Peter Hamilton - The Mandel Files

Their descent in the tilt-fan was a long spiralling glide. Even here, where energy shortage was a totally redundant phrase, the pilot was reluctant to burn fuel. She must’ve been a European, Greg thought, obsessive conservation was drilled into EC citizens from birth.

They flattened out at the bottom of the glide and lined up on one of the big cyber-factory ships, swinging over the bow and pitching nose-up as the fans returned to the vertical. Greg read the name Oscot painted on the rusting bow in big white lettering.

The Dornier settled amidships with minimum fuss, its landing struts absorbing any jolts.

Greg tapped the pilot’s shoulder. “Smooth ride. Thanks.”

She gave him a blank look.

He shrugged and climbed out.

Sean Francis, Oscot’s manager, nominally captain, was waiting at the foot of the airstairs. He was tall and lean, dressed in a khaki shirt and shorts, with canvas-top sneakers, broad sunglasses covering his eyes.

Greg dredged his name up from Morgan Walshaw’s briefing file. Thirty-two years old, joined Event Horizon straight out of university, some sort of engineering administration degree, fully cleared for company confidential material up to grade eleven, risen fast, unblemished reputation for competence.

He reminded Greg of Victor Tyo; the resemblance wasn’t physical, but both of them had that same hard knot of urgency, polite and determined.

The security team spilled out of the tilt-fan to stand behind Greg, waiting impassively. Sean Francis looked at them with a growing frown.

“My office was told you’re here to check on our spaceflight operations, yes?” Sean Francis said. “I’m afraid I don’t understand, the Sangers are a mature system. I rather doubt their flight procedures can be improved after all this time.”

Greg produced the card Walshaw had provided, which Francis promptly waved away. “It’s not your identity I’m questioning,” he said, “merely your purpose. OK?”

“This is not the place,” Greg said quietly. “Now would you please verify my card.”

Francis held out his cybofax, and Greg showed his card to the key. There was an almost subliminal flash of ruby light as the two swapped polarized photons.

He took his time checking the authorization before nodding sadly. “I see. Perhaps my office would be a more suitable venue. Yes?”

The seven of them started down the length of the deck towards the superstructure, drawing curious glances from Oscot’s crew.

Instinct made Greg look up towards the south-west. There was a black dot expanding rapidly out of the featureless sky, losing height fast. It was a returning Sanger orbiter, curving in a long shallow arc, pitched up to profile its sable-black heatshield belly. Greg tracked its descent, working out that it would reach zero altitude right at the end of the floating runway. He held his breath.

The orbiter straightened out three hundred metres from the runway, wings levelling. It smacked down on the concrete, blue-white plumes of smoke spurting up from the undercarriage. Small rockets fired in the nose, slowing its speed.

“What if it missed?” Greg asked. The orbiters didn’t have a jet engine, they couldn’t go around.

“They don’t,” Sean Francis said.

“It’s impressive,” Morgan Walshaw admitted. “One of the biggest tekmerc deals for quite some time. We estimate thirty to thirty-five of them were assembled to turn our memox-crystal furnace operators. As far as we can tell, they started last June, and they were still recruiting until November. That kind of involvement would take kombinate-level resources.” There was a grudging note in his voice that implied respect, or even admiration.

Julia didn’t like that, the security chief was supposed to be guarding her and Grandpa, not paying compliments to their enemies. It was that bloody dividing line between the legal and illegal again, too thin, far too thin.

“So it’s impressive,” Philip Evans grunted. “So is your division’s budget, Morgan. Question is: what are you doing about it?” He was sitting at the head of the table in the study with Julia and Morgan Walshaw on either side, facing each other.

Julia would’ve liked to voice her own criticism, but didn’t quite have the nerve. Morgan Walshaw was a forbidding figure, he’d always been stern around her, as if she didn’t match up to his expectations.

“My priority at the moment is to halt the spoiler,” Walshaw said. “Thanks to Greg Mandel we’ve rounded up all the guilty furnace operators who were on their furlough. Unfortunately none of the Zanthus management personnel he interviewed were responsible for circumventing the security monitors, we have to conclude the culprit is up there now. Mandel should be able to find him without any trouble.”

“Told you that boy was just what we needed,” Philip Evans said.

Walshaw remained unperturbed by the implied criticism, his composure mechanical. “Yes. We shall have to give serious consideration to employing gland psychics in security after this. The tekmercs seem to be making good use of them.”

Julia pulled a face. Her grandfather caught it and squeezed her hand softly.

“Certainly, I believe the tekmerc team who ran the spoiler used them quite extensively on this occasion,” Walshaw went on. “We’ve been running some deep analysis on our furnace operators, and there is overwhelming evidence that the tekmerc team assembled a comprehensive profile on every one of them. Bank accounts, medical records, past employers’ personnel files, they were all sampled by the team’s hotrods. I think we’d be correct in assuming that the likely candidates were also scanned by a psychic to see if they would be susceptible in the final instance. It’s very significant that not one of the furnace operators they approached ever came to us.”

“How many did they turn?” Philip Evans asked.

“So far, we’ve nabbed fourteen, out of a total of eighty-three on furlough. Greg Mandel and Victor Tyo are due up at Zanthus tonight. Probability suggests there are between four and six- furnace operators currently in orbit who’ve been turned. We’ve done our best to make sure no news of the round-up has leaked. Not that they can run, but there is the prospect of sabotage to consider. Out of the fourteen we’ve already got, two had consented to kamikaze if they were cornered up at Zanthus.”

“Bloody hell!’ Philip shouted. “What kind of people do we employ? That’s damn near twenty per cent of them willing to sell us out at the drop of a hat!”

“It’s over now, Grandee,” Julia said in a small voice. “Please.” She bowed her head so he wouldn’t see how upset she was. It’d been a good morning for him, he’d eaten well, and he wasn’t sweating like he usually did, even his colour was almost normal. But now she could see the pink spots burning on his cheeks, showing just how badly worked up he was, which wouldn’t do his heart any good.

There were some days when she wanted it all to be over, this pain-drenched clinging to life. And that wish only brought more guilt. Psychics would be able to see that clearly. Perhaps Walshaw would hold off using them until afterwards. She, ought to have a word with him about that.

When she looked up the security chief was staring candidly out of the window.

“All right, Juliet,” her grandfather said in a calmer voice. “I’ll be good.”

She gave him a tentative smile.

“I don’t believe the crystal-furnace operatives are representative of Event Horizon personnel as a whole, nor any of the other Zanthus workers for that matter,” Walshaw said. “Theirs is an extraordinarily high-stress situation. There is an average of three fatalities a year, a significant chance of radiation poisoning, and the psychological pressures from living in such a closed environment are way above normal. Those factors came out time and again from all the interviewees.”