Chapter 9

Magnus Crane laid in a steaming tub, absent-mindedly watching the seething hum of Grid 1 out the 99th story window of his darkened penthouse bathroom. At this time of night, the many high-rises and skyscrapers of the district scintillated with light, beating out complex rhythms of color that danced across their surfaces. At times, shapes from one would dance to another, then another, then fade before repeating again somewhere else.

It was a beautiful novelty of a thing, provided one didn’t watch the entire thing every night. After a few dozen evenings, the light performances would repeat, following the same nightly procession as before, with absolute regularity. Month after month, the same thirty or so light shows. Over, and over, and over again. At this point, he’d memorized every one through sheer repetition.

Next, lotus blossoms on the Exchequer. Petals flow to the Vault of Order and the TransCorp Press Office. All across a field of clouds and blue. Cut to black.

He boredly lifted the glass in his off-hand to his lips as he watched the pattern play out. Blooms. Petals. Clouds. Each in its order, their light drowning out the faint glow of the emotions he lay in.

When all faded to black, for a brief moment the light from the tub reflected off the interior of the plate glass in front of him. In the dim reflection of the bathroom, a towering figure draped in white loomed a few feet behind him.

Magnus gasped and spun around at the unexpected presence, sloshing luminescent bathwater all over the marble tile and nearly spilling his liquor.

The Conductor of the Silent Choir stared down at him, the faint glow of the bath reflecting in the flawless scarlet of her mask. This was far from the first time he’d seen the Conductor in person. Every time still filled him with a dread that went far beyond rational thought. That she made a habit of appearing inside perfectly secure places without tripping a single security measure or making a single decibel of sound certainly did not help. They stared at each other for a long moment before Magnus spoke.

“I’ve told you how much I despise your unannounced arrivals,” He said with irritation, bringing his drink to his lips again.

The Conductor loomed still and silent for long enough to make Magnus uncomfortable. Then she raised a red-gloved hand and made a series of sharp, elegant gestures with her fingers in the sign-speech of the Choir.

Your displeasure has been noted.

Magnus chose to ignore the sarcasm. He set the glass down on the marbletop table beside him and leaned back further into the tub, soaking in the gentle tingle from the confidence swirling in the mixture.

“I assume there is a purpose for your visit,” He said dryly.

The Conductor did not respond. She simply turned and looked in the direction of the bathroom’s entrance. Seconds later, the penthouse’s doortone chimed.

Another unexpected visitor.

Lovely.

He reached out and pressed a recessed button in the tub’s side.

A tone sounded. Then a genteel voice spoke.

“Yes, Mr. Crane?”

“Lawrence, who is at the door?”

“It appears to be Praetor-General Caliban, sir,” the voice replied. “Shall I send him in to you?”

Magnus adjusted his posture to a more sitting position, giving the Conductor a sidelong glance as he did so.

“Yes, directly. Thank you, Lawrence.”

“Of course, sir,” the voice said. The connection ended.

Magnus drew in a deep breath, then let it out.

“I have a feeling the two of you are about to ruin my evening,” he said.

The Conductor held his gaze, but said nothing.

After a moment, two sets of footsteps approached, then stopped at the bathroom door. There was a knock.

“Come,” Magnus said, straightening.

Lawrence strode into the room first, the glow of the Grid and bath shining off the polished chrome of his body and head. One of the few 5th-generation gearoids in existence, he would have been otherwise indistinguishable from human, had Magnus chosen to give him hair and synth-skin. The choice not to had been deliberate. Synthetic life deserved to be marveled at for its own merits, not for its ability to mimic its creators.

The man behind Lawrence stepped around into view. Praetor-General Caliban was not a tall man, nor was he broad. What he lacked in physical stature, however, he compensated for in sheer force of will. Chief officer of the city’s enforcer legions had typically been a difficult position to fill. Except in Caliban’s case. He carried himself with a self-assured authority that made even the most arrogant dilettante fall in line with little more than a glance. He walked within a couple steps of the tub, giving the Conductor a wide berth. He assumed a formal posture, pointedly keeping his gaze focused solely on Magnus’s face.

“Good evening, excellency. I trust I’m not interrupting anything important,” He said.

“Hardly,” Magnus said, waving the comment away. “Given that our friend here decided to arrive about sixty seconds before you did, I assume you must have something important on your mind.”

Caliban gave the Conductor a sideward glance, then nodded crisply.

“I thought it best that you saw this immediately.”

He stepped forward, offering a thin wafer of what looked like glass. Magnus took the wafer in and slid it into the datapad on the side table. With a few button presses, the datapad’s holo-projector flared to life. It projected a flat, two-dimensional screen into the air a few feet away from Magnus’s face. Evidently, whoever recorded the video hadn’t bothered to set the remote viewer to three-dimensional intake.

The video was cut together from two different recordings, each from the forward-mounted remote-view of a Ministry transport, paired with audio from personnel audio recorders. Played side-by-side, the footage told a story.

Two sets of thieves, in possession of stolen TransCorp technology, chased down and surrounded by Ministry suppression forces in the side-lot of a storage facility. Their vehicles disabled, they disembark. One team stands and fights. The other attempts to escape before it’s surrounded. Members of both teams are cut down by enforcer fire in the process.

Under normal circumstances, this sort of thing would not merit a second glance. The company employed a thousand analysts capable of reviewing such records. Magnus was about to ask what he was supposed to be concerned about, when what happened on the screen next answered that question.

A young woman in plain clothes cowers as enforcers approach. Suddenly, every enforcer freezes, then begins to backpedal. She screams, commands them to flee. All at once, every enforcer flees. Panic, screams of their own, stumbling and falling over one another, dropping weapons. The personnel audio becomes a cacophony of confusion and panic. The feeds from each vehicle then cut to black, shortly after each begins to depart the scene at speed.

Another bit of footage plays, this time in three dimensions. One of the gang members helps the girl to her feet. They speak to the surviving members of the other gang and agree to cooperate. They load the stolen equipment into the one still-working vehicle and drive out of view. The projection ends, leaving the three of them in silence.

Magnus stared blankly at the space in the air that the projection had occupied for several long seconds. Then he leaned back into the tub and grabbed his glass.

“Well, now I know why she’s here,” he said, motioning toward the Conductor with it. Then he downed the rest of its contents in two large mouthfuls. Setting the empty glass on the table, he looked at Lawrence and motioned toward it with his head. The gearoid gave a gentle bow, scooped up the glass, and walked out of the bathroom. Magnus turned his attention back to Caliban.

“Where was this footage taken?”

“In Grid 14, about 3 hours ago.” Caliban said.

Magnus shifted in his seat.

“That’s less recently than I would have hoped,” he said, frowning.

Caliban pursed his lips and nodded as Lawrence walked past him with a full glass.

“It took some time for us to become aware of what had happened. Both fireteams ceased broadcasting for over an hour after the event. More than half abandoned their posts entirely. Those that remained are still shaken to the point of professional incapacity,” he said.

Magnus whistled, taking the cup from the gearoid. Lawrence gave a slight nod, then left.

“When’s the last time we had an alchemist do something this substantial?”

“Not since the Silencing,” Caliban said grimly.

“You’ve had at least some time with the telecasts. Tell me you’ve gotten the biometrics of the ones who got away. ID records. Something.”

Caliban nodded.

“We were able to pull biometric records for nearly everyone in the video,” He said, tapping on the screenband on his wrist. The device’s micro-projector displayed a row of images in the air. “Although, given the generally savvy nature of those involved, it’s quite likely the names and other data we have on file are fabricated. However, the girl responsible produced no hits on any database in our network. As far as the Ministry is concerned, she’s a complete non-person.”

Magnus sat back and drank.

“So, we’ve got a grade A alchemist loose in the Grid Network, and no idea where she is.”

“We have multiple leads. The vehicle they escaped in passed through the Grid 17 checkpoint, then again through Grid 19 shortly after. After that, no more pings. Records show that the vehicle they abandoned came straight from Grid 19 to 14 as well. This strongly suggests they’re lurking somewhere in that rat’s nest. Additionally, the vehicle they fled in belongs to one of the local street gangs in 14. The Black Hands. We’ve located their base of operations, and several fireteams will be storming the place shortly. Once they’re rounded up, one of them is bound to squeal, if they know where the others went.”

The Conductor pointed a finger at one of the projected faces, a man in his late twenties.

This one is known to us. He crossed the Threshold.

Magnus spat liquor across the floor.

“What do you mean he crossed?” Magnus asked. “How? When? Why was I not informed?”

“This is news to me as well,” Caliban said dryly.

The Conductor stared at Magnus, her expressionless gaze boring a hole in his own until he blanched.

“...Continue.”

Our Voices pursued him there. He chose to return rather than be taken. The girl in the video followed him through the doorway when he returned.

Magnus cursed. Then drank. Then cursed again.

“You’re certain?” He asked.

We are certain.

Magnus looked up at the ceiling, watching the shifting reflected glow of Grid light. Despite floating in a marble bath of peace and confidence, he suddenly felt very ill at ease. He took a deep breath, letting it out slow between pursed lips. He had to get ahead of this now, not a moment later. He shifted, downed the remainder of his drink, and stood, grabbing a cashmere robe dangling off a silver hook on a side of the table. Caliban made a point of averting his gaze. The Conductor did not. He threw the robe around himself and tied it tight.

“Do whatever it takes to stop them, no matter how extreme. We cannot allow another uprising.”

Caliban nodded.

“Preparations are already underway.”

The Conductor said nothing.

“Good. Dismissed.”

Caliban saluted and turned to leave.

Magnus turned and strode to the plate glass window overlooking Grid 1, watching the lights swirl and dance far below as the other two departed. Beat by beat, he predicted every next step, smiling to himself with satisfaction.

Masked hunters pursue a pair of foxes from building to building.

Arrows fly from glowing bows.

Foxes dissolve in a storm of flower petals.

Darkness.

In the momentary blackness, the reflection of The Conductor loomed a few steps behind him. Instinctively, his heart jumped into his throat. He turned to look at her.

“You’ve been dismissed,” he said.

She strode closer until she towered over him. Her fingers flicked quietly.

Your dismissal has been noted.

Magnus opened his mouth to call for help, but nothing came out. Panic gripped him. He moved to run, and stumbled over something on the floor. When he turned to look at it, bile filled his throat. The desiccated body of Praetor-General Caliban lay in a crumpled heap. It looked like every drop of fluid had been drained out of him. It was the unmistakable look of someone who’d been harvested by the Choir.

Magnus screamed silently. He ran for the door. A red-gloved hand grasped him by the back of his neck and lifted him off the ground. The Conductor turned the blubbering mess of Magnus Crane to face her.

“What are you doing?!” His lips read.

Whatever it takes, her fingers replied.

The Conductor wrapped the fingers of her other hand around Magnus’s throat. She lowered her head down until their faces were centimeters apart. Magnus’s eyes were wild, his mouth wide in a mute scream as he thrashed futilely against the Choir Master’s fingers. The Conductor hunched further over, as if forcing all of the air out of her lungs. Then she reared back, as if drawing a massive breath. As she did, something soft and luminous rose and bubbled up in the back of Magnus’s mouth, drawing partway out of it before receding back in like a rat fleeing back to its burrow. The Conductor drew another breath, and this time whatever was inside the man’s body ripped free of it with a horrible tearing sound. The luminous wisp slid underneath the bottom of The Conductor’s mask, disappearing into the void beneath. The creature dropped the empty husk of Magnus’s body to the floor.

There was a knock at the bathroom door.

“Sir, is everything alright?” The voice of Lawrence asked.

The Conductor straighted. The voice of Magnus Crane spoke from beneath her mask.

“All is well, Lawrence. Thank you,” it said.

“Of course, sir.”

The Conductor turned and scooped up the leathery piles of Magnus and Caliban. She leaned down, and one by one stuffed them under her mask, swallowing down each with a faint sucking sound. Then she bent forward. With unnerving twists and jerks, her body began to reshape itself, diminishing and reforming until, after several long moments, the pale, slightly paunchy body of Magnus Crane stood in her place. She stepped over to the pile of clean clothes near the bathroom drawer and dressed herself.

Then Magnus Crane stepped out of the bathroom, calling for Lawrence to prepare his car for departure.