“It’s Christine. She’s in terrible danger.” Newcomen tried to wrestle Petrovitch out of the way.

“I don’t care if she’s fallen down the old well, Lassie: we’re nearly fifteen hundred k north of Seattle and there are easier ways of helping than presenting ourselves back there with massive targets painted on us.”

Newcomen hit him. Not hard enough to really hurt, but it was a surprise all the same. He only managed it once. Petrovitch closed his fist around Newcomen’s own and squeezed.

Newcomen gasped and slipped off the chair on to his knees, shaking uncontrollably.

“Don’t ever do that again. Do you understand?”

“Yes.”

“Michael, what the huy is going on?”

[Joseph Newcomen wished to communicate with Christine Logan. I initiated the call and secured it from the repeated attempts to trace our location. I was even able to provide him with a visual feed from spyware located throughout the Logan residence.]

Petrovitch let go, and left Newcomen clutching his bruised fingers. “When you say throughout, you mean that in your precise, unambiguous way, right?”

[Areas that would normally be considered private for humans such as bedrooms and bathrooms are being actively surveilled. I have discussed the implications of this discovery with Joseph Newcomen.]

“Which is why he’s crying at my feet and demanding I take him back to Seattle.” He looked down. “You know, I could do without this.”

[It is highly likely that Joseph Newcomen will make repeated attempts to return to Christine Logan alone, no matter how forcefully you prevent him. In addition, his psychological state will render him ineffectual.]

“More ineffectual? He’s positively a black hole of effectiveness as it is. So what you’re saying is we have to do something, or I’m going to end up kicking him out of a moving plane flying at five hundred k over the Canadian tundra just to get some peace and quiet.”

[Essentially, yes.]

“It’s not illegal to put surveillance cameras up in your own property, is it?”

[One of the fundamental tenets of Reconstruction is that a family is free to order itself within its own dwelling space, with no government interference.]

“Newcomen? I might be able to turn my ears off so I don’t hear your whining, but I still know you’re doing it. Sit in the chair and shut up. The grown-ups are trying to work out what to do.” Petrovitch scratched at the stubble on his chin. “Could never grow a proper beard. Now, Archie’s? That was serious beardage. Right, Michael: call an ad-hoc. I want to go after the house computer.”

Half a world away, a committee was formed, told of the reason, and asked to come to a decision.

They did. It wasn’t quite what he expected.

“Newcomen. I can make you an offer.”

Newcomen looked up for the first time in a while. He regarded Petrovitch suspiciously. “Go on.”

“Michael can attack Logan’s house computer: wipe its memory, erase its programs. The security system’s such that it’ll go into fail-safe mode, and Christine’s going to have to be rescued by the fire department cutting through the front door. That’ll get her out of the house for a couple of days.”

“But won’t Logan just load everything back up again?”

“Yeah, course he will. Trashing his computer is conditional on you telling Christine what we’ve done and why.” Petrovitch shrugged. “The ad-hoc says she has a right to know. Difficult to argue with that. And if you don’t do it, I will; I imagine she’s more likely to believe you without me having to get technical on her about where the spy-eyes and mics are hidden.”

“I…”

“Five minutes ago you wanted us to turn around and appear on her doorstep. What, precisely, were you going to say to her then?”

“I hadn’t really thought it through,” admitted Newcomen.

“No. Let’s try the brains before the balls, okay?”

Newcomen nodded. “Okay. I’ll tell her.”

“Good. Michael? Time to go to work.”

The AI bore down on the Logan house computer and inserted itself like a crowbar between its external face and its internal functions. It systematically deleted reams of data, all the while telling the program that was supposed to watch for that sort of thing that everything was just fine.

Once it had erased pretty much everything, it started on the security system itself. Doors locked, shutters fell, alarms sounded. No more than a shell running a few lines of code, the computer turned itself off. Phones, lights, power. Everything gone. Christine and her mother were left with their mobiles to call for help.

“Done,” said Petrovitch. “We need to get back in the air.”

“That’s it?”

“What did you expect? A really big explosion?”

“I don’t know. Can I check on her?” asked Newcomen.

“Michael’s monitoring the police: the dispatcher has just sent a squad car, and Mrs Logan’s called her husband. They’ll be out within the hour, even if they have to use a shaped charge.” Petrovitch rested his hand on the doorknob. “This is just a distraction. Saving your ex-fiancée from her pig of a father is not why I’m here. It’s not why you’re here, either. I’m glad you’re happier, but we did this so you could concentrate on finding Lucy.”

“I’m still grateful.”

“Good. Hold that thought.”

20

Petrovitch kept on heading north, and again he immersed himself in the being of the plane. He’d turned from a kid who’d die if he ran too far into a man-machine hybrid who believed he could fly. It wouldn’t stop there, either. Not if he had his way.

At some point, Newcomen excused himself and went to sit back in the cabin to talk to Christine: it wouldn’t have made any difference whether he stayed or not. Petrovitch was entirely content to leave the matter to Michael, and was mostly unaware of anything that was happening in the cockpit.

A long time later, Newcomen came back. Petrovitch emerged from his fugue long enough to see that the man was red-eyed and occasionally shuddering with an escaping sob.

It must have been like a funeral, to finally see all your hopes and dreams piled up in one heap, then have someone hand you the match to light the cordwood that would turn them all to ashes.

Petrovitch retreated.

[He has told her.]

“Yeah.”

[The conversation went as expected. Joseph Newcomen will be emotionally fragile for some time: we must factor that into our future treatment of him.]

“A broken heart is the least of his worries.”

[As far as he is concerned, it is his only worry at the moment. He asked for music afterwards: Kenny Rogers, specifically.]

“It’s worse than I thought. All this sitting around is giving him too much time to think: it’ll be different when we get to Fairbanks. Whatever it is they’ve got waiting for us won’t be bread and salt, at any rate.”

[There is further analysis of the events of February third. Do you wish to review it now, or wait until you land?]

“It’s fifteen minutes till Dawson City. It’ll keep.”

He dropped down into the Yukon Valley, the high mountains rising up either side. He turned hard to starboard, then to port, and suddenly there were lights on the ground in an unnatural geometric grid, burning bright against the snow. They illuminated the streets, and beyond: the glow carried out over the river ice. This was where he had to throttle down, and head up the Klondike to the airport. The residents wouldn’t appreciate yet another jet roaring in overhead.

Beyond the strange wormy landscape of mine tailings, he spotted the airport squeezed in between the valley sides. He cut the power further and drifted in over the runway. There was a collection of half a dozen small cargo planes clustered around the main terminal, and he slotted his craft down behind them. Compared with the bulky outlines of the next nearest plane, his own looked fragile.