by Dean Koontz
Buronto clutched the rifle in one hand as if it were a tiny pistol-or a toy from some more violent time. With the other hand, he steered the sled. "Where to?" he called over his shoulder.
"We have the starship hidden," Sam said. "We figured they would take over the spaceport, so we landed in the Five Mile Park. They shouldnt bother with that."
At the end of the alley, another sled and four slugs appeared. They seemed not to notice, for the moment, that these were humans and not other slugs. They came fluttering down the narrow passage, swiftly closing the blocks between them. Buronto raised the rifle, fired straight-on at the pilot of the other sled. The alien was flung apart like a doll, tossed from the sled in pieces. One of the others went for the controls, but the sled bucked before it could reach them, went out of control. It slammed back and forth from wall to wall, still advancing. One of the slugs-at a moment of extreme tilt-slid over the edge, grabbed the railing with pseudopods to pull itself back aboard. The sled swung into a wall again, crushing it, severing it in half and dragging it another fifty feet, leaving an orange smear along the building blocks.
"Were going to crash!" Lotus shouted, throwing her small hands over her eyes-but peeking through her slender fingers.
Buronto pulled on the stick, lifted the sled. They grabbed and fought the sharp upward slant. The out-of-control craft careened toward them. Buronto took the sled even higher, pushing the drive into whining protest. But the other craft started climbing too. And there was just not any room in which to dive.
* * *
XIII
The Central Being was overwhelmed by Hope. Hope the planet; Hope the city. The other planet-what had it been?-Chaplin, yes, was interesting. But here-the architecture, the parks, the ports. It was so-the Central Being reluctantly admitted-beautiful. But the forces of evil were often beautiful, often overwhelming. But only gaudiness, never any depth. The Central Being willed Itself to forget the surface shimmering and glittering and to concentrate on other things. Such as the success of the raiding parties and destruction teams. The purpose of the raiding parties was to kill in their assigned areas and leave buildings and other artifacts intact as much as possible so that later historical teams could photograph and catalog the culture. The destruction teams, on the other hand, were concerned with nothing but death. Kill, burn, ruin, crush, obliterate. Both were doing well in their respective areas. In fact, the entire blasphemous race should be wiped from the slate of existence in another month. This world would be bare in another twelve hours. Then on to smaller colony worlds. The easy marks...
XIV
Sam gritted his teeth, fought against closing his eyes. His ears, already booming with noise, anticipated the crash. No, that was blood rushing. His own blood. Fear blood. The alien sled climbed almost equal with theirs. The distance between closed rapidly.
Twenty yards...
Ten...
Five...
There was a sickening crunch, a severe jolt, and they were rushing past the other sled toward the end of the alley a few blocks further on. Behind, the other sled smashed into the wall, bearing its headless passengers, and crashed into the street. They had had the advantage of being four feet higher when they met the other sled. It had been a deadly encounter for the slugs, their heads sheared away by the bottom of the sled. But they had gotten away untouched, miraculously.
Buronto roared with laughter. A laughter, somehow, too deep for his fragile voice. The added depth of bloodlust.
"Land here!" Sam shouted a while later, his voice almost washed away by the whistling wind and the booming of the slaughter progressing in the depths of the center city behind them.
Buronto brought the sled to a jolting halt, gouging out five feet of grass at the entrance to the park. They clambered off and through the gate just as a slug stepped from behind a free-form aluminum statue.
"Watch it!" Coro shouted, catching the movement first.
Buronto brought his gun around, smashed the barrel into the slugs head, brought it up, down again. Up and down, up and down. Blood sprayed out with every swing.
"Thats enough!" Sam shouted.
Buronto laughed, spittle flecking the corners of his lips. He poked the narrow barrel through the middle of the aliens chest as if it were a bayonet, gouged the soft flesh, twisted and tore as orange blood poured down the gun and over his hands.
"I said that was enough!" Sam shouted even louder, his face red with disgust.
Buronto looked up, got angry, then realized who he was talking to. He still had that minimum of fear. Besides, this was the man who had given him the chance to kill. "Hurry up, then," he snapped shrilly.
Sam realized the savage lust of the giant was pushing any thought of servile obedience further and further from his mind. That last had sounded much like an order, not an agreement. "Ill say who is to hurry and when!" Sam roared.
Buronto looked at him, looked away. "Therell come a day-"
"But its damn far off!" Sam snapped. "Now, lets hurry."
They moved briskly through the park. The green trees, leafy and rustling with the passage of the wind, the grass as green as a finely woven carpet, the flowers multi-hued and full-bloomed, all belied the horror transpiring in the streets beyond, denied the death and pain Buronto had perpetrated in their midst only moments before.
The ship was where they had left it, almost invisible, half submerged in a large pond, the other half well-hidden by thick masses of Spanish moss strung from the trees like beards. They slopped through the water, activated the portal, and entered the last free ship on Hope.
"Now do you understand?" Sam asked, staring the giant down.
The lights on the control console flashed, pulsated, flooded the room with weird currents of color. Coro sat bent over the monitoring devices, occasionally rubbing a hand across dry lips. The time had come. Almost. Very near. Blessed be the time. Frightening too. Lotus sat beside Coro, a hand on his arm, pointing now and then to different dials and scopes.
"I understand," Buronto growled.
"No indiscriminate killing. We have to sneak in. If were confronted with the choice of killing a guard or sneaking past him-we sneak."
"I dont like it."
"You wouldnt."
"Or you either?" Buronto said, laughing slyly.
"Its a matter of necessity," Sam said wearily. They had been through it ten times now. He could think of no blunter, more forceful manner of putting it. "If you start killing everything that moves, the Central Being will have us pegged and dead before were anywhere near It. Itll blow your head off the first moment It knows youre in Raceship. Itll win, Buronto. And youll be real dead."
"Okay, okay. I got it well enough. Play it pansy. Gentility is the byword. No rough stuff until we bump off the big boy. But then, mister, I am going to have myself a lot of fun with the slugs."
"And youll have earned it."
"You too, huh?"
"Yeah."
"And youll be twice as bloody about it, Ill bet."
"Most likely," Sam said, leering false-heartedly. "Twice as bloody." He wondered how he would handle Buronto after the mission was completed-if it was completed. It was going to be a tight situation. A kill-crazy giant running amok with a laser rifle. How could he control him? If he refused to kill after the Central Being was disposed of, then Buronto would realize his masochism was a front, a trick. What would the giants reaction be to that? Or, rather, not what would it be-but how fast would it come? Well, that was a problem he would have to think about later. Later, when he was driven to the wall.
"They seem settled for the duration, Sam," Coro said, turning from the controls. "Raceship hasnt moved since weve been monitoring it. But the battle is raging beyond belief. Millions of people have died. I wish we hadnt waited for dark."
"But it is dark now," Sam answered, standing, stretching. "And we have a much better chance with darkness as a cover."
Buronto went to get their weapons and a lase
r hand-torch.
"Look, Sam," Coro said, moving close and whispering. "He frightens me. And-"
"Me too."
Coro hesitated. "Yeah. I see. He may be hideous, but hes the best-looking chance we have. But do you really think he can kill this Central Being that easily?"
"No."
"No?"
"Our God was weak and easy to dispatch because Breadloafs Shield had drained Him of His strength over the centuries. This God has not been drained."
"Then why the devil-"
"He doesnt have to kill God," Sam said, pulling the black hood of the nightsuit over his head.
"What? I dont understand this at all."
"Oh, he may kill God. He just might. But it isnt necessary. If we can get him in there and let God kill him, I think-"
But Buronto had returned with a rifle for each of them and a cutting torch. "Lets go," he said.
The two of them stepped quietly through the portal into the black blanket of night...
* * *
XV
Raceship had settled in the vast wild game reserve that stretched forty-seven miles on a side behind the Congressional Archives. It took a great deal of space to park a boat that big, and as he and Buronto stood among the still forms of oak trees looking at the vessel, Sam wondered how many animals had been crushed by its descent. And how many tourists.
"They came in that?" Buronto asked.
Sam grinned. It was a difficult thing to do under the circumstances of the moment. "Scare you?" Delicately, delicately lead on the brute...
"Nah! But, Mother, how big!"
The black hull loomed so high overhead that it was difficult to tell just where it ended and the night began. Trees had been snapped off around its base and were jutting outward like splintered toothpicks. The earth had settled under the tremendous weight, and the ship now rested in a pit of its own making.
"Put these in your ears," Sam said, handing two plugs to the giant.
"What for?"
"Theres an hypnotic command constantly played in the ship. You go in there without earplugs and youll be blubbering like a helpless idiot in seconds."
"But how do we talk?"
"Theres a micro-miniature receiver, transmitter, and amplifier in the tip. It touches the bones of your ear, picks up the vibrations of your own voice from your jaw, and transmits them to me. Mine does the same. Just whisper, and Ill hear you. Of course, we wont hear anything else."
Hesitantly, the big man followed suit, inserting the tight-fitting plugs.
"Now hold your head here," Sam said, producing a small tin.
"Why? Whats that?"
"Sound-proofing jelly."
"Ill put it in myself."
"Very well." Sam dipped his fingers into the thick goo, smeared it over the back of the plug and the rest of his ears, handed the tin to Buronto.
"Remember," Sam said, "when we get inside, no useless-"
"Killing," Buronto finished. "Dont worry. Just lead me in."
"Just to the Ships Core," Sam said. "Ill take you there, but you wont catch me fighting this thing."
"Im not scared!" Buronto snapped, a child being tested.
"Lets go."
They moved from the oaks, crouched and running, darting from one patch of growth to another. They reached the ship without incident. Fifteen minutes later, the laser torch had burned through all the layers of the hull... And the snout of a laser rifle punched through the hole, aimed directly between Sams eyes.
There was a blue blast. Sam was falling before he realized he had not been shot. Buronto had burned the alien down. The slug leaned out, hanging for a moment on the edge of the ragged hole, its flesh tearing on the shards of metal poking like fingers from the rim of the crudely cut aperture. The rifle dangled in its pseudopod, trembled almost as a living thing itself, then fell out onto the grass. The slug gurgled, swayed, tore itself further on the metal, then toppled out also, sprawling full-length at their feet. There was a yard-long gash on its side. Things spewed from it, wet and orange.
"Okay that I killed it?" Buronto asked snidely.
Sam coughed, got up. "Yes. Fine. Very good."
Buronto laughed, half at Sams embarrassment, half at the pile of gore he had made.
"It seems to have been a solitary guard," Sam said, peering into the dimly lighted corridor. "But lets hurry just the same." He pulled himself over the sill, disappeared into the ship.
Buronto climbed in after.
Blessed be the time. The time is near.
"This way," Sam hissed. "Gun at ready, but-"
"No killing unless necessary."
"Exactly. You learn well. Slow, but well."
Halfway down this corridor, Sam planted a small transmitter behind the edge of a jutting beam. He looked at his watch-screen. There was a yellow blip near the edge. That was the transmitter. The screen coordinates had been set so that, once they reached a position where their own blips (green) were in the center of the screen, they would be in the middle of the ship, somewhere near Ships Core. They moved on.
Though powerful and ruthless, the aliens were unimaginative. The ship was void, in the corridors at least, of any decoration or special styling. Solid gray walls, floors, and ceilings. One step brought them past the same sights as the last hundred had. The last thousand.
There was one danger with the earplugs. They could not hear the Racesong, but neither could they hear the slugs coming. Two aliens slithered into view at the end of the corridor, cloaks of shimmering purple material falling behind them and trailing a few feet on the floor. "Back!" Sam whispered.
They stood against the wall, pressing as tight as they could to its cool surface. The slugs came on, apparently talking, oblivious of their presence. They walked right past the two men... and whirled! Something had registered-but too late. Buronto brought his gun up, then hesitated as if he wasnt certain whether he should fire or not.
"Yes!" Sam shouted. "Before they call for help!"
Blue-blue-blue-blue. And it was over. The slugs were spattered across the floor, a few scraps of their bodies on fire, tiny yellow flames licking the rich fat.
"We have to move faster now," Sam said. "They find these bodies and were sunk."
They moved, faster now. Sam thought how dreamlike the last encounter had been. Without sound, it had all been a grotesque parody of reality. Death without sound. Murder without screaming. Certainly, the time was coming.
Eventually, after many steps and many turns, the wall to their right turned from gray to a brilliant bronze. They clung to the glittering metal and followed the wall. In a few minutes, they discovered they had walked in a large circle.
"Were here," Sam croaked, mouth suddenly dry, every nerve now sharp with fear.
"Where?"
"Ships Core. Its right inside this glittering wall-not more than two hundred feet in diameter."
Buronto stepped ahead of Sam to a door they had passed twice during their circumnavigation of the chamber. "Im going to get it over with."
So you can kill the slugs for fun, Sam thought. So you can gleefully romp through rivers of nice, thick, orange blood.
Buronto twisted the knob, almost broke it off. The door hummed, lifted to reveal a shimmering blue chamber hung with webs and permeated with mists. There seemed to be darker hulks concealed in the fog, looming like icebergs. As Sam watched from the hall, Buronto stepped through the doorway, rifle at ready.
* * *
XVI
Buronto stepped further into the chamber. At ten feet, the mists started to close in on him. At fifteen feet, they concealed his legs, his hips, the back of his head.
The floor was spongy, pores beginning to open in it. It bounced as he stepped on it.
"Im here!" the giant shouted defiantly.
A muffled echo was the only answer.
Then the floor heaved, and the room was alive.
It bucked, swayed, and Buronto went down. Wildy,
he blasted it, boring holes through the sponge, holes that immediately healed over and were full again. He tried to stand, but the body of God served as a mat for no creature. Down he went, floor seeming to un-gel and clutch at him. He sank into it, kicked and tried pulling free.
Sam leaned against the wall, gripping himself with his arms. This God was more powerful than the last, undrained. It was able to heal Itself where the other whimpered and died. More powerful, but ruling this vastly shrunken universe: one ship and spoors. He watched Burontos flesh peel away under the acidic touch of the floor that now resembled a tongue. All in silence, all deadly and still. A play seen through other eyes. And God was winning...
But, Sam hoped, in winning, God would also lose.
Buronto struggled to his feet again, fighting mightily against this much superior force, fighting with panic. Half his face was a bloody pulp. He held the beam on the floor, screaming steadily. Here comes the devil to the gates of Heaven, cursing and spraying foam, tossing the lightning bolts of his black power to tumble down the equal blackness of the divine light...
The floor bucked again. Buronto fell. And this time, he did not get up. The floor frothed, boiled about him, and when the foam steamed away, there were only fragments of steaming, bubbling bone. No worry now about how to handle Buronto. Now all he had to worry about was whether or not the trick had worked. It should have-given one fact as a truth! God must be, like the other God, a sado-masochist by nature, liking to give pain-the omnipotent fist ringed with smiling lips. Surely, the very nature of God demanded that He be a liker of pain and a giver of much of it. If this was true in this case, as it had been with the God Hurkos had killed, then the problem was over. God was now insane.
