12
The Command System: Engines
“… A sky like chipped ice, a wind to cut you to the body core. Too cold for snow, for most of the journey, but once for eleven
days and nights it
came, a blizzard over the field of ice we walked on, howling like an animal, with a bite like steel. The
crystals of ice flowed like a single torrent
over the hard and frozen land. You could not look into it or breathe; even trying
to stand was near impossible. We made a hole, shallow and
cold, and lay in it until the skies cleared.
“We were the walking wounded, straggled band. Some we lost when their blood froze in them. One just disappeared, at night
in a storm of
snow. Some died from their wounds. One by one we lost them, our comrades and our servants. Every one begged
us make what use we could
of their corpse once they were gone. We had so little food; we all knew what it meant, we were all
prepared; name a sacrifice more total, or
more noble.
“In that air, when you cried, the tears froze on your face with a cracking sound, like a heart breaking.
“Mountains. The high passes we climbed to, famished in that thin and bitter air. The snow was white powder, dry as dust. To
breathe it was
to freeze from inside; flurries from the jagged slopes, dislodged by feet in front, stung in the throat like
acid spray. I saw rainbows in the crystal
veils of ice and snow which were the product of our passing, and grew to hate those
colors, that freezing dryness, the starved high air and dark
blue skies.
“Three glaciers we traversed, losing two of our comrades in crevasses, beyond sight or sound, falling further than an echo’s
reach.
“Deep in a mountain ring we came to a marsh; it lay in that scoop like a cess for hope. We were too slow, too stupefied, to
save our Querl
when he walked out into it and floundered there. We thought it could not be, with air so cold around us, even
in that wan sunlight; we thought it
must be frozen and we saw what only seemed to be, and our eyes would clear and he come
walking back to us, not slip beneath that dark
ooze, out of reach.
“It was an oil marsh, we realized too late, after the tarry depths had claimed their toll from us. The next day, while we
were still looking for a
way across, the chill came harder still, and even that sludge locked itself to stillness, and we
walked quickly to the other side.
“In the midst of frozen water we began to die of thirst. We had little to heat the snow with save our own bodies, and eating
that white dust
until it numbed us made us groggy with the cold of it, slowing our speech and step. But we kept on, though
the cold sucked at us whether awake
or trying to sleep, and the harsh sun blinded us in fields of glittering white and filled
our eyes with pain. The wind cut us, snow tried to swallow
us, mountains like cut black glass blocked us, and the stars on
clear nights taunted us, but on we came.
“Near two thousand kilometers, little one, with only the small amount of food we could carry from the wreck, what little equipment
had not
been turned to junk by the barrier beast, and our own determination. We were forty-four when we left the battle cruiser,
twenty-seven when we
began our trek across the snows: eight of my kind, nineteen of the medjel folk. Two of us completed the
journey, and six of our servants.
“Do you wonder that we fell upon the first place we found with light and heat. Does it surprise you that we just took, and
did not ask. We
had seen brave warriors and faithful servants die of cold, watched each other wear away, as though the ice
blasts had abraded us; we had
looked into the cloudless, pitiless skies of a dead and alien place, and wondered who might
be eating who when the dawnlight came. We
made a joke of it at first, but later, when we had marched a thirty-day, and most
of us were dead, in ice gullies, mountain ravines or raw in our
own bellies, we did not think it so funny. Some of the last,
perhaps not believing our course was true, I think died of despair.
“We killed your human friends, these other Changers. I killed one with my own hands; another, the first, fell to a medjel,
while he still slept.
The one in the control room fought bravely, and when he knew he was lost, destroyed many of the controls.
I salute him. There was another who
put up a fight in the place where they stored things; he, too, died well. You should not
grieve too much for them. I shall face my superiors with the
truth in my eyes and heart. They will not discipline me, they
will reward me, should I ever stand before them."
Horza was behind the Idiran, walking down the tunnel after him while Yalson took a rest from guarding the tall triped. Horza
had asked
Xoxarle to tell him what had happened to the raiding party which had come to the planet inside the chuy-hirtsi animal.
The Idiran had responded
with an oration.
“
She,
" Horza said.
“What, human." Xoxarle’s voice rumbled down the tunnel. He hadn’t bothered to turn round when he talked; he spoke to the clear
air of the
foot tunnel leading to station seven, his powerful bassy voice easily heard even by Wubslin and Aviger, who were
bringing up the rear of the
small, motley band.
“You did it again," Horza said wearily, talking to the back of the Idiran’s head. “The one killed while asleep: it was a she;
a woman, a
female."
“Well, the medjel attended to her. We laid them out in the corridor. Some of their food proved edible; it tasted like heaven
to us."
“How long ago was that." Horza asked.
“About eight days, I think. It is hard to keep time down here. We tried to construct a mass sensor immediately, knowing that
it would be
invaluable, but we were unsuccessful. All we had was what was undamaged from the Changer base. Most of our own
equipment had been
attacked by the beast of the Barrier or had to be abandoned when we set off from the warp animal to come
here, or left en route, as we died
off."
“You must have thought it was a bit of luck finding the Mind so easily." Horza kept his rifle trained on the tall Idiran’s
neck, watching Xoxarle
all the time. The creature might be injured—Horza knew enough about the species to tell that the section
leader was in pain just from the way he