I do not know, Chief Parfitt. My input from the sensitive cells at the rear of the cavern has failed. I cannot account for it. Something seems to be affecting my interpretation routines.
«Christ!» The jeep had reached the entrance to the cavern. A dozen cyberfactory staff were milling round outside, uncertainty etched on their faces. I braked sharply, and tapped out my code on the small weapons locker between the jeep's front chairs. The lid flipped open, and I pulled out the Browning laser carbine.
Everybody back, i ordered. Get on the next tram, I don't want any of you left on this side of the circumfluous lake.
Rolf was elbowing his way through them.
Have you seen Steinbauer?i asked.
No. He hasn't tried to come out.
I gave the entrance to the cavern a jaundiced look; it resembled a railway tunnel that had been lined in marble. There were no doors, no way of sealing it. Eden, how many entrances to the inspection tunnels are there?
Eleven.
Oh great. OK, I want the entire southern endcap evacuated. Get everyone back across the lake. Nyberg, I want the response team distributed round all the tunnel entrances. If Steinbauer emerges without warning, they are to shoot on sight. Christ knows what he's got stashed away in the tunnels.
Yes, sir, she acknowledged.
Rolf, get the rest of our people kitted out with armour and issued with weapons. I think we might have to go into those tunnels and flush him out.
I'm on it, sir, he said, grim-faced.
Chief Parfitt, eden called. I am losing my perception inside the inspection tunnel leading away from the back of the cyberfactory cavern.
There's over eighty kilometres of tunnels, rolf exclaimed in dismay. It's a bloody three-dimensional maze in there.
Clever place to hide, i said. Or perhaps not. If he can't consult Eden about his location, he's going to wind up wandering round in circles.i started to walk into the cavern, the browning held ready. red light was flickering erratically. the chemical smell of coolant fluid was strong in the air.
Wing-Tsit Chong?
Yes, Harvey, how may I help you? I have been informed that armed police have been deployed in the habitat; and now Eden tells me it is suffering a disturbingly powerful glitch in its perception routines.
That's where I'd like your advice. Wallace Steinbauer has come up with some sort of disruption ability. Presumably it's based on the same principles he used to fox the chimp's monitoring routine. Have you and Hoi Yin come up with any sort of counter yet?
Wallace Steinbauer?
Yes, the Cybernetics Division manager. It looks like he's Penny's murderer.
I see. One moment, please.
I edged round the corner of the assembly bay closest to the entrance, and scanned the long aisle ahead of me. Several trolleys had stopped along its length, two of them had collided, producing a small avalanche of aluminium ingots. There was no sign of Steinbauer.
Eden, can you perceive me?
Only from the sensitive cells around the entrance, the rest of the cavern is blocked to me.
OK.i crouched low and scuttled along the aisle. the flashing red light made it hellish difficult to spot any genuine motion on the factory floor. funnily enough, the one thing which kept running through my mind as i made my way to the rear of the factory was the thought that if steinbauer had murdered penny maowkavitz, then hoi yin was in the clear.
Incredibly unprofessional.
Harvey, wing-tsit chong called. I believe we can offer some assistance. The dysfunctional routines Steinbauer leaves behind him can be wiped completely, and fresh ones installed to replace them.
Great.
However, the ones in his direct vicinity will simply be glitched again. But that in itself will enable us to track his position, to around fifteen or twenty metres.
OK, fine. Do it now.
A blinked glimpse of the placid lake beyond the veranda. Hoi Yin bending over towards him, long rope of blonde hair brushing his knee rug, her face compressed with worry. His thin frame was trembling from the effort of countering Steinbauer's distortion, a heavy painful throbbing had started five centimetres behind his temple.
I am regaining perception of the cavern, eden informed me. Steinbauer is not inside. He must be in the inspection tunnel.
I started running for the rear of the cavern. The muscle membrane was half-open, quivering fitfully. As I approached it the lips began to calm.
It is not just the perception routines Steinbauer is glitching, wing-tsit chong said with forced calmness. Every segment of the personality in the neural strata around him is being assaulted.
A wicked smell of sulphur was belching out of the inspection tunnel. I coughed, blinking against the acrid vapour. What the hell is that?
The muscle membrane promptly closed.
It must be a leakage from the enzyme sacs, wing-tsit chong said. The duct network which connects them to the organs is regulated by muscle membranes. Steinbauer is wrecking their autonomic governor routines.
Christ.i stared helplessly at the blank wall of polyp. Have you located him yet?
He is approximately two hundred metres in from the cavern, thirty metres above you, eden said.
Rolf, do we have gas masks?
No, sir. But we could use spacesuits.
Good idea, though they're going to restrict—
The cry which burst into the communal affinity band was awesome in its sheer volume of anguish. It contained nameless dread, and loathing, and a terrified bewilderment. The tormented mind pleaded with us, wept, cursed.
Wallace Steinbauer was standing, slightly stooped, in a cramped circular tunnel. It was illuminated in a gloomy green hue, a light emitted by the strip of phosphorescent cells running along the apex. Its polyp walls had a rough wavy texture, as if they'd been carved crudely out of living rock.
He was retching weakly from the appalling stench, hands clutching his belly. Lungs heaved to pull oxygen from the thick fetid air. The floor was inclined upwards at a gentle angle ahead of him. Wide bugged eyes stared at the tide of muddy yellow sludge which was pouring down the tunnel. It reached his shoes and flowed sluggishly around his ankles. Immediately he was struggling to stay upright, but there was no traction; the sludge was insidiously slippery. Cold burned at his shins as the level rose. Then blowtorch pain was searing at his skin, biting its way inwards. His trousers were dissolving before his eyes.
He lost his footing, and fell headlong into the sludge. Pain drenched every patch of naked skin, gobbling through the fatty tissue towards the muscle and bone beneath. He screamed once. But that simply let the rising sludge into his mouth. Fire exploded down his gullet. Spastic convulsions jerked his limbs about. Sight vanished, twisting away into absolute blackness.
Coherent thoughts ended then. Insanity blew some tattered nerve impulses at us for a few mercifully brief seconds. Then there was nothing.
Minds twinkled all around me, a galaxy misted by a dense nebula. Each one radiating profound shock,
