Читать книгу The Puzzler’s War - Eyal Kless - Страница 21

I t materialised out of the darkness, slowly and from afar, and I knew what it was even before it filled my entire field of vision. I have heard Vincha tell me about it in detail, even though she herself never saw it and only relayed Rafik’s story secondhand. Nevertheless, here I was, standing, mesmerised, in front of a puzzle wall, or perhaps the Great Puzzle Wall Rafik had mentioned. Hundreds, no, thousands of strange symbols raced before my eyes in all directions. How someone, even a Puzzler, could find a pattern within this chaos was beyond me.

I reached out, my arm extending farther than my eyes could see, and stopped a symbol with my finger. It felt cool but vibrant. I extended my other arm and after several attempts and failures managed to stop a similar symbol, not the exact same, but close enough in resemblance.

Now what?

Symbols kept floating all around my hands, but I knew that if I let go of the ones I was holding I would lose them all.

Suddenly another symbol changed course, slowly moving to the one I was holding and attaching itself to it with a mental click. Soon after another symbol moved on its own accord towards the three I was holding, as if someone else was helping me from beyond the wall. When the pattern was complete it shimmered and detached itself from the wall completely. The symbols spanned before me to create a metal double door. They slid apart and I stepped forward and into the chamber of the Leviathan. I saw Galinak sitting, examining his machine gun in his lap. He did not acknowledge me or look at the doors. My own body was lying motionless, but in this reality I was wearing the helmet. My transparent image drew closer to my body until we merged into one.

A little later I woke up.

Galinak turned his head towards me. Maybe he asked something, but I was already in the process of fastening the helmet on my head. Like waking up from a vivid dream, the images were slowly fading from my mind, and I had no idea how long they would linger.

The Leviathan sprang back to life, and I let my hands move and touch the transparent screens around me. Galinak put his own helmet on, but this time he took care not to touch anything.

We could both hear a hissing noise.

“What’s that?” Galinak’s voice rang inside my head as I somehow established a link between us.

“How long was I out?” I asked, more to keep him from distracting me with questions than anything else.

“Not long, but you were out cold. What are you doing?”

“Not sure, but I know what to do.” I touched two transparent buttons and turned a dial.

“That is a contradi—”

The music caught both of us by surprise.

“Whoa.” Galinak grabbed the seat with one hand. “What is that?”

“I think it is the music Rafik and Vincha used to listen to,” I said, still fiddling with the numbers on my screen. “It’s called Beethoven.”

Galinak sat motionless for a while. “Rust,” he finally muttered, “that was what we heard when Vincha was strapped to that chair. Rust, that half-man Jakov was a piece of work.”

I nodded but kept fiddling with the buttons as the music grew louder. Jakov was the weapons merchant who had stolen Rafik and sold him to the Keenan guild. Years later he returned with us to the City Within the Mountain, hoping to reestablish a supply route, or perhaps looking for redemption. He got neither.

“I’m trying to find a way in,” I said. “There is a pattern I need to latch on to and then we can establish a link with Tarakan, but I need to find the right channel. It involves delicate fine tuning.”

“And you know how to do this because …?”

I stopped myself from turning my head towards him. “I dreamt it. No, don’t ask. Find out what is going on outside instead, but don’t … touch … anything.”

As the music grew louder Galinak turned his head left and right, seeing through the metal wall of the Leviathan. “They established a perimeter around us,” he informed me, his voice growing into a shout as the music became almost unbearably loud. “Two snipers with long rifles on either side, the rest spread out. Guess they’ll wait us out. Bukra’s balls, how long is this gonna take?”

It took a lot of willpower not to throw the helmet off my head as the music got louder and louder.

“Getting there,” I shouted back, but Galinak unfastened his own helmet and took it off his head.

Suddenly the music ceased and Rafik’s face filled my field of vision.

“Hello,” he said.

I leaned back in my seat and let out a long sigh.

Rafik nodded in approval. “You did well.”

“Well? We did well?” My inner voice was rising with every word I uttered. “We woke up in a room filled with poisonous air and no idea what to do and where to go. You bet we did well, no thanks to you.”

Rafik remained calm. “We did not expect such a malfunction in transmitting you, but these things were bound to happen over time, even with Tarakan technology.”

Galinak watched me solemnly. Without the helmet he could not hear the conversation.

I turned to him. “It’s them,” I whispered and motioned at his helmet.

“Rust ’em,” he muttered. “I don’t want to hear anything they have to say. You talk to them and tell me the gist of it afterwards. Besides, the Dwaines might find a way inside. Someone should take watch.” He turned and left the cabin before I could react.

“Perhaps it was more than that?” I said to Rafik, turning back on my chair. “You told me this Mannes was dangerous. Maybe this was sabotage?”

“This is also a possibility within the realm of reason.” When I did not respond Rafik added, “I see you got yourself some gear. That is good.”

I could understand Galinak’s reaction. We had been cheated by the Tarkanians, only to be forced to work for them again and almost be killed before we even started. Now we were stuck inside a Sky Bird, surrounded by the hostile Dwaines, and none of that seemed to register with Rafik. The whole situation was infuriating.

“We managed to reconstruct the vessel, or body, the hibernating agent was downloaded into,” Rafik ploughed on.

A picture of a woman appeared in front of my eyes.

“Doesn’t look like much,” I commented without thinking.

“Don’t let appearances fool you,” Rafik admonished. “Luckily for you, this is not a full combat vessel, but Colonel Major Vera Geer is a veteran of many battles. She is one of our most experienced operatives, capable and dangerous, and she has a two-month head start on you.

“If Cain takes control and extracts the code from Emilija it would allow him even deeper access into Adam. There is no telling how much damage he could do, but it would be severe, perhaps even lethal.”

“So, you want us to find Emilija and bring her back to you.”

“And if at all possible, eliminate Mannes Holtz.”

“If possible …” I stopped myself from pointlessly arguing. Instead, I changed the subject. “How did I know how to do”—I gestured all around us—“all of this? The dream, the puzzle wall …”

“When Tarakan began cloning agents, we used to grow their bodies filled with hardware, but it didn’t take the others long to realise this and they began scanning for it. Hardware was too easy to spot. We needed a different method to send information to our operatives. One which did not involve detectable hardware.”

“Dreams? You communicate in dreams?”

“Brain waves, thoughts, they are but a shot of neurons, an electric pulse. Too weak to be transmitted under normal conditions, but when biological humans sleep deeply enough, the brain becomes much more susceptible, and with some DNA manipulation and mental practice it could be a reliable, effective tool.”

Rafik correctly interpreted my expression because he added, “No, we cannot read your minds, control your actions, or even send you complex orders. The subconscious cannot be fully controlled like that.”

“So every time I want to talk to you I should find a bed?”

“No. This time you fell into a deep sleep with a definite problem on your mind. We were trying to find you and we managed to do just that, but it doesn’t work every time. You should just be aware we may try to contact you. It is part of how you were made, how you are wired, so it might get easier with time.”

“Rust,” I cursed, it was almost too much to sink in. “What now?”

“Find Vincha’s daughter. Your best course of action is to find Vincha herself and convince”—Rafik tilted his head slightly—“or coerce her to lead you to her daughter.”

“You want me to look for Vincha again?” I couldn’t help but laugh at the irony of it.

Rafik ignored my reaction. “Vincha is not in the City of Towers, and she does her best to reduce her communication presence, but from the few activities she was unable to cover, we believe she operates along a long stretch of a Tarakan highway, not too far from the city itself.”

“It is still a very large area to look for a woman who does not want to be found.”

Rafik’s deep eyes found mine. “It’s a good start.”

“Galinak is not going to like this idea. Neither will Vincha, if we find her, to put it mildly.”

Rafik’s face didn’t show any sign of sympathy as he said, “Deal with it as you need to, but bring the girl to us.”

“Fine.” I was getting tired of this. “Anything else? I need to deal with an angry Troll and an entire tribe of Secluders who are as pissed as hell.”

“Actually, yes, there is more. Mannes had a personal log in his brain amp—all high-ranking Tarkanians used to have it. With all but the furthest communication devices down, it took a long time but we managed to reconstruct some of the data that was transmitted before it abruptly stopped. Only a severe head trauma or a very delicate medical operation could stop an amp from transmitting. That’s why we concluded the man died but now we know he lived, so he must have found a way to physically remove the brain amp from his head.”

“That must have been a painful experience.”

“We deemed it improbable that anyone could survive such a process.”

“But he did. Score two for this Mannes, if you count the Catastrophe as a win.”

“You should watch this as long as we are in direct communication.” Rafik’s image began to blur slowly. “You should know who you are up against.”