Impressive invective.... As far as first thoughts went, it was not particularly illuminating, but it was accurate. Someone was cursing vividly, with a variety in tone and word choice that part of Darame found astonishing. Other parts of her were too busy hurting to wonder why a voice was swearing at her.
Something about... why no light attached to my hard hat? Gagging, trying to breathe through her nose, Darame reached, gripping a projection of rock and hauling herself upward. Wincing from the glare of a spotlight, she saw bright spots of blood on her arm, and remembered where she stood... sat.
“A mucker was going to eat me.” Barely audible; certainly not heard over the low mutter of an idling engine, but suddenly the vituperative flow of words ceased.
Brilliant light slowly dimmed, becoming manageable. From out of the darkness came a musical, husky voice, distinctly female: “Serae, woul’ you min’ explaining what you are doing creeping down my heading with no hard hat, no toeboots, and no light?”
Darame tried to frame a coherent answer, and then concentrated on remaining upright.
A strong arm reached around her waist and slowly pulled her to her feet. “If you ha’ black hair like mine, you woul’ be a dea’ cipher.”
“Go to Norwood. The food does it — permanently.” So dizzy...
“Huh.” It was not disbelieving, really — more considering, withholding judgment. The arm guided her past the swinging corner of the massive, empty dipper, settling her on the running board edging the far side of the mucker. Cracking the passenger door, the miner reached inside and pulled out a thermos. Pouring something into the cupped lid, she thrust it at Darame.
It was an old-fashioned tisane, still warm from lunch, with more herbs in it than Darame could readily recognize. Carefully she sipped the fluid.
“Now, Serae, have you remembere’ how you arrive’ in my mine? Tho I suppose it is as much yours as mine, eh?” the miner added.
Sometimes silver hair is handy. “No. I was unconscious at the time. But I can explain why I am in your heading. I was looking for help.... Your drift was damp, so I knew someone was working back here.” Darame found speech coming slowly. The tisane was staying down, praise Mendülay.
“‘Damp.’ Aye, it woul’ be that.” A throaty chuckle escaped the woman. “So, it has finally come, eh? We are under siege?”
“You know?”
“Know my shift boss came by an hour ago and tol’ me to work through lunch. As if I usually stop!” A scoff, that.
“Your boss? Why did I miss him?”
“North en’, Serae. My whole crew enters at north — we take a buggy over the surface instea’ of through the drifts. But we all have ha’ itchy palms lately, what with that antimatter missing an’ all. Kooks bree’ more kooks, eh? So, do they want infonet time, trinium, or concessions?”
Darame stared over the rim of the cup, and then felt a rueful smile creeping up on her. That summed things up pretty well, actually.
“The last two, I suspect. They have other hostages, and are in what I think is the main underground control room... the one on 2377, just east of the cage. The bad part is, they are the same kooks — the antimatter is sitting on a platform at the bottom of the main shaft, and someone is sitting with it, in case Dielaan wants to set a timer and cut its power.”
“By the Worn Ruts of the Last Path! They are crazy! So, they have the cage, eh? Not goo’, not goo’ at all. Nothing for it — out Number six. Another half a kilometer that way —” Her thumb jerked expressively over her shoulder. “Right at the intersection, go a kilometer straight on, then hang right again at the auxiliary east-west. Four kilometers to the junction, then left and out... after a long walk,” she added.
“But how can we tell them to use shaft six?” The warmth was exploding in her stomach, making it easier to think through pain and grumbling machinery.
The woman sat down next to Darame. “Time is a problem, serae.”
“The problem is the antimatter. It is unstable, and could blow up. Also, Dielaan is armed, but with what, I do not know.”
“Huh.” Much flatter this time; almost irritated. “That is the way of it, eh? I thought you use’ that wor’. So — it begins again.”
“Not if we can stop it,” Darame said quickly. “One idiot is not going to topple ten years of good tribal relations.”
The miner’s light bobbed — jerked sharply to one side, as the woman detached it from her hard hat. Clicking it to a wide beam, she let the light diffuse around them. A dusky, oval face topped with ruffled dark ringlets was revealed. It was a strong face, not pretty by any definition except for a straight, elegant nose and brilliant blue eyes, the true, deep, purplish sapphire. As for expression, the woman looked skeptical.
“Maybe, serae. But I was raise’ in the mountains north of here, an’ I remember when Dielaan came over the passes.”
“That will not happen again.” She could not remember why, but Darame knew that had been taken into account.
“Maybe. First we nee’ to get you out of here.”
“First we need to figure out a way to warn the miners that something is wrong. Dielaan is on the internal net, so anything we transmit will be at the least overheard, if not pre-empted.” Darame’s eyelids drooped as she leaned back against the side of the mucker. “Then we need to tell them up top where that antimatter is located.”
Consulting a roman she had pulled out of a pocket, the miner said: “Two hours until shift change. We cannot wait?”
“To be honest, I am afraid to wait. The Dielaan is acting irrational.”
A snort. “All Dielaaners are irrational. So — how to reach everyone without using the wall boxes or internal net.” She thought for a minute or two. “Impossible.”
“There has to be another way! Surely you do not depend on that system alone for things! What if there is a power failure?”
“Back-up generators,” the woman answered calmly. “We use a few other systems — emergency alarms for injuries, bells for cage operation, a signal for when we are going to fire the hole. The wall boxes are separate, but they can be monitored by the internal net — do you see?”
Unfortunately, she did see. If they did not have to worry about Dielaan reacting violently, they could easily announce a problem and evacuate the mine. “We need something he cannot stop and cannot immediately assign blame to,” Darame muttered, sipping at the tisane and absently offering the lid to the miner.
They sat in silence, sharing the cup of herbal tea and considering. Then the miner began to chuckle.
“You have an idea?” Darame asked, carefully turning her head toward the other. It was bleeding again, she could feel the trickle down her neck.
“A gag.” The woman kept chuckling. “I wonder... if Doc is still in 2368 East, he coul’ do it.”
“Well?” Darame prompted gently. All the time in the world, down here.
A brilliant blue eye, momentarily flashing red, glanced her way. “A gag we pull on all the new han’s. We tell them that we have a code we use for the siren — an’ they have to memorize it. A huge list, really scares the whatever out of them, eh? They get a dozen or so down before they fin’ out trinium mines stoppe’ using the codes a thousan’year ago.” She grinned; it was contagious, that grin. “We use the ‘miner hurt’ code and the ‘fire in the hole’ code, an’ that is all that remains. But the thir’ one on the list is ‘evacuate mine, fire/explosion danger.’ “
“Would anyone remember that?” Darame said, skeptical in her turn.
“I do,” the miner pointed out. “Those who no longer remember will figure something is wrong. They will go to a wall box — an’ will probably fin’ another miner there, who knows what the signal means. By now folks down under know the main cage is blocked, so they woul’ start for the other shaft, anyway.” Straightening, the woman stood and reached for Darame’s arm. “We nee’ to fin’ a first ai’ box for you, an’ then Doc for the wiring. My name is Kristori, by the way.” Opening the cab, she helped Darame into the confines of the mucker. The compartment had its own lights in the roof and side panels; the soft glow was somehow comforting.
When Kristori had climbed in on the other side and shut both doors, silence descended upon them. The mutter of the engine seemed very far away.
“Good soundproofing,” Darame whispered approvingly. Still dizzy, she leaned back into the padded seat and half-veiled her eyes.
“Hang on, eh?” With practiced ease, Kristori threw the mucker into reverse, engaged the engine, and started backing down the dark drift at full throttle.
Darame decided to close her eyes.
“Are you sure that will do it?”
The other hard hat light raised slightly as Doc continued separating wires, throwing his long, sharp nose into high relief. “Did I kibitz when you patched her head and arm?” The tall, bony man had a restful voice, almost as if he was trying to lull them to sleep.
“Nay.”
“All right, then.” He seemed to feel he had covered the topic; only the murmur of Kristori’s engine filled the confines of the drift.
After a ride which had raised the hairs on Darame’s arms, though it was apparent Kristori knew her business and had not so much as grazed a support beam in passing, the missing miner known as “Doc” had been ferreted out of a nearby drift. This had involved stopping the mucker at the mouth of the heading, and signaling with a pocket torch that had a red lens. The roar from the darkness had died to a mutter, and eventually a spider-shanked apparition had loomed into their spotlight.
Two minutes... five minutes. Kristori had returned to the cab and headed her mucker off down the drift. Tilting her head as far as she had dared, Darame had seen the light from the following machine.
“He is with us,” Kristori had said succinctly. So it had proved.
Doc had turned out to be one of those people who could do anything with a pair of wire clippers, a clamp, and some industrial strength tape. Tenderly parking his mucker at a crossing and shutting it down completely, Doc had opened a nearby junction box and had had the face off before Darame had blinked. The hydra of wire within had fallen in coils to his feet, and he had immediately begun searching for the siren lines.
In the meantime, Kristori had hunted up peroxide and bandages, and had given Darame even greater appreciation for Sheel’s healing touch. After thought, they had decided to pack the ore grazes with biosporin and wrap her entire arm with a support bandage. Small adhesives had worked for the two large lacerations on her shoulder blade, and a seal for the split skin over the lump on her head. Beyond that, Kristori had admonished her to sit quietly and keep out of the way. Meekly Darame had done as ordered.
“All right, now,” Doc said suddenly. “We are ready for business. When I flip this —” his fingers hovered over a toggle switch —”the siren starts screaming ‘emergency, injured miner.’ Then the fun begins.”
Looking over his shoulder, Darame saw that he had tampered with all the incoming wires from the emergency switches, and had attached small dials to them. “Are those... detonator timers?”
“Always like to see beauty and brains combined,” Doc stated. “Yes, indeed, those are detonator timers. What will happen is the siren for clear the drifts will wail out. It is what we use to empty equipment from the transpo drifts, so an injured miner reaches the surface quickly. Normally it cycles three times, and then shuts itself off. But I have bypassed the shut-off, and have rigged these timers. So it will blow until someone re-routes the thing, or someone cuts off the main line up top and outside, at the power station.”
“Why the timers?”
“Those are for if someone tries to cut off the siren through the net. They will read the signal as coming from, say, 2380 East. So they cut it off. Well, then this one starts blaring. In another minute, this one starts signalling that someone is throwing the switch, and so on. Now, an electrician would know what had happened, but unless they have someone in there that has access to the wiring diagrams in the net, and can read them, they will give up before they figure out how to stop it.”
Darame gave him one of her tremendous smiles. “Magnificent, Doc.”
Straightening to an alarming height, Doc returned a toothy grin. “All right, then, serae.”
“So, we flip it and hea’ for shaft six,” Kristori said briskly.
“You head for shaft six. I need to get to that antimatter.” The two miners gave her a long look. Darame pushed irritably at the hard hat they had found for her, and smoothed her features. “If Dielaan becomes annoyed enough, he will slap his own timer on it; then where are we?”
“As isolated as the firstcomers,” Doc agreed. “Might be good for us.”
“Kristori —”
“Not alone.” Kristori was firm. “You will nee’ help.”
“Are you positive? This is a ‘volunteers only’ type of job.” Darame gave them both long looks in turn.
“Miners never do anything they do not want to do,” Doc assured her. A sinewy arm reached out, and nimble fingers flipped the toggle switch.
Weird moaning reached their ears, swelling and dying rhythmically.
“Hop on, everyone. Next stop, 2194.” Kristori tucked Doc behind the two seats and, with effort, got the cab door closed.
“On a mucker? How?”
“Nay! It woul’ take hours on the ramps; we woul’ run out of fuel long before reaching that level. No, we will go to Number two and call the inspection cage. It hol’s three big men, so we shoul’ fit easily, eh?” Throwing the engine open, Kristori roared off down the drift.
Darame considered the blur of jutting rock, and closed her eyes again.
Minutes seemed like hours.... Sheel had heard that phrase before, but had never fully appreciated it until now. Sometimes there was nothing to do but wait — wait for Zaide to report in, wait for Kilgore’s meth to land, wait for Crow to reach shaft six and Mailan to reach the mouth of the ore train tunnel. Sliding his gaze to one side, Sheel watched as Livia graciously took charge of the tea tray which had just been delivered.
Her sudden words shattered the genteel image.
“Fortunate that your wife is so skilled in an emergency, or we would not have known our destination.” Livia calmly handed him a mug of hot saffra.
“She was able to leave a message?”
“Not exactly.” Livia smiled without humor. “She almost gutted the warrior who seized her from behind — he will be fortunate if he lives, much less enjoys it. He was in the room when Rex gave his instructions to his captain, and it was a simple matter to extract the directions from him.”
Sheel decided not to ask how she gained the information.
“Yes!” The manager at the RAM practically shrieked with rapture. “Finally, something in our favor!” Turning around, she said to Sheel: “Have you noticed the ripple in our screens, Atare?”
“I was afraid it was my eyes,” Sheel admitted.
Smiling her agreement, the woman continued: “All of our screens update regularly, in intervals as brief as fifteen seconds or as long as several minutes. That is the ripple illusion — when the data changes. But I have found the original, dummy screens still in the system!”
“Dummy screens?” Livia repeated.
“The original sales tools which sold this system to the Mare Mines many years ago,” the manager clarified. “We will contact Cole over at the main control room, and find out what screen the underground room is watching. Then, when the next update comes up —” She fluttered her fingers suggestively.
“You will put up the dummy screens? To what advantage?” Livia asked.
“Because the dummy screens will not react when strange things begin happening at the ore train level,” Sheel whispered. “You can do this?”
“It will take a few moments, but yes, it can be done,” she replied, her concentration on a line of jumbled numbers and letters. “Ah, Cole,” she said into the mouthpiece of the earphones she had strapped on. “We have thought of a new way to confuse the enemy.”
“But who is the enemy?” came a familiar, expressive voice.
Energy flowed into Sheel. Turning toward the door, the faintest of smiles momentarily crooked his mouth as he said: “I had begun to wonder if you were swimming up.”
Nadine’s crystals chimed as she threw back her head in silent mirth. “You have never tried to wheedle a platoon of soldiers out of my brother and sister,” was her dry response. “It will go down in the annals as my greatest performance.” Glancing at Livia, she said: “Ragäree.”
The neutral greeting was acceptable. “Do sit down, serae,” Livia said with a sweep of her hand toward a chair. “We must give thought to the discipline of this fool who calls himself —”
Sheel nearly dropped his mug as a siren wailed through the room. Immediately the second of the managers leaped toward a membrane, his plump hands cutting the volume by more than half.
“What is it?” Sheel said quickly.
“It... it is not good,” was the reluctant response. “It is the siren code for an injured miner.”
“Not exactly, Wald,” the other said, her head cocked to one side. “Listen. It is still repeating.”
“How?”
Swiftly she called up another screen. “Someone has set off the switch at 2366 — no, 2372 —” She broke off as a third box lit up.
Now he had someplace to center that core of energy. Standing, Sheel moved over to the screen. “I may be optimistic, but it smacks of my woman’s meddling.” He glanced at the managers. “How will those below react?”
“They will try to call in,” Wald said. “If Dielaan is monitoring the wall boxes, his ears will be filled with annoyed miners wanting to know what in seven hells is going on.”
“I know that code!” The woman looked briefly stupefied. “It is the ‘Evacuate mine, fire/explosion danger’ siren. The same as the injured signal, but repeated indefinitely!”
“What?”
“Think, Wald! When you first went in the hole! Remember that stupid list? I think I memorized the entire damn thing — your pardon, seraes,” she said quickly, “before I found out they were archaic!”
Wald started laughing. “Well, someone is on their toes down there! With any luck, half the shift is on their way to Number six!”
A guaard’s whisper in his ear told Sheel the moment had arrived. “And now it is our turn. Did you not tell Dielaan you would inform him when The Atare reached the mine?” Sheel asked softly. “Well, the players are present, and the stage is set —” He gestured to the guaard behind him, who had just slipped in with communicator in hand. “We have reached both tunnels. Call over to your Cole, sir — we are ready to ask their terms.” Giving the other manager a sharp look, Sheel added: “Can you place the dummy screens while we talk to Dielaan?”
“Keep him talking,” was her grim reply.
“Silence it!” Rex’s fist shot out as he spoke, slamming into the supervisor’s jaw.
Three of the present warriors immediately leaped to membranes, calling up various subheadings in an attempt to find out what was causing the siren. In the meantime, the mining supervisor was using the edge of a RAM to pull himself to his feet. Garth had to give the old fellow credit — he was tough. He did not so much as touch the side of his face.
“It is no good, Dielaan,” the supervisor said slowly. “That alarm is an old one, in place long before the internal RAM was set. We might be able to close the switch on it, but —”
“Then close it.”
Lucy moved almost imperceptibly closer to Garth’s side. He resisted the temptation to slip an arm around her. It might be seen as criticism....
Seated once more before the screen, the man punched in several codes. As he typed, his fingers hesitated.
“Do not waste —”
“Something is funny. That is not the injured code,” Campbell muttered. A wiring diagram came up on the screen before him. “There — 2366. Someone threw the switch back there...” Another box lit up as he spoke. “Now 2372. How many injuries do we have, for Mendülay’s sake?” As he turned off 2366, a third box lit up. “That tears it to shreds — I cannot stop it, but we can turn it off in here.” He gestured to the horn above the door; a warrior moved over and touched the button beneath it. Instantly the shriek diminished, the sound of the siren muffled by the control room door. “We are receiving a vid call, Dielaan.” The Ataran waited for Rex to respond.
“Are there still guards on the cage and corridor intersections?” Rex asked aloud.
“No miners have been allowed into the area, Dielaan,” a warrior bearing silver stripes replied.
Seating himself, Rex growled at Garth and Lucy: “Stop cringing.” Settling his arms on the rests of the chair, Rex turned a three-quarter profile to the screen. “Bring up the vid.”
The man with the copper-colored patrician face was once again on the screen. “You asked to be informed when The Atare arrived. He is at the guardhouse. We can feed you the outside vid line, when you are ready.”
“Do we have infonet access yet?” Rex asked coolly.
“We can turn a camera on a screen with outside hookup.”
“Not good enough.” Rex bit off each word crisply. “Can we receive the vid?” he asked Campbell.
“Yes, Dielaan.”
“Then do so.”
Campbell sent the image to the large, center wall screen. It did not overpower — the lights in the guardhouse were set low, and starrise was far away. Only one person was visible, a man simply dressed except for the fine ruby-studded trinium chain around his neck. Sheel Atare was actually leaning on one arm of his chair, his body relaxed.
“Welcome, Atare,” Rex murmured, choosing Caesarean for the conversation. “I hope you are enjoying the entertainment.”
Sheel Atare actually lifted one eyebrow. “If you wanted a tour of a trinium mine, Dielaan, you could have requested one any time in the past year.”
Surely that would do it. No... Rex had better control of himself than Garth thought. Usually ridicule, even indirect ridicule, goaded him into indiscretion. Lucy’s hand crept over to grip his cuff. He found the action oddly comforting... something was still recognizable.
“I have already seen enough for my purposes,” was the soft response.
“You travel with a large entourage, Dielaan.”
“And growing. Do you like the second cordon, around your own?” The words were very smooth.
“Do you like the fact that their captain just sent word that he will not take sides between Dielaans?” Sheel responded.
“There is only one Dielaan.” Who would have thought Rex’s face could look so harsh. Chiseled, even; it had always seemed soft to Garth, free of expression or impression.
“There are three undisputed heirs to the throne — or so it has been explained to me many times,” Sheel corrected gently.
“Quen reb^Livia is not in a position to pursue a claim, and a child? The outkin are through with regents,” was the retort.
Sheel Atare rotated his chair, his gaze shifting to his left and then up. A slim red-headed figure moved into the lens’s view. At Garth’s side, Lucy grew rigid. He drew her attention with a poke; making sure the others were watching the screen, Lucy mouthed the words: His mother.
Ah. The ragäree who was regent. Nicholas’s Balls, he wished he and Lucy could talk! But Rex would allow no one to leave the area, except when Lucy stepped into the lunch room to tend The Atarae, and they certainly did not want to speak in front of him. Silas was sufficiently cowed that he had not spoken in at least an hour — the sight of his aunt seemed to visibly frighten him still further. Garth wondered what Rex’s face looked like; he had swiveled the flexseat away from them.
“If necessary, the future Coll Dielaan would greatly mourn the martyrdom of his brother Quen in our pursuit of continued peace and prosperity for the world of Nuala,” the tiny woman said tonelessly.
A drawn breath, so soft Garth scarcely heard it, came from Lucy. Her black eyes were wide with shock, and her hand tightened on his sleeve. He did not have to ask what had just happened — Rex was going to have to move fast to heal this breach. Of its own will, Garth’s gaze slid over to Quen. The young man looked calm; there was no longer any tension in his mouth.
A tilt of the flexseat; Rex Dielaan’s expression was rigid, whether with shock or fury Garth was not sure. The sudden wild look in his eyes did not clarify matters. Flicking his attention back to the screen, Garth saw what had triggered the last response.
A third person had entered the scene, and was standing to Sheel Atare’s right. A tall woman, with dark blonde hair woven with purple glass or gems that matched her vivid irises. Her smile was thin-lipped, without teeth, almost but not quite a grimace. “If you three are done amusing yourselves, I would like to talk about the antimatter,” she suggested crisply.
Rex Dielaan turned his face to Campbell. Whatever the man saw in it, his response was immediate — he disconnected the vid.
“What?” Garth heard himself whisper to Lucy.
Dazed, she made no attempt to modulate her voice. “We have lost.”
“If you must speak like a fool, then be silent,” Rex snapped, rising to his feet. Gesturing to his remaining officer, he said: “Bring in The Atarae.” The warrior started toward the closed panel.
Lucy’s hand tightened painfully on his wrist, and Garth felt a brief, irrational hope. Fool — how could she have stood upright, much less put any distance between herself and her captors? Suddenly Garth realized that Rex was still speaking.
“We are in control of the mine itself, and we have the antimatter. I fail to see why you should despair.” His black gaze burned into them. Light blazed from the adjoining room, as the warrior turned on all the overhead lights. “Are you trying to blind us?” Rex yelled after him.
“Dielaan, she is not here!”
“What?” The whisper was incredulous. “Impossible. She would have had to have crawled to get out of there.”
“That is exactly what it looks like she did,” came a mystified mutter — the warrior was bent over and examining the far wall. “See, here —”
“I am not interested in how she got out, I want her back! Send every available man after her!” Whirling, he turned on Lucy and Garth.
“Rex, she could not even sit up!” Lucy shrieked, leaping to her feet.
“Dielaan, the main control room is calling back. Do you wish to talk to them?” This was devoid of emotion, but Garth had caught the glitter in the man’s eye — he was enjoying the slow unraveling of Rex Dielaan.
“Why did you not tie her to a table?”
“With what? You did not tell me to —”
“Do I need to think for you?”
“This is not going to help,” Garth started, relieved that Rex was so distracted he was apparently unaware that Lucy was telling lie on top of lie.
The center screen flickered into life once again. Appalled silence descended upon the group. Instantly cold, forbidding, Rex turned toward the screen, remaining standing. This time the supervisor on the surface had not paused to intercede — already Sheel Atare and his “guests” were visible.
“It seems there was a technical difficulty, Dielaan,” The Atare said pleasantly. “A pity we cannot speak face to face. As Nadine reb^Ursel Kilgore was saying, about the antimatter?” He paused, and then added, casually, “And then there is the question of my wife.”
Rex said evenly: “The antimatter is under the tender guardianship of my captain. If anything at all threatens us, he will activate the timer.”
Sheel Atare actually looked mildly surprised. “Well, you must please yourself, of course,” he said, “but personally I would not wish to be 800 meters below the surface sitting on top of an unstable trap of antimatter.”
“If you do not wish to seriously discuss this,” Rex started, carefully spacing the words, “I will merely tie the nuisance of a woman to the trap and have done with it.”
Silence. Nadine of Kilgore smiled again; this time, her teeth showed.
“Excuse me,” Lucy said clearly, stepping into the circumference of the surveillance camera. “As you suggested, this is difficult over a vid. Perhaps you both should simply state the starting point for the negotiations, and then Rex will send one of us up with his thoughts on the subject.”
“The antimatter,” Sheel said without hesitation, “and the hostages, returned in one piece.”
“Reparations,” Nadine went on, her teeth hidden once again. “For the burning of crops in Kilgore and Seedar. We know you are behind it, Dielaan. We caught one of your firebugs.”
“You will forget all about this,” Livia said simply. “You will contact Tsuga by satellite, you will order the ships home, and then will we talk about your trip to Caesarea.”
“And about the warehouses in Amura, and my dead guaard,”Sheel finished pleasantly, leaning forward. “The antimatter was insured, and the insurance company wishes to talk to you about the ‘accident.’ Wergild will be expected for the family of the guaard.”
“Your turn, Dielaan.” Nadine was no longer smiling at all.
“Only one offer. For half of the trinium hauled out of this mine in a calendar year, I will give you — intact — the antimatter trap, the mine, and all hostages. And shut off that misbegotten siren!” Gesturing sharply with his hand, Rex indicated that the conversation was over. The diagram of the entire working mine reappeared on the main screen. Rex’s face relaxed. “I had completely forgotten they must have cameras!” Snapping his head in Campbell’s direction, he said: “Give me the cage area on this level.”
Campbell’s face was grim, but he was undoubtedly grateful Rex had not lashed out for his “forgetting” about the cameras. Instantly the dim corridor outside was visible, a warrior standing by the folded doors.
“Can he hear us?” Garth heard himself ask.
“Perhaps if you shout,” Campbell suggested.
“Any problems, warrior?” Rex said, raising his voice.
“None for some time, Dielaan,” the man yelled back. “The miners were unruly, but I let them call the cage, and when they realized it would not come, they all retreated down the passage. Then the siren began.”
“Remain at your post.” In a softer voice, Rex said: “Can we see the cage area on the lowest level?”
Stoically Campbell punched up the appropriate screen. Garth felt his throat tighten as they viewed the beginning and end of it all, a one hundred kilogram Stanford trap of antimatter. Conserving fuel, the captain had turned off the puff packet beneath the pallet — the flat rested directly upon the stone floor. There was a peevish look on the warrior’s face; as Campbell brought up the audio; they could hear the siren loud and clear.
“Why is it blowing down there? I thought no one goes to the train level?” Rex questioned.
“Rarely. The train is fully automated, and so is the sweep that catches the few loose pieces of ore that miss the cars. Maintenance checks the level every shift — just a walk past the panel, to be sure no yellows indicate something needs work. Easy enough for them to walk through, and it saves sending someone special, if an adjustment is needed.” What might have happened to the maintenance worker this shift, Campbell did not volunteer.
“Check the surrounding tunnels for that woman,” Rex finally said. Glancing at Lucy, he said mildly: “Whatever possessed you to interrupt?”
“You sounded like cats insulting one another,” Lucy said shortly. “I thought to spare your dignity. It is of no matter; we have lost the toss.”
“Stop saying that!”
“Do you not realize what your own eyes told you?” For the first time in days, Lucy seemed animated, in control. “That was Nadine, Rex — Nadine of Kilgore. And when she spoke of reparations, she included Seedar in her request. Seedar — included by a Kilgore!”
Lucy continued talking, but Garth suddenly could not hear her. Something tightened in his chest even as ringing swelled behind his ears. Kilgore? With Atare... and Dielaan present, instead of either backing Rex without question or stepping aside. And Seedar is part of it, somehow... “It was almost perfect, and you destroyed it,” he whispered aloud.
Both Dielaaners stopped shouting at his words. “Garth?” Lucy whispered his name.
“You have undone everything you claimed you wanted,” Garth said steadily, trying to ignore the numbness settling on him.
“Just what I said,” Lucy snapped. “We had The Synod mere steps from each others’ throats, Yang and Valdez about to walk out, Kilgore recalled — or so Captain Annich told me — and then you decide to have a nice little war! Suddenly we have at least four and possibly more tribes working together in closer consort than ever before!” Once again, she was shouting. “So, our entire plan has been rendered useless, and we are left with the wergild on a death and an unstable container of antimatter!”
“There is no problem,” Rex insisted. “Except we must recover the Atare woman. Other than that, we can come about! After the ransom is paid, the antimatter will be given over to them; if we do not allow them to stabilize it, they will deal all the sooner! And the hostages —” Here he shot Quen a venomous look. “Were merely taken to insure neither one of them had any clever ideas, both Quen and Atare’s woman being known for that. Tsuga is nothing, I can deal with him, if I choose. As for the rest — people can be Dielaan citizens, can claim our immunity, but they cannot connect us with the fires or the death. That we will push aside as criminal intent, and do what we can to extradite the minions. Or the warehouse exploding — we stole antimatter, for a purpose — we are not terrorists! As for mother —”
“Poison did not work. What is your next step?” Lucy asked acidly.
Her words rang out without fear or apology, and every face in the room whitened. It took visible effort for Quen to remain seated.
Garth found himself past surprise. Well, mother, father, what a fine monument I have erected to you — helping an idiot destroy the peace of a planet and try to kill his own mother. Enough was enough. He was out — no more helping anyone, no more plots, no more brushes with free-trading. Even... momentarily he flinched away from the final step. No more pursuing the wergild. At this rate, I will owe her as much as she owes me. All this, and I am no closer to knowing the truth.
Or was he?
“There are explosives on this level?”
That question snapped Garth back to the moment; he slowly stood.
“We could place small explosives,” Rex muttered. Glancing over at Garth’s movement, he said: “I will not give up a ransom. Either they part with trinium, or they will spend all of it rebuilding this mine.”
“I begin to think Atare would rather rebuild than give in.” Garth folded his arms over his chest and gave Rex his pale, blank stare.
“His wife will tip the balance.” Rex switched back to the ore train level. “Captain An —” He broke off abruptly.
The antimatter was gone. There was no evidence of how it had vanished, nor any sign of Annich. The cage, frozen in place, blinked its yellow warning message... the siren screamed on.
A hard, tight smile pulled over Rex’s face, and he carefully read the Nualan code running along the bottom of the screen. Touching a square, he switched to the passage running west... then east. At the end of the eastern passage, at the double doors leading to the ore train platform, they could just see the bob of a hard hat light.
“Behind a puff pallet,” Rex said simply.
“Where is Annich?” Lucy whispered, her quarrel with Rex momentarily set aside in confusion.
Rex turned and pointed a finger at Garth. “You.” He gestured to his second-in-command, and still another warrior. “Accompany him, Sim. Recover the antimatter — and the Atare woman, if she is there.” Glancing back at Garth, he said softly: “What do you think, Garth? Even odds that she is there.”
A chill crept into Garth’s numbness. Ah, my mother — indeed, the horns of a dilemma! I know Lucy has been up to something, while I haven’t been able to accomplish anything toward our goal of stopping this egoist. To let him think I have meddled is bad — but to shift his suspicions to Lucy would be worse. “The antimatter is a bargaining chip,” Garth said aloud.
“I am so glad we agree. Bring it back to this level.”
It was not a good time to argue, but.... “Do you want it that close?”
“As Lucy pointed out while you were leagues away in thought, the brass chit system means that usually they totally clear the mine before blasting — any blasting. If we are still in the mine when this decides to blow, it will not matter where we are.”
So. We may all die, and you have admitted the risk into your game. Garth did not look at Silas, who was alternating staring at the wall with sipping from a flask. He glanced at Lucy. “Shall we hunt?”
“No. I may need Lucy.” Very final.
Garth flicked a glance at the two warriors. Both large, and carrying small side weapons of some kind.... He smiled faintly, and sketched a parody of the Axis Republic salute. Turning to Lucy, he considered what to say. Was there anything? Before he could open his mouth, she threw her arms around his neck, pulled him down and kissed him fiercely.
“Be careful,” she admonished him, her dark eyes wide.
Grinning, he lightly caressed her jawbone. “Take care, love.” I hope you understand. Now you and Quen get yourselves out of here! Nodding to the silent Quen, who had shrewdly kept out of the entire preceding conversation, Garth turned on his heel and headed for the cage.
Once on the ore train level, Garth understood why the shift boss in the changing room had wanted them to take miner’s lights. Away from the cage, illumination diminished to the intersections... and in the distance, not even that. Through a window that had been set in the left side of the passage, Garth could see spotlights strategically placed in the rail area. Was there movement?... He was not going to mention it if the warriors did not.
Already the men were on edge, the darkness, the increased warmth and the continuing siren only adding to their agitation. Twice the group had stopped at small rooms, seeking a portable torch of some kind. Nothing.
“I would bet gold there are light switches on that console,” Sim said suddenly, gesturing through the window at the glowing dials of a control panel. “The doors are down here.”
“Use caution, sir — this is the same door,” the other whispered, indicating that Garth should move in front of him.
“Surely the miners do not carry weapons.”
Garth smiled crookedly. Miners made their own rules; it was that kind of culture. He started looking for someplace to duck behind, if necessary.
Afterward Garth was never sure what provoked Sim. Without warning the officer pulled off his side weapon and fired toward the rails. White-orange light blazed a trail much less than a meter from what proved to be the antimatter trap. A crash indicated several bodies leaping for cover.
“Have you lost your mind?” Garth screamed, diving behind the bulk of the control panel. The other warrior did not protest the criticism — he was burrowing in right behind Garth.
“We must have more light!” the man hissed, and edged up over the top of the waist-high instrument box. A crack near his head brought him back next to Garth.
Reaching out, Garth’s fingers closed over the object that had smacked into the wall. “A rock?” he said aloud.
Grinning idiotically, the warrior began to creep around the side of the control console.
Huh. Don’t get over-confident. So, how do you change sides in the middle of a fight without getting bonked by a rock? A good throw, too, if he was any judge. A sharp-edged rock... ore. A ton or so more, and you’ll be rich. Garth had a sudden urge to laugh. Leaning cautiously around the corner, he found he had a decent view of the platform. Before he could make any plans at all, he heard the sound of the ore train.
It had entered the cavern at a good clip, being empty, and was now slowing in response to what sounded like air brakes. Someone had tried to take advantage of the arrival — Sim’s weapon flared once again, and a shout of protest rang in the upper regions of the rock.
It might have been a signal. Dark forms swarmed from the last three cars, diving over the side and disappearing like slugs into dirt. Garth decided that the reinforcements had arrived — it was everyone’s tough luck that Sim was in a position to keep them pinned, at least until his “burn” was drained. Shivering in response to the memory of his one experience on the wrong end of a burn, Garth started crawling in the direction opposite the one taken by the Dielaan warrior. He needed the controller, and the person with the controller had jumped in this direction. They must have been planning on loading the antimatter onto a car —
More fire; someone was moving again. Now on his belly, Garth had reached the edge of the platform. No one was there... more room to either side of the rails than he had expected, but not much depth —
“Whoops!” came a male voice. A hard hat was briefly visible, then the individual dropped back out of sight.
“Do you have the controller?” Garth asked in Caesarean, hoping a normal tone of voice would carry through the siren. It was not quite as loud in the platform room; there was never a need to clear the rails. Usually. “Pass it over!”
“Would I want to give it to you?” was the understandable response.
“It would be easier to load that trap while looking at the car,” Garth pointed out.
“Very true. Will the pallet lift that high?”
Damn. Good question. And if the trap fell over.... Closing his eyes against the thought, Garth considered the risk. “No one down here would purposely hit the antimatter,” he said finally. “We must try.”
“Sim, report!” The voice actually overwhelmed the siren. Even with distortion, Garth knew it — Rex thought they were taking too long.
“Is that another of the Dielaan kooks?” came the calm voice from the rail level.
“You could say that,” Garth agreed. “He is on 2377 — can he control anything down here?”
“If he understands the panels, he can control the train, the ore pass doors, the sweeps — Damn!” The man appeared briefly and then vanished again. “And the lights, I fear. If he spots the screen for maintenance, we have problems.”
“He must have a problem, since he hasn’t found it yet.” They could not trust in that for long. “What should we do?”
Silence from the rail level. Burn fire erupted over their heads in several directions, and a groan came from the depths before him. “Sweet Mendülay, I do not want a burn. Hey, boy — we need to make sure no one moves the train. There is a switch on that panel, in the second row from the right — a big switch. Throw it.”
Now was not the time to ask for explanations. Garth let his fingers creep up the side of the control panel, waiting for a burn to lash out. There only seemed to be three of them firing — did that mean the others had no targets, or that they had no burns? Searching with his fingers for a large switch, Garth quickly looked around the area. A few dim red lights... cameras. So, soon the game would be over.
He bumped a switch, pulled it. A metallic groan competed with the siren and the burn fire, and suddenly ore began pouring into the car on the near side of their chosen receptacle. Somewhere a woman screamed.
“Hell, not that one!” The miner popped up higher this time before vanishing below the platform. A glance told Garth that the miner was actually only a handspan below his own level.
A second switch, larger to his fingers... desperate, Garth pulled it. A brief hum felt by the arm pressed to the instrument panel....
“That was it; the rail shut down. All right, then — we have manual control of the train. Now we load this thing.” Carefully a small rectangle rose above the poured edge of the walkway... settled itself as if it had a life of its own, then was abruptly slid toward Garth. “Catch.”
Someone else had been waiting. Burn fire lit up the platform, revealing the tip of a hard hat and a worn, dusty hand, both of which quickly pulled back toward the ore cars. By some miracle, the shot missed the pallet controller. Garth closed his hand protectively around it.
Now what? He knew better than to ask if the man — a miner — was going to follow the controller up and over. At any rate, the antimatter trap was three cars down to the left. He might be more help right where he was.
“Damnit all!” Rustling indicated that the miner was moving again, but he was trying to keep low.
Something was causing him to move... no time to waste. A spotlight suddenly flashed out, illuminating the far end of the console panel. DAMN! Rex had finally found the correct sub-screen! What if the pallet would not lift that high? What if it was too wide, or became wedged somehow? If it fell, and the controller was disconnected, how long would it stay cool enough to keep the superconducting rings working?
No choice. Pointing the controller around the corner, Garth activated it. As if by magic, unruffled by the burn fire, shouting, and rock throwing, the pallet rose serenely, vigorous air movement from the puff packet adding to the dust created by the falling ore. Using the outer ring of the spotlight, Garth quickly scanned the tiny box. An arrow pointed toward the top of the control... he pressed it. The pallet jerked up a notch. Touching it again, Garth held it down and watched the swirling air increase. Finally he averted his eyes from the wind. With agonizing slowness, the trap rose into the air.
The chute directly in front of him suddenly dumped a full load of ore into the appropriate car. Shielding his face from dust and fragments, Garth kept his finger on the button. Having fun, Rex? Fighting the urge to wave his arm at the dust cloud, Garth strained to see the trap pallet.
It was now higher than the ore car. Sweet Peter, the Gate is before us! Cautiously moving his thumb to the button below and to the immediate left, he prayed that Nualan controller patterns matched the republic norm.
Occasionally, prayer is answered. The pallet began to move — left, toward the ore car. And the trap began to rock.
By now, the cavern was a kaleidoscope of light, movement and noise. Rex apparently was hitting everything on his screen, and machinery noise was actually louder than the siren. There was no time to worry about an ore shaft opening above the car — he had to keep his finger on the button. But if one of the supports had moved....
Figures, hidden between the cars and below the platform, rose and reached for the trap. What they thought they could do to stop a hundred kilogram trap from — The support. They were wedging the support in place. And it was working — Garth threw up his arms as another burn blazed by, and one of the figures twitched and collapsed. The other, losing hard hat, silver hair askew, threw itself — herself — back between the edges of two cars — only a moment — then reached once more for the pallet.
It was more courage than he had. Garth honored it the only way he could, by gripping the controller until his thumb locked. Only a bit more. Just a bit — The figure stumbled, and now Garth had enough light to see that something was moving next to the rail, moving the still form of the fallen miner down the narrow trench between rail and platform. Standing again, reaching for the trap support, no time to watch the miner —
Using his other hand, Garth placed a thumb on the down button. A quick flick of his gaze told him that the fallen miner had completely disappeared. How — ? A blur of dark clothing sprinted from between two cars, one hand held to a hard hat, and the stocky form dove behind the control panel even as Garth threw himself up against the side of the big control. Two burn beams arced in their direction. He could barely see for the dust; praise all saints the spotlight on the console had been shut off.
Rocks again, now coming from behind the console. If the other person was Silver — Still pushing on the pallet support, she was leaning against the ore car, straining to keep a hand on the trap, when another burn sizzled by. Contracting, collapsing into the trench —
The pallet support snapped. One hundred kilos of trap dropped like a boulder into the ore car. Heaving the controller into space, Garth rolled into the trench. What are you doing, we are talking about antimatter! The stocky miner was on his heels, and creeping in the opposite direction.
How many tons of ore normally crashed into these cars? A solid kilo had caused scarcely a tremor. The trap was angled slightly, but as he wedged himself between the cars and peeked over the edge, Garth could see that the controller lights still showed green. Burn fire bounced off the edge of the car, and Garth threw himself back into the trench.
Only luck caused him to miss the sweep bar which had just passed. Something to pick up the precious ore that bounced — then where had that miner been swept? Garth started crawling down the trench, looking for Darame Daviddottir and an answer to his question.
Lights shut off completely, then flashed back on. Alone. How? Then he saw a glint of hair, and the curve of fingernails.
A silver lock was clamped under eight digits, which in turn wrapped around the lip of an opening a good meter across and easily high enough for a body to have passed through. The left hand suddenly released, and without thought Garth reached in and seized the remaining wrist.
Stone muffled the chaos considerably; the moment was almost intimate. Trying to find breath, Garth gasped: “We got it in the car.”
Whatever surprise she might have felt, her voice did not reveal it. “The train — we must start the train.”
“We switched — manual —”
“Start it.” Although whispered, it was an order.
“Can’t — reach —”
“Let go.”
Silenced, Garth tried desperately to swallow. Let go? What was underneath, some kind of conveyor belt? “How... far...”
“Oh, no more than five meters.”
One hysterical note escaped Garth before he bit his lip to still it. The dead weight was incredible, and she was making no move to reach back up with her other hand. Can’t reach —
“Start the train.” This time it was very gentle.
All options reduced to one... if they did not get the trap out of here, Rex would detonate it. Garth was sure of it. And she had already weighed all possibilities, chosen her path, their path — And why not? Oh, my enemy, my friend; Gavrielians do so like to die well, and in good company. Whatever made me think I was Caesarean? “Sweet Peter,” he whispered aloud.
Her tone was almost humorous as she answered: “He is waiting for us.”
Garth let go.
Throwing himself backward into the dust and noise of the cavern, he scrambled onto the platform and to the console. Which switch? How could he — He started by reversing the automation, which set off a new warning bell. Then he threw everything in the row. Grinding, sliding rock indicated movement, even as he dropped to the ground to avoid burn fire arcing in his direction. Another chute sent down a load, partially filling a car with ore and tossing fusillade over trench and platform as the train began to exit.
Impulse sent Garth sliding up the side of the console, groping for the one button that had to be there somewhere. Over by the chute controls, the ones with the levels — ah. By itself; it was even bright red. He slammed his hand on it.
A horn sounded, blaring a change in instructions. Overhead grates began to close. Two burn arcs crossed at the panel, blowing the back completely off, as Garth dove into the trench and swung himself legs first into the maw of an ore pass.
Rock and thunder followed him down into darkness.