Count to a Trillion

by John C. Wright

  D’Aragó looked shocked, and the look did not fade. He kept stealing nervous glances at the man version of Del Azarchel as he spoke with the machine version over his amulet.

  Montrose turned up the gain on his helmet’s earphones, and could make out the voice of the machine, cold and majestic, dimly echoing, as it conversed with D’Aragó: “Having received in proper course the challenge offered by the friend of the honorable gentleman, and agreed as to time and place, let us establish the uniformity of weapons. My principle is shy a shot from his fourth secondary barrel…”

  Del Azarchel must have also had his earphones turned up, because he raised his pistol to port arms, worked the action. With a clack of noise one of the eight shots, a slender micro-missile some nine inches in length, half inch in caliber, clattered, ringing, to the roadstones. He lowered the pistol again to its ready position.

  The cold voice of the machine rang out again from D’Aragó’s wrist. “Let us establish the question of a judge. Sergei Vardanov surrendered himself and his men to your principle’s custody. Let him and two others act as the tribunal…”

  Montrose spoke inside his helmet to turn on the phone in his wristband. “Hey, Exarchel!”

  The machine could carry on two conversations at once. Or a thousand. Over Montrose’s amulet he said, “Yes…?”

  “I don’t want Vardanov to be the judge. See if you can have him moved to a safe distance.”

  “I thought she would appreciate if I freed three of her men from militia custody.”

  “He can pick from his men: I trust him. Uh—for things like that, I trust him.”

  “It will be Hermeticists. No one else is old enough to remember or respect the Code of Duels.”

  “Fine.”

  “The Spanish custom was to have three men, and abide by their vote.”

  “Fine.”

  Three black-garbed figures climbed from the trenches, and walked with slow deliberation over to the area midway between the two armored men. The three judges were none other than Reyes y Pastor, his chin high and eyes bright; Sarmento i Illa d’Or, like a mountain of muscle, but stepping lightly as a heifer, his face stoical and grim-lipped; and Melchor de Ulloa, slouching and looking embarrassed.

  Father Reyes raised his hand and called out in a loud voice, “I must ask and abjure you that this quarrel should not proceed, for Our Heavenly Father has commanded all the faithful sons of His Church to peace. Gentlemen, I call upon you as baptized Christian men to turn aside from this wrath, to shake hands and make amends. Is there anything that can be done or said to reconcile you, that this contest might be resolved to the satisfaction of both parties, and with no dishonor?”

  Reyes y Pastor was dressed in his priestly vestments, which he had nonchalantly worn to a battlefield, and seemed to show no discomfort in acting in his role as a judge over a duel, either. Montrose decided that the man must have no respect at all for his office.

  Montrose said in a loud voice, “Blackie, if you can hear me, we don’t need to go through with this.”

  The voice of Exarchel came from his wrist, “Learned Montrose, if you wish me to act as your second in this, please respect the forms. All communication must go through me.”

  “Invite him.”

  “Where?”

  “Up! Tell him to come to the stars with us. The three of us, together again, aboard the Hermetic. He can use the Bellerophon to hold the world hostage, we can go to the Diamond Star together, and it will be a century or more Earth-time before we get back. He abdicates to the Advocacy, and the people will know there is more contraterrene on its way, and that should sooth things down. The world peace he wants is preserved, and he don’t have to trust his mechanical version, uh…”

  “Meaning me.”

  “Meaning you. Give D’Aragó the message.”

  No doubt Del Azarchel heard the words from D’Aragó’s wrist as clearly as did Montrose, but D’Aragó nevertheless took the time to walk slowly back over to Del Azarchel, bend his head to the helmet, and exchange words with Del Azarchel.

  D’Aragó walked too slowly. Montrose sighed, because there was no subtle way to do this, and he did not want to lift his pistol to use the muzzle camera, lest the gesture be mistaken. His helmet was not designed to turn, so he had to lift his heavy legs, and with clanking footsteps, turn his whole body in order to look behind him. The tether of the topless tower was bent, and from the curve it was clear that several cars were already climbing the cable.

  Clank, clank, went his feet as he turned back again.

  “Hey, X.”

  “Sir?” said Exarchel.

  “Give him another message. Tell him to get his men down out from the tower, or I will kill them all. This point is not open to negotiation.”

  His earphones picked up the voice of the machine, again coming from D’Aragó’s wrist, repeating the message. D’Aragó whispered to the helmet, and nodded, and raised the wristband to his face, and spoke.

  Exarchel said, “The Learned D’Aragó states that his principal has no interest in receiving such demands from you, since they are military matters outside of the scope of this duel. There is rebel activity in China and Australia, and it is standard procedure to secure such locations as may prove to be military assets in time of insurrection.”

  “Plague his chancrous dangle! Tell him their blood is on his hands. What’d he say about coming with us?”

  “He declines the offer, preferring to face you in combat. Really, Cowhand, I could have told you that. As your second, you should have consulted me before issuing it.”

  “Yeah, but you’re rooting for him, ain’t you?”

  The machine made a noise like a scratched record. Unlike its sighs and laughs, which had to be played out of a speaker as artificially as a harpist making a harp sing under her fingers, this sounded like an actually spontaneous nonverbal expression from the machine. “Zzxxxtk-K! You don’t think I want his hands on her any more than yours, do you? From my viewpoint, you are both monkeys, and for either to lay with her is bestiality. No, the optimal outcome for me is to have you kill each other.”

  “What do you care? You can’t have her.”

  “My love is regrettably Platonic, but nonetheless as real as yours.”

  “If we kill each other, will you let her go?”

  The Iron Ghost did not answer.

  “If you love her, you have to want what is best for her, what she wants, right? Blackie, the real Blackie, wants her as an angel in a birdcage, or a prize on his mantelpiece, or something. Is your love for her like that? I am asking you to promise not to help him chase her, if I die.”

  “I cannot make such a promise. The Learned D’Aragó announced that his principal will be satisfied, without a duel, if you sue for a divorce from the Princess, and agree to enter biosuspension until such time as after he dies a natural death.”

  “Those terms are not acceptable.”

  Father Reyes now raised his handkerchief. Montrose and Del Azarchel both raised their left hands, and the left gauntlets were white on the wrist fingers and back, but jet-black on the palm, so that when they opened their hands to show “ready,” the sign could be clearly seen.

  Reyes called out. “Gentlemen! You are within your rights to ask your opponent to empty and repack his weapon here and now, if you suspect any unbecoming practice.”

  Del Azarchel through D’Aragó, and Montrose through Exarchel, both admitted the other man was a trustworthy gentleman, and waived the right.

  That tickled Montrose’s suspicion. Del Azarchel was trying to stall, delay, and draw things out. A careful repacking of chaff could take an hour—so Blackie must have some good reason to not want Montrose to see how he had packed. Non-regulation chaff? Or, now that he was a posthuman, and the best damn mathematician on the planet, some radical new way to solve the Navier-Stokes equation? That was Del Azarchel’s special field of study, after all.

  Montrose grimaced. The same reason why Del Azarchel was trying to lengthen th
e time, Montrose had to shorten it. But now he ached to know what Del Azarchel had secretly done while packing his chaff and shot.

  “Even now, if an accommodation can be reached, both parties may withdraw in honor. Gentlemen! Will your principals seek reconciliation? Have all measures to avoid this conflict been exhausted?”

  The Seconds confirmed that no reconciliation was possible.

  Reyes called out. “Gentlemen, see to your countermeasures!”

  In his pistol-cameras, Del Azarchel blurred into a translucent shape, twisting and shimmering, a shattered mirror.

  Reyes called, “Gentlemen, ready your weapons! On peril of your honor, do not fire before the signal! Ah! Learned Montrose, you still clench your fist even though your honorable opposition shows black palm. Are the gentlemen prepared to exchange fire?”

  Montrose shouted out: “Not until he calls his men down from the tower. They got to come down, and I mean now, and I ain’t buggering around with him.”

  Del Azarchel shouted back: “Montrose, tell me what you are planning.”

  “You mean you can’t figure it out, smart as you are, and everything?”

  At that moment, even though the judge had not given the signal, Del Azarchel raised his massive pistol. “Treachery! Trickery!” he called out. “The Learned Montrose is—” But his voice was drowned out by the sound of his own cloud of chaff erupting from his pistol with a roar like a whirlwind. Black smoke rushed up and shrouded the figure.

  Montrose was already within his own cloud of smoke, with his pistol raised, and flickers of light of aiming or misleading beams, shining briefly with rainbow colors as they passed up or down through the visible spectrum, were now visible where they caught the oily motes of the rapidly-spreading chaff.

  But Father Reyes (showing far more courage or perhaps witlessness than Montrose would have credited him) stepped between the two duelists, and the aiming beams fixed on him. “Halt! Halt! This is not regular! Do the gentlemen wish to annul the meeting, and meet again upon some other day, or other terms? On peril of your honor, do not fire!”

  Both men held their fire, even though their chaff clouds were now spreading and thinning. This was dangerous for the both of them, since every moment that the clouds thinned before fire was exchanged, the less protection they offered the men inside.

  Montrose opened his palm. “I am ready to exchange fire!”

  Del Azarchel made a fist and shouted, “He is planning to topple the topless tower!”

  Montrose was impressed and disappointed that Blackie had figured it out. He blamed his own weakness, however, for giving Blackie the clues to do it. He should have just killed the damn soldiers without giving them a chance.

  “Call off your men, and I won’t,” Montrose called out.

  “If you’re dead, you won’t!” and Del Azarchel opened his palm as well.

  Father Reyes said, “Gentlemen, there has been a premature spread of chaff. Do you still agree, on peril of your honor, to be bound by the outcome of the exchange, and speak no ill of it?”

  Montrose said, “X! Tell Blackie that if he postpones, I’ll kill his men.”

  Exarchel said, “The Learned D’Aragó points out that both of you are covered by thin and insufficient chaff, and the duel may be mutually mortal. Do you agree to continue?”

  “I am ready,” said Montrose. There was nothing else to say. He still had his palm open.

  Del Azarchel stood, his massy pistol pointing at Montrose, and his left palm above his shoulder, open and showing a black palm with white fingers.

  Reyes stepped out of the line of fire and released the handkerchief.

  He had not heard the noise. Montrose was on his back, numb from shock, not certain what had struck him. Blood was in his mouth, and a din in his ears that drowned all earthly noises.

  Chaff too thin. We’re both dead.

  He thought it was strange there was no pain, but instead a sensation like a burning wire penetrating his chest, abdomen, and upper right leg. Gutshot, he thought. I’m dead. Funny there’s no pain. Am I in shock?

  He heard a ringing in his ears, and wondered if he had gone deaf.

  “Incoming call,” announced his wristband.

  Ah, Rania! Montrose knew such joy then, that the last word he was to hear would be from her.

  It was not Rania. Del Azarchel’s voice, breathy and ragged, issued from speakers in the wristband, and Montrose could hear it clearly echoing inside his suit. “Don’t ignite! Don’t ignite!”

  Montrose coughed, but he did not otherwise answer. He wondered where the hell the medics were? There were supposed to be doctors standing by.

  He must have uttered the question aloud, for Del Azarchel said, “No medics are coming. I’ve ordered my men back, until I know—” (Then Del Azarchel was coughing, and Montrose recognized from his war days that ragged noise. It was the particular sound of a punctured lung. Good. He assumed it was his number-five escort bullet, which he had programmed to feint left and correct right. Good old number five had not be confounded by the chaff.) “—until I know you are not going to set off an explosive. That’s what they are, aren’t they? The unaccounted-for mass from her cargo manifest. She mined the tower. Right? Right? Well—” (another bout of coughing, this more severe than the last) “—make you a deal, Cowhand. A deal. You tell me you’ve disarmed—” (coughing) “—and I’ll call in the medics.”

  Montrose thought idly that they were only supposed to talk through their Seconds.

  “—Those are good men, loyal. Have wives and children—never done anything to you—cold-blooded murder if you kill them—”

  Montrose must have said something at that point, because Del Azarchel said, “I’m not calling them back! Rania will not escape me!”

  By this point, Montrose managed, even though he could not feel his hands, to work the thumb-switch to turn his gun’s muzzle-camera back on. He could not raise his head, but now, from one of the camera’s view, he could see the thick and grotesque trail of blood leading from where Blackie had fallen in a crooked line toward where he was fallen.

  Blackie, in his armor, bleeding from all its joints, was crawling on his belly like a snake with a broken back, and in his hand he was still hauling his foot-long four-pound gun. From the tilted way it hung, Montrose could see that Blackie had held back the shot in the upper secondary barrel.

  Father Reyes and D’Aragó and the others were merely standing, faces held like masks, but eyes bulging, doing nothing to interfere. Handsome young Melchor de Ulloa was leaning forward, as if to rush toward the prone and supine bodies, but huge Sarmento i Illa d’Or was holding him back by both arms.

  Since Blackie still had a shot left, the duel was not over. The caliber of the secondary bullet would not penetrate armor except at point-blank range. Blackie was pulling himself by his hands, both legs limp and trailing behind, trying to get close enough to press the barrel up against Montrose’s gorget, and ignite his last shot.

  Holding back a shot is madness in a duel fought with these weapons, since each escort bullet had to stop an enemy escort in flight, or else the enemy shot would clear a path for the main payload, and ensure you’d be hit. Blackie had let himself get shot, just for the chance to deliver this final blow.

  But he was slowing down. His right arm dragged him a foot forward. His left arm dragged him six inches forward. And then he scraped some dust from the road toward himself. He clawed at the road surface once, twice, again and again, but was not moving. He did not give up. Over the radio, Montrose could hear his hissing and gasping, the sound of a man drowning in his own blood. Puncture wound. Bad way to die.

  Montrose spat, and blood scattered across the inside of his helmet, but his mouth was clear. “Delope.”

  “—Hell you say—”

  “Fire your last. Call the medics.”

  Not through the camera, but with his eyes, Montrose could see the bend in the tower: it was farther up, higher, than it had been.

  “—Don’t ign
ite!—It is what she wants, you know. She is smarter than you, smarter than me, smarter than all of us. She used you, used your—affection—like a toy on a string. Just a game. We’re just trained chimpanzees to her. Why do you trust her? I trusted her, too. Those explosives—did you know they were there? I bet you did not. Not until just the right moment. All arranged. All planned. Call her, why don’t you? She’s blocking your calls, because she does not want to speak to you, does not want to explain—”

  “Liar. You’re blocking it.”

  “—Not me—”

  “Liar. Or not. Pox. Exarchel. You on this line?”

  The cold, unemotional voice of the machine rang in his ear. “Your conclusion is correct.”

  “Bastard. You’re blocking the signal. You set the sniper, not him. The outcome you wanted. Both of us dead.”

  The machine spoke in a measured, unconcerned tone. “I did nothing to interfere with your reprehensible wishes and desires, either of you. If either of you had loved her more than you hated each other, you would have gone your ways in peace. Am I not the Master of the World? My justice is exact: you condemned yourselves. Neither of you will interfere with the overlordship of the Hyades when, in the future that seems far off to you, but not to me, they condescend to take control of whatever species I design to suit their needs.”

  Montrose gasped out, “But—why? Why?”

  The machine said calmly: “Do you know why we decided to collaborate with the Hyades? They are not evil. Do you remember the star list? The list appended to the message?”

  Montrose remembered. Alpha Centauri, 36 Ophiuchus, Omicron Eridani, 61 Cygni, 70 Ophiuchus, 82 Eridani, Altair, Delta Pavonis, Epsilon Eridani, Epsilon Indi, Eta Cassiopeiae, Gliese 570, Hr 7703, Tau Ceti.

  The machine said, “It is their promise. They are moving us to those stars. Whether we like or not. We are colonizing space. Men did not have the will, the forethought, to do it themselves. Men are too stupid, merely half a step above the apes, and no more worthy of escaping extinction, if left to their own devices. So we will not be left to our own devices. The determination is out of our hands. A higher power has decided.”