Текст книги "The Abyss Beyond Dreams"

Автор книги: Peter F. Hamilton

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Текущая страница: 8 (всего у книги 44 страниц)

‘I thank you. There is another aspect we would also request your assistance with.’

‘Which is?’

‘We would very much like to know how those humans got into the Void. Their arrival myth needs to be determined. Makkathran itself may be able to help.’

Nigel gave the huge Raiel a puzzled look. ‘Yeah, but how can you accomplish that?’

‘Someone has to go inside the Void and ask it.’

May 19th 3326

In all her seventeen years Alicia di Cadi had never seen anything as lovely as the isle of Llyoth. It was one of over a thousand tiny coral islands that made up the Anugu Archipelago, stretching for three hundred miles across Mayaguan’s Sambrero Ocean. The C-shaped ridge of coral was barely a kilometre long. Thanks to Mayaguan’s large close-in moon, low tide pulled the waves back for five hundred metres, exposing a shallow beach of the finest white sand, while on the other side of the isle a circle of low dragonspine polyps produced a shallow lagoon whose water was bath-hot. Native cycads clinging to the slender ground between had saltwater roots, allowing them to produce towering stems with emerald fronds that rolled out like sails every morning.

There were twelve wooden vacation shacks spread out along the curving shore. Deceptively ramshackle looking from the outside, but their interiors were a plush boutique design, promising the clientele a break of unashamed luxury.

Darrin had rented one of the shacks for a week. Darrin was twenty years old, a Natural human like herself, as were most of Mayaguan’s population – a stubborn little External world rejecting both Higher culture and the more prevalent Advancer ethos that so many in the Commonwealth adhered to. Darrin, who had moved to her mainland village only four weeks ago, taking up a position as assistant manager at the local Walland general store franchise. Darrin, who was simply a dream of perfection with his lean dark-skinned body, flat face with a wide smile and soft brown eyes that every girl in town wanted to have gaze at her.

But Alicia was the one who he made a special effort to talk to. And he was slightly shy, and funny, and had the same simple dreams as her. He seemed to understand her so well, the frustration of living in a backwater, her timidity of venturing out into the Commonwealth with all its wonder and strangeness.

‘Just don’t rush,’ he’d told her. ‘It’s been there for a thousand years, and it’ll last a lot longer. Wait until you’re confident enough. That’s what I’m doing. I will see it all, but when I do it’ll be on my terms.’

Darrin, for whom it took four whole days before she’d dumped Tobyn, her steady fella of seven months. Darrin, who she went for long walks with. Darrin, who encouraged her to keep up her schooling. Who seemed to understand her battleground relationship with her sixty-seven-year-old mother who was set in ways that belonged in some distant anachronistic century. Darrin offering support and advice and sympathy. Who was so unselfish and empathized with her own insecurities.

Darrin, who she was completely and utterly in love with like no boy and girl had ever been before, who she wanted to live with forever and give him as many children as he asked for. Darrin, who she would willingly die for.

He’d never made a move on her in those three weeks. Not that she would have said no to him. But instead he talked openly and honestly about them becoming true lovers. And then he’d suggested this week together.

With only a mild reluctance, her mother had agreed she could go. And so they took his ageing fifth-hand capsule to Llyoth’s discreet landing lawn in the middle of the isle that afternoon.

Their shack had a huge circular bed. Alicia blushed in delight as she looked at it; just considering all the possibilities it offered for naughtiness that night made her deliciously excited. Then they changed quickly and went out exploring the sublime isle, running down the vast deserted beach, where they splashed about in the waves. After that they took a paddle board lesson in the lagoon, constantly falling off, they were laughing so much. Holding hands during the walk back through the lush foliage, they discovered a number of sweet little secluded glades. Every time they stopped in one, they kissed, taking longer and longer each time until she just wanted to rip his swimming trunks off there and then.

‘Tonight,’ he said, his gorgeous eyes never leaving hers. ‘I want it to be just perfect.’

She nodded, nearly biting through her lower lip in frustration.

Dinner was served on a big wooden platform at one tip of the cove, with tables for two that had living canopies of scarlet flower vines. The only light came from candles.

Servicebots waited on the tables, but it was a real human chef working at the grill, cooking the fish. Alicia had put on her navy-blue polkadot dress, the one with a very short shirt and a neckline deep enough that Darrin just couldn’t stop staring. It was heavenly being able to entrance him like that.

There were five other couples on the platform that night. But the tables were placed well apart to grant each of them solitude. Alicia smiled round at how fine everyone looked. There was only one person dining on his own, a really old man – like almost thirty or something – with shaggy blond hair, wearing a dinner jacket that was as black as she’d ever seen – but even his table was set for two.

‘A tiff, do you think?’ Alicia asked with a giggle.

Darrin raised his small frosted beer glass. ‘Here’s to us never having one.’

She sighed; it was all so delectable. Until she’d met Darrin, she’d never really understood the term soulmate.

Another man and woman came in. She was wearing an expensive business suit, in complete contrast to all the very feminine dresses being worn by all the other women. Her partner was in an equally sober brown suit.

‘What . . .?’ Alicia began. She didn’t recognize the woman, who had thick jet-black hair styled primly round a very elegant face that had a strong Filipino heritage. A face that looked seriously determined. She turned to Darrin, startled to see how he had stiffened; his expression was no longer suffused with happiness. It unnerved her. She reached over the table for him, but he didn’t move.

The woman stopped at their table. ‘Darrin Hoss, birth registered name Vincent Hal Acraman, I am Senior Investigator Paula Myo of the Commonwealth Serious Crime Directorate. I am placing you under arrest with the preliminary charge of multiple illegal cloning. Please deactivate all your enrichments and accompany Probationary Agent Digby to our capsule. You will be taken in custody to Paris, Earth, where you will be brought before a judge.’

‘What?’ Alicia gasped. ‘This is all wrong. Darrin never did anything illegal.’

‘Unfortunately, Alicia, your assumption is incorrect.’

‘How do you know my name?’

‘Vincent, will you cooperate?’

‘Wait!’ Alicia said as her anger grew. ‘This is crazy. Darrin can’t have cloned anyone. He works at the Walland store, for Ozzie’s sake. Everyone knows that. You’ve got the wrong person.’

‘No,’ Paula Myo said. ‘I haven’t.’

Darrin calmly finished his beer and stood up. Agent Digby applied a small circular patch to the side of his neck.

‘Darrin?’ Alicia asked. But he wouldn’t look at her. ‘Darrin!’ She was too stunned to move. This couldn’t be happening. Not to her – not to her beloved Darrin.

‘Constable Gracill will escort you home,’ Paula told her as Agent Digby took Darrin away. ‘Your local clinic administrator has been informed of the situation, and a specialist psychiatric counsellor will be available for you.’ She gave Alicia a sympathetic smile. ‘Best you see them.’

‘Wait! I don’t understand,’ Alicia cried with rising distress. ‘Darrin couldn’t have cloned anyone, he’s just a store assistant. That’s all.’

‘He’s not. Trust me. We opened a case file on Vincent Acraman eight years ago. We suspect he has been engaged in this cloning activity for a lot longer.’

‘But . . . Who did he clone?’

Paula Myo’s stare was unflinching. ‘You.’

*

There were tears. A lot of tears. Paula had been ready for that. Not that it made watching any easier; poor Alicia’s suffering was awful to behold. She cried so hard. Sobbing uncontrollably as the constable from her hometown helped her up from the table.

‘It can’t be right,’ Alicia wailed dismally as she was gently led off the platform.

Paula let out a long breath and pinched out the candle flame in the middle of the romantic table for two.

Somebody started a slow handclap. A deliberately mocking sound that was disturbingly loud amid the silence of the remaining stunned diners.

Paula turned round, about to order her u-shadow to run an identity scan. Then she saw who it was sitting all by himself. She’d walked right past him earlier, she was so intent on Vincent Hal Acraman, her constant low-level fieldscan reporting no immediate threats.

‘Well done, Investigator,’ Nigel Sheldon said. ‘You got your man yet again.’ He held up a wine glass towards her. ‘Here. I chose a Camissie; you always like a fruity white. Nicely chilled, too.’

It wasn’t often Paula found herself lost for words. ‘Nigel. What are you doing here?’

He played the mock innocent well, gesturing at his table with its two place settings. ‘Waiting for you.’

‘Nigel . . .’

‘Oww, come on,’ he grinned. ‘It’s a beautiful night, on a planet that’s a little wild and invigorating. You closed another case perfectly. Don’t waste the moment. Celebrate with me.’

Paula sat down opposite him. ‘You’re not going to propose again, are you? That’s so old.’

He poured some of the Camissie into his own glass. ‘Of course not. I’m happily married.’

‘You always have been.’

‘Monogamously now.’

‘Hummm.’ She raised a questioning eyebrow.

‘You’re such a cynic.’

‘How did you know I was going to be here?’

‘I have a few people who still owe me favours; they checked with your office.’ He nodded at the weeping Alicia’s departing back. ‘That was bad timing on your part.’

‘It was in-the-nick-of-time timing, if you ask me,’ Paula corrected.

‘Poor Alicia doesn’t think so. But surely ’tis better to have loved and lost . . .’

‘Vincent Hal Acraman has been doing quite enough loving, thank you.’

Nigel smiled appreciatively. ‘So you still don’t compromise?’

‘You know the answer to that.’

‘Yes, but – this is really what you’re spending your time doing these days? Chasing after an illegal cloning operation?’

‘It was a weird one.’

‘And you do like your weird, don’t you? They’re the best challenge, I suppose. But, still, isn’t this a bit small for you?’

‘Why do I get the feeling you’re building up to something?’

‘Because you’re the best detective there’s ever been. So come on: chill, tell me, brag a bit to someone who appreciates you, how bad has dear old Vincent been?’

Paula took a sip of the wine, and it was a good choice. ‘Bad. He’s cloned Beatrice Lissard twenty-eight times that we know of, but he’s good at covering his tracks. Digby will give him a memory read when they get back to Paris. I almost don’t want to know what the true number will be.’

‘And who’s Beatrice?’

‘An old girlfriend of his. Very old. I interviewed her a while back. She and Vincent grew up on Kenyang three hundred years ago. And when he was twenty and she was seventeen, they fell in love. It was as wonderful as it always is at that age, then it fell apart.’

‘As it always does at that age.’

‘Quite. He was starting to get obsessional as well as over-possessive, so she moved on and found someone else. He never did.’

Nigel’s green eyes widened in understanding. ‘So he cloned her and lived the romance all over again.’

‘And again, and again, and—’

‘Then Alicia . . . ?’

‘Is Beatrice, yes. The latest one. He’s a Higher, so biononics maintain his body at biological age twenty.’

‘So every time the clone girl reaches seventeen . . . Urgggh.’ Nigel wrinkled his nose and took a large drink. ‘Definitely a weird one. So just to complete the creepiness, does he raise them himself?’

‘No. That’s why he only operates on the External worlds. He finds some Natural human woman who’s having second thoughts about her impending demise. It’s common enough out here. Faith often wavers in the face of death when you can see other Factions of our species carrying on partying for centuries. He poses as a representative from a Higher-sponsored charity that offers her money in a trust which will pay to have Advancer genes spliced in during a rejuvenation. That way she’ll get a couple of extra centuries without even enriching with biononics. But the price of the trust fund is raising a poor little infant orphan girl.’

‘Weird and sick.’

‘Yeah. I’m not even sure what you call this. Serial first-lover?’

‘How did you catch him?’

‘Not all the Beatrice clones turned out devout Naturals after their affair burnt out. Some of them started to migrate towards the Central worlds and got themselves some good new Advancer genes spliced in. Two of them wound up on Oaktier – twenty-three years apart.’ She raised her eyebrows significantly. ‘Eight years ago, when the second one checked in at a clinic and got herself assayed – surprise, her genome was already registered in the government archive.’

‘I’m curious: what specialist?’

‘Excuse me?’

You told Alicia you’ve arranged a specialist counsellor for her. What specialist?’

‘Troubled adolescents.’

‘Ah, right, no shortage of them. So when the memory read gives you the identity of all the clones, will you put the numerous Beatrices in touch with each other?’

‘I’ve no idea.’ Paula started to read the menu. It was printed on a sheet of card, which was a novelty; it reminded her of her official homeworld: Huxley’s Haven. ‘That one I can comfortably kick upstairs.’

‘Paula, you don’t have an upstairs. Even ANA does what you ask. It recognizes your value.’

She grinned. ‘Ah, is this when you tell me what tonight is all about?’

‘I’m leaving the Commonwealth, did you know that?’

‘Your Dynasty’s latest colony fleet will be finished in three years.’

‘Of course you know that,’ he said sourly.

She smiled demurely. ‘Unless you bottle out again.’

‘That’s a little harsh, don’t you think?’

‘Everybody thinks you left on your Dynasty’s big colony fleet in 3000. Why didn’t you?’

‘There was some . . . stuff I needed to do. Besides, living in obscurity has its advantages. Do you know how wonderful it is to be able to walk about in public without anyone bugging me? For a start, I can invite a beautiful woman to dinner and it’s not an instant shotgun event right across the unisphere.’

‘Wait, you weren’t going to ask me to go with you? That’s worse than marriage.’

‘Hey, I’m not that awful.’

‘No. Sorry. That came out wrong. I don’t want to leave, Nigel.’

‘I understand. I’m proud of you, you know that, Paula?’

‘Proud? What am I, a pet?’

‘I made the Commonwealth possible with wormhole technology – well, me and Ozzie. And only something as wondrously crazy as the Commonwealth could create you.’

‘Yeah, I was inevitable right from the moment Ozzie set foot on Mars.’

‘Hey, I was the first one who set foot on Mars, thank you! Ozzie didn’t trust the spacesuit we’d cobbled together. Believe it or not, he was a conservative little nerd in those days.’

‘Oooh, sensitive.’

‘Touché.’ He raised his glass.

‘So why are you finally leaving? Getting bored with your creation?’

‘Exasperated, more like.’

She loaded her order into the isle’s tiny network. Pan-fried choonfish in a garlic butter sauce, with crushed new potatoes and sugarsnap peas. Behind the counter, the chef gave her an approving nod. ‘So we’re at fault?’

‘Now we have biononics, we have effectively killed death.’ His hand gestured irritably at the other diners on the platform, all lovingly lost in each other. ‘And what have we done with it?’

‘Taken over this whole section of the galaxy, discovered alien life and other wonders, built ANA, given people the ability to live exactly how they please. Sure,’ she teased sarcastically. ‘So terrible it’s a wonder we’re not all fleeing.’

‘The Central worlds are fine. People are civilized, responsible. The rest—’

‘Drag you down. Oh the ingrates.’

‘Why do they need you, Paula? Why should they need you? Because they’re unhappy and try to get ahead the wrong way.’

‘Ah, now I get it. If only everyone knew their place and just did as they were told. You’re still the great dictator.’

‘I was never a dictator, I just had a huge amount of political clout. I still do. And just to be the devil’s advocate, Huxley’s Haven was all about knowing your place. And it produced you.’

Paula smiled as she twirled the wine glass in front of her face. She might have known he’d bring up her formative years. Huxley’s Haven had been a unique, and massively controversial, experimental society, where its citizens were sequenced with genes that fixed specific psychoneural profiles. In short, their personality and professional aptitude were established before they were even born. Paula had been genetically designed as a policewoman, with an obsessive compulsion to solve puzzles. She’d been taken away from Huxley’s Haven, and adapted to life in the Greater Commonwealth, because there were always crimes to solve. ‘I had to evolve to survive,’ she reminded him. ‘Those old profiling genes were sequenced right out on my fifth rejuve – or was it my fourth? Who knows? Point is: nothing stays the same. Our species has become a living free-will Darwinian organism; we are in a constant state of evolution towards post-physical status. The External worlds will become Higher eventually. Don’t tell me you’re finally becoming impatient?’

‘And when the current External worlds are Higher, there will still be some other planets or new Faction causing trouble.’

‘Of course they will. That’s being human for you.’

He poured himself more wine. ‘Yeah, well, I’m going to found a uniform society. Everyone agreeing to the same philosophy and goals before it starts. There’ll be no dissent because we won’t be taking any dissenters.’

‘I can’t believe you’re being that simplistic. Yes, the first generation will all have the same noble goal, living worthy lives in accordance with the Party rules. But differences will creep in; they always do. By the time the third or fourth generation is born, you’ll have a hundred different factions, just like the Commonwealth.’

‘I disagree. Differences used to creep into societies because of unfairness and inequality. If you eradicate that, and the potential for it, right at the start, then society will remain uniform. Our technology is finally capable of that; we’re effectively a post-scarcity society, Paula. We should be better than what we are.’

She sighed. ‘Go get yourself reprofiled and live on Huxley’s Haven; they’re all happy. Or they were last time I checked.’

‘It’s a goal worth aiming for, Paula.’

She raised her glass to him. ‘I’m proud of you for thinking and acting selflessly. A thousand years ago, who’d have thought . . . Now you’re true evolution.’

He laughed as they touched glasses. ‘I’ll miss you.’

‘All right, so now you’ve duly plied me with alcohol. And you’ve grabbed my attention with all this philosophy. Please tell me why. You know, tormenting me with this kind of suspense normally gets people thrown directly into memory read.’

‘I would like to hire you.’

She pursed her lips coyly. ‘Are you sure you can afford me?’

‘On a consultancy basis. There’s something I personally have to do, and I need your expertise to pull it off.’

‘All right, I am officially intrigued. What expertise?’

‘I need to know how to commit a perfect crime.’

May 22nd 3326

Golden Park was massive. Paula hadn’t quite appreciated how big Makkathran2 was until she walked the mile and a half over the greensward which surrounded it. Because there were no capsules on Querencia where the original was sited, Inigo had imposed a no-overflight law which extended for ten miles around his city, which she thought was taking realism a step too far. The only way into the construction site, which was the full-scale replica of the city on Querencia, was in a ground vehicle, or on foot. She and Nigel had arrived at the project’s landing field in a scheduled commercial capsule, then taken a bus to the greensward – actually a misnomer; the ground that would one day mimic the forests and meadows outside the Void’s Makkathran was currently a muddy swathe of freshly ploughed and planted earth. From there they’d walked, as all the Living Dream followers did the first time, emulating Edeard who came to the city as a traveller with the Barkus caravan.

Two thousand square miles of empty government land on the eastern coast of the Sinkang continent had been signed over to Inigo by the Ellezelin government eighteen months ago. Paula suspected a great many election campaign donations (among other payments) to local and national politicians by Inigo’s wealthier backers had secured it. The official explanation was that the quasi-religious movement would bring a huge influx of followers, who would boost the planet’s economy. Ellezelin had been founded as a capitalist Advancer culture and was quite devout in the pursuit of money.

They trudged in through the North Gate (just as Edeard had) – although this gate was less impressive than the one cut through the wall by Rah. The wall of golden crystal around the real Makkathran was nothing more than a three-metre-high mesh fence here – so far. Inside it, the High Moat was another strip of flat grassland. Then came the North Curve Canal – two parallel trenches with slim trickles of brown water along the bottom marking where the excavation was scheduled to be. There was a bridge over the unborn waterway, leading to the Ilongo district. In Edeard’s city, it had small boxy buildings with walls that leaned at precarious angles. Here it was like a refugee camp of plyplastic tents and malmetal cabins. The tracks between them were laid with a mesh of carbon fibre through which mud was oozing. The long sections were being slowly tramped down by the sheer amount of foot traffic. It was like being in some pre-Commonwealth bazaar, appropriately enough.

Three hundred metres above her, a realistic semiorganic ge-eagle was keeping pace with them, scanning the neighbourhood. Paula controlled it through a heavily shielded link. Several of the impressive-looking birds soared on the thermals above the proto-city; Inigo’s followers had resequenced them from terrestrial avian DNA, duplicating the birds that so many Makkathran citizens possessed. They competed for airspace with Ellezelin’s native seabirds. It wouldn’t be long before other replica Void creatures appeared.

‘I didn’t realize there were this many ardent followers,’ Paula said quietly as they stood back to allow a young goatherd to lead his animals past them. The other thing she’d noticed was the way people dressed. It was all natural cloth in old styles, some amazingly elaborate, like a costume convention; there was no semiorganic fabric or modern garments to be seen. For herself she’d chosen a simple green cotton skirt, a white blouse and a leather jacket with a satchel slung over her shoulder. Nigel had gone all out in the tunic of an Eggshaper Guild master, complete with fur-lined robe.

He was gazing to the east. ‘They’re doing that wrong,’ he muttered.

‘What?’ Paula followed his gaze, seeing a tall tower surrounded by scaffolding that swarmed with constructionbots. The ge-eagle performed a fast scan of the incomplete structure. ‘That’s Blue Tower, the Eggshaper Guild headquarters. I recognize it from the Fourth Dream. It looks pretty accurate to me.’

‘The tower is fine,’ Nigel said as they started walking along the twisting tracks. ‘What I mean is, when you’ve got a project like this, you complete the drudgework first, then build the landmarks. That’s how you make sure the donations keep coming in.’

Paula had her gaiamotes open, receiving the emotional wash of the eager followers and the general emissions of the city’s confluence nests. The gaiafield was an excellent simulacrum of Makkathran’s telepathic buzz, reproducing the same sensations of busyness and determination that Edeard experienced. ‘I don’t feel there’s going to be any shortage of donations.’ A couple of days previously, they had run a sweep through Living Dream’s official accounts. The figures involved had surprised her. Some seriously wealthy individuals had made large donations. Living Dream had refined its recruitment techniques to a degree which put most External world cults to shame. She’d almost assumed a degree of illegal coercion, maybe some advanced version of the old narcomemes, except for the sheer number of mid– and small-level devotees also handing over money – in some cases, everything they owned. It wasn’t entirely limited to Advancers and Naturals either: a significant percentage of Living Dream was made up from Highers.

That level of universal commitment couldn’t be written down to fraud and dirty practices. Edeard’s life held genuine appeal, and from the four dreams she’d witnessed, she could actually sympathize with that. It helped that Inigo was now releasing the Fifth Dream, slowly unveiling it a few minutes each night.

And that was what made her extremely suspicious. Those perfectly self-contained sequences were being offered up a little bit too neatly for a mythical vision which was supposedly gifted, and over which he had no control. It was one of the reasons she’d agreed to help Nigel. That and the whole mystery of Makkathran being a warrior Raiel armada ship – a puzzle she just couldn’t resist.

They walked from Ilongo over into Isadi, across a hologram of the Pink Canal – a wide ribbon of blue light stretching across the ground. Then Ysidro district, where the first phase of genuine Makkathran buildings were being laid out. The ge-eagle looked down on foundations of enzyme-bonded concrete forming an intriguing jumble of shapes in the raw earth. There were as many constructionbots as there were people working on the site. Large trucks were being driven at speed along makeshift roads, shifting subsoil out and material in.

‘Those aren’t automated,’ a surprised Nigel protested as they had to scuttle quickly across one of the roads to dodge a ten-wheel digger. The driver gave them a long angry blast on the horn as he thundered by.

‘You have to admit, Inigo’s going for authenticity.’

‘No he’s not. Makkathran is actually a technology even we haven’t mastered.’

Paula shook her head wryly. ‘Yeah, but he doesn’t know that. Or at least, if he does, he’s not admitting it yet.’

Upper Grove Canal, which marked the boundary between Ysidro and Golden Park, was a giant gash in the ground six metres deep. Extruderbots were working their way slowly along the floor and walls, chewing up a thick stratum of the earth, and squeezing out a seamless sheet of enzyme-bonded concrete behind them. The ge-eagle showed her that the Zelda district was covered in big biovats breeding enzymes; Living Dream was going to need an awful lot of it to complete this remarkable homage, she thought.

They made their way over a rickety temporary bridge and into the featureless expanse that was Golden Park. Holograms of the white pillars that lined the real thing appeared insubstantial under Ellezelin’s hot late-afternoon sunlight, flickering into translucency every now and then. Over on the other side of the park, the Outer Circle Canal had been completed and filled. The intersecting roofs of the Orchard Palace rose up beyond it like a giant primitive crustacean left behind by a treacherous tide, engulfing most of the Anemone district. Insect-like bots crawled over the curving edifice, dismantling the scaffolding.

‘Now what?’ Nigel asked.

‘We wait.’

Long open-sided marquees had been set up along the side of Outer Circle Canal, protecting tables from the elements. As the sun went down, people started to congregate there. Some tents were kitchens, others served drinks. A few had stages where acoustic bands started to play. The gaiafield was conducting some very mellow emotions.

Paula sent the ge-eagle over to Orchard Palace as they found themselves a bench under one of the marquees. It circled low over the steep domes and dispensed several batches of tiny semiorganic microdrones. Modelled on Tetranychidae mites, they began to invade the massive headquarters of Living Dream, penetrating deeper and deeper into the maze of rooms. A three-dimensional map began to build up in her exovision.

‘These can’t be the actual rooms,’ she murmured. ‘It’s just a grid of cubes made from lokfix panels. Standard cheap throw-it-up construction material. Nothing fanciful here.’

‘I guess we’ll see the interior in one of the dreams eventually,’ Nigel said. ‘In the meantime, something that can be changed easily makes sense.’

‘Yes, I suppose so.’ She sent the ge-eagle back for another pass, scattering more of the microdrones.

The cube rooms formed a stack of offices, living quarters for the senior disciples of Living Dream, kitchens, lounges, some labs where confluence nest technology was expanded, kilometres of identical corridors, store rooms, small replicators, a well-equipped clinic . . . It was like a government administration complex on a frontier planet. Every amenity present and correct, but basic.

‘Ah, the man himself,’ Paula muttered.

As the sun dipped below the horizon, Inigo had appeared at the marquee next to the one they were using – a tall ginger-haired man with pale skin and a lot of freckles. He had the appearance of a fit Natural Faction human in his mid-thirties, with an easy, sincere smile.

People were rising from their meal to greet him. He was polite and welcoming, working the crowd like a professional politician. When Paula checked his gaiafield emissions, he seemed genuinely to appreciate the attention – an emotion mixed in with just the right humility. I am not the chosen one, just the humble messenger.

‘He’s good,’ she admitted.

Nigel had turned to look. It wasn’t something he had to be circumspect about. Everyone in their marquee was craning for a glimpse of the man who offered them a vision of a different existence. ‘How old is he?’