Poseidon's Wake

by Alastair Reynolds

  She stared and stared. A minute passed, maybe longer. If she blinked, Goma did not see it.

  Eunice turned to the next pair of pages. She stared at them with the same intensity, but for not quite so long this time. The next pair she swept with her gaze, Goma watching her pupils track up and down the columns. She looked at the next couple of pages for a few seconds, then turned again. Faster now, the turning of the pages becoming a slowly accelerating whisk, like the chopping of helicopter blades.

  ‘Are you—’

  ‘Silence.’

  The pages sped by, her fingers moving with card-sharp speed, her eyes never blinking. The whisking settled into a machine-like rhythm, the action of her hands and eyes methodical enough that Goma was fairly sure this was a kind of photographic capture. She finished the notebook, closed it and sat motionless for a second or two, as if the information absorbed still needed to be processed into a deeper level of comprehension.

  ‘The second notebook.’

  ‘Not yet. Not everything in one go.’

  ‘I’ve waited long enough, Goma. There’s nothing to be gained from withholding the rest.’

  ‘Not for you, maybe. But the only power I have over you lies in these notebooks.’

  ‘Why do you feel the need to have power over me?’

  ‘Because I don’t know what you are, or what you’re really capable of. Because I don’t know what you think or feel about me.’

  ‘I think you can be useful.’

  ‘Tools are useful. Materials and rations are useful. I think I deserve more than that.’

  ‘And after everything that happened on Orison, the deaths of my friends, withholding this information is how you hope to elevate your status in my eyes?’

  ‘If necessary, yes. Do you want the second notebook or not?’

  ‘After this glimpse? Yes. And the third.’

  ‘How badly?’

  ‘More than anything. I’ve seen something marvellous, Goma – felt the curtain of ignorance being tugged aside. All the years I spent on Orison, trying to reconstruct a few fragments of insight – they’ve been eclipsed in a couple of minutes. Eclipsed and outshone. Ndege saw with clarity something I had barely begun to think might be true. And beyond.’ She tapped the shut notebook. ‘There is more than just symbolic connection here, Goma – more than just the patterns between two forms of an alien language laid down millions of years apart. This is the key to understanding – the start of comprehension. I saw things during the Terror, but until this moment I did not have the apparatus to make sense of them. Now I do. At least, now I have the start . . . I beg of you – the other notebooks.’

  ‘In good time.’

  ‘This is intolerable.’

  ‘This is how it feels to be human. Not always getting the universe on a plate. Having to be beholden to others.’

  ‘You are being cruel.’

  ‘No, I’m being kind. I don’t think you’re a monster, Eunice, and I’m sorry about Orison – truly sorry. But you’re going to have to work to become one of us. This is where it starts.’

  A hash of numbers and symbols sped past Goma’s eyes much too fast to read, even if there were some sense to be drawn from them. They were in Vasin’s quarters again. Eunice was stationed at a small fold-out console while Loring and Caspari watched with expressions of studied concern, still not quite satisfied that their guest was to be trusted.

  Eunice tapped at the keys, her fingers moving with an unnatural fluency. The numbers and symbols kept scrolling.

  ‘So,’ Vasin said, ‘tell us the state of things, as succinctly as you can manage.’

  Eunice glanced back at her audience. ‘The command channel to the mirrors is still open and they respond as I’d expect. I don’t think Dakota has done anything to alter their basic functionality. Why would she, so long as they continue working?’

  ‘What have you done so far?’

  ‘Nothing she’d notice, just asked the mirrors to confirm their status and their readiness to accept further commands. We’re using a tight beam, so it’s unlikely Dakota will have intercepted our signal. Similarly, the mirrors are only sending their responses in our direction – there’s little chance that Zanzibar has detected any of this traffic.’

  ‘That sounds promising,’ Goma said. ‘Do you think they’ll do what you tell them to?’

  ‘It depends on the complexity of the command. Turning them on and off shouldn’t be hard – it’s a simple matter of breaking the concentric symmetry of the individual mirror elements so that the beam is no longer focused. But that may not have been attempted since the mirrors were put in place. As for altering the beam angle, the mirrors need to do it all the time, so that shouldn’t be a problem.’

  ‘So you can switch the beams off or aim them somewhere else,’ Caspari said.

  ‘We won’t know for sure until I send the command.’

  ‘We don’t want to hurt them,’ Goma said, ‘but we’ve every indication that Kanu’s being coerced. Right now, the mirrors are our only long-range negotiating tool. I don’t intend to use them as a weapon, but if we can squeeze them short of power, we may buy some time for negotiation.’

  Eunice nodded, but there was a note of caution in her voice. ‘The instant the mirrors deactivate, Dakota will know that we have control. We’ll have played our only card at that point, and Dakota’s bound to start trying to regain control from her side. I’m doing everything I can to lock out direct commands from Zanzibar, but I can’t promise I’ll succeed.’

  ‘You designed this system?’ Loring asked.

  ‘Not exactly,’ she answered carefully. ‘The old version of me designed it, a version I barely remember being. Lot of water under the bridge since then.’

  ‘Do your best,’ Vasin said. ‘We can’t expect the impossible. Equally, we’d be fools not to try to use the mirrors. Could we . . .’ But she abandoned the thought with a sudden distasteful expression, as if she had bitten into something sour.

  ‘What?’ Eunice asked.

  ‘I was wondering if we might use them as a weapon, if it came to that?’

  ‘No!’ Peter Grave said, Goma shaping the word in the same moment, sharing his exact repugnance.

  ‘I’m not talking about inflicting deliberate loss of life, just making a statement. If that ship powers up again, could we focus the mirrors onto it, cause enough damage to prevent its departure?’

  ‘Not with several minutes of time lag thrown into the pot,’ Eunice responded. ‘We can steer the mirrors, but not in real-time. Provided the ship doesn’t follow a predictable path, it can always stay out of harm’s way.’

  ‘Maybe not the ship, then. But Zanzibar won’t be going anywhere in a hurry, will it? If we steer the beams off their power grids, we could inflict structural damage on the other parts.’

  Goma had believed there was steel in Gandhari Vasin before; now she had proof of it.

  ‘This isn’t war,’ Goma said.

  ‘Not yet,’ Vasin said. ‘But we’d be idiotic not to think ahead, wouldn’t we?’ Then she clapped her hands once, making a jangle of jewellery. ‘Continue your work, Eunice – do everything you can to lock Dakota out of the mirrors, but take no action she might notice. In the meantime, we will continue preparing the lander. It will make no difference to your work – if you can control the mirrors from Travertine, you will also be able to do so from the smaller ship, and the time lag will be reduced as we close in.’

  ‘When we do we leave?’ Goma asked.

  ‘Three days, maybe two if things progress well.’

  ‘It won’t be war, Gandhari. We need to understand that. Tell her, Eunice.’

  ‘What would you like me to tell her?’

  ‘That it can’t come down to violence. That nothing’s so serious that it has to end that way.’

  ‘I’d love to,’ Eunice said.
/>   Then she returned to her work, as if the matter was settled.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  Nothing remained for Kanu but to return to Zanzibar, knowing he had failed. Swift had intervened promptly enough to prevent Icebreaker suffering severe additional damage – certainly nothing that would prevent an imminent departure – and such slight damage as had been done could be rectified during normal operations.

  ‘Why?’ he asked as they assumed station, floating just beyond Zanzibar’s polar door.

  ‘Why did I not allow you to kill yourself?’ Swift’s figment asked, striking an ironic, chin-stroking pose. ‘Does that even require an answer, Kanu?’

  ‘It was our only way out.’

  ‘You mean it was your only way out. It would have absolved you of any further involvement in this unpleasantness, that is true. But it would not have begun to resolve the larger problem, or left Nissa with a hope of saving herself.’

  ‘I had to take the ship from Dakota. I couldn’t just run.’

  ‘And I could not allow a good man to sacrifice himself, no matter how much he might resent my intervention.’ Swift leaned in, both hands on the console, his face looming before Kanu. ‘We have work to do here – there is knowledge for the gathering. The potential for a meeting with intellects beyond our experience! Dakota is an opportunity, not an obstacle.’

  ‘To you, maybe.’

  ‘Our goals are not dissimilar, Kanu.’

  ‘I’m starting to wonder about that. I’ll admit I came here to find some answers. So did you. But that was before we knew about Poseidon, about the Terror, about all those dead Watchkeepers. About Dakota, and what they’ve turned her into. That’s enough for me for now. I’ve seen the pitfalls – seen what’s at stake. But you want to keep pushing – you want ultimate contact with the M-builders or the Watchkeepers, whichever presents itself first.’

  ‘In which case, forgive me for not wishing to revel in ignorance.’

  ‘This isn’t about ignorance, Swift – it’s about you putting the interests of you and your robot friends ahead of the rest of us.’

  ‘I shall pretend I did not hear that.’

  ‘Pretend what you like. I had a chance to stop this and you interfered.’

  ‘I am expected to apologise for saving your life?’

  ‘It was my choice. You took that away from me. If Dakota’s the Watchkeepers’ puppet, what does that make me? Just another puppet, except I’m serving the interests of the Evolvarium instead?’

  ‘I believe we are both serving the interests of reason and enlightenment. And our relationship is one of mutual benefit, Kanu. Individually, we are ineffective. Together, we at least have a chance of outflanking Dakota.’

  ‘This is your idea of outflanking her?’

  ‘One way or another she will have her ship, Kanu. If it is not this one, then she will lure Travertine in for the same ends. We have an obligation to spare our new friends that particular difficulty.’

  At last Kanu felt something inside him give way. He still felt violated, his trust in Swift damaged. But at the same time, he was only able to air these thoughts because his friend had not permitted him to kill himself.

  ‘Damn you, Swift. How do you manage to make everything you do feel like the only honourable course of action?’

  ‘Because I have learned well from a master.’ Swift moved to his side and patted his shoulder. ‘Strong heart, Kanu. Our day is far from lost.’

  ‘One promise.’

  ‘If I may oblige.’

  ‘Should I ever try to take my own life again, you will do me the honour of not intervening.’

  ‘But my own life would also be at stake.’

  ‘That’s true. But this is the deal you signed up to. If I choose to end my existence, I don’t want a parasitic machine intelligence from Mars deciding it knows better than I do.’ Swift tapped a finger against his lip. ‘Good that we can speak plainly.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Might I add a reciprocal condition of my own?’

  ‘If you insist.’

  ‘Do nothing in haste, Kanu. I had a taste of non-existence during skipover. Death is all very well – doubtless it has its benefits – but I am not quite done with living yet. I think the universe still has some surprises in store for both of us.’

  *

  At the household, Nissa was silent. She had programmed the projecting wall to show a moving image from Earth, the view from a beach as the old sun made its way to the ocean’s flat horizon. The light was bright, but also nearly colourless – a line of chrome breakers against the darkening platinum of the water, the sky a perfect shimmer of silver, the sand like snow, the trees in the foreground black silhouettes.

  ‘I couldn’t tell you,’ he said.

  The wall made the sound of the waves. They crashed and broke in an endless series of static roars, each the birth of a miniature universe, each drawn back into a slow, hissing death.

  ‘Never,’ she said, ‘do that to me again.’

  ‘I don’t intend to.’

  ‘You thought that was the answer, Kanu? After all this time? Are you really that stupid?’

  ‘The people aboard the other ship warned me,’ he replied. ‘I received a message from them saying I should not cooperate with her.’

  She was still facing the ocean, not Kanu. ‘They came all this way to tell you that?’

  ‘I don’t know. I’d have liked the opportunity for a longer conversation but it was difficult even with only a few minutes of time lag. Do you want to know the odd thing?’

  ‘I’m being held prisoner by talking elephants. I’d say my capacity for oddness is somewhat overloaded.’ A breaker surrendered itself to entropy; in the interval between that wave and the next, she said, ‘What was it?’

  ‘They sent one of us, another Akinya, on that other ship. Her name is Goma, and I don’t even know who she is.’

  ‘Do you think she means well?’

  ‘I think we all mean well.’

  ‘Not my question.’

  ‘It’s the best answer I have. We do mean well – all of us, not just Akinyas. But doing well is the hardest thing of all. Our minds aren’t up to it. The machine’s too big. We can’t see how any one of us fits into it, how any given action shapes the final outcome.’

  Nissa turned from the ocean. At last he sensed the promise of forgiveness, or at least a willingness not to withhold it for eternity. He would take that.

  ‘Then we have to get better,’ she said.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Much, much better.’ She rose and faced him, taking his head in both her hands, fingers like a vice. ‘I almost dare not ask. One of you decided not to go through with it. Who should I thank?’

  There were still a number of short-range service taxis aboard Zanzibar – Kanu and Nissa had noticed them on their first arrival – some of which had been adapted for the use and transportation of Tantors. Over a course of days, a small expeditionary force boarded Icebreaker, together with all the supplies and equipment Dakota deemed necessary. The shuttle Noah had been mated via a docking connection that allowed humans and Risen to pass from one ship to the other.

  There were three Risen, including Dakota. The others were a pair of males, both adults, but younger and smaller than their matriarch. Their names were Hector and Lucas, and from the similarity in their manners and build, Kanu was quick to decide they were siblings, or perhaps cousins. He had expected these newcomers to flounder in the unfamiliar weightless environment of the ship, but nothing could have been further from the truth. The Risen all had elephant-shaped spacesuits, enabling them to move from ship to ship even without the use of connecting airlocks, and their trunks proved surprisingly handy during weightless operations, serving as both anchor and counterbalance. No: this was a well-trained crew, unfazed by the challenges that lay ahead.
>
  Clearly they were among the elite of the Risen, perhaps the matriarch’s direct offspring. Their dedication to her appeared total, and utterly without question.

  ‘I thought Memphis would be coming with us,’ Kanu said.

  ‘Memphis would not cope well with the rigours of spaceflight,’ Dakota explained. ‘It does not come naturally to us. These younger Risen have prevailed over their instinctive fears with exhaustive training and dedication to the cause. They have learned to use spacesuits and manage weightless operations inside Zanzibar’s central core. They understand physics and the rudiments of astrogation. But Memphis is older, and consequently his ways are less easily altered. Besides, he is my most loyal and dependable ally. Were I required to entrust the safety and security of Zanzibar to anyone other than myself, it would be to wise and slow Memphis.’

  ‘And you, Dakota – are you prepared for the rigors ahead?’

  ‘I have faced the Terror already, Kanu. Faced it with it my deepest, boldest threat rumble. It is nothing to me, and neither is the idea of leaving Zanzibar.’

  ‘And when we reach Poseidon – your nerve will hold?’

  ‘When the chasing moons single us out, there will be fear. Anything less would be unnatural. But we will stand our ground. Why? Do you lack confidence in yourself?’

  ‘I’d feel more confident if I had a choice in the matter.’

  ‘Ah, but you do have a choice. You’ll always have that. There will never be a time when we are beyond reach of Zanzibar, and there will never be a time when I cannot dictate my commands to Memphis. Consequently the choice will be simple enough: cooperate, or think of the harm you are doing to the Friends.’

  ‘That’s no choice at all.’

  ‘Perhaps not. The truth is, I would much rather we see each other as friends engaged in a mutual adventure. But at the back of your mind, remember that you have a powerful disincentive to turn against me.’

  Kanu and Nissa boarded before the last of the Risen. Within the ship, they had all the liberty they desired – no part of the ship was barred to them, not even those spaces into which only a human could squeeze. The centrifuge sections had been spun back up to normal gravity and they had ample privacy – their old sleeping quarters were untouched despite the modifications. They could also access all the normal shipboard functions, from communications to navigation.