Peter Hamilton - Judas Unchained

Nigel gave the astonished girl a winning grin. “Told you I followed your activities.”

Mellanie sat back for a moment, then she recovered and flashed him an evil smile. “What I actually want is for one of your wormholes to recover the Bose motile for me.”

“What’s the Bose motile?” Nigel gave Dudley Bose a suspicious glance.

“The alien you’re calling the Primes is in fact a single consciousness distributed through billions of individual bodies,” Mellanie said. “The Bose motile is the one that contains Dudley’s memories; they were downloaded into it after he was captured. That’s who warned the Conway. It then managed to escape and make its way to Elan. My friends are guarding it for me.” She looked around the silent, startled faces in the office, before giving Nigel a sardonic grin. “I think that’s game to me.”

Morton’s e-butler woke him. The sensors that Cat’s Claws had emplaced all over the Randtown district were picking up a signal from a point two hundred kilometers directly above the Trine’ba. It was a repeated message on the same channel-hopping sequence that the navy used, yet the encryption was the one Mellanie had given him. When he used the key, text printed across his virtual vision. MORTY, I’VE GOT A WORMHOLE OPEN FOR YOU. PLEASE RESPOND. MELLANIE.

“Jeez!” He sat up fast. His body was stiff from sleeping in his armor suit. It was dark in the cave they were using. A couple of lights were showing a pale yellow glimmer, enough to reveal the slushy frost dripping down the rock. Rob was on duty, dressed in full armor, sitting up by the jagged entrance like some nightmare obeah idol. The Cat, who was supposed to be asleep, was in Moon Palm position on top of her sleeping bag. She stared at him wordlessly, which made him shiver despite the semiorganic fabric of his own sleeping bag maintaining his body temperature at a perfect level. The survivors were bundled up in their own bags and blankets like giant pupae lying together on the other side of the cave. They were motionless, apart from David Dunbavand, whose whimper would carry across the cave every time he quivered inside his thick wrappings. The medical kits had helped to stabilize him, but he’d made little progress recently.

Standing by the pile of equipment in the middle of the cave was the Bose motile. It had barely moved from that position since the day they’d marched up to the shelter. They had cloaked it in various sheets of semiorganic fabric to keep it warm and reasonably dry. Every couple of days one of them would drive a bubble down to the Trine’ba and load up with the polluted water for it to eat. Morton thought it was in pretty bad shape, despite Bose’s own protestations that it was fine.

“So what’s in the message?” the Cat asked.

Rob’s helmet had turned toward Morton.

“It’s Mellanie. She’s opened a wormhole for us. I knew it. I knew she’d come through.”

The Cat exhaled calmly. “I hope you’re right. The navy was very clear about its timetable.” She started pulling her armor on.

“Yeah yeah, screw you.”

The navy communication had come in that afternoon, telling them they were to be lifted off in three days’ time. Until then they were to cease all combat missions, and simply observe the Primes. It had been a big morale boost, and sparked an instant argument about what to do about the Bose motile. Rob had been all for shooting it there and then, pretending the whole episode had never happened. Even the survivors had objected to that.

Morton’s virtual hands moved quickly over communications icons, routing his reply through their network of sensor disks, so that the transmission wouldn’t come from anywhere near the mountain saddle where their cave was located. Just in case.

“Mellanie?”

“Morty! Hi, oh God, darling, are you okay?”

“Sure. Fine. How about you?”

“Good. We don’t have much time. This wormhole can take you off, all of you. Where are you?”

“Mellanie, what was the name of your stylist when we were living together?”

“What? Oh, I see, very paranoid. Sasha used to doll me up for you. Okay?”

“Okay. So what’s going to happen? Are we clear with the navy? My colleagues don’t exactly fancy going on the run after we get back.”

“You’re clear. I have some allies now, the best, you’ll see. Please hurry.”

“All right, this is the location.” He sent a file with their coordinates.

“Give us thirty seconds.” The signal cut off.

Morton stood up, and clapped his hands loudly. “Okay, people, we’re out of here. Let’s move! We don’t have long.”

The four survivors stirred as the lights were switched up to full brightness, blinking sleepily.

“Rob, get outside,” Morton said. “See if you can locate the wormhole. It’ll open any second now.”

“Right.”

“Dudley. You’re going to have to walk to it.”

“I can manage that, thank you,” the Bose motile replied through its array.

“I’ll just stay by your side when we go through,” the Cat purred smoothly. She was already standing at Morton’s shoulder, holding her helmet in one hand, a pack slung over her shoulder.

“Highlight of my day,” Morton retorted. He gave Simon and Georgia a hand lifting up David’s stretcher, and put his own helmet beside the injured man’s legs. The Cat simply walked alongside without volunteering any help as they picked their way over the slippery rock.

“Fuck me,” Rob said. “It’s here!”

“What’s on the other side?” the Cat asked sharply.

“Some kind of big room. Hey! I can see Mellanie. There are some troop types in there with her.”

Morton smiled to himself. He resisted the urge to say: Told you so.

It was sleeting heavily outside. Morton screwed his face up against the bitter cold striking his skin as he emerged from the cave’s narrow entrance; he wished he’d put the helmet on. The wormhole had opened a few meters beyond the cave entrance, a silver gossamer circle poised above the dirty slush, resembling a full moon. Dark shapes were just visible inside. Rob was standing directly in front of it, a tall black figure striding forward purposefully. Then the silver glow splashed around him and he was through on the other side.

“So Mellanie has pulled it off again,” Simon said. “You have yourself quite a lady there, Morton.”

“Yeah,” he drawled, suddenly very eager to see her again.

He picked his way over the awkward surface, paying more attention to his feet than to the glowing silver circle ahead of him. The cold was bitter, stinging his ears and cheeks. Then the air tingled around him, and he was through the force field. He blinked against the bright light. Warm air immediately started to melt the ice that had settled on his hair and suit.

They were in a CST exploratory division environment confinement chamber. He’d accessed news reports of their missions enough times to recognize one instantly: a spherical chamber fifty meters in diameter with black, absorptive walls. Yellow and red striped lines marked out airlocks and instrument recesses, while broad windows halfway up allowed the Operations Center staff a direct view of what was going on. A ring of lights shone down on him and the reception party. Morton didn’t even notice the rest of them. Mellanie stood out in front, wearing an agreeably short white skirt, and a blue denim shirt open virtually to her navel. Her hands were on her hips, and she was staring right at him, eyes shining and mouth smiling wide.

“Morty!” She ran forward.

He almost dropped David Dunbavand as her arms hugged him. Someone took the stretcher pole from his grip, and he hugged her back. Then they were kissing passionately, and he was ready to tear that shirt off and have sex with her on the floor of the chamber right there and then.