‘What is it?’
‘Kill me, please. Kill me now.’
ONE
Antoinette Bax watched the police proxy unfold itself from the airlock. The machine was all planar black armour and sharp articulated limbs, like a sculpture made from many pairs of scissors. It was deathly cold, for it had been clamped to the outside of one of the three police cutters which now pinned her ship. A rime of urine-coloured propellant frost boiled off it in pretty little whorls and helices.
‘Please stand back,’ the proxy said. ‘Physical contact is not advised.’
The propellant cloud smelt toxic. She slammed down her visor as the proxy scuttled by.
‘I don’t know what you’re hoping to find,’ she said, following at a discreet distance.
‘I won’t know until I find it,’ the proxy said. It had already identified the frequency for her suit radio.
‘Hey, look. I’m not into smuggling. I like not being dead too much.’
‘That’s what they all say.’
‘Why would anyone smuggle something to Hospice Idlewild? They’re a bunch of ascetic religious nuts, not contraband fiends.’
‘Know a thing or two about contraband, do you?’
‘I never said…’
‘Never mind. The point is, Miss Bax, this is war. I’d say nothing’s ruled out.’
The proxy halted and flexed, large flakes of yellow ice cracking away from its articulation points. The machine’s body was a flanged black egg from which sprouted numerous limbs, manipulators and weapons. There was no room for the pilot in there, just enough space for the machinery needed to keep the proxy in contact with the pilot. The pilot was still inside one of the three cutters, stripped of nonessential organs and jammed into a life-support canister.
‘You can check with the Hospice, if you like,’ she said.
‘I’ve already queried the Hospice. But in matters such as this, one likes to be absolutely certain that things are above board — wouldn’t you agree?’
‘I’ll agree to anything you like if it gets you off my ship.’
‘Mm. And why would you be in such a hurry?’
‘Because I’ve got a slush… sorry, a cryogenic passenger. One I don’t want thawing on me.’
‘I’d like to see this passenger very much. Is that possible?’
‘I’m hardly likely to refuse, am I?’ She had expected as much, and had already donned her vacuum suit while waiting for the proxy to arrive.
‘Good. It won’t take a minute, and then you can be on your way.’ The machine paused a moment before adding, ‘Provided, of course, that there aren’t any irregularities.’
‘It’s this way.’
Antoinette thumbed back a panel next to her, exposing a crawlway that led back to Storm Bird’s main freight bay. She let the proxy take the lead, determined to say little and volunteer even less. Her attitude might have struck some as obstinate, but she would have engendered far more suspicion had she started to be helpful. The Ferrisville Convention’s militia were not well liked, a fact which they had long since factored into their dealings with civilians.
‘This is quite a ship you have, Antoinette.’
‘That’s Miss Bax to you. I don’t remember us being on first-name terms.’
‘Miss Bax, then. But my point stands: your ship is outwardly unremarkable, but betrays all the signs of being mechanically sound and spaceworthy. A ship with such a capacity could run at a profit on any number of perfectly legal trade routes, even in these benighted times.’
‘Then I’d have no incentive to take up smuggling, would I?’
‘No, but it makes me wonder why you’d waste such an opportunity by running a peculiar errand for the Hospice. They have influence, but not, so far as we can gather, very much in the way of actual wealth.’ The machine halted again. ‘You have to admit, it’s a bit of a puzzler. The usual route is for the frozen to come down from the Hospice, not go up to it. And even moving a frozen body around is unusual — most are thawed before they ever leave Idlewild.’
‘It’s not my job to ask questions.’
‘Well, it does rather happen to be mine. Are we nearly there yet?’
The freight bay was not currently pressurised, so they had to cycle through an internal airlock to reach it. Antoinette turned the lights on. The enormous space was empty of cargo but filled with a storage lattice, a three-dimensional framework into which cargo pallets and pods were normally latched. They began to clamber their way through it, the proxy picking its way with the fastidious care of a tarantula.
‘It’s true, then. You are flying with an empty hold. There’s not a single container in here.’
‘It’s not a crime.’
‘I never said it was. It is, however, exceedingly odd. The Mendicants must be paying you extremely good money if you can justify a trip like this.’
‘They set the terms, not me.’
‘Curioser and curioser.’
The proxy was right, of course. Everyone knew that the Hospice cared for the frozen who had just been off-loaded from recently arrived starships: the poor, the injured, the terminally amnesiac. They would be thawed, revived and rehabilitated in the Hospice’s surroundings, tended by the Mendicants until they were well enough to leave, or at least able to complete a minimum set of basic human functions. Some, never regaining their memories, decided to stay on in the Hospice, training to become Mendicants themselves. But the one thing the Hospice did not routinely do was take in the frozen who had not arrived on an interstellar ship.
‘All right,’ she said. ‘What they told me was this: there was a mistake. The man’s documentation was mixed up during the off-loading process. He was confused with another puppy who was only meant to be checked over by the Hospice, not actually revived. The other man was supposed to be kept cold until he was in Chasm City, then warmed up.’
‘Unusual,’ the proxy said.
‘Seems the guy didn’t like space travel. Well, there was a fuck-up. By the time the error was discovered, the wrong frozen body was halfway to CC. A serious screw-up and one that the Hospice wanted to get sorted out before the mess got worse. So they called me in. I picked up the body in the Rust Belt and now I’m rushing it back to Idlewild.’
‘But why the hurry? If the body’s frozen, surely…’
‘The casket’s a museum piece, and it’s received a lot of rough handling in the last few days. Plus, there are two sets of families starting to ask awkward questions. The sooner the pups are switched back, the better.’
‘I appreciate that the Mendicants would wish to keep the matter discreet. The Hospice’s reputation for excellence would be tarnished if this got out.’
‘Yeah.’ She allowed herself to feel the tiniest hint of relief, and for a dangerous instant was tempted to throttle back on the studied obstinacy. Instead she said, ‘So now that you can see the whole picture, how about letting me get on my way? You wouldn’t want to piss off the Hospice, would you?’
‘Most certainly not. But having come this far, it would be a shame not to check out the passenger, wouldn’t it?’
‘Yeah,’ she intoned. ‘A real shame.’
They reached the casket. It was an unremarkable-looking reefersleep unit, tucked near the back of the freight bay. It was matte-silver, with a smoked-glass rectangular viewing window set into the top surface. Beneath that, covered by its own smoked-glass shield, was a recessed panel containing controls and status displays. Indistinct coloured traces flickered and moved beneath the glass.
‘Strange place to put it, this far back,’ said the proxy.
‘Not from my point of view. It’s close to my belly door — it was quick to load and it’ll be even quicker to off-load.’
‘Fair enough. You don’t mind if I take a closer look, do you?’
‘Be my guest.’
The proxy scuttled to within a metre of the casket, extending sensor-tipped limbs but not actually touching any part of it. It was being ultra-cautious, unwilling to run the risk of damagi
ng Hospice property or doing anything that might endanger the casket’s occupant.
‘You said this man came in to Idlewild recently?’
‘I only know what the Hospice told me.’
The proxy tapped a limb against its own body, thoughtfully. ‘It’s odd, because there haven’t been any big ships coming in lately. Now that knowledge of the war’s had time to reach the furthest systems, Yellowstone isn’t quite the popular destination it used to be.’
She shrugged. ‘Have a word with the Hospice then, if it bothers you. All I know is I’ve got a puppy and they want it back.’
The proxy extended what she took to be a camera, probing close to the viewing window set into the casket’s upper surface.
‘Well, it’s definitely a man,’ it said, as if this would be news to her.
‘Deep in reefersleep, too. Mind if I pop back that status window and take a look at the read-outs, while I’m here? If there’s a problem, I can probably arrange an escort to get you to the Hospice in double-quick time…’
Before she could answer or frame a plausible objection, the proxy had flipped back the smoked-glass panel covering the matrix of controls and status displays. The proxy leant closer, steadying itself against the spars of the storage lattice, and swept the scanning eye back and forth across the display, dithering here and there.
Antoinette looked on, sweating. The displays appeared convincing enough, but anyone who knew their way around a reefersleep casket would have been instantly suspicious. They were not quite as they should have been had the occupant been in a state of normal cryogenic hibernation. Once that suspicion had been aroused, all it would take would be a few more enquiries, a little burrowing into some of the hidden display modes, and the truth would be laid bare.
The proxy scrutinised the read-outs and then pulled back, apparently satisfied. Antoinette closed her eyes for an instant, and then regretted it. The proxy approached the display again, extending a fine manipulator.
‘I wouldn’t touch that if I were…’
The proxy tapped commands into the read-out panel. Different traces appeared — squirming electric-blue waveforms and trembling histograms.
‘This doesn’t look right,’ the proxy said.
‘What?’
‘It’s almost as if the occupant’s already dea—’
A new voice boomed out. ‘Begging your pardon, Little Miss…’
Under her breath she swore. She had told Beast to shut up while she was dealing with the proxy. But perhaps she should be relieved that Beast had decided to ignore that particular order.
‘What is it, Beast?’
‘An incoming transmission, Little Miss — beamed directly at us. Point of origin: Hospice Idlewild.’
The proxy jerked back. ‘What’s that voice? I thought you said you were alone.’
‘I am,’ she replied. ‘That’s just Beast, my ship’s subpersona.’
‘Well, tell it to shut up. And the transmission from the Hospice isn’t intended for you. It’s a reply to a query I transmitted earlier…’
The ship’s disembodied voice boomed, ‘The transmission, Little Miss… ?’
She smiled. ‘Play the damned thing.’
The proxy’s attention jerked away from the casket. Beast was relaying the transmission on to her helmet faceplate, making it seem as if the Mendicant was standing in the middle of the freight bay. She assumed the pilot was accessing its own telemetry feed from one of the cutters.
The Mendicant was a woman, one of the New Elderly. As always, Antoinette found it slightly shocking to see a genuinely old person. She wore the starched wimple and vestment of her order, emblazoned with the Hospice’s snowflake motif, and her marvellously veined and aged hands were linked beneath her chest.
‘My apologies for the delay in responding,’ she said. ‘Problems with our network routing again, wouldn’t you know. Well, formalities. My name is Sister Amelia, and I wish to confirm that the body… the frozen individual… in the care of Miss Bax is the temporary and beloved property of Hospice Idlewild and the Holy Order of Ice Mendicants, and that Miss Bax is kindly expediting its immediate return…’
‘But the body’s dead,’ the proxy said.
The Mendicant continued, ‘… and as such, we would be grateful for the absolute minimum of interference from the authorities. We have employed Miss Bax’s services on several previous occasions and we have experienced nothing less than total satisfaction with her handling of our affairs.’ The Mendicant smiled. ‘I’m sure the Ferrisville Convention appreciates the need for discretion in such a matter… after all, we do have something of a reputation to uphold.’
The message ended; the Mendicant blinked out of reality.
Antoinette shrugged. ‘See — I was telling the truth all along.’
The proxy eyed her with one of its cowled sensors. ‘There’s something going on here. The body inside that casket is medically dead.’
‘Look, I told you the casket was an old one. The read-out’s faulty, that’s all. It’d be pretty stupid to carry a dead body around in a reefersleep casket, wouldn’t it?’
‘I’m not done with you.’
‘Maybe not, but you’re done with me now, aren’t you? You heard what the nice Mendicant lady said. Expediting its immediate return, I think that was the phrase she used. Sounds pretty official and important, doesn’t it?’ She reached across and flipped the cover back over the status panel.
‘I don’t know what you’re up to,’ the proxy told her, ‘but rest assured, I’ll get to the bottom of it.’
She smiled. ‘Fine. Thanks. Have a nice day. And now get the fuck off my ship.’
Antoinette held the same heading for an hour after the police had left, maintaining the illusion that her destination was Hospice Idlewild. Then she veered sharply, burning fuel at a rate that made her wince. An hour later she had passed beyond the official jurisdiction of the Ferrisville Convention, leaving Yellowstone and its girdle of satellite communities. The police made no effort to catch up with her again, but that did not surprise her. It would have cost them too much fuel, she was outside their technical sphere of influence and, since she had just entered the war zone, there was every chance that she was going to end up dead anyway. It was simply not worth their bother.
On that cheering note, Antoinette composed and transmitted a veiled message of thanks to the Hospice. She was grateful for their assistance and, as her father had always done under similar circumstances, promised to reciprocate should the Hospice ever need her help.
A message came back from Sister Amelia. Godspeed and good luck with your mission, Antoinette. Jim would be very proud.
I hope so, Antoinette thought.
The next ten days passed relatively uneventfully. The ship performed perfectly, without even offering her the kind of minor technical faults that would have been satisfying to repair. Once, at extreme radar range, she thought she was being shadowed by a couple of banshees — faint, stealthy signatures hovering on the limit of her detection capability. Just to be on the safe side she readied the deterrents, but after she had executed an evasive pattern, showing the banshees just how difficult it would be to make a hard-docking against Storm Bird, the two ships fell back into the shadows, off to look for another victim to plunder. She never saw them again.
After that brief excitement, there was not an awful lot to do on the ship except eat and sleep, and she tried to do as little of the latter as she could reasonably get away with. Her dreams were repetitious and disturbing: night after night she was taken prisoner by spiders, snatched from a liner making a burn between Rust Belt carousels. The spiders carried her off to one of their cometary bases on the edge of the system, where they cracked open her skull and plunged glistening interrogation devices into the soft grey porridge of her brain. Then, just when she had almost been turned into a spider, had almost had her own memories erased and been pumped full of the implants that would bind her into their hive mind, the zombies arrived. They smashed int
o the comet in droves of wedge-shaped attack ships, firing corkscrewing penetration capsules into the ice, which melted through it until they reached the central warrens. There they spewed forth valiant red-armoured troops who tore through the maze of cometary tunnels, killing spiders with the humane precision of soldiers trained never to waste a single flèchette, bullet or ammo-cell charge.
A handsome zombie conscript pulled her from the spider interrogation /indoctrination room, applied emergency procedures to flush the invading machines from her brain, then replaced and sutured her skull and finally put her into a recuperative coma for the long trip back to the civilian hospitals in the inner system. He held her hand while she was taken into the cold ward.
It was nearly always the same fucking thing. The zombies had infected her with a propaganda dream, and although she had taken the usual recommended regimen of flushing agents, she could never clear it out completely. Not that she even wanted to, particularly.
The one night when she had slept untroubled by Demarchist propaganda, she had spent the entire time dreaming sad dreams of her father instead.
She knew that the zombie propaganda was, to some extent, an exaggeration. But only in the details: no one argued about what the Conjoiners did to anyone unfortunate enough to become their prisoner. Equally, Antoinette was certain, it would not exactly be a picnic to be taken prisoner by the Demarchists.
But the conflict was a long way away, even though she was technically in the war zone. She had chosen her trajectory to avoid the main battlefronts. Now and then Antoinette saw distant flashes of light, signifying some titanic engagement taking place light-hours from her present position. But the silent flashes had an unreal quality about them, allowing her to pretend that the war was over and that she was merely on some routine interplanetary haul. That was not too far from the truth, either. All the neutral observers said that the war was in its dying days, with the zombies losing ground on all fronts. The spiders, by contrast, were gaining by the month, pushing towards Yellowstone.
But even if its outcome was now clear, the war was not yet over, and she could still become a casualty if she was careless. And then she might find out exactly how accurate that propaganda dream was.
The Revelation Space Collection (revelation space) Page 145