House of the Galactic Elevator

by Gerhard Gehrke

  “I couldn’t understand the message for obvious reasons,” Shannanon said sourly. “I also couldn’t figure out the kiosk or my credit app, so thanks for nothing. But I did manage to find you on my map.”

  “You need to go,” Jordan said. “The officer’s right. It’s dangerous here, you know.”

  “Not a chance.”

  The skyline before them quivered. Three of the buildings that stood next to where the Security HQ had been tilted and swooned. Bass rumbles and a series of sharp cracks followed, splitting the air like peals of thunder. Fang sidled in close to Jordan.

  Ceph made a swiping motion on his device, and several bots retreated towards their position.

  The three buildings fell in on themselves, leaving a trail of dust in the sky where they had once stood. The clouds of debris soon collapsed and spilled onto the street like colossal melting candles.

  Shannanon grabbed Jordan, first laying one hand on her arm and then wrapping an arm around her entire body.

  “What’s doing that?” Shannanon screamed. “Is it the Bunnie again?”

  Jordan pushed at Shannanon’s arm so she could breathe. “We have other problems,” Jordan said. “Another invasion of sorts. They also took down the security building.”

  “The security building? How?”

  Jordan had no words left. She could only look out at the thick cloud where four buildings had once stood. She hugged Shannanon back, glad to have someone to try to comfort. She had seen the World Trade Center go down as a child, watching the news on television all that day with her mom. She cried for a week and had nightmares for months. The fact that perhaps only one Galactic Commons citizen had just died in this new disaster was small comfort.

  “Evac of this district is confirmed,” the other cop said to Ceph.

  Ceph just nodded. His fingers worked at his device. Whatever funk he had been in was apparently shelved for the moment. Several of the bots around them sped away in different directions.

  Jordan tried to see what Ceph was doing by looking over his shoulder, but with Shannanon conjoined to her side, moving was difficult. She took Fang by a tentacle and attached it to Shannanon’s hand.

  “Shannanon, watch Fang,” Jordan said. “Detective Ceph?”

  Ceph ignored her, muttering to himself. He had a glazed expression on his face. Jordan guessed this is what she looked like when she was in-game. She couldn’t tell what programs he was using. No doubt apps reserved for security matters.

  “Let me know what I can do,” she said.

  Down the street, the floating debris began to settle. Eddies and funnels appeared in the clouds of dust as the particulates were being drawn away by the city’s air filtration.

  “Look,” Shannanon said. She pointed a hairy finger.

  Jordan saw what appeared to be dozens of tiny chunks of hard debris on the street that hadn’t been there before. They looked like thick pieces of wire or sections of hose.

  The other cop started to snap off blaster bolts at the noodle-like objects. Jordan got down before realizing that no one was shooting back. What was he firing at? Then she noticed the debris was moving under its own power and was heading in their direction. Tiny worms inched forward, pinkie-length things with pointy heads.

  Four of the other bots opened fire with their stun weapons. There were many targets, and it should have been hard to miss, but the targets were small. A number of the yellow blaster bolts flew high or impacted on the street. Some of the worms got quite close before getting hit and turning into burning smears on the pavement.

  “What are they?” Jordan asked.

  “We don’t know,” the other cop said. “But they were at the transportation terminal, and Detective Ceph said they came out of the ground right underneath the security team. So watch your feet.”

  No more worms came at them. But for a few random clicks and whirrs from the bots as they pivoted and scanned the streets and Shannanon’s heavy breathing, the city around them fell to silence. Fang bobbed in place, content in keeping a tentacle on Jordan’s friend.

  Then the concrete shuddered under them. Ceph still had his head in his apps. Jordan hooked one of his arms and pulled him along just as the entire street lurched. She got him out of the way as a long trench opened, cutting across the thoroughfare. A persisting grinding sound broke the air. Grey plumes of discharge rose from either end of the opening as the gap grew on both ends. The pit continued to lengthen in a straight line between the buildings on either side of the avenue, growing at the speed of a fast walk. Its width stayed relatively consistent. Jordan caught a glimpse of something large in the trench to the right, something the size of a semi-trailer truck. It was bobbing up and down, throwing dirt up as it burrowed along. A second unit dug down the left end of the pit. Soon the big machines were out of sight, turning a corner as they continued to dig.

  “More of the worms!” Shannanon screamed. “They’re giants! They’ll tear more buildings down!” She pulled Fang close.

  “Retreat!” the other cop said, and he ran.

  “No, wait!” Jordan called, but he didn’t stop. “The machines are on our side, I think. Ceph, you brought them, didn’t you?”

  Ceph didn’t answer.

  Jordan saw that the trench now separated them from the part of the city where the four buildings had collapsed. Judging by the sound, the digging machines continued to cut around the infected area in either direction. She stepped to the edge of the trench.

  The excavation descended down about twenty feet. An underground pedestrian tunnel had been breached, standing open on either side of where it had been cut. Wisps of white steam rose from severed pipes. Small flows of debris trickled down the walls. Jordan was about to turn back to the others when something moving caught her eye. There on the opposite side of the trench between different colors of strata came a worm poking out from the dirt. It moved the tip of its head about as if it could see. Maybe it was tasting the air. Then it crawled out of its hole and inched its way down to the trench floor. Two others poked out of the ground near where the first had appeared.

  “Ceph, more worms,” Jordan said.

  He continued to do whatever he was doing. She nudged him. No response. Jordan knew she couldn’t keep dragging him away. The worms weren’t quick, but they would be climbing up their side of the trench in moments.

  “Shannanon, can you pick up the detective?” Jordan asked.

  Shannanon grunted. “Of course.”

  As Shannanon was about to wrap an arm around Ceph, he raised a hand to stop her.

  “Patience finds the fattest tidal gleanings,” Ceph said.

  He made a few deliberate gestures with his device. His eyes focused first on Shannanon and then on Jordan. He leaned over the edge of the trench. The first worm was already halfway up on their side. A half dozen more crawled along the bottom in their direction.

  “Shoot them!” Jordan said.

  “Watch,” Ceph said.

  Six metallic cockroaches emerged from a recently cut conduit. They gleamed silver in the daylight. They each made a straight line for a different worm. The worms turned to face the new arrivals, but before the worms could do anything the cockroaches sent out a spark that caused the worms to spasm and curl up. The seventh worm died a moment later.

  “What are those things?” Jordan asked. “Some kind of new security bot?”

  “Part of the electrical system maintenance.”

  Three more worms stuck their heads out of newly bored holes. The cockroaches doubled up and scurried over. A trio of crackling sounds followed. The worms died quickly.

  “That is so awesome! How many of things can you get?”

  “A dozen locally.”

  “And how many worms are there? They can go hunting them and get them all, right?”

  “This will work here, but the worms may be legion. We can try to keep them cooped up in this district. The digging bots will establish a perimeter. I will bring up more electrical maintenance units, but it will ta
ke time.”

  Ceph did a shoulder check and surveyed the remaining security bots and the street behind him. His face showed disappointment.

  “My fellow officer has quit the field.”

  “Want me to find him and bring him back?” Shannanon asked.

  “Stay together,” Jordan said. “Ceph, can you spread out your security bots to watch as much of the trench as possible? If they can’t get through here, they’ll try somewhere else. And can we order more cockroaches to be manufactured by whatever service does that sort of thing?”

  Ceph nodded and began tapping at his device. The security bots moved out. The digging sounds from the big machines continued in both directions and echoed between the buildings. Jordan looked at the screen of Ceph’s device. It showed half of a square had already been cut around the infected city district.

  “I’m not a cop or nothing,” Shannanon said, “but I have played enough strategy games in my life to know that this is only a temporary fix. If I were the worms, I would just go under the trench and come out on the other side. And this assumes that they’re all heading this direction. They could go every direction, come at us from the sides or from behind or bore through the overpass and drop down on us.”

  Ceph gave a reluctant nod. “Assumption is that the worms are but pawns under the direction of someone that is pulling their string. Irving the Grey flew the coop recently.”

  “We have to try something,” Jordan said. “Maybe we can damage enough of the worms to stop them from destroying any more of the city.”

  Something pinged in Jordan’s head. A friend notification. She almost disregarded it as some in-game business when she saw it was Jeff. He was back in the Galactic Commons. Ceph perked up at the same time, no doubt having received a similar message.

  “Jeff’s back,” Jordan said. “He’s at the transportation terminal with Oliop.”

  “And so is Irving the Grey,” Ceph said. One of his face tentacles twitched. “Perhaps the architect of this madness.”

  “I just friended your friend,” Shannanon said. An instant later: “Hey, he just tried to spam me with the game program. Step ahead of you, buddy.”

  “He does that,” Jordan said. “He’s new to the Galactic Commons and has bad manners. A real newbie.”

  “Says the human who speaks like a grognard.”

  More worms emerged. The cockroaches dispatched them before they could even pull themselves from their holes.

  “How’s the perimeter digging going?” Jordan asked.

  “Almost complete,” Ceph said.

  A nearby building began to wiggle. This one was a cylindrical ten-story tower with a decorative metallic sphere of intricate design on top. Shimmering blue piping ran up the length of the building. Jordan had stopped to look at this building several times when exploring the city. At any given time of day, the piping and the sphere looked to be a different color, and the effect was mesmerizing. Jordan’s breath caught in her throat, as she knew what would happen next. The structure rocked as if it were built upon shifting sand. A tortured groan of metal filled the air. The tower shook violently and fell down into a rising cloud of grey.

  A wall of dust blew their direction and enveloped them. Jordan shielded her mouth and nose, but not before she saw movement down in the trench. Someone or something about human size looked out from the cut pedestrian tunnel and lumbered out at an odd canter. Dust stung her eyes. She could no longer see the figure. Whoever it was was now on their side of the trench and moving into the tunnel. The cockroaches hadn’t done anything to him, and why would they? He wasn’t a worm. But there was a good chance he was someone up to no good. He had moved quickly, no doubt using the falling tower as cover. And he was getting away.

  “I’m going –” she started to say, but she choked on all the debris in the air.

  She saw the hazy images of Ceph, Fang, and Shannanon nearby, but none of them could hear her. She was the only one who had seen the mysterious figure.

  Jordan went to the edge of the pit and swung her legs over the side. There was enough of a slope that it wasn’t a straight drop. Remnants of broken pipe stuck out from the ground at various points. These would make for sufficient hand- and footholds. She dropped down to an exposed pipe. It broke, sending her sliding. She grabbed at anything, catching enough of the wall on the way down to slow herself. She struck a twisted piece of conduit hard with her foot, and this sent her into a tumble. She bounced once on the trench floor before sprawling to a stop. The dust gathered thick around her, turning in darker swirls. She could barely breathe, and it itched in her throat. It hurt to inhale. She had bit her lip and banged her hands and knees on impact. She wobbled as she got herself up. Stifled a cough.

  She could make out the broken underground tunnel that led away from the disaster zone and towards the rest of the city. That’s where the figure had gone. Some of the cockroaches scurried about at her feet.

  Jordan stepped into the tunnel and listened. Shuffle step, step, slide, shuffle.

  Whoever it was didn’t know how to sneak. Jordan did, and she would follow.

  PART THREE – THE PENTHOUSE THAT WASN’T THERE

  CHAPTER 25

  The far away alarms outside were barely audible through the windows of the transportation terminal lobby. Oliop and Jeff waited, still under guard. The Grey paced about, never close enough to grab, never distracted enough that the stunner in its hand wasn’t pointed in their general direction. The two bots also kept watch over them, so running was out of the question.

  It was Oliop who broke the silence.

  “I’m sorry, Jeff Abel,” Oliop said.

  The flurry of recent events had caught up with Jeff. He sat on the floor and stared up through one of the windows. A trio of worms moved aimlessly on one of the clear horizontal panes above him. An emergency message began to play just outside, but he couldn’t make out what it was saying. Jeff could only imagine how loud this terminal would be if the normal machinery worked and if the crowds of travelers coming and going were still passing through. But the terminal itself was empty and silent, a testament to their failure in bringing the system back online.

  When Oliop spoke, Jeff blinked and looked at his friend without understanding.

  “This is all my fault,” Oliop said.

  The lanky technician sat on the floor with his arms on his knees and his chin on his arms. His ears hung limp. His tail was wrapped around one leg.

  “How in the world could this be your fault?” Jeff said.

  “I stole the AI. Without it, they never would have gotten the elevator to work. And even before that, I made contact with you when you were back on Earth. Maybe you would never have come here if I hadn’t done that. Maybe they would have left you alone.”

  “I seriously doubt that. Irving here would have come and abducted me just the same. And the elevator’s still broken. They don’t have a guidance computer to go anywhere but Earth. Whatever their game is, the elevator is a non-starter. If anything, we now have the possibility of getting the refugees back here. That’s something, at least.”

  “Maybe. But with Thaco loose, more of your human friends are going to get infected.”

  “Huh. You’re assuming they don’t just drop a bomb on the entire camp.”

  Jeff knew it was the wrong thing to say once it slipped past his lips. Oliop groaned and put his head down. Jeff had never seen Oliop this way. Depression must be a galaxy-wide scourge.

  The Grey didn’t appear interested in the exchange. It continued walking back and forth. Its jaw clenched and unclenched. It hadn’t stopped pacing since calling for Lord Akimbo and that had been a while ago. A series of aromas followed the little fellow like a cloud, speaking to Irving’s impatience, irritation, and indignation.

  A door marked “Maintenance Personnel Only” opened. Lord Akimbo came lumbering out. He made a wobbly beeline towards them.

  “Where have you been?” the Grey said.

  “Irving the Grey!” Lord Akimbo said. “
You will address me with respect!”

  Irving the Grey offered a flourish and a deep bow. “Yes, Lord Akimbo. My apologies, Lord Akimbo.”

  “And don’t be cheeky. Report. Do you have the elevator?”

  “Of course. And I’m back after having gone to Earth, by the way. I have your elevator as I promised. I’m fine, thanks for asking.”

  “Lord Akimbo didn’t ask,” Lord Akimbo said. “Now take us to the elevator.”

  The Grey visibly balked. The rotten smell of apricots wafted from the Grey. Jeff smelled it and wondered if Lord Akimbo did, too, and if he did whether he cared that his subordinate didn’t like receiving orders. The Grey’s face flushed and its hands trembled. The stunner in its grip looked like it might discharge into the floor.

  The Grey took a breath and forced a grin, showing two rows of tiny blunt teeth.

  “But of course, Lord Akimbo,” Irving the Grey said. “Follow me. And won’t you need your worms?”

  Lord Akimbo didn’t respond. He made a round waving motion in the air. There must have been some other signal attached to the gesture, as the worms from outside the terminal immediately began to crawl their way, dropping down from the windows and creeping through the doors. Soon hundreds of the things wriggled at Lord Akimbo’s feet. Lord Akimbo and his entourage headed for the elevators.

  “Lord Akimbo, may I speak with you?” Jeff said.

  Lord Akimbo stopped. His fingers brushed slowly at the air as if tracing lines through smoke. Jeff couldn’t tell if the creature was looking his way, as his sparkling blue eyes continued to gaze forward.

  “I, uh, beseech you as a lesser being who implores your patience and, uh, forbearance.”

  “What can Lord Akimbo do for you?”

  “It’s the refugees. There are about two thousand Galactic Commons citizens who are in danger and need to be brought home. The one working elevator can do that. We need to use it to shuttle them in. It will only take a couple of hours, and you will save their lives.”