Peter Hamilton - The Temporal Void

Tucked away at the end of an ancillary chamber was another lift. It took her down another hundred metres to the oldest section of the base, comprising a single fortified compartment. This deep shelter had been designed to survive a nuclear strike by the Primes; it had force fields and molecular binding generators reinforcing the superstrength carbon walls. None of them had been switched on for over five hundred years; the smartcore didn't have the resources to maintain them at combat readiness. It didn't really matter, all they protected was an ancient secure storage vault dating back to the Starflyer War.

The Navy command at the time had estimated loss rates among the insurgency forces would be at least eighty per cent. Because of that the last thing every soldier did before being shipped out to their combat zone was to make a copy of their memories so they could be re-lifed if they didn't return. Kingsville's vault still retained the memories of those thirty thousand soldiers.

Paula's integral force field was on when the lift doors opened. She stood perfectly still scanning round with her biononic field functions. The air down here was foul; life support had broken down seven hundred years ago, and hadn't been repaired. There was no need, only bots moved through the ancient compartment. Two light panels out of thirty came on in the ceiling; it was as if the patches of floor they illuminated were suspended in deep space.

Paula's field scan function couldn't detect any evidence that the environment had been disturbed by a human for centuries, but having the scan pick up any proof was remote at best. Eight sensor bots deployed from the trolley-sledge, little globes that glowed with a weak violet light as they drifted forward through the air, sprouting long gossamer strands woven with sensitive molecular chains. The strands floated about like hair in water, probing the air.

Her u-shadow inserted itself into the chamber's ancient network and began to interrogate the management routines. Even with time-resistant fail-soft components and multiple redundancy there was little left functioning. Just enough to maintain viability. At the present rate of decline even that would be lost in another hundred years, and the Navy would have a decision to make.

A batch of forensic remotes darted out of the trolley-sledge. They zipped about through the darkness like cybernetic moths, settling on the physical sections of the network designated by Paula's u-shadow. They extruded active-molecule tendrils that wormed through the fragile casing to meld with the inert components below and began a very detailed analysis.

The network database gave Paula the location of the secure store she was here to investigate. Twelve hundred years ago, the Cat had sweated away her training sessions in the hot desert sun above before being deployed to Elan. Like everyone else, before she left she'd downloaded her memories in case she didn't come back.

Paula walked through the darkness, trepidation stirring her heart. The compartment was filled with row upon row of sealed shelving, containing thirty-thousand small armoured boxes. She stopped in front of the one holding the Cat's memorycell. Two forensic remotes were attached to it, their tendrils examining the twenty-centimetre door and its lock. The tendrils withdrew, and the remotes glided away to hover beside Paula.

'Open it, she told her u-shadow.

It took such a long time she wasn't sure the mechanism still worked — in fact she was quite impressed the network was still connected to the majority of the stores. Eventually the box buzzed as if there was a wasp trapped inside; then the little door hinged open and pink-tinged light shone out. The memorycell was sitting on a crystal pedestal, a neat grey ovoid three centimetres long.

Paula sent one of the forensic remotes in. It sat on the rim of the box, and extended its tendrils around the memorycell. Then the fragile strands were infiltrating the casing to probe the crystal lattice beneath. For something so old, the memorycell had endured surprisingly well. The company which had manufactured it twelve hundred years ago could finally justify their eternity survival marketing boast, Paula thought as her u-shadow displayed the results in her exovision.

DNA encrypted data confirmed the memories contained in the memorycell belonged to Catherine 'the Cat' Stewart, assigned to squad ERT03. Paula waited for twenty minutes while her forensic bots completed their analysis of the vault before calling ANA: Governance.

'I was right, she said. 'Somebody made a copy.

'Oh dear, ANA: Governance said.

'Quite. They were very good. There's almost no trace. I had to analyse dead network components for clues. A file search was conducted a hundred years ago in the network. And a quantum atomic review of the memorycell confirms a complete read with a corresponding timeframe.

'So it is her.

'The Accelerators must be very desperate indeed.

'We already know that.

'This isn't the Cat that went on to found the Knights Guardian; that was an older smarter personality. This is an early one.

'Do you believe the difference is relevant?

'I'm not sure. I expect this one to be… raw. Sholapur was confirmation of that.

'Are you sure? Remember why you finally arrested the Cat.

'Good point.

'What's next?

'I'm not sure. I think we need to concentrate on Chatfield. He's the only link we have between the Accelerators and the Prime, and the Conservatives are clearly interested in him. I shouldn't have allowed myself to get distracted by this.

'Very well. Good luck. The link closed.

Paula stood in front of the open box for a long time, staring at the grey memorycell. Eventually she put her hand in and took it off the pedestal, holding it in front of her face. 'This isn't going to end well, she told it, and let go. The little memorycell hit the ancient enzyme-bonded concrete floor and skittered a few centimetres before coming to a halt.

Paula stomped down hard, enjoying the crunch it made under her heel as it burst into minute fragments. Guilty enjoyment, admittedly, but then: 'Sometimes you have to do the wrong thing in order to do what's right, she told the dead vault.

Retracing her path through the Kingsville base, Paula considered ANA's claim about the Cat's personality. Perhaps it was right. Perhaps the Cat was utterly changeless. She'd learned to justify herself with the founding of the Knights Guardian, developing into an astute political leader. But was that just another form of manipulation. There had never been any need for her to adapt and evolve, she was always bending the universe to her will.

Paula always kept the memories of Narrogin with her, not particularly wanting to remember but knowing she should not forget. Narrogin was the 'contract' which had finally made the Senate issue an unlimited warrant for the Cat, and to hell with the political consequences. There was a huge sectarian struggle going on to determine the planet's ideological future, and one side brought in a team of Knights Guardian to help their cause.

The Cat had chosen to lead it. Her final act to prove the strength of her employer's cause was the Pantar Cathedral crisis, where she took twenty-seven opposition councillors hostage along with their families. She'd promised to execute the families unless political concessions were made, then she started slaughtering them anyway. Even some of her own team rebelled at that. A disastrous firefight erupted as three Knights Guardian attempted to protect the children against her and the loyalists.

Paula had walked through the cathedral five hours later. Despite every crime she'd witnessed, every evil she'd seen, nothing prepared her for the atrocity performed under the cathedral's elegant domed ceiling with its crystalline ribbing. She knew there and then that the Cat had to be stopped, no matter the immunity granted her by Far Away's government and the physical protection afforded her by the Knights Guardian. Standing amid the pools of blood and burned out pews, Paula had been prepared to go against a great many Commonwealth laws to bring about fundamental justice. She didn't have to, of course, the Senate gave her a perfectly legal validation for tracking down the Cat and bringing her to the specially convened court in Paris.