Logan: A Trilogy

by William F. Nolan

  Jessica and the girl slid Logan’s body onto a yielding bed of sand, draped with throwcovers, then slipped down beside him, exhausted. Their journey into the mountain’s interior had totally sapped their strength. Logan had tried to walk, but his body refused to cooperate; he was a dragging weight between them, an object to be moved through the dark skein of labyrinthine passages, guided only by Mary-Mary’s knowledge of the intricate caverns.

  They’d reached the cave which was home to the girl. Sunlight shafting down from a high crack in the outer rockface of Crazy Horse provided illumination. It was now mid-afternoon.

  Jessica lay in the patch of gold, soaking up the rays, face raised to the welcome yellow warmth. Tears formed in her eyes, rolled down the slope of her cheeks, but she was smiling. “So long…since…I’ve felt the sun.”

  “I’ve been preparing things,” said Mary-Mary. “Taking what I knew we’d be needing from Gant’s supplies. A little here, a little there.” She nodded toward the rear of the cave. “We have food, water, medicine for Logan.Even these!” And she folded back a throwcover, revealing two Fusers.

  Jessica looked at her. “Gant was going to kill us.”

  “I know,” said the girl. “I’ve been watching everything. He enjoys inflicting pain. He always did. As a Sandman, he never worried about who got hurt on a hunt. He’d Gun anyone in his way. Homered a seven-year-old once.”

  “How did you get here—to Crazy Horse?”

  “I came with Ballard as part of his Sanctuary Line. When he died I hid in the caverns, stealing the food I needed. They never missed it. I was careful about that.”

  “Then Gant doesn’t know you’re alive?”

  “No one knows I’m here in the mountain. That’s why I’ve been able to watch, find out what Gant’s planning. And it’s monstrous.”

  “I know he’s reactivated the Central Core,” said Jessica. “But, beyond that—”

  “Gant plans to revive the Thinker—use it to bring the cities back to life. If that happens, he’ll control the world.”

  “But Ballard killed the Thinker.”

  “Not really,” said Mary-Mary. “He didn’t have enough time. Gant’s men were on the way to Crazy Horse when he got there just ahead of them. Ballard did what he could—shorted out the Central Core, destroyed all of the main relays…enough to knock out the cities. But Gant homered him before he could effectively destroy the main computer body. The Thinker isn’t dead, it’s just sleeping. And Gant intends to awaken it.”

  “Can’t find them! And why not?” Steratt raged at his men. “They’re here in the mountain, aren’t they? Every exit is sealed. Why haven’t you found them?”

  “You’ve got ten thousand caves in there,” said the leader of the main-thrust search group. “It would take years to probe all of them. There’s just no way to do it. We searched the nearest caverns, but they’ve gone in deep. Too deep for us to follow.”

  “What about footprints?”

  “Much of the ground is hard rock and shale,” said the leader. “We didn’t find any footprints.”

  “Then we’ll starve them out,” said Steratt. “Time is on our side. Have a double guard assigned to all food and water supply areas. They can’t escape the mountain. And when they finally come out we’ll be waiting for them.”

  Logan slept. Mary-Mary had provided clothing for him, had tended the wounds on his body, had fed him. The injections she gave him allowed his body to relax, and begin to restore itself. His natural strength came into play; his muscle tone improved, his skin took on color again.

  Sometimes he would awaken, groggy and blinking, on the sandy floor of the cave, crying out Jessica’s name. She was always there to hold him, gentle him back to sleep, telling him that they were safe… safe…safe.

  Periodically, Mary-Mary would reconnoiter, then return to the cave with news of Gant’s operation.

  Jessica had many questions for her: “How does he get people to work for him? Surely he doesn’t reward them?”

  “Reward them!” Mary-Mary laughed. “Gant buys them on the Market as slave workers. Has them brought here. They work in twenty-four-hour shifts. He has well over a hundred men and women now, keeps them locked in cell units between shifts. Here…”

  And she sketched a rough map of Gant’s headquarters on the floor of the cave. “This building is for the technicians.”

  “How many of those?”

  “Dozens. Computer experts, most of them. They supervise the workers. The key scientist is named Fennister. A real genius. He can restore the Thinker to full performance.”

  “But why would a man of such brilliance work for Gant?”

  “You saw what Gant did to Logan. He uses torture to gain his ends. Fennister knows he’ll be tortured to death, slowly, if he fails to do what Gant asks. All of them know that.”

  “And they all…accept this?”

  “At first three of the techs rebelled, refused to be a part of Gant’s plan. So he used them as examples for the others. What he did to them was.terrible to see. Now no one defies Gant. No one.”

  “Then how can he be stopped?”

  Mary-Mary sighed; her eyes darkened. “I don’t think he can be stopped,” she said.

  * * *

  FENNISTER

  Sparks showered and burst blue against the terminal. Fennister 2 thinned the blade of cutting fire from the nozzle of the Flamer and finished the separation, then fused the tri-relay segment. He tested the cable. Perfect.

  “Gant’s here,” said a voice at his elbow. Fennister acknowledged with a nod, wearily putting aside the Flamer and peeling his workgoggles. He was a man ready for sleep when the cities died, which made him twenty-seven now. He would never have become a runner. It was not in Fennister’s nature to duck and dodge and hide and outwit. His world was computer science, and if the Thinker had told him to die he would have quietly obeyed its command and gone willingly to a Sleepshop.

  But with the death of the cities he quickly came to realize that life beyond the dictates of a machine was precious. Freed from the duties of computer maintenance, he had met a woman, Lisa 18, and had come to care greatly for her. They’d agreed to have children, planned for the future as pair-bound lovers.

  Then outlanders hit them. Lisa had been sold on the Market, and he’d been shipped to Crazy Horse as a worker for Gant. “Supervise the rebirth of the Thinker and I’ll see that Lisa is yours,” Gant had promised him. “Fail to get this job done and you’ll never see her again.” Thus, despite strong personal misgivings about the project, he had agreed to head it for Gant.

  The Central Core was first—and now it was almost totally restored. The main computer-body would follow, each operation done in the thorough, meticulous fashion that characterized Fennister’s work.

  But not fast enough to suit Gant. Three of Fennister’s best men had been tortured in the past week, another killed outright, and now Gant was coming here again, to the Core, to make fresh demands of his team.

  He would not resist these demands; it was not in Fennister’s nature to do so. Yet he hated Gant with the same quiet, deep intensity that he brought to his work. To rebuild the Thinker under this man’s rule was an agony to Fennister that lived within him each moment of the day and night like the breath in his body.

  Gant faced him, his tall shadow falling across Fennister’s lean body. As usual, Evans 9 was with him, a devil’s duo. The thought bitterly amused Fennister. No one had believed in devils for almost two hundred years, yet Gant and his Sandman-chief were surely prime candidates for demonhood.

  “How much longer?” Gant demanded.

  “The Core will be a hundred per cent operational within twelve hours. After that, the main body work should take another week to ten days.”

  Gant fingered the ruby at his throat, turned to Evans. “Tell me what he just said.”

  “Core to be a hundred per cent within six hours. Main body completed in another three days.”

  “Impossible!” protested Fennister. �
��I don’t have the technicians…the equipment…”

  “Ah, but you do,” said Gant smoothly, giving Fennister a jeweled smile. “We just picked up a dozen more techs for you on the Market. And additional equipment arrives by paravane tonight. You’ll meet my schedule.” Softly. “Won’t you?”

  Fennister sighed, tightening his thin lips. “Yes, I’ll meet your schedule.”

  * * *

  RECOVERY

  A shape, hovering. Hazy, double-imaged. Coming into focus.

  A face. A woman’s face. Close to his. Smiling.

  Jessica!

  Speechless, tears in his eyes, he held her, sought her lips with his, inhaled the sweet fragrance of her skin, touched at the soft flow of her hair. His arms closed around her convulsively.

  “It’s all right, Logan,” she said to him. “You’re safe…alive…with me. Everything’s all right now.”

  He drew in a long, shuddering breath; his eyes never left hers. “I thought I’d lost you forever…When the outlanders.”

  She stopped his words with a finger at his lips. “That’s all over—and we’re together again.”

  Logan stood up, swaying, still weak from the effects of the tranquilizing drugs. He looked around him at the cave.

  “Where are we? The last thing was…the storm.”

  “We’re with Mary-Mary inside Crazy Horse. She saved your life, got us both out of prison, gave you medicine.”

  Mary-Mary moved up to Logan, took his hands in hers. “I was the little girl in Cathedral,” she said. “When you were running.”

  “I remember,” said Logan.

  She told him about hiding inside the mountain, unable to go for help.about the ominous growth of Gant’s force (“He must have fifty Sandmen with him!”). And, finally, about Gant’s plan to reactivate the Thinker.

  “We’ve got to stop him,” said Logan. “If we don’t, he’ll start the whole inhuman process again… something even worse than death at twenty-one…a slow, enslaved death inside the cities. He’s got to be stopped before that can happen.”

  “But how?” asked Mary-Mary. “One man and two women against his armed Sandmen?”

  “We’ll need help,” Logan admitted.

  “And who’s going to help us?” said Jessica. “The Wilderness People—leaderless since Jonath was killed?.. .They’re weak, Logan, vulnerable. Gant would slaughter them in an instant! And how would we get word to them? The mountain is sealed. We can’t get out.”

  “She’s right,” said Mary-Mary. “Besides, Gant’s operation is nearly complete. We’ve no time to bring in outside help—even if we could find any.”

  A muscle tightened along Logan’s jaw; his eyes were set, intense, fixed on an inner goal. “Then…that leaves it to us,” he said.

  * * *

  EAGLE

  On Argos, in an ancient book, Logan had once read a short bit of verse, still remembered:

  If you wish

  To enter

  The nest of an eagle,

  You must wear

  His feathers.

  Which is why he asked Mary-Mary to take him to the place of workers’ supply.

  They crouched in cavern gloom, watching the guards.

  “Four of them,” whispered Logan. “Why four?”

  “Gant has doubled the guards on every door,” she told him.

  Too many, Logan told himself. The doors were useless.

  “The roof—is it wired?”

  “No,” she said.

  “Then I’ll use that,” said Logan, stuffing a Fuser into his belt.

  “They’ll hear you!”

  “Who can hear a cat?” Logan smiled.

  And was gone.

  On the roof, Logan kept low, moving in a half-run across the flat gray surface. As a Sandman, he’d done this sort of thing many times—entered buildings through stealth. This one would be simple.

  He found a ventpipe, leading down, pried loose its cover with the barrel of his weapon, working fast and without sound. Once inside the pipe, he carefully lifted the cover back into place. If anyone checked the roof all would be in order.

  A sense of adventure possessed him. He had his strength back, or most of it; he had Jessica, alive and loving him; he had his hatred of Gant to fire the blood in his body. It seemed to Logan, at this moment, that he could not fail, that he was truly invincible. He smiled at the madness of it, but logic did not matter; emotion ruled him, carried him swiftly forward in his plan.

  He located the clothing supply room without difficulty. It was precisely where Mary-Mary said it would be. The doorlock was an easy matter, and he slipped inside.

  No one on duty. A large room with long steel shelves holding neatly-folded workclothes. Logan selected three bodysuits all in matching blue, and quickly added the same number of gogglemasks and gloves. In removing the items, Logan did as Mary-Mary had done previously with foodstuffs and medical supplies: rearranged the stacks to disguise the fact that anything had been taken.

  With what he needed compactly bundled under one arm, Logan glided for the roof. When he heard voices he did not move. When they had faded he resumed. No problems.

  Invincible.

  They suited up. Masks. Gloves. Bodysuits.

  In these dark blue outfits it would be impossible to recognize them. They would blend in perfectly with the other workers, be able to move freely without fear of detection.

  When he had conceived the plan Logan intended going alone, but Mary-Mary told him that he’d need her to pinpoint the proper areas. “All right, then, the two of us.” No, not good enough. What they had to do required teamwork, and all three of them would be needed to get the job done.

  Reluctantly, Logan had agreed.

  * * *

  CORE

  The Central Core was Fennister’s pride. Working day and night, almost without sleep, toiling in the depths of the Core shoulder-to-shoulder with his men, he had converted a charred, heat-twisted mass of computer metal into its original machined perfection; he had reconstituted the heart of the Thinker. Now that great heart was beating strongly once again, sending its message of power out along mile upon mile of linked cable to all the dark areas of the multi-banked computer.

  Life was flowing back into the Thinker.

  The Core presently required only a standby crew; the main thrust of Fennister’s efforts concerned the vast computer-body itself. He was working desperately to meet Gant’s schedule—realizing that it was barely possible to succeed. He had to succeed, for the sake of his men, and for Lisa.

  Failure was unthinkable.

  Three figures detached from cavern shadow.three blue-clad workers, blending with more than a dozen other blue-clad workers.moving toward the Core.wearing the full-face gogglemasks required for this high-body-risk area.

  The Sandman accompanying this shift-replacement crew noticed nothing unusual; he had not counted the workers. That wasn’t his responsibility; if they sent him a dozen or two dozen his job was to guard them at the Core, make sure everything ran smoothly down there. Fennister knew what they should do; he didn’t. And didn’t give a damn in the bargain. They were sheep to be herded, and he was a bored shepherd.

  In the group, Logan kept Mary-Mary and Jessica close to him. Behind the opaque goggles, his eyes raked the area. They were entering the Core itself now, their transbelt taking them down to the glowing, pulsing interior.

  “Right on time,” said the guard below, his voice muted by the gogglemask he wore. “When have I ever been late?” growled the Sandman leading Logan’s group.

  “Have a good shift,” said the guard as his early hours workmen shuffled tiredly onto the return belt. We made it! Logan exalted. We’re here!

  With Mary-Mary and Jessica, he moved to a toolcab just out of the guard’s view. Shielding the move with his body, Logan took a needle-thin length of steel from his suit, worked it deftly into the drawerlock. The drawer slid back.

  Quickly, each of them removed a Flamer from the inside toolrack. The drawer
was closed, locked again.

  They moved off.

  Logan wasn’t sure of his direction. “Which way?” he asked Mary-Mary, his goggled head close to hers.

  “I’ll lead,” she said. “Follow me.”

  Logan and Jessica stayed close as she weaved a path around giant columns, past glowing relay units, deep into the humming depths of the inner Core.

  Now they were totally separated from the other workers, free to implement Logan’s plan. The Sandman on duty was long out of sight.

  “Is this the right cluster?” asked Logan, pausing before a tangle of multi-colored power cables protruding from the Core’s vitals like immense snakes.

  “Yes,” said Mary-Mary.

  Logan knelt to examine them. “If we cut through these and cross-connect them the power overload will blow the Core.”

  “But how will we get out?” asked Jessica, alarm in her muffled words.

  “Will this really stop Gant?”

  “Not completely,” said Logan. “But he’ll have to rebuild the entire Central Core again. By then we can figure a way out of the mountain and bring help back to fight him. This will work, I’m sure of it!”

  They each set their Flamers for maximum penetration. Using the high-intensity fire tools, they could slice through the massive cables with relative ease.

  But it would be dangerous.

  Keen concentration was a necessity; the depth of each cut had to be precise. Too shallow, and the cross-connection could not be achieved; too deep, and the cables would fuse, killing them instantly but leaving the Core intact.

  “Ready?” Logan’s Flamer was poised in his gloved hand, flickering blue at its tip. The two women nodded. “Begin,” he said.

  And three bright blades of flame began probing at the cables.

  * * *

  ATTENTION!