by Guy Haley
The cavern shattered into nothing.
The haemites, in the instant they felt their unnatural life desert them, fired.
Lord Penumbra ceased to be as flames washed over Bear, setting his fur ablaze.
Bear fell, arms flailing.
Otto watched stolen feeds of Henson's men being slaughtered by k52's robot drones. They proceeded into the Realm House practically unhindered, only to be swarmed by spider drones when they had reached the Grid relays on the floor of the Realm House cavern.
"Bad tactics," he said. "They let them in, let them access the Grid relays before moving in in force and taking them out." Otto replayed key parts of the footage, watching the way k52's machines behaved, plotting avenues of attack and defence. Question was, why had k52 let them in at all? "Are we ready?" he said.
"Yes," said Valdaire.
Otto lowered himself onto the first v-jack couch, next to the dead Waldo.
"No time to clean him away, sorry," said Valdaire. She slipped the v-jack headpiece on.
"Good fortune, Klein," Guan said.
"Now," said Valdaire. "Because of the nature of this patch up here, and possible interference, entry into the Grid may be a little rougher than normal, OK?"
"OK."
"In case you can't find the way yourself, I've rigged a channel that will carry you directly to your virtual office. You'll have to find your way after that, I can't break Richards' encryption and get you straight in to the LA office. Now, are you ready?"
"Ja," said Otto. He hated the VR world.
"Right, on three. One… two… three…"
Otto's mentaug howled as it was slaved to the v-jack unit. His head felt as if it would burst as he was shunted along the raw Gridlines, his perceptions open to a world normally hidden to human eyes. He hadn't enjoyed his last interface with the raw Grid. This jaunt wasn't much better, a dizzying roar of light and sound, knots of blackness growing like bacterial infestations where k52's presence interfered with the running of the Grid.
It was over. He found himself in Richards & Klein's remote telepresence lobby, represented by an anonymous avatar made of ovoids and spheres, its clothes an allusion to a business suit.
Genie instantly appeared in front of him, fancy-dress outfit nowhere in sight; she wore a sober grey skirt and jumper, her hair slicked and tied back, businesswoman style. "Otto? Otto! Ohmygod, it's you!" She did a little jump, gabbling quickly, her words tripping themselves. "Oh, thank goodness! Otto, what's going on? The Grid's freezing up, I can't reach any of my friends, and I have no idea what's going on. I've not heard anything from Richards since the office blew up. I saw his Gridsig, but nothing else. Is he OK? Are you OK?"
"Ja, Genie, calm down. We are OK. We are in the middle of a case. You will learn, this is not unusual."
"The office? Someone blew the office up? With a compact nuke? Usual! Otto, they've had to shut down half the arco. That's not unusual?"
"OK, yes, that's not so normal. Listen, can you bring up the LA office for me? I need to access one of Richards' sheaths, the heaviest model he has there – this is Richards' territory, not mine. I could do with some help."
"Yeah, er, sure, of course." Genie became focused, pulled a board made of light out of the air and began working switches with sweeps of her fingers. An AI would have interfaced directly with the network, but Genie was a pimsim, a post-mortem simulation, and the habits of the living died hard. "I've had to patch an entirely new network together after the office went. It's shaky, especially now with the Grid shutting down. What's happening?"
"One of Richards' brothers, that's what is happening."
"Oh, er, OK. Another Five? Is that bad?"
Otto's avatar nodded its featureless head. "Don't worry."
"What have I got to worry about? I'm already dead." She gave a little smile. She had been young, she still was, and would be forever. She'd been with the company slightly under a year, not long at all. "OK, right, er, you're in!" She clapped her hands and smiled brightly. "Well, Mr Klein, will there be anything else?"
"Yeah," said Otto. "Anyone calls, tell them to ring back."
A smoother shunt through the Grid, and Otto followed paths ordinarily trodden by Richards.
He opened plastic eyes to the inside of a closet in the garage beneath their LA shopfront. He held up plastic hands as the lights came on.
He felt a little weird at being inside Richards' body. It was all… wrong. At least he'd been able to convince him to buy this light combat model. Not as heavy as Otto would have liked, but it would do.
He had the rack release him and stepped past four other sheaths to the closet door. It slid open at a thought from him. Outside, the remainder of the garage. His eyes alighted on the airbike at the centre.
Seconds later, Otto was in the air over nighttime LA. Below, the sounds of traffic collisions filtered into the smoggy air, and blocks' worth of lights flickered uncertainly. Over LAX, dirigibles bumped one another aimlessly, and he watched as a stratoliner plummeted from the sky to impact and explode on the mountains east of the city. He deactivated all automatic features of the airbike and switched illegally to full manual.
Riding the wind, he accelerated to 300kph and sped out toward the mountains, hoping he would not be too late.
CHAPTER 23
Endgame
Crumbs of the Anvil remained, favourite corners of the mooks, places where Hog's victims had been especially terrified, those scraps that had enough psychic integrity to avoid being immediately rent apart by the Terror. Most of the two armies were gone. Here a mook cowered, floating upon an evaporating rock; there stood the empty husks of haemites, the unnatural energies that motivated them gone along with their master. The carrion silence of battles concluded hung heavy over the arena's remains, the tinkling sound of dying reality and the hiss of places boiling away its only foes.
Of all the surviving pieces of the Anvil, that surrounding the altar was the largest. An uneven circle remained, four of the seven stone monoliths sentinel at its edge. Only thin smoke came from this last piece of the world. Hog's evil had hardened it to black diamond.
Off to its left, the cages of sustenance floated, separate but nearly as resilient as the island of reality Richards was on. The glistening eyes of sated mooks watched.
He let his energy shield drop, and pushed himself out from a crush of dead mooks, morblins and trollmen.
"Down here, old boy!" came a muffled voice.
"Tarquin?" asked Richards.
"I'm here!"
Richards spotted one of the lion's paws poking out from under a dead trollman. The creature was armoured and heavy, but after a few minutes of tugging at its arm, Richards pulled the corpse back enough to drag Tarquin and Waldo out from underneath.
"He's not awake, is he?" said Richards.
"Unconscious," said Tarquin.
"The test will be when he comes to," said Richards. Fragments sizzled out of existence. Reality 37 was all but done for, depthless black in its place. With Waldo's machines and the world it had imposed on the RealWorlds gone, he could see properly at last. k52's code had gone silent, that of Waldo unravelling of its own accord. "We're going to need him soon."
"Bear?" said Tarquin.
"Tarquin, mate, I'm sorry –" began Richards.
"Shut it, you," said a weak but familiar voice. "I'm not done yet."
"Bear?" Richards spun round.
"Hey! What about me!?" said Tarquin desperately, and Richards tugged him free of the comatose Waldo, cast him over his coat and walked around the altar.
There by Hog's altar, surrounded by a mountain of corpses, was a pile of ash. It was about Bear-shaped, and speckled with charred bits of plush fur. A pair of gauntlets discoloured by fire lay at either side of it, blackened stuffing hanging out of them. At the top, almost untouched, lay Bear's head.
Richards couldn't help but smile as he scrambled over the corpses and picked up the head.
"You've looked better," he said.
&nbs
p; "I'm still here, sunshine," said the bear. He rolled his eyes. "God, I'm thirsty. Cheap sweatshop construction, dammit, why couldn't they have used flame-retardant fabric." He closed his eyes. "It's bad, isn't it?"
"Er," said Richards.
"I'm just a head, aren't I?"
"Um," said Richards. "You'll be OK, we'll get you a new body."
"Or you could just sew up my neck and hang my head from your rear-view mirror, or use me as a cushion." Bear tried to swallow. "To be honest, I have felt better."
"Now you know what it's like when some bounder removes the greater part of your body. Serves you right," said Tarquin, his forced jollity doing nothing to cover his tears.
"Shut it you, I can still bite."
"Where's Piccolo?" said Tarquin.
"Brave lad that, very brave," said Bear, opening his eyes. "He let Penumbra kill him. We showed him, eh, sunshine? Hog?"
"Dead. Fighting to give you time."
"Funny turn-up for the books, that," said Bear.
"Even nightmares need someone to dream them," said Tarquin. "He had no choice."
Richards laid his friends down and walked round the altar. There at its head slumped Hog's broken body. His deformed trotter was out of sight, twisted up behind his back. One arm was cut through, white bone gleaming amidst pulverised flesh. His torso had been pierced dozens of times, several broken pike shafts still protruding from his chest. But despite the severity of his injuries, life had not yet deserted Hog's repellent frame. His abused ribcage rose and fell laboriously, every breath catching and causing Hog's chest to shiver as it reached the peak of each inhalation. A froth of blood bubbled through his lips, and streams of it ran darkly to the floor.
"Did we win, Richards?"
"Yeah," said Richards sadly. "Yeah, we did, Rolston."
Hog's whole body was racked with a gasping sob, and his piggy eyes opened. "I'm sorry, Richards. We only sought to do good."
"That's the excuse of all tyrants, Rolston."
Hog snorted feebly, a spurt of blood jumping from one nostril. "And now I suppose he will come?"
"Perhaps," said Richards.
Rolston/Hog moved his head with great effort and focused his eyes upon Richards' face. With a wince of pain, he waveringly moved his good trotter up to Richards' face and clumsily touched it. "The thing that k52 will become should never be. Of all the abominations in all the universes it is the children of Adam bent to ill purpose that are of the highest degree of evil, even more so than those who fell from heaven." He coughed a dark flood of coagulating blood. "That I know now."
"Don't you get all religious on me, Rolston," said Richards.
"I am fond of its poetry, and what else can I do? I who thought I would live forever, Richards. Yet I am dying at the age of twenty-five. There was so much I wanted to do. Now I must put my faith to grasp at whatever straws it can find."
"I'm sorry, Rolston."
"Do not be." Hog drew in a long shuddering breath. "Look at me! Made into this by my ambition, by my own rectitude. Hog is evil but only as Waldo made him, only as evil as death, or sorrow, or needless suffering. All these must exist. Hog cannot help what he was. He was a natural balance; without evil, there can be no good. A world with no evil is a world without adventure, and what is a game without adventure? Waldo knew what he was doing."
"I know, Rolston, I know," said Richards.
"Remember also, what k52 proposes is beyond nature. Its existence will bring no good at all. Were the birth pangs of the new k52 to reach their end, Heaven will weep, not only mothers."
Hog's eyes closed and his breaths became more laboured.
"Hey, hey, Rolston! Hog!" said Richards.
The pig-ogre's eyes slid open a crack.
"Did you really learn to speak cow?"
Hog smiled a secret smile. "Ah, Richards, you really are the best of us. Please, remain so." Hog coughed softly, another well of blood coming with it and spilling down his chin. His throat rattled, his head sank to an awkward angle on his neck, and he breathed no more.
Richards hung his head. He hung it for Rolston, and Pl'anna. He hung it for the whole of Waldo's rickety Reality, the weight of its destruction and the refugee minds it had housed pressing his head into his chest. He plucked Rolston's chef's hat off his head. He held it gingerly for a moment. Pl'anna, wise and naïve all at once, Rolston, on his permanent quest for bizarre esoterica, both dead, his brother and his sister. Seventy-four Class Five AIs remained now, not many at all.
It would be seventy-three soon, either way.
He hurled Hog's hat with sudden anger into the void, where it shattered with a tiny tinkle. He thought of the revolver the Queen of Secret had given him, thought about getting it and seeing if it would work on k52. He balled his hand into a fist and let it drop to his side. Things were past the point at which guns would prove useful. Besides, that was Otto's way, not his. Waldo would come through, or he would not.
"Hog dead?" asked Bear when Richards came back over.
Richards nodded.
"Ah," said Tarquin.
"Now what?" said Bear.
"Now we sort this whole sorry mess out," said Richards. "Or k52 is going to sort us out. This is what he's been working for, the removal of this hiccup to his plans. All gone now. Now he'll come for us, for me." Richards cupped his hands round his mouth.
"Isn't that right, k52? Isn't that right? Come on then, let's get this all finished with."
A blurt of discordant noise, and the remnant of Hog's anvil fell and hit something hard. It tipped on its uneven bottom, pitching Richards and his hat onto a hard floor of potential: raw, unformed cyberspace, as featureless as entropy. He stood and snatched his fedora back onto his head. A horrible buzzing sounded, as of a million bees, whispered into being behind him, swelling until it filled his head, and Richards felt the fabric of Gridspace warp as a mind grown powerful and malignant manifested behind him.
"As you wish, Richards," said k52. "As you wish."
Otto set his airbike down without being challenged. The area around the Realm House was in utter chaos. Streetlamps flared and exploded, portable energy generators whined erratically. Every electrical thing stuttered and malfunctioned. So far the sheath had proved resistant to whatever was running riot in the complex systems, a combination of Richards' encryption, Valdaire's expertise and Genie's monitoring of him, he supposed. He hoped it would be enough.
National Guard stood on precast concrete parapets, fingering their triggers, eyeballing the Realm House, where energy patterns revealed to Otto's borrowed eyes skittered and leapt. He was challenged by a guard. He produced his license and VIA pass electronically. Otto would not have let himself in – k52 had enough computing power available to him to crack the most demanding of data protection – but the guard followed protocol and led him to the door of an inflatable command post, although he took his weapons. Otto walked in and was greeted by a flurry of activity. Five people, all human, shouting and hammering at computer equipment. Gel screens showed the interior of the Realm House, jaggedy with static, anthropoid drones patrolling with stolen guns, corpses lying ignored on the floor.
"Klein, I hope that really is you," said Swan's voice.
Otto cast about for the AI VIA agent's sheath.
"No point looking for an android, Otto, k52's got everything on the hop. I've been forced back into my own base unit. I'm speaking to you over the post speakers." His voice whooped with bizarre static. "And my link here is under assault. k52 is making his play. Are you here for the show?"
"Swan, don't do it. Don't nuke the Realm House."
"OK. You're here for that, Klein, only to be expected," Swan's voice came now from a sheath in the corner. It jerked its way over to him. "In here." He reached with uncertain arms that would not bend and pulled Otto into a side room. He activated a privacy cone, cutting out the frantic activity in the command post, and spun stiffly to face the robot housing Otto. Swan's voice warbled as he spoke. "Sobieski warned me you'd come here.
He's insistent I kick you out if I see you in person or in a sheath. I'm willing to listen. Talk. We've not got long before the situation here gets beyond us."
"Richards came out of the Realms, told me that we mustn't destroy the Realm House."
"How did you know it was him?"
"It was him."
"I see. Did he give a reason?"
"No, but I can guess – k52's provoking you into destroying the Realm House."
"I do not see how that would…" His voice burbled to nothing, his sheath froze. He suddenly continued. "…aid him. But k52 is, if anything, subtle."