Gary Gibson - The Thousand Emperors

Luc stared at him, speechless.

‘Now, I don’t know just how au fait you are with wormhole physics,’ Antonov continued, his face twisting up in pain as he spoke, ‘but they’re surprisingly robust under certain conditions. Once this ship’s descended far enough into 55 Cancri’s photosphere, the shielding will give way and the transfer gate linking it back to Aeschere will be destroyed. However – and this is the theory – the wormhole should maintain coherence just long enough for a great deal of superheated plasma to come rushing into the complex.’

‘Why? Why not just . . . surrender?’

‘For many reasons, Mr Gabion, but chiefly because Cheng would never let me live, knowing the things that I know.’

Luc shook his head in incomprehension. The inside of his head felt as if it had been hollowed out. ‘What things?’

Antonov chuckled. ‘You need,’ he said, ‘to make your way back up to that control room where you left your friends, back on the other side of the transfer gate. There are cryogenic units there – do you understand?’

‘No. No, I don’t.’

‘Oh, but I think you do. Get yourself inside one of those units, and you should have a decent chance of surviving the inferno.’

‘But why ?’ Luc demanded. ‘Why—’

But before he could say anything further, Antonov reached out to touch the side of his neck with something cold and sharp, and he lost consciousness once more.

Listen to me, Luc. You’re still asleep.

Antonov’s voice sounded like it came from everywhere and nowhere. Luc found himself afloat in a dreamless void, unable to determine where he was, or how long it had been since he had been knocked out. His limbs felt like a distant memory.

You’re going to wake up soon , he heard Antonov continue. There’s a lot you don’t understand yet, but you will, given time. But first, you must deliver a message for me.

What message? Luc tried to say, but he couldn’t feel his lips or his tongue.

The answer came a moment later:

After they come and rescue you, I want you to access Archives through your CogNet link. Then open a record with the following reference: Thorne, 51 Alpha, Code Yellow. Do you understand?

No , Luc answered. I —

Once you’ve done that, add the following statement to the text file contained within it: ‘I’m calling in my favour.’ Five words, Luc. That’s all I ask.

I don’t understand, Luc shouted into the abyss.

Someone did something a long time ago they shouldn’t have , said Antonov, his voice slowly fading. And now they’re going to repay me for keeping it quiet all these years. Remember what I said, Luc: ‘I’m calling in my favour.’

As if a switch had been thrown, Luc had control of his limbs once more, and could feel something hard beneath his back. His eyes flickered open in the same moment he realized his CogNet link was live once more, and he discovered more than four hours had passed since he had first entered the complex in the company of an entire squadron of Sandoz. Night would by now have fallen across the crater, meaning it was safe to go back out onto the surface.

Even more importantly, he was free. The tangled loops of cord that had bound him now floated loose around the chair in which he was still slumped.

Reaching up, he tentatively touched his head, exploring the contours of his skull. There had been something dreamlike about the whole encounter with Antonov, as if it hadn’t really happened, but when he touched fingers to his nose he found it crusted with dried blood.

Updates flooded in through his now-active CogNet: he learned that two more Sandoz squadrons had already entered the complex’s top level, and were working their way down towards him without meeting any resistance, machine or otherwise.

Luc pulled himself out of the chair, then stopped, seeing Antonov slumped against the railing on the far side of the bridge, head bowed forward. Luc kneeled before him and touched fingers to the rebel leader’s wrist. Dead.

Then he glanced towards the main display and felt a chill form around his heart.

he sent via the CogNet.

someone replied.

Luc responded.

Siedzik didn’t reply for some time, and Luc guessed he was conferring with his superiors on the orbital platform.

Siedzik sent back.

That, Luc knew, was because he was no longer beneath the surface of Aeschere, but on board a starship some millions of kilometres distant. The only reason they could converse at all was because the ship’s communication network was automatically bouncing his CogNet link back through the connecting gate. But there wasn’t the time to try and explain all that to Siedzik, even assuming he’d believe one word of the explanation.

Luc replied after a pause. extremely fucking cautious one way or the other.>

Siedzik commanded.

Luc sent back.

Luc replied, cutting the connection before Siedzik could demand any more details.

He pulled himself into a navigation booth surrounded by interface and astrogation gear. The ship linked into his CogNet just long enough for it to work out he didn’t know how to operate the navigational systems, and replaced most of the scrolling data surrounding him with a series of simplified questions and help menus.

It didn’t take long for Luc to work out that Antonov had not, in fact, been lying: the ship had already dipped into the turbulent upper reaches of 55 Cancri’s photosphere, and the external temperature was already a couple of thousand degrees beyond the craft’s design parameters. He had minutes, perhaps only seconds, before it shattered under the strain.

He stood jerkily, skin clammy with sweat, and pushed himself towards the exit from the bridge. It took another couple of minutes of fumbling and swearing in the zero gee before he managed to navigate his way back to the bay containing the transfer gate.

Luc sailed through the gate and back into Aeschere’s hollowed-out heart, sidestepping millions of kilometres in the blink of an eye. The little moon’s gravity took hold of him as soon as he was through, tugging him down towards the dusty floor of the cavern. Without the benefit of his spacesuit, it was numbingly cold, every breath filling his lungs with icy daggers.

An icon blinked in the corner of one eye: Siedzik.

Siedzik sent as soon as Luc activated the link.

Luc sent back. now .>

Luc caught a brief flash of Siedzik’s visual feed, and saw Siedzik and several more Sandoz warriors making their way towards an elevator platform at the far end of the complex.

not of a mind to accept orders from civilians,> Siedzik responded.

He stumbled back the way he had come, towards the nearest shaft and another elevator platform. His legs were still half-numb from Antonov’s paralytic, making it hard to run, and he caught sight of several mosquitoes lying inactive in the dust, their legs neatly folded beneath their tiny bodies.

The air misted white as he panted for breath, the cold sinking deeper and deeper into his flesh. It was almost funny; even if he managed to avoid being engulfed in white-hot plasma, he’d still be running a serious risk of hypothermia.

Reaching the platform, he slammed its control panel with one hand, then collapsed onto all fours, hooking his fingers through the metal grille as he was carried back up. It clanged to a stop a minute later, and Luc ran as best he could, until he was back at the control room where Marroqui and his Clan-members had died.