"I"m real glad I don"t work for these guys right now," said Vincenzi, out loud. His gunner snickered.
Mimas Chris felt someone brushing their fingers across his forehead, like spider"s feet dancing on his brain.
He decided there was no point in pretending to be asleep.
Well-spotted, said a voice in his head. said a voice in his head.
"Ow," said Chris. "Don"t do that."
He opened his eyes. Iaomnet was looking down at him.
No, she wasn"t. Iaomnet was long gone.
He jerked back, surprised to find he wasn"t restrained, the blank look in her eyes making his stomach turn. He knew what it reminded him of. A crocodile"s eyes, permanently jammed open by translucent scales.
It wasn"t that she didn"t blink, that she had a hypnotic stare, or laser beams coming out of her pupils or anything. Her eyes were the same dark colour as when he"d first looked into them aboard the Hopper, months ago.
But there was n.o.body home. Someone was looking through through her eyes. her eyes.
A lot of someones, said the Brotherhood. said the Brotherhood.
Their voices crawled crawled. He was backed against the wall, wanting nothing more than to get away from her.
"Where"s the Doctor?" he said.
You"re both safe and well, said the Brotherhood. said the Brotherhood. The rescue The rescue autopilot brought you down on the landing pad of our base. autopilot brought you down on the landing pad of our base.
"That was you," said Chris. "You attacked us in the shuttle. We could have crashed!"
285.
He looked around the room, everywhere but at her. The wall was curved, everything was made from inflatable plasticrete.
Some kind of building on the surface, then.
"Where"s the Doctor?" said Chris again.
We"ll bring you to him shortly, said the Brotherhood. said the Brotherhood. Yes, I did Yes, I did scan your mind while you were unconscious. It"s a shame the scan your mind while you were unconscious. It"s a shame the Doctor didn"t tell you his plan. Doctor didn"t tell you his plan.
"He "
I suppose it"s possible you"re right, he doesn"t have a plan at all, to make sure we can"t antic.i.p.ate it. His mind is almost all, to make sure we can"t antic.i.p.ate it. His mind is almost impossible to read. impossible to read.
Something cold went down Chris"s spine. "How long have I been unconscious?" he said.
Twenty-four hours.
Chris lunged at her. He"d barely begun to move when a ton of psychokinetic force fell on him, pinning him to the bed at an awkward angle.
"Let me see him," gasped Chris.
All right, said Iaomnet. She released the pressure. said Iaomnet. She released the pressure. We"re just We"re just about ready for you, anyway. about ready for you, anyway.
Achebe Gorge, Mars Vincenzi and Muller sat side by side on a fallen beam.
Vincenzi was smoking. "You want one?"
"Dirty habit," said the stocky sergeant. "Terrible for your health."
There was a flash of weapons fire in the distance, on the outside of Achebe Rim. "Why do so many soldiers smoke, Sergeant?" Vincenzi asked.
"A smart missile is much worse for your health, sir," she said.
Vincenzi grinned. "Report."
"We sustained light casualties only, sir. I"m working on the precise figure. The Unitatus will be making their drop in forty minutes. They"ll convey us back to the Victoria Victoria and continue the clean-up operation. The defenders" actions are limited to small pockets of resistance along our route. A few young ones too stubborn to give up." and continue the clean-up operation. The defenders" actions are limited to small pockets of resistance along our route. A few young ones too stubborn to give up."
286.
"They"ve probably forgotten to tell them to surrender," said Vincenzi.
Everything had gone very much according to plan. The defenders had collapsed the Rim gap they"d been aiming for with high explosives. But they"d fitted the tanks with outsystem mining tracks, and had just crawled up and over the rubble and into the Gorge.
After that, there was a lot of very intelligent but utterly hopeless resistance. Vincenzi had personally lobbed a sh.e.l.l into the conical surface of the C and C building, watching it crash down.
Now he and the sergeant were sitting in the rubble, on top of the biggest, toughest door in the solar system.
"What do you suppose they"re doing down there?" he said, drawing a line in the ash and dirt with the tip of his boot.
"Breathing hard, sir," said Muller.
Mimas The Doctor was sitting in a buggy, a tiny, spidery vehicle designed to handle rough terrain in very low gravity. There were seats for four; he sat right at the back, hands clasped in his lap, head leaning against the window. He was very pale.
Iaomnet watched from the hangar floor as Chris climbed into the vehicle, the only one in sight. She pulled the door closed behind him.
"I don"t feel very well," said the Doctor.
Chris bit his lip. He put a hand on the Doctor"s arm, frightened by how light he felt. It wasn"t just the tiny gravity. The Doctor felt paper-thin, as though he wasn"t quite there.
"What are we going to do?" said Chris.
The Doctor put a finger to his lips.
Iaomnet climbed aboard and shut the outer door. There was an ear-popping puff as the buggy pressurized. Iaomnet strapped herself into the driver"s seat. Banks of lights switched on in the dimness of the vehicle. She pulled the HUDS visor down over her left eye.
She turned around, her face half covered by machinery. "Don"t worry," said Chris. "I"m not going to try anything."
287.
The engines were a tiny grinding sound under their feet. It didn"t take much power to shift the buggy"s eight wheels. They rumbled softly forwards, the hangar"s airlock door automatically sliding upward. A minute later, they were on Mimas"s surface.
The Doctor looked as though he was asleep. Chris decided to let him rest; there was nothing to talk about while the Brotherhood were listening, anyway. He looked past the exhausted Time Lord, on to the surface.
The crater was something like ten klicks deep. The near rim cast an inky shadow, rising up to hide the stars. Chris tried hard not to think of it as a great big mouth.
At this temperature, ice acted like rock. He could see huge pits and scars where other meteorites had hailed down on Mimas. He tried to imagine huge machines sculpting the crater, tiny suited figures welding together the skeleton of the rim walls, creating a ma.s.sive fake.
"I"m not going to make it through this," said the Doctor.
Chris looked at him. "We"ll be all right." The Doctor looked as though he could barely open his eyes. "What did they do to you?"
"Oh, they haven"t even started yet," he said. "The entire gestalt is here, Chris. Deep beneath the surface. The new Grandmaster."
Waiting for you, said Iaomnet, making Chris jump. said Iaomnet, making Chris jump. We"ve been We"ve been waiting for a long time. waiting for a long time.
"Iaomnet tried a few basic scans," said the Doctor. "They"re very powerful, Chris. I won"t be able to keep them out of my head."
Chris sat back in his seat. The Doctor had always relied on tricking his enemies, knowing more than they did. How do you keep an ace up your sleeve when the Brotherhood can see right up your sleeve?
Relax, said Iaomnet. said Iaomnet. He doesn"t have a clever plan this time. I He doesn"t have a clever plan this time. I could tell that even from my initial scans. He"s so desperate to could tell that even from my initial scans. He"s so desperate to stop us he"s rushed in. stop us he"s rushed in. Chris could see her reflection in the windscreen. Chris could see her reflection in the windscreen. It"s almost as though he wanted to become one of us, It"s almost as though he wanted to become one of us, she said. she said.
Ja.n.u.s 288.
The Chief Programmer"s beeper went off at 01.00 local time.
She rolled out of bed and on to the floor. "Cruk," she said, picking herself up and s.n.a.t.c.hing the beeper from the bedside table. She hit the transmit b.u.t.ton. "Timmins," she said. What"s up?"
"You"d better come and see this," said whatever poor sod had drawn night-watch duty in the computer centre.
"That bad, huh? Let me guess. The counterintrusion routines have gone off again for no reason."
"The counterintrusion routines have gone over to the other side, ma"am," said the night watch.
"Say that again," said Timmins.
"I think you"d better get down here, ma"am."
Timmins got down there. The compute centre was a smallish, octagonal room, the eight wall panels giving you access to every part of the main system. The night watch and a couple of bleary-eyed techies were standing around, looking useless.
"Let"s get to work," said Timmins. "What exactly is the problem here?"
"Me," said the computer.
"Very funny," said Timmins.
"It"s an AI, ma"am," said night watch. His name refused to spring to her mind. "It began a download at zero hours exactly.
We couldn"t stop it."
"An AI?" said Timmins. "Do you know how much memory s.p.a.ce that would take up?"
"All of it," said the computer. "Of course, it"s not all of me. In fact, it"s one of my pieces that"s achieved a certain level of sentience on its own. See what happens when you let your children do as they please?"
Timmins leant on the console. Did the download complete?"
she asked night watch.
He nodded. "The whole OS was junked. It ate the counterintrusion routines."
"I just added them to myself," said the computer. "After all, they"re not dissimilar in structure to some of my own routines."
289.
"Look," said Timmins. "Are you trying to tell me that Centcomp Node Number One, the centre of the Empire"s computer control, has just been inhabited by an artificial intelligence? Who the h.e.l.l are you, anyway?"
"You may have heard of me," said the computer. "My name is FLORANCE."
"Oh G.o.d," said Timmins. Night watch"s face lit up, as though he was about to ask for the AI"s autograph.
"As you were, ladies and gentlemen," said FLORANCE. "It"s going to take me a little while to settle into place, of course, but I"m here to stay. I do think it"s time that the Empire"s computing systems were run by a real expert. Don"t you?"
Timmins sat down. Luckily, there was a chair between her and the floor.
"Now then," said FLORANCE. "What next?"
Mimas There was a pit dug into the dirty ice, the edges sharp, straight lines. The buggy rolled down a gentle slope. Another airlock irised open ahead.
The hangar was long and narrow. The underground tunnels were pressurized. Chris helped the Doctor out of the buggy as Iaomnet watched. He could feel her eyes moving over him, looking into him as deeply as she wanted.
He deliberately thought of the most lewd s.e.xual fantasy he could. After all, as soon as you met someone you knew could read your mind, all that stuff kind of bubbled up embarra.s.singly anyway.
Iaomnet laughed. It"s only a little way further, It"s only a little way further, she said. she said.
The floor was smooth, but not so smooth that it was slippery.
Some high-precision excavation devices had been here, slowly boring their way into Mimas. The Doctor stumbled. Chris held on to his arm, tightly, helping him along.
They must have walked for twenty minutes, a path gently leading down. Once, the Doctor fell back against Chris. "This wasn"t part of the bargain," he murmured. He sounded frightened.
290.
Chris wished to the G.o.ddess there was something more he could do than straighten the Time Lord up and help him keep going forward. Towards the Brotherhood.
The tunnel stopped at a lift. Chris recognized it as a mining access elevator, meant for engineers and managers to visit the coalface, or the iceface or whatever. Chris thought of attacking her again, but she just smiled. She watched as they got in.
She didn"t follow them in, operating the controls from outside.
Chris watched as the smile wiped off her face. She sat down against the wall, carefully, and suddenly her head rolled to one side and she slumped down.