Black Dawn

by Peter J Evans

  "Holy one? Where are you?"

  "Some kind of chamber." Red jumped onto one of the higher levels. Heavy mounting bolts were set into the concrete. "I think there was something here, pumps maybe. Some kind of machinery."

  "So where is it now?"

  "Good question." She trotted to the end of the chamber, glad to be out of the sewage for a while. "The chamber splits into three tunnels. Which one should we go down?"

  There was a moment's silence. Then: "Ah, holy one? Hold your position..."

  "Why?"

  "It's moving."

  Curses sounded from the Daedalans, and Red looked back to see them spreading out, swords and lanterns held high. They had formed automatically around Trewpeny. They must have known by now that, if they lost the comm-linker they would never find their way out.

  "Jude, which way is it going?"

  "Towards your position, coming from the west. It's moving quite slowly."

  "Probably means it's drilling through. Jude, we need to be out of here..."

  Rustling noises issued from behind her, and she spun around, but they were coming from the comm-linker. Harrow must have been throwing maps about. "The centre tunnel," he shouted. "Quickly, holy one. It's close!"

  Red jumped down onto the floor of the chamber and ran for the tunnel, splashing her way through the muck. As soon as she ducked into it, she could see that it only extended for about twenty metres. Past that, a mass of rusted metal barred her way.

  "No go, Jude! Something's been stuffed in there!"

  "Okay, try the left. I can take you around behind it that way..."

  Red switched tunnels. This one looked clear, although as soon as she began to stride through it she could tell that something was wrong. There was a draught blowing through it. "Jude, I'm not sure about this."

  "It's stopped."

  "Where?"

  "About ten metres to your left."

  "Sneck." She glanced over her shoulder. The rest of the Daedalans were in the tunnel with her; Bill Foxe just behind, then Trewpeny and then the other two. "Go on," Foxed hissed. "I don't want to be this close to it if I don't know what it's doing!"

  Red opened her mouth to reply, but before a word left her lips there was an enormous blast of air and muck from the tunnel ceiling, just inside the entrance. The explosive force of it almost sent her off her feet. The others staggered, shouting in panic. She saw Trewpeny fall against the wall, fighting to keep hold of the linker.

  Behind him, at the entrance of the tunnel, something had appeared. As the airborne sewage rained down, she could see that there was a vertical slab of metal, a huge girder dripping with fluid, extending clear from one wall to the other.

  There was something misshapen beneath it, pinned against the floor by the slab's massive weight. Something that had been a human being.

  "Oh shit," Red muttered. "Jude?"

  "Holy one, what's happening? What was that noise?"

  "Booby-trap," she replied flatly, "and we just lost somebody."

  It was only as they were trudging along through the tunnel that Red realised she didn't know the dead man's name. That didn't seem right, so she asked Bill Foxe.

  "Giles Clarke," he said glumly.

  "What did he do? Other than this?"

  "He was a roofer, star-fallen. Why'd you ask?"

  She shrugged. "I keep forgetting that you people don't do this for a living. I mean, you've all got other lives; jobs and families. Me, I'm on my own. If I get killed no one will miss me but Giles Clarke? He probably had roofs to fix tomorrow."

  "Probably."

  "Before you ask, star-fallen," called the other guard, "I'm Stephen Fysher and I own a vegetable stall in the Beam Street market."

  "Part-own," said Foxe. "Don't give yourself airs, Fysher."

  "At least Fysher's my real name, Mister Foxe!"

  Red put a hand up. "Okay fellers, keep it quiet. I think we're coming up to something."

  Once again, the tunnel was opening into a large chamber. This was circular, a great drum, with exits spaced around its rim. The floor of it was a torrent - sewage was washing down from each of the tunnels, pouring in a great whirling, reeking spiral towards a drain in the centre.

  The floor of the circular chamber was conical, like the inside of a funnel. "Sneck me, Jude. We've found the main drain."

  "One of them, it would seem. Red, please be careful. There's no telling where that drain leads to."

  "Don't worry, I've got no intention of finding out. Which tunnel do we need?"

  "Not the one directly to your left, but the next."

  Red climbed down from the tunnel, stepping warily on the concrete floor of the drain. It shelved away steeply under her boots, and the filth gushing past her made it slippery. "Oh boy, this is really not nice. If we survive this, I'm going to get in the shower and stay there for a snecking week."

  Slowly, and with terrified care, the five of them crept around the edge of the drain. Foxe lost his footing once, but Trewpeny grabbed him before he could slide far, displaying pretty good reactions for someone who seemed so awkward and gangling. Red was really quite glad she had brought the lad along.

  Getting into the tunnel again pleased her more than it really should have done. "Okay Jude, we're in. Where to now?"

  "Go ahead about five metres, and then left around the corner. That should lead you around behind it."

  Red found herself nodding, even though Harrow couldn't see her. "Right. This might be it. Everyone ready?"

  "No," said Foxe, "but if we wait for that, we'll be here forever."

  "Good point."

  The previous tunnel had angled towards the drain, too. Red made a quick map in her head and decided that this reverse bend was taking her roughly parallel to the chamber she had been in before. Sure enough, at the end of it a similar cavern had been built, although the floor of this was almost entirely on one level. Along the walls, rectangular depressions lay filled with bubbling sewage, but the centre of the chamber was raised above them to form a kind of walkway.

  Even with lanterns held high, the outer edges of the chamber were lost in shadow.

  Red padded forwards, glad to be out of the muck for a few moments. "Jude?"

  "It's not moving, holy one but there's something else..."

  She froze. "What?"

  "Some distance north. I'm picking up another power source, a strong one. It's not moving, but- Red, the helot!"

  "Sneck!" Red whirled, just in time to see glowing discs racing towards her out of the darkness.

  There was a tunnel drilled into one wall of the chamber, and the helot was skittering out of it.

  It was blindingly fast. Red saw it skate down the chamber wall, its clawed limbs moving so quickly that they seemed to vanish, sending up a wake of filth. It darted onto the walkway and barrelled right towards her.

  Bill Foxe leapt towards it, sword whirling. A tentacle lashed out and took him across the waist, drawing a scream the like of which Red had never heard. The sound choked to silence as Foxe spun across the chamber in two sections, each part slapping messily off the walkway to vanish beneath the muck.

  Red bolted forwards, hurled both Trewpeny and Fysher out of the helot's path, and then jumped clear over its back.

  She spun in the air and came down on her feet behind it. It skidded to a halt, whirled on its axis, and charged again.

  Red heard Harrow shouting through the linker, but she ignored him. The helot was almost on her again, vast and gleaming. She feinted left as it reached her and then dodged right, kicking out hard as she cartwheeled away.

  An eye shattered, spitting out a jet of sparks.

  The helot seemed to falter, its legs losing rhythm. Red jumped back at it, hoping to capitalise on its indecision, but it snapped out an arm and hammered her away. She tumbled to a halt on the walkway, just managing to avoid falling into a pit of sewage, her ribs on fire from the blow.

  It was turning towards her again. As it did so, Fysher swung his sword. He was sm
art, keeping to the blind side, where one eye was already gone. His blade took two smaller lenses clean out of their frames, and sent a waving sensor-spine spinning away.

  The helot keened, and tripped over its own legs. Red had to leap up to avoid being flattened as it rolled over.

  Tentacles sang out from it, whipping about randomly. Red had to duck away - if any of those limbs brushed her she'd lose whatever part they touched. She skirted the helot's bulk from behind, where the tentacles couldn't reach.

  The machine heaved itself up, and spun. It was still uncoordinated, though, and Red saw some of its claws slip on the walkway's wet surface.

  She ducked, and lashed out with one foot, breaking one of the stubby legs off at the root.

  The helot seemed to go mad, emitting piercing squeals and spinning round and round on its axis. Red tried to kick it again, but either she misjudged the blow or the helot was ready for her. It kicked back, hard, and sent her flying into the chamber wall.

  A moment later it stopped spinning, and hared off.

  Red staggered up, shaking her head. "Jude? Where's it going?"

  "Towards the other power source!"

  "Okay." She turned to Fysher and Trewpeny. "We've got it on the run but you two had better stay here, all right? I'll need somebody back this way if it tries to double back."

  Trewpeny blinked at her. "What will we do if it does?"

  "Are you kidding?" She took the linker from him and clipped it to her belt. "You've already kicked its arse once today!"

  With that, she bolted away, leaving the lantern-light behind her and running towards the scarlet-darkness of her own night-vision.

  The helot was slower, now. She could hear its claws scraping the tunnel ahead of her, and they sounded jittery and out of pattern, as though she had knocked something in their workings askew.

  She took that as a good sign, and hurried on.

  The tunnel branched partway along, and Red had to check back with Harrow to make sure she didn't take the wrong branch. "There's one heading left, or the main one going straight."

  "It's gone left but that's where the power source is."

  "Fine, I'll check that out later." The skittering sounds had ceased. Red slowed her own pace, and began creeping along the tunnel, hands out to the sides to steady herself. When she reached a corner she stopped and peered around it.

  The helot was there, watching her.

  She stepped out into the open. The machine flinched as she did so, backing up on its claws. Sensor spines extended, waved fitfully and then withdrew.

  Red climbed out of the tunnel, into a smaller chamber than the previous one. The floor was littered with debris; pieces of rusted metal, loops of cable and what looked like engine parts. She glanced around quickly, saw a metre length of girder and hauled it up, holding it like a sunderball bat.

  "You shouldn't have survived," she grated.

  The helot made a squealing noise. Then, to Red's surprise, she heard a scratchy replay of her own voice coming back at her.

  "YOU... should not have survived. YOU..."

  "Very clever. You got any more tricks before I knock you to pieces?"

  "I... clever... tricks..."

  Red raised the girder, and stepped forwards. "What?"

  "Clever tricks."

  The helot launched itself forwards.

  Red hurled herself aside. A metal arm smashed into her shoulder, spinning her about. A clawed leg ripped into her thigh. She yelled in pain and anger, swinging the girder blindly as she fell.

  The jagged end of the metal ripped into the helot's flank. Sparks and fluid erupted out of the wound.

  Squealing, the helot slewed around. The legs on one side of it had stopped moving and the others weren't enough to support the huge weight of the body. As Red got to her feet, she saw the machine roll sideways against the chamber wall, bringing down a shower of broken concrete.

  The helot seemed to twist and then simply fell over sideways.

  Red darted up, swinging the girder. A tentacle came out at her, but she battered it until it died. She hammered off the arms, broke two more of its legs and put out the eyes and the sensors.

  At the end, the helot's screams were heartbreaking but Red could do nothing but steel herself against it, and keep bringing down the girder, again and again, until there was nothing left that could harm her.

  Only then, when the machine was nothing more than a twitching, wailing hulk of dented metal, did she stop, and let the girder fall from her hands.

  "It's not alive," she breathed, trying to shut out the sounds it was making. "It's just a machine."

  "Not." Her voice again, replayed back at her. "Not... just a machine."

  "What do you mean?"

  "Does it matter?"

  Red turned fast. The voice wasn't one she recognised.

  There was a man at the entrance to the chamber, standing in the tunnel. He was tall and thin, his head shaved bald, and he was dressed in stained white robes. He was holding a plasma derringer.

  Behind him, in the grip of several of the halberd-wielding soldiers that had attacked her in the square, all that time ago, stood Trewpeny and Fysher.

  "So," he said, very calmly. "Another of the invaders falls into my grasp. My lady, I fear you are as inept as your companion."

  "Let me guess," she snarled. "Makeblise."

  "Not so foolish after all..." He shrugged, and raised the gun. "No matter. For the protection of the city, I'm afraid you must remain beneath it."

  She dived aside as the gun went off, and the plasma bolt ripped past her. Concrete shattered away from the wall.

  For a moment she thought she might actually get away with it, because the helot's bulk was blocking Makeblise's line of fire. Regrettably, the man wasn't as stupid as she might have hoped. He simply turned the gun on the ceiling, and fired again.

  Weakened by centuries, and by her battle with the helot, the structure of the chamber began to fail. Red looked up to see great slabs of concrete carving away from the ceiling and tilting down on her. She put an arm up to ward one off, felt the corner of it hammer down into her, and fell back in agony as the bone sheared through.

  There was no way she could avoid the rest of the debris. It thundered down in a torrent, blocking out the light, Trewpeny's cries, the wailing of the helot, everything.

  Darkness covered Durham Red, and she fell gratefully into its embrace.

  14. THE MARCH OF PROGRESS

  "Red?"

  She groaned, and tried to roll away from the voice but she couldn't move, and her left arm really hurt.

  "Holy one?"

  "Go away." It was dark. She couldn't see anything. There was no sound, other than the voice buzzing in her ear. "Let me sleep."

  "No, Red, you've got to stay awake. Please, holy one. Help's on the way."

  Red didn't answer. Gradually, flashes of memory were returning. The fight with the helot, Makeblise, half the chamber coming down on top of her... None of the memories were very pleasant, but they made a kind of sense of the situation she found herself in. Buried, in the dark, with a broken arm.

  She couldn't really remember having a broken bone before. Her skeleton was, like the rest of her, remarkably strong. Still, there was a first time for everything.

  "Jude? Is that you?"

  "It is. Red, you've been unconscious for hours."

  "What? Snecking hell..." She struggled, and managed to move a leg. When she brought her knee up, concrete fell away from it, and more tipped off the pile covering her. Light, or at least enough photons for her night-vision to pick up on, filtered through the new-made cracks.

  Voices, too, and not Harrow's.

  She decided to ignore them for the moment, and instead worked on getting herself out from under the debris. Her good arm, the right, was jammed under several slabs and boulders, but they had come down in a jumble, and none of them had their full weight on her. Getting free of them was a lot harder than pulling herself out from under the warehouse, but
at least she wasn't freezing to death while she did it.

  By the time the voices got close, she had both legs and her right arm out from under the slabs.

  Lantern-light spilled in past the rubble teetering over her head. Red raised her arm and waved. "Hello? A little help?"

  "Be still, Blasphemy. This area is far from stable."

  Red puffed out a relieved breath. Seldom had she been so pleased to hear Godolkin's flat, gravelly tones. "Okay, I'll keep still but I think my left arm's broken, so don't pull me too hard."

  "I have no intention of pulling you at all." There was a grinding squeak of stone against stone, and the slab covering Red's arm and head rose by several centimetres, showering her with powdered concrete.

  In a few seconds she had managed to slide herself out. "I'm okay. Let it go."

  Godolkin was standing in the debris pile, bracing himself against one wall and heaving the slab up on his shoulder. She could see the massively enhanced muscles straining under his clothes, sliding and bunching as he shifted his stance very slightly, and eased the slab back down.

  As he did, the rubble shifted, and collapsed into the space she had left.

  Red watched it drop, thought about what would have happened to her had she still been under it, and sagged a little. Hands caught her, and eased her down into a sitting position.

  There were several people in the chamber with her. Most of them were marshals. There was also an older man in a long grey robe, with a leather belt at his waist that seemed to consist entirely of pockets, and there was Godolkin. Red slumped gratefully back against the wall, feeling her head spinning and her broken arm sending rhythmic jags of pain up into her shoulder, and watched them work for a few moments. All the fight had been knocked out of her by the collapsing ceiling, and it was all she could do to keep from slipping back into unconsciousness. She wondered if she might be concussed, if perhaps her arm wasn't the only part of her that had been broken.