by Gary Gibson
It really is Kim, he decided, having spotted her there in the distance: that small, heart-shaped face framed by unruly dark brown hair cropped short, on top of a long-limbed body. He started towards her.
She stared at him, a frightened expression on her face. She was passing at the far end of a crowded corridor, too narrow for him to squeeze through quickly. By the time he had worked his way past the throng of people, she was gone. But Kim was definitely on board the Angel Station.
‘I need to see the Commander,’ Vincent demanded. He had reached an office near the cargo bays; it was a refitted fuel tank jutting out from the side of the Station. Vincent had needed to pass through at least three layers of security – mandatory scans, security men with barely concealed weapons and hostile expressions – to get this far.
‘Commander Holmes is busy right now,’ said the man behind the desk. Vincent had found out that the military used this office as an administrative buffer between themselves and the Angel Station’s civilian population.
‘I appreciate that,’ said Vincent. ‘He knows why I’m here.’
‘Can you tell me the nature of the enquiry?’ asked the man behind the desk.
Vincent shook his head. ‘Classified.’ He handed over the smartsheet he had found waiting for him on his arrival. Perhaps Vincent had been hoping people here would suddenly jump to attention, usher him through, apologizing for the delay. That didn’t happen.
The desk man nodded politely. ‘I need to check this with Commander Holmes’s office. Come back at seventeen hundred hours. We should have something back by then.’
‘It’s already been checked.’
‘Well, I’m sorry, but it’s procedure. I don’t have any notification otherwise here.’ The desk man shrugged his shoulders and gave him a friendly smile. Vincent wondered how many people were responsible for manning the desk; this was the third person he’d found here in as many days. ‘We can’t do anything without the appropriate authorization.’
He was being stalled; he could feel it in his bones. But why?
The answer came within twenty-four hours.
He woke up in the middle of the night to find the mail light on his quarters datacom blinking. He sat up groggily, found the right button, and a fresh smartsheet slid out of the datacom’s printer. It was a message from Eddie.
Not just a regular message, but an encrypted data-file locked to the security code he’d been handed by Eddie before his departure from Luna. After entering the code, he found himself watching a maximum-compression video in which Vincent could just see an amplified image of the Earth over Eddie’s shoulder. He must have recorded this at home, Vincent thought. He realized months had passed since they had last talked, but to Vincent it seemed barely a couple of weeks. Eddie really did look older, worn out.
‘Things are not good, Vincent. The news of the burster event should have gone completely public by now. There’ve been leaks, of course, and a lot of questions, but nobody above a certain level is either talking or taking any kind of stand.’ Note to self, Vincent thought: pay more attention to the news feeds.
‘I’ve been hearing a lot of stories,’ the video continued. ‘Some of them are verging on the extremely paranoid, but there’s a couple I’m not sure I can discount. I keep on hearing the same story from different sources. You’ll know about the Blight? Well, it’s spreading. It might even be out of control now.’
The Blight? Product of Angel technology, thought Vincent. A corrosive, destructive nano-organism. The bug that ate India.
‘. . . talk and more talk. But you’re talking about a disaster, a global disaster, Vincent. No other way to describe it.’ Vincent saw that wild look in Eddie’s eyes, the same one he’d seen that time Eddie had come to visit him in Antarctica. ‘Where do we go if we don’t have Earth anymore? Where do we go if we manage to devastate our own world?’
Kasper, Vincent thought immediately. Where else could we go? A genuinely Earth-like world. Even the higher orders of life there had a DNA not far removed from that found on Earth, almost certainly thanks to the aliens everyone called Angels. It was, of course, a deeply paranoid reaction. The Blight had been a problem for decades, and wasn’t likely to go away soon, but surely it wasn’t about to ravage the planet? Surely things hadn’t become so bad?
‘All I know is that, for some people, letting the Kaspians die off wouldn’t be such a bad thing because, after the radiation’s passed, they’d leave behind a world free of higher-order creatures,’ Eddie continued. ‘Which means, in the face of this global disaster back on Earth, it would be very hard to raise any serious moral objections to turning Kasper into a human colony. Now I know,’ Eddie’s pixellated features spoke quickly, one hand raised, ‘just how paranoid and ridiculous this sounds. But I have to consider all the options. All we can do here is raise the stakes, make people aware of it before it actually happens – if it does happen. Bring things out in the open. But keep doing what you can, Vincent. We need you out there. Do what you can.’
But how? thought Vincent. What was he supposed to do – stand in the middle of a crowded passageway and tell everybody the end of the world is coming, like some of the wild-eyed crazies in tattered pressure suits he’d already seen wandering the corridors here?
I can’t even get hold of the people who run the Station. And, what do you know, I try to get hold of some of the scientists running the Kasper Deep Space Array, and the whole thing is under temporary military jurisdiction. Refer to Holmes.
Despite himself, Vincent found he believed Eddie’s theories. The only bit he hadn’t known about was how serious the Blight had become. Back in Antarctica, there’d been talk about how far it could spread. How bad it could get. But all the available information then seemed to suggest it was containable, within acceptable parameters. Could that information be falsified, distorted? Perhaps it could, but it seemed so symptomatic of some dizzying descent into out-and-out madness and paranoia, where everyone was your enemy, or potential enemy. Could the sheer worry of it have affected Eddie’s mind?
If it had, it was now affecting Vincent’s too. He decided to check the public news feeds. The service in his quarters was too limited, so he went out to a coffee bar and hit the feeds there, feeling tired and fuzzy from too little sleep.
The news feed was linked to the Grid back home by dense packet bursts fed through every time the Station’s singularity was powered up. Since ships came through only a couple of times a day, it meant he was several hours behind on the most recent events, drawing instead on a localized Grid-image updated with each burst.
That was all he needed, in the end. He went looking for information about Eddie. A news item said Eddie had retired from his post, several days before. No reason given.
Vincent looked around and saw there were only a few other people about. He shook his smartsheet until it became rigid, then leaned it on one of his knees as he tapped his way through information.
I am getting very paranoid, thought Vincent, studying those few other people nearby. None of them appeared to be paying any attention to him. Nobody here is a spy, thought Vincent. Nobody here is out to get you.
Eddie sends me a note, next thing I know and he’s disappeared. There was no information, on any of the mainstream news feeds, about either the Blight or Kasper, or waves of radiation, or anything. Whatever crucial news Eddie had been trying to get out about what was happening, he seemed to have failed.
Vincent did find some related stuff in other parts of the Grid, however. Some people seemed to be paying attention, but there were the usual people proclaiming the end of the world, like the Primalists and a score of other crackpot religions. That made it hard to separate hard science from irrational preaching. And didn’t the Primalists preach that Kasper was the new Eden?
Vincent thought about that for a moment. Perhaps . . .
No, Vincent thought firmly. That way madness really does lie.
Eight
Roke
Beyond the open flap of
his tent, Roke glimpsed a hunched shadow flitting between tall marsh-roots that dangled their wide leaves down to touch the ground. Hesper’s Crown was low on the horizon, hanging over the distant mountain peaks to the south. He stepped to the open mouth of his tent. Two guards stood there, both wearing the distinctive jewellery that marked them out as native to the city of Roke’s birth. He asked them if they’d noticed anything, knowing that if it had been anything natural out there prowling on the edges of the camp, they would have seen it too.
When they told him they’d seen nothing, Roke nodded, then told them he would be leaving camp for some minutes. He needed time to think, which meant getting away from the camp.
But Seheren, the taller of the two guards, looked worried. ‘Master Roke, we were charged by the Emperor to protect you. If something happened to you, the blame would fall on us, and we’d deserve it.’
‘But I am still in command, and your orders are to follow my orders, Seheren. I don’t do things like this lightly, and I’ll only be gone a short while. If too much time passes, certainly come looking. But I assure you that that won’t be necessary.’
The expedition was, by necessity, large: a consignment of troops, plus servants, cooks, even some wives, and a small herd of icebeasts which could serve as mounts, or as a source of food, or be traded if necessary. Roke carried papers that guaranteed them safe passage through any of the cities that now formed part of Xan’s Empire. But now they had crossed the Northern Sea, a journey of two or three days by sail. Roke had not relished it, being trapped on one of several tiny vessels, whose constant swaying had not been good for his health. We were meant to be land creatures, he reflected, unsuited for the open seas.
Now they were here on the far northern shores, a long way from Tibe, and it was already considerably colder than the southern climes Roke had grown used to. Although his formative years had been spent close to these shores, revisiting this region failed to bring about any kind of nostalgic glow. Instead, it seemed merely bleak and forbidding.
Leaving the camp behind, Roke started walking towards the open land fringing the marsh-roots. When a small brown canthre came sniffing after him, he shooed at it. Looking old enough to be ready for its first embedding, he could as yet detect no glint of intelligence in its eyes. It soon gave up and wandered back to the camp.
He was alone now, the lights of the camp flickering distantly through the trees. He stared after the canthre. One day, he would die, and his flesh would be fed to other such canthres in what was known as the embedding ritual. His intelligence and his soul would flow into their receptive flesh, and they would learn to walk on two legs, and to speak.
After a few moments, a shadow moved from deep between the marsh-roots and slipped forward, hunched low. Roke could see the bright intelligence burning within its eyes, as if with some fever. The Monster opened its mouth briefly, showing, again, funereal rows of pitifully small black ruined teeth.
‘Whatever it is you have to say, Monster, say it now,’ snapped Roke. ‘I have to return to the camp.’
– Call me Sam, it said. – It is my name, after all. Do you remember what I told you about the true nature of your gods?
Roke felt a deep chill spread through his bones. ‘All too well.’
– What do you know of the city of Baul?
Roke stared at the Monster. It seemed even more ethereal, even less real, in this place of cold and shadows. ‘A story, a myth – the lost city of the gods, where the world was created. It’s a fantasy.’
– Baul is real.
Roke listened intently as the creature continued.
Ursu
Ursu remembered dying: he remembered the water sucking him down. He had no memory of spilling out of the deep tunnel caves and into the open air. He had no idea how long it had been before they found him by the river’s edge.
His memory was hazy. He remembered a voice calling to him, urging him to leap into the well – an insane, suicidal act. The tribesfolk who found him told him he had actually been dead, but that he had come back to life, raised by the god they had found him clutching.
His rescuers were from one of the many thousands of nomadic tribal families who criss-crossed the icy wastes extending between the great city settlements of the north. The routes they followed were sacred, the same paths taken by the migrating icebeasts since long before the time of the cities. The routes were now marked by great stone pillars dotted everywhere. Some of these tribes were better trusted by city-folk than others, but they all embellished their sparse nomadic existence by trading goods from one city to the next. These ancient trade routes wound through valleys and through mountain passes.
At first, the effigy of Shecumpeh was nowhere to be seen. He tried to mumble the god’s name to the tribes-folk tending to him, but they said nothing in reply. Whenever they did speak, it was in their own language, of which Ursu had no comprehension.
When he had first come to, bound and sightless, he had poked out his tongue. When it encountered dry, rough cloth, he realized he’d been stuffed into some kind of sack. The ropes were tight around his feet and arms. Long hours passed, giving him plenty of time to speculate in the most negative ways on what had happened to him.
It was only with nightfall that his restraints were cut away. When released, the cold summer light of Hesper’s Crown dazzled his eyes with its great pearly band stretching across the horizon. When he could focus, he saw he lay in the centre of an encampment, surrounded by tents, with small open fires dotted around in the semi-dark.
Somewhere far out on the tundra, he reckoned. He looked up, and saw a series of low hills extending into the distance. They were strangely familiar. Much closer were snow-apple trees scattered over their lower slopes, sufficiently ordered to show that they had once been carefully planted in long rows. Now wild roots clung to them, and sap-leeches, and he realized this was the city orchard.
He saw several adult females nearby with their newly embedded offspring tottering upright as they learned the unaccustomed art of walking on two legs. Unembedded canthres also darted here and there on all fours, their long snouts quivering in the cold air. A distant rushing of water indicated the Teive, which also nourished the orchard. The tribe had probably followed the course of the river for part of their never-ending journey. Some of the females came to him and tended to his wounds, all minor scrapes and bumps. They told him the story of how he had been found.
While this was happening, a couple of adult males sat by him, watching him carefully, their deep-set dark eyes glittering in the starry dusk. They sat with their traditional tribal knives – short, serrated affairs with handles made from leather dusted with baked icewort, so that the handles glittered in the night – lying handy before them, in the dust.
‘Where am I?’ he croaked.
‘Priest?’ said a voice behind him. He turned to look into a pair of wary eyes. A young female, not much older than himself. She pointed at his chest. ‘Are you a priest?’
‘Yes. I don’t know. No.’ What was he indeed? ‘I used to be.’
The younger of the males barked something in his own language at the young female, who hissed something back. She turned to Ursu. ‘He wants to know if you’re the one the soldiers are looking for.’
Ursu fought a powerful instinct to fold his ears flat against his head. As he felt them quiver above his scalp, he flicked them alert, trying to hide the gesture of fear. ‘What soldiers?’
She eyed him unbelievingly. ‘You’re from the city,’ she said firmly, ‘and you had something with you. I think those soldiers want it badly. You were lying by the river when Eif found you.’ She pointed to the young male who had spoken to her.
Eif was studying him intently, an unpleasant look on his face.
Ursu asked the question uppermost in his mind. ‘Can I go?’
The young female seemed to find this amusing. She turned to Eif and mumbled something to him. Eif stared at Ursu with contempt, but what was it, Ursu wondered, that brought that gl
int of fear into Eif’s eye?
He realized she was questioning him on behalf of their whole tribe, which consisted of perhaps a little over thirty individuals of all ages, from youngest to oldest, not counting the canthres. ‘But you’re our guest,’ said the girl, and giggled.
‘What are you going to do with me?’ Ursu suddenly felt defeated.
‘That depends,’ said the female. ‘My father hopes to trade you to the soldiers. He would have done so already, but he thinks he can drive the price up. He believes the thing you carried might be the god they are looking for, and they may be stupid enough to pay a lot of money for it – and for you.’
Ursu blinked. They had Shecumpeh? ‘You still have it?’
‘Yes, we have your little clay god,’ said the older of the two males, his ears distinctively rich with jewels. The girl’s father, perhaps? So she wasn’t the only who could speak in a civilized tongue.
‘You . . . intend to sell it to the soldiers?’
The older male slid forward quickly, in a fluid motion. Ursu felt his ears instinctively flatten in fear, but he forced himself to keep calm. It wasn’t easy. The older male nodded slightly as if he approved.
‘You know, the soldiers flayed some of your priests to discover its whereabouts.’
‘I don’t know what’s been happening.’
‘You knew enough to escape with your god.’ The older male leaned back on his haunches, withdrew his dagger, and held it close to one of Ursu’s ears. ‘Here’s what we’re going to do, then. You know what it signifies if I cut off one of your ears?’