Brain Plague (elysium cycle) Read online

  Xenon chimed. The sound startled Merope, who leaped down from the china closet. "We have a visitor, dear Chrysoberyl," Xenon announced. In her window appeared Daeren, standing expectantly between the outer pair of caryatids. "It's your testing day, remember?"

  She clapped a hand to her head. "Oh, right—I'll get to the hospital." What a damned nuisance.

  "We make house calls from now on," Daeren told her. "It's more comfortable all round."

  "Well, all right then. Send him up," she told the house, recovering herself. "And could you put out some refreshments?" she added. "The blue angels are here," she warned Jonquil. "No more questions."

  Daeren came up the flowing stairs between the rows of gargoyles and caryatids, their eyes swiveling after him. Chrys winced. "Xenon does our decor."

  "I'm sure as an artist you contribute."

  Chrys shook her head. "I'm an outdoors kind of person." That's why she ended up trapped in this city, she told herself sarcastically.

  Then she recalled Opal's house full of redwoods. Ideas flooded her head; she could really do her bedroom. But for now, she faced the blue angels. "Aster? The Lord of Light is here. Will you visit, and keep Jonquil dark?"

  "How's it going?" asked Daeren. "Anything I should know?"

  "Not that I can think of. Here, won't you have something?" Next door, Xenon had prepared an entire banquet table, from canapes to carved roast, including several expensive wines. Chrys looked away, embarrassed.

  "Thanks, but we don't accept anything on the job." Daeren looked her in the eye, and his irises flashed blue fireworks. His expression changed. "I'm sorry about Fern. You should have called someone; Opal would have slept over."

  Chrys lifted her chin. "I handled it myself."

  Daeren handed her a patch. She placed it at her neck, then handed it back. Daeren said, "I just wish I could have seen her before she died. I must have sounded angry most of the time, but actually I was quite fond of Fern." Opal was right, he really did get attached to the little rings. "You've done well," he said at last. "But they worry that you won't eat enough."

  "What?" Damn that Aster—no sense of discretion. "Where'd they get that idea?"

  "You're not anorexic?"

  She stared frankly. "Do I look it?" Then she remembered. "The Spirit Table. They had questions when I started serving there." Maybe the Sisters could use Xenon's banquet.

  Daeren's look softened. "The soup kitchen? The one at the tube stop?"

  "I gather these Eleutherians led a sheltered existence."

  He nodded. "We're careful what we let them see. They're supposed to think all gods are omnipotent."

  "That's bullshit."

  "It's committee policy. The theory is, they'll be easier to control."

  "Like I said." Though she herself had not been entirely candid about the weakness of the gods. "How do you control yours?" she wanted to know. "I mean, how do you make them obey?"

  "That's a very personal matter. You have to work out your own way." He hesitated. "There's always Selenite's way."

  "Executions?"

  "She sends in Sar's nanos to make an example of one, every generation or so."

  That petite woman with the black curls, a serial killer. Chrys shuddered. But then—what was the God of the Brethren, if not a serial killer? She'd try that one on her parents sometime. "Is that what you do? Executions?"

  "Mine don't give much trouble. They're mature." A likely story, pretty boy.

  Her youngest brother, Hal, she remembered suddenly. She had enough funds now to get him Plan Ten. But how long would it last? Xenon's salary alone would drain her in six months, unless her people got another contract. She had no idea how to manage money. "I hate to sound backwoods, but, what do you gods do with your credit? I mean, like, investing?"

  "You need a financial planner. Try Garnet. He lives just around the block."

  That was Lord Garnet of Hyalite. The Hyalite mansion took up several blocks. Hyalite was the most ancient of the Great Houses, having endured twenty-five centuries since the War of Purple. Chrys doubted whether Lord Garnet would care to see a starving artist. Especially one whose microbial symbionts built such shoddy buildings.

  After Daeren left, Selenite called. "Chrys," her sprite announced accusingly, "we've got a problem. Your people have uncovered a more serious structural defect than we expected." The face with the neat black curls looked grim as death.

  "Well, don't look at me. I once built a thatched cottage, when I first left home." The roof had sagged at the first snowfall. "That's about all I know of building."

  "Your people know more than enough." The way she said it, Chrys guessed her "minions" thought about as highly of her "libertines" as they thought of them. Chrys still wondered about this partnership. Selenite added, "Tomorrow afternoon we'll tell the Board."

  "The what?"

  "The Board of Directors of the Institute for Design."

  The Board of Directors met at the Comb's oldest level, the executive suite on the top floor. Below glittered all the towers of Iridis, the harbor shimmering in the late afternoon sun. Around the conference table sat a dozen lords and ladies in gray talars, as well as worm-faced engineers, one of whom wore enough emeralds to feed Dolomoth for a year. Chrys wore the one old talar she had, low-brained nanotex, now stretched thin over her Plan Ten-enhanced curves.

  She recognized Lord Zoisite, the minister of justice, often seen at Gold of Asragh. He had pledged to curb the Sapiens attacks and halt the spread of the brain plague. Even allowing for Plan Ten, his looks were striking, nearly as good as Topaz's portrait of him.

  Next to Zoisite, her window informed her, was Lord Jasper, husband of Lord Garnet of Hyalite. Chrys's eyes widened. Lord Garnet was a carrier—was Jasper? She studied Jasper's face. Distinguished, like Andra, she guessed; yet he had kept the thickened brow and flat nose of a sim. A sim, in a Great House, on a Board of Directors. He must be extra competent to have made it so far. From his neck hung a large namestone, round and polished, engrained with elaborate brown dots and tracery. Like a world one could enter into and travel along those lines; what they called in the trade a map stone.

  "The Map of the Universe!" Aster's letters pulsed feverishly. "Oh Great One, we have business with this god, business unfinished over twenty past generations."

  "Not now. Be dark." So the God of the Map Stone was here on the Board. Bad news for Eleutheria's future commission, once he saw the disaster of the Comb.

  "As you know," Selenite was saying, "Chrysoberyl of Dolomoth cultures the original line of brain enhancers from Titan." Cultures, indeed; a walking petri dish. "Chrys herself is an accomplished designer, one of the Seven Stars."

  Lord Zoisite nodded with a patrician smile. "I'm sure our new designer will be an improvement over the original."

  Chrys gave him a broad smile, the kind she reserved for well-heeled clients with questionable taste.

  From the end of the table spoke the Chair of the Board, a gentleman with a pinched expression who kept clearing his throat. "Frankly, Zoisite, we've had altogether enough 'designing.' "

  Selenite said quickly, "Chrys's brain enhancers have already given us invaluable clues to correct the fenestral development, as well as the roof integrity and several other minor points to improve the habitability of our landmark edifice. Unfortunately—or rather, fortunately for the long run—our investigation has revealed a deeper anomaly."

  The light dimmed. Above the table rose a golden honeycomb, the image of the Comb pushing up like an alpine flower in the spring. The shaft rose and widened, its crystalline windows spiraling slowly around it. Chrys imagined how this very conference room had risen over the past two years, its view ever more breathtaking.

  "The past plan of growth closely followed our projection," said Selenite. "The future, however, will be different. Based on measurements of stress, multidirectional movement, and so forth, a hundred sixty-eight factors in all, we project the following."

  As Selenite went on enumerating the
168 factors, the summit of the Comb continued to rise, but more slowly. About halfway down, the row of windows dipped and puckered in. Chrys squinted, trying to see more clearly. In the depression a shadow deepened, then suddenly gave way to blue sky. An invisible finger had pierced straight through the Comb. As the view slowly rotated and the sides of the Comb came around, Chrys could see that the hole was not so simple; there were three holes, as if one ring had sprouted another down the middle.

  "It's beautiful," insisted Jonquil. "A tripartite annulus will look most attractive."

  "Stay dark," ordered Chrys. "These gods are not carriers, nor do they care for great art. They just want a big phallic tower."

  "A unique splitting mechanism." A worm-faced engineer, whose worms all terminated as various writing implements, capped by conveniently sinking into its head. Female, according to the list. One of her implements popped out and traced a circle in the air. "Remarkably reminiscent of living development on that 'Ring World' of Prokaryon."

  The Chair was not amused. "Our attorneys advise us to sue."

  Chrys blinked. Sue whom? Herself? Her microbes?

  "Now, now," said Lord Zoisite with a gentle laugh. "Let's not be hasty. Why, the executive suite, this very conference room, will grow unchanged."

  From the engineer's head, a second worm with a lightpen popped out. Her two worms sketched vectors on the table. "We could build catwalks to link departments across the middle."

  Typical Valan planning, thought Chrys. The lower reaches of the city could split asunder, while at the top the Palace ruled on as it had for centuries.

  The Chair clasped his hands and leaned forward. "Such faulty design is entirely inexcusable."

  Lord Zoisite waved a hand. "The price of innovation. In any event, our new designer has guaranteed to correct the fault... for a fixed fee." He eyed Chrys more intently.

  Selenite leaned forward. "For our fee, we'll guarantee the first five years. After that, we offer a service contract."

  The Board members looked at each other. Lord Jasper with his map stone looked unimpressed. He must have heard the whole story from Selenite and quashed any thoughts he had about pursuing Eleutherian designs. "A building that needs a service contract?" Jasper flexed his fingers, his short thumbs meeting together. "Titan was said to build for the ages."

  Suddenly Chrys felt her pulse pounding. She had vowed to keep quiet, but the mention of a lawsuit had changed her mind. "Excuse me, I know less about building than a cold germ, but I think you're missing something. The Comb is not a fixed structure, like the pyramids. It's a living being, like a redwood tree. If you had a redwood growing in the middle of Iridis, you'd have to prune it forever."

  Lord Zoisite laughed. "A redwood in Iridis! That's it—that's the Comb."

  The engineer tucked her worms back into her head. The Chair leaned back. "We'll get a second opinion, of course," he said, his voice easing.

  Outside, alone together, Selenite took a deep breath. "We've done it, Chrys." She grinned. "We've convinced them we can do the fix."

  The air from the sea swept Chrys's face, and the warming circuit of her nanotex kicked on. "I sure hope we can."

  "My people are convinced, and so am I," Selenite assured her.

  "Can we do it, Aster?"

  The magenta voice hesitated. "We could use some help."

  "We need to recruit talent," added Jonquil. "From the wizards, and from all different peoples, of different gods. The brightest children of every generation." No wonder they always begged to visit the God of Wisdom. She wondered what Opal thought.

  "Where would I find other gods?"

  "Olympus."

  Chrys stared. She said aloud, "What's 'Olympus'?"

  "The Club Olympus," said Selenite. "We'll all be there. We have plenty to celebrate."

  Before the Club Olympus stretched a long colonnade of faux marble caryatids. Some of the draped figures had their arms outstretched; others held a piece of fruit to the mouth. All of their eyes swiveled eerily toward Chrys.

  Selenite wore black, with red and gold flames lapping ever higher. Opal wore a talar of deep blue, her gems swimming across its folds in the form of an ocean wave rising to foam, with a white moon at her breast, gradually changing phase. Any moment Chrys expected the outfit to demand a raise and a two-week vacation.

  "Chrys," Opal exclaimed, pressing her arm, "I'm so thrilled you're fixing the Comb. It will be wonderful to work without drip from the ceiling. We're all impressed. Everyone's dying to meet you." She added pointedly, "Despite the brain drain."

  The doorway of Olympus shimmered and expanded—into another world. Tree trunks arched into the virtual sky, then back to earth, like lava fountains frozen. The arched trunks were midnight blue, their foliage hung in green and yellow bangles, profuse enough to block the sun. Beside the looped foliage hovered a helicopter bird, its propeller buzzing. From beneath a tree's arch rolled a tire-shaped animal, headless and limbless, its suckers picking up from behind and rotating forward to catch the ground ahead. It took fright and sped off, like a wheel come loose from a wagon.

  "Living wheels," exclaimed Chrys.

  "It's Prokaryon," said Opal, "where the ancestral micros came from. On Prokaryon, all the creatures are living wheels. It's not so strange. Even your own mitochondria are covered with rotating energy generators, like molecular pinwheels."

  "Those trees—are they wheels too?"

  Opal nodded. "Their roots loop across underneath, and their arches sprout loopleaves. Micros inhabit the singing-trees; they make the loopleaves flash colors, to transmit their signals long-distance."

  "Or they live in us, and use human eyes." No wonder they invented the neuroports.

  Opal's arm swung forward, and a magnificent curl of gems rolled past her breast. "We humans make better transmitting towers. We're intelligent."

  In a clearing sat several Plan-Ten-polished people resplendent in gem-swirling nanotex, relaxing amid bowls of lambfruit and AZ. The chief of security glittered in pale green andradites, marching in rows around her waist. With her was an eye-stalked sentient; Sartorius, with his worms pulled in to look less repellent.

  "The Terminator," flashed Jonquil. "Turn away. We don't like to see him."

  "Mind your manners. Where's Aster?" Chrys did not care much for the doctor either, but her people had better watch their step.

  Opal and Selenite passed Andra transfer patches. Several carriers whom Chrys had not yet met held out patches to them, and to her. Everyone seemed to have their hands on someone, sending microbial visitors neck to neck. Plenty of talent to recruit, but it made Chrys uneasy, even if micros did keep the blood clean.

  Out of the forest came a caryatid, taking slow, gliding steps. Its form was a young man, pale as an Elysian, perfectly proportioned, its gaze serene. Chrys admired the face; it was well done, more sophisticated than Xenon's handiwork. Its arm held out a platter of sculpted fruits, lamb and pork flesh grown on a stem, the sort of trifle one saw for a hundred credits behind thick glass on Center Way. Chrys took one, and the taste of it went straight to her head; she weakened at the knees. How the other half a percent eats.

  Opal beckoned Chrys to sit. She and Selenite rested arm in arm beneath the brightly colored loopleaves. Selenite was already arguing with Daeren. "I'm not sure micros really are individuals, like human people," she insisted.

  Daeren wore no talar, but his black nanotex pulsed with subtle geometric forms. His face was relaxed, but his hand clenched and unclenched. "Of course they're individuals," he said quietly. "Each one has personality. A micro feels in one day what a humans takes decades to feel."

  "But they depend on us completely. Without us, they are nothing."

  "What are we humans without our planet, our atmosphere?"

  Another caryatid glided forward. This one looked faintly familiar. Chrys frowned in puzzlement. Topaz; not exactly, yet it resembled her, a boyish version. Chrys's lips parted, then she shook herself. All these strangers had her confused. And she
missed Topaz so badly. How had the show done? Topaz had not even called. At least Zircon had. She couldn't wait to see him again at Gold of Asragh.

  "Even if micros are individuals now," Selenite continued, "evolution will make them degenerate. Look how fast they mutate. Like our ancestral mitochondria, they'll start out individuals, then eventually lose most of their genes and merge with our own bodies."

  Daeren shook his head. "Mitochondrial ancestors were individual, but mindless. Mindless cells, like any ordinary microbe, at the mercy of natural selection. But micro people are intelligent. They breed their own children, correcting their genes."

  "Some of us breed them," Selenite rejoined coolly. "Some of us select which offspring to merge. We cultivate our strains for essential skills, while discarding less helpful traits. In the end, they'll merge with our own brains—true brain extensions."

  At that, Daeren did not answer. His face went blank, as if to hide his thoughts.

  Opal leaned her head on Selenite's shoulder. "The micros will change us too," she warned. "Even our mitochondria transferred their genes into our own chromosomes. On Prokaryon, the micro people bred the giant singing-trees to their desires. And now—"

  Selenite frowned. "Don't even say such things. The Sapiens will eat us alive."

  Chrys thought, she herself would eat those micros alive if they tried to mess with her genes.

  Opal leaned away and put a hand on Daeren's knee. "What about microsentients? Do you support them too?"

  His mouth lengthened slightly. "I do," he admitted.

  Selenite rolled her eyes. "So every nano-cell in every bit of plast could be a person?"

  Another caryatid approached Chrys. Servers of course were kept at a level of sentience just below what might "wake up." She admired this one's classic features. "Some water, please?" The server obligingly produced a phial of clear liquid, the taste of a Dolomite spring. For a moment Chrys closed her eyes, back to her childhood on the ash-dusted slope, at once pleasant, yet achingly sad.