They would know where to look for the gap scout.
Cued by his urgency, perhaps, or by some other in-built latitude, his datacore let Angus reset the gap parameters and throw Trumpet into another brutal course shift.
Klaxons wailed like the damned. Millions of tons of shattered rock hurtled closer, hot on the heels of the wave front. The displays plotted both brisance and stone as they scoured the void like furies: the ragged teeth of nightmares.
For half a dozen seconds, the gap scout hauled herself to the side so hard that only his zone implants kept Angus from passing out.
Nick collapsed against his restraints, unconscious. But welded reinforcements gave Angus the strength to endure. Trumpet was still turning—still broadside to the storm of Thanatos Minor’s ruin—when he reached out against a weight of six or more g’s and tapped the key which sent the gap scout into tach.
The violence which had riven the planetoid didn’t touch her.
Instead, with a disorienting lack of transition, she found herself perilously far down the gravity well of a red giant nearly three light-years deep in Amnion space.
Moving too quickly for caution, Angus hadn’t consulted astrogation—except by an almost autonomic reference to his internal databases—or made any attempt at precision; he’d simply pointed Trumpet at the nearest loud star he knew of and kicked her into the gap.
Luck and a near-miraculous synergy between his organic mind and his machine reflexes brought him close without killing him.
A red giant was exactly what he wanted: relatively low in mass, so that he could get nearer to it than to a heavier star; and relatively high in luminosity as well as other radiation, so that it might cover Trumpet’s trail. He hoped that brisance and debris would confuse the traces of his maneuvering near Thanatos Minor, prevent other ships from seeing where he’d gone. And if that didn’t work, he hoped that a star as loud as this one would make Trumpet impossible to detect.
The gap scout was still accelerating at full burn, ramming herself down the gravity well at a frightening rate. Minutes away, immolation loomed ahead of her. Despite his zone implants and enhanced strength, Angus was giddy with g-stress. Phosphors seemed to dance across his board, disabling the readouts; the tidal pressure of his pulse in his ears made the new alarms which the ship flung at him sound muffled and imprecise, vaguely meaningless.
But now his visceral fear and his computer’s programming worked together. One centimeter at a time, they forced his hand forward until his fingers found the keys which would ease Trumpet’s thrust and turn her aside from danger in a long curve across the pull of the well.
Then he was able to breathe again.
Sweet oxygen filled his lungs as the pressing weight of his body lifted. Relief spread a brief red haze across his vision, then wiped it clear. At the first touch of acceleration, automatic systems had locked the bridge in its thrust attitude, retracted the companionway. Now, as Angus stabilized Trumpet’s position in the red giant’s well, the orientation bearings unlocked, allowing the bridge to revolve within its hulls to accommodate the star’s gravity. His back and legs settled more comfortably into his g-seat.
Nick folded slowly over his belts and remained limp, breathing through his mouth.
A few more helm adjustments, and Angus would be able to relax. His computer ran calculations: his hands ran commands. When he was done, Trumpet had attained an elliptical orbit which would carry her around the star, absorbing gravity as momentum, and then enable her to slingshot herself back in the direction of human space at several times her present velocity. Fast enough for a gap crossing which would take her three or four light-years past the Amnion frontier.
There. Angus sucked air deep enough to distend his belly and held it until the CO2 balance in his lungs had slowed his heart rate a few beats. God, he was thirsty! Thanks to Milos’ abuse, and to the dehydration he’d suffered in his EVA suit, his mouth and throat felt like they’d been scoured with abrasives. A grainy sensation afflicted his eyeballs, as if they turned in grit. He was hungry and tired, and there was nothing he wanted right then more than a chance to check on Morn, find out if she was all right; touch her as if she still belonged to him.
His datacore had already allowed or coerced him to do several things he hadn’t expected. Maybe it would permit that as well.
Except that she had her zone implant control now. Or rather Davies did: it came to the same thing. Neither of them was likely to let him within ten meters of her. Not without force—and Angus didn’t believe for a second that his datacore would let him force himself on Morn Hyland. Warden Dios hadn’t gone to all this trouble to rescue her—and to keep it a secret, for God’s sake—just so that Angus could ease the dark ache in the pit of his heart.
Slowly he stretched out the muscles in his back and arms, then returned his attention to his board.
Trumpet’s course was stable. The red giant spat out so much radiation that he could hardly scan her trace himself, even though he knew where to look. And within an hour the star’s tremendous bulk would eclipse her from the direction of Thanatos Minor: she would be safe from pursuit or detection until she rounded the giant’s far side.
If he couldn’t approach Morn, he could at least drink several liters of fluid and get himself something to eat. Nick could be left where he was. He appeared to be asleep, overcome by the combined pressure of loss and g. And if he woke up, he couldn’t do any harm. It was a simple matter for Angus to disable both bridge stations with his own priority-codes, which would effectively frustrate any tampering or interference.
He’d unstrapped his restraints and started to his feet before he realized that he didn’t understand what he’d just done.
Wait a minute. He sat down again in shock. Wait a fucking minute.
What the hell are we doing here!
At that moment Nick stirred. Twitching, his hands found the edges of the second’s station; he braced his arms there to push himself upright. His eyes were dull with stupor. He blinked them deliberately, trying to clear them. His mouth hung open. Through the grime on his cheeks, his scars showed like small strips of bone.
By degrees a frown tightened his face as he blinked at his readouts.
He checked the screens in front of him, considered his readouts again. Unsteadily he tapped two or three keys. Then he turned his sturmed gaze toward Angus.
As if he and Angus had the same thoughts for the same reasons, he asked, “What the hell are we doing here?”
“Hiding,” Angus retorted. “What does it look like?” He had no idea what the truth was. Appalled by chagrin and incomprehension, he couldn’t think. In a few instants of gap travel, a few minutes of mad flight, everything had changed. Suddenly his predicament was profoundly altered, as profoundly as it had been by his datacore’s unexpected decision to rescue Morn, or by hearing Warden Dios say, It’s got to stop; by his discovery of Morn herself aboard Starmaster, or by UMCPDA’s req. Once again nothing made any sense, he had to start learning the rules and guessing the limits from the beginning—
“‘Hiding.’” Nick made an obvious effort to sound sarcastic, but he couldn’t raise his voice above a thin mutter. “Who the fuck are we hiding from? I didn’t bring us here. I must have passed out—you took the helm. Christ! Angus, we’re three fucking light-years inside Amnion space. If you could generate that kind of gap crossing, why didn’t you head the other way? Solve all your problems at once, let fucking Hashi Lebwohl welcome you with open fucking arms. What kind of shit is this?”
Good question. Angus would have said that aloud, if his programming had permitted it. UMCPDA had welded him precisely and explicitly for this mission. Either Hashi Lebwohl or Warden Dios had made every crucial decision. So what was Angus doing here? Why had his datacore led him to take this course, when it could have, should have, forced him to leap for human space?
“Calm Horizons was after us,” he suggested weakly.
“And you thought she would follow us past the frontier???
? Nick did his best to sneer. “Commit an act of war right in the cops’ face? So what? She couldn’t have caught us. We had momentum on her, we had a vector she couldn’t match. And we’ve got”—he clicked keys, peered at a readout for confirmation, then hissed softly through his teeth in surprise—“shit, Angus, this ship has a thrust-to-mass ratio a lumbering tub like that can’t compete with. Once she gets going, she can probably keep up with us in tach, but she can’t match us in normal space.
“Don’t tell me you came here to hide from her.” Despite the dullness in his eyes and the pallor of his scars, he was recovering some of his energy. “I couldn’t believe that even if I used both hands.”
Angus couldn’t believe it himself. And yet it was the truth. He himself, Angus Thermopyle—not his datacore, not Dios or Lebwohl—had made the decision to come here because Calm Horizons and Soar and maybe some of the Bill’s ships were after him.
Echoing Nick involuntarily, he protested in dismay, What kind of shit is this?
Then, like another echo, he remembered the last time his programming had spoken to him directly. When Milos had attempted to take control of him in the Amnion sector of Billingate, a soundless voice in his head had countermanded Milos’ orders.
You are no longer Joshua.
Jerico priority has been superseded.
You are Isaac. That is your name. It is also your access-code. Your priority-code is Gabriel.
“Shut up,” he told Nick. Let me think. “I don’t care whether you believe it or not. If I wanted you to know what my reasons are, I would have explained them already.”
Access-code Isaac, he told the gap in his brain which served as a datalink. Why did you let me come here? Why didn’t I have to head straight for UMCPHQ?
His datacore replied with a silence so complete that it seemed to resonate in his skull.
That fit. Although his computer had supplied him with vast impersonal bodies of information on such subjects as astrogation, Trumpet’s design, and fusion generators, it’d never revealed anything about itself. Dios had promised him, Your programming will tell you what you need as you go along. However, no one had ever offered him any kind of explanation.
The intercom chimed. “Angus, what’s happening?” Davies’ voice sounded ragged with g and helplessness. “Where are we? Can I wake up Morn yet? Is it safe?”
More vehemently than he realized, Angus hit commands on his board to disable all the ship’s intercoms.
He couldn’t suffer more distractions: he needed to understand.
Had Warden Dios or Hashi Lebwohl finally lost him? Had he somehow passed beyond the limits of his programming; broken free?
Or were his tormentors simply playing a deeper game than he could imagine?
God, was it possible that he’d broken free!
“Fine,” Nick drawled. “Keep it to yourself.” He studied Angus curiously. “Are you going to do that with your precious Morn, too? How do you think she and her self-righteous brat will react when they find themselves three light-years deep in Amnion space, and you refuse to explain why? My people I don’t know about—I guess they’ve lost their minds. But Morn and Davies are going to go ape-shit.”
“Shut up.” The intensity of Angus’ concentration congested his voice in his throat. He could hardly force out words. “I’m trying to think.”
Frantic for answers, he cried his access-code in the silence of his head, used it to open a window on his databases. That worked: he hadn’t lost his computer—or the information it contained. But did it still control him? Could he ignore its unspoken requirements?
A test: he needed a test. Some way to confirm quickly whether or not his datacore still ruled him. Some way to determine how far his ability to make his own decisions extended.
At once his heart tightened like a fist. Nick was here: the perfect choice. He was protected by his links to UMCPDA—and Angus hated him. If he spoke now, ignored or taunted Angus in any way, Angus would hit him again; hit him hard enough to splinter his skull, drive shards of bone into his brain, kill him by tearing his cerebral synapses to shreds—
“It’s a little late for that,” Nick remarked. Angus’ distraction appeared to intrigue him. “We’re here. And you can’t pretend there won’t be any consequences. My God, Angus, what is Hashi going to think of you? Or Min Donner?
“Sooner or later you’ll have to start telling us the truth. You won’t have any choice.”
Now. Test it.
Gathering the strength of his shoulders, tensing his arms, Angus rose from his g-seat, readied himself to strike—
—and stopped. All the muscles he needed froze. At that instant he couldn’t have swung his fist to save his sanity. Even the effort of closing the distance between himself and the second’s station was beyond him.
He knew the sensation too well. It was intimately familiar: as brutal as a rape; and so compulsory that he would never be able to fight it. The emissions of his zone implants were stronger than will and hope.
Confusion swirled through him, as complex as a masque; his breathing felt caged in his chest. Damn you! he raged uselessly. Damn you to hell! His programming refused to let him pound his fists on the command board, so he ground them against his thighs. You bastards, why don’t you tell me the truth once in a while? What would it cost you to let me know what you want?
But he couldn’t afford to fall into the abyss of his fury: not now, with Trumpet three light-years deep in Amnion space, and Morn aboard.
Savagely he hauled himself back from despair.
All right. Don’t give up. Understand it. His datacore still held him. He couldn’t break past his programming. Nevertheless something had changed. Neither Dios nor Lebwohl could have known that he would try to bring Trumpet here—and yet his programming had allowed him to do it.
“Tell you what,” Nick offered casually. “You sit there and think. Think until you burst a seal.” He undid his belts, shifted to his feet. “I’ll go tell your people and mine they can take a break from their cabins. Treacherous little shits, they’ll like that. I’m sure they want to talk to you. They’ll love hearing you refuse to explain why we’re here—or, for that matter, how you and Milos managed to snatch Davies right out from under the Bill’s nose, or what makes Morn so fucking important.
“Along the way I’ll bring you something to eat and drink. You look like you could use it.”
He paused, waiting for some acknowledgment.
Angus waved a hand to dismiss Nick; ignored Nick’s departure from the bridge. He wanted hope, wanted desperately to let himself hope. Nevertheless all his instincts screamed against it.
It didn’t make sense that the fucking cops would turn him loose. Someone—Dios or Lebwohl—had simply decided to pull a different set of strings. Strings and more strings, manipulating him like a puppet.
And yet the impulse to hope refused to let go of his heart.
Understand, God damn it!
Surely even his programming had limits. The more he did, the farther he traveled from UMCPDA’s surgical wing, the more likely it became that cracks would appear in the blank wall of his mental prison. That motherfucking Lebwohl couldn’t foresee everything.
But of course the cops knew that. They must have made some provision for it. Otherwise the cumulative inadequacies of his instruction-set might let him be captured; or let him escape.
What could they do?
They could kill him themselves. Hardwire some kind of self-destruct into his datacore. But if they did that they would lose Trumpet and everyone aboard. They would lose Morn. And they obviously did not want to lose Morn. If they decided to kill him, they wouldn’t do it until they learned what had happened to Thanatos Minor; until they got their hands on Morn.
Or they could put someone in a position to control him. That had been Milos’ job. But Milos had betrayed the cops—and clearly Lebwohl or Dios had seen that coming; had planned for it. And there were no other candidates: not now; not while Trumpet remained out of
contact with UMCPHQ. No one aboard knew the codes to command him.
Angus couldn’t think of any other alternatives. Only one option remained.
Simply to keep him alive, the cops would have to let him make some of his own choices. Until they were able to put another of their stooges in Milos’ place.
But if they did that, they would have to let him make decisions more and more often as time passed. And the gap between what he did and his original programming would widen. Eventually it might widen enough to let him slip through.
His brain seemed to burst with possibilities as a pain as bright as the detonation of Billingate’s fusion generator exploded in the back of his head.
He’d already undone his restraints. The force of the blow slammed him facedown on his board, blind with agony: the impact split the skin of his left temple and cheekbone. Then his own recoil toppled him off the command station.
Another blow struck like impact fire below his right shoulder blade; drove him headlong to the deck. He skidded across a small splash of blood.
In microseconds a window opened like a screen in his head; damage assessments scrolled past his awareness. The shielding for his computer and power supply had absorbed most of the power of the second blow: his back was bruised but not broken. But the first concussion had pulped his scalp, spread a fretwork of stress fractures through his occipital lobe, compressed his brain. Another strike like that might kill him.