by Kir Lukovkin
“I never thought that I would die in such a stupid way,” Rick said.
“I have no intention of dying yet,” Paul replied, about to jump from the catwalk.
He stepped towards the railing, but a roller quickly moved there and got in his way.
“Well, that's that,” Rick chuckled. “You're too late.”
“I'm happy that you're having fun,” Rick retorted angrily.
“Not at all.” Rick took him by the shoulder and turned him so he would face him. “You've really grown up, Paul. It's a shame that you don't share my beliefs, but...”
The humming of the spheres and the crackling of the charges suddenly stopped. A deafening silence fell and Rick and Paul could not believe what was happening. They looked around stupidly, not understanding what was going on. But then, when the spheres suddenly cracked at the top like the eggs of a gigantic spider to show humans sitting in the seats inside. Paul growled with fury and raised his blaster.
This was unbelievable. Rick expected to see anything but people controlling the rollers.
“Stop!” he shouted at Paul, but it was too late, as he shot blaster charge after blaster charge as the roller pilots ran to escape. “Just stop it!”
Rick grabbed Paul's arm when he was about to finish off one of the running men who had fallen to the floor and tore the blaster from his hands after elbowing him in the shoulder.
“They're not worthy it!”
“Have you lost your mind? They nearly killed us! I want to have revenge!”
“No!”
Rick took a step back, shouldering the blaster.
“Ah, so you're in league with them,” Paul bared his teeth. “You deliberately brought us here so they could kill us. Is that it?”
“You idiot! That's not how it is.”
“Yes it is!”
“I'll prove it to you, damn it!”
Rick spat angrily and turned to the man who tried to run away, who had already sat up, drawing his legs in and fearfully observing their argument.
“Who are you? Why did you want to kill us? Why are you murdering people on the highways and flyovers? What's your mission?”
The roller pilot was very young and he opened his mouth soundlessly, so terrified that he could not utter a single word.
“Answer me,” Rick stepped towards him, aiming straight at his head, “or prepare to die.”
“Put your weapon on the floor,” an imperious voice sounded from behind them.
Rick and Paul turned around. Armed men in white jumpsuits stepped out of the corridor that had been protected by the force field. They were armed and they lined up in a semicircle. The Landmaster, his face grim, but his spirit unbroken, followed them. He was pushed towards Paul and Rick. Rick understood that resistance was futile and threw his blaster on the floor. A tough-looking gray-bearded man with a silvery chain and a medallion on his neck stepped forward and spoke.
“You stopped your friend, saving many lives. I am a civilized man, so I would like to thank you for that.”
Rick nodded curtly.
“But you still wanted to kill Nathaniel. Is that fair?”
The stranger called the youth over and ruffled his hair. Once he understood that Rick had no intention of answering, he continued.
“You are barbarians that entered here without permission. You somehow found out the access codes for the transportation cabins and overcame the energy barriers. And then you sent a saboteur to turn off our network!”
“What have you done to him?” Rick breathed out as he realized that they were talking about Black Ant, who somehow turned off the power supply of the spheres.
“We had to isolate him.”
“Where is he? Why didn't you bring him here?” Rick did not like the sound of the word “isolate”. The stranger could have put a different meaning to it.
“Don't worry, he'll live.” The graybeard pushed the youth towards the armed men saying, “Go, my son, talk to him when he comes to.”
“You won't be able to.” Rick finally noticed the resemblance between the stranger and the youth. It was his son. “The boy that you isolated can't speak.”
“There are many ways to speak to a bearer of implants.”
The graybeard moved the hair back from his temple, showing a round disk by his ear which flashed with the weak light of a diode.
“Now then,” he caged his fingers. “Why did you come here?”
“We were looking for shelter,” Vasilevs replied.
“You're lying.” The graybeard glanced at him indifferently.
Commander Fritz suddenly stepped out from among the row of men in white jumpsuits and nodded at Vasilevs. For some reason he was also wearing white.
“I would not advise anyone here to lie,” the graybeard added. “We were watching everyone.”
Hans and Margaret, who Rick had considered dead stepped forward to stand by Fritz' side. They were joined by Igor from the cluster of the fords and they were all wearing white jumpsuits.
“There is no place for barbarians in the Enclave of the last men of Atlantis,” the graybeard declared.
“Do you even know what is going on up top?” Paul exclaimed. “The possessed are about to break in here any minute now!”
The graybeard shook his head and sneered ironically.
“Foolishness. The Enclave is impregnable. We will resist anyone that dares to cross our borders.”
“Oh yes,” Rick nodded. “Will you manage to repair your spheres in time?”
The grin disappeared from the face of the graybeard.
“Barbarians,” he hissed. “Get out of here while you still live!”
Vasilevs breathed heavily and stepped forward.
“You!” He poked Fritz in the chest. “How could you? I know you for so many years!”
Fritz stayed silent, looking at Vasilevs with indifference.
“Information, Landmaster,” the graybeard patiently replied. “The one who had information owns the world.”
“So you think that you are in control of the city?” Rick asked him. “You don't even control the core. The city changes, but it's not you changing it. You don't even have an idea about what's happening. You don't have access to the real information. You have probably tried to understand by reading chronicles, instructions, reference manuals and studying diagrams. But you understood nothing. The defensive programs recognize you as civilian citizens. You probably managed to alter some of the algorithms using the keys you found.” He nodded at the corridor behind their backs. “You reconfigured the defensive programs but never worked out the purpose of the Citadel. You definitely don't know why the landscape of the city changes. You don't know why the Ancients built such complex architecture and gigantic mechanisms.”
The people led by the graybeard looked at Rick in surprise, who added before they could get themselves together, “This is why I am here. Let me through to the lower levels and I will try to find the answers.”
“That is forbidden,” the graybeard glanced at the railing. “The holy font lies there.”
“You seem civilized, but you're exactly the same,” Rick spat.
“Go away.” The graybeard came to. “There's no place for you here. Be quick, before I change my mind.”
“No!” Margaret raised her hand. “Me and Hans are against this. We want to hear this young man out.”
“Me too,” Igor said, joining them.
The graybeard, glanced at Fritz, who nodded, saying, “I also want to know what he has in mind. Information above all!”
To add to this, some ancient mechanisms creaked far away and the catwalk shook. It seemed that the whole city murmured in complaint, like a gigantic animal that had woken up after a long hibernation.
“What?” the graybeard managed to mutter, before Margaret interrupted him.
“We have all seen Rick the outsider before and we all spoke to him. He is special and his thoughts are special. If he got this far, let him tell us about his goal and give him a chance
to reach it.”
“Get ready to run,” Vasilevs suddenly whispered as he stepped up to Rick.
He looked back and nodded at Paul.
Rick was about to tell them his thoughts and his plans but he suddenly noticed that the armed men behind the back of Margaret, Hans, Igor and Fritz suddenly raised their weapons all at once. Their blasters crackled with charges and Vasilevs pushed the four leaders at them, opening up the way into the corridor. Paul and Rick ran into the opening.
“Don't stop!” Vasilevs shouted behind their backs, when he noticed that Rick had a pronounced limp and slowed down. “Take the first turning on the left, then on the right and keep going straight.”
They turned as he ordered and heard more blaster shorts and a scream of pain.
“I'm fine,” Vasilevs shouted when Rick looked back. “Keep going!”
A minute later, they were in a corridor filled with light that had rooms with transparent walls on both sides. Rick worked out that these were experimental laboratories. He had no time to read their names on the signs. Vasilevs shouted that they needed to run into the last one on the left. It turned out that this was the medical block that Rick was familiar with from Thermopolis. Black Ant was lying down there with Nathaniel by his side, who had a visor of black plastic over his eyes for some reason. He was moving his hands around as his lips moved soundlessly.
Black Ant's head was covered in wires and complex graphs appeared on the monitors in front of the bed, flashing numbers and glyphs.
Nathaniel heard the noise, but he did not have time to take the visor off before Vasilevs grabbed a cleaver with a jagged edge from the instrument shelves and put it to the throat of the youth, shouting for Rick and Paul to step away from the entrance.
A few moments later, armed men appeared by the entrance. They let the graybeard into the laboratory and stepped back when Vasilevs demanded, still holding their weapons up.
“Now then, civilized one,” Vasilevs began, “are you going to be more agreeable now?”
Rick appreciated the tactics the Landmaster used. He originally thought that they were just running away, but it turned out completely different. He turned to the shelves and started to open them and look for painkiller injectors. Paul stared at him in surprise and whispered, “What are you doing?”
“Look for long white instruments like this one, they have green markings.”
He showed Paul an injector.
“You are wounded and you can't get out of here,” the graybeard pronounced.
Rick injected himself with the painkiller and then the physical activity stimulant and turned back towards the door. Vasilevs was grimacing and he had a charred hole in his side. Things were not looking good. Rick stepped up to him and glanced back asking, “Paul, what's going on?”
“Here,” Paul gave him two injectors.
Rick chuckled as he watched the graybeard grind his teeth with anger and gave Vasilevs a huge dose of the painkiller.
“Find the sealer,” he asked Paul. “It's a device that looks a bit like an injector, but it has a wider end and it must have yellow markings. You know how to read, so you'll manage.”
“You won't get out of here anyway!” the voice of the graybeard wavered.
“Sure about that?” Vasilevs stared at him with his bloodshot eyes. It looked like the medicine worked too quickly and in a way different to what Rick expected.
The Landmaster swayed and nearly slashed the throat of his hostage.
“Be careful!” the graybeard squealed.
“Why don't you go away and let us go,” the Landmaster managed to get over his medical intoxication. “Then the boy might stay alive.”
“We're at an impasse. I can let you through, but there are possessed above who will break in here as soon as we open the gates.”
“Show us the way downwards!” Vasilevs growled.
“But... but...” the graybeard gasped for air. “I don't know it.”
He glanced back, looking for support from his armed clan-mates, who nodded.
“There is a way,” a voice with a metallic timbre sounded from the ceiling.
Rick, Vasilevs and Paul stared upwards in surprise and then looked at each other. The voice did not seem to surprise the graybeard.
“Who's speaking?” Vasilevs asked warily.
“It's me, Black Ant. Rick, are you there?”
“Yes!” Rick looked at the motionless boy on the operating table, gradually realizing how he communicated with them. “Are you talking to us through the Network?”
“That's right!” Black Ant's voice was full of joy. “I never even knew about these capabilities, this is amazing, Rick!”
“We need to get out of here. How do we go down?”
“Only inside the Axis, Rick. The Axis, which you're used to calling the Chorda isn't just a pillar of energy; it's also a path between the levels.”
“How do we get inside?”
“The Landmaster has a medallion. You need to match the symbols on the key against similar symbols and the Axis will open up the way for you.”
Rick looked at Vasilevs, who shook his head.
“I don't get it,” Vasilevs replied.
“I think I do, though. Paul, have you found the sealer?”
“Here you are.”
Rick took the sealer from him. He told Vasilevs to hold on as it would hurt and put the device against the wound in his side. Vasilevs gritted his teeth, bravely going through the pain that went through the barrier of painkillers. He grabbed Nathaniel more tightly and told the graybeard to get out of there with the rest of his people before the cleaver in his hand twitched suddenly.
The armed men obeyed, which made Rick think. Something else was going on here. Nathaniel was definitely valuable to them, but what was it? Rick looked at the plastic visor that had covered Nathaniel's eyes and then looked at Black Ant, who was engulfed in wires.
“Black ant, you said that the Network had amazing capabilities, didn't you? You have access to them. Who else has access to the hidden sections?”
“Nathaniel. He explained how everything works to me, but I haven't figured it all out yet. There's a complex architecture here and many new things which I don't quite understand, but I'm learning fast.”
Everything became clear. Nathaniel was able to work with the Network better than the graybeard and the others.
“Why was it Nathaniel who taught you?” Rick wanted to check on another of his thoughts.
“Because a young mind is more flexible in perceiving virtual reality.” Black Ant realized that he used an unfamiliar word and clarified, “Virtual reality is the space inside the Network.”
“Thank you, Black Ant! Look after yourself!” Rick took a bag out of the cabinet and put the sealer and a few briquettes of nutritious concentrate from the neighboring shelf inside. Then he said, “We're done, let's go.”
This was exactly what the Landmaster had been waiting for, so he pushed Nathaniel towards the exit. The graybeard backed away into the corridor.
“What was he talking about,” Paul asked. “What is the space inside the Network?” Book of Faces told us about the Network and about connecting to it, but I did not understand anything then or now.”
“Paul, we'll talk about it later.”
Rick hurried after Vasilevs into the corridor. They repeated their journey in the company of the graybeard, coming out onto the catwalk which led around the hall with the holy found and the pillar of the Chorda in the middle.
“How do we come down into the hall?” Vasilevs asked irritably.
“Here,” the graybeard took two steps away from the passage and placed the medallion that he had on his silvery chain against the wall. An opening leading into a secret cabin opened in the wall.
“Another elevator,” Rick shook his head.
“You're coming with us,” Vasilevs pointed his cleaver at the graybeard and pushed him into the cabin after Nathaniel.
They descended and came out into the hall.
“Oh yes you will,” Vasilevs bared his teeth and pushed Nathaniel forward.
Rick and Paul climbed onto the border of the glowing pool, look at each other and stepped upon its surface in silent agreement. It turned out to be as hard as stone.
“I understand that this is the font!” the Landmaster exclaimed and climbed up, dragging the hostages with him. “Forward, soldiers! To glory!”
Rick and Paul approached the Chorda.
“What next?” Paul asked.
“The medallion,” Rick turned to Vasilevs.
He gave Rick a suspicious look but then quietly took the medallion out of his pocket and gave it to Rick.
“Paul, look for the symbol with three circles superimposed on each other with many glyphs inside,” Rick instructed and started to carefully examine the symbols on the surface of the pillar.
“I found it!” Paul exclaimed a minute later.
Rick walked around the pillar and stared at the place that Paul indicated. Yes, it was correct. He turned the outer ring on the medallion, making the position of the glyphs similar to the image on the pillar, and then the middle ring until the parts formed the correct pattern.
“By the sky gods!” Vasilevs swore. “How did you guess?”
“He saw the picture from above,” Paul answered for him, talking about the way they watched the city rings turn when they had climbed to the top of the tower. “I saw it too, but didn't know that the medallions had hidden features.”
“From above? Ah, who cares, what next?” Vasilevs asked impatiently and gave the confused graybeard a dirty look, as he warily stood around nearby.
“Next?” Rick was overcome with excitement — he was about to get the answers to all his questions. “Let Paul open it.”
Rick offered him the medallion, which Paul placed against the pictogram on the pillar. The key quickly sunk into the niche that opened up. Patterns of light crawled to the side of it and then blinding rays emerged as a wide portal appeared in front of them. The shining light around it gradually went dim. Vasilevs let go of Nathaniel, took a look inside the portal and recoiled.