Resolution (97 page)

Thanks.

Finally, Tom took a different crystal in his hand, one of a strange violet hue, and concentrated. Nothing. If there was ever a time he needed help, it was now.

He tried harder.

No ...
Yes.

Blue flames licked along his hand. Somewhere in the distance or in the past, he heard a soft singing voice. The Crystal Lady seemed very close for a moment.

—
Time, as we agreed.

And she was gone.

Tom’s heart ached for the broken contact. It seemed a dream already; but she
had
spoken to him: he was sure of it. Tom laid the violet crystal gently on the floor.

Then he looked up at the thin young soldier in his too-big uniform who was still standing by the door. The soldier swallowed.

‘Don’t worry,’ said Tom. ‘We’re going to win.’

As the action commenced, Tom sat alone in a chamber below the command centre and Saw what happened.

On a vast blue desert the sand erupts as arachnargoi leap from their hiding places, to take down the first wave of Absorbed infantry as they crawl from shafts which lead to the realm below.

Shift.

In the demesne known as Bilyarck Gebeet, a merchanalyst reaches out with a packing knife and slits an overseer’s throat. Others leap into action around the dusty godown, taking down their oppressors with bare hands and everyday implements, while in the corridor outside, graser fire cracks and cold waves wash through the air as Absorbed beings manifest themselves.

Shift.

Children scream as molten lava bursts through the floor. But it is the black-bronze creatures with angled wings who fall into magma as the humans flee.

Shift.

People are queuing in an Aqua Hall, buckets in hand: just going about their everyday business as ... nothing happens. Some failed communication, some courier screaming in an interrogation cell or lying face-down in a dank tunnel: no action kicks off here.

Shift.

A heavy battalion moves forward. Three thousand men and women, eyes wide with fear beneath their helmets, advance together along the winding series of caverns while arachnabugs, upside down, dance at speed along the broken ceilings, heading for the conflagration where Enemy forces await.

Shift.

Choking smoke. A golden dining-hall where glass songbirds wheel away in panic. A foppish-looking logosopher stops his recitation, reaches inside his sleeve, then leaps forward to thrust his bodkin through the ruling Lord’s throat.

‘For freedom!’ he cries as scarlet-clad men step out of black flames, surrounding him.

Shift.

Fencers in a salle d’armes, a loft overlooking a narrow tunnel, stop at the sound of graser fire below. Soldiers with scarlet cravats are directly underneath the window, firing into the unarmed crowd who are rising up against them.

Several of the fencers look at each other in silence.

Then they pull the safety tips from their weapons, haul themselves out onto the sill, crouch, and jump.

Shift.

Blood-ribbons in a swimming-pool as the action rages
—

Tom?

Yes.

There’s too much, Tom. You can’t track everything.

I
know. But I can try.

Tom was muttering directions and gesturing into holo images. Upstairs - he Saw briefly - the planners were swarming around the tac displays and two hundred comm sessions were open at once as they coordinated efforts around the globe. The planners were translating Tom’s mutterings into battle commands, and transmitting them to the free forces in their all-out strike against the Anomaly.

Eemur, working with Elva, was sending as many messages to the control centre as Tom himself. Eemur and Tom were each observing one hemisphere of Nulapeiron: between them, they had to cover every main strike against the Anomaly.

Had to.

Shift.

Limbs straining as the free humans fight those whose Absorbed masters have already corrupted them. Grappling, slick with sweat, no weapons or technology but basic primate struggle, and it is a free human who is first to use his teeth against his opponent’s carotid artery, heedless of the screaming.

Shift.

Tom, I’m OK now. I can See your hemisphere too, for a while.

There’s no
—

You have to check on Avernon.

Shift.

Daggers glinting in darkness.

No. He had to let Eemur help. She was right about Avernon.

OK, Eemur.

Shift.

Broke contact.

Tom was sitting cross-legged in his chamber, drenched with sweat, while the holos around him swirled with primary colours. The soldier in charge of relaying messages looked concerned.

‘Warlord?’

‘Fate. It
is
too much.’

‘Sir? What do you want me to—?’

‘Never mind.’ Avernon’s teams would be commencing action, and Tom
had
to know.

Shift.

Shuttles against the endless night.

There are squadrons of them, hundreds of kilometres apart in orbit above Nulapeiron. To every side they spray their load of shining copper specks: each the size of a human hand.

They drift above the spinpoint field, the gossamer shell that surrounds the world.

Tom waved open a subsidiary holo.

‘General Ygran? How goes it?’

‘Holding our own, Warlord. No better or worse than that.’

‘Good. Good.’

He closed the image.

From a thousand sites across the world, dart-shaped fighters rise with Absorbed pilots at the controls. They are not capable of spending extended time in orbit, but they can reach the atmosphere’s edge and launch weapons against the shuttles.

‘Now,’ says Zhao-ji, and from one commandeered facility at least a counteroffensive begins. Silver fighters with back-swept wings roar upwards to intercept the Enemy.

Shift.

Flames sweep across the clouds as smart dirigibles, released by the terraformer spheres, explode across the Enemy fighters’ trajectories. A squadron is blown apart at first contact with the airborne minefield; the others break off.

And start scanning for a safe way through, a route to reach Avernon‘s shuttles.