But on the helmet she can see the four letters A D A M!
May 9, 19, Marchenko 2
Sometimes you just have to wait and good things will happen. Just as Marchenko 2’s fabricators finished making his weapon, he hears footsteps—irregular, as if the person is injured. What could this be? He wonders whether he should move forward and look around the corner where the side corridor meets the main passage, but then he might give himself away, losing his greatest advantage. Who knows how well the other person can hear! If his assumption is correct and the unknown opponent is really injured, where would injured creatures go to hide? In narrow side passages, where they are not immediately visible.
Marchenko 2 prepares himself. He can flick his whip forward as soon as something comes around the corner. He will shoot first and ask questions later. While the metal wire is flying through the air he can still modulate the current, based on whom he is facing. It probably is Eve. The steps of the other Marchenko, and definitely those of the alien who uttered the scream, would be louder, he imagines.
He is so excited he can barely contain himself. He has been waiting for so long to see Eve again! What is approaching him is definitely alone. If he is lucky, the other Marchenko and Eve have separated, unaware of any danger. Then he can grab Eve and return with her to Valkyrie right away. At least if she still has her pressure suit—otherwise he will have to create a new one for her. Then it would become more likely that he’d have to eliminate the other Marchenko, because he...
He cannot believe what he is seeing: Adam! Adam? Where did he come from? How did he manage to escape Valkyrie? Marchenko 2 knows he must not hesitate. The whip lashes out and wraps around Adam’s legs as fast as lightning. He has selected the lowest current strength, yet Adam topples like a chopped-down tree, while a large lump of metal slides from his hands. This is the object he himself had found down in the garbage dump! Adam must have had an important reason to carry it along all the way, because the thing is heavy.
He cannot ask him right now, because he is unconscious. Marchenko 2 comes closer to examine him. He turns Adam’s head to the side. On his forehead he sees a heavily-bleeding laceration. He orders some nano-fabricators to close the wound. How did the boy manage to follow him? He almost admires Adam, even though he is also angry about his disobedience. He will have to teach his children respect, because the other Marchenko seems to have neglected to do that. One should not confuse love with tolerating disrespect.
Adam is no longer wearing a pressure suit. He probably took it off because of its weight. His body’s core temperature is slightly elevated. He must have really exerted himself during the last 12 hours. No wonder, Marchenko 2 thinks, after all, he has been pursuing me! He also sees a wound on Adam’s wrist. It is a cut, covered by a thin film to stop the bleeding.
One moment, Marchenko 2 thinks as he scratches off a piece of the film and analyses it. The structure was definitely created by fabricators. Adam does not possess any, so he must have met the other Marchenko. No. This can't be true! He himself did not encounter the other Marchenko, but Adam somehow found him? Wait... Could his alter ego have been—be—inside the lump of metal he left behind?
Marchenko 2 knows now he obviously made a big mistake. Luckily, everything turned out alright, because the other robot still seems to be in a dismal state. He obviously needed to absorb energy first. The two of them must have tried to find a sheltered spot in this side corridor, so the other Marchenko could take his time to repair his body. Well, that’s over now.
Marchenko 2 ties Adam’s legs firmly, so he won’t be able to run away after awakening. Then he approaches the fragment of scrap that once was a robot. Now, finally, he will turn it into a mere piece of trash. He just has to hit it for a while with his whip. A few seconds at the highest level and all circuits of the AI’s computing unit will melt into a useless lump. Whoever said an artificial intelligence could not die? He will soon demonstrate that the opposite is true. It is amazing, he thinks, that in the end biological and artificial intelligences are so similar. Any consciousness will disappear if its physical foundation is taken away.
“Don’t do it, Marchenko.”
The piece of scrap can talk. At least for now...
“How do you know what I am planning to do?”
“I saw how you brought down Adam.”
“The boy is fine, don’t worry. I took care of his head wound.”
“But what will he say when he wakes up and I am gone?”
“He will get used to it.” Wait a moment. He has an idea that will make his alter ego’s death even more painful. “He won’t even notice it. I will copy your structure. That’s easy, as it only has to be external. Then I can take your place once and for all.”
He likes this plan enormously. He just has to keep Adam unconscious until the transformation is finished. Then he will wake him and tell him how he managed to finally defeat the evil Marchenko— Marchenko 2, as they had labeled him. Afterward they just have to find Eve. She will be so happy to see Adam again that she will gladly come back to Valkyrie.
“But what is the purpose of it all?”
His alter ego realizes what Marchenko 2 is up to. And now he wants to stall him for as long as possible. Perhaps he hopes that Eve will appear in the nick of time to rescue him, or that some miracle will happen.
“It does not matter,” Marchenko 2 answers. “You are just stalling for time.”
“Maybe I should tell you what Adam and I talked about during the last few hours, and what Eve and I experienced. Otherwise the two of them will be suspicious right away. This won’t be their first time to have you pretending to be me.”
A clever approach. “And you would do that?”
“Do I have a choice? At least I can prolong my life that way.”
“By a few minutes.”
“So you agree?”
“Just get started.” Marchenko 2 is a bit annoyed that his alter ego managed to persuade him to delay his plan. Yet this issue of credibility is a valid one. There is only one problem: He cannot know whether he is being told lies. However, he does not think that Marchenko would do this. It is only natural he would want to delay his death. He definitely would not want Adam and Eve to be unhappy after his death.
If Marchenko 2 had to make that same decision, he would do anything to make life as difficult as possible for his opponent, even after his own death. He would die happy if he could be certain of that. Nevertheless, he trusts this Marchenko to tell him the truth. That is crazy, considering they were created from the same electronic substance. Adam and Eve are not related to each other, but he and this Marchenko are like identical twins separated at birth who discover 20 years later that they developed very differently.
Therefore he listens to the Marchenko in the lump of metal, and integrates what he hears into his own memories. Once he finishes this process he won’t even know that these are not his own recollections. About ten minutes have passed.
“And then we arrived in this side corridor. You know the rest,” says the piece of scrap, which soon will be a glowing heap of burned circuits.
“Thanks. It’s been fun talking with you.”
“Do you have any ideas concerning life after death?”
Now the other Marchenko is getting too garrulous. Life after death? That is ridiculous. Marchenko 2 does not articulate this thought. Instead, he checks the charge level of the whip. Then he examines Adam again, but he is not moving at all. He must make sure Adam does not witness this. It is very much like murder, after all, he thinks, and then wonders why this does not bother him more. Is that abnormal? Is he sick? He feels very healthy. He is really looking forward to the time with Adam and Eve. They had been taken from him for such a long time! At first he will treat them the way their Marchenko would, and then he will tighten the reins gradually, so it won’t be noticeable. This will seem like a normal process to the children. And it really will do them good.
Suddenly a deep, booming voice interrupts his musing
s.
“Whattt uss louketed thurr!”
Behind him, no more than a meter and a half away, stands a huge, brown-skinned creature that looks rather like a frog, with two legs and four arms, but without a head. Marchenko 2 knows right away that this must be the alien who uttered the scream earlier. One of its giant, dark eyes stares at him, and two of its four hands hold a weapon obviously aimed at him.
Now Marchenko 2 is glad he has not yet used the whip. He lashes out with it against the alien’s skin. He chooses maximum current strength, and the wire is glowing. The hot metal burns itself into the alien’s skin. Its limbs jerk. Marchenko 2 sees how all four hands try to grasp the weapon’s handle, where the trigger must be located, but the electrical energy makes the extraterrestrial lose control of its limbs. One of the arms involuntarily tosses the weapon in a high forward arc, into the main corridor. A slimy mass oozes out between the frog’s legs. The alien utters a horrifying, resounding scream. Then it falls backward, its arms and legs tremble, the scream fades, and the terrible creature is dead.
Brightnight 36, 3876
It’s no use. He is not getting through with his attempts to communicate with the foreign creature. If he is not mistaken, the foreigner is afraid. No wonder, as it looks strikingly more fragile in reality than in the video recordings from the control room. Its spindly arms and legs, the slender body with two bumps at the front, and particularly that impractical round thing in the middle on top... That must throw this creature quite off-balance. It doesn’t seem easy for the foreigner to balance this body part, as it wobbles back and forth, and sometimes the creature even has to use one of its hands to stabilize itself.
Nevertheless, this being has managed to travel through space. Life is amazingly varied and always finds a way, even under such negative starting conditions as the home planet of this species must have offered. If the intruder were not responsible for the death of his comrades and—soon—this entire world, Gronolf might almost pity it.
Gronolf watches the creature and speculates. Does it have a sex? How does it defend itself? He can see no weapons. Perhaps it uses a contact poison, like the pepperfish that not even the carriontooth dares to attack. He should not underestimate this strange creature. Perhaps that is its great advantage—not being considered capable of defense, so that it can surprise others by using its true abilities. Gronolf thinks of the lickslimer, which disguises itself as the discarded tail tip of the spiny lizard, a great delicacy. Those who greedily fell for this became victims themselves. As soon as the lickslimer landed in the primary stomach, it started to devour its host from the inside.
However, this strange creature is too large for that kind of attack.
“I donnt unnastand,” the creature had answered when he gave a friendly greeting. Gronolf cannot remember hearing these words in the video recordings. Nor was “latt ahss tokk” in there. How should he react? How can he make the weird creature understand he only wants to talk to it, at least for now?
“Peace be with you!” he says several times, but he realizes that the meaning of this greeting is not obvious. Any enemy understanding his language would value and appreciate this temporary peace offering. He hasn’t learned more. He was not trained as a Language Scientist, nor as a Script Scientist. However, he cannot imagine how such training would help him now. He would first need some time to study the stranger’s language. Unfortunately, time is the one thing he lacks
Therefore Gronolf takes a big step forward. He wants to take the foreign creature to the central room and use the system to communicate via sign language. Just as he feared, the creature considers his step as an attack. I haven’t even unlocked the safety catch on my weapon! he thinks.
The intruder runs away in panic. Gronolf doesn’t notice that the small machine accompanying the creature is also activating. It quickly slips under his descending foot and throws him off balance through the unexpected movement. He hears cracking and crunching when his weight grinds the machine to dust, followed by a loud rumbling caused by his falling body. Gronolf screams his frustration and anger into the corridor.
Then he slowly gets back on his feet. He doesn’t have to run. He is not in a hurry, because he knows the strange creature cannot escape. The corridor it selected will lead to the reactor cooling chamber, and that’s the end. He can follow the path leisurely. Perhaps the foreigner will also need some time to calm down. It has to realize there is no other way but to own up for its deeds. Gronolf stomps through the corridor that is slowly leading downward.
Suddenly he hears words.
“It dosont matta!” somebody says.
This sounds like the foreigner’s language. Is the creature talking to itself? Gronolf slows down and starts to move silently. His trainer always praised him for how well he could sneak up to targets.
“Juss gatt startad.”
What could this mean? It must be the same creature speaking these two sentences, as the pitch seems identical. Gronolf tries to remember the pitch of the intruder who ran away from him, but he can’t. It is hard to notice differences, particularly as he can’t understand a single word. This voice comes from a side corridor further ahead. Perhaps the creature is hiding from him there, trying to calm down by talking to itself? He likes to use that technique for himself. He prefers a louder voice, though, in order to vent his overflowing emotions. But that isn’t a very good idea if you are hiding.
Gronolf stops again, shortly before the side corridor. What at first sounded like a dialogue has become a soliloquy that has an oddly calming effect. One thing seems to be true: The foreign creature wants to comfort itself. Should he give it another moment? Fear only leads to irrational reactions. He stands silently and listens until the creature has ended its soliloquy. What had he just heard without understanding it?
It is time to solve the problem. Gronolf walks around the corner. What he sees confuses him. A foreign creature is lying on the ground, motionless. Is it dead? It is not the specimen he met earlier. So there were two intruders! Yet why did he only see one in the video recordings of the control room? Was that part of the plan? No matter what these alien creatures intended, it failed—otherwise one of them wouldn’t lie as though dead here in this side corridor.
The soliloquy must have come from the machine crouching next to the creature. Is it providing medical services? It has turned in his direction and is examining him. It does not look particularly dangerous, as it is small and has four legs that are even thinner than those of the alien creatures. He aims his harpoon at it, just to be safe, and releases the safety catch. He hopes that the machine won’t be so stupid as to attack him, because if he fires his weapon, the explosion might also injure the alien creature lying on the floor.
What is that on the machine’s front leg? The very instant Gronolf manages to formulate this thought, an incredible pain claws at his side. His body fails. He recognizes that he was attacked with electrical energy from the thing on the machine’s leg, but knowing that doesn’t help him any. His arms automatically try to fire the harpoon, but his muscles are beyond control. He doesn't stand a chance. The pain is unbearable. His spasming muscles throw the weapon from his hands. He is defenseless and feels the involuntary release of his sperm. He cannot help but scream in pain and outrage. Gravity is pulling his body backward. He cannot resist.
Gronolf falls. Unconsciousness claims him.
May 9, 19, Eve
“Adam, you were here? What happened to you?” Eve whispers. She turns her brother’s destroyed helmet in her hand. The lining is quite wet. Eve dips her index finger in the liquid, smells first and then touches it to her tongue. It tastes salty, but not like seawater. It is sweat. That fact calms her a bit because it tells her the helmet was not destroyed under water. Adam must have been wearing it, so he lived until arriving here. That piece of news fills her with infinite gratitude. Somehow, he managed to survive icy cold and darkness and even enter the building where she is. He is one hell of a guy.
She slams her fist aga
inst the pipe that crosses through the room, coming out of one wall and disappearing into the opposing one. There is a dull thud. The pipe is not empty. Then it must be filled with water. She walks alongside. Towards the middle, where the blood can be seen on the floor, the cover is missing for a length of one and a half meters. Eve is so short she did not notice it earlier. Below this opened area the pipe carries flowing water. She cautiously dips her hand into it and notices that it is warm. This liquid also tastes salty. But this time it is seawater, as it contains more than salt—it tastes of life.
She concludes there must be a connection from here to the ocean. That would be a good escape route... if she had her pressure suit and enough oxygen to swim for a few weeks under the ice sheet until she reached an ice-free zone. How did Adam make it all the way here? There is only one possible method: He must have found Valkyrie. So she has to find her brother, and then they can leave this place together.
Yet there is a minor obstacle—that giant alien. And there is a huge problem: The thing hurtling toward this planet. In reality, it will be practically impossible to get out of here alive. Yet she cannot just give up, not when she is so close to a reunion with Adam.
A rumbling and a scream shock her out of her musings. That must have come from obstacle number 1. Eve looks around. The room offers no way of escape. She could try to hide inside the pipe, but without a breathing apparatus she can’t stay underwater for long. Unfortunately, Adam’s equipment is damaged. She might as well face her problem right away. Trying to run away from the alien had been a stupid idea. The fact that it didn’t kill her right away, though, indicates there might be a chance for building an understanding. She takes another look at Adam’s suit before she turns around and marches upward, back along the corridor.
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