Poseidon's Wake

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‘Why?’ Vasin asked. ‘What did he do, that someone had to kill him for?’

‘I have a good idea,’ Goma said. ‘Mposi told me something not long ago. You can check with Crucible, if you like, Gandhari. He was in contact with them.’

‘About what?’ Vasin asked.

‘Sabotage,’ Goma said, with a sort of flat resignation. ‘They warned him there was a possibility of it. Something on this ship — a weapon, maybe, that you don’t know about, put aboard by people who don’t want this expedition to succeed.’

‘Why didn’t he tell me?’

‘He was trying to gather more information. I don’t think he wanted to come to you with something half-baked, especially if it was a false alarm.’

‘Dear god,’ Vasin said. ‘What kind of weapon was he thinking of? What was he looking for — how much did he tell you?’

‘You had better speak to Maslin Karayan.’

‘He’s the suspect? Is that what Mposi told you?’

Goma closed her eyes. This was all too much, a surfeit of troubles over and above those she had already accepted.

‘Maybe. There’s someone else you should look at. Karayan was asking what Mposi knew about Peter Grave.’ She swallowed. ‘We see him as a Second Chancer, but he’s different from the others. There’s something about him. Even they don’t trust him.’

‘You think he killed Mposi?’ Vasin asked.

‘Why don’t you ask him?’ Goma answered.

Before the news of Mposi’s death reached the entire ship — which it was bound to do, with or without official disclosure — Vasin declared a state of emergency, a condition-yellow situation. This was wisely chosen, being only one level above the routine condition green: not serious enough to suggest that the ship or its occupants were in immediate peril, but sufficient to limit the movements of crew and passengers, and oblige everyone who was already in their cabins to remain there. It was the kind of alert that might attend a problem with the air supply, such as the presence of a mild toxin or a breakdown of the proper equilibrium of component gases. There had been a couple of condition-yellow situations since they left Crucible, and the encounter with the Watchkeeper had elevated the emergency status a whole two levels above yellow, so this development was neither unprecedented nor liable to cause panic.

‘Do you want us to return to our room?’ Goma asked Vasin.

‘No — you’re here now so you might as well stay. I can’t completely eliminate you as suspects — or anyone else, for that matter, including myself, until we have more evidence — but the fact that you were actively searching for Mposi and directed our attention to the Knowledge Room… Well, if you had murdered him — and again I am sorry that we must speak so bluntly, Goma — but if you had done it, you would not be in such a rush to bring the body to my attention.’

‘I appreciate your compassion, Gandhari,’ Goma said, ‘but he was murdered, and the only way to find out who did it is to talk about it. I might as well get used to it.’

While they waited in her quarters, Vasin’s immediate subordinates had sealed the Knowledge Room and were now sweeping the rest of the ship, with a particular view to apprehending Maslin Karayan and Peter Grave.

‘In theory,’ Vasin said, ‘the bangles’ localising function should enable us to identify the killer just by backtracking everyone’s movements and finding out who was with Mposi since you last saw him. But whoever did this clearly knew their way around both the bangles and the nanomachines in the Knowledge Room. If they could tamper with one, they could just as easily tamper with the other — concealing their movements, if necessary. Still, it looks like they were in a rush — perhaps they were not as thorough as they might have wished.’

It took under thirty minutes to find the two men and bring them both to Vasin’s quarters. Neither showed any signs of having offered resistance, but of the two, only Maslin Karayan looked like a man who had just been dragged out of bed. He had a puffy, dishevelled appearance — even his beard was unruly.

Peter Grave by contrast was fully dressed, clean-shaven and had been apprehended en route to his cabin, apparently on his way back from the connecting spine.

They were in the formal stateroom adjoining Vasin’s private quarters. Vasin was seated behind her desk, Aiyana Loring and Nasim Caspari to either side of their captain and Ru and Goma at one end of the desk. Maslin Karayan and Peter Grave were seated opposite Vasin, and Dr Nhamedjo stood off to one side with his arms folded.

‘Do you know why you’re here?’ Vasin asked the two Second Chancers.

‘I’m waiting for you to explain why we’re under a yellow emergency when there is clearly nothing wrong with the ship,’ said the older man, bristling with righteous indignation.

‘What’s happened?’ asked Grave, his tone milder but still demanding of answers.

‘Mposi Akinya is dead,’ Vasin said. ‘He was found a few hours ago, in the Knowledge Room. The nanomachinery was in the process of digesting his body. Aiyana — can you confirm what happened?’

‘Machines had been reprogrammed — their core architecture altered? Very difficult thing. Process of disposal would have been complete.’

‘Would anything have alerted us about what had happened to him?’ Vasin asked.

Loring shook vis head, but the gesture was equivocal. ‘Not immediately? Nanotech was programmed to revert to a safe mode once the body was broken down. Conceal obvious evidence of its earlier reprogramming? Safe enough in the well — wouldn’t have started trying to dissolve you. All that absorbed biomass? Affected it in subtle ways, but take an expert to spot the signs.’

Both men remained silent. Eventually Maslin Karayan said, ‘I do not know what to say. We had our differences, but my respect for Mposi was total.’

‘I heard you arguing,’ Goma said before anyone else had a chance to respond. ‘I came to see Mposi and you were shouting at each other.’

‘That was months ago,’ Karayan said. ‘Besides, I had no grudge against him — it was just differences of opinion. Heartfelt differences, true, but I don’t go around killing the people I disagree with. And even if I did, I’d be a fool to hurt Mposi, knowing what you’d think.’

‘I’m aware of your background, Maslin,’ Vasin said, tapping one of several printed papers laid out on her desk. ‘On the face of it, there’s nothing in it to suggest any expertise with nanomachinery. If you had such skills, would you tell me?’

‘And incriminate myself?’

‘No, but the sooner our relevant technical experience is out in the open, the quicker this will be over. The same goes for you, Peter — if there’s anything in your history that isn’t in your biographical file, I want to know about it now.’

‘What about Aiyana?’ Karayan said, looking at the other scientist. ‘Haven’t you as good as admitted your own expertise with nanomachinery?’

‘Know enough to understand how difficult this was, Maslin,’ Loring answered. ‘Well beyond my capabilities. Basic expertise, different thing. General grasp of shipboard communications and security functions? Circumvent the security protocol on the bangles? Could if I wanted to.’

‘So could many of us,’ Caspari said, ‘but Aiyana hasn’t stated any sort of open opposition to this expedition, and the two of you have.’

‘That’s a gross mischaracterisation,’ Karayan said, flinching back as if he had been pricked with a needle.

‘You in particular,’ Caspari went on. ‘When you saw you could not prevent the expedition from happening, you used your political leverage to join the crew. Fundamentally, though, you’re still opposed to it. You are here to observe, to influence critical decision-making, but given the opportunity — as the Watchkeeper proved — you wouldn’t hesitate to send us back to Crucible. If sabotage was one of the tools at your disposal—’

‘Nasim,’ said Dr Nhamedjo gently, ‘we are all aggrieved by what has happened. Many of us share a basic scepticism where the activities of the Second Chancers are concerned. But we must not allow that scepticism to colour our judgement.’

‘So much for your neutrality, Doctor,’ Karayan said.

‘Medicine is science, Maslin, and to me your tenets are fundamentally regressive and anti-scientific. I do not think my personal views are a surprise to anyone.’

The doctor’s wide, boyish face appeared, to Goma, to contain a steeliness of character she not detected before. But he was still smiling, and his manner was as peaceable as it had ever been.

‘You are here by democratic means, though,’ Nhamedjo continued, ‘and you are human beings, with spouses and children. I presume some of them may be able to vouch for your whereabouts when Mposi was missing. Frankly, though, I don’t need their testimony to convince me that you played no part in this. Why would anyone hurt Mposi Akinya?’

‘Tell them what you know,’ Vasin said, nodding at Goma. ‘For the benefit of everyone present.’

As numb as she felt, unwilling as she was to start thinking of her uncle in the past tense, she forced some composure upon herself. ‘Mposi was in contact with Crucible.’

‘We all are?’ Loring said.

‘This was different. Some kind of private, political channel — a secret hotline. It makes sense that a man like my uncle would have something like that. Anyway, they told Mposi we had a problem.’