'Secondary?' asked Cormac. He looked at Blegg, who nodded slowly.
'It means the lock was opened, then replaced. Someone knew where the Maker went before we found it out. Y'understand?'
'Dragon,' said Cormac.
Blegg shrugged. 'Planetary scan, what y'got there?' he asked.
There was a pause before Samarkand II replied. 'There was an airborne energy trace, originally dismissed as stratospheric lightning. Re-integration of the data suggests it grounded at the Chiranian ruin in the Magadar forest.'
'There's y'Maker,' said Blegg, and stood.
Cormac gave a short nod and looked at him as Blegg finished his coffee and placed the cup carefully on the bench. Without more ado he headed for the shuttle door. Without pulling his mask across, he hit the touch-plate. Cormac quickly got his mask into place as the door cracked open. He watched Blegg.
'Anything else you might have neglected to tell me?' he asked.
'Y'have facts. Y'have a mind. I'll get things set for you.' Blegg paused. 'I'll get that silicon moron on Viridian to give you the details.'
Great.
Blegg stepped out into the cold and trudged off in the direction of the containment sphere. As the door closed, Cormac pulled off his mask and lay back against the bulkhead. He kept turning over what he knew. Pelter was on Viridian, and was likely there with Dragon's help. Dragon would lie about the reasons behind this, if it gave any answer at all. Cormac dared not ask. He was still very aware that here, now, Dragon held all the cards. It could destroy the runcible, and it could destroy Hubris. Cormac realized he had to keep his mouth shut and work everything out for himself. He needed more answers and he needed a clear course of action. Despite Blegg's assertion, he did not have all the facts and his course was not yet clear. He summarized some of the more pertinent facts available to him.
Fact: the runcible buffers were sabotaged in a way easily within the capabilities of Dragon and of this Maker, if what Dragon said were true. Fact: this Maker had escaped from its containment vessel, if such it was, and escaped Samarkand by runcible. That they had not discovered this until recently bespoke the Maker's ability to interfere with AI programming, an ability Dragon probably had as well. Fact: the creature in the tunnel had not been made to withstand the cold, yet the dracomen had. Fact: Dragon probably knew about the Maker's departure long before it arrived here and threw its apparent tantrum. These particular facts made a lie of Dragon's story. But what was the truth? Conclusion: if Dragon was responsible for what had happened here, how would he find out for sure, and what the hell would he do about it?
Cormac closed his eyes and he began running through things again. He knew, in the end, that the explanation would be simple, and any solution perhaps less so. Right at this moment he just couldn't seem to get anything in order. He needed rest. The bench was padded and would have to suffice. He stretched out on it and was wondering if he would be able to get any sleep, when sleep crept up and got him instead.
The cracking of the shuttle door had Cormac sitting upright and pulling his mask across. Thorn entered with a large bag slung over one shoulder. He dropped it before Cormac as the door closed.
'That was quick,' Cormac said.
Thorn pulled off his mask and gave him a quizzical look. 'It was quick,' he said, 'for shuttling up to Hubris and back.'
Cormac dropped his mask and looked around for some sort of time readout. He realized then that he should have acquired some sort of timepiece. While grid-linked he had always known the time, so it had never occurred to him that he might not know it.
'Ten hours,' said Thorn, as if reading his mind.
Cormac shook his head, trying to dispel that last fuzziness. He stood up, pointed at the bag and looked questioningly at the Sparkind.
'Your uniform,' said Thorn.
'Right,' said Cormac, taking up the bag, 'I'll change in the sphere. Let's go.'
They masked up and cracked the door for a second time. Outside, vapour was rising off the CO2 slush as the machine and human activity raised the temperature. They hastened for a lock into one of the covered walkways, then on to the containment sphere. Upon reaching the sphere, Cormac found the temperature almost uncomfortable: it was above zero Celsius.
Around the sphere, prefabs had been erected in some sort of analogue of embarkation lounges - and they were crowded. Technicians were setting up information consoles, laying insulated flooring, installing powerful little air heaters. Cables snaked all over the place and there was a racket of compressors, power tools, talking and shouting. When they finally got through to the sphere itself, they found it crowded as well. Thorn pointed out where Aiden, Cento and the dracomen stood. As he and Thorn headed over, Cormac saw that strangers viewed the dracomen without surprise. They probably thought they were just more adapted humans. There were plenty in the crowd already: catadapts with multicoloured fur, ophidapts with fangs, forked tongues and skin litde different from that of the dracomen, tripode adaptations to heavy-gravity worlds, and others more exotic and less easy to compare. There were some who looked askance at the dracomen. They were perhaps more observant or were members of the original mission.
'Wonder how long before we see copies,' said Cormac, when they reached the two Golem and the two dracomen.
'It would be a difficult adaptation,' said Aiden.
'Why's that?'
'It would require extensive rewiring of the nervous system.'
'You mean putting the legs on backwards and making them work.'
'Yes, that's what I mean.'
Cormac allowed himself a strained grin, then inspected Cento. The Golem had a fine network of lines on his face and on his hands. Obviously a new syntheskin covering could not be found quickly enough. He still wore his old one and the joins showed.
'Are you… all right?' he asked.
'All right?' Cento repeated.
'I mean,' said Cormac, 'are you fully functional?'
'I have eighty per cent efficiency. Replacement is better than repair. The welding of my chassis I cannot trust under the full loading of my joint motors.'
Eighty per cent. That meant the Golem could probably rip only one man in half at a time.
Cormac surveyed the crowds, then shrugged and began to pull off his coldsuit. Thorn did likewise. No one paid attention. Under his coldsuit, Thorn - like Cento and Aiden - had the uniform of a major in the ES regulars. Once he had his coldsuit removed, Cormac kept going until he was naked. He stooped and opened the bag Thorn had deposited. Inside he found underwear, chainglass body armour and a uniform. When he strapped on the armour, that drew more looks than his nakedness had.
Over the body armour Cormac donned the green and grey fatigues of a colonel in the ES regulars. It would ease the giving of orders. Once dressed, he again strapped shuriken to his wrist. He would be the only one of them armed. Hardwired proscription prevented the transmission of certain weapons through the runcibles, and it was easier to collect new weapons on the other side, rather than disconnect that wiring. Cormac could only manage to get shuriken dirough because he had managed to get it classified as an antique, but even then he needed special dispensations, and the weapon had to be deactivated. Had he tried to get it through illegally, it would have been reduced to dust by the proscription filter the runcible had inbuilt when he stepped out the other side. The body-armour helmet he dropped into the bag, along with a laptop that held all the information relevant to this mission. This was all he was taking. With a quick inspection of the inside of the sphere, he hoisted the bag to his shoulder.
'All set?' he asked, with a wary glance at the draco-men.