I’ll make something up.
I don’t have a sleeve right now, but that’s a minor inconvenience. I’ve got a half-share in twenty million UN dollars banked in Latimer City, a small gang of hardened spec ops friends, one of whom boasts blood connection to one of the more illustrious military families on Latimer. A psychosurgeon to find for Sutjiadi. A bad-tempered determination to visit the Limon Highlands and give Yvette Cruickshank’s family the news of her death. Beyond that, a vague idea that I might go back to the silver-grassed ruins of Innenin and listen intently for some echo of what I found on the Tanya Wardani.
These are my priorities when I get back from the dead. Anyone who has a problem with them can line right up.
In some ways, I’m looking forward to the end of the month.
This afterlife shit is overrated.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Once again, thanks to my family and friends for putting up with me during the making of Broken Angels. It can’t have been easy. Thanks once again also to my agent Carolyn Whitaker for her patience, and to Simon Spanton and his crew, notably the very passionate Nicola Sinclair, for making Altered Carbon fly like a golden eagle on sulphate.
This is a work of science fiction, but many of the books that influenced it are not. In particular, I’d like to express my deepest respect for two writers from my non-fiction inspiration bank; my thanks go to Robin Morgan for The Demon Lover, which is probably the most coherent, complete and constructive critique of political violence I have ever read, and to John Pilger for Heroes, Distant Voices and Hidden Agendas, which together provide an untiring and brutally honest indictment of the inhumanities perpetrated around the globe by those who claim to be our leaders. These writers did not invent their subject matter as I did, because they did not need to. They have seen and experienced it for themselves at first hand, and we should be listening to them.
Woken Furies
RICHARD MORGAN
Orion
www.orionbooks.co.uk
Table of Contents
Title Page
Dedication
PART ONE - This Is Who You Are
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
PART TWO - This Is Someone Else
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
PART THREE - That Was A While Ago
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
PART FOUR - This Is All That Matters
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
CHAPTER THIRTY
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
PART FIVE - This Is The Storm To Come
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
CHAPTER FORTY
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
EPILOGUE
Acknowledgements
This book is for my wife
Virginia Cottinelli
who knows of impediment
Fury (n):
Ia intense, disordered and often destructive rage...
2 wild, disordered force or activity
3a any of the three avenging deities who in Greek mythology punished crimes
3b an angry or vengeful woman
The New English Penguin Dictionary 2001
PROLOGUE
The place they woke me in would have been carefully prepared. The same for the reception chamber where they laid out the deal. The Harlan family don’t do anything by halves and, as anyone who’s been Received can tell you, they like to make a good impression. Gold-flecked black decor to match the family crests on the walls, ambient subsonics to engender a tear-jerking sense that you’re in the presence of nobility. Some Martian artefact in a corner, quietly implying the transition of global custody from our long-vanished unhuman benefactors to the firmly modern hand of the First Families oligarchy. The inevitable holosculpture of old Konrad Harlan himself in triumphal ‘planetary discoverer’ mode. One hand raised high, the other shading his face against the glare of an alien sun. Stuff like that.
So here comes Takeshi Kovacs, surfacing from a sunken bath full of tank gel, sleeved into who knows what new flesh, spluttering into the soft pastel light and helped upright by demure court attendants in cutaway swimming costumes. Towels of immense fluffiness to clean off the worst of the gel and a robe of similar material for the short walk to the next room. A shower, a mirror - better get used to that face, soldier - a new set of clothes to go with the new sleeve, and then on to the audience chamber for an interview with a member of the Family. A woman, of course. There was no way they’d use a man, knowing what they did about my background. Abandoned by an alcoholic father at age ten, raised alongside two younger sisters, a lifetime of sporadically psychotic reaction when presented with patriarchal authority figures. No, it was a woman. Some urbane executive aunt, a secret-service caretaker for the Harlan family’s less public affairs. An understated beauty in a custom-grown clone sleeve, probably in its early forties, standard reckoning.
‘Welcome back to Harlan’s World, Kovacs-san. Are you comfortable? ’
‘Yeah. You?’
Smug insolence. Envoy training conditions you to absorb and process environmental detail at speeds normal humans can only dream about. Looking around, the Envoy Takeshi Kovacs knows in split seconds, has known since the sunken bath awakening, that he’s in demand.
‘I? You may call me Aiura.’ The language is Amanglic, not Japanese, but the beautifully constructed misunderstanding of the question, the elegant evasion of offence without resorting to outrage, traces a clean line back to the First Families’ cultural roots. The woman gestures, equally elegantly. ‘Though who I am isn’t very important in this matter. I think it’s clear to you who I represent.’
‘Yes, it’s clear.’ Perhaps it’s subsonics, perhaps just the woman’s sober response to my levity that dampens the arrogance in my tone. Envoys soak up what’s around them, and to some extent that’s a contaminative process. You often find yourself taking to observed behaviour instinctively, especially if your Envoy intuition grasps that behaviour as advantageous in the current surroundings. ‘So I’m on secondment.’
Aiura coughs, delicately.
‘In a manner of speaking, yes.’
‘Solo deployment?’ Not unusual in itself, but not much fun either. Being part of an Envoy team gives you a sense of confidence you can’t get from working with ordinary human beings.
‘Yes. That is to say, you will be the only Envoy involved. More conventional resources are at your disposal in great number.’
‘That sounds good.’
‘Let us hope so.’
‘So what do you want me to do?’
Another delicate throat-clearing. ‘In due course. May I ask, once again, if the sleeve is comfortable?’
‘It seems very.’ Sudden realisation. Very smooth, response at impressive lev
els even for someone used to Corps combat custom. A beautiful body, on the inside at least. ‘Is this something new from Nakamura?’
‘No.’ Does the woman’s gaze slant upward and left? She’s a security exec, she’s probably wired with retinal datadisplay. ‘Harkany Neuro-systems, grown under offworld licence for Khumalo-Cape.’
Envoys aren’t supposed to suffer from surprise. Any frowning I did would have to be on the inside. ‘Khumalo? Never heard of them.’
‘No, you wouldn’t have.’
‘Excuse me?’
‘Suffice it to say we have equipped you with the very best biotech available. I doubt I need to enumerate the sleeve’s capacities to someone of your background. Should you wish detail, there is a basic manual accessible through the datadisplay in your left field of vision.’ A faint smile, maybe the hint of weariness. ‘Harkany were not culturing specifically for Envoy use, and there has not been time to arrange anything customised.’
‘You’ve got a crisis on your hands?’
‘Very astute, Kovacs-san. Yes, the situation might fairly be described as critical. We would like you to go to work immediately.’
‘Well, that’s what they pay me for.’
‘Yes.’ Would she broach the matter of exactly who was paying at this point? Probably not. ‘As you’ve no doubt already guessed this will be a covert deployment. Very different from Sharya. Though you did have some experience of dealing with terrorists towards the end of that campaign, I believe.’
‘Yeah.’ After we smashed their IP fleet, jammed their data transmission systems, blew apart their economy and generally killed their capacity for global defiance, there were still a few diehards who didn’t get the Protectorate message. So we hunted them down. Infiltrate, befriend, subvert, betray. Murder in back alleys. ‘I did that for a while.’
‘Good. This work is not dissimilar.’
‘You’ve got terrorist problems? Are the Quellists acting up again?’
She makes a dismissive gesture. No one takes Quellism seriously any more. Not for a couple of centuries now. The few genuine Quellists still around on the World have traded in their revolutionary principles for high-yield crime. Same risks, better paid. They’re no threat to this woman, or the oligarchy she represents. It’s the first hint that things are not as they seem.
‘This is more in the nature of a manhunt, Kovacs-san. An individual, not a political issue.’
‘And you’re calling in Envoy support.’ Even through the mask of control, this has to rate a raised eyebrow. My voice has probably gone up a little as well. ‘Must be a remarkable individual.’
‘Yes. He is. An ex-Envoy, in fact. Kovacs-san, before we proceed any further, I think something needs to be made clear to you, a matter that—’
‘Something certainly needs to be made clear to my commanding officer. Because to me this sounds suspiciously like you’re wasting Envoy Corps time. We don’t do this kind of work.’
‘—may come as something of a shock to you. You, ah, no doubt believe that you have been re-sleeved shortly after the Sharya campaign. Perhaps even only a few days after your needlecast out.’
A shrug. Envoy cool. ‘Days or months - it doesn’t make much difference to m—’
‘Two centuries.’
‘What?’
‘As I said. You have been in storage for a little under two hundred years. In real terms—’
Envoy cool goes out the window, rapidly. ‘What the fuck happened to—’
‘Please, Kovacs-san. Hear me out.’ A sharp note of command. And then, as the conditioning shuts me down again, pared back to listen and learn, more quietly: ‘Later I will give you as much detail as you like. For now, let it suffice that you are no longer part of the Envoy Corps as such. You can consider yourself privately retained by the Harlan family.’
Marooned centuries from the last moments of living experience you recall. Sleeved out of time. A lifetime away from everyone and everything you knew. Like some fucking criminal. Well, Envoy assimilation technique will by now have some of this locked down, but still—
‘How did you—’
‘Your digitised personality file was acquired for the family some time ago. As I said, I can give you more detail later. You need not concern yourself too much with this. The contract I am here to offer you is lucrative and, we feel, ultimately rewarding. What’s important is for you to understand the extent to which your Envoy skills will be put to the test. This is not the Harlan’s World you know.’
‘I can deal with that.’ Impatiently. ‘It’s what I do.’
‘Good. Now, you will of course want to know—’
‘Yeah.’ Shut down the shock, like a tourniquet on a bleeding limb. Drag up competence and a drawled lack of concern once more. Grab on to the obvious, the salient point in all of this. ‘Just who the fuck is this ex-Envoy you so badly want me to catch?’
Maybe it went something like that.
Then again, maybe not. I’m inferring from suspicion and fragmented knowledge after the event. Building it up from what I can guess, using Envoy intuition to fill in the gaps. But I could be completely wrong.
I wouldn’t know.
I wasn’t there.
And I never saw his face when they told him where I was. Told him that I was, and what he’d have to do about it.
PART ONE
This Is Who You Are
‘Make it personal . . .’
Quellcrist Falconer
Things I Should Have Learnt By Now Vol II
CHAPTER ONE
Damage.
The wound stung like fuck, but it wasn’t as bad as some I’d had. The blaster bolt came in blind across my ribs, already weakened by the door plating it had to chew through to get to me. Priests, up against the slammed door and looking for a quick gut-shot. Fucking amateur night. They’d probably caught almost as much pain themselves from the point-blank blowback off the plating. Behind the door, I was already twisting aside. What was left of the charge ploughed a long, shallow gash across my ribcage and went out, smouldering in the folds of my coat. Sudden ice down that side of my body and the abrupt stench of fried skin-sensor components. That curious bone-splinter fizzing that’s almost a taste, where the bolt had ripped through the biolube casing on the floating ribs.
Eighteen minutes later, by the softly glowing display chipped into my upper left field of vision, the same fizzing was still with me as I hurried down the lamp-lit street, trying to ignore the wound. Stealthy seep of fluids beneath my coat. Not much blood. Sleeving synthetic has its advantages.
‘Looking for a good time, sam?’
‘Already had one,’ I told him, veering away from the doorway. He blinked wave-tattooed eyelids in a dismissive flutter that said your loss and leaned his tightly-muscled frame languidly back into the gloom. I crossed the street and took the corner, tacking between a couple more whores, one a woman, the other of indeterminate gender. The woman was an augment, forked dragon tongue flickering out around her overly prehensile lips, maybe tasting my wound on the night air. Her eyes danced a similar passage over me, then slid away. On the other side, the cross-gender pro shifted its stance slightly and gave me a quizzical look but said nothing. Neither were interested. The streets were rain-slick and deserted, and they’d had longer to see me coming than the doorway operator. I’d cleaned up since leaving the citadel, but something about me must have telegraphed the lack of business opportunity.
At my back, I heard them talking about me in Stripjap. I heard the word for broke.
They could afford to be choosy. In the wake of the Mecsek Initiative, business was booming. Tekitomura was packed that winter, thronging with salvage brokers and the deCom crews that drew them the way a trawler wake draws ripwings. Making New Hok safe for a New Century, the ads went. From the newly built hoverloader dock down at the Kompcho end of town it was less than a thousand kilometres, straight line distance, to the shores of New Hokkaido, and the loaders were running day and night. Outside of an airdrop, there
is no faster way to get across the Andrassy Sea. And on Harlan’s World, you don’t go up in the air if you can possibly avoid it. Any crew toting heavy equipment - and they all were - was going to New Hok on a hoverloader out of Tekitomura. Those that lived would be coming back the same way.
Boom town. Bright new hope and brawling enthusiasm as the Mecsek money poured in. I limped down thoroughfares littered with the detritus of spent human merriment. In my pocket, the freshly excised cortical stacks clicked together like dice.
There was a fight going on at the intersection of Pencheva Street and Muko Prospect. The pipe houses on Muko had just turned out and their synapse-fried patrons had met late-shift dock workers coming up through the decayed quiet of the warehouse quarter. More than enough reason for violence. Now a dozen badly co-ordinated figures stumbled back and forth in the street, flailing and clawing inexpertly at each other while a gathered crowd shouted encouragement. One body already lay inert on the fused-glass paving, and someone else was dragging their body, a limb’s length at a time, out of the fray, bleeding. Blue sparks shorted off a set of overcharged power knuckles, elsewhere light glimmered on a blade. But everyone still standing seemed to be having a good time and there were no police as yet.
Yeah, part of me jeered. Probably all too busy up the hill right now.
I skirted the action as best I could, shielding my injured side. Beneath the coat, my hands closed on the smooth curve of the last hallucinogen grenade and the slightly sticky hilt of the Tebbit knife.
Never get into a fight if you can kill quickly and be gone.
Virginia Vidaura - Envoy Corps trainer, later career criminal and sometime political activist. Something of a role model for me, though it was several decades since I’d last seen her. On a dozen different worlds, she crept into my mind unbidden, and I owed that ghost in my head my own life a dozen times over. This time I didn’t need her or the knife. I got past the fight without eye contact, made the corner of Pencheva and melted into the shadows that lay across the alley mouths on the seaward side of the street. The timechip in my eye said I was late.
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