Adrian Tchaikovsky - Children of Time

Holsten tried to catch the eyes of Lain or Karst or, indeed, anyone, but he seemed to have faded into the background again.

‘What does that mean the surface is going to be like?’ Karst asked uneasily.

‘We may have to conduct some widespread cleansing,’ Vitas confirmed with apparent enthusiasm.

‘Wait,’ Holsten muttered.

Lain cocked an eyebrow at him.

‘Please let’s… not repeat their mistakes. The Empire’s mistakes.’ Because sometimes I feel that’s all we’ve been doing. ‘It sounds like you’re talking about poisoning the planet to death, so we can live on it.’

‘It may be necessary, depending on surface conditions. Allowing uncontrolled biotechnology to remain on the surface would be considerably worse,’ Vitas stated.

‘What if they’re sentient?’ Holsten asked.

Lain just watched, eyes hooded, and it looked as though Karst hadn’t really understood the question. It was now Holsten versus the voice of Vitas.

‘If that is the case,’ Vitas considered, ‘it will only be in the sense that a computer might be considered sentient. They will be following instructions, possibly in a way that gives them considerable leeway in order to react to local conditions, but that will be all.’

‘No,’ said Holsten patiently, ‘what if they are actually sentient. Alive and independent, evolved?’ Exalted , came the word inside his head. The exaltation of beasts . But Kern had spoken only of her beloved monkeys.

‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ Vitas snapped, and surely they all heard the tremble in her voice. ‘In any event, it doesn’t matter. The logic of the prisoners’ choice holds. Whatever we are ranged against, it is doing its best to destroy us. We must respond accordingly.’

‘Another drone gone,’ Karst announced.

‘What?’ Lain demanded.

‘With the hull sensors being picked off I’m trying to keep tabs on the fuckers with drones, but they’re taking them out. I’ve only got a handful left.’

‘Any armed like the ones that took down Kern?’ the old engineer asked.

‘No, and we couldn’t use them, anyway. They’re on the hull. We’d damage the ship.’

‘It may be too late for that,’ Alpash commented levelly. He showed them one of the last drone images. A group of spiders was clustered at one of the shuttle-bay doors. A new line in the metal was visible, flagged by a ghost of dispersing vapour down its length.

‘Fuckers,’ said Karst solemnly. ‘You’re sure we can’t electrify the hull?’ That had been a hot topic of conversation before they tried the EMP burst. Alpash had been trying to work up a solution for a localized electrical grid around wherever the spiders were located, but the infrastructure for it simply was not there, let alone the enormous energy that would be needed to accomplish it. Talk had then devolved towards lower-tech solutions.

‘You’ve got your people armed and ready?’

‘I’ve got a fucking army. We’ve woken up a few hundred of the best candidates from cargo and put disruptors into their hands. Assuming the little bastards can be disrupted. If not, well, we’ve broken out the armoury. I mean,’ and his voice trembled a little, small cracks evident from a deep, deep stress, ‘the ship’s so fucked a few more holes won’t make any difference, will they? And anyway, we can still stop them getting in. But if they do get in… we may not be able to contain them.’ He fought over that ‘may’, his need for optimism crashing brutally into the wall of circumstances. ‘It’s not like this ship was laid out with this kind of situation in mind. Fucking oversight, that was.’ And a rictus grin.

‘Karst…’ Lain began, and Holsten – always a little behind – thought she just wanted to shut him up and spare him embarrassment.

‘I’ll get suited up,’ the security chief said.

Lain just watched him, saying nothing.

‘What?’ Holsten stared. ‘Wait, no…’

Karst essentially ignored him, eyes fixed on the ancient engineer.

‘You’re sure?’ Lain herself seemed anything but.

Karst shrugged brutally. ‘I’m doing fuck all good up here. We need to go clear those vermin off the hull.’ There was precious little enthusiasm in his voice. Perhaps he was waiting for Lain to give some convincing reason that he should stay. Her creased face was twisted in indecision, though, an engineer seeking a solution to a technical problem she could not overcome.

At that point Holsten’s console flickered into activity again, and he realized the attackers on the outside had located the clear channels that Karst had been using to control his drones; and that Karst would soon be using to communicate with the ship. It was Holsten’s job to notify everyone the moment the spiders made this discovery, but he said nothing, part of him staring at the sudden patchy scatter of signals being picked up by the Gilgamesh ’s surviving receivers, the rest of him listening to the conversation going on behind him.

‘Your team?’ Lain prompted at last.

‘My core team are suited and ready,’ Karst confirmed. ‘It looks like we might have a fight the moment we open the airlock. Little bastards could be out there already, cutting in .’ Nobody was arguing with him, but he went on, ‘I can’t ask them to go and me stay behind,’ and then, ‘This is what I’m for, isn’t it? I’m not a strategist. I’m not a commander. I lead people: my team.’ He stood before Lain like a general who had disappointed his queen and now felt that he had only one way to redeem himself. ‘Let’s face it. Security was only ever here to keep Key Crew and cargo in place for the duration of the trip. But if we have to be soldiers, then we’ll be soldiers, and I’ll lead.’

‘Karst…’ Lain started, and then dried up. Holsten wondered whether she had been about to say something bizarrely trite, some piece of social ornament like, If you don’t want to go, then don’t . But they were long past what people did or didn’t want to do. Nobody had wanted the situation they found themselves in now, and their language, like their technology, had been pared down to only those things essential to life. Nothing else, none of the fripperies and flourishes, had been cost-effective to maintain.

‘I’ll get suited up,’ the security chief repeated tiredly, with a nod. He paused as though he wanted to throw out some more military form of acknowledgement, a salute from those about to die, and then he turned and left.

Lain watched him go, leaning on her metal stick, and there was a similar ramrod stiffness to her bearing despite her crooked spine. Her bony knuckles were white, and everyone in that room was watching her.

She took two deliberate steps until she was at Holsten’s shoulder, then glowered about her at the handful of Tribe engineers still left in comms.

‘Get to work!’ she snapped at them. ‘There’s always something that needs fixing.’ Having dispersed their attention, she took a deep breath, then let it out, close enough to Holsten’s ear that he heard the faint wheezing of her lungs. ‘He was right, wasn’t he?’ she said very softly, for his ears only. ‘We need to clear them from the hull, and the security detail will fight better if Karst’s out there with them.’ It was not that she had told the man to go, but a word from her might have stopped him.

Holsten glanced up at her and tried to make himself nod, but something went wrong with the motion, and the result was meaningless and noncommittal.

‘What’s this?’ Lain demanded abruptly, noticing the stream of signals on his screen.

‘They found our gap. They’re transmitting.’

‘Then why the fuck didn’t you say?’ She called out, ‘Karst?’ then waited until Alpash confirmed that she was connected to the man. ‘We’re changing frequencies, so get your people ready,’ next giving him the new clear channel. ‘Holsten—’