“Thank you, my Lord,” he whispered, humbled. Planets would truly bow before him now; just as Lawrence had prophesied.
Most of the blood had impacted on a surface, splattering wide into big smears and sticking tenaciously. Grotesque corpses
drifted peacefully in the warm air streams. The remnants of the gang were in a sorry state. With four possessed in the airlock
chamber and pulsing with malevolent power, their artificial body parts had either frozen or were running out of control. And
they were all combat vets, heavily dependent on replacements, almost up to cosmonik level. Lawrence and Graper were plucking
weapons from unresisting hands, claws, and wrist sockets.
Quinn kicked off towards Twelve-T. His robe resumed its usual extravagant cut as he glided across the compartment.
Twelve-T was sweating heavily. One of the soldiers whose arms were mostly the original organic was bandaging the gang lord’s
ruined hands with strips torn from his own T-shirt.
“I admire your strength,” Quinn said. “It can be harnessed to serve God’s Brother.”
“Ain’t no God, can’t have no fucking—” Pain gripped his left arm, forcing him to cry out. His skin hissed as it rose in huge
blisters.
“You wanted to irritate me,” Quinn said mildly.
Twelve-T glowered helplessly. He wasn’t used to so much pain, none of them were. Neural nanonics always protected them. That
meant it was going to get bad, he realized, real bad. Unless…
“And I won’t allow you to suicide,” Quinn said. “I know that’s what you were thinking. Everybody does when they grab what’s
gonna happen.”
The strips of cloth bandaging Twelve-T’s hands hardened into shiny nylon. Their ends flexed up like blind snakes, then slowly
knotted together.
“You’re so close to me, Twelve-T,” Quinn said earnestly. “Your serpent beast is almost free. You would never have become what
you are without realizing what your true nature is. Don’t hold back, embrace God’s Brother. Live in the Night with us.”
“You’ll make a mistake, asshole. And I’ll be around waiting for it.”
“I don’t make mistakes. I am the chosen one.”
“Holy fuck.”
“Follow me, Twelve-T. Submit to your true self and know the glory of His word. Betray your people for greed and profit. That
way you will never know defeat again. My disciples fuck who they want when they want. They see their enemies burn in torment.
Enjoy rewards you have never dared take before. Help me, Twelve-T. Tell me where the asteroid cops are. Shunt your gang’s
money into my credit disk. Show me where the spaceplanes are that can take my disciples down to the surface. Do it, Twelve-T.”
“You won’t get down to the planet,” Twelve-T grunted. “People are too frightened of the possessed landing. There’s all kinds
of weird checks going on down there. You might have beaten my troops, big deal; but you dead freaks ain’t going to turn my
planet into holiday hellpark.”
“You understand nothing,” Quinn said. “I don’t give a fuck about the souls in the beyond. I’m not here to save anyone, least
of all them. God’s Brother has chosen me to help Him bring down the Night.”
“Oh, sweet shit,” Twelve-T whimpered. Quinn was a loon. A motherfucking twenty-four-karat loon.
“I want two things from this planet,” Quinn continued. “A starship I can use to take me home to Earth; because that’s where
I can hurt the Confederation most. It’ll have to be a cargo ship of some kind, one which Govcentral’s defences will accept
is harmless. I’m sure there are plenty docked here right now, right?”
A small jaw muscle twitched on Twelve-T’s face.
“Good,” said Quinn. The gang lord’s thoughts had betrayed him, bitter defeat mingling with the dregs of resentment and anger.
“You want to know what the other thing is, don’t you? It’s simple, I intend Nyvan to be the first planet the Light Brother
can bring into His kingdom. I’m going to bring the Night to this planet, Twelve-T. Endless Night. Night without hope. Until
He comes from the other side of the beyond to grant you salvation.”
Making sure every word was perfectly clear, Twelve-T said: “Go fuck yourself.” He braced himself for the retribution.
Quinn laughed softly. “Not that easy, shithead. I told you, I want your help. I need a local smartarse to straighten out crap
like a ship and how to sneak my possessed disciples past the pigs guarding the planet. Someone who knows all the access codes
around here. And that’s you, Twelve-T. As He chose me, so I have chosen you.” He glanced around at the gang’s remaining soldiers.
“We’ll open the rest of this worthless trash for possession; then convert all of Jesup. After that, nobody down below will
be able to resist us.”
“Oh, Jesus, help us,” Twelve-T begged. “Please.”
“Ain’t no God,” Quinn mimicked savagely. “So he ain’t got no son, has he?” Laughing, he pushed Twelve-T down towards the decking.
The gang lord’s knees bent, allowing the stikpad to fasten to his trousers. Quinn stood in front of the supplicant and beckoned
Lawrence over. “I know you’re a tough mother, Twelve-T. If you’re possessed you’ll only try to fool your new owner, jazz me
about as best you can. You and your dumb pride. I can’t afford that kind of shit anymore. That means I’m gonna have to squeeze
what I want to know out of you myself, so I know you’re being honest.”
Kneeling before the monster, head bowed, Twelve-T said: “I will never help you.”
“You will. I have many ways of binding my disciples to me. For most it is love or fear. For you, I choose dependence.” He
placed his hands on either side of Twelve-T’s silver head. The feat was the converse of a coronation. Quinn lifted the silver
cap from the gang lord’s skull with an almost gentle reverence. It came loose with a soft sucking sound.The bone underneath
was covered in a sticky red mucus. Ichor dribbled over Twelve-T’s face, mingling with sticky tears.
Lawrence took the cap from Quinn, acting as jester to the king. A little mad giggle escaped from the boy’s lips as he held
it in front of the stricken gang lord, its mirror surface ensuring he witnessed his own reduction to impotent vassal.
Quinn’s hands descended again. This time the noise was louder as the bone creaked and split. He lifted the top of the skull
high, smiling at the bloody trophy. Twelve-T’s naked brain glistened below him, wrapped in delicate membranes, small beads
of fluid weeping up from the tightly packed ribbons of tissue.
“Now I can keep a real close eye on what you’re thinking,” Quinn said.
“So your group has no organized structure, as such?” Alkad asked.
“We’re organized, all right,” Lodi Shalasha insisted. “But nothing formal. We’re just like-minded people who keep in touch
and help each other out.”
Alkad pushed her legs down into the chameleon suit trousers. There was still a residue of cold sweat smearing the fabric from
when she’d worn the suit last night. Her nose wrinkled up in distaste, but she kept on working the trousers up her shins.
“You said you had junior cadres, the ones clearing the spiders away. That sounds like a regular underground movement hierarchy
to me.”
“Not really. Some of us work in day clubs, that way we help to keep the memory of the genocide alive for the children. Nobody
should be allowed to forget what was done to us.”
“I approve.”
“You do?” He sounded surprised.
“Yes. The original refugees seem to have forgotten. That’s why I’m in this mess right now.”
“Don’t worry, Doctor; Voi will get you off Ayacucho.”
“Perhaps.” Alkad prided herself that the somnolence program had been for the best. When the girl had woken this morning she’d
been subdued, but still functional. The grief for her father was still there, as it should be, but it hadn’t debilitated her.
Over breakfast, Alkad had explained what her priorities were: to get away from the Dorados as fast as possible now her location
was blown to the intelligence agencies, and the remaining principal requirement for a combat-capable starship (she still couldn’t
bring herself to mention the Alchemist). It would be too much to hope for the ship to be crewed by Garissan patriot types;
a mercenary crew would just have to do now. The three of them had discussed possible options, and Voi and Lodi had started
arguing over names, who to contact for what.
Voi had left by herself to secure a starship. It would be inviting disaster for Alkad to be seen with her again. As a pair
they were too distinctive, however adroit the chameleon suits were at hiding their peripheral features.
“Hey, you’ve made the news.” Lodi waved his communications block enthusiastically. He’d entered a reference search program
to monitor the media output. “Access the Cabral NewsGalactic studio.”
Alkad struggled the suit on over her shoulders, then datavised the room’s net processor for a channel to the studio.
Cabral NewsGalactic was showing a recording of a holo-morph sticker which had a young cheerleader shouting: “Run, Alkad, run!”
“Mother Mary,” Alkad muttered. “Is this the work of your people?”
“No. I swear. I’ve never seen one before. Besides, only Voi and I know your name. None of the others even know you exist.”
Alkad went back to the studio. A rover reporter was walking down one of Ayacucho’s main public halls. The stickers were everywhere.
A cleaner mechanoid was trying to spray one off the wall, but its solvent wasn’t strong enough. Smears of black semi-dissolved
plastic dribbled down the metallic wall panel.
“It is as if a plague has visited Ayacucho,” the rover reporter said cheerfully. “The first of these stickers appeared about
six hours ago. And if I didn’t know better I’d say they’ve been breeding like bacteria. Police say that the stickers are being
handed out to children; and detectives are currently correlating security monitor recordings to see if they can identify the
main distributors. Though sources inside the public prosecutor’s office tell me they’re not sure exactly what charges could
be brought.
“The question everyone is asking is: Exactly who is Alkad, and what is she running from?”
The image went back to the studio anchorman. “Our company’s investigations have uncovered one possible answer to the mystery,”
he said in a sombre bass voice. “At the time of the genocide, the Garissan navy employed a Dr Alkad Mzu to work on advanced
defence projects. Mzu is said to have survived the genocide and spent the last thirty years under an assumed name teaching
physics at the Dorados university. But now foreign intelligence agencies, acting in response to Omutan propaganda, have started
hunting her under the pretext of illegal technology violations. A senior member of the Dorados governing council, who asked
not to be named, said today: ‘Such an action by these foreign agents is a gross violation of our sovereignty. I find it obscene
that the Omutans can lay these unfounded allegations against one of our citizens who has dedicated her life to educating our
brightest youngsters. If this is their behaviour after thirty years of sanctions, then we must ask why the Confederation ever
lifted those sanctions in the first place. They certainly do not seem to have had the desired effect in remedying the aggressive
nature of the Omutan government. Their current cabinet is just a new collar on the same dog.’
“The council member went on to say that if Alkad Mzu turned up at his apartment he would certainly offer her sanctuary, and
that every true Dorados citizen would do the same. He said he would not rest until all suspected foreign agents had been expelled
from the asteroids.”
“Holy Mother Mary,” Alkad groaned.
She cancelled the channel and slumped down onto the bed, the suit’s hood hanging flaccidly over her shoulder. “I don’t believe
this is happening. Mother Mary, they’re turning me into a media celebrity.”
“That’s my uncle for you,” Lodi said. “Did you check out the positive bias in those reports? Mary, you’d be elected president
tomorrow if we were ever allowed to vote around here.”
“Your
uncle
?”
He flinched. “Yeah, sure. Cabral’s my uncle. He’s made a mint out of exploiting the little-Garissan attitude. I mean, just
look at the kind of people living here, they lap it up.”
“He’s insane. What does he think he’s doing giving me this kind of public profile?”
“Whipping up public support in your favour. This kind of propaganda is going to make life ten times harder for the agencies
chasing you. Anyone tries to take you out of Ay-acucho against your will today, they’ll wind up getting lynched.”
She stared at him. That eager face which permitted so much inner anger to show without ever dimming the natural innocence.
Child of the failed revolutionaries. “You’re probably right. But this isn’t happening the way I ever expected it to.”
“I’m sorry, Doctor.” He pulled a worn shoulder bag out of the cupboard. “Do you want to try some of these clothes now?”
He was proffering some long sports shorts and an Ayacu-cho Junior Curveball Team sweatshirt. With a short cut wig and the
chameleon suit reprogrammed, they intended her to walk out of the room as an average sports-mad teenager. A male one.
“Why not?”
“Voi will call soon. We ought to be ready.”
“You really believe she can get us off this asteroid in a starship, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Lodi, do you have any idea how difficult that is to arrange, now of all times? Underground movements need to have contacts
infiltrated right through the local administrative structure; dedicated, devoted people who will risk everything for the cause.
What have you got? You’re rich kids who’ve found a new way to rebel against their parents.”
“Yes, and we can use that money to help you, if you’d just let us. Voi taught us that. If we need something, we buy it. That
way there’s no network for the agencies to discover and penetrate. We’ve never been compromised. That’s why you stayed in
this room all night without anyone storming the door with an assault mechanoid.”
“You may have a point there. I have to admit the old partizans didn’t do too well, did they.” She gave the chameleon suit
hood a reluctant grimace, then started to smooth back her hair ready to slip it on.