“I am moved by your concern, Agent Shi Pei,” I said coolly. “Perhaps now I could make use of your expertise in a matter of less importance—”
She tapped her cigarette ash onto the floor, her nostrils dilating so that the butterfly tattoo seemed to flutter. “Of course, Imperator.”
“Some months ago there was a research subject who escaped from the Human Engineering Laboratory, in the Northeastern United Provinces. Subject 117, a young girl named Wendy Wanders.”
Shi Pei frowned. “I have no jurisdiction over HEL. The Ascendant Governors—”
“She is no longer under HEL’s control, and according to what you have told me, there is some doubt as to whether there are any more Ascendant Governors. I want to find this girl. She escaped into the City of Trees and lived there for several months, disguised as a young man named Aidan. I was with her immediately before my death; I believe she is still alive. I want her found and brought to me.”
Agent Shi Pei and Valeska exchanged glances. Finally Valeska said, “That City was retaken by Ascendant janissaries in January, Imperator. As Agent Shi Pei told you, there has been some trouble, and it has been necessary to use viral weapons to restrain the rebels there. As far as I know, any survivors of the original invasion were detained as a recreational labor force by the new governing body there.”
I smiled grimly at the thought of Subject 117 drafted as a prostitute by the Ascendants. “Then it should not be difficult to trace her.”
“If she survived.” Shi Pei tossed her cigarette across the room. It struck the window in a burst of sparks and dropped to the floor. “And if I can reestablish contact with the City.”
“She survived. I’m sure of it.”
Shi Pei raised her eyebrows. “And what does the Aviator Imperator want with this young girl? I assume the obvious reasons no longer apply to a rasa. ”
I crossed to the window and ground out the smoldering cigarette beneath my boot, gazed down upon the smoky yellow lights and softly swirling mist. “She was an empath engineered as a terrorist, a suicide trigger. When I last saw her, she was somewhat confused—it appeared her empathic abilities had been impaired, by grief or stress. I may have a use for her in spite of that. If what you say is true—if there is a geneslave Alliance planning war against us—then we may need humans like her fighting with us. Wendy Wanders. Find her for me.”
I continued to stare out the window. Behind me I heard a click as Shi Pei withdrew a vocoder and repeated the name. “Anything else, Imperator? Requests for aid from the Emirate’s fleet? Messages for the dead in Elysium?”
“I’d like to see a roster of the elÿon in port. We’ll leave immediately.” I turned in time to see Valeska looking anxiously at the nemosyne. “My server won’t need clearance, Captain Novus. You may accompany us to the elÿon and vouch that we are not allied with the rebel forces. Agent Shi Pei, I trust you will carry on your duties here until you are relieved of them.”
I glimpsed Agent Shi Pei’s bitter smile as I strode toward the door. She followed, stooping to pick up a heavy book with marbled cover. She flipped through it, marked a page with a bit of torn paper, and handed it to me.
“Here—I think this is the current list. Remember about the Caesaria. ” She made a mocking bow as Nefertity and I passed.
In the doorway I paused. I reached out and rested my metal hand upon Shi Pei’s shoulder. The derisive lines faded from her face; her brown eye rolled nervously, then blinked closed as I squeezed her. A moment later she cried out, buckling beneath my grip. When I let her go, she staggered against the wall. Valeska stared openmouthed, her Aviator’s composure shaken.
“The empath. I will be expecting to hear from you within one solar week, Agent Shi Pei.” Without another word I tramped down the stairwell.
The book Shi Pei had given me was heavy, with creamy thick pages and gilt edging, its covers an expensive swirl of violet and blue and yellow. Rather an archaic means for a Commanding Agent to track the comings and goings of an Ascendant staging area; but inside I found a meticulous record of just that, page after page of transport duties, arrival times and departures and ports of call, with the names of the various elÿon transcribed in an elegant hand whose delicate characters resembled ideograms more than our Arabic alphabet. The violet ink made the tiny figures difficult to read at first, but eventually I puzzled it out—
General Li
Angevin
Izanagi
Stella d’Or
Caesaria
Pierre Toussaint
Esashi
Of the seven listed on the page Shi Pei had indicated, I had only ever traveled aboard the Angevin and Izanagi. Both had been appropriated by Ascendant forces, the Izanagi being a stalwart Nipponian vessel, the Angevin a Gaulish freighter. The rest were mostly Ascendant vessels, built on the North American continent, and I was wary of them. My Academy training notwithstanding, I had seen too many Ascendant-made vessels sabotaged—it took only one disgruntled technician or clever geneslave to infect a nav program and bring the whole enterprise crashing down. Nipponian vessels were sturdier, their minds harder to infiltrate. I chose the Izanagi and handed the book to Valeska.
“Inform the Izanagi’s adjutant that we will be boarding and departing as soon as the ship can ready itself. Have the technicians place my Gryphon Kesef on board.”
She saluted and disappeared in the warren of towers on the main deck. Nefertity watched her go impassively, then turned her unblinking eyes on me.
“So now we will travel by starship?”
I laughed, my boots making a hollow boom on the metal grid beneath us as we walked. “Starship? No. There are no starships, Nefertity. Only a few old military vessels retrofitted for commercial transport between here and HORUS.”
She nodded. A fine rain had begun falling. It softened the edges of things, turned the glaring landing lights into golden halos, and made Nefertity look as though she were encased in glowing blue velvet. “And it is a long trip, to these space stations?”
“Not really.” From a speaker overhead a tinny amplified voice announced the hour and number of the shift that was due to change. A sudden frantic rush of yellow-uniformed personnel seethed from previously unseen doors and tunnels; there was much swearing amid the clatter of boots and the nearly silent hiss of rain. Then abruptly all was still again, as though the inhabitants of an overturned beetle’s nest had burrowed safely back into their holes. The platform’s rocking subsided to a gentle swell. From somewhere in the fog above us a kittiwake moaned, and I could hear the beating of its wings as it passed into the mournful darkness. I looked at Nefertity and said,
“The elÿon are all biotic craft, controlled by the thoughts of their adjutants—it is an old technology, and the Nipponian fleet was supposed to be the most sophisticated. And no, it does not take very long to reach HORUS. Perhaps three or four solar days; but time runs strangely in the elÿon. For humans, at least. For you it may be different.”
A smile glinted in the nemosyne’s face. “And for you? Does time move differently for rasas as well?”