Empire of Light

by Gary Gibson

  ‘Bridge of Mjollnir to the approaching shuttles,’ spoke a voice in Corso’s ear. ‘We need to confirm the details of your manifest. Who am I speaking to?’

  Corso glanced at the three other figures seated behind him in the supply shuttle. Like him, they all wore bulky armoured spacesuits, although for the moment they had left their helmets off. He saw Leo Olivarri, Eduard Martinez and Dan Perez. Perez had been the Mjollnir’s head of engineering until, like Nancy Schiller, he had been removed from his job for remaining loyal to Martinez.

  Olivarri’s boss, Ray Willis, was on a second shuttle following a parallel course to their own, which also carried Ted Lamoureaux, Nancy and Ty Whitecloud. The three members of the frigate’s crew remained completely unaware that the man they knew as Nathan Driscoll was operating under an assumed identity.

  Perez signalled with one hand, and Corso put the Mjollnir link on standby.

  ‘Your name is Herera,’ Perez instructed Corso. ‘Victor Herera.’

  ‘Why the hell is he asking?’

  Perez shrugged. ‘It’ll be nothing more than a standard security precaution. And it’s probably just shitty luck they picked on us.’

  Corso reopened the comms link. ‘Sorry, bridge, we’re getting random system glitches. You’re talking to Captain Herera, manifest five alpha zero.’ He then added, ‘Any problems up there?’

  ‘No problems,’ replied a bored-sounding voice at the other end. ‘Security’s been moved up a couple of notches this morning.’

  ‘Any idea why?’ Corso kept his voice casual.

  ‘Damned if I know, but we’re requesting you to dock at Bay Three, not Four. Sorry about that. Over and out.’

  Corso cut the link and turned to look at the men behind him. ‘Do you think they’ve worked out who we are?’

  Perez’s reply was blunt and to the point. ‘If they had, Senator, we’d already be dead.’

  Corso nodded and turned to face the viewscreens once more, while trying to ignore the tension growing in his chest.

  Whatever lingering doubts Corso still harboured about the Senate’s intentions had vanished a few nights earlier, when Marcus Kenley had appeared at his Senate lodgings in a stolen taxi, its electronic brain hacked in order to prevent it from revealing either its occupant or its whereabouts. He brought with him the news that several of Corso’s supporters in the Senate had been arrested during the past hour.

  Corso had dressed in a hurry, and then discovered Kenley had also hacked the taxi’s speed limiter, as the little vehicle accelerated with frightening speed, almost flipping on to its side at a sharp turn.

  Following Jarret’s defeat in the challenge, Kenley had been instrumental in setting up safe-houses around Unity, and before long they arrived at a colonial-style building on the outskirts of town. It was a huddle of old-fashioned pressure-domes like something out of a historical ’viro.

  Griffith and Velardo were already there, using secure data-net connections to organize more extractions. Olivarri and Willis arrived with the morning, along with some late arrivals who had their own stories of close escapes from the Senate’s police.

  At first the public news networks told of chaos in the streets surrounding the Senate, but when the networks went offline Corso knew his worst suspicions had come true, and a counter-coup was under way. He kept himself awake throughout the next few nights with a steady diet of coffee and amphetamines, throwing himself into finalizing the details of a plan to take control of the Mjollnir before it could be removed from Redstone’s orbital space.

  Kenley went off and returned a few hours later with Dan Perez in tow; both men departed once again, this time accompanied by Ray Willis, on a mission to retrieve the Mjollnir’s commander. They reappeared with Martinez some hours later, looking dirty and exhausted, Willis’s face streaked with blood that was clearly not his own.

  By then Whitecloud had been tracked down to a secure government building, but by the time someone went out to try and extract him, the residency building had been bombed and Whitecloud had vanished.

  His subsequent reappearance in a Unity police station, kilometres away from the residency, raised questions that Corso did not have the time to try and answer. Sympathetic contacts within the Senate’s own security services arranged for Whitecloud to be transferred to a less secure facility, where falsified documentation was all that was needed to extract him and bring him to the safe-house, to join with the rest of them.

  But of far greater concern to Corso was Dakota’s failure to show, even as the time to launch for the Mjollnir approached. He felt her absence like an ulcer throbbing in his guts, because without her everything he had planned was for nothing. He found his mood swinging between fury and despondency, and yet there was no way to contact her, not even through Lamoureaux after he also arrived at the safe-house.

  At one point, looking up from where he had fallen asleep in front of a screen, Corso realized that more than seventy-two hours had passed since his narrowly escaping arrest. He looked around at the people sitting before other screens, or talking quietly on secure links, or sleeping on mats on the floor.

  During the next twenty-four hours most of them would scatter, through Kenley’s underground network, to other safe-houses, while a very few, himself included, would board a couple of shuttles in place of the team of engineers detailed to check final repairs to the Mjollnir.

  That, at least, was the plan. But if Dakota didn’t show, that could still undo everything they had worked towards.

  Corso activated the shuttle’s interface, and saw they were only a few minutes away from docking with the frigate. He tapped on a screen before twisting around to face Martinez. ‘I’m updating the other shuttle on a course change. But not the one the Mjollnir’s expecting.’

  ‘Senator?’

  ‘If they’re already on to us groundside, they could be diverting us into a trap. The last thing we need is to find ourselves facing an armed welcoming committee. Am I right in thinking each docking bay has an emergency override that can be triggered by an outside signal?’

  ‘If you have the right signature code, yes,’ Martinez allowed, ‘but it’s bound to tip them off that we’re up to something.’

  ‘It might be too late for that already. Give me the code anyway.’

  Martinez sent him the code through their linked suit comms, while Corso glanced at the screen in front of him to watch the frigate growing larger by the second.

  He punched in the course correction. ‘Bay Five it is.’

  Sunlight broke over the rim of the planet below, filtered down to a soft glow by the shuttle’s external sensor arrays. A screen showed clouds drifting over the Mount Mor peninsula, while the broad curve of coast along which Port Gabriel was located could be seen to the west. Approach warnings began to blink as the two shuttles neared a row of bay entrances close to Mjollnir’s bow.

  ‘Mjollnir to lead shuttle,’ declared the voice from the frigate’s bridge. ‘You’re heading the wrong way. Please get back on your original course.’

  ‘We’re having problems with our automatic guidance systems,’ Corso improvised, ‘and it can’t lock on to your docking signal. We’re trying to compensate for that, but it’s tricky.’

  He heard the officer at the other end of the link move away from the microphone to speak to someone else, but he couldn’t make out any of their mumbled words before the first voice came back online. ‘We’ve just queried your shuttle’s on-board systems and they seem to be working fine. This is your final warning, Captain Herera. Now head for Bay Three.’

  Corso put the link on hold and twisted around to look at his fellow passengers. ‘Any ideas?’

  Martinez shrugged. ‘Fuck it, we’re just thirty seconds from docking. Use the override to get the bay doors open and don’t even bother replying. If they don’t know who we are yet, they’re sure as hell going to realize pretty damn soon that we’re not the engineers they were expecting.’

  Corso nodded, and punched in the override. A momen
t later the bridge of the Mjollnir came back online.

  ‘Bridge to shuttle, rendezvous without boarding. Repeat, rendezvous without boarding, Captain Herera. Is that clear? Dock with the external maintenance bays, but not with the Mjollnir itself. If you board, we’ll consider it a hostile action.’

  Corso reached out and terminated the link. The Mjollnir seemed to rush towards them, blotting out the stars beyond. Now all that could be seen on the displays was a wall of grey metal expanding towards him.

  A thin line of light appeared directly ahead, quickly growing wider as massive steel doors swung open to reveal the brightly lit interior of Bay Five.

  Corso felt his body forced back into the seat as the shuttle decelerated hard, and he wondered if they were cutting it too fine. But before he had completed this thought they were already inside, automated grapples seizing the tiny ship and lowering it into a docking cradle.

  The next step was critical: they had to disembark from the shuttle and get inside the frigate proper, before the crew on the bridge had a chance to react. Long, precious seconds passed while an airlock docked with the hatch in the shuttle’s belly. They spent this time pulling on their helmets and securing them.

  Corso knew there was a risk that Simenon might decide to dump the internal atmosphere and flush them out into space. Despite this concern, for the moment they kept their visors raised. It was easier to communicate face to face, and besides the helmets were designed to self-seal in case of a catastrophic loss of pressure.

  Corso himself went through the airlock last, dropping only slowly in the zero gravity before emerging into a disembarkation lounge located right next to the bays. Behind him the bulkheads rumbled and shook as the second shuttle docked.

  Martinez and the rest were already checking the seals on each other’s suits. Corso checked Perez’s suit, then Perez did the same for him. There was a clanging sound nearby, before, one by one, four passengers from the second shuttle dropped into the lounge, through a separate airlock.

  Olivarri meanwhile deposited an oblong case on the shelf running along one wall, and opened it to reveal several lightweight pulse-rifles. He passed these out to everyone but Lamoureaux and White-cloud.

  Martinez picked up a rifle, before stepping over to Corso and clapping him on the shoulder. ‘You did a nice job getting us this far, Senator. But I think I’ll take it from here.’

  Martinez turned and called for everybody’s attention.

  ‘First, a reminder of what we can expect. Mjollnir is currently undergoing last-minute checks before departing for the Sol system, a day from now, with a full complement of crew that’s expected to arrive here in no more than another three hours. In the meantime there’s a minimal presence on board – I reckon a skeleton crew of no more than a dozen.’

  ‘Why so few?’ asked Lamoureaux.

  ‘Because the main security contingent charged with guarding the frigate headed back down to the surface just under an hour ago. That leaves us a fairly narrow window of opportunity to take control and break from orbit. Mr Driscoll,’ he turned to Whitecloud, ‘you’re going to head straight to the labs. Leo, escort him there and keep your eyes peeled. Don’t engage anyone you run into if you can avoid it. Make sure first of all that the artefact’s where it should be and report back if there’s any problems or likelihood of delays.’

  Corso watched the two men depart and felt his lips tighten in disapproval. He did not enjoy having to maintain this pretence regarding Whitecloud, or even having to act civilly towards him, and yet it was clear from his own research into Whitecloud’s career that the man was quite brilliant. It was hard to believe someone with such a remarkable mind could have used it to perpetrate such terrible acts of inhumanity, but history was littered with just such men.

  The rest of them then moved out of the lounge, and floated in pairs down a long shaft. Dan Perez and Nancy Schiller took point, while Ray Willis came last, guarding their rear. The ship was running at low power, so they proceeded through a strange half-twilight, their shadows racing in front of them like black ghosts whenever they passed a dimly glowing light fixture.

  Corso swallowed and tried to ignore the fits of light-headedness that sometimes blurred his vision. He was still running on chemicals, and the last occasion he had actually slept seemed like part of another lifetime.

  So much of what they had planned hinged on various assumptions, particularly that the frigate’s security overrides would have remained unaltered in the wake of Martinez’s arrest. If they had been changed, however, the extra time taken up by burning or blowing their way through various sealed entrances might allow the security services enough time to muster a serious response.

  Before he could ponder any further, they arrived at a transport terminal and boarded a cylindrical windowless car that carried them swiftly along a tunnel running the entire length of the frigate, and headed towards the centrifuge’s hub.

  They had managed to get this far. Surely, thought Corso, fate wouldn’t be so cruel as to prevent them from reaching the bridge.

  The group disembarked shortly after, and found themselves in a cylindrical chamber six metres across and twice as much in length. It was situated at the axis of the centrifugal wheel that spun constantly to provide Mjollnir ’s bridge and main crew quarters with artificial gravity.

  Four colour-coded doors were set into the central third of the chamber, which revolved independently of the rest. These doors opened on to shafts radiating outwards from the chamber, each one leading into the centrifuge’s inner rim. No one was surprised to find the emergency locks on all four doors had been engaged.

  Corso watched as Nancy Schiller floated forward to grab a handhold next to one door, pulling herself in close as it dragged her around. She used her teeth to pull off a glove, then reached out to tap at a screen set into the door itself.

  ‘Fuck, it’s not responding,’ she announced. ‘My codes are no good.’

  Icy fingers twirled inside Corso’s belly.

  ‘I’ll give it a try,’ said Martinez.

  He grabbed a handhold next to another door, as it swept by, and tapped at this door’s screen. After a few moments the outline of a hand appeared, against which Martinez pressed his palm, and the door hissed open in response.

  We’re in, thought Corso, and realized he had been holding his breath the whole time. There were sighs of relief and whispered prayers from the others.

  He floated forward, grabbing another handhold next to the door Martinez had opened, and suddenly it was the station that was spinning while he remained stationary.

  ‘I thought there were supposed to be elevators,’ he grumbled to Martinez. He could feel the tiniest pull of spin-g by now, and it would only get stronger the closer they came to the centrifuge’s outer rim, seventy metres away.

  ‘Blame our friends on the bridge,’ said Martinez. ‘Looks like we’re going to have to climb all the way down.’

  Martinez let go of his handhold and pushed over to the door Nancy had tried to open. Twenty seconds later this door also slid open, to reveal a second shaft.

  ‘Dan, take the other shaft,’ instructed Martinez, turning and lowering his legs past the open door. ‘Nancy, Ray, you’re going with him. When you get to the ring, approach the bridge from the spin-ward direction, and we’ll come at it from the other side. But wait for our signal before trying to enter it. Senator, you’re with me and Ted.’

  Martinez took the lead, followed by Corso, with Lamoureaux coming last. The machine-head, Corso noted, now had a perpetually distracted look on his face, like someone who had forgotten something but couldn’t quite remember what.

  ‘Ted.’

  Lamoureaux finally seemed to snap out of it. ‘What?’

  ‘Something worrying you?’

  ‘No.’ Lamoureaux shook his head, then shrugged. ‘But I’m getting some weird distortion noise coming through my implants.’

  ‘Anything we need to be concerned about?’

  Lamoureaux thought for
a moment. ‘I don’t know. Maybe not.’

  The inside of the shaft was studded with handholds, but Corso wasn’t used to heights, and he had to fight off tendrils of panic that accompanied the slow increase of the wheel’s spin-g as they approached the ring. He focused instead on the steady rhythm of his movements, while keeping his eyes fixed on the wall directly before him.

  By the time they arrived at the ring, the gravity was close on two-thirds standard. Their way was now blocked by the roof of the shaft’s elevator car. Martinez used a single shot from his pulse-rifle to blow out an emergency hatch in the car’s roof, before climbing down inside it.

  Corso dropped down on top of the car and peered inside to see Martinez studying a panel next to the closed elevator doors. The panel looked blackened and melted.

  Martinez looked up at him and shrugged. ‘It’s been shot to pieces, and we’re going to have to go through the hard way. Got the explosives?’

  ‘Can’t you just yank the doors open?’

  Martinez shook his head. ‘These aren’t your standard-issue elevator doors, Senator.’

  Corso nodded, reached into his suit’s thigh pocket and withdrew the dark, slim oblong of a putty-like material before passing it down to Martinez. Corso next motioned to Lamoureaux to climb a little way back up the shaft, before following him a moment later. A minute passed before Martinez himself clambered back out of the car and crouched as close to the wall of the shaft as he could get.

  A dull crunch sounded, and a sharp, rattling vibration set Corso’s teeth on edge.

  A trail of thick, oily smoke drifted up from inside the elevator car. Martinez dropped back down inside and braced his shoulder against the doors, which were now bent and twisted out of shape. He thumped against them several times before they suddenly slid half-open with a discordant screech.