Transmission: Ragnarok: Book Two (54 page)

I’m going to kill you, Helsen
.

He was a professional, and he had picked up her trail through a tour de force of surveillance hacking that he would never be able to share with anyone; and he had intercepted her here, in a lonely chamber just inside the hull of Pneumos, too late to prevent the cascade of violence she had kicked off. Too late for normal procedures of arrest and detention then: just time for him to be the executioner.

‘Piss off,’ she said.

The floor ripped apart between them: a gap widening very fast. Already they were separated by a chasm too wide to jump across. He stared around, raising his arms to summon quickglass tendrils; but a rush of wind indicated the outer hull was splitting open, and then he was choking as Molsin’s toxic atmosphere mixed with city air.

Shit
.

He saw Helsen throw herself out through the gap –
good, she’s suicided
– but then a shining hull told of something very different: a mu-space ship, and Helsen’s being dropped inside by a city tendril before the ship’s opening sealed up.

It turned away, silver and red its colours; then it slammed out of existence.

Escaped
.

He could choke here, throw himself out, or run back inside the city to prolong his end; but whichever way it went, this was it.

It’s all too soon. Maura, I should never have—

Then scarlet light was blazing.

<>

<>

<>

<>

Sapphire blue, as the surroundings changed. A cabin, with air that did not choke him; and three more traceries of living light.

‘Wait,’ he managed. ‘I can’t survive in mu-space.’

Not conscious, anyhow. But they did not seem to hear him.

Oh, frigging God
.

He stood up, stared at the metal bulkhead, then crouched.

Oh, Maura
.

And lunged headfirst against the—

Piet Gunnarsson and his ship were basking in the golden void, meditating on the distant strings of black fractal stars, glad to be back in the universe where they belonged. It was a rest period, and he had already slept. Here, strictly, they had nothing to do.

In realspace there had been Fulgor to watch over, from what they had hoped was a safe distance. However deadly the possibility of attack from the planet-locked Anomaly, there was always a tedium to hanging in realspace. Here, the opposite was true: simply relaxing involved a resonance with mu-space energies that made him-and-ship fully alive.

Far off, Alice’s ship floated, and beyond her the others from their shift. A replacement sequence of ships was hanging in realspace to observe the hellworld of Fulgor.

**Someone’s in a hurry.**

That was Alice.

**I see them.**

No ID signals were evident, but the ship was flying hard – her hull silver and scarlet, translated to realspace colours. Not a vessel that Piet recognized. It would be past them in seconds.

Another signal came in from Alice.

**No response to hails and pings.**

On this geodesic, the newcomer could transit into realspace and pop out close to Fulgor. Piet’s stomach churned as he sank into ship-interface, and he-and-ship powered up their weapon systems.

**You can’t be serious.**

Alice again, but ship-and-Piet did not reply, because they knew how ferocious was the intent behind their orders: to let nothing leave or approach the realspace hellworld.

**Σ Γ 7 ≡ Ψ 9 **

Piet-and-ship felt the signal activate their recognition module. Entanglement collapsed to reveal the corresponding eigenmessage:

Priority Aleph. Admiral on board
.

He-and-ship allowed their weaponry to relax as the other ship sped past, flared with light, and disappeared from the golden void.

**Ours not to reason why, Piet.**

**Nobody tells us nothing.**

In Aeternum, the double negative implied an infinite mutual recursion akin to paradox, while the counter-rhythm of the nouns formed a twisted pun. It was enough for Alice to transmit a chuckle without words.

But Piet was not amused by his own joke, because he could see no reason why a lone admiral would fly straight towards the most unpredictable of danger zones.

On the other hand, Piet had his orders.

I’m not going to fail in my duty
.

If he had been more alert days earlier, he would have followed the evacuation fleet to Fulgor and helped refugees get clear before the Anomaly took over. Then, he had not been civic-minded, and the shame would remain for ever.

So I’ll do what I’m told
.

In a subjective hour, he would be back in realspace, on watch once more.

Observing the enemy
.

Because when it boiled down to it, the Anomaly was simply that.

The enemy.

It had evolved. It continued to evolve.

Its billions of constituent, pinpoint components, had once been independent minds. Buried deep inside were flimsy theories from Its ancestral species, such as: in the absence of a vast plurality, evolution could not progress: a solitary, unitary organism could only grow. Yet It continued to change in ways tiny life-forms could not contemplate, unable to fully grasp the strong coupling between emergent resonance and natural selection. It spread across the face of Its world. Soon, It would become Its world; only solitude was necessary.

And then, something disturbed Its isolation.

The ship that landed was silver and scarlet. Using archaic, ancestral communication modes, it broadcast this message:

**We wish to help. We wish to help you spread.**

For many nanoseconds, It contemplated the primitive semantics; then it received a further signal.

**Give us some of your people, and we will take them with us.**

This needed no thought. It would miss a handful of internal components no more than a human might regret a shed skin-cell. Using a level of detailed control It had not needed for some time, It directed several of Its human components to walk towards the waiting ship.

An opening melted in the hull, and a ramp flowed out. In single file, Its components ascended and went inside.

**We give our word.**

There was no need for It to answer.

Jed and Rhianna were with him, but he could hardly perceive their presence. Even before the wall melted open, he could sense her inside, and knew how much had changed, how much he had missed by being away on Molsin.

I’m here
.

The space was as vast as ever, but now she seemed to fill it. Stately in a way she could never have managed before, she floated closer: magnificent and huge and beautiful: black and webbed with both scarlet and gold, all power and manoeuvrability. Roger touched her lower hull with his hand.

You’re so beautiful
.

And I’m yours
.

Tears blurred everything.

Yes
.

A tendril came down, ready to lift him aloft, to take him inside her for the maiden flight.

I’m ready
.

For the flight?

And the rest
.

The moment stretched out as the tendril took hold of him around the waist.

Rest?

I have my mother’s memories
.

Oh
.

She lifted him up.

This stanza, which I’ve quoted in chapter 35, is from one of the Hávamál collection of poems as translated by R.I. Page, and printed in Page [1995]. Though the verses were not gathered until the late Viking Age, many date from earlier times.

Medium wise should a man be
,

Never too wise
.

No man should know his fate in advance;

His heart will be the freer of care
.

Many thanks to the volunteer staff at Bletchley Park and others who have told me more than I can use here. Massive gratitude to Andrew Jenkins, Mark Williamson and James Winters for encouraging feedback. And infinite love and thanks, as always, to Yvonne for getting me through it.

Articles on Telegraphy and on World War II in the 1956 edition of the
Encyclopædia Britannica
were also helpful.

A Gollancz eBook

Copyright © John Meaney 2012
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First published in Great Britain in 2012 by
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This eBook first published in 2012 by Gollancz.

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ISBN 978 0 575 09479 6

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