Exurbia: A Novel About Caterpillars (An Infinite Triptych Book 1)

by Alex McKechnie

  ‘Up.’

  The girl rolled on her leaf bed and covered her eyes from the dawning sun.

  ‘Up.’

  Something pointed was pressing into her stomach.

  ‘I’ll give you five more seconds before I split you in half.’

  The girl opened her eyes. A man, uniformed, something silver in his grip, the nib of which was aimed right at her belly.

  ‘Moxiana, yes?’ he said.

  ‘She’s called Moxie,’ said the crone from beside them, standing and with a uniformed man of her own pressing a weapon into her chest. The girl stood without comment. She had not seen this part, only the moments afterwards. What use is there resisting?

  ‘I hereby -’

  ‘It’s all right,’ said the girl. ‘I’m under arrest. She’s under arrest. We’re not going to run away or anything. Here.’

  She held out both her hands. The security man paused cautiously for a moment, then brought in a drone to bind her.

  ‘Lieutenant,’ said one of the lowlys, bounding out from the trees. ‘The Ayakashi, it just made for Bucephalia.’

  ‘It attacked?’

  ‘Almost. Apparently it stopped at the outskirts a few minutes ago, just vanished.’

  Fricke turned back to the girl and readjusted his grip on the glitz. ‘Anything to say about that?’

  ‘You don’t need to say a damn thing to them,’ said the crone, struggling to break out of the drone’s t’assali field. A nearby lowly gave her a quick smack to the shoulder and she cowered.

  ‘Eleven cities,’ said Lieutenant Fricke. ‘The Ayakashi has eaten eleven cities now. Miss Butterworth tells me you’re behind it. How can that be so, a little girl like you?’

  ‘Leave us,’ barked the crone, ‘or she’ll do it again, right here this time, burn you to the ground.’

  ‘I’m sure if young Moxiana here could use the talent on command she would have already by now. No, we’re of the opinion you can’t control it. It comes out in more complicated states of consciousness, dreams and the like. Is that correct?’

  The girl’s face was completely neutral.

  ‘Take me to the tower,’ she said. ‘Now that you have me.’

  ‘Well,’ said the lieutenant, ‘let’s not keep the girl waiting.’

  They will kill her, surely, thought the crone. At the very least there will be experiments and procedures, medical equipment, sociopathic doctors.

  ‘You bastards,’ said the crone. She hadn’t sworn in front of the girl before, nor raised her voice, not in twelve years of their travels. ‘You bastards,’ she screamed, taking a glitz of her own from beneath the pillow of the leaf bed and bringing it to the neck of the lowly. The girl cried out then, covering her eyes. The epic forest erupted all about them in spasmodic winding flames of orange, the deafening howl of the Ayakashi, its thrashing tendrils vanishing the trees where they stood. The ribbons converged and turned on the lowlys and the lieutenant, the thing rearing back like a cobra about to strike. Fricke turned to the crone in one practised fluid motion and the glitz sputtered snicker after snicker of Denkov radiation, the crone falling to her knees, crying out, then lying down, still. The Ayakashi evaporated.

  ‘It comes out in more complicated states of consciousness,’ Fricke repeated again, quieter this time and to himself.

  A glimmer of emotion formed in the girl’s hard face, tiny at first, then spreading like a crack in glass. The lieutenant felt a sudden urge to coddle the child, but let her cry alone instead.

  26

  “Preserve political stability. Stop. Continue to adhere to the Pergrin Decree. Stop. Await further instructions. Stop.”

  - Communication, Year of the Idle Lightning: Syndicate Hub Major to Exurbia Major

  261 -

  ‘Do you know how to open this?’ Fortmann said.

  ‘So long as the streams still recognise me.’ 261 put a hand to the door and, sure enough, it rolled aside silently.

  ‘Why,’ said Maria, ‘are the lights still on?’

  Fortmann took his glitz from its pocket and armed the nib. ‘Guards inside?’ he whispered. Maria shook her head. The cave looked identical to its state five months previous when Maria had ushered the imp out with her weapon. Fortmann stepped in first, sheepish and guarded. He leaned round the partition of the night chamber, turned back and shook his head. Possible incidental, thought the imp. Governance forgot to program the cave to dim the lights if not in use. A few more steps ahead, Fortmann's glitz raised to full firing position then, Maria tailing close behind. He froze. In the quandary chair sat a perfectly hairless female, garbed in standard cave dayrobes, the face passive and set.

  ‘Good morning,’ she said. ‘Could I offer you all some tsotl tea?’

  ‘Did you know about this?’ Fortmann snarled at 261. ‘How couldn’t you have known about this?’

  ‘I suspected it.’

  ‘Then why, Gnesha be damned, didn’t you say anything?’

  ‘Or water if you prefer. I wasn’t actually expecting visitors, but nonetheless, the honour is all mine,’ said the female imp.

  ‘Who the hell are you?’ Fortmann said.

  ‘Governance often run projects in pairs. I assume,’ said 261, eyeing the girl. She appeared close to his age, a certain facial resemblance too when one looked hard enough. ‘This is probably 131.’ The woman nodded.

  ‘With the old tersh outted,’ he continued, ‘Tersh Jura probably had little need for another moralising imp after my departure. Nevertheless, there are certain Exurbic systems which can only be controlled from the cave, and since the cave only responds to my genetic print, or one identical, I was apparently replaced.’

  ‘A fair assessment,’ said the woman.

  ‘But,’ said Maria, ‘Jura has publicly denounced the Moralising Imp Initiative. If he isn't using you for quandaries,’ she said to the female imp, ‘what do you do all day?’

  ‘They still provide me with five or so quandaries a day, probably only in the interest of keeping me stimulated. There are also administrative duties to attend to. The rest of the time I sit and cogitate.’

  ‘This is madness,’ Fortmann said. ‘Are there more of you, even?’

  ‘Just us,’ said the woman. ‘As far as I’m aware.’

  ‘But Gnesha, why?’

  ‘As a failsafe, of course.’ The she-imp smiled then, a warm and, 261 thought, genuine gesture that was for its own sake. ‘The imp project has been going on for some time, but there is still no real consensus on how to engineer the imps themselves. For example, should they be aemotional, or extremely empathetic? Total impartiality might help in making difficult decisions, but it could also encourage sociopathy.’

  ‘You’re emotional?’ said Maria.

  The woman nodded, Buddha-fashion.

  ‘Fully?’

  ‘I believe so, though I’m fairly sure they removed the maternal instinct from me, as well as the mating drive, much as they did with 261. Ah, excuse me a moment.’

  She turned to the quandary globes and began to rearrange them into what the imp decided must be some kind of medical issue on one of the north continents.

  ‘Is she a ruse?’ Fortmann whispered, furious.

  ‘It’s highly unlikely,’ said 261.

  ‘Then what the hell is she doing here?’

  ‘As I said, Governance often commissions projects in pairs. There’s every chance she will help us. If I have defected to another cause, she will trust it is for a worthy reason.’

  The she-imp dispatched the finished globe structure, turned back to the three of them, and smiled. ‘I suppose you’re here about the message.’

  ‘How did you know?’ said Fortmann.

  ‘Why else would you have come? Though you’ll need to leave in the next three and a half minutes if you’re to successfully escape. I assume you weren’t able to break into the surveillance system this time around, meaning they know you’re here. It will take a further thirty seconds for Governance to dispatch a security team and per
haps three minutes for them to travel the full length of the transport tube down here. With that in mind, I will try to be concise.’ She nodded to 261 and he took control of the omnicast with a gesture. ‘The message returned in the form of gamma pulses, probably sent from an accelerator of some kind. It’s encoded with the official syndicate seal, so we can assume it is indeed from the hub. It was encoded using hub glyphics, making the case for its legitimacy even stronger.’

  ‘All right, but what does it say?’ said Fortmann.

  ‘It was also wrapped in a data packet intended specifically for reception at the Bucephalian moralising imp’s cave, and only -’

  ‘All right, but what does it say?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘“Yes.”That was the message.’

  ‘In response to what, in Plovda’s name?’

  ‘In response to the question I asked,’ said 261. ‘Whether or not Miss Butterworth is a syndicate official.’

  Fortmann scuffed his feet and groaned.

  ‘Then damn, are we in hot water. There’s no chance it was just sent by renegades or impostors?’

  Both the imps shook their heads

  ‘But…Gnesha, if she’s the genuine article, then what is she doing here?’

  ‘Oh, there are hundreds of possibilities,’ said the she-imp.

  ‘Narrow them.’

  ‘Well,’ she thumbed at the cord of her dayrobe. ‘Attempts to build a wiremind weren’t any more frequent than usual before her visit. That discounts the possibility that she came as a result of an imminent Pergrin crisis. Relatedly, I’ve been surveying deep stream astronomical data from the Bureau of Celestials, and have made a curious finding. There isn’t any sign of civilisation on any of the supposed settled syndicate planets. Our telescopes aren’t powerful enough to reach the hub, but the outskirt worlds appear completely inert.’

  ‘She’s already destroyed them,’ Fortmann muttered.

  ‘No, that seems unlikely. Something more complex is at work here. I require more time to think the matter over. In any case, the syndicate visitor’s true intentions are quite apart from her public claims.’

  ‘Whatever her intentions, she’s nothing short of pure evil.’

  ‘That also seems unlikely. All of her actions so far seem to be in line with a strategy. Until we know exactly what that strategy is we can’t make absolute judgements.’

  ‘She has killed Ixenites! She has framed the tersh!’

  ‘That may be, but benevolence is not always an option when trying to enact change.’

  Fortmann stared agape. ‘What is it with you two? You’re unprincipled.’

  ‘I would defend the accusation but there is little time, Seer.’

  ‘Then we should go. You too. The security team will only hurt you when they get down here.’

  ‘They certainly won’t. I’m the last imp. Without me, they can’t even direct the streams properly. I have had a great deal of time for research between quandaries. You intend to build a wiremind, but the tersh and the syndicate woman will stop you at every turn, I guarantee it. You’ll need to incapacitate them both first. And to do that you’re going to need leverage. You only need cross the Corridor of Screaming Bark.’

  ‘What, on Exurbia, does that mean?’

  ‘It’s a place,’ said 261. ‘A forbidden place in the epicforest. I know of where she’s talking.’

  ‘In these last few moments,’ said the girl, ‘I must ask that you leave me alone with 261. I will have him join you when he’s quite ready. It’s been an honour to meet you and I wish you well.’

  ‘And we’re expected to just jaunt off to this mysterious spot, on nothing more than your word?’

  ‘She knows I will accompany you,’ said 261. ‘And she has no wish to see me come to harm, at least. I am too precious, genetically.’ 261 politely ushered the Ixenites from the chamber and returned then to the she-imp.

  ‘There is nothing for it,’ she said. ‘But to show you the gestalt. You will fare much better for it.’

  27

  “We began with placing Old Erde at the centre of creation. In time that was found to be hopelessly arrogant. Next we declared ourselves the centre of creation, even if our home was not. So too will we cast that stupidity off, when we meet with the unknowable minds waiting in the Up.”

  - Tersh Stanislav of Exurbia

  Jura -

  Stefan spied him through the casing assemblies. The boy was buried in mechanical parts – vertexes, plaited glass, fixture spheres, and casing sheets – like a nesting scallix. Gungovs waited at his side fetching bolts and tools when the boy called for them. He was bent at a pillar of some kind, nano-fusing two joins together, his face obscured by a workman’s helmet.

  ‘Mcalister,’ Jura called. The boy stopped his work and lifted the visor. The face beneath was dusted with debris and filings.

  'Your Partial Holiness.’

  I could have the gungovs burn your head clean off where you stand. ‘Don’t push my patience. How is it coming along?’

  ‘As well as can be expected. Your syndicate associate insists that I use her blue material instead of t’assali. But other than that, everything’s just majestic.’

  ‘Miss Butterworth assures me the ambrosia will provide a better result in all respects.’

  ‘It depends what you want to do with it,’ said the boy.

  ‘Whatever does that mean?’

  ‘I’ve seen the full schematics. There’s a basket at the base of the machine. Does it have a function?’

  ‘The function isn’t important.’

  ‘It’s important to me.’

  ‘Build the machine as instructed. I’m only here to ensure you have everything you need.’

  ‘Some information would be appreciated. As far as I can tell, it looks like a magnifier of some kind, for when the field goes critical.’

  Phanes on a spoon, I don’t even know myself. ‘As I said, it isn’t important.’

  ‘And,’ he unwrapped the water coil from his middle and hung it on a gungov, ‘I suppose I have some moral quibbles about all of this.’

  ‘Moral quibbles?’ Jura said, incredulous. ‘Who are you to have moral quibbles?’

  ‘I was arrested for trying to build exactly the kind of machine you are asking me to construct here. Is it one rule for the populace, and one rule for Governance?’

  ‘I think you forget who you’re talking to, Citizen.’

  ‘If you were going to have me killed, you would have done it already. Obviously I’m too valuable to dispense with, but you can’t openly let me know that. Worse than that though, it seems the decision to keep me alive wasn’t made by you at all but that woman of yours. The same woman that - and forgive my tenacity - has you at her mercy. The same woman who had the last tersh framed for a crime I personally have evidence of him not committing. I know who planted the generator in that mallet. There are rumours all across the Ixenite network. Worse though, she probably knows too, doesn’t she? And all of this has just been an elaborate game to remove anybody from power who might get in her way. So yes, Your Reverence, I have some moral quibbles. Why am I building this machine for a woman we know nothing about, who has no interest in Exurbia, who would debase its politics on a whim?’

  ‘You are talking,’ said Jura, ‘to the foremost honourable of Exurbia. You would do well to keep your mouth more tightly shut. My companion Miss Butterworth might consider you a valuable asset, but in the event that I do not, it will be no bother at all to have you disposed with.’

  ‘Stratigraphics,’ said Mcalister. ‘Three to five o’clock. Monday mornings.’

  'What?’

  ‘I thought you might remember me. Apparently you don’t. I took a semester of your stratigraphics module at university.’

  He searched the bastard’s face. There was only the long and blurry backlog of former students. Maybe he’s a touch familiar.

  ‘You were quite timid back then, but most of the students liked you. I
liked you. And the other Professor Jura. She taught physics back then. Anna?’

  ‘Annie,’ said Jura before he could stop himself. Annie. Where are you?

  ‘What became of her?’

  ‘She's no longer my wife. There were differences.’

  ‘Last I heard, she was working at the Bureau of Celestials. Until she was arrested and brought here.’

  ‘What of it?’

  ‘Nothing at all. I only mention it in passing. Say, do you remember old Kreole, the Old Erde history professor?’

  ‘The one with narcolepsy?’ Jura said.

  ‘He used to fall asleep mid-sentence when he was teaching.’

  ‘Plovda, he was mad enough awake. And -’ Jura collected himself. This is no place, nor time, for nostalgia.

  ‘It was no secret that you sympathised with the Ixenites,’ said Mcalister, undeterred by the silence. ‘Every lecture seemed pregnant with little hints. I suppose our suspicions weren’t wrong. This is your way of winning the race, isn’t it, Professor? Taking control of the game and arresting the opposition, locking them up in your tower.’

  ‘Didn’t you listen to Miss Butterworth’s speech?’ Jura said. ‘Didn’t you listen to a word of it? Spool, the last planet to achieve a critical wiremind state, it was destroyed, was it not?’