Final Inquiries (46 page)

Hannah rubbed her face. "I agree with Jamie. How about you, Brox? Do we rest up?"

"Yes," said Brox. "
After
we send our reports. Let us make our marks of authentication and responsibility and get them on their way."

"Fine by me," said Jamie. "Slide that thing over here again, will you?"

He took the datapad from Hannah's hand and went rapidly through the authentication procedure. "Okay, there," he said. "A blurry fingerprint, a scan of my bloodshot retina, plus my illegible signature. If anyone can read any of that, they ought to be able to prove it's me. Hannah?"

Hannah went through the same steps, a bit less theatrically, and handed the datapad to Brox. "Here," she said. "This thing is rigged to do Kendari authentication as well."

Brox let the unit scan his front teeth, the pattern of whorls in his snout, and do a voice match. He used the stylus to draw his personal mark on the input screen, and the job was done. "The weapon is loaded and energized," he said. "Now all that remains is to fire it."

"Let's just check to make sure it's aimed the right way first," said Jamie. "Let's just run through the list of recipients and make sure each one is getting the right version." They quickly confirmed that everything was in order, but Jamie paused over the last line on the list. The Vixa. More specifically, Founder's Column City, the presumed center of opposition to Kragshmal.

Jamie tapped at that entry. "Before we do this, let's think it through one more time. We have no idea at all how the Vixa will react. We've set things up to hide where the messages will be coming from, but they might be able to trace them back to here, to the bunker under the joint ops center. They might be able to do it very fast, and they might decide to vaporize us. They might think it over for a week, and
then
decide to wipe us out. They might decide to blast away without bothering to look. Or they might never find us."

"Are you changing your mind about staying here?" Hannah asked. "Are you saying we ought to make a run for it after we send the message, try and hole up somewhere?"

"No. If they attack us here, at least there's no one else around who might get hurt. If we run to one of the embassies, or to one of the human or Kendari groups, we'll be exposed while we're running, and we'll be endangering whoever agrees to take us in. They blew up
our
embassy. Why not someone else's? We stay here, and hope that things break our way, or at least calm down enough after a while so we can come out with some degree of safety before our food runs out."

"So what is the point you are trying to make?"

"We send the messages out. We immediately cut all our links to the comm net to reduce the chances of the Vixa tracing us back to here. But that means we can no longer send or receive messages. We won't know anything. The Vixa already have a mass mind. They don't exactly have a need for a continuous all-news video feed. We can't just turn on the news or read the text updates. We
might
be able to eavesdrop on radio frequencies that the Kendari and humans on-planet use. Maybe we'll learn something from that. My point is that once we send the message, we're down here for the duration--and we'll have almost no way of knowing what's going on, or how long that duration might be. Are you both prepared for that?"

"I'd like to think so," said Hannah.

"How could one prepare?" Brox asked. "But I am ready to endure the consequences. The weapon is now loaded, energized--and aimed. Are we ready?"

"Go ahead, Brox," said Hannah. "Pull the trigger."

The Kendari Inquirist reached out for the datapad, took it in his hands, and brought up the command sequence that would first send the messages, then cut the comm links. He paused, only for a moment and activated the sequence. Silently, quickly, invisibly, it was done.

The three of them stood there for a minute or two, half-expecting the Vixa to be able to do the traceback and vaporize them at once. But nothing happened.

"All right then," said Jamie, yawning and stretching. "I just hope that if the Vixa do zap us into dust, they at least have the decency to let me get some sleep first. Good night, or good morning, or whatever time of day it is."

None of them got any sleep at first. They were all too wound up--and also half-expecting that the Vixa would strike back at once. Every small noise in the bunker, every shift in the ventilator noise brought all of them back to instant alertness. But after a while, even being scared can get boring. With the comm links cut, and the exterior cameras destroyed, they had no way of knowing what reaction there had been to their messages. They didn't even have any way of knowing for sure if the messages had gotten through.

They monitored the radio frequencies used by the human and Kendari, but the signals were weak and intermittent at best. Besides, it was unlikely to be any news from there because they had decided not to send copies of their reports to the enclaves. The humans and Kendari on-planet were all pretty radical in their views to start with, and even the bits and pieces of the story they had already were likely to get them angry. There seemed no point in providing further incitement. What if the news started a riot that got humans or Kendari killed?

Keeping their own people off the send list was a sensible decision, but it did leave them with no good way to find out what was going on. About all they could do was wait until there was news over the human or Kendari radio that suggested it was safe to come out, or until someone came and got them, or until their food ran out and they were forced to come out of their hole and make a run for it.

And so they slept, and ate, and read whatever books and texts happen to be available in the bunker. Jamie tried to teach Brox chess, and Brox tried to show him a roughly similar Kendari game, but neither attempt really went anywhere.

Nothing at all happened.

Until something did.

The first sound was far off, distant, and low, almost more a vibration than a noise. But it was enough to wake Hannah up at once. She rolled out of her bunk, flipped on the lights, and went to find the others. The bunker had been designed to hold the entire staff of the embassy. It would have been a tight fit for that many, but it meant that Hannah, Jamie, and Brox could each have the luxury of a private room.

But Hannah didn't want that luxury at the moment, and it would seem that neither Brox nor Jamie did either. She found them out in the hallway, looking up at the ceiling--and watching the dust that was suddenly being kicked up everywhere.

Something was happening over their heads. That much was obvious.

"What have we got here, Jamie?" she asked in a whisper, as if whoever was overhead could hear her.

He shook his head. "I dunno," he said, whispering back. "It's not an attack. At least not yet. No explosions or anything. It could be they're setting up for an assault. Or not."

"That is not particularly comforting," said Brox.

There didn't seem to be more to say, or much more to be done about the situation. The sounds overhead grew louder, and seemed to get closer. The vibration grew more intense. There were
crashes
and
thuds
that sent low shudders through the bunker, and then relative quiet for a while, before another series of
bangs
and
thuds.

"They're right overhead," Jamie said at last. "I
think
it's demolition. But I don't know for what reason. They might be looking for us, or just clearing the site to put up a new restaurant--or this might be a deliberate attempt to dig us out or entomb us."

"All right," said Hannah. "Time to think about the escape tunnel." There was a second way out of the bunker, an emergency tunnel that climbed all the way out of the compound and ended in a vertical shaft under the street outside. The top of the vertical shaft came to an end about a meter short of the surface, with a metal cap on top. There were shaped charges rigged to it that would blast the top of the tunnel clear, opening the way for those inside to make a run for it, if need be. There were also shovels and picks stored in the shaft, in case there was time to make a more leisurely, if less spectacular, exit.

"Hannah, I checked that tunnel out," said Jamie. "After the first three meters it's a hands-and-knees crawl all the way through a round pipe eighty centimeters across and maybe a hundred meters long--and the vertical shaft is the same diameter, with ladder rungs set into the side of it."

"So?"

"So Brox simply can't fit inside a tunnel that size, let alone crawl through it. It was designed to keep Kendari out, not let them in."

"Then the two of you should go," said Brox.

"Very noble of you, Brox, but even if you weren't here, I'd say no," Jamie replied. "It'd be suicide. If we set off the charges to clear the tunnel, whoever is up there trying to dig us out is going to hear it, and probably see the dust and smoke from the blast even over the wall. If we try digging, they'd probably hear that too--and it would take us so long to break a personsized hole through the street surface that they'd be bound to spot that."

"So what do we do?" Hannah asked.

"We sit here and wait," said Jamie. "And hope the bunker entrance is as well camouflaged as we think. One thing we have going for us is now
we
know that
they
don't know we're here. If they did, they would have been here a lot sooner. With some luck, that should mean they won't be as thorough as they would be if they knew for sure this was the place."

"That all sounds very relaxing," said Hannah. There was another
boom,
deeper and harder. A new cloud of dust was kicked up, and the lights cut out for a moment. "Handlights," said Hannah. "Let's make sure we all have handlights. I don't want to be down here in the dark if the lights die for good. And let's find some clothes we can tie up into dust masks."

The booming and crashing went on. The lights cut out momentarily two more times in the next ten minutes, and then went out and stayed out. Jamie checked the breaker panel. It looked as if all they would have to do was reset the system--but they decided to wait on that. Whoever it was topside might have instruments that could detect electric systems turning on and off. They had their handlights, and the air would be okay for a while without the ventilation system or the scrubbers.

The crashing and the banging got louder still--and then, suddenly, it wasn't coming from overhead--but from alongside.

"Our bunker," said Brox. "We did not think to conceal the entrance. They must have found it and decided to destroy it."

There was another sharp
bang,
and a low, rumbling, shuddering
boom
strong enough to knock them all over. They climbed back to their feet, coughing and wheezing in the darkness. "Okay," said Jamie. "Back to the utility room. It's on the far side from the Kendari bunker, and that's where the tunnel leads off from."

"You can't be thinking of trying for a breakout now!" Hannah shouted. "And what about Brox?"

"I'm not thinking of a breakout," said Jamie. "But if this place collapses, and we live through it, we're going to want to be near the tunnel exit. And maybe we can push and pull Brox through the tunnel, or send one of us out to go for help--or to offer our surrender."

"Surrender?" Brox asked.

"Buried alive and starving to death, or prisoners of the Vixa," said Jamie. "Which would you choose?"

"To be honest," Brox said, "I am not quite sure."

"Let's get to the utility room, and we can debate it later," Hannah half shouted to be heard over a new series of rumbling crashes.

Jamie led the way as they staggered down the hallway and into the utility room. They slammed the reinforced door shut. Hannah and Jamie sat down on the floor with their backs to the far wall while Brox curled himself up into the smallest space possible in the corner.

The noise and vibration reached a climax, then began to ease off. Within a few minutes, they had dropped to almost nothing. There were a few low thuds and bumps that seemed to come from overhead. Even those stopped after a while. Whatever had been happening was over.

"I think your bunker might have saved us, Brox," said Hannah, speaking into the silence. "I think some gang of Vixa had orders to tear down the joint ops center to make sure we weren't in it. They found a bunker and wrecked it, as well--and managed to bury the entrance to this one and churn up the ground so much that they didn't notice there were
two
bunkers. Maybe we might be okay for a while."

"If you don't mind being buried alive," said Jamie.

"They've tried to find us here," said Hannah. "They've failed, and made such a mess that maybe they won't even think of trying again. This doesn't change our plan. It just improves the odds that it will work. We hold out here as long as we can. A few days. Maybe a week, if we can make it. Then we try and get the main bunker door open. It's got some heavy-duty hydraulic jacks on it. It might still be possible to get out that way. If it isn't, we use the escape hatch and send for help to get Brox out of here."

"You make it sound almost easy," said Brox in a sarcastic voice.

"It might be," said Hannah. "It might be. The hard part is going to be the waiting." She shined her handlight on the ceiling, looking for cracks and breaks and not finding any. "We sit in the dark for twelve hours," she said. "That will give the Vixa plenty of time to get bored and leave. Then we can risk turning the lights and air back on."

Jamie's eyes opened. He was in his bunk, in his room, in the bunker. The same place he had woken up for--how many days? He resisted the urge to check the time. He had decided to stop keeping track of time a while back. He hadn't noted the time in days, or even longer. The whole point of it was that he didn't know anymore.

The whole point of it is that you're starting to crack up,
Jamie told himself.

He got out of bed and made his way down the hallway. The bunker had actually come through the demolition assault in fairly good shape. There was a layer of dust on everything--including Jamie--but the structure still seemed solid.