Apparently the captain was not planning to move on at once. He opened a ration container and held it first to Vandy’s mouth and then his own, so they shared the contents. Nik’s empty stomach was a new source of pain as he watched.
“We shall give your friends” – Leeds’ voice was still cool and light.”some more time. They were probably misled by the zeal of your late champion when he sent the tracer bag downstream. But you have your own way of contacting them, haven’t you, Vandy? And I would suggest you use that gadget now.”
Little of the boy’s face could be seen below the masking goggles, but Nik noted the fining down of cheek and chin, the hollows beneath the grimy skin.
“You’ll blast anybody that tries to come.”
Once more Nik heard that new maturity in Vandy’s voice.
“On the contrary, my boy, I will welcome them with open arms. There is certainly no future here. And to return you to your anxious friends is a good way to get out, whole skin and free. You saw what I did to the man who brought you here in the first place.”
“Hacon said.”
Leeds laughed. “My poor boy, please understand the simplest of truths – there is no Hacon, except in the wonderland of your own imagination. That port rat who pulled you into this mess is Nik Kolherne from the Dipple. He is not even a member of the Guild.”
“You are.” Vandy held to his point.
“I am Guild when it suits me to be and no time else! There’s a big reward waiting for the man who returns Vandy i’Akrama – I want that and my ship. We’ll make a bargain, and that is the last you’ll see of me, I assure you. After all, Vandy, you have only to tell the truth. I am bringing you back; I have disposed of the man who stole you from Korwar. There isn’t any scanner on this world or any other that wouldn’t pass me clean on those two questions.”
“What’ll happen to Hacon – to him back there?” Vandy asked slowly.
“He’ll stay and nurse a sore head until the Patrol wants to pick him up.”
“But there were those other – other things. What if they find him first?
Leeds shrugged. “All right, what if they do? He’s no friend of yours. Now I’m telling you, boy, get out that fancy little com of yours and give it a tinkle. I heard that Commander i’Inad is with the Patrol.”
“Staven?” Vandy’s head came up. “Staven’s here? You’ll have to untie me or I can’t use the mike, you know.”
“Yes. One hand, Vandy, just one hand. You’re a slippery little fish, and you’re not wriggling off until we are all safe and sound again. Turn around.”
The boy, on his knees, twisted around so Leeds could get at the ties on his wrists. Nik measured the distance he must drop, the space before the roots could give him limited cover. In his weak state, he had to have more time –
Vandy’s free hand was at the breast of his tunic and came out with something cupped in the palm. He put it close to his lips and appeared to be breathing on it. Leeds watched him closely, the drawn blaster resting on his outthrust splinted leg.
Not a chance, thought Nik, not one little chance unless Leeds moved. In this light the captain’s face was a blue mask of goggles and shadowed flesh. Blue – !
Nik stared, alerted now to the odd change taking place in the misty light of the chamber. It was blue! Not only that, but there was also a distinct chill in the air. He levered himself up so that he now crouched in the crevice. As yet, neither of those below apparently noticed the alteration in the atmosphere.
Movement! Nik wrenched his attention from Leeds and the boy to focus on movement among the entwined roots of the weird growth. Something alike in size and shape to those worm roots was edging out into the open. More than one- from other directions – !
“Any contact yet?” Leeds demanded.
Vandy was quiet. Then he stiffened. His hand dropped from his mouth, and his lips shaped a cry. Leeds followed the boy’s horrified gaze and went into action. Roots and that which moved from them crisped in an instant.
Only it was not the crawlers that were to be feared the most. Vandy was on his feet, backing away, not from Leeds or the remainder of the crawlers; but from a space below and to the left of Nik’s perch. It was there, pulsating, growing, from nothingness into the totally alien shining thing.
Leeds fired again, this time directing his blaster at the growing core of light. And it absorbed the raw off-world energy of the weapon, seeming to suck the power away until Leeds looked down with terrified bewilderment at an empty tube. He began to back away as had Vandy.
The thing made no attack, no outward threat – it merely was. Nik wanted to draw back into the dark of the tunnel.
Only one thing held him where he was – Vandy’s face, upturned a little now to front the unknown.
Leeds had been right. Vandy was here only because of Nik Kolherne. And Nik Kolherne was finished any way you reckoned it. Better make it as good a finish as he had the chance to-
“Leeds!” Nik shouted. “The rayer – use the rayer!” That blinding light had stopped the thing back in the tunnel and might be the only defense now.
Leeds’ foot caught in a root tangle when he tried to move. Had Nik’s call pierced through the wall of Vandy’s terror? The boy flung himself on the captain, pawing at the other’s belt as Leeds strove to throw him off. Something clattered, spun across the rock, and stopped at the very edge of the stream.
The pillar of light was growing closer to Nik. To reach that weapon, he would have to pass it, and every nerve shrank from any contact with that light. Vandy crept toward the rayer, but Leeds suddenly caught the boy by one foot and hurled him back and away. Had the captain gone mad?
Nik gathered his feet under him. He looked away determinedly from the pillar and concentrated on the rayer. Then he swung down from the crevice. The fringe of the light struck his left side. It was a cold so intense that he was numbed, and he tottered rather than leaped for the rayer.
A shout, and Leeds threw himself as if to intercept Nik. Sprawling forward, the younger man flung out his arm in a last desperate try, and his fingers touched the smooth metal. Somehow he turned over, aimed at the towering pillar of icy light, and pressed the button, praying that all its charge had not been exhausted.
There was a flash, blinding. And all the air was filled with a moaning – or did he feel rather than hear that? He saw Leeds crawling, his splinted leg trailing behind him, heading into the light.
“Leeds!” Had Nik shouted that warning aloud or was it swallowed up in the noise that was a part of the air, of him, of all this buried world?
At any rate, the captain did not heed. He crept on into the swirling light. And Nik knew that, wearing the goggles, the other had been blinded. Then he saw Vandy staggering forward, also being drawn on into the place where the pillar had stood.
Nik made a last effort, rolled his body across the boy’s path, and threw up his good arm to prevent Vandy from merging with the chaos that had swallowed Leeds. He was still holding the weakly struggling boy, though he did not know it, when Vandy’s call was answered.
The window was too high for Nik to see through, but outside was real sun. A bar of its light was warm across his hands and face. This was the first time he could remember rising from the bunk in the drab room and moving about. How long had he been here – and where was here?
Nik thought he was awake now, but for a long time he must have dreamed. Or could he call it dreaming just to remember every searing bit of his past, all the hurt from the moment he had been found in the wrecked ship up to that last sight of the burrows of Dis when he had concentrated on saving Vandy from the thing that walked there?
“Hacon!”
Nik continued to stare up at a cloud, which was the only moving thing the window allowed him to view. But he knew he heard that call in the here-and-now, not out of memory.
“There is no Hacon,” he said harshly before he turned, his hand flying up in the old gesture to mask a face he had not dared to touch since his waking.