Steel Sky (50 page)

He has not worn the armor in the two days since Astrid left him. There is no way he can undo the damage he has done; the most he can do is to not make things any worse. So he has been sitting home alone, doing nothing. He has not dared to speak to Image, to admit his failure. He has performed his duties as a doctor only halfheartedly. The patients keep coming, especially since the cave-in, but he has begun to feel like a factory worker on an assembly line. He cannot help but think of how fragile his patients’ bodies are, how transitory. It’s the serum, he realizes, the serum that enables him to breathe the fumatory. It is affecting his mind as it alters his metabolism. His headaches are growing worse each day, but when he goes without the serum the effects of withdrawal are even more painful. He is trapped.

His heart sinks as Faith Lessup walks into his office. Her hand rests on her belly, which is huge. She is close to term now. Her child could be born at any time.

“Have a seat,” he says quietly.

Mrs. Lessup senses his mood. Silently she lowers herself into the chair on the other side of the desk.

“There’s something I need to tell you.” Edward bows his head and rubs his throbbing forehead. “Something I should have told you before. I’d like to say I was waiting for some tests to confirm it before we spoke, but the truth is I just kept putting it off.”

Mrs. Lessup leans forward. “Are you all right, Dr. Penn? Your face is so red . . .”

“No,” Edward says. “No, I’m not all right.” He raises his head for a fraction of a second, then lowers it again. “Your child is suffering from a condition called microphthalmia, meaning his eyes are severely underdeveloped, perhaps nonexistent.”

Mrs. Lessup stiffens in her seat and makes a small noise.

“Our options are extremely limited,” Edward continues. “If there is at least rudimentary optical tissue, and it is not diseased, we could use electrical stimulation to keep the nerves and muscles toned. We could use prostheses to keep his sockets from collapsing as his face grows. It’s conceivable that the eyes might partially regenerate, permitting a low level of vision. Or a transplant might be possible if a child of the right age and genotype dies with his eyes intact.”

Edward hears Mrs. Lessup start to cry, but he does not have the strength to comfort her, or even to look her in the face.

“This is all assuming, of course, that the Neonatal Assessment Board allows the child to live . . . which is, I’m afraid, quite unlikely.”

The office is very still. The lights flicker momentarily under a power surge.

“The other option — the humane option — would be to simply have a Deathsman waiting in the delivery room.”

Mrs. Lessup sniffles. “You consider that . . .
humane
?”

“Humane, yes,” Edward says, raising his head. “For the child, and for you.”

“I’m not going to give up my child.”

Edward stares at her through bleary eyes. The pressure in his head feels as if it about to split him wide open. “That’s entirely up to you, of course — at least for now — but you may want to consider . . .”

She stands abruptly, knocking her chair backwards. “I’m not going to give up my child before he’s even born!”

Finally, Edward can stand no more. “For Koba’s sake,” he snaps, “what’s the
point
?”

“I can’t stay here,” Mrs. Lessup says, backing toward the door. “I have to go.”

“Mrs. Lessup, wait . . .” Edward rises and takes a step in her direction, then falters as pain explodes in the right side of his head. He cries out, dimly hearing the door slam behind her. The pain disappears, replaced by an insidious numbness. Edward’s left leg slips out from under him. He tries to steady himself against the desk, but he cannot feel its surface. With his right hand he manages to push himself into his chair. He leans forward and hits the intercom.

“Marta,” he croaks. “Help me.”

PERPETUAL TRIBUTE

From her experience as an electrician and the social experimentation of her younger years, Amarantha has an excellent sense of the city. It doesn’t take her long to find a service elevator that goes directly down to Deck Seven. From there, she knows, she can pick one of dozens of other elevators that will take her still further into the bowels of the city. It’s simple logic: the deeper she goes, the safer she will be.

She presses the call button and waits impatiently for the car to arrive. She is disguised in the gray robes of a stonemute, an acolyte who has given up her home, her possessions, and even her voice to God. Her features are hidden in the shadows of the cowl, but with her face on every comm in the city she knows it is only a matter of time before someone recognizes her. Technically she is only wanted for questioning, but the crime is so heinous, and the certainty of her guilt so subtly but definitively implied, that she doubts she would survive the trip to custody.

Finally, the doors slide open and she hurries inside. As the doors close and the car begins its rumbling descent, Amarantha feels something superficially resembling calm for the first time in days. She has been acting on impulse for so long now, it will be good to settle down somewhere, no matter how squalid, to take a moment to think for a change. She needs to decide what her next move should be. She needs, for that matter, to decide what she wants to do with the rest of her life. She would have died — gladly — to save Cadell. She was prepared to die to avenge him. But none of that means she wants to die if she doesn’t have to. Every moment she is alive is a tribute to Cadell’s memory, to their love, and to herself. Every moment is a spit in the eye of Second Son, and a chance that she will live to stand over his dead body.

And then an idea hits her.

Where the idea comes from, she couldn’t say. It feels like a flower blossoming from a seed planted long ago. It occurs to her that the bowels of the city are not the only haven she could seek. There is another place, just as remote and even more unlikely to be suspected.

She lifts a clear protective panel on the elevator controls and pushes the emergency toggle. The elevator shudders and screeches as its descent comes to an abrupt halt, throwing Amarantha to her knees. The lights flicker momentarily, then resume their steady glow. Gingerly, she picks herself up and pulls the toggle out again. She takes a deep breath and presses the button that will return her to Deck One.

OLD BUSINESS

In any government, few decisions of real import are made in the great halls with marble floors and high ceilings. Real power sits in the back rooms, simple places with inexpensive furnishings. It is into just such a room that Second Son walks, thrusting the unlocked door open and slamming it shut behind him.

The people seated at the long table are some of the most important in the Hypogeum: high-ranking members of the Prime Medium, the Director of Security, the Manager of Hydroponics, and others. Their conversation stops awkwardly in mid-sentence. A few of them rise from their seats and look nervously at Second Son. Only the Culminant, Selachian, has the presence of mind to speak.

“I don’t recall that you were invited to this meeting, Second Son,” he says.

Second Son slams his palm down on the table. “Orcus!” he shouts. “I have taken my father’s position, I have taken his power, and I have taken his name! I will not tolerate your disrespect!”

“Yes, of course,” Selachian says impatiently. “However . . .”

“I don’t think you appreciate how much things have changed,” Second Son interrupts, glowering at Selachian across the length of the table. “I don’t think you appreciate how much these eyes see.”

“They’ll be seeing a warrant of execration if you don’t settle down,” Selachian says. “No one here is disposed to be generous to you. Half the people in this room lost their sons because of the madwoman you incited.”

Around the room, heads nod. Efforts to rescue the Rakehells had made no headway against the tons of rock that blocked the cave entrance. Even simple examination of the rubble caused dangerous rockslides and threatened to dam the river, which would have been disastrous for the city. It had quickly become clear that rescue was impossible.

“A tragedy which would not have occurred if the expedition
led by your son
had not gotten lost,” Second Son says. “But you are not the only man who has lost a son, Selachian. My father has also had that dubious privilege.”

One of the Mediaries interrupts: “Natural death by cancer is hardly the same thing.”

“Natural?” Second Son almost spits the word out. “This morning I noticed something unusual while I was reviewing the archives, some unscheduled repair work performed a few years back in the Hall of Indagation.” He reaches inside his surtout and withdraws a small, metal device. “So I had the casing of the camera in the Second Sensorium dismantled, and I found
this
. . . hidden in the only place the camera would not see: inside the camera itself.”

He tosses the object onto the table. It skitters across the tabletop and comes to rest, spinning, in front of Selachian, who resolutely ignores it. The Manager of Hydroponics reaches over and picks it up. It is a small, tapered tube with a power cell on one side. “What is it?” she asks.

“A simple device with a simple function. It beams a miniscule but steady stream of alpha particles at whatever is beneath it, in this case the head of the person sitting in the control chair of the Second Sensorium. My brother.”

Second Son waits, leaning forward, his hands spread across the table, for his words to sink in.

“Are you saying,” the Reclamations Manager asks, “that this device caused the tumor that killed First Son?”

“It would have killed me, too,” Second Son says, “if I hadn’t replaced my father so quickly. I moved out of the Second Sensorium before I could absorb enough radiation to become sick.” He looks at the Culminant. “You didn’t count on that, did you, Selachian?”

Selachian shifts in his seat. “I assure you, Sec . . .
Orcus
, that I had nothing to do with the installation of this device, whatever it may be.”

“I could prove that you did,” Second Son says, walking around the corner of the table, “but it doesn’t really matter. It would have come to this sooner or later anyway.” He looks at the Director of Security and tilts his head just a bit.

The clop pushes back his chair and stands. Because of his red eyeband it is impossible to tell in which direction he is looking, but his mouth is curved downward, his jaw set fiercely. The other people at the table lean away from him, unconsciously intimidated.

“No transfer of power can ever be secure without the support of the security force,” Second Son says quietly. “Director, whom do you trust to serve the good of the Hypogeum?”

Selachian smiles. He leans back in his chair, his interlocked fingers resting on his stomach. “You’ve miscalculated badly, Second Son,” he says. “The Director is on my payroll. He has been for a long time now.”

The clop pushes his chair in and walks toward Selachian. He stands behind him, one huge hand resting on Selachian’s shoulder.

“I know that already,” Second Son says. “I’ve seen you pay him.”

Selachian is still smiling when the clop leans forward and wraps his arm around Selachian’s throat. He pulls back sharply, lifting Selachian out of his seat. Selachian’s eyes bulge out. He tries to inhale past clenched teeth, but the clop’s grip is too tight.

Second Son picks the radiation device up from the table. He turns it over in his hands. It is very light, almost fragile in its construction. “I’ve also heard him complain that you don’t pay him half what he’s worth.”

Selachian’s face is bright red. He tries to reach up to grab at the clop, but his arms cannot get around the beefy forearm. His face turns from red to purple as he fights for breath. Veins stand out on his forehead.

The Reclamations Manager puts his hands on the table and lifts himself slightly out of his seat, as if he is about to stand and object. He glances first at Selachian, then at Second Son, then back again. Without a word, he sinks back into his chair.

Selachian’s chair falls over as he struggles, his feet flailing wildly. His white lips move wordlessly, trying to scream the words that he thinks will save him. The table shakes and papers go flying as his heel comes crashing down against it. Second Son ignores him. He holds the radiation device up to the light, studying it.

With a loud
pop
, Selachian’s thyroid cartilage collapses. Blood pours out of his mouth and nose. The clop holds him a few moments longer, making sure he is dead. Then he lifts Selachian’s limp body in his arms, like a child. He carries it to a corner and lays it there gently.

Second Son slams the radiation device against the marble tabletop. It shatters easily into a dozen pieces. He walks around the table, past the wide-eyed managers and directors. He leans over and picks up Selachian’s chair. He rolls it back to the head of the table and sits down.

“Is there any more old business?” he asks. The room is silent. “No? Good. I have some new business I think you’ll all find very exciting . . .”

SURFACE AREA