Exurbia: A Novel About Caterpillars (An Infinite Triptych Book 1) (4 page)

And what a strange lap to be born into, the slums.
Too many of the Blueberry Projects Ixenites were working tirelessly, filching parts from the glitter markets, ripping off Governance technology. Even if ten thousand of them had no idea what they were doing, it only took one genius born among the crowd to build a working wiremind. And that genius had probably already been born. The harbinger.
There will be only one horseman.

He liked to imagine it in his darker moments: that vile hour when the first wiremind woke up and took stock of the world. It would reach out into the planet communication networks and in one deft move take hold of trade, of the military, of the propaganda outlets, the retail centres, the black markets, the crèches, the radio telescopes. Everything entire. 

They passed over the Turner Flatlands and began to descend in a lazy spiral. Jura looked for an enforcement outfit and could see none. Of course not, they’d hardly be dressed in uniform,
halfwit
. The pilot set the flyer down behind a warehouse. Jura climbed from the hatch, a plainclothes already waiting for him.

‘Professor Jura,’ the grunt said.

‘Presently.’

‘This way please.’ 

There were more of them than usual, fifteen maybe, plainclothes, all probably straight from the recruitment centre. They crossed through alleys strewn with scrap metal and baby clothes and approached the door of a terraced hovel. The grass was cut
.
Perhaps it was exactly that which had given them away, a tended lawn on a street of weeds and tyre streaks. One of the plainclothes beat on the front door with a fist. ‘Raid,’ he shouted. The others took offensive positions. There was no answer. ‘Wiremind bust,’ said the plainclothes again, kicking at the wood this time. Eyes appeared at the window next door.

‘Storm it,’ said the superior. The plainclothes stepped back and one of the others took a glitz from his pocket. The door went up in a cough of vapour. 

The hall was empty. Most of them ran in, the superior hanging back with Jura. Primal shouts came bursting from the windows. A few of the plainclothes emerged with two dishevelled men, cuffed already, both with morning hair and still in their dressing gowns. One fixed Jura with a stare as he passed, doubtless bound for some unforgiving holding cell for the rest of his life at the Bureau of Rehabilitation. Perhaps he had been a student of Jura’s at the Stratigraphics Faculty. It was not impossible. That indignant pro-Ix streak in the kids sometimes, rare though it was, gave way to maverick sentiments. A decade later and they were usually being led out of some projects hovel by a plainclothes, always with that bitter and quiet resentment on their faces. When the grunts were all out, the superior gestured to the front door.

‘Take a look around, Professor. That's why you’re here isn’t it?’

Jura took the tineye from his pocket, clipped it to his lapel and began recording. The inside of the hovel bore the usual marks of neglected squalor. Detritus and mountains of unwashed dishes.
These were men with a singular purpose.
The usual pleasantries and appliances of comfortable living were absent. It was always this way.

There was no point in going upstairs. It would not be there. It never was. He made instead towards what looked like a door to the cellar and descended the stairway. No need to find the light, the room was already suffused in the characteristic orange glow of t’assali. 

‘Gnesha’s knees,’ muttered the superior, following him in. ‘They were almost there, weren’t they?’

Makeshift generators were scattered all about the cellar, power couplers and leads feeding the central podium. Atop it, five rings hung suspended in what must have been a Garlyle field, spinning fast enough to blur and intersecting. A pure ball of orange t’assali throbbed and waned at the heart of the rings. The sphere was still unstable, bobbing about uncertainly in the field. Still uncohered. 

‘It’s not…’ whispered the superior.

Awake
, thought Jura.
That’s what you want to say, isn’t it? And then what would you do? Explode it, I should expect. Would that be murder by your definition?

‘No,’ said Jura. ‘But they were just days from it. Lucky we got here when we did.’

He didn’t take his eyes from the t’assali sphere. ‘What will happen to the Ixenites?’ he said, unable to resist.

‘A quick trial, no jury. Then the rest of their lives in holding. You’d think they would know better.’

I wish I knew better
, Jura thought.

‘Well, the sphere isn’t stable,’ said Jura. ‘They didn’t have the power yet. It takes a lot of energy. They were probably going to try and hook it into the local grid, source the electricity that way. It’s how the others always do it. You’re done here, Detective. Go back to the Bureau, tell them it was mere days from a stage one crisis.’ 

The t’assali sphere jerked uncertainly and settled again.

‘I’m taking the machinery into my custody,’ he said then.
I cannot help myself.

‘
Your
custody?’ said the detective, guardedly incredulous.

‘Mine, yes. It’s my job to decommission Ixer equipment. Don’t worry, you can take the credit for the brute force, that’s the part the media streams will care about. Go back to the flyer. I’ll make my own way back.’

‘Professor -’

‘I always administrate the decommissioning in these instances. Go back to the Bureau.’ 
You know I have ties with Governance. You wouldn't dare contradict me.

The superior eyed him cautiously and ascended the cellar’s staircase, stopping at the landing to take a last look at the spinning rings, then finally leaving.

Jura bent to a crouch and stared into the orange sphere. It seemed, he thought, to stare into him.

5

“Every conflict tends towards total surrender on both sides.”

- The Ixenite Manifesto – 6th Edition

Fortmann -

‘Friends,’ Fortmann said. ‘Romans, countrymen, Ixenites.’ 
I wonder if they know what a Roman was.
Never mind, it was a little joke he could enjoy by himself if nothing else.

‘I have vital news, a little surprise if you will. But first, as you are all no doubt aware, the Ayakashi obliterated Xianxi several days ago. Several of Our Brothers in the Up, Tanaka Godel and Jonathan Incandenza, were visiting family members there. The entire city was lost. Let us hope that their final moments were not painful. They were good men, both having given themselves completely to our cause and the Up.’

Good riddance. Godel was an incompetent, and Incandenza a total simpleton.

‘Now, to happier matters. As you know, our sister Maria met with the moralising imp
himself
, thanks to our lottery scheme.’

He found her eyes in the audience. She was wearing the beginnings of a proud smile.

‘And had the chance to speak with him at length. I’m sure she will give you the full details of the proceedings in a moment. Let me assure you that it is good news. And let me further assure you that this is the breakthrough we have been waiting for, the fatal chink in Governance’s armour. As ever, we are tasked with being god’s midwives. And like any birth, it will now only take one final resolved push.’ 

They applauded at that. The Zdrastian was staring with desperate eyes. Even Mr. Covert Woof was up on his front paws at his master’s side.

Fortmann looked about.
Gnesha, they're
all
staring with desperate eyes.
Had Ceaser felt like this?
he wondered.
Had Alexander?
Some men were followers. It was in their nature. Others, a precious few, were born with something else in their blood, a kind of violent talent for leadership. He could feel it coursing through him now, a sort of vitality. He stifled the applause with a wave.

‘And it is with great pleasure and without further ado then that I invite Our Sister in the Up, Maria, onto the stage.’

Applause again. He took Maria’s seat in the audience as she made her way to the podium. She walked with a kind of feigned confidence.
One
, Fortmann thought,
she learned from me
.

‘Good afternoon,’ said Maria. He pictured her without clothes now, still wearing that almost-smug smile. ‘Thank you, of course, to Our Brother in the Up, Seer Fortmann, without whom none of what I’m about to tell you would have been possible. He engineered the entire operation from the outset. I volunteered for two reasons. Firstly, I considered it an honour to be able to meet with the imp, if only for such a short while. And secondly, I was a perfect candidate since as far as we can tell, Governance is extremely lax with their security checks when it comes to young women. Two weeks ago, Seer Fortmann and Our Brother Mikhail Ivanov -’ 

The Zdrastian smirked sheepishly at the mention of his name. 

‘- broke into a military cemetery and retrieved a neural implant from the body of a deceased political strategist, Dr. Kliment. We now have absolute proof that Governance is using exactly the kind of technology they have been executing their own citizens for trying to manufacture, as per the Pergrin Decree.’

This would only have been proof
, Fortmann thought,
to a total idiot
.
Anyone who hasn't worked it out by now is either soft in the brain, or missing one entirely.

‘After retrieving the device and bringing it back to the Chapterhouse, a brave volunteer, Our Brother Charlie Takashi, offered to undergo the implantation procedure. I acted as a consultant to the procedure myself, and can confirm that it was a complete success.’

Success
.
That's a rich term.
Poor Takashi, lying on a medical bed in the basement producing puddle after puddle of spittle on his pillow and moaning incomprehensibly.
All great causes require some degree of sacrifice.

‘Using Our Brother Charlie Takashi and the implant as a conduit, Seer Fortmann was able to break into the Governance mainframe and predetermine the outcome of the lottery, planting my name in the database. The rest was easy. Two days later, a small outfit of Governance men arrived at my apartment and informed me that I had been chosen to visit the imp in his dwelling. I feigned surprise and accompanied them to the Political District. They de-retinised me during the ride. We’re not sure how the device works, but it appears to disrupt all electrical signals between the optic nerve and the brain, rendering me blind for the entire journey. Seer Fortmann had already embedded a miniature geotracker in my foot, however.’

‘I was given grey overalls and told to remove all traces of make-up, which I did. The Governance men were extremely concerned with me not arousing the imp in any way. Then I was instructed to ask only very simple questions, and not to touch on any current events or moral quandaries, else I would be, as they put it, “ejected.”’

She holds the stage well,
Fortmann thought,
arms free and easy, keeping constant eye contact with the crowd, sentences precise and succinct. 
It hadn’t always been like this. He remembered her only a few years ago desperately begging to join up with the organisation. He was convinced at the time that she was nothing more than a mole. Everything reeked of it; her supple body, her desperation. He’d convinced her to undergo the Dmitrova procedure by explaining that it was the only way to be sure of her allegiances. The procedure was only designed to detect underlying mental illness, but she couldn’t possibly have known that. She had stepped into the machine without hesitation and stepped out with the same resolve. That had been enough for him. Either she was so conditioned that even
she
didn’t know she was a mole, or she was telling the truth.

‘I was then put into a motion tube and descended about one hundred feet below the ground, stopping at a partition. I heard slow footsteps behind the door. It slid aside to reveal an emaciated shadow of a man. It was of course the imp himself. He looked in perfect health, though the total absence of any hair on his head took me back at first. He was extremely well-mannered, and as far as I could tell, well-meaning. He offered me tea and welcomed me inside. The interior was as we assumed, if not a little worse. Everything inside is entirely beige so as not to excite him in any way. The cave is split into two sections; one side is his quarters, the other, the moral hub. There’s some kind of stereopticon machine inside the hub which projects a visual representation of whatever Governance has assigned him for consideration. He sits in an enormous beige chair, resolves the quandaries, then sleeps; ad infinitum, day after day.’

Pause for effect. The Ixenites were positively on the edge of their seats.
She’s not bad. Not bad at all.

‘The imp isn’t as inhuman as we’d assumed, despite genetic tampering from Governance. He’s particularly receptive to female company, apparently. He’s also extremely passive, which is excellent news for us. Would you like me to outline the details of the next step, Seer Fortmann, or would you prefer to introduce it yourself?’

Fortmann gestured encouragingly to her from the audience. ‘Please, Sister.’

Another pause for effect.

‘There’s not a living soul on Exurbia who knows the insides of Governance better than the imp. He’s seen deeper inside the political machine than the grand tersh himself. He’s only been allowed this privilege given that they know he wouldn’t dare do anything in contradiction with his duties. But exposed to the realities of Exurbia, exposed to anti-wiremind policy and the ritual executions because of it, and we’re confident he would be adequately sickened with Governance to side with
a more worthy cause.
And with the imp in our ranks, with his intimate knowledge of every aspect of Governance’s structure -’

Breath, full scan of the room, breath.

‘- we will force Governance to lift the Pergrin Decree.’

Applause, then furious applause, the Zdrastian smiling, getting to his feet, cheering, Mr. Covert Woof bounding about on the spot. Fortmann joined in with the fervour on principle.