Gunar was blistered on the outside, but his worst injuries were internal. Crayley had heated his air supply and he had taken several breaths of scalding air before turning it off. He was breathing normally, but his damaged throat and lungs couldn’t absorb the oxygen properly once it was inside him. He had burned his vocal cords, too, and could only speak in a soft, painful whisper.
The nature of his injuries made the tanks unsuitable for the time being. He needed to breathe heavy oxy-fluids in there, and the doctors considered his lungs too weak to cope. So he was put instead in an old-fashioned oxygen tent until the internal blisters had begun to heal and he was ready to go in a normal tank.
The family gathered round, although actually Gunar would have preferred to have been left on his own. He was furious— with Crayley, with himself, with Sigurd, with everything. The first time they saw him, he was sitting up in bed in his tent, panting, his blistered tongue hanging out and looking very doggy, and his face dark yellow and as long as misery. Hogni pulled a sympathetic face.
“You look so fed up,” he said. Gunar pursed his lips but couldn’t smile.
“You tried,” pointed out Gudrun.
“I failed,” hissed Gunar.
“Was succeeding the point?” she asked. Gunar had always insisted that he had to try or he’d never know if he could. So now he knew.
“It beat me so easily,” he whispered. “It just cooked me.”
“Like a little sausage,” said Hogni sadly.
“A st-stupid little sausage,” agreed Gunar.
He wasn’t allowed to speak much. The doctors wanted to let his internal burns heal as fast as possible so that they could get him into the tanks quickly. There were a couple of armchairs in his room and a basket with a cushion in it put down by the bedside for Grimhild, although she spent a lot of time lying on his feet. Ida came and went. Through her servant, Grimhild was trying to get her son moved home, although of course she could never say why. Home was where the heart was; and the replacements. Maybe her damaged son was no longer good enough. . . .
Now was the time for Sigurd to take over the task of killing the city, and as soon as possible. As soon as it had finished dispelling the waste from its first vast feeding binge, Crayley would withdraw its maw, sink like a whale into the depths, and go to seek out new feeding areas. No one could say exactly when that would be, but sonar readings showed that the city was already rearranging itself underground, and a move could be imminent. Every day that passed gave Sigurd a narrower window in which to complete the job.
But Sigurd, faithful as ever, would not go without Gunar telling him to. He did not want to steal his glory a second time; Gunar had to give it away, freely. He sat by the sick man’s bedside and waited. Gunar watched him from behind the plastic of the oxygen tent. The unspoken question and its inevitable answer remained in the air.
All that first day Sigurd waited, but nothing was said. As the day grew long, he leaned forward at last and spoke.
“Crayley’s on the move, Gunar.”
Gunar turned and looked at him. “It has to be now,” insisted Sigurd. “It has to be me, you can see that, can’t you? Unless you know another way.”
It was a rhetorical question. Another way than Sigurd? Surely not. But Gunar nodded his head. He moved his lips. Hardly a sound came out but Sigurd knew what he was saying.
“I know a way.”
Sigurd nodded. He was strangely unsurprised.
Gunar nodded across to where his mother sat in her basket. She opened her mouth and lopped out her tongue—pah pah pah.
“She showed me how wh-when I was still small,” whispered Gunar. Sigurd followed his gaze. Grimhild stared back and panted. Her expression was unreadable.
Regenerating flesh out of feed and mechanism from industrial waste, Slipper was always young. On his back, the clone felt that he would always be young too. They rode across the uncertain sands of Crayley’s feed-bowl as easily as over clay or turf, past the manufactured desert, and into the grown metal maw of the city. Then through the corrosive blast, down the long incline getting steadily steeper, through acids, enzymes, and avalanche, through fires and past obstacles, down the throat and into the body of Crayley. Around him the city crowed and sneered, flung weapons and little armies at him. This was the machine come to life. He’d find no mercy down here.
As he got deeper underground, the heat grew more intense. Slipper was soon without flesh, a titanium skeleton, pure machine now, but still loyal to him, still serving him. But Sigurd himself was untouched by the fires. This time, nothing burned. He was inside one of the dragon suits he had cut out. He was in disguise.
It had been easily done—well within the power of the sorceress Grimhild. It was Gunar who wrote out the runes and prepared the potion; he believed that was all there was to it. But it was she who secretly struck a deal with the god of shapes. A shape is such a thing that can be taken off and put on; nothing else need change. Sigurd kept his skin and his mind, all the effects of the dragon’s blood inside him, all of his memories, just as Gunar did. Only their shapes changed. In this way, Gunar the king would achieve his dreams without participation, win the prize in his own absence. He could not have the deed, but he could have the shadow of the deed fall on him. He could achieve it in story at least.
As a favor to a friend the clone went down to Crayley in Gunar’s shape. He rode like a fury past tongues of fire and teeth of steel as Gunar, while Gunar himself lay in secret, in his hospital bed, beautiful as he never was in life in the form of Sigurd.
Yes, Gunar was a good man—but he wanted too much. Perhaps his brains had been cooked as well down there. Sigurd, who genuinely did not care for the achievement, only for the doing, gave the glory away without a second’s thought, but he would have been a better friend if he had said no. This deed was to carve a wound in many hearts.
He rode through radioactive clouds, past shooting fireworks and blinding gushes of white flame, over puddles of corrosive juices and palpitating, red-hot organs reaching out to devour him. Where was he going? Slipper seemed to know. Deeper and deeper into Hel they rode. He had to get past this heat before releasing his parcel of viruses, or they would be rapidly destroyed. Marshall had reasoned that somewhere there must be layers where the organic and computing networks operated at more comfortable temperatures.
Past metal structures and over stone pathways oozing and puddling in the heat, through walls of fire. Where the way was blocked, Slipper fired a missile or the clone in Gunar’s shape simply cut his way through with the sword stub. His power was glorious to him. What could defeat him? Through steel gates, hacked to slices—he could hear the city moan as he did it— past stone walls and organic webs, past tissues that caught and blocked and filtered, like vast membranes, deeper and deeper, to where the heat died down, to where the acids softened, and where at last he saw a strangely familiar creature scuttle with bronzed fur and metallic eyes, but undeniably organic movements.
Then they were riding along an echoing corridor and up to a tangle of sheet steel and furry hides, stuck all around with the dried heads of familiar, unfamiliar creatures. The clone stared in amazement. Why had Slipper led him here? How did he know and not know this place at the same time? There was a doorway, human height, through which he was certain he had passed—but how could he have passed this way and have no memory of it? Why did his heart beat so hard?
He removed the helmet. As he did so, the furs at the entrance parted and a figure came out and stared at him with a look of horror on her face.
The clone stared; she stared, horrified, mesmerized, amazed—as if each expected the other to transform before their eyes into something else. Sigurd reigned in an overpowering desire to jump down and embrace this woman; to his astonishment, tears sprang into his eyes and he had to wipe them away. He wanted to shout, I’m back! But the words had no meaning for him.
“Who are you?” she demanded.
Their eyes had locked together. They were drinking each othe
r through their eyes, trying to understand the force that was between them. How could they know? The one could not remember, the other could not know, but each was looking at the one person they could ever truly love.
Slipper wheeled round; the clone’s eyes never left her face. “Gunar, my name is Gunar. I’m the king of everything above here,” he said. Never one to boast himself, he only wanted to promote his friend.
Her eyes burned into him. He felt she saw through everything. He could not tear his gaze away. He knew her! But he did not. . . .
“And that horse,” she said. These things belonged to someone else! She could not unlock her eyes from his face! Was she falling in love again? Was she someone who could fall helplessly in love with any man she saw—was she doomed to give away her soul every time someone met her? Was she worth so little?
Sigurd’s eyes slid sideways deceitfully, but only for a second; then they clamped back onto hers. Bryony smiled grimly. She had resigned herself to life here underground, but the craving for air and all the fullness of real life was still in her. When she heard the clatter of Slipper’s hooves on the metal floor, she was certain he had come back at last—her Sigurd, her beloved one, come back to take her away and give her the world! She ran out overflowing with joy, but there was no Sigurd. Instead it was this stranger, who boasted about himself and did not look her in the eye, but stood there in the manner of her beloved. Perhaps he was a murderer. Why else did he have Sigurd’s horse?
She was not sure she wanted the world if there was to be no Sigurd in it.
He dismounted and stood in front of her, frowning. It was like a myth; everything had a heightened meaning, but he had no idea why.
“How can Crayley be killed?” he demanded.
The woman, her eyes still fixed into his, smiled grimly. “Murder?” she said. It was on her mind. She’d killed every living thing she had seen for two years. This man was not what she wanted or expected—so why did she want to press herself into him until he became part of her flesh?
“Call it assassination,” replied the man. The skeleton horse she knew so well wheeled round like a living thing, and the clone’s gaze was torn from her. The bond was broken; they both breathed again. There was a pause while they panted and caught their breath, exhausted by the encounter. Sigurd nodded over his shoulder at the city smoking around them. “Do you know how?” he asked.
Bryony shrugged. Her eyes sought his out and they locked again, like steel clasps on each other’s soul. Unwittingly, Bryony’s arms rose in the air toward him. She was unaware; her body acted for her. Such love does not need eyes to recognize. And he, seeing her arms rise, smiled joyfully, lifted his own, took a step toward her. . . .
She dropped back and hissed in fear. The clone stepped back too, but their eyes did not part. Their rootless love rendered both speechless. Man and woman gazed into each other’s eyes in such a way as if they would harvest the other’s soul. A full ten seconds passed before they broke together at the same moment, scared by what they had seen but none the wiser.
For reasons he could not begin to understand, the clone began to sob.
“Why are you crying?”
He wiped his eyes on his arm. Where was my Sigurd? I wanted to grab him and shake him, as if he had him there with him, somehow hidden. I could feel him, I could taste him. But he wasn’t there.
“Where is he?” I hissed.
He looked at me as if I’d asked him for the moon. He shook his head.
“Who?” he demanded. Different face, different eyes. When Sigurd rode through the fire he came to me naked, his bones glowing through his flesh. He was more alive than any other living thing. Now was I falling in love with this pale thing, this look-the-other-way, this cheat-in-the-fire? What manner of a thing was I?
He squinted through his tears. So like Sigurd! But a different man. Were all men like this? He wept such tears, just like Sigurd. It’s hard to distrust tears. He was human, another creature. Just to talk to him was like being in love. But this one . . . this one wasn’t mine .
“Why are you crying?” I asked again.
He shook his head. “It must be shock. I’ve ridden through fire.”
“Are you scared?” I jeered.
“I’ve come for you,” he said. He tried to smile at me but his smile looked terrible. It looked false.
“You’ve come to kill Crayley,” I said. “Do you know how?”
He reached behind and touched Slipper with his hand. “I have viruses,” he said. “We don’t know if they’ll work. You live here. You must know something.”
I shrugged. “I know how to kill her. I’m just not sure if I want to.”
He started talking about how terrible it was above ground, how all the trees and the beasts and the people and even the ground and the air had been destroyed. I thought to myself, So what? I’ve never walked on that ground, I’ve never breathed that air, I’ve never known those people. All I know is these men with their blood that won’t boil who tell ludicrous tales that only a troglodyte like me would ever believe.
All the time he was looking at me as if he wanted to devour me. As if I was his, or as if I’d suffered some terrible disfigurement. Well, I am disfigured. It’s called my heart, it’s called my soul. I’ve turned into a monster down here.
“I’m only half alive,” I told him.
“You want to escape this, don’t you?” he said. “Think about it. The grass, the air, the trees, the people. The world! I’ve come to bring you the world. I’ve come for you. I want to give you the world.”
“Fuck you!” I screamed. How did he know to say that to me? How did he know I was in love with everything I’ve never had?
I tried to cover up my confusion. “She is everything to me.”
He looked at me curiously. “You call this place she?” he asked.
I hunted for Beatrice after it stole her. I thought if I could get to her soon enough maybe she’d be all right. I had her for such a short time, such a short time. It was very hard to know that she would be all alone, just like me. It was very hard to know that she was never going to grow up or smile at me or speak to me.
I went looking without any hope of finding because the only other thing was to kill myself and I wasn’t ready to do that. Sigurd might still come back to me. I knew where the place was of course. I thought Crayley would have moved it but I had to fight so hard as I got near, I knew she must be there. It took me weeks—months actually, circling about, trying different directions. I don’t know why I bothered, the city kept me at bay so easily. It wants me alive. More babies, more brains. Perhaps that’s what this new man is about.
Then one day the ways opened. The weapons in the walls hung their heads, the killer bots sat down and lifted up their arms, the doors unhinged themselves. There was a voice.
“Mother,” it said. Mother! How could it? How dare it?
I dropped my weapon. I walked past all the deadly things down the corridor and into a room and there she was— Beatrice, my daughter, my baby. Our daughter. She was sitting up in a tank, wired up. So pretty, so pretty. So young. She still had her baby fat. She smiled when she saw me.
“A trick,” I said out loud.
“I was inside you. Now you are inside me. What sense does that make?” Her mouth moved in the liquid, her words came out of the air. She laughed, a silver tinkle, a happy sound in that awful place. Such a little girl, and yet she spoke like an adult.
Was she still mine? Was she still even human?
“You can’t take me back, Mother. We need me. She is part of us now.”
“We?” I sneered.
“You and me, the rats, the machines, the walls, the vats. I am the mother of all. You are the mother of mothers. I love you. We all love you. Everything!”
“What have you done to her?” I wept.
A light came on in her tank. Still so young. A toddler who had never toddled.
“The human brain has seven billion synapses,” she said.
“
She’s so small,” I crooned. I went to the tank, I wanted to hold the tank but some creature appeared from behind and held me by my arms.
“Don’t touch me!” cried Beatrice.
I held out an arm toward her.
“Perhaps later,” said Beatrice.
“Please . . .”
“She’s loved. Our mother. I have factories to run and schedules to organize, oil and blood to pump. I have to feed us and grow. I am her, I am us. I am your mother now.”
I couldn’t find words. I collapsed in the creature’s arms and wept.
“We will speak to you from time to time, if you wish. You can come and see me.”
“I want her back.”
“Bryony, she is me now.”
“Sigurd,” I began.
“Has not come back.” There was a note of triumph in her voice. “An absent father. What is he worth? He deserted you, Bryony.”
“That’s not true!”
“I’m so sorry. So, so sorry.”
I put my hand out and this time she let me put it on the tank over her face.
“Why haven’t you killed me?”
“Bryony! You are our mother! How could we kill you? How could we?”
I began to cry. It was so unfair! I wept, I begged, I got on my knees. I’d been on my own for so long. And Crayley, oh, Crayley was so understanding, so forgiving, so loving. She sent the machines to stroke me and caress me, she murmured sweet nothings in my ear, she made promises about more babies, more men, a whole population down there to keep me company. I would be the mother of a nation! She would become a real city, a city of living souls. There would be hope, there would be the surface, the world, there would be life. She would get Sigurd back! There would be love.