by Paul Stewart
In the far distance, the colour of the water changes from dark green to an intense turquoise. Small submerged islands glow orange and pink and yellow. In places, they puncture the surface of the water, and are ringed with white as waves splash against them . . .
Hot swarf! The ocean zone is more wonderful than I could ever have imagined.
‘Cronos! York!’ Belle’s voice breaks into my thoughts.
I turn to see that Belle has reached us on the platform. But she is not alone. Rising up and hovering out of reach above her is a lens-head.
Cronos reacts with great speed, pulling a globe weapon from his flight-suit and holding it up. It glows and emits a burst of white noise. The lens-head spins out of control, and Belle leaps up and lands a kick that sends it crashing to the platform. It skids across the metal surface and comes to rest at my feet. Its lights flicker, then go out.
Belle joins us as Cronos and I are looking the zilched droid over.
‘We don’t have much time,’ says Cronos. ‘There’ll be others behind it.’
Just then, heads appear in the water below the platform. Gill-people – six of them – together with a transparent visiglass sphere which bobs to the surface moments later.
Cronos picks up the droid and puts it under his arm. ‘Follow me,’ he says, climbing down from the platform.
The gill-people are holding the sphere steady in the water as a panel slides back to reveal a circular opening. Cronos climbs inside and settles himself in a clear moulded seat. Belle follows him, and I take her hand as I climb down after her.
Inside, we sit next to Cronos, our seats tilting back as we do so, and the sphere seals itself with a soft hiss. We start to descend, the water rising up around us higher and higher, until it closes over our heads.
The four gill-men and two gill-women go with us. At first, as they dive down into the water, plumes of silver bubbles shoot out from the sides of their necks, but they soon peter out as their gills take over from their lungs. With their hands at their sides, acting as rudders, their bodies ripple and their webbed feet flip up and down, powering them down through the water at incredible speed.
It looks exciting. These humans, modified with their wings, their gills . . . they’re just so amazing.
An immense fish with fat lips and sleepy-looking eyes rises up from the depths. It swims beside us for a while, its mouth opening and closing as it feeds, before flicking its tail and swimming off, back into the shadows. A shoal of pale snake-like fish glide past, the tips of their tails flashing with an intermittent green light.
And then I hear it. Booming howls and lulling moans.
I recognize the sound straight away. I heard it before, in the chamber beneath the ocean. But now, in the ocean itself, it is twice as clear. I turn, and there, emerging from the shadows far ahead, is the great whale, its huge paddle-shaped flippers driving it through the water towards us. Its sleek body ripples with graceful movement; its tapered head tilts.
And it is not alone. There are three others with it; two as large as the first, the other a baby. They circle round us in great gliding spirals as we continue to move down, staring in at us with their dark, unblinking eyes. It’s as if, like the gill-people swimming out in front, these huge ocean creatures are escorting us to our destination.
It is dark down here in the ocean depths, but suddenly the water lights up below us, and I realize that we’re heading for a mass of glowing luminescence. As we approach, I see that it is made up of millions of jellyfish with long dangling stingers and pulsating bodies. Immune to their poison, the gill-people swim ahead, and the jellyfish part as they get closer, creating a living tunnel for them to go down.
We follow the gill-people into it, and the globe is enveloped in blue pulsing light. At the centre of this living fortress is a visiglass sphere, a hundred times bigger than the one we’re sitting in. We begin to slow, and up ahead I see figures, dim outlines, moving about in the interior of the larger sphere.
‘Welcome to the Citadel,’ says Cronos as we approach a circular airlock.
It opens, and we glide inside.
I stand looking out of the sphere of the underwater Citadel. Beyond its curved visiglass wall, the vast bloom of jellyfish swim in ever-changing patterns, providing the perfect camouflage.
Their translucent bodies flex and pulse, lacy frills ripple with glowing light, and long frond-like tentacles trail below them. Pink and pale yellow, lilac and green, the luminescence from the jellyfish lights up the sphere with a gentle shifting glow. I’m hypnotized by the strange, weightless movements of these creatures.
Of all the extraordinary zones I have come across in the Mid Deck, this is the most beautiful.
Cronos and the gill-people hurried off clutching the drone when we first arrived at the Citadel, leaving Belle and me by the airlock. I don’t know how long we’ve been standing here, but I don’t mind. I could look at the ever-changing display outside for hours.
Although the interior of the sphere is in semi-darkness, in the shimmering light I can see figures moving up and down the various levels. None of them pay us any attention. Finally, though, Cronos returns, and we follow him into the dimly lit interior.
Then I see Dextra. She’s alive!
Standing on a raised platform in the centre of the sphere, Dextra is surrounded by data-banks and info-pods, holo-units and memory-stacks, and the oval spheres on their thin urilium frames – all the gear I saw the Outsiders rescuing from the hub-generator. It’s up and running again now, screens flashing, circuits humming.
A fur-man is hunched over an info-stack close by. Next to him, a couple of gill-men are standing at one of the oval spheres, while just beyond them, a tall figure plucks and sweeps at the holo-screen in the air before him with scaly fingers.
Dextra, her wings outstretched, is quietly directing them all.
Cronos, Belle and I climb a flight of steps to join her. I look around me. There can’t be more than twenty Outsiders here.
‘Are these the only survivors?’ I ask her, shocked.
Dextra lowers her wings and smiles. ‘No, York,’ she says, indicating the various holo-screens. ‘We had prepared our evacuation procedures precisely. No one was lost.’
‘Thank the Half-Lifes for that!’ I exclaim. ‘Petra Crockett said you were all dead.’
Dextra nods. ‘She would like it if that was true,’ she says sadly. ‘The Citadel is our info-hub of last resort,’ she tells me. ‘Unfortunately, it’s not big enough to accommodate everyone. But from here, we can keep in touch with the others in their individual zones. And most importantly of all,’ she adds, ‘the Citadel protects our most precious resource.’
I look again at the rows of tech-gear. ‘All this,’ I say, nodding towards it.
Dextra laughs, a soft, gentle sound. ‘No, York,’ she says again, and passes a hand over a control panel.
At our feet, the surface of the platform becomes transparent, and I look through it to a lower level, where children are sleeping on mats of soft grey moss. Hundreds of them.
She passes her hand back over the panel, and the scene below vanishes.
‘But their parents are risking everything out in the zones,’ Dextra says, suddenly serious. ‘Zone 8 is increasingly unstable. The entire bio-engineering hub has been compromised. Without more resources we will not be able to hold back accelerated evolution . . .’
Cronos nods. He, like Dextra, is looking at me intently. So is Belle.
‘But before I ask you what I must ask you, York,’ she says, ‘there is something I want you to have.’
She turns to one of the oval spheres on its urilium frame. It is packed full of kit – micro-data slides, weapon globes, containers of regeneration wrap . . . and my backcan. She picks it up and returns it to me. I haven’t seen it since the raid on the Outsiders’ camp.
‘Cronos here saved it for you,’ Dextra says. ‘Open it, York.’
I take it in my hands. ‘Thanks,’ I say.
To be hones
t, the sleepcrib and ration packs it contains aren’t that important. But I don’t want to appear ungrateful. I hold the backcan up, and as I do so, I see movement through the perforations in the outer casing. I flick the switch at the top, the lid pops up – and a small furry head appears, nose twitching and eyes blinking into the light.
‘Caliph!’ I cry out as the little skeeter leaps up onto my shoulder, then jumps down into my arms. He’s purring and squeaking, nuzzling against my chest, then lapping at my chin with his tongue. ‘Caliph! Caliph!’ I laugh. ‘I thought I’d lost you for good!’
I look up to see Cronos and Dextra smiling back at me. Belle laughs, and I’m astonished because I’m not sure I’ve heard her laugh before.
‘I told Dextra how much Caliph meant to you,’ she says.
I stare at her, amazed. ‘You did this for me?’
Belle nods. ‘Because I like you, York. Because I knew it would make you happy.’ She pauses. ‘Because we are friends.’
And I don’t know what to say. So I hug her. Caliph joins in, jumping from my shoulder to hers and back again; the three of us, reunited.
‘Thank you. Thank you so much,’ I say, stroking the little squirming critter; tickling his belly, his neck, behind his ears; pressing my face to his. ‘Thank you all!’
When I look up again, the expression on Dextra’s face has changed. The smile has gone, and her gaze is intense once more.
‘There is something I must ask you to do,’ she says. ‘Something that will test your resolve to the limit.’
I look back at her. At Cronos. At Caliph . . . and Belle.
‘Name it,’ I say.
I walk towards the great visiglass dome of the Sanctuary. The lens-head droid hovers at my shoulder.
I’m terrified. But there’s no turning back now.
As I climb the stone steps, the circular door of the airlock slides open, and inside there are two spindle-leg droids waiting to meet me. I take a deep breath and go in. The lens-head follows. The airlock shuts behind us, and I’m back in the decontamination chamber.
A panel in the ceiling opens and the lens-head rises up and disappears through it for its own decontamination protocol.
‘Decontamination sequence activated,’ comes a familiar voice.
The visiglass tube descends. The red lasers cut away my clothes and turn them to ashes. My skin is probed and prodded. Antiseptic spray wafts over me, then the jets of warm air.
I’m given the all-clear, and dress in the Sanctuary clothes laid out.
The lens-head reappears at my side as the protocol ends and the door ahead of us hisses open. I walk through into the atrium – and am confronted by Travis.
He has a pulser aimed at my head. Behind him, Sanctuary-dwellers crowd the cavernous hall, while others stare down from every level of the dome, their faces pressed to the visiglass.
‘On your knees, traitor,’ says Travis.
I do as he says.
Petra Crockett is speeding down towards us in an elevator. All eyes turn as she steps out and strides across the floor towards us. As she approaches, I see that her face is drained of all colour; her lips pinched and thin.
She clearly wasn’t expecting to see me again.
‘Please, Petra,’ I begin. My mouth is dry and my voice cracks. ‘You must give me a chance to explain.’
Petra stops beside Travis and glares down at me.
‘Explanations are unnecessary,’ she says, and her voice is cold and hard. ‘We all saw what you did in the arena . . .’
‘I didn’t destroy the droids. Belle did!’ I protest. ‘She’s a zoid, manufactured in the Outer Hull. She turned against me, when all I wanted was to get her back from the mutants.’
Petra stares back at me, the expression on her face a mixture of disbelief and contempt.
‘And I’m sorry I sabotaged the safe-suits,’ I go on. ‘But I heard Travis pleading with you to mount a rescue mission, and I didn’t want any of you to risk your lives. For me, the safety of the Sanctuary and everyone who lives in it comes first, and always will.’
I’m talking quickly, looking first at Petra, then at Travis, then at the other Sanctuary-dwellers. I spread my arms. There are tears in my eyes.
‘Forgive me, I beg you,’ I plead. ‘I’ve learned my lesson. Belle was a machine, nothing more. But you . . . you are my friends.’
Petra Crockett still looks sceptical.
‘Belle was programmed by my people back in the Outer Hull to serve. To serve me. But then, when we got separated, the mutants tampered with her motherboard. They made her serve them instead.’ I shake my head. ‘I was such a fool to have tried to rescue her. You see, I overheard you ordering the destruction of the Outsiders’ lair, and I went there for my zoid. It was a mistake.’
Petra Crockett raises an eyebrow.
‘But I swear to you,’ I say, meeting her gaze, ‘everything I did was with the best of intentions. When I reached the mutants’ lair, Belle betrayed me to them. I was their prisoner. There was nothing I could do. I’m only thankful that the detonation droids arrived when they did. The mutants were totally wiped out – but Belle was still going to kill me. If your droids hadn’t found us when they did, I would be dead.’
I feel hot, sweaty. I’m speaking faster and faster, my voice trembling with passion.
‘And later, in the arena,’ I go on, ‘I didn’t have a chance to explain. You were all there – my fellow humans, my friends – looking down at me and I so wanted to tell you everything. To explain. But the pain . . .’
I leave the word hanging in the air.
I survey my audience. People are nudging one another, whispering behind their hands. Travis, too, looks uncertain. He has lowered his pulser.
‘And yet you went with them,’ Petra Crockett says, her icy voice cutting through the atmosphere. ‘The winged mutant and the zoid girl. The last transmission from the surveillance droid here showed the three of you standing on a platform in the ocean zone.’
She folds her arms.
‘I was their prisoner, Petra,’ I tell her again. ‘The winged mutant used his globe weapon to disable the droid. But I have scavenged it and brought the evidence back here to the Sanctuary. So you can see for yourself what actually happened.’
For a moment, Petra Crockett says nothing. She’s frowning, her eyes thoughtful. Then she gives a little nod to Travis.
‘My chamber, now,’ she says. ‘Bring York and the droid.’
The elevator whisks us to the upper chamber; me, Travis, the lens-head droid and Petra Crockett herself. After the hubbub and tension of the entrance hall, Petra Crockett’s chamber is a haven of peace and tranquillity.
Holo-screens flicker into life around the chair at eye level. Conversations, hundreds of them, murmur from panels in the synth-moulded head-rest. Info-cables which sprout from the arm-pads pulse with data.
The chair is supported by a single arched urilium stem, which revolves slowly as Petra surveys the images in front of her. There are views from all over the Sanctuary. The bev-counter, the crèche, the gym, the sleep-pods . . . Plus more images from outside, which are being sent back by lens-heads in the zones.
From her vantage point in this chair, Petra Crockett seems to see and hear everything.
The lens-head droid I brought with me hovers beside the chair and connects itself to one of the info-cables. I can see the dent from Belle’s boot on its black body.
Petra waves a hand and twenty-eight holo-screens become one. It’s dark at first. Then a bright scrawl of lines appear – which abruptly settle down to a clear picture.
And there’s the ocean-zone platform at the top of the frozen waterfall.
Cronos is standing to one side of me. He’s got a globe weapon in his hand. Belle’s next to him, her head half turned away as she scans the vast green and turquoise ocean.
‘There’s no one here,’ she’s saying. ‘Just like in every other zone. They’re all dead.’
Cronos waves his weapon at me. ‘Tha
nks to him,’ he snarls.
Belle turns. Her face looks impassive. ‘What shall we do with him?’ she says.
‘Kill him,’ Cronos tells her, and smiles unpleasantly. ‘Slowly.’
Belle nods grimly.
She takes a step towards me, one hand outstretched, and is about to seize my arm when I twist sharply round and seize the weapon from the wing-man’s grasp. Belle lunges towards me. But I’m too quick for her. I activate the globe, and a blast of white noise makes the image pixillate and break up.
When it reappears, Belle is lying on the platform. She shakes and judders as a blue light spreads out all over her body. Her hair’s on end. Her eyes roll back till only the whites are showing. Her head snaps forward in one last spasm of movement . . .
Then nothing.
In front of me, Cronos slumps to his knees, his wings crumpling behind him. There is a cutter embedded in his chest. My cutter. His blood-covered hands clutch hopelessly at the handle.
I see Petra Crockett wince, but she doesn’t look away.
Up on the holo-screen, I lift a boot and push the mutant firmly in the back. He topples from the platform and, arms and legs flailing wildly, hits the water. Cronos sinks, then comes bobbing up to the surface. And there he remains, wings rigid and outstretched, floating face down in the water.
Then the image jumps and my face appears, large and close up. I’m staring directly into the lens, my eyes blazing with a mixture of anger and delight.
‘Death to all mutants!’ I roar.
Then the screen goes black.
‘The mutant’s weapon damaged the transmitter node,’ I say. ‘But fortunately, not the memory banks.’
Petra Crockett nods. She swivels the chair round and eyes me levelly. My heart’s thumping in my chest. Has she believed what she’s just seen? Has the fake vid-clip convinced her?