The Stainless Steel Rat Goes to Hell ssr-10

by Harry Harrison

  “Maybe we should have gone right,” Berkk said brightly. This did not deserve an answer.

  Back to where the pipe ended. But we turned right this time and went on into the darkness, Berkk first, running abraded fingertips along the stone.

  “Ouch!” he said.

  “Why ouch?”

  “Because I cracked my knuckles on what feels like a door frame.”

  We traced the outline with our hands and it not only felt like a door frame but it was one. With a very familiar wheel in the middle of it. It was not easy to turn, but between us we managed to get it moving a bit; metal squealed and grated inside.

  “Long time… between openings,” I grunted; “Keep it going.”

  With a final squawk of protest the locking bolt was free and the door swung away. We looked into a small room, feebly lit by green glowing plates on the wall. This was more than enough light for our darkness—adjusted eyes to see another door on the far wall. With a handle.

  “And a combination lock!” Berkk said, reaching out.

  “Stop!” I said, slapping his hand away. “Let me look at it before we try anything.”

  I blinked at the thing, trying to make out the details in the feeble light, moved my head from side to side.

  “I can just about make out the numbers,” I said. “It is an antique drum lock that was old when I was young. I know this lock.”

  “Can you open it?”

  “Very possibly. Possibly not since there are no tumblers to drop that I could listen for. But—there is one long chance. To lock this lock it must be turned from the last number that is set in when you open it. Many people forget to do that.”

  I did not add that most people did not forget most of the time. The thought was too depressing. And we couldn’t go back. I needed some luck again—a very lot was riding on this. My fingers were damp and I rubbed them on my shirt. Reached out and grabbed the handle and pulled.

  The door didn’t budge.

  But the handle rattled a bit in my hand. Did it turn? I tried.

  And it did. The lock had not been locked after all.

  I pulled the door open a bit and put my eye to the crack.

  Chapter 22

  “What do you see?” Berkk whispered.

  “Nothing. Dark.”

  And very quiet. I opened the door all the way and enough light filtered through from the glowing plates to reveal a rough floor littered with debris. A bent sign on the wall spelled out, in glowing letters:

  PLEASE LEAVE THIS PLACE AS YOU FOUND IT

  They must have found it pretty awful if was like this now. Broken lengths of plastic littered the floor, as well as empty, half—crushed containers. And it stank.

  “Yukk,” Berkk said. “Something is rotten in here.”

  “No, not in here. In this entire place, that’s the smell I told you about, that came from the dust or sand. I’m back where I started. In Heaven.”

  “Doesn’t smell like Heaven.”

  “That is because Heaven is up there on the surface. I was grabbed there by that robot with a built—in gravchute. We dropped into a pit and ended up here. Heaven is above.”

  “It usually is.”

  “On the planet’s surface, you idiot. The planet is named Heaven.”

  “Great. But how do we get up there?”

  “That is a very good question. For which, at this moment, I do not have an answer. So let us start by getting out of this place first. Is that a chink of light over there? Close the door partway—enough. Yes, stay here while I take a look.”

  I stumbled and kicked my way through the junk to a vertical crack of some kind with a reddish light shining through it. My fingers pulled at the edges, apparently the gap between two thin metal plates. I pressed my eyes close and looked out. A barren landscape with glowing red pits in the ground, some with bursts of flame rising from them. And that smell, blowing in stronger. I was back in the same place in the underworld where I had arrived.

  “Berkk.”

  “Yes?”

  “Feel around in the junk and see if you can find something thin to pry with. This wall, or whatever it is, is made of sheet metal plates—and not too well joined.”

  The first shard of hard plastic bent, then snapped. We tried again with a length of angled metal and managed to make a bigger opening. It was wide enough to get our fingers through, to pull and curse as the sharp edges cut into our flesh.

  “Heave now, together,” I said. And we did. Something screeched and broke free, leaving a gap big enough for us to push through.

  Out of one prison and into another. I kept such defeatist thoughts to myself and looked around. Dark shapes.

  “Buildings,” I said. “I didn’t see them when I was brought here that first time. Not that I had much of a chance to see anything while I was dragged along.”

  “Shall we take a look?”

  “Any choice?”

  There was no answer to that one. In the red—shot semi—darkness it was hard to see very far. The landscape was open with no place to hide. But no one moved, there was nothing in sight.

  “Let’s go.”

  When were closer we could see that they were buildings, with dark openings cut into their sides. They looked like windows and doors without glass or covering. There were more of the glowing plates inside shedding some light; we approached cautiously. No sound, no one in sight. Looking through the empty rectangle of a window I could see rows of what could only be beds or bunks.

  “The women,” I whispered, pointing. “They can’t work all the time—and some of the bunks are occupied.”

  “Like us digging rock, two shifts maybe, so work goes on right around the clock.”

  We skirted around the silent building—and there they were—stretching out of sight in red—lit darkness. The tables. The women bent over them. The sudden rustle of sound, accompanied by the foul odor, as another mass of the finely ground rock was released.

  “I want to talk to them,” I said. “They will certainly know more than we do about this place. They came here from somewhere—so if there is a way in there must be a way out.”

  I started up and Berkk held my arm. “Not alone. I’m coming with you.”

  We ran together to the nearest table, dropped down in its shadows by the legs of one of the workers. If she knew we were there she gave no sign. “Ni estas amikof,” I said. “Parolas Esperanto?”

  At first she did not answer or respond. Just kept her arms swinging in slow motion over the moving surface of the table, then she stopped but did not look down.

  “Yes. Who are you—what are you doing here?”

  “Friends. What can you tell us about this place?”

  “There is nothing to tell. We work. Finding that which must be found. When we find enough, that thing knows about it. It always knows. Then it comes and takes what we have found and then we can eat and sleep. Then we work again. That is all there is.”

  As her voice died away her hands began their slow sweeping motions again.

  “What thing?” I asked. “What makes you work?”

  She lifted her arm, then turned and slowly pointed across the table. “That thing, over there.”

  I raised my head up just high enough to look—dropped down instantly and fearfully pulled Berkk after me into deeper shadow.

  “Her thing is my robot. The one I told you about, that brought me here. It’s the devil in this particular corner of hell.”

  “What do we do?” There was fear in his voice as well—for good reason.

  “I tell you what we don’t do—we don’t let it see us. We’ll be dead, or at the very best back with the rocks and our obnoxious keeper, Buboe.”

  We pressed as hard as we could against the dusty flank of the table. Hoping that we were concealed by the shadows as the robot appeared farther down the line of structures.

  A woman was with it, head down, shuffling slowly—along. They walked towards the building we had so recently left. Passed so close that the smear
s of rust were clearly visible on the robot’s flank. That single glowing eye. As they entered one of the doorways I scrambled to my feet.

  “Let’s go—as far away from that robot as we can get!”

  Berkk needed no urging, was in fact well ahead of me in what was possibly a life—or—death race.

  No heads turned in our direction as we ran by; the women’s aims kept sweeping, brushing.

  “Something up ahead there, lights of some kind. Maybe buildings,” Berkk said.

  I took a look behind us and put on a panic burst of speed; enough to pass him.

  “It’s seen us. It’s coming after us!’~

  When I dared to look again it was closer, running faster than us, steel legs pumping like pistons. We couldn’t win—

  I turned my head back just in time to see one of the women leave her position at the table, just a silhouetted figure against the distant lights. She turned and was stepping out in front of me. I tried to go around her but she put her arms out to grab me. A sudden twist and I was thrown breathless to the ground.

  An instant later Berkk fell on top of me. And the robot was almost there!

  The woman arrived first. Throwing her body forward so that she landed on top of both of us, her face almost pressing against mine.

  “It’s about time you showed up,” Angelina said.

  Chapter 23

  Darkness vanished and I blinked against the sudden glare of bright lights. I could feel Berkk writhing under me—while directly before my eyes was the most beautiful sight in all of the known, and unknown, galaxy.

  Angelina’s black—smeared smiling face. I lifted my head and kissed the tip of her nose.

  “Errgle,” Berkk errgled, trying to wriggle out from under our weight. I moved a bit so he could get free, still clutching harder to Angelina’s warm, firm body. We kissed enthusiastically and it was more of heaven than the Heaven we had just left would ever be.

  “When you are through with that you might report what you found,” Coypu said. I would recognize that voice anywhere. We separated reluctantly and stood up. Still holding hands.

  Behind Coypu was a very familiar laboratory.

  “We’re in Special Corps Prime Base!” I said.

  “Obviously, We moved the entire operation back here when you failed to return from Heaven. Slakey is very dangerous people. Soon after we got here there were a number of attempts to penetrate our defenses. They have all failed and the shields are stronger than ever.”

  “You would like a drink?” Angelina said, whistling over the robar. “Two double Venerian Vodka Coolers.”

  “After you, my darling. And another for my friend, Berkk, here.”

  He still sat on the floor, looking around and gaping. His fingers clutched the glass the robar gave him and we all glugged enthusiastically.

  “Now, tell me, Professor,” I said, hokling out my glass for a—refill. “What was Angelina doing in that terrible place—..and how did she get us back?”

  Before he could answer the door burst open and Bolivaror was it James?—burst in followed by his brother. With Sybil a short pace behind.

  “Dad!” There were enthusiastic embraces all around, and some more drinks from the robar so we could toast our successful return. As we lowered our glasses Berkk dropped his. When he bent over to pick it up he just kept going, falling heavily to the floor, unconscious. I grabbed his wrist—almost no pulse at all.

  “Medic!” I shouted as I rolled him onto his back and opened his mouth to make sure that his air passages were clear. But as I did this I was pushed not—too—gently aside by the medbot that had dropped Out of the ceiling. It put a manipulator into Berkk’s mouth to secure his tongue. At the same time it pressed an analyzer against his skin, took a blood sample, extruded a pillow under his head, did a fast body scan, covered him with a blanket and had already radioed for a doctor who burst through the door scant instants later.

  “Stand clear,” he ordered as the medbot slid an expanding metal web under Berkk’s body, popped wheels out of the ends and carefully drove off with him. “The surgeon is standing by,” the doctor said. “There appears to be a small blood clot on the patient’s brain, undoubtedly caused by a blow to the skull. Prognosis good.” He hurried after the medbot while Sybil hurried after him.

  “I’ll see what happens and report back,” she said. She left with Bolivar and James right behind her. The three were inseparable now. Which might lead to problems that I did not wish to consider at this moment.

  This put a bit of a damper on the party and we sipped glumly at our drinks. Before we finished them—modern medicine sure works fast—Coypu’s phone rang and he grabbed it up. Listened, nodded, then smiled.

  “Thank you, Sybil,” he said and hung up. “Operation successful, out of danger, no permanent brain damage. He’ll stay in narcsleep until the treatment is finished.”

  We cheered at that. “Thank you, Professor,” I said. “With this last emergency out of the way we can now relax and listen. While you tell us how my Angelina managed to drag me out of the hell in Heaven and how she got there in the first place. After which we will try to figure out what all the strange happenings that have been going on really mean. Professor.”

  “We will take the explanation one step a time, if you don’t mind. To go back to the beginning. When you did not return after a good deal of time had passed I activated your undetectable interuniversal activator and the boot returned. Without you. Since you were not wearing the boot I reached the inescapable conclusion that my machine had been detected. Therefore I had to improve its undetectability. I did this rather quickly because I was feeling very, very rushed.”

  “I held a gun to the back of his head with my finger trembling on the trigger,” Angeina said, smiling sweetly. “I was going after you and intended to bring you back—with a better machine than the duff one he had supplied you with.”

  “It was an early model,” Coypu muttered defensively. “I improved the design greatly then constructed three devices of varying degrees of undetectability.”

  “I carried the first hidden in the lining of my purse,” Angelina said. “The second was under the skin on my arm, here.” She rubbed at the long white scar, easily visible under the dusty smears, and scowled. “I will have to get this unsightly thing removed.”

  “That is not the only thing that is going to be removed,” I grated through tight—clamped teeth. “I’m going to kill that particular Slakey for that botched bit of surgery.”

  “Not if I get there first, darling. He of course very quickly found the one in my purse, and then he detected this one, with great difficulty I must say. He was so pleased with himself that he never considered that there might be a third.”

  “Where is it?” I asked.

  “Where Slakey obviously could not find it,” Coypu said, happily rattling his fingers on his foreteeth. “I knew that there was no way to detect the pseudo—electrons, so it must have been the pseudo—electron paths in the solid state circuitry that he found. So I impressed my neural network on Angelina’s neural network where it would be concealed by her neural activity.”

  “You mean that you built your machine right into her nervous system?” “Exactly so. Since my pseudo electrons move at pseudo speed, there would be no interference with the electrical function of her synapses. The circuitry ended directly in her brain.”

  “So when I thought go, we all went,” she said, throwing her empty glass towards the robar, which plucked it out of the air with a flip of a tentacle. “Now lam going to wash off this mud and stench and I suggest, Jim diGriz, that you do the same.”

  “I will after I ask you a single question..

  “It can wait.” Then she was gone. I whistled up another drink.

  “Tell me all that happened,” Coypu said.

  “You let her go after Slakey alone!” I accused. “With all the massed strength of the Corps to hand.”

  “And a gun to my head. Do you think that there was any way to stop her?
”

  “No—but you could at least have tried.”

  “I did. What happened?”

  I slumped in a chair, sipped my drink, and told him the entire repulsive story. My descent into Purgatory from Heaven and the women at the sorting tables there. Then being tossed through Slakey’s machine to the living hell of the mining world. He popped his eyes a bit when I told him about our escape in the rebar cages. Narrowed his eyes into pensive slits when he heard about the laboratory and the mysterious circular tunnel.

  “And that was that. My dearest Angelina was there and whisked us back here and you know the rest.”

  “Well, well, well!” Coypu said when I had finished, jumping to his feet with excitement and pacing back and forth.

  “Now we know what he is doing and how he is doing itwe just don’t know what he is doing it for.”

  “Perhaps you know, Professor, but some of us are still in the dark.” “It’s all so obvious.” He stopped pacing and raised a didactic finger. “Heaven is the seat of all of his activities, we can be sure of that now. It matters not in the slightest where the mineral is mined. Because it was brought to Heaven after you and the male slaves extracted it from the ground. Dropped through an interuniversal field to end up in Heaven where it is ground finely and bombarded in a cyclotron—” “A what?”

  “A cyclotron, that is the machine that you saw in the tunnel. Your description was quite apt, even if in your ignorance you did not know what you were looking at. It is an ancient and rather clumsy bit of research apparatus that is not used much anymore. It is basically a very large, circular tube that has all the air inside evacuated. Then ions are pumped in and whirled around and around through the tube, held in orbit away from the tube walls by electromagnets. After building up tremendous speeds the ions smash into a metallic target.”

  “Why?”