“What happened to the Captive? Is it stil here?”
Genemender’s whole demeanor altered. He squared his shoulders. “We wil not speak of that one,” he said. “We should begin scanning now.”
Time to flee!
I backed away from Genemender and the hovering monitors.
“Not yet. I need to know about the Captive.”
Hesitation—then, “It claims to be the last Precursor.”
“What are Precursors?”
“Creators of al life in our galaxy. The originals. They made Forerunners. They made humans. They made thousands of other species—and erased them when they felt the need. Long ago, when it became apparent that the Precursors were about to erase Forerunners, there was a war, and Forerunners erased them.”
Genemender moved his arm again, and I was surrounded by machines. No way between them!
“The ones who met us in the jungle, who filed the hal—why don’t they have any smel?” I asked.
The Lifeworker again gave me that familiar, stiff look.
“They’re not flesh, are they?” I asked. “What are they?”
“Spirit, you might say. They are al kept here,” Genemender said, pointing to the cylinders.
“Frozen inside?”
“No. Scanned, protected—neutralized. They wil not be abused by the Master Builder, or anything else.”
“They’re not here physicaly?”
He agreed, and my heart sank further. “Then the ones outside . .
.”
“Periodicaly, I rotate the records and refresh their experiences with projected walks around the compound, where they can interact.”
“You let them out?”
“I give them that impression,” Genemender said. “The only actual physical presence here is the female ape. She, too, enjoys company.”
“Where are their bodies?”
“Not essential. Scans are sufficient, and easier to control.”
“You kiled them.”
“They are no longer active, and no longer a danger.”
“They were al from Erde-Tyrene?” Suddenly al became clear.
The machines tightened their circle.
“Yes.”
They do not look strong, those machines. They were made for science, not fighting.
“It was the last command of the Librarian, conveyed to this instalation when it returned to the capital,” Genemender said.
“There was a good reason humans from Erde-Tyrene were not brought to the Halo instalations. They contain the memories and life experiences of ancient warriors. That makes them dangerous, and on such a weapon as this—”
Move.
The old spirit rose up with furious strength and took charge of my arms and legs. I kicked and flailed at the machines. They backed away, and I launched myself at the Forerunner, screaming with a rage so old it might have been kindled on Charum Hakkor itself, in those last days.
Then—a startling thing happened. For a moment, the Forerunner was not standing before me. My blows did not land. I flew into empty air, to strike the floor beyond and rol to my feet.
The machines now kept their distance.
Then, the Forerunner reappeared, off to one side—but while his body took a shimmering shape, I saw something else through the shimmer: a monitor with a single dul blue eye.
Then, Genemender was back, as solid as ever, regarding me with what might have been perplexity, or sadness.
“You’re dead, too, aren’t you?” I said.
No answer.
“Did you die to defend the preserve?”
No answer.
“You’ve explained everything to me. Why?”
Stil no answer. I jumped toward the image again, but it swiftly shifted away, flickering uncertainly.
“You can’t lie,” I said. “You’re just a machine—an ancila.”
The same steady, sad gaze. “Once, I was a Lifeworker. I chose this fate rather than serve the Master Builder.”
“But you can’t actualy do anything to me without my permission, can you?”
“I offer peace. I offer an end to questions that cannot be answered. And I am bound to carry out the Librarian’s final instructions.”
But the machines stil did not move in.
“How do you know the instructions came from the Librarian?”
Again the shimmer.
“There’s not much power left, is there? Al the power stations have been sabotaged. The beacons have been corrupted. That girl out there—was it the Librarian’s signal that sent her toward the Captive? Who commands you, realy?”
“I am sure of my instructions.” But the stiff expression remained.
“There are dead machines, dead Forerunners, everywhere,” I said. “This Halo is dead.”
“Would that it were. You refuse the honor of being archived?”
“I refuse.”
“You wish to leave?”
That did not seem to require an answer.
“Do you know what awaits you out there?”
“No.”
“It is beyond my comprehension, and so it is likely beyond yours.
Evil so vast . . . an awful misuse of al that Forerunners know and have created. Misuse of the Composer, designed once to save us al. . . . Destruction of the Mantle, and such knowledge of history that it rots a Forerunner’s soul. Yet we must serve the Librarian’s wil. Even you. You owe her your very existence.”
“Not anymore,” I said, in sudden equal partnership with the Lord of Admirals. “I’m going to leave now. Can you stop me?”
No answer, but the shimmer increased. Then there was no Genemender—only that rather smal monitor, its single blue eye dimming as I watched.
It moved back among the other machines.
I was alone, and the space with its rows of twisty cylinders filed with a silence and gloom more profound than I could bear. I spun about—and heard, from far outside, a woman screaming. It was Vinnevra, I was sure of it—accompanied by a throaty, deep roar that I immediately knew was the ape.
I had to get out of this place! I ran back along the corridor and again found a thicket of branches barring my way—branches that poked and creaked as I grabbed and pushed and puled, but would not yield.
Again, Vinnevra screamed.
I felt someone behind me—swiveled about, hands raised in defense—and saw Genemender lost in apparent melancholy. “I am unable to resolve these contradictions,” he said. “Time is short. The old human is very il. He needs immediate scanning or his imprint wil be lost.”
He walked through the barricade.
The thicket let me pass as wel.
We left the atrium of cylinders. I had no intention of alowing the monitor to do anything to Gamelpar.
Vinnevra had falen to her knees in front of the hut. Gamelpar squatted on the porch, leaning against a post. The shadow-ape was moving in circles around Vinnevra, looking left and right, swinging one arm—protecting both of them.
Vinnevra shouted, “I woke up and saw the little one—I could smel him! I touched him! But the others—I know why they don’t smel—they’re ghosts! They just vanished!”
Genemender regarded me sorrowfuly. “It is difficult maintaining appearances,” he said. “Our beautiful ape wil be sad without the others. It is our duty to keep her contented, and to welcome visitors —especialy those traveling under the Librarian’s imprint.”
This machine is both mad—and weak.
“You’re not real!” I said.
“I am equal to my responsibilities.”
More madness! Yet it obeys!
I ran over the last few meters of grass, puled up short when the ape rushed me—but stood my ground. She broke her charge, fel back on her haunches, gave another mournful, howling growl, then shook her giant fist at the sky.
Gamelpar did not appear at al wel. Leaning against a bamboo post and clutching one forearm, he looked down from the porch through rheumy, discouraged eyes.
Vinnevra had seen and touched Riser—and smeled him. He wasn’t an ilusion, wasn’t stored here in the twisted cylinders with al the others. But where was he, then? Did he even want to be associated with me?
That was too disturbing a thought, so I switched problems and tried to think through the motivations of this machine. It was a folower of the Librarian—or so it claimed. And so had I been— until now, perhaps.
“You are here to support the integrity of the Librarian’s specimens,” I said.
“And to prevent those of you from Erde-Tyrene from taking over this instalation.”
“Does that seem at al possible? Is there anything left to take over?”
The monitor hummed again.
“Al that’s left is our integrity and our survival,” I persisted. “To make any decision about where we might best survive, where it’s best for us to go—to fulfil the wishes of the Librarian—we need to know what’s real and what isn’t.” For a moment, I almost felt like my old self, persuading the gulible back in Marontik to part with their meager wealth.
The monitor continued to hum, no doubt hampered by its declining power. Finaly, it rose slightly and said, “That is a reasonable request. There is no contrary evidence, nor any recent instruction to prevent compliance.”
A shimmering veil seemed to rise from the field and the jungle around us. The entire compound suddenly became ragged and il- used. The huts—even the one in which we had stayed—were revealed as shabby and poorly maintained. The grassy field was overgrown—which explained the feeling of damp up my calves.
“It is good to be of real use,” the monitor said. “Are we useful?”
“Yes,” I said, distracted by the condition of the compound. “For now.”
Then, for a moment—a few seconds only—the compound returned to its former state. Many people emerged from the tree line, from the circle of huts—the Denisovans, the long-headed females who had served us food, the many, many varieties that had given me a strange glimmer of hope that al was not lost for humans on this broken wheel.
They seemed to want to gather, to apologize, to explain— But the power was weak at best. The veil rose again, and just as dawn light caught the wispy clouds above, they al faded. The huts were revealed again as ruins, the jungle as an ominous wal of trees and advancing creepers, working hard to reclaim the field.
I thought of the blue lady in my armor, of the services that ancilas supplied to their masters, of the strange presences within the war sphinxes that had taken us across the inner lake of Djamonkin Crater to the Didact’s growing star boat. . . .
And then, of the ghost or ghosts inside me. For a sudden dizzying moment, I feared that my body would twist up in a knot like some forlorn haunt—that I myself would turn out to be long dead, had died in the custody of the Master Builder around the San’Shyuum quarantine world—perhaps even as far back as on Charum Hakkor, on the parapet overlooking the pit where the Captive had once been held in a timelock. . . .
Perhaps I had already been stored away by the Forerunners and was no more real or solid than Genemender or the Denisovans.
But I would not just let my soul fling itself about in my skul and then fly apart. I could not accept that I was part of this awful deception—this awful, necessary, caring deception mounted to serve the Librarian.
The great, gentle shadow-ape, who had immediately taken a shine to Gamelpar and Vinnevra, and even now was protecting them, must have known al along. The deception had never fooled her. It had not fooled Vinnevra. And I had thought she was just exhibiting prejudice!
It had not fooled Riser.
Only I had been taken in. I had to start thinking more clearly.
Everything on this wheel was deception, and whatever the Librarian had wanted for us had been perverted, turned deadly—or worse.
You still believe in the Librarian, deep inside. You are still afraid to be alone, without family or friends. . . . And yet that is your natural condition, no? A thief. A con artist. What if being alone is the only way you can survive?
I slapped the side of my head until my jaw stung. I wanted to reach inside my head and pluck out that miserable, ancient voice.
“I can never be alone with you here, can I?” I murmured, then looked back at the blue-eyed monitor, trying to decide what to believe, of al the information I had been fed, and what to throw aside. “The real Forerunners are gone, aren’t they?” I asked it.
“I know nothing of their present plans. The communications have stopped, since the last message that warned us to look for you, to expect you.”
“And are you sure that message was sent by the Librarian?”
“Not now. No.”
“But you complied because you had no other instructions.”
“Correct.”
The Librarian’s servants had tried to do their best, but for how long? And now, even that had failed, leaving only this monitor and a few others, no longer in evidence—occupying the almost deserted plateau—and the shadow-ape.
“We have to leave,” I said, my voice choking.
“Where wil you go?”
“Anywhere but here.”
“That is not wise. Al your efforts on behalf of the Librarian wil be doomed—”
“I serve no Forerunner,” I insisted, knowing how much of a lie that stil was. The conflict was sharply painful. “Wil you try to stop us?”
“The old one is too sick to travel. Al of you need to be scanned.”
I looked up on the porch at Gamelpar.
“You can make him healthy again,” I said. “Forerunners can work miracles!”
“We preserve, we protect, but we do not extend. The way of the Librarian is folowed in al aspects. We wil scan him and archive him, but that is al we can do.”
“No!” the old man cried out, struggling to push himself to his feet.
“I wil die free. Do not let them do this to me! I must leave this place forever.”
Vinnevra clambered up the steps and knelt beside Gamelpar, while the shadow-ape rose to her ful height and stood between them and the monitor. The old man accepted Vinnevra’s embrace with a pained expression, then pushed her gently aside. His eyes looked down between the bamboo poles. He could barely see me, so I stepped closer.