“All right.” As we walked toward the lamppost, I called for the taxi. An automated response came back: the flyer would meet us near the Concourse entrance.
“I can’t walk past all those tourists on the Concourse soaked in blood,” Duane said.
“I know paths behind the shops.” As a child, I’d become an expert at sneaking around the Concourse. We all did, those of us willing to venture into that glitzy paean to commerciality. We never stole much, just enough to fend off starvation, but the cops would throw us into jail for taking even one sweet stick. So we created secret byways behind the shops. No one would see us today, except possibly another duster venturing into the forbidden land.
When the flyer landed on the palace roof, Duane refused to let the waiting medics put him on an air stretcher. The doctor started to treat him the moment we arrived, injecting him with nanomeds as we disembarked. She scanned his shoulder and ran a sterilizing stick over his wound. They did let him walk to a tower door, which I took as a good sign, but they had a hover chair waiting inside, and they insisted he sit. They bustled him through the palace until we reached a suite they called “the hospital.” It looked like an elegant living room. Tall windows let in sunlight, works of art hung on the ivory walls, and mosaics bordered the doors. Plush gold cushions upholstered the furniture. Seriously, this was a hospital? I should get sick.
“Here, Officer Ebersole.” The nurse rolled the chair over to a divan, near a bar by the wall. A crystal decanter with water stood on a tray on the bar, along with several goblets, but Duane didn’t ask.
The nurse tried to help Duane out of the chair, but Duane waved him off and managed on his own. He lay down with an exhale of relief. The divan shifted under him, trying to make him comfortable. Hieroglyphics flowed across its cushions, medical symbols: a heart, lungs, a braided coil for DNA. The doctor’s scanner glittered, probably receiving data from the divan. Patterns scrolled on the walls, too. They looked like abstract designs meant to soothe, but I recognized the medical glyphs. The entire room was analyzing him.
Duane closed his eyes and lay still while the doctor tended his wound and sealed it with a bandage that changed color to match his skin. The razor edges of the bullet had barely grazed his skin, but just that slight touch had torn apart his shoulder. If the bullet had actually hit him, it would have exploded his body.
“You’re a strong fellow,” the doctor said.
Duane grunted, what sounded like, “Thanks.”
The orderly motioned me toward a tall chair at the bar, one set back enough that I’d be out of the way. Gold threads embroidered its silk cushions, and the armrests sported carvings of a goddess with her hair streaming in the wind. I felt like I was committing sacrilege sitting in the chair, but I liked getting off my feet more than I liked being reverent, so I sat. The doctor touched the bar, and a section of its ivory surface morphed into a holoscreen, transforming into a medical station. Holos of Duane’s body appeared, rotating in the air.
I pulled my chair over to the divan. “You feeling better?” I asked Duane.
He opened his eyes, which seemed large in his ashen face. “Much better.”
“Don’t do that again.”
He smiled, drowsy with whatever drugs they were giving him. “What, don’t get better?”
“Come into the aqueducts.”
“It worked. I found you.”
I scowled at him. “You damn near got whacked.”
“By who? A ghost?” He touched a panel on the divan, and the front lifted until he was sitting up. “I don’t get it. I couldn’t find anything down there but dust sculptures. Yet last year you brought hundreds of people to the Rec Center. Everyone vanished after we tested them. We can’t locate anyone in the Undercity; they all disappear, even from our best sensors. Why? And how the hell do you find them? It’s like you have a secret door that only appears if you know the magic words. It’s surreal.”
That was a minefield. I couldn’t tell him how we hid from the Cries sensors, about the black market in stolen tech. Although I also hid my location and signals, I came by my shrouds legally. I couldn’t tell him about the cyber-riders. They smuggled in “borrowed” tech-mech, scavenged discarded pieces, or bargained for illicit goods, trading their skills for parts. At their best, they manipulated tech-mech better than the top engineers in Cries, creating eerie machines unlike anything the above-city knew. They had become so adept at hiding our population that even now, when Cries knew we existed, apparently the authorities couldn’t find us.
I said only, “You don’t see much in the canals because they’re throughways for foot travel. We don’t build there.” The canals were nowhere near as empty as they looked, but we left few traces of ourselves in such “public” places. I hadn’t realized the rest of humanity didn’t live that way until I went offworld.
“It’s more than that,” he said. “It’s an entire world no one in Cries can even access, let alone control.”
I stiffened. “Cries thinks it can control the Undercity?” Like hell.
“No, I didn’t mean that. The Majdas don’t want to antagonize your people.” He rubbed his eyes and yawned. “Gods, Bhaaj, all those psions. We could offer so much, training, jobs, goods. But no one even acknowledges our offers.”
“Give it time,” I said, more gently. “My people don’t know what to think about it yet.”
He closed his eyes. “They don’t trust us worth squat.”
True, but I decided that was better left unanswered. Instead I said, “Majda is taking the right approach, not pushing, just letting the relationship evolve. My people know you want them to train for Kyle jobs. They just need to come to the idea on their own terms.”
“So you keep saying . . .” His voice trailed off.
“Duane?” I asked.
“He’s sleeping,” the doctor said. “I activated the sedative in his meds.” Her voice became more businesslike as she looked past me. “He’ll feel better when he wakes. He’s going to be fine.”
I turned around. Damn! Lavinda Majda was standing a few paces back with two of her aides, in full uniform, her black hair pulled back from her face. How long had she been listening? At least I hadn’t said anything stupid.
“Colonel Majda.” I slid off the chair and bowed from the waist.
“Major.” Lavinda nodded. “I’m glad the two of you made it out in one piece.”
I couldn’t tell if she was angry. “Yes, ma’am.”
“Come walk with me.”
Although she phrased it as an invitation, I knew an order when I heard it. So I went with her out of the room, into a hallway that arched high above our heads. I kept my mouth shut, waiting to hear what she had to say, in case it was along the lines of You screwed up, brought back my officer soaked in his own blood, and where the hell were you when the pharaoh asked for you?
Lavinda glanced at me. “You are hard to read.”
Good. My mental shields were working. “I deeply that regret that Captain Ebersole was injured. He dealt with a difficult situation admirably.”
“I’m not going to fire either of you, Major. And I agree about the captain.”
The stiffness in my shoulders eased. “I understand the pharaoh wants to talk with me.”
“That’s right.” The colonel spoke firmly. “Now.”
V
The Down-Deep
They called the command center at the palace a “tech room.” It was like describing the cascade of a waterfall as a trickle of water. Unlike the eerie blue radiance of the Abaj center, this place glowed white, from its walls to its Luminex consoles. Holos flowed across the floor tiles, giving data about temperature, pressure, air quality, and more. Invisible currents of mental power ran here. Duane might consider the Undercity a mystery, but to me these control centers were the enigmas. I had just barely glimpsed the universe they accessed when the Abaj had linked me into their system.
At the far end of the room, a massive chair sat on a dais, tended by aides and st
udded by equipment. Lights flashed along its edges. A small figure sat there, encased in a more elaborate exoskeleton than those worn by the telops. Although I couldn’t see details from this far away, I knew psiphon plugs jacked into sockets in her wrists, ankles, and spine, linking the brain of the chair to the biomech web in her body. She looked so damn breakable, dwarfed by that tech-mech throne, yet she was all that stood between my people of the Imperialate and enslavement by the Trader Empire. I couldn’t imagine what it meant for the Ruby Pharaoh to live with the weight of that responsibility every day of every year of her life, never able to escape the voracious needs of her empire.
Most everyone here wore a uniform, mostly the dark green of the Pharaoh’s Army, but I saw the blue of Fleet, too. An army major came over and saluted Colonel Majda.
“At ease, Lieutenant Casestar,” Lavinda said. “Please inform Pharaoh Dyhianna we’re here.”
“Right away, ma’am.” He strode over to the closest console and settled into its control chair with the ease of long familiarity. I watched, fascinated, while its exoskeleton folded around him. As the visor lowered over his head, psiphon prongs clicked into his wrist sockets. So he was a telop. I wondered if I was the only non-psion here. I wasn’t sure how I felt about that, other than odd. Given the rarity of psions, I’d never expected to see so many in one place.
The quiet hum of people engrossed in their work continued. Lavinda tapped her ear. “Yes?”
I squinted, then realized she was responding to a transmission on her ear comm. She glanced at me. “Pharaoh Dyhianna wants you to join her in a meeting room.”
That sounded better than this huge place. “She’s coming out of the web, then?” I didn’t see any techs on the dais disconnecting her from the chair.
“Apparently not.” Lavinda listened on her comm. “She wants you to join her in the mesh.”
I blinked. “How? I can’t access Kyle space.”
She lowered her arm. “If we set you up in a VR suit and link you to her mesh session, the two of you can probably meet in a virtual conference.”
It seemed strange to suggest we have a virtual meeting when we were in the same place. Then again, mentally, Dyhianna Selei and I weren’t even in the same universe.
“That sounds fine.” I had no clue if it would work, but what the hell. Might as well try.
The techs connected me into a command chair. I tried to forget how my brain had rejected the Abaj system. I’d never been at ease with psions. They had extra organs in their brains, the Kyle afferent body and Kyle efferent body. The KAB received signals from other psions and the KEB sent them, acting like an amplifier. Their brains also produced the neurotransmitter psiamine, which carried messages to neural structures, called paras, that translated signals received by the KAB. In close proximity, psions could interpret brain waves from other psions, and to a lesser extent from people who weren’t psions. With biomech enhancement, their abilities became strong enough for them to operate in Kyle space, using the mesh created by the Ruby psions. It involved nothing more than neuroscience, but it bothered me. It didn’t seem real. You couldn’t see or feel any of how psions interacted, not unless you were one, too, a trait few people claimed.
“Major, are you all right?” Lieutenant Casestar was reading a screen on the console. “Your vitals just spiked.”
“I’m fine.” Quit obsessing, I told myself. I’d gone into VR plenty of times. Having the pharaoh join me from Kyle space rather than another conference room shouldn’t affect our interactions. It had nothing to do with my brain, only hers.
The visor lowered over my eyes, leaving me in darkness. I settled back, encased in a jumpsuit that could simulate textures on my skin. The majority of the virtual sim, however, depended on the link the chair made with my biomech web, allowing it to affect my brain.
Bhaaj, Max thought. The psiphon plugs on this console are trying to jack into your wrist sockets.
What for? I can’t link into Kyle space. I had neither the ability nor the tech.
I expect it’s an automatic response. Shall I block them?
Yah, keep them out.
Casestar spoke over the comm in my ear. “The pharaoh is ready. We’re activating the link.”
“Sounds good,” I said.
After that, I sat in darkness. The chair was actually quite comfortable.
I must have fallen asleep, because I woke up when someone spoke my name. The darkness had taken on a softer quality, faintly glittering. Pretty.
Yes? I asked.
No response.
I thought of asking if the sim had a problem, but I felt too sleepy. So instead I dozed.
Major Bhaajan, a woman said.
I yawned. Yah?
The mist cleared enough to reveal a stone bench. It curved in an arc, supported by legs sculpted into flying lizards with outstretched wings. Trees overhung it like a gathering of gnarled wizards. Pharaoh Dyhianna sat on one end, her hands folded in her lap, her white dress glistening. The scene was mostly dark, even the trees, but light glowed around her.
My greetings, Major, she said.
I sat on the other end of the bench, facing her. I am honored by your presence, Your Majesty. I’d looked up the greetings for leaders and discovered she used very few honorifics. It made a striking contrast to the Trader emperor, whose proper address dragged on forever.
Forever, indeed, she thought dryly. You have to give his entire lineage.
Do you hear everything I’m thinking?
No, not much, she said. Only your surface thoughts, and only when they are strong.
Well, hell. So much for privacy. I understand you wanted to talk with me?
It’s the cyber-riders, she said.
Ho! How had she found out about them? I don’t know what you mean.
I think you do.
Is this something the Majdas told you about? I hadn’t thought they knew, either.
They don’t know anything about the riders, she thought. The Majdas have no clue they exist.
Then what makes you think they do? I asked.
When you came to my attention, I looked at your mesh footprint.
Damn. I hadn’t thought I had a mesh footprint. I deliberately left no traces of my work on the meshes that networked our lives, hiding even from the Majdas and their ISC tech. Apparently I hadn’t succeeded as well as I thought.
You did succeed.
Not in hiding from you.
No, not from me. She watched me, her eyes such a deep shade of green, they reminded me of the trees in the deepest forest. Major, do you know how my nephew and I create the Kyle mesh?
No, actually, I don’t.
We use command stations called Locks. That’s why people call us Keys.
That actually sounded pretty simple. So a Lock is basically a machine.
It’s a space-time singularity.
Okay, maybe not so simple.
To become part of the Dyad, she continued, I used that singularity to access the Kyle. So did my nephew, Imperator Skolia.
Oh. I had no clue how that might work.
She spoke dryly. Neither do we. The Locks are thousands of years old. We believe the command stations that support them have intelligence and merely tolerate our presence.
Why are you telling me this? My head was beginning to hurt.
The ruins in the Undercity are also ancient. Her voice had become more distant. The cyber-riders draw on them.
I stiffened. I have no idea what you mean.
Yes, you do. Before I could deny it, she added, Just before Calaj killed Ganz, she and I connected through the Kyle, I don’t know how. What if she similarly gains access to the cyber-riders and their tech, or to ancient technology they may have found and learned to use in the ruins? I don’t know what damage she could inflict, and I don’t want to find out.
Of all the responses I expected, that wasn’t one. Shit. She had a good point. Gods only knew what a murderous Jagernaut could do with the more exotic tech our riders crea
ted. I needed to focus, but my head was throbbing with pain now, almost unbearable.
Do you think that’s why she came to Raylicon? I managed to ask.
I don’t know.
I didn’t see how a fighter pilot with no previous connection to Raylicon could know about the riders. No one in Cries did, not even after my people had come for the Kyle testing. The riders had looked like a raggedy collection of punks with salvaged prosthetics. The medics examined them for Kyle traits, not biomechanics.
The bench and trees wavered, then reformed. I struggled to concentrate. If these riders exist, I doubt an offworlder could know about them.
It does seem unlikely. She exhaled, a virtual gust of air that created a faint mist in the air. But I wouldn’t have thought Calaj and I could link in Kyle space, either. Until I understand why, I can’t dismiss any possibility.
It was a sobering thought. Yet she hadn’t told me to turn in the riders, stop them, or do anything else the authorities in Cries would’ve demanded, had they known about the riders. This pharaoh kept confounding my expectations.
You think—Calaj in aqueducts? I was slipping into dialect. My head felt ready to explode.
I can’t find her. Her voice was fading. When she killed Ganz . . . our link shattered . . . I felt him die . . . couldn’t bear it . . .
I groaned and lost my grip on the scene. The world fractured, all pain and searing light—
“—get a doctor, now!” Lavinda shouted.
I opened my eyes to see a trio of faces, Colonel Majda, Lieutenant Casestar, and an aide, all leaning over me, all looking far too worried.
“What the fuck?” I muttered. It felt like a hammer kept hitting my head.
Lavinda spoke dryly. “I think she’s back.”
“Back from where?” I asked. It hurt to talk.
She sat in a chair next to me. “Good question. What happened?”
I rubbed my temples. “The simulation wasn’t set right.”
Lieutenant Casestar frowned. “What simulation?”
“The VR session.” I tried to unfasten my exoskeleton. “Damn thing gave me a headache.”