The five inside it were naked, starving and hollow-eyed. They knew the ten days they had been given to make their peace with God were coming to an end, because the oxygen bottles had been wheeled out and the crowds were gathering. In the compartment below the Cage, bound faggots of dry flute grass had been stacked—but these wouldn’t burn on this airless world, hence the oxygen to feed the flames. This was a spectacle theocrats came to see from afar, even from the cylinder worlds of Faith, Hope and Charity. I couldn’t save them, neither could our revolutionary cell. But the thermite block I’d inserted amidst the fuel would bring about a quick end and might even take out a few of the viewing theocrats. I wouldn’t stay to watch. I’d had enough, at last, of pointless rebellion, and now the wealth I had slowly and secretly accumulated would buy me passage with smugglers off-world. I felt bad about this, but knew it was time to look after myself.
“You can come with us,” the smuggler captain had said. “Or we can drop you off at outlink station Miranda.”
“Where are you going?” I had asked.
When he told me about the Graveyard and the pickings to be had there I was undecided, but now I was certain. I would go with them. I wasn’t sure that years spent killing Theocracy vicars and proctors would make me a good fit for that strange utopia that was the Polity. I headed out of the church, my proctor’s uniform tight and uncomfortable across my breasts. It had been made to fit a man now decaying under the flute grass rhizome mat. The burning was nigh—because those in the church were standing to follow the Vicar of Chattering out into the milky sunlight—
“Spear!”
The shops returned and the Cage was again shrouded in monomer. I blinked and focused on Riss, who had risen up with her flat cobra head only inches from my face, the single black eye wide open. I realized I was down on my knees and that, all around, people were watching me with suspicion. I quickly stood up, not wanting them to mistake my prone position as a sudden impulse to pray.
Hallucination? No, I had just experienced someone’s memories with a clarity normally only open to AIs. It frightened me and I had no idea what it meant, though I guessed there was some connection to my previous experiences of déjà vu and odd memories. This was, I now felt sure, something Penny Royal had done to me—and coming here had unlocked this memory.
“What’s the matter with you?” Riss asked, now looking up at me from waist level. Her ovipositor was noticeably raised, as threatening as a scorpion’s sting.
“I’m fine,” I said, not wanting to explain, not knowing how to explain. I met the gazes of a few of the people standing around. “I’m okay—dizzy spell. I had the O2 of my breather set too high.”
They began moving away. Whether they believed me or not I couldn’t say, but they didn’t seem to want to get involved. I began walking towards Markham’s again.
“What did it do to you?” Riss asked next, confusing me utterly, ovipositor still poised.
“What?”
“The spine.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I told you that you and it are entangled,” Riss explained. “There was a data transference, though whether from you to it or it to you I don’t know.”
I could see no reason to lie, so said, “Memories.” I tried to gather my thoughts and continued, “Ever since I was resurrected, I’ve been experiencing odd moments of déjà vu and occasionally remembering things that I’m pretty certain never happened to me. I put it down to faults in the reconstruction work on my implant. Just then I had a big one.” I gestured back towards the Cage. “I remembered being present here before an execution and deciding to leave this world, to buy passage on a smuggler’s ship out to the Graveyard. I was a young woman—one of the rebels here.”
“One of Penny Royal’s victims,” Riss stated.
Yes, that was certainly possible. I stared at a series of jewelled rings, spinning in a circle before me within Markham’s display. Then I dropped my gaze to a strangely unnerving glass sculpture—some kind of arthropod with lights glowing in its depths—and considered that nightmare diorama trapped in an ammonite fossil. Penny Royal might well have killed many of its victims, but there was no guarantee it had completely erased them. Some it had certainly recorded. Could it have recorded more than just a few? So was I getting an accidental bleed-over from recorded memories contained within the spine, or from Penny Royal via the spine? Or was the introduction of those memories into my mind a deliberate act on the part of the AI? It being deliberate seemed more likely. What were the chances of one of the AI’s victims having been here—right in the very church where Markham’s opened for business and subsequently put my memplant ruby up for sale? I stepped over to the shimmershield and entered.
She was waiting in the middle of the shop. She appeared anxious, wary and she gazed at me as if she knew me.
“I’ve been expecting you,” said Gloria Markham.
17
ISOBEL
This system lay on the edge of the borderland. Here the Graveyard ended and the Polity began, and a red giant sun was steadily boiling the oceans from what had once, long ago, been a living world. Isobel transferred her gaze from the glowing sphere before her to a frame which she mentally opened up in the laminate. This expanded to fill a quadrant of the screen, showing a large asteroid—but that wasn’t what held her attention.
Just out from this asteroid were three ships, growing rapidly larger as the Moray Firth drew closer. These were the Nasturtium, the Glory and the much larger and more lethal-looking Caligula—a ship the colour of old oak, with atmosphere wings folded halfway back into its hull. A big teardrop-shaped weapons nacelle extended forward from below its sharkish nose. Isobel opened another frame.
“So you brought the Glory,” she said.
Morgan, who had recently transferred from the Nasturtium to the Caligula, squinted at her then replied, “Seems they received a cancellation on their stopover. Our clients all of a sudden decided they didn’t want to do business with us anymore.”
This gave Isobel momentary pause. Had her clients in the Kingdom been monitoring her activities and decided she was no longer a safe option to supply their particular kink? Had the king cracked down on them or, and now she might be being paranoid, had some other influence been at work, maybe even Penny Royal? She shook herself, dismissing that line of thought.
Her clients cancelling meant she had an extra ship, but it also probably meant the Glory still had its human cargo aboard. Perhaps it would be better to abandon that cargo here for later collection, since carrying the evidence of their crimes to Masada would make her men rather edgy. Not that she intended to let any Polity monitors or military anywhere near them. It would be a quick in and out operation beneath the Polity’s notice—a fast conclusion to the hunt—the kill.
She paused, closing all her eyes and trying to suppress the predator inside. She needed to think a lot more clearly about this. Despite her anxiousness to be on her way, she knew that Morgan and the others would rebel against following her to Masada. This would be the case whether or not they were carrying evidence of their crimes, and she needed to do something about that.
“It will be useful,” she said, referring to the Glory.
“So where are we heading now?” Morgan asked. “I’m not too happy about sitting this close to the Polity—I’d bet we’re being watched even now.”
Confirmation—she could not allow Morgan or the rest any choices. She blinked her numerous eyes, another subframe opening in the laminate. This showed an object like an extended dumb-bell, crusted all over with sensors. The structure glinted with lights from thousands of portals, coilgun barrels the size of sequoias sprouting from each end. This was the nearest Polity watch station. The obvious weapons weren’t all it possessed, apparently. There would be USERs in there or intelligent U-space missiles, plus runcible gates linked to installations inside suns or placed on the event horizons of black holes. These would be capable of routing appalling amounts of power. However, such s
tations were here to watch for some major push by the prador, so a few human ships like hers were surely beneath their notice.
“Don’t let that concern you,” she said. “This border is as leaky as a prador door seal—we’ve had our agents and Separatist agents crossing it for years.”
“We’re crossing it?” said Morgan, alarmed.
“Don’t be silly,” she lied. “Our business remains in the Graveyard. I’ll be coming over to the Caligula shortly to go into more detail about that—I’ll want full control of its weapons for what’s to come.” The rest wasn’t much of a lie. She had already penetrated the Caligula’s systems, as she had penetrated the other two ships, but they weren’t her main concern. While she controlled those systems remotely there was always a chance, once Morgan and the rest knew where they were going, that they would try and maybe succeed in mutinying. She needed to be within physical reach of the people, not the computers. She understood now that she had relied on computer omniscience for too long.
“I’ll be with you shortly,” she said. “Inform the captain of the Glory that my agent will be arriving on his ship shortly too.”
“Your agent?” Morgan enquired.
Almost without conscious thought, Isobel looked through cams inside the Moray Firth to where the Golem was working—making refinements to her space suit.
“Yes, my agent,” she said, and cut the communications link.
Fear was the key. Her presence aboard the Caligula would enforce the obedience of all aboard and the presence of a skeletal Penny Royal Golem aboard the Glory would do the same there. That was as far as she could extend her physical control. The Nasturtium, if its captain managed to rebel, would be an acceptable loss.
“You will take charge of this ship,” she said abruptly, turning to Trent.
He looked hopeful, but only for a moment, perhaps realizing that “taking charge” didn’t mean he would be able to flee in the Moray Firth.
“What are you going to do?”
Isobel turned away from the screen and her consoles. “I’m going to ensure absolute obedience,” she replied and set off back through her ship.
Soon, with Trent hurrying to catch up, she arrived at her laboratory platform, where the Golem held her bulky space suit stretched out over its arms. She quickly began donning it, with the Golem’s attentive assistance. Trent watched all this seemingly with tired acceptance. She knew he thought that taking the hunt to Masada was suicide, and knew he had given up trying to persuade her otherwise. He was a fool—there was a reason she was in charge with him subordinate. As the seals closed on her limbs and around the fixings to her weapons, she considered how all the work she’d done aboard the Moray Firth could have been wasted. Surely it would be better for her to remain aboard the Caligula now? It was the larger ship and so would have more room for her. It had more firepower and more resources aboard. Why had she retained her silly sentimental attachment to her old ship for so long, while keeping the Caligula moth-balled? She just had no idea, though she saw a connection to her earlier attachment to her human body.
“Return to the bridge,” she said to Trent. “You can monitor from there.”
It didn’t really matter where he located himself aboard, since he wouldn’t be operating any of its systems. And whatever he did, or didn’t do, made no difference whatsoever. But right then, she just wanted him away from her. Closing her suit had felt like abnegation—she was denying herself prey by putting the suit between them—and that made her feel even more like attacking him. As he walked away, she swept off the platform and down to the hold she’d designated as her airlock, the Golem stomping after her. She entered through the back cargo door and felt the monomer fabric of her suit stiffen slightly as the door closed and the air evacuated.
As the outer cargo doors opened on hard vacuum, she felt a surge of excitement—in complete contrast to her previous worries and her rage. It felt a little like going after Stolman, but now something martial was raising its head inside her. Moving to the lip of the hold, she gazed at her three other ships as the Moray Firth drew closer and began to decelerate. They were still some miles away and not very clear visually in the dim red light of the local sun. She was about to clean up the imagery using her haiman augmentations when the ships abruptly snapped into sharp and exact focus.
What?
Next gridlines and targeting frames appeared across her vision, just momentarily, but as they faded she knew precise distances, power levels and weapons complements. Attack plans blossomed in her mind in intricate detail.
My eyes …
It was something to do with them, and something to do with other changes inside her. Trying to understand what had happened as best she could, she realized all this had stemmed from some unconscious part of her—it included her augmentations, but was more sophisticated. Inside her, mind and machine had just taken a step closer than even haiman integration could manage.
I am a hooder.
Apparently hooders were biomech weapons, but she’d never thought very deeply about what that might mean. They were capable of withstanding powerful weapons, but where was the rest? Where was the tactical mind and where were the thought processes, the actual armaments and everything else implied by the words “biomech weapon”? It struck her that the hooders of Masada were as devolved, mentally, as the gabbleducks—the descendants of the Atheter. So what was this? What was happening to her?
Penny Royal.
What had the AI said during their last encounter, when it had initiated these further changes?
I know the original form now.
Isobel’s excitement increased as she finally understood the full potential of her change. Previously she had been transforming into one of Masada’s hooders. These were animals, mindless shadows of the biomechs they had once been. Penny Royal’s further intervention meant she was now changing into the original hooder form. The Polity had been sitting on data, so new insights into Masada’s hooders were under wraps. But major events had occurred on Masada. An alien machine had all but destroyed Penny Royal there, before Amistad resurrected the AI. That machine was destroyed in turn, mainly down to a hooder—an almost legendary albino hooder rumoured to be millions of years old. It was named the Technician.
I will be even more powerful now.
Isobel twitched her cowl, sending instructions to the Golem poised beside her. It immediately launched itself into vacuum; a skeletal missile perfectly on target for the Glory. She too then launched herself, her trajectory precisely and instinctively calculated. As she travelled, she felt the need to move her limbs but thought that ridiculous until she tried. Pale pink fire flickered around them and she felt them digging into the soft rhizome-coated loam of vacuum, gripping the quantum foam of the universe to accelerate her towards her target.
“Isobel! Isobel!”
It was Morgan, trying to talk to her. She was a missile, unreadable energies washing around her, and the Caligula’s automated defences had immediately come online. She felt a moment of chagrin, knowing she would have to reach out to shut down those defences, but before she could use her usual methods some other part of her reached out first. The defences went offline. A potential firing pattern blossomed within her and it had nothing to do with the Polity weapons she carried. She saw the induction wave would cause a surge through the Caligula’s reactor. The ensuing sub-space fold, as carefully shaped as an origami model, would force the U-space drive to initiate while being completely out of balance. Then, feeding on the power surge, the Caligula would be crushed in its own warp …
Noo!
Isobel forced away that other, lost her grip on space and found herself tumbling, everything that occurred before now a momentary fantasy. Her mind could now label all the energies she’d used and actions she’d made and intended to make. But just a moment ago these weren’t thoughts but feelings—and the resulting actions were as easy and as unconscious as walking, running, breathing … the beating of her heart. And now they were gone again.
She slammed into the hull of the Caligula and bounced away, leaving a definite dent, horror rippling through her. This was almost worse than her urge to kill and rend and feed. She had almost, without real conscious thought of her own, annihilated one of her own spaceships.
Isobel writhed in vacuum, unable to grip anything that would lead her back to the ship, but finally had to admit defeat and use the impellers on her suit. Slowly re-establishing control, she used prosaic haiman functions to penetrate the warship’s systems and get it to open a hold door. She collapsed inside on functioning grav-plates, noticing crates of weapons stacked all around her as the hold charged with air. She noted too that her space suit had split open and, unlike the last time she had found herself in vacuum, she felt no ill-effects at all. She abruptly, angrily, stripped away the suit and discarded it. Perhaps she was being foolish, but she felt sure that her future held no need for such basic protection.
“Isobel!”
Morgan was first through the bulkhead door, followed by four armed heavies, two of whom she vaguely recognized. She swung towards them and noted the heavies instinctively reaching for their weapons.
“You’ve changed,” Morgan added.
What was he talking about? He’d seen her transformation already. She reached out with her augmentations to gaze through the cams here in this hold, and looked upon the new Isobel. That had been no fantasy out there—something had definitely happened, some deep change had occurred. She could see, without calculating, that her length had increased to fifteen feet, with a consequent reduction in her girth. Her carapace, all of it, was now a perfect ivory colour and her eyes glowed a bright almost jewel-like lemon yellow.