Jack Glass: The Story of a Murderer (36 page)

‘You don’t think it is right?’

‘I’m sure it is. It explains the otherwise inexplicable supernovae that Miss Eva was studying. I’m sure it explains some more conventional supernovae as well. Only, think of
it! Whole civilisations burnt up in an instant. On old Earth they used to worry that simple atomics would destroy humanity. But atomic weapons are firecrackers compared to
this
.’

‘It is a monstrous thing,’ said Sapho. Diana looked from her to Iago, and back again. Here she was, with two actual murderers; yet both were touched in their tender consciences by
the possibilities of human death. And she, who had never murdered anybody in her life, felt a blankness in her heart when she contemplated it.

‘It makes me feel,’ she said, groping for the right word. ‘Old.’

Iago nodded sombrely.

‘Maybe it is inevitable,’ Diana said, carefully. ‘This McAuley fellow –
he
discovered the technology. And those, those, whoever-they-were, those
unknown
alien scientists too. Even if we don’t locate the revenant of McAuley’s research, the datachip, the thing everyone is looking for – well, even then, eventually somebody amongst
our trillionfold population of ingenious monkeys will replicate McAuley’s research. Maybe we are simply . . . doomed.’

‘The Fermi paradox,’ said Iago.

‘The what?’ asked Sapho.

‘Imagine,’ Diana agreed, ‘that life is common in the universe, and that when it reaches a certain level of technological advance it inevitably develops FTL capacity. But that
in doing so it inevitably destroys itself. That would be why we have never encountered the aliens.’

Sapho shook her head, slowly. ‘Goddess preserve us,’ she said again.

‘It’s not a consoling thought,’ Iago agreed. ‘But it doesn’t mean we should just give up. On the contrary, I tend to feel that any effort, any cost, is worth it
– if it preserves mankind from this threat.’

‘Even the cost of people all across the system thinking you are a monster?’ Diana asked him.

‘A small price to pay,’ he said. ‘Considering the stakes. Besides – there are people who know the real me.’

After Sapho had cleared the bowls, and was washing them in the kitchen, Iago said: ‘we can’t stay here much longer. We need to go upland.’

‘Are they coming?’

‘It’s awkward keeping tabs on what’s going on in the wider world without letting the Ulanov forces know that I’m doing so. But I have the sense they’re narrowing
in. They’re devoting enormous resources to finding us, after all. Because they believe we have the blueprint. They believe you know it, or you know where I am – Jack Glass, that is to
say – and that
I
know it.’

‘And do you?’

‘Of course not. But that doesn’t matter; the important thing is that the Ulanovs
believe
it to be the case. They’ll do anything – absolutely anything – to
get hold of us.’

‘They want it in the first instance to stop anybody else getting it,’ Diana said, automatically. ‘And in the second instance because they think faster-than-light travel will
unlock prodigious new opportunities for wealth and power. Do you think they realise the destructive potential, though?’

‘You realised it, a very short time after being told about the technology,’ said Iago. ‘You think they won’t make the same deduction? We are talking about massively
increasing c; and
E=mc
²
is hardly an obscure or little-known equation, after all. I realised it as soon as I became aware of the possibility. I didn’t make the connection
with your sister’s research, although now that you point it out, it acts as a terrible confirmation.’

‘I shouldn’t be naive,’ Diana said. ‘Of course, realising its destructive power only makes them want it more. Of course. Even more than great wealth, power craves
technologies of destruction. Good to be wealthy, but better to remain in power – and the more awe-inspiring the weaponry at your disposal, the better able you are to do that.’

Iago nodded. ‘The surface of the Earth is extensive,’ he said, ‘and I have many friends here. But a better hiding place is in amongst the greenbelt.’

‘You mean, the Sump?’

‘In amongst the trillions, yes. Tomorrow.’

‘Sapho too?’

‘She can come with us, or we can leave her to make her own way across the uplands. But the important thing is – to get away.’

‘Tomorrow,’ said Diana, thinking of Eva’s Champagne Supernova stars: each one the candle lit upon the mass grave of an entire civilisation – maybe several civilisations,
on several planets, but all eliminated together, at a stroke. Her breath caught in her throat. ‘Tomorrow,’ she said again.

part III

THE IMPOSSIBLE GUN

1

The Mystery of the Rogue RACdroid

‘It is about going
back
in time to an age when
democracy
was the way humanity governed itself! It is about going
back to that Eden
, one human one
vote!’ Those physically gathered about the speaker began chanting, a low murmur, more like a religious ritual than a political rally, ‘OHOV, OHOV’. The speaker wasn’t really
addressing them, of course; he was speaking through technology to the thousands in every suburb of the large sphere – and also to the seven bubbles linked by scramble tunnels, and to any
other habitations or communications in the local area.

It was happening in real-time, in the open air. There were of course many more efficient ways of addressing a large audience, in a variety of secure worldtuals. But the imitation of an old-style
Earth democratic hustings was an integral part of the performance.

‘Democracy is our birthright as human beings!’ the speaker cried, raising her voice to be heard clearly over the murmurous chant of the crowd. ‘It has been
stolen
from
us, by the Gongsi, by the MOHfamilies, but above all – by the Ulanovs!’ At this, the chanting was replaced by a great cheer. Badmouthing the MOHfamilies might not be politic, but it
wasn’t illegal: but badmouthing the Ulanovs was, legally, treason. That was what the crowd wanted to hear. Here in the depths of the Sump, they felt safe enough openly to flout the Lex
Ulanova.

‘They call it revolution!’ cried the speaker, over the hoots and chants, through which the chants of OHOV could still be heard. ‘They call it revolution and say it is against
the law! I say it
is
the law – the true law of humanity. I say it
is
revolution – as planets and worlds revolve about the sun and return to the original point on their
circle, so humanity shall return to its true inheritance! Ancient Greece! The Roman Senate! The British Parliament! The American Revolution! The Velvet and Jasmine Revolutions! A return to our
birthright!’

A large crowd surrendering to its own ecstasy in zero-g is a striking sight. People had originally gathered in a loose pattern determined by guy-ropes and wall-fixtures, so as to permit the
greatest visibility to the greatest number. But as levels of righteous frenzy increased, people loosed their hold, and floated or swam in a fishlike swarm. The view of the speaker was obscured. The
chanting rose in volume, others began shouting ‘Mithras! Mithras!’ with an inspired vehemence. Cameras were knocked – advertently or otherwise – from position, and the whole
meeting disintegrated into chaos. Or, if you prefer, integrated from rigidity into true human, democratic fluidity.

From the other side of the space, not more than two hundred metres away, many people watched, with approval, or interest, or disgust. And amongst those many were three of particular concern to
us: two young women, both with dark hair, and an older man with a face you might call careworn. Were you to look closely at him, you might notice grains of rust in at the roots of his hair –
as if he had been dirtied with something, and had not had time properly to wash it all out again. As it happened, the thing with which he had been dirtied was not rust, but blood.

This was not his own blood.

Behind them was a RACdroid – one of those devices for witnessing and affirming contracts. Why they should bring such a piece of machinery to such a place was not immediately clear. One
glance made it obvious that the entire place had been given over to a carnivalesque celebration of democratic revolution.

One of the women said to the man: ‘this place is pretty frenzied.’

And he to her: ‘they are true believers.’

‘So are you, Jack,’ she said. And then: ‘should I call you Jack? It doesn’t chime right.’

‘Stick with what you know,’ he advised.

‘They did find your house, after all,’ said the other. ‘Do you think they’ll trace us here?’

‘We can’t stay here long, certainly. But we need fuel. We need to find Aishwarya as quickly as possible, and have this RACdroid looked at. And then we need to move on.’

‘And find out who killed Bar-le-duc,’ said Diana.

‘Bar-le-duc,’ said the other woman. ‘The most famous policeman in the System, and it falls to us to investigate his death.’ She tutted.

‘I’m less worried about his death, Sapho,’ said Iago. ‘I care more for the authenticity of this RACdroid.’

‘The droid carries the answer to Bar-le-duc’s death,’ Sapho replied.

‘If it’s kosher.
If
. Come on.’

They had flown in piloting a small sloop, a private craft: blocky, about the size of a freight container and not much more elegantly styled. Its name was
Red Rum 2020
.
The docking area was cluttered with nearly a hundred craft, disposed higgledy-piggledy: they nudged in as close as they could to the nest of globes, but still had to unroll their own crawl-tube
more than twenty metres before they could find an access point. This was one of those aspects of her new life to which Diana found it very hard to become accustomed. As the privileged daughter of a
great and powerful house she had always been used to privileged docking – passing from ship to house or back again had only ever been simply a question of stepping across a threshold. Out in
the Sump, however, she always seemed to find herself pulling through the interior of some scanty umbilicus or other; and every time she did so the thought went through her mind: only a few
millimetres of eminently penetrable material separates me from the death of vacuum. Her experiences in Dunronin – only days before – had made this fear more acute.

This particular cluster of shanty bubbles was called Garland 400. It was deep inside the Sump, a longtime home to anti-Ulanov sentiment and illegal democratic agitation; only its remoteness had
protected it from the attention of the police. That and the relatively low-key nature of the revolutionary scheming. The police burst thousands of globes every year, exemplary punishments for
breaches in the Lex Ulanova. But Garland 400 had been one of the millions of delinquent communities that had not drawn attention to itself.

It was hard to see how they had evaded notice. As Iago, Diana, Sapho and their RACdroid pulled their way along the guy-ropes of the main bubble, they were surrounded on all sides by ecstatic
revolutionaries: drunk on alcohol or cannaboids, blissed out with corticotopian connections, zapped on diamondanes. There were people to the left and right, before and behind them, above and below,
chanting ‘OHOV! OHOV! OHOV!’ or singing hymns to Mithras, or bellowing the Marseillaise (or versions thereof). Many were naked, and some were copulating, in writhing clusters. It was a
cacophonous obstacle course. Perhaps the speaker was still speaking: if so, it was no longer possible to hear her. A superbly wrinkled old woman, naked from the waist up, floated towards them
repeatedly offering to buy their droid. Several people tried to tag them.

They made it through in the end, through the crawl tube into the second globe – smaller, and much quieter. It was clear the party was going on in the main space. There was some
merry-making above them: a long bar, linking curving wall to curving wall, was serving alcohol; several score people had their arms hooked about the metal, drinking and watching the goings-on next
door on screens or via IP access, discussing it animatedly with their friends, and singing.

‘This one?’ Diana asked, glad to be out of the riotous space.

‘Next one along.’

‘It’s amazing the police don’t close this down,’ she cried. She had to raise her voice to be heard over the din.

‘If they knew about it,’ said Iago, ‘they would.’

‘It makes me shudder with horrible recognition,’ said Sapho. ‘I grew up in places like this – riotous, ungodly places. Ra’allah does not smile on drunkenness. He
kindles sugar in the grape, but the grape can only make alcohol if it be hidden from his light.’

They pushed off and flew straight to one of a number of exits, Iago guided by memory, or perhaps by access to his mysterious bId-that-wasn’t-bId. They passed through a short tunnel and
found themselves in a green space: vegetation all around them, feeding directly off sunlight or clustering around light tubes. It took Diana’s eyes a moment to adjust to the marine quality of
the light. She began to pick out various huts in amongst the foliage.

‘Aishwarya,’ said Iago, gesturing with his hand. Or, waving to her as the individual so named floated over towards them. The sounds of revelry from the first, biggest sphere were
still clearly audible; but somehow they didn’t disturb the peace of this place. Faces appeared in the doorways to huts, and then disappeared back inside again. The guy-ropes stretched from
wall to wall were garnished with vines. Tomatoes grew upon long pendant strips, like giant red flies snagged on huge stretches of flypapers.

‘Jack Glass,’ said Aishwarya, coming close. She did not sound pleased to see him. ‘You look different.’

‘Trivial adjustments to the face,’ he said. ‘Not the eyes, though.’

‘No,’ she agreed, looking at him. ‘The eyes are the same.’