Polity Omnibus by Neal Asher

Author:Neal Asher
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Fantasy, Fiction, Science Fiction

3.

“Cormac, Dax is back,” said his mother. Again she was wearing old-style sunglasses—a habit that seemed to make her unapproachable, just like her perpetually distant tone, just like her perpetual affirmation of his name change. Cormac abandoned his p-top and school bag and broke into a run for the stair. “Don’t bother him for too long—I’ve packed your suitcase with clothes and you need to sort out what else you’ll be taking with you.”

Cormac skidded to a halt at the bottom of the stair and turned. “We’re going away again?”

“Yes, we’ll be spending a week with Dax in Tritonia.”

Cormac felt a flood of joy. Tritonia. He loved the city which stretched—with intermittent breaks—along the seabed from the south coast of Britain to France. His mother might allow him to take a haemolung out, especially if Dax went with him to keep watch. He charged up the stair yelling, “Dax!” but halted before his elder brother’s door. Dax, who had lived at home until finally shipping out with the medical arm of ECS, liked his privacy, especially so since the time Cormac had charged in while he had been having sex with Marella. She had been sitting astride him naked, bouncing up and down—the image was forever etched in the young boy’s mind. Cormac knocked on the door.

There was no answer for long seconds, and Cormac was about to open the door to peek inside when he heard the sound of movement from within. He waited a little longer and, disappointed, was about to head to his own room when there came a gruff, “Come in, Ian.”

“Dax! We’re going to—”

The sight that greeted him brought him to a confused halt. This was Dax? His elder brother had always been a big, heavily muscled young man with jet-black hair and an easy smile. This thin, haunted individual with flecks of grey in his hair, just did not seem like the same person.

“Dax,” he said, but could think of nothing else to add.

Dax was still wearing the camouflage fatigues of an ECS medic—the blue uniform had been abandoned during this war since to the Prador a medic was just as much a target as any human being. He stood with his back to the window, and was smoking a cigarette—something he had once frowned upon even though body nanites could negate the adverse health effects. “You’re thin,” Cormac finally managed.

Dax nodded contemplatively then stared with what Cormac could only feel as a complete lack of engagement. After a moment he shrugged, shook his head, then tried a weak smile.

“It’s hard out there, little brother,” he said.

Hoping for some return to normality, Cormac asked enthusiastically, “Tell me about it!”

“No.” No excuses, no explanation or justification, just No.

“What’s it like?” Cormac wheedled.

Dax just shook his head, then after a moment turned to the window. After a drawn-out silence he said, “We’ll talk once we’ve reached Tritonia—maybe I’ll feel better then... maybe.”

After another long delay, Cormac finally retreated, closing the door softly behind him.

They were going

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