Another memory of Dad surfaced – Dad, who had never (to Lucas’s knowledge) been in a fight, telling him: ‘Trust your instincts always, as my old Mum used to say. Four billion years of evolution are responsible for gut feelings, so go with them.’

Call it another message from Grandma.

So what do I do?

Think about it alone, was the best answer he had for now.

And Maria?

No. Alone meant alone.

‘I know it’s friggin’ early,’ said Arne, ‘but … Union Bar, anyone?’

‘Yeah,’ said Jim.

Even Fatima nodded.

‘Can’t do it,’ said Lucas. ‘Sorry. Got my students to look after.’

He watched as they all left.

Scared scared scared.

Even alone, he did not dare take the memory flake out of his pocket to look at.

FORTY-FIVE

MOLSIN, 2603 AD

Jed-and-ship burst into realspace, then decelerated, beginning a spiral trajectory around the yellow-orange gas giant. As Jed disengaged from ship-rapport, he opened up comms. In a moment, he was linked to City Customs in the sky-city of Barbour; and the face that appeared in the holo was familiar.

‘Bodkin Travers,’ Jed said. ‘Bod, it’s Jed Goran here.’

‘I remember you, of course, sir. But I’m a little surprised. There’s been no notification of– Well, you know. Still’ – with a nose-tapping gesture – ‘there’s no problem here if someone needs to slide in and out under the old QT.’

‘The embargo’s not revoked. Sorry. But I’m not breaking it, either. Special dispensation from the powers that be.’

‘Er, right.’

The political powers that Bodkin Travers recognized had nothing to with an Admiralty or mu-space city-world that he had never heard of.

‘Look,’ said Jed. ‘The embargo … It’s for your own good.’ With a grin: ‘I always hated it when my mum said that.’

‘Mine, too,’ said Bod. ‘So look, have you got another shit-load – er, shipload – of refugees? I’ll have to warn the—’

‘Just me, coming to visit.’

‘Right. I’ll warm you up a daistral, shall I?’

‘We’ll drink one together. Give me an hour.’

‘Looking forward to that, Pilot.’

‘Me too, Bod.’

Roger woke up in Rhianna Chiang’s bed. Alone, in a sumptuous room that was part of an extended, luxurious suite, still on Deltaville. Guest quarters, not her home. And he had slept alone, he was sure of it.

So how do I know it’s her place?

Maybe it was the scent, that exotic fragrance she wore. Lately, he had been so much more attuned to smells; whether that was due to Molsin’s atmosphere or some chemical effect of the sky-city quickglass all around, he could not be sure. Yesterday he had, he had—

He looked at his hands, but there was no blood.

Shaking, he rolled naked from the bed, accustomed to the easy movement – complex physical exercise had always been part of his life: the whole-body yoga/dance/martial art routines that brought suppleness and coordination to the forefront – but today there was something more: the prowling of a fighter scanning his surroundings, alert and ready to kick off.

I don’t remember killing him.

His memory was stroboscopic, gestalt flashes of struggle against a backdrop of chaotic movement; but in the aftermath, no longer berserk, he had looked down on the bloody, shattered corpse of Greg Ranulph, along with the Deltaville law officers he had knocked down, and that was clear in his mind’s eye. Blood-rage had descended on him, and then it was gone.

‘They won’t be pressing charges.’ Rhianna’s voice, but he had sensed her a half-second before the quickglass melted open. ‘If that’s what was making you frown.’

‘Right.’

He felt lean and predatory, and his nakedness was no worry.

Get a grip.

Ignoring Rhianna, he found his jumpsuit and pulled it on. As the clothing reconfigured, an all-over rippling sensation indicated it was cleaning him as well itself. A pine scent that he normally would not have noticed, rose from his collar.

‘While you slept,’ Rhianna said, ‘I tried using hypnotic techniques to relax you more deeply, and work on the trauma and guilt.’

‘I do feel OK about Ranulph.’

‘But that’s not my doing, that’s the point. There was nothing much to work on.’

‘Oh.’

The man’s face had been a reddened mess.

‘I’m a little surprised by the shift in your behaviour patterns, Roger. But it made for one hell of an adaptation to the circumstances.’

Roger blinked, then felt his eyes narrow, aggression beginning to rise.

‘He killed millions by creating the Anomaly.’

‘In which case,’ said Rhianna, ‘he got off lightly. I’d have gone for elongated torture. Preferably after interrogation, but that’s not a criticism of you. He was trying to kill us, and you used deadly force in response. Totally appropriate, also legal.’

‘Yes.’

He had become a killer but not a criminal. There was no joy in it, but nor was there guilt. Because he had a strong, integrated personality that accepted necessity? It would be nice to think so. He was still Roger Blackstone, but everything was different, and he felt strong enough to deal with it.

‘On Fulgor,’ he said, ‘Rafaella Stargonier – look you know the details of what happened there, right?’

‘I don’t know about details, but I know she was the seed. Merged with other minds through the virtual environment there. Skein, is it? Formed a group mind, a gestalt, obviously inhuman.’

‘Only Luculenti used Skein in full, so she attacked them first. But she had Zajinet tech in reserve. Eventually she – well, by now she was it, the Anomaly – it was able to start joining its global mind to the ordinary Fulgidi, by creating shortcut links through the Calabi-Yau dimensions. Creating neural connections as if all their brains were physically wired together.’

‘Perhaps my briefing was a little more detailed,’ said Rhianna. ‘Our analysts looked at how Skein worked – we had agents in place on Fulgor since its beginning, and by the way I knew your father – and did you know the story of Rafael de la Vega?’

‘Er … You knew Dad?’

‘Not well. He lectured a couple of times at Tangleknot when I was training.’

‘Tangleknot?’

‘The intelligence service academy in Labyrinth.’ Rhianna gestured at the quickglass walls. ‘We’re surveillance-free in here, by the way. This de la Vega guy was a rogue Luculentus, a psychopath, and he attacked his fellow Luculenti through Skein, and also copied torn neural patterns from the buried plexcores of dead people.’

Roger knew enough neuroscience to understand that thought is holistic, mental state emerging from the interplay of neural-clique activation across the brain – or brain-and-plexcores as a single unit.

‘So when did this happen? I grew up there and I never heard of it.’

‘A hundred years ago, mean geodesic. It wasn’t like the Anomaly, not quite. De la Vega’s so-called vampire code performed copying based on destructive quantum measurement: he copied his victims’ thoughts and memories into himself, while destroying the originals. It was fatal to the victims.’

Dad had never mentioned this, but why would he? He might not even have known the story. Clearly the intelligence analysts had gone back to their archives to make sense of the Fulgor Catastrophe. Perhaps they understood far more than he did; perhaps being caught up in events was not the best way to interpret what happened.

‘How many victims?’ he said.

‘That I can’t remember,’ said Rhianna. ‘It was definitely dozens at least. His mind must have started to shift into nonhuman cognition, but unlike the Anomaly, we’re talking about a single human body, de la Vega’s. A body linked to external plexcores – too much hardware to fit inside his body, you see. Pilots based in Sanctuary were involved in the peacekeeper operation that took de la Vega down, so the old reports are full of detail.’