The Cyborg and the Sorcerers

by Lawrence Watt-Evans

  Slant noticed then that the crater wall merged into the jutting triangle of stone seamlessly, and looked beyond at the crater itself.

  Beyond the stony rim the crater was as dead and lifeless as if the destruction had occurred three weeks before instead of three centuries; the entire interior was an unbroken plain of incredibly smooth stone that glistened black in the afternoon sun.

  The crater rim was jagged and uneven but flowed smoothly up from the crater floor, with no division visible, to end in the middle of its upward curve. Everywhere, the outside of the crater wall was either a sheer drop or an overhang. The jutting crag that protected Praunce was an integral part of the wall, not, as he had previously guessed, a loose chunk, that had become attached. All the crags he had spotted previously were parts of the crater wall, as were many other similar formations as well, forming a complete circle that reached almost to the southern horizon. Some of these formations sheltered villages; others guarded ruins that had not yet been reclaimed.

  The crater wall was not the usual curving ridge but a sharp, spiky coronet, marking a clear division between the barren plain within and the fertile hills without. Looking at it, Slant guessed something of the nature of the explosion that had created it

  Whatever the weapon had been, it must have melted the bedrock to a liquid as fluid as water; the shockwave had then splashed the molten stone into this eerie ring, where it had frozen again. Since a shockwave travels faster through rock than through air, the promontories that protected the ruins must have risen microseconds before the airborne heat and concussion reached them, which explained why there were still ruins instead of empty plain.

  Slant had once seen a photograph of a raindrop striking the ground, its motion frozen by the camera at the instant that it splashed; that raindrop had looked very much like this crater. The raindrop had been water measuring a few millimeters across, while the crater was a few kilometers of stone, but they were otherwise identical.

  He had spent a year in the wastelands of equatorial Mars, but the interior of the crater seemed far more dead than those expanses of rusty sand.

  This had been done by his own government, obliterating millions of people. In retaliation, his homeland had been subjected to even worse—he had heard, at any rate, that the D-series used new and more powerful weapons, but it was hard to imagine anything worse.

  He was suddenly depressed and bitter; he turned away from the window and nearly collided with Ahnao as she approached the glass. He let out a wordless noise of surprise and annoyance.

  "I wanted to see the view, too," she said timidly.

  "Go ahead," he answered, stepping aside.

  She was a problem that he needed to consider, he told himself. If Arzadel and his colleagues were to remove the thermite bomb and override, what would he do with Ahnao? Perhaps he could convince someone here in Praunce to take charge of her. It would probably be more difficult to convince her to stay here than to convince someone to accept her. She was an attractive young woman, and friendly, even if she was an idiot.

  Actually, he admitted to himself, she wasn't really an idiot. Ignorant and careless she might be, but she was no more stupid than average; her bizarre idea that she needed to be protected and therefore had no use for the basic skills of survival was simply a product of her upbringing—just as his insistence that a person ought to know those basic skills was a result of his.

  He seated himself at the table and chewed idly on a section of orange; Ahnao stayed by the window for a long time, staring out at the city, the countryside beyond, and the crater. Neither spoke as they waited for Arzadel to return.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  THE SUN HAD SET AND THE ROOM WAS DIM IN THE GATHERING dusk when the door Arzadel had departed through opened again. Slant had been leaning against one of the stone pillars between windows, idly considering the best means of recharging the ship's drained batteries, and Ahnao had curled up on the fur-covered floor and fallen asleep.

  When he heard the door's latch, Slant was immediately alert; he stood upright and began to speak a greeting to the returning wizard. Ahnao awoke, more or less, and rolled over to face the newcomer, blinking in the confusion of one half asleep.

  The figure that entered was not Arzadel, however, but a tall, awkward youth in a gray robe; Slant cut off what he had been about to say and let the stranger speak first.

  "Hello, Slant, and Ahnao. I am Haiger, apprentice to Pleido, and I come to deliver a message from Arzadel."

  There was a moment of silence; then the newcomer continued hesitantly, "You are Slant and Ahnao, aren't you? It's so dark in here!"

  "Yes, I am Slant, and this is Ahnao. And it is getting dark; is there a lamp somewhere?"

  "Oh, of course; just a moment." The apprentice reached up behind one of the fur hangings and brought forth an oil lamp; a moment later it was lit and set in the center of the nearest table, casting a circle of cheerful yellow light.

  "Is that better?"

  "Yes, much better. Thank you."

  "You're welcome."

  There was a moment of silence; .Slant asked, "You had a message from Arzadel?"

  "Oh, yes, I'm sorry! The matter you have brought for consideration is not to be decided lightly; therefore, the full Council of the Wizards of Praunce will meet tomorrow morning, and Arzadel will be occupied for the remainder of the night in preparations for that meeting. He respectfully begs your pardon, and bids you make free use of his home and its facilities, asking only that you remain on this level. He apologizes for the lack of proper bedding and hopes that the furs and cushions will serve. I am to point out to you anything you may ask for; for example, the door to the kitchen is there, and the privy is over there." He pointed to these two locations.

  Slant had begun to wonder if all wizard's apprentices were slightly scatterbrained when the lad had been so slow in delivering his message, but he certainly seemed to have covered all the important points neatly, and therefore presumably had remembered everything he had been told to say. "Thank you," Slant said in reply. "Will you then be staying the night here?"

  "Not in this room; I will be on the floor above, so that you may have your privacy. Should you need me, you may call up the stairwell. If you don't mind, though, I will stay for a while."

  "I don't mind at all. What's on the next floor, then, that you're free to see and we are not?" The question might be impolitic, but Slant was genuinely curious.

  "Oh, there's a study, and a library, and the private chambers of Arzadel and Shopaur."

  "Is that the top floor?"

  "No, there is one more."

  "And what is on that level?"

  "More living quarters."

  "I see." He fell silent.

  Ahnao spoke for the first time since awakening. "Are we to have any supper? I'm hungry."

  "Yes, of course! What would you like?"

  "Oh, anything."

  The youth looked pitifully uncertain, and Slant relieved him by saying "Don't worry about it; just show me where everything is in the kitchen and I'll take care of it."

  The youth assented eagerly, and Slant put together a meal of meat, bread, cheese, and fruit for the three of them. The apprentice joined them at the table, and joined as well in light conversation regarding the weather, the differences between Praunce and Awlmei and Teyzha, the difficulties of learning wizardry, and the color of Ahnao's eyes. This last subject was introduced by Haiger but appeared to surprise him as much as it did the others. It also served to put an embarrassed end to the conversation, and a moment later Haiger politely took his leave and departed through the door he had entered by.

  Slant studied Ahnao; she did not seem particularly displeased by the lad's remarks, and he suspected that it might be easier than he had thought to talk her into staying in Praunce. As the two of them prepared to settle s down for the night, he noticed that for the first time since he had rescued her from the dragon, she chose to sleep in a spot more than arm's length away from his own.

&
nbsp; It was still two or three hours until dawn when he suddenly came wide awake, sweating and on the verge of screaming. Unintentionally, from long habit, he mentally phrased a question to the computer, asking "What is it?"

  "Request cyborg unit response to reestablish communication."

  For a moment he thought that he had answered himself, that some fragment of his splintered psyche had decided to play the role of the computer; then he realized that had never happened before, and that there was no reason it should happen now.

  "Computer?" he asked.

  "Affirmative."

  "You're dead! You can't be there!" He wondered suddenly whether he was still dreaming; he had no recollection of ever having dreamed anything like this before, but it was almost possible.

  "Negative. Computer was shut down due to power loss. Minimum power levels for operation of secondary systems have been restored."

  "How? Everything was drained!"

  "Negative. Number-two repair mechanism is shielded and programmed for power supply operation in the event of on-ground power systems failure."

  "What kind of power supply? The drive was shut down and everything was dead!"

  "Ship's equipment includes photoelectric units. Number-two repair mechanism is programmed to set up photoelectric units,"

  "You mean you're running off solar power?"

  "Term 'solar' is incorrect. Term 'solar' refers only to the star Sol."

  "All right, all right, stellar power, then."

  "Affirmative."

  "Have you restarted the drive?"

  "Negative. Insufficient power available at present."

  "I don't believe any of this; I must be dreaming."

  "Negative. Cyborg unit is conscious."

  "I didn't know there was any photoelectric equipment aboard; where was it stored?"

  "Photoelectric units were stored in locker C thirty-one."

  That, Slant knew, was a storage compartment he had never had any call to look at, near the ship's nose, below the level of his own compartments. He had no recollection of what was supposed to be in those forward compartments; there might well have been solar cells—or photoelectric units, as the computer called them. He began to realize that he was indeed awake, and that the computer really was, too.

  He was right back where he had started, apparently.

  No, he corrected himself, he wasn't; his ship was grounded, at least for the moment. "Will you be able to restart the drive? Is it damaged?" he asked.

  "There is no evidence to indicate damage to main drive. Sufficient power reserve should permit reignition."

  "Sufficient power reserve? Have you got any way to provide that much power?"

  "Continued operation of photoelectric units should permit reignition within two hundred hours."

  "That's ten days, local time."

  "Affirmative."

  "Where have you got the photoelectric units set up?"

  "Photoelectric units are located on plain approximately twenty meters northwest of ship."

  "What if the wizards spot them?"

  "Information insufficient."

  Slant was able to make a guess; if the wizards of Awlmei found those solar cells and realized that the ship was repairing itself, they would shut it down again and make certain that it was permanent this time.

  He wasn't sure if that would be a bad thing. He had intended to revive the computer, true, but he had also intended to bring it under control and ensure it stopped killing people. He couldn't tinker with it while the override and thermite were still in his skull without first using the computer's release code, and he couldn't very well have them removed while the computer was awake.

  He did know the release code, though. It was simply his own civilian name repeated three times. He couldn't think of it offhand; he was still not fully awake. That would put him in command when he did remember it.

  "I know our release code," he told his computer.

  "Release code is not valid over this channel."

  That was an unpleasant surprise. "Why not?" he asked.

  "Release code can only be accepted over onboard audio or on Command frequency."

  "Damn." It had not occurred to him that there might be restrictions of that sort; he had thought that he would be able to use the code to erase the computer's military programming without having to actually speak it aloud and thereby return himself to civilian status, but that was apparently not the case. He had assumed, without giving it much consideration, that when the Command's recording told him that it had to be spoken aloud that it applied only to himself and not to the computer.

  He had no way of using the Command frequency, which meant that he would have to return to the ship in order to use the code.

  He was not entirely certain he wanted to; he had no idea exactly what the code would do. He knew that it would erase all his synthetic personalities, but he did not know whether he would retain any of his special abilities. He knew that it would turn the computer over to his control, but he did not know how much of the machine's programming might be erased and how many of the shipboard systems might be shut off or destroyed. He did not think that the Command was about to leave a civilian, even a veteran, in control of a nuclear arsenal, so something would have to be done with the missiles aboard. He wasn't even sure he was supposed to be able to fly the starship, though he thought that he would at least be permitted to fly it back to Mars.

  He didn't even know whether the computer would still be able to use the override and termination device. It would no longer be able to order him about, and would no longer be pursuing its mission, but it might still play watchdog on his loyalty. That could be as good as a death sentence on a world like this that it considered to be enemy territory.

  Of course, he didn't plan to stay on this world. He wasn't sure he wanted to go home, since he had no idea what he could expect to find there, but he had no great fondness for this backwater, even if it was strange and interesting with its wizards and rebuilt skyscrapers.

  He had wanted to be freed of the bomb and then to have taken his time in restarting the computer, trying to eliminate some of its more obnoxious programming, or at least to disarm it. That appeared a vain hope now. He was an IRU cyborg again. He had lived with it for fourteen years; he could live with it longer. If it became unbearable, he had the release code. That was something worthy of careful consideration: whether or not to use the code.

  "Query: Location and current status of cyborg unit." The computer interrupted his chain of thought.

  There was something peculiar about the computer's words; perhaps that was why he had been so willing to consider it all a dream.

  "I'm in a city the locals call Praunce, on an upper floor of a tall building that's half warehouse and half residential. I'm uninjured and otherwise normal, so far as I know. I have with me a snark, partially discharged—I don't know the exact level—a machine-pistol, a hand laser, and a few supplies, food, tools, and so forth."

  "Locating equipment not fully operational. Describe location more exactly."

  He understood now; the "voice" in his head was abnormally soft, with a thin, ghostly quality. The computer must either be operating at extreme range or at low power or both. "Praunce is east by southeast of your present position; I don't know the distance, but your transmission is weak."

  "Acknowledged. Describe current status more exactly."

  "I have …" He paused to phrase his message. "I have successfully infiltrated the stronghold of a wizard resident here, and am his guest. I have with me a captive whom the wizard believes to be my willing companion. In the morning the wizard will be meeting with others in order to decide whether they wish to aid me in repairing the ship; I was not aware that you would be able to restore yourself to operation as you have, and was therefore seeking assistance through subterfuge." He was grateful that the computer could not discern truth as wizards could; it would probably blow his head off if it learned the truth. He was glad that his internal recorders wer
e useless for periods exceeding an hour without computer contact.

  A brief pause followed; then the computer replied, "Continue action for present."

  That struck him as slightly odd; why would the computer allow him to continue with something that had been rendered completely pointless by the flow of events? Did it perhaps think he could convince the wizards to somehow speed up the recharging process? Had it some ulterior motive that it had not bothered to explain to him?

  He decided against asking it, and returned to sleep.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  THROWN OFF SCHEDULE BY THE INTERRUPTION OF HIS rest, Slant overslept that morning, and awoke only when Haiger let the kitchen door slam behind him. His hands were both busy holding a tray of breakfast for Ahnao and himself, and the door, which was not hung perfectly, got away from him.

  He almost dropped the tray in surprise as Slant came awake in response to the noise; the cyborg rolled over and to his feet in a single incredibly fast motion, the snark ready in his hand, though it had been wrapped in his vest half a meter from where he lay. Once upright, he quickly scanned the room, obviously poised either to fight or flee; when no enemy presented himself, there was a moment of confusion.

  Finally, Slant's face relaxed into an expression of sleepy bewilderment, and he lowered the snark. "What was that noise?"