The Chaos Chronicles

by Jeffrey A. Carver

  "Yes, if we—" L'Kell interrupted himself at the sound of a Neri voice warbling scratchily from the console. He replied in a low, quick voice—then, with a single warning cry, took the sub into a sweeping turn and angled it back downward into a dive. "We've been given a new assignment," he said. Bandicut's stomach lurched at the suddenness of the change, and he braced himself from the nose window. The motors changed pitch, then finally hummed to a higher speed as they accelerated downward.

  The sub swayed drunkenly, and Bandicut realized suddenly that L'Kell had just steered them into the powerful downwelling current that they had observed from the habitat. They were riding it downward. But to where? His breath caught as they passed the undersea city, now off to their left, and continued in a steep descent. The flickering glow from the abyss was in front of them now, and below. It looked like lightning embedded deep in the heart of a thunderstorm. Was that where they were headed? To confront the Devourer?

  "L'Kell?" he murmured.

  They were approaching the seafloor now, and began to follow the slope, like a terrain-hugging aircraft. It was mostly rock and silt, moving past in a featureless blur.

  "They've got people going after the breakaway," L'Kell explained finally. "We have a different job—to follow the current and see if anything's been dragged down." He was interrupted by a squawk from the console. He exchanged further words with a distant Neri comm operator, then said to his companions, "A docking cradle broke loose, and was last seen being carried downward, toward the factory. We must check for damage, and see what we can do."

  Bandicut glanced over at Ik, whose eyes were sparkling with an inner fire. Excitement? Or alarm? "We're not going to—go all the way down to the—what did you call it?" he asked in a husky voice.

  "The Demon of Darkness, the—" kraafff "—Maw of the Abyss," murmured L'Kell, his gaze fixed out the window. "I hope not. There is a lot between us and it."

  Bandicut began to breathe a little more easily.

  "Still—" L'Kell's eyes shifted toward Bandicut for a split second "—there are never any guarantees. Are there?"

  Bandicut blinked, and suddenly wished he hadn't asked.

  *

  Kailan was working intently. She had the targeting circle over the symbol representing the breakaway habitat, and was now studying a display that Antares took to be tracking data. "The habitat will breach surface in three minutes," Kailan said. "There's a good chance it will hit the collector array first."

  Without knowing exactly what Kailan was referring to, Antares felt a cold sense of distance. Kailan and Elbeth were working with urgent speed, and Antares was deliberately keeping her own emotions isolated, so as not to interfere, even while trying to follow what was happening.

  "I have Askelanda," said Elbeth suddenly.

  "Obliq," said a dry voice, from the console. "We're very busy right now. We've lost a habitat."

  Kailan touched the console. "I'm tracking the habitat. It will pass through the solar array in two minutes, with probable impact. It will breach in two and a half minutes."

  The answering voice seemed startled. "How do you know that?"

  "I am using the beam-targeting scanners you consider nonfunctional. There is no choice—I must take action. Please order your subs clear."

  Askelanda's voice was sharp and angry. "I can't order them clear! They're trying to catch it! It's the only thing we can do."

  "They cannot reach it. But I can stop it. You must get them clear."

  "Obliq—I don't see how you think—"

  "I am going to hole the habitat and sink it. Are the people out yet?"

  "We don't know—there's no contact! What do you mean, sink it?"

  "We've got to keep it from breaching. If it hits the surface, they'll die for sure. If I can put a hole in it, we might be able to bring it back down before it hits. Think of the array, Askelanda! We can't take the chance! Get those subs out from between me and the habitat!"

  "But surely you don't mean to use that ancient weapon—"

  "Ten seconds," Kailan said evenly.

  "But you can't—all right—we're calling them."

  "Seven."

  "Give us time!"

  "I can't. It'll be too late. Five." Kailan's fingers were flicking over the console. She peered up at the screen with her enormous eyes, narrowly webbed finger poised on one key. "Two—"

  "They're telling us—"

  "Can't wait. Starting pulse-beam now." She pressed the key.

  The screen on the left blinked back to a visible view overhead. A thin beam of light shot up green, vanishing into the mist. Three bright pulses flashed up the light thread, as though riding the beam, too fast to follow. Antares glanced at Kailan. She was staring at the center screen, where three twinkling icons were closing in on the large symbol and circle. She pointed to another symbol that was clearly a chase sub, and gestured frantically as though to sweep it out of the way. It wasn't moving fast enough.

  The first twinkle grazed the sub and blossomed. Kailan tensed. The second cleared the sub and intersected the habitat symbol. So did the third.

  The symbol billowed expanding red rings.

  Chapter 11

  Rescue

  THE SUB'S HULL creaked disconcertingly as they descended into a darkness broken only by the occasional glimmer of lightning below. Bandicut was reminded of a time, years ago, when he had made a toursub dive onto the site of the sunken Titanic, four thousand meters down in the North Atlantic, on Earth. It had been a haunting experience, watching the carefully lit wreck emerge from the darkness of the ocean grave, thinking of the hundreds who had gone with the ship to their personal graves. The wreck had lain undisturbed for decades, and even now, though it was a historic park, there was a sense of quietude about it, a somber sense of tragedy that would never go away. He had thumbed off the commentary in his earphones and just watched the floodlit ship loom before them in the perpetual night, a haunting presence of silence and solitude.

  Floating detritus streamed backward past them now in the sub's headlight, which was the only thing that told Bandicut that they were descending even faster than the current. He could still feel the current, as some occasional turbulence caught them and swayed them close to the limits of L'Kell's control. From time to time he heard a whispering rush of air and felt his ears popping, as the sub's internal pressure adjusted in stages to the growing pressure outside—not keeping the two equal, but reducing the differential. It made him think of the habitat that was rocketing toward the surface, if it hadn't already reached it, and he shuddered at the thought of the explosive decompression that must be occurring. When he asked L'Kell, the Neri answered, "With luck, anyone inside got out. They could survive a pressure change much of the way up—but they'll certainly die if the hull breaches and ruptures."

  Bandicut was silent after that. He wondered, where in all of this were Antares and Li-Jared?

  /// Your other friends?

  You miss them. ///

  /I'm worried sick about them. What if they're in the breakaway habitat?/

  /// They might die. Is that it? ///

  /Of course that's it. They're not like you, Charlie. Charlene, I mean. They don't spring back to life the way you do./ At least not as far as he knew.

  /// You can call me Charlie if you want.

  This matter of dying is

  an important business to you,

  isn't it? ///

  /What a question! Jesus, Charlie—yes! It hurts to have your friends die./

  /// Yes, I suppose it— ///

  /And I must tell you, it doesn't help to have you and your fellows dying all the time, usually just when I need you the most./

  He could almost sense Charlene pursing her lips in thought.

  /// Just like Charlie-Four, before me? ///

  /Well—yeah. Don't get me wrong—I'm happier with you here. I suppose you could say that that death was a good thing./

  /// Really? Why?

  Would you say that if I died? ///r />
  /No!/

  /// Don't get upset.

  I'm just trying to understand. ///

  Bandicut let out a slow breath, suddenly aware of his inward tension—stunned, in fact, by the rage and grief and bewilderment that were welling up inside him. /Listen. Charlie-Four was a mean-spirited, bad-tempered sonofabitch./ But even as he said it, he felt his inner voice catch.

  /// So you aren't sorry that he died. ///

  /I didn't say that!/ He struggled to find the words. /I am sorry! It hurt, it always hurts. But you know as well as I do that he wouldn't have done—well, what you did, to save Lako, for instance./

  /// You're sure about that. ///

  /Yeah I'm sure. He flat-out refused. Things got tough, and he checked out. I never knew quarx could commit suicide./

  /// If that's what he did. ///

  /Well, that's what it seemed like./

  /// And if he did . . . was that a bad thing to do? ///

  Bandicut peered moodily out into the streaming turbid flow, and wondered how deep they were and how much deeper they were going. L'Kell was piloting with silent concentration. /Yeah, it was, I think. An act of cowardice. Except . . . I am glad for its result. I'm glad you're here now./

  The quarx hesitated, and he sensed that she was debating whether or not to voice disagreement.

  /// Thank you, ///

  she said finally. And then she fell silent, and Bandicut found himself wondering if he had somehow missed something in the discussion.

  The water became gradually clearer even as the bottom slope appeared to become siltier. It also became steeper, for a while. Then some irregular topography loomed into the headlight beam: the slope almost leveled off, then rose in sharp little peaks, which L'Kell had to steer over or around. Then it dropped again, leveled, and peaked; and that pattern was repeated several times, in a series of stepped ledges punctuated with low ridges and hills. For a time, the flickering light from below disappeared or was blocked from view. Something about this topography rang a bell in his memory, but he couldn't quite place it . . . until plumes of dark, smoky material suddenly loomed in the headlight beam, billowing up out of chimneylike formations on the seafloor. The plumes bent sideways as they were caught by the current, and then streamed downslope in coiling, turbulent ribbons that flowed over the ridges toward the abyssal depths. Bandicut drew a sharp breath.

  /// You know these things? ///

  /On Earth they're called smokers. Volcanic vents on the seafloor. If these are the same, they'll have boiling hot water pouring out with the smoke—/

  "We must steer around these hot vents," L'Kell said, banking the sub into decelerating turns. "We are almost there."

  /There?/ Bandicut started to ask, then had a thought. /Ah, I think I understand./

  /// What? ///

  /I'll tell you in a moment. If I'm right./

  /// You could share the thought,

  whether you're right or wrong. ///

  Grunting, he strained to peer into the distance. He was rewarded seconds later by the sight of silt-covered domes and derricks and other machinery emerging from the darkness. /That's it! There it is! Their factory is located on the vent ridge! Unbelievable./

  /// Why would they do that? ///

  /Heat and raw materials, I suppose. Of course! Those smokers are billowing up plumes of chemicals and superheated water. With the right equipment, they could probably use that—/

  "Our factory," L'Kell said suddenly, "uses these plumes for mineral extraction and heat. When it is working correctly, it can—"

  "Hrahh, what is that?" Ik cried, interrupting the Neri. He pointed to a conglomeration of greyish machinery rising from the ledge ahead—and lodged against it, just visible in the headlight, what looked like a metal framework holding a ghostly bubble. As they drew closer, two small shapes became visible, moving around inside the bubble.

  "Mokin' fokin' lay me in hell," Bandicut whispered. "Is it really?"

  /// What? ///

  /Not what. Who. It's Napoleon and Copernicus. That's our bubble. Our star-spanner bubble./ Bandicut felt the tightening of fear in his stomach. "L'Kell—"

  "Yes, I know," said L'Kell, in a tone that implied he was very busy at the moment. He steered close to the structure holding the star-spanner bubble, then swung the sub around with motors singing at high pitch, countering the movement of the current. L'Kell was trying to hover close to the star-spanner bubble, and the current was trying to sweep them away into the darkness. He finally had to give up and move away. It appeared that the factory was perched on the edge of a sharp drop-off. Bandicut caught sight of a glimmer of lightning in the abyssal gloom, straight down beyond the edge.

  "I hope the current will ease soon," L'Kell said. "At that point we will return to do what we can about your bubble. In the meantime, we must inspect the area for anything else that might be caught—and for damage to the factory." He didn't elaborate, but Bandicut remembered his earlier remarks. The Neri's machine-makers were breaking down. And without them, the Neri faced disaster.

  "Will you bring teams down to repair the factory?" Ik asked.

  The Neri completed a maneuver before answering. He was guiding the sub over the neighboring landscape, angling this way and that to inspect what looked like an abandoned alien settlement on the bleak surface of a moon. Finally he said, "We would—if we knew how."

  Bandicut opened his mouth to say something, then closed it. What could he say? What could either of them say?

  *

  "Obliq, turn off your weapon! You've hit one of our subs," rasped a male Neri voice, not Askelanda's. "We need to get help to them."

  Kailan's finger was poised for more shots. She held off, watching the display. The sound of three concussions thumped through the walls, delayed by distance. "We've hit the breakaway," she breathed, "but did we put a big enough hole in it?" Her finger traced the likely path of the habitat up to a series of long, horizontal lines on the screen. "Still rising. It takes time to flood."

  "Obliq, please acknowledge!"

  "Message received," Kailan snapped. "Standing by. But keep the line of fire clear!" Kailan hesitated, watching the display. "It's not slowing fast enough. Okay—your sub is clear. Firing again!"

  Three flashes went up the thread of light.

  They hit the habitat symbol.

  The symbol was still rising, approaching the horizontal lines that represented the solar array, not far below the surface. But the habitat was slowing. It nearly touched one of the array symbols, as it came to a stop. It hung there for a few moments, then began to sink.

  Three thumps, delayed.

  "Obliq!" Askelanda's voice again, sharp.

  "Turning off power to the weapon," Kailan said. "The habitat is coming back down. It may have struck one solar collector, but I believe not. Can you get a grapple on it now? If there's anyone still aboard, they'll need help."

  The answer was a mixture of angry acknowledgment and shouts and orders in the background.

  Kailan stepped back from the console and said to Elbeth, "We must meet with Askelanda. Please ask for a sub, as soon as they can send one." She turned to Antares and Li-Jared. "There will be trouble over this, I am afraid. Askelanda and I do not see eye to eye on all of these matters. And now it will only be worse."

  "Why?" Antares asked. "Because of the habitat?"

  "Because the Maw of the Abyss has awakened," Kailan answered. Gesturing to Elbeth, she asked her assistant to lead the guests back to the submarine hangar. "I'll meet you there," she said, and quickly slipped away through a doorway on the far side of the room.

  *

  The current finally slackened, and tapered off into a leisurely horizontal flow. L'Kell was clearly relieved when he no longer had to fight to keep them from being dragged deeper into the abyss. The eerie glow had flickered out. Once it was gone, Bandicut felt an even greater sense of depth, as they moved about in darkness broken only by their own headlight. He wondered just how deep they really were now—a
nd decided that he would rather not know. On Earth, as he recalled, volcanic vents were thousands of meters deep.

  L'Kell turned the sub. "We'll go back to your bubble in a moment, but I must check something first." They glided above some machinery that seemed half buried in silt—the result, apparently, of the powerful downward flow just now. He made a rasping sound that Bandicut interpreted as displeasure.

  "Is something wrong?"

  The Neri pointed to a spot not far in front of them, where four short masts stuck up into the current. Just beyond them a smoldering vent billowed a thick cloud of smoke. It took Bandicut a moment to realize that the masts were broken; something had been attached to them, quite recently. "That was the last exterior loading assistant, for moving equipment out of the factory and into subs. It has broken away." L'Kell stared at the spot in obvious dismay.

  "Can't you replace it?" Bandicut asked. "Surely there must be a way."

  "The factory itself used to make repairs like that," L'Kell said softly. "But it does not do so anymore. And I—we—do not know what to do about it. We do not have the knowledge, and even we cannot work easily at this depth."

  Bandicut stared at him, then at Ik, who was silently contemplating the problem. And he suddenly thought, /You don't suppose . . . you know, I wonder if it could be—/

  /// I see your thoughts, but do not understand.

  "Nano-shit"? ///

  /It's only a guess, but it stands to reason. I'll have to ask L'Kell. But if he doesn't have the knowledge—/

  /// Submicroscopic machinery?

  Self-replicating assemblers?

  Self-repairing construction units? ///

  The quarx's voice became subdued, as she tried to interpret his memories, which included a complex amalgam of feelings. Nano-assemblers were an important part of the infrastructure of the human civilization he had come from; but it was misprogrammed nanomeds—microscopic cellular repair units injected into his body—that had destroyed his career by crippling his ability to neurolink. It was the nanomeds that had left him vulnerable to attacks of silence-fugue.