A World Too Near (7 page)

Ships. Damn right they couldn’t send ships. Although, if Minerva—if all the corporations—were content with the Entire as a route to Rose destinations, then he was much more at ease. It was staying and settling that he’d promised to guard against. Promised Su Bei, just one of those who lived in the new land who didn’t trust human actions, but who
did
trust Quinn to temper those actions.

What he could do to preserve the Entire, he would. Perhaps the enmity of the Tarig would be enough to restrain human immigration. But both the Rose and the Entire would have to come to terms with each other, and sooner rather than later. Because the correlates existed. Because he thought he knew where.

Because, this trip, he intended to bring them home.

Dressed in a paper lab coat, Quinn stood in the control room with Mikal and Lamar. Just as he had asked, no one else was present, much less Minerva bureaucrats.

The interface module stood out from the main platform some two hundred yards, connected to this sector of the platform by an access tube. Here in the control room Quinn couldn’t see outside, but he remembered the cold chamber with the harness that hung suspended from the ceiling. They’d lift him up, so that he’d be out of contact with the deck. He didn’t ask why that was necessary, didn’t ask for details of the quantum implosion and inflation process of which the nearest analogue was the Big Bang. As alarming as that summary was, Quinn didn’t dwell on it. What bothered him was the entry point. Last time he had landed in a wilderness where he nearly died of his injuries. He accepted that danger. He just didn’t want to fall between. From lessons learned in the Entire, he knew there
was
a between.

Glancing at the control room monitors, Quinn saw the transition chamber with the harness at its center. Embedded in the walls were 4310 titanium nozzles, giving the chamber the look of an inverted sea urchin.

He turned to Lamar, getting a reassuring smile

Lamar quipped, “No pictures in your hip pocket?” Pictures of Sydney.

Quinn tapped his head. “Got hers up here.”

“I know you do.” Lamar reached out a hand. Quinn shook it.

Looking at Mikal, he asked, “How long do I have to wait in that rat hole?”

“We never know. I’ll try to make it short.”

Time to go. The hatch to the sterilization booth lay before him. There, he would be sonically cleansed of microbes that they might not wish to unleash on the Entire. Just as he made ready to go through the door, Quinn noticed Lamar’s pinched expression, the sheen of sweat on his high forehead. What the hell did he mean,
Remember that I’m an old man?

They were waiting for him to pass through the door.

Quinn pulled off the paper gown, handing it to Lamar. Then he opened the hatch and walked through, closing the seal behind him.

Watching Quinn pass through to the sterilization chamber, Lamar realized he was holding his breath. He dragged air into his lungs. Waited.

After a few minutes, Mikal said under his breath, “Leaving sterilization booth.”

That meant Quinn was in the tube, and dressing in his travel clothes— garments assembled according to his strict instructions, including the Chalin knife he’d brought home last time.

“In.” Mikal nodded at the screen. Quinn had entered the transition module.

“Module two on screen,” Lamar said, finding a chair next to Mikal.

Then, side-by-side monitors showed Quinn and Helice adjusting straps, getting hooked in. She in her module, he in his.

Lamar and Mikal waited, in company with no less than three mSaps. When the three agreed, Mikal would enable the transition, not before. This time, one machine sapient alone would not decide when and if they were good to go. Coordinating between mSaps was Mikal’s job. The computers didn’t talk to each other, but would decide independently.

Lamar wiped his perspiring hands on his slacks. This was taking longer than before. He looked up, hoping to catch Mikal’s attention, but the man was focused on panel displays.

On the second screen, Helice was bearing up well, looking oddly elated. In his own module, Quinn’s expression was controlled—what many people mistake for coldness but which is actually intense concentration. He was a pilot. Maybe not one in a cockpit this time, but nevertheless going somewhere fast, and needing all his reactions intact when he got there.

Lamar looked at his watch. It had been ten minutes, but felt like an hour.

Even in this remote section of the platform, distant clangs of tools announced the continuing construction. For a moment, Lamar fancied it was fists beating on the bulkheads, trying to get in, trying to sabotage them.

Why didn’t the Tarig come to the Rose, after all, put a stop to this. . . .

“We’ve got something,” Mikal said. “Aligning. Aligning now.”

Lamar pushed himself out of the chair, heart racing.

“Okay,” Mikal said, “locked on. Have one. Have two.” He was noting the judgment call of the mSaps.

“Have three.”

Agreement. Mikal’s hand went to the toggle. “We’re good. Transition.”

He threw the switch, but immediately they were in trouble. The screen flashed a sickening warning, pulsing with error warnings. Two more strobing screens joined in, now accompanied by a shrill machine scream. The display for one of the mSaps went black, burst back to life in a scramble, an awful haze of decoherence. Mikal was swearing, hunched over the keyboard, as screens flipped and savant backups yelped frantic messages.

Mikal shook his head. “Should have waited, God. . . .”

“What’s going on?” Lamar staggered closer, staring at the screen. Helice hanging suspended.

But Quinn had gone. The harness hung by a wisp of material that stretched to a long, melted filament.

“God . . . ,” Mikal said. “We lost it, lost it. I should have waited.”

Helice was still in the module. Left behind. She had to go.

“Send her,” Lamar barked.

“Can’t,” Mikal barked. “Lost it.”

“No you didn’t. Look.” Lamar pointed to Quinn’s harness. It was moving on its own, moving backward, sliding sideways, disappearing inch by inch into nothingness. They still had connection. Two mSaps said they had connection; one said no. “Send her.”

“I can’t. We’ve only got two—”

Lamar fumbled in his coat pocket and drew out a small pistol, bristling with wires. Hand shaking, he pressed the gun against Mikal’s right temple. “Send her. Do it now.” As Mikal hesitated, Lamar made a dent in his skin with the barrel.

Mikal threw the switch. Then he lurched away from the computer banks, backing away from this apparent madman who shared his control room.

But Lamar’s attention was all on the second module. Helice was folding together like a book closing. She became a thick line, then a thin one.

Gone. But her harness hung in the air, burning.

“Shut off the goddamn racket,” Lamar growled.

The emergency noise subsided as Mikal whispered, “We just killed them. You killed them.” He looked at Lamar with loathing.

“Don’t be an idiot. We had two agreeing.” Almost dropping the pistol from the sweat streaming off his hands, Lamar jammed it into his jacket pocket. Until now he hadn’t known he had it in him, to use a weapon.

“I’ll report you.” Mikal was still trembling.

“Go ahead.”

Lamar felt his own legs shaking. He tottered out of the control room. “Goddamn mSaps,” he muttered.

How many mSaps does it take to screw in a lightbulb?

Answer: What’s a lightbulb?

It took a human to make the tough decisions. Helice had to cross over. Everything depended on it. Lamar might be an old man, but he knew that much.

PART II
THE
ENGINE
OF
WORLDS

CHAPTER FIVE

The Radiant Path is the sum of perfections. All that the virtuous
sentient could desire is found in the five primacies and the million
minorals. Since the gracious lords have gathered the supreme
pleasures of all that is into the Bright Realm, let the discreet sentient
be content. Scholars, in their agitation, must peer into inferior
places. This the vows permit, to document the dark of the
Rose, the kingdom of the evanescent. Peer, scholar, into the veil-of-
worlds, much may the scattered glories of the Rose satisfy you.
Behind each scholar’s life lies a pile of redstones, the sum of
squandered days.

—from
The Book of the Thousand Gifts

B
ENHU HAD BEEN WAITING SO LONG AT HIS POST that when something finally happened, he dropped his pipe and staggered to his feet, agape with surprise.

The floor was strewn with bedding, the remains of meals, and candles, some of them flaming. He grabbed a guttering candle and peered into the cleft at the end of the chamber. A V-shaped wedge pierced the wall, broad end facing out, the crevice clogged with a standing wedge of thick fluid.

Inside it, streaks of light skittered, dimmed, bloomed again. The floor pounded in heavy, slow beats. Something was happening behind the veil-of-worlds; and then, slow-witted, he realized it was a crossing—the one he’d been sent to assist. Already a sac had formed, and he could make out a wavering shape inside it. Benhu sprang into action. The computational devices lay stacked on either side of the cleft, with tendrils inserted into the veil. Benhu removed the cord from around his neck and fumbled at the knot, finally pulling off one redstone and inserting it into the master well. Benhu had no true understanding of any scholarly thing, but he followed Lord Oventroe’s instructions with precision. Still, events were not unfolding as expected. Light boiled inside the crevice, rumbling horribly. Furthermore, it appeared that two sacs were budding inside instead of one. The foremost sac twisted, shrank, and nearly collapsed. Then it bloomed vigorously, showing a lumpish being encapsulated there.

Startled into action, Benhu dropped the second stone into the master well, and then pressed his body sideways into the matrix that filled the wedge. A vacuole of air formed around him, and he waded with great difficulty toward the new sac, where he could just make out a body, curled up and twitching. Moving closer, Benhu realized with dismay that the person was in distress. He lost no time in pushing his own sac against the other one until they merged. Immediately, he regretted it.

Smoke filled his nostrils. He fell to his knees, gagging. Then, in desperation, he began dragging the body toward the outer chamber, coughing and struggling the few yards to the edge, where he burst through, releasing his burden along with a miasma of acrid smoke.

On hands and knees, Benhu coughed and gasped, eyes watering and beard slicked wet with ooze. Then, wiping his face with his sleeve, he looked down at the person he’d rescued, who moaned, showing signs of life.

To his horror, it was a woman.

He shouted in dismay. Grabbing a candle, he looked closer and saw that she was bleeding. Her chin and neck were burned raw, and she was shaking. He rushed for his blanket, covering her and trying to summon his wits. A woman? By the vows, this was not Titus Quinn.

Titus Quinn! He’d forgotten the second sac. Rushing back to the veil between worlds, he saw the remaining sac hovering in the center of the gelatinous mass. It contained a larger body than before. Benhu wondered if he could enter a second time and not lose himself for eternity. The computational boxes stacked nearby were still firmly attached to the veil with filaments, just as the lord instructed. But the lord had said nothing about
two
crossings. He had described, however, Benhu’s fate should he fail. Benhu muttered, “God not looking at me,” and shouldered himself in, half striding, half swimming toward the pouch of air.

He struggled toward the sac, peering into the obscuring gel. Finding the air pouch, he thrust himself inside, seized the man by the arms, and dragged him toward the outer chamber. The man’s larger bulk made it slow going, but eventually Benhu managed to push out of the veil. Turning to finish his task, he pulled on the man with all his strength, freeing first an arm and then head and shoulders. Bracing his feet on the floor, Benhu yanked hard. The man shot out of the matrix, colliding with Benhu, who collapsed backward onto the floor.

The room stank abominably of burned skin, guttering candles, and the horrifying viscous lake wherein the veil-of-worlds bridged over to the places that shall not be named.

Head on knees, Benhu sat stunned for a few moments. When he’d collected himself, he turned to face a long knife blade.

A wild man with plastered-back hair bent over him, grabbing his collar. “Name, on your life,” he snarled.

“Benhu, Your Excellency. But here is a more important name: Jesid. You have heard it?” Lord Oventroe had bid him use this name as a code.

The man narrowed his eyes. “Jesid?”

“Yes! Listen to me. Jesid the navitar. Does that get through to you?” He saw the man relax a bit, and to preserve his dignity, Benhu yanked away from his grip. Jesid was a name Quinn would know, Oventroe had said. By the man’s reaction, he did. So this
was
Titus Quinn. The knife was still pointed at his throat, but softer now.

Titus Quinn spat and wiped his face with his slimy arm. Benhu removed his jacket and offered it for a towel.

Accepting it, Quinn said, “Who sent you?”

Benhu now began to feel more in control, but wanted the knife put away before he divulged intelligences. He glanced at the blade. Quinn lowered it, but kept it ready.

“The lord you once met sent me. By the bright, do not say his name, not even here.” Benhu watched as the man wiped himself down, using his jacket as though the expensive garment were a rag.

“I met more than one lord, Benhu.”

Benhu felt like a veldt mouse frozen in the gaze of an Adda.

“Say his name,” Quinn said.

Poor as a beggar, and yet Titus Quinn was presuming to give orders. Benhu decided to overlook his tone for the sake of what the man had just been through.

“Say his name,” Quinn repeated.

“The gracious Lord Oventroe.” By a beku’s balls, Benhu thought. This pathetic man of the Rose, dripping with goo, daring to give orders, acting like a mighty legate when he was only a suppliant. Benhu stood up tall. “Fifty days I’ve waited in this stinking place, at my lord’s will and to your great advantage. Fifty days of dried food with vermin for company, and candles for daylight.