“Are you mad?” he hissed once his office door was shut. “If you were recognized in this city, or caught, I’d have a dozen rivals using the resulting investigation to get rid of me.” He gingerly took a seat behind his desk.

Rayker was not impressed by Merris—a short, balding man, who thought of himself as subtle, but was as easy to read as a gossip magazine. “You demanded a progress report,” she said. “I decided to deliver it personally.”

Merris raised a finger at her. “You’re an adrenaline junky, like everyone else in your sordid criminal underworld.”

Rayker stared back at him but said nothing.

He eventually turned away, flustered. Getting up out of his chair, he walked to the nearest window and looked out at the surrounding buildings. “The Caldera project is proceeding well below expectations. I am struggling to justify its existence to the Secretariat.”

“You’ll be closing it down, then?” she said, with practiced disinterest. No need to let him think she was too attached to the operation, or he might get suspicious. What the cardinals never understood about power was that it was never found in the decisions of the institution—only in what you could make people believe.

He turned back. “Now, I didn’t say that. But we must address its limitations, and develop a holistic process going forward, making sure we keep the defined objectives in view whilst furthering the team’s alignment with the Adjudicate’s broader strategy.”

Rayker tapped her fingers loudly on the armrest of her chair as she let the sentence fade into the forgettable past. He always spoke in such vacuous words that offered only the pretense of competence.

“As I have explained to you many times, Merris,” she said, “the machine cannot turn people into obedient drones. It simplifies and amplifies their instincts, making them violent and dangerous. We have had success with animals, true. But that is because animals have simple minds. If we give them food and a warm place to sleep, they are easy to manage. Every time we put a human in there, I lose men, and it is rather difficult to manage a rampaging monstrosity when your workforce is in pieces on the floor.”

Of course, Rayker had not been foolish enough to try a second human test, but she needed a believable way to justify her repeated requests for manpower. Specifically, for only those men who had served with, and were loyal to, Captain Reed.

“But you have been working towards a solution?”

“How can I? I don’t have any scientists or engineers on my team. Instead, we’ve been exploring the laboratory in greater detail, in the hopes of finding new research avenues.”

“Have you discovered anything?”

Rayker rolled her eyes. “Don’t you think I would have communicated something as exciting as a new discovery, Merris?”

“You will remember to address me as Cardinal Merris, please,” he said quietly, before looking back to the window. “I thought you knew how to use this alien technology from… from your own background.”

She turned up the corners of her mouth. “I am not an engineer, unfortunately, but I have had a degree of success in fine tuning some of our creature’s characteristics.”

“Meaning?”

“I can program the machine to make them larger, give them… upgrades.”

“But nothing so far that has truly intimidated the local populace?”

“Unfortunately not,” Rayker said. “They have proven quite adaptative. Their militias are well organized and able to absorb losses. The people have accepted the risk and continue to live their lives. Colony worlds are dangerous places that breed hardy folk.”

Merris turned back from the window and returned to his desk. He sank into his chair like a collapsing plastic sack. “Your, ah… your test subjects… You haven’t been using League citizens, I hope?”

“As much as it tempts me, no,” she said, enjoying his expression. “Don’t look so appalled; it was only a joke.”

Merris’ rotund face turned pink. “I’m not sure what you find so amusing in all of this. By now, the new colonies should be demanding the protection of Helvetic leadership from dangerous aliens. Instead, all we have after years of work is a manageable pest problem that barely makes the headlines in Rackeye. A brilliant plan, sloppily executed.”

Rayker laughed at him. Did he really think he could intimidate her?

Merris’ face paled. “I suppose we can’t infiltrate the militia’s command structure?” he suggested in a demurer tone.

“There is no command structure; they are completely decentralized,” Rayker said. This simple concept seemed to be beyond the understanding of anyone in the Helvetic world.

Merris shook his head. “Impossible to understand how these people get anything done.”

Rayker rolled her eyes. “They talk to each other.”

“Do I take it that you have some kind of sympathy for their way of life?”

“Of course. They are pursuing their biological need for self-determination, as any organism would, and with a reasonable degree of success. Unfortunately for them, evolution does not stand still; humanity must overcome its selfish, individualist nature if it is to approach philosophical truth.”

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“Indeed. The problem before us, then, is still to find what truth will return Caldera, and the other wayward colonies, to the brotherhood of nations?”

Rayker shrugged. “I need more people with the right backgrounds. Soldiers can only take me so far.”

“I thought you said you were training them with technical manuals?”

“Of course I am, Merris.” She noted his twitching eyebrow and felt a buzz of satisfaction. “But this technology is far more advanced than anything even a doctorate level engineer could understand. The men struggle with the basics of nanite networking. Now, if I were free to communicate with the League’s scientific personnel—”

“Absolutely not.” He sighed and turned away. “The risk is too great. The Director of Biological Research, Cardinal Crayland, has initiated another escalation over the delays in the project. If she were to start looking too closely into… ah, our personnel—”

“You mean if she discovered who I am?” Rayker raised an eyebrow.

“Indeed. She could dismantle the whole thing. An official request for more resources—and League scientists—could threaten the future of the project.”

“You mean the future of your career?”

Merris scowled. “Must you be so damned literal Rayker?”

“Cutting through vain illusions has always brought me great pleasure,” she said with a grin.

He shuddered.

“Now that I’m thinking about it,” she mused, “a new biological research lab has opened in the University of Rackeye. Lots of budding young minds, eager to do their part for the League.”

“You believe they will be able to find a solution that will enable you to control a human subject?”

Rayker nodded. “I think it’s worth a try.”

He shook his head. “Unfortunately, Adjudicate protocol does not allow us to work with… uncontrolled agents. Without careful indoctrination, vetting, and oversight of these students, the risk is too great.”

Rayker stood up to leave. “Oh well, I guess that’s it then. I have appreciated this discussion, and your input is always useful, but if we can’t find a solution, then I have other projects—”

“N-now wait a minute,” the Cardinal stammered. “I didn’t say it would be impossible. I just need to convince the other Cardinals…”

Rayker smiled. “I’m sure you’ll find a way.”

“But these students—what if they find our project to be… distasteful?” He swallowed.

Rayker waved a hand. “They don’t need to know everything,” she said. “Feeding them only the necessary information should suffice to open the way for new theories.”

She suppressed a smile. And if any of the pompous brats did make trouble, she would probably torture them. The pantomime Helvet culture raised their children to be bright and hopeful about the promise of mankind. A brief introduction to the horror that lay beneath the foundations of civilization would probably break them. Rayker felt a rush of excitement. How amusing it would be to look into a young man’s eyes as his soul fractured. And, of course, whatever was left would one day make for a useful test subject for the transformation chamber.

“At the next committee meeting,” Merris said, “I will suggest the possibility that a handful of students be transferred to your project. But understand that you will still have to answer to me, Rayker. If Crayland and her mob don’t start to see results soon, they’ll take me out of the equation. They’ll find out who you are, and before you know it, you’ll have a battle group in Calderan orbit ready to blow you all to pieces.”

“Did you just threaten me?”

Merris clenched his jaw and leaned back in his chair. “Yes. Work with me, dammit.”

Rayker bowed her head. “Very well Cardinal Merris. I will follow your lead.”

Rayker wandered through Geneva, gazing in boredom at the uninspiring, Solarian-school architecture that rose high over her head. Glass and mirror-smooth steel bulged from the mega-structure’s facades to create sleek curves and subtle forms. The designers had obviously intended to capture the power of technology and its domination over nature, but the reality looked cheap, like a child’s plastic toy.

When she reached the lakefront, Rayker saw the Secretariat building on the opposite side of the water. Housing the governing chambers of the League’s Central Committee, the edifice was a vast sphere that balanced precariously over the site of the old Jet d’Eau. Once, two powerful pumps had shot a fountain of water over four hundred feet into the air from the pier. Now, various Senators and functionaries imagined themselves to be just as magnificent, as they gazed out the windows of the debate chamber’s upper balconies. They were no doubt blissfully content in their vision of the power they held over the thirty-seven colonized worlds.

Rayker turned away from the view and headed towards the long Mont-Blanc bridge that stretched over Lac Leman. Mounted along the rail, flags of every nation, both terrestrial and extra-terrestrial, fluttered in the breeze. Pedestrians crowded the whole span—all vehicle traffic moved through subterranean tunnels below—though there were no tourists allowed in Geneva.

Only the most well-connected men and women could gain access to the hub of imperial power. The cities’ residents imagined themselves completely protected by the army of bureaucrats that stood between themselves and the rest of humanity.

Rayker felt the old seductive thrill, and her heartbeat quickened as she watched the passersby. If she turned on them now, she could kill hundreds before anyone could stop her. Corporations would collapse, planets would be plunged into political crisis, crime syndicates would run out of control. The possibilities were deliciously endless.

She shuddered to imagine the tedium of holding high office. Fortunately, her work kept her at the sharp end of the stick, where the smell of blood was a welcome indulgence. She had never met her true benefactor, who was vastly more powerful and cunning than Merris. The shadowy entity sent Rayker instructions and briefings via anonymous messages, that demonstrated an immense political and historical knowledge. No matter what resources she needed, whether weapons, ships or money, she got them immediately.

Only the Old Ones—exiled from Earth for millennia—had such power. Rayker didn’t know which of those mysterious beings she was dealing with, and she didn’t care. They had earned her loyalty long ago. Now, her benefactor had made plain their plans for humanity’s destiny, and Rayker was committed to fulfilling that vision.

The species was so cruel, so ignorant, and wicked. They couldn’t even imagine the glory of the civilization that had gone before them. The wiser, more evolved Old Ones had to be returned from the shadows to their rightful lordship over the heavens. But circumstances had left them weak, and humanity’s factions would unite aggressively against an external threat. Transformation had to come slowly, from the inside.

There had been pitfalls and failures, but the work continued. Humanity’s’ factions were all so petty; little fishes, singing and playing in the waves. Rayker navigated the tides and the currents. With time she would succeed in building her master’s unassailable and eternal empire over humanity. As far as she was concerned, it would be brought about efficiently, or inefficiently. The only interesting variable would be the body count.

To that end, she worked tirelessly behind the scenes of civilized society. A politician might have grown too principled and be overdue for an untimely accident. A corporation might need to be enriched by less than ethical means. If Rayker had to step outside the law to achieve her goals, so much the better. There was no room for doubt in her world. When she failed to stay a step ahead of her rivals, they tried to kill her, though none had survived such attempts. She had seen gangsters, oligarchs and warlords rise and fall. She had seen the inside of many prison cells. But she always managed to free herself, and with time and new identities, generations had forgotten who she was.