Return to Dakistee

by Thomas DePrima

  It wasn't. When the processes entailing gentle persuasion didn't work, Josef moved to the more serious tools. He clamped an enormous pipe wrench around the middle of the canister and fastened a long steel bar to the handle on the top. Again he applied heat evenly around the top for several minutes, then turned off the torch and laid the canister on its side on the floor. Placing his foot on the pipe wrench to hold the canister down, he applied as much of his body weight as possible to the steel bar. The top still refused to budge.

  "That's the best I can do without damaging the canister," Josef said as he straightened up from the last effort and set the canister back on the table. "We can take it down to Los Aliosis and put it into the hydraulic twisting clamp assembly they have there. It can torque up to five thousand foot-pounds. I'm sure it would have that open in a few seconds."

  "We need it open now," Dr. Edolis said. "Cut it, Josef."

  "But that will permanently damage the container, Doctor."

  "I realize that. Cut it open, Joseph, but only at the end so you don't damage the contents any more than necessary."

  "You're the boss, Doctor Edolis," Josef said as he grabbed the laser torch and set the cutting depth.

  Josef shook the canister to settle the contents towards the bottom, then began to cut as high around the top as possible. An inrush of air made a hissing noise as the canister was first punctured. It was a good sign; the vacuum had been intact. Josef continued cutting around the top of the container while Dr. Edolis' assistant sprayed the area just cut with a coolant.

  When the top was being held on by a mere spec of metal, Josef stopped cutting and waited until the coolant spray and been applied. Slipping on a pair of thick work gloves, he grabbed the top and bent it backwards.

  Dr. Edolis immediately rushed forward and pushed Josef away from the canister. "Thank you, Josef. That will be all. You probably want to head to town like the others."

  "Someone has to stay and watch the camp so we don't have scavengers ransacking the shelters," Josef said as he picked up the tools. "I don't mind. I sort of like the peace and quiet. Besides, I've lost enough money to those chiseling SOBs in the casinos."

  "Then I hope you have a peaceful evening."

  "Thanks, Doc. You too. Goodnight, Mr. Portnoy."

  "Goodnight, Josef," Portnoy said as he closed the door.

  "It's here, Edolis said as he reached into the wrecked contained and withdrew a black cylinder about the size of holo-tube cylinder.

  "What's so important about that object?" William asked. "It looks rather useless to me. Does it open?"

  "As I understand it, it's a piece to a puzzle that will allow Space Command to open the facility the Loudescott people uncovered. I have no idea how it will do that, but perhaps these symbols etched into the ends provide the necessary clues. In any event, we can return to our previous schedule now and this will get that damn loan-shark off my back."

  "How do you figure Cozarro fits into this?"

  "No idea, but he said that if we didn't make a maximum effort to find this, he was going to start having his thugs break legs and heads, starting with mine. I've never heard of Space Command employing such tactics before, but I never doubted Cozarro was serious. I wonder how much they paid him to force us into finding this as quickly as possible."

  As William returned to his shelter, Edolis relaxed with a double bourbon on the rocks. The liquor warmed his insides and made him feel better than he had in days. Although he'd never tell anyone, the threat from Cozarro had nothing to do with Space Command but arose from Edolis' failure to pay up on his gambling debts. But the gambler had promised to wipe the slate clean if Edolis found the cylinder quickly.

  * * *

  "The sixth cylinder has finally been found and has been sent to Commander Carver at Loudescott," Councilman Ahil Fazid announced as he gave his weekly status report in the Raider Lower Council meeting.

  "It's about time," Chairman Strauss said. "It's costing us a small fortune to keep our people hidden in readiness for their attack on Loudescott. What of the cylinder the warehouse misplaced? That's all Carver needs to complete her work, is it not?"

  "We've been unable to ascertain exactly how the cylinders fit into the picture," Ahil said. "Carver has told no one at Loudescott, except possibly her assistant, Lt. Carmoody. Since Carmoody is Space Command, there's little chance she'll pass on the information to any of the archeological people.

  "But we have been able to locate the cylinder that was missing from the warehouse. By pressuring our people who work there, we discovered that one of them had stolen it to sell on the black market. We tracked it down, but the buyer was unwilling to part with it. We were forced to use extreme prejudice with him. Following the recovery, it was returned to the warehouse where it was placed in a box of artifacts scheduled to be examined the next day. When it was identified as having been misfiled, it was sent to the proper section. The people there immediately recognized it and forwarded it to Carver.

  "And the employee who stole it for personal profit?" Councilman Bosworth asked.

  "He was disciplined, most severely. I doubt he will ever again steal anything from the warehouse without orders or permission."

  "While the cylinder was in our possession, did we examine it?" Strauss asked.

  "Yes, I've been assured that it's just a solid cylinder of lightweight composite metal with two symbols etched into the end surfaces. Other than its value as an artifact, it's nothing special."

  "So Carver has all the pieces now?" Councilwoman Overgaard asked.

  "If she doesn't have the sixth cylinder yet, she should have it within hours."

  "Very good," Strauss said. "Make sure our people are put on alert. We may need to send them at any time."

  * * *

  "Our ghost is gone," Gxidescu reported. "We've not seen a single sign of him in eleven days."

  "Does the captain agree?" Vejrezzol asked.

  "He does. He says that if they were still there, we would have caught sight of their sensor reflection at least once during those days."

  "Excellent. It's time to take over the ship. You know what to do."

  "Yes. I'll see to it immediately."

  * * *

  "So, now that we have all six cylinders," Carmoody said, "what do we do with them? There are still eighteen billion possible combinations."

  "I think we might narrow that down a bit using the letters engraved in the cylinders."

  The characters from the ancient alphabet?"

  "Yes. I've run them through an un-scrambler and come up with two possibilities in the ancient tongue. One, translated to Amer, means 'rodent hole.'"

  "How delightful," Carmoody said facetiously.

  "Yes," Christa said with a smile, "but the other means 'heritage.'"

  "Heritage? Now we're talking. I'd go with that one."

  "The question is: Go where? I agree 'heritage' sounds a lot more appropriate as a key than 'rodent hole,' but how do we apply it? Is it supposed to be stated aloud? Is it part of a popular phrase or saying from that period used to remind everyone which phrase must be read aloud, or is it simply a one-word utterance?"

  "Good questions all," Carmoody said. "Here's another suggestion. Since there are six letters in their word for heritage, perhaps that's the order the cylinders should be applied to the circles, left to right."

  "That sounds reasonable. Good thinking. If true, it means we've just cut the possible unknown combinations from eighteen billion to just three billion."

  Carmoody smiled and said, "Wonderful. The door is practically open."

  * * *

  Weeks later, the two women seemed no closer to opening the facility than when they first arrived on the planet.

  "This is getting us nowhere," Christa said as they sat in the tunnel staring at the door. "There's something we've overlooked in all this, or possibly misinterpreted."

  "Let's review what we've tried," Carmoody said. "We've placed the cylinders on the circles in the order require
d for 'heritage.' We're assuming the thirty-eight positions on the circles represent the twenty-eight letters of the ancient alphabet plus the first ten digits in a base-10 number system and that the numbers follow the letters. Counting from twelve o'clock, we've aligned each cylinder with the position represented by the symbol on that cylinder, then moved the cylinder within each circle, one mark at a time for all circles, until we had tried all thirty-eight marks as the starting position. Then we did the same thing over again assuming that the numbers preceded the letters in the layout. When that didn't work, we tried a progression system where only one circle at a time was altered, and we did that with the numbers and letters in both arrangements. When that failed to produce results, we did it in reverse order. Are you sure of the order they used for their alphabet?"

  "Yes. It was used the same way in every reference document found in the files we recovered."

  "If the people who possessed the cylinders were the highest ranking people in the Regional Cultural Centers, then it stands to reason they were older officials. How did they see the marks on the door? We're both young and yet we can barely see the etched lines when our noses are practically pressed against the surface."

  "That's a good point, Gracie," Christa said. "We're only able to see them when the light is coming from the side and the etched lines create a slight shadow."

  "Perhaps there are marks we can't see with the light from the Chembrite panels. Who knows what kind of light source they would have used in this tunnel."

  "That's true. What we need is hyperspectral projector capable of projecting the entire range from ultraviolet through infrared. I'd bet they don't have one on the planet and, even if they did, I wouldn't ask to borrow it. We've already told them too much about the leads we're following."

  "We had several portable units aboard the Heisenberg, but they're a very long way from here."

  "I'll contact Admiral Holt and request that one be sent to us as quickly as possible. In the meantime, let's continue to work on finding the right combination just in case the hyperspectral projector is a bust. Why don't we try reversing the order of the cylinders in the circles?"

  "Might as well," Carmoody said. "It might be a month before we get the projector."

  * * *

  Almost two weeks later, a ship arrived in orbit over the Loudescott location just before sunset and a shuttle immediately began the descent to the surface. The Diplomatic Corps emblem on the Space Command shuttle drew Christa's eyes as she watched the small ship park next to her shuttle. It was another five minutes before the hatch opened and a Space Command Lieutenant emerged. He strode purposefully to where Christa was standing and came to attention. He had been told to report to Lt. Commander Carver, and years of media coverage allowed him to recognize her immediately.

  "Lt. Lindall, ma'am," was all he said.

  "Stand easy, Lieutenant. Are you delivering a VIP?"

  "No, ma'am. We have a delivery for you from Admiral Holt. We were on our way to Nordakia to deliver a diplomatic pouch and he requested that we divert slightly to bring you important equipment."

  "Thank you, Lieutenant. We've been expecting a delivery, but I thought it might be coming via Quartermaster ship."

  "We're taking some of the load off the Quartermaster Corps in this deca-sector now that we have one of the new DS ships. We're ferrying small shipments and groups of personnel."

  "Your ship is DS?"

  "Yes, ma'am. Fresh out of the yard three months ago."

  "Is it a new design?"

  "Sail to keel. And is she ever fast. The trip to Higgins from Earth takes just four days, and we made it here in one."

  "Any armament?"

  "Well, we are supposed to be a diplomatic yacht, so we don't want to look like a scout destroyer, but we have four disguised laser arrays and hidden missile tubes fore and aft. Our missiles have limited punch, unlike the serious torpedoes you line officers have, but if someone attacks us, we can mount a defense of sorts while we prepare to go to Light-9790."

  As they talked, ratings had carried two large cases over to Christa's shuttle.

  "There's your delivery, Commander. Is there anything else you'll be needing from us?"

  "No. Thank you, Lt. Lindall. Extend my appreciation to your captain."

  "Yes, ma'am."

  * * *

  It took thirty minutes to set up one of the projectors the next morning. Instead of directing the beam from the side as they had been doing with the Chembrite panels, Christa and Carmoody set the projector directly in front of the door with the lens opened wide enough to cover the entire door. After they had both donned special eye protection goggles, Christa started at ten nanometers, the low end of the ultraviolet part of the spectrum, and gradually increased the wavelength. At three hundred nm, something began to appear on the door. Christa fine-tuned the wavelength and the image sharpened.

  "I'll be damned," Carmoody said. "Look at that."

  Christa's attention was already focused on the door and the now clearly visible markings. There was a tiny alphabetic or numeric symbol at each of the thirty-eight marks on each circle and, while the order was the same on all six circles, the starting position was different. No one would ever have chanced upon the combination. Most importantly, each circle had a large alphabetic symbol in the center.

  "Damn," Christa said. "It says rodent hole. We were even using the wrong order for the cylinders."

  "We would have been here a thousand years if we hadn't gotten this projector."

  "Let's not gloat too quickly. There may be additional parts to this puzzle we haven't discovered yet. Let's put our new information to the test."

  Five minutes later they had placed the cylinders on the right circles and aligned them with the proper symbols. Christa stood back and uttered the Ancient command for 'unlock.'

  Nothing happened.

  "Okay," Christa said, "it's time for Plan B." She reset the cylinders to the starting positions in each circle, then, one at time, without moving the cylinder away from the door, she twisted each until it pointed at the symbol identical to the one engraved on the cylinder. As she moved the last one into position, a rumbling sound could be heard from within the door as cams that hadn't moved in almost two hundred centuries tried to turn to new positions and bolts retracted into the door so it could move.

  When no noises were heard for several seconds, Christa reached out and removed the cylinders from the door. She then said, "dwuthathsei," which was the Nordakian word for 'open.' It hadn't changed very much in the nineteen thousand, four hundred years since the Ancients had occupied the planet.

  The door began to rumble again, then complained loudly as it slid into the door pocket.

  As the door completed its travel, Carmoody looked at Christa and said, "Now what?"

  "First I have to go report our breakthrough, and then we get to find out what was so valuable that the Ancients employed these incredibly complex machinations to protect it from prying eyes."

  * * *

  Chapter Eight

  ~ October 8th, 2285 ~

  As the two Space Command officers approached the surface, Christa halted to speak with Carmoody.

  "We've been pretty depressed the past few weeks because we didn't seem to be making any progress. It's important that we continue that depression. Right now you look much too happy, so you'll have to ratchet it down a few notches."

  "Why?" Carmoody asked. "We opened the door. That's cause for celebration."

  "If there's one thing I've learned when I'm not aboard ship, it's that someone is always watching. There can be any number of reasons, and most often it's innocent curiosity, but I would be willing to bet a year's salary that there's at least one Raider spy watching us whenever we're in the open."

  "A Raider spy? How can you be so sure?"

  "I have a deep appreciation for their intelligence-gathering and they have to have learned about this find since everyone on the planet seems to know about it. They've had plenty of time to pla
ce a dozen spies in the archeology camp so at least one can always be watching for any sign that we've been successful."

  "But you've closed and locked the door again."

  "It doesn't matter. I don't want them to know we've opened it. We have limited protection here and I don't want to let them think they can gain access somehow."

  "But surely the Marines can stop them."

  "Maybe, and maybe not. Either way, it's easier just to keep them from learning even the smallest bit of information. Now put on your most dejected look. The one you were wearing all day yesterday would be perfect."

  "I'm not going to be able to look depressed if you keep making jokes," Carmoody said with a grin.

  "Okay. Sorry." Christa said with a smile. "Now give me a depressed look." After a couple of seconds, Christa said, "That's good. Hold that one." Masking her own face with a look of boredom and fatigue, she turned and led the way out of the tunnel into the bright afternoon sun.

  Once inside the shuttle, Christa said, "Okay, you can drop the act. No one can see us in here."

  "What act?" Carmoody said. "I'm genuinely depressed about spies possibly watching our every move. You're not sure though, right?"

  "I have no proof, but I know it as sure as I know that I need a cup of coffee. Join me?"

  "Thanks. I'll get them while you send the message. Colombian, two sugars, black, right?"

  "Right."

  When Christa returned from the cockpit, Carmoody was relaxing with her coffee. Christa's full mug was on the table and had cooled enough that she could take a big sip.

  "Okay, the message is sent," Christa said as she took a seat. "But if we go back into the tunnel now, it will look suspicious. Let's wait until tomorrow. In fact, perhaps we should wait until we have some additional forces here. As soon as we start exhibiting signs of increased activity, we're going to have archeologists climbing all over us, trying to gain information about the find."