Return - Book III of the Five Worlds Trilogy

by Al Sarrantonio

  A recovered General Quet joined Wrath-Pei on the platform; his discomfort seemed to have vanished, replaced by pride at what he beheld below.

  “So, Quet, how are we doing?” Wrath-Pei asked, suppressing a chuckle.

  The general, trying not to look directly at Wrath-Pei’s ruined, painted, and altogether mad-looking face, replied, “On schedule, Your Grace.”

  “Then we’re ready to sail?” Wrath-Pei’s lipless grin widened.

  “Yes.”

  “Splendid! Simply splendid! And the men understand their mission?”

  “The … disembowelings convinced the doubters, your Grace.”

  “Ha ha! And you? Do you understand the mission, Quet?”

  Clearing his throat, the general said, “I do, Your Grace.”

  “Then what are we waiting for? Proceed!”

  The general nodded and gave a signal to a lieutenant in the tunnel behind him; the signal was relayed down through a chain of command until it reached a black-clad private whose finger hovered over a switch.

  Finger activated switch, and the cavern was filled with an ear-splitting blare; immediately the lights brightened and, far below the platform, there was a scramble of men into ships.

  The blare continued; and now there was an lo-shaking??? roar, subsumed by an even deeper one. Ships began to rise; and, above, the massive doors of the hidden cavern began to open, instantly sucking the sulfur clouds above the lights out into space, which now showed itself in a widening band of stars.

  Bouncing with excitement in his chair, Wrath-Pei shouted, “How long will the air last in here?”

  The general, looking concerned, peered over the edge of the platform as he answered, “Three minutes, at most; by then we were to be—ah, here it is now!”

  Occluding the rising armada before them, a monstrous black shape hove into view, a wedge a thousand meters long, moving with stately grace toward the platform; as it approached, a bay door opened in its side, letting out a blurt of light from within.

  Above the growing roar, Wrath-Pei laughed again and said, “My old ship! How simply delightful! And Tabrel Kris is safely stowed away?”

  “Yes, Your Grace!” general Orn Quet shouted; the bay now synced neatly with the platform, making a flat entrance for Wrath-Pei, who signaled for Lawrence to bring them aboard.

  They were followed by General Quet, and then the bay doors began to close, the ship pulling gently away from the platform.

  “Hold it!” Wrath-Pei said; and the ship immediately stopped, the doors half closed, twenty meters from the platform. The Gyro-chair, with the general standing beside it, now stood at a ledge with a thousand-meter drop below.

  “Your Grace, the air will be gone in a matter of moments!” Orn Quet shouted. “We must shut the bay doors!”

  “In a moment, Quet!” Wrath-Pei answered.

  Wrath-Pei leaned out over his gyro-chair and studied the floor far below.

  Suddenly he pointed. “Look! Someone is down there!”

  The general leaned over to look, and now Wrath-Pei gave him a shove, sending him tumbling out of the bay and into nothingness. A few moments later he bit the floor below.

  “There is someone down there—you!” Wrath-Pei hooted, and now Lawrence drew the gyro-chair into the bay as the door slid closed completely.

  And Wrath-Pei, laughing, stopped only to draw the silver tube in his breast pocket out, unscrew it, and let two drops fall onto his tongue. He put the vial away, clapped his hands, and said, “Proceed!”

  Chapter 26

  “They’re getting closer,” Visid Sneaden, Machine Master of Venus, reported.

  Dalin Shar did not need Visid’s report; he could see with his own eyes the Martian Marines nearly ringing their position in Visid’s Arabia Terra mountain stronghold.

  “How are they attempting to track us?” Dalin asked.

  Standing beside the king before her lab’s “picture window,” Visid replied, “They’re doing a frequency scan, trying to pick up our devices. I’ve been able to avoid them by changing frequencies or alternating our satellite links, turning one off while we used the other, and vice versa. But they’ve already crossed us enough times to narrow their search down, and sooner or later they’ll pinpoint us.”

  “Is there anything we can do?” Dalin asked.

  “Only two choices, Sire. Turn everything off and wait for them to burrow in here after us, or do what I told you three days ago—”

  “A preemptive strike.”

  Visid nodded. “Take out as many of their plasma soldier generators as we can.”

  “That would mean uncloaking Shatz Abel’s fleet,” Dalin Shar commented unhappily. “And putting all our eggs in one basket.”

  Visid bowed her head. “I’m sorry that basket is so small, Sire. I wish I could have done better.”

  Dalin brightened. “Nonsense! If we could have gotten you the parts, you could have built a thousand weapons against the plasma soldiers, instead of the fifty we have. We can’t help it that the Martians learned our little tricks and started consolidating their equipment and food supplies and guarding them more closely.” He put his hand on Visid’s shoulder. “You’ve done well.”

  Looking out at the Martians in the mountain passes below them, Visid said, “We’ll be able to disrupt the plasma soldier generators orbiting our positions here for a while; if Shatz Abel can destroy most of the others, we can fight the ones in front of us without worrying about more being moved into position.” Suddenly she became angry. “If only I had more time! I could have built more ’roos, more everything!”

  “We don’t have more time,” Dalin said. “I’m going to give the order to Shatz Abel.”

  Visid added tentatively, “There’s something else, Sire…”

  “What is it?”

  “Something… I’m not sure about. It’s bothered me for quite a while… “ She stared off into the distance, out the generated picture window, toward the far horizon.

  “Tell me, Visid.”

  “It’s Carter Frolich.”

  Dalin nearly laughed. “Frolich is dead! Are you becoming like Shatz Abel now, afraid of ghosts and goblins?”

  “It’s what he may have left behind that worries me.” Dalin’s face clouded as Visid continued:

  “When I dragged Benel to the Piton in Sacajawea Patera, it was to look into what Carter Frolich had been doing before his death. From what Benel told me about him, it occurred to me that Carter Frolich may have had something in mind for Venus.”

  “Something like what?”

  “I’m not sure. I monitored some Martian broadcasts later that convinced me that Frolich was up to something. The Martians apparently found some sabotage and neutralized it. But I can’t believe that Frolich would have made it easy for them.”

  “You mean what the Martians found may have been only the first level of sabotage?”

  Visid nodded slowly.

  Dalin began to shake his head. “That isn’t something we can worry about now—”

  “But I think we have to. My scans are showing a slight change in Venus’s atmosphere.”

  “A slight change? Couldn’t that be due to all the Martian activity?”

  Visid looked at the king and shook her head. “The feeder stations, all of them, are cycling down.”

  “Can we do anything about it?”

  Visid shook her head. “Not while Cornelian controls the Piton. I’m sure that’s where Frolich’s secret is.”

  “Is this atmospheric change dangerous?”

  “If it continues, it will be. It means that Carter Frolich planned to turn Venus back into a dead planet.”

  Shatz Abel did nothing but pace.

  “They’ve got to make a decision now!” he shouted at no one in particular, though the scarred Yar Pent stood nearby. The two of them occupied the perimeter of their invisible fleet operations center; the gelid lines of force that made them invisible curled up nearby into an overhead dome, making the Venusian valley in which the
y had settled, a clearing between two lush forest areas, wavering and translucent.

  There was a thin scream high overhead; Shatz Abel stopped to watch a high-flying Martian search shuttle, needle-nosed and bright orange against the blue sky.

  “If nothing happens, we’ll have to use that kangaroo again soon—I’m tired of moving!” the pirate yelled.

  “Then stand still,” Yar Pent said, studying his nails. “We’ll fight soon enough.”

  “Not soon enough for me!”

  A uniformed soldier appeared, saluted Yar Pent and Shatz Abel.

  “The order’s come,” the soldier said. “We go in two hours. We’re to get into position immediately.”

  “Ha!” Shatz Abel shouted happily, as the soldier saluted again and withdrew. “Did you hear that, Yar? Finally, we go!”

  Continuing to study his nails, Yar Pent nodded slowly. “I heard.” He looked up, a smile spreading the scar on his face. “And by damn I’m ready to go, too!”

  “Now, remember my orders,” Shatz Abel said into the huge Screen mounted amidships; it was split into twelve boxes, giving him eye contact with his twelve squadron commanders. “We’ll rise under cloak and stay under it until the last minute. Then we fly out like needles and go for our individual targets.”

  There were nods of agreement from eleven of the commanders; Yar Pent studied his nails and yawned. “Yar, did you hear me?” Shatz Abel growled.

  Yar Pent’s face split into a grin again. “I heard you, Shatz. And I bet I take out two generators to your one.”

  “You’re on,” Shatz Abel replied. To all of them he added, “Now go to it!”

  There was a lurch as Shatz Abel’s ship lifted and turned up toward orbit.

  “Take it easy up there, Weens, will you?” the pirate called up into the pilot’s cabin.

  “Aye, I’ll do that!” Captain Weens cackled; but this was immediately transformed into an oath as he turned on his two robots, one piloting and one navigating. “Ye blasted heaps o’ rust! Keep it smooth!”

  Shatz Abel wandered into the cabin to see Weens striking the chrome navigator with the flat of his hand. “Quick!” he said in mock need, turning his one good eye to regard Shatz Abel. “Get me a can opener!”

  “Operation is nominal,” the robot pilot reported, and now Weens turned his attention toward this robot. “Course it is, you mistaken pile o’ aluminum foil! Just tell me when something goes wrong!”

  “Yes, sir,” the pilot nodded slightly, then turned its gleaming head back to the Screen before it.

  Shatz Abel studied the view through the fore shield: a makeshift flotilla rising as one through the blackening atmosphere, the wavering bubble of the cloak making the stars shimmer as if seen through a film of water.

  “I hope this bucket of yours is ready for this fight, Weens,” Shatz Abel remarked.

  Weens flared anger, which quickly subsided into pride. “Course she is, Shatz! Best freighter in the fleet! And mark me—this squares us for good!”

  “This squares us for you leaving Dalin and I on Europa—”

  “Unavoidable, it was!”

  “As unavoidable as you not wanting to join the Earth fleet after I found you marooned off Charon and had this useless wreck fixed?”

  “And right nice o’ you it was, Shatz!”

  The pirate took the old captain by the front of his tunic and brought him dose. “Good. Then don’t even think of running out on me again. And if we get out of this, we’ll talk about being square on the other hundred things you owe me for. Agreed?”

  “Sure, Shatz! Anything ye say!”

  The pirate let Weens down.

  “Captain,” the robot pilot reported, shaking its head as it studied its Screen, “we seem to be losing power.”

  Alarmed, Shatz Abel looked through the front shield: indeed, they were falling behind the other ships.

  “If we break the cloak, Cornelian will know we’re here!” the pirate warned.

  “Can’t have that!” Weens hopped like a grasshopper out of the pilot’s cabin and into the back “Must be them plasma caps I replaced!”

  Shatz Abel, following him, bellowed, “What do you mean? You were given brand-new plasma caps!”

  Weens looked up sheepishly from the floor panel he had opened. “And mighty good they were, too, Shatz! Much too good for this crate, so I traded ’em for a slight downgrade and a bit ’o Titanian brandy—oh, ye wouldn’t believe how smooth that brandy was—”

  Roaring his displeasure, the pirate lifted the skinny captain out of the bay and reached down himself.

  “These are complete junk!”

  “Well,” Weens said, “perhaps they ain’t quite up to snuff—”

  From up front, the pilot reported, “We’ll be leaving the cloak in thirty seconds …”

  Giving another roar, Shatz Abel thrust his upper body down into the tight space of the work bay and desperately pulled at the plasma caps, removing, examining, and replacing them in a different order.

  “Any change?” he yelled up front.

  “Removal from the cloak in fifteen seconds. Yar Pent reports an unsuccessful tow attempt.”

  “This heap is too heavy for a tow!” the pirate shouted. His thick hands moved plasma caps as if they were checkers on a checkerboard. “How ’bout that?”

  “No change,” the report came.

  “Damnation!” The pirate’s thick fingers flew; he drew two caps out completely, tossing them aside, and bridged the gap with feeder cable. “That’s it! This works or nothing!”

  “A … slight improvement,” the robot pilot reported. After a moment the navigator reported, “Regaining course, though at reduced speed.”

  “So much for maneuverability,” the pirate spat, pushing himself out of the crawl space and slamming the hatch behind him. He stood up and faced Weens, who seemed to be searching for a way out of the ship. Ignoring the captain, Shatz Abel returned to the pilot’s cabin and asked the robot, “Tell me if I’m wrong, but we’ll be middling fast, and slow on the turns—am I right?”

  The pilot nodded. “Yes, sir. And weapons should all be operational, within those constraints.”

  “Fine. I’ve been in tighter spots—though,” he continued, turning a withering look on Weens, who was back in the hold, now intent on studying the port window, “not when I didn’t have to be.”

  “Aye, if Venus don’t look pretty from here!” Weens said, in a desperately cheerful voice.

  “And if there’s one more surprise on this ship,” Shatz Abel said, “you’ll be on your way back down there, without a space suit.”

  “Ready for cloak drop,” Yar Pent said.

  At the amidships Screen, Shatz Abel nodded to Yar Pent and the other eleven squad commanders. “On my mark. And good luck to everybody. Remember what to be ready for. All righ t… mark!”

  The Screen blanked, and the pirate lumbered up front to watch through the front shield.

  Arranged around Shatz’s ship like dandelion seeds, the fleet ships all lurched at once as the wavering cloak disintegrated. Twinkling stars became in an instant sharp as knife points, and now the fleet broke apart. The dandelion seeds scattered as if a sharp blow of wind had burst them away from their flower.

  The horizon of Venus, bright yellow with hints of blue and green, hove up into view. The black marks of Prime Cornelian’s plasma soldier generators floated like bobbers on the ocean of the planet’s hazy atmosphere.

  “Our own target ahead,” the robot pilot reported, and Shatz Abel studied the black object which resolved into a box, the round gleam of its belly lens just becoming visible.

  The pirate turned to the navigator. “What word from Dalin Shar?”

  The navigator paused, listening to the frequency scanner wired into its body, then reported, “They have successfully jammed the plasma generators in their sector. But there seems to be—”

  The robot stopped; and Shatz Abel cried, “Ah!” as the generator that was growing quickly in size before them, sho
wing the individual facets of its lens now, as well as the bolted bay of its plasma generator, their target, abruptly winked out.

  “Cloaked, by gum!” Captain Weens, his head poked reticently into the pilot’s cabin, declared.

  “We’re ready for this—try that cloak scanner that little girl Visid developed!”

  The pilot assented, and in a moment reported, “I’m getting no reading.”

  “Cloaked and kangarooed!” Weens stated. “Just like you said they would!”

  “I now have a reading behind us,” the pilot reported without passion.

  “This is what they did on Titan. Turn us around!” Shatz Abel ordered.

  “That will take some time,” the pilot reported. “As you remember, our plasma cap reconfiguration—”

  “That’s enough!” the pirate fumed. “Do your best!” Giving Weens a murderous look, Shatz Abel stalked back to the amidships Screen.

  “Report!” he ordered.

  The Screen went alive with twelve shouting, alarmed faces. Shatz Abel cut out the others and faced Yar Pent.

  “It cloaked and jumped behind us!” Yar Pent shouted. “We were ready and got off a shot, but it was neutralized with defensive weapons and now we’re being fired on!”

  “Fired on? By the generators?”

  As if in confirmation, Shatz’s own ship was rocked, nearly throwing him off balance.

  “We’re under attack, sir,” the robot pilot reported.

  Weens, who had entered the cabin, began to strike the chrome head. “O’ course he knows that, ye empty tin can!”

  Shatz Abel listened to two other reports before ordering, “Break off the attack!”

  Again, Shatz’s ship was rocked.

  “Get us out of here!” he shouted.

  “As you wish,” the pilot replied; the freighter lurched as it was brought out of its wide turn and all power was fed to the engines.