Asgard's Conquerors

by Brian Stableford

  Neither the man with pale blue eyes nor Jacinthe Siani volunteered any information about this place, and I realised that the Kythnan's single comment about the musical plants was a true gauge of what it took to awaken her curiosity. As for the invader, although he was "only a soldier," he seemed nevertheless to be remarkably insensitive to the beauty and the inherent fascination of what Asgard held. He took all this for granted—it meant nothing, in terms of inspiring theories about what Asgard was, and the godlike beings who had designed it.

  The savage mind, I thought, fixated on the wisdom of imaginary ancestors, uncaring about the progress of its own wisdom. And yet these people might succeed in driving the Tetrax from Asgard, and in bringing desolation to vast reaches of the macroworld.

  If ever I had thought seriously about throwing in my lot with the invaders and betraying the Tetrax, I was sure by now that I could not do it. I needed to pin my colours to the mast of some cause that was actually interested in penetrating Asgard's mysteries.

  After catching only the merest glimpses of the ecosystem on level fifty, I was enthusiastic to see more. Our next drop took us to what I judged to be level fifty-two. This was another weird one, and I knew when we changed vehicles before we went through the complicated locks that it would be another with a reducing atmosphere. The car we got into was like a miniature spaceship, sealed very tight.

  There was more life here, though, than there had been in the earlier hydrogenous environment. There, everything had been vaporous save for a kind of swampy sludge at ground level. Here, there were many dendritic forms—I hesitate to call them "trees" because they looked more like corals, and certainly didn't have any leafy foliage—coiling and branching tortuously. They didn't form much of a forest because they mostly kept their distance from one another, but some of them—after the fashion of the cloudy habitat on level fifty— bore what looked like luminescent fruit.

  There were flying creatures, too—or, to be strictly accurate, gliding creatures, because I couldn't see any evidence of fluttering wings as they floated from one dendrite to another. There was a sort of undergrowth, consisting mostly of globular entities of assorted sizes, many of which were associated in clusters. I couldn't imagine what kinds of metabolism these things must have; I knew there were bacteria in conventional ecosystems that could only grow in the absence of free oxygen, but I knew of no metazoan entities with anaerobic habits. Here, I assumed, some fairly radical revision of the basic DNA support-system must be necessary, if this life were akin to our own.

  Our drive across this territory was another short one—barely a couple of kilometres. We came then to a big windowed wall curving away in either direction into the murk. We crawled through a second system of airlocks, but instead of coming to another big elevator that could lower our vehicle down to the next level, we parked in a bay. As we disembarked, and were met by more armed troopers, I realised that we were not going any further. We had arrived at our destination.

  The wrist-timer I was wearing was showing Asgard metric time, but in human terms our journey had taken the best part of two days. While there had been plenty to look at, I hadn't been entirely aware of how tired I was, but now it came home to me that I'd only slept for about six of those forty-eight hours.

  I was initially surprised that our destination had proved to be located in such a hostile habitat, but I soon perceived the logic of it. What better place is there to put a maximum-security prison than a building surrounded by an alien atmosphere? It would certainly help to discourage would-be escapers.

  Now that we'd arrived, I could no longer distract myself from the extremity of my plight. Fifty levels down, there could be not the slightest hope that the Tetrax could do anything to free me. Susarma Lear would have not the slightest chance of ever finding me, even if she were disposed to bring the Star Force to my rescue.

  And as if that were not trouble enough, I was morally certain that my captors were going to demand far more information from me than I actually had to give, and were not going to take at all kindly to the inadequacy of my answers.

  17

  I later discovered that it was a pretty crowded prison camp, but that was by no means obvious when I arrived. The corridors were all empty—everyone was locked up in the cells. There weren't even many guards about; I suppose they didn't need very many, given that there was little future in dreams of rebellion or escape.

  The accommodation offered by the camp seemed somewhat basic, as far as I could judge while being marched through its corridors. The walls were polished, coldly metallic in appearance, and the cell doors were all identical— row upon row of them, a mere six metres apart.

  It seemed a bleak prospect as they hustled me to my appointed place, but when they opened the door and shoved me in, I was grateful to find that it wasn't quite as bad as I had begun to fear. The inmates of this curious institution were housed two to a cell, and our captors were considerate enough to match up like with like, placing members of the same race together. At the time of my arrival there was only one other human in the camp, so I was taken immediately to his cell.

  As the door banged shut behind me, he looked at me in open astonishment, as if the fact of my appearance were almost a miracle. I was pleased to see him, figuring that he was probably the next best thing to a friendly face that this godforsaken spot could offer.

  "Hello Alex," I said. "Small universe, isn't it? What time do we eat around here?"

  It was pleasant to see the expressions of utter surprise crossing his face, one after another.

  "Rousseau!" he said, almost as if I were Santa Claus—or maybe the devil incarnate.

  "You can call me Mike," I said.

  "But you left before the invasion," he complained, foolishly. "You should be back on Earth by now." He was speaking in parole—English wasn't his first language, and he tended not to speak it unless asked.

  I looked around warily. "Is this place bugged?" I asked, in English.

  He shook his head tiredly, more in amazement than negation. "Hardly," he said, answering in the same language. "As far as I can tell, these people are barbarians. Apart from technology they've taken over without really understanding it, they're about as sophisticated as early twentieth-century humans."

  "Well," I said, "it probably doesn't matter anyway. It's just that I'm not entirely sure how much the Neanderthalers know about me, or how much I should tell them. Jacinthe Siani fingered me as the guy who went down Saul Lyndrach's dropshaft, and blew a cover story I'd invented on the spur of the moment. They're interested in me on account of what I found down below, and I suspect that's the only thing that's inhibiting them from shooting me as a Tetron spy. I'm being as discreet as I can, but I don't know what they have planned. How much have you told them?"

  "I can assure you," he said, stiffly, "that I have told these people absolutely nothing, and have not the slightest intention of doing so. They may regard me as a first cousin to their race, due to a superficial similarity of appearance, but that only betrays their crudity of mind."

  I nodded. Aleksandr Sovorov could always be relied upon to stand on his dignity. He didn't go in for half-measures, either. If he had decided not to talk to his captors, he was perfectly capable of remaining silent until doomsday.

  I sat down on the unused bunk, and wiped my forehead with the back of my hand. I felt slightly feverish and my throat was a little sore. Until that moment, I had attributed the fact that I didn't feel on top of the world to tiredness, but now my sinuses were beginning to trouble me.

  "Have you got a spare handkerchief?" I asked. "I've got a cold coming on, and I was travelling light. I don't suppose the medical facilities around here are up to Tetron standards?"

  "Hardly," he said. He found me a handkerchief and passed it over to me gingerly. There didn't seem to be much point in avoiding physical contact—if we had to share a cell, we would also have to share our viruses.

  "I suppose one of our fellow humans identified you as the man most likely to kn
ow how Tetron technology works?" I speculated. "So they asked for your help, didn't like your uncooperative attitude, and sent you down here for a bit of re-education."

  "Quite probably," he said.

  "Have they tortured you yet?"

  "No. So far they have only tried to seduce my support with arguments and bribes. I think they believe that my knowledge is very limited. Their worst threats have been directed at the Tetrax."

  "That's a relief. I only hope they use the same tactics on me. Arguments and bribes I can stand."

  "I hope," he said frostily, "that you do not intend to co-operate with these vicious murderers."

  "That depends," I told him, "on what they want to know. I do have a certain authority to negotiate. Who's senior Tetron here in the camp?"

  "There is a man named 822-Vela," said Sovorov, a little suspiciously.

  "Do we have any opportunity to talk to him?"

  "Certainly. There are two exercise periods per day, when prisoners associate quite freely. Do you have any particular reason for wanting to communicate with him?"

  "I told you. I'm a Star Force spy. The Tetrax hired me, along with Susarma Lear and a shipful of troopers, to investigate the situation down here, and to open up lines of communication."

  "How do you expect to be able to report back?" he asked, sarcastically. "Security in the camp is lax, but it hardly needs to be tight. Even if you could get an atmosphere suit, there is nowhere to go except the elevator shaft, and even if you could get up or down the shaft, there are invader-occupied levels at the other ends."

  "So nobody escapes?"

  "Nobody even tries," he assured me.

  "In that case," I told him, "I'll probably have to talk my way out. And if that means telling them some of what they want to know, I'll do it. We all have to make sacrifices." I hadn't realised until I spoke that I would have to make plans along some such lines—in fact, I hadn't been planning at all—but Alex Sovorov was a man who'd always been able to provoke me with his marginally insufferable manner, and I wasn't about to tell him that I hadn't a clue what I could or should do.

  He looked at me uncertainly, not entirely sure whether it was appropriate for him to disapprove. That was a new dilemma for him—in all our past dealings, he'd been quite certain that I merited disapproval.

  "You're working for the Tetrax?" he queried.

  "That's right. They're having difficulty making contact with our genial hosts, and they sent down three teams of snoopers to find out what's going on. I was unlucky, and struck out before getting past phase one. Hopefully, some of the others have been enjoying better luck while I've been in transit. For my own satisfaction, though, I'd appreciate it if you could fill me in on what you know—assuming that your determination not to communicate hasn't extended to seeing and hearing no evil as well as speaking none?"

  "Of course not," he said. "Unfortunately, I have not been able to gather much information here. Much as I would have liked to talk to the natives of Asgard who are imprisoned here, the lack of a common language has proved a barrier. Some of them are as keen to learn parole as the invaders, but their opportunities are more restricted. Some have made progress during the exercise periods, but the invader linguists are busy round the clock with collaborators, and have mastered the language much more fully."

  "That's okay," I said. "I don't expect miracles. Let's start with the camp. How many people are here, and who are they?"

  "I have not been able to make an accurate count."

  I found his pedantry a little hard to cope with. I wondered whether it might be better to go to sleep now, and try to hold a more sensible conversation in the morning. My head was beginning to ache. But I persisted.

  "Come on, Alex. I just want to know the score. What kind of a place is this?"

  "Well," he said. "I think there are about two thousand people here. The great majority are members of non- galactic humanoid races—I estimate that there are at least a dozen different species. Perhaps a tenth of the prisoners are galactics. Most are Tetrax, but the invaders seem to have brought down at least one specimen of each of the races represented in Skychain City. This is as much a centre of learning as a place of imprisonment—it seems probable that anyone the invaders wish to interrogate for an extended period of time is brought here. There seems to be no routine mistreatment of prisoners, but I am not in a position to determine the whole range of the activities which go on. Until I have more data, it would be premature to draw too many conclusions."

  "Oh merde," I muttered. I should have known what to expect. I lay down, with my head on the pillow, and looked up at him.

  "You're tired," he observed. It was nice to see that he wasn't entirely incompetent in the business of drawing conclusions.

  "You never did tell me what time we eat around here," I reminded him.

  "We operate a day cycle slightly shorter than the Tetron norm," he told me. "The invaders appear to use a forty-unit division. I have no idea why. The lights go on at the zero point and off at twenty-five. We eat during the first, the eleventh, and the twenty-first periods. We exercise during the fifth and sixth, and during the fifteenth and sixteenth."

  "I'll try to remember," I promised.

  After a pause, during which time it might have sunk in to his thick skull that he was not being very helpful, he said, in a softer voice: "What's going to happen to us, Rousseau? Will the Tetrax succeed in securing our release?"

  "Now why should the Tetrax worry unduly about you?" I asked him, returning a little of the malicious sarcasm. "In spite of all your sterling work with the Co-ordinated Research Establishment, they probably don't give a damn about you, and now that I've failed in my mission, they probably care almost as little about me. If I were you, Alex, I'd start wondering how I could help myself. That's what I'm doing."

  "Oh," he said flatly. "In that case, I wish you the best of luck."

  I can tell when a man isn't sincere. Unfortunately, I thought I might need the very best of luck—and a bit more. I shut my eyes, and tried to figure out how I should play it when the questions began again—as they undoubtedly would. Unfortunately, I couldn't get my thoughts straight. I was tired and I was sniffing continually in a hopeless attempt to clear my sinuses.

  Of all the stupid places to catch a cold, I thought, furiously, I have to do it in the one place in the universe where I can't get proper treatment. Fate still seemed to be dealing me the worst cards it could find, and I realised that what I'd said to Alex was probably true. In all likelihood we were out of the game for good, and nobody would bother to make the slightest effort to bring us back into it. If I didn't play my cards exactly right, I might be here for a very long time.

  18

  The second phase of my interrogation started in a more polite fashion than the first. My new interlocutor spoke far better parole than my old acquaintance with the sky-blue eyes, and he obviously wasn't "only a soldier." He even began by telling me his name, which was Sigor Dyan. He was dressed in black, like all the uniformed men, but he wore no insignia of rank at all—which implied, in subtle fashion, that he was important enough to stand outside the hierarchy. He had the customary white skin, and his white hair was commonplace, too, but he had curious eyes, which were a purplish colour somewhere between light-blue and albinic pink. His brow-ridges weren't very prominent and he had a comparatively steep forehead, which made him look very human indeed.

  He received me in a pleasant room, and invited me to sit on a sofa, although he sat on a more angular chair whose seat was elevated—with the consequence that he could look at me from a higher vantage, even though I was a good three centimetres taller than he. There was a low-level glass-topped table between us, with two cups and a pot of some kind of hot drink. Without asking, he poured us each a cup, and pushed mine over. I tasted it carefully. It was green and sweet, like sugared mint tea. It soothed my throat, which had become very sore. It was obviously velvet glove time—but I knew I'd have to look out for the iron fist.

  "You
r name is Michael Rousseau?" he began.

  "That's right," I croaked.

  "And you are a native of a planet which you call Earth?"

  "It's the homeworld of my species. I was born on a microworld in the asteroid belt. That's a thin scattering of big rocks somewhat further away from our star than the homeworld. You know about stars and solar systems?"

  "We are learning. I believe that Asgard is a very great distance away from your homeworld—a distance so great that I can hardly imagine it. We have grown used to figuring distances in rather small units. We have discovered that our conceptual horizons were narrower than we could possibly have supposed."

  "I hope your soldiers aren't agoraphobic," I commented.

  He smiled. "I fear that they are," he told me. "Many have experienced difficulties in working on the surface. Even the dome of Skychain City seems to us to contain an unusually large open space. Beyond the dome . . . perhaps you can imagine what a vertiginous experience it is for our people to look up into that sky for the first time."

  "Perhaps I can," I admitted. I couldn't—when you're born in the asteroid belt you grow up with a sky that makes all others seem comfortable.

  "What brought you to Asgard, Mr. Rousseau?" He spoke gently, and I certainly didn't want to discourage him. I felt too poorly to get into an argument, though I was trying to put on a brave face and keep my symptoms under control.

  "A spirit of adventure," I told him. "You get to a point in life where you can afford to buy a starship, and suddenly the whole galactic arm is open to you. The microworld began to seem intolerably parochial, and the asteroid belt seemed to have very little to offer—just millions of orbiting boulders. I had a friend who was keen to head for somewhere Romantic. Asgard is Romantic, with a capital R: the biggest, strangest world in the known universe. News of its existence had only just reached the system, and it was the great mystery—the ultimate puzzle. The space-born tend to look outwards . . . they rarely go back to Earth. To them, Earth is the dead past . . . the galactic community is the future. What brought you to a place like this?"