She was clothed in her coverall, and fully conscious, though helpless, trembling as much as he was. Her voice quavered as she caught sight of him. “Who are you? What do you want?”
“I want nothing,” he said. “Your name is Sunbula. I have seen you.”
“Kill her,” commanded the berserker.
The executioner moved forward, and raised his gloved hands to grip the woman by the throat. She began to cry out, but his fingers, trembling no more, killed the sound at once.
At first his mind felt utterly blank, except for the essential purpose. This was a thing that he had never done before, and it proved physically more difficult than he would have thought. Her body persisted in trying to struggle for its evil life, but there was very little it could do, all its limbs held in the steely and unbreakable grip of Death. Her little pink tongue came up behind her lips, just starting to protrude. Choking was a very satisfactory method, he thought, because it was so quiet. Nothing to be heard but his own forceful breathing, she was not breathing at all.
The process was also agreeably quick, but not too quick. And he was close to his victim, in contact with her, when the climax came. He could tell, even in the semidarkness, he could see the very moment when the light of evil died in the woman’s eyes.
When Sunbula was forced to remove her spacesuit and taken away, the other cadets at first thought that the interrogation sessions were about to resume. But gradually, as time went on and she did not come back, they realized there had been a change in the routine.
Hemphill had called all of the surviving cadets together.
There were seven of them left, six men and one woman answering the ritual roll call: Cusanus, Lee, De Carlo, Dirigo, Hemphill, Kang Shin, and Zochler.
Lee was just starting to say something about what he saw as their desperate need for action, when he broke off in the middle of a sentence. He had felt his heart leap up at the subtle, temporary alteration he had just felt in the artificial gravity. This was something more than the almost ordinary stutters they had all been noticing for some time.
Dirigo could not keep quiet about it. “Feel that?”
“I sure as hell did.”
Lee was thinking that it might have been the precursor to a real jolt. The force would increase exponentially; only a little farther up the scale, and they would all be mashed.
Looking back over the last few hours, it seemed to him that there had been other signs, even more subtle, moments when the guardian machines seemed to lapse into inattention. Suggestions that all was not entirely well with the huge entity that held them captive.
“It’s fighting,” De Carlo said suddenly. When everyone looked at him, he added: “It’s another motherless space battle. I think maybe our people are coming for us!”
Cusanus raised a hand. “Hush, it’ll be listening”
“What if it is?”
It occurred to Lee that the machine had not fed its prisoners for what must have been many hours, another sign of change.
The water was still running in all the little grottoes.
Hemphill, as if thinking along the same lines, said: “But I think we’d better not drink any more of what it gives us. Start using what we’ve got stored up in the bottles. And get our helmets on.”
Hemphill had been trying for some time to spot a likely exit from their dungeon. It seemed that no such thing existed, and he would have been glad to settle for a faint possibility. That was one subject he had not wanted to openly discuss with anyone. Now, however, the discussion could no longer be put off.
Two of the surrounding bulkheads each contained a couple of panels in which the behavior of the guardian machines, going in and out, confirmed that there were doors. Beyond the doors, some kind of airlock doubtless existed, unless some larger part of the vast hull’s interior was filled with atmosphere, and Hemphill saw less and less reason to imagine anything like that.
Everyone had suits and helmets on. Kang Shin on intercom was warning: “If our fleet’s attacking, if there’s any serious space fight, this thing will be maneuvering.”
People nodded. No comment on that was necessary; everyone understood only too well what it would mean.
Feretti chimed in: “As long as the AG’s turned on, there’ll be no way for us to tell if the machine is maneuvering or not. Whether we’re traveling or sitting still.”
And Dirigo: “If the gravity’s ever turned off, we still won’t be able to learn much. Because with the cushions gone we’ll all be mashed to jelly the first time this big box starts or stops or changes course at combat speeds.”
“Wait!” Lee raised a hand. “Listen! What was that?”
It was possible to hear occasional faint impacts, tremors in the vast framework that enclosed them. Such noises could be attributed to human weapons.
Hemphill looked across the dungeon. “Random?” The robot had keener hearing than any helmeted human was likely to enjoy.
Random calmly nodded. “The sounds indeed can be identified, with more than ninety percent certainty, as weapons detonation.”
It came again. They could all hear it this time. But not all were ready to agree it offered hope.
“That’s fighting?” Dirigo was shaking his head. “But it sounds so faint, so far away.”
Like our chances, Lee thought. The noises kept on. If indeed they were caused by an attack, it might not be having much effect.
Dirigo was whispering: “I say we ought to be careful. This is some kind of a trick.”
Zochler spoke up loudly. “Could be. So what? If this is the only game in town, we play it.”
“Look. We all know that our fleet took a beating, trying to keep this monster away from Prairie.”
Feretti put in: “That’s what the reports we were getting seemed to indicate. But now it sounds like fighting.”
Lee had the last word: “Look, my friends, if there is indeed another battle going on, and this thing becomes convinced that it’s going to lose, well, I don’t see it asking for a prisoner exchange. In that case the first thing it will do is kill us all.”
Hemphill, without offering any explanation, began a series of encounters, one on one, with his classmates. Holding one of his suited wrists against theirs, one at a time, he seemed to be reading faceplate gauges.
“What are you doing?”
“Checking everyone’s reserve power.”
“But they’re all”
“Just oblige me, will you? I’ve started doing this, let me finish.”
A further protest died when Hemphill’s right eye closed briefly, in a solemn and deliberate wink.
Closely watching the gauge-image projected inside his own faceplate, Lee saw that his own suit was being drained of about seventy percent of its power. If it was all going into Hemphill’s suit, as he supposed it must be, Hemphill’s reserve power would be boosted well above its nominal value. Lee recalled from training that the regular power supply could carry several times its rated charge for a short period of time.
What was Hemphill up to? Sooner or later they would find out. If the enemy was watching them closely, listening to everything, only waiting to spring a trap, well, there was nothing to be done about that. It was a time for taking chances.
For some time they had all been inspecting the dungeon walls, as casually and closely as they could, for any sign of weakness. There was one obvious door by which the robots ordinarily came and went but that door looked formidably solid. The trouble was that they had no tools to work with, and no prospect of obtaining any.
“What was that?”
It hadn’t been a sound, rather the cessation of sound. In a moment Lee realized that the streams of water in all the little cells or niches had suddenly ceased to run.
Hemphill approached the last guardian as he had approached its kind before. But this time, as he drew close to it, he yelled:
“Wait! I have decided to do what you want, I accept your offer.”
He was reaching out with both arms, e
xtending his metal-gauntleted hands to the machine, as if in a gesture of peace or resignation
It raised its own two grippers smoothly in response. Whether it meant to acknowledge Hemphill’s greeting, or tear him bloodily apart, none of the onlookers would ever know
Hemphill’s left hand touched the machine’s right. Lee, watching, saw the spark leap out for several centimeters, as his right hand neared its left, draining nearly the full power supply of half a dozen suits. The jolt of voltage that passed across the guardian’s body was enough to jerk it backwards, then snap it forward, convulsing in a fall.
Lurching forward against Hemphill, the machine knocked him to the deck before it fell itself, pinning him down.
Almost before he hit the deck, he was barking orders. “Quick! Attack that wall!”
Before the fallen sentry could show any signs of recovery, human hands had seized it. The lid of a compartment in its belly had slid open, and a variety of small tools came spilling out. Other hands, including Random’s, were helping the half-stunned Hemphill to his feet.
Robbing the robot they had just killed, they came up with tools enough to help them escape, through one of their prison’s weaker walls or doors.
“You got it, man! You killed it!”
Hemphill shook off the congratulatory grip someone had clamped on his shoulder. Swaying on his feet, he looked as if he were about to deliver a savage kick to his fallen foe. But then he seemed to think better of wasting so much effort.
The power in Hemphill’s suit had been drained almost to zero in the process. The level in all the other suits was dangerously low, and there seemed no prospect of being able to recharge them.
The best way around this problem was to almost totally drain one suit of power, down to no more than about one percent, to give each of the others more than a very minimal charge.
Dirigo had raised his hand. His face was pale. “I volunteer to stay here. I’ve not been doing what I… this is something I can do.”
Huang Gun’s new master had left him alone with the body of the woman he had killed, after performing a kind of ritual over the body. This, the machine explained, was for the purpose of eliminating all the microscopic life that it contained, with a silent and invisible blast of radiation.
The presence of the body he had killed was good, in a way, but it somehow made him nervous. It lay slumped on the floor, in a position no live person could have maintained for very long, eyes staring, face discolored, looking very dead, as indeed she was, in every cell and every microbe.
For some reason that he did not understand, the suggestion had arisen in his mind that he might strip the dead woman of her clothing, and see how much the rest of her had changed.
His thoughts were interrupted by the noise of people breaking through a wall. What could it mean?
He was prevented from going to investigate; the intervening door held closed.
Presently the wall in his own room spoke to him, a harsh announcement. “The remaining seven badlife have escaped from their compartment.”
The executioner, who had been kneeling beside his victim, got to his feet, aghast. “How could they do that?”
“More badlife ships are attacking, and there is much damage.”
His fists were clenching and unclenching. “I will find them, hunt them down, kill them all.”
“That may be. But first you have another mission, vastly more important than killing a few badlife. It will be your job to protect the central processor.”
“Central processor,” he echoed vacantly.
“The part of me where plans are made, and the most important matters are decided.”
“Yes, yes, of course.” The executioner closed his eyes, forced himself to concentrate, reminding himself that he was talking to a machine. To perhaps the most marvelous computer in the Galaxy.
“Protect against what?”
“Weapons of the badlife have made inroads.” Was there no limit to their evil? “What must I do?”
“When you are near the place, I will give instructions. Review the checklist on your suit, make sure that it is functioning. Then come.” And it opened a new door.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
The first spacer of the Huvean fleet received the berserker’s stunning announcement with a keen awareness that he was in the middle of a gathering of his fellow humans, all of whom had heard the berserker’s words as well as he had.
The thing’s grating voice was crackling on, inviting him as fleet commander to join in the attack on his despised enemies.
He heard his own voice responding automatically, pleading that he must have time to respond, and asking for a recess in the discussion. The thing he was talking to immediately agreed.
Later on, it would become a point of considerable pride for the first spacer, that, as the official recordings of the incident were to show, his face, at the moment when the berserker proclaimed itself his ally, had remained impassive. Nothing in his appearance betrayed his ghastly shock of horror and surprise. His reactions, his demeanor, were at all times appropriate for one holding his exalted position of command.
Zarnesti, the peace conference delegate turned political adviser, was still unwilling to give up his conviction that this whole business of an exotic invader must be some kind of Twin Worlds trick.
As soon as he and the first spacer were effectively alone, the political officer confronted him: “Are you prepared to believe, First Spacer, that the Twin Worlds fleet has really been annihilated? That the missing battleships are not waiting in ambush somewhere nearby, to fall on us when we have let down our guard?”
“Concealing one ship in the manner you suggest might be possible. Hiding an entire fleet somewhere in the vicinity of the inner planets would be out of the question, I assure you, my scouts have been out since we arrived in system. My people and machines are aggressively on watch, alert against surprises.”
“Perhaps somewhere in the outer system, then. There are several large planets, many moons”
“If an entire fleet is somehow hidden out there, we will enjoy at least an hour’s warning as it moves to attack us. Honored Diplomat, what I am prepared to believe is not the words coming from one source or another, but the evidence before me. I take note of the condition of the Twin Worlds fleet as we can see it for ourselves.”
The politician grumbled his dissatisfaction, and expressed it with several formal gestures. He said: “It is very convenient that this supposed monster of destruction, showed up just when it did.”
The first spacer made no answer. Which in the circumstances was a very pointed answer in itself.
Zarnesti was not going to let up. “And what of our heroic hostages?”
“I know no more about them than I did an hour ago.”
“That is unsatisfactory, First Spacer!”
After a thoughtful pause, the first spacer offered: “If you are painting me an accurate picture of the situation, perhaps we should surrender.”
“Surrender!” The man was stunned. He seemed as immune to subtlety as he was to humor. The highest authorities must not have sent him to the conference as a serious negotiator, but only to be stubborn, for that he had a talent.
Homasubi said blandly: “Why yes, if you can prove your case. I think our fleet will have no chance against a Twin Worlds government and people so fanatical that they are willing to destroy half their own population, and ruin half of their own habitable planetary surface space, simply to promote a deception.”
The civilian sputtered. All he could finally come up with was: “You will have your little joke, First Spacer. Evidently you think this is an appropriate time.”
“If I did not think my response appropriate I would choose a different one, was there something else?”
“There is. The planet, Prairie, supposedly rendered uninhabitable, is hidden beneath a cloud. How do you know that it has really been destroyed?”
Homasubi turned majestically away, not bothering to answer. He had gr
eat contempt for such a fool. The political officer hung about the flagship’s bridge a little longer, then took himself away, doubtless to compose a private message to the higher authorities. Well, let him. Homasubi wanted to have it out with this irritating civilian, and intended to. But the time was not quite yet.
When the conference resumed, Homasubi had made it a firm requirement for anyone who was actually on the bridge with him to occupy a combat couch. He wanted no flying civilian bodies to interfere with him or his aides, in case sudden action should be called for, and something should happen to the artificial gravity at the same time.
One happy side effect of this requirement was that one could tell at a glance who was actually there and who was only virtually present. That was the kind of detail that in moments of great shock, one might even be inclined to forget.
The political one was quietly scandalized. “You are inviting our enemies to this meeting?”
“I will have a better idea of what they are doing, if they are where I can watch them.”
To arrange the type of conference that Homasubi wanted, there were technical matters to be managed, which gave him time to frame his answer in just the way he wanted it. Holostage space on the compact bridge had to be temporarily expanded. More virtual room was created, in a direction that kept the onlooking images physically and visually out of the way of crew members on the bridge whose battle stations had to have priority.
All this was carried out under the suspicious eye of the political officer. The result was that the participants found themselves all seated around a large, circular table. Documents and other small objects could sometimes be exchanged across this table, material duplicates being crafted on the spot as necessary. Each person could make adjustments, in his or her own space, as to what the others saw regarding the color of the table, the lighting, and other nonessentials. In most societies, fine-tuning one’s own personal appearance in this way was considered bad form, gratuitously deceptive. But the more subtle forms of the practice were in wide use anyway.
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