"That's what the plans show," Torres confirmed. He cast an eye quickly around the company. "We have to give it a try."
"Message exchanges between police fliers and HQ," zorac reported. "It sounds as if they're attacking something."
"How far can we reconfigure the external stress field?" Torres asked.
"Sufficient to arrest major falls below and redirect beyond city limits," zorac replied. "There might be some local peripheral fallout." The Shapieron's drive created a zone of distorted space-time around the ship. zorac was saying that it could shape that external field into a force zone that would project objects clear of the vicinity.
Torres looked at the other officers. "The decision is mine, totally," he said. "zorac, execute the plan as specified. We're going in."
"Geronimo!" zorac responded.
"What?"
"It's the expression that Terran paratroopers used on going into action, back in the days when they fought wars," zorac explained. "It seemed appropriate."
"Just fly the ship, please."
"Yessir."
* * *
Inside PAC, Langerif stared bemusedly at the scene being relayed from outside, as the huge shape of the starship hovering over the city started descending. The voice of the chief who was in charge at Geerbaine came excitedly over the audio. "I don't know what it's doing . . . It seems to be going down again. It can't be! It's going to land on top." On the view, a part of the city canopy immediately below the Shapieron was pulled up and fragmented into pieces which flew upward and out of sight. The voice became frenzied. "No, it isn't slowing down! What is it doing? I don't believe this. It's going straight down through!"
"What is happening there?" Eubeleus screeched on the screen from Uttan.
"I think that the intelligence destined to supplant us may have written us off a little too soon," Garuth said as he watched. He managed to make it sound satisfyingly mysterious. In truth, he hadn't the faintest idea.
They came to a halt, defeated. There was nowhere to go, nothing more to be tried.
And then Hunt realized that Gina was staring up past him and pointing incredulously. He turned and saw that a section of the imitation sky almost above their heads had gone dark and was bulging inward. Seconds later it broke into huge sections of canopy and supporting structure coming asunder, parting sideways unnaturally instead of falling, and then disappearing upward as if snatched away by a giant suction cleaner. At the same time a voice boomed like thunder across the city in Jevlenese. Hunt's head snapped around toward Murray.
Murray was bewildered. "It's telling people to get under cover. I don't—Jesus Christ!"
Hunt looked back. Silhouetted against the pale green outside, an immense shape consisting of a distorted cruciform fastened to a huge, streamlined tower that shrank away into the sky under the acute foreshortening of the perspective was coming down through the hole in the canopy. A roar of rushing air filled their ears, and minor debris scattered down and bounced off the face of the building above as the canopy above continued to buckle and tear.
"Goddamn spaceship!" Murray yelled hoarsely. "Spaceship coming down through the fuckin' roof!"
"That's the Shapieron!" Gina shouted dazedly. "Vic, it's the Ganymeans!"
The starship came down through the circling police fliers like a battleship scattering minnows, filling the volume above the city's rooftops.
"My God!" Danchekker exclaimed, staring up as the cathedral-like space between the four curving, swept fins enlarged second by second right above their heads. The retractable rearmost section of the main body, which contained the entry locks, was already sliding downward.
A bullhorn voice rang out, not as loud as before, and in English this time. "That's them, luckier than we hoped. Okay, Vic, we see you. Get everyone over. I'm opening a door." Never had Hunt been more glad to hear the voice of a computer.
Murray yelled something at Fendro, who came out of his funk and pressed a button inside a coverplate by the entrance. The doors closed, cutting off the police who had started moving forward across the hall inside. Hunt was already urging the others back across the landing platform.
The Shapieron could not maneuver close enough to the building to lower its rear section onto the platform, but was hanging overhead with the opened entrance just past the edge and a short distance below. Gina came to the rail and looked down into what appeared to be a bottomless void between the stern section of the ship, hanging in space, and the lower part of the tower, which was overhung, back beneath the platform. Inside the opened lock, Ganymean figures were gesturing frantically.
"It's okay," zorac's voice encouraged. "You're in a shaped field. I'll steer you in."
Hunt urged her up onto the guardrail. Consciously she wanted to do it, but some deep-rooted, primeval survival instinct held her back. She shook her head weakly. "I'm not sure I can."
Nixie climbed nimbly up on the far side of her, paused for a split second, and then launched herself forward. All the experiences and instincts of a lifetime's conditioning told Gina that Nixie shouldn't make it; but unseen forces guided her, and she landed lightly inside the Shapieron.
Gina swallowed and glanced at Hunt.
He nodded. "Go on!"
Forcing all other thoughts from her mind, she pitched off the rail—oblivious to the shove in her back that sent her moving.
Danchekker climbed up shakily. "If we ever manage to return after this escapade, I'll greet Ms. Mulling with flowers," he muttered to Hunt, and jumped.
As Keshen moved to follow, Fendro looked back and shouted in dismay. "We'll never make it!"
Hunt turned his head. The door from the building was open again, and police were rushing out onto the platform. "Go!" he yelled, and pushed Keshen off. But Fendro was right: there were still three of them to go, and some of the police were already leveling weapons.
And then one of the Shapieron's probes came swooping downward with a roaring, swishing sound, flattening out to race over the platform at head height, straight at the doorway like a fighter on a strafing run. The police scattered amid shouts of terror, some throwing themselves out of the way, others retreating back into the doorway. At the last moment the probe broke and peeled upward, grazing within a few feet of the face of the tower, and began turning for another run.
Murray and Fendro had clambered up onto the rail, and both disappeared together as Hunt looked back. Hunt glanced behind one last time, then hurled himself over after them. For an instant he seemed to hang in midair above the abyss, and then, without his really registering what had taken place, hands were steadying him inside the Shapieron.
"All aboard," zorac's voice said from somewhere. "Anybody want to change their mind? No? Then let's get out of here. Next stop, orbit. Calazar and Caldwell are through in the command deck via visar, waiting to talk to you."
Hunt accepted a set of communicator accessories from one of the Ganymeans and attached them to his neck, ear, and forehead as they walked. "Who's running the ship?" he asked as they approached one of the internal transit tubes.
"Leyel Torres, at your service," a voice said in his ear.
"Quite a stunt," Hunt complimented. "Pity about the hole in the roof."
"I assume their insurance will cover it."
"What's the score otherwise?"
"Well, it seems that you've gone and doubled all our problems—literally. The versions of you that we've just extricated from that mess were only half the story. Now we have to worry about the other half."
Chapter Sixty
Shingen-Hu refused to let himself be demoralized again. The higher gods had told him that he was to be their chosen instrument, and he had seen their power. Therefore the sudden cessation of the demonstration was a sign to him. It meant something. They had placed their emissaries in his charge, he had decided as the procession wound its way through the hills surrounding Rakashym, and left them stripped of their protection. All the time, the emissaries had remained quiet and subdued, obviously leaving Shing
en-Hu to work the interpretation out for himself. It could only mean that the gods were entrusting to him the task of saving them. It was a test of his faith and worthiness.
Having satisfied himself of that much, he maneuvered himself into one of the corners of the cart below the two guards who were riding up front, and out of their line of vision. Then, under cover of the other bodies packed around him, he slipped from his robe one of the pieces of mobilium from the dignitaries' carriage that he had picked up and concealed when they were back in the village square. He laid the sliver along one of his fingers and, concentrating his powers, slowly passed his finger through one of the links of the chain shackling his hands. The mobilium following behind his finger repelled the material, preventing it from rejoining behind, and the chain fell apart. He nudged Thrax, indicated what he had done, and passed him the other piece of mobilium. Thrax loosened his own chains, then worked his way across to the far side of the cart. By the time the cart had covered another mile, they had freed all five of the captives whom the gods had entrusted to them.
The train rounded a sharp bend at a point where the trail began descending, and there Shingen-Hu saw the opportunity that the gods had prepared for him. On one side, a steep gully rose into the rocks above the trail, its course littered with many loose and precarious boulders. On the other side, just past the bend where the gully spilled out onto the trail, there was a deep gorge with a stream at the bottom, and across it a cliff of crumbling, red-brown gritstone, its face patchy and veined with crystal of various colors.
Shingen-Hu waited until the cart carrying the prisoners had passed the gully, at which point the supply wagon and main body of the escorting soldiers following behind were obscured momentarily by the bend. Straightening up suddenly, he pointed at the gully with the extended fingers of both hands, singling out a large boulder that had acted as a dam and accumulated a mound of smaller debris fallen from higher up. The rock moved. Shingen-Hu sent a bolt of focused power, which he felt augmented by Thrax, concentrating beside him, and moments later a miniature avalanche came rumbling and tumbling down the gorge, sealing off the trail behind.
Ahead, the cart that the dignitaries were traveling in—commandeered from the villagers to replace the carriage—had come to a stop on a narrow stretch where the trail passed between two rock walls. As the occupants came spilling out in consternation, they blocked the way of the soldiers from the front, who were trying to get back. Shingen-Hu marveled at how perfectly the gods had prepared the moment.
Casting his powers forward, he materialized a curtain of thick, black smoke to add to their confusion. Now the train was blocked both to the rear and to the fore, and the way open for escape lay off to the side, across the gorge.
Again combining his power with Thrax's, he walked out on a jutting rock that the gods had provided. There he paused until he felt a current surging, gathered his effort, and then stepped forth confidently to feel himself carried across to a narrow ledge near the cliff base, a short distance above the water. Thrax moved onto the jutting rock, marshaling the emissaries. Shingen-Hu could see that, just as he had expected, they were giving Thrax no assistance, but were acting like helpless novices to let him meet his test on his own merits.
"Walk forward over the bridge," he called, beckoning for them to follow.
"What bloody bridge?" the emissary who was called Hunt shouted back.
"The bridge that faith shall build for ye. Trust my word, and my power shall carry thee safe."
Hunt shrugged and stepped off the rock, and Shingen-Hu felt a wave of exhilaration as he bore the emissary over. Next came the redheaded female, followed by the ring-eyed Father of Gods, who had arrived in the spinning temple of beasts. By that time the ledge was crowded, and Thrax was left on the other side with the short-skirted female and the long-headed giant.
"Now we must climb," Shingen-Hu exhorted. His power would never lift five of them to the top. The test would be to get them there, he was certain. What was to happen after that would then be revealed. So saying, he began moving smoothly and surely up the face, making use of frictite veins to afford a grip where there was no convenient hold, and avoiding the protrusions of green anchorite and black catchstone, as any youngster would know how to do.
But he had barely ascended halfway when a cry from below halted him. "What in God's name is this confounded stuff? I can't move."
Shingen-Hu leaned outward and peered back down. The Father of Gods was stuck to a knob of anchorite and gesticulating frantically. Hunt began traversing toward him but became entangled with a growth of clingweed hanging from a crevice, while the redheaded female below them was scrabbling futilely at a block of lubrite, which contained grains of mobilium and was unclimbable. They were acting like children to try him, Shingen-Hu realized. The test was not over yet.
Meanwhile, priests and soldiers were appearing from the confusion on the other side of the gorge. "Thrax, thou must cross over now and assist," Shingen-Hu called down. From his stance above he helped Thrax across the gorge, then turned and resumed climbing.
But as he reached the top, Thrax's voice came up from below. "'Tis beyond all hope, Master. They are as fish stranded in mud."
Shingen-Hu looked back across the gorge. The soldiers had reached the jutting rock and were dragging back the female and the long-headed one who had been left. "Then save thyself, Thrax," he called back down. "Nothing can be gained by thy sacrifice."
Thrax joined him at the top of the cliff minutes later. By that time the long-headed one and the short-skirted female had been led away, and soldiers had descended to the stream and were wading across. On the trail above the soldiers, the priests had assembled around the Examiner and were directing a paralyzing influence across at the three emissaries stranded below. Shingen-Hu looked on dejectedly. He had failed.
Movement higher up above caught his eye. A flock of vultures was circling above the trail, right over the spot where the priests were gathered. Raising his arm, he pointed at them, his eyes glinting malevolently. Seized by a sudden compulsion, the birds voided their contents upon the priests from on high. Shingen-Hu and Thrax turned and walked sadly away.
In the Shapieron, orbiting high over Jevlen, Eesyan was explaining over the connection from Thurien what would be involved in restoring visar's connection to jevex.
"The line out from the club connected into the regular Jevlenese planetary communications net," he said from one of the large screens overlooking the command deck. "The activation codes that were fed in triggered an h-link termination node somewhere, which was programmed with the operating parameters to access jevex. To restore the connection we need to do two things: first, find an entry point into the planetary net that bypasses the normal security checks; and second, input the same activation codes to it that Keshen entered from the club."
"So that would trigger the same h-space terminal to connect to Uttan," Hunt said. He was standing with Danchekker and Keshen beside the Ganymeans, Leyel Torres and Rodgar Jassilane. "We wouldn't need to know where the node is located or what it is, or exactly how it functions?"
"That's right," Keshen confirmed.
"But I thought all the links were shut down," Jassilane said. "Isn't that what disconnected you in the first place?"
"Yes," Eesyan agreed. "Apart from one that they've probably got open to their people inside PAC—but that would be inaccessible to us, anyway. But in order to stage his invasion from Uttan, Eubeleus will have to open jevex to access from Jevlen-based trunk nodes again. What we're saying is that when he does, visar will have been routed through to one of them."
Jassilane looked inquiringly at Keshen.
The Jevlenese nodded, "If we can get back into the net," he confirmed.
Gina watched with Nixie, Fendro, and Murray, over on one side. There was nothing she could contribute, and tossing in questions that could just as well be answered later would only delay things. Nixie, Fendro, and Murray were still too awed at the interior of the starship to have much tho
ught about anything else, anyway.
"And I think there's a way we might be able to do it," Keshen said. He looked around quickly. "Through one of the redirector satellites that were left functioning. There are about thirty of them. They're part of the regular net, unmanned, and a long way out." The others were listening intently. He spread his hands and went on. "If we could get to one of them and find a way inside it, I think I could break into one of the primary circuits. That would bypass the protection. The network itself would take care of finding a route to wherever the access code indicates. We don't have to know where it points."
"Do you know the codes?" Eesyan asked. He sounded dubious, as if he found the thought unlikely.
Keshen looked surprised. "But I assumed visar had the codes," he replied. "visar was connected when I entered them at the club. Isn't it true?"
"They were stored in local memory," visar said. "They got lost when I was cut off."
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