“What about you?” Ozzie’s virtual knuckle rapped on the virtual wall of the sphere. The orange and purple lines swerved around the impact point. “Are you finally going to come down off the fence?”
“In this form we only have a limited ability. Cressat is not part of the unisphere; recently it has had its interface filters upgraded, we assume so that the Dynasty’s lifeboat project was not compromised.”
“Yeah yeah. I need you to infiltrate and subvert this mansion’s network and security sensors. Nothing physical, I know how you’re so goddamn phobic about the real world; but can you do that for me at least?”
“It should be possible.”
“Finally, your humanity is shining through. Okay, Mellanie, I want you to leave.”
“Leave?”
“Yeah. Tonight. Have a bust-up with Orion, or something. After dark, get a cab or car to pick you up. I’ll say I’m staying in the study to go through the Dark Fortress data, but while our friend here takes care of the security systems I’ll make a break for the end of the drive. You have the car door open for me.”
“That seems very crude,” she said uncertainly.
“Simple is always the best. The less there is to go wrong, the less can go wrong.”
“I suppose so.”
“The study door,” said the SIsubroutine. “Observe the handle.”
Ozzie looked out past the giant versions of himself and Mellanie, still delightfully liplocked, then through the nebulous data of the Dark Fortress. The brass handle of the study door was rotating in agonizing slow motion. “Oh, shit,” he groaned. “Not this. Please.”
Orion went and told the cook what Mellanie wanted for lunch, and said he’d have the same, and made sure Tochee’s meal was taken care of, too. He slung his still-soaking shirt over his shoulder and set off through the mansion to the study. Everything had gone so well with Jasmine he just knew Ozzie wouldn’t believe him. He wasn’t even sure he trusted his own memory of the morning. But it felt so good. A girl so perfect, and she likes me!
He opened the study door, and blurted: “Hey, Ozzie, you’ll never…” and stopped, because Jasmine was in there. She and Ozzie were breaking apart. Their embrace hadn’t been just a kiss, Orion saw their hands clasped together. They separated fast, both with hugely guilty expressions.
“Now, er, kid, don’t get this ass backward,” Ozzie pleaded.
Orion spun on his heel, and ran. The mansion’s corridors were long and broad, he could get up a good speed. He ran hard. The shirt fell off his shoulder. He carried on running as the tears began to stream down his face. A devastated wail burst out of his mouth, echoing through the mansion.
Mellanie sucked in a sharp breath as Orion sprinted away. “Damn!” The boy’s face had looked so horror-stricken, it wasn’t easy knowing she was the cause of so much grief.
“I don’t believe this!” Ozzie yelled. His face crumpled into anguish, and he lifted both hands in an appeal to the heavens. “I’ve just crippled the kid—for life, most like. Fuck!” He grabbed Mellanie’s hand. “Go after him, put this right.”
“What?” she thought she’d misheard. Her e-butler told her Ozzie’s i-spot was interfaced with hers. THIS IS THE PERFECT EXCUSE FOR ME TO LEAVE, she sent in text.
“He’s besotted with you,” Ozzie said. “Don’t you understand? He’s never even held hands with a girl before, let alone spent a whole morning with one. For Christ’s sake; I’m beyond any form of salvation now, but he’ll still listen to you. You’ve got exactly one shot at putting this back together. Unless you do that he’ll be messed up for life.” YOU DON’T LEAVE UNTIL AFTER DARK. USE THE TIME TO STRAIGHTEN THE KID OUT. WE’LL TAKE CARE OF THE MANSION’S NETWORK.
“But…” She was exasperated with Ozzie’s attitude. It was almost as if he thought the boy was more important. Or he’s a superb actor. She was fairly sure the whole security staff would be accessing this little drama through the mansion’s security sensors.
“Don’t be a bitch,” Ozzie said harshly. “Remember what you’re paid for.” GO ON, RUN AFTER HIM.
Mellanie wrenched her hand from his, which didn’t require any acting. She strongly suspected he was being serious. “Yes, Boss,” she snapped angrily, and stomped out of the study.
It didn’t take a genius to work out where Orion would be—she’d retreated from the world enough times. His shirt was lying on the tiled floor in the hall. She picked it up and started up the stairs. The mansion’s network told her which was his room.
“Orion?” Mellanie tapped lightly on his door. No answer. “Orion?” she said, louder this time. Still nothing, so she told the mansion network to unlock the door. There was a moment while the household management array asked security for authorization, then the mechanism went click. She walked in to find the curtains drawn. Her lips pressed down on a smile. A walking, talking cliché. It was a wonder he didn’t have rock music playing at full volume, some angst-gorged Goth track about pain and death. Of course, Orion had probably never heard rock music, not growing up on Silvergalde. Oh, hell, what if he likes folk music?
Orion was curled up on the bed, turned away from the door. One hand was gripping the pendant around his neck.
“That was my fault,” she said softly.
“Go away.” There was a strange juddery quality to the voice.
“Orion, please, I was being silly. Do you have any idea how big a celebrity Ozzie is? Everyone in the Commonwealth thinks he’s a saint, or a fallen angel, or something. I just couldn’t resist. Do you know how much kudos I’d have at school for getting a kiss from Ozzie? People would actually notice I existed.”
“That’s rubbish.”
“It’s true.” She put her hand out and stroked his shoulder. “It’s no different than collecting his autograph. And you startled us, that’s all, that’s why we looked surprised.”
“I meant, everybody knows you exist. You’re just…phenomenal.”
She put her knees on the mattress and leaned over him. He gave her a sullen look, but didn’t flinch away. “You’re crying,” she exclaimed. It shocked her.
“I wanted to marry you,” he moaned. “I love you, Jasmine.”
“Whaa…You? No. Orion, you don’t love someone after a morning.”
“But I do. Even when you were arguing with the security staff I knew I never wanted anyone else.”
He sounded so piteous and terrifyingly sincere her skin turned cold. She took his hand in hers, and told her e-butler to initiate a secure interface. It told her it couldn’t. A quick passive scan from her inserts was unable to detect any OCtattoos in the boy’s body. “Orion?” she asked curiously. “Do you have any inserts?”
“No.” His hand tightened hopefully around hers. “Do you mean it, that you and Ozzie weren’t starting something?”
“We weren’t.” It was ridiculous, having to comfort this naïve boy when the real issues of the war were still unresolved; yet her conscience was stopping her from just walking out. God, he’s worse than Dudley. Actually, no, that’s not fair; Dudley was never this vulnerable. Or sweet.
“Oh.” He didn’t sound convinced.
“Believe me,” she said softly. “If it was anything else, if I liked him, would I do this?”
“What?”
She kissed him.
It was dark outside; Cressat’s sun had set nearly an hour earlier. Mellanie lay on the bed, listening to Orion’s regular breathing for several minutes before she knew for certain he was asleep. She got off the gelmattress as carefully as she could so she didn’t wake him. He was sprawled on his side, one hand hanging over the edge. She smiled as she pulled the thin duvet up around him. He sighed in his sleep, and settled contentedly under the fabric. Even when she gave him the lightest of kisses on his shoulder he never stirred.
I should hope not. He should be exhausted after everything I made him do. She felt a wicked sense of pride at how successfully he’d been corrupted during that long afternoon. I’m a bad bad girl. And loving every minute of it.
/>
Mellanie didn’t bother trying to find her swimsuit and toweling robe; the kafuffle might wake him. She just walked naked down the mansion’s long corridors back to the Bermuda room. Her smile kept shining the whole time. She couldn’t get his face out of her mind, the expressions of surprise and fearful delight. His body had been nicely responsive. Some of his reactions made her laugh, then gasp. Bad!
In the Bermuda room she placed her hand on the desktop array, her i-spot interfacing securely with the mansion’s network. The SIsubroutine was established in the arrays, waiting for her.
“We have infiltrated the network,” it told her. “Ozzie will be able to leave the building undetected. He will wait for you by the first cattle grid on the drive.”
“Right then, I’ll call a cab from Illanum. Give me fifteen minutes.”
The maidbots packed her bags while she took a quick shower. Before she left, she wrote a short note and sealed it in an envelope.
One of the security staff was standing in the hall as she came downstairs, a woman she remembered from the morning. Jansis? The cab from the Dynasty office had just pulled up outside.
“Would you give this to Orion in the morning, please?” Mellanie asked, and held out the envelope.
“You’re leaving now?” The woman seemed faintly surprised.
“I’ve done what I was paid to.” Mellanie couldn’t detect any suspicion. She proffered the envelope again.
“Okay.” The woman took the envelope.
Mellanie went down the broad steps, hoping she wasn’t showing too much haste. The cab was the same kind of maroon-colored Mercedes limousine that had brought her to the mansion. Her luggage rolled up into the open boot as she claimed one of the front seats. She didn’t like driving manually, so she told her e-butler to designate a route to Illanum station. “And slow down to a crawl when we reach the first cattle grid,” she instructed it.
The car followed the winding drive for a kilometer through the parklands surrounding the mansion before it slowed. Mellanie opened the door, and Ozzie bounded in.
“Cool,” he said admiringly as he settled next to her. “We did it.”
The Mercedes began to pick up speed. Ozzie ordered it to switch to manual control, and a steering wheel slid out in front of him. He gripped it with both hands. An enhanced light image appeared on the windshield, showing the trees of the parkland as silver-white ghosts.
“How’s Orion?” Ozzie asked.
Mellanie smiled broadly. It was an automatic response, she couldn’t help it. Didn’t particularly want to. “He’s just fine.”
Something in her tone made Ozzie shoot a quizzical look her way. “What does he think about me?”
“That you’re the antichrist.”
“Thanks.”
She watched the monochrome landscape sliding by. “I hope you know where the Sheldon Dynasty has its starship base, because I certainly don’t.”
“I’ve been thinking about that. The gateway to Cressat was expanded, and there was a lot of traffic going through. So at least part of the operation will be here.”
“Where? It’s a whole planet, and this is the only transport we’ve got.”
“Relax. One of the reasons Nigel was so keen to keep me penned up is because I’m so deeply embedded in CST. I told you, it’s half mine.”
“You also said he handles the day-to-day running.”
“True. I can ghost through most Dynasty security barriers, but I’m guessing this one will give me a problem. I know Nigel. A project on this scale, and designed to save his own ass, is going to kick his corporate paranoia into over-drive. Every security protocol surrounding it is going to be shiny new, and completely lacking my authorization privileges. There’s only one place he’ll build anything this secret. I just hope he hasn’t gone and switched the original personnel around too much.”
Chapter Sixteen
For once there was no crowd waiting to greet Elaine Doi as the presidential limousine pulled up smoothly. The bodyguards riding with her still went through the disembarkation procedure, scanning the area, running identity requests on the few people who were standing outside the gateway control center. It was a nondescript building made from a high-density metal stone amalgamation with slim recessed vertical windows, the kind of office block that would be rented by a small company going nowhere. In this case it was very literally in the shade of the Hanko wormhole generator building, whose composite panel sides rose up behind the gateway control like a vertical mountain.
Presidential security gave the okay, and the limousine’s thick armored doors unlocked. The pressure seal that protected her from chemical and biological attack disengaged, and the force field switched off.
“I see Nigel hasn’t bothered to come and welcome me,” the President complained. How the unisphere shows would love that slight. He’d sent some station management types to wait on the steps for her instead.
“Remember the Michelangelo feed is live,” Patricia warned as the door irised apart.
As she stepped out of the limousine Doi’s smile had the appropriate gravitas for the occasion. She thanked the two CSI managers for sparing the time to greet her at what must be a frantically busy time for them on this historic day. Nodded courteously at the reporter from the Michelangelo show standing to one side, and let herself be ushered inside.
The control center itself had undergone a hurried modification over the last few days, with over a dozen new consoles crammed into the narrow aisles between the existing two rows. Whereas before, under normal operating conditions, there would be no more than three or four people in the center at any one time, each position now had a technician sitting at it, while more specialists and engineers stood behind them monitoring the new procedures. In addition, the back wall was lined with dignitaries, including Michelangelo himself, who’d arm-twisted an invitation out of CST. With only half an hour to go before the wormhole was switched to its new advanced temporal flow mode, the atmosphere was strained and excited. None of the technical staff were bothering to use the communications links; they shouted questions and comments around the center at high volume.
“It’s worse than a Senate debate,” Doi said from the corner of her mouth as they entered the control center.
Patricia’s neutral expression never flickered.
Nigel Sheldon came over to greet her, apologetic that he hadn’t been at the front entrance earlier. “Things are getting a little tense around here,” he explained. “They even asked my advice on exotic matter stress. I was quite flattered.”
“I’m sure you gave them every help,” Doi said tightly; she was very aware of the Michelangelo reporter standing a few paces away, capturing everything for the unisphere audience. In her virtual vision grid the total access number was creeping up to the kind of level that the last Prime invasion had generated.
“We all contribute what we can,” Nigel said in a very condescending tone.
Rafael Columbia came over to welcome Doi.
“Admiral,” she said in relief; at least he would be more formal. The occasion deserved it, she felt. “How is the navy coping with the remaining Prime ships?” she said, as if the Prime armadas were some minor problem left over, a few spaceships already on the run from superior Commonwealth forces.
“Secure in this system, Madam President,” Rafael said. “We now have eight frigates assigned to elimination duty. Over half of the Prime ships have been successfully eliminated, the rest are in flight. Protecting Wessex with its wormhole generators is imperative. We will guarantee it at all costs.”
“I’m sure you will, Admiral.” Which didn’t quite equate the briefing he’d given her ten hours ago. The Prime ships in many of the Second47 systems were trying to congregate into swarms, merging their defense capabilities while they attempted to find a suitable asteroid or moon to claim as a new home. But in seven systems, the gathering swarms were heading into the Commonwealth worlds. The navy had diverted frigates to try to deflect the inward migration, but
the numbers were against them. Those seven planets were going to have a tough time of it during the next week while the evacuation progressed.
“We’re almost ready,” Nigel said. He and Doi walked down to the front of the control center while the noise died down. The five big holographic portals on the wall were projecting data schematics for the wormhole. The central one switched to a picture of Hanko’s Premier Speaker, Hasimer Owram.
“Mr. Sheldon, Madam President,” he said.
Doi was very aware of the hostile undercurrent in his voice, and hoped no one else would pick up on it. The last talk she’d had with him, five hours ago, had been short and antagonistic. Starting with his dismay that Hanko was going to be the first to begin evacuating into the future or, as he put it, the experiment to test if the whole lunatic time travel idea worked; right up to the fact that Nigel wasn’t kidding about not letting anyone opt out of the operation. Owram had wanted to be allowed back into the Commonwealth so he could “monitor” the preparations being made for his people on their new planet.
“Hello, Hasimer,” Doi said. “We’re about to open the wormhole for you.”
“Everyone here is ready. We’re leaving with great sadness, but also a sense of hope and pride. Hanko’s society will flourish again.”
“I have no doubt of that. I look forward to visiting and experiencing your triumph in the flesh.”
“Hasimer,” Nigel said. “The wormhole is ready. We’ve got a direct lock on the gateway at Anagaska. It’s opening now.”
“Anagaska it is then,” Hasimer Owram said. “Make sure we’ve got some decent weather when we arrive.”
“Consider it done,” Nigel said. Anagaska was a phase three world, eight light-years from Balkash, which CST had already advanced to predevelopment state. Its position close to the Lost23 was another source of Hasimer’s anger, but as Nigel had told him and all the other Second47 planetary leaders, the Wessex-based wormholes couldn’t reach the other side of the Commonwealth.
Doi watched the image pull back from Hasimer. The Premier Speaker had been standing beside a dark green six-seat Audi Tarol that was parked directly in front of the Hanko gateway. The train tracks had been ripped up and replaced by a vast apron of enzyme-bonded concrete that had been poured without any finesse over the ground all the way back to the main highway leading to the planetary station. It was starting to look like that wasn’t going to be nearly enough.