Jeff was happy they could breathe, but his lungs burned just the same.
“We should keep moving,” he said.
Lady Capitoline waited for them at the top of the steps. Her golden eyes glared at them. Her three arms hung loose at her sides. She stood poised and regal, yet appeared as if she was ready to pounce on them and there was nothing Jeff could do about it. His entire leg ached and his foot felt like it was on fire. He felt spent. If the seven-legged giant attacked, he would be helpless to do much about it.
“These are yours,” Lady Capitoline said. She held out a hand filled with a pair of Jordan’s robot cockroaches. “The worms destroyed two of them.”
Jordan stepped forward, thigh-high to the giant, and took her robots back.
“I thank you,” Lady Capitoline said. “You are a newer race, are you not?”
Jeff was about to answer when he realized that the giant wasn’t speaking to him. More surprising was when Jordan curtsied and then gave a bow. When did she turn into the gracious diplomat?
“We’re human, and we’re new here as you say,” Jordan said. “The most recently added race to the Galactic Commons, you know. I’m Jordan. This is Jeff.”
“Well met,” Lady Capitoline said. “We should remove ourselves to someplace safe until the intruders go away.”
Lady Capitoline turned and led them towards an enormous archway. The upper level of the building appeared to be a smaller version of the floor below. They entered a domed chamber filled with blocks of stone with intricate mineral patterns. Numerous horizontal fountains flowed through troughs, the water emerging from and vanishing to places unseen. A stone curtain closed down beneath the arch once they entered.
Lady Capitoline straddled a long rectangular bench and settled upon it. Even seated, she was more than twice as tall as Jeff. Jordan appeared mesmerized by the things in the room and began to meander. Jeff approached the giant.
“If I may be so bold,” Jeff said, “Lord Akimbo’s worms will be able to get in here, won’t they?”
“It appears so,” Lady Capitoline said. “He has made some modifications to his one invention.”
“His invention. The worms?”
“Yes. A finishing bolt for what you call the elevators. Not self-guiding, still reliant on the navigation AI, and able to direct the power flow across quantum switches.”
“He’s using them as his own private army to destroy the city.”
She sighed. With her slender fingers she arranged the coat of pearls around her legs. “I suppose then Lord Akimbo has come here to kill me?”
“I don’t know. I have no idea what he might want or what Irving the Grey is up to, either. What defenses can you activate? Is there a way to get you out of here?”
“Defenses? There is nothing of that sort here. No one comes here. No one ever. This place was closed off after the founding of the city. Besides myself and the automations, nothing resides here but memories.”
“It’s beautiful,” Jordan said.
She was staring up at the dome’s interior. Jeff looked up and saw an oculus cut into the dome’s top that revealed several pink and blue stars in tight constellations. Jeff wondered if a lens covered the oculus, as the stars appeared large. A pattern of sparkling lights decorated the inside the dome, some kind of inlaid gemstones or jeweled glass. It gave the structure the feeling of being translucent, as if he could see the universe above them.
“So why is Lord Akimbo here?” Jeff asked. “What work do you do that he might hope to interrupt?”
She laughed, and it was a rich sound that filled the chamber. “Work? My work finished ages ago. All I do now is contemplate and remember. The twilight years of my race are quite long, and I spend them here alone.”
“That’s so sad,” Jordan said.
“To one as short lived as you, I suppose it would sound that way. But this is the fulfillment of my life’s purpose. I have succeeded, and this is the fruit of my labor.”
Jeff looked at the chamber and its fountains and sculptures. He could imagine getting lost in the eddies of crystals in the rocks and peaceful gurgles of the moving water and the turning of the stars above. He liked his solitude, and he missed that part of his caretaker job back on Earth. But he enjoyed getting to know some of the odd characters of the Galactic Commons. Some might eventually become his friends, like Oliop. And the thought of years or centuries without anyone to talk to? Contrary to his ex-wife’s accusation, he wasn’t a hermit and didn’t want to be alone forever. But Lady Capitoline desired this life. So what else was here that Lord Akimbo might want?
Jeff walked to the stone door and listened. He heard nothing.
“Is it a revenge thing?” Jordan asked.
“Perhaps,” Lady Capitoline said. “Lord Akimbo was not given a plaque or an honorific statue. If that was all he wanted, I suppose we could manufacture one. But thousands of craftsmen aren’t included in the chamber below.”
“I’ve known lots of petty people, you know. Some would screw you over for a lot less.”
Jeff surveyed the room, tried to ignore the beauty of it, focused on its purpose. It was as it appeared. A chamber of contemplation, a place of retirement for this grand creature. He pushed his hair from his face.
“You said automation,” Jeff said. “What automation is there?”
“Oh, just old machines that keep this house in place,” Lady Capitoline said. “And the weather controls for the city.”
CHAPTER 27
The worms scratched at the chamber door. A soft vibrating sound came from the walls.
“Those worms destroyed entire buildings in minutes,” Jordan said. “They’ll be in here soon.”
“Nanites will rebuild what the worms damage,” Lady Capitoline said.
“But will they stop them?”
“No.”
“Is there another exit?” Jeff asked.
Lady Capitoline considered the door where the worms were drilling. “He would bring this place down,” she said in a contemplative voice.
“If he’s anything like Irving, yeah, that’s a safe bet.”
The grinding at the door got louder.
“Would this not be the natural progression of things?” Lady Capitoline asked in a dreamy voice. “That which was built would eventually fall due to our baser nature. Expansion, unity, collapse.”
Jeff gave Jordan a look. Jordan shrugged. “Is she talking to you or me?” she mouthed.
“My Lady,” Jeff said, “The struggle to prevent collapse never ends. It requires the cooperation of a civilization, everybody, to hold off the forces of entropy. A proverb of my people is ‘it takes a village.’”
Lady Capitoline didn’t respond, but continued her gaze into nothing. The stone door began to let light shine through from a dozen holes like a sieve.
“What my friend here is trying to say,” Jordan said, “is that you need to pitch in here or we’re all toast.”
Lady Capitoline turned on Jordan. Jeff thought the giant was about to yell. Then she smiled.
“Go to that obelisk,” Lady Capitoline said, pointing towards the opposite end of the room. “There’s a service hatch that will open for you when you get there. It leads down to the weather system.”
“What about you?” Jeff asked.
Lady Capitoline made a dismissive gesture. “I wouldn’t fit.”
Worms crawled through the holes, end-to-end lines of wriggling things. They whispered softly. Jeff made out the word “neutralize” as part of their mantra, repeated over and over.
Jordan rolled her remaining cockroaches towards the door.
“Get ’em, boys.”
Jeff and Jordan ran across the room. Jeff heard a klop-klop-klop behind them. He took one look back and saw that Lady Capitoline was now standing and stomping like a seven-legged whirling dancer. Her pearl dress swirled about, catching the chamber’s light on every orb. The cockroaches raced about underneath her, firing spark after spark into the oncoming tide. And the worms kept c
oming.
“She going to get –” Jordan started to say.
“We don’t know what,” Jeff said. “The worms can neutralize beings with translators. I recovered from that. Let’s go.”
The room was much larger than it appeared, and running across it took the last of Jeff’s strength. They made it to the obelisk. Jordan pushed Jeff off, unable to support him any longer. There in the tiled floor was an open hatch that led downward. The incongruity of the opening’s placement led Jeff to believe that the entire obelisk had slid without them having noticed.
There was no ladder. It was a straight drop into darkness.
“I guess this place isn’t up to code,” Jordan said. “Is it a grav chute?”
Jeff went to a nearby fountain and took a double handful of water. He threw it down the hatch. The droplets paused in midair before beginning a slow descent.
“Here goes nothing,” Jeff said.
He stepped into the opening.
***
Oliop didn’t like leaving Jordan or his sidekick behind, but with so many worms around, a direct confrontation with Lord Akimbo and the Grey wasn’t prudent. He first followed his nose and backtracked the scent of the giant being confronting the intruders. This led to an outer hall open to the sky. Here Oliop listened, but he heard little besides the commotion behind him. The entire place was somehow shielded from the winds and was surprisingly quiet. He trotted along, not seeing any other passages or access panels or doors. He finally came to a stairway leading either up or down. The faintest hum came from downstairs.
The lower level was a smaller curving corridor similar to the upper level. A mosaic of the stars ran along the inner wall. Oliop ignored the decorations and followed the sound. He arrived at a section of wall where a comet blazed bright among the stars of a faint constellation. He found a seam. He touched the comet. It didn’t budge. He pushed at the edges of what surely was a hatch or a door. He began to pull tools from his pouch and settled on a favorite pry bar.
The door popped open with some encouragement from his good friend leverage. A dark space greeted him. He threw one of his crawling drones down into the tunnel and attached a small lamp to his own head so he could see. The door closed on its own behind him after he entered, leaving him in darkness but for his light. Oliop was well accustomed to working in the dark, greasy recesses of the Galactic Commons. He hummed softly as he crouch-walked down the tunnel.
Oliop found a dead end. There hadn’t been any turns or intersections. He pushed, grunting, and the wall turned out to be another access door like the first, which led to a big room with the largest machine he had ever seen. This was the source of the hum. The machine appeared to be an immense disc-shaped tank with copper-colored skin. He saw his own blurry reflection, but the material was also partially translucent. He made out moving bits through the metal skin, thin white twigs that reminded him of fish bones. These churned through some kind of viscous purple liquid that appeared in different shades and layers, like the surface of a gas world. The moving twigs passed by at regular intervals, but whether they were doing the stirring or were being stirred wasn’t obvious. No doubt more things turned and moved deeper inside.
A faint smell of ozone hung in the air.
He began to walk a circle around the machine. He could find no control boxes and no meters. No information kiosk, maintenance bot with an overly helpful personality, or terminal with easy-to-exploit input devices were available. He didn’t even see any safety signs.
Everything in the Galactic Commons had safety signs.
He turned his light off, as the reflection on the machine’s coppery skin bothered him. He sent his drone to crawl up the sloping tank for a look. Nothing interesting up top. He had the bot take a look underneath. The base of the machine was attached the floor, with no gaps visible. Oliop ran a finger along the smooth surface. It had no seams. Oliop started to feel irritated. He would have to make a microscopic inspection of the thing to find any molecular-fused joints. If the machine had a purpose, it had to be controlled or have a brain somewhere. And didn’t everything need maintenance from time to time?
The crawling drone pinged. He went to find it. It waited at the machine’s base not far from where they had entered. It pointed towards a hatch in the floor. Oliop began to pry. At first it felt as if it wouldn’t open, even more stubborn than the first door had been. But the hatch gave slightly once he planted both feet on either side of it and heaved with all his might. He realized that a difference in air pressure was making opening the door a true challenge.
He went again into his tool kit and produced some surface-grabbing galoshes and put them over his boots. Next he set out his other three drones and had them pry at the hatch along with him, adding a demagnetizing pulse to neutralize any locks of that nature.
With a big whoosh, the hatch popped open. The room around him exhaled out the hatchway. The force of it would have pulled him out but for the grip his booties had on the floor. One of his drones went down and out the opening. The others placed anchors down. Oliop focused on keeping his balance. It was like standing in a windstorm. He then looked down.
Below him lay clouds. Far beneath them he made out the outline of the Galactic Commons, the metropolis a vast pattern of oddly shaped blocks, parks, curving avenues, and a number of gaudy, shining buildings visible even from this altitude. The force of the wind leaving the room subsided, settling down to a steady gust as whatever atmospheric controls within the building around him tried to return the air pressure back to normal.
He now heard something besides the hum of the machine. A grinding noise came from the access corridor. The worms were at the door and tunneling their way in. Oliop examined his options. Might there be other hidden access hatches or doors? There wasn’t enough time to find one. He heard the worms’ whispers approaching. He also heard the echo of Lord Akimbo saying something to Irving the Grey. They were here and would be in the machine room in moments.
Oliop scooped up his remaining drones. He heard approaching footsteps. He could go outside where the wind might sweep him off and down to the city below. Or he could round the machine and hope to stay hidden.
He had seen what the worm inside Jeff Abel’s head had done to him.
Oliop went down through the hatch and closed it behind him.
***
Why would a giant have a grav chute that didn’t fit her?
Jeff pondered this as he descended into darkness. Stepping into an open hole where the forces of gravity were twisted by technology was in and of itself an unnatural act that forced him to override the baser instinct to not jump off anything higher than a low porch onto solid ground. When he couldn’t see the bottom of the chute, let alone its sides, this proved an even greater test of willpower. The incongruity of size between the palace’s sole resident and this specific conveyance provided a nice but brief distraction as Jeff sank into the dark air below.
He heard Jordan scream above him, but it was the scream of a thrill-seeker riding a roller coaster. She was heading his way, and he wondered if it was possible that she was falling quicker than him.
He touched down on a solid floor and got out of the way as Jordan came tumbling in.
“That went a bit faster than the standard grav lifts in the city,” Jeff said.
“I know! Wish they were all like that,” Jordan said.
A series of dull amber lights illuminated a round, low-ceilinged room with no visible exits. In the middle was something that looked like a mushroom-shaped flue to a chimney but without any visible holes for the passage of smoke or air. Jeff got down on his knees and examined it. It had no buttons or lights or input jacks. He laid his hands on the flue and pushed at it, but the strange nodule was firmly installed in the floor. It felt cool and smooth to the touch.
“So is this the dungeon?” Jordan asked. She pushed at the low ceiling.
“Look for a hatchway out of here,” Jeff said. He began to check the walls.
Jordan was the f
irst to find a fingerhold in the floor. “Trapdoor here,” she said. She was about to pull it open when Jeff stopped her and had them listen. Through the walls came the faint sound of scores, maybe hundreds, of the worms scratching and digging.
“They’ve gotten past Lady Capitoline,” Jordan whispered. “They’re going to tear this entire place down like the other buildings.”
“But this seems to be coming from below. That would mean the worms split up. Let’s crack the hatch.”
They peered down into a large room filled with an enormous machine that hummed. The hatch placed them right above it.
“Looks like an industrial washing machine,” Jeff said. “One that could hold a million gallons of water.”
“Or a tank for brewing beer.”
The digging sound was louder now. A crumbling noise followed and then silence. Jeff held up a finger and listened. He tried not to breathe. Over the hum, he heard voices.
“This way, Irving the Grey,” Lord Akimbo’s echoed from below. “Ohhh, it’s been so long coming. Hurry, hurry.”
Jeff could hear his shuffling step getting closer.
“Lady Capitoline has fallen. All hail me.”
Jordan mimed blowing a raspberry.
“What do you need me to do, Lord Akimbo?” the Grey asked.
“Ah yes, your purpose, Irving the Grey. This is the machine that will deliver my children and scatter them down below. We will make it rain! Ohhh, Lord Akimbo is so excited. And, ah! With Lady Capitoline no longer around, we control this house. And by we, I mean I.” Lord Akimbo tittered.
Jeff heard the Grey sigh and could imagine the smell.
“Speak to the machine, Irving the Grey. Speak to it. With my worm enabling you, you can do what Lady Capitoline would refuse us. The Commons will know rain. I will call all of my children here to prepare.”
“There’s no input device,” Irving the Grey said.
House of the Galactic Elevator Page 32