Great North Road

by Peter F. Hamilton

  Vance didn’t know what she was doing, but with his command under deadly assault from the monster, he was long past giving her the benefit of the doubt. He ordered his e-i to trigger the smartmicrobe bug that Antrinell had tagged Angela with.

  Even the convoy’s decaying, glitching net could still perform a triangulation function. Her location popped up immediately in Vance’s iris smartcell grid. Angela was standing twenty-five metres outside the ring of vehicles. At least, he assumed she was standing – there was no medical data to confirm it, just the smartmicrobe’s weak ping.

  Antrinell and Jay watched him closely as he slipped the pistol into its rubbery heated sheath. His e-i quested a link to the magazine, and gave the bullets their arming code. ‘I’m going out there,’ he said.

  ‘Keep a link open,’ Antrinell said. ‘We need to know what’s happening.’

  ‘And be careful,’ Jay said. ‘She’s either the murderer or she’s helping that thing. There’s no other reason for her to be out there.’

  ‘I know,’ Vance said. The knowledge came with a heavy heart. Despite their differences, he had come to rely on Angela. And if she was part of whatever conspiracy they were caught up in, why had she brought Ravi back? Was Ravi part of this, too? He hated the fear his paranoia was generating. ‘Sweet Jesus, protect me, please,’ he whispered.

  Ball lightning struck the floor of the canyon several hundred metres away, detonating into a morass of belligerent lightning strands. The vehicles were briefly highlighted in the stark flickering light. He saw Garrick climbing up into biolab-2’s door chamber, and his e-i quested a link. ‘Did everyone get across okay?’ he asked.

  ‘Lulu and Darwin are inside,’ Garrick said. ‘Madeleine went back for something. I couldn’t stop her.’

  Vance studied his grid, but Madeleine Hoque’s identity icon was missing. ‘It’s back,’ he growled. ‘Get inside, now,’ he told Garrick.

  The lightning rampage died away, leaving Vance alone in the gloom of the savage blizzard. He bent into the wind, and hurried forwards as fast as he could go. Angela’s tracer hadn’t moved. His e-i activated his iris smartcells’ infrared function, shifting his vision to a seething blur-cloud of sapphire and cyan. A slim glimmer of pink fluctuated in and out of existence up in front as the harsh flurries of snow marched across it.

  Elston gripped the pistol tightly and slogged forward over the hellish wasteland of the broken ice river. Nothing was going to stop him now, not weather, not monsters. Angela Tramelo was finally going to tell him the truth no matter what. The Good Lord would understand and forgive extreme measures on this day.

  As he drew closer, the red glimmer strengthened, widening, resolving out of smeared chaos. Another lightning ball plummeted into the ground behind him. White light flooded out, revealing the canyon. It was two figures up ahead!

  Angela was easy enough to identify, she was in a parka with one of those thick scarfs she knitted wrapped round her head. The monster was standing beside her. Its skin was sleeker than the images had shown him, and it wasn’t as large as he’d expected. ‘I have looked upon you,’ Vance snarled into the storm, ‘and I have seen the devil.’ He raised his pistol and walked forward. He fired. Once. Twice.

  The monster bent and ducked. Just as it had been with Ravi, the bullets had no effect. I have to get closer. Have to get a clean eye shot. Then Vance realized it didn’t have blades for hands. In fact it looked remarkably human, despite being featureless. There must be different types.

  ‘Stop stop,’ Angela yelled. She was racing forward, waving her arms frantically. ‘Elston, for fuck’s sake. Stop shooting!’

  ‘You are allied,’ he cried in consternation. His pistol swung round, lining up on the traitor woman who had persecuted his dreams for too long. Satan’s whore. The arch deceiver.

  ‘She’s my daughter,’ Angela bellowed.

  Vance wouldn’t have believed anything could have stopped him from pulling the trigger. Yet his finger now refused to move. ‘What?’ To know . . . to finally know!

  ‘Madeleine, she’s my daughter. That’s why I was in the mansion.’

  ‘This is— I don’t—’ Vance was stricken with doubt. His e-i reported a quest ping emanating from the dark figure. It carried Madeleine Hoque’s identity code. ‘You can’t be—’ he blurted.

  ‘I am,’ Madeleine said. ‘I’m an undercover operative. My real name’s Rebka DeVoyal, and Angela is my mother.’

  ‘You’re the monster?’

  ‘Crap no. This is metamolecule armour. Constantine North sent me. Jupiter wants to know what’s going on.’

  ‘Sweet Jesus,’ Vance moaned. But . . . a daughter. ‘How?’ he pleaded.

  ‘I needed money to save her,’ Angela said. ‘I was scamming the Norths.’

  ‘You really didn’t kill them.’ The revelation was almost spiritual. Despite where he was he felt like laughing for the sheer joy of finally understanding.

  ‘Of course I fucking didn’t, you cretin,’ Angela spat.

  Vance grinned. That was Angela. The one and true—

  Something moved behind Rebka. ‘Look out,’ he yelled, and brought the pistol up again.

  An arm with five fingerblades slammed into Rebka’s side.

  *

  Rebka guessed it didn’t matter any more that her cover was blown. She couldn’t see how it compromised her now. And it had certainly stopped that fool of a colonel from shooting at her. He was left begging Angela to explain. While Angela of course was just angry.

  Rebka frowned as the two ancient adversaries barked at each other. Her infrared receptors showed her the pistol Elston was carrying was positively hot compared to the rest of him. Then he was yelling directly at her, and his pistol was coming up—

  Something smashed against her. Even the armour’s amplified muscle functions couldn’t keep her upright from such an blow. Rebka toppled over and skidded along the rock-hard ice. Red icons flared in her grid, detailing the damage her net gun had received. It was effectively ruined. That was deliberate. The monster had sliced at it in the holster. Why that?

  Combat analysis routines slipped up into her optic nerves, analysing every byte of external sensor data, predicting and forecasting options – hers and her opponent’s. She spun hard along the ground, using her momentum to give her extra speed, coming round into a crouch. Not quite fast enough.

  The monster had followed her. Its hand swung down again, striking against her neck before she was properly balanced again. The metamolecules protected her from the blade edges, but the blow hurt. Amber caution icons blinked up. The metamolecules were actually straining to maintain integrity against such impacts.

  ‘Shit,’ she grunted. Going with the strike again, falling and rolling. Again, an apparent ungainly struggle to her feet.

  The monster loomed large above her, its arm raised to club her down. Standing close.

  Rebka’s foot lashed out. She saw her foot slide along the program’s maximum impact vector, its force amplified by the metamolecules, which even actively corrected her body motion marginally. Her heel connected perfectly against its ankle. The power behind the strike knocked its legs out from under it, sending it crashing down onto the rumpled unforgiving ice. It immediately started to scramble to its feet.

  With the metamolecule armour’s help Rebka beat it up. Just in time to see Angela sprinting up to help. ‘No,’ she yelled, flinging out a hand to keep her mother away. That distraction was all the monster needed.

  The kick landed full square at the base of her spine. She actually left the ground to half-somersault through the gusting snow.

  Ball lightning landed behind the convoy vehicles, detonating into a fountain-spume of lightning fronds that soared twenty metres up into the blizzard. With her enhanced senses, Rebka saw the scene in perfect monochrome light.

  The monster turning to follow her. Angela still charging forwards with her hands extended wide. Elston lumbering on behind, trying to keep the warm pistol level on the monster.


  ‘Stay back, Mother,’ she cried, as if that would do any good. She watched in disbelief as Angela pulled her gloves off.

  Her e-i was throwing up combat options. Weapons were coming on line. She cursed herself for being so slow, for letting emotions interfere with her responses. Without the net gun, capturing the monster wasn’t going to be an option any more. Survival was what drove her now. She started to rise.

  The lightning withered down, spent against the frozen river. Darkness collapsed in on them again. Elston’s muzzle flash was bright in her sensors. Which made the monster turn towards him – and Angela. Those fatal blades swept up. Then Angela was jumping.

  Rebka screamed: ‘No!’

  But Angela reached out, and Rebka’s sensors perceived the weirdest pulse of electrical energy surging down her arm.

  *

  They worked, the old dark cy-tech weapons. Angela felt the tips surge up through the flesh of her fingertips, as she started to jump, to distract the monster from its brutal assault on her daughter. Ten sharp stabs of pain that she ignored. The monster was turning, its blades stretching out as they repeated their ancient dance. And she reached out to stroke its shoulder once again, but this time going low.

  The cells discharged. As before, those twenty years ago, there was a blinding flash, and the monster went staggering back through the icy darkness. But this time there was something wrong, some piece of insulation that hadn’t quite developed correctly. Fire burned down the inside of her left wrist. Stunning her, stalling the scream of agony that was in her throat. Her senses blanked out for a moment and she hit the ground, sprawling helplessly, heart juddering wildly.

  Five blades slid down amid the snowflakes. And she couldn’t move.

  Elston came hurtling out of the blizzard, shoulder down in the old football tackle. Crunched into the side of the monster, sending them both crashing over together beside Angela. She saw him try to bring his pistol up to the monster’s face. Too slow. Five blades jabbed upward, penetrating his parka and the armour vest below, slicing deep into the abdomen.

  ‘NO!’ Angela wailed.

  Elston’s face was inches from her. Shock filled his eyes as he drew down a feeble gasp of air. The blades were withdrawn from his body. He shook uncontrollably as he slumped down onto the ice.

  *

  Rebka watched in horror as Elston sacrificed himself to deflect the blades from her mother. Then the terrible creature was recovering, pushing the dying colonel to one side, ready to administer the same fatal blow to Angela. Angela who snarled with savage defiance, and brought her weaponized hands up again.

  Rebka jumped, effortlessly covering the distance. She landed on both feet directly in front of it, knees bent, fist clenched. Purple and gold kinetic profile projections blossomed in her optic interface as the combat programs ran options. The armour locked into shape as the five-blade hand came slashing round malevolently. The edges hit her upper shoulder and rebounded, slewing the humanoid shape round, trailing projections like neon contrails. Three opportunities opened for a counter-strike. Rebka punched with her right hand, seeing her fist slide along the combat program’s trajectory. Impact point was perfect, mid-torso while it was still regaining equilibrium from its deflected attack. It left the ground to fly backwards, thudding down heavily a couple of metres away.

  ‘Enough,’ Rebka said coldly. She drew the e-carbine from her waist. Theoretically, it could slice through a two-metre column of metalloceramic armour. But Rebka dialled the power down, and fired. A glaring purple-white beam of electrons stabbed out, hitting the monster’s waist. It juddered frantically under the blast. Rebka switched it off. ‘Don’t like electricity, huh?’ She fired again. The monster’s fists and heels began to beat against the ice river. Slim serpents of electron currents writhed furiously around it in a splendorous cage of agonizing illumination; its hide was smouldering from the points where it was grounding out, thin wisps of smoke mingling with the steam fizzing up from the ice. ‘They want me to keep you alive. I can’t do that if you keep up the aggression.’ She switched the e-carbine off again. ‘What do you say?’

  Her e-i reported a link quest from the prone monster, using Bastian North’s identification tag. ‘I concede your advantage,’ he said.

  *

  Angela knelt beside Elston, and smiled wretchedly at him. ‘What did you do that for?’ she choked. ‘That was so stupid. I had everything under control.’

  He smiled weakly and held her hand, turning it round slowly so he could see her bleeding fingertips with the talons exposed. ‘Little girl fought off a monster all by herself. Never did believe it.’

  ‘Good stuff, cy-tech. I’m sure you’ve got better today.’

  ‘We have.’

  ‘I’ll remember that for next time.’

  ‘Angela.’

  ‘I’m not going anywhere.’

  He tried to smile again, but a glob of blood spilled out of his mouth. ‘You have to see the end of this. I trust you, Angela. The Lord has shown me your true self. You are worthy of His love. Finish this properly. For me.’

  ‘Elston.’ Her e-i was questing Coniff, for the others, for help. It reported a file was being sent to her on a secure link from Elston’s bodymesh.

  ‘I understand now,’ he said. ‘She’s wonderful. A surprise, just like you. You did the right thing.’

  ‘Hold on,’ she urged, and squeezed his hand.

  A large spurt of blood gushed out of Elston’s mouth. ‘My Lord is calling. I will wait for you, Angela. We will meet again in His grace.’

  ‘Vance—’

  ‘Ha, first time . . .’

  Angela watched a small smile lift his lips. Then he was staring at something beyond her, an expression of relief and hope filled his pained eyes at the last. In her grid, all his physiological readouts turned red, then bleached down to white. Her head snapped round to the monster which was standing passively beside Rebka. ‘You son of a bitch.’ She brought her hands up – and fuck the broken insulation.

  ‘He tried to destroy my world, everything I am,’ the monster sent down the link.

  ‘You killed him. You killed everyone.’ Confronting her nightmare of twenty years was chilling her far more than any blizzard ever could. She wasn’t sure how long she could restrain herself.

  ‘Examine the file he sent you. Examine the genocide weapon you have in the biolab. Tell me then who is evil, who is the murderer.’

  ‘What? What are you talking about?’ Angela regarded the urbane monster in dismay as she hugged her hands to her chest to try and shelter them from the sub-zero wind. She couldn’t even feel the pain from the talons any more. Drops of her blood had frozen into lumps around the small tears where they’d punctured her fingertips.

  ‘You were so full of life, Angela. Once. The most delightful human I ever knew; the most human human, despite the deception you were living. Your soul is not something you can disguise. Have you lost that zest? Is it only ever to be the cold-hearted who judge me?’

  ‘What the fuck are you?’ she bellowed against the blizzard.

  The monster’s shape changed – softening.

  Angela swayed backwards. Of all the things she’d braced herself for, a North in a parka and quilted trousers wasn’t one of them. ‘You’re not Bastian North,’ she said to the thing, forcing herself to believe it. ‘So what are you?’

  ‘I speak for this world.’

  ‘Zebediah North.’

  ‘I was. For a long time.’ And amid the thick snow and treacherous gloaming illumination the humanoid shape lost cohesion, as if the North had only ever been a spectre. Angela even doubted her brief memory.

  ‘Yet you couldn’t be,’ she told the monster. ‘Because he was never Barclay North to begin with. You murdered Barclay back at the mansion. So what are you? A different kind of clone?’

  ‘I mirror Barclay North. In one respect I still am him, for I retain his essence. You loved me once, Angela, or so I thought. Even in my rage at what your kind had done to me, I c
herished that thought.’

  ‘You hesitated,’ she said in astonishment. ‘That night twenty years ago, when you came out of Bartram’s bedroom, you hesitated. That’s why I survived.’

  ‘Just like humans, I make mistakes. That and you do pack quite a punch. Who knew?’

  ‘Why did you kill them all? The Norths, those poor helpless girls . . . Why?’

  ‘Why do you kill me? You slash, you burn, you poison; and now you bring a weapon that will destroy all my life on this world.’

  ‘I . . . didn’t know that.’ She told her e-i to open Elston’s file.

  *

  Angela went in first. Four carbines were aimed at her as she came out of biolab-1’s door compartment. Jay, Roarke, Omar and Paresh who were holding them had hyped themselves up on fear and adrenalin. It wasn’t a good combination, not if you were facing that many muzzles, all of which were shaking to some degree.

  ‘Come on, guys, it’s only me,’ Angela said as she carefully unwound the scarf from her face. As soon as she came into contact with the cabin’s warm air her frozen blood droplets began to melt, mingling with the ice clinging to her hands. Sensation was creeping back into her extremities, as if she’d been stung by a wasp on each finger.

  But they weren’t listening to her, they were looking at the other two figures in the door compartment: Rebka in her metamolecule armour and the hulking Barclay avatar with its five-blade hands.

  ‘Get down,’ Paresh pleaded desperately.

  ‘Stop it,’ she told him. ‘There’s nothing to fear, this is Rebka and—’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Madeleine. You know her as Madeleine.’

  Rebka’s armour flowed away from her face, and she smiled out stoically. ‘Hi.’

  Paresh kept looking at Angela along the carbine’s barrel. ‘Down,’ he whispered.

  ‘Listen to me,’ Angela said slowly. ‘All of you. Put your weapons down. There is to be no more violence. We agreed to that.’

  ‘It killed Elston,’ Jay said. ‘And you’re part of this, you’re its partner.’

  ‘A part of what?’ Angela studied the fear on Jay’s face, and knew she’d never win him over. ‘Paresh. Omar. Listen to me, the time for killing and weapons is over. We have to salvage this another way, we have to think and act like rational creatures. Now, please put the weapons down. We all know they’re no good against the avatar. The only thing you’ll damage with bullets in here is us and the bulkheads.’