Part 40 (1/2)
”I'm not sure. Let me think.” She tried to raise her esp, and couldn't. The sheer alienness of the city was overpowering. ”I thought I saw something moving, just on the edge of my vision. Down that way.”
The marines looked where she indicated, and then looked at each other.
”It could be anything,” said Corbie.
”Probably nothing,” said Lindholm.
”No point in putting ourselves at risk.”
”We're just a scouting party. The Captain said so.”
”Even if there is something there, it could be leading us into a trap.”
”Yeah. Let's go after it.”
”Right.”
They grinned at each other, and started off down the street. They'd given it enough time to get away, if it was just an animal. On the other hand, if it wanted them to follow it, it would still be there, waiting for them. DeChance hurried along beside them, her eyes fixed on the spot where she thought the movement had been. It turned out to be a street intersection. They stopped and looked around them. There was no sign of any living thing, but far down on the right-hand side of the street, a huge metallic door was slowly closing. DeChance and the marines moved silently towards it, guns at the ready. The door was firmly shut by the time they got there, and the featureless metal had no handle or obvious locking mechanism. Corbie blasted it open with his disrupter. The torn metal door was blown inwards by the impact. Lindholm quickly moved forward to take the point until Corbie's gun had recharged, and then one by one they stepped cautiously through the doorway.
Oval panels set into the high ceiling glowed varying shades of red, none of them very bright. The walls were a complex latticework of glistening metallic threads. Dark nodes hung in cl.u.s.ters here and there on the latticework, grouped in no discernible pattern. Ma.s.sive, hulking alien machinery jutted from the walls and floor and ceiling. No one machine looked like any other, but they were all covered with kaleidoscopic displays of lights that hurt the eyes if stared at too long. The lights flickered on and off at irregular intervals, but there was no other sign to show how or why the machines were working. A low, almost sub-audible hum permeated the air, which had a tense, static feel.
”What the h.e.l.l is this place?” said Lindholm.
”Beats me,” said Corbie. ”But it must be important if the machines here are still working, long after everything else has shut down. Look how clean and immaculate it is in here. The rest of the city looks like it's been deserted for centuries, but as far as these machines are concerned their operators could just have stepped outside for a moment and left things running till they got back.”
”Centuries . . . ,” said Lindholm. ”Could they really have been running all that time, unattended?”
”I don't know. Maybe. I've got a bad feeling about this place, Sven. Let's get out of here. Now.”
”Wait a minute, Russ.” Lindholm looked at DeChance. ”What do you think, esper? Can you tell us anything about this place?”
DeChance shook her head. ”My esp's almost useless here. It's all too alien. My mind could get lost in all this. I'm an esper, not an Investigator. Krystel might be able to make something of these machines, but they're beyond me. Could you take one of them apart and see what makes it hum?”
”Not without the right equipment,” said Corbie. ”And even then I'd be very reluctant to meddle with anything here. I'd hate to get one of these things doing something and then find I couldn't turn it off.
Besides, I don't think I like the look of them. Sven . . .”
”Yeah, I know. You think we're being watched. I'm starting to feel that way too. It's up to you, esper.
You're in charge. Do we leave, or go on?”
DeChance scowled unhappily. Without her esp to back her up, she felt blind and deaf. If they went on and there was something lying in wait for them, they could end up in real trouble. On the other hand, they couldn't afford to overlook the first sign of life they'd found. She hesitated for a long moment, torn by indecision. What would the Captain do? That thought calmed her a little. She knew what he'd do.
”I think we should check this place out,” she said evenly. ”Look for a door, or stairs, or something.”
They made their way gingerly through the hulking alien machinery, careful not to touch anything. The constant humming of the machines hovered persistently at the edge of their hearing, like an itch they couldn't scratch. Corbie glared at the machines, and thought fleetingly that it might be fun to blast one or two of them with his disrupter, just to see what would happen. He'd never cared much for mysteries. He always liked to know what was going on and where he stood. If only so that he could set about turning things to his own advantage. He looked round quickly as Lindholm hissed to him. The big marine was standing before an open doorway in the far wall.
”Where the h.e.l.l did that come from?” said Corbie quietly.
”Beats me,” said Lindholm. ”I'd swear it wasn't here a minute ago. Maybe we hit the opening mechanism by accident.”
”Yeah. Maybe.” Corbie scowled at the opening. It was dark and gloomy in the room beyond, and the pale rosy light from the machine room didn't seem to penetrate far.
Lindholm moved forward slowly, his disrupter held out before him. Corbie kept close behind him.
DeChance stayed where she was. Lindholm stepped quickly through the doorway in one smooth motion, his disrupter sweeping back and forth as he looked around him for a target. A wide-open room lay spread out before him, empty and abandoned. The walls were bare and featureless, and the high ceiling was lost in shadows. Lindholm slowly lowered his gun and walked forward into the room. Corbie and DeChance went in after him.
”Cheerful-looking place,” said Corbie. ”I take it you've noticed there are no other doorways in here?
What happens if the door we just came through decides to disappear again?”
”Then you get to blow a hole in the wall. DeChance, are you all right?”
The marines moved a step closer to the esper as she swayed unsteadily on her feet. Her face was ghostly pale in the dim light, her eyes fixed and staring.
”I can hear them,” she said faintly. ”I can feel them, all around us. They're waking up.”
”Who are?”
”They're waking up,” said DeChance. ”They're coming for us. They want what makes us sane.”
CHAPTER FOUR.
The Alien ”If we're going to set a trap,” said Investigator Krystel, ”I have to be the bait. No offence, Captain, but I'm most likely to survive if something goes wrong.”
”You'll get no argument from me,” said Hunter. ”I've seen an Investigator in action before.”
”From a distance, I trust,” said Krystel.
”Of course,” said Hunter. ”I'm still here, aren't I?”
Krystel smiled fleetingly and looked round the large open square they'd chosen as the setting for their trap. Jagged metallic buildings stood side by side with squat stone monoliths and intricate structures of spiked gla.s.s. There were only three entrances to the square, one of which was blocked with a high wall of rubble from a derelict building. There was no sign to show why the building had collapsed, and its neighbours seemed unaffected. Krystel eased her sword in its scabbard, and checked the power level on her force s.h.i.+eld. Everything was ready. All they had to do now was bait the trap and stand ready to spring it.
It should work; it was simple and straightforward. Hunter and Williams would leave the square, making a great deal of noise as they did so, and then circle quietly back, staying under cover all the way. Krystel, on the other hand, would take her ease in the middle of the square, and wait to see if anything came to join her. Simple and straightforward. Krystel believed in being direct and to the point whenever possible.
The more complicated a plan was, the more chances there were for something to go wrong. Besides, they were working against a deadline. They had only three hours or so before night fell, and none of them wanted to be caught in the city after dark. The city might be deserted, but its ghosts didn't feel at all friendly.
Hunter and Williams made loud good-byes, and left the square together. It seemed very quiet with them gone. Krystel walked over to the wall of rubble, sat down on a comfortable-looking stone slab, and took a cigar stub out of her pocket. She took her time about lighting it, trying hard to give the impression of being completely relaxed and at ease. Normally, she'd have thrown away a stub this small, but she'd nearly finished the pack she'd brought with her. Waste not, want not, as her mother used to say. Krystel drew her sword, took a piece of rag from the top of her boot, and polished the blade with long, easy strokes. The familiar ritual was quietly soothing. When the job was done, she put the piece of rag away and sat with the sword lying flat across her thighs. It was a good blade. A claymore, handed down through three generations of her family. She hoped she'd brought no dishonour to the sword, though sometimes she wasn't sure. An Investigator's work was like that, mostly.
She wondered idly what she'd be facing when the time came. The scale of the buildings meant it would be big, probably around nine to ten feet tall. She remembered the statues from the plain, frowned slightly, and then shrugged. It didn't matter. Whatever it was, she could handle it. She was an Investigator.
She sat up straight suddenly. A faint repet.i.tive sound came clearly to her on the quiet. She looked quickly around her, but there was no trace of any movement, and she couldn't place which direction the sound was coming from. Krystel stubbed out her cigar and put what was left of it back in her pocket for later. She stood up, sword and disrupter in hand, and slapped her left wrist against her side. The glowing force s.h.i.+eld appeared on her arm. She stood waiting, confident and ready, checking out possible cover and escape routes. Whatever was coming sounded large and heavy and determined, but the sounds echoed round and round the square until she couldn't tell where they originated. Captain Hunter and Dr.
Williams should be somewhere close at hand by now, but she knew she couldn't afford to depend on them. The sound was drawing nearer. A long, wailing howl suddenly broke the silence, shrill and powerful and horribly angry. Krystel's hackles rose sharply. Something about the awful sound touched her deeply on some basic, primitive level, and she felt a sudden impulse to turn and run until she'd left the alien city far behind her. She crushed the thought ruthlessly. She was an Investigator, and it was just another alien.
Investigators killed aliens. That was their function, their reason for being.