"Anything," I said. "If I can do it, I will."

"If it is possible, ask the One Who Teaches to return with you to Vitus-Gray-Balia.n.u.s B and the people of the Amoiete Spectrum Helix. We shall try not to convert to the Pax's Christianity until she comes to speak to us."

I nodded, looking at Bin Ria Dem Loa Alem's shaven skull, his red cowl flapping around him in the breeze, his cheeks gaunt with chemotherapy, his eyes gleaming more with excitement than reflected fireworks. "Yes," I said. "If it is at all possible, I will do that."

They all touched me then-not to shake hands, but merely to touch, fingers against my vest or arm or face or back. I touched them back, turned the bow of the kayak into the current, and stepped into the c.o.c.kpit. The paddle was in the hullclamp where I had left it. I tightened the c.o.c.kpit skirt around me as if there were white water ahead, b.u.mped my hand against the clear plastic cover over the red "panic b.u.t.ton" that Aenea had shown me as I set the pistol on the c.o.c.kpit skirt-if this interlude had not caused me to panic, I was not sure what could-held the paddle in my left hand, and waved farewell with my right. The six robed figures blended into the shadows beneath the ferns as the kayak swept out into the middle current.

The farcaster arch grew larger. Overhead, the first moon began to move beyond the disc of the sun but the second, larger moon moved to cover both with its bulk. The fireworks and siren sounds continued, even grew in ferocity. I paddled closer to the right bank as I came close to the farcaster, trying to stay in the small-boat traffic headed downstream but not too close to anyone.

If they are going to intercept me, I thought, they will do it here they will do it here. Without thinking, I raised the flechette pistol onto the curve of hull in front of me. The swift current had me now, and I set the paddle in its bracket and waited to pa.s.s under the farcaster. No other ships or small boats would be under the farcaster when it activated. Above me, the arch was a curve of blackness against the starry sky.

Suddenly there was violent commotion on the riverbank not twenty meters to my right.

I raised the pistol and stared, not understanding what I was seeing and hearing.

Two explosions like sonic booms. Strobe flashes of white light.

More fireworks? No, these flashes were much brighter. No, these flashes were much brighter. Energy weapons fire? Energy weapons fire? Too bright. Too unfocused. It was more like small plasma explosives going off. Too bright. Too unfocused. It was more like small plasma explosives going off.

Then I saw something in a blink of an eye, more a retinal echo than a true vision: two figures locked in a violent embrace, images reversed like a negative of an ancient photograph, sudden, violent motion, another sonic boom, a flash of white that blinded me even before the image had registered in my brain-spikes, thorns, two heads b.u.t.ting together, six arms flailing, sparks flying, a human form and something larger, the sound of metal rending, the sound of something or someone screaming with a voice louder than the sirens wailing on the river behind me. The shock wave from whatever was happening on the bank rippled out across the river, almost tumbled my kayak, and proceeded across the water like a curtain of white spray.

Then I was under the farcaster arch, there was the flash and instant of vertigo I had known before, a bright light surrounded me through the flash-bulb blindness, and the kayak and I were falling.

Truly falling. Tumbling into s.p.a.ce. A section of water that had been farcast under me fell away into a brief waterfall, but then the kayak was falling free from the water, spinning as it fell, and in my panic I dropped the flechette pistol into the c.o.c.kpit and grabbed the hull of the kayak, setting it spinning more wildly as it fell.

I blinked through the flash echoes and tried to see how far I had to fall, even as the kayak went bow down and picked up speed.

Blue sky above. Clouds all around-huge clouds, stratoc.u.mulus rising thousands of meters above and falling more thousands of meters below, cirrus many kilometers above me, black thunderstorms many more kilometers below.

There was nothing but sky and I was falling into it. Beneath me, the brief waterfall from the river had separated into giant teardrops of moisture, as if someone had taken a hundred buckets of water and hurled them into a bottomless chasm.

The kayak spun and threatened to go stern over bow. I shifted forward in the little kayak and almost tumbled out, with only my crossed legs and the lashing of the little moisture skirt holding me in.

I grabbed the rim of the c.o.c.kpit in a white-knuckled, hopeless grip. Cold air whipped and roared around me as the kayak and I picked up speed, hurtling toward terminal velocity. Thousands and thousands of meters of empty, open air lay between me and the lightning-darted clouds so far below. The two-bladed paddle ripped from its bracket and tumbled away in freefall.

I did the only thing I could do under the circ.u.mstances. I opened my mouth and screamed.

11.

-enzo Isozaki could say honestly that he had never been afraid before in his life. Raised as a business-samurai in the fern islands of Fuji, he had been taught and trained since infancy to be disdainful of fear and contemptuous of anyone who felt it. Caution he allowed-it had become an indispensable business tool for him-but fear was alien to his nature and his carefully constructed personality.

Until this moment.

M. Isozaki stood back while the inner door of the air lock cycled open. Whatever awaited within had been on the surface of an airless, tumbling asteroid a minute earlier. And it was not wearing a s.p.a.cesuit.

Isozaki had chosen not to bring a weapon on the little asteroid hopper: neither he nor the ship was armed. At this moment, as ice crystals billowed like fog from the opening air lock and a humanoid figure stepped through, Kenzo Isozaki wondered if that had been a wise choice.

The humanoid figure was human...or at least human in appearance. Tan skin, neatly cut gray hair, a perfectly tailored gray suit, gray eyes under lashes still rimmed with frost, and a white smile.

"M. Isozaki" said Councillor Albedo.

Isozaki bowed. He had brought his heart rate and breathing under his control, and now he concentrated on keeping his voice flat, level, and emotionless. "It is kind of you to respond to my invitation."

Albedo crossed his arms. The smile remained on the tanned, handsome face, but Isozaki was not fooled by it. The seas around the fern islands of Fuji were thick with sharks descended from the DNA recipes and frozen embryos of the early Bussard seedships.

"Invitation?" said Councillor Albedo in a rich voice. "Or summons?"

Isozaki's head remained slightly bowed. His hands hung loosely at his sides. "Never a summons, M..."

"You know my name, I think," said Albedo.

"The rumors say that you are the same Councillor Albedo who advised Meina Gladstone almost three centuries ago, sir," said the CEO of the Pax Mercantilus.

"I was more hologram than substance then," said Albedo, uncrossing his arms. "But the...personality...is the same. And you need not call me sir."

Isozaki bowed slightly.

Councillor Albedo stepped deeper into the little hopper. He ran his powerful fingers over consoles and the single pilot's couch and the rim of its empty high-g tank. "A modest ship for such a powerful person, M. Isozaki."

"I thought it best to exercise discretion, Councillor. May I call you that?"

Instead of answering, Albedo took an aggressive step closer to the CEO. Isozaki did not flinch.

"Did you feel it an act of discretion to release an AI viral telotaxis into Pacem's crude datasphere so that it could go looking for TechnoCore nodes?" Albedo's voice filled the hopper cabin.

Kenzo Isozaki raised his eyes to meet the gray glare of the taller man. "Yes, Councillor. If the Core still existed, it was imperative that I...that the Mercantilus...make personal contact...The telotaxis was programmed to self-destruct if detected by Pax antiviral programs, and to inoculate only if it received an unmistakable Core response."

Councillor Albedo laughed. "Your AI telotaxis was about as subtle as the metaphorical t.u.r.d in the proverbial punchbowl, Isozaki-san."

The Mercantilus CEO blinked in surprise at the crudity.

Albedo dropped into the acceleration couch, stretched, and said, "Sit down, my friend. You went to all that trouble to find us. You risked torture, excommunication, real execution, and the loss of your parking privileges in the Vatican skimmer park. You want to talk...talk."

Temporarily off balance, Isozaki looked for another surface on which to sit. He settled on a clear section of the plotting board. He disliked zero-g, so the crude internal containment field kept up a differential simulating one gravity, but the effect was inconsistent enough to keep Isozaki teetering on the edge of vertigo. He took a breath and gathered his thoughts.

"You are serving the Vatican..."he began.

Albedo interrupted at once. "The Core serves no one, Mercantilus man."

Isozaki took another breath and began again. "Your interests and the Vatican's have overlapped to the point that the TechnoCore provides counsel and technology vital to the survival of the Pax..."

Councillor Albedo smiled and waited.

Thinking For what I will say next, His Holiness will feed me to the Grand Inquisitor. I will be on the pain machine for a hundred lifetimes For what I will say next, His Holiness will feed me to the Grand Inquisitor. I will be on the pain machine for a hundred lifetimes, Isozaki said, "Some of us within the Executive Council of the Pancapitalist League of Independent Catholic Transstellar Trade Organizations feel that the interests of the League and the interests of the TechnoCore may well hold more in common than those of the Core and the Vatican. We feel that an...ah...investigation of those common goals and interests would be beneficial to both parties."

Councillor Albedo showed more of his perfect teeth. He said nothing.

Feeling the hemplike texture of the noose he was placing around his own neck, Isozaki said, "For two and three-quarters centuries, the Church and the Pax civil authorities have held as official policy that the TechnoCore was destroyed in the Fall of the Farcasters. Millions of those close to power on worlds across Pax s.p.a.ce know the rumors of the Core's survival..."

"The rumors of our death are greatly exaggerated," said Councillor Albedo. "So?"

"So," continued Isozaki, "with the full understanding that this alliance between Core personalities and the Vatican has been beneficial to both parties, Councillor, the League would like to suggest ways in which a similar direct alliance with our trading organization would bring more immediate and tangible benefits to your...ah...society."

"Suggest away, Isozaki-san," said Councillor Albedo, leaning farther back in the pilot's chair.

"One," said Isozaki, his voice growing firmer, "the Pax Mercantilus is expanding in ways which no religious organization can hope to do, however hierarchical or universally accepted it might be. Capitalism is regaining power throughout the Pax. It is the true glue that holds the hundreds of worlds together.

"Two, the Church continues to carry on its endless war with the Ousters and with rebellious elements within the Pax sphere of influence. The Pax Mercantilus views all such conflicts as a waste of energy and precious human and material resources. More importantly, it involves the TechnoCore in human squabbles that can neither further Core interests nor advance Core goals.

"Three, while the Church and the Pax utilize such obviously Core-derived technologies as the instantaneous Gideon drive and the resurrection creches, the Church gives the TechnoCore no credit for these inventions. Indeed, the Church still holds the Core up as an enemy to its billions of faithful, portraying the Core ent.i.ties as having been destroyed because they were in league with the Devil. The Pax Mercantilus has no need for such prejudice and artifice. If the Core were to choose continued concealment when allied with us, we should honor that policy, always willing to present the Core as visible and appreciated partners when and if you should so decide. In the meantime, however, the League would move to end, for now and forever, the demonization of the TechnoCore in history, lore, and the minds of human beings everywhere."

Councillor Albedo looked thoughtful. After a moment of gazing out the port at the tumbling asteroid beyond, he said, "So you will make us rich and and respectable?" respectable?"

Kenzo Isozaki said nothing. He felt that his future and the balance of power in human s.p.a.ce was teetering on a knife's edge. He could not read Albedo: the cybrid's sarcasm could well be a prelude to negotiation.

"What would we do with the Church?" asked Albedo. "More than two and a half human centuries of silent partnership?"

Isozaki willed his heart rate to slow again. "We do not wish to interrupt any relationship which the Core has found useful or profitable," he said softly. "As businesspeople, we in the League are trained to see the limitations of any religion-based interstellar society. Dogma and hierarchy are endemic to such structures...indeed, such are are the structures of any theocracy. As businesspeople dedicated to the mutual profit of ourselves and our business a.s.sociates, we see ways in which a second level of Core-human cooperation, however secretive or limited, should and would be beneficial to both parties." the structures of any theocracy. As businesspeople dedicated to the mutual profit of ourselves and our business a.s.sociates, we see ways in which a second level of Core-human cooperation, however secretive or limited, should and would be beneficial to both parties."

Councillor Albedo nodded again. "Isozaki-san, do you remember in your private office in the Torus when you had your a.s.sociate, Anna Pelli Cognani, remove her clothes?"

Isozaki retained a neutral expression but only by the utmost effort of will. The fact that the Core was looking into his private office, recording every transaction, made his blood literally chill.

"You asked then," continued Albedo, "why we had helped the Church refine the cruciform. 'To what ends?' I believe you said. 'Where is the benefit to the Core?'"

Isozaki watched the man in gray, but more than ever he felt that he was locked in the little asteroid hopper with a cobra that had reared up and opened its hood.

"Have you ever owned a dog, Isozaki-san?" asked Albedo.

Still thinking about cobras, the Mercantilus CEO could only stare. "A dog?" he said after a moment. "No. Not personally. Dogs were not common on my homeworld."

"Ah, that's right," said Albedo, showing his white teeth again. "Sharks were the pet of choice on your island. I believe that you had a baby shark which you tried to tame when you were about six standard years old. You named it Keigo, if I am not mistaken."

Isozaki could not have spoken if his life had depended upon it at that second.

"And how did you keep your growing baby shark from eating you when you swam together in the Shioko Lagoon, Isozaki-san?"

After a moment of trying, Isozaki managed, "Collar."

"I beg your pardon?" Councillor Albedo leaned closer.

"Collar," said the CEO. Small, perfectly black spots were dancing in the periphery of his vision. "Shock collar. We had to carry the transmitter palmkeys. The same devices our fishermen used."

"Ah, yes," said Albedo, still smiling. "If your pet did something naughty, you brought it back into line. With just a touch of your finger." He held his hand out, cupping it as if he were cradling an invisible palmkey. His tanned finger came down on an invisible b.u.t.ton.

It was not so much like an electrical shock pa.s.sing through Kenzo isozaki's body, more like radiating waves of pure, unadultered agony-beginning in his chest, beginning in the cruciform embedded under his skin and flesh and bone-and radiating out like telegraph signals of pain flowing through the hundreds of meters of fibers and nematodes and cl.u.s.tered nodes of cruciform tissue metastasized through his body like rooted tumors.

Isozaki screamed and doubled over in pain. He collapsed to the floor of the hopper.

"I believe that your palmkeys could give old Keigo increasing jolts if he got aggressive," mused Councillor Albedo. "Wasn't that the case, Isozaki-san?" His fingers tapped at empty air again, as if cueing a palmkey.

The pain grew worse. Isozaki urinated in his shipsuit and would have voided his bowels if they had not been already empty. He tried to scream again but his jaws clamped tight, as if from violent teta.n.u.s. Enamel on his teeth cracked and chipped away. He tasted blood as he bit through a corner of his tongue.

"On a scale of ten, that would have been about a two for old Keigo, I think," said Councillor Albedo. He stood and walked to the air lock, tapping the cycling combination in.

Writhing on the floor, his body and brain useless app-pendages to a cruciform of horrific pain radiating through his body, Isozaki tried to scream through his locked jaws. His eyes were swelling out of their sockets. Blood ran from his nose and ears.

Finished with cycling the air-lock combination, Councillor Albedo tapped at the invisible key in his palm once again.

The pain vanished. Isozaki vomited across the deckplates. Every muscle in his body twitched randomly while his nerves seemed to misfire.

"I will bring your proposal to the Three Elements of the TechnoCore," Councillor Albedo said formally. "The proposition will be discussed and considered most seriously. In the meantime, my friend, your discretion will be counted upon."

Isozaki tried to make an intelligible noise, but he could only curl up and retch on the metal floor. To his horror, his spasming bowels were pa.s.sing wind in a ripple of flatulence.

"And there will be no more AI viral telotaxes released in anyone's datasphere, will there, Isozaki-san?" Albedo stepped into the air lock and cycled the door shut.

Outside the port, the slashed rock of the unnamed asteroid tumbled and spun in dynamics known only to the G.o.ds of chaos mathematics.

IT TOOK RHADAMANTH NEMES AND HER THREE SIBLINGS only a few minutes to fly the dropship from Pax Base Bombasino to the village of Lock Childe Lamonde on the slate-dry world of Vitus-Gray-Balia.n.u.s B, but the trip was complicated by the presence of three military skimmers that that meddling fool Commander Solznykov had sent along in escort. Nemes knew from the "secure" tightbeam traffic between the base and the skimmers that the Base Commander had sent his aide, the b.u.mbling Colonel Vinara, to take personal charge of the expedition. More than that, Nemes knew that the Colonel would be in charge of nothing-that is, Vinara would be so wired with real-time holosim pickups and tightbeam squirters that Solznykov would be in actual command of the Pax troopers without showing his jowled face again.

By the time they were hovering over the proper village-although "village" seemed too formal a term for the four-tiered strip of adobe houses that ran along the west side of the river just as hundreds of other homes had for almost the entire way between the base and here-the skimmers had caught up and were spiraling in for a landing while Nemes looked for a site large enough and firm enough to hold the dropship.

The doors of the adobe homes were painted bright primary colors. People on the street wore robes of the same hue. Nemes knew the reason for this display of color: she had accessed both their ship's memory and the encrypted Bombasino files on the Spectrum Helix people. The data was interesting only in that it suggested that these human oddities were slow to convert to the cross, slower still to submit to Pax control. Likely, in other words, to help a rebellious child, man, and one-armed android hide from the authorities.

The skimmers landed on the dike road bordering the ca.n.a.l. Nemes brought the dropship down in a park, partially destroying an artesian well.

Gyges shifted in his copilot's seat and raised an eyebrow.

"Scylla and Briareus will go out to make the formal search," Nemes said aloud. "You stay here with me." She had noted with no pride or vanity that her clone-siblings had long since submitted to her authority, despite the death threat they had brought from the Three Elements and the certainty of it being carried out if she were to fail again.

The other female and male went down the ramp and through the crowd of brightly robed people. Troopers in combat armor, visors sealed, jogged to meet them. Watching on the common optic channel, not via tightbeam or vid pickup, Nemes recognized Colonel Vinara's voice through his helmet speaker. "The Mayor-a woman named Ses Gia-refuses permission for us to search the houses."

Nemes could see Briareus's contemptuous smile reflected on the Colonel's polished visor. It was like looking at a reflection of herself with slightly stronger bone structure.

"And you allow this...Mayor...to dictate to you?" said Briareus.

Colonel Vinara raised a gauntleted hand. "The Pax recognizes the indigenous authorities until they have become...part of the Pax Protectorate."

Scylla said, "You said that Dr. Molina left a Pax trooper as guard..."

Vinara nodded. His breathing was amplified through the morphic, amber helmet. "There is no sign of that trooper. We have attempted to establish communication since we left Bombasino."