The Call of Distant Shores (34 page)

EXOTECH INTERNAL MEMO 1009-53-0

Step one of the key accessed.
 
Source genes human, as prophesied. Trigger is acoustic.
 
Subject Roberts activated.
 
Standard sensor array disabled, decoding sequence initiated.
 
Subject is stable.

The first sensation was helplessness. Roberts could move neither arms, nor legs.
 
His head was gripped on either side by padded braces.
 
His eyelids would not close, and when he tried to blink, the pain was excruciating.
 
His fingers were individually banded to a cold, hard surface.
 
Someone moved, and the motion sent a soft breeze rippling across his skin.
 
He was naked.

He scanned the periphery of his limited vision.
 
The walls were bright, luminous white, like those of his bedchamber.
 
A painfully bright light glared down at him from above.
 
He heard the sound of voices; at least they seemed to be voices.
 
He could make out none of the words.
 
He tried to speak, but his lower jaw was clamped in place.
 
His tongue was so bone dry it crackled when he moved it and a wave of thirst so excruciating it knifed into the base of his brain and caused his entire body to go rigid stung his throat.

Someone moved close by, out of sight.
 
He tried so hard to see them that his eyes actually cramped from the effort of trying to twist them sideways.
 
Something hummed.
 
A large, polished metal bar slid into view above his toes.
 
It stretched across from one side of the table to the other.
 
The whirr repeated, followed by a loud THUNK! And the bar swiveled.
 
A whine rose, like a turbine firing up, the sound louder and louder until it became painfully piercing, beating at his eardrums with insistent, malevolent pressure.

He heard more mechanical movement to either side of his head, but he saw nothing.
 
Moments later he felt soft pricks of pain just forward of either ear.
 
The pressure increased slowly; something long, thin and very sharp slid through his skin.
 
He wanted to scream and could not.
 
The effort brought the thirst again, and he nearly blacked out.

Then the bar glowed bright blue at the end of the table, shifted to white, and a solid beam burst from the base of the thing, bathing his feet in its glow.
 
The pain was incredible.
 
He trembled, fought to scream, and fought the urge to scream because it brought the thirst.
 
The bar moved so slowly down the length of his body that he only knew it was moving at all by the burning, searing pain of its passing.

Ice cold pricks of sensation formed where the long, thin probes had pierced his flesh, behind his ears.
 
He started to shake, and then…grew still.
 
The pain ceased.
 
He still followed the progress of the scanner up his calves toward his thighs, but the burning, searing pain was gone.
 
He floated, detached from all sensation.
 
In the back of his mind, something itched.
 
He wanted to watch the scanner move over his form.
 
He wanted to think about how he would remove the icy probes from the sides of his head.
 
He wanted to scream, but he had no more control over his lungs and vocal chords than he did over his arms and legs.

In the air above him, particles joined, separated, and joined again.
 
They swirled. He watched, fascinated, as they formed an image similar to the thing he'd seen on his slide.
 
It pulsed.
 
Tentacles stretched out to either side, probing.
 
It whirled slowly, and he followed each motion, picking out the pattern as it moved.
 
He wanted to speak, though only to seek a certain word.
 
The thing was like a letter in an arcane alphabet – something he'd known and forgotten.
 
It meant something important and was communicating that thing to Roberts, but he could not understand.
 
Tears formed in the corners of his eyes and rolled down, sliding around the probing lengths of metal piercing his skull.

The scanner passed over his torso and reached his neck.
 
There was an unpleasant ripple about an inch beneath his skin.
 
His jaw ached, and as the scan rippled over his face and up to his cranium whatever the icy pain relief that had flooded him had been, it was overmatched.
 
All thought ceased and the blinding white of the light wiped away the room and the machinery, leaving him silently motionlessly screaming into a luminous void.

The walls pulsed from deep purple shades up into shades of blue.
 
A light mist of stimulant, laced with the scent of fresh coffee misted the air.
 
Roberts sat up slowly.
 
Wide awake in seconds, as always, he slid his legs off the side of his cot, leaned his head into his hands, and fought the urge to vomit.
 
His skin tingled.
 
The dull throb of the memory of machinery echoed in his head and his ears were filled with a buzzing, ringing sensation.

If he didn't move, sensors would alert the central control.
 
Roberts stood shakily and began his morning routine.
 
For once, the absolute monotony of his existence worked in his favor.
 
Synthetic coffee and breakfast slid up through the multiple airlocks; he ate and drank quickly, and the tray disappeared.
 
Next, Roberts stepped into a clear tube.
 
It closed around him.
 
He shivered, as always, as the chemical and sonic cleansing removed any and all impurity from his skin.
 
He stepped clear of the tube and straight into the bio-suit that now hung in front of the tube.

At the door he stopped again, moving through the airlock sequence and the careful scan of the exterior of his suit.
 
His heart pounded.
 
What had become a simple routine terrified him.
 
What if they saw it?
 
What if there was something left on his skin, in his blood? What if he hadn't been dreaming?
 
Had they done that to him – EXOTECH?
 
Was it possible?
 
If he asked, his time here would be over, along with his dreams of retirement.
 
If they were behind it, they'd silence him.
 
If not – well, then he was going crazy, and they'd ship him out on the next freighter home with a partial pension.

He stepped into the hall and headed for his pod.
 
Once he was inside, he could drift into the mechanics of the job and try to forget this.
 
The quicker he wiped it all out of his mind, the more likely he was to relax.
 
He passed none of the guards, and made it into his workspace without incident.
 
Once he'd passed through the safeguards and left the bio-suit behind, he set to work quickly.

He worked methodically.
 
He would get no extra pay for extra output, and EXOTECH frowned on hurried results.
 
If his standard time parameter for a particular task varied too much, they would light a warning on his control panel and withhold samples.
 
Too many variations and he could be called out for examination.
 
They allowed this to happen one time during the tenure of employ.
 
Any variation beyond this was considered an unacceptable expense, and that technician was replaced.

Everything went smoothly, and within half an hour he had several slides prepped and had set his "control" data carefully.
 
All that remained was to submit the slides to a set of sonic pulses.
 
In his time on The Compound, he'd been through several batteries of tests.
 
Each time the control was exactly identical to the last.
 
Only the slight variation in sonic pulses changed, and each time the test ended, the results were whisked off by the sensors and monitors to the central memory banks to make way for the next batch of data.
 
Clockwork.

Roberts liked to think of the pulses as notes.
 
Each vibrated differently, and over time he'd fancied he could detect the minute differences himself.
 
It was ridiculous; they were far too subtle for anything but very sensitive electronic equipment to monitor, but he couldn't help toying with the notion.
 
Maybe the pulses were affecting his mind, as well.
 
Maybe they caused the hallucination that had invaded his screen the previous day.
 
It could be that familiarity with the sonic patterns was what he'd been unable to put his finger on when he saw the waving tentacles.
 
A similarity in patterns.

Roberts shook his head.
 
He swapped the first of the slides out and replaced it with another.
 
He studied the chart beside him on the bench, and performed very minor adjustments to the sonic equipment.
 
He pressed the toggle that began the sequence of pulses and watched as the invisible lines of force interacted with his slide.

The back of his hand itched, and he glanced down.
 
In the valley formed behind the knuckles of his index and middle finger he saw a tiny black dot.
 
Roberts stared.
 
The itch continued, and he knew he wouldn't be able to stand it long.
 
What in hell could it be?
 
Not an insect.
 
Not here. No dirt.
 
Had he slipped up somehow in prepping the slides?

Very carefully, he reached down with his free hand and flicked at the dot with the back of his fingernail.
 
He felt nothing.
 
Whatever it was, it was flush with his skin.
 
He leaned closer, but still couldn't make out what the offending spot could be.
 
The itch grew more intense with each passing moment.
 
Roberts flicked his gaze back to his screen, grunted, and reached for the slide.
 
He could barely grip the edges as he slid it out, deposited it in the disposal slot, and clicked on the button that transferred his data.
 
Gritting his teeth, he ignored the itch on his hand and grabbed the next slide.
 
He managed to get it into place without mishap, changed the setting on the sonic pulse, and flipped the toggle for the next sequence.

Just for a second, the itch on his hand abated, and he leaned back.
 
Then it hit harder and faster, a sudden stab of pain.
 
He stared, horrified, at his hand.
 
Tiny tentacles branched out from the perimeter of the spot, groping across his skin.
 
Each touch burned like fire.
 
Tears in his eyes, frantic, Roberts glanced up at the screen.
 
Everything looked normal, except…

The settings. He'd changed them.
 
He ran back over the past few moments in his mind.
 
There was no way to doubt himself, despite the distraction of the pain in his hand.
 
He'd moved the pulse settings to the next combination in line, but now they'd changed back.
 
He hadn't touched the dials, and yet there it was.
 
The previous settings had been restored, and the test was running a second time.
 
On the screen the mirror image of the spot on his hand stared back at him.
 
Under the lens of the electron microscope it was so large it threatened to
writhe
off the edge of the slide.

Roberts cried out and flipped the toggle, ending the test early.
 
He backed away from the workstation.
 
The image on the screen faded.
 
His hand stopped burning.
 
He glanced at the slide, and at the disposal slot.
 
He knew that somewhere in the complex, alarms were sounding.
 
Lights flashed on security desks and in medical to warn them of an "anomaly."
 
Still, he stared at the slide.
 
He could return the settings on the switch to the position they were supposed to be in and finish the test.
 
He might get on to the next setting before anyone arrived, and he could always claim that the glitch was in the machinery, and not himself.
 
No one needed to know of the spot on his hand, stretching out and groping across his skin, or the way it had burned.
 
No one needed to know that the slide had been contaminated, because all sensors indicated it was as clean as any before it.

Roberts decided quickly.
 
He'd get away with it, or he wouldn't.
 
He had nothing to lose by trying.
 
He flipped the controls to the next setting again, double-checking, and held them there.
 
With his thumb he flipped the toggle.
 
There was a small jerk in the controls, as if they wanted to twist back again, but he held them firmly, and after a moment, the pressure subsided.
 
He was just sliding the finished test slide into the deposit slot when the guard's faceplate pressed against the outer window of his pod.