A blue light surrounded them, making Mica squint and throw her hand up to shield her eyes.
Alisa cursed, adjusting the controls. “What is that? Another scan?”
“If so, it’s coming from outside this time.”
Alisa slowed the ship. According to the map, they were sailing toward another chamber.
“Let’s hope it doesn’t figure out that neither of us are Starseers,” Alisa said. “I can barely see, that’s so bright.”
The illumination disappeared as abruptly as it had come. The walls shook, as they had before, pebbles and dust floating out into the beams from the dodger’s running lights.
“Maybe we should stop and land,” Mica said. “Nothing good happened the last time the walls shook.”
“I’m not sure we want to be in this tunnel if another huge slab of rock comes down to block it.” With those words, Alisa took them out of the passage and into the chamber ahead. She cursed and pulled up abruptly.
Mica glimpsed something floating past them on a disk no more than a foot in diameter before the ship’s body blocked her view. But the forward beams glinted off dozens of other floating metallic disks in the chamber. Gray blocks sat in the middle of all of them.
“What are those?” Mica asked.
“I don’t know, but I have a feeling touching them would be a bad idea.” Alisa’s voice and shoulders were tense as she weaved and spun, sticking near the wall where fewer disks floated. “I’m going to follow your suggestion on landing,” she added, angling toward what Mica dubbed the floor, though she supposed floors and ceilings were arbitrary without gravity. What looked like ore-cart rails meandered along it, the first sign that mining equipment had indeed been used here once.
The wings tilted again, and Mica’s breath caught as one of the floating disks came so close that, if not for the canopy, she could have stood and touched it.
“I think I know what those are,” Mica said, getting a better look at one of the blocks.
“Enlighten me.” Alisa lowered them toward the floor. “And tell me there are mag clamps for landing in zero-grav too.”
“Blue switch to your lower right. As to what those are, they’re explosives. Old T-7 ones. I’ve seen them in a textbook about controlled demolitions. They’re just a couple of steps up from gunpowder.”
“If they were used for controlled demolitions, does that mean they’re stable and won’t go off if we bump one?”
“Actually, in the book, they were mentioned as an example of what not to use.”
“Ah.”
The dodger settled onto the floor with a slight jolt.
“The question is: what are they doing here?” Alisa peered through the canopy, contemplating the explosives.
The disks they rested on floated about, not in any obvious pattern, though Mica immediately started looking for one. She wished they had better lighting. Now that the dodger and its running lights were on the ground, only the bottom third of the cavernous space was visible. The tunnel they had flown in through lay hidden in darkness, and they could not see the far side of the chamber or the ceiling. Given the proliferation of the disks floating around in the air, it was amazing that Alisa had landed the craft without hitting one.
“Sentinels?” Mica guessed, eyeing the closest ones and hoping the dodger was safe down here, out of whatever patterns they were programmed to follow. There seemed to be about a ten-foot buffer zone along the walls.
“I did see a ledge on the far wall as we flew in.” Alisa pointed to a spot beyond all the disks, and Mica thought she could pick out the faint outline of the ledge in the dim lighting. “I couldn’t tell if it was piled high with treasure,” Alisa said.
“Treasure.” Mica snorted. “What are you, half pirate?”
“It’s possible. I never knew my father. But I was thinking more that it might be a cache of resources that the Alliance could use.”
“So the Alliance is half pirate?”
“Well, we’re desperate. You may have noticed that we’re drastically outmanned and outgunned.”
“I doubt there’s anything useful on the ledge,” Mica said. “That map was probably designed to lead us to our deaths.”
“Why would it do that?”
“Because the Starseers wanted to take over the entire system, and killing people is a good way to cow everyone else left.” It had certainly worked to keep Mica’s mining brethren in line.
“I don’t think that makes sense, given that we’re in one of their ships. Why would they try to kill their own people?”
Mica grunted, not sure they could apply logic to the machinations of people.
“The map was probably meant to lead their own people to this place. I bet the booby trap—” Alisa waved at the tape-plastered panel, “—was designed to take care of unapproved personnel, like if someone stole one of their ships.”
“Wouldn’t the Starseers consider us unapproved personnel?”
“Maybe, but we thwarted the booby trap.”
“You put tape on it after it had already decided not to shoot you. I don’t think that counts as thwarting anything. Maybe you have Starseer blood.”
“Hah, sure. Maybe you do.”
Mica was about to respond that she had at least met both of her parents, even if they hadn’t been much of a presence in her life after she had been transferred from the crèche to her first work camp, but one of the disks distracted her as it swooped to within five feet of their craft.
“I probably just ducked under the sensor,” Alisa said.
“There’s something on the bottom of that one,” Mica said, more concerned about the disks.
“Looks like a bunch of scratches. Maybe it’s the remains of the last ship that flew in here and got blown up.”
“Now you sound like me.” Mica unfastened her harness and let herself float out of her seat. She arranged herself, feet and hands planted, so she could nearly press her nose to the canopy to look out. “Any chance you can adjust the running lights and point one up there? That disk looks like it’s in an elliptical pattern—it keeps swooping toward us.”
“We are interesting.” Alisa poked around on the control panel. “I don’t think I can adjust the lights, but we can try this.” She pulled out a multitool and thumbed on the flashlight part of it.
Mica grunted dubiously as she pressed it to the canopy, expecting the uneven material to diffuse the light. It did spread out into more of a cone than a beam, but enough made it through. When the disk flew close again, Mica had a good look at the bottom. A simplistic image was carved into the flat metal, what appeared to be a two-dimensional representation of the chamber, the ledge, and the tunnel from which the dodger had entered. In addition, dozens of little dots were shown on one side. Moved to one side, she decided. It must be displaying what had to be done for a ship to fly through the chamber.
“Well, that’s obvious,” Mica said. “Move them, but how?”
“I suppose if you’re a Starseer, you can use telekinesis.”
“Must be handy.”
“It’s too bad we didn’t bring spacesuits,” Alisa said. “The explosives aren’t flying that close to the walls. Understandably, I suppose. We might have walked along the bottom and climbed up the other side.”
“There could be traps on the walls too. You’re lucky we didn’t blow up when we landed.”
“Why do I have a feeling that you consider yourself lucky every day you manage to live through?”
“I do,” Mica said. The disk came around again, giving her another look at the map. “I also wouldn’t be surprised if something bad happened if you approached the platform without shoving all the bombs over onto that side of the chamber.”
“So how do we do that?”
“How should I know?”
“You’re the engineer. This is why I brought you along. To come up with creative solutions to problems.”
“I thought you brought me along because I was standing nearby when your butt volunteered you fo
r this mission.”
“That too.”
Mica nibbled on her lip and watched the disks, ideas percolating through her mind, even though she had argued. She did like to solve problems.
“The disks look to be made of metal,” she mused, “and the walls are dense with iron. It might be possible to magnetize one of the walls and draw the disks in that direction. But you’d have to create a buffer so that they didn’t actually hit the wall. There’s enough explosive power in this room to blow up the entire asteroid.”
Alisa made a distressed sound. Perhaps the reality of their situation was finally sinking in for her. Not only were they trapped, but if they set off a chain reaction in here, it might destroy the entire Alliance base—and everybody inside it.
“Is there any chance that the explosives wouldn’t go off?” Alisa asked. “There’s no atmosphere out there, no oxygen. Don’t fires need oxygen to burn?”
“Chemical explosives, which these are, function by breaking components with weak bonds. No oxygen required. We use more modern—and more stable versions—in mining.”
“All right, so we should definitely try to avoid setting them off.”
“We could fly back the way we came and leave them and this entire chamber alone,” Mica pointed out.
“Until we get to the closed slab that we can’t get through.”
“We haven’t explored the rest of the tunnels yet.”
“That could take days. And more air than we have in this little ship.”
“There’s no proof that aligning the bombs and getting to that ledge will do anything to open that passage again and let us out.”
“No…” Alisa agreed slowly, “but it’s possible that something on that ledge would be useful in getting out. Like a nice e-cannon, or whatever they had back then. Also, if we could lasso one of the bombs and fly out of here with it, we could use it to blow up that slab.”
“You’re full of ideas that don’t come with practical means of implementing them, aren’t you?”
“Pilots are idea people. We have engineers to make things practical.”
“I’m only here to fix quirks.”
The walls shivered, as they had before, and Mica groaned, certain another stone slab was dropping to seal them in. However, the movement came from the opposite side of the chamber, not the tunnel they had left behind. A slab she hadn’t noticed earlier slid sideways, revealing a dark compartment. Even with the shadows, Mica could pick out blocky shapes resting inside of it. Several sets of beady red lights came on. Eyes.
The hulking shapes rolled out of the compartment on metal wheels attached to the tracks in the floor. Those rails didn’t have anything to do with mining, after all. The robots had humanoid upper bodies with tank-like lower bodies and wheels locked to the rails so they would not float away. Where arms would have been on a person, they had rotating rifle barrels, no doubt capable of rapidly firing numerous rounds. The robots pointed those weapons straight toward Alisa and Mica as they came closer.
“Oh, we’ve got quirks aplenty,” Alisa said. “I’m taking us up the wall. Those robots look cranky.”
“Yes, and if they shoot and hit one of the bombs, it could trigger that chain reaction of explosions we talked about, and blow up the entire asteroid.”
“I was more worried about them hitting us, but thanks for upping the stakes.” Alisa guided the dodger off the ground, once again maneuvering its wings carefully to avoid the floating explosives. “There’s a reason Starseers are so hated.”
Mica poked into her satchel, hoping some tool would inspire her. Alisa would have to concentrate on flying. If they were going to get out of this, Mica would have to be the one to do something. Magnetizing a wall sounded interesting, but she had no idea how to do it from inside the ship.
“There’s a slab over the tunnel here too,” Alisa said as they flew past what had been the entrance. For the first time, real grimness laced her tone.
“At least having to stick to the rails means they’re limited as to where they can travel in the room.”
“They’re not limited as to where they can shoot,” Alisa said, as the first bullet pinged against their ship’s hull. Mica had no idea how much damage the dodger could take without shields.
“No,” she murmured, “but one wonders why they wouldn’t have created magnetized treads so their guard robots would have greater maneuverability.”
“Maybe they didn’t have the technology back then.” Alisa whipped the dodger around another corner, and flew away from the floor, avoiding more bullets hammering into the wall.
“The technology of… magnets? That’s been around a while. Oh, maybe they worried that the magnets would attract their floating disks. I have no idea what’s powering those, but they look lightweight. I wonder…”
The ship’s belly bumped the side of the chamber again. They were almost skipping along the wall as Alisa struggled to avoid disks—and bullets.
“I can see the ledge,” Alisa said, “but I can’t get to it. The bombs are even thicker over here.”
“Maybe there is a cache that the Starseers wanted defended.”
“Yup. Better warn you. Sooner or later, I’m going to get tired and my reflexes will—” Alisa hissed, and the ship lurched again, throwing Mica sideways against her harness. “Exactly,” she finished.
“Hang on for a few minutes more. I have an idea.” Mica twisted in her seat and opened the panel leading into the tiny engine compartment. “Remember earlier when Captain Brandt said the built-in shielding was woefully inadequate to protect against radiation?”
“No,” Alisa said, her voice sounding muffled.
Mica had stuck her head back into the compartment, barely aware of her legs trying to float up. She was looking for—there.
“Here it is,” she said. “My team put in a magnetic field generator to protect us. It’s on right now, creating a mini magnetosphere to deflect away ionizing particles that—”
The pings of something striking the ship reverberated through the hull. Bullets.
“I don’t need a science lesson right now,” Alisa said. “Just—oh, I can finally see what’s on the ledge. There are a bunch of crates and chests strapped down there. Oh, do those look like rockets to you?”
With her head stuffed into the rear compartment, the panel on the side of the magnetic field generator open and a flashlight shining inside, Mica was not in a position to answer that question. All she offered was a grunt as she cranked up the generator.
“Definitely a cache,” Alisa said. “Maybe there are some Starseer artifacts, too, something that could truly help the Alliance.”
“I’m attempting to increase the output of the field generator so that it will repel more than particles,” Mica said.
“Like bombs?”
“Ideally. Is anything happening yet?” Mica twisted, peering past her hips, but she couldn’t see much while half inside the compartment.
“Not yet. Just be sure you don’t attract them.”
“I would have to reverse the polarity for that.”
“Sounds like something I could accidentally do.”
“Only if you swallow a lodestone,” Mica said. “Try getting closer. See if they’re pushed back.”
She expected a protest, Alisa asking what kind of nut would deliberately get closer to explosives. But Alisa nudged the craft away from the wall. Right, Mica had forgotten. Alisa was a nut.
Something thumped against the bottom of the craft, and Mica jerked, cracking her head as she imagined them blowing up.
“Bullet,” Alisa said. “It’s alarming when you don’t hear them firing and they abruptly hit you.”
“Alarming, yes.” Mica rubbed her head. “Any progress on the—”
“It’s working! They’re being repelled. Very subtly and slowly. I’ll have to be extremely careful, but let me see if I can swing us around.”
“Subtle and slow is good. We don’t want them bouncing off each other in their hurry to get awa
y from us, like a blind date gone awry.” Mica scooted out of the compartment, leaving the panel open for easy access.
“What kind of blind date involves repelling hordes of men all at once?”
“Let’s just say it started with an ad on a sketchy sys-net site. And they weren’t all men.”
“Were they all human?”
“That’s debatable.”
“Taking us to the ledge,” Alisa said. “Slowly.”
Now that Mica could see through the canopy again, she wondered if she should have stayed in the back. She was glad she wasn’t the one flying. Having a cloud of bombs hovering a few feet away from their hull made her twitchy. They had all stopped following their loops, and dozens of them hung close, almost as if they were drawn in before being repelled.
“I hope the generator doesn’t run out of juice,” Mica muttered.
“Is that likely to happen?”
“Let’s just agree not to spend a lot of time in here.” Mica craned her neck, trying to see the exit tunnel. The slab was still blocking it. “We need to figure out how to move that,” she said, not pleased that Alisa was heading in the opposite direction. Rockets, or whatever was on that ledge over there, were the last thing Mica cared about right now.
“I’m going to record the cache down there,” Alisa said. “We could come back in here with a ship that has a grab beam and pick up the whole pile at once. Or your team could add a grab beam generator to this ship.”
As the dodger settled on the ledge in front of the crates of rockets and who knew what else, Mica peered around, hoping for something that could help them escape. Since they couldn’t get out of the ship to pick anything up, she wasn’t optimistic.
There wasn’t much more than the rock ledge, long ago carved from the asteroid interior, but the ship’s lights also revealed a couple of plaques on the back wall. They almost looked like two large buttons.
“Can you press those?” Mica wondered. “Maybe they turn off the bombs.”
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