War Games (25 page)

Smooth sinusoidal tracks already wound down the glacier, but there was still untracked snow between them. We launched ourselves over a cornice and began making our own S-turns. The snow was about a meter deep and was still light and fluffy. Tall roostertails rose behind us. On the forward half of a turn, the snow would puff into a cloud around my body, blinding me momentarily, before I burst through. It was quite exhilarating: skis swishing, snow rustling against my body, seeing the domes of Atlas far below. Clouds hung like fat snakes behind us, marking our passage.

I pulled up on a small rise about a thousand meters down the glacier. Grychn halted beside me.

“This is great,” she said. “It’s been a long time since I’ve had fun.” She smiled behind her O
2
bubble.

I returned her smile.

Then I heard the swish of skis uphill. I looked up. A skier burst out of a cloud of snow right above me, swooped by, and brushed me with her hip as she passed. I watched a fine figure bobbing up and down as she cut tight S-turns. I’d just glimpsed her face, but something about it disturbed me—jade-green eyes, hair as black as space, lips gleaming blood red. Then I remembered where I’d seen that face before—at Telluride. And I remembered her name—Michele Kramr. The same Kramr? She must have been. But Kramr couldn’t have followed us to Iapetus. The skier must be someone else. Just a close resemblance. But I had to be sure.

I took off after her. She was a good skier, but then Kramr had been an expert also. I pressed hard with my toes, turning my skis to max grav to increase my rate of descent. I sat back on them, so they floated on top of the snow, reducing drag. I slowly gained on the woman.

She looked back. Faint laughter came to me. She increased her speed.

I cut back and forth through her wake, not gaining much ground on her now. I was skiing out of control—I would crash eventually if I didn’t slow down.

She saved me the trouble. I saw her lose her balance. She was sitting too far back on her skis—the tails slipped out sideways beneath her, sending her sprawling on her backside in a cloud of snow. I leaned forward to slow my descent and then cut a couple of turns before finally coming to a stop below the woman. She was buried under snow,

I wondered what I’d do if it was Kramr. I had no weapon with me. Maybe she wasn’t armed. I still remembered the twenty-three ways. Skis would make it twenty-four.

A form moved beneath the snow. One arm came out, then another. She sat up. Snow fell away from her face. Blue eyes regarded mine. Strands of yellow hair peeked out from a stocking hood. I had never seen her before.

“Do I know you?” she asked.

“I think not, I mistook you for someone else. Sorry.”

She smiled. “That’s OK.” She stood up. Her skis had not released from their bindings. “I think I would like to get to know you.” She looked up the hill. Grychn approached. “I party at the Critical Mass. Maybe I’ll see you there some time.” She smiled. “Don’t bring your friend, though.” Then she was off again, skiing down the glacier, her fine ass bobbing up and down as she made her turns.

Grychn stopped above me, showering me with snow. “Who’s she?” Her voice was strained.

“Nobody. I thought she was someone else. She was nobody at all.”

“Good. “ Her voice laughed. “I’m glad she was someone else. “

We finished that run and made several more that afternoon.

Then we ate dinner in our room, and made love in front of the fire afterward.

With sleep, the dreams came to me again.

* * *

I woke with Grychn holding me close.

“You shouted in your sleep,” she said. “Quite bloodcurdling. What were you dreaming?”

I tried to make fleeting images hold still in my mind. I couldn’t. They melted away like cool water seeping into hot sand. Memory of them was fragmented. But still disturbing.

“I’m not sure,” I answered. “Something about my parents. And my brothers. I kept seeing Henri hanging Robrt and me. Only sometimes I switched places with Henri. When I was the hangman, I had two other victims.” I closed my eyes, trying to push away the faces of Trinks and Vichsn with bulging eyes, protruding tongues. And sometimes Grychn took Vichsn’s place. I didn’t tell her that.

“I wonder why you should have that dream?”

“I don’t know.” I kept my suspicions to myself.

“Whatever happened to Henri?”

“I don’t know that, either. When they took him away, they gave him a new identity to go with his new memories. Although I can’t be sure, I suspect he went to the Combrid Corps instead of the cyborg factories—otherwise they wouldn’t have bothered to give him a new psyche. And the Corps likes young recruits—they’re more malleable. A lot of combrids have synthetic pasts. No one can be entirely sure of his memories. I suspect Henri died on one of the garrison worlds—maybe he was a hero. Who knows?”

“The timestone is making you dream, isn’t it?”

“I suppose.”

“We can still leave.”

“I can’t. Not yet.”

“Then go back to sleep. I’ll hold you.”

I closed my eyes. I felt the timestone calling to me in strange songs, eerie music. And when at last I slept, it again inserted images into my mind to disturb my dreamtune.

I saw my own death mask again.

I should have guessed the truth then; I’d been given all the hints.

But I didn’t.

Truth was harder than that to find.

THE NEXT MORNING,
we
got up late. I couldn’t get my body out of bed early—I kept falling back to sleep. I’d wanted to leave Atlas that day, but decided against it because we’d be making such a late start.

I spent what was left of the morning packing the skimmer I’d rented with the gear from Grychn’s gravship—combat armor, battle packs, assault rifles, extra ammo, even a spare minimissile I’d found. You’d think we were going into battle. Maybe we were. Anyway, everything got packed and was ready.

I planned to leave first thing the next morning.

That afternoon we went skiing again. I didn’t see the woman I’d mistaken for Kramr. We had fun skiing. I was glad we’d delayed our departure. The fun would soon be over. Running an empire would be work.

Grychn wanted to go out for dinner that night. She suggested the Critical Mass, the nightclub on top of EI Diente. I could see no reason not to go.

Our liftube rode past sheer cliffs of ice to the three-thousand-meter summit of EI Diente. Jets of plasma squirted into space like a giant fountain, or the prelude to an eruption if the mountain was volcanic, which it was not. The plasma came from the thruster nozzles of a fuship ore freighter that had crashed on the summit a century earlier, when Atlas was a mining town and spaceships still flew with the raw energies of fusion. No one had bothered to remove the wreckage after the cargo of radioactive isotopes had been salvaged. When Atlas had become a resort, an enterprising businessman converted the wreck into a nightclub and recharged the fusion engine, using stripped nuclei spewing out of nozzles as a beacon to attract business. So I’d read in a brochure in our hotel room. Sounded interesting enough. Everyone had a sense of nostalgia for the wild energies of the days before gravships.

I felt a little thrill of excitement as we stepped out of the foyer of the liftube into the Critical Mass. I’d seen lots of holos about the days of fusion rockets. Sailors had been fragile men then, not hybrids. The energies had been untamed at that time.

I wasn’t disappointed. A clear dome had been constructed around the wreck, which had plowed into the mountain nose-first. At the center of everything was the fusion thruster: coils of superconductor surrounded a ceramic core, creating a magnetic bottle to hold the extreme pressures and temperatures necessary to fuse hydrogen nuclei into helium. A low throbbing came from the thruster and permeated the rest of the Critical Mass—a whisper of the song sung by dying stars. The fuship’s jets protruded from the vertex of the dome. Streams of plasma roared from the nozzles, cutting deep into night. Thermonuclear fire glowed throughout the crystal dome, like angry corposant. Transparent decks divided the dome into three levels.

A hostess handed us each a radiation badge to pin on our chests. This touch of verisimilitude charmed us. Another hostess showed us to a table. Cargo pods had been converted into dining rooms. At the center of each table was a radium candle, which cast flickering blue light on lead-foil tablecloths.

The menus were printed on mylar sheets clipped between aluminum covers stenciled with “Decontamination Manual.” The fare consisted of Strontium
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Steaks, Radon Relishes, Cesium
20
Crepes. You get the picture.

Grychn smiled, appearing like a specter in radioactive blue light. “Isn’t this adorable?”

“A little camp.”

“Quaint. Rustic. And adorable. I love it. Makes you realize how crazy those early sailors and miners were. They all died of radiation poisoning eventually.” Her eyes gleamed blue in radium light.

Our waiter wore an antique decon suit complete with helmet and heavy lead gauntlets. I was surprised he could serve us at all in such an outfit. His dexterity in doing so amazed me.

The food was quite ordinary, but they did serve a passable claret. We had two bottles with dinner. Then there was absinthe after dinner. Then brandy after coffee. I overindulged. Especially the absinthe. I felt all warm inside.

War seemed very far away indeed. I had almost forgotten about the timestone.

So when Grychn wanted to try the casino, I agreed.

It was just like old times there. No matter what game we played, we won: craps, roulette, faro, blackjack. We could have won all night. Fortunately, I noticed a croupier staring at us, and had enough sense to quit before she became suspicious.

We went down one deck to the dance floor and took a table on the periphery.

Grychn heaped a pile of chips on the table between us. “The timestone?” She moved them around with her finger.

“I’m afraid so. Its power must be awesome if my mind can make it work from this far away.” For the first time, I began to feel a little bit afraid.

Grychn laughed. “At least it has some practical advantages.” She paused. “Come on, let’s dance.”

I let her pull me out on the dance floor, even though I detested dancing.

A huge singing diamond hung directly above. Optical music swirled from its facets and floated over the dance floor, before slowly sinking to become tangled among dancers. The dance fioor was crowded. Sweat glistened from naked skin. Jewelry glittered. Silver and gold shone. Tendrils of music tangled among us like singing spiderwebs.

Then I saw a face I remembered and thought I would never see again. Copper eyes laughed above haughty cheekbones. Hair like carbon wool cascaded over naked shoulders. Jain Maure danced across the room from me! What was Dr. Pepper doing on Iapetus? That was too much of a coincidence to accept.

I crossed the dance floor, forcing my way through naked bodies bound up in strands of music. Faces laughed at me. Fingers touched, clinging to my hands, wanting me to touch them. I flung them away. Discordant harmonies hurt my ears as I broke the wires of song. I tried to keep my eyes on Jain Maure so I wouldn’t lose her in the crowd.

She had turned her back to me. But I kept sight of her hair.

As I approached she turned. But it was not Jain Maure. A vague similarity, no more. And the eyes were green.

Then I understood.

Chameleons could wear any face, but familiar patterns were easier.

I knew who had followed me to Iapetus.

I turned around and went back the way I’d come. Grychn waited for me.

“Marc, what’s wrong? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

I had. But there wasn’t time to explain. I grabbed her hand and pulled her along behind me. We left the dance floor, also leaving behind a fortune in casino chips. We ran to the foyer and jumped into the down liftube, floating three thousand meters to the valley floor. There, we took another tube to the lot where our rented skimmer was parked. I couldn’t take a chance and go back to our room. It might be watched. The skimmer might also be under surveillance. That was a chance I had to take.

We climbed in.

I was glad everything was packed. But then, I’d suspected we might need to make a quick getaway.

As soon as we strapped in and the doors closed, I gunned the skimmer into flight. I headed east, into the Rocky Mountains, hoping to confuse any pursuit. I kept the skimmer a few meters off the ground, hugging the sides of mountains. We’d gone a hundred klicks into the Rockies before I let myself believe there wasn’t any pursuit. But there wasn’t any. I slowed the skimmer down to a sane speed.

“What’s the big hurry?” Grychn asked. But she knew.

I told her anyway. “Kramr was at the Critical Mass tonight. He followed us here. If we don’t hurry, he’ll find the timestone before we do.” I watched her closely for her reaction. I was beginning to suspect something.

She turned her eyes away. “Let him find it. Let him carry its curse.”

“You know what would happen then. He’d use it as a weapon. How long do you think your elf friends would stay in business if the spooks had the timestone? Not very long, I’ll bet.”

“Let’s not argue. Go find your timestone if that’s what you want.”

“That’s what I want.”

I turned the skimmer and headed in a circular course back toward the Ice Mountains. I wanted to make a wide berth of Atlas. No sense tempting fate. The skimmer was equipped with excellent navigation instruments. The rental agency didn’t want their customers getting lost. Transmitters were located on strategic peaks. A computer-triangulated fix was a snap.

Before morning, Mt. Themis stood before us, all ten thousand meters of him. Sunshine Peak stood next to him like a younger sister. A steep canyon separated them. Somewhere up that canyon a mine shaft had been drilled into the side of Mt. Themis.

The timestone waited for me there. I felt its call growing stronger in my mind.

I parked the skimmer as far up the canyon as I could land it, on the last flat spot. It settled into a meter of snow. Stars shone steady in a black sky, but orange fire glowed on the eastern horizon. It would be light soon.

“Here we are,” I said. “Are you coming with me, or do you want to wait?”

“I’nI going with you,” she said, simply.

We pulled on combat armor and ski boots, then climbed out of the skimmer before shouldering battle packs and putting on our skis. I hung an assault rifle from a chest sling, and felt silly doing so. We had not been followed. There wasn’t anyone else within a hundred klicks. I had acquired nasty habits. My helmet thermometer read a hundred below. A brisk morning on Iapetus.

Sunlight shone from the summit of Mt. Themis, glaring brightly from hydrocarbon ice. A line of light crept down sheer ice cliffs. Snow that had recondensed that night still drifted gently to ground.

The canyon ran directly west for about thirty klicks, ending in a high pass between the two summits. Several side canyons opened into it. Actually, they were snow chutes—snow that gradually accumulated on the steep mountainsides eventually became unstable from thawing and freezing and crashed down to the canyon’s bottom in an avalanche. Over millions of years, troughs had been carved into the canyon walls along natural slide paths. Somewhere up that canyon was my timestone. I wasn’t going to get it by standing around enjoying the scenery.

“Ready?” I asked Grychn.

“I guess so.” Her voice spoke in my mind. There was no reason not to use e-wave transmissions here.

We began skiing up the canyon. Small thrusters were mounted on our skis just behind the boot heels, and were plugged into the cybernetic systems of our suits. Like any other servo, they were under conscious control. Thrust was varied by willing it so. The skis were surplus from the Tenth Mountain Division, who were garrisoned in the mountains of Mars. But they worked just as well on hydrocarbon snow as powdered carbon dioxide.

Our skis floated on the surface of the snow as we coasted along at thirty kilometers an hour. Roostertails rose behind us. Falling snow rattled against my visor. We were as quiet as ice wraiths and almost invisible in the falling snow. Two pairs of ski tracks were the only evidence of our passage.

“Do you know where it is?” Grychn asked.

“Not exactly. I’ll know when we get there. I can feel the stone calling to me.” And its urgings grew ever stronger.

The canyon rose steeply in two dimensions, along the bottom and from both sides. Rock and ice towered over us. Snowfields lay in high basins, separated from each other by ridges of jagged rock. Sunlight sparkled from snowdrifts in the high pass. As morning deepened, the snow stopped falling. Gradually the sky became deep orange as hydrocarbons once more sublimed into a thin atmosphere. Stars dimmed overhead in a glowing sky.

Trickles of pentane and hexane dripped from cliff walls warmed by the sun.

I felt wonderful. The goal I’d set for myself was almost within reach. We were tracking virgin powder a meter deep, in a region as desolate and undisturbed as one was likely to find. We looked splendid in battle dress—like images formed in swirling mist. Soon the Terran Empire would fall into anarchy, as the Lords of Earth lost their control to entropic forces. Someone would be needed to put the pieces back together. May as well be me. I was ready to start an empire. Emperor Detrs, the First. I liked the sound of it. Images came to my mind. I became lost in pleasant reverie. It never occurred to me the daydream originated anywhere but in my own head.

I should have been paying more attention to business. I should have noticed a flash and a puff of smoke on the mountainside. My sensors should have tracked a silver trajectory.

Grychn’s yell intruded into my fantasy. “Marc! Look up there!”

I got a glimpse of a frozen face, then pushed it away and let my mind perceive what my eyes were seeing. Grychn was pointing to the right. The mouth of a snow chute opened into the canyon beside us. That didn’t concern me. What bothered me was what was going on at the head of the chute. A hundred-meter wall of ice and snow was churning down from the basin there. An old-fashioned avalanche. The only thing missing was the roar of a thousand oceans all at once. But sound didn’t carry well on Iapetus.

Not that there was time to be impressed by natural phenomena. In a few seconds, tons of frozen hydrocarbon and ammonia would tumble into the bottom of the canyon, burying Grychn and me. The death mask flashed in my mind again. Was this how it was going to be? Had the timestone let me get this close, only to let me freeze to death at its doorstep?