The Ascendant Stars - Michael Cobley [198]
‘Quite a sight, eh? – nice symbology, I thought.’
At the sound of that familiar, despised voice Julia began to turn back into the room. But Talavera was already charging at her, hands outflung. The impact shoved her backwards off her feet and out of the window …
Suddenly she was back on the couch in the Great Hub, dumped out of the metacosm by her implant’s hazard-detection cutout. The VR visor still sat asquint on her face and she whipped her head to the side a couple of times before it finally flew off.
‘Okay, so now you’ve got a better view,’ came Talavera’s voice from somewhere behind her. ‘Good – there’s something I want you to see.’
The Chaurixa leader came and stood next to Julia’s couch, looked down and shook her head. ‘Clever gambit,’ she said. ‘Those decoys had my boys running around and going crazy trying to find non-existent Construct combat droids. Meanwhile one of these neat probes fed you in via some subsystem and you crept back to your old carcass. Only now you’re a fractalised sentience occupying an implant in your own brain! Goodness, the irony is practically industrial-strength – especially now that I have isolated your implant from extraneous connections.’
‘Okay, we’ve established that you’re screaming mad,’ Julia said in a hoarse whisper. ‘What new outburst of vileness are you going to show me?’
‘Hmm, you’ve got feisty since we last met.’ Talavera chuckled but her eyes glittered. ‘What you don’t know is that all this constitutes an act of rational purpose. There is an ecology of greatness in the cosmos – evolution has many directions and only the greatest can defy the currents of dissolution. That’s what this is about, and you are privileged to be a witness … ’
She broke off as a Henkayan carrying three weapons appeared at the end of the round passageway.
‘We have him,’ it said gruffly.
‘Bring him to me.’
Talavera laughed as her minion left, a high girlish sound that, Julia recalled, usually presaged a deed of outstanding cruelty.
‘It’s a shame you didn’t let me know you were coming,’ Talavera said. ‘I’d have had drinks and snacks arranged, sweet lights and sweet music.’ She raised her hands dramatically. ‘But – at least my cherished travelling companions are here with me to celebrate this historical event … dearest Kao Chih! Do join us.’
The barrel-chested, four-armed Henkayan had returned with a Human, a black-haired, youthful male in a dull orange two-piece. The man’s hands were bound behind his back, his features were Asiatic and he had a bruised jaw and a split lip. As the Henkayan steered him along the passage Talavera brought out a chair and pointed at it. The man was prodded towards it and shoved down into a seated position. Talavera grinned and patted his cheek.
‘Right, first introductions. Julia, this is Kao Chih; Kao Chih – Julia. I’ve spent some time with both of you, and finally we’ve got the whole gang together in the one place!’ She smiled. ‘Did you miss me, KC? Remember all the fun we had?’
‘I have not forgotten you, Mistress Talavera.’
Talavera glanced at Julia and rolled her eyes. ‘Mistress! Always so polite, the Chinese. Even when they’re stabbing you in the back – isn’t that right, KC? After all, that’s what you did back in the Shafis system, when you abandoned me on that miserable scumpot of a planet.’ She had been poking his shoulder as she spoke but then stopped. ‘And yet if I hadn’t been dumped there I might never have encountered my master’s servants and heard his message and his promise … ’
As she spoke, the smoky black snake creatures appeared from below, winding their way up her body. Julia stared, remembering their name – vermax – and wondered if they were actually even organic creatures.
‘ … and we wouldn’t be here today