Leviathans in the Clouds

by David Parish-Whittaker

  He watched Annabelle string her bow, then go through her quiver of arrows, sighting down each to check them for straightness with a practiced efficiency. He decided against voicing his concerns to Annabelle. She might not be able to climb mountains, but she was perfectly capable of taking care of herself. As he was sure he’d be told should he raise the subject.

  “German humans must be in the big house of hard water,” Thymon said, peering into the distance. “Too much rains to see.”

  “Hard water?” said Nathanial. “Oh, right, the eishaus. Thought they only could afford ice cooling up on the plateau.” There really must be something here for the Germans to invest resources and money into a state of the art climate control device.

  “Human peoples no like heat,” Thymon said.

  “It’s cooler on our world, mostly.”

  “Thymon knows.” Thymon clicked what might have been a laugh. “Not strange not to see German humans hide in house. But no other peoples here. Thiss is strange.”

  “You mean no Skreelan?” Nathanial asked.

  “Yessss. Most work done by Skreelan if no machines is used.” Those clicks of his were almost certainly laughter, Nathanial decided. “German humans prefer the naps during day.”

  “Perhaps we can catch them napping, then,” said Annabelle. “I’m thinking that they had a revolt or some such. Why else would they be on their own without help?”

  “Could be,” said Nathanial. “Just so long as any rebel Skreelan can tell the difference between us and their former masters.”

  “Thymon will explain difference to Skreelan,” said Thymon.

  “Let’s hope they listen to reason if that’s the case,” said Nathanial. “But we won’t get any answers just sitting here.”

  “Indeed,” said Arnaud. “Mademoiselle Annabelle has arranged her quiver, and I mine,” he said, patting the satchel that contained his survey equipment. “After you, mon ami.”

  The hike down the earthen embankment was easily enough done, although at times it resembled more of a slide than anything else. Testing the peat-stained water with a walking stick, it appeared to be only a few feet deep.

  “Can you get a sample from the mud?” Nathanial asked Arnaud.

  “Yes. But first I am thinking I want to see this machine. It would seem most likely to be near the ore, eh? I do not think they will be digging where they think there will be no result.”

  “True.” Nathanial had wanted to look over the digger anyway. It reminded him somewhat of the bore drill he had driven during his first visit to Luna. A squat thing the size of a locomotive engine, it was stained with the inevitable rust of anything iron on Venus. Its front end sprouted a long drill half again its length. The backside was adorned with large drainpipes that discharged onto a long conveyor belt that led to a mound of displaced mud and rock in the middle of the water. There was certainly no danger of its winning an award for design aesthetics.

  But Nathanial was never one to judge a piece of equipment by anything other than its functionality. He’d always had a boyish love for machinery. Later in life, that passion had become the impetus for his interest in aether propeller design. He absolutely loved seeing thousands of parts working together towards one goal. There might have been a metaphor for human achievement there, but more prosaically, he felt that tools were what defined intelligent life. An ape might pick up a stick to catch tasty termites, but it was an object of convenience, not purposeful design.

  It was a belief that had always bothered him about the intelligence named Hermes that they’d discovered on Mercury. Hermes just was, and didn’t seem to create or grow, much less make tools. It was perplexing, and Nathanial had to wonder if Hermes really was an intelligent being with a divinely granted soul. Could it be just some form of incomprehensibly advanced machinery? Perhaps it merely mimicked intellect, in the same way that a phonograph cylinder mimicked speech.

  But if that were the case, then who—or what—created Hermes?

  Nathanial shook his head. They had enough problems without him letting his mind wander. Hermes, if it still existed, was several million miles away at the moment, and very much the least of his worries.

  Arnaud was already scampering up the ladder that led to the top of the digger, where its control cab was.

  “Perhaps they have ore samples onboard,” Arnaud called down. “Would be much more easy than to swim to the refuse pile over there, non?” He disappeared out of sight.

  The control cab was perched at the end of the digger’s body that overlooked the drill bit, looking for all the world like a slightly undersized bowler worn by a locomotive. Getting to it required climbing along the length of the digger, passing various gearings that led to the lower power train shaft, lines of pipes with adjustment valves and a forest of exhaust stacks that gave the digger a faint resemblance to a hedgehog.

  Nathanial watched the drizzle stream down the stacks. The water wasn’t even sizzling, much less boiling away. He cautiously placed the back of his hand against the metal.

  It was as cool as anything ever got on Venus.

  Nathanial picked up his pace, making better time now that he was willing to use the nearby pipes as handholds. It was perplexing. He wasn’t sure about the protocol for diggers, but ships rarely let their boilers get cold, not if they needed to be ready to sail or soar at a moment’s notice. A large engine could literally take days before it was hot enough to get up to full steam. Even now, Jack was tending the solar boiler on Esmeralda 2. Had the Germans abandoned this site? If they had, why did they leave something as valuable as a digger behind?

  Nathanial had the feeling that the answers to those questions might be less than pleasant. He caught up with Arnaud outside the control cab. A glance at his friend’s face told him that he wasn’t alone in the thoughts. Arnaud looked grim.

  “I am unable to open this door,” he said, wiping his brow with a soiled kerchief. “But I think it is not locked so much as blocked by something.”

  “I wonder what. I mean, there’s no one inside, is there?” Nathanial suppressed the urge to knock.

  “No one home, I think. But perhaps we will find a clue, should we get this door open. Shall we?”

  Nathanial nodded quickly. Without saying another word, they forced the door open and entered.

  2.

  The cab was a mess. The view ports were shuttered, but the gumme rubber canopy that served as a roof was in tatters, allowing the rain and vegetation to do their work on the control panels and steering console. But it wasn’t the muck that had held the door closed.

  That difficulty was courtesy of the last efforts of the digger operator, whose mummified corpse still clung tightly to an iron bar he had braced against the door jam. It was hard to say if the terrified rictus on the corpse’s face was due to the effects of mummification, or if mummification had preserved the man’s last few moments of horror.

  Nathanial decided he didn’t want to know.

  Kneeling down next to the body, Arnaud tapped its skin with one finger.

  “Taut as a drum, is that the saying? If you’ll pardon the imagery, this poor man has been turned into a large piece of dried beefsteak. Preserved well enough to prevent the rot, even in this natural Turkish bath.”

  “Just like that hand we found.”

  “It is possible. I might even venture to say almost certainly related. It is too much of an oddity to be coincidence, I think.”

  “Who would do something like this?” Nathanial said, pacing around the cab. “Killing someone, then going to all the trouble of mummifying them? Then just leaving them in place?”

  “It makes no sense, I agree. But look, what do you see? Or rather, what do you not see?”

  Calming himself, Nathanial joined Arnaud in his examination of the corpse.

  “How did he die?” Nathanial said. “Other than being completely dehydrated, he’s in perfect condition.

  “Perfect for a dead man, yes.”

  Nathanial looked at the ripped awn
ing over their heads, half expecting to see someone—or something—drop through it at any moment. “So. As Edwin’s favourite detective might say, we’re left with the impossible.”

  “Mais oui.” Arnaud jerked a thumb at the ceiling. “Our friend here was caught unawares as he was attempting to hold the door closed. His nemesis must have torn through the roof, perhaps with a knife.”

  “It’s a big hole.”

  “A big knife, then.”

  “Then death by desiccation.”

  Arnaud unbuttoned the driver’s tunic. “Here. It is hard to see with the wrinkling of the flesh, but there seem to be several small holes in his skin.”

  Nathanial shuddered. “As if pierced by a hundred syringes.”

  “Precisely. A mummifying machine, I am thinking. It would not be that hard to design, although I cannot think of a need for it.”

  “Nor can I,” Nathanial said, standing up and opening the shutters. “If someone wanted this fellow dead, there are simpler ways to kill a man.”

  “Thousands. But how many would be so frightening as to scare off the rest of the colony?”

  “That sounds as plausible as anything else, I suppose.” Nathanial peered out of the window. The mists were parting, allowing him to just make out the shadowy outline of the eishaus. Littered along the road leading to it were a few score of corpses, their arms and legs contorted and pointing straight up into the sky, reminiscent of a dead colony of insects.

  Insects.

  “What if those syringes were attached to a beast?” Nathanial said. “If Luna had oversized ants, why not oversized mosquitoes or ticks on Venus? A creature that drains all fluid from the victim. What do you think of that hypothesis?”

  “If true, we need to leave soon. I am thinking now would be good.” Arnaud gave up trying to close the shrunken eyes of the driver and stood up. “Rest in peace, mon ami.”

  “I thought you didn’t believe in an afterlife.”

  “I don’t. But I believe in rest. Heaven is a myth perpetrated by the bourgeoisie, but eternity is all too real.”

  It was a rare glimpse into Arnaud’s philosophical side, but this was hardly a coffee house were they could discuss such things at leisure. Nathanial decided that, assuming they got out of this without perforated hides, he’d definitely enjoy joining Arnaud in conversation over a few bumpers of port, preferably at an establishment unlikely to toss an atheistic Frenchman out the door.

  But for now, he just wanted to get out of here.

  3.

  “Annabelle!” Nathanial yelled as they clambered up the mud slope.

  “The same,” the girl replied, casually nocking an arrow. She squinted into the distance. “You look frantic. Is something chasing you?”

  “No. At least, not yet,” Nathanial said as he struggled to catch his breath. “But something strange is going on.” He quickly outlined what they had seen.

  “Murderous mad scientist or carnivorous insects?” Annabelle shuddered. “Why don’t we ever discover something pleasant? Perhaps a panda or an alien puppy, for an example.”

  “I suspect even the puppies around here would be reptilian monstrosities. No offense, Thymon,” Nathanial added with an apologetic glance at their guide.

  “Had pets when hatchling,” Thymon said with an oddly human like shrug. “Humans call it snakes, but hads legs. Was not pretty, is true. But would play with Thymon, and Thymon love back. Thymon very sad when had to eat it.”

  “Wait,” said Nathanial. “You ate your pet snake?”

  “Was hard year, not enough food. Was snake or Thymon’s brother. And brother owed Thymon money.”

  “He makes jokes now,” Annabelle interjected.

  “That is rather a matter of opinion, I’d say.” Nathanial studied Thymon’s impassive features. Was the Skreelan holding back a smile?

  “Prawns,” whispered Arnaud.

  “Pardon?” said Nathanial. Then he looked down the embankment where Arnaud was pointing. The stagnant water was swarming with what indeed looked like prawns, suitable for boiling up and serving with cocktail sauce. Then he realised that their size was being obscured by distance.

  “Look at them next to that shovel,” Arnaud said. “I will say a meter, at the very least.”

  “I’m rather glad we decided against wading out to that rock mound.”

  Arnaud drew his breath in. “I as well. But it seems our prawns are not averse to wading onto land. Regard!”

  Prawns surged onto the land, crawling their way up the mud embankment.

  “Do you think they’re our culprit?” Nathanial asked.

  “I think I do not wish to conduct the observations necessary to discover that answer.”

  Thymon made a clacking roar and swept Annabelle off her feet. “Eishaus!” he yelled.

  Nathanial looked back to see a carpet of meter long prawns covering the embankments on either side.

  He decided not to look back again. Running was a far more suitable item for the agenda.

  Chapter Ten

  1.

  They hurried along past the dehydrated corpses of German workers sprawled along the top of the embankment. Their dead eyes stared up into the rain, making them look as if they were still begging for a mercy that never came.

  Thymon was carrying Annabelle over his shoulder despite her protests.

  “I can walk on my own!” she shouted.

  “No walk now,” Thymon said. “See no dead Skreelan here? Humans not always run when they must.”

  “I think I agree with our friend,” Nathanial said.

  Clearly unhappy, Annabelle nonetheless settled down and held onto Thymon tightly. Nathanial was reminded of a penny dreadful he’d seen at a newsstand once. It had some horrid title along the lines of Bug Eyed Monsters of Mercury or some such, with a cover illustration that seemed to imply that alien monsters had no greater desire in life than to carry a young human female across the threshold.

  To call such affection unlikely was an understatement, of course. Presumably monsters would prefer to court other eligible young monsters, perhaps restricting themselves to those with established incomes or dowries. But Nathanial reflected that interspecies love in the form of friendship was clearly possible. Thymon would probably have been best off leaving them all to the ministrations of the prawns instead of slowing himself down carrying Annabelle. And yet here he was, risking himself to help his human friends.

  As Arnaud might point out, self-sacrifice wasn’t precisely a survival trait. But at this moment, it was more than welcome.

  Certainly, the two men couldn’t compete with Thymon’s strength and stamina. Despite his burden, the Skreelan was easily able to maintain a pace that was pushing Nathanial to the edge of exhaustion and Arnaud into fits of coughing.

  “Are you all right?” Nathanial asked Arnaud.

  “Decidedly more so than if we slow down,” Arnaud managed to wheeze out. “Please. Keep moving.”

  Nathanial bit his lip. There was no arguing with that. But so far, they were keeping pace ahead of the sea of prawns crawling after them. Which raised the question of how the Germans had managed to get caught. The poor digger operators had no doubt been caught off guard, but what of the rest? For all their size, the prawns seemed no faster than their Earth counterparts.

  They must have surrounded their victims, Nathanial realised. There were undoubtedly prawns all over this colony. Assuming that was the case, there could be no question of slowing. As if in answer to that thought, the sun broke through the clouds just enough to part the mists ahead and revealed the eishaus a mere hundred yards away on a small central plateau with a web of embankments leading to it. In fact, it looked very much like a spider, what with it being perched atop ten foot high stilts.

  “It must have needed those stilts once,” said Nathanial.

  “Before they drained the bog to look for the minerals, yes,” said Arnaud. “Can prawns climb the stilts, I wonder?”

  “I just hope we can.”

  Ahead
, on the far embankments, Nathanial saw a golden-brown glint of light reflecting off a mass of swarming carapaces. Well, if they died here, perhaps future xenobiologists might grant them the honour of naming the prawns after them. It would only be fair.

  For some reason the thought didn’t comfort him. Neither did the pile of dehydrated corpses at the base of the ladder leading to the eishaus entrance. But unlike the unfortunate Germans, they had made it to safety. They’d just have to find out how real that safety was.

  2.

  Those who’d visited the great Eispalast of Venusstadt spoke of its neo-Classical architecture braced with a splash of Teutonic bombast. While its rooms proper were lushly furnished affairs suitable for entertaining dignitaries in style, the halls connecting the rooms were long and airy, lined with marble statues of chisel-jawed heroes for whom the hazy memory of history allowed a certain level of cosmetic embellishment. One wondered what the advent of the photograph would do for such nonsense, of course. Would future generations of German schoolboys be treated to images of Bismarck with an Olympian physique? No doubt, if the Chancellor had any say in it, they would.

  But no statues, exaggerated or otherwise, were to be found in this eishaus. It had stuck to pure military functionality, with excavation tools lined up around the walls like weapons and rows of purely functional bunks. The one nod to comfort was the central ice storage unit and the heat exchanger piping that crisscrossed the ceiling, but even that managed to convey a certain stoicism, as if it wanted to inform the occupants that it was only there to promote greater efficiency in their work output.

  The architectural details seemed rather secondary to the far too familiar stench of death pervading the room, courtesy of a corpse laying on a bunk. Unlike his fellows, he had escaped desiccation. But not death.

  “L’odeur!” Arnaud said, waving a hand in front of his nose. “So much for any provisions, eh? That is to say, if anyone has appetite left. Shall we drop him out the door to join his fellows?”