by Philip Reeve
The Pyxis had fallen from the interface’s hand. Zen picked it up. It opened for him. The sphere inside was shining. The complicated lines that covered it glowed with white rushing light, as if it were a tiny dark planet lying there on his palm and the lines were the lighted streets of its cities. Answering lights woke on the floor and walls, bright veins leading toward the hollow where the sphere needed to be.
Zen looked at Malik, wondering if the Railforce man was going to stop him. But Malik just looked down at the dead interface and said, “They hired me to kill Raven. Never said anything about K-gates, or stopping this machine from doing whatever it’s been built to do.”
Nova said, “Even if Raven wasn’t lying, the new gate will change everything.”
“Maybe everything needs to change,” said Zen.
She came to him. She touched his cheek, and kissed him very softly on the mouth, the way she had learned from movies. Her lips were as cool and smooth as vinyl, salty with the taste of the sea.
“That’s how I feel, Zen Starling,” she said. “That won’t change.”
Zen took a deep breath. When he stretched out his arm toward the hollow in the floor, the sphere seemed to sense that it was nearly home. The hollow drew it like a magnet. He held it close. He was still not sure what he would do. At the last moment he stopped himself, filled with sudden doubts. Just because you have a chance to change everything, it doesn’t mean you should.
The sphere made his decision for him. It jumped from his fingers into the hollow. There was a faint crisp sound. A connection being made. Things falling into place.
Zen winced, and waited for the world to end.
It didn’t.
Just those crisp noises spreading beneath the floor, then silence.
What have I done? he wondered. And then, Have I done anything?
The Worm sighed. It writhed. Deep whooshing noises started happening behind the chamber walls.
Malik said, “It doesn’t need us anymore.”
Carlota came up the stairs. “I talked to your train,” she said. “It says the rays are gone.”
“Nothing moving out there to attract them,” said Nova.
The Worm felt different. There was a sense of energy building, of things gathering toward some climax. It was the way you felt when your train was approaching a K-gate.
They went down together to the hatch, which opened to let them out. Zen looked back before he stepped outside. The stairway was folding itself away, engulfing Raven’s body.
He jumped down after the others onto the ceramic surface of the island. The Worm was stirring again, its arms sketching weird shapes in the air. Nervously checking the sky for rays, they made their way past it to where the Damask Rose still waited on the rails. She opened her doors for them, and as they came aboard she said, “I am going to pull back a little way. Something very strange is happening.”
She reversed slowly back along the viaduct for a few miles, until she reached the place where the wreckage of the Railforce train blocked the tracks. They could barely see what was happening on the island from there, but the Damask Rose could. She hung a holoscreen in the air in front of her passengers, and filled it with the view from a camera on her nose.
The Worm was in motion. It had raised itself up off the ground on its strange, conical legs and was starting to lumber slowly forward, nosing through the archway it had built. Around those spines on its back there played a light that was not light, and colors that had no names. As it went, it left a trail behind it: two long lines of shining stuff, very even, very straight.
“It’s laying rails,” said Nova. “Extending the line…”
A flash of that nameless color came from somewhere at the front of the Worm, casting no glow upon the wet ceramic, lighting no reflections in the waves. From beneath the arch there came answering flashes of something that looked like light, but wasn’t, not exactly. Twists of brightness danced across the ceramic island, taking on the spindly shapes of Station Angels, waving their shining limbs and beckoning. The Worm’s stag-beetle horns seemed to grasp the light, to stretch the edges of it. The spines on its back swayed forward like grass in a gale, snagging filaments of the light and drawing them backward to cloak the Worm’s whole body. Even through the diamondglass windows of the Damask Rose they could hear the noise it made, that sky-filling roar.
“I am detecting KH energy,” said the Damask Rose. “But that machine is not traveling fast enough to pass through a K-gate…”
The Worm seemed ignorant of this. It hunched itself into the whorl of light. Energy arced between its spines. It raised its head, stood proud for a moment, thrust forward, and was gone. Where it had been, the rings of Hammurabi were reflected in the sea-wet ceramic, and the Station Angels danced, and the new rails shone dull silver, leading into that weird curtain of energy beneath the arch.
“It is a K-gate,” said Nova.
“Where does it lead to?” asked Malik.
“Beyond all maps,” said the Damask Rose.
“To the far side of the galaxy,” said Zen.
“Is anything going to come through it, do you think?” asked Nova.
“The Guardians will want it quarantined, in case,” said Malik. “Railforce will be sending more trains. They’ll shut it if they can, or destroy the line or something. So if you’re going through, you’d best go quick.”
“Go through?” said Zen. “I’m not going through there! There might be no way back.”
“Never was a way back for you, Zen,” said Malik. “If you stay here, you’ll have to explain yourself to the Noons. And then you’ll have to explain yourself to the Guardians. What they’ll all do to you, I couldn’t say. But you won’t be going home again. You passed the point of no return the day you first stepped onto Raven’s train. There’s no place for you this side of that new gate. The other side—who knows? You can start again.”
“And you’d just let me go?” asked Zen.
Malik gave a slow shrug. “My mission is over. You’re not my business, Zen Starling. And I don’t think you ever meant much harm.”
The Damask Rose had caught the scent of that new gate, or the vibration or the harmony or whatever it was that K-gates gave off and trains adored. They could feel it trembling, straining to keep its brakes on and its wheels in this world.
Nova stood close to Zen. She said, “I’m going too.”
Malik nodded.
“You could come with us,” she said. “Aren’t you curious? Don’t you want to know what’s beyond that gate?”
Malik grinned. “I’m old, Moto. The only journey I’m going to take is the one that gets me to where there’s something to eat, and a real bed to sleep in. I’m going to start walking.”
“But the rays…” said Zen.
Carlota patted her gun. “I can accompany you back to the Terminal Hotel, sir.”
Nova said, “They don’t attack if you stay still.”
The Damask Rose opened her doors. Carlota stepped out onto the viaduct, looking curiously toward the K-gate. Malik hesitated for a moment before he went out after her. He glanced back at Zen.
“I used to think Raven didn’t care about anyone,” he said, “but I was wrong. I think he cared about you, Zen. I don’t know why. Maybe he found something in you that reminded him of himself, when he was young. All I know is, I’ve seen him die a lot, and that was the first time it felt like watching a human being go.”
Then he went outside to where Carlota was waiting. A last look, a wave, and they were headed northward, picking their way past splinters of the Railforce train.
*
In the carriage, Nova and Zen sat down together. The Damask Rose revved her engines.
A stray Monk bug bumbled against the lamps. Zen rested his head on Nova’s shoulder. She was shivering with excitement, just like a human being would. Just like he was. Ou
tside the window, Hammurabi filled the sky.
“I’ll miss this place,” said Nova.
“There will be better places,” said Zen.
“What will you miss?” she asked.
He looked at her. He was going to miss Cleave, and Desdemor, and Summer’s Lease, and the Ambersai Bazar. He was going to miss Myka. He was going to miss Raven. He was going to miss his mother. He was going to miss the boy he’d been, the dreams he’d had. He was going to miss everything. But he guessed that was how everybody always felt. Everyone was losing things, leaving things behind, clinging to old memories as they rushed into the future. Everyone was a passenger on a runaway train. It was true that Zen would be going farther than most. But at least he didn’t have to go alone.
“I won’t miss anything,” he said.
Then the Damask Rose began to move, faster and faster, down the old rails, onto the new, and Zen took Nova’s hand as the light of Raven’s gate broke over them, and they turned to the windows and raised up their faces in the glory of far stars and alien skies and suns no human eyes had seen, until the rush and strangeness of their journey washed them clean of all the things they’d done and every role they had been made to play and they were just themselves: lovers, heroes, railheads, riding their old red train toward new lives amid the untold shining stations of the Angels.
And the Damask Rose raised up her siren voice, and sang.
GLOSSARY
Ambersai—
A moon on one of the branch-lines leading from Golden Junction, Ambersai is mainly an industrial settlement, which serves as a launch-point for the miners who exploit its system’s rich asteroid belt. It is also famed for the Ambersai Bazar, the largest marketplace in the region.
Bandarpet—
An industrial world on the Spiral Line, famous in more warlike times for its armaments factories and weapons shops.
Beetle—
A popular type of military drone, which gets its name from the initials of the company that makes it, Bandarpet Tactical Logistics. (Also sometimes known as a “Bacon, Lettuce, and Tomato.”)
Chiba—
A Junction world where travelers from the central Network can change for trains to Golden Junction and to the industrial worlds beyond Prell Plaza—the so-called “Trans-Chiba Branchlines.”
Corporate Families—
In the first thousand years of the Great Network, the companies that took on the great task of laying rail-links and terraforming worlds soon found themselves facing all sorts of difficulties. Laws and customs began to differ widely between different stations, and often changed during the centuries-long time periods that were needed for massive long-term projects. It gradually became the norm for business agreements to be sealed by marriage between the families of company directors, since bonds of blood were more enduring than ordinary contracts. In this way, over many centuries, the great companies and corporations of the Network became Corporate Families, in which power was handed down from parent to child.
Corporate Marines—
Most of the larger corporate families maintain a small army to police their stations and fend off hostile takeovers by rival families. During the First Expansion these armies were often large and well trained, their ranks swollen by hired mercenaries. Since the coming of the Empire they have dwindled to small forces of Corporate Marines, or “CoMa.” Some family CoMas are still tough fighting units, used to quell rebellions on outlying industrial worlds, but most are mainly used for ceremonial duties.
Datasea—
As human beings spread out across the galaxy during the First Expansion, the Datasea spread with them—a massive information system made from the interlinked internets of all the inhabited worlds. Human beings use only tiny portions of the sea, the safely firewalled “data rafts,” which they access via wallscreens, data-slates, or headsets. The rest is the domain of the Guardians and other, lesser data-entities.
One of the most important functions of the K-bahn is to spread information through the Datasea; data stored in the mind of a train can be transferred instantaneously from world to world, rather than having to travel through space in the form of light or radio waves. It has sometimes been suggested that the Guardians built the Network not for humanity’s sake, but simply in order to enlarge the Datasea.
Data Divers—
The Imperial College of Data Divers is a caste of elite IT consultants, trained to venture into the deep Datasea. They are also responsible for carrying messages from the Guardians to the Emperor, or any other human being to whom a Guardian wishes to speak.
Dog Star Line—
Over the history of the Great Network many stations have been abandoned because of planetary disaster or simply because the worlds they served were of no more use. The Dog Star Line is the only entire line to suffer this fate. An old line, it was founded by the Sirius Transgalactic Rail Company, a subsidiary of the Abayrek Family. It served a number of the industrial worlds, which were stripped to build the cities of Grand Central and the O Link stations. It served as a supply-line for the rebel forces during the Spiral Line Rebellion, and was the scene of several running battles between rebel and Railforce wartrains. By 2935 most of the stations had closed, and the rest were so little-used that the Abayreks decided to shut the entire line.
Far Cinnabar—
A small Noon resort world on a branch line leading from Golden Junction. It is famed for its Painted Desert, and for the Noons’ Summer Palace, one of the most beautiful buildings on the Network.
First Expansion—
The First Expansion is the name given to the earliest era of the Great Network, a period lasting several thousand years, when explorers and settlers from Old Earth were first finding their way through the new K-gates, and starting to develop the worlds that they found waiting there. During the first part of this era there was an attempt by the old nation states of Earth to claim different parts of the Network, but the old system did not long survive, and was gradually replaced by the Corporate Families. The First Expansion was a period of great advances, but also of terrible conflict, as different groups fought over freshly opened worlds. Seeking to ensure stability after the Third Rail War, the Guardians intervened and installed the head of the Chael-Kefri family as the first Network Empress. This brought an end to the First Expansion and began the Modern or Imperial Era.
Galaghast—
A prosperous hub world that links the Spiral Line to Kishinchand and the O Link. Scene of the final battle between Railforce and the Prell-backed separatists during the Spiral Line Rebellion.
Guardians—
At some point in the 21st century CE, on humankind’s original homeworld, artificial intelligences were constructed that became far more intelligent than their makers. How many there were, and whether one was built first and constructed the others or all twelve were created at once, is not known. Some stories claim that there were more than twelve, but that the weak ones were defeated and deleted by the stronger, or are in hiding, or simply have no interest in humanity. Even of the twelve, several have always remained aloof from human affairs. The others—the Mordaunt 90 Network, Sfax Systema, Anais Six, the Twins, Vohu Mana, and the Shiguri Monad—have guided human beings ever since. Their personalities are spread across the whole of the Datasea, their vast programs stored in deep data centers like the ones on Grand Central or separate hardware-planets. All scientific and technological advances since the creation of the Guardians have been revealed by the Guardians themselves, while several have been suppressed because the Guardians believe they are not in humanity’s interests. In recent years, however, the Guardians’ interest in human beings seems to have faded—they seldom speak to individuals, or take any active part in life on the Great Network.
Golden Junction—
One of the most pleasant stations of the eastern Network, Golden Junction was among the first worlds to be claimed
and terraformed by the Noon family during the turbulent years of the First Expansion. Best known in modern times for its university.
Grand Central—
Grand Central is an Earth-like planet situated near the heart of the Great Network, with more than seventy K-gates linking it to all the major rail lines of the galaxy.
Most of Grand Central’s K-gates are on its main continent, Chilest. It is the home of Railforce HQ, the K-bahn Timetable Authority, the Imperial Senate, and the Durga, the ancient palace of the Network Emperors. The smaller southern continent is mostly desert, and is the site of vast underground data centers from where the Guardians keep watch on human affairs. With their usual theatrics, the Guardians have marked the site of these buried facilities with huge pyramids and statues, turning the whole continent into a giant sculpture park that visitors from all over the Network come to admire.
Hive Monks—
Some people claim that Monk Bugs, which form the mobile colonies known as “Hive Monks,” are an alien species that originated on one of the far-flung worlds of the Network. It seems more likely that they are simply a type of insect that migrated from Old Earth along with human beings, and has mutated as a result of exposure to K-gate radiation while clinging to the outsides of trains. When a colony of the bugs grows large enough, it forms a kind of simple intelligence, which seems to make it want to mimic human beings. The cowled, shambling Hive Monks have been a feature of life on the Great Network for thousands of years. Attempts to stop them boarding K-trains have always been abandoned, because when a Hive Monk becomes agitated or is subjected to physical violence, it often disintegrates into an unintelligent swarm, causing far more inconvenience to trains, station staff, and passengers than it would as a hive. For this reason they are allowed to ride the trains as they please. It is estimated that there are more than ten million Hive Monks, all constantly traveling from station to station on pilgrimages connected with their primitive insect religion.