Capella's Golden Eyes
Page 17
It grew late and I began to doze fitfully. And then Mal was shaking me awake. He told me that it was morning and that I was to come with him.
Morning it was, but not yet light. We hurried down the still, deserted streets, reached the waterfront and walked along it until we came to a motorboat moored at a small jetty. Tomas stood at the wheel. Mal ushered me on board, then left. Tomas started the engine and we headed out to sea. As soon as we were out of sight of the bay, he swung the boat in a northerly direction and eventually veered back towards the shore until we were following the duned coastline. Dawn had broken by now, a hazy, copper-coloured dawn, still and silent, save for the purr of the boat’s motor. I did not ask where we were going. I sat back, enjoying a peculiar sense of freedom after the confines of the cellar.
We had been at sea for about two hours and I was ensconced in a daydream when a sudden change in the pitch of the engine stirred me. Tomas was swinging the boat towards an indentation in the coastline, a tiny cove surmounted by an arc of dunes. He disengaged the engine in shallow water and we waded ashore.
A dark, semi-cylindrical building stood between two dunes, reflecting the sunlight to a dull metallic blur. The dunes had encroached around the building, enveloping the wall on the windward side. The entrance had evidently been cleared of sand and carefully landscaped so that it would not look artificial.
I recognized the place from an old photograph shown in one of my history lessons: it was Landfall Three, one of the six base-camps which had been established in different parts of Gaia just after the Auriga made orbit above the planet. The survey teams had been equipped to check out the immediate area with a view to determining the best site for settlement. The team at Landfall Five, on the northern bank of the Tamus, had eventually won out and the other camps had been abandoned with the landing of the Auriga. Landfall Five itself had been preserved as a site of historical interest and lay just south of Union Plaza.
Tomas rapped twice on the door and shouted his name.
We were admitted by a bearded man whose face seemed vaguely familiar to me. The hut was divided by a central corridor lined on both sides by open-plan laboratories, workrooms and sleeping quarters. The bearded man led us to the largest of the laboratory areas towards the far end of the building. Its benches were cluttered with an array of electronic equipment, some of which, I saw, was still operational. A fairhaired woman and a tall, ungainly youth were brewing tea on a hot-plate. Eilan sat in an armchair, an unopened folder in her lap.
Tomas provided the introductions. Eilan greeted me warmly and apologized for my incarceration in the cellar.
“Thomas is sometimes a little over-zealous in his caution,” she told me. “But you must understand that we could afford to take no risks, We have been forced to behave like frightened criminals. It is regrettable, but necessary under the circumstances.”
The youth’s name was Islor, a toothy, freckled fellow who grinned hugely and patted me on the shoulder several times as if I was a long-lost friend. By contrast, Junith, the fair-haired woman, was cool in her reception: she neither smiled nor attempted body-contact, but acknowledged my presence with the curtest of nods. Her skin was extremely pale, as if she had spent all her days avoiding the sun. The bearded man was called Wolther, and as soon as Tomas announced his name, I remembered him. During one of my visits to the quarries in southern Gaia, the foreman in charge had taken me along to see a blasting and I recalled Wolther crouched at the base of an overhang implanting explosives. I had talked with him briefly afterwards (he had been like a ghost, his entire body covered with a film of fine, cinereal dust), although he didn’t remember the occasion when I mentioned it to him.
Islor poured tea while I reiterated my reasons for contacting the League. Eilan was fascinated by the details of my visit to the tower and intrigued by my ideas about the M’threnni-Voice relationship. This gratified me enormously, since it was the first sign of goodwill that anyone connected with the League had hitherto shown me. She then informed me that they planned a raid on the lighthouse to free Jax and his comrades. Would I play a part in this operation? Although there was no hint of obligation in her tone, I knew that I had no option other than to accept.
I described the lay-out of the lighthouse and the surrounding area as well as my memory would allow, and then Eilan outlined the plan of attack. Two boats would approach from the sea by night and make a landing on the southern side of Needle Point where we would not be visible from the lighthouse. Wolther and Islor would take the first boat, with Tomas, Junith and myself following thirty minutes later. Wolther and Islor would set explosives around the perimeter of the desalination plant further along the Point and as soon as the guards had been drawn away from the lighthouse by the explosions, Tomas, Junith and I would move in and free Jax and his two comrades.
“Do you think three of us will be enough?” I asked. “My disappearance has been noted and Helmine must have guessed that I have contacted you. She may be expecting an attack on the lighthouse.”
“Oh, she will,” Eilan said, smiling somewhat unctuously. “But not, perhaps, for a day or two. We move in tonight.”
It was a still, clear night, the bed of stars in the sky providing sufficient light for navigation, but insufficient (or so we hoped) for any guard gazing out to sea to make out our incoming boat. Tomas sat on the prow, peering ahead to the ragged black outline of the Point. I wielded the starboard oar; Junith, the port. My arms ached with the exertion and it seemed like an eternity since we had set off from the trawlerfoil which was resting further out to sea, awaiting our return. I voiced no complaints, however, for Junith, pale and sickly though she looked, pulled steadfastly, and I was determined not to be outdone. The ocean gleamed under the starlight like an expanse of liquid metal; our oars plopped and swished through the water, and slowly the shoreline loomed nearer.
As we drew into a small cove at the base of a rocky ridge, I saw Wolther and Islor’s boat moored in the shadows less than fifty metres away. Tomas leapt ashore and wrapped the guy-rope around a pinnacle of rock. Gratefully I released the oar and began to massage my shoulder muscles. Junith climbed out and Tomas hissed at me: “Hurry!” Clumsily I disembarked and began to follow them up the slippery, weed-choked rocks.
We had landed, as planned, midway between the lighthouse and the desalination plant. Finding a convenient niche between some rocks, we lay down and waited. A small searchlight atop the outbuilding threw a cone of light across the compound. The gates were closed and a guard attended them, I looked westwards, towards the desalination plant, its towers and chambers lit at intervals by red and white lights; a thin plume of white smoke or steam billowed languidly into the air from one of the towers. The road between the plant and the compound was deserted.
The pistol I was carrying in my belt was jutting into my groin. I removed it and examined it in the starlight. Ever since Tomas had handed me the weapon several hours earlier I had felt uncomfortable. “Do you expect me to use this?” I had asked him, and he had simply replied: “It may be necessary.” It was only then that I had realized how naive my hope had been that we might be able to spirit Jax and his comrades away without having to confront any guards. I was not a pacifist, but I had never considered the possibility of inflicting permanent damage, let alone death, on anyone. The gun terrified me. It was one of the heavy, snub-nosed discharge pistols carried by the militia and capable of delivering pulsed electronic charges of variable intensity. I set the dial on low, so that the gun would deliver nothing more than a debilitating electric shock. Medium intensity charges could stun a person, while the charge from a high intensity bolt would be fatal. Only the militia were allowed to bear arms, so the guns must have come by some circuitous route from Helmine’s troops: another irony. That we possessed them at all tended to confirm my suspicion that the League had better resources than most people imagined.
A guard emerged from the outbuilding, wandered around the compound and stopped to talk to the guard at the gate. He then c
ompleted another circuit and went back inside. No sooner had he closed the door than a flare of white light illuminated the peninsula, followed an instant later by the thump of an explosion, then several more bursts of light and noise. Orange-rimmed smoke shrouded the desalination plant.
Several figures emerged from the outbuilding, some clambering into floaters, others running ahead to the gate, which was hurriedly being opened by the guard. They took off down the road towards the plant and within minutes the compound was deserted save for a solitary guard stationed between the outbuilding and the lighthouse.
“Quickly,” Thomas whispered.
We went down the incline, crouching low, keeping pace with the group on the road, moving towards the compound as they moved away. The guard, growing restless, began a tour of the perimeter and disappeared behind the outbuilding. We approached the gate and walked boldly through, our pistols tucked into our belts behind our backs.
We were half-way across the compound when the guard reappeared. Tomas immediately strode over to him and said: “Where are the others? I gave orders that a full complement of guards were to remain on duty here.”
The guard, who had pulled out his own pistol, looked confused, “There was an explosion at the plant. They have gone to investigate.”
“I can see that, you idiot,” Tomas said. Junith walked past the two of them and stopped just behind the guard.
“Well?” Tomas said. “Have they left you here alone?”
“No, there’s one—who are you, anyway?”
He began to raise his pistol, but Junith turned sharply and clubbed him over the head with the butt of her gun. He stumbled forward, dazed but not unconscious, and Thomas grabbed his weapon away. He wedged it into the small of his Back and began marching him towards the outbuilding. The door opened, and a female guard emerged. Junith levelled her pistol. There was a sharp, loud crackle and a bolt of white light flashed across the compound, hitting the woman in her midriff. Her body jerked as if hidden strings had been pulled and she slumped to the ground.
“Get over to the lighthouse and stand guard,” Tomas directed me.
I fled across the compound, my heart pounding with fear and tension. I crouched beside the door and pointed my pistol towards the gate, praying that no one would appear.
The seconds dragged by. Finally Tomas and Junith emerged from the outbuilding and hurried across to me. Tomas had the keys.
“What have you done with them?” I asked as he unlocked the door.
“Tied and gagged them. Come.”
Junith stood guard at the door while Tomas and I moved slowly up the steps, our backs flattened against the wall. We had expected to encounter at least one more guard in the tower itself, but there was no sound or movement above us, and when we reached the landing, it was deserted. This was strange, I thought; surely they wouldn’t have left the cell unattended?
Tomas unbolted the door and opened it.
“Sam!” he whispered. “Nita! Jax!”
There was no reply. Tomas switched on his torch and the eye of the beam flashed over the bunks. Jax and his two comrades lay asleep. Tomas knelt beside the lower bunk in which the woman lay and shook her gently, lifting her head. Her eyes opened, but her pupils were only just visible beneath her upper eyelids, as if she was staring at her eyebrows. Tomas flashed the torch in her face but there was no reaction. He shook her more vigorously and her mouth lolled open.
He set her down and moved to Jax’s bunk. Raising him to a sitting position, he slapped his cheek. Jax murmured, his eyes opened and I saw that they were the same as the woman’s: raised in moronic supplication to the heavens. Tomas removed his support and Jax flopped back on the pillow.
“What is it?” I asked.
“Let’s go,” Tomas said, moving past me.
I grabbed his arm. “What’s happened to them?”
“They are as good as dead,” he said in a level tone. “We can do nothing for them. Let’s get out of here.”
I blocked his exit. “I’m not leaving Jax.”
“Then stay here with him!” he said, pushing me aside.
I went over to Jax, dragged him off the bed and forced him to stand. Drugged, I told myself. He’s drugged.
“You can walk,” I said, leading him towards the door. He moved his feet, ponderously, mechanically, and we reached the top of the stairs.
“Steps,” I said, leading him down. He stumbled and I was only just able to support him. But his legs would not work again. I took his weight on my shoulder and began to drag him down the stairs. Once or twice his feet moved, as if some dim consciousness of their function was trying to surface, but their movements were so uncoordinated as to be of no help to me.
At length we reached the bottom. To my surprise I found that Junith and Tomas were waiting for me. Junith put one arm under Jax’s shoulder and together we propelled him across the compound and out through the gate. Tomas ran at our side, his pistol at the ready.
Two guards were coming down the road from the plant. They saw us and broke into a run. Tomas knelt and fired. The light-bolt cut a searing path down the road, forcing the guards to dive for cover. Junith and I began to drag Jax up the rocks while Tomas gave covering fire behind. Several balls of light rent the air over our heads; the fire was being returned. We reached the ridge and began tumbling, helter-skelter, down the slope to the cove.
Junith and I bundled Jax on board then took the oars. Junith yelled to Tomas, who appeared moments later on the crest of the ridge. Suddenly his figure was starkly silhouetted as a ball of white light exploded just in front of him. He keeled backwards and came careening down the slope, arms and legs flailing, before finally coming to rest sprawled across a weed-covered boulder only metres away. I leapt ashore, scrambled over the rocks and, hoisting him by the armpits, dragged him towards the boat. Junith took his legs and we heaved him on board.
Frantically Junith and I pulled off, thrusting and lifting, thrusting and lifting, our progress from the shore inexorably slow. Within minutes several guards had appeared on the ridge and they began firing at us. Lightballs hissed through the air and exploded into the water on either side of the boat. From their size I knew that the guards’ weapons were set to maximum intensity. If a bolt hit the boat, we were all dead.
Slowly, slowly the coastline receded. Thrust and lift. Thrust and lift. At some point I became aware that the boat was no longer being illuminated by hostile flashes of light; no cascades of water drenched us; the air did not crackle overhead. I looked up in time to see the last bright explosion of water some distance behind the boat. We were out of range and the guards had ceased fire. For the first time since we had landed on the Point, I thought it possible we might escape.
But I continued to row as obsessively as ever, pouring all my thoughts and energies into the act. When Junith tapped me on the shoulder and told me to stop, I had no idea of how long we had been at sea. An hour, perhaps, or perhaps only ten minutes. Tomas was lying in the prow of the boat and Junith went over to him.
“Is he all right?” I asked.
“He’s burned but he’s still breathing.”
“I’m all right,” Tomas said in a cracked voice. “Help me up.”
Junith helped him sit. Jax was still slumped in the bottom of the boat like a man in a stupor of drunkenness.
“You risked our lives for a corpse,” Tomas said. He was staring out to sea.
“What’s wrong with him?”
“He’s been brain-blanked.”
So Helmine had carried out her threat. “Is there nothing we can do for him?” I asked, knowing that the question was futile.
“Helmine used no delicacy in her attempt to extract the information she required,” Tomas said through clenched teeth. He was obviously in great pain. “Enforced memory retrieval burns out vital neural pathways and only a rudimentary consciousness remains. Reason cannot be re-imprinted on a blanked mind. The only kindness you could do him now would be to put him out of his misery.”
“It won’t work,” Junith said. “It’s not charged.”
I stared at the gun, then at her.
“We could not take the risk,” she said, removing her own pistol and making adjustments to the barrel aperture before passing it to me. The aperture was now the size of a pin-hole and would deliver a thin, concentrated beam of energy which could cut effortlessly through flesh and bone.
Telling myself that he was dead, already dead, I lifted Jax, hung his head over the edge of the boat and put the barrel of the pistol under his chin. Turning away, I pressed the trigger. There was a brief, loud hiss, like a jet of water escaping from a nozzle, and Jax’s body jerked, went limp. I threw the gun to the floor of the boat, then heaved the body over the side. It hit the water with a splash, brine splattering my face. A muted frenzy of despair and self-loathing passed through me like a shiver. I turned away from Tomas and Junith, feeling nauseous and utterly spent.
Presently Junith activated her torch and began flashing it out to sea. I heard the low throb of the trawlerfoil’s auxiliary engine and then I saw the dark bulk of the foil itself less than fifty metres away.
We manoeuvred the boat alongside the foil and a rope-ladder uncoiled from the deck. We climbed on board. Eilan ushered Tomas off to attend to his bums, while Junith conferred with Alma, the foil’s captain. I slumped against the railing, thinking dire thoughts. Had I not fled from Helmine, Jax might never have had to undergo brain-blanking. I had not only “executed” him on the boat, but had effectively sentenced him to death when I had escaped Helmine’s surveillance and fled to the harbour. By attempting to save Jax, I had only hastened his demise.