Asimov's SF, April-May 2009

by Dell Magazine Authors

  But Meklos didn't stand on the drawing, even though on previous occasions he had walked all over it. He stayed at the other end of it, forcing her to walk to him.

  She almost didn't. She almost made him come to her.

  But she was too excited over the idea of a discovery. She wanted to see it, whatever it was.

  “Aren't they early?” she asked. “Was there trouble? Why are they back so soon?”

  “They aren't back,” he said. “I found out about this by going through their belongings.”

  The disappointment hit her like a physical blow.

  She made sure her tone was cool. “I thought you had already searched the packs.”

  “I did,” he said. “But I hadn't turned on their extra diving suit.”

  “They have an extra suit?” she asked.

  He shrugged. “In case one got damaged, I would suppose. They form to whatever body puts them on.”

  She nodded. She'd seen suits like that in some of the space vessels she'd traveled on. She had even worn one, since one of the captains on one of her early trips wanted to make certain everyone knew how to put one on.

  “So?”

  “So,” he said, “this one comes fitted with a map.”

  “A map?” she asked.

  “Of the caverns.”

  “I never gave them a map of the caverns,” she said. “We don't have one.”

  He studied her for a moment, as if he didn't believe her. “Are you sure about that?”

  “Why the hell do you think I've sent them below?” she snapped. “It's not because I enjoy spending money. I need to know what's down there, and right now, I don't.”

  He nodded. The nod was tiny, and she wasn't even sure she was meant to see it. It seemed like a private nod, meant for him alone.

  “Well,” he said after a moment. “You know part of what's down there.”

  “Of course I do,” she said. “Just like you do. We've been in the dry caverns—”

  “No,” he said. “You're standing on it.”

  She frowned, then looked down. She was standing on the reproduction of the Spires of Denon.

  “What are you saying?”

  He crouched and put his finger alongside one of the curves. “When I turned on the suit, this appeared. Only it was in outline only and three dimensional, like the Spires are above. And it had one added feature.”

  She walked toward him so that she could see what he was doing.

  “Right here,” he said, “was a small red dot. Right here.”

  One of the widest points of the Spires.

  “When I moved the suit,” he said, “the dot moved.”

  Like a directional device.

  “It fits.” With his finger, he traced the bottom part of the Spires. The drawing was wider here than at any other point. The circles crowded in on each other and eventually were separated by branches. Passageways.

  “If you overlay the map you have of the existing caves, you'll see that they're identical to this drawing,” he said.

  “That's not possible,” she said. But she didn't mean that it was impossible for this map to exist. She was surprised, yes, but not that surprised.

  “It's possible,” he said, somewhat defensively.

  “No, no,” she said. “That's not what I meant.”

  Then she realized she couldn't explain what she meant. She meant it was impossible for a lowly security guard, no matter how inflated his opinion was of himself, to make a discovery she had missed.

  “What did you mean then?” he asked.

  She shook her head. “I meant,” she lied, “I wonder how they knew.”

  * * * *

  25

  The next cavern was obviously smaller. Navi could see that from the passageway. Roye's light hit the walls, the ceiling, and the floor all at the same time, showing the entire cavern.

  She could even see the passageway beyond.

  The floor held nothing, so far as she could tell. There were niches, just like there'd been in the other caverns, but if she were a betting woman, she would bet they were empty.

  Still, she would have to check them out.

  Roye had moved toward one wall. She kicked slightly to propel herself forward and veered a little to the left. She grabbed the edge of the passageway's opening with one covered hand, planning to use the wall to push herself into the cavern. Instead a thrumming echoed through her head. Her hand shook off the wall, and the violence of it sent her tumbling backward. Her entire body felt like it was being vibrated apart.

  On one of her spins, she saw Roye, bent in half, his hands over his ears, even though the suit covered them.

  What the hell? she said, but doubted Roye could hear her.

  He shook his head—maybe he had heard her—and then looked toward her. Sediment was filling the water. Sediment—and something else—something coming out of the top of the passageway door.

  * * * *

  26

  Sirens went off—and just as Meklos was going to ask what was causing the sound (and why had Dr. Reese had set up such a system, since they were worried about the vibrations destroying the Spires)—light flared.

  Reflexively, he covered his eyes, and then he forced himself to open them.

  A small line on the Spires drawing near his feet was glowing, the light so bright that he had to blink to keep the tears out of his eyes.

  He looked up and saw that the ceiling of the temple had become porous, and through it, he thought he saw a similar light on the Spires themselves.

  “Make it stop!” Dr. Reese shouted. “You'll ruin the Spires.”

  Her shout sounded like a whisper. He didn't want to answer her—it would take more effort than she deserved. Instead, he ran outside. The light seemed worse than it had a moment ago, as if the sun had become even brighter. He shielded his eyes and made himself look up. Sure enough, one small part of the Spires was glowing, sending light down to the temple, to the map that the Denonites had built in the temple floor.

  He couldn't see the Spires clearly enough from below, not clearly enough to understand what he was looking at, so he went back inside the temple.

  The single line glowed and so did one of the circles beyond. It wasn't very far from the first caverns that the divers would have gone into underwater. A series of caverns, and then a passageway, and then another cavern. The passageway and the cavern had lit up.

  “My God,” Meklos said. “It's not artwork at all.”

  “What?” Dr. Reese had somehow managed to join him. Her eyes were small pinpoints of blackness in her pale face. “What's not art?”

  “The Spires,” he said. “They're not art or a map or anything like that. They're a defense system.”

  * * * *

  27

  A barrier descended from the top of the passageway door. The barrier was milk-colored and opaque, like the water, and it came down with great force.

  Navi thought it should have shattered as it hit the ground. Then she realized that had her hand been in the way, the sharp bottom of that barrier would have sliced it off.

  She whirled, not wanting to be trapped in the passageway. But nothing had come down behind her. She looked up, and the ceiling of the passage looked fine. She was disturbing the water, making the sediment rise around her, but otherwise she was fine.

  The vibrating had stopped. All the shaking and thrumming and violence had ended when the barrier had connected with the bottom of the passage.

  Roye? She sent to him. Roye?

  She could see him through the barrier. He looked a little smaller than he was. He had swum to the barrier between them.

  He tapped his head—he couldn't hear her or communicate with her. He had to be trying, just like she was.

  They both grabbed the sides of the passageway, just like she had before, feeling for something, anything, that would make the barrier rise again. Only she hadn't pressed her hands flat against anything. She had grabbed the curve in the doorway, the wall itself, separating the p
assage from the cavern. She had activated something. And now she had to shut it off.

  She held up a finger, then swam back to the caverns they had explored before. The first cavern looked no different, except that there might have been more sediment floating in the water.

  She had to force herself to breathe slowly, to calm herself, so that she didn't swim through the caverns and out. She swam back into the passageway, even though it made her cringe.

  Roye was still trying to figure out how to open the damn thing. He didn't look panicked, not like she felt. But how could she tell? She could only see his eyes through the clear part of his suit and even that was through this weird milky barrier.

  She resumed touching the sides as well. If only she could remember exactly where she had put her hand, she might be able to touch the edge of whatever it was. Her heart was racing and she was breathing too rapidly. Her suit would shut her down soon if she weren't careful. It would start regulating her air.

  She concentrated on touching the wall. One hand overlapping the other, moving slowly. Moving deliberately. Trying to find a way to get Roye out.

  * * * *

  28

  The sirens stopped. Meklos's ears rang.

  He looked down. The light remained, the line glowing, the cavern glowing, and a smaller blackish silvery light threading out of the little area between them.

  “Did we have a groundquake?” Dr. Reese asked.

  He frowned. He hadn't noticed, with the light and the sound and the Spires glowing above them.

  “Was that real vibration or was it caused by the sound?” she asked.

  Her words still sounded tinny and far away. Those sirens had been loud. He looked up. The ceiling was still porous. The light was still flowing down, and he could almost see that silvery blackness in the center of it.

  She shook her head at him in exasperation, then staggered away, toward the back. He had a hunch she was talking, but he had no idea what she was saying. He didn't care. If this was some kind of defense system, then the divers had set it off. And if they had set it off, then they were in trouble. He left the temple at a full run.

  * * * *

  29

  The little vase had shattered. It had vibrated off her worktable and landed on the newly installed floor. Gabrielle knelt, removing tiny slivers of glass, her heart aching.

  If she had left the vase in the niche near the door of the house she had chosen to live in, the vase would be fine now. It wouldn't have fallen. It wouldn't have broken. All those centuries, only to have her carelessness destroy it.

  But, as she held the larger shards in the palm of her hand, she realized she could test it now. She could see if the glass had truly been made from the white dirt near the Spires.

  The Spires. What had Meklos said? That they were a defense system? Which meant that they made that noise. Impossible.

  She cupped the shards in her hand, grabbed a small box that still remained on her worktable, and poured the shards into the box. Then she used a cloth to gently wipe off her palm. Her ears rang. Maybe the fall hadn't broken the vase. Maybe the sound had shattered it. Just like it would have shattered the Spires. Her breath caught. She set the cloth down. Shattered the Spires and sent them tumbling to the ground, causing the quake.

  She was probably lucky nothing had hit the temple. Even though she really didn't recognize this place with the debris on the floor, the light emanating from one small part of the painting, and the open ceiling, which was letting the light through. She had been in a panic and now she wasn't. Now she was thinking clearly. She made herself walk out of the temple, avoiding the artwork on the floor just because it made her nervous. The whole thing made her nervous. She had never experienced anything like this, not in all her years as an archeologist and leader of expeditions.

  The sunlight blinded her. She blinked away tears, then wiped her eyes. Finally she looked at the area around her. Even after the quake, it looked the same. Nothing had fallen here. Nothing had broken. She expected to see bits of the Spires all over the city, crushing buildings, ruining all her hard work. But she saw nothing different, except a small amount of dust floating in the air, as if it had been dislodged from the dust piles.

  She steeled herself, straightening her shoulders, stiffening her back. Then she looked up. The Spires were so bright that they hurt her eyes. Light flowed from them to the temple itself.

  But the Spires hadn't crumbled. They hadn't fallen apart. All that worry about sound and vibration and powerful equipment had been completely wrong. The Spires were sturdy. They were sending light to the temple, through the open ceiling, and onto that little two-dimensional drawing on the floor. White light threaded with black. Like the drawing. Meklos had said it was a map. And if it was a map, then something had just triggered it. Something had turned it on. The light had appeared in the area where the divers were. She cursed.

  How was she supposed to deal with the fact that the security guard—a lowly security guard—had seen something she and her team had missed for years?

  She shook her head. She couldn't think about that now. She needed to figure out what to do next.

  * * * *

  30

  Roye had brought a scanner. He held it up against the barrier. The scanner was small, barely the size of his fingers, and if Navi hadn't known what it was, she wouldn't have recognized it. He ran it along the edge of the barrier.

  She hadn't brought any equipment, not like that. She had believed Dr. Reese's experts—that this environment was incredibly fragile, and needed protection from all sorts of equipment. If this place was so delicate, then it should have fallen apart from the vibration as the barrier came down. It hadn't. Still, she was here with only her suit's sensors. They would have to do. She opened the palm of her right hand and surveyed the wall holding the barrier in place. Equipment yes, but no controls. The controls, so far as her small scanner could tell, had to be somewhere else.

  She methodically moved her hand along the edge, searching for some kind of device, any kind, to release the barrier.

  After all, she had triggered it from here. She had to be able to release it from here as well.

  Roye ran his scan along his side. He finished before she did, then started all over again.

  When she was finally done, she looked at him through the barrier. His face was distorted by the water and the glass-like material. His eyes looked too big in their clear protective area. He shook his head. So did she. What had she triggered? She put her palm on the side again and this time got a small hit.

  This part of the wall was touch-sensitive. She had triggered something, but nothing in the wall itself. The touch system had sent a signal elsewhere and that signal told the system to lower the barrier. Then she frowned. Slowly she raised her hand to her mouth. Her teeth didn't ache any more. Neither did her head. She had been feeling some kind of energy field. Either the barrier had cut the field off, or the field had shut off when she touched the wall. She couldn't remember when her teeth stopped aching. It was hard to notice an absence of pain.

  She tapped the barrier. Roye looked at her, startled. She put a finger to her cheek and hoped he could understand what she meant since he could no longer hear her. She couldn't mouth anything at him, and she couldn't point to her own teeth.

  She tapped her cheek again, then held out her hands in a question.

  He stared at her for a moment, then he seemed to understand. He ran a hand along his chin, then stopped. He shook his head. Then he shrugged.

  She wasn't sure what that meant. Was the pain still there? Or was it gone? She shrugged.

  He made a circle with his fist. Zero. He didn't feel anything. Neither did she. She nodded.

  So the barrier hadn't broken the field, leaving it working on his side and off on hers. The field had just gone away. Maybe she hadn't triggered it when she'd touched the wall. Maybe Roye had when he swam through the opening.

  Or maybe the only part of the field that still worked was the wall area. The
water might have damaged the rest.

  She pointed at her finger, as if she held the small scanner he'd brought. It took him a moment, but he finally held it up.

  She nodded. Then she pointed behind him.

  It took a few more gestures before he realized that she wanted him to scan the passages behind him, see if there were more barriers. He held up a finger and swam away from her.

  The water swirled where he had been. There was definitely more sediment in it now, and that intrigued her. It meant something, although she wasn't sure what.

  She waited, holding her breath until she realized what she was doing. When she finally released it, she saw him swimming back toward her. He was nodding. It looked like his eyes were crinkling in the corners. Did that mean he was grinning? He mimed swimming, then pointed behind him. Then he pointed behind her. She nodded.

  They were each going to swim away from the barrier. Obviously as far as he could scan, there were no detectable barriers. She doubted there were any on her side either.

  But if there were, she would wait near one of them for him to come get her. Because once they got out of this godforsaken underground lair, they'd communicate with each other, Spires be damned. And then they'd get the hell out of here.

  He waved at her. She waved back. Then he whirled and swam away from the barrier. After a moment, she did the same thing, swimming back the way they had come.

  * * * *

  31

  Meklos went down the ancient steps five at a time, until he slipped and had to catch himself with a hand on the ice-cold wall. The steps were covered with white dust, which was as slick as water.

  He made his way down the remaining steps carefully until he reached the cavern where Yusef was waiting for the divers to return. For a moment, Meklos didn't see Yusef. He didn't see the packs either, and thought he was in the wrong place. Then he realized they were all covered in dust.

  He hurried across the floor. Yusef leaned against the wall, his heavy coat white, his face so dust-covered it looked like it was coated in ice.