The Myst Reader (45 page)

IN THE SUDDEN SILENCE, THE EXCAVATOR
backed out of the hole, its segmented sides coated in dust, its drill head glowing red despite the constant stream of coolant. Inside the node the dust was slowly settling.

“Can we go outside and see for ourselves now?” One of the other Observers, Ja’ir, a Master in the Guild of Writers asked.

“I am afraid not,” Aitrus answered him. “It is much too hot. Besides, you would choke on the dust. Even our men will have to wear breathing suits for a while. No, first they will have to spray the node with water to settle the dust. Then, once the drill bit has cooled a little, we shall start pumping air back into the node from outside. Only then will they start the clearing up process.”

“And the next stage of drilling?” Kedri asked, turning fully in his seat and leaning over the back of the chair to stare at Aitrus.

“That begins almost at once, Master,” Aitrus answered. “Look.”

Even as he spoke, a door opened in the side of the excavator and two young guildsmen stepped out, suited-up, air canisters feeding the sealed helmets they were wearing. They were both carrying what looked like spears, only these spears were curved and had sharp, diamond tips at the end.

“They’ll set the Cycler up straight away. We should be able to start the second stage of drilling as soon as that’s done. Meanwhile, the rest of the men will begin the clearing up operation.”

As the two suited guildsmen began to put together the great cutting hoop of the Cycler, two more stepped out, trailing flaccid lengths of hose behind them. Getting into position in the center of the platform, one of them turned and gave a hand signal. Almost at once the hoses swelled and a jet of water gushed from each, arching up into the ceiling of the great sphere. As the two men adjusted the nozzles of their hoses, the fountain of water was transformed into a fine mist that briefly seemed to fill the node.

It lasted only a minute or two, but when the water supply was cut, the node was clear of dust, though a dark paste now covered every surface.

Aitrus smiled. “If you ever wondered what we surveyors do most of the time, it’s this. Cleaning up!”

There was laughter.

“You talk as if you dislike the job, Aitrus,” Kedri said with a smile.

“Not at all. It gives me time to think.”

Kedri stared at him a moment, a thoughtful expression in his eyes, then he turned back, leaving Aitrus to wonder just what was going on inside the Legislator’s head.

THE FOUR OBSERVERS STEPPED OUT FROM THE
excavator, their movements slightly awkward in the unfamiliar protective suits Master Telanis had insisted they wear. Kedri, as ever, led the way, Aitrus at his side as they stepped over to the tunnel’s mouth.

The Cycler had done its job several times already and the cadets had already chipped out a section twenty spans in length and sprayed it with a coating of D’ni stone. Further down the tunnel, they could see the dark O of the central borehole running straight into the rock and, surrounding it like some strange, skeletal insect, the Cycler, encased in its translucent sheath.

Two brightly glowing fire-marbles the size of clenched fists were suspended from the ceiling. In their blazing blue-white light a number of cadets loaded rock onto a mobile trailer.

“This is more like it,” Kedri said, with an air of satisfaction. “This is just how I imagined it.”

They walked slowly toward the lamps. Surrounding them, the finished section of the tunnel had the look of permanence. Moving past the young guildsmen, they approached the rock face, stopping beneath the anchored feet of the Cycler.

They looked up, past the sleek engine of the Cycler to where its great revolving hoop was at rest against the face. The transparent sheath surrounding the Cycler was there to catch the excavated rock and channel it down into a chute that fed straight into the central borehole. From there the cadets would collect it up, using great suction hoses, and feed it into the pulverizer.

Kedri looked to Aitrus. “You remember your promise, Aitrus?”

“I have not forgotten.”

“Then what are we waiting for?”

Aitrus turned and signaled to his friend, Efanis, who was working nearby. At once, Efanis came across and, positioning himself at the controls of the Cycler, gave two long blasts on the machine’s siren.

Kedri made a face. “Yours must be the noisiest of guilds, young Aitrus. It seems you do nothing without a great blast of air beforehand!”

Aitrus smiled. It was true. If anyone was up there, they would surely hear them long before they broke through to the surface.

“If you would make sure your masks are kept down, Masters,” he said, looking from one to another. “It should be perfectly safe, but if the sheath was to be punctured your headgear should protect you.”

“Cautious,” Kedri muttered. “Ever cautious!”

Slowly the great cutting-hoop of the Cycler began to spin, slowly at first, then faster, at first only skimming the surface of the rock, whistling all the while. Then, abruptly, the whole top of the Cycler seemed to lean into the rock face, a great grinding buzz going up as if a thousand swarms of bees had all been released at once.

Chips of rock flew like hailstones against the clear, thick surface of the sheath. Slowly the arm of the Cycler raised on its hydraulics, moving toward the horizontal as the spinning cutting hoop bit deeper and deeper into the rock, carving its great O, like the outer rim of an archery target.

In less than three minutes it was done. Slowly the machine eased back, the hoop slipping from the rock, its surface steaming hot. As the Observers turned, four of the young Surveyors wheeled the great metal hoop of the brace down the tunnel toward them. They had seen already how it was mounted on the cutting hoop, then pushed into place.

So easy it seemed, yet every stage was fraught with dangers and difficulties.

As the guildsmen took over, removing the covering sheath and fitting the brace, Kedri and his fellows stood back out of their way. Only when they were finished and the brace was in place did Aitrus take them through, past the base of the Cycler and into the central borehole. It was darker here, but the piles of rock stood out against the light from outside.

Aitrus pointed to two machines that stood to one side. The first was recognizably the machine they used to gather up all the fragments of rock, a great suction hose coiling out from the squat, metallic sphere at its center. The second was small and squat, with what looked like a deep, wedge-shaped metal tray on top.

Ignoring the rock-gatherer, Aitrus stooped and, picking up one of the larger chunks of rock, handed it to Kedri. “Well, Guild Master? Do you want to feed the compounder?”

Kedri grinned and, taking the rock over to the machine, dropped it into the tray.

“What now?” he asked, looking to Aitrus.

In answer, Aitrus stepped up and pressed a button on the face of the fusion-compounder. At once a metal lid slid across over the tray. There was a low, grinding sound, and then the lid slid back. The tray was now empty.

“And the nara?”

Aitrus crouched and indicated a bulky red cylinder that rested in a mesh cage on the underside of the machine.

“The nara is kept in there,” Aitrus said, “in its basic, highly compacted form, until we need to use it.”

“But surely it would just … solidify!”

Aitrus nodded. “It does. The cylinder is just temporary; a kind of jacket used to mold the nara into a storable form. When we have enough of the nara, we load up another machine with the cylinders. In effect, that machine is little more than a large pressure-oven, operating at immensely high pressures, within which the cylinders are burned away and the nara brought back to a more volatile, and thus usable, state.”

“The sprayer, you mean?” Kedri said, staring at Aitrus in open astonishment.

Aitrus nodded.

Kedri crouched, staring at the bright red cylinder in awe, conscious of the immense power of these simple-seeming machines, then, like a schoolboy who has been briefly let off the leash, he straightened up and, looking about him, began to gather up rocks to feed into the machine.

THAT NIGHT MASTER TELANIS TOOK AITRUS ASIDE
once more.

“I hear our friends enjoyed themselves today. That was a good idea of yours to let them operate a few of the less dangerous machines. They’re bookish types, and such types are impressed by gadgetry. And who knows, even something this small may serve to sway them for the good.”

“Then you think it
is
good?”

“Making contact with the surface-dwellers?” Telanis smiled. “Yes. Just so long as it is done discreetly.”

Aitrus frowned. “How do you mean?”

“I mean, I do not think we should mix our race with theirs. Nor should we think of any extended relationship with them. They are likely, after all, to be a primitive race, and primitive races—as we have learned to our cost—tend to be warlike in nature. It would not do to have them pouring down our tunnels into D’ni.”

“But what kind of relationship does that leave us?”

Telanis shrugged, then. “We could go among them as Observers. That is, providing we are not too dissimilar from them as a species.”

“But why? What would we learn from doing that?”

“They might have certain cultural traits—artifacts and the like—that we might use. Or they might even have developed certain instruments or machines, though, personally, I find that most unlikely.”

“It seems, then, that Master Kedri is right after all, and that ours is something of a fool’s errand.”

Master Telanis sat forward, suddenly alert. “Are those his words?”

“Something like. It was something he was saying to one of the other Observers—Ja’ir, I think—as they were coming away from the rock face. Ja’ir was wondering aloud whether there was anyone up there on the surface anyway.”

“And?”

Aitrus paused, trying to recall the conversation. “Master Kedri was of the opinion that there would be. His view was that the climatic conditions are ideal for the development of an indigenous species.”

“And on what did he base this claim?”

“It seems that all four of them have seen copies of the Book.”

“The Book of Earth,” Telanis said, nodding thoughtfully. “It was written by Grand Master Ri’Neref himself, Aitrus, perhaps the greatest of the ancient Writers. Yet it is said that it was one he wrote as an apprentice.”

“So Master Kedri also claimed. Yet most troubling, perhaps, was what Master Ja’ir said next.”

Telanis’s eyes seemed to pierce Aitrus. “Go on.”

“Ja’ir said that whether there was a humanoid race up there on the surface or not, he nevertheless wondered whether so much time and effort ought to have been spent on such a speculative venture.”

“Speculative … he said speculative, did he?”

Aitrus nodded.

Master Telanis sat back and stared thoughtfully. For a while he did not speak, then, looking at Aitrus, he asked, “And what do you think, Aitrus? Is it worth it?”

“Yes, Guild Master. To know for certain that we are sharing a world with another intelligent species—that surely is worth twice the time and effort that we have given it!”