Terminal World (26 page)

‘Quillon.’ He looked at Nimcha and Kalis, knowing that he must do everything in his power to protect the girl. His heart raced in his chest. He knew he was on the edge of something irrevocable, a point from beyond which there was no return. ‘There is something, actually.’

‘Something?’

‘I’ve been having a little trouble focusing, since I was hit in the face. I’m wondering if something didn’t get ... dislodged.’

‘Let me see. Stand up, will you?’

Gambeson looked over his shoulder, perhaps making sure the other men were still behind him, and then produced a silver instrument from his medical bag. It had a delicate, precision-tooled look, with an elegant knurled handle.

‘You’ve been dealing with injured men,’ Quillon said, in not much more than a whisper. ‘Where are they? Perhaps there’s something I can do to help.’

Gambeson peered into his eyes one at a time, squinting into the eyepiece of his instrument. ‘Be very still, Doctor Quillon.’

‘I can show you how to use my medicines to best advantage. I can also operate, if it comes to that.’

Gambeson lowered the instrument, frowning slightly, and rubbed one of its hinged lenses against his coat sleeve before raising it again. ‘I must insist that you be still. And silent.’ He looked at Quillon’s eyes again, but this time with a deepening frown, a recognition of wrongness. He pulled back sharply, as if he had seen his own death in those deep, dark pools of midnight blue.

‘What are you, Doctor Quillon? What the
hell
are you?’

‘Perhaps it would be best if you continued your examination in private,’ Quillon suggested.

 

He was taken to another room, through a part of the gondola he had not seen before. As they passed through one section, a gloved and masked airman came down a spiral ladder descending from the ceiling, the open hatch offering a glimpse of the sepulchral vault of the airship’s envelope. He heard the resonant, organ-like throb of the air rushing by her skin, the droning skirl of her engines. The craft was larger than he had grasped on the ground. He could not guess at the size of its crew, even allowing for injuries. It seemed entirely possible that there might be many dozens of airmen aboard
Painted Lady.

‘You know what I am,’ he told Gambeson, when the doctor faced him alone in the tiny chamber, which appeared to be little more than a walk-in medicine cabinet. ‘Or at the very least you have an inkling.’

Gambeson closed the door behind them.

‘What you are is an impossibility, Doctor Quillon. Nonetheless, you are standing before me, so I must confront ... accept ... your true nature.’

‘Have you ever seen anything like me?’

‘I’ve had the pleasure of dissecting angels once or twice. They were dead long before they came to me. How could they not be, when they can’t survive beyond Spearpoint for more than a few hours? Nonetheless, their bodies may be collected and ... pickled ... and conveyed to those, such as I, who find amusement ... interest ... in them.’ He had prepared a basin of hot water and was dabbing the dried blood from Quillon’s face with a tenderness that bordered on the maternal. ‘They were very old corpses, Doctor Quillon. They’d been dead for centuries, according to the provenance, which I have no reason to doubt. But angels don’t change very much, if at all. And I remember the structure of their eyes very well. Would you mind removing your garments?’

‘Of course not.’

Quillon shrugged off his replacement coat, donned hastily from the pile before Gambeson led him away from the others. He unbuttoned his shirt and removed his vest. He stood before Gambeson, his own wraith-like image reflected back at him from the bottles on the shelving, a pale, hairless, attenuated thing with ribs like radiator bars.

Gambeson studied him expressionlessly. ‘Turn around please, Doctor. I would like to see your ...’ He swallowed as Quillon presented his back to his examiner. ‘Wings. Might I touch ... examine ... them?’

‘Be my guest.’

Quillon felt Gambeson’s cold fingertips touch first his left and then his right wing-buds. He kneaded them gently, exploring the underlying structure, the tiny bones and muscles that were struggling to assume functionality.

‘What are you?’ he said again, softly this time.

‘You would have discovered my nature soon enough, Doctor. I saw no point in prolonging the matter. I am what you imagine me to be, but both more and less than that. I was an angel, once. I was born in the

Celestial Levels, and I would have looked very like those pickled bodies you cut open. Then I was changed.’

‘Why?’

‘For the purposes of infiltration,’ Quillon answered blandly. ‘There were four of us. We were altered, surgically and genetically, to make us look human. Or prehuman, as angels would say. We were sent down to Neon Heights, to live amongst normal men and women, to prove that it could be done. What would have killed unmodified angels was merely troublesome to us. With the right antizonals, we could still function.’

‘Why didn’t they remove your wings, alter your eyes?’

‘They did. Nine years ago you’d have needed detailed blood and urine chemistry to tell I was anything other than human. Unfortunately, the infiltration exercise went wrong.’

‘In what way?’

‘There was a ... disagreement.’ He smiled thinly as he glossed over Aruval’s death, his own role in murdering the other two infiltrators. ‘I was left behind, stranded in Neon Heights. Eventually our specialised drugs ran out. I made do with what I could find, but while I was able to stave off zone sickness, I couldn’t stop my underlying physiology from beginning to reassert itself. The circumstances I found myself in hadn’t been anticipated. The best I could do was suppress the changes with chemistry and surgery.’

‘There are scars under your wings.’

‘They were cut back whenever they grew too obviously. It had to be done over and over again. There was nothing I could do about my eyes, so I concealed them as best I could. I had help from human friends in Spearpoint.’

‘They trusted you?’

‘We trusted each other. I’m hoping you and I can come to the same accommodation.’

‘You lied to me about being a doctor, then.’

Quillon turned around slowly. ‘No, that’s the truth. Most of it, anyway. I am, or was, a pathologist. I worked in the Third District Morgue. And before I was sent down to Neon Heights I was a kind of physician. There’s very little I don’t know about bodies, be they angel or human. My offer to help you still stands.’ He paused. ‘Would you mind if I dress again? I’m fully aware that I don’t conform to the usual standards of aesthetic normality.’

‘You’re a master of understatement, Doctor.’ Gambeson passed him his vest. ‘Why would you help us? And please don’t give me any specious half-truths about moral imperatives.’

‘It wouldn’t be a half-truth. Besides, I want to convince you of my good intentions. And I hope if I do so it will reflect well on my comrades. They don’t have much else to offer.’

‘They know what you are, of course.’

‘No,’ Quillon said, buttoning his shirt. ‘They don’t. Not at all. And for now you would be doing me a very great favour if things stayed that way.’

‘Why haven’t you told them?’

‘The woman and the child, we’re barely acquainted. The other one, Meroka, has excellent reason to hate the likes of me.’

‘She’ll learn the truth eventually.’

‘I know. I’m just hoping I can earn enough respect for her not to throw me out of the nearest window when it happens. I’m sure she’s capable of it.’

‘A firebrand.’

‘She has her reasons.’

Gambeson pursed his lips. ‘For now, I would indeed like to keep you apart. There’s a small holding cell, which I’m afraid is even less salubrious than the place where we’re holding your friends. But you’ll be ... comfortable ... warm, and I’ll make sure you’re served a decent ration, such as we can spare.’

‘That would be kind, Doctor.’

‘I may wish to examine you some more in the morning. In the meantime, though, I’m afraid other patients call on my time.’

‘I can help,’ Quillon said.

‘Your offer is noted. It will, of course, need to be reviewed by Captain Curtana. I can’t promise that she’ll see eye to eye with you. Many of us have a well-earned dislike of angels, over and above anything we might feel for Spearpoint.’

‘I understand.’

Gambeson hesitated. ‘Your companions: now that we’re speaking candidly, as it were, as two medical men - is there anything about them I need to know? Any matters that have come to your attention?’

He shook his head as casually as he was able. ‘Nothing that I’m aware of. They could all use food, water and a good wash. Beyond that, there doesn’t seem to be much wrong with them.’

‘Even the mother and daughter?’

‘They’ve survived on their own for long enough. They’re stronger than they look.’

 

Quillon attempted to sleep during the remainder of the night, but his efforts were fruitless. The pain from his smashed nose was all but gone; what disturbed him was the profound unfamiliarity of his surroundings, the discomfort of the bench he was expected to use as a bed, the bucking and swaying motion of the airship and the habit of the engines, just when his brain was beginning to adjust to their endless monk-like droning, to subtly change tone and volume. That and the many worries circling his mind, chasing each other like the Moon’s two halves.

It had been an impetuous decision to reveal his identity to Gambeson, one that he had barely had time to evaluate, but it had served its intended function. He had given the doctor - and by extension the rest of the crew - something other than the girl to puzzle over. He would be the object of their fascination now; Nimcha just a semi-mute child of only subsidiary interest. He was not so naive as to think he could protect her secret for ever, but under the present circumstances a delaying action was the best he could offer. As to what would happen when Nimcha’s true nature was eventually revealed, he dared not speculate.

It scarcely mattered whether or not he believed Kalis when she said that Nimcha had caused the storm. That was not the way the world worked, or at least not the one he lived in. It was not that he refused to believe in tectomancers. And granted, she might have some mild, demonstrable power over the zones ... but it could only be a local influence. Surely. To believe otherwise was to surrender every rational instinct he had ever cherished. No child could have brought about what he had witnessed happening to Spearpoint.

What mattered - the only thing that mattered - was what everyone else would think when they discovered that mark on her head. How were the Swarmers liable to take it? Not well, he suspected. They might have their airships and machine guns, but superstition wasn’t something that went away just because you had engines and bullets.

In his mind’s eye he kept seeing a child’s body tumbling though leagues of air, falling like a rag doll.

One less piece of ballast.

When at last he gave up on sleep he went to the holding cell’s narrow slit of a window and watched the sky lighten to orange. From his present vantage point he could not see Spearpoint, so he had no idea how far they had come or in which direction they were now moving. Beneath
Painted Lady
the unlit landscape offered no clues. Fires burned here and there, semaphore towers stood motionless, but for all the sense these portents made to him they could have been constellations in an alien sky.

Once, when the sky had nearly brightened to dawn, he fancied he saw another ship shadowing them at a distance. He had begun to dismiss it as a phantom when, a little later,
Painted Lady
changed course and the other ship came nearer. Manoeuvres ensued, the engine drone rising and falling, and for one instant he heard a short, sharp discharge, a guttural rip of sound that could have been some ship-borne gun-battery being deployed. Afterwards the airship resumed steady flight, and when he swept the sky he saw nothing but wisps and quills of morning cloud.

Gambeson came to see him again shortly after sunrise. He was given another examination, more thorough than the last. Gambeson was cordial, but rebuffed almost all of Quillon’s questions. In daylight Quillon was struck by how much older the man looked compared to the night before. His beard seemed whiter, his eyes more wrinkled, his face more lined and drawn. Quillon wondered if he had slept at all since their conversation.

‘My offer still stands,’ Quillon said, when Gambeson was packing his instruments away.

‘It could never be that easy, Doctor. That you are a Spearpointer would be reason enough for most of our crew to distrust you. But an angel trying to pass himself off as human?’ Gambeson shook his head in mock exasperation.

‘You seem the exception to this rule, Doctor.’

Afterwards, he was taken not back to the others but to another room in the airship. It had small, shuttered windows, the shutters hinged open to admit stripes of wintry daylight. It must have been somewhere near the front, since the walls tapered slightly along their length. The room contained a large table, the kind that could be spread with charts, and the concave walls were lined with books and map rolls, secured in place with leather clasps. The cumulative weight of the books and maps must have been considerable. Quillon could only conclude that each and every one had been deemed essential to the airship’s operation. Once or twice, strangely, he heard birdsong coming from somewhere nearby, as if a small aviary was located next door.

There were three other people in the room, Gambeson amongst them. Seated next to the surgeon behind the chart table was Captain Curtana. She also had the look of someone who had not seen much sleep lately. Her hair had been tied back, but a few lank strands hung down against her cheek. Her skin, which had appeared nearly black at night, was merely a rich brown, shading to yellow under her eyes, where she looked puffy and exhausted. Once again Quillon was struck by the elegant structure of her face, the birdlike delicacy of her features. She wore the same kind of side-buttoned tunic as the other airmen, although hers had been tailored for a woman. The tunic was unbuttoned to the breast, revealing a white shirt underneath, stained around the collar. Quillon couldn’t tell if she was still wearing her service revolver, but nothing about her mood - impatient, ready to dispense summary justice and move on to the next item of business - seemed in any way intended to put him at ease.