The Bloodlight Chronicles: Reconciliation (7 page)

Rix nodded, feeling hot and sweaty with anxiety. What was in the satchel? Drugs? Illegal biochips? What if he got shot? What if he went to jail?

He climbed on the idling bike and set the package between his knees. So this was it, the life of a smuggler.
Be careful what you ask for.

He stepped into gear and headed up the ramp. He quickly spiralled up to the third level, saw the caution tape, and parked beside an orange pylon. A man stood there, an older man, bald and slightly stooped, wearing dirty grey coveralls and holding a push broom.

“Are you Jimmy?”

The man leaned his broom against a support post and stepped forward.

“You must be Rix. Take off your helmet so I can get a look at you.”

Rix hung his helmet on the handlebars and met the man's appraising eyes. He kept the bike idling but offered the package forward with a trembling right hand. Jimmy took it and peered inside. He pulled out a brushed-silver canister that looked like a housing for binoculars and slid it into a pocket inside his coveralls. “Thanks.” He handed back the empty satchel.

“No problem. Do I get a receipt?”

Jimmy chuckled at that. “I saw you hack
Killer Warz
a few years ago. That was some twisted crack.”

“Totally. But they kicked me off the game.”

Jimmy held a forefinger in the air. “Not before you logged your rep. The technical term for that move is watermark feedback attack.”

“I know. I read about it afterward.”

“So you've studied the classics?”

“A little. Mostly I just feel the crack. I know it's there, like music. I don't do algorithms.”

Jimmy nodded with recognition. “I know what you mean. I can barely do multiplication without an app.”

“So you wanted to see me?”

“Yeah, I just wanted to remind you not to waste your best tricks when the stakes are low. Watch for the breakout move, you know?”

“I've got lots of tricks left.”

“I'll bet you do.”

“You still play
Killer Warz
?”

“Not any more. I followed a few top players for a while.”

“Some kind of talent scout?”

“I guess maybe I am. Look me up. We'll do a quick tour up-Prime someday.”

“That would be awesome, but I'm using a friend's launch couch at the moment. She doesn't want me screwing up her schematics.”

“Aaah. A ladies man. I'm impressed.”

Rix felt a blush of blood but didn't let it faze him. Let the stranger think what he might. “You must have known my dad when he was young.”

“I did indeed. How does that old folk song go?

Jimmy crooned out the last note and spread his hand for the final showman's ta-da.

“That's pretty good. Are you an ex-rockstar?”

“No, hardly even a digital guitar hero. I was a twenty-first century schizoid kid, not the brightest light, but I did okay over the years. I guess I was lucky to meet some talented people along the way.”

“So what's in the package? I know I'm not supposed to ask.”

Jimmy eyebrows popped at this break in protocol, but he smiled after a few seconds. “Rotaxane in a ground-breaking architecture.”

“And that's good, right?”

Jimmy chuckled at the blatant admission of naïveté. “The competitive edge in nanotech, at the moment. By this time next year it will be duck soup. We're climbing high asymptotes.” He shrugged as though to apologize for the manic progress of science.

“Well, it's nice to meet you, sir.”

“The pleasure is all mine. It does my heart good to see the next generation taking the world by storm. Don't let anyone steal your gift, Rix. The future is your heritage.”

“You sound like a V-space greeting card.”

“I know. Funny how reality imitates virtuality.”

Rix revved the throttle to warm the bike out of powersaver mode. “Will I see you again in the flesh?”

Jimmy's lips pressed into a thin line as he considered the thought. “I doubt it.”

Rix slid on his helmet and gave the old man a thumbs up for good measure. Now that the deal was done he felt a pulse of elation in his abdomen. He was a smuggler now, a freakin' secret agent. He kicked into gear and wheeled a tight circle to head back down the ramp.

Niko waited for him downstairs, looking pissed and beautiful, pointing at her wristband monitor. “You had me worried,” she said. “We're not supposed to chitchat with customers.”

“I was gaining rapport with the client,” he replied, regurgitating her own training jargon back at her. “Everything okay down here?”

“Nothing unusual. Let's wrap up.”

“Hop on. I'll drive.” The future looked so bright Rix had to flip down his visor.

The Macpherson Doorway had a diameter of just under one metre and required an orbiting antimatter facility to keep it open that wide. A steady trade of commerce used the tunnel, and humans could be sent one at a time in sealed capsules designed to withstand a microsecond of hypothesized nonspace, but the exorbitant expense kept tourist traffic to a minimum.

Colin Macpherson, the long-dead physicist after whom the transport system was named, had harnessed the power of wormholes, sub-atomic wrinkles in the fabric of space-time, by manipulating gravitational forces in tight parameters. He discovered the first blue planet beyond Earth, a lifeless sphere that was quickly terraformed to provide a breathable atmosphere and opened to colonization. His work brought humanity out of its cradle and spawned the rapid growth of the Cromeus outposts a century before the birth of Zakariah Davis. His ashes had been sprinkled on extraterrestrial soil, and his soul was rumoured to have been uploaded into the primitive communications network of the time, a legendary status he held to this day as the architect of a new world.

Zakariah had studied quantum field theory along with every other schoolboy, of course, and liked to think he had a layman's grasp of the anthropic universe—the exquisitely crafted mathematical constants necessary for the firestorm factories that built the carbon molecule, the precursor of life. Macpherson's equations had proved reliable in widening and stabilizing one of the natural wormholes of the convoluted cosmos, but the thought of actually becoming a part of the ongoing experiment still gave Zakariah a chill. Even after all these years, the fact of the matter remained that no one had yet located the alien sun, Cromeus Signa, on any stellar map. It was so far away in space, or perhaps time, that it shared no galactic landmarks with the universe visible from Earth.

“The Doorway works; that's all we need to know,” Helena said on the shuttle trip up.

“If it closes down, we'll be stranded,” Zakariah reminded her, unease like a sickness welling up inside him. “We'll be at the mercy of a repair crew and their financiers. The colonists must resent that dependence on old Earth.”

“I understand they're almost self-sufficient now. It could be that they're pulling a lot more strings down here than we imagine. If they go to market with the virus, they'll control everything. We'll be puppets. Don't worry about the Doorway; think of it as a glorified elevator.”

“Right,” Zakariah agreed, but his stomach continued to roil. He pulled another antacid tablet out of a pocket and placed it on his tongue. He chewed noisily. “So the latest specs from the Cromeus colonies indicate a hardline V-net system with satellite repeaters. Crypto looks pretty basic but has probably been updated. Does that jibe with your own research?”

Helena nodded. “The satellite hardware is several years out of date, the V-space relatively undeveloped. All the elements are there for a full system. You'll probably be a god when you get online.”

Zakariah squinted self-effacement at her and puffed a reply.

“I'm being half serious. Your intuitive grasp of V-net mechanics borders on the supernatural. These deep harmonics you mention—no one else has any clue what you're talking about. Your arcade-style approach to computing would be cerebral suicide to any normal person. I've seen it inside my own brain and I still don't believe it.” The Director smiled, showing no offense. “Just like the Doorway—I don't believe it either.”

“Attention, travellers,” the intercom resounded in a deep male baritone, “we will begin deceleration in sixty seconds. Gravitational experience will approach
1.7
g for several minutes. Please buckle into your flight seats and secure all loose items.”

“Yeah, well, I think you're pretty special too,” Zakariah shot back to Helena with a grin.

She tilted her face with a sly twist on her lips as though considering a flirtation, then shook her head. “You just might survive after all,” she replied. She had her long hair tied in a bun and tucked under a hairnet for travel, and she wore a fashionable grey flying suit with heat-reflective coating and a plain white turtleneck. The effect was austere, businesslike.

Zakariah wore an archaic white-leather
NASA
jacket that Jimmy had dredged up from a museum for good luck, the seams cracked and the elbows rough and crusty, and a pair of baggy silver flight pants, his shaggy hair fringed with the green highlights his nurse, Marjy, had installed during his recuperation from surgery. His jacket had set off a barrage of detectors at Richmond Station Earthside, and Helena had pulled rank on the Base Commander to get Zakariah on board. The special metallic lining had been designed to minimize cosmic radiation exposure above the atmosphere, and there would be bloody hell to pay when they hit the
NFTA
pre-launch scanners.

“Magnetic treadways on Macpherson Station are marked in bright yellow paint,” the intercom resounded, this time in a higher tone, female, pleasantly efficient. “New Freedom Transit Authority requests that all passengers orient themselves to the public treadway in order to be quickly processed past inspection and launch points. Please have palm verification ready for the attendant on duty. For your security and safety, passengers are not allowed any carry-on bags or accessories. All registered luggage must be packed in appropriate launch tubes. Have a safe and pleasant journey.”

A chime sounded. “Attention, travellers,” the male baritone boomed again, “we will begin deceleration in thirty seconds. Gravitational experience will approach
1.7
g for several minutes. Please buckle into your flight seats and secure all loose items.”

Zakariah thought of Mia waiting at home for his return. What would she think of him leaving the planet and jumping through the Doorway without telling her? She probably thought he was still kicking back at the cabin, and all the better for her. A thick patchwork of deception separated them now, a labyrinth of intrigue. All outside contact had been cut off by the Director since the experimental wetware operation, and he could not get on the V-net without her tagging presence. Helena lived inside his head and he would never get used to it.

In his heart he knew Mia would understand his motivation. It was all for Rix. Everything was for Rix, their shared masterpiece of creation. He remembered his first meeting with Mia years ago, when he had just received the Eternal virus and had found refuge in the nearest protective enclave. He arrived on the doorstep a blind novitiate, confused and wary, yet eager to learn. An induction session followed and a welcoming celebration, a pageantry rooted in tradition, a mystery beyond understanding.

On a wooden bench in a back corner he noticed a fellow newcomer, a thin, blond-haired beauty with impossibly long legs, sitting in her own quiet confusion, her eyes moving from face to face, her vibrant smile flashing with each introduction. Zakariah sat beside her and joined in the rituals of community fellowship, and they shared that first evening together as blood siblings, adopted into a new extended family that neither of them might ever fully comprehend. Zakariah felt kinship with her from before the beginning. He felt that he shared her essence just by sitting close to her, that a higher authority had united their souls.

“Are you leaving anyone behind, Helena? Family and friends? A lover?”

“No, not really.” Helena activated the touchscreen monitor on the seat in front of her. She made a point of checking obvious data. “Over time my friendships became business, and my business became friendship.”

Zakariah nodded as he activated his own monitor. He checked the schedule carefully.

“I'm not really a monster, Zak. I'm not doing this just for money.”

“Everyone's got a tangled web, Helena.”

“The world needs the virus. It's the way of the future, our only hope for global peace. I don't believe the protectionist pap of the Evolutionary Terrorist Omnibus. The
ETO
arose from a misguided, knee-jerk panic by frightened politicians.”

“It was a declaration of war. I live it every day.”

“Eternals are not the enemy. They should be elevated, not downtrodden.

“Scientists say we're a vanguard of alien biology.”

“Everything unknown is magic until we understand it.”

“So what do you think, Helena? Is it science or magic?”

She looked down her nose at him, her eyes hooded. “I'm a scientist first. I'll proceed with clinical assumptions for now. What about you? You're the one with alien blood in your veins. Do you believe in magic?”

Zakariah matched her veracious gaze. He wondered if Director Sharp had a thread of compassion after all. “I expect the ineffable in the morning and a miracle by mid-afternoon, but I wouldn't call it magic.”

She blinked at him, puzzled at his poetry. A deceleration burn took their breath away as it pushed them back into their seats.

“It took me a long time to find you,” Mia said and watched Jimmy's head rise up from a cluttered holodesk bright with bar graphs and hyperlinks. She could see no hint of surprise on his stony features. The front door had been unlocked, and her calls of entry unanswered.