three short corridors, lights flickering, water showering from the roof, smoke crawling under the ceiling
in lazy waves.
Horza had gone right, the way the Idiran would have gone if he was heading for the transit tubes, and if he had worked out
the right
direction, and if he didn’t have some other plan.
But he’d chosen the wrong way.
He held the gun tight in his hands. His face ran with the false tears of the showering water. The gun hummed through his gloves;
a swollen
ball of pain rose from his belly, filling his throat and his eyes and souring his mouth, weighing in his hands,
clamping his teeth. He stopped at
another junction, near the dormitories, in an agony of indecision, looking from one direction
to another while the water fell and the smoke crept
and the lights guttered. He heard a scream, and set off that way.
The woman struggled. She was strong, but still powerless, even in his weakened grasp. Xoxarle limped along the corridor, toward
the great
cavern.
Balveda screamed, tried to wriggle her way free, then use her legs to kick at the Idiran’s thighs and knees. But she was held
too tightly, too
high on Xoxarle’s back. Her arms were pinned at her sides; her legs could only beat against the keratin plate
which curved out from the Idiran’s
rump. Behind her, the sleep-nets of the Command System’s builders swayed gently in the
tides of air which swept through the long dormitory
with each fresh explosion from the platform area and the wrecked trains.
She heard firing from somewhere behind them, and doors at the far end of the long room blew out. The Idiran heard the noise,
too; just
before they crashed through the exit from the dormitory his head turned to glance back in the direction the noise
had come from. Then they
were in the short corridor and out onto the terrace which ran round the deep cavern of the repair
and maintenance area.
On one side of the huge cavern, a fallen, tangled heap of smashed carriages and wrecked machinery blazed. The train Wubslin
had started
moving had been rammed into the rear of the train already in the long scooped-out alcove which hung over the cavern
floor. Parts of both the
front trains had scattered like toys; down to the cavern floor, piled against the walls, crushed
into the roof. The foam fell through the cavern,
sizzling on the hot debris of the wreck, where flames spilled up from crumpled
carriages, and sparks flashed.
Xoxarle slipped on the terrace, and for one second Balveda thought they would both skid off its surface, over the guard rails
and down to
the jumble of machinery and equipment on the cold, hard floor below. But the Idiran steadied himself, turned and
pounded along the broad
walkway toward the metal catwalk which crossed the breadth of the cavern and led over the far edge
of the terrace into another tunnel—the
tunnel which led to the transit tubes.
She heard the Idiran breathe. Her ringing ears caught the crackle of flames, the hiss of foam and the labored wheeze of Xoxarle’s
breath.
He held her easily, as though she weighed nothing. She cried out in frustration, heaved her body with all her strength,
trying to break his grip or
even just get an arm free, struggling weakly.
They came to the suspended catwalk, and again the Idiran almost slipped, then again caught himself in time and steadied. He
started along
the narrow gantry, his limping, unsteady tread shaking it, making it sound like a metal drum. Her back hurt
as she strained; Xoxarle’s grip
stayed firm.
Then he skidded to a halt, brought her round in front of his huge, saddle-face. He held her by both shoulders for a moment,
then took her
right arm by the elbow with one hand, keeping hold of her right shoulder with the other fist.
He brought one knee out, holding his thigh level with the cavern floor, thirty meters below. Held by elbow and shoulder, her
weight taken by
that one arm, her back aching, her head hardly clear, she suddenly realized what he was going to do.
She screamed.
Xoxarle brought the woman’s upper arm down across his thigh, snapping it like a twig. Her cry broke like ice.
He took her by the wrist of her good arm and swung her out over the side of the catwalk, sweeping her down beneath him and
positioning
her hand on a thin metal stanchion, then he left her. It was done in a second or two; she swung like a pendulum
under the metal bridge. Xoxarle
ran off, limping. Each step, shaking the suspended gantry, vibrated through the stanchion
to Balveda’s hand, loosening her grip.
She hung there. Her broken arm dangled uselessly at her side. Her hand gripped the cold, smooth, foam-smeared surface of the
thin
stanchion. Her head spun; waves of pain she tried to but could not shut off crashed through her. The cavern lights blinked
out, then came back
on again. Another explosion shook the wrecked carriages. Xoxarle crossed the catwalk and ran hobbling
over the terrace on the other side of
the great cave, into the tunnel. Her hand started to slip, going numb; her whole arm
was going cold.
Perosteck Balveda twisted in the air, put her head back, and howled.
The drone stopped. Now the noises were from behind. It had taken the wrong direction. It was still fuddled; Xoxarle hadn’t
doubled back after
all.
I’m a fool! I shouldn’t be allowed out by myself !
It turned its body over in the air of the tunnel leading away from the control room and the long dormitories, slowed and stopped,
then
powered back down the way it had come. It could hear laser-fire.
Horza was in the control room; it was clear of water and foam, though smoke was coming from a large hole in one console. He
hesitated, then
heard another scream—the sound of a human, a woman—and ran through the doors leading to the dormitories.
* * *
She tried to swing herself, make a pendulum of her body and so hook a leg onto the gantry, but the already injured muscles
in her lower back
could not do it; the muscle fibers tore; pain swamped her. She hung.
She couldn’t feel her hand. Foam settled on her upturned face and stung her eyes. A series of explosions racked the mangled
heap of
carriages, making the air around her quiver, shaking her. She felt herself slip; she dropped fractionally, her grip
moving down the stanchion a
millimeter or two. She tried to hold on tighter, but could feel nothing.
Noise came from the terrace. She tried to look round and in a moment she saw Horza, racing along the terrace for the catwalk,
holding the
gun. He skidded on the foam and had to reach out with his free hand to steady himself.
“Horza…" she tried to shout, but all that came out was a croak. Horza ran along the catwalk above her, staring ahead. His
steps shook her
hand; it had started to slip again. “Horza…" she said again, as loud as she could.
The Changer ran on past her, his face set, the rifle raised, his boots hammering the metal deck above her. Balveda looked
down, her head
dropping. Her eyes closed.
Horza… Kraiklyn… that geriatric outworld minister on Sorpen… no piece or image of the Changer, nothing and nobody the man
had ever
been could have any desire to rescue her. Xoxarle seemed to have hoped some pan-human compassion would make Horza
stop and save
her, and so give the Idiran a few precious extra moments to make his escape; but the Idiran had made the same
mistake about Horza that his
whole species had made about the Culture. They were not that soft after all; humans could be
just as hard and determined and merciless as
any Idiran, given the right encouragement….
I’m going to die,
she thought, and was almost more surprised than terrified.
Here, now. After all that’s happened, all I’ve done. Die. Just