The White Mountain (39 page)

‘We're going to kill her, aren't we?'

Drake glanced at him. ‘She was dead before she came here. Remember that.'

Chen shook his head. ‘That's just words. No, what I mean is that
we
are going to kill
her
. Us. Personally.'

‘In a manner of speaking.'

‘No. Not in a manner of speaking. This is real. We're going out to kill her. I've been trying not to think about it, but I can't help it. It seems…' He shook his head. ‘It's just that some days I can't believe it's me, doing this. I'm a good man. At least, I thought I was.'

Drake was silent, hunched over the controls as if concentrating, but Chen could see he was thinking; chewing over what he'd said.

‘So?' Chen prompted.

‘So we set down, do our job, get back. That's it.'

Again Chen stared at Drake for a long time, not sure even what he was looking for. Whatever it was, it wasn't there. He looked down at the tiny screen. Below the central glass were two buttons. They looked innocuous enough, but he wasn't sure. Only Drake knew what they were for.

He looked away, holding his tongue. Maybe it was best to see it as Drake saw it. As just another job to be done. But his disquiet remained, and, as the mountain grew larger through the front screen, his sense of unreality grew with it.

It was all so impersonal. As if what they were tracking was a thing, another kind of machine – one that ran. But Chen had seen her close; had looked into her eyes and stared down into her face while Debrenceni had been operating. He had seen just how vulnerable she was.

How human…

He had put on the suit's heater and pulled the helmet visor down – even so, his feet felt like ice and his cheeks were frozen. A cold breeze blew across the mountain now, shredding the mist in places, but generally it was thick, like a flaw in seeing itself.

There was a faint buzz on his headset, then a voice came through. ‘It's clearing up here. We can see right up the mountain now, to the summit.'

Chen stared up the slope, as if to penetrate the dense mist, then glanced back at Drake. ‘What now?'

Drake nodded distractedly, then spoke into his lip-mike. ‘Move to within a hundred
ch'i
. It looks like she's stopped. Gustaffson, you go to the north
of where she is. Palmer, come round to the east. Tong Chou and I will take the other points. That way we've got a perfect grid.'

Drake turned, looking up the mountain. ‘Okay. Let's give this thing a proper test.'

Chen spoke to Drake's back. ‘The trace ought to be built into a visor display. This thing's vulnerable when you're climbing. Clumsy, too.'

‘You're right,' Drake answered, beginning to climb. ‘It's a bloody nuisance. It should be made part of the standard Security headgear, with direct computer input from a distance.'

‘You mean wire the guards, too?'

Drake paused, mist wreathing his figure. ‘Why not? That way you could have the coordinator at a distance, out of danger. It would make the team less vulnerable. The runner couldn't get at the head – the brains behind it.'

Halfway up, Drake turned, pointing across. ‘Over there. Keep going until you're due south of her. Then wait. I'll tell you what to do.'

Chen went across, moving slowly over the difficult terrain, then stopped, his screen indicating that he was directly south of the trace, approximately a hundred
ch'i
down. He signalled back, then waited, listening as the others confirmed they were in place. The mist had cleared up where he was and he had eye contact with both Gustaffson and Palmer. There was no sign of the runner.

Drake's voice sounded in his headset. ‘You should be clear any minute. We'll start when you are.'

Chen waited, while the mist slowly thinned out around him. Then, quite suddenly, he could see the mountain above him, the twin peaks of Kebo and Mawensi white against the vivid blue of the sky. He shivered, looking across, picking out the others against the slope.

‘I see you,' Drake said, before he could say anything. ‘Good. Now come up the slope a little way. We'll close to fifty now. Palmer, Gustaffson, you do the same.'

Chen walked forward slowly, conscious of the others as they closed on him. Above him was a steep shelf of bare earth. As he came closer he lost sight, first of Drake, then of the other two.

‘I'll have to come up,' he said into his lip-mike. ‘I can't see a thing from down here.'

He scrambled up and stood there, on the level ground above the shelf,
where the thick grass began. He was only twenty
ch'i
from the trace signal now. The others stood back at fifty, watching him.

‘Where is she?' he said, softer than before.

‘Exactly where the trace shows she is,' said Drake into his head. ‘In that depression just ahead of you.'

He had seen it already, but it looked too shallow to hide a woman.

‘Palmer?' It was Drake again. Chen listened. ‘I want you to test the left-hand signal on your handset. Turn it slowly to the left.'

Chen waited, watching the shallow pit in front of him. It seemed as if nothing had happened.

‘Good,' said Drake. ‘Now you, Gustaffson. I want you to press both your controls at the same time. Hold them down firmly for about twenty seconds. Okay?'

This time there was a noise from the depression. A low moaning that increased as the seconds passed. Then it cut off abruptly. Chen shuddered. ‘What was that?'

‘Just testing,' Drake answered. ‘Each of our signals is two-way. They transmit, but they also have a second function. Palmer's cuts off all motor activity in the cortex. Gustaffson's works on what we call the pain gate, stimulating nerves at the stem of the brain.'

‘And yours?' asked Chen. He could hear the breathing of the others on the line as they listened in.

‘Mine's the subtlest. I can talk to our runner. Directly. Into her head.'

The line went silent. From the depression in front of Chen came a sudden whimper of pure fear. Then Drake was speaking again. ‘Okay. You can move the signal back to its starting position. Our runner is ready to come out.'

There was a tense moment of waiting then from the front of the shallow pit a head bobbed up. Wearily, in obvious pain, the woman pulled herself up out of the deep hole at the front lip of the shallow depression. As her head came up and round she looked directly at Chen. For a moment she stood there, swaying, then she collapsed and sat back, pain and tiredness etched in her ravaged face. She looked ragged and exhausted. Her legs and arms were covered in contusions and weeping cuts.

Drake must have spoken to her again, for she jerked visibly and looked round, finding him. Then she looked about her, seeing the others. Her head
dropped and for a moment she just sat there, breathing heavily, her arms loose at her sides.

‘Okay,' Drake said. ‘Let's wrap things up.'

Chen turned and looked across at Drake. In the now brilliant sunlight he seemed a cold and alien figure. His suit, like all of them, was non-reflective. Only the visor sparkled menacingly. Just now he was moving closer in. Twenty
ch'i
from the woman he stopped. Chen watched as Drake made Palmer test his signal again. As it switched off, the woman fell awkwardly to one side. Then, moments later, she pushed herself up again, looking round, wondering what had happened to her. Then it was Gustaffson's turn. He saw how the woman's face changed, her teeth clamped together, her whole body arching as she kicked out in dreadful pain.

When she sat up again, her face twitched visibly. Something had broken in her. Her eyes, when they looked at him now, seemed lost.

He looked across at Drake, appalled, but Drake was talking to her again. Chen could see his lips moving, then looked back and saw the woman try to cover her ears, a look of pure terror on her face.

Slowly, painfully, she got up and, looking straight at Chen, clambered over the lip and began to make her way towards him, almost hopping now, each touch of her damaged leg against the ground causing her face to buckle in pain. But still she came.

He made to step back, but Drake's voice was suddenly in his headset, on the discreet channel. ‘Your turn,' it said. ‘Just hold down the left-hand button and touch the right.'

She was less than two body-lengths away from him now, reaching out to him. He looked down at the tiny screen, then held and touched.

The air was filled with a soft, wet sound of exploding matter. As if someone had fired a gun off in the middle of a giant fruit. And there, where the signal had been, there was nothing.

He looked up. The body was already falling, the shoulders and upper chest ruined by the explosion that had taken off the head. He turned away, sickened, but the stench of burned flesh was in his nostrils and gobbets of her ruptured, bloodied flesh were spattered all over his suit and visor. He stumbled and almost went down the steep, bare bank, but stopped there on the edge, swaying, keeping his balance, telling himself quietly that he would not be sick, over and over again.

After a while he turned and, looking past the body, met Drake's eyes. ‘You bastard… why did she come at me? What did you say to her?'

Drake pulled off his helmet and threw it down. ‘I told her you'd help her,' he said, then laughed strangely. ‘And you did. You bloody well did.'

Chapter 76

FLAMES IN A GLASS

‘
W
ang Ti?'

Chen stood just inside the door, surprised to find the apartment in darkness. He put out his hand, searching the wall, then slowly brought up the lights. Things looked normal, everything in its place. He released a breath. For the briefest moment…

He went out into the kitchen and filled the kettle, then plugged it in. As he turned, reaching up to get the
ch'a
pot, he heard a noise. A cough.

He went out, into the brightness of the living room. ‘Wang Ti?' he called softly, looking across at the darkened doorway of their bedroom. ‘Is that you?'

The cough came again, a strong, racking cough that ended with a tiny moan.

He went across and looked into the room. It was Wang Ti beneath the covers, he could see that at once. But Wang Ti as he had never seen her before, her hair unkempt, her brow beaded with sweat. Wang Ti, who had never suffered a day's illness in her life.

‘
Wang Ti?
'

She moaned, turning her head slightly on the pillow. ‘Nmmm…'

He looked about him, conscious that something was missing, but not knowing what. ‘Wang Ti?'

Her eyes opened slowly. Seeing him, she moaned and turned away, pulling the sheet up over her head.

‘Wang Ti?' he said gently, moving closer. ‘Where are the children?'

Her voice was small, muffled by the sheets. ‘I sent them below. To Uncle Mai.'

‘Ahh…' He crouched down. ‘And you, my love?'

She hesitated, then answered in that same small, frightened voice. ‘I am fine, husband.'

Something in the way she said it – in the way her determination to be a dutiful, uncomplaining wife faltered before the immensity of her suffering – made him go cold inside. Something had happened.

He pulled back the sheet, studying her face in the half-light. It was almost unrecognizable. Her mouth – a strong mouth, made for laughter – was twisted into a thin-lipped grimace of pain. Her eyes – normally so warm and reassuring – were screwed tightly shut as if to wall-in all the misery she felt, the lids heavy and discoloured. Pained by the sight, he put his fingers to her cheek, wanting to comfort her, then drew them back, surprised. She had been crying.

There was a moment's blankness, then he felt his stomach fall away. ‘The child…'

Wang Ti nodded, then buried her face in the pillow, beginning to sob, her body convulsing under the sheets.

He sat on the bed beside her, holding her to him, trying to comfort her, but his mind was in shock. ‘No…' he said, after a while. ‘You have always been so strong. And the child was well. Surgeon Fan said so.'

She lay there quietly – so quiet that it frightened him. Then it was true. She had lost the child.

‘When was this?'

‘A week ago.'

‘A week!
Ai ya!
' He sat back, staring sightlessly into the shadows, thinking of her anguish, her suffering, and him not there. ‘But why wasn't I told? Why didn't Karr send word? I should have been here.'

She put out a hand, touching his chest. ‘He wanted to. He begged me to, but I would not let him. Your job…'

He looked back at her. She was watching him now, her puffed and blood-red eyes filled with pity. The sight of her – of her concern
for him
– made his chest tighten with love. ‘Oh, Wang Ti, my little pigeon… what in the gods' names happened?'

She shuddered and looked away again. ‘No one came,' she said quietly. ‘I waited, but no one came…'

He shook his head. ‘But the Surgeon… We paid him specially to come.'