by S. D. Perry
Grow, I grow. See, I see. Feel, I feel. Hear, I hear. She repeated the mantra several times. Stess, as usual, tried to lead, but she kept at it until there was smooth continuity, until there was sameness.
After a moment, she carefully reopened her sensory bulbs, all of her parts in tune, projecting and receiving as one. She wanted to send Dez her feelings of readiness, but did not. When she was in complete unity, her projections were much stronger, and though she could also direct them better, there was always some emanation beyond her control…which meant that Glessin would be made uncomfortable, which she didn’t want. He was an honest man who too often thought negative things about himself because of a bad time in his past, a terrible battle (dead Cardassian soldier, room of blood rain), she believed…but that seemed to be what he wanted, and she did not wish to interfere. Coamis didn’t care for feeling what she felt, either, though for a different reason—he was simply uncomfortable with his own emotions, which made it difficult for him to be comfortable with another’s. He tried to pretend indifference, even to himself, but some of his thought images were quite clear on the subject (dish of spoiled fruit, feigning enthusiasm for an unwanted gift).
Instead of sending, Stess told the captain that she was prepared, and then Arislelemakinstess started toward the back of the ship. Several of the others wished her well as she passed, audibly and in directed thought (smiling faces, a chest of polished gems, a triumphantly howling Aarruri), and she did her best not to project her thanks, letting Stess thank them verbally.
Past the cargo hold, she gathered herself tightly on the transporter pad, visual bulbs directed outward. Srral had moved into the system controls, and informed her that, as expected, there were three Drang guards at the TMP, grouped together. It had not picked up any other Drang in the tunnel system, though it admitted that there were a few sensory blind spots, almost certainly organic. Arislelemakinstess thanked Srral, and said she was ready for transportation, asking that it place her as close as possible to the southeastern corner of the open area. Srral said that it would. The conversation was painfully formal; because the engineered creature did not think or feel on a level that Arislelemakinstess understood—a mutual circumstance, no doubt—she was as verbally specific as possible whenever they interacted. Srral, of course, was rarely anything else.
Arislelemakinstess concentrated, collecting her thoughts. A second later, the ship disappeared around her…and then she was at the edge of a massive, shadowy cavern, unseen by the trio of tall reptilian beings some ten meters away, gathered near a freestanding control console. She’d transported into the shadows, and there were, in fact, loose piles of rock heaped at all sides of the rough-hewn cavern, some taller than she, very close to the shades of her body paint. She’d gotten lucky.
Although none of it was necessary—she’d been ready to hit them immediately—she was glad for the camouflage, and for the heedless guards. An instant strike would have been weak, wearing off quickly; she always preferred extra preparation time after transport, even if only a second or two. The change in environment—from cool and dry to hot and dry, in this instance—sometimes upset her carefully achieved balance, making her attack less potent.
She studied the guards a moment, their sloping brows, their open, toothy mouths. I might be able to take an hour or two to prepare on this one….
The three Drang—males, from the clothing—were completely oblivious of her presence, deeply immersed in their conversation, spitting and hissing loudly around each guttural word. Her translator was switched off; it was entirely possible that they were discussing music or art, but from the lurching, monosyllabic growls and saliva-sucking gasps, she couldn’t help but doubt it.
Time to get moving. She closed off most of her external sensory bulbs, this time leaving Stess’s open. Stess focused on the trio, on their collective energy, opening herself toward them. She got a sense that the fat one on the left disliked the other two (fist punching, fake smile, broken stick), but nothing else directly….
…I feel. I see. Stess concentrated on all of Arislelemakinstess’s internal self, pulling together feelings and thoughts, pictures and sounds, letting them build in intensity. It happened very quickly, the amplification; Friagloims needed all their parts operating together—either open, sending and receiving, or closed, joined internally—or there was a kind of psychic backlash, one that quickly became dangerous. Stess felt Arislelemakin struggling to maintain sensory withdrawal and used that pressure, too, adding it to the internal storm. I hear. I grow.
In the space of a few heart pulses, it was all Stess could do to maintain her share of sanity; it was time; she didn’t want to kill, only stun them. She opened her pores wide and then closed them, aimed at the energy of the three guards—and sent, as hard and as focused as she could.
In mid-snarling-hiss, all three of them crumpled to the stone floor, hitting hard. Stess felt a flush of accomplishment. From the intensity of her projection—what Pif had once referred to as a “brain blast”—they wouldn’t be waking up for at least a half hour.
Arislelemakin opened up once more and she spread out, looking around, Stess moving toward the guards and their console. The tunnel entrances all connected here, three yawning mouths that opened into the cavern they’d designated as the transporter meet point from the northwest and west…and there was a fourth, smaller mouth that led directly north. Arislelemakinstess assumed it led to the surface, that it wasn’t part of the storage facility. She hoped so; the maps that they’d based their plans on had shown only three tunnels, running vaguely parallel; the drop ship sensors had confirmed. There were supposed to be smaller tunnels running between the three, but none leading into the TMP cavern…and it was odd that the dropship hadn’t picked it up.
I could cover each tunnel and still remain here.
She considered it only briefly before rejecting it. Stess was to remain at the TMP. Of the other four, two would take the west tunnel—it was purported to be longer than the others—and then a tunnel each for the other two. That was the plan, and she wasn’t about to break from it without consulting Dez or Facity.
Fortunately, one of the guards had fallen close enough to the control console for her to climb on top of him, saving her from having to boost herself up. The control panel was almost exactly like the one the Even’s actuality-web room had come up with, based on uninspired Drang technology. She was incapable of pulling the optical network board, that was for someone else on the team, but she could lean into the main tunnel observation switches and turn them off, which she did. As soon as that was done, Arislelemakin separated and moved off to their respective tunnels.
Stess climbed down from the unconscious guard, checking the time patch applied to her front knee. It had been just under two minutes since she’d been transported from the dropship, about what she’d expected.
She felt herself spreading out farther, could see the first rough cave rooms coming into sight, through both Kin and Arislema. It was time to call in. Stess used one of her aural bulbs to compress her collar’s com and translator, thinking that if the rest of the job went as smoothly, they were going to walk away with not only the Yaron Oracle, but everything valuable that the Drang had ever stolen.
The team listened carefully, everyone keeping very still. Except for Facity and Srral, they had all gathered around the patch com, next to the transporter controls.
“…B tunnel, room four…fabrics, embroidered linens, pillows, no value…a set of silver daggers, origin unknown…three racks of glassine or crystal bottles with liquid, definitely liquor, possibly Serk…” Stess’s soft, nearly expressionless voice was translated directly through the com; it was strange, hearing her talk without the normal backdrop of creaks and moans, but not strange enough to divert Dez’s attention from what she was telling them.
That we could retire off of this one.
“…and there’s a table of sculptured pieces. Small, clay and metal…some are carved stone. Several of them look Gocibi, but
I’m not certain.”
Dez glanced at Coamis and Glessin, saw both men concentrating, memorizing. B tunnel was theirs. A was Brad and Pif’s, C was Dez and Jake’s. So far, Stessie had spotted a number of extremely valuable items in the rooms off each tunnel.
“A tunnel, room three…there are paintings and wall hangings, stacked, I can’t tell…there, there it is,” Stess said, no change in inflection but Dez saw the entire team tensing. “The Yaron Oracle, it’s sitting on the floor next to some of the candleholders.”
“Keep looking, we’re on the way,” Dez said, grinning widely as the team quickly assembled on the transporter pad, all of them grinning, too. Even Glessin wore a small smile. It was impossible not to, with what was waiting for them in the tunnels.
A full tube of VihnAKAn scissor pearls…the v’Xaji glass, still intact…a collection of pre-blight Teplan system folk art… And Stessie was not even halfway through the scout.
Dez glanced at his chrono patch as Srral started the transporters. Only eight minutes since she had gone in, too. Things could not be going better.
The ship melted away and then they were there, in a large, roughly rounded chamber littered with rock and shadow. There was Stess, looking remarkably like a rock herself, standing near the downed guards. Dez noted absently that it was overly warm, the air artificially heated to keep the cold-blooded Drang guards happy. Bad for the artifacts, though at least it was dry, too.
“Everybody check time, and get in position,” Dez said, and pointed at A tunnel. “Pif, mark it and get back here.”
The team moved, Pifko gone before Dez could blink, everyone else stepping to the mouths of their assigned tunnels. The idea was for each team to make the most of their limited time, searching the rooms that Stessie hadn’t yet reached, marking off the most valuable items that she’d already seen along the way. It wasn’t as organized as a room-by-room, but there was no way they were going to be able to mark every worthwhile piece; the very best would have to do.
Dez had already decided to disregard the north tunnel, which hadn’t been on the maps; he figured that the Drang had finally gotten tired of transporting in and out, and had hacked out a surface entrance. The dropship sensors hadn’t been able to see much of it, but they hadn’t been able to pick up parts of the other tunnels, either—it seemed that the Drang underground was full of sensor jam, as Facity liked to call it, a kind of dense, naturally occurring clay that messed with density measurements. The stores were clear, at least. In any case, they had more than enough to look through without worrying about scouting and marking a fourth tunnel.
Dez walked quickly to a standing control console, the only piece of equipment in the chamber, and yanked all of the optical and communication boards. The tunnel switches were already off, but it never hurt to play it safe. He dropped the thin plates on the back of one snoring Drang.
“Nice work, Stess,” he said, smiling down at her, and was about to ask if Stessie had spotted anything T-Rogoran—T-Rogoran items were suddenly in demand, another postwar jumper—when Pif rocketed back into the room. He was going fast enough that he had to run halfway around the chamber before he could stop.
“Marked,” he said, his eyes bright.
“Good, let’s get started,” Dez said, and touched his com button as he walked toward Jake, waiting at their tunnel’s entrance. “The Oracle is locked, take it out.”
He glanced back at the others, saw Pif and Brad stepping into A, while Coamis and Glessin had already disappeared. Stess had propped herself against a real rock to keep watch and wait; if Dez wasn’t looking for her, he wouldn’t have noticed her at all.
He turned back, satisfied that his team was on top of things, and grinned, almost laughed out loud; the eager, frightened, delighted look on Jake’s face was priceless. It was the face that every fortune hunter had but kept hidden, and it did his heart good to see Jake wearing it.
Together, they stepped into the shadowy corridor and started walking, Dez wondering if they should skip the first room entirely, remembering that Lema had seen those pearls in the second—
—and suddenly, Facity’s tight voice was spilling out of his com, the tone hitting him before the words, clenching his gut. Her tone said it was bad. When he heard what she had to say, it got worse.
“Dez, that signature we picked up—it was a scrambler,” she said, talking fast. “It must have been set to trigger if we tried to transport anything out; Srral says it went on just as we tried for the Oracle—I can’t get you out, do you copy?”
“Okay, okay,” Dez said, thinking fast, not taking the time to kick himself, aware that he’d have to, later—he’d forgotten about the “turned off” power sig about a minute after Facity had pointed it out. If the Drang had set up a scrambler to keep them there…
…then somebody will be coming to meet us, as soon as they see it’s turned on. They wouldn’t have much time; he had to make some quick decisions.
“Can we get to it?” he asked, looking at Jake. Jake’s eyes were wide with alarm.
“It’s about a hundred twenty meters due north of the TMP,” Facity said. “I’d bet money it’s through that fourth tunnel, but the sensors won’t back it up, they say there’s no tunnel at all between you and the scrambler.”
Sensor jam. “All right. I’ll take care of it, we’re just going to have to—”
“They’re coming,” Facity interrupted, the panic in her voice barely controlled. “Full run, twenty, twenty-five Drang…from the north, Dez, through the fourth tunnel. They’ll be there in a minute, maybe less.”
The time to decide had run out.
7
DEZ BARELY HESITATED. He double-tapped his com button for an open line, plucking it from the front of his suit as he spoke, his tone quick and sure.
“Mission abort—company’s coming and we can’t transport out right now,” he said, and paused. Jake saw that he was adjusting his com button into an earpiece. Pif had shown Jake how to do it only yesterday…along with a few tips on aiming the disruptor, Jake remembered, feeling sick. He reached for his own com with suddenly clumsy fingers.
“Find a good room in which to hide, now, and switch to ears-only when I say ‘go,’” Dez continued, as he slipped the communicator into his ear canal, pinching the tiny directional pickup over the flap of cartilage at the front of his ear. “There’s a transport scrambler on in the north tunnel. Jake and I are going to knock it out—”
—we are?
“—but it may take a few minutes; stay down, it looks like there are going to be five to ten Drang for each tunnel, so don’t start a fight…but stand ready to throw some diversion noise when I say, and Stess, I may need a mood—anxiety, bloodlust, some kind of a physical motivator. Everyone listen for your name or team before direction, I’ll be as specific as possible.
“I want everyone to give Facity your location and status updates at two-minute intervals, if you can—actually, no, scratch that,” Dez went on, reminding Jake that there wasn’t a plan, that in spite of how it sounded, he was making it up as he went along. “Keep quiet, update at discretion. Srral, do your best to keep the beacons locked. Ground team, when Facity or Srral say they can transport, get somewhere they can read your beacon…. The TMP is ideal, no sensor jam, but we may not be able to clear it. Most of the storerooms are good. And let me repeat—this mission is an abort, don’t risk yourself marking. Say check if you copy, A tunnel.”
“Check,” Pif said, his voice high and taut.
“B tunnel.”
“Check,” Glessin said. Jake thought there was an almost resigned note in his voice, as though he’d been expecting this.
“Stessie?”
They were actually close enough to the main cavern to just lean back in and ask her, but Jake suspected that Dez didn’t want to waste a single second. Jake didn’t, either. He suddenly noticed that the air was much too warm, that he was sweating.
“Check,” Stess said softly.
“Stess, can you adjust th
e com collar alone?” Dez asked. “I’ll need to talk to you.”
“I can adjust it.”
“Good,” Dez said. “And good luck, everyone. If you don’t hear from me within ten minutes, Facity, you’re in charge, coordinate with Glessin for a second run at the scrambler. Now…go.”
Jake had just managed to fit the communicator in his ear. Dez lightly placed one hand on his shoulder and steered him down the tunnel at a jog, directed toward an opening ahead on the right, room one. Jake remembered Stess saying that there were a lot of crates in the first room, with what appeared to be dishes inside. That seemed like forever ago, listening to Stess list off items, safely standing around on the dropship. Safe and totally unaware that in a matter of moments, they were going to be trapped, about to be overrun by the famously angry Drang. To think he’d been impatient.
How do we know when it’s safe to get to the scrambler? How are we supposed to clear the TMP? He had about a hundred questions and was afraid to ask any of them—because even as they stepped into the first Drang storeroom, Jake realized he could hear them coming. It was distant, but he could hear them, sounding like—there was nothing he could equate it with, nothing like it. It sounded like a large group of reptilian aliens running through a tunnel, getting closer.
The cavelike room they jogged into was big, not as big as the main cavern but large, about the size of the Even Odds’s bridge. There were boxes and crates everywhere, stacked five and six high. Most were averagesize storage containers, cubic meters, and of the open ones Jake could see, they were, in fact, full of dishes. He saw a number of vases and urns, too.
Dez put one finger over the com’s pickup, talking low and fast. “We’re going to stay in here until at least some of the Drang get past us, then we’re going back to that tunnel.”
