by Linda Nagata
Buyu was using his suit radio to talk to someone. Skye was startled, and for a moment she was overcome with doubt. Maybe Buyu wasn’t the one in control of the warden? Maybe city authority had only used his voice, thinking she would be more likely to listen? How dangerous were viperlions, anyway?
Zia and Devi reached the stream bank. They scrambled toward Skye, crushing bushes, snapping branches, sending pebbles rolling toward the water. The noise angered the staring viperlion. Both its maws opened, flashing a red warning. Then it charged.
Ord shrieked. It was the loudest sound Skye had ever heard the robot make, but she didn’t need any encouragement to run. She turned and scrambled up the gully wall, pulling on stems and tree trunks to haul herself higher.
The viperlion required only two bounds to cross the natural rock dam that had created the pool. Water fountained beneath its tiny feet, and then it reached the gravel bank. It was met by the warden, which appeared as if from nowhere. The startled viperlion skidded to a stop. Skye hesitated too, turning to watch the confrontation.
The warden had given up its camouflage colors. Instead of blending in with the foliage, its color had changed to bright red, and as she watched, its body stretched into an absurdly tall, absurdly thin figure, like a paper cut-out.
The viperlion wasn’t fooled though—or else it just didn’t care how big its prey appeared to be. It dropped into a crouch, and its two heads darted forward, attacking the warden from opposite sides. The maws snapped. One closed on the warden’s shoulder. The other grabbed it by the hip. When the heads jerked back, the warden flew apart in a great splash of red gelatinous goo. The remains of the warden trailed from the maws as they swung back, tucking their prizes into the viperlion’s underbelly stomach.
“Run!” Devi shouted. “Skye! Get over the ridge and out of sight!”
Skye was just about to take his advice when the branch she’d been holding snapped. She lost her footing on the steep slope and went down, sliding on her rear through the broken bushes. The viperlion heard the noise, and gave up on retrieving the scattered remains of the warden. It called out in a hooting growl. Then it charged again, rushing up the slope on its six ribbon legs, moving with a terrifying, mechanical smoothness.
Skye grabbed at the brush to stop her slide. She got her feet back under her. Giving up on climbing out of the gully, she turned, scrambling upstream, shattering bushes in her path. Behind her, Devi was whooping, trying to distract the viperlion … but it had already chosen its prey.
She burst out of the bushes, only to find herself facing a wall of rough, gray stone. The stream was now several meters below her, dropping down a series of steep rapids. It was too wide to jump, and too shallow to hide in. She would have to climb the wall.
She leaped, grabbing for a knob of rock half a meter above her head. She got her hand on it, but the knob snapped off. She tumbled to the ground, landing on her back, hard. The air was knocked out of her lungs. She lay there a second, staring at the bright blue sky and listening to the crackle of the viperlion’s approach. “Up, Skye, up,” Ord pleaded, patting her neck. “Go home now. Be safe.”
A gust of cold air flowed over her cheek. She turned her head and saw a dark hole, barely half a meter wide and only twenty centimeters high, in the bottom of the gray stone wall. It was half-hidden behind shrubs, with moss growing around the entrance and some kind of white scat on the ground in front of it. Another gust of cold air flowed out of the hole … which meant it had another entrance somewhere!
She flopped over just as the viperlion bounded out of the thicket. It hesitated, confused, perhaps, by her position on the ground, for after all, it had been expecting a tall, slender lunch. Skye used the moment to scramble on her elbows, wriggling headfirst into the narrow opening, willing it to be deep enough to shelter her whole body. As she jammed her shoulders in, dirt scraped off the walls. Roots slapped her face. The viperlion huffed and growled. It sounded as if it were right behind her.
She scrambled faster. She got her shoulders in, her waist, her hips and then her legs. She still had not come to the end of the dark tunnel; a frigid breeze whispered past her face, coaxing her onward.
She surged forward. She was going to make it! The viperlion was way too big to follow her into this little hole.
Then a horrible pressure closed over her right foot. The viperlion had bit her with its maw! The scales of her skin suit responded instantly, locking into place around her leg, freezing into a diamond-hard protective armor that prevented her foot from being crushed. The warden’s soft biogel body had been shredded by the viperlion. Her suit was tougher than that, but it could not make the viperlion let go. The creature hauled back on her foot, trying to drag her out of the burrow. Skye fought it. She dug her gloved fingers into the sparse soil. She clung to knobs of rock, and wedged her elbows against the tunnel walls, but it was a losing battle. Slowly, slowly, the viperlion was dragging her out.
She kicked its snout with her other foot. She screamed at it: “Let go of me you mindless biomachine! I am not your babies’ lunch!”
As if in reply, it yanked her back another ten centimeters.
Her arms trembled with exhaustion. Ord was whispering something in her ear, but she couldn’t understand it. “What? What?”
How long could her skin suit protect her, if the viperlion got her outside?
Ord disappeared. Skye felt it clambering along her back, slipping through the narrow space beneath the tunnel roof. Did Ord think it could force the viperlion to let her go? Ord was made of biogel! The viperlion could shred it with a single bite. “Ord! Get back here!”
Then suddenly, the same horrible odor Skye had smelled at the hungry rock pond filled the tunnel in an invisible, noxious cloud. She dropped her nose to her arm with a retching yell of disgust. Her eyes watered, and she was instantly nauseous.
The viperlion let go.
It took Skye a moment to realize it, but the pressure on her foot was gone. Were the viperlion’s eyes stinging as badly as her own?
She charged forward again on elbows and knees, dirt raining down on her neck, until at last she was sure she’d gone far enough that even with its long neck, the viperlion couldn’t reach her.
But did that mean it would be hunting for Devi and Zia and Buyu now?
At once, Skye started to turn around—only to realize she had crawled beyond the tunnel, into a lightless cavern, where the harsh sound of her breathing echoed off unseen walls. When she tried to turn back, she bumped into rock. She felt for the passage, but it wasn’t where she expected to find it. She peered into the darkness, searching for some distant glimmer of daylight, but there was nothing. The tunnel must have turned without her realizing it, cutting off any light.
“Ord?” Her voice sounded faint in the darkness. She raised her head cautiously, but the roof was high enough that she didn’t bump into it. “Ord?” she repeated.
She heard a clattering of limbs against stone. “Ord?” Her voice slid into unstable high notes.
“Yes good Skye. Quiet and safe now. Yes. But you should go home.”
She heard the viperlion huffing and snorting somewhere nearby. She tried to follow the sound, but in the lightless cave it seemed to come from everywhere at once. So at least the viperlion wasn’t hunting the others. Not yet. If they were smart, they would use this time to get far away—but they wouldn’t run away unless they knew she was okay … would they?
“Ord, can you reach Buyu’s suit radio?”
Several seconds passed, then, “No, Skye.”
“Maybe if you crawl out to the edge of the tunnel? Can you find your way out?”
“Yes Skye.”
“Tell them to get away. There’s got to be another way out of this cave. I’ll look for it, and meet them when I get out. And Ord—”
“Yes Skye?”
“Don’t get eaten, okay?”
“Okay, Skye.”
She listened to Ord scuttle away. Then she stood up, cautiously feeling for a roo
f, but there was nothing. It occurred to her to talk to her suit DI. “Is there a function for light?” she asked.
The suit answered in its soft, feminine voice. “Yes. The surface scales are capable of luminescence in any designated pattern.”
Well, slick.
“Light them all,” Skye commanded.
The skin suit began to glow. At first the illumination was a soft blue, but it grew gradually brighter, casting blue light just the color of her suit across the high walls and ceiling of a long cavern. The chamber was at least three times her height. The light of her skin suit did not reach to the far end. Trailing ropes hung from the ceiling. It took her a moment to realize they were the roots of plants growing on the slope above the cave. Water dripped from them, and from the cave roof, which was encrusted with a dull layer of bubbly, light-colored stone that looked blue in the blue light of her suit.
She could still hear the snuffling of the viperlion, which discouraged the idea of trying to get out the same way she had gotten in. She could wait for it to leave, but that might take all day. If she didn’t get back to the elevator on time, rescuers would come after her, and she would never get a chance to explore the mounds. Rescuers might be coming already, responding to the loss of the warden. Were the devices monitored that closely? She didn’t know, but clearly time was limited. She needed to get out of this cave and find a mound before the opportunity was lost forever.
“Ord?”
“Coming, Skye.” Its voice sounded distant. “Buyu and Zia and Devi report they are safe.” Its limbs rattled on rock as it scuttled into sight. She realized she was looking at the passage. It was such a tiny hole! Had she really come in through that?
Ord crouched, assuming a look of concentration. Then Devi’s voice emerged from its mouth. “Skye, it sounds like you’re in a lava tube. Be careful, because there could be pits in the floor, or loose rock on the ceiling. Let Ord go first. We’ll move upslope, and try to find the other entrance … but hey ado, at least you got rid of the warden.”
Skye grinned. Well, yeah. That had been the whole point, hadn’t it? “Come on, Ord,” she said. “Let’s find another way out of here.”
Chapter 11
The floor of the cave was treacherous, with massive slabs of steeply slanting rock, and piles of rubble where parts of the ceiling had collapsed. Yet, taken as a whole, the cave was remarkably orderly. It ran upslope in roughly a straight line, and while the walls were made of jagged lava, the passage itself was still regular enough that it might have been drilled out of the original rock.
Ord scrambled ahead, looking for the best path. Skye hurried to keep up, thankful for the cold breeze in her face that assured her there was another way out. At one point they came to a Y-shaped junction, where the cave branched in two directions. Ord hesitated, its tentacles spread as it tested the air. Then it scurried down the left side.
“What exactly is a lava tube?” Skye asked.
Ord replied, “City library does not respond.”
“Oh. The radio signal can’t get out of this cave.” Never before had Ord failed to answer such a simple factual question. It gave her a strangely vulnerable feeling.
They walked on for another fifteen minutes. Finally, Skye was able to make out a gray glimmer in the distance. The light brightened as they approached. It fell from overhead, onto a cone-shaped pile of tumbled rocks, twice as tall as her own considerable height. The light had an odd, gray-green quality. She approached the site with a growing sense of gloom.
Clearly, the cave roof had fallen in, creating the pile of rubble and opening up a skylight to the outside world. The trouble was, the cave roof was at least ten meters overhead. Climbing the pile of rubble would get her halfway there, but she would still be a long way from getting out.
Ord said, “A lava tube is a channel formed by fast-moving lava when the surface of the flow cools and hardens. This crust insulates the superhot lava beneath, which continues to flow, sometimes for days. When the eruption stops, the lava drains out of the channel, leaving behind a long, tubular cave.”
Skye smiled. “Are you in contact with city library again, Ord?”
“Yes Skye.”
The cave continued on past the skylight. No telling how far. She squinted into the darkness, wondering if it was worth pushing on. “What do you think, Ord? Is there another entrance farther up?”
“Good to check,” Ord said, and scrambled away.
While it was gone, Skye climbed the rock pile, pausing every few steps to listen for Devi or Zia calling. She heard nothing. She reached the top of the mound and balanced there, gazing up at a canopy of leaves in a hundred shades of green. A flock of small red flyers fluttered and darted through the branches. The day seemed very dim. No sunlight glinted between the leaves, and after a minute she realized that a heavy layer of clouds had gathered across the sky.
Ord reappeared. “No good, Skye. Bad air.”
“Okay, Ord. Then we get out this way.”
It occurred to her she could toss Ord out. It could sample any mounds in the neighborhood. The job would be done. Then she could just wait here until rescue arrived.
Of course then Buyu would be in deep, deep trouble for losing her. Maybe he already was, but she would hope for the best. She would hope city authority hadn’t yet noticed that anything was wrong.
She drew in a deep breath, then yelled as loudly as she could, “Zia!” Her voice echoed off the cave wall and off the trees, and the red flyers scattered. “Zia! Devi! Buyu!” Again the echoes rolled away.
This time though, someone answered, sounding not too far off. “Skye?”
“Devi! Down here! Watch out for a big hole in the ground!”
“Keep talking, Skye! I’m following your voice.”
“Here. I’m over here, but I can’t get out. Are you all right? Where’s Zia?”
“Right here,” Zia said, sticking her head over the rim of the hole. She had dirt and bits of leaves stuck in her wiry hair, but her usual good humor had returned. She grinned at Skye’s predicament. “You look like some kind of goddess on her altar … only the ground fell out from under you.” She snickered.
“Ha ha. How am I going to get out of here?”
Devi’s head appeared beside Zia. He had lost the tie for his ponytail; his red and blond hair fell forward over his face as he looked down. He shoved one side of it behind an ear. “Are you all right?”
“Sooth. How am I going to get out of here?”
Buyu said, “I’ve got a rope.”
She turned to see him standing at a low point on the rim of the skylight. He had dropped his pack at his feet. Now he uncoiled a strand of orange rope. As he lowered it into the cave, loops sprouted every half meter along its length. Skye scrambled down the pile of rocks, but Ord reached the rope first. “Check for safety, Skye.” It scrambled up the line, testing each loop as it formed.
“We’re set,” Buyu called down. “Climb up when you’re ready.”
“Sooth. I’m coming now.”
Each loop hardened as she touched it, making a perfect step. It was an easy climb. When she reached the point where the rope lay against the rim of the skylight, each loop arched up a little, so she could get her fingers all the way around it. In a few more steps, she rolled out onto a padding of fallen leaves, and laughed. “What an adventure! Buyu, I couldn’t believe it when you took control of that warden. It was amazing!”
“The whole thing was stupid,” Buyu snapped. He held up his finger and thumb, only a centimeter apart. “You came this close to being lunch for that viperlion. When was the last time you updated your personal record?”
She couldn’t remember. What did it matter? She’d gotten away. Though Buyu was right—it had been close. “It bit my foot,” she said, sitting up. “The skin suit hardened.”
“The skin suit wouldn’t have saved you if it had gotten its maw on your skull. Did it ever occur to you to put your hood up? Coming down here was a big mistake. Only dumb ados would come u
p with a plan like this. No wonder they didn’t want me on an exploration team!”
She stared at him in shock. She had never seen Buyu angry before. He was certainly showing an unwelcome range of emotions lately. She looked to Zia and Devi for help. Devi only looked confused. Zia nodded. “Take it easy, Buyu. It may not have been the most elegant plan, but it worked.”
“That’s right,” Skye said. “Don’t forget why we’re down here.”
“You should be in the monkey house,” Buyu countered.
Her temper snapped. “Gutter dogs! Buyu, the mounds were your idea, and it was a good idea. It’s still a good idea, so let’s do it while we have the chance. Okay?”
He looked like he wanted to argue, but there was no good argument to make. He nodded. “All right. I saw a mound about twenty meters down the ridge.”
They had just set out when a pattering sound swept across the canopy. Skye looked up, curious and a little concerned. “What—?” Droplets of water splashed on her face and she ducked her head, spluttering.
“Rain,” Buyu said.
Devi held out his hands to feel the fat, cold drops falling off the trees. On his face was a look of wonder. “Rain. This is so wild! Water, just falling out of the sky.”
Skye wiped the water off her face, but more kept falling from the leaves … or from the clouds, that was it. Rain. She had seen rain in virtual reality stories, but she had never felt it before. It was cold, and she wasn’t sure she liked it.
They found the mound a minute later. It was small, only about half a meter across and knee-high. It looked like it was made of matted soil, or half-rotted mulch. Nothing grew on its surface. Mounds were nanotech factories, and they were said to be hot. She laid her gloved hand against it. The glove translated the feel of anything she touched; raw heat soaked into her palm. The mound had to be at least fifteen degrees above human body temperature. A light mist steamed off its surface as the rain struck.