Mirrored Heavens

And then suddenly it all goes blank.

It’s like the spaceplane: the only way she’s seeing is through her eyes. She can’t see the zone at all. She can see the flitcar in front of her swerving though, and switches seamlessly to manual, dodges the vehicle as it veers crazily past her—then she turns again to compensate as the momentum of her initial evasion almost carries her straight off the ramp she’s on. She barrels onward while vehicles smash into one another, tumble away into space. She gets a quick glimpse of pedestrians milling in confusion on a nearby walkway—and beyond that, an explosion as something hits a building in the middle distance. That blast is the first of many. Haskell no longer has contact with anyone. She’s just driving all out toward the Flats while the city erupts in pandemonium around her.

Then the zone kicks back in. But not as it was before. She can see the immediate distance quite clearly. Beyond that it’s like a kaleidoscope on acid. The Seleucus Flats are lost in a wash of colors. The edge of the city isn’t in sight. There’s no sign of Marlowe or the handler. Or anything coherent, for that matter: she ricochets past more cars, switches off onto a side street—roars through alleys, then beneath roofs that put the sky out of sight. She sears through one of the city’s thousand skid rows. Up ahead people are blocking the road, signaling her to stop. She accelerates, runs them down. Shots rip past her—she turns through a junction, roars through a labyrinth of warehouses—and then out into the district’s local downtown. The roof gives out for just a moment—she can see the sky and if anything it looks like there are even more ships out there now. They seem to be holding their formations though. She guesses that whatever’s going on here doesn’t extend all the way out there—so she steers her car into a tunnel, turns from there into a much narrower tunnel, eases her way to where it ends in a wall, and brakes.

She gets out, a pistol in each hand. She opens a door in the wall—goes through into a corridor that looks like it’s used for storage. She comes out the other end in a roofed street. It’s deserted. It’s lined with doors. She opens one of them, climbs stairs, and goes through another door into a bar. There are two men within it. One’s the bartender.

The other’s Jason Marlowe.

“No weapons here,” says the bartender. His accent marks him for Australian. His face marks him for a burn victim once upon a time. He doesn’t seem the slightest bit intimidated by her guns.

“It’s okay,” says Marlowe. “She’s a friend of mine.”

“So tell her to put her gear away.”

But Haskell’s already doing so. She sits down next to Marlowe, who’s sitting in front of a drink. That they found each other isn’t the least bit strange. It’s just standard procedure. Positioned along a rough line between where they started and where they’re going are four other potential rendezvous locations. Which one got used depended on the point at which any disruption of communication occurred. And such disruption was just one contingency among many for which they planned: getting attacked simultaneously, getting attacked individually, picking up the scent of Manilishi, picking up the scent of the Rain themselves….

“No such thing as surprise,” says Marlowe.

“I disagree,” replies Haskell. “There’s nothing but.”

And thus their conversation starts up, maneuvering through inanities and amateur speculation while the one- on-one kicks back in and their real conversation deploys beneath the surface.

“What the fuck is going on?” says Marlowe.

“The Rain’s somehow managed to invest primacy in the local nodes all over the city. Each one thinks it runs the whole HK zone.”

“So it’s irreversible?”

“For the short term, yes.”

“Short term’s all that’s left. We’ve got no choice but to make the Flats. We’re only five klicks out.”

“Think that means anything now? The fact that the Rain can do this citywide means that they probably already have the Manilishi.”

“We’ve got nothing else to go on,” shoots back Marlowe. “If we can get up to the Flats, we may yet find the trail. How much control do you have in the immediate zone?”

“Enough to keep us guarded. We’ll be like ghosts. Theoretically anyway.”

“Real problem’s the local wildlife,” says Marlowe.

“No,” says Haskell. “Real problem’s whatever the Rain’s preparing behind anarchy’s screen.”

“You still got the car?”

“Yeah.”

“And the suits?”

“In the back.”

“Hey,” says Marlowe out loud. “Thanks for the drink.” He stands up.

“You kids be safe,” says the bartender. “It’s all shades of shit out there.”

“It’s just getting started,” says Haskell.

The door swings shut behind them.

Several hours up the Amazon amidst several lanes of traffic. The ones nearest to the shore are reserved for local boats—mostly local fishermen running out of things to fish. Civilian freight’s a little farther out. Military craft take up the rest. The center’s reserved for heavy cargo—mostly rocket sections and rocket engines conveyed on massive barges. And all the while lines of fire stitch their way from horizon into sky….

“They’re really picking up the pace,” says Linehan on the one-on-one.

He and Spencer are standing on a platform adjacent to the bridge of a tramp steamer that looks like it should have been scrapped long ago. Canvas stretches above them, though both men know that all it’s shielding is the sun. The two men look quite different from the two who boarded the train back in the Mountain—new faces, new skin. New IDs, too. Turns out there’s still enough of an economy left in Belem-Macapa to get the basics done. Especially with Priam burning money like it’s going out of style.

“No reason they shouldn’t,” says Spencer. “There may be no tomorrow.”

“If the U.S. puts up too much hardware too quickly, they may provoke the East to strike before they reinforce their orbital positions.”

“A delicate balancing act,” mutters Spencer.

“The nature of the game.”

Then over the roar of ships launching they hear motors close by. They look up. Two jet-copters have swept in over some kind of ramshackle settlement stretched out along the shore. People are running from the shacks, diving into the river. Flame pours in over them. All that’s left of that village is a pier jutting out into the water—and smoke billowing out over the jungle. The jet-copters streak off downstream. The craft nearest shore turn toward the deeper river. Spencer shakes his head. But Linehan just laughs.

“Local public relations,” he says.

“No wonder these people hate you.”

“These people hate anybody who’s stronger. Anyone who’s not, they’ll stamp bootprints on their throat.”

“Sort of like the Rain did to you?”

And for a moment Spencer thinks he’s gone too far—thinks that Linehan is about to throttle him or hurl him into the river or both. Spencer desperately winds up for a zone-blast at Linehan’s skull. But then the larger man steps back.

“Just you wait till we get on the farside of border,” he spits out. “Not only am I going to break out of whatever backstab Control’s got cooked up for me—but I’ll make sure to gut you while I’m doing it.”

“Aren’t you getting a little ahead of yourself? We haven’t even turned south yet.”

“Well,” says Linehan, “how about you wake me up when we do.”

He stalks back inside the ship.

The Operative sits in a room, data flitting across the screens. He’s already well into several thousand deals. He’s putting into motion several thousand more. He eyes the door to the room while he keeps an eye out for any