Hille said, “Soad came and made us see what we’d been doing.”
“Soad?” Alicar repeated.
Ceveldt nodded, smiling. “The Child of the Gods. You see, djeel oil is god matter, Mr. Ralke! It wasn’t intended for men. Only the Children of the Gods may use it. Soad wants djeel oil, so we’ve been processing it for him. He’s forgiven us for taking it for ourselves.”
Alicar looked exasperated. “Telzey, get them out of this trance or whatever they’re in!”
“They’re in no trance,” she told him. “I’ve neutralized the control mechanisms enough to let them say what they really think. The Child of the Gods converted them, don’t you see? They believe him. The only djeel oil stored at the mine at this moment is what’s been processed during the past week. He comes by regularly to collect what they have on hand for him.”
“Who is that Child of the Gods?” She giggled helplessly. “A great big drop of liquid rolling like mercury across the desert at night! Ponogan was dreaming about it when I checked the mine from the mountain. I mentioned it, remember? That’s Soad. And, believe me, he is big!”
Alicar stared at her. “There’s no creature like that on Mannafra!”
Ceveldt said, “Soad came from far away. He needs djeel oil to return, and it’s been our privilege to provide him with what we could. But it isn’t enough.”
Hille added, “Mr. Ralke, he wants the djeel you took away from Mannafra. That was terribly wrong of you, but you didn’t know it. Soad’s forgiven you and has been waiting for you to return. He’ll come tonight, and you’ll understand then why you must go with one of his servants to bring back his djeel.”
“ ‘Servant’ meaning one of those control mechanisms,” Telzey put in.
Alicar looked startled. “I doubt he could do that to a shielded psi mind!”
She giggled again. “Couldn’t he? Remember how you stumbled across the djeel ore in the first place? You said you were flying by overhead and turned down on a hunch to take mineral samples—possibly at the one point on Mannafra where djeel can be found. On a hunch! Doesn’t it look like Soad was waiting for someone to come within psi range who could dig up and process the stuff for him? He slipped up then in letting you get away with the product of the first three months of operation. He’d like it back, of course. And he put full controls on the people who remained at the mine after you’d left, to make sure nothing like that could happen again.”
She added, “Whatever he is, he has a use for a ready supply of protoplasm, too! He’s collected the five missing members of your mine personnel along with his djeel.”
“Well,” Ceveldt said mildly, “it was required. The desert offers insufficient nourishment for Soad. Naturally, we’re no longer interested in mining serine crystals, and those men weren’t needed in the full production of the oil. It was an honor for them to serve him in another way.”
IV
Alicar shook his head, drew a deep breath. “Code Alicar!” he said sharply.
The Romango computer’s flat voice came into the office. “Instructions?”
“Close and seal every section of the installation to make sure the personnel stay where they are. Free passage at will is permitted only for myself and Nessine!”
“Complying,” said the computer.
“Unlock the vehicle section and open its exit.”
“Complying.”
“Accept no further orders until I address you again.”
“Understood.”
“End of instructions.” Alicar jerked his head at Telzey, started for the door to the outer office. “Come along!”
Hille and Ceveldt began to push themselves up from their chairs, the vapor-induced weakness still evident in clumsy motions.
“Mr. Ralke,” said Hille, “you mustn’t attempt to leave! That’s against Soad’s wishes!”
Alicar swung around to them, and now his gun was in his hand.
“Shut up!” he said savagely. “Stay in those chairs! If you try to follow, you’re dead men . . . Come on, Telzey!”
They left Hille and Ceveldt staring after them, hurried through the outer office, along the passage.
“Soad’s more than I counted on!” Alicar’s voice was unsteady. “We’re leaving, of course!”
“Hille was thinking the computer wouldn’t obey you,” Telzey told him.
“Well, he’s wrong! He didn’t know about the code override. You heard it acknowledge my instructions. The Romango’s one thing their monster can’t control. But hurry it up! I won’t feel safe until I’m off the planet.”
They ran back the way they’d come. There were blurred impressions of various minds in the surrounding structures, but Telzey tightened her shield and ignored them. For once, she agreed with Alicar—getting completely out of this area seemed the best immediate thing they could do. If possible.
They came to the passage leading to the vehicle section, to the door at its end. Alicar grasped the door handle, pulled at it, then strained, putting in all his strength. He swore furiously.
“Still locked! What—”
“Can you check with the computer?” Telzey asked.
“Not here! No voice pickup around!” Alicar chewed his lip, added, “Stand back!” and stepped away from the door, leveling his gun. Long darts of scarlet flame hissed around the lock. Metal flowed under the flame, hardened lumpily again. The air in the passage grew hot.
Alicar switched off the gun. He stepped forward, rammed the sole of his boot against the surface of the door. The door flew open.
“Come on!” he gasped. “We can open the exit manually!”
They started through into the vehicle section, came to a stop together.
The big work crane which had been standing in a corner when they arrived at the mine hadn’t stayed there. It was near the center of the compartment, swinging around toward the door on its treads as they caught’ sight of it. Crushed parts of their aircar lay scattered about. The crane started rolling toward them then. They backed hastily out into the passage.
“Now what?” Telzey felt short of breath. “Your override system’s a fake—a trick! Hille was right. Somebody spotted it while you were gone!”
Alicar stared at her, mouth twisting.
“Gulhas,” he said. “The technician! Where is he?”
“In the computer room, I think. I’ll check.”
“Do it while we’re on our way there. Get into full contact with him at once! Come on!”
“Alicar,” she said, running along behind him. “You’d better let me—”
“I’ll have you put Gulhas under control when we reach the computer room. Don’t bother me now. We might have other problems.”
Telzey didn’t reply. She caught an impression of Gulhas, lost it again. Contact wasn’t easy. She had to give attention to keeping up with Alicar, and there was another distraction. Something was going on; she wasn’t yet sure what. But—
“Alicar!”
“Come on!!” He didn’t glance back.
“Wait! Hille—”
Telzey broke off They were passing through the mine’s storage area; and now two men had appeared suddenly in the aisle ahead, stepping out from behind packing cases. Hille and Ceveldt. Guns in their hands, pointed at Alicar. And Alicar, hand hovering above the pocket that held his gun, came to an abrupt halt. She’d stopped twenty feet behind him.
“Mr. Ralke, don’t move!” Hille said quietly, walking forward. He might still be unsteady on his legs, but his face was hard and determined, and the gun didn’t waver. He went on. “The situation has changed! Your actions indicate to Soad that it might be too dangerous to send you back to get the djeel oil you stole. Therefore—”
The gun in his hand went off as Alicar threw himself to the floor and rolled sideways. It went off again, and so did Ceveldt’s, and Telzey saw one of the scarlet darts of Alicar’s gun flash into Hille’s chest. Ceveldt fired again, and Alicar jerked violently around, the gun flying from his hand and skidding down the aisl
e toward Telzey. She scooped it up, darted behind a piece of machinery on her left, and crouched down, heart pounding.
There was stillness for a moment. She worked herself in farther between the machines and the wall. From there, she could see a section of the floor, Hille lying on his back. She tried to reach his mind, found it disintegrating in death. Alicar—no, Alicar wasn’t dying, not yet! But he was badly hurt and unconscious.
Slow, cautious footsteps. Ceveldt. She shifted contact to his mind. Ceveldt was uninjured and coming watchfully toward the array of machines behind which she crouched, not knowing exactly where she was. She couldn’t see him and didn’t need to. She knew what he was going to say before he spoke.
“Soad can’t permit you to live either, Nessine or whoever you are,” his voice told her. “He knows what you’ve done, and it seems you might cause a great deal of trouble here before he made you understand it was wrong. You can’t get away—the doors are locked now. So come on out!” He added, “It will be painless and quick.”
Did he know she had Alicar’s gun? No, he didn’t; he’d seen it spinning away from Alicar’s hand, but his attention had been on the man, not the weapon. He’d seen her dart out of sight behind the machines, and he wanted to make sure of her before he went back to finish off Alicar, if that was required.
She felt him reach a decision, and crouched lower. Overhead and to her right, something thudded against the wall; heat washed briefly over her, and when she glanced up, she saw a small section of the wall glowing where the bolt had struck. She crept over to a point directly beneath it. He was less likely to fire at that exact spot again in trying to flush her into sight.
There were a dozen more shots, some crashing into metal, some against the wall. Then Ceveldt, not knowing whether he had reached her or not, was coming around the end of the array of machines where he had seen her disappear.
She rested Alicar’s gun on a piece of steel and held it there unsteadily, thumb against the firing stud. She nearly wasn’t quick enough then. Most of Ceveldt’s strength had returned to him in the interval; he was suddenly in view, standing beside the wall, seeing her. He shot. She fired into a blaze of light, felt a succession of shocks jolt through Ceveldt, felt intense heat above her and a spray of fire pain across her back. She dropped flat and rolled over to crush out the sparks on her shirt.
That took only moments. She turned again and crept forward until she was past the impact area of the last shot, then got to her feet. Ceveldt was down, and Ceveldt was dead. She stepped around him and came out from behind the machines.
Alicar’s left thigh was an ugly, seared mess, and Hille’s gun had punched a hole through his right shoulder. That wound was bleeding heavily. She could stop the bleeding and would—if she had time left for it. The control mechanisms attached to Hille and Ceveldt might not understand death, but she sensed them reacting to the fact that their charges weren’t performing as they were supposed to perform. That reaction was being picked up by the other mechanisms here—and, no doubt, being communicated to Soad.
She started to kneel down beside Alicar, then hesitated. A sound behind her? She turned quickly, bringing the gun around. For a moment, she stood frozen.
Hille’s body had turned on its side. His hand was groping with slow, fumbling awkwardness toward the gun he had dropped. He hadn’t come back to life—Soad’s mechanism was forcing the corpse into a semblance of action. The fingers stretched and curled, reaching. The boots scratched against the floor.
Unnerved, Telzey hurried toward the contorting thing, snatched up the gun, then ran to check on Ceveldt. And dead Ceveldt, too, was being driven to attempt to regain the weapon he’d lost.
She had both weapons now; but there was a furious thudding on a distant door as she ran back to Alicar, and a feeling of despair came to her. Ceveldt and Hille had secured the doors to the storage area from within; and if that lock system had been under the Romango computer’s control, the doors would have reopened by now. So it wasn’t. But it could be only minutes before Soad’s other slaves forced their way in by one means or another; they’d come armed, and that would be the end. Given more time, she might have pried them away from their psi mechanisms in turn. Given the capabilities of which Alicar had so carefully deprived her—
Realization blazed through Telzey.
She thought: “But of course!”
She stood staring down at Alicar then in such utter concentration that the racket of the assault on the door receded completely from her awareness. Seconds went racing by. Here was where he’d blocked her—and here! And here! The controls dissolved as she came to them. Abruptly, she knew she was free.
She drew a deep breath, reached confidently for one of the minds she’d touched before, restored contact. Psi flashed over the line of contact, struck with calculated violence. That mind went blank.
Barely a minute later, there was only one human mind besides her own still functioning consciously at the Ralke Mine. It was that of Gulhas, computer technician.
Gulhas was as much a convert to the Child of the Gods as Hille and Ceveldt had been, but he became Telzey’s property before he knew what was happening. She detached Soad’s mechanism from him, disintegrating it carefully in the process, and had him come with a float carrier and medical kit to the storeroom where he helped her do what could be done immediately for Alicar. Then they placed Alicar on the carrier and went to the Romango’s control room with him.
As they arrived there, Soad found Telzey. There was a cold surging of psi, and the palms of her hands were suddenly wet. For a long moment then, Soad was looking at her as a man might look at a domestic animal which has turned unexpectedly intractable. She was prepared for an immediate attack, but none came. Gradually, the awareness of Soad withdrew, though not entirely.
Telzey let her breath out in a sigh. Her mind shield was tight: and whatever the Child of the Gods might be, it was unlikely that he could accomplish much in a direct assault on that shield. The danger should take other forms.
She said to Gulhas, “Give me verbal override on the computer,” and to make sure there’d be no slips, she kept most of her attention on him as he went through the brief process, though he was no more able to go against her wishes now than she’d been able to go against those of Alicar. Some attention, however, she kept on the lingering shadowy presence of Soad, not knowing what that entity might be up to—and, particularly, not knowing where it was at the moment. It hadn’t been in the vicinity of the Ralke Mine when she’d been scanning the area; she should have picked up some indication of the alien mentality otherwise. But the situation might have changed by now.
The Romango acknowledged her identity and control and asked for instructions.
“Activate the Ralke Mine’s defense zone,” she said.
“Activated.”
She felt a little better. “You’ve been given the identification of a being called Soad, or the Child of the Gods?”
“I have. This is the recorded image.”
A panel before Telzey became a viewscreen, and in the screen appeared a picture much like the one she’d seen in Ponogan’s mind as he dreamed: a great liquid-seeming globe rolling along the side of a desert dune under the starblaze.
She said, “Is Soad at present in your sensor range?”
“No.”
Her tensions lessened again, but she remembered how far Alicar had been able to maneuver them in toward the mine. She said, “If you do sense it, inform us immediately.”
“Complying.”
She went on. “And if Soad appears within the defense zone, attack it with every weapon you have until it’s destroyed.”
There was the shortest of pauses. Then the computer said, “The instruction is not comprehensible.”
Startled, Telzey glanced at Gulhas. He said, “That’s correct. Soad told us to see to it that the mine’s armament couldn’t be turned against him, and the Romango was programmed accordingly. Your override doesn’t affect that because the computer
doesn’t know it’s been programmed. An order to attack Soad simply has no meaning for it.”
“Then get it unprogrammed fast!” Telzey said. “But first have it put me in communicator contact with the Mannafra Federation Station.” She hesitated, seeing the response in Gulhas’s mind. “So it’s been programmed against that, too!”
The Romango had, in fact, been programmed against letting a communication of any kind go out from the Ralke Mine. The Child of the Gods hadn’t relied entirely on conversion and psi mechanisms to maintain its hold on the humans. Telzey asked a few more questions, saw how complete their isolation had been. Except for the automatic contacts with vehicles approaching the defense zone, the computer’s external communication system was shut off. There was no other communicator at the mine, and the only air truck and two groundcars had been destroyed.
Nor would it be at all easy now to turn the Romango into a weapon against the Child of the Gods, or to restore the use of the communicator. Gulhas hadn’t been involved in installing the prohibiting programs. Hille had let the machine calculate for him how it should be done, and how the programs then could be deleted from record and made inaccessible to its locators, leaving it unable to act on later instructions to erase something which for it had no existence.
Telzey then had Gulhas set the situation up as a theoretical problem. Could a method be developed to track down and eliminate such lost programs? The computer said it was possible, but warned that a number of the procedures involved might reduce it to uselessness before the task was accomplished.
Since it was effectively useless as it was, Telzey told Gulhas to go ahead. His pessimistic estimate was that if the job could be done, it should take several hours to carry it out. But that couldn’t be helped.
She had time now to give attention again to other matters. Alicar was deeply sedated; unless and until they got him to a hospital, there was no more to be done for him. She’d scanned the remaining personnel occasionally, half expecting to find Soad’s mechanisms attempting to make the same kind of awkward use of the unconscious bodies as they had of Ceveldt and Hille, but all was quiet in that area. It couldn’t have made much difference in any case. The approaches to the computer room were sealed, and throughout the mine’s structures every security lock controlled by the Romango had slammed shut. Even if the men had been awake, they wouldn’t have been able to interfere with her here.
Complete Short Fiction (Jerry eBooks) Page 248