Part 22 (1/2)

*Mars is in crisis, Dalia Cythera,' said Rho-mu 31. *Disaster strikes at every turn, and though Adept Zeth's forge escaped the worst of it, our beloved planet is on the verge of slipping into chaos.'

*Chaos? What are you talking about?' asked Caxton. *We heard some rumours of accidents, but nothing like as serious as you're making out.'

*Whatever you have heard, I can a.s.sure you the reality is far worse than you can possibly imagine,' said Rho-mu 31. *The terror of Old Night threatens to descend upon us once more, and I believe Dalia may hold the key to our salvation.'

*Me? No... I told you before that I'm n.o.body,' said Dalia, unwilling to be saddled with such responsibility.

*You are wrong, Dalia,' stated Rho-mu 31 as the mag-lev came to a halt behind her. *You have an innate understanding of technology, but I believe what makes you special is the ability to intuit things that others would not. If you think there is something within the Noctis Labyrinthus of importance, then I am willing to put my faith in you.'

*I thought you didn't believe in faith?'

*I don't. I believe in you.'

Dalia smiled. *Thank you,' she said.

*I do not require your thanks,' replied Rho-mu 31. *I am a Protector. I am your Protector. That is my purpose.'

*I thank you anyway.'

Caxton patted Dalia on the shoulder. *Well, if we're going to go, we should probably get on this mag-lev?' Dalia nodded and looked up at her Protector. *After you,' said Rho-mu 31.

ADEPT ZETH STOOD in the highest tower of her forge, the noospheric halo above her head twitching with information. She sorted through a number of active feeds with her MIU. None of them made for easy reading.

Most were streaming from the forges of Fabricator Loc.u.m Kane and Ipluvien Maximal, but there were others coming in from isolated adepts that had come through the Death of Innocence and were desperately seeking friendly voices.

Beside her, one of her underlings waited uncomfortably for the adept to speak.

*Be at ease,' said Zeth. *Rho-mu 31 is with them now.'

*They're safe?'

Zeth shrugged and glanced down at the woman beside her. *As much as anyone can be said to be safe on Mars just now.'

*And he'll keep them from harm?'

*That is his purpose,' agreed Zeth. *Though a journey to the Noctis Labyrinthus is not without peril. They will pa.s.s close to Mondus Gamma, the domain of Lukas Chrom, and he is a p.a.w.n of the Fabricator General.'

*That's bad, isn't it?'

*Yes, I rather suspect it is,' said Zeth, thinking of what Kane had told her. *It is imperative that no one else should learn of Dalia's whereabouts.'

*Of course.'

*Delete all records of her destination from your memory coils and supply me with a record of deletion. Understood?'

*Yes.'

Zeth waited for a few seconds until the deletion record arrived in her noosphere before speaking again.

*You should return to your duties,' she said. *Amba.s.sador Melgator will be arriving soon from Olympus Mons and I think it would be better if you were elsewhere.'

*As you wish,' said Mellicin.

2.05.

OF ALL THE visitors ever to climb the steps to her forge, Amba.s.sador Melgator was one of the least welcome. Koriel Zeth watched the man approach, his thin body wrapped in a dark, ermine-trimmed robe, his few overt augmetics concealed beneath a hood of dark velvet. Though Kelbor-Hal's messenger was still some distance away, Zeth's enhanced vision saw that the amba.s.sador had changed since last she had seen him.

His skin was waxen and unhealthy, yet his eyes remained dark pools of sinister purpose like a bearer of bad news eager to spread his misery. However, Melgator's presence, as unwelcome and unlooked for as it was, did not worry her so much as that of his companion.

Sheathed in an all-enclosing bodyglove of a gleaming synthetic material that rippled like blood across her skin, a slender female figure followed a discreet distance behind the amba.s.sador.

Zeth needed no help from the noosphere to recognise what this woman was.

asked Magos Polk in a soft cant of binary. Zeth could read her apprenta's disquiet in the formulation of his numerics and hoped her own biometrics did not betray her unease so obviously.

*Yes,' she said. *Do not speak to her if you can avoid it.'

*Have no worries about that,' promised Polk. *Not if my life depended on it.'

*Let us hope it does not come to that, Polk,' said Zeth. *But her presence here cannot be a good thing.'

*Surely the Fabricator General has merely despatched her as a guard for the amba.s.sador after all the troubles we have had,' said Polk, his tone begging for rea.s.surance.

*Perhaps, but I doubt it. To act merely as a bodyguard would be seen as beneath the skills of a tech-priest a.s.sa.s.sin.'

*Then why is she here?'

Zeth felt her irritation at Polk's questions grow, but forced it down. *I expect we shall find out soon enough,' she said. This meeting with Kelbor-Hal's lackey would need a clear head and Zeth could not afford to be distracted by Polk's fear, even though it mirrored her own.

The tech-priest a.s.sa.s.sins were a body of mysterious and aloof killers who had existed since the settling of Mars in the distant past. A law unto themselves, they answered to no authority save that of unknown masters said to dwell in the shadows of the Cydonia Mensae.

Melgator and his accomplice reached the plinth beneath the great portico, and Zeth wondered if this was how she was going to die, struck down by an a.s.sa.s.sin's blade, her vital fluids pouring down the steps of her forge.

Melgator smiled, though Zeth found nothing rea.s.suring in its reptilian insincerity. The amba.s.sador and his companion came towards her, pa.s.sing into the splayed shadows of the piston columns and golden portico. Melgator moved with the clicking gait of one whose lower limbs were augmetic, while the a.s.sa.s.sin flowed across the milky white marble of the floor as though on ice.

Zeth saw that the a.s.sa.s.sin's legs were long and multi-jointed, fused together just above the ankles by a spar of metal, below which her legs ended not in feet, but in a complex series of magno-gravitic thrusters that skimmed her along just off the ground. Her athletic form was beautifully deadly, honed to perfect physicality by a rigorous regime of physical exercise, gene-manipulation and surgical augmentation.

Melgator stopped before Zeth and bowed deeply, his arms spread wide.

*Adept Zeth,' he began. *It is a pleasure to once again visit your unique forge.'

*You are welcome, Amba.s.sador Melgator,' said Zeth. *This is my magos-apprenta, Adept Polk.'

She left her words hanging and Melgator read the pause expertly. He turned towards his companion, who wore a facemask fas.h.i.+oned in the form of a grinning crimson skull with a horn of gleaming metal jutting from its chin.

*This is my... a.s.sociate, Remiare,' said Melgator.