The Line of Polity

by Neal Asher

  With practised ease, Ternan brought the AGC in to land on a platform mounted at one end of the barge, and the other AGC followed her down. Four people waited on the platform. Two of them were guards armed with what looked like rail-guns of a manufacture Thorn did not recognize – not Polity because these weapons required a separate belt-mounted power pack. He stepped out and, with Ternan coming to his side and the others coming quickly behind, advanced on the four.

  ‘Ahh . . . Stiles.’

  Brom.

  He wore a loose suit of silky material over his gross frame and seemed indifferent to the chill breeze coming in off the sea. Thin grey hair framed his thickly jowled face and, on seeing it close, Thorn saw the man’s skin seemed flecked with small scales. There issued from him a smell reminiscent of a reptile’s terrarium. The aug he wore was more than a temporary attachment – it looked like a growth from his body. Thorn recognized him at once from his file, but he was not supposed to know him. He shook the proffered hand.

  ‘You’re Brom?’ he asked.

  Brom nodded and smiled a hard smile as he studied Thorn’s face. Thorn glanced past him to the strange individual standing at Brom’s shoulder. This man was pale with contrasting flat black hair, and wore a white shipsuit with something written down its side and all down one leg. Around his neck he wore a wide band of white metal, and on the side of his head he sported a scaled aug, the same as everyone else here. His face was lacking in expression, almost dead.

  Brom gestured to a stair leading from the platform down to the deck, and began walking in that direction. Thorn, glancing behind to note the others moving off in a different direction, fell in beside him, sticking his hands in his pockets so his wristcom was well away from the itchy forefinger on his other hand. One press and his team would be on their way in – and likely he would have signed their death warrant. He had to just ride this out for the moment, get away safely, then come back in force. No way could he send a message out of this place without being detected. If it came to the worst, he would first use the spring gun concealed in his sleeve.

  ‘You seem well-organized here,’ he said.

  ‘Due to my friend here: Deacon Aberil Dorth,’ said Brom.

  Thorn glanced at the pale man indicated and got only a flat stare in response.

  ‘Well, your friend has provided you with some sophisticated equipment. That ’ware shield seems almost as good as anything the Polity possesses.’

  ‘Ah.’ Brom raised a pudgy finger. ‘Now that comes from another source, and you’ll understand if I do not feel able to reveal it to you.’ Brom glanced at him. ‘You did good work at the study facility. John Spader was beginning to ask some awkward questions about the dark-otter death rate in this area. He had to go.’

  Was that all?

  ‘And now you have something more for me?’

  ‘Oh yes.’ Brom led the way down a spiral stair to the lower deck. As he climbed down after the man, Thorn surreptitiously studied the nearest gun turret. Rail-guns again, which confirmed Brom’s assertion of there being two sources of technology here, for such weapons were fairly low-tech when compared with the chameleonware shield this barge employed.

  Moving across the deck, Thorn now studied a group of people working on a jetty ramp by which was moored a motorized catamaran. Boats like these, he knew, were employed for the illegal hunting of dark-otters for their metals-laden bones, which were used decoratively by those with that kind of taste. The workers were unloading from the vessel plastic crates Thorn immediately identified as the kind that weapons were often packed in. His attention focused on a heavy-set individual, obviously boosted, who was standing next to the woman supervising the unloading. His and Thorn’s eyes locked for a moment, then the other turned away as if nothing of moment had occurred. Thorn turned his head so his face was no longer visible to the man.

  John Stanton. Jesus!

  Stanton was a mercenary often employed by Separatist cabals for his expert knowledge. He’d worked for Arian Pelter, and he’d given himself up on Viridian to betray Pelter, after coming to believe the Separatist leader had killed Stanton’s lover – the smuggler woman, Jarvellis. During the resultant battle he had escaped – and no one was really sure how. If Stanton recognized him, then that would be it, all over, for Thorn had been in Ian Cormac’s fighting force on Viridian.

  Brom led Thorn and the Deacon into a luxurious cabin set right over on the edge of the deck so that the panoramic window on one side of it looked out on nothing but sea. He waved them to a sofa upholstered with dark-otter hide, then played the perfect host with the autobar. He brought over a glass of orange for the Deacon and a cips for Thorn. He himself drank expensive Earth-import whisky – obviously having a taste for wealth, and the luxury it could buy. As the governor of a planet, of course, he could enjoy plenty of both – such was the real aim of many would-be ‘freedom fighters’.

  Sitting down in a huge armchair Brom said, ‘A few years ago this planet lost some of its foremost Separatist leaders—’

  ‘They rest with God,’ murmured Aberil.

  What the hell is he doing here? wondered Thorn. He did not seem Brom’s type at all.

  With a flicker of a frown Brom went on, ‘The man responsible for their deaths was an agent of Earth Central, very high up. He is in fact almost as legendary as Horace Blegg. On some worlds they do not even believe he exists. But unlike Blegg, he does exist. His name is Ian Cormac.’ As he finished speaking, his inspection of Thorn was quite intense.

  ‘Son of Satan,’ hissed the Deacon.

  Thorn ignored Aberil and leant forward. ‘I’ve heard of him, of course. Is it him you want me to kill?’

  Brom smiled and leant back. ‘Oh no, I’m just outlining the dangers such people as ourselves need to face, and why we must take the actions we will take.’

  ‘Those actions being?’ Thorn asked.

  Waving a negligent hand Brom said, ‘Later. Let us finish our drinks and discuss something else. Tell me, Stiles’ – Thorn did not at all like the emphasis Brom gave the name – ‘what weapon did you use for that distance shot?’

  ‘Low-speed gas rifle firing an explosive seeker round. Anything above the speed of sound would have been detected, and taken down by antimunitions. I always find the simplest approach is best,’ Thorn replied.

  As Brom mused over this, a chime sounded and he reached out and tapped a touch-console inset in the pedestal table beside him. The door to the suite opened and in stepped Ternan and Lutz, the latter watching Thorn with a sneer of satisfaction. They both held nasty-looking gas-fed pulse-guns. One press on the face of his wristcom would have Thorn’s team coming in – but the team would die if he did this. He curled a finger back to the spring-release concealed in his sleeve, but before he could decide who to go for first, there came a low thunk and something stabbed his chest. He glanced down and saw some sort of dart sticking into him. It had two bulbous sacs that pulsed once, pumping something dark down its glassy stem. Like a ripple on a pool of flesh, deadness spread out from the point of penetration. The gun sprang from Thorn’s sleeve and struck a hand already going numb, before clattering to the floor. He stared across at Brom and saw that the man was returning to concealment – under his silk top – something tubular, organic. Brom now waved Ternan and Lutz forward.

  ‘What came up on scan?’ Brom asked, as the two caught Thorn under his arms and hauled him to his feet. He managed to get his legs underneath himself and gained a modicum of control over them.

  ‘Underspace beacon in his pelvis, and his wristcom set to transmit a preset signal. We also found two coded frequencies in storage. Got to be Earth Central Security,’ said Ternan.

  Thorn tried to move, but he now felt like a wet rag. Some sort of paralytic in the dart, but what the hell kind of delivery system was that? It was biotech, certainly, but none he recognized. As Brom moved before him, he just had enough strength to lift his head and meet the man’s eyes.

  ‘Trooper Thorn, I believe,’ said Brom. �
��You know you really should have changed your appearance. Or have you such contempt for us that you can’t comprehend that we possess our own information networks?’ Brom nodded dismissively to the door and, as his two lieutenants dragged Thorn in that direction, Lutz took great pleasure in twisting the barbed dart from the agent’s chest. Thorn wanted to yell out, couldn’t even manage that.

  Stanton – had to be his doing. The man must have recognized him and passed on this information. The network proscriptions on the identity of ECS agents and soldiers would never have allowed his physical appearance to be recorded or transmitted from either Viridian or Samarkand. Once outside Thorn found that even the dull light of Cheyne’s pale sun hurt his eyes. He blinked on tears and managed enough movement from his neck so that he could look around. Stanton was standing there still, watching the unloading of the catamaran. Thorn saw him glance over briefly at him, and turn away. Then he felt a tugging at his arm.

  ‘DNA-keyed I have no doubt,’ said Brom. ‘And no doubt it won’t work unless still strapped on your wrist. What is it, right forefinger?’

  No!

  While Ternan gripped his left wrist, Lutz pushed Thorn’s right hand across to the wristcom and pressed his right forefinger down on the screen.

  ‘Signal’s been sent,’ confirmed Ternan, and Thorn glanced at her. She had one hand up at the side of her sunglasses, and he realized she must have some sort of screen set into them. ‘My,’ she went on, ‘that was fast. One military carrier coming in from the east. Should be within visual any time now.’

  ‘Well, let Mr Thorn see,’ ordered Brom.

  Lutz grabbed his hair and wrenched his head back. They turned him roughly so he was staring out to sea. And there, immediately, Thorn discerned a black dot on the horizon – growing rapidly as it approached.

  ‘Of course,’ explained Brom, ‘they cannot see us.’

  God no.

  The carrier became increasingly visible: like a railway carriage hurled into the sky – all grey armour and hard angles. Four people on board, people he’d eaten with, slept with and worked with for more than a solstan year. He heard the rail-gun turret turn and heard the cycling drone of it powering up.

  ‘Not quite near-c,’ said Brom.

  ‘At this distance it makes no difference,’ interjected the voice of the Deacon.

  There now came a rushing crackle and Thorn saw the carrier dip in midair, then in silence transform into a plummeting shell spewing fire as it arced towards the waves. The sound of the explosion came shortly after – the grumble of a distant storm over the sea.

  Bastard.

  ‘Right,’ said Brom, ‘let’s get moving. ECS will soon be all over this area like worms on a turd.’

  ‘You’ll kill him now?’ asked the Deacon.

  ‘Oh no, he’s got far too much information in that fine head of his for us to open it so inelegantly. Show Mr Thorn to his accommodation, Ternan.’

  As they dragged him, staggering, across the deck, Thorn felt the vibration of engines starting below, and before they took him down inside the barge he saw that it was already moving. The cell they threw him into was a ceramal box containing only a chair and a table on which rested the chromed carapace of a small autodoc. Just for the pleasure of it, Lutz drove his fist three times into Thorn’s face, breaking his teeth and nose. Thorn wanted to defend himself, if not with blows then at least with words. All he could do was lie on the floor and bleed, as Lutz then went to pick up the autodoc.

  ‘You know, you can do some real nasty things with these,’ he said. ‘Let me tell you: I’m setting it to cut that beacon out of your pelvis without nerve-blocking. But don’t worry, I’ll also set it to inject the drugs that’ll prevent you fainting from shock.’

  A moment later, Lutz stood over Thorn, holding the doc up for view. The thing was much the same size and shape as a streamlined cycling helmet, and from below his view of it was mainly its chrome gripping legs and the array of surgical cutlery underneath. Grinning nastily, Lutz put it on the floor beside Thorn and stood back. Immediately it scuttled towards him and sliced a hole in the side of his trousers. He felt the tug of it then cutting into his flesh, but the pain arrived only as a probe went in. Thorn closed his eyes and locked his expression – he would give Lutz no satisfaction at all from this. Soon he felt a humming vibration as the doc began to drill into his pelvis. The pain became unbelievably intense for a moment and Thorn felt he might yell out despite himself, but then it began to fade as a bone-welder thrummed, then a cell-welder after it as the probe itself withdrew.

  Thorn opened his eyes at last to see Ternan stooping over him. She stood examining something bloody held between her forefinger and thumb. She turned to Lutz. ‘Go and throw this over the side.’

  For a moment he appeared set to rebel, but he then took the beacon and left the room.

  Ternan returned her attention to Thorn. ‘You know, we could have done with an emulation of you in which to plant that.’ She gestured with her thumb to where Lutz had gone. ‘It would have then taken ECS somewhat longer to get around to genetic testing and therefore discover it wasn’t you. We did our own testing very quickly.’

  Thorn stared at her, puzzled.

  ‘We have people in the facility, you see, and one of them brought us a sample of Spader’s so-called corpse.’ She gave a sneering smile. ‘It was his ear I think.’

  Thorn managed a grunt of enlightenment.

  ‘Imagine our surprise,’ she went on, ‘upon discovering that the thing you shot was a syntheflesh emulation – no more alive than a wristcom.’

  With that she left the cell, closing and locking the door on him.

  Apis cringed in horror when he saw what he had done, but he did not allow himself to cry. The landing craft was now full of bloated bodies, floating in a fog of their own evaporating juices. He surveyed this human wreckage for only a moment, before selecting one of the bodies and towing it to the airlock to send it tumbling out into space. Quite a crowd was drifting away from the ship when he finally pulled his mother inside and sealed the locks.

  It seemed an interminable time passed before his body began to react to the increase in pressure. He felt himself contracting – deflating to a more normal human shape. After a time the resin sealing his lips and nose softened, and he rolled it away before taking his first breath. Inside her suit his mother had also returned to normal, so it was much easier to remove her from the suit than it had been to put her in it. He next installed her in a sleep bag, and was looking for medical equipment when he discovered that what he had at first taken to be lockers lining the walls were in fact cold-coffins. Eventually, locating what he wanted, he returned to his mother with a diagnosticer that seemed primitive to him. It revealed she was unconscious and had a skull fracture, so he administered the drugs it prescribed and left her to recover – hopefully. It was all he could do, and he did not know if the drugs or dosages were right for an Outlinker, but there was no AI to advise him – nothing.

  In the cockpit extending across the front of the landing craft, he was in familiar territory again. The controls there were similar to the manual controls on which he had trained. A quick check showed him that the craft was increasing its speed, though that acceleration was still small – the engines having been set for the least wasteful burn. Another quick check showed him that the course keyed in was not to the nearest inhabited world. It was with a cold lack of surprise that he calculated that there would have been quite enough supplies on board to have taken them all there rather than to ‘Masada or nothing’. For a moment he stared at one screen that gave him a view back towards the now distant General Patten. Increasing magnification, he saw now only a cloud of floating wreckage dispersing from around its assailant, Dragon. With a cold sick feeling he reckoned how long it would take for him to return to that area, but realized there was only an outside chance that any Outlinkers who had survived the destruction of the ship would be alive by the time he got there. Dare he risk such a rescue mission with Dr
agon still in the vicinity? He dared not, and surely they were all dead – and sometime soon he knew he would begin to feel that.

  Fethan closed the casing on the control column of the aerofan, clicked down a sequence of bright red buttons on the panel below the joystick, and stepped back. Something in the thick floor of the aerofan droned and engaged with a clunk and, starting with a low susurrating whine, its fans began to get up to speed. A second clunk notched up that speed, and from where she stood Eldene felt the blast of air. Upon the third clunk, the machine lurched from the ground like a rock hauled up by elastic and, twenty metres up, it tilted and slid away as if caught in a vicious crosswind. As soon as this happened, Fethan rested his hand on Eldene’s shoulder.

  ‘About now, girl, they’ll be getting the return signal from this fan. They’ll know Volus’s Gift died, but they won’t know for sure about him. We’ll soon see if he’s been found,’ he said.

  ‘What do you mean?’ Eldene asked.

  Fethan did not reply: the sky did. A greenish flash ignited the air, leaving afterimages on Eldene’s retinas. Shortly after this there came a thunderclap and, as her vision cleared, she saw that the aerofan was now just falling debris and a drifting cloud of black smoke.

  ‘Guess they found him,’ said Fethan. ‘That was the battery EL-41, unless I miss my bet: artificially lased emerald focusing in an argon field-cylinder. It’s their oldest array and the only one of that type they have up there.’

  Eldene stared at him. If Fethan had ever come out with a mouthful like that before recent events, she would have thought the old man’s mind going, but now she had to contend with the fact that what was speaking here was not wholly a man. Also, she had to contend with the fact that she now did not have very long to live. Pulling away from Fethan, she stepped to a nearby tricone shell resting on the damp soil and sat down on it.