Line War (47 page)

Orlandine left communications with Vulture open and now ventured perceptually down her U-space link to Bludgeon aboard
Heliotrope.
There was no need to communicate since she could clearly see her erstwhile craft some thousands of miles up, just out from the fountain raging from one pole of the Anulus black hole.
Heliotrope
was turning to bear down on the fountain at a sharp angle, and within the hour Bludgeon would be able to deploy the cargo runcible. Orlandine felt both frightened and elated, but her elation disappeared some moments later when an ECS attack ship dropped out of U-space and entered the corridor. Thus far she had committed one murder, and the burden of that guilt was more than enough. However, since the chameleonware had yet to stabilize, it was certain those aboard that ship had spotted the war runcible. Could she convince them to leave the area before Erebus arrived? Most likely they would see her only as a threat to the Polity and consequently either do what they could to stop her or scream for help. She could allow them neither option, for they could give away her position. So much depended on what she was doing that it seemed the safest option to destroy this new arrival -to again commit murder.

Reluctantly, Orlandine contacted Knobbler.

* * * *

The disruption encroached and it was as if the
King of Hearts
was hurtling down a perilous tunnel that grew steadily narrower. Seated on his bed, Cormac stared at the chrome cylinder resting on the mattress beside him. Not bothering with the touch controls of the small inset console, he gridlinked directly into the device’s hardware to assure himself it would operate just as he wanted. It would. At a thought he could detonate it, in any circumstances. But he really did not want to be there when that happened, so he checked that he could set the timer, order the CTD to detonate if it was moved, if it was exposed to vacuum, or if the sensors inside it heard someone singing out of tune. He could also set it to detonate should the constant signal to it from his gridlink be disrupted, which would probably mean it no longer mattered whether he was nearby or not.

King had assured him that it would try to keep in range of the war runcible so that Cormac could transport himself out. But what was that range? Cormac felt he would know it only once he was within it. But things were almost certain to get a little difficult for the attack ship, so he needed to prepare for an involuntary stay aboard the runcible. Thoughtfully, he slid the CTD into his backpack, then turned his attention to the other weapons arrayed beside him: his thin-gun, Shuriken and a proton carbine. Last time, aboard this very vessel, he had transported himself fully clothed, so he knew he could take materials with him. What governed that? Was it subconscious choice? Might he even arrive aboard the war runcible without the CTD? And why did he not arrive at his destination naked? He guessed that such questions were insignificant in comparison with the question of how he managed to move through U-space at all. Belatedly, he decided not to arm the CTD before transporting it over, since if by any chance it did not make the transition, the signal-break to his gridlink could result in
King of Hearts
being spread over the firmament.

The disruption faded, and Cormac almost resented the feeling of the attack ship surfacing into the real once again. It was as if, now that he was managing to control his perception of U-space, he wanted to stay there. He was, however, glad to find himself still sitting on his bed this time and not sprawled in one of the ship’s corridors outside.

‘I have something,’ said King over the ship’s intercom.

‘Erebus?’

‘It’s gone.’

‘What do you mean it’s gone?’

‘I sensed some large object ahead - mass equivalent to that of the war runcible,’ said King tetchily. ‘Now it’s gone.’

‘ Chameleonware?’

‘Possibly.’

Cormac had not really taken that into account. Why would this Orlandine, controlling a massive heavily armed thing like that, feel the need to hide from a mere attack ship?

‘Position?’ Cormac enquired.

‘Two thousand miles Earthside of the narrowest constriction in the corridor through the U-space disruption.’

Interesting . . .

‘It’s back again.’

‘What?’

‘Are you deaf?’

‘Please confirm for me—’

‘Gone again,’ King interrupted, then deigned to explain further: ‘Unusual chameleonware, and it seems Orlandine is having some trouble with it.’

Cormac was on his feet now, strapping Shuriken to his wrist. He donned the backpack, hung the proton carbine from its strap over his shoulder, and jammed his thin-gun into his envirosuit belt. Stepping out into the corridor, he quickly headed for the bridge, his U-sense expanding out from the attack ship but still unable to penetrate the surrounding disruption. In a moment he was aware that Arach and Hubbert Smith had joined him. Maybe they hoped he could take them with him.

Within seconds they arrived on the black glass floor, under a dome of stars.

‘I am receiving communication,’ said King. ‘Orlandine says she wants to speak with whoever is in charge here.’

‘Well, take the usual precautions and let’s hear what she has to say. Meanwhile keep taking us in closer.’

‘Understood.’

After a delay, doubtless while King checked for informational attack, a line cut down through the air, then opened out into the figure Cormac recognized from a file presently stored in his gridlink. She was an imposing woman but, then, with people able to remake themselves however they wanted, that really meant nothing.

‘Orlandine,’ said Cormac, intending to continue talking for as long as possible so King could get closer.

‘Who are you?’ she asked abruptly.

‘I am Agent Ian Cormac of ECS,’ he replied. ‘It would appear you have acquired some Polity property there. Do you suppose that you could see your way clear to explaining what you intend to do with it.’

‘I see,’ said Orlandine, ‘that you intend to draw this conversation out so you can get closer. An attack ship’s conventional weapons would have some problem getting through my defences, so either you have something else or you are desperate.’

‘You didn’t answer my question, Orlandine.’

Her hologram gazed at him. ‘I doubt you would believe the answer.’

‘Try me.’

‘I am here to destroy Erebus.’

The problem with that explanation, Cormac felt, was that it was all too plausible. However, the problem with that plausibility was that he could not afford to acknowledge it. There would only be one chance to get close enough to the stolen war runcible.

‘And why would you want to do such a thing?’

‘Cease approaching this war runcible immediately or I will fire on you,’ was her reply.

‘All I need is an explanation,’ said Cormac.

‘You’re not listening, are you.’ She gave a disappointed frown, her hologram froze, shrank to a line, disappeared.

‘Engaging chameleonware,’ King intoned.

A sudden change of course sent Cormac staggering to one side despite the gravplates’ attempts to compensate. Abruptly, the war runcible was hanging out there in space, and he felt it was almost within his grasp. With an effort of will he could throw himself across to it, transport himself to the selected set of buffers . . . Then it fell out of his grasp as
King of Hearts
turned hard and accelerated. A blinding stream of ionized matter stabbed past. Its effect was negligible to Cormac’s deeper U-sense but, upon snatching information from King’s server, he saw that Orlandine was firing a particle beam at them powerful enough to cut the attack ship in half.

‘Oops,’ said Arach. ‘I guess this means she’s hostile.’

‘Surely not,’ said Smith. ‘She throws moons at those who really irk her.’

Ignoring this comedy duo, Cormac instructed, ‘King,
closer.’

‘I’m trying,’ King replied, ‘but there’s the small matter of the rail-gun missiles and the targeting systems trying to lock onto me, despite my chameleonware, which I’m incidentally having to reconfigure every five seconds.’

‘Right,’ conceded Cormac.

Another abrupt change of direction sent him staggering, so he stepped over to a fixed chair and braced himself against it. Despite the attack ship dodging back and forth, King managed to keep the image of the war runcible steady. Each time Orlandine’s particle beam lashed out, Cormac flinched and drove his fingers harder into the chair back. At one point it flashed particularly close and a sound like a ship’s hull scraping a reef echoed through the bridge. A second later the outside view was momentarily blocked by a cloud of incandescent gas filled with sparking globules of molten metal, for the beam had grazed King’s hull. Then flashes blossomed about the war runcible and, again linking to King’s server, he identified their source as a multitude of hunter-killer missiles being launched.

‘I cannot stay here for much longer,’ said King. ‘I will attempt one close run, then I’ll have to pull out. Just be ready.’

Cormac glanced around at Arach, who was gripping the indents specially cut in the floor for him, then across at Hubbert Smith, who was rigidly ensconced in a chair with his arms crossed and a frown creasing his face. He felt
King of Hearts
turn again and, reaching out with his U-sense, found the attack ship now heading directly towards the war runcible. He brought that massive objective into full focus, his perception sliding inside it. Concentrating on one of the five horn assemblies, he identified his destination and tried to fix on it. The sensation was like preparing to jump down to the deck of a violently rocking boat. The missiles were now close, their nose cones glaring steel eyes in the blackness.

Now.

Cormac felt able to take himself across and knew, at that moment, he could bring more along with him.

‘Arach!’

The drone abruptly scuttled forward and Cormac reached down, placing a hand behind his head as if grabbing the scruff of a pet dog.

Smith?

No, there wasn’t time to grab him, for even now
King of Hearts
was turning to evade the approaching missiles and so moving away from his objective - and anyway he didn’t trust the Golem. As he stepped through nothingness, he felt that his perception of missiles whipping past him could only be illusion. He focused on a landing point, his foot coming down on metal. Gravity snatched hold of him and he realized the metal under his foot was a wall.

‘Whoohoo!’ Arach yelled.

Cormac fell back towards a gravplated floor, turning in midair to land heavily on his feet and then roll. He ended up crashing into Arach, who had landed much better. The drone steadied him with one gleaming limb, which Cormac used to haul himself upright.

Stay with it. . .

He still kept
King of Hearts
within his perception, but warheads were now detonating out there, while something here - perhaps the runcible technology surrounding him - was interfering with his U-sense. Through his gridlink he set the CTD for signal-break detonation, unhooked his rucksack and abandoned it on the floor, then prepared to make the jump back to the attack ship. Too late, for the attack ship was gone - either it was already out of range or one of the detonations had destroyed it. He tried making contact through his gridlink but found too much interference.

‘What now, boss?’ Arach enquired

‘Can you contact King?’

‘Nah,’ said the drone. ‘Lot of EMR out there and there’s signal-blocking in this place.’ Arach reached out to point one limb up.

Cormac looked up to see that running above them was an open framework of bubble-metal stanchions. Wound around some of these were metallic vinelike growths he recognized instantly.

‘I reckon it’s everywhere here,’ the drone added, punctuating this comment by opening his abdomen hatches to extrude his Gatling cannons.

Cormac again shouldered his rucksack. A brief instruction to Shuriken prepared the weapon for fast release, then he raised his proton carbine and hoped to hell he wouldn’t have to use it.

‘She must know that we’re here by now,’ he said.

‘How true,’ said a voice he knew was Orlandine’s.

Something peeled open twin sliding doors at the end of the corridor and a monstrous figure crashed through. Cormac crouched protectively and observed the bastard child of a giant steel octopus and a crab. War drone. One of Arach’s Gatling cannons turned and fired. The thing was lost in flame, then an instant later Arach’s missiles were detonating against a hard-field some yards ahead of it. Arach ceased firing and backed up until standing directly before Cormac. Behind the hard-field, the big drone braced its tentacular limbs against the walls of the corridor. Then its lower waspish abdomen detached and drifted forward. It began turning randomly, and around it the air filled with distortions like hard-edged heat haze. Cormac was unsure of what he was seeing until he spotted a chunk of metal sticking out from one wall clatter to the floor, cut clean through. This object was projecting atomic shear fields, and now it advanced to the hard-field and began to slide through.

‘I might survive this,’ observed Arach. ‘But
you
won’t unless you get the hell out of here.’