Hamilton, Peter F – Mindstar Rising

Cindy was well into a completely unbelievable recital of her recent Spanish holiday when both of them became aware of the shouting. The Fifth Horseman ground to a halt in a dissonant metallic skin. Adrian, Kendric, and Kats stood in the middle of the dance floor, two against one. Kats stood beside Kendric, breathing heavily, sweat-darkened tassel ends of her hair sticking to her shoulders. Hologram blobs orbited the trio slowly. ‘Enough!’ Adrian yelled. Kendric raised a warning finger. ‘Go home, little boy, you’re making a fool of yourself.’ ‘I’ll go all right, you people make me want to puke. And you’re coming with me.’ He tried to grab Katerina, but she dodged nimbly behind Kendric. ‘No way,’ she shrilled. ‘I’m having some real fun. First time in bloody ages, too.’ Julia knew Kats well enough to see how she was loving the scene, milking it. The centre of attention. All the glitzy people she worshipped were focusing on her, asking who she was, a girl so desirable she was worth fighting over in public. Kendric grinned. ‘That seems pretty plain, little boy. Go play somewhere else.’ MINOSTAR RISING 121 ‘Come on,’ Adrian entreated. His fists were clenched, face beaming hatred at his rival. Kendric’s arm snaked protectively round Katerina, his hand squeezing her breast. ‘I do so detest these revolting peasants. Why don’t you and I go somewhere quieter? My yacht is anchored in the marina.’ Katerina’s face was flushed with triumph. She tossed her head. ‘Sounds good. Better than anything Mr Ten Centimetres here ever offered me.’ Kendric roared with laughter. There were snickers from the guests. Adrian paled, staring at Katerina in complete and abject incomprehension. There was a voice inside Julia’s skull pleading at her to rush over and throw her arms round Adrian. He was too honest, too decent for this to be happening to him. Somehow she managed to keep her feet in place, clinging magnetically to the black tiles. Kendric and Katerina turned as one. Walking away. Adrian stared at their departing backs, his hands had fallen limply to his side. ‘Katey,’ he called after her. She let out a playful squeal as Kendric pinched her nnnp, giggling. Never looking round. ‘Katey!’ Julia closed damp eyes. The music boomed again.

Julia waited for five days after the party before she sat in the chair at the head of the study table and called Kendric. The arrangements with Globecast had taken a while to finalize, but Uncle Horace had come through in the end, God bless him. And then there was her nerve to screw up. When the phone’s flatscreen activated, Kendnic was sitting on the aft deck of his yacht, the marina forming a bright enticing backdrop, slightly out of focus. The sight of him stiffened her own resolution. He was wearing a lemon-yellow silk shirt, open at the neck, looking supremely relaxed, Impenetrably black glasses covering his eyes, just the right 122 PITIR F. HAMILTON amount of stubble shading his chin, emphasizing masculinity. It was a calculated pose, she thought, intended to demonstrate the ease with which he moved through life, his authority and influence. The epitome of an international wheeler-dealer. It was working, too, the effect seeping out through the screen to abrade her own confidence. She gripped the armrests on her chair against the impulse to smooth down her hair. Wishing she’d taken some time to straighten out her own appearance. Her blouse was nothing special, a hundred-and-fifty-pound Malkham, she’d already worn it a couple of times before. She should’ve worn a Chanel suit. ‘Hermione was only saying the other day we don’t see enough of you, Julia,’ Kendric said. ‘It’s such a pity. We’re having a party here on the Mirnam tomorrow night, nothing formal. Why don’t you come along? A lovely young girl like you ought to involve herself socially. Katerina tells me you don’t have many friends. That makes me so sad.’ Julia didn’t trust herself to speak for a moment. That little cow Kats had told him that! How he and that dyke Hermione must’ve laughed. God, what else had she told them? ‘I’m afraid I’m a very busy person nowadays, Mr di Girolamo. I’m in industry, you see, not finance. It means I have to work for a living.’ ‘Julia, please. What is all this Mr di Girolamo? I am Kendtic, your friend, your grandfather’s friend.’ ‘Bullshit. Grandpa tolerated you. I won’t. Don’t think I don’t know what you’re after.’ ‘After, Julia?’ ‘Ranasfani’s project. That’s what it was all about, right?’ He smiled a wounded smile. ‘So much of your late grandfather you have inherited. You are a straight talker. I respect that, Julia. It is a rare commodity. Pleasing in this world of deceit. So in return I too will be a straight talker. You have to tolerate me, or at least my family house. It’s in our contract. Unbreakable.’ The smile hardened. ‘A profitable arrangement all round.’ ‘I’ve had my financial division draw up a buyout agreement, your house will be well compensated.’ MINO$TAR RISING 123 ‘And you expected our house to agree to this? Julia, you are more naпve than I thought. Multi-billion Eurofranc contracts are not torn up because of schoolgirl temper tantrums.’ ‘You are the house’s representative in the consortium. Your family will accept your judgement in this matter.’ ‘And my judgenient is no.’ ‘You won’t like the alternative.’ ‘Threats, Julia? Has it come to this? And with what will you threaten me?’ ‘A scandal.’ She was disappointed by how hollow it sounded. A whole complex of doubts was rising. She’d banked so much on forcing Kendric to accept the buyout. Never even considered he would refuse. There was no way now she could mitigate failure. Kendric chortled delightedly. ‘A scandal. In this world? In this day and age? Scandal is dependent on perspective, Julia. You smuggle three and a half million Eurofrancs’ worth of gear into Scotland every night. Isn’t that a scandal? Everyone knows I am a lovable rogue. Certainly your dear grandfather did. After all, Event Horizon bought all those templates from me.’ ‘The memox-crystal spoiler.’ ‘Ah yes, I heard your orbiting furnaces were producing a depressing amount of contaminated crystals. How unfortunate for you.’ ‘The rest of the consortium would be very upset to hear that you planned to steal Event Horizon’s assets, don’t you think? It might be difficult for the di Girolamo house to find partners after that.’ ‘Fantasy,’ he said. But there was no smile any more. She let go of the armrests and placed her hands on the table, pleased by how steady they were. ‘The onus is on proof, of course. Even if I could prove your involvement, the family Would simply disown you, claim they weren’t involved, which they possibly weren’t. The house could survive your fall. What the house would not tolerate is for you to drag them down With you.’ ‘An admirable summary,’ he mocked. ‘So where is this alleged proof?’ PETER P. HAMILTON 126 Then Adrian appeared on the screen, and all the wonder blew away in a blast of trepidation, chilling her heart. He’d lost his verve, the chirpy smile and devilish glint were gone. Broken-hearted. Just how hung up on Kats had he been? ‘Hello, Julia, nice to see you.’ The words said it, but not the voice, that was funereal. Had she called too soon? ‘Sorry to bother you, Adrian. I can call back if it’s not convenient.’ ‘No, please, I’m deep into cell composition right now. God, it’s dull.’ ‘Oh, well, that’s something. At least I’m more interesting than an amoeba.’ He looked blank for a second, then smiled sheepishly. ‘That did come out wrong, didn’t it?’ ‘Not to worry. Look, I wouldn’t have called, but I need this truly enormous favour, and I don’t know who else to turn to.’ ‘What?’ There was a ificker of interest. ‘Well, there’s this publishing company which is throwing a big book-launch party next weekend. And I’ve got to go, it’s a social obligation. Event Horizon won the contract to supply them with memoxes, you see. Only the embarrassing thing is, I haven’t got anyone to go with. The business keeps me so busy right now, I don’t get to meet people my age.’ He scratched the back of his neck, staring at the floor, looking very unhappy. ‘I dunno, Julia-‘ ‘I’ve got to find someone, Adrian. People will think I’m funny if I just keep turning up to these events by myself all the time. It’ll only be for the weekend. I could have the car pick you up, you wouldn’t miss any lectures.’ ‘Oh, I see.’ A grin plucked at his mouth. ‘Well, we can’t have people thinking that, now can we? I’d be honoured.’ They sorted out details, and she signed off glowing. Yes. He’d said yes! Honoured. CHAPTER FOURTEEN G reg had settled comfortably into his morning regimen when the phone shrilled. He was straddling the wooden bench in the lounge, back flat against the chalet wall, lifting the bar smoothly, letting it fall, push again. The exercise was mindless, easing him into a near dream-state. Push. Relax. Nothing to it. He’d rigged the pulley up to a pump which filled the chalet’s rafter tank. Twenty minutes each morning was enough to top it up. It supplied the toilet and shower in the bathroom. The jacu.zzi didn’t work any more, there weren’t enough solar cells on the roof to heat that much water. He didn’t mind, showers with Eleanor were more than enough compensation. She’d blossomed beautifully over the last six weeks, independence giving her a seasoned self-assurance. There was very little left of the timid, uncertain girl he’d seduced that night in the Wheatsheaf. Easy youthful enthusiasms had given way to measured assessments. Eleanor voiced her own opinions now instead of quiescently accepting other people’s, and she no longer watched over her shoulder, fearful of past shadows. If her father ever showed up again, he would be in for the shock of his life. Greg almost wished he would come. The real foundation of their relationship was the level of trust, which was total. That was unique to Greg. He’d never escaped the habit of letting his espersense sniff out the faults md insecurities of anyone in his presence. It was a behavioural reflex, one of the psychologists assigned to the Mindstar Brig-ide had told him, establishing your superiority over everyone to your own satisfaction. Don’t worry about it, we’d all do it if we could. With Eleanor it wasn’t necessary. He knew her too well. The phone jarred his mind away from introspection. He ignored it. Push. Relax. Perhaps the caller would give up. Push, slop of water overhead. Relax. His belly was like steel PETER F. HAMILTON now, flat and hard; legs solid, arms powerful. He’d never been fitter, not even as a squaddie. It made him feel good, confident, capable of tackling anything. The phone kept on shrilling. There was a dump facility in the terminal for messages, but the caller wasn’t using it. Push. Relax. Someone must want him urgently. He let the bar fall and walked over to the new Event Horizon terminal. The chalet was all kitted out with Event Horizon gear now. And he’d left a whole lot more in the delivery van, there simply hadn’t been room for all the stuff that Julia had sent. Eleanor had had a ball picking out what they could use. The fee money had been good as well. He’d paid off the outstanding instalments on the Duo, then went to town refurbishing the chalet – new carpets, curtains, restoring the furniture; stripped the roof down and replaced the tiles; tacked on a second solar panel to power the new air-conditioner. There hadn’t quite been enough cash to replace the shaky walls, but the money ordinary cases brought in should see to that before the end of the year. He’d already worked on a couple since the memox skim, both corporate, sniffing out dodgy personnel. The phonescreen swirled and Philip Evans’s face appeared. ‘Hello, Greg. I need your help again, boy. Someone is trying to kill me.’ Greg suppressed a smile. Ten years in the business, and nobody had ever phoned in a clichй before. ‘Bodyguard services aren’t really my field, sir, wouldn’t your own security . . .’ He trailed off and stared at the screen, stared and stared. Small muscles at the back of his knees began to twitch, threatening to topple him. When he looked back on it, he blamed his exercise-induced lethargy for putting his mind on a ten-second delay to reality, that and intuition. It wasn’t just the voice and image which convinced him, any animation synthesizer could mimic Philip to perfection. But this was Philip Evans, grinning away at the other end of the connection. Both the natural and neurohormone-boosted faculties squatting in his brain forced him to accept it at a fundamental level. The black-clad funeral procession wending its way through Peterborough’s rain~slicked streets occluded his vision. MINDSYAR RISINO ‘You’re dead,’ he told the image. ‘Gone but not forgotten.’ That malicious chuckle. Perfect. Him. ‘Sorry to give you a shock, m’boy, but I’d never have called unless it was absolutely vital. Can you come out to Wilholm? I really can’t discuss too much over the phone. I’m sure you appreciate that.’ The tone mocked. Greg’s skittish nerves began to flutter down towards some kind of equilibrium. Shock numbness, probably. ‘I. . . I think I can manage that. When?’ ‘Soon as possible, Greg, please.’ The image wasn’t perfect, he realized. This was a Philip Evans he hadn’t seen before, flesh firmer, skin-colour salubrious. Stronger. Younger by about a decade. ‘OK. Are you in any danger right now?’ At some aloof level, he marvelled at his own reaction. Treating it as just another prosaic problem. Spoke. volumes for Army training. ‘Not from anything physical. The manor is well protected.’ Physical. So what was a ghost afraid of anyway, being exorcized? Should he stop off to buy a clove of garlic, a crucifix, a grimoire? ‘I’m on my way.’ He pulled on his one decent suit, barking a shin on that idiotically oversized bed in the scramble to shove his feet into a pair of black leather shoes. Thought about taking the Walther, and decided against. The Duo bounced along the estate’s gravel track and lurched on to the road. He set off towards Withoim Manor coaxing a full fifty-five kilometres per hour from the engine, rocking slowly in the seat. The Duo had thick balloon-type tyres, made out of a hard-wearing silicon rubber. They were designed to cope with the country’s shambolic road surfaces without being torn to ribbons. A typical PSP fix, he thought, adapting the cars to cope with their failure to maintain the roads. There was a white watchman pillar standing outside Wilhoim’s odd cattle grid. He wound the side window down, and showed his card to it. ‘Your visit has been authorized, Mr Mandel,’ a construct 132 PETER F. HAMILTON billionaires. He wasn’t sure whether he was fascinated or utterly disgusted. The concept didn’t sink in readily. ‘I can create the image of myself in a cube again, if that would be easier for you to talk to, boy.’ Greg shuddered. ‘No, thank you.’ Morgan Walshaw sat next to him, resting his hands on the table, face blank. ‘Why am I here?’ Greg asked stoically. ‘Because we have a problem,’ said Julia. ‘Someone is trying to wreck Event Horizon’s future.’ – He received the distinct impression she was enjoying his discomfiture. ‘You see, Greg,’ she said, ‘Dr Ranasfari has succeeded in developing a viable room-temperature giga-conductor for us.’ Greg looked at her sharply. ‘You’re kidding!’ He remembered some Royal Engineering Corps officers he’d been stationed with once had talked about the stuff. A panacea, they’d called it. The answer to the energy shortage, to carbon dioxide pollution. Every university and kombinate in the world had its own research team working on giga-conductors before the Credit Crash. Then there were innumerable mega-budget military programmes; a giga-conductor would have produced a whole new generation of weapons. ‘Told you he was a genius, boy. Edison of the age. Dedicated, too; it took him over a decade of solid grind to crack.’ ‘Quiet, please, Grandpa. It’s a tremendous breakthrough, Greg, its energy storage density is phenomenal. It will replace every other form of power-storage system in existence; gear, cars, ships, planes, airships, spaceplanes, they’ll all use it. And it’s cheap, clean, and relatively easy to produce. Our whole way of life will be altered, it’s a revolution equal to the introduction of the steam engine.’ ‘And Event Horizon holds the patent,’ Philip chuckled savagely. ‘We’re going to wipe the floor with the opposition. A Custer and the Indians massacre. I’ll make damn sure of that when I introduce the stuff on thc market.’ Greg took another look at the mass of fibre-optic cables leading out of the plinth, trying to work out the NN core’s MINOSTAR RISING 133 bit rate. ‘You’re still running Event Horizon,’ he said. All Philip Evans’s talk about arranging for trustees he had confidence in, and the flash of cunning at the time, came flooding back to him. ‘Damn right I am, boy. There are no trustees, never were, the nominees are all Zurich fronts. Event Horizon is my life. No individual in the world can run a company better than me. I’m talking fifty years’ worth of accumulated experience. There’s no substitute for that. It’s the efficiency of dictatorship. A group of trustees would be worse than useless, lawyers and airhead accountants; they’d never push the giga-conductor with the kind of vigour necessary to effect a complete domination of the market. Discussion groups, reports, delays for consultation. What a load of crap. Event Horizon run by a committee would shrivel up and die an ignominious death. This is the perfect solution. ‘Before now, when a family company grew too big for one person to pay attention to every detail it used to stall. It was inevitable. Responsibilities had to be delegated, the initial individual-led drive was diluted. But the NN core solves even that. I can devote myself one hundred per cent to each problem, no matter the size; co-ordinate every policy; supervise every division. No kombinate will be able to match a company run along these lines.’ ‘You were doing pretty well before,’ Julia said acidly. ‘One ordinary person, and an ill one at that. With the right people in key posts Event Horizon will prosper. All that’s needed is direction, a firmness of purpose, the big decisions made quickly and implemented without delay.’ ‘And you can do that, Juliet, can you?’ ‘Yah.’ ‘Rubbish. You don’t have anything like the experience.’ She was angry now, straight-backed rigid, gripping the arms of her seat. ‘I do.’ ‘Node implants don’t give you experience, girl, just theory. All that money you spent getting rid of Kendric, pure bloody folly.’ Greg flicked a glance at Julia, intrigued. Her cheeks were PETER F. HAMILTON burning red, embarrassed rather than angered. Implanted nodes had been banned in England by the PSP, for the usual heinous crime of elitism. The New Conservatives had yet to repeal the Act. But at least he could finally explain away her remarkably smooth thought currents, and that marvellous ability to fish obscure data out of memory cores. ‘It’s like chess,’ Philip Evans explained gently. ‘You know how each piece should move, but you don’t know the rules, the strategy. You’ll learn, Juliet, really you will. It just takes time. And I’m here to bridge the gap for you.’ ‘But the NN core is untried,’ she said, fighting to keep her voice level. ‘How do we know all your memories translocated? Suppose these miraculous thought processes of yours are incorrect? And you’re basing judgements about the company’s entire future on them.’ Finally Greg understood her terror. She was afraid of losing everything; that wonderful edifice which was Event Horizon collapsing to rubble because it was balanced on a single assumption. And she had no way of checking the NN core’s integrity. No control. ‘If I could bring us back to our current problem,’ said Morgan Walsbaw. ‘Unless something is done to solve it we may lose the core anyway.’ ‘You told me someone tried to kill you,’ Greg said. ‘Damn right, boy. Yesterday evening the NN core’s inputs were blitzed, saturated with override-priority data squirts. Every channel simultaneously; ground links and satellite circuits. It was clever, the attacker was attempting to force me out of the NN core with the sheer quantity of input. With all the data being given a priority code the core-function management program would have to assign it storage space, eventually displacing my memories. I would’ve been erased, for God’s sake! That’s attempted murder in my book.’ ‘So what went wrong?’ ‘I’m not a rational, neatly mathematical program. I fought back, began wiping their data as it came in, changed the priority codes, shut down the Event Horizon datanet – and you wouldn’t believe how much that’s going to cost us. They MINOSTAR RISING 135

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