Judgment at Proteus

by Timothy Zahn

  And across at the end of the aircar, Sam and Carl abruptly came to life and started along the side of the aircar directly toward Riijkhan and me.

  Or rather, toward me. I was the one, after all, whom the Chahwyn Elder had ordered them to kill if I started to speak of the forbidden subject.

  But Riijkhan didn’t know that. As far as he knew, the defenders were heading toward him, probably with murder on their minds.

  And his reaction was exactly what I’d hoped it would be. Spinning to face his approaching attackers, he opened his mouth and whistled the command tone.

  The defenders froze in place, and I felt Bayta stiffen beside me as she also came under their spell. Riijkhan started to turn back toward me, his tone still ringing through the air, a baleful look in his eye.

  And then, Sam started moving again.

  He moved slowly, like someone wading against a spring-thaw river current. But he was moving nevertheless. Riijkhan spun back around toward the Spiders, his blaze paling, as Carl stirred and also resumed his advance. A moment of stunned disbelief later, the other four Shonkla-raa opened up with command tones of their own, adding their voices to Riijkhan’s and raising the volume to a head-splitting level.

  And with all eyes on the defenders, I dropped into a crouch and reached under the edge of the aircar for one of the flashless stun grenades McMicking and I had concealed under the vehicle’s entire rim before we’d started the last leg of our trip. In a single motion I rose back to my feet, squeezed the trigger, and hurled it high above the army of Humans standing silently behind Riijkhan. Then, squeezing my eyes tightly closed in case this one wasn’t as flashless as the ones Hardin’s techs had demonstrated back on Earth, I pressed my palms hard against my ears.

  With a thunderclap that eclipsed even the Shonkla-raa control tone, the grenade detonated, temporarily deafening everyone within a thirty-meter radius.

  And as Minnario had proved back on Proteus Station, if a walker’s Modhran colony couldn’t hear the command tone, the Shonkla-raa power was broken. Riijkhan was fighting to regain his balance from the grenade’s effect when Hardin’s team, themselves not exactly steady on their feet, staggered into a charge.

  They did their best, and with another thirty seconds they might have pulled it off. But Riijkhan hadn’t been lying about not being alone. The echoes of the stun blast were still caroming off the Ten Mesas when the doors of both big tents were flung open and a horde of Shonkla-raa came charging out, a hundred strong at least, slamming into the rear of the unsteady Human charge and throwing the men and women aside like combat dummies.

  And with the Shonkla-raa finally out in the open, it was time to play my final card.

  My comm had been taken along with my gun belt. But Morse still had his. As Riijkhan grabbed Morse’s Beretta and wrenched it from his hand, I ducked past the Shonkla-raa’s side and snatched Morse’s comm from its holder. “Dies irae!” I shouted into it, dodging back as Riijkhan slashed his hand toward me. I made it back to Bayta and pulled her down into a crouch beside the aircar. “Dies irae!” I shouted again.

  Nothing happened.

  I raised the comm again, my eyes flicking away from the melee around me long enough to confirm that all of the comm’s settings were correct. “Dies irae!” I tried one more time. “Fayr—now!”

  But there was still nothing. And with a sinking feeling, I realized that my Belldic sharpshooters weren’t going to be saving the day.

  It was too late anyway. The last of the Humans were down, lying motionless or twitching in the desert dust, and with the command tone once again filling the air Sam and Carl had also ground again to a halt, their metal legs stiff and glistening in the afternoon sun.

  Riijkhan turned toward me, Morse’s gun still gripped in his hand. Swallowing, I rose back to my feet. There were times, I reflected distantly, when making the enemy mad maybe wasn’t such a good idea. “All right,” I said. “What now?”

  Riijkhan didn’t reply, and for a heart-thudding moment I thought he was going to shoot me right there and then. But as we stood facing each other, the downed men and women began rising slowly to their feet. They stood motionless, pain and frustration simmering in their faces.

  Their hearing was coming back, and with that the brief window of opportunity had passed. Once again, the Humans and their Modhran colonies had become Shonkla-raa slaves.

  “Did you truly think we wouldn’t notice your Belldic ally and his commando squad?” Riijkhan asked. Instead of the anger I’d expected, his voice merely held a sort of detached curiosity. “They, too, were carefully infected with Modhran polyps on their journey here.”

  “I guess I should have anticipated that,” I conceded. “Are they even still alive?”

  “Of course,” Riijkhan said, sounding surprised at the question. “As are they,” he added, waving a hand behind him at the unmoving Humans once more standing at attention. “One does not kill one’s soldiers without need or cause.”

  “I suppose not,” I murmured.

  “In addition, as you said earlier, we may require the aid of a few of them to operate the ship.” He lifted his hand, frowning at the gun he was holding as if just noticing it was still there. I tensed, but he merely handed the weapon behind him to Morse, who silently holstered it. “Now that your last hope has been proved futile, I trust you’re ready to cooperate?”

  I frowned. “Cooperate how?”

  For the first time he actually looked embarrassed. “We’ve found one of the entrances to the warship,” he said. “But we haven’t been able to open it.”

  I raised my eyebrows. “You’re kidding. Your own ship has locked you out?”

  “Hardly,” he growled. “If necessary, we’ll blast it open. But we’d prefer not to cause unnecessary damage.”

  “And you think I know how to open the door for you?” I asked. “Or would consider doing so even if I did know?”

  “You’re an uncommonly intelligent Human,” Riijkhan said. “And your companion is a daughter of one of the ancient races. Together, I think it possible that you’ll find the solution.”

  “And if we don’t?”

  “Then you will die,” he said, the complete lack of emotion in his tone somehow more chilling than any of his earlier anger had been. “Slowly, of course, and in agony.”

  “Of course,” I said. “And if we do?”

  His blaze lightened a bit. “If you do?”

  “What do we get if we open the door?” I clarified. “We get to live, of course—that one’s obvious. But for a job this important you’ll need to throw something else into the pot.”

  “I’ve already said we can blast the door open.”

  “Wrecking who knows what in the process,” I reminded him. “Come on, Osantra Riijkhan—you were ready to hand over the whole Terran Confederation if I cooperated with you. Surely you can spare a little loose change on this one.”

  His eyes were steady on me. “What do you want?”

  I pointed at my battered team standing unmoving in the sun. “Them.”

  Riijkhan seemed taken aback. “What?”

  “You heard me,” I said. “They all get to leave with Bayta and me after we open the door for you. Unharmed, of course, and you pledge not to come after us.”

  “Impossible,” Riijkhan said firmly. “But I offer a counterproposal.”

  I nodded. “I’m listening.”

  “Since they are clearly of value to you,” Riijkhan said, “I offer to kill one for each hour you fail to open the warship. Beginning with him.” He leveled a finger toward Morse. “The first hour begins now.”

  I looked at Morse. His face was silently contorted, the face of a man who wants desperately to say something. “Let him speak,” I said.

  Riijkhan shrugged slightly— “Don’t do it,” Morse gasped. “Let the bast—”

  His mouth clamped shut again. “He’s spoken his word,” Riijkhan said. “Do I need again to speak mine?”

  For a long moment I gazed into Morse’
s eyes. He’d hated me once. Probably still did. And I’d never really liked him, either.

  I sighed. “Fine,” I said, taking Bayta’s arm. “Show me this damn door.”

  * * *

  Riijkhan loaded us into one of the larger ground vehicles: Bayta, Morse, five of the other Shonkla-raa, McMicking, Riijkhan himself, and me. Sam and Carl they hauled away into one of the big tents, their legs securely chained.

  Somewhere along the line, once he had a spare moment or two, Riijkhan would probably order their dissection.

  Considering that the Shonkla-raa had known about the warships for only a few weeks, they’d done an impressive amount of work. The tunnel went straight into the mesa, cutting first through a meter or so of dirt and then boring through solid rock. Forty meters in, it had finally struck an old but still smooth wall of metal.

  At that point, the tunnel branched off in both directions, widening at various points along the way, here and there climbing up the side of the hull as the Fillies had dug along an interesting set of markings or a promising groove. In a few places alcoves had been dug out of the rock beside the ship, where small machine shops or equipment storage had been set up. One of the alcoves we passed contained a collection of recovered artifacts, and I spotted a couple each of the small Lynx, Hawk, and Viper sculptures that had given Bayta and me such trouble our last time here. A string of lights glowed down from the ceiling, and a six-centimeter pipe running around the upper edge hissed out a continual flow of fresh air.

  And amid the dust and light and rumble of activity, the whole damn place was filled to the brim with Shonkla-raa.

  I’d thought the hundred Fillies who’d suddenly appeared in reaction to my stun grenade attack had been impressive. But there had to be at least twice that number here in the warren, digging at the tunnel faces or examining the hull or working to coax more artifacts from the rocky ground. Three of the aliens were crammed into another of the alcoves, crooning their command tone softly into an impressively large radio transmitter.

  On the ride over, with the advantage of hindsight, I’d been regretting not having simply rammed one of the big tents with our aircar on our way in, wondering if I might have been lucky enough to take out the command-tone transmitter that still held the Hardin team hostage. Now, with the advantage of even more hindsight, I was just as glad I hadn’t tried it.

  “Nothing like a really good group project to draw people together,” I commented to Riijkhan as we walked along the left-hand branch of the tunnel. “Are you really all here? Or was that just a ploy to egg me into calling Fayr down on you?”

  “Of course we’re all here,” he said. “This is the culmination of our dreams.”

  “Ah,” I said. “Besides which, with your Proteus base gone and the rest of the Filiaelian Assembly hunting you like fresh game, this is as good a place as any to lie low?”

  He didn’t answer. Fifty meters later, we reached the door.

  It was considerably bigger than any of us, taller and wider, implying it was probably a cargo or vehicle hatchway. There were eight small openings set into the hull on either side, evenly spaced from eye level to waist level. Some of them were covered with metal mesh, while others were little more than deep, irregular-edged dimples in the metal.

  There was no handle, keyhole, touchpad, or anything else that suggested an opening mechanism. Or at least nothing recognizable as such. “There,” Riijkhan said, jabbing a finger at it. “And your first hour is now half over.”

  Under normal circumstances, I would have stalled for a while, just to make it look good. But I was pretty sure Riijkhan meant what he said about the hourly executions. “Was that a collection of artifacts I saw back there?” I asked.

  “It was.”

  “Have someone bring me one of everything,” I said. “I think I can have this open for you in a few minutes.”

  Riijkhan’s eyes flicked to Morse, who turned and headed back toward the artifact alcove. “We’ve already tried each of them in each of the openings,” he warned. “None of them is a key.”

  “I know,” I said. “While we wait, how about giving us a peek at your plans? Since you’re going to kill all of us anyway, you really have nothing to lose.”

  “We may not kill you,” Riijkhan said. “I still hope to find a way to persuade you to our side. If we do, Bayta will naturally also live.”

  “As a guarantee of my cooperation.”

  “Yes,” Riijkhan said. “As to the others, we’ll soon see if we need any of them to help control this ship. Those who aren’t needed, as you say, will be eliminated.”

  “I thought you didn’t like wasting troops.”

  “I don’t,” Riijkhan said. “But your demonstration earlier has also reminded me that it’s dangerous to be overdependent on slaves.”

  “Seems to me that leaves you between the proverbial rock and hard place,” I said. “Unless you expect more Shonkla-raa to rise spontaneously from the ground, your current crowd is pretty much it.”

  “Not from the ground.” He tapped the metal hull beside us. “From here. Once the ship is activated and freed from its nest, we will have the necessary time, resources, and freedom of movement to re-create the Kuzyatru Station facilities that were destroyed by the traitor Emikai. Once we’re fully operational, we’ll send word back to the Assembly. From there, thousands of Filiaelians will rise up and join us, eager to take back what was once ours.”

  “Impressive,” I murmured. “Hitler would be proud.”

  “Who?”

  I shook my head. “Never mind.”

  Morse returned, a tray of artifacts in his hands. Among them, as I’d hoped, were a Lynx, a Viper, and a Hawk, the three components of the ancient Shonkla-raa trinary weapon. “Good,” I said briskly. “Bring them here, and let’s see what we’ve got.”

  Morse started forward, then abruptly stopped. “A moment,” Riijkhan said, eyeing me closely. “Modhri: are any of these devices weapons?”

  I held my breath. But Riijkhan had phrased the question just loosely enough. “No,” Morse said.

  Riijkhan nodded, and Morse started forward.

  And again stopped. “Can any combination form a weapon?” Riijkhan added.

  Morse seemed to wilt a little. “Yes.”

  Riijkhan eyed me, his blaze darkening. “Fine,” I said with a sigh. “I just need the Viper.”

  “What is it?” Riijkhan asked suspiciously. “What does it do?”

  “It’s a power source,” I explained. “I don’t think the door’s locked. I think it’s just not powered up.”

  “And you can do that from out here?”

  “I don’t know,” I said with strained patience. “Give me the Viper, and we’ll find out together.”

  Riijkhan whinnied a snort. But Morse had, after all, already confirmed that none of the artifacts by itself was a weapon. At Riijkhan’s silent command he set the tray down, picked out the Viper from the collection, and walked over to me.

  I took it from him, an eerie feeling creeping up my back. The Viper was a power source, just as I’d told Riijkhan.

  What I hadn’t told him was that under the proper circumstances it could also explode violently. Circumstances that included an injured, pain-racked, or highly stressed Modhri.

  Which meant that I held the final solution in my hands.

  It wasn’t a pleasant solution. Certainly not the one I would have chosen. But it was the best we were going to get. Normally, a Viper explosion was reasonably contained, but here inside a tunnel system I guessed it had a fair chance of bringing the whole wall of rock down on top of the working Shonkla-raa. If it managed to also take out the command-tone transmission station, Hardin’s team back in the compound would suddenly be freed from Shonkla-raa control. If they were able to take out the remaining Fillies fast enough, and if Riijkhan was telling the truth about the entire Shonkla-raa contingent being here, we could eliminate the threat right here and now.

  All it would cost would be Morse, McMicking, Bay
ta, and me. Heavy collateral damage, indeed.

  But the only other choice was capitulation.

  I braced myself. “Okay,” I said to Riijkhan. “I need you to release the Modhri.”

  Riijkhan’s blaze darkened. “Why?”

  “Because this gadget was apparently designed and intended for Modhran use,” I told him. “It therefore needs the Modhri to telepathically activate it.”

  “Very well,” Riijkhan said. “I will give the order.”

  I locked eyes with Morse and gave a little nod. He couldn’t nod back, but in his eyes I could see that he and the Modhri understood. He took the Viper and slid its irregular end into the opening that matched its shape. Stepping close to Bayta, I surreptitiously took her hand.

  And with a grinding like sand in teeth, the door began to move, backing away ponderously into the hull. It receded about a meter, until the inner edge of the hull itself was visible. Then, just as ponderously, the door moved sideways, sliding into a pocket to the side and revealing a faintly lit corridor beyond. For a moment there was a small breeze as the air pressures between the ship and the tunnel equalized, and I caught the scent of dust and lubricants and old metal.

  The door stopped, the breeze faded away, and Morse pulled the Viper from the receptacle.

  And we were still alive. All of us.

  I looked at Morse. Surely he’d understood what I’d been telling him to do with the Viper. He gazed back, his eyes trapped inside a body that was no longer his.

  And with a sinking feeling, I understood.

  Riijkhan had called it, way back on the super-express. The Modhri wasn’t on my side. Not anymore.

  I took a deep breath. “There you go,” I murmured to Riijkhan, gesturing to the opening. “Help yourself.”

  Riijkhan drew himself up, murmuring something under his breath in Fili, and beckoned to one of the Shonkla-raa who’d come running up at the sound of the door’s opening. {Inform the herders to gather the slaves and bring them here,} he ordered.

  {The Humans only?} the other Shonkla-raa asked.