Absorption: Ragnarok v. 1 (Ragnarock 1)

by John Meaney

  He had ways of establishing enciphered comms in emergency, using codes that not even Luculenti could break - or so Dad claimed. But although the signals might not be decipherable, they were detectable, and such high-encryption traffic was suspicious in itself.

  Starting here on campus, he could possibly make the journey home undetected, using every trick he knew; but it would take many hours. Or he could simply call an aircab and fly home to see his parents: overt, perhaps a little unexpected, but surely nothing to raise suspicion in any watching peacekeepers.

  So he washed with smartgel, and pulled on his clothing, refactoring it to jumpsuit shape, tuning it to dark blue. He could have done with breakfast, but he no longer thought he had time to waste. He used the fast route to exit his room - using the window as an extending quickglass slide that carried him to the house forecourt.

  Walking clear, he summoned an aircab, and within a minute one was descending. Its interior was dark as the classic gull-wing door lifted. He slipped inside, the door came down, and as the aircab ascended he realized he had company.

  The interior brightened to reveal a blond-haired man with bronze forehead studs smiling at him.

  ‘Who the hell are you?’

  ‘You don’t know me?’

  ‘No . . .’ Roger blinked, then reached out. ‘But I know what you are.’

  His fingertips disappeared inside the man’s arm.

  ‘Well, part of it, at least.’

  The holo changed.

  ‘You.’

  ‘Yes.’ Now the virtual man next to Roger was familiar: pale oriental features, subtle bronze wires like highlights in his hair. ‘You’re not under arrest.’

  ‘Superintendent Sunadomari.’

  ‘You remember. Good. Would you like to know why you’re not under arrest?’

  There was no reason for an ordinary aircab to have ultra-res lasing capability, to project holos inside its cabin that were so realistic you needed senses other than sight to tell the difference.

  ‘Is this a peacekeeper vehicle?’

  ‘You’re fast, Roger Blackstone. That’s good.’

  Mild acceleration pressed Roger back in his seat.

  ‘Where are we going?’

  ‘To your parents’ house. That’s where you want to go, isn’t it?’

  ‘I—’

  He stopped. Sleep deprivation had fallen away, as the hormones of fear washed through his body: the ultimate stimulant.

  ‘You didn’t recognize this person.’ For a moment, the holo Sunadomari became the holo blond Luculentus; then it snapped back to Sunadomari’s actual appearance. ‘Did you, Mr Blackstone?’

  ‘No, Superintendent.’

  ‘That’s why you’re not under arrest, despite what you are.’

  Roger tried to swallow, but it felt as if murderous thumbs had fastened on his throat.

  ‘Not only that,’ Sunadomari went on, ‘but you passed as ordinary human at Barleysugar Spiral, where we had new scanners in place. And I see you were well aware of that.’

  All of this could be bluff, and a Luculentus peacekeeper would have enormous acuity and psych training; but the aircab was no civilian vehicle, and it could be filled with biotelemetry, scanning Roger’s entire neurophysiology, with realtime results and analyses in Sunadomari’s full awareness.

  It was as close to mind-reading as you got in reality.

  Dad, I’m sorry.

  He got ready to transmit one last tu-ring signal, the bug-out burst that would tell his parents to flee now.

  ‘Don’t bother,’ said Sunadomari. ‘We’re shielded in here.’

  Defeat.

  Half a kilometre from the house, at altitude, a peacekeeper flyer took up position alongside the aircab; and the holo Sunadomari disappeared. Roger said nothing as both vehicles descended and touched down.

  Dad was waiting in the open doorway.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ said Roger.

  ‘Everything’s fine.’ Dad’s smile was gentle. ‘So, Superintendent. Nice to see you again.’

  Sunadomari was beside Roger.

  ‘Shall we go inside?’

  ‘You trust me that much?’ said Dad.

  With an upward glance, then a nod towards the landed flyer, Sunadomari said: ‘I’ll be expected to reappear intact.’

  ‘No doubt.’

  Indoors, they sat in the lounge with Mum, and a goblet of citrola daistral rose from the arm of each chair. Sunadomari hesitated over his for a moment - there was a flicker of light, perhaps some form of spectroscopic analysis - and then he sipped.

  ‘Very nice. It’s good to have a civilized confrontation, don’t you think?’

  ‘Is that what we’re doing?’ asked Dad.

  ‘It could be. Thank you for allowing my signal to continue getting through.’

  ‘You’re welcome.’ Dad glanced at Mum, then Roger. ‘Deadman transmission. If we block it, the interruption is the danger signal.’

  It showed Dad’s awareness of a threat; but it was also a reminder of the power he held in this place, in a house whose full capabilities remained unknown even to Roger. This was not a stalemate - Sunadomari had the full peacekeeper force behind him - but neither were the Blackstones helpless.

  ‘You’ve never visited the Pilots Sanctuary in the city,’ said Sunadomari. ‘An ordinary man in your position, with the amount of offworld commerce you facilitate, might have been curious enough to attempt a meeting there.’

  ‘So you’ve trawled through years of surveillance logs.’ Dad crossed his legs, looking even calmer. ‘But that’s not the evidence that swung it for you.’

  Roger wanted to speak up about Barleysugar Spiral and getting past the scanners, but he had done enough damage. He was out of his depth.

  Then Dad did something surprising.

  ‘Carl—’ Mum started from her seat, then sat back.

  With two quick dabs, Dad had removed his smartlenses. He gazed at Sunadomari with eyes of shining jet, pure polished black, and smiled.

  Sunadomari smiled back.

  ‘Pleased to meet you, Pilot Blackstone. If that’s your real name.’

  ‘It is.’

  ‘Good. So, Pilot. Have you ever had dealings with—’

  ‘Call me Carl.’

  Sunadomari paused, then: ‘Call me Keinosuke.’

  It gave up a psychological advantage; but it was a sign of his confidence. Roger looked from Sunadomari to Dad and back.

  ‘Tell me,’ Sunadomari went on, ‘about Luculenta Rafaella, previously Rashella, Stargonier.’

  ‘I’d have to search in Skein,’ said Dad. ‘I’ve had no dealings with her, not directly.’

  ‘May I access your house system to display an image?’

  ‘Go ahead.’

  Standing beside Sunadomari’s chair was the image of a blond Luculentus, the same man he had manifested in the aircab.

  ‘This was Luculentus Daniel Deighton,’ said Sunadomari. ‘And he was a friend.’

  All three Blackstones looked at each other, understanding the implications: the man was dead, and probably not of natural causes.

  ‘Who do you think killed him?’ asked Dad.

  Talk about getting to the heart of the matter. Roger focused on Sunadomari, wondering what he was going to say or do next.

  Sunadomari looked straight at him.

  ‘What did you notice about Rafaella Stargonier’s behaviour?’

  ‘I—’ How could just speaking be so hard? ‘She did something to a Luculentus in Parallaville. He rocked back, and . . . and afterwards, when I talked to him, he had no memory of her.’

  Dad’s eyebrow was raised.

  ‘Sorry,’ Roger added. ‘It’s part of why I was coming here.’

  ‘Tell me’ - Sunadomari’s voice became a shade deeper - ‘about Drs Helsen and Ranulph.’

  ‘Sir? Um . . . Helsen is my tutor. I don’t know the other person.’

  Sunadomari gestured, and a small holo appeared on his palm, an image of a stocky man.

&n
bsp; ‘Oh,’ said Roger. ‘He’s a friend of Helsen’s. I’ve seen him at a distance.’

  He looked at Dad.

  Should I tell all the rest?

  After a moment, Dad gave a half smile.

  ‘I suggest you come clean, son.’

  ‘There’s—’ Roger rubbed his face. It felt as if he had a dirty secret habit about to be made public. ‘In the past, I . . . Look, I thought I was stressed out. I get weird dreams and . . .’

  Mum spoke for the first time since Sunadomari sat down.

  ‘Let’s stop here. This is my son, Superintendent.’

  ‘No, Mum, it’s all right. I thought I was hallucinating, that Helsen is a’ - he shrugged - ‘a creature of darkness. But that’s not really what I mean.’

  ‘Tell us,’ said Sunadomari.

  ‘Sometimes she’s surrounded by - things. Twists of darkness. Black fragments of, of - nothing. And they twist in odd ways, I mean geometrically odd ways.’

  Now Sunadomari was blinking. So it was possible to surprise a Luculentus. The superintendent stared at Dad, eyes widening, then returned his attention to Roger.

  ‘You thought these were visual hallucinations, is that it?’

  Roger wanted to sob with the relief of confession.

  ‘Yes. No one else sees them. No one.’

  Except in my dreams.

  He pushed that aside.

  ‘And Greg Ranulph, Helsen’s friend. Does this darkness surround him too?’

  Roger nodded.

  ‘I’m curious about something,’ Sunadomari continued. ‘Why were you following Rafaella Stargonier?’

  ‘I . . . she was suspicious. I mean, I was suspicious of her.’

  ‘But why did you even see her?’

  ‘She was meeting with Alisha, my friend . . . Oh, shit.’

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘It was Dr Helsen that put Alisha in touch with the Luculenta, er, with Rafaella Stargonier.’

  The atmosphere was already charged; now it stepped up a notch.

  ‘Why would she do that?’

  ‘To get her to talk about Calabi-Yau, about realspace hyperdimensions. That’s why I took Alisha to the Zajinet place, the research institute.’

  He bit his lip, and looked at Dad.

  ‘All right, son.’

  But Sunadomari was looking pale, his eyelids flickering as he immersed himself in Skein.

  ‘There’s no reply from the institute,’ he said. ‘Did you talk to Luculenta Weissmann?’

  ‘Luculenta? But she had no—’ Roger thought about her intellectual sharpness, the sense of charisma despite her lack of forehead studs or scalp wires. ‘I should have realized.’

  ‘So you did speak to her?’

  ‘Yes. But if she’s not answering—’

  ‘She should always answer. One moment.’ Sunadomari sank deep inside himself, then came back out of it and looked around the room. ‘I’m despatching full forces, but I expect the worst. And that is the quid, Carl, in a quid pro quo.’

  Dad inclined his head.

  ‘We had our suspicions about the institute, Superintendent. You had the Zajinet prisoner, I take it? The one whose ship crashed nearly twenty years ago?’

  ‘Yes. Clearly you’ll not speak about this outside this room.’

  ‘Not in this universe, at least.’

  ‘Touché. So tell me about the darkness.’

  Dad twitched.

  ‘I don’t—’

  Mum reached over and held the back of his hand, which was tightening on the arm of his chair.

  ‘Carl, relax. Whatever it is . . .’ She looked at Sunadomari. ‘What have you done to him?’

  ‘Not me. Carl, breathe. Just breathe.’

  Roger was scared.

  ‘Dad?’

  ‘Breathe, Carl,’ said Sunadomari.

  After thirty long seconds, Dad’s chest stopped heaving, and his respiration returned to normal. He wiped sweat from his face.

  ‘I have no idea what happened,’ he said.

  Sunadomari regarded him for a moment.

  ‘Would you like me to tell you? Perhaps it will be a lesson in whom to trust.’

  ‘I . . . I don’t know.’

  ‘Think about it. Now, Roger, it’s clear that Alisha’s father enabled you to pass through the scanners in Barleysugar Spiral. He was the only one with relevant access.’

  Roger tried to show nothing.

  ‘What’s this about a dead person?’ Mum, still looking concerned over Dad, spoke up. ‘Is there a connection, Superintendent, between Xavier Spalding and your murdered friend?’

  But Dad was breathing easily now.

  ‘Was your friend,’ he asked, ‘one of the eight Luculenti who died at the same time?’

  ‘You know of that? Impressive, Carl.’ Sunadomari blinked. ‘In fact no, Daniel died earlier, but it’s likely the same killer or killers did it. Do you have any suspects?’

  ‘Sorry. My monitoring picked up the news of their deaths, nothing more. Except for a hint they might have been killed through Skein. Is that what happened?’

  Dad was treating Sunadomari as an ally. Roger hoped it turned out to be true.

  ‘Almost certainly.’

  ‘So this Rafaella Stargonier must now be your prime suspect.’

  ‘Perhaps.’

  ‘Roger said she manipulated a Luculentus, causing . . . amnesia.’

  ‘That’s right.’ Sunadomari looked at Roger. ‘It’s Dr Helsen’s role I find interesting.’

  The paleness was returning to Dad’s face.

  ‘In the light of what we’ve shared,’ Sunadomari went on, ‘is there any data you can give me, of any kind? Additional speculations?’

  ‘No,’ said Dad. ‘None I can think of.’

  ‘I believe you.’

  ‘So—’

  ‘So I suggest the three of you leave however you can, as fast as possible. I take it there are faster ways offplanet than through Barleysugar Spiral?’

  ‘In emergency, yes.’

  Roger felt as if the room had tipped sideways. They were fleeing to mu-space? After all his indecision about where he belonged, there was suddenly no choice?

  Sunadomari was shaking his head.

  ‘What is it?’ asked Dad.

  ‘The institute. My people had to break in.’ Sunadomari looked at the floor, then at the Blackstones. ‘Stella Weissmann is dead, killed in the same way as the other Luculenti. And the basement level is destroyed. A tac team has secured the place.’

  ‘You mean the cell where you kept the Zajinet prisoner?’

  ‘Difficult circumstances make for difficult—Never mind. Whether we tortured the Zajinet or not, someone certainly did. There’s nothing left of it.’

  ‘Why were you interrogating the prisoner, Superintendent? There are other ways to learn about mu-space.’

  ‘We were more interested in realspace’ - with a glance at Roger - ‘and teleportation through the hyperdimensions. Can’t you imagine how useful that would—?’

  Sunadomari stopped, held up a hand, then lowered his chin to his chest and closed his eyes. Five seconds later - surely an age for a Luculentus in the full flow of Skein - he looked up, eyes widening.

  ‘Thank you for your assistance.’

  He stood up.

  What the hell?

  ‘You’ve been very helpful, and I keep my promises, both implied and explicit. You’re free to go.’

  Dad also stood.

  ‘Thank you, Superintendent.’ He held out a formal fist. ‘We’ll be gone within ten minutes.’

  Sunadomari touched his fist to Dad’s.

  ‘Then I’ll share the information I offered,’ he said, ‘because it might inform your decision of where to fly to.’

  Surely there was no decision. Or perhaps Sunadomari did not know of Labyrinth - it wasn’t something Pilots talked about.

  ‘What information?’