Multiverse: Stories Across Realms

by Steve Rzasa

  Brian blushed. “C’mon, guys.”

  Zayd laughed. “Ah, Captain, Allah has put me in great hands, I see. He truly is As-Salam, the source of peace and safety, the Most Perfect.”

  “Zayd, you know all of your Ninety-Nine names for God, don’t you?”

  “Proudly.”

  “Well, there is a name for God that you don’t know, and to me, it is the most important.”

  “And it is …?”

  “Father.”

  HUNTING SOULS (2010)

  EVER SINCE BEGINNING THE FACE of the Deep, I’ve been fascinated by Kesek, the secret police who keep religious denominations in line. They are the ones who chase down texts, either printed or electronic. They are the villains of all the novels.

  In between finishing The Word Reclaimed and The Word Unleashed, but prior to writing Broken Sight, I wanted to explore their ranks. What would the average officer’s life be like? What kind of partner would he have? How would he interact with the more villainous agents?

  Thus was born Hunting Souls.

  June 2599

  Earth’s Star System

  Saturn, Dione Moon, Tannerford Base

  Jesse was looking for a woman.

  She was so elusive no one had seen her true face and managed to record it. There were no still images, no security holograms, no visual information stored on any computer or linked to any delver anywhere in all the Realm of Five.

  Jesse didn’t know where she was, or for that matter, even who she really was.

  All he had was a name—Lydia.

  He sat on one side of an obsidian table. His thumb rested on the scroll button of his delver. He paged with gentle pressure through the report streaming across the secure datalink in the Reach information network. Everyone had one, of course, but his own was far more sophisticated and secure than the average delver. It was adept at managing data, communications, and, in this particular instance, spilling the details of Hideo Narita’s life before Jesse’s eyes.

  Hideo sat across from him. Perspiration beaded his small forehead and his narrow Asian face was tense. He ran a hand through shaggy black hair, exhaled, and repeated the gesture.

  It smelled in the interrogation room. Smelled of sweat and fear.

  They were alone. Their only companions were tiny, bulbous security imagers in each of the four ceiling corners. The walls were mirror-polished and black, as was the ceiling. The floor was grey tile. The black table and grey chairs were equally dull. They were meant to be. Even Hideo’s charcoal prisoner jumpsuit was shaded to match that scheme.

  Only Jesse’s maroon jacket and tan trousers stood out.

  Jesse made a show of frowning at something on the delver. Then he shut it off, pushed it to one side, folded his hands together, and waited. This too was calculated to enhance Hideo’s unease. Jesse, meanwhile, stared at his tired reflection in the dark tabletop. He marveled at the tight lines around the eyes and the slightly thinning blond hair. Stars, but I look old. He pulled himself from his reverie and raised his face to meet Hideo’s stare.

  The young man blanched. “Look, man, whatever those vac-heads say I did, it isn’t true. Boku o shinjite. You got no right to hold me here—”

  “No right?” Jesse put permacrete into the statement. Then he lay on the fear. “You’re dealing with Kesek. Royal Stability Force. Remember what that means.”

  Hideo swallowed whatever retort he’d had planned. His eyes flicked to Jesse’s jacket. Jesse smiled thinly and tapped the plain brass badge. It bore only the words Koninklijke stabiliteitskracht—the translation of Royal Stability Force, often abbreviated as KSK. Kesek.

  “We will try this again, Hideo.” Jesse rapped the delver sharply against the table, making Hideo jump. “Two days ago, Kesek officers inquired of your delver. As programmed, your delver divulged all your personal and public data into our servers. Subsequent analysis turned up a brief but nonetheless illegal copy of a text-in-violation. Do you deny this?”

  Hideo tried an indignant shake of the head. Jesse stared him down. That was the third denial. Peter the apostle had supposedly done as much. Let’s see this one hold fast.

  Hideo suddenly deflated. Any bravado he’d had simply left him. He sighed. “No, I don’t.”

  Jesse consulted his delver’s glowing screen. “Something called ‘John,’ right?”

  “Yes.”

  “If memory serves, this is a very important text for your…kind.”

  “It’s one of the greatest, and you’d never understand why.”

  Jesse found the statement ironic. “Try me.”

  Hideo lifted his chin, looking surprisingly defiant. “It’s the message of salvation.”

  “Sounds big.” Jesse leaned back in his chair and folded his arms. “So where did you get it, Hideo?”

  Hideo looked away.

  “Look, I know it isn’t yours. Yes, you have a copy, but you aren’t the only one—we’ve picked up three others with the same text bearing the same electronic signature. You got it from someone. Tell me whom.”

  Hideo said nothing.

  Time for a change. “Hideo,” Jesse said gently, “I’m not after you. We can make this go much easier if you cooperate. Just tell me who gave it to you.”

  Nothing.

  “Was it Lydia?”

  Hideo started.

  Jesse leaned forward. It was working. “Don’t panic. Don’t worry. Tell me where to find her. This can all go away. Just help me find her.”

  Hideo was shaking. Success was coming. “My parents. They need my help. Working at the hydroponics lab lets me support them.”

  “You and your siblings do a good job of that.” Jesse’s delver had coughed up every detail of Hideo’s life. “You’re not a bad man, Hideo, but you have broken the law, and so has this Lydia. Now, please—did you get the text from her?”

  Hideo bowed his head. “No.”

  Keep the pressure on. “Then whom? Someone connected with her. I know it. Tell me.”

  “Y—yes. Someone who works with her.”

  Elation washed over Jesse. A solid lead. He kept his expression studiously neutral. “Where?”

  “I …” Hideo shook his head.

  Jesse pressed his knees hard against the underside of the table instead of clenching his fists as he felt like doing.

  “Janus. He’s on Janus.” Hideo buried his face in his hands. His voice came out muffled. “He got the Gospel from Lydia.”

  Jesse smiled “Good. Very good.” He spun his delver around and pushed it across the table. “Tell me exactly where and how you contacted him.”

  Hideo looked up. His eyes were red. Tortured.

  Jesse knew about tortured. “This doesn’t have to end badly for you,” he said. “One word from me and your jail time can be reduced. We can even keep you in the solar system. It all has to do with your level of cooperation.”

  Hideo studied the floor. Jesse folded his hands, staring at him, willing him to comply.

  Finally, Hideo met his gaze. He grabbed the delver. “I’ll show you.”

  Jesse nodded and smiled. “You’re doing the right thing.”

  He felt sick to his stomach.

  Jesse left the interrogation room ten minutes later.

  His partner, Constable Frederick Hanse, slouched against the bulkhead. He apparently hadn’t noticed Jesse, so the latter cleared his throat. Fred leapt to attention. “Sir!” He gave the Kesek salute by quickly touching all fingers but his thumb on his right hand to his left shoulder and bowing his chin to his chest.

  Jesse looked over the newly-minted constable. His crisp, clean Kesek uniform bulged under duress from his burly chest and stretched in protest to his towering height. His build was incongruous with his cherubic face and sandy hair. The blazing white lights shining on Fred, Jesse, and the blue-grey corridor bulkheads made their skin equally pale.

  “He confessed, Fred. We’re off to Janus as soon as our shuttle is ready.” Jesse handed over the delver and started down the corridor. H
e didn’t wait for Fred.

  Fred was studying the delver with eagerness as he fell in step beside Jesse. They came to a pair of guards in black and maroon body armor.

  “Take Mister Narita into custody,” Jesse said, “and put him on the next prisoner transport to Beaudreau’s Rock.”

  One of the guards saluted. They bustled off to the interrogation room.

  Fred frowned at Jesse. “Beaudreau’s? Sir, it says here Narita confessed on condition that his sentence would be mitigated to local time served in a Saturnian penal facility.”

  Jesse took the delver back. “So it does,” he said dryly. He tapped the screen a few times and then held it up again. He kept his expression cold. “Now it doesn’t. Come on.”

  “You lied to him, sir?”

  “Nobody told me you were a genius, Fred. Is that the last thing you learned in training?”

  The young constable turned beet red. “No, sir.”

  “What do they teach you there, anyway?” Jesse put himself nose-to-nose with the constable—a difficult task, considering Fred could stare right over Jesse’s scalp.

  “Sir. We learned the importance of the Charter of Religious Tolerance.”

  “And what does that esteemed document say?”

  “It says that any religion that claims exclusivity is a danger to the stability to the Realm of Five and must be dealt with. All religions must be regulated to ensure the safety of all citizens.”

  “Very good. Remember, that’s why we do what we do.”

  Jesse strode off, trying not to show his frustration. Fred kept pace. Jesse activated his wrist comm. “This is Detective Inspector Jesse Bahn. Have my shuttle ready for departure in ten.”

  “Affirmative,” came the tinny response.

  An anguished shout echoed down the corridor from behind them. Fred looked back but Jesse refused to. He could just barely hear the cry, “But he said—” before a muffled blow silenced the rest.

  Jesse steeled himself. Steady now.

  The Tethys docks personnel hurried the Kesek shuttle through all normal flight clearances. The only restriction they placed on the flight was to plot it a course well out of range of the dozen mass drivers busily flinging chunks of ice down their bright red, magnetically-charged rails toward the inner planets.

  Jesse sat at the flight controls. Fred manned the comm and nav display in the co-pilot’s seat. The shuttle, a blunted grey triangle of a ship, was big enough to accommodate both of them comfortably in the cockpit. It sported a quartet of bunks farther back in the fuselage, as well as a pair of holding cells and a restroom.

  Jesse pushed the shuttle to its maximum acceleration.

  “Time to Janus is twenty minutes,” Fred reported.

  Jesse nodded. He was only half listening. Out the wide, curving viewport, the frigid surface of Tethys slipped by below. Gaping maws of deepwater drilling sites and slashing canyons of ice mines surrounded the sprawling structures of Tannerford Base.

  “You think we’ll catch her this time, sir?” Fred wasn’t looking at Jesse. Probably still mad about how he had deceived Narita.

  Good. “We’ll see.”

  “There’s only so many places she can go if she stays in-system.”

  Jesse sighed. “You do recall that there are more than sixty moons around Saturn alone, don’t you? And that Earth has billions of people on it?”

  “Oh. Right.”

  “She’s violated the Charter for Religious Tolerance by proselytizing, by claiming exclusivity, and by disseminating copies of a text-in-violation. Make no mistake, we will find her.”

  The rest of the trip was conducted in silence. It wasn’t long before the already massive Saturn loomed larger before them. Its rings caught the sun’s light and scattered across icy rocks with the beauty of a rare painting. The apparently perfect spheres of the planet and its largest moons, Titan foremost among them, awed Jesse to no end. Janus, by comparison, brought back memories of cooking dinner on Saturday evenings with his father. One time he’d dropped a bag of russet potatoes on the floor. They’d both laughed. Janus looked like one of those potatoes. His father loved them. He’d passed that love on to his eldest son.

  The shuttle descended toward the surface of Janus.

  Janus was a bustling port of call for the hydrogen sweepship captains who dared the stormy atmosphere of Saturn. It was their prime transshipment point to the rest of the solar system, and beyond. An interstellar ferry left twice monthly, bound for the Tiaozhan Path. Jesse followed Janus dock’s instructions for avoiding the ovoid sweepships clustered in orbit.

  The port settlement they were headed to, Camese, was the primary hive for that activity. Jesse punched up a landing display on the center console. Space launch gantries and facilities reached up from the surface and away from the domes of residences, shops, and trading guild offices, clustered like soap bubbles.

  They landed without incident and disembarked. Both carried black duffel bags. Local police nodded deferentially as Jesse tapped his badge. “We’ll change in here,” he said to Fred. “Remember. Wait five minutes after I leave.”

  Fred looked nervous, but nodded. “Understood.”

  A short while later, Jesse walked alone onto the main boulevard of Camese. The transparent dome reached far overhead. The star-spotted black of space formed a comforting canopy for Jesse. Bright lights of soft yellow shone from overhead poles. The boulevard was carved from Janus’ own rocky surface: greys and whites. The rainbow variety of shops lining one side were made of all manner of material—permacrete, metal, composites, the ever-rare wood, even a few tents. A long railing meandered along the other side. Jesse could hear the soothing rush of water from beyond the railing. It formed a low background noise to the chatting of visitors and advertisements from the stores.

  Today was a particularly busy day, coming before the end of the month ferry arrival. The shops, which sold mostly hard-to-find foods and crafts, were doing a brisk business. One nondescript art gallery had a steady stream of customers entering and exiting. The swirling gold name on the sign said, “Alfonso Bianchi, Esq.” Advertisements said he did a brisk business in paintings from Earth and the Venus orbital habitats.

  Today, Jesse was one of his customers.

  He had on a set of casual clothes—brown slacks, blue shirt, black jacket. So he fit right in with the dozen or so people milling between the glass shelves of paintings. The oil works were mostly landscapes and animal portraits. Few were larger than a half-meter in length.

  Jesse spotted Alfonso behind a low counter and moved to casually intercept. “Nice shop.”

  “Thank you, sir.” Alfonso was cheery, dark-skinned, and bearded. “Is there anything in particular you want?”

  “You have anything good by Stephen?”

  Alfonso froze in the middle of a transaction with a young woman. His own smile stayed in place as he bid her farewell. Alfonso gave Jesse a curious look. “Very rare work. And valuable.”

  “Money’s not a problem. Is it authentic?” Jesse prayed the code would work.

  “Yes, and it is true.”

  That was the countersign. Jesse did his best to hide his relief. Now for the last piece. “I’m interested in the son of thunder.”

  Alfonso waggled his fingers. “Come with me, please.”

  He left two of his clerks in charge of the front counter. Jesse followed Alfonso toward the back of the shop. They brushed by a young sandy-haired man perusing the pottery. Alfonso paid him no notice, but Jesse did. Fred glanced up quickly from the pottery.

  Alfonso drew back a gauzy red and blue curtain. Behind it was a metal door. He opened it and led Jesse inside. Jesse found himself in a small storage area surrounded by boxes on shelves. Alfonso closed the door and reached inside a box. He pulled a delver from its hiding place. “Do you have a safe method of transport?”

  Jesse nodded. He dug a delver from his jacket pocket. “I have my own grey delver. Untraceable.”

  “Good.” Alfonso linked the two units
and began the download. A second later it beeped. “Take good care of it.”

  Jesse’s lip twitched. “Oh, I will take care of it.”

  “Will you pay now?”

  “No.” Jesse drew his badge. “You’ll pay.”

  Alfonso’s reactions weren’t poor. He barreled into Jesse and shoved past. Alfonso opened the door. A freckled fist slammed into his face. Fred stood in the doorway.

  “Detective Inspector Jesse Bahn, Kesek.” Jesse stood over him with his KM3 pistol aimed at Alfonso’s face. “Alfonso Bianchi, you’re under arrest for violating the Charter of Religious Tolerance and willingly disseminating a text-in-violation, namely the Gospel of John from the Christian Bible. Get him up, Fred.”

  Fred hauled Alfonso to his feet. He took a moment to shake his fist and wince, then he placed Alfonso’s wrists in binders. The pair of Kesek officers pushed him out through the door and back into the shop. They walked close beside Alfonso, looking as nonchalant as possible. Jesse kept his gun pressed close to Alfonso’s side. “Now. Let’s have a little chat about our mutual friend, Lydia.”

  Someone moved out of the corner of his eye. Fred shouted, “Gun!”

  The gunshot sounded like a cannon. It slammed squarely into Alfonso’s chest. He jerked back with a blank expression on his face. Blood spattered across Jesse’s shirt. He went limp.

  No!

  Screams tore through the busy store. Customers knocked over artwork and each other in a frenzied attempt to flee. Jesse saw in that instant one of the young clerks—a pale-skinned girl with jet black hair—slip between them.

  “Halt! Kesek!” He shoved Fred forward. “Go, go!”

  The two elbowed their way through the customers. They ignored the frantic calls in the background for a medic. A security robot hurtled down the main boulevard, its treads whirring and emergency lights flashing amber. “Weapons discharge reported,” it droned.

  “Man down, wounded, in there!” Jesse shouted at both the robot and its unseen remote operator as he sprinted by. “Keep him alive!”

  It was easy to track the girl. Jesse followed the groups of disheveled looking passersby until he caught a glimpse of her ducking toward a row of gaudily decorated merchant stalls. The stalls lined a chest-high railing along the boulevard. Beyond that railing lay a thirty-meter drop down a sheer, laser-cut trench to rushing waters of an open irrigation conduit that fed domed farms.