Charles Stross - Ancient Of Days

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Ancient of Days

Charles Stross

There were less than two weeks to go until Christmas, and flakes of snow were

settling silently on the window-sill. Sue leaned against the wall next to the casement so that

her breath formed patterns of condensation on the glass. The red glow of the newly-lit street

lights turned the falling snow to blood, drifting down across the deserted alleyway behind the

lab. She blinked slowly. Was it her imagination or was there a new shadow behind the dump-

bins? Holding her breath so that it would not fog the glass, she stared out of the window. The

shadow disappeared and she breathed out. Then she undid the catch and swung the window

open in invitation. "You're late," she said.

The shadow re-appeared in front of her, resolved into the shape of a man shrouded

in a donkey-jacket against the cold. "Rush-hour traffic," he said, his voice somehow

deadened by the softness that settled on every surface. "Help me in?"

Sue extended a hand. He took it and levered himself up and over the sill. He swung

himself into the room and dropped to the floor, looking around as he did so. "You're wet," said

Sue. "Did you bring any equipment?"

He nodded and held up a small brief case. She looked at his face. Something wasn't

quite right. "You look strained," she said as she shut the window.

He nodded tiredly. "I am not as young as I used to be, Sally. If you knew what I had to

do to get here –"

"I can guess, and as for the name I'm called Sue," she said, a trifle too sharply. He

stared at her for a moment then nodded and forced a smile. The shape of his cheekbones

turned it into something hollow and unconvincing.

"Please accept my apologies then – Sue. It's late and I've got a job to do and we've

all been under considerable stress recently –"

"Accepted. Just remember who it was who laid their neck on the line to get a job here

..." "It is noted," he said curtly.

"No it's not!" she flashed. "This unit is licensed to work with pathogenic organisms.

They wanted a blood sample and insisted upon giving me a series of vaccinations –"

"Ah, I'm sure it hurt." He shook his head, oblivious to the finer points of immunological

stress. "But in view of what you found that's immaterial now, isn't it?"

She turned away angrily and busied herself with an untidy pile of papers that sat on

the desk in the corner by the centrifuge.

"Believe me when I say that this could be the greatest threat we have ever

encountered," he said softly. "Greater than any ancient encounter with half-glimpsed horrors

..." She nodded slowly, wondering if she had it in herself to forgive him the slight. "You

might have a point," she said. "But only time will tell." She rummaged through a drawer in

search of a paper-clip, bound the documents together, and slid them out of the way. Then

she walked to the battered metal locker and removed a creased lab coat. "Let's make a start

on it, shall we?"

Kristoph grinned and removed his donkey-jacket. "Let's," he said. He opened his brief

case and pulled out a pair of disposable plastic gloves. "Now who shall we apportion the

blame to? How about some animal rights activists? Or shall we make it look like an industrial

job this time, do you think?"

Kristoph was not his real name. He had no real birth certificate, although he had

carried several. He was much older than Sue, and he had lived through interesting times. He

had lost a large part of his heart on the Eastern front, so that fifty years later he still wondered

if he could ever be whole again: he had survived the decades since the war by auctioning his

soul at Checkpoint Charlie, running jobs for Stasi and the CIA and another, less familiar

Organisation. With the collapse of the Wall he had been set free to wander, and finally to turn

his hand to Family business. As he prepared for the job in hand he whistled a half-forgotten

marching song to himself.

"Will you stop doing that?" asked Sue.

He glanced up from his kit and caught her eye. "Why?"

"Anyone would think you were an old Nazi," she said.

"Oh." He glanced down again so that she wouldn't see his smile. Now he

remembered what the tune was. "Time flies," he said, clipping the camera shut. Then he

stood up. "How long have you been here then?" he asked.

Sue walked to the window and stared out of it again. "Two years," she said, "but

that's only in this job. I had to go to one of their Universities to qualify for it. My family –"

"Demonstrated a laudable degree of fore-sight," opined Kristoph.

"In this day and age anything else condemns you to life as a menial. Times have

changed. If you want to get ahead you've got to play by their rules. The net's too tight."

Kristoph, who knew better than she, held his silence.

"I've heard all the old tales," Sue continued. "My parents are really keen on them. But

things aren't the same, are they? It's hard to maintain a sense of ... community ... while all

around us ..."

Kris stood up. "I think you'd better show me to the offices. We don't want to start too

late; this could take all night."

Sue turned slowly, looking around as if she had forgotten where the door was. When

she opened it she glanced swiftly down the corridor outside. "Clear," she called over her

shoulder as she slipped out of the basement laboratory. Kristoph looked around curiously as

he followed her through the deserted passages of the department.

The concrete floor was scuffed and dirty and the whitewashed walls had seen better

days. Fluorescent lights flickered overhead, casting what Kristoph saw as a gangrenous blue-

green glare across the crowded bulletin boards. An ancient ultra-centrifuge keened to itself in

a shadowy niche as they hurried past. Sue pushed through two pairs of fire doors and turned

a corner on a concealed staircase. "Meet me in room D-11 if we become separated," she

said. "It's two flights up. There's a walkway from the corridor opposite it to the Geophysics

block if you need a quick getaway."

"I don't think that will be necessary," he said quietly.

"You know there are security guards?" she asked, pausing on a landing half-way

between floors.

"Whatever makes you think we'll encounter any trouble?" he replied, looking her

straight in the eyes.

She appeared to be slightly flustered. "Nothing," she said. "I just thought you spook

types always liked to know a way out of a tight corner –"

Kris held her gaze for a moment then nodded. "The ones you read about are the

ones who get caught," he said. "Don't worry about me, Sue. I can take care of myself." He

waved a hand in an abrupt cutting motion. "Carry on. We haven't got all night."

Presently they arrived outside a locked door. "This is it," she said.

Kristoph bent over the lock for a couple of minutes, fiddling with a set of fine-tipped

pliers. "You've got to be careful to leave all the right signs," he murmured. "Otherwise the

Polizei get suspicious. Is there a vending machine anywhere near here?"

"Sure," said Sue. "Why?"

"Get me a cup of coffee, please," he said. "White, no sugar. We're going to be here a

while." The lock snicked open and he turned the door handle as she walked away. The room

within was darkened. He pushed the door open and reached around it for the light switch,

every nerve straining for signs of potential trouble. But there was nothing amiss: it was just

another night-time office, plastic covers drooping over the copier and word processors. He

breathed out slowly, willing the muscles in his arms to relax as he looked around. There were

papers in every in-tray, filing cabinets full of pre-publication data: he rubbed the skeleton keys

in his pocket. The soul of a research group lay exposed to his midnight fingers, so prosaic an

institution that it seemed ridiculous to connect it to some hideous, numinous threat to the

survival of the race. But that was what Ancient of Days had said – and Kris knew full-well,

with the bitterness of experience, that when Ancient of Days spoke, everyone listened.

Kris went to work with a precision that was born of long experience. First he closed

the venetian blinds; then he switched on the photocopier and went to work on the first of the

filing cabinets as it warmed up. His brief-case he placed upon a nearby desk, opening it to

reveal two reams of lightweight copier paper: why bother with toys like Minox spy-cams, his

trainers had once explained, when any well-run office provides all the tools you need? He

whistled as he worked, in an effort to forget the snow on the window ledge. If it wasn't for that

damned snow, with its burden of remembered horrors preying on his mind, he might even

admit that he was happy.

There was a knock on the door. Kristoph spun round then relaxed, recognizing that it

was Sue: a slight catch in her breath and the way she shifted her balance on the floor outside

gave her away. "Come in," he said, turning back to examine the suspension files in the top

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Charles Stross - Ancient Of Days

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