The Machinery of Light (31 page)

The Operative looks around. The room is as large as it is empty. All it contains is a dais in the center. The walls are cut through three levels, a walkway circling the room halfway up. Several marines stand along that walkway. Several more ring the entrance in a semicircle. They wear the insignia of Szilard’s bodyguard. Their guns are trained on the Operative and the conveyor. He raises his hands.

“I’m unarmed,” he says.

But none of the marines say anything. And as the Operative stares at them, he realizes why.

“They’re dead,” says a voice.

Still rotting too, from the looks of the faces inside the visors. But apparently their armor’s working just fine. The suits immediately in front of the Operative step aside, gesture at him to move forward. A man’s appeared on the dais, though he’s flickering ever so slightly. A holograph.

“Admiral Szilard,” says the Operative.

“Forgive me that it’s not in the flesh,” says Szilard.

W
e’ve got him,” says Lynx.

“So where the fuck is he?” says Linehan.

In one of about twenty rooms, according to the readouts—a complex on which Lynx and Linehan are now closing. Lynx’s mind centers on the chamber where Carson is, traces back along the signal that’s being projected to that room: the signal that shows the holograph of Szilard—the signal that’s being sent from one of those twenty chambers—now narrowing down to fifteen … ten …

“You are
so
mine,” says Lynx.

T
he cockpit of
Hammer of the Skies
isn’t small. It’s divided into two areas—Chinese and Russian—each of which sweeps back from a central section where two captains monitor events. Pilots and navigators and gunnery specialists man consoles. Soldiers line the walls. There are only two ways in. One’s the elevators. The other’s the escape shaft in which three men are crouching.

“So what now?” says Spencer.

“Now we take over,” says Jarvin.

S
he’s getting slotted into cranial matter that’s not her own but that’s all too familiar nonetheless. Her mind’s turning in upon itself, wandering through the meat of someone else’s brain while she wrestles with some kind of pattern that’s threatening to overwhelm her. She’s trying to hold steady, but it’s no use. Everything’s collapsing in upon her, and it’s all she can do to keep from getting buried. But in the cacophony that’s sounding all around her she’s starting to get glimpses of what she’s been missing. She opens her eyes—

S
o this is the Manilishi,” says Szilard.

The Operative can see why people call this man the Lizard behind his back. He’s as tall as he is thin. His tongue keeps on flickering out in a disquieting manner. There’s a scar down the right side of his face that looks fresh. The woman in the cart clears her throat, coughs—

“I’ve come to make you an offer,” she says.

“Are you really in a position to do that?” replies Szilard.

“Do you want to be president or not?”

“Maybe you should let me speak to the man who stole you.”

“Maybe you should both shut up,” says the Operative.

They look at him—her face staring up from her cart, his face blinking as though he’s just been slapped. He knows he’d better talk fast. He can think of only one thing to say.

“There’s a plot against you.”

“Just one?” says Szilard.

“Instigated by Montrose.”

“Oh,” says Szilard, in a tone that says
is that all
.

“This man’s lying,” says the woman.

“Who cares what you think?” says the Operative.

“Sounds like you two need to get your story straight,” says Szilard.

The Operative laughs.
“I’m
the one who stole her.”

“My fucking heart, you mean.”

He glances at her. He suddenly realizes she really
is
Haskell now. That’s when he hears her voice inside his head too.

“You’re doing great,” it says.

“What’s the nature of this plot?” asks Szilard.

“What happened to your bodyguards?” asks Haskell.

“Only people I can trust are those who are already dead.”

“And either you or Montrose are about to join them,” says the Operative.

“Tell me something I don’t know,” says Szilard.

“The president’s one step ahead of you,” says Haskell.

“What do you mean?”

“The only way to get inside your perimeter. Hand you something you have to have.”

“That cuts both ways,” says the admiral.

The Operative nods. He examines that image, examines the lifeless visors of the bodyguards—gets ready to move fast. Szilard laughs.

“You think I don’t know what this is all about? That I don’t know who you are?”

“He’s Strom Carson,” says Haskell. “We know you know it.”

“The leader of the original Rain triad,” says Szilard.

“Leader’s
not exactly how I’d put it,” says the Operative.

“So how the hell does Montrose think you’re going to nail me?”

“She doesn’t,” says the Operative.

“You sure?”

“In case you haven’t noticed, I’m a captive.”

“But whose captive?” adds Haskell.

“Ah yes.” Szilard’s tongue flashes out again. Another holograph materializes in midair beside him: a camera-view of the interior hangar, looking out along the line of sight of a KE gatling, aimed down on the shuttle that the Operative rode to L2.

“Jon Maschler and Nik Riley,” says Jharek Szilard. “I get it. Really, I do. The idea was to make me think
they’d
stolen the Manilishi.”

“A story only a fool would buy,” says the Operative.

“Right,” says Szilard. “Because if they
really
stole the most valuable object in the fucking solar system,
why the hell would they bring it to me?”

“Because they’re SpaceCom agents,” says Haskell.

“Of course they’re SpaceCom agents,” says Szilard. “Treacherous ones, too.”

“Doesn’t mean they can’t be useful,” says Haskell.

Szilard shrugs. “How else was I to get my hands on the original Rain operative?”

“And the Manilishi,” says the Operative.

“Stop patronizing me,” says Szilard, “I know damn well—even if she’s speaking through it—
that’s
not the Manilishi.”

“But it was intended to be,” says the Operative.

“More bullshit,” says Szilard. “Lies within lies. Montrose wanted me to believe she’d created a duplicate Manilishi.”

“She almost did,” says the Operative.

“And if she had, she could have switched it on at your very doorstep,” says Haskell. “Checkmated you at point-blank range.”

“Too bad she failed,” says Szilard.

“You don’t know the half of it,” says Haskell.

“But I do,” says Szilard. “Montrose almost ran off the rails completely. In creating a link between you and your would-be doppleganger, she opened the door to Sinclair.”

“You
saw
that?” asks Haskell.

“Don’t count me out of the game yet,” says Szilard.

L
ynx frowns. “Shit,” he mutters.

“What’s up?” says Linehan. Lynx doesn’t even look at him.

“I said—”

“I heard what you said.”

“You can’t admit something’s wrong?”

“I’ll admit to anything if you’ll shut the fuck up.”

R
un the fucking sequences,”
says Sarmax.

Jarvin’s already doing just that. And it’s all Spencer can do to keep up with him; his mind’s getting swept up in Jarvin’s, up along the wires that lead into the cockpit, into the main consoles that contain the executive software for the ship. There are two such consoles. One’s Chinese. One’s Russian.
Jarvin’s going for both of them simultaneously, and Spencer’s running backup. He’s starting to get a sense of just how good a razor Alek Jarvin is—how easily that man’s been running rings around him. Now that they’re within the main cockpit firewall, Jarvin’s taking those databases apart—running a blizzard of sequences while Spencer triple-checks them, processes the patterns, scans the implications. The codes necessary to take control of the entire ship are coming into focus. Until—

“Shit,” says Jarvin.

The screens go crazy.

I
’m not even Montrose’s biggest problem,” says Szilard. “Sinclair is—”