Cosmopath, p.1
Cosmopath, page 1
Praise for Eric Brown
“Eric Brown’s Helix is a classic concept—a built world to dwarf Rama and Ringworld—a setting for a hugely imaginative adventure. Helix is the very DNA of true SF. This is the rediscovery of wonder.”
Stephen Baxter
“Eric Brown is the name to watch in SF.”
Peter F. Hamilton
“Eric Brown joins the ranks of Graham Joyce, Christopher Priest and Robert Holdstock as a master fabulist.”
Paul di Filippo
“Kéthani’s beauty is in its simplicity—by never attempting to aim above its height, it attains a kind of self-contained allure that is almost impossible to ignore. This is surely one of Brown’s breakthrough stories, an achievement that highlights the extensive talents of an author destined, like his characters, for something far greater.”
SciFi Now
“There is always something strikingly probable about the futures that Eric Brown writes... No matter how dark the future that Eric Brown imagines, the hope of redemption is always present. No matter how alien the world he describes, there is always something hauntingly familiar about the situations that unfold there.”
Tony Ballantyne
“SF infused with a cosmopolitan and literary sensibility... accomplished and affecting.”
Paul J. McAuley
“Helix is equal parts adventure, drama and wonder. Sometimes they work alone, providing a raw dose of science fiction. Other times, Brown uses them in concert to spin an irresistible blend that pulls the narrative along almost faster than you can keep up. However it’s served, Helix is a delightful read and is an excellent reminder of why we read science fiction: it’s fun!”
SF Signal
“Classic science-fiction components and a general reverence for science make this tale of intergalactic travel a worthy, occasionally awe-inspiring read... Brown’s spectacular creativity creates a constantly compelling read... a memorable addition to the genre.”
Kirkus Reviews
“Helix is essentially a romp—a gloriously old-fashioned slice of science fiction... What gives the novel a unique spin is its intertwining parallel plots. It’s smart, fun, page-turning stuff, with an engaging cast and plenty of twists... A hugely entertaining read.”
SFX Magazine
“The parallel plotting lends the novel much of its energy with Brown alternating his focus from one chapter to the next and often leaving each thread on a cliff-hanger. The other thing that Brown does well is balance the big concepts with the character drama... Brown’s prose is very readable... You’ll have a good time with it.”
Deathray Magazine
“Brown concentrates on stunning landscapes and in the way he conveys the conflicting points of view between races... No matter how familiar each character becomes, they continue to appear completely alien when viewed through the opposing set of eyes. Brown has a casual and unpretentious style and... the accessibility, the tenderness between characters and more importantly the scale of wonder involved are what makes this highly enjoyable escapism.”
Interzone
“Eric Brown is a masterful storyteller. Helix is put together extraordinarily well, jumping between the POVs of Hendry and Ehrin, holding back on key bits of information and delaying inevitable moments with leaps of perspective timed precisely to make us want to read to the end. It’s a fun read... the action is all worked through with great finesse... All the elements are here for something great: a massive construct, first contact with an alien species, an autocratic government... Eric Brown is often lauded as the next big thing in science fiction and you can see why...”
Strange Horizons
COSMOPATH
A BENGAL STATION NOVEL
ERIC BROWN
Also by Eric Brown
Novels
Jani and the Greater Game
Murder at the Loch
Murder at the Chase
Salvage
Satan’s Reach
The Serene Invasion
Murder by the Book
Starship Seasons
Helix Wars
The Devil’s Nebula
The Kings of Eternity
Guardians of the Phoenix
Cosmopath
Xenopath
Necropath
Kéthani
Helix
New York Dreams
New York Blues
New York Nights
Penumbra
Engineman
Meridian Days
Novellas
Reunion on Alpha Reticuli II
Sacrifice on Spica III
Famadihana on Fomalhaut IV
Starship Spring
Starship Winter
Gilbert and Edgar on Mars
Starship Fall
Revenge
Starship Summer
The Extraordinary Voyage of Jules Verne
Approaching Omega
A Writer’s Life
Collections
Rites of Passage
Strange Visitors
The Angels of Life and Death
Ghostwriting
Threshold Shift
The Fall of Tartarus
Deep Future
Parallax View (with Keith Brooke)
Blue Shifting
The Time-Lapsed Man
First published 2009 by Solaris
an imprint of Rebellion Publishing Ltd,
Riverside House, Osney Mead,
Oxford, OX2 0ES, UK
www.solarisbooks.com
ISBN (epub): 978-1-84997-158-4
ISBN (mobi): 978-1-84997-159-1
Cover by Jon Sullivan.
Copyright © 2009 Eric Brown.
All rights reserved.
The rights of the authors to be identified as the authors of this work have been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owners.
This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.
This novel is for the Pickerel Regulars; Chris Beckett, Una McCormack, Philip Vine and Ian Whates
ONE
THE KORTH ASSASSIN
VAUGHAN WAS THREE days into a routine murder investigation when the assassin came after him with a pulse-gun.
The monsoon rains were late this year and it was another sultry day on Bengal Station. Soon the seasonal downpour would drop unannounced from the heavens, deluging the top level and sluicing away the accumulated filth of months. Until then the heat would remain intolerable and the mood of the citizens increasingly fraught. The humidity incubated anger, and hair-trigger tempers tripped at the slightest provocation. Vaughan had been working for the Kapinsky Agency long enough to know that the crime rate spiked in the weeks leading up to the first rains. It was never his favourite time of year.
He sat at a table on the terrace of the Kit-Kat Bar overlooking Silom Road, a glass of ice-cold Blue Mountain beer before him. He tapped the keys of the handset on his left wrist, enabling his tele-ability, and instantly the minds of those around him flared into life.
Four days ago a high-class prostitute had been stabbed to death in an alley off Silom Road. The death of another working girl would have passed unnoticed, and uninvestigated, had she not been the favourite of someone high up in the government. The Kapinsky Agency had been called in to bring the killer to justice, and Lin had dropped the case in Vaughan’s lap.
The other telepaths in the agency had ragged him about the job, but Lin had known what she was doing. Six years ago Vaughan’s wife Sukara had left Thailand, where she had been a working girl in a Bangkok brothel, and now she taught English to the girls who worked the escort agencies around Silom Road. She had known the murdered woman, and put Vaughan into contact with the woman’s friends who might otherwise have been suspicious of an official investigator.
He’d talked to the women, and scanned them, but come up with nothing.
Now he scanned at random, on the off chance that he might happen upon some stray thought, conscious or subconscious, that might lead him in the right direction. He flitted through minds close by, dipping for memories of the dead woman. She was known in the bar, but no one working or drinking here today knew anything about her death. The escort agency had its base next door, in the polycarbon high-rise that soared like a scimitar into the cloudless blue sky. Vaughan moved through the minds of the women there, quickly, not wanting to mire himself in the short-term memories of working prostitutes: some had known the murder victim, and many were grieving. In the penthouse suite, Vaughan came across the pulsing collective signature of an orgy: four respected Indian politicians and a dozen Thai and Indian women were working up a sweat in the air-conditioned, mattress-lined room reserved for gold-chip customers. One of the men had been the dead girl’s patron, now sublimating his grief with the energetic assistance of his next favourite.
Vaughan withdrew his probe, despite the first stirrings of arousal—or perhaps because of them. These situations were common in his line of work, and he felt like a voyeur.
He touched a control on his handset and mind-silence sealed over him. He wondered if it were guilt that moved him to dial Sukara’s code.
“Jeff!” She beamed up from his metacarpal screen. ”How’s it going?”
“Slowly. Are you at the hospital yet?”
“Daddy!” Li’s round face pushed Sukara from the frame and giggled at him. She looked better than she had for days, the waxy pallor gone from her cheeks. “We going to see doctor!”
Sukara appeared again. “I’m just in the grounds. I’ll call you when we’ve seen Dr Chang.” She peered past him. “Are you in a bar, Mr Vaughan?”
He smiled. “All in the line of work.”
She laughed. “Love you, Jeff. Bye.”
It’s nothing, he told himself for the hundredth time that day. Li had been sick for a week, listless and lacking appetite. He’d put it down to the time of year, but Sukara had taken Li to see their local medic who’d recommended a specialist, just to be on the safe side. Vaughan wished he’d been present at the examination, in order to discern the truth behind the medic’s bland platitudes.
He’d reassured Sukara that there was nothing to worry about, and wished he could convince himself.
“Mr Vaughan?”
He looked up. A gamin Thai street-kid, about fourteen, bandy-legged and flat-chested, squinted at him in the blazing sun.
Vaughan was taken back years, to the time he’d first met Sukara’s sister, Tiger. This kid was her double.
He smiled. “How can I help?”
The girl made a nervous knot of her fingers. “Ah, you Sukara’s husband, no?”
“That’s right.”
“You investigate murder of Kia, no?”
Vaughan sat up. “Right again. Why don’t you sit down and I’ll get you a drink?”
The kid winced as a flier screamed overhead, violating airspace. She slipped into the seat opposite and Vaughan ordered a mango lassi from a passing waiter. Her face was slick with sweat.
If the girl knew Sukara, then that meant she was a prostitute. Surreptitiously, below the level of the table, he enabled his tele-ability. The girl’s psyche swamped him. He fielded the emanation, damped it down, and was surprised to learn that the kid was eighteen.
“You knew Kia, right?” he asked.
Her grief leapt at him. Images of Kia and the kid—her name was Lula—strolling through in the park were uppermost in her mind; deeper, and Vaughan saw the images of her everyday work, the abuse she had suffered recently. He shut them out.
“Kia and me, we good friends. Like sisters. She knew man, regular customer. He frightened her, said he was going to kill her...”
He probed. The first thing he came across was the fact that she knew he was a telepath; she had debated coming to him with this information, at once not wanting him reading her secrets, but compelled to tell him what she knew.
And what pitiful secrets... She’d stolen a necklace from the market last week, when she had no money; she’d enjoyed sex with a young man who treated her well... Vaughan felt a sudden upwelling of emotion and incipient tears stung his eyes.
She also knew what Sukara had told her: that she, Sukara, had once been a working girl, and now she was married to the finest man in the world. The kid thought it a fairy story, hardly believed it could be true, and Vaughan read in her juvenile mind the doubt that any relationship between a man and a woman could be as good as Sukara claimed.
“This man...?” he prompted.
He captured the image of the guy as it surfaced in her mind: a well-dressed Indian business-man.
“His name is Mr Narayan...” she began, but Vaughan had already read that, and more.
Narayan owned a bar off Silom Road, a plush sex club catering for the half a dozen alien races which stopped off at the Station spaceport. Narayan had hired Kia’s services once a week, then tried to lure her into working for him. When she’d refused, saying she didn’t want to work with Ee-tees, he’d beaten her and threatened her life.
The kid recounted all this to Vaughan between sips of lassi, and he nodded and let her go on. Whether Narayan was her killer remained to be seen, but it was his first lead in three days.
She faltered, then said, “Mr Vaughan...?”
He reached across the table and laid a hand on hers. “Kia wasn’t in pain. It happened so quickly. She didn’t even know she’d been attacked.”
The girl’s wide eyes leaked big tears and she bit her lip, nodding.
He was aware of her next question forming, and pre-empted it, “Of course I love Sukara. She’s a very special person. We... we went through a lot together.”
“Sukara, she say, you saved her life.”
He smiled. In reality, Sukara had saved his life. He said, “We saved each other, Lula.”
She said, “Maybe I’ll find someone, one day, no?”
Vaughan nodded. “I think the boy you know, Ajay—he’s a good person.”
She beamed. “You think so? So do I!”
He read her joy as she stood up, making to go. Vaughan stopped her. He took out his wallet and offered her a hundred baht note.
She stared at the money, then murmured, “I don’t want paying for telling you about Mr Narayan. I did it for Kia—”
“I think Kia would like you to buy the dress you were looking at the other day. Didn’t she always say you suited red?”
Lula smiled and took the note, then waved and slipped from the terrace. Seconds later she was lost in the crowd surging along the street.
He sipped his drink, leaving his tele-ability enabled. He was aware that the orgy next door had played itself out; the politicians returning to the senate while the girls took showers or counted their earnings.
He spoke into his handset and got through to a female-voiced computer program at the agency. “What can you tell me about a Mr Narayan, the owner of the Blue World Bar, Silom Road?”
“One moment, please.”
The reply came a second later. “Rajeesh Narayan, forty-five, Indian national, resident of Bengal Station. Criminal record for illegal transference of cash, illicit narcotic substances. Address: Penthouse suit, Blue World Bar, Silom Road, Trat Mai sector.”
“Anything else?” he asked.
“Negative.”
He cut the link and looked along the street. The crowd surged down the thoroughfare like some multiheaded Chinese dragon, accompanied by a miasma of conflicting emotions. He was about to deactivate when he sensed something: a hundred metres to his left, he came across an area of mind-static, which indicated a citizen wearing a mind-shield. He glanced up and caught a quick glimpse of someone staring at him. Seconds later the fluid movement of the crowd concealed the watcher.
He’d seen enough, though, to recognise the alien: a tall, jade-green humanoid from Tau Ceti III. What did they call themselves? The Korth.
He wondered at an Ee-tee wearing a mind-shield. The fact was that the workings of alien minds were so abstruse as to be unreadable by human telepaths. He wondered if this one was taking no chances—or if he, Vaughan, was being paranoid. Had the alien actually been looking at him?
He scanned, but found no evidence of the mind-static, and told himself not to be so uptight. The alien had evidently moved off, out of range.
He deactivated, relaxed into the resultant silence, and finished his drink.
Two minutes later he quit the terrace and slipped into the crowded street, making for the alley and Narayan’s sex club.
Silom Road stretched from one corner of the Station to the other, a main arterial through-way connecting the rich Thai suburbs of the north-eastern sector to the spaceport. The raised railway ran parallel, along which white trains strobed like torpedoes; overhead, the din of the crowd was frequently drowned out by the scream of fliers criss-crossing the Station at five times the speed of sound.
He reckoned he had another half-kilometre to walk when his handset chimed. He accessed the call, assuming it was Sukara.
Instead, Lin Kapinsky’s thin face stared up from the screen. “Jeff, where are you?”
