Neal Asher - The Departure

Var reached into her hip pouch to take out the remaining side arm, then just stared at it. Ruthless she might be, but simply not ruthless enough. Kaskan was right: even with potentially a hundred and fifty people against them, Ricard’s men still held the upper hand. Four or five assault rifles – and she guaranteed that Ricard still had some ceramic ammo available – could easily turn that number of people into mincemeat. But even if the enforcers presently in the Community Room were somehow driven out, they could simply withdraw to an airlock antechamber like the one she and her friends had just departed – easily defended – then head out of the main base. No one would follow, not with assault rifles trained on the exit, and certainly not at risk of being snatched by a shepherd.

Thereafter, Ricard controlled the reactor, which meant, essentially, that he could shut down all systems. Eventually the air would turn foul and he could dictate whatever terms he chose. She suspected he would just wait until there was no need to turn those systems back on again. He was stupid enough.

‘We need to take off the head. We need to get Ricard,’ she decided.

‘We can’t get to him through Wing Five,’ said Lopomac. ‘We’d need to repair the window and repressurize before we could open either of the bulkhead doors, and that would mean going outside just to get to that section.’

‘Maybe we can make it to Hex Three without that shepherd getting to us first,’ she suggested weakly.

‘Maybe,’ said Lopomac, ‘though the closest we can get to it without actually going outside is the Hydroponics hex, where Ricard has two enforcers. If I didn’t know him to be so stupid, I’d reckon he was covering that approach, too.’

‘I can kill the two in Hydroponics,’ said Kaskan.

‘But how do we do that without risking the glass being smashed, and wiping out any chance we have of surviving here?’ Var asked.

‘I’ll give the plants too much of a good thing.’

Earth

Rows of seats ran down the middle of the passenger compartment, while either side was walled with aluminium cupboards. A large video screen to the fore provided a display from the cockpit, almost as if a hole had been cut through the craft’s exterior to show a carbocrete runway curving away to the right. Flexi-displays were hooked on to the back of each seat, facing the passengers behind. They were of the kind that could be removed, bent into a curve, and lodged inside space helmets to give a 3D effect. Inset into the arms of each seat, ahead of the sockets for oxygen hoses, were VR half-gloves for calling up any chosen view or entertainment.

The two soldiers dragged Saul to one of the front-row seats and manhandled him down into it, then shoved Hannah into the seat just beside him. She glanced to one side, noting the technician now stripping off his overalls and donning a spacesuit like his fellows. Two guards remained standing over her and Saul, with squat, ugly machine pistols trained on them.

‘Can you think of any reason why I should not kill you immediately?’ Malden demanded, stepping into the space before them and leaning back against the bulkhead.

‘You want to know who and what I am, and why I am here,’ Saul instantly replied.

‘That’s true, but you nearly fucked up this entire mission.’

Saul pressed the heel of one hand between his eyes. Before he could reply, Hannah said, ‘How? We didn’t even know about this mission.’

Malden’s gaze strayed towards her. ‘You led the Inspectorate straight to Embarkation, and now we’ve got more on the way. Luckily I’ve given them other distractions.’

‘The space plane?’ said Saul.

Malden’s gaze swung back to him. ‘A distraction to facilitate our boarding this space plane, but I used the aeros to remove what I thought was a threat to us.’

‘You thought I worked for the Inspectorate.’

‘What was I to think? Inspectorate enforcers were heading here; you were ahead of them. It was only after I hit them that I realized they were after you , upon discovering your sloppy penetration of their security here. Did you deliberately follow me?’

‘No. Pure coincidence – or more likely our aims are the same.’

Malden then just stared at Saul, almost statue-like, his eyes a deep, dark red and with fractured blood vessels webbing his face, and Hannah realized that Saul’s prediction was on the button. Malden was dying, and it seemed likely he knew it. Perhaps this was the real reason he had not killed them. Maybe he hoped she could do something to help him to change that verdict or, if not, maybe he hoped Saul might somehow replace him.

‘So why are you here?’ Saul asked.

‘I intend to take Argus and the Argus Network out of Committee hands.’

Saul tilted his head, with a flash of amusement. ‘Really?’

‘Really.’

‘That’s . . . interesting.’

‘Why are you here?’ Malden countered.

‘I’m here to take Argus and the Argus Network out of Committee hands.’

Malden gazed at him blankly for a moment, then stepped closer, studying Saul more intently.

‘It’s true,’ Hannah interjected. ‘You’re not the only one who doesn’t care for our rulers.’

‘Yet, despite your dislike, you worked for them willingly enough,’ Malden commented.

‘That’s not fair.’

‘Little is fair, in this world.’ He returned his attention to Saul and continued, ‘Do you know they never decommissioned the Traveller VI engine on the Argus asteroid? They kept it at first because they were going to reposition out at the Lagrange point between Earth and the Moon, then as a safety protocol. They’ve kept that engine fuelled and workable for decades just in case the asteroid needed to be used against anything bigger coming in out of the Oort cloud.’

‘Yes, I do know,’ Saul replied. ‘But why does it interest you so?’

‘I’ll use it to drop the asteroid on Brussels,’ said Malden. ‘The impact should depopulate much of Europe and take out most of the Committee and nearly forty per cent of the Executive.’ He paused. ‘Centralized world government is never ever a good idea.’

Hannah sat quietly chewing that over. Saul had previously stated his intention of seizing control of Argus and the satellite network, and now that she looked at it in the light of Malden’s statement, it didn’t seem enough. Had Saul intended to do something similar? Because, once he had taken control up there, the question remained: what next?

‘That seems . . . drastic,’ said Saul.

‘You disagree?’

‘Let’s say I have moral doubts,’ Saul hedged.

‘Why?’ Malden asked.

‘Perhaps I’m not so careless of human life as you,’ Saul suggested. ‘Anyway, I’d have thought the power of the Argus Network would’ve appealed to you.’

It was like seeing two big cats facing off in a world full of herbivores, but Hannah felt one of them was severely underestimating the potential of the other. Malden had been an intelligent and resourceful man, who was now running some serious hardware and software in his head. Saul had been a genius with an intelligence difficult to describe, let alone measure, and the additions inside his skull were of an order of magnitude more powerful than Malden’s, or at least they would be when the organic interface had made sufficient connections.

‘Of course, it does,’ Malden replied. ‘But Argus Station is not essential to that network. In fact, once I’ve seized control of the network and taken the Argus computers out of the equation, I can operate it from down on Earth.’

Hannah seriously doubted that would improve the situation on Earth for anyone.

From outside came a series of clattering booms as umbilicals detached. Hannah glanced round to see two of the soldiers closing the airlock hatch, while others were returning to their seats to strap in. The erstwhile technician came across to them and pulled their straps into position, and from where they inserted in sockets down beside their hips, there came the click of locks closing. After he stepped over to Saul, Hannah reached down and tentatively tried to disengage her own strap. No joy. It seemed the locking mechanisms of the straps could be controlled via the plane’s computers, so they wouldn’t be going anywhere until Malden gave instructions to unlock.