Resolution (34 page)

The Aurineate Grand’aume had been a rich realm; now it was suffering because of its status as Blight-occupied territory during the war. It formed a prime recruiting ground.

One of the people that Tom hired personally was Dr Xyenquil, the red-haired medic who might or might not have saved Tom’s life once, from femtocytic infection.

‘I don’t know why Axolon rejects the regrow-factors,’ he told Tom more than once. ‘It’s as if his cells - and they’re femto constructs as much as biological - have evolved antibody reactions to Jack technology.’

‘Or he doesn’t
want
to be reconstituted as a killing machine.’

Xyenquil would shrug. ‘I can’t argue with that, my Lord.’

Couriers sent to the Klivinax Toldrinov were met with blank silence. The guild which manufactured cyborgs had disowned Axolon, or were unwilling to reveal their secrets.

‘He’s not suicidal,’ Xyenquil said once. ‘Axolon has no self-destruct facility ... Not consciously.’

Every tenday or so, instead of running on his laminar flow pad, Tom would clamber over the terraformer’s balcony and freeclimb around the outer surface of the sphere, buffeted by winds and always conscious that the slightest mistake would spring him into the void.

These were the times when Tom forgot about political subterfuge, about inferring motives and machinations in realms he would never see, based on a haze of doubtful intelligence.

After one such climb, Tom sat in lotus and slid into deepest logosophical trance, attempting to clarify the global situation in his mind. When his eyes snapped open an hour later, his strategic understanding remained shadowy, but he knew exactly what to do about Axolon, and put the matter to him.

The cyborg agreed.

And was reborn.

The terraformer sphere legally became Axolon Array. It continued to drift among the clouds; but now, on the outer surface, mounted just below the equatorial ring, a cyborg’s head looked down upon the landscape, his fibres and metal sinews splayed across the stone surface and rooted in it, linked organically with ancient control systems so that he became a composite being: no longer a Jack, but something new and powerful.

Sometimes, Tom would climb down, perch on the narrowest of windswept ledges close to the cyborg’s face, and hold logosophical discussions on the nature of life and death and humankind’s purpose in the universe.

On other occasions, they would remain silent, watching the landscape slide slowly past beneath, until it was time for Tom to go back inside.

Spies and counterspies; double and triple agents; measures and counter-measures; plans within plans. And in that confusion, Elva came to visit: twice in the first year, once the next, always accompanied by Adam who made sure to bury himself in technical discussions for as much of the time as possible.

It was not supposed to happen this way.

How could Tom ask that Elva love him, when they were never together?

Four times, Thylara arrived by shuttle: ostensibly to discuss alliances with the TauRiders and other clans. Two visits ended with a wild ride in bed when she rode Tom like a bucking arachnasprite and he cried aloud with anguished pleasure when he came.

Then Tom returned to work, feeling dirty and driven, surrounded by holodisplays which mapped cause and effect, allegiance and betrayal, making use of every possible resource save Oracular truecasts to determine the state of Nulapeiron.

Pushing himself ever harder ...

You will not have my world.

...
until the day a small flyer marked with the charcoal signs of graser fire, its control surfaces so badly damaged that its survival was a near miracle, docked in a transfer bay near the bottom of the sphere, and the wounded occupant came aboard.

Tom received the man in the polished chamber with the chequered blue-and-white floor where, nearly twelve Standard Years before, the Oracle had died.

‘My Lord.’ Despite his injuries, the man went down on one knee and bowed his head. ‘I have bad news.’

The rest was detail, for in that moment Tom deduced exactly what had occurred, and clearly saw the depths of his own failure, and the helplessness with which he and everyone else faced the future.

Fate help us.

The Anomaly was here.

~ * ~

23

NULAPEIRON AD 3426

It was night and white lightning forked through purple clouds. Tom stood on the balcony, dark cloak whipping in the wind as he stared at the sky and saw only failure.

You’re achieving nothing out there, my Lord.

In his fist he clenched a crystal delineating the Anomalous incursions. The worst aspects were all-clear reports from Fire Watch bodies in realms which clearly had been subverted. Whom could he trust?

There were sightings of scarlet-clad human figures appearing from black flames; of metallic beings with flanges and wings and talons; mysterious decrees and repressive military occupation by forces whose officers had eyes like stone and the emotional warmth of reptiles.

Sheets of rain, silver and hard, began to fade, intensity lessening until drizzle remained, then nothing: just flat, preternaturally still air, while in the distance lightning blasted through the cloudbase.

Eye of the storm.

They were in the midst of it.

Soon the violence will rage.

Tom turned and went inside. Around a conference table in the chamber where he had murdered the Oracle, his friends and advisers waited. Xyenquil’s frown of concern might be for Tom’s health, and Eemur on her floating tray merely glistened with fresh blood, but the others looked fearful, knowing the entire world could fall in days.

And what am I supposed to do?

They were looking up at him, expecting leadership. Tom let out a breath.

Then: ‘Axolon?’ he said.

The voice reverberated all around them.

‘Ready a drop-capsule. I’m going down to the surface.’