The Trilisk Supersedure (16 page)

Oh, of
course. It leaped from here. To…where?

Finally
her poor vision noticed a circular well in the floor instead of a grille.

An
entrance to the Trilisk tunnels.

Telisa
crawled all about until she found a spot where the Konuan before her had
landed. It
had
been a jump that broke the trail. She followed the line.
It had jumped here, and then…? Probably into the tunnel below. Telisa crawled
down to check. She put half her body down the well and walked around the rim.
She could smell it. This is where it had gone, into the Trilisk tunnels.

With a
shrug that could only be imagined, Telisa crawled over the edge of the well and
downward. Despite the smooth surface of the well, her legs stuck to the sides.
She moved over the metal without fear of falling.

The
tunnel below smelled very different to her Konuan feet. Clean and metallic.

Of
course. I smell through my feet. Sigh.

Her
gill flaps rustled.

I try
to sigh, and it causes this new body to breathe. I try to move forward and my
hundreds of legs just do it. It has all been connected in a way to minimize the
alien-ness of the transfer. Yet a change this radical remains profound. One can’t
be perfectly mapped from Terran to Konuan. It all just feels right. Masterful.

The
bottom of the well smoothly joined into a horizontal tunnel. Telisa followed
the trail onto the ceiling of the tunnel and crawled on. She slowed. A new
sensation had started to build. Some of her legs were not working. She felt
them clutching onto something instead. Many somethings. She held many tiny orbs
to her body with at least a dozen legs.

What
are those? Eggs? I don’t understand. This is less than masterful.

Telisa
tried to release one. She couldn’t quite force herself to let it go. She didn’t
want to let them go. Somehow the deposits had become so very
important.

Unbelievable.
I don’t understand my own physiology enough to even get by. It could be
dangerous. This could be a symptom of not breathing right, not eating,
drinking, even standing upside down too long.

Telisa
could not bring herself to drop anything so she simply walked on. A few more of
her legs became distracted by the tiny spheres.

They
have to be coming from me. This ceiling is utterly clean.

She
came to a three-way intersection of the tunnels. Staying on the ceiling, she
entered a triangular shaped space that joined the tunnels. There was a niche in
the three corners of the ceiling. Telisa was drawn to one of the tiny protected
spaces. She flowed over it, covering the depression with her body.

She
shook. Her legs spasmed. Telisa couldn’t think about anything; she just
was
for a moment. Then she focused on the smell of the spheres. Several of her legs
ticked out to tap the walls of the niche. Then she put one of the orbs there.
Somehow, it stuck to the wall.

Then
she placed another, and another.

Well,
at least I know what to do with them now. Less to carry…Five Entities.

Her
legs started to work rapidly. More and more of the tiny modules became affixed
to the surfaces of the niche as she worked. Time became meaningless. Finally
she seemed to come back into focus.

I can
move away now.

She
flowed forward from the niche, then turned about to take a look. Her eyesight
was poor, but it looked like she had deposited at least a hundred little black
nodules, maybe more.

If this
is what my life has become, I’m not going to be sane much longer.

She
attempted to dispel the negative thoughts.

I’m
going to get help. Shiny could help. Or I can figure out that Trilisk platform
and get back to my regular self.

Telisa
found the trail again and continued. She had to be following a chemical trail
like an ant following a predecessor. The trails would help her to find another
Konuan. But now she wondered: Did she really want to find the one that hunted
them? Wouldn’t it be deadly? Or did it only kill Terrans?

If I
can follow it, then it can follow me. If it finds those egg-things, it might
fertilize them. Or maybe they are clones of me. Or maybe they are just chunks
of excrement. This is miserable.

Telisa
left the intersection on the trail and left by another corridor. It was long
and straight like the last one. The trail started out in parallel with the
tunnel on the ceiling, but after some distance, which was hard for Telisa to
estimate, it veered left.

Telisa
noticed something. A tiny crack. She would have missed it as a Terran. To a
Konuan, it was like a canyon. As soon as she started to crawl across it, she
could feel it there.

Why did
the tunnel have a seam? An artifact of modular construction?

No.
Trilisk stuff is made perfectly, designed down to the molecular level. No such
thing as an accidental or incidental seam in their work. It’s a doorway.

She
searched the large square panel that curved with the surface of the cylindrical
tunnel. There were no buttons or levers. Only the perfect seam around the
entire perimeter.

Open?

The
panel started to slide open. Telisa hopped off it instantly in a startled
reaction.

Wow. I’m
fast.

She
felt elation that the panel had opened to her mere mental command. Either that,
or something else had opened it…Telisa listened. The sound of the mechanism
sliding the door was like thunder to her fine hearing. She looked through the
doorway. She saw a small passageway leading into a hidden room. Telisa hopped
through and landed on the wall as naturally as a Terran would have strode
through on the smooth black floor.

The
room beyond looked like a space force armory. A dozen rifles leaned against the
wall. Bins of grenades. Five battle suits. Pieces of military robots.
Explosives.

This is
an incredible pile of tech. If this was gathered by the Konuan, it’s no
primitive.

Backdropped
against it all, a large column extended from floor to ceiling. It looked out of
place in the cubical room with grilles on each wall.

Trilisk.
Jackpot!

Telisa
scurried right up to it, then onto its surface almost without thinking. She
felt the smooth surface with her surface-clinging legs. Her claw legs tapped it
gently, feeling everything under the two square meters of her body surface.

This is
creepy how fast I’m getting used to crawling all over everything.

Telisa
crawled around it full circle in the space of a second.

I want
to be myself again,
Telisa thought. Nothing happened. Is anything
there?
I want to switch back.

Her
desires were ignored. But she felt another crack in the surface under her feet.

Open.

The
casing of the column started to drop. Telisa hopped aside effortlessly and
watched from a nearby wall. Her dim vision showed her the column opened to
reveal a workspace within. She immediately found a small screwdriver-shaped
tool sitting on a flat surface in one of her arm lights. She hopped into the
column and took a closer look.

The
craftsmanship was perfect. It was shiny. It looked to be made of plastic and
metal. It was very flat. Tiny loops of metal decorated its sides.

Wait a
moment. It’s so very flat. And those loops…

Telisa
walked over it. She slid six legs through the loops and pulled it flush with
her belly.

Fits
like a glove! This is a Konuan tool. But it’s so much more advanced than a
sword or a simple mechanical device. It could even be beyond Terran technology.

She
carefully moved the wand to one corner of her body so both ends pointed off
away from her. Then half a dozen of her legs moved over its surface.

It has
no manual controls. It must use a link of some kind. But I have no link.

Telisa
felt immense frustration.
Why would I be put into this body without my link?
Wouldn’t inter-body travelers need their cybernetic enhancements to come with
them?
Yet here she was, helpless in so many ways. Trapped in body she
couldn’t understand yet had some almost instinctual ability to operate, but
without any means of interfacing electronically with anything advanced. She
crawled about the space again, looking for more tools or hints as to what the
owner did inside the column.

I want
a link. I need to be able to interface with these things
, she
thought. Nothing happened. If a prayer device was active, it had been set to
ignore her pleas.

The
other Konuan has a link or something like it.
It makes no sense. Has that creature actually
advanced itself from early industrial age to this all by itself? Or was it a
servant or slave of the Trilisks? How is it still alive? What does it want? And
if it finds me here, is it going to kill me?

Chapter 15

Cilreth
had the last load of cases loaded onto the four scout robots she had gathered.
The tiny convoy headed back to the ship at her command as Chigran’s star
lightened the eastern horizon.

“Magnus?
Telisa? Shiny?” she transmitted. No answer. “What the hell am I gonna do if no
one shows up? Take off in the
Clacker
by myself?”

She
sighed. Then the opposite thought struck her: What would she do if a lot of
people showed up? Magnus had said the UED might be coming for the Clacker.
There had been yesterday’s huge cloud in the distance and the sound of thunder
like a bomb. Should she lock herself inside? The Vovokan vessel was so advanced;
maybe they would not be able to get in.

Right
about now she wished she had grabbed those pills at the criminal’s compound.
With a thousand or so of those, she might be able to forget about everything
for a while.

Cilreth
wondered how long she had before the UED showed up. But she did not want to
leave. She wanted to get her friends out of trouble. How could she help Magnus
and Telisa?

Well,
the bad guys already know we’re here,
she thought. Telisa had gone
down into one of the Trilisk tunnels. They hadn’t taken time to map them yet.
Yet. The
Clacker
could probably perform the scan…or she might be able to
accomplish it right here. She asked the cases for inventory. One of them had a
seismic analyzer.

Cilreth
dug out the analyzer and pulled it from its case. It was a tall,
hourglass-shaped metal cylinder with a flat black top and bottom. The curved
parts in the middle were silver. Her link found its activation service. She
turned it on with a thought and placed it on the ground. It didn’t sit very
well on the ragged rocks. She went to the nearest plant and shined a light down
into its fissure. There among the roots she saw soft black soil. A few
scuttling creatures ran from her light.

“Wonderful,”
she said to herself. She dropped to the ground and put the device into the
fissure. She had to put her entire arm deep into the hole to place it. She
closed her eyes and pushed it into the soft dirt. Then it was over. She
snatched her arm back up and rolled away from the rocky opening.

I hope
no one is listening.

The
machine sent out impulses into the ground from the plant well. The resulting
scan was fuzzy but good enough to take a peek. Tunnels crisscrossed the area
about eight meters under the surface. Cilreth focused on the building where she
and Telisa had gotten separated.

The
tunnel below branched in three directions. Cilreth decided she had no way to
know which way Telisa went, not with the jamming going on. But assuming Telisa
had the presence of mind to run towards the
Clacker
, she might have
taken the tunnel leading…almost below her current camp. Cilreth followed the
tunnel further. The next intersection was a building not far from the camp.

And it’s
toward the Clacker.

Cilreth
ordered the scout robots to resume carrying the load back toward the ship. She
walked alongside them, carrying two cases herself. Then she set the cases down
to check her weapons. She thought of the thing again: fast, deadly.

“I’m no
match for that thing. Next mission we need fighting machines,” she vowed. But
she knew she still had her stealth suit. And it had worked to get her away
alive once.

“What
now?” she asked herself aloud.

Hmm.
Maybe Telisa didn’t go far. I could look for her down there. Or her blood. Oh,
by the Entities, I don’t want to find her body.

Cilreth
fidgeted with her stunner. Then she drew her machete.

“I’ll
never hit the bastard with this,” she said. What other weapons did they have?
Pistols, stunners, lasers, grenades, and swords. The thing was fast, so light, handheld
weapons were the only thing she might hit with…unless….