Julia followed the burn’s progress through her nodes. The others used the time to relax; Teddy trying to chat up Rachel over by the drinks cabinet; Greg, Eleanor, Morgan, and Gabriel all with their heads together, talking in low tones. Eleanor still hadn’t let go of Greg, her hand gripping his, fingers entwined. Royan in hotrod mode was awesome to watch. She had learned a lot about hacking techniques from him; modesty aside, she was good, she knew that. Good enough to crack Jakki Coleman’s bank account – and Uoyds-Tashoko’s guardian programs were the best corporate money could buy. But she watched Royan’s infiltration of Stocken Hall’s ‘ware with something approaching envy; the speed of the penetration was incredible, and he didn’t have lightware crunchers to back him up. He didn’t even bother trying to crack the authorized user entry цodes, he went straight for the management routines. A melt virus got him past the first-level guardian programs, opening up the prison’s datanet. The structure unfolded in her mind, an origami molecule, individual terminals and ‘ware cores linked together by a spiderweb of databuses. She had access to menus of low-grade security files stored in the terminals, along with the Hall’s day to day administration details, and financial datawork. But the cell security and surveillance circuits were blocked, along with a vast series of memories in the cores. Royan squirted a more complex virus at the second-level guardian programs, the ones governing access to restricted core memories. Let’s see what the medical department has on Bursken, A QUANTUM MURDER 343 Julia said, studying the menu. At the least his file should tell us whether or not he’s got a cortical interface. Nice one, Snowy. It isn’t on the restricted list. Here we go. He pulled a Home Office identification code from the administration officer’s terminal, and used it to request a squirt from the records terminal in the medical division. ‘This is Bursken’s medical file,’ she said as the datasheets swarmed down the conference room’s flatscreens. ‘Grandpa, review it for implants, please.’ The datasheets flashed past, too fast to read. ‘Here we go, Juliet.’ The deluge of bytes halted. She was looking at some kind of official Home Office package. ‘Hell, girl, they really were wetting themselves over Bursken. This confinement order gives the director, that is MacLennan, permission to employ any method he sees fit to restrain Liam Bursken, including chemical suppression, or even remedial surgery such as a lobotomy.’ ‘And who would ever complain?’ Greg mused, not looking up from his flatscreen. ‘Even the human rights lawyers wouldn’t bother arguing in Bursken’s favour. He’s beyond the lowest of the low. You could do anything you wanted to him, and no one would give a shit.’ ‘I don’t know about anything, boy,’ Philip said. ‘But a month ago he was wheeled into surgery and given a cortical interface.’ A new datasheet slid into place. ‘It was ordered by MacLennan, part of a new mental assessment project. According to this it was supposed to provide data on his psychotic state trigger stimulants. Follow up results are restricted.’ ‘I knew that…’ Greg looked puzzled for a moment, then clicked his fingers. ‘Of course, it was Stephanie Rowe who filled me in on Bursken, MacLennan just sat there and let her recite facts to me. How stupid of me.’ ‘You weren’t interrogating them,’ Eleanor said. ‘Thanks,’ he said. Julia’s nodes showed her the second-level guardian programs falling as the virus penetrated. Huge stacks of data materialized into the nodes’ visualization, dense packages of 344 PETER F. HAMILTON colourless binary digits extending out to her mind’s horizon. A batch of Royan’s tracer programs slithered through them. Bursken’s surgical records vanished from the flatscreen in front of her. PROBLEM, it printed. ‘What’s the matter?’ Greg asked. / THINK I’VE FOUND THE PARADIGM FILE IT/S LISTED AS BURSKEN’S CORTICAL INTERFACE FOLLOW-UP RESULTS, AND IT HAS A DIRECTOR-ONLY ACCESS CODE ‘So what’s the problem?’ THEY WILL KNOW IF I ACCESS IT A NOT/F/CATION PROCEDURE IS HARD WIRED IN TO THE CORES. ALL SQUIRTS ARE LOGGED AUTOMATICALLY ‘But the cores think we’re the Home Office,’ Julia said. ‘Under that premiss, we’re entitled to access their data. Berkeley operates Stocken under government licence.’ IF WE ARE THE HOME OFFICE, HOW COME WE CAN ORDER A SQUIRT FOR A DIRECTOR-ONLY FILE??? MACLENNAN WOULD HAVE TO BE AT THE HOME OFFICE TO AUTHORIZE THE SQUIRT ‘OK, let’s look at what we want to achieve,’ Greg said. ‘What we need is for Inspector Langley to go into Stocken first thing tomorrow morning, armed with a data warrant, and find that paradigm. So we have to.be sure it’s there before we send him in. Is there any chance this file will crash wipe if you order a squirt?’ NO. ‘Then I’d say do it. Morgan?’ ‘I can’t see any objection. Even if you were to interrogate MacLennan, a lawyer might conceivably neutralize your testimony; there are still some legal queries over evidence obtained psychically. As Eleanor said, we need tangible proof. The evidence is piling up against MacLennan, to my mind he’s guilty as hell. It has to be the killer paradigm in that file.’ ‘OK, squirt it over, Royan.’ It came through the link, a large construct, taking half a second to transfer. In her terminal cube it was nothing, a moire patchwork of randomized data. In her mind- A QUANTUM MURDER 345 She opened a secure file in one of her memory nodes and let the construct fill it. Analysis programs sifted through the bytes, trying to identify coherent segments. The patterns they formed were like nothing she had ever seen before; there were analogue visual sequences, interlaced with data pulses that defied decryption. She accessed one at random. Chiaroscuro images, black and scarlet, bloomed silently around her. She was standing on a rainswept street at night, parallel rows of cheap terrace housing, their walls shimmering as sheets of water sluiced down over the bricks, it was almost as though they were melting. There were no stars above, only empty night. A solitary figure walked down the middle of the road, a man in a sodden greatcoat. Julia felt her heart ignite with exaltation. She was stalking through woodland, the smooth boles of dead beech trees sliding past, a deep claret in colour. Ribbons of black ivy were clawing their way up the crumbling bark, crisp dry leaves like heart-shaped flakes of ash crunched underfoot. She circled a glade, the procession of boles eclipsing the sight of the two young lovers in its centre. All she caught was fleeting glimpses, their bodies moved in a stop-motion sequence. And they were unmarried, profaning the gift of life with their casual coupling. Their skin was salmon pink, their scattered clothes burgundy and ebony. A knife was heavy in her hand, its blade a glowing coral. Her mind was alive with whispers, enticing dark promises. God’s voice. His strength flooding through her limbs. A face coalesced before her. An old man, with bright smiling eyes, and wispy hair. Mocking eyes. Black eyes, light wells. The man stared into hell and laughed in joy at what he saw. The whispers grew bolder, caressing her. Exit. The nodes shut off with an almost audible snap. She took a deep gulp of air, shuddering violently. ‘What is it?’ Morgan asked sharply. ‘I’m all right.’ She held up her hands, surprised to find them trembling. ‘1 was accessing some of the paradigm’s PETER F. HAMILTON 346 visual routines, that’s all. Greg’s right, it is made up from Bursken’s memories.’ She stopped, remembering the confused montage. A smell of the street’s sweet fresh rain lingered in the executive conference room. And she detested the God-violator Edward Kitchener. Feeling a wild primitive joy that he was dead dead dead. ‘Dear Lord, he’s not human.’ She stared at Greg. ‘And you looked into his mind all the time you interviewed him?’ ‘Goes with the job.’ ‘Yech!’ ‘So that settles it, then,’ Greg said. ‘Royan, do you understand the paradigm?’ MOST SECTIONS ARE ANALOGUE BUT THERE IS ONE SEQUENCE WHICH IS A DIGITAL COMPOSITION. ‘Is it the instruction to kill Kitchener?’ GREEDY GREEDY GREEDY iS WHAT YOU ARE! THE DIGITAL SEQUENCE IS STRANGE, I WILL HAVE TO WRITE A DECRYPTION PROGRAM. TELL YOU TOMORROW. ‘OK,’ Greg said casually, as though he didn’t care. Liar! Julia thought. Teddy walked back from the drinks cabinet to stand next to Greg, a dumpy German beer bottle in his hand, condensation mottling its silver and ice-blue label. ‘Hell, man, all this shit about paradigms turning the Beswick kid into a cyborg, it’s kinda screwy, but I’ll buy it. But you still ain’t told us the wiry of it. How come this MacLennan guy wants to snuff his old teacher? He did all right by Kitchener. Christ, made it to the top in his field. Head of a premier-grade research institution, respected man, big bucks backing him. What’s he wanna go and risk all that for?’ ‘Wrong question,’ Gabriel said. She was smiling faintly, head tilted right back on her chair, stating at the ceiling. ‘What you ought to ask is why did MacLennan kill Clarissa Wynne? That’s the real question. After he murdered her he had to get rid of Kitchener; it was inevitable. He was covering himself to protect that cushy number he’s wound up with.’ ‘The neurohormone!’ Julia exclaimed, quietly pleased she could keep up with Gabriel. A QUANTUM MURDER 347 WELL DONE, SNOWY Morgan flicked an ironic glance at the camera. Gabriel suddenly leant forward, resting her elbows on the table, fixing Teddy with an intent stare. ‘MacLennan must have been worried that once Kitchener perfected the retrospective neurohormone he would look into the past and see him murdering Clarissa. That’s why poor old Nicholas Beswick was also ordered to destroy the bioware which produced the neurohormome, and wipe the Abbey’s Bendix. To eliminate any possibility of anybody looking back. Lucky he missed those ampoules. I don’t suppose MacLennan could think of every contingency.’ ‘I couldn’t have seen that far back,’ Eleanor said. ‘A week was a hell of an effort. Eleven years would have been utterly impossible.’ ‘Yes,’ Gabriel said. ‘I never used to look more than a couple of days into the future when I had my gland. That was partly psychological, admittedly. But. . . well, with Kitchener working on it, who knows what might have been accomplished in the end.’ ‘I think I’ve found the reason why she was murdered,’ Philip said. ‘Yeah?’ Greg perked up. ‘Go on.’ ‘Ten years ago there was a paper published on the possibilities of laser paradigms applied to education. The first of its kind. It was co-authored by James MacLennan and Clarissa Wynne.’ ‘Ten years?’ Morgan asked. ‘We confirmed that World Bank loan was eleven years ago.’ ‘Published posthumously,’ Greg said. ‘That’s why MacLen-nan killed her. I’ll give you good odds that Clarissa did the real breakthrough work on paradigms while she was at Launde. And MacLennan was sharp enough to realize the possibilities. He was very keen to stress that when I talked to him. Once they are perfected, paradigms will be worth a fortune. He reckoned the entire penal system would have be to rebuilt from the ground up, and not just in this country. I suppose it would be the same for schools and universities as 348 PETER F. HAMILTON well, paradigms could replace lessons and lectures. And he’s leading the project. He’ll get all the fame and the glory, not to mention a share of the royalties. And it should have been her in charge of Berkeley’s team.’ ‘Ah!’ Julia cried. She grinned at the curious faces. ‘Grandpa, that financial profile we assembled on Diessenburg Mercantile should still be in our finance division memory core. Access it, and run a check for me. See how much money Diessenburg Mercantile is loaning the Berkeley company.’ ‘You all hear that?’ Philip’s voice boomed. ‘Now that is a true Evans. Laser sharp. My granddaughter.’ There were times – like now – when she wished the NN core was only loaded with a simple Turing management program. ‘Got it,’ Philip said. ‘The Berkeley company has borrowed eight hundred million Eurofrancs from Diessenburg Mercantile. There are extension options covering another two and a half billion, but they’re all subject to some kind of clause. Dunno what, it’s classified, board members only.’ ‘MacLennan succeeding with the laser paradigms?’ Morgan suggested. ‘Very probable,’ Philip agreed. ‘Thro and a half billion,’ Julia said, ruminating out loud. ‘That’s more than Diessenburg loaned us before Prior’s Fen.’ ‘How much would it cost to build and operate an entire continent’s educational and penal services?’ Greg asked. ‘A lot; she said. ‘And Karl Hildebrandt is on holiday. Unavailable for two months. I asked his office yesterday after you said you wanted to meet him.’ ‘We can’t really blame them,’ Morgan said. ‘They were just protecting their investment. Natural corporate reflex.’ Julia didn’t approve of that attitude at all. ‘That doesn’t take away the fact that MacLennan is a double murderer, nor that an innocent man is in jail because of him.’ ‘You’ll have a terrible job trying to establish degrees of complicity,’ Morgan said. ‘I doubt Karl will ever reappear anywhere under English jurisdiction. The Diessenburg Mercantile directors will disclaim any knowledge of the affair. And if the bank does allow any of them to come into our A QUANTUM MURDER courts to testify, you can be sure they will be genuinely ignorant so that Greg here won’t be able to implicate them.’ ‘Maybe,’ Greg said. ‘But at least we’ve got MacLennan nailed.’ ‘Yes,’ Morgan said. ‘I’ll get on to the Home Office, they’ll have MacLennan arrested first thing tomorrow morning.’ ‘I’d like the Oakham police to handle the actual arrest,’ Greg said. ‘They need the credit. I’ll rap with Langley, explain what actually happened. And we’d better have a premier-grade programmer on hand to serve the data warrant. I’d hate anything to happen to that paradigm now.’ ‘Right.’ Morgan loaded a note into his cybofax. Greg climbed to his feet, stretching laboriously. Julia stood and tugged her windcheater jacket from the back of the chair. ‘Thanks again for helping, Teddy.’ He took a last swig from his beer bottle, and gave her a shrewd look. ‘No problem, gal, does me good to get out and about, keep my hand in. But you leave off Greg once this case is over, hear me? He’s a fucking orange farmer now. Nothing else.’ ‘I hear you, Teddy.’ She blew him a kiss. I t was midnight when Greg and Eleanor reached the farm. Fog had given way to a steady rain, the darkness was total. Greg could hear the wind rustling the tops of the new saplings on either side of the driveway. The EMC Ranger’s tyres splashed through long trickles of water as Eleanor let it roll slowly down the slope. He ran a hand through his greasy hair. What he wanted was a shower, a drink, and bed. Worst of all, he wanted to go to bed to sleep. Arms and belly muscles were stiff and sore from hanging under the Westland ghost wing. Surprisingly, given all the aches, plus a persistent post-mission edginess, he still felt easier than he had for a week. He grinned at his weak reflection in the side window. I knew Nicholas didn’t do it. ‘What’s so funny?’ Eleanor asked. ‘Nothing. Tell you, I’m just glad it’s over.’ ‘Me too.’ ‘Yeah. Thanks for understanding.’ ‘Make the most of it. Next time, I’ll stomp my foot and say no.’ ‘Good,’ he said, with feeling. ‘You’d better go and see Mrs Beswick tomorrow, give her the good news. I expect I’ll be having quite a busy day. Christ, and Vernon was upset about the murder being complicated before.’ ‘He’ll survive. Like you said, they’ll get a lot of credit for wrapping this up.’ ‘Yeah.’ There’s justice. But at least it will make life in Oakham more tolerable for everybody. Beyond the window’s reflection, Maurice Knebel’s mirage rippled unsteadily on the edge of reality. Greg knew his last memory of the ex-detective would take a long time to dissipate. Knebel had closed his eyes tightly, teeth clamping down on his lower lip, whimpering softly as Greg aimed the stun- CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR A QUANTUM MURDER shot at him. In the background Teddy had muttered snidely about using the Uzi instead. Then there was the trip back to the warehouse. Walton’s minacious streets crowding in on him, plaguing him with the prospect of running into some kind of hazard now the mission was over – the oldest squaddie fear in the book. The EMC Ranger’s headlight beams tracked across the side of the barn, unnaturally bright under the cloud-blocked sky. They touched the house briefly, a flash of moth-grey stone. Greg began searching round with his hand, lifting the stun-shot from the back seat. He slung it over his shoulder. Bloody good job Langley can’t see me now, he thought. He had always been dubious of Greg’s real motivations, the underground politics behind his assignment to the case. Seeing him in full combat gear would conlirm every black paranoid suspicion about Julia’s undue influence. Eleanor stopped the EMC~ Ranger in front of the door, and the porch light came on automatically. They both climbed out, shoulders hunched against the rain. Eleanor blipped the lock, pulling her navy-blue jacket tighter across her sweatshirt. Greg heard the lynch mob first. Footsteps crunching on the wet gravel behind the EMC Ranger. His gland gave a lurch, discharging the neurohormone into his brain. He grunted in shock as the five minds trespassed on his consciousness. They were all identical, possessed with unrelenting berserker arrogance, thought currents devoid of any rationality. A teratoid insanity. Recognition was instantaneous; he had encountered that mind once before: Liam Bursken. They walked into the splash of light thrown by the porch light, a soft dead smile on their lips – Frankie Owen, Mark Sutton, Les Hepburn, Andrew Foster, and Douglas Kellam. Eleanor twisted round. ‘What-‘ Mark Sutton raised a double-barrelled shotgun. Thoughts radiant with cool delight. Greg’s training took over. He fired the stunshot even as he was bringing it to bear. The pulse was dazzlingly bright to 352 PETER F. HAMILTON his night-acclimatized retinas. It missed Sutton, fizzling voraciously as it sliced through the rain. But it was enough. Sutton jerked aside, complacency shattered. The shotgun went off, blowing out one of the EMC Ranger’s rear windows. A lethal blast of crystalline splinters slammed into the stone wall to Greg’s right. He felt stmgers of pain jab down his chest where the combat jacket was open. Spots of blood bloomed on his white T-shirt. He saw the other four men jumping back into the concealing murk of rain and darkness which cloaked the rest of the farmyard, surprise and outrage rampant on their faces. Fury that their victim should dare to fight back, resist the Lord’s will. His fumbling fingers found the stunshot’s fire selector catch, and flicked it to continuous. A solid stream of glaring bluc-white lighting speared out of the barrel as he tugged the trigger, illuminating the entire farmyard. Its end grew ragged over by the barn, ifickering spasmodically as the close-packed pulses lost cohesion. He swung the weapon down and round, not really aiming, simply chasing Sutton as the man scrambled for cover behind the EMC Ranger. The torrent of pulses caught him on the shoulder, spinning him round as if it was a high-pressure water jet. The shotgun went flying off into the night as he whirled around, arms extended. He let go of the trigger, and Sutton collapsed into a bucking heap. To his left he saw Frankie Owen making a grab for Eleanor, his nprmally sulky face snarled up in an expression of wrath. A flick knife gleamed as it slid out of his fist. Eleanor was blocking the stunshot’s line of fire. A narrow line of damp air in front of Greg suddenly fluoresced a vivid green. Raindrops scintillated with an uncanny beauty as they fell through it. Laser. He was being shot at! Overstressed nerves jerked him backwards. He nearly lost his footing on the gravel as he dropped below the level of the EMC Ranger. He fought to regain balance. Judging by the angle of the beam, it was coming from the tangerine grove on the other side of the barn. The beam swept along the farmhouse’s stonework, across A QUANTUM MURDER 353 the door, towards the two figures thrashing about. It was too broad to be a rifle targeting-laser. Wrong colour, anyway. Realization struck like a spike of ice directly into his spine. The paradigm imprinter. MacLennan himself was out there, trying to zombie Eleanor. ‘Down!’ he screamed, and launched himself at the wrestling figures just as they broke apart. Eleanor was staggering backwards. Green light stroked her torso. He caught her round the waist in a tackle which sent both of them crashing to the ground. Eleanor yelped in shock and pain as they hit the gravel. Somehow he managed to hold on to the stunshot; ‘ware modules jabbed painfully into his side. Up above, the laser slashed furiously from side to side, producing a canopy of lurid green radiation between the EMC Ranger and the house, flecked with twinkling jade raindrops. Frankie Owen groaned, his thought currents disfigured by supreme agony. Greg glanced up to see him curled up on the gravel just in front of them, hands clutching his groin, nursing crushed testicles. A mushy spurt of vomit sputtered out of his open mouth. His face was corpse white, eyes red and wet. Eleanor did that to him. Greg felt a crazy edge of glee. My Eleanor. Out on the brink of his espersense those remaining three joyless minds were congregating. Scattered thoughts refocusing on him. ‘Are you all tight?’ he hissed. ‘My arm’s numb. Why did you pull me down?’ ‘Look up, that’s the paradigm imprint laser.’ ‘Oh, Jesus.’ ‘Let’s see if we can get inside.’ He rolled over and rose to a crouch. Foster, Hepburn, and Kellam were moving apart again, fanning out around the EMC Ranger. It was four metres to the door, the laser painted a sharp green line two-thirds of the way up. ‘I’ll go first,’ he told her. ‘Start moving as soon as I reach it.’ ‘Right.’ He tensed his legs, then he was up and running. Fingers reaching for the brass bulb handle. The polished metal was PETER F. HAMILTON 354 slick in his palm. Turning slowly. His shoulder thudded into the wood, and he was through, skating on the hall tiles. Eleanor was racing past him less than a second later. He shoved the door shut with a burst of frantic strength. There was a quiet whine as the lock engaged. He aimed the stunshot at it, and fired. The plastic covering melted with a flash of orange flame, droplets spraying out. The ‘ware circuits inside flared briefly, sparks fountained, dying embers skittering over the cold tiles. Someone outside smacked into the door. He saw it quiver in the frame. There was the sound of a fist hammering on the panels. ‘Mandel.’ It was I_es Hepburn’s voice, but toneless, that same clipped precision Bursken used. ‘Come out, Mandel. You shall not escape the Lord’s justice.’ ‘Fuck offi’ He grabbed Eleanor’s hand. ‘Come on, they’ll be inside in a minute.’ There was no light in the hail. He felt round for the photon amp band hooked on his shoulder tab, and slapped it into place. The time display and guido coordinates gleamed brightly. Walls, floor, and furniture shimmered out of nowhere, solidifying into their familiar places. He bled in the infrared. The photon amp’s grey and blue world tinted into red, becoming fractionally brighter, losing some definition. ‘I’ll call the police,’ Eleanor said. ‘No way,’ he said, leading her down to the study. ‘People like Keith Willet aren’t going to be able to cope with a bunch of Liam Burskens, even if they believed us. In any case it would take them too long to get here.’ ‘Greg! We need help.’ She was battling panic. ‘I know!’ He switched on the communication ‘ware, and pulled his skull helmet into place. ‘Emergency.’ ‘What is it, boy?’ Philip Evans asked. ‘We’ve been ambushed at the farm. MacLennan is here with five people he’s loaded with Bursken’s paradigm. And this time it’s me they’re after.’ ‘Shit, boy; you all right?’ ‘For now. We need help and fast.’ A QUANTUM MURDER ‘I’m launching the security crash team now. They’ll be there in ten minutes.’ Greg opened the study door. The room was supposed to be his den, but he still hadn’t got it sorted out. There was a big desk over by the window, a settee, long planks were leaning against a wall, destined to be shelves when he got round to screwing them together. The floor was cluttered with kelpboard boxes full of his accumulated junk. He could just make out the Berrybut estate through the window, pinprick glints of light from the chalets; the rain must have extinguished the bonfire hours ago, the photon amp’s infrared function couldn’t even pick up the dying cinders. ‘Philip’s launching the Event Horizon crash team,’ he told Eleanor. ‘Right. Why are we in here?’ A dark human silhouette moved across the window, eclipsing the chalets. The head glowed brightly in grades of red, hot blood highlighting the cheeks and nose; eyes were cooler, darker. It contained the familiar thought currents of Liam Bursken. ‘Shush.’ He gripped her hand tighter. Even with the infrared’s ambiguous slant, he could recognize the features of the face pressed to the glass. Brendan Talbot, an engineer who lived in Hambleton. Christ, how many people had MacLennan loaded the paradigm into? Greg’s free hand closed around the stock of the Heckler and Koch rifle lying on the desk. A real weapon. Ronnie Kay appeared next to Brendan Talbot, and hurled a brick straight through the study window. Eleanor yelled in fright. A torch shone into the room with the force of a solar flare. The photon amp filters responded immediately, reducing the glare until it was a manageable corona. Greg could see Talbot, his hand reaching through the jagged hole in the glass, scrabbling round for the catch. ‘Face your judgement, Mandel,’ Kay shouted. ‘Embrace us. We will deliver you from sin.’ PETER F. HAMILTON 356 Greg levelled the rifle at Talbot. And couldn’t pull the trigger. It wasn’t Talbot, only his body. Brendah had a wife, a six-year-old daughter. ‘Shit!’ he roared. In his army days it wouldn’t have made any difference. None. See a hostile and snuff them. Nothing else had ever been allowed to interfere with that maxim. It was simple survival. Life was so fucking easy in those days. Uncomplicated. Brendan Talbot’s fingers closed around the catch. Greg yanked the stunshot round, strap cutting into his shoulder. Aim and fire. The pulse hit the glass, and splattered, minute static tendrils writhing across the oblong pane. ‘Shit shit shit.’ Aim and fire. This time the pulse struck Talbot’s hand. There was a muffled grunt, and he was flailing backwards. His wrist caught the spikes of glass around the edge of the hole, skin tearing. There was a confused splash of heat. The torch beam wavered about as Kay tried to catch him. ‘Let’s go,’ Greg said. Runnels of Talbot’s blood were seeping down the window below the hole, glowing like radioactive sludge. ‘What’s happening now, boy?’ Philip asked anxiously. ‘Trouble. Where’s the crash team?’ ‘They’re getting into the tilt-fan now.’ ‘Jesus!’ Eleanor gave him a frightened glance as they charged back into the hail. ‘The crash team is just taking off,’ he told her. ‘Philip, have they got stunshots with them?’ ‘Sure thing, boy.’ ‘Tell them to use the stunshots wherever possible, remember these people aren’t responsible for what they’re doing.’ ‘I’ll tell ‘eni.’ ‘Upstairs,’ he said to Eleanor. They started to pound up the staircase. There was an almighty crash of breaking glass from the lounge when they were halfway up. Knocking the whole window out by the sound of it, Greg thought. He handed Eleanor the stunshot when they reached A QUANTUM MURDER 357 the landing. At least if she did have to shoot she would never have the guilt of killinga complete innocent. He could always use the rifle to immobilize, If he had time, if the mкlйe didn’t become too confusing, if he could hang on to his scruples. They ran down the landing to the master bedroom. ‘Philip, plug Royan in,’ Greg said. ‘Right-oh, boy.’ The landing’s biolums came on just as they reached the bedroom door, three sets of wall globes shaped like lilies. Greg shot them out with the rifle. They disintegrated with loud popping sounds, showering the landing with radiant flakes that died as they bounced along the carpet. From a tactical standpoint there was little improvement; biolum light shone up from the hail, casting long delusive shadows over the landing walls. He could hear people moving about below. They went through into the bedroom. ‘Keep watching the stairs,’ Greg said. ‘Anyone comes up, shoot ’em.’ ‘Right.’ Eleanor knelt down beside the door, peering through the crack. The photon amp’s time numerals and guido co-ordinates blurred then merged into a single wavery band of yellow light. There was a moment’s pause, then the display printed: I’M HERE, GREG. ‘Great. Listen, I’ve got about half a dozen people who think they’re Liam Bursken coming at me. Now there has got to be some way to flush that paradigm out of them. We know it erases itself after a set time. Access the recording you made and look for the magic photons sequence, see if there’s any way we can activate it prematurely.’ GOT YOU. ACCESSING NOW. ‘They’re here, Greg,’ Eleanor called softly. She fired the stunshot, ten or twelve pulses zinged along the landing, scorching long burn marks into the wallpaper, blistering the paint on the banister rail. He was aware of the minds on the stairs. One of them ruptured in a flurry of pain, the thought currents fragmenting into comate insensibility. ‘You got one.’ PETER F. HAMILTON 358 GREG, HAVE YOU GOTA LASER WITH YOU? ‘Yeah, a Heckler and Koch hunting rifle.’ TOO POWERFUL. HAS IT GOTA TARGETING IMAGER? ‘Yeah.’ GOOD GOOD GOOD. PLUG THE IMAGER INTO YOUR SUIT ‘WARE. ‘Right.’ ‘The crash team has left,’ Philip said. ‘Be with you in eight minutes.’ It was going to be too long, that much was obvious. Greg tugged the rifle’s targeting imager monocle out of its recess, and detached it from the fibre optic cable. The interface was standard – thank Christ. He plugged the cable into a socket on the guido ‘ware module. Blue target circles hardened in front of him, angling down towards the carpet, the same line as the rifle barrel was pointing. ‘Come out, Mandel,’ Ronnie Kay shouted up from the ball, ‘or we will burn you out. Fire is always the great purifier. Your wife will die with you then. Come out.’ ‘Don’t you dare,’ Eleanor said. ‘Royan?’ I’VE DECRYPTED IT STRANGE. NOT LIKE SOFTWARE. NO SUBROUTINES. EVERYTHING STRUNG TOGETHER, SIMILAR TO PIXEL CODES, MUCH HIGHER BIT RATE THOUGH. ‘Have you found the magic photons sequence?’ WORKING ON IT Greg went over to the window, standing beside it with his back to the wall, expanding his espersense outwards. There were three minds below. He edged the rifle out past the curtains and activated the imager. The photon amp’s picture of the bedroom faded away, replaced by a view of the garden below. Three men were standing on the lawn, waiting patiently. One of them held what looked like a shotgun, the other two were carrying clubs of some kind. ‘Come out, Mandel.’ Eleanor fired another barrage of stunshot pulses down the landing. A QUANTUM MURDER ‘We’ll burn your flesh to ashes. Your last minutes will be the torment of Hell. Repent.’ THINK I’VE GOT IT ‘Thank Christ for that.’ THERE ARE TWO SEPARATE SEQUENCES, BOTH BECOME ACTIVE AFTER A MEASURED INTERVAL FOLLOWING IMPRINT TIMED BY HEARTBEATS. CLEVER THAT THE FIRST SEQUENCE CONTAINS THE PARADIGM ITSELF AND THE INSTRUCTION TO KILL KITCHENER, ALONG WITH ADDITIONAL ORDERS TO DESTROY HIS RETROSPECTIVE NEUROHORMONE WORK. IT ACTIVATED ITSELFAFTERAPPROXIMATELY NINE HOURS. THE SECOND SEQUENCE IS THE MAGIC PHOTONS, WHICH ACTIVATES TWO HOURS LATER. Even now, Greg couldn’t quite shake off his fascination with the case. Nicholas must have been hit before the storm, before the rising waters of the Chater closed the ramshackle bridge. ‘Can you trigger the magic photons sequence?’ YES. I’VE ISOLATED ITS ACTIVATION CODE FROM THE PARADIGM’S TIMER SECTION. ‘OK, there are three people we can try it on.’ The target circles vanished as Royan took command of the rifle’s ‘ware. Greg watched the imager’s laser sending a fan of ruby light sweeping across the lawn. The grid emerged in its wake, splitting into three sections, folding around the waiting men. HERE GOES. The contoured lines around the central figure began to flash. NOW. Greg saw a single strobe-like flicker of pink douse the man’s face. His espersense showed him the man’s thought currents start to seethe furiously. A loud destitute wailing penetrated the glass. ‘What’s happening?’ Eleanor demanded. ‘I’m not sure.’ Even as he spoke he sensed the new tide of personality usurping Bursken’s resolute thought currents. His PETER F. HAMILTON 360 empathy was caught by the backlash of petrified bewilderment raging inside the abused brain, feedback sending a quake of dismay shuddering along his own synapses. Then the man was dropping to his knees, curling into a foetal position, mind rushing headlong into welcome oblivion. ‘OK, we got him. Zap the other two, Royan.’ Their grid outlines began to flash. The targeting laser fired twice. ‘Flames, Mandel,’ Ronnie Kay shouted. ‘They will consume you. There will be no redemption.’ Wait,’ Greg shouted back. ‘I’m coming out.’ ‘Greg!’ Eleanor pleaded. ‘Those crazies will torch the place if I don’t. We have to clear them out.’ ‘Let the crash team do it.’ ‘That bastard MacLennan is still out there. He can load Bursken’s mind into them as soon as they land. Then where will we be? They are armed and armoured, Eleanor. At least the lynch mob only have shotguns.’ ‘Come then, Mandel. Come to us.’ She drew a sharp breath through her teeth. ‘God, you be careful, Gregory~’ He knew exactly how much that cost her to say. ‘No messing.’