Open Artemis, I thought.
The scroll vanished, replaced by a holoscript of my arrest on Delos. Pah. This was the last thing I wanted. Close, I thought.
Closed, EM16 answered.
I continued going over the files. Nothing looked unusual. Finally I thought, Close Delos.
Clos—
No! Wait. Why put a file about my arrest here? Yes, sure, if a highly placed Imperial officer alienated the Delos government, it could damage our already shaky relationship with them. But the behavior—or misbehavior—of military officers was Kurj’s concern, and he was unremittingly literal with his organization. He would put the file on my arrest in the same place where he put all his other files about arrests of highly placed officers who could damage negotiations with the Allieds.
My aunt must have made this copy. I could see why she might want a notation of the incident here. But the complete record? Whatever for?
Open Artemis, I thought.
The holoscript activated, recreating the police station on Delos so vividly that I felt as if I were there. Again. I went through the entire mortifying file. It contained every last detail, even the fact that Blackstar, the computer on my ship, had intercepted a satellite transmission about my arrest that the Delos police sent to ISC. The file was exactly what it claimed; a report of my unplanned visit with the Allied police.
Something kept tugging my mind. A small point…Taas? Yes, I remembered. When Blackstar dumped that satellite transmission into my mindscape, it had spilled into the node on Taas’s ship. He tried to stop the spillover, but—what? He used the wrong commands. That was it. He used every one he could think of and none worked. My spinal node still had the list he had tried: stop, cancel, break, quit, exit, bye, system, chop, stomp, flush, dump, and curse. I told him—what? To use erase. Yes, erase had done the trick.
Huh. This file should include the spillover. But it wasn’t here. I went over the record detail by detail, but found no mention of it. I had come looking for data and instead discovered its lack. It couldn’t have disappeared by accident; all the fighters in my squad had recorded it, and I found it hard to believe the same omission would occur in all four reports. I couldn’t imagine Kurj deleting it. In his view of the universe, such an omission would be sloppiness, which he avoided to the point of obsession.
It had to be my aunt. Why would she remove such trivial data? She was too smart to do it by accident. She was too damned smart, period. Trying to follow her mental processes often left me feeling as if my brain worked with the speed of a slug.
I closed the Artemis file and searched the other Delos records, looking for anything related to Taas. Nothing even marginally promising came up. I was running out of time, and I knew nothing more than when I had started. Taas. Artemis. Delos. Satellite. Spillover. What?
The psicon. After Taas used the erase command, he sent me an image of his erase psicon, a scantily dressed woman with a big bosom whose scraps of clothing disappeared as she painted them. She disappeared whenever she appeared. Of course! What better way to hide data than to make it self-vanishing, so that the act of calling it up erased it. It was exactly the kind of solution that would appeal to my aunt.
Now I knew where she had hidden Jaibriol’s files. It wasn’t in EM16. She had left Kurj a pointer here as a precaution, in case he came looking for the files. It was an effective method; only someone who knew those facts were missing would realize the pointer existed. The information, however, existed in another place: it was on the key to the cyberlock in her brain.
Anyone could have a cyberlock implanted. They didn’t need to be a psion. That was why we called it cyber instead of psiber. Every member of my family who had a biomech web also had a cyberlock. The Assembly insisted on it. That was why I had recognized the rainbows around Jaibriol’s mansion on Delos, the almost invisible veil of colors that warned of an active cyberlock.
None of us liked them. The field disrupted brain function and could cause damage if used too often. To operate mine, I needed my psiberchip, a card with neural tracings created from my brain cells. For most people, such a chip was useless. Only psions could activate them. If I linked to the card through psiberspace, it became a functioning part of my brain. If another psion tried to link to it, the chip would know it wasn’t me the same way I would know if an intruder began thinking in my mind.
We kept the keys to our cyberlocks on psiberchips because implanting the keys in our brains was too risky. A head injury could damage it. Separating the key and the lock made it easier to steal the key, but using psiberchips solved that problem. A chip that recognized its owner’s brain could be set to erase if a foreign mind accessed it. What better place for my aunt to hide the data about Jaibriol than on her psiberchips? If someone tried to access the data, the chip would erase. It was an ingenious warning system, too, because if her chips erased it would trigger an alarm in her spinal node.
Unfortunately, it also meant I couldn’t access the data. But then, neither could Kurj. Why leave him a pointer to a place he couldn’t go?
Wait. Maybe the information wasn’t on her chips. Maybe she put it on his. But how? They were also protected. They would erase if she fiddled with them.
The Kyle-Mesh. Of course. Boosted by the Triad psilink, she and Kurj could meld their minds even more closely than Jaibriol and I had done on Delos. With their minds blended into one, she could access his chips. I doubted he could do the reverse; it required too much delicacy. Only my aunt had the necessary knowledge, finesse, power, and mesh privileges. Knowing her, she could probably manage it without Kurj even noticing. However, that still did me no good. I couldn’t join the Triad link. The flux of power it generated increased exponentially with each Rhon telepath. Two minds posed no danger. Three worked only if the minds weren’t too much alike. A fourth would overload the Mesh in one giant, star-spanning short circuit.
So now what?
A thought came to me. Kurj had access to my psiberchips. He claimed it was for my protection, but I knew better. He wanted control over my cyberlock, another of his precautions to minimize the chance one of his heirs would turn on him. My chips included neural tracings cultured from his brain to ensure my keys wouldn’t erase if he accessed them. Could I link to my chip, merge with that piece of his brain, and fool his chips into thinking I was him? He wouldn’t notice my meddling unless he happened to access the chip at the same time. And right now he was asleep.
I shuddered. The risk of being detected wasn’t what disturbed me most about the idea. What if I couldn’t dissociate from his mind when I finished my work? The prospect of being imprisoned in Kurj’s rigidly controlled paradigm of existence scared the hell out of me.
I closed the Delos files and deleted all record of my visit. After setting the Hub monitors so they wouldn’t record my departure, I withdrew from the Mesh. Then I stood in the dark, waiting for the psiphon cage to release me.
Waiting.
Waiting.
Sweat beaded on my temple. No, I couldn’t show fear. That, more than anything I had done so far, would give me away.
Suddenly the psiphon restraints snapped away from my body. The tube that had surrounded me slid back into the ground, letting cool air waft across my bare skin.
I took a breath. Then I put on my clothes and left.
#
The psiberchip lay in my hand, a square the size of my palm. I sat at the console in my bedroom and stared at the chip. Taking it out of the safe here had been easy, but I couldn’t go any further.
Alive. This card was alive. Nanomeds tended the neural tracings, keeping them ready to link with my brain. I had ten chips, two in a vault in my father’s house, three on Forshires, four at Headquarters, and this one in my apartment.
The console waited. I had only to insert the card. My node calculated a 94 percent probability that I could merge with the microscopic piece of Kurj’s brain on the chip. Whether or not that would let me access his chips was another story, but I wouldn’t find out unti
l I tried. If I tried. If I could force myself to become Kurj.
I stared at the card. One minute passed. Three. Five. The few precious hours I had to work with while Kurj slept were leaking away.
I took a breath. Then I slid the card into the console and logged into my personal account, the one I used for private rather than military matters. I entered the optical network anyone could use, but from there I accessed Kyle space, or psiberspace as many of us called that eerie universe. My mind expanded onto the four nodes that served the relatively small civilian arm of the Dieshan mesh. They worked together, swapping among themselves according to whichever happened to be free when a user entered a command.
I started on Alto. Its subgrid was subdued, a faint gold color. No sign showed of my father. The whole mesh changed when he withdrew, becoming less vibrant. Nor did I pick up the delicate sparkles of my aunt’s presence or the immense flux of Kurj’s power. Right now Alto just felt like Alto, one of four simple voices singing together with no Triad soloists to jazz up the tune.
Greetings, Soz, Alto thought.
Greetings. Connect me with my psiberchip.
Chip accessed.
I felt nothing. No reason I should have, given that it was part of my brain. Locate Imperator Skolia’s neural tracings.
It was Soprano that answered. Located.
Match my brain activity with his. I had no idea if that command would work; no formalized procedures existed for doing this.
Attempting match, Soprano thought.
I waited, watching the mesh flicker. It was lovely, with an eerie beauty that never appeared the same twice. The infinite gold network hung in a shimmering atmosphere, one more liquid than gas, pale and sparkling. It undulated. The sounds of the civilian nodes were gentler than in the Hub, sweet melodies that rippled like ocean swells. Its smells were honey-corn and spice.
Soprano? I thought. Is anything happening?
Tenor answered. Your brain resists.
That was no surprise. I had shared enough thoughts with Kurj to know that our mental processes were basically foreign.
Keep trying, I thought.
I continued to wait. Although the grid exhibited a well ordered pattern of squares, it showed many defects. Those discontinuities came from poorly maintained connections and negligent users. Fluctuations appeared in its environment, concentrations of color and light in asymmetric patches. Civilians were inefficient. Our organization of the military grids was far more ordered.
What is the status of matching procedure? I asked.
Bass answered. Matching complete.
What difference exists between my brain activity and that of Imperator Skolia, as determined by his tracings on my chip?
1.6 percent, Bass answered.
I felt nothing. That I perceived no difference didn’t prove its absence. However, a 1.6 percent discrepancy wasn’t negligible. The possibility still existed that his chip would erase if I tried to access it, leaving irrefutable evidence I had been in violation of security procedures.
I needed to rethink the risks of tampering with Kurj’s strategy for the Qox interrogation. Here on Diesha, Qox was too close to the power centers of the Kyle-Mesh. If he escaped, he could carry out exactly the function he had been bred to execute. He could gain access to the link and overload the Triad. If he managed it without killing himself, he would be perfectly positioned to take over the functions of the three people he had murdered. It would put him in control of the Mesh and ISC.
Bass, stop matching, I thought.
Stopped, Bass thought.
I withdrew from the meshes in proper format, rising through its levels. Then I considered my next move. If I told Kurj what I knew about Jaibriol, I risked execution for the treason I committed by hiding the truth for so long. But Kurj needed the information. Instead, I could interrogate Qox, break his barriers, and inform Kurj that the Highton Heir was Rhon. I would present the information as if I were learning it for the first time. That way, I protected both myself and the Imperialate.
I would have to be careful when I broke Jaibriol’s barriers, though, so I didn’t hurt him.
I rubbed my eyes, drained from my work. And now I was about to make Jaibriol’s suicide attempt into reality.
Suicide. Suicide. Why had I forgotten that? What the blazes was wrong with me, thinking Jaibriol had come here to kill us?
I got up and paced out of the room, trying to clear my head. A moment ago I had been thinking with what I believed was perfect clarity. Yet now I felt as if a stranger had been in my head. My intention was to free Jaibriol, not betray him to Kurj. How could I get the information I needed to locate Jaibriol, if the process of finding it made me betray him?
I picked up a paper and wrote: It’s not your mind. If you listen, you will regret it. Get the data.
#
The maze of halls under the ISC Records complex went on for kilometers. Its stark lines and dim lighting had earned it the name Catacombs. My psiberchips were in a Catacombs vault secured a beta scanner, which analyzed retinal patterns, fingerprints, voice, height, weight, body chemistry, skeletal structure, and brainwaves. It opened only to me or Kurj, who also kept one of his chips there. That vault stood inside a larger vault secured with a beta scanner, inside a room secured with a beta, at the end of a hall secured by a beta. It was the best security the Imperialate had to offer. Breaking in was impossible—unless you happened to be the person it was meant to protect.
Every lock opened for me. Within the innermost vault, I found our chips in a molded box on a shelf. I sat at a console by the wall and clicked my card into the psiberchip slot. This time Bass gave me a 1.2% match to Kurj’s brain. I picked up Kurj’s card—
—and stopped.
I was about to commit an act that could destroy my family and the Imperialate. I was a fool. I had been operating within an emotional mindset that damaged my ability to think clearly.
I looked at the paper in my hand. It’s not your mind.
Incorrect. It was imprecise to state that merging with Kurj’s brain made my mind his. It altered my mental processes, giving me insights I otherwise lacked. My mind remained my own.
If you listen, you will regret it.
No. The only source of regret I would find in these actions were the actions themselves. It was time I stopped this treason.
Get the data.
No data was available to me. My aunt had protected it with her customary brilliance; even if someone came this close, they would go no further because in the process of reaching it they came to understand why it must not be reached.
It’s not your mind.
My mind had been strained. Tager had made this clear in my talks with him.
Seeing Tager had been a weakness.
No!
I clenched the console so tightly my knuckles turned white. The paper crumpled in my hand, its edges sticking out of my fist. Seeing Tager had not been a weakness. My mind was sound. If I had written these words on this paper, they were sound.
I picked up Kurj’s card and placed it in the slot. His chip resisted me, like a human body rejecting a transplanted organ. I tensed, waiting for that sense of deletion that would come when it wiped itself blank.
Instead I felt a curious relaxation. Then I remembered where to find Jaibriol.
#
I entered EM16 as before, cloaking my operations. This time I went straight to the security subgrid. When I toggled visual mode, the net blinked out of existence, replaced by the desert. Parched land surrounded me for thousands of kilometers, red and mottled with upjutting rocks that cut the landscape in angular fingers. Prickly grey stubs of dustbite poked out of the sand. Only far in the north, where the plains rose into a haze of mountains, did the view soften. The sky above me stretched in a blue stone tablet washed clean of clouds.
No one lived here. ISC had other purposes for this desert. We had honeycombed it with installations, including Block Three, a complex hidden under the desert.
Psicon
, I thought.
The desert retreated like a cloth backdrop yanked away by a giant hand, shrinking as it receded, until it was no more than an icon glittering within a square of the Kyle-Mesh. I accessed the file in my node with the data I had stolen from Kurj’s psiberchip. Guards: three units watched Jaibriol’s cell, six guards per unit. Each unit knew the location of one other unit. I reprogrammed EM16 so that on the next shift, units one and three knew about each other and unit two knew about itself. I reassigned unit two to a new area so its original location appeared to be another unit. At the original location, a hole now gaped in the security cage around Jaibriol.
I reprogrammed the Block Three defense systems to ignore certain input at a certain time. I reset the medical monitors that watched Jaibriol’s cell to watch the guard outside the Block Three cafeteria. I switched the monitors to the holography darkroom, and I changed work shifts to clear workers out of certain areas. I reset the robot mice that scurried around, supposedly cleaning the base while they spied on people. Then I set up a program that would, minutes after my changes went into effect, undo every one of them, reset every system to its original state, wipe out the record of my changes, destroy itself, and delete the record of my deletions.
There were going to be a lot of confused people in the morning.
XV
Chains And Silk
I landed the flyer in darkness. No moon shed its softening rays on the desert, only the cold light of the stars, a multitude that glittered above the parched land. I ran across the rocky ground to a point several meters away. Then I touched a button on the leather guard around my wrist.
Primary Inversion Page 27