Requiem (60 page)

The Doctor had
moved on to his tenth bout against Mondor the Cranium Crusher. He
was walking from the medical cabinet with what looked like a five
headed syringe attached to a handheld motor pump when the door
opened and Belameir walked in.

Seline
immediately stood up, grabbed her crutches and pushed Belameir back
out the door.

'See you, Doc,'
she yelled.

'But I still
haven't finished my tale of woe to foe to doctor!'

'Maybe next
time!' she said, still dragging Belameir with her as she hobbled to
the nearest elevator.

'It's a pretty
good story,' said Belameir, 'you sure you don't wanna stay?'

'I'm sure,' she
said.

They took the
lift to fourth floor and stepped into one of the maglev carts
stationed at the taxi stand.

'I messaged you
on your optics but you weren't replying,' said Belameir.

'Yeah, the Doc
said I had to take the lens out so he could check my eyes
properly.'

'Well, yeah,
anyway, I wanted to find you and see if you wanted to go to the
labs.'

'What
labs?'

'The research
labs.'

'Anywhere is
better than the med-bay at this point.' Seline looked out the
window at the rain clouds forming once more over the forest.

They walked
into one of the labs. In the centre of the room the sentinel was
hanging from two large suction plates attached to it which were in
turn attached to chains from the far sides of the ceiling. There
was a Yurrick working beneath the sentinel, a plasma cutter in
hand, scribing into the sentinel's underside.

Seline and
Belameir walked down the steps to the ground floor of the lab. On
the other side of the sentinel was a raised hydraulic platform for
access to a panel on the back. A small repair droid was hovering
there, shining a fluorescent torch into the hole. There was
movement inside, then the sharp, metallic ring of a tool being
dropped, then a familiar voice asking the repair drone for more
light.

'What are you
doing in there, Therin?' Belameir yelled up at the sentinel.

The same
metallic ring came from inside the sentinel. 'Damnit, Belameir!'
said Therin. She poked her head out. 'Do you know how hard it is to
find something if you drop it in here? How in the hell did you get
in here anyway?' she asked.

'Through the
door,' he said.

Therin crawled
out of the sentinel onto the platform and lowered it to the floor.
She was wearing thick white overalls that clung close to her body.
There was oil and patches of grease smeared over the front of it as
well as her face, her hands and forearms. The blue tint of her skin
looked pale, almost translucent making her eyes seem even darker,
as if they were sinking towards the back of her skull.

'How are you,
Seline?' she asked. Her voices were out of sync, the second no
longer complimented the first but merely followed behind like a
tired echo.

'I'm alright,
thanks,' said Seline. 'You look... tired.'

Therin looked
across at the other Yurrick examining the lens. 'I've been working
on this thing almost twenty hours at a time for over a week.' She
looked back at Seline. 'And I still feel like I know nothing.'

'It doesn't
look so hard to me,' said Belameir.

Therin ignored
him. 'When I first looked at this thing I expected it to be jammed
full of processors, heat sinks, and CPU's... but whatever
electronics that are in there are almost entirely dedicated to one
of three things: movement, weaponry, and wireless data transfer.
This thing is essentially an eye with a gun.'

Therin walked
over to one of the counters running along the wall.

'It doesn't
look that simple from here,' said Seline, looking at the components
and pieces of machinery scattered across the counters.

'Relatively
simple anyway.'

'Do we know
what it's made out of?' asked Belameir.

Therin wiped
the back of her hand over her forehead, smearing the patch of
grease. 'The exterior is almost entirely composed of solar panels
which makes sense since it spends so much of its time around stars.
But the thing about these solar panels... they have one hundred
percent efficiency. Even the best panels we can come up with have
no more than fifty percent. And with the microscopic batteries
these things have on board, they're never going to run out of
energy.'

'You sound
pretty impressed with it,' said Belameir.

'If Icarus
weren't trying to kill us, the technological advancements we could
make from this one sentinel alone would be at least fifty years
work.' Therin looked back up at the sentinel. 'There's also a thin
layer of fullerite polymers that move about all over the surface of
this thing in a thin layer just above the panels. It's nanotech;
the polymers can communicate with one another, so if any single one
of them detects a threat to the sentinel, say, a bullet, then the
polymers predict where it's going to hit and cover the area,
deflecting the bullet.'

Therin looked
at the modified ratchet in her hand. 'There's no way we can
replicate that kind of technology. At least not before Icarus
arrives. We don't have anything that could pierce that kind of
defence.'

'What about the
energy cannon that this thing had?' asked Belameir. 'Can we use
their own weapons against them?'

'The
anti-matter cannon was one of the first things we began working on.
They took it to the weapons division but last time I checked, they
hadn't had much luck. They were, however, pretty close to
developing a shield that could withstand the blasts... but it would
only be good for one shot before shorting out.'

'Have you heard
anything on the virus?' asked Seline.

'I talked to
Athene just a few hours ago and by the sounds of it the virus has
reached a deadhead. We simply don't understand enough about the
nature of Icarus's mind. Most of the information they were using
was taken from the brain scans inside the suits of the bodies we
found in the scout ship and on your hard-suit when this guy,' she
gestured towards the sentinel, 'went down. But all that information
is a little one-sided. We know the effects but not the cause.'

Seline looked
around the room again. At the dead sentinel hanging above. Even
with its organs scooped out it looked like it could come to life at
any moment.

'Have they had
any luck with the blackbox?' Seline asked.

'You should
probably ask Sear,' said Therin. She indicated with her finger.
'He's in a lab just down the main hall, working with the engineers.
They've already begun work on the device.'

Belameir looked
at Seline. 'The device? What device?'

'Have you two
not been following the news at all?'

Seline and
Belameir both muttered something about being too busy.

Therin looked
at the time in her optics. 'I have to get back to work. I've got
some tests to run on the sentinel's heat sinks. If you want to
learn more about the device, go find Sear. He'll be busy but he'll
probably have time for you two.'

Therin stood
back on the hydraulic lift and it climbed up to the sentinel's open
panel.

Seline and
Belameir wished her luck and walked from the room, back into the
hall. They started walking to the engineer labs.

'So you don't
know anything about this device,' Belameir asked Seline.

'No,' she said.
'Sear said he was working on the blackbox but nothing else. I
haven't seen him in a couple of days.'

They came to a
lab, 'Experimental Technology #1'. Through the pane of glass they
could view the entire room. A large, circular holo-display in the
centre of the room with smaller stations along the wall where two
Yurrick were busily scanning schematics. Atop the desks and other
working stations lay pieces of alien machinery, most of which
looked dismantled or non-operational.

Seline wasn't
sure who noticed who first but as she peered into the room she
could see a familiar figure standing on the other side of the large
holographic display. Sear had looked up from the alien schematics.
He was staring straight at Seline on the other side of the
glass.

Sear grabbed
something from the counter and came to the door. His face was
thinner than normal. Like Therin, the colour of his skin had become
pale, thin and tenuous like paper that could tear at the slightest
touch. Sear greeted them and handed Seline the blackbox.

'We've copied
what we need from it,' he said.

Seline thanked
him.

'How're things
going in there?' asked Belameir. 'Therin told us you've started
work on some device. She said you're going to save us all.'

'Progress is...
good,' said Sear. 'We've only just begun work but the initial signs
are positive.'

Seline was
staring into the lab at the three dimensional schematics hovering
in the centre of the room. 'Those look similar to the blueprints I
saw on the blackbox,' she said, pointing to the holo-displays.

'They are one
in the same,' said Sear. 'Your mother uncovered these blueprints on
the Alpha Gate before she disappeared. They're Sceril design. The
translators have already deciphered most of the text and formulas,
enough for us to understand some of the basic functions of the
device.'

'Which is?'
asked Belameir.

'It will allow
us to open and close the Atlas Gates.'

'That's great!'
said Belameir. 'So we can use this on any Atlas Gate we want?'

'We aren't
sure. We know that the device communicates with the Gates through a
kind of quantum entanglement but we aren't sure how it works when
co-ordinating multiple signals.'

'So is there a
plan yet? I mean, how is this going to stop Icarus?' asked
Belameir.

'Assuming the
device can affect multiple Gates simultaneously, we wait for Icarus
to pass into the Yeta System-'

'The Yeta
System?' said Belameir. 'That's cutting it a bit close isn't it?
One step away from Saranture, and Earth for that matter.'

'That's the
best we can do. We simply won't have the device finished fast
enough to stop Icarus at any earlier point. But if we can catch
Icarus in the Yeta System and close off the dual way Gate between
Yeta, here, and Sol, then we can essentially trap Icarus in that
system.'

'That's it?'
said Belameir. 'It's a bit... simple isn't it?'

'It's not going
to stop Icarus,' said Seline. 'It can still move out of the Yeta
System It will just have to take the long way here.'

'Right,' said
Sear, 'and it may just give us the time we need to develop a proper
solution. Given the limitations of this device, that's all we can
hope for. That is why it would be preferable to trap it in the Yeta
System, because it's thousands of light years away from any of the
other established systems.'

There was a
strain in Sear's voice. He was tired, angry, suddenly more
human.

'It does not
speak well of our chances to say that this is our best option but
that's exactly what it is,' said Sear. 'Our best option.'

'How long will
it take?' asked Belameir.

'Construction
is already under way. We've dedicated ninety percent of the city's
industrial printers to the production of the parts for the device.
We've also co-ordinated with Hyrule and Dremaar, two of the nearest
cities to help with production. The device itself is enormous,
looking at the blueprints it will stand about half the size of a
modern day skyscraper. While we have most of the materials required
for physical construction right at out doorstep, we'll have to make
some alterations to the blueprints since we're building this thing
on-planet instead of above planet, next to the Atlas Gate where
it's supposed to be.'

Belameir raised
his eyebrows, 'So...?'

'If it all goes
smoothly we could have it built in under a week. We'll have to use
a lot of our available anti-matter just as fuel, but we should be
ready for Icarus, if the projections for its behaviour are
accurate.'

'What happens
if something goes wrong? Are we going to be able to construct a
back-up?'

'Harvesting
anti-matter is a long process and if Icarus moves in to the Yeta
System then it'll have already destroyed our major harvesting
stations. So, in short, no, there is no back-up.'

'No back-up.
Great. So this is basically a hail Mary with our eyes closed,' said
Belameir.

'I don't
understand the reference,' said Sear, 'but it is a long shot.'

'Sear!' came a
voice from the lab. 'Sear, you need to look at this.'

Sear glanced
back into the lab then back to Seline and Belameir.

'I have to get
back to work,' he said. 'I'll contact you whenever I have some free
time.' He kissed Seline on the forehead and disappeared back into
the lab, closing the door behind him. He didn't watch Seline and
Belameir walk away as he walked back to the central holo-display
where Pheros was working.

'What is it?'
Sear asked.

'There's a
problem with the schematics,' said Pheros. He was leaning forward
on the edge of the console, concentrating on the image. 'We may be
over-estimating its strength.'

A world,
holding its breath, waiting for the final blow. The sentinels swept
down over Sceril. The minds of the creatures that dwelled there
were ripped from feeble brains while their bodies were left where
they fell as empty husks. What resistance the Ordonians did put up
was uncoordinated and short lived. Under the belief that they could
defend their planet against any threat that might come knocking,
their preparations were minimal and inadequate.

There was not
much in the way of precious metals for the planet to offer but
Icarus still found what little it had to give. Enormous machines
descended from the main body of Icarus. Designed to gouge and scoop
out what was hidden beneath the planet's skin. They set to their
task, gorging themselves on Sceril's flesh and bone.