The Collapsium (19 page)

“Yes’m. I’m there now.”

“Good. On your way out, tell yourself to seal it behind us. Official access only. And while you’re at it, find out more about these unlogged fax transactions. There’s something very uncanny about that.”

“So this unidentified ‘saboteur’ of yours—” Vivian sighed
, looking out the headquarters window at a distant line of palm trees. “—either a person or an organization, is not only trying to push the Ring Collapsiter into the sun, but also to eradicate any persons able to stop it. I don’t get it. I don’t get a motive for this. I mean, we haven’t received any kind of threats or demands.”

“Indeed,” Bruno said. “It’s difficult to imagine an outcome useful to
anyone
. And yet, the tricks being played here are extraordinarily clever. This is not the work of a madman.”

“Madmen aren’t necessarily stupid,” Marlon pointed out sullenly. He had good cause to be sullen: as the investigation spread, it had quickly become apparent that
no
fax machine anywhere in the Queendom had record of him. He’d been erased, in the ninety minutes leading up to the destruction of his house. There was only one copy of him currently in existence, and if not for the discovery of the bodies on Station 117 and the timing of his visit there,
no
copy would exist. Even the Royal Registry, when asked to produce him, begged “a slight delay, owing to technical difficulties.”

It seemed to horrify Tamra and Deliah at least as much as it horrified Marlon himself. Bruno, who’d been single-copy for most of his life, couldn’t easily grasp their mood. Marlon was still alive, right? But for those accustomed to multiplicity, that seemed little comfort. This much was apparent to all: that the greatest of rarities, a murder in the
first
degree, had been attempted, and had very nearly succeeded.

No one seemed to notice that Bruno himself had nearly been obliterated in the same stroke. Had hunter-killer apps gone looking for his fax image in the collapsiter grid? Were the police investigating that? Perhaps they assumed he’d left a live copy at home, as many people did while traveling.

“Nor are stupid men invariably hapless,” Deliah added, with a sort of low anger. “The gravity projector was invented by a moron. Half the senate are fools, but see how they come alive when crossed!” She was standing at the window, looking out at coconut palms and bamboo and beach sand, and the distant breaking of ocean waves. She’d been quietly outraged, Bruno thought, to find that her murder was an afterthought, that she wasn’t the target, that she was merely standing next to Marlon Sykes at the wrong time. She, the Lead Componeer for the Ministry of Grapples, had not been seen as a threat to the Ring Collapsiter’s fall. The idyllic island of Tongatapu had done little to assuage her indignation; she stood guywire taut, hands clasped firmly behind her buttocks.

“Boyle Schmenton was hardly a moron,” Bruno felt compelled to point out.

“Oh, dry up.”

“That’s enough, Laureate-Director,” Tamra said coolly.

A collective sigh or yawn went through them all—all except the robot guards, who stood like anchored chrome statues, gleaming in the sunlight. Royal Constabulary Headquarters, on the northeast edge of the city of Nuku’alofa, was a pyramid of yellow-white glass, nearly as large as Bruno’s whole planet and really far too bright inside for an office building. But the temperature and humidity were just right, and the air smelled
brilliantly of ocean and wood smoke and vanilla.
Wild
vanilla, probably—nobody really farmed anymore, or fished, or roasted pigs and turtles in pits on the beach.

In some ways, Bruno had always felt he was more Tongan than the Tongans themselves. His father, Enzo de Towaji, had won a lot of money flying kites, and sunk it all—against every bit of advice—into a restaurant that served only “natural” foods and beverages. A stupid idea, yes, but it had not only caught on, but spawned a whole range of subindustries to support and complement it. Bruno had grown up in the retro-Girona of gentlemen farmers and butchers and vintners, and eventually even weaver women and chandlers to complete the ambience. Back-to-basics was always an easy sell in Catalonia—Enzo was no fool. Of course, the Sabadell-Andorra earthquake had ended that era rather decisively, but Bruno had never really shaken off its influence.

Still, he’d forgotten how much he missed
Tonga
, how very many memories he had tied up here. The noisy palace, the quiet beaches, the secret harbors of Eua accessible only by catamaran … He’d come to Tamra’s court at the age of thirty, and remained for thirty years more, fighting always for the time to seclude himself, to lock these sultry islands away behind white laboratory walls and
work
. The
arc de fin
, the
arc de fin
! But now he’d been away and alone for nearly as long, his life neatly trisected by this residence and birthplace and ancestral capital of Queen Tamra Lutui.

He moved his chair closer to hers, and would have reached for her hand if they’d been anything like alone together. As it was, there were seven people in the room here, and dozens more visible in the rooms nearby, and hundreds or thousands of news cameras swarming like thirsty mosquitoes at the cordon line, three hundred meters out. But Tamra seemed to sense his thoughts, and nodded sidelong at him: Yes, Philander, I remember it too.

Vivian set down her wellstone slate and rubbed her eyes with her thumbs in a very unchildlike gesture. “I need more information. This isn’t falling into place for me. You, Sergeant,”
she said, singling out one of the uniformed officers standing guard. “Find me Cheng Shiao, with a reconstruction of the attack on Sykes’ house. No excuses—I want whatever he’s got. And bring me a soda, also.”

“Yes’m. Right away.”

To Bruno, for some reason, she said, “It’s like something I’ve learned in school but mostly forgotten.”

“Mademoiselle?” Bruno said, in a tone meant to convey incomprehension.

“My life. My job. I feel as if I know them until it’s time to
do
something, and then I’m never sure what. I keep expecting people to laugh, to say I’m doing it all wrong.”

Bruno felt a little smile plant itself on him. “I’ve often felt that way myself, mademoiselle. It’s more normal than you might suppose. I do think you’re being too bossy, though. You might tone that down a notch.”

“My name is Vivian,
sir
.”

“Ah. Well. I shall call you that in the future, and if you like, you may call me Bruno. Understand, I’ve never met a person in your … circumstances before. We’re making up the protocol as we go along, both of us.”

“Hmm.” She considered that answer, or perhaps the smile behind it, and finally seemed to find it good.

“You’re doing a splendid job,” Tamra added sincerely. “Believe me, I’d remove you if you weren’t. The Queendom deserves no less.”

“Hmm.” After a moment’s reflection, Vivian seemed to like that answer even better.

They all fell silent. The hum of ventilators and lighting seemed, somehow, to match the rolling and crashing of the ocean, too distant to be audible behind the wellstone glass of the windows.

Half a minute later, Cheng Shiao strode into the office, a glass of dark, fizzing soda in his hand. He set it down in front of Vivian, then stood at attention. “Cola Five-Two, no ice. Regrettably, I’m unavailable with the full reconstruction at this time, as my cruiser is presently docking with the remains
of Sykes Manor. Only the gross reconstruction, based on our last radar assay, is available yet. I’ve taken the liberty of uploading it to your pads.”

“Thank you, Lieutenant. Will you walk us through it?”

“A pleasure, Commandant-Inspector, though I’m afraid there isn’t much to it.” Images appeared on all the little pads, and on a backlit holographic rectangle that appeared in the center of the table’s smooth surface, like a glass window looking down on outer space, on the golden-white sphere of Marlon’s house spinning silently against the starscape, lit mainly by floodlights but with a sliver of bright sunlight illuminating one side. “A directed energy stream approximately six meters wide strikes the house in a single pulse at fourteen hours fifty-two minutes, penetrating
here
and exiting
here
. Although the structure remains largely intact, atmospheric containment fails immediately—note the venting gases—and power distribution fails within seconds.”

The little house shot gouts of debris and glittering crystals of frozen air from a pair of circular openings that appeared in it. The mangled Athenian structures within showed clearly.

“Power distribution failed?” Marlon asked angrily. “There’s wellstone all through that house—more than enough redundancy to keep it alive.”

“Yes sir. Apparently it was the embedded computing structures themselves that failed.”

“Secondary radiation?” Bruno speculated. “A shower of charged particles released by the sudden energy flux?”

“Possibly, sir.”

“What sort of beam was it?”

“Unknown, sir.”

“Hmm.” Bruno pinched his chin between thumb and forefinger, as was his habit when attempting to concentrate. “I don’t suppose you have the precise time of impact? Coupled with the rotation rate of the house, that could be used to trace the beam back to its source.”

“We have timeline only to the half minute, sir, based on long-range radar tracks of the larger debris. I expect to refine
that figure through proximity scan and direct assay of the impact site.”

“This is police business,” Vivian noted impatiently. “Shiao
does
know what he’s doing.”

“Please,” Tamra said, holding up a hand in what was either a scolding or a beseeching gesture, or perhaps both. “The Royal Committee for Investigation of Ring Collapsiter Anomalies does share jurisdiction here. Their investigation precedes yours, in fact precedes the murder itself, and I daresay their business is the more urgent. You’re to provide de Towaji with anything he asks.”

“Oh,” Vivian said, with surprising equanimity. “Okay.”

Bruno, who hadn’t realized he was a member of any sort of official committee, said, with some embarrassment, “Er, what’s the soonest you could get us a full reconstruction?”

Shiao shrugged. “Unknown, sir. Since the investigating cruiser is some seven light-minutes distant, I haven’t communicated with myself directly. For a precise figure, you’d have to ask me there yourself, in person.”

“Ah. An excellent suggestion. Your cruiser is fully equipped? Can I fax myself there?”

Shiao looked alarmed. “Well, um, technically yes, sir, but in actuality I was attempting a joke. You’d need to be certified for shipboard operations. Have you even had any spacesuit training?”

Bruno laughed. “Breathe in, breathe out, and keep your boot grapples engaged? I’ve seen it in the movies.”

“Sir, emergency procedures alone require eight weeks of intensive immersion. I’m afraid I can’t authorize—”

“You
can
authorize it,” Her Majesty said firmly. “Was I unclear about this? De Towaji is operating under full royal dispensation, and shall have whatever resources he requires. His safety is
my
responsibility, not yours.”

Nervously, Shiao pressed. “Sir, have you ever even
worn
a spacesuit?”

“No,” Bruno admitted, “but I grew up in a back-to-basics community where primitive skills like that were highly prized.
I’m adaptable. Don’t worry, son; I intend no unwarranted risks, and you’ll be held blameless for any foolishness on my part. I do think this merits my attention, though. And yours, Marlon, if you feel up to accompanying me.”

“It’s my house,” Marlon said unhappily. “Of course I’ll go.”

“And I,” Tamra said, stifling Shiao’s protest with a stern look. “It’s my Queendom at risk. And I
have
had spacesuit and spaceship training—in fact, I’m a level-one instructor.” Shiao looked surprised at this, which only made Her Majesty grow sterner. “You think I’m a twit, like my dear departed Queen Mother? All my life I’ve had the finest doctors, the finest fax programmers, the finest tutors and trainers. I’m as fit and as fast and as wise as modern science can make me, and I’ve been certified with more tools and vehicles and weapons than you’ve probably ever heard of. It’s not Tamra Lutui who’ll step aboard that cruiser, but the Queendom of Sol itself, and your approval, Lieutenant, has not been solicited.”

Bruno noted that Marlon, who’d been Tamra’s childhood mathematics tutor long before he’d been anything else, swelled with pride at these remarks. Shiao, though, gasped, bowed his head, and dropped to his knees.

“Meaning no disrespect, Your Majesty! My concern is only for your safety!”

“And appreciated as such,” Tamra conceded. “But overruled. Vivian, have
you
retained any spacesuit training?”

“Um, I think so.”

“Excellent. Will you accompany us?”

“Sure.”

Bruno watched Shiao’s down-turned face, thinking he’d never seen someone actually
bite back
a protest before. He wondered if it was anywhere near as uncomfortable as it looked.

It took less than fifteen minutes for the Constabulary wardrobe
to dress them all in custom-fit, top-of-the-line vacuum-safety equipment, by which time Shiao admitted that his
docking maneuvers were complete and that he was dutifully awaiting the Royal Committee in what remained of Sykes Manor.

Bruno flexed his fingers and elbows and knees experimentally. The silvery-blue garments weren’t nearly as heavy or stiff as they looked, and the helmet dome, when he commanded it to swing shut over his head, was optically superconducting, invisible except for faint silver marking dots applied to it—he supposed they were there so he’d know where the dome was, so he wouldn’t accidentally try to put his gloved fingers through it.

They each had their name emblazoned on their rebreather backpacks—literally
emblazoned
, in dully glowing red letters. Bruno’s said TOWAJI, an error or abbreviation he hadn’t seen fit to correct. And here around him, as they crowded into the fax atrium, were SYKES and SKETTERING, a miniature RAJMON and a couple of hulking SHIAOs.