Eetoo

by Robby Charters

  She says something. It's in Akkadi -- sort of.

  Tsaphar is talking to her now.

  Tsaphar turns to Heptosh. 'She asks if we're the ones the imperial troops are after. She wants us to go inside.'

  We go in. It looks like an eating place here. Her name's Tasha.

  'We don't have any money,' Heptosh says.

  'It's okay,' says Tsaphar. 'She wants to help us. They hate the empire.'

  Tasha sets us down at a table.

  'How did all these people come to be here?' Heptosh asks.

  She talks Akkadi. Tsaphar translates: 'They all came as slaves and workers. In the early days, there was lots of work to do, building, mining, performing services, and as personal servants. Then, over the years, they slowly replaced them with machines and things, until now there's hardly any work for common workers to do. There are some factories down here that some of them can work in, but most of them use mechanical hands instead of human ones.'

  'How does everyone live then?'

  She asks Tasha, and she answers. I can sort of understand her, but I pick up what I miss from Tsaphar.

  'We have our own economy now. We raise some animals and vegetables, but that's not enough. Each of these pillars,' she points to one of the giant stems nearby, 'has a sewage and rubbish disposal outlet, and some of the people near each one run it through a refinery to extract nourishing edibles from it. We also do the same with our own wastes. Our forefathers would have thought it disgusting, but we've been reduced to this, and now we don't think anything of it.'

  Tasha gets up to get us something. I think she sees the look on our face.

  'Don't worry,' she says. 'I have some turnips from my sisters garden.'

  'Why is she good to us, if they hate the people upstairs?' Heptosh asks Tsaphar.

  'I told her we came from the home galaxy of the Akkadis.'

  'But it's different from the Akkadi you talk,' I say.

  'I also studied Modern Akkadi. It's still a bit different, but I can still understand her.'

  Tasha comes back with boiled turnips. It's sitting on a dish as though it were a roast lamb or something.

  'We're actually fortunate in this neighbourhood,' she says. 'In others, people are starving to death, and in some places, they process the dead in the same way we do human wastes. There's lots of feuds. In the next community, people are killed every day. This one's more peaceful now.'

  'Why the air dirty here?' I ask in Akkadi. It's all I can think of. It's making me dizzy.

  'The factories,' she says. 'This planet is the manufacturing hub for the whole galaxy. All the things you see they use up there, they make down here. All space is used up, either by the factories, or our living needs. Even then, they still crowd us together still more when they need new factories. There's less and less space to grow anything. Just a few of our people work in the factories, but mostly, they use machines. In some factories, the machines are so complicated, they say we are too uneducated to run them, so only people from upstairs can work in them. Those ones are sealed up so the air is clean. We have to breath the smoke that the machines spit out.'

  'How do the people put up with it?' asks Heptosh.

  'They'll simply slaughter us all if we don't,' says Tasha.

  My chest feels heavy.

  We start talking about ways to get our ship down here. We need an open space.

  'My roof,' says Tasha.

  She takes us up -- three floors. It looks like she rents rooms out to people.

  There are no more carriers flying about.

  Good! I want to get out of here!

  Shan starts to communicate with the ship. He can get the ship's location, and he can use the ship's scanner to get our own location. He says they haven't done anything to it yet.

  It's on its way now, but he says some of the people on duty started running to action when they saw it take off.

  We wait.

  I can barely see some very tall buildings through the mist not far from us. There must be an awfully lot of people here.

  Soon, out of the grey sky, we see shadowy thing coming down to us. We step aside to make way.

  It lands.

  Heptosh says to Tasha, 'We will try to do something for you. I don't know what yet. I promise we'll try.'

  I see other shadows moving about in the sky above us.

  Tasha thanks us.

  We're off -- straight to Nephtesh.

  Heptosh does something to clean the air in the ship.

  We're out of there now, but all those people still have to live there!

  33

  Heptosh scanned the star spotted blackness that now appeared before them.

  The historian's calculation of the amount of rotation the galaxy would have done in four hundred years was accurate.

  'Let's take it that way,' he said.

  According to his calculation, this should have been the star. He scanned the system for a planet fitting the description.

  There it was.

  Heptosh used his beacon finder to locate the port. There was a very weak signal.

  Heptosh signalled for landing. There was no answer.

  They descended slowly. Heptosh magnified the image for a view of the ground.

  The area around where the landing beacon shone appeared to be half city, half jungle. There were streets, boulevards, lanes, all set out in geometric order, but much of it was obscured by dense forest. Major intersections featured humongous temples and palaces. At the end of one street, with a long pool down the middle, was the remains of an obelisk. The centerpiece of the city appeared to be a giant white pyramid.

  They flew low over visible parts of the city. There was far more vegetation than would normally be allowed in a city. Trees were growing where they shouldn't, creeping vines stretched across streets and whole groves had managed to plant themselves at some intersections. Cracks in the pavement facilitated a variety of vegetation in most parts of the city, and some parts were overtaken by dense jungle.

  Heptosh decided to land in an intersection not far from the pyramid.

  They got out and looked about.

  'Hoi!' There was someone coming towards them. 'What do you think you're doing? You can't just go landing those things anywhere, you know! This is a busy city! You're obstructing traffic!'

  It was a bionic, limping towards them as fast as it could shuffle.

  'Hold on!' it said. 'You're not bionic! Have you taken an implant yet? It's mandatory now, you know!'

  'How old are you?' asked Heptosh.

  'Er -- I'm -- let me see -- four hundred and thirty-seven years if I'm a day! I take care of myself, I do. I have all my parts oiled regularly -- when there's oil, that is. Now, your vehicle ...'

  'Have you noticed there isn't any traffic for us to obstruct?'

  'Well, yes -- things have been quiet lately. But law is the law. Remove this vehicle, and get yourselves in to ...'

  Shan sent a signal to his brain, and he stopped.

  'Now, can you tell us,' began Heptosh again, 'where we could find the tele-gate to the Planet of Red Earth?'

  'Tele-gate? Red Earth? Hmmm. I remember something like that from school days -- hmmm -- it seems there was a tele-gate, but it didn't work, or something. Where? Hmmm. Well, you should ask Mr. Ingtos, the historian. You should find him in the library. Go down this street, turn left where you see the oak tree, go one furlong, and you should see it.'

  They thanked him. Shan and Heptosh agreed they ought to put the old robot out of its misery. Shan disabled it.

  They used the ship like a carrier and sped down the street to the oak tree, and then to the left until they came to the library.

  They went in.

  There were all sorts of books. Clay tablets sat in rows on shelves, parchments and papyri were rolled up neatly in bins, and codices were filed on their own shelves.

  'I'm sure all these books would be valuable for learning the history of the Nephteshi empire,' remarked Heptosh.

  They
found Mr. Ingtos behind a desk. He told them the tele-gate was in the great pyramid in the middle of the city. It was approachable through secret passages, and that only members of the royal family were authorised to enter.

  He would accompany them to the royal palace, but he couldn't walk. He had been seated in the same chair for close to a hundred years. They left him intac in case they needed any more questions answered, or hints on where to look. They got the directions to the royal palace and were off again.

  The palace looked as though it were every bit as grand, in its time, as that of Teknesh.

  They made their way to the throne hall, sometimes modifying the half functional guards, sometimes disabling them altogether.

  They found it, complete with lords, advisers and ladies in waiting, about half of them still functional.

  The king, though on his throne, sat perfectly still.

  Shan had to read his circuits to get any information out of him. He hadn't moved a tendon in fifty years.

  A prince by the name of Shaktec seemed to be the most suitable one to show them the way to the tele-gate.

  They went to the pyramid.

  That was in much better shape than the bionics. Pressing the appropriate tile was enough to release a catch so that a door on a counter-weight swung open for them quite easily. Heptosh lit a metzig torch, and they trooped in.

  'No one has been here for at least 1000 years,' said the prince. 'It hasn't served any function, except as a centrepiece. I only know the way because it is the duty of members of the royal family to retain such knowledge.'

  He led them this way and that, up and down ascending and descending passages until they came to a passage that appeared to be at the heart of the pyramid. There was a square granite stone on the ground, about knee high. Here, he stopped.

  'Where now?' queried Heptosh.

  'This is as far as I know.'

  Apart from the stone, there was nothing but the empty passage that appeared to go nowhere.

  'Is it in that direction?'

  'No. My memory of the instructions takes us to precisely this spot,' said the robotic prince.

  'There's nothing here.'

  34

  darkness all about

  but a light dawns in the young adventurer's mind

  This place seems familiar in a way. I've seen a dark passage like this before -- but where?

  I've seen that square rock before too. I even stood on it -- in my dream!

  'Er -- ' I don't know how to say it.

  'Yes, Eetoo?' answers Heptosh.

  'I -- Er -- let me have the torch.' That's all I know to say. I never remembered this part of the dream until now.

  Heptosh hands me the metzig torch.

  I do what I remember from the dream. I get up on the rock and hold it straight up.

  'Look at that!' said Tsaphar.

  Everyone looks.

  There's something shiny stuck into the ceiling -- some sort of crystal or something that sends a shaft of light down towards the wall. The shaft gets narrower and narrower until it's just a point -- like a star from a distance.

  'There!' I say. I point to the wall where the beam of light hits it. 'The gold plates there! We just dig them out!'

  'But it's nothing but solid rock,' says Heptosh.

  He walks up to the wall where the light shines.

  'But -- what's this?'

  He puts his finger on the point of light.

  'Wow!' He jerks his finger away, as though it were a snake.

  Suddenly everything's shaking

  'Wah!' I jump down.

  Tsaphar rans and clutches on to me.

  The wall where Heptosh put his finger is moving slowly downward. Behind it we see another wall, this one covered with lots of writing, some lines, and something that looks like a door frame in the middle. It doesn't go anywhere though. It's just solid rock in the middle.

  'We were never told of this,' says the prince. 'However, this is very much like the ancient tele-gates. One would turn it on by placing this square stone into this socket.

  There's a tiny shelf built in next to the frame, with a tiny stone block sitting next to a hole the same size and shape.

  Heptosh does what he says. A blue light starts coming out from cracks about the inside of the frame, lighting up the room. However, it's still bare rock in the middle.

  The prince says, 'The other end needs to be turned on before it will work. A legend says that will happen one day. In fact, the inscription here appears to refer to the prophecy.'

  Heptosh reads the inscription in Nephteshi pictographs:

  I, Imhotep, servant of Pharaoh Djoser, have closed this door from the entrance on the Planet of Red Earth, so that it shall no longer be used to remove resources from this planet. It shall be closed from henceforth until the day that a chosen son of Hamtep shall enter thereby, in order that he might seek for the golden tablets of Simtep.

  'We're in the right place,' says Heptosh.

  This is amazing! Tsaphar and I are reading it again and again.

  'Why is it not open from the other side?' says Heptosh. 'Does anyone know the coordinates of the planet of Red Earth?'

  The prince shakes his head. 'Imhotep was very crafty. It was said that he came here in person, and forcibly removed the record book containing the location of his planet. In those days, only a few key people were entrusted with such information. He even, apparently, hid this tele-gate, so no one has found it until now. According to our legends, he had predicted a time of drought for his planet. It was brought on by the early Nephteshis removing topsoil and vegetation from a large portion of that planet and placing it here. It would have continued indefinitely until that planet was rendered uninhabitable had he not closed this door. Over here, on this wall, you will see a map of the original kingdom of Nephtesh.'

  He points to carved design on other side of the frame. I can see it looks like the shape of tiny mountains, rivers and an ocean with a coastline all around it.

  He explains, 'Over here, you see the vast area that became desert as the result of the removal of soil. Over there, you see the city of Memphis, from which Imhotep administered the affairs of state. That's the great river, which empties into the Great Sea. Down here, you see the location of a pyramid, not unlike this one, and a giant figure of a cat with a human head, nearby. The other end of this tele-gate is located in a passage connecting the two structures.'

  I can see it. It's a tiny little pyramid.

  Heptosh is standing in front of the map. 'This is what it would look like from space then!'

  'On a clear day, of course,' says Shan.

  'Shan,' Heptosh says, finally. 'Can you read the reverse beam being emitted by this tele-gate?'

  'It's not configured to any coordinates, but I can scan it for those that were last used... There, done.'

  'Can you memorise this map?'

  'Yes.'

  'Why don't the two of us go and look for the pyramid at the planet of Red Earth and see if we can't open the door from that side? If we simply find a sea on that planet that has a coastline like this, I'm sure we should easily find it.'

  They go off with the bionic prince. Tsaphar and I will wait here for them. There's enough light from this tele-gate to see by, but I have an extra metzig torch in my bag in case we need it. It's not too difficult to find our way out if we have to.

  We wait.

  We take a nap.

  We wake up. They're not here yet.

  We read the inscriptions a few more times.

  We're getting hungry. We don't have any food.

  I'm talking to Tsaphar about all the confusion in my head about humanity.

  First, I was really happy about life in Teknesh, but now I've seen what they do to their people when they don't need them anymore. It's like they throw them away! The people living in the nice flower houses and the nice green planets don't care what happens to the ones living in the dirty air, eating their crap! They were cruel to the Groki in our galaxy, and th
ere, they're cruel to their own species!

  The Groki are right! Humans can be worse than animals! I have to find answers.

  Tsaphar thinks so too. But she hopes we can get home soon.

  35

  Heptosh was confused by the fact that while the image in the pyramid had shown an ocean surrounded by land, most of the land masses here were surrounded by water.

  There was no landing beacon to be detected on the entire planet.

  Shan suggested that perhaps the ocean they were looking for was much smaller in scale. If it was, it would take longer to find. Their best chances of finding it would be if it were on the side of the planet still receiving daylight. Then, what about cloud cover?

  Heptosh repositioned the ship to various angles. Maybe they'd be lucky.

  A large portion of the planet that was moving towards dusk looked like a vast desert. This suggested the climate change resulting from the removal of the Nephtesh kingdom. The parts towards the North were covered in cloud.

  Shan thought he recognised a part of a river from the map. They descended and began scouring that from a safe distance.

  A wide swath of field in various states of ripeness denoted the area within reach of the river, in contrast to the desert sands beyond, stretching from the south all the way to the area covered in cloud. Cities and towns clung to the path of the river, and to dirt roads branching out in either direction.

  This ship that Shan had given him had much better magnification than his own ship did. He turned it on full strength.

  It all looked primitive. The houses were clay, the roads dusty; the only means of transport appeared to be animal powered on the road, and wind, along the river. Some boats, however, appeared to be using oars. There was no sign of anything that resembled a carrier or spaces ship. No landing ports. Everything looked hand made out of local material.

  Heptosh noticed what looked like a large troop of soldiers. Their weapons looked basic: swords, bows, spears, body armour, large shield -- fine workmanship, but it suggested primitive metal forging methods. Some were on horses, others on foot. The leader of the troop wore a fine brass helmet with a plum sticking out. One of them bore a standard atop a poll, with the representation of an eagle. The ornateness of it, the manner in which he held it, and the way they carried themselves, and the response of the local people they passed, suggested that they represented something important to their civilisation. It reminded Heptosh of the imperial regalia of Teknesh.