The Naked God

by Peter F. Hamilton

  At least Carmitha’s new-found sense allowed her to see that it was the right way round for the birth, and the umbilical cord hadn’t got wrapped round its neck. Nor were there any other obvious complications.

  Basically, that just left her to look, sound, and radiate assured confidence. She had after all assisted with a dozen natural childbirths, which was a great comfort to everyone else involved. Somehow, what with the way Véronique looked up to her as a cross between her long-lost mother and a fully qualified gynaecologist, she’d never actually mentioned that assistance involved handing over towels when told and mopping up for the real midwife.

  “I can see the head,” Carmitha said excitedly. “Just trust me now.”

  Véronique screamed again, trailing off into an angry whimper. Carmitha placed her hands over the girl’s swollen belly, and exerted her energistic power, pushing with the contractions. Véronique kept on screaming as the baby emerged. Then she broke into tears.

  It happened a lot quicker than usual thanks to the energistic pressure.

  Carmitha caught hold of the infant and eased gently, making the last moments more bearable for the exhausted girl. Then it was the usual fast panic routine of getting the umbilical tied and cut. Véronique sobbing delightedly. People moving in with towels and smiles of congratulations.

  Having to wipe the baby off. Delivering the placenta. Endless mopping up.

  New to this was applying some energistic power to repair the small tears in Véronique’s vaginal walls. Not too much, Carmitha was still worried about the long-term effects which even mild healing might trigger. But it did abolish the need for stitches.

  By the time Carmitha finally finished tidying up, Véronique was lying on clean sheets, cradling her baby daughter with a classic aura of exhausted happiness. And a smooth mind.

  Carmitha studied her silently for a moment. There was none of the internal anguish caused by a possessing soul riding roughshod over the host. Sometime during the pain and blood and joy, two had become one, merging at every level in celebration of new life.

  Véronique smiled shyly upwards at Carmitha. “Isn’t she wonderful?” she entreated of the drowsy baby. “Thank you so much.”

  Carmitha sat on the edge of the bed. It was impossible not to smile down at the wrinkled-up face, so innocent of its brand-new surroundings.

  “She’s lovely. What are you going to call her?”

  “Jeanette. Both our families have had that name in it.”

  “I see. That’s good.” Carmitha kissed the baby’s brow. “You two get some rest now. I’ll pop by in an hour or so to check up on you.”

  She walked through the manor out into the courtyard. Dozens of people stopped her on the way; asking how it had gone, were mother and child all right? She felt happy to be dispensing good news for once, helping to lift some of the worry and tension that was stifling Cricklade.

  Luca found her sitting in the open doorway at the back of her caravan, taking long drags from a reefer. He leant against the rear wheel and folded his arms to look at her. She offered him the joint.

  “No thanks,” he said. “I didn’t know you did that.”

  “Just for the occasional celebration. There’s not much weed about on Norfolk. We have to be careful where we plant it. You landowners get very uptight about other people’s vices.”

  “I’m not going to argue with you. I hear the baby arrived.”

  “She did, yes, she’s gorgeous. And so is Véronique, now.”

  “Now?”

  “She and Olive kissed and made up. They’re one now. One person. I guess that’s the way the future’s going for all of you.”

  “Ha!” Luca grunted bitterly. “You’re wrong there, girl. I killed people today. Butterworth’s right to fear his health. Once your body goes in this realm, you go with it. There’s no ghosts, no spirits, no immortality. Just death. We screwed up—lost our one chance to go where we wanted, and we didn’t go there.”

  Carmitha exhaled a long stream of sweet smoke. “I think you did.”

  “Don’t talk crap, my girl.”

  “You’re back where we thought the human race started from. What exists here is all we had before people began inventing things and making electricity. It’s the kind of finite world humans feel safe in. Magic exists here, though it’s not good for much. Very few machines work, nothing complicated, and certainly no electronics. And death … death is real. Hell, we’ve even got gods on the other side of the sky again; gods with powers beyond anything possible here, made in our own image. In a couple of generations, we’ll only have rumours of gods. Legends that tell how this world was made, racing out of the black emptiness in a blaze of red fire. What’s that if it’s not a new beginning in a land of innocence? This place isn’t for you, it never was. You’ve reinvented the biological imperative, and made it mean something this time. All that you are must carry on through your children. Every moment has to be lived to the full, for you’ll get no more.” She took another drag, the end of the joint glowing bright tangerine. Small sparks were reflected in her gleeful eyes. “I rather like that, don’t you?”

  Stephanie’s bullet wound had healed enough to let her walk round the headland camp; she and Moyo and Sinon made the circuit twice a day. Their small secluded refuge had grown in a chaotic manner as the deserters from Ekelund’s army dribbled in. Now it sprawled like an avalanche of sleeping bags away from the cliff edge. The new people tended to stay in small groups, huddling together round the pile of whatever items they’d brought with them. The only rule the serjeants had about extending sanctuary from Ekelund was that they hand over their real weapons once they arrived.

  Nobody had objected enough to return.

  As she circled round the knots of subdued people, Stephanie picked up enough fragments of conversation to guess what awaited any deserter foolish enough to venture back. Ekelund’s paranoia was growing at a worrying rate. And Tinkerbell’s appearance hadn’t helped. Apparently, the crystal entity had been shot at. That was the reason for it fleeing away into the empty glare.

  As if they didn’t have enough to worry about with their current predicament, there was now the prospect Ekelund had started a war.

  “I miss him, too,” Moyo said sympathetically. He squeezed Stephanie’s hand in an attempt at reassurance.

  She smiled faintly, thankful he’d picked up on her melancholic thoughts.

  “A couple of days without him, and we’re all going to pieces.” She paused to take a breath. Perhaps her recovery wasn’t as advanced as she liked to imagine. “Let’s go back,” she said. These little walks had started out to give the newcomers some sense of identity, that they were all part of a big new family. She was the one they’d come to, and she wanted to show she was available to them if they needed it. Most of them recognized her as she walked past. But there were so many now that they had their own identity, and it was the serjeants who guaranteed their safety. Her role had diminished to nothing. And God forbid I should try to manufacture my own importance like Ekelund.

  The three of them turned and headed back to the little encampment where their friends kept a vigil over Tina. A little way beyond it, the serjeants formed a line of watchers strung out along the top of the cliff, searching for any sign of Tinkerbell. They covered almost a fifth of the rim now, and Sinon told her their mini-consensus was considering stationing them all the way round the island. When she’d asked if Ekelund might consider that a threatening move, the big bitek construct merely shrugged. “Some things are considerably more important than placating her neuroses,” he’d said.

  “Quick inspection tour,” Franklin remarked as they returned.

  Stephanie guided Moyo to a comfortable sitting position a couple of metres from Tina’s makeshift bed and sprawled on a blanket beside him.

  “I’m not exactly an inspiring sight any more.”

  “Of course you are, darling,” Tina said.

  Everyone had to strain to hear her. She was in a bad way now. The serjeants
, Stephanie knew, had basically given up and were just making what they considered her last days as comfortable as possible. Even though Rana rarely even let go of her friend’s hand, she didn’t exert any energistic power other than a general wish for Tina to mend. Active interference with the woman’s crushed organs would probably only make things worse. Tina didn’t have the willpower to maintain any form of body illusion any more. Her dangerously pale skin was visible for anyone to see as she laboured for air. The stopgap intravenous tube was still feeding fluid into her arm, though her body seemed determined to sweat it out at a faster rate.

  They all knew it wouldn’t be long now.

  Stephanie was furious with herself for wondering what would happen. If Tina’s soul would migrate back to the beyond, or be trapped here; or if she’d simply and finally die. A legitimate enough interest given their situation. But Stephanie was sure Tina would pick up the pulse of guilt in her mind.

  “We’re still attracting Ekelund’s discards,” she said. “At this rate everyone will be camping here with us in another week.”

  “What week?” McPhee grumbled softly. “Can you no’ feel the air fouling?”

  “The carbon dioxide level is not detectable at this moment,” Choma said.

  “Oh? And what are you lot doing to help right now?” McPhee indicated the line of stationary serjeants standing along the cliff. “Other than making that madwoman more paranoid.”

  “Our efforts continue,” Sinon said. “We are still trying to formulate a method of opening a wormhole, and our observation role has been increased.”

  “Putting our hopes on a bloody fairy! This place must be making us all soft in the head.”

  “That term is a misnomer, though a perfectly understandable one for Cochrane to use.”

  “I guess that means you still haven’t figured out what it was,” Moyo said.

  “Unfortunately not. Though the fact that some kind of intelligence exists here is an encouraging development.”

  “If you say so.” He turned away.

  Stephanie snuggled up closer to Moyo, enjoying the reflex way his arm went round her shoulders. Being together made the awful wait a tiny bit more tolerable. She just couldn’t work out what she wanted to happen first. Though they’d not spoken of it, the serjeants would probably try to open a wormhole back to Mortonridge. As a possessed, it would hardly be a rescue for her. Perhaps staying here until the carbon dioxide built to a lethal level was preferable.

  She flicked another guilty glance at Tina.

  Three hours later, the wait ended. This time the serjeants saw it coming.

  A riot of tiny dazzling crystals swooped out around the base of the flying island to rush up vertically. They erupted over the top of the cliff like a silent white firestorm. Thousands of them curved in mid air and cascaded downwards to spread out above the headland camp, slowing to hover just over the heads of the astounded humans and serjeants.

  The light level was quadrupled, forcing Stephanie to shield her hand with her eyes. Not that it did much to protect her from the vivid scintillations. Even the drab ground was sparkling.

  “Now what?” she asked Sinon.

  The serjeant watched the swirl of crystals drifting idly, sharing what he saw with the others. There was no real pattern to their movement. “I have no idea.”

  <> Choma said. <>

  <> Sinon said.

  <> the serjeants along the cliff warned. A disc of raw light was expanding out from underneath the island. Not that it could have been hidden there, it was well over a hundred kilometres in diameter. The emergence effect was similar to an Adamist starship’s ZTT jump, but much much slower.

  Once it had finished distending, it began to rise up parallel to the cliff. A cold, brilliant sun slid over the horizon to fill a third of the sky. It wasn’t a solid sphere, snowflake geometries fluctuated behind the overpowering glare.

  The small crystals parted smoothly, racing away over the landscape, leaving nothing between the headland camp and the massive visitor.

  Fountains of iridescence erupted deep inside it, mushrooming open against the prismatic surface. Streaks and speckles shimmered and danced around each other, striving for order within the huge blemish.

  It was the sheer size of the image they melded into which defeated Stephanie for some time. Her eyes simply couldn’t accept what she was seeing.

  Cochrane’s face, thirty kilometres high, smiled down at them.

  “Hi, guys,” he said, “Guess what I found.”

  Stephanie started laughing. She used the back of her hand to smear tears across her cheeks.

  The crystal sphere drifted in towards Ketton island, dimming slightly as it came. When it was a few metres from the cliff, a tiny circular section darkened completely, and receded inside in a swift fluidic motion.

  At Cochrane’s urging, Stephanie and her friends, along with Sinon and Choma, stepped through the opening. The tubular tunnel had smooth walls of clear crystal, with thin green planes bisecting the bulk of the material around it. After a hundred metres it opened out into a broad lenticular cavern a kilometre wide. Here, the long fractures of light beneath their feet glimmered crimson, copper, and azure, intersecting in a continual filigree that melted away into the interior. There was no sign of the fearsome light emitted by the outer shell, yet they could see out. Ketton island was clearly visible behind them, distorted by the compacted facets of crystal.

  One of the red sheets of light fissuring the cavern wall began to enlarge, the crystal conducting it withdrawing silently. Cochrane walked out of the opening, grinning wildly. He whooped and rushed over to his friends. Stephanie was crushed in his embrace.

  “Man! It is good to see you again, babe.”

  “You, too,” she whispered back.

  He went round the rest of the group, greeting them exuberantly; even the serjeants got high fives.

  “Cochrane, what the hell is this thing?” Moyo asked.

  “Don’t you recognize her?” the hippie asked in mock surprise. “This is Tinkerbell, dude. Mind you, she inverted, or something like that, since you saw us last.”

  “Inverted?” Sinon asked. He was gazing round the chamber, sharing his sight with the serjeants outside.

  “Her physical dimension, yeah. There’s a whole load of real groovy aspects to her which I don’t really dig. I think, if she wants, she can get a lot bigger than this. Cosmic thought, right?”

  “But what is she?” Moyo asked impatiently.

  “Ah.” Cochrane gestured round uncertainly. “The information has been kinda flowing mostly one way. But she can help us. I think.”

  “Tina’s dying,” Stephanie said abruptly. “Can anything be done to heal her?”

  Cochrane’s bells tinkled quietly as he shuffled about. “Well sure, man, no need to shout. I’m awake to what’s going down.”

  “The smaller crystals are gathering around Tina,” Sinon reported, looking at what he could see through the serjeants tending the invalid. “They appear to be encasing her.”

  “Can we talk to this Tinkerbell directly?” Choma asked.

  “You may,” a clear directionless female voice said.

  “Thank you,” the serjeant said sombrely. “What are you called?”

  “I have been named Tinkerbell, in your language.”

  Cochrane twisted under the stares directed at him. “What?”

  “Very well,” Choma said. “Tinkerbell, we’d like to know what you are, please.”

  “The closest analogy would be that I have a personality like an Edenist habitat multiplicity. I have many divisions; I am singular as I am manifold.”

  “Are the small crystals outside segments of yourself?”

  “No. They are other members of my race. Their physical dynamic is in a different phase from mine, as Cochrane explained.”

  “Did Cochrane explain to you how we got here?”

>   “I assimilated his memories. It has been a long time since I encountered an organic being, but no damage was incurred to his neural structure during the reading procedure.”

  “How could you tell?” Rana muttered. Cochrane gave her a thumbs up.

  “Then you understand our predicament,” Stephanie said. “Is there a way back to our universe?”

  “I can open a gateway back to it for you, yes.”

  “Oh God.” She sagged against Moyo, overwhelmed with relief.

  “However, I believe you should resolve your conflict first. Before we began our existence in this realm, we were biological. Our race began as yours; a commonality which permits me to appreciate the ethics and jurisprudence that you observe at your current level of evolution. The dominant consciousness has stolen these bodies. That is wrong.”

  “So’s the beyond,” McPhee shouted. “You’ll no’ make me go back there without a fight.”

  “That will not be necessary,” Tinkerbell said. “I can provide you with several options.”

  “You said you used to be biological beings,” Sinon said. “Will we all evolve into your current form in this realm?”

  “No. There is no evolution here. We chose to transfer ourselves here a long time ago. This form was specifically engineered to sustain our consciousness in conjunction with the energy pattern which is the soul. We are complete and essentially immortal now.”

  “Then we were right,” Moyo said. “This realm is a kind of heaven.”

  “Not in the human classical religious sense,” Tinkerbell said. “There are no city kingdoms with divine creatures tending them, nor even levels of ecstasy and awareness for your souls to rise through. In fact, this realm is quite hostile to naked souls. The energy pattern dissipates rapidly. You are capable of dying here.”

  “But we wanted a refuge,” McPhee insisted. “That’s what we imagined when we forced the way open to come here.”

  “A wish granted in essence if not substance. Had you arrived with an entire planet to live on, then its atmosphere and biosphere would sustain you for thousands of generations; at least as long as it would orbiting a star. This realm is about stability and longevity. That’s why we came here. But we were prepared for our new life. Unfortunately, you came here on a barren lump of rock.”