The Dark Side (3 page)

Finally you'll spot fields of radio masts and power towers on the horizon, and cranes and warehouses and shunting yards and a garbage heap of discarded machinery and drill bits. This, clearly, is a mining town. But it's also the end of the line. It's Peary Base at the North Pole—beyond which “there is only darkness.”

You'll spend as little time here as possible: The whole place has all the charm of a low-rent shopping mall. There's a second-rate observation tower. A mass driver or rail gun, a kilometer-long stretch of curving electromagnetic rail that dispatches and receives payloads to and from Earth. And all the cranes, crawlers, and deep-drilling towers of the ice-mining industry. But not much else. So you'll check into one of the utilitarian, low-ceilinged hotels, ascend to a closet-sized room (pressurizing an entire hotel with oxygen and nitrogen is expensive), and collapse onto a bed that's about as big as a submarine bunk.

On the bedside table—if there is one—you'll probably find a ten-page brochure, a traveler's advisory warning you all about Purgatory. If you're game, or just seeking amusement, you'll give it a glance. “
Extremely dangerous
 . . .
exercise caution . . . restrictions on communication . . . eccentric local laws brutally enforced
 . . .
death penalty imposed
 . . .
high rate of sexually transmitted diseases . . . uncertified medical establishments
 . . .
controversial procedures . . . hostile locals
 . . .
visa and other entry and exit procedures change indiscriminately . . . tourists lured, targeted, and frequently killed.
”

If that doesn't give you second thoughts—and if you've made it this far, why would it?—you'll continue your journey by heading down to the Peary Transport Terminus. But don't expect to be traveling by m-train anymore: To preserve the integrity of its radar
readings, no electromagnetic propulsion systems—or radio waves, cell-phone networks, or satellite technologies—are permitted on Farside. So you'll be forced to choose among a hydro-powered coach, a minibus, or a cab, or, if you're really wealthy, a chauffeured limousine. Then your vehicle, whatever it is, will steer around a few bends, into the lattice-shadow of the mass driver, through a gap in an escarpment of piled refuse—a sort of unofficial exit gate—and onto a hard-packed road of sintered regolith that's rolled out like a ribbon across the pockmarked lunar terrain.

This is the Road of Lamentation, the official highway to Purgatory.

The regolith has been piled high by the side of the road as a sort of retaining wall, so at first there won't be much to look at: an occasional crater rim or lunar mountain, the stanchion-mounted, color-coded pipelines of hydrogen, nitrogen, and oxygen, and the crystal-clear cosmos itself if it's nighttime and your vehicle's shields are down. On the road itself there are regular solar-flare shelters, supply caches, emergency parking bays, and a couple of specialized sidings where tourists can turn in for a last glimpse of Earth. But for the most part the journey is numbingly monotonous—like traveling down a desert highway at midnight—except perhaps when there's a crest in the road and the unballasted vehicles leave the surface and soar through the air for a few giddy seconds.

Past the seventy-fifth parallel, however, the Lamentation starts winding like a river, skirting the larger craters, and the camber of the road allows you to see more of the lunar landscape: notably more rugged and hummocky than most of Nearside. But even this becomes tedious after a while, and just when you start wondering if the journey is ever going to end—and just when your eyelids begin fluttering—you'll be startled awake by the sight of a
huge object at the side of the road, towering at least thirty meters over the traffic.

It's a statue, spray-painted in glossy white, garishly illuminated at night with halogen spotlights, and looking like a winged angel standing on the bow of a boat.

It's the Celestial Pilot, the one who carries lost souls to Purgatory. And it's not the last statue you'll see in this final stage. Just a kilometer farther on there's a giant eagle, the one that transported Virgil in his dream. Then a colossal warrior—Bertran de Born—holding his own severed head like a lantern. Then a Roman emperor—Trajan—on a caparisoned horse. And finally a naked woman—Arachne—with eight spiderlike limbs. It's a gallery of characters from Dante Alighieri and Gustave Doré, all designed to give extra mythological resonance to your destination.

Then the Lamentation will descend, and the lines of cabs, coaches, transports, and haulers will merge into a bottleneck at least half a kilometer long. And somewhere in the middle of this you'll catch your first glimpse of Störmer Crater, the massive ramparts of the natural ringwall, illuminated by flickering electric lamps. And the entrance itself—ornate brass doors flanked by giant pillars twenty meters high and thickly decorated with faux-Renaissance bas-reliefs. And before you know it you'll be passing through. The gates will be closing behind you. And finally you'll be inside, shunted through a series of airlocks into the terminus. And the coach driver, or your chauffeur, or your guide, or an android, or an automated recording in a multitude of languages, will have a sobering message for you.

“Welcome to Purgatory.”

L
IEUTENANT DAMIEN JUSTUS IS
being interviewed in his office by a reporter from the
Tablet
, Purgatory's only official news outlet. The reporter, who sports the improbable name of Nat U. Reilly, is wearing a crumpled hat and a threadbare jacket with elbow patches. He's chewing gum and taking notes on a tiny scribble pad with a pencil. But at least he has the good grace to be self-conscious.

“It's the way we do things here in Purgatory,” he says. “Retro-style.”

“So I've seen.”

“We still roll the presses at the
Tablet
, you know that?”

“I'm no longer surprised,” says Justus.

Even the office that's been assigned to him is like something from the 1950s: a groaning wooden desk, a filing cabinet with squeaky drawers, a Bakelite rotary-dial telephone, and on the
wall a black-and-white photo of Fletcher Brass like an official portrait of Eisenhower. The police uniforms themselves—all midnight-blue wool, brass buttons, and peaked saucer caps—belong in a Dick Tracy cartoon. Justus expected as much in the tourist precincts, as part of the prevailing show business, but not behind the scenes as well.

“Anyway,” Reilly goes on, “you say your name is pronounced—how, again?”

“Like ‘Eustace.' ”

“Sure you don't wanna go with ‘Justice'?”

“I'm sure.”

“We like a good pun in our business.”

“And a bad one, it seems.”

Nat U. Reilly smirks and makes a note. “Justus it is, then. That's Swedish, isn't it?”

“It can be. Are you sure your readers will be interested in this, Mr. Reilly?”

“They'll be interested in everything about you, Lieutenant. Why? Not in a hurry, are you?”

“I've had some bad experiences with the press before, that's all.”

“We're different up here.”

“I'm pleased to hear it.” In truth, Justus knows that Reilly is very likely a criminal, a fugitive from terrestrial justice, like most permanent residents of Purgatory.

“You're from Arizona, that right?”

“From Nevada,” Justus says. “But I spent the last ten years in Arizona, that's true.”

“So you're used to arid places.”

“Nothing as arid as the Moon.”

“And you're used to casino towns.”

“If you mean Vegas and Reno, I spent some time in both; that's also true. I was in Homicide then.”

“And more lately you've been in Narcotics.”

“I was in charge of a squad operating out of Phoenix, yes.”

“You ruffled a few feathers, is what I hear.”

“You hear correctly.”

“You arrested the wrong man.”

“I arrested the right man.”

“But I mean, you arrested a man with the wrong connections.”

“If you asked him, I'm sure he'd say he had the
right
connections.”

Reilly snorts. “But you don't take shit from anyone, do you, Lieutenant? Not even a drug baron with his hand deep up the ass of the local legislature.”

“You put that very well.”

“You left not because
you
were corrupt, but because the system was.”

“You put that very well too.” To Justus it sounds as though Reilly has already written the article.

“You were told—in no uncertain terms—to get off Earth, is that right?”

“Sort of.”

“Sort of?”

“Well, if that was all there was to it—a threat to me—I wouldn't have left.”

“They threatened people close to you, yeah? Your wife and daughter?”

“That's as much as I want to say about that subject, Mr. Reilly.”

“But you knew—from experience—that they didn't mess around, right?”

“I said, that's as much as I want to say about that, Mr. Reilly.”

The reporter seems to stop himself from asking one very obvious question and moves on. “So you decided to come to Purgatory?”

“Well, it's not quite as simple as that. I was offered a position here.”

“By QT Brass.”

“By the Department of Law Enforcement.”

“Which is controlled by QT Brass.”

“I know nothing about that.”

“Have you met QT Brass?”

“I'm not even sure what she looks like.”

“What about Fletcher Brass, her father?”

“As I understand it, he's got a lot on his plate right now.”

“Well, that's a fact. But you know all about him, though? Everything he's done here?”

“To me, he's just another citizen.”

Reilly seems pleased with the answer. “You don't belong to anyone, do you, Lieutenant? Not even to the Patriarch of Purgatory?”

“I answer to the law, like everyone else.”

“And you'd throw Fletcher Brass in the slammer just as quick as any two-bit shoplifter?”

“If he'd committed a crime, and if I had sufficient evidence, then I'd certainly arrest him. But it's not up to me to issue sentences.”

Reilly, scribbling something down, is practically grinning now. “Then what about all the others in Purgatory—mobsters, war criminals? You're not scared of them either?”

“Whatever they did on Earth is no longer my concern. It's what they do here that's my business.”

“And you're not doing this for kicks, right?”

“I'm not interested in doing anything for kicks. A lecturer of mine at the police academy used to have a favorite saying: ‘A man with a hammer will find plenty worth hammering.' Well, I'm not interested in hammering anything, unless it would fall apart otherwise.”

“But there must be some particular attraction for you here in Purgatory, yeah? The idea of cleaning up a cesspit like this?”

“You call it a cesspit. To me, it's just another precinct.”

“You can't really mean that?”

“Whether it's Earth or the Moon, an assault is an assault, a robbery is a robbery, and a murder's a murder. Gravity doesn't change that.”

“What about the fact that there's no CCTV here? No radar?”

Reilly is referring to the fact that Purgatory is a “surveillance-free zone.” It began as a necessity and became a means of attracting tourists, because on Earth there's barely a square inch that's not being watched, probed, or listened to.

“It makes things more challenging, certainly,” says Justus. “I guess it makes the law as old-fashioned as the furniture.”

Reilly snickers. “How about your gravity adjustment, then—how's that coming along?”

“I took a two-week course at Doppelmayer before I got here.”

“So you're already well acclimatized?”

“I still overshoot the mark occasionally. I bounce off walls. Nothing serious.”

“And the Purgatory Police Department? How have you slotted in there?”

“Everyone in the PPD has been very cooperative.”

“You didn't put any noses out of joint, though, getting your lieutenant stripes without having served here first?”

“Well, I wasn't responsible for that. And the circumstances are unique. I think the others accept that.”

“What about the locals—in Sin, I mean? How do you find them?”

“Suspicious, but that's to be expected. And again, I'm not here to judge anyone. I've always believed in redemption. I believe in sin too, but even more in redemption.”

For some reason this answer seems to unsettle Reilly, so he flips a page and goes on hurriedly.

“And friends? Have you made any friends yet?”

“I'm not here to make friends. Or enemies.”

“And women? What do you make of the Purgatorial women?”

“They're female.”

Reilly has reached the last page of his notepad and suddenly seems a little hesitant. “Okay, just one last question. And I hope you don't take this personally. But it's about your appearance.”

“Go ahead.”

“Well, you were obviously in a fire or something, right?”

Justus is sure the reporter already knows the truth, but he answers anyway. “I had a vial of nitric acid flung at my face.”

“By that drug baron back in Phoenix?”

“By someone acting on his orders.”

“And that's partly the reason you came here?”

“Partly.”

“Then you know we have some excellent surgeons here—doctors who can give you a whole new face in two hours?”

“And I'm sure it would be a very handsome face too.”

“But you wanna stay the way you are? To remind yourself of the past?”