The Temporal Void (76 page)

‘Could be. Who knows?’

‘So what do you want me to do?’

‘Stick him up at the top of your priority list. He needs to be found.’

‘After what happened on Sholapur I expect he’s halfway to Andromeda by now.’

‘We can’t take the risk. You must not allow the Accelerators to find him again.’

‘Don’t try to tell me my job,’ she told him curtly.

‘Wouldn’t dream of it. Just making information available like a good citizen.’

‘So what are you up to right now? I heard you didn’t show up for the ExoProtectorate meeting.’

‘I thought now was a good time to take a sabbatical. But don’t worry, I’m still sticking my hand in.’

‘Stick it in too deep and I’ll break it off. You know you don’t have half the special privileges you think you do, not as far as I’m concerned.’

‘Pleasure doing business with you, Paula. As always.’ The call ended.

Paula sat back on the couch. After a while she began to grin.

*

The Wurung Transport cab rattled along Colwyn City’s ageing public rails all day long. Araminta sat on the wide front seat with the wrap-around bubble window switched to one-way, watching a city in torment. The Ellezelin capsules zoomed low over the buildings, an unending reminder of their presence and power. Desperation was sinking in now, replacing the previous sullen resentment which had claimed the city. The Senate delegation had been on the ground for six hours before Cleric Phelim even agreed to see them. Crowds around the docks were treated badly by the paramilitaries as they shouted their demands to be heard by the Senators. Flights by ambulance capsules were still forbidden; cabs and trike pods were kept busy carrying the injured to city hospitals. By mid-afternoon numbers were thinning out around the docks. Other disturbance areas were growing.

Laril had switched on the cab’s unisphere node as he promised. It responded to simple voice instructions, which was proving incredibly useful. Almost the first thing she saw was a unisphere report on Justine’s encounter with the Skylord. The dream had been released into the gaiafield a few hours ago, the show said, and they’d transferred the images over. A lot of smart commentators were busy providing their interpretation, as was a Living Dream Councillor called DeLouis, who seemed repellently excited by the Skylord’s refusal to take Justine to the nucleus. Araminta watched for a while until she realized that no one really knew anything, then switched to local news. The tiny portal projected scenes captured by reporters all across town.

One thing kept happening over and over again. It was random, and inexplicable to the news shows. Ellezelin capsules pounced out of the sky to snatch women by force. There was no discoverable connection between the women as far as anyone could make out, and some very sophisticated semi-sentient scrutineers were employed to that effect. The Ellezelin troopers who performed the seizures were extremely determined, and didn’t care how much peripheral damage was committed to achieve their objective. The images helped stir a lot of the outrage people were feeling. The minority of residents who had valiantly gone to work as normal were heading for home by mid-afternoon. Almost no one on late shifts turned up. A siege mentality was growing. Homes were double locked and alarmed.

Araminta only had to see the first three atrocious snatches to work out the link between the poor hapless women. They looked like her.

‘Sweet Ozzie,’ she groaned as the third was dragged away in the middle of a street in Espensten district, her two young children screaming at the horror of Mummy being forcefully taken from them.

Condemnation from across the Commonwealth reached a crescendo with that one. It didn’t affect the behaviour of the paramilitaries.

Her feeling of depression grew as she saw her homeworld suffer because of her; a feeling not helped by the way the Skylord had rejected Justine. Araminta was furious about that. After all she’d risked contacting the Skylord and getting Justine into the Void, the effort had come to nothing. Justine hadn’t even got to the Heart. There would be no negotiation now, no explaining to whatever controlled the Void the damage it was causing.

There was nothing Araminta could do about that, or anything, actually – short of surrendering, which was one very swift answer to everything. Instead she did what Laril advised, and delved into the gaiafield, losing herself amid the emotional outpourings and whispered messages of enticement and spectacular memories divulged by the confluence nests. There were levels, or layers, or perhaps she was too rigid in applying such labels; there were certainly different aspects to the emotive universe which she could immerse herself in.

The dreams, of course, were the primary foundation of the gaiafield. Inigo’s dreams and the countless billions of others given to the confluence nests by their creators, all identifiable by their unique emotional appellation. Any one of which would rise into her consciousness to the summons of a matching mood or image; exactly the way memories inside her own head worked – simple association. Although Inigo’s dreams all seemed to have strong tags and were the easiest of all to acquire.

So, as the cab trundled onwards steered by Laril’s dodgy software, Araminta bowed to the inevitable and lived through Inigo’s first few dreams, only finally to shake herself free hours later, smiling exuberantly as young Edeard walked across Birmingham Pool to defeat Arminel. She felt like letting out a cheer inside the cab. Makkathran was such a delight, with its strange architecture and peculiar genistars, populated by rich and pompous lords and ladies out of some incredibly ancient text. She wondered if Edeard would wind up marrying Kanseen or Salrana; either would be a lovely romantic outcome. And she knew for sure it all had some kind of ridiculously happy ending, not that she’d ever want to live in such a backward culture.

Outside Inigo’s dreams of Edeard were the voices carried on winds of pure emotion: the everyday emissions of her fellow Colwyn City residents. The gaiafield was a bleak state indeed beyond the cab, worry and fear from the majority almost drowning out the fervent hopes of the Living Dream adherents that their Second Dreamer was truly close at hand.

Perhaps it was because her Silfen heritage delivered her into the gaiafield rather than gaiamotes like everyone else, but this whole strange universe of memory and raw emotions seemed remarkably clear to her. She was able to rise above the emotional clamour to study the composition of this strange cosmos in a calm and objective fashion. By doing that rather than simply plunging in regardless, she was aware of what her mind interpreted as little neutral zones. Slivers of nothingness anchored throughout the babble. Strangest of all was the way they really did appeal to her; their outer layers reverberated to an emotional state that was almost identical to her own. That mental siren song alone made her cautious. Holding them aloft in her mind she could feel the subliminal tethers to the confluence nests of the city.

Ozzie! Living Dream really is desperate to find me.

She carefully separated herself from the treacherous traps. Beyond that brash bright constellation of human thoughts was the ever-present serenity of the Silfen Motherholm.

‘Do you know me?’ she asked in trepidation.

The answer wasn’t specific, not speech in human terms, more a warm feeling of acknowledgement and welcome.

‘Can you help me?’

Sadness, not cold, it was regret rather than a rejection.

‘I might make a real hash of things.’

The comforting warmth of a mother’s embrace.

‘I wish I had that much confidence in me. Do you have any idea what’s at stake here?’

A glowing gold light bathing every cell of her body, as if an angel’s smile had broken through Colwyn City’s fug of misery.

‘Oh for Ozzie’s sake; all right, I’ll ask it again.’ And she reached beyond the Silfen Motherholm for the entity that lurked right on the edge of her perception. Carefully this time, avoiding the vigilant watchers, speaking softly within herself rather than the cry across thirty-thousand lightyears. A call which found her bathed in a luminescence similar to the Void’s nebulas, relishing the smooth flow of the universe around her.

‘Hello,’ she said to the Skylord.

‘I wait for you.’

‘Was that you with my friend? The one who is inside your universe?’

‘I have not guided one of your species for a long time.’

‘Doesn’t mean much,’ Araminta muttered sourly. ‘If I come to your universe, would you guide me to the nucleus?’

‘I will.’

‘Immediately?’

‘Once you have reached fulfilment.’

‘Ah. You just won’t do it, will you? None of you will.’

‘I am gladdened by your desire to reach the nucleus. I will guide you.’

‘When our species first arrived in your universe, where did you guide them?’

‘My kindred showed them where they might live and reach maturity.’

‘So you will take people to planets, just not the nucleus? Interesting.’

‘I will guide those who have reached fulfil—’

‘Yeah, yeah, I get it.’

‘Do you come?’

‘Many of my species will try to reach you.’

‘I await with joy.’

‘By reaching you, they will slaughter billions of other people, trillions of lives will be lost as your universe destroys the galaxy. How do you feel about that?’ She knew she was risking triggering another devourment phase, but she’d managed to calm it last time.

‘Not all reach fulfilment. Your species grows strong. Few of your kind will be left to ascend into the fabric alone.’

‘Do you even understand that there is a universe outside yours?’

‘There is only here, the universe and the nucleus. You will emerge here somewhen.’

‘Déjà vu,’ she grunted. ‘Okay, then,’ she told the Skylord. ‘Maybe I will.’

‘I wait for you,’ it said as she withdrew her consciousness. She hurriedly checked round outside the cab. Night was falling, the low sunlight diffused to a smear by the city’s force field weather dome. She peered upwards urgently, but couldn’t see any of the Ellezelin capsules swooping down on her, so presumably they hadn’t overheard her conversation with the Skylord.

‘Big deal,’ she snorted to the inside of the cab. ‘I can’t stop the Void from taking us in. The bastards have just about won.’

Which left her with some decisions to make. She told the cab to swing past Bodant Park, using the rail on the marina side, away from her apartment block. It wasn’t as foolhardy as it seemed.
Well, all right, maybe a little stupid
. But she wanted one last look at what she’d considered her first real home since – well, leaving Langham. It was becoming clear to her that she would have to get out somehow. The only way to stop Living Dream from using her was to get beyond their reach. That cut her options considerably. Cressida’s offer of a starship ticket was clearly impossible, events of the last few days had made it obvious that even a diplomatic starship wasn’t going to lift her away from Colwyn City. Thinking of that made her remember Cressida’s claim of a Silfen path in Francola Wood. Now that was a definite possibility. But she was more confident that Laril might negotiate for her. He was part Higher now, he must know a reliable Faction, one that was opposed to the Pilgrimage. Everyone knew the Factions had agents with all sorts of enrichments; and Gore had said they were looking for her. If anyone could get her out of Colwyn City and away from Viotia it would be them.

That came hooked to the sheepish thought that if a Faction took care of her she wouldn’t have to make the big decision herself.

Forget that. You just need to get out of here.

It was dark by the time the Wurung Transport cab slid along Aeana Street, parallel to the Cairns. Strong white light shone through one side of the cab’s bubble window, coming off the big deco marina buildings. She could hear the crowd now, that unnerving buzz of so many people sharing their anger.

The cab pulled into a marina slot and Araminta got out. She was surprised by how many people were in the park, it was in the thousands now. On this side they were milling around in loose groups; while over near her apartment block they’d concentrated into a dense knot, shouting abuse and clashing with the barrier set up along the road.

Araminta suddenly realized what the problem was. The cordon the paramilitaries had thrown up around her apartment block was acting as a huge provocation.

My fault. Again.

She walked forward into the crowd. The gaiafield was a storm of hatred and resentment. Her macrocellular clusters reported a colossal amount of pings zipping across the park. Directionless, without any author code, not routed through the cybersphere nodes and therefore untraceable.

‘>file< Binder frequency at the second segment.’

‘Counter that with a patch from Etol, they have the fixes.’

‘Managed to hit one scumfuck with a maser pulse.’

‘Cheer.’ ‘Cheer.’ ‘Cheer.’ ‘Cheer.’

‘Left side of the building, road crumbling around a segment.’

‘Gather there people.’

‘Free Viotia.’

‘Bot attack ready. Maybe. Are you listening fuckheads? Are we joking?’

‘Fuckheads, we’re coming for you.’

‘Free Viotia.’

‘Gonna carve the memorycells right out of your living dreaming brains.’

‘None of you is ever going to see re-life.’

‘Gather at segment five. Push hard people.’

Araminta soon realized that the segments were part of the barricade the paramilitaries had set up. The mob was organizing for an assault. There was no leader – not obviously – they were reacting like antibodies to the invasion forces.

‘Got me some disruptor rifles that’ll cut clean through their armour.’

‘Good.’ ‘Great.’ ‘Laugh.’

‘Handing out the rifles.’

‘Hey, scum in armour; if you think your Waterwalker’s strong enough to save you from us, start screaming for her.’

‘Laugh.’ ‘Laugh.’ ‘Laugh.’

‘Ready? Go.’

Araminta tensed. The paramilitaries fired a barrage of jangle-pulse shots through the barricade. Screams echoed over the park.

‘You believed me. Stupid dumb shits.’