Read The Dark Imbalance Online
Authors: Sean Williams,Shane Dix
Tags: #Science Fiction, #Fiction, #Space Opera
The Dark Imbalance (10 page)
The authorities believed her story about a clash between rival mercenaries. Using her EEPC pass, she was on the tug within the hour, and back on
Kindling
an hour after that.
* * *
She shrugged noncommittally. He knew damn well it hadn’t, she guessed, and that ate at her. She was no better off than she had been the day before. But it was only a matter of time before she found someone suitable for her needs. There were many other places to look, and she would have plenty of other opportunities to do so while she followed Roche across the system.
Kindling’s
engines hummed softly through the walls of its cramped cockpit. In a way, she was glad to be on her own. Relying on other people was dangerous, albeit a necessary danger at times. It was much better, she’d always thought, to have them rely on you....
<1 hope you know what you’re doing, Page,> said Trezise across the expanding distance between the two ships—one as large as a good-sized moon, the other barely a speck. There was still no emotion in the man’s voice.
There was a slight pause.
it,> she snapped.
he said, with the barest hint of dryness in his voice.
didn’t wipe those records. Someone else did. Someone’s covering up. The same someone who got in the way when I tried to stop her. The same someone who sacked me.>
Trezise sighed heavily.
<1 think you’re paranoid,> he said. believe
you’re making sense.>
He acknowledged this with a nod of the head.
She shook her head. Trezise enjoyed arguing for the sake of it; she shouldn’t let him get her worked up so easily.
is. Did you know that the Heresiarch has advised all council vessels to avoid traveling in or near the ring after a probe found evidence of nanoware in the dust?>
he said, cutting her short. <1 know how much it means to you.> He almost seemed to smile as he added:
Then he was gone, leaving De Bruyn half-smiling to herself. Trezise annoyed her, but he played a good game. She’d rather have one single adversary like him than ten allies of Uyeno Lenz’s ilk. Not that Trezise
was
an adversary, she hoped.
Following the
Ana Vereine’s
trace at a discreet distance, she drilled deeper into the nugget of data Trezise had given her. What she found did little to put her mind at ease, and what she
didn’t
find only added to her frustration. If only, she thought, she could get at the data directly and not worry about elements of corruption along the way. Or better yet, get her hands on
Roche
, and extract the data in a way that would leave no doubt at all....
PART TWO:
PERDUE
5
AVS-44 955.1.30
1100
Roche let Kajic pilot the scutter while she watched their new companion break dock. Defender-of-Harmony Vri flew a compact rapid fighter that looked like a cross between a throwing-star and a dagger. Roche didn’t recognize it as a Surin military ship. Their designs were normally more hospitable. Only when the craft were attacked did they sprout numerous means of retaliation, suddenly taking on a more aggressive look.
Back on the
Phlegethon,
the warrior had spoken barely a dozen words to Roche before turning and moving off to where his ship was docked.
“Does he have a first name?” Roche had asked Nemeth, staring at the back of the receding warrior. On the back of his lightly furred skull was a triangle of darker hair, pointed upward like an arrowhead. Whether it was natural or dyed, Roche couldn’t tell; and she wasn’t about to ask him in a hurry, either. His wide-spaced, dark eyes had discouraged any personal questions.
“Not that I’m aware of,” Nemeth had replied. “Or Vri might be it. Like your friend here, he doesn’t seem to have a family name.”
“Which would make him a renegade, right?”
Roche caught an image from the girl of something that looked anything
but
harmonious. “So he’s a fanatic?”
Roche couldn’t argue with that. When introduced, Vri had nodded to Roche and Maii in turn and said: “I will defer to your instructions unless they conflict with the directives given to me by the Agora.”
She could tell he would be a force to be reckoned with. Even from a distance he looked intimidating, with his sheer size—strange for his Caste—and the strange orange and yellow overlapping garments the Surin called ceremonial armor. It looked more like some sort of thick fungus.
“Is he any relation to Fighter-for-Peace Jancin Xumai?” she asked, thinking of the Surin who had threatened them earlier.
“Maybe,” Nemeth said with a shrug. “We don’t know exactly how many Surin there are in the system,” he had said. “There could be numerous factions. You’d be more familiar than we are with how they operate.”
The air-car had waited patiently for him while they talked. Vischilglin was watching silently and suspiciously on the sidelines. Roche had half expected Nemeth to say something more, but he obviously felt constrained by the woman’s presence. He had bowed at Roche and Maii in turn, then climbed back into his seat.
“Perhaps we will meet again,” he said.
“Perhaps.” Roche didn’t return his wave as the air-car sped off along the curving floor.
“I must apologize for him,” said Vischilglin. “If his behavior offended you—”
“No, it’s all right.” Roche suddenly felt sorry for the woman. If her hopes had been as high as Maii had said, then acting as Roche’s guide must have been something of an honor. To see that hope dashed, then have that honor usurped by someone else, must have been disappointing.
Taking Vischilglin’s hands in her own, Roche pressed them to her forehead, in the same way Vischilglin had done when they first met. “Thank you for your hospitality,” she said. “I will do my best to prove that your faith in me was warranted.”
Vischilglin looked in turn confused and embarrassed, then relieved. Then she smiled warmly. “Thank you, Morgan Roche. And you.” She bowed to Maii. “My thoughts go with you.”
She turned and walked away, leaving Roche and Maii to make their own way through the airlock doors and into the scutter. The same terse traffic controller as before guided them out of the dock in the same perfunctory manner, adding almost as an afterthought once they were clear: “Weryn guide you and keep you safe.”
Vri’s ship rapidly overtook the scutter, darting through space on jets of blue energy.
“How do you feel about him, Maii?”
Roche shook her head. “But they
sold
you,” she said. “Surely that’s just an excuse to get a look inside your head.”
believes only what he’s been told. He is very traditional and holds the Agora in high regard, as one would expect of anyone in the military. But how he came to be here, working with the Ulterior, I don’t know. His thoughts do not reveal whether he thinks it an honor or a punishment.>
“Maybe it’s neither,” said Roche. “Maybe it’s simply a chance to prove himself, an opportunity for advancement.”
“That could hardly be regarded as harmonious.”
Roche couldn’t argue with that....
* * *
By the time the scutter docked with the
Ana Vereine,
Vri had placed the
Esperance
in formation nearby. Roche and Maii went straight to the bridge to debrief the others, and to open communications with the Surin warrior.
“I don’t like it,” said Haid. “He’s potentially dangerous.”
“His ship is no match for ours,” she said. “Would you agree, Uri?”
“Without question. If he tried to attack, he would be disabled or destroyed with little effort.”
“But if he catches us off guard—” Haid began.
“He won’t.” Kajic’s voice was firm. “His every move is being monitored.”
“But—”
“Enough,” said Roche. “There’s no point arguing about this. We can’t do anything about it right now, so let’s just accept that we’re stuck with him and get on with it.”
A signal came from the angular craft and Kajic put it through to the main screen.
“Commander Roche.” Vri’s elongated face was fuzzy with tightbeam static and hair. “I am instructed to accompany you on your journey and to lend assistance where I see fit. In order to do this, I will need notice of your destinations
and
intentions. I trust this will not be a contentious issue.”
“Of course not,” she said. “But as far as my ‘destinations and intentions’ go, I haven’t thought that far ahead.”
“Assistant Vice Primate Nemeth instructed me to advise you of the communication channels used by the Ulterior, and to ask you to call him immediately. A description of how to contact him accompanies this message.”
Roche looked up at Kajic’s hologram. “Got it,” he said after a momentary pause.
“Thanks,” she said, turning back to Vri. “We’ll call him now.”
The Surin warrior nodded slightly. “When you have decided what to do next, I may be contacted on this frequency.”
He disconnected the line before Roche had a chance to say anything else. She shrugged and addressed the hologram once again. “Kajic, open a line to the Ulterior.”
“Doing so now, Morgan,” he said.
“I presume this will be a secure line?” she said.
“The content of the transmissions is encrypted, yes, but the transmissions themselves are not hidden. Signals in both directions travel in the same way the
Phlegethon
communicates with its ftl drones.”
“As though we have nothing to hide, eh?” Roche could see the reasoning, but she didn’t feel entirely comfortable with it. “I hope they’re right...”
“Ah, Roche.” Nemeth’s voice and image simultaneously burst from the main screen. “Glad to see you received my message in good faith.”
She was in no mood for pleasantries. “Are you sure this is the best way to talk to each other?”
“No method of communication would be a hundred percent safe from prying ears,” he said. “But this is certainly the safest option at our disposal right now. Just as I cannot possibly hope to safeguard against every security breach, so too are they—”
“Okay, okay,” said Roche. “Just tell me what it is you’ve got to say. I presume you’re going to tell me what you want me to do.”
“More or less,” he said, smiling at her impatience. “Rather than wandering all over the system in the hope of stumbling across something useful, we feel you would be better served having your own area to investigate. A file will follow this conversation; it maps out that area for you. Obviously it will change as ships arrive and leave, but it’s a starting point. I have listed all major known Castes and alliances, and marked key congregation points. Infiltrate them and see what you can find, then move on to the next site. Report back as you are able.”
“Anything else?” she asked, not even attempting to disguise her irritability. She listened to Nemeth with a growing sense of unease. She was becoming a lackey again, a pawn in someone else’s game—something she thought she’d left behind with Intelligence HQ.
“You know the score, Roche,” he said, suddenly serious. “Our main objective is to deal with the enemy, but first we have to know how to
find
them. There has to be a way of determining who they are—a test of some kind that can apply to
all
of them, collectively rather than just as individuals. Your reave might be able to help with that: if the enemy does possess a unique n-body signature, that might be a way we can distinguish between them and us. Our reaves have had no success at seeing what you’ve reported, but that doesn’t mean you might not have better luck.”
Roche nodded. “And once we have found a means of doing this, what then? How do you propose we deal with them?”
His shrug was both heavy and helpless. “That’s a completely different issue,” he replied. “And one we will address at a later date. But the matter of where they come from might assist us in this, just as why they’re here might help us work out where to find them. They
must
be communicating somehow, so if you can work that out too, that would be excellent.” There was a slight pause as the signal broke up momentarily. “Oh, and see if you can find out why so much energy is being wasted talking about you, too. The
Lucence-2
gives us a direct link between one of the enemy and the propagation of your name; it would be foolish to ignore the possible ramifications of this link. Clearly your Box wouldn’t have kept you alive for so long if it too didn’t have some sort of plans for you.”
The mention of the Box threw her for a second. “I thought you didn’t think the Box was important.”
“Me? I said nothing of the sort. Even the council isn’t so stupid as to ignore what it knows to be true—although it denies it in public. We’ve had some dealings with High Humans in the past months and years, but not as many as we would like. Two in particular—Aquareii and the Catiph—were quite frank until they suddenly stopped communicating with us.” He paused again, as if in thought. “It’s common knowledge in some circles that High Humans limit or actively suppress AI technology—except when it suits them, of course. That the Crescend runs a factory in Commonwealth space where you obtained this mysterious Box only supports your theory that it is somehow important.”
“
Was
important” she corrected.
He shrugged again. “Anyway, one can only wonder what it would have thought of your situation now.”
Privately she agreed, and promised to deal with that question as soon as possible.
“Is there anything else you’d like of me?” she said.
He either missed the sarcasm or didn’t care. “That will be enough for now, I think. We can call each other another time, should something dramatic occur or some important need arise; otherwise we’ll just get on separately with our work. Agreed?”
Again, she had little choice. “Agreed.”
“Good. Until then...” With a curt nod he was gone.
Roche turned to face Haid and Cane, watching from the sidelines.
“I’m liking this situation even less, now,” said Haid.
“It’s better than nothing,” she said. “We need
some
sort of contact with the council. At least this way we have a chance of making headway.”
“Covert organizations can operate more effectively than their parent bodies,” said Cane. “They can respond to changes more rapidly, and can work in areas prohibited to officials. I believe that this is a good sign, Morgan. Working for the council, you would have been just one agent among many; your voice could have been lost. Now you have a greater chance of gaining the attention of the entire Ulterior, and in time the council itself. Now, I believe we will start to make progress.”
She couldn’t remember the last time he had shown such enthusiastic support for one of her decisions. Her satisfaction was tempered only by the part of her that wondered if he was telling the truth.
“Well,
I hope you’re right, Cane, and Ameidio is
wrong. No offense.” She smiled at the ex-mercenary, who shrugged affably back. “Maybe we should look at the file Nemeth gave us, to see where we’re supposed to go.”
Kajic displayed a map on the main screen. It showed the entirety of Sol System, as mapped by the
Phlegethon’
s network of ftl drones over the previous days, with particular attention to a region beyond the planetary ring, one hundred and fifty million kilometers out from Sol. There, a moderately large collection of ships and habitats had gathered, including—if Roche wasn’t mistaken—no less than five outrigger spines. Someone must have piggybacked them into the system, since they didn’t use hyper-space technology. But why they were here at all, Roche didn’t know; the system itself didn’t even have an asteroid belt. She wondered if Nemeth had given her this region because she had worked with outriggers before. Certainly, there didn’t seem to be any other reason.
“What does the file say about the people here?” she asked.
“There’s a wide mix,” said Kajic. “Some extremely Exotic Castes and some Pristines, with numerous variations in between. Some Castes segregate except to negotiate; others mix freely. There are three mobile habitats around which most of the activity takes place; the largest of these is called Perdue. There has been word of fighting from its vicinity, and remote observations of weapon-use. This is to be our first destination.”