O Master Caliban (25 page)

“Yes, Joshua. I have been told.”

“Fine.”

“But they may be quite a burden for me with yourself and Mod Dahlgren, if you don’t mind my saying so.”

“I’ll unburden you. I’m getting off at the transformer.”

“A three-two-five is stationed there at the door.”

Joshua had picked up the signal: his heart raced. “Guarding?”

“No. Recharging.”

He could see nothing around the curve of the hallway. “Turn back then. Hurry!”

“I have been told to leave you at the transformer without waste of time.” Smoothly, serenely, Clothier picked up speed.

“Clothier!”

“Be calm.”

Joshua got up on his knees, rivet gun in hand, erg signal shrilling in his ears. Clothier skimmed the curve, and the servo by the door to the transformer room plucked the socket from the connection in its body without any haste, let it reel back into the wall, turned and drove for Clothier, all limbs out.

“Hold on now, Joshua.”

Clothier braked, made a U-turn, went into reverse at full speed while Joshua flattened himself with an arm holding down erg-Dahlgren. It backed alongside the servo, ducking the grazing limbs by a few centimeters with its low height, squealed to a stop, withdrew its heat sealer and poised it for an instant like a cobra before driving it red-hot into the erg’s sensor plexus.

The servo’s treads slewed, its arms clanged to the floor, its motor died.

“A clumsy thing like that is no match for a good sewing machine.”

“Clothier,” Joshua swallowed, “I’m glad you’re with us.” He disembarked. “Now I’ll leave you to the other one, who will tell you what to do. While you’re in Stores collect as many other power cells as you can and put them in the recycler or waste disposal.”

“I cannot do that, Joshua.” The voice was very gentle. “I can destroy only what is useless to everyone or dangerous to my existence.”

“I see.” Joshua pulled the control from his chest and stuck it on the table, under erg-Dahlgren’s hand. “Goodbye, then, and thank you.”

“You are welcome, Joshua. Remember, burnt orange!”

* * *

Joshua found the button that opened the door to Transformer Room 1, zipped down and pulled a length of sticky plastic from his body. He threaded it swiftly through the tubing, found his longest fuse and lit it.

Outside he fired the blowtorch, opened three or four of the half-dozen sockets in the wall beside the door and aimed enough of a jet at each to melt the plastic so that it could not be pulled out. He jammed the torch in his pocket, ran past the stalled erg, heading counterclockwise to Transformer Room 4.

* * *

“What’re you looking at me so funny for?” Shirvanian asked. His teeth were chattering. “Were you afraid I’d let her kill you so I could stay alive?”

“No, I thought you’d ask her to have us tortured first,” said Mitzi. “You sure laid it on thick with all that blubbering and howling. You didn’t have to wet your pants.”

“That’s what you think.” He looked down. “Didn’t even know I’d done it. I’m glad I fainted before I died from being so scared.”

“I hope the air lasts.” Esther was perched on a shelf, among batteries. There was no room for her on the floor where the others were squeezed together. The one dim light in the ceiling, like every other in the place, had its own peculiarly unpleasant quality. “Why have you got your fingers in your ears, Ardagh? Hey, Ardagh!” She reached down and pulled at the fair hair.

“I’m afraid she’s hurting Sven,” Ardagh whispered.

“She hasn’t touched him again,” said Shirvanian. “Yet. He’s told her where the Dahlgren was ... she’s ordered the nearest servo to go to Clothier’s storeroom—ow, it’s recharging by the door to the transformer Joshua’s heading for!—and—and Clothier just skewered it! Now she’ll send everything out! Joshua, you better run like hell!”

“Is he all right?”

“I dunno. He’s left Clothier.”

“She never checked to find if any of us was missing.”

“She never checked with us—but she knew somebody got killed along the way. Why should she care? Human beings don’t get counted around here. Now shut up, I’m going to work.”

* * *

Beneath the Pit floor Clothier skimmed a corridor too narrow for the larger ergs; it did not expect difficulty with the trimmers which serviced the Pit machinery. It stopped in a dark alcove leading to the machine room, bared erg-Dahlgren’s shoulder, withdrew the cells, whipped off the cloth and replaced them. The plastic heart quivered and squeezed the artificial blood, the air sacs swelled in a thoracic cavity filled more with brains than bowels, the lines of EEG and EKG zipped and twittered behind the camera eyes. Erg-Dahlgren sat up.

“Are you in good order, Mod Dahlgren?” Clothier asked.

After an instant’s orientation, erg-Dahlgren answered, “I am, thank you, Clothier. And yourself?” He put his arm in his sleeve and fastened the clothing.

“The same. Please pick up that article on my table, turn back the tape and move the dial clockwise by three millimeters. Tape down the dial, place the article in your pocket, follow this corridor eastward and up the ramp to second level and deliver it to the person who has requested it of you.”

“I will be discovered, Clothier.”

“You will be shielded, Mod Dahlgren.”

Mod Dahlgren!

Yes, Shirvanian.

I’m
glad you’re okay. We’re locked in a closet on West corridor off the main vault. One servo guarding, I’ve got hold of it, when it opens the door give me the control, then go to erg-Queen and do whatever she asks. She’ll be happy to see you.

I cannot say the same, but I will do what you want.

ERG-QUEEN,
taking
input from all her latitudes, said, THE SERVO SENT TO RECOVER MOD DAHLGREN IS DISABLED, MOD DAHLGREN IS MISSING FROM CLOTHIER’S STOREROOM, THERE IS A TWENTY-FIVE METER LENGTH OF CLOTH ON THE FLOOR WITH A FORTY-CENTIMETER SQUARE CUT OUT FROM IT AND SEVERAL OF MOD DAHLGREN’S HAIRS ADHERING TO IT. OUTSIDE THE STOREROOM WE FOUND A PIECE OF THE SAME CLOTH WITH SOLDER FRAGMENTS ON IT.

The ten arms beat against the body like two giant hands, ringing an echoing chord. Sven said nothing.

NOW TELL ME YOU DO NOT KNOW WHERE MOD DAHLGREN IS.

“I don’t! I don’t know where he is now!”

BUT DO NOT TELL ME THAT SHIRVANIAN HAS DONE ALL THIS. HE IS IN A CLOSET CRYING FOR HIS MOTHER. THERE IS ANOTHER HUMAN BEING FREE IN THIS BASE, OR MORE THAN ONE. TELL ME, DAHLGRENSSON, THAT THIS IS NOT SO.

“The others died, they died,” Sven whispered. The arms rose.

* * *

The closet door opened.

“Shirvanian,” Behind erg-Dahlgren the servo stood, humming quietly, not moving.

“That’s me,” said Shirvanian. “Hullo, Mod Dahlgren.”

“Quietly,” Esther whispered. She was trembling at the sight of Dahlgren’s doppelganger.

Erg-Dahlgren looked down at the small filthy child with a rats’ nest for a head of hair. “Shirvanian?”

“Who did you expect,” Shirvanian hissed. “Turing or von Neumann?”

“I do not know who those are.”

“Give me the control.”

Erg-Dahlgren handed it over. Shirvanian ripped off the tape. “Okay. Now go to Mod Seven Seven Seven and lie like hell—and leave the door open here. We’ll do the rest.”

“Is that really what Dahlgren looks like?” Mitzi asked.

“That’s what Mod Dahlgren looks like,” Esther said.

The footsteps died away, and outside the guardian erg turned and rolled westward along the shadowed corridor, pausing every once in a while by the wall on either side to pull at and rip out the recharging sockets it found there.

* * *

I HAVE ASKED EIGHT QUESTIONS, said erg-Queen, AND I HAVE RECEIVED TWO ANSWERS. ONE: SHIRVANIAN WAS KIND ENOUGH TO TELL ME HIS NAME. TWO: YOU HAVE TOLD ME WHERE MOD DAHLGREN WAS, BUT HE IS NOT IN THAT PLACE NOW. REGARD THESE ARMS, DAHLGRENSSON. THEY ARE ALL CAPABLE OF CARRYING HEAT, AND THEY WILL EMBRACE YOU.

Sven regarded them. He couldn’t keep his eyes away from them. The air smelled of their heat.

MOD DAHLGREN!

The arms fell; Sven gave a faint whimper. His nose was running and his mouth was dry. His arms and torso were glued together with sweat, it ran in trickles down his back and inside his thighs.

Erg-Dahlgren came into the vault. He paused, examined Sven with curiosity, and came to stand beside erg-Queen at ease, arms behind his back. “I am here, Mod Seven Seven Seven.”

Sven shuddered at the sound of the voice and turned his head away.

WHY HAVE YOU NOT COMMUNICATED WITH ME?

“I returned to order only a few moments ago. I was confused. I have been in this area only once. Did you not pick up my signal?”

Erg-Queen tapped her arms. I WAS ENGAGED OTHERWISE. WHAT CAUSED YOUR MALFUNCTION?

“I don’t know, Creatrix. I was lying on my bed with my afferents turned down and without knowing I became as nothing.”

GO TO THE SHIP AT ONCE AND BOARD IT. YOU WILL BE SAFE THERE.

“Certainly.” He glanced again at Sven before he left. Sven kept his eyes turned away. He did not dare look.

What now, Shirvanian?

Get aboard the ship, Mod Dahlgren. You’ll be as safe there as anywhere.

* * *

IT IS A PITY YOU WOULD NOT LOOK AT MY WORK, DAHLGRENSSON. NOW IT IS SECURE.

Sven wrenched at the coils. “Why do you have to kill? Why can’t you leave us alone? We can’t harm you any more!”

IN THE FOREST ONE THRESHER WAS DESTROYED AND ONE DISABLED. IN THE TREAD-REPAIR CHAMBER ONE SERVO WENT OUT OF CONTROL, DAMAGING EQUIPMENT. AT THE DEPOT TWO DRONES, TWO ERGS IN THE FIVE-HUNDRED CLASS AND FIFTEEN TRIMMERS WERE WRECKED TO THE POINT WHERE THEY COULD ONLY BE SALVAGED FOR PARTS. IN MY HALLS PROVISIONER WENT OUT OF ORDER AND DAMAGED FOUR MACHINES. ON THE LANDING FIELD TWO THRESHERS WERE DESTROYED AND TWO DISABLED WHEN THE TRANSPORT EXPLODED. FIVE MINUTES AGO AN ERG ON THE LOWEST LEVEL HAD ITS BRAIN CENTER DESTROYED—PURPOSELY BY ONE OF MY OWN MACHINES. I ASSURE YOU, SVEN DAHLGREN, THAT FROM THIS MOMENT ONWARD YOU WILL NOT HARM US ANY MORE. WHATEVER POWER MACHINEMAKER POSSESSES IT HAS LOST ITS VALUE, BOTH FOR ME AND FOR YOU.

Sven closed his eyes and waited for the searing arms.

The first of the transformers blew up.

* * *

Coming out of the third transformer room, Joshua heard not only erg signals but ergs themselves. He ran. The treadway was circular; if he kept on he would reach the entrance to the hangar again, and that would be clogged with ergs. He swallowed in panic, thumbed the button of every doorway, finding traps, storerooms, closets, hallways, hoping for an elevator, on the theory that for speed the ergs would use ramps; in narrow corridors and warrens he would be hopelessly lost, and eventually trimmers, like savage rats, would corner him.

One door opened into an elevator; he peered into its cavern anxiously: empty. He plunged in, punched the CLOSE plate and the one for third level where the Pit entrance was. Ergs whined by the door and he sank against the wall. Ergs upstairs too, but he would be fighting toward the place he wanted to go. In his pocket he had saved a lump of plastic and a length of fuse for any situation he found urgent or interesting. The blowtorch was half-full; he had most of the rivets. Armed to the teeth.

The elevator moved slowly, very slowly. It stopped at level two. The door opened.

Joshua shrank into a corner, pushed his spine into it, wanted to be part of it, a right-angle of steel and concrete.

Twenty people crowded in, some men, some women, some he couldn’t tell which. They paid no attention to him, and an erg reached in a limb, pressed a button and withdrew it.

The door closed and the elevator started downward again. Joshua gulped down the lump in his throat.

The humans did not look at him. Their skins were white, black, red, yellow, blue, mauve; they were dressed in the uniform of Mod Dahlgren with gold emblems on the breast, same material, colors matching or contrasting with skin tone, pleasingly, according to Clothier’s aesthetic values. They were all humanoid in shape, though one did not appear to have a nose, another had a snout and a fringe of tentacles on his/her skull, yet another a narrow reptilian jaw, very short arms and a long balancing tail. They spoke in low tones, not quite to each other.

“Yes, it’s good to be home again.”

“It is a pleasure to visit your distinguished planet.”

“An honor to have participated in this valuable experiment.”

“Working with Doctor Dahlgren.”

“Alongside colleagues from all the distances of the Galaxy.”

“Don’t you agree, Doctor Lindstrom?”

Mild laughter. “Of course we did not always agree, but—”

By the time the elevator reached ground Joshua had concluded that these were androids created for the trip to GalFed Central.

The door opened, an erg reached in a limb to shepherd them. Joshua held his breath. The limb, before withdrawing, scoured the wall, found one more object, Joshua, and plucked him out with a pinch of his sleeve. It did not care that he was wearing sagging dark-blue jersey stained with dirt and sweat. He was dragged along with the crew in their bright, clean cloth and fresh unhuman skins. He might have disabled the servo with his rivet gun, but he did not know how the others would react. They walked without turning their heads, practicing the inane phrases.

“Conditions were difficult.”

“If not impossible.”

“Although we did succeed to some degree.”

“In stabilizing.”

“The mutation rate in zones.”

“In which the specimens were subjected to.”

“And which statistics will show.”

Joshua did not discover what the statistics showed. He had been plodding along a tube-shaped corridor; as the light changed he saw that a pair of gates were opening into a narrower tube of shining metal, and he was sure that this led to the ship.

The servo guide was sending the androids over the step and up the arch two by two. Joshua, odd-man-out, cast about the tunnel and found flanges in its sides, like those of the old buttress trees in the forest. Their shadows were dark; Joshua darted into one and it received him like a mother’s arms. The servo ticked off the last two, closed the gates behind them and locked the heavy latch. It turned and wheeled away, past Joshua and back down the tunnel, its signal faded. Joshua permitted himself to breathe. Mod Dahlgren was not among the androids. Perhaps he was on the ship already, perhaps not. On impulse, Joshua picked the lump of plastic from his pocket, spun it into a string, wound it around the gate latch, thumbed it down firmly, found his bit of fuse and lit it. Then ran.

He was a few meters away from the main corridor when the explosion boomed. At the tunnel mouth, a swarm of trimmers, signals in his receiver muffled by the blast, appeared from nowhere and everywhere and grabbed Joshua, pulling him in all directions like ants fighting over a leaf. They choked, wrenched, tore. He screamed and a screwdriver smacked his mouth.

Just as suddenly they dropped him and scuttled off.

He lay sobbing on the filthy concrete floor, blood running from his mouth. Hands picked him up and set him on his feet. Or tried to. His knees kept buckling.

“Get up! Hurry, get up!”

He got his feet planted on the floor, finally, pulled his head up on his sore neck. The steel strength of the arms told him, if not the face. Mod Dahlgren.

“Who are you? Are you a friend of Shirvanian’s?”

“Y-yes.” He swallowed blood. One of his front teeth was loose, his throat was swollen. “Josh ... Joshua ... Ndola.” He coughed up the blood, turned his head and spat.

“I am Mod Dahlgren.”

“I know ... I—we got you out of Clothier’s storeroom.”

“I didn’t know that was where I had been taken.”

“Those trimmers ... they obeyed you?”

“They do when Shirvanian is around.”

Joshua’s clothes were ripped, the receiver had fallen out of his ear and been trampled somewhere, the blowtorch had dropped from his pocket, now half torn off, and was crushed. He still had the rivet gun. But he felt broken. “I have to find Dahlgren ... I promised Sven.” He coughed again. “If I could rest a bit ...”

“Not too long, Joshua Ndola.”

“And you—what will you do?”

“I was to board the ship, but it seems the gates are badly jammed.”

“You’ll have to go to her.”

“No. I have had enough. Come along, Joshua. I too wish to find Dahlgren.”

In the vault the lights flickered, went out, came on again.

WHAT IS HAPPENING?

Sven opened his eyes, raised his head. “Don’t you know? A transformer has blown up.”

Heat the arms again, monster. Sport of nature, of everything hideous in men. And we’ll go down together.

* * *

Shirvanian waited in the shadow of the corridor, so frightened he thought his heart would shrivel and slither down between his lungs and his liver. His control was in one palm, his eyes were on erg-Queen, he was waiting for the ripeness of a moment and his hands were curved to catch it as it dropped.

The second transformer blew, and two seconds later the third. The light jumped once like a bomb’s flare, and went down dim, fading into the deep orange, near-red of an ancient dream of hell.

On third level a corridor went dark; the ergs running it slowed. Their infra-red kept them from crashing into each other, but they skittered along the walls, treads and limbs hooked into doorways. They were lost.

On first level several ergs paused to recharge; when they found fused sockets they searched for others, but from the others no current flowed. They stood where they were, slowly dying.

At Transformer 2, where power was still flowing, six recharging ergs of different classes were set upon by a pack of trimmers and threshers with recharge signals beeping. They pulled and clawed sockets, limbs, antennas, sensors. The battle raged for a few minutes, and as the last of their power ebbed, it slowed, wavered, died down. One surviving thresher hugged the last whole socket to its receptor and recharged. Its light sensors were smashed and its antennas broken.

Now most lights were out in all levels northwest, southwest, and southeast. Hundreds of ergs swarmed toward the lights of northeast, but they had no duties there, they milled about, collided with each other, clogged the corridors.

Shirvanian’s control was full out.

* * *

After a couple of hours of uneasy sleep in great discomfort, Dahlgren was wakened by a sound of metallic creaking. He lifted himself on one elbow, painfully. The creatures about him stirred a little; there was no wind here, no thunder or lightning. During the Pit “nights” there was no light except the faint glow from the band of glass at top level, and now most of that was gone. Power failure? The Pit had its own generators to control heat, light and ventilation, but the switches were outside.