“I’ll take a communicator; I’ll check in," Horza said. He stood with his arms crossed, his backside resting on the edge of
a control panel; the
same one Wubslin’s helmet lay on. The engineer was familiarizing himself with the controls of the train.
They were pretty simple really.
“It’s basic, Horza," Yalson told him; “you never go alone. What stuff did they teach you at this goddamned Academy."
“If I’m allowed to say anything," Balveda put in, clasping her hands in front of her and looking at the Changer, “I would
just like to say I think
Yalson’s right."
Horza stared at the Culture woman with a look of unhappy amazement. “No, you are not allowed to say anything," he told her.
“Whose side
do you think you’re on, Perosteck."
“Oh, Horza," Balveda grinned, crossing her arms, “I almost feel like one of the team after all this time."
About half a meter away from the gently rocking, slowly cooling head of Subordinate-Captain Quayanorl Gidborux Stoghrle III,
a small light
began to flash very rapidly on the console. At the same time, the air in the control deck was pierced by a high-pitched
ululating whine which
filled the deck and the whole front carriage and was relayed to several other control centers throughout
the speeding train. Quayanorl, his firmly
wedged body tugged to one side by the force of the train roaring round a long curve,
could have heard that noise, just, if he had been alive. Very
few humans could have heard it.
Unaha-Closp thought the better of cutting off all communication with the outside world, and reopened its communicator channels.
Nobody
wanted to speak to it, however. It started to cut the cables leading into the conduit, snipping them one by one with
a knifeedged force field. No
point in worrying about damaging the thing after all that had happened to the train in station
six, it told itself. If it hit anything vital to the normal
running of the train, it was sure Horza would yell out soon enough.
It could repair the cables without too much trouble anyway.
A
draft.
Xoxarle thought he must be imagining it, then that it was the result of some air-circulation unit recently switched on. Perhaps
the heat from
the lights and the station’s systems, once it was powered up, required extra ventilation.
But it grew. Slowly, almost too slowly to discern, the faint, steady current increased in strength. Xoxarle racked his brains;
what could it be.
Not a train; surely not a train.
He listened carefully, but could hear nothing. He looked over at the old human, and found him staring back. Had he noticed.
“Run out of battles and victories to tell me about." Aviger said, sounding tired. He looked the Idiran up and down. Xoxarle
laughed—a little
too loudly, even nervously, had Aviger been well enough versed in Idiran gestures and voice tones to tell.
“Not at all!" Xoxarle said. “I was just thinking…" He launched into another tale of defeated enemies. It was one he had told
to his family, in
ship messes and in attack-shuttle holds; he could have told it in his sleep. While his voice filled the
bright station, and the old human looked
down at the gun he held in his hands, Xoxarle’s thoughts were elsewhere, trying to
work out what was going on. He was still pulling and tugging
at the wires on his arm; whatever was happening it was vital
to be able to do more than just move his hand. The draft increased. Still he could
hear nothing. A steady stream of dust was
blowing off the girder above his head.
It had to be a train. Could one have been left switched on somewhere. Impossible….
Quayanorl! Did we set the controls to—.
But they hadn’t tried to jam the controls on. They had only worked out what the various controls did
and tested their action
to make sure they all moved. They hadn’t tried to do anything else; and there had been no point, no time.
It had to be Quayanorl himself. He had done it. He must still be alive. He had sent the train.
For an instant—as he tugged desperately at the wires holding him, talking all the time and watching the old man—Xoxarle imagined
his
comrade still back in station six, but then he remembered how badly injured he had been. Xoxarle had earlier thought his
comrade might still be
alive, when he was still lying on the access ramp, but then the Changer had told the old man, this
same Aviger, to go back and shoot Quayanorl
in the head. That should have finished Quayanorl, but apparently it hadn’t.
You failed, old one!
Xoxarle exulted, as the draft became a breeze. A distant whining noise, almost too high pitched to hear, started up. It
was
muffled, coming from the train. The alarm.
Xoxarle’s arm, held by one last wire just above his elbow, was almost free. He shrugged once, and the wire slipped up over
his upper arm
and spilled loose onto his shoulder.
“Old one, Aviger, my friend," he said. Aviger looked up quickly as Xoxarle interrupted his own monologue.
“What."
“This will sound silly, and I shall not blame you if you are afraid, but I have the most infernal itch in my right eye. Would
you scratch it for me. I
know it sounds silly, a warrior tormented half to death by a sore eye, but it has been driving me
quite demented these past ten minutes. Would
you scratch it. Use the barrel of your gun if you like; I shall be very careful
not to move a muscle or do anything threatening if you use the muzzle
of your gun. Or anything you like. Would you do that.
I swear to you on my honor as a warrior I tell the truth."
Aviger stood up. He looked toward the nose of the train.
He can’t hear the alarm. He is old. Can the other, younger ones hear. Is it too high-pitched for them. What of the machine.
Oh come
here, you old fool. Come here!
Unaha-Closp pulled the cut cables apart. Now it could reach into the cable-run and try cutting further up, so it could get
in.
“Drone, drone, can you hear me." It was the woman Yalson again.
“
Now
what." it said.
“Horza’s lost some readouts from the reactor car. He wants to know what you’re doing."
“Damn right I do," Horza muttered in the background.
“I had to cut some cables. Seems to be the only way into the reactor area. I’ll repair them later, if you insist."
The communicator channel cut off for a second. In that moment, Unaha-Closp thought it could hear something high pitched. But
it wasn’t
sure. Fringes of sensation, it thought to itself. The channel opened again. Yalson said, “All right. But Horza says
to tell him the next time you
think about cutting anything, especially cables."
“All right, all right!" the drone said. “Now, will you leave me alone." The channel closed again. It thought for a moment.
It had crossed its
mind that there might be an alarm sounding somewhere, but logically an alarm ought to have repeated on
the control deck, and it had heard
nothing in the background when Yalson spoke, apart from the Changer’s muttered interjection.
Therefore, no alarm.
It reached back into the conduit with a cutter field.
* * *
“Which eye." Aviger said, from just too far away. A wisp of his thin, yellowish hair was blown across his forehead by the
breeze. Xoxarle waited
for the man to realize, but he didn’t. He just patted the hairs back and stared up quizzically at the
Idiran’s head, gun ready, face uncertain.