The Line of Polity (34 page)

On the third day,
Lyric II
closely passed the Theocracy's cylinder worlds. Close by extended a structure two kilometres long and half a kilometre in diameter, with a huge mirror mounted at one end to reflect sunlight inside, and at the other end a chaos of loading docks around which various ships hovered like bees round a hole in a log. Further out was another such cylinder with mirrors at
both
ends, but one of those mirrors forming a ring penetrated centrally by a strangely displaced Gothic tower. And distantly there lay yet another such world, shadowed against starlit space and only just visible.

"How many of these orbitals are there?" he asked Stanton and Jarvellis who, for this dangerous flyby, were both back at the flight and weapons controls.

"Just the three," Stanton replied. "With a population of over a few hundred thousand in each."

"I'd have expected more."

"Remember, they don't have Polity technology here, as that's difficult to maintain without using AI — and AI to them is a product of Satan." Stanton pointed at the cylinder world. "The shielding from cosmic radiation and solar flares is not the best, and that causes a high incidence of infertility. They like it that way — keeps the whole thing exclusive."

"Why cylinders?"

"Again: the technology. AG motors and grav-plates are manufactured, but not on any scale. It would take a major industrial upgrade for them to produce enough for these worlds. Then again, why bother? The centrifugal system works well enough."

"Lyric tells me there's something of an imbalance between planetary and orbital populations."

Stanton glanced at him. "Only the usual one existing between the rulers and the ruled. How many major AIs would you say there are in the Polity? One to ten for each planet?"

"But they don't rule, as such," said Thorn.

Stanton grinned. "Yeah, I know, they 'direct'. You have to remember, I've often witnessed what happens to people who don't take the AI's considered advice."

"Thinking of becoming a Separatist?" Thorn sniped.

"Oh no, I've no objection to the Polity. The way I see it is that if you don't like it then there's plenty of places to go where it isn't present. It would be an eye-opener for some of those soft objectors to the 'AI autocrat' of Earth to come out
here
and see how they'd get on."

The cylinder world slid behind them and Masada itself grew large on the central screen. Some time later, Thorn was in a position to ask Jarvellis her opinion of Polity AIs. She replied, "Stone Age men broke flint and found it cut things better than their own teeth did. We've created methods of transportation that work better than legs, and often do things we could only dream of, like flying. A hydraulic grip clamps on things better than a human hand. They're all tools and nobody objects to them, so why should anyone object to creating minds that are better at thinking than our own, and rulers that are better at their job than those humans who would aspire to rule?"

"Tools?" Thorn repeated.

"All extensions of ourselves." She shrugged. "And probably not even that for much longer. With augs and gridlinks and the like, we're seeing them become ourselves. There'll come a time when humans and AIs are indistinguishable. What's a memcording of a human mind? Is it, strictly speaking, AI or human? And when they did that experiment, way back, of downloading an AI mind into a vat-grown human body, what did they make then?"

"So what do you think of the Separatist cause?"

"Anachronisms, throwbacks. AIs are just larger and more efficient versions of ourselves. Those people are fighting for a past that never existed — and they'll lose."

"Why did you run arms for them, then?"

"Money," she replied succinctly, bringing their conversation down to earth.

On the second day, Thorn tried to learn some more about the Theocracy: its aims, its teachings, its structure, and what its members actually believed in. It seemed for them there was a god whose rules for the existence of his children were little different from those posited by the Islamic or Christian religions. And, as was the case with those old religions, the higher up you were in the hierarchy, the more freedom you enjoyed to interpret those rules. In the end, brute force maintained the whole thing, and those who lived in the cylinder worlds spent most of their time utterly wrapped up in power struggles. It would seem they had other methods of population control to 'keep the whole thing exclusive', as Stanton had opined, and were often crueller to the losers in this continual struggle than they were to the surface dwellers of Masada. Given the courage and the opportunity, such losers often took the option of suicide, as the alternatives were far from pleasant. They consisted of a device similar to an autodoc but which could be programmed to inflict things the Inquisition never thought of; the aptly named 'steamer' in one of the world's rendering plants; and a veritable cornucopia of viral and bacterial agents.

"Do you believe in this god?" he asked Stanton.

"No," came the flat reply. "But if he does exist, I'd like to give him a CTD suppository."

Their exchange of greetings had been brief, and the other three seemed intent on staying at the cave mouth. Eldene crouched alone by the fire, which issued from blocks of some brownish organic matter. It was nevertheless welcome. Slowly the chill began to leave her, and before she knew it she had dozed off then woken again. After a time Lellan entered the cave, crouched beside Eldene, and poked at the embers with a length of flute grass.

"Did he get the ajectant?" the rebel woman asked.

Eldene peered at her. "What's that?"

Lellan looked up. "Did he get a sample of the pills you must take to prevent your scoles from dying?"

Eldene nodded.

Lellan went on, "Then let's hope he gets back in one piece. But then, if anyone could survive a hooder attack it would be him. I haven't yet witnessed anything he can't survive."

"He told me he's part machine and part human."

Lellan grimaced. "Yeah, you could say that, though I'd challenge him to point out which part is human."

"You don't believe him?" Eldene asked.

"It doesn't matter. I'm glad to have him on my side." Lellan stood up and, from amongst the packs, found another rifle like the one she was carrying, and handed it to Eldene. "In there" — Lellan pointed to another of the packs — "you'll find spare oxygen and food, if you need them. I suspect we'll be facing a long night here."

"You suspect wrong," said a voice out of the darkness.

"Fethan!" said Eldene, shooting up.

The old man walked into the middle of the cave followed by the other two. They were called Beckle and Carl — the latter being the one who had run alongside her.

Fethan glanced around. "Very cosy."

"So what happened out there?" Lellan asked.

"Don't think I smelt right, so it stopped chasing me. I tracked it for a while, but it seemed intent on going after a herd of grazers up at the other end of the valley." He shook his head and grinned. "That was some experience. I've always wanted to actually see one of them."

Everyone in the cave stared at him as if he was quite mad.

"You get to my age," he explained, "and you come to relish experiences like that. It's what makes life worth living."

"It's also the kind of thing that can make life shorter," opined Beckle.

Fethan shrugged, then winked at Eldene.

"We all been introduced?" he asked.

"Yeah," said Lellan. "But we can save the getting-to-know-you routine until we've got some decent stone overhead. Let's move out now. I don't fancy hanging around here in case our friend comes back, having worked up an appetite chasing grazers.
That
is not an experience I'd relish."

Quickly the three began gathering their equipment and hoisting bulky packs onto their backs. After passing his own pack to Eldene, Fethan took up one of the bulky ones as well. Carl, who was now the one without a pack, exchanged his heavy rifle for an even more lethal ugly-looking weapon.

"You still got the ajectant?" Lellan asked when they were nearly ready to go.

Fethan pretended to search his pockets in panic before finding the tube of pills and tossing it to her. She studied them for a moment then carefully buttoned them into her top pocket.

"A more important question to ask is, 'Have the manufactories arrived yet?' " he said.

"Not yet," Lellan replied. "But they're on their way — along with some arms, more ballots, and a U-space transmitter."

"A lot," said Fethan, puzzled.

"There, old man: you don't know everything. We've got a ship coming in soon, with enough maybe for us to tilt the balance down here."

"How the hell will you get something that big past the arrays?" Fethan asked.

Lellan turned to Eldene and grinned at her. "Wouldn't he like to know?"

Eldene smiled back uncertainly — she just did not know her own position here. These people behaved as if she was one of them, yet they discussed things that were beyond her. She realized she had a great deal to learn.

They all headed to the cave mouth, Lellan and her two comrades moving some sort of apparently opaque visors across their eyes. Fethan took the lead out into the night, followed by Lellan and Beckle. Before waving her ahead, Carl passed Eldene a pair of glasses of a similar material to the visor he himself wore. She at least understood enough to know that these must provide night vision, but she let out a sound of startlement when she discovered just how effectively — it was as if day had descended instantly. Carl moved in behind her, his head moving from side to side with almost robotic vigilance — his heavy gun hanging from a strap over his shoulder.

It gave her a weird sense of dislocation, this sudden daylight, and walking out into it while realizing that if she raised these glasses she wore it would be night again was weirder still. Trudging along with her new companions, Eldene wondered just how much her life was about to change. She felt trepidation at this, but also a growing excitement at the feeling that she might be taking part in major events. With a sense of irony she realized that just about
anything
might appear 'major' to someone who had spent a dull five seasons managing squerm ponds. However, a grinding weariness — with which she was all too familiar — soon extinguished excitement. One of the few benefits of her previous employment had been that you got to go to bed at night.

As the trek went on and on, Eldene found herself slipping into a state of fugue. Even seeing three grazers — of the type she had seen earlier — close by on a slope, worming their snouts between the rocks, did not arouse in her any curiosity this time, and later, when something flew overhead making a strange whickering, she didn't even look up at it.

"Watch your footing," warned Carl from behind her, and she gazed down at her boots as if they were somehow disconnected from her. Nevertheless, the boots trudged on, without any intercession from her brain.

How long this continued she had no idea, until Beckle glanced back towards her, his visor raised, and informed her, "Calypse is up."

Eldene removed her night glasses and blinked in the twilight of early morning. Placing the glasses in her pocket, she felt herself coming out of her stupor, as if they had disconnected her from reality. The gas giant had breached the horizon and, in this stage of the cycle, the sun would not be far behind it.

"Not much further," said Carl in a more affable tone, slapping her on the shoulder as he moved past her.

"Well, that'll be one to tell the kiddies," said Beckle.

From all of them there now seemed a relaxing of tension. When Fethan slipped back to walk at her side, Eldene asked him, "The hooder?"

"From what I gather they only hunt in the full dark. Best stay alert, though — they might be wrong about that," Fethan replied. "Be a bit of a bastard to get hit when we're this close."

"Close to what?" she asked.

"The real Underworld," he replied.

Soon they were walking along under a rocky overhang that resembled a breaking wave. The further along this they proceeded, the further it overhung them, until soon it closed over completely on their right and they were entering a perfectly circular tunnel. Seeing the others push their visors back into place, Eldene took out her night glasses and put them back on. Here the effect of them was even stranger, for the inside of a cave was not a place one ever expected to be as bright as day. She found it weird that it could be so light in here without any apparent source of illumination.

The cave curved off to the left then began to drop. Before the floor became too steep to negotiate easily it became stepped. Staring down at these steps, Eldene realized that they were not natural, and had obviously been specially cut.

"What if proctors ever found this place?" she asked Fethan. "They could march straight in."

"Pin-head cameras," Fethan explained, gesturing to the curving walls. "If they did find this place and tried to go down lower they'd find themselves at the hot end of a pulse-cannon."

Before they had descended much further, Lellan held up her hand and the party came to a halt while she unreeled a thin optic cable from her coms helmet and plugged it into a hidden socket in the wall. She then stood frowning with her hand up against the speaking side of her helmet.

"It here yet?" Carl asked.

She detached the cable, then shook her head. "Nothing yet. The dishes are out to track Ragnorak, but they've picked up nothing else."

"Ragnorak?" Eldene whispered to Fethan.

"A weapon powerful enough to destroy what you're just about to see," he replied.

After a time they came down to a level tunnel lit by wall panels, where they all removed their visual aids. Eldene was already thinking how grim an existence it must be to live constantly under the earth in tunnels like this one, when the tunnel itself opened out into a circular chamber. At the centre of this gaped the mouth of a wide shaft, and poised over this stood a steel framework containing a cable mechanism, electric motor, and lift cage. Lellan led the way over, throwing the locks on the cage's wire door with a remote control she took from her pocket. Inside, Eldene noted a more visible camera that moved on its little stem up in the corner of the cage to inspect each of them in turn. Without any of them touching another control, the lift jerked and began to descend, the motor droning.