Metal Fatigue (34 page)

No matter how much he ached to return her call, he could not. His throat was as silent in the dream as it was in waking life. His only course of action was to follow the voice to its source, to a city in the middle of a wilderness, surrounded by gnarled forests of hatred.

The woman's name was Sanctuary; the city's name was Peace. And this was reality, beyond the dream. He had simply become so used to the nightmare in his years before Sanctuary that part of him still thought it would never end.

But this time the dream didn't end the way it usually did, with him in that city of Peace and the woman called Sanctuary at his side.

This time he found himself standing on a building in the heart of the city. A crowd had gathered beneath him, filling the streets as far as he could see: a veritable sea of people, all standing still and silent, all staring upward, watching him. The mute intensity of their regard made him nervous.

Just as he realised that Sanctuary's voice had stopped calling for him, the crowd began to change. One by one, as though a wave had rippled across them, the people shimmered and vanished, leaving only a faint heat-flicker where they had been. The wave of invisibility spread rapidly through the silent masses, until the streets themselves seemed to liquefy and melt, and the city floated like a herd of icebergs in a sea of bent light.

The people were still watching him. He could feel their combined stare like pointed fingers on his skin, testing, probing, dissecting,
judging
.

Exposed and therefore vulnerable, he quailed and tried to hide. He ducked behind a ventilation duct, but that too dissolved into nothing, leaving him as naked as before. Panic welled in his chest as he ran from side to side, leaving a path of evaporated shelters in his wake. And still the crowd watched, the weight of eyes becoming heavier by the second.

When the top of the building was smooth and featureless he fell to his hands and knees in despair. There was nowhere left to run: the long chase was over, and he had finally lost everything.

Then the building itself vanished, sending him falling into a roiling gulf that pulled at him, yawned to accept his spinning body —

"I am Lucifer."

He awoke with a panicky start, the echoes of the voice still ringing in his mind.

"I am Lucifer!"

He screamed silently into the void, pounding the sides of the ventilation shaft with his feet and fists, exorcising the fear and hopelessness of the dream by attacking the space within which he cowered.

The city hated him, everybody wanted to kill him, and his controller would not let him forget. Perhaps
reality
was the dream, and the nightmare had been biding its time all along.

What had he done to deserve this
?

"I AM LUCIFER!" repeated the voice, more firmly still, as though sensing his anguish, his unwillingness to obey. He wanted to shout his defiance, to rebel against the authority that made him do wrong, made people afraid of him.

But he could not voice his protest. He was as mute now as he had been in the dream. And the wrongness of disobeying far outweighed the crimes he was forced to commit.

Regaining a measure of self control, he forced his heartbeat to slow and his panic to subside.

Closing his eyes, he whispered acceptance of his fate outward into the distance.

And the voice that called itself Lucifer told him exactly what he had to do.

7:55 p.m.

Mayor's House lay half a kilometre north of Kennedy City University. At the summit of a low rise, its white marble and plaster facade reflected the light of spotlights much as that of the long-destroyed White House had — and was just as well maintained, despite the Dissolution. The building was extensive, four storeys high, and contained most of the official chambers required by the Council. A ring of lawn approximately twenty metres across surrounded it, with a thick wall of trees shielding it from the city. The grounds were in turn protected by a three-metre-high mesh fence with security emplacements every fifty metres. Two wide gates formed the entrance and exit of a gravel driveway leading to the building's massive, pillared foyer. Apart from one or two official cars, the drive was normally empty; now, however, it served as a parking lot for the fifteen largest vehicles of the RUSAMC convoy, including the control van.

Roads, watching from the shelter of the trees, noted the clockwork precision of the RUSAMC troops as they patrolled the area. Most wore night-specs and carried automatic weapons; every security pass, including his own, was checked before admission to the grounds was granted. Through the gloom, he could make out the occasional scampering robot shadowing the patrols and checking in spaces that the troops could not enter. Perhaps one hundred men and women had taken over the lawn, plus the local RSD squads beyond the fence: two hundred and fifty or more, he estimated, all to protect one man.

General Stedman had left the control caravan shortly before sunset and entered Mayor's House on foot with a small contingent of bodyguards and officers. The control van, with its humming field-engines inactive, had settled on sturdy, retractable legs onto the gravel drive and hadn't moved since. Apart from that, and the ceaseless patrolling of troops and robots, the evening had been uneventful.

Roads glanced at his watch: 8:00 p.m. The crowd of sightseers around Mayor's House had dispersed some time ago. He envied their ignorance. What happened in the next twenty-four hours could decide the fate of Kennedy Polis, once and for all.

He turned at the sound of approaching feet. A woman in the uniform of an RSD officer ducked underneath a branch to join him at his unofficial post.

"Sorry I'm late," Barney said, slightly out of breath. "I walked back in. No free lifts available."

"That's okay. Did you bring it?"

She slipped a rucksack from her shoulder. "As requested."

"Thanks." He rummaged through the bag and removed her laptop.

"The batteries are fully-charged," she said, putting a hand on his arm. "Are you okay? You didn't want to talk earlier — "

"I couldn't." Roads squatted down and put the computer on his knees. A flickering glow painted patterns on his face as he switched it on. "Give me a second and I'll fill you in."

The PolNet program booted automatically. Working in the dark, using his amplified sight to see the manual keyboard, he tapped his way into the network's root directory.

"Anything happening out here?" Barney nodded restlessly towards the parked convoy.

"Nothing much. Stedman hasn't reappeared, and neither has the Mayor. If I can get into the security program we might be able to find out what they're talking about." Roads shrugged. "Otherwise I'll have to go in person."

"Morrow produced the goods, then?"

"I hope so. I mean, I have a pass — but God only knows whether it'll get me into the building or not."

Barney crouched down beside him. "You don't trust him?"

"Not any more." While he fiddled with the program, Roads briefly outlined what he had found at Katiya's that afternoon: Keith Morrow's face in Cati's catalogue of non-verbal memories.

Barney stared at him. "You mean the Head — ?"

"Why not? He has access to all the city's databases, so stealing the CATI file wouldn't be a problem. He understands the old biotechnology better than I do. He can also hijack official transmitters to broadcast the code, if he needs to." Roads turned to face her. "I'm beginning to think he's the only person in Kennedy who
could
be Cati's controller."

"So what's the problem, then? Why are you here instead of down at the harbour?"

"Because it feels wrong ... somehow. I don't know why. What's his motive, Barney? What does he stand to gain by keeping the States out of Kennedy?"

"Market share?" she suggested.

"Perhaps. But that's still not enough."

"Okay, then," said Barney. "Maybe he's afraid the States will catch up with him. He
is
outlaw tech, after all. If he thinks they're getting close, he might try something like this in self-defence."

"And end up making things worse for himself?" Roads shook his head. "It doesn't seem likely — too dramatic by far. More likely he'd try to infiltrate their databases and distort the evidence. He — or anyone, for that matter — would need a more pressing reason to keep the Reunited States out of the city."

The laptop chirped, and both looked down at it. A silver icon encrusted with spikes had appeared on the screen.

"Good. We've reached House security." Roads tapped at the keyboard again, using PolNet overrides to bypass the required password. Once he had entered the system, he browsed through menus and subprograms, looking for one in particular. Although Mayor's House lacked the tight security net RSD had installed in the library at the university, it did have a closed-circuit monitoring network linked to the central security program. Within moments, Roads had gained access to all the data and had routed it through the screen and his implants.

He and Barney settled back to watch, neither immune to the importance of what they were seeing.

The historic first meeting between General Stedman and the Mayor of Kennedy had begun in one of the building's largest conference halls, normally used only for special sittings of the Council. While not open to the general public, the room was filled with people representing both factions: senior officers from the Reunited States on one side, city dignitaries on the other. MSA bodyguards — ubiquitous since the assassinations had begun — hovered around every entrance. Scanning the crowd, Roads recognised Margaret Chappel and the head of the MSA, Adam Xenophou. Not far away was Antoni DeKurzak, watching proceedings from the end of a row, his tall frame allowing him a clear view over the heads in front of him. Martin O'Dell sat at the front of the hall, the superior position earned by his work in the city thus far. Stedman and Packard, with their respective deputies, sat together at a large oak table facing the small crowd. The General was dressed in full uniform, his white hair neatly combed back over his proud forehead and his attention focused firmly forward. The Mayor wore a formal suit and gown of office, and had just started his speech.

Roads turned up the volume on the computer for Barney's benefit while he eavesdropped via his implants:

"... through the trials of the Dissolution," Mayor Packard was saying, "Kennedy Polis has stood alone, not immune to the tragedy that befell the rest of the country but strong enough to keep it at bay. After four decades of social engineering — including legislated birth control, strict rationing and recycling, and adherence to the Humanity Laws — the democratic principle has remained firm in our minds. Indeed, in the microcosm that is Kennedy Polis, we have preserved intact a fragment of what has been lost, guarding it jealously for this generation and for future generations to come.

"Yet we are not too proud to admit that the time has arrived for us to open our doors, to bring to an end the egalitarian way of life that has protected us these long years. The growth of the Reunited States of America has been both remarkable and admirable, and fuelled by desires similar to our own. In joining together we will become partners in a new endeavour: not merely to rebuild what went before, but to create a new society that has learnt from the errors of the past, one that is wiser and stronger for the tribulations its creators have endured ..."

Barney chuckled softly as the speech continued. "He's laying it on a bit thick, isn't he?"

"That's his job." Roads indicated the screen. "And the brass seem to like it."

"Well, they would, wouldn't they? The MSA loves pomp and circumstance, so I guess Stedman's gang would too." Barney shrugged, her smile fading. "Some of what he says makes sense, though. We
have
been hanging onto the past. That's why it's so hard to believe the Reassimilation's finally here. After all the waiting and all the talk, we don't have any choice but to let go."

"Not necessarily." Roads studied her image in infrared while the scene in the meeting hall continued in a window on the screen. "As Roger Wiggs said the other day: 'It's never too late in politics.'"

"Meaning?"

"Meaning that nothing's certain. Stedman's offer has been tabled, but Packard can still reject it, or Stedman can renege on it. Until the deal is up and running, I wouldn't place any bets."

"You mean Cati, don't you? If he kills Stedman — "

"Not just Cati." Roads sighed. "The more I see and the more I think about it, the more positive I am that the States are responsible for the Mole. They want something from Kennedy that they're not telling us about."

Barney stared at him for a long moment. "The Mole's a spy? Is that what you're getting at?"

"I don't know. Maybe that's what he is, maybe not. But I can't ignore the wolf element any longer." Roads ticked facts off with his fingers. "The timber wolf first appeared around the same time Stedman's envoy arrived; then it turned up on the university lawns the night of Blindeye; and you yourself thought that the Mole was some kind of werewolf. Add that to the fact that timber wolves are common up north — to the point where the States have a picture of one on their coat of arms — and you'll see where I'm headed."

Barney looked uncertain. "It's a bit tenuous, Phil."

"I know, but it's there. There
has
to be a connection."

"Maybe not the one you think, though. Why would one of Stedman's spies be protecting you, for starters? And why would he continue stealing data when — "

Roads grunted. "I thought of that, too. Rationally, it looks ridiculous, yet intuitively it doesn't. As much as I like — and, to a certain extent, trust — Martin O'Dell, I can't shake the feeling that he knows something about this. Something he's not telling me."

"Or isn't
allowed
to tell you."

"Probably." Roads sighed again, then rose to stretch his legs. "And the worst of it is, there's nothing I can do about it. Martin has the case, now. If he
is
involved, he'll find a way to cover it up."

"Then the best thing to do is to forget about it, don't you think?"