by Timothy Zahn
And came to an abrupt halt. Standing motionlessly in the corridor between me and the car’s rear door were two conductor Spiders. “What?” I demanded.
Neither of them answered. I opened my mouth to ask the question again … and then belatedly, my brain caught up with me, and I took a second, closer look.
Because they weren’t conductors. They were larger, with the pattern of white dots that usually denoted a stationmaster.
I’d almost forgotten about the message we’d tried to send as we’d blown past the hidden siding a few days ago. Apparently, the gamble had paid off.
No wonder Bayta had been so anxious for me to cut short the conversation and get out here.
“Frank Compton?” one of the Spiders said in the flat voice all Spiders seemed to have.
“Yes.” I took a deep breath, a cold chill shivering across my skin. “Welcome, defenders. And may I say, it’s about damn time.”
I’d expected to have to spend at least the first hour helping get all the compartment cars emptied of passengers. But either Bayta or the defenders had already given the orders, and I quickly discovered that the conductors had the procedure under way. Leaving that task to them, I took the defenders back to my compartment for a quick tactical session.
“Let’s start with you,” I said as I closed the door behind me. “How many of you are there, and where’s your tender?”
“We are two,” one of the defenders said. His particular white-dot pattern reminded me of a military chevron lying on its side; privately, I dubbed him Sarge. “Our tender currently travels behind this train.”
“Which I assume means you came aboard from the rear through the baggage cars,” I said. “Did you bring any specialized equipment?”
“What sort of equipment?”
“Anything besides standard Spider tools and replacement parts,” I said. “Weapons, another kwi, burglar tools—anything?”
The Spiders were silent for a moment, probably discussing the matter between themselves. “No weapons or tools,” Sarge said at last. “But the tender is equipped with a side-extendable sealable passageway.”
I frowned. “You mean like a portable airlock?”
“Yes,” Sarge confirmed.
“Good,” I said. “Let’s get whatever you do have within a bit easier reach. Can you bring the tender up the auxiliary service tracks alongside the right-hand side of the train?”
“We require a crosshatch to change tracks,” Sarge said.
“Yes, I know,” I said. A crosshatch was a section of spirallaid tracks that allowed a Quadrail to quickly switch from one track to another without having to first get to a station. “Are there any coming up?”
Another pause as they again communed with each other. If defenders were the Chahwyn’s attempt to create Spiders with quick minds and the ability to take the initiative, I reflected, they still had a long way to go. “The nearest is three hours away,” Sarge reported.
“That should do,” I said. “When we hit the crosshatch, bring the tender up alongside—let’s see—alongside the door into the center compartment car. Kennrick’s compartment is on the opposite side, so he won’t spot it.”
“Other passengers may notice its passage,” Sarge warned.
“Not if they’re all watching dit rec dramas at the time,” I said. “But you’re right. We’ll have the conductors opaque any open display windows before you move the tender, just to be on the safe side.” I braced myself. “Now we need an update from the inside. Can you get in contact with Bayta?”
Sarge seemed to straighten a little on his metallic legs. “Frank?” Bayta’s voice came.
I jumped. I’d never even heard of Spiders being able to do that. Something new the Chahwyn had come up with for their defenders? “Bayta? Is that you?” I called.
“Yes,” Sarge said, still in Bayta’s voice. “I hope things look better out there than they do in here.”
“I’m working on it,” I assured her. “Can you see where the other ends of your nooses are connected?”
“One’s attached to the door, the other to the curve couch,” she reported. “Both are running through pulley systems, so that if the door opens or the couch collapses into the divider …” She left the sentence unfinished.
“Understood,” I said quickly. I didn’t want to dwell on the consequences, either. “Is there any way to get to the wires from outside the room? Maybe open the door or divider just far enough to send in a mite with wire cutters?”
“No,” the response came immediately. “Opening the door at all will kill me. And the divider can only be opened about as far as it was earlier.”
Which hadn’t left enough of a gap for a mite to squeeze through. I wondered briefly about the even smaller twitters, but quickly abandoned the thought. Twitters were delicate creatures, designed for electronics repair and assembly, and I doubted they would have the strength to carry and operate something as big and heavy as wire cutters. “How about the ceiling?” I asked. “We’ve still got almost two hours’ worth of Spiders and moving passengers thudding around. Could the mites disassemble their way through enough of the ceiling so that they could get the rest of the way through later tonight while Kennrick’s asleep?”
“Two hours wouldn’t be nearly enough time,” Bayta said. “Besides, I think he’s put sensors up there. There are six lumps of what looks like clay attached to parts of the ceiling and wired into his reader.”
“Gray-colored clay?”
“Dark gray, yes.”
“They’re sensors, all right,” I confirmed. “Certainly audio, possibly motion, too. There are six, you say?”
“Yes, with four more lined up by the door,” Bayta said. “From the lengths of their wires, I’d guess he’s planning to put them out into the corridor after everyone’s left.”
I grimaced. The man had definitely thought this through. “Anything else?”
“He’s been stretching more wires like the ones around my neck over the floor,” she said. “I think they’re all just fastened to the walls, but I can’t be completely sure.”
“Probably just window dressing,” I told her. “The more wires he loads the room with, the harder it’ll be for us to know which ones we have to cut. Anything else?”
“I don’t know what it means,” Bayta said slowly, “but he’s brought in the oxygen repressurization tank from our car.”
I frowned. Every Quadrail car came equipped with a self-contained and self-controlled supply/scrubber/regulator system as an emergency backstop against a sudden loss of air pressure. Bayta and I had used them ourselves on occasion. “What’s he thinking, that we’re going to try to gas him?”
“I don’t know,” Bayta said. “He also spent a few minutes earlier cutting into the end of his ticket. Not the key end, but the other end—”
“You talking to Compton?” Sarge interrupted himself.
Only now his voice was Kennrick’s.
A shiver ran up my back. I could understand why the Chahwyn might have thought it a good idea to design their new Spiders to channel voices as well as words. But reasonable or not, it was definitely on the north end of creepy.
“If you are, be sure to tell him about the sensors on the ceiling,” Kennrick’s voice continued. “I don’t think he’d be stupid enough to try to get those little mite Spiders digging in from that direction, but better to err on the cautious side. Oh, and ask him how the evacuation’s going.”
“Frank?” Bayta’s voice came back anxiously. “What do I do?”
“Go ahead and tell him,” I said. “He already knows you can communicate with the Spiders. Don’t mention the defenders, though.”
“All right.”
Sarge’s mimicry shifted tone, presumably indicating that his relay had changed from Bayta’s thoughts to her verbal conversation with Kennrick. I listened with half an ear as she described how the passengers were being moved and listed how many were left to go.
“Sounds like it’s under control,” Kennric
k said when she’d finished. “Just remind Compton that he needs to be back here in exactly—let’s see—one hour and forty minutes. If he’s not, the doors close and you’re going to be mighty hungry by the time we get to Venidra Carvo.”
“I’ll tell him,” Bayta’s voice came back. “Frank?” she said, Sarge’s tone again shifting as she switched back to telepathy. “Did you hear all that?”
“Yes, thanks,” I told her. “Overconfident SOB, isn’t he?”
“What do you want me to do?”
“For now, just try to relax,” I said. “And keep me informed as to what he’s doing.”
“All right.” There was a brief pause. “Frank … if it doesn’t look like it’s going to work out …”
“It’s going to work out,” I interrupted. “You just relax, okay? I’ll come up with something.”
“I’ll try,” she said. “Thank you.”
Sarge fell silent. As he did so, the other defender stirred. “One of the conductors has been asked how long the passengers will need to remain out of their compartments,” he relayed.
I stared out my compartment’s display window at the dull landscape of the Tube racing past, illuminated only by the coruscating glow of the Coreline above us and the faint light from our train’s own windows. Over two weeks to go before we reached Venidra Carvo. Over two weeks for Bayta to be trapped with a murderer.
I looked back at the defenders. Their white-dotted silver globes didn’t carry the faintest hint of an expression, but there was something about the way they were standing, something in their stance and stillness, that conveyed an unpleasant mixture of determination and ruthlessness.
The defenders weren’t going to let Bayta spend two weeks as Kennrick’s prisoner, either. The only question was whether I would come up with a plan to free her, or they would.
And which of our plans would get her through this alive.
“Compton?” Sarge prompted.
I took a deep breath. “Tell them six hours,” I said. “One way or another, they’ll be back in their compartments in six hours.”
TWENTY-ONE
Precisely two hours after being dismissed from Minnario’s compartment, I was back.
“Right on time,” Kennrick said approvingly as I came up to the narrow gap he’d again opened in the divider wall. “Excellent. All that Westali training, no doubt. You have your friend’s rations?”
“Right here,” I said, peering through the gap as I held up the package for him to see. He was back to his earlier cross-legged posture on the bed, this time with his reader propped up on the pillow beside him.
Bayta, in contrast, was now lying on her back on the floor with her feet toward me, the blanket covering her from neck to ankles, her head resting on the pillow. Her face was under control, but I could see the low-level nervousness beneath it. I also noted that there were now three loops of wire around her neck instead of two.
When Bayta had said Kennrick was stringing new lengths of wire around the room, she’d definitely been understating the case. The place was full of the damn stuff, most of it criss-crossing the room at shin height. Half a dozen of the wires ran over Bayta’s torso and legs, while the rest were arranged in front of the door and divider. Even if none of them were actually attached to Bayta’s neck loops, making a mad dash across the room to wring Kennrick’s neck was now out of the question.
“You like the new arrangement?” Kennrick asked.
“Looks like the hobby room of a tall-ship model maker,” I said. “Listen, the gap here is too small to fit the package through. Can you open it up a bit?”
“I could,” he said consideringly. “But it would be a bit tricky for her to eat with a sliced throat, don’t you think?”
I grimaced. “How about I open the package and send them through individually?”
“How about you do that,” he agreed. “Only be careful where they land.”
Tearing open the package, I started dropping the bars through the gap, making sure to miss all the wires. “I hope you’re not going to try to tell me all of those are connected to Bayta.”
“Some of them might be,” he said. “Others might be holding back other lines, so that her throat only remains intact if you leave them alone. Just in case you were thinking about sending in some twitters with instructions to cut everything in sight.”
“I wasn’t,” I assured him. “Look, Kennrick—”
“Hey, you have to see this,” he interrupted, reaching down to the bed beside him and picking up a flat piece of dull gray metal. “Especially since you asked about it earlier. This is part of the stiffening frame for my larger carrybag. Watch.”
Picking up his multitool, he used the needle-nosed pliers to get a grip on the corner of the plate. He pulled carefully to the side; and, to my amazement, a thin wire began to peel away from the metal. “Isn’t that cool?” he asked, continuing to pull wire from the plate until he’d reached the full extension of his arm. “It’s called knitted-metal something-or-other. The stuff’s perfectly solid and perfectly innocent until you need to garrote someone.” He smiled. “I’ll bet Mr. Hardin didn’t give you toys like this.”
“I wouldn’t have taken them if he had,” I said. “Kennrick, we may have some trouble here. Another side has joined the game.”
“What, Esantra Worrbin’s making threatening noises again on behalf of the Assembly?” he asked contemptuously.
“This has nothing to do with the passengers,” I said. “It has to do with the Spiders.”
“The Spiders are making threatening noises?”
“I’m not joking,” I growled. “There’s a new class of Spider that’s just come on line. They’re called defenders, and they’re like nothing you’ve ever seen before.”
“I’ll be sure to watch out for them,” Kennrick promised solemnly. “Along with the ogres and hobgoblins that have also been hiding aboard since we left Homshil. Really, Compton. I was hoping for something a little more imaginative.”
“Two of them came aboard an hour ago from a tender that’s pulled up behind us,” I went on doggedly. “Up to now, my experience with defenders has mostly consisted of being slammed up against a wall by one of them. They’re strong, they’re smart, they’re aggressive, and they’re not going to let you walk off this train. Not alive.”
I shifted my eyes to Bayta. “And unlike me, they don’t particularly care whether you die alone or with company.”
For a long moment Kennrick studied my face. “Okay, I’ll play along,” he said. “Let’s assume I’m sufficiently scared. What do you suggest I do next?”
“I suggest we get the hell off this train,” I said. “I suggest you and Bayta and I get aboard that tender, turn it around, and head back toward Homshil.”
“All three of us, you say?” Kennrick asked. “Interesting.”
“You and I can’t operate the tender,” I explained. “Bayta can. But you’ll need me as a hostage to guarantee her cooperation.”
“As well as guaranteeing a much more exciting ride, I assume?”
“You can tie me up for the whole trip if you want,” I said. “The point is that we have to get you off this train while we still can.”
“I’ll take it under advisement,” Kennrick said. “You about done with those?”
I flipped through the last of the ration bars. “Yes.”
“And the passengers are out of all three compartment cars?” he asked. “Except for you, of course.”
“Yes, everyone’s out.”
“Good.” Unfolding his legs, Kennrick got up from the bed. “See, here’s what I’m more concerned about at the moment than imaginary attack Spiders: the question of what you’re going to do when I close down that divider.”
“I leave the car like you told me to,” I said, frowning. “Why?”
“Don’t be naive, Compton,” he said, picking his way carefully between the wires as he walked toward me. “And don’t assume I am, either.”
“You can unfasten the w
ire from the door and watch me go,” I suggested.
“You mean open the door and discover to my chagrin that you’re standing right outside ready to punch me in the throat?” he countered. “No, thanks.”
He came to a stop just out of arm’s reach. “So let me explain how this is going to work.” He held up a small object. “This is the electric motor from my shaver,” he said. “I’m going to use it to rig up a device that’ll automatically strangle Bayta after a preprogrammed number of seconds or minutes.”
I felt my stomach tighten. “You don’t need to do that,” I said.
“Ah, but I do,” he countered. “You see, once you’ve gone I’m going to go through all three cars with the infrared sensor in my reader, and it’s a very good sensor. If I get even a hint that you or someone else is hiding in one of the compartments, I’ll come straight back here and make sure Ms. Bayta regrets your stupidity.”
“You kill her and you’ll have lost your hostage,” I warned.
“Oh, I wouldn’t kill her,” he assured me. “Not right away. I’d probably start by slicing off the end of a finger or two. I’m assuming she’s strong enough not to succumb to shock, but of course I don’t know that for sure.”
I took a deep breath. “Anything else?”
“Two things.” He dug into his pocket and pulled out his ticket, and I saw it was sliced about halfway through. “Point one: note the tear,” he went on. “If you or anyone else tries to jump me while I’m outside my compartment, all I have to do is tear it the rest of the way through and it becomes useless as a key. You might be able to put it back together, but not before the automatic strangler kicks in.”
“You don’t have to belabor the point, Kennrick,” I said. “I recognize that you’ve thought this whole thing through very carefully.”
“Good,” he said. “Point two …”
Without warning he turned halfway around, bringing the kwi on his right hand to bear on Bayta. His thumb pressed the switch, and Bayta’s eyes rolled up and closed as her body went limp.
Before I could react, Kennrick had swung back to face me. “Point two is I don’t want her giving you a running commentary on what I’m doing,” he said conversationally. “Good-bye, Compton.”
