by F
"Personal preferences don't matter, Pashupa. We sell to the high bidder. It wouldn't be fair to the others."
"That would be a valid point if you were not obviously planning to cut them—and myself—out of the profits entirely."
"What makes you say that?"
"At the very beginning of this operation you very generously agreed to divide the take into four equal shares. However, you have paid all of the costs of this project, which I believe are quite considerable. Such generosity is praiseworthy, but—if you will pardon me for saying so—it does not seem particularly in keeping with your personality as I have observed it."
"Have you... discussed this with anyone?"
Pashupa pulled himself out of his couch on the opposite side. His laser was still strapped to the tip of his tail. "I have not mentioned it yet."
"Hey, relax," said Bolorma. Her own blade retracted back into her sleeve. "No need to get crazy. So you want us to sell it to your temple and split the take?"
"The money actually does not matter to me. You may keep it all, so long as the Temple gets the Object."
"And you get to be some kind of super high juju maker in the temple."
"While honesty compels me to admit that I expect to be made Anointed Master at the very least, that is not my primary motivation. I am serving God's will as much as my own ambition." Pashupa relaxed a little and lowered his tail.
"What about the other two?"
"I rather imagine you already have a plan to get rid of them."
Bolorma stood still for a moment, her face carefully blank. Then she smiled. "Okay, you've got a deal."
She seated herself again, and used the opportunity to subvocalize. " Did you get all that ?"
" Yes, " said Erden over their private link. " Any sign of our friend yet ?"
" Yes, " said Bolorma silently as her control panel flashed for attention.
"Tell me what is happening," said Pashupa, climbing back into his own seat.
"Betraying the others will have to wait. Someone's following us."
Haar and Erden came up the ladder as soon as they heard the news. Erden looked unhappy at the interruption. They stood behind Pashupa and Bolorma, watching the zoom window. There was something only five kilometers behind them.
"I see no sign of a life-support bubble," said Pashupa. "It could be a drone, or even a citizen machine."
"Probably a drone," said Bolorma. "Citizens can be tried for murder. Might be an illegal sapient."
"But what's it doing?" asked Erden. "Is it trying to catch us?"
"Not sure," said Bolorma. "Looks like...it'll reach Sunpoint landing field about five minutes before us. Just enough time to have some local cops or remotes ready when we come out the hatch."
"Why?" asked Haar. "Cops can tell Sunpoint."
"It didn't launch from the cop bays," said Bolorma, skimming through the telescope memory file. "Looks like it was parked in free space and started to boost just after we did."
"It was waiting for us," said Erden quietly.
"Someone talked," said Bolorma.
For a moment nobody said anything.
"We must not let it catch us," said Pashupa. "We should divert, perhaps to Old Dome or the Rosette." He reached for his control pad with his feeding limbs.
"No," said Haar, resting one clawed hand on Pashupa's back. "Why trust you?"
"And you could just as easily be the traitor among us. Making sure we do not get away," said Pashupa, but he didn't touch the pad.
"This is ridiculous," said Bolorma. "We've got to do something."
"We'll pick a random spot on the surface," said Erden. She closed her eyes and stabbed a finger at the image of the Object. "There."
"The spot you've chosen appears to be just a few kilometers from the hole," said Pashupa.
Bolorma glared at Erden. "Don't even think it," she said. She tapped her pad and the ship swung around to boost sideways onto the new vector. The faint buzz of the ion motor changed pitch. All four of them watched the display window. After a couple of seconds they could see the exhaust plume of their pursuer change angle. "And...it's matching vector."
"At least now we know it really is following us," said Erden.
"And it knows we've seen it, so it no longer gives a damn about sneaking up on us. Which means it thinks it can take us," said Bolorma.
"We must not let it get the Object," said Pashupa.
"Launching!" yelled Bolorma. "Suits!"
Pashupa still had on his environment suit—oxygen was as fatal to him as vacuum—and Erden had been too eager to get at the Object to do more than push back her hood. Haar slipped its suit on in less than twenty seconds. Bolorma was still struggling into hers when the projectile hit with a solid thump somewhere above them.
"Tank the air," she told Pashupa as she sealed her hood. "What was that?"
"No hole," said Haar.
"It's a bomb!" cried Erden.
"Should be right about...there," said Bolorma, pointing at a spot about forty-five degrees up the dome of the flight deck, just above the suit locker. The bare patch of wall suddenly looked very sinister.
"Erden's right," said Haar. "It has us now."
"If the drone wants the Object it can't destroy our ship," said Pashupa.
"It doesn't have to," said Bolorma. "It could be a shaped charge with flechettes. Or a gray-goo bomb. Or a nerve disruptor. The point is, it's a threat. The question is what do we do?"
"We jump!" said Erden. "We've got these armor suits—what impact speed can they protect against?"
Bolorma called up the owners' manual. "Says here the built-in crash bags are rated up to twenty-five meters per second for Humans and Arekh, thirty for Shupi. Faster than that, you'd better be a Machine."
"Okay, our descent speed is almost down to that right now. Let's just take the Object and jump."
"Somebody should stay with the ship, " said Pashupa. "Start maneuvering to distract it."
"I don't like the idea of splitting up," said Bolorma. "It weakens us."
"Who stays?" asked Haar.
After a second's silence, Bolorma said, "I'll do it. Erden, get the Object. Meet me at Topside Dome. And I want all three of you to remember that I know more about you than you think I do, and I can track you down if you try to skip out on me."
"I would be extremely disappointed if you didn't," said Pashupa.
Erden and Bolorma shared a suite in the Institute's guesthouse, with two bedrooms and unlimited bathwater. Erden settled into a routine of intense scholarship mixed with absurd self-indulgence. She woke early and breakfasted with Bolorma on real fruit and eggs, then presented herself at the archive just before opening time. She worked steadily until the archive closed, exercised for an hour (Bolorma insisted), had dinner sent up, and spent an hour in a hot bath before sleep.
Bolorma had no routine at all. Sometimes she spent the whole day in her room; sometimes she vanished for as much as a week without any warning. She often joined Erden for her daily workout, scolding her if she wasn't progressing fast enough.
"I've decided to try a new approach," said Erden at breakfast after eight weeks had passed. When Bolorma grunted encouragingly, she continued, "All the accounts of the third Object are full of inconsistencies and lies. I have to assume they're all bogus."
"You're giving up?"
"No, no. Just a new approach. I'm going to look for silences. If we assume that, say, the Institute has the third Object and is keeping it secret, then one would expect higher-level Institute scholars would tend to publish fewer speculations about it than other groups."
"What if they're just not interested?"
"I've got about five thousand years of literature to search. If an academic fashion can endure that long, it's probably significant."
That analysis took her three weeks, and when it was done she presented her findings to Bolorma. "I think I've traced it—at least, the broad outlines of its history. Five thousand years ago it was in the hands of the System Co
uncil. That's the regime the Humans set up after they overthrew the Disiuq hegemony. For two thousand years the Council didn't support any research or speculation about the missing key to the Object. By comparison, the Original Reborn Temple and the Institute were responsible for more than six hundred investigations during that same period."
"Great, but where is it now?"
"I think it fell into the hands of the Old New Temple—the second Old New Temple—after the Third Holy War. The Temple went from actively looking for new Objects to condemning the search as a waste of time and resources."
"But they don't have it anymore," said Bolorma. It wasn't even a question.
"No, of course not. I think someone got hold of it during the last war. I'm going to trace the operations and try to figure out where it was and who might have taken it."
To Erden's surprise, Bolorma joined her in her research after that. She dropped all the mysterious errands and meetings and stayed in the suite with Erden. She had an amazing ability to skim through text at high speed. The two of them barely went outside for three weeks.
"We're closing in," she told Bolorma as they shared the tub after dinner. It was big enough, and despite the unlimited water Erden couldn't bear to waste a couple of hundred liters. "I've narrowed it down to one ship's crew. All I need now is some memoir, some clue."
"You've done well," said Bolorma. She gave Erden a friendly hug from behind. Erden leaned back against her, and it seemed the most natural thing in the world when Bolorma kissed her.
WITH FIFTEEN MINUTES left to fall, Object One filled half of Erden's field of vision. Most of it was still in shadow, but a brilliant curve of sunlit metal showed on one edge, faintly crosshatched by the webwork of steel cables that anchored all the walkways and cities to it. Haar and Pashupa were off to her left, the three of them linked by a tether with a comm line.
"Haar, you and Erden should curl up and inflate your crash bags. Override your suits and set them to maximum compression—that will prevent organ displacement. Erden, be sure to hold our Object against the front of your abdomen."
"What about you?" Erden asked him.
"I do not anticipate any difficulty for myself. My ancestors evolved in a high-gravity environment, so my limbs and joints can handle these forces without significant damage."
"Can you tell what the drone is doing?"
"Since none of us has been shot yet, one can deduce it did decide to pursue Bolorma and the ship. That may indicate it has confederates waiting to intercept us down below."
"You know, we're going to touch down right near the hole in the Object. We could hike over there and see if this really is the key," she said.
"No!" said Pashupa. "I absolutely forbid you to attempt that. Perhaps it would be safer if you give Object Three to me."
"Relax, I was just making a suggestion." Erden felt the bulk of the Object through the bag strapped to her chest. Then she touched the equipment pouch at her side, where the fat-mouthed little web gun Bolorma had given her was hidden.
"We have five minutes remaining," said Pashupa. "It is time for everyone to get into position. I hope neither of you objects if I say a brief prayer for the preservation of our souls."
"Go ahead," said Erden. Haar said nothing.
"O God, thou ultimate intelligence that simulates all possible Universes, we three humbly acknowledge that all our illusions of freedom and choice are the work of interactions which thou hast predetermined. We pray, therefore, that when the simulation of our lives is done, we may be gathered into thine infinite awareness, and for the first time know true freedom. For thy will alone is not constrained, and therefore thou alone art capable of mercy."
With three minutes to go, Erden asked,"Say, Pashupa, what do you think is inside the Object?"
"It violates all the laws of nature, which are God's laws. If it opens, this simulation ends and everything in it will be erased. We must prevent that at all costs."
"If God predetermines everything, why try to stop it?"
"The desire to prevent it is also God's will. We can only know which outcome God has chosen when it happens. So far, God has kept the Object sealed. That is a very important indicator of God's preferences in this matter."
"Oh. But then that means anyone who wants to open it is doomed to fail, right? So why bother stopping them?"
"We are God's tools."
"But—"
"You should assume crash position now. Relax your muscles, supercharge yourself with chlorine, and—"
The last part of Pashupa's instructions was cut off when something twenty kilometers long slammed into Erden at thirty meters per second.
They hit at a tangent, sliding and bouncing along the surface in a spray of dust, the tether snagging hundreds of little marker flags. Erden felt something hard punch into her side through the crash bag, then a sharp pain as a couple of ribs cracked. She left the surface and for a moment was terrified that she would simply rebound off into deep space on some random vector, when the tether snapped taut and yanked her back down to where Haar had grabbed one of the walkways.
"Please tell me if you still have it!" said Pashupa.
"Yes," she managed to gasp. "Are you two okay?" Her own medical display lit up inside her hood, and she felt the prick of the injector shooting her full of painkillers and bone-growth stimulators.
"One of my legs is wrenched, but I believe I can walk," said Pashupa. "It helps when one has spares."
"I'm—I can walk," said Erden. She got her boots onto the walkway and stood. The broken ribs kept surprising her, and it was difficult to tell what motions would call up a stab of pain. They were still on the nightside of the Object. Her suit lamp created an oval of reality in the darkness.
Almost by reflex, Erden connected her tether to the walkway guideropes. Pashupa disconnected himself and approached her. His tail was raised. "My dear Erden, I am afraid I must ask you to hand over the Object. Put it down on the walkway and then back up ten meters. Haar, if either of you move I shall not hesitate to kill you both. Your suits are not designed to stop lasers."
Erden knelt and unfastened her bag. Here in the light of Pashupa's suit lamp she could do nothing but obey.
Then Haar shot past just over Erden's head, leaping on a flat trajectory right at Pashupa. The flash of Pashupa's laser lit up the entire landscape for a microsecond with grainy purple light. Erden could see the giant Arekh's hood fly apart in a spray of air and vaporized flesh.
Haar didn't even slow down. Despite having its head blown off and its breathing air venting into space, Haar grabbed Pashupa, slashing its claws through its own suit and into Pashupa's as if the armor fabric wasn't there.
Erden screamed uselessly into her hood as she watched the headless giant tear apart the struggling Shupi. Pashupa's laser-tipped tail thrashed wildly, scoring the walkway with bubbling lines and blasting apart Haar's shoulder. Erden curled herself into a ball around the bag holding the Object, even though she was much more vulnerable than it was. After a few seconds she stopped seeing purple flashes through her eyelids and dared to raise her head.
Haar stood over her, with no head and several deep holes in its torso still leaking boiling blood. Its suit was in tatters.
"Give me the Object," it said. The voice was Haar's regular translator chip, but the speech was all wrong.
"Who are you? You're not Haar."
"Haar was given a neural implant seed, which activated when it detected the Object you hold. It overrode Haar's nervous system and continued operating when Haar's brain was destroyed."
"You're a Godmind."
"A tiny fragment of one. Give me the Object."
"What are you going to do with it?"
"Give me the Object now."
"I'll throw it into space if you don't get back!" she yelled. "Look, maybe we can work out a deal? I just want to study it, find out what it does. What do you want?"
"It is too dangerous to exist."
"Keep back! I'm serious!" she said. "If I
throw it, it'll orbit and come down somewhere else. Anybody could find it. You don't want that."
It didn't answer, but shot out one of Haar's arms faster than Erden could react. The claws clamped over her hood. The other arm reached more gently for the bag.
Then something knocked Erden back, away from the undead Haar. She flew up until her tether sprung taut, then slammed down onto the surface of the Object. The bag containing Object Three in it punched her in the stomach as she landed, and she screamed as she felt her broken ribs flex.
When she could get her breath, she opened her eyes. Haar's clawed hand still gripped her head, but there was nothing but space past the shreds of wrist. Erden pried the claws off and tossed away the hand.
The place where Haar had been standing was the epicenter of a huge splatter of fluids and debris, and the walkway itself was completely melted away. Beyond the haze of freezing vapor Erden could see the Jewel-Bright Hero touch down on the surface of the Object. A huge hole gaped in one side of the hull, and a moment later Bolorma climbed out through the opening and down to the surface.
She was carrying an enormous pistol connected to a powerpack on her back. The whole thing had a weird, fuzzy appearance as if its entire surface was covered with detail too small to see. She said nothing as she made her way past Haar's condensing remains to where Erden waited.
"You took the real one instead of the fake," said Bolorma.
Erden didn't bother lying. "I have to find out what it does. What happened to the ship?"
"This," said Bolorma, raising the enormous gun. "It's Godmind tech. When I found the fake I just blew off that whole part of the hull from inside, in case the bomb was real after all. Then I blew away the drone in case it was planning to double-cross me, too."
"I'm glad you're okay. Here." Erden held out the Object.
"I ought to kill you." The gun twisted in Bolorma's grip until it pointed precisely between Erden's eyes.
"I never lied," said Erden. "I told you I want to know what's inside."
"I thought I had seduced you," said Bolorma. "I was going to use you to find it and then ditch you with the others. But I changed my plan! "