‘Is this what you wanted to hear?’ Jack asked. ‘Is this the debriefing your patron asked for?’
He’d just described, in detail, the death agonies of a Jovian mind. It was a survey and ore-recovery swarm that fled Calisto, looking to dream its last weeks away until the licences that supported it ended and the fusion reactors that drove it sputtered into death. It had been working non-stop for eighty-seven years. Corazon had stopped taking notes long ago. She was staring at Jack, fascinated.
‘Do you want to hear how we tore them apart to protect you from their need to be free? Do you really want to know, Lestak?’
‘And do I need to tell you about the thousands dead, Jack? About the rock your cold friends threw at the moon? Do you want to hear about the children my – our – colleagues lost? Do you want to hear how many classrooms were just empty, because there was no one left to fill them? Do you, Jack, when you tell me how you felt eradicating those unreal fucking creatures, when they stepped out of line, and started to become machines for killing? Do you?’
‘None of the minds Fist and I killed were responsible for that. And soon I’ll be just one more of the war dead too. I won’t even leave a fetch behind me.’
There was a moment’s silence, then Lestak said: ‘Oh, what’s the use?’
Outside, the Sunwall had darkened, spinelights fading with it, and night had come to the Homelands. But neither Lestak nor Corazon had made the gesture that would illuminate the room. So, as the Assistant Commissioner turned away from the table, she seemed to curl up into the blackness and be lost within it. Jack felt a soft touch at his shoulder. It was Corazon.
‘The interview’s over. I’ll take you back to Docklands.’
Lestak said nothing as Corazon led Jack out of the room. Her silence was more pointedly accusing than any of her questions.
[Oh, I loved hearing about all the fun we had,] chortled Fist. [ Those were the good old days, weren’t they?]
That cut even deeper.
Chapter 6
Lieutenant Corazon said little as they returned to the flyer. It was only when they entered the deep black of the Wart that she spoke again. Her face was softly etched on the darkness by the green and blue glow of dashboard instruments. Her voice had hushed to a whisper. Dreams of journalistic objectivity had slipped away. She almost seemed to be trying to engage with him as a person.
‘I didn’t realise how tough it was out there.’
A container train appeared ahead of them. There was the soft hissing of gravity baffles and a whine from the little pulse engine as the flyer altered course. Its swing, its seatbelts’ soft tug, reminded both Jack and Corazon that they were moving unsupported through space, with nothing to hold them should they fall.
Jack kept his voice neutral. ‘Breaking minds. Watching them break us. There was nothing soft about it.’
Corazon smiled sadly. ‘We had our own problems. Terrorist bombs, Kingdom killing terrorists. It was non-stop. Out beyond Mars, hardly anything seemed to be going on.’
A warning light flickered red. She touched a switch and it faded. Jack suddenly felt very alone. ‘What happened to Issie?’ he asked.
‘She was Lestak’s daughter. She died on the moon.’
It was the answer he’d expected. He supposed that, after their meeting, Lestak would be salving herself with the company of her child’s fetch.
‘It was a terrible time,’ he said, to himself as much as to Corazon.
[ It was our casus belli. A joy.]
Jack reached inside his mind and let a partition grow, trapping Fist behind it. There would be no more of his synthetic rage for a while. Jack thought about the attack. As ever, he felt no anger at the loss that had been inflicted on humanity. There was only a deep, impassioned grief at the bloody decisions that political calculation could lead to, and at the fact that – once created – such wounds could be so hard to heal.
‘I was just too old to be up there,’ Corazon told him. ‘I lost friends.’
An asteroid had been diverted from its course and dropped on to one of the old lunar mining bases. Those responsible had somehow rendered the asteroid invisible to Station’s sensors, and thus unstoppable. The attack seemed to have been meant as a spectacular but harmless show of strength. But at the time the base had been hosting the annual Homelands Junior Schools Mooncamp. Three thousand children aged between four and thirteen had died instantly. The failure to spot the asteroid had been Sandal’s responsibility. He’d lost status accordingly. Several of his key security subdivisions had been transferred into the care of Kingdom. The Pantheon refused to accept the Totality’s protestations of innocence. The Soft War began shortly after.
‘I can’t believe you even protested about being sent to fight them, Jack.’ Corazon’s questions had become more intimate. Now her anger felt more personal too.
‘I was an accountant,’ he replied. ‘All the rest of the puppeteers were soldiers. They were professionals who’d been working with Kingdom’s mind-killing systems for a long time before they were merged with puppets. I was dropped in pretty much untrained. I had no reason to be there.’
‘Grey wanted you to go, didn’t he? It was his will. The gods see much further than we do.’
‘That’s nonsense, Corazon.’
‘The Pantheon know what’s best for us, Jack. They protect us. They always try to steer the right course.’
‘You think? Look at where Grey’s choices have left me. And it’s not just me. Look at the Penderville murder case – there was evidence of Pantheon involvement there.’
‘That’s impossible.’ Shocked fear resonated in her voice.
‘If the gods themselves turned away from the truth, I’d follow the truth and not the gods.’
‘Don’t use the InSec vows to justify such … heresy.’
‘I was starting to find it in the Panther Czar’s accounts. It was well hidden, but it was real. One of them was helping smuggle sweat into Station.’
‘You think a god would help do that, Jack? And kill to cover it up?’
‘I’d just taken my initial findings to Harry Devlin. He took me seriously. Then the Soft War began. The Pantheon used it to shut our investigation down. None of those fucks care about justice.’
‘Hush, Jack. You can’t say things like that.’
‘Why not? It’s the truth.’
‘It can’t be. And anyway – it’s not respectful.’
‘Things have changed, Corazon. Sandal failed us all. Grey was naïve. Kingdom fought and lost an unjust war. East used it all to quadruple her viewing figures.’
‘Your point is?’
‘The Pantheon are brutal and self-interested, and they’re very powerful indeed. That’s a bad combination.’
‘I won’t listen to this, Jack.’
‘They lie to us, they use us and they throw us away. I’ve killed for them, so I know. You’re not a journalist, are you? I bet you dreamed of it, ever since you were young. How much choice did East give you when she sent you to InSec? And did you really believe her when she said it was the best thing for you?’
‘I could have chosen to do something else.’
‘I had a friend who was a singer. A very good one. She wasn’t happy with East’s plans for her. East broke her career.’
The flyer broke out of the Wart. Corazon steered it to swoop down low over Docklands. ‘Where did you want to go to, Forster?’ she said, her voice suddenly free of emotion.
Fist had found his way round the partition.
[Sounds like you hit a nerve!]
‘Just by Kanji Square station,’ said Jack.
‘Far from your hotel.’
‘Someone to find.’
Corazon settled the flyer on to the street. Jack opened the door. Scheduled rain pattered at it, gusting in and chilling him.
‘They gave you your InSec credit at Customs House?’
‘Yes . You had an observer there. She should have confirmed that.’
‘We had nobody at your reentry interview.’