“Jarvas.” Illylle took a step forward and laid her hand on his arm. “What of those it controls, made into mirror patterns and then robots? Can they be restored—saved?”
He did not meet her eyes. “Perhaps no, perhaps yes. But for that we must have both time and knowledge. And with this running, ruling the burrows and the Waste, able to muster an army against us—time we do not have. The machine first—”
They were all agreed upon that. Ayyar lifted the sword. Should he use the energy in that weapon to blast the banks around him? He had taken a step toward the nearest when Rizak thrust out his arm as a barrier before him.
“Not there!” He looked not at Ayyar but at the banks of lighted, clicking relays on the nearest wall.
“Where then?” Ayyar demanded. All he knew of computers was their servicing, not their innermost workings.
“We do not know,” Myrik returned. “This thing runs the burrows—it controls ventilation, everything else. Smash it and it could close doors, stop air, bury us—and still we might not finish it off. We cannot move until we are more sure—”
“Look!” Illylle called sharply. She pointed to one of the banks they had thought dead, as it had been dark since they had entered.
Now a zigzag of lights streaked down it, to be as quickly gone. A second pattern flickered into life and vanished while they watched it. So small a thing, sparks of light coming and going swiftly. Yet somehow it was ominous, an alert they did not understand.
“Back—” Jarvas’ voice was a whisper, as if he feared words could be picked up, read, understood by the machine that boxed them in. And Ayyar shared that feeling for the moment. An enemy one might see, that came openly, a kalcrok, one of the false Ift or an animated space suit, could be faced with firmness of purpose. But lights on a computer board, meant to awaken some menace, they were certain—that was another matter.
Three times those lights drew a design on the board, and each time the sequence was different, as was the color. For the first time they had been a light blue, the second a darker, and the third time purple. Ayyar knew that the others were as tense, using all their senses for any intimation of present danger.
“Myrik—where do you place the master controls?” Jarvas whispered.
“They can be anyplace. I am not expert on alien computers.”
“Ayyar, do you feel any pull from a source of power?” The Mirrormaster rounded on him.
He raised the sword and pointed it to the board that had just come to life. He could feel his own form of force surge through his body, as if it fretted at the bonds of flesh now containing it—would be free to meet, in some flare of incandescence, that other and alien power.
Closing his eyes, he tried to measure that ebb and flow of energy, turning slowly, blindly, using the sword as a pointer to hunt out the center of That. There was a slight change as he turned to the right, so slight that he could not actually be sure he had felt anything. He took another fraction of a turn, was aware of a difference, for now he was rent by a rising storm. He might have cried out; he was not sure, but still he turned. Ebb, to be followed again by flow, now ebb—complete quiet. Ayyar opened his eyes. Now he faced a dead portion of the banks, crisscrossed by the old scars, with no signs of repair.
Eyes closed once more—why that was needful he did not know—but self-blinded he was more inwardly aware of that other force. Turn—flow—to a lesser degree, turn, ebb, flow, sharp and strong, lessening—dead. Then, following so quickly on the dead that he swayed and nearly fell, strong, very strong, flow, flow, ebb, flow—
Yes, by so much could he chart the life of the banks, but that also the others could see and hear for themselves. He was about to say this when Illylle spoke.
“Try underfoot.”
Why she suggested that Ayyar did not know. He took a step or so along, and the sword dipped in his hold, its tip not now pointing to the banks but to the floor. Again he made that slow swing to face each wall. Ebb and flow again, as above—
Then he was being pulled forward as if the sword were a rope, the end drawn by a port machine. This time Ayyar could not save himself against the urgency but went to his knees, and as the sword point dug into the flooring, Ayyar opened his eyes. He was at the foot of the ladder down which they had come. And from his sword point sparks arose higher and higher, while under the tip the floor began to glow red. He dared not watch; the glow hurt his Ift eyes. The sword sank, as if the floor were soft sand, to engulf the blade and finally the arm of its bearer.
“Move it to cut!” Jarvas knelt beyond that fire of sparks. He put out a hand as if to lay it on the sword hilt, then flinched back.
Only half understanding, Ayyar tried to move the blade. It yielded a little so he was cutting through the substance of the floor, or was that merely melting away from any contact with the blade? Wider grew the hole. He thrust right, left, forward, back, enlarging it yet more. Now he must jerk back himself to escape a puff of heat coming from the red and glowing edges of that opening.
Out of him flowed the energy that had been pent in his body. He could almost watch it going into the sword, helping to open this door. Now the opening was large enough for a man, and the smell of molten metal a fog.
“On the stairs—watch out!” He did not know which of them shouted that warning. A beam cut down, struck across the edge of the hole, touched the sparks of the sword force, flashed up in a great burst of light.
Ayyar cried out, blinded. He could not drop the sword that moved, pulling him after it. Heat seared his body, pain such as he had not known could exist— He fell, blind, the sword a great weight he could not master or loose. He struck something below, close below, and lay there writhing in pain. Still the sword was heavy, inert; he could not even stir the hand that held it. And again energy flowed out of him. He could smell burning—acrid—choking—
He sat by the game board, and on that board shone brightly all those curious lines, squares, and dots he could not read. That, which had been his opponent there, which he had never seen, only sensed—yes, It was there, but It no longer heeded him. It had—not retreated, no—It had closed into Itself. When he looked down upon the board, all those figures—the space suits, the Larsh, the others—were overturned, rolling. Now and then one rose, only to topple.
On his side, though the trees—the thin line of Iftin—trembled and shook, they did not fall or roll.
And That which had played the unknown game so confidently—It drew farther and farther in upon Itself. Yet It was still to be feared, for now It was mad—mad!
Arms about him, holding him—the board vanished. He must say it aloud—
“It—is—mad—”
They were pulling at him, racking his body with pain. He could not see—
“Let—me—” But they did not listen to his pleas, and he was an empty thing, hollow of all save the energy he had held, so that he could not beg or fight those hands.
“To the air—can you bring him? Look out! Blast that one—now move!”
Words without meaning uttered in high voices. Words did not matter—nothing mattered. He was lost and empty and knew only pain that was sometimes sharp, sometimes dull, but always a part of him. After a space it was in his chest, so he choked and coughed and choked again. And this added to the pain. He longed for the dark to shut it out.
“Look—It has gone crazy— Oh—” Shrill that voice, so shrill and high as to pierce his dark. “The trees—Rizak, look out for the trees!”
Ayyar could breathe better now. There was a difference in the air. Hands still on him, holding him tight. Liquid dripped into his mouth, cool on his lips and chin as it dribbled out again. He swallowed. It was cool inside him, too.
Coolness on his eyes, soothing their burning. He drew a breath that was a little broken sigh, relaxed.
Around him was a sickening lurch of earth, a grinding—then a shrill screaming from farther off. He could not move, though in him worked a ferment to be up and running, away from this mad place. The arms that held him tightened, bringing stabbing pains to his chest and shoulder. Ayyar tried to cry out, but any sound he might make was lost in the surrounding tumult. Again the earth heaved, there were crashes—