A Threat Among the Stars

by Mark Henwick

“Didn’t bother with the lights. Pity,” Kat says.

  “That has to be a junction,” Talan says, pointing at the construction where the small pipes connect to the bigger one. “This is the junction chamber.”

  “The right one, though?” I’m feeling uneasy.

  “As long as we keep going up, we’ve got to get out into the city somewhere,” Kat says.

  “It would seem logical, but none of us is an expert in the design of municipal sewers,” I say.

  I’m worried and trying not to show it, while still arguing caution.

  “Let’s look at the next bit,” Kat says.

  The next section is supposed to be a fifty meter walk to find a ladder of iron rungs set in the wall on the right. We find a ladder at sixty meters.

  Up a level and there are no sewage pipes on this level, but there is a maze of passages.

  We follow the directions as best we can, and they are almost right.

  After ten minutes of walking, turning, and climbing stairs, we’re in a vast, echoing chamber, rough cut out of the stone. Halfway across, I get a feeling of something behind us. Kat and Talan have the flashlights. All I have is the little solar lamp. I switch it on, stop walking and look backwards.

  Nothing.

  The lamp hasn’t been charged for a day or two. Its light barely reaches the edges of the chamber, which has six passages feeding into it from that end.

  We’ve just emerged from a passage, but which one? They all look the same. How would we get back, if we needed to?

  I switch the lamp off and turn around. Kat’s gone ahead, looking for another set of rungs to take us to the next level. They’re not where the instructions say they should be.

  She jogs further, her flashlight bouncing around the walls, getting dimmer.

  “Maybe these, here,” she calls out to us, and at that exact moment, her flashlight battery dies.

  Talan’s flashlight guides her back and then she switches it off while we hold a hurried conversation in the dark.

  “Either the directions are wrong, or we’ve taken a wrong turn.” Talan voices my own fear.

  “I think we went wrong at the first bulkhead door,” I say. “We came too far along the Neve. We’ve got to go back.”

  “But that’s going to take longer and we’re already low on battery power,” Kat says.

  “The further we get into this maze, the longer it’ll take to get back to the start, which we need to do if we’ve gone wrong,” I respond. “We could just about make our way in these levels without a flashlight, or just using the light from our pad screens, but the place we can’t risk that is the walkway above the Neve. Firstly, it’s too dangerous without light, and secondly, we won’t be able to find a bulkhead door in the overhang. We’ve got to get that part right while we have a flashlight left.”

  Talan agrees with me.

  Ruslan seems to follow what we’re saying and grunts approval.

  We’re going to be delayed. I can only hope Hwa doesn’t need us today.

  “Okay,” I say, “we’ll walk back the way we came in these tunnels, only using the flashlight at junctions until we get back to the river walkway.”

  “I’ll lead,” Talan says. “Let’s feed the rope through our belts to keep us together.”

  That takes a few minutes to sort out. The darkness is pressing on my eyes, making me see flashes of light that aren’t there. My hearing goes super-sensitive as well. I can hear the breathing of all four of us, the scuff of our boots on the ground... and other things, which aren’t caused by us. Squeaks. Creaks. A sort of hum which seems to come from the pipes. Dripping water. Distant scurryings.

  Rats came with mankind to Newyan. Of course there are rats down here.

  There are stories as well...

  Stupid. Shut up.

  It takes us twenty minutes to retrace our steps to the set of iron rungs that will take us down to the first level.

  Is it the right set of rungs?

  I don’t want to infect Talan with doubt, so I shut up and climb down.

  Talan switches off the flashlight again and I feel the rope tug me forward. It should be just sixty paces back to the junction chamber.

  Sixty paces.

  Step carefully.

  Ignore the noises.

  There’s a gasp from Talan. The flashlight flicks on.

  Talan’s blundered against the electric cable hanging down in the middle of the junction room.

  We all laugh a little raggedly, and I learn some old, short Arvish words from Talan that I hadn’t heard before.

  She leaves the light on for a few moments while we get ourselves back together.

  Talan isn’t over-imaginative like me. She doesn’t know the old stories about creatures that hide in the sewers under Iruña. But still, there’s a look in her eyes.

  Kat’s distracted, retying the laces on her boot. Ruslan is showing her a different pattern of lacing that he thinks is better.

  “What’s up, apart from electrical cable and the crippling feeling of being lost?” I mutter to Talan.

  “Don’t know.” She shrugs. “Crazy. Hearing things. Like there’s someone calling my name.” She shakes her head as Kat tightens her knots. “Like I said, craziness. Come on.”

  She switches the flashlight back off.

  The darkness rushes back like a tangible thing, squeezing me from every side.

  And nova, if I can’t now hear someone calling my name, too.

  Zarate. Like a long, slow sigh. It’s like listening to the surf on a beach: listen hard enough to surf and you can persuade yourself that there are words in what you know is just noise.

  Not just my name. The sound of the sea. Distant chanting. The wind keening around shaped stone.

  Kat and Ruslan seem oblivious. They don’t like being blind, but they’re not hearing things. Talan and I are.

  Two hundred and fifty paces to the bulkhead set in the floor of this tunnel. Just two hundred and fifty. Then we can switch the light back on.

  I get a feeling that huge eyes which can see in the dark are looking for me.

  I’m counting steps, partly to try and drown the sound in my head.

  Two hundred.

  Two hundred and fifty.

  The bulkhead’s not there.

  Talan’s voice, very quiet and breathy, from in front: “My stride’s got shorter in the dark. Just nerves. It’s okay. We can’t walk past the bulkhead. It’s got that big, raised lip. Just keep—”

  There’s a noise all of us hear.

  A squeal as the bulkhead on the floor of the tunnel opens, not twenty meters in front of us.

  Talan... Zarate... Talan... Zarate...

  Light shines from below, and a long-headed, glistening monster, straight out of the old stories, rises up through the bulkhead tube.

  Chapter 61

  Yion

  Nothing had prepared him for this assault on all his senses—the speed, the sheer physical violence of the attack.

  One moment it had been cold and quiet in the pre-dawn of a spring morning. He’d just checked the sentries posted around the old airfield and settled back down, feeling Natalia’s warmth reaching out for him.

  The next moment, the wall in front of him had exploded and the attack had begun with a rain of rockets.

  He can’t see in front—the intense flashes of the rockets are burned into his retinas, blinding him. From the edges of his sight, plasma rifle rounds whip overhead, as if they’re reaching out into the darkness, searching for him with lethal, electric-blue fingers. Through the pandemonium, he can hear people screaming in pain. The building is quivering with the impact of plasma bolts and burning with a lung-searing chemical smell. The smoke is choking him, and stupidly, all his body wants to do is lie down and hide.

  “Out!” Natalia shouts. A plasma rifle is thrust into his hands. She picks up hers and their ammunition. Grabbing his belt, she pulls him to the back, away from the flames. They stumble in the rubble. Through the shattered walls, he can see t
he fuel depot go up like a torch. They fall out of their building and stagger into the central car park.

  Clouds of smoke shroud everything. Half the buildings have been hit. There are eye-searing flares overhead, sinking down toward them, making him feel exposed to hidden watchers.

  A few shots are fired back at the attackers, but each time, return fire from the dark perimeter concentrates on that position.

  He’s quickly reached a point where he can’t get any more frightened, and his senses come back to him.

  “Down! Down under cover and wait,” he calls out. He can barely hear his voice.

  Natalia calls out and others shout, relaying his order. He can’t hear them either, but he has a moment of intense pride that this band of untrained volunteers responds.

  While Natalia is diverted with assembling their comrades, he takes a deep breath into his raw lungs, holds it and dives back into the building they just left.

  It’s like a scene from hell; his eyes are blind to everything but the horrific glare of the flames.

  He throws himself onto the floor. Under the shattered remains of some old wooden tables, his hands desperately dig through the broken neo-crete and rubble. He has to search by touch.

  Here! Somewhere here! It’s got to be.

  His chest feels like it’s being crushed.

  Hands are gripping him.

  He can’t spare the breath to order them to get back, away from the flames.

  No, they’re helping him. It’s Natalia, pulling blocks of neo-crete out of the way.

  His hands are slick with blood, full of splinters, painful cuts and...

  There!

  One hand to grip it. The other to wipe the dirt from the controls. He has to take a breath and wishes he hadn’t. It burns his lungs, makes him double up in a fit of coughing, but he doesn’t let go the controller.

  One switch. Two. The circuits are armed.

  He can feel his hair singeing. He can feel the heat of the flames even through his jacket. Every inch of exposed skin has gone tight, cringing from the pain.

  Activate.

  He hammers down on the stiff button. Made deliberately stiff. Not moving. Dirt jamming it? Hit it. Again. Did it move?

  Nothing!

  Again.

  He’s being dragged backwards, out of the building. The controller slips from his hands.

  “No!”

  He must finish, but Natalia can’t seem to hear him.

  Clear of the building, he redoubles his struggles. Someone powerful grabs him from behind and Natalia throws freezing cold water in his face, then slaps him.

  Her mouth moves. He blinks; he can just hear her over the ringing in his ears: “Look.”

  She pulls his chin around, points outwards to the perimeter.

  There are flames around the airfield. No one is shooting at them. The mines they laid have detonated, and by sheer luck, they detonated right in the middle of the Syndacians, just as they advanced.

  ∞ ∞ ∞ ∞ ∞

  They get an hour’s respite and they use it.

  The rebel survivors look like he feels: dizzy, not hearing clearly, burned and bleeding. However, no one thinks the Syndacians have given up, and everyone who can walk helps to create a few more barriers, using damaged trucks, metal tables, doors torn off their hinges, chairs and beds from the barracks: anything they can lift and carry.

  Fires are extinguished. Ammunition replenished. Bodies removed.

  They have ‘medics’—junior doctors and nurses who’ve joined them. The wounded are carried to a tent they’ve prepared. It has red cross symbols on both sides. Whether or not that was the reason, it took no hits.

  The rest of the airfield is a mess. Every single building has some damage, and about half are no more than rubble.

  Obviously, it’s fortunate the Syndacians left their heaviest weapons here at the airfield when they went hunting Zara. The cannon were stored in containers that the rebels broke into, but unfortunately, no one here knew how to assemble them, let alone actually fire them. It was only through some lucky guesses that Yion worked out how to rig the mines.

  He had the cannon and ammunition loaded up into trucks yesterday and sent them high into the hills. Perhaps the Rangers would be able to use them. Or if not, they might have the time to destroy them, to prevent the Syndacians from using them.

  The rebels are left with lots of plasma rifles and enough ammunition for a siege.

  It isn’t going to be a very long siege, he can see that. A quarter of them are dead or injured already.

  “Why didn’t they attack again immediately?” Natalia asks, as they scrabble behind a pile of rubble and peer cautiously across the width of the airfield.

  The sun is coming up. There’s a mist. They can’t see anything, but they can hear the distant sound of helicopters.

  He snorts. “I guess they’re getting the rest of the troops back from chasing Zara. They’re waiting until they’re all here and in position. And once the troops are here, it frees up the helicopters to help.”

  He wishes they’d been able to get one plasma cannon working. That would fix the problem of helicopters. Not that any of it would make a great deal of difference in the end.

  “I’m sorry...” he starts to say.

  “Shut up!” She whips around and glares at him.

  “What?”

  “You were going to say something like you should have sent me away with the trucks.”

  It was exactly what he was going to say. He clears his throat. It still feels raw.

  “Thank you for helping me find the detonator.”

  She laughs. “Oh, very good. Quick change of topic, Mister Bey. Clever boy. Anyway, without you, there wouldn’t have been a detonator, or mines. We’d be dead.”

  We’ll be dead soon anyway.

  He doesn’t say that.

  “There wouldn’t be anything without you,” he croaks. His throat hurts. “Not for me.”

  She turns and looks at him. It’s light enough now that he can see her eyes. Beautiful, sad and vulnerable, all at the same time.

  “You don’t need to keep pretending,” she says. “I know it’s not real. I’m nothing.”

  “You’re wrong. You’re special, Natalia. Very special. I—”

  She huffs. “Easy to say here and now. But words don’t change anything...” She bites her lip and looks back out at the misty dawn. “You’re a Name and I’m a nobody.”

  “No—”

  The sound startles them. A muffled thump, like you’d get beating dust out of a rug. Then a ripple of them.

  “Down!” Yion screams. “Take cover.”

  Mortar shells fall. They’re short at first: a few meters outside the rebels’ protective ring of rubble and old trucks. The explosions shake the ground, and the shells start to creep forward, obliterating their defenses. He’d thought the earlier attack was intense, but he knows now it wasn’t. It was nothing. The Syndacians had wanted to take the airfield back with only a little damage. This time, they’re intent on obliterating all the resistance. Explosions blend into one single, unending roar. The air itself is screaming with bits of stinging metal and brick and wood as their protection is torn apart.

  The rising sun disappears. Towering clouds of dust and smoke sweep over them, red as old blood, bringing the darkness of another night, full of noise and terror.

  The pile of rubble they’re sheltering behind takes a direct hit. They’re lifted and thrown back towards the car park.

  Yion grabs Natalia. They’ve lost their rifles. He tries to get to his feet, but there’s an explosion above them, bigger than all the others. It flattens them, crushes them into the dirt. Yion can feel the earth trembling under this new assault. Flames in the sky.

  And more explosions. Huge explosions. Everywhere.

  He has to get them away. He tries to get up. He’s tangled with her. She’s not helping. She’s just lying there.

  “Natalia! Natalia!”

  Oh, Goddess!
r />   There’s blood.

  He kneels, tears away the bandoliers of ammunition. Tears away the jacket.

  She’s soaked in blood.

  “Medic! Medic!” he screams.

  There’s no response. It’s gone quiet. The last explosions have ended everything. Nothing moves in the hellish clouds that cover the airfield. They could be alone.

  “Medic!”

  Her eyes open.

  “Natalia! Listen to me. We’ve got to—”

  Her hand comes up, stops him. Grips his shirt.

  She whispers. He has to lean down till her lips are against his ear.

  “Not all stories... have a happy ending... my love.”

  “No! No!” He stands up, desperately searching around. “Medic! Medic! Please!”

  There are figures approaching through the swirling smoke. Figures from nightmares. Huge, bulky shapes with demonic red eyes.

  Chapter 62

  Hwa

  A dream of Newyan. The mummers spinning in the starlight. Singing before the King’s Table, on the beautiful Arvish coast. The dawn sea-breeze is soft and quiet as it slips among the stones. Calling. Hwa... Hwa...

  The Dreamers wake!

  She sits bolt upright in her bed, dreams vanishing.

  The window shows a pale, clear sky. It’s dawn, as it was in the dream. The sounds... they’re different. That’s not the dream. Something around her has changed. The subliminal whisper of electricity in the building has faded to almost nothing.

  “Xing?”

  Silence. She mentally queries the delegation’s infoserver: the power to the building has been cut. Emergency power is on.

  How long can we run on emergency power?

  Xing?

  She throws on a plain robe and sprints down the empty, solemn corridors of the delegation. In the darker areas, there are emergency lights on, but only a few, because the delegation’s systems understand that the priority requirement for power is their servers.

  Xing is on the servers, and their connection to the Wújìn has been broken. He is trapped here. The Xing-that-is-here will die if the backup power runs out.

  The Newyan government don’t know about Xing, but not for one moment does she believe this is an accident. This is a Hajnal attack on the Xian information processing and hacking capabilities. It just happens to be that’s Xing.