The Machinery of Light

by David J. Williams

  “Try Sinclair’s.”

  They’ve come through into an area of the war-sat that looks to be a lot better maintained. The lighting’s a lot more reliable. There’s an open door up ahead. Emanating from within is a noise that sounds a lot like someone’s fingers hitting a keyboard.

  “Hmmm,” says Lynx.

  “No shooting unless I say otherwise,” says the Operative.

  “Now he tells us,” says Riley—gestures. Maschler moves through the doorway, guns at the ready.

  The flash dies away. Spencer blinks, adjusts his vision. Looks at the alcove he’s in—at the room beyond that. It looks exactly the same as it did before. He feels like a jet engine just went through his head. Dust is everywhere. A lot of it looks like it just got blasted from the alcoves.

  “What do you mean she’s still alive?” says Sarmax.

  “I don’t think this worked,” says Jarvin.

  Sinclair wants you to switch this on,” says Haskell.

  “I’ll find a way to surprise him anyway.”

  “You’ve got the coordinates?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “He’s way ahead of you, Jharek. Turn that on and God knows what will happen.”

  “You know what they say about desperate times, Claire.”

  The pillar’s starting to glow in a very weird way: some sort of greenish-blue. It starts to pervade the place, shadows running up and down over the walls. The two marines move in closer to Szilard.

  They take the room like any good commando squad: those on point going through, moving out into the room in different directions, the rearguard suddenly charging past the guys in the middle and in after the point and—

  “All clear,” says Linehan.

  The Operative and Lynx move through. The room looks like any normal office. Fancy, though: wood panels along the walls and door opposite. Nice carpet underfoot. A well-appointed desk takes up most of one corner. A very attractive woman sits at it. She regards them calmly.

  “Can I help you gentlemen?” she asks.

  She’s not in armor—just civilian clothing. She looks so good she’s got to be genetically engineered. But it’s not her looks that are making the Operative nervous.

  “We’re here to see Dr. Sorensen,” says the Operative.

  “Are you nuts?” says Lynx, and shoots the woman in the chest.

  They step out of the alcoves.

  “You’d better answer my question,” says Sarmax, moving toward Spencer. Jarvin cuts in between them.

  “Easy,” he says.

  “You guys have been talking behind my back,” says Sarmax.

  “Better get used to it,” says Spencer. “We’re the razors.”

  “Where the hell’s my Indigo?”

  “Where she’s always been,” says Jarvin.

  “At Sinclair’s side,” says Spencer.

  He’s counting on you doing this,” says Haskell. “Just not so soon,” replies Szilard. The pillar is now blazing so bright they’re having to adjust the shades on their visors. Haskell’s watching everything get just a little darker. She realizes the equipment has reached activation frequency.

  “It’s too early,” she says.

  “You mean this doesn’t appear in any of your visions?”

  She nods. He laughs. “Such a shame,” he says. “So sorry to disappoint you. But in truth, nothing’s written.”

  There’s a blinding flash.

  The woman’s blown backward out of her chair. She drops behind the desk.

  “Suck it,” says Lynx.

  “What the fuck’s your problem?” says the Operative.

  “Let’s go see the doctor—shit!”

  The woman’s coming up from behind the desk with a carbine, spraying explosive rounds. Lynx fires his suit-jets, leaps to one side and unloads on full-auto, unleashing in tandem with the four other men. Now the woman’s taking damage. Bullets slice through her flesh, starting to reveal the metal chassis underneath. The Operative tosses a grenade at the woman’s feet. It detonates, taking half the room with it.

  How am I supposed to reach her?” says Sarmax.

  “She’s within a klick of us,” says Spencer.

  “But like Jarvin said—this didn’t work,” says Sarmax.

  “I’ve changed my mind,” says Jarvin.

  The flash subsides. The room looks the same as it did before. Szilard looks puzzled.

  “We haven’t moved,” he says.

  “We weren’t supposed to,” says Haskell.

  “This didn’t work?”

  “Depends what you mean by ‘work,’” says a voice.

  The room’s a shambles. So is the secretary-android. Smoke’s everywhere. The opposite door’s been blown down. Lynx is already moving through it. The Operative turns to the other three men.

  “You guys stay here,” he says. “Set up a perimeter.”

  “Perimeter?” asks Linehan.

  “This room is the only way to reach what lies beyond it.”

  “How long will you be?”

  “Depends on how many questions you’ve got.”

  Linehan mock-salutes. The Operative moves after Lynx.

  You’re saying we just—?” asks Sarmax.

  “More than just saying,” says Spencer.

  “Welcome to the Righteous Fire-Dragon,” says Jarvin.

  “Jesus,” says Sarmax. He checks his suit readouts—they all check out. “Is this me?”

  “Who else would it be?” asks Jarvin.

  “Say hi to the new you,” says Spencer.

  “What happened to the old one?”

  “Nothing good.”

  “Fuck,” says Sarmax.

  “And you might have lost a thing or two along the way.”

  “What the hell do you mean?”

  “No such thing as quantum cloning,” says Spencer. “Something always gets lost in the shuffle.”

  “You’re saying we should check our memories?” says Sarmax. “Like they weren’t suspect enough—”

  “He’s saying don’t be surprised if you start bleeding out,” says Jarvin. “We’re just going to have to see how this plays out, huh.”

  Spencer nods. “Terra incognita for sure.”

  “Teleportation’s real,” mutters Sarmax.

  “Real question is who else knows it,” says Jarvin.

  She’s been thinking in that direction for a while now. After all, Sinclair’s been fucking with the space-time continuum. Once you’ve sent messages back from the future, bypassing space isn’t so far beyond the pale. But now she’s face to face with it. Because everyone in this chamber’s whirling. Standing on one end of the catwalk is a figure wearing what looks to be a seriously sophisticated suit of powered-armor.

  “Who the hell are you?” asks Szilard.

  “The person who’s going to kick your ass,” says the figure—right before it starts firing.

  The Operative and Lynx move through into what looks to be a standard office complex, though all the offices on either side are empty. Their sensors are cranked—they’re looking for anything with a heat source.

  “You really think he’s here?” asks Lynx.

  “Bastard never goes anywhere without that bitch of his.”

  They start getting ready to move out. Spencer does a quick scan on the zone around him. Sarmax keeps going on about teleportation.

  “I’m still trying to get my head around this,” says Sarmax. “The amount of computational power needed—the amount of energy—you’re talking about something that’s—”

  “Off the charts,” says Spencer. “But just so we’re all on the same page, spare us all and stop playing stupid.”

  “Who says I’m playing stupid?”

  “You know all about these fucking devices.”

  “I don’t know if I’d go that far.”

  “Heard about them, then.”

  “Okay,” says Sarmax, “so I’ve heard about them—”

  “In your goddamn basement,” says Jarvin.<
br />
  Flame streaks across the room. Szilard’s two bodyguards leap in front of him, taking the shots. One of them takes a few too many. His suit starts burning. Szilard’s grabbing at Haskell—but she’s leapt from the catwalk, finds herself tumbling down in low-gravity toward the rail beneath. The figure advances on Szilard’s remaining bodyguard, who closes rapidly, firing all his weapons. Szilard comes to a quick decision—he ignites his suit-jets and blasts upward toward the elevator shaft.

  They’ve left the offices behind and have come to what looks more like a lab-complex. Equipment’s everywhere, gleaming like it’s seen recent use. Standing in one corner is a man who looks at them like he expected this all along.

  So I had one in my cellars,” says Sarmax. “So what?

  Didn’t mean I ever switched the fucking thing on.

  Problem with having a teleporter is—”

  “Not enough to have just one,” says Jarvin.

  “Got to know the location of the others,” mutters Spencer.

  “If you don’t, having only one is worse than useless,” says Sarmax. “Never know when something just fucking manifests—”

  “That’s what the Praesidium intended to do if rogue elements got ahold of these megaships,” says Jarvin. “They could just beam in commandos and—”

  “So could the Rain,” says Spencer.

  Jarvin laughs. “The Coalition’s has been played. If they have these devices, it’s only because the Rain wanted it that way.”

  Spencer looks at Sarmax. “Who installed yours?”

  “That’d be Sinclair,” says Sarmax.

  “Let’s trash this place,” says Jarvin.

  Szilard shoots into the shaft and disappears from sight. His second bodyguard fights on for about two more seconds before getting torn apart. The newcomer vaults over the catwalk, fires its jets, speeds down toward Haskell. She’s still falling, picking up speed. The figure catches up to her just before she hits the bottom.

  You’re well off the beaten path,” says the man.

  He looks pretty old. His beard’s gone almost white.

  His face is wizened, but his eyes are bright. He smiles like he’s trying to cover up how scared he is.

  “Where the fuck is it?” demands Lynx.

  Destroying the teleportation chamber isn’t a no-brainer. Once it’s done, they can no longer get out. But the only place they can escape to is the ship they came from. And the risks of anyone else catching up with them using the same technology is just too great. A few silenced rounds of ammo and some good old-fashioned battering with their fists, and the room may as well have just been bombed.

  “Nothing like burning bridges,” says Jarvin.

  “Let’s go,” says Spencer.

  The ship’s zone clicks in around him.

  Haskell feels herself seized by gloved fists; she watches walls rush by as the suited figure fires its jets, hauls her back up, and dumps her unceremoniously onto the catwalk. The shattered bodies of Szilard’s bodyguards lie nearby. The president’s nowhere to be seen.

  “He’ll be back any moment,” says the interloper.

  Where’s what?” asks the old man.

  “Where the fuck is the telepor—”

  “Let me handle this,” the Operative says to Lynx on the one-on-one. He opens up the channel again: “You’re Dr. Arthur Sorenson.”

  “Is that a question?” says the man.

  “More like confirmation,” says Lynx. “We’ve already got your résumé.”

  Sorenson looks at him a little strangely. “Which résumé?”

  “That’d be the real one.”

  They leave the wrecked equipment behind, head out through passages that look familiar. An identical set of doors as on the Hammer of the Skies, only this time they’re going the other way. Spencer feels like he’s retracing his footsteps. It’s strange to think he isn’t. In short order they reach the elevator shaft—between floors, same as before. An elevator car’s just arriving for them.

  Who the fuck are you?” says Haskell.

  “A secret admirer.”

  “With access to the teleport machines—”

  “Narrows it down, doesn’t it?”

  “Goddammit, who—”

  “First things first.”

  It all happened so long ago,” says Sorenson.

  “May as well have been yesterday,” says Lynx.

  “At least tell me which ones you are.”

  “Originals,” says the Operative.

  Sorenson’s eyes narrow. “Where’s the third?”

  “We’re asking the questions,” says Lynx.

  “So how about you give us a guided tour,” says the Operative.

  The elevator hurtles toward the rear of the ship.

  “Which is where Sinclair is,” says Sarmax.

  “You got it,” says Jarvin.

  “And Indigo’s a prisoner too?”

  “They may not be prisoners,” says Spencer.

  The figure leans forward, unlocks the restraints on Haskell’s suit in one fluid motion, and beams her data. Haskell realizes they’re coordinates—that the figure is giving her directions. Only—

  “These aren’t for the portal,” she says.

  “Because it doesn’t lead to where you need to go.”

  “Szilard thought it led to the—”

  “He was wrong. Use the map I just gave you; Sarmax’s own back door. Eighty klicks south to Shackleton. To the South Pole.” A pause. “You know about the South Pole?”

  “I’ve known all along.”

  “Then you know what lies beyond it.”

  “South of every south,” says Haskell.

  They look at each other.

  “And you?” she adds.

  “I’m going back the way I came. To run some more errands. Which starts with blowing this equipment behind me.” The figure tosses plastique, starts to turn—

  “Are you Matthew Sinclair?” asks Haskell.

  The figure says nothing, just starts up the machinery, surging jets and heading in toward it. Haskell’s eyes narrow.

  “Morat?”

  A laugh: “Not even vaguely.”

  You want me to show you around?” asks Sorenson.

  “Don’t make me ask twice,” says the Operative.

  “No need. But there’s no teleportation device here.” Lynx laughs. “Do you want to die, old man?”

  “I dream of it every day,” says Sorenson.

  They may be running a takeover sequence,” says Jarvin

  “They may be running this place already,” says Spencer.

  “Only one way to find out,” says Sarmax.

  The elevator comes to a halt. The doors open.

  Haskell watches a door slide open in the pillar, watches the figure step toward it—and turn back toward her one more time. She hears the voice echo in her helmet.

  “Go,” it says.

  She fires her suit-jets.

  They follow Sorenson back into the rest of his labs. The Operative’s keeping him in his crosshairs the whole way. He’s got no idea what the guy might try. All he knows is that this is a man who’s been on the run for a long time—who knows all the tricks. That’s how he was able to seclude himself in the backwaters of SpaceCom—just another weapons laboratory among so many, this one producing something on paper and somehow never quite being called upon to produce it for real. None of which mattered when the funding kept on arriving and all inquiries got led down false trails. But every reckoning comes eventually.

  They move through more corridors. Spencer’s checking out zone-grids. Righteous Fire-Dragon turns out to be a very different proposition from its sister ship. It’s a lot more complex. The cockpit’s even better defended than on Hammer of the Skies. The ship’s executive node is far more formidable. But Spencer’s mind is sifting through it all the same. His new zone techniques put the old ones to shame. He and Jarvin triangulate on the area of the ship that’s been turned into a prison. They’re plotting their route i
n. But that route includes one preliminary stop—one they’ve almost reached. They prime their weapons.

  She’s roaring through more tunnels, and her mind’s awhirl with a million thoughts. She’s got a very narrow window on the zone now, too—the microzone contained within this tunnel. She can see the pursuit boiling in behind her. Szilard’s marshaling the rest of his force. He’s coming after her with the most elite marines SpaceCom can muster. He knows if he doesn’t take her back he’s meat. She feels the rock around her shake as though a large explosive just detonated. She can guess what just blew. She wonders how the hell Sarmax acquired it in the first place—wonders if he even knew it was there. Her thoughts are racing—Szilard didn’t seem to realize what he was dealing with, thought this was the gateway to Sinclair’s true fortress—that he could get there before the old man himself showed up. But he ended up getting punked. Haskell’s wondering whether maybe she did, too. She’s still doing analysis on the nature of the device she was just face to face with—the radiations it emitted, the energies it was accessing. She reaches the end of a tunnel, drops through a trapdoor—sees what she’s been told was there, starts its motors before she’s even reached it.

  They come through into the rear areas of the lab and reach another door. It’s got several seals on it.

  “We need to put on special suits to proceed,” says Sorenson.

  “We’re dressed just fine,” says the Operative.

  Sorenson glances back at the Operative’s armor. “At least let me—”

  “Fat chance,” says Lynx. He rips off the seals, yanks open the door and—

  “Shit,” he says.

  They’re into some of the more restricted areas aboard the Righteous Fire-Dragon.

  They’re still seeing no one. They transition from passageways to shafts, quickly crawl down them, smash through a grille—and drop down into a room.

  That room contains three Chinese soldiers in powered armor. They’re still alive, but only just. Their armor’s malfunctioning about as badly as Spencer’s been intending it. Same as it ever was: once you get the high ground on the zone you can wreak havoc on everything below it. Spencer and Jarvin mesh minds and catch what’s left of their targets in a death grip. The suits go haywire, electrocuting the men within them.

  Sarmax climbs into the room and stares at the bodies.

  “What have we here?” he asks.