Charles Stross - Halting State

It’s Zonespace, and there’s a city here, a city built on the glacier-rasped basalt plug of an extinct volcano. Huge lumps of steep granite rear from the pine-forested flanks of a huge loch, and the swampy slopes down to a rough timber-crafted coastal harbour in which galleons and triremes swing at anchor. Someone’s obviously been having fun with a bunch of historical maps, because you recognize bits of it from context—a huge castle looming from the top of a basalt spine, a proud royal palace sprawling at the opposite end of the Royal Mile—but you’re pretty certain the real Dunedin never had a mangrove swamp where now the railway station sits, nor was there a rain forest in Leith or an Aztec step-pyramid out by the Gyle.

But that’s all by the by. You’ve got an army of hundreds and a sword in your hand (not to mention snakes in your hair) and a job to do of killing every Orc you can see, repeatedly, until they stop coming back from the dead. Maybe it’s going to work out, you think. Now all I need to do is figure out how to run god mode in SPOOKS and establish a perimeter. And so you flip back to the desktop and log in to the call-centre application Michaels gave you , just as the office door opens.

You’re watching over Elaine’s shoulder to see if she’s got the hang of riding the horde of zombie griefers you’ve just unleashed, which is why you’re puzzled in the extreme when she zips out of the game interface and flips over to the laptop’s other screen to start messing with some other application. “What are you—” doing? you begin to say, as the door opens and you look round expecting to see Sergeant Smith or her big goon of a trainee, and instead find yourself looking at Marcus Hackman, who is staring at you with an expression of concentrated loathing that is rendered even more frightening by what he’s pointing at you: an extremely illegal black-market automatic pistol.

“Don’t move,” he says. “Keep your hands where I can see them. Both of you,” he adds, as Elaine begins to turn round to see what’s going on—her back is to the door. He steps sideways, out of the doorway, and kicks it shut, keeping his back to the wall.

What the fuck? you think, a sick, sinking sensation loosening your guts. A lot of things come into abrupt focus. Hackman is wearing his usual expensive suit, but he hasn’t shaved recently, and his normally lacquered hair-style is giving way to minor chaos, strands and tufts out of place. His left shoe, highly polished, has a scuff mark on its toe. And the gun, a Yarygin PYa if you’re any judge of such things (and you swallowed the Zone Weapons Bible whole during your probationary period, lo those many years ago, as young men are wont to do) has seen better days since it fell off the back of a Russian army lorry and into the hands of some blacknet-connected mafiya scumbag.

“Mr. Reed. If you don’t do exactly as I say, I shall shoot Ms. Barnaby. Ms. Barnaby, if you disobey an instruction, I shall shoot Mr. Reed. If you understand what I’m saying, you may nod.”

You swallow and make like a parcel-shelf ornament. After a momentary hesitation, Elaine does likewise. The small of your back is chilly with perspiration.

“Very good,” says Hackman, as if he’s speaking to a small child. “Where’s your phone, Ms. Barnaby? Quickly.”

“In my hip pocket,” she says, again hesitating slightly.

“Good. Ms. Barnaby, when I finish talking, I want you to take Mr. Reed’s phone—there on the desk—and without standing up I want you to drop it in the trash can.” The bin is under the desk, between your right leg and her left. “Do it.”

Shit. You watch as she reaches across you with her left arm and takes your mobie from where it’s sitting next to the laptop and slowly moves it over the bin. Double shit. Of course it can’t recognize her, so she can’t speed-dial the distress number even if CopSpace was working—

Clonk.

“Good. Now, Mr. Reed, when I finish talking, you will reach over and take Ms. Barnaby’s phone from her pocket and put it in the bin. Without standing up.”

“But it’s—”

“Shut up,” he snarls, and you put a sock in it fast. “Ms. Barnaby may rise slightly to give you access. She will keep both hands on the table as she does so. If she takes either hand off the table or moves either foot while she is standing, I will shoot you. If you understand, nod.”

You feel yourself nodding. This can’t be happening, can it? He’s about three metres away, too damn far to try and get to him—he’d shoot one of you first. If it was just you, you might try something ( poor impulse control said Miss Fuller in elementary fourth, a damning diagnosis of potential heroism), but he’s aiming at Elaine, and just the thought of him putting a bullet in her makes your heart hammer and turns your vision grey at the edges.

“Do it,” he says. “Ms. Barnaby first.”

Elaine puts her hands on the table and tenses, rising out of her chair slowly. She’s got her head cranked round, looking over her shoulder with an expression of profound apprehension ( or is it calculation? ) on her face. You reach out and slowly slide your fingers into her pocket, finger the warm soap-bar shape of her mobile, and retract. “In the bin, Mr. Reed. Now .”

Clonk. And a faint sigh as the gas strut under the chair takes Elaine’s weight again.

“Take your glasses off and put them in the bin. Then put your hands behind your neck. Stay away from the keyboards.” Hackman is stripping you naked—not of clothing, but in a more significant way: stripping you of the right to volitional speech, stripping you of the ability to communicate, stripping you of identity. But he hasn’t reached your skin yet— if Sergeant Smith comes back …“Now turn round to face the door. Slowly. ”

“What do you want?” Elaine asks, getting the words out in a hurry.

Hackman twitches. “Shut up.” He glances at you. “If I don’t call a certain number in sixteen minutes, your niece dies. Do you understand?”

You nod, your heart in your mouth. You understand all too well: Hackman’s got hold of Barry’s crock of shit about Elsie, and now you know he’s lying. But he probably doesn’t know he’s lying, not if he’s going through Team Red—there’s no reason for any of them to know the truth about your family. Or for Elaine to know, for that matter. Which puts an uncomfortable complexion on things. Because if Sue Smith isn’t coming back, if Hackman’s used Team Red’s favours to lure her away, thinking Elsie is at risk from his friends could stop Elaine getting away. Inconvenient , and then some. You’re going to have to bite a bullet, if not take one for a team you never asked to join.

“Why?” you croak.

“Shut up. I’ve got a car downstairs, round the back. Auto-drive. We’re going for a little ride into the borders, then you’re going to spend an uncomfortable twenty-eight…no, twenty-seven…hours locked in a cellar. Then I’ll be in the clear, and you’ll be free. Do you understand?”

Elaine is shaking her head. “Why?”

“Follow the money, stupid.” He looks angry, and a bit bewildered now. “It was working fine until you showed up.” If it wasn’t for you pesky interfering kids, I’d have gotten away with it …

“How much money?” Maybe, you think, you can convince him that you’re venal enough to switch sides to an obvious liar.

“Twenty million in put options hedged against Hayek going down the tubes within two months of IPO, bought through a blind trust.” His cheek twitches. “I’m into covering my bets. Barry and Wayne were just way too confident. The writing’s been on the walls for months.”