by Neal Asher
The pods began reporting other such habitations on the world and she ordered them to be taken out. More missiles streaked down towards the surface, and particle beams scoured the beginnings of prador aquaculture. But surely this was not all . . .
The U-signature occurred a second later, dropping a prador dreadnought into the real above the world. She hit it at once, realizing how stupid she had been to come here so unprepared. Certainly her choice had been driven by Dragon’s taunt, “you do not have the knowledge you had and never will.” But had she expected this place to be abandoned? Had she expected the prador to leave it as some graveyard monument to their victory?
The dreadnought was of a style she did not recognize. It was shaped like a fat teardrop with big ringed drive section about its narrow end and a large under-slung nacelle shaped like a wedge. However, the ports in its surface were instantly recognizable as they smoked, flashed and emitted streams of railgun missiles or bright blue particle beams.
Three attack pods detonated, a fourth bent in half and fell spiralling towards the world. Particle beams struck the weapons platform too, carving into its already damaged structure for a full three seconds before automatics managed to get hardfields online. Her own missiles struck the dreadnought’s hardfields and it disappeared behind multiple explosions, then emerged spewing burning projectors. She now hit it with everything available, continuously, and it was unable to return fire. Still shedding projectors, the vessel accelerated hard, diving for a close swing around the world. But the sheer firepower of the weapons system the Client controlled, even damaged as it was, began to tell. Missiles got through, striking the ship’s hull and slamming it closer to the world, its shape distorting and spewing fire. The dreadnought finally broke and began a long fall. But at the last moment, the wedge nacelle detached from it and ignited a powerful fusion drive. She fired on it, hitting a hard-field and seeing explosions within, then it managed to jump, a photon stream behind it as it dropped out of the real.
The Client watched the falling dreadnought, but only briefly. She could not stay here. Her reason for coming, to find the moon, was gone. The ship that had escaped had likely destroyed itself by U-jumping so close to the gravity well of the world and under such heavy fire, but there was no guarantee of that. It also seemed likely that the prador here had been screaming for help the moment Weapons Platform Mu and its subsidiary system arrived. It wasn’t as if it was invisible. She now set every available drive to take the platform and its attack pods towards the sun, while concentrating all other resources on the most essential tasks. She needed to get her various U-space drives working as soon as possible, or she would be joining her kin in this graveyard of the Species.
EARTH CENTRAL
There were, in total, eighty-seven ongoing police actions in Polity border space, or beyond it, that involved black-ops attack ships. Why then did Earth Central find this one so . . . interesting? The answer was plain: many of those other attack ships were out of communication due to the nature of both their missions and their character. Such ships communicated as briefly and concisely as possible. However, judging by the last telemetry from Obsidian Blade, it wasn’t talking because it was incapable of doing so. EC had lost such ships before. The Blade’s circumstances seized EC’s attention because its mission involved Jain tech. And, it was now apparent, a rogue swarm AI called the Clade.
EC gave a mental sigh.
Rogue AIs were bad enough. Swarm AIs seemed particularly prone to falling out of the giggle tree and hitting every branch on the way down. And AIs manufactured during the war in War Factory Room 101 who went rogue were often the worst of all. So now it seemed that the Clade—an AI swarm of killing machines made in Room 101—had allied itself with a legate who was running around in a wormship, both of which were creatures or mechanisms based on Jain technology. Beside that, it seemed they were looking for Jain tech artefacts which, judging by the data EC had on them, might include something particularly lethal. This was the reason for the “exterminate with extreme prejudice” order it had sent to Blade. And now it seemed this legate was getting close to what he wanted.
However, was there more here? Was it a coincidence that things were being stirred up at the accretion disc—the site of the largest mass of active Jain tech in existence—at about the same time as a legate was searching for such artefacts? Coincidences were less common than some humans supposed, especially to EC with its vast overview of thousands of worlds and trillions of Polity citizens, both human and AI. But it could not risk seeing this as only that. Connections must be explored, scenarios extrapolated and actions taken.
“Can you speak?”
Earth Central stood upon a white plain below a white sky, its form that of a huge, fully limbed and heavily armed prador father-captain. He had chosen his physical form and colouring carefully—they matched that of the usurped and now long-dead king of the prador who had gone to war against the Polity. Clacking his mandibles at the bland appearance of the virtuality, he made some alterations. Dry sea grasses and papery carapaces now crunched under his many arthropod feet, a sea lapped across nearby mud flats where things like giant mudskippers croaked and romped, while the sky took on the red and green hues of heliotrope.
“I can speak,” replied something snappishly. “Though your choice of form sets the tone of the conversation.”
A shadow fell across EC and a large complex arthropod foot crunched down, sinking into the soft loam the sea grass grew upon. EC waved a claw then squatted, bringing his belly plates and manipulatory limbs down onto the sea grass. He tilted back his eye stalks, looked up at the nightmare king of the prador, and wondered if the image the king had projected into this virtuality was a true one. Subterfuge was a game they often played here.
“A legate seeks Jain-tech artefacts on the world of the Cyberat,” EC stated.
“As do I and as do you,” replied the king.
“I seek to put them out of the way of those who would use them to do harm.”
“As do I.”
They gazed at each other, neither giving an inch.
“My approach there was a soft one,” said EC. “I have agents on the ground surveying the situation, and another agent has arrived.”
“Captain Cogulus Hoop,” stated the king.
EC’s father-captain showed little response to that, while it wondered frantically how the king of the prador knew about him. He continued, “However, it would seem that your diplomatic approach involves two of your destroyers.”
“There are two rebel destroyers there.”
EC waved a dismissive claw. “Whatever. Any data on this legate and his wormship would be most useful to both of us. If the wormship went away that would be even more useful.”
“Your agents could acquire no less data than my own, had I any there,” said the king. “Two destroyers would not survive against one of those wormships.”
“If destroyers are all they are.”
“Yes, if that is all they are.”
“You do not trust me,” said EC, mandibles apparently grinding out disappointment.
“Talk to me about the accretion disc,” said the king.
Ah . . .
“A weapons platform went missing,” said EC. “As far as I gather, this is due to a disagreement on resource allocation between Dragon and Orlandine.”
“Her plan to use a black hole to hoover up the disc . . .”
“Quite. Dragon never liked the idea.”
“Because the straightest course is the one that leads into the trap.”
EC, now fully engaged, processed that. Jain nodes were a trap. The Jain tech in the disc was still active. What might be the trap? Then another thought occurred. Orlandine was difficult. She was a haiman incorporating Jain technology. Dragon was more than difficult, in fact positively incomprehensible. The king was being rather reserved . . . Could he be working with Dragon to prevent Orlandine carrying out her plan? Or could he be working with Orlandine?
EC waggled
his eye stalks in irritation. One of the problems with having access to so much data and the ability to process it all was that it opened up so many possibilities. It was also a swift route to paranoia.
“The wormship,” EC stated.
“There is an agreement with the Cyberat ruler Zackander,” said the king. “If it becomes a threat to his world the two rebel ships may act, or they may not.”
“Would they survive an attack?”
“Data would be gathered.”
“But would I get to see it?”
“Who knows?”
“Then might I suggest you liaise with someone who you trust more?” “I am listening.”
Before he spoke, the ruler of the Polity understood that he was now forcing a connection between events and actors. Maybe it wasn’t there before but, if it was, this could be revealing. Or not.
“Very well,” EC began, “we both know an expert on all things Jain . . .”
ANGEL
The egg, its surface as iridescent as paua shell, rolled through vacuum under the initial impetus given by the shuttle. It then seemed to fade from existence as its chameleonware hid it from all scans. Since it wasn’t using a drive, no energy anomalies were detectable either. Rolling slowly, it fell towards the planet, entering atmosphere long after the shuttle had landed and its passenger had departed. Now, closer to the planet, it initiated a heavily shielded grav-motor to slow it. The risk of this being detected was much lower than that of the heat it would generate travelling so fast through atmosphere.
When its speed was down to just a few hundred miles an hour, the grav-motor, rather than slowing the egg, switched over to reducing its weight. It sank slowly through atmosphere, then got picked up by a steady jet stream that propelled it towards the grey anvil of a large storm cloud. Here, where lightning crackled through the atmosphere surrounding it and hail hissed against its surface, its occupant calculated that the grav-motor was even less likely to be detected. Its weight increased and the egg plummeted for a while, until a strong storm-wind propelled it in a different direction. It bobbed towards a blue and umber mountain range, then fell perfectly into a long winding canyon of whorled beige stone, punctuated with the ragged blue-green spikes of trees. Here it deployed a very different kind of drive that pushed against the surrounding universe. The egg sped along the canyon, just below the speed of sound here, finally exiting over a long spill of scree. It dropped, bounced twice, and landed in a rough river with a splash that disappeared like mist under a chameleonware effect. The river carried the egg for twenty miles, its grav and other drive keeping it centred and away from any rocks. When it reached a deeper section of water, it submersed and continued its journey for another fifteen miles. Finally, where the river wound through stands of blue reed trees, it floated to the surface and propelled itself to a muddy shore. Insect creatures, like millipedes but with numerous wings instead of legs, were flying all around.
Distortion like heat haze shimmered over the mud. A hole seemed to open in mid-air exposing a glittery interior packed with either mechanisms or something living. A long-fingered hand reached out and gripped the edge. Angel hauled himself out of the egg and dropped to the mud, sinking to his knees. He waded through this quickly, as if it was no more than air, and stepped up onto dry ground. One of the flying millipedes squirmed through the air towards his head, and he caught it in one hand, inspecting it closely. The thing continued to wriggle, triple pincers snapping and trying to reach for his face.
As if this got through to it, the Wheel turned in his mind, but then became quiescent again. Angel closed his hand with a snap and two writhing halves fell to the ground. Was that its influence on him again? Or just his own destructiveness, perhaps? Either way, one thing was now certain. The Wheel’s control over him was strongest when he was in his wormship, and it got weaker the further he went from the ship. The one time its contact with him had completely broken was when the ship itself had been badly damaged. It seemed the Wheel, whatever it was, was either in his ship’s system or using it as a relay to get to him.
He watched the two halves of the creature. They shuddered and grew still, then, in a series of clicks, fell into individual segments. After a moment, these began to take off and fly away. When the last had departed, all that remained on the ground were two crushed segments and three discarded pincers. He stepped over these and moved on, his internal and external sensors on full alert. He still couldn’t judge which of his actions were influenced by the Wheel. Certainly it had grown dull and powerless since he left the wormship, and now he just wanted to get this mission done and be rid of it.
Further flying millipedes came to take a snip out of him but he ignored them. Failing to make any impression on his metal skin, they soon flew away. He was more interested in anything else that might be hidden in the trees. After a moment, he detected something far ahead, and he faded to invisibility.
The autonomous detector had found a new position in one of the reed trees. It clung to a stem, sharp legs driven in, and a hole opened in its bulbous body to expose intricate scanning gear. For a second Angel wondered if Zackander had seen his arrival, and positioned the scanner here. But, striding forwards and widening his scan, he detected these devices in every direction for miles. They were just a demonstration of man’s paranoia or, rather, his understandable caution. But he had not been cautious enough. Since Ruth’s and his own communication with the old Cyberat, Angel now knew the precise location of his home.
Angel walked right up to the thing, probing inside with sensors and virtual warfare induction, soon mirroring its total function in his mind. The device could not see him standing right in front of it, and it was puzzling over anomalous fluctuations in air density, as well as in the local gravity field. Using induction warfare, Angel erased its concerns. He was tempted to spread something to other detectors like this to cancel out the possibility of being discovered, but decided that sudden faults out here might alert Zackander. Angel stepped round the detector and moved on.
The reed trees grew smaller and smaller; at the perimeter of the stand they even began to look like something to be found on Earth. The land beyond looked surprisingly Earthlike too, like a grassy plain. Angel tilted his head and inspected the greenery, but found bubble-grass instead. This was definitely an import and had doubtless been planted by Zackander himself. Bubblegrass was impossible to walk across without leaving a trail due to the photosynthesizing nodules which burst under the slightest pressure. Footing would also be dangerous, for the liquid that issued from the nodules was incredibly oily and slippery. In fact, where this grass grew naturally, its oily product was sold to companies that made frictionless coatings for vehicles and windows.
Angel inspected the area ahead carefully, scanning deep into the ground to find vibration detectors, a series of antipersonnel mines and shearfield generators—presently inactive. He stretched, and his feet sprouted numerous spicules, projecting a shimmershield downwards. This puddled below his feet as he stepped onto the grass and, like a man walking slide-steps on ice, he moved across it. Then, three hundred feet out, he came to a sliding, surf-board halt. Something was coming directly towards him.
The robot bore the appearance of a harvestman spider, but with a body three feet across. What had it detected? Angel scanned it, trying to key into its simple mind, but found it surprisingly difficult to penetrate. He decided to take a risk and went into a skating run, rapidly moving out of the thing’s path before coming to a sliding halt again.
The robot seemed to hesitate for a moment then changed direction, heading towards a point just ten feet behind him. He tried again to penetrate its mind, upping the intensity of the induction warfare technique he was using, and thereby increasing its chance of detection. Still nothing. He could not find the mind. He moved on cautiously, watching the robot, then detected another one ahead, also approaching. He eyed them both for a moment, then widened his scanning to find more of the same scattered across the bubblegrass for miles. It was
all just random—
“I know you’re here,” said a voice, issuing from the robot which had halted behind him.
Angel reacted without further thought, turned and raised his hand, palm facing the robot. A hole opened in its centre and spat out a crumb of intricate technology, which struck the robot’s casing. Immediately eating carbon fibre, this grew explosively, wrapping the robot in black filaments which found the smallest gaps to gain access inside. It penetrated the inner workings of the device, taking them apart and eating them as it decoded them. The robot’s main body shrank like an apple under accelerated decay, blackening and shooting out sparks. Even as it collapsed, and Angel absorbed all its data, the other robot ahead moved away, pausing only to issue the same words: “I know you’re here.”
Angel felt an almost uncontrollable surge of anger, and the Wheel seemed to make another attempt to spin and engage with him. Did it cause his anger or did his anger rouse it? He shook his head—this was a new anger that he knew was his own. He had been fooled by the simplest of ruses. The robots moved randomly over this grassland, occasionally stopping to issue those words just as randomly. None of them possessed any mind to penetrate; what controlled them were instructions on a magnetized disc. He had looked for complexity and been fooled by simplicity. Below him the shimmershield went out and he dropped heavily, oily fluid splashing up his legs. Holding up both his hands, palms open, he emitted the bright stabs of particle beams. The body of a robot ahead disappeared in a flash, its legs cartwheeling away through the air. What sounded like a storm rumbled about the landscape, with the flashes of a land battle, and within thirty seconds two hundred robot spiders were glowing scrap. As Angel now broke into a run, his anger cooling, he recognized that Zackander might have been tardy about investigating why one of his robots had gone offline, but the destruction of so many would have certainly alerted him.