Newtons wake, p.8
Newton's Wake, page 8
‘I’ll be right over,’ she said.
L
ucinda Carlyle toyed with a plastic skull on the desk in Jacques Armand’s office, somewhere at the back of Lesser Light Lane. Armand stared into an optic tank, studying material balances, ignoring her. Outside, on the field that here took the place of a park in the prevalent pattern, aircars lifted and landed more or less continuously. She was patient, aware that Armand was busy, but felt a need to do something with her hands. The skull, used as a paperweight, was a reconstruction of that of the type specimen of Eurydice’s indigenous intelligent species, extinct ten million years. Large empty orbits and a braincase low-slung down the back, protected by a dorsal ridge as thick as your thumb. It looked like something between a tarsier and an australopithecene. Only the ocherous remains of a rifle clutched in the creature’s claw, some traces of a buckle at the pelvis, and spots of rust marking the nails of a shoe around one of the feet, had identified it as intelligent, and a builder of the Artificial Strata. Prior to this discovery, the purported fossils of the sapient autochthon had been of what later investigation confirmed to be a two-metre-long freshwater amphibian, whose misleadingly large cranial domes had housed the oil-filled cavities of its hunting sonar.
Armand looked up and pushed the optic tank to one side.
‘Sorry to keep you waiting,’ he said. He passed a hand across his brow. ‘We’ve been busy, as you can imagine. How are you getting on? Everyone treating you right?’
‘More than all right,’ she said. ‘People are very generous. I can’t get over not paying for things.’
‘Oh, you are paying,’ said Armand. ‘Your credit and interest are high. Don’t worry about that.’
‘And people have stopped recommending cosmetic resculpting, ever since I gave someone a bloody cheek for his, so tae speak.’
‘Ah, yes,’ said Armand. He looked suitably embarrassed. ‘Tact in these matters is not, ah, a well-cultivated virtue on Eurydice. There’s nothing wrong with your face, you know,’ he added fiercely.
‘Oh, I know. It’s them that don’t.’
‘I myself am considered ill-favoured,’ Armand said. ‘I have kept my original genome. Fortunately, so has my wife.’
He rotated a mounted photograph to show himself, and a quite ordinary-looking but by no means unattractive woman of the same apparent age, smiling at the camera.
‘That’s us, straight out of the revival tank.’
‘And very nice you both look too,’ said Carlyle. ‘I understand you go back a long way.’
‘So you’ve been told of my dubious history.’
‘Aye.’ She had not exactly been told of it. She had researched it from her hotel room’s screen. ‘Why did the Runners resurrect you?’
‘The Runners?’ Armand smiled, thin-lipped. ‘Don’t let them hear you call them that. The Reformers can be a bit touchy about it at the best of times. Anyway, to answer your question. I never took part in the Returner rebellion of 2098. Many of my best friends did, and died in it, thinking I had betrayed them. I did not. I was a loyal officer, that’s all. I went along with the Reform, and the flight, but I threatened to blow my brains out if the recordings of the dead Returners were not taken along too. Their souls are still sealed in the vaults. They include some of the best military minds of their generation, the last people alive—so to speak—who fought in the final war. We could use them now, but as you see, the Joint Chiefs remain implacable on the question. Over the years they’ve cleared and revived a few minor figures, civilians mostly, that’s all. Humanitarian reasons—reuniting families that were divided in the conflict, that kind of thing.’ He laughed. ‘They’ve just cleared a couple of really crass folksingers, I notice. Winter and Calder.’
‘I’ve heard of them,’ Carlyle said, startled. ‘My great-great-grandmother has some of their songs. Crass is the word.’
Armand chuckled. ‘They were big in the asteroid belt.’
‘Aye, you said it. Anyway, that’s no what I’m here to talk about. Well, it is in a way. You saw the show, right? Last night and this morning?’
‘I’ve seen it,’ said Armand, ‘I was struck by your passing remark about where Shlaim was recovered from, and how he’d got there. Was it true?’
‘Yes, as far as I know. It’s no big deal.’
‘It’s a big deal to me, as I’m sure you know.’
‘Uh-huh,’ said Carlyle cautiously. ‘I wouldn’t want to claim that we can bring them all back, but … ’
She waited for his response. She had just alluded to the oldest slogan and boldest aim of the Returners: to rescue and resurrect the billions of dead whose minds—it was an article of faith, backed by scraps of evidence—were still recorded somewhere in the war machines that had overwhelmed them.
Armand tilted his hand up. ‘Careful where you throw that phrase around … but, ah, putting that aside for the moment.’ He scratched the back of his head. ‘I’m still a loyal officer, albeit in a private capacity. And before, ah, going any deeper … hmm, this is difficult. I also noticed what Shlaim had to say, and it doesn’t bode well for relations with the Carlyles, as the Joint Chiefs seem to have picked up on very fast. Can you tell me more about that?’
‘Well, there is some truth in what Shlaim was saying. You see, we have an implacable older generation too. Several of them, in fact, but the hardest are the folks who were born back on Earth, who lived through the Hard Rapture and the final war. They remember you.’
Armand raised his eyebrows. ‘Me?’
‘No you personally, at least I never heard your name. But if they have a low opinion ae the Raptured, a wee bit instrumental as you’ll have noticed, they positively hate the forces who fought against the Raptured in the final war.’
‘Why on Earth—?’ Armand asked. ‘We fought on your side!’
‘On Earth, aye, that’s why!’ Carlyle clasped her knees with her hands, and took a few deep breaths. ‘Please remember,’ she said, ‘I’m telling you how I’ve been told it looked fae the point of view of the folks in the rubble you fought over. And tae them, it was aw war-machines, nae matter if some ae them had men inside them. Tanks and jets and bombs, huge installations, the weather going crazy, and weird terrifying valkyries ca’ed the Black Sickle harvesting heids ae the dead. And after aw that, they lost, they retreated, and they fucked off intae space. With scant regard for whatever or whoever was under their rockets at the time, I may add.’
‘Those were desperate times,’ said Armand.
‘Oh, I agree. I’m no condemning you myself. I’m just telling you how the older family members felt about it. Of course, it’s aw been moot, syne there was neither hide nor hair ae ye left in the Solar System after we aw climbed back intae space. But now—’
‘Now, you’ve found us.’ Armand frowned. ‘Is this view common among the other powers? Should we have the same concern about the Knights of Enlightenment, or anyone else who may turn up?’
‘No really. They were aw in a different situation. The Yanks were behind posthuman lines, so tae speak, the Japs were on a quieter front, and the commie guerillas were off in their jungles and mountains. None of them were fucking churned over like our part ae the world.’
‘Well, that’s a relief. All we have to worry about is your criminal family, as Shlaim puts it. If they get here first I take it a shakedown is likely, and perhaps a little rougher than your usual run of them.’
Carlyle nodded. ‘They’ll want to take more out of your hides than they do for most of our clients, that’s for sure. And that’s where your Returner-Runner squabble comes in.’
‘How so? It seems a bit irrelevant in this context.’
‘Let me tell you how my family works,’ Carlyle said. ‘They started off as scrap merchants, drug dealers, and loan sharks. We haven’t changed much. We give the customer what they want, in return for what we want. There’s something I want from you, a wee favour.’
‘And what might that be?’
Carlyle glanced around. ‘Is this place secure?’
‘Of course,’ said Armand, sounding indignant.
‘All right. What I want you to do for me is let me get back through the gate when it reopens. That could mean, you know, kind of hiding me if anyone else—say the Government, or the Knights—tries to pull me in.’
‘I could consider that,’ said Armand. ‘What’s in it for me?’
‘Our goodwill if we ever come to get a wee bit of compensation—’
Armand shook his head. ‘Too intangible, and not enough.’
‘I know. That’s not all. We have something to offer that the Returners really, really want, and that the Knights cannae and willnae give.’
‘FTL flight? Your backup technology?’ Armand sounded puzzled.
‘No,’ said Carlyle. ‘Return.’
CHAPTER 5
Tir nan Og
I was Winter. He was Calder.
Every time it was the same.
Winter had come back from the dead before. The experience was over-rated. You woke, and didn’t remember dying: death is not lived through. In both cases, he woke to find the most beautiful woman he had yet seen looking at him with an expression of disdain and dread. She didn’t scream, but Winter had put it in the song just the same, after his first time.
The lab tech screamed: the sight appalled her.
I was ugly. He was lame.
That had always gotten a laugh.
‘Don’t try to sit up,’ she said. He knew she wasn’t a nurse. And her white coat didn’t have the Black Sickle on it. The only question in his mind was whether she was the mad scientist, or his (or her) beautiful assistant. So here we are, he thought, back in the land of the living again. The country of the young: Tir nan Og. Where everybody is beautiful, except us. And there he had been not even knowing he was dead.
‘How’s Calder?’ he asked. His mouth was dry.
She glanced sideways. ‘Recovering.’ Her gaze returned to Winter, and softened somewhat. ‘You loved him very much?’
Winter laughed, and then it wasn’t funny. They must have lost the fight, and lost centuries. ‘How long have we been dead?’
She turned away, and turned back holding out a steaming plastic cup.
‘Drink this,’ she said.
He raised himself on his elbow and took the cup, sipped cautiously. It was just short of being too hot to drink, and smelled and tasted meaty, but clean of any trace of grease, and with a slight bitter edge.
‘We call it umami tea,’ she said. ‘A local herb. It’s a mild stimulant.’
It was more than mild. Every sip was like a shot of vodka. His stomach glowed and his limbs tingled, and his mind felt clearer by the second. He took advantage of the moment to look around and check out his surroundings. He was lying naked on a sheet spread on a high table. Another such table stood a couple of metres away. He could see the curved back of a man lying curled on his side, presumably Calder. Winter’s own body fitted his body-image. Even his beard was the length he remembered, a rough fiveday stubble. The ceiling was about five metres above him, and the room seemed proportionately large. Cluttered with unfamiliar but antique machines and pieces of dusty furniture, hung with paintings and costumes, lit by five tall windows through which he could see masses of green, it struck him as more like a studio than a laboratory, let alone a clinic. Two of the machines, close by, he recognised as resurrection tanks.
‘So the terraforming worked,’ he said.
She looked at him oddly. ‘You’re taking this very calmly.’
Winter sat up and shrugged. ‘It’s only a shock the first time.’
Gallows humour, from the men they couldn’t hang.
Calder stirred and rolled over. His hand moved, utterly predictably, to his crotch. As though satisfied with the systems check, he opened his eyes and blinked. The woman was already leaning over him. He leered up at her, revealing that his teeth, if nothing else, had been improved by the process.
‘Don’t try to sit up,’ the woman said.
‘I’m in no hurry,’ he said. The leer brightened.
She passed him a cup of umami tea. As he propped himself up to drink it he caught sight of Winter and almost dropped it.
‘Should have known,’ Calder said to Andrea. He set down the cup beside him and reached behind his neck to feel the curvature of his spine. ‘Ankylosing fucking spondylitis, too,’ he added, aggrieved. ‘You could have got rid of that, you know.’ He sipped the tea. ‘And him, while you were at it.’
Winter swung his legs over the edge of the table. ‘Glad to see you, too.’
Calder cracked a grin and raised his cup. ‘Good health.’ He glanced around. ‘I suppose this means the fight’s over, one way or the other.’ He looked at the woman. ‘So who won?’
She looked from Calder to Winter, and back. She really was extraordinarily beautiful. Her face showed her bafflement and disappointment with such transparency that her lip trembled. It made Winter want to comfort her.
‘This is not what we expected,’ she said. ‘You are Winter and Calder, yes? The musicians?’
‘That’s us,’ Winter said.
‘The Winter and Calder? The Returner heroes? The famous lovers?’
Winter could see Calder arriving at the same awful realisation as he had.
‘Fuck,’ Calder said. ‘We’re history.’
‘Legend,’ said Winter.
Calder smirked. ‘What I said.’ He sat up on the bed and swung his legs over, and continued to drink his tea.
‘What’s your name?’ Winter asked the woman, to give her something else to look at.
‘Andrea Al-Khayed,’ she replied. She moistened her lips. ‘I think I should call the promoter.’
Winter didn’t see her use any comms, but a moment later a door at the far end of the room opened and a man walked in. He was tall, with long dark hair, and wearing a sort of academical gown in green silk over what looked like dungarees—denim, brass clips, and all. Not to Winter’s surprise, he was remarkably good-looking—dark eyes and skin, prominent nose. He stopped a little way off and looked at the two men, smiling.
‘My name is Benjamin Ben-Ami,’ he said. He nodded at the woman. ‘Thank you, Andrea. They seem to be fit.’
‘They’re fine,’ she said, standing aside with an over-to-you gesture. Ben-Ami stepped to the ends of the tables and beamed at the men on them with an expression of proprietorial pride. It was a look Winter had seen before, and it didn’t bode well.
‘Gentlemen,’ said Ben-Ami, ‘allow me to welcome you.’
‘Thanks,’ said Calder. ‘Now cut the crap and tell us where we are and what you want.’
Ben-Ami showed no sign of taking offence. Like Andrea’s, his expressions were easily readable, and at that moment showed a certain awe, as though it was only by hearing Calder’s voice that he had become convinced of their presence. And, also like her, he evaded the question.
‘I have had your clothes reconstructed,’ he said. ‘You may feel more comfortable dressed.’
‘Oh, I don’t know,’ said Calder, favouring Andrea with another leer. Ignoring this, the man and the woman swung a wheeled gurney between the tables. On top of it were two neat stacks of clothes. Winter slid off the table and began to climb into the ones he recognised as his own. They were almost too authentic. Every stain on his jeans, rip in his T-shirt and crack in his leather jacket and boots was exactly as it had been on the cover screen of their last album. Calder finished pulling his clothes on, and struggled into and stood up in his cowboy boots. They made him look taller, but that was not to say much.
‘If you’re expecting gratitude and surprise from us, forget it,’ he told Ben-Ami. ‘Coming back ain’t like recovery from an illness or something. When you’re sick, you know it, whereas—’ He glanced up at Winter, a corner of his lower lip caught between his teeth. He sniffed and glared at his feet, and reached up and banged a fist on the table. ‘Oh, fuck, fuck, fuck.’
The thing that overwhelms you, Winter thought, is not that you have come back. It’s that so many others have gone. As with any traumatic accident, you lose the memories immediately preceeding it. The last thing he could remember, before waking under that admired, unadmiring face, was of walking down the main tube in Polarity, not a care in the world beyond the ever-present vague unease that the arguments were getting uglier by the day.
‘So tell us,’ Winter said.
‘Come to the window,’ said Ben-Ami.
They followed Ben-Ami and Al-Khayed across the room, their feet resounding on strong bare boards, their hips brushing the dust off odd items of furniture and incomprehensible machines in the room’s vast clutter. Having to watch where they were going made their view on arriving before the window quite sudden. They strode to the sill and looked out, astonished. Their vantage was about a hundred metres above a street, along which vehicles moved with startling speed. The street faced on to a park, a complex grassland of low knolls, small streams, and bushes and taller trees. Airy wicker-like structures stood here and there, linked by swaying suspension bridges. Across on the other side of the park more buildings rose, in a similarly complex skyline. Other clusters of buildings and clumps of trees extended as far as the eye could see. Beyond them the sky was blue, chalked with high cirrus. Unfamiliar aircraft with blurred, rapidly vibrating wings soared high or shot across the lower levels like birds, swooping and stooping.
‘Oh my god,’ said Calder. ‘I mean, shit.’
‘Always with the poetic eloquence,’ said Winter.
How long could this have taken? In Winter’s time the terraforming of Mars had barely begun, and was expected to take many centuries. However far progress had speeded up, the physical constraints of the process were intractable. He had known at once, without undue modesty, that if the details of their lives were so far forgotten or distorted as to cast him and Calder as lovers they must have been dead for some such span, and that few if any of the people who had known them had lived through it. Nevertheless, seeing the evidence with his own eyes made his knees weak for a moment. He found himself closing his eyes and leaning hard on the sill, then looking sadly at Calder. Calder nodded, lips compressed.
