by Mick Farren
Reave sighed. 'Then we're just going to have to hope that that thing in the nothings is just a column of refugees.'
He turned and walked slowly to the edge of the gate tower. Out on the flat grasslands, the Grand Army had formed itself into fighting phalanxes. Spears with bright polished tips bristled through the shield wall as two of the solid squares advanced on each other, executing a perfectly rehearsed textbook maneuver. It was a grand but completely irrelevant spectacle.
'Yeah, they'd be great against a bunch of Trojans.'
'Aren't you being a little hard on these people?'
Showcross Gee had come up behind him. Reave eyed him coldly.
'And?'
'The introduction of advanced weapons could have a disastrous effect on these people's social structure.'
'So would fifty heavily armed raiders.'
'It's hardly likely, though, is it?'
'I don't know what's likely, just what's possible.'
'Would you like to see a man like Zeum in charge of a really effective fighting force?'
'It's hardly my problem.'
'It might become your problem.'
Reave raised an eyebrow. 'What exactly are you trying to say to me?'
'If the Palanaquii had advanced weapons, they might decide that they were in a position to expel us from the settlement. It's very important right now that we remain where we are.'
'Operating according to strict self-interest, are we?'
'Our work is very near its completion. We must not be interrupted at this point.'
'Did you stop for a moment and consider what it might mean if that really is a party of raiders coming in from the nothings?'
Showcross Gee stroked his chin. He seemed to be weighing Reave's loyalty before he answered. He glanced around to make sure that they were not being overheard.
'We have discussed this. We estimate that in the event of an attack, we could seal ourselves in the Great Pyramid. It could withstand a lengthy siege.'
'And the Palanaquii can go hang?'
Out on the flatlands the Grand Army of Palanaique had formed itself into four spear squares of equal sizes. They were circling each other in a stately martial gavotte. Showcross Gee watched them for almost a minute before he turned to face Reave.
'The work in which we are engaged is infinitely more important than the survival or otherwise of this odd little settlement.'
Reave nodded. 'Just so long as we understand each other.'
Showcross Gee's eyes met Reave's. 'I think we've always understood each other.'
'Perhaps you 'd like to give me an idea what this work of yours is all about.'
Showcross Gee shook his head. 'Even if I did, you wouldn't understand me.'
'You could try me.'
'I don't think so.'
Reave considered slugging the metaphysician. Showcross Gee's superior certainty had become something more than a simple irritant. He was starting to ball his fist when Jet Ace suddenly provided a face-saving distraction by taking off in a roar of rocket exhaust. He climbed high and then swooped down in a steep power dive. He skimmed low over the heads of the Palanaquii hoplites and then pulled up and climbed again. He made a wide turn, then came in for a second pass. It had to be said in favor of the Grand Army that they did not falter in theface of the metal man's antics. They did not scatter and run but simply went on with what they were doing.
Showcross Gee looked at Reave. 'What does he think he's doing?'
Reave shrugged.'What can I tell you? He's crazy and getting crazier.'
'I don't understand how you can work so calmly with an individual who is so unstable.'
Reave grinned. 'I guess there are some things that you'll never understand, either.'
Showcross Gee scowled and said nothing.
Later that night there was a tense emergency meeting beside Dass-el-Hame's pool. The exotics and house girls had taken one look at the faces of the contract warriors and made themselves scarce. The games were on hold, and life was suddenly very serious. Billy, who seemed to have been shocked into normalcy by the spectacle of General Zeum's toy army, said it all in two sentences: 'This place is beyond weird. We got to get the hell out of here, right now.'
Renatta and the Minstrel Boy nodded as one.
'He's right. We should pull out before it gets any more bizarre. We all saw those clowns marching about this afternoon. If anything goes down here, we're on our own.'
Reave was not in quite such a hurry. 'We need to think about this.'
Blaisdell looked at him in surprise. 'What's there to think about? It's time to be moving on, and that's that. You can't argue about that, Reave.'
Reave walked over to the edge of the pool and looked down at the water. It glittered with reflections of foxfire, moonglo, and the flame insects. The fountain splashed, and behind him the wind chimes rang in the night breeze. The place seemed so peaceful that it was hard to conceive of it as maybe being on the edge of destruction.
'All I'm saying is that we need to think about it. This place might prove to be a haven. We've got no idea of what conditions might be like in the other realities.'
Billy was not buying it. 'We've got no idea what's coming out of the nothings.'
'We'd look pretty stupid if we lit out for some place a wholelot worse and the thing in the nothings turned out to be nothing more than a bunch of refugees.'
Blaisdell snorted. 'We'd look pretty stupid if it turned out to be a bunch of raiders, armed to the teeth and barking crazy, with only the seven of us to stand against them.'
The Minstrel Boy nodded. 'He's got a point there. My mother didn't raise no sitting duck.'
Up to that point Lister Stent had not spoken. He and Jet Ace had been standing on the sidelines while the others argued. Now he caught everyone's attention with a metallic clearing of his throat. 'I'm afraid that this whole conversation is quite academic.'
Everyone except Jet Ace looked at him in amazement.
'Say what?'
'We cannot leave Palanaque. We'd be in contractual breach.'
'So? Who's going to stop us?'
Stent raised a steel arm. The gesture was almost apologetic. 'Unfortunately I would.'
Reave raised an eyebrow. 'And what would you want to go and do that for?'
'I'd have no choice.'
Renatta was shaking her head. 'What are you talking about?'
Stent did his best to be calming. 'Perhaps I should explain something. I am a very powerful and dangerous weapon and virtually indestructible. Because of this, like all of my kind, I don't have the luxury of choice and emotion that is available to you unadapted humans. Because of my strength I have been conditioned from my birth and creation to absolute obedience to authority. It is reinforced by chemical blockers. If I disobey a legitimate order, I start to vomit. After that, I go into convulsions, and finally I die.'
Renatta did not look particularly concerned with Stent's problem. 'So you stay. We don't have no conditioning to keep us here.'
'I'm afraid it's not as simple as that. I have been ordered to stop any of you from deserting.'
Reave slowly let out his breath. 'And when was that order given?'
'Soon after we left Krystaleit.'
'So Showcross Gee screwed us.'
'He did indeed.'
Billy thrust his hands deep into his pockets. 'So what do we do now?'
Reave once again stared at the reflections on the surface of the pool. 'All we can do is wait and see what pops out of the nothings. Once we know what we're facing, we can make a decision.'
For the next five days Reave and the Minstrel Boy made regular trips to the communications center to monitor the blip on the detector screen. Although it was still moving very slowly, if the lizardbrain could be believed, it was definitely moving in their direction.
'Can you guess at an ETA on this thing?'
The Minstrel Boy did not look happy. 'It's real hard to tell, but I can't see whatever it is taking more than a week to get
here.'
On the fifth day of monitoring the object in the nothings it became plain that even the Minstrel Boy's prediction of when the thing would make realityfall had been overcautious.
'There's no mistake now. The signals have been too consistent. We'll know all about this sucker in the next sixteen hours.'
'It'll be here?'
The Minstrel Boy nodded. The pale green glow of the screen in the otherwise darkened room cast sinister shadows across his face.
'It'll be here.'
Reave's voice was very quiet. 'Damn.'
The Minstrel Boy turned away from the bowl-shaped screen. The messengers were already on their way to inform the beloved Master and General Zeum.
'You worried?'
Reave shook his head. 'I don't know. Maybe we've been watching this thing for too long.'
'All we can do is wait and see.'
'That's the worst part.'
Reave looked around. The communications center looked even more like a tomb. Most of the staff members were standing in a group on the far side of the detector room watching the two of them nervously. They could easily have passed for mourners.
'So what do we do now? Hang around here and wait for whatever it is to arrive?'
'I don't see what else we can do. I'd like to be around when the thing hits. It's most probably a false alarm, but I figure we need as much time as we can get to start motivating.'
Reave did not seem particularly enthusiastic about waiting in the communication center for the object to arrive. 'Motivating?'
'Motivating our collective ass.'
'What about Stent?'
The Minstrel Boy pursed his lips. 'We're going to have to sneak past Stent.'
'We sure as hell can't go through him.'
'That's a fact.'
Reave slumped into a chair, resigned to the wait. 'Okay, so let it come.'
'It's going to. Don't worry about that.'
Palanaque had a single advantage. Its stasis field was shaped so that anyone or anything approaching it would be tunneled around and forced to enter only at a single point, the break in the mountains at the very end of the valley, the farthest point from the city. Although its passengers had not known it at the time, the R1009 had come in that way. The entry point was right beside the upland lake that was the source of what turned into a wide river by the time it flowed past the city and eventually ran out into the nothings over the spectacular waterfall at the lower end of the valley.
The instant General Zeum received the word, he was galvanized. His reaction might not have been inspired, but it was certainly swift. A detachment of 150 hoplites with spears and shields, attendant epsilons, a malfunctioning portable communicator, and supplies for two days were dispatched up the valley. The first leg of their journey was by gaily painted riverboat, the kind normally used to provide pleasure trips for the leisure caste. When they were close to the rapids below the lake, they would disembark and make the remainder of the journey on foot. Overall, the trip would take them some five hours. Once in place they would stand guard at the edge of the nothings and wait for whatever arrived. Reave and the Minstrel Boy had long since given up trying to advise Zeum, so they simply kept their own council and watched the screen.
The wait took on the feeling of a vigil. After a couple of hoursRenatta and Blaisdell arrived. They were both a little drunk, but they had brought an epsilon with them, carrying a basket containing food and a number of jugs of the raw local wine. They had their weapons with them, and they seemed to have come to stay for the duration. The epsilon had brought along Reave's pistols and the Minstrel Boy's knife belt and AK 5000 as well as SG portapacs.
'If the moment of truth's on its way, we ought to be ready for it,' Blaisdell explained.
Reave looked approvingly at the equipment and the wine. 'Good looking out. Where's Billy?'
'Oh, he's gone again. No one home there.'
'Fuck him, he's tailing back into his old ways.'
'He's picked a great time for it.'
'He always does. Where are the metal men?'
'They're out in the city someplace. They seemed to feel the need to move around.'
The Minstrel Boy broke the seal on the first jug of wine. The staff of the communication center looked a little askance at their pristine inner sanctum being turned into a party place, but they appeared too intimidated to say anything. The hours passed, and the mysterious blip crawled painfully slowly toward the merge point.
Renatta was the first one to grow angry at the waiting. 'This is like watching paint dry.'
'So don't watch it. Go on getting drunk.'
After eleven and a half hours the object entered Palanaque reality. There was a brief flash on the detector screen as it made the transition.
'This is it. They're here.'
Renatta stared a little wearily at the now-empty screen. 'Do you realize that they probably watched us come in just like this?'
Blaisdell laughed. 'They probably weren't drinking.'
'Maybe they should have been.'
Reave stood up and stretched. 'Let's hope these guys don't cause any more trouble than we did.'
Renatta looked up at him.'How do you know they are guys?'
One of the communication staff members came into the detector room and bowed. 'There's a signal coming through from the company at the lake.'
Reave looked up. 'Can you patch it in here?'
'Easily.'
'Then please do so.'
The technician bowed again and hurried away. Within a matter of seconds the detector room was filled with an urgent voice that was almost drowned in static.
'. . and the nothings have started to glow. . major transition flux is being created.' The static increased, and the voice came through only in brief snatches. '. . something coming through. . can't make. . just shadows against the. . a lot of. .'
The clear voice of a military operator in the city cut in. ' Please say again, Company A. You are breaking up very badly. I repeat, please say again. Check your equipment and say again.'
'. . moving in. . I don't know. . it looks. . hard to. .'
'We are losing you altogether, Company A. Dispatch the runners now. I say again, dispatch the runners now.'
'Holy shit!'
The Minstrel Boy clapped his hands to his ears. The signal was gone, and the room was filled with violent shrieking feedback. It lasted for almost a half minute and then cut out. Thie static returned, but this time there was not even the semblance of a voice. The Minstrel Boy sighed. 'They're off the air.'
Renatta put down the wine jug she had been cradling. Her voice was suddenly sober. 'Do we ask ourselves why?'
The Minstrel Boy stood up. 'I've been trying to avoid doing that, but I haven't found a way around it. I also have this terrible feeling that the best thing we could do would be to go up to that lake and take a look for ourselves.'
Reave looked at him as though he were mad. 'Are you kidding?'
'No, I'm not.' He motioned in the direction of the communication staff. 'But I'd rather not discuss it in front of them. Little pigs often have big ears.'
Reave picked up his jug and stood up. 'So let's go stretch our legs.'
As soon as they were out in the open, the Minstrel Boy started to outline his plan. 'The way I see it, we volunteer to go up the river and see what's going on by the lake.'
'And do we?'
'Sure we do. It's what we do next that counts.'
'And what's that?'
'We'll have two options. If whatever's come out of the nothings proves to be harmless, we come back to the city and spread the good news.'
Blaisdell pushed his fingers through his hair. 'And if it ain't harmless?'
'Then we try and creep through and make it to the nothings.'
'But why go all the way up to that lake? Why don't we just hit the nothings at the nearest point?'
The Minstrel Boy allowed himself a small superior smile. 'Because if you'd check out the stasis field on t
his place, you'd know that it's one of those spiral fold deals. The only way in or out is through a quite small access window up by the lake. '
Reave shook his head. 'I'm not so sure about this.'
The Minstrel Boy halted. 'Listen, it's only just after sunset outside. We would make it before dawn. We can take a boat most of the way.'
Renatta blinked. 'A boat?'
The Minstrel Boy was confident. 'We can get a boat.'
'We can?'
'Sure we can. I figure they'll be about ready to give us anything right about now if we can shed some light on the situation.'
Clay Blaisdell was nodding his agreement. 'The Minstrel Boy's right. If this is a raiding party and they're moving on the city, they won't bother to hide their position. They'll be coming with fire and sword, and we'll see them when they're still miles off.'
Reave sighed. 'I guess you're right. I've got to tell you, though, trekking up that river is the last thing I feel like doing. '
The Minstrel Boy ignored that final objection. 'So we ask for a boat.'
He started toward the Great Pyramid, but Reave caught him by the arm.
'What about Billy?'
The Minstrel Boy had temporarily forgotten their third musketeer.
'Oh, hell. Yes. Billy. .'
Renatta stepped in. 'Clay and I will get Billy. You guys get the boat. We'll meet you at the dock.'
As the Minstrel Boy had predicted, the beloved Master and General Zeum were more than willing to help anyone who wasfoolhardy enough to go upriver and find out what was going on. Forty-five minutes saw Reave and the Minstrel Boy at the river pier closest to the pyramid. A light, fast galley with a prow like a painted sea monster, a single tier of epsilon rowers, and the sleek stylized lines of racing craft of the Elite was moored there. Torches burned on the canopied quarterdeck, their flames reflecting off the oiled bodies of the rowers. Reave and the Minstrel Boy were, however, a little too preoccupied to spend very long admiring the beauty of the craft. The Minstrel Boy looked anxiously back down the dock.
'Where the hell are the others?'