City Of The Living Dead rb-26

by Джеффри Лорд

  They came out of the trees onto the shore of a small lake. It was only a few acres, but the storm was whipping up respectable waves. The water was churning ankle-deep over the stepping stones they used to cross the lake. Once Twana slipped and went to her knees in the water, but Blade pulled her to her feet and half-carried her the rest of the way across.

  They moved on listening to the roar of the wind and the thunder, the crackle and crash of falling trees, the hammering beat of the rain, until they were half-deaf. They were thoroughly drenched, and Blade was beginning to wonder if he were losing his sense of direction. He kept on though-it would be safer to get completely lost than to arouse the suspicion of the robots.

  How long he and Twana kept going it was impossible to guess. Blade only knew that it was still pitch dark and blowing a gale when Twana began to stumble and stagger. She shook her head and mouthed the words, «I can't go on.» Blade lifted her onto his back, with her arms clamped about his neck.

  His own legs were beginning to ache and stiffen when they finally reached something that could serve as shelter. It was a small stone house, open on one side. Fortunately, the open side faced away from the storm, so the interior was reasonably dry. Blade carried Twana inside and set her down in a corner. He would have liked to make a fire, but there was nothing to burn, nothing to light it with, and too much risk of being spotted by the robots.

  Inside, Blade and Twana stripped, wrapped themselves in their soggy blankets, and lay down to get as much sleep as they could. Exhaustion quickly sent them off to sleep, with the storm still howling in their ears.

  In the morning the storm was still blowing as hard as ever, and Twana flatly refused to face it again. Blade began to wonder if he'd have done better to leave her in the building by the Wall and do his exploring on his own. Twana could cope with the robots, and they would probably protect her from any other danger until he returned.

  However, he and Twana were both committed now, and something good might come of her joining him. The more she saw with her own eyes about what lay beyond the Wall, the more she could tell her own people, and the more likely they were to believe her. Blade was sure that knowing more about what lay beyond the Wall would help the villagers. If it did nothing else, it would ease their superstitious fear of the Watchers.

  By late afternoon the wind was no more than a stiff breeze, and the clouds were breaking up. Blade saw several Gardener robots pass the house, most of them carrying fallen branches in their claws. He and Twana headed straight west until darkness overtook them, seeing a good many more Gardeners, but only one Watcher. They passed it slowly, and it ignored them as if they were only leaves blown on the wind. There didn't seem to be any hunt on for them yet.

  They slept that night on the driest patch of ground they could find, deep inside a pine grove. When morning came, Blade scrambled up to the top of the tallest tree he could find and took his bearings. They'd come far enough so that in the pale morning light he could make out hints of the distant city from this lower perch. It looked as if they still had a long walk ahead of them, so the sooner they got started, the better.

  They had to walk all that day and most of the next. Every hour or so Blade climbed a tree to check direction. The city was always there, though for a long time it seemed to be getting no closer. At times during the first day, Blade almost suspected the city was a phantom, receding into the distance, as he and Twana advanced toward where they thought it was.

  Toward evening he could see the sunset light flashing from dozens of ranked metal towers. The city was there. What surprised him was realizing its size. It must be a good ten of fifteen miles wide, and many of those towers had to be at least a mile high. Blade was tempted to push on through the darkness but decided against it. What lay around him was no longer any sort of garden, but rank wilderness that might hold all sorts of surprises.

  This area might have been a garden once. Twice Blade saw heavily overgrown patches of tumbled stone, once the remains of a bridge. But here the neglect that was overtaking the land closer to the Wall had gone totally unchecked for many years. Even the robots seemed to shun this land. Blade hadn't seen one all afternoon.

  They pushed on at dawn the next day. For the first few hours they faced a tangle of vegetation that would have done justice to a tropical jungle. Blade would gladly have traded one of their swords for a machete.

  Then abruptly they came out into open country, rolling away toward the city that was now clearly visible from the ground for the first time. Somehow, in spite of its size and the hundred or more shimmering towers, the city looked sterile and asleep, even dead. It seemed to radiate a vast, overpowering silence that spread across the country and swallowed up even the sigh of the wind and the crunch of Blade's and Twana's footsteps through the brittle grass.

  Blade wondered for a moment if he'd taken off on a wild-goose chase after a dead city. Still, there was no point in calling the city a corpse until he'd at least tried to take its pulse! He lengthened his stride.

  They covered the last miles to the city in a couple of hours. As they drew closer, Blade saw the city had its own wall. It was the same height as the Wall outside, but this one was studded with featureless cylindrical towers about every hundred yards. Towers and wall both seemed to be made of something that looked like frosted, white glass. There was no shimmering in the air over his wall and no glint of metal from prowling Watchers. This wall looked as dead as the city behind it.

  The wall stood unbroken as far as Blade could see, but once more the storm had been his friend. A good many trees grew along the wall, and one of them had fallen against it. Branches large enough to support a man jutted almost up to the top of the wall. Blade and Twana headed toward the tree.

  Blade dropped his pack and other gear and scrambled up the tree. Some of the branches sagged under his weight, but all of them held. In a few minutes he crawled out onto the top of the city wall. On hands and knees he crept toward the inner side of the wall, half-expecting to stick his head into yet another weird energy field.

  Instead, he found himself staring down at the ground. The city wall was barely ten feet thick. At the foot of the wall was a belt of what looked like faded green concrete. Beyond it was another stretch of ragged garden. Two miles away the buildings of the city began, mounting up like a mountain range, from five-story foothills to the crowning peaks of the mile-high towers. Nothing moved except the grass, where it was long enough to ripple in the wind.

  Blade sighed. It looked as if he had come all this way to reach a dead city.

  He crawled back across the wall, threw one end of the rope down, and saw Twana tie his gear and weapons to it. He pulled them up, put on his sword belt, then threw the rope down again. A moment later Twana was standing beside him.

  In the moment after that, the city came horribly alive. The nearest tower, fifty yards away, sprouted lean, red-clad figures with gleaming blue rifles in their hands. «Get down!» Blade shouted, grabbing Twana's belt as he dropped flat.

  He was seconds too slow. One of the figures raised his rifle, sighted, and fired. Air crackled and blurred, and a halo of white danced around Twana's head. She gave a choked cry and threw her arms out wildly to keep her balance. She took a drunken, reeling step; then one flailing foot came down on the empty air inside the wall. She vanished with a scream that ended in a crunch as she struck the ground fifty feet below.

  Then there was silence-except for the sharp hiss of Blade's indrawn breath as he stood up and the softer hiss of steel as he drew his sword.

  Chapter 11

  Blade had enough self-control left not to charge or even shout. He stood where he was, staring at the cluster of red figures on the tower. He stared as if the intensity of his stare could draw them down from their perch and into range of his sword.

  A part of his mind told him that he shouldn't do this, that he was endangering himself and his chances of peaceful relations with the people of this city. It was only a small part of his mind that said this, a
nd the rage in Blade made him totally deaf to it. He didn't care about the danger to himself, not if he could take a few of those red-suited sharpshooters with him. As for peaceful relations-as far as he could see, these people couldn't have cared less about that. If they were going to be this trigger-happy ….

  Or were they? There seemed to be confusion among the men on the tower. Two of them seemed to be arguing with the man who'd fired. The wind blurred the words past understanding, but they all seemed to be thoroughly excited about something. Their lean bodies were taut, and their arms waved about frantically. It looked as though something unexpected had happened. Could it be Twana's death-if she were dead? Blade risked stepping over to the edge of the wall and looking down. After a moment he looked away. Even from up here he could tell that he'd brought Twana to her death. She lay face down, her head twisted at an angle to her body that nothing living could ever take.

  As Blade stepped back from the edge of the wall, the soldiers started disappearing from the top of the tower. A moment later a door opened onto the top of the wall, dilating like the lens of a camera. Five soldiers filed out and came toward Blade. All of them were carrying their rifles at the ready. The one who'd fired trailed a little behind the other four, and Blade saw the others looking uncertainly back at him. Blade relaxed slightly, but did not sheath his sword and went on willing the soldiers to come closer. If they kept on, they'd be so close that they could hardly use their rifles without hitting each other. He would have no such problem with his sword.

  The soldiers came on. Their boots, coveralls, and helmets were all fire-engine red. Apparently they'd never heard of camouflage, or else had no need of it. Their rifles were streamlined, with silver barrels and stocks and butts of dark-blue plastic. They carried black truncheons and small cylindrical green boxes on their web belts. The faces under the helmets ….

  The faces had human shape and human features, but all five sets of features were as identical as so many stamped coins. The skin of their faces and hands flexed and creased like living skin, but it had a waxy sheen that Blade had never seen, except in the skin of a dying man or a corpse.

  More robots. No, not robots-androids. Artificial beings in human shape, perhaps organic, perhaps with all the parts and processes of a human being. Nonetheless, artificial creations of a biological science generations beyond that of Home Dimension. Were they programmed like the robots, or had they been given human intelligence to match their human forms? Certainly their greater physical versatility would make them more formidable opponents than the Watchers.

  Blade decided to take the initiative and see what came of it. As the androids approached, he raised his sword and held in out in front of him, barring the androids' path.

  «Halt! What is your business here?»

  The five androids stopped as if they'd run into a stone wall, and the one who'd fired raised his rifle to his shoulder. One of his comrades grabbed it by the barrel and, with an angry growl, drew it down again. «He commands like a Master, (a meaningless gabble that might have been a name or a number),» the restraining android said sharply.

  «He is not a Master,» said the other.

  «We do not know that.»

  «Ask him, then,» said a third android. All of them spoke without changing the expressionless blankness of their faces. They all spoke in a clipped, almost comically precise fashion, biting off their words so quickly that Blade had to listen carefully to understand what they were saying.

  «You need not ask,» he said. «I am a Master.»

  «You are not of the Authority,» said the one who'd fired. He did not raise his rifle, but now his voice held a distinct note of anger that Blade didn't like. «No Master who is not of Authority leaves the Houses of Peace.»

  «I am of the Authority,» said Blade. «I have been ordered to travel beyond the wall of the city. The Master you killed was with me. The Authority will not be pleased at what you have done.»

  This had no effect on the hostile android, but the other four looked at each other. Finally one of them said, «We must keep you here and call the Authority. They will tell us who you are.»

  «You doubt the word of a Master,» said Blade. He made it a statement, not a question. He also made his voice flat and cold, deliberately menacing.

  «Yes,» said the hostile android. The others were silent and seemed to be thoroughly uncomfortable about the whole situation.

  «It is not permitted to doubt the word of a Master,» said Blade sharply. «Since you have done that which is not permitted, you shall give me your weapon.» He shifted his feet slightly apart, into combat stance, and watched the android's hands and eyes. From long experience he knew that dividing one's enemies and setting them against each other was always a step in the right direction.

  «I-will-not-give-it!» said the android. Each word was at a higher pitch than the one before it, until the last one came out a shrill scream.

  Blade took a step sideways and got ready to drop his sword and close with the hysterical android. Before he could do anything more, the android went into action. The muzzle of its rifle swung toward Blade. Blade started to drop to his knees, ready to go in under the rifle with the sword. Before either the android or Blade could complete their movements, one of the other androids leaped forward. The hysterical android fired by sheer reflex. The white beam of the rifle took the second android in the head at a range of no more than a single foot. His mouth sagged open, his eyes dissolved into pulp, blood gushed from his nose. He went to his knees, dropping his own rifle. One hand clutched at his killer's belt. Then he went forward on his face in a widening pool of silver-tinged blood.

  Blade dropped his sword and snatched up the fallen rifle. Before he could bring it into action, another android closed with the killer, grabbing his rifle and shoving the muzzle skyward. The killer held on grimly and tried to back away, dragging his attacker with him. Blade and the last two androids raised their rifles and sighted on the killer. Before they could fire, the killer whirled around, swinging his attacker with him. The other android gave a tremendous heave, pulling his opponent off his feet but going down with him.

  The two androids rolled over and over, kicking and clawing at each other, so thoroughly tangled together that Blade and the other androids didn't dare fire. The fighting androids rolled over several more times, reached the edge of the wall, and vanished over it. Unlike Twana, they did not scream. There was a moment of ghastly silence, then a double-barreled thud, and the crackle of one of the rifles fired by dead fingers. The rifle fired until the air reeked of ozone, then died away, leaving silence behind it.

  Blade was the first to break the silence. He pointed his rifle at the last two androids and spoke sharply. «You will give me your weapons. You will go into the tower. You will stay there until the Authority gives you an order to leave. You are all unreliable.» The two androids shuddered at the last word. Blade wondered if it had some special meaning in their programming or training.

  «We shall please the Master.» The two androids knelt, put down their rifles, and remained kneeling while Blade picked up the weapons. He examined them, found the power sources, and removed them. Each power source was a small red box, about the size of a pocket calculator. Blade put both boxes in his pack, then hammered the rifles on the top of the wall until they broke apart.

  «Now I shall go down from the wall and go to the Authority,» he said. The androids nodded. Still kneeling, one of them touched the top of the green cylinder of his belt. Blade heard a faint hiss and saw a ladder reaching all the way to the ground slide out from the inner face of the wall.

  «I am pleased,» he said. «You may now go to your tower.» Blade waited until the androids had vanished, then scrambled down the ladder.

  The two fallen androids were both as dead as Twana. Blade left them lying where they'd fallen but took the power cells of their rifles. Then he lifted Twana's body on his back and carried it a mile toward the city. Inside a circle of close-grown trees, he used the girl's own sword to di
g a grave. When the grave was deep enough, he laid Twana in it, with her weapons beside her. Then he pushed the earth back over her and finally piled heavy stones from a fallen wall on the grave. When he'd finished, he was filthy and sweating, and he suspected he'd taken more time than he should have.

  He also knew that he could have done no less. His good intentions had only brought Twana on a long and futile journey to a wretched death and a lonely grave far from her own village and her own people. He could at least give her a decent burial.

  Then he washed himself off in the nearest pond, gathered up weapons and pack, and headed toward the city.

  Blade followed an intricate path through the gardens, keeping under cover as much as possible. He hoped he'd kept the two androids on the wall from sounding the alarm or setting up ambushes for him, but he didn't trust them. He did not intend to be an easy target for any of the city's defenders-robot, android, human, or anything else.

  Apparently there were some living human beings in this city, or at least there had been within the memory of the androids. He'd be more careful and conciliatory in his approach to these humans, if he found them. He'd also have a few things to tell them about their pet android soldiers!

  It took Blade several hours to creep to the edge of the city. By that time it was getting dark, and a rising wind hinted at another storm coming. Blade started looking for an intact, but uninhabited, building to shelter him for the night. Before he entered the city, he stopped and tied one of his spare knives to the muzzle of his rifle with a length of cord. It was an improvised and precarious bayonet, but enough to be a thoroughly unpleasant surprise to any enemy who came to close quarters.