Iain Banks - Against a Dark Background

They heard what sounded like gunfire just as they were setting off again; a distance-dulled crackle that seemed to come from further down the fjord in the direction they were heading.

They ran to the shore and stood there, gazing down the fjord.

“Shit,” Miz said. “Wonder what that means?”

Nobody suggested anything.

They had been walking for about an hour when they saw Feril jogging towards them through the trees.

“Welcome back,” Zefla said. Sharrow just stood there, smiling at the android.

“Thank you,” Feril said. It still had the dials and the laser they had given it; it presented both to Zefla.

“So?” Miz asked it.

“I have been to the end of the fjord,” the android began.

“Let’s walk and listen at the same time, eh?” Zefla said.

They hiked on; Feril walked backwards in front of them without once putting a foot wrong, which was an unsettling but also rather impressive sight.

“The ground between here and the end of the fjord,” it told them, “is similar to that you have already traversed. There are two sizeable streams to be crossed, one of which has a fallen tree across it and so is quite easy, the second of which is more difficult and has to be waded. There is a place where one must either cross a very exposed beach only a kilometre or so from a point on the far side, or make a four or five kilometre detour round some cliffs.”

“What did you do?” Zefla asked.

“On my outward journey,” Feril told her. “I crossed the beach without incident; on my return I again started to cross the beach. But then I was fired upon.” Its upper body did a quarter turn to show a bullet graze on one shoulder. It kept on walking. “I returned fire with the laser pistol but then decided that my position was too exposed, and entered the water. I completed that part of the journey crawling along just under the ford’s surface.”

Zefla smiled. Miz shook his head. Dloan looked vaguely impressed. Sharrow just blinked and said, “Hmm.”

“Where is this beach?” Dloan asked.

“About ten kilometres from here.”

Dloan nodded. “We heard the gunfire.”

“So they’re that much further ahead?” Zefla said.

“I believe only a sniper has been left on the point opposite the beach,” Feril said. “I think I saw the main body of the Solipsists earlier, about another three kilometres further down the fjord, ferrying themselves across the mouth of a side-fjord in an inflatable boat. I attempted to fire on the boat, but the range was approximately four kilometres and I was not able to observe any effect.”

Dloan shook his head understandingly.

“So,” Miz said, “what have we got to look forward to apart from finding the Solipsists there first?”

“There are no more major obstacles after the beach I mentioned, though there is a small hill to be climbed, avoiding a cliff which is sheer to the water. The end of the fjord has many small islands and rocks, starting from about ten kilometres or so from its head; I believe these are why the flying boat did not simply land immediately. The end of the fjord is quite sudden; there is no significant narrowing, just the islands and then an almost straight length of shore in front of a marshy plain, which looks as though it is the result of land reclamation.

“The Gun is, I believe, in a stone tower. The tower is approximately fifteen metres high and seven metres in diameter and topped with a hemispherical black dome of indeterminate substance. It stands in the centre of a stone square about fifty metres to a side; the square has a circular wall half a metre high built upon it which just touches the mid-point of each edge of the square, and a metre-high stone post at each corner. A small river delta forms the far boundary of the square; on this side there is a field of tall rushes.

“The stone tower is surrounded by numerous human bodies, pieces of equipment and debris; these are mostly within the circular stone wall. From the state of decay involved, I would estimate that some of the bodies and pieces of debris have been there for many decades. The most recent bodies in the vicinity appear to be those of two young men I took to be Solipsists by their uniforms. Both bodies were attached to parachutes; one lay against the inside of the circular wall, his parachute snagged on a small tree just outside the square; the other parachutist appeared to have been dragged for some distance through the rushes before being stopped by rocks, and I was able to determine that he had been killed by some form of laser device which had removed his head. It had also left a hole in his chest and another in his groin, consistent with a sixty-millimetre beam. I deduced that the dome on top of the tower housed such a device, perhaps along with the concomitant detection and tracking equipment it would require.”

“Amazing deduction,” muttered Miz. He glanced at Sharrow but she didn’t seem to have heard.

“I noticed,” Feril continued, “that the few birds which overflew the area kept well away from the tower, though there were avian bodies of various species distributed around it, along with those of numerous small animals. Insects appeared to be tolerated. I conducted a brief experiment with pieces of wood, and found that anything moving within twenty-five metres of the centre of the tower with a frontal area greater than approximately two square centimetres will be attacked by the tower’s defences. I believe this to be a powerful X-ray laser, though the beam used on the pieces of wood I threw into this zone was considerably smaller than those which had killed the two Solipsist parachutists. I also noticed that when the dead parachutist resting against the inside of the wall moved-when his parachute was caught by a gust of wind-the beam that hit him was narrow and attenuated, and one of several dozen or so which had seemingly hit him after his death while he was presumably in the same state of morbid mobility.”

“Well,” Sharrow said. “Sounds good news and bad.” She looked distracted, grimacing as she rubbed at her left glove. “Let’s assume whatever’s in the tower is… intact, but-”

“But how the hell do we get in when nobody else has?” Miz said, kicking at a rotten branch in his way.

“Ah,” the android said. It held up one finger. “I mentioned the stone posts at each corner of the square.”

“Yes?” Zefla said.

“Beneath a cover on the top of each post,” Feril said, “there is a hand-lock plate; a security device in the shape of a doublethumbed hand. From their construction I would say that they are designed to react to some chemical or genetic trigger rather than the more usual handprint-pattern. At least two of these posts appear to be operational, the other two having been partially dismantled. All four bear the legend, ‘Female Line’.”

Sharrow stopped; they all did.

Zefla looked at her. “Sounds like Gorko again,” she said. “Might just switch the thing off for you, eh, kid?”

Sharrow was staring at her feet. Then she looked up at Zefla and seemed to shake, and then smiled and nodded. “Yes,” she said. She gazed at her left hand, holding it awkwardly. “Yes, it might.”

“So even if the Solipsists do get there first,” Miz said, “they won’t be able to do anything.”

“Yeah,” Zefla said. “But if they do get there before we do, they can make it impossible for us to do anything either.”

Sharrow swayed, blinking, trying to think. There was something else, too. So hard to think.

Zefla looked at Feril. “When will you have to set off if you’re to rendezvous with the sub?”

(Yes, that’s it, Sharrow thought.)

“In about thirty hours,” Feril said.

Zefla nodded, looking at Sharrow. “Onward?” she asked.