The Song of the Jubilee (The Phantom of the Earth Book 1) (9 page)

Stay close to me now, Connor
, Hans sent. Connor could receive but not send telepathic messages. He’d not yet learned how to avoid Marstone’s reach in that manner—a recaller only did so much to elude the commonwealth’s surveillance. Hans pushed his consciousness out into the ZPF. He influenced the visual cortexes of the crowd and the Janzers such that they could no longer see him or Connor.
Neither the Piscatorians nor the Janzers can see us,
he sent to his brother.
Avoid them.

They’d practiced this contingency. Father would take no chances with Connor, not after what had happened to Solstice. It was one of the reasons Hans became so skilled at creating illusions. When executing this particular feat with the ZPF, the last thing Hans would need was for his brother to crash into an unsuspecting Piscatorian, drawing attention to their departure.

To Hans’s relief, Connor moved in stride with him, and they soon arrived at an interterritory track where four unoccupied transports lay in wait. Hans glanced back. The Piscatorians moved swiftly, focused on achieving the day’s production and sales targets. He’d miss many of them, especially Icarian, the Block operator. He touched his finger to the side of one of the transports, determined to see his brother to safety in Natura and rescue his father from captivity.

WELCOME FARKAI appeared on the readout. The solid barrier disappeared for Hans’s entry. It sealed. Connor did the same, and WELCOME ALLESANDRO appeared. Inside, Hans stood near a screen that showed the tunnels, the interterritory portion labeled in blue, the intraterritory portion labeled in red. He placed his pack in front of a seat across from Connor, who’d set his pack on the adjacent seat.

Connor pulled the overhead latch down over his shoulders. “What now?”

“Tell Marstone we’re going to Calabria Station in Yeuron City,” Hans said.

Connor nodded. He inserted his forged commonwealth card and entered his forged commonwealth security number on a digital display. Murray had explained to Connor the transport’s system of checks and balances—the fingerprint, the key cards, the security numbers and test of telepathy—all meant to prevent the unregistered, undeveloped, or underdeveloped from traveling. Murray also taught the boy that all legitimate interterritory travel led to the Phanes Beltway, which looped around Beimeni City.

Hans latched into his seat.

What’s your destination?

Marstone regulated and moderated telepathic mind-to-mind and machine-to-mind communications in the ZPF, anywhere in the solar system. Its voice sounded brash and unassailable.

Calabria Station, Yeuron City,
Hans sent.

He waited for Connor to indicate the same destination, then flicked a switch on his scrambler, which transmitted counterfeit signals to the transport and the Department of Transportation in Beimeni City.

Connor fidgeted in his seat.

“Relax,” Hans said.

Marstone didn’t inquire about the purpose of the trip, its standard protocol altered by the scrambler, and the overhead lighting dimmed. An outdoor scene engulfed them, and the transport’s walls instead looked like windows, revealing rolling dunes, waves over an ocean, the smell of sea salt in the air—a perfect Granville illusion.

Hans unlatched and held the seats for balance. At the main digital display, he attached a wire to a card and to the scrambler. He inserted the card into an access dock on the transport’s control panel. On a digital display, boxes numbered 1 to 100, and lettered with the word GO replaced the maps. Hans sent his algorithm.

“Johann, where’re we going?” Connor said.

Hans didn’t answer. He pushed more numbers, hit the GO button, then more numbers, GO, and one more time—until the transport shifted to a service tunnel, which would avoid the Phanes Beltway. Hans eased into his seat. The transport increased to its top speed, nearly fifteen hundred kilometers per hour—the highest speed a transhuman could handle without wearing a synsuit—but purred in the maglev tunnel.

Hans closed his eyes and imagined Farino Prison and what it would take for him and Murray to succeed in the operation: a combination of stealth, skilled telepathy, and luck.

Spas of Tranquility

Natura, Underground West

The transport slowed into Gzhela Station. The ocean disappeared, and the transport walls turned white.

“How do you feel?” Hans said.

“A little dizzy,” Connor admitted. “That transport moved a lot faster than the intraterritory ones.”

Hans suspected this wasn’t the only reason for his brother’s vertigo. He didn’t want to scare Connor. It seemed the fever might hit him sooner than Hans anticipated. Assuring himself he’d made the right decision, he dug into his pack and threw cashmere slippers, a sleeveless tunic, and a fur cape at Connor, who looked a bit pale.

The cape slipped out of Connor’s grasp as if it were a fish. “It’s so soft.” He picked it up.

“Wear it, the tunic, and the slippers,” Hans said.

He pulled more luxury garb out of his pack, and he and Connor redressed. He combed his hair and told Connor to do the same. Then he sprayed himself and his brother with oceanic cologne to remove their fishy, sweaty stench and lifted a thin bottle filled with a clear fluid from his pocket. He sprayed his and Connor’s packs, and they turned from a worn-looking tan to a rich red-brown. Hans also sprayed the packs with cologne, then stored their fishermen bodysuits and capes.

“What’re you doing?” Connor said.

“Piscatorians can’t afford trips to the Naturan resorts, certainly not during the peak.”

“A resort?” Connor said. “What’ll I do at a resort?”

“Survive.” Hans slung his pack over his shoulder, as did Connor. “There’re going to be a lot of aristocrats here today.”

Some of the developers who frequented the resorts were nearly as skilled with the ZPF as Hans, and even if they couldn’t decipher his intrusion into their consciousness, some might sense his meddling in their minds and alert the commonwealth. Put plainly, the skill he used in Piscator would not work at the Spas of Tranquility, but he didn’t want to admit this to Connor.

“Hold out your arm,” he said. Connor obeyed, and Hans injected him with a cloudy liquid. “Look as I look,” Hans continued. He injected his own arm. “Move and speak the way I do. Be courteous the way Murray taught you. The people here must think we are as wealthy as they and come here as frequently as they do. Does that make sense?”

Connor didn’t answer him. He narrowed his eyes, looking at his arms. “What’d you do to me?” His animated tattoos of seashells and ocean waves disappeared, replaced by bronze skin. He looked at Hans. He shook his head. “What’d you do to us?”

“I’ve treated us with
E. pigmentation
, a synism capable of adjusting the color of transhuman skin.”

“Why?”

“To look like aristocrats.” Hans put his dark hand on Connor’s shoulder and connected to his mind. “From this day forward, you are Trent Zimmer. You competed in the Harpoons in 364, received a bid from the Bajocian Consortium, a group known to recruit neophytes for developers in Underground Central. You work with House Tremadoci in Mantlestone Village. You’re at the spa with their approval.” Hans transmitted three terabytes of data to Connor’s neurochip with all details he’d need to understand his new identity. “Now, answer me, does all of this make sense?”

Connor nodded. “I guess so.”

“Not guess—yes or no, brother.”

“Yes.”

They stepped out.

Golden lettering rotated in midair beneath a Granville sphere the size of a melon, dangling from the station’s angled glass ceiling, high above. ABUNDANT CELEBRATIONS ARE ENCOURAGED BY THE OFFICE OF THE CHANCELLOR. The chancellor’s Twenty-first Precept appeared at all the transport stations near the spas. Hans felt a swell of anger rise within him. He despised all of the precepts and this one the most: too many of his comrades died during the government-sanctioned Jubilees.

He looked away from the precept. Beyond the glass walls and ceiling, a firmament filled the territory with light, a burning silver sun above lifeless mountains. A man-made lagoon lay below, its clear water surrounded by porous rock and sage plants, which gave Natura Territory its signature herbal musk. The smell didn’t calm Hans. His thoughts focused on the future. He’d see his brother to safety, rescue his father, fulfill his people’s dreams, then return to Vivo City with Mari.

“Let’s move,” he said.

The Selendias blended with the aristocrats, most dressed in golden or maroon robes, tunics, or capes with cashmere slippers. They ambled over cobblestones lined with flowers and bushes, and soon they arrived at a clearing with a doorway labeled SPAS OF TRANQUILITY. Hans knocked, and a scanner emerged from an opening on the side. He pushed his finger to it, and ACCESS GRANTED flashed on the doorway, which disappeared, revealing a hostess. Golden locks sprang from her widow’s peak and curled over her bodysuit to hang at her shapely waist.

“Welcome to the Spas of Tranquility,” she said with a thick Naturan accent, “do you have a reservation with us?”

“We do,” Hans said, bowing slightly to her. Connor mirrored his movements. “It’s under Anemone.”

Her eyes moved rapidly back and forth as she searched her extended consciousness. “Excellent, I see your party.” She waved gently. “Follow me.”

She took them through passages lined with golden palm trees and clear streams. Connor was breathing deeply and, judging by his stride, starting to relax. It pleased Hans to see his reticence melting. He hated to leave his brother while he underwent the fever and preferred the chance that he might at least enjoy the atmosphere of his new home.

When they arrived close to the cliffs above the spas, Connor halted. “Gods,” he said, “I never expected this.”

Hans gave his brother a cautious look, then pushed his consciousness into the hostess’s. When she beamed and did not try to send a message to a spa manager, Hans exhaled. He didn’t want to kill her.

“These are the finest spas in all the Great Commonwealth, my lords,” she said. “We have over a million cabanas behind the falls.”

Hans believed her. He knew it had taken his father’s research team decades to fully terraform the spas. Water cascaded down the sides of cliffs in what looked like an oblong canyon. At the bottom of the canyon, fields with flowers and trees of every type and color intermingled with walking paths. At the far end, an archway broke through the falls, leading to a corridor that Hans knew elevated to a ramp, up and up to House Thuddan. The lady and lord of this house developed candidates for the Harpoons. Friends of the Front, they had offered to aid Connor’s advancement with the ZPF and transhuman capabilities, a sizeable risk, for development was heavily regulated by the Masimovian Administration. They’d not dare use developmental synisms on someone unregistered in Marstone’s Database, and they also wouldn’t like that Hans induced the fever in Connor. Hans hoped they’d understand that after Jeremiah’s arrest, he
had
to.

Now the hostess took them to a cutout in a garnet stone pathway, down marble stairs to an archway of polished mantle stone covered with holographic letters that read REGISTRATION. An usher in a sleeveless tunic and maroon cape stood behind the counter, surrounded by representations of the spa’s services. Everything from natural currents to ponds to robotic masseuses to aromatherapy shoals to sparkling water was available.

“Welcome to Natura,” the usher said, “the place of leisure. Where is it you wish to escape?”

“We’re here to meet with the Anemone party,” Hans said.

The usher moved as if to adjust the holograms, but his fingers spread shadows on the wall that formed a flapping phoenix.

“Thank you,” Hans said.

He recognized the BP signal for Janzers, and tried his best to steady his singing heart.
How could Lady Isabelle know?
He’d told only Maribel, Arturo, and Murray of his plans to leave Connor in House Thuddan. He hoped this signal didn’t mean Lady Erelah and Lord Turi Thuddan had been arrested. It would be another blow to the Front’s network in the underground. Hans didn’t have time to enquire and wouldn’t risk contacting them telepathically. He searched the ZPF for Janzers, and though he did sense their presence at the spas, he couldn’t tell how many, or where they were. Something, or someone, was interfering with his mind-body-cosmos interface.

“We’ll be on our way.” He bowed to the usher, as did Connor. Hans leaned next to Connor’s ear. “We have to go.”

“What’s wrong?” Connor said softly.

“A problem. Stay close.”

They moved through the crowd, and Hans took note of the eyes following him and his brother. Developers and district overlords didn’t typically arrive and leave the spas so fast. At Gzhela Station, Hans found an empty interterritory transport and commandeered it the way he did the one at Piscator Shore. He directed it through the supply tunnels.

“Where’re we going now?” Connor said. He sat with the alloy latch firmly set over his shoulders.

“Ypresia Village,” Hans said. That village held the largest market in Gaia.

“Why there?”

“We will meet with Murray, now be quiet, please, let me think.”

Hans seethed inside while blocking his mind from Marstone. For no matter the care the BP took in recent years, the commonwealth speared them.
Damn Lady Isabelle and damn her Janzers,
Hans thought,
and damn this godsforsaken commonwealth!
He used his scrambler to adjust the transport’s itinerary, and they flew through the maglev tunnel.

Sometime later, Connor unlatched. “What’s going on?” he asked.

The transport turned up, and the Selendias rolled down to the bottom of it, Connor on top of Hans.

“Get off me,” Hans said. He flung his brother beside him. A pond, rimmed by colorful roses, geraniums, and oak trees, surrounded them in the transport’s walls.

“You asked me to trust you,” Connor said, grasping on to a latch, “and I did! Why won’t you trust me?”

Hans grabbed a seat and pulled himself to his feet. He laughed wanly. “It’s too late, brother.”