London. Max-Earth.

2543. January.

Chakraborty fidgeted, shifting her weight from one foot to another. They were in a corridor of the hotel in which Kaminski was staying - or being kept - having been whisked up an almost entirely silent elevator to one of the upper floors. Golden sunlight beamed in through windows on one side, the corridor clean and sparse, with doors to the rooms on the other. She stood before the door to Kaminski’s room, her fist raised and ready to knock.

“Do you need the bathroom?” Clarke had noticed her fidgeting and was staring at her, she realised.

“No, I’m fine.”

“Want me to knock?”

“I think I can handle it.” She took a breath and rapped on the door twice. She didn’t know why she felt so wired, as if she’d had far too much coffee.

The door opened and there he was: Zoltan Kaminski, in the flesh. Alive. Surprising herself, she took a step forward and wrapped her arms around his neck, holding him close. He stiffened awkwardly for a second, then relaxed and put his hands gently on her back. “Hey, Nisha,” he said.

She released him and stepped back, feeling silly, and laughed. “Sorry. You OK?”

He nodded thoughtfully, his eyes locked to hers. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m doing fine. Been a weird week. How was your new year’s?”

“Fuck you.”

He grinned, then turned to Clarke. “Yannick Clarke. They told me you were coming too, but I didn’t believe it.”

“It wasn’t my idea,” Clarke said, taking Kaminski’s hand and shaking it firmly. “It’s good to see you.”

A tension was released, a pressure valve finally open, and Chakraborty felt herself thinking clearly for the first time in days. She hadn’t been aware of how tightly wound she had been. The world came back into focus: she was on Max-Earth. It was the year 2543, locally. There were flying cars outside and they were in a building that was taller than anything in their own version of London.

“Greetings, detectives,” said a voice from within the apartment. Ah yes, and there was a robot.

Zoltan stood aside and gestured for them to enter. Standing by a window across the apartment was a tall, slender woman. “This is Justin,” he said. “They got me out of this mess.”

“Or nearly out of it, Detective Kaminski,” the woman said, smiling and nodding slightly. “It is good to see you again, Detective Clarke.”

Clarke hesitated. “Are you sure we’ve met?”

“On the Pluma, with your colleague Detective Styles. I assisted with your investigation.”

Clarke blinked three times. “Right. Different body, then?”

“Indeed. This is a host simulant, like the one I was using on the Pluma. I have injected my consciousness into it, enabling me to be physically present in locations that would otherwise not accommodate a two mile-long megaship.”

“I can see how that would be a challenge,” Clarke said, his words a little clipped, his posture stiff. Chakraborty found it somehow a relief that she wasn’t the only one struggling to keep up.

Zoltan shut the door and gestured for them to all take seats around a low coffee table. Chakraborty lowered herself into a plush, awkwardly low seat, already considering how she could extricate herself from it in an elegant manner.

“Thank you for coming at such short notice,” Justin said, sat in a relaxed, natural posture, one leg crossed over the other. “I’m aware that this was not an ordinary request and no doubt raised some eyebrows, but it seemed like the least problematic approach.”

Seeming to ignore the robot, Clarke looked to Zoltan. “They been treating you right, Kaminski?”

“I was in a holding cell for the first four days. That wasn’t pleasant.” Kaminski took a deep breath, let it out slowly, as if trying to expel the memory. “Then Justin here pulled some strings, got me out.” He gestured at the apartment. “This is definitely an upgrade.”

Chakraborty held up a hand. “Why were you in a shipping container in the first place?”

Pursing his lips in annoyance, Zoltan sighed. “It was my own stupid fault. Got a kid to open it up for me, then the little shit locked me in. I was sloppy.”

“You are being hard on yourself, detective,” said Justin. “That was not an obvious eventuality. Even I may not have identified it as a likely outcome.”

“Even you?” Clarke raised his eyebrows.

Ignoring the hostile undertones in Clarke’s voice, the woman-robot that was Justin looked at him and smiled. “My quantum core is capable of running hundreds of thousands of simulations on theoretical outcomes for any given situation. The limiting factor is usually sensory input rather than computational capacity. This is hampered somewhat when I am operating a remote shard through a portal, as I am unable to communicate directly with myself. But when I’m in this dimension I can offload processing to my primary core in orbit around the planet. This can be more-or-less difficult depending on communications delay over distance, of course.”

“Of course.” Clarke looked slowly round at Chakraborty and shrugged with his face. She suppressed a laugh. He was never one for technology, but at least the electronic typewriters in the SDC offices didn’t talk back.

“I’m not clear on who knows what,” Chakraborty said. There were several agendas at play, and if what Bakker had told her and Clarke was accurate it meant there were unknown actors at play, pulling strings on a puppet they couldn’t even see.

“I was thinking the same,” Zoltan said. “Have either of you talked to Bakker lately?”

“Yeah, we’re in the loop,” Clarke said. He tilted his head towards Justin. “What about her?”

Chakraborty thought she saw Zoltan wince slightly. “Justin knows that I was on an off-the-books investigation,” he said, “and that it went tits up. They know I got myself locked into the container. I haven’t said much more about the why or the what.”

“I find this entirely agreeable for the moment,” Justin said. “I am aware that you are all involved in a highly sensitive matter. I do not need to know the details immediately, as that would require you trusting me to a degree which would not be natural or sensible for humans in your position. I am accustomed to matter involving humans taking longer than is strictly necessary. Nevertheless, we must find a way forward.”

Zoltan and the robot were surprisingly chummy. Chakraborty almost felt a pang of jealousy, but she strangled it before it could properly be born. Zoltan looked like he could happily spend a few more days in the fancy apartment with the amazing view. God, the view. Chakraborty paused, entirely distracted by it for a second. Endless skyscrapers, glass and chrome, and vehicles in all directions - including up. Something impossibly huge towered up even above the buildings, disappearing into haze.

Focus, Nisha. “Explain something to me,” she said, looking from Zoltan to Justin and back again. “Why are you not still in a customs holding cell? Why is this not all over the papers? How come the Commissioner wasn’t called in, or the ambassador?” Her gaze fell on Justin. There was clearly more at play.

“There is a further complication, detective. Your partner reported seeing a strange object inside the container, an object I would most like to have seen. The container itself has, unfortunately, vanished. An irregularity in the records had it destined for Luna, but it never arrived. A container from Mid-Earth should not be able to simply disappear, especially one that was under customs jurisdiction for further investigation.”

Clarke leaned forward. “Why’s this such a big deal for you? The stuff we’re looking into - that Kaminski’s been on for a while. That’s on us, that’s our turf. That container was of interest to us. What is it to you?”

Justin smiled. “You are not yet ready to tell me everything about your side of the matter, which I fully accept. In this instance, you will now have to do the same for me. I have theories about the container’s contents but this is not the right time to share them.” Uncrossing their legs and clasping their fingers together on their knees, Justin mirrored Clarke by leaning in slightly. “You no doubt recall how I nearly provoked panic on board the Pluma by openly voicing my concerns and theories. That was a valuable reminder for me, even after all these years.”

“You’re saying that whatever is in there,” Chakraborty said, “is likely to be of as much interest to you as it is to us?”

“Indeed. And, for the moment at least, it would serve all of us well to minimise the number of individuals with this knowledge.”

Zoltan got to his feet and moved to the window. “We’ve come up with a plan,” he said, pacing slowly back and forth. “Clarke, you met Justin back in town on board that airship. We use that as an in. Let’s say Justin has been wanting to bring you over to Max-Earth for a couple of months, after being so impressed with your professional conduct. That’s why you’re here. Meanwhile, I was auditing portal station security, testing for holes in the transit system. That’s why I was there, that’s why I was using a false warrant: to see if it would be picked up. Testing the portal station staff.”

Clarke crossed his arms. “Tenuous, but it might pass. How’d you get yourself locked inside one?”

“By accident. One which usefully highlights one of those security holes in the transit system that I was supposedly checking for. Everyone is very grateful and says thanks. We can get some paperwork in place to create a log of conversations leading up to this. It can even be a follow-up to the human trafficking investigation back in August.”

That actually made some kind of sense. “That actually makes some kind of sense,” she said. “The only people it won’t convince is the bad guys. I mean, not that we even know who we’re dealing with.”

“That will not matter,” Justin said, sitting upright and looking rather pleased. “Humans make a game of politics. Even we megaships indulge in such frivolities from time to time. In this instance, those involved will know that we know. But they cannot do anything to move against us, for fear of further exposing themselves. Everybody knows, but nobody can act. This is how human politics has been enacted for centuries.”

“So, what,” Clarke said, “they just carry on doing what they’re doing?”

“Nah,” Zoltan said, ceasing his pacing. “Whatever Barrindon’s involved in, this is going to bring too much scrutiny down on them. Whatever they’re doing is going to have to stop, at least for now. Gives us some time, perhaps, but it also means this lead is going to dead-end.”

Clarke leaned his elbows on his thighs. “That company has been involved in two pretty ugly things in the last six months. They’ve got a bad smell around them.”

“They also have deep pockets and the best lawyers,” Chakraborty noted. “The DCS isn’t going to like this, you know.”

“Walpole can lump it,” Zoltan said with a grin. “He might not like it, but he’s not going to complain at us making friends with an AI megaship.” He glanced at Justin. “That’s a powerful friend to have on Max-Earth.”

“Then it is agreed,” Justin announced. “You will all stay for another day. I will give you the official tour of our London, introduce you to all the right people. I would take you off-world but we alas do not have sufficient time.” As Justin looked at each of them, Chakraborty could have sworn that the wrinkle-less, strangely ageless eyes sparkled. “Although we exist in a tenuous, dangerous state of chaotic uncertainty, I have hope, my friends. This should be the beginning of a most fortuitous alliance.”

Leaning back and folding his arms with a harrumph, Clarke lifted his chin up. “You just work that out in one of your millions of simulations?”

“No,” Justin said, cocking their head to one side, “just a hunch.”