drowning out every other sound, even explosions and shots, so that everything else seemed to be happening in a shocked
silence within that
ultimate scream—rose in pitch.
Yalson dropped; her suit was damaged.
Her legs started to work before she hit the ground, and when she did she was running, running for the nearest cover. She ran
for the Mind,
dull silver by the wall side.
And changed her mind.
She turned, just before she would have been able to dive behind the Mind, and ran on round it, toward the doorways and alcoves
of the wall
beyond.
Xoxarle’s fire slammed into her again the instant she turned, and this time her suit armor could soak up no more energy; it
gave way, the
laser-fire bursting through like lightning all over the woman’s body, throwing her into the air, blowing her
arms out, kicking her legs from under
her, jerking her like a doll caught in the fist of an angry child, and throwing a bright
crimson cloud from her chest and abdomen.
The train hit.
It flashed into the station on a tide of noise; it roared from the tunnel like a solid metal thunderbolt, seeming to cross
the space between the
tunnel mouth and the slowly moving train in front in the same instant as it appeared. Xoxarle, closest
of them all, caught a fleeting glimpse of the
train’s sleek shining nose before that great shovel front slammed into the back
of the other train.
He could not have believed there was a sound greater than that the train had made in the tunnel, but the noise of its impact
dwarfed even
that cacophony. It was a star of sound, a blinding nova where before there had only been a dim glow.
The train hit at over one hundred and ninety kilometers per hour. Wubslin’s train had barely progressed a carriage length
into the tunnel and
was moving hardly faster than walking speed.
The racing train smashed into the rear coach, lifting and crumpling it in a fraction of a second, crushing it into the tunnel
roof, jack-
hammering its layers of metal and plastic into a tight wad of wreckage in the same instant as its own nose and
front carriage caved in
underneath, shattering wheels, snapping rails and bursting the train’s metal skin like shrapnel from
some vast grenade.
The train plowed on: into and under the front train, skidding and crashing to one side as smashed sections of the two trains
kicked out to
the wall side of the tracks, forcing them both into the main body of the station in a welter of tearing metal
and fractured stone, while the
carriages bucked, squashed, telescoped and disintegrated all at once.
The whole length of the racing train continued to pour out of the tunnel, coaches flashing by, streaming into the chaos of
disintegrating
wreckage in front, lifting and crashing and slewing. Flames burst and flickered in the detonating debris; sparks
fountained; glass blew spraying
out from the breaking windows; flaying ribbons of metal beat at the walls.
Xoxarle ducked in, away from the pulverizing sound of it.
Wubslin felt the train hit. It threw him back in the chair. He knew already he had failed; the train, his train, was going
too slowly. A great hand
from nowhere rammed into his back; his ears popped; the control deck, the carriage, the whole train
shook round him, and suddenly, in the
midst of it, the rear of the next train, the one in the repair and maintenance cavern,
was racing toward him. He felt his train jump the tracks on
the curve that might have let him roll to safety. The acceleration
went on. He was pinned, helpless. The rear carriage of the other train flashed
toward him; he closed his eyes, half a second
before he was crushed like an insect inside the wreckage.
Horza was curled in a small doorway in the station wall, with no idea how he had got there. He didn’t look, he couldn’t see.
He whimpered in
a corner while the devastation bellowed in his ears, pelted his back with debris and shook the walls and floor.
Balveda had found a space in the wall, too—an alcove where she hid, her back turned, her face hidden.
Unaha-Closp had planted itself on the station ceiling, behind the cover of a camera dome. It watched the crash as it went
on beneath; it saw
the last carriage leave the tunnel, saw the crashing train smash into and through the one they had been
in only seconds before, pushing it
forward in a skidding, tangled mess of mangled metal. Carriages left the tracks, skidding
sideways over the station floor as the wreck slowed,
tearing the access ramps from the rock, smashing lights from the ceiling;
debris flew up, and the drone had to dodge. It saw Yalson’s body,
beneath it on the platform, hit by the slewing, rolling
carriages, tumbling over the fused rock surface in a cloud of sparks; they swept past, just
missing the Mind, scraped the
woman’s torn body from the floor and buried it with the access ramps in the wall, hammering into the black rock
by the side
of the tunnel where a squeezed-out collar of wreckage swelled as the last of the impetus from the collision spent itself compressing
metal and stone together.
Fire burst out; sparks flashed from the tracks; the station lights flickered. Wreckage fell back, and the quivering echo of
the wreck
reverberated through the station. Smoke started up, explosions shook the station, and suddenly, from out of the
ceiling, surprising the drone,
water started to spray from holes all along the surface of rock, beside the flickering lines
of lights. The water turned to foam and floated down
through the air like warm snow.
The mangled wreckage hissed and groaned and creaked as it settled. Flames licked over it, fighting against the falling foam
as they found
flammables in the debris.
Then there was a scream, and the drone looked down through a haze of smoke and foam. Horza ran from a doorway in the wall,
just up the
platform from the near edge of the burning metal rubble.
The man ran up the wreckage-littered platform, screaming and firing his gun. The drone saw rock fracture and explode around
the distant
tunnel entrance Xoxarle had been firing from. It expected to see answering fire and the man fall, but there was
nothing. The man kept on running
and firing, shouting incoherently all the time. The drone couldn’t see Balveda.
Xoxarle had stuck the gun round the corner as soon as the noise died away; at the same time the man appeared and started firing.
Xoxarle
had time to take aim but not to fire. A shot landed near the gun, on the wall, and something hammered into Xoxarle’s
hand; the gun sputtered,
then went dead. A splinter of rock protruded from the weapon’s casing. Xoxarle swore, threw it away
across the tunnel. More shots burst around
the tunnel mouth as the Changer fired again. Xoxarle looked down at Aviger, who
was moving weakly on the floor, face down, limbs shifting in
the air and over the rock like somebody trying to swim.
Xoxarle had kept the old one alive to use as a hostage, but he was of little use now. The woman Yalson was dead; he had killed
her, and
Horza wanted to avenge her.
Xoxarle crushed Aviger’s skull with his foot, then turned and ran.
There were twenty meters to run before the first turn. Xoxarle ran as fast as he could, ignoring the pains from his legs and
body. An
explosion sounded from the station. A hissing noise came from above Xoxarle’s head, and spurts of water from the
sprinkler system started to
fall from the ceiling.
The air glowed with laser-fire as he dived for the first side tunnel; the wall blew out at him, and something hit his leg
and back. He ran on,
limping.
There were some doors ahead, to the left. He tried to remember how the stations were laid out. The doors ought to lead to
the control room
and accommodation dormitories; he could cut through there, cross the repair and maintenance cavern by the
gantry bridge, and get up a side
tunnel to the transit tube system. That way he could escape. He hobbled quickly, shoulder-charging
the doors. The Changer’s steps sounded
loud somewhere in the tunnels behind him.
The drone watched Horza, his gun still firing, his legs pumping, run up the platform like a madman, screaming and howling
and vaulting bits