Shadow Over Avalon (32 page)

Ector’s thoughts intruded.
‘I’m not impressed. Having just scanned the man, I can tell he is neutralized by jealousy over you. What, by the deeps, have you done to him for him to behave in this primitive fashion?’

Shadow started to reach for her earring to reply, but Copper’s hot glare stayed her hand.

‘Leave it in place. Do you want him thinking we talk behind his back? Open to me so I can pick out your answer.’

Shadow organized almost every contact she’d had with her King into chronological order for Ector to review.

‘Are you so emotionally dead that you can’t see how much he has attached himself to you? Do something with him, or the cause you’re ready to die for will evaporate in a cloud of temper.’

Shadow wilted in her chair under that cold, accusing assessment. Ector withdrew from her, and Ambrose’s momentary inattention suggested him as the next target. The meeting came to an abrupt end with nothing agreed except a rethink. She looked for an escape before Ector started digging for details.

Copper bristled. “I suppose I’m to be sent back to my prison until you’re ready to resume.”

“Shadow can show you around Elite barracks,” Ambrose said. “I will guarantee freedom of movement only within our facility. Seers are very interested in your foreseeing abilities. You really wouldn’t enjoy helping them learn, should they catch you in the open, and I have no authority over them to prevent it.”

Copper stalked to the door. His posture indicated his intention to brood in private. Shadow followed after. They were almost at Copper’s room when a call brought them both about.

The same young medi-tech who had tended Helga hurried up to them. “Shadow, I was looking for you. I’ve got your power pack. Can you come for fitting now?”

“This is something you should see,” she said to Copper, wanting revenge. “I need this procedure if I am to return to the surface. Are you prepared to learn what I am?”

“I’ll see for myself how they control my subject.” Copper’s mouth formed a hard line.

The medi-tech led them to the grav lifts, and Shadow felt too irritated with Copper to warn him what to expect. She enjoyed his gasp of terror as the device started up. Copper looked panicked by the time the doors slid open, and he dived out first, distancing himself as far from the contrivance as he could manage with his dignity intact. His eyes held a look of grave injury. The young medi-tech ushered them into his ready room, where Copper started forward on sighting a covered woman beyond a glass partition.

“No.” The medi-tech barred his passage. “Access denied. Your woman is in a clean-room for her own protection.”

“I’m not dirty.” Copper attempted to move around him.

“Copper, no.” Shadow grabbed at him. “No one is allowed in there without special clothing. She must be getting better, or they wouldn’t be so protective.”

“She had the growth removed this morning. We are in the process of regenerating tissue,” the young man said.

Copper looked through the glass. “She will live?”

“It might take a few weeks to repair her, as we are still working on a way to restore normality. Shadow has donated tissue for our comparison check.”

“Is there hope?” Copper looked at the figure with profound pity.

“We won’t give up on this. It’s too intriguing.” The medi-tech reached out for a slim silver box with lights and buttons. “While we’re on the subject, I want a full scan of you, since I understand curing is part of the treaty. This won’t take a moment.”

“Shadow—” Copper backed off.

“It doesn’t hurt,” she said, grinning at his obvious discomfort.

The device made a rapid sweep, and then the young man checked his instrument panel. He grunted in satisfaction. “Fertility is impaired by an unnatural metabolic rate causing too great a temperature. It is a careful piece of manipulation, but the area is too fragile for experimentation. I can insert an implant to compensate. It is a simple procedure, if I adapt a com-link. Report at first wake call tomorrow.”

Copper’s eyes bulged, and his hands clasped over his genitals. “What’s he going to do to me?”

“They remove a small circle of bone in your head.” She began to enjoy herself even more. “Metal threads lead from a flat device attached there into your brain to correct the problem. You will be asleep the whole time. Most of the Elite have one, including Ector. They use it to access information from our control data bank. Yours will be modified to personal need. Having one won’t make you their creature. It will mean you stay away from Harvester priests. We wouldn’t want them finding one of those.”

“What if I don’t want a lump of metal stuck in my head?” He backed away from the pair of them.

“Damage, courtesy of Harvesters, doesn’t heal. If you want the effects neutralized—” She paused. “Just how important is fertility? Submariners may develop a way to free our speech with such a device, so that we don’t need earrings. It won’t impede our special gifts, since those are protected as a priority. Think about it. No one will force the issue. It is a personal choice.”

“Some among us have much more intrusive implants to no ill-effect. Are you ready, Shadow?” the medi-tech asked, grinning.

Shadow stripped off her tunic, presenting her left arm to him, interested to see if he would remember.

“What would you do if I went ahead?” he challenged, chuckling. “Go sit down, I’ll get the power pack.”

“A certain arm makes so much difference? What’s he going to do to you?” Copper hovered over her.

“Watch and learn. I concealed this for good reason, but now . . . it’s best you learn.”

The sound of Copper gagging interrupted the peeling back of artificial skin and muscle layers. There was a pause while he got himself under control.

“It’s not flesh.” His face was a sickly white.

“Organs, we can regrow, some flesh, but not nerves.” The medi-tech continued his digging. “Shadow is a cyborg—part living, part mechanism. The mechanism needs an energy source to work. I am installing a replacement to enable normal activity to continue.”

“You call that normal function?”

“For her, it is. The alternative is disability inappropriate to her duties. Many Elite are cyborg to a greater or lesser extent. It goes along with the territory.” He poked a blunt glass rod into the exposed circuitry. A small disc gently rose from the opening, and its retaining clips loosened.

There was a faint sigh from behind, followed by a thud as Copper hit the ground, senseless.

Glowing blue water made a familiar sky above the flat rooftop of Elite barracks where Arthur mulled over his first major disagreement with the Archive. When he asked the sentient about the group of Terran slaves in the bowels of High Fort Shadow discovered, it reacted in the same way emotionless way to him as it had to her. The Archive was an autonomous, sentient intelligence, so what force could reduce it into an archaic behavior pattern? Those few moments when its established personality appeared to disintegrate sent shivers down his spine. Like Shadow, he changed the subject.

Thoughts of Shadow called up those of that other peculiar inhabitant of his dreams: the old-young man, who seemed to want something from him. Arthur contemplated quizzing this timeless specter, partly to discern whether it was linked to him as an insane extension, or a separate, outside influence. If he received answers to unresolved questions the next time it invaded his dreams – if those answers were outside his personal experience . . . yes, that would be a pivotal point.

The sense of another presence disturbed his meditation. A few heartbeats of gentle scan revealed Ector about to access the roof; no mistaking the flavor of
his
mind, despite the careful privacy barriers. Ector wanted to catch him by surprise, did he? Arthur shut his eyes, waiting until Ector padded near in the soundless way learned from Brethren.

“I know I’m skipping classes, so if you’ve come to chastise me, it’s a wasted effort.” He waited out a controlled silence from his superior. “Ector, I’m not going back until I’m ready. I’m quite prepared for any accrued punishment.”

“You knew who found you.” Ector sounded irritated. “Good guess, but it could easily have been a quorum of seers, bent on sneaking up to recover a lost acolyte. It would be too late by the time we came up with a legal process to yank back a reluctant meal from the shark’s belly.”

“I knew who searched. I always know.” Arthur opened his eyes and smiled. “They can’t steal what they can’t see or sense. This roof would appear empty if I wanted to stay hidden.”

“Arthur?” Ector frowned, looking uncertain. “Can you really screen to that extent?”

He considered demonstrating, but Arthur didn’t want to be diminished in Ector’s eyes. “I don’t hide from friends. Sometimes I need to be alone, and Sanctuary isn’t a good place for that, so I worked out my own way to avoid seers.”

“Screening leaves an aftertaste,” Ector said. “Any initiate could pick it up.”

“Not my method. They use mind link and eyes to locate. I project an image of myself doing various things and moving off before they get there. It was the only form of exercise some of them got before I left.”

“Arthur, no one can do that. You’d have to split your mind in two.”

“I’ve had plenty of time to practice.” He stretched to ease a kink in his back. “As long as the projection sticks to predictable behavior patterns, it almost runs itself. Watchers get frustrated, but they don’t believe anyone has the capability to generate such a realistic image for long, so they don’t suspect.”

Still frowning, Ector sat beside him, leaning back against an air duct with his hands behind his head. “I can’t say I’m astonished you have the Great Control, given your mother’s abilities. If I had any doubts left on that score, they have just evaporated.” He chuckled. “One day you will learn how much you upset Sanctuary. Oh, this is too good.”

“Who is my mother?” Arthur sat up to watch Ector’s face for any minute betrayals. The woman must be one of the Elite. He wouldn’t raid for data – he couldn’t without losing a friend – but he could still read body language.

“She will tell you, or I will, when I think you are mature enough to handle the consequences. That day is drawing close.” Ector shut his eyes and relaxed his face muscles, as if aware of Arthur’s scrutiny. “What bothered you so much that you needed seclusion? Dreams again?”

“No—Shadow. Years back she found a topic the Archive didn’t like. It started spouting antiquated security restrictions. I tried to access data on that subject with the same result. I suppose I was conceited to imagine I might get answers where she failed. Did she ever discuss the experience with you?”

“She didn’t. Show me both incidents.” Ector’s shoulders tensed.

Arthur tried to put his exasperation aside. Ector must know his mother well. Perhaps she was one of the Elite support staff, or maybe an active seer member? Would it be Suki? She was still a popular addition to any landing party. He suppressed a sigh and transmitted Shadow’s experiences of the Archive in exact detail. The sense of shock and wonder radiated from Ector as the scenes played out in his mind.

“The Archive shouldn’t be subject to security overrides. This is a revelation. I’m tempted to check that incident in Shadow’s files myself, just to see if it’s still there.”

Ector propped himself up on one elbow looking out at Sanctuary for a moment as if drawing strength from the presence of the place. The twin towers in daytime were jeweled with inner lights against the dark walls to present an irresistible focal point.

“I started an unwelcome line of thought some time back also.” Ector yawned. “I wasn’t satisfied at the explanation for continued life on the surface after the holocaust. I can’t see why every animal life form wasn’t annihilated. Avalon had a fifty-year food supply stockpiled when the catastrophe happened, and the ability to generate food from hydroponic units, so how did repopulation occur on the surface, given only a few underground shelters were known to exist with the same food resource? Why are some animal species unaltered, while others mutated to primeval condition? Then there are beasts which shouldn’t exist in nature, being throwbacks to long extinct species.” Ector yawned a second time. “It’s happening again. Every time I think about this problem I start to fall asleep.”

Arthur projected a flow of pure energy to Ector. He met with unconscious resistance – a resistance not controlled by his friend.

“Think about my encounter instead for a moment,” he urged, shaking Ector’s shoulders. “I’ll investigate your discovery if I get a chance.”

Ector made an effort, immediately looking more alert. “The Archive is not the only source for data. Avoid sensitive topics when you access it. Two of us with a sleep problem aren’t going to accomplish much.”

“I’ve a resource I intend to explore tonight. Whether it will prove useful is another matter.”

“Be careful with those dreams of yours. Shadow has spent years in digging ancient ruins for lost technology. She might have discovered data, but she may have created a memory block when returning to Avalon. There is a core of isolation remaining in her that none of us have ever penetrated.”

“I thought she was on our side,” Arthur objected.