Necroscope: Invaders

Jake sensed that he must be close now. But so did Zek, who was anxious to divert him. And:

Jake, she cut in, you'll have an explanation. All of this will be explained eventually — or you'll work it out for yourself— but for now let it go, and let the teeming dead deliberate. The wisdom of the ages is down in the earth, Jake. I can't see that they'll make a mistake on your account, know they'll let you in… eventually.p>

'Huh!' he snorted. 'In a way they're just like Trask; even like you, Zek! Everyone seems to think I should want to be "in" — that I should consider it a privilege — but all of these E-Branch types will tell you their talents are a curse. So why is it different for me? Why should I accept a curse? And just what sort of a curse is it, anyway? I mean, that is what this is all about, isn't it? The stuff that Trask isn't telling me? The bottom line? The downside?'

Then for a while there was silence in the psychic aether, until Zek said, I can't ask you to trust me, can't promise you anything, for the dangers are enormous. But one thing is certain: you can be the new Necroscope. You are the Necroscope, if only you'll accept it.

'I would accept it,' he told her then. 'I have accepted it in a way. For how can I deny what is? But if there's a short cut to my — well, to my being — then why can't I take it now? And as for the drawbacks… surely it's my right to know what they are? I mean, what's the big mystery?'

Jake, Zek answered, Harry Keogh was born with his skills, or with some of them at least, but you've had them thrust upon you. What came naturally to Harry is coming unnaturally to you. But some things are so unnatural— and the very possibility of others is so frightening — as to make deadspeak and the Mobius Continuum seem mundane by comparison.

'Now, if that was intended to give me confidence—' Jake started to say, only to be cut off as Zek broke in:

Personally, you wouldn't have been my choice. (He sensed the sad, reluctant shake of an incorporeal head.) But you were Harry Keogh's choice, which has to be good enough, for he must have had good reasons. And now there are others I have to talk to, others to convince — on your behalf, yes — on the far side of the world. Before I go, however, it seems only fair to tell you: you're not making it easy, Jake…

'That seems to be one of my big problems—' he started to say, then realized that she was gone.

But I am here, Jake, always, said another voice, phlegmy, lustful and darkly sinister, close and even too close to hand. The voice of Korath Mindsthrall, fading to a distant, bubbling chuckle.

And in a little while, coming to Jake as if from far, far away, the whispering of the teeming dead started up again. But it was now more fearful than ever…

Morning found Jake in an introspective mood. But before he was up and about Liz took the opportunity to have a word in private with Trask about her experience of the previous night.

They were out in the grounds, walking under the high wall, breathing easy while still the sun hung low in the east. It was early, and the dawn chorus of various parrot species was clattering in the still air. Another hour or two, the air would be dry and 'subtropical' Brisbane baking in furnace heat.

Trask heard Liz out, was silent a while, thinking it over. Then he asked her: 'He was definitely using deadspeak?'

'I don't think so… but does it matter? I mean, the way I understand it, as a Necroscope — or the Necroscope — his very thoughts are deadspeak. Unless he's shielding his thoughts, the dead will hear him thinking. And they will always know where he is. It's like an extra sense, their only sense. They can't see, hear, feel, taste or smell, but they'll know when he's near.'

Trask shook his head defeatedly. 'I probably know as much about deadspeak as anyone else,' he sighed. 'Indeed, more than anyone else. But I still don't know about it. I talk about it, yes — I know it exists — but sometimes it's hard to believe in it. So don't ask me about it, because I don't know. Hell, Liz! You're the telepath!'

'It was deadspeak,' she said. 'Or at least, he was listening to deadspeak. Listening to — my God! — to dead people, conversing in their graves. And they were talking about him. That was all I got: the fact that he could hear them and was trying to join in their conversation, but they wouldn't let him.'

'Huh!' Trask grunted. 'Who can blame them? Neither would I "let him in" if I could help it. His bloody attitude…'

'But to mature, to be the Necroscope, he has to be able to talk to them, right?'

'That's part of it, yes. Well, let's just hope it comes to him, as everything else will have to come to him — the good and the bad. And meanwhile you keep an eye, or an ear, on him.'

'You're still hot sure of Jake, are you?' Liz said.

Trask shrugged. 'I'm not sure he's sure of us! And despite what he has said, I know he still has his own agenda. Anyway, I spoke to Premier Turchin about that, and I'm hoping he can come up with some answers. If we can just find a way to lay that one ghost — kill off the one thing that's burning a hole in Jake's brain, this revenge thing, this course he's set on — maybe it will leave him with an open mind.'

'You mean with Castellano out of the way, Jake would more easily be able to concentrate on the job in hand?'

'Right. So Turchin will try to dig some dirt on this fellow, see if he can get something solid on him. If we could lock him away it would be a start. But lan doesn't think that would be enough, not for Jake. And the hell of it is I understand: I know how Jake feels. Think yourself lucky, Liz, that you don't know the kind of hatred we're all capable of. What if I should tell you that I would gladly give my right arm at the shoulder just to see Nephran Malinari writhing, burning on a cross, and to revel in the stink of his smoke? Well, now I'm telling you. And I mean it.'

'And Jake's no different,' she said, with a small shiver.

'Neither was the Necroscope Harry Keogh,' Trask told her.

'And neither am I. Few men are, when the crime and the pain it brings are nasty enough. An eye for an eye, Liz.'

'But in fact, Jake hardly knew that girl.'

'He knows that she was raped and tormented and died horribly, because of him. He knows it was fixed so that he'd take the blame, and that Castellano tried to have him killed in the jail in Turin. That's enough. It would be enough for me, too.'

'Yet you're still hard on him. You think hard on him.'

But the other shook his head. 'He's hard on himself. Anyway, let it go now. And let's hope Turchin comes up with something.'

Hearing footsteps on the gravel drive, they look'ed toward the house.

It was the precog, lan Goodly. He came in his accustomed, long-legged lope — with a long face, too — for all the world a cadaverous mortician. 'Fresh coffee's on the go,' he said in his piping fashion. And: 'Did I hear someone mention Turchin?'

'What about him?' said Trask.

'It was on the early news,' the precog answered. 'He'll be attending a couple of conference sessions this morning, but tonight or tomorrow he's out of here and back to Moscow.'

'What?' Trask frowned. 'Moscow is the last place he'd want to be right now. What happened?'

'A fist fight, apparently,' Goodly answered. 'In Turchin's hotel bar last night. An Australian delegate got drunk, accused the Premier point-blank of lying about Russia's soft ecological policy, went on to call him a puppet mouthpiece for his industrial and military masters back home.'

'Which right now is true as far as it goes,' Trask nodded. 'Mainly because he has no other choice. So what else?'

'Turchin got a drink thrown in his face before his minders stepped in and started throwing their weight around. The upshot is that he'll speak today — state Russia's case, protest about his treatment and what have you — and take the first plane out tomorrow. Tonight, if he can get one.'