Peter Hamilton - The Evolutionary Void

“Ah. And for this bounty you expect to be taken into the Void?”

“Without my assistance you cannot reach the boundary.”

“And without me you cannot get inside.”

“It would seem we need each other.”

“Then we have reached an accord.”

“You will take me?” Ilanthe’s voice carried a note of surprise.

“The Void welcomes all who seek fulfillment. Whatever you are, you obviously believe you need what the Void can offer. Therefore, I will be happy to bring you to it. It is, after all, my destiny as Dreamer to help those who yearn to reach the Heart.”

“That’s very noble of you. And completely unbelievable.”

“You are evil,” Araminta said.

“No, I am driven. It is not just Inigo and Edeard who had a vision of a beautiful future.”

“Nonetheless, you are inimical to the Commonwealth and its citizens.”

“Again you are misjudging me. I simply wish to achieve a different goal from the mundane aspirations which have so far existed among our species. A wonderful uplifting goal that everyone can share. I require the Void’s assistance to do that.”

“Then I wish you well on your voyage.”

“Why?”

“Because the Void will obliterate you. The Heart will not tolerate malevolence no matter the intent behind it, deluded or deliberate. You cannot avoid it, you cannot elude it. Despite my many misgivings I do genuinely believe in the goodness of the Heart, for I am twinned with the Skylords, who truly know its munificence. If necessary, I will travel there myself to expose you and your machinations.”

“Good luck with that.”

“Knowing this, knowing I will oppose you, do you still wish to come with us?”

“Yes. Do you still wish to take me?”

“Yes.”

“So be it. Our fate will be decided within the Void.”

“That it will.”

The sphere faded out, and the solido projector switched off. A long breath escaped through Araminta’s pursed lips. She grinned nervously for the benefit of her billions-strong spellbound audience. “Lady! I wonder what day two is going to be like?”

Paula was curious about that herself.

“She’s up to something,” Oscar insisted over the ultrasecure link. “This self-coronation is only the start.”

“I don’t see what else there can be for her,” Paula said.

“Well yeah … If it was obvious, everyone would figure it out and it’d be pointless.”

“I do love your optimism. It was always your most endearing quality. You probably believe Ilanthe will see the error of her ways before long.”

“You sound bitter.”

Paula rubbed a hand over her brow, surprised to find it was trembling. But then, she hadn’t slept for days; even biononics could keep her fatigue at bay for only so long. “I probably am. We’re the good guys, Oscar; we’re not supposed to lose.”

“We haven’t lost. We’re nowhere near losing. The Pilgrimage ships haven’t even been finished, let alone launched. So tell me how many ways covert operations can sabotage them.”

“Hundreds, but that’s only a delay. It’s not a solution.”

“I want to keep going. I want to see if Araminta contacts me.”

“She won’t. Everyone in the galaxy can observe every second of her existence. It’s actually quite clever: Sharing like that puts her beyond mere Dreamer status; she’s almost achieved the same level Edeard had. Every moment of her life is available for her followers to idolize, just like his was. But they’ll only keep supporting her if she does what they want and takes them into the Void. There’s no escape.”

“Humor me. I have faith in her, too. Different from everyone else, but faith nonetheless. She’s not stupid, and she’s descended from Mellanie.”

“If that’s what your faith is based on, we’re in serious deep shit.”

“Yeah, I noticed that, too.”

Paula smiled wearily. “All right, Oscar, I certainly haven’t got anything else for you to do. Stick with the original mission; see if you can make contact with the Second Dreamer.”

“Thank you.”

“What do your colleagues think about the notion?”

“They’re still on the payroll.”

“Are they all okay? Francola Wood seemed unnecessarily violent.”

“Wasn’t me, honest.”

“You were there.”

“We were. And I still don’t understand what happened. The path became active somehow; we all knew that. Hell, we felt it. But she never came through.”

“And yet she turned up in Colwyn City right after.”

“Exactly. See, there’s more to her than we understand. I trust you noticed what she’s wearing around her neck.”

“Yes.”

“And she knew about Ilanthe. I didn’t.”

“It was classified. The navy knew she’d escaped.”

“So she’s getting her information from somewhere. She understands what’s going on. Which means she knows what she’s got to do.”

“I hope you’re right, Oscar.”

“Me, too. So what are you going to do now?”

“Follow up leads, act on information. The usual.”

“Good luck.”

The link ended. Paula lay back on the couch, closing her eyes for a moment to summon up the willpower to place her next call. It was all very well being tired, but the situation was moving on with or without her.

Symbols appeared in her exovision, and her secondary routines pulled out the technical results. Alexis Denken was currently in full stealth mode fifty thousand kilometers above Viotia’s equator. The smartcore had been running a painstaking search across local space for signs of anyone else lurking above the planet. The first eight starships were easy enough for its sensors to detect; she suspected they were backup vessels for various agent teams on the planet. Now it had found another, the faintest hyperspatial anomaly a quarter of a million kilometers out from the planet. The stealth effect was first-rate; anything less than Alexis Denken ’s ANA-fabricated sensors wouldn’t have been able to find it. That left her with the question of who it was and if it even mattered.

Her u-shadow opened a secure link to Admiral Juliaca. “I wasn’t expecting this,” she said.

“Neither were we,” the Admiral confirmed. “The President is not happy with today’s events.”

“You mean the President is frightened.”

“Yeah. Our best guess is that someone captured her and broke into her mind. They’re just remote-controlling her now. It’s probably Ethan himself if it isn’t Ilanthe.”

“That doesn’t quite fit. I don’t believe Ethan and Ilanthe would want their shabby little arrangement to be public knowledge. And how did Araminta know about Ilanthe?”

“Exactly. She has to have been taken over.”

“Or she communed with the Silfen Motherholme while she was on the paths. After all, we still haven’t got a clue how she returned to Viotia, and it would appear she’s been named a Friend.”

“Okay,” the Admiral said. “So why would the Silfen want Living Dream to go on Pilgrimage?”

Paula pressed her fingertips into her temple again, massaging firmly. “I haven’t got a clue. I’m just saying it’s possible Araminta has decided to step up her game.” She could barely believe she was repeating Oscar’s hopes, but what else was there to explain such extraordinary behavior?

“Then her new game is going to kill us all.”

“Will the navy destroy the Pilgrimage fleet?”

“President Alcamo is still trying to decide what to do. We’re as compromised now as we were before, if not worse. If Ilanthe does make good on her promise and supply Sol barrier force fields to the ships, then they’ll be invulnerable to anything we can hit them with. That just leaves us a small window while they’re on the ground under construction.”