“Name it.”
“It’s not it — it’s her. Do you know a woman named Godiva Lomberd.”
“I’ve met her. She’s a well-known figure on Earth.”
“She’s not on Earth. She’s here. Luther Brachis has entered into a contract with her.”
“You know Luther. He’s had a thousand women. They come and go. Godiva Lomberd is just another one.”
“That was what I thought, when he brought her up from Earth. A month here, at most two, and she would be gone. But this is different. Luther is different.”
“Different, how?” Mondrian wondered how much Lotos Sheldrake knew. Did she suspect that he had been the one who first arranged for Brachis to meet Godiva? The only other person who could have told her that was Tatiana, and she was still locked away on Horus with Chan Dalton.
“Different with me.” Lotos slapped her hand on the desk, rattling cups. “As you said, Luther has had a thousand women. I never gave any of them a thought. They did not affect his personality, or his work — until now. I do not like surprises, and the new Luther Brachis is a surprise. I want to meet this woman. I want to know who she is, where she came from, what she wants from him.”
Jealousy — from a most unlikely source. “1 can’t deliver all that.”
“You will not need to.” Lotos was in full control again, smiling her deadly smile. “You just arrange for me to meet her — and leave the rest to me.”
Chapter 15
The facilities on Earth were nowhere near the best in the system. For high-quality storage of living organisms, the perceptive buyer went to Enceladus, or to the Great Vault of Hyperion, where ambient disturbances were less and both bodies and maintenance personnel less corruptible.
But from the purchaser’s point of view, Earth storage provided one unarguable advantage: anonymity. Provided that the rental was paid on time (which meant five full years in advance) no one ever questioned the contents of the pallet. According to rumor, more than three thousand rightful Earth monarchs slept their dreamless storage sleep in the Antarctic warehouses. No one could ever accuse the usurpers of murder; but it would be a long, long time before the real kings and queens would be recalled from slumber to claim their thrones.
The warehouses were kept well below freezing. The two people searching the long files wore heavy clothing, thick gloves, and thermal boots. They cursed the layers of frost that made every identification tag difficult to read.
“Here we are, then.” The short, red-haired man bent over the long box and scrubbed again at the tag for a second look. He nodded to his companion to grab the other end. “This is it. Ready?”
The fat blond woman puffed out a frosty breath. “Let’s do it. I’m tired. Just this one, then that’s it for the day. Up’s-a-daisy.”
The container slid easily onto the moving railway. The man and woman walked beside it at each end, making sure that the ride out was smooth. They emerged at last into a long, white-walled room filled with medical equipment and banks of monitors. Working as an efficient team, they moved the container to one of the lone tables, broke the seals, and hooked in the pumps and catheters. The woman checked the inner identification against the work order that she was carrying.
“It’s an A label. How about that. Been a long time since we saw an Artefact coming out of the cooler. Any idea what we got here?”
The man sniffed, pulling off his thick white gloves. “Nah. Better keep a good watch on this one, though. Last time we did an A label, it was one of them four-wing dragon-fliers. We had a good laugh with that one — it was all over the lab, and nearly had a leg off Jesco Siemens before we could tie it down. Old Jesco, he couldn’t see the joke at all.”
The top and side were off the long box, and the pumps and wipers were slowly removing thick layers of semi-solid jelly, warming it as they worked. A shape began to emerge. The two stared at it in fascination.
“Uurgh.” The man was leaning close. “I don’t like the look of that. It’s hideous. See them legs.”
They were staring at a pair of long, bony feet, still with thick black gunk between the knobbly toes. As they watched the rest of the figure slowly came into view. It was a male, facedown; naked, tall, angular, hollow-chested, and skinny.
“How’d you like to find him under your bed, eh?” The fat woman laughed. “You sure we got the right one? Don’t look like an Artefact.”
“Think so.” The man was peering at the identification he was holding, and rubbing his cold nose with a stubby finger.
“Well, I can’t see nobody in their right mind making an Artefact that looks like that — never mind waking him up.” She took a step closer and stared at the naked body on the bench. “If you asked me, I’d say this is one of the bloody inbred royals, something the family stuck down here and never wanted to see any more. I think we ought to check again.”
“I’m doing it. This writing is terrible.”
“And check that the payment was made, too. It’s getting a bit late to stick him back. He’ll be spoiled.”
The man was frowning over the label. “It’s this one, all right.” He scratched his head as the body was rotated to face upwards. “Lordy. You’re right, he’s no beauty. I liked him better the other way up. But here’s the chit. Paid in full, automatic bank draft from somebody’s final estate. Same ID marking on the container. Label, A type, Artefact by — what’s it say? — Fu — jit — su. Let’s get on with it before we freeze. If anything’s wrong, it’s nothing to do with us.”
The protective layers of jelly were almost gone. The catheters were sliding in as the last scraping was removed, and the deep-heat batteries increased in intensity. The table tilted, raising the body to a vertical position and holding it. There was a horrible spluttering cough, and a choking grunt as lungs filled with thin oil labored to expel it. With another cough a spray of brown liquid went out onto the floor. Suddenly the figure sneezed and shook its head from side to side.
“Take it easy, now.” The man stepped forward, but he was too late. Clawlike hands were scooping out the thick jelly that still filled the eye cavities. The head was massive, with a bald, domed skull. A full beard grew beneath the thin mouth, and was shadowed above by a prominent red beak of a nose.
The mouth opened, to reveal crooked teeth. “Hh-hmmm. Ah. Thank you.”
There was another violent cough. The tall figure pulled out catheters, stood up straight, and took a step away from the table. It was still naked, and splotched with thick black goo. In spite of its bizarre appearance it had a strange dignity.
“Thank you,” it said again. It looked at the two workers and took in a long, lung-expanding breath. “I appreciate your services. But now I must go. Time is short, and I have important work to do.”
It jerked into motion and headed for the door of the chamber. The man and woman looked at each other, then started after it.
“You can’t go yet,” cried the woman. “You forgot your bath — you have to have a bath, it’s the rules.”
“And your clothes!” added the man. “You can’t go out there bare-bum naked. Don’t worry about the price of ’em, everything’s already paid for.”
But the tall Artefact was not listening. It was already out of the door, striding purposefully towards the elevators that led to the Link entry point.
Chapter 16
Chan had been on Ceres before, briefly, in transit from Earth to Horus. At that time, Kubo Flammarion had taken him to his office, shown him the big displays, and let him play with the buttons and switches. Chan had skipped for five minutes around the planets and moons known to the Stellar Group; yawned; and asked for a cold drink.
Now he was there again, in front of the same console. Tatty Snipes sat on one side of him. Kubo Flammarion was on the other, scratching his head in amazement. Instead of being bored by the controls, or idly playing with them, Chan was studying the board and asking questions. Loads of them.
“What about this one?” He had flicked fast through a series o
f images and now paused at one of them. It was a low-orbit satellite view of a dreary gray landscape, and it showed a lot more detail than most. “It’s been flagged.”
Flammarion nodded. “Certainly has. That’s Barchan. You’ll need to know all about it, once you pass the entrance examination. The first training courses with all team members present are held there.
“Looks — what is the right word to use? — parched?’
“Sure is. Dry as a bone, almost all of it. It’s a desert world in the Eta Cass system — that’s where the Pipe-Rillas come from. Barchan is two worlds sunward of S’kat’lan, their home planet.”
“Can I live there without a suit? Is it — what is the word for that?”
“Habitable. Yes, you’ll be able to breathe the air — just — but it’s so hot you’ll wear a suit almost all the time. Want to take a look at it from ground level?”
Chan shook his head. “Later.” His eyes were already fixed on another image and his fingers danced across the board.
Tatty caught Flammarion’s eye. Get a load of that.
When Chan had no more than an infant’s mentality, there had been nothing wrong with his coordination. Now he was operating the control board faster than Flammarion.
The older man scowled and shook his head. It didn’t fool Tatty. Kubo Flammarion had no children, and never expected to. He could not conceal his pleasure and parental approval when Chan did something new and impressive.
Here’s another one that’s been flagged,” said Chan. “Where is it?”
The screen showed a verdant world, one where even the oceans were covered with a dense carpet of vegetation.
“That’s Dembricot, in the Tinker system.” Flammarion moved closer. “Move over a bit, and I’ll show you why the training supervisors flagged it for you.” He leaned across, linked in to a surface camera, and zoomed across to take a close-up view of a building nestled among tall, spiky ferns. “See that? Main training center for Team Alpha, before they headed out.”
“Team Alpha? Did you tell me about that?” Chan was worried.
Flammarion glanced questioningly at Tatty.
“Don’t worry, Chan, you’re not forgetting things,” she said. “I never mentioned it. My fault — but there s been so much to pack in.”
“Team Alpha is the first Pursuit Team to complete training,” said Flammarion. “Leah Rainbow is part of it, along with three aliens.”
“What does the name mean?”
“Nothing much.” Flammarion shrugged. “Just that it’s the first team to go out. Leah hates the name, says she’s going to change it soon as she gets the chance.”
“So Leah was right there, in that building.” Chan eyed it hungrily. “I wish she was there still, so we could use your — comm-un-i-cator? — and I could talk with her.”
“Sorry. They left Dembricot days ago. You see, Chan, they’re all done with their training. Leah came through it in fine shape, just the way you will when your time comes. Now it’s the real thing. The team’s in high orbit around a planet called Travancore. The Morgan Construct is supposed to be hiding away there, so at the moment they re not allowed closer than a million kilometers. You know, maybe I can link us to their ship — at the very least I should be able to get the one-way visuals they’re sending back to base.”
Flammarion rattled at the controls with black-nailed fingers, cursing as a mystifying succession of grainy images fled across the screens. “Rotten cheap equipment,” he said, as the picture finally steadied. “Rotten tight-fisted politicians. That’s probably as good as we’ll get. Low signal bandwidth, see.”
“Bandwidth?”
“Take too long to explain now. Just remember that low bandwidth usually means we get only so-so voice communication and a lousy picture or no picture. Like that.”
A flickering black and white image filled the display.
“No color either,” said Flammarion. “Can’t get realtime color with low bandwidth. Make the most of it. That’s a long shot of Travancore, coming from the pursuit team’s ship.’
They were again seeing the surface of a planet under high magnification, but this time from a ship far away. At first sight it was a repeat of Dembricot, a dense, horizon-to-horizon carpet of vegetation. A closer look showed differences on the speckled screen. Instead of being flat and uniform, the surface of Travancore pushed up into millions of small hillocks and hummocks, each one only a few hundred meters across.
“See ’em?” said Flammarion. “Whole planet’s like that. Pretty odd place, and I’ve seen some. Those hills are solid plant life. Surface gravity is low, but not all that low. Somehow, though, vegetation can grow six kilometers deep.
Vertical jungle, layer after layer after layer of it. Don t ask me why it doesn’t all come crashing down.”
“How can a ship land there?”
“Very fair question. It can’t — not in the usual way. There’s no solid surface to put a ship down on, and no way it could stay in one place if it tried to land. It would sink down and down, Lord-knows-how far before packed vegetation could hold up the weight. So a ship has to hover at the top layer, and drop off people and cargo, and then hit right up again.”
“I never heard of a ship doing that,” said Tatty.
“So you’re learning something as well as Chan. Flammarion was fiddling with another part of the control board as he spoke. “You can both see why Travancore makes such a hell of a good hiding place — we can’t see much with a space survey, and we can’t do a mechanized ground survey. But somewhere under all that mess, if you believe the Angels, there’s a surviving Morgan Construct.”
“Leah will go there?”
“Not until they know the planet a whole lot better — maybe in another week or two. But eventually Leah and her team have to find the Construct and destroy it.” A series of clicks came from the communicator, while a pattern of red squares appeared in the upper left corner of the display.
“Virtue rewarded,” said Flammarion. “I put in that tracer, but I didn’t really expect success. That s the signal I.D. from Team Alpha itself — we’re in contact with the ship, not just tapping the data stream they’re sending back to base.”
“You mean I can talk to Leah?”
“If our luck holds.” Flammarion started to complete the sequence. “I told her that you’d be on-line at this end.”
“Wait a minute.” Chan stood up and stared at the screen. He began to breathe very rapidly.
“And here she is.”
Flammarion had taken no notice of Chan’s request to wait. He had just managed a pretty neat trick of realtime signal patching, and he was rather pleased with himself. He turned to explain to Chan what he had done, and found himself looking at a rapidly retreating back. “Hey, where are you going? I’ve got her on the line with me right now.”
“Chan?” Leah’s dark countenance flickered onto the screen. “Chan, is that really you? This is wonderful.” The camera panned across the room and she looked increasingly puzzled. “Chan, where are you? I’ve been longing to talk to you ever since the moment I got the news.”
Tatty came forward and stood in front of the scanning camera. “I’m sorry, Leah. This is Tatty. I ought to have guessed that this might happen. Chan’s here, and he’s doing fine. But he finds it hard to talk to you.”
“Hard to talk to me?” The picture quality was too poor to read subtleties of Leah’s expression, but her voice was bewildered. “Tatty, I’ve been talking to Chan since he was practically in diapers. I can talk to him and understand him better than anyone else breathing.” The voice hardened. “What have you and Flammarion and Mondrian done to him? For all your sakes, he’d better be all right. Because if he’s not, I’ll come back from this place and scrag every one of you.”
“Calm down.” Tatty knew better than to smile and joke when Leah was in this mood. “I told you, Chan is all right. Better than all right, he’s so smart now he frightens us. And I can tell you exactly what’s wrong with him. It’s
you. He finds it hard to talk to you — really — because he’s embarrassed.”
“Spacefluff!” Leah shook dark hair clear of her eyes. “Get your head screwed on, Tatty Snipes. I said I’ve known Chan since he was in diapers, but that’s only half of it. Since I was six years old, we’ve eaten together, and cried together, and slept together, and bathed together. Everything, from the first day I took him over down in the Gallimaufries. He was just like my own baby.”
“I’m sure he was,” said Tatty dryly. She was having her own “problems with this conversation. “But he’s not your baby now. He’s not anyone’s baby. He’s a man.”
It went right past Kubo Flammarion, but Leah caught it in a second. “Chan? You mean somebody—”
“Yes.”
“Who was it. Do you know who — ”
“Yes.” Tatty turned to Flammarion, who had listened to the exchange with total incomprehension. “Kubo, would you please go and bring Chan back here. Leah really needs to talk to him.”
As he left she turned rapidly to face the camera. “I was the somebody. I think you guessed that. And it wasn’t the way you think, an experienced woman seducing an innocent boy. It happened right after a Stimulator session, the one that made the big change. Leah, he needed somebody — any somebody. No, I don’t mean that. He needed somebody, but what he wanted was you. He spoke your name to me as though I was you. Maybe he even thought I was you.”
Leah’s image stared stonily out of the screen. “I see.”
“I know, Leah. I know just how you must be feeling.”
“No.” Leah shook her head. “You sure as hell don’t know how I’m feeling. You can’t. For all those years, ever since we were little children, I looked after both of us. As I grew up I had my own secret hope. I dreamed that Chan would somehow become intelligent, and grow up too, and we would become lovers.
“That was my fantasy, and by the time I was twelve I knew it could only be fantasy. He was the little boy who would never grow up. I could love Chan, but for that kind of love, sexual love, I would have to look somewhere else.” The anger faded from Leah’s voice and was replaced by a wistful tone. “There was no trouble finding sex, you see. There never is. But it wasn’t what I’d dreamed of. And now you tell me that the dream came true — but it was you and Chan, not me and Chan …”
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