Mortality is not something you measure out like a pint of ale, Miss Kelly. It will live its life to the full, and thats all that can be said.
He doesnt know, Reza muttered curtly.
Shaun Wallace practised a knowing, slightly condescending smile.
It was growing lighter around the hovercraft. Up ahead, Kelly could see the wonderfully welcome glare of pure sunlight striking emerald foliage. A colour that wasnt red! She had begun to believe that red was all there ever was, all there ever had been.
The hovercraft skimmed out from under the chafed edge of the cloudband. All of the mercenaries broke into a spontaneous cheer.
What is that thing? Kelly shouted above the rebel whoops, pointing up at the cloud.
A reflection of ourselves, our fear.
What do you fear?
The emptiness of the night. It reminds us too much of the beyond. We hide from it.
You mean youre making that? she asked, scepticism warring with astonishment. But it covers thousands of kilometres.
Aye, that it does. Tis our will that creates it; we want shelter, so shelter we have. All of us, Miss Kelly, even me who shuns the rest of them, we all pray for sanctuary with every fibre of being. And its growing, this will of ours, spreading out to conquer. One day soon it will cover all of this planet. But even that is only the first chapter of salvation.
Whats the second?
To leave. To escape the harsh gaze of this universe altogether. Well withdraw to a place of our own making. A place where there is no emptiness hanging like a sword above the land, no death to claim us. A place where your butterfly will live for ever, Miss Kelly. Now tell me that isnt a worthy goal, tell me that isnt a dream worth having.
Reza watched the last of the jungles trees go past as the hovercraft reached the savannah. The lush green grassland seemed to unroll on either side of the river as though it was only just coming into existence. He wasnt really paying much attention; the strange (supposed) Irishman was a captivating performer. A closed universe, he said, and the earlier scorn was lacking.
Kelly gave him a surprised glance. You mean it is possible?
It happens thousands of times a day. The blackhawks and voidhawks open interstices to travel through wormholes every time they fly between stars. Technically theyre self-contained universes.
Yes, but taking a planet
There are twenty million of us, Shaun Wallace purred smoothly. We can do it, together, we can pull open the portal that leads away from mortality.
Kellys neural nanonics faithfully recorded the silver chill tickling her nerves at the naked conviction in his voice. Youre really planning to generate a wormhole large enough to enclose the whole of Lalonde? And keep it there?
Shaun Wallace wagged his finger at her. Ah, now there you go again, Miss Kelly, putting your fine, elegant words in my mouth. Plans, such a grand term. Generals and admirals and kings, now they have plans. But we dont, we have instinct. Hiding our new world from this universe God created, that comes as naturally as breathing. He chuckled. It means we can go on breathing, too. Im sure you wouldnt want to stop me from doing that, would you now? Not a sweet lass like yourself.
No. But what about Rai Molvi? Tell me what happens to him afterwards?
Shaun Wallace scratched his chin, looked round at the savannah, shifted the jump-suit fabric round his shoulders, pulled a sardonic face.
He stays, doesnt he? Kelly said stiffly. You wont let him go.
I need the body, miss. Real bad. Perhaps therell be a priest amongst us I can visit for absolution.
If what youre saying is true, Reza said charily, focusing an optical sensor on the cloudband behind, then we really dont want to be staying here any longer than we have to. Wallace, when is this planetary vanishing act supposed to happen?
You have a few days grace. But there are none of your starships left to sail away on. Sorry.
Is that why you didnt resist, because we cant escape?
Oh, no, Mr. Malin, youve got me all wrong. You see, I dont want much to do with my fellows. Thats why I live out in the woods, there. I prefer being on my own, Ive had a bucketful of their company. Seven centuries of it, to be precise.
So youll help us?
He gathered himself up and threw a glance over his shoulder at the second hovercraft. I wont hinder you, he announced magnanimously.
Thank you very much.
Not that it will do you much good, mind.
Hows that?
Theres not going to be many places you can run to, Im afraid. Quite a few of us have sailed away already.
Fucking hell, Kelly gasped.
Shaun Wallace frowned in disapproval. To be sure, thats no word for a lady to be going and using.
Kelly made sure he was in perfect focus. Are you telling me that whats happening on Lalonde is going to happen on other planets as well?
Indeed I am. Theres a lot of very anguished souls back there in the beyond. Theyre all in dire need of a clean handsome body, every one of them. Something very much like the one youve got there.
This is occupied, to the hilt.
His eyes flashed with black amusement. So was this one, Miss Kelly.
And all these worlds the possessed have gone to, are you going to try and imprison them in wormholes?
Thats a funny old word youre using there: wormholes. Little muddy tunnels in the ground, with casts on top to show the fishermen where they are.
It means chinks in space, gaps you can fall through.
Does it now? Well, then, I suppose thats what I mean, yes. I like that, a gap in the air which leads you through to the other side of the rainbow.
Surreal. The word seemed to be caught on some repeater program in Kellys neural nanonics, flipping up in hologram violet over the image of a mad, dead Irishman sitting in front of her, grinning in delight at her discomfort. Worlds snatched out of their orbits by armies of the dead. Surreal. Surreal. Surreal.
Fenton rose growling to his feet, fangs barred, hackles sticking up like spikes. Shaun Wallace gave the hound an alarmed look, and Kellys retinas caught the minutest white static flames twinkle over his fingertips. But Fenton swung his head round to the prow and barked.
Jalals gaussrifle was already coming round. He saw the huge creature crouched down in the long grass at the side of the water thirty-five metres ahead of the hovercraft. The Lalonde generalist didactic memory called it a kroclion, a plains-dwelling carnivore which even the sayce ran from. He wasnt surprised, the beast must have been nearly four metres long, weighing an easy half-tonne. Its hide was a sandy yellow, well suited to the grass, making visual identification hard (infrared was, thankfully, a furnace flame). The headlike a terrestrial sharkhad been grafted on, all teeth and tiny killer-bright eyes.
Blue target graphics locked on. He fired an EE round.
Everyone ducked, Kelly jamming her hands over her ears. A dazzling explosion sent a pillar of purple plasma and mashed soil spouting twenty metres into the air. Its vertex flattened out, a ring of soot-choked orange flame rolling across the river. The ululate crack was loud enough to drown out the tattoo of thunder chasing them from the red cloud.
Kelly lifted her head carefully.
I think you got him, Theo said drily, as he steered the hovercraft away from the quaking water sloshing round the new crater. A semicircle of grass on the bank was burning.
Theyre vicious bastards, Jalal protested.
Not that one, not any more, as anyone within five kilometres will tell you, Ariadne said.
And you could have dealt with it better?
Forget it, Reza said. Weve got more important things to worry about.
You believe what this dickhead has been telling us? Ariadne asked, jerking a thumb at Shaun Wallace.