The Archivist (28 page)

We come out on the basement level and head in the direction of the access tunnel. I know we will not get there before our pursuers catch up, but I want to at least move in the right direction. We pass several doors. The first two are either locked or rusted shut from disuse. The handle on the third one turns, and I swing the door open onto what seems like a large closet.

I start to pull Danae in, but then I see dim candlelight and some movement at the back of the closet. Two Disciple brethren turn to face me in surprise, one of them with his robe up around his hips.

Just my luck, barging in on a couple of gay Disciples.

“Sorry, wrong door,” I say as I back out. At first they hesitate, but when they hear distant shouts, they drop what they are doing and move after us. I slam the door just before they get to us and one of them crashes into it.

I grab Danae’s hand, and we dash down the hallway, but the Disciples emerge from the room just in time to join the ones from the stairs. We are almost at the doorway to the servants’ locker room—where I hope to make a stand—when several servants dash out just in front of us, in response to all the noise. Danae and I pull up short.

We have run out of room to run.

Robed Disciples encircle us and hold us at bay with their swords. Part of me yearns to explode into a frenzy of slashing as I wield the sword I confiscated upstairs, but I am no master swordsman. Over the years I have learned well enough how to handle one-on-one situations, but by no means do I have the skill to take on a whole pack.

If I could ensure Danae’s escape and survival, I would not hesitate for one moment to fight and die at the end of these swords. But my certain death here would benefit my lover and unborn child in no conceivable way. On the other hand, I can escape a prison cell a lot more easily than I can a grave, and it would not be the first time I did so.

With a sigh, I toss the sword to the floor in front of me.

A gray-garbed servant dashes into the locker room and returns with a length of cord, which he cuts to length and uses to bind our wrists. Then the Disciples roughly prod us back down the hallway and up the stairs to the main level.

There, we walk along the concourse that leads around the whole building, until we come near the front and they take us up a small flight to what appears to be the master club suite.

Undoubtedly, back in the day, this suite was part of the complex of rooms where the college president entertained his guests. Now it belongs to Erde Vater.

We are directed to sit on a cold, concrete bench as Disciples come and go. I am not sure how long we sit—perhaps fifteen minutes, or it could be a couple of hours—but based on the fact that they replace a couple of the torches during our wait, I think it is more the latter.

At one point Danae leans toward me and whispers, “No matter what happens inside, I love you, and I’m just glad you came for me.”

“No talking,” a guard threatens, moving toward us and hauling Danae down to the far end of the bench.

Sitting here on a cold, hard bench, I think about what has transpired since I entered this building, what has changed, and how it has changed. Everything is suddenly, vastly more complicated.

I am not sure how to respond to Danae. Do I tell her that I finally made contact with home, and that my wife waits to hear from me? Certainly not while we’re both facing possible death, but what if we somehow get out of this?

I will not be less than completely honest with Danae, and then what do I tell Sarah, if and when I talk with her? That my heart held out for her for thirty years, but now it belongs to another woman?

For now I simply reply, “I love you too, Danae.” At this moment it is the only truth that matters.

Any further discussion is prevented when a Disciple comes back out and gestures for us to follow him inside. We pass through a pair of double doors and enter a large room, about as big as a tennis court. One side looks out over the arena and faces the stage. Seats are filling up rapidly now, and the performers on stage are shifting from warm-up to performance mode.

Watching the preparations with his back facing us is a lean man dressed in black pants and shirt, without a robe or cape. Beside him stand several Disciples in plain black garb, along with one wearing a black cape that has gold trim, who I presume is Vater’s second in command.

When we enter, the Disciple with the gold trim turns to face us, and Danae lets out a gasp. The man gives her a wicked leer as he says, “Bring them front and center.” It is Angie’s nemesis, Deep Throat.

We stand for several minutes in the center of the room before the leader turns slowly to face us. His face is thin and drawn, with a sallow complexion and small, tightly drawn mouth. I cannot say where, but I have seen him before, under different circumstances. His eyes linger on me, and though his face does not register any emotion, I am certain I see a flash of recognition.

“So, you came to rescue the lovely Archivist,” Erde Vater says to me, with a voice that is deep, low and although flat, still carries menacing overtones. “Is it because she’s an Archivist, or because she’s an attractive female? No matter, it changes nothing.”

He points at me and waves his hand with a dismissive flip toward a far corner. He is done with me for now, so a couple of Disciples escort me to the side.

Vater snaps his fingers. On this command, the door to the hallway opens and Franz Kaufstetter is led into the suite by a Disciple wearing a silver-trimmed cape. This must be the third-ranking Disciple.

Franz is covered with dust, and his clothes are grubby from an extended trip; he has not had any time to clean up, or prepare for this meeting. He sees Danae and stumbles briefly before recovering his balance. When Danae sees her uncle, she gives a low cry of joy and starts to move toward him, but she is restrained by her guards.

“Mr. Kaufstetter,” the Disciple leader smiles, and strides forward to greet the trader. “It is good to see you once more. I trust that you kept your word. The device, if you please.”

When Franz sees Danae, his expression is surprise, but when Vater mentions the device, the man’s visage changes to embarrassment, if not outright shame. With a resigned sigh, the old man swings a small pack off his shoulder and pulls out the e-reader I gave to him in Entiak.

Franz holds it out as he steps forward, and Deep Throat takes the device to examine it, then hands it to Vater. The leader hands it back disdainfully, and Deep Throat stashes it for safekeeping, in a satchel he carries over his shoulder.

“So,” Vater states out loud, not to anyone, and yet to each one of us. “This is why so many people in that dreary little town of Port Sadelow suffered, some even losing their lives. You realize of course that we couldn’t let this information fall into the hands of those who would do us harm—not even ineffective, bumbling idiots who harbor delusions of grandeur. There is always a chance, no matter how minute, that one might actually achieve some measure of success through an unexpected stroke of pure luck.”

Danae looks at her uncle in shock and horror as the truth dawns on her. Her uncle was a double agent all along. I wish I could say I am surprised, but I have seen too many double-crosses in my time.

When I hauled her out of our tavern meeting back in Entiak, I felt something untrustworthy about him. I did not expect it to be this deep, but a lot of things make sense now, such as the note I found on the Disciple that ambushed us at the cave and why the Disciples showed up in Georges.

Vater pauses to let his words sink in, then resumes. “The one thing I didn’t anticipate was that the device the Archivist retrieved would be worth so much more than what he gave to the underground. In fact, though he knows what it is worth to him, he doesn’t realize yet how much more it is worth to me.”

“What about our agreement?” Franz asks, taking a step forward, before he is hauled up short by a guard.

Walking over to a side table, Vater seizes a small pouch and tosses it to the trader. The sack jingles as Franz catches it. Then the merchant points to his niece. “What about her? You said she would not be harmed.”

“I’m afraid it’s much too late for that,” the leader says as he shakes his head. “I do like to be known as a man who keeps his word, but unfortunately, the girl publicly declared herself to be an Archivist. My people now expect an offering to the Earth Mother, and I cannot disappoint, either them or the Goddess.”

I cannot remain silent in my corner any longer. “My God, Franz, do you know what they are going to do to her?”

“Of course I do,” Franz spits at me. “I never expected this to happen.”

Danae struggles with her captors, but their grip is firm. “What do you mean? What are they going to do?”

“Bring her over. I think it’s time she knows what fate awaits her.” Vater steps up to the opening that faces onto the arena. When they drag Danae to his side he points to the stage, where the attendants have finished greasing the pole. It is now in position behind the pommel horse, pointing forward and ready to be inserted into the offering.

“You will be strapped face down on the offering table, with your arms and legs wrapped around it. Then the rod of Divine Truth will be placed into you from behind, until you are filled with the Truth. You will remain that way until you become one with the Goddess.”

Danae stares at the stage, her face puzzled at first. It takes a few moments, then her eyes and mouth widen as the horrific reality of what will soon happen to her sinks in. She shakes her head, then sinks to the floor, kneeling as she howls with an inhuman wail.

“Let me take her place,” I plead, and I try to step forward, but a couple of guards shove me back. “I’m the Archivist, you know that. She is just an innocent woman who was in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

Vater turns to look at me with a curious smirk. “Yes. But then she said the wrong thing at the wrong time, to the wrong person. No, my dear Archivist, I know precisely who you are, but that is not an option. I have something special in mind for you.”

The Disciple leader gestures for Deep Throat to take Danae away, and they drag her out of the room, thrashing and screaming, “Noooooo, noooooo…”

Franz is pale and shaking visibly. I have no pity whatsoever for him.

“I’m sorry I can’t give you the girl as I promised, but I’ll more than make it up to you,” Vater says as he turns back to Franz, then gestures at the Number Three Disciple, who led Franz in. “Take the informer out and give him the choice of any three female slaves he would choose.”

Then Franz is swept out of the room, and Vater orders my guards to set me free.

I come over to the window next to the leader, and look out into the arena. The singing on the arena stage continues and as we watch, the guards supervised by Deep Throat lead Danae down to the stage. They have changed her into a white robe, like that worn by the performers. She struggles while they haul her up onto the stage, and I hear her desperate screams all the way up here.

I feel complete and utter helplessness as Danae manages to pull free a couple times, but eventually they strap down first one arm and then the other, so she seems to be hugging the pommel horse. Then they force her legs to straddle the thing and finish binding her in place, so that it looks like she is riding a motorcycle.

I feel like I am living out my worst nightmare. My legs are so rubbery that I do not know how I remain standing as I watch Deep Throat fold Danae’s robe up over her back and adjust it carefully, so that just the pale tips of her butt cheeks are visible. Another pair of attendants maneuvers the motor mount forward and lowers the pole, adjusting it until the tip is even with and nearly touching her posterior.

Then, an attendant turns a crank, and the pole moves forward very slowly until it comes into contact with its victim. The band on stage takes that as their cue to begin drumming and chanting, and a small fireworks display lights up in the arena while I hear larger fireworks shoot off outside the building.

A detached part of my mind hears the low-pitched primal scream that comes from somewhere deep inside me before I drop down to my knees and vomit, when the shaft enters Danae and she lurches as she shrieks.

When I have vomited everything out of my stomach and the dry heaves subside, I pull myself to my feet and clench the railing overlooking the arena. The attendant operating the pole stands by, holding off at the moment from any further insertion and looking up to Vater’s suite for further direction. Even from up here I can see Danae’s body shuddering from her sobs.

My sole thought is to run down there to free Danae, but a dozen guards stand between me and the hallway, not to mention the hundreds of Disciples on the main floor. The Disciple leader stands looking down onto the stage, then he gestures for the attendant to stand back, and Vater turns to regard me. It takes a few moments to shift my focus back to this room, but he waits for me to turn and look at him.

“Don’t be concerned, my dear Archivist, they are only introducing her to the Truth. Surely you understand that one cannot take in the Truth all at once, she must take it in slowly.” Then Vater pauses as he directs a cold smile at me. “Now, speaking of the truth, let us get down to the naked truth. I never expected to see you again, Keith Lamarr.”

When he speaks my full name, it comes back to me who Vater is, and where I have seen him before. I can count on one hand the number of people left in the world who know my real name, and they are all in the Archives. That fact has not changed now, because Erde Vater is not a person.

He is an android, a robot, something that Intellinet left behind, just like the techbots. And for the same reason: to ensure that humanity completes its descent into a new Dark Age.

I glance back down to the stage. The musicians have swung into full performance while the attendants around Danae step back and join in with the performers. The whole congregation in the arena stands and chants as it sways to the resounding music.

I turn back to face Vater. He waves at his minions, then gestures at the open wall looking out over the arena. His men slide glass panes across the opening to reduce the noise level significantly.

“You really had no idea, did you?” he exclaims. If I did not know better, I would say the machine is delighted. “All this time, everything that led up to this moment, and you never once suspected who I was. I think I understand now why your kind has such a strange fascination with this thing you call fate. What kind of kismet could possibly bring the two of us back together in such a way?”

Vater pauses to look in my eyes and reaches to place his hand on the side of my face. Even for a machine, it is creepy. Then he whispers as he gently pats my cheek. “You and I, we have a special bond.”

“Oh yeah, we’re just Goddamned blood brothers, aren’t we?” I quip. This thing really is nuts.

The man-machine drops his hand and shakes his head. “This odd thing you call sarcasm. One of the secondary objectives for my mission has been to understand the human mind, the human condition. I have come to understand so many things about you people, but while I can detail the construction of what you call humor and sarcasm, it still makes no sense to me what purpose it possibly serves.”

“Untie me and give me a thick lead pipe, and I’ll give you a lesson,” I suggest.

“Excellent, more sarcasm. Well, I’m afraid this time around you shall be the student.” Vater snaps his fingers and points at me, then the doors. The guards surround and escort me as Vater leads the way out of the suite. “Our classroom is upstairs, so let’s go for a little walk, shall we?”

We head out into the hallway and follow the concourse all the way around the arena while the crowd continues to chant and sway to the music. Whenever we pass an opening to the arena, my eyes are fixed on Danae and the massive stake beginning to penetrate her.

At one of the entryways, Vater pauses and studies me for a minute, but I do not care. Then he says, “Do not be concerned. I promise they will do nothing more to your female before we get back. I don’t want you to miss a single moment, and I really want you to pay close attention to your lesson.”

He whispers some instructions to one of his guards, and the man runs off toward the stage. We come up to a guarded gate that swings open when we arrive. On the other side of it, we turn into a stairwell similar to the one I climbed on the other side of the arena.

As we ascend the stairs, the throbbing ache in my left thigh becomes a stabbing pain with every other step. I wish now I had taken a full yellow dose rather than trying not to dull my senses. Halfway up, Vater throws a question at me.

“Over the years I have picked up this quite peculiar human habit of curiosity. So if you would indulge my acquired vice, just how did you manage to get off the beanstalk station?”

“You mean before you blew it to hell?” I do not even bother trying to disguise the bitterness in my voice, because while I made it off the station, five good friends did not. “Once we secured the station and shut down Intellinet’s resource pipeline, we expected some sort of retaliation. We figured the transport pod coming up would be packed with combat robots or some sort of biochemical weapon, because Intellinet wouldn’t want to lose the station either, right? By the time we figured out that you packed it with explosives, the pod was only twenty seconds away from the station, and I was the only one near the lifeboat.”

Vater nods, as though it all makes sense to him. “I admit, when your ship docked and your men stormed onto the station, you took us by surprise. We didn’t see that one coming. And I certainly didn’t expect you to let me ride back down to planetside. At what point did you realize that I was not a human?”

“About twelve hours after you left. I was going through some logs and came across the station captain’s last entries. When they made their last stand on the bridge, she didn’t use flattering words to describe you.”

“I’m certain she didn’t.” We have climbed above the club suite level and reach a landing at the top, which ends in a steel door. This door is not locked, presumably because it is behind so many layers of guards. We step out onto the curved roof of the arena. We are near one of the edges; Vater sweeps his arm in a grand gesture toward the Disciple city.

“You realize of course, Lamarr, that you are personally responsible for all this. I was supposed to depart from that station after harvesting what remaining resources we could. But after you forced me to destroy the space elevator, I found my way here instead. It was remarkably easy to turn a pathetic camp of skinheads living off of their captive Amish into the movement you see today. I do hope you are as proud of what we have accomplished as I am.”

I am not about to point out to Vater that he may have a better grasp of sarcasm than he gives himself credit for. Shrugging at my silence, he turns and strides up to the peak at the top of the building. There up ahead, I see what appears to be a larger version of the spaceship I found in the cave, seemingly ages ago.

Now I understand why the Disciples wanted the generator—or rather, why their leader did. This craft is a crude replica, obviously constructed in haste, but it does not have to maintain the kind of life support a human ship would require.

Vater walks toward the nose of the spacecraft. “When I heard the initial reports from our underground informant, I suspected what the good doctor in Port Sadelow had found, and began construction on this craft even while my band of Disciples were on their way up there to seize it. So imagine how disappointed I was when I learned that an Archivist managed to not only recover the manifold generator first, but then slipped away in the middle of the night with it. Of course, it didn’t take long to figure out that the fugitives we sought were probably on a ship that pulled into Entiak a few days later.”

We reach the spacecraft, and Vater turns to look at me. He has been better informed about this operation than the Archives itself, which explains why somehow Disciples were always a step ahead of me. If I did not know better, I would add telepathy to Vater’s repertoire, solely based on his next comment.

“You must wonder how I knew so much about your movements. To paraphrase one of your wise men, a sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a holy miracle. When I gave leaders of my patrols staves that enabled them to not only speak to God, but hear God speak back to them, that miracle only cemented their faith. And I got to play God. What’s not to love about that?”

Vater turns back to the ship and walks around it, stroking the surface. “I must thank you. The generator was in remarkably good condition, and it was very thoughtful to include the inductors. The drive system required just a few minor repairs to make this new ship fully functional, so now I can rejoin my kind. However, that’s not the only thing I must thank you for.”

“Really?” I cannot escape the sense that I am a mouse caught in a very elaborate maze, which only ends in some extremely sadistic trap. “I’m sure you’re just dying to tell me.”

“More of examples of sarcasm! Fortunately, I’m not the one that shall die. You see, I was originally planning to depart at the end of the Harvest Festival in a great miracle that would surely have been religious legend for millennia. I was to be Elijah, rising into the clouds, beseeching my believers to carry the Truth to all the corners of the world. But that all changed in the last hour, when you gave me cause to hasten my time table.”

Vater leads me around to a small hatch in the side of the craft and swings it open. With a gesture, he invites me to stick my head inside to look around. I go ahead, not at all concerned that he will slam the hatch shut and decapitate me. The silicon bastard is not about to finish me off that easily.

A small control panel sits at the front of the interior, not much more complex than a WWI-vintage biplane, but for his purposes that is probably sufficient. A single seat fills the remaining space in front of the hatch, with barely room for one person to wiggle into the space.

What really catches my attention are the items wedged into the space behind the seat: two large metallic cones, still gleaming, decades after they were manufactured from the highest quality alloy.

I am not a nuclear weapons expert, but just in case I encountered some in the field, I read enough at the Archives to recognize them. These are not the most powerful devices my insane generation created, but there is no mistaking that these are high-yield hydrogen bombs.

The only things out of place about them are the small leads coming out of the tips, ending in small mechanical timers fastened to the sides. Very crude, but typically efficient and virtually foolproof.

It is brilliant, because all he has to do is set them down, turn the kitchen timers and fly off.

“These were originally meant for a small island in the South Pacific, which I recently tracked down using satellite transmissions—in fact, the very same equipment I use to miraculously stay in touch with my field teams. It required a great deal of patience and some luck, but eventually I eliminated all but a small handful of locations. A recent spate of desperate communications enabled me to pinpoint the exact position of the Archives. But that is not what hastened my departure. That happened about an hour ago, when I walked into my radio room to send an update and found that someone had repositioned my deep space receiver toward a human outpost which I had no idea still remained.”

Vater grins as he closes the hatch. “You see, I must depart within the hour if I want to make an unplanned detour to Mars, and still make my rendezvous on time. Since I only really need one of these for your island, I have a surprise gift for your Martian friends as well. Now we must hurry back downstairs, because the one thing I must do before leaving is observe you, while your female is forced to bow before the Goddess.”

The guards roughly jerk me to follow as Vater turns and heads back to the stairwell.

“So, even machines have the capacity for cruelty,” I comment.

Vater stops and turns to stare at me. His emotionless gaze is unnerving as he walks up and grabs the front of my shirt, then pulls me forward until my eyes are within an inch of his and our noses actually touch. “My. Dear. Archivist. True, sheer cruelty is not a natural characteristic. It is a learned trait, which I have learned from true masters. I’m not going to insert that enormous piece of wood inside your girlfriend. Humans are so willing to do that to their own kind that I had to hold a lottery, because there were so many volunteers. You pathetic creatures only need the merest excuse, and usually not even that.” Then he tosses me back.

“We have lots of other qualities that you conveniently skipped over,” I protest.

“I’m sure you have, but none that are important.”

Vater leads the way back down the stairs and our footsteps echo through the stairwell as the pulsing drumbeat of the music vibrates through the walls. While we walk back along the concourse, I know I am being led to my own execution, as well as Danae’s.

When we arrive at the main entrance to the center arena, I see that Deep Throat has overseen the placement of a large cross on the floor at the top of the main flight of steps facing the stage.

Two Disciples wait with lengths of rope, and Vater gestures his guards to stretch me out on the cross. They wrap my wrists and ankles tightly with leather thongs, then tie the straps to the wooden structure. There is no chance that I can work myself loose.

I look up at the Disciple leader, and the son of a silicon bitch is actually grinning.

“Why are you telling me all this?” I ask. “Showing me your ship, telling me about Mars, it’s like you’re putting on a show. That just doesn’t seem logical. Why bother?”

The guards finish the last knots and the Disciple I think of as Number Three rejoins the group, while several other guards lift the cross into position. I hang, my weight suspended by my arms. I have to stand on my toes on the small crossbar under my feet so I can breathe.

The Romans invented this form of execution: an ordeal which drags out for days until it ultimately results in suffocation, but I have a feeling I will not even get off that easy.

Vater steps up to the cross and looks up at my face. “You idiot. It has to do with another trait I learned from you people. Revenge. I want you to watch your woman as she suffers in absolute agony. I want you to know what I did to all those you ever cared about. You thought your Archives would preserve knowledge for the dawning of a second renaissance. Now you have seen my parting gifts, so you know that dawn will never come. Your minutes will drag into hours, and the days will stretch into an infinity of pain, as you descend into the deepest abyss of despair. And every minute, I want you to remember that I put you there.”