The Marriage of the Living Dark

Or maybe not, if what he’d heard was right

DeVore steepled his hands before his face and smiled. All was in place now, every stone set in its proper place on the board. All, that was, except the last He took a long, relaxing breath, then spoke again. “Opaque the windows.” As the ice of the windows cleared, he found himself looking out over a sprawl of ancient Han buildings, six to eight levels high, each level smaller than the last, like the steps of a giant pyramid. Hutong, they called these nests of alleyways and rat-runs. They were crawling with life beneath their protective meshes - five, six, sometimes even eight families to a living unit, wallowing in their own filth. If he’d had his way he would have had them cleared years ago. They and the teeming hordes who inhabited them. Yes, he’d have gassed them and bulldozed the district flat And then he’d have built something better. Something deaner.

Below him the airlanes were packed with barely-moving traffic, but up here he was alone. Not that that surprised him. He had paid for exclusive use of this lane.

He sat back, smiling now, imagining the panic - the pure fear - that would run through that nest of tiny alleyways.

If it worked.

DeVore grinned fiercely. Of course it would fucking work. He hadn’t spent the last twenty-five years setting this up for nothing. Why, once it got going, it would be unstoppable. The bastards would feed upon themselves like wounded sharks.

Fear. That was the key. That was the engine that would drive the world to self-destruction. Simple naked fear.

And now he laughed. “Tomorrow,” he said, making a toast in the air with an imaginary glass. “Here’s to tomorrow!”

Kim sat there watching K. at work, feeling his own frustration mounting by the moment. At last, unable to help himself, he stood. “Are you sure I can’t help?”

K. stopped and turned, looking at him. “I’m almost done now. But if you want...”

“No ...” Kim smiled, then slowly sat again. “No, you’re right Please, carry on.” It was true. It would have taken K. much longer to teach Kim how to recalibrate the machine than for him to do it himself, and time was of the essence. Even so, he watched, trying to make sense of the tiny alterations K. was making.

“Earlier, when you were speaking of it, you called it the paradigm world. Why?” K. frowned with concentration a moment, then, “You’ll see. The moment you enter it. If s different” “How?”

But K. was saying no more. He gave the machine one final little tweak, then straightened up, a look of immense satisfaction on his face. He had changed a great deal these past few days. Gone was the moroseness of former days. And no wonder. It was not every day a man got his dead wife given back to him.

Kim stared at his twin admiringly. It was narcissistic, he knew, but he could not help it. It was like seeing himself in one of those distorting mirrors that gave back a flattering image of oneself. Only this mirror was real. Was himself. “Don’t you think we ought to tell the others? I mean... what if something goes wrong?”

K. glanced at him again. “We’ll be in and out of there before anyone realises we’ve gone. Besides, they’d only argue against it You know they would.” “And rightly so.” Kim sighed. He was still not sure about this. “Can’t we let Karr know? Swear him to keep it a secret Then if something does go wrong, he could come after us.”

K. shook his head. “Karr would just go and tell Kao Chen. And Chen would tell Ebert, and then ...”

Kim raised a hand. “Okay. Just you and me. But we find out what”s happening and we get back. Okay? No risks, no danger.” “Okay. And then ... and only then ... we have that strategy meeting. Agreed?” “Agreed.” “Good. Then are you ready, Kim? If s time to go.”

Yang’s occupied the whole of the 135^th floor of the old Tiananmen building on Kennedy Avenue, overlooking the Imperial Park, Lung Tan Lake to the left, the Tien Tan -the Temple of Heaven - to the right Beyond it, less than three miles south, began the megalithic sprawl of the new city, its walls like a breaking wave of glass that reflected back the clouds that drifted past its upper storeys.

From his seat beside the massive wall-length window, Yuan looked down, his eyes resting briefly on the ancient three-tiered temple. From this height it seemed to jut like an erect nipple from the centre of its great circular base. Yuan smiled at the thought, and found himself momentarily wondering what it had been like in those days.

If he’d been Emperor he would have fucked every beautiful woman in the land. A new one every night.

As it was ...

He looked away, determined not to dwell on the break-up of his latest marriage. Across from him, Cho Yi was scanning the desktop comset, checking that all was well back at the office.

As Cho looked up again, he smiled. “All’s well.” “Good,” Yuan said, then turned, in time to see his brother Han come striding across the floor of the eating hall towards him, his huge, muscular frame seeming to strain the seams of his uniform.

Han Ch’in was wearing his full military regalia and as he moved between the tables, Li Yuan saw how heads turned, giving a tiny bow of respect as they saw the three golden stars on his bright red epaulettes. Yuan stood and gave a bow, then, as Han stepped closer, embraced him in a hug that was returned with equal warmth.

“Yuan!” Han Ch’in said, showing his perfect white teeth in a wide grin. “How are you, little brother?”

“I’m fine,” Yuan said, beaming delightedly. “And you?” “Hungry,” Han Ch’in answered, and laughed. Then, noticing Cho Yi for the first time, he whooped. “Master Cho!”

Cho Yi stood and gave Han Ch’in a deep, dignified bow, only to be grasped and hugged by Li Yuan’s bear-like elder brother.

“How good to see you, Cho Yi! Are your mother and father well?” “They are very well, thank you,” Cho said, smiling with pleasure at the politeness.

They sat, looking to each other and smiling, letting the waiters fuss about them a moment, fixing the sound baffle that would keep their conversation private. As the glass screen came up about their table, Han Ch’in leaned forward, speaking in a confidential tone.

“I had to see you, brother. To tell you the news.”

“News? Are you engaged, Han Ch’in?”

Han laughed exaggeratedly. “Gods! Perish the thought! No, little brother. My Masters have given me a special task. I am to look after the American President when he arrives later this evening.”

Li Yuan’s eyes widened. “President Newell?”

Han Ch’in nodded. ‘It is a great honour and may lead to other things.”

“Other things?” Cho Yi looked doubtful. “A posting,” Han said. “To the American Empire. As Consul.” “But you’re a soldier, Han,” Li Yuan said. “As was President Wei.”

“You are to be Wei’s protege, then?” Again Cho’s eyes held a depth of scepticism.

“Not at all. It will be an army appointment.”

“Then that is different,” Cho said with a terse nod of approval. “But let us order now. There will be time to talk while our meal is being cooked.” Han looked to his brother and smiled, a look passing between them, then he turned back to Cho Yi and gave him a tiny bow of respect “You know the menu here, Cho Yi. I would be honoured if you would order for us all.” Cho Yi looked up over his menu and nodded, pleased by Han Ch’in’s courtesy. “As you wish, Han Ch’in. As you wish.”

The smell of chrysanthemums was overwhelming. Kim, who had just stepped through the burning hoop, reeled and then sat abruptly on the bed, gasping, his eyes watering. The air seemed thick and rich, as if he could taste each molecule of oxygen.

K. turned to him and smiled. “You see?” “I see,” Kim gasped. Yes, and felt and smelled and tasted the difference.

The blinds were down over the windows, yet his eyes still smarted from the brightness. As if a giant searchlight was focused on the window outside. And that scent!

He was drowning ... drowning in his own senses! “Here,” K. said, pressing something into his hand, “take these.”

Kim blinked, then held the capsules away from him. They seemed to glow in his hand, mauve and yellow, like the abdomens of some strange species of insect “Am I hallucinating?”

K. shook his head. “Not at all. This is Reality with a capital R. Where you and I come from is but a pale shadow of it This is the real thing. Full strength.” Kim put out a hand to steady himself, and felt the texture of the fabric against his flesh. He felt a shock ripple through him, almost as if it touched him, and felt that he could almost see its surface, its presence was so vivid. Like braille against a blind man’s palm.

Everything here seemed to shout at him, announcing itself, glaring at him in startling neon colours.

He closed his eyes. Then, trusting that K. knew what he was doing, he popped the two tablets into his mouth and swallowed. Even so, he could feel them move down his gullet, as if he’d just gulped down a pair of bullets. He could feel the flex of the muscles in his chest and abdomen, the tingle of the nerve ends in his fingertips.

Alive. This world was vividly alive. And he... he was like a radio receiver in its midst, tuned in to everything.

Or like a child, new born to the world.

For a moment longer he felt the throb of it pulsing all about him, and then it began to fade.

The smell of chrysanthemums slowly became less prominent

He opened his eyes again and sighed. “Why didn’t you give me those before?” K smiled. “Because I wanted you to know. To experience what 7 experienced. And to understand. This is it, Kim. The primary world. The most real of realities. This is the one we have to win in. This is the one we’ve got to make all of the others conform to.”

Kim nodded, then looked about him. It was a very ordinary room, now that his senses had dulled. There was a single bed, a chair, and a small table on which there was a lamp and a bowl of flowers.

Chrysanthemums.

He turned. There was one window, with a blind, and, on the far side of the room, a single door. And nothing else. Not even a painting on the plain white walls. “Where are we?”

“Beijing.”

“And the year?”

“It is April in the year two thousand two hundred and forty two.”

“Ah .. .” Kim hesitated, then. “And we are dead here, I take it?”

“We were never born.”

“You know that for a fact?”

K. nodded. “I’ve checked the records. The woman who, in our worlds, was our mother, here died childless twelve years ago. And our father, Wyatt, also had no children. They never met We were never conceived.” Kim shivered. “You’ve been here a number of times?”

“Eleven in all.”

“And yet you never wrote about it.” K. smiled bleakly. “I wrote about it several times, and at length. But then I tore the pages out and burned them.” “Burned them? Why?”

“In case he followed me and found out what I was doing.” “And what were you doing?” “Planning how best to stop him.” Him. It could be no other. “DeVore?” “Yes.”

‘This is his world?”

K. hesitated, then shook his head. “No. Not yet But it will be.