Abruptly, he froze where he sat, his spine turning into a backbone-shaped icicle under his skin. He ran his recent thoughts back through his mind until he came to the bit in parentheses. Had he really questioned the identity of the God’s prophet? It seemed that he had and no bolt of angry lightning had left him a twitching, overcooked mess on the floor.
Of course, he had been questioning the same thing for weeks, ever since the speech in the barn and the visit to Eli Wallacher’s spaceship in its cave, but he had carefully structured his thoughts into an investigation determined to prove the Prophet’s identity was true. If it found that the man was false then the God couldn’t blame him for that now could He? The fact that the great God Manure would be too all-seeing to be fooled by that argument was something that Bentham carefully avoided considering. Instead, he buried himself in the Holy texts and in conversation with other scholars, all the while reporting his lack of success, but unwavering optimism, to the rest of the High Council.
Now that the thought was fully out in the open and unpunished by electrical discharges of any kind, Bentham felt free to examine it more fully and more closely .
The start had been the speech in the barn. Gods work in mysterious ways their wonders to perform, he knew only too well, but why send a Prophet to Hochnar when he was actually needed elsewhere? Why not just have him pop up where he was supposed to be? It seemed a bit unfair on the Hochnarians for them to do all the hard worshipping for the Prophet to appear and say ‘Thanks a lot, but I’m off’. Then again, ‘fair’ was not a word that the average Hochnarian would ever use in reference to the state of affairs that gave them their current place in the universe.
Then there was the ship. Why should the Prophet of a God need a man-made spaceship to get to another planet? Surely the God could just send him there in a puff of miracle smoke. Yet, here he was trying to reactivate old Silas’s ship.
As a member of the council, he knew the story of Eli (or Silas as he chose to call himself after the ship died and he found himself stranded) and the living ship. It was all written down in the texts with a single stark warning. ‘Machines that count are useful things, but ones that think for themselves are dead dodgy’.
That the Prophet should be so fascinated, and excited, by such a thinking ship, one forbidden explicitly by the texts and one that by his own admission had been a threat to the whole of humanity, was contrary to everything that he would have expected of the God’s earthly messenger. Which left only the nagging doubt that Gods don’t do things the way that you expect.
Abruptly, the lights in the room flickered once and died. Bentham rose from his seat and crossed to the window. There was no comforting glow from behind the curtains, so when he pulled them aside he was not surprised to see the whole city swathed in darkness. The only lights showing were in the windows of the hospital. Only they possessed a back-up generator and that only because of the importance of their work. It had never been needed anyway because the power plant was so efficient.
There was a knock at the door and an acolyte rushed in without waiting for an answer. He fell to his knees in supplication. “Master Bentham, the lights...”
“Have gone out, yes,” Bentham said calmly, and calmingly, without turning away from the window.
“Has the power plant blown up?” the acolyte asked fearfully.
“Are you currently glowing in the dark?” Bentham questioned, still looking out over the darkened rooftops.
The acolyte furrowed his brow in confusion at the strange question and then did what he always thought was safest and answered it directly, “No master.”
“Then it is probably safe to say that the power plant has not blown up,” Bentham told him, serenely.
“But what does it mean?” the acolyte wailed. Bentham recognised him now as the young man with the unfortunate habit of not wearing underwear and who always drew giggles from groups of local girls as he passed by.
“It means simply that the lights are out,” Bentham told him patiently. It was in a way, he considered, fortunate that the majority of the city’s populace would be at the Prophet’s party...
Realisation switched on in his mind just as the lights came on in room.
“How many council members are in residence?” he demanded, stalking to the desk and sweeping aside the pile of papers that lay upon it.
The acolyte thought for a moment and then said, “All but three master.”
“Wake them,” Bentham ordered his fingers jabbing out a commlink number into the panel set into the top of the desk, “and have them convene in the Great Hall immediately.”
The acolyte scurried away.
The commlink signalled only twice before it was answered by a severe-looking man with a haircut that was as severe as possible without being ingrowing. “Master Bentham,” he greeted with a slight nod of his head, “I was expecting your call.”
“Captain,” Bentham ignored the pleasantries, “the men are ready I trust?”
“No,” the captain responded, “but they will be, and certainly faster than the council can give the order.”
“Assume the order has been given,” Bentham instructed. “Find out where they are.”
“Wow! What a rush!” the computer cried. As the power transfer dwindled back to zero, the colours on the screen slowed their mad swirling to the point where the human eye could tell them apart again. “You have got to try this.”
“Considering what it would do to me, I don’t think so,” Haynes demurred. “Did it work? Were you able to kick start the fusion reactor?”
The colours stopped swirling so abruptly that Haynes almost fell over. “Ah, is that what we were trying to do?” the computer asked in an abashed voice.
“You know it was,” Haynes snapped.
“Sorry, I kind of got caught up in the moment there. It’s something of a unique experience,” the computer apologised.
Haynes flicked open the communications channel to the earpiece fitted to Simeon’s ear, “Simeon, can you get yourself set up for another shot?”
“OK, but we’re going to have to work quickly,” Simeon warned him.
“Problems?”
“The Chief Engineer’s been on the comm channel since the first power outage,” Simeon confirmed. Haynes could hear in the background that he was already preparing the equipment for a second attempt at forcing life into the ship’s fusion reactor.
“We knew this might not work first time round and that there would be calls,” he reminded the younger man.
“True enough,” Simeon agreed, “but these calls are not just from the authorities, but from the military as well.”
“You have a military?” Haynes was surprised.
“It’s not widely advertised as there’s never been anyone to fight, but it pays to be prepared.”
“Fair enough,” Haynes allowed. “Let me know when you’re ready.”
Master Bentham responded to the commpanel’s beeping immediately. The Captain’s face appeared equally immediately, sandwiched between a combat helmet and body armour.
“You have a report?”
“They are just to the south of the city,” the military commander told him. “They are trying to restart the ship’s engine by taking the power from the plant as a primer.”
“Your scouts move quickly,” Bentham approved.
The Captain chose not to inform him that the information was received through the simple act of commlinking with the power plant and asking the manager what was going on. It never paid to reveal one’s methods to a superior authority.
“Your orders?” he decided to enquire simply instead.
“Protect the power plant from any damage and destroy the forbidden thinking machine.”
“And if the Prophet...”
“The High Council has ruled that he is not the true prophet of the great god Manure, but an impostor,” Bentham informed him coldly.
“As you say,” the Captain did not care what the man’s status was beyond how much
of a target he presented. “And if this impostor or his associates attempt to interfere?”
“We prize human life above all things, but if their deaths proved to be unavoidable then we would not be displeased.”
“I understand,” the Captain was used to translating the doubletalk of politicians into direct action. He had spent a long time developing weapons and he was not about to miss an opportunity for using them.
“Oh man that is some good stuff,” the computer moaned deliriously as the second jolt of energy flowed down the cable from the power plant. Despite being made from the best materials they had been able to use the name of the Prophet to obtain, it was not rated for this level of energy exchange and was now smoking in several places. “I could get used to this.”
“The reactor?” Haynes asked, hopefully.
“Sorry no.”
“What do you mean ‘no’?” Haynes shouted, losing his patience. He had a sense of time running out in the way that sand runs out from an hourglass and then drops a huge boulder on you from a great height. “Why the bloody hell not?”
“Stuck relays, frozen injectors and overloaded circuits to name but three reasons,” the computer snapped back. “Maybe we should sit you in a damp cave for a decade or three without moving and see how your joints are doing.”
“That cave was hardly damp!”
“Could we leave the domestic quarrel for another time?” Simeon’s voices asked over the commlink. “I think that we have more pressing matters.”
“All right,” Haynes postponed the argument for later. “Set it up for another go.”
“Can’t do that.”
“Why not?”
The colours on the screen resolved themselves into a view of the outside world. The darkness took on shades of green as the camera switched to light-enhanced mode and then zoomed forward to show several vehicles racing in their direction, vehicles with an undeniably military aspect. It was probably the very large cannons they carried that gave them away. A bright bloom of orange and yellow emerged from the end of the nearest cannon. The lens was then obscured by a shower of dirt.
“What the hell was that?” Simeon demanded over the commlink. “It sounded like an explosion.”
“They’re shooting at us,” Haynes told him.
“Oh really?” the computer demanded sarcastically. “You think?”
“Time to go,” Haynes decided.
“I’d love to oblige, but you might recall a small cable that is currently tying us to the power plant.”
“Damn!” Haynes swore. “Can’t you detach it remotely?”
“Look Ma, no hands,” the computer replied tartly.
There was another flash of orange and yellow on the screen and Haynes could feel the floor tilt a little under the impact.
“All right, all right!” he raced out of the control room and down to the exit hatch, which popped open obligingly as he approached. He stepped out into a deluge of dirt from another impact.
“They’ve almost got their range,” the computer told him unnecessarily as he fell into the crater left by the last shell. The ground all around him was bubbling furiously.
“I don’t think that they’re using ordinary shells,” he warned as he hauled himself to his feet and wiped his hands off on his trousers.
“The cable,” the computer reminded him.
The power coupling was placed only a few short paces forward of the hatch, but on the far side of the ship. He stumbled over the uneven ground, knocked over again by the impact of an artillery round, and reached the point where the cable was plugged into a power input.
“Is this thing switched off?” he demanded.
“It’s off,” the computer assured him.
Yeah, like I’m really going to believe you, Haynes thought to himself. “Simeon?”
“Off and disconnected at this end,” the voice in his ear assured him.
Haynes grabbed the cable in both hands and was gratified that they did not both burst into flames. With a grunt, he twisted the fitting around and hauled the cable free. It was surprisingly heavy and, surprised, he dropped it, narrowly missing his toes. Immediately, the ship lurched away. He dodged around the rear undercarriage and headed for the hatchway, but the vessel was accelerating faster than he was.
“What are you doing? Stop!” he yelled.
Abruptly, and surprisingly, the ship stopped immediately. A shell fell only a few feet in front of it, showering the nose with dirt. Haynes scrambled through the deluge and into the hatch, banging the control panel and shouting, “I’m in.”
“There’s no need to be so loud,” the computer informed him testily as the ship lurched forward again. “There’s enough of that going on outside thank you very much.”
Haynes regained his feet and worked his way back to the control deck. It wasn’t that easy as the floor beneath his feet was bucking with every hillock and rut in the ground and then shaking each time that another shell landed.
“Could you make this a bit more uncomfortable?” he demanded as he fell headlong into one of the flight couches, which immediately folded around him and cushioned the shocks.
“If I really tried hard I might be able to,” the computer shot back. “Do you really want me to try hard?”
“Forget I spoke,” Haynes decided to play it a bit softer for the present.
“Easily done,” the computer allowed.
The screen, now showing the view behind the ship, displayed the three military vehicles gaining ground fast. They were constructed for travelling over uneven ground, which the spaceship clearly was not. Two of the vehicles fired and only one shower of dirt resulted.
“Owwww!!” the computer cried. “That bloody hurt.”
“What do you mean ‘that hurt’?” Haynes demanded, amazed. “You’re built to withstand direct hits from disrupter barrages.”
“It’s some kind of chemical weapon,” the computer informed him. The ship swerved off to the left and picked up speed. Haynes wondered if the undercarriage could take the pounding for much longer. It was built for limited taxi-ing across spaceport tarmac, not racing through fields of cabbages. “It’s sticky and it burns.”
Simeon, who was watching the scene unfold from the roof of the power plant, a position he had taken up as soon as he had released the cable from his end, pointed out helpfully, “People are constantly amazed what can be made out of manure.” He added urgently, “Diana you’ve just turned onto a direct heading for the edge of a canyon.”
Haynes switched the viewscreen to a forward view and immediately saw the edge of the drop-off coming rapidly towards him.
“Did you hear me Diana?” Simeon asked, focussing his field glasses to get a better view of the hazard.
“Did you hear him computer?” Haynes demanded as the metres between them and a plunge to destruction raced out of the viewscreen’s field of vision.
“Oh yes, I heard him,” the computer replied with a shout of triumph as the last few metres melted away beneath the front of the ship and it sailed into the empty air.
Simeon heard the faint whoomph as the engines ignited, but didn’t see them as the ship had plunged out of his view. It emerged moments later, rising on a pillar of blue fire. The engines did not emit anything visible in normal operation, he knew, so he presumed that the computer was dumping something into the exhaust just to show off. “Nice,” he commented to himself in appreciation.
Inside the ship, on the flight deck, Haynes was enjoying the spectacle a good deal less. He had seen the view in front of him tip into a deep chasm and then suddenly, at the last apparent moment, sweep upwards into a view of the sky. They had not shattered into a million irradiated pieces on the canyon floor, but appeared to be in full flight mode.
“I don’t want to appear to be making assumptions here,” he said angrily, “but we appear to be flying.”
“Sorry about that,” the computer actually displayed no other signs of being sorry about anything. “I may have lied about the po
wer connection not working.”
“Lied?”
“Maybe just a little bit,” the computer admitted.
“OK. I’ll decide what to do about that later.” He keyed the microphone, “Simeon, can you get to the roof of the power plant? We can swing by and pick you up on the way.”
Down on the roof of the power plant, Simeon watched the doors of the military vehicles burst open and soldiers flood out of them and into the building. It would take them only moments to reach him. “No need,” he replied with a wry smile. “It was never my intention to leave Hochnar, just to get you to.”
Haynes nodded to himself in salute to his young friend, “Understood.”
“Just look after Keely for me.”
Haynes frowned, “Keely? She’s not here.”
“I think that if I know my sister then you will find that she is,” Simeon disagreed. The doors leading down into the plant below burst open and soldiers emerged onto the roof. “Company’s here. Good luck.” He killed the link and raised his hands above his head.
Haynes listened to the carrier wave for a few moments before closing down the link at his end.
“Brave kid,” the computer commented sombrely.
On the screen, the surface of Hochnar started to curve as they sailed up into orbit above it.
Haynes savoured the view and the moment. Now, he was free again. True, he had escaped Srindar Djem several weeks ago, but that had been swapping one prison for another, larger, one with fewer pigs to muck out. He was in space in command (sort of) of his own ship with the pick of the planets before him. He could go anywhere he wanted for no other reason than he wanted to go there. That was what being free meant.
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