A Deepness in the Sky (91 page)

"It's all messed up now."

"What?" Pham's mind came back to the Attic grouproom, the irritable voices of the zipheads. It was Trixia Bonsol who had just spoken. Her eyes were distant and her fingers still twitched across her keys.

Pham sighed. "Yeah, you got that right," he replied. Whatever she was talking about, the comment was appropriate.

His low-rate synthesis from the unpowered net was complete: He had a view down on L1-A. If he could trigger a little more connectivity, he might reach the ejets near L1-A. No great processing power there, but those sites were on the ejet power grid...and more important,Maybe we canuse the electric jets themselves! If they could target a few dozen of them on the Podmaster..."Trud! Have you had any luck with the numerical people?"

FIFTY-EIGHT

Rachner Thract's helicopter lifted clean of the tilted landing pad, its turbine and rotor sounds healthy. By turning his head this way and that, Thract was able to keep track of the terrain. He took them eastward, along the caldera wall. The punched-hole craters marched off ahead of them, a line of destruction that disappeared over the top of the far wall. In the city below, there were emergency lights now, and ground traffic heading for the craters that had been apartments and occupied mansions.

On the perch beside him, Underhill was moving feebly, pulling at the panniers on his guide-bug's back. The animal was trying to help, but it was injured far worse than its master. "I need to see, Rachner. Can you help me with Mobiy's pack?"

"Just a minute, sir. I want to bring us around to the heliport."

Underhill pushed a few inches up from his perch. "Just put it on autopilot, Colonel. Please, help me."

Thract's helicopter contained dozens of embedded processors, themselves hooked into traffic control and information nets. Once he had been very proud of this fancy aircraft. He hadn't flown it on automatic since that last staff meeting at Lands Command. "Sir...I don't trust the automatics."

Underhill gave a gentle laugh, then broke into liquid coughing. "It's okay, Rach. Please, I have to see what's happening. Help me with Mobiy."

Yes! By the Dark, what did it matter now! Rachner slammed four hands into the control sockets, and wiggled on full auto. Then he turned to his passengers and quickly unzipped the bag on the top of Mobiy's broken back.

Underhill reached in and removed the gear within as if it were some King's crown jewels. Rachner turned his head for a closer look. What...a bloody computer game helmet, it was!

"Ah, it looks okay," Underhill said softly. He started to settle the helmet across his eyes, then winced away. Rachner could see why; there were blisters all across the cobber's eyes. But Underhill didn't give up. He held the device just off his head, then turned on the power.

Glittering light splashed out and around his head. Rachner jerked back reflexively. The cabin of the heli was suddenly awash in a million shifting colors, bright and plaid. He remembered the rumors about Underhill's crazy hobbies, the videomancy. So it had all been true; this "gaming helmet" must have cost a small fortune.

Underhill mumbled to himself, shifting the helmet this way and that, as if to see around the blind spots in his burned eyes. There really wasn't much to see, just an incredibly beautiful shifting of lights, the mesmerizing power of computers in the service of quackery. It seemed to satisfy Sherkaner Underhill. He stared and stared, petting his guide-bug with a free hand. "Ah...I see," he said softly.

And the helicopter's turbines suddenly began a banshee twistup, well past their redline. The power was like magic, and would burn them out in a matter of an hour or two. That's why no reasonable controls would allow such performance.

"What the devil—" The words caught in Thract's throat as the turbine windup finally reached the blades above. His aircraft suddenly became a maniac, clawing its way up and up, over the caldera ridge.

The turbines briefly idled as the helicopter soared over the top, five hundred feet, a thousand feet above the altiplano. Rachner had a glimpse of the flatlands. The single row of destruction they had seen at Calorica was actually part of a grid. Stretched out south and west of them were hundreds of steaming plumes.The antimissile fields. But the crappers had missed! Wave after wave of interceptor rockets were sweeping up from their silos across the altiplano. Hundreds of launches, quick and profligate as short-range rocket artillery—except that the silos were dozens of miles away. Those rocket plumes were pushing smart payloads toward long-range intercepts thousands of miles away, and scores of miles up. It was awesome beyond all the staff-meeting hype that Air Defense had ever shilled...and it must mean that the Kindred had just launched everything they had.

Sherkaner Underhill didn't seem to notice. He moved his head back and forth under the helmet's light show. "There has to be some reconnect. There has to be." His hands twitched at the game controls. Seconds passed. "It's all messed up now," he sobbed.

Trud left his numerical-control zipheads and rejoined Pham Trinli by the translators. "The pure numericals I can manage, Pham. I mean I can get answers. But for control—"

Trinli just nodded, brushing the objections aside.Trinli looks so different. I've known him years of Watch time, and now he's a different person. The old Pham Trinli had been loud and arrogant, a bluster that you could argue and joke with. This Pham was quieter, but his actions were like knives.Killing us all. Trud's eyes slid unwillingly to where Anne Reynolt's body hung like meat on a hook. And even if he could conceive a scheme to betray Pham, it probably wouldn't save him. Nau and Brughel were Podmasters, and Trud knew he had passed beyond foriveness.

"—still a chance, Trud." Pham's voice cut through his fear. "Maybe we could open things a little further, fool the zipheads into—"

Silipan shrugged. Not that it mattered, but, "Do that and the Podmaster will be down our throat instantly. I'm getting fifty service requests a second from Nau and Brughel."

Pham rubbed his temples and his eyes got a faraway look. "Yeah, I see what you're saying. Okay. What do we have? The temp—"

"The cameras at Benny's show a lot of very puzzled people. If they're lucky they'll stay where they are." And afterward the Podmasters would have no claim of vengeance on them.

One of the zipheads—Bonsol—interrupted, the typical irrelevance of the Focused: "There are millions of people on the ground. They will start dying in a few seconds."

The comment actually seemed to derail Pham. Even the new Pham Trinli was still an amateur when it came to dealing with zipheads. "Yeah," he said, more to himself than to Silipan or the ziphead. "But at least the Spiders have a chance. Without our zipheads, Ritser can't tighten the screws any more." Of course, Bonsol ignored the reply, just went on tapping at her keys.

Trinli's attention snapped back to Silipan. "Look. Nau is in a taxi, coming in on the L1-A site. There are electric stab jets all over the area. If we can get a few zipheads to work them—"

Trud felt anger sweeping up. Whatever he was, Pham Trinli was still a fool. "Plague take you! You just don't understand Focused loyalty! We need to—"

Bonsol interrupted. "Ritser can't tighten the screws, but we can't loosen them either." She was laughing, almost inaudibly. "What an intriguing thing. We have a deadlock."

Trud motioned for Pham to move back toward the ceiling, out of range of this random ziphead commentary. "They'll go on like that forever."

But Pham turned back to the ziphead, abruptly giving her all his attention. "What do you mean ‘we have a deadlock'?" he said quietly.

"Pus take it, Pham! What does it matter!" But Trinli jerked his hand up, commanding silence. The gesture had the peremptory confidence of a senior Podmaster—and Silipan's protests died on his lips. Inside, his fear just grew and grew. So much for miracles. If there had been any chance for keeping Nau out of L1-A, it was vanishing in this delay. And Silipan knew what was in L1-A. Oh yes. Beyond all automation and subtlety, L1-A would give the Podmaster back his absolute power. The clock at the corner of Trud's vision counted mercilessly on, the seconds of life dribbling out. And of course, the ziphead wasn't even paying attention to Pham, much less his question.

The silence stretched for ten or fifteen seconds. Then, abruptly, Bonsol's head snapped up and she stared directly into Pham's eyes—the way a ziphead almost never did, except when role-playing. "I mean you're blocking us and we're blocking you," she said. "My victory thought you were all monsters, that we couldn't trust any of you. And now we are all paying for that mistake."

It was ziphead nonsense, just more portentous than most. But Pham pulled himself down to Bonsol's chair. His mouth was half-open as if in unutterable surprise, the look of a man whose world has suddenly been blown apart, who is falling headlong into insanity. And when he finally spoke, his words were crazy, too. "I—mostly we're not monsters. If the deadlock were to end, can you run everything? And afterwards...we would be at your mercy afterwards. How can we trust you?"

Bonsol's gaze had wandered. She didn't answer, and her hands roamed her console. Silent seconds ticked by, but now a cold surmise stole up Trud's spine.No.

Sharp on ten seconds, Trixia Bonsol spoke again: "If you restore full access, we can control the most important things. At least that was the plan. As for trust..." Bonsol's face twisted in a strange smile, mocking and wistful all at once. "Well, you know us much better than the reverse. You must choose your own monsters."

"Yes," said Pham. He rubbed his temple and squinted at something invisible to Trud. He turned to Silipan, and he was smiling the same feral smile as when he had popped up in the supply closet, the smile of someone who is risking everything—and expects to win. "Let's restore all the comm links, Trud. It's time to give Nau and Brughel the ziphead support they deserve."

FIFTY-NINE

Nau watched Qiwi guide their taxi in; ahead and below were the snow mounds that he had piled around the L1-A lock. With only the automation aboard the taxi, Qiwi had found the sluiceway, overridden the hatch safeties, and rescued them—all in a few hundred seconds. If only she would last a few more seconds, he would have an absolute whip hand. If only she would last that few more seconds...He saw the looks she was giving her father. The sight of Ali was somehow pushing her toward the edge of understanding.Pestilence! Just get us safely down, that's all I ask. Then he could kill her.

Marli looked up from his comm gear. There was surprised relief on his face. "Sir! I'm getting acks back from the ziphead channels. We should have full automation in a few seconds."

"Ah." Finally some unexpected good news. Now he could limit the destruction necessary to regain control.Except this is Pham Nuwen you'reup against, and almost anything is possible. This could be some incredible masquerade. "Very good, Podcorporal. But for the moment, don't use that automation."

"Yes, sir." Marli sounded puzzled.

Nau looked out the taxi's window. Strange to be seeing raw nature with no enhancement. The L1-A lock was about seventy meters away now, deep in shadow. There was something strange about it...the lip of metal was highlighted in red.But I'm not wearing huds.

"Qiwi—"

"I see it. Someone is—"

There was a loud snapping sound. Marli screamed. His hair was on fire. The hull by his seat was glowing red.

"Shit!" Qiwi boosted the taxi up. "They're usingmy electric jets!" She spun the taxi even as she jinked it back and forth. Nau's stomach crawled up his gut.Nothing is supposed to fly like this.

The glow on the L1-A lock, the hot spot in the hull behind him—the enemy must be using all the stab jets within line of sight. Each jet by itself could only be an accidental, local danger. Somehow, Nuwen had ganged dozens of them to shine precisely on the two targets that mattered.

Marli was still screaming. Qiwi's piloting jammed Nau up into his restraints, turned him as he came back down. He had a glimpse of the podcoporal in the arms of his fellows. As least he wasn't burning anymore. The other guards' eyes were wide. "X-rays," one of them said. The splash from those electron beams could fry them all. A long-term peril, all things considered—

Still spinning the taxi, Qiwi swung them close to the hillsides of Diamond One. The craft was precessing now, a wild triple spin. No way could the enemy keep their guns on one spot. And yet, the glow in the wall grew brighter with each rev.Pestilence. Somehow Nuwen had full system automation.

The nose and then the butt of the taxi smashed into the ground, splashing snow up from the surface. The hull groaned but held. And now, in the floating haze of rising volatiles, Nau could see the beams of the ejets. The ice and air in their way exploded into incandescence. Five beams, maybe ten, they shifted in and out as the taxi spun, and several were always on the glowing spot in their hull.

Around them the swirl of vapor and ice grew thicker. The glowing spot in the hull began to dim as the snows soaked and diffused the murderous beams. Qiwi damped their spin with four precise bursts of attitude control, at the same time snaking their craft over the boiling snows toward the L1-A airlock.

Peering forward, Nau saw the lock approach from dead ahead, a certain crash. But somehow Qiwi was still in control. She flipped the taxi up, slamming the docking collar into its mate on the lock. There was the sound of bending metal, and then they were stopped.

Qiwi tapped at the lock controls, then bounded out of her chair, to the forward hatch mechanism. "It's jammed, Tomas! Help me!"

And now they were locked down, trapped like dogs in a pit shoot. Tomas rushed forward, braced himself, and pulled with Qiwi at the taxi hatch. It was jammed. Almost jammed. Together, they pulled it partway open. He reached through, spent precious seconds clearing security on the L1-A hatch.All right!

He looked over Qiwi's head at the hull behind them. The red spot was more like a bull's-eye now, a ring of red, a ring of orange, and glaring white in the middle. It was like standing in front of an open kiln.