by Peter David
“Don’t inquire?!” It was all he could do not to stammer. “In case you haven’t noticed, I’m up to my neck in the affairs of wizards! So you’ll forgive me if I make an inquiry or two!”
“Very well,” she said archly. “You are forgiven.”
Vir rolled his eyes and wondered why he had even bothered.
They approached an archway that loomed high ahead of them, and went through it. The sound clearly emanated from the other side, so loud that Vir couldn’t have missed it even if he were deaf. Considering the volume that was engulfing him, he began to worry that he might indeed wind up without hearing, at that.
The place was huge, as Vir had suspected it would be. But it was like no power core that he had ever seen. There were towering columns all around him, except there was no sense of symmetry. Structures appeared to come together, then split apart from one another. It reminded him of nothing so much as a gigantic spider web made entirely of stone … except it wasn’t exactly stone. It was some sort of porous, black material , which glowed from within with a blue fire.
He didn’t have a clue as to where to look first. Gwynn, meantime, called out, “Kane! Finian!” Her two associates stepped out from behind different parts of the power room. “Vir ran into a Drakh. They’re apparently not all at the other end of the base, as we had hoped.”
“Then we must attend to this quickly,” said Kane.
“Okay, so what do we do?” Vir asked. “Can you just, I don’t know … wave your hands or say some magic words and blow this place up?”
“I’m afraid not,” said Finian. “We cannot use our tech for destruction. Only for creation.”
Vir’s eyes widened. “You’re not serious.” But the other nodded in affirmation. “Okay, fine, how about this!” he sputtered . “How about you use your power to create a big chunk of empty space where this base used to be!”
“You must do it, Vir.”
“Me!” He gaped at Kane. Then, realizing it was pointless to argue, he waved his hands about and said, “Okay, okay, fine. What do I do?”
“Blow it up.”
“How?”
“Quickly.” And then he pointed over Vir’s shoulder, and Vir -against his better judgment looked where Kane was indicating.
More of the Drakh were coming. There appeared to be at least a dozen of them, perhaps more, and they were pouring in through the entrance that Vir and Gwynn had just used, nineteen yards away.
“This could be a problem,” murmured Finian.
That seemed, to Vir, to be something of an understatement. He backed up, watching what seemed like a wave of dark grey advancing on them quickly.
And suddenly Vir and the techno-mages ran in one direction.
And then another. And then another, and still another.
Vir had no idea which way to look first, but neither did the Drakh. Suddenly the entire power room was cluttered with Virs and techno-mages, and no one could possibly have known which way to look or which was which.
“Hurry! Hurry!” whispered Kane, and he shoved Vir in the back, to start him running. Then the techno-mages moved off in a variety of directions, and suddenly Vir was alone in a crowd.
The Drakh made no sound, yet seemed to move in unison as they literally threw themselves into the chaos. They carried what appeared to be small weapons in their hands, though Vir couldn’t make out precisely what they were. They looked vaguely like PPGs, but there was something different about them.
Suddenly there was a rush of air and something small and presumably lethal hurtled past Vir’s face, missing by the narrowest of margins. It made a metallic noise just beyond him and Vir’s head snapped around to see what it was and where it had landed. It appeared to be a spike, about as long as one of his fingers, narrow and sharp and extremely deadly. It was embedded in a rocklike “web strand,” and was still quivering from the impact.
Vir had to credit the illusions provided by the techno-mages, however. If the genuine Vir had been the only one reacting with obvious horror, he would easily have stood out. Instead every single one of the mirages dashing madly about had the exact same look of fear and trepidation. Several of them were even “hit” by the spikes and reacted as if they had been mortally wounded. The way they doubled over, staggered about and such, it was impossible to determine whether one of the lethal missiles had actually embedded itself in a corporeal body or had passed harmlessly through an illusion. Any technology capable of creating such instantly adjusting holograms was beyond Vir’s ability even to contemplate.
Not that he had the time for pondering. Instead he had to concentrate on one thing and one thing only: coming through this madness with his head still firmly attached to his neck.
He wove his way through the bizarre structure, trying to find some sort of vulnerable point. Not that he had any idea what he was going to do once he located it. It was most unlikely that he would encounter a large sign that read “Press here to destroy Shadow Base.”
He darted left, right, right again … and suddenly found himself in what appeared to be another area entirely. There was still the humming of tremendous power around him, but there was something else, as well. Control panels still looked like control panels, no matter what technology was crafting them, and that was exactly what he had found. Even more important , he saw a holographic image floating nearby that he recognized instantly: it was one of the Death Clouds that was still under construction. With horror, Vir noted that the device was already much further along-it actually seemed to be nearing completion.
Small robotic drones were moving around it in a smoothly coordinated display of activity. They were not, however, acting entirely on their own. A Drakh was overseeing the entire operation, making sure that each of the ‘bots attended to its assigned task as smoothly and efficiently as possible.
Vir knew this because the Drakh was sitting right there in front of him, doing his job. He turned and saw Vir, and for a moment, they simply stared at each other.
Then the Drakh let out an angry screech, and from the folds of his garment he yanked out what appeared to be one of the spike-firing weapons.
Vir’s reaction was entirely automatic. Given time to reflect on it later, he wouldn’t even remember pulling the rock from his pocket. All he knew was that one moment the stone was in his pocket and the next it was in his hand, and just as the Drakh brought up his weapon to fire, Vir let fly with all his strength. The rock crashed squarely into the Drakh’s head, and the Drakh let out a shout of fury even as he toppled backward. Fumbling his weapon as he fell, his finger spasmodically tightened on the trigger. As a result, the spike embedded itself squarely in the Drakh’s chest. The Shadow servant let out a last strangled protest, and then collapsed altogether.
Vir didn’t even take the time to be horrified-the silence around him told him the techno-mages must have drawn the Drakh off in another direction. He just stepped over the fallen one and went quickly to the controls. He looked them over for a moment, trying to determine what was what. The robots that had been assembling the Death Cloud had ground to a halt, twirling calmly in space and obviously waiting for further instructions.
“There.”
Vir jumped involuntarily at the sound of Kane’s voice coming from practically in his ear. He saw Kane standing right at his shoulder, studying the controls. There was no hint of confusion on Kane’s face-it seemed to Vir as if Kane understood everything. He pointed at several panels in sequence. “That one … then that one … then rest your hand on that and tell it to do what you want it to do. It will respond.”
“Are you sure? I’m not a Drakh…”
“You do not have to be. The Shadows designed this equipment to be as simple to operate as possible. Even the most ignorant person, with a modest bit of training, can handle it.”
“Oh. Good.” Vir didn’t exactly feel flattered by that piece of information, but this wasn’t the time to take offense. He touched the panels in the order Kane had indicated, then placed his hand where he was supposed to. At fi
rst nothing seemed to be happening, even though Vir was concentrating so hard that he thought the top of his head was going to blow off.
“Just remember who is in charge,” Kane counseled him.
Vir nodded, then realized he had been having trouble simply focusing thoughts, perhaps out of sheer nervousness. “Move away,” he said firmly and, sure enough, the robots began to clear themselves from the Death Cloud.
The robots were not, however, Vir’s major concern. He had given that command more or less as a test, in preparation for something more extensive and, ideally, more final. He took a deep breath, which rasped unsteadily in his chest, and then he ordered, “Move into position.”
For a moment nothing happened, and then the Death Cloud slid gracefully forward and around the end of Xha’dam, positioning itself so smoothly that one would have thought Vir had been doing it all his life.
He steadied his nerves, focusing on the far end of the Shadow Base, and then in a quiet voice of command, said, “Fire.”
No response.
Vir immediately assumed that the Death Cloud must not have been far enough along to have been given any sort of detonation capacity. Really … how could it be? When they had first spotted it, it had been little more than a skeleton. Even with all the advantages the Shadow tech provided, it simply wasn’t conceivable that any sort of weapon of mass destruction could be brought into working order in that short a-
Then the Death Cloud shuddered slightly, as its weaponry discharged-directly into the far end of the Shadow Base. Even as far away as they were from the source of the destruction , Vir still felt the base trembling around him from the impact.
More hits, more firing upon the base, as the Death Cloud-operating in some sort of automatic program now—started to progress down the base’s length. Then, on the holographically reproduced image, Vir saw more explosions, this time from within Xha’dam itself. The vibrations became more pronounced , even though the source of the devastation was still miles off.
“Now would be a good time to leave,” Kane said, with such calm that one would have thought the base’s destruction could have no immediate impact upon him.
Vir’s head was bobbing. “Yes … yes, I think you’re right.”
He turned to head for the door, and suddenly Kane was shoving him to one side. Vir tumbled to the floor, wondering just what in the world was going on, unable to comprehend why in the world Kane would have suddenly attacked him. Then he heard a slight whisper of a noise, a pfwwt of air, followed by another, and he half sat up and twisted around to look behind him.
Kane was standing there, looking down in what almost seemed to be amusement. Three spikes were imbedded in his chest. The centermost one happened to be the one that he had intercepted when he had pushed Vir out of the way. The second and third were still quivering, having just been shot into him. Vir, to his horror, saw the Drakh lying on the ground, his fingers still twitching around his weapon, apparently not as dead as they had assumed him to be.
It all happened so quickly that Kane had no time to react or prepare a spell to freeze them in place. He tried to use his staff for support, but instead sank to his knees, and the Drakh focused on Vir. Vir desperately threw himself to one side as the Drakh squeezed off two quick shots. Both of the needle darts flew past him, but he tripped, hit the ground, and found himself lying there, eye-to-eye with the fallen Drakh. The creature swung the weapon around and Vir found himself staring right down the barrel.
“I can’t die,” he whispered. “Londo said so. I’m invincible.”
Not giving a damn about fate, Centauri predictions, or Londo Mollari, the Drakh squeezed the trigger. His weapon made an oddly vacant sound-one that had a uniform quality across a variety of cultures. It was the sound of a weapon empty of ammunition.
The Drakh uttered a word that Vir could only surmise to be a curse in the Drakh’s native tongue, and then the creature began to haul himself up. Suddenly the entire room shook violently, and the Drakh flopped over onto his back. This time he didn’t get up. The creature emitted a sound that could only be a death rattle, and his head slumped to one side.
Kane was still on his knees, looking somewhat perplexed as he stared at the metal projectiles sticking in his chest. Vir hauled him to his feet, shouting, “Come on! Hurry! Back to the ship!”
“I do not think … that is going to happen,” Kane said softly.
“Oh no you don’t!” Vir yelled at him. “I am not about to go back to your techno-pals and tell them that I left you behind! And they’re going to tell me that if I’d dragged you along with me, maybe they could have saved you, and the next thing I know, someone’s going to be wearing my head for a hat! No thank you!”
Kane tried to say something else, but Vir wasn’t listening to him. Instead, with a strength he never would have dreamt he had, Vir yanked Kane to his feet and started hauling him, draping one of Kane’s arms around his own shoulder to provide support. They stumbled out of the control room and down the corridor, and Vir didn’t even want to think about what was going to happen if they ran into a Drakh because they had absolutely no defense at all.
Kane sagged, and Vir thought desperately to himself-to himself, and to whatever deity might be willing to listen- Please. Please let us get back to the ship without any problems . Please.
They rounded a corner, and there was a Drakh standing there. Vir froze, almost losing his grip on Kane. He saw, out of the corner of his eye, that Kane actually had a grim smile on his face, and for a moment he was certain that the techno-mage had completely lost his mind.
That was when Vir realized that the Drakh wasn’t moving. He wasn’t looking at Vir and Kane; they simply happened to be standing directly in the path of his blank gaze. Then the Drakh sagged to the ground to reveal Gwynn right behind him. “The Drakh and I were having a chat,” she said.
Her dark eyes widened as she realized Kane’s condition. For a moment her veneer of unflappability slipped, and then she composed herself. She moved forward quickly and brought Kane’s other arm around her own shoulder. The two of them helped Kane toward the ship without a word. The shaking around them grew more violent, and Finian joined them on a dead run. He cast a glance at Kane’s condition, but made no comment.
They half ran, half stumbled into the ship as the door irised shut behind them. “Where are the rest of the Drakh!” Vir called out.
“In case you haven’t noticed, Mr.Cotto, this place is about to blow up,” said Gwynn.
“I know. I caused it.”
“Well done,” said Finian, who had seated himself at the controls. But there wasn’t a great deal of congratulations in his voice, for his attention was split between getting the ship into motion and glancing worriedly over at Kane. Kane, for his part, seemed to be staring at the spikes in his chest as if he were studying someone else’s body.
“Get those out of him! Can’t you help him? Wave a magic wand or something!” Vir shouted with increasing agitation. The frightening calm that had settled upon the cloisters was to him the most disconcerting thing.
Gwynn glanced at Vir for a moment, looking as if she wanted to explain something of great consequence. Then obviously she changed her mind, and instead crouched next to Kane, studying the spikes. Then she looked up at Kane, who simply shook his head. There was sadness on his face, as if he felt more sorry for her than for himself.
Vir started forward, and suddenly the ship shifted wildly. Finian was hardly handling the vessel with the same calm assurance that Kane had displayed. His jaw was set in grim determination and he shouted, “Hold on!”
Vir, who by this time was lying in a crumpled heap on the far side of the ship, considered the advice to be a classic case of too little, too late.
On the monitor display, he could see the rapidly receding Shadow Base, and then suddenly it vanished entirely. For a moment he had no idea why, and then he remembered: the null field. They had emerged from it, and the base had securely vanished back into its invisibility.
A moment before the mage ship leaped into the gate, they saw the null field suddenly split apart. Gigantic chunks of Xha’dam spiraled away in all directions. There were pieces of the planet destroyer as well, ripped to shreds by the force of the explosions that the device itself had instigated. A fireball, feeding on itself and the continued detonation of Xha'dam, grew wider and faster, and for just a moment, Vir was certain that the thing was going to engulf them.
That was when space again seemed to stretch all around them, and an instant later they had leaped into the gate and were propelled at speeds that would have once been considered beyond all imagination.
Vir picked himself up off the floor and went quickly over to Gwynn and Kane. Kane’s face looked absolutely ashen, his eyes were misting over. “Do something!” Vir urged once again.
Gwynn's detached demeanor cracked. “Don’t you think I would if I could!” she said angrily. “If I could help him … if any of this could have been avoided…”
Something about the way she said that brought realization to Vir. “What he saw … what he said he saw … it was this, wasn’t it.”
“Some of this,” Kane said softly. “Not all. But ‘twas enough. ‘Twould serve.”
“Do all of your—”
“See the future? Have visions of what is to come? Some. A few of the full techno-mages, full adepts … but a cloister?” Gwynn shook her head and regarded Kane with something approaching reverence. “Never. He is most blessed.”
Vir gestured helplessly. “You call this blessed? Great Maker, at least pull those out of him!”
“It would be … too late,” whispered Kane. “And it would simply cause … a bloody mess. Vir … there are things you should know. Must know. Things that … only you can stop.”
He leaned in closer to Kane. “What are they?”
Kane’s eyes momentarily refocused. “Don’t worry. You already know them.”