But the wound was mortal. She writhed, clutched at the arm still protruding from her chest, then collapsed. There was a sudden bright flash, and, as in the city station, a presence, a horrible face of hatred composed of pure emotion, flashed briefly before them, and then was gone.
They broke the connection and ran to the dead body.
“Incredible!” Gun Roh Chin said, amazed. “We actually Killed one!”
“A leaf, a blade of grass. Every race has its idiots and its assholes,” Jimmy commented. “There was a reason why she was stuck on guard duty out here in the middle of the night.”
“But the others will know she’s dead!” Modra reminded them. “They’ll come in force, see this, and send for a ton of them, better ones than this!”
“I’m afraid you’re right,” Chin said worriedly. “We can’t take on two hundred, even one at a time! And while they’re unable to group, they can afford to send fifty against us while another hundred just circle around and gnaw. The station will have to wait. We’re going to have to find a hiding place and lie low and pull no funny stuff they can sniff out. Now!”
“Okay,” Jimmy agreed. “But not before we reprogram the other three robots. We shouldn’t disappoint the lads, should we?”
MARTYRS TO THE CAUSE
BAAL, VICE LORD OF HELL, PRINCE OF THE OUTER Darkness, dwarfed the Quintara gathered around the altar both in stature and in presence, dressed in purple velvet, his cape rippling in the soft breeze.
<WELL?>
<We have scanned the entire region, My Lord. There is nothing out there that could have caused this.>
The prince was not mollified. <Scanned? By chance, did anyone think to actually LOOK?>
He didn’t need that question answered.
<Too late now, you idiots. Some Master Race! The more I look at your miserable selves, the more I am tempted to go to the pit and loose the Legions! But I have hopes we may yet be able to conquer without having to turn the whole sector into a wasteland in which even you would yearn for death!>
The thought of loosing the Legions terrified them. Insane, fanatical, uncontrollable, they were the Quintara distilled, not corrupters but destroyers of all they found. So fearsome were they that not even the Engineer could tame them, and they had been sealed in their own dimensional wormhole by their master and creator.
<Perhaps, Highness, it was just a horrible accident. The robot—>
<IDIOT! She was careless and stupid and she got what she deserved! When she is reborn she shall suffer a few centuries in the Lake of Fire to see if she can have some sense burned into her.’ A mere machine can hold no terrors for us. Someone out-thought her, although right now I’m none too sure an insect couldn’t have out-thought her and maybe the lot of you. But this someone still is very good indeed.>
<Highness, could they have come from the station? Hit and run?>
He thought about it. <Very likely. There is hope for you. But I am also disturbed of this report of this spaceship that was blown up yesterday. Why was I not told of it? And what idiot blew it up rather than forcing it down so we could see why it was here? Oh, never mind! I—>
He suddenly stopped, turned, and started sniffing the air, as if he’d suddenly caught a strange and unnatural scent.
<Odd. For a moment there I thought I detected a presence. Someone—familiar somehow. I can’t place it, but it will come to me.> He sighed, and his sigh was like a roar of lions. <All right. From now on I want a full detail here at all times, with emphasis on the station, not the altar. I may come out at any time, and anyone 1 find sleeping behind the altar will suffer! And remember that that idol represents our Lord! I want no more disrespect, unless you want me to report such attitudes to Him!>
That was the one thing they were unanimous on.
<Very well. First, get. rid of that body. Burn it beyond recognition! We want no one to have a demonstration that we can be done in. And I want a full sweep of the area for fifty kilometers square around this spot. Starting now/ Use everything at your disposal. If there is anything, anything, within this region that doesn’t belong there I want to know it immediately!>
They were stunned. <But, My Lord, the Rithians are not much good at night. At dawn—>
<R1THIANS! Who said anything about them? You shall do it. Do you think a Rithian or even a Rithian army is any match for anyone who can bring down any one of us?>
<But—My Lord! It will take a hundred of us to cover such an area with any. speed and thoroughness!>
</ don’t care if it takes two hundred! Something far more serious than the loss of a sentry is at foot here, and I will know about it before it strikes!>
It was incredible to see the Quintara virtually evacuating the city. Incredible—but also frightening to see a veritable demonic army on the march.
They lay there on a blackened rooftop three stories above the scene, watching things unfold.
“How many do you make?” Jimmy whispered.
“A hundred, certainly. Perhaps much more,” Chin responded. “But remember they’re looking for us, and even if there’s two hundred, that leaves more than thirty in the city, or about the same number as in their own city. Only this time we’ve got a regular population to contend with as well.”
“Fat lot of good it does us anyway,” Josef commented. “The sky is already growing light, and the sun will be up in maybe an hour and a half tops. There’s maybe sixty, seventy thousand Rithians in this hive. We may be able to blank a few minds, but not the kinds of crowds that will be out on those streets soon.”
“I agree,” Chin told him. “As much as I would love to take advantage of their absence, we didn’t count on it.”
“Well, it’s going to be hot as a volcano on this rooftop,” Krisha noted. “What do we do?”
“Hostile environment,” Modra replied. “Full suits, full internal systems. There is far too much high-tech stuff in this place for them to pick up five suits. No power problems; I assume these suits have a solar charge option. We relax and get some sleep in air-conditioned comfort. I’ve spent worse times in suits similar to these on worlds you couldn’t live for three seconds on without a full suit. This isn’t nearly as hot as that volcanic place on the path to the city. This isn’t the kind of roof that sees much traffic.”
Gun Roh Chin nodded. “I’m a little concerned about the higher buildings, but none are nearby and we have something of a roof wall. It is reasonably flat. Still, we are vulnerable in sleep if discovered. Modra and I will sleep first. Josef, at two hours awaken me and I will relieve you. An hour after that, Krisha will awaken Modra and do the same. Jimmy, you will then wake Josef and be relieved by him, and so on until we are in darkness once more. The three awake, if vigilant, should be sufficient to thwart any real danger. Just group and it will come to you. The sleepers will awaken when you do. No use of the intercoms, telepathic shields up. We want no monitors picking us up.”
It was not the greatest sleep any of them had ever had, nor the most comfortable, but it was sufficient. It had to be sufficient. At least no one came up there the entire day, and nobody seemed to have peered out of the wrong window at just the right time. The hardest part was guard duty; with full systems on, but no intercom allowed, and shields up, there was no way to really talk. Mostly, you just stared at the city and watched it work.
The Rithians really did look like giant bipedal insects; their native speech, as opposed to the Mycohl standard tongue, appeared to consist of rapid clicks, whistles, and hums which filled the shimmering hot air. They appeared not to wear or need clothes in this customized environment, but most carried backpacks or shoulder purses to hold their essentials. The two sexes were easy to differentiate; there were large reddish-brown Rithians, rather plain-looking, and smaller, almost beige-colored ones who appeared to pretty themselves up by having designs painted on their shells. Modra naturally assumed that the smaller ones with the fancy designs were the females and was startled to realize that the children, who ranged from fat white worm-like things to miniature versions of their parents depending on age, were almost invariably associated with the larger, plain sex. By sign, she managed to ask Josef who was who, and he indicated that the big plain ones were indeed the females.
Modra couldn’t help but think that there was something to say about the women being the big, strong ones and the men the smaller and weaker sex who had to dress themselves up
to please the girls. She wondered if “Lord” wasn’t a generic; Squazos might well be a female.
The Rithian form of the drol was much in evidence as well, and as disturbing as ever. All of the cleaning and pulling and hauling and whatnot she saw them doing could have been done by machines, yet machines were left for security. No civilization that could restructure a planet to its own design and send spaceships far and wide should ever need slaves; apparently they had them either for status, to feel power, or just because that’s the way things were done. Josef saw nothing wrong, and he was of Terran ancestry himself. He’d explained while they moved from lake to city that drols were Terrans because there were more surplus Terrans, and that their race had replaced the patchwork of other races used by most until Terran inclusion. On the moral question, he’d asked them if they’d be as upset if this were a Terran world and the drols had looked like Rithians. All of them liked to think that they’d feel the same, but Modra wasn’t the only one who, deep down, wasn’t all that sure. She hoped so.
No new drols had been developed for centuries, of course, which gave present-day Terrans some distance, but there was a method, generic male and generic female for some drol creation. Terran authorities used it as the ultimate punishment and to make examples of rebels, spies, and would-be usurpers. It used some kind of nanotechnology and it was very fast, and it had frightened Josef as nothing else had when he was younger. No worry here, though; you couldn’t create drols from Rithians so why bother?
The worse thing, though, was that it made them wonder what other quaint Mycohl customs there might be that they weren’t seeing. There were ugly enough worlds in the Exchange—Tris’s home world was a horror—so what might some worlds be like here?
As night fell, the city slowed down to a crawl. Within the first hour of darkness, everything appeared close and there were few on the streets save some drols sweeping the remnants of the day’s commerce up and throwing it into carts.
Some Quintara had been going in and out of the city all day, but only in small numbers, usually ones and twos. It was fascinating to see the Rithians’ reaction to the huge creatures; they dropped to all fours and prostrated themselves in near automatic motion and remained that way as the demons passed, usually ignoring them completely. It was more than fear, although that was there in abundance; the emotions washing up when the demons passed was also bordering on worshipful adoration. Either they’d sold out body and soul to the Quintara, or the demons had dealt with the doubters.
Other races, too, had been present, although in very small numbers. Lord Squazos had a number of worlds and races under the hive, including two Terran worlds, although no one had seen a sign of any Terrans anywhere during the day watch.
Even though it was still a steambath, it was a relief to have helmets off again and therefore to be able to speak.
“I think redirecting the crystal station is out for the moment. They’ll have it bristling with guards and traps,” Chin said with a trace of disappointment.
“Not necessarily,” Josef responded, thinking. “I can’t think of a single act that would bring about what we want quicker and with the least fuss. The problem is simply one of drawing them off. Cap, how many of us could do that job?”
“The minimum number. Three. But I dislike splitting up the team for any reason. If we should lose any one of the three for any reason, we’d be dead.”
“Wouldn’t we still be able to link, even though physically separated?”
” Yes,, but—”
“Let’s hear what he’s got in mind first,” Jimmy said. “It beats livin’ up here and thumb-twiddlin’. If we don’t move fast, before they know who and what they’re facing, we’re bound to be in for it.”
Gun Roh Chin sighed. “All right. Let’s hear your plan, Josef.”
“Well, I suggest that three of us get as near the station as is possible without being detected. The other two will take the explosives into the city and pack them in the right places
around the central hive. There’s enough here to do a lot of damage to that keep.”
“So what?” Jimmy asked him. “You’ll not harm the Quintara with any bombs, unless you get lucky and some debris hits their soft spots. You’ll just make a mess, tell ’em we’re here, and leave a calling card.”
Modra thought about it. “Jimmy, you’ve seen the typical Quintara they have around here now. If those types were guarding the crystal and suddenly saw the castle blow, what do you think they’d do?”
“Stay put, as their leaders will order them to do,” Chin answered. “They’re all powerful telepaths, you remember.”