14

By late afternoon Merral, feeling hot and increasingly thirsty, decided to try and distract himself. He turned to Vero, who still had his jacket over his head. “Let me ask you what you now think these creatures are.” “Ah. As you know, I have had a number of theories. I make the total five. One theory has been destroyed over these last two days. Namely, that the whole thing was a collective psychosis.”

Merral tapped his bandaged ankle gently. “I have evidence that renders that untenable.”

“Rather a shame. It was the easiest view to hold.” There was a thoughtful pause. “Theory two was that it was a direct incursion of the demonic. Obviously, we have little data on how that might occur. . . .” He paused. “But did you feel it was a demon you grappled with this morning?”

Merral thought about what he had seen and felt in those terrible few minutes. “No, I don’t believe you can kill demons with a bush knife. But, having said that . . .” He stopped, finding himself unable to continue for some moments. “Having said that, I felt in some way that that cockroach-beast was more than an organism. I felt there was anger in its actions, even hatred. Evil.” Merral caught a sympathetic nod of agreement from his companion and went on. “I cannot express it,” he added. “Not yet. Ask me again after the memory fades.”

And, for a few moments, Merral sat still, staring at his shadow on the baking black rock and trying to put out of his mind the weird jumping motion, the sound of the plates clicking together, the hateful organic smell, and those staring, bottomless, tarlike eyes.

Vero spoke suddenly, seeming to choose his words carefully. “I agree. It’s all too tangible. But I share your hesitation; there are some strange effects. Something has come into the worlds. I hope we can get it out. Or that, at least, it will not spread . . .” He tailed off midspeech, his face full of unspoken worries.

He slid over to the cliff edge, peered over carefully for a few moments, and then slid back. “Still under the tree.” Then he leaned back gently, putting his hands behind his head, and stared up at the sky. “So we scrub theories one and two. Now theory three is that these are aliens. We are, after all, on the edge of the Assembly. ‘Worlds’ End’ and all that. A thought which must have struck you?”

“Indeed, and been rejected,” Merral replied. “These creatures do not seem to me to be alien. Certainly not the ape-creatures. And all our experience is that the probability of intelligent alien life is very small. That Earth stayed stable long enough for such life to develop has always been assumed to be a direct work of God. And, of course, despite claims, we have never found anything more than simple algae or bacteria. And no alien artifacts or signals.” He paused. “At least such was the confident view I was taught. But my confidence is being eroded right now.”

Vero, still staring upward, nodded. “I agree. We may have become too confident. But I can’t see these things as alien. The DNA evidence seems against that too.”

“No. Not aliens. They are simply not alien enough. Which leaves you where?”

“With two related possibilities. Either theory four . . .” Vero shaded his eyes a moment. “Funny buzzards you have in your world. I’ve been watching this one for a bit.”

“Probably the same one I saw earlier. But go on.”

“Ah yes, theory four. Here we have a genetic mutation of humanity. More precisely, two mutations. Natural events occurring due to some accelerated biological process; a supercharged evolution.”

Merral’s answer came slowly. “No, again. All we have here is microevolution, the same as you have. Some of it pretty dramatic, but it is limited. Yes, we have new species, but they are recognizably related to what was imported here. Variation on places like Farholme is about what you would expect for a world with new niches. That buzzard you are watching is probably a living example. That strange flight pattern is probably because it’s moving slowly into a new niche. Another hundred generations and it will probably be more like a condor. And, as you know, human genetic change here, while it occurs, is slight. But these things . . .” He hesitated, wondering how to express his feelings. “These monstrosities would be a major jump—or a series of major jumps—beyond anything we can imagine. Anyway, the whole Assembly would hear and mourn if any parent here produced an ape-creature or a cockroach-beast as offspring. A truly horrible thought. Try me with your last one.”

Vero was shading his eyes again and squinting as he looked upward at the buzzard. “Hmm. Strange how he keeps the sun close enough behind him. Yes, theory five is similar, but says that these things are deliberately gene-engineered.”

“What?!” Merral could hardly contain himself. “That we have produced these things?”

“Well, that someone has.” Vero had shifted his gaze sideways so he could look directly at Merral. “This is my preferred option. Reluctantly.”

Indignation and unbelief seemed to flood into Merral’s mind at once. “But that,” he protested loudly, “is totally against everything the Technology Protocols allow. Gene-engineering up to plants—if needed—is allowed. But no further. That’s enough. That’s about the most fundamental breach possible. I mean, we were upset enough about modifying a long-dead human voice, but that is nothing. Nothing at all in comparison.”

“Ah. . . .” Vero’s voice had a sharp edge to it. “You too made the link. How interesting. This is one reason why I was trying not to feed you with my ideas.”

“The link?”

“Between altering a re-created voice and genetic manipulation of human cells.”

“Oh, there is no link!” Merral felt himself getting irritated. “Your overactive sentinel imagination!”

“Sorry. I’m not saying your uncle did this, too. But—what shall we say?—a spiritual climate in which one can happen is a climate in which the other can happen. Both are rebellion.”

Merral could merely shake his head. “The idea that anyone could create that fiendish creature that attacked us is beyond me. Why?”

“It may have advantages that we do not have.” Vero rolled over so he could face upward again. “For instan—wait a minute!” His voice sharpened and he froze. “Oh, the idiots we are!”

Something’s up, Merral realized. But what?

“I wish I hadn’t left my pack,” Vero announced suddenly in a voice that was oddly louder than normal. He turned sideways to face Merral and began whispering with exaggerated lip movements. “I think the bird is not right. A mechanical observer of some sort. Pretend to have a conversation with me and take a look.”

It took Merral a second or two for the bizarre concept to be understood.

“It’s not your fault, Vero,” he said loudly as he looked upward, narrowing his eyes against the brightness of the sky. “We needed to make a quick getaway, so it was quite reasonable.”

He looked at the bird out of the corner of his eye. Yes, Vero was right. There was something wrong about it. It wasn’t that it was a buzzard practicing to be something else. It was something else pretending to be a buzzard.

Vero was speaking. “Yes, but I shouldn’t have left the water.”

Merral made his mind up; all the evidence fit. He rolled over and looked at Vero. “You are quite right,” he whispered. “I should have spotted it.”

“It’s called surveillance, and we don’t want it,” Vero muttered between clenched teeth. “Any ideas how we remove it?”

Over the next few minutes, in quiet asides interjected into a loud conversation about why, and why not, they should have left the pack, they plotted how they should get rid of the circling watcher above them.

“Right,” announced Vero. “I’m going to see if I can get any more decent images of the ape-creatures below.”

“Fine, a good idea. I shall sit here and save my energy.”

As Vero walked over, peered over the margin of the cliff, and toyed with his diary, Merral leaned back next to the tiny pile of weapons and looked upward at the sky.

The bird drifted over Vero.

Still staring upward, Merral reached out slowly until his fingers wrapped around a flare tube. The bird seemed preoccupied with Vero and slowly descended to within four or five meters of him. Without looking at what he held in his hand, Merral rotated the two setting rings to give the shortest range and the maximum intensity. The flare wouldn’t last for a long time, but it might be enough. If he was accurate.

One-handed, he pulled off the tab that protected the firing button.

“Hey, Merral!” Vero shouted, walking toward him, “wait until you see this.”

Vero came over with his diary and put it down next to Merral, who rolled over as if to look at what his friend had in his hand.

“Ready?” whispered Vero.

“Yes.”

Still staring in apparent fascination at the screen, Merral held onto the flare, carefully avoiding the recessed button. He listened until he was sure that he could hear the gentle sound of slow wing beats and see, faintly reflected on the polished screen, an image of the circling bird.

Suddenly, Merral rolled over, swung up the flare tube, aimed it, and pressed the firing button.

There was a brief, ear-piercing screech as the flare shot up, a brilliant flash of silver light, and a simultaneous bang.

As Merral leapt to his feet, he heard a falling, fluttering sound that ended in a gentle thud as the bird struck the rock nearby.

Vero bounded over and put a foot on its neck. The bird writhed and flapped; he twisted his foot sharply and the creature became still.

Vero bent down, picked up the buzzard by its wingtip, and dropped it on the rock at Merral’s feet. It lay there as a curiously stiff, broken mass of brown feathers with no hint of motion.

“Pooh! It smells!” Vero said, wrinkling his nose. He bent over the bird and began poking it tentatively with a tiny pocketknife. As he did, Merral caught sight of a fine silver tracery that glinted in the sun.

“You see,” Vero stated in flat, almost numbed tones, “it is a machine imitating something. A simulacrum.” He looked sharply at Merral. “I presume this the first thing of its kind you have seen?”

“Of course! I have never dreamed of such a thing. The Technology Protocols forbid it. All our machines proclaim that they are machines.”

“As throughout the Assembly. Since that far-off year of 2110 when the Rebellion ended.” There was a strange, grim satisfaction in his voice.

Merral swallowed, squatted down, and looked in wonder and puzzlement at the creature. True, there were feathers and claws. But the beak was fixed half open, the eyes were empty holes, and beneath the vacant sockets was a pair of tiny, glinting lenses that ran back into wires.

Vero, who had been prodding gently with his knife, abruptly paused and muttered. Then he poked again. “An odd technology. Very odd. Look!”

Merral peered closer, seeing where Vero had stripped off a part of the skin and feathers and exposed a filigree of delicate silver wires wrapped over a gray substance in which thin white tubes were embedded. An unpleasant, rotting smell came from somewhere.

Vero glanced up at Merral with a worried expression. “It’s not at all what I expected. There are bits of dead bird here.”

“Dead?” Merral asked, suddenly aware where the foul odor was coming from.

He stared at the bird, catching sight of a tiny wisp of smoke. “Look out!”

There was a tiny crackling sound and a burst of yellow flame began to play around the body. Vero and Merral hurriedly stepped back as a black-edged golden flame flickered rapidly over the body, giving a cloud of acrid stinking smoke that twisted upward.

Flapping away the smoke with disgust, Merral stared at Vero. “What happened? Did you short-circuit it?”

“No. I don’t think so.” He looked thoughtfully at the fire, which was already sputtering out. “I think it was a mechanism to prevent us from taking it away and analyzing it.”

“So they have clever machines, too. Do we have the power to do this?”

Vero was staring at where the abating flames were revealing a blackened skeleton over which melted wires drooped. “Extraordinary, quite extraordinary,” he muttered, a great disgust evident in his tones. “The power? Maybe. The desire? Thank God, no. Disguise has never been our way. And to do it by using a dead bird? That is something very strange. No, far worse than strange. . . .” He tailed off.

“Well spotted,” commented Merral, “I thought it was odd. It has been watching us for some time?”

“Yes. Probably listening, too. But good shooting on your part. You got the wing.”

“I stunned it. I suppose it was that odd owl we saw.”

“Yes.” Vero nodded, still staring at the pile of wire and bone. “We should have realized it wasn’t flesh and blood when we couldn’t pick it up on the infrared.”

“Of course.”

Vero scratched his chin. “And what was the power source? I saw no fuel or energy cells. Odd.”

Then he stood up and turned to Merral. “This bird thing is, it seems to me, every bit as significant as the other creatures. But a discussion about what it portends must wait. We must get a message out. Our own safety—even our survival—is quite immaterial.”

Merral looked at him and realized that he was perfectly serious. Then, as he thought about what they had encountered that day, he realized that Vero’s judgment was right. “I agree, reluctantly. The message must get out. That is all that matters.”

Vero reached out and patted his arm. “Thank you for your support. Now we have only limited time. In under three hours or so the light will begin to go. Let us think through our options. We might be able to make a run for it now, down the other side and through the woods. How well can you walk?”

“I suspect short distances. But I am unenthusiastic. We might have to walk a long way for a diary to work. Possibly Herrandown, in fact. Not an easy task with enemies at our heels.”

Vero frowned. “Well, it was one idea. Perhaps we must just hope that Anya realizes there is a problem when she calls us.”

Then he sat down and fell silent.

At five o’clock they divided the last of the water, had some food, and for the fiftieth time tried—and failed—to send a signal out. Then they returned to watching, Vero taking the west side of the plateau and Merral the east.

Merral, wishing, among many things, that they had more water, sat dry-mouthed near the edge of the cliff, moving forward every few minutes and peering down to the trees. There the three dark figures continued their seated vigil, and only the occasional slight movement revealed that they were not statues. The lower angle of the late-afternoon sun had enlarged their shadows and somehow seemed to increase their menace. As he stared at them, an alarming thought struck.

He rolled back away and walked slowly over the hot rock to the other side of the summit where Vero was squatting down, peering over the edge. Vero glanced back at him and gestured him down with an unmistakable urgency.

Merral’s heart sank. He dropped to his knees and crawled alongside his friend.

Vero grimaced. “Well, we don’t have to worry about making a run for it down here. Look.”

Merral carefully looked down. Here, too, the sheer cliff face ended in a long, bare rock scree which, amid more large tumbled boulders, ran down under dense trees. Now, in the shadows of the trees and the boulders, five large figures were standing still, like distorted and blackened imitations of humanity. At their feet, equally immovable, half a dozen smaller, brown figures were clustered. Although they were too far away for him to be certain, and he was squinting against the light, the indelible impression Merral had was that all of them were staring up at the cliff.

For a moment, Merral could say little, so great was the internal turmoil this scene caused him. A part of him, detached from the cold waves and billows of emotion that buffeted him, was able to recognize that he was again deeply afraid. What I am feeling today is true fear. What I have only read about before, I now experience. This time, though, he knew it was different; with the cockroach-beast he had been scared, but he had had no time to think about his emotions; he had to act. Now, I have fear and cannot act, and I can feel the fear seeping into my mind and corroding my thinking. But, even as he thought this, another part of his mind intruded and said that he must think, and that now was not the time for analysis of his feelings.

He swallowed. “Yes. Interesting. Eight ape-creatures and six cockroach-beasts. I don’t suppose sentinel training gives you any idea what to do next?”

“No,” Vero muttered. “Not at all. The vision Jorgio had seems the best guide here: watch, stand firm, and hope. And, at the last, to die well and take as many with you as you can.”

“I hate to add trouble to trouble, but before long, perhaps ten minutes or so, my side of the hill will be in total shadow.”

“Shadow!” Vero winced. “I had forgotten. They might prefer that to darkness. I was hoping for another hour or two at least. What a mess we are in!”

“Perhaps we can hold them off until tomorrow with stones.”

“Perhaps. Would they see one of these flares from space?”

“If they knew where to look they would see one. But if they knew where to look they wouldn’t need a flare.”

“We need a bigger flare, then.” Vero screwed his eyes up. “Wait! There may be a way. If I can remember—”

“Listen!” Merral interrupted, as from over the eastern side of the hill came the faintest rattle of stone on stone.

They ran to the edge. Below, in the darkness of the ravine they had come up, two of the dark ape-creatures were climbing up with smooth, confident moves, their arms and feet working together in a powerful and coordinated motion.

Without hesitation, Merral picked a brick-sized basalt fragment and hurled it down. It hit the wall just above the head of the leading ape-creature and shattered. There was an angry rumbling growl, and the creature paused in its ascent and looked up.

They were separated by no more than twenty meters, and Merral could see the face clearly despite the shadows. It seemed to him that, despite its flattened appearance, the face was more human than ape. The large brown eyes seemed to stare at him, and Merral decided that if the face conveyed any emotion at all, it was of a cold intelligence and a determined and calculating hatred. He knew with absolute certainty that it was useless to try to communicate with this creature.

“Throw another!” cried Vero, letting fly with a rock himself. This, however, was way off target and clattered away harmlessly down the ravine.

Merral looked around and found, a few strides away, a large rock slab, the size of a kitchen tabletop but thicker.

“Quick, Vero, help me push this.”

Together they tugged and heaved until the slab was at the cliff edge. Then, putting their shoulders to it, they pushed until it started to hang over the edge.

From below came a high-pitched series of wordless squeals and grunts that conveyed alarm. Merral pushed and suddenly the block began to wobble. He pushed again and the rock fell over the edge.

There was a series of booming and echoing crashes as the slab fell and bounced down the cliff. They peered over the edge in time to see it displace other rocks and cannonade down the gloom of the ravine in a gathering tumult of fragments. At the bottom of the cliff, the debris cloud exploded outward down the scree in a turbulent dark cloud of fragments. Stray rocks could be seen careening clear of the debris flow and bouncing up into the trees.

Then the rising dust cloud covered their view.

“Very satisfactory,” Vero announced in admiring tones, as the sound of crashing and clattering blocks died away.

Merral, nonplussed at the effect of combining one large rock, gravity, and a fifty-meter drop, said nothing. What have I maimed and injured now?

As if in answer to his question, a howl of agony came from below. Although there were no words, it seemed to Merral that it conveyed an intelligence greater than any animal had. He shivered.

Slowly, the dust died away and they could see one creature standing at the edge of the trees apparently unharmed, while another sat nearby nursing a bloodied and useless arm. Of the third, nothing could be seen until Vero pointed out a red smear under a gray block of rock.

“One ape-creature and a cockroach-beast dead so far. Another wounded.” Vero’s voice was dry.

“Ugh! You make it sound like a sport that way.”

“Unintentionally. But men once did, you know.”

“I know. ‘Saul has killed his thousands, David his ten thousands.’ But that was another age of the world, Vero. I do not rejoice. I am answerable to their maker for those that I have killed.”

Vero bowed his head slightly. “I am rebuked by your sensitivity. But I do not think that you will stand in judgment before their maker.”

“You mean . . . ?”

“Simply, I do not believe that God alone made them. I believe their maker may have far more to answer for at the Final Judgment than you.”

“You may be right,” Merral said, wondering whether that diminished the magnitude of his killing them. “May the Most High grant us the leisure and security to debate the point further. But how do things stand now?”

“Well, this side now seems to me much less climbable than it was.”

Merral looked down. Sure enough, the top part of the ravine was now cleared of boulders and was vertical for the last ten meters.

Vero rubbed his face with his hands. “Now, it has come to me that there is a slight hope. But only a slight one and it is fraught with problems.”

“Go on.”

Vero tapped a finger on his diary. “Do you realize how much energy these things use in the ten years between energy cell replacement?”

“No. A lot, though.”

“Yes. Well, there is a way of realizing it all, of venting it all in a few milliseconds.”

“You’d have an awesome explosion. I’ve never heard that.”

“I was told it was the fourth best-kept secret in the Assembly.”

“The other three are?”

“I don’t know. The third is probably what the first two are.” Vero’s face twisted into a grin and Merral had to laugh.

“The results are spectacular?”

“So it’s claimed. Mostly visible light, but a lot of electromagnetic wavelengths get a hefty kick. I was told you could see it on the moon. If you did it on Ancient Earth, that is.” He paused, stroking his diary thoughtfully. “Non-nuclear. Just. I think that’s what they said.”

“You think?”

“Well,” he sounded embarrassed, “the whole technique was given as a sort of passing comment at the end of a lecture. A piece of curious information. Any brighter ideas?”

“No.”

“Well, I’ll try it. It will take some time to do. It’s not an easy trick. For obvious reasons.”

“So I would hope.”

“Quite. Now, Merral, if I may, can I download all my data onto your machine? I wonder if you could check the other side. Just in case they try the same trick.”

Merral handed over his diary, and as Vero made the orders for a full data download to be made, he went over to the western side and peered into the gathering shadows, trying to see if there was any change in the positions of the ape-creatures and cockroach-beasts. Unnervingly, they were standing in silence exactly as he had last seen them. In frustration—and was it also fear?—he threw a block of rock at them, but it fell short and clattered away into the trees with no effect.

He returned to Vero.

“Still there and still out of range. But what’s your plan?”

Vero looked up, his eyes showing tiredness. “We need to wait for darkness so we can guarantee being seen. If I can trigger the reaction, we will have a short delay. We find a spot where the energy can be channeled upward. Then, we get down onto that ledge at the south end. Put our fingers in our ears and, well—let it go. Hopefully, one of your satellites will notice a firework that size. You think so?”

“If it is as big as you say, I should think so. We are always on the alert for forest fires or volcanic eruptions. The Northern Menaya Monitor will pick it up unless it’s helping Perena watch the rift volcanics. But will they act on it?”

“Ah. A key point. Will they?”

“They may send someone over.”

There was a silence and Vero looked doubtful.

He knows, thought Merral, as I know, that it probably will not be enough. But as he considered Vero’s suggestion, an idea came to him.

“There might be a way of making it of more benefit to us,” he suggested.

Vero raised an eyebrow. “How so?”

“If the model you proposed for their interception of our signals is correct, then a blast of such a size might overload their blocking system. At least briefly. If we could get a message out immediately afterward . . .”

“Yes!” Vero nodded urgently. “That might work. Let’s do that. Anyway, data download is now complete. I feel happier about losing my diary now.”

He handed back Merral’s diary and slid open the access panel on his own. He started muttering to himself. “Now you set the toggles. Blue to green, yellow striped to orange . . . and that down, that up. Or is it the other way about? It was such a joke when I was told it. The most useless piece of information ever. Now I close the back and reset. Thus. Now, input the following codes.” His forehead puckered in thought.

“Diary! Go into deep internal level four. Password is Gedaliah. Reveal battery temperature. Now, cycle energy cells one through eight.”

The metallic voice that responded seemed startling in the quietness. “Under current parameters this will eventually give potentially dangerous thermal conditions in energy cells. Require authorization for procedure.”

“This is the first tricky bit. Diary! Password is Eleazar! Aha, looks good.”

“Authorization accepted.”

“Proceed.”

Vero sighed and slid the diary back on his belt.

“So far so good. Let us hope that after that failed assault, our enemies stay down at the foot of the hill for some time.”

“How long before it works?”

“I can’t remember. A couple of hours, at least. Anyway, we can’t do anything until dark. I suggest we get some more images of those cockroach-beasts through the fieldscope. If we do get out, such evidence will be invaluable. Then we just sit and wait. And pray.”

An hour later Vero came over to where Merral was lying down, peering over the edge at the immobile tableau of creatures below.

“How are things on your side?” Merral asked, drawing back from the margin.

“Only the one ape-creature left; the injured one has gone somewhere else.”

“Your diary?”

“At least thirty minutes, I’d guess, but it is definitely heating up.”

Merral gestured westward where the remains of the morning’s storm clouds hung on the horizon as the last of the rain emptied itself into the wastes on Interior Menaya. The red sphere of the sun was dropping rapidly toward them. “A fine sunset,” he commented.

“I would prefer dawn,” sighed Vero.

“And so would I. I feel that this side is where the attack will come from. It’s a wider front. I can see various places for them to try and get up. But hopefully they will wait for darkness.”

Vero got down on his knees and moved cautiously to the edge of the plateau. The setting sun had put a warm orange glow on the rocks and at the same time exaggerated both the darkness and the length of the shadows so that it was not easy to see what was happening down below among the trees and rocks.

“There are more,” hissed Vero.

“Yes, I didn’t feel it worth telling you,” Merral added as he joined him. There were now at least six of the tall dark figures standing rigid and staring up at them, and perhaps slightly more of the cockroach-beasts, their shorter stature making them hard to distinguish from the shadows of the rocks. It is unnatural, Merral decided. Both types behave like men in many ways and yet they seem to have little individuality. To act as regimented machines is not at all like us. What creatures are they? He wondered whether Vero was right in thinking that they were modified humans and, if so, what had been taken out of them—or put in—to make them so different.

“Well, I hope they stay there longer,” Vero said as he backed away. “Let me know if anything happens. I’m going to sit back from the edge and check the diary.”

Merral lay down and waited, trying not to stare at the setting sun lest it damage any night vision. Finally, the lower edge of the sun dropped behind the clouds and a warm twilight started to descend. He leaned forward, stared down into the gloom, and saw that nothing had changed.

Something caught his attention. Hanging back behind the ape-creatures and all but hidden in the gloom under the trees was something new. He peered at it, recognizing another anthropoid figure, but one with a different, smaller, and somehow more familiar shape. As he strained his eyes Merral felt that, despite a size midway between the ape-creatures and the cockroach-beasts, there was somehow a presence about the figure as if it was superior to those beasts: almost, it seemed, as if it was their master.

“Vero,” he called out, “there’s something odd—”

There was a violent hissing and bubbling next to him. Something spat angrily and stung his right hand.

“Get back!” Vero shouted.

Merral threw himself backward, landing awkwardly and painfully on his hip. He was aware of a strange heat around and a smell of burning in the air.

Vero was ducked down behind him, pointing with an urgent hand at the lip of the cliff. An arm’s length from where Merral had been lying the rock edge was glowing a livid scarlet and spitting vapor and drops of lava. Bubbles of rock were forming and bursting with an intense popping noise.

“What was that?” Merral asked as the color of the rock returned slowly to black.

Vero nodded, as if to himself. “One of a number of things capable of transmitting enough energy to melt rock. An infrared laser, a portable pulsed particle beam, something like that. Probably would just explode flesh and blood.”

“So they are no longer unarmed.” Sucking his hand where a small drop of molten rock had struck, Merral cautiously got to his feet, and together they moved back into the middle of the plateau. Could he be certain of what he thought he had seen? He was about to speak when there was a pulsing on his wrist.

Merral pulled his diary off his belt so fast that he nearly dropped it. On the screen, Anya was staring at him from her laboratory bench.

Thank you Lord, thought Merral in exultation, she’s called early. “Anya! Anya!” he shouted at the diary.

To his horror, he saw her face acquire a blank, puzzled look.

Her voice was clear. “Say, what’s up with you guys? Merral’s location signal goes off. Now, I’m having problems even making contact.”

Vero was beside him now, peeping over his shoulder at the image.

At least, Merral comforted himself, she will realize that there is enough of a problem to call for a search tomorrow.

She stared at the screen. “You know guys, I’m getting worried.”

“That’s it Anya! Go on. You get worried! Really worried!” Merral heard himself speaking aloud.

Without warning, another voice sounded from the diary. Although it was weirdly familiar, for a moment Merral could not recognize it.

“Sorry, Anya. We have had diary problems. Some trick of Vero’s, trying to transmit data. Seems to have fused circuits on both.”

Merral heard a gasp from beside him. “Now what are we up against?”

“Yes,” the familiar voice went on, “we lost both vision and location.”

“Okay, Merral. Apart from that, how is it going?”

Merral? In a dreadful, appalling moment of revelation, Merral understood why the voice was familiar. It was his own voice!

“It’s not me!” Merral yelled in fury, “Anya, it’s not me!”

“Hi, Anya,” came from the diary. It was Vero’s voice, but so convincing that Merral had to stare at the wide-open mouth of the startled figure next to him to be sure he wasn’t hearing his friend. “Sorry. I just used too much power. Stupid sentinel trick. Anyway, we are fine.”

Merral was on the point of saying something when Vero silenced him with a sharp wave of the arm.

“Oh yes,” went on the voice from the diary, “we are fine. We are beyond Daggart Lake. We’ll call you tomorrow night. We aim for pickup the day after. Look, we’d better shut down now, while we still have a signal. Good-bye.”

It was Vero to the syllable.

The machine spoke again. “I agree. This is Merral saying good night, too.”

There was a faint look of consternation on Anya’s face.

“Well, okay. Sleep well. Talk to you tomorrow. Bye for now.”

The screen went dark. There was a long silence, and finally Vero spoke, his numbed voice suggesting he was still absorbing the impact of what he had overheard. “Well, there have been a couple of times today when I thought we might get out of this alive. I am now repenting my optimism. It was very clever.”

“Clever? It was diabolical!”

“Exactly so.”

“How did they do it?”

“They have been monitoring us. Easy to do. They have had hours to prepare a voice duplicate. That will be how they did Maya Knella, of course. Anya said it was a bad transmission.”

“You mean they faked a Gate call?”

Vero laughed quietly and bitterly. “Merral, don’t you see? Whoever—or whatever—is behind this can do almost anything. They can bend and break genes to suit themselves, they can create imitation birds, and they can mimic people. Intercepting interstellar communications is a little thing. And not only do they have the means, they have the will.” He seemed to shudder. “They appear to have no barriers. I would have to think carefully, but I am certain that they have broken all of the Technology Protocols and some that were never even thought of.”

“I had no idea. . . .”

“No, neither had I,” Vero replied, looking troubled and seeming to struggle with something. Then, without warning, he slammed a fist into the palm of his hand.

“No! We will not yield without a fight.” His face acquired a determined look. “They are not immune. We will stand firm. By grace, we may win through. But everything hinges on us calling in help. We can’t rely on Anya anymore. We are on our own.”

He struck his fist in his palm again in resolve and turned back to Merral. “What do you think?”

“Vero, I am reeling from this morning. And this afternoon.” Then Merral paused, thinking of the right words to express what he wanted to say. “But I will gladly die here if we need to. We must fight. For the Assembly and for the King.”

Vero clapped him on the back. “Good! I feel better listening to you. We may have had nearly twelve millennia of peace, but if we have to fight a last stand here then I feel you—at least—will do no worse than any heroes of the distant past. And I will do what I can.”

“We will try.” Merral added thoughtfully, “I—well, I suppose my own feelings are mixed. I do not mind, or fear, dying, but I do not relish it. And I wish I had not killed.”

“I understand, but we must do what we are called to do. Anyway, let us prepare for an early attack. I think you had best take charge of the weapons. These things seem to be your expertise, not mine.”

“As you wish,” Merral answered as Vero crouched back down over his diary.

Merral went over to their few belongings, put on his jacket, and stuck the two remaining flares in one pocket and the tranquilizer gun with its two cartridges in another. He grasped the knife and clicked the blade in and out, reflecting that this—plus all the rocks he could throw—was all they had. Against adversaries who outmatched them in numbers, technology, and weapons, he knew it wasn’t enough.

As he grappled with the thought, he turned to watch the sunset. There was a narrow gap in the clouds at the bottom, and in it a tiny ruby-colored sliver of the sun shone out. As Merral watched, it slipped down below the horizon and, almost instantly, the shadows about him seemed to thicken.

For a strange moment, an extraordinary desire seemed to seize hold of Merral. It was a desire to lament his lot and his pending death, to grieve for himself and Vero and for the loss his saddened family and Isabella would feel. At the heart of this compelling desire was a dark yearning to give in and to admit that the whole thing was hopeless. As he grappled with the emotion, Merral tried, and failed, to label it, until suddenly the word came to him. Despair, he thought with a sudden recognition. That’s what I am close to. Today I have met four strange things: ape-creatures, cockroach-beasts, terror, and despair. And will death be the fifth stranger I meet?

Then he looked up into the sky and saw that the stars were coming out and that southward the six beacons of the Gate were becoming plain. Heartened, he praised the All Highest; hope returned and the despair fled.

As he turned to go back to Vero, he remembered that the last warrior to set out to fight for the Assembly had been Lucas Ringell in 2110. He had gone to the Centauri Station to take on Jannafy and the rebels, well trained, surrounded by his troops, and armed and suited with the best defensive and offensive equipment the Assembly could devise.

And as Merral remembered that, he was suddenly aware that all he had was two flares in one jacket pocket, a tranquilizer gun in the other, and a knife. Not one of them had even been designed as a weapon.

Suddenly, the irony of the situation struck him and, in spite of all his fears, Merral smiled.