Ascension

by Jeannie van Rompaey

  ‘You’ve heard the latest, I suppose?’ Thor continues. He doesn’t wait for an answer. ‘Sati and Jaga have had an almighty row. Sati wants to turn the basement into a luxurious living space for herself. A kind of Arabian palace. I’m talking about the area originally designated for the museum, where you could have been the curator.’

  I’m hardly listening. My ambitions have grown considerably since then. Being curator of a museum, wherever it is sited, is not one of them.

  ‘I haven’t really being following events at C55,’ I tell him. ‘I’ve had enough of that place and of Sati.’

  ‘You should tap in to the sectoid-mag to keep you up to date. It’s a laugh if nothing else. It won’t be long before Sati finds she’s out of her depth. Jaga is stronger than we thought. Ra knew what he was doing when he made her joint chief.’

  The mention of Ra reminds me that I have an appointment with him this afternoon. I push my half-finished meal aside, make my excuses to Thor and agree to meet him later to go sharking at the disco-cube.

  Once back at my workstation in the compu-centre I think about Ra. As well as being CEO of Worldwideculture, Ra is also head of this compound. It’s Ra who has given me a second chance. What I don’t know is why. Has he recognised my extraordinary skills and intelligence and brought me here to assist him?

  Or has he decided to keep me close to him because he doesn’t trust me? If so, he’s right. He must know I’m a hacker and a code-breaker and therefore a subversive. He may think it better to keep me in range of his huge central eye.

  Ra knows I’m ambitious but he doesn’t know the extent of that ambition. Nobody does. It makes my head spin to think of it. I intend to unseat him and replace him as leader of Worldwideculture. Imagine it – me, Heracles, the supreme leader of all the sectoids. When that happens – I won’t say if, I must think positive – when that happens I won’t pussyfoot around making stupid speeches like Ra. I’ll be a man of action. For a start I’ll have Sati assassinated – burnt as a witch – and give Kali back control of C55. I’ll eliminate a few unproductive compounds and create new ones. After that I intend to explore the wilderness. It can’t still be polluted after all these years. I’ll employ researchers to find out. If it’s pollution-free, I’ll commission new buildings, new cities. Why not? All the best architects are here in C99. I’ll build palaces in different parts of the Earth and kit them out with beautiful female mutants. I’ll build a high tower and call it the Heracles Tower as a reminder of my virility and the Heracles mausoleum will house my remains when I die. Oh yes, I’m ambitious all right. Very. With confidence and careful planning I can make these things happen.

  Today I am to see Ra about a new project. He’s bound to want to exploit me, to take advantage of my superior intelligence, but I won’t give him all my ideas, just enough to make him dependent on me. I intend to out-manipulate the manipulator.

  He sits behind his desk, his great trunk of a neck supporting his three heads, the giant eye in the central forehead focused on me as I amble in and sprawl in the shaper opposite him.

  ‘I have great plans for you,’ he informs me.

  And I’ve got great plans for you, I think. Whiz bang you’re dead, man.

  ‘We have had our differences in the past, Heracles. There were times when I despaired of you.’ He moves his eyes to the right.

  Head Two begins to speak. ‘You have to learn not to be led by your emotions, not to lose your temper at the least provocation and….’ what passes for a smile crosses its ugly mug, ‘not to fall in love so easily.’

  Before I have time to consider a reply, Head Three butts in. Her voice is full of sadness. ‘You have not always been loyal to us, Heracles. If you are to work with us that will have to change.’

  I open my mouth to assure her that I am a changed mutant humanoid, but Head Two is speaking again. ‘Your loyalty to Kali has been noted. Now you must transfer that loyalty to us.’

  Head Three says, ‘We have been disappointed by some of your seditious activities – your hacking of compus and code-breaking of the teleports.’

  ‘On the other hand,’ says Head Two, smirking, ‘we admire the way you were able to use those skills to do everything in your power to achieve your objective. What we would like you to do is to employ those skills again but this time to use them – not for selfish purposes – but for the benefit of Worldwideculture.’

  The central head takes over the lecture. ‘You will work directly for me, report directly to me and your one and only loyalty will be to me. How do you feel about that?’

  I’m gob-smacked. Everything is going better than I expected. ‘What exactly do you want me to do?’

  ‘Your first task is to check out the efficiency of Durga’s army.’

  Fantastic. A chance to go and see the golden warriors I’ve heard so much about. What an opportunity.

  ‘Of course,’ says Ra’s central head, ‘I could go to C98 myself, but I would only see what Durga intends me to see. She would put on a special show for me to demonstrate how great she is and how spectacular her army is, but I’ll be none the wiser.’

  ‘Whereas if I go,’ I suggest, ‘I stand more chance of finding out what’s going on by chatting casually to members of the workforce and to individual warriors.’

  ‘No,’ says the central head. ‘No, no, no,’ say the three heads one after the other. ‘That is not the plan.’

  Head One leans forward and focuses his huge dark eye on me. ‘What I want you to do, Heracles, is to hack into Durga’s secret files and discover exactly what she is proposing to do and how likely it is that – if carried out – her plan will succeed.’

  He informs me that I am to have an office to myself with a compu that has almost unlimited access to the documents and accounts of the other sectoids.

  ‘Almost unlimited access,’ he says, ‘but not quite. There are always some files that are kept secret. Even from me. They are stored deep in the system but I’m sure you can find them, Heracles.’

  I’m sure I can. ‘Thank you, Sir. I assure you that your faith in me will be justified.’

  ‘I hope so,’ he says dryly. ‘I know Durga is plotting something. It is up to you to discover exactly what.’

  A private office fitted out with a giant console and multi-screens which show, at a flick of a switch, what is going on in all the sectoids. Great. The whole world revealed to me without me having to move a muscle. The compu and auto-put is a complex organism but it won’t take me long to get used to its idiosyncrasies. I set up a device that shows me when Ra is online observing me. It gives me a little leeway to do a bit of extra-curriculum research of my own. When I’m ready. To begin with I don’t intend to give him cause to think that I am doing anything but work for him. I am to send him a report of my findings at the end of every day.

  Having this big private workspace turns out to have other advantages. It’s as if my credit rating in the popularity stakes have gone up several notches.

  Thor is dead impressed. ‘Heh, man, you must have done something right to be given this,’ he says, walking round the console, admiring the compu and multi-screens.

  I warn him not to touch anything. ‘This is a very sensitive machine. No one is permitted to touch it but me.’

  He’s a bit miffed when I click off the images and refuse to let him look at what is going on in the other sectoids.

  The respect that my promotion generates in C99 is very gratifying. Mutant humanoids I’ve never met before nod and smile at me. I nod graciously back and note their faces and names. Thor is of help in identifying them. Later when I need supporters for my schemes I’ll remember them. As for the females, overnight my chances to pull have increased a hundredfold. I no longer have to take what I can get. I can be really picky. I choose only the hottest. It’s like being presented with a box of assorted chocolates all with delicious centres and having to decide which one to sample first. When I start to swing my hips, cavorting to George Michael or Robbie Williams, I am immediately
surrounded by a flock of female mutant humanoids. I grin at them all but scrutinize them carefully. By the time a slow number begins, I have already decided which to choose to dance with up close and personal and, by the end of the evening, well….

  Thor sulks a bit. ‘It’s not you they’re interested in but your power. They think your connection to Ra will keep them safe. They look on you as an insurance policy. They’re just using you, man.’

  I grin and shrug. Why should I care? I’m using them too and having a hell of a time. Powerful humanoids have always found it easy to procure the females they want. Nothing wrong with that. Thor is just jealous. It’s not just quantity, it’s quality that counts and he can’t compete with me in that department.

  One particular female seems determined not to succumb to my charms. I see her in the disco-cube most nights. She rarely dances but when she does take to the floor she moves with a rare grace.

  Athene. I remember her from the last time I was here. Ra favoured her, I seem to remember. She’s quite something to look at. Apart from the extra eye in the centre of her forehead she doesn’t appear to have any other visible mutations. She has high cheekbones and is beautiful in a classical way, like a statue of a Greek goddess made of white alabaster or marble.

  She isn’t exactly antagonistic towards me. Just indifferent. Her coolness may not be deliberate. It’s just that I rarely have to ask any female to dance. They either cluster round me in a group, leaving it up to me to make my choice of partner, or slide up to me, showing their intent by the lift of an eyebrow or a hand on my arm.

  Athene does neither of these things. In the daytime, when I see her in the dino-cube, she’s always immersed in conversation with other colleagues and doesn’t even look up when I pass.

  Thor says I’m only interested in her because she shows no interest in me. There may be some truth in that. I’ve quickly become accustomed to being the centre of attention. To be ignored by this one female is disconcerting, to say the least.

  ‘Get over her,’ says Thor. ‘There’s plenty more females to choose from, lots of them more attractive than her.’

  That’s his opinion, not mine. Athene’s cool beauty haunts me and her lack of interest in me does increase my desire. I look her up on the staff list on auto-put to find out more about her but draw a blank. She exists but doesn’t appear to have a specific occupation. That could mean that her position is classified. I consider hacking into the hidden data but hesitate. It’s early days yet to delve into business that has nothing to do with the task in hand. I don’t want to do anything to make Ra suspicious. There is no doubt that he monitors everything I do.

  ‘Don’t even go there,’ says Thor, when he sees I’m still looking at her. ‘They say that she and Ra are an item.’

  I don’t believe it. How can she be in a sexual relationship with a mutant humanoid with no body, only a tree trunk of a neck and three heads? No one has ever seen Ra other than behind a desk. Apart from her, perhaps. The thought makes my skin crawl. The only parts of C99 I can’t bring up on screen are Ra’s office, his dormo-cube and any other private areas he may occupy. Maybe Athene has personal knowledge of these places. My interest in her takes on a different focus.

  In the dino-cube she is sitting alone for once. I amble over as casually as possible. She doesn’t look up, though my shadow falls over her plate.

  ‘Hi, I’m Heracles,’ I begin.

  She does look up then, her forehead creased in a puzzled frown. She has no idea why I should be addressing her. ‘I know who you are,’ she says.

  ‘I wondered if – when you have a spare moment – we could have a little chat?’

  She looks amused. ‘Why? What have we got to chat about?’

  ‘I’d really like to get to know you. At your convenience, of course.’

  Just in case she hasn’t heard of my promotion, I add, ‘You could come to my workspace, the office next to Ra’s.’

  She twists her mouth into a wry smile. ‘I know where you work. I should do. It was my office and my job before it was yours.’

  I feel my mouth drop open.

  ‘Oh, you didn’t know,’ she says. ‘I thought you wanted to meet me to pick my brains, but if you didn’t know you were my replacement, I don’t understand what we have to talk about. Unless – oh I see – it’s a chat up line. You expect me to be one of your tarts.’

  She gives short laugh and stands up. ‘Dream on. It’s not going to happen.’

  She walks away with smooth assurance. I’ve never seen any mutant humanoid move so effortlessly. Odysseus thinks he’s the smoothest mover ever, but he’s a joke. He has to concentrate hard to glide even the shortest distance, chin sticking out like a clown, but the way Athene moves is the stuff of dreams.

  She’s gone. I’ve blown it. There’s nothing more I can do. Thor looks at me from the other side of the dino-cube, puts his thumb up and then down in a questioning gesture. He expects me to tell him what happened, but I don’t want to talk to him. I stomp off to my office, which somehow doesn’t seem so special now.

  I sit in front of the compu but don’t feel like working. So this was Athene’s office. She was Ra’s assistant before me. No wonder she hasn’t joined in the general adulation. Ra got rid of her because he needed my special skills but I’m sure that if I make a balls-up of this project, I’ll find myself expendable too. Next time it would be the wilderness for me for sure, but Athene has been demoted and is still here. Perhaps because she is Ra’s mistress. The thought disgusts me. I don’t want to believe it but it comes to me that I’ve never seen her dance with any males in the disco-cube. She only takes to the floor with one or two females who dance individually, as is the custom. It fits. As Ra’s partner she would have to be discreet.

  That night I decide not to go to the disco-cube. Thor raises an eyebrow. He thinks I must be ill. I tell him I have work to do. I haven’t told him about my conversation with Athene. Better not. I don’t trust him to keep his two big mouths shut.

  A bit of research for Ra. He wants me to find Durga’s secret files. First I flick on the screen to see what’s going on in C98.

  The warriors are practising their skills: fencing, archery, shooting. A familiar figure is draped over a shaper watching them. Isis. I zoom in and enlarge the image. She’s all dressed up in some sort of gold robe. She’s a nice enough female but none too bright. If I can persuade Ra to let me visit C98 I should be able to chat her up and pump her for some inside knowledge. I sigh. Fat chance. Ra hasn’t employed me for my negotiating powers, but for my computer skills. I’d better try to hack in to Durga’s personal files and see what I can find out. It takes some time but at last I think I have it – an untitled file with a five star marker, hidden in the trash. I hesitate. Ra told me that if I find something unusual to pass it over to him immediately, unopened, but I’m tempted to open it. If I give it to Ra and it doesn’t contain any relevant data, he’ll think me an incompetent fool. I open it up.

  I don’t understand what I’m reading at first but a series of words stand out: planets, satellites, fresh air, above the polluted atmosphere. I scroll down. Durga appears to be planning an attack, not on an earthbound compound but on one of these satellites floating in space. As far as I can make out she’s building a huge teleport, big enough to house an army. Her army. Who lives on these satellites? Who is she intending to fight? I scroll down further and there is a list of what I assume to be the names of various satellites: Italiana, Russiana, Arabiana, Frenchinia, Germania. Each satellite appears to contain humanoids of the same nationality or at least those who speak the same language. Which ones are for English speakers? I search for one called Americana or Britannia without success, but there are some that could indicate that English speakers live there. One of them catches my eye – Paradise Island – and another – Planet Oasis.

  I scroll down again and discover accounts about the “completes”, elite, uncontaminated humanoids with no mutations, like the man in the suit who came to Headculturedom
e. They escaped from Earth to start life afresh on the satellites.

  No wonder Durga wants to attack them and make them suffer as we have suffered. Pay them back for leaving us to rot in the wilderness while they fled to live in the clean, unpolluted air above the clouds.

  A knock on the door. Damn. Just as it’s getting interesting that bloody Thor has turned up. I’ve already told him that I’m not going sharking this evening. What the hell does he want? I ignore the knock and continue my research, but the knocking becomes persistent. I minimise the page and go the door, ready to tell him exactly what I think of him.

  It’s not Thor standing in the doorway, but Athene. She’s wearing a long silver robe and looks more desirable than ever.

  ‘I’m sorry to disturb you,’ she says, ‘but I really need to talk to you.’

  I feel my jaw dropping open again. She must think me a moron. ‘Of course. Come in,’ I say, and indicate the shaper in front of my workstation. She hesitates. I realise it must seem odd to her to sit there. She’s accustomed to sitting at the compu in what is now my place. She doesn’t sit, just stands and looks at me.

  ‘I didn’t know whom to turn to,’ she says. ‘He doesn’t trust anyone really but I thought he must trust you as he’s given you this job and this – this workspace. I can trust you, can’t I?’

  ‘Of course you can,’ I assure her. Her manner is completely different from the last time we spoke. She seems afraid. No, not exactly afraid, but unsure if she’s doing the right thing in confiding in me. She seems vulnerable – a description I never thought would apply to her.

  Athene looks down at her long, elegant fingers. They’re trembling. She clasps her hands to control them, looks up at me and says, ‘I was very rude to you this morning and I regret that. I hope you’ll accept my apology.’

  ‘Of course,’ I say again. Why am I so inarticulate in her company? I feel like a clumsy, uncoordinated lout. ‘How can I help?’

  ‘I’m not sure you can.’ She hesitates, makes up her mind and blurts out, ‘It’s Ra. He’s had a heart attack. I need to get him to Hos-sat as soon as possible.’