Engineman (16 page)

Ella drew her legs to her chest and hugged her shins. The damned thing was, she could almost bring herself to understand why her father had felt towards her as he had. Her mother had died when Ella was young, leaving him with a child as a reminder of his loss - a child that he had never wanted. His work for the Organisation around the Rim had taken him away from home when she was young, and later in her teens his absence made any rapprochement impossible. She could almost understand her father's disaffection, but she could not bring herself to forgive him.

And then this bolt from the blue. "I have seen the light, Ella. I need to see-" To see you? To finally treat her as he should have all those years ago? It was almost too much to hope for, too cruel a joke for him to play on her. She had built her own life, had almost reconciled herself to the fact that she did not have a father who cared. And then the communiqué, which had made her realise how much she still wanted his love and acceptance.

She watched Max fill the trail bike's tank with petrol. He stowed the canister under the porch and joined her. He leaned against the rail. "Hope you don't mind my saying, but when we came for you last night I thought you were an Enginewoman."

"You're not the first over the past day or two," she said. "I think I must have aged."

"How old are you?"

She squinted up at him. He was a dark silhouette against the sunset. Was she mistaken in thinking she detected a note of genuine interest in his tone?

"Twenty-five - but I know: I look a lot older. Don't tell me."

Max laughed. There was something so warm and gentle, so lost and vulnerable about Enginemen of a certain age that always made Ella's heart go out to them.

"Okay, so I won't say I thought you were thirty."

"Thanks. And how old are you?"

"I fluctuate," he said. "Sometimes I feel a hundred. Other times I feel around sixty-two."

A silence came between them. Finally Ella asked, "What happened...?" indicating his missing arm.

"Last year we attacked a marine base in the south. I got hit in a shoot out." He smiled at her. "I'm lucky to be alive."

"What about today?" She felt a certain tightness in her throat, hindering her words.

"We'll be leaving in about ten minutes. We'll keep off the roads and follow the track we use to get from here to the coast. We're heading for the spaceport-"

"You're not trying to leave the Reach?"

"No - we just have some business at the 'port." He hesitated. "It shouldn't take too long."

Conchita appeared at the door with her daughter when the time came for them to leave. Ella mounted the trail bike, kick-started it and did a practice circuit of the house. Max joined her, and she noticed that he was wearing padding beneath his peasant's jacket, to disguise the bulky occipital console that spanned his shoulders.

He climbed on behind her and held her around the waist. Ella waved to Conchita, then accelerated down the track between the trees. The way was steep, but not as rough as she had feared. The track was a deep gully cut into the red earth, following for the most part an old water course left over from the rainy season. The bike whined and spluttered, bumped and bucked over exposed tree roots and boulders, but only twice were they forced to dismount. The jungle closed in on each side, which, while cutting down the available light, did have the advantage of muffling the sound of the engine. Ella enjoyed the challenge of the ride, the ego-trip of displaying her skill to Max. Not since evading a horde of thugs in the Latin Quarter had she had so much fun.

They hit sea level and the track became a sandy path winding through the dense foliage. The going was easy here and Ella could relax, allow her thoughts to dwell on more than just the ride.

One hour later they climbed a jungle-covered hilltop, stopped and looked down at the extensive, gun-metal grey tarmac of the spaceport.

"There she is," Max said to himself. He was staring at the interface as if it were his personal holy grail.

Ella laughed nervously. "So... what now, Max?"

"Get the bike under cover and wait here for-" he consulted his watch, "- one hour. No more. If I'm not here by then, head off without me. I'll make my own way back. Keep your head down, Ella, okay?"

"Hey, and you take care, too. That's an order."

Max smiled. "I'll be as careful as I have to."

As he started to leave, Ella rushed forward and impulsively embraced him. He returned the gesture, one-armed and awkward. He even seemed reluctant, as if to show her affection now might hurt both of them later. Quickly, he turned and slipped off through the undergrowth. Ella watched him go, then strained her eyes to catch glimpses of him as he slid and scrambled down the hillside. She concealed the bike in the undergrowth, then settled herself in the cradling root system of a giant hardwood tree and peered down at the spaceport.

Was it her imagination, her paranoia, or were there more guards patrolling the 'port than there had been when she arrived yesterday? Sentries stood to attention at regular intervals around the perimeter and patrols made clockwise circuits of the vast strips of tarmac in armoured personnel carriers.

The interface was identical to all the others she had ever seen across the Expansion. Two vertical columns rose like slim towerblocks, portals and viewscreens giving the occasional glimpse of technicians and officials inside, and between them stretched the bright blue membrane of the interface itself. It was not surprising that Disciples considered the portals to be iconic. Even in their industrial, work-a-day aspect they were tremendously powerful symbols, monuments to humankind's incredible achievement of instantaneous star travel.

Ella dug her old digital watch from her breast-pocket. Almost thirty minutes had elapsed since Max had left. She was relieved that she had witnessed no disturbance down at the 'port. She was aware of her heartbeat as she willed the Disciples to return safely, and soon.

The rapid chatter of gunfire almost stopped her heart.

She surged to her feet, desperately scanning the 'port for the source of the firing. Directly below her, half a dozen guards were laying down a barrage of rapid fire across the tarmac, orange tracer creating a complex network in the twilight. At first, Ella could not make out their intended target. Then, when the return fire began, she saw two tiny, blue-uniformed figures - one crouched behind the 'port's courtesy coach and the other, twenty metres away, taking cover behind a small luggage transporter. Rodriguez and Jerassi bobbed up occasionally to return fire, but there was something at once incredibly heroic and hopeless about their stand. Even as they occupied the attention of the perimeter guards, others were closing in across the tarmac behind them. Ella sobbed, trying to shout loudly enough to warn the Disciples. She scoured the 'port for any sign of Max. Had he been arrested already, or killed...?

Then, something jumping and twisting in her gut, she saw the taxi-cab crazily swerving across the tarmac towards the interface, and Max was at the wheel. Their strategy was obvious. Rodriguez and Jerassi were providing the distraction while Max went for the 'face. Even as she watched, adrenalised with fear and despair, she knew with a solid, dull certainty that there was no hope of their surviving. She screamed again as one of the guards fifty metres behind Rodriguez knelt, took aim, and unleashed a withering volley of bullets at the Disciple. Rodriguez didn't fall so much as disintegrate. Jerassi turned and killed his companion's killer. He turned again, took aim - but too late. He was swept away by the continuous fire from two guards sprinting towards him.

Max raced the taxi towards the interface, and only when it was fifty metres from the portal did the guards realise the danger and attack. A line of fire hit the back of the cab, swiping it a full three-sixty degrees and shredding its tyres. The driver's door flew open. Ella shook her head, watching through a veil of tears. Max dived from the taxi, sprinted towards the 'face, dodging the matrices of tracer like a trained combat soldier. Ella was unsure whether he was finally hit by the guard's fire, or if he detonated the explosion himself. The result was the same. Where Max had been, a blinding white starburst exploded. Ella yelled aloud and closed her eyes in pain. When she opened them again, she looked down on a scene of utter devastation. The sunrise laid bloody light across a battlefield. At least two dozen guards lay dead; the taxi was blazing fiercely. Before the interface was a smouldering crater where Max's body-bomb had blown. And the interface itself - Ella stared through her tears, her sobs turning into a kind of crazy laughter... The blue membrane of the interface was no more. The frame was scarred and burnt, the viewscreens shattered, and through it Ella saw the continuation of the tarmac. Never before had she beheld a redundant frame, but however much she tried to tell herself that this had been the aim of her colleagues, she could not accept that their sacrifice had been worthwhile.

She slumped, held her head in her hands and wept.

They'd used her, of course. The bastards had used her to gain their ends - and then deserted her.

Ella sat in the root system of the tree for a long time, considering her options. After perhaps an hour she cuffed the tears from her cheeks, stood and limped with the effects of cramp towards the concealed bike.

She dragged the bike from the undergrowth and, leaving the smouldering ruin of the interface in her wake, headed north towards the Falls.

Chapter Nine

Hirst Hunter stood before the arched floor-to-ceiling window and stared out at the darkness stealing over the dying city. For the most part, the advance of night went unopposed: only the occasional district put up a fight in the form of street-lights and neon advertisements. The sight of the moribund city depressed him. It brought to mind the dream he'd been having of late, in which a vast area of light was falling to the gradual encroachment of a black malignancy.

The interface at Orly hung in the air to the south of the city, the blue sky of a colony world contrasting surreally with the Paris night. The portal dominated the skyline, and the pang of guilt it caused him was as sour as heartburn.

He poured himself another brandy and walked across the room to a north-facing window. Here the portal could not be seen, and night held sway totally; the only lights were high in the sky, the industrial orbitals whose profligate illumination mocked the barren land below.

He'd arrived in Paris three days ago and moved his retinue into the top floor of the old Victorian building which had once housed the city morgue. It was situated in a district so derelict and overgrown that the street gangs had been and gone long ago. The building stood squat and solid within its mantle of alien creeper, and the top floor provided the perfect retreat. Hunter had furnished the cavernous chambers of the mortuary with thick carpets, wall-hangings and
chaises-longues
- the polished wood and velvet antiques softening the rather harsh brass and marble fittings of the dissection room and cold storage area.

Hunter stood in his own room, a Spartan chamber furnished with a foam-form on which he slept and a crude bar consisting of half a dozen bottles of Thai brandy. Through the open door he could see the main room with its banks of computers and wall-screens. His bodyguards and advisers sat about smoking or watching vid-screen with a collective air of patient boredom. They had shown surprise at his choice of base, but had known better than to demur. They took it as just another indication of his morbid sense of humour.

Hunter sipped his brandy and considered his meeting with Mirren that morning. It had gone, all things considered, rather well. He had been concerned at first by intelligence reports which stated that Mirren was not a Disciple; he had feared that the Engineman might not crave the flux with the same degree of desperation as some of his believing colleagues. Their meeting had soon dispelled that fear. Mirren might be an atheist, but he desired union just as much as the next Engineman. In Hunter's opinion it was these two factors which were tearing Ralph Mirren apart. He craved the flux, and yet he could not bring himself to believe that it was anything more than an extreme psychological effect. If only he would believe that the wonder of the union had its source in the
nada
-continuum, and not in his own head - and that union awaited everyone in the end - then Mirren might be a more content individual than he was. Hunter wondered whether the only thing that prevented Mirren taking his own life was the perceived oblivion to which he mistakenly believed he would be committing himself. Still, he craved the flux, and that, for the time being, was all that mattered.

Hunter shot the cuff of his silk jacket and glanced at his watch. It was not yet seven. He had another five hours before his meeting with Mirren and the others. He was debating whether to have another brandy when there was a knock on the open door.

Sassoon leaned through, holding the jamb. "We've located a third, sir."

"Excellent! Is it far from here?"

"Clamart, about ten kilometres south-west. Miguelino found it, following up Kelly's information."

Hunter finished his brandy. "Is the car ready?"

"And waiting, sir."

They descended in an ancient, clanking elevator and stepped into the basement of what had once been a spice warehouse. The reek of chilli and petrol fumes filled the air. The Mercedes roadster stood before the elevator gate, doors open and engine running. Hunter slipped into the back seat, Sassoon in the front next to Rossilini.