Great North Road

by Peter F. Hamilton

  Tork Ericson’s body was carried over to the clinic, where Dr Coniff performed a quick autopsy. Cause of death was easy enough. A cluster of five extremely sharp blades had slashed across his exposed throat, almost severing the head from the body.

  ‘That does give us a small advantage,’ Elston said as Coniff slid the cadaver into one of her two morgue fridges.

  ‘An advantage?’ she queried.

  ‘Ericson was wearing an armour vest, as ordered,’ Elston said. ‘The creature normally goes straight for the heart. It couldn’t this time, the armour protected him.’

  ‘It protected his chest,’ Dr Coniff said.

  ‘Then we need to produce full body armour for everyone,’ Elston said. ‘It’ll be tough to move around for everyone, but better than being dead.’

  ‘Tell me something,’ the doctor asked. She pointed to the big pile of clothing in the sink that she’d removed from Tork’s corpse. The snow clinging to his parka was melting, soaking into the other garments. ‘How did it know he was wearing an armour vest? His parka was on top. You couldn’t see it.’

  Elston looked from the pile of sodden clothes to the rectangular fridge door, and back again. ‘I don’t know,’ he admitted.

  *

  Once the bulldozers were dug out and their fuel cells started, their first priority was to excavate snow from around the microfacture shack. With a slope cleared down to the entrance, the big yellow machines lumbered back to all the other vehicles parked around the domes. An hour later ramps had been dug down to the front of each of them, and the bulldozers moved on to the domes.

  The next batch of vehicles to be cleared of snow and started up were the two self-loading pallet trucks. Elston and Ophelia Troy had decided they couldn’t risk the accommodation domes being buried. If there was another blizzard of the same duration and intensity as the one they’d just come through, then the snow would cover the domes. She’d already told him her concern about the thermal effect of the winter conditions on the panels – the composite they’d selected wasn’t intended to be used in such a cold environment, and she was worried about it losing strength and cracking if it was loaded heavily in the sub-zero temperatures.

  So the bulldozers cleared a trench round each dome, and two ramps down on opposite sides. The self-loading trucks inched down the ramp slopes of the first dome to be cleared, and slowly manoeuvred their long fork-lift prongs under the dome. With a link between their autos synchronizing the lift actuators, they hoisted it off the ground, and slowly moved it over to a fresh patch of snow much closer to the clinic. Ophelia and Karizma inspected the result, making sure the panels survived without stress-fracturing before they gave the go-ahead for the remaining five to be moved.

  After that, the bulldozers and trucks were tasked with moving pallets closer to the domes. The biolabs were started up and moved. Printers began to churn out modified vents for the air grilles, then moved on to producing smaller hexagonal panels to fabricate entrance tunnels for each dome, completing their igloo-mimicry. Power and data lines were relaid. Everybody watched the sky for the return of clouds, except the Legionnaires – their gazes were on the surrounding snow field, alert for anything moving out there.

  By mid-afternoon, the AAV team had prepared an Owl for a rocket-assisted launch. The add-on system was a standard kit, of which Wukang had three. They were intended to be used when a short runway or even clear field wasn’t available. Although the vast expanse of snow around the camp was clear of obstacles, Ken Schmitt, the AAV team chief, wasn’t sure what would happen if an Owl tried a takeoff run. It might just skate along and lift off as normal, but then again if the snow was soft it could just plough itself in. With Elston’s support, Ken Schmitt decided not to take any chances. The team slotted a pair of solid rocket boosters onto each side of the fuselage, and the whole assembly was towed away from the domes by a Land Rover. Two hundred metres from the Administration Qwik-Kabin, the drone plane was set up with its tail planted in the snow, nose pointing straight at the sky.

  Nobody had been particularly surprised when the blizzard ended and they couldn’t contact the e-Ray which had spent the last couple of months loitering three hundred and fifty kilometres to the south. The AAV team was hoping to boost the Owl to an altitude where it could locate and link to the next e-Ray in the relay chain – assuming that had survived.

  The rest of the camp stopped work preparing their accommodation against the inevitable arrival of further bad weather, and gathered to watch the lone firework display. Ken’s e-i ordered the Owl’s twin eDyne fuel cells to power up. Once the network confirmed the pre-flight systems check, he switched to full auto, and stood back to watch the countdown.

  ‘. . . seven, six, five, four . . .’ the onlookers chanted across the silent winter wilderness.

  Both solid rocket boosters ignited in a flash of orange light and billow of smoke. Steam followed, hissing out from around the searing flame as it burned into the snow, and the Owl rose rapidly into the iridescent sky. Twin columns of flame and smoke twisted round, braiding together as the Owl’s nose orientated itself along the flight path, curving round to point at the grey lustre of the ring bands which commanded the southern sky. The crackling roar washed over the cheering spectators. After seventy-five seconds the rockets were exhausted. They separated from the Owl’s fuselage and began their tumble back to the ground. The drone levelled out, and began its long, shallow spiral upwards through the spangled ion torrents sweeping through the sky around it, coaxial fans spinning silent and bright at the tail.

  Forty-five minutes later, still spiralling high above Wukang, it made contact with an e-Ray. Two of the four in the relay between Wukang and Sarvar had fallen during the blizzard. The remaining two were in bad shape, but still airborne, though with a gradual drift downwards as they lost helium and power. Even in this calm post-blizzard day there wasn’t enough redshifted sunlight to fully charge their regenerative cells. But two were enough to provide a tenuous link.

  ‘It killed Ericson last night,’ Vance told Vermekia. ‘We barely made it through the blizzard, and that was just the first to hit us. Either get us out of here or reinforce us.’

  ‘Those are not easy options,’ Vermekia said. ‘Do you have any proof?’

  ‘Yes! Finally, we do.’ He sent Angela’s visual file through the link, watching it with Vermekia as lightning flared, revealing Ericson lying on the snow, and Mohammed standing over him. A vague human shape shambled off into the raging snowstorm as the light died. Then another flare as the ball lightning exploded, and the muzzle of a Heckler carbine fired wildly at a grey shadow.

  ‘That was Tramelo’s visual?’ Vermekia asked.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Why has she been issued with a carbine?’

  ‘Are you joking? Did you see those conditions? She was standing guard while Paresh cleared their dome’s vents.’

  ‘Okay, I appreciate things are tough for you there. But, Vance, that image isn’t exactly conclusive. And the provenance means it’s going to be immediately called into question. How come she’s the only one that ever sees it?’

  ‘I don’t believe I’m hearing this, not from you. Ericson had his throat slashed apart by a five-blade weapon, we see a humanoid shape running off, and that isn’t good enough.’

  ‘Where was Tramelo during the actual murder?’

  ‘That visual was taken seconds afterwards. Seconds!’

  ‘I’m just asking you what I’m going to be asked. This is good, but I don’t think it will be enough. The Newcastle investigation is over.’

  ‘Not good enough? Another man is dead. Dead! Killed by a five-bladed hand.’

  ‘I know. Opinion here is that we wait to see what kind of corporate battle is going on. Once Reinert is charged, that will give the GE Financial Regulation Bureau the opportunity to go into Northumberland Interstellar’s level one network and find out what they’re involved in. Scrupsis is confident they’ll find evidence of black ops.’

  ‘Scrupsis
! What happened to Ralph’s follow-up investigation?’

  ‘Nothing yet. Hurst is still harvesting data.’

  ‘We have the alien stalking us. You’ve got to push for reinforcements. Speak to the General. Show him the visual, explain what’s happening here.’

  ‘Vance . . . He knows. He’s the one who is waiting on the Newcastle situation to resolve. He’s been burned by the satellite deployment; the politicians are not happy with it.’

  ‘But we needed to know if the sunspots were Zanth related.’

  ‘I know. And now, with the wonder of hindsight, everyone is moaning about the cost. Passam pulled the rug out from the expedition, and now she’s running for cover, saying its work is complete.’

  ‘One Daedalus flight. One, with enough Legionnaires to give me a decent chance of capturing this thing. That’s all I need.’

  ‘Vance, it isn’t just one. Not any more. A Daedalus can’t land at Wukang, not with all that snow. And you said yourself it’s just going to get worse. If we’re going to get to you now, it’ll mean building a full gateway. Not even the HDA can swing that.’

  ‘There are ski-equipped Daedalus variants for arctic conditions, I know there are, they’re in the registry. Drop one of those out here. It can land, and make the journey back to Abellia.’

  ‘I’ll brief the General. Explain how urgent it is. You have my word on it.’

  ‘And if the answer’s “no”? What about us? The situation out here is not good. The e-Ray relay isn’t going to last much longer. What do we do?’

  ‘My office has drawn up land evacuation procedures for you. I’m sending them now in case the relay does fail.’

  ‘Land evacuation?’

  ‘It can be done – it was always factored into the mission profile. If you can get to Sarvar, you can winter over without any trouble. Now that there’s just a skeleton crew there, you’ll have enough supplies and fuel to sustain you for over a year. It’ll be safer for you, too. With a convoy on the move, the alien will have trouble keeping up.’

  ‘Only if the thing is on foot. It didn’t have any trouble reaching us here in the middle of nowhere. How did it get here? Has anyone in your office analysed that?’

  ‘Vance, I appreciate the position you’re in, I really do. But no one could have anticipated Sirius redshifting. I have to say you’re not the only one on St Libra in a difficult situation. It’s only going to take another week of this and we’re going to have the mother of all humanitarian crises on our hands. The Independencies are already living on food stocks that aren’t going to last long. The algaepaddies can’t survive prolonged cooling, which is going to eliminate ten per cent of GE’s bioil supply. Most of Highcastle is already camped out by the gateway demanding to return. And nobody is making any decisions, certainly not in the GE. Every commissioner is running scared of a decision. Right now they’re having summits about holding summits on what to do. I’ve never seen anything so pathetic. Even the licensed news shows are sneering.’

  Vance took a deep breath. ‘Okay. But all that is going to mean nothing if it turns out there’s another hostile alien species on St Libra.’

  *

  Vance called Antrinell and Jay Chomik to a conference in his office. The heating had been off during the blizzard, allowing the water vapour to freeze on every surface; now he’d switched it back on again, and condensation was dripping down the walls and ceiling. His solitary wall pane was showing a feed from the Owl’s weather radar, which revealed another large mass of cloud approaching from the north-west.

  Vance knew he must order the Owl to be retrieved within the hour or it would be lost to them, annihilated by what looked like a blizzard as ferocious as the first one. But Vermekia hadn’t got back to him with an answer from the General yet. He wasn’t entirely sure why he bothered keeping the Owl flying. He knew full well what the answer would be.

  Vermekia was a good man, a fellow Gospel Warrior dedicated to ridding the universe of evil without personal prejudice; but that didn’t stop him being human. Stuck under the Australian desert for months at a time, he had become part of the HDA headquarters staff now, assimilating their mainstream culture. He hadn’t abandoned Jesus, but he certainly followed the bureaucrat tenets now. Words were weighed for full political content before being uttered, high-level contacts and allies were slowly accrued. Vance was sure Vermekia would argue that he could best serve the cause of the Gospel Warriors by insinuating himself into the highest echelons of the HDA. And looking at the big picture, he might even be right. But for now, stuck in the middle of a newformed polar wasteland and cut off from the rest of the human race, Vance found it hard to follow Jesus’s preachings to forgive; it was all too obvious that Vermekia had fallen to the oldest sin of all: vanity.

  ‘I don’t believe we’ll be receiving any external help now,’ Vance told his two principal colleagues. ‘We must face this with our fortitude and whatever comfort Jesus can bestow us in His wisdom.’

  ‘Vermekia will help,’ Jay said.

  ‘I don’t believe he can,’ Vance said. ‘He’s a prisoner of HDA politics and bureaucracy as much as we’re prisoners of the weather. Assistance would be a blessing indeed, but we have to strategize for the worst. Vermekia’s office has sent through some plans for us to travel in convoy to Sarvar. I have to concede that is looking attractive to me right now.’

  ‘Are you sure?’ Antrinell exclaimed. ‘That’s two thousand kilometres away. And we’re totally unprepared for this kind of terrain. Nobody’s ever faced a jungle covered in snow before.’

  ‘We have to be realistic,’ Vance said. ‘If the last sunspot erupted tomorrow, it would still be a month or more before it dissipated along with the others – not that any have bled away yet. And how long it would take for the snows to melt after that is anyone’s guess. The planet’s entire albedo has changed. But I do know that we’d be better off travelling over a frozen snow field than trying to drive over a melting snow field. We can do this, gentlemen. I reviewed the preliminary figures and we have the resources. Just. The longer we wait, the more our chances of success are reduced.’

  ‘Fair enough,’ Jay said with mounting concern; his focus was distant, betraying his reading of the data in his grid. ‘But what about the creature? Or creatures?’

  ‘Vermekia believes we will have an advantage over it if we’re travelling.’

  ‘That’s stupid,’ Antrinell said. ‘It caught up with us here, didn’t it?’

  Jay clenched his fists in frustration. ‘If we just knew what it was . . . Look at us, we’re a species that travels between stars, we’re here with the most sophisticated research tools known, the best sensors, some damn good troops, and we’ve got nothing. We’re frightened of a boogieman in the night like some medieval peasant. How could this happen?’

  ‘On the contrary,’ Antrinell said. ‘We know a lot about it.’ He held his hand up, silencing Jay’s protest. ‘Aside from its psychology, which I’ll grant you is strange. But first off, we know it’s not from this world. The plants simply don’t have variance, their genetic composition is too rigid. There’s no diversity here that could account for animal life. So like us it is a foreigner here. Secondly, I believe it to be singular. If there were many, then we’d be dead. It’s that simple. We may not understand its motivation, but we are very aware of its goal: our death. If there was more than one, they would simply overwhelm us. They are faster, stronger, and have a mastery of our technology that allows them to circumvent our sensors.’

  ‘You think it’s a protector sent by the bioformers?’ Vance asked.

  ‘That is the most logical conclusion. I’ve considered others. Perhaps it is a hunter and we are its sport. Or it is rogue in some way. But the protector theory is the strongest. I’m not sure why it slaughtered everyone in Bartram’s mansion, perhaps something to do with the Norths contaminating its world. But we can be certain why it has singled out Wukang rather than any of the other forward camps and supply bases. We are the ones with the weapon cap
able of destroying St Libra.’

  ‘And how do you explain its humanoid form? Evolution as we understand it is not going to replicate our own bipedal structure, there are too many random factors involved. Let alone give it a hand with five fingers.’

  ‘It has that shape so it can walk among us.’

  ‘But I’ve seen it,’ Vance said. ‘Twice; I watched the image the brainscan pulled from Angela’s mind, and I saw her iris smartcell recording from last night. It’s human-shaped, but not human.’

  ‘I considered that,’ Antrinell said. ‘That’s what has bothered me since we began this expedition, and it’s the single glaring flaw in all the theories which political opponents like Scrupsis and Passam can use against us every time. In which case the simplest explanation is the most likely: it’s human-shaped when it’s in attack mode. That would explain just about everything that’s happened. We’ve already postulated it’s from a civilization with a very advanced technology base.’

  Vance glanced at Jay, who was looking extremely uncomfortable. His mind was racing, trying to come up with an explanation that would exclude such an idea. But he had travelled inside the terrible wonders of a Zanthworld, seen what alien truly meant, the potential involved. When everything, every possibility however remote, had to be taken into account, a shapeshifter was eminently reasonable. ‘But who?’

  ‘Who’s the one person who’s been in every murder location?’ Antrinell said.

  ‘It can’t be Tramelo,’ Vance said. ‘I simply won’t accept that. We’ve scanned her, taken DNA samples. And the real proof it wasn’t her is the Newcastle murder.’

  ‘Where did she come from? Why has she not changed appearance in twenty years? And do we know her exact position at the moment of each slaying? How fast is the creature? How stealthy? It has never been captured by any sensor. All we have is her accounts of its appearance.’