by Chris Walley
“Shadow!” Vero winced. “I had forgotten. They might prefer that to darkness. I was hoping for another hour or two at least. What a mess we are in!”
“Perhaps we can hold them off until tomorrow with stones.”
“Perhaps. Would they see one of these flares from space?”
“If they knew where to look they would see one. But if they knew where to look they wouldn’t need a flare.”
“We need a bigger flare, then.” Vero screwed his eyes up. “Wait! There may be a way. If I can remember—”
“Listen!” Merral interrupted, as from over the eastern side of the hill came the faintest rattle of stone on stone.
They ran to the edge. Below, in the darkness of the ravine they had come up, two of the dark ape-creatures were climbing up with smooth, confident moves, their arms and feet working together in a powerful and coordinated motion.
Without hesitation, Merral picked a brick-sized basalt fragment and hurled it down. It hit the wall just above the head of the leading ape-creature and shattered. There was an angry rumbling growl, and the creature paused in its ascent and looked up.
They were separated by no more than twenty meters, and Merral could see the face clearly despite the shadows. It seemed to him that, despite its flattened appearance, the face was more human than ape. The large brown eyes seemed to stare at him, and Merral decided that if the face conveyed any emotion at all, it was of a cold intelligence and a determined and calculating hatred. He knew with absolute certainty that it was useless to try to communicate with this creature.
“Throw another!” cried Vero, letting fly with a rock himself. This, however, was way off target and clattered away harmlessly down the ravine.
Merral looked around and found, a few strides away, a large rock slab, the size of a kitchen tabletop but thicker.
“Quick, Vero, help me push this.”
Together they tugged and heaved until the slab was at the cliff edge. Then, putting their shoulders to it, they pushed until it started to hang over the edge.
From below came a high-pitched series of wordless squeals and grunts that conveyed alarm. Merral pushed and suddenly the block began to wobble. He pushed again and the rock fell over the edge.
There was a series of booming and echoing crashes as the slab fell and bounced down the cliff. They peered over the edge in time to see it displace other rocks and cannonade down the gloom of the ravine in a gathering tumult of fragments. At the bottom of the cliff, the debris cloud exploded outward down the scree in a turbulent dark cloud of fragments. Stray rocks could be seen careening clear of the debris flow and bouncing up into the trees.
Then the rising dust cloud covered their view.
“Very satisfactory,” Vero announced in admiring tones, as the sound of crashing and clattering blocks died away.
Merral, nonplussed at the effect of combining one large rock, gravity, and a fifty-meter drop, said nothing. What have I maimed and injured now?
As if in answer to his question, a howl of agony came from below. Although there were no words, it seemed to Merral that it conveyed an intelligence greater than any animal had. He shivered.
Slowly, the dust died away and they could see one creature standing at the edge of the trees apparently unharmed, while another sat nearby nursing a bloodied and useless arm. Of the third, nothing could be seen until Vero pointed out a red smear under a gray block of rock.
“One ape-creature and a cockroach-beast dead so far. Another wounded.” Vero’s voice was dry.
“Ugh! You make it sound like a sport that way.”
“Unintentionally. But men once did, you know.”
“I know. ‘Saul has killed his thousands, David his ten thousands.’ But that was another age of the world, Vero. I do not rejoice. I am answerable to their maker for those that I have killed.”
Vero bowed his head slightly. “I am rebuked by your sensitivity. But I do not think that you will stand in judgment before their maker.”
“You mean . . . ?”
“Simply, I do not believe that God alone made them. I believe their maker may have far more to answer for at the Final Judgment than you.”
“You may be right,” Merral said, wondering whether that diminished the magnitude of his killing them. “May the Most High grant us the leisure and security to debate the point further. But how do things stand now?”
“Well, this side now seems to me much less climbable than it was.”
Merral looked down. Sure enough, the top part of the ravine was now cleared of boulders and was vertical for the last ten meters.
Vero rubbed his face with his hands. “Now, it has come to me that there is a slight hope. But only a slight one and it is fraught with problems.”
“Go on.”
Vero tapped a finger on his diary. “Do you realize how much energy these things use in the ten years between energy cell replacement?”
“No. A lot, though.”
“Yes. Well, there is a way of realizing it all, of venting it all in a few milliseconds.”
“You’d have an awesome explosion. I’ve never heard that.”
“I was told it was the fourth best-kept secret in the Assembly.”
“The other three are?”
“I don’t know. The third is probably what the first two are.” Vero’s face twisted into a grin and Merral had to laugh.
“The results are spectacular?”
“So it’s claimed. Mostly visible light, but a lot of electromagnetic wavelengths get a hefty kick. I was told you could see it on the moon. If you did it on Ancient Earth, that is.” He paused, stroking his diary thoughtfully. “Non-nuclear. Just. I think that’s what they said.”
“You think?”
“Well,” he sounded embarrassed, “the whole technique was given as a sort of passing comment at the end of a lecture. A piece of curious information. Any brighter ideas?”
“No.”
“Well, I’ll try it. It will take some time to do. It’s not an easy trick. For obvious reasons.”
“So I would hope.”
“Quite. Now, Merral, if I may, can I download all my data onto your machine? I wonder if you could check the other side. Just in case they try the same trick.”
Merral handed over his diary, and as Vero made the orders for a full data download to be made, he went over to the western side and peered into the gathering shadows, trying to see if there was any change in the positions of the ape-creatures and cockroach-beasts. Unnervingly, they were standing in silence exactly as he had last seen them. In frustration—and was it also fear?—he threw a block of rock at them, but it fell short and clattered away into the trees with no effect.
He returned to Vero.
“Still there and still out of range. But what’s your plan?”
Vero looked up, his eyes showing tiredness. “We need to wait for darkness so we can guarantee being seen. If I can trigger the reaction, we will have a short delay. We find a spot where the energy can be channeled upward. Then, we get down onto that ledge at the south end. Put our fingers in our ears and, well—let it go. Hopefully, one of your satellites will notice a firework that size. You think so?”
“If it is as big as you say, I should think so. We are always on the alert for forest fires or volcanic eruptions. The Northern Menaya Monitor will pick it up unless it’s helping Perena watch the rift volcanics. But will they act on it?”
“Ah. A key point. Will they?”
“They may send someone over.”
There was a silence and Vero looked doubtful.
He knows, thought Merral, as I know, that it probably will not be enough. But as he considered Vero’s suggestion, an idea came to him.
“There might be a way of making it of more benefit to us,” he suggested.
Vero raised an eyebrow. “How so?”
“If the model you proposed for their interception of our signals is correct, then a blast of such a size might overload their blocking system. At least briefl
y. If we could get a message out immediately afterward . . .”
“Yes!” Vero nodded urgently. “That might work. Let’s do that. Anyway, data download is now complete. I feel happier about losing my diary now.”
He handed back Merral’s diary and slid open the access panel on his own. He started muttering to himself. “Now you set the toggles. Blue to green, yellow striped to orange . . . and that down, that up. Or is it the other way about? It was such a joke when I was told it. The most useless piece of information ever. Now I close the back and reset. Thus. Now, input the following codes.” His forehead puckered in thought.
“Diary! Go into deep internal level four. Password is Gedaliah. Reveal battery temperature. Now, cycle energy cells one through eight.”
The metallic voice that responded seemed startling in the quietness. “Under current parameters this will eventually give potentially dangerous thermal conditions in energy cells. Require authorization for procedure.”
“This is the first tricky bit. Diary! Password is Eleazar! Aha, looks good.”
“Authorization accepted.”
“Proceed.”
Vero sighed and slid the diary back on his belt.
“So far so good. Let us hope that after that failed assault, our enemies stay down at the foot of the hill for some time.”
“How long before it works?”
“I can’t remember. A couple of hours, at least. Anyway, we can’t do anything until dark. I suggest we get some more images of those cockroach-beasts through the fieldscope. If we do get out, such evidence will be invaluable. Then we just sit and wait. And pray.”
An hour later Vero came over to where Merral was lying down, peering over the edge at the immobile tableau of creatures below.
“How are things on your side?” Merral asked, drawing back from the margin.
“Only the one ape-creature left; the injured one has gone somewhere else.”
“Your diary?”
“At least thirty minutes, I’d guess, but it is definitely heating up.”
Merral gestured westward where the remains of the morning’s storm clouds hung on the horizon as the last of the rain emptied itself into the wastes on Interior Menaya. The red sphere of the sun was dropping rapidly toward them. “A fine sunset,” he commented.
“I would prefer dawn,” sighed Vero.
“And so would I. I feel that this side is where the attack will come from. It’s a wider front. I can see various places for them to try and get up. But hopefully they will wait for darkness.”
Vero got down on his knees and moved cautiously to the edge of the plateau. The setting sun had put a warm orange glow on the rocks and at the same time exaggerated both the darkness and the length of the shadows so that it was not easy to see what was happening down below among the trees and rocks.
“There are more,” hissed Vero.
“Yes, I didn’t feel it worth telling you,” Merral added as he joined him. There were now at least six of the tall dark figures standing rigid and staring up at them, and perhaps slightly more of the cockroach-beasts, their shorter stature making them hard to distinguish from the shadows of the rocks. It is unnatural, Merral decided. Both types behave like men in many ways and yet they seem to have little individuality. To act as regimented machines is not at all like us. What creatures are they? He wondered whether Vero was right in thinking that they were modified humans and, if so, what had been taken out of them—or put in—to make them so different.
“Well, I hope they stay there longer,” Vero said as he backed away. “Let me know if anything happens. I’m going to sit back from the edge and check the diary.”
Merral lay down and waited, trying not to stare at the setting sun lest it damage any night vision. Finally, the lower edge of the sun dropped behind the clouds and a warm twilight started to descend. He leaned forward, stared down into the gloom, and saw that nothing had changed.
Something caught his attention. Hanging back behind the ape-creatures and all but hidden in the gloom under the trees was something new. He peered at it, recognizing another anthropoid figure, but one with a different, smaller, and somehow more familiar shape. As he strained his eyes Merral felt that, despite a size midway between the ape-creatures and the cockroach-beasts, there was somehow a presence about the figure as if it was superior to those beasts: almost, it seemed, as if it was their master.
“Vero,” he called out, “there’s something odd—”
There was a violent hissing and bubbling next to him. Something spat angrily and stung his right hand.
“Get back!” Vero shouted.
Merral threw himself backward, landing awkwardly and painfully on his hip. He was aware of a strange heat around and a smell of burning in the air.
Vero was ducked down behind him, pointing with an urgent hand at the lip of the cliff. An arm’s length from where Merral had been lying the rock edge was glowing a livid scarlet and spitting vapor and drops of lava. Bubbles of rock were forming and bursting with an intense popping noise.
“What was that?” Merral asked as the color of the rock returned slowly to black.
Vero nodded, as if to himself. “One of a number of things capable of transmitting enough energy to melt rock. An infrared laser, a portable pulsed particle beam, something like that. Probably would just explode flesh and blood.”
“So they are no longer unarmed.” Sucking his hand where a small drop of molten rock had struck, Merral cautiously got to his feet, and together they moved back into the middle of the plateau. Could he be certain of what he thought he had seen? He was about to speak when there was a pulsing on his wrist.
Merral pulled his diary off his belt so fast that he nearly dropped it. On the screen, Anya was staring at him from her laboratory bench.
Thank you Lord, thought Merral in exultation, she’s called early. “Anya! Anya!” he shouted at the diary.
To his horror, he saw her face acquire a blank, puzzled look.
Her voice was clear. “Say, what’s up with you guys? Merral’s location signal goes off. Now, I’m having problems even making contact.”
Vero was beside him now, peeping over his shoulder at the image.
At least, Merral comforted himself, she will realize that there is enough of a problem to call for a search tomorrow.
She stared at the screen. “You know guys, I’m getting worried.”
“That’s it Anya! Go on. You get worried! Really worried!” Merral heard himself speaking aloud.
Without warning, another voice sounded from the diary. Although it was weirdly familiar, for a moment Merral could not recognize it.
“Sorry, Anya. We have had diary problems. Some trick of Vero’s, trying to transmit data. Seems to have fused circuits on both.”
Merral heard a gasp from beside him. “Now what are we up against?”
“Yes,” the familiar voice went on, “we lost both vision and location.”
“Okay, Merral. Apart from that, how is it going?”
Merral? In a dreadful, appalling moment of revelation, Merral understood why the voice was familiar. It was his own voice!
“It’s not me!” Merral yelled in fury, “Anya, it’s not me!”
“Hi, Anya,” came from the diary. It was Vero’s voice, but so convincing that Merral had to stare at the wide-open mouth of the startled figure next to him to be sure he wasn’t hearing his friend. “Sorry. I just used too much power. Stupid sentinel trick. Anyway, we are fine.”
Merral was on the point of saying something when Vero silenced him with a sharp wave of the arm.
“Oh yes,” went on the voice from the diary, “we are fine. We are beyond Daggart Lake. We’ll call you tomorrow night. We aim for pickup the day after. Look, we’d better shut down now, while we still have a signal. Good-bye.”
It was Vero to the syllable.
The machine spoke again. “I agree. This is Merral saying good night, too.”
There was a faint look of consternation on Anya’s
face.
“Well, okay. Sleep well. Talk to you tomorrow. Bye for now.”
The screen went dark. There was a long silence, and finally Vero spoke, his numbed voice suggesting he was still absorbing the impact of what he had overheard. “Well, there have been a couple of times today when I thought we might get out of this alive. I am now repenting my optimism. It was very clever.”
“Clever? It was diabolical!”
“Exactly so.”
“How did they do it?”
“They have been monitoring us. Easy to do. They have had hours to prepare a voice duplicate. That will be how they did Maya Knella, of course. Anya said it was a bad transmission.”
“You mean they faked a Gate call?”
Vero laughed quietly and bitterly. “Merral, don’t you see? Whoever—or whatever—is behind this can do almost anything. They can bend and break genes to suit themselves, they can create imitation birds, and they can mimic people. Intercepting interstellar communications is a little thing. And not only do they have the means, they have the will.” He seemed to shudder. “They appear to have no barriers. I would have to think carefully, but I am certain that they have broken all of the Technology Protocols and some that were never even thought of.”
“I had no idea. . . .”
“No, neither had I,” Vero replied, looking troubled and seeming to struggle with something. Then, without warning, he slammed a fist into the palm of his hand.
“No! We will not yield without a fight.” His face acquired a determined look. “They are not immune. We will stand firm. By grace, we may win through. But everything hinges on us calling in help. We can’t rely on Anya anymore. We are on our own.”
He struck his fist in his palm again in resolve and turned back to Merral. “What do you think?”
“Vero, I am reeling from this morning. And this afternoon.” Then Merral paused, thinking of the right words to express what he wanted to say. “But I will gladly die here if we need to. We must fight. For the Assembly and for the King.”
Vero clapped him on the back. “Good! I feel better listening to you. We may have had nearly twelve millennia of peace, but if we have to fight a last stand here then I feel you—at least—will do no worse than any heroes of the distant past. And I will do what I can.”
