by John Rankine
Menos said, ‘With your help and technical skills, I see no reason why it should not be done.’
Helena Russell asked a key one. ‘What happened to Copreon? Why did they abandon you? Surely they could send reinforcements to bring the androids under control?’
‘There is no certain answer. We keep constant listening watch for news of the home planet. It is a long story, but, briefly, there was significant change in the magnetic fields around Pelorus. One theory is that the long mining operations finally altered the run of infrangom in this great chain of mountains. Also, the endless labyrinth of galleries and tunnels, with their mineral tracks and power circuits, are like the nerve structure of a brain. The androids understood that. They can draw energy from it. Conditions were such that the supply shuttles could not navigate. We were the last party of replacements. Some superior-grade androids became independent of computer control. They successfully concealed this fact and slowly worked to bring the whole android force under their own direction. We were forced to retreat to this area of old workings. Now, there is a kind of balance. They are not strong enough to mount a full-scale offensive against us. We could not defeat them without crippling losses.’
Rama said bitterly, ‘But they know that time is on their side. We can not replace ourselves and will finally die.’
The question had not been answered and Bergman put it again, ‘And Copreon?’
Menos said, ‘We do not know with any certainty. There was political unrest. Powerful interests opposed to each other. Perhaps there was war. The space programme was expensive and used up resources. The wealth from infrangom created envy. It could be that the space installations were a primary target for malcontents.’
It figured. Koenig could envisage a similar situation arising for Alpha, if the moon had stayed in orbit round Earth planet. It was not impossible that a hot war down below might have effectively broken the complex communication service.
Helena Russell returned to another question which had been niggling in the back of her mind. ‘Have you voluntarily decided that there should be no children?’
Rama could not avoid a quick look at Menos. His face was impassive. She answered for both, ‘Our race is very ancient and has been at a high level of civilisation for many millennia. Fertility levels are low. But, in any event, sterilising procedures were carried out on all women before leaving Copreon for service on Pelorus. On return, after a five-year term here, the procedures were reversed. That is acceptable. But we do not have the medical knowledge or facilities to carry out such operations.’
‘But you have medical staff?’
‘They are trained for diagnostic work, but the back-up service was so regular, that any seriously ill patient was lifted out for treatment on Copreon. Our only qualified surgeon who might have carried out such operations was killed in an accident.’
Sandra Benes, who had been looking through an observation port into the control room, said suddenly, ‘Commander!’
All eyes turned her way and she said in a rush, ‘I was thinking, Commander, that the equipment here is much more powerful than anything on Eagle Nine. Could we use it to try to raise Main Mission and put them in the picture?’
Koenig was sure that it was not what she intended to say, but the same question had been on his list. He looked at Menos for his reaction.
The Copreon was ready enough. ‘We can try, of course. Your moon is nearer than our planet. Just now conditions are at their worst. In the morning perhaps?’
Koenig stood up. ‘You have been frank and open with us. I will be equally frank with you. The decision to leave Moonbase Alpha and throw in our lot with you will not be an easy one. But it will be put fairly to our people. Tomorrow morning at first light we will prepare to lift off.’
Menos made no comment. It was as good an exit line as another to close the long day’s march.
Up aloft, covers had been rolled aside in three sleeping chambers. Beds were on the lines of well upholstered play pens and Koenig could have kept his party together in any one. But he went for a sober division by sex and seniority. He said, ‘Helena, you and Sandra in here, in the middle. Alan and Paul on your left. Victor and I will take this end one.’
Sandra was trying to catch his eye and finally followed him into his room, coming close and touching the zip of his tunic. But it was not Eros biting her neck; it was communication. He took out his memo pad and she wrote in a rounded, feminine hand, ‘They were lying. They can reach Alpha. I saw a corner of a picture on their scanner. I’m sure it was Main Mission.’
He nodded and passed the book over to Bergman. ‘Thank you, Sandra.’
‘Good night, Commander. Good night, Professor.’
They both watched her trim action as she moved out. Bergman, looked surprised. He turned the leaf over and wrote, ‘What are they playing at, then?’
Koenig shrugged. Aloud, he said, ‘Tomorrow is another day. I guess I’ve never been more ready to hit the sack. Good night, Victor.’
‘Good night.’
There was no sound from outside the suite. Acoustic screening was first-class. They could have been with Cheops in his burial chamber. Koenig programmed himself to wake in a couple of hours and closed his eyes.
When he opened them and looked at his time disc, he was only half an hour over his self-imposed limit. He climbed carefully out of the play pen, slipped on his pants and foam-soled boots, buckled on his belt and stepped silently for the archway. Courtesy lights in the lounge area gave a dim glow, not enough to see into the middle room as he passed. But he could imagine Helena’s sleeping face, lashes in even arcs, hair in a honey-blonde fan. Instead of all the endless march and countermarch, he ought to be in there, feeling the long, smooth run of her thigh, her head on his arm. Would it ever come? They were as far from a true landfall as they had ever been. He shut his mind to it and went on through the third arch, stopping inside to let his eyes adjust to the low lumen count.
Alan Carter was nearest the door, sleeping like a deckhand in the piping days of sail, ready to turn out when the main split. His laser was on a wristband and Morrow, two metres off across the diagonal, had every chance of getting a hole in his head, if a dream took a bad turn.
Koenig put pressure on his shoulder and packed all the persuasion he could get into a whisper. ‘Alan. Steady as you go. It’s Koenig.’
There was a dicey, split second when Carter’s finger’s closed on the butt of his laser and it came round in a rush, looking for a target. Then he was saying ‘Commander?’
‘Quietly. I want to take a look downstairs.’
The lounge area was closed from the gallery by a hatch. There was no need for words, they knew each other too well. Koenig silently shifted the switchgear and Carter was flat back against the wall, out of sight as the door opened.
Koenig stepped through empty-handed, a man putting the cat out and taking a turn round the shrubbery. The first armed Copreon they had seen, with a bulbous blaster held two-handed, was standing with his back to the balustrade watching the opening. His mouth was opening for a warning shout and the gun was coming up to aim for Koenig’s sternum, when Carter picked him off with a stun beam that hit with mathematical accuracy between his eyes.
They left him standing, rigid as a tin man. Light levels were low and the floor of the huge rotunda was in semidarkness. Shaded spot lamps threw bright patches like coins in a muddy pool. There was no movement on the gallery. The sentry was the only one. The main force was off stage, recharging its psychic batteries.
The Alphans circled the gallery and chose the stairway that took them farthest from the control area. There was no challenge as they went down and reached the cover of the lounge with its free-standing book racks and room dividers. At the nearest point they could get to the duty room, Koenig called a halt. There were two Copreons, a man and a woman, still serving the hardware.
It was not the time of day to be one hundred per cent vigilant and, in any event, they must have believed that the Alph
ans were no threat. The girl was sitting on the edge of a desk swinging her legs and drinking from a beaker. Her co-worker was running a finger down the hollow of her back. It was a clear case of making the best of the situation they were in.
Carter looked at Koenig and got a nod. There was all the time in the world to take aim. He sent a wide-angled stun beam across the floor and the action congealed with a leg in mid swing and a finger poised on the middle lumbar vertebra.
Koenig did a rapid tour of the consoles. Some monitors were set to watch the outer approaches to the valley. He recognised the opening of the pass and knew that they had been watched every step of the way. There was the darkened Eagle waiting on its pad. Two screens showed sections of underground tunnel, closed at the ends by massive hatches with wheel release gear. One showed a silent and empty monorail platform. It was the updated version of having scouts out round the hideaway. It had also come to suffer from the weakness of all defensive works: its flank could be turned by an enemy already inside the gate.
Some screens were blank. Koenig passed them; he was looking for something else. Victor Bergman or Sandra might have found it sooner, but he went to work methodically and finally isolated the operating console for the main scanner. Carter roamed about the perimeter keeping an all-round watch.
The switchgear was unfamiliar, but the years of piloting strange ships and using communications systems paid off. Koenig cleared his mind of every other thing and stared at the instrument spread until the working detail made a pattern.
When he finally moved and shoved down a banana key, the big screen glowed at the centre with a bright dot that expanded to fill the frame. It was the night sky of Pelorus. Stars like jewels on a black velvet pad. Tuned dead centre and mellowed by an apricot tint, Earth’s ravaged moon was set up as the principal feature and must have been plotted to a centimetre and locked in vision by a constant tracking probe.
Apart from the occasional flicker as interference beat the dampers, the picture was rock steady. Koenig selected another stud and was on familiar ground. Main Mission had a full operations staff. He seemed to be looking down at his command island from a point high on the communications post. David Kano, at the command desk, looked as though he had not left it since Eagle Nine blasted off and had no intention of moving. Tanya was clearly worried about him and appeared at his side with a tray of coffee and sandwiches. Kano was calling slowly and deliberately on the Eagle command net and although he was no lip reader, Koenig could get the message: ‘Alpha to Eagle Nine. Do you read me? Come in Eagle Nine.’
With the gear they had, the Copreons could have been beamed into Alpha for days or weeks before their planet was ever picked out of the cosmic ragbag by Sandra’s skillful hand. Koenig had to work with trial and error for a couple of minutes before Kano’s voice was backing up the picture and Carter was across at a spring. ‘You got through to Alpha, Commander?’
‘One way.’
‘Can you speak to them?’
It took longer and Carter was looking at the lay figures at the desk and debating how long it would be before they were taking up where they left off. Then Koenig had the method and Main-Mission staff were looking incredulously at the big screen.
Koenig said urgently, ‘Commander to Alpha. We are down on Pelorus. Expect another communications blackout. We aim to leave by first light in Eagle Nine. Navigation round Pelorus hazardous. Magnetic fields. Pinpoint this signal as a reference. Do you read me?’
Kano was equally quick, packing it in without asking questions, ‘I read you, Commander. Do not delay liftoff. Calculations now show an increase in velocity. Moon contact with Pelorus will be shorter than we thought. Do you want backup support?’
‘How much shorter?’
‘There are variables. Estimate only, three days shorter. You must leave within eighteen hours for optimum window. I repeat, do you want backup?’
‘On that time scale, one Eagle hazarded is one too many. We’ll make it. There’s another time scale running out right now. Over and out.’
They heard Kano say, ‘Good luck, Commander.’ and Koenig was flipping switches to restore status quo.
In Main Mission, there was a buzz of conversation to break the hush and Kano had to quell it for a little service. He said, ‘Tanya, Leanne, I want that sequence rerun frame by frame. See what you can pick up. There’s a limited view of the pad they’re in. One thing’s sure, it’s not Eagle Nine. Alan’s waving a laser. Piece it together and see what we have.’
Alan Carter was looking at his living tableau. He took the beaker from the girl’s hand and set it on the desk. The moving finger was developing a twitch and was ready to move on. He said ‘The effect’s wearing, Commander. We don’t have too much time.’
As a last check, Koenig punched along the row of dark screens. He saw Bergman lying on his back, mouth open, very human and vulnerable for a man of science. Morrow was dead to the world. Still searching, he brought up an empty bed and one that was over full, where some of the home team were still batting. Carter began, ‘Commander . . .’ and Koenig left it.
They went up the long stair at a run and were through the hatch into the lounge area as the guard completed his move and raised his gun to aim at the blank panel. He had not seen Carter and the image, still flickering on his retina, was the tall figure of the leading Alphan, standing in the opening and making no threatening move. He brushed a hand across his eyes. Vision playing tricks? He had no wish to look a fool. He stepped across to the door and examined it, undecided.
Down below, the duo were back on circuit with the girl looking at her empty hand and saying in sultry Copreon, ‘You do have an eloquent forefinger, Orcus. I’ve gone all goosey and I don’t recall putting that glass there. Just look at me.’
Orcus swivelled her round to do that thing. It was true. He said, ‘Relief’s due in thirty minutes. Be patient, my flower. Get your can off of my table top and take a walk round the shop. Meanwhile, I’ll get that duty report drafted.’
Up aloft, the guard had come to a decision. Taking it real slow and making no noise, he rolled the hatch. The lounge area was empty. He stepped quietly across to the right-hand arch and looked inside. There was enough light for him to make out two figures lying on the bed. He missed out the middle room and looked in the left-hand one. Two more. Silently, he went back the way he had come. It was all a black mystery, but the count was right. He began to walk up and down in front of the door. He knew Menos. If he was found asleep at his post, it would be a flogging and ten days solitary at the least count. He reckoned soberly, he had been saved by the bell.
Unseen inside the burrow the spectacular, apricot dawn of Pelorus was filling the valley with the outriders of a new day, when Koenig rolled out and brought his scientific adviser back on stream.
Victor Bergman sat up and ran his fingers over his thinning hair. The rest had sharpened up his computer and he had a whole raft of questions that needed answers. But he recognised that it was not the time. One calculation, which had been running through his unconscious mind while it was off load, had implications which perhaps the Copreons already knew. There would be no harm in their hearing it. He said, ‘You remember when we first worked out a likely trajectory for the moon’s passage through this gravisphere?’
‘We feared there might be devastation on Pelorus and damage to centres of population. Now we see there’s nothing to fear from that.’
‘That’s partly right. These bunkers should be secure enough. But there will be effects.’
‘Such as?’
‘The moon’s mass is big enough to distort these magnetic fields. It could affect the androids and our first estimates of passage could be way out. Action and reaction. The moon won’t get clear scot free.’
‘The screens will protect Alpha.’
‘Correction, John. We hope the screens will protect Alpha. We should raise Main Mission as soon as we can and get Kano working on it.’
Paul Morrow was in through the arch and looking
around, clearly a puzzled man. He said, ‘They’re not with you then?’ and Koenig saw the row of monitors down below and the snap picture of the empty bed.
‘Helena and Sandra?’
‘The same.’
Koenig brushed past him, striding through into the middle room and on into the washroom. It was empty. Except for a faint trace of sandalwood in the still air, there was nothing to show that the Alphan women had ever been on the set.
Outside, the hive was stirring. Some Copreons were on the gallery, others had already gone down and were dotted about the floor of the rotunda.
Koenig picked the nearest, shoved a hand flat on his chest and backed him to the balustrade. Hawk face grim, he said, with a cold menace that needed no translation, ‘Menos. Where is Menos?’
There was no doubt that the man understood. The danger he was in of taking a dive over the rail sharpened his mind. Taking care to make clear that he, personally, was a man of peace, he mimed that he would be glad to act as a guide.
There was not far to go. Menos, with Rama by his side, appeared on the gallery from his own suite of rooms, spruce and fresh for the day’s march in a well-pressed kilt. No armed Copreons were about, but instinct told Koenig there must be some close at hand. Menos looked too complacent, as though he knew that he had the cards stacked in his favour.
He had to be admired in one sense. He was trading his own life on the speed of someone else’s reaction times. Koenig stopped two metres off. Alan Carter sidestepped to the gallery wall and put his back to it. If there was anything fancy going on, he was placed to see all angles.
The move was not lost on Menos, but his smile of welcome never faltered. ‘Good day to you, Commander. You will eat with us? Then we will escort you to your spacecraft.’
‘Where are they, Menos?’
‘I do not have the pleasure of understanding you, Commander.’
‘You understand well enough. Where are our companions, the two Alphan women?’
‘Are they not in their room?’
