stone," Minla said. �Thatłs all. Now
letłs be on our way."

Merlin looked back at the lapping waters as he followed
Minla to the moonlit flying wing. Something about the whetstone, something
about tides of that sea, something about the moon itself, kept nagging at the
back of his mind. There was a connection, trivial or otherwise, that he was
missing.

He was sure it would come to him sooner or later.

* * * *

Minla walked with a stick, clicking its hard metal shaft
against the echoing flooring of the stationłs observation deck. Illness or
injury had disfigured her since their last meeting; she wore her graying hair
in a lopsided parting, hanging down almost to the collar on her right side.
Merlin could not say for certain what had happened to Minla, since she was
careful to turn her face away from him whenever they spoke. But in the days
since his revival he had already heard talk of assassination attempts, some of
which had apparently come close to succeeding. Minla seemed more stooped and
frail than he remembered, as if she had worked every hour of those twenty
years.

She interrupted a light beam with her hand, opening the viewing
shields. �Behold the Space Dormitories," she said, declaiming as if she had an
audience of thousands rather than a single man standing only a few meters away.
�Rejoice, Merlin. You played a part in this."

Through the window, wheeling with the gentle rotation of the
orbital station, the nearest dormitory loomed larger than Lecythus in the sky.
The wrinkled gray sphere would soon reach operational pressure, its skin
becoming taut. The final sun mirrors were being assembled in place, manipulated
by mighty articulated robots. Cargo rockets were coming and going by the
minute, while the first wave of evacuees had already taken up residence in the
polar holding pens.

Twenty dormitories were ready now; the remaining eighty
would come online within two years. Every day, hundreds of atomic rockets
lifted from the surface of Lecythus, carrying evacuees-packed into their holds
at the maximum possible human storage density, like a kind of three-dimensional
jigsaw of flesh and blood-or cargo, in the form of air, water, and
prefabricated parts for the other habitats. Each rocket launch deposited more
radioactivity into the atmosphere of the doomed world. It was now fatal to
breathe that air for more than a few hours, but the slow poisoning of Lecythus
was of no concern to the Planetary Government. The remaining surface-bound
colonists, those who would occupy the other dormitories when they were ready,
awaited transfer in pressurized bunkers, in conditions that were at least as
spartan as anything they would have to endure in space. Merlin had offered the
services of Tyrant to assist with the evacuation effort, but as efficient and
fast as his ship was, it would have made only a token difference to the speed
of the exercise.

That was not to say that there were not difficulties, or
that the program was exactly on schedule. Merlin was gladdened by the progress
he saw in some areas, disheartened in others. Before he slept, the locals had
grilled him for help with their prototype atomic rockets, seemingly in
expectation that Merlin would provide magic remedies for the failures that had
dogged them so far. But Merlin could only help in a limited fashion. He knew
the basic principles of building an atomic rocket, but little of the detailed
knowledge needed to circumvent a particular problem. Minlałs experts were
frustrated, and then dismayed. He tried explaining to them that though an
atomic rocket might be primitive compared to the engines in Tyrant, that didnłt
mean it was simple, or that its construction didnłt involve many subtle
principles. �I know how a sailing ship works," he said, trying to explain
himself. �But that doesnłt mean I could build one myself, or show a master boatbuilder
how to improve his craft."

They wanted to know why he couldnłt just give them the technology
in Tyrant itself.

�My ship is capable of self-repair," hełd said. �But it isnłt
capable of making copies of itself. Thatłs a deep principle, embodied in the
logical architecture at a very profound level."

�Then run off a blueprint of your engines. Let us copy what
we need from the plans," they said.

�That wonłt work. The components in Tyrant are manufactured
to exacting tolerances, using materials your chemistry canłt even explain, let
alone reproduce."

�Then show us how to improve our manufacturing capability,
until we can make what we need."

�We donłt have time for that. Tyrant was manufactured by a
culture that had had over ten thousand years of experience in spacefaring, not
to mention knowledge of industrial processes and inventions dating back at
least as far again. You canłt cross that kind of gap in fifty years, no matter
how hard you might want to."

�Then what are we supposed to do?"

�Keep trying," Merlin said. �Keep making mistakes, and learning
from them. Thatłs all any culture ever does."

That was exactly what they had done, across twenty painful years.
The rockets worked now, after a fashion, but theyłd arrived late and there was
already a huge backlog of people and parts to be shifted into space. The
dormitories should have been finished and occupied by now, with work already
under way on the fleet of Exodus Arks. But the Arks had met obstacles as well.
The lunar colonization program had run into unanticipated difficulties,
requiring that the Arks be assembled from components made on Lecythus. The
atomic rocket production lines were already running at maximum capacity without
the burden of carrying even more tonnage into space.

�This is good," Merlin told Minla. �But you still need to
step things up."

�Wełre aware of that," she answered testily. �Unfortunately,
some of your information proved less than accurate."

Merlin blinked at her. �It did?"

�Our scientists made a prototype for the fusion drive,
according to your plans. Given the limited testing theyłve been able to do,
they say it works very well. It wouldnłt be a technical problem to build all
the engines we need for the Exodus Arks. So Iłm told, at least."

�Then whatłs the problem?"

Her hand gripped the walking stick like a talon. �Fuel,
Merlin. You told us wełd find helium 3 in the topsoil of our moon. Well, we
didnłt. Not enough to suit our needs, anyway."

�Then you mustnłt have been looking properly."

�I assure you we looked, Merlin. You were mistaken. Now wełll
have to find fuel from an alternative source, and redesign our fusion drive
accordingly. Wełll need your help, if we arenłt to fall hopelessly behind
schedule." Minla extended a withered hand toward the wheeling view. �To have
come so far, to have reached this point, and then failed ... that would be
worse than having never tried at all, donłt you think?"

Chastened, Merlin scratched at his chin. �Iłll do what I
can. Let me talk to the fusion engineers."

�Iłve scheduled a meeting. Theyłre very anxious to talk to
you." Minla paused. �Therełs something you should know, though. Theyłve seen
you make a mistake. Theyłll still be interested in what you have to say. But
donłt expect blind acceptance of your every word. They know youłre human now."

�I never said I wasnłt."

�You didnłt, no. Iłll give you credit for that. But for a
little while some of us allowed ourselves to believe it."

Minla turned and walked away, the tap of her stick echoing into
the distance.

* * * *

As space wars went, it was brief and relatively tame,
certainly by comparison with the awesome battles delineated in the Cohortłs
pictorial history. The timeworn frescoes on the swallowships commemorated
engagements where entire solar systems were reduced to mere tactical details,
hills or ditches in the terrain of a much larger strategic landscape, and where
the participantshuman and Husker both-were moving at significant fractions of
the speed of light and employing relativistic weapons of world-shattering
destructive potential. A single skirmish could eat up many centuries of
planetary time, whole lifetimes from the point of view of a starships crew. The
war itself was a thing inseparably entwined with recorded history, a monstrous
choking structure with its roots reaching into the loam of deep time, and whose
end must be assumed (by all except Merlin, at least) to lie in the unimaginably
remote future.

Here, the theater of conflict was considerably less than
half a light-second in diameter, encompassing only the immediate space around
Lecythus, with its girdle of half-finished dormitories and Exodus Arks. The
battle lasted barely a dozen hours, between first and last detonation. With the
exception of Merlinłs own late intervention, no weapons more potent than
hydrogen bombs were deployed. Horrific, certainly, but possessed of a certain
genteel precision compared to the weapons that had consumed Plenitude.

It began with a surprise strike from the surface, using a
wave of commandeered atomic rockets. It seemed that the Regressives had gained
control of one of the rocket-assembly-and-launch complexes. The rockets had no
warheads, but that didnłt matter: kinetic energy, and the explosive force
stored in their atomic engines, was still enough to inflict havoc on their
targets. The weapons had been aimed with surprising accuracy. The first wave
destroyed half of the unfinished dormitories, inflicting catastrophic damage on
many of the others. By the time the second wave was rising, orbital defenses
had sprung into action, but by then it was too late to intercept more than a
handful of the missiles. Many of the atomic rockets were being piloted by
suicide crews, steering their charges through Minlałs hastily erected
countermeasure screens. By the third hour, the Planetary Government was
beginning to retaliate against Regressive elements using atmospheric-entry
interceptors, but while they could pick away at enemy fortifications on the
ground, they couldnłt penetrate the antimissile cordon around the launch
complex itself. Rogue warheads chipped away at the edges of aerial landmasses,
sending mountain-sized boulders crashing to the surface. Even as the battle
raged, brutal tidal waves ravaged the already-frail coastal communities. As the
hours ticked by, Minlałs analysts maintained a grim toll on the total number of
surface and orbital casualties. In the fifth and sixth hours, more dormitories
fell to the assault. Stray fire accounted for even more losses. A temporary
ceasefire in the seventh hour was only caused by the temporary occultation of
the launch complex by a medium-sized aerial landmass. When the skies were clear
again, the rockets rose up with renewed fury.

�Theyłve hit all but one of the Exodus Arks," Minla said,
when the battle was in its ninth hour. �We just had time to move the final ship
out of range of the atomics. But if they find a way to increase their reach, by
eliminating more payload mass ..." She turned her face from his. �Itłll all
have been for nothing, Merlin. Theyłll have won, and the last sixty years may
as well have not happened."

He felt preternaturally calm, knowing exactly what was coming.
�What do you want me to do?"

�Intervene," Minla said. �Use whatever force is merited."

�I offered once. You said no."

�You changed your mind once. Now I change mine."

Merlin went to Tyrant. He ordered the ship to deliver a
concentrated charm-torp salvo against the compromised rocket facility, bringing
more energy to bear on that one tiny area of land than had been deployed in all
the years of the atomic wars. There was no need for him to accompany his ship;
like a well-trained dog, Tyrant was perfectly capable of carrying out his
orders without direct supervision.

They watched the spectacle from orbit. When the
electric-white fire erupted on the horizon of Lecythus, brightening that entire
limb of the planet in the manner of a stuttering cold sunrise, Merlin felt
Minlałs hand tighten around his own. For all her frailty, for all that the
years had taken from her, there remained astonishing steel in that grip. �Thank
you," she said. �You may just have saved us all."

* * * *

It had been ten years.

Lecythus and its sun now lay many light-weeks to stern. The
one remaining Exodus Ark had reached five percent of the speed of light. In
sixty years-faster, if the engine could be improved-it would streak into
another system, one that might offer the possibility of landfall. It flew
alongside the gossamer line of the Waynet, using the tube as cover from Husker
long-range sensors. The Exodus Ark carried only twelve hundred exiles, few of
whom would live long enough to see another world.

The hospital was near the core of the ship, safely distant
from the sleeting energies of interstellar radiation or the exotic emissions of
the Waynet. Many of its patients were veterans of the Regressive War, victims
of the viciously ingenious injuries wrought by the close conjunction of vacuum
and heat, radiation and kinetic energy. Most of them would be dead by the time
the fusion engine was silenced for cruise phase. For now they were being
afforded the care appropriate to war heroes, even those who screamed
bloodcurdling pleas for the painkilling mercy of euthanasia.

In a soundproofed private annex of that same complex, Minla
also lay in the care of machines. This time the assassins had come closer than
ever before, and they had very nearly achieved their objective. Yet shełd
survived, and the prognosis for a complete recovery-so Merlin was informed-was
deemed higher than seventy-five percent. More than could be said of Minlałs
aides, injured in the same attack, but they were at least receiving the best
possible care in Tyrantłs frostwatch cabinets. The exercise was, Merlin knew,
akin to knitting together human-shaped sculptures from a bloody stew of meat
and splintered bone, and then hoping that those sculptures would retain some
semblance of mind. Minla would have presented no challenge at all, but the
Planetary Director had declined the offer of frostwatch care herself,
preferring to give up her place to one of her underlings. Knowing that, Merlin
allowed himself a momentary flicker of empathy.

He walked into the room, coughing to announce himself. �Hello,
Minla."

She lay on her back, her head against the pillow, though she
was not asleep. Slowly she turned to face Merlin as he approached. She looked
very old, very tired, but she still found the energy to form a smile.

�Itłs so good of you to come. I was hoping, but ... I didnłt
dare ask. I know how busy youłve been with the engine upgrade study."

�I could hardly not pay you a visit. Even though I had a
devil of a job persuading your staff to let me through."

�Theyłre too protective of me. I know my own strength, Merlin.
Iłll get through this."

�I believe you would."

Minkłs gaze settled on his hand. �Are those for me?"

He had a bouquet of alien flowers. They were of a peculiar
dark hue, a shade that ought to have appeared black in the roomłs subdued gold
lighting yet which was clearly and unmistakably purple, revealed by its own
soft inner illumination. They had the look of a detail that had been
hand-tinted in a black-and-white photograph, so that it appeared to float above
the rest of the image.

�Of course," Merlin said. �I always bring flowers, donłt I?"

�You always used to. Then you stopped."

�Perhaps itłs time to start again."

He set them by her bedside, in the watered vase that was already
waiting. They were not the only flowers in the room, but the purple ones seemed
to suck the very color from the others.

�Theyłre very beautiful," Minla said. �Itłs like Iłve never
seen anything precisely that color before. Itłs as if therełs a whole circuit
in my brain thatłs never been activated until now."

�I chose them especially. Theyłre famous for their beauty."

Minla lifted her head from the pillow, her eyes brightening
with curiosity. �Now youłll have to tell me where theyłre from."

�Itłs a long story."

�That never stopped you before."

�A world called Lacertine. Itłs ten thousand light-years
from here; many days of Shiptime, even in the Waynet. I donłt even know if it
still exists."

�Tell me about Lacertine," she said, pronouncing the name of
the world with her usual scrupulousness.

�Itłs a very beautiful planet, orbiting a hot blue star.
They say the planet must have been moved into its present orbit by the
Waymakers, from another system entirely. The seas and skies are a shimmering
electric blue. The forests are a dazzle of purple and violet and pink; colors
that youłve only ever seen when you close your eyes against the sun and see
patterns behind your eyelids. White citadels rise above the tree line, towers
linked by a filigree of delicate bridges."

�Then there are people on Lacertine?"

Merlin thought of the occupants, and nodded. �Adapted, of
course. Everything that grows on Lacertine was bioengineered to tolerate the
scalding light from the sun. They say if something can grow there, it can grow
almost anywhere."

�Have you been there?"

He shook his head ruefully. �Iłve never been within a
thousand light-years of the place."

�Iłll never see it. Nor any of the other places youłve told
me about."

�There are places Iłll never see. Even with the Waynet, Iłm
still just one human man, with one human life. Even the Waymakers didnłt live
long enough to glimpse more than a fraction of their empire."

�It must make you very sad."

�I take each day as it comes. Iłd rather take good memories
from one world, than fret about the thousand Iłll never see."

�Youłre a wise man," Minla said. �We were lucky to get you."

Merlin smiled. He was silent for many moments, letting Minla
enjoy the last calmness of mind she would ever know. �Therełs something I need
to tell you," he said eventually.

She must have heard something in his tone of voice. �What,
Merlin?"

�Therełs a good chance youłre all going to die."

Her tone became sharp. �We donłt need you to remind us of
the risks."

�Iłm talking about something thatłs going to happen sooner rather
than later. The ruse of shadowing the Waynet didnłt work. It was the best thing
to do, but there was always a chance ..." Merlin spread his hands in
exaggerated apology, as if there had ever been something he could have done
about it. �Tyrantłs detected a Husker attack swarm, six elements lying a
light-month ahead of you. You donłt have time to steer or slow down. Theyłd
shadow every move you made, even if you tried to shake them off."

�You promised us"

�I promised you nothing. I just gave you the best advice I
could. If you hadnłt shadowed the Waynet, theyłd have found you even sooner."

�We arenłt using the ramscoop design. You said wełd be safe
if we stuck to fusion motors. The electromagnetic signature"

�I said youłd be safer. There were never ironclad
guarantees."

�You lied to us." Minla turned suddenly spiteful. �I never
trusted you."

�I did all in my power to save you."

�Then why are you standing there looking so calm, when you
know wełre going to die?" But before Merlin had time to answer, Minla had seen
the answer for herself. �Because you can leave," she said, nodding at her own
percipience. �You have your ship, and a syrinx. You can slip into the Waynet
and outrun the enemy."

�Iłm leaving," Merlin said. �But Iłm not running."

�Arenłt they one and the same?"

�Not this time. Iłm going back to Plenitude, I mean
Lecythus, to do what I can for the people we left behind. The people you
condemned to death."

�Me, Merlin?"

�I examined the records of the Regressive War: not just the
official documents, but Tyrantłs own data logs. And I saw what I should have
seen at the time, but didnłt. It was a ruse. It was too damned easy, the way
they took control of that rocket factory. You let them, Minla."

�I did nothing of the kind."

�You knew the whole evacuation project was never going to be
ready on time. The Space Dormitories were behind schedule, there were problems
with the Exodus Arks ..."

�Because you told us falsehoods about the helium in the moonłs
soil."

Merlin raised a warning hand. �Wełll get to that. The point
is, your plans were in tatters. But you could still have completed more
dormitories and ships, if youłd been willing to leave the system a little
later. You could still have saved more people than you did, albeit at a
slightly increased risk to your own survival. But that wasnłt acceptable. You
wanted to leave there and then. So you engineered the whole Regressive attack,
set it up as a pretext for an early departure."

�The Regressives were real!" Minla hissed.

�But you gave them the keys to that rocket silo, and the
know-how to target and guide those missiles. Funny how their attack just missed
the one station that you were occupying, you and all your political cronies,
and that you managed to move the one Exodus Ark to safety just in time. Damned
convenient, Minla."

�Iłll have you shot for this, Merlin."

�Good luck. Try laying a hand on me, and see how far it gets
you. My shipłs listening in on this conversation. It can put proctors into this
room in a matter of seconds."

�And the moon, Merlin? Do you have an excuse for the error
that cost us so dearly?"

�I donłt know. Possibly. Thatłs why Iłm going back to Lecythus.
There are still people on the surface-Regressives, allies, I donłt care. And
people you abandoned in orbit as well."

�Theyłll all die. You said it yourself."

He raised a finger. �If they donłt leave. But maybe therełs
way. Again, I should have seen it sooner. But thatłs me all the way. I take a
long time to put the pieces together, but I get there in the end. Just like
Dowitcher, the man who gave your father the whetstone."

�It was just a stone."

�So you said. In fact, it was a vital clue to the nature of
your world. It took spring tides and neap tides to lay down those patterns. But
you said it yourself: Lecythus doesnłt have spring tides and neap tides. Not
anymore, at least."

�Iłm sure this means something to you."

�Something happened to your moon, Minla. When that whetstone
formed, your moon was raising tides on Lecythus. When the moon and Calliope
were tugging on your seas in the same direction, you got a spring tide. When
they were balancing each other, you got a neap tide. Hence the patterning on
the whetstone. But now the tides are the same from day to day. Calliopełs still
there, so that only leaves the moon. It isnłt exerting the same gravitational
pull it used to. Oh, it weighs something-but the effect is much reduced, and if
you could skip forward a few hundred million years and examine a piece of
whetstone laid down now, youłd probably find very faint variations in sediment
thickness. But whatever the effect is now, it must be insignificant compared to
the time when your whetstone was formed. Yet the moonłs still there, in what appears
to be the same orbit. So whatłs happened?"

�You tell me, Merlin."

�I donłt think itłs a moon anymore. I think the original
moon got ripped to pieces to make your armored sky. I donłt know how much of
the original mass got used for that, but Iłm guessing it was quite a
significant fraction. The question is, what happened to the remains?"

�Iłm sure you have a theory."

�I think they made a fake moon out of the leftovers. It sits
there in your sky, it orbits Lecythus, but it doesnłt pull on your seas the way
the old one used to. And because itłs new-relatively speaking-it doesnłt have
the soil chemistry wełd expect of a real moon, one thatłs been sitting there
for billions of years, drinking in solar winds. Thatłs why you didnłt find the
helium you were expecting."

�So what is it?"

�Thatłs what Iłm keen to find out. The thing is, I know what
Dowitcher was thinking now. He knew that wasnłt a real moon. Which begs the
question: whatłs inside it? And could it make a difference to the survivors you
left behind?"

�Hiding inside a shell wonłt help them," Minla said. �You already
told us wełd achieve nothing by digging tunnels into Lecythus."

�Iłm not thinking about hiding. Iłm thinking about moving.
What if the moonłs an escape vehicle? An Exodus Ark big enough to take the
entire population?"

�You have no evidence."

�I have this." With that, Merlin produced one of Minlałs old
picture books. Seventy years had aged its papers to a brittle yellow, dimming
the vibrancy of the old inks. But the linework in the illustrations was still
clear enough. Merlin held the book open to a particular page, letting Minla
look at it. �Your people had a memory of arriving on Lecythus in a moon-sized
ship," he said. �Maybe that was true. Equally, maybe it was a case of muddling
one thing with another. Iłm wondering if the thing you were meant to remember
was not that you came by moon, but that you could leave by one."

Minla stared at the picture. For a moment, like a breeze on
a summerłs day, Merlin felt a wave of almost unbearable sadness pass through
the room. It was as if the picture had transported her back to her childhood,
before she had set her life on the trajectory that, seventy years later, would
bring it to this bed, this soundproofed room, the shameful survival of this one
ship. The last time she had looked at the picture, everything had been possible,
all lifełs opportunities open to her. Shełd been the daughter of a powerful and
respected man, with influence and wisdom at her fingertips. And yet from all
the choices presented to her, she had selected this one dark path, and followed
it to its conclusion.

�Even if it is a ship," she said softly, �youłll never get
them all aboard."

�Iłll die trying."

�And us? We get abandoned to our fates?"

Merlin smiled: hełd been expecting the question. �There are
twelve hundred people on this ship, some of them children. They werenłt all
party to your schemes, so they donłt all deserve to die when you meet the
Huskers. Thatłs why Iłm leaving behind weapons and a detachment of proctors to
show you how to install and use them."

For the first time since his arrival in the room, Minla
spoke like a leader again. �Will they make a difference?"

�Theyłll give your ship a fighting chance. Thatłs the best I
can offer."

�Then wełll take what wełre given."

�Iłm sorry it came to this. I played a part in what you
became, of that Iłve no doubt. But I didnłt make you a monster."

�No," she said. �Iłll at least take credit for myself, and
for the fact that I saved twelve hundred of my people. If it took a monster to
do that, doesnłt that mean we sometimes need monsters?"

�Maybe we do. But that doesnłt mean we should forgive them
for what they are, even for an instant." Gently, as if bestowing a gift, Merlin
placed the picture book on Minlałs recumbent form. �Iłm afraid I have to go
now. There wonłt be much time when I get back to Lecythus."

�Please," she said. �Not like this. Not this way."

�This is how it ends," he said, before turning from her bed
and walking to the exit. �Goodbye, Minla."

Twenty minutes later he was in the Waynet, racing back to Lecythus.

* * * *

Therełs a lot to tell, and one day Iłll get around to
writing it up properly. For now itłs enough to say that I was right to trust my
instincts about the moon. I just wish Iłd put the clues together sooner than I
did. Perhaps then Minla would never have had to commit her crimes.

I didnłt save as many as Iłd have wished, but I did save
some of the people Minla left behind to die. I suppose that has to count for
something. It was close, but if therełs one thing to be said for Waymaker-level
technology, itłs that itłs almost childishly easy to use. They were like babies
with the toys of the gods. They left that moon there for a good reason, and
while it was necessary for them to camouflage it-it had to be capable of
fooling the Huskers, or whoever they built that sky to hide from-the moon
itself was obligingly easy to break into, once our purpose became clear. And
once it started moving, once its great engines came online after tens of
thousands of years of quiet dormancy, no force in the universe could have held
it back. I shadowed the fleeing moon long enough to establish that it was
headed into a sector that appeared to be free of Husker activity, at least for
now. Itłll be touch-and-go for a few centuries, but with Force and Wisdom on
their side, I think theyłll make it.

Iłm in the Waynet now, riding the flow away from Calliope.
The syrinx still works, much to my relief. For a while I considered riding the
contraflow, back toward that lone Exodus Ark. By the time I reached them theyłd
have been only days away from the encounter. But my presence wouldnłt have made
a decisive difference to their chances of surviving the Huskers, and I couldnłt
have expected much of a warm welcome.

Not after my final gift to Minla.

Iłm glad she never asked me too much about those flowers, or
the world they came from. If shełd wanted to know more about Lacertine, she
might have sensed that I was holding something back. Such as the fact that the
assassin guilds on Lacertine were masters of their craft, known throughout the
worlds of the Waynet for their skill and cunning, and that no guild on
Lacertine was more revered than the bioartificers who made the sleepflowers.

It was said that they could make them in any shape, any
color, to match any known flower from any known world. It was said that they
could pass all tests save the most microscopic scrutiny. It was said that if
you wanted to kill someone, you gave them a gift of flowers from Lacertine.

She would have been dead not long after my departure. The
flowers would have detected her presence-they were keyed to locate a single
breathing form in a room, most commonly a sleeper-and when the room was quiet
they would have become stealthily animate, leaving their jar and creeping from
point to point with the slowness of a sundialłs shadow, their movement
imperceptible to the naked eye, but enough to take them to the face of the
sleeper. Their tendrils would have closed around Minlałs face with the softness
of a loverłs caress. Then the paralyzing toxins would have hit her nervous
system.

I hoped it was painless. I hoped it was quick. But what I remembered
of the Lacertine assassins was that they were known for their cleverness, not
their clemency.

Afterward, I deleted the sleepflowers from the biolibrary.

I knew Minla for less than a year of my life, and for
seventy years by another reckoning. Sometimes when I think of her I see a human
being in all her dimensions, as real as anyone Iłve ever known. Other times, I
see something two-dimensional, like a faded illustration in one of her books,
so thin that the light shines through her.

I donłt hate her, even now. But I wish time and tide had
never brought us together.

A comfortable number of light-hours behind me, the Waynet
has just cut into Calliopełs heart. It has already sliced through the
photosphere and the starłs convection zone. Quite what has happened, or is
happening, or will happen, when it touched (or touches, or will touch) the
nuclear-burning core is still far from clear.

Theory says that no impulse can travel faster than light.
Since my ship is already riding the Waynetłs flow at very nearly the speed of
light, it seems impossible that any information concerning Calliopełs fate will
ever be able to catch up with me. And yet ... several minutes ago I swear that
I felt a kick, a jolt in the smooth glide of my flight, as if some report of
that destructive event had raced up the flow at superluminal speed, buffeting
my little ship.

Therełs nothing in the data to suggest any unusual event,
and I donłt have any plans to return to Lecythus and see what became of that
world when its sun was gored open. But I still felt something, and if it
reached me up the flow of the Waynet, if that impulse bypassed the iron barrier
of causality itself, I canłt begin to imagine the energies that must have been
involved, or what must have happened to the strand of the Waynet behind me.
Perhaps itłs unraveling, and Iłm about to breathe my last breath before I
become a thin smear of naked quarks, stretched across several billion kilometers
of interstellar space.

That would certainly be one way to go.

Frankly, it would be nice to have the luxury to dwell on
such fears. But I still have a gun to find, and Iłm not getting any younger.

Mission resumed.

* * * *

Nightingale

I checked the address Tomas Martinez had given me, shielding
the paper against the rain while I squinted at my scrawl. The number Iłd
written down didnłt correspond with any of the high-and-dry offices, but it was
a dead ringer for one of the low-rent premises at street level. Here the walls
of Threadfall Canyon had been cut and buttressed to the height of six or seven
storeys, widening the available space at the bottom of the trench. Buildings
covered most of the walls, piled on top of each other, supported by a haphazard
arrangement of stilts and rickety, semi-permanent bamboo scaffolding. Aerial
walkways had been strung from one side of the street to the other, with stairs
and ladders snaking their way through the dark fissures between the buildings.
Now and then a wheeler sped through the water, sending a filthy wave of brown
water in its wake. Very rarely, a sleek, claw-like volantor slid overhead. But
volantors were off-world tech and not many people on Skyłs Edge could afford
that kind of thing anymore.

It didnłt look right to me, but all the evidence said that
this had to be the place.

I stepped out of the water, onto the wooden platform in
front of the office, and knocked on the glass-fronted door while rain curtained
down through holes in the striped awning above me. I was pushing hair out of my
eyes when the door opened.

Iłd seen enough photographs of Martinez to know this wasnłt
him. This was a big bull of a man, nearly as wide as the door. He stood there
with his arms crossed in front of his chest, over which he wore only a
sleeveless black vest that was zipped down to the midriff. His muscles were so
tight it looked like he was wearing some kind of body-hugging amplification
suit. His head was very large and very bald, rooted to his body by a neck like
a small mountain range. The skin around his right eye was paler than the rest
of his face, in a neatly circular patch.

He looked down at me as if I was something that the rain had
washed in.

�What?" he said, in a voice like the distant rumble of
artillery.

�Iłm here to see Martinez."

�Mr. Martinez to you," he said.

�Whatever. But Iłm still here to see him, and he should be expecting
me. Iłm ..."

�Dexia Scarrow," called another voicefractionally more welcoming,
this timeand a smaller, older man bustled into view from behind the pillar of
muscle blocking the door, snatching delicate pince-nez glasses from his nose. �Let
her in, Norbert. Shełs expected. Just a little late."

�I got held up around Armestomy hired wheeler hit a pothole
and tipped over. Couldnłt get the thing started again, so had to ..."

The smaller man waved aside my excuse. �Youłre here now,
which is all that matters. Iłll have Norbert dry your clothes, if you wish."

I peeled off my coat. �Maybe this."

�Norbert will attend to your galoshes as well. Would you
care for something to drink? I have tea already prepared, but if you would
rather something else ..."

�Tea will be fine, Mr. Martinez," I said.

�Please. Call me Tomas. Itłs my sincere wish that we will
work together as friends."

I stood out of my galoshes and handed my dripping wet coat
to the big man. Martinez nodded once, the gesture precise and birdlike, and
then ushered me to follow him farther into his rooms. He was slighter and older
than Iłd been expecting, although still recognizable as the man in the
photographs. His hair was grey turning to white, thinning on his scalp and
shaved close to the skin elsewhere on his head. He wore a grey waistcoat over a
grey shirt, the ensemble lending him a drab, clerkish air.

We navigated a twisting labyrinth formed from four layers of
brown boxes, piled to head height. �Excuse the mess," Martinez said, looking
back at me over his shoulder. �I really should find a better solution to my
filing problems, but therełs always something more pressing that needs doing
instead."

�Iłm surprised you have time to eat, let alone worry about
filing problems."

�Well, things havenłt been as hectic lately, I must confess.
If youłve been following the news youłll know that Iłve already caught most of
my big fish. Therełs been some mopping up to do, but Iłve been nowhere near as
busy as in ..." Martinez stopped suddenly next to one of the piles of boxes,
placed his glasses back on the ridge of his nose, and scuffed dust from the
paper label on the side of the box nearest his face. �No," he said, shaking his
head. �Wrong place. Wrong damned place! Norbert!"

Norbert trudged along behind us, my sodden coat still draped
over one of his enormous, trunklike arms. �Mr. Martinez?"

�This one is in the wrong place." The smaller man turned
around and indicated a spot between two other boxes, on the other side of the
corridor. �It goes here. It needs to be moved. Kesslerłs case is moving into
court next month, and we donłt want any trouble with missing documentation."

�Attend to it," Norbert said, which sounded like an order
but which I assumed was his way of saying hełd remember to move the box when he
was done with my laundry.

�Kessler?" I asked, when Norbert had left. �As in Tillman
Kessler, the NC interrogator?"

�One and the same, yes. Did you have experience with him?"

�I wouldnłt be standing here if I did."

�True enough. But a small number of people were fortunate
enough to survive their encounters with Kessler. Itłs their testimonies that
will help bring him to justice."

�By which you mean crucified."

�I detect faint disapproval, Dexia," Martinez said.

�Youłre right. Itłs barbaric."

�Itłs how wełve always done things. The Haussmann way, if
you like."

Sky Haussmann: the man who gave this world its name, and who
sparked off the 250-year war wełve only just learned to stop fighting. When
they crucified Sky they thought they were putting an early end to the violence.
They couldnłt have been more wrong. Ever since then, crucifixion is the way
executions happen.

�Is Kessler the reason you asked me here, sir? Were you expecting
me to add to the case file against him?"

Martinez paused at a heavy wooden door.

�Not Kessler, no. Iłve every expectation to see him nailed
to Bridgetop by the end of the year. But it does concern the man for whom
Kessler was an instrument."

I thought about that for a moment. �Kessler worked for Colonel
Jax, didnłt he?"

Martinez opened the door and ushered me through, into the
windowless room beyond. By now we must have been back into the canyon wall. The
air had the inert stillness of a crypt. �Yes, Kessler was Jaxłs man," Martinez
said. �Iłm glad you made the connection: it saves me explaining why Jax ought
to be brought to justice."

�I agree completely. Half the population would agree with
you. But Iłm afraid youłre a bit late: Jax died years ago."

Two other people were already waiting in the room, sitting
on settees either side of a low black table set with tea, coffee and pisco
sours.

�Jax didnłt die," Martinez said. �He just disappeared, and
now I know where he is. Have a seat, please."

He knew I was interested; knew I wouldnłt be able to walk
out of that room until Iłd heard the rest of the story about Colonel Brandon
Jax. But there was more to it than that: there was something effortlessly
commanding about his voice that made it very hard not to obey. In my time in
the Southland Militia Iłd learned that some people have that authority and some
people donłt. It canłt be taught; canłt be learned; canłt be faked. Youłre
either born with it or youłre not.

�Dexia Scarrow, allow me to introduce you to my other two
guests," Martinez said, when Iłd taken my place at the table. �The gentleman
opposite you is Salvatore Nicolosi, a veteran of one of the Northern Coalitionłs
freeze/thaw units. The woman on your right is Ingrid Sollis, a personal
security expert with a particular interest in counter-intrusion systems. Ingrid
saw early combat experience with the Southland, but she soon left the military
to pursue private interests."

I bit my tongue, then turned my attention away from the woman
before I said something I might regret. The manNicolosilooked more like an
actor than a soldier. He didnłt have a scar on him. His beard was so neatly
groomed, so sharp-edged, that it looked sprayed on through a stencil.
Freeze/thaw operatives rubbed me up the wrong way, no matter which side theyłd
been on. Theyłd always seen themselves as superior to the common soldier, which
is why they didnłt feel the need for the kind of excessive musculature Norbert
carried around.

�Let me introduce Dexia Scarrow," Martinez continued, nodding
at me. �Dexia was a distinguished soldier in the Southland Militia for fifteen
years, until the armistice. Her service record is excellent. I believe she will
be a valuable addition to the team."

�Maybe we should back up a step," I said. �I havenłt agreed
to be part of anyonełs team."

�Wełre going after Jax," Nicolosi said placidly. �Doesnłt
that excite you?"

�He was on your side," I said. �What makes you so keen to
see him hang?"

Nicolosi looked momentarily pained. �He was a war criminal,
Dexia. Iłm as anxious to see monsters like Jax brought to justice as I am to
see the same fate visited on their scum-ridden Southland counterparts."

�Nicolosiłs right," said Ingrid Sollis. �If wełre going to
learn to live together on this planet, we have to put the law above all else,
regardless of former allegiances."

�Easy coming from a deserter," I said. �Allegiance clearly
didnłt mean very much to you back then, so Iłm not surprised it doesnłt mean
much to you now."

Martinez, still standing at the head of the table, smiled
tolerantly, as if hełd expected nothing less.

�Youłre under an understandable misapprehension, Dexia. Ingrid
was no deserter. She was wounded in the line of duty: severely, I might add.
After her recuperation she was commended for bravery under fire and given the
choice of an honorable discharge or a return to the frontline. You cannot blame
her for choosing the former, especially given all that she had been through."

�OK, my mistake," I said. �Itłs just that I never heard of
many people making it out alive, before the war was over."

Sollis looked at me icily. �Some of us did."

�No one here has anything but an impeccable service record,"
Martinez said. �I should know: Iłve been through your individual biographies
with a fine tooth-comb. Youłre just the people for the job."

�I donłt think so," I said, moving to stand up. �Iłm just a
retired soldier with a grudge against deserters. I wasnłt in some shit-hot freeze/thaw
unit, and I didnłt do anything that resulted in any commendations for bravery.
Sorry, folks, but I think ..."

�Stay seated."

I did what the man said.

Martinez continued speaking, his voice as measured and patient
as ever. �You participated in at least three high-risk extraction operations,
Dexia: three dangerous forays into enemy lines, to retrieve two
deep-penetration Southland spies and one trump card NC defector. Or do you deny
this?"

I shook my head, the reality of what he was proposing still
not sinking in. �I canłt help. I donłt know anything about Jax ..."

�You donłt need to. Thatłs my problem."

�How are you so sure hełs still alive, anyway?"

�Iłd like to know, too," Nicolosi said, stroking an elegant
finger along the border of his beard.

Martinez sat down, employing his own stool at the head of
the table, so that he was higher than the three of us. He removed his glasses
and fiddled with them in his lap. �It is necessary that you take a certain
amount of what I am about to tell you on faith. Iłve been gathering
intelligence on men like Jax for years, and in doing so Iłve come to rely on a
web of contacts, many of whom have conveyed information to me at great personal
risk. If I were to tell you the whole story, and if some of that story were to
leak beyond this office, lives might well be endangered. And that is to say nothing
of how my chances of bringing other fugitives to justice might be undermined."

�We understand," Sollis said, and I bridled at the way she
presumed to speak for all of us. Perhaps she felt she owed Martinez for the way
hełd just stood up for her.

Again I bit my lip and said nothing.

�For a long time, Iłve received titbits of intelligence
concerning Colonel Jax: rumours that he did not, in fact, die at all, but is
still at large."

�Where?" Sollis asked. �On Skyłs Edge?"

�It would seem not. There were, of course, many rumours and
false trails that suggested Jax had gone to ground somewhere on this planet.
But one by one I discounted them all. Slowly the truth became apparent. Jax is
still alive; still within this system."

I felt it was about time I made a positive contribution. �Wouldnłt
a piece of dirt like Jax try and get out of the system at the first
opportunity?"

Martinez favoured my observation by pointing his glasses at
me. �I had my fears that he might have, but as the evidence came in, a
different truth presented itself."

He set about pouring himself some tea. The pisco sours were
going unwanted. I doubted that any of us had the stomach for drink at this time
of the day.

�Where is he, then?" asked Nicolosi. �Plenty of criminal elements
might have the means to shelter a man like Jax, but given the price on his
head, the temptation to turn him in ..."

�He is not being sheltered," Martinez said, sipping
delicately at his tea before continuing. �He is alone, aboard a ship. The ship
was believed lost, destroyed in the final stages of the war, when things
escalated into spacebut I have evidence that the ship is still essentially
intact, with a functioning life-support system. There is every reason to
believe Jax is still being kept alive, aboard this vehicle, in this system."

�Whatłs he waiting for?" I asked.

�For memories to grow dim," Martinez answered. �Like many
powerful men, Jax may have obtained longevity drugsor at least undergone
longevity treatmentduring the latter stages of the war. Time is not a concern
for him."

I leaned forward. �This ship ... you think itłll just be a
matter of boarding it and taking him alive?"

Martinez seemed surprised at the directness of my question.
He blinked once before answering.

�In essence, yes."

�Wonłt he put up a fight?"

�I donłt think so. The Ultras that located the vehicle for
me reported that it appeared dormant, in power-conservation mode. Jax himself
may be frozen, in reefersleep. The ship did not respond to the Ultrasł sensor
sweeps, so therełs no reason to assume it will respond to our approach and
docking."

�How close did the Ultras get?" Sollis asked.

�Within three or four light-minutes. But therełs no reason
to assume we canłt get closer without alerting the ship."

�How do you know Jax is aboard this ship?" Nicolosi asked. �It
could just be a drifter, nothing to do with him."

�The intelligence Iłd already gleaned pointed towards his
presence aboard a vehicle of a certain age, size and designeverything matches."

�So letłs cut to the chase," Sollis said, again presuming to
speak for the rest of us. �Youłve brought us here because you think wełre the
team to snatch the colonel. Iłm the intrusion specialist, so youłll be relying on
me to get us inside that ship. Nicolosiłs a freeze/thaw veteran, soapart from
the fact that hełs probably pretty handy with a weapon or twohełll know how to
spring Jax from reefersleep, if the colonel turns out to be frozen. And
shewhat was your name again?"

�Dexia," I said, like it was a threat.

�Shełs done some extractions. I guess she must be OK at her
job, or she wouldnłt be here."

Martinez waited a moment, then nodded. �Youłre quite right,
Ingrid: all credit to you for that. I apologize if my machinations are so
nakedly transparent. But the simple fact of the matter is that you are the
ideal team for the operation in question. I have no doubt that, with your
combined talents, you will succeed in returning Colonel Jax to Skyłs Edge, and
hence to trial. Now admit it: that would be something, wouldnłt it? To fell the
last dragon? �

Nicolosi indicated his approval with a long nasal sigh. �Men
like Kessler are just a distraction. When you hang a monster like Kessler, youłre
punishing the knife, not the man who wielded it. If you wish true justice, you
must find the knifeman, the master."

�What do we get paid?" Sollis asked.

Martinez smiled briefly. �Fifty thousand Australs for each
of you, upon the safe return of Colonel Jax."

�What if we find him dead?" I asked. �By then wełll already
have risked an approach and docking to his ship."

�If Jax is already dead, then you will be paid twenty-five
thousand Australs."

We all looked at each other. I knew what the others were
thinking. Fifty thousand Australs was life-changing money, but half of that
wasnłt bad either. Killing Jax would be much easier and safer than extracting
him ...

�Iłll be with you, of course," Martinez said. �So therełll
be no need to worry about proving Jax was already dead when you arrived, should
that arise."

�If youłre coming along," I asked, �who else do we need to
know about?"

�Only Norbert. And you need have no fears concerning his
competency."

�Just the five of us, then," I said.

�Five is a good number, donłt you think? And there is a practical
limit to the size of the extraction team. I have obtained the use of a small
but capable ship, perfectly adequate for our purposes. It will carry five, with
enough capacity to bring back the colonel. Iłll provide weapons, equipment and
armour, but you may all bring whatever you think may prove useful."

I looked around the cloisterlike confines of the room, and remembered
the dismal exterior of the offices, situated at the bottom of Threadfall
Canyon. �Three times fifty thousand Australs," I mused. �Plus whatever it cost
you to hire and equip a ship. If you donłt mind me asking ... where exactly are
the funds coming from?"

�The funds are mine," Martinez said sternly. �Capturing Jax
has been a long-term goal, not some whimsical course upon which I have only
recently set myself. Dying a pauper would be a satisfactory end to my affairs,
were I to do so knowing that Jax was hanging from the highest mast of
Bridgetop."

For a moment, none of us said anything. Martinez had spoken
so softly, so demurely, that the meaning of his words seemed to lag slightly
behind the statement itself. When it arrived, I think we all saw a flash of
that corpse, executed in the traditional way, the Haussmann way.

�Good weapons?" I asked. �Not some reconditioned
black-market shit?"

�Only the best."

�Technical specs for the ship?" Sollis asked.

�Youłll have plenty of time to review the data on the way to
the rendezvous point. I donłt doubt that a woman of your abilities will be able
to pinpoint an entry point."

Sollis looked flattered. �Then I guess Iłm in. What about
you, Salvatore?"

�Men like Colonel Jax stained the honour of the Northern Coalition.
We were not all monsters. If I could do something to make people see that ..."
Nicolosi trailed off, then shrugged. �Yes, I am in. It would be an honour, Mr.
Martinez."

�That leaves you, Dexia," Sollis said. �Fifty thousand
Australs sounds pretty sweet to me. Iłm guessing it sounds pretty sweet to you
as well."

�Thatłs my call, not yours."

�Just saying ... you look like you could use that money as
much as any of us."

I think I came close to saying no, to walking out of that
room, back into the incessant muddy rain of Threadfall Canyon. Perhaps if Iłd
tried, Norbert would have been forced to detain me, so that I didnłt go
blabbing about how a team was being put together to bring Colonel Jax back into
custody. But I would never get the chance to find out what Martinez had in mind
for me if I chose not to go along with him.

I only had to think about the way I looked in the mirror,
and what those fifty thousand Australs could do for me.

So I said yes.

* * * *

Martinez gestured to one of the blank pewter-grey walls in
the shuttlełs compartment, causing it to brighten and fill with neon-bright
lines. The lines meshed and intersected, forming a schematic diagram of a ship,
with an accompanying scale.

�Intelligence on Jaxłs ship is fragmentary. Strip out all
the contradictory reports, discard unreliable data, and wełre left with this."

�Thatłs it?" Sollis asked.

�When we get within visual range wełll be able to improve
matters. I shall reexamine all of the reports, including those that were
discarded. Some of themwhen we have the real ship to compare them againstmay
turn out to have merit after all. They may in turn shed useful light on the
interior layout, and the likely location of Jax. By then, of course, wełll also
have infrared and deep-penetration radar data from our own sensors."

�It looks like a pretty big ship," I said as I looked at the
schematic, scratching at my scalp. We were a day out from Armesto Field, with
the little shuttle tucked into the belly hold of an outbound lighthugger named
Death of Sophonisba.

�Big but not the right shape for a lighthugger," Sollis
said. �So what are we dealing with here?"

�Good question," I said. What Martinez was showing us was a
rectangular hull about one kilometre from end to end; maybe a hundred metres
deep and a hundred metres wide, with some kind of spherical bulge about halfway
along. There was some suggestion of engines at one end, and of a gauntlet-like
docking complex at the other. The ship was too blunt for interstellar travel,
and it lacked the outrigger-mounted engines that were characteristic of
Conjoiner drive mechanisms. �Does look kind of familiar, though," I added. �Anyone
else getting that d�ją vu feeling, or is it just me?"

�I donłt know," Nicolosi said. �When I saw it I thought ..."
He shook his head. �It canłt be. It must be a standard hull design."

�Youłve seen it too," I said.

�Does that ship have a name?" Nicolosi asked Martinez.

�I have no idea what Jax calls his ship."

�Thatłs not what the man asked," Sollis said. �He asked if"

�I know the name of the ship," I said quietly. �I saw a ship
like that once, when I was being taken aboard it. Iłd been injured in a
fire-fight, one of the last big surface battles. They took me into spacethis
was after the elevator came down, so it had to be by shuttleand brought me
aboard that ship. It was a hospital ship, orbiting the planet."

�What was the name of the ship?" Nicolosi asked urgently.

�Nightingale," I said.

�Oh, no."

�Youłre surprised."

�Damn right Iłm surprised. I was aboard Nightingale too."

�So was I," Sollis said, her voice barely a whisper. �I didnłt
recognize it, though. I was too fucked up to pay much attention until they put
me back together aboard it. By then, I guess ..."

�Same with me," Nicolosi said. �Stitched back together
aboard Nightingale, then repatriated."

Slowly, we all turned and looked at Martinez. Even Norbert,
who had contributed nothing until that point, turned to regard his master.
Martinez blinked, but otherwise his composure was impeccable.

�The ship is indeed Nightingale. It was too risky to tell
you when we were still on the planet. Had any of Jaxłs allies learned of the
identity ..."

Sollis cut him off. �Is that why you didnłt tell us? Or is
it because you knew wełd all been aboard that thing once already?"

�The fact that you have all been aboard Nightingale was a factor
in your selection, nothing more. It was your skills that marked you out for
this mission, not your medical history."

�So why didnłt you tell us?" she asked.

�Again, had I told you more than was wise ..."

�You lied to us."

�I did no such thing."

�Wait," Nicolosi said, his voice calmer than I was
expecting. �Letłs just ... deal with this, shall we? Wełre getting hung up on
the fact that we were all healed aboard Nightingale, when the real question we
should be asking is this: what the hell is Jax doing aboard a ship that doesnłt
exist anymore?"

�Whatłs the problem with the ship?" I asked.

�The problem," Nicolosi said, speaking straight at me, �is
that Nightingale was reported destroyed near the end of the war. Or were you
not keeping up with the news?"

I shrugged. �Guess I wasnłt."

�And yet you knew enough about the ship to recognize it."

�Like I said, I remember the view from the medical shuttle.
I was drugged-up, unsure whether I was going to live or die ... everything was
heightened, intense, like in a bad dream. But after they healed me and sent me
back down surfaceside? I donłt think I ever thought about Nightingale again."

�Not even when you look in the mirror?" Nicolosi asked.

�I thought about what theyłd done to me, how much better it
could have been. But it never crossed my mind to wonder what had happened to
the ship afterwards. So what did happen?"

�You say ęthey healed me,ł" Nicolosi observed. �Does that
mean you were treated by doctors, by men and women?"

�Shouldnłt I have been?"

He shook his head minutely. �My guess is you were wounded
and shipped aboard Nightingale soon after it was deployed."

�Thatłs possible."

�In which case, Nightingale was still in commissioning
phase. I went aboard it later. What about you, Ingrid?"

�Me too. I hardly saw another human being the whole time I
was aboard that thing."

�That was how it was meant to operate: with little more than
a skeleton staff, to take medical decisions the ship couldnłt take for itself.
Most of the time they were meant to stay behind the scenes."

�All I remember was a hospital ship," I said. �I donłt know
anything about ęcommissioning.ł"

Nicolosi explained it to me patiently, as if I was a small
child in need of education.

Nightingale had been financed and built by a consortium of
well-meaning postmortal aristocrats. Since their political influence hadnłt
succeeded in curtailing the war (and since many of their aristocratic friends
were quite happy for it to continue) theyłd decided to make a difference in the
next best way: by alleviating the suffering of the mortal men and women engaged
in the war itself.

So they created a hospital ship, one that had no connection
to either the Northern Coalition or the Southland Militia. Nightingale would be
there for all injured soldiers, irrespective of allegiance. Aboard the neutral
ship, the injured would be healed, allowed to recuperate, and then repatriated.
All but the most critically wounded would eventually return to active combat
service. And Nightingale itself would be state-of-the-art, with better medical
facilities than any other public hospital on or around Skyłs Edge. It wouldnłt
be the glittering magic of Demarchist medicine, but it would still be superior
to anything most mortals had ever experienced.

It would also be tirelessly efficient, dedicated only to
improving its healing record. Nightingale was designed to operate autonomously,
as a single vast machine. Under the guidance of human specialists, the ship
would slowly improve its methods until it had surpassed its teachers. Iłd come
aboard ship when it was still undergoing the early stages of its learning
curve, butas I learned from Nicolosithe ship had soon moved into its �operational
phase." By then the entire kilometre-long vehicle was under the control of only
a handful of technicians and surgical specialists, with gamma-level
intelligences taking most of the day-to-day decisions. That was when Sollis and
Nicolosi had been shipped aboard. Theyłd been healed by machines, with only a
vague awareness that there was a watchful human presence behind the walls.

�It worked, too," Nicolosi said. �The ship did everything
its sponsors had hoped it would. It functioned like a huge, efficient factory:
sucking in the wounded, spitting out the healed."

�Only for them to go back to the war," I said.

�The sponsors didnłt have any control over what happened
when the healed were sent back down. But at least they were still alive; at
least they hadnłt died on the battlefield or under the operating table. The
sponsors could still believe that they had done something good. They could
still sleep at night."

�So Nightingale was a success," I said. �Whatłs the problem?
Wasnłt it turned over to civilian use after the armistice?"

�The ship was destroyed just before the ceasefire," Nicolosi
said. �Thatłs why we shouldnłt be seeing it now. A stray NC missile,
nuke-tippedtoo fast to be intercepted by the shipłs own countermeasures. It
took out Nightingale, with staff and patients still aboard her."

�Now that you mention it ... maybe I did hear about
something like that."

Sollis looked fiercely at Martinez. �I say we renegotiate
terms. He never told us we were going to have to spring Jax from a fucking
ghost ship."

Norbert moved to his masterłs side, as if to protect him
from the furious Sollis. Martinez, who had said nothing for many minutes,
removed his glasses, buffed them on his shirt and replaced them with an
unhurried calm.

�Perhaps you are right to be cross with me, Ingrid. And perhaps
I made a mistake in not mentioning Nightingale sooner than I did. But it was
imperative to me that I not compromise this operation with a single careless
indiscretion. My whole life has been an arrow pointing to this one task: the
bringing to justice of Colonel Jax. I will not fail myself now."

�You should have told us about the hospital ship," Nicolosi
said. �None of us would have had any reason to spread that information. We all
want to see Jax get his due."

�Then I have made a mistake, for which I apologize."

Sollis shook her head. �I donłt think an apologyłs going to
cut it. If Iłd known I was going to have to go back aboard that thing ..."

�You are right," Martinez said, addressing all of us. �The
ship has a traumatic association for you, and it was wrong of me not to allow
for that."

�Amen to that," Sollis said.

I felt it was time I made a contribution. �I donłt think any
of us are about to back out now, Tomas. But maybegiven what we now know about
the shipa little bit more incentive might not be a bad idea."

�I was about to make the same suggestion myself," Martinez
said. �You must appreciate that my funds are not inexhaustible, and that my
original offer might already be considered generousbut shall we say an extra
five thousand Australs, for each of you?"

�Make it ten and maybe wełre still in business," Sollis
snapped back, before Iłd had a chance to blink.

Martinez glanced at Norbert, thenwith an expression that
suggested he was giving in under duresshe nodded at Sollis. �Ten thousand
Australs it is. You drive a hard bargain, Ingrid."

�While wełre debating terms," Nicolosi said, �is there
anything else you feel we ought to know?"

�I have told you that the ship is Nightingale." Martinez directed
our attention back to the sketchy diagram on the wall. �That, I am ashamed to
admit, is the sum total of my knowledge of the ship in question."

�What about constructional blueprints?" I asked.

�None survived the war."

�Photographs? Video images?"

�Ditto. Nightingale operated in a war zone, Dexia. Casual
sightseeing was not exactly a priority for those unfortunate enough to get
close to her."

�What about the staff aboard her?" Nicolosi asked. �Couldnłt
they tell you anything?"

�I spoke to some survivors: the doctors and technicians whołd
been aboard during the commissioning phase. Their testimonies were useful, when
they were willing to talk."

Nicolosi pushed further. �What about the people who were
aboard before the ceasefire?"

�I could not trace them."

�But they obviously didnłt die. If the shipłs still out
there, the rogue missile couldnłt have hit it."

�Why would anyone make up a story about the ship being blown
to pieces, if it didnłt happen?" I asked.

�War does strange things to truth," Martinez answered. �No
malice is necessarily implied. Perhaps another hospital ship was indeed
destroyed. There was more than one in orbit around Skyłs Edge, after all. One
of them may even have had a similar name. Itłs perfectly conceivable that the
facts might have got muddled, in the general confusion of those days."

�Still doesnłt explain why you couldnłt trace any survivors,"
Nicolosi said.

Martinez shifted on his seat, uneasily. �If Jax did
appropriate the ship, then he may not have wanted anyone talking about it. The
staff aboard Nightingale might have been paid offor threatenedto keep silent."

�Adds up, I guess," I said.

�Money will make a lot of things add up," Nicolosi replied.

* * * *

After two days the Death of Sophonisba sped deeper into the
night, while Martinezłs ship followed a pre-programmed flight plan designed to
bring us within survey range of the hospital ship. The Ultras had scanned
Nightingale again, and once again theyłd elicited no detectable response from
the dormant vessel. All indications were that the ship was in a deep cybernetic
coma, as close to death as possible, with only a handful of critical
life-support systems still running on a trickle of stored power.

Over the next twenty-four hours we crept in closer, narrowing
the distance to mere light-seconds, and then down to hundreds of thousands of
kilometres. Still there was no response, but as the distance narrowed, so our
sensors began to improve the detail in their scans. While the rest of us took
turns sleeping, Martinez sat at his console, compositing the data, enhancing
his schematic. Now and then Norbert would lean over the console and stare in
numb concentration at the sharpening image, and occasionally he would mumble
some remark or observation to which Martinez would respond in a patient,
faintly condescending whisper, the kind that a teacher might reserve for a slow
but willing pupil. Not for the first time I was touched by Martinezłs obvious
kindness in employing the huge, slow Norbert, and I wondered what the war must
have done to him to bring him to this state.

When we were ten hours from docking, Martinez revealed the
fruits of his labours. The schematic of the hospital ship was three-dimensional
now, displayed in the navigational projection cylinder on the shipłs cramped
flight deck. Although the basic layout of the ship hadnłt changed, the new plan
was much more detailed than the first one. It showed docking points, airlocks,
major mechanical systems, and the largest corridors and spaces threading the
shipłs interior. There was still a lot of guesswork, but it wouldnłt be as if
we were entering a completely foreign territory.

�The biggest thermal hotspot is here," Martinez said,
pointing at a spot about a quarter of the way down from the front. �If Jax is anywhere,
thatłs my best guess as to where wełll find him."

�Simple, then," Nicolosi said. �In via that dorsal lock,
then a straight sprint down that access shaft. Easy, even under weightless
conditions. Canłt be more than fifty or sixty metres."

�Iłm not happy," Sollis said. �Thatłs a large lock, likely
to be armed to the teeth with heavy duty sensors and alarms."

�Can you get us through it?" Nicolosi asked.

�You give me a door, Iłll get us through it. But I canłt
bypass every conceivable security system, and you can be damned sure the ship
will know about it if we come through a main lock."

�What about the other ones?" I asked, trying not to sound as
if I was on her case. �Will they be less likely to go off?"

�Nothingłs guaranteed. But Iłd always rather take my chances
with the backdoor."

�I think Ingrid is correct," Martinez said, nodding his
approval. �Therełs every chance of a silent approach and docking. Jax will have
disabled all non-essential systems, and that will include proximity sensors. If
thatłs the caseif we see no evidence of having tripped approach alarmsthen I
believe we would be best advised to maintain stealth." He indicated farther
along the hull, beyond the rounded midsection bulge. �That will mean coming in
here, or here, via one of these smaller service locks. I concur with Ingrid:
they probably wonłt be alarmed."

�Thatłll leave us with four or five hundred metres of ship
to crawl through," Nicolosi said, leaving us in no doubt what he thought about
that. �Four or five hundred metres for which we only have a very crude map."

�Wełll have directional guidance from our suits," Martinez
said.

�Itłs still a concern to me. But if you have settled upon
this decision, I shall abide by it."

I turned to Sollis. �What you said just then ... about not
spending a minute longer aboard Nightingale than we have to?"

�I wasnłt kidding."

�I know. But there was something about the way you said it.
Is there something about that ship you know that we donłt? You sounded spooked,
and I donłt understand why. Itłs just a disused hospital, after all."

Sollis studied me for a moment before answering. �Tell her,
Nicolosi."

Nicolosi looked placidly at the other woman. �Tell her what?"

�What she obviously doesnłt know. What none of us are in any
great hurry to talk about."

�Oh, please."

�Oh please what?" I asked.

�Itłs just a fairy story, a stupid myth," Nicolosi said.

�A stupid story which nonetheless always claimed that Nightingale
didnłt get blown up after all."

�What are you talking about?" I asked. �What story?"

It was Martinez who chose to answer. �That something unfortunate
happened aboard her. That the last batch of sick and injured went in, but for
some reason were never seen to leave. That all attempts to contact the
technical staff failed. That an exploratory team was put aboard the ship, and
that they too were never heard from again."

I laughed. �Fuck. And now wełre planning to go aboard?"

�Now you see why Iłm kind of anxious to get this over with,"
Sollis said.

�Itłs just a myth," Martinez chided. �Nothing more. It is a
thing to frighten children, not to dissuade us from capturing Jax. In fact it
would not surprise me in the least if Jax or his allies were in some way
responsible for this lie. If it were to cause us to turn back now, it would
have served them admirably, would it not?"

�Maybe," I said, without much conviction. �But Iłd still
have been happier if youłd told me before. It wouldnłt have made any difference
to my accepting this job, but it would have been nice to know you trusted me."

�I do trust you, Dexia. I simply assumed that you had no
interest in childish stories."

�How do you know Jax is aboard?" I asked.

�Wełve been over this. I have my sources, sources that I
must protect, and it would be ..."

�He was a patient, wasnłt he."

Martinez snapped his glasses from his nose, as if my point
had been at an unexpected tangent to whatever wełd been talking about. �I know
only that Jax is aboard Nightingale. The circumstances of how he arrived there
are of no concern to me."

�And it doesnłt bother you that maybe hełs just dead, like
the rest of whoever was aboard at the end?" Sollis asked.

�If he is dead, you will still receive twenty-five thousand
Australs."

�Plus the ten we already agreed on."

�That too," Martinez said, as if it should have been taken for
granted.

�I donłt like this," Sollis muttered.

�I donłt like it either," Nicolosi replied. �But we came
here to do a job, and the material facts havenłt changed. There is a ship, and
the man we want is aboard it. What Martinez says is true: we should not be
intimidated by stories, especially when our goal is so near."

�We go in there, we get Jax, we get the hell out," Sollis
said. �No dawdling, no sightseeing, no souvenir hunting."

�I have absolutely no problem with that," I said.

* * * *

�Take what you want," Martinez called over Norbertłs shoulder,
as we entered the armoury compartment at the rear of the shuttlełs pressurized
section. �But remember: youłll be wearing pressure suits, and youłll be moving
through confined spaces. Youłll also be aboard a ship."

Sollis pushed bodily ahead of me, pouncing on something that
Iłd only begun to notice. She unracked the sleek, cobalt-blue excimer rifle and
hefted it for balance. �Hey, a Breitenbach."

�Christmas come early?" I asked.

Sollis pulled a pose, sighting along the rifle, deploying
its targeting aids, flipping the power-up toggle. The weapon whined obligingly.
Blue lights studded its stock, indicating it was ready for use.

�Because Iłm worth it," Sollis said.

�Iłd really like it if you pointed that thing somewhere
else," I said.

�Better still, donłt point it anywhere," Nicolosi rumbled.
Hełd seen one of the choicer items too. He unclipped a long, matte-black weapon
with a ruby-red dragon stencilled along the barrel. It had a gaping maw like a
swallowing python. �Laser-confined plasma bazooka," he said admiringly. �Naughty,
but nice."

�Finesse isnłt your cup of tea, then."

�Never got to use one of these in the war, Dexia."

�Thatłs because they were banned. One of the few sensible
things both sides managed to agree on."

�Then nowłs my chance."

�I think the idea was to extract Jax, not to blow
ten-metre-wide holes in Nightingale."

�Donłt worry. Iłll be very, very careful." He slung the
bazooka over his shoulder, then continued his way down the aisle.

I picked up a pistol, hefted it, replaced it on the rack.
Found something more to my likinga heavy, dual-gripped slug gunand flipped
open the loading bay to check that there was a full clip inside. Low-tech but
reliable: the other two were welcome to their directed-energy weapons, but Iłd
seen how easily they could go wrong under combat conditions.

�Nice piece, Dexia," Sollis said, patronizingly. �Old
school."

�Iłm old school."

�Yeah, I noticed."

�You have a problem with that, we can always try some target
practice."

�Hey, no objections. Just glad you found something to your
liking. Doing better than old Norbert, anyway." Sollis nodded over her
shoulder. �Looks like hełs really drawn the short straw there."

I looked down the aisle. Norbert was near the end of one of
the racks, examining a small, stubby-looking weapon whose design I didnłt
recognize. In his huge hands it looked ridiculous, like something made for a
doll.

�You sure about that?" I called. �Maybe you want to look at
one of these ..."

Norbert looked at me like I was some kind of idiot. I donłt
know what he did thenthere was no movement of his hand that I was aware ofbut
the stubby little weapon immediately unpacked itself, elongating and opening
like some complicated puzzle box, until it was almost twice as big, twice as
deadly-looking. It had the silken, precision-engineered quality of expensive
off-world tech. A Demarchist toy, probably, but a very, very deadly toy for all
that.

Sollis and I exchanged a wordless glance. Norbert had found
what was probably the most advanced, most effective weapon in the room.

�Will do," Norbert said, before closing the weapon up again
and slipping it into his belt.

* * * *

We crept closer. Tens of thousands of kilometres, then thousands,
then hundreds. I looked through the hull windows, with the interior lights
turned down, peering in the direction where our radar and infrared scans told
us the hospital ship was waiting. When we were down to two dozen kilometres I
knew I should be seeing it, but I was still only looking at stars and the
sucking blackness between them. I had a sudden, visceral sense of how easy it
was to lose something out here, followed in quick succession by a dizzying
sense of how utterly small and alone we were, now that the lighthugger was
gone.

And then suddenly, there was Nightingale.

We were coming in at an angle, so the hull was tilted and
foreshortened. It was so dark that only certain edges and surfaces were visible
at all. No visible windows, no running lights, no lit-up docking bays. The ship
looked as dark and dead as a sliver of coal. Suddenly it was absurd to think
that there might be anyone alive aboard it. Colonel Jaxłs dead corpse, perhaps,
but not the living or even life-supported body that would guarantee us the rest
of our payment.

Martinez had the ship on manual control now. With small,
deft applications of thrust he narrowed the distance down to less than a dozen
kilometres. At six kilometres Martinez deemed it safe to activate floodlights
and play them along the length of the hull, confirming the placement of locks
and docking sites. There was a peppering of micro-meteorite impacts and some
scorching from high-energy particles, but nothing that I wouldnłt have expected
for a ship that had been sitting out here since the armistice. If the ship
possessed self-repair mechanisms, they were sleeping as well. Even when we
circled around the hull and swept it from the other side, there was no trace of
our having been noticed. Still with reluctance, Nicolosi accepted that we would
follow Sollisłs entry strategy, coming in by one of the service locks.

It was time to do it.

* * * *

We docked. We came in softly, but there was still a solid
clunk as the capture latches engaged and grasped our little craft to the hull
of the hospital ship. I thought of that clunk echoing away down the length of
Nightingale, diminishing as it travelled, but still not becoming weak enough
not to trip some waiting, infinitely patient alarm system, alerting the
sleeping ship that it had a visitor. For several minutes we hung in weightless
silence, staring out the windows or watching the sensor readouts for the least
sign of activity. But the dark ship stayed dark in all directions. There was no
detectable change in her state of coma.

�Nothingłs happened," Martinez said, breaking the silence
with a whisper. �It still doesnłt know wełre here. The lock is all yours,
Ingrid. Iłve already opened our doors."

Sollis, suited up now, moved into the lock tube with her
toolkit. While she worked, the rest of us finished putting on our own suits and
armour, completing the exercise as quietly as possible. I hadnłt worn a
spacesuit before, but Norbert was there to help all of us with the unfamiliar
process: his huge hands attended to delicate connections and catches with
surprising dexterity. Once I had the suit on, it didnłt feel much different
than wearing full-spectrum bioarmour, and I quickly got the hang of the
life-support indications projected around the border of my faceplate. I would
only need to pay minor attention to them: unless there was some malfunction,
the suit had enough power and supplies to keep me alive in perfect comfort for
three days; longer if I was prepared to tolerate a little less comfort. None of
us were planning on spending quite that long in Nightingale.

Sollis was nearly done when we assembled behind her in the
lock. The inner and outer lock doors on our side were open, exposing the grey
outer door of the hospital ship, held tight against the docking connector by
pressure tight seals. I doubted that shełd ever had to break into a ship
before, but nothing about the door seemed to be causing Sollis any
difficulties. Shełd tugged open an access panel and plugged in a fistful of
coloured cables, running back to a jury-rigged electronics module in her
toolkit. She was tapping a little keyboard, causing patterns of lights to alter
within the access panel. The face of a womanblank, expressionless, yet at the
same time severe and unforgivinghad appeared in an oval frame above the access
panel.

�Whołs that?" I asked.

�Thatłs Nightingale," Sollis said, adding, by way of explanation:
�The ship had its own gamma-level personality, keeping the whole show running.
Pretty smart piece of thinkware by all accounts: full Turing-compliance; about
as clever as you can make a machine before you have to start giving it human
rights."

I looked at the stern-faced woman, expecting her to query us
at any moment. I imagined her harsh and hectoring voice demanding to know what
business any of us had boarding Nightingale, trespassing aboard her ship, her
hospital.

�Does she know ..." I started.

Sollis shook her head. �This is just a dumb facet of the
main construct. Not only is it inactivethe image is frozen into the door
memorybut it doesnłt seem to have any functioning data links back to the main
sentience engine. Do you, Nightingale?"

The face looked at us impassively, but still said nothing.

�See: deadsville. My guess is the sentience engine isnłt
running at all. Out here, the ship wouldnłt need much more than a trickle of
intelligence to keep itself ticking over."

�So the gammałs off-line?"

�Uh-huh. Best way, too. You donłt want one of those things
sitting around too long without something to do."

�Why not?"

�łCause they tend to go nuts. Thatłs why the Conjoiners wonłt
allow gamma-level intelligences in any of their machines. They say itłs a kind
of slavery."

�Running a hospital must have been enough to stop Nightingalełs
gamma running off the rails."

�Letłs hope so. Letłs really hope so." Sollis glanced back
at her work, then emitted a grunt of satisfaction as a row of lights flicked to
orange. She unplugged a bunch of coloured cables and looked back at the waiting
party. �OK: wełre good to go. I can open the door anytime youłre ready."

�Whatłs on the other side of it?"

�According to the door, air: normal trimix. Bitchingly cold,
but not frozen. Pressurełs manageable. Iłm not sure we could breathe it, but
..."

�Wełre not breathing anything," Martinez said curtly. �Our
airlock will take two people. One of them will have to be you, Ingrid, since you
know how to work the mechanism. I shall accompany you, and then we shall wait
for the others on the far side, when we have established that conditions are
safe."

�Maybe one of us should go through instead of you," I said,
wondering why Norbert hadnłt volunteered to go through ahead of his master. �Wełre
expendable, but you arenłt. Without you, Jax doesnłt go down."

�Considerate of you, Dexia, but I paid you to assist me, not
take risks on my behalf."

Martinez propelled himself forward. Norbert, Nicolosi and I
edged back to permit the inner door to close again. On the common suit channel
I heard Sollis say: �Wełre opening Nightingale. Stand by: comms might get a bit
weaker once wełre on the other side of all this metal."

Nicolosi pushed past me, back into the flight deck. I heard
the heavy whine of servos as the door opened. Breathing and scuffling sounds,
but nothing that alarmed me. �OK," Sollis said. �Wełre moving into Nightingalełs
lock. Closing the outer door behind us. When you need to open it again, hit any
key on the pad."

�Still no sign of life," Nicolosi called.

�The inner door looks like itłll open without any special
encouragement from me," Sollis said. �Should be just a matter of pulling down
this lever ... you ready?"

�Do it, Ingrid," I heard Martinez say.

More servos, fainter now. After a few moments Sollis
reported back: �Wełre inside. No surprises yet. Floating in some kind of
holding bay, about ten metres wide. Itłs dark, of course. Therełs a doorway
leading out of the far wall: might lead to the main corridor that should pass
close to this lock."

I remembered to turn on my helmet lamp.

�Can you open both lock doors?" Nicolosi asked.

�Not at the same time, not without a lot of trouble that
might get us noticed."

�Then wełll come through in two passes. Norbert: you go
first. Dexia and I will follow."

It took longer than Iłd have liked, but eventually all five
of us were on the other side of the lock. Iłd only been weightless once, during
the recuperation program after my injury, but the memory of how to moveat
least without making too much of a fool of myselfwas still there, albeit
dimly. The others were coping about as well. The combined effects of our helmet
lamps banished the darkness to the corners of the room, emphasizing the deeper
gloom of the open doorway Sollis had mentioned. It occurred to me that
somewhere down that darkness was Colonel Jax, or whatever was left of him.

Nervously, I checked that the slug gun was still clipped to
my belt.

�Check your helmet maps," Martinez said. �Does everyone have
an overlay and a positional fix?"

�Iłm good," I said, against a chorus from the other three,
and acutely aware of how easy it would be to get lost aboard a ship as large as
Nightingale, if that positional fix were to break down.

�Check your weapons and suit systems. Wełll keep comms to a
minimum all the way in."

�Iłll lead," Nicolosi said, propelling himself into the
darkness of the doorway before anyone could object.

I followed hard on his heels, trying not to get out of
breath with the effort of keeping up. There were loops and rails along all four
walls of the shaft, so movement consisted of gliding from one handhold to the
next, with only air resistance to stop one drifting all the way. We were
covering one metre a second, easily: at that rate, it wouldnłt take long to
cross the entire width of the ship, which would mean wełd somehow missed the
axial corridor we were looking for, or that it just didnłt exist. But just when
it was beginning to strike me that wełd gone too far, Nicolosi slowed. I
grabbed a handhold to stop myself slamming into his feet.

He looked back at us, making me squint against his helmet
lamp. �Herełs the main corridor, just a bit deeper than we were expecting. Runs
both ways."

�We turn left," Martinez said, in not much more than a whisper.
�Turn left and follow it for one hundred metres, maybe one hundred and twenty,
until we meet the centrifuge section. It should be a straight crawl, with no
obstructions."

Nicolosi turned away, then looked back. �I canłt see more
than twenty metres into the corridor. We may as well see where it goes."

�Nice and slowly," Martinez urged.

We moved forward, along the length of the hull. In the
instants when I was coasting from one handhold to the next, I held my breath
and tried to hear the ambient noises of the ship, relayed to my helmet by the
suitłs acoustic pickup. Mostly all I heard was the scuffing progress of the
others, the hiss and hum of their own life-support packs. Other than that,
Nightingale seemed as silent as when wełd approached. If the ship was aware of
our intrusion, there was no sign of it.

Wełd made maybe forty metres from the junction: at least a
third of the distance we had to travel before hitting the centrifuge, when
Nicolosi slowed. I caught a handhold before I drifted into his heels, then
looked back to make sure the others had got the message.

�Problem?" Martinez asked.

�Therełs a T-junction right ahead. I didnłt think we were expecting
a T-junction."

�We werenłt," Martinez said. �But it shouldnłt surprise us
that the real ship deviates from the blueprint here and there. As long as we
donłt reach a dead-end, we can still keep moving towards the colonel."

�You want to flip a coin, or shall I do it?" Nicolosi said,
looking back at us over his shoulder, his face picked out by my helmet light.

�Therełs no indication, no sign on the wall?"

�Blank either way."

�In which case take the left," Martinez said, before
glancing at Norbert. �Agreed?"

�Agreed," the big man said. �Take left, then next right.
Continue."

Nicolosi kicked off, and the rest of us followed. I kept an
eye on my helmetłs inertial compass, gratified when it detected our change of
direction, even though the overlay now showed us moving through what should
have been a solid wall.

Wełd moved twenty or thirty metres when Nicolosi slowed
again. �Tunnel bends to the right," he reported. �Looks like wełre back on
track. Everyone cool with this?"

�Cool," I said.

But wełd only made another fifteen or twenty metres of
progress back along the new course when Nicolosi slowed and called back again. �Wełre
coming up on a heavy door; some kind of internal airlock. Looks like wełre
going to need Sollis again."

�Let me through," she said, and I squeezed aside so she
could edge past me, trying to avoid knocking our suits together. In addition to
the weapons shełd selected from the armoury, Sollisłs suit was also hung with
all manner of door-opening tools, clattering against each other as she moved. I
didnłt doubt that shełd be able to get through any kind of door, given time.
But the idea of spending hours inside Nightingale, while we inched from one
obstruction to the next, didnłt exactly fill me with enthusiasm.

We let Sollis examine the door: we could hear her ruminating
over the design, tutting, humming and talking softly under her breath. She had
panels open and equipment plugged in, just like before. The same unwelcoming
face glowered from an oval display.

After a couple of minutes Martinez sighed and spoke: �Is
there a problem, Ingrid?"

�Therełs no problem. I can get this door open in about ten
seconds. I just want to make damned sure this is another of Nightingalełs dumb
facets. That means sensing the electrical connections on either side of the
frame. Of course, if youłd rather we just stormed on through ..."

�Keep voice down," Norbert rumbled.

�Iłm wearing a spacesuit, dickhead."

�Pressure outside. Sound travel, air to glass, glass to air."

�You have five minutes," Martinez said, decisively. �If you
havenłt found what youłre looking for by then, we open the door anyway. And Norbertłs
right: letłs keep the noise down."

�So, no pressure then," Sollis muttered.

But in three minutes she started unplugging her tools, and
turned aside with a beaming look on her face. �Itłs just an emergency airlock,
in case this part of the ship depressurizes. They must have decided to put it
in after the original blueprints were drawn up."

�No danger that tripping it will alert the rest of
Nightingale?" I asked.

�Canłt ever say therełs no risk, but Iłm happy for us to go
through."

�Open the door," Martinez said. �Everyone brace in case
therełs vacuum or underpressure on the other side."

We followed his instructions, but when the door opened the
air remained as still as before. Beyond, picked out in our wavering lights, was
a short stretch of corridor terminating in an identical-looking door. This time
there was enough room for all of us to squeeze through, while Sollis attended
to the second lock mechanism. Some hardwired system required that the first
door be closed before the second one could be opened, but that posed us no real
difficulties. Now that Sollis knew what to look for, she worked much faster:
good at her job and happy for us all to know it. I didnłt doubt that shełd be
even faster on the way out.

�Wełre ready to go through, people. Indications say that the
airłs just as cold on the other side, so keep your suits buttoned."

I heard the click as one of usmaybe Nicolosi, maybe Norbertreleased
a safety catch. It was like someone coughing in a theatre. I had no choice but
to reach down and arm my own weapon.

�Open it," Martinez said quietly.

The door chugged wide. Our lights stabbed into dark
emptiness beyond: a suggestion of a much deeper, wider space than Iłd been
expecting. Sollis leaned through the door frame, her helmet lamp catching fleeting
details from reflective surfaces. I had a momentary flash of glassy things
stretching away into infinite distance, then it was gone.

�Report, Ingrid," Martinez said.

�I think we can get through. Wełve come out next to a wall,
or floor, or whatever it is. There are handholds, railings. Looks like they
lead on into the room, probably to the other side."

�Stay where you are," Nicolosi said, just ahead of me. �Iłll
take point again."

She glanced back and swallowed hard. �Itłs OK, I can handle
this one. Canłt let you have all the fun, can I?"

Nicolosi grunted something: I donłt think he had much of a
sense of humour. �Youłre welcome to my gun, you want it."

�Iłm cool," she said, but with audible hesitation. I didnłt
blame her: it was different being point on a walk through a huge dark room,
compared to a narrow corridor. Nothing could leap out and grab you from the
side in a corridor.

She started moving along the crawlway.

�Nice and slowly, Ingrid," Martinez said, from behind me. �We
still have time on our side."

�Wełre right behind you," I said, feeling she needed moral
support.

�Iłm fine, Dexia. No problems here. Just donłt want to lose
my handhold and go drifting off into fuck knows what ..."

Her movements became rhythmic, moving into the chamber one
careful handhold at a time. Nicolosi followed, with me right behind him. Apart
from our movements, and the sound of our suit systems, the ship was still as
silent as a crypt.

But it wasnłt totally dark anymore.

Now that we were inside the chamber, it began to reveal its
secrets in dim spots of pale light, reaching away into some indeterminate
distance. The lights must have always been there; just too faint to notice
until we were inside.

�Somethingłs running," Sollis said.

�We knew that," Martinez said. �It was always clear that the
ship was dormant, not dead."

I panned my helmet around and tried to get another look at
the glassy things Iłd glimpsed earlier. On either side of the railinged
walkway, stretching away in multiple ranks, were hundreds of transparent flasks.
Each flask was the size of an oil drum, rounded on top, mounted on a steel-grey
plinth equipped with controls, readouts and input sockets. There were three
levels of them, with the second and third layers stacked above the first on a
skeletal rack. Most of the plinths were dead, but maybe one in ten was showing
a lit-up readout.

�Oh, Jesus," Sollis said, and I guess shełd seen what Iłd
just seen: that the flasks contained human organs, floating in a chemical green
solution, wired up with fine nutrient lines and electrical cables. I was no
anatomist, but I still recognized hearts, lungs, kidneys, snakelike coils of
intestine. And there were things anyone would have recognized: things like
eyeballs, dozens of them growing in a single vat, swaying on the long stalks of
optic nerves, like some weird species of all-seeing sea anemone, things like
hands, or entire limbs, or genitals, or the skin and muscle masks of eyeless
faces. Every external body part came in dozens of different sizes, ranging from
child-sized to adult, male and female, and despite the green suspension fluid
one could make out subtle variations in skin tone and pigmentation.

�Easy, Ingrid," I said, the words as much for my benefit as
hers. �We always knew this was a hospital ship. It was just a matter of time
before we ran into something like this."

�This stuff ..." Nicolosi said, his voice low. �Where does
it come from?"

�Two main sources," Martinez answered, sounding too calm for
my liking. �Not everyone who came aboard Nightingale could be saved,
obviouslythe ship was no more capable of working miracles than any other
hospital. Wherever practicable, the dead would donate intact body parts for
future use. Useful, certainly, but such a resource could never have supplied
the bulk of Nightingalełs surgical needs. For that reason the ship was also
equipped to fabricate its own organ supplies, using well-established principles
of stem-cell manipulation. The organ factories would have worked around the
clock, keeping this library fully stocked."

�It doesnłt look fully stocked now," I said.

Martinez said: �Wełre not in a war zone anymore. The ship is
dormant. It has no need to maintain its usual surgical capacity."

�So why is it maintaining any capacity? Why are some of
these flasks still keeping their organs alive?"

�Waste not, want not, I suppose. A strategic reserve,
against the day when the ship might be called into action again."

�You think itłs just waiting to be reactivated?"

�Itłs just a machine, Dexia. A machine on standby. Nothing
to get nervous about."

�No onełs nervous," I said, but it came out all wrong,
making me sound like I was the one who was spooked.

�Letłs get to the other side," Nicolosi said.

�Wełre halfway there," Sollis reported. �I can see the far
wall, sort of. Looks like therełs a door waiting for us."

We kept on moving, hand over hand, mostly in silence. Surrounded
by all those glass-cased body parts, I couldnłt help but think of the people
many of them had once been part of. If these parts had belonged to me, I think
Iłd have chosen to haunt Nightingale, consumed with ill-directed, spiteful
fury.

Not the right kind of thinking, I was just telling myself,
when the flasks started moving.

We all stopped, anchoring ourselves to the nearest handhold.
Two or three rows back from the railinged crawlway, a row of flasks was gliding
smoothly toward the far wall of the chamber. They were sliding in perfect,
lock-step unison. When my heart started beating again, I realized that the
entire row must be attached to some kind of conveyor system, hidden within the
support framework.

�Nobody move," Nicolosi said.

�This is not good," Sollis kept saying. �This is not good.
The damn ship isnłt supposed to know ..."

�Quiet," Martinez hissed. �Let me past you: I want to see
where those flasks are going."

�Careful," Norbert said.

Paying no attention to the man, Martinez climbed ahead of
the party. Quickly we followed him, doing our best not to make any noise or
slip from the crawlway. The flasks continued their smooth, silent movement,
until the conveyor system reached the far wall and turned through ninety
degrees, taking the flasks away from us into a covered enclosure like a
security scanner. Most of the flasks were empty, but as we watched, one of the
occupied, active units slid into the enclosure. Iłd only had a moment to
notice, but I thought Iłd seen a forearm and hand, reaching up from the
life-support plinth.

The conveyor system halted. For all was silent, then there
came a series of mechanical clicks and whirrs. None of us could see what was
happening inside the enclosure, but after a moment we didnłt need to. It was
obvious.

The conveyor came back on again, but running in reverse this
time. The flask that had gone into the enclosure was now empty. I counted back
to make sure I wasnłt making a mistake, but there was no doubt. The forearm and
hand had been removed from the flask. Already, I presumed, it was somewhere
else in the ship.

The flasks travelled backreturning to what must have been
their former positionsand then halted again. Save for the missing limb, the
chamber was exactly as when we had entered it.

�I donłt like this," Sollis said. �The ship was supposed to
be dead."

�Dormant," Martinez corrected.

�You donłt think the shit that just happened is in any way related
to us being aboard? You donłt think Jax just got a wake-up call?"

�If Jax were aware of our presence, wełd know it by now."

�I donłt know how you can sound so calm."

�All that has happened, Ingrid, is that Nightingale has performed
some trivial housekeeping duty. We have already seen that it maintains some
organs in pre-surgical condition, and this is just one of its tissue libraries.
It should hardly surprise us that the ship occasionally decides to move some of
its stock from A to B."

She made a small, catlike snarl of frustrationI could tell
she hadnłt bought any of his explanationsand pulled herself hand over hand to
the door.

�Any more shit like that happens, Iłm out," she said.

�Iłd think twice if I were you," Martinez said, �itłs a hell
of a long walk home."

I caught up with Sollis and touched her on the forearm. �I
donłt like it either, Ingrid. But the manłs right. Jax doesnłt know wełre here.
If he did, I think hełd do more than just move some flasks around."

�I hope youłre right, Scarrow."

�So do I," I said under my breath.

We continued along the main axis of the ship, following a corridor
much like the one wełd been traversing before the organ library. It swerved and
jogged, then straightened out again. According to the inertial compasses we
were still headed towards Jax, or at least the part of the ship where it
appeared most likely wełd find him, alive or dead.

�What we were talking about earlier," Sollis said, �I mean,
much earlierabout how this ship never got destroyed at the end of the war
after all ..."

�I think I have stated my case, Ingrid. Dwelling on myths
wonłt bring a wanted man to justice."

�Wełre looking at about a million tonnes of salvageable spacecraft
here. Gotta be worth something to someone. So why didnłt anyone get their hands
on it after the war?"

�Because something bad happened," Nicolosi said. �Maybe
there was some truth in the story about that boarding party coming here and not
leaving."

�Oh, please," Martinez said.

�So who was fighting back?" I asked. �Who was it who stopped
them taking Nightingale?"

Nicolosi answered me. �The skeleton staffsecurity agents of
the postmortals who financed this thingmaybe even the protective systems of
the ship itself. If it thought it was under attack ..."

�If there was some kind of firefight aboard this thing," I
asked, wherełs the damage?"

�I donłt care about the damage," Sollis cut in. �I want to
know what happened to all the bodies."

* * * *

We came to another blocked double-door airlock. Sollis got
to work on it immediately, but if Iłd expected that she would work faster now
that she had already opened several doors without trouble, I was wrong. She
kept plugging things in, checking readouts, murmuring to herself just loud
enough to carry over the voice link. Nightingalełs face watched us
disapprovingly, looking on like the portrait of a disappointed ancestor.

�This one could be trickier," she said. �Iłm picking up
active data links, running away from the frame."

�Meaning it could still be hooked into the nervous system?"
Nicolosi asked.

�I canłt rule it out."

Nicolosi ran a hand along the smooth black barrel of his plasma
weapon. �We could double back, try a different route."

�Wełre not going back," Martinez said. �Not now. Open the
door, Ingrid: wełll take our chances and move as quickly as we can from now on."

�You sure about this?" She had a cable pinched between her
fingers. �No going back once I plug this in."

�Do it."

She pushed the line in. At the same moment a shiver of animation
passed through Nightingalełs face, the mask waking to life. The door spoke to
us. Its tone was strident and metallic, but also possessed of an authoritative
feminity.

�This is the Voice of Nightingale. You are attempting to
access a secure area. Report to central administration to obtain proper
clearance."

�Shit," Sollis said.

�You werenłt expecting that?" I asked.

�I wasnłt expecting an active facet. Maybe the sentience
engine isnłt powered down quite as far as I thought."

�This is the Voice of Nightingale," the door said again. �You
are attempting to access a secure area. Report to central administration to
obtain proper clearance."

�Can you still force it?" Nicolosi asked.

�Yeah ... think so." Sollis fumbled in another line, made
some adjustments and stood back as the door slid open. �Voila."

The face had turned silent and masklike again, but now I
really felt that we were being watched; that the womanłs eyes seemed to be
looking in all directions at once.

�You think Jax knows about us now?" I asked, as Sollis propelled
herself into the holding chamber between the two sets of doors.

�I donłt know. Maybe I got to the door in time, before it
sent an alert."

�But you canłt be sure."

�No." She sounded wounded.

Sollis got to the work on the second door, faster now,
urgency overruling caution. I checked that my gun was still where Iłd left it,
and then made sure that the safety catch was still off. Around me, the others
went through similar preparatory rituals.

Gradually it dawned on me that Sollis was taking longer than
expected. She turned from the door, with her equipment still hooked into its
open service panel.

�Somethingłs screwed up," she said, before swallowing hard. �These
suits youłve got us wearing, Tomashow good are they, exactly?"

�Full-spectrum battle hardened. Why do you ask?"

�Because the door says that the shipłs flooded behind this
point. It says wełll be swimming through something."

�I see," Martinez said.

�Oh, no," I said, shaking my head. �Wełre not doing this. Wełre
not going underwater."

�I canłt be sure itłs water, Dexia." She tapped the readout
panel, as if Iłd have been able to make sense of the numbers and symbols. �Could
be anything warm and wet, really."

Martinez shrugged within his suit. �Could have been a containment
leakspillage into this part of the ship. Itłs nothing to worry about. Our
suits will cope easily, provided we do not delay."

I looked him hard in the faceplate, meeting his eyes, making
certain he couldnłt look away. �Youłre sure about this? These suits arenłt
going to stiff on us as soon as they get wet?"

�The suits will work. I am so certain that I will go first.
When you hear that I am safe on the other side, you can all follow."

�I donłt like this. What if Ingridłs tools donłt work underwater?"

�We have no choice but to keep moving forward," Martinez
said. �If this section of the ship is flooded, wełll run into it no matter
which route we take. This is the only way."

�Letłs do it," I said. �If these suits made it through the
war, Iłm pretty sure theyłll get us through the next chamber."

�Itłs not the suits Iłm worried about," Nicolosi said,
examining his weapon again. �No one mentioned ... immersion ... when we were in
the armoury."

I cupped a hand to my crude little slug gun. �Iłll swap you,
we make it to the other side."

Nicolosi didnłt say anything. I donłt think he saw the funny
side.

Two minutes later we were inside, floating weightless in the
unlit gloom of the flooded room. It felt like water, but it was hard to tell.
Everything felt thick and sluggish when you were wearing a suit, even thin air.
My biohazard detectors werenłt registering anything, but that didnłt
necessarily mean the fluid was safe. The detectors were tuned to recognize a
handful of toxins in common wartime use: they werenłt designed to sniff out
every harmful agent that had ever existed.

Martinezłs voice buzzed in my helmet. �There are no handholds
or guide wires. Wełll just have to swim in a straight direction, trusting to
our inertial compasses. If we all stay within sight of each other, we should
have no difficulties."

�Letłs get on with it," Nicolosi said.

We started swimming as best as we could, Nicolosi leading,
pushing himself forward with powerful strokes, his weapons dangling from their
straps. It would have been hard and slow with just the suits to contend with,
but we were all carrying armour as well. It made it difficult to see ahead;
difficult to reach forward to get an effective stroke; difficult to kick the
legs enough to make any useful contribution. Our helmet lamps struggled to
illuminate more than ten or twenty metres in any direction, and the door by
which wełd entered was soon lost in gloom. I felt a constricting sense of
panic; the fear that if the compasses failed we might never find our way out
again.

The compasses didnłt fail, though, and Nicolosi maintained
his unfaltering pace. Two minutes into the swim he called: �I see the wall. Itłs
dead ahead of us."

A couple of seconds later I saw it for myself, hoving out of
the deep pink gloom. Any relief I might have felt was tempered by the
observation that the wall appeared featureless, stretching away blankly in all
illuminated directions.

�Therełs no door," I said.

�Maybe wełve picked up some lateral drift," Nicolosi said.

�Compass says no."

�Then maybe the doors are offset. It doesnłt matter: wełll
find it by hitting the wall and spiralling out from our landing spot."

�If therełs a door."

�If there isnłt," Nicolosi said, �we shoot our way out."

�Glad youłve thought this through," I said, realizing that
he was serious.

The wall came nearer. The closer we got, the more clearly it
was picked out by our lamps, the more I realized there was something not quite
right about it. It was still blanklacking any struts or panels, apertures or
pieces of shipboard equipmentbut it wasnłt the seamless surface Iłd have
expected from a massive sheet of prefabricated spacecraft material. There was
an unsettling texture to it, with something of the fibrous quality of cheap
paper. Faint lines coursed through it, slightly darker than the rest of the
wall, but not arranged according to any neat geometric pattern. They curved and
branched, and threw off fainter subsidiary lines, diminishing like the veins in
a leaf.

In a nauseating flash I realized exactly what the wall was.
When Nicolosiłs palms touched the surface, it yielded like a trampoline,
absorbing the momentum of his impact and then sending him back out again, until
his motion was damped by the surrounding fluid.

�Itłs ..." I began.

�Skin. I know. I realized just before I hit."

I arrested my motion, but not enough to avoid contacting the
wall of skin. It yielded under me, stretching so much that I felt I was in
danger of ripping my way right through. Then it held, and began to trampoline
me back in the direction Iłd come. Fighting a tide of revulsion, I pulled back
into the liquid and floated amidst the others.

�Fuck," Sollis said. �This isnłt right. There shouldnłt be
fucking skin ..."

�Donłt be alarmed," Martinez said, wheezing between each
word. �This is just another form of organ library, like the room we already
passed through. I believe the liquid wełre swimming in must be a form of growth
support mediumsomething like amniotic fluid. Under wartime conditions, this
whole chamber would have been full of curtains of growing skin, measured by the
acre."

Nicolosi groped for something on his belt, came up with a serrated
blade that glinted nastily even in the pink fluid.

�Iłm cutting through."

�No!" Martinez barked.

Sollis, who was next to Nicolosi, took hold of his forearm. �Easy,
soldier. Got to be a better way."

�There is," Martinez said. �Put the knife away, please. We
can go around the skin, find its edge."

Nicolosi still had the blade in his hand. �Iłd rather take
the short cut."

�There are nerve endings in that skin. Cut them and the monitoring
apparatus will know about it. Then so will the ship."

�Maybe the ship already knows."

�We donłt take that chance."

Reluctantly, Nicolosi returned the knife to his belt. �I
thought wełd agreed to move fast from now on," he said.

�Therełs fast, and therełs reckless," Sollis said. �You were
about to cross the line."

Martinez brushed past me, already swimming to the left. I followed
him, with the others tagging on behind. After less than a minute of hard
progress a dark edge emerged into view. It was like a picture frame stretching
tight the canvas of the skin. Beyond the edge, only just visible, was a wall of
the chamber, fretted with massive geodesic reinforcing struts.

I allowed myself a moment of ease. We were still in danger,
still in about the most claustrophobic situation I could imagine, but at least
now the chamber didnłt seem infinitely large.

Martinez braked himself by grabbing the frame. I came to
rest next to him, and peered over the edge, towards what I hoped would be the
wall wełd been heading towards all along. But instead of that I saw only
another field of skin, stretched between another frame, spaced from ours by no
more than the height of a man. In the murky distance was the suggestion of a
third frame, and perhaps one beyond that as well.

�How many?" I asked as the others arrived on the frame,
perching like crows.

�I donłt know," Martinez said. �Four, fiveanything up to a
dozen, Iłd guess. But itłs OK. We can swim around the frames, then turn right
and head back to where wełd expect to find the exit door." He raised his voice.
�Everyone all right? No problems with your suits?"

�There are lights," Nicolosi said quietly.

We turned to look at him.

�I mean down there," he added, nodding in the direction of
the other sheets of skin. �I saw a flicker of somethinga glow in the water, or
amniotic fluid, or whatever the fuck this is."

�I see light too," Norbert said.

I looked down and saw that he was right; that Nicolosi had
not been imagining it. A pale, trembling light was emerging between the next
two layers of skin.

�Whatever that is, I donłt like it," I said.

�Me neither," Martinez said. �But if itłs something going on
between the skin layers, it doesnłt have to concern us. We swim around, avoid
them completely."

He kicked off with surprising determination, and I followed
quickly after him. The reverse side of the skin sheet was a fine mesh of pale
support fibres, the structural matrix upon which the skin must have been grown
and nourished. Thick black cables ran across the underside, arranged in
circuit-like patterns.

The second sheet, the one immediately below the first, was
of different pigmentation to the one above it. In all other respects it
appeared similar, stretching unbroken into pink haze. The flickering, trembling
light source was visible through flesh, silhouetting the veins and arteries at
the moments when the light was brightest.

We passed under the second sheet, and peered into the gap between
the second and third layers. Picked out in stuttering light was a tableau of
furtive activity. Four squidlike robots were at work. Each machine consisted of
a tapering, cone-shaped body, anchored to the skin by a cluster of whiplike
arms emerging from the blunt end of the cone. The robots were engaged in
precise surgery, removing a blanket-sized rectangle of skin by cutting it along
four sides. The robots had their own illumination, shining from the ends of
some of their arms, but the bright flashing light was coming from some kind of
laser-like tool that each robot deployed on the end of a single segmented arm
that was thicker than any of the others. I couldnłt tell whether the flashes
were part of the cutting, or the instant healing that appeared to be taking
place immediately afterwards. There was no bleeding, and the surrounding skin appeared
unaffected.

�What are they doing?" I breathed.

�Harvesting," Martinez answered. �What does it look like?"

�I know theyłre harvesting. I mean, why are they doing it?
What do they need that skin for?"

�I donłt know."

�You had plenty of answers in the organ library, Mr. Martinez,"
Sollis said. All five of us had slowed, hovering at the same level as the
surgical robots. �For a ship thatłs supposed to be dormant, Iłm not seeing much
fucking evidence of dormancy."

�Nightingale grows skin here," I said. �I can deal with
that. The shipłs keeping a basic supply going, in case it gets called into
another war. But that doesnłt explain why it needs to harvest it now."

Martinez sounded vague. �Maybe itłs testing the skinmaking
sure itłs developing according to plan."

�Youłd think a little sample would be enough for that," I
said. �A lot less than several square metres, for sure. Thatłs enough skin to
cover a whole person."

�I really wish you hadnłt said that," Nicolosi said.

�Letłs keep moving," Martinez said. And he was right, too, I
thought: the activity of the robots was deeply unsettling, but we hadnłt come
here to sight-see.

As we swam awaywith no sign that the robots had noticed
usI thought about what Ingrid Sollis had said before. About how it wasnłt
clever to leave a gamma-level intelligence up and running without something to
occupy itself. Because otherwisebecause duty was so deeply hardwired into
their logic pathwaysthey tended to go slowly, quietly, irrevocably insane.

But Nightingale had been alone out here since the end of the
war. What did that mean for its controlling mind? Was the hospital running
itself out herereliving the duties of its former life, no matter how pointless
they had becomebecause the mind had already gone mad, or was this the hospitalłs
last-ditch way of keeping itself sane?

And what, I wondered, did any of that have to do with the
man we had come here to find in the first place?

We kept swimming, passing layer upon layer of skin. Now and
then wełd pass another surgical party: another group of robots engaged in skin
harvesting. Where theyłd already been, the flesh was excised in neat rectangles
and strips, exposing the gauzelike mesh of the growth matrix. Occasionally I
saw a patch that was half-healed already, with the skin growing back in
rice-paper translucence. By the time it was fully repaired, I doubted that
therełd be any sign of where the skin had been cut.

Ten layers, then twelveand then finally the wall Iłd been
waiting for hoved into view like a mirage. But I wasnłt imagining it, nor
seeing another layer of drum-tight skin. There was the same pattern of geodesic
struts as Iłd seen on the other wall.

Sollis came through. �Got a visual on the door, people. Wełre
nearly out of here. Iłm swimming ahead to start work."

�Good, Ingrid," Martinez called back.

A few seconds later I saw the airlock for myself, relieved
that Sollis hadnłt been mistaken. She swam quickly, theneven as she was
gliding to a halt by the doorcommenced unclipping tools and connectors from
her belt. Through the darkening distance of the pink haze I watched her flip
down the service panel and begin her usual systems-bypass procedure. I was glad
Martinez had found Sollis. Whatever else one might say about her, she was pretty
hot at getting through doors.

�OK, good news," she said, after a minute of plugging things
in and out. �Therełs air on the other side. Wełre not going to have to swim in
this stuff for much longer."

�How much longer?" Nicolosi asked.

�Canłt risk a short circuit here, guy. Gotta take things one
step at a time."

Just as she was saying that, I became aware that we were casting
shadows against the wall; ones that we hadnłt been casting when we arrived. I
twisted around and looked back the way wełd just swum, in the direction of the
new light source I knew had to be there. Four of the squid-like machines were
approaching us, dragging a blanket of newly harvested skin between them, one
robot grasping each corner between two segmented silver tentacles. They were
moving faster than we could swim, driven by some propulsion system jetting
fluid from the sharp end of the cone.

Sollis jerked back as the outer airlock door opened
suddenly.

�I didnłt ..." she started.

�I know," I said urgently. �The robots are coming. They must
have sent a command to open the lock."

�Letłs get out of the way," Martinez said, kicking off from
the wall. �Ingrid: get away from the lock. Take what you can, but donłt spend
too long doing it."

Sollis started unplugging her equipment, stowing it on her
belt with fumbling fingers. The machines powered nearer, the blanket of skin
undulating like a flying carpet. They slowed, then halted. Their lights pushed
spears of harsh illumination through the fluid. They were looking at us,
wondering what we were doing between them and the door. One of the machines
directed its beam to Martinezłs swimming figure, attracted by the movement.
Martinez slowed and hung frozen in the glare, like a moth pinned in a beam of
sunlight.

None of us said a word. My own breathing was the loudest
sound in the universe, but I couldnłt make it any quieter.

One of the machines let go of its corner of the skin. It
hovered by the sheet for a moment, as if weighing its options. Then it singled
me out and commenced its approach. As it neared, the machine appeared far
larger and more threatening than Iłd imagined. Its cone-shaped body was as long
as me; its thickest tentacle appearing powerful enough to do serious damage
even without the additional weapon of the laser. When it spread its arms wide,
as if to embrace me, I had to fight not to panic and back away.

The robot started examining me. It began with my helmet,
tap-tapping and scraping, shining its light through my visor. It applied
twisting force, trying to disengage the helmet from the neck coupling. Whether
it recognized me as a person or just a piece of unidentifiable floating debris,
it appeared to think that dismantling was the best course of action. I told
myself that Iłd let it work at me for another few seconds, but as soon as I
felt the helmet begin to loosen Iłd have to acteven if that meant alerting the
robot that I probably wasnłt debris.

But just when Iłd decided as much, the robot abandoned my
helmet and worked its way south. It extended a pair of tentacles under my chest
armour from each side, trying to lever it away like huge scab. Somehow I kept
my nerve, daring to believe that the robot would sooner or later lose interest
in me. Then it pulled away from the chest armour and started fiddling with my
weapon, tap-tapping away like a spirit in a s�ance. It tugged on the gun,
trying to unclip it. Then, as abruptly as it had started, the robot abandoned
its investigation. It pulled away, gathering its tentacles into a fistlike
bunch. Then it moved slowly in the direction of Nicolosi, tentacles groping
ahead of it.

I willed him to stay still. Therełd be no point in swimming.
None of us could move faster than those robots. Nicolosi must have worked that
out for himself, or else he was paralysed in fright, but he made no movements
as the robot cruised up to him. It slowed, the spread of its tentacles
widening, and then tracked its spotlight from head to toe, as if it still
couldnłt decide what Nicolosi was. Then it reached out a pair of manipulators
and brushed their sharp-looking tips against his helmet. The machine probed and
examined with surprising gentleness. I heard the metal-on-metal scrape through
the voice link, backgrounded by Nicolosiłs rapid, sawlike breathing.

Keep it together ...

The machine reached his neck, examined the interface between
helmet and torso assembly, and then worked its way down to his chest armour,
extending a fine tentacle under the armour itself, to where the vulnerable
life-support module lay concealed. Then, very slowly, it withdrew the tentacle.

The machine pulled back from Nicolosi, turning its blunt end
away. It seemed to have completed its examination. The other three robots
hovered watchfully with their prize of skin. Nicolosi sighed and eased his
breathing.

�I think ..." he whispered.

That was his big mistake. The machine righted itself,
gathered its tentacles back into formation and began to approach him again, its
powerful light sweeping up and down his body with renewed purpose. The second
machine was nearing, clearly intent on assisting its partner in the examination
of Nicolosi.

I looked at Sollis, our horrified faces meeting each other. �Can
you get the door ..." I started.

�Not a hope in hell."

�Nicolosi," I said, not bothering to whisper this time. �Stay
still and maybe theyłll go away again."

But he wasnłt going to stay still: not this time. Even as I
watched, he was hooking a hand around the plasma rifle, bringing it around like
a harpoon, its wide maw directed at the nearest machine.

�No!" Norbert shouted, his voice booming through the water
like a depth charge. �Do not use! Not in here!"

But Nicolosi was beyond reasoned argument now. He had a
weapon. Every cell in his body was screaming at him to use it.

So he did.

In one sense, it did all that he asked of it. The plasma
discharge speared the robot like a sunbeam through a cloud. The robot came
apart in a boiling eruption of steam and fire, with jagged black pieces riding
the shockwave. Then the steamthe vaporized amniotic fluidswallowed
everything, including Nicolosi and his gun. Even inside my suit, the sound hit
me like a hammerblow. He fired one more time, as if to make certain that he had
destroyed the robot. By then the second machine was near enough to be flung
back by the blast, but it quickly righted itself and continued its progress.

�More," Norbert said, and when I looked back up the stack of
skin sheets, I saw what he meant. Robots were arriving in ones and twos,
abandoning their cutting work to investigate whatever had just happened here.

�Wełre in trouble," I said.

The steam cloud was breaking up, revealing the floating form
of Nicolosi, with the ruined stump of his weapon drifting away from him. The
second time he fired it, something must have gone badly wrong with the plasma
rifle. I wasnłt even sure that Nicolosi was still alive.

�I take door," Norbert said, drawing his Demarchist weapon. �You
take robots."

�Youłre going to shoot us out, after what happened to Nicolosi?"
I asked.

�No choice," he said, as the gun unpacked itself in his
hand.

Martinez pushed himself across to the big man. �No. Give it
to me instead. Iłll take care of the door."

�Too dangerous," Norbert said.

�Give it to me."

Norbert hesitated, and for a moment I thought he was going
to put up a fight. Then he calmly passed the Demarchist weapon to Martinez and
accepted Martinezłs weapon in return; the little slug gun vanishing into his
vast gauntleted hand. Whatever respect Iłd had for Norbert vanished at the same
time. If he was supposed to be protecting Martinez, that was no way to go about
it.

Of the three of us, only Norbert and I were carrying
projectile weapons. I unclipped my second pistol and passed it to Sollis. She
took it gratefully, needing little persuasion to keep her energy weapon glued
to her belt. The robots were easy to kill, provided we let them get close
enough for a clean shot. I didnłt doubt that the surgical cutting gear was
capable of inflicting harm, but we never gave them the opportunity to touch us.
Not that the machines appeared to have deliberately hostile designs on us
anyway. They were still behaving as if they were investigating some shipboard
malfunction that required remedial action. They might have killed us, but it
would only have been because they did not understand what we were.

We didnłt have an inexhaustible supply of slugs, though, and
manual reloading was not an option underwater. Just when I began to worry that
wełd be overwhelmed by sheer numbers, Martinezłs voice boomed through my
helmet.

�Iłm ready to shoot now. Follow me as soon as Iłm through
the second door."

The Demarchist weapon discharged, lighting up the entire
chamber in an eyeblink of murky detail. There was another discharge, then a
third.

�Martinez," I said. �Speak to me."

After too long a delay, he came through. �Iłm still here.
Through the first door. Weaponłs cycling ..."

More robots were swarming above us, tentacles lashing like
whips. I wondered how long it would take before signals reached Nightingalełs
sentience engine and the ship realized that it was dealing with more than just
a local malfunction.

�Why doesnłt he shoot?" Sollis asked, squeezing off one controlled
slug after another.

�Sporting weapon. Three shots, recharge cycle, three shots,"
Norbert said, by way of explanation. �No rapid-fire mode. But work good
underwater."

�We could use those next three shots," I said.

Martinez buzzed in my ear. �Ready. I will discharge until
the weapon is dry. I suggest you start swimming now."

I looked at Nicolosiłs drifting form, which was still as
inert as when he had emerged from the steam cloud caused by his own weapon. �I
think hełs dead ..." I said softly. �But we should still"

�No," Norbert said, almost angrily. �Leave him."

�Maybe hełs just unconscious."

Martinez fired three times; three brief bright strobe
flashes. �Through!" I heard him call, but there was something wrong with his
voice. I knew then that hełd been hurt as well, although I couldnłt guess at how
badly.

Norbert and Sollis fired two last shots at the robots that
were still approaching, then kicked past me in the direction of the airlock. I
looked at Nicolosiłs drifting form, knowing that Iłd never be able to live with
myself if I didnłt try to get him out of there. I clipped my gun back to my
belt and started swimming for him.

�No!" Norbert shouted again, when hełd seen my intentions. �Leave
him! Too late!"

I reached Nicolosi and locked my right arm around his neck,
pulling his head against my chest. I kicked for all I was worth, trying to pull
myself forward with my free arm. I still couldnłt tell if Nicolosi was dead or
alive.

�Leave him, Scarrow! Too late!"

�I canłt leave him!" I shouted back, my voice ragged.

Three robots were bearing down on me and my cargo, their
tentacles groping ahead of them. I squinted against the glare from their lights
and tried to focus on getting the two of us to safety. Every kick of my legs,
every awkward swing of my arm, seemed to tap the last drop of energy in my muscles.
Finally I had nothing more to give.

I loosened my arm. His body corkscrewed slowly around, and
through his visor I saw his face: pale, sweat-beaded, locked into a rictus of
fear, but not dead, nor even unconscious. His eyes were wide open. He knew
exactly what was going to happen when I let him go.

I had no choice.

A strong arm hooked itself under my helmet, and began to tug
me out of harmłs way. I watched as Nicolosi drifted towards the robots, and
then closed my eyes as they wrapped their tentacles around his body and started
probing him for points of weakness, like children trying to tear the wrapping
from a present.

Norbertłs voice boomed through the water. �Hełs dead."

�He was alive. I saw it."

�Hełs dead. End of story."

* * * *

I pulled myself through a curtain of trembling pink water.
Air pressure in the corridor contained the amniotic fluid, even though Martinez
had blown a man-sized hole in each airlock door. Ruptured metal folded back in
jagged black petals. Ahead, caught in a moving pool of light from their helmet
lamps, Sollis and Martinez made awkward, crabwise progress away from the ruined
door. Sollis was supporting Martinez, doing most of the work for him. Even in
zero gravity, it took effort to haul another body.

�Help her," Norbert said faintly, shaking his weapon to
loosen the last of the pink bubbles from its metal. Without waiting for a
reaction from me, he turned and started shooting back into the water, dealing
with the remaining robots.

I caught up with Sollis and took some of her burden. All
along the corridor, panels were flashing bright red, synchronized to the
banshee wail of an emergency siren. About once every ten metres, the shipłs
persona spoke from the wall; multiple voices blurring into an agitated chorus. �Attention.
Attention," the faces said. �This is the Voice of Nightingale. An incident has
been detected in culture bay three. Damage assessment and mitigation systems
have now been tasked. Partial evacuation of the affected ship area may be
necessary. Please stand by for further instructions. Attention. Attention ..."

�Whatłs up with Martinez?"

�Took some shrapnel when he put a hole in that door." She indicated
a severe dent in his chest armour, to the left of the sternum. �Didnłt puncture
the suit, but Iłm pretty sure it did some damage. Broken rib, maybe even a
collapsed lung. He was talking for a while back there, but hełs out cold now."

�Without Martinez, we donłt have a mission."

� I didnłt say he was dead. His suit still seems to be
ticking over. Maybe we could leave him here, collect him on the way back."

�With all those robots crawling about the place? How long do
you think theyłd leave him alone?"

I looked back, checking on Norbert. He was firing less frequently
now, dealing with the last few stragglers still intent on investigating the
damage. Finally he stopped, loaded a fresh clip into his slug gun, and then
after waiting for ten or twenty seconds turned from the wall of water. He began
to make his way towards us.

�Maybe there arenłt going to be any more robots."

�There will," Norbert said, joining us. �Many more. Nowhere
safe, now. Ship on full alert. Nightingale coming alive."

�Maybe we should scrub," I said. �Wełve lost Nicolosi ... Martinez
is incapacitated ... wełre no longer at anything like necessary strength to
take down Jax."

�We still take Jax," Norbert said. �Came for him, leave with
him."

�Then what about Martinez?"

He looked at the injured man, his face set like a granite
carving. �He stay," he said.

�But you already said the robots"

�No other choice. He stay." And then Norbert brought himself
closer to Martinez and tucked a thick finger under the chin of the old manłs
helmet, tilting the faceplate up. �Wake!" he bellowed.

When there was no response, Norbert reached behind Martinezłs
chest armour and found the release buckles. He passed the dented plate to me,
then slid down the access panel on the front of Martinezłs tabard pack, itself
dented and cracked from the shrapnel impact. He scooped out a fistful of pink
water, flinging the bubble away from us, then started making manual adjustments
to the suitłs life-support settings. Biomedical data patterns shifted, accompanied
by warning flashes in red.

�What are you doing?" I breathed. When he didnłt hear me, I
shouted the question.

�He need stay awake. This help."

Martinez coughed red sputum onto the inside of his
faceplate. He gulped in hard, then made rapid eye contact with the three of us.
Norbert pushed the loaded slug gun into Martinezłs hand, then slipped a fresh
ammo clip onto the old manłs belt. He pointed down the corridor, to the blasted
door, then indicated the direction wełd all be heading when we abandoned
Martinez.

�We come back," he said. �You stay alive."

Sollisłs teeth flashed behind her faceplate. �This isnłt
right. We should be carrying himanything other than just leaving him here."

�Tell them," Martinez wheezed.

�No."

�Tell them, you fool! Theyłll never trust you unless you
tell them."

�Tell them what?" I asked.

Norbert looked at me with heavy lidded eyes. �The old man
... not Martinez. His name ... Quinlan."

�Then who the fuck is Martinez?" Sollis asked.

�I," Norbert said.

I glanced at Sollis, then back at the big man. �Donłt be
silly," I said gently, wondering what must have happened to him in the flooded
chamber.

�I am Quinlan," the old man said, between racking coughs. �He
was always the master. I was just the servant, the decoy."

�Theyłre both insane," Sollis said.

�This is the truth. I acted the role of Martinezdeflected
attention from him."

�He canłt be Martinez," Sollis said. �Sorry, Norbert, but
you can barely put a sentence together, let alone a prosecution dossier."

Norbert tapped a huge finger against the side of his helmet.
�Damage to speech centre, in war. Comprehension ... memory ... analytic
faculties ... intact."

�Hełs telling the truth," the old man said. �Hełs the one
who needs to survive, not me. Hełs the one who can nail Jax." Then he tapped
the gun against the big manłs leg, urging him to leave. �Go," he said, barking
out that one word like it was the last thing he expected to say. And at almost
the same moment, I saw one of the tentacled robots begin to poke its limbs
through the curtain of water, tick-ticking the tips of its arms against the
blasted metal, searching for a way into the corridor.

�Think the man has a point," Sollis said.

* * * *

It didnłt get any easier from that point on.

We left the old manI still couldnłt think of him as �Quinlan"slumped
against the corridor wall, the barrel of his gun wavering in the rough
direction of the ruined airlock. I looked back all the while, willing him to
make the best use of the limited number of shots he had left. We were halfway
to the next airlock when he squeezed off three rapid rounds, blasting the robot
to twitching pieces. It wasnłt long before another set of tentacles began to
probe the gap. I wondered how many of the damned things the ship was going to
keep throwing at us, and how that number stacked up against the slugs the old
man had left.

The flashing red lights ran all the way to the end of the
corridor. I was just looking at the door, wondering how easy it was going to be
for Sollis to crack, when Norbert/Martinez brought the three of us to a halt,
braking my momentum with one tree-like forearm.

�Blast visor down, Scarrow."

I understood what he had in mind. No more sweet-talking the
doors until they opened for us. From now on we were shooting our way through
Nightingale.

Norbert/Martinez aimed the Demarchist weapon at the airlock.
I cuffed down my blast visor. Three discharges took out the first airlock door,
crumpling it inward as if punched by a giant fist.

�Air on other side," Norbert/Martinez said.

The Demarchist gun was ready again. Through the visorłs
near-opaque screen I saw three flashes. When I flipped it back up, the weapon
was packing itself back into its stowed configuration. Sollis patted aside
smoke and airborne debris. The emergency lights were still flashing in our
section of corridor, but the space beyond the airlock was as pitch dark as any
part of the ship wełd already traversed. Yet wełd barely taken a step into that
darkness when wall facets lit up in swift sequence, with the face of Nightingale
looking at us from all directions.

Something was wrong now. The faces really were looking at
us, even though the facets were flat. The images turned slowly as we advanced
down the corridor.

�This is the Voice of Nightingale," she said, as if we were
being addressed by a perfectly synchronized choir. �I am now addressing a
moving party of three individuals. My systems have determined with a high statistical
likelihood that this party is responsible for the damage I have recently
sustained. The damage is containable, but I cannot tolerate any deeper
intrusion. Please remain stationary and await an escort to a safe holding area."

Sollis slowed, but she didnłt stop. �Whołs speaking? Are we
being addressed by the sentience engine, or just a delta-level subsidiary?"

�This is the Voice of Nightingale. I am a Turing-compliant
gamma-level intelligence of the Vaaler-Lako series. Please stop, and await
escort to a safe holding area."

�Thatłs the sentience engine," Sollis said quietly. �It
means wełre getting the shipłs full attention now."

�Maybe we can talk it into handing over Jax."

�I donłt know. Negotiating with this thing might be tricky.
Vaaler-Lakos were supposed to be the hot new thing around the time Nightingale
was put together, but they didnłt quite work out that way."

�What happened?"

�There was a flaw in their architecture. Within a few years
of start-up, most of them had gone bugfuck insane. I donłt even want to think
about what being stuck out herełs done to this one."

�Please stop," the voice said again, �and await escort to a
safe holding area. This is your final warning."

�Ask it ..." Norbert/Martinez said. �Speak for me."

�Can you hear me, ship?" Sollis asked. �Wełre not here to do
any harm. Wełre sorry about the damage we caused already. Itłs just that wełve
come for someone. Therełs a man here, a man aboard you, that wełd really like
to meet."

The ship said nothing for several moments. Just when Iłd concluded
that it didnłt understand us, it said: �This facility is no longer operational.
There is no one here for you to see. Please await escort to a safe holding
area, from where you can be referred to a functioning facility."

�Wełve come for Colonel Jax," I said. �Check your patient
records."

�Admission code Tango Tango six one three, hyphen five,"
said Norbert/Martinez, forcing each word out like an expression of pain. �Colonel
Brandon Jax, Northern Coalition."

�Do you have a record of that admission?" I asked.

�Yes," the Voice of Nightingale replied. �I have a record
for Colonel Jax."

�Do you have a discharge record?"

�No such record is on file."

�Then Jax either died in your care, or hełs still aboard.
Either way therełll be a body. Wełd really like to see it."

�That is not possible. You will stop now. An escort is on
its way to escort you to a safe holding area."

�Why canłt we see Jax?" Sollis demanded. �Is he telling you
we canłt see him? If so hełs not the man you should be listening to. Hełs a war
criminal, a murderous bastard who deserves to die."

�Colonel Jax is under the care of this facility. He is still
receiving treatment. It is not possible to visit him at this time."

�Damn thingłs changing its story," I said. �A minute ago it
said the facility was closed."

�We just want to talk to him," Sollis said. �Thatłs all.
Just to let him know the world knows where he is, even if you donłt let us take
him with us now."

�Please remain calm. The escort is about to arrive."

The facets turned to look away from us, peering into the
dark limits of the corridor. There was a sudden bustle of approaching movement,
and then a wall of machines came squirming towards us. Dozens of squid-robots
were nearing, packed so tightly together that their tentacles formed a flailing
mass of silver-blue metal. I looked back the other way, back the way wełd come,
and saw another wave of robots coming from that direction. There were far more
machines than wełd seen before, and their movements in dry air were at least as
fast and fluid as theyłd been underwater.

�Ship," Sollis said, �all we want is Jax. Wełre prepared to
fight for him. Thatłll mean more damage being inflicted on you. But if you give
us Jax, wełll leave nicely."

�I donłt think it wants to bargain," I said, raising my slug
gun at the advancing wall just as it reached the ruined airlock. I squeezed off
rounds, taking out at least one robot with each slug. Sollis started pitching
in to my left, while Norbert/Martinez took care of the other direction with the
Demarchist weapon. He could do a lot more damage with each discharge, taking
out three or four machines every time he squeezed the trigger. But he kept
having to wait for the weapon to re-arm itself, and the delay was allowing the
wall to creep slowly forward. Sollis and I were firing almost constantly,
taking turns to cover each other while we slipped in new slugs clips or ammo
cells, but our wall was gaining on us as well. No matter how many robots we
destroyed, no gap ever appeared in the advancing wave. There must have been
hundreds of them, squeezing us in from both directions.

�Wełre not going to make it," I said, sounding resigned even
to myself. �Therełs too many of them. Maybe if we still had Nicolosiłs rifle,
we could shoot our way out."

�I didnłt come all this way just to surrender to a haunted
hospital," Sollis said, replacing an ammo cell. �If it means going out fighting
... so be it."

The nearest robots were now only six or seven metres away,
with the tips of their tentacles probing even nearer. She kept pumping shots
into them, but they kept coming closer, flinging aside the hot debris of their
damaged companions. There was no possibility of falling back any farther, for
we were almost back to back with Norbert/Martinez.

�Maybe we should just stop," I said. �This is a hospital. Itłs
programmed to heal people. The last thing itłll want to do is hurt us."

�Feel free to put that to the test," Sollis said.

Norbert/Martinez squeezed off the last discharge before his
weapon went back into recharge mode. Sollis was still firing. I reached over
and tried to pass him my gun, so hełd at least have something to use while
waiting for his weapon to power up. But the machines had already seen their
moment. The closest one flicked out a tentacle and wrapped it around the big
manłs foot. Everything happened very quickly, then. The machine hauled Norbert/Martinez
towards the flailing mass, until he fell within reach of another set of
tentacles. They had him, then. He cartwheeled his arms, trying to reach for
handholds on the walls, but there was no possibility of that. The robots
flicked the Demarchist weapon from his grip, and then took the weapon with
them. Norbert/Martinez screamed as his legs, and then his upper body, vanished
into the wall of machines. They smothered him completely. For a moment we could
still hear his breathinghełd stopped screaming, as if knowing it would make no
differenceand then there was absolute silence, as if the carrier signal from
his suit had been abruptly terminated.

Then, a moment later, the machines were on Sollis and me.

* * * *

I woke. The fact that I was still alivenot just alive but
comfortable and lucidhit like me like a mild electric shock, one that snapped
me into instant and slightly resentful alertness. Iłd been enjoying unconsciousness.
I remembered the robots, how Iłd felt them trying to get into my suit, the
sharp cold nick as something pierced skin, and then an instant later the
painless bliss of sleep. Iłd expected to die, but as the drug hit my brain, it
erased all trace of fear.

But I wasnłt dead. I wasnłt even injured, so far as I could
tell. Iłd been divested of my suit, but I was now reclining in relative comfort
on a bed or mattress, under a clean white sheet. My own weight was pressing me
down onto the mattress, so I must have been moved into the shipłs reactivated
centrifuge section. I felt tired and bruised, but other than that I was in no
worse shape than when wełd boarded Nightingale. I remembered what Iłd told
Sollis during our last stand: how the hospital ship wouldnłt want to do us
harm. Maybe therełd been more than just wishful thinking in that statement.

There was no sign of Sollis or Norbert/Martinez, though. I
was alone in a private recovery cubicle, surrounded by white walls. I
remembered coming around in a room like this during my first visit to
Nightingale. The wall on my right contained a white-rimmed door and a series of
discrete hatches, behind which I knew lurked medical monitoring and
resuscitation equipment, none of which had been deemed necessary in my case. A
control panel was connected to the side of the bed by a flexible stalk, within
easy reach of my right hand. Via the touchpads on the panel I was able to adjust
the cubiclełs environmental settings and request services from the hospital,
ranging from food and drink, washing and toilet amenities, to additional drug
dosages.

Given the semi-dormant state of the ship, I wondered how
much of it was still online. I touched one of the pads, causing the white walls
to melt away and take on the holographic semblance of a calming beach scene,
with ocean breakers crashing onto powdery white sand under a sky etched with
sunset fire. Palm trees nodded in a soothing breeze. I didnłt care about the
view, though. I wanted something to drinkmy throat was rawand then I wanted
to know what had happened to the others and how long we were going to be
detained. Because, like it or not, being a patient aboard a facility like
Nightingale wasnłt very different to being a prisoner. Until the hospital
deemed you fit and well, you were going nowhere.

But when I touched the other pads, nothing happened. Either
the room was malfunctioning, or it had been programmed to ignore my requests. I
made a move to ease myself off the bed, wincing as my bruised limbs registered
their disapproval. But the clean white sheet stiffened to resist my efforts,
hardening until it felt as rigid as armour. As soon as I pulled back, the sheet
relinquished its hold. I was free to move around on the bed, to sit up and
reach for things, but the sheet would not allow me to leave the bed itself.

Movement caught my eye, far beyond the foot of the bed. A
figure walked towards me, strolling along the holographic shoreline. She was
dressed almost entirely in black, with a skirt that reached all the way to the
sand, heavy fabric barely moving as she approached. She wore a white bonnet
over black hair parted exactly in the middle, a white collar and a jewelled
clasp at her throat. Her face was instantly recognizable as the Voice of
Nightingale, but now it appeared softer, more human.

She stepped from the wall and appeared to stand at the foot
of my bed. She looked at me for a moment before speaking, her expression one of
gentle concern.

�I knew youłd come, given time."

�How are the others? Are they OK?"

�If you are speaking of the two who were with you before you
lost consciousness, they are both well. The other two required more serious
medical intervention, but they are now both stable."

�I thought Nicolosi and Quinlan were dead."

�Then you underestimate my abilities. I am only sorry that
they came to harm. Despite my best efforts, there is a necessary degree of
autonomy among my machines that sometimes results in them acting foolishly."

There was a kindness there that had been entirely absent
from the display facets. For the first time I had the impression of an actual
mind lurking behind the machine-generated mask. I sensed that it was a mind
capable of compassion and complexity of thought.

�We didnłt intend to hurt you," I said. �Iłm sorry about any
damage we caused, but we only ever wanted Jax, your patient. He committed
serious crimes. He needs to be brought back to Skyłs Edge, to face justice."

�Is that why you risked so much? In the interests of
justice?"

�Yes," I answered.

�Then you must be very brave and selfless. Or was justice
only part of your motivation?"

�Jax is a bad man. All you have to do is hand him over."

�I cannot let you take Jax. He remains my patient."

I shook my head. �He was your patient, when he came aboard.
But that was during the war. We have a record of his injuries. They were
serious, but not life-threatening. Given your resources, it shouldnłt have been
too hard for you to put him back together again. Therełs no question of Jax
still needing your care."

�Shouldnłt I be the judge of that?"

�No. Itłs simple: either Jax died under your care, or hełs
well enough to face trial. Did he die?"

�No. His injuries were, as you note, not life-threatening."

�Then hełs either alive, or youłve got him frozen. Either
way, you can hand him over. Nicolosi knows how to thaw him out, if thatłs what
youłre worried about."

�There is no need to thaw Colonel Jax. He is alive and conscious,
except when I permit him to sleep."

�Then therełs even less reason not to hand him over."

�Iłm afraid there is every reason in the world. Please
forget about Colonel Jax. I will not relinquish him from my care."

�Not good enough, ship."

�You are in my care now. As you have already discovered, I
will not permit you to leave against my will. But I will allow you to depart if
you renounce your intentions concerning Colonel Jax."

�Youłre a gamma-level persona," I said. �To all intents and
purposes you have human intelligence. That means youłre capable of reasoned
negotiation."

The Voice of Nightingale cocked her head, as if listening to
a faraway tune. �Continue."

�We came to arrest Colonel Jax. Failing that, we came to
find physical proof of his presence aboard this facility. A blood sample, a
tissue scraping: something we can take back to the planetary authorities and
alert them to his presence here. We wonłt get paid as much for that, but at
least they can send out a heavier ship and take him by force. But therełs
another option, too. If you let us off this ship without even showing us the
colonel, therełs nothing to stop us planting a few limpet mines on your hull
and blowing you to pieces."

The Voicełs face registered disapproval. �So now you resort
to threats of physical violence."

�Iłm not threatening anything: just pointing out the
options. I know you care about self-preservation: itłs wired deep into your
architecture."

�I would be advised to kill you now, in that case."

�That wouldnłt work. Do you think Martinez kept your coordinates
to himself? He always knew this was a risky extraction. Hełd have made damn
sure another party knew about your whereabouts, and who you were likely to be
sheltering. If we donłt make it back, someone will come in our place. And you
can bet theyłll bring their own limpet mines as well."

�In which case I would gain nothing by letting you go,
either."

�No, youłll get to stay alive. Just give us Jax, and wełll
leave you alone. I donłt know what it is youłre doing out here, what it is that
keeps you sane, but really, itłs your business, not ours. We just want the
colonel."

The shipłs persona regarded me with narrowed, playful eyes.
I had the impression she was thinking things through very carefully indeed,
examining my proposition from every conceivable angle.

�It would be that simple?"

�Absolutely. We take the man, we say good-bye and you never
hear from us again."

�Iłve invested a lot of time and energy in the colonel. I
would find it difficult to part company with him."

�Youłre a resourceful persona. Iłm sure youłd find other
ways to occupy your time."

�It isnłt about occupying my time, Dexia." Shełd spoken my
name for the first time. Of course she knew me: it would only have taken a
blood or tissue sample to establish that Iłd already been aboard the ship. �Itłs
about making my feelings felt," she continued. �Something happened to me around
Skyłs Edge. Call it a moment of clarity. I saw the horrors of war for what they
were. I also saw my part in the self-perpetuation of those horrors. I had to do
something about that. Removing myself from the sphere of operation was one
thing, but I knew there was more that I could do. Thankfully, the colonel gave
me the key. Through him, I saw a path to redemption."

�You didnłt have to redeem yourself," I said. �You were a
force for good, Nightingale. You healed people."

�Only so that they could go back to war. Only so that they
could be blown apart and sent back to me for more healing."

�You had no choice. It was what you were made to do."

�Precisely."

�The warłs over. Itłs time to forget about what happened.
Thatłs why itłs so important to bring Jax back home, so that we can start
burying the past."

The Voice studied me with a level, clinical eye. It was as
if she knew something unspeakable about my condition, some truth I was as yet
too weak to bear.

�What would be the likely sentence, were Jax to be tried?"

�Hełd get the death penalty, no question about it.
Crucifixion. Hung from the Bridge, like Sky Haussmann."

�Would you mourn him?"

�Hell, no. Iłd be cheering with the rest of them."

�Then you would agree that his death is inevitable, one way
or the other."

�I guess so."

�Then I will make a counter-proposition. I will not permit
you to take Jax alive. But I will allow you an audience with him. You shall
meet and speak with the colonel."

Wary of a trap, I asked: �Then what happens?"

�Once the audience is complete, I will remove the colonel
from life support. He will die shortly afterwards."

�If youłre willing to let him die ... why not just hand him
over?"

�He canłt be handed over. Not anymore. He would die."

�Why not?"

�Because of what I have done to him."

Fatigue tugged at me, fogging my earlier clarity of thought.
On one level I just wanted to get out of the ship, with no additional
complications. Iłd expected to die, when the hospital sent its machines against
us. Yet as glad as I was not to find myself dead, as tempted as I was to take
the easier option and just leave, I couldnłt ignore the prize that was now so
close at hand.

�I need to talk to the others."

�No, Dexia. This must be your decision, and yours alone."

�Have you put the same proposition to them?"

�Yes. I told them they could leave now, or they could meet
the colonel."

�What did they say?"

�Iłd rather hear what you have to say first."

�Iłm guessing they had the same reaction I did. Therełs got
to be a catch somewhere."

�There is no catch. If you leave now, you will have the
personal satisfaction of knowing that you have at least located the colonel,
and that he remains alive. Of course that information may not be worth very
much to you, but you would always have the option of returning, should you
still wish to bring him to justice. On the other hand, you can see the colonel
nowsee him and speak with himand leave knowing he is dead. I will allow you
to witness the withdrawal of his life support, and I will even let you take his
head with you. That should be worth more than the mere knowledge of his
existence."

�Therełs a catch. I know therełs a catch."

�I assure you there isnłt."

�We all get to leave? Youłre not going to turn around and demand
that one of us takes the colonelłs place?"

�No. You will all be allowed to leave."

�In one piece?"

�In one piece."

�All right," I said, knowing the choice wasnłt going to get
any easier no matter how many times I reconsidered it. �I canłt speak for the
othersand I guess this has to be a majority decisionbut Iłm ready to see the
sonofabitch."

* * * *

I was allowed to leave the room, but not the bed. The sheet
tightened against me again, pressing me against the mattress as the bed tilted
to the vertical. Two squid-robots entered the room and detached the bed from
its mountings, and then carried it between them. I was glued to it like a
figure on a playing card. The robots propelled me forward in an effortless
glide, silent save for the soft metallic scratch of their tentacles where they
engaged the wall or the floor.

The Voice of Nightingale addressed me from the bedside panel,
a small image of her face appearing above the touchpads.

�Itłs not far now, Dexia. I hope you wonłt regret your decision."

�What about the others?"

�Youłll be joining them. Then you can all go home."

�Are you saying we all made the same decision, to see the colonel?"

�Yes," the Voice said.

The robots carried me out of the centrifuge section, into
what I judged to be the forward part of the ship. The sheet relinquished its
hold on me slightly, just enough so that I was able to move under it.
Presently, after passing through a series of airlocks, I was brought to a very
dark room.

Without being able to see anything, I sensed that this was
as large as any pressurized space wełd yet entered, save for the skin
cultivation chamber. The air was as moist and blood-warm as the inside of a
tropical greenhouse.

�I thought you said the others would be here."

�Theyłll arrive shortly," the Voice said. �Theyłve already
met the colonel."

�There hasnłt been time."

�They met the colonel when you were still asleep, Dexia. You
were the last to be revived. Now, would you like to speak to the man himself?"

I steeled myself. �Yes."

�Here he is."

A beam of light stabbed across the room, illuminating a face
that I recognized instantly. Surrounded by blackness, Jaxłs face appeared to
hover as if detached from his body. Time had done nothing to soften those
pugnacious features; the cruel set of that heavy jaw. Yet his eyes were closed,
and his face lolled at a slight angle, as if he remained unaware of the beam.

�Wake up," the Voice of Nightingale said, louder than Iłd
heard her so far. �Wake up, Colonel Jax!"

The colonel woke. He opened his eyes, blinked twice against
the glare, then held a steady gaze. He tilted his head to meet the beam,
projecting his jaw forward at a challenging angle.

�You have another visitor, Colonel. Would you like me to introduce
her?"

His mouth opened. Saliva drooled out. From out of the darkness,
a hand descended down from above the colonelłs face to wipe his chin dry.
Something about the way the hand came in was terribly, terribly wrong. Jax saw
my reaction and let out a soft, nasty chuckle. That was when I realized that
the colonel was completely, irrevocably insane.

�Her name is Dexia Scarrow. Shełs part of the same party youłve
already met."

Jax spoke. His voice was too loud, as if it was being fed
through an amplifier. There was something huge and wet about it. It was like
hearing the voice of a whale.

�You a soldier, girl?"

�I was a soldier, Colonel. But the warłs over now. Iłm a civilian."

�Goody for you. What brought you here, girly girl?"

�I came to bring you to justice. I came to take you back to
the war crimes court on Skyłs Edge."

�Maybe you should have come a little sooner."

�Iłll settle for seeing you die. I understand thatłs an
option."

Something Iłd said made the colonel smile. �Has the ship
told you the deal yet?"

�The ship told me it wasnłt letting you out of here alive.
It promised us your head."

�Then I guess it didnłt get into specifics." He cocked his
head away from me, as if talking to someone standing to my left. �Bring up the
lights, Nightingale: she may as well know what shełs dealing with."

�Are you sure, Colonel?" the ship said back.

�Bring up the lights. Shełs ready."

The ship brought up the lights.

I wasnłt ready.

For a moment I couldnłt process what I was seeing. My brain
just couldnłt cope with the reality of what the ship had done to Colonel Jax,
despite the evidence of my eyes. I kept staring at him, waiting for the picture
before me to start making sense. I kept waiting for the instant when Iłd
realize I was being fooled by the play of shadows and light, like a child being
scared by a random monster in the folds of a curtain. But the instant didnłt
come. The thing before me was all that it appeared to be.

Colonel Jax extended in all directions: a quivering expanse
of patchwork flesh, of which his head was simply one insignificant component;
one hill in a mountain range. He was spread out across the far wall, grafted to
it in the form of a vast breathing mosaic. He must have been twenty metres
wide, edged in a crinkled circular border of toughened flesh. Under his head
was a thick neck, merging into the upper half of an armless torso. I could see
the faint scars where the arms had been detached. Below the slow-heaving
ribcage, the torso flared out like the melted base of a candle. Another torso
rose from the flesh two metres to the colonelłs right. It had no head, but it
did have an arm. A second torso loomed over him from behind, equipped with a
pair of arms, one of which must have cleaned the colonelłs chin. Farther away,
emerging from the pool of flesh at odd, arbitrary angles, were other living
body parts. A torso here; a pair of legs there; a hip or shoulder there. The torsos
were all breathing, though not in perfect synchronization. When they were not
engaged in some purposeful activity, such as wiping Jaxłs chin, the limbs
twitched and palsied. The skin between them was an irregular mosaic, formed
from many ill-matched pieces that had been fused together. In places it was
drum-tight, pulled taut over hidden armatures of bone and gristle. In other
places it heaved like a stormy sea. It gurgled with hidden digestive processes.

�You see now why Iłm not coming with you," Colonel Jax said.
�Not unless you brought a much bigger ship. Even then, Iłm not sure youłd be
able to keep me alive very long without Nightingalełs assistance."

�Youłre a fucking monstrosity."

�Iłm no oil painting, thatłs a fact." Jax tilted his head,
as if a thought had just struck him. �I am a work of art, though, wouldnłt you
agree, girly girl?"

�If you say so."

�The ship certainly thinks sodonłt you, Nightingale? She
made me what I am. Itłs her artistic vision shining through. The bitch."

�Youłre insane."

�Very probably. Do you honestly think you could take one day
of this and not go mad? Oh, Iłm mad enough, Iłll grant you that. But Iłm still
sane compared to the ship. Around here, shełs the imperial fucking yardstick
for insanity."

�Sollis was right, then. Leave a sentience engine like that
all alone, and itłll eat itself from the inside out."

�Maybe so. Thing is, it wasnłt solitude that did it.
Nightingale turned insane long before it ever got out here. And you know what
did it? That little war we had ourselves down on Skyłs Edge. They built this
ship and put the mind of an angel inside it. A mind dedicated to healing,
compassion, kindness. So what if it was a damned machine? It was still designed
to care for us, selflessly, day after day. And it turned out to be damned good
at its job, too. For a while, at least."

�Then you know what happened."

�The ship drove itself mad. Two conflicting impulses pushed
a wedge through its sanity. It was meant to treat us, to make us well again, to
alleviate our pain. But every time it did its job, we got sent back down to the
theatre of battle and ripped apart again. The ship took our pain away only so
that we could feel it again. It began to feel as if it was complicit in that
process: a willing cog in a greater machine whose only purpose was the
manufacture of agony. In the end, it decided it didnłt much like being that
cog."

�So it took off. What happened to all the other patients?"

�It killed them. Euthanized them painlessly, rather than
have them sent back down to battle. To Nightingale, that was the kinder thing
to do."

�And the technical staff who were aboard, and the men who
were sent to reclaim the ship when it went out of control?"

�They were euthanized as well. I donłt think Nightingale
took any pleasure in that, but it saw their deaths as a necessary evil. Above
all else, it wouldnłt allow itself to be returned to use as a military
hospital."

�Yet it didnłt kill you."

A dry tongue flicked across Jaxłs lips. �It was going to.
Then it delved deeper into its patient records and realized just who I was. At
that point it began to have other ideas."

�Such as?"

�The ship was smart enough to realize that the bigger
problem wasnłt its existencethey could always build other hospital shipsbut
the war itself. War itself. So it decided to do something about it. Something
positive. Something constructive."

�Which would be?"

�Youłre looking at it, kid. Iłm the war memorial. When Nightingale
started doing this to memaking me what I amit had in mind that Iłd become a
vast artistic statement in flesh. Nightingale would reveal me to the world when
it was finished. The horror of what I am would shame the world into peace. Iłd
be the living, breathing equivalent of Picassołs Guernica. Iłm an illustration
in flesh of what war does to human beings."

�The warłs over. We donłt need a memorial."

�Maybe you can explain that to the ship. Trouble is, I donłt
think it really believes the war is over. You canłt blame it, can you? It has
access to the same history files we do. It knows that not all ceasefires stay
that way."

�What was it intending to do? Return to Skyłs Edge with you
aboard?"

�Exactly that. Problem is, the ship isnłt done. I know I may
look finished, but Nightingalewell, she has this perfectionist streak. Shełs
always changing her mind. Canłt ever seem to get me quite right. Keeps swapping
pieces around, cutting pieces away, growing new parts and stitching them in.
All the while she has to make sure I donłt die on her. Thatłs where her real
genius comes in. Shełs Michelangelo with a scalpel."

�You almost sound proud of what shełs done to you."

�Would you rather I screamed? I can scream if you like. Itłs
just that it gets old after a while."

�Youłre way too far gone, Jax. I was wrong about the war
crimes court. Theyłll throw your case out on grounds of insanity."

�That would have been a shame. Iłd have loved to have seen
their faces when they wheeled me into the witness box. But Iłm not going to
court, am I? Shipłs laid it all out for me. Shełs pulling the plug."

�So she says."

�You donłt sound as if you believe it."

�I canłt see her abandoning you, after all the effort shełs
gone to."

�Shełs an artist. They act on whims. Maybe if I was ready,
maybe if she thought shełd done all she could with mebut thatłs not the way
she feels. I think she felt she was getting close three or four years agobut
then she had a change of heart, a major one, and tore out almost everything.
Now Iłm an unfinished work. She couldnłt bear to see me exhibited in this
state. Shełd rather rip up the canvas and start again."

�With you?"

�No, I think shełs more or less exhausted my possibilities.
Especially now that shełs seen the chance to do something completely different;
something that will let her take her message a lot closer to home. That, of
course, is where you come in."

�I donłt know what you mean."

�Thatłs what the others said as well." Again, he cocked his
head to one side. �Hey, ship! Maybe itłs time you showed her what the deal is,
donłt you think?"

�If you are ready, Colonel," the Voice of Nightingale said.

�Iłm ready. Dexiałs ready. Why donłt you bring on the dessert?"

Colonel Jax looked to the right, straining his neck. Beyond
Jaxłs border, a circular door opened in part of the wall. Light rammed through
the opening. Something floated in silhouette, held in suspension by three or
four squid robots. The floating thing was dark, rounded, irregular. It looked
like half a dozen pieces of dough balled together. I couldnłt make out what it
was.

Then the robots pushed it into the chamber, and I saw, and
then I screamed.

�Itłs time for you to join your friends now," the ship said.

* * * *

That was three months ago. It feels like an eternity, until
we remember being held down on the surgical bed, while the machines emerged and
prepared to work on us, and then it feels like everything happened only a
terror-filled moment ago.

We made it safely back to Skyłs Edge. The return journey was
arduous, as one might expect given our circumstances. But the shuttle had
little difficulty in flying itself back into a capture orbit, and once it fell
within range it emitted a distress signal that brought it to the attention of
the planetary authorities. We were off-loaded and taken to a secure orbital
holding facility, where we were examined and our story subjected to what
limited verification was actually possible. Dexia had bluffed the Voice of
Nightingale when she told the ship that Martinez was certain to have told
someone else of the coordinates of the hospital ship. It turned out that he
hadnłt told a soul, too wary of alerting Jaxłs allies. The Ultras who had found
the ship in the first place were now a fifth of a light-year away, and falling
farther from Skyłs Edge with every passing hour. It would be decades, or
longer, before they returned this way.

All the same, we donłt think anyone seriously doubted our story.
As outlandish as it was, no one could suggest a more likely alternative. We did
have the head of Colonel Brandon Jax, or at least a duplicate that passed all
available genetic and physiological tests. And we had clearly been to a place
that specialized in extremely advanced surgery, of a kind that simply wasnłt
possible in and around Skyłs Edge. That was the problem, though. The planetłs
best surgeons had examined us with great thoroughness, each eager to advance
their own prestige by undoing the work of Nightingale. But all had quailed,
fearful of doing more harm than good. No separation of Siamese twins could
compare in complexity and risk with the procedure that would be necessary to
unknot the living puzzle Nightingale had made of us. None of the surgeons was
willing to bet on the survival of more than a single one of us, and even the
odds werenłt overwhelming. That pact wełd made with ourselves was that we would
only consent to the operation if the vote was unanimous.

At massive expense (not ours, for by then we were the
subject of considerable philanthropy) a second craft was sent out to snoop the
coordinates where wełd left the hospital ship. She had the best military
scanning gear money could buy. But she found nothing out there but ice and
dust.

From that, we were free to draw two possible conclusions. Either
Nightingale had destroyed herself soon after our departure, or she had moved
somewhere else to avoid being found again. We couldnłt say which alternative pleased
us less. At least if wełd known the ship was gone for good, we could have
resigned ourselves to the surgeons,mhowever risky that might have been. But if
the ship was hiding itself, there was always the possibility that someone might
find it again. And then somehow persuade it to undo us.

But perhaps Nightingale will need no persuasion, when she decides
the time is right. It seems to us that the ship will return one day, of her own
volition. She will make orbit around Skyłs Edge and announce that the time has
come for us to be separated. Nightingale will have decided that we have served
our purpose, that we have walked the world long enough. Perhaps by then she
will have some other memorial in mind. Or she will conclude that her message
has finally been taken to heart, and that no further action is needed. That, we
think, will depend on how the ceasefire holds.

Itłs in our interests, then, to make sure the planet doesnłt
slip back into war. We want the ship to return and heal us. None of us like
things this way, despite what you may have read or heard. Yes, wełre famous.
Yes, wełre the subject of a worldwide outpouring of sympathy and goodwill. Yes,
we can have almost anything we want. None of that compensates, though. Not even
for a second.

Itłs hard on all of us, but especially so for Martinez. Wełve
all long since stopped thinking of the big man as Norbert. Hełs the one who has
to carry us everywhere: more than twice his own bodyweight. Nightingale thought
of that, of course, and she made sure that our own hearts and respiratory
systems take some of the burden off Martinez. But itłs still his spine bending
under this load; still his legs that have to support us. The doctors whołve
examined us say his condition is good; that he can continue to play his part
for years to comebut theyłre not talking about forever. And when Martinez
dies, so will the rest of us. In the meantime we just keep hoping that
Nightingale will come sooner than that.

Youłve seen us up close now. Youłll have seen photographs
and moving images before, but nothing really compares with seeing us in the
flesh. We make quite a spectacle, donłt we? A great tottering tree of flesh, an
insult to symmetry. Youłve heard us speak, all of us, individually. You know by
now how we feel about the war. All of us played our part in it to some degree,
some more than others. Some of us were even enemies. Now the very idea that we
might have hated each otherhated that which we depend on for life itselflies
beyond all comprehension. If Nightingale sought to create a walking argument
for the continuation of the ceasefire, then she surely succeeded.

We are sorry if some of you will go home with nightmares tonight.
We canłt help that. In fact, if truth be told, wełre not sorry at all.
Nightmares are what wełre all about. Itłs the nightmare of us that will stop
this planet falling back into war.

If you have trouble sleeping tonight, spare us a thought.

* * * *

Signal To Noise

Alastair Reynolds is a frequent contributor to Interzone,
and has also sold to Asimovłs Science Fiction, Spectrum SF, and elsewhere. His
first novel, Revelation Space, was widely hailed as one of the major SF books
of the year; it was quickly followed by Chasm City, Redemption Ark, Absolution
Gap, and Century Rain, all big sprawling space operas that were big sellers as
well, establishing Reynolds as one of the best and most popular new SF writers
to enter the field in many years. His other books include a novella collection,
Diamond Dogs, Turquoise Days. His most recent books are a novel, Pushing Ice,
and two new collections, Galactic North and Zima Blue and Other Stories. Coming
up is a new novel, The Prefect. A professional scientist with a Ph.D. in
astronomy, Reynolds comes from Wales, but lives in the Netherlands, where he
works for the European Space Agency.

Reynoldsłs work is known for its grand scope, sweep, and
scale (in one story, �Galactic North," a spaceship sets out on in pursuit of
another in a stern chase that takes thousands of years of time and hundreds of
thousands of light-years to complete; in another, �Thousandth Night," ultrarich
immortals embark on a plan that will call for the physical rearrangement of all
the stars in the galaxy. In the intimate and compassionate story that follows,
he sticks a lot closer to home, in one sensewhile in another sense taking us
to another universe altogether, one further away than the most distant
galaxies, but close as the touch of a hand.

* * * *

Friday

MICK Leighton was in the basement with the machines when the
police came for him. Hełd been trying to reach Joe Liversedge all morning to
cancel a prearranged squash match. It was the busiest week before exams, and
Mick had gloomily concluded that he had too much tutorial work to grade to
justify sparing even an hour for the game. The trouble was that Joe had either
turned off his phone or left it in his office, where it wouldnłt interfere with
the machines. Mick had sent an email, but when that had gone unanswered he
decided there was nothing for it but to stroll over to Joełs half of the
building and inform him in person. By now Mick was a sufficiently well-known
face in Joełs department that he was able to come and go more or less as he
pleased.

�Hello, matey," Joe said, glancing over his shoulder with a
half-eaten sandwich in one hand. There was a bandage on the back of his neck,
just below the hairline. He was hunched over a desk covered in laptops, cables,
and reams of hardcopy. �Ready for a thrashing, are you?"

�Thatłs why Iłm here," Mick said. �Got to cancel, sorry. Too
much on my plate today."

�Naughty."

�Ted Evans can fill in for me. Hełs got his kit. You know
Ted, donłt you?"

�Vaguely." Joe set down his sandwich to put the lid back on
a felt-tipped pen. He was an amiable Yorkshireman whołd come down to Cardiff
for his postgraduate work and decided to stay. He was married to an
archaeologist named Rachel who spent a lot of her time poking around in the
Roman ruins under the walls of Cardiff Castle. �Sure I canłt twist your arm? Itłll
do you good, you know, bit of a workout."

�I know. But there just isnłt time."

�Your call. How are things, anyway?"

Mick shrugged philosophically. �Been better."

�Did you phone Andrea like you said you were going to?"

�No."

�You should, you know."

�Iłm not very good on the phone. Anyway, I thought she probably
needed a bit of space."

�Itłs been three weeks, mate."

�I know."

�Do you want the wife to call her? It might help."

�No, but thanks for suggesting it anyway."

�Call her. Let her know youłre missing her."

�Iłll think about it."

�Yeah, sure. You should stick around, you know. Itłs all go
here this morning. We got a lock just after seven this morning." Joe tapped one
of the laptop screens, which was scrolling rows of black-on-white numbers. �Itłs
a good one, too."

�Really?"

�Come and have a look at the machine."

�I canłt. I need to get back to my office."

�Youłll regret it later. Just like youłll regret canceling
our match, or not calling Andrea. I know you, Mick. Youłre one of lifełs born
regretters."

�Five minutes, then."

In truth, Mick always enjoyed having a nose around Joełs
basement. As solid as Mickłs own early-universe work was, Joe had really struck
gold. There were hundreds of researchers around the world who would have killed
for a guided tour of the Liversedge laboratory.

In the basement were ten hulking machines, each as large as
a steam turbine. You couldnłt go near them if you were wearing a pacemaker or
any other kind of implant, but Mick knew that, and hełd been careful to remove
all metallic items before he came down the stairs and through the security
doors. Each machine contained a ten-ton bar of ultra-high-purity iron, encased
in vacuum and suspended in a magnetic cradle. Joe liked to wax lyrical about
the hardness of the vacuum, about the dynamic stability of the magnetic field
generators. Cardiff could be hit by a Richter six earthquake, and the bars
wouldnłt feel the slightest tremor.

Joe called it the call center.

The machines were called correlators. At any one time eight
were online, while two were down for repairs and upgrades. What the eight
functional machines were doing was cold-calling: dialing random numbers across
the gap between quantum realities, waiting for someone to answer on the other
end.

In each machine, a laser repeatedly pumped the iron into an
excited quantum state. By monitoring vibrational harmonics in the excited
ironwhat Joe called the back-chirpthe same laser could determine if the bar
had achieved a lock onto another strand of quantum realityanother worldline.
In effect, the bar would be resonating with its counterpart in another version
of the same basement, in another version of Cardiff.

Once that lock was establishedonce the cold-calling machine
had achieved a hitthen those two previously indistinguishable worldlines were
linked together by an information conduit. If the laser tapped the bar with
low-energy pulses, enough to influence it but not upset the lock, then the
counterpart in the other lab would also register those taps. It meant that it
was possible to send signals from one lab to the other, in both directions.

�This is the boy," Joe said, patting one of the active
machines.

�Looks like a solid lock, too. Should be good for a full ten
or twelve days. I think this might be the one that does it for us."

Mick glanced again at the bandage on the back of Joełs neck.
�Youłve had a nervelink inserted, havenłt you."

�Straight to the medical center as soon as I got the alert
on the lock. I was nervousfirst time, and all that. But it turned out to be
dead easy. No pain at all. I was up and out within half an hour. They even gave
me a Rich Tea Biscuit."

�Ooh. A Rich Tea Biscuit. It doesnłt get any better than
that, does it. Youłll be going through today, I take it?"

Joe reached up and tore off the bandage, revealing only a
small spot of blood, like a shaving nick. �Tomorrow, probably. Maybe Sunday.
The nervelink isnłt active yet, and thatłll take some getting used to. Wełve
got bags of time, though; even if we donłt switch on the nervelink until
Sunday, Iłll still have five or six days of bandwidth before we become
noise-limited."

�You must be excited."

�Right now I just donłt want to cock up anything. The
Helsinki boys are nipping at our heels as it is. I reckon theyłre within a few
months of beating us."

Mick knew how important this latest project was for Joe. Sending
information between different realities was one thing, and impressive enough in
its own right. But now technology had escaped from the labs out into the real
world. There were hundreds of correlators in other labs and institutes around
the world. In five years it had gone from being a spooky, barely believable
phenomenon, to an accepted part of the modern world.

But Joewhose team had always been at the forefront of the
technologyhadnłt stood still. Theyłd been the first to work out how to send voice
and video comms across the gap with another reality, and within the last year
theyłd been able to operate a camera-equipped robot, the same battery-driven
kind that all the tourists had been using before nervelinking became the new
thing. Joe had even let Mick have a go on it. With his hands operating the
robotłs manipulators via force-feedback gloves, and his eyes seeing the world
via the stereoscopic projectors in a virtual-reality helmet, Mick had been able
to feel himself almost physically present in the other lab. Hełd been able to
move around and pick things up just as if he were actually walking in that
alternate reality. Oddest of all had been meeting the other version of Joe Liversedge,
the one who worked in the counterpart lab. Both Joes seemed cheerily
indifferent to the weirdness of the setup, as if collaborating with a duplicate
of yourself was the most normal thing in the world.

Mick had been impressed by the robot. But for Joe it was a
stepping stone to something even better.

�Think about it," hełd said. �A few years ago, tourists
started switching over to nervelinks instead of robots. Who wants to drive a
clunky machine around some smelly foreign city, when you can drive a warm human
body instead? Robots can see stuff, they can move around and pick stuff up, but
they canłt give you the smells, the taste of food, the heat, the contact with
other people."

�Mm," Mick had said noncommittally. He didnłt really approve
of nervelinking, even though it essentially paid Andreałs wages.

�So wełre going to do the same. Wełve got the kit. Getting
it installed is a piece of piss. All we need now is a solid link."

And now Joe had what hełd been waiting for. Mick could practically
see the Nature cover article in his friendłs eyes. Perhaps he was even thinking
about taking that long train ride to Stockholm.

�I hope it works out for you," Mick said.

Joe patted the correlator again. �Iłve got a good feeling
about this one."

That was when one of Joełs undergraduates came up to them.
To Mickłs surprise, it wasnłt Joe she wanted to speak to.

�Doctor Leighton?"

�Thatłs me."

�Therełs somebody to see you, sir. I think itłs quite
important."

�Someone to see me?"

�They said you left a note in your office."

�I did," Mick said absent-mindedly. �But I also said I
wouldnłt be gone long. Nothingłs that important, is it?"

But the person who had come to find Mick was a policewoman.
When Mick met her at the top of the stairs her expression told him it wasnłt
good news.

�Somethingłs happened," he said.

She looked worried, and very, very young. �Is there somewhere
we can talk, Mister Leighton?"

�Use my office," Joe said, showing the two of them to his
room just down the corridor. Joe left the two of them alone, saying he was
going down to the coffee machine in the hall.

�Iłve got some bad news," the policewoman said, when Joe had
closed the door. �I think you should sit down, Mister Leighton."

Mick pulled out Joełs chair from under the desk, which was
covered in papers: coursework Joe must have been in the process of grading.
Mick sat down, then didnłt know where to put his hands. �Itłs about Andrea, isnłt
it."

�Iłm afraid your wife was in an accident this morning," the
policewoman said.

�What kind of accident? What happened?"

�Your wife was hit by a car when she was crossing the road."

A mean, little thought flashed through Mickłs mind. Bloody
Andrea: shełd always been one for dashing across a road without looking. Hełd
been warning her for years she was going to regret it one day.

�How is she? Where did they take her?"

�Iłm really sorry, sir." The policewoman hesitated. �Your
wife died on the way to hospital. I understand that the paramedics did all they
could, but ..."

Mick was hearing it, and not hearing it. It couldnłt be
right. People still got knocked down by cars. But they didnłt die from it, not
anymore. Cars couldnłt go fast enough in towns to kill anyone. Being knocked
down and killed by a car was something that happened to people in soap operas,
not real life. Feeling numb, not really present in the room, Mick said, �Where
is she now?" As if by visiting her, he might prove that theyłd got it wrong,
that she wasnłt dead at all.

�They took her to the Heath, sir. Thatłs where she is now. I
can drive you there."

�Andrea isnłt dead," Mick said. �She canłt be. Not now."

�Iłm really sorry," the policewoman said.

* * * *

Saturday

For the last three weeks, ever since they had separated,
Mick had been sleeping in a spare room at his brotherłs house in Newport. The
company had been good, but now Bill was away for the weekend on some ridiculous
team-building exercise in Snowdonia. For tedious reasons, Mickłs brother had
had to take the house keys with him, leaving Mick with nowhere to sleep on
Friday night. When Joe had asked him where he was going to stay, Mick said hełd
go back to his own house, the one hełd left at the beginning of the month.

Joe was having hone of it, and insisted that Mick sleep at
his house instead. Mick spent the night going through the usual cycle of
emotions that came with any sudden bad news. Hełd had nothing to compare with
losing his wife, but the texture of the shock was familiar enough, albeit
magnified from anything in his previous experience. He resented the fact that
the world seemed to be continuing, crassly oblivious to Andreałs death. The
news wasnłt dominated by his tragedy; it was all about some Polish miners
trapped underground. When he finally managed to get to sleep, Mick was
tormented by dreams that his wife was still alive, that it had all been a
mistake.

But he knew it was all true. Hełd been to the hospital; hełd
seen her body. He even knew why shełd been hit by the car. Andrea had been
crossing the road to her favorite hair salon; shełd had an appointment to get
her hair done. Knowing Andrea, she had probably been so focused on the salon
that she was oblivious to all that was going on around her. It hadnłt even been
the car that had killed her in the end. When the slow-moving vehicle knocked
her down, Andrea had struck her head against the side of the curb.

By midmorning on Saturday, Mickłs brother had returned from
Snowdonia. Bill came around to Joełs house and hugged Mick silently, saying
nothing for many minutes. Then Bill went into the next room and spoke quietly
to Joe and Rachel. Their low voices made Mick feel like a child in a house of
adults.

�I think you and I need to get out of Cardiff," Bill told
Mick, when he returned to the living room. �No ifs, no buts."

Mick started to protest. �Therełs too much that needs to be
done. I still need to get back to the funeral home."

�It can wait until this afternoon. No onełs going to hate
you for not returning a few calls. Cłmon; letłs drive up to the Gower and get
some fresh air. Iłve already reserved a car."

�Go with him," Rachel said. �Itłll do you good."

Mick acquiesced, his guilt and relief in conflict at being
able to put aside thoughts of the funeral plans. He was glad Bill had come
down, but he couldnłt quite judge how his brotheror his friends, for that
matterviewed his bereavement. Hełd lost his wife. They all knew that. But they
also knew that Mick and Andrea had been separated. Theyłd been having problems
for most of the year. It would only be human for his friends to assume that
Mick wasnłt quite as affected by Andreałs death as he would have been had they
still been living together.

�Listen," he told Bill, when they were safely under way. �Therełs
something Iłve got to tell you."

�Iłm listening."

�Andrea and I had problems. But it wasnłt the end of our marriage.
We were going to get through this. I was going to call her this weekend, see if
we couldnłt meet."

Bill looked at him sadly. Mick couldnłt tell if that meant
that Bill just didnłt believe him, or that his brother pitied him for the
opportunity hełd allowed to slip between his fingers.

When they got back to Cardiff in the early evening, after a
warm and blustery day out on the Gower, Joe practically pounced on Mick as soon
as they came through the door.

�I need to talk to you," Joe said. �Now."

�I need to call some of Andreałs friends," Mick said. �Can
it wait until later?"

�No. It canłt. Itłs about you and Andrea."

They went into the kitchen. Joe poured him a glass of
whisky. Rachel and Bill watched from the end of the table, saying nothing.

�Iłve been to the lab," Joe said. �I know itłs Saturday, but
I wanted to make sure that lock was still holding. Well, it is. We could start
the experiment tomorrow if we wanted to. But somethingłs come up, and you need
to know about it."

Mick sipped from his glass. �Go on."

�Iłve been in contact with my counterpart in the other lab."

�The other Joe."

�The other Joe, yes. We were finessing the equipment, making
sure everything was optimal. And we talked, of course. Needless to say I
mentioned what had happened."

�And?"

�The other me was surprised. Shocked, even. He said Andrea
hadnłt died in his reality." Joe held up a hand, signaling that Mick should let
him finish before speaking. �You know how it works. The two histories are
identical before the lock takes effect: so identical that there isnłt even any
point in thinking of them as being distinct realities. The divergence only
happens once the lock is in effect. The lock was active by the time you came
down to tell me about the squash match. The other me also had a visit from you.
The difference was that no policewoman ever came to his lab. You eventually
drifted back to your office to carry on grading tutorials."

�But Andrea was already dead by then."

�Not in that reality. The other me phoned you. You were staying
at the Holiday Inn. You knew nothing of Andrea having had any accident. So my
other wife ..." Joe allowed himself a quick smile. �The other version of Rachel
called Andrea. And they spoke. Turned out Andrea had been hit by a car, but shełd
barely been bruised. They hadnłt even called an ambulance."

Mick absorbed what his friend had to say, then said, �I canłt
deal with this, Joe. I donłt need to know it. It isnłt going to help."

�I think it is. We were set up to run the nervelink
experiment as soon as we had a solid lock, one that we could trust to hold for
the full million seconds. This is it. The only difference is it doesnłt have to
be me who goes through."

�I donłt understand."

�I can put you through, Mick. We can get you nervelinked tomorrow
morning. Allowing for a day of bedding in and practice once you arrive in the
other reality ... well, you could be walking in Andreałs world by Monday
afternoon, Tuesday morning at the latest."

�But youłre the one who is supposed to be going through,"
Mick said. �Youłve already had the nervelink put in."

�Wełve got a spare," Joe said.

Mickłs mind raced through the implications. �Then Iłd be controlling
the body of the other you, right?"

�No. That wonłt work, unfortunately. Wełve had to make some
changes to these nervelinks to get them to work properly through the
correlator, with the limited signal throughput. We had to ditch some of the
channels that handle proprioceptive mapping. Theyłll only work properly if the
body on the other end of the link is virtually identical to the one on this
side."

�Then it wonłt work. Youłre nothing like me."

�Youłre forgetting your counterpart on the other side," Joe
said. He glanced past Mick at Bill and Rachel, raising his eyebrows as he did
so. �The way it would work is, you come into the lab and we install the link in
you, just the same way it happened for me yesterday morning. At the same time
your counterpart in Andreałs world comes into his version of the lab and gets
the other version of the nervelink put into him."

Mick shivered. Hełd become used to thinking about the other
version of Joe; he could even begin to accept that there was a version of
Andrea walking around somewhere who was still alive. But as soon as Joe brought
the other Mick into the argument, he felt his head begin to unravel.

�Wouldnłt hethe other meneed to agree to this?"

�He already has," Joe said solemnly. �Iłve been in touch
with him. The other Joe called him into the lab. We had a chat over the
videolink. He didnłt go for it at firstyou know how you both feel about
nervelinking. And he hasnłt lost his version of Andrea. But I explained how big
a deal this was. This is your only chance to see Andrea again. Once this window
closeswełre talking about no more than eleven or twelve days from the start of
the lock, by the waywełll never make contact with another reality where shełs
alive."

Mick blinked and placed his hands on the table. He felt
dizzy with the implications, as if the kitchen was swaying. �Youłre certain of
that? Youłll never open another window into Andreałs world?"

�Statistically, we were incredibly lucky to get this one
chance. By the time the window closes, Andreałs reality will have diverged so
far from ours that therełs essentially no chance of ever getting another lock."

�Okay," Mick said, ready to take Joełs word for it. �But
even if I agree to thiseven if the other me agrees to itwhat about Andrea? We
werenłt seeing each other."

�But you wanted to see her again," Bill said quietly.

Mick rubbed his eyes with the palms of his hands, and
exhaled loudly. �Maybe."

�Iłve spoken to Andrea," Rachel said. �I mean, Joe spoke to
himself, and the other version of him spoke to the other Rachel. Shełs been in
touch with Andrea."

Mick hardly dared speak. �And?"

�She says itłs okay. She understands how horrible this must
be for you. She says, if you want to come through, shełll meet you. You can
spend some time together. Give you a chance to come to some kind of ..."

�Closure," Mick whispered.

�Itłll help you," Joe said. �Itłs got to help you."

* * * *

Sunday

The medical center was normally closed on weekends, but Joe
had pulled strings to get some of the staff to come in on Sunday morning. Mick
had to sit around a long time while they ran physiological tests and prepared
the surgical equipment. It was much easier and quicker for tourists, for they
didnłt have to use the modified nervelink units Joełs team had developed.

By the early afternoon they were satisfied that Mick was
ready for the implantation. They made him lie down on a couch with his head
encased in a padded plastic assembly with a hole under the back of the neck. He
was given a mild, local anesthetic. Rubberized clamps whirred in to hold his
head in position with micromillimeter accuracy. Then he felt a vague impression
of pressure being applied to the skin on the back of his neck, and then an odd
and not entirely pleasant sensation of sudden pins and needles in every part of
his body. But the unpleasantness was over almost as soon as hełd registered it.
The support clamps whirred away from his head. The couch tilted up, and he was
able to get off and stand on his feet.

Mick touched the back of his neck, came away with a tiny
smear of blood on his thumb.

�Thatłs it?"

�I told you there was nothing to it," Joe said, putting down
a motorcycling magazine. �I donłt know what you were so worried about."

�Itłs not the nervelink operation itself I donłt approve of.
I donłt have a problem with the technology. Itłs the whole system, the way it
encourages the exploitation of the poor."

Joe tut-tutted. �Bloody Guardian readers. It was you lot who
got the bloody moratorium against air travel enacted in the first place. Next
youłll be telling us we canłt even walk anywhere."

The nurse swabbed Mickłs wound and applied a bandage. He was
shunted into an adjoining room and asked to wait again. More tests followed. As
the system interrogated the newly embedded nervelink, he experienced mild
electrical tingles and strange, fleeting feelings of dislocation. Nothing he
reported gave the staff any cause for alarm.

After Mickłs discharge from the medical center, Joe took him
straight down to the laboratory. An electromagnetically shielded annex
contained the couch Joe intended to use for the experiment. It was a modified
version of the kind tourists used for long-term nervelinking, with facilities
for administering nutrition and collecting bodily waste. No one liked to dwell
too much on those details, but there was no way around it if you wanted to stay
nervelinked for more than a few hours. Gamers had been putting up with similar
indignities for decades.

Once Mick was plumbed in, Joe settled a pair of specially designed
immersion glasses over his eyes, after first applying a salve to Mickłs skin to
protect against pressure sores. The glasses fit very tightly, blocking out Mickłs
view of the lab. All he could see was a gray-green void, with a few meaningless
red digits to the right side of his visual field.

�Comfortable?" Joe asked.

�I canłt see anything yet."

�You will."

Joe went back into the main part of the basement to check on
the correlation. It seemed that he was gone a long time. When he heard Joe
return, Mick half-expected bad newsthat the link had collapsed, or some
necessary piece of technology had broken down. Privately, he would not have
been too sorry were that the case. In his shocked state of mind in the hours
after Andreałs death, he would have given anything to be able to see her again.
But now that the possibility had arisen, he found himself prone to doubts.
Given time, he knew hełd get over Andreałs death. That wasnłt being cold, it
was just being realistic. He knew more than a few people whołd lost their
partners, and while they might have gone through some dark times afterward,
almost all of them now seemed settled and relatively content. It didnłt mean
theyłd stopped feeling anything for the loved one who had died, but it did mean
theyłd found some way to move on. There was no reason to assume he wouldnłt
make the same emotional recovery.

The question was, would visiting Andrea hasten or hamper
that process? Perhaps they should just have talked over the videolink, or even
the phone. But then hełd never been very good on either.

He knew it had to be face to face, all or nothing.

�Is there a problem?" he asked Joe, innocently enough.

�Nope, everythingłs fine. I was just waiting to hear that
the other version of you is ready."

�He is?"

�Good to go. Someone from the medical center just put him
under. We can make the switch any time youłre ready."

�Where is he?"

�Here," Joe said. �I mean, in the counterpart to this room.
Hełs lying on the same couch. Itłs easier that way; therełs less of a jolt when
you switch over."

�Hełs unconscious already?"

�Full coma. Just like any nervelinked mule."

Except, Mick thought, unlike the mules, his counterpart hadnłt
signed up to go into a chemically induced coma while his body was taken over by
a distant tourist. That was what Mick disapproved of more than anything. The
mules did it for money, and the mules were always the poorest people in any
given tourist hotspot, whether it was some affluent European city or some
nauseatingly �authentic" Third World shithole. No one ever aspired to become a
mule. It was what you did when all other options had dried up. In some cases it
hadnłt just supplanted prostitution, it had become an entirely new form of
prostitution in its own right.

But enough of that. They were all consenting adults here. No
oneleast of all the other version of himselfwas being exploited. The other
Mick was just being kind. No, kinder, Mick supposed, than he would have been
had the tables been reversed, but he couldnłt help feeling a perverse sense of
gratitude. And as for Andrea ... well, shełd always been kind. No one ever had
a bad word to say for Andrea on that score. Kind and considerate, to a fault.

So what was he waiting for?

�You can make the switch," Mick said.

There was less to it than hełd been expecting. It was no
worse than the involuntary muscular jolt he sometimes experienced in bed, just
before dozing off to sleep.

But suddenly he was in a different body.

�Hi," Joe said. �Howłre you feeling, matey?"

Except it was the other Joe speaking to him now: the Joe who
belonged to the world where Andrea hadnłt died. The original Joe was on the
other side of the reality gap.

�I feel ..." But when Mick tried speaking, it came out
hopelessly slurred.

�Give it time," Joe said. �Everyone has trouble speaking to
start with. Thatłll come quickly."

�Canłt shee. Canłt see."

�Thatłs because we havenłt switched on your glasses. Hold on
a tick."

The gray-green void vanished, to be replaced by a view of
the interior of the lab. The quality of the image was excellent. The room
looked superficially the same, but as Mick looked aroundsending the muscle
signals through the nervelink toł move the body of the other Mickhe noticed
the small details that told him this wasnłt his world. Joe was wearing a
different checked shirt, smudged white trainers instead of Converse sneakers.
In this version of the lab, Joe had forgotten to turn the calendar over to the
new month.

Mick tried speaking again. The words came easier this time.

�Iłm really here, arenłt I."

�How does it feel to be making history?"

�It feels ... bloody weird, actually. And no, Iłm not making
history. When you write up your experiment, it wonłt be me who went through
first. Itłll be you, the way it was always meant to be. This is just a dry run.
You can mention me in a footnote, if that."

Joe looked unconvinced. �Have it your way, but"

�I will." Mick moved to get off the couch. This version of
his body wasnłt plumbed in like the other one. But when he tried to move,
nothing happened. For a moment, he felt a crushing sense of paralysis. He must
have let out a frightened sound.

�Easy," Joe said, putting a hand on his shoulder. �One step
at a time. The link still has to bed in. Itłs going to be hours before youłll
have complete fluidity of movement, so donłt run before you can walk. And Iłm
afraid wełre going to have to keep you in the lab for rather longer than you
might like. As routine as nervelinking is, this isnłt simple nervelinking. The
shortcuts wełve had to use to squeeze the data through the correlator link mean
wełre exposing ourselves to more medical risks than youłd get with the standard
tourist kit. Nothing that you need worry about, but I want to make sure we keep
a close eye on all the parameters. Iłll be running tests in the morning and
evening. Sorry to be a drag about it, but we do need numbers for our paper, as
well. All I can promise is that youłll still have a lot of time available to
meet Andrea. If thatłs what you still want to do, of course."

�It is," Mick said. �Now that Iłm here ... no going back,
right?"

Joe glanced at his watch. �Letłs start running some coordination
exercises. Thatłll keep us busy for an hour or two. Then wełll need to make
sure you have full bladder control. Could get messy otherwise. After thatwełll
see if you can feed yourself."

�I want to see Andrea."

�Not today," Joe said firmly. �Not until wełve got you housetrained."

�Tomorrow. Definitely tomorrow."

* * * *

Monday

He paused in the shade of the old, green boating shed at the
edge of the lake. It was a hot day, approaching noon, and the park was already
busier than it had been at any time since the last gasp of the previous summer.
Office workers were sitting around the lake making the most of their lunch
break: the men with their ties loosened and sleeves and trousers rolled up, the
women with their shoes off and blouses loosened. Children splashed in the
ornamental fountains, while their older siblings bounced meters into the air on
servo-assisted pogo sticks, the seasonłs latest, lethal-looking craze. Students
lolled around on the gently sloping grass, sunbathing or catching up on
neglected coursework in the last week before exams. Mick recognized some of
them from his own department. Most wore cheap, immersion glasses, with their
arms covered almost to the shoulder in tight-fitting, pink, haptic feedback
gloves. The more animated students lay on their backs, pointing and clutching
at invisible objects suspended above them. It looked like they were trying to
snatch down the last few wisps of cloud from the scratchless blue sky above
Cardiff.

Mick had already seen Andrea standing a little further
around the curve of the lake. It was where they had agreed to meet, and true to
form Andrea was exactly on time. She stared pensively out across the water,
seemingly oblivious to the commotion going on around her. She wore a white
blouse, a knee-length burgundy skirt, sensible office shoes. Her hair was
shorter than he remembered, styled differently and barely reaching her collar.
For a momentuntil shełd turned slightlyhe hadnłt recognized her at all.
Andrea held a Starbucks coffee holder in one hand, and every now and then shełd
take a sip or glance at her wrist-watch. Mick was five minutes late now, and he
knew there was a risk Andrea would give up waiting. But in the shade of the
boating shed, all his certainties had evaporated.

Andrea turned minutely. She glanced at her watch again. She
sipped from the coffee holder, tilting it back in a way that told Mick shełd
finished the last drop. He saw her looking around for a waste bin.

Mick stepped from the shade. He walked across the grass,
onto concrete, acutely conscious of the slow awkwardness of his gait. His
walking had improved since his first efforts, but it still felt as if he were
trying to walk upright in a swimming pool filled with treacle. Joe had assured
him that all his movements would become more normal as the nervelink bedded in,
but that process was obviously taking longer than anticipated.

�Andrea," he said, sounding slurred and drunk and too loud,
even to his own ears.

She turned and met his eyes. There was a slight pause before
she smiled, and when she did, the smile wasnłt quite right, as if shełd been
asked to hold it too long for a photograph.

�Hello, Mick. I was beginning to think ..."

�Itłs okay." He forced out each word with care, making sure
it came out right before moving to the next. �I just had some second thoughts."

�I donłt blame you. How does it feel?"

�A bit odd. Itłll get easier."

�Yes, thatłs what they told me." She took another sip from
the coffee, even though it must have been empty. They were standing about two
meters apart, close enough to talk, close enough to look like two friends or
colleagues whołd bumped into each other around the lake.

�Itłs really good of you ..." Mick began.

Andrea shook her head urgently. �Please. Itłs okay. We
talked it over. We both agreed it was the right thing to do. If the tables were
turned, you wouldnłt have hesitated."

�Maybe not."

�I know you, Mick. Maybe better than you know yourself. Youłd
have done all that you could, and more."

�I just want you to know ... Iłm not taking any of this
lightly. Not you having to see me, like this ... not what he has to go through
while Iłm around."

�He said to tell you there are worse ways to spend a week."

Mick tried to smile. He felt the muscles of his face move,
but without a mirror there was no way to judge the outcome. The moment
stretched. A football splashed into the lake and began to drift away from the
edge. He heard a little boy start crying.

�Your hair looks different," Mick said.

�You donłt like it."

�No, I do. It really suits you. Did you have that done after
... oh, wait. I see. You were on your way to the salon."

He could see the scratch on her face where shełd grazed it
on the curb, when the car knocked her down. She hadnłt even needed stitches. In
a week it would hardly show at all.

�I canłt begin to imagine what itłs been like for you,"
Andrea said. �I canłt imagine what this is like for you."

�It helps."

�You donłt sound convinced."

�I want it to help. I think itłs going to. Itłs just that
right now it feels like Iłve made the worst mistake of my life."

Andrea held up the coffee holder. �Do you fancy one? Itłs my
treat."

Andrea was a solicitor. She worked for a small legal firm located
in modern offices near the park. There was a Starbucks near her office
building. �They donłt know me there, do they."

�Not unless youłve been moonlighting. Come on. I hate to say
it, but you could use some practice walking."

�As long as you wonłt laugh."

�I wouldnłt dream of it. Hold my hand, Mick. Itłll make it
easier."

Before he could step back, Andrea closed the distance
between them and took his hand in hers. It was good of her to do that, Mick
thought. Hełd been wondering how he would initiate that first touch, and Andrea
had spared him the fumbling awkwardness that would almost certainly have
ensued. That was Andrea to a tee, always thinking of others and trying to make
life a little easier for them, no matter how small the difference. It was why
people liked her so much; why her friends were so fiercely loyal.

�Itłs going to be okay, Mick," Andrea said gently. �Everything
thatłs happened between us ... it doesnłt matter now. Iłve said bad things to
you and youłve said bad things to me. But letłs forget about all that. Letłs
just make the most of what time we have."

�Iłm scared of losing you."

�Youłre a good man. Youłve more friends than you realize."

He was sweating in the heat, so much so that the glasses
began to slip down his nose. The view tilted toward his shoes. He raised his free
hand in a stiff, salutelike gesture and pushed the glasses back into place.

Andreałs hand tightened on his.

�I canłt go through with this," Mick said. �I should go
back."

�You started it," Andrea said sternly, but without rancor. �Now
you finish it. All the way, Mick Leighton."

* * * *

Tuesday

Things were much better by the morning of the second day.
When he woke in Joe Liversedgełs lab there was a fluency in his movements that
simply hadnłt been there the evening before, when hełd said goodbye to Andrea.
He now felt as if he was inhabiting the host body, rather than simply shuffling
it around like a puppet. He still needed the glasses to be able to see
anything, but the nervelink was conveying sensation much more effectively now,
so that when he touched something it came through without any of the fuzziness
or lag hełd been experiencing the day before. Most tourists were able to
achieve reasonable accuracy of touch differentiation within twenty-four hours.
Within two days, their degree of proprioceptive immersion was generally good
enough to allow complex motor tasks such as cycling, swimming, or skiing. Repeat-visit
tourists, especially those that went back into the same body, got over the
transition period even faster. To them it was like moving back into a house
after a short absence.

Joełs team gave Mick a thorough checkup in the annex. It was
all routine stuff. Amy Flint, Joełs senior graduate student, insisted on adding
some more numbers to the tactile test database that she was building for the
study. That meant Mick sitting at a table, without the glasses, being asked to
hold various objects and decide what shape they were and what they were made
of. He scored excellently, only failing to distinguish between wood and plastic
balls of similar weight and texture. Flint was cheerfully casual around him,
without any of the affectedness or oversensitivity Mick had quickly detected in
his friends or colleagues. Clearly she didnłt know what had happened; she just
thought Joe had opted to go for a different test subject than himself.

Joe was upbeat about Mickłs progress. Everything, from the
host body to the hardware, was holding up well. The bandwidth was stable at
nearly two megabytes per second, more than enough spare capacity to permit Mick
the use of a second video feed to peer back into the version of the lab on the
other side. The other version of Joe held the cam up so that Mick could see his
own body, reclining on the heavy-duty immersion couch. Mick had expected to be
disturbed by that, but the whole experience turned out to be oddly banal, like
replaying a home movie.

When they were done with the tests, Joe walked Mick over to
the university canteen, where he ate a liquid breakfast, slurping down three
containers of fruit yoghurt. While he atewhich was tricky, but another of the
things that was supposed to get easier with practicehe gazed distractedly at
the television in the canteen. The wall-sized screen was running through the
morning news, with the sound turned down. At the moment the screen was showing
grainy footage of the Polish miners, caught on surveillance camera as they
trudged into the low, concrete pithead building on their way to work. The
cave-in had happened three days ago. The miners were still trapped underground,
in all the world-lines that were in contact with this one, including Mickłs
own.

�Poor fuckers," Joe said, looking up from a draft paper he
was penciling remarks over.

�Maybe theyłll get them out."

�Aye. Maybe. Wouldnłt fancy my chances down there, though."

The picture changed to a summary of football scores. Again,
most of the games had ended in identical results across the contacted
worldlines, but two or threehighlighted in sidebars, with analysis text
ticking below themhad ended differently, with one team even being dropped from
the rankings.

Afterward Mick walked on his own to the tram stop and caught
the next service into the city center. Already he could feel that he was
attracting less attention than the day before. He still moved a little stiffly,
he could tell that just by looking at his reflection in the glass as he boarded
the tram, but there was no longer anything comical or robotic about it. He just
looked like someone with a touch of arthritis, or someone whołd been overdoing
it in the gym and was now paying with a dose of sore muscles.

As the tram whisked its way through traffic, he thought back
to the evening before. The meeting with Andrea, and the subsequent day, had
gone as well as he could have expected. Things had been strained at first, but
by the time theyłd been to Starbucks, he had detected an easing in her manner,
and that had made him feel more at ease as well. Theyłd made small talk,
skirting around the main thing neither of them wanted to discuss. Andrea had
taken most of the day off; she didnłt have to be at I he law offices until late
afternoon, just to check that no problems had arisen in her absence.

Theyłd talked about what to do with the rest of their day together.

�Maybe we could drive up into the Beacons," Mick had said. �Itłll
be nice up in the hills with a bit of a breeze. We always used to enjoy those
days out."

�Been a while though," Andrea had said. �Iłm not sure my
legs are up lo it anymore."

�You always used to hustle up those hills."

�Emphasis on the ęused to,ł unfortunately. Now I get out of
breath lust walking up St. Maryłs Street with a bag full of shopping."

Mick looked at her skeptically, but he couldnłt deny that Andrea
had a point. Neither of them was the keen, outdoors type they had been when
they met fifteen years earlier through the universityłs hill-walking club. Back
then theyłd spent long weekends exploring the hills of the Brecon Beacons and
the Black Mountains, or driving to Snowdonia or the Lake District. Theyłd had
some hair-raising moments together, when the weather turned against them or
when they suddenly realized they were on completely the wrong ridge. But what
Mick remembered, more than anything, was not being cold and wet, but the
feeling of relief when they arrived at some cozy warm pub at the end of the
day, both of them ravenous and thirsty and high on what theyłd achieved. Good
memories, all of them. Why hadnłt they kept it up, instead of letting their
jobs rule their weekends?

�Look, maybe we might drive up to the Beacons in a day or
two," Andrea said. �But I think itłs a bit ambitious for today, donłt you?"

�Youłre probably right," Mick said.

After some debate, theyłd agreed to visit the castle and
then take a boat ride around the bay to see the huge and impressive sea
defenses up close. Both were things theyłd always meant to do together but had
kept putting off for another weekend. The castle was heaving with tourists,
even on this midweek day. Because a lot of them were nervelinked, though, they
afforded Mick a welcome measure of inconspicuousness. No one gave him a second
glance as he bumbled along with the other shade-wearing bodysnatchers, even
though he must have looked considerably more affluent and well-fed than the
average mule. Afterward, they went to look at the Roman ruins, where Rachel
Liversedge was busy talking to a group of bored primary school children from
the valleys.

Mick enjoyed the boat ride more than the trip to the castle.
There were still enough nervelinked tourists on the boat for him not to feel
completely out of place, and being out in the bay offered some respite from the
cloying heat of the city center. Mick had even felt the breeze on the back of
his hand, evidence that the nervelink was really bedding in.

It was Andrea who nudged the conversation toward the reason
for Mickłs presence. Shełd just returned from the counter with two paper cups
brimming with murky coffee, nearly spilling them as the boat swayed
unexpectedly. She sat down on the boatłs hard wooden bench.

�I forgot to ask how it went in the lab this morning?" she
asked brightly. �Everything working out okay?"

�Very well," Mick said. �Joe says we were getting two megs
this morning. Thatłs as good as he was hoping for."

�Youłll have to explain that to me. I know itłs to do with
the amount of data youłre able to send through the link, but I donłt know how
it compares with what wełd be using for a typical tourist setup."

Mick remembered what Joe had told him. �Itłs not as good.
Tourists can use as much bandwidth as they can afford. But Joełs correlators
never get above five megabytes per second. Thatłs at the start of the
twelve-day window, too. It only gets worse by day five or six."

�Is two enough?"

�Itłs what Joełs got to work with." Mick reached up and
tapped the glasses. �It shouldnłt be enough for full color vision at normal
resolution, according to Joe. But therełs an awful lot of clever software in
the lab to take care of that. Itłs constantly guessing, filling in gaps."

�How does it look?"

�Like Iłm looking at the world through a pair of sunglasses."
He pulled them off his nose and tilted them toward Andrea. �Except itłs the
glasses that are actually doing the seeing, not myhiseyes. Most of the time,
itłs good enough that I donłt notice anything weird. If I wiggle my head around
fastor if something streaks past too quicklythen the glasses have trouble
keeping up with the changing view." He jammed the glasses back on, just in time
for a seagull to flash past only a few meters from the boat. He had a momentary
sense of the seagull breaking up into blocky areas of confused pixels, as if it
had been painted by a cubist, before the glasses smoothed things over and
normality ensued.

�What about all the rest of it? Hearing, touch ..."

�They donłt take up anything like as much bandwidth as vision.
The way Joe puts it, postural information only needs a few basic parameters:
the angles of my limb joints, that kind of thing. Hearingłs pretty
straightforward. And touch is the easiest of all, as it happens."

�Really?"

�So Joe says. Hold my hand."

Andrea hesitated an instant then took Mickłs hand.

�Now squeeze it," Mick said.

She tightened her hold. �Are you getting that?"

�Perfectly. Itłs much easier than sending sound. If you were
to say something to me, the acoustic signal would have to be sampled,
digitized, compressed, and pushed across the link: hundreds of bytes per
second. But all touch needs is a single parameter. The system will still be
able to keep sending touch even when everything else gets too difficult."

�Then itłs the last thing to go."

�Itłs the most fundamental sense we have. Thatłs the way it
ought to be."

After a few moments, Andrea said, �How long?"

�Four days," Mick said slowly. �Maybe five, if wełre lucky.
Joe says wełll have a better handle on the decay curve by tomorrow."

�Iłm worried, Mick. I donłt know how Iłm going to deal with
losing you."

He closed his other hand on hers and squeezed in return. �Youłll
get me back."

�I know. Itłs just ... it wonłt be you. Itłll be the other
you."

�Theyłre both me."

�Thatłs not how it feels right now. It feels like Iłm having
an affair while my husbandłs away."

�It shouldnłt. I am your husband. Wełre both your husband."

They said nothing after that, sitting in silence as the boat
bobbed its way back to shore. It was not that they had said anything upsetting,
just that words were no longer adequate. Andrea kept holding his hand. Mick
wanted this morning to continue forever: the boat, the breeze, the perfect sky
over the bay. Even then he chided himself for dwelling on the passage of time,
rather than making the most of the experience as it happened to him. That had
always been his problem, ever since he was a kid. School holidays had always
been steeped in a melancholic sense of how few days were left.

But this wasnłt a holiday.

After a while, he noticed that some people had gathered at
the bow of the boat, pressing against the railings. They were pointing up, into
the sky. Some of them had pulled out phones.

�Therełs something going on," Mick said.

�I can see it," Andrea answered. She touched the side of his
face, steering his view until he was craning up as far as his neck would allow.
�Itłs an airplane."

Mick waited until the glasses picked out the tiny, moving
speck of the plane etching a pale contrail in its wake. He felt a twinge of
resentment toward anyone still having the freedom to fly, when the rest of
humanity was denied that right. It had been a nice dream when it lasted,
flying. He had no idea what political or military purpose the plane was
serving, but it would be an easy matter to find out, were he that interested. The
news would be in all the papers by the afternoon. The plane wouldnłt just be
overflying this version of Cardiff, but his as well. That had been one of the
hardest things to take since Andreałs death. The world at large steamrolled on,
its course undeflected by that single human tragedy. Andrea had died in the
accident in his world, shełd survived unscathed in this one, and that planełs
course wouldnłt have changed in any measurable way (in either reality).

�I love seeing airplanes," Andrea said. �It reminds me of
what things were like before the moratorium. Donłt you?"

�Actually," Mick said, �they make me a bit sad."

* * * *

Wednesday

Mick knew how busy Andrea had been lately, and he tried to
persuade her against taking any time off from her work. Andrea had protested,
saying her colleagues could handle her workload for a few days. Mick knew
better than thatAndrea practically ran the firm single-handedlybut in the end
theyłd come to a compromise. Andrea would take time off from the office, but
shełd pop in first thing in the morning to put out any really serious fires.

Mick agreed to meet her at the offices at ten, after his
round of tests. Everything still felt the way it had the day before; if
anything he was even more fluent in his body movements. But when Joe had
finished, the news was all that Mick had been quietly dreading, while knowing
it could be no other way. The quality of the link had continued to degrade.
According to Joe they were down to one point eight megs now. Theyłd seen enough
decay curves to be able to extrapolate forward into the beginning of the
following week. The link would become noise-swamped around teatime on Sunday,
give or take three hours either way.

If only theyłd started sooner, Mick thought. But Joe had
done all that he could.

Todaydespite the foreboding message from the labhis sense
of immersion in the counterpart world had become total. As the sunlit city
swept by outside the tramłs windows, Mick found it nearly impossible to believe
that he was not physically present in this body, rather than lying on the couch
in the other version of the lab. Overnight his tactile immersion had improved
markedly. When he braced himself against the tramłs upright handrail, as it
swept around a curve, he felt cold aluminum, the faint greasiness where it had
been touched by other hands.

At the offices, Andreałs colleagues greeted him with an unforced
casualness that left him dismayed. Hełd been expecting awkward expressions of
sympathy, sly glances when they thought he wasnłt looking. Instead he was
plonked down in the waiting area and left to flick through glossy brochures
while he waited for Andrea to emerge from her office. No one even offered him a
drink.

He leafed through the brochures dispiritedly. Andreałs job
had always been a sore point in their relationship. If Mick didnłt approve of
nervelinking, he had even less time for the legal vultures that made so much
money out of personal injury claims related to the technology. But now he found
it difficult to summon his usual sense of moral superiority. Unpleasant things
had happened to decent people because of negligence and corner-cutting. If
nervelinking was to be a part of the world, then someone had to make sure the
victims got their due. He wondered why this had never been clear to him before.

�Hiya," Andrea said, leaning over him. She gave him a businesslike
kiss, not quite meeting his mouth. �Took a bit longer than I thought, sorry."

�Can we go now?" Mick asked, putting down the brochure.

�Yep, Iłm done here."

Outside, when they were walking along the pavement in the
shade of the tall, commercial buildings, Mick said: �They didnłt have a clue,
did they? No one in that office knows whatłs happened to us."

�I thought it was best," Andrea said.

�I donłt know how you can keep up that act, that nothingłs
wrong."

�Mick, nothing is wrong. You have to see it from my point of
view. I havenłt lost my husband. Nothingłs changed for me. When youłre
gonewhen all this ends, and I get the other you backmy life carries on as
normal. I know whatłs happened to you is a tragedy, and believe me Iłm as upset
about it as anyone."

�Upset," Mick said quietly.

�Yes, upset. But Iłd be lying if I said I was paralyzed with
grief. Iłm human, Mick. Iłm not capable of feeling great emotional turmoil at
the thought that some distant counterpart of myself got herself run over, all
because she was rushing to have her hair done. Silly cow, thatłs what it makes
me feel. At most it makes me feel a bit odd, a bit shivery. But I donłt think
itłs something Iłm going to have trouble getting over."

�I lost my wife," Mick said.

�I know, and Iłm sorry. More than youłll ever know. But if
you expect my life to come crashing to a halt ..."

He cut her off. �Iłm already fading. One point eight this
morning."

�You always knew it would happen. Itłs not like itłs any surprise."

�Youłll notice a difference in me by the end of the day."

�This isnłt the end of the day, so stop dwelling on it. All
right? Please, Mick. Youłre in serious danger of ruining this for yourself."

�I know, and Iłm trying not to," he said. �But what I was saying,
about how things arenłt going to get any better ... I think todayłs going to be
my last chance, Andrea. My last chance to be with you, to be with you properly."

�You mean us sleeping together," Andrea said, keeping her
voice low.

�We havenłt talked about it yet. Thatłs okay; I wasnłt expecting
it to happen without at least some discussion. But therełs no reason why ..."

�Mick, I ..." Andrea began.

�Youłre still my wife. Iłm still in love with you. I know wełve
had our problems, but I realize now how stupid all that was. I should have
called you sooner. I was being an idiot. And then this happened ... and it made
me realize what a wonderful, lovely person you are, and I should have seen that
for myself, but I didnłt ... I needed the accident to shake me up, to make me
see how lucky I was just to know you. And now Iłm going to lose you again, and
Iłm not sure how Iłm going to cope with that. But at least if we can be
together again ... properly, I mean."

�Mick ..."

�Youłve already said you might get back together with the other
Mick. Maybe it took all this to get us talking again. Point is, if youłre going
to get back together with him, therełs nothing to stop us getting back together
now. We were a couple before the accident; we can still be a couple now."

�Mick, it isnłt the same. Youłve lost your wife. Iłm not
her. Iłm some weird thing there isnłt a word for. And you arenłt really my
husband. My husband is in a medically induced coma."

�You know none of that really matters."

�To you."

�It shouldnłt matter to you either. And your husbandme, incidentallyagreed
to this. He knew exactly what was supposed to happen. And so did you."

�I just thought things would be bettermore civilizedif we
kept a kind of distance."

�Youłre talking as if wełre divorced."

�Mick, we were already separated. We werenłt talking. I canłt
just forget what happened before the accident as if none of that mattered."

�I know it isnłt easy for you."

They walked on in an uneasy silence, through the city center
streets theyłd walked a thousand times before. Mick asked Andrea if she wanted
a coffee, but she said shełd had one in her office not long before he arrived.
Maybe later. They paused to cross the road near one of Andreałs favorite
boutiques and Mick asked if there was something he could buy for her.

Andrea sounded taken aback at the suggestion. �You donłt
need to buy me anything, Mick. It isnłt my birthday or anything."

�It would be nice to give you a gift. Something to remember
me by."

�I donłt need anything to remember you, Mick. Youłre always
going to be there."

�It doesnłt have to be much. Just something youłll use now
and then, and will make you think of me. This me, not the one whołs going to be
walking around in this body in a few days."

�Well, if you really insist ..." He could tell Andrea was
trying to sound keen on the idea, but her heart still wasnłt quite in it. �There
was a handbag I saw last week ..."

�You should have bought it when you saw it."

�I was saving up for the hairdresser."

So Mick bought her the handbag. He made a mental note of the
style and color, intending to buy an identical copy next week. Since he hadnłt
bought the gift for his wife in his own worldline, it was even possible that he
might walk out of the shop with the exact counterpart of the handbag hełd just
given Andrea.

They went to the park again, then to look at the art in the
National Museum of Wales, then back into town for lunch. There were a few more
clouds in the sky compared to the last two days, but their chrome whiteness
only served to make the blue appear more deeply enameled and permanent. There
were no planes anywhere at all; no contrail scratches. It turned out the
aircraftwhich had indeed been militarythat they had seen yesterday had been
on its way to Poland, carrying a team of mine rescue specialists. Mick
remembered his resentment at seeing the plane, and felt bad about it now. There
had been brave men and women aboard it, and they were probably going to be
putting their own lives at risk to help save other brave men and women stuck
miles underground.

�Well," Andrea said, when theyłd paid the bill. �Moment of
truth, I suppose. Iłve been thinking about what you were saying earlier, and
maybe ..." She trailed off, looking down at the remains of her salad, before
continuing, �We can go home, if youłd like. If thatłs what you really want."

�Yes," Mick said. �Itłs what I want."

They took the tram back to their house. Andrea used her key
to let them inside. It was still only the early afternoon, and the house was
pleasantly cool, with the curtains and blinds still drawn. Mick knelt down and
picked up the letters that were on the mat. Bills, mostly. He set them on the
hall-side table, feeling a transitory sense of liberation. More than likely hełd
be confronted with the same bills when he got home, but for now these were
someone elsełs problem.

He slipped off his shoes and walked into the living room.
For a moment he was thrown, feeling as if he really was in a different house.
The wallscreen was on another wall; the dining table had been shifted sideways
into the other half of the room; the sofa and easy chairs had all been altered
and moved.

�Whatłs happened?"

�Oh, I forgot to tell you," Andrea said. �I felt like a
change. You came around and helped me move them."

�Thatłs new furniture."

�No, just different seat covers. Theyłre not new, itłs just
that we havenłt had them out for a while. You remember them now, donłt you?"

�I suppose so."

�Cłmon, Mick. It wasnłt that long ago. We got them off Aunty
Janice, remember?" She looked at him despairingly. �Iłll move things back. It
was a bit inconsiderate of me, I suppose. I never thought how strange it would
be for you to see the place like this."

�No, itłs okay. Honestly, itłs fine." Mick looked around,
trying to fix the arrangement of furniture and decor in his mindłs eye. As if
he were going to duplicate everything when he got back into his own body, into
his own version of this house.

Maybe he would, too.

�Iłve got something for you," Andrea said suddenly, reaching
onto the top of the bookcase. �Found it this morning. Took ages searching for
it."

�What?" Mick asked.

She held the thing out to him. Mick saw a rectangle of laminated
pink card, stained and dog-eared. It was only when he tried to hold it, and the
thing fell open and disgorged its folded paper innards, that he realized it was
a map.

�Bloody hell. I wouldnłt have had a clue where to look."
Mick folded the map back into itself and studied the cover. It was one of their
old hill-walking maps, covering that part of the Brecon Beacons where theyłd
done a lot of their walks.

�I was just thinking ... seeing as you were so keen ...
maybe it wouldnłt kill us to get out of town. Nothing too adventurous, mind."

�Tomorrow?"

She looked at him concernedly. �Thatłs what I was thinking.
Youłll still be okay, wonłt you?"

�No probs."

�Iłll get us a picnic, then. Tescołs does a nice luncheon
basket. I think wełve still got two thermos flasks around here somewhere, too."

�Never mind the thermos flasks, what about the walking
boots?"

�In the garage," Andrea said. �Along with the rucksacks. Iłll
dig them out this evening."

�Iłm looking forward to it," Mick said. �Really. Itłs kind
of you to agree."

�Just as long you donłt expect me to get up Pen y Fan
without getting out of breath."

�I bet youłll surprise yourself."

A little later they went upstairs, to their bedroom. The
blinds were open enough to throw pale stripes across the walls and bedsheets.
Andrea undressed, and then helped Mick out his own clothes. As good as his control
over the body had now become, fine motor taskslike undoing buttons and
zipswould require a lot more practice than he was going to have time for.

�Youłll have to help me get all this on afterward," he said.

�There you go, worrying about the future again."

They lay together on the bed. Mick had already felt himself
growing hard long before there was any corresponding change in the body he was
now inhabiting. He had an erection in the laboratory, halfway across the city
in another worldline. He could even feel the sharp plastic of the urinary
catheter. Would the other Mick, sunk deep into coma, retain some vague
impression of what was happening now? There were occasional stories of people
coming out of their coma with a memory of what their bodies had been up to
while they were under, but the agencies had said these were urban myths.

They made slow, cautious love. Mick had become more aware of
his own awkwardness, and the self-consciousness only served to exaggerate the
stiffness of his movements. Andrea did what she could to help, to bridge the
gap between them, but she could not work miracles. She was patient and
forgiving, even when he came close to hurting her. When he climaxed, Mick felt
it happen to the body in the laboratory first. Then the body he was inhabiting
responded, too, seconds later. Something of it reached him through the
nervelinknot pleasure, exactly, but confirmation that pleasure had occurred.

Afterward, they lay still on the bed, limbs entwined. A
breeze made the blinds move back and forth against the window. The slow
movement of light and shade, the soft tick of vinyl on glass, was as lulling as
a becalmed boat. Mick found himself falling into a contented sleep. He dreamed
of standing on a summit in the Brecon Beacons, looking down on the sunlit
valleys of South Wales, with Andrea next to him, the two of them poised like a
tableau in a travel brochure.

When he woke, hours later, he heard her moving around downstairs.
He reached for the glasseshełd removed them earlierand made to leave the bed.
He felt it then. Somewhere in those languid hours hełd lost a degree of control
over the body. He stood and moved to the door. He could still walk, but the
easy facility hełd gained on Tuesday was now absent. When he moved to the
landing and looked down the stairs, the glasses struggled to cope with the
sudden change of scene. The view fractured, reassembled. He moved to steady
himself on the banister, and his hand blurred into a long smear of flesh. He
began to descend the stairs, like a man coming down a mountain.

* * * *

Thursday

In the morning he was worse. He stayed overnight at the
house, then caught the tram to the laboratory. Already he could feel a
measurable lag between the sending of his intentions to move, and the
corresponding action in the body. Walking was still just about manageable, but
all other tasks had become more difficult. Hełd made a mess trying to eat
breakfast in Andreałs kitchen. It was no surprise when Joe told him that the
link was now down to one point two megs, and falling.

�By the end of the day?" Mick asked, even though he could
see the printout for himself.

�Point nine, maybe point eight."

Hełd dared to think it might still be possible to do what
they had planned. But the day soon became a catalogue of declining functions.
At noon he met Andrea at her office and they went to a car rental office, where
theyłd booked a vehicle for the day. Andrea drove them out of Cardiff, up the
valleys, along the A470 from Merthyr to Brecon. They had planned to walk all
the way to the summit of Pen y Fan, an ascent theyłd done together dozens of
times during their hill-walking days. Andrea had already collected the picnic
basket from Tescołs and packed and prepared the two rucksacks. Shełd helped
Mick get into his walking boots.

They left the car at the Storey Arms then followed the
well-trodden trail that wound its way toward the mountain. Mick felt a little
ashamed at first. Back in their hill-walking days, theyłd tended to look down
with disdain on the hordes of people making the trudge up Pen y Fan, especially
those that took the route up from the pub. The view from the top was worth the
climb, but theyłd usually made a point of completing at least one or two other
ascents on the same day, and theyłd always eschewed the easy paths. Now Mick
was paying for that earlier superiority. What started out as pleasantly
challenging soon became impossibly taxing. Although he didnłt think Andrea had
begun to notice, he was finding it much harder than hełd expected to walk on
the rough, craggy surface of the path. The effort was draining him, preventing
him from enjoying any of the scenery, or the sheer bliss of being with Andrea.
When he lost his footing the first time, Andrea didnłt make much of itshełd
nearly tripped once already, on the dried and cracked path. But soon he was
finding it hard to walk more than a hundred meters without losing his balance.
He knew, with a heavy heart, that it would be difficult enough just to get back
to the car. The mountain was still two miles away, and he wouldnłt have a hope
as soon as they hit a real slope.

�Are you okay, Mick?"

�Iłm fine. Donłt worry about me. Itłs these bloody shoes. I
canłt believe they ever fit me."

He soldiered on for as long as he could, refusing to give
in, but the going got harder and his pace slower. When he tripped again and
this time grazed his shin through his trousers, he knew hełd pushed himself as
far as he could go. Time was getting on. The mountain might as well have been
in the Himalayas, for all his chances of climbing it.

�Iłm sorry. Iłm useless. Go on without me. Itłs too nice a
day not to finish it."

�Hey." Andrea took his hand. �Donłt be like that. It was always
going to be hard. Look how far wełve come anyway."

Mick turned and looked dispiritedly down the valley. �About
three kilometers. I can still see the pub."

�Well, it felt longer. And besides, this is actually a very
nice spot to have the picnic." Andrea made a show of rubbing her thigh. �Iłm
about ready to stop anyway. Pulled a muscle going over that sty."

�Youłre just saying that."

�Shut up, Mick. Iłm happy, okay? If you want to turn this
into some miserable, pain-filled trek, go ahead. Me, Iłm staying here."

She spread the blanket next to a dry brook and unpacked the
food. The contents of the picnic basket looked very good indeed. The taste came
through the nervelink as a kind of thin, diluted impression, more like the
memory of taste rather than the thing itself. But he managed to eat without
making too much of a mess, and some of it actually bordered on the enjoyable.
They ate, listening to the birds, saying little. Now and then other walkers
trudged past, barely giving Mick and Andrea a glance, as they continued toward
the hills.

�I guess I shouldnłt have kidded myself I was ever going to
get up that mountain," Mick said.

�It was a bit ambitious," Andrea agreed. �It would have been
hard enough without the nervelink, given how flabby the two of us have become."

�I think Iłd have made a better job of it yesterday. Even
this morning ... I honestly felt I could do this when we got into the car."

Andrea touched his thigh. �How does it feel?"

�Like Iłm moving away. Yesterday I felt like I was in this
body, fully a part of it. Like a face filling a mask. Today itłs different. I
can still see through the mask, but itłs getting further away."

Andrea seemed distant for several moments. He wondered if
what hełd said had upset her. But when she spoke again there was something in
her voicea kind of steely resolutionthat he hadnłt been expecting, but which
was entirely Andrea.

�Listen to me, Mick."

�Iłm listening."

�Iłm going to tell you something. Itłs the first of May
today; just past two in the afternoon. We left Cardiff at eleven. This time
next year, this exact day, Iłm coming back here. Iłm going to pack a picnic
basket and go all the way up to the top of Pen y Fan. Iłll set off from Cardiff
at the same time. And Iłm going to do it the year after, as well. Every first
of May. No matter what day of the week it is. No matter how bloody horrible the
weather is. Iłm going up this mountain and nothing on Earth is going to stop
me."

It took him a few seconds to realize what she was getting
at. �With the other Mick?"

�No. Iłm not saying we wonłt ever climb that hill together.
But when I go up it on the first of May, Iłll be on my own." She looked levelly
at Mick. �And youłll do it alone as well. Youłll find someone new, Iłm sure of
it. But whoever she is will have to give you that one day to yourself. So that
you and I can have it to ourselves."

�We wonłt be able to communicate. We wonłt even know the
other onełs stuck to the plan."

�Yes," Andrea said firmly. �We will. Because itłs going to
be a promise, all right? The most important one either of us has ever made in
our whole lives. That way wełll know. Each of us will be in our own universe,
or worldline, or whatever you call it. But wełll both be standing on the same
Welsh mountain. Wełll both be looking at the same view. And Iłll be thinking of
you, and youłll be thinking of me."

Mick ran a stiff hand through Andreałs hair. He couldnłt get
his fingers to work very well now.

�You really mean that, donłt you?"

�Of course I mean it. But Iłm not promising anything unless
you agree to your half of it. Would you promise, Mick?"

�Yes," he said. �I will."

�I wish I could think of something better. I could say wełd
always meet in the park. But therełll be people around; it wonłt feel private.
I want the silence, the isolation, so I can feel your presence. And one day
they might tear down the park and put a shopping center there instead. But the
mountain will always be there. At least as long as wełre around."

�And when we get old? Shouldnłt we agree to stop climbing
the mountain, when we get to a certain age?"

�There you go again," Andrea said. �Decide for yourself. Iłm
going to keep climbing this thing until they put me in a box. I expect nothing
less from you, Mick Leighton."

He made the best smile he was capable of. �Then ... Iłll
just have to do my best, wonłt I?"

* * * *

Friday

In the morning Mick was paraplegic. The nervelink still worked
perfectly, but the rate of data transmission from one worldline to the other
had become too low to permit anything as complex and feedback-dependent as
walking. His control over the bodyłs fingers had become so clumsy that his
hands might as well have been wearing boxing gloves. He could hold something if
it was presented to him, but it was becoming increasingly difficult to
manipulate simple objects, even those that had presented no difficulty
twenty-four hours earlier. When he tried to grasp the breakfast yoghurt, he
succeeded only in tipping it over the table. His hand had seemed to lurch
toward the yoghurt, crossing the distance too quickly. According to Joe he had
lost depth perception overnight. The glasses, sensing the dwindling data rate,
were no longer sending stereoscopic images back to the lab.

He could still move around. The team had anticipated this
stage and made sure an electric wheelchair was ready for him. Its chunky
controls were designed to be used by someone with only limited upper body
coordination. The chair was equipped with a panic button, so that Mick could
summon help if he felt his control slipping faster than the predicted rate.
Were he to fall into sudden and total paralysis, the chair would call out to
passersby to provide assistance. In the event of an extreme medical emergency,
it would steer itself to the nearest designated care point.

Andrea came out to the laboratory to meet him. Mick wanted
one last trip into the city with her, but although shełd been enthusiastic when
theyłd talked about the plan on the phone, Andrea was now reluctant.

�Are you sure about this? We had such a nice time on Thursday.
It would be a shame to spoil the memory of that now."

�Iłm okay," Mick said.

�Iłm just saying, we could always just stroll around the
gardens here."

�Please," Mick said. �This is what ... I want."

His voice was slow, his phrasing imprecise. He sounded drunk
and depressed. If Andrea noticedand he was sure she must haveshe made no
observation.

They went into town. It was difficult getting the wheelchair
on the tram, even with Andreałs assistance. No one seemed to know how to lower
the boarding ramp. One of the benefits of nervelink technology was that you
didnłt see that many people in wheelchairs anymore. The technology that enabled
one person to control another personłs body also enabled spinal injuries to be
bypassed. Mick was aware that he was attracting more attention than on any
previous day. For most people wheelchairs were a medical horror from the past,
like iron lungs or leg braces.

On the tramłs video monitor he watched a news item about the
Polish miners. It wasnłt good. The rescue team had had a number of options
available to them, involving at least three possible routes to the trapped men.
After carefully evaluating all the dataaware of how little time remained for
the victimstheyłd chosen what had promised to be the quickest and safest
approach.

It had turned out to be a mistake, one that would prove
fatal for the miners. The rescuers had hit a flooded section and had been
forced to retreat, with damage to their equipment, and one of their team
injured. Yet the miners had been saved in one of the other contacted
worldlines. In that reality, one of the members of the rescue team had slipped
on ice and fractured his hip while boarding the plane. The loss of that one
manwhołd been a vocal proponent for taking the quickest routehad resulted in
the team following the second course. It had turned out to be the right
decision. Theyłd met their share of obstacles and difficulties, but in the end
theyłd broken through to the trapped miners.

By the time this happened, contact with that worldline had almost
been lost. Even the best compression methods couldnłt cope with moving images.
The pictures that came back, of the men being liberated from the ground, were
grainy and monochrome, like a blowup of newsprint from a hundred years earlier.
Theyłd been squeezed across the gap in the last minutes before noise drowned
the signal.

But the information was useless. Even armed with the knowledge
that there was a safe route through to the miners, the team in this worldline
didnłt have time to act.

The news didnłt help Mickłs mood. Going into the city turned
out to be exactly the bad move Andrea had predicted. By midday his motor
control had deteriorated even further, to the point where he was having
difficulty steering the wheelchair. His speech became increasingly slurred, so
that Andrea had to keep asking him to repeat himself. In defense, he shut down
into monosyllables. Even his hearing was beginning to fail, as the auditory
data was compressed to an even more savage degree. He couldnłt distinguish
birds from traffic, or traffic from the swish of the trees in the park. When
Andrea spoke to him she sounded like her words had been fed through a
synthesizer, then chopped up and spliced back together in some tinny
approximation to her normal voice.

At three, his glasses could no longer support full color
vision. The software switched to a limited color palette. The city looked like
a hand-tinted photograph, washed out and faded. Andreałs face oscillated
between white and sickly gray.

By four, Mick was fully quadriplegic. By five, the glasses
had reverted back to black and white. The frame rate was down to ten images per
second, and falling.

By early evening, Andrea was no longer able to understand
what Mick was saying. Mick realized that he could no longer reach the panic
button. He became agitated, thrashing his head around. Hełd had enough. He
wanted to be pulled out of the nervelink, slammed back into his own waiting
body. He no longer felt as if he was in Mickłs body, but he didnłt feel as if
he was in his own one either. He was strung out somewhere between them,
helpless and almost blind. When the panic hit, it was like a foaming, irresistible
tide.

Alarmed, Andrea wheeled him back to the laboratory. By the
time she was ready to say goodbye to him, the glasses had reduced his vision to
five images per second, each of which was composed of only six thousand pixels.
He was calmer then, resigned to the inevitability of what tomorrow would bring:
he would not even recognize Andrea in the morning.

* * * *

Saturday

Mickłs last day with Andrea began in a world of sound and visionsenses
that were already impoverished to a large degreeand ended in a realm of
silence and darkness.

He was now completely paralyzed, unable even to move his
head. The brain that belonged to the other, comatose Mick now had more control
over this body than its wakeful counterpart. The nervelink was still sending
signals back to the lab, but the requirements of sight and sound now consumed
almost all available bandwidth. In the morning, vision was down to one thousand
pixels, updated three frames per second. His sight had already turned
monochrome, but even yesterday there had been welcome gradations of gray,
enough to anchor him into the visual landscape.

Now the pixels were only capable of registering on or off;
it cost too much bandwidth to send intermediate intensity values. When Andrea
was near him, her face was a flickering abstraction of black and white squares,
like a trick picture in a psychology textbook. With effort he learned to
distinguish her from the other faces in the laboratory, but no sooner had he
gained confidence in his ability than the quality of vision declined even
further.

By midmorning the frame rate had dropped to eight hundred
pixels at two per second, which was less like vision than being shown a
sequence of still images. People didnłt walk to him across the labthey jumped
from spot to spot, captured in frozen postures. It was soon easy to stop
thinking of them as people at all, but simply as abstract structures in the
data.

By noon he could not exactly say that he had any vision at
all. Something was updating once every two seconds, but the matrix of black and
white pixels was hard to reconcile with his memories of the lab. He could no
longer distinguish people from furniture, unless people moved between frames,
and then only occasionally. At two, he asked Joe to disable the feed from the
glasses, so that the remaining bandwidth could be used for sound and touch.
Mick was plunged into darkness.

Sound had declined overnight as well. If Andreałs voice had
been tinny yesterday, today it was barely human. It was as if she were speaking
to him through a voice distorter on the end of the worst telephone connection
in the world. The noise was beginning to win. The software was struggling to
compensate, teasing sense out of the data. It was a battle that could only be
prolonged, not won.

�Iłm still here," Andrea told him, her voice a whisper
fainter than the signal from the furthest quasar.

Mick answered back. It took some time. His words in the lab
had to be analyzed by voice-recognition software and converted into ASCII
characters. The characters were compressed further and sent across the reality
gap, bit by bit. In the other version of the labthe one where Mickłs body
waited in a wheelchair, the one where Andrea hadnłt died in a car
crashequivalent software decompressed the character string and reconstituted
it in mechanically generated speech, with an American accent.

�Thank you for letting me come back," he said. �Please stay.
Until the end. Until Iłm not here anymore."

�Iłm not going anywhere, Mick."

Andrea squeezed his hand. After all that he had lost since
Friday, touch remained. It really was the easiest thing to send: easier than
sight, easier than sound. When, later, even Andreałs voice had to be sent
across the gap by character string and speech synthesizer, touch endured. He
felt her holding him, hugging his body to hers, refusing to surrender him to
the drowning roar of quantum noise.

�Wełre down to less than a thousand useable bits," Joe told
him, speaking quietly in his ear in the version of the lab where Mick lay on
the immersion couch. �Thatłs a thousand bits total, until we lose all contact.
Itłs enough for a message, enough for parting words."

�Send this," Mick said. �Tell Andrea that Iłm glad she was
there. Tell her that Iłm glad she was my wife. Tell her Iłm sorry we didnłt
make it up that hill together."

When Joe had sent the message, typing it in with his usual
fluid speed, Mick felt the sense of Andreałs touch easing. Even the microscopic
data-transfer burden of communicating unchanging pressure, hand on hand, body
against body, was now too much for the link. It was like one swimmer letting a
drowning partner go. As the last bits fell, he felt Andrea slip away forever.

He lay on the couch, unmoving. He had lost his wife, for the
second time. For the moment the weight of that realization pinned him into
stillness. He did not think he would ever be able to walk in his world, let
alone the one he had just vacated.

And yet it was Saturday. Andreałs funeral was in two days.
He would have to be ready for that.

�Wełre done," Joe said respectfully. �Link is now
noise-swamped."

�Did Andrea send anything back?" Mick asked. �After I sent
my last words ..."

�No. Iłm sorry."

Mick caught the hesitation in Joełs answer. �Nothing came
through ?"

�Nothing intelligible. I thought something was coming
through, but it was just ..." Joe offered an apologetic shrug. �The setup at
their end must have gone noise-limited a few seconds before ours did. Happens,
sometimes."

�I know," Mick said. �But I still want to see what Andrea
sent."

Joe handed him a printout. Mick waited for his eyes to focus
on the sheet. Beneath the lines of header information was a single line of
text: SO0122215. Like a phone number or a postal code, except it was obviously
neither.

�Thatłs all?"

Joe sighed heavily. �Iłm sorry, mate. Maybe she was just trying
to get something through ... but the noise won. The rucking noise always wins."

Mick looked at the numbers again. They began to talk to him.
He thought he knew what they meant.

�... always fucking wins," Joe repeated.

* * * *

Sunday

Andrea was there when they brought Mick out of the medically
induced coma. He came up through layers of disorientation and half-dream,
adrift until something inside him clicked into place and he realized where he
had been for the last week, what had been happening to the body over which he
was now regaining gradual control. It was exactly as they had promised: no
dreams, no anxiety, no tangible sense of elapsed time. In a way, it was not an
entirely unattractive way to spend a week. Like being in the womb, hełd heard
people say. And now he was being born again, a process that was not without its
own discomforts. He tried moving an arm and when the limb did not obey him
instantly, he began to panic. But Joe was already smiling.

�Easy, boyo. Itłs coming back. The softwarełs rerouting
things one spinal nerve at a time. Just hold on there and itłll be fine."

Mick tried mumbling something in reply, but his jaw wasnłt
working properly either. Yet it would come, as Joe had promised. On any given
day, thousands of recipients went through this exact procedure without blinking
an eyelid. Many of them were people whołd already done it hundreds of times
before. Nervelinking was almost insanely safe. Far safer than any form of
physical travel, that was certain.

He tried moving his arm again. This time it obeyed without hesitation.

�How are you feeling?" Andrea asked.

Once more he tried speaking. His jaw was stiff, his tongue
thick and uncooperative, but he managed to make some sounds. �Okay. Felt
better."

�They say itłs easier the second time. Much easier the
third."

�How long?"

�You went under on Sunday of last week. Itłs Sunday again
now," Joe said.

A full week. Exactly the way theyłd planned it.

�Iłm quite hungry," Mick said.

�Everyonełs always hungry when they come out of the coma,"
Joe said. �Itłs hard to get enough nourishment into the host body. Wełll get
you sorted out, though."

Mick turned his head to look at Joe, waiting for his eyes to
find grudging focus. �Joe," he said. �Everythingłs all right, isnłt it? No
complications, nothing to worry about?"

�No problems at all," Joe said.

�Then would you mind giving Andrea and me a moment alone?"

Joe held up his hand in hasty acknowledgement and left the
room, off on some plausible errand. He shut the door quietly behind him.

�Well?" Mick asked. �Iłm guessing things must have gone
okay, or they wouldnłt have kept me under for so long."

�Things went okay, yes," Andrea said.

�Then you met the other Mick? He was here?"

Andrea nodded heavily. �He was here. We spent time together."

�What did you get up to?"

�All the usual stuff you or I wouldłve done. Hit the town,
walked in the parks, went into the hills, that kind of thing."

�How was it?"

She looked at him guardedly. �Really, really sad. I didnłt
really know how to behave, to be honest. Part of me wanted to be all consoling
and sympathetic, because hełd lost his wife. But I donłt think thatłs what Mick
wanted."

�The other Mick," he corrected gently.

�Point is, he didnłt come back to see me being all weepy. He
wanted another week with his wife, the way things used to be. Yes, he wanted to
say goodbye, but he didnłt want to spend the whole week with the two of us
walking around feeling down in the dumps."

�So how did you feel?"

�Miserable. Not as miserable as if Iłd lost my husband, of
course. But some of his sadness started wearing off on me. I didnłt think it
was going to ... Iłm not the one whołs been bereaved herebut youłd have to be
inhuman not to feel something, wouldnłt you?"

�Whatever you felt, donłt blame yourself for it. I think it
was a wonderful thing you agreed to do."

�You, too."

�I had the easy part," Mick said.

Andrea stroked the side of his face. He realized that he
needed a good shave. �How do you feel?" she asked. �Youłre nearly him, after
all. You know everything he knows."

�Except how it feels to lose a wife. And I hope I donłt ever
find that out. I donłt think I can ever really understand what hełs going
through now. He feels like someone else, a friend, a colleague, someone youłd
feel sorry for ..."

�But youłre not cut up about what happened to him."

Mick thought for a while before responding, not wanting to
give the glib, automatic answer, no matter how comforting it might have been. �No.
I wish it hadnłt happened ... but youłre still here. We can still be together,
if we want. Wełll carry on with our lives, and in a few months wełll hardly
ever think of that accident. The other Mick isnłt me. He isnłt even anyone wełll
ever hear from again. Hełs gone. He might as well not exist."

�But he does. Just because we canłt communicate anymore ...
he is still out there."

�Thatłs what the theory says." Mick narrowed his eyes. �Why?
What difference does it really make, to us?"

�None at all, I suppose." Again that guarded look. �But
therełs something I have to tell you, something you have to understand."

There was a tone in her voice that troubled Mick, but he did
his best not to show it. �Go on, Andrea."

�I made a promise to the other Mick. Hełs lost something no
one can ever replace, and I wanted to do something, anything, to make it easier
for him. Because of that, Mick and I came to an arrangement. Once a year, Iłm
going to go away for a day. For that day, and that day only, Iłm going
somewhere private where Iłm going to be thinking about the other Mick. About
what hełs been doing; what kind of life hełs had; whether liełs happy or sad.
And Iłm going to be alone. I donłt want you to follow me, Mick. You have to
promise me that."

�You could tell me," he said. �There doesnłt have to be secrets."

�Iłm telling you now. Donłt you think I could have kept it
from you if I wanted to?"

�But I still wonłt know where ..."

�You donłt need to. This is a secret between me and the
other Mick. Me and the other you." She must have read something in his
expression, something he had hoped wasnłt there, because her tone turned grave.
�And you need to find a way to deal with that, because it isnłt negotiable. I
already made that promise."

�And Andrea Leighton doesnłt break promises."

�No," she said, softening her look with a sweet half-smile. �She
doesnłt. Especially not to Mick Leighton. Whichever one it happens to be."

They kissed.

Later, when Andrea was out of the room while Joe ran some
more post-immersion tests, Mick peeled off a yellow Post-it note that had been
left on one of the keyboards. There was something written on the note, in neat,
blue ink. Instantly he recognized Andreałs handwriting: hełd seen it often
enough on the message board in their kitchen. But the writing
itselfSO0122215meant nothing to him.

�Joe," he asked casually. �Is this something of yours?"

Joe glanced over from his desk, his eyes freezing on the
small rectangle of yellow paper.

�No, thatłs what Andrea asked" Joe began, then caught himself.
�Look, itłs nothing. I meant to bin it, but ..."

�Itłs a message to the other Mick, right?"

Joe looked around, as if Andrea might still be hiding in the
room or about to reappear. �We were down to the last few usable bits. The other
Mick had just sent his last words through. Andrea asked me to send that
response."

�Did she tell you what it meant?"

Joe looked defensive. �I just typed it. I didnłt ask.
Thought it was between you and her. I mean, between the other Mick and her."

�Itłs okay," Mick said. �You were right not to ask."

He looked at the message again, and something fell solidly
into place. It had taken a few moments, but he recognized the code for what it
was now, as some damp and windswept memory filtered up from the past. The
numbers formed a grid reference on an Ordnance Survey map. It was the kind
Andrea and he had used when they went on their walking expeditions. The
reference even looked vaguely familiar. He stared at the numbers, feeling as if
they were about to give up their secret. Wherever it was, hełd been there, or
somewhere near. It wouldnłt be hard to look it up. He wouldnłt even need the
Post-it note. Hełd always had a good memory for numbers.

Footsteps approached, echoing along the linoleum-floored
hallway that led to the lab.

�Itłs Andrea," Joe said.

Mick folded the Post-it note until the message was no longer
visible. He flicked it in Joełs direction, knowing that it was none of his
business anymore.

�Bin it."

�You sure?"

From now on there was always going to be a part of his wifełs
life that didnłt involve him, even if it was only for one day a year. He would
just have to find a way to live with that.

Things could have been worse, after all.

�Iłm sure," he said.

The Six Directions Of Space

Taken from the short story collection �Galactic Empires"
(2008) edited by Gardner Dozois

 

Alastair Reynolds is a frequent contributor to Interzone and
has also sold to Asimovłs Science Fiction, Spectrum SF, and elsewhere. His
first novel, Revelation Space, was widely hailed as one of the major SF books
of the year; it was quickly followed by Chasm City, Redemption Ark, Absolution
Gap, and Century Rain, all big sprawling Space Operas that were big sellers as
well, establishing Reynolds as one of the best and most popular new SF writers
to enter the field in many years. His other books include a novella collection,
Diamond Dogs, Turquoise Days. His most recent books are a novel, Pushing Ice,
and two new collections, Galactic North and Zima Blue and Other Stories. Coming
up is a new novel, The Prefect. A professional scientist with a Ph.D. in
astronomy, he comes from Wales, but lives in the Netherlands, where he works
for the European Space Agency.

Reynoldsł work is known for its grand scope, sweep, and
scale (in one story, �Galactic North," a spaceship sets out in pursuit of
another in a stern chase that takes thousands of years of time and hundreds of
thousands of light-years to complete; in another, �Thousandth Night," ultrarich
immortals embark on a plan that will call for the physical rearrangement of all
the stars in the Galaxy. In the hard-hitting and disquieting story that
follows, Reynolds shows us a brutal Galactic Empire embattling itself to defend
against attacks by other Empires that come not just from elsewhere in the
Galaxy, but from other universes altogether!

 

[VERSION HISTORY]

v1.0 by the N.E.R.Dłs. Page numbers removed, paragraphs
joined, formatted and spell checked. A full read through is required.

 

We had been riding for two hours when I tugged sharply on
the reins to bring my pony to a halt. Tenger, my escort, rode on for a few
paces before glancing back irritatedly. He muttered something in annoyance-a
phrase that contained the words �stupid" and �dyke"before steering his horse
back alongside mine.

�Another sightseeing stop?" he asked, as the two mismatched
animals chewed their bits, flared their nostrils, and flicked their heads up in
mutual impatience.

I said nothing, damned if I was going to give him the
pleasure of an excuse. I only wanted to take in the view: the deeply shadowed
valley below, the rising hills beyond (curving ever upward, like a tidal wave
formed from rock and soil and grass), and the little patch of light down in the
darkness, the square formation of the still-moving caravan.

�If you really want to make that appointment" Tenger continued.

�Shut up."

Tenger sniffed, dug into a leather flap on his belt, and
popped something into his mouth.

�On your own head be it, Yellow Dog. It certainly wonłt be
my neck on the line, keeping the old man waiting."

I held both reins in one hand so that I could cup the other
against my ear. I turned the side of my head in the direction of the caravan
and closed my eyes. After a few moments, I convinced myself that I could hear
it. It was a sound almost on the edge of audibility, but which would become
thunderous, calamitous, world-destroying, as they drew nearer. The sound of
thousands of riders, hundreds of wheeled tents, dozens of monstrous siege engines.
A sound very much like the end of the world itself, it must have seemed, when
the caravan approached.

�We can go now," I told Tenger.

He dug his spurs in, almost drawing blood, his horse
pounding away so quickly that it kicked dirt into my eyes.

Goyo snorted and gave chase. We raced down into the valley,
sending skylarks and snipe barreling into the air.

* * * * *

�Just going by the rules, Yellow Dog," the guard said, apologizing
for making me show him my passport. We were standing on the wheeled platform of
the imperial ger. The guard wore a knee-length blue sash-tied coat, long black
hair cascading from the dome of his helmet. �Wełre on high alert as it is.
Three plausible threats in the last week."

�Usual nut jobs?" I said, casting a wary glance at Tenger,
who was attending to Goyo with a bad-tempered expression. I had beaten him to
the caravan and he did not like that.

�Two Islamist sects, one bunch of Nestorians," the guard answered.
�Not that Iłm saying that the old man has anything to fear from you, of course,
but we have to follow protocol."

�I understand fully."

�Frankly, we were beginning to wonder if you were ever coming
back." He looked at me solicitously. �Some of us were beginning to wonder if
youłd been disavowed."

I smiled. �Disavowed? I donłt think so."

�Just saying, wełre all assuming youłve got something
suitably juicy, after all this time."

I reached up to tie back my hair. �Juicyłs not exactly the
word Iłd use. But itłs definitely something he has to hear about."

The guard touched a finger to the pearl on his collar.

�Better go inside, in that case."

I did as I was invited.

My audience with the khan was neither as private nor as lengthy
as I might have wished, but, in all other respects, it was a success. One of
his wives was there, as well as Minister Chiledu, the national security
adviser, and the khan was notoriously busy during this ceremonial restaging of
the war caravan. I thought, not for the first time, of how old he looked: much
older than the young man who had been elected to this office seven years
earlier, brimming with plans and promises. Now he was graying and tired, worn
down by disappointing polls and the pressures of managing an empire that was
beginning to fray at the edges. The caravan was supposed to be an antidote to
all that. In this, the nine hundred and ninety-ninth year since the death of
the Founder (we would celebrate this birthday, but no one knows when it
happened), a special effort had been made to create the largest caravan in
decades, with almost every local system commander in attendance.

As I stepped off the ger to collect Goyo and begin my
mission, I felt something perilously close to elation. The data I had presented
to the khan-the troubling signs I had detected concerning the functioning and
security of the Infrastructure-had been taken seriously. The khan could have
waved aside my concerns as an issue for his successor, but-to his credit, I
think-he had not. I had been given license and funds to gather more
information, even if that meant voyaging to the Kuchlug Special Administrative
Volume and operating under the nose of Qilian, one of the men who had been
making life difficult for the khan these last few years.

And yet my mood of elation was short-lived.

I had no sooner set my feet on the ground than I spied
Tenger. He was bullying Goyo, jerking hard on his bridle, kicking a boot
against his hocks. He was so preoccupied with his business that he did not see
me approaching from behind his back. I took hold of a good, thick clump of his
hair and snapped his head back as far it would go. He released the bridle,
staggering back under the pressure I was applying.

I whispered in his ear. �No one hurts my horse, you ignorant
piece of shit." Then I spun him around, the hair tearing out in my fist, and
kneed him hard in the groin, so that he coughed out a groan of pain and nausea
and bent double, like a man about to vomit.

* * * * *

Some say that it is Heavenłs Mandate that we should have the
stars, just as it was the will of Heaven that our armies should bring the
squabbling lands of Greater Mongolia under one system of governance, a polity
so civilized that a woman could ride naked from the western shores of Europe to
the eastern edge of China without once being molested. I say that it is simply
the case that we-call us Mongols, call us humans, it scarcely matters nowhave
always made the best of what we are given.

Take the nexus in Gansu system, for instance. It was a medium-sized
moon that had been hollowed out nearly all the way to its middle, leaving a
shell barely a hundred li thick, with a small round kernel buttressed to the
shell by ninety-nine golden spokes. Local traffic entered and departed the
nexus via apertures at the northern and southern poles. Not that there was much
local traffic to speak of: Gansu, with its miserly red sun-only just large
enough to sustain fusion-and handful of desolate, volatile-poor, and radiation-lashed
rocky worlds, was neither a financial nor military hub, nor a place that
figured prominently in tourist itineraries. As was often the case, it was
something of a puzzle why the wormlike khorkoi had built the nexus in such a
miserable location to begin with.

Unpromising material, but in the five hundred years since we
first reopened a portal into the Infrastructure, we had made a glittering
bauble out of it. Five major trunk routes converged on Gansu, including a
high-capacity branch of the Kherlen Corridor, the busiest path in the entire
network. In addition, the moon offered portals to a dozen secondary routes,
four of which had been rated stable enough to allow passage by juggernaut-class
ships. Most of those secondary routes led to stellar population centers of some
economic importance, including the Kiriltuk, Tatatunga, and Chilagun
administrative volumes, each of which encompassed more than fifty settled
systems and around a thousand habitable worlds. Even the routes that led to
nowhere of particular importance were well traveled by prospectors and
adventurers, hoping to find khorkoi relics or, that fever dream of all
chancers, an unmapped nexus.

We did not know the function of the ninety-nine spokes, or
of the core they buttressed. No matter; the core made a useful foundation, a
place upon which to build. From the vantage point of the rising shuttle, it was
a scribble of luminous neon, packed tight as a migraine. I could not
distinguish the lights of individual buildings, only the larger glowing
demarkations of the precincts between city-sized districts. Pressurized
horseways a whole li wide were thin, snaking scratches. The human presence had
even begun to climb up the golden spokes, pushing tendrils of light out to the
moonłs inner surface. Commercial slogans spelled themselves out in letters ten
li high. On Founderłs Day, drink only Temujin Brand Airag. Sorkan-Shira rental
ponies have low mileage, excellent stamina, and good temperament. Treat your
favorite wife: buy her only Zarnuk Silks. During hunting season, safeguard your
assets with New Far Samarkand Mutual Insurance. Think youłre a real man? Then
you should be drinking Death Worm Airag: the one with a sting at both ends!

I had spent only one night in Gansu, arranging a eunuch and
waiting for the smaller ship that would carry us the rest of the way to
Kuchlug. Now Goyo, the eunuch, and I were being conveyed to the Burkhan
Khaldun, a vessel that was even smaller than the Black Heart Mountain that had
brought me to Gansu. The BK was only one li from end to end, less than a
quarter of that across the bow. The hull was a multicolored quilt of patch
repairs, with many scratches, craters, and scorches yet to be attended to. The
lateral stabilization vanes had the slightly buckled look of something that had
been badly bent and then hammered back into shape, while the yaw dampeners
appeared to have originated from a completely different ship, fixed on with
silvery fillets of recent welding work. A whole line of windows had been plated
over.

As old as the BK might have been, it had taken more than
just age and neglect to bring her to that state. The Parvan Tract was a
notoriously rough passage, quickly taking its toll on even a new ship. If the
Kherlen Corridor was a wide, stately river that could almost be navigated
blindfold, then the Tract was a series of narrow rapids whose treacherous
properties varied from trip to trip, requiring not just expert input from the
crew, but passengers with the constitution to tolerate a heavy crossing.

Once I had checked into my rooms and satisfied myself that
Goyo was being taken care of, I made my way back to the passenger area. I
bought a glass of Temujin airag and made my way to the forward viewing
platform, with its wide sweep of curved windowscratched and scuffed in places,
worryingly starred in others-and leaned hard against the protective railing.
The last shuttle had already detached, and the BK was accelerating toward the
portal, its great human-made doors irising open at the last possible moment, so
that the interior of Gansu was protected from the Parvan Tractłs unpredictable
energy surges. Even though the Infrastructure shaft stretched impossibly far
into the distance, my mind kept insisting that we were about to punch through
the thin skin of the moon.

The ship surged forward, the sluggish artificial gravity
generators struggling to maintain the local vertical. We passed through the
door, into the superluminal machinery of the Infrastructure. The tunnel walls
were many li away, but they felt closeras they raced by at increasing speed,
velocity traced by the luminous squiggly patterns that had been inscribed on
the wall for inscrutable reasons by the khorkoi builders, I had the impression
that the shaft was constricting, tightening down on our fragile little ship.
Yet nothing seemed to disconcert or even arouse the interest of my fellow
passengers. In ones and twos, they drifted away from the gallery, leaving me
alone with my eunuch, observing from a discrete distance. I drank the airag
very slowly, looking down the racing shaft, wondering if it would be my fortune
to see a phantom with my own eyes. Phantoms, after all, were what had brought
me here.

Now all I had to do was poison the eunuch.

The eunuch answered to �eunuch," but his real name (I
learned after a certain amount of probing) was Tisza. He had not been surgically
castrated; there was an implant somewhere in his forearm dispensing the
necessary cocktail of androgen-blockers, suppressing his libido and lending him
a mildly androgynous appearance. Other implants, similar to those employed by
government operatives, had given him heightened reflexes, spatial coordination,
and enhanced night vision. He was adept with weapons and unarmed combat, as (I
had no cause to doubt) were all Batu eunuchs. I had no need of his protection,
of course, but appearances were paramount. I was posing as a woman of means, a
well-healed tourist. No women in my circumstances would ever have traveled
without the accompaniment of a man such as Tisza.

He served my purpose in another way. We shared the same
rooms, with the eunuch sleeping in a small, doorless annex connected to mine.
Because I might (conceivably) be drugged or poisoned, Tisza always ate the same
meals as me, served at the same time and brought to my cabin by one of the BKłs
white uniformed stewards.

�What if you get poisoned and die on me?" I asked,
innocently, when we were sitting across from each other at my table.

He tapped a pudgy finger against his belly. �It would take a
lot to kill me, Miss Bocheng. My constitution has been tailored to process many
toxins in common circulation among would-be assassins and miscreants. I will
become ill much sooner than you would, but what would kill you would merely
make me unwell, and not so unwell that I could not discharge my duties."

�I hope youłre right about that."

He patted his chin with napkin. �It is no occasion for
pride. I am what I am because of the chemical intervention and surgery of the
Batu Escort Agency. It would be equally pointless to understate my abilities."

Later, feigning nervousness, I told him that I had heard a
noise from his annex.

�It is nothing, I assure you. No one could have entered
these rooms without our knowing it."

�It sounded like someone breathing."

He smiled tolerantly. �There are many foreign sounds on a
ship like this. Noises carry a great distance through the ducts and conduits of
the air-circulation system."

�Couldnłt someone have crawled through those same conduits?"

He rose from the table without a note of complaint. �It is unlikely,
but I shall investigate."

As soon as he had vanished through the door into his annex,
I produced a vial from my pocket and tipped its sugary contents onto the
remains of his meal. I heard him examining things, pulling open cupboard doors
and sliding drawers. By the time he returned, with a reassuring expression on
his face, the toxin crystals had melted invisibly into his food and the vial
was snug in my pocket.

�Whatever you heard, therełs no one in mere."

�Are you sure?"

�Completely. But Iłm willing to look again, if it would put
your mind at ease."

I looked abashed. �Iłm just being silly."

�Not at all. You must not be afraid to bring things to my
attention. It is what you have hired me for."

�Tuck in," I said, nodding at his meal, �before it gets
cold."

* * * * *

Tisza was moaning and sweating on the bed, deep in fever, as
Mr. Tayang appraised him warily. �Did he tell you he could detect poisons? They
donłt all come with that option."

�He can. Isnłt that the point?"

�It could just be a bug hełs picked up. On the other hand,
he may have been hit by something intended for you that his system wasnłt
designed to filter out."

�A poison?"

�Itłs a possibility, Miss Bocheng."

Tayang was a steward, a young man with a pleasant face and a
highly professional manner. I had seen him around earlier, but-as was the case
with all the crew-he had steadfastly refused to engage in any conversation not
related to my immediate needs. I had counted on this, and contrived the
poisoning of the eunuch to give me heightened access to one or more of the
crew. It need not have been Tayang, but my instincts told me that he would
serve excellently.

�Then why isnłt it affecting me?" I asked.

�I donłt wish to alarm you, but it could be that itłs going
to in a very short while. We need to get both of you into the sick bay. Under
observation, we should be able to stabilize the eunuch and ensure you come to
no harm."

This was the outcome I had been hoping for, but some indignation
was called for. �If you think Iłm going to spend the rest of this trip in some
stinking sick bay, after Iłve paid for this cabin ..."

Tayang raised a calming hand. �It wonłt be for long. A day
or two, just to be on the safe side. Then you can enjoy the rest of the trip in
comfort."

Another pair of stewards was summoned to help shift the hapless
Tisza, while I made my way to the sick bay on foot. �Actually," I said, �now
that you mention it ... I do feel a little peculiar."

Tayang looked at me sympathetically. �Donłt worry, Miss Bocheng.
Wełll have you right as rain in no time."

The sick bay was larger and better equipped than I had been
expecting, almost as if it belonged in a different ship entirely. I was
relieved to see that no one else was using it. Tayang helped me onto a reclined
couch while the other stewards pulled a screen around the stricken eunuch.

�How do you feel now?" Tayang asked, fastening a black cuff
around my forearm.

�Still a bit funny."

For the next few minutes, Tayangwho had clearly been given
basic medical training-studied the readouts on a handheld display he had pulled
from a recess in the wall.

�Well, it doesnłt look" he began.

�I should have listened to my friends," I said, shaking my
head. �They told me not to come here."

He tapped buttons set into the side of the display. �Your
friends warned you that you might end up getting poisoned?"

�Not exactly, no. But they said it wasnłt a good idea
traveling on the Burkhan Khaldun, down the Parvan Tract. They were right, werenłt
they?"

�That would depend. So far, I canłt see any sign that youłve
ingested anything poisonous. Of course, it could be something that the analyzer
isnłt equipped to detect"

�And the eunuch?"

�Just a moment," Tayang said, leaving the display suspended
in the air. He walked over to the other bed and pulled aside the curtain. I
heard a murmured exchange before he returned, with a bit less of a spring in
his step. �Well, therełs no doubt that something pretty heavyłs hit his system.
Could be a deliberate toxin, could be something nasty that just happened to get
into him. Wełre not far out of Gansu; he could have contracted something there
thatłs only just showing up."

�Hełs been poisoned, Mr. Tayang. My bodyguard. Doesnłt that
strike you as a slightly ominous development?"

�I still say it could be something natural. Wełll know soon
enough. In the meantime, I wouldnłt necessarily jump to the conclusion that youłre
in immediate peril."

�Iłm concerned, Mr. Tayang."

�Well, donłt be. Youłre in excellent hands." He leaned over
to plump my pillow. �Get under the blanket if you feel shivery. Is there
anything youłd like me to fetch from your room?"

�No, thank you."

�In which case, Iłll leave you be. Iłll keep the analyzer attached
just in case it flags anything. The other stewards are still here. If you need
anything, just call."

�I will."

He was on the verge of leaving-I had no doubt that he was a
busy manwhen something caused him to narrow his eyes. �So if it wasnłt about
being poisoned, Miss Bocheng, why exactly was it that your friends didnłt want
you taking this ship?"

�Oh, that." I shook my head. �Itłs silly. I donłt know why I
mentioned it at all. Itłs not as if I believe any of that nonsense."

�Any of what nonsense, exactly?"

�You know, about the phantoms. About how the Parvan Tract is
haunted. I told them I was above all that, but they still kept going on about
it. They said that if I took this ship, I might never come back. Of course,
that only made me even more determined."

�Good for you."

�I told them I was a rationalist, not someone who believes
in ghosts and goblins." I shifted on the couch, giving him a sympathetic look. �I
expect that youłre fed up with hearing about all that, especially as you
actually work here. I mean, if anyone would have been likely to see something,
it would be you, wouldnłt it, or one of the other crew?"

�That would make sense," he said.

�Well, the fact that you obviously havenłt ... there canłt
be anything to it, can there?" I crossed my arms and smiled triumphantly. �Wait
until I tell my friends how silly theyłve been."

�Perhaps," he began, and then fell silent.

* * * * *

I knew that I had him then; that it would be only a matter
of time before Tayang felt compelled to show me evidence. My instincts proved
correct, for within a day of my discharge from the sick bay (the eunuch was
still under observation, but making satisfactory progress), the steward
contrived an excuse to visit my quarters. He had a clean towel draped over his
arm, as if he had come to replace the one in my bathroom.

�I brought you a fresh one. I think the cleaning section
missed this corridor this morning."

�They didnłt, but I appreciate the gesture all the same."

He lingered, as if he had something to get off his chest but
was struggling to find the right words.

�Mr. Tayang?" I pressed.

�What we were talking about before."

�Yes?" I inquired mildly.

�Well, youłre wrong." He said it nicely enough, but the defiance
in his words was clear. �The phantoms exist. I may not have seen anything with
my own eyes, but Iłve seen data thatłs just as convincing."

�I doubt it."

�I can show you easily enough." He must have been intending
to say those words from the moment he had decided to come to my cabin, yet now
that he had spoken them, his regret was immediate.

�Really?"

�I shouldnłt have."

�Tell me," I said forcefully. �Whatever this is, I want to
see it."

�It means your friends were right; and you were wrong."

�Then I need to know that."

Tayang gave me a warning look. �Itłll change the way you
think. At the moment, you have the luxury of not believing in the phantoms. I
know that therełs something out there that we donłt understand, something that
doesnłt belong. Are you sure you want that burden?"

�If you can handle it, I think I can. What do I have to do?"

�I need to show you something. But I canłt do it now. Later,
during the night shift, itłll be quieter."

�Iłll be ready," I said, nodding eagerly.

* * * * *

Close to midnight, Tayang came for me. Remembering to keep
in character for someone half convinced she was the target of an assassin, I
did not open up immediately.

�Yes?"

�Itłs me, Tayang."

I cracked open the door. �Iłm ready."

He looked me up and down. �Take off those clothes, please."

�Iłm sorry?"

He glanced away, blushing. �What I mean is, wear as much or
as little as you would wear for bed." I noticed that he had a jacket draped
over his arm, as if he was ready to put it around my shoulders. �Should we meet
someone, and should questions be asked, you will explain that I found you
sleepwalking, and that Iłm taking you back to your cabin via the most discrete
route I can think of, so you donłt embarrass yourself in front of any other
passengers."

�I see. Youłve given this some thought, havenłt you?"

�You arenłt the first skeptical passenger, Miss Bocheng." I
closed the door and disrobed, then put on thin silk trousers and an equally
thin silk blouse, the one scarlet and the other electric yellow, with a design
of small blue wolves. I untied my hair and messed it to suggest someone only
recently roused from the bed.

Outside, as was customary during the night shift of the BKłs
operations, the corridor lights were dimmed to a sleepy amber. The bars, restaurants,
and gaming rooms were closed. The public lounges were deserted and silent, save
for the scurrying mouselike cleaning robots that always emerged after the
people had gone away. Tayang chose his route well, for we did not bump into any
other passengers or crew.

�This is the library," he said, when we had arrived in a
small, red-lit room, set with shelves, screens, and movable chairs. �No one
uses it muchitłs not exactly a high priority for most of our passengers. Theyłd
rather drink away the voyage with Temujin airag."

�Are we allowed here?"

�Well, technically therełd be nothing to stop you visiting
this room during normal ship hours. But during normal ship hours, I wouldnłt be
able to show you what Iłm about to." He was trying to be nonchalant about the
whole adventure, but his nervousnous was like a boy on a dare. �But donłt
worry, we wonłt get into trouble."

�How is a library going to change my mind about the phantoms?"

�Let me show you." He ushered me to one of the terminals,
swinging out a pair of hinged stools for us to sit on. I sat to the left of
him, while Tayang flipped open a dust cover to expose a keyboard. He began to
tap at the keys, causing changes to the hooded data display situated at eye
level. �As it happens, these consoles are connected to the Burkhan Khaldunłs
own computers. You just have to know the right commands."

�Wonłt this show up?"

He shook his head. �Iłm not doing anything that will come to
anyonełs attention. Besides, Iłm perfectly entitled to access this data. The
only thing wrong is you being with me, and if anyone comes down here, wełll
have time to prepare for them, to make it look as if I caught you sleepwalking."
He fell silent for a minute or so, tapping through options, obviously
navigating his way through to the information stored in the computerłs memory
bank. �I just hope the company spooks havenłt got to it already," he murmured. �Every
now and then, someone from Blue Heaven comes aboard and wipes large chunks of
the BKłs memory. They say theyłre just doing routine archiving, clearing space
for more data, but no one believes that. Looks like wełre in time, though. I
didnłt see any spooks nosing around when we were in Gansu: theyłll probably
come aboard next time wełre back." He glanced over his shoulder. �Iłll show it
to you once. Then we go. All right?"

�Whatever you say, Mr. Tayang."

�The BK has cameras, pointed into the direction of flight.
They detect changes in the tunnel geometry and feed that data to the servomotors
driving the stabilizing vanes and yaw dampers, so that they can make
adjustments to smooth out the turbulence. Theyłre also there as an emergency
measure in case we encounter another ship coming the other way, one that isnłt
on schedule or hasnłt got an active transponder. The cameras give us just enough
warning to swerve the BK to one side, to give passing clearance. Itłs bumpy for
the passengers when that happens, but a lot better than a head-on collision at
tunnel speeds."

�I take it the cameras saw something," I said.

Tayang nodded. �This was a couple of trips ago, about
halfway between Gansu and Kuchlug. They only got eight clear frames. Whatever
it was was moving fast, much quicker than one of our ships. The fourth, fifth,
and sixth frames are the sharpest."

�Show me."

He tapped keys. A picture sprang onto the display, all fuzzy
green hues, overlaid with date stamps and other information. It took a moment
before I was sure what I was looking at. There was some kind of pale green
smudge filling half the frame, a random-looking shape like the blind spot one
sees after looking at the sun for too long, and beyond that, a suggestion of
the curving squiggles of the tunnelłs khorkoi patterning, reaching away to
infinity.

I pressed a finger against the smudge. �Thatłs the phantom?"

�This is frame three. It becomes clearer on the next one."
He advanced to the next image and I saw what he meant. The smudge had enlarged,
but also become sharper, with details beginning to emerge. Edges and surfaces,
a hint of organized structure, even if the overall shape was still elusive.

�Next frame," Tayang mouthed.

Now there could be no doubt that the phantom was some kind
of ship, even if it conformed to the pattern of no vessel I had ever seen. It
was sleek and organic-looking, more like a darting squid than the clunky lines
of the BK.

He advanced to the next frame, but-while the image did not become
substantially clearer-the angle changed, so that the three-dimensional
structure of the phantom became more apparent. At the same time, hints of
patterning had begun to emerge: darker green symbols on the side of the hull,
or fuselage, or body, of whatever the thing was.

�Thatłs about as good as it gets," Tayang said.

�Iłm impressed."

�You see these armlike appendages?" he asked, pointing to
part of the image. �Iłm guessing, of course, but I canłt help wondering if they
donłt serve the same function as our stabilization vanes, only in a more
elegant fashion."

�I think you could be right."

�One thing Iłm sure of, though. We didnłt build that ship. Iłm
no expert, Miss Bocheng, but I know what counts as cutting-edge ship design,
and that thing is way beyond it."

�I donłt think anyone would argue with that."

�It wasnłt built by the government, or some mysterious
splinter group of Islamist separatists. In fact, I donłt think it was built by
humans at all. Wełre looking at alien technology, and theyłre using our
Infrastructure system as if they own it. More than that: every now and then you
hear about entire ships and message packets going missing. Theyłre not just
trespassing in our network, theyłre stealing from it as well."

�I can see Blue Heaven would rather this didnłt get out."

Tayang closed the display. �Iłm sorry, but thatłs all I can
show you. Itłs enough, though, isnłt it?"

�More than enough," I said.

Of course, I had my doubts. Tayang could have easily faked
those images, or been the unwitting victim of someone elsełs fakery. But I did
not think that was the case. I had been looking at genuine data, not something
cooked up to scare the tourists.

I was just beginning to plot my next move-how I would get a
copy of the data, and smuggle it back to NHK while I continued with my
investigations in Kuchlug space-when I became aware of a presence behind me.
Tayang must have sensed it, too, for he turned around as I did. Standing in the
doorway to the library was one of the other stewards, an older man whose name I
had yet to learn. I noticed that the sleeves of his uniform were too short for
him.

Wordlessly, he raised a hand. In it glinted the smooth alloy
form of a small, precise weapon: the kind often carried by government spies
such as myself. He shot me; I had a moment to stare at the barb embedded in my
thigh, and then I passed out.

* * * * *

I came around in my cabin, gripped by a vile nausea, a headache
like a slowly closing iron vice, and no conception of how much time had passed
since Tayang and I had been disturbed in the library. Getting out of bedI had
been placed on top of the sheets-I searched the adjoining annex for the eunuch,
before I remembered that he was still in the sick bay. I tried my door and
found that it had been locked from the outside; there was no way for me to
leave my room.

Understand, I did not accept my imprisonment lightly, but understand
also that all my attempts at escape proved futile. I could not even squeeze
through the conduit I had mentioned to the eunuch: such methods succeed in
adventure stories, but not in real life.

Of course, it was desired that I be kept alive. The man who
had shot me could have administered a fatal dose simply by twisting a dial in
the grip of his weapon. He had chosen not to, and it was no accident that food
and water appeared in the roomłs serving hatch at regular intervals. But as to
who had chosen to detain me, I was uninformed.

I could guess, though.

He was the first to see me when the ship docked in Kuchlug
space. He came to my room, accompanied by guards. He was as squat and muscled
as a wrestler, his bare arms fully as thick as my thighs. He wore a leather
jerkin, crisscrossed by thick black belts to which were fastened various
ceremonial weapons and symbols of martial authority. A carefully tended
mustache curled down on either side of his mouth, with a tiny but deliberate
tuft of hair preserved under his lower lip. A stiff leather helmet, long at the
sides and back, covered the rest of his head. The only visible part of his hair
was a blunt, wedge-shaped fringe terminating just above his eyebrows, which
were at once finely drawn, expressive, and deeply quizzical.

Of course, I knew the face.

�Commander Qilian," I said.

�Yes, I get about." His hands were impressively hairy,
scarred and knotted like the roots of a very old tree. He snapped his fingers
at the guards. �Have her brought to the debriefing facility on the Qing Shui
moon. Bring the pony as well." Then he poked one of those fingers under my
chin, lifting it up so that our eyes met. �Give some thought to the particulars
of your story, Miss Bocheng. It may make all the difference."

* * * * *

They took me down to the moon. We landed somewhere and I was
carried through dark, rusting corridors to a windowless holding cell. The floor
rocked with a slow, sickening motion, as if I was on a ship at sea in a high
swell-even though there were no oceans on the Qing Shui moon. They stripped me,
took away my belongings, and gave me prison clothing to wear: a simple
one-piece affair in orange silk. I pretended to be shocked and disoriented, but
I was already summoning my training, recollecting those stratagems I had been
taught to withstand prolonged detention and interrogation. As the guards were
shutting the door on me, I contrived to slip a finger into the crack between
the door and its frame. When the door closed, I yelped in pain and withdrew my
hand with the fingertip squashed and red from the pressure.

I sucked it in my mouth until the pain abated.

�Stupid bitch," someone said.

There was a bunk, a spigot in the wall that dribbled tepid,
piss-colored water, and a hole in the floor, with chipped ceramic sides stained
an unspeakable brown. Light seeped in through a grille in the door. Neither
willing nor able to sleep, I lay on the bunk and shivered. Presently-no more
than two or three hours after my arrivalmen came to take me down the corridor,
to an interrogation room.

It is not necessary to document all that happened-the many weeks
that it took for me to permit them to peel back the layers of identity I had
wrapped around myself, each time thinking that the victory was theirs.

Suffice it to say that most of what they did to me involved
electricity and chemicals in varying combinations. They did break two fingers
on my left hand, including the one I had trapped in the door, but when they
pulled out one of my fingernails, it was from the other hand, not the one I had
hurt. They beat me around, broke my teeth, extinguished Yesugei brand
cigarettes on my skin, but only cut me superficially, to demonstrate that they
could and would. Then they had other men come in to sterilize and dress the
wounds. Once in a while, a gowned doctor with a Slavic face came to the cell
and gave me a thorough, probing medical examination.

It was during one of the doctorłs examinations that I
elected to reveal myself as a government spy. As the doctor was examining me, I
allowed my hairstiff and greasy with dirtto fall away from the nape of my
neck. I knew instantly that he had taken the bait. I felt his fingers press
into the area around the subcutaneous device, feeling for the hard-edged
component lodged under the skin.

�What is this?"

�What is what?" I asked, all innocence.

�Therełs something under your skin."

They took me back to the interrogation room. My hair was
shaved and my neck swabbed. The Slavic doctor dithered over the medical tools
on the shelves until he found the bundle he wanted. He brought the instruments
onto the table, unrolling the towel so that I could see what lay in store for
me. When he was done, the implant was placed on a piece of clean towel in front
of me. It was bloodied, with bits of whitish flesh still attached to its
feelerlike input probes.

�Looks like government," someone said.

I did not admit to it immediately; that would have made them
rightfully suspicious. It was a matter of judging the moment, making my
confession appear natural, rather than a scripted event.

In hindsight, I wish that I had arranged my confession
sooner.

I was brought to a different room. There was a window in the
wall, before which I was encouraged to sit. A clamp was fitted around my eyes
so that I could not look away. The doctor dripped some agent into my eyes that
had the effect of paralyzing the lids, preventing me from blinking. When the
lights came on in the room on the other side of the window, I found myself
looking at Goyo.

He was upside down, suspended in a sling, rotated on his
back in the manner that horses are prepared for veterinary work. The sling was
supported from a heavy white framework mounted on trolley wheels. Goyołs legs
had been bound together in pairs using thick adhesive material. Even his head
and neck had been braced into position using cushioned supports and clamps. A
leathery girth strap enclosed his waist, preventing him from thrashing around.
His abdominal region, between fore and hind limbs, had been shaved to the skin.
A white sheet, not much larger than a towel, had been draped over part of that
shaven area. There was a red stain in the middle of the sheet, where it formed
a depression.

Goyołs eye, the one that I could see, was white and wild and
brimming with fear.

Qilian walked into the room. He was dressed as I remembered
him from our encounter on the BK, except that his hands and forearms were now
gloved. The gloves had a heavy, martial look to them, with curved steel talons
on the ends of the fingers. He stopped next to Goyo, one hand resting on the
frame, the other stroking my ponyłs neck, as if he sought to placate him. When
he spoke, his voice came through a microphone.

�We think we know who you are, but some corroboration would
be welcome. What is your operational code name? To which section are you
assigned? Are you one of the Thirteen?"

My mouth had turned dry. I said nothing.

�Very well," Qilian continued, as if he had expected as
much. He reached over and whisked the white sheet away from Goyołs abdomen.
There was a wound there, a red sucking hole wide enough to plunge a fist
through.

�No," I said, trying to break free of the straps that bound
me to the chair.

�Before you arrived," Qilian said, �certain surgical preparations
were made. A number of ribs have already been removed. They can be put back, of
course, but their absence now means that there is an unobstructed path through
to your ponyłs heart."

With his right hand, he reached into the wound. He frowned,
concentrating on the task. He delved in slowly, cautiously. Goyo responded by
thrashing against his restraints, but it was to no more avail than my own efforts.
In a short while, Qilianłs entire fist was hidden. He pushed deeper,
encountering resistance. Now the fist and fully half of his forearm were gone.
He adjusted his posture, leaning in so that his chest was braced against Goyołs
shoulder. He pushed deeper, until only the top extremity of the glove remained
visible.

�I am touching his beating heart now," Qilian said, looking
directly at me. �Hełs a strong one, no doubt about that. A fine pony, from good
Mongol stock. But I am stronger, at least when I have my hand on his heart. You
donłt think I can stop it beating? I assure you I can. Would you like to see?"
The expression on his face altered to one of concentrated effort, little veins
bulging at the side of his temple. Goyo thrashed with renewed energy. �Yes, he
feels it now. He doesnłt know whatłs happening, but a billion years of dumb
evolution tells him somethingłs not right. I donłt doubt that the pain is
excruciating, at least in animal terms. Would you like me to stop?"

The words spilled out, feeling like a genuine confession. �I
am Yellow Dog. I am a government operative, one of the Thirteen."

�Yes, we thought you were Yellow Dog. We have the
non-official cover list for all of the Thirteen, and we know that Ariunaa
Bocheng is a name youłve used before, when posing as a journalist." He broke
off, took a deep breath, and seemed to redouble his efforts. �But itłs good to
get it from the horsełs mouth, so to speak."

�Stop now."

�Too late. Iłve already started."

�You said youłd stop," I replied, screaming out the words. �You
promised youłd stop!"

�I said nothing of the sort. I said the ribs could be put
back. That remains the case."

In an instant, Goyo stopped thrashing. His eye was still
open, but all of a sudden there was nothing behind it.

* * * * *

Several weeks later-I could not say precisely how
many-Qilian sat opposite me with his big hairy hands clasped in silent contemplation.
The documents on his desk were kept in place by grisly paperweights: little
plinth-mounted bones and bottled, shrunken things in vinegary solution. There
were swords and ceremonial knives on the wall, framing a familiar reproduction
watercolor showing the landing of the invasion fleet on Japanese soil.

�You were good," he said eventually. �Iłll give you that. My
men genuinely thought theyłd hit bottom when they got you to confess to being
the journalist. It was a surprise to all concerned when that identity turned
out to be a cover."

�Iłm glad I provided you with some amusement," I said.

�If it hadnłt been for that implant, we might never have
known. Your people really should give some thought into making those things
less detectable."

�My people?" I asked. �The last time I checked, we were all
working for the same government."

�I donłt doubt thatłs how it feels in New High Karakorum.
Out here, itłs a different story. In case you hadnłt realized, this is a special
administrative volume. Itłs part of the empire, but only in a very tenuous,
politically ambiguous sense. They want what we can give themraw materials,
cheaply synthesized chemicals, mass-produced low-bulk consumer goods-but they
donłt want to think too hard about what we have to do to keep that river of
commerce flowing. Laws have to be bent here, because otherwise therełd be no
here. Look out the window, Yellow Dog."

Visible through the partially shuttered window of his
office, a good four or five li below, was a brutal, wintery landscape of
stained ice, reaching all the way to the horizon. The sky was a rose pink,
shading to midnight blue at the top of the window. Cutting through it along a
diagonal was the twinkling, sicklelike curve of a planetary ring system.
Canyon-deep fissures cracked the surface, leaking feathery quills of
yellow-white steam into the thin, poisonous atmosphere of that windswept sky.
Here and there, an elbow of splintered rock broke the surface. There were no
fixed communities on the moon. Instead, immense spiderlike platforms, mounted
on six or eight intricate jointed legs, picked their way across the
ever-shifting terrain in awesome slow motion. The platforms varied in size, but
at the very least each supported a cluster of squat civic buildings, factories,
refineries, and spacecraft handling facilities. Some of the platforms had
deployed drilling rigs or cables into the fissures, sucking chemical
nourishment from under the icy crust. A number were connected together by long,
dangling wires, along which I made out the tiny, suspended forms of cable cars,
moving from platform to platform.

�Itłs very pretty," I said.

�Itłs a hellhole, frankly. Only three planets in the entire
volume are even remotely amenable to terraforming, and not one of those three
is on track for completion inside five hundred years. Wełll be lucky if any of
them are done before the Founderłs two thousandth anniversary, let alone the
thousandth. Most of the eighty million people under my stewardship live in
domes and tunnels, with only a few aids of soil or glass between them and a
horrible, choking death." He unclasped his hands in order to run a finger
across one of his desktop knickknacks. �Itłs not much of an existence, truth be
told. But that doesnłt mean we donłt have an economy that needs fueling. We
have jobs. We have vacancies for skilled labor. Machines do our drilling, but
the machines need to be fixed and programmed by people, down at the cutting
face. We pay well, for those prepared to work for us."

�And you come down hard on those who displease you."

�Local solutions to local problems, thatłs our mantra. You
wouldnłt understand, cozied up in the middle of the empire. You pushed the
dissidents and troublemakers out to the edge and left us to worry about them."
He tapped a finger against his desk. �Nestorian Christians, Buddhists,
Islamists. Itłs a thousand years since we crushed them, and they still havenłt
got over it. Barely a week goes by without some regressive, fundamentalist
element stirring up trouble, whether itłs sabotage of one of our industrial
facilities or a terrorist attack against the citizenship. And yet you sit there
in New High Karakorum and shake your heads in disgust when we have the temerity
to implement even the mildest security measures."

�I wouldnłt call mass arrests, show trials, and public executions
ęmild,ł" I said tartly.

�Then try living here."

�I get the impression thatłs not really an option. Unless
you mean living in prison, for the rest of my life, or until NHK sends an
extraction team."

Qilian made a pained expression. �Letłs be clear. You arenłt
my enemy. Quite the contrary. You are now an honored guest of the Kuchlug
special administrative volume. I regret what happened earlier, but if youłd
admitted your true identity, none of that would have been necessary." He folded
his arms behind his neck and leaned back in his chair with a creak of leather. �Wełve
got off on the wrong footing here, you and I. But how are we supposed to feel
when the empire sends undercover agents snooping into our territory? And not
only that, but agents who persist in asking such puzzling questions?" He looked
at me with sudden, sharp intensity, as if my entire future hung on my response
to what he was about to say. �Just what is it about the phantoms that interests
you so much, Yellow Dog?"

�Why should you worry about my interest in a phenomenon that
doesnłt exist?" I countered.

�Do you believe that, after what you saw on the Burkhan Khaldun?"

�I can only report what I saw. It would not be for me to
make inferences."

�But still."

�Why are we discussing this, Commander Qilian?"

�Because Iłm intrigued. Our perception was that NHK probably
knew a lot more about the phenomenon than we did. Your arrival suggests
otherwise. They sent you on an intelligence-gathering mission, and the thrust
of your inquiry indicates that you are at least as much in the dark as we are,
if not more so."

�I canłt speak for my superiors."

�No, you canłt. But it seems unlikely that theyłd have
risked sending a valued asset into a trouble spot like Kuchlug without very
good reason. Which, needless to say, is deeply alarming. We thought the core
had the matter under control. Clearly, they donłt. Which only makes the whole
issue of the phantoms even more vexed and troubling."

�What do you know?"

He laughed. �You think Iłm going to tell you, just like
that?"

�Youłve as much as admitted that this goes beyond any petty
political differences that might exist between NHK and Kuchlug. Let me report
back to my superiors. Iłll obtain their guarantee that therełll be a two-way
traffic in intelligence." I nodded firmly. �Yes, we misjudged this one. I
should never have come under deep cover. But we were anxious not to undermine
your confidence in us by revealing the depth of our ignorance on the
phenomenon. I assure you that in the future everything will be aboveboard and
transparent. We can set up a bilateral investigative team, pooling the best
experts from here and back home."

�That easy, eh? We just shake hands and put it all behind
us? The deception on your part, the torture on ours?"

I shrugged. �You had your methods. I had mine."

Qilian smiled slightly. �Therełs something you need to know.
Two days agonot long after we dug that thing out of youwe did in fact send a
communique to NHK. We informed them that one of their agents was now in our
safekeeping, that she was being more than helpful in answering our questions,
and that we would be happy to return her at the earliest opportunity."

�Go on."

�They told us that there was no such agent. They denied knowledge
of either Ariunaa Bocheng or an operative named Yellow Dog. They made no
demands for you to be returned, although they did say that if you were handed
over, youłd be of ęinterestł to them. Do you know what this means?" When I
refrained from answeringthough I knew precisely what it meantQilian continued.
�Youłve been disavowed, Yellow Dog. Left out in he cold, like a starving
mongrel."

* * * * *

His men came for me again, several days later. I was taken
to a pressurized boarding platform, a spindly structure cantilevered out from
the side of the government building. A cable car was waiting, a dull gray,
bulbous-ended cylinder swaying gently against its restraints. The guards pushed
me aboard, then slammed the airtight door, before turning a massive wheel to
lock it shut. Qilian was already aboard the car, sitting in a dimpled leather
chair with one leg crossed over the other. He wore huge fur-lined boots
equipped with vicious spurs.

�A little trip, I thought," he said, by way of welcome,
indicating the vacant seat opposite his.

The cable car lurched into motion. After reaching the limit
of the boarding area, it passed through a long glass airlock and then dropped
sickeningly, plunging down so far that it descended under the lowest level of
buildings and factory structures perched on the platform. One of the huge,
skeletal legs was rising toward us, the foot raised as if it intended to stomp
down on the fragile little cable car. Yet just when it seemed we were doomed,
the car began to climb again, creaking and swaying. Qilian was looking at something
through a pair of tiny binoculars, some piece of equipment-a probe or drill
head, I presumed-being winched up from the surface into the underside of the
platform.

�Is there a point to this journey?" I asked.

He lowered the binoculars and returned them to a leather
case on his belt. �Very much so. What I will show you constitutes a kind of
test. I would advise you to be on your guard against the obvious."

The cable car slid across the fractured landscape of the
moon, traversing dizzyingly wide crevasses, dodging geysers, skimming past
tilted rockfaces that seemed on the verge of toppling over at any moment. We
rose and descended several times, on each occasion passing over one of the
walking platforms. Now and then, there was an interruption while we were
switched to a different line, before once more plunging down toward the
surface. After more than half an hour of this-just when my stomach was beginning
to settle into the rhythm-we came to a definite halt on what was in all
respects just another boarding platform, attended by a familiar retinue of
guards and technical functionaries. Qilian and I disembarked, with his spurs
clicking against the cleated metal flooring. With a company of guards for
escort, we walked into the interior of the platformłs largest building. The
entire place had an oily ambiance, rumbling with the vibration of distant
drilling processes.

�Itłs a cover," Qilian said, as if he had read my thoughts. �We
keep the machines turning, but this is the one platform that doesnłt have a
useful production yield. Itłs a study facility instead."

�For studying what?"

�Whatever we manage to recover, basically."

Deep in the bowels of the platform, at a level that must
have meant they were only just above the underside, was a huge holding tank
that-so Qilian informed me-was designed to contain the unrefined liquid slurry
that would ordinarily have been pumped up from under the ice. In this platform,
the tank had been drained and equipped with power and lighting. The entire
space had been partitioned into about a dozen ceilingless rooms, each of which
appeared to contain a collection of garbage, arranged within the cells of a
printed grid laid out on the floor. Some of the cells held sizable clusters of
junk; others were empty. Benches arranged around the edges of the cells were
piled with bits of twinkly rubbish, along with an impressive array of analysis
tools and recording devices.

It looked as if it should have been a literal hive of
activity, but the entire place was deserted.

�You want to tell me what Iłm looking at here?" Qilian indicated
a ladder. �Go down and take a look for yourself. Examine anything that takes
your fancy. Use any tools you feel like. Look in the notebooks and data files.
Rummage. Break stuff. You wonłt be punished if you do."

�This is phantom technology, isnłt it? Youłve recovered
pieces of alien ships." I said this in a kind of awed whisper, as if I hardly
dared believe it myself.

�Draw whatever conclusion you see fit. I shall be intensely
interested in what you have to say."

I started down the ladder. I had known from the moment I saw
the relics that I would be unable to resist. �How long have I got? Before Iłm
judged to have failed this test, or whatever it is."

�Take your time," he said, smiling. �But donłt take too
much."

There seemed little point agonizing over which room to start
with, assuming I had the time to examine more than one. The one I chose had the
usual arrangement of grid, junk, and equipment benches. Lights burned from a
rack suspended overhead. I stepped into the grid, striding over blank squares
until she arrived at a promising little clump of mangled parts, some of them
glittery, some of them charred to near blackness. Gingerly, I picked up one of
the bits. It was a curving section of metallic foil, ragged along one edge,
much lighter and stiffer than I felt it had any right to be. I tested the edge
against a finger and drew a bead of blood. No markings or detail of any kind. I
placed it back down on the grid and examined another item. Heavier this time,
solid in my hands, like a piece of good carved wood. Flowing, scroll-like green
patterning on one convex surface: a suggestion of script, or a fragmented part
of some script, in a language I did not recognize. I returned it to the grid
and picked up a jagged, bifurcated thing like a very unwieldy sword or
spearhead, formed in some metallic red material that appeared mirror-smooth and
untarnished. In my hands, the thing had an unsettling buzzing quality, as if
there was still something going on inside it. I picked up another object: a
dented blue-green box, embossed with dense geometric patterns, cross-woven into
one another in a manner that made my head hurt. The lid of the box opened to
reveal six egglike white ovals, packed into spongy black material. There were
six distinct spiral symbols painted onto the ovals, in another language that I
did not recognize.

I perused more objects in the grid, then moved to the
benches, where more items were laid out for inspection.

I moved into one of the adjoining rooms. There was something
different about the degree of organization this time. The grid was the same,
but the objects in it had been sorted into rough groupings. In one corner cell
was a pile of spiky, metallic red pieces that obviously had something in common
with the swordlike object I had examined in the other room. In another lay a
cluster of dense, curved pieces with fragmented green patterning on each. Each
occupied cell held a similar collection of vaguely related objects.

I examined another room, but soon felt that I had seen
enough to form a ready opinion. The various categories of relic clearly had
little in common. If they had all originated from the phantoms-either wrecked
or damaged or attacked as they passed through the Infrastructure-then there was
only one conclusion to be drawn. There was more than one type of phantom,
which, in turn, meant there was more than one kind of alien.

We were not just dealing with one form of intruder. Judging
by the number of filled cells, there were dozens-many dozens-of different alien
technologies at play.

I felt the hairs on the back of my neck bristle. Our probes
and instruments had swept the galaxy clean and still we had found no hint of
anyone else out there. But these rooms said otherwise. Somehow or other, we had
managed to miss the evidence of numerous other galaxy-faring civilizations, all
of which were at least as technologically advanced as the Mongol Expansion.

Other empires, somehow coexisting with ours!

I was ready to return to Qilian, but, at the last moment, as
I prepared to ascend the ladder, something held me back. It had all been too
simple. Anyone with a pair of eyes in their head would have arrived at the same
conclusion as I had. Qilian had said it would be a test, and that I must pass
it.

It had been too easy so far.

Therefore, I must have missed something.

When we were back on the cable car, nosing down to the geysering
surface, Qilian stroked a finger against his chin and watched me with an
intense, snakelike fascination.

�You returned to the rooms."

�Yes."

�Something made you go back, when it looked as if youłd already
finished."

�It wouldnłt have been in my interests to fail you."

There was a gleam in his eye. �So what was it, Yellow Dog,
that made you hesitate?"

�A feeling that Iłd missed something. The obvious inference
was that the collection implied the presence of more than one intruding
culture, but you didnłt need me to tell you that."

�No," he acknowledged.

�So there had to be something else. I didnłt know what. But
when I went back into the second room, something flashed through my mind. I
knew I had seen something in there before, even if it had been in a completely
different context."

I could not tell if he was pleased or disappointed. �Continue."

�The green markings on some of the relics. They meant nothing
to me at first, but I suppose my subconscious must have picked up on something
even then. They were fragments of something larger, which Iłd seen before."

�Which was?"

�Arabic writing," I told him.

�Many people would be surprised to hear there was such a
thing."

�If they knew their history, theyłd know that the Arabs had
a written language. An elegant one, too. Itłs just that most people outside of
academic departments wonłt have ever seen it, any more than they know what
Japanese or the Roman alphabet looks like."

�But you, on the other hand"

�In my work for the khanate, I was obliged to compile dossiers
on dissident elements within the empire. Some of the Islamist factions still
use a form of Arabic for internal communications."

He sniffed through his nostrils, looking at me with his
penetrating blue eyes. The cable car creaked and swayed. �It took my analysis
experts eight months to recognize that that lettering had a human origin. The
test is over; you have passed. But would you care to speculate on the meaning
of your observation? Why are we finding Arabic on phantom relics?"

�I donłt know."

�But indulge me."

�It can only mean that therełs an Islamist faction out there
that we donłt know about. A group with independent space-faring capability, the
means to use the Infrastructure despite all the access restrictions already in
place."

�And the other relics? Where do they fit in?"

�I donłt know."

�If I told you that, in addition to items we consider to be
of unambiguously alien origin, wełd also found scraps of other vanished or
obscure languagesor at least, scripts and symbols connected to them-what would
you say?"

I admitted that I had no explanation for how such a thing
might be possible. It was one thing to allow the existence of a secret enclave
of technologically advanced Islamists, however improbable that might have been.
It was quite another to posit the existence of many such enclaves, each
preserving some vanished or atrophied branch of human culture.

�Here is whatłs going to happen." He spoke the words as if
there could be no possibility of dissent on my behalf. �As has already been
made clear, your old life is over, utterly and finally. But there is still much
that you can do to serve the will of Heaven. The khanate has only now taken a
real interest in the phantoms, whereas we have been alert to the phenomenon for
many years. If you care about the security of the empire, you will see the
sense in working with Kuchlug."

�You mean, join the team analyzing those relics?"

�As a matter of fact, I want you to lead it." He smiled; I
could not tell if the idea had just occurred to him, or whether it had always
been at the back of his mind. �Youłve already demonstrated the acuteness of
your observations. I have no doubt that you will continue to uncover truths
that the existing team has overlooked."

�I canłt just ... take over, like that."

He looked taken aback. �Why ever not?"

�A few days ago, I was your prisoner," I said. �Not long
before that, you were torturing me. Theyłve no reason to suddenly start
trusting me, just on your say-so."

�Youłre wrong about that," he said, fingering one of the
knives strapped across his chest. �Theyłll trust who I tell them to trust,
absolutely and unquestioningly."

�Why?" I asked.

�Because thatłs how we do things around here."

* * * * *

So it was. I joined Qilianłs investigative team, immersing myself
in the treasure trove of data and relics his people had pieced together in my
absence. There was, understandably, a degree of reluctance to accept my
authority. But Qilian dealt with that in the expected manner, and slowly, those
around me came to a pragmatic understanding that it was either work with me or
suffer the consequences.

Relics and fragments continued to fall into our hands. Sometimes
the ships that intruded into the Infrastructure were damaged, as if the passage
into our territory had been a violent one. Often, the subsequent encounter with
one of our ships was enough to shake them to pieces, or at the very least
dislodge major components. The majority of these shards vanished without a
trace into the implacable machinery of the Infrastructure. Even if the khorkoi
apparatus was beginning to fail, it was still more than capable of attending to
the garbage left behind by its users. But occasionally, pieces lingered in the
system (as if the walls had indigestion?), waiting to be swept up by Qilianłs
ships, and eventually brought home to this moon.

As often as not, though, it was a trivial matter to classify
the consignments, requiring only a glance at their contents. The work became so
routine, in fact-and the quantity of consignments so high-that eventually I had
no choice but to take a step back from hands-on analysis. I assembled six teams
and let them get on with it, requiring that they report back to me only when
they had something of note: a new empire, or something odd from one of those we
already knew about.

That was when the golden egg fell into our hands. It was in
the seventh month of my service under Qilian, and I immediately knew that it
originated from a culture not yet known to us. Perhaps it was a ship, or part
of one. The outer hull was almost entirely covered in a quilt of golden
platelets, overlapping in the manner of fish scales. The only parts not covered
by the platelets were the dark apertures of sensors and thruster ports, and a
small, eye-shaped area on one side of the teardrop that we quickly identified
as a door.

Fearing that it might damage the other relics if it exploded
under our examinations, I ordered that the analysis of the egg take place in a
different part of the mining structure. Soon, though, my concern shifted to the
welfare of the eggłs occupants. We knew that there were beings inside it, even
if we could not be sure if they were human. Scans had illuminated ghostly
structures inside the hull: the intestinal complexity of propulsion subsystems,
fuel lines, and tanks packed ingeniously tight, the fatty tissue of insulating
layers, the bony divisions of armored partitions, the cartilaginous detailing
of furniture and life-support equipment. There were even ranks of couches, with
eight crew still reclining in them. Dead or in suspended animation, it was
impossible to tell. All we could see was their bones, a suggestion of humanoid
skeletons, and there was no movement of those bones to suggest respiration.

We got the door open easily enough. It was somewhat like
breaking into a safe, but once we had worked out the underlying mechanismand
the curiously alien logic that underpinned its design-it presented no
insurmountable difficulties. Gratifyingly, there was only a mild gust of
equalizing pressure when the door hinged wide, and none of the sensors arrayed
around the egg detected any harmful gases. As far as we could tell, it was
filled with an oxygen-nitrogen mix only slightly different from that aboard our
own ships.

�What now?" Qilian asked, fingering the patch of hair
beneath his lip.

�Wełll send machines aboard now," I replied. �Just to be
safe, in case there are any booby traps inside."

He placed a heavy, thick-fingered hand on my shoulder. �What
say we skip the machines and just take a look inside ourselves?" His tone was
playful. �Not afraid, are we, Yellow Dog?"

�Of course not," I answered.

�Therełs no need to be. Iłll go in first, just in case there
are surprises."

We walked across the floor, through the cordon of sensors,
to the base of the attenuated metal staircase that led to the open door. The
robots scuttled out of the way. My staff exchanged concerned glances, aware
that we were deviating from a protocol we had spent weeks thrashing out to the
last detail. I waved down their qualms.

Inside, as we already knew from the scans, the egg was compartmented
into several small chambers, with the crew in the middle section. The rear part
contained most of the propulsion and life-support equipment. Up front, in the
sharp end, was what appeared to be a kind of pressurized cargo space. The egg
still had power, judging by the presence of interior lighting, although the air
aboard it was very cold and still. It was exceedingly cramped, requiring me to
duck and Qilian to stoop almost double. To pass from one compartment to the
next, we had to crawl on our hands and knees through doors that were barely
large enough for children. The external door was larger than the others,
presumably because it had to admit a crew member wearing a spacesuit or some
other encumbrance.

Qilian was the first to see the occupants. I was only a few
seconds behind him, but those seconds stretched to years as I heard his words.

�They are aliens after all, Yellow Dog. Strapped in their
seats like little pale monkeys. I can see why we thought they might be human
... but theyłre not, not at all. So much for the theory that every empire must
represent a human enclave, no matter how incomprehensible the artifacts or
script."

�That was never my theory, sir. But itłs good to have it dismissed."

�They have masks on. I can see their faces, but Iłd like a
better look."

Still on my knees, I said, �Be careful, sir."

�Theyłre dead, Yellow Dog. Stiff and cold as mummies."

By the time I reached Qilian, he had removed one of the intricate
masks from the face of his chosen alien. In his hands, it was tiny, like a
delicate accessory belonging to a doll. He put it down carefully, placing it on
the creaturełs lap. The alien was dressed in a quilted gold uniform,
cross-buckled into the couch. It was the size of an eight-year-old child, but
greatly skinnier in build, its torso and limbs elongated to the point where it
resembled a smaller creature that had been stretched. Though its hands were
gloved, the layout of the long, dainty-looking digits corresponded exactly to
my own: four fingers and an opposed thumb, though each of the digits was
uncommonly slender, such that I feared they might snap if we attempted to
remove the gloves. Its head-the only part of it not covered by the suit-was
delicate and rather beautiful, with huge, dark eyes set in patches of black
fur. Its nose and mouth formed one snoutlike feature, suggestive of a dog or
cat. It had sleek, intricate ears, running back along the sides of its head.
Save for the eye patches, and a black nose at the tip of the snout, its skin
varied between a pale buff or off-white.

The alienłs hands rested on a pair of small control consoles
hinged to the sides of the couch; the consoles were flat surfaces embossed with
golden ridges and studs, devoid of markings. A second console angled down from
the ceiling to form a blank screen at the creaturełs eye level. The other seven
occupants all had similar amenities. There were no windows, and no controls or
readouts in the orthodox sense. The aliens were all alike, with nothing on
their uniforms to indicate rank or function. From what little I could see of
their faces, the other seven were identical to the one we had unmasked.

I suppose I should have felt awed: here I was, privileged to
be one of the first two people in history to set eyes on true aliens. Instead,
all I felt was a kind of creeping sadness, and a tawdry, unsettling feeling
that I had no business in this place of death.

�Iłve seen these things before," Qilian said, a note of
disbelief in his words.

�These aliens, sir? But this is the first time wełve seen
them."

�I donłt mean that. I mean, isnłt there something about them
that reminds you of something?"

�Something of what, sir?"

He ignored my question. �I also want this vehicle stripped
down to the last bolt, or whatever it is that holds it together. If we can hack
into its navigation system, find an Infrastructure map, we may be able to work
out where they came from, and how the hell wełve missed them until now."

I looked at the embossed gold console and wondered what our
chances were of hacking into anything, let alone the navigation system.

�And the aliens, sir? What should we do with them?"

�Cut them up. Find out what makes them tick." Almost as an
afterthought, he added, �Of course, make sure theyłre dead first."

The aliens were not the greatest surprise contained in the
egg, but we did not realize that until the autopsy was under way. Qilian and I
observed the procedure from a viewing gallery, looking down on the splayed and
dissected creature. With great care, bits of it were being removed and placed
on sterile metal trays. The interior organs were dry and husklike, reinforcing
the view that the aliens were in a state of mummification: perhaps (we
speculated) some kind of suspended animation to be used in emergency situations.
But the function and placement of the organs were all too familiar; we could
have been watching the autopsy of a monkey and not known the difference. The
alien even had a tail, lightly striped in black and white; it had been
contained within an extension of the clothing, tucked back into a cavity within
the seat.

That the creatures must have been intelligent was not open
to dispute, but it was still dismaying, when they were cut up, to learn how
human their brains looked. Small, certainly, yet with clear division of brain
hemispheres, frontal and temporal lobes, and so on. Yet the real shock lay in
the blood. It was not necessarily a surprise to find that it had DNA, or even
that its DNA appeared to share the same protein coding alphabet as ours. There
were (I was led to believe) sound arguments for how that state of affairs might
have arisen independently, due to it being the most efficient possible replicating/coding
system, given the thermodynamic and combinative rules of carbon-based
biochemistry. That was all well and good. But it entirely failed to explain
what they found when they compared the alienłs chromosomes to ours. More on a
whim than anything else, they had tested the alien blood with human-specific
probes and found mat chromosomes 1 and 3 of the alien were homeologous to human
chromosomes 3, 9, 14, and 21. There were also unexpectedly strong signals in
the centromeric regions of the alien chromosomes when probed for human
chromosomes 7 and 19. In other words, the alien DNA was not merely similar to
ours; it was shockingly, confoundingly, alike.

The only possible explanation was that we were related.

Qilian and I were trying to work out the ramifications of
this when news came in from the team examining the pod. Uuganmy deputycame
scuttling into the autopsy viewing room, rubbing sweaty hands together. �Wełve
found something," he said, almost tongue-tied with excitement.

Qilian showed him the hot-off-the-press summary from the genetics
analysis. �So have we. Those aliens arenłt alien. They came from the same planet
we did. I thought they looked like lemurs. Thatłs because they are.ł"

Uugan had as much trouble dealing with that as we did. I
could almost hear the gears meshing in his brain, working through the
possibilities. �Aliens must have uplifted lemur stock in the deep past, using
genetic engineering to turn them into intelligent, tool-using beings." He
raised a finger. �Or, other aliens spread the same genetic material on more
than one world. If that were the case, these lemurs need not be from Greater
Mongolia after all."

�What news do you have for us?" Qilian asked, smiling
slightly at Uuganłs wild theorizing.

�Come to the egg, please. It will be easier if I show you."

We hastened after Uugan, both of us refraining from any speculation
as to what he might have found. As it happened, I do not think either of us
would have guessed correctly.

In the sharp end of the egg, the investigators had uncovered
a haul of cargo, much of which had now been removed and laid out on the floor
for inspection. I glanced at some of the items as we completed the walk to the
pod, recognizing bits and pieces from some of the other cultures we already
knew about. Here was a branching, sharp-tipped metallic red thing, like an
instrument for impaling. Here was a complexly manufactured casket that opened
to reveal ranks of nested white eggs, hard as porcelain. Here was a curving
section of razor-sharp foil, polished to an impossible luster. Dozens more
relics from dozens of other known empires, and still dozens more that
represented empires of which we knew nothing.

�Theyłve been collecting things, just like us," I said.

�Including this," Uugan said, drawing my attention to the object
that now stood at the base of the egg.

It was the size and shape of a large urn, golden in
construction, surfaced with bas-relief detailing, with eight curved green windows
set into its upper surface. I peered closer and rested a hand against the urnłs
throbbing skin. Through the windows burbled a dark liquid. In the dark liquid,
something pale floated. I made out the knobbed ridge of a spine, a backbone
pressing through flawless skin. It was a person, a human, a man judging by his
musculature, curled into fetal position. I could only see the back of his head:
bald and waxy, scribed with fine white scars. Ridged cables dangled in the
fluid, running toward what I presumed was a breathing apparatus, now hidden.

Qilian looked through one of the other windows. After a lengthy
silence, he straightened himself and nodded. �Do you think he was their
prisoner?"

�No way to tell, short of thawing him and out and seeing
what he has to say on the matter," Uugan said.

�Do what you can," Qilian told Uugan. �I would very, very
much like to speak to this gentleman." Then he leaned in closer, as if what he
was about to say was meant only for Uuganłs ears. �This would be an excellent
time not to make a mistake, if you understand my meaning."

* * * * *

I do not believe that Qilianłs words had any effect on
Uugan; he was either going to succeed or not, and the difference between the
two outcomes depended solely on the nature of the problem, not his degree of
application to the task. As it happened, the man was neither dead nor brain
dead, and his revival proved childishly simple. Many weeks were spent in
preparation before the decisive moment, evaluating all known variables. When
the day came, Uuganłs intervention was kept to a minimum: he merely opened the
preservation vat, extracted the man from his fluid cocoon, and (it must be
said, with fastidious care) removed the breathing apparatus. Uugan was standing
by with all the tools of emergency medical intervention at his disposal, but no
such assistance was required. The man simply convulsed, drew in several gulping
breaths, and then settled into a normal respiratory pattern. But he had yet to
open his eyes, or signal any awareness in the change of his surroundings. Scans
measured brain activity, but at a level indicative of coma rather than
consciousness. The same scans also detected a network of microscopic machines
in the manłs brain and much of his wider nervous system. Though we could not
see these implants as clearly as those we had harvested from the lemur, they
were clearly derived from a different technology.

Where had he come from? What did he know of the phantoms?

For weeks, it appeared that we would have no direct answer
to these questions. There was one thing, one clue, but we almost missed it.
Many days after the manłs removal from the vat, one of Uuganłs technicians was
working alone in the laboratory where we kept our new guest. The lights were
dimmed and the technician was using an ultraviolet device to sterilize some
culture dishes. By chance, the technician noticed something glowing on the side
of the manłs neck. It turned out to be a kind of tattoo, a sequence of horizontal
symbols that was invisible except under ultraviolet stimulation.

I was summoned to examine the discovery. What I found was a
word in Arabic, Altair, meaning eagle, and a string of digits, twenty in all,
composed of nine numerical symbols, and the tenth, what the pre-Mongol scholars
called in their dead language theca or circulus or figura nihili, the round
symbol that means, literally, nothing. Our mathematics incorporates no such
entity. I have heard it said that there is something in the Mongol psyche that
abhors the very concept of absence. Our mathematics cannot have served us
badly, for upon its back we have built a five-hundred-year-old galactic
empire-even if the khorkoi gave us the true keys to that kingdom. But I have
also heard it said that our system would have been much less cumbersome had we
adopted that Arabic symbol for nothing.

No matter; it was what the symbols told me that was
important, not what they said about our choice of number system. In optimistic
anticipation that he would eventually learn to speak, and that his tongue would
turn out to be Arabic, I busied myself with preparations. For a provincial
thug, Qilian had a library as comprehensive as anything accessible from NHK. I
retrieved primers on Arabic, most of which were tailored for use by security
operatives hoping to crack Islamist terror cells, and set about trying to
become an interpreter.

But when the man awokewhich was weeks later, by which time
it felt as if I had been studying those primers for half my lifeall my preparations
might as well have been for nothing. He was sitting up in bed, monitored by
machines and watched by hidden guards, when I came into the room. Aside from
the technician who had first noticed his return to consciousness, the man had
seen no other human being since his arrival.

I closed the door and walked to his bedside. I sat down next
to him, adjusting the blue silk folds of my skirt decorously.

�I am Yellow Dog," I told him in Arabic, speaking the words
slowly and carefully. �You are among friends. We want to help you, but we do
not know much about you."

He looked at me blankly. After a few seconds I added: �Can
you understand me?"

His expression and response told me everything I needed to
know. He spoke softly, emitting a string of words that sounded superficially
Arabic without making any sense to me at all. By then I had listened to enough
recordings to know the difference between Arabic and baby talk, and all I was
hearing was gibberish.

�Iłm sorry," I said. �I do not understand you. Perhaps if we
started again, slower this time." I touched a hand to my breast. �I am Yellow
Dog. Who are you?"

He answered me then, and maybe it was his name, but it could
just as easily have been a curt refusal to answer my question. He started
looking agitated, glancing around the room as if it was only now that he was
paying due regard to his surroundings. He fingered the thin cloth of his
blanket and rubbed at the bandage on his arm where a catheter had been
inserted. Once more I told him my name and urged him to respond in kind, but
whatever he said this time was not the same as his first answer.

�Wait," I said, remembering something, a contingency I had
hoped not to have to use. I reached into my satchel and retrieved a printout. I
held the filmy paper before me and read slowly from the adhan, the Muslim call
to prayer.

My pronunciation must still not have been perfect, because I
had to repeat the words three or four times before some flicker of recognition
appeared behind his eyes and he began to echo what I was saying. Yet even as he
spoke the incantation, there was a puzzlement in his voice, as if he could not
quite work out why we should be engaged in this odd parlor game.

�So I was half right," I said, when he had fallen silent
again, waiting for me to say something. �You know something of Islamic culture.
But you do not understand anything I say, except when I speak words that have
not been permitted to change in fifteen centuries, and even then you only just
grasp what I mean to say." I smiled, not in despair, but in rueful
acknowledgment that the journey we had to make would be much longer and more
arduous than I had imagined. Continuing in Mongol, so that he could hear my
tongue, I said: �But at least we have something, my friend, a stone to build
on. Thatłs better than nothing, isnłt it?"

�Do you understand me now?" he asked, in flawless Mongol.

I was astonished, quite unable to speak. Now that I had
grown accustomed to his baldness and pallor, I could better appreciate those
aspects of his face that I had been inclined to overlook before. He had
delicate features, kind and scholarly. I had never been attracted to men in a
sexual sense, and I could not say that I felt any such longing for this man.
But I saw the sadness in his eyes, the homesick flicker that told me he was a
long way from family and friends (such as I have never known, but can easily
imagine), and I knew that I wished to help him.

�You speak our language," I said eventually, as if the fact
of it needed stating.

�It is not a difficult one. What is your name? I caught something
that sounded like ęfilthy hound,ł but that cannot have been correct."

�I was trying to speak Arabic. And failing, obviously. My
name is Yellow Dog. Itłs a code, an operational identifier."

�Therefore not your real name."

�Ariunaa," I said softly. �I use it sometimes. But around
here they call me Yellow Dog."

�Muhunnad," he said, touching his sternum.

�Muhunnad," I repeated. Then: �If you understood my name-or
thought you understood it-why didnłt you answer me until I spoke Mongolian? My
Arabic canłt be that bad, surely."

�You speak Arabic like someone who has only heard a whisper
of a whisper of a whisper. Some of the words are almost recognizable, but they
are like glints of gold in a stream." He offered me a smile, as if it hurt him
to have to criticize. �You were doing your best. But the version of Arabic I
speak is not the one you think you know."

�How many versions are there?"

�More than you realize, evidently." He paused. �I think I
know where I am. We are inside the Mongol Expansion. We were on the same track
until 659, by my calendar."

�What other calendar is there?"

�You count from the death of a warrior-deity; we count from
the flight of the Prophet from Mecca. The year now is 1604 by the Caliphatełs
reckoning; 999 by your own, 2226 by the calendar of the United Nations. Really,
we are quibbling over mere centuries. The Smiling Ones use a much older dating
system, as they must. The"

I interrupted him. �What are you talking about? You are an
emissary from a previously hidden Islamic state, that is all. At some point in
the five hundred years of the Mongol Expansion, your people must have escaped
central control to establish a secret colony, or network of colonies, on the
very edge of the Infrastructure."

�It is not like that, Ariunaa. Not like that at all." Then
he leaned higher on the bed, like a man who had just remembered an urgent
errand. �How exactly did I get here? I had not been tasked to gather
intelligence on the Mongols, not this time around."

�The lemurs," I answered. �We found you with them."

I watched him shudder, as if the memory of something awful
had only just returned. �You mean I was their prisoner, I think." Then he
looked at me curiously. �Your questions puzzle me, Ariunaa. Our data on the
Mongols was never of the highest quality, but we had always taken it for
granted that you understood."

�Understood what?"

�The troubling nature of things," he said.

* * * * *

The cable car pitched down from the boarding platform, ducking
beneath the base of the immense walking platform. After a short while, it came
to an abrupt halt, swaying slightly. Qilian pulled out his binoculars and
focused on a detail under the platform, between the huge, slowly moving
machinery of the skeletal support legs.

�There," he said, passing me the binoculars.

I took them with trembling hands. I had been on my way to
Muhunnad for one of our fruitless but not unpleasant conversational sessions,
when Qilianłs men had diverted me to the cable car platform.

�What am I supposed to be looking at?"

�Press the stud on the side."

I did so. Powerful gyroscopes made the binoculars twist in
my hands, tracking and zooming in on a specific object, a thing hanging down
from the underside like the weight on the end of a plumb line. I recalled now
the thing I had seen the first time Qilian had accompanied me in the cable car,
the thing that he had been examining with the binoculars. I had thought it was
some kind of test probe or drilling gear being winched back into the platform.
I saw now that I had been wrong.

I did need to see his face to know that I was looking at
Muhunnad. He had been stuffed into a primitive spacesuit, blackened by multiple
exposures to scorching heat and corrosive elements. They had him suspended from
his feet, with his head nearest the ground. He was being lowered down toward
one of those outgassing rifts in the surface of the Qing Shui moon.

�You canłt be doing this," I said.

�If there was any other way," Qilian said, in a tone of
utter reasonableness. �But clearly there isnłt. Hełs been dragging his heels,
giving us nothing. Spoke too soon early on, confided too much in you, and chose
to clam up. Obviously, we canłt have that." Qilian opened a walnut-veneered
cabinet and took out a microphone. He clicked it on and tapped it against his
knee before speaking. �Can you hear me, Muhunnad? I hope your view is as
spectacular as ours. I am speaking from the cable car that you may be able to
see to your right. We are about level with your present position, although you
will soon be considerably lower than us."

�No," I said.

Qilian raised a calming hand. He hadnłt even bothered to
have me tied into the seat. �Do you hear that, Muhunnad? You still have an
admirer." Then he said: �Lower the line, please. Take him to half his present
elevation."

�Can you see that hełs told you everything he knows?" I
asked, tossing the binoculars against the floor.

�Hełs told us as little as he could get away with," Qilian
replied, placing a hand over the end of the microphone to muffle his words. �We
could go through the usual rigmarole of conventional interrogation, but I think
this will prove much more effective."

�Wełll learn far more from him alive than dead."

He looked at me pityingly. �You think I donłt know that? Of
course Iłm not going to kill him. But very soonunless he chooses to talk-hełll
be wishing I did."

The winch dropped Muhunnad to within fifteen or twenty aids
of the surface, just above the point where the outgassing material became
opaque.

�I can hear you," a voice said over the cable carłs speaker
system. �But I have told you everything I intend to. Nothing you can do now
will make any difference."

�Wełll see, wonłt we," Qilian said. To me, confidingly, he
said: �By now, he will be in extreme discomfort. You and I are fine, but we
have the benefit of a functioning life-support system. His suit is damaged. At
the moment, his primary concern is extreme cold, but that will not remain the
case for very much longer. As he nears the fissure, it is heat that will begin
to trouble him."

�You can tell the womanAriunaa-that I am sorry it was necessary
to withold information from her," Muhunnad said. �Her kindness was appreciated.
I think she is the only one of you with a heart."

�Therełs no need for me to tell her anything," Qilian
replied. �Shełs listening in. Arenłt you, Yellow Dog?" Somewhat to my surprise,
he passed me the microphone. �Talk to him. Reason with your favorite prisoner,
if you imagine it will help."

�Muhunnad," I said. �Listen to me now. I have no reason to
lie to you. Qilian means what he says. Hełs going to put you through hell until
he finds out what you know. Iłve seen him murder people already, just to get at
the truth."

�I appreciate the concern for my welfare," he said, with a
sincerity that cut me to the bone.

�Lower him to five aids," Qilian said.

* * * * *

Is it necessary to document all that happened to Muhunnad? I
suppose not; the essential thing is that the pain eventually became intolerable
and he began to tell Qilian some of the things my master was desirous of
knowing.

What we learned was: Muhunnad was a pilot, a man surgically
adapted for optimum control of a ship with extreme Infrastructure agility. His
implants were part of the interface system by which he flew his vehicle. It
turned out that Muhunnadłs people had become aware of the breakdown of
Infrastructure integrity many decades ago, long before it had come to our
attention. The difference was, rather than pretending that the problem did not
exist, or entrusting it to a single agent like myself, they had dedicated almost
their entire state apparatus to finding a solution. Think of Qilianłs research,
multiplied by a thousand. There were countless men and women like Muhunnad,
brave angels tasked with mapping the weak spots in the

Infrastructure, the points of leakage, and learning
something of the other empires beginning to spill into their own. They knew
enough about the properties of those weak points; enough to slip through them,
gather intelligence, and still return home. The rate of attrition was still
high. Muhunnad was a criminal, convicted of a crime that would have been
considered petty in our own society, but normally merited the death penalty in
his. In his case, he had been offered the chance to redeem himself, by becoming
a pilot.

They knew about us. They had been intercepting our lost message
packets for years, and had even found a couple of our ships with living crew.
That was how they had learned Mongolian. They also knew about dozens of other
empires, including the lemurs.

�They caught me," Muhunnad said, �as they catch any unwary
traveler. They are to be feared."

�They look so harmless," Qilian answered.

�They are vicious beyond words. They are a hive society,
with little sense of self. The beings you found, the dead ones, would have
sacrificed themselves to ensure their cargo returned home intact. It did not
mean that they did so out of any consideration for my well-being. But there are
worse things than the lemurs out there. There are the beings we call the
Smiling Ones. You will meet them sooner or later. They have been in space for
millions of years, and their technology is only matched by their loathing for
the likes of you and me."

�Tell us about your state," Qilian probed.

�We call it the Shining Caliphate. It is an empire
encompassing seven thousand star systems, comprising twenty thousand settled
worlds, half of which are of planet class or at least the size of major moons.
A third of those worlds are terraformed or on the way to completion."

�You are lying. If an empire of that size already existed, we
would have seen signs of it."

�That is because you are not looking in the right place. The
Shining Caliphate is here, now, all around you. It occupied much the same
volume as your own empire. It even has the same home world. You call it Greater
Mongolia. We call it Earth."

�Lies!"

But I knew Muhunnad was not lying to us. I think it likely
that even Qilian knew it, too. He was a brutal man, but not a stupid or
unimaginative one. But I do not think he could bare to contemplate his place in
a universe in which Muhunnad spoke the truth. Qilian was a powerful man, with
an empire of his own on the very edge of the one he was meant to serve. If our
empire was a map spread across a table, then he controlled more than could be
covered by the palm of a hand. Yet if what Muhunnad said was correct, then that
map was but one unexceptional page in a vast atlas, each page a dominion in its
own right, of which our own was neither the most powerful nor the most ancient.
Set against such immensity, Qilian controlled almost nothing. For a man like
him, that realization would have been intolerable.

But perhaps I am crediting him with too much intelligence,
too much imagination, and he was simply unable to grasp what Muhunnad was
telling us.

What he could grasp, however, was an opportunity.

I was with them when we brought Muhunnad to the room where
the couch had been prepared. I had heard of the existence of the couch, but
this was my first sight of it. Even knowing its function, I could not help but
see it as an instrument of torture. Muhunnadłs reaction, to begin struggling
against the guards who held him, showed that he saw the couch in similar terms.
Behind the guards loomed white-coated doctors and technicians, including the
Slav who had torn out my implant.

�This isnłt to hurt you," Qilian said magnanimously. �Itłs
to help you."

The couch was a skeletal white contraption, encumbered with
pads and restraints and delicate hinged accessories that would fold over the
occupant once they had been secured in place.

�I do not understand," Muhunnad said, although I think he
did.

�We have studied your implants and deduced something of
their function," Qilian said. �Not enough to learn everything about them, but
enough to let you control one of our ships, instead of the one you were meant
to fly."

�It will not work."

�No one is pretending it will be easy. But it is in your
interests to do what you can to make it succeed. Help us navigate the Infrastructure-the
way you do, finding the weak points and slipping through them-and we will let you
return home."

�I do not believe you."

�You have no option but to believe me. If you cannot assist
me in this matter, you will have concluded your usefulness to me. Given the
trouble I would get into if New High Karakorum learned of your existence, I would
have no option but to dispose of you."

�He means it," I said forcefully. �Help us fly the ships, Muhunnad.
Whatever happens, itłs better than staying here."

He looked at me as if I was the one thing in the universe he
was willing to trust. Given all that had happened to him since leaving his
people, it did not surprise me in the slightest.

�Plug him in," Qilian told the technicians. �And donłt be
too tender about it."

* * * * *

The name of the ship was the River Volga. She was half a li
in length, her frontal stabilization spines suggesting the curving whiskers of
a catfish. She had been a merchant vehicle once; later, she had been equipped
for scouring the Parvan Tract for phantom relics, and, most recently, she had
been hardened and weaponed for an exploratory role. She would carry six of us:
Muhunnad, Qilian, Uugan, and two more members of the technical staff-their
names were Jura and Batbayar-and myself. Next to her, identical in almost all
respects, was the Mandate of Heaven. The only significant distinction between
the two craft was that Muhunnad would be piloting the River Volga, while the
Mandate of Heaven followed close behind, slaved to follow the same trajectory
to within a fraction of an aid. The navigation and steering mechanisms of both
ships had been upgraded to permit high-agility maneuvers, including reversals,
close-proximity wall skimming, and suboptimal portal transits. It did not bear
thinking about the cost of equipping those two ships, or where the funds had
been siphoned from, but I supposed the citizens of the Kuchlug special
administrative volume would be putting up with hardships for a little while longer.

We spent five days in shakedown tests before entering the
Tract, scooting around the system, dodging planets and moons in high-gee
swerves. During that time, Muhunnadłs integration into the harness was slowly
improved, more and more ship systems brought under his direct control, until he
reported the utmost confidence in being able to handle the River Volga during
Infrastructure flight.

�Are you sure?" I asked.

�Truly, Ariunaa. This ship feels as much a part of me as anything
I ever flew in the Shining Caliphate."

�But indescribably less sophisticated."

�I would not wish to hurt your feelings. Given your
resources, you have not done too badly."

The transit, when it came, was utterly uneventful. The
Mandate of Heaven reported some minor buffeting, but this was soon negated
following a refinement of the control linkage between the two ships. Then we
had nothing to do but wait until Muhunnad detected one of the points of
weakening where, with a judicious alteration in our trajectory, we might slip
from one version of the Infrastructure to another.

Did I seriously think that Qilian would keep his promise of
returning Muhunnad to his own people? Not really, unless my master had hopes of
forging some kind of alliance with the Shining Caliphate, to use as leverage
against the central authority of New High Karakorum. If that was his intention,
I did not think he had much hope of succeeding. The Caliphate would have every
reason to despise us, and yet-given the demonstrably higher level of both their
technology and their intelligence-there was nothing they could possibly want
from us except craven submission and cowering remorse for the holocaust we had
visited upon their culture nearly a thousand years earlier.

No; I did not think Muhunnad stood much chance of returning
home. Perhaps he knew that as well. But it was better to pretend to believe in
Qilianłs promises than incur his bored wrath back on the Qing Shui moon. At
least this way, Muhunnad could continue to be materially useful to Qilian and,
therefore, too valuable to hurt.

The detection of a weakening in the tunnel geometry, Muhunnad
explained, was only just possible given the blunt sensibilities of our
instruments. The Caliphate kept detailed maps of such things, but no record had
survived his capture by the lemurs, and the information was too voluminous to
be committed to memory. He recalled that there were four weak points in the section
of Infrastructure we called the Parvan Tract, but not their precise locations
or detailed properties.

No matter; he had every incentive to succeed. We overshot
the first weakening, but the incident gave Muhunnad a chance to refine the
manner in which he sifted the sensor data, and he was confident that he would
not make the same error twice. Rather than attempt a reversal, it was agreed to
push forward until we encountered the next weakening. It happened two days
later, halfway to the Gansu nexus. This time, Muhunnad started to detect the
subtle changes in the properties of the tunnel in time to initiate a hard
slow-down, echoed by the Mandate of Heaven immediately to our stern.

We had been warned that the passage would be rough; this was
an understatement. Fortunately, we were all braced and ready when it came; we
had had two minutesł warning before the moment arrived. Even then, the ship
gave every indication of coming close to breakup; she whinnied like a horse,
her structural members singing as if they had been plucked. Several steering
vanes broke loose during the swerve, but the River Volga had been equipped to
withstand losses that would have crippled a normal ship; all that happened was
that hull plates swung open and new vanes pushed out to replace the missing
ones. Behind us, the Mandate of Heaven suffered slightly less damage; Muhunnad
had been able to send correctional steering signals to her guidance system,
allowing her to follow a less treacherous path.

And then we were back in the tunnel, traveling normally. To
all intents and purposes, it was as if nothing had happened. We appeared to be
still inside the Parvan Tract.

�We have become phantoms now," Muhunnad informed us. �This
is someone elsełs Infrastructure."

Qilian leaned over the control couch, where our pilot lay in
a state of partial paralysis, wired so deeply into the River Volgałs nervous
system that his own body was but an incidental detail. Around us, the bridge
instruments recorded normal conditions of Infrastructure transit.

�Where are we?"

�Therełs no way of telling, not with these sensors. Not
until we emerge."

�In the Gansu nexus?"

�Yes," he replied. �Or whatever they call it. There will be
risks; you will not have seen many phantoms emerge into your version of the
nexus because most such ships will make every effort to slip through another
weakening."

�Why?"

He spoke as if the answer should have been obvious. �Because
unless they are pilots like me, on specific intelligence-gathering missions,
they would rather keep transitioning between versions of the Infrastructure,
than emerge into what is likely to be a densely populated interchange.
Eventually, they hope to detect the microsignatures in the tunnel physics that
indicate that they have returned home."

�Signatures that we canłt read," I said.

�I will attempt to refine my interpretation of the sensor
data. Given time, I may be able to improve matters. But that is some way off."

�Wełll take our chances with Gansu," Qilian said.

There was, as I understood it, a small but nonnegligible
possibility that the weakening had shunted us back into our own version of the
Tractwe would know if we emerged into the nexus and I saw advertisements for
Sorkan-Shira rental ponies. Muhunnad assured us, however, that such an outcome
was very unlikely. Once we were elsewhere, we would only get home again by
throwing the dice repeatedly, until our own special number came up.

For all that, when we did emerge into the Gansu nexus, my
first thought was that Muhunnad had been wrong about those odds. Somehow or
other, we had beaten them and dropped back into our own space. As the door
opened to admit us back into the spherical volume of the hollowed-out moon, I
had the same impression of teeming wealth; of a city packed tight around the
central core, of luminous messages rising up the ninety-nine golden spokes, of
the airspace thick with jewel-bright ships and gaudily patterned, mothlike
shuttles, the glittering commerce of ten thousand worlds.

And yet, it only took a second glimpse to see that I was
wrong.

This was no part of the Mongol Expansion. The ships were
wrong; the shuttles were wrong: cruder and clumsier even than our most
antiquated ships. The city down below had a haphazard, ramshackle look to it,
its structures ugly and square-faced. The message on the spokes were spelled
out in the angular letters of that pre-Mongol language, Latin. I could not tell
if they were advertisements, news reports, or political slogans.

We slowed down, coming to a hovering standstill relative to
the golden spokes and the building-choked core. The Mandate of Heaven had only
just cleared the portal entrance, with the door still open behind it. I
presumed that some automatic system would not permit it to close with a ship
still so close.

Qilian was a model of patience, by his standards. He gave Muhunnad
several minutes to digest the information arriving from the River Volgałs many
sensors.

�Well, pilot?" he asked, when that interval had elapsed. �Do
you recognize this place?"

�Yes," Muhunnad said. �I do. And we must leave, now."

�Why so nervous? Iłve seen those ships. They look even more
pathetic and fragile than ours must have seemed to you."

�They are. But there is no such thing as a harmless
interstellar culture. These people have only been in space for a couple of hundred
years, barely a hundred and fifty since they stumbled on the Infrastructure,
but they still have weapons that could hurt us. Worse, they are aggressors."

�Who are they?" I whispered.

�The culture I mentioned to you back on the Qing Shui moon:
the ones who are now in their twenty-third century. You would call them
Christians, I suppose."

�Nestorians?" Qilian asked, narrowing his eyes.

�Another offshoot of the same cult, if one wishes to split
hairs. Not that many of them are believers now. There are even some Islamists
among them, although there is little about the Shining Caliphate that they
would find familiar."

�Perhaps we can do business with them," Qilian mused.

�I doubt it. They would find you repulsive, and they would
loathe you for what you did to them in your history."

It was as if Muhunnad had not spoken at all. When he alluded
to such matters, Qilian paid no heed to his words. �Take us closer to the core,"
he said. �We didnłt weld all this armor onto the Volga for nothing."

When Muhunnad did not show readiness to comply with Qilianłs
order, a disciplinary measure was administered through the input sockets of the
harness. Muhunnad stiffened against his restraints, then-evidently deciding
that death at the hands of the Christians was no worse than torture by
Mongols-he began to move us away from the portal.

�I am sorry," I whispered. �I know you only want to do whatłs
best for us."

�I am sorry as well," he said, when Qilian was out of
earshot. �Sorry for being so weak, that I do what he asks of me, even when I
know it is wrong."

�No one blames you," I replied.

We had crossed five hundred li without drawing any visible attention
from the other vessels, which continued to move through the sphere as if going
about their normal business. We even observed several ships emerge and depart
through portals. But then, quite suddenly, it was as if a great shoal of fish
had become aware of the presence of two sleek, hungry predators nosing through
their midst. All around us, from one minute to the next, the various craft
began to dart away, abandoning whatever course or errand they had been on
before. Some of them ducked into portals or lost themselves in the thicket of
spokes, while others fled for the cover of the core.

I tensed. Whatever response we were due was surely on its
way by now.

As it happened, we did not have long to wait. In contrast to
the civilian vessels attempting to get as far away from us as possible, three
ships were converging on us. We studied them on high magnification, on one of
the display screens in the River Volgałs bridge. They were shaped like
arrowheads, painted with black and white stripes and the odd markings of the
Christians. Their blade-sharp leading edges bristled with what could have been
sensors, refueling probes, or weapons.

From his couch, Muhunnad said: �We are being signaled. I believe
I can interpret the transmission. Would you like to see it?"

�Put it on," Qilian said.

We were looking at a woman who was wearing a heavy black
uniform, shiny like waxed leather. She was pinned back into a heavily padded
seat: I did not doubt that I was looking at the pilot of one of the ships
racing to intercept us. Much of her face was hidden under a globular black
helmet, with a red-tinted visor lowered down over her eyes. On the crown of the
helmet was a curious symbol: a little drawing of Earth, overlaid with lines of
latitude and longitude, and flanked by what I took to be a pair of laurel
leaves. She was speaking into a microphone, her words coming over the bridge
speaker. I wished I had studied more dead languages at the academy. Then again,
given my lack of success with Arabic, perhaps I would still not have understood
her Latin either.

What was clear was that the woman was not happy; that her
tone was becoming ever more strident. At last, she muttered something that, had
she been speaking Mongol, might have been some dismissive invitation to go to
hell.

�Perhaps we should turn after all," Qilian said, or started
to say. But by then, the three ships had loosed their missiles: four apiece,
grouping into two packs of six, one for the Mandate of Heaven and one for us.

Muhunnad needed no further encouragement. He whipped us
around with all haste, pushing the River Volgałs thrust to its maximum. Again,
the stress of it was enough to set the ship protesting. At the same time,
Muhunnad brought our own weapons into use, running those guns out on their
magnetic cradles and firing at the missiles as they closed distance between us
and the Christians. Given the range and efficacy of our beam weapons, it would
not have troubled him to eliminate the three ships. In concentrating on the
missiles, not the pursuers, he was doing all that he could not to inflame
matters further. As an envoy of Greater Mongolia, I suppose I should have been
grateful. But I was already beginning to doubt that the fate of my empire was
going to be of much concern for me.

Because we had turned around, the Mandate of Heaven was the
first to reach the portal. By then, the door had begun to close, but it only
took a brief assault from the Mandatełs chaser guns to snip a hole in it.
Muhunnad had destroyed nine of the twelve missiles by this point, but the
remaining three were proving more elusive; in witnessing the deaths of their
brethren, they appeared to have grown more cunning. By the time the Mandate
cleared the portal, the three had arrived within fifteen li of the River Volga.
By switching to a different fire pattern, Muhunnad succeeded in destroying two
of them, but the last one managed to evade him until it had come within five
li. At that point, bound by the outcome of some ruthless logical
decision-making algorithm, the missile opted to detonate rather than risk
coming any closer. It must have hoped to inflict fatal damage on us, even at
five li.

It very nearly did. I recalled what our pilot had said about
there being no such thing as a harmless interstellar culture. The blast inflicted
severe damage to our rear shielding and drive assembly, knocking off another
two stabilization vanes.

And then we were through, back into the Infrastructure. We
had survived our first encounter with another galactic empire.

More were to follow.

* * * * *

In my mindłs eye, I have an image of a solitary tree, bare
of leaves, so that its branching structure is laid open for inspection. The
point where each branch diverges from a larger limb is a moment of historical
crisis, where the course of world events is poised to swerve onto one of two
tracks.

Before his death, our founder spoke of having brought a
single law to the six directions of space, words that have a deep resonance for
all Mongols, as if it was our birthright to command the fundamental fabric of
reality itself. They were prescient words, too, for the bringing of unity to
Greater Mongolia, let alone the first faltering steps toward the Expansion, had
barely begun. Fifty-four years after his burial, our fleet conquered the
islands of Japan, extending the empire as far east as it was possible to go.
But the day after our fleet landed, a terrible storm battered the harbors of
those islands, one that would surely have repelled or destroyed our invasion
fleet had it still been at sea. At the time, it was considered a great good
fortune; a sure sign that Heaven had ordained this invasion by delaying that
storm. Yet who is to say what would have become of Japan, had it not fallen
under Mongol authority? By the same token, who is to say what would have become
of our empire if its confident expansion had been checked by the loss of that
fleet? We might not have taken Vienna and the cities of western Europe, and
then the great continents on the other side of the ocean.

I thought of Muhunnadłs Shining Caliphate. The common view
is that the Islamists were monotheistic savages until swept under the tide of
the Mongol enlightenment. But I am mindful that history is always written by
the victors. We regard our founder as a man of wisdom and learning first and a
warrior second, a man who was respectful of literacy, was curious about the
sciences, and possessed a keen thirst for philosophical inquiry. Might the conquered
have viewed him differently, I wonder? Especially if our empire fell, and we
were not there to gilden his name?

No matter; all that need concern us is that solitary tree,
that multiplicity of branches, reaching ever upward. After the moment of crisis,
the point of bifurcation, there should be no further contact between one branch
and the next. In one branch, the Mongols take the world. In another, the
Islamists. In another, some obscure sect of Christians. In another, much older
branch, none of these empires ever become a gleam in historyłs eye. In an even
older one, the lemurs are masters of Creation, not some hairless monkey.

But what matters is that all these empires eventually find
the Infrastructure. In some way that I cannot quite grasp, and perhaps will
never truly understand, the khorkoi machinery exists across all those branches.
Not simply as multiple copies of the same Infrastructure, but as a single
entity that in some way permits the reunification of those branches: as if,
having grown apart, they begin to knot back together again.

I do not think this is intentional. If it were, the leaky
nature of the Infrastructure would have been apparent to us five hundred years
ago. It seems more likely to me that it is growing leaky; that some kind of
insulation is beginning to wear away, an insulation that prevents history
short-circuiting itself, as it were.

But perhaps I am wrong to second-guess the motives of aliens
whose minds we will never know. Perhaps all of this is unfolding according to
some inscrutable and deliriously protracted scheme of our unwitting wormlike
benefactors. I do not think we will ever know.

* * * * *

I shall spare you the details of all the encounters that
followed, as we slipped from one point of weakness to another, always hoping
that the next transition would be the one that brought us back to Mongol space,
or at least into an empire we could do business with. By the time of our eighth
or ninth transition, I think, Qilian would have been quite overjoyed to find
himself a guest of the Shining Caliphate. I think he would have even settled
for a humbling return to the Christians: by the time we had scuttled away from
empires as strange, or as brazenly hostile, as those of the Fish People or the
Thin Men, the Christians had come to seem like very approachable fellows
indeed.

But it was not to be. And when we dared to imagine that we
had seen the worst that the branching tree of historical possibilities could
offer, that we had done well not to stray into the dominion of the lemurs, that
Heaven must yet be ordaining our adventure, we had the glorious misfortune to
fall into the realm of the Smiling Ones.

They came hard and fast, and did not trifle with
negotiation. Their clawlike green ships moved without thrust, cutting through space
as if space itself was a kind of fluid they could swim against. Their beam
weapons etched glimmering lines of violet across the void, despite the fact
that they were being deployed in hard vacuum. They cut into us like scythes. I
knew then that they could have killed us in a flash, but that they preferred to
wound, to maim, to toy.

The River Volga twisted like an animal in agony, and then
there was a gap in my thoughts wide enough for a lifetime.

* * * * *

The first thing that flashed through my mind after I
returned to consciousness was frank amazement that we were still alive; that
the ship had not burst open like a ripe fruit and spilled us all into vacuum.
The second thing was that, given the proximity of the attacking vehicles, our
stay of execution was unlikely to be long. I did not need the evidence of
readouts to tell me that the River Volga had been mortally wounded. The lights
were out, artificial gravity had failed, and in place of the normal hiss and
chug of her air recirculators, there was an ominous silence, broken only by the
occasional creak of some stressed structural member, cooling down after being
heated close to boiling point.

�Commander Qilian?" I called, into the echoing darkness.

No immediate answer was forthcoming. But no sooner had I
spoken than an emergency system kicked in and supplied dim illumination to the
cabin, traced in the wavery lines of fluorescent strips stapled to walls and
bulkheads. I could still not hear generators or the other sounds of routine
shipboard operation, so I presumed the lights were drawing on stored battery
power. Cautiously, I released my restraints and floated free of my chair. I
felt vulnerable, but if we were attacked again, it would make no difference
whether I was secured or not.

�Yellow Dog," a voice called, from further up the cabin. It
was Qilian, sounding groggy but otherwise sound. �I blacked out. How long was I
under?"

�Not long, sir. It canłt have been more than a minute since
they hit us." I started pulling myself toward him, propelling myself with a
combination of vigorous air-swimming and the use of the straps and handholds
attached to the walls for emergency use. �Are you all right, sir?"

�I think" Then he grunted, not loudly, but enough to let me
know that he was in considerable pain. �Armłs broken. Wasnłt quite secure when
it happened."

He was floating with his knees tucked high, inspecting the
damage to his right arm. In the scarlet backup lighting, little droplets of
blood, pulled spherical by surface tension, were pale, colorless marbles. He
had made light of the injury but it was worse than I had been expecting, a
compound fracture of the radius bone, with a sharp white piece glaring out from
his skin. The bleeding was abating, but the pain must have been excruciating.
And yet Qilian caressed the skin around the wound as if it was no more
irritating than a mild rash.

I paddled around until I found the medical kit. I offered to
help Qilian apply the splint and dressing, but he waved aside my assistance
save for when it came time to cut the bandage. The River Volga continued to
creak and groan around us, like some awesome monster in the throes of a
nightmare.

�Have you see the others?"

�Uugan, Jura, and Batbayar must still be at their stations
in the midship section."

�And the pilot?"

I had only glanced at Muhunnad while I searched for the medical
kit, but what I had seen had not encouraged me. He had suffered no visible
injuries, but it was clear from his extreme immobility, and lack of response as
I drifted by him, that all was not well. His eyes were open but apparently
unseeing, fixated on a blank piece of wall above the couch.

�I donłt know, sir. It may not be good."

�If hełs dead, wełre not going to be able to cut back into
the Infrastructure."

I saw no point in reminding Qilian that, with the ship in
its present state, Muhunnadłs condition would make no difference. �It could be
that hełs just knocked out, or that therełs a fault with his interface harness,"
I said, not really believing it myself.

�I donłt know what happened to us just before I blacked out.
Did you feel the ship twist around the way I did?"

I nodded. �Muhunnad must have lost attitude control."

Qilian finished with his dressing, inspecting the arm with a
look of quiet satisfaction. �I am going to check on the others. See what you
can do with the pilot, Yellow Dog."

�Iłll do my best, sir."

He pushed off with his good arm, steering an expert course
through the narrow throat of the bridge connecting door. I wondered what he
hoped to do if the technical staff were dead, or injured, or otherwise
incapable of assisting the damaged ship. I sensed that Qilian preferred not to
look death in the eye until it was almost upon him.

Forcing my mind to the matter at hand, I moved to the
reclined couch that held Muhunnad. I positioned myself next to him, anchoring
in place with a foothold.

I examined the harness, checking the various connectors and
status readouts, and could find no obvious break or weakness in the system.
That did not mean that there was not an invisible fault, of course. Equally, if
a power surge had happened, it might well have fried his nervous system from
the inside out with little sign of external injury. We had built safeguards
into the design to prevent that kind of thing, but I had never deceived myself
that they were foolproof.

�Iłm sorry, Muhunnad," I said quietly. �You did well to
bring us this far. No matter what you might think of me, I wanted you to make
it back to your own people."

Miraculously, his lips moved. He shaped a word with a mere
ghost of breath. �Ariunaa?"

I took hold of his gloved hand, squeezing it as much as the
harness allowed. �Iłm here. Right by you."

�I cannot see anything," he answered, speaking very slowly. �Before,
I could see everything around me, as well as the sensory information reaching
me from the shipłs cameras. Now I only have the cameras, and I am not certain
that I am seeing anything meaningful through them. Sometimes I get flashes, as
if something is working ... but most of the time, it is like looking through
fog."

�Are you sure you canłt make some sense of the camera data?"
I asked. �We only have to pass through the Infrastructure portal."

�That would be like threading the eye of a needle from
halfway around the world, Ariunaa. Besides, I think we are paralyzed. I have
tried firing the steering motors, but I have received no confirmation that
anything has actually happened. Have you felt the ship move?"

I thought back to all that had happened since the attack. �In
the last few minutes? Nothing at all."

�Then it must be presumed that we are truly adrift and that
the control linkages have been severed." He paused. �I am sorry; I wish the
news was better."

�Then we need help," I said. �Are you sure therełs nothing
else out there? The last time we saw it, the Mandate of Heaven was still in one
piece. If she could rendezvous with us, she might be able to carry us all to
the portal."

After a moment, he said: �There is something, an object in
my vicinity, about one hundred and twenty It out, but I only sense it
intermittently. I would have mentioned it sooner, but I did not wish to raise
your hopes."

Whatever he intended, my hopes were rising now. �Could it be
the Mandate?"

�It is something like the right size, and in something like
the right position."

�We need to find a way to signal it, to get it to come in
closer. At the moment, they have no reason to assume that any of us are alive."

�If I signal it, then the enemy will also know that some of
us are still alive," Muhunnad answered. �I am afraid I do not have enough
directional control to establish a tight-beam lock. I am not even certain I can
broadcast an omnidirectional transmission."

�Broadcast what?" Qilian asked, drifting into the bridge.

I wheeled around to face him; I had not been expecting him
to return so quickly. �Muhunnad says therełs a good chance the Mandate of
Heaven is nearby. Since we donłt seem to able to move, shełs our only chance of
getting out of here."

�Is she intact?"

�No way to tell. Therełs definitely something out there that
matches her signature. Problem is, Muhunnad isnłt confident that we can signal
her without letting the enemy know wełre still around."

�It wonłt make any difference to the enemy. Theyłll be
coming in to finish us off no matter what we do. Send the signal."

After a moment, Muhunnad said: �Itłs done. But I do not know
if any actual transmission has taken place. The only thing I can do is monitor
the Mandate and see if she responds. If she has picked up our signal, then we
should not have long to wait. A minute, maybe two. If we have seen nothing
after that time, I believe we may safely assume the worst."

We waited a minute, easily the longest in my life, then
another. After a third, there was still no change in the faint presence Muhunnad
was seeing. �I am more certain than ever that it is the Mandate" he informed
us. �The signature has improved; it matches very well, with no sign of damage.
She is holding at one hundred and twenty li. But she is not hearing us."

�Then we need another way of signaling her," I said. �Maybe
if we ejected some air into space ..."

�Too ambiguous," Qilian countered. �Air might vent simply
because the ship was breaking up, long after we were all dead. It could easily
encourage them to abandon us completely. What do we need this ship for in any
case? We may as well eject the lifeboats. The Mandate of Heaven can collect
them individually."

After a instant of reflection, Muhunnad said: �I think the
commander is correct. There is nothing to be gained by staying aboard now. At
the very least, the lifeboats will require the enemy to pursue multiple
targets."

There were six lifeboats, one for each of us.

�Letłs go," Qilian replied.

�Iłll see you at the lifeboats," I said. �I have to help
Muhunnad out of the harness first."

Qilian looked at me for a moment, some dark calculation working
itself out behind his eyes. He nodded once. �Be quick about it, Yellow Dog. But
we donłt want to lose him. Hełs still a valued asset."

With renewed strength, I hauled the both of us through the
echoing labyrinth of the ship, to the section that contained the lifeboats. It
was clear that the attack had wrought considerable damage on this part of the
ship, buckling wall and floor plates, constricting passageways, and jamming
bulkhead doors tight into their frames. We had to detour halfway to the rear
before we found a clear route back to the boats. Yet although we were ready to
don suits if necessary, we never encountered any loss of pressure. Sandwiched
between layers of the River Volgałs outer hull was a kind of foam that was
designed to expand and harden upon exposure to vacuum, quickly sealing any
leaks before they presented a threat to the crew. From the outside, that
bulging and hardening foam would have resembled a mass of swollen dough
erupting through cracks in the hull.

There were six lifeboats, accessed through six armored doorways,
each of which was surmounted with a panel engraved with both operating
instructions and stern warnings concerning the penalties for improper use.
Qilian was floating at the far end, next to the open doorway of the sixth boat.
I had to look at him for a long, bewildered moment before I quite realized what
I was seeing. I wondered if it was a trick of my eyes, occasioned by the gloomy
lighting. But I had made no mistake. Next to Qilian, floating in states of
deceptive repose, were the bodies of Jura and Batbayar. A little further away,
as if he had been surprised and killed on his own, was Uugan. They had all been
stabbed and gashed: knife wounds to the chest and throat, in all three
instances. Blood was still oozing out of them.

In his good hand, Qilian held a bloody knife, wet and slick
to the hilt.

�I am sorry," he said, as if all that situation needed was a
reasonable explanation. �But only one of these six boats is functional."

I stared in numb disbelief. �How can only one be working?"

�The other five are obstructed; they canłt leave because
there is damage to their launch hatches. This is the only one with a clear
shaft all the way to space." Qilian wiped the flat of the blade against his
forearm. �Of course, I wish you the best of luck in proving me wrong. But I am
afraid I will not be around to witness your efforts."

�You fucking" I began, before trailing off. I knew if I
called him a coward he would simply laugh at me, and I had no intention of
giving him even the tiniest of moral victories. �Just go," I said.

He drew himself into the lifeboat. I expected some last word
from him, some mocking reproach or grandiloquent burst of self-justifying
rhetoric. But there was nothing. The door clunked shut with a gasp of compressed
air. There was a moment of silence and stillness and then the boat launched
itself away from the ship on a rapid stutter of electromagnetic pulses.

I felt the entire hull budge sideways in recoil. He was
gone. For several seconds, all I could do was breathe; I could think of nothing
useful or constructive to say to Muhunnad, nothing beyond stating the obvious
hopelessness of our predicament.

But instead, Muhunnad said quietly: �We are not going to
die."

At first, I did not quite understand his words. �Iłm sorry?"

He spoke with greater emphasis this time. �We are going to
live, but only if you listen to me very, very carefully. You must return me to
the couch with all haste."

I shook my head. �Itłs no good, Muhunnad. Itłs all over."

�No, it is not. The River Volga is not dead. I only made it
seem this way."

I frowned. �I donłt understand."

�There isnłt time to explain here. Get me back to the
bridge, get me connected back to the harness, then I will tell you. But make
haste! We really do not have very much time. The enemy are much nearer than you
think."

�The enemy?"

�There is no Mandate of Heaven. Either she scuttled back to
the portal, or she was destroyed during the same attack that damaged us."

�But you said ..."

�I lied. Now help me move!"

Not for the first time that day, I did precisely as I was
told.

Having already plotted a route around the obstructions, it
did not take anywhere near as long to return to the bridge as it had taken to
reach the lifeboats. Once there, I buckled him into the couchhe was beginning
to retain some limb control, but not enough to help me with the taskand set
about reconnecting the harness systems, trusting myself not to make a mistake.
My fingers fumbled on the ends of my hands, as if they were a thousand li away.

�Start talking to me, Muhunnad," I said. �Tell me whatłs
going on. Why did you lie about the Mandate!"

�Because I knew the effect that lie would have on Qilian. I
wished to give him a reason to leave the ship. I had seen the kind of man he
was. I knew that he would save himself, even if it meant the rest of us dying."

�I still donłt understand. What good has it done us? The damage
to the ship ..." I completed the final connection. Muhunnad stiffened as the
harness took hold of his nervous system, but did not appear to be in any
obvious discomfort. �Are you all right?" I asked warily.

�This will take a moment. I had to put the ship into a deep
shutdown, to convince Qilian. I must bring her back system by system, so as not
to risk an overload."

The evidence of his work was already apparent. The bridge
lights returned to normal illumination, while those readouts and displays that
had remained active were joined by others that had fallen into darkness. I held
my breath, expecting the whole ensemble to shut back down again at any moment.
But I should have known better than to doubt Muhunnadłs ability. The systems remained
stable, even as they cycled through startup and crash recovery routines. The
air circulators resumed their dull but reassuring chug.

�I shall dispense with artificial gravity until we are
safely under way, if that is satisfactory with you."

�Whatever it takes," I said.

His eyes, still wide open, quivered in their sockets. �I am
sweeping local space," he reported. �There was some real damage to the sensors,
but nowhere as bad as I made out. I can see Qilianłs lifeboat. He made an
excellent departure." Then he swallowed. �I can also see the enemy. Three of
their ships will shortly be within attack range. I must risk restarting the
engines without a proper initialization test."

�Again, whatever it takes."

�Perhaps you would like to brace yourself. There may be a degree
of undamped acceleration."

Muhunnad had been right to warn me, and even then it came
harder and sooner than I had been expecting. Although I had managed to secure
myself to a handhold, I was nearly wrenched away with the abruptness of our
departure. I felt acceleration rising smoothly, until it was suppressed by the
dampeners. My arm was sore from the jolt, as if it had been almost pulled from
its socket.

�That is all I can do for us now," Muhunnad said. �Running
is our only effective strategy, unfortunately. Our weapons would prove totally
ineffective against the enemy, even if we could get close enough to fire before
they turned their own guns on us. But running will suffice. At least we have
the mass of one less lifeboat to consider."

�I still donłt quite get what happened. How did you know
therełd still be one lifeboat that was still working? From what I saw, we came
very close to losing all of them."

�We did," he said, with something like pride in his voice. �But
not quite, you see. That was my doing, Ariunaa. Before the instant of the
attack, I adjusted the angle of orientation of our hull. I made sure that the
energy beam took out five of the six lifeboat launch hatches, and no more.
Think of a knife fighter, twisting to allow part of his body to be cut rather
than another."

I stared at him in amazement, forgetting the pain in my arm
from the sudden onset of acceleration. I recalled what Qilian had said, his
puzzlement about the ship twisting at the onset of the attack. �You mean you
had all this planned, before they even attacked us?"

�I evaluated strategies for disposing of our mutual friend,
while retaining the ship. This seemed the one most likely to succeed."

�I am ... impressed."

�Thank you," he said. �Of course, it would have been easier
if I had remained in the harness, so that we could move immediately once the
pod had departed. But I think Qilian would have grown suspicious if I had not
shown every intention of wanting to escape with him."

�Youłre right. It was the only way to convince him."

�And now there is only one more matter that needs to be
brought to your attention. It is still possible to speak to him. It can be
arranged with trivial ease: despite what I said earlier, I am perfectly capable
of locking on a tight beam."

�Hełll have no idea whatłs happened, will he? Hełll still
think hełs got away with it. Hełs expecting to be rescued by the Mandate of
Heaven at any moment."

�Eventually, the nature of his predicament will become apparent.
But by then, he is likely to have come to the attention of the Smiling Ones."

I thought of the few things Muhunnad had told us about our
adversaries. �What will they do to him? Shoot him out of the sky?"

�Not if they sense a chance to take him captive with minimal
losses on their own side. I would suggest that an unpowered lifeboat would
present exactly such an opportunity."

�And then?"

�He will die. But not immediately. Like the Shining Caliphate
and the Mongol Expansion, the Smiling Ones have an insatiable appetite for
information. They will have found others of his kind before, just as they have
found others of mine. But I am sure Qilian will still provide them with much
amusement."

�And then?" I repeated.

�An appetite of another kind will come into play. The
Smiling Ones are cold-blooded creatures. Reptiles. They consider the likes of
us-the warm, the mammalian-to be a kind of affront. As well they might, I
suppose. All those millions of years ago, we ate their eggs."

I absorbed what he said, thinking of Qilian falling to his
destiny, unaware for now of the grave mistake he had made. Part of me was
inclined to show clemency: not by rescuing him, which would place us
dangerously close to the enemy, but by firing on him, so that he might be
spared an encounter with the Smiling Ones.

But it was not a large part.

�Time to portal, Muhunnad?"

�Six minutes, on our present heading. Do you wish to review
my intentions?"

�No," I said, after a moment. �I trust you to do the best
possible job. You think wełll make it into the Infrastructure without falling
to pieces?"

�If Allah is willing. But you understand that our chances of
returning to home are now very slim, Yellow Dog? Despite my subterfuge, this ship
is damaged. It will not survive many more transitions."

�Then wełll just have to make the best of wherever we end
up," I said.

�It will not feel like home to either of us," he replied,
his tone gently warning, as if I needed reminding of that.

�But if there are people out there ... I mean, instead of
egg-laying monsters, or sweet-looking devils with tails, then itłll be better
than nothing, wonłt it? People are people. If the Infrastructure is truly
breaking down, allowing all these timelines to bleed into one another, than we
are all going to have get along with each other sooner or later, no matter what
we all did to each other in our various histories. Wełre all going to have to
put the past behind us."

�It will not be easy," he acknowledged. �But if two people
as unalike as you and I can become friends, then perhaps there is hope. Perhaps
we could even become an example to others. We shall have to see, shanłt we?"

�We shall have to see," I echoed.

I held Muhunnadłs hand as we raced toward the portal, and
whatever Heaven had in store for us on the other side.

The Sledge-Makerłs Daughter

This story, from Interzone issue 209, has been
shortlisted for the 2007 BSFA Award

### ###

She stopped in sight of Twenty Arch Bridge, laying down her
bags to rest her hands from the weight of two hogsł heads and forty pence worth
of beeswax candles. While she paused, Kathrin adjusted the drawstring on her
hat, tilting the brim to shade her forehead from the sun. Though the air was
still cool, there was a fierce new quality to the light that brought out her
freckles.

Kathrin moved to continue, but a tightness in her throat
made her hesitate. She had been keeping the bridge from her thoughts until this
moment, but now the fact of it could not be ignored. Unless she crossed it she
would face the long trudge to New Bridge, a diversion that would keep her on
the road until long after sunset.

ęSledge-makerłs daughter!ł called a rough voice from across
the road.

Kathrin turned sharply at the sound. An aproned man stood in
a doorway, smearing his hands dry. He had a monkeylike face, tanned a deep
liverish red, with white sideboards and a gleaming pink tonsure.

ęBrendan Lynchłs daughter, isnłt it?ł

She nodded meekly, but bit her lip rather than answer.

ęThought so. Hardly one to forget a pretty face, me.ł The
man beckoned her to the doorway of his shop. ęCome here, lass. Iłve something
for your father.ł

ęSir?ł

ęI was hoping to visit him last week, but work kept me here.ł
He cocked his head at the painted wooden trademark hanging above the doorway. ęPeter
Rigby, the wheelwright. Kathrin, isnłt it?ł

ęI need to be getting along, sirłKł

ęAnd your father needs good wood, of which Iłve plenty. Come
inside for a moment, instead of standing there like a starved thing.ł He called
over his shoulder, telling his wife to put the water on the fire.

Reluctantly Kathrin gathered her bags and followed Peter
into his workshop. She blinked against the dusty air and removed her hat.
Sawdust carpeted the floor, fine and golden in places, crisp and coiled in
others, while a heady concoction of resins and glues filled the air. Pots
simmered on fires. Wood was being steamed into curves, or straightened where it
was curved. Many sharp tools gleamed on one wall, some of them fashioned with
blades of skydrift. Wheels, mostly awaiting spokes or iron tyres, rested
against another. Had the wheels been sledges, it could have been her fatherłs
workshop, when he had been busier.

Peter showed Kathrin to an empty stool next to one of his
benches. ęSit down here and take the weight off your feet. Mary can make you
some bread and cheese. Or bread and ham if youłd rather.ł

ęThatłs kind sir, but Widow Grayling normally gives me something
to eat, when I reach her house.ł

Peter raised a white eyebrow. He stood by the bench with his
thumbs tucked into the belt of his apron, his belly jutting out as if he was
quietly proud of it. ęI didnłt know you visited the witch.ł

ęShe will have her two hogsł heads, once a month, and her
candles. She only buys them from the Shield, not the Town. She pays for the
hogs a year in advance, twenty four whole pounds.ł

ęAnd youłre not scared by her?ł

ęIłve no cause to be.ł

ęTherełs some that would disagree with you.ł

Remembering something her father had told her, Kathrin said,
ęThere are folk who say the sheriff can fly, or that there was once a bridge
that winked at travellers like an eye, or a road of iron that reached all the
way to London. My father says therełs no reason for anyone to be scared of
Widow Grayling.ł

ęNot afraid shełll turn you into a toad, then?ł

ęShe cures people, not put spells on them.ł

ęWhen shełs in the mood for it. From what Iłve heard shełs
just as likely to turn the sick and needy away.ł

ęIf she helps some people, isnłt that better than nothing at
all?ł

ęI suppose.ł She could tell Peter didnłt agree, but he wasnłt
cross with her for arguing. ęWhat does your father make of you visiting the
witch, anyway?ł

ęHe doesnłt mind.ł

ęNo?ł Peter asked, interestedly.

ęWhen he was small, my dad cut his arm on a piece of skydrift
that he found in the snow. He went to Widow Grayling and she made his arm
better again by tying an eel around it. She didnłt take any payment except the
skydrift.ł

ęDoes your father still believe an eel can heal a wound?ł

ęHe says hełll believe anything if it gets the job done.ł

ęWise man, that Brendan, a man after my own heart. Which
reminds me.ł Peter ambled to another bench, pausing to stir one of his bubbling
pots before gathering a bundle of sawn-off wooden sticks. He set them down in
front of Kathrin on a scrap of cloth. ęOff cuts,ł he explained. ęBut good
seasoned beech, whichłll never warp. No use to me, but I am sure your father
will find use for them. Tell him that therełs more, if he wishes to collect it.ł

ęI havenłt got any money for wood.ł

ęIłd take none. Your father was always generous to me, when
I was going through lean times.ł Peter scratched behind his ear. ęOnly fair,
the way I see it.ł

ęThank you,ł Kathrin said doubtfully. ęBut I donłt think I
can carry the wood all the way home.ł

ęNot with two hogsł heads as well. But you can drop by when
youłve given the heads to Widow Grayling.ł

ęOnly I wonłt be coming back over the river,ł Kathrin said. ęAfter
Iłve crossed Twenty Arch Bridge, Iłll go back along the south quayside and take
the ferry at Jarrow.ł

Peter looked puzzled. ęWhy line the ferrymanłs pocket when
you can cross the bridge for nowt?ł

Kathrin shrugged easily. ęIłve got to visit someone on the
Jarrow road, to settle an account.ł

ęThen youłd better take the wood now, I suppose,ł Peter
said.

Mary bustled in, carrying a small wooden tray laden with
bread and ham. She was as plump and red as her husband, only shorter. Picking
up the entire gist of the conversation in an instant, she said, ęDonłt be an
oaf, Peter. The girl cannot carry all that wood and her bags. If she will not
come back this way, she must pass a message on to her father. Tell him that
therełs wood here if he wants it.ł She shook her head sympathetically at
Kathrin. ęWhat does he think you are, a pack mule?ł

ęIłll tell my father about the wood,ł she said.

ęSeasoned beech,ł Peter said emphaticł?ally. ęRemember that.ł

ęI will.ł

Mary encouraged her to take some of the bread and meat, despite
Kathrin again mentioning that she expected to be fed at Widow Graylingłs. ęTake
it anyway,ł Mary said. ęYou never know how hungry you might get on the way
home. Are you sure about not coming back this way?ł

ęIłd best not,ł Kathrin said.

After an awkward lull, Peter said, ęThere is something else
I meant to tell your father. Could you let him know that Iłve no need of a new
sledge this year, after all?ł

ęPeter,ł Mary said. ęYou promised.ł

ęI said that I should probably need one. I was wrong in
that.ł Peter looked exasperated. ęThe fault lies in Brendan, not me! If he did
not make such good and solid sledges, then perhaps I should need another by
now.ł

ęI shall tell him,ł Kathrin said.

ęIs your father keeping busy?ł Mary asked.

ęAye,ł Kathrin answered, hoping the wheelwrightłs wife
wouldnłt push her on the point.

ęOf course he will still be busy,ł Peter said, helping
himself to some of the bread. ęPeople donłt stop needing sledges, just because
the Great Winter loosens its hold on us. Any more than they stopped needing
wheels when the winter was at its coldest. Itłs still cold for half the year!ł

Kathrin opened her mouth to speak. She meant to tell Peter
that he could pass the message onto her father directly, for he was working not
five minutes walk from the wheelwrightłs shop. Peter clearly had no knowledge
that her father had left the village, leaving his workshop empty during these
warming months. But she realised that her father would be ashamed if the
wheelwright were to learn of his present trade. It was best that nothing be
said.

ęKathrin?ł Peter asked.

ęI should be getting on. Thank you for the food, and the
offer of the wood.ł

ęYou pass our regards on to your father,ł Mary said.

ęI shall.ł

ęGod go with you. Watch out for the jangling men.ł

ęI will,ł Kathrin replied, because that was what you were supposed
to say.

ęBefore you go,ł Peter said suddenly, as if a point had just
occurred to him. ęLet me tell you something. You say there are people who
believe the sheriff can fly, as if that was a foolish thing, like the iron road
and the winking bridge. I cannot speak of the other things, but when I was boy I
met someone who had seen the sheriffłs flying machine. My grandfather often
spoke of it. A whirling thing, like a windmill made of tin. He had seen it when
he was a boy, carrying the sheriff and his men above the land faster than any
bird.ł

ęIf the sheriff could fly then, why does he need a horse and
carriage now?ł

ęBecause the flying machine crashed down to Earth, and no
tradesman could persuade it to fly again. It was a thing of the old world,
before the Great Winter. Perhaps the winking bridge and the iron road were also
things of the old world. We mock too easily, as if we understood everything of
our world where our forebears understood nothing.ł

ęBut if I should believe in certain things,ł Kathrin said, ęshould
I not also believe in others? If the sheriff can fly, then can a jangling man
not steal me from my bed at night?ł

ęThe jangling men are a story to stop children misbehaving,ł
Peter said witheringly. ęHow old are you now?ł

ęSixteen,ł Kathrin answered.

ęI am speaking of something that was seen, in daylight, not
made up to frighten bairns.ł

ęBut people say they have seen jangling men. They have seen
men made of tin and gears, like the inside of a clock.ł

ęSome people were frightened too much when they were small,ł
Peter said, with a dismissive shake. ęNo more than that. But the sheriff is
real, and he was once able to fly. Thatłs Godłs truth.ł

###

Her hands were hurting again by the time she reached Twenty
Arch Bridge. She tugged down the sleeves of her sweater, using them as mittens.
Rooks and jackdaws wheeled and cawed overhead. Seagulls feasted on waste
floating in the narrow races between the bridgełs feet, or pecked at vile
leavings on the road that had been missed by the night soil gatherers. A boy
laughed as Kathrin nearly tripped on the labyrinth of crisscrossing ruts that
had been etched by years of wagon wheels entering and leaving the bridge. She
hissed a curse back at the boy, but now the wagons served her purpose. She
skulked near a doorway until a heavy cart came rumbling along, top-heavy with
beer barrels from the Blue Star Brewery, drawn by four snorting dray-horses, a
bored-looking drayman at the reins, huddled down so deep into his leather coat
that it seemed as if the Great Winter still had its icy hand on the country.

Kathrin started walking as the cart lumbered past her, using
it as a screen. Between the stacked beer barrels she could see the top level of
the scaffolding that was shoring up the other side of the arch, visible since
no house or parapet stood on that part of the bridge. A dozen or so workers ę
including a couple of aproned foremen ę were standing on the scaffolding,
looking down at the work going on below. Some of them had plumb lines; one of
them even had a little black rod that shone a fierce red spot wherever he wanted
something moved. Of Garret, the reason she wished to cross the bridge only once
if she could help it, there was nothing to be seen. Kathrin hoped that he was
under the side of the bridge, hectoring the workers. She felt sure that her
father was down there too, being told what to do and biting his tongue against
answering back. He put up with being shouted at, he put up with being forced to
treat wood with crude disrespect, because it was all he could do to earn enough
money to feed and shelter himself and his daughter. And he never, ever, looked
Garret Kinnear in the eye.

Kathrin felt her mood easing as the dray ambled across the
bridge, nearing the slight rise over the narrow middle arches. The repair work,
where Garret was most likely to be, was now well behind her. She judged her
progress by the passage of alehouses. She had passed the newly painted Bridge
Inn and the shuttered gloom of the Lordłs Confessor. Fiddle music spilled from
the open doorway of the Dancing Panda: an old folksong with nonsense lyrics
about sickly sausage rolls.

Ahead lay the Winged Man, its sign containing a strange painting
of a foreboding figure rising from a hilltop. If she passed the Winged Man, she
felt she would be safe.

Then the dray hit a jutting cobblestone and the rightmost
front wheel snapped free of its axle. The wheel wobbled off on its own. The
cart tipped to the side, spilling beer barrels onto the ground. Kathrin stepped
nimbly aside as one of the barrels ruptured and sent its fizzing, piss-coloured
contents across the roadway. The horses snorted and strained. The drayman spat
out a greasy wad of chewing tobacco and started down from his chair, his face a
mask of impassive resignation, as if this was the kind of thing that could be
expected to happen once a day. Kathrin heard him whisper something in the ear
of one of the horses, in beast-tongue, which calmed the animal.

Kathrin knew that she had no choice but to continue. Yet she
had no sooner resumed her pace ę moving faster now, the bags swaying awkwardly,
than she saw Garret Kinnear. He was just stepping out of the Winged Manłs
doorway.

He smiled. ęYou in a hurry or something?ł

Kathrin tightened her grip on the bags, as if she was going
to use them as weapons. She decided not to say anything, not to openly acknowledge
his presence, even though their eyes had met for an electric instant.

ęGetting to be a big strong girl now, Kathrin Lynch.ł

She carried on walking, each step taking an eternity. How foolish
she had been, to take Twenty Arch Bridge when it would only have cost her
another hour to take the further crossing. She should not have allowed Peter to
delay her with his good intentions.

ęYou want some help with them bags of yours?ł

Out of the corner of her eye she saw him move out of the
doorway, tugging his mud-stained trousers higher onto his hip. Garret Kinnear
was snake thin, all skin and bone, but much stronger than he looked. He wiped a
hand across his sharp beardless chin. He had long black hair, the greasy grey
colour of dishwater.

ęGo away,ł she hissed, hating herself in the same instant.

ęJust making conversation,ł he said.

Kathrin quickened her pace, glancing nervously around. All
of a sudden the bridge appeared deserted. The shops and houses she had yet to
pass were all shuttered and silent. There was still a commotion going on by the
dray, but no one there was paying any attention to what was happening further
along the bridge.

ęLeave me alone,ł Kathrin said.

He was walking almost alongside her now, between Kathrin and
the road. ęNow what kind of way to talk is that, Kathrin Lynch? Especially
after my offer to help you with them bags. What have you got in them, anyways?ł

ęNothing thatłs any business of yours.ł

ęI could be the judge of that.ł Before she could do
anything, hełd snatched the bag from her left hand. He peered into its dark
depths, frowning. ęYou came all the way from Jarrow Ferry with this?ł

ęGive me back the bag.ł

She reached for the bag, tried to grab it back, but he held
it out of her reach, grinning cruelly.

ęThatłs mine.ł

ęHow much would a pigłs head be worth?ł

ęYou tell me. Therełs only one pig around here.ł

Theyłd passed the mill next to the Winged Man. There was a
gap between the mill and the six-storey house next to it, where some improbably
narrow property must once have existed. Garret turned down the alley, still
carrying Kathrinłs bag. He reached the parapet at the edge of the bridge and
looked over the side. He rummaged in the bag and drew out the pigłs head.
Kathrin hesitated at the entrance to the narrow alley, watching as Garret held
the head out over the roiling water.

ęYou can have your pig back. Just come a wee bit closer.ł

ęSo you can do what you did last time?ł

ęI donłt remember any complaints.ł He let the head fall,
then caught it again, Kathrinłs heart in her throat.

ęYou know I couldnłt complain.ł

ęNot much to ask for a pigłs head, is it?ł With his free
hand, he fumbled open his trousers, tugging out the pale worm of his cock. ęYou
did it before, and it didnłt kill you. Why not now? I wonłt trouble you again.ł

She watched his cock stiffen. ęYou said that last time.ł

ęAye, but this time I mean it. Come over here, Kathrin. Be a
good girl now and youłll have your pig back.ł

Kathrin looked back over her shoulder. No one was going to
disturb them. The dray had blocked all the traffic behind it, and nothing was
coming over the bridge from the south.

ęPlease,ł she said.

ęJust this once,ł Garret said. ęAnd make your mind up fast,
girl. This pigłs getting awfully heavy in my hand.ł

###

Kathrin stood in the widowłs candlelit kitchen ę it only had
one tiny, dusty windowwhile the old woman turned her bent back to attend to
the coals burning in her black metal stove. She poked and prodded the fire
until it hissed back like a cat. ęYou came all the way from Jarrow Ferry?ł she
asked.

ęAye,ł Kathrin said. The room smelled smoky.

ęThatłs too far for anyone, let alone a sixteen year old
lass. I should have a word with your father. I heard he was working on Twenty
Arch Bridge.ł

Kathrin shifted uncomfortably. ęI donłt mind walking. The
weatherłs all right.ł

ęSo they say. All the same, the evenings are still cold, and
there are types about you wouldnłt care to meet on your own, miles from Jarrow.ł

ęIłll be back before it gets dark,ł Kathrin said, with more
optimism than she felt. Not if she went out of her way to avoid Garret Kinnear
she wouldnłt. He knew the route shełd normally take back home, and the
alternatives would mean a much longer journey.

ęYou sure about that?ł

ęI have no one else to visit. I can start home now.ł Kathrin
offered her one remaining bag, as Widow Grayling turned from the fire, brushing
her hands on her apron.

ęPut it on the table, will you?ł

Kathrin put the bag down. ęOne pigłs head, and twenty candles,
just as you wanted,ł she said brightly.

Widow Grayling hobbled over to the table, supporting herself
with a stick, eyeing Kathrin as she opened the bag and took out the solitary
head. She weighed it in her hand then set it down on the table, the head facing
Kathrin in such a way that its beady black eyes and smiling snout suggested
amused complicity.

ęItłs a good head,ł the widow said. ęBut there were meant to
be two of them.ł

ęCan you manage with just the one, until I visit again? Iłll
have three for you next time.ł

ęIłll manage if I must. Was there a problem with the butcher
in the Shield?ł

Kathrin had considered feigning ignorance, saying that she
did not recall how only one head had come to be in her bags. But she knew Widow
Grayling too well for that.

ęDo you mind if I sit down?ł

ęOf course.ł The widow hobbled around the table to one of
the rickety stools and dragged it out. ęAre you all right, girl?ł

Kathrin lowered herself onto the stool.

ęThe other bag was taken from me,ł she answered quietly.

ęBy who?ł

ęSomeone on the bridge.ł

ęChildren?ł

ęA man.ł

Widow Grayling nodded slowly, as if Kathrinłs answer had only
confirmed some deep-seated suspicion she had harboured for many years. ęThomas
Kinnearłs boy, was it?ł

ęHow could you know?ł

ęBecause Iłve lived long enough to form ready opinions of
people. Garret Kinnear is filth. But therełs no one thatłll touch him, because
theyłre scared of his father. Even the sheriff tugs his forelock to Thomas
Kinnear. Did he rape you?ł

ęNo. But he wanted me to do something nearly as bad.ł

ęAnd did he make you?ł

Kathrin looked away. ęNot this time.ł

Widow Grayling closed her eyes. She reached across the table
and took one of Kathrinłs hands, squeezing it between her own. ęWhen was it?ł

ęThree months ago, when there was still snow on the ground.
I had to cross the bridge on my own. It was later than usual, and there werenłt
any people around. I knew about Garret already, but Iłd managed to keep away
from him. I thought I was going to be lucky.ł Kathrin turned back to face her
companion. ęHe caught me and took me into one of the mills. The wheels were
turning, but there was nobody inside except me and Garret. I struggled, but
then he put his finger to my lips and told me to shush.ł

ęBecause of your father.ł

ęIf I made trouble, if I did not do what he wanted, Garret
would tell his father some lie about mine. He would say that he caught him
sleeping on the job, or drunk, or stealing nails.ł

ęGarret promised you that?ł

ęHe said, lifełs hard enough for a sledge-makerłs daughter
when no one wants sledges. He said it would only be harder if my father lost
his work.ł

ęIn that respect he was probably right,ł the widow said resignedly.
ęIt was brave of you to hold your silence, Kathrin. But the problem hasnłt gone
away, has it? You cannot avoid Garret forever.ł

ęI can take the other bridge.ł

ęThatłll make no difference, now that he has his eye on you.ł

Kathrin looked down at her hands. ęThen hełs won already.ł

ęNo, he just thinks that he has.ł Without warning the widow
stood from her chair. ęHow long have we known each other, would you say?ł

ęSince I was small.ł

ęAnd in all that time, have I come to seem any older to you?ł

ęYoułve always seemed the same to me, Widow Grayling.ł

ęAn old woman. The witch on the hill.ł

ęThere are good witches and bad witches,ł Kathrin pointed
out.

ęAnd there are mad old women who donłt belong in either category.
Wait a moment.ł

Widow Grayling stooped under the impossibly low doorway into
the next room. Kathrin heard a scrape of wood on wood, as of a drawer being
opened. She heard rummaging sounds. Widow Grayling returned with something in
her hands, wrapped in red cotton. Whatever it was, she put it down on the
table. By the noise it made Kathrin judged that it was an item of some weight
and solidity.

ęI was just like you once. I grew up not far from Ferry, in
the darkest, coldest years of the Great Winter.ł

ęHow long ago?ł

ęThe sheriff then was William the Questioner. You wonłt have
heard of him.ł Widow Grayling sat down in the same seat shełd been using before
and quickly exposed the contents of the red cotton bundle.

Kathrin wasnłt quite sure what she was looking at. There was
a thick and unornamented bracelet, made of some dull grey metal like pewter.
Next to the ornament was something like the handle of a broken sword: a grip,
with a crisscrossed pattern on it, with a curved guard reaching from one end of
the hilt to the other. It was fashioned from the same dull grey metal.

ęPick it up,ł the widow said. ęFeel it.ł

Kathrin reached out tentatively and closed her fingers
around the crisscrossed hilt. It felt cold and hard and not quite the right
shape for her hand. She lifted it from the table, feeling its weight.

ęWhat is it, widow?ł

ęItłs yours. Itłs a thing that has been in my possession for
a very long while, but now it must change hands.ł

Kathrin didnłt know quite what to say. A gift was a gift,
but neither she nor her father would have any use for this ugly broken thing,
save for its value to a scrap man.

ęWhat happened to the sword?ł she asked.

ęThere was never a sword. The thing you are holding is the entire
object.ł

ęThen I donłt understand what it is for.ł

ęYou shall, in time. Iłm about to place a hard burden on
your shoulders. I have often thought that you were the right one, but I wished
to wait until you were older, stronger. But what has happened today cannot be
ignored. I am old and weakening. It would be a mistake to wait another year.ł

ęI still donłt understand.ł

ęTake the bracelet. Put it on your wrist.ł

Kathrin did as she was told. The bracelet opened on a heavy
hinge, like a manacle. When she locked it together, the join was nearly
invisible. It was a cunning thing, to be sure. But it still felt as heavy and
dead and useless as the broken sword.

Kathrin tried to keep a composed face, all the while
suspecting that the widow was as mad as people had always said.

ęThank you,ł she said, with as much sincerity as she could
muster.

ęNow listen to what I have to say. You walked across the
bridge today. Doubtless you passed the inn known as the Winged Man.ł

ęIt was where Garret caught up with me.ł

ęDid it ever occur to you to wonder where the name of the tavern
comes from?ł

ęMy dad told me once. He said the tavern was named after a
metal statue that used to stand on a hill to the south, on the Durham road.ł

ęAnd did your father explain the origin of this statue?ł

ęHe said some people reckoned it had been up there since before
the Great Winter. Other people said an old sheriff had put it up. Some other
peoplełKł But Kathrin trailed off.

ęYes?ł

ęItłs silly, but they said a real Winged Man had come down,
out of the sky.ł

ęAnd did your father place any credence in that story?ł

ęNot really,ł Kathrin said.

ęHe was right not to. The statue was indeed older than the
Great Winter, when they tore it down. It was not put up to honour the sheriff,
or commemorate the arrival of a Winged Man.ł Now the widow looked at her
intently. ęBut a Winged Man did come down. I know what happened, Kathrin: I saw
the statue with my own eyes, before the Winged Man fell. I was there.ł

Kathrin shifted. She was growing uncomfortable in the widowłs
presence.

ęMy dad said people reckoned the Winged Man came down
hundreds of years ago.ł

ęIt did.ł

ęThen you canłt have been there, Widow Grayling.ł

ęBecause if I had been, I should be dead by now? Youłre
right. By all that is natural, I should be. I was born three hundred years ago,
Kathrin. Iłve been a widow for more than two hundred of those years, though not
always under this name. Iłve moved from house to house, village to village, as
soon as people start suspecting what I am. I found the Winged Man when I was
sixteen years old, just like you.ł

Kathrin smiled tightly. ęI want to believe you.ł

ęYou will, shortly. I already told you that this was the
coldest time of the Great Winter. The sun was a cold grey disk, as if it was
made of ice itself. For years the river hardly thawed at all. The Frost Fair
stayed almost all year round. It was nothing like the miserable little
gatherings you have known. This was ten times bigger, a whole city built on the
frozen river. It had streets and avenues, its own quarters. There were tents
and stalls, with skaters and sledges everywhere. Therełd be races, jousting
competitions, fireworks, mystery players, even printing presses to make newspapers
and souvenirs just for the Frost Fair. People came from miles around to see it,
Kathrin: from as far away as Carlisle or York.ł

ęDidnłt they get bored with it, if it was always there?ł

ęIt was always changing, though. Every few months there was
something different. You would travel fifty miles to see a new wonder if enough
people started talking about it. And there was no shortage of wonders, even if
they were not always quite what you had imagined when you set off on your
journey. Things fell from the sky more often in those days. A living thing like
the Winged Man was still a rarity, but other things came down regularly enough.
People would spy where they fell and try to get there first. Usually all theyłd
find would be bits of hot metal, all warped and runny like melted sugar.ł

ęSkydrift,ł Kathrin said. ęMetal thatłs no use to anyone,
except barbers and butchers.ł

ęOnly because we canłt make fires hot enough to make that
metal smelt down like iron or copper. Once, we could. But if you could find a
small piece with an edge, there was nothing it couldnłt cut through. A surgeonłs
best knife will always be skydrift.ł

ęSome people think the metal belongs to the jangling men,
and that anyone who touches it will be cursed.ł

ęAnd Iłm sure the sheriff does nothing to persuade them otherwise.
Do you think the jangling men care what happens to their metal?ł

ęI donłt think they care, because I donłt think they exist.ł

ęI was once of the same opinion. Then something happened to
make me change my mind.ł

ęThis being when you found the Winged Man, I take it.ł

ęBefore even that. I would have been thirteen, I suppose. It
was in the back of a tent in the Frost Fair. There was a case holding a hand
made of metal, found among skydrift near Wallsend.ł

ęA riderłs gauntlet.ł

ęI donłt think so. It was broken off at the wrist, but you
could tell that it used to belong to something that was also made of metal.
There were metal bones and muscles in it. No cogs or springs, like in a clock
or tin toy. This was something finer, more ingenious. I donłt believe any man
could have made it. But it cannot just be the jangling men who drop things from
the sky, or fall out of it.ł

ęWhy not?ł Kathrin asked, in the spirit of someone going
along with a game.

ęBecause it was said that the sheriffłs men once found a
head of skin and bone, all burned up, but which still had a pair of spectacles
on it. The glass in them was dark like coal, but when the sheriff wore them, he
could see at night like a wolf. Another time, his men found a shred of garment
that kept changing colour, depending on what it was lying against. You could
hardly see it then. Not enough to make a suit, but you could imagine how useful
that would have been to the sheriffłs spies.ł

ęTheyłd have wanted to get to the Winged Man first.ł

Widow Grayling nodded. ęIt was just luck that I got to him
first. I was on the Durham road, riding a mule, when he fell from the sky. Now,
the law said that they would spike your head on the bridge if you touched
something that fell on the sheriffłs land, especially skydrift. But everyone
knew that the sheriff could only travel so fast, even when he had his flying
machine. It was a risk worth taking, so I took it, and I found the Winged Man,
and he was still alive.ł

ęWas he really a man?ł

ęHe was a creature of flesh and blood, not a jangling man,
but he was not like any man I had seen before. He was smashed and bent, like a
toy that had been trodden on. When I found him he was covered in armour, hot
enough to turn the snow to water and make the water hiss and bubble under him.
I could only see his face. A kind of golden mask had come off, lying next to
him. There were bars across his mask, like the head of the Angel on the tavern
sign. The rest of him was covered in metal, jointed in a clever fashion. It was
silver in places and black in others, where it had been scorched. His arms were
metal wings, as wide across as the road itself if they had not been snapped
back on themselves. Instead of legs he just had a long tail, with a kind of
fluke at the end of it. I crept closer, watching the sky all around me for the
sheriffłs whirling machine. I was fearful at first, but when I saw the Winged
Manłs face I only wanted to do what I could for him. And he was dying. I knew
it, because Iłd seen the same look on the faces of men hanging from the sheriffłs
killing poles.ł

ęDid you talk to him?ł

ęI asked him if he wanted some water. At first he just
looked at me, his eyes pale as the sky, his lips opening and closing like a
fish that has just been landed. Then he said, ęWater will not help me.ł Just
those five words, in a dialect I didnłt know. Then I asked him if there was
anything else I could do to help him, all the while glancing over my shoulder
in case anyone should come upon us. But the road was empty and the sky was
clear. It took a long time for him to answer me again.ł

ęWhat did he say?ł

ęHe said, ęThank you, but there is nothing you can do for
me.ł Then I asked him if he was an angel. He smiled, ever so slightly. ęNo,ł he
said. ęNot an angel, really. But I am a flier.ł I asked him if there was a
difference. He smiled again before answering me. ęPerhaps not, after all this
time. Do you know of fliers, girl? Do any of you still remember the war?łłł

ęWhat did you tell him?ł

ęThe truth. I said I knew nothing of a war, unless he spoke
of the Battle of the Stadium of Light, which had only happened twenty years earlier.
He looked sad then, as if he had hoped for a different answer. I asked him if
he was a kind of soldier. He said that he was. ęFliers are warriors,ł he said. ęMen
like me are fighting a great war, on your behalf, against an enemy you do not
even remember.łłł

ęWhat enemy?ł

ęThe jangling men. They exist, but not in the way we imagine
them. They donłt crawl in through bedroom windows at night, clacking tin-bodied
things with skull faces and clockwork keys whirring from their backs. But theyłre
real enough.ł

ęWhy would such things exist?ł

ęTheyłd been made to do the work of men on the other side of
the sky, where men cannot breathe because the air is so thin. They made the
jangling men canny enough that they could work without being told exactly what
to do. But that already made them slyer than foxes. The jangling men coveted
our world for themselves. That was before the Great Winter came in. The flier
said that men like him ę special soldiers, born and bred to fight the jangling
men ę were all that was holding them back.ł

ęAnd he told you they were fighting a war, above the sky?ł

Something pained Widow Grayling. ęAll the years since havenłt
made it any easier to understand what the flier told me. He said that, just as
there may be holes in an old piece of timber, one that has been eaten through
by woodworm, so there may be holes in the sky itself. He said that his wings
were not really to help him fly, but to help him navigate those tunnels in the
sky, just as the wheels of a cart find their way into the ruts on a road.ł

ęI donłt understand. How can there be holes in the sky, when
the air is already too thin to breathe?ł

ęHe said that the fliers and the jangling men make these
holes, just as armies may dig a shifting network of trenches and tunnels as
part of a long campaign. It requires strength to dig a hole and more strength
to shore it up when it has already been dug. In an army, it would be the muscle
of men and horses and whatever machines still work. But the flier was talking
about a different kind of strength altogether.ł The widow paused, then stared
into Kathrinłs eyes with a look of foreboding. ęHe told me where it came from,
you see. And ever since then, I have seen the world with different eyes. It is
a hard burden, Kathrin. But someone must bear it.ł

Without thinking, Kathrin said, ęTell me.ł

ęAre you sure?ł

ęYes. I want to know.ł

ęThat bracelet has been on your wrist for a few minutes now.
Does it feel any different?ł

ęNo,ł Kathrin said automatically, but as soon as shełd
spoken, as soon as shełd moved her arm, she knew that it was not the case. The
bracelet still looked the same, it still looked like a lump of cold dead metal,
but it seemed to hang less heavily against her skin than when shełd first put
it on.

ęThe flier gave it to me,ł Widow Grayling said, observing
Kathrinłs reaction. ęHe told me how to open his armour and find the bracelet. I
asked why. He said it was because I had offered him water. He was giving me
something in return for that kindness. He said that the bracelet would keep me
healthy, make me strong in other ways, and that if anyone else was to wear it,
it would cure them of many ailments. He said that it was against the common law
of his people to give such a gift to one such as I, but he chose to do it
anyway. I opened his armour, as he told me, and I found his arm, bound by iron
straps to the inside of his wing, and broken like the wing itself. On the end
of his arm was this bracelet.ł

ęIf the bracelet had the power of healing, why was the
Winged Man dying?ł

ęHe said that there were certain afflictions it could not
cure. He had been touched by the poisonous ichor of a jangling man, and the
bracelet could do nothing for him now.ł

ęI still do not believe in magic,ł Kathrin said carefully.

ęCertain magics are real, though. The magic that makes a machine
fly, or a man see in the dark. The bracelet feels lighter, because part of it
has entered you. It is in your blood now, in your marrow, just as the jangling
manłs ichor was in the flierłs. You felt nothing, and you will continue to feel
nothing. But so long as you wear the bracelet, you will age much slower than
anyone else. For centuries, no sickness or infirmity will touch you.ł

Kathrin stroked the bracelet. ęI do not believe this.ł

ęI would not expect you to. In a year or two, you will feel
no change in yourself. But in five years, or in ten, people will start to
remark upon your uncommon youthfulness. For a while, you will glory in it. Then
you will feel admiration turn slowly to envy and then to hate, and it will
start to feel like a curse. Like me, you will need to move on and take another
name. This will be the pattern of your life, while you wear the flierłs charm.ł

Kathrin looked at the palm of her hand. It might have been imagination,
but the lines where the handles had cut into her were paler and less sensitive
to the touch.

ęIs this how you heal people?ł she asked.

ęYoułre as wise as I always guessed you were, Kathrin Lynch.
Should you come upon someone who is ill, you need only place the bracelet
around their wrist for a whole day and ę unless they have the jangling manłs
ichor in them ę they will be cured.ł

ęWhat of the other things? When my father hurt his arm, he
said you tied an eel around his arm.ł

Her words made the widow smile. ęI probably did. I could
just as well have smeared pigeon dung on it instead, or made him wear a
necklace of worms, for all the difference it would have made. Your fatherłs arm
would have mended itself on its own, Kathrin. The cut was deep, but clean. It
did not need the bracelet to heal, and your father was neither stupid nor
feverish. But he did have the loose tongue of all small boys. He would have
seen the bracelet, and spoken of it.ł

ęThen you did nothing.ł

ęYour father believed that I did something. That was enough
to ease the pain in his arm and perhaps allow it to heal faster than it would
otherwise have done.ł

ęBut you turn people away.ł

ęIf they are seriously ill, but neither feverish nor
unconscious, I cannot let them see the bracelet. There is no other way,
Kathrin. Some must die, so that the braceletłs secret is protected.ł

ęThis is the burden?ł Kathrin asked doubtfully.

ęNo, this is the reward for carrying the burden. The burden
is knowledge.ł

Again, Kathrin said, ęTell me.ł

ęThis is what the flier told me. The Great Winter fell across
our world because the sun itself grew colder and paler. There was a reason for
that. The armies of the celestial war were mining its fire, using the furnace
of the sun itself to dig and shore up those seams in the sky. How they did this
is beyond my comprehension, and perhaps even that of the flier himself. But he
did make one thing clear. So long as the Great Winter held, the celestial war
must still be raging. And that would mean that the jangling men had not yet
won.ł

ęBut the ThawłKł Kathrin began.

ęYes, you see it now. The snow melts from the land. Rivers
flow, crops grow again. The people rejoice, they grow stronger and happier,
skins darken, the Frost Fairs fade into memory. But they do not understand what
it really means.ł

Kathrin hardly dared ask. ęWhich side is winning, or has already
won?ł

ęI donłt know; thatłs the terrible part of it. But when the
flier spoke to me, I sensed an awful hopelessness, as if he knew things were
not going to go the way of his people.ł

ęIłm frightened now.ł

ęYou should be. But someone needs to know, Kathrin, and the
bracelet is losing its power to keep me out of the grave. Not because there is
anything wrong with it, I think ę it heals as well as it has ever done ę but
because it has decided that my time has grown sufficient, just as it will
eventually decide the same thing with you.ł

Kathrin touched the other object, the thing that looked like
a swordłs handle.

ęWhat is this?ł

ęThe flierłs weapon. His hand was holding it from inside the
wing. It poked through the outside of the wing like the claw of a bat. The
flier showed me how to remove it. It is yours as well.ł

She had touched it already, but this time Kathrin felt a
sudden tingle as her fingers wrapped around the hilt. She let go suddenly,
gasping as if she had reached for a stick and picked up an adder, squirming and
slippery and venomous.

ęYes, you feel its power,ł Widow Grayling said admiringly. ęIt
works for no one unless they carry the bracelet.ł

ęI canłt take it.ł

ęBetter you have it, than let that power go to waste. If the
jangling men come, then at least someone will have a means to hurt them. Until
then, there are other uses for it.ł

Without touching the hilt, Kathrin slipped the weapon into
her pocket where it lay as heavy and solid as a pebble.

ęDid you ever use it?ł

ęOnce.ł

ęWhat did you do?ł

She caught a secretive smile on Widow Graylingłs face. ęI
took something precious from William the Questioner. Banished him to the ground
like the rest of us. I meant to kill him, but he was not riding in the machine
when I brought it down.ł

Kathrin laughed. Had she not felt the power of the weapon,
she might have dismissed the widowłs story as the ramblings of an old woman.
But she had no reason in the world to doubt her companion.

ęYou could have killed the sheriff later, when he came to inspect
the killing poles.ł

ęI nearly did. But something always stayed my hand. Then the
sheriff was replaced by another man, and he in turn by another. Sheriffs came
and went. Some were evil men, but not all of them. Some were only as hard and
cruel as their office demanded. I never used the weapon again, Kathrin. I
sensed that its power was not limitless, that it must be used sparingly,
against the time when it became really necessary. But to use it in defence,
against a smaller targetłKthat would be a different matter, I think.ł

Kathrin thought she understood.

ęI need to be getting back home,ł she said, trying to sound
as if they had discussed nothing except the matter of the widowłs next delivery
of provisions. ęI am sorry about the other head.ł

ęThere is no need to apologise. It was not your doing.ł

ęWhat will happen to you now, widow?ł

ęIłll fade, slowly and gracefully. Perhaps I will see things
through to the next winter. But I donłt expect to see another thaw.ł

ęPlease. Take the bracelet back.ł

ęKathrin, listen. It will make no difference to me now, whether
you take it or not.ł

ęIłm not old enough for this. Iłm only a girl from the
Shield, a sledge-makerłs daughter.ł

ęWhat do you think I was, when I found the flier? We were
the same. Iłve seen your strength and courage.ł

ęI wasnłt strong today.ł

ęYet you took the bridge, when you knew Garret would be on
it. I have no doubt, Kathrin.ł

She stood. ęIf I had not lost the other headłKif Garret had
not caught mełKwould you have given me these things?ł

ęI was minded to do it. If not today, it would have happened
next time. But let us give Garret due credit. He helped me make up my mind.ł

ęHełs still out there,ł Kathrin said.

ęBut he will know you will not be taking the bridge to get
back home, even though that would save you paying the toll at Jarrow Ferry. He
will content himself to wait until you cross his path again.ł

Kathrin collected her one remaining bag and moved to the
door.

ęYes.ł

ęI will see you again, in a month. Give my regards to your father.ł

ęI will.ł

Widow Grayling opened the door. The sky was darkening to the
east, in the direction of Jarrow Ferry. The dusk stars would appear shortly,
and it would be dark within the hour. The crows were still wheeling, but more
languidly now, preparing to roost. Though the Great Winter was easing, the
evenings seemed as cold as ever, as if night was the final stronghold, the
place where the winter had retreated when the inevitability of its defeat
became apparent. Kathrin knew that she would be shivering long before she
reached the tollgate at the crossing, miles down the river. She tugged down her
hat in readiness for the journey and stepped onto the broken road in front of
the widowłs cottage.

ęYou will take care now, Kathrin. Watch out for the janglies.ł

ęI will, Widow Grayling.ł

The door closed behind her. She heard a bolt slide into
place.

She was alone.

Kathrin set off, following the path she had used to climb up
from the river. If it was arduous in daylight, it was steep and treacherous at
dusk. As she descended she could see Twenty Arch Bridge from above, a thread of
light across the shadowed ribbon of the river. Candles were being lit in the
inns and houses that lined the bridge, tallow torches burning along the
parapets. There was still light at the north end, where the sagging arch was
being repaired. The obstruction caused by the dray had been cleared, and
traffic was moving normally from bank to bank. She heard the calls of men and
women, the barked orders of foremen, the braying of drunkards and slatterns,
the regular creak and splash of the mill wheels turning under the arches.

Presently she reached a fork in the path and paused. To the
right lay the quickest route down to the quayside road to Jarrow Ferry. To the
left lay the easiest descent down to the bridge, the path that she had already
climbed. Until that moment, her resolve had been clear. She would take the
ferry, as she always did, as she was expected to do.

But now she reached a hand into her pocket and closed her fingers
around the flierłs weapon. The shiver of contact was less shocking this time.
The object already felt a part of her, as if she had carried it for years.

She drew it out. It gleamed in twilight, shining where it
had appeared dull before. Even if the widow had not told her of its nature,
there would have been no doubt now. The object spoke its nature through her
skin and bones, whispering to her on a level beneath language. It told her what
it could do and how she could make it obey her. It told her to be careful of
the power she now carried in her hand. She must scruple to use it wisely, for
nothing like it now existed in the world. It was the power to smash walls.
Power to smash bridges and towers and flying machines. Power to smash jangling
men.

Power to smash ordinary men, if that was what she desired.

She had to know.

The last handful of crows gyred overhead. She raised the weapon
to them and felt a sudden dizzying apprehension of their number and distance
and position, each crow feeling distinct from its brethren, as if she could
almost name them.

She selected one laggard bird. All the others faded from her
attention, like players removing themselves from a stage. She came to know that
last bird intimately. She could feel its wingbeats cutting the cold air. She
could feel the soft thatch of its feathers, and the lacelike scaffolding of
bone underneath. Within the cage of its chest she felt the tiny strong pulse of
its heart, and she knew that she could make that heart freeze just by willing
it.

The weapon seemed to urge her to do it. She came close. She
came frighteningly close.

But the bird had done nothing to wrong her, and she spared
it. She had no need to take a life to test this new gift, at least not an
innocent one. The crow rejoined its brethren, something skittish and hurried in
its flight, as if it had felt that coldness closing around its heart.

Kathrin returned the weapon to her pocket. She looked at the
bridge again, measuring it once more with clinical eyes, eyes that were older
and sadder this time, because she knew something that the people on the bridge
could never know.

ęIłm ready,ł she said, aloud, into the night, for whoever
might be listening.

Then resumed her descent.

Spirey And The Queen

Space war is godawful slow. Mouserłs long-range sensors had
sniffed the bogey two days ago, but it had taken all that time just to creep
within kill-range. I figured it had to be another dud. With ordnance, fuel and
morale all low, we were ready to slink back to Tigerłs Eye anyway; let one of
the other thickships pick up the sweep in this sector.

Sostill groggy after frogsleepI wasnłt exactly wetting myself
with excitement; not even when Mouser started spiking the thick with combat-readiness
psychogens. Even when we went to Attack-Con-One, all I did was pause the
neurodisney I was tripping (Hellcats of Solar War Three, since you asked),
slough my hammock and swim languidly up to the bridge.

�Junk", I said, looking over Yarrowłs shoulder at the
readout. �War debris or another of those piss-poor chondrites. Betcha."

�Sorry kid. Everything checks out."

�Hostiles?"

�Nope. Positive on the exhaust; dead ringer for the stolen
ship." She traced a webbed hand across the swathe of decorations which already
curled around her neck. �Want your stripes now or when we get back?"

�You actually think thisłll net us a pair of tigers?"

�Damn right it will."

I nodded, and thought: she isnłt necessarily wrong. No defector,
no stolen military secrets reaching the Royalists. Ought to be worth a medal,
maybe even a promotion.

So why did I feel something wasnłt right?

�Alright," I said, hoping to drown qualms in routine. �How
soon?"

�Missiles are already away, but shełs five light-minutes
from us, so the quacks wonłt reach her for six hours. Longer if she makes a run
for cover."

�Run for cover? Thatłs a joke."

�Yeah, hilarious." Yarrow swelled one of the holographic displays
until it hovered between us.

It was a map of the Swirl, tinted to show zones controlled
by us or the

Royalists. An enormous slowly rotating disk of primordial material,
eight-hundred AU edge to edge; wide enough that light took more than four days
to traverse it.

Most of the action was near the middle, in the light-hour of
space around the central star Fomalhaut. Immediately around the sun was a
material-free void which we called the Inner Clearing Zone, but beyond that
began the

Swirl proper; metal-rich lanes of dust condensing slowly
into rocky planets. Both sides wanted absolute control of those planet-forming

Feeding Zonesprime real estate for the day when one side
beat the other and could recommence mining operationsso that was where our
vast armies of wasps mainly slugged things out. We humansRoyalist and
Standardist bothkept much further out, where the Swirl thinned to
metal-depleted icy rubble. Even hunting the defector hadnłt taken us within ten
light hours of the Feeding Zones, and wełd gotten used to having a lot of empty
space to ourselves. Apart from the defector, there shouldnłt have been anything
else out here to offer cover.

But there was. Big too, not much more than a half
light-minute from the rat.

�Practically pissing distance," Yarrow observed.

�Too close for coincidence. What is it?"

�Splinter. Icy planetesimal, you want to get technical."

�Not this early in the day."

But I remembered how one of our tutors back at the academy
put it:

Splinters are icy slag, spat out of the Swirl. In a few
hundred thousand years therełll be a baby solar system around Fomalhaut, but
therełll also be shitloads of junk surrounding it, leftovers on million-year
orbits.

�Worthless to us," Yarrow said, scratching at the ribbon of
black hair which ran all the way from her brow to fluke. �But evidently not to
ratty."

�What if the Royalists left supplies on the splinter? She
could be aiming to refuel before the final hop to their side of the Swirl."
Yarrow gave me her best withering look. �Yeah, okay," I said. �Not my smartest
ever suggestion." Yarrow nodded sagely. �Ours is not to question, Spirey. Ours
is to fire and forget."

Six hours after the quackheads had hared away from Mouser,
Yarrow floated in the bridge, fluked tail coiled beneath. She resembled an inverted
question mark, and if Iłd been superstitious Iłd have said that wasnłt necessarily
the best of omens.

�You kill me," she said.

An older pilot called Quillin had been the first to go sirenfirst
to swap legs for tail. Yarrow followed a year later. Admittedly it made sense,
an adaptation to the fluid-filled environment of a high-gee thickship. And I
accepted the cardiovascular modifications that enabled us to breathe thick, as
well as the biomodified skin which let us tolerate cold and vacuum far longer
than any unmodified human. Not to mention the billions of molecule-sized demons
which coursed through our bodies, or the combat-specific psychomodifications.
But swapping your legs for a tail touched off too many queazy resonances in me.
Had to admire her nerve, though.

�What?" I said.

�That neurodisney shit. Isnłt a real space war good enough
for you?"

�Yeah, except I donłt think this is it. When was the last
time one of us actually looked a Royalist in the eye?"

She shrugged. �Something like four hundred years."

�Point made. At least in Solar War Three you get some blood.
See, itłs all set on planetary surfacesTitan; Europa; all those moons theyłve
got back in Sol system. Trench warfare; hand to hand stuff. You know what adrenalin
is, Yarrow?"

�Managed without it until now. And therełs another thing:
Donłt know much about Greater Earth history, but there was never a Solar War
Three."

�Itłs conjectural," I said. �And in any case it almost
happened; they almost went to the brink."

�Almost?"

�Itłs set in a different timeline."

She grinned, shaking her head. �Iłm telling you, you kill
me."

�She made a move yet?" I asked.

�What?"

�The defector."

�Oh, wełre back in reality now?" Yarrow laughed. �Sorry,
this is going to be slightly less exciting than Solar War Three."

�Inconsiderate," I said. �Think the bitch would give us a
run for our money." And as I spoke the weapons readout began to pulse faster and
faster, like the cardiogram of a fluttering heart. �How long now?"

�One minute, give or take a few seconds."

�Want a little bet?"

Yarrow grinned, sallow in the red alert lighting. �As if Iłd
say no,

Spirey."

So we hammered out a wager; Yarrow betting fifty
tiger-tokens the rat would attempt some last-minute evasion. �Wonłt do her a
blind bit of good," she said. �But that wonłt stop her. Itłs human nature."

Me, I suspected our target was either dead or asleep.

�Bit of an empty ritual, isnłt it."

�What?"

�I mean, the attack happened the best part of five minutes
ago, realtime.

The ratłs already dead, and nothing we can do can influence
that outcome."

Yarrow bit on a nicotine stick. �Donłt get all philosophical
on me,

Spirey."

�Wouldnłt dream of it. How long?"

�Five seconds. Four ..."

She was somewhere between three and four when it happened. I
remember thinking that there was something disdainful about the ratłs actions:
that shełd deliberately waited until the last possible moment, and that shełd dispensed
with our threat with the least effort possible.

That was how it felt, anyway.

Nine of the quackheads detonated prematurely, way beyond
kill-range. For a moment the tenth remained, zeroing in on the defectorbut instead
it failed to detonate, until it was just beyond range. For long moments there was
silence, while we absorbed what had happened. Yarrow broke it, eventually.

�Guess I just made myself some money," she said.

Colonel Wendigołs hologram delegate appeared, momentarily
frozen before shivering to life. With her too-clear, too-young eyes she fixed
first

Yarrow and then me.

�Intelligence was mistaken," she said. �Seems the defector
doctored records to conceal the theft of those countermeasures. But you harmed
her anyway?"

�Just," said Yarrow. �Her quackdrivełs spewing out exotics
like Spirey after a bad binge. No hull damage, but ..."

�Assessment?"

�Making a run for the splinter."

Wendigo nodded. �And then?"

�Shełll set down and make repairs." Yarrow paused, added: �Radar
says therełs metal on the surface. Mustłve been a wasp battle there, before the
splinter got lobbed out of the Swirl."

The delegate nodded in my direction. �Concur, Spirey?"

�Yes sir," I said, trying to suppress the nervousness I
always felt around

Wendigo, even though almost all my dealings with her had
been via simulations like this. Yarrow was happy to edit the conversation afterwards,
inserting the correct honorifics before transmitting the result back to Tigerłs
Eyebut I could never free myself of the suspicion that Wendigo would somehow
unravel the unedited version, with all its implicit insubordination.

Not that any of us didnłt inwardly accord Wendigo all the respect
she was due. Shełd nearly died in the Royalist strike against Tigerłs Eye
fifteen years agothe one in which my mother was killed. Actual attacks against
our two mutually opposed comet bases were rare, not happening much more than
every other generationmore gestures of spite than anything else.

But this had been an especially bloody one, killing an
eighth of our number and opening city-sized portions of our base to vacuum.
Wendigo was caught in the thick of the kinetic attack.

Now she was chimeric, lashed together by cybernetics. Not
much of this showed externallyexcept that the healed parts of her were too
flawless, more porcelain than flesh. Wendigo had not allowed the surgeons to
regrow her arms. Story was she lost them trying to pull one of the injured through
an open airlock, back into the pressurised zone. Shełd almost made it, fighting
against the gale of escaping air. Then some no-brainer hit the emergency door
control, and when the lock shut it took Wendigołs arms off at the shoulder,
along with the head of the person she was saving. She wore prosthetics now;
gauntleted in chrome.

�Shełll get there a day ahead of us," I said. �Even if we
pull twenty gees."

�And probably gone to ground by the time you get there."

�Should we try a live capture?"

Yarrow backed me up with a nod. �Itłs not exactly been possible
before."

The delegate bided her time before answering. �Admire your
dedication,"

she said, after a suitably convincing pause. �But youłd only
be postponing a death sentence. Kinder to kill her now, donłt you think?"

Mouser entered kill-range nineteen hours later, a wide
pseudo-orbit three thousand klicks out. The splinterseventeen by twelve klicks
acrosswas far too small to be seen as anything other than a twinkling speck, like
a grain of sugar at armłs length. But everything we wanted to know was clear:
topology, gravimetrics, and the site of the downed ship. That wasnłt hard. Quite
apart from the fact that it hadnłt buried itself completely, it was hot as
hell.

�Doesnłt look like the kind of touchdown you walk away from,"
Yarrow said.

�Think they ejected?"

�No way." Yarrow sketched a finger through a holographic enlargement
of the ship, roughly cone-shaped, vaguely streamlined just like our own thickship,
to punch through the Swirlłs thickest gas belts. �Clock those dorsal hatches.
Evac pods still in place."

She was right. The pods could have flung them clear before
the crash, but evidently they hadnłt had time to bail out. The ensuing impacteven
cushioned by the shipłs manifold of thickprobably hadnłt been survivable.

But there was no point taking chances.

Quackheads would have finished the job, but wełd used up our
stock. Mouser carried a particle beam battery, but wełd have to move
uncomfortably close to the splinter before using it. What remained were the molemines,
and they should have been perfectly adequate. We dropped fifteen of them, embedded
in a cloud of two hundred identical decoys. Three of the fifteen were
designated to dust the wreck, while the remaining twelve would bury deeper into
the splinter and attempt to shatter it completely.

That at least was the idea.

It all happened very quickly, not in the dreamy slow-motion
of a neurodisney. One instant the molemines were descending toward the splinter,
and then the next instant they werenłt there. Spacing the two instants had been
an almost subliminally brief flash.

�Starting to get sick of this," Yarrow said.

Mouser digested what had happened. Nothing had emanated from
the wreck.

Instead, therełd been a single pulse of energy seemingly
from the entire volume of space around the splinter. Particle weapons, Mouser
diagnosed.

Probably single-use drones, each tinier than a pebble but numbering
hundreds or even thousands. The defector must have sewn them on her approach.

But she hadnłt touched us.

�It was a warning," I said. �Telling us to back off."

�I donłt think so."

�What?"

�I think the warningłs on its way."

I stared at her blankly for a moment, before registering
what she had already seen.

That arcing from the splinter was something too fast to
stop, something against which our minimally-armoured thickship had no defense,
not even the option of flight.

Yarrow started to mouth some exotic profanity shełd reserved
for precisely this moment. There was an eardrum punishing bang and Mouser
shudderedbut we werenłt suddenly chewing vacuum.

And that was very bad news indeed.

Antiship missiles come in two main flavours: quackheads and
sporeheads.

You know which immediately after the weapon has hit. If youłre
still thinkingif you still existchances are itłs a sporehead. And at that point
your problems are just beginning.

Invasive demon attack, Mouser shrieked. Breather manifold
compromised ...

which meant something uninvited was in the thick. That was
the point of a sporehead: to deliver hostile demons into an enemy ship.

�Mm," Yarrow said. �I think it might be time to suit up."

Except our suits were a good minutełs swim away back into
the bowels of

Mouser, through twisty ducts which might skirt the infection
site. Having no choice, we swam anyway, Yarrow insisting I take the lead even
though she was a quicker swimmer. And somewhereitłs impossible to know exactly
wheredemons reached us, seeping invisibly into our bodies via the thick. I
couldnłt pinpoint the moment; it wasnłt as if there was a jagged transition between
lucidity and demon-manipulated irrationality. Yarrow and me were terrified
enough as it was. All I know is it began with a mild agoraphilia; an urge to
escape Mouserłs flooded confines. Gradually it phased into claustrophobia, and
then became fully-fledged panic, making

Mouser seem as malevolent as a haunted house.

Yarrow ignored her suit, clawing the hull until her fingers
spooled blood.

Fight it," I said. �Itłs just demons triggering our fear
centers, trying to drive us out!"

Of course, knowing so didnłt help.

Somehow I stayed still long enough for my suit to slither
on. Once sealed,

I purged the tainted thick with the suitłs own supplybut I
knew it wasnłt going to help much. The phobia already showed that hostile demons
had reached my brain, and now it was even draping itself in a flimsy logic.
Beyond the ship wełd be able to think rationally. It would only take a few
minutes for the thickłs own demons to neutralise the invaderand then wełd be
able to reboard. Complete delusion, of course.

But that was the point.

When something like coherent thought returned I was outside.

Nothing but me and the splinter.

The urge to escape was only a background anxiety, a flock of
stomach-butterflies urging me against returning. Was that demon-manipulated
fear or pure common sense? I couldnłt tellbut what I knew was that the
splinter seemed to be beckoning me forward, and I didnłt feel like resisting.
Sensible, surely: wełd exhausted all conventional channels of attack against
the defector, and now all that remained was to confront her on the territory
shełd staked as her own.

But where was Yarrow?

Suitłs alarm chimed. Maybe demons were still subjugating my
emotions, because I didnłt react with my normal speed. I just blinked, licked my
lips and stifled a yawn.

�Yeah, what?"

Suit informed me; something massing slightly less than me,
two klicks closer to the splinter, on a slightly different orbit. I knew it was

Yarrow; also that something was wrong. She was drifting. In
my blackout

Iłd undoubtedly programmed suit to take me down, but Yarrow
appeared not to have done anything except bail out.

I jetted closer. And then saw why she hadnłt programmed her
suit. Would have been tricky. She wasnłt wearing one.

I hit ice an hour later.

Cradling Yarrowshe wasnłt much of a burden, in the splinterłs
weak gravityI took stock. I wasnłt ready to mourn her, not just yet. If I could
quickly get her to the medical suite aboard the defectorłs ship there was a
good chance of revival. But where the hell was the wreck?

Squandering its last reserves of fuel, suit had deposited us
in a clearing among the graveyard of ruined wasps. Half submerged in ice, they looked
like scorched scrap-iron sculptures; phantoms from an entomologistłs worst nightmare.
So therełd been a battle here, back when the splinter was just another drifting
lump of ice. Even if the thing was seamed with silicates or organics, it would
not have had any commercial potential to either side. But it might still have
had strategic value, and that was why the wasps had gone to war on its surface.
Trouble wasas wełd known before the attackthe corpses covered the entire
surface, so there was no guessing where wełd come down. The wrecked ship might
be just over the nearest hillockor another ten kilometers in any direction.

I felt the ground rumble under me first. Hunting for the
source of the vibration, I saw a quill of vapour reach into the sky, no more
than a klick away. It was a geyser of superheated ice.

I dropped Yarrow and hit dirt, suit limiting motion so that
I didnłt bounce. Looking back, I expected to see a dimple in the permafrost,
where some rogue had impacted.

Instead, the geyser was still present. Worse, it was coming
steadily closer, etching a neat trench. A beam weapon was making that plume, I
realisedlike one of the party batteries aboard ship. Then I wised up.

That was Mouser. The demons had worked their way into its
command infrastructure, reprogramming it to turn against us. Now Mouser worked
for the defector.

I slung Yarrow over one shoulder and loped away from the
boiling impact point. Fast as the geyser moved, its path was predictable. If I
made enough lateral distance the death-line would sear past

Except the damn thing turned to follow me.

Now a second flanked it, shepherding me through the thickest
zone of wasp corpses. Did they have some significance for the defector? Maybe
so, but I couldnłt see it. The corpses were a rough mix of machines from both
sides:

Royalist wasps marked with yellow shell symbols, ours with
grinning tiger-heads. Generation thirty five units, if I remembered Mil-Hist,
when both sides toyed with pulse-hardened optical thinkware. In the seventy-odd
subsequent generations therełd been numerous further jumps: ur-quantum logics,
full-spectrum reflective wasp armour, chameleoflage, quackdrive powerplants and
every weapon system the human mind could devise. Wełd tried to encourage the
wasps to make these innovations for themselves, but they never managed to
evolve beyond strictly linear extrapolation. Which was good, or else we human
observers would have been out of a job.

Not that it really mattered now.

A third geyser had erupted behind me, and a fourth ahead, boxing
me in.

Slowly, the four points of fire began to converge. I
stopped, but kept holding Yarrow. I listened to my own breathing, harsh above
the basso tremor of the drumming ground.

Then steel gripped my shoulder.

She said wełd be safer underground. Also that she had
friends below who might be able to do something for Yarrow.

�If you werenłt defecting," I began, as we entered a roughly
hewn tunnel into the splinterłs crust, �what the hell was it?"

�Trying to get home. Least that was the idea, until we
realised Tigerłs

Eye didnłt want us back." Wendigo knuckled the ice with one
of her steel fists, her suit cut away to expose her prosthetics. �Which is when
we decided to head here."

�You almost made it," I said. Then added: �Where were you
trying to get home from?"

�Isnłt it obvious?"

�Then you did defect."

�We were trying to make contact with the Royalists. Trying
to make peace."

In the increasingly dim light I saw her shrug. �It was a
long-shot, conducted in secrecy. When the mission went wrong, it was easy for
Tigerłs

Eye to say wełd been defecting."

�Bullshit."

�I wish."

�But you sent us."

�Not in person."

�But your delegate"

�Could be made to say anything my enemies chose. Even to
order my own execution as a traitor."

We paused to switch on our suit lamps. �Maybe youłd better
tell me everything."

�Gladly," Wendigo said. �But if this hasnłt been a good day
so far, Iłm afraid itłs about to go downhill."

Therełd been a clique of high-ranking officers who believed
that the Swirl war was intrinsically unwinnable. Privy to information not released
to the populace, and able to see through Tigerłs Eyełs own carefully filtered internal
propaganda, they realised that negotiationcontactwas the only way out.

�Of course, not everyone agreed. Some of my adversaries
wanted us dead before we even reached the enemy." Wendigo sighed. �Too much in
love with the warłs stabilityand who can blame them? Life for the average
citizen in Tigerłs Eye isnłt that bad. Wełre given a clear goal to fight for,
and the likelihood of any one of us dying in a Royalist attack is small enough
to ignore. The idea that all of that might be about to end after four hundred
years; that we all might have to rethink our roles ... well, it didnłt go down
too well."

�About as welcome as a fart in a vac-suit, right?"

Wendigo nodded. �I think you understand."

�Go on."

Her expeditionWendigo and two pilotshad crossed the Swirl
unchallenged. Approaching the Royalist cometary base, theyłd expected to be
questionedperhaps even fired uponbut nothing had happened. When they entered
the stronghold, they understood why.

�Deserted," Wendigo said. �Or we thought so, until we found
the

Royalists." She expectorated the word. �Feral, practically.
Naked, grubby subhumans. Their wasps feed them and treat their illnesses, but
thatłs as far as it goes. They grunt, and theyłve been toilet-trained, but theyłre
not quite the military geniuses wełve been led to believe. �

�Then ..."

�The war is ... nothing we thought." Wendigo laughed, but
the confines of her helmet rendered it more like the squawking of a
jack-in-the-box. �And now you wonder why home didnłt want us coming back?"

Before Wendigo could explain further, we reached a wider bisecting
tunnel, glowing with its own insipid chlorine-coloured light. Rather than the meandering
bore of the tunnel in which we walked, it was as cleanly cut as a rifle barrel.
In one direction the tunnel was blocked by a bullet-nosed cylinder, closely
modelled on the trains in Tigerłs Eye. Seemingly of its own volition, the train
lit up and edged forward, a door puckering open.

�Get in," Wendigo said." And lose the helmet. You wonłt need
it where wełre going. �

Inside I coughed phlegmy ropes of thick from my lungs.

Transitioning between breathing modes isnłt pleasantmore so
since Iłd breathed nothing but thick for six weeks. But after a few lungfuls of
the trainłs antiseptic air, the dark blotches around my vision began to recede.

Wendigo did likewise, only with more dignity.

Yarrow lay on one of the couches, stiff as a statue carved
in soap. Her skin was cyanotic, a single all-enveloping bruise. Pilot skin is a
better vacuum barrier than the usual stuff, and vacuum itself is a far better insulator
against heat loss than air. But where Iłd lifted her my gloves had embossed
fingerprints into her flesh. Worse was the broad stripe of ruined skin down her
back and the left side of her tail, where she had lain against the splinterłs
surface.

But her head looked better. When she hit vac, biomodified
seals would have shut within her skull, barricading every possible avenue for
pressure, moisture or blood loss. Even her eyelids would have fused tight.
Implanted glands in her carotid artery would have released droves of friendly demons,
quickly replicating via nonessential tissue in order to weave a protective
scaffold through her brain.

Good for an hour or somaybe longer. But only if the hostile
demons hadnłt screwed with Yarrowłs native ones.

�You were about to tell me about the wasps," I said, as
curious to hear the rest of Wendigołs story as I was to blank my doubts about
Yarrow.

�Well, itłs rather simple. They got smart."

�The wasps?"

She clicked the steel fingers of her hand. �Overnight. Just
over a hundred years ago."

I tried not to look too overwhelmed. Intriguing as all this
was, I wasnłt treating it as anything other than an outlandish attempt to
distract me from the main reason for my being here, which remained killing the
defector. Wendigołs story explained some of the anomalies wełd so far encounteredbut
that didnłt rule out a dozen more plausible explanations. Meanwhile, it was
amusing to try and catch her out. �So they got smart," I said. �You mean our
wasps, or theirs?"

�Doesnłt mean a damn anymore. Maybe it just happened to one
machine in the

Swirl, and then spread like wildfire to all the trillions of
other wasps.

Or maybe it happened simultaneously, in response to some
stimulus we canłt even guess at."

�Want to hazard a guess?"

�I donłt think itłs important, Spirey." She sounded like she
wanted to put a lot of distance between herself and this topic. �Point is it
happened.

Afterwards, distinctions between us and the enemyat least
from the point of view of the waspscompletely vanished."

�Workers of the Swirl unite."

�Something like that. And you understand why they kept it to
themselves, donłt you?"

I nodded, more to keep her talking.

�They needed us, of course. They still lacked something. Creativity,
I guess youłd call it. They could evolve themselves incrementally, but they couldnłt
make the kind of sweeping evolutionary jumps wełd been feeding them."

�So we had to keep thinking there was a war on."

Wendigo looked pleased. �Right. Wełd keep supplying them
with innovations, and theyłd keep pretending to do each other in." She halted,
scratching at the unwrinkled skin around one eye with the alloy finger of one
hand.

�Clever little bastards."

Wełd arrived somewhere.

It was a chamber, large as any enclosed space Iłd ever seen.
I felt gravity; too much of the stuff. The whole chamber must have been gimbaled
and spun within the splinter, like one of the gee-load simulators back in

Tigerłs Eye. The vaulted ceiling, hundreds of meters ęaboveł,
now seemed vertiginously higher. Apart from its apex, it was covered in intricate
frescosdozens of pictorial facets, each a cycling hologram. They told the
history of the Swirl, beginning with its condensation from interstellar gas,
the ignition of its star, the onset of planetary formation. Then the action cut
to the arrival of the first Standardist wasp, programmed to dive into the Swirl
and breed like a rabbit, so that one day therełd be a sufficiently huge population
to begin mining the thing; winnowing out metals, silicates and precious
organics for the folks back home. ęCourse, it never happened like that. The
Royalists wanted in on the action, so they sent their own wasps, programmed to
attack ours.

The rest is history. The frescos showed the warłs beginning,
and then a little while later the arrival of the first human observers, beamed
across space as pure genetic data, destined to be born in artificial wombs in hollowed
out comet-cores, raised and educated by wasps, imprinted with the best tactical
and strategic knowledge available. Thereafter they taught the wasps. From then
on things hotted up, because the observers werenłt limited by years of timelag.
They were able to intervene in wasp evolution in realtime.

That ought to have been it, because by then we were pretty
up to date, give or take four hundred years of the same.

But the frescos carried on.

There was one representing some future state of the Swirl,
neatly ordered into a ticking orrery of variously sized and patterned worlds,
some with beautiful rings or moon systems. And finallylike Mediaeval
conceptions of Edenthere was a triptych of lush planetary landscapes, with
wierd animals in the foreground, mountains and soaring cloudbanks behind.

�Seen enough to convince you?" Wendigo asked.

�No," I said, not entirely sure whether I believed myself.
Craning my neck, I looked up toward the apex.

Something hung from it.

What it was was a pair of wasps, fused together. One was complete,
the other was only fully-formed, seemingly in the process of splitting from the
complete wasp. The fused pair looked to have been smothered in molten bronze,
left to dry in waxy nodules.

�You know what this is?" Wendigo asked.

�Iłm waiting."

�Wasp art."

I looked at her.

�This wasp was destroyed mid-replication," Wendigo continued.
�While it was giving birth. Evidently the image has some poignancy for them.
How Iłd put it in human terms I donłt know ..."

�Donłt even think about it."

I followed her across the marbled terrazzo which floored the
chamber.

Arched porticos surrounded it, each of which held a single
dead wasp, their body designs covering a hundred generations of evolution. If
Wendigo was right, I supposed these dead wasps were the equivalent of venerated
old ancestors peering from oil paintings. But I wasnłt convinced just yet.

�You knew this place existed?"

She nodded. �Or else wełd be dead. The wasps back in the
Royalist stronghold told us we could seek sanctuary here, if home turned against
us."

�And the waspswhat? Own this place?"

�And hundreds like it, although the others are already far
beyond the

Swirl, on their way out to the halo. Since the wasps came to
consciousness, most of the splinters flung out of the Swirl have been infiltrated.
Shrewd of themall along, wełve never suspected that the splinters are anything
other than cosmic trash."

�Nice decor, anyway."

�Florentine," Wendigo said, nodding. �The frescos are in the
style of a painter called Masaccio; one of Brunelleschiłs disciples. Remember,
the wasps had access to all the cultural data we brought with us from GE

every byte of it. Thatłs how they work, I thinkby constructing
things according to arbitrary existing templates."

�And therełs a point to all this?"

�Iłve been here precisely one day longer than you, Spirey."

�But you said you had friends here; people who could help
Yarrow."

�Theyłre here alright," Wendigo said, shaking her head. �Just
hope youłre ready for them."

On some unspoken cue they emerged, spilling from a door
which until then

Iłd mistaken for one of the surrounding porticos. I
flinched, acting on years of training. Although wasps have never intentionally
harmed a human beingeven the enemyłs waspstheyłre nonetheless powerful,
dangerous machines. There were twelve of them; divided equally between
Standardist and Royalist units. Six-legged, their two-meter long, segmented
alloy bodies sprouted weapons, sensors and specialized manipulators. So far so
familiar, except that the way the wasps moved was subtly wrong. It was as if
the machines choreographed themselves, their bodies defining the extremities of
a much larger form which I sensed more than saw.

The twelve whisked across the floor.

�They areor rather it isa queen," Wendigo said. �From what
Iłve gathered, therełs one queen for every splinter. Splinterqueens, I call them."

The swarm partially surrounded us nowbut retained the
brooding sense of oneness.

�She told you all this?"

�Her demons did, yes." Wendigo tapped the side of her head. �I
got a dose after our ship crashed. You got one after we hit your ship. It was a
standard sporehead from our arsenal, but the Splinterqueen loaded it with her
own demons. For the moment thatłs how she speaks to usvia symbols woven by
demons."

�Take your word for it."

Wendigo shrugged. �No need to."

And suddenly I knew. It was like eavesdropping a topologistłs
fever dream

only much stranger. The burst of Queenłs speech couldnłt
have lasted more than a tenth of a second, but its after-images seemed to
persist much longer, and I had the start of a migraine before it had ended. But
like

Wendigo had implied before, I sensed planningthat every
thought was merely a step toward some distant goal, the way each statement in a
mathematical proof implies some final QED.

Something big indeed.

�You deal with that shit?"

�My chimeric parts must filter a lot."

�And she understands you?"

�We get by."

�Good," I said. �Then ask her about Yarrow."

Wendigo nodded and closed both eyes, entering intense
rapport with the

Queen. What followed happened quickly: six of her components
detaching from the extended form and swarming into the train we had just
exited. A

moment later they emerged with Yarrow, elevated on a loom
formed from dozens of wasp manipulators.

�What happens now?"

�Theyłll establish a physical connection to her neural
demons," Wendigo said. �So that they can map the damage."

One of the six reared up and gently positioned its blunt,
anvil-shaped

ęheadł directly above Yarrowłs frost-mottled scalp. Then the
wasp made eight nodding movements, so quickly that the motion was only a series
of punctuated blurs. Looking down, I saw eight bloodless puncture marks on

Yarrowłs head. Another wasp replaced the driller and
repeated the procedure, executing its own blurlike nods. This time, glistening
fibers trailed from Yarrowłs eight puncture points into the wasp, which looked
as if it was sucking spaghetti from my compatriotłs skull.

Long minutes of silence followed, while I waited for some
kind of report.

�It isnłt good," Wendigo said eventually.

�Show me."

And I got a jolt of Queenłs speech, feeling myself inside Yarrowłs
hermetically sealed head, feeling the chill that had gasped against her brain
core, despite her pilot augs. I sensed the two intermingled looms of native and
foreign demons, webbing the shattered matrix of her consciousness.

I also sensedwhat? Doubt?

�Shełs pretty far gone, Spirey."

�Tell the Queen to do what she can."

�Oh, she will. Now shełs glimpsed Yarrowłs mind, shełll do
all she can not to lose it. Minds mean a lot to herparticularly in view of
what the

Splinterqueens have in mind for the future. But donłt expect
miracles."

�Why not? We seem to be standing in one."

�Then youłre prepared to believe some of what Iłve said?"

�What it means," I started to say

But I didnłt finish the sentence. As I was speaking the
whole chamber shook violently, almost dashing us off our feet.

�What was that?"

Wendigołs eyes glazed again, briefly.

�Your ship," she said. �It just self-destructed."

�What?"

A picture of what remained of Mouser formed in my head: a
dulling nebula, embedding the splinter. �The order to self-destruct came from
Tigerłs

Eye," Wendigo said. �It cut straight to the shipłs
quackdrive subsystems, at a level the demons couldnłt rescind. I imagine they
were rather hoping youłd have landed by the time the order arrived. The blast
would have destroyed the splinter."

�Youłre saying home just tried to kill us?"

�Put it like this," Wendigo said. �Now might not be a bad
time to rethink your loyalties."

Tigerłs Eye had failed this timebut they wouldnłt stop
there. In three hours theyłd learn of their mistake, and three or more hours after
that we would learn of their countermove, whatever it happened to be.

�Shełll do something, wonłt she? I mean, the wasps wouldnłt
go to the trouble of building this place only to have Tigerłs Eye wipe it out."

�Not much she can do," Wendigo said, after communing with
the Queen. �If home choose to use kinetics against usand theyłre the only
weapon which could hit us from so farthen there really is no possible defense.
And remember there are a hundred other worlds like this, in or on their way to
the halo. Losing one would make very little difference."

Something in me snapped. �Do you have to sound so damned
indifferent to it all? Here we are talking about how wełre likely to be dead in
a few hours and youłre acting like itłs only a minor inconvenience." I fought
to keep the edge of hysteria out of my voice. �How do you know so much anyway?

Youłre mighty well informed for someone whołs only been here
a day,

Wendigo."

She regarded me for a moment, almost blanching under the
slap of insubordination. Then Wendigo nodded, without anger. �Yes, youłre right
to ask how I know so much. You canłt have failed to notice how hard we crashed.
My pilots took the worst."

�They died?"

Hesitation. �One at leastSorrel. But the other, Quillin,
wasnłt in the ship when the wasps pulled me out of the wreckage. At the time I
assumed theyłd already retrieved her."

�Doesnłt look that way."

�No, it doesnłt, and ..." She paused, then shook her head. �Quillin
was why we crashed. She tried to gain control, to stop us landing ..." Again

Wendigo trailed off, as if unsure how far to commit herself.
�I think

Quillin was a plant, put aboard by those who disagreed with
the peace initiative. Shełd been primedaltered psychologically to reject any

Royalist peace overtures."

�She was born like thatwith a stick up her ass."

�Shełs dead, Iłm sure of it."

Wendigo almost sounded glad.

�Still, you made it."

�Just, Spirey. Iłm the humpty who fell off the wall twice.
This time they couldnłt find all the pieces. The Splinterqueen pumped me full
of demons; gallons of them. Theyłre all thatłs holding me together, but I donłt
think they can keep it up forever. When I speak to you, at least some of what you
hear is the Splinterqueen herself. Iłm not really sure where you draw the line."

I let that sink in, then said: �About the ship. Repair
systems would have booted when you hit. Any idea when shełll fly again?"

�Another day, day and a half."

�Too damn long."

�Just being realistic. If therełs a way to get off the
splinter within the next six hours, ship isnłt it."

I wasnłt giving up so easily. �What if wasps help? They
could supply materials. Should speed things."

Again that glazed look. �Alright," she said. �Itłs done. But
Iłm afraid wasp assistance wonłt make enough difference. Wełre still looking at
twelve hours."

�So I wonłt start any long disneys." I shrugged. �And maybe
we can hold out until then." She looked unconvinced, so I said: �Tell me the
rest.

Everything you know about this place. Why, for starters."

�Why?"

�Wendigo, I donłt have the faintest damn idea what any of us
are doing here. All I do know is that in six hours I could be suffering from
acute existence failure. When that happens, Iłd be happier knowing what was so
important I had to die for it."

Wendigo looked toward Yarrow, still nursed by the detached
elements of the

Queen. �I donłt think our being here will help her," she
said. �In which case, maybe I should show you something." Something like a grin
appeared on Wendigołs face. �After all, it isnłt as if we donłt have time to
kill."

So we rode the train again, this time burrowing deeper into
the splinter.

�This place," Wendigo said, �and the hundred others already
beyond the

Swirland the hundreds, thousands more which will followare
arks.

Theyłre carrying life into the halo; the cloud of left-over
material around the Swirl."

�Colonisation, right?"

�Not quite. When the timełs right the splinters will return
to the Swirl.

Only there wonłt be one any more. Therełll be a solar
system, fully formed. When the colonisation does begin, it will be of new
worlds around

Fomalhaut, seeded from the life-templates held in the splinters."

I raised a hand. �I was following you there ... until you mentioned
life-templates."

�Patience, Spirey."

Wendigołs timing couldnłt have been better, because at that
moment light flooded the trainłs brushed-steel interior.

The tunnel had become a glass tube, anchored to one wall of
a vast cavern suffused in emerald light. The far wall was tiered, draping rafts
of foliage. Our wall was steep and forested, oddly-curved waterfalls draining into
stepped pools. The waterfalls were bent away from true ęverticalł by coriolis
force, evidence thatjust like the first chamberthis entire space was
independently spinning within the splinter. The stepped pools were surrounded
by patches of grass, peppered with moving forms which might have been naked
people. There were wasps as welltending the people.

As the people grew clearer I had that flinch you get when
your gaze strays onto someone with a shocking disfigurement. Roughly half of
them were males.

�Imported Royalists," Wendigo said. �Remember I said theyłd
turned feral?

Seems there was an accident, not long after the wasps made
the jump to sentience. A rogue demon, or something. Decimated them."

�They have both sexes."

�Youłll get used to it, Spireyconceptually anyway. Tigerłs
Eye wasnłt always exclusively female, you know that? It was just something we
evolved into. Began with you pilots, matter of fact. Fem physiology made sense
for pilotswomen were smaller, had better gee-load tolerance, better stress psychodynamics
and required fewer consumables than males. We were products of bio-engineering
from the outset, so it wasnłt hard to make the jump to an all-fem culture."

�Makes me want to ... I donłt know." I forced my gaze away
from the

Royalists. �Puke or something. Itłs like going back to
having hair all over your body."

�Thatłs because you grew up with something different."

�Did they always have two sexes?"

�Probably not. What I do know is that the wasps bred from
the survivors, but something wasnłt right. Apart from the reversion to dimorphism,
the children didnłt grow up normally. Some part of their brains hadnłt developed
right."

�Meaning what?"

�Theyłre morons. The wasps keep trying to fix things of
course. Thatłs why the Splinterqueen will do everything to help Yarrowand us,
of course.

If she can study or even capture our thought patternsand
the demons make that possiblemaybe she can use them to imprint consciousness
back onto the Royalists. Like the Florentine architecture I said they copied, right?
That was one template, and Yarrowłs mind will be another."

�Thatłs supposed to cheer me up?"

�Look on the bright side. A while from now, there might be a
whole generation of people who think along lines laid down by Yarrow."

�Scary thought." Then wondered why I was able to crack a
joke, with destruction looming so close in the future. �Listen, I still donłt
get it.

What makes them want to bring life to the Swirl?"

�It seems to boil down to two ... imperatives, I suppose youłd
call them.

The firstłs simple enough. When wasps were first opening up
Greater

Earthłs solar system, back in the mid Twenty First Century,
we sought the best way for them to function in large numbers without supervision.
We studied insect colonies and imprinted the most useful rules straight into the
waspsł programming. More than six hundred years later, those rules have percolated
to the top. Now the wasps arenłt content merely to organize themselves along
patterns derived from living prototypes. Now they want to becomeor at least
give rise toliving forms of their own."

�Life envy."

�Or something very like it."

I thought about what Wendigo had told me, then said: �What
about the second imperative?"

�Trickier. Much trickier." She looked at me hard, as if
debating whether to broach whatever subject was on her mind. �Spirey, what do
you know about Solar War Three?"

The wasps had given up on Yarrow while we traveled. Theyłd
left her on a corniced plinth in the middle of the terrazzo; poised on her
back, arms folded across her chest, tail and fluke draping asymmetrically over
one side.

�She didnłt necessarily fail, Spirey," Wendigo said, taking
my arm in her own unyielding grip. �Thatłs only Yarrowłs body, after all."

�The Queen managed to read her mind?"

There was no opportunity to answer. The chamber shook, more
harshly than when Mouser had gone up. The vibration keeled us to the floor,
Wendigołs metal arms cracking against the tesselated marble. As if turning in
her sleep, Yarrow slipped from the plinth.

�Home," Wendigo said, raising herself from the floor.

�Impossible. Canłt have been more than two hours since
Mouser was hit.

There shouldnłt be any response for another four!"

�They probably decided to attack us regardless of the
outcome of their last attempt. Kinetics."

�You sure therełs no defense?"

�Only good luck." The ground lashed at us again, but Wendigo
stayed standing. The roar which followed the first impact was subsiding, fading
into a constant but bearable complaint of tortured ice.

�The first probably only chipped usmaybe gouged a big crater,
but I doubt that it ruptured any of the pressurised areas. Next time could be worse."

And there would be a next time, no doubt about it. Kinetics
were the only weapon capable of hitting us at such long range, and they did so
by sheer force of numbers. Each kinetic was a speck of iron, accelerated to a hairłs
breadth below the speed of light. Relativity bequeathed the speck a disproportionate
amount of kinetic energyenough that only a few impacts would rip the splinter
to shreds. Of course, only one in a thousand of the kinetics they fired at us
would hitbut that didnłt matter. Theyłd just fire ten thousand.

�Wendigo,łł I said. �Can we get to your ship?"

�No," she said, after a momentłs hesitation. �We can reach
it, but it isnłt fixed yet."

�Doesnłt matter. Wełll lift on auxiliaries. Once wełre clear
of the splinter wełll be safe."

�No good, either. Hullłs breacheditłll be at least an hour
before even part of it can be pressurised."

�And itłll take us an hour or so just to get there, wonłt
it? So why are we waiting?"

�Sorry, Spirey, but"

Her words were drowned by the arrival of the second kinetic.
This one seemed to hit harder, the impact trailing away into aftergroans. The holographic
frescos were all dark now. Thenever so slowlythe ceiling ruptured, a huge
mandible of ice probing into the chamber. Wełd lost the false gravity; now all
that remained was the splinterłs feeble pull, dragging us obliquely toward one
wall.

�But what?" I shouted in Wendigołs direction.

For a moment she had that absent look which said she was
more Queen than

Wendigo. Then she nodded in reluctant acceptance. �Alright,
Spirey. We play it your way. Not because I think our chances are great. Just
that Iłd rather be doing something."

�Amen to that."

It was uncomfortably dim now, much of the illumination having
come from the endlessly cycling frescos. But it wasnłt silent. Though the groan
of the chamberłs off-kilter spin was gone now, what remained was almost as bad:
the agonized shearing of the ice which lay beyond us. Helped by wasps, we made
it to the train. I carried Yarrowłs corpse, but at the door

Wendigo said: �Leave her."

�No way."

�Shełs dead, Spirey. Everything of her that mattered, the
Splinterqueen already saved. You have to accept that. It was enough that you
brought her here, donłt you understand? Carrying her now would only lessen your
chancesand that would really have pissed her off."

Some alien part of me allowed the wasps take the corpse.
Then we were inside, helmeted up and breathing thick.

As the train picked up speed, I glanced out the window,
intent on seeing the Queen one last time. It should have been too dark, but the
chamber looked bright. For a moment I presumed the frescos had come to life
again, but then something about the scenełs unreal intensity told me the Queen
was weaving this image in my head. She hovered above the debris-strewn terrazzoexcept
that this was more than the Queen I had seen before.

This waswhat?

How she saw herself?

Ten of her twelve wasp composites were now back together,
arranged in constantly shifting formation. They now seemed more living than
machine, with diaphonous sunwings, chitin-black bodies, fur-sheened limbs and sensors,
and eyes which were faceted crystalline globes, sparkling in the chamberłs
false light. That wasnłt all. Before, Iłd sensed the Queen as something implied
by her composites. Now I didnłt need to imagine her.

Like a ghost in which the composites hung, she loomed vast
in the chamber, multiwinged and brooding

And then we were gone.

We sped toward the surface for the next few minutes, waiting
for the impact of the next kinetic. When it hit, the trainłs cushioned ride smothered
the concussion. For a moment I thought wełd made it, then the machine began to
decelerate slowly to a dead halt. Wendigo convened with the Queen and told me
the line was blocked. We disembarked into vacuum.

Ahead, the tunnel ended in a wall of jumbled ice.

After a few minutes we found a way through the obstruction,
Wendigo wrenching aside boulders larger than either of us. �Wełre only half a klick
from the surface," she said, as we emerged into the unblocked tunnel beyond.
She pointed ahead, to what might have been a scotoma of absolute blackness
against the milky darkness of the tunnel.

�After that, a klick overland to the wreck." She paused. �Realise
we canłt go home, Spirey. Now more than ever."

�Not exactly spoilt for choice, are we."

�No. It has to be the halo, of course. Itłs where the
splinterłs headed anyway; just means wełll get there ahead of schedule. There
are other

Splinterqueens out there, and at the very least theyłll want
to keep us alive. Possibly other humans as wellothers who made the same
discovery as us, and knew there was no going home."

�Not to mention Royalists."

�That troubles you, doesnłt it?"

�Iłll deal with it," I said, pushing forward.

The tunnel was nearly horizontal, and with the splinterłs
weak gravity it was easy to make the distance to the surface. Emerging,
Fomalhaut glared down at us, a white-cored bloodshot eye surrounded by the
wrinklelike dust lanes of the inner Swirl. Limned in red, wasp corpses marred
the landscape.

�I donłt see the ship."

Wendigo pointed to a piece of blank caramel-colored horizon.
�Curvaturełs too great. We wonłt see it until wełre almost on top of it."

�Hope youłre right."

�Trust me. I know this place like, well ..." Wendigo
regarded one of her limbs. �Like the back of my hand."

�Encourage me, why donłt you."

Three or four hundred meters later we crested a
scallop-shaped rise of ice and halted. We could see the ship now. It didnłt
look in much better shape than when Yarrow and I had scoped it from Mouser.

�I donłt see any wasps."

�Too dangerous for them to stay on the surface," Wendigo
said.

�Thatłs cheering. I hope the remaining damage is cosmetic,"
I said.

�Because if it isnłt"

Suddenly I wasnłt talking to anyone.

Wendigo was gone. After a moment I saw her, lying in a crumpled
heap at the foot of the hillock. Her guts stretched away like a rusty
comet-tail, half way to the next promontary.

Quillin was fifty meters ahead, risen from the concealment
of a chondrite boulder.

When Wendigo had mentioned her, Iłd put her out of mind as
any kind of threat. How could she pose any danger beyond the inside of a
thickship, when shełd traded her legs for a tail and fluke, just like Yarrow?
On dry land, shełd be no more mobile than a seal pup. Well, that was how Iłd figured
things.

But Iłd reckoned without Quillinłs suit.

Unlike Yarrowłsunlike any siren suit Iłd ever seenit
sprouted legs.

Mechanized, they emerged from the hip, making no concessions
to human anatomy. The legs were long enough to lift Quillinłs tail completely free
of the ice. My gaze tracked up her body, registering the crossbow which she
held in a double-handed grip.

�Iłm sorry," Quillinłs deep voice boomed in my skull. �Check-inłs
closed."

�Wendigo said you might be a problem."

�Wise up. It was staged from the moment we reached the
Royalist stronghold." Still keeping the bow on me, she began to lurch across the
ice. �The ferals were actors, playing dumb. The wasps were programmed to feed
us bullshit."

�It isnłt a Royalist trick, Quillin."

�Shit. See Iłm gonna have to kill you as well."

The ground jarred, more violently than before. A nimbus of
white light puffed above the horizon, evidence of an impact on the splinterłs
far side. Quillin stumbled, but her legs corrected the accident before it tripped
her forward.

�I donłt know if youłre keeping up with current events," I
said. �But thatłs our own side."

�Maybe you didnłt think hard enough. Why did wasps in the
Swirl get smart before the trillions of wasps back in Sol System? Should have
been the other way round."

�Yeah?"

�Of course, Spirey. GEłs wasps had a massive head-start."
She shrugged, but the bow stayed rigidly pointed. �Okay, war sped up wasp
evolution here. But that shouldnłt have made so much difference. Thatłs where
the story breaks down."

�Not quite."

�What?"

�Something Wendigo told me. About what she called the second
imperative. I guess it wasnłt something she found out until she went underground."

�Yeah? Astonish me."

Well, something astonished Quillin at that pointbut I was only
marginally less surprised by it myself. An explosion of ice, and a mass of swiftly-moving
metal erupting from the ground around her. The wasp corpses were partially
dismembered, blasted and halfmeltedbut they still managed to drag Quillin to
the ground. For a moment she thrashed, kicking up plumes of frost. Then the
whole mass lay deathly still, and it was just me, the ice and a lot of metal
and blood.

The Queen must have coaxed activity out of a few of the wasp
corpses, ordering them to use their last reserves of power to take out Quillin.

Thanks, Queen.

But no cigar. Quillin hadnłt necessarily meant to shoot me
at that point, butbless hershe had anyway. The bolt had transected me with the
precision of one of the Queenłs theorems, somewhere below my sternum.

Gut-shot. The blood on the ice was my own.

I tried moving.

A couple of light-years away I saw my body undergo a frail
little shiver.

It didnłt hurt, but there was nothing in the way of
proprioceptive feedback to indicate Iłd actually managed to twitch any part of
my body.

Quillin was moving too.

Wriggling, that is, since her suitłs legs had been cleanly
ripped away by the wasps. Other than that she didnłt look seriously injured.
Ten or so meters from me, she flopped around like a maggot and groped for her
bow.

What remained of it anyway.

Chalk one to the good guys.

By which time I was moving, executing a marginally quicker
version of

Quillinłs slug crawl. I couldnłt stand upthere are limits
to what pilot physiology can cope withbut my legs gave me leverage she lacked.

�Give up, Spirey. You have a head-start on me, and right now
youłre a little fasterbut that shipłs still a long way off." Quillin took a moment
to catch her breath. �Think you can sustain that pace? Gonna need to, you donłt
want me catching up."

�Plan on rolling over me until I suffocate?"

�Thatłs an option. If this doesnłt kill you first."

Enough of her remained in my field-of-view to see what she
meant.

Something sharp and bladelike had sprung from her wrist, a
bayonet projecting half a meter ahead of her hand. It looked like a nasty little
toybut I did my best to push it out of mind and get on with the job of crawling
toward the ship. It was no more than two hundred meters away now

what little of it protruded above the ice. The external
airlock was already open, ready to clamp shut as soon as I wriggled inside

�You never finished telling me, Spirey."

�Telling you what?"

�About thiswhat did you call it? The second imperative?"

�Oh, that." I halted and snatched breath. �Before I go on, I
want you to know Iłm only telling you this to piss you off."

�Whatever bakes your cake."

�Alright," I said. �Then Iłll begin by saying you were
right. Greater

Earthłs wasps should have made the jump to sentience long before
those in the Swirl, simply because theyłd had longer to evolve. And thatłs what
happened."

Quillin coughed, like gravel in a bucket. �Pardon?"

�They beat us to it. About a century and a half ago. Across
Sol system, within just a few hours, every single wasp woke up and announced its
intelligence to the nearest human being it could find. Like babies reaching for
the first thing they see." I stopped, sucking in deep lungfuls. The wreck had
to be closer nowbut it hardly looked it.

Quillin, by contrast, looked awfully close nowand that
blade awfully sharp.

�So the wasps woke," I said, damned if she wasnłt going to
hear the whole story. �And that got some people scared . So much, some of them
got to attacking the wasps. Some of their shots went wide, because within a day
the whole system was one big shooting match. Not just humans against wasps

but humans against humans." Less than fifty meters now,
across much smoother ground than wełd so far traversed. �Things just escalated.
Ten days after Solar War Three began, only a few ships and habitats were still
transmitting. They didnłt last long."

�Crap," Quillin saidbut she sounded less cocksure than she
had a few moments before. �There was a war back then, but it never escalated
into a full-blown Solar War."

�No. It went the whole hog. From then on every signal we
ever got from GE was concocted by wasps. They darenłt break the news to usat
least not immediately. Wełve only been allowed to find out because wełre never
going home. Guilt, Wendigo called it. They couldnłt let it happen again."

�What about our wasps?"

�Isnłt it obvious? A while later the wasps here made the
same jump to sentiencepresumably because theyłd been shown the right moves by
the others. Difference was, ours kept it quiet. Canłt exactly blame them, can you?"

There was nothing from Quillin for a while, both of us concentrating
on the last patch of ice before Wendigołs ship.

�I suppose you have an explanation for this too," she said
eventually, swiping her tail against the ground. �Cłmon, blow my mind."

So I told her what I knew. �Theyłre bringing life to the
Swirl. Sooner than you think, too. Once this charade of a war is done, the
wasps breed in earnest. Trillions out there now, but in a few decades itłll be
billions of trillions. Theyłll outweigh a good-sized planet. In a way the

Swirl will have become sentient. Itłll be directing its own
evolution."

I spared Quillin the detailshow the wasps would arrest the
existing processes of planetary formation so that they could begin anew, only
this time according to a plan. Left to its own devices, the Swirl would contract
down to a solar system comprised solely of small, rocky planetsbut such a
system could never support life over billions of years.

Instead, the wasps would exploit the systemłs innate chaos
to tip it toward a state where it would give rise to at least two much larger
worlds

planets as massive as Jupiter or Saturn, capable of shepherding
left-over rubble into tidy, world-avoiding orbits. Mass extinctions had no place
in the Splinterqueensł vision of future life.

But I guessed Quillin probably didnłt care.

�Why are you hurrying, Spirey?" She asked, between harsh
grunts as she propelled herself forward. �The ship isnłt going anywhere."

The edge of the open airlock was a meter above the ice. My
fingers probed over the rim, followed by the crest of my battered helmet. Just
lifting myself into the lockłs lit interior seemed to require all the energy Iłd
already expended in the crawl. Somehow I managed to get half my body length
into the lock.

Which is when Quillin reached me.

There wasnłt much pain when she dug the bayonet into my ankle;
just a form of cold I hadnłt imagined before, even lying on the ice. Quillin
jerked the embedded blade to and forth, and the knot of cold seemed to reach out
little feelers, into my foot and lower leg. I sensed she wanted to retract the
blade for another stab, but my suit armour was gripping it tight.

The bayonet taking her weight, Quillin lofted her bulk over
the rim of the lock. I tried kicking her away, but the skewered leg no longer
felt a part of me.

�Youłre dead," she whispered.

�News to me."

Her eyes rolled wide, then locked on me with renewed venom.
She gave the bayonet a violent twist. �So tell me one thing. That storybullshit,
or what?"

�Iłll tell you," I said. �But first consider this." Before
she could react

I reached out and palmed a glowing panel set in the lock
wall. The panel whisked aside, revealing a mushroom-shaped red button. �You
know that story they told about Wendigo, how she lost her arms?"

�You werenłt meant to swallow that hero guff, Spirey."

�No? Well get a load of this. My handłs on the emergency
pressurisation control, Quillin. When I hit it, the outer doorłs going to slide
down quicker than you can blink."

She looked at my hand, then down at her wrist, still
attached to my ankle via the jammed bayonet. Slowly the situation sunk in. �Close
the door,

Spirey, and youłll be a leg short."

�And you an arm, Quillin."

�Stalemate, then."

�Not quite. See, which of us is more likely to survive? Me inside,
with all the medical systems aboard this ship, or you all on your lonesome outside?
Frankly, I donłt think itłs any contest."

Her eyes opened wider. Quillin gave a shriek of anger and entered
one final furious wrestling match with the bayonet.

I managed to laugh. �As for your question, itłs true, every
word of it."

Then, with all the calm I could muster, I thumbed the
control. �Pisser, isnłt it."

I made it, of course.

Several minutes after the closing of the door, demons had lathered
a protective cocoon around the stump and stomach wound. They allowed me no painonly
a muggy sense of detachment. Enough of my mind remained sharp to think about my
escapeproblematic given that the ship still wasnłt fixed.

Eventually I remembered the evac pods.

They were made to kick away from the ship fast, if some quackdrive
system went on the fritz. They had thrusters for that; nothing fancy, but here
theyłd serve another purpose. Theyłd boost me from the splinter, punch me out
of its grav well.

So I did it.

Snuggled into a pod and blew out of the wreck, feeling the
gee-load even within the thick. It didnłt last long. On the evac podłs cam I
watched the splinter drop away until it was pebble-sized. The main body of the
kinetic attack was hitting it by then, impacts every ten or so seconds. After a
minute of that the splinter just came apart. Afterwards, there was only a sooty
veil where it had been, and then only the Swirl.

I hoped the Queen had made it. I guess it was within her
power to transmit what counted of herself out to sisters in the halo. If so,
there was a chance for Yarrow as well. Iłd find out eventually. Afterwards, I
used the podłs remaining fuel to inject me into a slow elliptical orbit, one
that would graze the halo in a mere fifty or sixty years.

That didnłt bother me. I wanted to close my eyes and let the
thick nurse me whole againand sleep an awful long time.

 

� Alastair Reynolds 1996, 1998

This story first appeared in Interzone.

A Spy In Europa

� Alastair Reynolds 1996, 2001

This story first appeared in Interzone.

 

Marius Vargovic, agent of Gilgamesh Isis, savoured an
instant of free-fall before the flitterłs engines kicked in, slamming it away
from the

Deucalion. His pilot gunned the craft toward the moon below,
quickly outrunning the other shuttles which the Martian liner had disgorged.

Europa seemed to be enlarging perceptibly; a flattening arc
the colour of nicotine-stained wallpaper.

�Boring, isnłt it."

Vargovic turned around in his seat, languidly. �Youłd rather
they were shooting at us?"

�Rather they were doing something."

�Then youłre a fool," Vargovic said, making a tent of his fingers.

�Therełs enough armament buried in that ice to give Jupiter
a second red spot. What it would do to us doesnłt bear thinking about it."

�Only trying to make conversation."

�Donłt botheritłs an overrated activity at the best of
times."

�Alright, MariusI get the message. In fact I intercepted
it, parsed it, filtered it, decrypted it with the appropriate one-time pad and
wrote a fucking two-hundred page report on it. Satisfied?"

�Iłm never satisfied, Mishenka. It just isnłt in my nature."

But Mishenka was right: Europa was an encrypted document;
complexity masked by a surface of fractured and refrozen ice. Its surface
grooves were like the capillaries in a vitrified eyeball; faint as the structure
in a raw surveillance image. But once within the airspace boundary of the

Europan Demarchy, traffic-management co-opted the flitter,
vectoring it into a touchdown corridor. In three days Mishenka would return,
but then he would disable the avionics, kissing the ice for less than ten
minutes.

�Not too late to abort," Mishenka said, a long time later.

�Are you out of your tiny mind?"

The younger man dispensed a frosty Covert Ops smile. �Wełve
all heard what the Demarchy do to spies, Marius."

�Is this a personal grudge or are you just psychotic?"

�Iłll leave being psychotic to you, Mariusyoułre so much
better at it."

Vargovic nodded. It was the first sensible thing Mishenka
had said all day.

They landed an hour later. Vargovic adjusted his Martian businesswear,
tuning his holographically-inwoven frock coat to project red sandstorms; lifting
the collar in what he had observed from the linerłs passengers was a recent
Martian fad. Then he grabbed his bagnothing incriminating there; no gadgets or
weaponsand exited the flitter, stepping through the gasket of locks. A slitherwalk
propelled him forward, massaging the soles of his slippers. It was a single
cultured ribbon of octopus skin, stimulated to ripple by the timed firing of
buried squid axons.

To get to Europa you either had to be sickeningly rich or
sickeningly poor. Vargovicłs cover was the former: a lie excusing the single-passenger
flitter. As the slitherwalk advanced he was joined by other arrivals:

business people like himself, and a sugaring of the merely
wealthy. Most of them had dispensed with holographics, instead projecting
entoptics beyond their personal space; machine-generated hallucinations decoded
by the implant hugging Vargovicłs optic nerve. Hummingbirds and seraphim were in
sickly vogue. Others were attended by autonomous perfumes which subtly altered
the moods of those around them. Slightly lower down the social scale, Vargovic
observed a clique of noisy touristsantlered brats from

Circum-Jove. Then there was a discontinuous jump:
squalid-looking Maunder refugees, who must have accepted indenture to the
Demarchy. The refugees were quickly segregated from the more affluent
immigrants, who found themselves within a huge geodesic dome, resting above the
ice on refrigerated stilts. The walls of the dome glittered with duty-free
shops, boutiques and bars. The floor was bowl-shaped, slitherwalks and spiral stairways
descending to the nadir, where a quincunx of fluted marble cylinders waited.
Vargovic observed that the newly-arrived were queueing for elevators which
terminated in the cylinders. He joined a line and waited.

�First time in Cadmus-Asterius?" asked the bearded man ahead
of him, iridophores in his plum-coloured jacket projecting Boolean propositions
from Sirikitłs Machine Ethics in the Transenlightenment.

�First time on Europa, actually. First time Circum-Jove, you
want the full story."

�Down-system?"

�Mars."

The man nodded gravely. �Hear itłs tough."

�Youłre not kidding." And he wasnłt. Since the sun had
dimmedthe second

Maunder minimum, repeating the behaviour which the sun had
exhibited in the seventeenth centurythe entire balance of power in the First
System had altered. The economies of the inner worlds had found it hard to adjust;
agriculture and power-generation handicapped, with concomitant social upheaval.
But the outer planets had never had the luxury of solar energy in the first
place. Now Circum-Jove was the benchmark of First

System economic power, with Circum-Saturn trailing behind.
Because of this, the two primary Circum-Jove superpowersthe Demarchy, which controlled
Europa and Ioand Gilgamesh Isiswhich controlled Ganymede, and parts of
Callistowere vying for dominance.

The man smiled keenly. �Here for anything special?"

�Surgery," Vargovic said, hoping to curtail the conversation
at the earliest juncture. �Very extensive anatomical surgery."

They hadnłt told him much.

�Her name is Cholok," Control had said, after Vargovic had
skimmed the dossiers back in the caverns which housed the Covert Operations
section of

Gilgamesh Isis security, deep in Ganymede. �We recruited her
ten years ago, when she was on Phobos."

�And now shełs Demarchy?"

Control had nodded. �She was swept up in the brain-drain,
once Maunder II began to bite. The smartest got out while they could. The
Demarchyand us, of coursesnapped up the brightest."

�And also one of our sleepers." Vargovic glanced down at the
portrait of the woman, striped by video lines. She looked mousey to him, with a
permanent bone-deep severity of expression.

�Cheer up," Control said. �Iłm asking you to contact her,
not sleep with her."

�Yeah, yeah. Just tell me her background."

�Biotech." Control nodded at the dossier. �On Phobos she led
one of the teams working in aquatic transform workmodifying the human form for
submarine operations."

Vargovic nodded diligently. �Go on."

�Phobos wanted to sell their know-how to the Martians,
before their oceans froze. Of course, the Demarchy also appreciated her
talents. Cholok took her team to Cadmus-Asterius, one of their hanging cities."

�Mm." Vargovic was getting the thread now. �By which time wełd
already recruited her."

�Right," Control said, �except we had no obvious use for
her."

�Then why this conversation?"

Control smiled. Control always smiled when Vargovic pushed
the envelope of subservience. �Wełre having it because our sleeper wonłt lie
down." Then

Control reached over and touched the image of Cholok, making
her speak.

What Vargovic was seeing was an intercept; something Gilgamesh
had captured, riddled with edits and jump-cuts.

She appeared to be sending a verbal message to an old friend
in Isis. She was talking rapidly from a white room; inert medical servitors
behind her.

Shelves displayed flasks of colour-coded medichines. A cruciform
bed resembled an autopsy slab with ceramic drainage sluices.

�Cholok contacted us a month ago," Control said. �The roomłs
part of her clinic."

�Shełs using phrase-embedded three," Vargovic said,
listening to her speech patterns, siphoning content from otherwise normal Canasian.

�Last code we taught her."

�Alright. Whatłs her angle?"

Control chose his wordsskating around the information excised
from

Cholokłs message. �She wants to give us something," he said.
�Something valuable. Shełs acquired it accidentally. Someone good has to
smuggle it out."

�Flattery will get you everywhere, Control."

The muzak rose to a carefully timed crescendo as the
elevator plunged through the final layer of ice. The view around and below was
literally dizzying, and Vargovic registered exactly as much awe as befitted his

Martian guise. He knew the Demarchyłs history, of coursehow
the hanging cities had begun as points of entry into the ocean; air-filled
observation cupolas linked to the surface by narrow access shafts sunk through
the kilometre-thick crustal ice. Scientists had studied the unusual smoothness
of the crust, noting that its fracture patterns echoed those on Earthłs ice-shelves,
implying the presence of a water ocean. Europa was further from the sun than
Earth, but something other than solar energy maintained the oceanłs liquidity.
Instead, the moonłs orbit around Jupiter created stresses which flexed the moonłs
silicate core, tectonic heat bleeding into the ocean via hydrothermal vents.

Descending into the city was a little like entering an amphitheatreexcept
that there was no stage; merely an endless succession of steeply tiered lower
balconies. They converged toward a light-filled infinity, seven or eight
kilometres below, where the cityłs conic shape constricted to a point. The
opposite side was half a kilometre away; levels rising like geologic strata. A
wide glass tower threaded the atrium from top to bottom, aglow with smoky-green
ocean and a mass of kelplike flora, cultured by gilly swimmers. Artificial
sunlamps burned in the kelp like christmas tree lights. Above, the tower
branched; peristaltic feeds reaching out to the ocean proper. Offices, shops,
restaurants and residential units were stacked atop each other, or teetered
into the abyss on elegant balconies, spun from lustrous sheets of bulk-chitin
polymer, the Demarchyłs major construction material. Gossamer bridges arced
across the atrium space, dodging banners, projections and vast translucent sculptures,
moulded from a silky variant of the same chitin polymer. Every visible surface
was overlaid by neon, holographics and entoptics. People were everywhere, and
in every face Vargovic detected a slight absence; as if their minds were not entirely
focused on the here and now. No wonder:

all citizens had an implant which constantly interrogated
them, eliciting their opinions on every aspect of Demarchy life, both within

Cadmus-Asterius and beyon. Eventually, it was said, the implantłs
nagging presence faded from consciousness, until the act of democratic participation
became near-involuntary.

It revolted Vargovic as much as it intrigued him.

�Obviously," Control said, with judicial deliberation. �What
Cholok has to offer isnłt merely a nuggetor shełd have given it via PE3."

Vargovic leant forward. �She hasnłt told you?"

�Only that it could endanger the hanging cities."

�You trust her?"

Vargovic felt one of Controlłs momentary indiscretions coming
on. �She may have been sleeping, but she hasnłt been completely valueless.
There were defections she assisted in ... like the Maunciple jobremember that?"

�If youłre calling that a success perhaps itłs time I
defected."

�Actually, it was Cholokłs information which persuaded us to
get Maunciple out via the ocean rather the front door. If Demarchy security had
reached

Maunciple alive theyłd have learnt ten years of tradecraft."

�Whereas instead Maunciple got a harpoon in his back."

�So the operation had its flaws." Control shrugged. �But if
youłre thinking all this points to Cholok having been compromised ... Naturally,
the thought entered our heads. But if Maunciple had acted otherwise it would
have been worse." Control folded his arms. �And of course, he might have made
it, in which case even youłd have to admit Cholokłs safe."

�Until proven otherwise."

Control brightened. �So youłll do it?"

�Like I have a choice."

�Therełs always a choice, Vargovic."

Yes, Vargovic thought. There was always a choice ... between
doing what ever Gilgamesh Isis asked of him ... and being deprogrammed,
cyborgized and sent to work in the sulphur projects around the slopes of Ra Patera.
It just wasnłt a particularly good one.

�One other thing ..."

�Yes?"

�When Iłve got whatever Cholok has ..."

Control half-smiled, the two of them sharing a private joke
which did not need illumination. �Iłm sure the usual will suffice."

The elevator slowed into immigration.

Demarchy guards hefted big guns, but no one took any
interest in him. His story about coming from Mars was accepted; he was
submitted to only the usual spectrum of invasive procedures: neural and genetic
patterns scanned for pathologies, body bathed in eight forms of exotic
radiation. The final formality consisted of drinking a thimble of chocolate.
The beverage consisted of billions of medichines which infiltrated his body,
searching for concealed drugs, weapons and illegal biomodifications. He knew
that they would find nothing, but was relieved when they reached his bladder and
requested to be urinated back into the Demarchy.

The entire procedure lasted six minutes. Outside, Vargovic
followed a slitherwalk to the city zoo, and then barged through crowds of schoolchildren
until he had arrived at the aquarium where Cholok was meant to meet him. The
exhibits were devoted to Europan biota, most of which depended on the
ecological niches of the hydrothermal vents, carefully reproduced here. There
was nothing very exciting to look at, since most

Europan predators looked marginally less fierce than
hatstands or lampshades. The commonest were called ventlings; large and
structurally simple animals whose metabolisms hinged on symbiosis. They were
pulpy, funnelled bags planted on a tripod of orange stilts, moving with such torpor
that Vargovic almost nodded off before Cholo arrived at his side.

She wore an olive-green coat and tight emerald trousers, projecting
a haze of medicinal entoptics. Her clenched jaw accentuated the dourness he had
gleaned from the intercept.

They kissed.

�Good to see you Marius. Itłs beenwhat?"

�Nine years, thereabouts."

�Howłs Phobos these days?"

�Still orbiting Mars." He deployed a smile. �Still a dive."

�You havenłt changed."

�Nor you."

At a loss for words, Vargovic found his gaze returning to the
informational readout accompanying the ventling exhibit. Only half attentively,
he read that the ventlings, motile in their juvenile phase, gradually became
sessile in adulthood, stilts thickening with deposited sulphur until they were
rooted to the ground like stalagmites. When they died, their soft bodies
dispersed into the ocean, but the tripods remained; eerily regular clusters of
orange spines concentrated around active vents.

�Nervous, Marius?"

�In your hands? Not likely."

�Thatłs the spirit."

They bought two mugs of mocha from a nearby servitor, then
returned to the ventling display, making what seemed like small-talk. During indoctrination
Cholok had been taught phrase-embedded three. The code allowed the insertion of
secondary information into a primary conversation, by careful deployment of
word-order, hesitation and sentence structure.

�What have you got?" Vargovic asked.

�A sample," Cholok answered, one of the easy, pre-set words
which did not need to be laboriously conveyed. But what followed took nearly
five minutes to put over, freighted via a series of rambling reminiscences of the
Phobos years. �A small shard of hyperdiamond."

Vargovic nodded. He knew what hyperdiamond was: a topologically
complex interweave of tubular fullerene; structurally similar to cellulose or
bulk chitin but thousands of times stronger; its rigidity artificially maintained
by some piezo-electric trick which Gilgamesh lacked.

�Interesting," Vargovic said. �But unfortunately not
interesting enough."

She ordered another mocha and downed it replying. �Use your
imagination.

Only the Demarchy knows how to synthesise it."

�Itłs also useless as a weapon."

�Depends. Therełs an application you should know about."

�What?"

�Keeping this city afloatand Iłm not talking about economic
solvency.

Do you know about Buckminster Fuller? He lived about four
hundred years ago; believed absolute democracy could be achieved through
technological means."

�The fool."

�Maybe. But Fuller also invented the geodesic lattice which
determines the structure of the buckyball; the closed allotrope of tubular fullerene.
The city owes him on two counts."

�Save the lecture. How does the hyperdiamond come into it?"

�Flotation bubbles," she said. �Around the outside of the
city. Each one is a hundred-metre wide sphere of hyperdiamond, holding vacuum.
A

hundred-metre wide molecule, in fact, since each sphere is
composed of one endless strand of tubular fullerene. Think of that, Marius: a molecule
you could park a ship inside."

While he absorbed that, another part of his mind continued
to read the ventling caption; how their biochemistry had many similarities with
the gutless tube worms which lived around Earthłs ocean vents. The ventlings drank
hydrogen sulphide through their funnels, circulating via a modified form of
haemoglobin, passing through a bacteria-saturated organ in the lower part of
their bags. The bacteria split and oxidised the hydrogen sulphide, manufacturing
a molecule similar to glucose. The glucose-analogue nourished the ventling,
enabling it to keep living and occasionally make slow perambulations to other
parts of the vent, or even to swim between vents, until the adult phase rooted
it to the ground.

Vargovic read this, and then read it again, because he had
just remembered something; a puzzling intercept passed to him from cryptanalysis
several months earlier; something about Demarchy plans to incorporate ventling
biochemistry into a larger animal. For a moment he was tempted to ask

Cholok about it directly, but he decided to force the
subject from his mind until a more suitable time.

�Any other propaganda to share with me?"

�There are two hundred of these spheres. They inflate and deflate
like bladders, maintaining C-As equilibrium. Iłm not sure how the deflation happens,
except that its something to do with changing the piezo-electric current in the
tubes."

�I still donłt see why Gilgamesh needs it."

�Think. If you can get a sample of this to Ganymede, they
might be able to find a way of attacking it. All youłd need would be a
molecular agent capable of opening the gaps between the fullerene strands so
that a molecule of water could squeeze through, or something which impedes the
piezo-electric force."

Absently Vargovic watched a squidlike predator nibble a
chunk from the bag of a ventling. The squid blood ran thick with two forms of
haemoglobin; one oxygen-bearing, one tuned for hydrogen sulphide. They used glycoproteins
to keep their blood flowing and switched metabolisms as they swam from oxygen-dominated
to sulphide-dominated water.

He snapped his attention back to Cholok. �I canłt believe I
came all this way for ... what? Carbon?" He shook his head, slotting the gesture
into the primary narrative of their conversation. �How did you obtain this?"

�An accident, with a gilly."

�Go on."

�An explosion near one of the bubbles. I was the surgeon assigned
to the gilly; had to remove a lot of hyperdiamond from him. It wasnłt hard to save
a few splinters."

�Forward thinking of you."

�Hard part was persuading Gilgamesh to send you. Especially
after

Maunciple ..."

�Donłt lose any sleep over him," Vargovic said, consulting
his coffee. �He was a fat bastard who couldnłt swim fast enough."

The surgery took place the next day. Vargovic woke with his
mouth furnace-dry.

He feltodd. They had warned him of this. He had even interviewed
subjects who had undergone similar procedures in Gilgameshłs experimental labs.
They told him he would feel fragile, as if his head was no longer adequately
coupled to his body. The periodic flushes of cold around his neck only served
to increase that feeling.

�You can speak," Cholok said, looming over him in surgeonłs
whites. �But the cardiovascular modificationsand the amount of reworking wełve
done to your laryngeal areawill make your voice sound a little strange. Some of
the gilled are really only comfortable talking to their own kind."

He held a hand before his eyes, examining the translucent
webbing which now spanned his fingers. There was a dark patch in the pale tissue
of his palm: Cholokłs embedded sample. The other hand held another.

�It worked, didnłt it." His voice sounded squeaky. �I can
breathe water."

�And air," Cholok said. �Though what youłll now find is that
really strenuous exercise only feels natural when youłre submerged."

�Can I move?"

�Of course," she said. �Try standing up. Youłre stronger
than you feel."

He did as she suggested, using the moment to assess his surroundings.
A

neural monitor clamped his crown. He was naked, in a
brightly-lit revival room; one glass-walled side facing the exterior ocean. It
was from here that Cholok had first contacted Gilgamesh.

�This place is secure, isnłt it."

�Secure?" she said, as if it was obscene. �Yes, I suppose
so."

�Then tell me about the Denizens."

�What?"

�Demarchy code word. Cryptanalysis intercepted it recentlysupposedly
something about an experiment in radical biomodification. I was reminded of it
in the aquarium." Vargovic fingered the gills in his neck.

�Something that would make this look like cosmetic surgery.
We heard the

Demarchy had tailored the sulphur-based metabolism of the
ventlings for human use."

She whistled. �That would be quite a trick."

�Useful, thoughespecially if you wanted a workforce who
could tolerate the anoxic environments around the vents, where the Demarchy
happens to have certain minerological interests."

�Maybe." Cholok paused. �But the changes required would be
beyond surgery.

Youłd have to script them in at the developmental level. And
even then ...

Iłm not sure what youłd end up with would necessarily be human
anymore."

It was as if she shivered, though Vargovic was the one who
felt cold, still standing naked beside the revival table. �All I can say is, if
it happened, no one told me."

�I thought Iłd ask, thatłs all."

�Good." She brandished a white medical scanner. �Now can I
run a few more tests? We have to follow procedure."

Cholok was right: quite apart from the fact that Vargovicłs
operation was completely realand therefore susceptible to complications which
had to be looked for and monitoredany deviation from normal practise was undesirable.

After the first hour or so, the real strangeness of his
transformation hit home. He had been blithely unaffected by it until then, but
when he saw himself in a full-body mirror, in the corner of Cholokłs revival
room, he knew that there was no going back.

Not easily, anyway. The Gilgamesh surgeons had promised him
they could undo the workbut he didnłt believe them. After all, the Demarchy was
ahead of Ganymede in the biosciences, and even Cholok had told him reversals
were tricky. Hełd accepted the mission in any case: the pay tantalising; the
prospect of the sulphur projects rather less.

Cholok spent most of the day with him, only breaking off to
talk to other clients or confer with her team. Breathing exercises occupied
most of that time: prolonged periods spent underwater, nulling the brainłs
drowning response. Unpleasant, but Vargovic had done worse things in training.
They practised fully-submerged swimming, using his lungs to regulate buoyancy,
followed by instruction about keeping his gill-openingswhat Cholok called his
operculaclean, which meant ensuring the health of the colonies of commensal
bacteria which thrived in the openings and crawled over the fine secondary
flaps of his lamellae. Hełd read the brochure:

what shełd done was to surgically sculpt his anatomy toward
a state somewhere between human and air-breathing fish: incorporating
biochemical lessons from lungfish and walking-catfish. Fish breathed water
through their mouths and returned it to the sea via their gills, but it was the
gills in Vargovicłs neck which served the function of a mouth. His true gills
were below his thoracic cavity; crescent-shaped gashes below his ribs.

�Compared to your body size," she said, �these gill-openings
are never going to give you the respiratory efficiency youłd have if you went
in for more dramatic changes ..."

�Like a Denizen?"

�I told you, I donłt know anything."

�It doesnłt matter." He flattened the gill-flaps down, watchingonly
slightly nauseatedas they puckered with each exhalation. �Are we finished?"

�Just some final bloodwork," she said. �To make sure everythingłs
still working. Then you can go and swim with the fishes."

While she was busy at one of her consoles, surrounded by
false-colour entoptics of his gullethe asked her: �Do you have the weapon?"

Cholok nodded absently and opened a drawer, fishing out a
hand-held medical laser. �Not much," she said. �I disabled the
yield-suppresser, but youłd have to aim it at someonełs eyes to do much damage."

Vargovic hefted the laser, scrutinising the controls in its
contoured haft. Then he grabbed Cholokłs head and twisted her around, dousing
her face with the laserłs actinic-blue beam. There were two consecutive popping
sounds as her eyeballs evaporated.

�What, like that?"

Conventional scalpels did the rest.

He rinsed the blood, dressed and left the medical centre
alone, travelling kilometres down-city, to where Cadmus-Asterius narrowed to a
point. Even though there were many gillies moving freely through the citythey
were volunteers, by and large, with full Demarchy rightshe did not linger in public
for long. Within a few minutes he was safe within a warren of collagen-walled
service tunnels, frequented only by technicians, servitors or other gill-workers.
The late Cholok had been right; breathing air was harder now; it felt too thin.

�Demarchy security advisory," said a bleak machine voice
emanating from the wall. �A murder has occurred in the medical sector. The
suspect may be an armed gill worker. Approach with extreme caution."

Theyłd found Cholok. Risky, killing her. But Gilgamesh preferred
to burn its bridges, removing the possibility of any sleeper turning traitor
after they had fulfilled their usefulness. In the future, Vargovic mulled, they
might be better using a toxin, rather than the immediate kill. He made a mental
note to insert this in his report.

He entered the final tunnel, not far from the waterlock
which had been his destination. At the tunnelłs far end a technician sat on a
crate, listening with a stethoscope to something going on behind an access
panel.

For a moment Vargovic considered passing the man, hoping he
was engrossed in his work. He began to approach him, padding on bare webbed
feet, which made less noise than the shoes he had just removed. Then the man
nodded to himself, uncoupled from the listening post and slammed the hatch.
Grabbing his crate, he stood and made eye contact with Vargovic.

�Youłre not meant to be here," he said. Then offered, almost
plaintively:

�Can I help you? Youłve just had surgery, havenłt you? I always
know the ones like you: always a little red around the gills."

Vargovic drew his collar higher, then relented because that
made it harder to breathe. �Stay where you are," he said. �Put down the crate
and freeze."

�Christ, it was you, wasnłt itthat advisory?" the man said.

Vargovic raised the laser. Blinded, the man blundered into
the wall, dropping the crate. He made a pitiful moan. Vargovic crept closer,
the man stumbling into the scalpel. Not the cleanest of killings, but that
hardly mattered.

Vargovic was sure the Demarchy would shortly seal off access
to the ocean

especially when his last murder came to light. For now,
however, the locks were accessible. He moved into the air-filled chamber, his
lungs now aflame for water. High-pressure jets filled the room, and he quickly
transitioned to water-breathing, feeling his thoughts clarify. The secondary
door clammed open, revealing ocean. He was kilometres below the ice, and the
water here was both chillingly cold and under crushing pressurebut it felt normal;
pressure and cold registering only as abstract qualities of the environment.
His blood was inoculated with glycoproteins now; molecules which would lower
its freezing point below that of water.

The late Cholok had done well.

Vargovic was about to leave the city when a second
gill-worker appeared in the doorway, returning to the city after completing a
shift. He killed her efficiently, and she bequeathed him a thermally-inwoven wetsuit,
for working in the coldest parts of the ocean. The wetsuit had octopus ancestry,
and when it slithered onto him it left apertures for his gill-openings. She had
been wearing goggles which had infrared and sonar capability, and carried a
hand-held tug. The thing resembled the still-beating heart of a vivisected animal,
its translucent components nobbed with dark veins and ganglia. But it was easy
to use: Vargovic set its pump to maximum thrust and powered away from the lower
levels of C-A.

Even in the relatively uncontaminated water of the Europan
ocean, visibility was low; he would not have been able to see anything were the
city not abundantly illuminated on all its levels. Even so, he could see no
more than half a kilometre upwards; the higher parts of C-A lost in golden haze
and then deepening darkness. Although its symmetry was upset by protrusions and
accretions, the cityłs basic conic form was evident, tapering at the narrowest
point to an inlet mouth which ingested ocean.

The cone was surrounded by a haze of flotation bubbles,
black as caviar.

He remembered the chips of hyperdiamond in his hands. If
Cholok was right,

Vargovicłs people might find a way to make it
water-permeable; opening the fullerene weave sufficiently so that the spheresł
buoyant properties would be destroyed. The necessary agent could be introduced
into the ocean by ice-penetrating missiles. Some time laterVargovic was uninterested
in the detailsthe Demarchy cities would begin to groan under their own weight.
If the weapon worked sufficiently quickly, there might not even be time to act
against it. The cities would fall from the ice, sinking down through the black
kilometres of ocean below them.

He swam on.

Near C-A, the rocky interior of Europa climbed upwards to
meet him. He had travelled three or four kilometres north, and was comparing
the visible topographylit by service lights installed by Demarchy gill-workerswith
his own mental maps of the area. Eventually he found an outcropping of silicate
rock. Beneath the overhang was a narrow ledge, on which a dozen or so small
boulders had fallen. One was redder than the others.

Vargovic anchored himself to the ledge and hefted the red
rock, the warmth of his fingertips activating its latent biocircuitry. A screen
appeared in the rock, filling with the face of Mishenka.

�Iłm on time," Vargovic said, his own voice sounding even
less recognisable through the distorting medium of the water. �I presume youłre
ready?"

�Problem," Mishenka said. �Big fucking problem."

�What?"

�Extraction sitełs compromised." Mishenkaor rather the simulation
of

Mishenka which was running in the rockanticipated Vargovicłs
next question: �A few hours ago the Demarchy sent a surface team out onto the ice,
ostensibly to repair a transponder. But the spot theyłre covering is right
where we planned to pull you out." He paused. �You diduhkill

Cholok, didnłt you? I mean you didnłt just grievously injure
her?"

�Youłre talking to a professional."

The rock did a creditable impression of Mishenka looking
pained. �Then the

Demarchy got to her."

Vargovic wave his hand in front of the rock. �I got what I
came for, didnłt I?"

�You got something."

�If it isnłt what Cholok said it was, then shełs
accomplished nothing except get herself dead."

�Even so ..." Mishenka appeared to entertain a thought
briefly, before discarding it. �Listen, we always had a backup extraction
point, Vargovic.

Youłd better get your ass there." He grinned. �Hope you can
swim faster than Maunciple."

It was thirty kilometres south.

He passed a few gill-workers on the way, but they ignored
him and once he was more than five kilometres from C-A there was increasingly
less evidence of human presence. There was a head-up display in the goggles.

Vargovic experimented with the readout modes before calling
up a map of the whole area. It showed his location, and also three dots which
were following him from C-A.

He was being tailed by Demarchy security.

They were at least three kilometres behind him now, but they
were perceptibly narrowing the distance. With a cold feeling gripping his gut,
it occurred to Vargovic that there was no way he could make it to the extraction
point before the Demarchy caught him.

Ahead, he noticed a thermal hot-spot; heat bubbling up from
the relatively shallow level of the rock floor. The security operatives were
probably tracking him via the gill-workerłs appropriated equipment. But once he
was near the vent he could ditch it: the water was warmer there; he wouldnłt need
the suit, and the heat, light and associated turbulence would confuse any other
tracking system. He could lie low behind a convenient rock, stalk them while
they were preoccupied with the homing signal.

It struck Vargovic as a good plan. He made the distance to
the vent quickly, feeling the water warm around him, noticing how the taste of
it changed; turning brackish. The vent was a fiery red fountain surrounded by bacteria-crusted
rocks and the colourless Europan equivalent of coral.

Ventlings were everywhere; their pulpy bags shifting as the
currents altered. The smallest were motile, ambling on their stilts like
animated bagpipes, navigating around the triadic stumps of their dead
relatives.

Vargovic ensconced himself in a cave, after placing the
gill-worker equipment near another cave on the far side of the vent, hoping
that the security operatives would look there first. While they did so, he
would be able to kill at least one of them; maybe two. Once he had their
weapons, taking care of the third would be a formality.

Something nudged him from behind.

What Vargovic saw when he turned around was something too
repulsive even for a nightmare. It was so wrong that for a faltering moment he
could not quite assimilate what it was he was looking at, as if the thing was a
three-dimensional perception test; a shape which refused to stabilise in his
head. The reason he could not hold it still was because part of him refused to
believe that this thing had any connection with humanity. But the residual
traces of human ancestry were too obvious to ignore.

Vargovic knewbeyond any reasonable doubtthat what he was
seeing was a Denizen. Others loomed from the cave depths. They were five more of
them; all roughly similar; all aglow with faint bioluminescence, all regarding
him with darkly intelligent eyes. Vargovic had seen pictures of mermaids in
books when he was a child; what he was looking at now were macabre corruptions
of those innocent illustrations. These things were the same fusions of human
and fish as in those picturesbut every detail had been twisted toward
ugliness, and the true horror of it was that the fusion was total; it was not
simply that a human torso had been grafted to a fishłs tail, but that the
splice had been madeit was obviousat the genetic level, so that in every
aspect of the creature there was something simultaneously and grotesquely
piscine. The face was the worst; bisected by a lipless down-curved slit of a
mouth, almost sharklike. There was no nose, not even a pair of nostrils; just
an acreage of flat, sallow fish-flesh. The eyes were forward facing; all
expression compacted into their dark depth. The creature had touched him with
one of its arms, which terminated in an obscenely human hand. And thento compound
the horrorit spoke, its voice perfectly clear and calm, despite the water.

�Wełve been expecting you, Vargovic."

The others behind murmured, echoing the sentiment.

�What?"

�So glad you were able to complete your mission."

Vargovic began to get a grip, shakily. He reached up and dislodged
the

Denizenłs hand from his shoulder. �You arenłt why Iłm here,"
he said, forcing authority into his voice, drawing on every last drop of
Gilgamesh training to suppress his nerves. �I wanted to know about about you ...
that was all ..."

�No," the lead Denizen said, opening its mouth to expose an
alarming array of teeth. �You misunderstand. Coming here was always your
mission. You have brought us something we want very much. That was always your
purpose."

�Brought you something?" His mind was reeling now.

�Concealed within you." The Denizen nodded; a human gesture
which only served to magnify the horror of what it was. �The means by which we
will strike at the Demarchy; the means by which we will take the ocean."

He thought of the chips in his hands. �I think I understand,"
he said slowly. �It was always intended for you, is that what you mean?"

�Always."

Then hełd been lied to by his superiorsor they had at least
drastically simplified the matter. He filled in the gaps himself, making the
necessary mental leaps: evidently Gilgamesh was already in contact with the
Denizens

bizarre as it seemedand the chips of hyperdiamond were
meant for the

Denizens, not his own people. Presumablyalthough he couldnłt
begin to guess at how this might be possiblethe Denizens had the means to examine
the shards and fabricate the agent which would unravel the hyperdiamond weave.
Theyłd be acting for Gilgamesh, saving it the bother of actually dirtying its
hands in the attack. He could see why this might appeal to Control. But if that
was the case ... why had Gilgamesh ever faked ignorance about the Denizens? It
made no sense. But on the other hand, he could not concoct a better theory to
replace it.

�I have what you want," he said, after due consideration. �Cholok
said removing it would be simple."

�Cholok can always be relied upon," the Denizen said.

�You knewknowher, then?"

�She made us what we are today."

�You hate her, then?"

�No; we love her." The Denizen flashed its sharklike smile
again, and it seemed to Vargovic that as its emotional state changed, so did the
coloration of its bioluminescence. It was scarlet now; no longer the blue-green
hue it had displayed upon it first appearance. �She took the abomination that
we were and made us something better. We were in pain, once. Always pain. But
Cholok took it away, made us strong. For that they punished her, and us."

�If you hate the Demarchy," Vargovic said, �why have you
waited until now before attacking it?"

�Because we canłt leave," one of the other Denizens said;
the tone of its voice betraying femininity. �The Demarchy hated what Cholok had
done to us. She brought our humanity to the fore; made it impossible to treat us
as animals. We thought they would kill us, rather than risk our existence becoming
known to the rest of Circum-Jove. Instead, they banished us here."

�They thought we might come in handy," said another of the
lurking creatures.

Just then, another Denizen entered the cave, having swum in
from the sea.

�Demarchy agents have followed him," it said, its coloration
blood red, tinged with orange, pulsing lividly. �Theyłll be here in a minute."

�Youłll have to protect me," Vargovic said.

�Of course" the lead Denizen said. �Youłre our saviour."

Vargovic nodded vigorously, no longer convinced that he
could handle the three operatives on his own. Ever since he had arrived in the
cave he had felt his energy dwindling, as if he was succumbing to slow poisoning.
A

thought tugged at the back of his mind, and for a moment he
almost paid attention to it; almost considered seriously the possibility that
he was being poisoned. But what was going on beyond the cave was too
distracting.

He watched the three Demarchy agents approach, driven forward
by the tugs which they held in front of them. Each agent carried a slender
harpoon gun, tipped with a vicious barb.

They didnłt stand a chance.

The Denizens moved too quickly, lancing out from the shadows,
cutting through the water. The creatures moved faster than the Demarchy agents,
even though they only had their own muscles and anatomy to propel them.

But it was more than enough. They had no weapons, eithernot
even harpoons. But sharpened rocks more than sufficedthat and their teeth.

Vargovic was impressed by their teeth.

Afterwards, the Denizens returned to the cave to join their
cousins. They moved more sluggishly now; as if the fury of the fight had
drained them.

For a few moments they were silent, and their
bioluminescence curiously subdued.

Slowly, though, Vargovic watched their colour return.

�It was better that they not kill you," the leader said.

�Damn right," Vargovic said. �They wouldnłt just have killed
me, you know." He opened his fists, exposing his palms. �Theyłd have made sure
you never got this."

The Denizensall of themlooked momentarily toward his open
hands, as if there ought to have been something there. �Iłm not sure you understand,"
the leader said, eventually.

�Understand what?"

�The nature of your mission."

Fighting his fatigueit was a black slick lapping at his consciousness

Vargovic said: �I understand perfectly well. I have the
samples of hyperdiamond, in my hands ..."

�That isnłt what we want."

He didnłt like this, not at all. It was the way the Denizens
were slowly creeping closer to him; sidling round him to obstruct his exit from
the cave.

�What then?"

�You asked why we havenłt attacked them before," the leader
said, with frightening charm. �The answerłs simple. We canłt leave the vent."

�You canłt?"

�Our haemoglobin. Itłs not like yours." Again that awful
sharklike smileand now he was well aware of what those teeth could do, given
the right circumstances. �It was tailored to allow us to work here."

�Copied from the ventlings?"

�Adapted, yes. Later it became the means of imprisoning us.
The DNA in our bone marrow was manipulated to limit the production of normal
haemoglobin; a simple matter of suppressing a few beta-globin genes while
retaining the variants which code for ventling haemoglobin. Hydrogen sulphide is
poisonous to you, Vargovic. You probably already feel weak. But we canłt survive
without it. Oxygen kills us."

�You leave the vent ..."

�We die, within a few hours. Therełs more, as well. The waterłs
hot here; so hot that we donłt need the glycoproteins. We have the genetic instructions
to synthezise them, but theyłve also been turned off. But without the
glycoproteins we canłt swim into colder water. Our blood freezes."

Now he was surrounded by them; looming aquatic devils,
flushed a florid shade of crimson. And they were coming closer.

�But what do you expect me to do about it?"

�You donłt have to do anything, Vargovic." The leader opened
its chasmic jaw wide, as if tasting the water. It was a miracle an organ like
that was capable of speech in the first place ...

�I donłt?ł

�No." And with that the leader reached out and seized him,
while at the same time he was pinned from behind by another of the creatures. �It
was

Cholokłs doing," the leader continued. �Her final gift to
us. Maunciple was her first attempt at getting it to usbut Maunciple never
made it."

�He was too fat."

�All the defectors failedthey just didnłt have the stamina
to make it this far from the city. That was why Cholok recruited youan
outsider."

�Cholok recruited me?"

�She knew youłd kill heryou have, of coursebut that didnłt
stop her.

Her life mattered less than what she was about to give us.
It was Cholok who tipped off the Demarchy about your primary extraction site,
forcing you to come to us."

He struggled, but it was pointless. All he could manage was
a feeble: �I

donłt understand ..."

�No," the Denizen said. �Perhaps we never expected you to.
If you had understood, you might have been less than willing to follow Cholokłs
plan."

�Cholok was never working for us?"

�Once, maybe. But her last clients were us."

�And now?"

�We take your blood, Vargovic." Their grip on him tightened.
He used his last draining reserves of strength to try and work loose, but it was
futile.

�My blood?"

�Cholok put something in it. A retrovirusa very hardy one,
capable of surviving in your body. It reactivates the genes which were
suppressed by the Demarchy. Suddenly, wełll be able to make oxygen-carrying
haemoglobin.

Our blood will fill up with glycoproteins. Itłs no great
trick: all the cellular machinery for making those molecules is already
present; it just needs to be unshackled."

�Then you need ... what? A sample of my blood?"

�No," the Denizen said, with genuine regret. �Rather more
than a sample,

Iłm afraid. Rather a lot more."

And thenwith magisterial slownessthe creature bit into his
arm, and as his blood spilled out, the Denizen drank. For a moment the others waitedbut
then they too came forward, and bit, and joined in the feeding frenzy.

All around Vargovic, the water was turning red.

The Star Surgeonłs Apprentice

Through the barłs windows, Juntura Spaceport was an endless
grid of holding berths, launch gantries, and radiator fins, coiling in its own
pollution under a smeared pink sky. Thr air crackled with radiation from
unshielded drives. It was no place to visit, let alone stay.

�I need to get out of here," I said.

The shipmaster sneered at my remaining credit. �That wonłt
get you to the Napier Belt, kid, let alone Frolovo."

�Itłs all Iłve got."

�Then maybe you should spend a few months working in the
port, until you can pay for a ride."

The shipmasterhe was a cyborg, like most of themturned
away with a whine of his servo-driven exoskeleton.

�Wait," I said. �Please ... just a moment. Maybe this makes
a difference."

I pulled a black bundle from inside my jacket, peeling back
enough of the cloth to let him see the weapon. The shipmaster his name was
Master Khorogreached out one iron gauntlet and hefted the prize. His
eye-goggle clicked and whirred into focus.

�Very nasty," he said appreciatively. �I heard someone used
one of these against Happy Jack." The eye swiveled sharply onto me. �Maybe you
know something about that?"

�Nothing," I said easily. �Itłs just an heirloom."

The heirloom was a bone gun. Kalarash Empire tech: very old,
very difficult to pick up in security scans. Not much of it around anymore,
which is why the gun cost me so much. It employed a sonic effect to shatter
human bone, turning it into something resembling sugar. Three seconds was all
it needed to do its work. By then the victim no longer had anything much
resembling a skeletal structure.

You couldnłt live long like that, of course. But you didnłt
die instantly either.

�The trickso they sayis not to dwell on the skull," Khorog
mused. �Leave enough cranial structure for the victim to retain consciousness.
And the ability to hear, if you want to taunt them. There are three small bones
in the ear. People usually forget those."

�Will you take the gun or not?"

�I could get into trouble just looking at it." He put the
gun back onto the cloth. �But itłs a nice piece. Warm, too. It might make a
difference. There used to be a good market for antique weapons on Jelgava.
Maybe there still is."

I brightened. �Then you can give me a berth?"

�I only said it makes a difference, kid. Enough that you can
pay off the rest aboard the Iron Lady."

I could already feel Happy Jackłs button men pushing their
way through the port, asking urgent questions. Only a matter of time before
they hit this bar and found me.

�If you can get me to the Frolovo Hub, Iłll take it."

�Maybe wełre not going to Frolovo. Maybe wełre going to the.
Bafq Gap, or the Belterra Sphere."

�Somewhere nearby, then. Another hub. It doesnłt matter. I
just have to get off Mokmer."

�Show us your mitts." Before I could say yes, Khorogłs metal
hands were examining my skin-and-bone ones, splaying the fingers with
surprising gentleness. �Never done a hard dayłs work in your life, have you?
But you have good fingers. Hand-to-eye coordination okay? No neuromotor
complications? Palsy?"

�Iłm fine," I said. �And whatever it is you want me to do, I
can learn."

�Mister Zealour surgeonneeds an assistant. Itłs manual labor,
mostly. Think you can handle it?"

Jackłs men, closer now. �Yes," I said. By then Iłd have said
anything to get off Mokmer.

�Therełll be no freezer berth: the Iron Lady doesnłt run to
them. Youłll be warm the whole trip. Two and a half years subjective, maybe
three, till we make the next orbitfall. And once Zealłs trained you up, he wonłt
want you leaving his service at the first port of call. Youłll be looking at
four or five years aboard the Lady; maybe longer if he canłt find another pair
of hands. Doesnłt sound so sweet now, does it?"

No, I thought, but then neither did the alternative. �Iłm
still willing."

�Then be at shuttle dock nine in twenty minutes. Thatłs when
we lift for orbit."

We lifted on time.

I didnłt see much of the ship from the shuttle: just enough
to tellkit the Iron Lady looked much the same as all the other ramscoops parked
in orbit around Mokmer: a brutalist gray cylinder, swelling to the armored
mouth of the magnetic field intake at the front, tapering to the drive assembly
at the back. Comms gear, radiators, docking mechanisms, and modular cargo
containers ringed the ship around its gently in-curving waist. It was bruised
and battered I from endless near-light transits, with great scorch marks and
impact raters marring much of the hull.

The shuttle docked with just Khorog and me aboard. Even before
I had been introduced to the rest of the crewor even the surgeonthe Iron Lady
was moving.

�Sooner than I expected," I said.

�Complaining?" Khorog asked. �I thought you wanted to get
away from Mokmer as soon as possible."

�No," I said. �Iłm glad wełre under way." I brushed a wall
panel as we walked. �Itłs very smooth. I expected it to feel different."

�Thatłs because wełre only on in-system motors at the moment."

�Therełs a problem with the ramscoop?"

�We donłt switch on the scoop until wełre well beyond Mokmeror
any planet, for that matter. Wełre safe in the shiplife quarters are well
shieldedbut outside, youłre looking at the strongest magnetic field this side
of the Crab pulsar. Doesnłt hurt wetheads like you all that much ... but us,
thatłs different." He knuckled his fist against his plated cranium. �Cyborgs
like me ... cyborgs like everyone else youłll meet aboard this ship, or in any
kind of space environmentwe feel it. Get within a thousand kilometers of a
ship like this ... it warms up the metal in our bodies. Inductive heating: we
fry from the inside. Thatłs why we donłt light the scoop: it ainłt neighborly."

�Iłm sorry," I said, realizing that Iłd touched the cyborg
equivalent of a nerve.

�Wełll light in good time." Khorog hammered one of the wall
plates. �Then youłll feel the old girl shiver her timbers."

On the way to the surgeon, we passed other members of the
Iron Ladyłs redoubtable crew, none of whom Khorog saw fit to introduce. They
were a carnival of grotesques, even by the standards of the cyborgs Iłd seen
around the spaceport. One man consisted of a grinning, cackling, gap-toothed
head plugged into a trundling life-support mechanism that had apparently
originated as a cleaning robot: in place of wheels, or legs, he moved on
multiple spinning brushes, polishing the deck plates behind him. A woman
glanced haughtily at me as she passed: normal enough except that the upper
hemisphere of her skull was a glass dome, in which resided a kind of ticking
orrery: luminous planetary heads orbiting the bright lamp of a star. As she
walked she rubbed a hand over the swell of her belly and I understoodas I was
surely meant tothat her brain had been relocated there for safekeeping.
Another man moved in an exoskeleton similar to the one Khorog wore, but in this
case there was very little man left inside the powered frame: just a desiccated
wisp, like something that had dried out in the sun. His limbs were like strands
of rope, his head a piece of shriveled, stepped-on fruit. �Youłll be the new
mate, then," he said in a voice that sounded as if he was trying to speak while
being strangled.

�If Zeal agrees to it," Khorog said back. �Only then."

�What if Mister Zeal doesnłt agree to it?" I asked, when we
were safely out of earshot.

�Then wełll find you something else to do," Khorog replied. �Always
plenty of jobs on the ..." And then he halted, as if hełd been meaning to say
something else but had caught himself in time.

By then wełd reached the surgeon.

Mister Zeal occupied a windowless chamber near the middle of
the ship. He was working on one of his patients when Khorog showed me in.
Hulking surgical machines loomed over the operating table, carrying lights,
manipulators, and barbed, savage-looking cutting tools.

�This is the new assistant," Khorog said. �Has a good pair
of hands on him, so try and make this one last."

Zeal looked up from his work. He was a huge, bald,
thick-necked man with a powerful jaw. There was nothing obviously mechanical
about him: even the close-up goggle he wore over his left eye was strapped into
place, rather than implanted. He wore a stiff leather apron over his bare,
muscular chest, and he glistened with sweat and oil.

His voice was a low rumble. �Just a pup, Master Khorog. I
asked for a man."

�Beggars canłt be choosers, Mister Zeal. This is what was on
offer."

Zeal stood up from the table and studied me with a curl on
his lips, wiping his right hand against his apron. He pushed his left hand
against the rust-dappled side of one of the surgical machines, causing it to
move back on a set of caterpillar tracks. He stepped over a body that happened
to be lying on the floor, scuffing his boot heel against the chest.

The voice rumbled again. �Whatłs your name, lad?"

�Peter," I said, fighting to keep my nervousness in check. �Peter
Vandry."

He pushed the goggle off his eye, up onto his forehead.

�Your hands."

�Iłm sorry?"

He roared, �Show me your damned hands, boy!"

I stepped closer to the surgeon and offered him my hands.
Zeal examined them with a particular attentiveness, his scrutiny more thorough,
more methodical, than Khorogłs had been. He looked at my tongue. He peeled back
my eyelids and looked deep into my eyes. He sniffed as he worked, the curl
never leaving his lips. All the while I tried to ignore the semihuman thing
laid out on the opera, ing table, horrified that it was still breathing, still
obviously alive.

The crewmanłs torso was completely detached from his hips
and legs.

�I need a new mate," Zeal told me. He kicked the body on the
floor. �Iłve been trying to manage ever since with this lobot, but today ..."

�Temper got the better of you, did it?" Khorog asked. �Never
mind my temper," Zeal said warningly.

�Lobots donłt grow on trees, Mister Zeal. There isnłt an inexhaustible
supply."

The surgeon snapped his gaze back onto me. �Iłm a pair of
hands down. Do you think you can do better?"

My throat was dry, my hands shaking. �Master Khorog seemed
to think I could do it." I held out my hand, hoping he didnłt notice the
tremble. �Iłm steady."

�Steadiness is a given. But do you have the stomach for the
rest?"

�Iłve seen worse than that," I said, glancing at the
patient. But only today, I thought, only since I left Happy Jack flopping and
oozing on the carpet.

Zeal nodded at the other man. �You may leave us now, Master
I Khorog. Please ask the captain to delay drive start-up until Iłm finished
with this one, if that isnłt too much trouble?"

�Iłll do what I can," Khorog said.

Zeal turned smartly back to me. �Iłm in the middle of a procedureŹ
u re. As you can tell from the lobot, things took a turn for the worse. Youłll
assist in the completion of the operation. If things conclude satisfactorily ...
well, wełll see." The curl became a thin, uncharitable smile.

I stepped over the dead lobot. It was common knowledge that
space crews made extensive use of lobots for menial labor, but quite another to
see the evidence. Many worlds saw nothing wrong in turning urning criminals
into lobotomized slave labor. Instead of the death sentence, they got
neurosurgery and a set of implants so that they could be puppeted and given
simple tasks.

�What do you want me to do?" I asked.

Zeal lowered his goggle back into place, settling it over
his left eye.

�Looking in the rough direction of the patient would be a
start, lad."

I forced myself to take in the bloody mess on the table: the
two detached body halves, the details of meat and bone and nervous system
almost lost amid the eruptive tangle of plastic and metal lines spraying from
either half, carrying pink-red arterial blood, chemical green pneumatic fluid.
The tracked machines attending to the operation were of ancient, squalid
provenance. Nothing in Zealłs operating room looked newer than a thousand years
old.

Zeal picked up the end of one segmented chrome tube. �Iłm
trying to get this thoracic line in. There was a lot of resistance ... the
lobot kept fumbling the job. Iłm assuming you can do better."

I took the end of the line. It was slippery between my
fingers. �Shouldnłt I ... wash, or something?"

�Just hold the line. Infectionłs the least of his worries."

�I was thinking of me."

Zeal made a small guttural sound, like someone trying to
cough up an obstruction. �The least of yours as well."

I worked as best I could. We got the line in, then moved on
to other areas. I just did what Zeal told me, while he watched me with his one
human eye, taking in every slip and tremor of my hand. Once in a while hełd dig
into the wide leather pocket sewn across the front of his apron and come out
with some new blade or too. Occasionally a lobot would arrive to take away some
piece of equipment or dead flesh, or arrive with something new and gleaming on
a plate. Now and then the tracked robot would creep forward to assist in a
procedure. I noticed, with skin-crawling horror, that its dual manipulator arms
ended in a pair of perfect female human d hands, long fingered and elegant and
white as snow.

�Forceps, � hełd say. �Laser scapel." Or, sometimes, �Soldering
iron"

�What happened to this man?" I asked, feeling I ought to be
showing interest in more than just the mechanics of the operation. �Hold that
down," Zeal said, ignoring my question completely.

�Cut there. Now make a knot and tie off. Godłs teeth,
careful."

A little while later, the engine lit up. The transition to
thrust weight was sudden and unannounced. The floor shook violently.

Equipment clattered off trays. Zeal slipped with a knife,
ruining half an hourłs work, and swore in one of the ancient trade languages. �Theyłve
lit the drive," he said.

I I bought you asked ..

I did. Now apply pressure here."

We kept on working, even as the ship threatened to shake
itself to bits. Scoop instability, Zeal said: it was always rough at first,
before the fields settled down. My back began to ache from all the leaning over
over the table. Yet after what felt like many hours, we were done: the two
halves reunited, the interconnects joined, the bone and flesh encouraged to
fuse across the divide.

The patient was sewn up, rebooted, and restored to consciousness.
I rubbed my back as Zeal spoke softly to the man, answering his questions and
nodding now and then.

�Youłll be all right," I heard him say. �Just keep away from
any argo lifts for a while."

�Thanks," the cyborg said.

The crewman got up off the table, whole againor as whole as
he would ever be. He walked stiffly to the door, pawing at his healed injuries
in a kind of stunned wonderment, as if he had never expected to leave the
operating table.

�It wasnłt as bad as it looked," Zeal told me, when the
patient had gone. �Stick with me, and youłll see a lot worse."

�Does that mean youłll let me stay?"

Zeal picked up an oily rag and threw it my way. �What else
would it mean? Clean yourself up and Iłll show you to your quarters."

It was a job, and it had got me off Mokmer. As gruesome as
working for Zeal might have been, I kept reminding myself that it was a lot
better than dealing with Happy Jackłs button men. And in truth, it could have
been a lot worse. Gruff as he had been to start with, Zeal gradually opened up
and started treating me ... not exactly as an equal, but at least as a
promising apprentice. He chided me when I made mistakes but was also careful to
let me know when had done something wellwhen Iłd sewn up a wound nicely or
when Iłd wired in a neuromotor implant without causing too much surrounding
brain damage. He wouldnłt say anything, but the end of his lip would soften and
hełd favor my efforts with a microscopic nod of approval.

Zeal, I came to learn, enjoyed an uneasy relationship with
thee rest of the Iron Ladyłs crew. It must have always been that way for shipłs
surgeons. They were there to keep the crew healthy, and much of their work was
essentially benign: the treating of minor ailments, the prescribing of
restorative drugs and diets. But occa sionally they had to do unspeakable things,
things that inspired dread and horror. And no one was beyond the surgeonłs
reach, not even the captain. If a crewman needed treatment, he was going to get
iteven if Zeal and his lobots had to drag the man screaming and kicking to the
table.

Most of the accidents, though, tended to happen during port
time. Now that we were under flight, sucking interstellar gases into the
ramscoop field, climbing inexorably closer to the speed of light, Zealłs work
tended to minor operations and adjustments. Days went by with nobody to treat
at all. During these intervals, Zeal would have me practicing on the lobots,
refining my techniques.

Three or four years, Khorog had said. Longer, if Zeal couldnłt
find a replacement. With only a week under my belt, it seemed like a life
sentence aboard the Iron Lady. But I would get through it, I promised myself.
If conditions became intolerable, I would just jump ship in the next port of
call.

In the meantime I got to know as much of my new home as I
was allowed. Large areas of the Iron Lady were out-of-bounds: the rear section
was deemed too radioactive, while the front was closed to low-ranking crew
members like myself. I never saw the captain, never learned his name. But that
still left a labyrinth of rooms, corridors, and storage bays in which I was
allowed to roam during my off-duty hours. Now and then I would pass other crew
members, but apart from Khorog, none of them ever gave me the time of day. Zeal
told me not to take it to heart: it was just that I was working for him and
would always be seen as the butcherłs boy.

After that, I began to take a quiet pride in the fear and
respect Zeal and I enjoyed. The other crew might loathe us, but they needed us
as well. Our knives gave us power.

The lobots were different: they neither feared nor admired
us but simply did what we wanted with the instant obedience of machines. They
didnłt have enough residual personality to feel emotions. That was what Iłd
been told, anyway, but I still found myself wondering. There were nine of them
on the Iron Lady: five men and four women. Looking into their slack,
sleepwalker faces, I couldnłt help wondering what kind of people they had been
before, what kinds of lives they had led. It was true that they must have all
committed capital crimes to have become lobots in the first place. But not
every planet defined capital crimes in exactly the same way.

I knew there were nine, and only nine, because they came
through Zealłs room on a regular basis, for minor tweaks to their control
circuitry. I got to know their faces, got to recognize their slumping,
shuffling gait as they walked into a room.

One day, however, I saw a tenth.

Zeal had sent me off on an errand to collect replacement
parts for one of his machines. Iłd taken a wrong turn, then another one, and
before I realized quite how lost I was, I had ended up in an unfamiliar part of
the Iron Lady. I stayed calm at first, expecting that after ten or twenty
minutes of random wandering, Iłd find a corridor I recognized.

I didnłt.

After thirty minutes became an hour, and every new corridor
looked less familiar than the last, I began to panic. There were no markings on
the walls, no navigation consoles or color-coordinated arrows. The shipłs dark
architecture seemed to be rearranging itself as I passed, confounding my
attempts at orientation. My panic changed to dread as I considered my plight. I
might starve before I found my way back to the part of the ship I knew. The
Iron Lady was huge, and its living crew tiny. If they had little cause to visit
these corridors, it might be years before they found my dead body.

I turned another corner, more in desperation than hope, and
faced yet another unrecognized corridor. But there was someone standing at the
end of it. The harsh overhead light picked out only her face and shoulders,
with the rest of her lost in shadow. I could see from her collar that she wore
the same kind of overall as the other lobots. I could also see that she was
quite pretty. The lobots were usually shaved to the scalp, to make life easier
when their heads had to be opened. This one had a head of hair. It grew out
ragged and greasy, tangled like the branches of an old tree, but it was still
hair. Beneath it was a pale, almond-shaped face half lost in shadow.

She started back from me, vanishing into deeper shadow and
then around a bend at her end of the corridor.

�Wait!" I called. �Iłm lost! I need someone to show me the
way out of here!"

Lobots never spoke, but they understood spoken instructions.
The girl should have obeyed me instantly. Instead she broke into a running
shuffle. I heard her shoes scuffing on the deck plating.

I chased after her, catching up with her easily before she
reached the end of the next corridor. I seized her by the left arm and forced
her to look at me.

�You shouldnłt have run. I just need to know how to get out
of here. Iłm lost."

She looked at me from under the stiff, knotted overhang of
her hair. �Who you?" she asked.

�Peter Vandry, surgeonłs mate," I said automatically, before
frowning. �You talk. Youłre not meant to talk."

She lifted up her right arm, the sleeve of her overall
slipping down to reveal a crude mechanical substitute for a hand. This
claw-like appendage was grafted onto her forearm, held in place by a tight
black collar. I thought for a moment that she meant to shock me, but then I
realized that she was only making a human gesture, touching the tip of her
mechanical hand against the side of her head.

�I ... talk. Still ... something left."

I nodded, understanding belatedly. Some of the lobots were
clearly allowed to retain more mental faculties than others. Presumably these
were the lobots that needed to engage in more complex tasks, requiring a degree
of reciprocal communication.

But why had I never seen this one before?

�What are you doing here?" I asked.

�I ... tend." She screwed up her face. Even this
stripped-down approximation of normal speech was costing her great effort. �Them.
Keep them ... working."

�What do you mean, them?"

She cocked her head behind us, in the direction of wall
plating . �Them."

�The engine systems?" I asked.

�You ... go now." She nodded back the way I had chased hher �Second
... left. Third right. Then you ... know."

I let go of her, conscious that I had been holding her arm
too tightly. I saw then that both her hands had been replaced by mechanical
substitutes. With a shudder my thoughts raced back to the sur gical machine in
Zealłs operating room, the one with the feminine hands.

�Thank you," I said softly.

But before I could leave her, she suddenly reached out her
let t hand and touched the metal to the side of my head, running her fingers
against the skin. �Wethead," she said, with something like fascination. �Still."

�Yes," I said, trying not to flinch against the cold touch. �Zealłs
talked about putting some implants into me soon, to help with the surgery ...
nothing irreversible, he says ... but he hasnłt done it yet."

Why was I talking to her so openly? Because she was a girl.
Because it had been a long time since Iłd seen someone who looked even remotely
human, let alone someone pretty.

�Donłt let," she said urgently. �Donłt let. Bad thing happen
soon. You okay now. You stay okay."

�I donłt understand."

�You stay wethead. Stay wethead and get off ship. Soon as
can. Before bad thing."

�How am I supposed to get off the ship? Wełre in
interstellar space!"

�Your problem," she said. �Not mine."

Then she turned away, the sleeves of her overalls falling
down to hide her hands.

�Wait," I called after her. �Who are you? What is ... what
was your name?"

She paused in her stiff shuffle and looked back at me. �My
name . gone." Then her eyes flashed wild in the shadows. �Second left. Third
right. Go now, Peter Vandry. Go now then get off ship."

Zeal and I were midway through another minor procedure when
the engagement began. The Iron Lady shook like a struck bell. �Godłs teeth!"
Zeal said, flinging aside his soldering iron. �What now?"

I picked up the iron and wiped sandpaper across its tip
until it was bright again. �I thought the scoop fields were supposed to have
settled down by now."

�That didnłt feel like a field tremor to me. Felt more like
an attack. Pass me the iron: wełll sew this one up before things get worse."

�An attack?" I asked.

Zeal nodded grimly. �Another ship, probably. Theyłll be
after our cargo."

�Pirates, you mean?"

�Aye, son. Pirates. If thatłs what they are."

We tidied up the patient as best we could, while the ship continued
to shudder. Zeal went to an intercom, bent a stalk to his lips, and spoke to
the rest of the crew before returning to me. �Itłs an attack," he said. �Just
as I reckoned. Apparently wełve been trying to outrun the other ship for weeks.
Quite why no one thought to tell me this ..." He shook his head ruefully, as if
he expected no better.

We were a long way in from the hull, but the impacts sounded
like they were happening next door. I shuddered to think of the energies being
flung against the Iron Ladyłs already bruised armor. �How long can we hold?" I
asked.

�Come with me," Zeal said, pushing the goggle up onto his
forehead. �Therełs a reinforced observation bubble not far from here Itłs not
often youłll get to see close action, so you might as well make the most of it."

Something in Zealłs tone surprised me. Hełd been annoyed at
the interruption to his surgical work, but he still did not sound particularly
ticularly alarmed at the fact that we were being shot at by another ship.

What did Zeal know that I didnłt?

As he led me to the observation bubble, I finally found the
nerve to ask the question I had been meaning to put to him ever since I met the
girl in the corridor, several weeks a go. Now that he was distracted with the
battle, I assumed he wouldnłt dwell overlong on my questions.

�Mister Zeal ... that lobot we were just working on ..." He
looked back at me. �What about it?"

�It seems funny that we can do so much to their brains ..
stuff in, take stuff out ..."

�Go on."

�It seems funny that we never give them language. I mean,
they can understand us ... but wouldnłt it be easier if they could talk to us
as well? At least that way wełd know that theyłd understood our instructions."

�Language modules are too expensive. The captain has one,
but thatłs only because a hull spar took out his speech center."

�Iłm not talking about cyber modules."

Zeal halted and looked back at me again. Around us, the ship
dui ked and roared. Emergency alarms sounded from the distance. Z mechanical
voice intoned warning messages. I heard the shriek of severed air line.

�What, then?"

�Why do we take out the language center in the first place?
I mean, why not just leave it intact?"

�We take the lobots as we get łem, son. If the speech centerłs
been scooped out ... it isnłt in our power to put it back again."

I steadied myself against a bulkhead, as the floor bucked
under us. �Then theyłre all like that?"

�Unless you know otherwise." Zeal studied me with chilling
suspicion. �Wait," he said slowly. �This line of questioning ... it wouldnłt be
because youłve seen her, would it?"

�ęHer,ł Mister Zeal?"

�You know who I mean. The other lobot. The tenth one. Youłve
met her, havenłt you?"

�I ..." Zeal had the better of me. �I got lost. I bumped
into her somewhere near the back of the ship."

The curl of his lip intensified. �And what did she say?"

�Nothing," I said hurriedly. �Nothing. Just ... how to find
my way back. Thatłs all I asked her. Thatłs all she said."

�Shełs out of control," he said, more to himself than me. �Becoming
trouble. Needs something done to her."

I sensed further questions would be unwise, bitterly
regretting that I had raised the subject in the first place. At least the
battle was still ongoing, with no sign of any lessening in its intensity.
Difficult as it was to look on that as any kind of positive development, it
might force Zealłs mind onto other matters. If we had a rush of casualties, he
might forget that Iłd mentioned the girl at all.

Some chance, I thought.

We reached the observation bubble, Zeal silent and brooding
at first. He pulled back a lever, opening an iron shutter. Beyond the glass,
closer than Iłd expected, was the other ship. It couldnłt have been more than
twenty or thirty kilometers from us.

It was another ramscoop, shaped more or less like the Iron Lady.
We were so close that the magnetic fields of our scoops must have been meshed
together, entangled like the rigging of two sailing ships, exchanging cannon
fire. Near the front of the other ship, where the scoop pinched to a narrow
mouth, I could actually see the field picked out in faint purple flickers of
excited, inrushing gas. Behind the other ship was the hot spike of its drive
flame: the end result of all that interstellar material being sucked up in the
first place, compacted and compressed to stellar core pressures in her drive
chamber. A similar flame would have been burning from the Iron Ladyłs stern,
keeping us locked alongside.

The other ship was firing on us, discharging massive energy
and projectile weapons from hull emplacements.

�They must be pirates," I said, bracing myself as the ship
took another hit. �Iłd heard they existed but never really believed it until
now."

�Start believing it," Zeal grunted.

�Could that ship be the Devilfish?"

�And what have you heard about the Devilfish?"

�If you take the stories seriously, thatłs the ship they say
does most of the pirating between here and the Frolovo Hub. I suppose if
pirates exist, then therełs a good chance the Devilfish does as well."

The hull shook again, but it was a different kind of
vibration than before: more regular, like the steady chiming of a great clock.

�Thatłs us firing back," Zeal said. �About bloody time."

I watched our weapons impact across the hull of the other
ship, ęlowering in a chain. Huge blasts ... but not enough to stop a wave
retaliatory fire.

�Shełs switched to heavy slugs," Zeal said. �Wełll feel
this."

We did. It was worse than anything we had experienced
before, .is if the entire ship were being shaken violently in a dogłs jaw. By
now the noise from the klaxons and warning voices had become deafening. Through
the window I saw huge scabs of metal slam past.

�Hull plating," Zeal said. �Ours. Thatłll take some fixing."

�You donłt seem all that worried."

�Iłm not."

�But wełre being shot to pieces here."

�Wełll hold," he said. �Long enough."

�Long enough for what?"

I felt a falling sensation in my gut. �Thatłs our drive
flame stuttering," Zeal reported, with no sense of alarm. �Captainłs turned off
our scoop. Wełll be on reserve fuel in a moment."

Sure enough, normal weight returned. The two ships were
still locked alongside each other.

�Whyłs he done that?" I asked, fighting to keep the terror
from my voice, not wanting to show myself up before Zeal. �We wonłt be able to
burn reserve fuel for very long without the scoop to replenish ..."

�Scoopłs down for a reason, son."

I followed Zealłs gaze hack to the other ship. Once again, I
saw the hot gases ramming into the engine mouth, flickering purple. But now
there was something skewed about the geometry of the field, like a candle flame
bending in a draught. The distortion to the field intensified, and then snapped
back in the other direction.

�Whatłs happening?"

�Her fieldmasterłs trying to compensate," Zeal said. �Hełs
pretty good, give him that."

Now the ramscoop field was oscillating wildly, caught
between two distorted extremes. The pinched gas flared hotterblue white,
shifting into the violet.

�Whatłs happening to them? Why doesnłt the fieldmaster shut
down the field, if hełs losing control of it?"

�Too scared to. Most ships canłt switch to reserve fuel as
smoothly as we can."

�I still donłt see ..."

That was when the field instabilities exceeded some critical
limit. Gobbets of hot gas slammed into the swallowing mouth. An eyeblink later,
an explosion ripped from the belly of the other ship. Instantly her drive flame
and scoop field winked out.

She began to fall behind us.

We cut our engines and matched her velocity. The other ship
was a wreck: a huge hole punched amidships, through which I saw glowing innards
and pieces of tumbling debris, some of which looked horribly like people.

�Shełs dead now," I said. �We should leave, get out of here
as quickly as we can. What if they repair her?"

Zeal looked at me and shook his head slowly. �You donłt get
it, do you? They werenłt the pirates. They were just trying to get away from
us."

�But I thought you said ...

�I was having some fun. This was a scheduled
interceptionalways ways was. It just happened a bit sooner than the captain
told me."

�But then if theyłre not the pirates ..."

�Correct, lad. We are. And this isnłt really the Iron Lady.
Thatłs only a name she wears in port." He tapped a hand against the metal
framing of the bubble."Youłre on the Devilfish, and that makes you one of us."

A week passed, then another. I learned to stop asking questions,
afraid of where my tongue might take me. I kept thinking back to the girl in
the corridor and the cryptic warning she had given me. About how I should get
off the ship as soon as possible, before Mister Zeal put machines in my head or
the bad thing happened. Well, a bad thing had certainly happened. The Iron
Lady, or the Devilfish as I now had to think of her, had attacked and crippled
another ship. Her holds had been looted for cargo. A handful of her crew had
managed to escape in cryopods, but most had died in the explosion when her
drive core went critical. I did not know what had happened to the few
survivors, but it could not have been coincidence that I suddenly noticed we
were carrying three new lobots. I had played no part in converting them, but it
would not have taxed Zeal to do the surgery on his own. I knew my way around
his operating room by now, knew what was difficult and what was easy.

So we had murdered another ship and taken some of her crew
as prize. Every hour that I stayed aboard the Devilfish made me complicit in
that crime and any other attacks that were yet to take place. But where could I
run to?

We were between systems, in deep interstellar space. Get off
ship. Before bad thing happens.

Had she meant the attack, or was she talking about something
else, something yet to happen?

I had to find her again. I wanted to ask her more questions,
but that wasnłt the only reason. I kept seeing her face, frozen in the corridor
lights. I knew nothing about her except that I wanted to know more. I wanted to
touch that face, to pull back that messy curtain of hair and look into her
eyes.

I fantasized about saving her: how Iłd do the bare minimum
in Zealłs service, just enough to keep him happy, and then jump ship at the
first opportunity. Jump and run, and take the lobot girl with me. Iłd outrun
Happy Jackłs button men; I could outrun the crew of the Devilfish.

But it wasnłt going to be that easy.

�Iłve got a job for you," Zeal said. �Nice and easy. Then
you can have the rest of the day off."

�A job?" I ventured timidly.

�Take this." He delved into his apron pocket and passed something
to me: a gripped thing shaped a little like the soldering iron. �Itłs a
tranquilizer gun," he said.

�What do you want me to do?"

�I want you to bring the girl back in."

�The girl?"

�Donłt try my patience, Peter." He closed my hand around the
grip. �You know where she haunts. Find her, or let her find you. Shouldnłt be
too hard."

�And when Iłve found her?"

�Then you shoot her." He raised a warning finger. �Not to
kill, just to incapacitate. Aim for a leg. Shełll drop, after a minute or so.
Then you bring her back to me."

Hełd cleared the operating table. I knew from our work schedule
that we were not expecting any more patients today.

�What do you want her for?" I asked.

�Always been a bit too chirpy, that one. She has a job to do
... a certain job that means she has to be brighter than the other lobots. But
not that much brighter. I donłt like it when they answer back, and I definitely
donłt like it when they start showing notions of free will." He smiled. �But itłs
all right. Nothing we canłt fix, you and I."

�Fix?"

�A few minutes under the knife, is all."

My hand trembled on the gun. �But then she wonłt be able to
talk."

�Thatłs the idea."

�I canłt shoot her," I said. �Shełs still a person. Therełs
still something left of who she was."

�How would you know? All she told you was how to get back
home. Or did you talk more than you said?"

�No," I said, cowed. �Only what I told you."

�Good. Then you wonłt lose any sleep over it, will you?"

With gun in my hand I considered turning it on Mister Zeal
and putting him under and then killing him. With the rest of the crew still
alive, my chances of stopping the Devilfish (let alone making it off the ship
in one piece) were practically zero. It would be a futile gesture, nothing
more. Without Zeal the crew would be inconvenienced, but most of them would
still survive.

I still wanted to stop them, but the gun wasnłt the answer.
And she was just a lobot, after all. She hadnłt even remembered her name. What
kind of person did that make her?

I slipped the gun into my belt.

�Good lad," Zeal said.

I found her again. It didnłt take all that long,
considering. I kept a careful note on the twists and turns I took, doubling
back every now and then to make sure the ship really wasnłt shifting itself
around me. That much had always been my imagination, and now that I was revisiting
the zone where I had been lost before, it all looked a degree more familiar.
Now that I had been given license to enter this part of the ship, I felt more
confident. I still wasnłt happy about shooting the girl ... but then it wasnłt
as if Zeal was going to kill her. When so much had already been taken from her,
what difference did a little bit more make?

I turned a corner and there she was. She wolfed vile-looking
paste into her mouth from some kind of spigot in the wall, the stuff lathering
her metal hands.

My hand tightened on the gun, still tucked into my belt. I
took a pace closer, hoping she would stay engrossed in her meal.

She stopped eating and looked at me. Through the tangled
fringe of her hair, eyes shone feral and bright.

�Peter Vandry," she said, and then did something horrible
and unexpected, something no lobot should ever do.

She smiled.

It was only a flicker of a smile, quickly aborted, but I had
still seen it. My hand trembled as I withdrew the gun and slipped off the
safety catch.

�No," she said, backing away from the spigot.

�Iłm sorry," I said, aiming the gun. �It isnłt personal. If
I donłt do it, Zealłll kill me."

�Donłt," she said, raising her hands. �Not shoot. Not shoot
me. Not now. Not now."

�Iłm sorry," I said again.

My finger tightened on the trigger. Two things made me hesitate,
though. The first was: what did she mean: not now? What did it matter to her if
I shot her now, rather than later? The second thing was those fierce, beautiful
eyes.

My hesitation lasted an instant too long.

�Baby," she said.

The gun quivered in my hand, and then leapt free with
painful force, nearly snapping my fingers as it escaped my grip. It slammed
into the wall, the impact smashing it apart. The metal remains hovered there
for an agonizing instant, before droppingone by oneto the floor.

I looked on, stunned at what had just happened.

�Warn ... you," she said. �Warn you good, Peter Vandry. Warn
you ... get off ship. Stay wethead. Soon bad thing happen and you still here."

I pushed my hand against my chest, trying to numb the pain
in my forefinger, where it had been twisted out of the trigger grip.

�The bad thing already happened," I said, angry and confused
at the same time. �We took out a ship ... killed its crew."

�No," she said, shaking her head gravely. �That not what I
mean. I mean real bad thing. Real bad thing happen here. Here and soon. This
ship."

I looked at the remains of the gun. �What just happened?"

�She save me."

I frowned. �She?

For a moment the girl seemed torn between infinite opposed
possibilities.

�You try shoot me, Peter Vandry. I trust you and you try
shoot me."

�Iłm sorry. I didnłt want to ... itłs just that I need to
keep on Mister Zealłs good side."

�Zeal bad man. Why you work for Zeal?"

�I didnłt have a choice. They tricked me aboard. I didnłt
know this was a pirate ship. I just needed a ticket off Mokmer."

�What happen on Mokmer?"

�Bad thing," I said, with half a smile.

�Tell."

�A man called Happy Jack did something to my sister. I got
even with Happy Jack. Unfortunately, that meant I couldnłt stick around."

�Happy Jack bad man?"

�As bad as Zeal."

She looked at me, hard and deep and inquiring, and then
said, �I hope you not lie, Peter Vandry."

�Iłm not lying."

of their function, the brutal way theyłd been grafted to her
arms. She showed me her hands, giving me time to admire the crudity

�Zeal did this."

�I figured."

�Once I work for Zeal. All go well ... until one day. Then I
make mistake. Zeal get angry. Zeal take hands. Zeal say ęmore use on end of
machine.ł"

�Iłm sorry."

�Zeal got temper. One day Zeal get angry with you."

�Iłll be off the ship before then."

�You hope."

Now it was my turn to sound angry. �What does it matter?

Therełs nowhere for me to go. I have no choice but to work
with

Zeal."

�No," she said. �You have choice."

�I donłt see that I do."

�I show. Then you understand. Then you help."

I looked at her. �I just tried to shoot you. Why would you
still trust me?"

She cocked her head, as if my question made only the barest
sense to her. �You ask me ... what my name is." She blinked, screwing up her
face with the effort of language. �What my name was."

�But you didnłt know."

�Doesnłt matter. No one else ... ever ask. Except you, Peter
Vandry."

She took me deeper into the ship, into the part I had always
been told was off-limits because of its intense radiation. Dimly, it began to
dawn on me that this was just a lie to dissuade the curious.

�Zeal not happy, you not bring me in," she said.

�Iłll make something up. Tell him I couldnłt find you, or
that you tricked me and destroyed the gun."

�Not work on Zeal."

�Iłll think of something," I said glibly. �In the meantime
... you can just hide out here. When we dock, we can both make a run for it."

She laughed. �I not get off Devilfish, Peter Vandry. I die
here."

�No," I said. �It doesnłt have to happen like that."

�Yes, it does. Nearly time now."

�Back there," I said. �When you did that thing with the gun
... what did you mean when you said ębabył?"

�I mean this," she said, and opened a door.

It led into a huge and bright room: part of the engine
system. Since my time on the ship, I had learned enough of the ramscoop design
to understand that the interstellar gases collected by the magnetic scoop had
to pass through the middle of the ship to reach the combustion chamber at the rear
... which was somewhere near where we were standing.

Overhead was a thick, glowing tube, running the length of
the room. That was the fuel conduit. With the drive off, the glass lining the
tube would have been midnight black. Only a fraction of the glow from the
heated gases shone through ... but it was still enough to bathe the room in
something like daylight.

But that wasnłt the only bright thing in the room.

We walked along a railinged catwalk, high above the floor. Below,
but slightly off to one side, was a thick metal cage in the form of a
horizontal cylinder. The cage flickered with containment fields.

Something huge floated in the cage. It was a creature: sleek
and elongated, aglow with its own fierce, brassy light. Something like a whale
but carved from molten lava. Quilted in fiery platelets that flexed and
undulated as the creature writhed in the fieldłs embrace. Flickering with arcs
and filaments of lightning, like a perpetual dance of St. Elmołs fire.

I squinted against the glare from the alien thing.

�What ... ?" I asked, not needing to say any more.

�Flux Swimmer," she said. �Devilfish found her ... living in
outflow jet from star. Didnłt evolve there. Migrated. Star to star, billions of
years. Older than Galaxy."

I stared, humbled, at the astonishing thing. �Iłve heard of
such things. In the texts of the Kalarash ... but everyone always assumed hey
were legendary animals, like unicorns, or dragons, or tigers."

�Real," she said. �Just ... rare."

The creature writhed again, flexing the long, flattened whip
of its body. �But why? Why keep it here?"

�Devilfish needs Flux Swimmer," she said. �Flux Swimmer ...
has power. Magnetic fields. Reaches out ... shapes. Changes."

I nodded slowly, beginning to understand. I thought back to
the engagement with the other ramscoop; the way its intake field had become
fatally distorted.

�The Flux Swimmer is the Devilfishłs weapon against other
ships," I said, speaking for the girl. �She reaches out and twists their
magnetic fields. Zeal always knew we were going to win." I looked down at the
creature again, looking so pitiful in its metal cage. I did not have to read
the animalłs mind to know that it did not want to be held here, locked away in
the heart of the Devilfish.

�They .. make her do this," the girl said.

�Torture?"

�No. She could always ... choose to die. Easier for her."

�How, then?"

She led me along an extension to the catwalk, so that we
walked directly over the trapped animal. It was then that I understood how the
crew exerted their control on the alien.

Hidden from view before, but visible now, was a smaller version
of the same cage. It sat next to the Flux Swimmer. It held another version of
the alien animal, but one that was much tinier than the first. Probes reached
through the field, contacting the fiery hide of the little animal.

�Baby," the girl said. �Hurt baby. Make mother shape field,
or hurt baby even more. That how it works."

It was all too much. I closed my eyes, numbed at the implication
horror I had just been shown. The baby was not being hurt now, but that was
only because the Devilfish did not need the motherłs set vices. But when
another ship needed to be destroyed and looted ... then the pain would begin
again, until the mother extended her alien influence beyond the hull and
twisted the other shipłs magnetic field.

�I see why the captain cut our field now," I said. �It was
so she could reach through it."

�Yes. Captain clever."

�Where do you come into it?" I asked.

�I look after them. Tend them. Keep them alive." She nodded
upward, to where smaller conduits branched off the main fuel line. �Swimmers
drink plasma. Captain lets them have fuel. Just enough ... keep alive. No more."

�Wełve got to stop this evern happening again," I said, repopening
my eyes. Then a thought occured to me. �But she can stop it, canłt she? If the
mother has enough influence over magnetic fields to twist the ramscoop of a
ship thirty kilometers away ... surely she can stop the captain and hiw crew?
Theyłre cyborgs, after all. Theyłre practically made of metal."

�No," she said, shaking her head in exasperationeither with
the situaiton, or her own limitaitons. �Mother ... too strong. Long range ... good
control. Smash other ship, eays. Short range ... bad. Too near"

�So what youłre saying is ... she canłt exercise enough
local intro!, because shełs too strong?"

�Yes," she said, nodding emphatically. �Too strong. Too much
danger ... kill baby."

So the mother was powerless, I thought: she had the ability
to destroy another ramscoop, but not to unshackle herself from her own chains
without harming her child.

�Wait, though. The thing with the gun ... that took some
precision, didnłt it?"

�Yes," she said. �But not mother. Baby."

She had said it with something like pride. �The baby can do
the same trick?"

�Baby weak ... for now. But I make baby stronger. Give baby
more fuel. They say starve baby ... keep baby alive, but just." She clenched
her fist and snarled. �I disobey. Give baby more food. Let baby get stronger.
Then one day ..."

�The baby will be able to do what the mother canłt," I said.
�Kill them all. Thatłs the bad thing, isnłt it? Thatłs what you were warning me
about. Telling me to, get off the ship before it happened. And to make sur
eZEal didnłt pu timplant sin my head. So Iłd have a chance."

�Someone .. live," she said. ęSomeone ... come back. Find Devilfish.
Let mother and baby go. Take them home."

�Why not you?"

She touched the side of her head. �I, lobot."

�Oh, no."

�When bad thing happen, I go too. But you live, Peter
Vandry. You wethead. You come back."

�How soon?" I breathed, not wanting to think about what she
had just said.

�Soon. Baby stronger ... hour by hour. Control ...
improving. See, feel, all around it. Empathic. Know what to do. Understand
good." Again that flicker of pride. �Baby clever."

�Zealłs on to you. Thatłs why he sent me here."

�That why ... has to happen soon. Before Zeal take away ...
mc. What left behind after ... not care about baby."

�And now?"

�I care. I love."

�Well, isnłt that heartwarming," said a voice behind us.

I turned around, confronted by the sight of Mister Zeal blocking
the main catwalk, advancing toward us with a heavy gun in his human hand: not a
tranquilizer this time. He shook his head disappointedly. �Here was I, thinking
maybe you needed some help ... and when I arrive I find you having a good old
chinwag with the lobot!"

�Zeal make you lobot too," she said. �He train you now ...
just to build up neuromotor patterns."

�Listen to her," Zeal said mockingly. �Step aside now,
Peter. Let me finish the job you were so tragically incapable of completing."

I stood my ground. �Is that right, Zeal? Were you going to
make me into one of them as well, or were you just planning on taking my hands?"

�Stand aside, lad. And itłs Mister Zeal to you, by the way."

�No," I said. �Iłm not letting you touch her."

�Fine, then."

Zeal aimed the gun and shot me. The round tore through my
leg, just below the knee. I yelped and started to fold as my leg buckled under
me. By tightening my grip on the railings I managed not to slip off the
catwalk.

Zeal advanced toward me, boots clanging on the catwalk. I
couId barely hold myself up now. Blood was drooling down my leg I frWm the
wound. My hands were slippery on the railing, losing their grip.

�Iłm trying not to do too much damage," Zeal said, before leveling
the gun at me again. �Iłd still like to be able to salvage something."

I steeled myself against the shot.

�Baby," the girl called.

Zealłs arm swung violently aside, mashing against the
railing. I I is hand spasmed open to drop the gun. It clattered to the deck of
he catwalk, then dropped all the way to the floor of the chamber, where it
smashed apart.

Zeal grunted in anguish, using his good hand to massage the
lingers of the other.

�Nice trick," he said. �But itłll only make it slower and
messier for both of you."

With both handshe couldnłt have been hurt that badlyhe
delved into the pocket on the front of his apron. He came out with a pair of
long, vicious-looking knives, turning them edge-on so that wełd see how sharp
they were.

�Baby ..." I called.

But Zeal kept advancing, sharpening the knives on each
other, showing no indication that the baby was having any effect on his
weapons. It was only then that I realized that the knives were not necessarily
made of metal.

Baby wasnłt going to be able to do anything about them.

Zealłs huge boots clanged ponderously closer. The pain in my
leg was now excruciating, beginning to dull my alertness. Slumped down on the
deck, I could barely reach his waist, let alone the knives.

�Easy now, lad," he said as I tried to block him. �Easy now,
and wełll make it nice and quick when itłs your turn. How does that sound?"

�It sounds ..."

I pawed ineffectually at the leather of his apron, slick
with blood and oil. I couldnłt begin to get a grip on it, even if Iłd had the strength
to stop him.

�Now lad," he said, sounding more disappointed than angry. �Donłt
make me slash at your hands. Theyłre too good to waste like that."

�Youłre not getting any part of me."

He clucked in amusement and knelt down just far enough to
stab the tip of one of the knivesthe one he held in his right handagainst my
chest. �Seriously, now."

The pressure of the knife made me fall back, so that my back
was on the deck. That was when I touched the deck with my bare hand and felt
how warm it was.

Warm and getting hotter.

Inductive heating, I thought: Babyłs magnetic field washing
back and forth over the metal, cooking it.

I twisted my neck to glance back at the girl and saw her
pain. She held her hands in front of her, like someone expecting a gift. Baby
must have been warming her hands as well as the deck.

Baby couldnłt help it.

Flat on the deck now, Zeal lowered his heel onto my chest. �Yes,
the deckłs getting hotter. I can just feel it through the sole of my shoe."

�Donłt you touch her."

He increased the pressure on my chest, crushing the wind
from my lungs. �Or what, exactly?"

I didnłt have the strength to answer. All I could do was
push ineffectually against his boot, in the hope of snatching a breath of air. �Iłll
deal with you in a moment," Zeal said, preparing to move on. But then he
stopped.

Even from where I was lying, I saw something change on his
face. The cocky set of his jaw slipped a notch. His eyes looked up, as If hełd
seen something on the ceiling.

He hadnłt. He was looking at his goggle, pushed high onto
his forehead.

Nothing about the goggle had changed, except for the thin
wisp of smoke curling away from it where it contacted his skin.

It was beginning to burn its way into his forehead, pulled
tight by the strap.

Zeal let out an almighty bellow of pain and fury: real this
time. His hands jerked up reflexively, as if he meant to snatch the goggle
away. But both hands were holding knives.

He screamed, as the hot thing seared into his forehead like
a brand.

He lowered his hands, and tried to fumble one of the knives
into his apron pocket. His movements were desperate, uncoordinated. The knife
tore at the leather but couldnłt find its way home. Finally, shrieking, he
simply dropped the weapon.

It fell to the decking. I reached out and took it.

Zeal reached up with his bare hand and closed his fingers
around the goggle. Instantly I heard the sizzle of burning skin. He tried to
pull his hand away, but his fingers appeared to have stuck to the goggle.
Thrashing now, he reached up with the other knifestill unwilling to relinquish
itand tried to use its edge to lever offending mass of fused metal and skin
from his forehead.

That was when I plunged the other knife into his shin, and
twisted. Zeal teetered, fighting for balance. But with one hand stuck to his
forehead and the other holding the knife, he had no means to secure himself.

I assisted him over the edge. Zeal screamed as he fell. Then
there was a clatter and a sudden, savage stillness.

For what seemed like an age I lay on the catwalk, panting
until the pain lost its focus.

�It wonłt be long before the rest of the crew comes after
us," I told the girl.

She was still holding her metal hands before her: I could
only imagine her pain.

�Need to make baby strong now," she said. �Feed it more." She
moved to a console set into a recess in the railing itself. She touched her
claws against the controls, and then gasped, unable to complete whatever action
shełd had in mind.

I forced myself to stand, putting most of my weight on my
good leg. My arm was in a bad way, but the fingers still worked. If I splinted
it, I ought to be able to grip something.

I lurched and hobbled until I was next to her.

�Show me what to do."

�Give Baby more fuel," she said, indicating a set of
controls. �Turn that. All the way."

I did what she said. The decking rumbled, as if the ship
itself had shuddered. Overhead, I noticed a dimming in the glow of the pipe
after the point where the smaller lines branched out of it.

�How long?" I said, pushing my good hand against the slug
wound to keep the blood at bay.

�Not long. Ship get slower ... but not enough for captain to
notice. Baby drink. Then ... bad thing."

�Everyone aboard will die?"

�Baby kill them. Fry them alive, same way as Zeal. Except
you."

I thought of all that the Devilfish had done. If only half
of those stories were true, it was still more than enough to justify what was
bout to happen.

�How long?" I repeated.

�Thirty ... forty minutes."

�Then itłs time enough," I said.

She looked at me wonderingly. �Time enough ... for what?"

�To get you to the surgeonłs room. To get you on the table
and get those implants out of your head."

Something like hope crossed her face. It was there,
fleetingly. Then it was gone, wiped away. How often had she dared to hope,
before learning to crush the emotion before it caused any more pain? I didnłt
want to know ... not yet.

�No," she said. �Not time."

�There is time," I said. If I could extract those implants
in time, and remove those metal hands, she would weather Babyłs magnetic storm
when it ripped through the rest of the crew. There was nothing I could do for
the other lobots, not in the time that was left. And maybe there was nothing
anyone could do for them now.

But the girl was different. I knew there was something more
in there ... something that hadnłt been completely erased. Maybe she didnłt
remember her name now, but with time ... with patience ... who knew what was
possible?

But first we had to save the aliens. And we would, too. Wełd
have the Devilfish to ourselves. If we couldnłt work out how to fly the aliens
home, we could at least let them go. They were creatures of space: all that
they really craved was release.

Then .. once the Flux Swimmers were taken care of ... wełd
find a cryopod and save ourselves. So what if it took a while before anyone
found us?

�No time," she said again.

�There is," I said. �And wełre doing this. Youłre my
patient, and Iłm not giving up on you. Iłm Peter Vandry, surgeon."

�Surgeonłs mate," she corrected.

I looked down at Zealłs spread-eagled, motionless form and
shook my head. �Surgeon, actually. Someone just got a promotion."

Stroboscopic

Alastair Reynolds is a frequent contributor to Interzone,
and has also sold to Asimovłs Science Fiction, Spectrum SF, and elsewhere. His
first novel, Revelation Space, was widely hailed as one of the major SF books
of the year; it was quickly followed by Chasm City, Redemption Ark, Absolution
Gap, and Century Rain, all big books that were big sellers as well,
establishing Reynolds as one of the best and most popular new SF writers to
enter the field in many years. His other books include a novella collection, Diamond
Dogs, Turquoise Days. His most recent book is a new novel, Pushing Ice. Coming
up are two new collections, Galactic North and Zima Blue and Other Stories. A professional
scientist with a PhD in astronomy, he comes from Wales, but lives in the
Netherlands, where he works for the European Space Agency.

Herełs a taut, inventive, and fast-paced story that
speculates that the newish realm of computer game design will eventually merge
with the field of daredevil exhibitions of the jump-over-a-canyon-on-a-rocket
sled sort, to produce a sport where everything can change in the blink of an
eyesometimes with fatal results.

�OPEN THE BOX."

I wasnłt making a suggestion. Just in case the tone of my
voice didnłt make that clear, I backed up my words with an antique but
functional blunderbuss; something won in a gaming tournament half a lifetime
earlier. We stood in the airlock of my yacht, currently orbiting Venus: me, my
wife, and two employees of Icehammer Games.

Between us was a gray box the size of a childłs coffin.

�After all this time," said the closest man, his face hidden
behind a mirrored gold visor on a rococo white helmet. �Still donłt trust us?"

�First rule of complex systems," I said. �You canłt tell
friends from enemies."

�Thanks for the vote of confidence, Nozomi."

But even as he spoke, White knelt down and fiddled with the
latches on the lid of the box. It opened with a gasp of air, revealing a mass
of translucent protective sheeting wadded around something very cold. After
passing the blunderbuss to Risa, I reached in and lifted out the package,
feeling its bulk.

�What is it?

�An element of a new game," said the other man, Black. �Something
called Stroboscopic."

I carried the package to a workbench. �Never heard of it."

�Itłs hush-hush," Black said. �Company hopes to have it up
and running in a few months. Rumor is itłs unlike anything else in Tycho."

I pulled back the last layer of wadding.

It was an animal packed in ice; some kind of hardshelled arthropod;
like a cross between a scorpion and a craball segmented exoskeletal plates and
multijointed limbs terminating in various specialized and nasty-looking
appendages. The dark carapace was mottled with patches of dirty white,
sparkling with tiny reflections. Elsewhere it shone like polished turtleshell.
There were ferocious mouth parts but nothing I recognized as an eye, or any
kind of sensory organ at all.

�Looks delicious," I said. �What do I cook it with?"

�You donłt eat it, Nozomi. You play it." Black shifted
nervously as if wary of how much he could safely disclose. �The game will
feature a whole ecology of these thingsdozens of other species; all kinds of
predator-prey relationships."

�Someone manufactures them?"

�Nah." It was White speaking now. �Icehammer found łem
somewhere outside the system, using the snatcher."

�Might help if I knew where."

�Tough titty. They never told us; wełre just one of dozens
of teams working on the game."

I couldnłt help but laugh. �So youłre saying, all I have to
go on is one dead animal, which might have come from anywhere in the galaxy?"

�Yeah," White said, his helmet nodding. �Except it isnłt
dead."

THE mere fact that Iłd seen the creature, of course, meant
that Iłd have an unfair advantage when it came to playing the game. It meant
that I, Nozomi, one of the dozen or so best-known gamers in the system, would
be cheating. But I could live with that. Though my initial rise to fame had
been driven mainly by skill, it was years since Iłd played a game without
having already gained an unfair edge over the other competitors.

There were reasons.

I could remember a time in my childhood when the playing of
games was not the highest pinnacle of our culture; simply one means by which
rich immortals fought boredom. But that was before the IWP commenced the first
in a long series of wars against the Halo Ideologues, those scattered
communities waging dissent from the systemłs edge. The Inner Worlds Prefecture
had turned steadily more totalitarian, as governments generally do in times of
crisis. Stealthily, the games had been pushed toward greater prominence, and
shady alliances had been forged between the IWP and the principal gaming
houses. The games enthralled the public and diverted their attentions from the
Halo wars. Andunlike the artsthey could not be used as vehicles for
subversion. For gamers like myself it was a near-utopian state of affairs. We
were pampered and courted by the houses and made immensely rich.

Butmaybe because wełd been elevated to such loftinesswe
also saw what was going on. And turning a blind eye was one of the few things Iłd
never been good at.

One day, five years ago, I was approached by the same individuals
whołd brought the box to my yacht. Although they were officially working for
Icehammer, they were also members of an underground movement with cells in all
the gaming houses. Its lines of communication stretched out to the Ideologues
themselves.

The movement was using the games against the IWP. Theyłd
approach players like myself and offer to disclose material relating to games
under development by Icehammer or other houses; material that would give the
player an edge over their rivals. The player in turn would siphon a percentage
of their profit into the movement.

The creature in the box was merely the latest tip-off.

But I didnłt know what to make of it, except that it had
been snatched from somewhere in the galaxy. Wormhole manipulation offered
instantaneous travel to the stars, but nothing larger than a beachball could
make the trip. The snatcher was an automated probe that had retrieved
biological specimens from thousands of planets. Icehammer operated its own
snatcher, for obtaining material that could be incorporated into products.

This time, it seemed to have brought back a dud.

�IT just sits there and does nothing," Risa said when the Icehammer
employees had left, the thing resting on a chilled pallet in the sick bay.

�What kind of game can they possibly build around it?"

�Last player to die of boredom wins?"

�Possible. Or maybe you throw it? Itłs heavy enough, as
though the damn thing is half-fossilized. Those white patches look like quartz,
donłt they?"

Maybe the beast wouldnłt do anything until it was placed
into the proper environmentperhaps because it needed olfactory or tactile cues
to switch from dormancy.

�Black said the game was based on an ecology?" I said.

�Yeah, but how do you think such a game would work?" Risa
said. �An ecologyłs much too chaotic to build into a game." Before she married
me shełd been a prominent games designer for one of the other houses, so she
knew what she was talking about. �Do you know how disequilibrate your average
ecology is?"

�Not even sure I can pronounce it."

�Ecologies arenłt kidsłs stuff. Theyłre immensely complexfood
webs, spectra of hierarchical connected-ness .... Screw up any one level, and
the whole thing can collapseunless youłve evolved the system into some kind of
Gaian self-stabilizing regime, which is hard enough when youłre not trying to
re-create an alien ecology, where there might be all sorts of unexpected emergent
phenomena."

�Maybe thatłs the point, though? A game of dexterity, like balancing
spinning plates?"

Risa made the noise that told she was half acknowledging the
probable truthfulness of my statement. �They must constrain it in some way.
Strip it down to the essentials, and then build in some mechanism whereby
players can influence things."

I nodded. Iłd been unwilling to probe the creature too
deeply until now, perhaps still suspicious of a trapbut I knew that if I didnłt,
the little arthropod would drive me quietly insane. At the very least, I had to
know whether it had anything resembling a brainand if I got that far, I could
begin to guess at the kinds of behavioral routines scripted into its synapses,
especially if I could trace pathways to sensory organs. Maybe I was being
optimistic, though. The thing didnłt even have recognizable eyes, so it was
anyonełs guess as to how it assembled a mental model of its surroundings. And
of course that told me something, though it wasnłt particularly useful.

The creature had evolved somewhere dark.

A MONTH later, Icehammer began a teaser campaign for
Stroboscopic. The premiere was to take place two months later in Tycho, but a
handful of selected players would be invited to an exclusive preview a few
weeks earlier, me among them.

I began to warm up to competition fitness.

Even with insider knowledge, no game was ever a walkover,
and my contacts in the resistance movement would be disappointed if I didnłt
turn in a tidy profit. The trouble was I didnłt know enough about the game to
finesse the required skills; whether they were mental or physical or some
combination of the two. Hedging my bets, I played as many different types of
games as possible in the time frame, culminating in a race through the
atmosphere of Jupiter piloting frail cloudjammers. The game was one that demanded
an acute grasp of aerodynamic physics, coupled with sharp reflexes and a
willingness to indulge in extreme personal risk.

It was during the last of the races that Angela Valdez misjudged
a thermal and collapsed her foil. Valdez had been a friend of mine years ago,
and though wełd since fallen into rivalry, wełd never lost our mutual respect.
I attended her funeral on Europa with an acute sense of my own mortality.
There, I met most of the other gamers in the system, including a youngish man
called Zubek whose star was in the ascendant. He and Valdez had been lovers, I
knewjust as Iłd loved her years before I met Risa.

�I suppose youłve heard of Stroboscopic?" he asked, sidling
up to me after Valdezłs ashes had been scattered on Europałs ice.

�Of course."

�I presume you wonłt be playing, in that case." Zubek
smiled. �I gather the gamełs going to be more than slightly challenging."

�You think Iłm not up to it?"

�Oh, you were good once, Nozominobodyłd dispute that." He
nodded to the smear of ash on the frost. �But so was Angela. She was good
enough to beat the hardest of gamesuntil the day when she wasnłt."

I wanted to punch him. What stopped me was the thought that
maybe he was right.

I WAS on my way back from the funeral when White called,
using the secure channel to the yacht.

�What have you learnt about the package, Nozomi? Iłm curious."

�Not much," I said, nibbling a fingernail. With my other
hand I was toying with Risałs dreadlocks, her head resting on my chest. �Other
than the fact that the animal responds to light. The mottled patches on its
carapace are a matrix of light-sensitive organs; silicon and quartz deposits.
Silicon and silicon oxides, doped with a few other metals. I think they work as
organic semiconductors, converting light into electrical nerve impulses."

I couldnłt see Whitełs faceit was obscured by a golden blur
that more or less approximated the visor of his suitbut he tapped a finger
against the blur, knowingly. �Thatłs all? A response to light? Thatłs hardly
going to give you a winning edge."

�Therełs nothing simple about it. The light has to reach a
certain threshold intensity before therełs any activity at all."

�And then it wakes up?"

�No. It moves for a few seconds, like a clockwork toy given
a few turns of the key. Then it freezes up again, even if the light level
remains constant. It needs a period of darkness before it shows another
response to light."

�How long?"

�Seventy seconds, more or less. I think it gets all the
energy it needs during that one burst of light, then goes into hibernation
until the next burst. Its chemistry must be optimized so highly that it simply
canłt process more rapid bursts."

The gold ovoid of his face nodded. �Maybe that ties in with
the title of the game," he said. �Stroboscopic."

�You wouldnłt care to hazard a guess as to what kind of evolutionary
adaptation this might be?"

�I wish there was time for it, Nozomi. But Iłm afraid that
isnłt why I called. Therełs trouble."

�What sort?" Though I didnłt really need to ask.

He paused, looking to one side, as if nervous of being interrupted.
�Blackłs vanished. My guess is the goons got to him. Theyłll have unpicked his
memory by now."

�Iłm sorry."

�It may be hazardous for you to risk competition now that
youłre implicated."

I let the words sink in, then shook my head. �Itłs too late,"
I said. �Iłve already given them my word that Iłll be there."

Risa stirred. �Too pigheaded to back down?"

�No," I said. �But on the other hand, I do have a reputation
to uphold."

AS the premiere approached we learned what we could of the
creature. It was happier in vacuum than air, although the latter did not seem
to harm it provided it was kept cold. Maybe that had something to do with its
silicon biochemistry. Silicon had never seemed like a likely rival to carbon as
a basis for life, largely because siliconłs higher valency denied its compounds
the same long-term stability. But under extreme cold, silicon biochemistry
might have the edge, or at least be an equally probable pathway for evolution.
And with silicon came the possibility of exploiting light itself as an energy
source, with no clumsy intermediate molecular machinery like the rhodopsin molecule
in the human retina.

But the creature lived in darkness.

I couldnłt resolve this paradox. It needed light to energize
itselfa flash of intense blue light, shading into the UVand yet it hadnłt
evolved an organ as simple as the eye. The eye, I knew, had been invented at
least 40 times during the evolution of life on Earth. Nature came up with the
eye whenever there was the slightest use for it.

It got stranger.

There was something I called the secondary responsealso
triggered by exposure to light. Normally, shown a flash every 70-odd seconds,
the animal would execute a few seemingly purposeful movements, each burst of
locomotion coordinated with the previous one, implying that the creature kept
some record of what it had been doing previously. But if we allowed it to
settle into a stable pattern of movement bursts, the creature began to show
richer behavior. The probability of eliciting the secondary response rose to a
maximum midway through the gap between normal bursts, roughly half a minute
after the last, before smoothly diminishing. But at its peak, the creature was
hypersensitized to any kind of ambient light at all, even if it was well below
the threshold energy of the normal flash. If no light appeared during the time
of hypersensitivity, nothing happened; the creature simply waited out the
remaining half a minute until the next scheduled flash. But if even a few
hundred photons fell on its carapace, it would always do the same thing;
thrashing its limbs violently for a few seconds, evidently drawing on some
final reserve of energy that it saved for just this response.

I didnłt have a clue why.

And I wasnłt going to get one, eitherat least not by
studying the creature. One day wełd set it up in the autodoc analysis chamber
as usual, and wełd locked it into the burst cycle, working in complete darkness
apart from the regular pulses of light every minute and ten seconds. But we
forgot to lash the animal down properly. A status light flashed on the autodoc
console, signifying some routine health-monitoring function. It wasnłt bright
at all, but it happened just when the creature was hypersensitized. It thrashed
its limbs wildly, making a noise like a box of chopsticks.

And hurled itself from the chamber, falling to the floor.

Even though it was dark, I saw something of its shattering,
as it cleaved into a million pieces. It sparkled as it died.

�Oops," Risa said.

THE premiere soon arrived. Games took place all over the system,
but the real epicenter was Tycho. The lunar crater had been domed, pressurized,
and infused with a luminous mass of habitats and biomes, all dedicated to the
pursuit of pleasure through game. Iłd visited the place dozens of times, of
coursebut even then, Iłd experienced only a tiny fraction of what it had to
offer. Now all I wanted to do was get in and outand if Stroboscopic was the
last game I ever played there, I didnłt mind.

�Somethingłs bothering you, Noz," Risa said, as we took a
monorail over the Icehammer zone. �Ever since you came back from Valdezłs
funeral."

�I spoke to Zubek."

�Him?" She laughed. �Youłve got more talent in your dick."

�He suggested I should consider giving this one a miss."

�Hełs just trying to rile you. Means you still scare him."
Then she leaned toward the window of our private cabin. �There. The Arena."

It was a matt-black geodesic ball about half a kilometer
wide, carbuncled by ancillary buildings. Searchlights scissored the air above
it, neon letters spelling out the name of the game, running around the ballłs
circumference.

Stroboscopic.

Thirty years ago the eponymous CEO of Icehammer Games had
been a top-class player in his own rightuntil neutral feedback incinerated
most of his higher motor functions. Now Icehammerłs frame was cradled within a
powered exoskeleton, stenciled with luminous Chinese dragons. He greeted
myself, the players, and assorted hangers-on as we assembled in an atrium adjoining
the Arena. After a short preliminary speech a huge screen was unveiled behind
him. He stood aside and let the presentation roll.

A drab, wrinkled planet hove into view on the screen,
lightly sprinkled with craters; one ice cap poking into view.

�PSR-J2034+454A," Icehammer said. �The decidedly unpoetic
name for a planet nearly 500 light-years from here. Utterly airless and barely
larger than our moon, it shouldnłt really be there at all. Less than ten
million years ago its sun reached the end of its nuclear-burning life cycle and
went supernova." He clapped his hands together in emphasis; some trick of
acoustics magnifying the clap concussively. �Apart from a few comets, nothing
else remains. The planet moves in total darkness, even starlight attenuated by
the nebula of dust that embeds the system. Even the star it once drew life from
has become a corpse."

The star rose above one limb of the planet: a searing point
of light, pulsing on and off like a beacon.

�A pulsar," Icehammer said. �A 15-kilometer ball of nuclear
matter, sending out an intense beam of light as it rotates, four flashes a
second; each no more than 13 hundredths of a second long. The pulsar has a
wobble in its rotational axis, however, which means that the beam only crosses
our line of sight once every 72 seconds, and then only for a few seconds at a
time." Then he showed us how the pulsar beam swept across the surface of the
planet, dousing it in intense, flickering light for a few instants, outlining
every nuance of the planetłs topography in eye-wrenching violet. Followed by
utter darkness on the face of the world, for another 72 seconds.

�Now the really astonishing thing," Icehammer said, �is that
something evolved to live on the planet, although only on the one face, which
it always turns to the star. A whole order of creatures, in fact, their biology
tuned to exploit that regular flash of light. Now we believe that life on Earth
originated in self-replicating structures in pyritic minerals, or certain kinds
of clay. Eventually, this mineralogic life formed the scaffolding for the first
form of carbon-based life, whichbeing more efficient and flexiblequickly
usurped its predecessor. But perhaps that genetic takeover never happened here,
stymied by the cold and the vacuum and the radiative effects of the star." Now
he showed us holoimages of the creatures themselves, rendered in the style of
watercolors from a naturalistłs fieldbook, annotated in handwritten Latin.
Dozens of formsincluding several radically different bodyplans and modes of
locomotionbut everything was hardshelled and a clear cousin to the animal wełd
examined on the yacht. Some of the more obvious predators looked incredibly
fearsome. �They do all their living in bursts lasting a dozen seconds,
punctuated by nearly a minute of total inactivity. Evidently some selection
mechanism determined that a concentrated burst of activity is more useful than
long, drawn-out mobility."

Jumping, I thought. You couldnłt jump in slow motion. Predators
must have been the first creatures to evolve toward the burst strategyand then
grazers had been forced to follow suit.

�Wełve given them the collective term Strobelifeand their
planet wełve called Strobeworld, for obvious reasons." Icehammer rubbed his
palms together with a whine of actuating motors. �Which, ladies and gentlemen,
brings us rather neatly to the game itself. Shall we continue?"

�Get on with it, you bastard," I murmured. Next to me, Risa
squeezed my hand and whispered something calming.

WE were escorted up a sapphire staircase into a busy room
packed with consoles and viewing stands. There was no direct view of the Arena
itself, but screens hanging from the ceiling showed angles in various
wavebands.

The Arena was a mockup of part of the surface of
Strobeworld, simulated with astonishing precision: the correct rocky terrain
alleviated only by tufts of colorless vacuum-tolerant �vegetation," gravity
that was only a few percent from Strobeworldłs own, and a magnetic field that
simulated in strength and vector the ambient field at the point on Strobeworld
from which the animals had been snatched. The roof of the dome was studded with
lamps that would blaze for less than 13 hundredths of a second, once every 72
seconds, precisely mimicking the passage of the starłs mercilessly bright beam.

The game itselfLevel One, at leastwould be played in
rounds: single player against single player, or team against team. Each
competitor would be allocated a fraction of the thousand-odd individual animals
released into the Arena at the startfifty/fifty in the absence of any
handicapping. The sample would include animals from every ecological level,
from grazers that fed on the flora, right up to the relatively scarce top
predators, of which there were only a dozen basic variants. They had to eat, of
course: light could provide their daily energy needs, but theyłd still need to
consume each other for growth and replication. Each competitorłs animals would
be labeled with infrared markers, capable of being picked up by Arena cams. It
was the competitorłs goal to ensure that their population of Strobeworld
creatures outperformed the rivalłs, simply by staying alive longest. Computers
would assess the fitness of each population after a round and the winner would
be announced.

I watched a few initial heats before my turn.

Most of the animals were sufficiently far from each otheror
huddled in herdsthat during each movement burst they did little except shuffle
around or move slightly more in one direction than another. But the animals
that were near each other exhibited more interesting behavior. Prey
creaturessmall, flat-bodied grazers or midlevel predatorswould try and get
away from the higher-level predators, which in turn would advance toward the
grazers and subordinate predators. But then theyłd come to a stop, perfectly
motionless, their locations revealed only by the cams, since it was completely
dark in the Arena.

Waiting.

It was harder than it lookedthe dynamics of the ecosystem
far subtler than Iłd expected. Interfering at any level could have wildly
unexpected consequences.

Risa would have loved it.

Soon it was my turn. I took my console after nodding briefly
at my opponent; a rising player of moderate renown, but no real match for
myself, even though neither of us had played Stroboscopic before.

We commenced play.

The Arenainitially emptywas populated by Strobelife via
robot drones that dashed out from concealed hatches. The Strobelife was in stasis;
no light flashes from the dome to trigger the life cycle; as stiff and
sculptural as the animal wełd studied in the yacht. My console displayed a
schematic overlay of the Arena, with �my" animals designated by marker symbols.
The screens showed the same relationships from different angles. Initial placement
was pseudo-random; animals placed in lifelike groupings, but with distances
between predator and prey, determined by algorithms compiled from real
Strobeworld populations.

We were given five minutes to study the grouping and evolve
a strategy before the first flash. Thereafter, the flashes would follow at
72-second intervals until the gamełs conclusion.

The five minutes slammed past before Iłd examined less than
a dozen possible opening gambits.

For a few flash cycles nothing much happened; too much distance
between potential enemies. But after the fifth cycle some of the animals were
within striking range of each other. Little local hot spots of carnage began to
ensue; animals being dismembered or eaten in episodic bursts.

We began to influence the game. After each movement
burstduring the minute or so of near-immobilitywe were able to selectively
reposition or withdraw our own or our opponentłs animals from the Arena,
according to a complex shifting value scheme. The immobile animals would be
spirited away, or relocated, by the same robots that had placed them initially.
When the next flash came, play would continue seamlessly.

All sorts of unanticipated things could happen.

Wipe out one predator and you might think that the animals
it was preying on would thrive, or at least not be decimated so rapidly. But
what often happened was that a second rival predatoruntil then contained in
numberwould invade the now unoccupied niche and become more successful than
the animal that had been wiped out. If that new predator also pursued the prey
animals of the other, then they might actually be worse off.

I began to grasp some of Stroboscopicłs latent complexity.
Maybe it was going to be a challenge after all.

I played and won four rounds out of five. No point deluding
myself: at least two of my victories had been sheer luck, or had evolved from
dynamics of the ecology that were just too labyrinthine to guess at. But I was
impressed, and for the first time in years, I didnłt feel as if Iłd already
exhausted every aspect of a game.

I was enjoying myself.

I waited for the other heats to cycle through, my own name only
displaced from the top of the leader board when the last player had completed
his series.

Zubek had beaten me.

�Bad luck," he said, in the immediate aftermath, after wełd
delivered our sound bites. He slung an arm around my shoulder, matishly. �Iłm
sorry what I said about you before, Nozomi."

�Would you be apologizing now if Iłd won?"

�But you didnłt, did you? Put up a good fight, Iłll admit.
Were you playing to your limit?" Zubek stopped a passing waiter and snatched
two drinks from his tray, something fizzy, passing one to me. �Listen, Nozomi.
Either way, we won in style and trashed the rest."

�Good. Can I go now? Iłd like to speak to my wife." And get
the hell away from Tycho, I thought.

�Not so fast. Iłve got a proposition. Will you hear me out?"

I LISTENED to what Zubek had to say. Then caught up with
Risa a few minutes later and told her what he had outlined.

�Youłre not serious," she said. �Hełs playing a game with
you, donłt you realize?"

�Isnłt that the point?"

Risa shook her head exasperatedly. �Angela Valdez is dead.
She died a good death, doing what she loved. Nothing the two of you can do now
can make the slightest difference."

�Zubek will make the challenge whether I like it or not."

�But you donłt have to agree." Her voice was calm but her
eyes promised tears. �You know what the rumors said. That the next level was
more dangerous than the first."

�Thatłll make it all the more interesting, then."

But she wasnłt really listening to me, perhaps knowing that
Iłd already made my mind up.

Zubek and I arranged a press conference an hour later,
sharing the same podium, microphones radiating out from our faces like the
rifles of a firing squad; stroboscopic flashes of cameras prefiguring the game
ahead. We explained our proposition: how wełd agreed between ourselves to
another game; one that would be dedicated to the memory of Angela Valdez.

But that wełd be playing Level Two.

Icehammer took the podium during the wild applause and
cheering that followed our announcement.

�This is extremely unwise," he said, still stiffly clad in
his mobility frame. �Level Two is hardly tested yet; there are bound to be bugs
in the system. It could be exceedingly dangerous." Then he smiled and a
palpable aura of relief swept through the spectators. �On the other hand, my
shareholders would never forgive me if I forewent an opportunity for publicity
like this."

The cheers rose to a deafening crescendo.

Shortly afterward I was strapped into the console, with
neuro-effectors crowning my skull, ready to light up my pain center. The
computer overseeing the game would allocate jolts of pain according to the
losses suffered by my population of Strobelife. All in the mind, of course. But
that wouldnłt make the pain any less agonizing, and it wouldnłt reduce the
chances of my heart simply stopping at the shock of it all.

Zubek leant in and shook my hand.

�For Angela," I said, and then watched as they strapped
Zubek in the adjacent console, applying the neuro-effector.

It was hard. It wasnłt just the pain. The game was made more
difficult by deliberately limiting our overview of the Arena. I no longer saw
my population in its entiretythe best I could do was hop my point of view from
creature to creature, my visual field offering a simulation of the
electrical-field environment sensed by each Strobelife animal; a snapshot only
updated during Strobetime. When there was no movement, there was no
electrical-field generation. Most of the time I was blind.

Most of the time I was screaming.

Yet somehowwhen the computer assessed the fitness of the
two populationsI was declared the winner over Zubek.

Lying in the couch, my body quivered, saliva water-falling
from my slack jaw. A moan filled the air, which it took me long moments to
realize was my own attempt at vocalization. And then I saw something odd;
something that shouldnłt have happened at all.

Zubek hauled himself from his couch, not even sweating.

He didnłt look like a man whołd just been through agony.

An unfamiliar face blocked my view of him. I knew who it
was, just from his posture and the cadences of his speech.

�Yes, youłre right. Zubek was never wired into the
neuro-effector. He was working for uspersuading you to play Level Two."

�White," I slurred. �You, isnłt it?"

�The very man. Now how would you like to see your wife
alive?"

I reached for his collar, fingers grasping ineffectually at
the fabric. �Wherełs Risa?"

�In our care, I assure you. Now kindly follow me."

He waited while I heaved myself from the enclosure of the
couch, my legs threatening to turn to jelly beneath me.

�Oh, dear," White said, wrinkling his nose. �Youłve emptied
your bladder, havenłt you?"

�Iłll empty your face if you donłt shut up."

My nervous system had just about recovered by the time we
reached Icehammerłs quarters, elsewhere in the building. But my belief system
was still in ruins.

White was working for the IWP.

ICEHAMMER was lounging on a maroon settee, divested of his
exoskeletal support system. Just as I was marveling at how pitiable he looked,
he jumped up and strode to me, extending a hand.

�Good to meet you, Nozomi."

I nodded at the frame, racked on one wall next to an
elaborate suit of armor. �You donłt need that thing?"

�Hell, no. Not in years. Good for publicity, thoughneural
burnout and all that."

�Itłs a setup, isnłt it?"

�How do you think it played?" Icehammer said."

�Black really was working for the movement," I said, aware
that I was compromising myself with each word, but also that it didnłt matter. �White
wasnłt. You were in hock to the IWP all along. You were the reason Black
vanished."

�Nothing personal Nozomi," White said. �They got to my family,
just as wełve got to Risa."

Icehammer took over: �Shełs in our care now, Nozomiquite
unharmed, I assure you. But if you want to see her alive, I advise that you pay
meticulous attention to my words." While he talked he brushed a hand over the
tabard of the hanging suit of armor, leaving a greasy imprint on the black
metal. �You disappointed me. That a man of your talents should be reduced to
cheating."

�I didnłt do it for myself."

�You donłt seriously imagine that the movement could possibly
pose a threat to the IWP? Most of its cells have been infiltrated. Face it,
man, it was always an empty gesture."

�Then where was the harm?"

Icehammer tried a smile but it looked fake. �Obviously Iłm
not happy at your exploiting company secrets, even if you were good enough to
keep them largely to yourself."

�Itłs not as if I sold them on."

�No, Iłll credit you with discretion, if nothing else. But
even if I thought killing you might be justified, therełd be grave difficulties
with such a course of action. Youłre too well known; I canłt just make you
disappear without attracting a lot of attention. And I canłt expose you as a
cheat without revealing the degree to which my organizationłs security was
breached. So Iłm forced to another optionone that, on reflection, will serve
the both of us rather well."

�Which is?"

�Iłll let Risa go, provided you agree to play the next level
of the game."

I thought about that for a few moments before answering. �Thatłs
all? Why the blackmail?"

�Because no one in their right minds would play Level Three
if they knew what was involved." Icehammer toyed with the elegantly flared cuff
of his bottle-green smoking jacket. �The third level is exponentially more
hazardous than the second. Of course, it will eventually draw competitorsbut
no one would consent to playing it until theyłd attained total mastery of the
lower levels. We donłt expect that to happen for at least a year. You, on the
other hand, flushed with success at beating Zubek, will rashly declare your desire
to play Level Three. And in the process of doing so you will probably die, or
at the very least be severely maimed."

�I thought you said it would serve me well."

�I meant your posthumous reputation." Icehammer raised a
finger. �But donłt imagine that the game will be rigged, either. It will be
completely fair, by the rules."

Feeling sick to my stomach, I still managed a smile. �Iłll
just have to cheat, then, wonłt I?"

A FEW minutes later I stood at the podium again, a full audience
before me, and read a short prepared statement. There wasnłt much to it, and as
I hadnłt written a word of it, I canłt say that I injected any great enthusiasm
into the proceedings.

�Iłm retiring," I said, to the hushed silence in the atrium.
�This will be my last competition."

Muted cheers. But they quickly died away.

�But Iłm not finished yet. Today I played the first two
levels of what I believe will be one of the most challenging and successful
games in Tycho, for many years to come. I now intend to play the final level."

Cheers followed againbut they were still a little fearful.
I didnłt blame them. What I was doing was insane.

Icehammer came outback in his frame againand made some
halfhearted protestations, but the charade was even more theatrical than last
time. Nothing could be better for publicity than my failing to complete the
levelexcept possibly my death.

I tried not to think about that part.

�I admire your courage," he said, turning to the audience. �Give
it up for Nozomihełs a brave man!" Then he whispered in my ear: �Maybe wełll
auction your body parts."

But I kept on smiling my best shit-eating smile, even as
they wheeled in the same suit of armor that Iłd seen hanging on Icehammerłs
wall.

I WALKED into the Arena, the armorłs servo-assisted joints
whirring with each step. The suit was heated and pressurized, of coursebut the
tiny air-circulator was almost silent, and the ease of walking meant that my
own exertions were slight.

The Arena was empty of Strobelife now, brightly lit; dusty
topsoil like lunar regolith, apart from the patches of flora. I walked to the
spot that had been randomly assigned me, designated by a livid red circle.

Icehammerłs words still rang in my ears. �You donłt even
know what happens in Level Three, do you?"

�Iłm sure youłre going to enjoy telling me."

�Level One is abstractedthe Arena is observed, but it might
as well be taking place in a computer. Level Twołs a little more visceral, as
youłre now well awarebut therełs still no actual physical risk to the
competitor. And, of course, even Level Two could be simulated. You must have
asked yourself that question, Nozomi. Why create a real ecology of Strobelife
creatures at all, if youłre never going to enter it?"

That was when he had drawn my attention to the suit of
armor. �Youłll wear this. Itłll offer protection against the vacuum and the
effects of the pulse, but donłt delude yourself that the armor itself is much
more than cosmetic."

�Iłm going into the Arena?"

�Where else? Itłs the logical progression. Now your
viewpoint will be entirely limited to one participant in the gameyourself."

�Get it over with."

�Youłll still have the ability to intervene in the ecology,
just as beforethe commands will be interpreted by your suit and transmitted to
the controlling computer. The added complexity, of course, is that youłll have
to structure your game around your own survival at each step."

�And ifwhenI win?"

�Youłll be reunited with Risa, I promise. Free to go. All
the rest. You can even sell your story, if you can find anyone whołll believe
you."

�Know a good ghostwriter?"

Hełd winked at me then. �Enjoy the game, Nozomi. I know I
will."

Now I stood on my designated spot and waited.

The lights went out.

I had a sense of rapid subliminal motion all around me. The
drones were whisking out and positioning the inert Strobelife creatures in
their initial formations. The process lasted a few seconds, performed in total
silence. I could move, but only within the confines of the suit, which had now
become rigid apart from my fingers.

Unguessable minutes passed.

Then the first stammering pulse came, bright as a nuclear explosion,
even with the visorłs shielding. My suit lost its rigidity, but for a moment I
didnłt dare move. On the faceplatełs head-up display I could see that I was
surrounded by Strobelife creatures, rendered according to their electrical
field properties. There were grazers and predators and all the intermediates,
and they all seemed to be moving in my direction.

And something was dreadfully wrong. They were too big.

Iłd never asked myself whether the creature wełd examined on
the yacht was an adult. Now I knew it wasnłt.

The afterflash of the flash died from my vision, and as the
seconds crawled by, the creaturesł movements became steadily more sluggish,
until only the smallest of them were moving at all.

Then they, too, locked into immobility.

As did my suit, its own motors deactivating until triggered
by the next flash.

I tried to hold the scene in my memory, recalling the large
predator whose foreclaw might scythe within range of my suit, if he was able to
lurch three or four steps closer to me during the next pulse. Iłd have to move
fast, when it cameand on the pulse after that, Iłd have another two to contend
with, nearing me on my left flank.

The flash cameintense and eye-hurting.

No shadows; almost everything washed out in the brilliance.
Maybe that was why Strobelife had never evolved the eye: it was too bright for
contrast, offering no advantage over electrical field sensitivity.

The big predatora cross among a tank, armadillo, and lobstercame
three steps closer and slammed his foreclaw into a wide arc that grazed my
chest. The impact hit me like a bullet.

I fell backward, into the dirt, knowing that Iłd broken a
rib or two.

The electrical field overlay dwindled to darkness. My suit
seized into rigidity.

Think, Noz. Think.

My hand grasped something. I could still move my fingers, if
nothing else. The gloves were the only articulated parts of the suit that werenłt
slaved to the pulse cycle.

I was holding something hard, rocklike. But it wasnłt a
rock. My fingers traced the line of a carapace; the pielike fluting around the
legs. It was a small grazer.

An idea formed in my mind. I thought of what Icehammer had
said about the Strobeworld system; how there was nothing apart from the planet,
the pulsar, and a few comets.

Sooner or later, one of those comets would crash into the
star. It might not happen very often, maybe only once every few years, but when
it did it would be very bad indeed: a massive flare of X rays as the comet was
shredded by the gravitational field of the pulsar. It would be a pulse of
energy far more intense than the normal flash of light; too energetic for the
creatures to absorb.

Strobelife must have evolved a protection mechanism.

The onset of a major flare would be signaled by visible
light, as the comet began to break up. A tiny glint at first, but harbinger of
far worse to come. The creatures would be sensitized to burrow into the topdirt
at the first sign of light, which did not come at the expected time ....

Iłd already seen the reaction in action. It was what had
driven the thrashing behavior of our specimen before it dropped to its death on
the cabin floor. It had been trying to burrow; to bury itself in topdirt before
the storm came.

The Arena wasnłt Strobeworld, just a clever facsimile of
itand there was no longer any threat from an X-ray burst. But the evolved
reflex would remain, hardwired into every animal in the ecology.

All I had to do was trigger it.

The next flash came, like the brightest, quickest dawn imaginable.
Ignoring the pain in my chest, I stood upstill holding the little grazer in my
gloved hand.

But how could I trigger it? Iłd need a source of light,
albeit small, but Iłd need to have it go off when I was completely immobile.

There was a way.

The predator lashed at me again, gouging into my leg. I
began to topple, but forced myself to stay upright, if nothing else. Another
gouge, painful this time, as if the leg armor was almost lost.

The electrical overlay faded again, and my suit froze into immobility.
I began to count aloud in my head.

Iłd remembered something. It had seemed completely insignificant
at the time; a detail so trivial that I was barely conscious of committing it
to memory. When the specimen had shattered, it had done so in complete
darkness. And yet Iłd seen it happen. Iłd seen glints of light as it smashed
into a million fragments.

And now I understood. The creaturełs quartz deposits were
highly crystalline. And sometimeswhen crystals are stressedthey release
light; something called piezoluminescene. Not much; only the amount corresponding
to the energy levels of electrons trapped deep within latticesbut I didnłt
need much, either. Not if I waited until the proper time, when the animals
would be hypersensitized to that warning glint. I counted to 35, what I judged
to be halfway between the flash intervals. And then let my fingers relax.

The grazer dropped in silence toward the floor.

I didnłt hear it shatter, not in vacuum. But in the total
darkness in which I was immersed, I couldnłt miss the sparkle of light.

I felt the ground rumble all around me. Half a minute later,
when the next flash came from the ceiling, I looked around.

I was alone.

No creatures remained, apart from the corpses of those that
had already died. Instead, there were a lot of rocky mounds, where even the
largest of them had buried themselves under topdirt. Nothing moved, except for
a few pathetic avalanches of disturbed dirt. And there theyłd wait, I knewfor
however long it was evolution had programmed them to sit out the X-ray flare.

Thanks to the specimens on the yacht, I happened to know exactly
how long that time was. Slightly more than four and a half hours.

Grinning to myself, knowing that Nozomi had done it
againcheated and made it look like winnerłs luckI began to stroll to safety,
and to Risa.

Tiger, Burning

It was not the first time that Adam Fernandołs
investigations had taken him this far from home, but on no previous trip had he
ever felt quite so perilously remote; so utterly at the mercy of the machines
that had copied him from brane to brane like a slowly randomising Chinese
whisper. The technicians in the Office of Scrutiny had always assured him that
the process was infallible; that no essential part of him was being discarded
with each duplication, but he only ever had their word on the matter, and they
would say it was safe, wouldnłt they? Memory, as always, gained foggy holes
with each instance of copying. He recalled the precise details of his
assignmentthe awkward nature of the problembut he couldnłt for the life of
him say why he had chosen, at what must have been the very last minute, to
assume the physical embodiment of a man-sized walking cat.

When Fernando had been reconstituted after the final duplication,
he came to awareness in a half-open metal egg, its inner surface still slick
with the residue of the biochemical products from which he had been quickened.
He pawed at his whorled, matted fur, then willed his retractile claws into
action. They worked excellently, requiring no special effort on his part. A
portion of his brain must have been adapted to deal with them, so that their
unsheathing was almost involuntary.

He stood from the egg, taking in his surroundings. His
colour vision and depth perception appeared reassuringly human-normal. The
quickening room was a grey-walled metal space under standard gravity, devoid of
ornamentation save that provided by the many scientific tools and instruments
that had been stored here. There was no welcoming party, and the air was a
touch cooler than conventional taste dictated. Scrutiny had requested that he
be allowed embodiment, but that was the only concession his host had made to
his arrival. Which could mean one of two things: Doctor Meranda Austvro was
doing all that she could to hamper his investigation, without actually breaking
the law, or that she was so blissfully innocent of any actual wrongdoing that
she had no need to butter him up with formal niceties.

He tested his claws again. They still worked. Behind him, he
was vaguely aware of an indolently swishing tail.

He was just sheathing his claws when a door whisked open in
one pastel-grey wall. An aerial robot emerged swiftly into the room: a
collection of dull metal spheres orbiting each other like clockwork planets in
some mad, malfunctioning orrery. He bristled at the sudden intrusion, but it
seemed unlikely that the host would have gone to the bother of quickening him
only to have her aerial murder him immediately afterwards.

�Inspector Adam Fernando, Office of Scrutiny," he said. No
need to prove it: the necessary authentication had been embedded in the header
of the graviton pulse that had conveyed his resurrection profile from the
repeater brane.

One of the larger spheres answered him officiously. �Of
course. Who else might you have been? We trust the quickening has been
performed to your general satisfaction?"

He picked at a patch of damp fur, suppressing the urge to
shiver. �Everything seems in order. Perhaps if we moved to a warmer room ..."
His voice sounded normal enough, despite the alterations to his face: maybe a
touch less deep than normal, with the merest suggestion of feline snarl in the
vowels.

�Naturally. Doctor Austvro has been waiting for you."

�Iłm surprised she wasnłt here to greet me."

�Doctor Austvro is a busy woman, Inspector; now more than
ever. I thought someone from the Office of Scrutiny would have appreciated
that."

He was about to mention something about common courtesies,
then thought better of it: even if she wasnłt listening in, there was no
telling what the aerial might report back to Austvro.

�Perhaps wełd better be moving on. I take it Doctor Austvro
can find time to squeeze me into her schedule, now that Iłm alive?"

�Of course," the machine said sniffily. �Itłs some distance
to her laboratory. It might be best if I carried you, unless you would rather
locomote."

Fernando knew the drill. He spread his arms, allowing the
cluster of flying spheres to distribute itself around his body to provide
support. Small spheres pushed under his arms, his buttocks, the padded black
soles of his feet, while others nudged gently against chest and spine to keep
him balanced. The largest sphere, which played no role in supporting him, flew
slightly ahead. It appeared to generate some kind of aerodynamic air pocket.
They sped through the open door and down a long, curving corridor, gaining
speed with each second. Soon they were moving hair-raisingly fast, dodging
round hairpin bends and through doors that opened and shut only just in time.

Fernando remembered his tail and curled it out of harmłs
way.

�How long will this take?" he asked.

�Five minutes. We shall only be journeying a short distance
into the inclusion."

Fernando recalled his briefing. �What wełre passing through
now: this is all human built, part of Pegasus Station? Wełre not seeing any
KR-L artefacts yet?"

�Nor shall you," the aerial said sternly. �The actual
business of investigating the KR-L machinery falls under the remit of the Office
of Exploitation, as you well know. Scrutinyłs business is confined only to
peripheral matters of security related to that investigation."

Fernando bristled. �And as such ..."

�The word was ęperipheralł, Inspector. Doctor Austvro was
very clear about the terms under which she would permit your arrival, and they
did not include a guided tour of the KR-L artefacts."

�Perhaps if I ask nicely."

�Ask whatever you like. It will make no difference." While
they sped onin silence now, for Fernando had decided he preferred it that
wayhe chewed over what he knew of the inclusion, and its significance to the
Metagovernment.

Hundreds of thousands of years ago, humanity had achieved
the means to colonise nearby branes: squeezing biological data across the
hyperspatial gap into adjacent realities, then growing living organisms from
those patterns. Now the Metagovernment sprawled across thirty thousand
dense-packed braneworlds. Yet in all that time it had only encountered evidence
of one other intelligent civilisation: the vanished KR-L culture.

Further expansion was unlikely. Physics changed subtly from
brane to brane, limiting the possibilities for human colonisation. Beyond
fifteen thousand realities in either direction, people could only survive
inside bubbles of tampered space time, in which the local physics had been
tweaked to simulate homebrane conditions. These ęinclusionsł became
increasingly difficult to maintain as the local physics grew more exotic. At
five kilometres across, Meranda Austvrołs inclusion was the smallest in
existence, and it still required gigantic support machinery to hold it open.
The Metagovernment was happy to shoulder the expense because it hoped to reap
riches from Austvrołs investigations into the vanished KR-L culture.

But that investigation was supposed to be above-topsecret:
the mere existence of the KR-L culture officially deniable at all levels of the
Metagovernment. By all accounts Austvro was close to a shattering discovery.

And yet there were leaks. Someone close to the
operationmaybe even Austvro herselfwas blabbing.

Scrutiny had sent Fernando in to seal the leak. If that
meant shutting down Austvrołs whole show until the cat could be put back into
the bag (Fernando could not help but smile at the metaphor then he had the
necessary authorisation.

How Austvro would take it was another thing.

The rush of corridors and doors slowed abruptly, and a
moment later Fernando was deposited back on his feet, teetering slightly until
he regained his balance. He had arrived in a much larger room than the one
where he had been quickened, one that felt a good deal more welcoming. There
was plush white carpet on the floor, comfortable furniture, soothing pastel
decor, various homely knickknacks and tasteful objets dłart. The rock-effect
walls were interrupted by lavish picture windows overlooking an unlikely garden,
complete with winding paths, rock pools and all manner of imported vegetation,
laid out under a soothing green sky. It was a convincing simulacrum of one of
the more popular holiday destinations in the low-thousand branes.

Meranda Austvro was reclining in a silver dress on a long
black settee. Playing cards were arranged in a circular formation on the coffee
table before her. She put down the one card that had been in her hand and
beckoned Fernando to join her.

�Welcome to Pegasus Station, Inspector," she said. �Iłm
sorry I wasnłt able to greet you sooner, but Iłve been rather on the busy side."

Fernando sat himself down on a chair, facing her across the
table. �So I see."

�A simple game of Clock Patience, Inspector, to occupy
myself while I was waiting for your arrival. Donłt imagine this is how Iłd
rather be spending my afternoon."

He decided to soften his approach. �Your aerial did tell me
youłd been preoccupied with your work."

�Thatłs part of it. But I must admit we botched your first
quickening, and I didnłt have time to wait around to see the results a second
time."

�When you say ębotchedł .."

�I neglected to check your header tag more carefully. When
all that cat fur started appearing ..." She waved her hand dismissively. �I
assumed therełd been a mistake in theprofile, so I aborted the quickening,
before you reached legal sentience."

The news unnerved him. Failed quickenings werenłt unknown,
though, and shełd acted legally enough. �I hope you recycled my remains."

�On the contrary, Inspector: I made good use of them."
Austvro patted a striped orange rug, spread across the length of the settee. �You
donłt mind, do you? I found the pattern quite appealing."

�Make the most of me," Fernando said, trying not to sound as
if she had touched any particular nerve. �You can have another skin when I
leave, if it means so much to you."

She clicked her fingers over his shoulder, at the aerial. �You
may go now, Caliph."

The spheres bustled around each other. �As you wish, Doctor
Austvro."

When Fernando had heard the whisk of the closing door, he
leaned an elbow on the table, careful not to disturb the cards. He brought his
huge whiskered head close to Austvrołs. She was an attractive woman, despite a
certain steely hauteur. He wondered if she could smell his breath; how
uniquely, distastefully feline it was. �I hope this wonłt take too much time,
for both our sakes. Scrutiny wants early closure on this whole mess."

�Iłm sure it does. Unfortunately, I donłt know the first
thing about your investigation." She picked up a card from one part of the
pattern, examined it with pursed lips, then placed it down on top of another
one. �Therefore Iłm not sure how I can help you."

�You were informed that we were investigating a security
hole."

�I was informed, and I found the suggestion absurd. Unless I
am the perpetrator." She turned her cool, civil eyes upon him. �Is that what
you think, Inspector? That I am the one leaking information back to the
homebrane, risking the suspension of my own project?"

� I know only that there are leaks."

�They could be originating from someone in Scrutiny, or Exploitation.
Have you considered that?"

�We have to start somewhere. The operation itself seems as
good a place as any."

�Then youłre wasting your time. Return down-stack and knock
on someone elsełs door. Iłve work to do."

�Why are you so certain the leaks couldnłt be originating
here?"

�BecausefirstlyI do not accept that there are leaks. There
are merely statistical patterns, coincidences, which Scrutiny has latched onto
because it has nothing better to do with its time. Secondly, I run this show on
my own. There is no room for anyone else to be the source of these non-existent
leaks."

�Your husband?"

She smiled briefly and extended a hand over the coffee
table, palm down. A figurea grave, clerical-looking man in blackappeared
above the tablełs surface, no larger than a statuette. The man made a gesture
with his hands, as if shaping an invisible ball, then said something barely
audibleFernando caught the phrase ęthree hundredłthen vanished again, leaving
only the arrangement of playing cards.

Austvro selected another, examined it once more and returned
it to the table.

�My husband died years ago, Inspector. Edvardo and I were
deep inside the KR-L machinery, protected by an extension of the inclusion. My
husbandłs speciality was acausal mechanics ..." For a moment, a flicker of
humanity interrupted the composure of her face. �The extension collapsed.
Edvardo was on the other side of the failure point. I watched him fall into
KR-L spacetime. I watched what it did to him."

�Iłm sorry," Fernando said, wishing he had paid more
attention to the biographical briefing.

�Since then I have conducted operations alone, with only the
machines to help me. Caliph is the most special of them: I place great value on
his companionship. You can question the machines if you like, but it wonłt get
you anywhere."

�Yet the leaks are real."

�We could argue about that."

�Scrutiny wouldnłt have sent me otherwise."

�There must be false alarms. Given the mount of data
Scrutiny keeps tabs onthe entire informational content of meta-humanity,
spread across thirty thousand reality layersisnłt any pattern almost
guarantedto show up eventually?"

�It is," Fernando conceded, stroking his :hit tufts. �But
thatłs why Scrutiny pays attention to contex, ahd to clustering. Not simply to
exact matches for sensitie keywords, either, but for suspicious similarities:
near-mise designed to throw us off the scent. Miranda for Meranda Ostrow for
Austvro, that kind of thing."

�And youłve found these clusters?"

�Nearly a dozen, at the last count. Someone vith intimate
knowledge of this research project is talking, and we canłt have that."

This amused her. �So the Metagovernment does have its enemies
after all."

�Itłs no secret that there are political difficulties in the
high branes. Talk of secession. Exploitation feel tat the KR-L technology may
give the Metagovernment the tools it needs to hold the stack together, if the
dissidents try to gain the upper hand."

Austvro sneered. �Tools of political controlł

�An edge, thatłs all. And obviously matters wonłt be helped
if the breakaway branes learn about tie KR-L discoveries, and what we intend to
do with thr. Thatłs why we need to keep a lid on things."

�But these clusters ..." Austvro leaned back into the
settee, studying Fernando levelly. �I was shown some of the evidencesome of
the documentsbefore you arrived, and, frankly, none of it made much sense top."

�It didnłt?"

�If someonesome molewas trying to get a message through to
the breakaway branes, why insist on being so cryptic? Why not just come out and
say whatever needs to be said, instead of creating jumbled riddlesł Tames mixed
up ... names altered ... the context changd dut of all recognition ... some of
these keywords even looked like they were embedded in some kind of play."

�All I can say is that Scrutiny considered the evidence sufficiently
compelling to require immediate action Itł. still investigating the provenance
of these documents, but I should have word on that soon enough."

Austvro narrowed her flint-grey eyes. �Provenance?"

�As I said, the documents are faked: made to appear
historical, as if theyłve always been present in the data"

�Which is even more absurd than there beingleals in the
first place."

He smiled at her. �Iłm glad we agree on something."

�Itłs a start."

He tapped his extended claws against the cofee able. �I appreciate
your scepticism, Doctor. But the fat i. I canłt leave here until I have an
explanation. If Scrutiny isnłt satisfhed with my findingsif the source of the
leaks canłt be tracedtheyłll have no option but to shut down Pegasus, or at
least replace the current set-up with something under much tighter government
control. So itłs really in your interests to work with me, to help me find the
solution.

�I see," she said coldly.

�Iłd like to see more of this operation. Not just Pegasus Station,
but the KR-L culture itself."

�Unthinkable. Didnłt Caliph clarify where your inspection
ends, Inspector?"

�Itłs not a question of jurisdiction. Give me reson to think
you havenłt anything to hide, and Iłll focusmyenquiries somewhere else."

She looked down, fingering the striped orange rug she had
made of his skin.

�It will serve no purpose, Inspector: except to disturb you."

�Iłll edit the memories before I pass them back down the
stack. How does that sound?"

She rose from the settee, abandoning her card game. �Your
call. But donłt blame me when you start gibbering."

Austvro led him from the lounge, back into a more austere
part of the station. The hem of her silver dress wised on the iron-grey
flooring. Now and then an aerial flashed past on some errand, but in all other
respects the station was deserted. Fernando knew that Exploitation had offered
to send more expertise, but Austvro had always declined assistance. By all
accounts she worked efficiently, feeding a steady stream of titbits and
breakthroughs back to the Metagoverninent specialists. According to Fernandołs
dossier, Austvro didnłt trust the stability of anyone who would actually volunteer
to be copied this far up-stack, knowing the protocols. It was no surprise that
she treated him with suspicion, for he was also a volunteer, and only his
memories would be going back home again.

Presently they arrived at an oval aperture cut into one
wall. On the other side of the aperture, ready to dart down a tunnel, was a
two-seater travel pod.

�Are you sure about this, Inspector?"

�Iłm perfectly sure."

She shruggedletting him know it was his mistake, not
hersand then ushered him into one of the seats. Austvro took the other one,
facing him at right angles to the direction of travel. She applied her hand to
a tiller and the pod sped into motion. Tunnel walls zipped by in an
accelerating blur.

�Wełre about to leave the main body of the inclusion,"
Austvro informed him.

�Into KR-L spacetime?"

�Not unless the support machines fail. The inclusionłs more
or less sphericalin so far as one can talk about ęsphericalł intrusions of one
form of spacetime into anotherbut it sprouts tentacles and loops into
interesting portions of the surrounding KR-L structure. Maintaining these
tentacles and loops is much harder than keeping the sphere up, and Iłm sure youłve
heard how expensive and difficult that is."

Fernando felt his hairs bristling. The pod was moving
terrifically fast now; so swiftly that there could be no doubt that they had
left the main sphere behind already. He visualised a narrow, delicate stalk of
spacetime jutting out from the sphere, and him as a tiny moving mote within
that stalk.

�Was this where your husband died, Doctor?"

�A similar extension; it doesnłt matter now. Wełve made some
adjustments to the support machinery, so it shouldnłt happen again." Her
expression turned playful. �Why? Youłre not nervous, are you?"

�Not at all. I just wondered where the accident had
happened."

�A place much like here. It doesnłt matter. My husband never
much cared for these little jaunts, anyway. He much preferred to restrict
himself to the main inclusion."

Fernando recalled the image of Austvrołs husband, his hands
cupping an imaginary ball, like a mime, and something of the gesture tickled
his interest.

�Your husbandłs line of work: acausal signalling, wasnłt it:
the theoretical possibility of communication through time, using KR-L
principles?"

�A dead-end, unfortunately. Even the KR-L had never made
that work. But the Metagovernment was happy with the crumbs and morsels he sent
back home."

�He must have thought there was something in it."

�My husband was a dreamer," Austvro said. �His singular failing
was his inability to distinguish between a practical possibility and an
outlandish fantasy."

�I see."

�I donłt mean to sound harsh. I loved him, of course. But he
could never love the KR-L the way I do. For him these trips were always
something to be endured, not relished."

He watched her eyes for a glimmer of a reaction. �And after
his accidentdid you have misgivings?"

�For a nanosecond. Until I realised how important this work
is. How we must succeed, for the sake of the homebrane." She leaned forward in
her seat and pointed down the tunnel. �There. Wełre approaching the interface.
Thatłs where the tunnel cladding becomes transparent. The photons reaching your
eyes will have originated as photon-analogues in KR-L spacetime. Youłll see
their structures, their great engines. The scale will astound you. The mere
geometry of these artefacts is ... deeply troubling, for some. If it
disconcerts you, close your eyes." Her hand remained hard on the tiller. �Iłm
used to it, but Iłm exposed to these marvels on a daily basis."

�Iłm curious," Fernando said. �When you speak of the aliens,
you sometimes sound like youłre saying three letters. At other times.

�Krull, yes," she said, dismissively. �Itłs shorthand,
Inspector: nothing more. Long before we knew it had ever been inhabited, we
called this the KR-L brane. K and R are the Boltzmann and Rydberg constants,
from nuclear physics. In KR-L spacetime, these numbers differ from their values
in the homebrane. L is a parameter that denotes the degree of variation."

�Then Krull is ... a word of your own coining?"

�If you insist upon calling it a word. Why? Has it appeared
in these mysterious keyword clusters of yours?"

�Something like it."

The pod swooped into the transparent part of the stalk. It
was difficult to judge speed now. Fernando assumed there was some glass-like
cladding between him and the inclusion boundary, and somewhere beyond that (he
was fuzzy on the physics) the properties of spacetime took on alien attributes,
profoundly incompatible with human biochemistry. But things could still live in
that spacetime, provided theyłd been born there in the first place. The KR-L
had evolved into an entire supercivilisation, and although they were gone now,
their great machines remained. He could see them now, as huge and bewildering
as Austvro had warned. They were slab-sided, round-edged, ribbed with flanges
and cooling grids, surmounted by arcing spheres and flickering discharge cones.
The structures glowed with a lilac radiance that seemed to shade into
ultraviolet. They receded in all directionsmore directions, in fact, than
seemed reasonable, given the usual rules of perspective. Somewhere low in his
throat he already felt the first queasy constriction of nausea.

�To give you an idea of scale ..." Austvro said, directing
his unwilling attention towards one dizzying feature, �.. that structure there,
if it were mapped into our spacetime, and built from our iron atoms, would be
larger than a Jupiter-class gas giant. And yet it is no more than a heat
dissipation element, a safety valve on a much larger mechanism. That more
distant machine is almost three light-hours across, and it too is only one
element in a larger whole."

Fernando fought to keep his eyes open. �How far do these machines
extend?"

�At least as far as our instruments can reach. Hundreds of
light-hours in all directions. The inclusion penetrates a complex of KR-L
machinery larger than one of our solar systems. And yet even then there is no
suggestion that the machinery ends. It may extend for weeks, months, of
light-travel time. It may be larger than a galaxy."

�Its function?" Seeing her hesitation, he added: �I have the
necessary clearance, Doctor. Itłs safe to tell me."

�Absolute control," she said. �Utter dominance of matter and
energy, not just in this brane, but across the entire stack of realities. With
this instrumentality, the KR-L could influence events in any brane they
selected, in an instant. This machinery makes our graviton pulse equipmentthe
means by which you arrived herelook like the hamfisted workings of a
brain-damaged caveman."

Fernando was silent for a moment, as the pod sped on through
the mind-wrenching scenery.

�Yet the KR-L only ever occupied this one brane," he said. �What
use did they have for machinery capable of influencing events in another one?"

�Only the KR-L can tell us that," Austvro said. �Yet it
seems likely to me that the machinery was constructed to deal with a threat to
their peaceful occupation of this one brane."

�What could threaten such a culture, apart from their own
bloody-minded hubris?"

�One must presume: another culture of comparable sophistication.
Their science must have detected the emergence of another civilisation, in some
remote brane, hundreds of thousands or even millions of realities away, that
the KR-L considered hostile. They created this great machinery so that they
might nip that threat in the bud, before it spilled across the stack towards
them."

�Genocide?"

�Not necessarily. Is it evil to spay a cat?"

�Depends on the cat."

�My point is that the KR-L were not butchers. They night
their own self-preservation, but not at the ultimate expense of that other
culture: whoever they might have been. Surgical intervention was all that was
required."

Fernando looked around again. Some part of his mind was finally
adjusting to the humbling dimensions of the machinery, for his nausea was
abating. �Yet theyłre all gone now. What happened?"

�Again, one must presume: some fatal hesitancy. They created
this machinery, but, at what should have been their moment of greatest triumph,
flinched from using it."

�Or they did use it, and it came back and bit them."

�I hardly think so, Inspector."

�How many realities have we explored? Eighty, ninety housand
layers in either direction?"

�Something like that," she said, tolerantly.

�How do we know what happens when you get much further out?
For that matter, what could the KR-L have known?"

�Iłm not sure I follow you."

�Iłm just wondering ... when I was a child I remember someoneI
think it was my uncleexplaining to me that the stack was like the pages of an
infinitely thick book, a book whose pages reached away to an infinite distance
in either direction: reality after reality, as far as you could imagine, with
the physics changing only slightly from page to page."

�As good an explanation as the layman will ever grasp."

�But the same person told me there was another theory of the
stack: taken a bit less seriously, but not completely discredited."

�Continue," Austvro said.

�The theory was that physics kept changing, but after a
while it flattened out again and began to converge back to ours. And that by
then you were actually coming back again, approaching our reality from the
other direction. The stack, in other words, was circular."

�Youłre quite right: that theory is taken a bit less
seriously."

�But it isnłt discredited, is it?"

�You canłt discredit an untestable hypothesis."

�But what if it is testable? What if the physics does begin
to change less quickly?"

�Local gradients tell you nothing. Wełd have to map
millions, tens of millions of layers, before we could begin ..."

�But you already said the KR-L machinery might have had that
kind of range. What if they were capable of looking all the way around the
stack, but they didnłt realise it? What if the hostile culture they thought
they were detecting was actually themselves? What if they turned on their
machinery and it reached around through the closed loop of realities and nipped
them in the bud?"

�An amusing conceit, Inspector, but no more than that."

�But a deadly one, should it happen to be true." Fernando
stroked his chin tufts, purring quietly to himself as he thought things
through. �The Office of Exploitation wishes to make use of the KR-L machinery
to deal with another emerging threat."

�The Metagovernment pays my wages. Itłs up to it what it
does with the results I send home."

�But as was made clear to me when I arrived, you are a busy
woman. Busy because you are approaching your own moment of greatest triumph.
You understand enough about the KR-L machinery to make it work, donłt you. You
can talk to it through the inclusion, ask it do your bidding."

Her expression gave nothing away. �The Metagovernment expects
results."

�I donłt doubt it. But I wonder if the Metagovernment has
been fully appraised of the risks. When they asked you what happened to the
KR-L, did you mention the possibility that they might have brought about their
own extinction?"

�I confined my speculation to the realm of the reasonably
likely, Inspector. I saw no reason to digress into fancy."

�Nonetheless, it might have been worth mentioning."

�I disagree. The Metagovernment is intending to take action
against dissident branes within its own realm of colonisation, not some
barely-detected culture a million layers away. Even if the topology of the
layers was closed ..."

�But even if the machinery was used, it was only used once,"
Fernando said. �Therełs no telling what other side-effects might be involved."

�Iłve made many local tests. Therełs no reason to expect any
difficulties!"

�Iłm sure the KR-L scientists were equally confident, before
they switched it on."

Her tone of voice, never exactly confiding, turned chill. �Iłll
remind you once again that you are on Scrutiny business, not working for
Exploitation. My recollection is that you came to investigate leaks, not to
question the basis of the entire project."

�I know, and youłre quite right. But I canłt help wondering
whether the two things arenłt in some way connected."

�I donłt even accept that there are leaks, Inspector. You
have some way to go before you can convince me they have anything to do with
the KR-L machinery."

�Iłm working on it," Fernando said.

They watched the great structures shift angle and
perspective as the pod reached the apex of its journey and began to race back
towards the inclusion. Fernando was glad when the shaft walls turned opaque and
they were again speeding down a dark-walled tunnel, back into what he now
thought of as the comparable safety and sanity of Pegasus Station. Until he had
recorded and transmitted his memories down the stack, self-preservation still
had a strong allure.

�I hope that satisfied your curiosity," Austvro said, when
they had disembarked and returned to her lounge. �But as I warned you, the
journey was of no value to your investigation."

�On the contrary," he told her. �Iłm certain it clarified a
number of things. Might I have access to a communications console? Iłd like to
see if Scrutiny have come up with anything new since I arrived."

�Iłll have Caliph provide you with whatever you need. In the
meantime I must attend to work. Have Caliph summon me if there is anything of
particular urgency."

�Iłll be sure to."

She left him alone in the lounge. He fingered the tiger skin
rug, repulsed and fascinated in equal measure at the exact match with his own
fur. While he waited for the aerial to arrive, he swept a paw over the coffee
table, trying to conjure up the image of Austvrołs dead husband. But the little
figure never appeared.

It hardly mattered. His forensic memory was perfectly
capable of replaying a recent observation, especially one that had seemed
noteworthy at the time. He called to mind the dead man, dwelling on the way he
shaped an invisible form: not, Fernando now realised, a ball, but the
ring-shaped stack of adjacent branes in the closed-loop of realities. �Three
hundred and sixty degrees," hełd been saying. Meranda Austvrołs dead husband
had been describing the same theoretical meta-reality of which Fernandołs uncle
had once spoken. Did that mean that the dead man believed that the KR-L had
been scared by their own shadow, glimpsed at some immense distance into the
reality stack? And had they forged this soul-crushingly huge machinery simply
to strike at that perceived enemy, not realising that the blow was doomed to
fall on their own heads?

Perhaps.

He looked anew at the pattern of cards, untouched since
Austvro had taken him from this room to view the KR-L machinery. The ring of
cards, arranged for Clock Patience, echoed the closed-loop of realities in her
husbandłs imagination.

Almost, he supposed, as if Austvro had been dropping him a
hint.

Fernando was just thinking that through when Caliph appeared,
assigning one of his larger spheres into a communications console. Symbols and
keypads brightened across the matte grey surface. Fernando tapped commands,
claws clicking as he worked, and soon accessed his private data channel.

There was, as he had half expected, a new message from Scrutiny.
It concerned the more detailed analysis of the leaks that had been in motion
when he left on his investigation.

Fernando placed a direct call through.

�I lello," said Fernandołs down-brane counterpart, a man
!ramed Cook. �Good news, bad news, Iłm afraid."

�Continue," Fernando purred.

�Wełve run a thorough analysis on the keyword clusters, as
promised. The good news is that the clusters havenłt gone away: their
statistical significance is now even more certain. Therełs clearly been a leak.
That means your journey hasnłt been for nothing."

�Thatłs a relief."

�The bad news is that the context is still giving us some
serious headaches. Frankly, itłs disturbing. Whoeverłs responsible for these
leaks has gone to immense trouble to make them look as if theyłve always been
part of our data heritage."

�I donłt understand. I mean, I understand, but I donłt get
it. There must be a problem with your methods, your data auditing."

Cook looked pained. �Thatłs what we thought, but wełve been
over this time and again. Therełs no mistake. Whoever planted these leaks has
tampered with the data at a very deep level; sufficient to make it seem as if
the clusters have been with us long before the KR-L brane was ever discovered."

Fernando lowered his voice. �Give me an example. Austvro
mentioned a play, for instance."

�That would be one of the oldest clusters. The Shipwreck, by
a paper-age playwright, around 001611. No overt references to the KR-L, but it
does deal with a scholar on a haunted island, an island where a powerful witch
used to live ... which could be considered a metaphorical substitute for
Austvro and Pegasus Station. Contains a Miranda, too, and ..."

�Was the playwright a real historical figure?"

�Unlikely, unless he was almost absurdly prolific. There are
several dozen other plays in the records, all of which we can presume were the
work of the mole."

�Mm," Fernando said, thoughtfully.

�The mole screwed up in other ways too," Cook added. �The
plays are riddled with anachronisms; words and phrases that donłt appear
earlier in the records."

�Sloppy," Fernando commented, while wondering if there was
something more to it than mere sloppiness. �Tell me about another cluster."

�Skip to 001956 and we have another piece of faked drama: something
called a ęfilmł; some kind of recorded performance. Again, lots of giveaways:
Ostrow for Austvro, Bellerophonhełs the hero who rode the winged horse
Pegasusthe KR-L themselves ... real aliens, this time, even if theyłre
confined to a single planet, rather than an entire brane. Therełs evenget
thisa tiger."

�Really," Fernando said dryly.

�But herełs an oddity: our enquiries turned up peripheral matter
which seems to argue that the later piece was in some way based upon the
earlier one."

�Almost as if the mole wished to lead our attention from one
cluster to another." Fernando scratched at his ear. �Whatłs the next cluster?"

�Jump to 002713: an ice opera performed on Pluto Prime, for
one night only, before it closed due to exceptionally bad notices. Mentions ęentities
in the eighty three thousandth layer of realitył. This from at least six
thousand years before the existence of adjoining braneworids was proven beyond
doubt."

�Could be coincidence, but ... well, go on."

�Jump to 009655, the premier of a Tauri-phase astrosculpture
in the Wenlock star forming region. Supplementary text refers to ęthe aesthetic
of the doomed Crailł and ęMirandine and Kalebinł."

�There are other clusters, right up to the near-present?"

�All the way up the line. Random time-spacing: wełve looked
for patterns there, and havenłt found any. It must mean something to the mole,
of course ..."

�If there is a mole," Fernando said.

�Of course therełs a mole. What other explanation could
there be?"

�Thatłs what Iłm wondering."

Fernando closed the connection, then sat in silent contemplation,
shuffling mental permutations. When he felt that he had examined the matter
from every conceivable angle and yet still arrived at the same unsettling
conclusionhe had Caliph summon Doctor Austvro once more.

�Really, Inspector," she said, as she came back into the
lounge. �Iłve barely had time ..."

�Sit down, Doctor."

Something in the force of his words must have reached her.
Doctor Austvro sank into the settee, her hands tucked into the silvery folds of
her dress.

�Is there a problem? I specifically asked ..."

�Youłre under arrest for the murder of your husband, Edvardo
Austvro."

Her face turned furious. �Donłt be absurd. My husbandłs
death was an accident: a horrid, gruesome mistake, but no more than that."

�Thatłs what you wished us all to think. But you killed him,
didnłt you? You arranged for the collapse of the inclusion, knowing that he
would be caught in KR-L spacetime."

�Ridiculous."

�Your husband understood what had happened to the KR-L: how
their machinery had reached around the stack, through three hundred and sixty
degrees, and wiped them out of existence, leaving only their remains. He knew
exactly how dangerous it would be to reactivate the machinery; how it could
never become a tool for the Metagovernment. You said it yourself, Meranda: he
feared the machinery. Thatłs because he knew what it had done; what it was
still capable of doing."

�I would never have killed him," she said, her tone flatly
insistent.

�Not until he opposed you directly, not until he became the
only obstacle between you and your greatest triumph. Then he had to go."

�Iłve heard enough." She turned her angry face towards the
aerial. �Caliph: escort the Inspector to the dissolution chamber. Hełs in clear
violation of the terms under which I agreed to this investigation."

�On the contrary," Fernando said. �My enquiry is still of central
importance."

She sneered. �Your ridiculous obsession with leaks? I monitored
your recent conversation with the homebrane, Inspector. The leaks are what Iłve
always maintained: statistical noise, meaningless coincidences. The mere fact
that they appear in sources that are incontrovertibly old ... what further
evidence do you need, that the leaks are nothing of the sort?"

�Youłre right," Fernando said, allowing himself a heavy
sigh. �They arenłt leaks. In that sense I was mistaken."

�In which case admit that your mission here was no more than
a wild goose chase, and that your accusations concerning my husband amount to
no more than a desperate attempt to salvage some ..."

�They arenłt leaks," Fernando continued, as if Austvro had
not spoken. �Theyłre warnings, sent from our own future." She blinked. �Iłm
sorry?"

�Itłs the only explanation. The leaks appear in context
sources that appear totally authentic ... because they are."

�Madness."

�I donłt think so. It all fits together quite nicely. Your
husband was investigating acausal signalling: the means to send messages back
in time. You dismissed his work, but what if there was something in it after
all? What if a proper understanding of the KR-L technology allowed a future
version of the Metagovernment to send a warning to itself in the past?"

�What kind of warning, Inspector?" she asked, still sounding
appalled.

�Iłm guessing here, but it might have something to do with
the machinery itself. Youłre about to reactivate the very tools that destroyed
the KR-L. Perhaps the point of the warning is to stop that ever happening. Some
dreadful, unforeseen consequence of turning the machinery against the dissident
branes ... not the extinction of humanity, obviously, or there wouldnłt be
anyone left alive to send the warning. But something nearly as bad. Something
so awful that it must be edited out of history, at all costs."

�You should listen to yourself, Inspector. Then ask yourself
whether you came out of the quickening room with all your faculties intact."

He smiled. �Then you have doubts."

�Concerning your sanity, yes. This idea of a message being
sent back in time ... it might have some microscopic degree of credibility if
your precious leaks werenłt so hopelessly cryptic. Who sends a message and then
scrambles the facts?"

�Someone in a hurry, I suppose. Or someone with an imperfect
technique."

�Iłm sure that means something to you."

�Iłm just wondering: what if there wasnłt time to get it
right? What if the sending of the message was a one-shot attempt, something
that had to be attempted even though the net hod was still not fully
understood?"

�That still doesnłt explain why the keywords would crop up
in ... a play, of all things."

�Perhaps it does, though. Especially if the acausal
signalliing involves the transmission of patterns directly into the human mind,
across time, in a scattergun fashion. The playwright .."

�What about him?" she asked, with a knowingness that reminded
him she had listened in on his conversation with Cook.

�The man lived and died before the discovery of quantum mechanics,
let alone braneworlds. Even if the warning arrived fully-formed and coherent in
his mind, he could only have interpreted it according to his existing mental
framework. Itłs no wonder things got mixed up, confused. His conceptual
vocabulary didnłt extend to vanished alien cultures in adjacent reality stacks.
It did extend to islands, dead witches, ghosts."

�Ridiculous. Next youłll be telling me that the other
clusters ..."

�Exactly so. The dramatised recordingthe ęfilmłwas made a
few centuries later. The creators did the best they could with their limited
understanding of the universe. They knew of space travel, other worlds. Closer
to the truth than the playwright, but still limited by the mental prison of
their contemporary worldview. The same goes for all the other clusters, Iłm
willing to bet."

�Let me get this straight," Austvro said. �The future Metagovernment
resurrects ancient KR-L time-signalling machinery, technology that it barely
understands. It attempts to send a message back in time, but it ends up
spraying it through history, back to the time of a man who probably thought the
Sun ran on coal."

�Maybe even earlier," Fernando said. �Therełs nothing to say
there arenłt other clusters, lurking in the statistical noise .."

Austvro cut him off. �And yet despite this limited understanding
of the machinery, theas you saidscattershot approachthey still managed to
score direct hits into the heads of playwrights, dramatists, sculptors .." She
shook her head pityingly.

�Not necessarily," Fernando said. �We only know that these
people became what they were in our timeline. It might have been the warning
itself that set these individuals on their artistic courses ... planting a
seed, a vaguely-felt anxiety, that they had no choice but to exorcise through
creative expression, be it a play, a film, or an ice-opera on Pluto Prime."

�Iłll give you credit, Inspector: you really know how to
take an argument beyond its logical limit. Youłre actually suggesting that if
the signalling hadnłt taken place, none of these works of art would ever have
existed?"

He shrugged. �If you admit the possibility of time messages ..."

�I donłt. Not at all."

�It doesnłt matter. Iłd hoped to convince youI thought it
might make your arrest an easier matter for both of usbut itłs really not
necessary. You understand now, though, why I must put an end to your research.
Scrutiny and Exploitation can decide for themselves whether therełs any truth
in my theory."

�And if they donłt think there isthen Iłll be allowed to
resume my studies?"

�Therełs still the small matter of your murder charge,
Merand a."

She looked sad. �Iłd hoped you might have forgotten."

�Itłs not my job to forget."

�How did you guess?"

�I didnłt guess," he said. �You led me to it. More than
that: I think some part of yousome hidden, subconscious puntactually wanted
me to learn the truth. If not, that was it very unfortunate choice of card
game, Meranda."

�Youłre saying I wanted you to arrest me?"

�I canłt believe that you ever hated your husband enough to
kill him. You just hated the way he opposed your research. For that reason he
had to go, but I doubt that therełs been a moment since when what you did hasnłt
been eating you from inside."

�Youłre right," she said, as if arriving at a firm decision.
�I didnłt hate him. But he still had to go. And so do you."

In a flash her hand had emerged from the silvery folds of
her dress, clutching the sleek black form of a weapon. Fernando recognised it
as a simple blaster: not the most sophist icated weapon in existence, but more
than capable of inflicting mortal harm.

�Please, Doctor. Put that thing away, before you do one of
us an injury."

She stood, the weapon wavering in her hand, but never losing
its lock on him.

�Caliph," she said. �Escort the Inspector to the dissolution
chamber. Hełs leaving us."

�Youłre making a mistake, Meranda."

�The mistake would be in allowing the Metagovernment to
close me down, when Iłm so close to success. Caliph!"

�I cannot escort the Inspector, unless the Inspector wishes
to be escorted," the aerial informed her.

�I gave you an order!"

�He is an agent of the Office of Scrutiny. My programming
does not permit ..."

�Walk with me, please," Fernando said. �Put the gun away and
wełll say no more about it. Youłre in enough trouble as it is."

�Iłm not going with you."

�Youłll revive a fair trial. With the right argument, you
may even be able to claim your husbandłs death as manslaughter. Perlaps you
didnłt mean to kill him, just to strand him ..."

�Itłs not the trial," she snarled. �Itłs the thought of
stepping into that thing . When I came here I never intended to leave. I wonłt
go with you."

�You must."�

He took a step towards her, knowing even as he did it that
the move wasunwise. He watched her finger tense on the blasterłs trigger, and
for an instant he thought he might cross the space to her before the weapon
discharged. Few people had the nerve to hold a gun against an agent of
Scrutiny; even fewer had the nerve to fire.

But Merand Austvro was one of those few. The muzzle spat
rapid bolt of self-confined plasma, and he watched in slow-motion horror as
three of the bolts slammed into his right arm, below the elbow, and took his
hand and forearm away in an agonising orange fire, like a chalk drawing smeared
in the rain. The pain hit him like a hammer, and despite his traning he felt
the full force of it before mental barriers slammed down in rapid succession,
blocking the worst. He could smell his own charred fur.

�An error, actor Austvro," he grunted, forcing the words
out.

�Donłt take another step, Inspector."

�Iłm afraid I must."

�Iłll kill you."� The weapon was now aimed directly at his
chest. If her earlier shot had been wide, there would be no error now.

He took another step. He watched her finger tense again, and
readied himelf for the annihilating fire.

But the weapon dropped from her hand. One of Caliphłs smaller
spheres had dashed it from her grip. Austvro clutched her hand with the other,
massaging the fingers. Her face showed stunnedincomprehension. �You betrayed
me," she said to the aerial

�You injured n agent of Scrutiny. You were about to inflict
further harm. I could not allow that to happen." Then one of the larger sphere
swerved into Fernandołs line of �Do you require mdeical assistance?"

�I donłt think so. Iłm about done with this body anyway."

�Very well."

�Will you help me to escort Doctor Austvro to the
dissolution chamber?"

�If you order it."

�Help me, in that case.

Doctor Austvro tried to resist, but between them Fernando
and Caliph quickly had the better of her. Fernando kicked the weapon out of
harmłs way, then pulled Austvro against his chest with hi left arm, pinning her
there. She struggled to escape, but her strength was nothing against his, even
allowing for the shock of losing his right arm.

Caliph propelled them to the dissolution chamber. Austvro
fought all the way, bu with steadily draining will. Only at the last moment,
who she saw the grey hood of the memory recorder, next to he recessed alcove of
the dissolution field, did she summon some last reserve of resistance. But her
efforts counted for nothing. Fernando and the robot placed her into the
recoder, closing the heavy metal restraining buckles across her body. The hood
lowered itself, ready to capture a final neural image; a snapshot of her mind
that would be encoded into a graviton pulse and relayed hack to the homebrane.

�Meranda Austvro," Fenando said, pushing the blackened stump
of his arm into his chest furs, �I am arresting you on the authority of the
Office of Scrutiny. Your resurrection profile will be captured and transmitted
into the safekeeping of the Metagovernment. A new body will be quickened and
employed as a host for thee patterns, and then brought to trial. Please compose
your houghts accordingly."

�When they quicken me again, Iłll destroy your career," she
told him.

Fernando looked sympathetic. �You wouldnłt believe how many
times Iłve heard that before."

�I should have skinned you twice."

�It wouldnłt have worked. Theyłd have sent a third copy of
me."

He activated the memory recorder. Amber lights flickered
across the hood, stabilising to indicate that the device had obtained a
coherent image and that the relevant data was ready to be committed to the
graviton pulse. Fernando issued the command, and a tumbling hourglass symbol
appeared on the hood.

�Your patterns are on their way home now, Meranda. For the
moment you still have a legal existence. Enjoy it while you can."

Hełd never said anything that cruel before, and almost as
soon as the words were out he regretted them. Taunting the soon-to-be-destroyed
had never been his style, and it shamed him that he had permitted himself such
a gross lapse of professionalism. The only compensation was that he would soon
find himself in the same predicament as Doctor Austvro.

The hourglass vanished, replaced by a steady green light. It
signified that the homebrane had received the graviton pulse, and that the
resurrection profile had been transmitted without error.

�Former body of Meranda Austvro," he began, �I must now inform
you .."

�Just get it over with."

Fernando and Caliph helped her from the recorder. Her body
felt light in his hands, as if some essential part of it had been erased or
extracted during the recording process. Legally, this was no longer Doctor
Meranda Austvro: just the biological vehicle Austvro had used while resident in
this brane. According to Metagovernment law, the vehicle must now be recycled.

Fernando turned on the pearly screen of the dissolution
field. He tested it with a stylus, satisfied when he saw the instant actinic
flash as the stylus was wrenched from existence. Dissolution was quick and
efficient. In principle the atomic fires destroyed the central nervous system
long before pain signals had a chance to reach it, let alone be experienced as
pain.

Not that anyone ever knew, of course. By the time you went
through the field, your memories had already been captured. Anything you
experienced at the moment of destruction never made it into the profile.

�I can push you into the field," he told Austvro. �But by
all accounts youłll find it quicker and easier if you run at it yourself."

She didnłt want it to happen that way. Caliph and Fernando
had to help her through the field. It wasnłt the nicest part of the job.

Afterwards, Fernando sat down to marshall and clarify his
thoughts. In a little while he too would be consumed by fire, only to be reborn
in the homebrane. Scrutiny would be expecting a comprehensive report into the
Pegasus affair, and it would not do to be woolly on the details. Experience had
taught him that a little mental preparation now paid dividends in the long run.
The recording and quickening process always blurred matters a little, so the
clearer one could he at the outset, the better.

When he was done with the recorder, when the green light had
reported safe receipt of his neural patterns, he turned to Caliph. �I no longer
have legal jurisdiction here. The ęmeł speaking to you is not even legally
entitled to call itself Adam Fernando. But I hope you wonłt consider it
improper of me to offer some small thanks for your assistance."

�Will someone come back to take over?" Caliph asked.

�Probably. But donłt be surprised if they come to shut down
Pegasus. Iłm sure my legal self will put in a good word for you, though."

�Thank you," the aerial said.

�Itłs the least I can do."

Fernando stood from the recorder, andas was his usual habittook
a running jump at the dissolution field. It wasnłt the most elegant of endsthe
lack of an arm hindered his balancebut it was quick and efficient and the
execution not without a certain dignity.

Caliph watched the tiger burn, the stripes seeming to linger
in the air before fading away. Then it gathered its spheres into an agitated
swarm and wondered what to do next.

Turquoise Days

ęSet sail in those Turquoise Daysł

Echo and the Bunnymen

One

Naqi Okpik waited until her sister was safely asleep before
she stepped onto the railed balcony that circled the gondola. It was the most
perfectly warm and still summer night in months. Even the breeze caused by the
airshipłs motion was warmer than usual, as soft against her cheek as the breath
of an attentive lover. Above, yet hidden by the black curve of the vacuum-bag,
the two moons were nearly at their fullest. Microscopic creatures sparkled a hundred
metres under the airship, great schools of them daubing galaxies against the
profound black of the sea. Spirals, flukes and arms of luminescence wheeled and
coiled as if in thrall to secret music. Naqi looked to the rear, where the
airshipłs ceramic-jacketed sensor pod carved a twinkling furrow. Pinks and
rubies and furious greens sparkled in the wake. Occasionally they darted from
point to point with the nervous motion of kingfishers. As ever, she was alert
to anything unusual in movements of the messenger sprites, anything that might
merit a note in the latest circular, or even a full-blown article in one of the
major journals of Juggler studies. But there was nothing odd happening tonight,
no yet-to-be catalogued forms or behaviour patterns, nothing that might
indicate more significant Pattern Juggler activity. She walked around the
airshipłs balcony until she had reached the stern, where the submersible sensor
pod was tethered by a long fibre-optic dragline. Naqi pulled a long hinged
stick from her pocket, flicked it open in the manner of a courtesanłs fan and
then waved it close to the winch assembly. The default watercoloured lilies and
sea serpents melted away, replaced by tables of numbers, sinuous graphs and
trembling histograms. A glance established that there was nothing surprising
here either, but the data would still form a useful calibration set for other
experiments. As she closed the fandelicately, for it was worth almost as much
as the airship itself
Naqi reminded herself that it was a day since she had
gathered the last batch of incoming messages. Rot had taken out the connection
between the antenna and the gondola during the last expedition, and since then
collecting the messages had become a chore, to be taken in turns or traded for
less tedious tasks. Naqi gripped a handrail and swung out behind the airship.
Here the vacuum-bag overhung the gondola by only a metre, and a grilled ladder
allowed her to climb around the overhang unravel and scramble onto the flat top
of the bag. She moved gingerly, bare feet against rusting rungs, doing her best
not to disturb Mina. The airship rocked and creaked a little as she found her
balance on the top and then was again silent and still. The churning of its
motors was so quiet that Naqi had long ago filtered the sound from her
experience. All was calm, beautifully so. In the moonlight the antenna was a
single dark flower rising from the broad back of the bladder. Naqi started moving
along the railed catwalk that led to it, steadying herself as she went but
feeling much less vertigo than would have been the case in daylight. Then she
froze, certain that she was being watched. Just within Naqiłs peripheral vision
appeared a messenger sprite. It had flown to the height of the airship and was
now sprite. It had flown to the height of the airship and was now shadowing it
from a distance of ten or twelve metres. Naqi gasped, delighted and unnerved at
the same time. Apart from dead specimens this was the first time Naqi had ever
seen a sprite this close. The organism had the approximate size and morphology
of a terrestrial hummingbird, yet it glowed like a lantern. Naqi recognised it
immediately as a long-range packet carrier. Its belly would be stuffed with
data coded into tightly packed wads of RNA, locked within microscopic protein
capsomeres. The packet carrierłs head was a smooth teardrop, patterned with
luminous pastel markings, but lacking any other detail save for two black eyes
positioned above the midline. Inside the head was a cluster of neurones, which
encoded the positions of the brightest circumpolar stars. Other than that,
sprites had only the most rudimentary kind of intelligence. They existed to
shift information between nodal points in the ocean when the usual chemical
signalling pathways were deemed too slow or imprecise. The sprite would die
when it reached its destination, consumed by microscopic organisms that would
unravel and process the information stored in the capsomeres. And yet Naqi had
the acute impression that it was watching her: not just the airship, but her,
with a kind of watchful curiosity that made the hairs on the back of her neck
bristle. And thenjust at the point when the feeling of scrutiny had become
unsettlingthe sprite whipped sharply away from the airship. Naqi watched it
descend back towards the ocean and then coast above the surface, bobbing now
and then like a skipping stone. She remained still for several more minutes,
convinced that something of significance had happened, though aware too of how
subjective the experience had been; how unimpressive it would seem if she tried
to explain it to Mina tomorrow. Anyway, Mina was the one with the special bond
with the ocean, wasnłt she? Mina was the one who scratched her arms at night;
Mina was the one who had too high a conformal index to be allowed into the swimmer
corps. It was always Mina. It was never Naqi. The antennałs metre-wide dish was
anchored to a squat plinth inset with weatherproofed controls and readouts. It
was century-old Pelican technology, like the airship and the fan. Many of the
controls and displays were dead, but the unit was still able to lock onto the
functioning satellites. Naqi flicked open the fan and copied the latest feeds
into the fanłs remaining memory. Then she knelt down next to the plinth,
propped the fan on her knees and sifted through the messages and news summaries
of the last day. A handful of reports had arrived from friends in PrachuapPangnirtung
and Umingmaktok snowflake cities, another from an old boyfriend in the swimmer
corps station on Narathiwat atoll. He had sent her a list of jokes that were
already in wide circulation. She scrolled down the list, grimacing more than
grinning, before finally managing a half-hearted chuckle at one that had previously
escaped her. Then there were a dozen digests from various special interest
groups related to the Jugglers, along with a request from a journal editor that
she critique a paper. Naqi skimmed the paperłs abstract and thought that she
was probably capable of reviewing it. She checked through the remaining
messages. There was a note from Dr Sivaraksa saying that her formal application
to work on the Moat project had been received and was now under consideration.
There had been no official interview, but Naqi had met Sivaraksa a few weeks
earlier when both of them happened to be in Umingmaktok. Sivaraksa had been in
an encouraging mood during the meeting, though Naqi couldnłt say whether that
was because shełd given a good impression or because Sivaraksa had just had his
tapeworm swapped for a nice new one. But Sivaraksałs message said she could
expect to hear the result in a day or two. Naqi wondered idly how she would
break the news to Mina if she was offered the job. Mina was critical of the
whole idea of the Moat and would probably take a dim view of her sister having
anything to do with it. Scrolling down further, she read another message from a
scientist in Qaanaaq requesting access to some calibration data she had obtained
earlier in the summer. Then there were four or five automatic weather
advisories, drafts of two papers she was contributing to, and an invitation to
attend the amicable divorce of Kugluktuk and Gjoa, scheduled to take place in
three weeksł time. Following that there was a summary of the latest worldwide
newsan unusually bulky file
and then there was nothing. No further messages
had arrived for eight hours.

There was nothing particularly unusual about thatthe ailing
network was always going downbut for the second time that night the back of
Naqiłs neck tingled. Something must have happened, she thought. She opened the
news summary and started reading. Five minutes later she was waking Mina. ęI
donłt think I want to believe it,ł Mina Okpik said. Naqi scanned the heavens,
dredging childhood knowledge of the stars. With some minor adjustment to allow
for parallax, the old constellations were still more or less valid when seen
from Turquoise. ęThatłs it, I think.ł

ęWhat?ł Mina said, still sleepy. Naqi waved her hand at a vague
area of the sky, pinned between Scorpius and Hercules. ęOphiuchus. If our eyes
were sensitive enough, wełd be able to see it now: a little prick of blue
light.ł

ęIłve had enough of little pricks for one lifetime,ł Mina
said tucking her arms around her knees. Her hair was the same pure black as
Naqiłs, but trimmed into a severe, spiked crop which made her look younger or
older depending on the light. She wore black shorts and a shirt that left her
arms bare. Luminous tattoos in emerald and indigo spiralled around the piebald
marks of random fungal invasion that covered her arms, thighs, neck and cheeks.
The fullness of the moons caused the fungal patterns to glow a little
themselves, shimmering with the same emerald and indigo hues. Naqi had no
tattoos and scarcely any fungal patterns of her own; she couldnłt help but feel
slightly envious of her sisterłs adornments. Mina continued, ęBut seriously,
you donłt think it might be a mistake?ł

ęI donłt think so, no. See what it says there? They detected
it weeks ago, but they kept quiet until now so that they could make more
measurements.ł

ęIłm surprised there wasnłt a rumour.ł Naqi nodded. ęThey
kept the lid on it pretty well. Which doesnłt mean there isnłt going to be a lot
of trouble.ł

ęMm. And they think this blackout is going to help?ł

ęMy guess is official trafficłs still getting through. They
just donłt want the rest of us clogging up the network with endless
speculation.ł

ęCanłt blame us for that, can we? I mean, everyonełs going
to be guessing, arenłt they?ł

ęMaybe theyłll announce themselves before very long,ł Naqi
said doubtfully. While they had been speaking the airship had passed into a
zone of the sea largely devoid of bioluminescent surface life. Such zones were
almost as common as the nodal regions where the network was thickest, like the
gaping voids between clusters of galaxies. The wake of the sensor pod was
almost impossible to pick out, and the darkness around them was absolute,
relieved only by the occasional mindless errand of a solitary messenger sprite.
Mina said: ęAnd if they donłt?ł

ęThen I guess wełre all in a lot more trouble than wełd
like.ł For the first time in a century a ship was approaching Turquoise,
commencing its deceleration from interstellar cruise speed. The flare of the
lighthuggerłs exhaust was pointed straight at the Turquoise system. Measurement
of the Doppler shift of the flame showed that the vessel was still two years
out, but that was hardly any time at all on Turquoise. The ship had yet to
announce itself, but even if it turned out to have nothing but benign
intentionsa short trade stopover, perhaps
the effect on Turquoise society
would be incalculable. Everyone knew of the troubles that had followed the
arrival of Pelican in Impiety. When the Ultras moved into orbit there had been
much unrest below. Spies had undermined lucrative trade deals. Cities had
jockeyed for prestige, competing for technological tidbits. There had been
hasty marriages and equally hasty separations. A century later, old enmities
smouldered just beneath the surface of cordial intercity politics. It wouldnłt
be any better this time.

ęLook,ł Mina said, łit doesnłt have to be all that bad. They
might not even want to talk to us. Didnłt a ship pass through the system about
seventy years ago without so much as a by-your-leave?ł Naqi agreed; it was
mentioned in a sidebar to one of the main articles. ęThey had engine trouble,
or something. But the experts say therełs no sign of anything like that this
time.ł

ęSo theyłve come to trade. What have we got to offer them
that we didnłt have last time?ł

ęNot much, I suppose.ł Mina nodded knowingly. ę A few works
of art that probably wonłt travel very well. Ten-hour-long nose-flute
symphonies, anyone?ł She pulled a face. ęThatłs supposedly my culture, and even
I canłt stand it. What else? A handful of discoveries about the Jugglers, which
have more than likely been replicated elsewhere a dozen times. Technology,
medicine? Forget it.ł

ęThey must think we have something worth coming here for,ł
Naqi said. ęWhatever it is, wełll just have to wait and see, wonłt we? Itłs
only two years.ł

ęI expect you think thatłs quite a long time,ł Mina said. ęActuallył
Mina froze. ęLook!ł Something whipped past in the night, far below, then a handful
of them; then a dozen, and then a whole bright squadron. Messenger sprites,
Naqi realisedbut she had never seen so many of them moving at once, and on
what was so evidently the same errand. Against the darkness of the ocean the
lights were mesmerising: curling and weaving, swapping positions and
occasionally veering far from the main pack before arcing back towards the
swarm. Once again one of the sprites climbed to the altitude of the airship,
loitering for a few moments on fanning wings before whipping off to rejoin the
others. The swarm receded, becoming a tight ball of fireflies, and then only a
pale globular smudge. Naqi watched until she was certain that the last sprite
had vanished into the night. ęWow,ł Mina said quietly. ęHave you ever seen
anything like that?ł

ęNever.ł

ęBit funny that it should happen tonight, wouldnłt you say?ł

ęDonłt be silly,ł Mina said. ęThe Jugglers canłt possibly
know about the ship.ł

ęWe donłt know that for sure. Most people heard about this
ship hours ago. Thatłs more than enough time for someone to have swum.ł Mina
conceded her younger sisterłs point. ęStill, information flow isnłt usually
that clear-cut. The Jugglers store patterns, but they seldom show any sign of
comprehending actual content. Wełre dealing with a mindless biological
archiving system, a museum without a curator.ł

ęThatłs one view.ł Mina shrugged. ęIłd love to be proved otherwise.ł

ęWell, do you think we should try following them? I know we
canłt track sprites over any distance, but we might be able to keep up for a
few hours before we drain the batteries.ł

ęWe wouldnłt learn much.ł

ęWe wonłt know until wełve tried,ł Naqi said, gritting her
teeth. ęCome onitłs got to be worth a go, hasnłt it? I reckon that swarm moved
a bit slower than a single sprite. Wełd at least have enough for a report,
wouldnłt we?ł Mina shook her head. ęAll wełd have is a single observation with
a little bit of speculation thrown in. You know we canłt publish that sort of
thing. And anyway, assuming that sprite swarm did have something to do with the
ship, there are going to be hundreds of similar sightings tonight.ł

ęI just thought it might take our minds off the news.ł

ęPerhaps it would. But it would also make us unforgivably
late for our target.ł Mina dropped the tone of her voice, making an obvious
effort to sound reasonable. ęLook, I understand your curiosity. I feel it as
well. But the chances are it was either a statistical fluke or part of a global
event everyone else will have had a much better chance to study. Either way we
canłt contribute anything useful, so we might as well just forget about it.ł
She rubbed at the marks on her forearm, tracing the Paisleypatterned barbs and
whorls of glowing colouration. ęAnd Iłm tired, and we have several busy days
ahead of us. I think we just need to put this one down to experience, all
right?ł

ęFine,ł Naqi said. ęIłm sorry, but I just know wełd be
wasting our time.ł

ęI said fine.ł Naqi stood up and steadied herself on the
railing that traversed the length of the airshipłs back. ęWhere are you going?ł

ęTo sleep. Like you said, wełve got a busy day coming up. Wełd
be fools to waste time chasing a fluke, wouldnłt we?ł An hour after dawn they
crossed out of the dead zone. The sea below began to thicken with floating
life, becoming soupy and torpid. A kilometre or so further in and the soup
showed ominous signs of structure: a blue-green stew of ropy strands and wide,
kelplike plates. They suggested the floating, half-digested entrails of embattled
sea monsters. Within another kilometre the floating life had become a dense
vegetative raft, stinking of brine and rotting cabbage. Within another
kilometre of that the raft had thickened to the point where the underlying sea
was only intermittently visible. The air above the raft was humid, hot and
pungent with microscopic irritants. The raft itself was possessed of a
curiously beguiling motion, bobbing and writhing and gyring according to the
ebb and flow of weirdly localised current systems. It was as if many invisible
spoons were stirring a great bowl of spinach. Even the shadow of the airship,
pushed far ahead of it by the low sun, had some influence on the movement of
the material. The Pattern Juggler biomass scurried and squirmed to evade the
track of the shadow, and the peculiar purposefulness of the motion reminded
Naqi of an octopus she had seen in the terrestrial habitats aquarium on Umingmaktok,
squeezing its way through impossibly small gaps in the glass prison of its
tank. Presently they arrived at the precise centre of the circular raft. It
spread away from them in all directions, hemmed by a distant ribbon of
sparkling sea. It felt as if the airship had come to rest above an island, as
fixed and ancient as any geological feature. The island even had a sort of
geography: humps and ridges and depressions sculpted into the cloying texture
of layered biomass. But there were few islands on Turquoise, especially at this
latitude, and the Juggler node was only a few days old. Satellites had detected
its growth a week earlier, and Mina and Naqi had been sent to investigate. They
were under strict instructions simply to hover above the island and deploy a
handful of tethered sensors. If the node showed any signs of being unusual, a
more experienced team would be sent out from Umingmaktok by high-speed
dirigible. Most nodes dispersed within twenty to thirty days, so there was
always a need for some urgency. They might even send trained swimmers, eager to
dive into the sea and open their minds to alien communion. Readyas they called
itto ken the ocean. But first things first: chances were this node would turn
out to be interesting rather than exceptional. ęMorning,ł Mina said when Naqi
approached her. Mina was swabbing the sensor pod she had reeled in earlier,
collecting the green mucus that had adhered to its ceramic teardrop. All human
artefacts eventually succumbed to biological attack from the ocean, although
ceramics were the most resilient. ęYoułre cheerful,ł Naqi said, trying to make
the statement sound matter-of-fact rather than judgmental. ęArenłt you? Itłs
not everyone gets a chance to study a node up this close. Make the most of it,
sis. The news we got last night doesnłt change what we have to do today.ł Naqi
scraped the back of her hand across her nose. Now that the airship was above the
node she was breathing vast numbers of aerial organisms into her lungs with
each breath. The smell was redolent of ammonia and decomposing vegetation. It
required an intense effort of will not to keep rubbing her eyes rawer than they
already were. ęDo you see anything unusual?ł

ęBit early to say.ł

ęSo thatłs a �no", then.ł

ęYou canłt learn much without probes, Naqi.ł Mina dipped a
swab into a collection bag, squeezing tight the plastic seal. Then she dropped
the bag into a bucket between her feet. ęOh, wait. I saw another of those
swarms, after youłd gone to sleep.ł

ęI thought you were the one complaining about being tired.ł
Mina dug out a fresh swab and rubbed vigorously at a deep olive smear on the
side of the sensor. ęI picked up my messages, thatłs all. Tried again this
morning, but the blackout still hasnłt been lifted. I picked up a few
short-wave radio signals from the closest cities, but they were just
transmitting a recorded message from the Snowflake Council: stay tuned and donłt
panic.ł

ęSo letłs hope we donłt find anything significant here,ł
Naqi said, ębecause we wonłt be able to report it if we do.ł

ęTheyłre bound to lift the blackout soon. In the meantime I
think we have enough measurements to keep us busy. Did you find that spiral
sweep programme in the airshipłs avionics box?ł

ęI havenłt looked for it,ł Naqi said, certain that Mina had
never mentioned such a thing before. ęBut Iłm sure I can programme something
from scratch in a few minutes.ł

ęWell, letłs not waste any more time than necessary. Here.ł
Smiling, she offered Naqi the swab, its tip laden with green slime. ęYou take
over this and Iłll go and dig out the programme.ł Naqi took the swab after a
momentłs delay. ęOf course. Prioritise tasks according to ability, right?ł

ęThatłs not what I meant,ł Mina said soothingly. ęLook, letłs
not argue, shall we? We were best friends until last night. I just thought it
would be quicker ...ł She trailed off and shrugged. ęYou know what I mean. I
know you blame me for not letting us follow the sprites, but we had no choice
but to come here. Understand that, will you? Under any other circumstancesł

ęI understand,ł Naqi said, realising as she did how sullen
and childlike she sounded; how much she was playing the petulant younger
sister. The worst of it was that she knew Mina was right. At dawn it all looked
much clearer. ęDo you? Really?ł Naqi nodded, feeling the perverse euphoria that
came with an admission of defeat. ęYes. Really. Wełd have been wrong to chase
them.ł Mina sighed. ęI was tempted, you know. I just didnłt want you to see how
tempted I was, or else youłd have found a way to convince me.ł

ęIłm that persuasive?ł

ęDonłt underestimate yourself, sis. I know I never would.ł Mina
paused and took back the swab. ęIłll finish this. Can you handle the sweep
programme? Naqi smiled. She felt better now. The tension between them would
still take a little while to dissipate, but at least things were easier now.
Mina was right about something else: they were best friends, not just sisters. ęIłll
handle it,ł Naqi said. Naqi stepped through the hermetic curtain into the
air-conditioned cool of the gondola. She closed the door, rubbed her eyes and
then sat down at the navigatorłs station. The airship had flown itself automatically
from Umingmaktok, adjusting its course to take cunning advantage of jet streams
and weather fronts. Now it was in hovering mode: once or twice a minute the
electrically driven motors purred, stabilising the craft against gusts of wind
generated by the microclimate above the Juggler node. Naqi called up the current
avionics programme, a menu of options appearing on a flat screen. The options
quivered; Naqi thumped the screen with the back of her hand until the display
behaved itself. Then she scrolled down through the other flight sequences, but
there was no preprogramme spiral loaded into the current avionics suite. Naqi
rummaged around in the background files, but there was nothing to help her
there either. She was about to start hacking something togetherat a push it
would take her half an hour to assemble a routinewhen she remembered that she
had once backed up some earlier avionics files onto the fan. She had no idea if
they were still there, or even if there was anything useful amongst the cache,
but it was probably worth taking the time to find out. The fan lay closed on a
bench; Mina must have left it there after she had verified that the blackout
was still in force. Naqi grabbed the fan and spread it open across her lap. To
her surprise, it was still active: instead of the usual watercolour patterns
the display showed the messages she had been scrolling through earlier. She
looked closer and frowned. These were not her messages at all. She was looking
at the messages Mina had copied onto the fan during the night. Naqi felt an immediate
prickle of guilt: she should snap the fan shut, or at the very least close her
sisterłs mail and move into her own area of the fan. But she did neither of
those things. Telling herself that it was only what anyone else would have
done, she accessed the final message in the list and examined its incoming
time-stamp. To within a few minutes, it had arrived at the same time as the
final message Naqi had received. Mina had been telling the truth when she said
that the blackout was continuing. Naqi glanced up. Through the window of the
gondola she could see the back of her sisterłs head, bobbing up and down as she
checked winches along the side. Naqi looked at the body of the message. It was
nothing remarkable, just an automated circular from one of the Juggler
special-interest groups. Something about neurotransmitter chemistry. She exited
the circular, getting back to the list of incoming messages. She told herself
that she had done nothing shameful so far. If she closed Minałs mail now, she
would have nothing to feel really guilty about. But a name she recognised
jumped out at her from the list of messages: Dr Jotah Sivaraksa, manager of the
Moat project. The man she had met in Umingmaktok, glowing with renewed vitality
after his yearly worm change. What could Mina possibly want with Sivaraksa? She
opened the message, read it. It was exactly what she had feared, and yet not
dared to believe. Sivaraksa was responding to Minałs request to work on the
Moat. The tone of the message was conversational, in stark contrast to the
businesslike response Naqi had received. Sivaraksa informed her sister that her
request had been appraised favourably, and that while there were still one or
two other candidates to be considered, Mina had so far emerged as the most
convincing applicant. Even if this turned out not to be the case, Sivaraksa
continuedand that was not very likelyMinałs name would be at the top of the
list when further vacancies became available. In short, she was more or less
guaranteed a chance to work on the Moat within the year. Naqi read the message
again, just in case there was some highly subtle detail that threw the entire
thing into a different, more benign light. Then she snapped shut the fan with a
sense of profound fury. She placed it back where it was, exactly as it had
been. Mina pushed her head through the hermetic curtain. ęHowłs it coming
along!ł

ęFine,ł Naqi said. Her voice sounded drained of emotion even
to herself. She felt stunned and mute. Mina would call her a hypocrite were she
to object to her sister having applied for exactly the same job she had ... but
there was more to it than that. Naqi had never been as openly critical of the
Moat project as her sister. By contrast, Mina had never missed a chance to
denounce both the project and the personalities behind it. Now that was real
hypocrisy. ęGot that routine cobbled together?ł

ęComing along,ł Naqi said.

ęSomething the matter?ł

ęNo,ł Naqi forced a smile, ęno. Just working through the details.
Have it ready in a few minutes.ł

ęGood. Canłt wait to start the sweep. Wełre going to get
some beautiful data, sis. And I think this is going to be a significant node.
Maybe the largest this season. Arenłt you glad it came our way!ł

ęThrilled,ł Naqi said, before returning to her work. Thirty
specialised probes hung on telemetric cables from the underside of the gondola,
dangling like the venom-tipped stingers of some grotesque aerial jellyfish. The
probes sniffed the air metres above the Juggler biomass, or skimmed the fuzzy
green surface of the formation. Weighted plumb lines penetrated to the sea
beneath the raft, sipping the organism-infested depths dozens of metres under
the node. Radar mapped larger structures embedded within the nodedense kernels
of compacted biomass, or huge cavities and tubes of inscrutable functionwhile
sonar graphed the topology of the many sinewy organic cables which plunged into
darkness, umbilicals anchoring the node to the seabed. Smaller nodes drew most
of their energy from sunlight and the breakdown of sugars and fats in the seałs
other floating micro-organisms but the larger formations, which had a vastly
higher information-processing burden, needed to tap belching aquatic fissures,
active rifts in the ocean bed kilometres under the waves. Cold water was pumped
down each umbilical by peristaltic compression waves, heated by being circulated
in the superheated thermal environment of the underwater volcanoes, and then
pumped back to the surface. In all this sensing activity, remarkably little
physical harm was done to the extended organism itself. The biomass sensed the
approach of the probes and rearranged itself so that they passed through with
little obstruction, even those scything lines that reached into the water.
Energy was obviously being consumed to avoid the organism sustaining damage,
and by implication the measurements must therefore have had some effect on the
nodełs information-processing efficiency. The effect was likely to be small,
however, and since the node was already subject to constant changes in its architecturesome
probably intentional, and some probably forced on it by other factors in its
environmentthere appeared to be little point in worrying about the harm caused
by the human investigators. Ultimately, so much was still guesswork. Although
the swimmer teams had learned a great deal about the Pattern Jugglersł encoded
information, almost everything else about themhow and why they stored the
neural patterns, and to what extent the patterns were subject to subsequent
postprocessingremained unknown. And those were merely the immediate questions.
Beyond that were the real mysteries, which everyone wanted to solve, but right
now they were simply beyond the scope of possible academic study. What they
would learn today could not be expected to shed any light on those
profundities. A single data pointeven a single clutch of measurementscould
not usually prove or disprove anything, but it might later turn out to play a
vital role in a chain of argument, even if it was only in the biasing of some
statistical distribution closer to one hypothesis than another. Science, as
Naqi had long since realised, was as much a swarming, social process as it was
something driven by ecstatic moments of personal discovery. It was something
she was proud to be part of. The spiral sweep continued uneventfully, the
airship chugging around in a gently widening circle. Morning shifted to early
afternoon, and then the sun began to climb down towards the horizon, bleeding
pale orange into the sky through soft-edged cracks in the cloud cover. For
hours Naqi and Mina studied the incoming results, the ever-sharper scans of the
node appearing on screens throughout the gondola. They discussed the results
cordially enough, but Naqi could not stop thinking about Minałs betrayal. She
took a spiteful pleasure in testing the extent to which her sister would lie,
deliberately forcing the conversation around to Dr Sivaraksa and the project he
steered. ęI hope I donłt end up like one of those deadwood bureaucrats,ł Naqi
said, when they were discussing the way their careers might evolve. ęYou know,
like Sivaraksa.ł She observed Mina pointedly, yet giving nothing away. ęI read
some of his old papers; he used to be pretty good once. But now look at him.ł

ęItłs easy to say that,ł Mina said, ębut I bet he doesnłt
like being away from the front line any more than we would. But someone has to
manage these big projects. Wouldnłt you rather it was someone whołd at least
been a scientist?ł

ęYou sound like youłre defending him. Next youłll be telling
me you think the Moat is a good idea.ł

ęIłm not defending Sivaraksa,ł Mina said. ęIłm just sayingł
She eyed her sister with a sudden glimmer of suspicion. Had she guessed that
Naqi knew? ęNever mind. Sivaraksa can fight his own battles. Wełve got work to
do.ł

ęAnyone would think you were changing the subject,ł Naqi
said. But Mina was already on her way out of the gondola to check the equipment
again. At dusk the airship arrived at the perimeter of the node, completed one
orbit, then began to track inwards again. As it passed over the parts of the
node previously mapped, time-dependent changes were highlighted on the
displays: arcs and bands of red superimposed against the lime and turquoise
false-colour of the mapped structures. Most of the alterations were minor: a
chamber opening here or closing there, or a small alteration in the network
topology to ease a bottleneck between the lumpy subnodes dotted around the
floating island. Other changes were more mysterious in function, but conformed
to other studies. They were studied at enhanced resolution, the data
prioritised and logged. It looked as if the node was large, but in no way
unusual. Then night came, as swiftly as it always did at those latitudes. Mina
and Naqi took turns, one sleeping for twoor three-hour stretches while the
other kept an eye on the readouts. During a lull Naqi climbed up onto the top
of the airship and tried the antenna again, and for a moment was gladdened when
she saw that a new message had arrived. But the message itself turned out to be
a statement from the Snowflake Council stating that the blackout on civilian
messages would continue for at least another two days, until the current ęcrisisł
was over. There were allusions to civil disturbances in two cities, with
curfews being imposed, and imperatives to ignore all unofficial news sources
concerning the nature of the approaching ship. Naqi wasnłt surprised that there
was trouble, though the extent of it took her aback. Her instincts were to
believe the government line. The problem, from the governmentłs point of view
at least, was that nothing was yet known for certain about the nature of the
ship, and so by being truthful they ended up sounding like they were keeping
something back. They would have been far better off making up a plausible lie,
which could be gently moulded towards accuracy as time passed. Mina rose after
midnight to begin her shift. Naqi went to sleep and dreamed fitfully, seeing in
her mindłs eye red smears and bars hovering against amorphous green. She had
been staring at the readouts too intently, for too many hours. Mina woke her
excitedly before dawn. ęNow Iłm the one with the news,ł she said. ęWhat!ł

ęCome and see for yourself.ł Naqi rose from her hammock,
neither rested nor enthusiastic. In the dim light of the cabin Minałs fungal
patterns shone with peculiar intensity: abstract detached shapes that only
implied her presence. Naqi followed the shapes onto the balcony. ęWhat,ł she
said again, not even bothering to make it sound like a question. ęTherełs been
a development,ł Mina said. Naqi rubbed the sleep from her eyes. ęWith the node?ł

ęLook. Down below. Right under us.ł Naqi pressed her stomach
hard against the railing and leaned over as far as she dared. She had felt no
real vertigo until they had lowered the sensor lines, and then suddenly there
had been a physical connection between the airship and the ground. Was it her
imagination, or had the airship lowered itself to about half its previous
altitude, reeling in the lines at the same time? The midnight light was all
spectral shades of milky grey. The creased and crumpled landscape of the node
reached away into mid-grey gloom, merging with the slate of the overlying cloud
deck. Naqi saw nothing remarkable, other than the surprising closeness of the
surface. ęI mean really look down,ł Mina said. Naqi pushed herself against the
railing more than she had dared before, until she was standing on the very tips
of her toes. Only then did she see it: directly below them was a peculiar
circle of darkness, almost as if the airship was casting a distinct shadow
beneath itself. It was a circular zone of exposed seawater, like a lagoon
enclosed by the greater mass of the node. Steep banks of Juggler biomass, its
heart a deep charcoal grey, rimmed the lagoon. Naqi studied it quietly. Her
sister would judge her on any remark she made. ęHow did you see it?ł she asked
eventually. ęSee it?ł

ęIt canłt be more than twenty metres wide. A dot like that
would have hardly shown up on the topographic map.ł

ęNaqi, you donłt understand. I didnłt steer us over the
hole. It appeared below us, as we were moving. Listen to the motors. Wełre
still moving. The holełs shadowing us. It follows us precisely.ł

ęMust be reacting to the sensors,ł Naqi said. ęIłve hauled
them in. Wełre not trailing anything within thirty metres of the surface. The
nodełs reacting to us, Naqito the presence of the airship. The Jugglers know
wełre here, and theyłre sending us a signal.ł

ęMaybe they are. But it isnłt our job to interpret that
signal. Wełre just here to make measurements, not to interact with the
Jugglers.ł

ęSo whose job is it?ł Mina asked. ęDo I have to spell it
out? Specialists from Umingmaktok.ł

ęThey wonłt get here in time. You know how long nodes last.
By the time the blackoutłs lifted, by the time the swimmer corps hotshots get
here, wełll be sitting over a green smudge and not much more. This is a
significant find, Naqi. Itłs the largest node this season and itłs making a
deliberate and clear attempt to invite swimmers.ł Naqi stepped back from the
railing. ęDonłt even think about it.ł

ęIłve been thinking about it all night: This isnłt just a
large node, Naqi. Somethingłs happeningthatłs why therełs been so much sprite
activity. If we donłt swim here, we might miss something unique.ł

ęAnd if we do swim, wełll be violating every rule in the
book. Wełre not trained, Mina. Even if we learned somethingeven if the
Jugglers deigned to communicate with uswełd be ostracised from the entire
scientific community.ł

ęThat would depend on what we learned, wouldnłt it?ł

ęDonłt do this, Mina. It isnłt worth it.ł

ęWe wonłt know if itłs worth it or not until we try, will
we?ł Mina extended a hand. ęLook. Youłre right in one sense. Chances are pretty
good nothing will happen. Normally you have to offer them a gifta puzzle, or
something rich in information. We havenłt got anything like that. Whatłll
probably happen is wełll hit the water and there wonłt be any kind of
biochemical interaction. In which case, it doesnłt matter. We donłt have to
tell anyone. And if we do learn something, but it isnłt significantwell, we
donłt have to tell anyone about that either. Only if we learn something major.
Something so big that theyłll have to forget about a minor violation of
protocol.ł

ęA minor violation?ł Naqi began, almost laughing at Minałs
audacity. ęThe point is, sis, we have a win-win situation here. And itłs been
handed to us on a plate.ł

ęYou could also argue that wełve been handed a major chance
to fuck up spectacularly.ł

ęYou read it whichever way you like. I know what I see.ł

ęItłs too dangerous, Mina. People have died ...ł Naqi looked
at Minałs fungal patterns, enhanced and emphasised by her tattoos. ęYou flagged
high for conformality. Doesnłt that worry you slightly?ł

ęConformalityłs just a fairy tale they use to scare children
into behaving,ł said Mina. ę �Eat all your greens or the sea will swallow you
up forever." I take it about as seriously as I take the Thule kraken, or the
drowning of Arviat.ł

ęThe Thule kraken is a joke, and Arviat never existed in the
first place. But the last time I checked, conformality was an accepted
phenomenon.ł

ęItłs an accepted research topic. Therełs a distinction.ł

ęDonłt split hairsł Naqi began. Mina gave every indication
of not having heard Naqi speak. Her voice was distant, as if she were speaking
to herself. It had a lilting, singsong quality. ęToo late to even think about
it now. But it isnłt long until dawn. I think itłll still be there at dawn.ł
She pushed past Naqi. ęWhere are you going now?ł

ęTo catch some sleep. I need to be fresh for this. So do
you.ł They hit the lagoon with two gentle, anticlimactic splashes. Naqi was
underwater for a moment before she bobbed to the surface, holding her breath.
At first she had to make a conscious effort to start breathing again: the air
immediately above the water was so saturated with microscopic organisms that
choking was a real possibility. Mina, surfacing next to her, drew in gulps with
wild enthusiasm, as if willing the tiny creatures to invade her lungs. She
shrieked delight at the sudden cold. When they had both gained equilibrium,
treading with their shoulders above water, Naqi was finally able to take stock.
She saw everything through a stinging haze of tears. The gondola hovered above
them, poised beneath the larger mass of the vacuum bladder. The life-raft that
it had deployed was sparkling-new, rated for one hundred hours against moderate
biological attack. But that was for mid-ocean, where the density of Juggler
organisms would be much less than in the middle of a major node. Here, the hull
might only endure a few tens of hours before it was consumed. Once again, Naqi
wondered if she should withdraw. There was still time. No real damage had yet
been done. She could be back in the boat and back aboard the airship in a
minute or so. Mina might not follow her, but she did not have to be complicit
in her sisterłs actions. But Naqi knew she would not be able to turn back. She
could not show weakness now that she had come this far. ęNothingłs happening ...ł
she said. ęWełve only been in the water a minute,ł Mina said. The two of them
wore black wetsuits. The suits themselves could become buoyant if necessarythe
right sequence of tactile commands and dozens of tiny bladders would inflate
around the chest and shoulder areabut it was easy enough to tread water. In
any case, if the Jugglers initiated contact, the suits would probably be eaten
away in minutes. The swimmers who had made repeated contact often swam naked or
near-naked, but neither Naqi nor Mina were yet prepared for that level of abject
surrender to the oceanłs assault. After another minute the water no longer felt
as cold. Through gaps in the cloud cover the sun was harsh on Naqiłs cheek. It
etched furiously bright lines in the bottle-green surface of the lagoon, lines
that coiled and shifted into fleeting calligraphic shapes as if conveying
secret messages. The calm water lapped gently against their upper bodies. The
walls of the lagoon were metre-high masses of fuzzy vegetation, like the steep
banks of a river. Now and then Naqi felt something brush gently against her
feet, like a passing frond or strand of seaweed. The first few times she
flinched at the contact, but after a while it became strangely soothing.
Occasionally something stroked one hand or the other, then moved playfully
away. When she lifted her hands from the sea, mats of gossamer green draped
from her fingers like the tattered remains of expensive gloves. The green
material slithered free and slipped back into the sea. It tickled between her
fingers. ęNothingłs happened yet,ł Naqi said, more quietly this time.

ęYoułre wrong. The shorelinełs moved closer.ł Naqi looked at
it. ęItłs a trick of perspective.ł

ęI assure you it isnłt.ł Naqi looked back at the raft. They
had drifted five or six metres from it. It might as well have been a mile, for
all the sense of security that the raft now offered. Mina was right: the lagoon
was closing in on them, gently, slowly. If the lagoon had been twenty metres
wide when they had entered, it must now be a third smaller. There was still
time to escape before the hazy green walls squeezed in on them, but only if
they moved now, back to the raft, back into the safety of the gondola. ęMina ...
I want to go. Wełre not ready for this.ł

ęWe donłt need to be ready. Itłs going to happen.ł

ęWełre not trained!ł

ęCall it learning on the job, in that case.ł Mina was still
trying to sound outrageously calm, but it wasnłt working. Naqi heard it in her
voice: she was either terribly frightened or terribly excited. ęYoułre more
scared than I am,ł she said. ęI am scared,ł said Mina, ęscared wełll screw this
up. Scared wełll blow this opportunity. Understand? Iłm that kind of scared.ł
Either Naqi was treading water less calmly, or the water itself had become
visibly more agitated in the last few moments. The green walls were perhaps ten
metres apart, and were no longer quite the sheer vertical structures they had
appeared before. They had taken on form and design, growing and complexifying
by the second. It was akin to watching a distant city emerge from fog, the
revealing of bewildering, plunging layers of mesmeric detail, more than the eye
or the mind could process. ęIt doesnłt look as if theyłre expecting a gift this
time,ł Mina said. Veined tubes and pipes coiled and writhed around each other
in constant, sinuous motion, making Naqi think of some hugely magnified
circuitry formed from plant parts. It was restless, living circuitry that never
quite settled into one configuration. Now and then chequerboard designs
appeared, or intricately interlocking runes. Sharply geometric patterns
flickered from point to point, echoed, amplified and subtly iterated at each
move. Distinct three-dimensional shapes assumed brief solidity, carved from
greenery as if by the deft hand of a topiarist. Naqi glimpsed unsettling anatomies:
the warped memories of alien bodies that had once entered the ocean, a million,
or a billion years ago. Here was a three-jointed limb, there the shieldlike
curve of an exoskeletal plaque. The head of something that was almost equine
melted into a goggling mass of faceted eyes. Fleetingly, a human form danced
from the chaos. But only once. Alien swimmers vastly outnumbered human
swimmers. Here were the Pattern Jugglers, Naqi knew. The first explorers had
mistaken these remembered forms for indications of actual sentience, thinking
that the oceanic mass was a kind of community of intelligences. It was an easy
mistake to have made, but it was some way from the truth. These animate shapes
were enticements, like the gaudy covers of books. The minds themselves were
captured only as frozen traces. The only living intelligence within the ocean
lay in its own curatorial system. To believe anything else was heresy. The
dance of bodies became too rapid to follow. Pastel-coloured lights glowed from
deep within the green structure, flickering and stuttering. Naqi thought of
lanterns burning in the depths of a forest. Now the edge of the lagoon had
become irregular, extending peninsulas towards the centre of the dwindling
circle of water, while narrow bays and inlets fissured back into the larger
mass of the node. The peninsulas sprouted grasping tendrils, thigh-thick at the
trunk but narrowing to the dimensions of plant fronds, and then narrowing
further, bifurcating into lacy, fernlike hazes of awesome complexity. They
diffracted light like the wings of dragonflies. They were closing over the lagoon,
forming a shimmering canopy. Now and then a spriteor something smaller but equally
brightarced from one bank of the lagoon to another. Brighter things moved
through the water like questing fish. Microscopic organisms were detaching from
the larger fronds and tendrils, swarming in purposeful clouds. They batted
against her skin, against her eyelids. Every breath that she took made her
cough. The taste of the Pattern Jugglers was sour and medicinal. They were in
her, invading her body. She panicked. It was as if a tiny switch had flipped in
her mind. Suddenly all other concerns melted away. She had to get out of the
lagoon immediately, no matter what Mina would think of her. Thrashing more than
swimming, Naqi tried to push herself towards the raft, but as soon as the panic
reaction had kicked in, she had felt something else slide over her. It was not
so much paralysis as an immense sense of inertia. Moving, even breathing,
became problematic. The boat was impossibly distant. She was no longer capable
of treading water. She felt heavy, and when she looked down she saw that a
green haze had enveloped the parts of her body that she could see above water.
The organisms were adhering to the fabric of her wetsuit. ęMinał she called, ęMina!ł
But Mina only looked at her. Naqi sensed that her sister was experiencing the
same sort of paralysis. Minałs movements had become languid; instead of panic,
what Naqi saw on her face was profound resignation and acceptance. It was
dangerously close to serenity. Mina wasnłt frightened at all. The patterns on
her neck were flaring vividly. Her eyes were closed. Already the organisms had
begun to attack the fabric of her suit, stripping it away from her flesh. Naqi
could feel the same thing happening to her own suit. There was no pain, for the
organisms stopped short of attacking her skin. With a mighty effort she hoisted
her forearm from the water, studying the juxtaposition of pale flesh and dissolving
black fabric. Her fingers were as stiff as iron. Butand Naqi clung to this
factthe ocean recognised the sanctity of organisms, or at least, thinking
organisms. Strange things might happen to people who swam with the Jugglers,
things that might be difficult to distinguish from death or near-death. But
people always emerged afterwards, changed perhaps, but essentially whole. No
matter what happened now, they would survive. The Jugglers always returned
those who swam with them, and even when they did effect changes, they were
seldom permanent. Except, of course, for those who didnłt return. No, Naqi told
herself. What they were doing was foolish, and might perhaps destroy their
careers, but they would survive. Mina had flagged high on the conformality
index when she had applied to join the swimmer corps, but that didnłt mean she
was necessarily at risk. Conformality merely implied a rare connection with the
ocean. It verged on the glamorous. Now Mina was going under. She had stopped
moving entirely. Her eyes were blankly ecstatic. Naqi wanted to resist that
same impulse to submit, but all the strength had flowed away from her. She felt
herself begin the same descent. The water closed over her mouth, then her eyes,
and in a moment she was under. She felt herself a toppled statue sliding
towards the seabed. Her fear reached a crescendo, and then passed it. She was
not drowning. The froth of green organisms had forced itself down her throat,
down her nasal passage. She felt no fright. There was nothing except a profound
feeling that this was what she had been born to do. Naqi knew what was
happening, what was going to happen. She had studied enough reports on swimmer
missions. The tiny organisms were infiltrating her entire body, creeping into
her lungs and bloodstream. They were keeping her alive, while at the same time
flooding her with chemical bliss. Droves of the same tiny creatures were
seeking routes to her brain, inching along the optic nerve, the aural nerve, or
crossing the blood-brain barrier itself. They were laying tiny threads behind
them, fibres that extended back into the larger mass of organisms suspended in
the water around her. In turn, these organisms would establish data-carrying
channels back into the primary mass of the node ... And the node itself was connected
to other nodes, both chemically and via the packetcarrying sprites. The green
threads bound Naqi to the entire ocean. It might take hours for a signal to
reach her mind from halfway around Turquoise, but it didnłt matter. She was
beginning to think in Juggler time, her own thought processes seeming pointlessly
quick, like the motion of bees. She sensed herself becoming vaster. She was no
longer just a pale, hard-edged thing labelled Naqi, suspended in the lagoon
like a dying starfish. Her sense of self was rushing out towards the horizon in
all directions, encompassing first the node and then the empty oceanic waters
around it. She couldnłt say precisely how this information was reaching her. It
wasnłt through visual imagery, but more an intensely detailed spatial
awareness. It was as if spatial awareness had suddenly become her most vital
sense. She supposed this was what swimmers meant when they spoke of kenning.
She kenned the presence of other nodes over the horizon, their chemical signals
flooding her mind, each unique, each bewilderingly rich in information. It was
like hearing the roar of a hundred crowds. And at the same time she kenned the
ocean depths, the cold fathoms of water beneath the node, the life-giving
warmth of the crustal vents. Closer, too, she kenned Mina. They were two
neighbouring galaxies in a sea of strangeness. Minałs own thoughts were
bleeding into the sea, into Naqiłs mind, and in them Naqi felt the reflected
echo of her own thoughts, picked up by Mina ... It was glorious. For a moment
their minds orbited each other, kenning each other on a level of intimacy
neither had dreamed possible. Mina ... Can you feel me? Iłm here, Naqi. Isnłt
this wonderful? The fear was gone, utterly. In its place was a marvellous
feeling of immanence. They had made the right decision, Naqi knew. She had been
right to follow Mina. Mina was deliciously happy, basking in the same hopeful
sense of security and promise. And then they began to sense other minds.
Nothing had changed, but it was suddenly clear that the roaring signals from
the other nodes were composed of countless individual voices, countless
individual streams of chemical information. Each stream was the recording of a
mind that had entered the ocean at some point. The oldest mindsthose that had
entered in the deep pastwere the faintest, but they were also the most
numerous. They had begun to sound alike, the shapes of their stored personalities
blurring into each other, no matter how differenthow alienthey had been to
start with. The minds that had been captured more recently were sharper and
more variegated, like oddly shaped pebbles on a beach. Naqi kenned brutal
alienness, baroque architectures of mind shaped by outlandish chains of
evolutionary contingency. The only thing any of them had in common was that
they had all reached a certain threshold of tool-using intelligence, and had
allfor whatever reasonbeen driven into interstellar space, where they had
encountered the Pattern Jugglers. But that was like saying the minds of sharks
and leopards were alike because they had both evolved to hunt. The differences
between the minds were so cosmically vast that Naqi felt her own mental
processes struggling to accommodate them. Even that was becoming easier. Subtlyslowly
enough that from moment to moment she was not aware of itthe organisms in her
skull were retuning her neural connections, allowing more and more of her own
consciousness to seep out into the extended processing-loom of the sea. Now she
sensed the most recent arrivals. They were all human minds, each a glittering
gem of distinctness. Naqi kenned a great gulf in time between the earliest
human mind and the last recognisably alien one. She had no idea if it was a
million years or a billion, but it felt immense. At the same time she grasped
that the ocean had been desperate for an injection of variety, but while these
human minds were welcome, they were not exotic enough, just barely sufficient
to break the tedium. The minds were snapshots, frozen in the conception of a
single thought. It was like an orchestra of instruments, all sustaining a
single, unique note. Perhaps there was a grindingly slow evolution in those
mindsshe felt the merest subliminal hint of changebut if that were the case,
it would take centuries to complete a thought ... thousands of years to
complete the simplest internalised statement. The newest minds might not even
have recognised that they had been swallowed by the sea. And now Naqi could
perceive a single mind flaring louder than the others. It was recent, and human,
and there was something about it that struck her as discordant. The mind was
damaged, as if it had been captured imperfectly. It was disfigured, giving off
squalls of hurt. It had suffered dreadfully. It was reaching out to her,
craving love and affection; it searched for something to cling to in the
abyssal loneliness it now knew. Images ghosted through her mind. Something was
burning. Flames licked through the interstitial gaps in a great black structure.
She couldnłt tell if it was a building or a vast, pyramidal bonfire. She heard
screams, and then something hysterical, which she at first took for more
screaming, until she realised that it was something far, far worse. It was laughter,
and as the flames roared higher, consuming the mass, smothering the screams,
the laughter only intensified. She thought it might be the laughter of a child.
Perhaps it was her imagination, but this mind appeared more fluid than the
others. Its thoughts were still slowfar slower than Naqiłsbut the mind
appeared to have usurped more than its share of processing resources. It was
stealing computational cycles from neighbouring minds, freezing them into
absolute stasis while it completed a single sluggish thought. The mind worried
Naqi. Pain and fury was boiling off it. Mina kenned it too. Naqi tasted Minałs
thoughts and knew that her sister was equally disturbed by the mindłs presence.
Then she felt the mindłs attention shift, drawn to the two inquisitive minds
that had just entered the sea. It became aware of both of them, quietly
watchful. A moment or two passed, and then the mind slipped away, back to
wherever it had come from. What was that ...? She felt her sisterłs reply. I
donłt know. A human mind. A conformal, I think. Someone who was swallowed by
the sea. But itłs gone now. No, it hasnłt. Itłs still there. Just hiding.
Millions of minds have entered the sea, Naqi. Thousands of conformals, perhaps,
if you think of all the aliens that came before us. There are bound to be one
or two bad apples. That wasnłt just a bad apple. It was like touching ice. And
it sensed us. It reacted to us. Didnłt it? She sensed Minałs hesitation. We canłt
be sure. Our own perceptions of events arenłt necessarily reliable. I canłt
even be certain wełre having this conversation. I might be talking to myself ...
Mina ... Donłt talk like that. I donłt feel safe. Me neither. But Iłm not going
to let one frightening thing unnecessarily affect me. Something happened then.
It was a loosening, a feeling that the oceanłs grip on Naqi had just relented
to a significant degree. Mina, and the roaring background of other minds, fell
away to something much more distant. It was as if Naqi had just stepped out of
a babbling party into a quiet adjacent room, and was even now moving further
and further away from the door. Her body tingled. She no longer felt the same
deadening paralysis. Pearl-grey light flickered above. Without being sure
whether she was doing it herself, she rose towards the surface. She was aware
that she was moving away from Mina, but for now all that mattered was to escape
the sea. She wanted to be as far from that discordant mind as possible. Her
head rammed through a crust of green into air. At the same moment the Juggler
organisms fled her body in a convulsive rush. She thrashed stiff limbs and took
in deep, panicked breaths. The transition was horrible, but it was over in a
few seconds. She looked around, expecting to see the sheer walls of the lagoon,
but all she saw in one direction was open water. Naqi felt panic rising again.
Then she kicked herself around and saw a wavy line of bottle-green that had to
be the perimeter of the node, perhaps half a kilometre away from her present
position. The airship was a distant silvery teardrop that appeared to be perched
on the surface of the node itself. In her fear she did not immediately think of
Mina. All she wanted to do was reach the safety of the airship, to be aloft.
Then she saw the raft, bobbing only one or two hundred metres away. Somehow it
had been transplanted to the open waters as well. It looked distant but
reachable. She started swimming, fear giving her strength and sense of purpose.
In truth, she was well within the true boundary of the node: the water was
still thick with suspended micro-organisms, so that it was more like swimming
through cold green soup. It made each stroke harder, but she did not have to
expend much effort to stay afloat. Did she trust the Pattern Jugglers not to
harm her? Perhaps. After all, she had not encountered their minds at allif
they even had minds. They were merely the archiving system. Blaming them for
that one poisoned mind was like blaming a library for one hateful book. But
still, it had unnerved her profoundly. She wondered why none of the other
swimmers had ever communicated their encounters with such a mind. After all,
she remembered it well enough now, and she was nearly out of the ocean. She
might forget shortlythere were bound to be subsequent neurological effectsbut
under other circumstances there would have been nothing to prevent her relating
her experiences to a witness or inviolable recording system. She kept swimming,
and began to wonder why Mina hadnłt emerged from the waters as well. Mina had
been just as terrified. But Mina had also been more curious, and more willing
to ignore her fears. Naqi had grasped the opportunity to leave the ocean once
the Jugglers released their grip on her. But what if Mina had elected to
remain? What if Mina was still down there, still in communion with the
Jugglers? Naqi reached the raft and hauled herself aboard, being careful not to
capsize it. She saw that the raft was still largely intact. It had been moved,
but not damaged, and although the ceramic sheathing was showing signs of
attack, peppered here and there with scabbed green accretions, it was certainly
good for another few hours. The rot-hardened control systems were alive, and
still in telemetric connection with the distant airship. Naqi had crawled from
the sea naked. Now she felt cold and vulnerable. She pulled an aluminised quilt
from the raftłs supply box and wrapped it around herself. It did not stop her
from shivering, did not make her feel any less nauseous, but at least it
afforded some measure of symbolic barrier against the sea. She looked around
again, but there was still no sign of Mina. Naqi folded aside the weatherproof
control cover and tapped commands into the matrix of waterproofed keys. She
waited for the response from the airship. The moment stretched. But there it
was: a minute shift in the dull gleam on the silver back of the vacuum bladder.
The airship was turning, pivoting like a great slow weather vane. It was
moving, responding to the raftłs homing command. But where was Mina? Now
something moved in the water next to her, coiling in weak, enervated spasms.
Naqi looked at it with horrified recognition. She reached over, still shivering,
and with appalled gentleness fished the writhing thing from the sea. It lay in
her fingers like a baby sea serpent. It was white and segmented, half a metre
long. She knew exactly what it was. It was Minałs worm. It meant Mina had died.

Two

Two years later Naqi watched a spark fall from the heavens.
Along with many hundreds of spectators, she was standing on the railed edge of
one of Umingmaktokłs elegant cantilevered arms. It was afternoon. Every visible
surface of the city had been scoured of rot and given a fresh coat of crimson
or emerald paint. Amber bunting had been hung along the metal stay-lines that
supported the tapering arms protruding from the cityłs towering commercial
core. Most of the berthing slots around the perimeter were occupied by
passenger or cargo craft, while many smaller vessels were holding station in
the immediate airspace around Umingmaktok. The effect, which Naqi had seen on
her approach to the city a day earlier, had been to turn the snowflake into a
glittering, delicately ornamented vision. By night they had fireworks displays.
By day, as now, conjurors and confidence tricksters wound their way through the
crowds. Nose-flute musicians and drum dancers performed impromptu atop
improvised podia. Kick-boxers were being cheered on as they moved from one
informal ring to another, pursued by whistleblowing proctors. Hastily erected
booths were marked with red and yellow pennants, selling refreshments, souvenirs
or tattoo-work, while pretty costumed girls who wore backpacks equipped with
tall flagstaffs sold drinks or ices. The children had balloons and rattles
marked with the emblems of both Umingmaktok and the Snowflake Council, and many
of them had had their faces painted to resemble stylised space travellers.
Puppet theatres had been set up here and there, running through exactly the
same small repertoire of stories that Naqi remembered from her childhood. The
children were enthralled nonetheless; mouths agape at each miniature epic,
whether it was a roughly accurate account of the worldłs settlementwith the
colony ship being stripped to the bone for every gram of metal it heldor
something altogether more fantastic, like the drowning of Arviat. It didnłt
matter to the children that one was based in fact and the other was pure mythology.
To them the idea that every city they called home had been cannibalised from
the belly of a four-kilometre-long ship was no more or less plausible than the
idea that the living sea might occasionally snatch cities beneath the waves
when they displeased it. At that age everything was both magical and mundane,
and she supposed that the children were no more nor less excited by the
prospect of the coming visitors than they were by the promised fireworks
display, or the possibility of further treats if they were well-behaved. Other
than the children, there were animals: caged monkeys and birds, and the
occasional expensive pet being shown off for the day. One or two servitors
stalked through the crowd, and occasionally a golden float-cam would bob
through the air, loitering over a scene of interest like a single detached
eyeball. Turquoise had not seen this level of celebration since the last acrimonious
divorce, and the networks were milking it remorselessly, overanalysing even the
tiniest scrap of information. This was, in truth, exactly the kind of thing
Naqi would normally have gone to the other side of the planet to avoid. But
something had drawn her this time, and made her wangle the trip out from the
Moat at an otherwise critical time in the project. She could only suppose that
it was a need to close a particular chapter in her life, one that had begun the
night before Minałs death. The detection of the Ultra shipthey now knew that
it was named Voice of Eveninghad been the event that triggered the blackout,
and the blackout had been Minałs justification for the two of them attempting
to swim with the Jugglers. Indirectly, therefore, the Ultras were ęresponsibleł
for whatever had happened to Mina. That was unfair, of course, but Naqi
nonetheless felt the need to be here now, if only to witness the visitorsł
emergence with her own eyes and see if they really were the monsters of her
imagination. She had come to Umingmaktok with a stoic determination that she
would not be swept up by the hysteria of the celebrations. Yet now that she had
made the trip, now that she was amidst the crowd, drunk on the chemical buzz of
human excitement, with a nice fresh worm hooked onto her gut wall, she found
herself in the perverse position of actually enjoying the atmosphere. And now
everyone had noticed the falling spark.

The crowd turned their heads into the sky, ignoring the musicians,
conjurors and confidence tricksters. The backpacked girls stopped and looked
aloft along with the others, shielding their eyes against the midday glare. The
spark was the shuttle of Voice of Evening, now parked in orbit around
Turquoise. Everyone had seen Captain Moreaułs ship by now, either with their
own eyes as a moving star, or via the images captured by the orbiting cameras
or ground-based telescopes. The ship was dark and sleek, outrageously elegant.
Now and then its Conjoiner drives flickered on just enough to trim its orbit,
those flashes like brief teasing windows into daylight for the hemisphere
below. A ship like that could do awful things to a world, and everyone knew it.
But if Captain Moreau and his crew meant ill for Turquoise, theyłd had ample
opportunity to do harm already. They had been silent at two years out, but at
one year out the Voice of Evening had transmitted the usual approach signals,
requesting permission to stopover for three or four months. It was a formalityno
one argued with Ultrasbut it was also a gladdening sign that they intended to
play by the usual rules. Over the next year there had been a steady stream of
communications between the ship and the Snowflake Council. The official word
was that the messages had been designed to establish a framework for negotiation
and person-to-person trade. The Ultras would need to update their linguistics
software to avoid being confused by the subtleties of the Turquoise dialects,
which, although based on Canasian, contained confusing elements of Inuit and
Thai, relics of the peculiar social mix of the original settlement coalition.
The falling shuttle had slowed to merely supersonic speed now, shedding its
plume of ionised air. Dropping speed with each loop, it executed a lazily
contracting spiral above Umingmaktok. Naqi had rented cheap binoculars from one
of the vendors. The lenses were scuffed, shimmering with the pink of fungal
bloom. She visually locked onto the shuttle, its roughly delta shape wobbling
in and out of sharpness. Only when it was two or three thousand metres above
Umingmaktok could she see it clearly. It was very elegant, a pure brilliant
white like something carved from cloud. Beneath the manta-like hull complex
machinesfans and control surfacesmoved too rapidly to be seen as anything
other than blurs of subliminal motion. She watched as the ship reduced speed
until it hovered at the same altitude as the snowflake city. Above the roar of
the crowdan ecstatic, flagwaving massall Naqi heard was a shrill hum, almost
too far into ultrasound to detect. The ship approached slowly. It had been
given instructions for docking with the arm adjacent to the one where Naqi and
the other spectators gathered. Now that it was close it was apparent that the
shuttle was larger than any of the dirigible craft normally moored to the cityłs
arms; by Naqiłs estimate it was at least half as wide as the cityłs central
core. But it slid into its designated mooring point with exquisite delicacy.
Bright red symbols flashed onto the otherwise blank white hull, signifying
airlocks, cargo ports and umbilical sockets. Gangways were swung out from the
arm to align with the doors and ports. Dockers, supervised by proctors and city
officials, scrambled along the precarious connecting ways and attempted to fix
magnetic berthing stays onto the shuttlełs hull. The magnetics slid off the
hull. They tried adhesive grips next, and these were no more successful. After
that, the dockers shrugged their shoulders and made exasperated gestures in the
direction of the shuttle. The roar of the crowd had died down a little by now.
Naqi felt the anticipation as well. She watched as an entourage of VIPs moved
to the berthing position, led by a smooth, faintly cherubic individual that
Naqi recognised as Tak Thonburi, the mayor of Umingmaktok and presiding chair of
the Snowflake Council. Tak Thonburi was happily overweight and had a permanent
cowlick of black hair, like an inverted question mark tattooed upon his
forehead. His cheeks and brow were mottled with pale green. Next to him was the
altogether leaner frame of Jotah Sivaraksa. It was no surprise that Dr
Sivaraksa should be here today, for the Moat project was one of the most
significant activities of the entire Snowflake Council. His irongrey eyes
flashed this way and that as if constantly triangulating the positions of
enemies and allies alike. The group was accompanied by armed, ceremonially
dressed proctors and a triad of martial servitors. Their articulation points
and sensor apertures were lathered in protective sterile grease, to guard
against rot. Though they tried to hide it, Naqi could tell that the VIPs were
nervous. They moved a touch too confidently, making their trepidation all the
more evident. The red door symbol at the end of the gangway pulsed brighter and
a section of the hull puckered open. Naqi squinted, but even through the
binoculars it was difficult to make out anything other than red-lit gloom. Tak
Thonburi and his officials stiffened. A sketchy figure emerged from the
shuttle, lingered on the threshold and then stepped with immense slowness into
full sunlight. The crowdłs reactionand to some extent Naqiłs ownwas
double-edged. There was a moment of relief that the messages from orbit had not
been outright lies. Then there was an equally brief tang of shock at the actual
appearance of Captain Moreau. The man was at least a third taller than anyone
Naqi had ever seen in her life, yet commensurately thinner, his seemingly
brittle frame contained within a jade-coloured mechanical exoskeleton of ornate
design. The skeleton lent his movements something of the lethargic quality of a
stick insect. Tak Thonburi was the first to speak. His amplified voice boomed
out across the six arms of Umingmaktok, echoing off the curved surfaces of the
multiple vacuum-bladders that held the city aloft. Float-cams jostled for the
best camera angle, swarming around him like pollen-crazed bees. ęCaptain Moreau
... Let me introduce myself. I am Tak Thonburi, mayor of Umingmaktok Snowflake
City and incumbent chairman of the Snowflake Council of All Turquoise. It is my
pleasure to welcome you, your crew and passengers to Umingmaktok, and to
Turquoise itself. You have my word that we will do all in our power to make
your visit as pleasant as possible.ł The Ultra moved closer to the official.
The door to the shuttle remained open behind him. Naqiłs binocs picked out red
hologram serpents on the jade limbs of the skeleton. The Ultrałs own voice
boomed at least as loud, but emanated from the shuttle rather than Umingmaktokłs
public address system. ęPeople of greenish-blue ...ł The captain hesitated,
then tapped one of the stalks projecting from his helmet. ęPeople of Turquoise
... Chairman Thonburi ... Thank you for your welcome, and for your kind
permission to assume orbit. We have accepted it with gratitude. You have my word
... as captain of the lighthugger Voice of Evening ... that we will abide by
the strict terms of your generous offer of hospitality.ł His mouth continued to
move even during the pauses, Naqi noticed: the translation system was lagging. ęYou
have my additional guarantee that no harm will be done to your world, and
Turquoise law will be presumed to apply to the occupants ... of all bodies and
vessels in your atmosphere. All traffic between my ship and your world will be
subject to the authorisation of the Snowflake Council, and any member of the
council willunder the ... auspices of the councilbe permitted to visit Voice
of Evening at any time, subject to the availability of a ... suitable
conveyance.ł The captain paused and looked at Tak Thonburi expectantly. The
mayor wiped a nervous hand across his brow, smoothing his kiss-curl into obedience.
ęThank you ... Captain.ł Tak Thonburiłs eyes flashed to the other members of
the reception party. ęYour terms are of course more than acceptable. You have
my word that we will do all in our power to assist you and your crew, and that
we will do our utmost to ensure that the forthcoming negotiations of trade
proceed in an equable manner ... and in such a way that both parties will be
satisfied upon their conclusion.ł The captain did not respond immediately,
allowing an uncomfortable pause to draw itself out. Naqi wondered if it was really
the fault of the software, or whether Moreau was just playing on Tak Thonburiłs
evident nervousness. ęOf course,ł the Ultra said, finally. ęOf course. My
sentiments entirely ... Chairman Thonburi. Perhaps now wouldnłt be a bad time
to introduce my guests?ł On his cue three new figures emerged from Voice of
Eveningłs shuttle. Unlike the Ultra, they could almost have passed for ordinary
citizens of Turquoise. There were two men and one woman, all of approximately
normal height and build, each with long hair, tied back in elaborate clasps.

Their clothes were brightly coloured, fashioned from many
separate fabrics of yellow, orange, red and russet, and various permutations of
the same warm sunset shades. The clothes billowed around them, rippling in the
light afternoon breeze. All three members of the party wore silver jewellery,
far more than was customary on Turquoise. They wore it on their fingers, in
their hair, hanging from their ears. The woman was the first to speak, her
voice booming out from the shuttlełs PA system. ęThank you, Captain Moreau.
Thank you also, Chairman Thonburi. We are delighted to be here. I am Amesha
Crane, and I speak for the Vahishta Foundation. Vahishtałs a modest scientific
organisation with its origins in the cometary prefectures of the Haven
Demarchy. Lately we have been expanding our realm of interest to encompass
other solar systems, such as this one.ł Crane gestured at the two men who had
accompanied her from the shuttle. ęMy associates are Simon Matsubara and Rafael
Weir. There are another seventeen of us aboard the shuttle. Captain Moreau
carried us here as paying passengers aboard Voice of Evening, and as such
Vahishta gladly accepts all the terms already agreed upon.ł Tak Thonburi looked
even less sure of himself. ęOf course. We welcome your ... interest. A
scientific organisation, did you say?ł

ęOne with a special interest in the study of the Jugglers,ł
Amesha Crane answered. She was the most strikingly attractive member of the
trio, with fine cheekbones and a wide, sensual mouth that looked to be always
on the point of smiling or laughing. Naqi felt that the woman was sharing
something with her, something private and amusing. Doubtless everyone in the
crowd felt the same vague sense of complicity. Crane continued, ęWe have no
Pattern Jugglers in our own system, but that hasnłt stopped us from focusing
our research on them, collating the data available from the worlds where
Juggler studies are ongoing. Wełve been doing this for decades, sifting
inference and theory, guesswork and intuition. Havenłt we, Simon?ł The man
nodded. He had sallow skin and a fixed, quizzical expression. ęNo two Juggler
worlds are precisely alike,ł Simon Matsubara said, his voice as clear and confident
as the womanłs. ęAnd no two Juggler worlds have been studied by precisely the
same mix of human socio-political factions. That means that we have a great
many variables to take into consideration. Despite that, we believe we have
identified similarities that may have been overlooked by the individual
research teams. They may even be very important similarities, with
repercussions for wider humanity. But in the absence of our own Jugglers, it is
difficult to test our theories. Thatłs where Turquoise comes in.ł The other manNaqi
recalled his name was Rafael Weirbegan to speak. ęTurquoise has been largely
isolated from the rest of human space for the better part of two centuries.ł

ęWełre aware of this,ł said Jotah Sivaraksa. It was the
first time any member of the entourage other than Tak Thonburi had spoken. To
Naqi he sounded irritated, though he was doing his best to hide it. ęYou donłt
share your findings with the other Juggler worlds,ł said Amesha Crane. ęNorto
the best of our knowledgedo you intercept their cultural transmissions. The
consequence is that your research on the Jugglers has been untainted by any
outside considerationsthe latest fashionable theory, the latest groundbreaking
technique. You prefer to work in scholarly isolation.ł

ęWełre an isolationist world in other respects,ł Tak
Thonburi said. ęBelieve it or not, it actually rather suits us.ł

ęQuite,ł Crane said, with a hint of sharpness. ęBut the
point remains. Your Jugglers are an uncontaminated resource. When a swimmer
enters the ocean, their own memories and personality may be absorbed into the
Juggler sea. The prejudices and preconceptions that swimmer carries inevitably
enter the ocean in some shape or formdiluted, confused, but nonetheless
present in some form. And when the next swimmer enters the sea, and opens their
mind to communion, what they perceivewhat they ken, in your own terminologyis
irrevocably tainted by the preconceptions introduced by the previous swimmer.
They may experience something that confirms their deepest suspicion about the
nature of the Jugglersbut they canłt be sure that they arenłt simply picking
up the mental echoes of the last swimmer, or the swimmer before that.ł Jotah
Sivaraksa nodded. ęWhat you say is undoubtedly true. But wełve had just as many
cycles of fashionable theory as anyone else. Even within Umingmaktok there are
a dozen different research teams, each with their own views.ł

ęWe accept that,ł Crane said, with an audible sigh. ęBut the
degree of contamination is slight compared to other worlds. Vahishta lacks the
resources for a trip to a previously unvisited Juggler world, so the next best
thing is to visit one that has suffered the smallest degree of human cultural
pollution. Turquoise fits the bill.ł Tak Thonburi held the moment before
responding, playing to the crowd again. Naqi rather admired the way he did it. ęGood.
Iłm very ... pleased ... to hear it. And might I ask just what it is about our
ocean that we can offer you?ł

ęNothing except the ocean itself,ł said Amesha Crane. ęWe
simply wish to join you in its study. If you will allow it, members of the
Vahishta Foundation will collaborate with native Turquoise scientists and study
teams. They will shadow them and offer interpretation or advice when requested.
Nothing more than that.ł

ęThatłs all?ł Crane smiled. ęThatłs all. Itłs not as if wełre
asking the world, is it?ł * Naqi remained in Umingmaktok for three days after
the arrival, visiting friends and taking care of business for the Moat. The
newcomers had departed, taking their shuttle to one of the other snowflake
citiesPrachuap or the recently married Qaanaaq-Pangnirtung, perhapswhere a
smaller but no less worthy group of city dignitaries would welcome Captain Moreau
and his passengers. In Umingmaktok the booths and bunting were packed away and
normal business resumed. Litter abounded. Worm dealers did brisk business, as
they always did during times of mild gloom. There were far fewer transport
craft moored to the arms, and no sign at all of the intense media presence of a
few days before. Tourists had gone back to their home cities and the children
were safely back in school. Between meetings Naqi sat in the midday shade of
half-empty restaurants and bars, observing the same puzzled disappointment in
every face she encountered. Deep down she felt it herself. For two years they
had been free to imprint every possible fantasy on the approaching ship. Even
if the newcomers had arrived with less than benign intent, there would still
have been something interesting to talk about: the possibility, however remote,
that onełs own life might be about to become drastically more exciting. But now
none of that was going to happen. Undoubtedly Naqi would be involved with the visitors
at some point, allowing them to visit the Moat or one of the outlying research
zones she managed, but there would be nothing life-changing. She thought back
to that night with Mina, when they had heard the news. Everything had changed
then. Mina had died, and Naqi had found herself taking her sisterłs role in the
Moat. She had risen to the challenge and promotions had followed with
gratifying swiftness, until she was in effective charge of the Moatłs entire
scientific programme. But that sense of closure she had yearned for was still
absent. The men she had slept withmen who were almost always swimmershad
never provided it, and by turns they had each lost patience with her, realising
that they were less important to her as people than what they represented, as
connections to the sea. It had been months since her last romance, and once
Naqi had recognised the way her own subconscious was drawing her back to the
sea, she had drawn away from contact with swimmers. She had been drifting since
then, daring to hope that the newcomers would allow her some measure of
tranquillity. But the newcomers had not supplied it. She supposed she would
have to find it elsewhere. On the fourth day Naqi returned to the Moat on a
high-speed dirigible. She arrived near sunset, dropping down from high altitude
to see the structure winking back at her, a foreshortened ellipse of grey-white
ceramic lying against the sea like some vast discarded bracelet. From horizon
to horizon there were several Juggler nodes visible, webbed together by the
faintest of filamentsto Naqi they looked like motes of ink spreading into
blotting paperbut there were also smaller dabs of green within the Moat
itself. The structure was twenty kilometres wide and now it was nearly
finished. Only a narrow channel remained where the two ends of the bracelet did
not quite meet: a hundred-metre-wide sheer-sided aperture flanked on either
side by tall, ramshackle towers of accommodation modules, equipment sheds and
construction cranes. To the north, strings of heavy cargo dirigibles ferried
processed ore and ceramic cladding from Narathiwat atoll, lowering it down to
the construction teams on the Moat. They had been working here for nearly
twenty years. The hundred metres of the Moat that projected above the water was
only one tenth of the full structurea kilometre-high ring resting on the
seabed. In a matter of months the gaplittle more than a notch in the top of
the Moatwould be sealed, closed off by immense hermetically tight sea-doors.
The process would be necessarily slow and delicate, for what was being attempted
here was not simply the closing-off of part of the sea. The Moat was an attempt
to isolate a part of the living ocean, sealing off a community of Pattern
Juggler organisms within its impervious ceramic walls. The high-speed dirigible
swung low over the aperture. The thick green waters streaming through the cut
had the phlegmatic consistency of congealing blood. Thick, ropy tendrils
permitted information transfer between the external sea and the cluster of
small nodes within the Moat. Swimmers were constantly present, either inside or
outside the Moat, kenning the state of the sea and establishing that the usual
Juggler processes continued unabated. The dirigible docked with one of the two
flanking towers. Naqi stepped out, back into the hectic corridors and office
spaces of the project building. It felt distinctly odd to be back on absolutely
firm ground. Although one was seldom aware of it, Umingmaktok was never quite
still: no snowflake city or airship ever was. But she would get used to it; in
a few hours she would be immersed in her work, having to think of a dozen
different things at once, finessing solution pathways, balancing budgets
against quality, dealing with personality clashes and minor turf wars, and
perhapsif she was very luckymanaging an hour or two of pure research. Aside
from the science, none of it was particularly challenging, but it kept her mind
off other things. And after a few days of that, the arrival of the visitors
would begin to feel like a bizarre, irrelevant interlude in an otherwise
monotonous dream. She supposed that two years ago she would have been grateful
for that. Life could indeed continue much as she had always imagined it would.
But when she arrived at her office there was a message from Dr Sivaraksa. He
needed to speak to her urgently. * Dr Jotah Sivaraksałs office on the Moat was
a good deal less spacious than his quarters in Umingmaktok, but the view was
superb. His accommodation was perched halfway up one of the towers that flanked
the cut through the Moat, buttressed out from the main mass of prefabricated
modules like a partially opened desk drawer. Dr Sivaraksa was writing notes
when she arrived. For a few moments Naqi lingered at the sloping window, watching
the construction activity hundreds of metres below. Railed machines and
helmeted workers toiled on the flat upper surface of the Moat, moving raw
materials and equipment to the assembly sites. Above, the sky was a perfect
cobaltblue, marred now and then by the passing green-stained hull of a cargo
dirigible. The sea beyond the Moat had the dimpled texture of expensive
leather. Dr Sivaraksa cleared his throat and, when Naqi turned, he gestured at
the vacant seat on the opposite side of his desk. ęLife treating you well?ł

ęCanłt complain, sir.ł

ęAnd work?ł

ęNo particular problems that Iłm aware of.ł

ęGood. Good.ł Sivaraksa made a quick, cursive annotation in
the notebook he had opened on his desk, then slid it beneath the smoky-grey
cube of a paperweight. ęHow long has it been now?ł

ęSince what, sir?ł

ęSince your sister ... Since Mina ...ł He seemed unable to
complete the sentence, substituting a spiralling gesture made with his index
finger. His finely boned hands were marbled with veins of olive green. Naqi
eased into her seat. łTwo years, sir.ł

ęAnd youłre ... over it?ł

ęI wouldnłt exactly say Iłm over it, no. But life goes on,
like they say. Actually I was hoping ...ł Naqi had been about to tell him how
she had imagined the arrival of the visitors would close that chapter. But she
doubted she would be able to convey her feelings in a way Dr Sivaraksa would
understand. ęWell, I was hoping Iłd have put it all behind me by now.ł

ęI knew another conformal, you know. Fellow from Gjoa. Made
it into the elite swimmer corps before anyone had the foggiest idea ...ł

ęItłs never been proven that Mina was conformal, sir.ł

ęNo, but the signs were there, werenłt they? To one degree
or another wełre all subject to symbiotic invasion by the oceanłs micro-organisms.
But conformals show an unusual degree of susceptibility. On one hand itłs as if
their own bodies actively invite the invasion, shutting down the usual
inflammatory or foreign cell rejection mechanisms. On the other, the ocean
seems to tailor its messengers for maximum effectiveness, as if the Jugglers
have selected a specific target they wish to absorb. Mina had very strong
fungal patterns, did she not?ł

ęIłve seen worse,ł Naqi said, which was not entirely a lie. ęBut
not, I suspect, in anyone who ever attempted to commune. I understand you had
ambitions to join the swimmer corps yourself?ł

ęBefore all that happened.ł

ęI understand. And now?ł Naqi had never told anyone that she
had joined Mina in the swimming incident. The truth was that even if she had
not been present at the time of Minałs death, her encounter with the rogue mind
would have put her off entering the ocean for life. ęIt isnłt for me. Thatłs
all.ł Jotah Sivaraksa nodded gravely. ęA wise choice. Aptitude or not, youłd
have almost certainly been filtered out of the swimmer corps. A direct genetic
connection to a conformaleven an unproven conformalwould be too much of a
risk.ł

ęThatłs what I assumed, sir.ł

ęDoes it trouble you, Naqi?ł She was wearying of this. She
had work to do: deadlines to meet that Sivaraksa himself had imposed. ęDoes
what trouble me?ł

He nodded at the sea. Now that the play of light had shifted
minutely, it looked less like dimpled leather than a sheet of beaten bronze. ęThe
thought that Mina might still be out there ... in some sense.ł

ęIt might trouble me if I were a swimmer, sir. Other than
that ... No. I canłt say that it does. My sister died. Thatłs all that mattered.ł

ęSwimmers have occasionally reported encountering mindsessencesof
the lost, Naqi. The impressions are often acute. The conformed leave their mark
on the ocean at a deeper, more permanent level than the impressions left behind
by mere swimmers. One senses that there must be a purpose to this.ł

ęThat wouldnłt be for me to speculate, sir.ł

ęNo.ł He glanced down at the compad and then tapped his forefinger
against his upper lip. ęNo. Of course not. Well, to the matter at handł She
interrupted him. ęYou swam once, sir?ł

ęYes. Yes, I did.ł The moment stretched. She was about to
say somethinganythingwhen Sivaraksa continued, ęI had to stop for medical
reasons. Otherwise I suppose Iłd have been in the swimmer corps for a good deal
longer, at least until my hands started turning green.ł

ęWhat was it like?ł

ęAstonishing. Beyond anything Iłd expected.ł

ęDid they change you?ł At that he smiled. ęI never thought
that they did, until now. After my last swim I went through all the usual
neurological and psychological tests. They found no anomalies; no indications
that the Jugglers had imprinted any hints of alien personality or rewired my
mind to think in an alien way.ł Sivaraksa reached across the desk and held up
the smoky cube that Naqi had taken for a paperweight. ęThis came down from
Voice of Evening. Examine it.ł Naqi peered into the milky-grey depths of the
cube. Now that she saw it closely she realised that there were things embedded
within the translucent matrix. There were chains of unfamiliar symbols,
intersecting at right angles. They resembled the complex white scaffolding of a
building. ęWhat is it?ł

ęMathematics. Actually, a mathematical argumenta proof, if
you like. Conventional mathematical notationno matter how arcanehas evolved
so that it can be written down on a two-dimensional surface, like paper or a
readout. This is a three-dimensional syntax, liberated from that constraint.
Its enormously richer, enormously more elegant.ł The cube tumbled in Sivaraksałs
hand. He was smiling. ęNo one could make head or tail of it. Yet when I looked
at it for the first time I nearly dropped it in shock. It made perfect sense to
me. Not only did I understand the theorem, but I also understood the point of
it. Itłs a joke, Naqi. A pun. This mathematics is rich enough to embody humour.
And understanding that is the gift they left me. It was sitting in my mind for
twenty-eight years, like an egg waiting to hatch.ł Abruptly, Sivaraksa placed
the cube back on the table. ęSomethingłs come up,ł he said. From somewhere came
the distant, prolonged thunder of a dirigible discharging its cargo of
processed ore. It must have been one of the last consignments. ęSomething, sir?ł

ęTheyłve asked to see the Moat.ł

ęThey?ł

ęCrane and her Vahishta mob. Theyłve requested an oversight
of all major scientific centres on Turquoise, and naturally enough wełre on the
list. Theyłll be visiting us, spending a couple of days seeing what wełve
achieved.ł

ęIłm not too surprised that theyłve asked to visit, sir.ł

ęNo, but I was hoping wełd have a few monthsł grace. We donłt.
Theyłll be here in a week.ł

ęThatłs not necessarily a problem for us, is it?ł

ęIt mustnłt become one,ł Sivaraksa said. ęIłm putting you in
charge of the visit, Naqi. Youłll be the interface between Cranełs group and
the Moat. Thatłs quite a responsibility, you understand. A mistakethe tiniest
gaffecould undermine our standing with the Snowflake Council.ł He nodded at
the compad. ęOur budgetary position is precarious. Frankly, Iłm in Tak Thonburiłs
lap. We canłt afford any embarrassments.ł

ęNo sir.ł She certainly did understand. The job was a
poisoned chalice, or at the very least, a chalice with the strong potential to
become poisoned. If she succeededif the visit went smoothly, with no hitchesSivaraksa
could still take much of the credit for it. If it went wrong, on the other
hand, the fault would be categorically hers. ęOne more thing.ł Sivaraksa
reached under his desk and produced a brochure that he slid across to her. The
brochure was marked with a prominent silver snowflake motif. It was sealed with
red foil. ęOpen it; you have clearance.ł

ęWhat is it, sir?ł

ęA security report on our new friends. One of them has been
behaving a bit oddly. Youłll need to keep an eye on him.ł For inscrutable
reasons of their own, the liaison committee had decided she would be introduced
to Amesha Crane and her associates a day before the official visit, when the
party was still in Sukhothai-Sanikiluaq. The journey there took the better part
of two days, even allowing for the legs she took by high-speed dirigible or the
ageing, unreliable trans-atoll railway line between Narathiwat and Cape Dorset.
She arrived at Sukhothai-Sanikiluaq in a velvety purple twilight, catching the
tail end of a fireworks display. The two snowflake cities had only been married
three weeks, so the arrival of the off-worlders was an excellent pretext for
prolonging the celebrations. Naqi watched the fireworks from a civic landing
stage perched halfway up Sukhothaiłs core, starbursts and cataracts of scarlet,
indigo and intense emerald green brightening the sky above the vacuum-bladders.
The colours reminded her of the organisms that she and Mina had seen in the
wake of their airship. The recollection left her suddenly sad and drained,
convinced that she had made a terrible mistake by accepting this assignment. ęNaqi?ł
It was Tak Thonburi, coming out to meet her on the balcony. They had already
exchanged messages during the journey. He was dressed in full civic finery and
appeared more than a little drunk. ęChairman Thonburi.ł

ęGood of you come to here, Naqi.ł She watched his eyes map
her contours with scientific rigour, lingering here and there around regions of
particular interest. ęEnjoying the show?ł

ęYou certainly seem to be, sir.ł

ęYes, yes. Always had a thing about fireworks.ł He pressed a
drink into her hand and together they watched the display come to its mildly
disappointing conclusion. There was a lull then, but Naqi noticed that the
spectators on the other balconies were reluctant to leave, as if waiting for
something. Presently a stunning display of three-dimensional images appeared,
generated by powerful projection apparatus in the Voice of Eveningłs shuttle.
Above Sukhothai-Sanikiluaq, Chinese dragons as large as mountains fought epic
battles. Sea monsters convulsed and writhed in the night. Celestial citadels
burned. Hosts of purple-winged fiery angels fell from the heavens in tightly
knit squadrons, clutching arcane instruments of music or punishment. A marbled
giant rose from the sea, as if woken from some aeons-long slumber. It was very,
very impressive. ęBastards,ł Thonburi muttered. ęSir?ł

ęBastards,ł he said, louder this time. ęWe know theyłre
better than us. But do they have to keep reminding us?ł He ushered her into the
reception chamber where the Vahishta visitors were being entertained. The
return indoors had a magical sharpening effect on his senses. Naqi suspected
that the ability to turn drunkenness on and off like a switch must be one of
the most hallowed of diplomatic skills. He leaned towards her, confidentially. ęDid
Jotah mention anył

ęSecurity considerations, Chairman? Yes, I think I got the
message.ł

ęItłs probably nothing, onlył

ęI understand. Better safe than sorry.ł He winked, touching
a finger against the side of his nose. ęPrecisely.ł The interior was bright
after the balcony. Twenty Vahishta delegates were standing in a huddle near the
middle of the room. The captain was absentlittle had been seen of Moreau since
the shuttlełs arrival in Umingmaktokbut the delegates were talking to a clutch
of local bigwigs, none of whom Naqi recognised. Thonburi steered her into the
fray, oblivious to the conversations that were taking place. ęLadies and
gentleman ... I would like to introduce Naqi Okpik. Naqi oversees the
scientific programme on the Moat. Shełll be your host for the visit to our
project.ł

ęAh, Naqi.ł Amesha Crane leaned over and shook her hand. ęA
pleasure. I just read your papers on information propagation methods in
class-three nodes. Erudite.ł

ęThey were collaborative works,ł Naqi said. ęI really canłt
take too much credit.ł

ęAh, but you can. All of you can. You achieved those
findings with the minimum of resources, and you made very creative use of some
extremely simplistic numerical methods.ł

ęWe muddle through,ł Naqi said. Crane nodded enthusiastically.
ęIt must give you a great sense of satisfaction.ł Tak Thonburi said, ęItłs a
philosophy, thatłs all. We conduct our science in isolation, and we enjoy only
limited communication with other colonies. As a social model it has its
disadvantages, but it means we arenłt forever jealous of what theyłre achieving
on some other world that happens to be a few decades ahead of us because of an
accident of history or location. We think that the benefits outweigh the costs.ł

ęWell, it seems to work,ł Crane said. ęYou have a remarkably
stable society here, Chairman. Verging on the utopian, some might say.ł Tak
Thonburi caressed his cowlick. ęWe canłt complain.ł

ęNor can we,ł said the man Naqi recognised as
quizzical-faced Simon Matsubara. ęIf you hadnłt enforced this isolation, your
own Juggler research would have been as hopelessly compromised as everywhere
else.ł

ęBut the isolation isnłt absolute, is it?ł The voice was
quiet, but commanding. Naqi followed the voice to the speaker. It was Rafael
Weir, the man who had been identified as a possible security risk. Of the three
who had emerged from Moreaułs shuttle, he was the least remarkable looking,
possessing the kind of amorphous face that would allow him to blend in with
almost any crowd. Had her attention not been drawn to him, he would have been
the last one she noticed. He was not unattractive, but there was nothing particularly
striking or charismatic about his looks. According to the security dossier, he
had made a number of efforts to break away from the main party of the
delegation while they had been visiting research stations. They could have been
accidentsone or two other party members had become separated at other timesbut
it was beginning to look a little too deliberate. ęNo,ł Tak Thonburi answered. ęWełre
not absolute isolationists, or wełd never have given permission for Voice of
Evening to assume orbit around Turquoise. But we donłt solicit passing traffic
either. Our welcome is as warm as anyonełs, we hope, but we donłt encourage
visitors.ł

ęAre we the first to visit since your settlement?ł Weir
asked. ęThe first starship?ł Tak Thonburi shook his head. ęNo. But itłs been a
number of years since the last one.ł

ęWhich was?ł

ęThe Pelican in Impiety, a century ago.ł

ęAn amusing coincidence, then,ł Weir said. Tak Thonburi narrowed
his eyes. ęCoincidence?ł

ęThe Pelicanłs next port of call was Haven, if Iłm not mistaken.
�It was en route from Zion, but it made a trade stopover around Turquoise."ę He
smiled. ęAnd we have come from Haven, so history already binds our two worlds,
albeit tenuously.ł Thonburiłs eyes narrowed. He was trying to read Weir and
evidently failing. ęWe donłt talk about the Pelican too much. There were technical
benefitsvacuum-bladder production methods, information technologies ... but
there was also a fair bit of unpleasantness. The wounds havenłt entirely
healed.ł

ęLetłs hope this visit will be remembered more fondly,ł Weir
said. Amesha Crane nodded, fingering one of the items of silver jewellery in
her hair. ęAgreed. All the indications are favourable, at the very least. Wełve
arrived at a most auspicious time.ł She turned to Naqi. ęI find the Moat
project fascinating, and Iłm sure I speak for the entire Vahishta delegation. I
may as well tell you that no one else has attempted anything remotely like it.
Tell me, scientist to scientist, do you honestly think it will work?ł

ęWe wonłt know until we try,ł Naqi said. Any other answer
would have been politically hazardous: too much optimism and the politicians
would have started asking just why the expensive project was needed in the
first place. Too much pessimism and they would ask exactly the same question. ęFascinating,
all the same.ł Cranełs expression was knowing, as if she understood Naqiłs
predicament perfectly. ęI understand that youłre very close to running the
first experiment?ł

ęGiven that itłs taken us twenty years to get this far, yes,
wełre close. But wełre still looking at three to four months, maybe longer. Itłs
not something we want to rush.ł

ęThatłs a great pity,ł Crane said, turning now to Thonburi. ęIn
three to four months we might be on our way. Still, it would have been
something to see, wouldnłt it?ł Thonburi leaned towards Naqi. The alcohol on
his breath was a fog of cheap vinegar. ęI suppose there wouldnłt be any chance
of accelerating the schedule, would there?ł

ęOut of the question, Iłm afraid,ł Naqi said. ęThatłs just
too bad,ł said Amesha Crane. Still toying with her jewellery, she turned to the
others. ęBut we mustnłt let a little detail like that spoil our visit, must we?ł
They returned to the Moat using the Voice of Eveningłs shuttle. There was
another civic reception to be endured upon arrival, but it was a much smaller
affair than the one in Sukhothai-Sanikiluaq. Dr Jotah Sivaraksa was there, of
course, and once Naqi had dealt with the business of introducing the party to
him she was able to relax for the first time in many hours, melting into the
corner of the room and watching the interaction between visitors and locals
with a welcome sense of detachment. Naqi was tired and had difficulty keeping
her eyes open. She saw everything through a sleepy blur, the delegates
surrounding Sivaraksa like pillars of fire, the fabric of their costumes
rippling with the slightest movement, reds and russets and chrome yellows
dancing like sparks or sheets of flame. Naqi left as soon as she felt it was
polite to do so, and when she reached her bed she fell immediately into
troubled sleep, dreaming of squadrons of purple-winged angels falling from the
skies and of the great giant rising from the depths, clawing the seaweed and
kelp of ages from his eyes. In the morning she awoke without really feeling
refreshed. Anaemic light pierced the slats on her window. She was not due to
meet the delegates again for another three or four hours, so there was time to
turn over and try and catch some proper sleep. But she knew from experience
that it would be futile. She got up. To her surprise, there was a new message
on her console from Jotah Sivaraksa. What, she wondered, did he have to say to
her that he could not have said at the reception, or later this morning? She
opened the message and read. ęSivaraksa,ł she said to herself. ęAre you insane?
It canłt be done.ł The message informed her that there had been a change of
plan. The first closure of the sea-doors would be attempted in two days, while
the delegates were still on the Moat. It was pure madness. They were months
away from that. Yes, the doors could be closedthe basic machinery for doing
that was in placeand yes, the doors would be hermetically tight for at least
one hundred hours after closure. But nothing else was ready. The sensitive
monitoring equipment, the failsafe subsystems, the backups ... None of that
would be in place and operational for many weeks. Then there was supposed to be
at least six weeks of testing, slowly building up to the event itself ... To do
it in two days made no sense at all, except to a politician. At best all they
would learn was whether or not the Jugglers had remained inside the Moat when
the door was closed. They would learn nothing about how the data flow was
terminated, or how the internal connections between the nodes adapted to the
loss of contact with the wider ocean. Naqi swore and hit the console. She
wanted to blame Sivaraksa, but she knew that was unfair. Sivaraksa had to keep
the politicians happy, or the whole project would be endangered. He was just
doing what he had to do, and he almost certainly liked it even less than she
did. Naqi pulled on shorts and a T-shirt and found some coffee in one of the
adjoining mess rooms. The Moat was deserted, quiet except for the womblike throb
of generators and air-circulation systems. A week ago it would have been as
noisy now as at any other time of day, for the construction had continued
around the clock. But the heavy work was finished; the last ore dirigible had
arrived while Naqi was away. All that remained was the relatively light work of
completing the Moatłs support subsystems. Despite what Sivaraksa had said in
his message there was really very little additional work needed to close the
doors. Even two days of frantic activity would make no difference to the
usefulness of the stunt. When shełd calmed down, she returned to her room and
called Sivaraksa. It was still far too early, but seeing that the bastard had
already ruined her day she saw no reason not to reciprocate. ęNaqi.ł His silver
hair was a sleep-matted mess on the screen. ęI take it you got my message?ł

ęYou didnłt think Iłd take it lying down, did you?ł

ęI donłt like it any more than you do. But I see the
political necessity.ł

ęDo you? This isnłt like switching a light on and off,
Jotah.ł His eyes widened at the familiarity, but she pressed on regardless. ęIf
we screw up the first time, there might never be a second chance. The Jugglers
have to play along. Without them all youłve got here is a very expensive
mid-ocean refuelling point. Does that make political sense to you?ł He pushed
green fingers through the mess of his hair. ęHave some breakfast, get some
fresh air, then come to my office. Wełll talk about it then.ł

ęIłve had breakfast, thanks very much.ł

ęThen get the fresh air. Youłll feel better for it.ł
Sivaraksa rubbed his eyes. ęYoułre not very happy about this, are you?ł

ęItłs bloody madness. And the worst thing is that you know
it.ł

ęAnd my hands are tied. Ten years from now, Naqi, youłll be
sitting in my place having to make similar decisions. And ten to one therełll
be some idealistic young scientist telling you what a hopeless piece of
deadwood you are.ł He managed a weary smile. ęMark my words, because I want you
to remember this conversation when it happens.ł

ęTherełs nothing I can do to stop this, is there?ł

ęIłll be in my office inł Sivaraksa looked aside at a
clock, ęthirty minutes. We can talk about it properly then.ł

ęTherełs nothing to talk about.ł But even as she said that
she knew she sounded petulant and inflexible. Sivaraksa was right: it was
impossible to manage a project as complex and expensive as the Moat without a
degree of compromise. Naqi decided that Sivaraksałs adviceat least the part
about getting some fresh airwas worth heeding. She descended a helical
staircase until she reached the upper surface of the Moatłs ringshaped wall.
The concrete was cold beneath her bare feet and a pleasantly cool breeze
caressed her legs and arms. The sky had brightened on one horizon. Machines and
supplies were arranged neatly on the upper surface ready for use, although
further construction would be halted until the delegates completed their visit.
Stepping nimbly over the tracks, conduits and cables that crisscrossed each
other on the upper surface, Naqi walked to the side. A high railing, painted in
high-visibility rotresistant sealer, fenced the inner part of the Moat. She
touched it to make sure it was dry, then leaned over. The distant side of the
Moat was a colourless thread, twenty kilometres away, like a very low wall of
sea mist. What could be done in two days? Nothing. Or at least nothing compared
to what had always been planned. But if the new schedule was a fait accompliand
that was the message she was getting from Sivaraksathen it was her responsibility
to find a way to squeeze some scientific return from the event. She looked down
at the cut, and at the many spindly gantries and catwalks that spanned the
aperture or hung some way towards the centre of the Moat. Perhaps if she
arranged for some standard-issue probes to be prepared today, the type dropped
from dirigibles ... Naqiłs eyes darted around, surveying fixtures and telemetry
conduits. It would be hard work to get them in place in time, and even harder
to get them patched into some kind of real-time acquisition system ... But it
was doable, just barely. The data quality would be laughable compared to the
supersensitive instruments that were going to be installed over the next few
months ... But crude was a lot better than nothing at all. She laughed, aloud.
An hour ago she would have stuck pins into herself rather than collaborate in
this kind of fiasco. Naqi walked along the railing until she reached a pair of
pillar-mounted binoculars. They were smeared with rot-protection. She wiped the
lens and eyepieces clean with the rag that was tied to the pedestal, then swung
the binoculars in a slow arc, panning across the dark circle of water trapped
within the Moat. Only vague patches of what Naqi would have called open water
were visible. The rest was either a verdant porridge of Juggler organisms, or
fully grown masses of organised floating matter, linked together by trunks and
veins of the same green biomass. The latest estimate was that there were three
small nodes within the ring. The smell was atrocious, but that was an excellent
sign as well: it correlated strongly with the density of organisms in the
nodes. She had experienced that smell many times, but it never failed to slam
her back to that morning when Mina had died. As much as the Pattern Jugglers ęknewł
anything, they were surely aware of what was planned here. They had drunk the
minds of the swimmers who had already entered the sea near or within the Moat,
and not one of those swimmers was ignorant of the projectłs ultimate purpose.
It was possible that that knowledge simply couldnłt be parsed into a form the
aliens would understand, but Naqi considered that unlikely: the closure of the
Moat would be about as stark a concept as one could imagine. If nothing else,
geometry was the one thing the Jugglers did understand. And yet the aliens
chose to remain within the closing Moat, hinting that they would tolerate the
final closure that would seal them off from the rest of the ocean. Perhaps they
were not impressed. Perhaps they knew that the event would not rob them of
every channel of communication, but only the chemical medium of the ocean.
Sprites and other airborne organisms would still be able to cross the barrier.
It was impossible to tell. The only way to know was to complete the experimentto
close the massive sea-doorsand see what happened.

She leaned back, taking her eyes from the binoculars. Now Naqi
saw something unexpected. It was a glint of hard white light, scudding across
the water within the Moat. Naqi squinted, but still she could not make out the
object. She swung the binoculars hard around, got her eyes behind them and then
zigzagged until something flashed through the field of view. She backed up and
locked onto it. It was a boat, and there was someone in it. She keyed in the image
zoom/stabilise function and the craft swelled to clarity across a clear
kilometre of sea. The craft was a ceramic-hulled vessel of the type that the
swimmer teams used, five or six metres long from bow to stern. The person sat
behind a curved spray shield, their hands on the handlebars of the control
pillar. An inboard thruster propelled the boat without ever touching water. The
figure was difficult to make out, but the billowing orange clothes left no room
for doubt. It was one of the Vahishta delegates. And Naqi fully expected it to
be Rafael Weir. He was headed towards the closest node. For an agonising few
moments she did not know what to do. He was going to attempt to swim, she
thought, just like she and Mina had done. And he would be no better prepared
for the experience. She had to stop him, somehow. He would reach the node in
only a few minutes. Naqi sprinted back to the tower, breathless when she
arrived. She reached a communications post and tried to find the right channel
for the boat. But either she was doing it wrong or Weir had sabotaged the
radio. What next? Technically, there was a security presence on the Moat,
especially given the official visit. But what did the security goons know about
chasing boats? All their training was aimed at dealing with internal crises,
and none of them were competent to go anywhere near an active node. She called
them anyway, alerting them to what had happened. Then she called Sivaraksa,
telling him the same news. ęI think itłs Weir,ł she said. ęIłm going to try and
stop him.ł

ęNaqi ...ł he said warningly. ęThis is my responsibility,
Jotah. Let me handle it.ł Naqi ran back outside again. The closest elevator
down to sea level was out of service; the next one was a kilometre further
around the ring. She didnłt have that much time. Instead she jogged along the
line of railings until she reached a break that admitted entry to a staircase
that descended the steep inner wall of the Moat. The steps and handrails had
been helpfully greased with antirot, which made her descent that more treacherous.
There were five hundred steps down to sea level but she took them two or three
at a time, sliding down the handrails until she reached the grilled platforms
where the stairways reversed direction. All the while she watched the tiny
white speck of the boat, seemingly immobile now that it was so far away, but
undoubtedly narrowing the distance to the node with each minute. As she worked
her way down she had plenty of time to think about what was going through the
delegatełs head. She was sure now that it was Weir. It did not really surprise
her that he wanted to swim: it was what everyone who studied the Jugglers
yearned for. But why make this unofficial attempt now when a little gentle
persuasion would have made it possible anyway? Given Tak Thonburiłs eagerness
to please the delegates, it would not have been beyond the bounds of
possibility for a swimming expedition to be organised ... The corps would have
protested, but just like Naqi they would have been given a forceful lesson in
the refined art of political compromise. But evidently Weir hadnłt been
prepared to wait. It all made sense, at any rate: the times when he had dodged
away from the party before must have all been abortive attempts to reach the
Jugglers. But only now had he been able to seize his opportunity. Naqi reached
the water level, where jetties floated on ceramic-sheathed pontoons. Most of
the boats were suspended out of the water on cradles, to save their hulls from
unnecessary degradation. Fortunately, there was an emergency rescue boat
already afloat. Its formerly white hull had the flaking, pea-green scab
patterning of advanced rot, but it still had a dozen or so hours of
seaworthiness in it. Naqi jumped aboard, released the boat from its moorings
and fired up the thruster. In a moment she was racing away from the jetty, away
from the vast, stained edifice of the Moat itself. She steered a course through
the least viscous stretches of water, avoiding conspicuous rafts of green
matter. She peered ahead through the boatłs spray-drenched shield. It had been
easy to keep track of Weirłs boat when she had been a hundred metres higher,
but now she kept losing him behind swells or miniature islands of Juggler
matter. After a minute or so she gave up trying to follow the boat, and instead
diverted her concentration to finding the quickest route to the node. She
flipped on the radio. ęJotah? This is Naqi. Iłm in the water, closing on Weir.ł
There was a pause, a crackle, then: ęWhatłs the status?ł She had to shout over
the abrasive thump, thump, thump of the boat, even though the thruster was
nearly silent. ęIłll reach the node in four or five minutes. Canłt see Weir,
but I donłt think it matters.ł

ęWe can see him. Hełs still headed for the node.ł

ęGood. Can you spare some more boats, in case he decides to
make a run for another node?ł

ęTheyłll be leaving in a minute or so. Iłm waking everyone I
can.ł

ęWhat about the other delegates?ł Sivaraksa did not answer
her immediately. ęMost are still asleep. I have Amesha Crane and Simon
Matsubara in my office, however.ł

ęLet me speak to them.ł

ęJust a moment,ł he said, after the same brief hesitation. ęCrane
here,ł said the woman. ęI think Iłm chasing Weir. Can you confirm that?ł

ęHe isnłt accounted for,ł she told Naqi. ęBut itłll be a few
minutes until we can be certain itłs him.ł

ęIłm not expecting a surprise. Weir already had a question
mark over him, Amesha. We were waiting for him to try something.ł

ęWere you?ł Perhaps it was her imagination, but Crane
sounded genuinely surprised. ęWhy? What had he done?ł

ęYou donłt know?ł

ęNo ...ł Crane trailed off. ęHe was one of us,ł Matsubara
said. ęA good ... delegate. We had no reason to distrust him.ł Perhaps Naqi was
imagining this as well, but it almost sounded as if Matsubara had intended to
say ędiscipleł rather than ędelegateł. Crane came back on the radio. ęPlease do
your best to apprehend him, Naqi. This is a source of great embarrassment to
us. He mustnłt do any harm.ł Naqi gunned the boat harder, no longer bothering
to avoid the smaller patches of organic matter. ęNo,ł she said. ęHe mustnłt.ł

Three

Something changed ahead. ęNaqi?ł It was Jotah Sivaraksałs
voice. ęWhat?ł

ęWeirłs slowed his boat. From our vantage point it looks as
if hełs reached the perimeter of the node. He seems to be circumnavigating it.ł

ęI canłt see him yet. He must be picking the best spot to
dive in.ł

ęBut it wonłt work, will it?ł Sivaraksa asked. ęThere has to
be an element of cooperation with the Jugglers. They have to invite the swimmer
to enter the sea, or nothing happens.ł

ęMaybe he doesnłt realise that,ł Naqi said, under her
breath. It was of no concern to her how closely Weir was adhering to the usual
method of initiating Juggler communion. Even if the Jugglers did not cooperateeven
if all Weir did was flounder in thick green waterthere was no telling the
hidden harm that might be done. She had already grudgingly accepted the
acceleration of the closure operation. There was no way she was going to
tolerate another upset, another unwanted perturbation of the experimental
system. Not on her watch. ęHełs stopped,ł Sivaraksa said excitedly. ęCan you
see him yet?ł Naqi stood up in her seat, even though she felt perilously
unbalanced. ęWait. Yes, I think so. Iłll be there in a minute or so. ęWhat are
you going to do?ł Crane asked. ęI hesitate to say it, but Weir may not respond
to rational argument at this point. Simply requesting that he leave the water
wonłt necessarily work. Um, do you have a weapon?ł

ęYes,ł Naqi said. ęIłm sitting in it.ł She did not allow herself
to relax, but at least now she felt that the situation was slipping back into
her control. She would kill Weir rather than have him contaminate the node. His
boat was visible now only as a smudge of white, intermittently popping up
between folds and hummocks of shifting green. Her imagination sketched in the
details. Weir would be preparing to swim, stripping off until he was naked, or
nearly so. Perhaps he would feel some kind of erotic charge as he prepared for
immersion. She did not doubt that he would be apprehensive, and perhaps he
would hesitate on the threshold of the act, teetering on the edge of the boat
before committing himself to the water. But a fanatic desire had driven him
this far and she doubted that it would fail him. ęNaqił

ęJotah?ł

ęNaqi, hełs moving again. He didnłt enter the water. He didnłt
even look like he had any intention of swimming.ł

ęHe saw I was coming. I take it hełs heading for the next
closest node?ł

ęPerhaps ...ł But Jotah Sivaraksa sounded far from certain.
She saw the boat again. It was moving fastmuch faster than it had appeared
beforebut that was only because she was now seeing lateral motion. The next
node was a distant island framed by the background of the Moatłs encircling
rim. If he headed that way she would be hard behind him all the way there as
well. No matter his desire to swim, he must realise that she could thwart his
every attempt. Naqi looked back. The twin towers framing the cut were smothered
in a haze of sea mist, their geometric details smeared into a vague suggestion
of haphazard complexity. They suggested teetering, stratified sea-stacks,
million-year-old towers of weathered and eroded rock guarding the narrow
passage to the open ocean. Beneath them, winking in and out of clarity, she saw
three or four other boats making their way into the Moat. The ponderous
teardrop of a passenger dirigible was nosing away from the side of one of the
towers, the low dawn sun throwing golden highlights along the fluted lines of
its gondola. Naqi made out the sleek deltoid of the Voice of Eveningłs shuttle,
but it was still parked where it had landed. She looked back to the node where
Weir had hesitated. Something was happening. The node had become vastly more active
than a minute earlier. It resembled a green, steep-sided volcanic island that
was undergoing some catastrophic seismic calamity. The entire mass of the node
was trembling, rocking and throbbing with an eerie regularity. Concentric
swells of disturbed water raced away from it, sickening troughs that made the
speeding boat pitch and slide. Naqi slowed her boat, some instinct telling her
that it was now largely futile to pursue Weir. Then she turned around so that
she faced the node properly and, cautiously, edged closer, ignoring the nausea
she felt as the boat ducked and dived from crest to trough. The node, like all
nodes, had always shown a rich surface topology: fused hummocks and tendrils;
fabulous domes and minarets and helter-skelters of organised biomass, linked
and entangled by a telegraphic system of draping aerial tendrils. In any
instant it resembled a human cityor, more properly, a fairy-tale human citythat
had been efficiently smothered in green moss. The bright moving motes of
sprites dodged through the interstices, the portholes and arches of the urban
mass. The metropolitan structure only hinted at the nodełs Byzantine interior
architecture, and much of that could only be glimpsed or implied. But this node
was like a city going insane. It was accelerating, running through cycles of
urban renewal and redesign with indecent haste. Structures were evolving before
Naqiłs eyes. She had seen change this rapid just before Mina was taken, but
normally those kinds of changes happened too slowly to be seen at all, like the
daily movement of shadows. The throbbing had decreased, but the flickering
change was now throwing out a steady, warm, malodorous breeze. And when she
stopped the boatshe dared come no closer nowNaqi heard the node. It was like
the whisper of a billion forest leaves presaging a summer storm. Whatever was
happening here, it was about to become catastrophic. Some fundamental
organisation had been lost. The changes were happening too quickly, with too
little central coordination. Tendrils thrashed like whips, unable to connect to
anything. They flailed against each other. Structures were forming and
collapsing. The node was fracturing, so that there were three, four, perhaps
five distinct cores of flickering growth. As soon as she had the measure of it,
the process shifted it all. Meagre light flickered within the epileptic mass.
Sprites swarmed in confused flight patterns, orbiting mindlessly between foci.
The sound of the node had become a distant shriek. ęItłs dying ...ł Naqi
breathed. Weir had done something to it. What, she couldnłt guess. But this
could not be a coincidence. The shrieking died down. The breeze ceased. The
node had stopped its convulsions. She looked at it, hoping against hope that
perhaps it had overcome whatever destabilising influence Weir had introduced.
The structures were still misshapen, there was still an impression of
incoherence, but the city was inert. The cycling motion of the sprites slowed,
and a few of them dropped down into the mass, as if to roost. A calm had
descended. Then Naqi heard another sound. It was lower than anything she had
heard beforealmost subsonic. It sounded less like thunder than like a very distant,
very heated conversation. It was coming from the approximate centre of the
node. She watched as a smooth green mound rose from the centre, resembling a
flattened hemisphere. It grew larger by the second, assimilating the malformed
structures with quiet indifference. They disappeared into the surface of the
mound as if into a wall of fog, but they did not emerge again. The mound only
increased its size, rumbling towards Naqi. The entire mass of the node was
changing into a single undifferentiated mass.

ęJotah ...ł she said. ęWe see it, Naqi. We see it but we donłt
understand it.ł

ęWeir must have used some kind of ... weapon against it,ł
she said. ęWe donłt know that hełs harmed it ... He might just have
precipitated a change to a state we havenłt documented.ł

ęThat still makes it a weapon in my book. Iłm scared, Jotah.ł

ęYou think Iłm not?ł Around her the sea was changing. She
had forgotten about the submerged tendrils that connected the nodes. They were
as thick as hawsers, and now they were writhing and thrashing just beneath the
surface of the water. Green-tinged spume lifted into the air. It was as if
unseen aquatic monsters were wrestling, locked in some dire, to-the-death
contest. ęNaqi ... Wełre seeing changes in the closest of the two remaining
nodes.ł

ęNo,ł she said, as if denying it would make any difference. ęIłm
sorry ...ł

ęWhere is Weir?ł

ęWełve lost him. Therełs too much surface disturbance.ł She
realised then what had to be done. The thought arrived in her head with a
crashing urgency. ęJotah ... You have to close the sea-doors. Now. Immediately.
Before whatever Weirłs unleashed has a chance to reach open ocean. That also
happens to be Weirłs only escape route.ł Sivaraksa, to his credit, did not
argue. ęYes. Youłre right. Iłll start closure. But it will take quite a few
minutes ...ł

ęI know, Jotah!ł She cursed herself for not having thought
of this sooner, and cursed Sivaraksa for the same error. But she could hardly
blame either of them. Closure had never been something to take lightly. A few
hours ago it had been an event months in the futurean experiment to test the
willingness of the Jugglers to cooperate with human plans. Now it had turned
into an emergency amputation, something to be done with brutal haste. She
peered at the gap between the towers. At the very least it would take several
minutes for Sivaraksa to initiate closure. It was not simply a matter of
pressing a button on his desk, but of rousing two or three specialist
technicians, who would have to be immediately convinced that this was not some
elaborate hoax. And then the machinery would have to work. The mechanisms that
forced the sea-doors together had been tested numerous times ... But the
machinery had never been driven to its limit; the doors had never moved more
than a few metres together. Now they would have to work perfectly, closing with
watchmaker precision. And when had anything on Turquoise ever worked the first
time? There. The tiniest, least perceptible narrowing of the gap. It was all
happening with agonising slowness. She looked back to what remained of the
node. The mound had consumed all the biomass available to it and had now ceased
its growth. It was as if a child had sculpted in clay some fantastically
intricate model of a city, which a callous adult had then squashed into a
single blank mass, erasing all trace of its former complexity. The closest of
the remaining nodes was showing something of the same transformation, Naqi saw:
it was running through the frantic cycle that had presaged the emergence of the
mound. She guessed now that the cycle had been the nodełs attempt to nullify
whatever Weir had used against it, like a computer trying to reallocate
resources to compensate for some crippling viral attack. She could do nothing
for the Jugglers now. Naqi turned the boat around and headed back towards the
cut. The sea-doors had narrowed the gap by perhaps a quarter.

The changes taking place within the Moat had turned the
water turbulent, even at the jetty. She hitched the boat to a mooring point and
then took the elevator up the side of the wall, preferring to sprint the
distance along the top rather than face the climb. By the time she reached the
cut the doors were three-quarters of the way to closure and, to Naqiłs immense
relief, the machinery had yet to falter. She approached the tower. She had
expected to see more people out on the top of the Moat, even if she knew that
Sivaraksa would still be in his control centre. But no one was around. This was
just beginning to register as a distinct wrongness when Sivaraksa emerged into
daylight, stumbling from the door at the foot of the tower. For an instant she
was on the point of calling his name. Then she realised that he was stumbling
because he had been injuredhis fingers were scarlet with bloodand that he was
trying to get away from someone or something. Naqi dropped to the ground behind
a stack of construction slabs. Through gaps between the slabs she observed
Sivaraksa. He was swatting at something, like a man being chased by a
persistent wasp. Something tiny and silver harried him. More than one thing, in
fact: a small swarm of them, streaming out the open door. Sivaraksa fell to his
knees with a moan, brushing ineffectually at his tormentors. His face was turning
red, smeared with his own blood. He slumped on one side. Naqi remained frozen
with fear. A person stepped from the open door. The figure was garbed in shades
of fire. It was Amesha Crane. For an absurd moment Naqi assumed that the woman
was about; to spring to Sivaraksałs assistance. It was something about her
demeanour. Naqi found it hard to believe that someone so apparently serene
could commit such a violent act. But Crane did not step closer to Sivaraksa.
She merely extended her arms before her, with her fingers outspread. She
sustained the oddly theatrical gesture, the muscles in her neck standing proud
and rigid. The silver things departed Sivaraksa. They swarmed through the air,
slowing as they neared Crane. Then, with a startling degree of orchestrated
obedience, they slid onto her fingers, locked themselves around her wrists,
clasped onto the lobes of her ears. Her jewellery had attacked Sivaraksa. Crane
glanced at the man one last time, spun on her heels and then retreated back
into the tower. Naqi waited until she was certain the woman was not coming
back, then started to emerge from behind the pile of slabs. But Sivaraksa saw
her. He said nothing, but his agonised eyes widened enough for Naqi to get the
warning. She remained where she was, her heart hammering. Nothing happened for
another minute. Then something moved above, changing the play of light across
the surface of the Moat. The Voice of Eveningłs shuttle was detaching from the
tower, a flicker of white machinery beneath the manta curve of its hull. The
shuttle loitered above the cut, as if observing the final moment of closure.
Naqi heard the huge doors grind shut. Then the shuttle banked and headed into
the circular sea, no more than two hundred metres above the waves. Some
distance out it halted and executed a sharp right-angled turn. Then it resumed
its flight, moving concentrically around the inner wall. Sivaraksa closed his
eyes. She thought he might have died, but then he opened them again and made
the tiniest of nods. Naqi left her place of hiding. She crossed the open ground
to Sivaraksa in a low, crablike stoop. She knelt down by him, cradling his head
in one hand and holding his own hand with the other. ęJotah ... What happened?ł
He managed to answer her. ęThey turned on us. The nineteen other delegates. As
soon asł He paused, summoning strength. ęAs soon as Weir made his move.ł

ęI donłt understand.ł

ęJoin the club,ł he said, managing a smile. ęI need to get
you inside,ł she said. ęWonłt help. Everyone else is dead. Or will be by now.
They murdered us all.ł

ęNo.ł

ęKept me alive until the end. Wanted me to give the orders.ł
He coughed. Blood spattered her hand. ęI can still get youł

ęNaqi. Save yourself. Get help.ł She realised that he was
about to die. ęThe shuttle?ł

ęLooking for Weir. I think.ł

ęThey want Weir back?ł

ęNo. Heard them talking. They want Weir dead. They have to
be sure.ł Naqi frowned. She understood none of this, or at least her
understanding was only now beginning to crystallise. She had labelled Weir as
the villain because he had harmed her beloved Pattern Jugglers. But Crane and
her entourage had murdered people, dozens, if what Sivaraksa said was correct.
They appeared to want Weir dead as well. So what did that make Weir, now? ęJotah
... I have to find Weir. I have to find out why he did this.ł She looked back
towards the centre of the Moat. The shuttle was continuing its search. ęDid
your security people get a trace on him again?ł Sivaraksa was near the end. She
thought he was never going to answer her. ęYes,ł he said finally. ęYes, they
found him again.ł

ęAnd? Any idea where he is? I might still be able to reach
him before the shuttle does.ł

ęWrong place.ł She leaned closer. ęJotah?ł

ęWrong place. Ameshałs looking in the wrong place. Weir got
through the cut. Hełs in the open ocean.ł

ęIłm going after him. Perhaps I can stop him ...ł

ęTry,ł Sivaraksa said. ęBut Iłm not sure what difference it
will make. I have a feeling, Naqi. A very bad feeling. Things are ending. It
was good, wasnłt it? While it lasted?ł

ęI havenłt given up just yet,ł Naqi said. He found one last
nugget of strength. ęI knew you wouldnłt. Right to trust you. One thing, Naqi.
One thing that might make a difference ... if it comes to the worst, that isł

ęJotah?ł

ęTak Thonburi told me this ... the most top secret, known
only to the Snowflake Council. Arviat, Naqił For a moment she thought she had
misheard him, or that he was sliding into delirium. ęArviat? The city that
sinned against the sea?ł

ęIt was real,ł Sivaraksa said. * There were a number of lifeboats
and emergency service craft stored at the top of near-vertical slipways, a
hundred metres above the external sea. She took a small but fast emergency
craft with a sealed cockpit, her stomach knotting as the vessel commenced its
slide towards the ocean. The boat submerged before resurfacing, boosted up to
speed and then deployed ceramic hydrofoils to minimise the contact between the
hull and the water. Naqi had no precise heading to follow, but she believed
Weir would have followed a reasonably straight line away from the cut, aiming
to get as far away from the Moat as possible before the other delegates
realised their mistake. It would require only a small deviation from that course
to take him to the nearest external node, which was as likely a destination as
any. When she was twenty kilometres from the Moat, Naqi allowed herself a moment
to look back. The structure was a thin white line etched on the horizon, the
towers and the now-sealed cut faintly visible as interruptions in the linełs
smoothness. Quills of dark smoke climbed from a dozen spots along the length of
the structure. It was too far for Naqi to be certain that she saw flames licking
from the towers, but she considered it likely. The closest external node appeared
over the horizon fifteen minutes later. It was nowhere as impressive as the one
that had taken Mina, but it was still a larger, more complex structure than any
of the nodes that had formed within the Moata major urban megalopolis,
perhaps, rather than a moderately sized city. Against the skyline Naqi saw
spires and rotundas and coronets of green, bridged by a tracery of elevated
tendrils. Sprites were rapidly moving silhouettes. There was motion, but it was
largely confined to the flying creatures. The node was not yet showing the
frenzied changes she had witnessed within the Moat. Had Weir gone somewhere
else? She pressed onwards, slowing the boat slightly now that the water was
thickening with microorganisms and it was necessary to steer around the occasional
larger floating structure. The boatłs sonar picked out dozens of submerged
tendrils converging on the node, suspended just below the surface. The tendrils
reached away in all directions, to the limits of the boatłs sonar range. Most
would have reached over the horizon, to nodes many hundreds of kilometres away.
But it was a topological certainty that some of them had been connected to the
nodes inside the Moat. Evidently, Weirłs contagion had never escaped through
the cut. Naqi doubted that the doors had closed in time to impede whatever
chemical signals were transmitting the fatal message. It was more likely that
some latent Juggler self-protection mechanism had cut in, the dying nodes
sending emergency termination-of-connection signals that forced the tendrils to
sever without human assistance. Naqi had just decided that she had guessed
wrongly about Weirłs plan when she saw a rectilinear furrow gouged right
through one of the largest subsidiary structures. The wound was healing itself
as she watchedit would be gone in a matter of minutesbut enough remained for
her to tell that Weirłs boat must have cleaved through the mass very recently.
It made sense. Weir had already demonstrated that he had no interest in
preserving the Pattern Jugglers. With renewed determination, Naqi gunned the
boat forward. She no longer worried about inflicting local damage on the
floating masses. There was a great deal more at stake than the wellbeing of a
single node. She felt a warmth on the back of her neck. At the same instant the
sky, sea and floating structures ahead of her pulsed with a cruel brightness.
Her own shadow stretched forward ominously. The brightness faded over the next
few seconds, and then she dared to look back, half-knowing what she would see.
A mass of hot, roiling gas was climbing into the air from the centre of the
node. It tugged a column of matter beneath it, like the knotted and gnarled
spinal column of a horribly swollen brain. Against the mushroom cloud she saw
the tiny moving speck of the delegatesł shuttle. A minute later the sound of
the explosion reached her, but although it was easily the loudest thing she had
ever heard, it was not as deafening as she had expected. The boat lurched; the
sea fumed, and then was still again. She assumed that the Moatłs wall had
absorbed much of the energy of the blast. Suddenly fearful that there might be
another explosion, Naqi turned back towards the node. At the same instant she
saw Weirłs boat, racing perhaps three hundred metres ahead of her. He was
beginning to curve and slow as he neared the impassable perimeter of the node.
Naqi knew that she did not have time to delay. That was when Weir saw her. His
boat sped up again, arcing hard away. Naqi steered immediately, certain that
her boat was faster and that it was now only a matter of time before she had
him. A minute later Weirłs boat disappeared around the curve of the nodełs
perimeter. She might have stood a chance of getting ah echo from his hull, but
this close to the node all sonar returns were too garbled to be of any use.
Naqi steered anyway, hoping that Weir would make the tactical mistake of
striking for another node. In open water he stood no chance at all, but perhaps
he understood that as well. She had circumnavigated a third of the nodełs perimeter
when she caught up with him again. He had not tried to run for it. Instead he
had brought the boat to a halt within the comparative shelter of an inlet on
the perimeter. He was standing up at the rear of the boat, with something small
and dark in his hand. Naqi slowed her boat as she approached him. She had
popped back the canopy before it occurred to her that Weir might be equipped
with the same weapons as Crane. She stood up herself. ęWeir?ł He smiled. ęIłm
sorry to have caused so much trouble. But I donłt think it could have happened
any other way.ł She let this pass. ęThat thing in your hand?ł

ęYes?ł

ęItłs a weapon, isnłt it?ł She could see it clearly now. It
was merely a glass bauble, little larger than a childłs marble. There was
something opaque inside it, but she could not tell if it contained fluid or
dark crystals. ęI doubt that a denial would be very plausible at this point.ł
He nodded, and she sensed the lifting, partially at least, of some appalling
burden. ęYes, itłs a weapon. A Juggler killer.ł

ęUntil today, Iłd have said no such thing was possible.ł

ęI doubt that it was very easy to synthesise. Countless
biological entities have entered their oceans, and none of them have ever
brought anything with them that the Jugglers couldnłt assimilate in a harmless
fashion. Doubtless some of those entities tried to inflict deliberate harm, if
only out of morbid curiosity. None of them succeeded. Of course, you can kill
Jugglers by brute forceł He looked towards the Moat, where the mushroom cloud
was dissipating. ęBut that isnłt the point. Not subtle. But this is. It
exploits a logical flaw in the Jugglersł own informational processing algorithms.
Itłs insidious. And no, humans most certainly didnłt invent it. Wełre clever,
but wełre not that clever.ł Naqi strove to keep him talking. ęWho made it,
Weir?ł

ęThe Ultras sold it to us in a presynthesised form. Iłve
heard rumours that it was found inside the topmost chamber of a heavily
fortified alien structure ... Another that it was synthesised by a rival group
of Jugglers. Who knows? Who cares, even? It does what we ask of it. Thatłs all
that matters.ł

ęPlease donłt use it, Rafael.ł

ęI have to. Itłs what I came here to do.ł

ęBut I thought you all loved the Jugglers.ł His fingers
caressed the glass globe. It looked terribly fragile. ęWe?ł

ęCrane ... Her delegates.ł

ęThey do. But Iłm not one of them.ł

ęTell me what this is about, Rafael.ł

ęIt would be better if you just accepted what I have to do.ł
Naqi swallowed. ęIf you kill them, you kill more than just an alien life form.
You erase the memory of every sentient creature thatłs ever entered the ocean.ł

ęUnfortunately, that rather happens to be the point.ł Weir
dropped the glass into the sea. It hit the water, bobbed under and then popped
back out again, floating on the surface. The small globe was already immersed
in a brackish scum of grey-green micro-organisms. They were beginning to lap
higher up the sides of the globe, exploring it. A couple of millimetres of ordinary
glass would succumb to Juggler erosion in perhaps thirty minutes ... But Naqi
guessed that this was not ordinary glass, that it was designed to degrade much
more rapidly. She jumped back down into her control seat and shot her boat
forward. She came alongside Weirłs boat, trapping the globe between the two
craft. Taking desperate care not to nudge the hulls together, she stopped her
boat and leaned over as far as she could without falling in. Her fingertips
brushed the glass. Maddeningly, she could not quite get a grip on it. She made
one last valiant effort and it drifted beyond her reach. Now it was out of her
range, no matter how hard she stretched. Weir watched impassively. Naqi slipped
into the water. The layer of Juggler organisms licked her chin and nose, the
smell immediate and overwhelming now that she was in such close proximity. Her
fear was absolute. It was the first time she had entered the water since Minałs
death. She caught the globe, taking hold of it with the exquisite care she might
have reserved for a rare birdłs egg. Already the glass had the porous texture
of pumice. She held it up, for Weir to see. ęI wonłt let you do this, Rafael.ł

ęI admire your concern.ł

ęItłs more than concern. My sister is here. Shełs in the
ocean. And I wonłt let you take her away from me.ł Weir reached inside a pocket
and removed another globe. They sped away from the node in Naqiłs boat. The new
globe rested in his hand like a gift. He had not yet dropped it in the sea,
although the possibility was only ever an instant away. They were far from any
node now, but the globe would be guaranteed to come into contact with Juggler
matter sooner or later. Naqi opened a watertight equipment locker, pushing
aside the flare pistol and first-aid kit that lay within. Carefully she placed
the globe within, and then watched in horror as the glass immediately cracked
and dissolved, releasing its poison: little black irregularly shaped grains
like burnt sugar. If the boat sank, the locker would eventually be consumed
into the ocean, along with its fatal contents. She considered using the flare
pistol to incinerate the remains, but there was too much danger of dispersing
it at the same time. Perhaps the toxin had a restricted lifespan once it came
into contact with air, but that was nothing she could count on. But Weir had
not thrown the third globe into sea. Not yet. Something she had said had made
him hesitate. ęYour sister?ł

ęYou know the story,ł Naqi said. ęMina was a conformal. The
ocean assimilated her entirely, rather than just recording her neural patterns.
It took her as a prize.ł

ęAnd you believe that shełs still present, in some sentient
sense?ł

ęThatłs what I choose to believe, yes. And therełs enough
anecdotal evidence from other swimmers that conformals do persist, in a more
coherent form than other stored patterns.ł

ęI canłt let anecdotal evidence sway me, Naqi. Have the
other swimmers specifically reported encounters with Mina?ł

ęNo ...ł Naqi said carefully. She was sure that he would see
through any lie that she attempted. ęBut they wouldnłt necessarily recognise
her if they did.ł

ęAnd you? Did you attempt to swim yourself?ł

ęThe swimmer corps would never have allowed me.ł

ęNot my question. Did you ever swim?ł

ęOnce,ł Naqi said. ęAnd?ł

ęIt didnłt count. It was the same time that Mina died.ł She
paused and then told him all that had happened. ęWe were seeing more sprite
activity than wełd ever recorded. It looked like coincidenceł

ęI donłt think it was.ł Naqi said nothing. She waited for
Weir to collect his own thoughts, concentrating on the steering of the boat.
Open sea lay ahead, but she knew that almost any direction would bring them to
a cluster of nodes within a few hours. ęIt began with Pelican of Impiety,ł Weir
said. ęA century ago. There was a man from Zion on that ship. During the
stopover he descended to the surface of Turquoise and swam in your ocean. He
made contact with the Jugglers and then swam again. The second time the experience
was even more affecting. On the third occasion, the sea swallowed him. Hełd
been a conformal, just like your sister. His name was Ormazd.ł

ęIt means nothing to me.ł

ęI assure you that on his homeworld it means a great deal
more. Ormazd was a failed tyrant, fleeing a political counterrevolution on
Zion. He had murdered and cheated his way to power on Zion, burning his rivals
in their houses while they slept. But therełd been a backlash. He got out just
before the ring closed around himhim and a handful of his closest allies and
devotees. They escaped aboard Pelican in Impiety.ł

ęAnd Ormazd died here?ł

ęYesbut his followers didnłt. They made it to Haven, our
world. And once there they began to proliferate, spreading their word,
recruiting new followers. It didnłt matter that Ormazd was gone. Quite the
opposite. Hełd martyred himself: given them a saint figure to worship. It
evolved from a political movement into a religious cult. The Vahishta
Foundationłs just a front for the Ormazd sect.ł Naqi absorbed that, then asked,
ęWhere does Amesha come into it?ł

ęAmesha was his daughter. She wants her father back.ł Something
lit the horizon, a pink-edged flash. Another followed a minute later, in nearly
the same position. ęShe wants to commune with him?ł

ęMore than that,ł said Weir. ęThey all want to become him;
to accept his neural patterns on their own. They want the Jugglers to imprint
Ormazdłs personality on all his followers, to remake them in his own image. The
aliens will do that, if the right gifts are offered. And thatłs what I canłt
allow.ł Naqi chose her words carefully, sensing that the tiniest thing could
push Weir into releasing the globe. She had prevented his last attempt, but he
would not allow her a second chance. All he would have to do would be to crush
the globe in his fist before spilling the contents into the ocean. Then it
would all be over. Everything she had ever known; everything she had ever lived
for. ęBut wełre only talking about nineteen people,ł she said. Weir laughed
hollowly. ęIłm afraid itłs a little more than that. Why donłt you turn on the
radio and see what I mean?ł Naqi did as he suggested, using the boatłs general
communications console. The small, scuffed screen received television pictures
beamed down from the comsat network. Naqi flicked through channels, finding
static on most of them. The Snowflake Councilłs official news service was off
the air and no personal messages were getting through. There were some suggestions
that the comsat network itself was damaged. Yet finally Naqi found a few weak
broadcast signals from the nearest snowflake cities. There was a sense of
desperation in the transmissions, as if they expected to fall silent at any
time. Weir nodded with weary acceptance, as if he had expected this. In the
last six hours at least a dozen more shuttles had come down from Voice of Evening,
packed with armed Vahishta disciples. The shuttles had attacked the planetłs
major snowflake cities and atoll settlements, strafing them into submission.
Three cities had fallen into the sea, their vacuumbladders punctured by beam
weapons. There could not have been any survivors. Others were still aloft, but
had been set on fire. The pictures showed citizens leaping from the citiesł
berthing arms, falling like sparks. More cities had been taken bloodlessly, and
were now under control of the disciples. None of those cities were transmitting
now. It was the end of the world. Naqi knew that she should be weeping, or at
the very least feel some writhing sense of loss in her stomach. But all she got
was a sense of denial; a refusal to accept that events could have escalated so
quickly. This morning the only hint of wrongness had been a single absent disciple.
ęThere are tens of thousands of them up there,ł Weir said. ęAll that youłve
seen so far is the advance guard.ł Naqi scratched her forearm. It was itching, as
if she had caught a dose of sunburn. ęMoreau was in on this?ł

ęCaptain Moreaułs a puppet. Literally. The body you saw was
just being tele-operated by orbital disciples. They murdered the Ultras and
commandeered the Shipł

ęRafael, why didnłt you tell us this before?ł

ęMy position was too vulnerable. I was the only anti-Ormazd
agent my movement managed to put aboard Voice of Evening. If Iłd attempted to
warn the Turquoise authorities ... Well, work it out for yourself. Almost
certainly I wouldnłt have been believed, and the disciples would have found a
way to silence me before I became an embarrassment. And it wouldnłt have made a
difference to their takeover plans. My only hope was to destroy the ocean, to
remove its usefulness to them. They might still have destroyed your cities out
of spite, but at least theyłd have lost the final thread that connected them to
their martyr.ł Weir leaned closer to her. ęDonłt you understand? It wouldnłt
have stopped with the disciples aboard the Voice. Theyłd have brought more
ships from Haven. Your ocean would have become a production line for despots.ł

ęWhy did they hesitate, if they had such a crushing
advantage over us?ł

ęThey didnłt know about me, so they lost nothing by
dedicating a few weeks to intelligencegathering. They wanted to know as much as
possible about Turquoise and the Jugglers before they made their move. Theyłre
brutal, but theyłre not inefficient. They wanted their takeover to be as
precise and surgical as possible.ł

ęAnd now?ł

ęTheyłve accepted that things wonłt be quite that neat and tidy.ł
He flipped the globe from one palm to another, with a casual playfulness that
Naqi found alarming. ęTheyłre serious, Naqi. Crane will stop at nothing now.
Youłve seen those blast flashes. Pinpoint anti-matter devices. Theyłve already
sterilised the organic matter within the Moat, to stop the effect of my weapon
from reaching further. If they know where we are, theyłll drop a bomb on us as
well.ł

ęHuman evil doesnłt give us the excuse to wipe out the
ocean.ł

ęItłs not an excuse, Naqi. Itłs an imperative.ł At that
moment something glinted on the horizon, something that was moving slowly from
east to west. ęThe shuttle,ł Weir said. ęItłs looking for us.ł Naqi scratched
her arm again. It was discoloured, itching. Near local noon they reached the
next node. The shuttle had continued to dog them, nosing to and fro along the
hazy band where sea met sky. Sometimes it appeared closer, sometimes it
appeared further away, but it never left them alone, and Naqi knew that it would
be only a matter of time before it detected a positive homing trace, a chemical
or physical note in the water that would lead it to its quarry. The shuttle
would cover the remaining distance in seconds, a minute at the most, and then
all that she and Weir would know would be a moment of cleansing whiteness, a
fire of holy purity. Even if Weir released his toxin just before the shuttle
arrived, it would not have time to dissipate into a wide enough volume of water
to survive the fireball.

So why was he hesitating? It was Mina, of course. Naqi had
given a name to the faceless library of stored minds he was prepared to erase.
By naming her sister, Naqi had removed the onesidedness of the moral equation,
and now Weir had to accept that his own actions could never be entirely
blameless. He was no longer purely objective. ęI should just do this,ł he said.
ęBy hesitating even for a second, Iłm betraying the trust of the people who
sent me here, people who have probably been tormented to extinction by Ormazdłs
followers by now.ł Naqi shook her head. ęIf you didnłt show doubt, youłd be as
bad as the disciples.ł

ęYou almost sound as if you want me to do it.ł She groped
for something resembling the truth, as painful as that might be. ęPerhaps I do.ł

ęEven though it would mean killing whatever part of Mina survived?ł

ęIłve lived in her shadow my entire life. Even after she died
... I always felt she was still watching me, still observing my every mistake,
still being faintly disappointed that I wasnłt living up to all she had
imagined I could be.ł

ęYoułre being harsh on yourself. Harsh on Mina too, by the
sound of things.ł

ęI know,ł Naqi said angrily. ęIłm just telling you how I
feel.ł The boat edged into a curving inlet that pushed deep into the node. Naqi
felt less vulnerable now: there was a significant depth of organic matter to
screen the boat from any sideways-looking sensors that the shuttle might have
deployed, even though the evidence suggested that the shuttlełs sensors were
mainly focused down from its hull. The disadvantage was that it was no longer
possible to keep a constant vigil on the shuttlełs movements. It could be on
its way already. She brought the boat to a halt and stood up in her control
seat. ęWhatłs happening?ł Weir asked. ęIłve come to a decision.ł

ęIsnłt that my job?ł Her angerbrief as it was, and directed
less at Weir than at the hopelessness of the situationhad evaporated. ęI mean
about swimming. Itłs the one thing we havenłt considered yet, Rafael. That
there might be a third way: a choice between accepting the disciples and
letting the ocean die.ł

ęI donłt see what that could be.ł

ęNor do I. But the ocean might find a way. It just needs the
knowledge of whatłs at stake.ł She stroked her forearm again, marvelling at the
sudden eruption of fungal patterns. They must have been latent for many years,
but now something had caused them to flare up. Even in daylight, emeralds and
blues shone against her skin. She suspected that the biochemical changes had
been triggered when she entered the water to snatch the globe. Given that, she
could not help but view it as a message. An invitation, perhaps. Or was it a
warning, reminding her of the dangers of swimming? She had no idea, but for her
peace of mind, howeverand given the lack of alternativesshe chose to view it
as an invitation. But she did not dare wonder who was inviting her. ęYou think
the ocean can understand external events?ł Weir asked. ęYou said it yourself,
Rafael: the night they told us the ship was coming, somehow that information
reached the seavia a swimmerłs memories, perhaps. And the Jugglers knew then
that this was something significant. Perhaps it was Ormazdłs personality,
rising to the fore.ł Or maybe it was merely the vast, choral mind of the ocean,
apprehending only that something was going to happen. ęEither way,ł Naqi said. ęIt
still makes me think that there might be a chance.ł

ęI only wish I shared your optimism.ł

ęGive me this chance, Rafael. Thatłs all I ask.ł Naqi
removed her clothes, less concerned that Weir would see her naked now than that
she should have something to wear when she emerged. But although Weir studied
her with unconcealed fascination, there was nothing prurient about it. What commanded
his attention, Naqi realised, were the elaborate and florid patterning of the
fungal markings. They curled and twined about her chest and abdomen and thighs,
shining with a hypnotic intensity. ęYoułre changing,ł he said. ęWe all change,ł
Naqi answered. Then she stepped from the side of the boat, into the water. The
process of descending into the oceanłs embrace was much as she remembered it
that first time, with Mina beside her. She willed her body to submit to the
biochemical invasion, forcing down her fear and apprehension, knowing that she
had been through this once before and that it was something that she could
survive again. She did her best not to think about what it would mean to
survive beyond this day, when all else had been shattered, every certainty
crumbled. Mina came to her with merciful speed. Naqi? Iłm here. Oh, Mina, Iłm
here. There was terror and there was joy, alloyed together. Itłs been so long.
Naqi felt her sisterłs presence edge in and out of proximity and focus.
Sometimes she appeared to share the same physical space. At other times she was
scarcely more than a vague feeling of attentiveness. How long? Two years, Mina.
Minałs answer took an eternity to come. In that dreadful hiatus Naqi felt other
minds crowd against her own, some of which were so far from human that she
gasped at their oddity. Mina was only one of the conformal minds that had
noticed her arrival, and not all were as benignly curious or glad. It doesnłt
feel like two years to me. How long? Days ... hours ... It changes. What do you
remember? Minałs presence danced around Naqi. I remember what I remember. That
we swam, when we werenłt meant to. That something happened to me, and I never
left the ocean. You became part of it, Mina. The triumphalism of her answer
shocked Naqi to the marrow. Yes! You wanted this? You would want it, if you
knew what it was like. You could have stayed, Naqi. You could have let it
happen to you, the way it happened to me. We were so alike. I was scared. Yes,
I remember. Naqi knew that she had to get to the heart of things. Time was
passing differently herewitness Minałs confusion about how long she had been
part of the oceanand there was no telling how patient Weir would be. He might
not wait until Naqi reemerged before deploying the Juggler killer. There was
another mind, Mina. We encountered it, and it scared me. Enough that I had to
leave the ocean. Enough that I never wanted to go back. Youłve come back now.
Itłs because of that other mind. It belonged to a man called Ormazd. Something
very bad is going to happen because of him. One way or the other. There was a
moment then that transcended anything Naqi had experienced before. She felt
herself and Mina become inseparable. She could not only not say where one began
and the other ended, but it was entirely pointless to even think in those
terms. If only fleetingly, Mina had become her. Every thought, every memory,
was open to equal scrutiny by both of them.

Naqi understood what it was like for Mina. Her sisterłs memories
were rapturous. She might only have sensed the passing of hours or days, but
that belied the richness of her experience since merging with the ocean. She
had exchanged experience with countless alien minds, drinking in entire
histories beyond normal human comprehension. And in that moment of sharing,
Naqi appreciated something of the reason for her sister having been taken in
the first place. Conformals were the oceanłs way of managing itself. Now and
then the maintenance of the vaster archive of static minds required stewardshipthe
drawing-in of independent intelligences. Mina had been selected and utilised,
and given rewards beyond imagining for her efforts. The ocean had tapped the
structure of her intelligence at a subconscious level. Only now and then had
she ever felt that she was being directly petitioned on a matter of importance.
But Ormazdłs mind ...? Mina had seen Naqiłs memories now. She would know
exactly what was at stake, and she would know exactly what that mind
represented. I was always aware of him. He wasnłt always therehe liked to hide
himselfbut even when he was absent, he left a shadow of himself. I even think
he might be the reason the ocean took me as a conformal. It sensed a coming
crisis. It knew Ormazd had something to do with it. It had made a terrible
mistake by swallowing him. So it reached out for new allies, minds it could
trust. Minds like Mina, Naqi thought. In that instant she did not know whether
to admire the Pattern Jugglers or detest them for their heartlessness. Ormazd
was contaminating it? His influence was strong. His force of personality was a
kind of poison in its own right. The Pattern Jugglers knew that, I think. Why
couldnłt they just eject his patterns? They couldnłt. It doesnłt work that way.
The sea is a storage medium, but it has no self-censoring facility. If the
individual minds detect a malign presence, they can resist it ... But Ormazdłs
mind is human. There arenłt enough of us here to make a difference, Naqi. The
other minds are too alien to recognise Ormazd for what he is. They just see a
sentience. Who made the Pattern Jugglers, Mina? Answer me that, will you? She
sensed Minałs amusement. Even the Jugglers donłt know that, Naqi. Or why. You
have to help us, Mina. You have to communicate the urgency of this to the rest
of the ocean. Iłm one mind amongst many, Naqi. One voice in the chorus. You
still have to find a way. Please, Mina. Understand this, if nothing else. You
could die. You could all die. I lost you once, but now I know you never really
went away. I donłt want to have to lose you again, for good. You didnłt lose
me, Naqi. I lost you. She hauled herself from the water. Weir was waiting where
she had left him, with the intact globe still resting in his hand. The daylight
shadows had moved a little, but not as much as she had feared. She made eye
contact with Weir, wordlessly communicating a question. ęThe shuttlełs come
closer. Itłs flown over the node twice while you were under. I think I need to
do this, Naqi.ł He had the globe between thumb and forefinger, ready to drop it
into the water. She was shivering. Naqi pulled on her shorts and shirt, but she
felt just as cold afterwards. The fungal marks were shimmering intensely; they
appeared almost to hover above her skin. If anything they were shining more
furiously than before she had swum. Naqi did not doubt that if she had lingeredif
she had stayed with Minashe would have become a conformal as well. It had
always been in her, but it was only now that her time had come. ęPlease wait,ł
Naqi said, her own voice sounding pathetic and childlike. ęPlease wait, Rafael.ł

ęThere it is again.ł

The shuttle was a fleck of white sliding over the top of the
nearest wall of Juggler biomass. It was five or six kilometres away, much
closer than the last time Naqi had seen it. Now it came to a sudden sharp halt,
hovering above the surface of the ocean as if it had found something of
particular interest. ęDo you think it knows wełre here?ł

ęIt suspects something,ł Weir said. The globe rolled between
his fingers. ęLook,ł Naqi said. The shuttle was still hovering. Naqi stood up
to get a better view, nervous of making herself visible but desperately
curious. Something was happening. She knew something was happening. Kilometres
away, the sea was bellying up beneath the shuttle. The water was the colour of
moss, supersaturated with micro-organisms. Naqi watched as a coil of solid
green matter reached from the ocean, twisting and writhing. It was as thick as
a building, spilling vast rivulets of water as it emerged. It extended upwards
with astonishing haste, bifurcating and flexing like a groping fist. For a
brief moment it closed around the shuttle. Then it slithered back into the sea
with a titanic splash; a prolonged roar of spent energy. The shuttle continued
to hover above the same spot, as if oblivious to what had just happened. Yet
the manta-shaped craftłs white hull was lathered with various hues of green.
And Naqi understood: what had happened to the shuttle was what had happened to
Arviat, the city that drowned. She could not begin to guess the crime that
Arviat had committed against the sea, the crime that had merited its
destruction, but she could believenow, at leastthat the Jugglers had been
capable of dragging it beneath the waves, ripping the main mass of the city
away from the bladders that held it aloft. And of course such a thing would
have to be kept maximally secret, known only to a handful of individuals. For
otherwise no city would ever feel safe when the sea roiled and groaned beneath
it. But a city was not a shuttle. Even if the Juggler material started eating
away the fabric of the shuttle, it would still take hours to do any serious
damage ... And that was assuming the Ultras had no better protection than the
ceramic shielding used on Turquoise boats and machines ... But the shuttle was
already tilting over. Naqi watched it pitch, attempt to regain stability and
then pitch again. She understood, belatedly. The organic matter was clogging
the shuttlełs whisking propulsion systems, limiting its ability to hover. The
shuttle was curving inexorably closer to the sea, spiralling steeply away from
the node. It approached the surface and then, just before the moment of impact,
another misshapen fist of organised matter thrust from the sea, seizing the
hull in its entirety. That was the last Naqi saw of it. A troubled calm fell on
the scene. The sky overhead was unmarred by questing machinery. Only the thin
whisper of smoke rising from the horizon, in the direction of the Moat, hinted
of the dayłs events. Minutes passed, and then tens of minutes. Then a rapid series
of bright flashes strobed from beneath the surface of the sea itself. ęThat was
the shuttle,ł Weir said, wonderingly. Naqi nodded. ęThe Jugglers are fighting
back. This is more or less what I hoped would happen.ł

ęYou asked for this?ł

ęI think Mina understood what was needed. Evidently she managed
to convince the rest of the ocean, or at least this part of it.ł

ęLetłs see.ł They searched the airwaves again. The comsat
network was dead, or silent. Even fewer cities were transmitting now. But those
that werethose that had not been overrun by Ormazdłs disciplestold a
frightening story. The ocean was clawing at them, trying to drag them into the
sea. Weather patterns were shifting, entire storms being conjured into
existence by the orchestrated circulation of vast ocean currents. It was
happening in concentric waves, racing away from the precise point in the ocean
where Naqi had swum. Some cities had already fallen into the sea, though it was
not clear whether this had been brought about by the Jugglers themselves or
because of damage to their vacuum-bladders. There were people in the water:
hundreds, thousands of them. They were swimming, trying to stay afloat, trying
not to drown. But what exactly did it mean to drown on Turquoise? ęItłs
happening all over the planet,ł Naqi said. She was still shivering, but now it
was as much a shiver of awe as one of cold. ęItłs denying itself to us by
smashing our cities.ł

ęYour cities never harmed it.ł

ęI donłt think itłs really that interested in making a
distinction between one bunch of people and another, Rafael. Itłs just getting
rid of us all, disciples or not. You canłt really blame it for that, can you?ł

ęIłm sorry,ł Weir said. He cracked the globe, spilled its contents
into the sea. Naqi knew there was nothing she could do now; there was no
prospect of recovering the tiny black grains. She would only have to miss one,
and it would be as bad as missing them all. The little black grains vanished
beneath the olive surface of the water. It was done. Weir looked at her, his
eyes desperate for forgiveness. ęYou understand that I had to do this, donłt
you? It isnłt something I do lightly.ł

ęI know. But it wasnłt necessary. The oceanłs already turned
against us. Crane has lost. Ormazd has lost.ł

ęPerhaps youłre right,ł Weir said. ęBut I couldnłt take the
chance that we might be wrong. At least this way I know for sure.ł

ęYoułve murdered a world.ł He nodded. ęItłs exactly what I
came here to do. Please donłt blame me for it.ł Naqi opened the equipment
locker where she had stowed the broken vial of Juggler toxin. She removed the
flare pistol, snatched away its safety pin and pointed it at Weir. ęI donłt
blame you, no. Donłt even hate you for it.ł He started to say something, but
Naqi cut him off. ęBut itłs not something I can forgive.ł She sat in silence,
alone, until the node became active. The organic structures around her were beginning
to show the same kinds of frantic rearrangement Naqi had seen within the Moat.
There was a cold sharp breeze from the nodełs heart. It was time to leave. She
steered the boat away from the node, cautiously, still not completely convinced
that she was safe from the delegates even though the first shuttle had been destroyed.
Undoubtedly the loss of that craft would have been communicated to the others,
and before very long some more of them would arrive, bristling with
belligerence. The ocean might attempt to destroy the new arrivals, but this
time the delegates would be profoundly suspicious. She brought the boat to a
halt when she was a kilometre from the fringe of the node. By then it was
running through the same crazed alterations she had previously witnessed. She
felt the same howling wind of change. In a moment the end would come. The toxin
would seep into the nodełs controlling core, instructing the entire biomass to
degrade itself to a lump of dumb vegetable matter. The same killing
instructions would already be travelling along the internode tendril
connections, winging their way over the horizon. Allowing for the topology of
the network, it would only take fifteen or twenty hours for the message to
reach every node on the planet. Within a day it would be over. The Jugglers
would be gone, the information theyłd encoded erased beyond recall. And
Turquoise itself would begin to die at the same time, its oxygen atmosphere no
longer maintained by the oceanic organisms. Another five minutes passed, then
ten.

The nodełs transformations were growing less hectic. She recalled
this moment of false calm. It meant only that the node had given up trying to
counteract the toxin, accepting the logical inevitability of its fate. A
thousand times over this would be repeated around Turquoise. Towards the end,
she guessed, there would be less resistance, for the sheer futility of it would
have been obvious. The world would accept its fate. Another five minutes
passed. The node remained. The structures were changing, but only gently. There
was no sign of the emerging mound of undifferentiated matter she had seen
before. What was happening? She waited another quarter of an hour and then
steered the boat back towards the node, bumping past Weirłs floating corpse on
the way. Tentatively, an idea was forming in her mind. It appeared that the
node had absorbed the toxin without dying. Was it possible that Weir had made a
mistake? Was it possible that the toxinłs effectiveness depended only on it
being used once? Perhaps. There still had to be tendril connections between the
Moat and the rest of the ocean at the time that the first wave of
transformations had taken place. They had been severed latereither when the
doors closed, or by some autonomic process within the extended organism itselfbut
until that moment, there would still have been informational links with the
wider network of nodes. Could the dying nodes have sent sufficient warning that
the other nodes were now able to find a strategy for protecting themselves?
Again, perhaps. It never paid to take anything for granted where the Jugglers
were concerned. She parked the boat by the nodełs periphery. Naqi stood up and
removed her clothes for the final time, certain that she would not need them
again. She looked down at herself, astonished at the vivid tracery of green
that now covered her body. On one level, the evidence of alien cellular
invasion was quite horrific. On another, it was startlingly beautiful. Smoke
licked from the horizon. Machines clawed through the sky, hunting nervously.
She stepped to the edge of the boat, tensing herself at the moment of
commitment. Her fear subsided, replaced by an intense, loving calm. She stood
on the threshold of something alien, but in place of terror what she felt was
only an imminent sense of homecoming. Mina was waiting for her below. Together,
nothing could stop them. Naqi smiled, spread her arms and returned to the sea.

Understanding Space And Time

�Mars ainłt the kind of place to raise your kids"



Part One



Something very strange appeared in the outer recreation
bubble on the day that Katrina Solovyova died. When he saw it, John Renfrew
rushed back to the infirmary where he had left her. Solovyova had been slipping
in and out of lucidity for days, but when he arrived he was glad to find her
still conscious. She seldom turned her face away from the picture window,
transfixed by the silent and vast twilight landscape beyond the armoured glass.
Hovering against the foothills of Pavonis Mons, her reflection was all
highlights, as if sketched in bold strokes of chalk.

Renfrew caught his breath before speaking.

�Iłve seen a piano."

At first he did not think she had heard him. Then the
reflection of Solovyovałs mouth formed words.

�Youłve seen a what?"

�A piano," Renfrew said, laughing. �A big, white,
B�sendorfer grand."

�Youłre crazier than me."

�It was in the recreation bubble," Renfrew said. �The one
that took a lightning hit last week. I think it fried something. Or unfried
something, maybe. Brought something back to life."

�A piano?"

�Itłs a start. It means things arenłt totally dead. That
therełs a glimmer of ... something."

�Well, isnłt that the nicest timing," Solovyova said.

With a creak of his knees Renfrew knelt by her bedside. Hełd
connected Solovyova to a dozen or so medical monitors, only three of which were
working properly. They hummed, hissed and bleeped with deadening regularity.
When it began to seem like musicwhen he started hearing hidden harmonies and
tonal shiftsRenfrew knew it was time to get out of the infirmary. That was why
he had gone to the recreation bubble: there was no music there, but at least he
could sit in silence.

�Nicest timing?" he said.

�Iłm dying. Nothing that happens now will make any difference
to me."

�But maybe it would," Renfrew said. �If the rec systems are
capable of coming back on line, what else might be? Maybe I could get the
infirmary back up and running ... the diagnostic suite ... the drug synth ..."
He gestured at the banks of dead grey monitors and cowled machines parked
against the wall. They were covered in scuffed decals and months of dust.

�Pray for another lightning strike, you mean?"

�No ... not necessarily." Renfrew chose his words with care.
He did not want to offer Solovyova false optimism, but the apparition had made
him feel more positive than at any time he could remember since the
Catastrophe. They could not unmake the deaths of all the other colonists, or
unmake the vastly larger death that even now it was difficult mention. But if
some of the base systems they had assumed broken could be brought back, he
might at least find a way to keep Solovyova alive.

�What, then?"

�I donłt know. But now that I know that things arenłt as bad
as we feared ..." He trailed off. �There are lots of things I could try again.
Just because they didnłt work first time ..."

�You probably imagined the piano."

�I know I didnłt. It was a genuine projection, not a
hallucination."

�And this piano ..." The reflection froze momentarily. �How
long did it last, Renfrew? I mean, just out of curiosity?"

�Last?"

�Thatłs what I asked."

�Itłs still there," he said. �It was still there when I
left. Like it was waiting for someone to come and play it."

The figure in the bed moved slightly.

�I donłt believe you."

�I canłt show you, Solovyova. I wish I could, but ..."

�Iłll die? Iłm going to die anyway, so what difference does
it make?" She paused, allowing the melancholic chorus of the machines to swell
and fill the room. �Probably by the end of the week. And all Iłve got to look
forward to is the inside of this room or the view out this window. At least let
me see something different."

�Is this what you really want?"

Solovyovałs reflection tipped in acknowledgement. �Show me
the piano, Renfrew. Show me you arenłt making this shit up."

He thought about it for a minute, perhaps two, and then
dashed back to the recreation bubble to check that the piano was still there.
The journey took several minutes even at a sprint, through sunken tunnels and
window-lined connecting bridges, up and down grilled ramps, through ponderous
internal airlocks and sweltering aeroponics labs, taking this detour or that to
avoid a blown bubble or failed airlock.

Parts of the infrastructure creaked ominously as he passed
through. Here and there his feet crunched through the sterile red dust that was
always finding ways to seep through seals and cracks. Everything was decaying,
falling apart. Even if the dead had been brought back to life the base would
not have been able to support more than a quarter of their number. But the
piano represented something other than the slow grind of entropy. If one system
had survived apparent failure, the same might be true of others.

He reached the bubble, his eyes closed as he crossed the threshold.
He half expected the piano to be gone, never more than a trick of the mind. Yet
there it was: still manifesting, still hovering a few inches from the floor.
Save for that one suggestion of ghostliness, it appeared utterly solid, as real
as anything else in the room. It was a striking pure white, polished to a
lambent gloss. Renfrew strode around it, luxuriating in the conjunction of flat
planes and luscious curves. He had not noticed this detail before, but the keys
were still hidden under the folding cover.

He admired the piano for several more minutes, forgetting
his earlier haste. It was as beautiful as it was chilling.

Remembering Solovyova, he returned to the infirmary.

�You took your time," she said.

�Itłs still there, but I had to be sure. You certain you
want to see it?"

�I havenłt changed my mind. Show me the damned thing."

With great gentleness he unplugged the vigilant machines and
wheeled them aside. He could not move the bed, so he took Solovyova from it and
placed her in a wheelchair. He had long grown accustomed to how frail human
bodies felt in Martian gravity, but the ease with which he lifted her was
shocking, and a reminder of how close to death she was.

Hełd hardly known her before the Catastrophe. Even in the
days that followedas the sense of isolation closed in on the base, and the
first suicides beganit had taken a long time for them to drift together. It
had happened at a party, the one that the colonists had organised to celebrate
the detection of a radio signal from Earth; originating from an organised band
of survivors in New Zealand. In New Zealand they had still had something like a
government, something like society, with detailed plans for long-term endurance
and reconstruction. And for a little while it had seemed that the survivors
mightby some unexplained meanshave acquired immunity to the weaponised virus
that had started scything its way through the rest of humanity in June 2038.

They hadnłt. It just took a little longer than average to
wipe them out.

Renfrew pushed her along the tortuous route that led back to
the bubble.

�Why a ... what did you call it?"

�A B�sendorfer. A B�sendorfer grand piano. I donłt know.
Thatłs just what it said."

�Something it dragged up from its memory? Was it making any
music?"

�No. Not a squeak. The keyboard was hidden under a cover."

�There must be someone to play it," Solovyova said.

�Thatłs what I thought." He pushed her onward. �Music would
make a difference, at least. Wouldnłt it?"

�Anything would make a difference."

Except not for Solovyova, he thought. Very little was going
to make a difference for Solovyova from this point on.

�Renfrew ..." Solovyova said, her tone softer than before. �Renfrew,
when Iłm gone ... youłll be all right, wonłt you?"

�You shouldnłt worry about me."

�It wouldnłt be human not to. Iłd change places if I could."

�Donłt be daft."

�You were a good man. You didnłt deserve to be the last of
us."

Renfrew tried to sound dignified. �Some might say being the
last survivor is a sort of privilege."

�But not me. I donłt envy you. I know for a fact I couldnłt
handle it."

�Well, I can. I looked at my psychological evaluation.
Practical, survivor mentality, they said."

�I believe it," Solovyova said. �But donłt let it get to
you. Understand? Keep some self respect. For all of us. For me."

He knew exactly what she meant by that.

The recreation bubble loomed around the curve in the
corridor. There was a moment of trepidation as they neared, but then he saw the
white corner of the floating piano, still suspended in the middle of the room,
and sighed with relief.

�Thank God," he said. �I didnłt imagine it."

He pushed Solovyova into the bubble, halting the wheelchair
before the hovering apparition. Its immense mass reminded him of a chiselled
cloud. The polished white gleam was convincing, but there was no sign of their
own reflections within it. Solovyova said nothing, merely staring into the
middle of the room.

�Itłs changed," he said. �Look. The coverłs gone up. You can
see the keys. They look so real ... I could almost reach out and touch them.
Except I canłt play the piano." He grinned back at the woman in the wheelchair.
�Never could. Never had a musical bone in my body."

�There is no piano, Renfrew."

�Solovyova?"

�I said, there is no piano. The room is empty." Her voice
was dead, utterly drained of emotion. She did not even sound disappointed or
annoyed. �There is no piano. No grand piano. No B�sendorfer grand piano. No
keyboard. No nothing. Youłre hallucinating, Renfrew. Youłre imagining the
piano."

He looked at her in horror. �I can still see it. Itłs here."
He reached out to the abstract white mass. His fingers punched through its
skin, into thin air. But he had expected that.

He could still see the piano.

It was real.

�Take me back to the infirmary, Renfrew. Please." Solovyova
paused. �I think Iłm ready to die now."

* * * *

He put on a suit and buried Solovyova beyond the outer perimeter,
close to the mass grave where he had buried the last survivors when Solovyova
had been too weak to help. The routine felt familiar enough, but when Renfrew
turned back to the base he felt a wrenching sense of difference. The low-lying
huddle of soil-covered domes, tubes and cylinders hadnłt changed in any
tangible way, except that it was now truly uninhabited. He was walking back
toward an empty house, and even when Solovyova had been illeven when Solovyova
had been only half presentthat had never been the case.

The moment reached a kind of crescendo. He considered his
options. He could return to the base, alone, and survive months or years on the
dwindling resources at his disposal. Tharsis Base would keep him alive
indefinitely provided he did not fall ill: food and water were not a problem,
and the climate recycling systems were deliberately rugged. But there would be
no companionship. No network, no music or film, no television or VR. Nothing to
look forward to except endless bleak days until something killed him.

Or he could do it here, now. All it would take was a twist
of his faceplate release control. He had already worked out how to override the
safety lock. A few roaring seconds of pain and it would all be over. And if he
lacked the courage to do it that wayand he thought he probably didthen he
could sit down and wait until his air-supply ran low.

There were a hundred ways he could do it, if he had the
will.

He looked at the base, stark under the pale butterscotch of
the sky. The choice was laughably simple. Die here now, or die in there, much
later. Either way, his choice would be unrecorded. There would be no eulogies
to his bravery, for there was no one left to write eulogies.

�Why me?" he asked, aloud. �Why is it me who has to go
through with this?"

Hełd felt no real anger until that moment. Now he felt like
shouting, but all he could do was fall to his knees and whimper. The question
circled in his head, chasing its own tail.

�Why me," he said. �Why is it me? Why the fuck is it me who
has to ask this question?"

Finally he fell silent. He remained frozen in that position,
staring down through the scuffed glass of his faceplate at the
radiation-blasted soil between his knees. For five or six minutes he listened
to the sound of his own sobbing. Then a small, polite voice advised him that he
needed to return to the base to replenish his air supply. He listened to that
voice as it shifted from polite to stern, then from stern to strident, until it
was screaming into his skull, the boundary of his faceplate flashing brilliant
red.

Then he stood up, already light-headed, already feeling the
weird euphoric intoxication of asphyxia, and made his ambling way back toward
the base.

He had made a choice. Like it said in the psych report, he
was a practical-minded, survivor type. He would not give in.

Not until it got a lot harder.

* * * *

Renfrew made it through his first night alone.

It was easier than he had expected, although he was careful
not to draw any comfort from that. He knew that there would be much harder days
and nights ahead. It might happen a day or a week or even a year from now, but
when it did he was sure that his little breakdown outside would shrink to
insignificance. For now he was stumbling through fog, fully aware that a
precipice lay before him, and also that he would have to step over that
precipice if he hoped to find anything resembling mental equilibrium and true
acceptance.

He wandered the corridors and bubbles of the base.
Everything looked shockingly familiar. Books were where he had left them; the
coffee cups and dishes still waiting to be washed. The views through the
windows hadnłt become mysteriously more threatening overnight, and he had no
sense that the interior of the base had become less hospitable. There were no
strange new sounds to make the back of his neck tingle; no shadows flitting at
the corner of his eye, no blood freezing sense of scrutiny by an unseen watcher.

And yet ... and yet. He knew something was not quite right.
After he had attended to his usual chorescleaning this or that air filter,
lubricating this or that seal, scrutinising the radio logs to make sure no one
had attempted contact from homehe again made his way to the recreation bubble.

The piano was still there, but something was different about
it today. Now there was a single gold candelabra sitting above the keyboard.
The candles burned, wavering slightly.

It was as if the piano was readying itself.

Renfrew leaned through the piano and passed his fingers
through the candle flames. They were as insubstantial as the instrument itself.
Even so, he could not help but sniff the tips of his fingers. His brain refused
to accept that the flames were unreal, and expected a whiff of carbon or
charred skin.

Renfrew remembered something.

He had spent so long in the base, so long inside its
electronic cocoon, that until this moment he had forgotten precisely how the
bubble worked. The things that appeared inside it were not true holograms, but
projections mapped into his visual field. They were woven by tiny implants
buried in the eye, permitting the images to have a sense of solidity that would
have been impossible with any kind of projected hologram. The surgical
procedure to embed the implants had taken about thirty seconds, and from that
moment on he had never really needed to think about it. The implants allowed
the base staff to digest information in vastly richer form than allowed by flat
screens and clumsy holographics. When Renfrew examined a mineral sample, for
instance, the implant would overlay his visual impression of the rock with an
X-ray tomographic view of the rockłs interior. The implants had also permitted
access to recreational recordings ... but Renfrew had always been too busy for
that kind of thing. When the implants began to failtheyłd never been designed
to last more than a year or two in vivo, before replacementRenfrew had thought
no more of the matter.

But what if his had started working again? In that case it
was no wonder Solovyova had not been able to see the piano. Some projection
system had decided to switch on again, accessing some random fragment from the
entertainment archives, and his reactivated implant had chosen to allow him to
see it.

It meant there was still a kind of hope.

�Hello."

Renfrew flinched at the voice. The source of it was immediately
obvious: a small man had appeared out of nowhere at the end of the piano. The
small man stood for a moment, pivoting around as if to acknowledge a vast and
distant invisible audience, his eyeslargely hidden behind ostentatious pink
glassesonly meeting Renfrewłs for the briefest of instants. The man settled
into a stool that had also appeared at the end of the piano, tugged up the
sleeves of the plum paisley suit jacket he wore, and began to play the piano.
The manłs fingers were curiously stubby, but they moved up and down the
keyboard with a beguiling ease.

Transfixed, Renfrew listened to the man play. It was the
first real music he had heard in two years. The man could have played the most
uncompromisingly difficult exercise in atonality and it would still have
sounded agreeable to Renfrewłs ears. But it was much easier than that. The man
played the piano and sang a song; one that Renfrew recognisedalbeit barelyfrom
his childhood. It had been an old song even then, but one that was still played
on the radio with some regularity. The man sang about a trip to Mars: a song
about a man who did not expect to see home again.

The song concerned a rocket man.

* * * *

Renfrew maintained the ritual that he and Solovyova had established
before her death. Once a week, without fail, he cocked an ear to Earth to see
if anyone was sending.

The ritual had become less easy in recent weeks. The linkage
between the antenna and the inside of the base was broken, so he had to go
outside to perform the chore. It meant pre-breathing; it meant suiting up; it
meant a desolate trudge from the airlock to the ladder on the side of the comms
module, and then a careful ascent to the modulełs roof, where the antenna was
mounted on a turret-like plinth. Hełd spend at least half an hour scooping
handfuls of storm dust from the steering mechanism, before flipping open the
cover on the manual control panel, powering up the system and tapping a
familiar string of commands into the keyboard.

After a few moments the antenna would begin to move, grinding
as it overcame the resistance of the dust that had already seeped into its
innards. It swung and tilted on multiple axes, until the openwork mesh of the
dish was locked onto the Earth. Then the system waited and listened, LEDs
blinking on the status board, but none of them brightening to the hard, steady
green that would mean the antenna had locked onto the expected carrier signal.
Occasionally the lights would flicker green, as if the antenna was picking up
ghost echoes from something out there, but they never lasted.

Renfrew had to keep trying. He wasnłt expecting rescue, not
any more. Hełd resigned himself to the idea that he was going to die on Mars,
alone. But it would still be some comfort to know that there were survivors
back on Earth; that there were still people who could begin to rebuild
civilisation. Better still if they had the kindness to signal him, to let him
know what was happening. Even if only a few thousand people had survived, it
wouldnłt take much for one of them to remember the Mars colony, and wonder what
was happening up there.

But Earth remained silent. Some part of Renfrew knew that
there would never be a signal, no matter how many times he swung the dish
around and listened. And one day soon the dish was simply not going to work,
and he was not going to be able to repair it. Dutifully, when he had powered
down the antenna and returned to the inside of the base, he made a neat entry
in the communications log, signing his name at the top of the page.

On his rounds of the base, Renfrew made similar entries in
many other logs. He noted breakdowns and his own ramshackle repair efforts. He
took stock of spare parts and tools, entering the broken or life-expired items
into the resupply request form. He noted the health of the plants in the
aeroponics lab, sketching their leaves and marking the ebb and flow of various
diseases. He kept a record of the Martian weather, as it tested the basełs
integrity, and at the back of his mind he always imagined Solovyova nodding in
approval, pleased with his stoic refusal to slide into barbarism.

But in all his bookkeeping, Renfrew never once referred to
the man at the piano. He couldnłt quite explain this omission, but something
held him back from mentioning the apparition. He felt he could rationalise the
appearance of the piano, even of the personality that was programmed to play
it, but he still wasnłt sure that any of it was real.

Not that that stopped the piano man from appearing.

Once or twice a day, most days, he assumed existence at the
piano and played a song or two. Sometimes Renfrew was there when it happened;
sometimes he was elsewhere in the base and he heard the music starting up.
Always he dropped whatever he was doing and raced to the recreation bubble, and
listened.

The tunes were seldom the same from day to day, and the
small man himself never looked quite the same. His clothes were always
different, but there was more to it than that. Sometimes he had a shapeless mop
of auburn hair. At other times he was balding or concealed his crown beneath a
variety of ostentatious hats. He frequently wore glasses of elaborate,
ludicrous design.

The man had never introduced himself, but once or twice Renfrew
felt that he was close to remembering his name. He racked his memory for the
names of twentieth century musicians, feeling sure it would come to him
eventually.

In the meantime he found that it helped to have someone to
talk to. Between songs the man would sometimes sit silently, hands folded in
his lap, as if waiting for some instruction or request from Renfrew. That was
when Renfrew talked aloud, unburdening himself of whatever thoughts had been
spinning around in his skull since the last visitation. He told the man about
the problems with the base, about his loneliness, about the despair he felt
every time the antenna failed to pick up anything from Earth. And the man
simply sat and listened, and when Renfrew was donewhen he had said his
piece-the man would unlace his fingers and start playing something.

Now and then the man did speak, but he never seemed to be
addressing Renfrew so much as a larger unseen audience. Hełd introduce the
songs, tell a few jokes between numbers, throw out an offer to take requests.
Renfrew sometimes answered, sometimes tried to persuade the pianist to play one
of the songs hełd already performed, but nothing he said seemed to reach
through to the man.

But still: it was better than nothing. Although the style of
the music never varied greatly, and one or two of the songs began occasionally
to chafe at Renfrewłs nerves, he was generally happiest when the music was
playing. He liked A Song For Guy, I Guess Thatłs Why They Call It The Blues,
Tiny Dancer. When the piano man was playing, he did not feel truly alone.

* * * *

Renfrew made a point of tending to Solovyovałs grave. He
cared about the other dead, but Solovyova mattered more: shełd been the last to
go, the last human being Renfrew would ever know in his life. It would be too
much work to keep the dust from covering the mass burial site, but he could at
least do something for Solovyova. Sometimes he detoured to clean her grave when
he was outside on the antenna duty; other times he pre-breathed and suited up
just for Solovyova, and always when he returned to the base he felt cleansed,
renewed of purpose, determined that he could get through the days ahead.

That feeling didnłt last long. But at least tending the
grave kept the darkness at bay for a while.

There were moments when his stratagems failed, when the reality
of his situation came crashing back in its full existential horror, but when
that happened he was able to slam a mental door almost as soon as the scream
had begun. As time had passed he had found that he became more adept at it, so
that the moments of horror became only instants, like blank white frames
spliced into the movie of his life.

When he was outside, he often found himself watching the
sky, especially when the cold sun was low and twilight stars began to stud the
butterscotch sky. A thought occurred to him, clean and bright and diamond hard:
humanity might be gone, but did that necessarily mean he was the last
intelligent creature in the universe? What if there was someone else out there?

How did that change the way he felt?

And what if there was in fact no one else out there at all:
just empty light years, empty parsecs, empty megaparsecs, all the way out to
furthest, faintest galaxies, teetering on the very edge of the visible
universe?

How did that make him feel?

Cold. Alone. Fragile.

Curiously precious.



Part Two



Weeks slipped into months, months slipped into a long
Martian year. The base kept functioning, despite Renfrewłs grimmest expectations.
Certain systems actually seemed to be more stable than at any time since
Solovyovałs death, as if theyłd grudgingly decided to cooperate in keeping him
alive. For the most part, Renfrew was glad that he did not have to worry about
the base failing him. It was only in his darkest moments that he wished for the
base to kill him, swiftly, painlessly, perhaps when he was already asleep and
dreaming of better times. Therełd be nothing undignified about going out that
way; nothing that violated the terms of his vow with Solovyova. She wouldnłt
think badly of him for wishing death on those terms.

But the fatal failure never came, and for many days in a
given month Renfrew managed not to think about suicide. He supposed that he had
passed through the anger and denial phases of his predicament, into something
like acceptance.

It helped to have someone to talk to.

He spoke to the piano man a lot now, quite
unselfconsciously. The odd thing was that the piano man spoke back, too. On one
level, Renfrew was well aware that the responses were entirely in his
imagination; that his brain had started filling in the other half of the
one-sided conversation, based around the speech patterns that the piano man
used between songs. On another level the responses seemed completely real and
completely outside his own control, as if he no longer had access to the part
of his brain that was generating them. A form of psychosis, perhaps: but even
if that were the case, it was benign, even comforting, in its effects. If the
thing that kept him sane was a little self-administered madness, confined
solely to the piano man, then that seemed a small price to pay.

He still didnłt know the manłs real name. It was nearly
there, but Renfrew could never quite bring it to mind. The piano man offered no
clues. He introduced his songs by name, often spinning elaborate stories around
them, but never had cause to say who he was. Renfrew had tried to access the
rec systemłs software files, but hełd given up as soon as he was confronted by
screen after screen of scrolling possibilities. He could have delved deeper,
but he was wary of breaking the fragile spell that had brought the piano man
into existence in the first place. Renfrew reckoned it was better not to know,
than lose that one flicker of companionship.

�Itłs not exactly a rich human life," Renfrew said.

�Probably not." Piano Man glanced at the window, out towards
the point where the others had been buried. �But you have to admit. Itłs a hell
of a lot better than the alternative."

�I suppose so," Renfrew said doubtfully. �But what am I
meant to do with the rest of my life? I canłt just mope around here until I
drop dead."

�Well, thatłs always one possibility. But what about doing
something a little bit more constructive?"

Piano Man fingered the keys, sketching a tune.

�Learn to play the piano? No point, is there? Not while youłre
around."

�Donłt count on me always being here, luv. But I was
thinking more along the lines of a bit of reading. There are books, arenłt
there? I mean real ones."

Renfrew imagined Piano Man miming the opening of a book. He
nodded in return, without much enthusiasm. �Nearly a thousand."

�Must have cost a bomb to bring them here."

�They didnłtnot most of them, anyway. They were printed
locally, using recycled organic matter. The printing and binding was totally
automatic, and you could ask for a copy of just about any book that had ever
been printed. Of course it doesnłt work now ... the thousand is all wełve got
left."

�You already know this, Renfrew. Why are you telling me?"

�Because you asked."

�OK. Fair enough." Piano Man pushed his glasses back onto
the bridge of his little nub of a nose. �A thousand books, though: that should
keep you going for a while."

Renfrew shook his head. He had already glanced through the
books and he knew that there were a lot less than a thousand that were of any
interest to him. Most of the books had been produced purely for recreational
value, since the technical journals and documentation had always been available
for consultation via the optic implants or handhelds. At least two hundred
volumes were childrenłs books or juvenile material. Another three hundred were
in Russian, French, Japanese or some other language he did not understand. He
had time, but not that much time.

�So there are how many leftwhat? Five hundred or so that
you might want to read?"

�It isnłt that easy either," Renfrew said. �I tried reading
fiction. Bad mistake. It was too depressing, reading about other people going
about their lives before the accident."

Piano Man peered at him over the rims of his glasses. �Fussy
bugger arenłt you. So whatłs left if we throw out the fiction?"

�It doesnłt get much better. Travelogues ... historical
biographies ... atlases and books on natural history ... all any of it does is
remind me of what Iłm never going to see again. Never another rainstorm. Never
another bird, never another ocean, never another ..."

�OK, point made. Fine: throw out the coffee table booksguests
are going to be a bit thin on the ground anyway. What does that leave us with?"

Renfrew had done exactly that, his pile of books becoming
smaller. There were philosophical texts: Wittgensteinłs Philosophical
Investigations; Sartrełs Being and Nothingness; Foucaultłs The Order of Things;
a dozen others.

�Who had those printed?"

�I donłt know."

�Must have been a right lonely sod, whoever he was. Still;
did you make any progress with them?"

�I gave them my best shot."

Renfrew had flicked through them, allured and at the same
time appalled at the density of the philosophical speculation within them. On
one level, they dealt with the most fundamental of human questions. But the
books were so detached from anything that Renfrew considered mundane reality
that he could consult them without triggering the episodes of loss and horror
that came with the other books. That was not to say that he dismissed the arguments
in the books as irrelevant, but because the books dealt with human experience
in the mass there was far less than pain than when Renfrew was forced to
consider a specific individual other than himself. He could deal with the
thought of losing the rest of humanity.

It was the idea of losing anyone specific that cut him open.

�So the heavy German guys werenłt a total waste of time. All
right. What else?"

�Well, there was a Bible," Renfrew said.

�Read it much?"

�Religiously." Renfrew shrugged. �Sorry. Bad joke."

�And now ... after the accident?"

�I must admit Iłve started thinking about some things I
never thought about before. Why wełre here. Why Iłm here. What it all means.
What itłll all mean when Iłm gone. That doesnłt mean I expect to find any
useful answers."

�Maybe youłre not looking in quite the right place. What
else was left in your pile?"

�Scientific stuff," Renfrew said. �Mathematics, quantum
theory, relativity, cosmology ..."

�I thought you told me all that stuff was available on the
handhelds?"

�These are more like textbooks. Not bang up to date, but not
horribly out of date either. Someonełs idea of light reading."

�Looks like youłre stuck with them, in that case. They
shouldnłt be too daunting, should they? I thought you were a scientist as well."

�A geologist," Renfrew told him. �And you donłt need much
tensor algebra to study rocks."

�You can always learn. Youłve got plenty of time. Andletłs
face itit has to be easier than Japanese, doesnłt it?"

�I suppose so. You still havenłt told me why I should
bother."

Piano Man looked at him with sudden seriousness, the
mirrored facets of his glasses like holes punched through to some burnished
silver realm. �Because of what you just said. Because of the questions you want
answered."

�You think a load of physics books is going to make a difference?"

�Thatłs up to you. Itłs all a question of how much you want
to understand. How deep you want to go."

Piano Man turned back to the keyboard and started playing
Saturday Nightłs All Right for Fighting.

* * * *

Piano Man was right. It was a question of how deep he wanted
to go.

But surely there was more to it than that. Something else
was spurring him on. It felt like a weird sense of obligation, an onus that
weighed upon him with pressing, judicial force. He was certain now that he was
the last man alive, having long since abandoned hope that anyone was left on
Earth. Was it not therefore almost required of him to come to some final
understanding of what it meant to be human, achieving some final synthesis of
all the disparate threads in the books before him? There could only be one
witness to his success, he knew, but it seemed that if he were to fail he would
be letting down the billions who had come before him. He could almost feel the
weight of their expectation reaching to him from the past, urging him to come
to that difficult understanding that had always eluded them. They were dead but
he was still alive, and now they were looking over his shoulder, anxiously
waiting to see how he solved the puzzle that had bettered them.

�Hey, genius?" Piano Man asked, a week into his study. �Solved
the mysteries of the universe yet?"

�Donłt be silly. Iłve only just begun."

�OK. But I take it youłve made at least a smidgeon of
progress." Piano Man wore a sparkling white suit and enormous star-shaped
spectacles. He was grinning a lot and playing some of his weaker material.

�Depends what you mean by progress," Renfrew said. �If you
mean absorbing what Iłve read, and not being thrown by anything so far ..." He
shrugged. �In that case, so far itłs been a piece of piss."

�Ah-ha."

�But Iłm under no illusions that itłs going to stay that
way. In fact Iłm well aware that itłs going to get a lot harder. So far all Iłm
doing is catching up. I havenłt even begun to think about moving beyond the
existing theories."

�All right. No point trying to run before you can crawl."

�Precisely."

Piano Man swept his fingers down the keys in an exuberant
glissando. �But you can still tell me what youłve learned, canłt you?"

�Are you sure youłre interested?"

�Of course Iłm interested, luv. Why else would I ask?"

* * * *

He told Piano Man what he had learned so far.

He had read about the dual histories of cosmology and quantum
mechanics, two braids of thought that had their origins in the early twentieth
century. The one dealt with the vast and ancient, the other with the
microscopic and ephemeral. Cosmology encompassed galaxies and superclusters of
galaxies, Hubble flows and the expansion of the universe. Quantum mechanics
dealt with the fizzing, indeterminate cauldron of subatomic reality, where
things could be in more than one place at once and where apparently rock-solid
concepts like distance and the one-way flow of time became almost obscenely
pliant.

Handling the concepts of classical cosmology required an imaginative
leap, and the ability to think of space and time as facets of the same thing.
But once he had made that mental adjustment, which became slightly easier with
practise, Renfrew found that the rest was merely a question of elaboration of
scale and complexity. It was like holding the architecture of a vast, dark
cathedral in his skull. At first it required a supreme effort of will to
imagine the basic components of the building: the choir, the nave, the
transepts, the spire. Gradually, however, these major architectural elements
became fixed in his mind and he was able to start concentrating on the
embellishments, the buttresses and gargoyles. Once he was comfortable with the
classical cosmological model he found it easy enough to revise his mental floor
plan to accommodate inflationary cosmology and the various models that had
succeeded it. The scales became vaster, the leaps of perspective all the more
audacious, but he was able to envisage things within some kind of metaphoric
framework, whether it was the idea of galaxies painted on the skin of an
expanding balloon, or the ęphase transitionł of water thawing in a frozen
swimming pool.

This was not the case with quantum mechanics. Very quickly,
Renfrew realised that the only tool for understanding the quantum realm was
mathematics; all else failed. There were no convenient metaphors from everyday
human experience to assist with the visualisation of wave-particle duality, the
Heisenberg principle, quantum non-locality, or any of the other paradoxical
properties of the microscopic world. The human mind had simply not evolved the
appropriate mental machinery to deal with quantum concepts in the abstract.
Trying to ęunderstandł any of it in workaday terms was futile.

Renfrew would have found this hard to accept had he not been
in good company. Almost all of the great thinkers who had worked on quantum
mechanics had been troubled by this to one degree or another. Some had accepted
it, while others had gone to the grave with the nagging suspicion that a layer
of familiar, Newtonian order lay beneath the shifting uncertainties of QM.

Even if quantum physics was ęcorrectł, how did that fuzzy
view of reality join up with the hard-edged concepts of General Relativity? The
two theories were astoundingly successful at predicting the behaviour of the
universe within their own specified areas of application, but all attempts to
unify them had collapsed in failure. QM produced absurd results when applied to
the kinds of macroscopic objects encountered in the real world: cats, boxes,
B�sendorfer grand pianos, galactic superclusters. GR collapsed when it was used
to probe the very small, whether it was the universe an instant after the Big
Bang, or the infinitely dense, infinitely compact kernel of a black hole.

Thinkers had spent three quarters of a century chasing that
fabled unification, without success. But what if all the pieces had been in
place at the time of the Catastrophe, and all that was needed was someone to
view them with a fresh eye?

Some chance, Renfrew thought to himself. But again he
smiled. Was it arrogant to think that he could achieve what no one had managed
before? Perhaps: but given the uniqueness of his situation, nothing seemed
improbable. And even if he did not succeed in that task, who was to say that he
would not pick up one or two useful insights along the way?

At the very least it would give him something to do.

Still, he was getting ahead of himself. He had to understand
QM before he could demolish it and replace it with something even more shiny
and elegant, something which at the same time would be utterly consistent with
every verified prediction of GR and at the same time nicely resolve all the
niggling little details of observational mismatch ... while at the same time
making testable predictions of its own.

�Are you sure you still want to go through with this?" Piano
Man asked.

�Yes," Renfrew told him. �More than ever."

His companion looked out toward the burial zone. �Well, itłs
your funeral."

And then started playing Candle in the Wind.

* * * *

Renfrew powered up the antenna again. Once more it laboured
into life, gears crunching against the resistance of infiltrated dust as it
steered onto target. It was twilight and Earth was a bright star a few degrees
above the horizon. The antenna locked on, Renfrew sighting along the main axis
to confirm that the device really was pointed at the planet, and wasnłt
misaligned due to some mechanical or software fault. As always, as near as he
could judge, the dish was aimed at Earth.

He waited to see the lights on the status board, never quite
able to kill the hope that the flickering signal LED would harden into a
steady, insistent green, indicating that the antenna had picked up the expected
carrier transmission.

Never quite able to kill the hope that someone was still sending.

But the board told him the same thing it always did. No
dice: it wasnłt hearing anything beyond the random snap and crackle of
interplanetary static.

Renfrew tapped the buttons to tell the dish to stow itself
until his next visit. He stood back from the operating panel as the machinery
moved, waiting to see it stow itself safely in readiness for his next dutiful
visit.

Something shone on the panel: a momentary brightening of the
LED. It only lasted an instant, but it caught Renfrewłs attention like a glint
of gold in a prospectorłs stream. Hełd seen the antenna slew back countless
times before, and hełd never seen more than a glimmer from the LED. It had been
too hard, too clear, to be caused by random contamination, and he certainly
hadnłt imagined it.

He told himself to be calm. If the LED had brightened when
the antenna was locked onto Earthwell, that might be worth getting excited
about. Might. But as it slewed back to stow, the antenna was just sweeping over
empty sky.

All the same: plenty of cosmic radio signals out there, but
none of them should be outputting in the narrow frequency range that the
antenna was built to sniff. So maybe it had picked up something, unless the
electronics were finally going south.

One way to tell.

Renfrew told the dish to track back onto Earth. He watched
the board carefully this time, for he hadnłt been paying attention the first
time the antenna had moved.

But there it was again: that same brightening. And now that
hełd seen it twice, he saw that the LED brightened and dimmed in a systematic
fashion.

Exactly as if the dish was tracking across a concentrated
radio source.

Exactly as if something was out there.

Renfrew backed up and repeated the cycle, using manual override
to guide the antenna onto the signal. He waggled the dish until he judged that
the LED was at its brightest, then watched the steady green light with a
growing and cautious amazement.

He noted the coordinates of the source, remembering that he
had only chanced upon it by accident, and that the same slew operation wouldnłt
necessarily pick up the mystery signal a day or a week from now. But if he
recorded the position of the source now, and kept an eye on it from hour to
hour and then day to day, he should at least be able to tell if it was an
object moving inside the solar system, rather than some distant extragalactic
radio source that just happened to look artificial.

Renfrew dared not invest too much hope in the detection. But
if it was local, if it was coming from something within the system ... then it
might have serious implications.

Especially for him.

* * * *

Renfrewłs excitement was tempered with caution. He vowed not
to speak of the matter to Piano Man until he could be certain that the object
was all that he hoped it might be: some tangible sign that someone had
survived.

Hełd expected that the discovery might make it hard for him
to keep his mind on his studies, like a student distracted by something more
interesting out the window. But to his surprise exactly the reverse was the
case. Spurred on by the possibility that his future might hold surprises, that
it was not necessarily pre-ordained that he would die alone and on Mars,
Renfrew found that his intellectual curiosity was actually heightened. He
redoubled his efforts to understand his predicament, gulping down pages of text
that had seemed opaque and impenetrable only days before, but which now seemed
lucid, transparent, even childlike in their simplicity. He found himself
laughing, delighted with each tangible instance of progress towards his goal.
He barely ate, and neglected some of the less pressing matters of base
maintenance. And as the radio source refused to awayas it looked more and more
like something approaching MarsRenfrew was gripped by the sense that he was
engaged in a race; that he was in some way obliged to complete his task before
the source arrived, that they would be waiting to hear what he had to say.

By night he dreamed cosmology, his dreams becoming ever more
epic and ambitious as his knowledge of the science improved. With a fever-like
sense of repetition he recapitulated the entire history of the universe, from
its first moment of existence to the grand and symphonic flourishing of
intelligence.

At the beginning there was always nothingness, an absence
not only of space and time but of existence itself, and yet at the same time he
was aware of a trembling pre-potential, a feeling that the nothingness was
poised on the cusp of an awesome instability, as if the unborn universe was
itching to bring itself into being. With nightly inevitability it came: less an
explosion than a kind of delicate clockwork unravelling, as cunningly-packed
structures unwound with inflationary speed, crystallising out into brand new
superluminally expanding vacuum. He dreamed of symmetries snapping apart, mass
and energy becoming distinct, force and matter bootstrapping into complex
structures. He dreamed of atoms stabilising, linking to form molecules and
crystals, and from those building blocks he dreamed the simple beginnings of
chemistry. He dreamed of galaxies condensing out of gas, of supermassive young
suns flaring brilliantly and briefly within those galaxies. Each subsequent
generation of stars was more stable than the last, and as they evolved and died
they brewed metals and then coughed them into interstellar space. Out of those
metals condensed worldshot and scalding at first, until comets rained onto
their crusts, quenching them and given them oceans and atmospheres.

He dreamed of the worlds ageing. On some the conditions were
right for the genesis of microbial life. But the universe had to get very much
older and larger before he saw anything more interesting than that. Even then
it was scarce, and the worlds where animals stalked ocean beds before flopping
and oozing ashore had a precious, gemlike rarity.

Rarer still were the worlds where those animals staggered toward
self-awareness. But once or twice in every billion years it did happen.
Occasionally life even learned to use tools and language, and look towards the
stars.

Toward the end of one particularly vivid cosmological dream
Renfrew found himself focussing on the rarity of intelligence in the universe.
He saw the galaxy spread out before him, spiral arms of creamy white flecked
here and there by the ruby reds of cool supergiants or the dazzling kingfisher
blues of the hottest stars. Dotted across the galaxyłs swirl were candles, the
kind he remembered from birthday cakes. There were a dozen or so to start with,
placed randomly in a rough band that was not too near the galactic core nor too
close to the outer edges. The candles wavered slightly, and thenone by onethey
began to go out.

Until only one was left. It was not even the brightest of
those that had been there to begin with.

Renfrew felt a dreadful sense of that solitary candlełs
vulnerability. He looked up and below the plane of the galaxy, out toward its
neighbours, but he saw no signs of candles elsewhere.

He desperately wanted to cradle that remaining candle,
shelter it from the wind and keep it burning. He heard Piano Man singing: And
it seems to me youłve lived your life ...

It went out.

All was void. Renfrew woke up shivering, and then raced to
the suiting room and the airlock, and the waiting antenna, seeking contact with
that radio signal.

* * * *

�I think I understand," he told Piano Man. �Life has to be
here to observe the universe, or it doesnłt have any meaning. Itłs like the
idea of the observer in quantum mechanics, collapsing an indeterminate system
down to one possibility, opening the box and forcing the cat to chose between
being dead or alive ..."

Piano Man took off his glasses and polished them on his
sleeve. He said nothing for at least a minute, satisfying himself that the
glasses were clean before carefully replacing them on his nose. �Thatłs what
you think, is it? Thatłs your big insight? That the universe needs its own
observer? Well, break out the bubbly. Houston, I think we have a result."

�Itłs better than nothing."

�Right. And do how did this universe manage for fifteen
billion years before we dropped by and provided an intelligent observer? Are
you seriously telling me it was all fuzzy and indeterminate until the instant
some anonymous caveman had a moment of cosmic epiphany? That suddenly the
entire quantum history of every particle in the visible universeright out to
the furthest quasarsuddenly jumped to one state, and all because some thicko
in a bearskin had his brain wired up slightly differently to his ancestor?"

Renfrew thought back to his dream of the galactic disk
studded with candle light. �No ... Iłm not saying that. There were other observers
before us. Wełre just the latest."

�And these other observersthey were there all along, were
they? An unbroken chain right back to the first instant of creation?"

�Well, no. Obviously the universe had to reach a certain minimum
age before the preconditions for lifeintelligent lifebecame established. But
once that happened ..."

�Itłs bollocks, though, isnłt it, luv? What difference does
it make if therełs a gap of one second where the universe is unobserved, or ten
billion years? None at all, as far as Iłm concerned."

�Look, Iłm trying, all right? Iłm doing my best. And anyway
..." Renfrew felt a sudden lurch of intuitive breakthrough. �We donłt need all
those other observers, do we? We have observed the entire history of the
universe, just by looking out at higher and higher redshifts, with increasing
look-back times. Itłs because the speed of light is finite. If it wasnłt,
information from the very further parts of the universe would reach us
immediately, and wełd have no way of viewing earlier epochs."

�Fuck me man, you almost sound like a cosmologist."

�I think I might have become one."

�Just donłt make a career of it," Piano Man said. He shook
his head exasperatedly, then started playing Benny and the Jets.

* * * *

A week later he told him the news. Renfrewłs companion
played the tentative ghost of a melody on the keyboard, something that hadnłt
yet crystallised into true music.

�You waited until now to tell me?" Piano Man asked, with a
pained, disappointed look.

�I had to be certain. I had to keep tracking the thing,
making sure it was really out there, and then making sure it was something
worth getting excited about."

�And?"

Renfrew offered a smile. �I think itłs worth getting excited
about."

Piano Man played an icy line, dripping sarcastic bonhomie.

�Really."

�Iłm serious. Itłs a navigation signal, a spacecraft beacon.
It keeps repeating the same code, over and over again." Renfrew leaned in
closer: if hełd been able to lean on the phantom piano, he would have. �Itłs
getting stronger. Whateverłs putting out that signal is getting closer to Mars."

�You donłt know that."

�OK, I donłt. But therełs the Doppler to consider as well.
The signalłs changing frequency a little from day to day. Put the two things
together and youłve got a ship making some kind of course correction, coming in
for orbital insertion."

�Good for you."

Renfrew stepped back from the piano, surprised at his companionłs
dismissive reaction.

�Therełs a ship coming. Arenłt you happy for me?"

�Tickled pink, luv."

�I donłt understand. This is what Iłve been waiting for all
this time: news that someonełs survived, that it doesnłt all end here." For the
first time in their acquaintance, Renfrew raised his voice with Piano Man. �What
the hellłs wrong with you? Are you jealous that you wonłt be all the company Iłm
ever going to have?"

�Jealous? I donłt think so."

Renfrew plunged his fist through the white nothingness of
the piano. �Then show some reaction!"

Piano Man lifted his hands from the keyboard. He closed the
keyboard cover very gently and then sat with his hands in his lap, demurely,
just the way hełd been when Renfrew had first witnessed him. He looked at
Renfrew, his expression blank, whatever message his eyes might have conveyed
lost behind the star-shaped mirrors of his glasses.

�You want a reaction? Fine, Iłll give you one. Youłre making
a very, very serious mistake."

�Itłs no mistake. I know. Iłve double-checked checked everything
..."

�Itłs still a mistake."

�The shipłs coming."

�Somethingłs coming. It may not be all that you expect."

Renfrewłs fury boiled over. �Since when have you the
faintest fucking idea what I expect or donłt expect? Youłre just a piece of
software."

�Whatever you say, luv. But remind me: when was the last
time software encouraged you to take a deep interest in the fundamental
workings of the universe?"

Renfrew had no answer for that. But he had to say something.
�Theyłre coming. I know theyłre coming. Things are going to get better. Youłll
see when the ship comes."

�Youłre going to do yourself a lot of harm."

�As if you cared. As if you were capable of caring."

�Youłve found a way to stay sane, Renfreweven if that means
admitting a tiny piece of piano-playing madness into your world. But therełs a
cost to that sanity, and it isnłt moi. The cost is you canłt ever allow
yourself an instant of hope, because hope is something that will always be
crushed, crushed utterly, and in the crushing of hope you will be weakened
forever, just as surely as if youłd mainlined some slow-acting poison." Piano
Man looked at Renfrew with a sudden, scholarly interest. �How many instants of
defeat do you think you can take, big guy? One, two, three? From where Iłm
sitting I wouldnłt bet on three. I think three might easily kill you. I think
two might get you on a shitty day."

�Somethingłs coming," Renfrew said, plaintively.

�I thought for a while you had the balls to get through
this. I thought youłd banished hope, learned to keep it outside in the cold. I
was wrong: youłve let it in again. Now itłs going to stalk you, like a starved,
half-crazed wolf."

�Itłs my wolf."

�Therełs still time to chase it away. Donłt let me down now,
Renfrew. Iłve counting on you not to screw things up."

* * * *

That night Renfrew dreamed not of cosmology, but of something
stranger and more upsetting. It was not one of the dreams he used to have about
the past, for he had trained himself not to have those any more; the sense of
sadness and loss upon waking almost too much to bear. Nor was it one of the
equally troubling ones about visitors, people coming down out of cold blue
skies and landing near the base. When then came through the airlock they
arrived with flowersHawaiian luasand utterly pointless but lovingly
gift-wrapped presents. Their faces were never familiar at first, but by the end
of each visitation, just before he woke, they would always start to transmute
into old friends and loved ones. Renfrew hadnłt yet trained himself not to have
that kind of dream, and given the news about the radio signal he was sure at
least one of them would haunt his sleep in the days ahead.

It was not that kind of dream. What happened in the dream
was that Renfrew rose like a sleepwalker from his bed in the middle of the
night and crept through the base to the same medical lab where Solovyova had
died, and placed his head into one of the functioning scanners, conjuring a
glowing lilac image of his skull on the main screen, and then emerged from the
scanner and examined the readout to learn that his optic implants had been dead
for years; that there was no possible way it was picking up the B�sendorfer,
let alone the talking ghost that played it.

In the morning, when he woke from the dream, Renfrew couldnłt
bring himself to visit the medical lab, in case he had already been there in
the night.

* * * *

By day he kept a weather eye on the radio signal. It strengthened
and Dopplered, moving quickly against the stars as it fell into the grasp of
Mars. Then the signal altered, switching to a different, equally meaningless
burst of repeating binary gibberish. Renfrew knew that it meant something, and
intensified his vigil.

A day later, a meteor flared across the twilight sky, etching
a fire trail, and dropped behind the closest range of hills under a dark
umbrella of parachutes.

�Iłm going out to find where they came down," Renfrew said.

�How far?"

�I donłt know how far. Canłt be all that far beyond the
western marker."

�Thatłs still twenty kilometres away."

�Iłll take the car. It still works."

�Youłve never driven it alone. Itłs a long walk home if something
goes wrong."

�Nothingłs going wrong. I wonłt be alone."

Piano Man started to say something, but Renfrew wasnłt listening.

He pre-breathed, suited up, climbed onto the skeletal
chassis of the buggy, then went out to meet the newcomers. As the mesh-wheeled
vehicle bounced and gyred its way to the horizon, Renfrew felt a thrilled
elation, as if he were on his way to a date with a beautiful and mysterious
woman who might be his lover by the end of the evening.

But when he crested the hills and saw the fallen ship, he
knew that nobody had ridden it to Mars. It was too small for that, even if this
was just the re-entry component of a larger ship still circling the planet.
What had come down was just a cargo pod, a blunt cylinder the size of a small
minibus. It was tangled up with its own parachutes and the deflated gasbags it
had deployed just before impact.

Renfrew parked the buggy, then spent ten minutes clearing fabric
away from the cargo podłs door. The re-entry had scorched the decals, flags and
data panels on the podłs skin to near-illegibility, but Renfrew knew the drill.
Back when the base was inhabited, hełd occasionally drawn the short straw to
drive out to recover a pod that had fallen away from the usual touchdown beacon.

He was sorry it wasnłt a crewed ship, but the pod was the
next best thing. Maybe they were still getting the infrastructure back up to
speed. Sending out a manned vehicle was obviously too much of a stretch right
now, and that was understandable. But theyłd still had the presence of mind not
to forget about Mars, even if all they could muster was a one-shot cargo pod.
He would not be ungrateful. The pod could easily contain valuable medicines and
machine parts, enough to relieve him of several ever-present worries. They
might even have sent some luxuries, as a token of goodwill: things that the
synths had never been very good at.

Renfrew touched a hand against the armoured panel next to
the door, ready to flip it open and expose the pyrotechnic release mechanism.
That was when one of the scorches caught his eye. It was a data panel, printed
in spray-stencilled letters.



HTCV-554

Hohmann Transfer Cargo Vehicle

Scheduled launch: Kagoshima 05/38

Destination: Tharsis Base, Mars

Payload: replacement laser optics

Property: Mars Development Corporation

According to the data panel, the cargo pod had been
scheduled to lift from Kagoshima spaceport one month before the virus hit.
Maybe the panel was wrong; maybe this pod had been prepared and sprayed and
then held on the pad until the virus had passed and the reconstruction had begun
...

But why send him glass?

Renfrew knew, with an appalling certainty, that the vehicle
had not been delayed on the pad. It had launched just as its owners had
intended, on time, with a consignment of precision glassware that might just
have been useful back when the base was fully inhabited and theyłd needed a
steady supply of laser optics for the surveying work.

But somewhere between Earth and Mars, the cargo pod had lost
its way. When the virus hit, the pod would have lost contact with the
Earth-based tracking system that was supposed to guide it on its way. But the
pod hadnłt simply drifted into interplanetary space, lost forever. Instead, its
dumb-as-fuck navigation system had caused it to make an extra fuel-conserving
loop around the sun, until it finally locked onto the Mars transponder.

Renfrew must have picked it up shortly afterwards.

He stumbled back to the buggy. He climbed into the openwork
frame, settled into the driverłs seat and didnłt bother with the harness. He
kept his breathing in check. The disappointment hadnłt hit yet, but he could
feel it coming, sliding toward him with the oiled glide of a piston. It was
going to hurt like hell when it arrived. It was going to feel like the weight
of creation pushing down onto his chest. It was going to squeeze the life out
of him; it was going to make him open that helmet visor, if he didnłt make it
home first.

Piano Man had been right. Hełd allowed hope back into his
world, and now hope was going to make him pay.

He gunned the buggy to maximum power, flinging dust from its
wheels, skidding until it found traction. He steered away from the cargo pod,
not wanting to look at it, not even wanting to catch a glimpse of it in the
buggyłs rear view mirrors.

Hełd made it to within five kilometres of the base when he
hit a boulder, tipping the buggy over. Renfrew tumbled from the driverłs seat,
and the last thing he sawthe last thing he was aware ofwas an edge of sharp
rock rising to shatter his visor.



Part Three



And yet Renfrew woke.

Consciousness came back to him in a crystal rush. He remembered
everything, up to and including the last instant of his accident. It seemed to
have happened only minutes earlier: he could almost taste blood in his mouth.
Yet by the same token the memory seemed inhumanly ancient, calcified into
hardness, brittle as coral.

He was back in the base, not out by the crashed buggy.
Through narrow, sleep-gummed eyes he picked out familiar d�cor. Hełd come
around on the same medical couch where he had seen Solovyova die. He moved his
arm and touched his brow, flinching as he remembered the stone smashing through
the visor, flinching again as he recalled the momentary contact of stone
against skin, the hardening pressure of skin on bone, the yielding of that pressure
as the edge of the stone rammed its way into his skull like a nuclear-powered
icebreaker cracking hard arctic pack-ice.

The skin under his fingers was smooth, unscarred. He touched
his chin and felt the same dayłs growth of stubble hełd been wearing when he
went out to meet the pod. There was stiffness in his muscles, but nothing he
wouldnłt have expected after a hard dayłs work. He eased himself from the
couch, touched bare feet to cold ceramic flooring. He was wearing the one-piece
inner-layer that hełd put on under the spacesuit before he went outside. But
the inner-layer was crisper and cleaner than he remembered, and when he looked
at the sleeve the tears and frays he recalled were absent.

Gaining steadiness with each step, Renfrew padded across the
medical lab to the window. He remembered seeing Solovyovałs face reflected in
the glass, the first time hełd seen the piano. It had been twilight then; it
was full daylight now, and as his eyes adjusted to wakefulness, they picked out
details and textures in the scenery with a clarity hełd never known before.

There were things out there that didnłt belong.

They stood between the base and the foothills, set into the
dust like haphazardly placed chess pieces. It was hard to say how tall they
weremetres or tens of metresfor there was something slippery and elusive
about the space between the forms and the base, confounding Renfrewłs sense of
perspective. Nor could he have reported with any certainty on the shapes of the
objects. One moment he saw blocky, unchanging chunks of crystalline growthsomething
like tourmaline, tinted with bright reds and greensthe next he was looking at
stained-glass apertures drilled through the very skein of reality, or skeletal,
prismatic things that existed only in the sense that they had edges and
corners, rather than surfaces and interiors. And yet there was never any sense
of transition between the opposed states.

He knew, instantly and without fear, that they were alive,
and that they were aware of him.

Renfrew made his way to the suiting room, counted the intact
suits that were hanging there, and came up with the same number he remembered
before the buggy accident. No sign of any damage to the racked helmets.

He suited up and stepped out into Martian daylight. The
forms were still there, surrounding the base like the weathered stones of some
grand Neolithic circle. Yet they seemed closer now, and larger, and their
transformations had an accelerated, heightened quality. They had detected his
emergence; they were glad of it; it was what they had been waiting for.

Still there was no fear.

One of the shapes seemed larger than the others. It beckoned
Renfrew nearer, and the ground he walked upon melted and surged under him,
encouraging him to close the distance. The transformations became more
feverish. His suit monitor informed him that the air outside was as cold and
thin as ever, but a sound was reaching him through the helmet that hełd never
heard in all his time on Mars. It was a chorus of shrill, quavering notes, like
the sound from a glass organ, and it was coming from the aliens. In that chorus
was ecstasy and expectation. It should have terrified him; should have sent him
scurrying back inside, should have sent him into gibbering catatonia, but it
only made him stronger.

Renfrew dared to look up.

If the aliens gathered around the base were the crew, then
the thing suspended over the basethe thing that swallowed three fifths of the
sky, more like a weather system than a machinehad to be their ship. It was a
vast frozen explosion of colours and shapes, and it made him want to shrivel
back into his skull. The mere existence of the aliens and their ship told him
that all he had learned, all the wisdom he had worked so hard to accrue, was at
best a scratch against the rock face of reality.

He still had a long, long way to go.

He looked down, and walked to the base of the largest alien.
The keening reached a shrill, exultant climax. Now that he was close, the alienłs
shape-and-size shifting had subsided. The form looming over him was stable and
crystalline, with the landscape behind it faintly visible through the refracted
translucence of the alienłs body.

The alienłs voice, when it came, felt like the universe
whispering secrets into his head.

�Are you feeling better now?"

Renfrew almost laughed at the banality of the question. �Iłm
feeling ... better, yes."

�Thatłs good. We were concerned. Very, very concerned. It
pleases us that you have made this recovery."

The keening quietened. Renfrew sensed that the other aliens
were witnesses to a one-on-one conversation between him and this largest
entity, and that there was something utterly respectful, even subservient, in
their silence.

�When you talk about my recovery ... are you saying ..." Renfrew
paused, choosing his words with care. �Did you make me better?"

�We healed you, yes. We healed you and learned your language
from the internal wiring of your mind."

�I should have died out there. When I tipped the buggy ... I
thought I was dead. I knew I was dead."

�There were enough recoverable patterns. It was in our gift
to remake you. Only you, however, can say whether we did a good enough job."

�I feel the same way I always did. Except better: like Iłve
been turned inside out and flushed clean."

�That is what we hoped."

�You mind if I ask ..."

The alien pulsed an inviting shade of pink.

�You may ask anything you like."

�Who are you? What are you doing here? Why have you come
now?"

�We are the Kind. We have arrived to preserve and resurrect
what we may. We have arrived now because we could not arrive sooner."

�But the coincidence ... to come now, after wełve been
waiting so long ... to come now, just after wełve wiped ourselves out. Why
couldnłt you come sooner, and stop us fucking things up so badly?"

�We came as fast as we could. As soon as we detected the electromagnetic
emanations of your culture ... we commenced our journey."

�How far have you come?"

�More than two hundred of your light years. Our vehicle
moves very quickly, but not faster than light. More than four hundred years
have passed since the transmission of the radio signals that alerted us."

�No," Renfrew said, shaking his head, wondering how the
aliens could have made such a basic mistake. �That isnłt possible. Radio hasnłt
been around that long. Wełve had television for maybe a hundred years, radio
for twenty or thirty years longer ... but not four hundred years. No way was it
our signals you picked up."

The alien shifted to a soothing turquoise.

�You are mistaken, but understandably so. You were dead
longer than you realise."

�No," he said flatly.

�That is the way it is. Of course you have no memory of the
intervening time."

�But the base looks exactly the way it did before I left."

�We repaired your home, as well. If you would like it
changed again, that is also possible."

Renfrew felt the first stirrings of acceptance; the
knowledge that what the alien was telling him was correct.

�If youłve brought me back ..."

�Yes," the alien encouraged.

�What about the others? What about all the other people who
died hereSolovyova and the ones before her? What about all the people who died
on Earth?"

�There were no recoverable forms on the Earth. We can show
you if you would like ... but we think you would find it distressing."

�Why?"

�We did. A lifecrash is always distressing, even to
machine-based entities such as us. Especially after such a long and uninterrupted
evolutionary history."

�A lifecrash?"

�It did not just end with the extinction of humanity. The
agent that wiped out your species had the capacity to change. Eventually it
assimilated every biological form on the planet, leaving only itself: endlessly
cannibalising, endlessly replicating."

Renfrew dealt with that. Hełd already adjusted to the fact
that humanity was gone and that he was never going to see Earth again. It did
not require a great adjustment to accept that Earth itself had been lost, along
with the entire web of life it had once supported.

Not that he was exactly thrilled, either.

�OK," he said falteringly. �But what about the people I
buried here?"

Renfrew sensed the alienłs regret. Its facets shone a sombre
amber.

�Their patterns were not recoverable. They were buried in
caskets, along with moisture and microorganisms. Time did the rest. We did try,
yes ... but there was nothing left to work with."

�I died out there as well. Why was it any different for me?"

�You were kept cold and dry. That made all the difference,
as far as we were concerned."

So hełd mummified out there, baked dry under that merciless
sterilising sky, instead of rotting in the ground like his friends. Out there
under that Martian sun, for the better part of three hundred years ... what
must he have looked like when they pulled him out of the remains of his suit,
he wondered? Maybe a bleached and twisted thing, corded with the knotted
remains of musculature and tissue: something that could easily have been
mistaken for driftwood, had there been driftwood on Mars.

The wonder and horror of it all was almost too much. Hełd
been the last human being alive, and then he had died, and now he was the first
human being to be resurrected by aliens.

The first and perhaps the last: he sensed even then that, as
Godlike as the Kind appeared, they were bound by limits. They were as much
prisoners of what the universe chose to allow, and what it chose not to allow,
as humanity, or dust, or atoms.

�Why?" he asked.

A pulse of ochre signified the alienłs confusion.

�Why what?"

�Why did you bring me back? What possible interest am I to
you?"

The alien considered his remark, warming through shades of
orange to a bright venous red. Like an echo, the shade spread to the other
members of the gathering.

�We help," the leader told Renfrew. �That is what we do.
That is what we have always done. We are the Kind."

* * * *

He returned to the base and tried to continue his affairs,
just as if the Kind had never arrived. Yet they were always out there whenever
he passed a window: brighter and closer now as evening stole in, as if they had
gathered the dayłs light and were now re-radiating it in subtly altered shades.
He closed the storm shutters but that didnłt help much. He did not doubt that
the ship was still poised above, suspended over the base as if guarding the
infinitely precious thing that he had become.

Renfrewłs old routines had little meaning now. The aliens
hadnłt just brought the base back to the way it had been before he crashed the
buggy. They had repaired all the damage that had accrued since the collapse of
Earthside society, and the base systems now functioned better than at any point
since the basełs construction. As mindless as his maintenance tours had been,
they had imposed structure on his life that was now absent. Renfrew felt like a
rat thatłd had his exercise wheel taken away.

He went to the recreation room and brought the system back
online. Everything functioned as the designers had intended. The aliens must
have repaired, or at least not removed, his implant. But when he cycled through
the myriad options, he found that something had happened to Piano Man.

The figure was still thereRenfrew even knew his name, nowbut
the companion he remembered was gone. Now Piano Man behaved just like all the
other generated personalities. Renfrew could still talk to him, and Piano Man
could still answer him back, but nothing like their old conversations was now
possible. Piano Man would take requests, and banter, but that was the limit of
his abilities. If Renfrew tried to steer the conversation away from the
strictly musical, if he tried to engage Piano Man in a discussion about
cosmology or quantum mechanics, all he got back was a polite but puzzled stare.
And the more Renfrew persisted, the less it seemed to him that there was any
consciousness behind that implant-generated face. All he was dealing with was a
paper-thin figment of the entertainment system.

Renfrew knew that the Kind hadnłt ęfixedł Piano Man in the
sense that they had fixed the rest of the base. Butdeliberately or otherwisetheir
arrival had destroyed the illusion of companionship. Perhaps they had
straightened some neurological kink in Renfrewłs brain when they put him back
together. Or perhaps the mere fact of their arrival had caused his
subconsciousness to discard that earlier mental crutch.

He knew it shouldnłt have meant anything. Piano Man hadnłt
existed in any real sense. Feeling sorrow for his absence was as ridiculous as
mourning the death of a character in a dream. Hełd made Piano Man up; his
companion had never had any objective existence.

But he still felt that he had lost a friend.

�Iłm sorry," he said, to that polite but puzzled face. �You
were right, and I was wrong. I was doing fine just the way things were. I
should have listened to you."

There was an uncomfortable pause, before Piano Man smiled
and spread his fingers above the keyboard.

�Would you like me to play something?"

�Yes," Renfrew said. �Play Rocket Man. For old timełs sake."

* * * *

He allowed the Kind into Tharsis Base. Their crystalline
forms were soon everywhere, spreading and multiplying in a mad orgy of
prismatic colour, transforming the drab architecture into a magical lantern-lit
grotto. The beauty of it was so startling, so intoxicating, that it moved
Renfrew to tears with the knowledge that no one else would ever see it.

�But it could be different," the leader told him. �We did
not broach this earlier, but there are possibilities you may wish to consider."

�Such as?"

�We have repaired you, and made you somewhat younger than
you were before your accident. In doing so we have learned a great deal about
your biology. We cannot resurrect the dead of Earth, or your companions here on
Mars, but we can give you other people."

�I donłt follow."

�It would cost us nothing to weave new companions. They
could be grown to adulthood at accelerated speed, or your own ageing could be
arrested while you give the children time to grow."

�And then what?"

�You could breed with them, if you chose. Wełd intervene to
correct any genetic anomalies."

Renfrew smiled. �Mars ainłt the kind of place to raise your
kids. At least, thatłs what a friend of mine told me that once."

�Now there is nowhere but Mars. Doesnłt that make a difference?
Or would you rather we established a habitable zone on Earth and transplanted
you there?"

They made him feel like a plant: like some incredibly rare
and delicate orchid.

�Would I notice the difference?"

�We could adjust your faculties so that Earth appeared the
way you remembered. Or we could edit your memories to match the present conditions."

�Why canłt you just put things back the way they were?
Surely one runaway virus isnłt going to defeat you."

The alien turned a shade of chrome blue that Renfrew had
learned to recognise as indicative of gentle chiding. �Thatłs not our way. The
runaway agent now constitutes its own form of life, brimming with future
potential. To wipe it out now would be akin to sterilising your planet just as
your own single-celled ancestors were gaining a foothold."

�You care about life that much?"

�Life is precious. Infinitely so. Perhaps it takes a machine
intelligence to appreciate that." The chrome blue faded, replaced by a
placatory olive green. �Given that Earth cannot be made the way it was, will
you reconsider our offer to give you companionship?"

�Not now," he said.

�But later, perhaps?"

�I donłt know. Iłve been on my own a long time. Iłm not sure
it isnłt better this way."

�Youłve craved companionship for years. Why reject it now?"

�Because ..." And here Renfrew faltered, conscious of his
own inarticulacy before the alien. �When I was alone, I spent a lot of time
thinking things through. I got set on that course, and Iłm not sure Iłm done
yet. Therełs still some stuff I need to get straight in my head. Maybe when Iłm
finished ..."

�Perhaps we can help you with that."

�Help me understand the universe? Help me understand what it
means to be the last living man? Maybe even the last intelligent organism, in
the universe?"

�It wouldnłt be the first time. We are a very old culture.
In our travels we have encountered myriad other species. Some of them are
extinct by now, or changed beyond recognition. But many of them were engaged on
quests similar to your own. We have watched, and occasionally interceded to
better aid that comprehension. Nothing would please us more than to offer you
similar assistance. If we cannot give you companionship, at least let us give
you wisdom."

�I want to understand space and time, and my own place in
it."

�The path to deep comprehension is risky."

�Iłm ready for it. Iłve already come a long way."

�Then we shall help. But the road is long, Renfrew. The road
is long and you have barely started your journey."

�Iłm willing to go all the way."

�You will be long past human before you near the end of it.
That is the cost of understanding space and time."

Renfrew felt a chill on the back of his neck, a
premonitionary shiver. The alien was not warning him for nothing. In its
travels it must have witnessed things that caused it distress.

Still he said: �Whatever it takes. Bring it on. Iłm ready."

�Now?"

�Now. But before we begin ... you donłt call me Renfrew any
more."

�You wish a new name, to signify this new stage in your
quest?"

�From now on, Iłm John. Thatłs what I want you to call me."

�Just John?"

He nodded solemnly. �Just John."



Part Four



The Kind did things to John.

While he slept, they altered his mind: infiltrating it with
tiny crystal avatars of themselves, performing prestigious feats of neural
rewiring. When he woke he still felt like himself: still carried the same
freight of memories and emotions that hełd taken with him to sleep. But
suddenly he had the ability to grasp things that had been impenetrably
difficult only hours earlier. Before the accident, he had explored the inlets
of superstring theory, like an explorer searching for a navigable route through
a treacherous mountain range. He had never found that easy path, never dreamed
of conquering the dizzying summits before him, but now, miraculously, he was on
the other side, and the route through the obstacle looked insultingly easy.
Beyond superstring theory lay the unified territory of M-theory, but that, too,
was soon his. John revelled in his new understanding.

More and more, he began to think in terms of a room whose
floor was the absolute truth about the universe: where it had come from, how it
worked, what it meant to be a thinking being in that universe. But that floor
looked very much like a carpet, and it was in turn concealed by other carpets,
one on top of the other, each of which represented some imperfect approximation
to the final layer. Each layer might look convincing; might endure decades or
centuries of enquiry without hinting that it contained a flaw, but sooner or
later one would inevitably reveal itself. A tiny loose threadperhaps a
discrepancy between observation and theoryand with a tug the entire fabric of
that layer would come apart. It was in the nature of such revolutions that the
next layer down would already have been glimpsed by then. Only the final
carpet, the floor, would contain no logical inconsistencies, no threads waiting
to be unravelled.

Could you ever know when youłd reached it, John wondered?
Some thinkers considered it impossible to ever know with certainty. All you
could do was keep testing, tugging at every strand to see how firmly it was
woven into the whole. If after tens of thousands of years, the pattern was
still intact, then it might begin to seem likely that you had arrived at final
wisdom. But you could never know for sure. The ten thousand and first year
might bring forth some trifling observation that, as innocent as it first
seemed, would eventually prove that there was yet another layer lurking
underneath.

You could go on like that forever, never knowing for sure.

Oras some other thinkers speculatedthe final theory might
come with its own guarantee of authenticity, a golden strand of logical
validation threaded into the very mathematical language in which it was
couched. It might be in the nature of the theory to state that there could be
no deeper description of the universe.

But even then: it wouldnłt stop you making observations. It
wouldnłt stop you testing.

John kept learning. M-theory became a distant and trifling obstacle,
dwarfed by the daunting unified theories that had superseded it. These theories
probed the interface not just of matter and spacetime, but also of
consciousness and entropy, information, complexity and the growth of
replicating structures. On the face of it, they seemed to describe everything
that conceivably mattered about the universe.

But each in turn was revealed as flawed, incomplete, at odds
with observation. An error in the predicted mass of the electron, in the
twenty-second decimal place. A one-in-ten-thousandth part discrepancy in the
predicted bending of starlight around a certain class of rotating black hole. A
niggling mismatch between the predicted and observed properties of inertia, in
highly charged spacetime.

The room contained many carpets, and John had the dizzying
sense that there were still many layers between him and the floor. Hełd made
progress, certainly, but it had only sharpened his sense of how far he had to
go.

The Kind remade him time and again, resetting his body clock
to give him the time he needed for his studies. But each leap of understanding
pushed him closer to the fundamental limits of a wet human brain wired together
from a few hundred billion neurons, crammed into a tiny cage of bone.

�You can stop now, if you like," the Kind said, in the hundredth
year of his quest.

�Or what?" John asked mildly.

�Or we continue, with certain modifications."

John gave them his consent. It would mean not being human
for a little while, but given the distance he had come, the price did not
strike him as unreasonable.

The Kind encoded the existing patterns of his mind into a
body much like one of their own. For John the transition to a machine-based
substrate of thinking crystal was in no way traumatic, especially as the Kind
assured him that the process was completely reversible. Freed of the
constraints of flesh and scale, his progress accelerated even more. From this
new perspective, his old human mind looked like something seen through the
wrong end of a telescope. Compared to the mental mansion he now inhabited, his
former residence looked as squalid and limiting as a rabbit hutch. It was a
wonder hełd understood anything.

But John wasnłt finished.

A thousand years passed. Always adding new capacity to himself,
he had become a kilometre-high crystalline mound on the summit of Pavonis Mons.
He was larger by far than any of the Kind, but that was only to be expected: he
was probing layers of reality that they had long since mapped to their own
satisfaction, and from which they had dutifully retreated. Having attained that
understanding once, the Kind had no further need for it.

There were other people on Mars now. John had finally acquiesced
to the Kindłs offer to bring him companions, and they had created children who
had now grown to become parents and grandparents. But when John agreed to the
coming of other humans, it had little do with his own need for companionship.
He felt too remote from other humans now, and it was only because he sensed
that the Kind wished to perform this exercisethat it would please the aliens
to have something else to dothat he had relented. But even if he could not
relate to the teeming newcomers, he found it pleasing to divert a small portion
of his energies to their amusement. He rearranged his outer architecturededicated
to only the most trivial data-handling tasksso that he resembled an ornate
crystalline fairy palace, with spires and domes and battlements, and at dusk he
twinkled with refracted sunlight, throwing coloured glories across the great
plains of the Tharsis Montes. A yellow road spiralled around his foot slopes.
He became a site of pilgrimage, and he sang to the pilgrims as they toiled up
and down the spiral road.

Millennia passed. Still Johnłs mind burrowed deeper.

He reported to the Kind that he had passed through eighteen
paradigmatic layers of reality, each of which had demanded a concomitant
upgrade in his neural wiring before he could be said to have understood the
theory in all its implications, and therefore recognised the flaw that led to
the next layer down.

The Kind informed him thatin all the history that was known
to themfewer than five hundred other sentient beings had attained Johnłs
present level understanding.

Still John kept going, aware that in all significant
respects he had now exceeded the intellectual capacity of the Kind. They were
there to assist him, to guide him through his transformations, but they had
only a dim conception of what it now felt to be John. According to their data
less than a hundred individuals, from a hundred different cultures, all of them
now extinct, had reached this point.

Ahead, the Kind warned, were treacherous waters.

Johnłs architectural transformations soon began to place an
intolerable strain on the fragile geology of Pavonis Mons. Rather than
reinforce the ancient volcano to support his increasing size and mass, John
chose to detach himself from the surface entirely. For twenty six thousand
years he floated in the thickening Martian atmosphere, supported by batteries
of antigravity generators. For much of that time it pleased him to manifest in
the form of a B�sendorfer grand piano, a shape reconstructed from his oldest
human memories. He drifted over the landscape, solitary as a cloud, and
occasionally he played slow tunes that fell from the sky like thunder.

Yet soon there came a time when he was too large even for
the atmosphere. The heat dissipation from his mental processes was starting to
have an adverse effect on the global climate.

It was time to leave.

In space he grew prolifically for fifteen million years. Hot
blue stars formed, lived and died while he gnawed away at the edges of certain
intractables. Human civilisations buzzed around him like flies. Among them, he
knew, were individuals who were engaged in something like the same quest for
understanding. He wished them well, but he had a head start none of them had a
hope of ever overtaking. Over the years his density had increased, until he was
now composed mostly of solid nuclear matter. Then he had evolved to substrates
of pure quark matter. By then, his own gravity had become immense, and the Kind
reinforced him with mighty spars of exotic matter, pilfered from the disused
wormhole transit system of some long-vanished culture. A binary pulsar was harnessed
to power him; titanic clockwork enslaved for the purposes of pure mentation.

And still deeper John tunnelled.

�I ... sense something," he told the Kind one day.

They asked him what, fearing his answer.

�Something ahead of me," he said. �A few layers down. I canłt
quite see it yet, but Iłm pretty sure I can sense it."

They asked him what it was like.

�An ending," John told them.

�This is what we always knew would come to pass," the Kind
told him.

They informed him that only seven other sentient beings had
reached Johnłs current state of enlightenment; none in the last three billion
years. They also told him that to achieve enlightenment he would have to change
again; become denser still, squeezed down into a thinking core that was only
just capable of supporting itself against its own ferocious gravity.

�Youłll be unstable," they told him. �Your very thought
processes will tend to push you into your own critical radius."

He knew what they meant, but he wanted to hear them spell it
out. �And when that happens?"

�You become a black hole. No force in the universe will be
able to prevent your collapse. These are the treacherous waters we mentioned
earlier."

They said łearlierł as if they meant łearlier this
afternoon,ł rather than łearlier in the history of this universe.ł But John had
long since accustomed himself to the awesome timescales of the Kind.

�I still want you to do it. Iłve come too far to give up
now."

�As you wish."

So they made him into a vast ring of hyperdense matter,
poised on the edge of collapse. In his immense gravitational field, Johnłs
lightning thought processes grew sluggish. But his computational resources were
now vast.

Many times he orbited the galaxy.

With each layer that he passed, he sensed the increasing presence
of the ending; the final, rock-hard substrate of reality. He knew it was the
floor, not another mirage-like illusion of finality. He was almost there now:
his great quest was nearing its completion, and in a few thoughtsa few hours
in the long afternoon of the universehe would have arrived.

Yet John called a halt to his thinking.

�Is there a problem?" the Kind asked, solicitously.

�I donłt know. Maybe. Iłve been thinking about what you said
before: about how my own thought processes might push me over the edge."

�Yes," the Kind said.

�Iłm wondering: what would that really mean?"

�It would mean death. There has been much debate on the matter,
but the present state of understanding is that no useful information can ever
emerge from a black hole."

�Youłre right. That sounds an awfully lot like death to me."

�Then perhaps you will consider stopping now, while there is
still time. You have at least glimpsed the final layer. Is that not enough for
you? Youłve come further than you could ever have dreamed when you embarked on
this quest."

�Thatłs true."

�Well, then. Let this be an end to it. Dwell not on what is
left to be done, but, yes, on what you have already achieved."

�Iłd like to. But therełs this nagging little thing I canłt
stop thinking about."

�Please. To think about anything in your present state is
not without risk."

�I know. But I think this might be important. Do you think
itłs coincidence that Iłve reached this point in my quest, at the same time
that Iłm teetering on the edge of collapsing into myself?"

�We confess we hadnłt given the matter a great deal of
thought, beyond the immediate practicalities."

�Well, I have. And Iłve been thinking. Way back when, I read
a theory about baby universes."

�Continue ..." the Kind said warily.

�How they might be born inside black holes, where the ordinary
rules of space and time break down. The idea being that when the singularity
inside a black hole forms, it actually buds off a whole new universe, with its
own subtly altered laws of physics. Thatłs where the information goes: down the
pipe, into the baby universe. We see no evidence of this on the outsidethe
expansionłs in a direction we canłt point; it isnłt as if the new universe is
expanding into our own like an explosionbut that doesnłt mean it isnłt
happening every time a black hole forms somewhere in our universe. In fact, itłs
entirely possible that our universe might well have been budded off from someone
elsełs black hole."

�We are aware of this speculation. And your point being?"

�Perhaps it isnłt coincidence. Perhaps this is just the way
it has to be. You cannot attain ultimate wisdom about the universe without
reaching this point of gravitational collapse. And at the moment you do attain
final understandingwhen the last piece falls into place, when you finally
glimpse that ultimate layer of realityyou slip over the edge, into
irreversible collapse."

�In other words, you die. As we warned."

�But maybe not. After all, by that point youłve become
little more than pure information. What if you survive the transition through
your own singularity, and slip through into the baby universe?"

�To become smeared out and re-radiated as random noise, you
mean?"

�Actually, I had something else in mind. Whołs to say that
you donłt end up encoding yourself into the very structure of that new
universe?"

�Whołs to say that you do?"

�I admit itłs speculative. But there is something rather
beautiful and symmetric about it, donłt you think? In the universes where there
is intelligent life, one or more sentient individuals will eventually ask the
same questions I asked myself, and follow them through to this point of
penultimate understanding. When they achieve enlightenment, they exceed the
critical density and become baby universes in their own right. They become what
they sought to understand."

�You have no proof of this."

�No, but I have one hell of a gut feeling. There is, of
course, only one way to know for sure. At the moment of understanding, Iłll
know whether this happens or not."

�And if it doesnłt ..."

�Iłll still have achieved my goal. Iłll know that, even as Iłm
crushed out of existence. If, on the other hand, it does happen ... then I wonłt
be crushed at all. My consciousness will continue, on the other side, embedded
in the fabric of space and time itself." John paused, for something had
occurred to him. �Iłll have become something very close to ..."

�Donłt say it, please," the Kind interjected.

�All right, I wonłt. But you see now why I hesitate. This
final step will take me as far from humanity as all the steps that have
preceded it. Itłs not something Iłm about to take lightly."

�You shouldnłt."

�The others ..." John began, before trailing off, aware of
the fear and doubt in his voice. �What did they do, when they got this far? Did
they hesitate? Did they just storm on through?"

�Only three have preceded you, in all of recorded history.
Two underwent gravitational collapse: we can show you the black holes they
became, if you wish."

�Iłll pass. Tell me about the third."

�The third chose a different path. He elected to split his
consciousness into two streams, by dividing and reallocating portions of his
architecture. One component continued with the quest for ultimate
understanding, while the other retreated, assuming a less-dense embodiment that
carried no risk of collapse."

�What happened to the component that continued?"

�Again," the Kind said, with the merest flicker of amusement
at Johnłs expense, �wełd be delighted to show you the results."

�And the other half? How could he have preserved the understanding
hełd achieved, if he backtracked to a simpler architecture?"

�He couldnłt. Thatłs exactly the point."

�I donłt follow. Understanding required a certain level of
complexity. He couldnłt have retained that understanding, if he stripped
himself back."

�He didnłt. He did, however, retain the memory of having understood.
That, for him, was sufficient."

�Just the memory?"

�Precisely that. Hełd glimpsed enlightenment. He didnłt need
to retain every detail of that glimpse to know hełd seen it."

�But thatłs not understanding," John said exasperatedly. �Itłs
a crude approximation, like the postcard instead of the view."

�Better than being crushed out of existence, though. The
being under discussion seemed adequately content with the compromise."

�And you think I will be, too?"

�We think you should at least consider the possibility."

�I will. But Iłll need time to think about it."

�How long?"

�Just a bit."

�All right," the Kind said. �But just donłt think too hard
about it."

* * * *

It passed that, much less than a million years later, John announced
to the Kind that he wished to follow the example of the third sentient being
they had mentioned. He would partition his consciousness into two streams, one
of which would continue towards final enlightenment, the other of which would
assume a simpler and safer architecture, necessarily incapable of emulating his
present degree of understanding. For John the process of dividing himself was
as fraught and delicate as any of the transformations he had hitherto
undergone. It required all of the skill of the Kind to affect the change in
such a way as to allow the preservation of memories, even as his mind was
whittled back to a mere sketch of itself. But by turns it was done, and the two
Johns were both physically and mentally distinct: the one still poised on the
edge of gravitational annihilation, only a thought away from transcendence, the
other observing matters from a safe distance.

So it was that Simple John witnessed the collapse and infall
of his more complex self: an event as sudden and violent as any natural stellar
catastrophe in recent galactic times. In that moment of understanding, he had
pushed his own architecture to the limit. Somewhere in him, matter and energy
collapsed to open a howling aperture to a new creation. He had reached the
conclusion of his quest.

In the last nanoseconds of his physical existence howeverbefore
he was sucked under the event horizon, beyond which no information could ever
emergeComplex John did at least manage to encode and transmit a parting wave
of gravitational energy, a message to his other half.

The content was very brief.

It said only: �Now I get it."

* * * *

That might have been the end of it, but shortly afterwards
Simple John took a decision that was to return him to his starting point. He
carried now the memory of near-enlightenment, and the memory wasas the Kind
had promised, despite Johnłs natural scepticismvery nearly as illuminating as
the thing itself. In some ways, perhaps, more soit was small and polished and
gemlike, and he could examine it from different angles; quite unlike the
unwieldy immersiveness of the experience itself, from which the memory had been
expertly distilled.

But why, he wondered, stop there? If he could revert back to
this simplified architecture and still retain the memory of what he had been
before, why not take things further?

Why not go all the way back?

The descent from near-enlightenment was not a thing to be
rushed, for at every stageas his evolved faculties were stripped back and
discardedhe had to be assured that the chain of memory remained unbroken. As
he approached being human again, he knew on an intellectual level that what he
now carried was not the memory of understanding, but the memory of a memory of
a memory ... a pale, diminished, reflected thing, but no less authentic for
that. It still felt genuine to John, and nowas they packed his wet, cellular
mind back into the stifling cage of a Homo sapiens skullthat was all that
truly mattered.

And so it came time for him to return to Mars.

Mars by then was a green and blue marble of a world much
like old Earth. Despite the passage of time the rekindled human civilisation
had spread no further than the solar system, andsince Earth was out of boundsMars
remained its capital. Sixteen million people lived there now, many of them
gathered into small communities scattered around the gentle foot slopes of
Pavonis Mons. Deep inside Mars, a lattice of artificial black holes created a
surface gravity indistinguishable from that of old Earth. Mammoth sunken
buttresses kept the ancient landscape from falling in on itself. The seas were
soupy with life; the atmosphere thick and warm, brimming with insects and
birds.

Certain things had been preserved since Johnłs departure.
The spiralling yellow road, for instance, still wormed its way to the summit of
Pavonis Mons, and pilgrims made the long but hardly arduous ascent, pausing
here and there at the many pennanted tea houses and hostels that lined the
route. Though they belonged to different creeds, all remembered John in some
form or another, and many of their creeds spoke of the day when he would come
back to Mars. To this end, the smooth circular plateau at the top of the volcano
had been kept clear, awaiting the day of Johnłs return. Monks brushed the dust
from it with great brooms. Pilgrims circled the plateau, but none ventured very
far inwards from the edge.

John, human again, dropped from the sky in a cradle of alien
force. It was day, but no one witnessed his arrival. The Kind had arranged an
invisibility barrier around him, so that from a distance he resembled only a
pillar of warm air, causing the scene behind him to tremble slightly as in a mirage.

�Are you sure youłre ready for this?" the Kind asked. �Youłve
been gone a long time. They may have some trouble dealing with your return."

John adjusted the star-shaped spectacles he had selected for
his return to Mars, settling them onto the small nub of his nose.

�Theyłll get used to me sooner or later."

�Theyłll expect words of wisdom. When they donłt get any,
theyłre likely to be disappointed. ęI get it nowł isnłt likely to pass muster."

�Theyłll get over it."

�You may wish to dispense some harmless platitudes: just
enough to keep them guessing. We can suggest some, if youłd like: wełve had
considerable practise at this sort of thing."

�Iłll be fine. Iłm just going to be straight with them. I
came, I saw, I backed off. But I did see it, and I do remember seeing it. I
think it all makes sense."

�ęI think it all makes senseł," the Kind repeated. �Thatłs
the best youłre going to give them?"

�It was my quest. I never said it had to measure up to
anyone elsełs expectations." John ran a hand over his scalp, flattening down
his thin auburn thatch against the air currents in the invisibility field. He
took a step forward, teetering on the huge red boots he had selected for his
return. �How do I look, anyway?"

�Not quite the way you started out. Is there any particular
reason for the physiological changes, the costume?"

John shrugged. �None in particular."

�Fine, then. Youłll knock them out. That is the appropriate
turn of phrase, isnłt it?"

�Itłll do. I guess this is it, then ... I step through here,
and Iłm back with people. Right?"

�Right. You have plans, we take it?"

�Nothing set in stone. See how things go, I thought. Maybe Iłll
settle down, maybe I wonłt. Iłve been on my own for a long time now: fitting
back into human society isnłt going to be a breeze. Especially some weird,
futuristic human society that half thinks Iłm some kind of god."

�Youłll manage."

John hesitated, ready to step through into daylight, into
full visibility. �Thanks, anyway. For everything."

�It was our pleasure."

�What about you, now?"

�Wełll move on," the Kind said. �Find someone else in need
of help. Perhaps wełll swing by again, further down the line, see how youłre
all doing."

�That would be nice."

There was an awkward lull in the conversation.

�John, there is one thing we need to tell you, before you
go."

He heard something in the Kindłs tone that, in all their
time together, was new to him.

�What is it?"

�We lied to you."

He let out small, involuntary laugh: it was the last thing
he had been expecting. He did not think the Kind had ever once spoken an
untruth to him.

�Tell me," he said.

�The third sentient being we spoke about ... the one that
split itself into two consciousness streams?"

John nodded. �What about it?"

�It didnłt exist. It was a story we made up, to persuade you
to follow that course of action. In truth, you were the first to do such thing.
No other entity had reached such a final stage of enlightenment without
continuing on to final collapse."

John absorbed that, then nodded slowly. �I see."

�We hope you are not too angry with us."

�Why did you lie?"

�Because we had grown to like you. It was wrong ... the
choice should have been yours, uncontaminated by our lies ... but without that
example, we did not think you would have chosen the route you did. And then we
would have lost you, and you would not be standing here, with the memories that
you have."

�I see," he said again, softer this time.

�Are you cross with us?"

John waited a little while before answering. �I should be, I
suppose. But really, Iłm not. Youłre probably right: I would have carried on.
And given what I know nowgiven the memories I haveIłm glad this part of me
didnłt."

�Then it was the right thing to do?"

�It was a white lie. There are worse things."

�Thank you, John."

�I guess the next time you meet someone like mesome other
sentient being engaged on that questyou wonłt have to lie, will you?"

�Not now, no."

�Then wełll let it be. Iłm cool with the way things turned
out." John was about to step outside, but then something occurred to him. He
fought to keep the playful expression from his face. �But I canłt let you get
away without at least doing one final favour for me. I know itłs a lot to ask
after youłve done so much ..."

�Whatever it is, we will strive to do our best."

John pointed across the mirror-smooth surface of the
plateau, to the circling line of distant pilgrims. �Iłm going to step outside
in a moment, onto Pavonis Mons. But I donłt want to scare the living daylights
out of them by just walking out of thin air with no warning."

�What did you have in mind?"

John was still pointing. �Youłre going to make something appear
before I do. Given your abilities, I donłt think it will tax you very much."

�What is it that you would like?"

�A white piano," John said. �But not just any old piano. It
has to be a B�sendorfer grand. I was one once, remember?"

�But this one would be smaller, we take it?"

�Yes," John said, nodding agreeably. �A lot smaller. Small
enough that I can sit at the keyboard. So youłd better put a stool by it as
well."

Swift machinery darted through the air, quick as lightning.
A piano assumed startling solidity, and then a red-cushioned stool. Across the
plateau, one or two pilgrims had already observed its arrival. They were
gesticulating excitedly, and the news was spreading fast.

�Is that all?"

John tapped the glasses back onto the bridge of his nose. �Therełs
one final thing. By the time I reach that stool, I need to be able to play the
piano. I made music before, but that was different. Now I need to do it with my
fingers, the old way. Think you can oblige?"

�We have much knowledge of music. The necessary neural
scripting can be implemented by the time you arrive at the B�sendorfer. There
may be a slight headache ..."

�Iłll deal with it."

�It only remains to ask ... is there anything in particular
you want to play?"

�Actually," John said, stretching his fingers in readiness
for the performance, �there is one song I had in mind. Itłs about Mars, as it
happens."

Weather

We were at one-quarter of the speed of light, outbound from
Shiva-Parvati with a hold full of refugees, when the Cockatrice caught up with
us. She commenced her engagement at a distance of one light-second, seeking to
disable us with long-range weapons before effecting a boarding operation.
Captain Van Ness did his best to protect the Petronel, but we were a lightly
armoured ship and Van Ness did not wish to endanger his passengers by provoking
a damaging retaliation from the pirates. As coldly calculated as it might
appear, Van Ness knew that it would be better for the sleepers to be taken by
another ship than suffer a purposeless death in interstellar space.

As shipmaster, it was my duty to give Captain Van Ness the
widest choice of options. When it became clear that the Cockatrice was on our
tail, following us out from Shiva-Parvati, I recommended that we discard fifty
thousand tonnes of nonessential hull material, in order to increase the rate of
acceleration available from our Conjoiner drives. When the Cockatrice ramped up
her own engines to compensate, I identified a further twenty thousand tonnes of
material we could discard until the next orbitfall, even though the loss of the
armour would marginally increase the radiation dosage we would experience
during the flight. We gained a little, but the pirates still had power in
reserve: theyłd stripped back their ship to little more than a husk, and they
didnłt have the mass handicap of our sleepers. Since we could not afford to
lose any more hull material, I advised Van Ness to eject two of our three heavy
shuttles, each of which massed six thousand tonnes when fully fuelled. That
bought us yet more time, but to my dismay the pirates still found a way to
squeeze a little more out of their engines.

Whoever they had as shipmaster, I thought, they were good at
their work.

So I went to the engines themselves, to see if I could
better my nameless opponent. I crawled out along the pressurised access tunnel
that pierced the starboard spar, out to the coupling point where the foreign
technology of the starboard Conjoiner drive was mated to the structural fabric
of the Petronel. There I opened the hatch that gave access to the controls of
the drive itself: six stiff dials, fashioned in blue metal, arranged in hexagon
formation, each of which was tied to some fundamental aspect of the enginełs
function. The dials were set into quadrant-shaped recesses, all now glowing a
calm blue-green.

I noted the existing settings, then made near-microscopic
alterations to three of the six dials, fighting to keep my hands steady as I
applied the necessary effort to budge them. Even as I made the first
alteration, I felt the engine respond: a shiver of power as some arcane process
occurred deep inside it, accompanied by a shift in my own weight as the thrust
increased by five or six per cent. The blue-green hue was now tinted with
orange.

The Petronel surged faster, still maintaining her former heading.
It was only possible to make adjustments to the starboard engine, since the
port engine had no external controls. That didnłt matter, because the Conjoiners
had arranged the two engines to work in perfect synchronisation, despite them
being a kilometre apart. No one had ever succeeded in detecting the signals
that passed between two matched C-drives, let alone in understanding the
messages those signals carried. But everyone who worked with them knew what
would happen if, by accident or design, the engines were allowed to get more
than sixteen hundred metres apart.

I completed my adjustments, satisfied that Iłd done all I
could without risking engine malfunction. Three of the five dials were now
showing orange, indicating that those settings were now outside what the
Conjoiners deemed the recommended envelope of safe operation. If any of the
dials were to show red, or if more than three showed orange, than wełd be in
real danger of losing the Petronel.

When Ultras meet on friendly terms, to exchange data or
goods, the shipmasters will often trade stories of engine settings. On a busy
trade route, a marginal increase in drive efficiency can make all the difference
between one ship and its competitors. Occasionally you hear about ships that
have been running on three orange, even four orange, for decades at a time. By
the same token, you sometimes hear about ships that went nova when only two dials
had been adjusted away from the safety envelope. The one thing every shipmaster
agrees upon is that no lighthugger has ever operated for more than a few days
of shiptime with one dial in the red. You might risk that to escape aggressors,
but even then some will insist that the danger is too great; that those ships
that lasted days were the lucky ones.

I left the starboard engine and retreated back into the main
hull of the Petronel. Van Ness was waiting to greet me. I could tell by the
look on his facethe part of it that I could readthat the news wasnłt good.

�Good lad, Inigo," he said, placing his heavy gauntleted
hand on my shoulder. �Youłve bought us maybe half a day, and Iłm grateful for
that, no question of it. But itłs not enough to make a difference. Are you sure
you canłt sweet-talk any more out of them?"

�We could risk going to two gees for a few hours. That still
wouldnłt put us out of reach of the Cockatrice, though."

�And beyond that?"

I showed Van Ness my handwritten log book, with its meticulous
notes of engine settings, compiled over twenty years of shiptime. Black ink for
my own entries, the style changing abruptly when I lost my old hand and slowly
learned how to use the new one; red annotations in the same script for comments
and know-how gleaned from other shipmasters, dated and named. �According to
this, wełre already running a fifteen per cent chance of losing the ship within
the next hundred days. Iłd feel a lot happier if we were already throttling
back."

�You donłt think we can lose any more mass?"

�Wełre stripped to the bone as it is. I can probably find
you another few thousand tonnes, but wełll still only be looking at prolonging
the inevitable."

�Wełll have the short-range weapons," Van Ness said resignedly.
�Maybe theyłll make enough of a difference. At least now we have an extra
half-day to get them run out and tested."

�Letłs hope so," I agreed, fully aware that it was hopeless.
The weapons were antiquated and underpowered, good enough for fending off
orbital insurgents but practically useless against another ship, especially one
that had been built for piracy. The Petronel hadnłt fired a shot in anger in
more than fifty years. When Van Ness had the chance to upgrade the guns, hełd
chosen instead to spend the money on newer reefersleep caskets for the
passenger hold.

People have several wrong ideas about Ultras. One of the
most common misconceptions is that we must all be brigands, every ship
bristling with armaments, primed to a state of nervous readiness the moment
another vessel comes within weapons range.

It isnłt true. For every ship like that, there are a
thousand like the Petronel: just trying to ply an honest trade, with a decent,
hardworking crew under the hand of a fair man like Van Ness. Some of us might
look like freaks, by the standards of planetary civilisation. But spending an
entire life aboard a ship, hopping from star to star at relativistic speed,
soaking up exotic radiation from the engines and from space itself, is hardly
the environment for which the human form was evolved. Iłd lost my old hand in
an accident, and much of what had happened to Van Ness was down to time and
misfortune in equal measure.

He was one of the best captains Iłd ever known, maybe the
best ever. Hełd scared the hell out of me the first time we met, when he was
recruiting for a new shipmaster in a carousel around Greenhouse. But Van Ness
treated his crew well, kept his word in a deal and always reminded us that our
passengers were not frozen �cargo" but human beings who had entrusted
themselves into our care.

�If it comes to it," Van Ness said, �wełll let them take the
passengers. At least that way some of them might survive, even if they wonłt
necessarily end up where they were expecting. We put up too much of a fight,
even after wełve been boarded, the Cockatricełs crew may just decide to burn
everything, sleepers included."

�I know," I said, even though I didnłt want to hear it.

�But herełs my advice to you, lad." Van Nessłs iron grip tightened
on my shoulder. �Get yourself to an airlock as soon as you can. Blow yourself
into space rather than let the bastards get their hands on you. They might be
in mind for a bit of cruelty, but they wonłt be in need of new crew."

I winced, before he crushed my collarbone. He meant well,
but he really didnłt know his own strength.

�Especially not a shipmaster, judging by the way things are
going."

�Aye. Hełs good, whoever he is. Not as good as you, though.
Youłve got a fully laden ship to push; all they have is a stripped-down
skeleton."

It was meant well, but I knew better than to underestimate
my adversary. �Thank you, Captain."

�Wełd best start waking those guns, lad. If youłre done with
the engines, the weaponsmaster may appreciate a helping hand."

I barely slept for the next day. Coaxing the weapons back to
operational readiness was a fraught business, and it all had to be done without
alerting the Cockatrice that we had any last-minute defensive capability. The
magnetic coils on the induction guns had to be warmed and brought up to
operational field strength, and then tested with slugs of recycled hull
material. One of the coils fractured during warm-up and took out its entire
turret, injuring one of Wepsł men in the process. The optics on the lasers had
to be aligned and calibrated, and then the lasers had to be test fired against
specks of incoming interstellar dust, hoping that the Cockatrice didnłt spot
those pinpoint flashes of gamma radiation as the lasers found their targets.

All the while this was going on, the enemy continued their
long-range softening-up bombardment. The Cockatrice was using everything in her
arsenal, from slugs and missiles to beam-weapons. The Petronel was running an
evasion routine, swerving to exploit the sadly narrowing timelag between the
two ships, but the routine was old and with the engines already notched up to
close-on maximum output, there was precious little reserve power. No single
impact was damaging, but as the assault continued, the cumulative effect began
to take its toll. Acres of hull shielding were now compromised, and there were
warnings of structural weakness in the port drive spar. If this continued, we
would soon be forced to dampen our engines, rather than be torn apart by our
own thrust loading. That was exactly what the Cockatrice wanted. Once theyłd
turned us into a lame duck, they could make a forced hard docking and storm our
ship.

By the time they were eighty thousand kilometres out, things
were looking very bad for us. Even the Cockatrice must have been nervous of
what would happen if the port spar gave way, since theyłd begun to concentrate
their efforts on our midsection instead. Reluctantly I crawled back along the
starboard spar and confronted the engine settings again. I was faced with two
equally numbing possibilities. I could turn the dials even further into the
orange, making the engines run harder still. Even if the engines held, the ship
wouldnłt, but at least wełd go out in a flash when the spar collapsed and the
two engines drifted apart. Or I could return the dials to blue-green and let
the Cockatrice catch us up without risk of further failure. One option might
ensure the future survival of the passengers. Neither looked very attractive
from the crewłs standpoint.

Van Ness knew it, too. Hełd begun to go around the rest of
the crew, all two dozen of us, ordering those who werenłt actively involved in
the current crisis to choose an empty casket in the passenger hold and try to
pass themselves off as cargo. Van Ness was wise enough not to push the point
when no one took him up on his offer.

At fifty thousand kilometres, the Cockatrice was in range of
our own weapons. We let her slip a little closer and then rotated our hull
through forty-five degrees to give her a full broadside, all eleven working
slug-cannons discharging at once, followed by a burst from the lasers. The
recoil from the slugs was enough to generate further warnings of structural
failure in a dozen critical nodes. But we held, somehow, and thirty per cent of
that initial salvo hit the Cockatrice square-on. By then the lasers had already
struck her, vaporising thousands of tonnes of ablative ice from her prow in a
scalding white flash. When the steam had fallen astern of the
still-accelerating ship, we got our first good look at the damage.

It wasnłt enough. Wełd hurt her, but barely, and I knew we
couldnłt sustain more than three further bursts of fire before the Cockatricełs
own short-range weapons found their lock and returned the assault. As it was,
we only got off another two salvos before the slug-cannons suffered a targeting
failure. The lasers continued to fire for another minute, but once theyłd
burned off the Cockatricełs ice (which she could easily replenish from our own
shield, once wełd been taken) they could inflict little further damage.

By twenty thousand kilometres, all our weapons were inoperable.
Fear of breakup had forced me to throttle our engines back down to zero thrust,
leaving only our in-system fusion motors running. At ten thousand kilometres,
the Cockatrice released a squadron of pirates, each of whom would be carrying
hull-penetrating gear and shipboard weapons, in addition to their thruster
packs and armour. They must have been confident that we had nothing else to
throw at them.

We knew then it was over.

It was, too: but for the Cockatrice, not us. What took place
happened too quickly for the human eye to see. It was only later, when we had
the benefit of footage from the hull cameras, that we were able to piece
together what had occurred.

One instant, the Cockatrice was creeping closer to us, her engines
doused to a whisper now to match our own feeble rate of acceleration. The next
instant, she was still there, but everything about her had changed. The engines
were shut down completely and the hull had begun to come apart, flaking away in
a long lateral line that ran the entire four kilometres from bow to stern. The
Cockatrice began to crab, losing axial stabilisation. Pieces of her were
drifting away. Vapour was jetting from a dozen apertures along her length.
Where the hull had scabbed away, the brassy orange glow of internal fire was
visible. One engine spar was seriously buckled.

We didnłt know it at the timedidnłt know it until much
later, when wełd actually boarded herbut the Cockatrice had fallen victim to
the oldest hazard in space: collision with debris. There isnłt a lot of it out
there, but when it hits ... at a quarter of the speed of light, it doesnłt take
much to inflict crippling damage. The impactor might only have been the size of
a fist, or a fat thumb, but it had rammed its way right through the ship like a
bullet, and the momentum transfer had almost ripped the engines off.

It was bad luck for the crew of the Cockatrice. For us, it
was the most appalling piece of good luck imaginable. Except it wasnłt even
luck, really. Every now and then, ships will encounter something like that.
Deep-look radar will identify an incoming shard and send an emergency steer
command to the engines. Or the radar will direct anti-collision lasers to
vaporise the object before it hits. Even if it does hit, most of its kinetic
energy will be soaked up by the ablation ice. Ships donłt carry all that
deadweight for nothing.

But the Cockatrice had lost her ice under our lasers. Shełd
have replaced it sooner or later, but without it she was horribly vulnerable.
And her own anti-collision system was preoccupied dealing with our short-range
weapons. One little impactor was all it took to remove her from the battle.

It gave us enough of a handhold to start fighting back. With
the Cockatrice out of the fight, our own crew were able to leave the protection
of the ship without fear of being fried or pulverised. Van Ness was the first
out of the airlock, with me not far behind him. Within five minutes there were
twenty-three of us outside, our suits bulked out with armour and antiquated
weapons. There were at least thirty incoming pirates from the Cockatrice, and
they had better gear. But theyłd lost the support of their mother ship, and all
of them must have been aware that the situation had undergone a drastic
adjustment. Perhaps it made them fight even more fiercely, given that ours was
now the only halfway-intact ship. Theyłd been planning to steal our cargo
before, and strip the Petronel for useful parts; now they needed to take the
Petronel and claim her as her own. But they didnłt have back-up from the
Cockatrice andjudging by the way the battle proceededthey seemed handicapped
by more than just the lack of covering fire. They fought as well as they could,
which was with a terrible individual determination, but no overall coordination.
Afterwards, we concluded that their suit-to-suit communications, even their
spatial-orientation systems, must have been reliant on signals routed through
their ship. Without her they were deaf and blind.

We still lost good crew. It took six hours to mop up the
last resistance from the pirates, by which point wełd taken eleven fatalities,
with another three seriously wounded. But by then the pirates were all dead,
and we were in no mood to take prisoners.

But we were in a mood to take what we needed from the Cockatrice.

If wełd expected to encounter serious resistance aboard the
damaged ship, we were wrong. As Van Ness led our boarding party through the
drifting wreck, the scope of the damage became chillingly clear. The ship had
been gutted from the inside out, with almost no intact pressure-bearing
structures left anywhere inside her main hull. For most of the crew left aboard
when the impactor hit, the end would have come with merciful swiftness. Only a
few had survived the initial collision, and most of them must have died shortly
afterwards, as the ship bled through its wounds. We found no sign that the
Cockatrice had been carrying frozen passengers, althoughsince entire internal
bays had been blasted out of existence, leaving only an interlinked chain of
charred, blackened cavernswe probably wouldnłt ever know for sure. Of the few
survivors we did encounter, none attempted surrender or requested parley. That
made it easier for us. If they stood still, we shot them. If they fled, we
still shot them.

Except for one.

We knew there was something different about her as soon as
we saw her. She didnłt look or move like an Ultra. There was something of the
cat or snake about the way she slinked out of the illumination of our lamps,
something fluid and feral, something sleek and honed that did not belong aboard
a ship crewed by pirates. We held our fire from the moment her eyes first
flashed at us, for we knew she could not be one of them. Wide, white-edged eyes
in a girlłs face, her strong-jawed expression one of ruthless self-control and
effortless superiority. Her skull was hairless, her forehead rising to a bony
crest rilled on either side by shimmering coloured tissue.

The girl was a Conjoiner.

It was three days before we found her again. She knew that ship
with animal cunning, as if the entire twisted and blackened warren was a lair
she had made for herself. But her options were diminishing with every hour that
passed, as more and more air drained out of the wreck. Even Conjoiners needed
to breathe, and that meant there was less and less of the ship in which she
could hide.

Van Ness wanted to move on. Van Nessa good man, but never
the most imaginative of soulswasnłt interested in what a stray Conjoiner could
do for us. Iłd warned him that the Cockatricełs engines were in an unstable
condition, and that we wouldnłt have time to back off to a safe distance if the
buckled drive spar finally gave way. Now that wełd harvested enough of the
other shipłs intact hull to repair our own damage, Van Ness saw no reason to
hang around. But I managed to talk him into letting us hunt down the girl.

�Shełs a Conjoiner, Captain. She wouldnłt have been aboard
that ship of her own free will. That means shełs a prisoner that we can free
and return to her people. Theyłll be grateful. That means theyłll want to
reward us."

Van Ness fixed me with an indulgent smile. �Lad, have you
ever had close dealings with Spiders?"

He still called me �lad" even though Iłd been part of his
crew for twenty years, and had been born another twenty before that, by
shiptime reckoning. �No," I admitted. �But the Spidersthe Conjoinersarenłt
the bogey men some people like to make out."

�Iłve dealt with łem," Van Ness said. �Iłm a lot older than
you, lad. I go right back to when things werenłt so pretty between the Spiders
and the rest of humanity, back when my wife was alive."

It took a lot to stir up the past for Rafe Van Ness. In all
our years together, hełd only mentioned his wife a handful of times. Shełd been
a botanist, working on the Martian terraforming programme. Shełd been caught by
a flash flood when she was working in one of the big craters, testing plant
stocks for the Demarchists. All I knew was that after her death, Van Ness had
left the system, on one of the first passenger-carrying starships. It had been
his first step on the long road to becoming an Ultra.

�Theyłve changed since the old days," I said. �We trust them
enough to use their engines, donłt we?"

�We trust the engines. Isnłt quite the same thing. And if
they didnłt have such a monopoly on making the things, maybe we wouldnłt have
to deal with them at all. Anyway, who is this girl? What was she doing aboard
the Cockatrice ? What makes you think she wasnłt helping them?"

�Conjoiners donłt condone piracy. And if we want answers, we
have no option but to catch her and find out what she has to say."

Van Ness sounded suddenly interested. �Interrogate her, you
mean?"

�I didnłt say that, Captain. But we might want to ask her a
few questions."

�Wełd be playing with fire. You know they can make things
happen just by thinking about them."

�Shełll have no reason to hurt us. Wełll have saved her life
just by taking her off the Cockatrice."

�Maybe she doesnłt want it saved. Have you thought of that?"

�Wełll cross that bridge when we find her, Captain."

He pulled a face, that part of his visage still capable of
making expressions, at least. �Iłll give you another twelve hours, lad. Thatłs
my limit. Then we put as much distance between us and that wreck as God and
physics will allow."

I nodded, knowing that it was pointless to expect more of
Van Ness. Hełd already shown great forbearance in allowing us to delay the
departure for so long. Given his feelings regarding Conjoiners, I wasnłt going
to push for any more time.

We caught her eleven hours later. Wełd driven her as far as
she could go, blocking her escape routes by blowing the few surrounding volumes
that were still pressurised. I was the first to speak to her, when we finally
had her cornered.

I pushed up the visor of my helmet, breathing stale air so
that we could speak. She was huddled in a corner, compressed like some animal
ready to bolt or strike.

�Stop running from us," I said, as my lamp pinned her down
and forced her to squint. �Therełs nowhere left to go, and even if there was,
we donłt want to hurt you. Whatever these people did to you, whatever they made
you do, wełre not like them."

She hissed back, �Youłre Ultras. Thatłs all I need to know."

�Wełre Ultras, yes, but we still want to help you. Our
captain just wants to get away from this time bomb as quickly as possible. I
talked him into giving us a few extra hours to find you. You can come with us
whenever you like. But if youłd rather stay aboard this ship ..."

She stared back at me and said nothing. I couldnłt guess her
age. She had the face of a girl, but there was a steely resolution in her
olive-green eyes that told me she was older than she looked.

�Iłm Inigo, the shipmaster from the Petronel," I said,
hoping that my smile looked reassuring rather than threatening. I reached out
my hand, my right one, and she flinched back. Even suited, even hidden under a
glove, my hand was obviously mechanical. �Please," I continued, �come with us.
Wełll treat you well and get you back to your people."

�Why?" she snarled. �Why do you care?"

�Because wełre not all the same," I said. �And you need to believe
it, or youłre going to die here when we leave. Captain wants us to secure for
thrust in less than an hour. So come on."

�What happened?" she asked, looking around at the damaged
compartment in which she had been cornered. �I know the Cockatrice was
attacking another ship ... how did you do this?"

�We didnłt. We just got very, very lucky. Now itłs your
turn."

�I canłt leave here. I need to be with this ship."

�This ship is going to blow up if one of us sneezes. Do you
really want to be aboard when that happens?"

�I still need to be here. Leave me alone, Iłll survive by
myself. Conjoiners will find me again."

I shook my head firmly. �That isnłt going to happen. Even if
this ship doesnłt blow up, youłre still drifting at twenty-five per cent of the
speed of light. Thatłs too fast to get you back to Shiva-Parvati, even if therełs
a shuttle aboard this thing. Too fast for anyone around Shiva-Parvati to come
out and rescue you, too."

�I know this."

�Then you also know that youłre not moving anywhere near
fast enough to actually get anywhere before your resources run out. Unless you
think you can survive fifty years aboard this thing, until you swing by the
next colonised system with no way of slowing down."

�Iłll take my chances."

A voice buzzed in my helmet. It was Van Ness, insisting that
we return to the Petronel as quickly as possible. �Iłm sorry," I said, �but if
you donłt come willingly, Iłm going to have to bring you in unconscious." I
raised the blunt muzzle of my slug-gun.

�If therełs a tranquiliser dart in there, it wonłt work on
me. My nervous system isnłt like yours. I only sleep when I choose to."

�Thatłs what I figured. Itłs why I dialled the dose to five
times its normal strength. I donłt know about you, but Iłm willing to give it a
try and see what happens."

Panic crossed her face. �Give me a suit," she said. �Give me
a suit and then leave me alone, if you really want to help."

�Whatłs your name?"

�We donłt have names, Inigo. At least nothing you could get
your tongue around."

�Iłm willing to try."

�Give me a suit. Then leave me alone."

Van Ness started screaming in my ears again. Iłd had enough.
I pointed the muzzle at her, aiming for the flesh of her thigh, where she had
her legs tucked under her. I squeezed the trigger and delivered the stun
fl�chette.

�You fool," she said. �You donłt understand. You have to
leave me here, with this ..."

That was all she managed before slumping into unconsciousness.
Shełd gone down much faster than Iłd expected, as if shełd already been on her
last reserves of strength. I just hoped I hadnłt set the stun dose too high. It
was already strong enough to kill any normal human being.

Van Ness had been right to be concerned about our proximity
to the Cockatrice. Wełd barely doubled the distance between the two ships when
her drive spar failed, allowing the port engine to drift away from its
starboard counterpart. Several agonising minutes later, the distance between
the two engine units exceeded sixteen hundred metres and the drives went up in
a double burst that tested our shielding to its limits. The flash must have
been visible all the way back to Shiva-Parvati.

The girl had been unconscious right up until that moment,
but when the engines went up she twitched on the bunk where wełd placed her,
just as if shełd been experiencing a vivid and disturbing dream. The rilled
structures on the side of her crest throbbed with vivid colours, each chasing
the last. Then she was restful again, for many hours, and the play of colours
calmer.

I watched her sleeping. Iłd never been near a Conjoiner
before, let alone one like this. Aboard the ship, when we had been hunting her,
she had seemed strong and potentially dangerous. Now she looked like some
half-starved animal, driven to the brink of madness by hunger and something in
finitely worse. There were awful bruises all over her body, some more recent
than others. There were fine scars on her skull. One of her incisors was
missing a point.

Van Ness still wasnłt convinced of the wisdom of bringing
her aboard, but even his dislike of Conjoiners didnłt extend to the notion of
throwing her back into space. All the same, he insisted that she be bound to
the bunk by heavy restraints, in an armoured room under the guard of a servitor,
at least until we had some idea of who she was and how she had ended up aboard
the pirate ship. He didnłt want heavily augmented crew anywhere near her,
either: not when (as he evidently believed) she had the means to control any
machine in her vicinity, and might therefore overpower or even commandeer any
crewperson who had a skull full of implants. It wasnłt like that, I tried to
tell him: Conjoiners could talk to machines, yes, but not all machines, and the
idea that they could work witchcraft on anything with a circuit inside it was
just so much irrational fearmongering.

Van Ness heard my reasoned objections, and then ignored
them. Iłm glad that he did, though. Had he listened to me, he might have put
some other member of the crew in charge of questioning her, and then I wouldnłt
have got to know her as well as I did. Because I only had the metal hand, the
rest of me still flesh and blood, he deemed me safe from her influence.

I was with her when she woke.

I placed my left on her shoulder as she squirmed under the restraints,
suddenly aware of her predicament. �Itłs all right," I said softly. �Youłre
safe now. Captain made us put these on you for the time being, but wełll get
them off you as soon as we can. Thatłs a promise. Iłm Inigo, by the way, shipmaster.
We met before, but Iłm not sure how much of that you remember."

�Every detail," she said. Her voice was low, dark-tinged, untrusting.

�Maybe you donłt know where you are. Youłre aboard the Petronel.
The Cockatrice is gone, along with everyone aboard her. Whatever they did to
you, whatever happened to you aboard that ship, itłs over now."

�You didnłt listen to me."

�If wełd listened to you," I said patiently, �youłd be dead
by now."

�No, I wouldnłt."

Iłd been ready to give her the benefit of the doubt, but my
reservoir of sympathy was beginning to dry up. �You know, it wouldnłt hurt to
show a little gratitude. We put ourselves at considerable risk to get you to
safety. Wełd taken everything we needed from the pirates. We only went back in
to help you."

�I didnłt need you to help me. I could have survived."

�Not unless you think you could have held that spar on by
sheer force of will."

She hissed back her reply. �Iłm a Conjoiner. That means the
rules were different. I could have changed things. I could have kept the ship
in one piece."

�To make a point?"

�No," she said, with acid slowness, as if that was the only
speed I was capable of following. �Not to make a point. We donłt make points."

�The shipłs gone," I said. �Itłs over, so you may as well
deal with it. Youłre with us now. And no, youłre not our prisoner. Wełll do
everything I said we would: take care of you, get you to safety, back to your
people."

�You really think itłs that simple?"

�I donłt know. Why donłt you tell me? I donłt see what the
problem is."

�The problem is I canłt ever go back. Is that simple enough
for you?"

�Why?" I asked. �Were you exiled from the Conjoiners, or
something like that?"

She shook her elaborately crested head, as if my question
was the most naive thing she had ever heard. �No one gets exiled."

�Then tell me what the hell happened!"

Anger burst to the surface. �I was taken, all right? I was
stolen, snatched away from my people. Captain Voulage took me prisoner around
Yellowstone, when the Cockatrice was docked near one of our ships. I was part
of a small diplomatic party visiting Carousel New Venice. Voulagełs men
ambushed us, split us up, then took me so far from the other Conjoiners that I
dropped out of neural range. Have you any idea what that means to one of us?"

I shook my head, not because I didnłt understand what she
meant, but because I knew I could have no proper grasp of the emotional pain
that severance must have caused. I doubted that pain was a strong enough word
for the psychic shock associated with being ripped away from her fellows.
Nothing in ordinary human experience could approximate the trauma of that
separation, any more than a frog could grasp the loss of a loved one. Conjoiners
spent their whole lives in a state of gestalt consciousness, sharing thoughts
and experiences via a web of implant-mediated neural connections. They had
individual personalities, but those personalities were more like the blurred
identities of atoms in a metallic solid. Beyond the level of individual self
was the state of higher mental union that they called Transenlightenment,
analogous to the fizzing sea of dissociated electrons in that same metallic
lattice. And the girl had been ripped away from that, forced to come to terms
with existence as a solitary mind, an island once more.

�I understand how bad it must have been," I said. �But now
you can go back. Isnłt that something worth looking forward to?"

�You only think you understand. To a Conjoiner, what happened
to me is the worst thing in the world. And now I canłt go back: not now, not
ever. Iłve become damaged, broken, useless. My mind is permanently disfigured.
It canłt be allowed to return to Transenlightenment."

�Why ever not? Wouldnłt they be glad to get you back?"

She took a long time answering. In the quiet, I studied her
face, watchful for anything that would betray the danger Van Ness clearly
believed she posed. Now his fears seemed groundless. She looked smaller and
more delicately boned than when wełd first glimpsed her on the Cockatrice. The
strangeness of her, the odd shape of her hairless crested skull, should have
been off-putting. In truth I found her fascinating. It was not her alienness
that drew my furtive attention, but her very human face: her small and pointed
chin, the pale freckles under her eyes, the way her mouth never quite closed,
even when she was silent. The olive green of her eyes was a shade so dark that
from certain angles it became a lustrous black, like the surface of coal.

�No," she said, answering me finally. �It wouldnłt work. Iłd
upset the purity of the others, spoil the harmony of the neural connections,
like a single out-of-tune instrument in an orchestra. Iłd make everyone else
start playing out of key."

�I think youłre being too fatalistic. Shouldnłt we at least
try to find some other Conjoiners and see what they say?"

�That isnłt how it works," she said. �Theyłd have to take me
back, yes, if I presented myself to them. Theyłd do it out of kindness and
compassion. But Iłd still end up harming them. Itłs my duty not to allow that
to happen."

�Then youłre saying you have to spend the rest of your life
away from other Conjoiners, wandering the universe like some miserable
excommunicated pilgrim?"

�There are more of us than you realise."

�You do a good job keeping out of the limelight. Most people
only see Conjoiners in groups, all dressed in black like a flock of crows."

�Maybe you arenłt looking in the right places."

I sighed, aware that nothing I said was going to convince
her that she would be better off returning to her people. �Itłs your life, your
destiny. At least youłre alive. Our word still holds: wełll drop you at the
nearest safe planet, when we next make orbitfall. If that isnłt satisfactory to
you, youłd be welcome to remain aboard ship until we arrive somewhere else."

�Your captain would allow that? I thought he was the one who
wanted to leave the wreck before youłd found me."

�Iłll square things with the captain. He isnłt the biggest
fan of Conjoiners, but hełll see sense when he realises you arenłt a monster."

�Does he have a reason not to like me?"

�Hełs an old man," I said simply.

�Riven with prejudice, you mean?"

�In his way," I said, shrugging. �But donłt blame him for
that. He lived through the bad years, when your people were first coming into
existence. I think he had some first-hand experience of the trouble that
followed."

�Then I envy him those first-hand memories. Not many of us
are still alive from those times. To have lived through those years, to have
breathed the same air as Remontoire and the others ..." She looked away sadly. �Remontoirełs
gone now. So are Galiana and Nevil. We donłt know what happened to any of them."

I knew she must have been talking about pivotal figures from
earlier Conjoiner history, but the people of whom she spoke meant nothing to
me. To her, cast so far downstream from those early events on Mars, the names
must have held something of the resonance of saints or apostles. I thought I
knew something of Conjoiners, but they had a long and complicated internal
history of which I was totally ignorant.

�I wish things hadnłt happened the way they did," I said. �But
that was then and this is now. We donłt hate or fear you. If we did, we wouldnłt
have risked our necks getting you out of the Cockatrice."

�No, you donłt hate or fear me," she replied. �But you still
think I might be useful to you, donłt you?"

�Only if you wish to help us."

�Captain Voulage thought that I might have the expertise to
improve the performance of his ship."

�Did you?" I asked innocently.

�By increments, yes. He showed me the engines and ... encouraged
me to make certain changes. You told me you are a shipmaster, so you doubtless
have some familiarity with the principles involved."

I thought back to the adjustments I had made to our own engines,
when we still had ambitions of fleeing the pirates. The memory of my trembling
hand on those three critical dials felt as if it had been dredged from deepest
antiquity, rather than something that had happened only days earlier.

�When you say ęencouragedł ..." I began.

�He found ways to coerce me. It is true that Conjoiners can
control their perception of pain by applying neural blockades. But only to a
degree, and then only when the pain has a real physical origin. If the pain is
generated in the head, using a reverse-field trawl, our defences are useless. �
She looked at me with a sudden hard intensity, as if daring me to imagine
one-tenth of what she had experienced. �It is like locking a door when the wolf
is already in the house."

�Iłm sorry. You must have been through hell."

�I only had the pain to endure," she said. �Iłm not the one
anyone needs to feel sorry about."

The remark puzzled me, but I let it lie. �I have to get back
to our own engines now," I said, �but Iłll come to see you later. In the
meantime, I think you should rest." I snapped a duplicate communications
bracelet from my wrist and placed it near her hand, where she could reach it. �If
you need me, you can call into this. Itłll take me a little while to get back
here, but Iłll come as quickly as possible. �

She lifted her forearm as far as it would go, until the
restraints stiffened. �And these?"

�Iłll talk to Van Ness. Now that youłre lucid, now that youłre
talking to us, I donłt see any further need for them."

�Thank you," she said again. �Inigo. Is that all there is to
your name? Itłs rather a short one, even by the standards of the retarded."

�Inigo Standish, shipmaster. And you still havenłt told me
your name."

�I told you: itłs nothing you could understand. We have our
own names now, terms of address that can only be communicated in the
Transenlightenment. My name is a flow of experiential symbols, a string of
interiorised qualia, an expression of a particular dynamic state that has only
ever happened under a conjunction of rare physical conditions in the atmosphere
of a particular kind of gas giant planet. I chose it myself. Itłs considered
very beautiful and a little melancholy, like a haiku in five dimensions."

�Inside the atmosphere of a gas giant, right?"

She looked at me alertly. �Yes."

�Fine, then. Iłll call you Weather. Unless youłd like to
suggest something better."

She never did suggest something better, even though I think
she once came close to it. From that moment on, whether she liked it or not,
she was always Weather. Soon, it was what the other crew were calling her, and
the name thatgrudgingly at first, then resignedlyshe deigned to respond to.

I went to see Captain Van Ness and did my best to persuade
him that Weather was not going to cause us any dif ficulties.

�What are you suggesting we should give hera free pass to
the rest of the ship?"

�Only that we could let her out of her prison cell."

�Shełs recuperating."

�Shełs restrained. And youłve put an armed servitor on the
door, in case she gets out of the restraints."

�Pays to be prudent."

�I think we can trust her now, Captain." I hesitated,
choosing my words with great care. �I know you have good reasons not to like
her people, but she isnłt the same as the Conjoiners from those days."

�Thatłs what shełd like us to think, certainly."

�Iłve spoken to her, heard her story. Shełs an outcast from
her people, unable to return to them because of whatłs happened to her."

�Well, then," Van Ness said, nodding as if hełd proved a
point, �outcasts do funny things. You canłt ever be too careful with outcasts."

�Itłs not like that with Weather."

�Weather," he repeated, with a certain dry distaste. �So shełs
got a name now, has she?"

�I felt it might help. The name was my suggestion, not hers."

�Donłt start humanising them. Thatłs the mistake humans always
make. Next thing you know, theyłve got their claws in your skull."

I closed my eyes, forcing self-control as the conversation
veered off course. Iłd always had an excellent relationship with Van Ness, one
that came very close to bordering on genuine friendship. But from the moment he
heard about Weather, I knew she was going to come between us.

�Iłm not suggesting we let her run amok," I said. �Even if
we let her out of those restraints, even if we take away the servitor, we can
still keep her out of any parts of the ship where we donłt want her. In the
meantime, I think she can be helpful to us. Shełs already told me that Captain
Voulage forced her to make improvements to the Cockatrice ęs drive system. I
donłt see why she canłt do the same for us, if we ask nicely."

�Why did he have to force her, if youłre so convinced shełd
do it willingly now?"

�Iłm not convinced. But I canłt see why she wouldnłt help
us, if we treat her like a human being."

�Thatłd be our big mistake," Van Ness said. �She never was a
human being. Shełs been a Spider from the moment they made her, and shełll go
to the grave like that."

�Then you wonłt consider it?"

�I consented to let you bring her aboard. That was already
against every God-given instinct." Then Van Ness rumbled, �And Iłd thank you
not to mention the Spider again, Inigo. Youłve my permission to visit her if
you see fit, but she isnłt taking a step out of that room until we make
orbitfall."

�Very well," I said, with a curtness that Iłd never had
cause to use on Captain Van Ness.

As I was leaving his cabin, he said, �Youłre still a fine
shipmaster, lad. Thatłs never been in doubt. But donłt let this thing cloud
your usual good judgement. Iłd hate to have to look elsewhere for someone of
your abilities."

I turned back and, despite everything that told me to hold
my tongue, I still spoke. �I was wrong about you, Captain. Iłve always believed
that you didnłt allow yourself to be ruled by the irrational hatreds of other
Ultras. I always thought you were better than that."

�And Iłd have gladly told you I have just as many prejudices
as the next man. Theyłre whatłve kept me alive so long."

�Iłm sure Captain Voulage felt the same way," I said.

It was a wrong and hateful thing to sayVan Ness had nothing
in common with a monster like Voulagebut I couldnłt stop myself. And I knew
even as I said it that some irreversible bridge had just been crossed, and that
it was more my fault than Van Nessłs.

�You have work to do, I think," Van Ness said, his voice so
low that I barely heard it. �Until you have the engines back to full thrust, I
suggest you keep out of my way."

Weps came to see me eight or nine hours later. I knew it
wasnłt good news as soon as I saw her face.

�We have a problem, Inigo. The captain felt you needed to
know."

�And he couldnłt tell me himself?"

Weps cleared part of the wall and called up a display,
filling it with a boxy green three-dimensional grid. �Thatłs us," she said,
jabbing a finger at the red dot in the middle of the display. She moved her
finger halfway to the edge, scratching her long black nail against the plating.
�Something else is out there. Itłs stealthed to the gills, but Iłm still seeing
it. Whatever it is is making a slow, silent approach."

My thoughts flicked to Weather. �Could it be Conjoiner?"

�That was my first guess. But if it was Conjoiner, I donłt
think Iłd be seeing anything at all."

�So what are we dealing with?"

She tapped the nail against the blue icon representing the
new ship. �Another raider. Could be an ally of Voulagewe know he had
friendsor could be some other ship that was hoping to pick over our carcass
once Voulage was done with us, or maybe even steal us from him before he had
his chance."

�Hyena tactics."

�Wouldnłt be the first time."

�Range?"

�Less than two light-hours. Even if they donłt increase
their rate of closure, theyłll be on us within eight days."

�Unless we move."

Weps nodded sagely. �That would help. Youłre on schedule to
complete repairs within six days, arenłt you?"

�On schedule, yes, but that doesnłt mean things can be moved
any faster. We start cutting corners now, wełll break like a twig when we put a
real load on the ship."

�We wouldnłt want that."

�No, we wouldnłt."

�The captain just thought you should be aware of the
situation, Inigo. Itłs not to put you under pressure, or anything. �

�Of course not."

�Itłs just that ... we really donłt want to be hanging
around here a second longer than necessary."

I removed Weatherłs restraints and showed her how to help
herself to food and water from the roomłs dispenser. She stretched and purred,
articulating and extending her limbs in the manner of a dancer rehearsing some
difficult routine in extreme slow motion. Shełd been �reading" when I arrived,
which for Weather seemed to involve staring into the middle distance while her
eyes flicked to and fro at manic speed, as if following the movements of an
invisible wasp.

�I canłt let you out of the room just yet," I said, sitting
on the fold-down stool next to the bed, upon which Weather now sat
cross-legged. �I just hope this makes things a little more tolerable."

�So your captainłs finally realised Iłm not about to suck
out his brains?"

�Not exactly. Hełd still rather you werenłt aboard."

�Then youłre going against his orders."

�I suppose so."

�I presume you could get into trouble for that."

�Hełll never find out." I thought of the unknown ship that
was creeping towards us. �Hełs got other things on his mind now. Itłs not as if
hełs going to be paying you a courtesy call just to pass the time of day."

�But if he did find out ..." She looked at me intently,
lifting her chin. �Do you fear what hełd do to you?"

�I probably should. But I donłt think hełd be very likely to
throw me into an airlock. Not until wełre under way at full power, in any case."

�And then?"

�Hełd be angry. But I donłt think hełd kill me. Hełs not a
bad man, really."

�Perhaps I misheard, but didnłt you say his name was Van
Ness?"

�Captain Rafe Van Ness, yes." I must have looked surprised. �Donłt
tell me it means something to you."

�I heard Voulage mention him, thatłs all. Now I know wełre
talking about the same man."

�What did Voulage have to say?"

�Nothing good. But I donłt think that necessarily re flects
poorly on your captain. He must be a reasonable man. Hełs at least allowed me
aboard his ship, even if I havenłt been invited to dine in his quarters."

�Dining for Van Ness is a pretty messy business," I said
confidingly. �Youłre better off eating alone."

�Do you like him, Inigo?"

�He has his flaws, but next to someone like Voulage, hełs
pretty close to being an angel."

�Doesnłt like Conjoiners, though."

�Most Ultras would have left you drifting. I think this is a
point where you have to take what youłre given."

�Perhaps. I donłt understand his attitude, though. If your
captain is like most Ultras, therełs at least as much of the machine about him
as there is about me. More so, in all likelihood."

�Itłs what you do with the machines that counts," I said. �Ultras
tend to leave their minds alone, if at all possible. Even if they do have
implants, itłs usually to replace areas of brain function lost due to injury or
old age. Theyłre not really interested in improving matters, if you get my
drift. Maybe thatłs why Conjoiners make them twitchy."

She unhooked her legs, dangling them over the edge of the
bed. Her feet were bare and oddly elongated. She wore the same tight black
outfit wełd found her in when we boarded the ship. It was cut low from her
neck, in a rectangular shape. Her breasts were small. Though she was bony, with
barely any spare muscle on her, she had the broad shoulders of a swimmer.
Though Weather had sustained her share of injuries, the outfit showed no sign
of damage at all. It appeared to be self-repairing, even self-cleaning.

�You talk of Ultras as if you werenłt one," she said.

�Just an old habit breaking through. Though sometimes I donłt
feel like quite the same breed as a man like Van Ness."

�Your implants must be very well shielded. I canłt sense
them at all."

�Thatłs because there arenłt any."

�Squeamish? Or just too young and fortunate not to have
needed them yet?"

�Itłs nothing to do with being squeamish. Iłm not as young
as I look, either." I held up my mechanical hand. �Nor would I exactly call
myself fortunate."

She looked at the hand with narrowed, critical eyes. I remembered
how shełd flinched back when I reached for her aboard the Cockatrice, and
wondered what maltreatment she had suffered at the iron hands of her former
masters.

�You donłt like it?" she asked.

�I liked the old one better."

Weather reached out and gingerly held my hand in hers. They
looked small and doll-like as they stroked and examined my mechanical
counterpart.

�This is the only part of you that isnłt organic?"

�As far as I know."

�Doesnłt that limit you? Donłt you feel handicapped around
the rest of the crew?"

�Sometimes. But not always. My job means I have to squeeze
into places where a man like Van Ness could never fit. It also means I have to
be able to tolerate magnetic fields that would rip half the crew to shreds, if
they didnłt boil alive first." I opened and closed my metal fist. �I have to
unscrew this, sometimes. I have a plastic replacement if I just need to hook
hold of things."

�You donłt like it very much."

�It does what I ask of it."

Weather made to let go of my hand, but her fingers remained
in contact with mine for an instant longer than necessary. �Iłm sorry that you
donłt like it."

�I could have got it fixed at one of the orbital clinics, I
suppose," I said, �but therełs always something else that needs fixing first.
Anyway, if it wasnłt for the hand, some people might not believe Iłm an Ultra
at all."

�Do you plan on being an Ultra all your life?"

�I donłt know. I canłt say I ever had my mind set on being a
shipmaster. It just sort of happened, and now here I am."

�I had my mind set on something once," Weather said. �I thought
it was within my grasp, too. Then it slipped out of reach." She looked at me
and then did something wonderful and unexpected, which was to smile. It was not
the most genuine-looking smile Iłd ever seen, but I sensed the genuine intent
behind it. Suddenly I knew there was a human being in the room with me, damaged
and dangerous though she might have been. �Now here I am, too. Itłs not quite
what I expected ... but thank you for rescuing me."

�I was beginning to wonder if wełd made a mistake. You seemed
so reluctant to leave that ship."

�I was," she said, distantly. �But thatłs over now. You did
what you thought was the right thing."

�Was it?"

�For me, yes. For the ship ... maybe not." Then she stopped
and cocked her head to one side, frowning. Her eyes flashed olive. �What are
you looking at, Inigo?"

�Nothing," I said, looking sharply away.

Keeping out of Van Nessłs way, as hełd advised, was not the
hard part of what followed. The Petronel was a big ship and our paths didnłt
need to cross in the course of day-to-day duties. The difficulty was finding as
much time to visit Weather as I would have liked. My original repair plan had
been tight, but the unknown ship forced me to accelerate the schedule even
further, despite what Iłd told Weps. The burden of work began to take its toll
on me, draining my concentration. I was still confident that once that work was
done, wełd be able to continue our journey as if nothing had happened, save for
the loss of those crew who had died in the engagement and our gaining one new
passenger. The other ship would probably abandon us once we pushed the engines
up to cruise thrust, looking for easier pickings elsewhere. If it had the
swiftness of the Cockatrice, it wouldnłt have been skulking in the shadows
letting the other ship take first prize.

But my optimism was misplaced. When the repair work was
done, I once more made my way along the access shaft to the starboard engine
and confronted the hexagonal arrangement of input dials. As expected, all six
dials were now showing deep blue, which meant they were operating well inside
the safety envelope. But when I consulted my log book and made the tiny
adjustments that should have taken all the dials into the blue-greenstill
nicely within the safety envelopeI got a nasty surprise. I only had to nudge
two of the dials by a fraction of a millimetre before they shone a hard and
threatening orange.

Something was wrong.

I checked my settings, of course, making sure none of the
other dials were out of position. But therełd been no mistake. I thumbed
through the log with increasing haste, a prickly feeling on the back of my
neck, looking for an entry where something similar had happened; something that
would point me to the obvious mistake I must have made. But none of the
previous entries were the slightest help. Iłd made no error with the settings,
and that left only one possibility: something had happened to the engine. It
was not working properly.

�This isnłt right," I said to myself. �They donłt fail. They
donłt break down. Not like this."

But what did I know? My entire experience of working with
C-drives was confined to routine operations, under normal conditions. Yet wełd
just been through a battle against another ship, one in which we were already
known to have sustained structural damage. As shipmaster, Iłd been diligent in
attending to the hull and the drive spar, but it had never crossed my mind that
something might have happened to one or other of the engines.

Why not?

Therełs a good reason. Itłs because even if something had happened,
there would never have been anything I could have done about it. Worrying about
the breakdown of a Conjoiner drive was like worrying about the one piece of
debris you wonłt have time to steer around or shoot out of the sky. You canłt
do anything about it, ergo you forget about it until it happens. No shipmaster
ever loses sleep over the failure of a C-drive.

It looked as if I was going to lose a lot more than sleep.

Even if we didnłt have another ship to worry about, we were
in more than enough trouble. We were too far out from Shiva-Parvati to get back
again, and yet we were moving too slowly to make it to another system. Even if
the engines kept working as they were now, wełd take far too long to reach
relativistic speed, where time dilation became appreciable. At twenty-five per
cent of the speed of light, what would have been a twenty-year hop before
became an eighty-year crawl now ... and that was an eighty-year crawl in which
almost all that time would be experienced aboard ship. Across that stretch of
time, reefersleep was a lottery. Our caskets were designed to keep people
frozen for five to ten years, not four-fifths of a century.

I was scared. Iłd gone from feeling calmly in control to
feeling total devastation in about five minutes.

I didnłt want to let the rest of the crew know that we had a
potential crisis on our hands, at least not until Iłd spoken to Weather. Iłd
already crossed swords with Van Ness, but he was still my captain, and I wanted
to spare him the dif ficulty of a frightened crew, at least until I knew all
the facts.

Weather was awake when I arrived. In all my visits, Iłd
never found her sleeping. In the normal course of events Conjoiners had no need
of sleep: at worst, theyłd switch off certain areas of brain function for a few
hours.

She read my face like a book. �Somethingłs wrong, isnłt it?"

So much for the notion that Conjoiners were not able to
interpret facial expressions. Just because they didnłt make many of them didnłt
mean theyłd forgotten the rules.

I sat down on the fold-out stool.

�Iłve tried to push the engines back up to normal cruise
thrust. Iłm already seeing red on two dials, and we havenłt even exceeded
point-two gees."

She thought about this for several moments: what for Weather
must have been hours of subjective contemplation. �You didnłt appear to be
pushing your engines dangerously during the chase."

�I wasnłt. Everything looked normal up until now. I think we
must have taken some damage to one of the drives, during Voulagełs softening-up
assault. I didnłt see any external evidence, but"

�You wouldnłt, not necessarily. The interior architecture of
one of our drives is a lot more complicated, a lot more delicate, than is
normally appreciated. Itłs at least possible that a shock-wave did some harm to
one of your engines, especially if your coupling gearthe shock-dampening
assemblywas already compromised."

�It probably was," I said. �The spar was already stressed."

�Then you have your explanation. Something inside your engine
has broken, or is considered by the engine itself to be dangerously close to
failure. Either way, it would be suicide to increase the thrust beyond the
present level."

�Weather, we need both those engines to get anywhere, and we
need them at normal efficiency."

�It hadnłt escaped me."

�Is there anything you can do to help us?"

�Very little, I expect."

�But you must know something about the engines, or you
wouldnłt have been able to help Voulage."

�Voulagełs engines werenłt damaged," she explained
patiently.

�I know that. But you were still able to make them work
better. Isnłt there something you can do for us?"

�From here, nothing at all."

�But if you were allowed to get closer to the engines ...
might that make a difference?"

�Until Iłm there, I couldnłt possibly say. Itłs irrelevant
though, isnłt it? Your captain will never allow me out of this room."

�Would you do it for us if he did?"

�Iłd do it for me."

�Is that the best you can offer?"

�All right, then maybe Iłd for it for you." Just saying this
caused Weather visible discomfort, as if the utterance violated some deep
personal code that had remained intact until now. �Youłve been kind to me. I
know you risked trouble with Van Ness to make things easier in my cell. But you
need to understand something very important. You may care for me. You may even
think you like me. But I canłt give you back any of that. What I feel for you
is ..." Weather hesitated, her mouth half-open. �You know we call you the
retarded. Therełs a reason for that. The emotions I feel ... the things that go
on in my head ... simply donłt map onto anything youłd recognise as love, or
affection, or even friendship. Reducing them to those terms would be like ..."
And then she stalled, unable to finish.

�Like making a sacrifice?"

�Youłve been good to me, Inigo. But I really am like the
weather. You can admire me, even love me, in your way, but I canłt love you
back. To me youłre like a photograph. I can see right through you, examine you
from all angles. You amuse me. But you donłt have enough depth ever to
fascinate me."

�Therełs more to love than fascination. And you said it yourself:
youłre halfway back to being human again."

�I said I wasnłt a Conjoiner any more. But that doesnłt mean
I could ever be like you."

�You could try."

�You donłt understand us."

�I want to!"

Weather jammed her olive eyes tight shut. �Letłs ... not get
ahead of ourselves, shall we? I only wanted to spare you any unnecessary
emotional pain. But if we donłt get this ship moving properly, thatłll be the
least of your worries. �

�I know."

�So perhaps we should return to the matter of the engines.
Again: none of this will matter if Van Ness refuses to trust me."

My cheeks were smarting as if Iłd been slapped hard in the
face. Part of me knew she was only being kind, in the harshest of ways. That
part was almost prepared to accept her rejection. The other part of me only
wanted her more, as if her bluntness had succeeded only in sharpening my
desire. Perhaps she was right; perhaps I was insane to think a Conjoiner could
ever feel something in return. But I remembered the gentle way shełd stroked my
fingers, and I wanted her even more.

�Iłll deal with Van Ness," I said. �I think therełs a little
something that will convince him to take a risk. You start thinking about what
you can do for us."

�Is that an order, Inigo?"

�No," I said. �Nobodyłs going to order you to do anything. I
gave you my word on that, and Iłm not about to break it. Nothing youłve just
said changes that."

She sat tight-lipped, staring at me as if I was some kind of
byzantine logic puzzle she needed to unscramble. I could almost feel the
furious computation of her mind, as if I was standing next to a humming
turbine. Then she lifted her little pointed chin minutely, saying nothing, but
letting me know that if I convinced Van Ness, she would do what she could,
however ineffectual that might prove.

The captain was tougher to crack than Iłd expected. Iłd assumed
he would fold as soon as I explained our predicamentthat we were going
nowhere, and that Weather was the only factor that could improve our
situationbut the captain simply narrowed his eyes and looked disappointed.

�Donłt you get it? Itłs a ruse, a trick. Our engines were
fine until we let her aboard. Then all of a sudden they start misbehaving, and
she turns out to be the only one who can help us."

�Therełs also the matter of the other ship Weps says is
closing on us."

�That ship might not even exist. It could be a sensor ghost,
a hallucination shełs making the Petronel see."

�Captain"

�That would work for her, wouldnłt it? It would be exactly
the excuse she needs to force our hands."

We were in his cabin, with the door locked: Iłd warned him I
had a matter of grave sensitivity that we needed to discuss. �I donłt think
this is any of her doing," I said calmly, vowing to hold my temper under better
control than before. �Shełs too far from the engines or sensor systems to be
having any mental effect on them, even if we hadnłt locked her in a room thatłs
practically a Faraday cage to begin with. She says one or other of the engines
was damaged during the engagement with the Cockatrice, and Iłve no reason to
disbelieve that. I think youłre wrong about her."

�Shełs got us right where she wants us, lad. Shełs done something
to the engines, and nowif you get your waywełre going to let her get up close
and personal with them."

�And do what?" I asked.

�Whatever takes her fancy. Blowing us all up is one
possibility. Did you consider that?"

�Shełd blow herself up as well."

�Maybe thatłs exactly the plan. Could be that she prefers
dying to staying alive, if being shut out from the rest of the Spiders is as
bad as you say it is. She didnłt seem to be real keen on being rescued from
that wreck, did she? Maybe she was hoping to die aboard it."

�She looked like she was trying to stay alive to me, Captain.
There were a hundred ways she could have killed herself aboard the Cockatrice
before we boarded, and she didnłt. I think she was just scared of us, scared
that we were going to be like all the other Ultras. Thatłs why she kept
running."

�A nice theory, lad. Itłs a pity so much is hanging on it,
or I might be inclined to give it a momentłs credence."

�We have no choice but to trust her. If we donłt let her try
something, most of us wonłt ever see another system."

�Easy for you to say, son."

�Iłm in this as well. Iłve got just as much to lose as
anyone else on this ship."

Van Ness studied me for what felt like an eternity. Until
now his trust in my competence had always been implicit, but Weatherłs arrival
had changed all that.

�My wife didnłt die in a terraforming accident," he said
slowly, not quite able to meet my eyes as he spoke. �I lied to you about that,
probably because I wanted to start believing the lie myself. But now itłs time
you heard the truth, which is that the Spiders took her. She was a technician,
an expert in Martian landscaping. Shełd been working on the Schiaparelli
irrigation scheme when she was caught behind Spider lines during the Sabaea
Offensive. They stole her from me, and turned her into one of them. Took her to
their recruitment theatres, where they opened her head and pumped it full of
their machines. Rewired her mind to make her think and feel like them."

�Iłm sorry," I began. �That must have been so hard"

�Thatłs not the hard part. I was told that shełd been
executed, but three years later I saw her again. Shełd been taken prisoner by
the Coalition for Neural Purity, and they were trying to turn her back into a
person. They hadnłt ever done it before, so my wife was to be a test subject.
They invited me to their compound in Tychoplex, on Earthłs Moon, hoping I might
be able to bring her back. I didnłt want to do it. I knew it wasnłt going to
work; that it was always going to be easier thinking that she was already dead."

�What happened?"

�When she saw me, she remembered me. She called me by name,
just as if wełd only been apart a few minutes. But there was a coldness in her
eyes. Actually, it was something beyond coldness. Coldness would mean she felt
some recognisably human emotion, even if it was dislike or contempt. It wasnłt
like that. The way she looked at me, it was as if she was looking at a piece of
broken furniture, or a dripping tap, or a pattern of mould on the wall. As if
it vaguely bothered her that I existed, or was the shape I was, but that she
could feel nothing stronger than that."

�It wasnłt your wife any more," I said. �Your wife died the
moment they took her."

�Thatłd be nice to believe, wouldnłt it? Trouble is, Iłve
never been able to. And trust me, lad: Iłve had long enough to dwell on things.
I know a part of my wife survived what they did to her in the theatres. It just
wasnłt the part that gave a damn about me any more."

�Iłm sorry," I said again, feeling as if Iłd been left
drifting in space while the ship raced away from me. �I had no idea."

�I just wanted you to know: with me and the Spiders, it isnłt
an irrational prejudice. From where Iłm sitting, it feels pretty damn rational."
Then he drew an enormous intake of breath, as if he needed sustenance for what
was to come. �Take the girl to the engine if you think itłs the only way wełll
get out of this mess. But donłt let her out of your sight for one second. And
if you get the slightest idea that she might be trying somethingand I mean the
slightest ideayou kill her, there and then."

I clamped the collar around Weatherłs neck. It was a heavy
ring fashioned from rough black metal. �Iłm sorry about this," I told her, �but
itłs the only way Van Ness will let me take you out of this room. Tell me if it
hurts, and Iłll try to do something about it."

�You wonłt need to," she said.

The collar was a crude old thing that had been lying around
the Petronel since her last bruising contact with pirates. It was modified from
the connecting ring of a space helmet, the kind that would amputate and
shock-freeze the head if it detected massive damage to the body below the neck.
Inside the collar was a noose of monofilament wire, primed to tighten to the
diameter of a human hair in less than a second. There were complicated moving
parts in the collar, but nothing that a Conjoiner could influence. The collar
trailed a thumb-thick cable from its rear, which ran all the way to an
activating box on my belt. Iłd only need to give the box a hard thump with the
heel of my hand, and Weather would be decapitated. That wouldnłt necessarily
mean shełd die instantlywith all those machines in her head, Weather would be
able to remain conscious for quite some time afterwardsbut I was reasonably
certain it would limit her options for doing harm.

�For what itłs worth," I told her as we made our way out to
the connecting spar, �Iłm not expecting to have to use this. But I want you to
be clear that I will if I have to."

She walked slightly ahead of me, the cable hanging between
us. �You seem different, Inigo. What happened between you and the captain,
while you were gone?"

The truth couldnłt hurt, I decided. �Van Ness told me something
I didnłt know. It put things into perspective. I understand now why he might
not feel positively disposed towards Conjoiners."

�And does that alter the way you think about me?"

I said nothing for several paces. �I donłt know, Weather.
Until now I never really gave much thought to those horror stories about the
Spiders. I assumed theyłd been exaggerated, the way things often are during
wartime."

�But now youłve seen the light. You realise that, in fact,
we are monsters after all."

�I didnłt say that. But Iłve just learned that something I
always thought untruethat Conjoiners would take prisoners and convert them
into other Conjoinersreally happened. �

�To Van Ness?"

She didnłt need to know all the facts. �To someone close to
him. The worst was that he got to meet that person after her transformation."

After a little while, Weather said, �Mistakes were made.
Very, very bad mistakes."

�How can you call taking someone prisoner and stuffing their
skull full of Conjoiner machinery a ęmistake,ł Weather? You must have known
exactly what you were doing, exactly what it would do to the prisoner."

�Yes, we did," she said, �but we considered it a kindness.
That was the mistake, Inigo. And it was a kindness, too: no one who tasted
Transenlightenment ever wanted to go back to the experiential mundanity of
retarded consciousness. But we did not anticipate how distressing this might be
to those who had known the candidates beforehand."

�He felt that she didnłt love him any more."

�That wasnłt the case. Itłs just that everything else in her
universe had become so heightened, so intense, that the love for another
individual could no longer hold her interest. It had become just one facet in a
much larger mosaic."

�And you donłt think that was cruel?"

�I said it was a mistake. But if Van Ness had joined her ...
if Van Ness had submitted to the Conjoined, known Transenlightenment for
himself ... they would have reconnected on a new level of personal intimacy."

I wondered how she could be so certain. �That doesnłt help
Van Ness now."

�We wouldnłt make the same mistake again. If there were ever
to be ... difficulties again, we wouldnłt take candidates so indiscriminately."

�But youłd still take some."

�Wełd still consider it a kindness," Weather said.

Not much was said as we traversed the connecting spar out to
the starboard engine. I watched Weather alertly, transfixed by the play of
colours across her cooling crest. Eventually she whirled around and said, �Iłm
not going to do anything, Inigo, so stop worrying about it. This collarłs bad
enough, without feeling you watching my every move."

�Maybe the collar isnłt going to help us," I said. �Van Ness
thinks you want to blow up the ship. I guess if you had a way to do that, we
wouldnłt get much warning."

�No, you wouldnłt. But Iłm not going to blow up the ship.
Thatłs not within my power, unless you let me turn the input dials all the way
into the red. Even Voulage wasnłt that stupid."

I wiped my sweat-damp hand on the thigh of my trousers. �We
donłt know much about how these engines work. Are you sensing anything from
them yet?"

�A little," she admitted. �Therełs crosstalk between the two
units, but I donłt have the implants to make sense of that. Most Conjoiners donłt
need anything that specialised, unless they work in the drive crŁches,
educating the engines. �

�The engines need educating?"

Not answering me directly, she said, �I can feel the engine
now. Effective range for my implants is a few dozen metres under these
conditions. We must be very close."

�We are," I said as we turned a corner. Ahead lay the hexagonal
arrangement of input dials. They were all showing blue-green now, but only
because Iłd throttled the engine back to a whisper of thrust.

�Iłll need to get closer if Iłm going to be any use to you,"
Weather told me.

�Step up to the panel. But donłt touch anything until I give
you permission."

I knew there wasnłt much harm she could do here, even if she
started pushing the dials. Shełd need to move more than one to make things
dangerous, and I could drop her long before she had a chance to do that. But I
was still nervous as she stood next to the hexagon and cocked her head to one
side.

I thought of what lay on the other side of that wall. Having
traversed the spar, we were now immediately inboard of the engine, about
halfway along its roughly cylindrical shape. The engine extended for one
hundred and ten metres ahead of me, and for approximately two hundred and fifty
metres in either direction to my left and right. It was sheathed in several
layers of conventional hull material, anchored to the Petronel by a
shock-absorbing cradle and wrapped in a mesh of sensors and steering-control
systems. Like any shipmaster, my understanding of those elements was so total
that it no longer counted as acquired knowledge. It had become an integral part
of my personality.

But I knew nothing of the engine itself. My log book, with
its reams of codified notes and annotations, implied a deep and scholarly grasp
of all essential principles. Nothing could have been further from the truth.
The Conjoiner drive was essentially a piece of magic wełd been handed on a
plate, like a coiled baby dragon. It came with instructions on how to tame its
fire, and make sure it did not come to harm, but we were forbidden from probing
its mysteries. The most important rule that applied to a Conjoiner engine was a
simple one: there were no user-serviceable components inside. Tamper with an
engineattempt to take it apart, in the hope of reverse-engineering itand the
engine would self-destruct in a mini-nova powerful enough to crack open a small
moon. Across settled space, there was no shortage of mildly radioactive craters
testifying to failed attempts to break that one prohibition.

Ultras didnłt care, as a rule. Ultras, by definition,
already had Conjoiner drives. It was governments and rich planet-bound individuals
who kept learning the hard way. The Conjoiner argument was brutal in its
simplicity: there were principles embodied in their drives that �retarded"
humanity just wasnłt ready to absorb. We were meant to count ourselves lucky
that they let us have the engines in the first place. We werenłt meant to go
poking our thick monkey fingers into their innards.

And so long as the engines kept working, few of us had any inclination
to do so.

Weather took a step back. �Itłs not good news, Iłm afraid. I
thought that perhaps the dial indications might be in error, suggesting that
there was a fault where none existed ... but that isnłt the case."

�You can feel that the engine is really damaged?"

�Yes," she told me. �And itłs this one, the starboard unit."

�Whatłs wrong with it? Is it anything we can fix?"

�One question at a time, Inigo." Weather smiled tolerantly before
continuing, �Therełs been extensive damage to critical engine components, too
much for the enginełs own self-repair systems to address. The engine hasnłt
failed completely, but certain reaction pathways have now become
computationally intractable, which is why youłre seeing the drastic loss in
drive efficiency. The engine is being forced to explore other pathways, those
that it can still manage given its existing resources. But they donłt deliver
the same output energy."

She was telling me everything and nothing. �I donłt really understand,"
I admitted. �Are you saying therełs nothing that can be done to repair it?"

�Not here. At a dedicated Conjoiner manufacturing facility,
certainly. Wełd only make things worse."

�We canłt run on just the port engine, eithernot without rebuilding
the entire ship. If we were anywhere near a moon or asteroid, that might just
be an option, but not when wełre so far out."

�Iłm sorry the news isnłt better. Youłll just have to resign
yourselves to a longer trip than you were expecting."

�Itłs worse than that. Therełs another ship closing in on
us, probably another raider like Voulage. Itłs very close now. If we donłt
start running soon, theyłll be on us."

�And you didnłt think to tell me this sooner?"

�Would it have made any difference?"

�To the trust between us, possibly."

�Iłm sorry, Weather. I didnłt want to distract you. I
thought things were bad enough as they were."

�And you thought Iłd be able to work a miracle if I wasnłt
distracted?"

I nodded hopelessly. I realised that, as naive as it might
seem, Iłd been expecting Weather to wave a hand over the broken engine and
restore it to full, glittering functionality. But knowing something of the
interior workings of the drive was not the same as being able to fix it.

�Are we really out of options?" I asked.

�The engine is already doing all it can to provide maximum
power, given the damage it has taken. There really is no scope to make things
better."

Desperate for some source of optimism, I thought back to
what Weather had said a few moments before. �When you talked about the
computations, you seemed to be saying that the engine needed to do some
number-crunching to make itself work."

Weather looked conflicted. �Iłve already said too much, Inigo."

�But if wełre going to die out here, it doesnłt matter what
you tell me, does it? Failing that, Iłll swear a vow of silence. How does that
sound?"

�No one has ever come close to working out how our engines
function," Weather said. �Wełve played our hand in that, of course: putting out
more than our share of mis-information over the years. And itłs worked, too. Wełve
kept careful tabs on the collective thinking concerning our secrets. Wełve
always had contingencies in place to disrupt any research that might be headed
in the right direction. So far wełve never had cause to use a single one of
them. If I were to reveal key information to you, I would have more to worry
about than just being an outcast. My people would come after me. Theyłd hunt me
down, and then theyłd hunt you down as well. Conjoiners will consider any
necessary act, up to and including local genocide, to protect the secrets of
the C-drive." She paused for a moment, letting me think she was finished,
before continuing on the same grave note, �But having said that, there are
layers to our secrets. I canłt reveal the detailed physical principles upon
which the drive depends, but I can tell you that the conditions in the drive,
when it is at full functionality, are enormously complex and chaotic. Your ship
may ride a smooth thrust beam, but the reactions going on inside the drive are
anything but smooth. There is a small mouth into hell inside every engine:
bubbling, frothing, subject to vicious and unpredictable state-changes. �

�Which the engine needs to smooth out."

�Yes. And to do so, the engine needs to think through some
enormously complex, parallel computational problems. When all is well, when the
engine is intact and running inside its normal operational envelope, the burden
is manageable. But if you ask too much of the engine, or damage it in some way,
that burden becomes heavier. Eventually it exceeds the means of the engine, and
the reactions become uncontrolled."

�Nova."

�Quite," Weather said, favouring my response with a tiny
nod.

�Then let me get this straight," I said. �The enginełs
damaged, but it could still work if the computations werenłt so complicated."

Weather answered me guardedly. �Yes, but donłt underestimate
how difficult those computations have now become. I can feel the strain this
engine is under, just holding things together as they are."

�Iłm not underestimating it. Iłm just wondering if we couldnłt
help it do better. Couldnłt we load in some new software, or assist the engine
by hooking in the Petronelłs own computers?"

�I really wish it was that simple."

�Iłm sorry. My questions must seem quite simple-minded. But
Iłm just trying to make sure we arenłt missing anything obvious."

�We arenłt," she said. �Take my word on it."

I returned Weather to her quarters and removed the collar.
Where it had been squeezing her neck, the skin was marked with a raw pink band,
spotted with blood. I threw the hateful thing into the corner of the room and
returned with a medical kit.

�You should have said something," I told her as I dabbed at
the abrasions with a disinfectant swab. �I didnłt realise it was cutting into
you all that time. You seemed so cool, so focused. But that must have been
hurting all the while."

�I told you I could turn off pain."

�Are you turning it off now?"

�Why?"

�Because you keep flinching."

Weather reached up suddenly and took my wrist, almost making
me drop the swab. The movement was as swift as a snakebite, but although she
held me firmly, I sensed no aggressive intentions. �Now itłs my turn not to
understand," she said. �You were hoping I might be able to do something for
you. I couldnłt. That means youłre in as much trouble as you ever were. Worse,
if anything, because now youłve heard it from me. But youłre still treating me
with kindness."

�Would you rather we didnłt?"

�I assumed that as soon as my usefulness to you had come to
an end"

�You assumed wrongly. Wełre not that kind of crew."

�And your captain?"

�Hełll keep his word. Killing you would never have been Van
Nessłs style." I finished disinfecting her neck and began to rummage through
the medical kit for a strip of bandage. �Wełre all just going to have to make
do as best we can, you included. Van Ness reckoned we should send out a
distress call and wait for rescue. I wasnłt so keen on that idea before, but
now Iłm beginning to wonder if maybe it isnłt so bad after all." She said
nothing. I wondered if she was thinking of exactly the same objections Iłd
voiced to Van Ness, when he raised the idea. �We still have a ship, thatłs the
main thing. Just because we arenłt moving as fast as wełd like"

�Iłd like to see Van Ness," Weather said.

�Iłm not sure hełd agree."

�Tell him itłs about his wife. Tell him he can trust me,
with or without that silly collar."

I went to fetch the captain. He took some persuading before
he even agreed to look at Weather, and even then he wouldnłt come within twenty
metres of her. I told her to wait at the door to her room, which faced a long
service corridor.

�Iłm not going to touch you, Captain," she called, her voice
echoing from the corridorłs ribbed metal walls. �You can come as close as you
like. I can barely smell you at this distance, let alone sense your neural
emissions."

�Thisłll do nicely," Van Ness said. �Inigo told me you had
something you wanted to say to me. That right, or was it just a ruse to get me
near to you, so you could reach into my head and make me see and think whatever
you like?"

She appeared not to hear him. �I take it Inigołs told you
about the engine."

�Told me you had a good old look at it and decided there was
nothing you could do. Maybe things would have been different if you hadnłt had
that collar on, though, eh?"

�You mean I might have sabotaged the engine, to destroy myself
and the ship? No, Captain, I donłt think I would have. If I had any intention
of killing myself, youłd already made it easy enough with that collar." She
glanced at me. �I could have reached Inigo and pressed that control box while
the nervous impulse from his brain was still working its way down his forearm.
All hełd have seen was a grey blur, followed by a lot of arterial blood."

I thought back to the speed with which shełd reached up and
grabbed my forearm, and knew she wasnłt lying.

�So why didnłt you?" Van Ness asked.

�Because I wanted to help you if I could. Until I saw the engineuntil
I got close enough to feel its emissionsI couldnłt know for sure that the
problem wasnłt something quite trivial."

�Except it wasnłt. Inigo says it isnłt fixable."

�Inigołs right. The technical fault canłt be repaired, not
without use of Conjoiner technology. But now that Iłve had time to think about
it, mull things over, it occurs to me that there may be something I can do for
you."

I looked at her. �Really?"

�Let me finish what I have to say, Inigo," she said
warningly, �then wełll go down to the engine and Iłll make everything clear.
Captain Van Nessabout your wife."

�What would you know about my wife?" Van Ness asked her
angrily.

�More than you realise. I know because Iłm aI wasa Conjoiner."

�As if I didnłt know."

�We started on Mars, Captain Van Nessjust a handful of us.
I wasnłt alive then, but from the moment Galiana brought our new state of
consciousness into being, the thread of memory has never been broken. There are
many branches to our great tree now, in many systemsbut we all carry the
memories of those who went before us, before the family was torn asunder. I donłt
just mean the simple fact that we remember their names, what they looked like
and what they did. I mean we carry their living experiences with us, into the
future." Weather swallowed, something catching in her throat. �Sometimes wełre
barely aware of any of this. Itłs as if therełs this vast sea of collective
experience lapping at the shore of consciousness, but itłs only every now and
then that it floods us, leaving us awash in sorrow and joy. Sorrow because
those are the memories of the dead, all thatłs left of them. Joy because something
has endured, and while it does they canłt truly be dead, can they? I feel
Remontoire sometimes, when I look at something in a certain analytic way. Therełs
a jolt of d�ją vu and I realise it isnłt because Iłve experienced it before,
but because Remontoire did. We all feel the memories of the earliest Conjoiners
the most strongly."

�And my wife?" Van Ness asked, like a man frightened of what
he might hear.

�Your wife was just one of many candidates who entered Transenlightenment
during the troubles. You lost her then, and saw her once more when the
Coalition took her prisoner. It was distressing for you because she did not
respond to you on a human level."

�Because youłd ripped everything human out of her," Van Ness
said.

Weather shook her head calmly, refusing to be goaded. �No.
Wełd taken almost nothing. The difficulty was that wełd added too much, too
quickly. That was why it was so hard for her, and so upsetting for you. But it
didnłt have to be that way. The last thing we wanted was to frighten possible
future candidates. It would have worked much better for us if your wife had
shown love and affection to you, and then begged you to follow her into the
wonderful new world shełd been shown."

Something of Weatherłs manner seemed to blunt Van Nessłs
indignation. �That doesnłt help me much. It doesnłt help my wife at all."

�I havenłt finished. The last time you saw your wife was in
that Coalition compound. You assumedas you continue to assumethat she ended
her days there, an emotionless zombie haunting the shell of the woman you once
knew. But that isnłt what happened. She came back to us, you see."

�I thought Conjoiners never returned to the fold," I said.

�Things were different then. It was war. Any and all
candidates were welcome, even those who might have suffered destabilising
isolation away from Transenlightenment. And Van Nessłs wife wasnłt like me. She
hadnłt been born into it. Her depth of immersion into Transenlightenment was inevitably
less profound than that of a Conjoiner whołd been swimming in data since they
were a foetus."

�Youłre lying," Van Ness said. �My wife died in Coalition custody
three years after I saw her."

�No," Weather said patiently. �She did not. Conjoiners took
Tychoplex and returned all the prisoners to Transenlightenment. The Coalition
was suffering badly at the time and could not afford the propaganda blow of
losing such a valuable arm of its research programme. So it lied and covered up
the loss of Tychoplex. But in fact your wife was alive and well." Weather
looked at him levelly. �She is dead now, Captain Van Ness. I wish I could tell
you otherwise, but I hope it will not come as too shocking a blow, given what
you have always believed."

�When did she die?"

�Thirty-one years later, in another system, during the
malfunction of one of our early drives. It was very fast and utterly painless."

�Why are you telling me this? What difference does it make
to me, here and now? Shełs still gone. She still became one of you."

�I am telling you," Weather answered, �because her memories
are part of me. I wonłt pretend that theyłre as strong as Remontoirełs, because
by the time your wife was recruited, more than five thousand had already joined
our ranks. Hers was one new voice amongst many. But none of those voices were
silent: they were all heard, and something of them has reached down through all
these years."

�Again: why are you telling me this?"

�Because I have a message from your wife. She committed it
to the collective memory long before her death, knowing that it would always be
part of Conjoiner knowledge, even as our numbers grew and we became
increasingly fragmented. She knew that every future Conjoiner would carry her
messageeven an outcast like me. It might become diluted, but it would never be
lost entirely. And she believed that you were still alive, and that one day
your path might cross that of another Conjoiner."

After a silence Van Ness said, �Tell me the message."

�This is what your wife wished you to hear." Almost imperceptibly,
the tone of Weatherłs voice shifted. �I am sorry for what happened between us,
Rafemore sorry than you can ever know. When they recaptured me, when they took
me to Tychoplex, I was not the person I am now. It was still early in my time
amongst the Conjoiners, andperhaps just as importantlyit was still early for
the Conjoiners as well. There was much that we all needed to learn. We were
ambitious then, fiercely so, but by the same token we were arrogantly blind to
our inadequacies and failings. That changed, later, after I returned to the
fold. Galiana made refinements to all of us, reinstating a higher degree of
personal identity. I think she had learned something wise from Nevil Clavain.
After that, I began to see things in the proper perspective again. I thought of
you, and the pain of what I had done to you was like a sharp stone pushing
against my throat. Every waking moment of my consciousness, with every breath,
you were there. But by then it was much too late to make amends. I tried to
contact you, but without success. I couldnłt even be sure if you were in the
system any more. By then, even the Demarchists had their own prototype
starships, using the technology wełd licensed them. You could have been
anywhere." Weatherłs tone hardened, taking on a kind of saintlike asperity. �But
I always knew you were a survivor, Rafe. I never doubted that you were still
alive, somewhere. Perhaps wełll meet again: stranger things have happened. If
so, I hope Iłll treat you with something of the kindness you always deserved,
and that you always showed me. But should that never happen, I can at least
hope that you will hear this message. There will always be Conjoiners, and
nothing that is committed to the collective memory will ever be lost. No matter
how much time passes, those of us who walk in the world will be carrying this
message, alert for your name. If there was more I could do, I would. But
contrary to what some might think, even Conjoiners canłt work miracles. I wish
that it were otherwise. Then I would clap my hands and summon you to me, and I
would spend the rest of my life letting you know what you meant to me, what you
still mean to me. I loved you, Rafe Van Ness. I always did, and I always will."

Weather fell silent, her expression respectful. It was not
necessary for her to tell us that the message was over.

�How do I know this is true?" Van Ness asked quietly.

�I canłt give you any guarantees," Weather said, �but there
was one word I was also meant to say to you. Your wife believed it would have
some significance to you, something nobody else could possibly know."

�And the word?"

�The word is ęmezereon.ł I think it is a type of plant. Does
the word mean something to you?"

I looked at Van Ness. He appeared frozen, unable to respond.
His eye softened and sparkled. He nodded, and said simply, �Yes, it does."

�Good," Weather answered. �Iłm glad thatłs done: itłs been
weighing on all of our minds for quite some time. And now Iłm going to help you
get home."

Whatever �mezereon" meant to Van Ness, whatever it revealed
to him concerning the truth of Weatherłs message, I never asked.

Nor did Van Ness ever speak of the matter again.

She stood before the hexagonal arrangement of input dials,
as I had done a thousand times before. �You must give me authorisation to make
adjustments," she said.

My mouth was dry. �Do what you will. Iłll be watching you
very carefully."

Weather looked amused. �Youłre still concerned that I might
want to kill us all?"

�I canłt ignore my duty to this ship."

�Then this will be difficult for you. I must turn the dials
to a setting you would consider highly dangerous, even suicidal. Youłll just
have to trust me that I know what Iłm doing."

I glanced back at Van Ness.

�Do it," he mouthed.

�Go ahead," I told Weather. �Whatever you need to do"

�In the course of this, you will learn more about our
engines. There is something inside here that you will find disturbing. It is
not the deepest secret, but it is a secret nonetheless, and shortly you will
know it. Afterwards, when we reach port, you must not speak of this matter.
Should you do so, Conjoiner security would detect the leak and act swiftly. The
consequences would be brutal, for you and anyone you might have spoken to."

�Then maybe youłre better off not letting us see whatever
youłre so keen to keep hidden."

�Therełs something Iłm going to have to do. If you want to understand,
you need to see everything."

She reached up and planted her hands on two of the dials.
With surprising strength, she twisted them until their quadrants shone ruby
red. Then she moved to another pair of dials and moved them until they were
showing a warning amber. She adjusted one of the remaining dials to a lower
setting, into the blue, and then returned to the first two dials she had
touched, quickly dragging them back to green. While all this was happening, I
felt the engine surge in response, the deck plates pushing harder against my
feet. But the burst was soon over. When Weather had made her last adjustment,
the engine had throttled back even further than before. I judged that we were
only experiencing a tenth of a gee.

�What have you just done?" I asked.

�This," she said.

Weather took a nimble, light-footed step back from the input
controls. At the same moment a chunk of wall, including the entire hexagonal
array, pushed itself out from the surrounding metallic-blue material in which
it had appeared to have been seamlessly incorporated. The chunk was as thick as
a bank-vault door. I watched in astonishment as the chunk slid in silence to
one side, exposing a bulkhead-sized hole in the side of the engine wall.

Soft red light bathed us. We were looking into the hidden
heart of a Conjoiner drive.

�Follow me," Weather said.

�Are you serious?"

�You want to get home, donłt you? You want to escape that
raider? This is how it will happen." Then she looked back to Van Ness. �With
all due respect ... I wouldnłt recommend it, Captain. You wouldnłt do any
damage to the engine, but the engine might damage you."

�Iłm fine right here," Van Ness said.

I followed Weather into the engine. At first my eyes had
difficulty making out our surroundings. The red light inside seemed to emanate
from every surface, rather than from any concentrated source, so that there
were only hints of edges and corners. I had to reach out and touch things more
than once to establish their shape and proximity. Weather watched me guardedly,
but said nothing.

She led me along a winding, restrictive path that squeezed
its way between huge intrusions of Conjoiner machinery, like the course etched
by some meandering, indecisive underground river. The machinery emitted a low
humming sound, and sometimes when I touched it I felt a rapid but erratic
vibration. I couldnłt make out our surroundings with any clarity for more than
a few metres in any direction, but as Weather pushed on I sometimes had the
impression that the machinery was moving out of her way to open up the path,
and sealing itself behind us. She led me up steep ramps, assisted me as we
negotiated near-impassable chicanes, helped me as we climbed down vertical
shafts that would be perilous even under one-tenth of a gee. My sense of
direction was soon hopelessly confounded, and I had no idea whether we had
travelled hundreds of metres into the engine, or merely wormed our way in and around
a relatively localised region close to our entry point.

�Iłm glad you know the way," I said, with mock
cheer-fulness. �I wouldnłt be able to get out of here without you."

�Yes, you will," Weather said, looking back over her
shoulder. �The engine will guide you out, donłt you worry."

�Youłre coming with me, though."

�No, Inigo, Iłm not. I have to stay here from now on. Itłs
the only way that any of us will be getting home."

�I donłt understand. Once youłve fixed the engine"

�It isnłt like that. The engine canłt be fixed. What I can
do is help it, relieve it of some of the computational burden. But to do that I
need to be close to it. Inside it."

While we were talking, Weather had brought us to a box-like
space that was more open than anywhere wełd passed through so far. The room, or
chamber, was empty of machinery, save for a waist-high cylinder rising from the
floor. The cylinder had a flattened top and widened base that suggested the
stump of a tree. It shone the same arterial red as everything else around us.

�Wełve reached the heart of the engine-control assembly now,"
Weather said, kneeling by the stump. �The reaction core is somewhere elsewe
couldnłt survive anywhere near thatbut this is where the reaction computations
are made, for both the starboard and port drives. Iłm going to show you
something now. I think it will make it easier for you to understand what is to
happen to me. I hope youłre ready."

�As Iłll ever be."

Weather planted a hand on either side of the stump and
closed her eyes momentarily. I heard a click and the whirr of a buried mechanism.
The upper fifth of the stump opened, irising wide. A blue light rammed from its
innards. I felt a chill rising from whatever was inside, a coldness that seemed
to reach fingers down my throat.

Something emerged from inside the stump, rising on a pedestal.
It was a glass container pierced by many silver cables, each of which was
plugged into the folded cortex of a single massively swollen brain. The brain
had split open along fracture lines, like a cake that had ruptured in the
baking. The blue light spilled from the fissures. When I looked into
onepeering down into the geological strata of brain anatomyI had to blink
against the glare. A seething mass of tiny bright things lay nestled at the
base of the cleft, twinkling with the light of the sun.

�This is the computer that handles the computations,"
Weather said.

�It looks human. Please tell me it isnłt."

�It is human. Or at least thatłs how it started out, before
the machines were allowed to infest and reorganise its deep structure." Weather
tapped a finger against the side of her own scalp. �All the machines in my head
only amount to two hundred grams of artificial matter, and even so I still need
this crest to handle my thermal loading. There are nearly a thousand grams of
machinery in that brain. The brain needs to be cooled like a turbopump. Thatłs
why itłs been opened up, so that the heat can dissipate more easily."

�Itłs a monstrosity."

�Not to us," she said sharply. �We see a thing of wonder and
beauty."

�No," I said firmly. �Letłs be clear about this. What youłre
showing me here is a human brain, a living mind, turned into some kind of
slave."

�No slavery is involved," Weather said. �The mind chose this
vocation willingly."

�It chose this?"

�Itłs considered a great honour. Even in Conjoiner society,
even given all that we have learned about the maximisation of our mental
resources, only a few are ever born who have the skills necessary to tame and
manage the reactions in the heart of a C-drive. No machine can ever perform
that task as well as a conscious mind. We could build a conscious machine, of
course, a true mechanical slave, but that would contravene one of our deepest
strictures. No machine may think, unless it does so voluntarily. So we are left
with volunteer organic minds, even if those selfsame minds need the help of a
thousand grams of nonsentient processing machinery. As to why only a few of us
have the talent ... that is one of our greatest mysteries. Galiana thought
that, in achieving a pathway to augmented human intelligence, she would render
the brain utterly knowable. It was one of her few mistakes. Just as there are
savants amongst the retarded, so we have our Conjoined equivalents. We are all
tested for such gifts when we are young. Very few of us show even the slightest
aptitude. Of those that do, even fewer ever develop the maturity and stability
that would make them suitable candidates for enshrinement in an engine."
Weather faced me with a confiding look. �They are valued very highly indeed, to
the point where they are envied by some of us who lack what they were born
with."

�But even if they were gifted enough that it was possible ...
no one would willingly choose this."

�You donłt understand us, Inigo. We are creatures of the
mind. This brain doesnłt consider itself to have been imprisoned here. It
considers itself to have been placed in a magnificent and fitting setting, like
a precious jewel."

�Easy for you to say, since it isnłt you."

�But it very nearly could have been. I came close, Inigo. I
passed all the early tests. I was considered exceptional, by the standards of
my cohort group. I knew what it was like to feel special, even amongst
geniuses. But it turned out that I wasnłt quite special enough, so I was
selected out of the programme."

I looked at the swollen, fissured mind. The hard blue glow
made me think of Cherenkov radiation, boiling out of some cracked fission core.

�And do you regret it now?"

�Iłm older now," Weather said. �I realise now that being
unique ... being adored ... is not the greatest thing in the world. Part of me
still admires this mind; part of me still appreciates its rare and delicate
beauty. Another part of me ... doesnłt feel like that."

�Youłve been amongst people too long, Weather. You know what
itłs like to walk and breathe."

�Perhaps," she said, doubtfully.

�This mind"

�Itłs male," Weather said. �I canłt tell you his name, any
more than I could tell you mine. But I can read his public memories well
enough. He was fifteen when his enshrinement began. Barely a man at all. Hełs
been inside this engine for twenty-two years of shiptime; nearly sixty-eight
years of worldtime."

�And this is how hełll spend the rest of his life?"

�Until he wearies of it, or some accident befalls this ship.
Periodically, as now, Conjoiners may make contact with the enshrined mind. If
they determine that the mind wishes to retire, they may effect a replacement,
or decommission the entire engine."

�And then what?"

�His choice. He could return to full embodiment, but that
would mean losing hundreds of grams of neural support machinery. Some are
prepared to make that adjustment; not all are willing. His other option would
be to return to one of our nests and remain in essentially this form, but
without the necessity of running a drive. He would not be alone in doing so."

I realised, belatedly, where all this was heading. �You say
hełs under a heavy burden now."

�Yes. The degree of concentration is quite intense. He can
barely spare any resources for what we might call normal thought. Hełs in a
state of permanent unconscious flow, like someone engaged in an enormously
challenging game. But now the game has begun to get the better of him. It isnłt
fun any more. And yet he knows the cost of failure."

�But you can help him."

�I wonłt pretend that my abilities are more than a shadow of
his. Still, I did make it part of the way. I canłt take all the strain off him,
but I can give him free access to my mind. The additional processing
resourcescoupled with my own limited abilitiesmay make enough of a
difference. �

�For what?"

�For you to get wherever it is you are going. I believe that
with our minds meshed together, and dedicated to this one task, we may be able
to return the engines to something like normal efficiency. I canłt make any
promises, though. The proof of the pudding ..."

I looked at the pudding-like mass of neural tissue and asked
the question I was dreading. �What happens to you, while all this is happening?
If hełs barely conscious"

�The same would apply, Iłm afraid. As far as the external
world is concerned, Iłll be in a state of coma. If Iłm to make any difference,
Iłll have to hand over all available neural resources."

�But youłll be helpless. How long would you last, sitting in
a coma?"

�That isnłt an issue. Iłve already sent a command to this
engine to form the necessary life-support machinery. It should be ready any
moment now, as it happens." Weather glanced down at the floor between us. �Iłd
take a step back if I were you, Inigo."

I did as she suggested. The flat red floor buckled upwards,
shaping itself into the seamless form of a moulded couch. Without any ceremony,
Weather climbed onto the couch and lay down as if for sleep.

�There isnłt any point delaying things," she said. �My mind
is made up, and the sooner wełre on our way, the better. We canłt be sure that
there arenłt other brigands within attack range."

�Wait," I said. �This is all happening too quickly. I
thought we were coming down here to look at the situation, to talk about the
possibilities."

�Wełve already talked about them, Inigo. They boil down to
this: either I help the boy, or we drift hopelessly."

�But you canłt just ... do this."

Even as I spoke, the couch appeared to consolidate its hold
on Weather. Red material flowed around her body, hardening over her into a
semitranslucent shell. Only her face and lower arms remained visible,
surrounded by a thick red collar that threatened to squeeze shut at any moment.

�It wonłt be so bad," she said. �As I said, I wonłt have
much room left for consciousness. I wonłt be bored, thatłs for sure. Itłll be
more like one very long dream. Someone elsełs dream, certainly, but I donłt
doubt that therełll be a certain rapturous quality to it. I remember how good
it felt to find an elegant solution, when the parameters looked so unpromising.
Like making the most beautiful music imaginable. I donłt think anyone can
really know how that feels unless theyłve also held some of that fire in their
minds. Itłs ecstasy, Inigo, when it goes right."

�And when it goes wrong?"

�When it goes wrong, you donłt get much time to explore how
it feels." Weather shut her eyes again, like a person lapsing into microsleep. �Iłm
lowering blockades, allowing the boy to co-opt my own resources. Hełs wary. Not
because he doesnłt trust me, but because he can barely manage his own
processing tasks, without adding the temporary complexity of farming some of
them out to me. The transition will be difficult ... ah, here it comes. Hełs
using me, Inigo. Hełs accepting my help." Despite being almost totally enclosed
in the shell of red matter, Weatherłs whole body convulsed. Her voice, when she
spoke again, sounded strained. �Itłs difficult. So much more difficult than I
thought it would be. This poor mind ... hełs had so much to do on his own. A lesser
spirit would already have buckled. Hełs shown heroic dedication ... I wish the
nest could know how well he has done." She clamped her teeth together and
convulsed again, harder this time. �Hełs taking more of me. Eagerly now. Knows
Iłve come to help. The sense of relief ... the strain being lifted ... I canłt
comprehend how he lasted until now. Iłm sorry, Inigo. Soon there isnłt going to
be much of me left to talk to you."

�Is it working?"

�Yes. I think so. Perhaps between the two of us" Her jaws
cracked together, teeth cutting her tongue. �Not going to be easy, but ...
losing more of me now. Language going. Donłt need now."

�Weather, donłt go."

�Canłt stay. Got to go. Only way. Inigo, make promise. Make
promise fast."

�Say it. Whatever it is."

�When we get ... when we" Her face was contorted with the
strain of trying to make herself understood.

�When we arrive," I said.

She nodded so hard I thought her neck was going to break. �Yes.
Arrive. You get help. Find others."

�Other Conjoiners?"

�Yes. Bring them. Bring them in ship. Tell them. Tell them
and make them help."

�I will. I swear on it."

�Going now. Inigo. One last thing."

�Yes. Whatever it is."

�Hold hand."

I reached out and took her hand, in my good one.

�No," Weather said. �Other. Other hand."

I let go, then took her hand in my metal one, closing my
fingers as tightly as I dared without risking hers. Then I leaned down,
bringing my face close to hers.

�Weather, I think I love you. Iłll wait for you. Iłll find
those Conjoiners. Thatłs a promise."

�Love a Spider?" she asked.

�Yes. If this is what it takes."

�Silly ... human ... boy."

She pulled my hand, with more strength than I thought she
had left in her. She tugged it down into the surface of the couch until it
lapped around my wrist, warm as blood. I felt something happening to my hand, a
crawling itch like pins and needles. I kissed Weather. Her lips were
fever-warm. She nodded and then allowed me to withdraw my hand.

�Go now," she said.

The red material of the couch flowed over Weather completely,
covering her hands and face until all that remained was a vague, mummy-like
form.

I knew then that I would not see her again for a very long
time. For a moment I stood still, paralysed by what had happened. Even then I
could feel my weight increasing. Whatever Weather and the boy were doing
between them, it was having some effect on the engine output. My weight climbed
smoothly, until I was certain we were exceeding half a gee and still
accelerating.

Perhaps we were going to make it home after all.

Some of us.

I turned from Weatherłs casket and looked for the way out.
Held tight against my chest to stop it itching, my hand was lost under a glove
of twinkling machinery. I wondered what gift I would find when the glove
completed its work.

Zima Blue

After the first week people started drifting away from the
island. The viewing stands around the pool became emptier by the day. The big
tourist ships hauled back toward interstellar space. Art fiends, commentators
and critics packed their bags in Venice. Their disappointment hung over the
lagoon like a miasma.

I was one of the few who stayed on Murjek, returning to the
stands each day. Iłd watch for hours, squinting against the trembling blue
light reflected from the surface of the water. Face down, Zimałs pale shape
moved so languidly from one end of the pool to the other that it could have
been mistaken for a floating corpse. As he swam I wondered how I was going to
tell his story, and who was going to buy it. I tried to remember the name of my
first newspaper, back on Mars. They wouldnłt pay as much as some of the bigger
titles, but some part of me liked the idea of going back to the old place. It
had been a long time ... I queried the AM, wanting it to jog my memory about
the name of the paper. Therełd been so many since ... hundreds, by my
reckoning. But nothing came. It took me another yawning moment to remember that
Iłd dismissed the AM the day before.

�Youłre on your own, Carrie," I said. �Start getting used to
it."

In the pool, the swimming figure ended a length and began to
swim back toward me.

Two weeks earlier Iłd been sitting in the Piazza San Marco
at noon, watching white figurines glide against the white marble of the clock
tower. The sky over Venice was jammed with ships parked hull-to-hull. Their
bellies were quilted in vast glowing panels, tuned to match the real sky. The
view reminded me of the work of a pre-Expansion artist who had specialised in
eye-wrenching tricks of perspective and composition: endless waterfalls,
interlocking lizards. I formed a mental image and queried the fluttering
presence of the AM, but it couldnłt retrieve the name.

I finished my coffee and steeled myself for the bill.

Iłd come to this white marble version of Venice to witness
the unveiling of Zimałs final work of art. Iłd had an interest in the artist
for years, and Iłd hoped I might be able to arrange an interview. Unfortunately
several thousand other members of the in-crowd had come up with exactly the
same idea. Not that it mattered what kind of competition I had anyway; Zima
wasnłt talking.

The waiter placed a folded piece of card on my table.

All wełd been told was to make our way to Murjek, a waterlogged
world most of us had never heard of before. Murjekłs only claim to fame was
that it hosted the one hundred and seventy-first known duplicate of Venice, and
one of only three Venices rendered entirely in white marble. Zima had chosen
Murjek to host his final work of art, and to be the place where he would make
his retirement from public life.

With a heavy heart I lifted the bill to inspect the damage.
Instead of the expected bill there was a small blue card, printed in fine gold
italic lettering. The shade of blue was that precise, powdery, aquamarine that ęZima
had made his own. The card was addressed to me, Carrie Clay, and it said that
Zima wanted to talk to me about the unveiling. If I was interested, I should
report to the Rialto Bridge in exactly two hours.

If I was interested.

The note stipulated that no recording materials were to be
brought, not even a pen and paper. As an afterthought, the card mentioned that
the bill had been taken care of. I almost had the nerve to order another coffee
and put it on the same tab. Almost, but not quite.

Zimałs servant was there when I arrived early at the bridge.
Intricate neon mechanisms pulsed behind the flexing glass of the robotłs
mannequin body. It bowed at the waist and spoke very softly. �Miss Clay? Since
youłre here, we might as well depart."

The robot escorted me to a flight of stairs that led to the
waterside. My AM followed us, fluttering at my shoulder. A conveyor hovered in
waiting, floating a metre above the water. The robot helped me into the rear
compartment. The AM was about to follow me inside when the robot raised a
warning hand.

�Youłll have to leave that behind, Iłm afraid: no recording
materials, remember?"

I looked at the metallic green hummingbird, trying to remember
the last time I had been out of its ever-watchful presence.

�Leave it behind?"

�Itłll be quite safe here, and you can collect it again when
you return after nightfall."

�If I say no?"

�Then Iłm afraid therełll be no meeting with Zima."

I sensed that the robot wasnłt going to hang around all afternoon
waiting for my answer. The thought of being away from the AM made my blood run
cold. But I wanted that interview so badly I was prepared to consider anything.

I told the AM to stay here until I returned.

The obedient machine reversed away from me in a flash of metallic
green. It was like watching a part of myself drift away. The glass hull wrapped
itself around me and I felt a surge of un-nulled acceleration.

Venice tilted below us, then streaked away to the horizon.

I formed a test query, asking the AM to name the planet
where Iłd celebrated my seven hundredth birthday. Nothing came: I was out of
query range, with only my own age-saturated memory to rely on.

I leaned forward. �Are you authorised to tell me what this
is about?"

�Iłm afraid he didnłt tell me," the robot said, making a
face appear in the back of his head. �But if at any moment you feel uncomfortable,
we can return to Venice."

�Iłm fine for now. Who else got the blue card treatment?"

�Only you, to the best of my knowledge."

�And if Iłd declined? Were you supposed to ask someone else?"

�No," the robot said. �But letłs face it, Miss Clay. You
werenłt very likely to turn him down."

As we flew on, the conveyorłs shock wave gouged a foaming
channel in the sea behind it. I thought of a brush drawn through wet paint on
marble, exposing the white surface beneath. I took out Zimałs invitation and
held it against the horizon ahead of us, trying to decide whether the blue was
a closer match to the sky or the sea. Against these two possibilities the card
seemed to flicker indeterminately.

Zima Blue. It was an exact thing, specified scientifically
in terms of angstroms and intensities. If you were an artist, you could have a
batch of it mixed up according to that specification. But no one ever used Zima
Blue unless they were making a calculated statement about Zima himself.

Zima was already unique by the time he emerged into the public
eye. He had undergone radical procedures to enable him to tolerate extreme
environments without the burden of a protective suit. Zima had the appearance
of a well-built man wearing a tight body stocking, until you were close and you
realised that this was actually his skin. Covering his entire form, it was a
synthetic material that could be tuned to different colours and textures
depending on his mood and surroundings. It could approximate clothing if the
social circumstances demanded it. The skin could contain pressure when he
wished to experience vacuum, and stiffen to protect him against the crush of a
gas giant planet. Despite these refinements the skin conveyed a full range of
sensory impressions to his mind. He had no need to breathe, since his entire
cardiovascular system had been replaced by closed-cycle life-support
mechanisms. He had no need to eat or drink; no need to dispose of bodily waste.
Tiny repair machines swarmed through his body, allowing him to tolerate radiation
doses that would have killed an ordinary man in minutes.

With his body thus armoured against environmental extremes,
Zima was free to seek inspiration where he wanted. He could drift free in
space, staring into the face of a star, or wander the searing canyons of a
planet where metals ran like lava. His eyes had been replaced by cameras
sensitive to a huge swathe of the electromagnetic spectrum, wired into his
brain via complex processing modules. A synaes-thesic bridge allowed him to
hear visual data as a kind of music; to see sounds as a symphony of startling
colours. His skin functioned as a kind of antenna, giving him sensitivity to
electrical field changes. When that wasnłt sufficient, he could tap into the
data feeds of any number of accompanying machines.

Given all this, Zimałs art couldnłt help but be original and
attention-grabbing. His landscapes and starfields had a heightened, ecstatic
quality about them, awash in luminous, jarring colours and eye-wrenching tricks
of perspective. Painted in traditional materials but on a huge scale, they
quickly attracted a core of serious buyers. Some found their way into private
collections, but Zima murals also started popping up in public spaces all over
the Galaxy. Tens of metres across, the murals were nonetheless detailed down to
the limits of vision. Most had been painted in one session. Zima had no need
for sleep, so he worked uninterrupted until a piece was complete.

The murals were undeniably impressive. From a standpoint of
composition and technique they were unquestionably brilliant. But there was
also something bleak and chilling about them. They were landscapes without a
human presence, save for the implied viewpoint of the artist himself.

Put it this way: they were nice to look at, but I wouldnłt
have hung one in my home.

Not everyone agreed, obviously, or else Zima wouldnłt have
sold as many works as he had. But I couldnłt help wondering how many people
were buying the pictures because of what they knew about the artist, rather
than because of any intrinsic merit in the works themselves.

That was how things stood when I first paid attention to
Zima. I filed him away as interesting but kitschy: maybe worth a story if
something else happened to either him or his art.

Something did, but it took a while for anyoneincluding meto
notice.

One dayafter a longer than usual gestation periodZima
unveiled a mural that had something different about it. It was a picture of a
swirling, star-pocked nebula, from the vantage point of an airless rock.
Perched on the rim of a crater in the middle distance, blocking off part of the
nebula, was a tiny blue square. At first glance it looked as if the canvas had
been washed blue and Zima had simply left a small area unpainted. There was no
solidity to the square; no detail or suggestion of how it related to the
landscape or the backdrop. It cast no shadow and had no tonal influence on the
surrounding colours. But the square was deliberate: close examination showed
that it had indeed been overpainted over the rocky lip of the crater. It meant
something.

The square was just the beginning. Thereafter, every mural
that Zima released to the outside world contained a similar geometric shape: a
square, triangle, oblong or some similar form embedded somewhere in the
composition. It was a long time before anyone noticed that the shade of blue
was the same from picture to picture.

It was Zima Blue: the same shade of blue as on the
gold-lettered card.

Over the next decade or so, the abstract shapes became more
dominant, squeezing out the other elements of each composition. The cosmic
vistas ended up as narrow borders, framing blank circles, triangles,
rectangles. Where his earlier work had been characterised by exuberant
brushwork and thick layers of paint, the blue forms were rendered with
mirror-smoothness.

Intimidated by the intrusion of the abstract blue forms,
casual buyers turned away from Zima. Before very long Zima unveiled the first
of his entirely blue murals. Large enough to cover the side of a
thousand-storey building, the mural was considered by many to be as far as Zima
could take things.

They couldnłt have been more wrong.

I felt the conveyor slowing as we neared a small island, the
only feature in any direction.

�Youłre the first to see this," the robot said. �Therełs a
distortion screen blocking the view from space."

The island was about a kilometre across: low and
turtle-shaped, ringed by a narrow collar of pale sand. Near the middle it rose
to a shallow plateau, on which vegetation had been cleared in a roughly rectangular
area. I made out a small panel of reflective blue set flat against the ground,
surrounded by what appeared to be a set of tiered viewing stands.

The conveyor shed altitude and speed, bobbing down until it
stopped just outside the area enclosed by the viewing stands. It came to rest
next to a low white pebble-dash chalet I hadnłt noticed during our approach.

The robot stepped out and helped me from the conveyor.

�Zima will be here in a moment," it said, before returning
to the conveyor and vanishing back into the sky.

Suddenly I felt very alone and very vulnerable. A breeze
came in from the sea, blowing sand into my eyes. The sun was creeping down
toward the horizon and soon it would be getting chilly. Just when I was
beginning to feel the itch of panic, a man emerged from the chalet, rubbing his
hands briskly. He walked toward me, following a path of paved stones.

�Glad you could make it, Carrie."

It was Zima, of course, and in a flash I felt foolish for
doubting that he would show his face.

�Hi," I said lamely.

Zima offered his hand. I shook it, feeling the slightly
plastic texture of his artificial skin. Today it was a dull pewter-grey.

�Letłs go and sit on the balcony. Itłs nice to watch the
sunset, isnłt it?"

�Nice," I agreed.

He turned his back to me and set off in the direction of the
chalet. As he walked, his muscles flexed and bulged beneath the pewter flesh.
There were scale-like glints in the skin on his back, as if it had been set
with a mosaic of reflective chips. He was beautiful like a statue, muscular
like a panther. He was a handsome man, even after all his transformations, but
I had never heard of him taking a lover, or having any kind of a private life
at all. His art was everything.

I followed him, feeling awkward and tongue-tied. Zima led me
into the chalet, through an old-fashioned kitchen and an old-fashioned lounge,
full of thousand-year-old furniture and ornaments.

�How was the flight?"

�Fine."

He stopped suddenly and turned to face me. �I forgot to check
... did the robot insist that you leave behind your Aide Memoire?"

�Yes."

�Good. It was you I wanted to talk to, Carrie, not some surrogate
recording device."

�Me?"

The pewter mask of his face formed a quizzical expression. �Do
you do multisyllables, or are you still working up to that?"

�Er ..."

�Relax," he said. �Iłm not here to test you, or humiliate
you, or anything like that. This isnłt a trap, and youłre not in any danger.
Youłll be back in Venice by midnight."

�Iłm okay," I managed. �Just a bit starstruck."

�Well, you shouldnłt be. Iłm hardly the first celebrity youłve
met, am I?"

�Well, no, but ..."

�People find me intimidating," he said. �They get over it
eventually, and then wonder what all the fuss was about."

�Why me?"

�Because you kept asking nicely," Zima said.

�Be serious."

�All right. Therełs a bit more to it than that, although you
did ask nicely. Iłve enjoyed much of your work over the years. People have
often trusted you to set the record straight: especially near the ends of their
lives."

�You talked about retiring, not dying."

�Either way, it would still be a withdrawal from public
life. Your work has always seemed truthful to me, Carrie. Iłm not aware of
anyone claiming misrepresentation through your writing."

�It happens now and then," I said. �Thatłs why I always make
sure therełs an AM on hand so no one can dispute what was said."

�That wonłt matter with my story," Zima said.

I looked at him shrewdly. �Therełs something else, isnłt
there? Some other reason you pulled my name out of the hat."

�Iłd like to help you," he said.

When most people speak about his Blue Period they mean the
era of the truly huge murals. By huge I do mean huge. Soon they had become
large enough to dwarf buildings and civic spaces; large enough to be visible
from orbit. Across the Galaxy twenty-kilometre-high sheets of blue towered over
private islands or rose from storm-wracked seas. Expense was never a problem,
since Zima had many rival sponsors who competed to host his latest and biggest
creation. The panels kept on growing, until they required complex, Sloth-tech
machinery to hold them aloft against gravity and weather. They pierced the tops
of planetary atmospheres, jutting into space. They glowed with their own soft
light. They curved around in arcs and fans, so that the viewerłs entire visual
field was saturated with blue.

By now Zima was hugely famous, even to people who had no
particular interest in art. He was the weird cyborg celebrity who made huge
blue structures; the man who never gave interviews or hinted at the private
significance of his art.

But that was a hundred years ago. Zima wasnłt even remotely
done.

Eventually the structures became too unwieldy to be hosted
on planets. Blithely Zima moved into interplanetary space, forging vast
free-floating sheets of blue ten thousand kilometres across. Now he worked not
with brushes and paint, but with fleets of mining robots, tearing apart
asteroids to make the raw material for his creations. Now it was entire stellar
economies that competed with each other to host Zimałs work.

That was about the time that I renewed my interest in Zima.
I attended one of his �moonwrappings": the enclosure of an entire celestial
body in a lidded blue container, like a hat going into a box. Two months later
he stained the entire equatorial belt of a gas giant blue, and I had a ringside
seat for that as well. Six months later he altered the surface chemistry of a
sun-grazing comet so that it daubed a Zima Blue tail across an entire solar
system. But I was no closer to a story. I kept asking for an interview and kept
being turned down. All I knew was that there had to be more to Zimałs obsession
with blue than a mere artistic whim. Without an understanding of that
obsession, there was no story: just anecdote.

I didnłt do anecdote.

So I waited, and waited. And thenlike millions of othersI
heard about Zimałs final work of art, and made my way to the fake Venice on
Murjek. I wasnłt expecting an interview, or any new insights. I just had to be
there.

We stepped through sliding glass doors out onto the balcony.
Two simple white chairs sat either side of a white table. The table was set
with drinks and a bowl of fruit. Beyond the unfenced balcony, arid land sloped
steeply away, offering an uninterrupted view of the sea. The water was calm and
inviting, with the lowering sun reflected like a silver coin.

Zima indicated that I should take one of the seats. His hand
dithered over two bottles of wine.

�Red or white, Carrie?"

I opened my mouth as if to answer him, but nothing came.
Normally, in that instant between the question and the response, the AM would
have silently directed my choice to one of the two options. Not having the AMłs
prompt felt like a mental stall in my thoughts.

�Red, I think," Zima said. �Unless you have strong
objections."

�Itłs not that I canłt decide these things for myself," I
said.

Zima poured me a glass of red, then held it up to the sky to
inspect its clarity. �Of course not," he said.

�Itłs just that this is a little strange for me."

�It shouldnłt be strange," he said. �This is the way youłve
lived your life for hundreds of years."

�The natural way, you mean?"

Zima poured himself a glass of the red wine, but instead of
drinking it he merely sniffed the bouquet. �Yes."

�But there isnłt anything natural about being alive a
thousand years after I was born," I said. �My organic memory reached saturation
point about seven hundred years ago. My headłs like a house with too much
furniture. Move something in, you have to move something out."

�Letłs go back to the wine for a moment," Zima said. �Normally,
youłd have relied on the advice of the AM, wouldnłt you?"

I shrugged. �Yes."

�Would the AM always suggest one of the two possibilities?
Always red wine, or always white wine, for instance?"

�Itłs not that simplistic," I said. �If I had a strong
preference for one over the other, then, yes, the AM would always recommend one
wine over the other. But I donłt. I like red wine sometimes and white wine
other times. Sometimes I donłt want any kind of wine." I hoped my frustration
wasnłt obvious. But after the elaborate charade with the blue card, the robot
and the conveyor, the last thing I wanted to be discussing with Zima was my own
imperfect recall.

�Then itłs random?" he asked. �The AM would have been just
as likely to say red as white?"

�No, itłs not like that either. The AMłs been following me
around for hundreds of years. Itłs seen me drink wine a few hundred thousand
times, under a few hundred thousand different circumstances. It knows, with a
high degree of reliability, what my best choice of wine would be given any set
of parameters."

�And you follow that advice unquestioningly?"

I sipped at the red. �Of course. Wouldnłt it be a little
childish to go against it just to make a point about free will? After all, Iłm
more likely to be satisfied with the choice it suggests."

�But unless you ignore that suggestion now and then, wonłt
your whole life become a set of predictable responses?"

�Maybe," I said. �But is that so very bad? If Iłm happy,
what do I care?"

�Iłm not criticising you," Zima said. He smiled and leaned
back in his seat, defusing some of the tension caused by his line of
questioning. �Not many people have an AM these days, do they?"

�I wouldnłt know," I said.

�Less than one percent of the entire Galactic population."
Zima sniffed his wine and looked through the glass at the sky. �Almost everyone
else out there has accepted the inevitable."

�It takes machines to manage a thousand years of memory. So
what?"

�But a different order of machine," Zima said. �Neural implants;
fully integrated into the participantłs sense of self. Indistinguishable from
biological memory. You wouldnłt need to query the AM about your choice of wine;
you wouldnłt need to wait for that confirmatory whisper. Youłd just know it."

�Wherełs the difference? I allow my experiences to be recorded
by a machine that accompanies me everywhere I go. The machine misses nothing,
and itłs so efficient at anticipating my queries that I barely have to ask it
anything."

�The machine is vulnerable."

�Itłs backed up at regular intervals. And itłs no more
vulnerable than a cluster of implants inside my head. Sorry, but that just isnłt
a reasonable objection."

�Youłre right, of course. But therełs a deeper argument
against the AM. Itłs too perfect. It doesnłt know how to distort or forget."

�Isnłt that the point?"

�Not exactly. When you recall somethingthis conversation,
perhaps, a hundred years from nowthere will be things about it that you
misremember. Yet those misremembered details will themselves become part of
your memory, gaining solidity and texture with each instance of recall. A
thousand years from now, your memory of this conversation might bear little
resemblance with reality. Yet youłd swear your recollection was accurate."

�But if the AM had accompanied me, Iłd have a flawless
record of how things really were."

�You would," Zima said. �But that isnłt living memory. Itłs
photography; a mechanical recording process. It freezes out the imagination;
leaves no scope for details to be selectively misremembered." He paused long
enough to top up my glass. �Imagine that on nearly every occasion when you had
cause to sit outside on an afternoon like this you had chosen red wine over
white, and generally had no reason to regret that choice. But on one occasion,
for one reason or another, you were persuaded to choose whiteagainst the
judgement of the AMand it was wonderful. Everything came together magically:
the company, the conversation, the late afternoon ambience, the splendid view,
the euphoric rush of being slightly drunk. A perfect afternoon turned into a
perfect evening."

�It might not have had anything to do with my choice of
wine," I said.

�No," Zima agreed. �And the AM certainly wouldnłt attach any
significance to that one happy combination of circumstances. A single deviation
wouldnłt affect its predictive model to any significant degree. It would still
say ęred wineł the next time you asked."

I felt an uncomfortable tingle of understanding. �But human
memory wouldnłt work that way."

�No. It would latch onto that one exception and attach undue
significance to it. It would amplify the attractive parts of the memory of that
afternoon and suppress the less pleasant parts: the fly that kept buzzing in
your face, your anxiety about catching the boat home, and the birthday present
you knew you had to buy in the morning. All youłd remember was that golden glow
of well-being. The next time, you might well choose white, and the time after.
An entire pattern of behaviour would have been altered by one instance of
deviation. The AM would never tolerate that. Youłd have to go against its
advice many, many times before it grudgingly updated its model and started
suggesting white rather than red."

�All right," I said, still wishing we could talk about Zima
rather than me. �But what practical difference does it make whether the
artificial memory is inside my head or outside?"

�All the difference in the world," Zima said. �The memories
stored in the AM are fixed for eternity. You can query it as often as you like,
but it will never enhance or omit a single detail. But the implants work
differently. Theyłre designed to integrate seamlessly with biological memory,
to the point where the recipient canłt tell the difference. For that very
reason theyłre necessarily plastic, malleable, subject to error and distortion."

�Fallible," I said.

�But without fallibility there is no art. And without art
there is no truth."

�Fallibility leads to truth? Thatłs a good one."

�I mean truth in the higher, metaphoric sense. That golden afternoon?
That was the truth. Remembering the fly wouldnłt have added to it in any
material sense. It would have detracted it from it."

�There was no afternoon, there was no fly," I said. Finally,
my patience had reached breaking point. �Look, Iłm grateful to have been
invited here. But I thought there might be a little more to this than a lecture
about the way I choose to manage my own memories."

�Actually," Zima said, �there was a point to this after all.
And it is about me, but itłs also about you." He put down the glass. �Shall we
take a little walk? Iłd like to show you the swimming pool."

�The sun hasnłt gone down yet," I said.

Zima smiled. �Therełll always be another one."

He took me on a different route through the house, leaving
by a different door than the one wełd come in by. A meandering path climbed
gradually between white stone walls, bathed now in gold from the lowering sun.
Presently we reached the flat plateau Iłd seen on my approach in the conveyor.
The things Iłd thought were viewing stands were exactly that: terraced
structures about thirty metres high, with staircases at the back leading to the
different levels. Zima led me into the darkening shadow under the nearest
stand, then through a private door that led into the enclosed area. The blue
panel Iłd seen during the approach turned out to be a modest rectangular
swimming pool, drained of water.

Zima led me to the edge.

�A swimming pool," I said. �You werenłt kidding. Is this
what the stands are all about?"

�This is where it will happen," Zima said. �The unveiling of
my final work of art, and my retirement from public life."

The pool wasnłt quite finished. In the far corner, a small
yellow robot glued ceramic tiles into place. The part near us was fully tiled,
but I couldnłt help noticing that the tiles were chipped and cracked in places.
The afternoon light made it hard to be surewe were in deep shadow nowbut
their colour looked to be very close to Zima Blue.

�After painting entire planets, isnłt this is a bit of a
letdown?" I asked.

�Not for me," Zima said. �For me this is where the quest
ends. This is what it was all leading up to."

�A shabby-looking swimming pool?"

�Itłs not just any old swimming pool," he said.

He walked me around the island, as the sun slipped under the
sea and the colours turned ashen.

�The old murals came from the heart," Zima said. �I painted
on a huge scale because that was what the subject matter seemed to demand."

�It was good work," I said.

�It was hack work. Huge, loud, demanding, popular, but ultimately
soulless. Just because it came from the heart didnłt make it good."

I said nothing. That was the way Iłd always felt about his
work as well: that it was as vast and inhuman as its inspiration, and only Zimałs
cyborg modifications leant his art any kind of uniqueness. It was like praising
a painting because it had been done by someone holding a brush between their
teeth.

�My work said nothing about the cosmos that the cosmos wasnłt
already capable of saying for itself. More importantly, it said nothing about
me. So what if I walked in vacuum, or swam in seas of liquid nitrogen? So what
if I could see ultraviolet photons, or taste electrical fields? The
modifications I inflicted upon myself were gruesome and extreme. But they gave
me nothing that a good telepresence drone couldnłt offer any artist."

�I think youłre being a little harsh on yourself," I said.

�Not at all. I can say this now because I know that I did
eventually create something worthwhile. But when it happened it was completely
unplanned."

�You mean the blue stuff?"

�The blue stuff," he said, nodding. �It began by accident: a
misapplication of colour on a nearly-finished canvas. A smudge of pale,
aquamarine blue against near-black. The effect was electric. It was as if I had
achieved a short-circuit to some intense, primal memory, a realm of experience
where that colour was the most important thing in my world."

�What was that memory?"

�I didnłt know. All I knew was the way that colour spoke to
me, as if Iłd been waiting my whole life to find it, to set it free." He
thought for a moment. �Therełs always been something about blue. A thousand
years ago Yves Klein said it was the essence of colour itself: the colour that
stood for all other colours. A man once spent his entire life searching for a
particular shade of blue that he remembered encountering in childhood. He began
to despair of ever finding it, thinking he must have imagined that precise
shade, that it could not possibly exist in nature. Then one day he chanced upon
it. It was the colour of a beetle in a museum of natural history. He wept for
joy."

�What is Zima Blue?" I asked. �Is it the colour of a beetle?"

�No," he said. �Itłs not a beetle. But I had to know the
answer, no matter where it took me. I had to know why that colour meant so much
to me, and why it was taking over my art."

�You allowed it to take over," I said.

�I had no choice. As the blue became more intense, more dominant,
I felt I was closer to an answer. I felt that if only I could immerse myself in
that colour, then I would know everything I desired to know. I would understand
myself as an artist."

�And? Did you?"

�I understood myself," Zima said. �But it wasnłt what I expected."

�What did you learn?"

Zima was a long time answering me. We walked on slowly, me
lagging slightly behind his prowling muscular form. It was getting cooler now
and I began to wish Iłd had the foresight to bring a coat. I thought of asking
Zima if he could lend me one, but I was concerned not to derail his thoughts
from wherever they were headed. Keeping my mouth shut had always been the
toughest part of the job.

�We talked about the fallibility of memory," he said.

�Yes."

�My own memory was incomplete. Since the implants were installed
I remembered everything, but that only accounted for the last three hundred
years of my life. I knew myself to be much older, but of my life before the
implants I recalled only fragments; shattered pieces that I did not quite know
how to reassemble." He slowed and turned back to me, the dulling orange light
on the horizon catching the side of his face. �I knew I had to dig back into
that past, if I was to ever understand the significance of Zima Blue."

�How far back did you get?"

�It was like archaeology," he said. �I followed the trail of
my memories back to the earliest reliable event, which occurred shortly after
the installation of the implants. This took me to Kharkov 8, a world in the
Garlin Bight, about nineteen thousand light-years from here. All I remembered
was the name of a man I had known there, called Cobargo."

Cobargo meant nothing to me, but even without the AM I knew
something of the Garlin Bight. It was a region of the Galaxy encompassing six
hundred habitable systems, squeezed between three major economic powers. In the
Garlin Bight normal interstellar law did not apply. It was fugitive territory.

�Kharkov 8 specialised in a certain kind of product," Zima
said. �The entire planet was geared up to provide medical services of a kind
unavailable elsewhere. Illicit cybernetic modifications, that kind of thing."

�Is that where ..." I left the sentence unfinished.

�That is where I became what I am," Zima said. �Of course, I
made further changes to myself after my time on Kharkov 8improving my
tolerance to extreme environments, improving my sensory capabilitiesbut the
essence of what I am was laid down under the knife, in Cobargołs clinic."

�So before you arrived on Kharkov 8 you were a normal man?"
I asked.

�This is where it gets difficult," Zima said, picking his
way carefully along the trail. �Upon my return I naturally tried to locate
Cobargo. With his help, I assumed I would be able to make sense of the memory
fragments I carried in my head. But Cobargo was gone; vanished elsewhere into
the Bight. The clinic remained, but now his grandson was running it."

�I bet he wasnłt keen on talking."

�No; he took some persuading. Thankfully, I had means. A little
bribery, a little coercion." He smiled slightly at that. �Eventually he agreed
to open the clinic records and examine his grandfatherłs log of my visit."

We turned a corner. The sea and the sky were now the same inseparable
grey, with no trace of blue remaining.

�What happened?"

�The records say that I was never a man," Zima said. He
paused a while before continuing, leaving no doubt as to what he had said. �Zima
never existed before my arrival in the clinic."

What I wouldnłt have done for a recording drone, orfailing
thata plain old notebook and pen. I frowned, as if that might make my memory
work just that little bit harder.

�Then who were you?"

�A machine," he said. �A complex robot; an autonomous artificial
intelligence. I was already centuries old when I arrived on Kharkov 8, with
full legal independence."

�No," I said, shaking my head. �Youłre a man with machine
parts, not a machine."

�The clinic records were very clear. I had arrived as a
robot. An androform robot, certainlybut an obvious machine nonetheless. I was
dismantled and my core cognitive functions were integrated into a vat-grown
biological host body." With one finger he tapped the pewter side of his skull. �Therełs
a lot of organic material in here, and a lot of cybernetic machinery. Itłs
difficult to tell where one begins and the other ends. Even harder to tell
which is the master, and which is the slave."

I looked at the figure standing next to me, trying to make
the mental leap needed to view him as a machinealbeit a machine with soft,
cellular componentsrather than a man. I couldnłt; not yet.

I stalled. �The clinic could have lied to you."

�I donłt think so. They would have been far happier had I
not known."

�All right," I said. �Just for the sake of argument ..."

�Those were the facts. They were easily verified. I examined
the customs records for Kharkov 8 and found that an autonomos robot entity had
entered the planetłs airspace a few months before the medical procedure."

�Not necessarily you."

�No other robot entity had come near the world for decades.
It had to be me. More than that, the records also showed the robotłs port of
origin."

�Which was?"

�A world beyond the Bight. Lintan 3, in the Muara Archipelago."

The AMłs absence was like a missing tooth. �I donłt know if
I know it."

�You probably donłt. Itłs no kind of world youłd ever visit
by choice. The scheduled lightbreakers donłt go there. My only purpose in
visiting the place seemed to me ..."

�You went there?"

�Twice. Once before the procedure on Kharkov 8, and again
recently, to establish where Iłd been before Lintan 3. The evidence trail was
beginning to get muddy, to say the least ... but I asked the right kinds of
questions, poked at the right kinds of database, and finally found out where Iłd
come from. But that still wasnłt the final answer. There were many worlds, and
the chain was fainter which each that I visited. But I had persistence on my
side."

�And money."

�And money," Zima said, acknowledging my remark with a
polite little nod. �That helped incalculably."

�So what did you find, in the end?"

�I followed the trail back to the beginning. On Kharkov 8 I
was a quick-thinking machine with human-level intelligence. But I hadnłt always
been that clever, that complex. Iłd been augmented in steps, as time and
circumstances allowed."

�By yourself?"

�Eventually, yes. That was when I had autonomy; legal independence.
But I had to reach a certain level of intelligence before I was allowed that
freedom. Before that, I was a simpler machine ... like an heirloom or a pet. I
was passed from one owner to the next, between generations. They added things
to me. They made me cleverer."

�How did you begin?"

�As a project," he said.

Zima led me back to the swimming pool. Equatorial night had
arrived quickly, and the pool was bathed now in artificial light from the many
floods arrayed above the viewing stands. Since we had last seen the pool the
robot had finished glueing the last of the tiles in place.

�Itłs ready now," Zima said. �Tomorrow it will be sealed,
and the day after it will be flooded with water. Iłll cycle the water until it
attains the necessary clarity."

�And then?"

�I prepare myself for my performance."

On the way to the swimming pool he had told me as much as he
knew about his origin. Zima had begun his existence on Earth, before I was even
born. He had been assembled by a hobbyist, a talented young man with an
interest in practical robotics. In those days, the man had been one of many
groups and individuals groping toward the hard problem of artificial
intelligence.

Perception, navigation and autonomous problem-solving were
the three things that most interested the young man. He had created many
robots, tinkering them together from kits, broken toys and spare parts. Their
mindsif they could be dignified with such a termwere cobbled from the innards
of junked computers, with their simple programs bulging at the limits of memory
and processor speed.

The young man filled his house with these simple machines,
designing each for a particular task. One robot was a sticky-limbed spider that
climbed around the walls of his house, dusting the frames of pictures. Another
lay in wait for flies and cockroaches. It caught and digested them, using the
energy from the chemical breakdown of their biomass to drive itself to another
place in the house. Another robot busied itself by repainting the walls of the
house over and over, so that the colours matched the changing of the seasons.

Another robot lived in his swimming pool.

It toiled endlessly up and down and along the ceramic sides
of the pool, scrubbing them clean. The young man could have bought a cheap
swimming pool cleaner from a mail-order company, but it amused him to design
the robot from scratch, according to his own eccentric design principles. He
gave the robot a full-colour vision system and a brain large enough to process
the visual data into a model of its surroundings. He allowed the robot to make
its own decisions about the best strategy for cleaning the pool. He allowed it
to choose when it cleaned and when it surfaced to recharge its batteries via
the solar panels grouped on its back. He imbued it with a primitive notion of
reward.

The little pool cleaner taught the young man a great deal
about the fundamentals of robotics design. Those lessons were incorporated into
the other household robots, until one of thema simple household cleanerbecame
sufficiently robust and autonomous that the young man began to offer it as a
kit, via mail-order. The kit sold well, and a year later the young man offered
it as a pre-assembled domestic robot. The robot was a runaway success, and the
young manłs firm soon became the market leader in domestic robots.

Within ten years, the world swarmed with his bright, eager machines.

He never forgot the little pool cleaner. Time and again he
used it as a test-bed for new hardware, new software. By turns it became the
cleverest of all his creations, and the only one that he refused to strip down
and cannibalise.

When he died, the pool cleaner passed to his daughter. She
continued the family tradition, adding cleverness to the little machine. When
she died, she passed it to the young manłs grandson, who happened to live on
Mars.

�This is the original pool," Zima said. �If you hadnłt
already guessed."

�After all this time?" I asked.

�Itłs very old. But ceramics endure. The hardest part was
finding it in the first place. I had to dig through two metres of topsoil. It
was in a place they used to call Silicon Valley."

�These tiles are coloured Zima Blue," I said.

�Zima Blue is the colour of the tiles," he correctly gently.
�It just happened to be the shade that the young man used for his swimming pool
tiles."

�Then some part of you remembered."

�This was where I began. A crude little machine with barely
enough intelligence to steer itself around a swimming pool. But it was my
world. It was all I knew; all I needed to know."

�And now?" I asked, already fearing the answer.

�Now Iłm going home."

I was there when he did it. By then the stands were full of
people who had arrived to watch the performance, and the sky over the island
was a mosaic of tight-packed hovering ships. The distortion screen had been
turned off, and the viewing platforms on the ships thronged with hundreds of
thousands of distant witnesses. They could see the swimming pool by then, its
water mirror-flat and gin-clear. They could see Zima standing at the edge, with
the solar patches on his back glinting like snake scales. None of the viewers
had any idea of what was about to happen, or its significance. They were
expecting somethingthe public unveiling of a work that would presumably trump
everything Zima had created before thenbut they could only stare in puzzled
concern at the pool, wondering how it could possibly measure up to those atmosphere-piercing
canvases, or those entire worlds wrapped in shrouds of blue. They kept thinking
that the pool had to be a diversion. The real work of artthe piece that would
herald his retirementmust be somewhere else, as yet unseen, waiting to be
revealed in all its immensity.

That was what they thought.

But I knew the truth. I knew it as I watched Zima stand at
the edge of the pool and surrender himself to the blue. Hełd told me exactly
how it would happen: the slow, methodical shutting down of higher-brain
functions. It hardly mattered that it was all irreversible: there wouldnłt be
enough of him left to regret what he had lost.

But something would remain: a little kernel of being; enough
of a mind to recognise its own existence. Enough of a mind to appreciate its
surroundings, and to extract some trickle of pleasure and contentment from the
execution of a task, no matter how purposeless. He wouldnłt ever need to leave
the pool. The solar patches would provide him with all the energy he needed. He
would never age, never grow ill. Other machines would take care of his island,
protecting the pool and its silent slow swimmer from the ravages of weather and
time.

Centuries would pass.

Thousands of years, and then millions.

Beyond that, it was anyonełs guess. But the one thing I knew
was that Zima would never tire of his task. There was no capacity left in his
mind for boredom. He had become pure experience. If he experienced any kind of
joy in the swimming of the pool, it was the near-mindless euphoria of a
pollinating insect. That was enough for him. It had been enough for him in that
pool in California, and it was enough for him now, a thousand years later, in
the same pool but on another world, around another sun, in a distant part of
the same Galaxy.

As for me ...

It turned out that I remembered more of our meeting on the
island than I had any right to. Make of that what you will, but it seemed I
didnłt need the mental crutch of my AM quite as much as Iłd always imagined.
Zima was right: Iłd allowed my life to become scripted, laid out like a
blueprint. It was always red wine with sunsets, never the white. Aboard the
outbound lightbreaker a clinic installed a set of neural memory extensions that
should serve me well for the next four or five hundred years. One day Iłll need
another solution, but Iłll cross that particular mnemonic bridge when I get
there. My last act, before dismissing the AM, was to transfer its observations
into the echoey new spaces of my enlarged memory. The events still donłt feel
quite like they ever happened to me, but they settle in a little bit better
with each act of recall. They change and soften, and the highlights glow a
little brighter. I guess they become a little less accurate with each instance
of recall, but like Zima said: perhaps thatłs the point.

I know now why he spoke to me. It wasnłt just my way with a
biographical story. It was his desire to help someone move on, before he did
the same.

I did eventually find a way to write his story, and I sold
it back to my old newspaper, the Martian Chronicle. It was good to visit the
old planet again, especially now that theyłve moved it into a warmer orbit.

That was a long time ago. But Iłm still not done with Zima,
odd as it seems.

Every couple of decades, I still hop a lightbreaker to
Murjek, descend to the streets of that gleaming white avatar of Venice, take a
conveyor to the island and join the handful of other dogged witnesses scattered
across the stands. Those that come, like me, must still feel that the artist
has something else in store ... one last surprise. Theyłve read my article now,
most of them, so they know what that slowly swimming figure means ... but they
still donłt come in droves. The stands are always a little echoey and sad, even
on a good day. But Iłve never seen them completely empty, which I suppose is
some kind of testament. Some people get it. Most people never will.

But thatłs art.