E-Branch - Invaders Part 41

We come to it, said Korath. Do you remember those numbers that the Necroscope showed you before he took his leave of us?

And do you know what they were?

'They were a formula,' Jake answered. 'They were the numbers that govern all s.p.a.ce and time, Harry's gateway to the Mobius Continuum. But do I remember them?'

He thought back on it: That incredible wall of numbers - like a computer screen run riot, evolving in the eye of his mind - its symbols, calculi, and incredible equations marching and mutating until they achieved some sort of nu merical cr itical ma.s.s ... and formed a door. A Mobius door. Remember it? He would never forget it! It was like watching creation itself. But duplicate it?

No, you can't, said Korath. But I can! I can make it, but I can't use it. Not without you. And you can't make it without me.

And there you have my offer ...

'Tempting, if it were true,' said Jake.

It is.

'But how? You said yourself that numbers were practically unknown in your world.'

Just so. But didn't I also say that Malinari's essence is strong in my blood?

And now Jake understood. 'His photographic memory? That's what you got from him! And it's why he killed you, because one day you might know as much as him.'

Now you have it all, Korath said, and I await your answer.

What's it to be? Can we work together, for Malinari's downfall?

'But there's something else.' Still Jake was cagey.

And Korath sighed his frustration. What now?

'The secret that Harry Keogh was searching for, or in your own words "the crux of the matter", which is probably more 461.

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important than all the rest put together. The Wamphyri - Malinari and the others - have been here for some time now, but it seems they've achieved very little. So like the Necroscope before me I'm asking you: what are they up to, Korath? What's their plan? You were one of theirs and so you must know.' Oh, I do, I do. But as you have repeated the Necroscope's words, now I shall repeat mine. That is for me to know, and for you and yours to discover - through me. It is my only remaining bargaining point, the last trick up a poor dead thing's sleeve. And before I give you that, -we must be far, far better acquainted, you and L That said, I can tell you this: there isn't too much time left, and what they have started will run its course. Unless it is stopped.

Before you can stop it, however, you must know what it is.

Jake pondered that a while, then said, Til have to think it over.

All of it.'

But try not to take too long over it, said the other. Your world hangs by a thread, and the thread is unwinding.

Til keep that in mind,' said Jake. 'But for now leave me be.

There's something I must do before I awake, or all this has been for nothing.'

5o be it, said the other without further comment. And Jake sensed his departure like a waft of fresh air, the way the shadows crept back from his mind.

Then, experimenting - making sure that Korath was gone - he attempted to close his mind to deadspeak and turned to telepathy instead: 'Liz, if you are there, and I think you probably are, try to remember this name: Korath. If it's possible, you might even write it down. But in any case remember it, and tomorrow remind me of it. It could be very important.'

That done, Jake relaxed and let himself drift free on the tides of his own subconscious mind.

And in a little while he felt himself buoyed up, taken by far less ominous dreams, the disjointed, meaningless flotsam of his waking hours ...

CHAPTER THIRTY.

The Lull ...

Sunday was a busy yet paradoxically quiet time; work was being done, but in a kind of vacuum chamber. People moved about with purpose within a oddly surreal atmosphere of near- silence. It was, Jake thought, a sensation similar to being on an airplane during its descent, in the moments before your ears pressurize, when sounds are flat and distant and you feel as though you've suddenly gone deaf. In short, it was the lull before the storm, when the hatches are battened down, and Jake (who seemed to be the only one with no hatches to batten) felt completely out of it. Apart from an o-group he'd been scheduled to attend in the evening, he had nothing to do.

Which was as well, for he didn't think he would be able to concentrate on anything much; there was something on his mind, in the back of his head, desperately trying to push its way to the forefront. It had to do with last night - something lingering over from his dreams, perhaps? - but apart from that he was at a loss.

Jake remembered his nightmare, of course. He always remembered that. It was a recurrent thing ( a thing of conscience, he supposed), that came back to haunt him maybe two or three times a month. It had used to be far more frequent, but time is merciful and was doing its job. This thing in the back of his mind, however, was other than that; he found himself listening for an unknown something, and at the same time dreading it. So much 463.

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so that he was s.h.i.+elding his mind to shut things out, and doing it consciously, holding at bay those whispering voices of which he was becoming ever more frequently aware... which might perhaps explain something of the eerie atmosphere: he was in fact isolating himself. And also from the living.

It was a shuddersome thought, and deadspeak was a terrible thing. Jake found himself wondering if perhaps that was it: was it Harry he was listening for? Harry Keogh and the Great Majority? Was his neurosis growing, spreading out of control? Or was it something else, not fear at all but the simple need for privacy? Some kind of persecution complex, with Liz Merrick - his 'partner' - taking on the role of the Inquisition, or of a spy at the very least. But in any case, she was giving him the cold shoulder this morning. Odd, because he also felt that there was something she might want to tell him.

Jake wandered about the safe house, through the Ops Room and other rooms, trying to interest himself in something - in anything - that was going on around him, and feeling more and more the outsider ... at least until Lardis Lidesci joined him and Jake saw that he was in the same boat.

Jake really felt for Lardis, because he was a genuine outsider, not even of this world! On one occasion when they spoke to each other, the old man told him: 'Don't fret so! We're men of action, you and I. That's all it is.

But we'll get to it, never fear.' Unlike Jake, however, the Old Lidesci made no complaint. Instead he prowled the safe house in tandem with the younger man, and kept his feelings to himself...

The long hours pa.s.sed slowly; hours of tactical and logistical planning and correlation, concentrated poring over maps, and the making of battle-plans in general. The techs were feeding questions to the computers, and supplying Trask and his SAS Commanders with the answers; apart from catching the occasional break, they would probably still be working well into the eleventh hour. Surface plans of Xanadu - together with sche matics of the resort's sub-surface labyrinth - littered tables in the central Ops Room. Detailed diagrams, ordnance survey maps, and aerial photographs of Jethro Manchester's island in the Capricorn Group were scattered over the floor of a room with tightly drawn curtains.

Warrant Officer Cla.s.s Two Joe Davis was on a radio in the Ops Room, logging in the task force's vehicles as they arrived in groups or as individuals across the mountains and down onto the coastal strip. They had kept radio silence until now; even now they voiced only their call-sig ns - and then just the o nce, - received coded grid-references of their destinations, verified their receipt, and disappeared again into the aether. Soon they would be arriving at the designated operational locations, in which they would maintain low profiles and wait for orders. The big articulated Ops Truck wouldn't be in until the dead of night or early morning. But ev eryone would be, and must be, in situ b y midday tomorrow, Monday, the night of the full moon ...

By six in the evening Ben Trask was about ready to start pulling his hair out over his main problem with Xanadu. It was the one thing he couldn't request help on from higher authority (indeed, it was the one thing he daren't even mention to higher authority): how to evacuate the 'civilians' from the resort before attacking the place. For lan Goodly had forecast blood and thunder in Xanadu, and whether or not this was an accurate prediction or some scene from the past that the precog had somehow witnessed, Trask wasn't about to risk having his operation compromised, dela yed, or possibly even shut down by the objections and vacillations of jittery political powers.

It was nerve-racking; for from Trask's own point of view, and while it had been one thing to personally authorize, coordinate, and take part in a firefight in the badlands of the Gibson Desert, setting fire to Xanadu would be something else entirely! And since he didn't have time to argue the toss with the powers that be, it 464.

465 meant that, should anything go wrong tomorrow night, he would be the one to carry the can.

Trask was desperately in need of a plan of evacuation, and it would have to be one that wouldn't alert Nephran Malinari to E-Branch's or any other enemy's hand in things. But with little more than twenty-four hours to go, no such plan seemed likely.

Then came the televis ed evening news report - of the first cases of Asiatic Pla gue showing up in Brisbane and half a dozen other Australian ports - and with it the germ of an idea and a possible reprieve. It was Liz Merrick who heard the report, formulated the idea, and brought it to Trask's attention. At first he was doubtful; the notion seemed too contrived, too Hollywood ...

but it was the sort of idea that can grow on you. And as it grew on Trask, so he got to work on it.

For after all, it was all that he had to work on ...

Later, in the early hours of the night, when it was cooler and Liz went outdoors for a breath of fresh air, Jake took the opportunity to corner her and have a word in private.

'You've been avoiding me all day/ he said. 'Sort of peculiar behaviour for a partner, partner. Or is it wearing off?'

Seated together on a bench, they were close but not touching.

Liz gave him a wary look, and said. 'Umm? Wearing off?'

'I thought we had something special going,' Jake said. 'Er, business-wise, that is. I mean, psychically if not physically.'

She smiled (a little ruefully, he thought) and said, 'Perhaps physically, too, under different circ.u.mstances. So don't underestimate yourself, Jake Cutter. But you're carrying a lot of baggage around with you, and the extra weight is taking too much of a toll on you. You haven't been the most sociable type, you know? And even if you were, this isn't the best of times.'

'Which disposes of physically,' he said. 'But there's still psychically to consider. I thought you were interested in that side of me, too - or should that be "at least?"' With which he felt her shy away from him, as her expression became a lot more serious. But then she gave a shrug, and said: 'Out in the desert, that first job of ours was like an initiation, a baptism by fire - for both of us. As we were working together and it was part of our job, it seemed only fitting and sensible that we develop something of a rapport. But-'

'Which we did,' he cut her off. 'So, is that finished now?'

'-But,' Liz went on, 'for this thing tomorrow night we've been split up, and since we're not going to be working together there seemed little point in us, well, working together! I mean, with this twin operation about to go down, Xanadu and the Capricorn Group island thing together, letting anything else get in the way would have been too much of a distraction. So I haven't been trying to avoid you, Jake. It's simply that we've all been very busy.'

'You have all been busy!' said Jake, moodily. And abruptly: 'I'm not... not having a good time of this.'

'Of this conversation?'

'And of everything else,' he answered. Then shook his head and said, 'Christ! Do I come off sounding like a cry-baby?'

And suddenly Liz found herself melting. It was the first time that Jake had shown any open wounds - in his waking hours, anyway - and here she was pouring salt in them with her deliberately detached, overly cool att.i.tude! And so: 'What is the problem, Jake?' she said.

With which he felt that oh-so-tender telepathic aura probing in his direction, and immediately raised his s.h.i.+elds.

She knew it, drew back from him, said, 'Is that what it's about?

But I can't help what I am, Jake! If someone close to me is hurting, surely it's only natural that I should want to kn ow why? And anyway, isn't it a contradiction? You were the one who brought up our telepathic rapport, this special "thing"

that we have going! But you can't expect anyone to be close to you, concerned for you on the one hand, while deliberately pus.h.i.+ng them away on the other. You're s.h.i.+elding yourself- and from contact with me, Jake!'

He nodded, and said, 'And if contact -1 suppose we can call 467.

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it that for now, instead of spying - if contact gets to be a habi t, what then? Look, Liz, last night I had a blo ody awful nightmare, a piece of the extra luggage you were talking about, that's the result of something I've done. It was an act of vengeance, but a very terrible act. You say it's only natural you should want to know what's hurting, but please believe me, you really don't want to know about something like that!'

At which she scarcely managed to keep from biting her lip. For she already knew about that - all about it. But before she could say anything and perhaps give herse lf away, Jake went on: 'I thi nk ... I thought, that maybe you were there with me, that you had seen, and tha t was why you were avoiding me.'

'No,' Liz shook her head. 'I wasn't, I didn't, it isn't.'

And she thought: d.a.m.n you, Ben Trask! I know it's your job, but this is killing me! And at the same time she knew how fortunate she was that it wasn't Trask himself she was talking to!

But even so (she tried to qualify her deceit), what she had told Jake was only a half-lie, or at worst a white one. For the real reason she had been avoiding him was because she knew that sooner or later she must remind him of that name, Korath.

It would be the right and proper thing to do after all, for with all the emphasis that Jake had placed on it, it might well be important to everyone. But now she had gone and complicated matters, making herself an even bigger liar. For as soon as she mentioned that name to Jake and he remembered it, he would know that she really had been there after all, sneaking in his mind, like a thief!

Right there and then she might have done it, blurted it out and accep ted the consequences ..

. except at that precise moment Ben Trask appeared in the door to the house, calling, 'Liz? And is that you, Jake? O-group time. Come and get your orders.'

Heading for the house, suddenly Liz found herself hating it all.

But especially hating her weird talent, her telepathy. And more clearly than ever she understood why most E-Branch espers thought of their skills as curses. Again and again her condemnation of herself rang in her mind, but she heard it as an accusation, as if spoken by Jake: 'Sneaking in my mind like a thief! - like a thief!- like a thief!' And she hated it, yes. For the fact of the matter was that Liz valued him far too much for that. And not only psychically, either...

Then it was Monday.

By midday an observation post had been set up on the single approach road that angled up the mountain to Xanadu. In a tree-shrouded lay-by, it looked like a party of picknickers was enjoying the view and the mountain air. A table had been set up, and a small barbecue stand sent up smoke f rom where it stood on the stump of a tree. Cubes of meat sizzled on skewers, and a camera and six-pack of beer sat on the table. Two of the cans had been opened, one of which lay on its side. All very 'casual.'

Three men in light summer clothes ran the show. One of them was sitting in the car with the windows rolled down, apparently listening to the radio. In fact he was using a radio, or would be when it was required. Another soldier sat at the table, 'casually' watching the road where it zig-zagged up into the wooded heights. He wore binoculars round his neck but only rarely used them. The third member of the team carried a guitar. He perched on a stool in the shade of a pine, his broad- brimmed hat givin g him a li ttle extra cover as he strummed an inadequate, mainly tuneless tune out of his instrument, which was in fact capable of far more serious music. He was the team's 'minder,' and the sound- box of his guitar housed a deadly 9mm machine-pistol.

So far, the man in the car had registered their call-sign and reported their situation only once, clearly and succinctly stating that they were 'In situ ...'

Also at midday, Liz's Warrant Officer Cla.s.s Two 'Red'

Bygraves, and the tech Jimmy Harvey, had bought 'day visitor'

tickets at Xanadu's gatehouse reception desk. By I p.m., having 'cased the 469.

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joint' but oh-so-carefully, they were sunbathing on opposite sides of the main pool. Both men had taken an armful of local morning newspapers with them, with front-page spreads that dealt with the incursion of Asiatic Plague; these had been left in strategic locations where they were bound to be picked up and read. Of course the resort had its own newsvending outlets; Trask's news-sheet ploy was intended as a supplementary incentive once his evacuation scheme got in gear.

As for the scheme: that was simplicity itself.

At precisely 1:15 p.m. Bygraves got up and strolled round to Harvey's side of the pool, stepping carefully around or over the many tanned bodies lounging there. The two men were 'total strangers/ of course. Jimmy Harvey saw Bygraves coming, adjusted his dark gla.s.ses, and stretched his arms up above his head, letting the sun caress the pale underarm areas. And: 'Christ!' said Bygraves, going down on a knee beside him, staring at the dark, purplish blotches under Jimmy's arms.

'Eh?' Harvey sat up. 'What?'

'Sir/ said Bygraves, 'would you mind if I examined those marks, that pustule?'

'Marks?

Pustule?'

'Under your arms, sir. Because if they're what they look like...'

Harvey glanced under his arm, looked concerned. 'Is that something new?' he said.

And, 'Who are you, anyway?'

'Doctor Bygraves/ said the other, prodding beneath Harvey's left arm where he obligingly lifted it. And by now the people at the poolside were interested in what was going on. 'A doctor?' Harvey was starting to look worried.

'Specializing in communicable Asiatic diseases/ Bygraves nodded. 'I'm up here for the day, before reporting for duty in Brisbane. And while I don't want to frighten you, right now it looks like I'll have my work cut out!' He pushed Harvey's arm down by his side and asked: 'How long have you been up here?'