Ragnarok 03 - Resonance Read Free Page B

– Gavriela meant the Poynting vector that declared the energy propagation of an electromagnetic field – ‘but the gravity apparatus, I only learned about yesterday, reading up on the place.’
    â€˜It’s not the most significant work we’ve done here.’ Anders looked from right to left, checking they were alone, then heldhis pipe to his chest and stoppered it with his palm, as if closing someone’s ear to prevent them hearing. ‘Radio cavity work and the magnetron, and I was here throughout the war.’
    â€˜Oh,’ said Gavriela.
    â€˜I’ve said nothing to my colleagues, but you’ve appeared overnight, while the department listings and so on make it look as if you’ve been here for ever.’ He put the pipe in his mouth and sucked hard three times, causing it to release a smoke-cloud. ‘Brings back memories.’
    Of war work and the need for secrecy. Understood.
    The Soviets had detonated an H-bomb last year, but it was the American test four months ago that had fired up reporters everywhere. With its 14-megaton blast catching the crew of a vessel called the Lucky Dragon , nasty indeed, and how about that ship’s name for irony? The Cold War, and the likelihood of its growing hot, was on everybody’s mind.
    Perhaps that was why Anders jumped now, seeing the stranger standing fifteen feet away, near the end of the Bridge.
    â€˜It’s OK,’ said Gavriela. ‘He’s friendly.’
    â€˜We keep an Alsatian, my wife and I,’ said Anders. ‘He slobbers over us, but if you’re a stranger, he’ll bite your hand off.’
    Gavriela laughed.
    â€˜You’re right. He’s exactly that kind of friendly.’
    Him and the other watchdogs.
    â€˜I hope he keeps you safe,’ said Anders.
    â€˜Yes. So do I.’
    â€˜I’ll leave you to it.’
    Anders strode away, leaving her in the middle of the Bridge on her own, visible to anyone outside who cared to look up, which was of course the point.
    A Judas goat.
    Just like you on Molsin, Roger .
    One of those strange thoughts that sometimes flitted intoher mind then evaporated, sublimating like dry ice to invisible gas. Yet somehow she felt better, despite her conviction that the darkness was somewhere beyond the edge of her ability to see it, like the tiger lurking before he bursts from cover to a sudden end.
    His own, the goat’s, or both.

THREE
    LABYRINTH, 2603 AD (REALSPACE-EQUIVALENT)
    Bullies arise everywhere, even in a city-world of infinite wonders: witness this small boy shivering with his back against a wall, confronted by bigger lads. Roger, coming on the group from behind, allowed his inductive energies to grow inside him, eyeballs growing sore with the need to release until the resonance caused the boys to flinch, sensing him at last, picking up the potential for destruction. Then he damped the energies back down as the boys – call them a gang – walked away, all apart from two, including the biggest, less attentive than the others, about to push his fist into the victim’s face.
    But his pal grabbed his sleeve, receiving a startled look; then they were summoning a shaky fastpath rotation. ‘He’s a peacekeeper, must be, you moronic—’ The words disappeared as the rotation shut down.
    Only the trembling boy, their victim, was left. Roger knelt down beside him.
    â€˜You’ll be OK.’
    But the expression in those wide obsidian eyes said that the problem went far beyond the incident Roger had interrupted. This was the boy’s everyday world, not an isolated event.
    â€˜I remember when I was your age,’ Roger continued, still kneeling. ‘Adults seemed to have forgotten what the world was like when they were young. I could never understand that.’
    The boy’s eyes widened further.
    Dad, I didn’t think I’d use your gifts for this .
    Espionageware in Roger’s tu-ring slipped through