Empire State (36 page)

  He was right. Carson's experiments at probing the fog had given the most outlandish, obviously incorrect, results. Something to do with the fog, some factor or property that made it impervious to analysis, twisting all data carried through and throwing it back as a garbled reflection.

  Except it was not so. Carson's data was correct, and the Chairman's theory of the Pocket, and the Empire State, was correct.

  There was nowhere else but the Empire State, and there was no Enemy.

  Or rather... there
was
somewhere else. The Pocket hadn't been created by the fight between the Skyguard and the Science Pirate. They'd torn open the Fissure, and had created the Empire State, but the Pocket was a pre-existing space, an interstitial nothingness between the real universe and... and whatever else. Only it hadn't been empty. Like lights reflected on calm water,
something
was there. An after-image of the Origin, a semi-formed, reflected impression of New York. It must have been there from the beginning, from the birth of the Origin's universe, forged in the maelstrom of creation, a shadow, a blank silhouette of the "real" world.

  But when the Fissure was opened by the Skyguard and the Science Pirate, it provided a direct connection, a conduit for data, for information. New York City was
reflected
and
projected
into the Pocket. An imperfect copy, not a parody or caricature, but a broken, incomplete model. The Empire State.

  Only there had already been a reflection of New York in the Pocket. The amorphous, pale sketch, mirroring the Origin but not existing, as such. Nothing more than a shadow crossing the dimensions. The Empire State usurped it, pushed it out as it made space for itself.

  Pushing it beyond the fog, beyond the impenetrable, impossible walls of the Pocket. As New York was reflected in the Empire State, so the Empire State was reflected in the Enemy. The Enemy
was
the Empire State, but another copy, another image, another generation down, the imperfections and incompleteness increased by an order of magnitude. Not so much a place, but a state of being. With no independent existence outside of the shadow of the Empire State, it merely mirrored its own origin, the raw data that had been the original shade of New York solidifying and taking form beyond the fog.

  The Empire State had been fighting itself. Every ironclad manufactured in the naval dockyard was matched by its counterpart across the fog, only the imperfect reflection created great floating airships instead of water ships. No matter how many ironclads were built, no matter how many citizens of the Empire State were converted into armoured sailors, no matter how large the fleet, they were matched, one for one, by the Enemy. Equal and opposite. Total, perfect, mutual annihilation.

  The Chairman wept. He was responsible. Pulled into the Pocket without warning, without choice, finding himself leading a version of New York that wasn't New York, locked in a forever war with the nation beyond the fog. But he didn't know. How could he? But God knew. God had shown him the way. He reached into his pocket and fingered the folded white cloth, not quite remembering what it was for.

  And Carson, not a refugee from New York like him, but another reflection, a copy of Nimrod from the State Department. Someone with expertise, know-how.

  Martial law had been Carson's idea. Prohibition had been Carson's idea. The ironclads and robots and blimps and airships were his design.

  But the war was the Chairman's responsibility. Sending the fleet and thousands of men to extinction had been entirely his decision. And when Carson left and locked himself in his house on the hill, realising that the data from his fog probes were correct, the Chairman kept building the ironclads, sending the fleets.

  How many deaths?

  And so the Chairman wept. He pushed himself away from the robot and hugged his knees, rocking back and forth as he cried. Eyes screwed tight in misery, he failed to notice the party of four that stepped into the boardroom.

 

"Sonovabitch!"

  The Chairman's head snapped around, Rex's exclamation echoing loudly around the marble-floored boardroom. Rad turned to him, furious, but Rex pushed him off and stepped forward.

  "So that's where you've been hiding."

  Rad laid a hand on Rex's shoulder. He grimaced at the touch. It might have been his imagination, but his fingertips seemed to numb, just a little, at the contact.

  "That's the Chairman," said Rad. He nodded to the man sitting on the floor. "What's the matter? You recognise him?"

  "You bet I do." Rex took another step forward and looked at the man, who glanced up and pulled his knees even tighter to his chest.

  "He's the 'Missingest Man in New York'."

  Rad looked at Grieves and Jones. Grieves shrugged but Jones raised his gun.

  Rex stood over the Chairman, who flinched away from his look.

  "Joseph Crater, Associate Judge of the New York Supreme Court," said Rex. "I got a bone to pick with you."

 

 
 

 
 

KANE SLIPPED THE HELMET OFF and placed it carefully on an area of the control deck clear of levers. He sighed and waved a gloved hand over the panel.

  "Any of this make sense to you?"

  His companion paced the small bridge slowly, almost casually, dragging fingertips across the control panels that lined the walls. The metal-tipped gauntlets made a hollow, metallic sound like glass marbles rolling on pavement.

  "Yes and no. Patience," said the Science Pirate.

  Kane frowned, and turned back to the panel in front of him. Switches, levers, dials. That was fine, what he expected. But the language was odd. To be perfectly honest, he'd expected English. It had never occurred to him that it could be anything else, that
there could be
anything else. The letters were slanted, twisted, faded even. The whole ship felt old, worn out. Yet it floated above the Empire State's perpetual cloud deck without so much as a sound.

  "You'd better work this out, because if I start pressing buttons, who knows what'll happen."

  The laugh that emanated from the front grille of the Science Pirate's helmet was a deep, hard basso, the pitch artificially lowered to frighten people, Kane suspected. It was the same with the Skyguard's helmet, as he had discovered, but he couldn't stop himself flinching as his companion spun around to face him.

  The Pirate said, "You want to crash this thing, don't you?"

  Kane's eyes widened. "Generally, yes," he answered, taking a step towards his mysterious ally. "But not just anywhere. And not with us on it, preferably."

  That laugh again. Kane watched the Science Pirate's helmet bob up and down. The helmet was similar to that of the Skyguard, although more austere and compact, with fewer flourishes. He decided he liked the look of his helmet better.

  "Relax, pal. I can work it out. It's all going according to plan." The Science Pirate reached out and pulled a short lever downwards without looking. The airship shuddered, and there was a whining noise coming from somewhere high above them. Kane's big eyes searched the ceiling of the dark bridge.

  "OK, I've got it." The Science Pirate turned to the control panel, and after a few minutes and a few more shakes, Kane saw the view outside the front window change. The airship was rotating about its axis. Kane watched his companion at work, the armoured frame hunched over the alien controls. After a while, the Science Pirate slid one glove off to get better precision on a panel of buttons, and then moments later took the other off as well.

  Kane leaned forward, jaw flopping like a wet copy of the
Sentinel
fished from a gutter. He was about to say something when the Science Pirate sighed mechanically and began fiddling with a hidden strap under the helmet's chin. There was a click as a buckle and popper were undone, and then the faceplate pushed up and the helmet came off, swept off the back of the Pirate's head. Long hair, deep brown, spilled out from it as the Pirate pulled the helmet free, then balanced it on the top of the control deck.

  Kane stared.

  "You're... a woman?"

  The Science Pirate laughed, this time in a beautiful, haughty female voice. She shook her hair out and swept it out of her eyes with her long fingers, and turned to look at Kane.

  "Surprised, pal?"

  "Ah... a little, yes."

  The Pirate turned her attention back to the control panel.

  Kane stood dumbfounded. OK, the Science Pirate was a girl. A woman. That was fine. In fact, that was more than fine, that was... alluring. He smiled as he watched her work, his eyes undressing her cloaked, armour-plated body.

  He shook his head. There was something... familiar about her. She was slim, the armour bulking her dainty frame deliberately as part of the disguise to make her look like a man. It made sense – a female hero, protector of the city, wouldn't be taken seriously. Kane was sure she was a sure-fire hit, but really, during their partnership policing the skies of New York City, how much of the heroics had been down to the Skyguard and how much down to...
her?

  Partnership? Kane smirked. Maybe that was just what it was. What were they? Boyfriend and girlfriend? Lovers? Husband and wife? Was it a lover's tiff that split them apart and turned the Science Pirate against the Skyguard, and against the city? Gardner – the
real
Skyguard, the refugee hero from the Origin – had never said anything about his home life and had never gone into detail about the big fight. This had been a major hole in Kane's newspaper story leading up to Gardner's execution, an important omission, but one he'd had to gloss over with his best journalistic purple prose, distracting the
Sentinel
's readers with tales of the Skyguard's wondrous exploits.

  The Science Pirate hadn't got a mention either. It had taken some fancy and creative writing, but he'd excised the other half of the duo from the newspaper stories. Kane wanted to keep that part a secret. When the Science Pirate arrived in the Empire State, he wanted him – her! – to himself.

  Her voice interrupted. "You going to help me with this, or just stand there looking handsome and heroic all night?"

  Kane blinked. The Science Pirate –
she
– had both hands on a large lever, something like a railway track switcher, rising up out of the deck as part of a row of big controls. She was leaning on it, and looking back at him over her shoulder, clearly requiring help even with her powered suit. Kane's mouth twitched into a smirk. She was awful pretty. She smiled back, and her hair, all loose and natural, dropped over one eye. Kane studied her face. It was small, finely boned, exquisite in every detail. Although it was hard to tell in the dim light of the airship control room, her eyes were a brown so dark they were almost as black as the pupils. Her face was… familiar.

  Kane stopped short, his expression hardening suddenly. The Pirate saw his change, her own face reflecting something else. Confusion, and alarm.

  She raised an eyebrow and looked Kane up and down. "So, tough guy, a little help?"

  Kane darted forward, grabbing her arm. She cried out – it was a high, harsh sound.

  Kane looked into her face, at her chin, the nose, those deep eyes. He swore.

  "So who the hell are you?"

  "What?"

  "Because I sure as hell know you're not Sam Saturn. Because Sam Saturn is dead."

  The Pirate pulled her arm away, her face dark.

  "I don't know what you're talking about."

  "I'm talking about the fact that we found Sam Saturn's body lying behind a dumpster in an alley down there, in the city." Kane punched a gauntleted finger towards the airship window. He repeated, "So who the hell are you?"

  The woman raised an eyebrow and went back to heaving on the lever. She grunted, then stopped, letting out a breath.

  "I don't know who Sam Saturn is, but she's no relative of mine. My name is Lisa. Lisa Saturn. Isn't that a hoot?" She stood up and rubbed the raw pads of her hands. "And this Ms Saturn is very much alive and well and trying to move this lever. So the question still stands."

  Kane leaned back against the panel, arms folded.

  "What question?"

  She smiled.

  "You gonna stand there looking handsome and heroic, or are you going to help me crash this goddamned airship?"

 
 

 

 
 

RAD WATCHED REX CIRCLE THE CHAIRMAN – Judge Joseph Crater, the Missingest Man in New York – mindful of the hulking figure of the nearly seven-foot-tall robotic sailor standing just a few yards away. The machine wasn't moving, but it had killed hundreds of people to get into the office. When Rad and his companions had arrived at the Empire State Building, they'd found the street-level entrance a deserted war zone. The police had taken to the air in their blimps, orbiting the building many stories up, regarding the street level as perhaps too dangerous. As they entered, a blimp spotlight played over them for a second before they could dart into the smashed entrance. Rad hoped they'd been quick enough to escape detection, but then he didn't really care. It was time to end the farce. The Empire State would either fall tonight, or would survive. And if it survived, it would never be the same again. The power was still on, a fact Rad had been thankful for as they moved up through the building in the unbearably slow elevator; as they rose, the four of them standing in silence, Rad considered which would be the better option.

  What would happen if the Empire State survived? Would anything change? Would the city still be at war, or was the return of the ironclad somehow signifying a change in policy? Even if Wartime passed, would the population accept that? Rad now knew that Wartime had existed from the very beginning of the Empire State. Nobody – including himself – had a memory of peace because there never had been peace.