The Empty Warrior (81 page)

“All right,” he said when he was done. “Let’s get him on the stretcher and then take him up to the infirmary. There’s a molecular knitter up there that I can use to close his wounds. Once that is done I can take those stitches out straight away. It should keep the scarring to a minimum.”

Lindy and Beccassit gently pulled O’Keefe up onto his side, placed the stretcher as close to his back as they were able, and then rolled him over and on top of the canvas litter. Lindy then grasped the two handles at one end while a stranger wandering the floor was recruited to lift the stretcher from the other. The doctor walked at O’Keefe’s side, directing the aberrant’s bearers and carefully holding the transfusion assembly where it would not pull the needle from O’Keefe’s arm. The dogs, meanwhile, formed a moving shield, clearing the way, while Regulus walked opposite Beccassit, refusing to leave O’Keefe’s side.

Thankfully they did not have far to go. In the space of only a few minutes they reached a large, unapt steel door built into an opening in the ubiquitous stone walls. Several blood covered tank hulls were scattered randomly about the area and the floor was littered with the gruesome remains of reptilian guards. The door, round and nearly a foot thick, was ajar and guarded by several canines. One of them employed a clumsy paw to push it completely open as the group of humans carefully approached through the gore. Beyond the door was a burnished chamber, clearly an elevator. Lindy and the stranger placed O’Keefe inside as Beccassit followed. Not to be left behind, Regulus nosed his way in as well.

The dog’s form nearly filled the car. It was enough to make the stranger bolt from the lift; he disappeared, running, back into the crowd outside. Chills ran down Lindy’s spine. The dogs all seemed more helpful than dangerous now, but Lindy had feared the beasts for so long that the emotion that gripped him was visceral and quite beyond his control. To be locked into a confined space with one of the animals was almost too much for him to bear. He glanced at the doctor with protests in his eyes.

Beccassit, however, did not seem to be affected by the presence of the animal at all nor did he seem in any way aware of Lindy’s disquiet. Instead he touched a control panel next to him as if he were merely changing floors in the Union Academy of Sciences library. Inner door panels slid horizontally and silently shut before them. As soon as the panels were secure Lindy felt a lurch and then the slightly stomach-sickening sensation of rising at great speed. It did not last long. In only moments it abruptly ceased, and his heels felt lighter against the floor as the car rapidly decelerated to a halt. The door opened and the elevator was flooded with light; extraordinary, blinding light. More light than Lindy’s optic nerves could endure. He winced, turning his head away and instinctively squinting as his arm flew up to cover his face.

“I’m sorry Willet,” Beccassit said with genuine concern. “I should have warned you. Living below, you’ve not seen natural light for months. Stand still for a moment, and let your eyes adjust. They haven’t forgotten how; they’re just not used to it.” Lindy obeyed, and slowly he was able to take his arm from before his eyes and more slowly still part his eyelids from their squint. “There,” Beccassit said soothingly. “Better?” Lindy nodded an affirmative. “Good. Now let’s get our man here into the infirmary. Quickly now.”

Lindy picked up his end of the stretcher, two fingers of his right hand grasping the transfusion shaft as well, and followed the doctor’s lead until they were placing O’Keefe atop a medical table in what was, aside from bloody footprints, an immaculate infirmary. No mote of the ever-present rock dust floated in the air here; the infirmary fairly reeked of sterility. In response Lindy unconsciously wiped his always soiled hands on his stained gray trousers. The doctor ignored him, going right to work on O’Keefe and leaving Lindy to feel useless and in the way. He turned and shuffled out into Elorak’s former rooms.

He discovered they were enclosed in a large, transparent environmental dome. It was all that protected them from the poisonous atmosphere of the planet. Above him an enormous star hung in the yellowish sky, baking the barren and lifeless surface to oven-like temperatures. A sea of desolation surrounded the structure; rock strewn, arid soil punctuated by huge, craggy outcroppings of chiseled mountainous stone stretched out in every direction; as far as the eye could see. The vista spread before him made him shudder. He had never before spent time on a world so desolate. But more shocking still was the sight that came into view as he approached the wall of the enclosure. In the outside area immediately adjacent to Elorak’s quarters were spread the remnants of human beings, all in various stages of decomposition ranging from skeletal remains to blackened bodies. It was an abject explanation of what became of the favored who were taken up into their goddess’s quarters. Apparently the last pleasure they were able to offer her was the sight of their own choking, broiling deaths.

Lindy turned away, sickened; and began to survey other aspects of his late tormentor’s residence. The interior of the dome was starkly antithetic to the nature of its surrounds. It was fastidiously clean and ornately furnished, separated into rooms by walls whose top edges were the only reference point defining the extent of the dome. Artwork hung everywhere, and beneath his feet the carpet sank luxuriously at his every step. He walked to a sofa and took a seat, the faux leather enfolding him as the padding beneath conformed to the now sharp edges of his body. Laying his head back and closing his eyes, he relished the comfort he had stumbled into. It was a far cry from the straw mattress he had bunked on since his arrival.

To his left and further back in the dome, he suddenly heard muffled curses and recognized them as coming from Steenini. He forced himself to rise and followed the sound of the expletives, passing several sadistic looking restraining devices, until he entered a sleeping chamber and found his friend bent over a virtual keyboard, oblivious to his entry. Lindy fell loudly into the softness of the large bed that dominated the room, eliciting a start and a frightful glance from his friend, who had been sitting with his back to where Lindy now lay. “You scared me,” he said, turning back to his work. “I didn’t know there was anyone else up here.”

“I helped the doctor bring Hill in. He is working on him now in the infirmary. From what he said, I think it is all good news. It appears that our aberrant friend is going to be fine, and in the not too distant future. So all we need to do now is get off this repugnant planet.”

“Don’t fret, mate. I’m presently endeavoring to accomplish that very thing.”

Lindy sat up on the side of the bed and took a position directly behind Steenini’s right shoulder. “What are you doing exactly?” he asked.

“I am attempting to hack into the command functions of the colony network, or more precisely I am trying to make the command functions respond.” His fingers worked the keyboard furiously even as he conversed with Lindy. “I had none of the problems that I had foreseen getting in, but for some reason, even though the system appears to be accepting my commands, nothing is happening. I’m not sure what the problem is. This would be so much easier if I had voice actuation, but I don’t have the tools to trick the thing into giving me that. Damn!” he suddenly expostulated.

“What?” asked Lindy, seeing nothing worthy of note on the display and a little shaken by his seeing his genius friend exasperated.

“It’s the same thing all over again. See? Look here.” He typed in a long sequence of keystrokes. “I just commanded the system to close off access to the dock area, and the network accepted the command. Right now all the blast doors leading to the docking hangar should be closing. But I’m not getting any confirmation of that here on this board. And watch this.” He quickly typed in new commands and the display came alive with a half dozen video feeds sectioned across the screen, each showing an open doorway, guarded by two or more dogs. “There. I’ve got video feeds from all over the colony. Apparently anything deemed to be of critical importance is monitored constantly by the colony network. These are the entrances to the storerooms surrounding the dock. Not one door has moved an inch, and they should all be closed and locked down tight by now. Something’s not right here.” Then more to himself than to Lindy, he added, “I think I’ll check the power systems. Maybe there is some glitch there.”

Lindy watched as Steenini worked his way expertly into the power grid. Screens flashed by so quickly on the monitor that Lindy could not follow clearly what Steenini was doing or where he was going. Schematics gave way to video feeds, each showing various pipes and pumps, some partially obscured by jetting steam. Then there were feeds showing various scenes of destruction, one shot after another of areas covered with debris. Finally the view settled into a sectioned screen of several rubble filled shafts and corridors. “This is not good,” Steenini muttered. “This is not good at all.”

“What do you mean?” Lindy demanded, still confused.

“The network computers are operating perfectly, and we still have plenty of power, at least for the time being. Neither one of those things is the problem. That’s why it was so easy for me to get in, because the network doesn’t care.” As he spoke Steenini shook his head gravely, his face falling into an expression of embittered despair. “The Vazileks couldn’t care less whether we hack into the system. It doesn’t make any difference. This isn’t a computer problem or a power problem, it’s mechanical. The mechanical interfaces that actually do the work have been destroyed. Even the repair bots and the towing vehicles have self-destructed. That’s why so many things are not working. Apparently the systems were rigged to render themselves inoperative in the event of Elorak’s death. She must have had some sort of implanted sensor that set the program in motion.”

“So what?” asked Lindy. “We just repair the damage by hand. We have plenty of time and all we have to do is get the hangar doors open and then we just leave.”

“I wish that were true, Willet,” Steenini said flatly, swiveling in his chair as he spoke so he could face Lindy without turning his head. “But we don’t have plenty of time. The power for the colony is generated by fission reactors buried deep beneath the complex. The coolant lines are breached, the repair bots are destroyed, and the access tunnels are blocked with rubble. The reactor cores are all in the process of melting down. And there is nothing we can do to stop it. Even if we could somehow dig our way to the pumps, we’d never be able to repair them, and it is too late anyway. Soon we will have no power except the emergency batteries, and after that, nothing. There will be no air purification. It will simply be a matter of how much rubble is blocking the access tunnels as to whether we die from asphyxiation or radiation exposure.”

Both men were silent for some time before Lindy jumped up from the bed where he sat and began to stalk about the room ranting. “Fission plants? For the love of Stirga, who still builds fission plants? What is wrong with those people? What kind of fools are the Vazileks?”

“The kind of fools that are cheap and don’t mind killing people,” Steenini said quietly.

“Yeah,” Lindy answered with a sigh. He sat down heavily on the bed once more and his face fell into his hands, while he searched every corner of his mind for a way out.

“There has to be some way to get those doors open. That’s all we need.” His voice was muffled, as it came from between his palms. “Once we’re on board the ships we don’t even need the air.” His mind raced from one line of reasoning to another and back again, yet still he could find no possible solution. They had no cutting tools, no robots at their disposal, and soon they would have no power. All they had were the borers. They were independently powered, so they would still operate even after the electricity died, but what good were they? He could think of no way to raise a borer to the level of the hangar doors, and even if it were possible, and one of the machines managed to drill a hole through the ceiling of the hangar, without the field generators to contain the colony air, all they would accomplish would be to evacuate most of the breathable atmosphere to the outside. And once the pressure was equalized the colony would be open to the toxic surrounds of Ashawzut. The first hole opened would rob them of their air and in all likelihood kill them before any larger opening could be excavated. What they needed was something that would make a nice big hole in a nice big hurry.

As that thought flew across his neurons, the genesis of an idea formed in Lindy’s brain. He raised his head to look at Steenini. “We’re in the wrong place,” he said deliberately. “We need to be on those freighters. They have their own power source; they’re self-contained. Damn it all, they might even be armed. I mean, they’re Vazilek aren’t they? We need to get down to the hangar!”

Steenini was already out of his chair, trotting from the room. Lindy followed close behind. The two of them practically ran over Beccassit as they came storming into the living area. “Where’s the dog!” Lindy demanded.

“He is in the infirmary,” replied Beccassit, as the two men rushed by him in that direction. Lindy heard the doctor’s voice continue behind him. “It’s the damnedest thing I’ve ever seen. The dog won’t leave his side; the beast just sits there with his head lying on the table next to Hill’s. I’d rather he not be in there at all but… Hey, what is going on anyway?”

“We need to get to the ships,” Lindy shouted back to him. Both he and Steenini fairly sprinted into the infirmary, nearly colliding with the bulk of Regulus as they did so. Within the confining walls of the small room, the dog looked every bit as prodigious as it had in the elevator. Lindy, ignoring his fear, stepped carefully around the animal until he could look into the dog’s eyes.