Space Eater (23 page)

Answering “no,” now, when I thought about it (it was hard to think about it), was such a bloody great effort, lifting weights like mountains, far, far too much when you were so sleepy, what was the point of going to all that trouble to say what wasn’t so...

The Chinese burn reminded me not to let go.

“And you came using a faster-than-light transport system.”

“Yes.” I had to give that “yes” a bit more of a push to set it going than the last one. So far so good, unless the difference had shown on those impressive-looking displays and readouts. I tried to think ahead but it all got lost in the splintered lights and the lush velvety voice.

“The microfiche you gave to General Lowenstein—that carries the specifications for constructing a total-conversion weapon based on anomalous-physics theory? Is that correct?”

“Yes.”

“Why is there a misleading identification on this fiche?”

This was it. “Security,” I said, paring it down as much as I could.

“Mmm. Let’s leave that for the moment. Please confirm your statement about the explosive force of this

‘nullbomb.’ What is the explosive force?”

I relaxed again and let it spill out. “There is an unprecedented energy release estimated to be in the teraton (10^6 megaton) range and presumably dependent on the quantity of included mass within the sphere of quantum collapse. The sphere’s precise radius has for obvious reasons been only estimated rather than accurately measured.” Hadn’t known I knew all that.

“Is this a direct quotation from a report on the device?”

“Yes.”

“Mmm. Is the major purpose of your mission as stated—to avoid damage on a possibly cosmic scale?”

“That’s what they told us.” Now why couldn’t I just say yes?

“Mmm. Why bring specifications for the nullbomb in particular?”

Oh Christ. Lucky she didn’t ask something like “Did you bring this thing to blow our research center to tiny pieces?”—she’d have got me then. This way it was just possible, if I sort of pushed sideways, to say:

“Idea was to give example of destructive power of some MT things. Frighten you off.” The last bit slipped out before I could stop it.

“Let’s leave that for the moment. Is your faster-than-light engine based on MT principles?”

Good question. It wasn’t an engine but she hadn’t asked that. “Yes.”

“Is that faster-than-light engine still intact aboard your craft?”

“No.” Gotcha! Now d’you believe we might have ditched it out the airlock—or left half of it in the Tunnel lab?

“Mmm. With full control of your craft’s shipsystems, would it be possible to reconstruct the FTL

transport unit?”

“...Yes. Maybe.” It was hard work to carry on and say, “Not possible—get control—of systems.

Booby-traps. Maybe nullbomb.”

“Is there any hidden danger or trap whatever for the Archipelago and its government in the stratagem you’ve suggested for the use of the nullbomb?”

“Not that I know about. Idea handed over in good faith.”

“Why?”

“You got an arms race. Have to stop that to stop MT work.”

“Mmm. On some questions, Lt. Jacklin, I find you almost suspiciously garrulous. On others, you seem to be holding back. Tell me what you’re holding back.”

It was like a cold shock of water hitting me accurately on and around the belly button. My mouth opened and shut a couple of times. Eventually: “No ... comment.”

“Are the areas in question areas of Earth governmental or planetary security?”

“...Yes.” Saved. Or was I?

“Would you consider that
our
continued ignorance in these areas is detrimental to Pallas planetary security and especially the Archipelago?”

I had to work out what that one meant. “No. Don’t think so.”

Suddenly: “Could the FTL drive be used for missiles within an atmosphere?”

“No.” Gotcha again. “No. No. Absolutely impossible.” I went slack with relief. That put paid to that one...

“Why not?”

“One point nine centimeters—“ Oh Christ. Another slip. I clamped my lips shut.

“What does that mean?”

“No comment. Security.”

“Mmm. Well, we’ll analyze the recordings later. That seems to cover the main areas, doesn’t it? No more questions, Lieutenant.” (I went limp ...) “—Oh, what is the meaning of ‘Devourer’?”

The bastards. Bugged after all. “I ... don’t ... know.”

The voice sounded limp itself. “Thank you, Lt. Jacklin. That will be all.” I felt colder now, and could feel chilly sweat all over my face, arms, and chest. My wrist, though, felt as if it must be bright red and blistered—but I knew it wouldn’t be. I’d passed the test, I thought. Onward Colophon!

Twenty-Two

Onward Colophon but not onward us. I’d thought it pretty damn claustrophobic before, with the odd trip out to see Lowenstein or the War Room: now it settled to no trips at all. House arrest. Even fetching color schemes in blue and silver, and smart furniture in old-fashioned glass and chrome, get to look as dull as a Force cubicle or Tunnel room when you stare at them long enough. Rossa passed a few cracks about being bounded in a nutshell and calling yourself a king of infinite space. The way we got to feeling, it was more likely that even if we had the infinite space we wouldn’t be any happier—how much of space can you
use
, what was the point of space unless new things were happening somewhere? I remembered my picture of everything-there-was as a glass ball hanging by a wire. When I poked at my feelings to find the hard core, it turned out that even when I preached to Lowenstein about disasters happening to all the universe, I only meant a tiny glass ball, the bit of it I could see for myself. Maybe I only meant myself, though again things would be harder without Rossa.

We’d had another fake cuddling session to fox the watchers who were so quick to notice small talk about the thing called DEVOURER. It seemed Rossa hadn’t had any more trouble than me—less trouble than she said, I guessed, she being so much more in control of herself than, say, me. But between us we’d made one problem: when it came to the business of whether “the FTL engine” was actually aboard Corvus Station, I’d truthfully said no and Rossa, thinking about the thing from her angle, truthfully said yes. Funny, too, they’d actually dropped in a question about her bracelet, “is it a communications device of any sort?”

“I had to fight against the drugs quite hard,” she whispered to me as we writhed together, “until I remembered that, of course, it isn’t a transmitter—merely a convenient masochist’s aid!
I’m
the damned transmitter. So I could say no, and I did; the pause while I was reasoning through that pink haze must have made him suspicious, and he followed up with ‘you have no means whatever of contacting your craft in orbit?’ and of course I said no straightaway.”

“Mine was a she,” I said.

“Their minds do work in predictably simple ways...”

“Well: thanks for the wakey-wakey signal. It helped.”

Afterward I found again that in spite of everything I was reacting in a physical sort of way to holding Rossa—or parts of me were, though not as much as they might. That didn’t matter, I told myself fiercely.

But it was so comforting to kiss and hold each other close; a different ache that wasn’t pain had woken up inside me; and now, with nothing at all happening, there was no excuse for playing that game.

UTTER TOP SECRET CHICANE/COLOPHON

For your information: StraProgCom has now agreed to Chicane/Colophon as originally
discussed. The data will be transmitted from Research Center as soon as coded and delivered
there—ostensibly as instruction for building advanced MT installation at “off-planet base.”

STRACEN-1 security is being stepped up beyond former maximum while Chicane/Colophon is
pending and I regret to inform you of your temporary confinement to embassy suite. No holder of
C/C strategy information will be permitted above STRACEN-1 sublevel 5 for the duration. This
includes StraProgCom members. Reply is not necessary: imperative you return this document to
bearer for destruction. Lowenstein.

“A number of people are ready to murder both of you,” Keeb told us as he took back the lurid striped paper. “Practically all topside leave has been canceled and at the moment no one who gets below sublevel 1 is being allowed out of STRACEN. All outside calls go onto delay tapes for triple vetting; all internal C/C messages are being—well, you see—escorted.” He jerked his thumb toward the two armed guards watching from the doorway. “What happens now is that they escort me to the shredding room, where everyone in sight has to sign the form swearing that UTS memo code such-and-such has been destroyed. Believe me, you’re the lucky ones...”

He left, after explaining that this was sublevel 6. The guards who went with him swapped nods with the two who seemed to have put down roots outside our door; and the door clicked shut again.

“The general sounded quite apologetic,” Rossa said.

“Oh great. That helps no end, doesn’t it?”

We practiced sullen silences. So much of what we might say to each other was ruled out by the hidden cameras. Think about it: my times as a kid in the slums, my times in the Force tanks, anything at all about

“world government” or Tunnel or Corvus Station ... all
verboten
. Rossa’s time in Comm: hell, if they asked the right questions and found out her talent they’d have her in a sensory-deprivation tank with a big padlock before you could say “breach of security.” So we played chess; house arrest didn’t seem to get Rossa down as much as me, and by now she was a dozen games ahead. We went in for the very smallest of small talk, maybe microtalk, picotalk, femtotalk. And when everything else failed, we sat polishing up our talent for sullen silences.

UTTER TOP SECRET CHICANE/COLOPHON

For your information: phase one, dissemination of the data, has been concluded satisfactorily. All
networks now seeking evidence that the leak has been detected, “correctly” interpreted, and
acted upon. Reply is not necessary; imperative you return this document to bearer for destruction.

Lowenstein.

“I suppose it’s nice of him to keep us in touch,” Rossa said in a tone that might have been ironic, or again might not.

“He’s so worried about us getting bored, why doesn’t he come around and play a game of cards?” I mumbled.

Keeb took back the paper. “I meant to ask before ... are you in the Faith?” he said unexpectedly.

“Because Colonel Hazell can hear confessions
and
he should be clear to visit you if...”

“No thanks,” we both said. He shrugged, went, and I wandered off to do press-ups. Couldn’t let myself go flabby, just in case ... Well, I couldn’t see any future outside this place at the moment; but it was harder to think when you were wearing yourself out, and fifty fast press-ups or half an hour’s isometric wrenching certainly saved me from thinking for a while. Rossa preferred yoga.

UTTER TOP SECRET CHICANE/COLOPHON

For your information: hostile MT disturbance transmissions ceased within 36 hours of “leak.”

Conjecture is that all MT effort diverted to construction of Colophon device. Reply is not
necessary, etc. Lowenstein.

“What I mean is,” I said, “what I thought somehow was that I’d be doing some kind of commando thing with the nullbomb, maybe you and me both, maybe even carrying the plans ourselves and getting captured. Yes, I know it sounds silly—but with my training you go and try to deal with the opposition yourself, not sit around letting other folks arrange it all. Know what I mean?”

Rossa said: “That only works when you know who the opposition are and when they’re the sort of enemy you’ve been trained to fight.”

“Um, ye-es. I suppose here we hardly know—“ End of conversation all of a sudden. Another topic you couldn’t take any further. No way was it a safe thing to let the chat move onto how, maybe, the “rebels”

were in the right and maybe we’d have done better to get caught by them.

“Your problem,” said Rossa as she lifted a bishop, “is that you’re temperamentally unsuited to the close game. I’ve never
known
you use a fianchetto development—“

UTTER TOP SECRET CHICANE/COLOPHON

For your information: still no detectable MT activity from enemy. Massive brain missile strike six
hours ago with some damage to Port Island facilities. Desired retaliatory strike ruled out by
strategy considerations already discussed. Some unrest in StraProgCom. Reply is not, etc.

Lowenstein.

What a lot can happen while you’re stuck in a blue-and-silver cell. Keeb mentioned something about Port being the third most heavily defended island. Keeb was looking thinner and rattier, like a stray dog that was getting pushed to the point where it’d go for a bigger dog’s throat out of sheer desperation. I wondered if the second most heavily defended island mightn’t be the famous research center. Rossa sounded listless as she said that was as good a guess as any. By now her hair had grown out to something like what it had been before, and I was starting to think I could do with a haircut.

UTTER TOP SECRET CHICANE/COLOPHON

Urgent: StraProgCom emergency session takes grave view of noneffect of C/C to date. Another
brain missile strike repelled with difficulty. Am instructed to ask whether it might be possible you
have been deceived as to nature of Colophon device. Please insert reply below and return via
bearer. Lowenstein.

Deceived! Keeb must have wondered why I let out this half-strangled chuckle when I read that line. No; we’d seen the hardcopy of the fiche; the configuration was still a nullbomb. Rossa kept her deadpan look as usual, and I put:
No deception possible. Refer you to interrogation transcripts
. We signed it, both of us, and when Keeb was gone, Rossa broke into small painful giggles that you might pretty near have called sobs. She sat in the deep chair, head in her hands, making these small funny noises, and we ended up with her leaning her head against my thigh and me stroking her new hair. It was something to do.