by P R Glazier
Chapter 34. The Companions Reunited
They didn’t have to wait for long for over the dunes they saw the top of the great beast, the sun glinted off its shiny hide. It rose over the dunes, slowly it crept forward, a throbbing humming noise emanated from it, the noise of great but harnessed power. Nar’Allia thought it was just above the desert flying low, but that was a deception, for the sheer size of the monster made it look closer than it actually was, for when its nose section was immediately above them Nar’Allia could see that in fact it was fifty or sixty metres above them at least, but still it blotted out the sun and a deep shadow fell over them. None of the three had the time to worry about any imminent attack, not that they would have stood a chance against something so massively large and powerful, but the sight of the great beast hovering above them was awe-inspiring to say the least. If this was a good example of what the human adversaries of ancient times faced when under attack then the war that raged must have been terrible indeed.
But then they noticed the great machine was losing altitude, it was descending right above them. Nar’Allia gasped; did it mean to crush them into the sands?
Then piercingly loud they heard a voice say, “STAY WHERE YOU ARE, DO NOT MOVE.”
Nar’Allia covered her ears the sound was deafening, but then she heard equally as booming, “WHOOPS, SORRY THAT WAS TOO LOUD WASN’T IT?”
She had to stop herself from saying that yes, it was, but she still found herself nodding her head in agreement. But, she was thinking about something else, not concentrating on her reactions for something about that voice was familiar, she had heard it many times before. But her attention was taken away, for a circular opening had appeared in the belly of the beast above them and slowly winding its way down through this opening was a set of metal spiral stairs that stopped about a metre above the desert sands.
“Come on up.” The same voice as before spoke, but the volume had obviously been adjusted down to a comfortable level.
“By the Maker, if that’s you master Pnook; if you are in there, you have some serious questions to answer.” It was Amndo hauling himself up and stepping onto the lower rung of the ladder. Once he was secure, he held out his hand to Nar’Allia who took it and found herself immediately lifted onto the spiral stair. She squeezed past Amndo and went up several steps. Looking back down she could see that Amndo had also helped Jonas to step up. So she wearily carried on climbing up the steps and into the belly of the beast. She stepped from the top step of the stairway onto a hard metal floor, looking around she could see she had entered a small room, various suits of clothing hung on one of the walls and a rack of weapons on another, at least she assumed they were weapons, for they had the little trigger and the long tube like device similar to those she had seen JDC take in the hall of the Leviathan. But once they were all inside the spiral ladder rose back up, neatly folding itself as it came until it took up but a small space within the circular door through which they had entered, the door then sealed shut again.
A light came on in the chamber, Nar’Allia shivered slightly as she thought how her enjoyment of being back in the open once more was after all short lived. Suddenly they heard a hissing noise; looking upwards they became aware of a fine mist filling the chamber from out of several nozzles mounted in the ceiling above their heads. Nar’Allia cried out in alarm as did the other two. Jonas looked around frantically for an exit, but could find no hint of a door handle or anything that would allow their escape out of the room. They all crouched trying to evade the mist that was coming down, but eventually to no avail and they were enveloped in a fine spray. It felt slightly moist to the touch; it was odourless and quite pleasantly cool. Nar’Allia held her hands in front of her; she could just about see them through the gathering fog. She gasped as she saw all the grime and red dust from the desert running off her hands and dripping onto the floor. The fine mist was gathering into dark red coloured puddles around their feet, but as they watched it seemed to disperse and soak into the floor through fine holes that they had not noticed earlier. After a few minutes the mist had cleared, gradually it had all disappeared through the floor. When it had all gone, the companions stared at each other in amazement, for all their clothing, their hair, their very skin all was clean and sparkling. Even the metal fitments about their persons looked highly polished, looking like the day they were made. A door that they had not noticed suddenly opened on one side of the room. There beyond the door stood a figure they knew. JDC was standing there his arms folded across his chest and a beaming smile upon his face.
Nar’Allia couldn’t contain herself any longer, her relief and joy at seeing JDC again spilled out in laughter. She ran forward and kneeling hugged the Pnook in a tight embrace. The other two joined her, although they were content to shake his hand or clap him fondly on the back.
After the greetings were over JDC stepped backwards and stood to one side, he gestured with a flourish and a bow. “Welcome, welcome my friends to the great Leviathan. But before we do anything else please drink this.” He reached into a small alcove in the wall and withdrew three small cups of bright blue liquid, he handed each of them a cup and encouraged them to drink. Nar’Allia sniffed at the liquid, Amndo and Jonas both eyed it with deep suspicion.
“Please,” said JDC, “I assure you I am not trying to poison you, it is a special fluid that will render the residual effects of the sterilisation fluid within the air lock inert inside you.”
They looked at him in confusion.
“The fine mist that engulfed you in the air lock? It is a biological cleaning substance, if some got into you this drink will render it safe so that it does not affect you adversely.”
Nar’Allia downed hers in one fearing being poisoned by the mist that they had all been exposed to.
JDC laughed, he turned and beckoned to them to follow him. “By the Maker have I got things to show you, come.” He waved at them to follow him. They walked along many corridors, some had rooms leading off to each side, but JDC ignored all of them. They climbed many spiral metal stairs to other levels within the machine. Eventually they faced a large door, JDC pressed a button and the door slid to one side. They stepped into a large room, windows surrounded them looking out over the Rust desert. The windows extended from the front and wrapped around each side. In the centre of the room were several table-like structures, each flat and with a glassy surface through which many lights shone, all different shapes and colours. All around beneath the windows similar flat glass tables could be seen each with its own array of lights.
JDC stepped forward and with a sweeping motion of his hand said, “this my friends is the main control room.” Walking forward to one of the tables beneath the windows he said, “here at the front we have navigational equipment and controls, I detected your body heat from sensors on the hull connected through to this console. These sensors can detect the smallest amount of heat from a great distance away so I knew someone was there, thus suspecting the three sources that showed up to be you three, I came to meet you.” He walked across to one side of the control room. “Over here we have internal functional controls, here is the control centre for releasing and recovering the Startmektoken this control panel is replicated within the hangar bay below where the soldiers are housed. Here are the functions for weapons control and over there the backup weapons control.” He strode across to the other side. “Here are the main guidance systems and communications desks.” He then walked to the centre of the control room and sat in a large plush chair which he playfully spun around whilst holding out one arm as if to show them everything once again. “In short my friends what we have here is a very advanced and complex weapons system, far beyond anything known to any race, at least that I know of. We have in our possession an extremely powerful and potentially very destructive machine.” Then as if to voice Nar’Allia’s earlier thoughts he said. “If this is one weapon that the humans had at their disposal to wage war with, then quite frankly I’m not surprised that they virtua
lly destroyed themselves and their world along with them.
Jonas frowned at JDC.
JDC on seeing his expression said, “no offence my friend, you should be proud that your race at one point in their history had this technology at their disposal.
“But there is Pnook influence here as well, you as much as said so back in the Silo, perhaps it is not of human design after all?”
JDC nodded, “you are right, many of the controls have Pnook characters and indicators. I suspect that the Pnook took a human design and modified it, adapted it to undertake more functionality. It is a very impressive piece of technology, born from a very advanced scientific knowledge.
Jonas in response just said, “it does not impress me master Gnome.”
Nar’Allia shook her head at JDC’s explanations, it all went over her head, beyond her understanding. She was far more interested in other things. “But JDC, how did you, I mean you escaped, how? You must tell us what happened after you closed the door and we lost you.”
JDC laughed and stopped the chair in which he sat from spinning around again. He faced Nar’Allia and the other two, “Well, therein lays a tale to be sure,” said JDC. “As you know I shut the door once again and I turned immediately thinking that I would face the creatures that I knew must be following us. It was dark in the passageway, I shouldered my weapon ready to send them back to whatever darkened hole they originated from, but you can imagine my surprise and relief when none came. I waited there for many minutes, but none showed their ugly faces. So I started to go back the way that we had come, feeling my way along the walls. Not that I had any choice of course. But eventually I arrived back in the hall of the Leviathan; the creatures must have the ability to open the big blast doors to access the chamber of the Leviathan for they were open when I arrived. Imagine my relief at seeing the gradually brightening glow of the lights from the chamber shining up the passage I walked down. Other than that, nothing had changed; all seemed the same as when we had left. The creatures that attacked us had gone, not one was to be seen in the place, not only that but they had taken their dead and wounded with them.” He thought for a while and said, “I do not want to think why they took the dead and wounded, but I assume food is scares if you are resident, unless we have missed something of course. But anyway, they had gone and the only other way out I assumed was the door through which we had come from the cistern. It occurred to me that the only possible way to reopen the door must be from the control room.
I spent many hours, more than a few days most probably, learning all about the controls and what they did. As I experimented it suddenly dawned on me that I might be able to fly the Leviathan out, for it became apparent that the hall in which the metal monster stood was a purpose-built hanger and it was meant to fly from there, and return of course. All I had to do was find out how to get everything operational. Then I had a breakthrough I found a control screen in which were stored many technical manuals for the place.” He looked towards Jonas, “many of the instructions were in my language. I couldn’t believe my luck, I had all the help I needed, more than I needed actually, that I’m afraid did delay me further because I could not miss the opportunity to learn about the whole place. I found out many things, you know the cistern full of water, well that is a store for cooling water, coolant for the power generation centre which is somewhere in another complex.”
Here Jonas said, “yes, we found it, the power room I mean.”
“Did you now! What was it like? The power needed to supply this place must be phenomenal; I bet it was an impressive sight?” Then without stopping and waiting for an answer he carried on, “did you know that the original power source was from some kind of crude contained and continual explosion at the molecular level. Very clever, it relied upon the destruction of materials that make up the smallest building blocks of matter. Very dangerous and uncontrollable, for once the cycle was started it would have been impossible to stop, only to slow down or speed up. But somewhere long ago this old and unreliable energy source was replaced by one that we are familiar with, there is a small but powerful gravitational arcane core set in the heart of the facility. This compressed core generates all the power that the facility needs. I am sure that the humans that built the Silo did not have this technology at the time, the power source must have been installed by the Pnook! The core would also have to have been contained, the compressed state of the arcane energy would have bent time and space otherwise. The containment coils alone would be enormous, the housing for them alone would span many kilometres.”
Nar’Allia thought about the power room and its sheer size, she also remembered the presence she felt, the looming doom she sensed within the power room, she wondered if the core that JDC spoke of could have been what she sensed. She knew her people were sensitive to the arcane energies generated by focussing the natural gravity associated with large masses like the world. She supposed that if through some technology those energies could be compressed and held in stasis then the arcane output would greatly increase, her natural senses would most probably react to it.
But before she could voice her thoughts, JDC carried on with his enthusiastic speech. “Well maybe one day I will return and take a look myself. But anyway, the water from the cistern cycles around non-stop cooling the original power coils the humans installed, for although they are now redundant the nuclear reaction that was started can never be stopped, it would take tens of thousands of years for the reaction to decay to an extent where the materials used would become safe.” Here he laughed, “forgive me master Jonas but your people must have been desperate to use such a dangerous and unclean source of energy. The cooling water when it is cycling becomes contaminated with special chemicals that I assume were designed to enhance the cooling properties of the water. But once a year, now this is interesting, the power plant is automatically adjusted for maintenance and the quantity of cooling water is reduced. During this time the pollutants in the cooling water of the cistern quickly evaporate within a few hours. The water is also put through a filtration system and completely by chance the water becomes drinkable for about seven to eight days during this period.
“And during one of the maintenance periods as you describe it, that is when the nomads have Jethrent.” Exclaimed Nar’Allia.
“Just so,” said JDC. “But I also found out that there may be other facilities dotted around the continent; each facility was totally independent of the others. I tried to communicate with the other facilities, but there was no answer from any of them. I fear that the one we were in is the only one remaining operational, all the others have either failed or had been destroyed during the war that raged here long ago.”
“It would seem however that the cistern provides perfect camouflage and defence for the entrance and exit of the Leviathan machines, as we saw the water can be drained out of the cistern and stored in vast tanks underground and then pumped back into the cistern again. So I discovered how to fly this machine out. All that was left for me to do was to learn how to control the machine itself. This actually proved quite simple. Once the machine is running, control from the control room can be duplicated from within the machine; that is what some of these control desks do. The whole process can be controlled from within the machine and by a single individual if necessary, it seems that the whole system was designed that way. Imagine my delight when I found out that to launch the Leviathan and fly it out of its hanger and out of the cistern requires but the push of a single button here on this console.” He indicated the button with his finger. “I think that by the time these machines of war were designed and built. Perhaps the race that made them was dwindling to but a few and they couldn’t spare a large crew to control these beasts. So I was able to drain the cistern and open the great doors that allow these machines to fly out into the now empty cistern and rise out of the lake and fly off. No wonder the nomads thought there to be a monster living in the lake eh?”
“JDC you’re a genius,” said Amndo, “thank yo
u for the detailed history lesson, but I fear I will have to disappoint you on one point”.
“Oh?” exclaimed JDC as he held his head cocked to one side.
“Yes, I’m afraid that the hall of the Leviathan has most probably been destroyed.”
At this point Nar’Allia, Amndo and Jonas told JDC of the events they had experienced after they were split up, JDC took great interest in all they had to say. He asked them to describe in detail the interior of the facility. At the end Nar’Allia commented on how pleased she was that JDC had managed to escape before the destruction and how good it was to see him again.
JDC was also interested in the state of the old man they had met within the power room. He was amazed that the systems within kept the old man alive for all this time, if what he had said was true. But he also said that the Leviathan was also a sealed unit; that was why after they had entered into the small room up the spiral stair they could not enter the Leviathan proper until a rigorous cleansing process had been accomplished. So perhaps the facility ensured the survival of all its inhabitants by artificial means and this is replicated within this machine.”
Jonas was the next to speak, “I think I know why, for there was decay within the facility, the desert had breached through the walls and ceilings in many places, the machine that Nar’Allia so affectionately called Tidbit was obviously a maintenance and repair automaton, but alone he couldn’t possibly stem the tide of the inevitable forever, it would only have been a matter of time I feel before that facility went the same way as the others.”
“It is a shame,” said JDC, “we have most likely witnessed the destruction of the last remaining facility. In my many years traversing the desert region I have never seen another range of mountains with a cistern within and the peoples that populate the desert regions only tell of one such place. All the other facilities as I said, must have either been totally destroyed by war, or degenerated into nothing long ago.”
Amndo was deep in thought and when all was silent he said, “but I still wonder what are we going to do with this machine, now we have discovered it, we will surely make many enemies once the true nature of the Leviathan is discovered, many will seek to destroy it, or worse capture it for their own use. However pleased you may be with your new toy JDC, I can’t help thinking that you may wish that such a thing remained hidden and undiscovered before this adventure of ours is over.”