In Heaven and Earth (5 page)

“
Aren’t you
going to ask why I chose that particular myth?”

“
Since a wound
to the thigh was a medieval euphemism for castration, I’m just
going to assume—”

“
My dick works
just fine,” Vairya snapped, the first hint of irritation in his
voice. “I chose the Fisher King because he can’t be healed by just
anyone. It has to be someone worthy.”

Reuben wasn’t convinced.
There were plenty of myths about sick kings. If Vairya had chosen
this one, it meant something, although probably not sexual
dysfunction. It was a reminder that this man, for all his banter,
was a patient and a terrified and traumatised one at that. Gentling
his voice, he asked, “How may I prove myself worthy?”

Vairya shot him a
startled look, and said hurriedly, “Do come and see my garden, Sir
Reuben.”

“
I’m not here
to pick flowers,” Reuben started, but Vairya seized his hand and
dragged him forwards, through the deep gateway and out into the
sunlit land beyond.

He had expected a castle
yard or a city. Instead, the walls of Vairya’s citadel circled a
vast rose garden. There were walls scattered between the flowers,
but they were all overgrown with flowering briars. The air smelt
sweet as he stepped forwards in surprise, the scent so heady that
he felt a little dizzy. Swathes of coloured flowers curled across
the ground like streaked marble: pink, red, yellow, white, all
still in bud, but close enough to opening that the air was full of
their perfume.

“
Aren’t they
lovely?” Vairya asked and reached out to touch one of the roses
tenderly, running his finger down the pink curve of its
petals.

“
Beautiful,”
Reuben said, “but I am here for you, not the flowers.”

Vairya shrugged. “But I
am here for the roses. They have such short lives, and they are so
lovely when they flower. They deserve to be cared for.”

“
What about the
people in the city? Don’t they deserve your care too? We need your
memory working so we can find out what happened to
them.”

Vairya bowed his head
towards the flower, breathing in softly. When he looked up, his
eyes were sad. “I was starting to think you might be the one, but
you don’t understand at all. You can’t help me.”

“
I could if
you’d let me,” Reuben said in frustration, but Vairya just shook
his head.

What was he missing? Oh,
it was obvious enough that Vairya didn’t want to remember and was
twisting this scenario to avoid it, but there must be a weakness
here, some flaw in Vairya’s defences that Reuben could exploit to
break through all the fear and avoidance.

“
You doubt I am
worthy? Set me a task, and let me prove my worth.” He knew the kind
of quests a scenario like this would throw up, fighting monsters,
fetching obscure items, or rescuing princesses, and he was
confident his imagination was a match for any of them.

Vairya hesitated, lifting
his shoulders slightly. “That’s not how—”

Reuben pressed his
advantage. “It’s only fair. I’ve come here with the best of
intentions, as a complete stranger who knows nothing of your
situation. You owe me a chance to prove myself.”

Vairya was quiet for a
moment. Then he lifted his chin with a sudden sharp grin. “You
won’t like it.”

“
Try
me.”

“
Oh, I will.
Your task is trial by ordeal.”

“
And what will
that prove?” Reuben asked, intrigued. It seemed out of
character.

“
Your
determination.”

“
Trying to
scare me off? It won’t work.” In here torture was merely a matter
of the mind, and Reuben knew he could out-think the mere illusion
of pain.

Vairya led him under an
arch covered with scarlet flowers, into a round of grass. Roses
surrounded it, and a pebbled path led across it to a
door.

It stood within a stone
archway, with the path continuing on either side. It was made of
wood, with a heavy iron ring as its handle. Reuben walked around
it, trying to swallow a laugh. He was beginning to suspect that
Vairya was taking his ideas from bad vids rather than any actual
historical source. Waggling his eyebrows, he said, “Let me guess—
the Chamber of the Ordeal?”

“
No,” Vairya
said, though he looked cross. “Of course not.”

“
What is it,
then?”

“
It’s, er… It
has no name. It’s the Nameless Chamber.”

“
Of Dread?”
Reuben inquired, grinning. “The Nameless Chamber of Doom?
Destiny?”

“
It needs no
name,” Vairya said primly, but amusement was starting to dance in
his eyes again. “It is beyond such petty mortal
concerns.”

“
The rack,
boiling oil, or pliers to my toenails?”

Vairya looked horrified.
“What sort of doctor are you? That’s barbaric.”

“
Torture always
is,” Reuben said grimly. “No matter how civilised men try to
justify it.”

“
I don’t intend
to torture you, just understand you. It won’t hurt.”

He seemed genuinely
upset, so Reuben smiled a little, wanting to reassure him, and
opened the door.

It did not, inevitably,
simply open on the garden on the other side of its frame. Instead,
a long grey corridor led away into the distance. Reuben recognised
its type at once, a space station passage. Nowhere else combined
that windowless blandness with such scope.

“
You coming?”
he asked Vairya.

“
I’ll watch
from here.”

“
If this turns
out to be an emergency exit, I’m going to be overflowing with
righteous wrath when I get back.”

“
It’s not a
trick.”

Reuben shrugged and
stepped through the doorway. It hissed shut behind him, and he
turned to see it had become a metal hatch. Shrugging again, he
walked along the corridor at a steady speed, bracing for an
attack.

None came, but after a
few minutes the corridor ended at another hatch. Reuben touched the
keypad, and took a slow breath as it slid open. Whatever
unpleasantness Vairya had concocted for him, he was
ready.

The door opened to show a
wide office backed with a clear wall that displayed the stars
beyond. A glass desk stood on a slightly raised dais, and someone
was standing by the window, looking out at the vastness of
space.

Reuben froze. He knew
this room, knew it couldn’t be real, had long ago been
dismantled.

The figure at the window
turned and stepped forwards into the light.

“
Dr Cooper,”
General Ahrima said, her voice soft and dangerous, “I’ve been
waiting for you.”

Reuben’s throat
closed.

“
Come in. Sit
down. We should talk.”

He still couldn’t
breathe, each breath catching in his throat before he could pull it
into his lungs. His head felt hot and swollen, his pulse beating
like a drum in the back of his skull, and he gasped desperately,
trying to think past the sight of her, smiling at him with that
terrible mixture of charm and menace.

She wasn’t here. It
wasn’t real. She was imprisoned on Sirius, her mind lulled by soft
drugs, and her will chained. She couldn’t hurt him now.

Napoleon, he remembered,
had escaped from Elba. He had been one of the few historical
figures Ahrima had recognised and admired.

“
We have worlds
to conquer, my friend,” she said, leaning back against the desk
with an easy smile. “I need men of your calibre,
Cooper.”

His vision was going
black at the edges, but he managed to croak, “No.”

Her smile didn’t fade,
but even the illusion of warmth faded from her dark eyes. “I know
everything you have done, Cooper. You cannot refuse me. I own
you.”

“
No,” Reuben
managed again, but all the other words caught in his throat. He
threw his hand out, clawing at the air to pull breath back into his
lungs. “No!”

And, neatly and suddenly,
a wall of darkness rolled over him, scrolling down from the corner
of the room until he drowned in it.

Chapter Four

HE WOKE in the infirmary
with a breathing mask over his face, and Eskil standing beside him,
one of his dreads plugged into the bed as he perused the medical
data scrolling across the wall. Meili stood in the doorway, her
arms crossed as she stared at him.

This was the real
sickbay, then, not his imaginary one. Surprised, Reuben pushed the
mask off and rasped, “What happened?”

“
You had a
panic attack,” Eskil said. “I pulled you out.”

“
Shit,” Reuben
said, sitting up enough to glower at Vairya where he lay sleeping
on the other side of the bay. “Little shit sucker-punched
me.”

Meili snorted. “Your
respect for your patients is always such an inspiration,
Cooper.”

“
What did he
do?” Eskil asked more gently, holding his hand up to hush
her.

Reuben didn’t feel like
sharing. “Doesn’t matter. I was making progress. I need to go back
in.”

“
Not until your
breathing and heart rate have settled.”

“
Fuck
that.”

Eskil glared at him,
which was unusual enough that Reuben shut up. “Right now, I’m your
doctor too. You don’t get to put yourself at any more risk until I
say so.”

“
Get Meili to
do it,” Reuben grumbled. “She doesn’t care if my heart
explodes.”

Meili grinned
at him, sharp
-
toothed. “Damn right.”

“
Hippocrates,”
Eskil said to her, stressing every syllable.

“
Never heard of
him.”

Reuben grinned at her as
Eskil’s unused hair stood on end. “And you call
yourself—”

“
Always works,”
Meili commented to Reuben, returning his grin. “You manage to talk
to your cyberboy?”

There was something oddly
reassuring about their mutual loathing, and Reuben returned her
smirk with a lazy shrug. “Briefly. Eskil had the right idea. He’s
using every dodge he can to avoid his memories.”

“
Going to do
something about that?”

“
Sure, when
Eskil stops fussing.”

“
You’ll be here
forever.”

“
I’m still
here,” Eskil put in mildly. “Stop baiting him, and tell him what
you found.”

“
I can do
better than that.
Juniper
, show headcam from fifteen
thirty-four.”

A rectangular window
opened up, shouldering the medical reports to the side of the wall.
It showed the airless and dark remains of Caelestia. This was a
residential area, and had clearly been tree-lined once, because
blackened boughs hung by the sides of the doors and stretched
across the street. Reuben thought of Vairya’s rose garden and
wondered what had flowered here once.

A couple of glass statues
stood beside the leafy arches, gleaming in the dim light, and the
walls were pale. It must have been a pretty place once.

On the screen, the
observer entered the building. Inside stairs and lifts showed there
must be higher floors, but they turned into one of ground floor
apartments.

There was a family in
there, all caught in death.

Unlike the people in the
street, they hadn’t collapsed where they stood when the air ran
out. They were all seated quite comfortably, angled towards
still-playing vids on the walls or games rising out of the flexible
table tops.

“
This is what’s
weird,” Meili said, before he could make his own observations. “All
through the residential areas, we found people who had been
connected to the city net before the disaster. All of them were
already brain dead when the air ran out. The only ones who died of
air loss were those who weren’t connected to the net.”

“
What killed
them?”

“
Haven’t got
that far yet. Caelestia has a mental net, and they’ve all got burns
around the wireless chips in their cortex. Something, or someone,
got to them through the net, and we’re not planning to sign in to
find out how.”

“
Someone?”
Reuben echoed, turning to look at Vairya. “You think it was him?
No.”

“
Why
not?”

Reuben shrugged. “Doesn’t
seem the type. Too easily shocked.”

Meili raised an eyebrow.
“You woke up screaming.”

“
He didn’t make
me scream,” Reuben said and forced himself to settle back against
the pillows calmly. “Send me back in.”

Eskil looked concerned.
“Your heart rate is still a little fast.”

“
Send me back.
I need to talk to Vairya.”

“
Ask him if he
killed his city on purpose or whether it was an accident,” Meili
suggested sharply.

Reuben ignored her to
close his eyes and breathe in deeply. He felt the pinch of the
sedative again, and let the stars rise around him.