“I can stop you,” Gaul insisted, “so why would I allow you anything? That bottle could hold enough nanite doses for a few hundred introductions. Why would I allow you that kind of power?”
“Because there is something you haven’t considered. My people haven’t been slaughtering the population of Central, Gaul, they’ve been gathering them,” John Parson said modestly. “Thus far, most of them remain alive and well. As long as I am satisfied with the outcome, they will live. However, if you were to try to stop me — and I am far from certain that you could — I will simply return to the Outer Dark with them, to use as fodder for my experiments, instead of the nanites. We can do remarkable things with Operators in the flesh-pits, you see.”
There was a pause while Gaul did the math, and checked the probability streams, looking for flaws, alternatives, traps. Then his shoulders slumped.
“Alright,” Gaul said, holding out his hand. “But I fill the bottle. You watch. You don’t even go in the same room as the Source Well.”
“Deal,” John said, with a toothy grin. “You see, Gaul? Even you can be reasonable, when you have the proper motivation.”
Gaul didn’t say anything. He walked to the doorway and John trailed behind him. The room on the other side was small, five meters in diameter, and roughly circular. A stone well was set in the center of the room, the narrow mouth capped with a flagstone. Gaul turned back to check that John remained by the door, and then, once he was satisfied, pushed the flagstone aside. He took a dipper from the side of the stone well, and filled the bottle with it, careful to make sure the excess water dripped back into the well. It looked no different from any other water, but both men knew it was rich in dormant nanites, nanites that would only function once introduced into a living being.
“The Rosicrucian?” Gaul asked contemptuously, carefully tipping the dipper so that the water poured into the half-full bottle. “Really, John. Your flair for the dramatic is getting the best of you.”
“I told you, it was a joke, a joke meant for you,” John protested, holding up his hands. “It’s not like I actually make people call me that.”
“So you found things at the Outer Dark. Language, technology — but no nanites? No Source Well of your own?”
John hesitated for a moment before his smile returned.
“I wouldn’t be here otherwise,” John admitted. “It’s really the only thing we lack. With this, I can complete my experiments, and build an army that you will not be able to stop. You know that, right, Gaul? When I return, there will be no fighting the Anathema.”
“Looks to me like we did alright,” Gaul said, continuing to fill the bottle. “If it wasn’t for Alistair’s treachery, you might have been defeated entirely. Your people didn’t hold up very well against the Auditors.”
“Don’t be a fool,” John said, laughing. “Only young Leigh was one of my creations. And if Mitsuru Aoki is your queen, old friend, then she just stalemated with one of my pawns. Unless you have a better piece hidden somewhere, just waiting for the right moment to place it on the board, hmm?”
“Maybe,” Gaul said, shrugging.
“Tell me then,” John encouraged. “Who would you have stand against me? Your chief Auditor is mine, Rebecca Levy is paralyzed until I say otherwise, and whatever promise Mitsuru Aoki showed decades ago, you have squandered it. Whom else would you look to? Surely not to that abomination the Martynova clan has produced, Anastasia? You know as well as I do that whatever the secret of her protocol, that it is deviant. She belongs with us, not you. Or, perhaps, your hopes rest on the narrow shoulders of one Alexander Warner?”
“You ask a lot of questions, John. You always did.”
“You can’t really expect to make an Auditor of the boy before I return,” John said forcefully, “and who is to say, old friend, that I won’t be able to take him from you before then?”
“Leigh is impressive,” Gaul admitted, still bent over the well. “Are you sure you wouldn’t prefer to leave her at the Academy for proper instruction?”
John’s robust laughter echoed through the small stone room.
“Perhaps not this time. When I return, though, we can talk again, once some changes are made to Central and to the Academy. Besides, are you really so eager to harbor your enemies? How can you continue to allow Alice Gallow to remain an Auditor, when you know how badly I have compromised her? Would you like to know the truth about her, Gaul? What she really is?”
“Here,” Gaul said curtly, shoving the bottle in his direction. “I know. I’ve always known. But Alice belongs here.”
“If you say so,” John said, clutching the bottle eagerly. “Though I personally try not to clasp adders to my bosom.”
John walked out of the doorway, staring at the bottle, and Gaul followed him closely.
“Now for your part,” Gaul said stiffly. “Give the command. Pull your people out of Central, and release mine.”
John disappeared the bottle into the folds of his robe, and then turned to grin at Gaul.
“Are you even precognitive anymore, Gaul? Why would I do something like that? I will be taking your people back to the Outer Dark. We need test subjects. Surely, you must have suspected something like this would happen.”
“Of course,” Gaul said sourly. “But I had to play for time, until Rebecca was ready.”
The worry on John’s face disappeared quickly, but for Gaul, it made the whole day a little bit more worthwhile.
29
Alex stood in the hallway for quite a while, hoping that she would hear him shifting his feet and clearing his throat, and invite him inside, or at least open the door. She didn’t do any of that. Eventually, he resorted to knocking.
“Come in,” she said, so fast that he became certain that she had known he was standing there. He steeled himself, wiped the sweat from his palms on his jeans, and then opened the door and went inside.
“Sorry,” she said, barely looking up from the computer she slouched in front of. “I would have cleaned if I had known you were coming.”
Alex glanced around the room, finding it the same as the last time he had seen it. Piles of electronics, discarded packaging, and loose pieces of paper mixed with wrinkled t-shirts and balled up knee socks. One narrow path leading from the door to the computers stacked on her desk, and a second, even thinner path leading to her bed. He stood just inside the door, while Eerie continued to tap away at her keyboard. She didn’t make an effort to acknowledge him.
“So… uh, are you… are you okay?” Alex asked, desperate to break the silence.
“Yes,” Eerie hummed to herself, “and you?”
“Up and down,” Alex said helplessly. “Um. Did you see that thing, outside?”
“Oh, you mean your fight with my eight-year old housemate, Sebastian? I did see that.”
“Yeah,” Alex said, scratching his arm and shifting uncomfortably. “So, is he going to be… okay?”
“I think so,” Eerie said, frowning at her display. “He’s not used to being punched by people twice his size, that’s all.”
“Hey, he started it.”
Eerie didn’t say anything.
“He tried to set me on fire!” Alex pleaded, holding the arms of his scorched sweatshirt for examination. Eerie remained silent, keying commands into the keyboard in her lap, never even looking up at him while he fidgeted. Her display, from Alex’s angle, appeared to show nothing but fields of scrolling numbers.
“I wasn’t trying to hurt him or anything. It’s just that people have been trying to kill me all day, and I sort of thought that I was still being attacked by them, and…”
“Alex,” Eerie interrupted, “what are you doing here?”
“Damn it, Eerie,” Alex swore softly, “I came to make sure you were okay.”
“Oh?” Eerie asked, still glued to her display.
“Yeah,” Alex affirmed, slumping down against the wall and crouching there. “I figured that if I showed up and saved you from the bad guys all cool-like that you might, I don’t know, forgive me.”