“It doesn’t make any sense,” she said, as much for her own benefit as Caillebot’s.
“They’re attacking the wrong stalk. They know we’re not at the top of that one.”
“Maybe attacking it isn’t the idea.”
She nodded. Caillebot had been on her case after the upgrade had failed, but now his tone of voice and body language suggested he was prepared to bury the hatchet, at least for now.
“I think you’re right,” she said. Then she tracked her glasses onto one of the other processions, at least a kilometre away, tilted gently towards her on the footslopes of the habitat’s curving wall.
“Those machines are dismantling something as well. Can’t tell what it is.”
“Mind if I take a look?” Caillebot asked.
She passed him the glasses. He pressed them cautiously to his eyes. Prefects weren’t meant to share
equipment like that, but she supposed if there was ever a time when the rules were meant to be bent, this was it.
“That’s the open-air amphitheatre at Praxis Junction,” the gardener said.
“They’re tearing into that as well.”
“Then it isn’t just us. Something’s going on here, Citizen Caillebot.” He returned her glasses.
“You notice anything about those lines of machines?”
“Like what?”
“They’re all moving in more or less the same direction. Maybe they didn’t come from the marina after all, but they’ve still come from the direction of the docking endcap, where you came in. It looks to me as if they’ve been working their way along the habitat, stopping to demolish anything that takes their fancy.”
“How would machines cross the window panels?”
“There’re roads and bridges for that kind of thing. Even if there weren’t, the glass could easily take the weight of one of those machines, even fully loaded. The panels wouldn’t have been an obstacle to them.”
“Okay, then. If they’re headed away from the docking endcap, where are they likely to end up?”
“After they’ve swept through the whole habitat? Only one place to go—the trailing endcap. No major docking facilities there, so it’s a dead end.”
“But they can’t be carrying all that stuff for nothing. They must be gathering it for a reason.”
“Well, there’s the manufactory complex, of course,” he said offhandedly.
“But that doesn’t make any sense either.” Thalia experienced a premonitory chill.
“Tell me about the manufactory complex, Citizen Caillebot.”
“It’s practically dead, like I already told you. Hasn’t run at normal capacity for years. Decades. Longer than I can remember.” Thalia nodded patiently.
“But it’s still there. It hasn’t been removed, gutted, replaced or whatever?”
“You think they’re going to crank it up again. Start making stuff on a big scale, feeding it with the junk the machines are collecting.”
“It’s just an idea, Citizen Caillebot.”
“Ships?” he asked.
“Not necessarily. If you can make single-molecule hulls, there’s nothing you can’t make.” As an afterthought, she added: “Provided you have the construction blueprint, of course. The manufactory won’t be able to make anything unless it’s given the right instructions.”
“You sound relieved.”
“I probably shouldn’t be. It’s just that I was thinking of all the unpleasant things you could make with a manufactory if you had the right blueprints. But the point is the only blueprints in the public domain are for things you can’t hurt anyone with.”
“You sound pretty sure of that.”
“Try locating the construction blueprint for a space-to-space weapon, Citizen Caillebot, or an attack ship, or a military servitor. See how far you get before a prefect comes knocking.”
“Panoply keeps tabs on that kind of thing?”
“We don’t just keep tabs. We make sure that data isn’t out there. On the rare occasions when someone needs to make something nasty, they come to us for permission. We retrieve and unlock the files from our archives. We issue them and make damned sure they’re deleted afterwards.”
“Then you’re certain nothing nasty can come out of that manufactory?”
“Not without Panoply’s help,” Thalia said bluntly. Caillebot responded with a knowing nod.
“A day ago, Prefect, I’d have found that statement almost entirely reassuring.”
Thalia turned back to the window, ruminating on what the gardener had just said. The machines were working with the manic industry of insects. They had chewed deep into the lowest part of the stalk, exposing the geodesic struts that formed the structure’s scaffolding. Judging by the rubble and remains being shovelled into a waiting hopper, the cutting tools were making short work of that as well.
“It’s not going to last long,” Thalia said. Then she turned around and looked at the polling core, hoping that she was right about the machines needing to keep it intact, and therefore being unable to launch an all-out attack on the stalk supporting the sphere in which they were sheltering.
She’d been wrong about several things already today. She hoped this wasn’t another.
Dreyfus knew something was amiss as soon as he approached the passwall into Jane Aumonier’s sphere and saw the two internal prefects waiting on either side of it, whiphounds drawn, tethered by quick-release lines that ran from their belts to eyelets in the doorframe. The passwall itself was set to obstruct.
“Is there a problem?” Dreyfus asked mildly. He’d occasionally been barred from talking to Aumonier when she was engaged in some activity that exceeded his Pangolin clearance. But it had never required the presence of security guards, and Aumonier had generally given him fair warning.
“Sorry, sir,” said the younger of the two guards, “but no one’s allowed to speak to Prefect Aumonier at the moment.”
“Why don’t you let me be the judge of that?”
“Not without authorisation from the supreme prefect, sir.” Dreyfus looked at the kid as if he was being asked to answer a deceptively simple riddle.
“She is the supreme prefect.”
The young guard looked embarrassed.
“Not presently, sir. Prefect Baudry is now acting supreme.”
“On what grounds was Prefect Aumonier removed from her position?” Dreyfus asked disbelievingly.
“I’m authorised to tell you that the decision was taken on the basis of medical fitness, sir. I thought you’d been informed, but—”
“I hadn’t.” He was trying to keep his fury in check, not wanting to take out his anger on this kid the way he had abused Thyssen earlier.
“But I still want to talk to Prefect Aumonier.”
“Prefect Aumonier is in no fit state to talk to anyone,” said a gruff male voice behind Dreyfus. He pushed
himself around to see Gaffney floating towards him along the same corridor he’d just traversed.
“I’m sorry, Field, but that’s just the way it is.”
“Let me talk to Jane.” Gaffney shook his head, looking genuinely regretful.
“I hardly need impress on you how precarious her situation is. The last thing she needs right now is someone upsetting her unnecessarily.”
“Jane isn’t going to be the one who’s upset if I don’t get to see her.”
“Easy, Field. I know you’ve had a tough time today. But don’t use it as an excuse to lash out at your superiors.”
“Did you have any part in removing Jane?”
“She wasn’t ’removed’. She was relieved of the burden of command at a time when it would have been an intolerable imposition for her to have continued.” In his peripheral vision, Dreyfus saw that the two guards were looking straight ahead with resolutely neutral expressions, pretending that they were not party to this high-level scuffle. Neither man had summoned the senior prefect. Gaffney must have been lurking nearby, Dreyfus thought: waiting until he tried to visit Aumonier.