Lensing

Lattice

It seemed like a joke; and if the handwriting had not been hers, it would have been funny.

When she went downstairs, Mrs Wilson was in the kitchen, frying bread in lard, while Rupert Forrester was in the front room, talking to a one-armed man called Brian, who it appeared was also a lodger.

‘We’re in luck this morning,’ Brian said. ‘Old Rupert is our bus driver for the day.’

‘Don’t expect it as a matter of course.’ Rupert went to the door and checked that the hall was clear. ‘But I’ll take you both back again tonight. It’s nice to visit here when I can.’

‘He went to school with Mrs Wilson’s son,’ said Brian.

‘Oh.’

‘Now Gabby’ - Rupert gave a microsecond smile - ‘you’re going to be in Hut 27, but there’s something you need to know about that.’

Brian’s head tilted, revealing scars on his neck.

‘There is no Hut 27.’

‘That,’ Rupert told Gavriela, ‘is the thing you need to know.’

‘I’m sorry?’

‘We’re codes and ciphers.’ Brian shrugged his intact shoulder. ‘It’s not just hush-hush, it’s more important than anybody knows.’

‘Even more than you know,’ said Rupert.

‘But where are we working?’ asked Gavriela.

‘You’ll see.’

Then Mrs Wilson called them in to eat, and for a short period it was like an ordinary peacetime breakfast, except that there was no butter, only lard; the tea was made from ground-up acorns; and the curtains that stood open were blackout drapes, to avoid light spilling out at night, assisting Luftwaffe bomber crews to navigate.

And Gavriela wondered, as she ate, how far her night-time writing could creep from rational reality before becoming signs of psychotic delusion, a mind finally cracked in a world grown mad and horrible.

FORTY-EIGHT

FULGOR, 2603 AD

Sunadomari stalked through the splendour of the Via Lucis Institute, scarcely seeing the shining kaleidoscope of holos and Skein projections, an avalanche of visual stimuli that would overwhelm an ordinary human. One holovolume that kept pace with him showed the face of Hsiu Li-Cheng, whom he would see in person within seconds; another showed Helen Eisberg with her tac team troopers, inside a flyer en route to Ebony Tower.

‘Why’s this Alisha Spalding important?’ Eisberg was asking. ‘I understand she’s a victim, but what’s it got to do with your case?’

‘It wasn’t the slimeball perverts who raped her. It was Luculenta Rafaella Stargonier who tore out her mind.’

‘Oh. I was under the impression the murder victims were Luculenti.’

‘Spalding is pre-upraise. She has interface nodes without true processors. Maybe that’s the difference.’

‘And you want me to take her straight there?’

‘Yes. Please.’

They stopped talking but kept the hololink open.

‘As soon as she’s inside the flyer,’ said Li-Cheng in the other holovolume, ‘I can pass through the emergency med-nodes and start my analysis.’

‘Do you think it will help?’

‘Maybe. I’m curious about these other people, Helsen and Ranulph. What are they, some kind of pure-humanity terrorists? Setting a rogue Luculenta loose among her own kind, and serve us right?’

‘I’ll be very curious myself,’ said Sunadomari, ‘just as soon as we find them.’

A third holo opened: Roger Blackstone.

‘Your people are here, Superintendent. A Lieutenant Eisberg?’

‘That’s her.’

In Eisberg’s holo, the viewpoint shifted, showing her officers carrying the girl on board. Immediately, the medscanners whirled into action, new displays blossoming red and orange all around Sunadomari as he reached the end of one shining corridor, passed beneath a razor-edged archway, and came to a halt. A silver wall rippled open, revealing an immense workspace filled with holo glory - phase spaces and rippling manifolds, network graphs that glimmered and equations that shone, tabular data in swirling ribbons, and a million realtime images floating all around.

Beneath the glory, twelve Skein designers were working, deep in the flow, while at their centre stood Hsiu Li-Cheng, the golden studs gleaming on his forehead, smiling when he saw Sunadomari.

‘We should have results in about—Ah. There.’

He was staring at a holospace.

‘What is it?’ asked Sunadomari.

‘Throw her out now!’

‘What?’

In the comms holo, Lieutenant Eisberg said: ‘Sir, can you repeat that?’

‘Put her out of the flyer.’ Sunadomari was staring at his friend, Li-Cheng. ‘Do what he said, Helen.’

‘All right. Doing it now.’

On Li-Cheng’s skin, dots of sweat expanded, while the muscles around his mouth hardened.

‘Vampire . . . code. Remnants.’

‘Can you fight it? Hey.’ Sunadomari turned to the twelve designers. ‘Help him.’

But they remained in their seats, locked into whatever they were working on Skein.

‘Doing. It.’ Li-Cheng was wheezing. ‘My. Self.’

Sunadomari’s fists were tight. Being this helpless, especially with Skein involved, was new to him. But this was happening at such a level that he had neither the expertise nor the authorization that would allow him to follow the processes, much less render help.

Helen Eisberg was asking for further instructions, but he ignored her.

Finally, Li-Cheng shuddered and dropped to one knee.

‘Ah . . .’

‘Are you all right?’

‘Hurt my knee, maybe the anterior cruciate ligament, otherwise’ - he smiled at Sunadomari - ‘my mind is clear. Finally.’

‘The vampire code has evolved, I take it?’ Sunadomari helped him up.

‘Yes, and I think it might have a different . . . intent. It’s hard to tell in Alisha Spalding’s case, because she did not have a true plexweb. Probably why she was abandoned.’

‘Not to act as an amusing boobytrap for any Luculentus who tried to investigate?’

‘Ah, Keinosuke. You have a twisty, paranoid mind.’

‘Thank you,’ said Sunadomari. ‘So how is the code different?’

‘I’m not sure it’s designed to kill—What’s this?’

Li-Cheng stared at the twelve designers, all of them deep in Skein.

‘They wouldn’t answer me,’ began Sunadomari, ‘when I tried to—’

‘Hush,’ said Li-Cheng. ‘Let me think.’

That was not something you heard a Luculentus say every day - one’s ability to think powerfully and fast was taken for granted. Sunadomari could not understand the multidimensional phantasmagoria of holos; but he could read Li-Cheng’s expression as he tried to make sense of the displays.

Then Li-Cheng strode forward and placed one hand on a designer’s shoulder.

‘Cataleptic,’ he said. ‘I’ve never seen a person work so hard, do so much at one time. His effort is incredible, over two thousand simultaneous sessions and each one non-trivial.’

‘What is he doing?’ said Sunadomari. ‘What are they all doing?’

‘They’re—’

One of the designers screamed, sat upright with sinews tight, toppled back in her chair, and slid to the floor.

‘It’s Skein,’ said Li-Cheng.

‘What about Skein?’

‘It’s attacking through Skein.’ His face turned a luminous ash-grey. ‘I think we’re finished.’

On the edge of the city stood a natural stone house in its own grounds. The property was surrounded by a high wall, and a tall gateway of black iron separated it from the long trail that led to the nearest residential area. But neither its isolation nor its design was the reason for its safety - that rested on reputation, and the very real capabilities of those who sojourned here.

Currently, three Pilots were resident in Sanctuary. The eldest was Jed Goran, the youngest Al Morgan, while Angus Cho was a psychologist and military intelligence specialist, normally based in Labyrinth, who did not have a ship. It was Angus who was deep in holo displays on the patio, while the other two were drinking daistral and talking about the news from the Admiralty Council.