Medusa in the Graveyard
Page 8
“Well, criminal,” said Lady Sheba. “We meet at last.”
* * *
My voice died in my throat. It was as if Lady Sheba had closed her hand around my windpipe.
Fortunately, Medusa covered my visage. She spoke for me. “Sheba. Let me guess. Your shuttle survived the destruction of Titania, though its engines were disabled. You were rescued by the Weapons Clan? It was kind of them to show mercy to an orphan.”
“You will call me Lady Sheba,” commanded the woman my mother had called the Iron Fist. “I am the last surviving authority of Olympia, and I am asserting my right of command. You will stand down and you will obey my orders.”
Medusa smiled. “Well! Where to begin? You have no right of command, Sheba. We are traveling inside the Charon system, which is administered by the Alliance of Ancient Races. Clan law does not apply here. We will not stand down, we will not accept your orders, and we will not permit you to return to Olympia.”
I expected Sheba to glower with outrage, but I had forgotten what a skillful Machiavellia she had been. Her smile matched Medusa’s. “I have no intention of arguing with a machine. Nothing you say has validity.”
“In that case,” said Medusa, “I will speak with Bomarigala of the Weapons Clan. He has no authority over us either, and his clan has no claim over Olympia, but I would like to convey a final message to him before we end this conversation.” She raised her voice. “Because we are going to end it, Bomarigala. This charade is over.”
“You are a tool,” said Lady Sheba. “Nothing more.”
“I am Medusa. I speak for Olympia.”
“For the time being,” said Sheba, utterly sure of herself. She never lost her smile—but she relinquished her seat. The one who was really in charge sat down again.
“Well,” said Bomarigala, “I regret that the tone of this conversation has become so bitter. I hope we’ll be able to salvage a more cordial relationship when we speak again.”
“Hope springs eternal,” said Medusa.
Bomarigala gave a curt nod. “Should you choose to travel outside the Charon system, you’ll find that your debts to us will be in full effect.”
“Likewise,” said Medusa.
“Very well. I’ll say goodbye. There is one final thing I’d like you to know. Sheba was not the only survivor we rescued from Titania. We may yet realize a profit on our investment.” Bomarigala smiled. “We’ll be sending our own delegation into the graveyard.”
His smile faded. “See you there, Oichi?”
The screen went dark.
* * *
Nuruddin sighed.
Lee said, “You caught them off guard with that call. That’s why Bomarigala tried to make you lose your focus, by showing you that woman, but you stayed cool.” Medusa detached herself, and Lee could see my expression. “Or—um—that’s how it looked.”
What had I done when I had the chance to confront the woman who had been an architect of our misery? I sat like a speechless child in the presence of a stern grandmother.
Sheba wasn’t dead. That was a gravity bomb right in the middle of my model of the universe, but it wasn’t even the thing that scared me the most.
Lady Sheba tried to assert her clan rights—no surprise there. Bomarigala had reminded us that the Weapons Clan had made a substantial investment in Titania and Olympia; they had never wavered in that narrative. It was the last thing he said that had my stomach clenching like a fist.
We’ll be sending our own delegation into the graveyard.
I looked at the dead screen and saw no camera light. Not that it mattered what they saw at this point. If they heard us, hadn’t they been hearing us all along? “We made it clear where we stand,” I concluded.
What more I would have said beyond that point, I may never recall, because Captain Nemo’s second chose that moment to pop a priority warning into my queue.
URGENT, it declared.
I paused to add Medusa and Terry Charmayne to our link.
That would be a lot of Medusas and Minis. On the other hand, we could search faster and more thoroughly with that kind of force.
Medusa drew her tentacles in close.
When it was done, she gave me a short nod.
Considering the conversation we had just had with Bomarigala of the Weapons Clan and the not-quite-dead Lady Sheba, a little paranoia seemed judicious at that juncture.
I got up from Thomas’s chair. “Captain, a security matter has come to our attention. We ask that you confine yourselves to Merlin until further notice.”
“Affirmative,” said Thomas.
“I’ll work on the contract,” said Lee. “When you’ve got time, we can go over it together.”
Cocteau stood with the others in the hall. She still held her bottle of wine, a gift from Ogden, and she still wore a smile, as if she felt my conversation with Bomarigala had been an unqualified success. Wilson stood beside her, dwarfing her in size yet solicitous toward her, as if she were as powerful a grandmother as Lady Sheba.
“Thank you for a lovely visit,” said Cocteau.
“You’re welcome,” I said, since My pleasure no longer seemed appropriate, and Medusa and I began the challenging process of exiting Merlin.
* * *
When we emerged into Lock 212, Merlin shut her door behind us.
Medusa flowed over me; we linked again. We sealed Lock 212 and went in search of a mover that would take us to a maintenance air lock, which would be the fastest (normal) way to access the exterior of Olympia so we could join the searchers who were looking outside.
Outside may seem like an odd place for someone to hide, but Medusa and I had hidden there for years. We knew that landscape better than anyone, with the possible exception of Kitten. Olympia’s access canyons, research towers, locks, ladders, nodes, valves, arrays, and hatches presented a rich variety of places to conceal things—and a serious challenge to searchers. Lady Sheba had hidden a ship called Escape in one of the engine nozzles for decades.
The stars blazed as they wheeled overhead, but we were close enough to Charon now that it outshone the best of them, casting stark shadows.
Medusa and I began our survey near the edge of Central Sector, working our way meticulously toward the leading edge of Olympia, climbing man-made mountains and descending access canyons while consulting a ta
ctical grid displayed inside our heads. Since we were looking for Captain Nemo, the music I played was Bernard Herrmann’s score for Mysterious Island. Herrmann liked to use unusual instrument combinations to characterize the fantastic creatures portrayed in the movie, conveying both a sense of wonder and the impression of danger. The original Captain Nemo showed up at the conclusion of that film (rather like a deus ex machina, now that I think of it), so it was appropriate.
Once that music finished, it seemed logical to move on to Herrmann’s score for Jason and the Argonauts. My favorite part was where the dragon’s teeth were sown, and the Children of the Hydra’s Teeth sprouted into an army of skeletons. The dominant instrument in this sequence was the bassoon—its effect was menacing. Once those skeletons started fighting, an array of percussion instruments joined the wind section to create the effect of clashing swords and rattling bones.
Just as the music announced the fall of that skeletal army over a cliff, Medusa slowed and found a spot to perch near one of the 200-series locks. We were now on the opposite side of the ship from Lock 212 and Merlin.
This reminded me of the very important question I had failed to ask Schnebly, when Nemo had been so chilly with us in the Command Center. If I had queried sooner, perhaps our captain would not be missing now. I pondered my failure while we waited. It didn’t appear any more forgivable, regardless of how I tried to look at it.
Lilith was Schnebly’s work partner, though they hadn’t bonded. She was formally paired with a Security officer who worked in the Charmayne family compound, a job that didn’t necessarily require the help of a Medusa unit on a daily basis.
Lilith and Schnebly worked together for special projects—for instance, when Schnebly needed to travel across the outside of the hull of Olympia at top speed. We saw them zooming toward us. The Medusa units could use their tentacles to great advantage in zero gravity, pulling themselves and their passengers along at considerable speed. It was a marvelous thing to see and even more wonderful to do. When they had joined us, Lilith touched Medusa with a tentacle. They drew close and pressed their faces together.
“Can you hear me?” said Schnebly. His voice sounded a bit tinny, and I realized the sound waves of his voice were passing through Lilith’s mask and into Medusa’s.
“Why not use the helmet radios?” I called back. “They’re short range.”
“I’m not so sure we’re alone out here,” said Schnebly, and somehow I didn’t think he was referring to the Minis. “I don’t want to risk being overheard.”
The Security overlay that Medusa and I had constructed was very accurate. I didn’t kid myself that we could see everything, especially now that we had entered territory controlled by the Alliance of Ancient Races.
“Okay,” I said. “What’s up?”
He got right to the point. “Did you kill Nemo?”
I almost broke the contact. “What? No!”
“I don’t think he could still be alive,” said Schnebly. “He would never abandon his post.”
“So that automatically means I killed him? Why would I do that?”
“He’s an old-fashioned guy,” said Schnebly. “I cut him a lot of slack for that. He was always charged with keeping Olympia safe, and that’s a job that forces you to make some cruel decisions. He’s got integrity—he never gave me a reason to doubt that, but I wonder if he’s as happy about our Revolution as we are.”
“We’re not the ones who murdered the voting members of the ruling clans.” At least, not most of them. “Baylor Charmayne did that.”
“You’re preaching to the choir,” said Schnebly. “I think Nemo disagreed with the Executives about a lot of things, but maybe he shared their suspicion of the Medusa units. I don’t think he likes having them involved with every aspect of our operations.”
“Why not? We’re more efficient when they assist us.”
“Yes, but they’re also more observant—and Nemo was used to having the Weapons Clan swoop in and rescue us from wheat plagues. If they’ve been planning to step up their operations, now that we’re closer to Graveyard, the Medusa units are eventually going to notice suspicious activities.”
Again, I thought of Nuruddin’s God Machines. “You think he’s their operative? A double agent?”
“Maybe not one hundred percent of the time. Part of the time, I think he is. He may not approve of our decision to cut them loose.”
“So why has he disappeared? He can’t help them or us if he’s not our captain.”
“That, I don’t know,” said Schnebly. “We’d better find him. We’d better ask him some hard questions.”
I thought about that for a long moment. If Nemo had been antagonized by seeing Medusa in his Operations Center, he was going to be even less happy being interrogated by her.
“I want you to ask him,” I said. “You know what makes him tick.”
“As well as anybody does,” said Schnebly, “who isn’t the captain of a generation ship. That’s a pretty exclusive club.”
I tapped Schnebly’s shoulder to let him know I was receiving a communication.
9
Finding Nemo (Sort Of)
Ten thousand Medusa units reside on Olympia. Not all of them are assigned and operational, but most of them are, and those are paired with people from all walks of life, from administrators to agriculture specialists to doctors. Those Medusas assist their partners in their daily activities.
However, in emergency situations, the Medusa units can go to war. They can act as a security force, a rescue squad, a search team, with or without their partners. When Kitten broadcast her message about the headless body, Medusa put her sisters on high alert.
You might think that meant everyone rushed to rescue Kitten, but the Invader Protocol is far more cautious than that. The assumption is that every place on Olympia is equally at risk, and that invaders or saboteurs are trying to create a diversion for destructive activities that will take place once the good guys have all run off in the wrong direction.
I called Captain Thomas by radio. “Merlin should lock down.”
“Affirmative,” she said.
That took longer than you might imagine. We had several kilometers to travel. On the way, Minis, Medusas, and their partners gave us regular status reports as they inspected sections of Olympia for intruders and cleared them. I tried to be reassured by their reports, but I had a feeling we were all missing something.
Kitten said.
Medusa did her best to comfort her.
I checked the Security overlay of Kitten’s general location. We weren’t the only ones moving toward her—so were eight of the newer Minis who had been designed to aid with Security work. These newer Minis were armed with several weapons, from lethal to nonlethal—though also with a full library of show tunes, to round out their personalities.
Kitten said.
* * *
Olympia’s leading edge is a platform on which is mounted a communications array and a collection of research towers. Our generation ship spins around an axis, but the leading edge doesn’t spin with it, so even though the towers can be pressurized, they are zero-gravity environments. People who walk on the platform between the towers use magnetized shoes.
Nemo’s body seemed to be standing at attention when we found him near Lucifer Tower; his mags connected him to the platform. Medusa took one look at him and said,
I felt hurt that Medusa had also suspected me of killing Nemo, but I have to admit, the first thing that occurred to me is that I’ve never been a head-chopper-offer because I’ve never had a tool by which I could accomplish such a thing. Technically that’s innocence by default.
Kitten flitted back and forth near Nemo’s body, using her eyes as cameras to take pictures of the scene. They worked independently of each other, so she looked a bit odd as each lens expanded and shut with the snap of each picture, very much out of sync, lending her the appearance of cartoon bewilderment.
That appearance was false. Kitten felt dismayed, but she was thinking on her feet (paws?), trying to document a scene that would be examined in greater detail from those pictures she was taking.