The Half-Made World (12 page)

He had nothing to do. The work of the Engine went on around him, and he was not needed. He was left idle as any civilian. He hated idleness. Twice an hour, his thoughts switchbacked from sweaty-palmed nervous hope—because he might be traveling toward some unexpected, unimaginable promotion—to despair—because he might equally well be traveling to his own court-martial, for any one of the countless sins of which he was, he didn’t doubt, entirely guilty.

After a while, he removed a volume of the Black File from his suitcases and passed his time studying it: the names and faces and the modus operandi and the long, long lists of crimes of his enemies, the enemies of all civilized people. . . . He told himself this study was useful work, but in fact he just found that the fog of self-righteous loathing that rolled over him whenever he opened the Black File soothed his nerves.

He’d never visited Kingstown Station before. However, the Station’s physical and hierarchical organization was almost identical to that of Angelus Station—as one would expect, since both were designed according to the same principles of efficiency and good order. The two Stations, though they were thousands of miles apart, differed only in that Kingstown’s outer ring of fortifications was rather thicker than Angelus’s, and bristled with a gteater density of barbed wire and machine guns—but of course, this was wild, unsettled country.

He quickly found his way to the relevant Desk where he was assigned a room and a temporary office, which was identical to the one he’d had back in Angelus.

He waited to be summoned.

They came for him at midnight. Two Privates of the Army of the Kingstown Engine banged on his door, waking him from dreamless sleep. When he answered the door, they turned smartly on their heels and disappeared down an unlit corridor, gesturing for him to follow. He did. Their boots echoed dully down the concrete hallways.

A midnight summons almost invariably meant court-martial, or more often discipline without formal process, and so he didn’t even bother to ask the two Privates where they were leading him. They probably didn’t know, anyway. He trudged along in dismal silence, preparing himself for the worst, reminding himself that the Line’s wisdom was greater than his own.

They led him into a windowless room, and left him there.

The floor was gray tile. At the far side of the room was a steel table. Behind that were three chairs and an electric lamp. Behind the chairs and the lamp, there was another door.

Presently three uniformed persons came through that door and sat at the chairs. Two of them were men. One of them was, Lowry guessed, a woman. With the light at their back, he could not make out their insignia or rank. Their faces were unremarkable, except that one of the men had only one ear, and their expressions told him nothing.

He folded his hands behind his back to stop them shaking.

One of them said, “Please sit, Lowry.”

He looked around. There was nowhere obvious to sit.

“
Sit,
Lowry.”

Slowly, not sure whether this was the proper response, he sat cross-legged on the cold floor.

“Do you know why you’re here, Sub-Invigilator (Third Class) Lowry?”

He stared blankly at the tiles. “I submit myself to the judgment of the Line.”

“You don’t know why you’re here.”

“I’m sure there are reasons. I have not been informed of them.”

One of them grunted and made a note on a piece of paper.

The one Lowry thought was probably a woman said, “You have a long service record, Lowry.”

A pocket of stubborn pride surfaced in him, like stomach acid, and he said, “I believe my record of service is exemplary.”

“It’s adequate,” she said. “No more.”

The one-eared man said, “Repeated indications of pride.”

“Inappropriate sympathies,” said the other man. A deep and monotone voice.

“Blunders,” the woman said, “Leading to the loss of men and matériel, and the slowing of progress.”

“Yes,” Lowry said. He didn’t know what incidents they were referring to, but he was instantly quite sure they were correct. His face flushed and he continued to stare at the floor. “I regret my inadequacies.”

“Very good.” The one-eared man made another note.

The woman said, “Don’t despair, Lowry. Despair is not productive. Your record is not disgraceful. For instance, you’ve survived an unusual number of encounters with the Agents of our enemy. I understand you have made a special study of their habits. What are your feelings regarding them?”

“Feelings?” Lowry shook his head. “Dogs. Vermin. Criminals. Scum. I don’t know. I do my job. They have to be put down.”

She said, “Why?”

He had no idea how to safely answer that question, so he remained silent.

“What do you know about their masters?”

He shrugged. “Monsters. Or delusions.”

“You’re not curious about them?”

“No, ma’am. In my experience, it makes no difference which demon they serve, or say they serve. If you need to know their individual peculiarities, their behaviors, you only got to look at the man himself. Or the woman. That’s all you need to get the job done.”

“Their masters are real,” the woman said. “They are not delusions. The Agents are irrelevant. Criminal flotsam. Any lunatic will do. It’s their masters who are our enemy, their masters who make them dangerous.”

Lowry shrugged again.

“And their masters,” the woman said, “are immortal. Killing the Agent, smashing the vessel, only sends the master briefly back to their Lodge. Do you know that term?”

“I’ve read it.” He’d seen it in interrogation records, in the pages of the Black File.

“Immortal,” the woman said. “Much like the Engines we serve.”

The comparison was so shocking, so unexpectedly foul, that Lowry could not stop his lip curling back in a snarl.

The woman made a note. While she wrote, the man to her left spoke up. “Ever had any encounters with the First Folk, Lowry?”

The snarl faded from Lowry’s face. He looked up, utterly confused. The question was bizarre.

Clearly this was no ordinary disciplinary hearing. He tried not to look hopeful.

“You mean the Hillfolk? No, sir.”

“No?”

“No—sorry, sir. Yes. I forgot. Yes. Ten years ago, when we razed Nemiah. There was a nest of Folk in the hills, had to be cleaned out. They were messing with our supply lines. Don’t know why. Stupid of them, really.”

“You went in personally, I believe.”

“That’s right. We used noisemakers aboveground, then gas in the tunnels, but someone had to clear out what was left.”

“Into their tunnels. Were you afraid?”

He looked from face to face. “No,” said. “They’re only savages.”

“You’re unimaginative, Lowry. That’s for the best.”

“Sir—”

The one-eared man interrupted, “Do you study history, Lowry?”

“No, sir.”

“How old are you?”

“Thirty-two.”

“Do you remember the Red Valley Republic?”

“Yes, sir. A little. An enemy.”

“What do you know about them?”

“I was at the Battle of Black Cap Valley, sir.”

“And?”

Lowry shuddered, remembering. In the last days of the Line’s war against the Republic, the Engines had determined, in their infinite wisdom, that the situation called for one great final push, to put an end to the Republic’s insolence and to free the Line’s forces for operations on the western front, against the true enemy. This required full mobilization of all possible personnel. The children of the warrens under Angelus Station had been rounded up, packed into locked carriages, transported in the belly of the Engine without explanation halfway across the world, and delivered into hell. Lowry had been attached to a unit that had laid barbed wire, under cover of night, under fire, across the slippery black muck of the valley. He’d been ten years old.

Lowry said, “I did my job, sir.”

“Good. Good.” The man pointed to the scar he had in place of a left ear and said, “I was there, too. Does the name
General Orlan Enver
mean anything to you?”

“He was one of their ringleaders, right? Dead, I suppose.”

“No. Wait a moment, Sub-Invigilator (Third Class) Lowry.”

The three officers put their heads together and conferred. Lowry waited. It seemed unlikely now that they would discipline him; so what did they want?

The woman said, “Lowry. You are one of thousands who might equally well have been chosen for this task.”

“Ma’am.”

“You’re adequate. That’s all.”

“Ma’am.”

“This is to be kept in the strictest confidence.”

“Of course.”

“In the morning, you are to travel north from here. You will accompany the expedition of Conductor Banks of the Kingstown Engine and assist him in all endeavors. On a probationary basis, you may immediately consider yourself and act as Sub-Invigilator
Second
Class. The paperwork will follow.”

“Ma’am—of course—but under what authority?”

“We speak for the Engines themselves.”

The one-eared man rapped his pen on the table. “Listen, Lowry. The General Enver is not dead. He disappeared after the fall of the Republic, and made an obstruction of himself for a decade, until finally a noisemaker shut him up. We don’t know exactly where or when. No records. Apparently he had the bad luck to survive, if you can call that survival. He was picked up off the mountainside where he should have died and transported through various hospitals, where apparently no one had the good sense to just stop feeding him. His trail gets unclear. For some years, we’ve been aware of rumors that he’s been seen, by now quite mad, in a little hospital in the very far West, about four days’ drive northwest of this Station, calls itself the House Dolorous. Ever heard of it?”

“No. So, he’s alive—we go in, kill him.”

“No,” the one-eared man said. “Not so simple. You’ll read the file, Lowry. The hospital is protected. Hillfolk stuff. Listen, Lowry. The General must at all costs be extracted alive.”

“Why?”

“The proper question,” the man said, “is,
Why now?
And the answer is this: One month ago, the forces of the Dryden Engine occupied a town called Brazenwood, away back east.”

“There was oil beneath it,” the woman interjected. “Its development had been planned for decades. So what we are telling you, Lowry, is not a matter of chance and contingency, but the inevitable unfolding of Progress. Do you understand?”

Lowry nodded, but said nothing. That seemed safest.

“One of the locals,” the one-eared man continued, “a pawnshop owner, currying favor, tried to sell the commanding officer on-site a letter. It appears to be the General’s last letter, to his daughter and granddaughter. Not clear yet how it ended up in the pawnshop. The family are dead. It contains intelligence of great importance. We’d thought the General irrelevant. Not so. He must be questioned.”

“Yes, sir. What?”

The woman said, “You don’t need to know.”

“Apparently,” the one-eared man added, “the damn fool pawnshop owner had been holding on to that letter for years, and he would have been better off holding on to it forever, because of course he had to be shot. Yet despite these precautions, I’m sorry to say, we have reason to believe that Agents of the enemy may have acquired the same intelligence we possess. If so, you will face opposition. You’re to advise and assist Conductor Banks in that regard.”