Ken MacLeod - Newton's Wake

‘What’s happened to Higgins?’

Yoshi’s cheek twitched. ‘The head has adjusted to its loss. It is conversing by radio. The personality of Higgins appears to be alive. We are discussing with her what to do. She is not a Carlyle, nor an employee of the family, so she is not a prisoner of war. She will be repatriated to New Glasgow if she wishes. It is not yet clear what she wishes. Her mind is confused and quite naturally we have no medicine for her, other than by speaking.’

Carlyle smiled skeptically. ‘Psychotherapy?’

‘Physics,’ said Yoshi.

‘That makes sense,’ said Carlyle. ‘Give her my … give her my love.’

Life was good. This life was good, and it was about to end. She regretted its loss desperately. That she had a backup was no comfort. That she would live again an infinite number of times was no comfort. There was only one number that mattered, and that number was one . All that she would carry forward into the dark would be anger and regret and the burning will to go on living; no acceptance, no enlightenment, none.

‘We have something to ask of you,’ Yoshi said, diffidently. ‘When you were in your sleep you talked of how you came to be here. You thought the Knights had stolen your ship, and the teleportation device.’

‘Oh!’ Carlyle felt embarrassed. ‘I’m sorry, that was just … raving. I hope I didn’t offend you.’

‘Not at all,’ said Yoshi. ‘It is true.’

‘What?’

‘It is true,’ Yoshi repeated. ‘The Knights wanted the QTD. Had the opportunity arisen some other way, they would have taken it, but as it is you handed it to them on a plate. Or rather, Johnstone did. His reward will be to share in their investigation.’

‘Wait a minute,’ said Carlyle. ‘If they wanted it, why the hell didn’t they just go through to Chernobyl from here?’

Yoshi looked taken aback. ‘You do not understand. This is a women’s planet. A homeworld. The Knights cannot mount expeditions from it, no matter how convenient that might seem. They may only come here to visit the women and see the children.’

‘There are no men here?’

Yoshi laughed. ‘Of course there are. The Knights are a small elite, though not quite as small as their name suggests. Perhaps one in five of the men has the mental and physical discipline required for what the Knights do. The others, and the women, do all the other necessary work of society.’ She waved a hand. ‘But that is not important. What is important is what the Knights have discovered at the planet Eurydice. Control of it could give them great power.’

Carlyle nodded firmly. ‘You’re telling me! That’s why my family can’t let them control a skein nexus.’

Yoshi’s perfect eyebrows rose a fraction. ‘A skein nexus?’

‘Aye,’ said Carlyle. ‘A group of gates, all within easy distance of each other. Walking distance, in this case.’

‘That is not the most important thing there,’ said Yoshi. ‘The important thing is what you call the relic. What do you think the relic is?’

Carlyle spread her hands. ‘I speculated that it was the remains of the starship that took the Eurydiceans to the planet. This seems to have been borne out.’ She smiled. ‘It transmitted a defensive virus that contained Microsoft patches.’

Yoshi smiled too. ‘That would not be definitive. It could have picked them up from scanning Eurydicean communications. But as it happens, you are right. The Knights’ preliminary investigations confirm it. It is indeed the starship. But it is more than that. It is a wormhole generator.’

‘Oh, fucking hell! ’ Carlyle almost shouted, shocked, then caught herself. ‘Sorry, sorry about the language, but—that’s so much worse for us than we thought. If the Knights can generate new wormholes—’

‘It is worse than that, from your point of view,’ Yoshi said, sounding politely amused. ‘The relic is the machine that created the entire existing wormhole skein in the first place. It generated Carlyle’s Drift.’

I should die right now, Carlyle thought. I should have died before I knew this. But she had to know more, to drink the cup to the dregs.

‘Can it be used to control the skein?’

‘Oh yes,’ said Yoshi. ‘Once it is mastered. That is why the Knights wanted the QTD. It is a primitive version of a wormhole generator. Through investigating that, they hope to understand the skein generator. And, as you say, control it.’

‘Why are you telling me this?’ It seemed cruel, tormenting her when she could do nothing with the information.

‘Because,’ said Yoshi, ‘we do not wish the Knights to have this power.’

‘Why ever not? They’re your top men.’

‘They are indeed our top men, and there is the problem. The balance of power between the sexes and the classes is subtle. For the Knights to have such a sudden access of power would tilt it decisively towards them.’

Carlyle stared at her. This was a way of thinking that was not familiar to her. But if it could be used to the family’s advantage, and hers …

‘How does telling me this help you?’

Yoshi’s face was expressionless. ‘That is for you to decide,’ she said. ‘I may just remind you that as a prisoner of war you have the right to correspond with your family, and that the secrecy of that correspondence is guaranteed by law and convention.’

‘Oh,’ said Carlyle. They sat for a while in silence.

‘What do you wish to do now?’ Yoshi asked.

‘I’d like to stay here.’

Yoshi nodded and stood up. ‘Can I have anything sent to you?’

‘Yes, please. I would like you to get me something to eat, something to drink, and something to write with. I have letters to send home.’

‘To your family?’

‘Yes. And one to myself.’

The big empty building down by the docks had been a warehouse, decades back, before being made obsolete by local nanofacture of the wares concerned. Ben-Ami had no idea what the wares had been, but the air and floor and very beams of the place were pervaded with some scent, spicy and sour, that suggested long-degraded alcohol molecules. The extravagant electricity supply might have originally been to maintain temperature and humidity. Now it powered lighting and sound, holograms and engines. Rehearsals of songs, dances, and dialogues, and workings through of stage and prop business, had been going on for a week. Denied for the first time in his career a performance permit for the Jardin des Étoiles by a flagrantly spurious fire-safety objection from the municipality of the Seventy-Ninth Arondissement, Ben-Ami had instructed his MEA to contest it and had provisionally transferred Rebels and Returners to this marginal locale. In interviews he had called it the Theatre in Exile. The name was now in lights above the doors.

Today was his first attempt to run the first act—or the prelude, depending on how it went. He sat in a plastic bucket seat a few rows from the front. Winter, Calder, Kowalsky, and Al-Khayed sat in the row behind him. Other people—technicians and stagehands—sat farther back, or hung about the aisles. A few strangers, too. Some attempt had been made to keep the public out, but it wasn’t enforced wholeheartedly—Ben-Ami wanted rumours to circulate in advance. The stage was dark and empty, except for two four-metre-tall wood-and-cardboard radio-controlled and string-suspended puppet replicas of Walker tanks on either side.

‘Looks good,’ Winter said, leaning forward.

Ben-Ami turned his head and grinned. ‘I have a surprise,’ he said.

‘More surprising than the Polarity tunnel orgy in the third act?’ said Calder. ‘That’ll be something.’