The Martian Viking (18 page)

The soft whir of working devices filled the air. And there
was
air, he realized. He could hear it being pumped in. That must have been what the gate was for, to keep the oxygen in. He walked around the perimeter of the cavern, looking for tube mouths.

He found one after a couple of minutes. It was closed up with flexible sheets that opened as you passed through them and closed up once you were inside the tube. He prodded one with the barrel of his pistol. The cavern was completely enclosed, and the atmosphere was comfortable for the Arkies as they busily produced the forbidden onees.

But where were they now? Had they mobilized to fight the invaders? It seemed as if they should have left
somebody
to guard their onee factory.

"Johnsmith."

Somebody was calling him, whispering his name. He didn't see anybody, though.

"Over here, Johnsmith." It was a woman's voice. But he still couldn't see where she was.

At that moment, a pressure-suited figure rose from behind a work table, only a few feet from Johnsmith. She stepped out from behind the table and approached him.

As she came closer, he saw that it was Frankie Lee Wisbar.

"How did you get in here?" she said.

"Well, I kind of did it accidentally," he said. "How about you? How did you get in here?"

"Same way as you."

"Well, how do we get out?" Johnsmith asked.

"Through there." Frankie pointed to one of the covered tunnel mouths.

"That's what I thought," Johnsmith said.

"Torquemada will be proud of us." Frankie Lee smiled. "Deep penetration, you know."

"Right."

"Maybe we should get moving," Frankie said. "Before somebody comes in here looking for us."

"Right."

"Uh oh," said Frankie. "It looks like we waited a little too long."

Johnsmith turned to see what she meant. Five figures in crazy quilt pressure suits were emerging from one of the tube mouths he and Frankie had been about to use as a means of escape.

THE FOREMOST OF the Arkies spotted them. He raised his weapon, and so did Johnsmith.

Frankie grabbed Johnsmith's forearm to stop him. "Wait!" she cried. "Don't kill him!"

Johnsmith clenched his teeth. Why shouldn't he kill these son of a bitches, he thought angrily. Hadn't they ambushed him and his friends and ruthlessly killed several of them? He struggled to free himself from Frankie's grip. If she didn't let him go, they would kill him. Why didn't they shoot?

And then he realized that she had been speaking to the Arkies, not him. She had been imploring them not to kill him.

"Tell him to give us his pistol," the Arkie leader said.

"Do it, Johnsmith," Frankie told him, with a real sense of urgency.

With several guns trained on him, he didn't have much choice. He handed the pistol to the advancing Arkie.

Johnsmith turned on Frankie in a rage. "You traitor!" he shouted.

She sighed. "Johnsmith, it's all right. We aren't your enemies."

"Then who is?" he demanded.

"How about Angel Torquemada?" she said. "Or good old Sergeant Daiv?"

She was right, of course. But still, these people standing here had killed his friends, not Angel Torquemada or Sergeant Daiv. "You weren't there when they murdered those people a few minutes ago," he said.

"What did you expect us to do?" one of the Arkies asked. "Just let you come in here and arrest us, or kill us all? We were defending ourselves."

"What would
you
have done?" another one asked.

That question was difficult to answer, Johnsmith had to admit . . .at least to himself. "But you're criminals," he said weakly.

"No, we're not," Frankie Lee Wisbar said in a patient tone. "And you know it."

"Conglom law . . ."

"Fuck Conglom law," another Arkie said. "All any of us is guilty of is human weakness."

That was something Johnsmith had often thought, but it seemed strange to hear somebody saying it in these surroundings. He had become convinced that there really was something wrong with him in some subtle but fundamental way. But he wasn't alone, it seemed.

Gunshots echoed in the distance.

"I don't understand any of this," Johnsmith said. What sense was there in taking a hard line? He trusted Frankie Lee Wisbar a hell of a lot more than he trusted the Conglom. "I just don't understand."

"Nobody really does," Frankie said. "And there's no time to explain it now."

More gunshots crackled, these sounding a little closer than the last.

"What are you going to do with me?" Johnsmith asked.

"Nothing," the Arkie leader said. "You can go back with Frankie if you like."

Johnsmith was astonished. Were they really going to let him go? He knew that Frankie was one of them now. How could they afford to do such a thing.

"Or you can stay with us," the leader said. "We always need more people."

"Aren't you afraid somebody will overhear what we're saying?" Johnsmith asked.

"Communications are cut off inside this room," the leader said. "This place is pretty well defended. It's one of the places where onees are imprinted."

Johnsmith thought it over. He would be free if he stayed here, as free as anyone on Mars, at least. But it would be a precarious existence. And then there was Felicia . . . .

He owed her something for loving him.

"How do I know you won't shoot me when I turn my back?" Johnsmith asked.

"What's to stop us from shooting you now?" the leader said.

"How do you know I won't turn Frankie in?"

"
They
don't," Frankie said. "But
I
trust you."

He nodded. She was right; he couldn't conceivably have done such a thing to her.

"Maybe you'll work with Frankie," the leader said, "on the inside."

Johnsmith wasn't sure if he would dare, but, then again, he thought he might.

"We'll see."

The Arkie leader gave him back his gun. "You two better get going," he said.

"When we get back outside this room," Frankie said, "we can never talk about this, not a word."

"Okay."

Instead of heading toward one of the escape hatches, Frankie guided him straight back to the gate.

"Now, when this thing opens," she said, "run for it, run as if your life depended on it."

Johnsmith nodded. It occurred to him that he might get shot by those
outside
the gate; now, that would be truly ironic.

The gate cracked open, showing only darkness on the other side. There were helmet lights bobbing around.

"It's opening," somebody said. It sounded like Sergeant Daiv, but Johnsmith couldn't be sure.

"Don't shoot," Johnsmith said. "It's Biberkopf and Wisbar. We're coming out."

Johnsmith nudged Frankie's back with his palm, and she ran out ahead of him. No sooner were they outside in the lava tube, than the gate shut behind them. It had only opened a meter wide at the most.

Nobody fired a shot.

"How the hell did you do that?" Daiv demanded to know.

"I threatened to shoot their leader, if he didn't let us go," Frankie Lee lied. "It was a stalemate, and when they heard you coming, they chickened out."

"Oh." Sergeant Daiv didn't look as though he was quite ready to believe her story, but there were more important things to worry about at the moment. "The other tubes didn't lead anywhere, so we came after you two," he said. "Good thing we did, looks like."

"Yeah," Johnsmith said, already beginning to wish that he had stayed with the Arkies. Well, it was too late now. He had thrown away his one chance for freedom.

"Let's melt through that door," Sergeant Daiv said.

"I don't know if it will work," Frankie said. "It's a highly reflective surface."

"Then we'll blow the fucking thing open," Sergeant Daiv told her with his customary belligerence.

Johnsmith knew that this was so much hot air, though. Even if they had brought explosives with them, they couldn't have used them. They were deeper under the volcano now, a mountain the size of Missouri. How could they risk bringing tons of rock down on them?

Sergeant Daiv must have realized this, too. He stood back and fired his .357 magnum point blank at the seam in the center of the gate. The bullets spanged off the slick surface without leaving so much as a dent.

Johnsmith cringed as the bullets ricocheted, but nobody was hurt.

"That's the toughest goddamn plastic I ever saw," Sergeant Daiv said with a mixture of annoyance and admiration. "Did you see that, for Christ's sake?"

"Very dense," Frankie Lee Wisbar said.

"Yeah, I noticed," Sergeant Daiv said, holstering his pistol. "I'm just trying to figure out where these Judases got ahold of it."

"Maybe they built it," Johnsmith said. "Maybe they can do anything we do."

"What?" Daiv turned on him angrily. "They're just a bunch of ragtag anticap radicals, Biberkopf. How the hell could they develop that kind of technology?"

"Well, I saw some of the stuff they've got back there. It looked pretty sophisticated."

From Sergeant Daiv's scowling reaction, it was clear that Johnsmith should say nothing more.

"Well, anyway," Daiv muttered, "we've got them on the run now."

Several of the prisoners voiced their agreement, observing how close to the boiling point Daiv was.

"We better look for a way around this goddamn door," he said after what passed for a thoughtful moment.

As his helmet light swung around, Johnsmith caught a glimpse of Frankie's relieved eyes through her mask. He could have told Daiv the truth, he supposed, but why should he? Besides, wouldn't Torquemada be suspicious of him for walking out of the Arkie plant unharmed?

No, he had better keep his word to Frankie and the five other Arkies. He was on their side now.

They were soon back at the intersecting lava tubes. As they emerged, the rattle of gunfire shattered their cautious sense of victory.

Sergeant Daiv went down.

"Jesus Christ!" somebody screamed.

Sergeant Daiv was lying at Johnsmith's feet, limbs twitching spasmodically. His face mask was shattered, and blood pooled in his eyes sockets as it gouted from a hole in his forehead.

Johnsmith hit the dirt. He used Daiv's body as cover, cocking the .45 and looking for a target.

Some of the prisoners were firing wildly, and others were backing into the tunnel leading to the Arkie plant. Johnsmith saw that the only way out was the way they had come. They had to make a run for daylight. He couldn't be sure, but he didn't think the Arkies would shoot him or Frankie.

"This way!" he shouted, waving his pistol toward the tube leading outside. "Back to the carrier!"

The prisoners did as he said, some of them bumping into each other, the rest crawling on their hands and knees. Anything to get out of the line of fire. Bullets thundered and screeched off the volcanic rock, and particle beam fire blinded Johnsmith momentarily. But he stood his ground, waving the prisoners into the lava tube that would lead them to safety.

He saw bodies dropping to the tunnel floor all around him, but most of the prisoners were out of gunshot range in a few seconds.

Frankie Lee Wisbar was next to him, firing her pistol at the empty darkness, in case anybody was watching.

"Let's get out of here!" she cried out.

Johnsmith turned to flee, slipping in blood. He stumbled, his right shoulder bouncing off the wall, but he righted himself and kept going. Frankie was right behind him.

They were outside in what seemed a much longer time than it really was, a few seconds that seemed like hours. The Martian afternoon was dazzling, even through the polarized plastic face masks. Dead ahead was the carrier, its back end opening to them like a willing lover.

Particle beam fire rained down on them from somewhere above. A man was cut in half, his choking death cry threatening to burst Johnsmith's skull with its plaintive agony. A woman watched in horror as her legs were burned out from underneath her. She fell onto the cauterized stumps and lurched forward a few paces like a drunken dwarf, before collapsing onto the red sand.

It was a slaughter! The Arkies had allowed them to come inside, and now they were killing the prisoners at their leisure. They were positioned on the rupes of Olympus above, and they were dug in pretty well.

Only eight prisoners made it back to the carrier. Torquemada stood in the front of the personnel compartment, staring straight ahead, looking very grim.

No sooner was the last prisoner through the hatch than the carrier was off, quickly gaining speed. Beam fire scored its armor as it hurled itself across the desert. Its robot controls had responded to the emergency as no human could have, getting them out of range in seconds.

"Oh, my God," somebody wailed. "Oh, my dear God."

Alderdice threw off his helmet. Johnsmith was relieved to see his friend as he removed his own helmet and gloves. In his horror and panic, he had forgotten all about him.

"Are you okay, Alderdice?" he asked.

"Yes, yes, I think so." But Alderdice's face showed that he was anything but all right, though physically unharmed. "It was terrible, monstrous."

"Yeah, but we're alive." It was Frankie Lee Wisbar. "We're all alive, Alderdice."

But Alderdice looked as though he'd just as soon have been dead, at least at that moment.

"They were waiting for us," a guy said. "They let us walk in, and they picked off a few of us, but they were really waiting for us to come back outside. Jesus."

Torquemada said nothing.

"If it hadn't been for Biberkopf here," the man said, "we'd all be burnt meat right now. Not only was he the only one who killed any of the bastards, but he saved the few of us who are left."

He had actually led them into the worst part of the slaughter, it seemed to Johnsmith. But what else could he do? He couldn't have let them stay in the lava tubes. At least now they were out, and headed back to Elysium.

If Johnsmith hadn't known better, he would have sworn that Angel Torquemada was in shock. But Torquemada finally made his way down the aisle, and looked down at Johnsmith, who sat wiping sweat off his face.