'A third of a million. I don't hold out much hope. Most of them will have been washed into the sea. He gestured at the wrinkled lump on the table. 'Dear Aeva's car was forty-seven kilometres from the road she used, and that was the easy find; she was deep under sediment. Persistence pays off. We still find about twenty or so each year, even now.
They moved on into DNA sequencing. To Aaron it was just an ordinary office with five large smartcores. Even in ordinary circumstances, human DNA decomposed quickly; after twelve hundred years on Hanko, only the smallest fragments remained. But there were a lot of cells in each body, each with its own fragments. Piecing them together was possible with the right techniques, and a vast amount of computing power. Once the main sequences had been established, the project could use family records to fill the gaps. In a lot of cases, there were full DNA records from clinics available. As soon as the body had been properly identified, a clone was grown for re-life.
'But not here, Purillar said. 'Clinics back on Anagaska handle that part. After all, who would want to wake up here? People have enough trouble adjusting to the present — their future — as it is. Most need specialist counselling.
'Is life that different?
'Essentially no, and most died hoping for rescue in the form of re-life. It is the amount of time involved which shocks them. None of their immediate family and friends remain. They are very much alone when they wake.
After DNA there was the memory rehabilitation section, which tried to reassemble the information read from memorycells. A process orders of magnitude more complex than DNA sequencing.
The history archive: for recovered people who couldn't be identified. All of Hanko's civic records, and memoirs of families with lost relatives, the logs and recollections of the evacuation teams. Lists of people who may have been visiting Hanko when the attack started. The Intersolar missing persons list of the time.
Laboratories specializing in analysis of molecular structures; identifying baroque, minute clues the bots had discovered as they wormed their way through Hanko's frozen earth. Trying to place flakes of paint with individual car models. Tying scraps of cloth to specific clothes, from that to manufacturer, to retail outlet, to customer lists, to bank statements. Items of jewellery. Even pets. A long register of unknown artefacts, each one potentially leading to another lost corpse.
The case room. With files on everyone still known to be missing.
Operations centre, which monitored the sensor bots and the outpost teams which were excavating in terrible conditions.
After two hours, they'd met everyone in the building. None reacted to Corrie-Lyn, and nobody tried to avoid her. Aaron quietly scanned all of them. No one was enriched with biononics.
'There are a few other people around, Purillar said. 'You'll probably meet them tonight at the canteen. We tend to eat together.
'And if he's not there? Aaron asked.
'Then I'm sorry, but there's not much I can do, the director said. He gave Corrie-Lyn an uncomfortable glance.
'Can we visit the outposts? she asked.
'If he is here, he'll know about you by now. He would have used the beacon net to call in. I guess he doesn't want to get back with you.
'Seeing me in the flesh might be the one thing he can't resist, Corrie-Lyn said. 'Please. Her outpouring of grief into the gaia-field was disturbing.
The director looked deeply unhappy. 'If you want to venture outside, there's nothing I can do to stop you, technically this is still a free Commonwealth world. You can go wherever you want. I'd have advise against it, though.
'Why? Aaron asked.
'You've got a good ship, but even that would be hard pressed to manoeuvre close to the ground. We can't use capsules here, the winds are too strong, and the atmospheric energy content too high. The two times we tried to use our ship for an emergency rescue nearly ended in disaster. We aborted both, and wound up having to re-life the team members.
'My ship has an excellent force field.
'I'm sure it does. But expanding the force field doesn't help, you just give the wind a bigger surface area to push at. Down here it actually makes you more susceptible to the storm. The only stability you have in the air is what your drive units can provide.
Aaron didn't like it. The Artful Dodger was just about the best protection possible. Under normal circumstances. He couldn't forget the way the regrav units had approached their limits bringing them down to the base's force field dome, and that was a big target. 'How do your teams get about? he asked.
'Ground crawlers. They weigh three tons apiece, and move on tracks. They're not fast, but they are dependable.
'Can we borrow one? There must be some you're not using. You said there used to be a lot more personnel here at one time. Just an old one will do.
'Look. Really. He's not here.
'Whatever release document you want us to certify, we'll do it. Corrie-Lyn said. 'Please. Give me this last chance.
'I've got over twenty teams out there. Half of them aren't even on this continent. We use the polar caps as a bridge to get to the other landmasses. It would take you a year to get round them all.
'At least we can make a start. If Yigo hears we're going round everyone, he'll know he'll have to face me eventually. That might make him get in contact.
Purillar rubbed agitated fingers across his forehead. 'It will have to be the mother of all legal release claims. I can't have any come-back against the project.
'I understand. And thank you.
* * * * *
After dinner, Aaron and Corrie-Lyn made their way over to the second block to inspect the ground crawler Purillar was oh-so-reluctantly allowing them to use. Overhead, the airborne lights were dimming down to a gentle twilight. The effect was spoiled by constant flares of lightning outside the force field.
'He wasn't at the canteen then? Corrie-Lyn asked.
'No. I've scanned everyone in the base now. None of them have biononics. Though quite a few have some interesting enrichments. It can't be as tame here as the good director claims.
'You always judge people, don't you?
'Quite the opposite. I don't care what they do to each other in the privacy of their own cottage. I just need to make a threat-assessment.
The malmetal door of garage eleven rolled apart to show them the ground crawler. It was a simple wedge-shape of metal on four low caterpillar tracks. With the bodywork painted bright orange, its slit windows made empty black gashes in the sides. Force field projectors were lumpy bulbs on the upper edges, along with crablike maintenance bots which clung to the surface like marsupial babies. When Aaron queried the vehicle's net he found it had a large self-repair function. A third of the cargo compartments were filled with spares.
'We should be all right in this, he told her. 'The net will drive it. All we have to do is tell it where we want to go.
'And that is, exactly? You know, Purillar was right. If Inigo is here, then he knows I'm here looking for him. He would have contacted us. Me, at least.
'Would he?
'Oh don't, she said, her face furrowed in disgust. 'Just don't.
'He obviously doesn't miss you as much as you miss him. He left, remember.
'Screw you! she screamed.
'Don't hide from this. Not now. I need you functional.
'Functional, she sneered. 'Well I'm not. And if we find him the first thing I'll tell him is not to help you, you psychofuck misfit.
'I never expected anything else from you.
She glowered, but didn't walk away. Aaron smiled behind her back.
'If he's here, the Pilgrimage will be long gone before we find him, she said sulkily.
'Not quite. Remember we have an advantage that lets us reduce the search field. We know he's Higher.
'How does that help? There was distain in her voice still, but warring with curiosity now.
'The field scan effect would be very useful out there, helping to track down bodies buried in the ground. I can use it to detect anoma
lies several hundred metres away. It's a little more difficult through a solid mass, but the pervasive function is still capable of reaching a reasonable distance.
'If he's here, he'll have a better success rate than the others, she said.
'There are other factors, such as getting the location of a lost person reasonably accurate. Which is all down to how well an individual case has been researched. But yes. It's a reasonable assumption to say the team with the best success rate will be Inigo's.
'Is there one?
'Yep. My u-shadow didn't even have to hack any files. They're all open to review. The team with the current highest Recovery rate is working up at Olhava province. That's on this continent, nine hundred kilometres south-west. If we start first thing tomorrow morning, we'll be there in forty-eight hours.
* * * * *
Oscar Monroe had fallen in love with the house the first moment he saw it. It was a plain circle, with a high glass wall separating floor and ceiling, standing five metres off the ground on a central pillar that contained a spiral stair. Both the base and the roof were made from some smooth artificial rock similar to white granite, which shone like mountain-top snow in Orakum's blue-tinged sunlight. The sprawling grounds outside resembled some grand historical parkland that had fallen into disuse, with woolly grass overgrowing paths, lines of ornamental trees, and a couple of lakes with a little waterfall between them. There were even some brick Hellenic structures resting in deep nooks, swamped by moss and flowering creepers to add to the image of great age. That image was one which several dozen gardening bots worked hard at achieving.
He had lived there for nineteen years now. It was a wonderful home to return to every time his pilot shift was over, devoid of stress and the kind of bullshit politics that went in tandem with any corporate job. Oscar flew commercial starships for Orakum's thriving national spaceline, which had routes to over twenty External planets. Piloting was the only job he'd sought since he'd been re-lifed.
Waking up in the clinic had been one hell of a surprise. The last thing he remembered was crashing his hyperglider into an identical one piloted by Anna Kime. Saving the Commonwealth — good. Killing the wife of his best friend — not so hot. Without Anna to wreck their flight, Wilson Kime should have managed to fly unimpeded on a mission that was pivotal in the Starflyer War. Oscar could remember the instant before the collision, a moment of complete serenity. He hadn't expected anyone to recover his memorycell. Not after his confession, that in his youth he'd been involved in an act of politically-motivated terrorism that had killed four hundred and eight people, a third of them without memorycells, mostly children too young for the inserts. The fact that he'd never intended it, that the deaths were a mistake, that they'd missed their actual target — that should never have counted in his favour. But it seemed as though his service to the Commonwealth, and ultimate sacrifice, had meant something to the judge. He wanted to think Wilson had maybe paid for a decent lawyer. They'd been good friends.
'I guess this means we won, then, were his first words. It even sounded like his own voice.
Above him, a youthful doctor's face smiled. 'Welcome back Mr Yaohui, he said.
'Call me Oscar. I was that longer than I was ever Yaohui. His new identity when he went on the run for over forty years.
'As you wish.
Oscar managed to prop himself up on his elbows. A movement which surprised him; he'd seen re-life clones several times; pitiful things with thin flesh stretched over bones and organs that had been force-grown to adolescence, unable to move for months while they painfully built up muscle mass. This body, though, seemed almost complete. Which meant the technique had improved. There had been a lot of bodyloss in the War — tens of millions at least. He'd probably been shoved down to the bottom of the list. 'How long?
'Please understand, er, Oscar, you were put on trial for your, uh, previous crime. It set quite a few legal precedents, given your, uh, state at the time.
'What trial? What do you mean, state? I was dead.
'You suffered bodyloss. Your memorycell survived the crash intact — legally that is recognized by the Commonwealth as being your true self. It was recovered by one Paula Myo.
'Uh— Oscar was suddenly getting a very bad feeling about this. 'Paula recovered me?
'Yes. You and Anna Kime. She brought both of you back to Earth.
'But Anna was a Starflyer agent.
'Yes. Under the terms of the Doi amnesty her Starflyer conditioning was edited out of her memories and she was re-lifed as a normal human. Apparently she went on to have a long life and a successful marriage to Wilson Kime. She was certainly on the Discovery with him when it flew round the galaxy.
Oscar's shoulders weren't so strong after all; he sagged back on to the mattress. 'How long? he repeated, there was an urgency in his growl.
'You were found guilty at the trial. Your Navy service record was a mitigating factor in sentencing of course, but it couldn't compensate for the number of people who were killed at Abadan Station. The judge gave you suspension. But as the Commonwealth clinics were unable to cope with the sheer quantity of, uh, non-criminals requiring re-life at the time, he allowed you to remain as a stored memory rather than be re-lifed before the sentence began.
'How long? Oscar whispered.
'You were sentenced to one thousand one hundred years.
'Fuck me!
He was all alone. That was probably a worse punishment than suspension. After all, he wasn't aware of time passing during that millennia, he couldn't reflect and repent on his wrongdoing. But in this present, life was different. Everyone he'd known had either died or migrated inwards — ridiculous phrase, a politically correct way of saying they'd committed euthanasia with a safety net. Maybe that was the point of suspension after all. It certainly hurt.
So, with no friends, no family, knowledge and skills that even museums wouldn't be interested in, Oscar Monroe had to start afresh.
The Navy, rather understandably, didn't want him. He explained he didn't expect to be part of the deterrence fleet, and offered to retrain as a pilot for their exploration crews. They declined again.
Back before the Starflyer War he'd worked in the exploration division at CST. Opening new planets, giving people a fresh start, was kind of like a self-imposed penance. Except he'd really enjoyed it. So he did train as a starship pilot. Fortunately the modern continuous wormhole drive used principles and theories developed during his first life, he brought himself up to speed on its current technology applications quite rapidly.
Orakum SolarStar was the third company he'd worked for since his re-life. It wasn't much different to any other External World starline. In fact it was smaller than most. Orakum was on the edge of the Greater Commonwealth, settled for a mere two hundred years. But that location made it a chief candidate from which to mount new exploration flights, opening up yet more worlds. They were rare events. The Navy had charted every star system directly outside the External Worlds. Expansion to new worlds was also at a historical low. The boundary between Central and External Worlds hadn't changed much for centuries. The old assumption that Higher culture would always be extending outwards, and the ordinary humans would be an expanding wave in front of it was proving to be a fallacy. With inward migration, the number of Higher humans remained about constant; and the External Worlds provided just about every kind of society in terms of ethnicity, ideology, technology, and religion. Should any citizen feel disenfranchised on their own planet they just had to take a commercial flight to relocate. There was very little reason to found a new world these days.
In the nineteen years he'd been on Orakum, SolarStar had only launched three planetary survey flights. Two of these had been closer than the company's long-range commercial flights travelled. Hardly breaking through new frontiers. But he had seniority now. If another outward venture came along, he ought to be chosen. Like all pilots, he was an eternal optimist.
There was no hint of that elusive mission in the company offices
when he filed his flight report. He'd just got back from a long haul flight to Troyan, seventy lightyears away. A fifteen-hour trip with nothing to do other than talk to the smartcore and trawl the Unisphere for anything interesting. One day soon, he was sure, people would finally chuck the notion that they had to have a fellow human in charge. He was only sitting up in the front of the starship for public relations. In fact there were probably people sitting in the passenger cabin who were better qualified than him if repairs were ever needed. Not that they ever were.
But at least he got to visit new planets. The same ones. Over and over again.
His regrav capsule sank out of the wispy clouds to curve sedately round the house and land on the grass beside the spinney of lofty rancata trees, nearly twenty metres tall with reddish-brown whip-leaves that swayed in the mild breeze. He climbed out and took a deep breath of the warm, plains-scented air. Out beyond the horizon, Orakum's untamed countryside was carpeted by spiky wildflowers that budded most of the year. Another reason to choose Orakum was its benign climate.
Jesaral was walking out from underneath the house. The splendidly handsome youth didn't quite have a welcoming smile on his face, but definitely looked relieved to see Oscar. He was only wearing a pair of knee-length white trousers, showing off a tanned body that always got Oscar's blood pumping a little faster. Jesaral was the youngest of his three life partners, barely twenty.
Which, Oscar suspected, probably qualified him as the worst Punk Skunk in the galaxy. A thousand-year-plus age gap: it was delightfully naughty.
The youth opened his arms wide and gave Oscar a big hug to accompany a long sultry kiss. Enthusiasm sprayed out heedlessly into the gaiafield.
'What's the matter? Oscar asked.
'Them, Jesaral said, stabbing a thumb dismissively back at the house.
Oscar refused to sigh. He and his other partners Dushiku and Anja had been a stable trio for over a decade. They were both over a hundred, and completely at ease with each other. At their age they understood perfectly the little accommodations necessary to make any relationship to work. It was taking everyone longer than expected to accommodate and adjust to their newcomer — who didn't have anything like their experience and sophistication. Which was what made him so exciting in and out of bed.
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