Steelheart

by William C. Dietz

  The pilgrims were assembled by the time Crono arrived, chivied into place by an ever-obedient Solly, who further distanced himself from the flock with every order he gave. The youth had caught on by now, a fact made clear by the resentment in his eye, but was helpless to do anything about it. A realization about which Crono felt no emotions whatsoever. Unwanted growth must be pruned if the plant is to flourish ... and the farmer must make the cut.

  The fact that there were five new faces in the group, each carrying a twenty-five-kol bag of dried fish or a bladder of fish oil, spoke well of Org's zeal but raised questions regarding his competency. Why were the monk's parishioners so eager to leave Serenity? Because they were filled with religious fire? Or because their monk was a despot?

  It was an important question—and one that Crono would pursue with the bishop. Perhaps Org was better suited for a less visible role ... something that would teach the importance of humility.

  The priest made a note in his diary, tucked the tablet away, and waved his staff. "You heard Solly! The road awaits! Onward for the glory of God!"

  Brother Org looked disappointed, but if anyone else took note of the much-abbreviated morning prayer, there was no sign of it and the march began.

  The village prayer caller had been ill for the last few days. He struggled to the top of the pole, croaked as best he could, and wondered if God could hear him.

  Ostracized by his peers, and feeling rather sorry for himself, Solly took a position behind the newcomers. Four qualified as oldsters, but the fifth, an attractive female named Dara, was close to his age. She was pretty, to his eye at least, and somewhat mysterious. Why had she undertaken the pilgrimage alone? Especially when most of the youngsters, he being the obvious exception, were accompanied by a grandparent? And why, when setting forth on such a grand adventure, did she look so unremittingly glum?

  Mysteries such as those demanded answers, and Solly, who had plenty of time to consider such things, was determined to discover them. He fell into step three pilgrims behind Dara, and waited to see what would happen.

  The sun arced across the sky, pushed occasional shafts of light down through broken clouds, and settled into the west. Dara had walked the path from Serenity to Faith many times before—hut had never been so weary doing it. It was as if the fetus growing within her abdomen had leached the strength from her body.

  Gradually, without meaning to do so, she slipped toward the end of the column and became one of the laggards. In spite of the fact that they were subject to blows from Crono's staff, and complained bitterly when such blows fell, most were unwilling to walk any faster.

  The bladder of fish oil was a particular burden, far worse than she had imagined it would be, and impossible to get rid of. For the tithe, like the grain carried by others, had become the property of the Church, and as such was considered sacred.

  The path started upward, the beginning of the long, hard climb into the hills above Faith. Dara felt dizzy, heard the chink, chink, chink of Crono's staff, and forced herself forward. It was then, as she waited for the blow to fall, that a hand touched her elbow. The weight of the bladder disappeared, and a voice spoke in her ear. "You look a bit tired ... let me take your arm."

  Dara was an independent sort, who didn't want any help, but knew she needed it. She sent her eye to the far left-hand side of her face and saw the youth named Solly, the one nobody liked because he nagged them all the time, and was a student of the Devil.

  He didn't look so bad, though, kind of nice in a rough sort of way, and had saved her from punishment. As for the Devil, well, who was she to criticize? Not with a demon growing in her belly.

  Crono bowed politely on his way forward, wondered about Solly's motives, and assumed the worst. The lad fancied the lass and wanted some fun. Or did he? What if Solly were the genuine article? A true vessel of the Church? Such were rare, like gems found in a streambed, but all the more valuable for their scarcity. Time would tell.

  Nightfall brought the pilgrims into the village of Faith, a once prosperous place, which in spite of the hard times caused by the weather still managed a cheerful facade, and was larger than Harmony or Serenity.

  Having had a chance to rest for awhile, Dara offered herself as a guide. Solly was thrilled, and hurried to accept. He finished Crono's chores, took Dara's arm, and followed where she led.

  The priest followed for a while, saw the twosome enter the church, and smiled approvingly. Satisfied with the activity that the youngsters had chosen, and eager to collect the local news, he turned into a side street, whacked a pair of mischievous ten-year-olds, and proceeded on his way.

  Solly had never been in a full-fledged church before, and he was awed by its size and the feeling of solemnity that filled the triangular nave.

  Of even more importance, however, to him anyway, was the Devil's altar. The youngster's body went through the movements expected of it—but his eye remained on the display. It was a good deal more complex than the one in Harmony, consisting as it did of a black box, a length of metal tubing, a ball-and-socket joint of the same kind that hordu had, another section of tubing, and a U-shaped construct that had no name. There was a click, followed by a whir, and the pincer closed.

  Solly gave an exclamation of surprise and jumped back out of the way. Dara, who had seen the whole phenomenon before, stayed where she was. There was a chuckle as the local monk stepped out of the shadows. He was small, wore immaculate robes, and possessed enormous feet. They were bare despite the cold. A smile rippled down his mouth. "That's right, lad .. .jump back... or the Devil will bite."

  Solly felt embarrassed, checked to see if Dara had laughed, and saw no indication that she had. Not outwardly, anyway.

  They made their way forward, found places on the backless benches, and spent the next fifteen minutes in prayer. Or were supposed to anyway, but Dara was somewhat preoccupied, and Solly couldn't forget what he'd seen. Imagine! An arm that moved on its own! And a grasper.... What if one were able to construct a body to go with it? A body that could plow the fields?

  Wondrous possibilities filled Solly's mind, caused his hearts to beat faster, and made his hands twitch. But for what? The Devil's work?

  The Zid cross seemed to glow, to summon his eye, and Solly knew the horrible truth. The Devil had his soul—and planned to keep it.

  A thick blanket of snow had accumulated during the night. It was beautiful to look upon, but hard to walk through, and Crono considered his options. He could hold the group in Faith, waiting for the weather to clear, or ignore conditions and push on through. He knew the first approach was the safest, but it was also the most expensive, and would place additional pressure on the city's already strained resources. Food reserves were growing thinner with each passing month, and the pilgrims were a burden—a fact that the local monk had made abundantly clear.

  The priest scanned the sky, thumped the ground with his staff, and made the necessary decision. "Round 'em up, Solly, check their footgear, and secure those packs. The grain belongs to the Lord... and every bag will be accounted for."

  Solly made the necessary rounds, suffered the inevitable abuse, and saved Dara for last. The female was in the final stages of fastening her boots. There was something sad about her countenance, and he tried to cheer her up. "We'll be staying in Sacrifice tonight—I hear they have more than one church, and lots of shops."

  Dara had no interest in churches, or shops for that matter, and knew the address by heart. Number 4 River Street— that's where she would go. The thought of losing what grew within her made the youngster sad in one way, yet happy in another, knowing it had never been quickened. Solly offered a hand, and she took it. It was easy to stand with his help. Dara smiled, and Solly felt warm through and through.

  Crono knew he'd made the wrong decision by noon that day. The snow was deep, too deep for the oldsters, the wind was cold, and the column had lost its cohesiveness. Rather than the even formation that the priest took such pride in, the pilgrims had clustered t
ogether in a series of semi-isolated clumps, some centered around a strong individual, many representing nothing more than friends who had gathered together or, in the case of the elderly, been left to fend for themselves.

  Nowhere was this problem more visible than on the mountainside they were now forced to traverse. Crono identified seven separate groups, each struggling forward, leaning into the wind. Solly and he had already slogged the length of the column twice each, nagging, cajoling, and begging. All to no avail.

  The priest looked back at his somewhat unwilling assistant, saw the extent to which Dara was dependent on him, and wondered what troubled her. Sick? Or something else? Something the priest should be even more concerned about? Such cases were rare but hardly unknown. He would check once they arrived.

  Unwilling to take Solly away from his charge, Crono yelled for the two of them to move a little bit faster, pulled the scarf over his face, and forged ahead. An incentive would help—and his staff would provide it.

  It was a small thing, as seismic events go. A fault line slipped and a tremor was born. One of thousands felt since the Cleansing—little more than a blip on the seismograph at Flat Top.

  But the snow pack had been growing for many days now, layer upon layer, with the latest addition perched on top. Any number of things could have started it, a sudden blast of wind, even a change in temperature, but it was the tremor that triggered this particular avalanche and sent it roaring down the slope.

  Crono heard the sound, turned, and saw the great white wave. His warning was lost in the rumble of the oncoming snow, but others became aware of the avalanche just as he had, and started to run. The first group, consisting of young males, managed to escape.

  The second cluster, which was composed of oldsters, tried to run, but had farther to go, and weren't as fleet of foot. The snow hit them full force, rolled over their heads, and buried them deep.

  The third grouping was more fortunate, and escaped unscathed as the avalanche hit the rocky outcropping above their position, split in two, and continued down the mountain.

  Bumped toward the north, one of the flows seemed to know exactly where the priest was, and selected him as a target.

  Crono did the only thing he could. He turned toward the end of the column, ran with all the speed he could muster, and left the rest to God.

  The snow fanned out across the slope, sent a female tumbling to her death, and caught Crono from behind. The priest felt the weight hit his legs, remembered to swim, and was engulfed in white snow. It filled in around him, brought his movements to a halt, and covered the sky.

  Both Solly and Dara had been too far back to be in danger—but they watched in horror as their fellow pilgrims were swallowed up.

  Solly saw Crono disappear, then plunged downhill himself and hoped there were no hidden holes.

  Slowed by friction and the loss of mass, the snow came to a halt. Guessing where the priest might be, and then encouraged by the sight of his scarf, Solly fought through the chest-high snow.

  What happened next was more luck than skill. Solly felt one of his boots hit something solid, and started to dig.

  Dara arrived a few moments later, joined the rescue effort, and was the first to see Crono's face. "I found him, Solly! Come—I need your help."

  Once he was located, it took a relatively short amount of time to free the priest from his snowy prison and drag him free. His gratitude, or lack of it, was pure Crono. "What kept you, lad? How are the others?"

  It took the better part of the afternoon to fully answer the priest's question—and the answer wasn't good. No less than twenty-three pilgrims had been killed by the avalanche, and three remained missing. It was the single worst disaster since a suspension bridge had broken eight years before and dropped thirty-one of the faithful into a gorge. But that group had been under another priest's control—a priest Crono regarded as careless and felt little sympathy for. Now it was his turn.

  The disaster dumped the once proud priest into the depths of depression, reduced him to little more than a shambling hulk, and left Solly in charge.

  The temperature fell, darkness descended over the land, and snow continued to fall. "So," an oldster said, his hands in his pockets, "you like to boss everyone around ... what should we do?"

  Solly applied his mind to the problem. The pilgrims needed hot food, psychological comfort, and protective shelter. Sacrifice was too far away—so what to do? The youngster prayed—and the Devil listened.

  14

  ex pi a' tion / n / the act of atoning for a crime

  Research Assistant Amy Reno knelt before the Devil's altar. The display was as poor as Piety itself. Little more than a scrap of alloy salvaged from a Mothri maintenance bot. The symbolic value was there, however—or so Father Haslo had assured the locals during his periodic visits.

  The synthetic thought about the rich display her body parts would produce and felt her self-preservation subroutines kick in. It urged the synthetic to run and hide—something she had already accomplished to the extent that she could.

  Reno rose, followed the other parishioners toward the true altar, and felt the weight of their stares. Stupid stares, mostly—since most of the more intelligent citizens had left Piety long before.

  There were exceptions however, individuals like Elder Porno, who was possessed of a crafty intelligence, and made good use of it. The synthetic could feel the Zid's eye on her, probing for weakness, hoping for profit. For in spite of the rocky fields and ever shorter growing seasons, both he and his fellow elders lived rather well by Zid standards, a fact they sought to conceal from Father Haslo.

  The android took her place toward the rear of the congregation, among the others of low status, and felt very much alone. Originally part of a three-person biological survey team, she, along with Doctor Arno Styles and Doctor Imo Toss, had volunteered for a dangerous field trip. Especially for Amy.

  The objective was to sample as many of Zuul's microorganisms as possible to better understand the way the world was put together. This was a project to which Garrison had assigned the highest priority.

  And they had done well, too—filling what Styles laughingly referred to as "the zoo" with hundreds of samples. It was strange, however, since most if not all of the organisms Amy had observed appeared to have off-world origins. She couldn't be sure, of course, not until they returned to the lab, but that's the way it seemed.

  The trip had gone surprisingly well at first, especially in light of all the things that could have gone wrong but didn't. That good fortune was partly due to the fact that the scientists had maintained an extremely low profile. That's what they believed, anyway.

  Then came the day approximately two months before, when Amy had set off to take samples from a necklace of slushy lakes. The humans had remained in camp, cataloging their samples and resting after the previous day's hike.

  It had been a beautiful day, clear and bright, with not a cloud in the sky. Snow clung to the ground like a sparkly blanket and crunched under the android's boots. Amy liked to hum the same tune all day. It drove Toss crazy, so the synthetic hummed when she was alone, and enjoyed the opportunity to do so.

  So that's how the day passed, hiking from one lake to the next, filling vials with water, and singing songs. There were no interruptions, save for a radio transmission about noon, which was garbled and impossible to understand. It could have been one of the doctors, but it could have been someone attempting to flush them out, so the android maintained her silence.

  The afternoon passed pleasantly, and the android was in a good mood as she approached camp. That's why it came as such a shock when the synthetic found that her colleagues had been murdered and their equipment stolen. Everything, except for the specimen tubes and some personal odds and ends, had disappeared. What remained lay scattered across the blood reddened snow.

  Amy knew she would never forget the sight of Styles, head down over the remains of the still-smoldering campfire, or of Toss, his old-fashioned glasses
broken, blood clotting his throat.

  There was no way to know who had attacked them. If there were clues in the hundreds of mutimal tracks, the boot prints, or the way in which her friends had been murdered, the android lacked the training to interpret them. They were Zid—that much was obvious, given the kind of boots they wore—but that didn't really matter much. Justice, if such a thing existed any more, was beyond the synthetic's grasp. Her primary concern was for the bodies and the widely scattered specimen tubes.

  The containers were relatively easy. Amy gathered them together, restored the cylinders to the pack designed to carry them, and retrieved some personal items that lay trampled in the snow.

  The bodies were more difficult. Like most of her kind, Amy had an extremely unsentimental attitude toward her corporeal body. She saw it as a tool, something she would use, repair as necessary, and trade for another. She felt no special attachment to parts virtually identical to those located on a shelf somewhere else.

  Most humans were different, however. They saw their physical bodies as the very essence of who and what they were. That being the case, they had developed elaborate rituals around the way in which remains were disposed of.

  Should she stay, knowing the killers might return? Or go, and preserve her own existence? Common sense suggested the latter. The synthetic made one last circuit of the camp, collected some items that might be useful, and left.

  A stream, half choked with ice, offered the means to hide her tracks. Amy followed it for half a mile or so, turned into a creek, and used that as an exit.

  Flat Top was a long way to the southeast. Though not equipped with internal long-range radio equipment like some of her siblings, the android had a short-range com unit and plenty of onboard navigational aids, including a heavily shielded compass. She chose her line of march, ordered her body into motion, and walked with the tireless efficiency of exactly what she was—an extremely durable machine.