by Chris Walley
“I have seen this sign before,” he said. “Are we sure that the chamber is empty?”
“Azeras says so,” was Luke’s comment, but Merral noted Lloyd and the two other men tightening their grips on their weapons.
“Watch out for slitherwings,” he commanded as they all squeezed into the air lock. There they sealed their helmets and opened the inner door.
The two armed men moved out first into the gloom beyond, and with Lloyd at his elbow, Merral—followed by Ludovica—walked after them. A few paces beyond the door they stopped in a wary semicircle, gazing nervously around. The chamber was similar to the one Merral had seen on the slave craft, but it was larger, and the lights on the ceiling that represented stars were fainter. There were pools of darkness, but Merral saw no sign of movement either on the floor or up on the roof beams. In the center of the room he could make out a high, empty chair and a hexagonal column.
Merral ordered that a small flare be fired, and as the dazzling sphere hung above their heads, they looked around again. Merral glanced down, seeing the white shards amid the dust at his feet. He poked around with his foot, recognizing some fragments of bone. Are they human?
Lloyd nudged him and pointed out a strange, empty, dishlike structure. Merral pondered it for a moment before realizing it was the carapace of a cockroach-beast.
How sad, he thought and realized that the chamber depressed him more than it frightened him.
One of Luke’s men had cautiously opened his visor and raised his thumb. One by one, the party followed and opened face plates.
“It stinks,” Ludovica said with feeling and Merral nodded agreement. Yet as he tried to ignore the odor of decay, he realized that there was something stale and dated about it. Whatever process of rotting had occurred, it had been some time ago. This is a crypt not a slaughterhouse.
Merral looked at Luke. “This is deserted. I see—and sense—nothing evil in it. It fits with what we have been told. I suggest we vent it to vacuum, then spray it with disinfectant and seal it.”
Luke considered the advice for a moment. “Agreed.”
Ludovica nodded her support.
“Lead on, Luke,” Merral said. “I think I know who we have an appointment with.”
Ten minutes later, they stood midway along a corridor two levels down staring at a broad and unusually ornate door sealed with bars.
“Azeras says he has unlocked it from the bridge,” Luke said. “Are you ready?”
“Yes.”
They slid the bolts off and the doors swung silently outward. Beyond the doors, soft yellow lighting switched on, revealing a long chamber with a low arched and buttressed roof. The walls were mantled with thick black cloth on which were embroidered gigantic and outlandish symbols in a solemn red. In the center of the room was a black plinth and on it, its base swathed in dark cloth, was a long, dull cylinder of crystal. Merral found that the cloth and the plinth somehow gave the room a feeling of a great and sad antiquity.
Merral stared at the cylinder, realizing that he wanted to look—and not to look—at the dark twisted form inside.
I must deal with this. With slow steps, he walked forward. There seemed to be something about the room that absorbed sound so that he could no longer hear even the rustling of the space suit.
Merral stood by the side of the cylinder and peered down, seeing inside the glass a long, dark, waxy form out of which tubes flowed.
“‘Zhalatoc, Great Prince of Lord-Emperor Nezhuala’s Dominion,’” he murmured.
Suddenly the twisted figure writhed.
Merral gasped and stepped back.
“Luke, did you see . . . ?” he began, but the chaplain, bending down by the plinth, didn’t answer.
“Here,” Luke ordered sharply, beckoning one of the big men to him. He pointed to a series of small green lights and turned urgent eyes to Merral. “Commander, permission to terminate this . . . outrage?”
“Yes.”
Luke took a gun and, an instant later, smashed the butt into the box. As splinters flew out, a red light throbbed in the roof. Luke snapped out more urgent orders to his men and wires were cut away. Inside the crystal chamber, the withered form moved again but in ever waning spasms.
Merral saw that inside the crystal cylinder a mist was gathering that masked the form. The light stopped flashing. Luke and his men, working with determined urgency, now tore away the drapes surrounding the lowest part of the cylinder to reveal handles.
“Grab them, men,” Luke ordered, his face bent with distaste. “Right-hand air lock.”
Bearing the cylinder, the party walked down the corridor and turned into an air lock. There the crystal object was placed on the floor and two small flasks like drink bottles were attached to the rear.
Back outside the air lock door, Luke gave more orders. “Decompression! Gravity modification to negative!”
Amid a faint hissing, the coffin slowly rose free of the floor.
“Outer door open!”
The outer port slid away to reveal a vision of stars, space, and nothingness that gave Merral vertigo.
“Fire jets now!”
The two flasks jetted out gas and the cylinder slowly accelerated out of the air lock. A few moments later, the crystal container was clear of the ship and glinting in the starlight.
Luke stood back, his loud voice seeming more dominant than ever in the confines of the corridor. “In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Spirit, we commend this . . . soul to eternity.” And then, as if it was an afterthought, he added, “And your mercy.”
“Thanks, Luke. That needed doing,” Merral said, strangely relieved. Then he turned to Ludovica. “We need to talk.”
Ludovica gave him a terse nod. “Let’s go back to the bridge,” she said.
As they padded their way back to the bridge, doubt tugged at the edges of Merral’s mind. Can we have come so far and not be allowed to proceed?
On the bridge, Merral listened as Ludovica interrogated the engineers and the seizure team. The conclusion was that although not all the rooms had been searched, so far nothing unexpected had been found. Completing a full search of areas such as the holds would take another dozen hours. Merral found himself staring at Ludovica’s unexpressive face trying—and failing—to read any verdict there.
Eventually Ludovica shook her head and led Merral into an adjacent cabin and closed the door.
She tilted her head and looked hard at him. “I am interested in your impression. You were on the slave ship.”
“This is better than I thought it would be. I detect no sense of evil on this ship. I think—”
“Evil might be well hidden,” she interrupted.
“True. But I think it isn’t. I think, Ludovica, that the loss of the steersman has made things better. It’s an ugly and depressing ship, and I don’t care for the steersman chamber or that disgusting body we ejected into space, but I have a feeling . . . it is harmless.”
“A feeling?” The eyes were sharp.
“Yes.”
“And would you stake the lives of thirty people on your ‘feeling’?”
“Ludovica, I have no choice. Realistically, what we need is to take this whole ship to pieces, mount a room-by-room search, work out where everything is. But we don’t have the time.”
Ludovica walked over to a nearby port and looked out. Merral followed her gaze to the gleaming, multicolored arc that was Farholme.
“The other team is on its way,” she said. “The White Birch should be here in ten hours.” She scratched her nose for a moment with a gloved hand. “I have decided that I dislike space suits very much. Even with the visor open.”
She looked around. “So have you found any evidence of a discrepancy between what Azeras described and reality?”
“No.”
“Neither have the engineers. So I’m going to give you permission.”
For a moment Merral couldn’t speak. “Thank you. . . . Thank you very much.”
Ludovica
gave a dismissive shrug. “I shall probably get into trouble for this. You know my main concerns: Azeras and this Betafor. I’d watch both.”
Then, to his surprise, she reached into a long pocket on her space suit thigh, extracted a slender roll of paper, and passed it to him.
“What is it?”
“Don’t try to open it with gloves on. It’s Professor Elaxal’s report on Betafor. I’m giving it to you.”
“But isn’t there only one copy?”
“Yes. And Elaxal will stay quiet.” She pursed her lips in an expression of glum acceptance. “You know, Merral, we can try to make rules. But war makes a mockery of them. Maybe that’s the worst part of it all.” There was a sigh. “Go with my blessing and my prayers.” Then she paused. “But be careful. Please.”
Twenty-four hours later, much had changed. No one on the Star—as it was now universally abbreviated—was wearing a space suit, the lighting was brighter, new signs in Communal were appearing, and the air had a clean, if disinfected, tang.
The White Birch had docked, and all those due to travel on the Star were on board and assigned—rather simplistically—into one of two camps: “crew” or “military.” The military—headed by Ilyas Malarka, the captain of the soldiers, and Helena Leonardy, the leader of the sniper unit—were already securing weapons and setting up training rooms in the lower parts of the ship. The crew were either familiarizing themselves with the ship or, under Vero’s supervision, transferring the last supplies and equipment. The result was a ship that was alive with light, noise, and activity. Even Betafor was busy, reprogramming the Star’s computer and command and navigation systems to use Communal rather than Saratan.
Not everyone seemed happy. On inspection tour with Azeras and Laura Bezemov, Merral saw the sarudar survey a corridor section with something close to a scowl.
“You’ll be wanting to paint it next, Captain,” he said in a grumpy tone.
“Now it’s funny you should say that,” Laura said with a grin. “I was thinking about it.”
The response was sour. “Oh, gentle pastel shades, I suppose?”
“Of course. With some plant pots and a few drapes.”
“That’s enough!” Merral interrupted, laughing.
Later Merral and Vero toured the ship. They found Abilana Ghosn overseeing the accumulation of medical material in a large cabin.
“I intend setting up shop in the existing medical facilities once I have sterilized them. And understood what it all does.” She smiled. “I always think it’s a good idea to find out how surgical equipment works before patients turn up. Don’t you agree?”
Merral did.
They walked on, past cases packed along the corridor walls to be sorted out later.
“Vero, why didn’t we put everything in a single large room? The one on the second level, for a start?”
“That’s best used as a place where all can gather together. And . . .” His friend looked troubled.
“And?”
“Azeras has said the effects of Below-Space may be so bad that we may have to all stay together.”
“Aah.” Finding this ship may have been the easy part.
They walked on and, surveying the stores, Merral nudged Vero. “There’s a lot of food here.”
“Yes. And it’s the best quality I could get.” He gave Merral a look of subdued amusement. “Given the fact that every dish is going to be shades of gray, it seemed worth making sure it tastes good. And besides, with what we all face, it seemed worthwhile. ‘The condemned man ate a hearty meal.’”
“And are we condemned?”
Vero stared at him and then gave a halfhearted shrug. “No. That is to admit defeat. A figure of speech.”
Around a corner Merral stopped. “Vero, that looks just like a cello case.”
“My friend, it is a cello case.”
Merral stopped and looked around, realizing that there were more instrument cases. “Are we an orchestra on tour or a rescue party?”
“As we have time to pass, I assumed we ought to have a range of pastimes available. And as almost everybody on the team plays something, it seemed a good idea if we had the instruments. We have it on fairly good authority that the enemy of our souls does not like music.”
“Do we have scores?”
“Ah, something else that I didn’t tell you about. Here, in this room. Let me show you.”
In the cabin was a metallic box the size of a small suitcase. Vero picked it up with something that approached reverence.
“What is that?”
“It’s the data from the Library.”
“All of it?”
“No. We didn’t copy a lot of trivia—old sports results, minutes of council meetings on obscure worlds, people’s family details, and the like. But there are scores and films and almost all our music in here. And play scripts for any dramas we may want to put on. And I have things I want to research and compare with the limited databanks here.”
Merral stared at it. And why not? We have to keep our minds occupied.
Vero continued. “I’ve also added quite a lot of the material that Brenito had collected. I scanned it all in without really digesting. My friend, data is power.”
“I see.”
They moved down the corridor to another cabin. Inside were three large sealed crates.
“What are these?”
“This is the material brought in from Langerstrand. The inventory with this is basic, but it seems Lezaroth left in a hurry. There are files, notes, clothing, even some weapons.”
“I’ll look at it on the flight. Perhaps it will help me understand him.”
“A good idea. You are going to have to think like him.”
“As long as I don’t become like him.”
Vero intertwined his fingers in an odd, nervous gesture. “Ah; that is the real danger.”
Two hours later, they were ready to depart. Almost all the personnel of the Water Hyacinth and White Birch were invited on board and, in what was now being called the gathering hall on level two, they grouped around a table with bread and wine and Luke celebrated a Communion meal. Betafor and Azeras were absent.
Merral found himself moved by the ceremony, yet he found the language and resonances of the Last Supper troubling. These men and women are my responsibility. He cast a furtive look around, a dark certainty growing in his mind. Some of us gathered here will not come back alive.
The meal over, the crew of the Assembly freighters began to leave. Merral, struck by a thought, caught up with the chairman.
“Ludovica, can I give you a small task?”
“Of course.”
He pulled his diary off his belt. “A friend of mine—with some unusual gifts has been drawing and writing some strange formulae that he has no understanding of.” He found the file with the images of Jorgio’s writings.
“What do you want me to do with them?”
“Find a mathematician and try to see if they make any sense.”
As he transmitted the file to her diary, she asked, “You think it’s important?”
“I have no doubt it is. But I just don’t know how.”
Then, with more farewells, she was gone.
A few minutes later, the air locks were sealed and the shuttles began slowly undocking.
As Merral walked toward the bridge, Lloyd handed him a package.
“You agreed, sir.”
Mystified, Merral glanced inside to see a holster with a pistol.
“Ten rounds, sir. Special rounds. Good against man or beast.”
“Thank you, Sergeant.” Reluctantly, Merral slipped the holster onto his belt.
“No problem. Shouldn’t penetrate any walls. With a certain . . . creature, my guess is that you may need at least a couple of rounds to stop it.”
“Thank you, Sergeant,” Merral repeated and realized he sounded brusque. “Oh, and I mean it. I just don’t like guns. Or swords.”
“They’re just tools, sir.”
Merral hesitated. “No, Lloyd. That they are not; they change what we are. But thanks for this.”
Lloyd stared at the gun. “As you wish, sir.”
Then Merral walked on and took his place with Azeras and Captain Bezemov on the bridge. Merral saw Azeras glance round and noticed how his eyes paused as he saw the gun, but he could read no emotions on the lean, impassive face.
“Ready, Sarudar?”
There was a nod. Merral saw that all eyes were upon him. He realized he didn’t know what words to use. “What do I say? How about ‘Assembly vessel Star is ready for launch’? Or ‘Captain Bezemov, would you fire the engines’?”
“That will do . . . sir.” Laura answered. She smiled and began tapping keys as a flurry of orders and queries began to flow between her and Azeras.
The faintest of jolts shuddered through the ship.
This journey is already perilous; we must survive Below-Space, overtake the Nanmaxat’s Comet, and seize it at the other end. As the sense of motion grew, Merral looked at a wall clock and did a quick calculation.
And we are already forty hours behind.
7
Despite the sense of haste, Azeras and Laura refused to be hurried, and for well over an hour they stayed in Normal-Space as systems were checked and counterchecked.
Finally, Azeras was ready to start the descent into Below-Space, and as Merral watched out of the port, the stars faded behind a gray fog until only a pale disk of Alahir could be seen. Then that too vanished, and Merral was struck by the mournful thought that the star that had lit all his life had gone.
Within minutes the ports were all shuttered closed. Azeras was adamant that no one should try to look out. “Not only is there nothing to see,” he said, “but you may meet more than you bargained for.”
An hour later the loss of color was noticeable; two hours later everything was just lifeless tones of white, gray, and black. Merral found the monochrome world disturbing and unpleasant. But it was not, he reminded himself, either painful or threatening.
