Deathstalker - Twilight Of The Empire Omnibus Part 38

"And that's why I'm here with you, Captain. Because I missed the warning signs and let the creatures loose. And because I hadn't the sense to get myself honourably killed on Grendel. Maybe I'll do better this time."

They sat in silence a while, staring out at the darkness and the thickening mists beyond the force screen.

Krystel turned and looked at Hunter for the first time. "So tell me, Captain, what was it like, out in the Rim worlds?"

Hunter tried to answer her, and his throat closed up on him. He struggled to get the words out anyway.

She'd told him her story as honestly as she could, and he was d.a.m.ned if he'd do less for her.

"It's dark out there, on the Rim. The stars are scattered thinly across the gulf, and habitable planets are few and far between. Beyond the edge of our galaxy lies the endless night, a darkness so deep no ship has ever crossed it and returned. But the Rim planets are still part of the Empire, and have to be patrolled.

"Time seems to move differently, out there. It drags on slowly, each day like the day before, until you can't tell one day from another. The endless dark preys on your nerves, like an itch you can't scratch.

You begin to feel as if you've always been out on the Rim, and always will. You can't ever relax. Ships disappear on the Rim, and no one knows why. You start to look forward to trouble breaking out, because then at least there'll be some action; something to do, something to strike back at.

"I was a good soldier. I carried out my orders, defended the Empire from her enemies, and never once questioned a command. Until they made me a Captain. You see, then I had to give the orders, and more and more I found the reasons behind those orders just weren't good enough. Sometimes they didn't even make sense. But I gave the orders, and saw them followed through, because my superiors told me to. I was a good soldier. But during the endless watches, spent staring out into the starless gulf, I began to wonder if their reasons were any better than mine, if their orders were any more sensible than mine, or if we were all just stumbling blindly in the dark.

"Giving orders began to grow more difficult. Making decisions, any decisions, took more and more of an effort. I didn't trust my superiors anymore, or the Empire, and certainly not myself. I lost all sense of security, of stability. I couldn't depend on anything anymore. Just getting through the day got harder all the time. Even small, simple decisions had to be wrestled over until I nearly drove myself crazy. I started having to check things over and over, to make sure I'd done them, even though I knew I had. Sometimes I gave the same order two or three times, and checked up on my crew to be sure it had been carried out.

"People began to notice. Some of them started to talk about me. I knew, but I did nothing about it. I didn't know whether to feel worried or relieved. And then an order came through that I couldn't ignore.

A starship had gone rogue in my sector. I was to hunt it down and destroy it. It wasn't difficult to find.

The rogue ship turned out to be the same cla.s.s as mine, and armed to the teeth. In the heat of the battle I had to give orders quickly and efficiently, and I couldn't. I panicked, unable to decide, and my ship was blown apart. I got away in one of the lifeboats. So did some of my crew. Certainly more than enough to place the blame on me.

"But I wasn't to blame. Not really. It was the Rim. All that darkness with no stars. The Rim would drive anyone over the edge if they stayed out there long enough.

"And that's why I'm here, Investigator. I lost my sense of security and stability, so they sent me here. To h.e.l.l."

He smiled briefly, and looked at the Investigator. Her face was calm and impa.s.sive, as always, and he was glad of that. If she'd shown him anything that even looked like pity, he thought he might have hit her.

But she didn't say anything, and after a while he looked away again.

"Captain," said Krystel finally, "just supposing that the city does check out as harmless, and the Empire does establish a colony here, what will you do? I mean, what will you do as a colonist? They're not going to need a starship Captain."

"I hadn't really thought about it," said Hunter. "I've got my military training. That's always useful in itself.

How about you?"

Krystel chuckled dryly. "I'm an Investigator, Captain. The perfect killing machine. There'll always be work for me."

Hunter was still trying to find an answer to that when the proximity mine went off. The ground shook, and an alarm rang automatically in Hunter's ears until he shut it off. The explosion seemed to echo on and on, deafeningly loud on the night's quiet. Hunter and Krystel rose quickly to their feet and stood back to back, guns in hand, searching the camp's perimeter for signs of the force screen being breached. Williams scrambled to his feet and kicked aside his bedroll as he grabbed for his gun.

"What is it? What's happening?"

"Proximity mine," said Hunter brusquely. "Something's found our camp. Stay alert and watch where you're pointing your gun."

"Two o'clock, Captain," said Krystel softly, gesturing with her gun at that part of the perimeter.

"According to the computers, the rest of the mines are still active, but nothing's close enough to trigger them. The screen's still up and holding."

Hunter strained his eyes against the mists and the darkness, but the light from the field lantern didn't reach far beyond the perimeter. The mists were still curling angrily near the blast site, but there was no trace of what might have caused the explosion. Hunter hefted his gun uneasily. "Can't see a thing, Investigator. Williams, what about those augmented eyes of yours?"

"Sorry, Captain, the mists are too thick. I'm just as blind as you."

"Terrific," said Hunter.

"Quiet," said Krystel. "Listen."

They fell silent, and Hunter was struck again by how unnaturally quiet the night was. No animal cries, no birds or insects, not even the moan of the wind. But somewhere out in the night, outside the force screen, something was moving. It sounded big and heavy, and its footsteps had a slow, dragging quality. It was heading slowly around the perimeter, counterclockwise.

Widdershins, thought Hunter crazily.It shouldn't do that. That's unlucky .

"It should hit the next mine any second now," said Krystel quietly. "Whatever it is, it must be tough as h.e.l.l. That first mine should have ruined its day permanently."

The ground shook again as the second proximity mine exploded. The mists writhed and curled at one o'clock on the perimeter, and Hunter caught a brief glimpse of something huge and dark before the mists closed over it again. The echoes of the explosion died slowly away, and then there came a high, screeching roar from beyond the force screen. It sounded clear and sharp on the quiet, continuing long after human lungs would have been able to sustain it. If there was any emotion in the sound. Hunter was unable to put a name to it.

"Captain," said Krystel urgently, "patch into the computers. Something's come in contact with the screen."

Hunter activated his comm implant, and computer images appeared via his optic nerve, superimposed over his vision. Something was pressing hard against the screen, over and over again, trying to break through. The computers measured the varying strengths of the pressure, and provided simulations of what might be causing it. Hunter's mouth went dry. Whatever was out there was apparently some twenty feet tall, weighed roughly eight to nine tons, and probably walked on two legs. The pressure readings jumped sharply as the creature beat viciously against the force screen. The high-pitched roar sounded again on the night, shrill and piercing, and then the attack stopped as suddenly as it had begun. The creature turned away from the screen, and its slow, dragging footstep grew gradually quieter as it disappeared back into the night.

Hunter sighed slowly, and put away his gun. "Stand down, everyone. It's gone." He shut down his comm unit, and his vision returned to normal.

"What the h.e.l.l was that?" said Williams shakily.

"Just a visitor," said Krystel. "Perhaps it'll come again tomorrow."

"Captain, I strongly suggest we set a watch," said Williams. He went to holster his gun, but his hand was shaking so much he had to make three attempts before he got it right. "Whatever that was might come back again, while it's still dark."

"So what if it does?" said Krystel. "It can't get through the screen."

"On the other hand," said Hunter, "the mines didn't seem to bother it much. I think a watch is a good idea, Doctor. I'll take the first shift, you'll take the second, and the Investigator can take the last. I think we'll all sleep a little better that way."

He stared grimly at the curling mists surrounding the field lantern's small circle of light. Twenty feet tall, eight to nine tons, and two mines didn't even slow it down. He just hoped it wasn't one of the things that built the city. Because if it was, tomorrow could turn out to be a very interesting day.

Night was falling by the time Megan DeChance and the marines reached the stone monolith. They stopped some distance away and studied it carefully before going any further. They'd been watching it ever since it first appeared on the horizon. Now, seen up close, it remained as dark and enigmatic as ever. The monolith was a huge stone cube, some thirty feet to a side, with an opening in the wall before them that seemed to be a doorway. The opening was ten feet high and six feet wide. It held only darkness. The rough surface of the stone was a grey so dark it was almost black. Raised lines and ridges crawled across the stone walls like petrified ivy. The monolith had a squat, solid air of permanence, as though it had always stood there and always would. Set against the darkening sky, it looked like nothing so much as an ancient, deserted mausoleum.

"I think this will serve nicely as a campsite," said DeChance finally.

Lindholm shrugged. "Why not? I've slept in worse."

"So have I," said Corbie. "And I'm still not sleeping in that b.l.o.o.d.y tomb. Just looking at it gives me the creeps. I mean, what's it doing out here, in the middle of nowhere? We're miles from the city. No, Sven, I don't like the look of this. There could be anything inside it."

"We'll check it out thoroughly before we go in," said DeChance patiently. "If I were you, I'd be more worried about what might be lurking outside this . . . structure, once darkness falls. After what we saw in and around the forest this morning, there's no telling what forms of life come out at night."

"We've still got the portable force screen," said Corbie stubbornly.

"Yes, we have," said DeChance. "But if we set up camp out on the plain, in the open, where everything can see us, there's no telling what we might attract. I don't think there's anything on this world powerful enough to break through a force screen, but I'd rather not find out I was wrong the hard way. Now be quiet, Corbie, and let me run a mental scan on the structure."

She closed her eyes, and her face went blank. The muscles in her face twitched a few times and then were still as all trace of personality left her features. Her breathing slowed till it was barely visible. Corbie looked at her, and then looked away, unable to repress a shudder.

"Don't worry, Russ," said Lindholm quietly. "She hasn't gone far. She'll be back soon."

"Yeah," said Corbie. "That's what worries me."

DeChance's mind roamed freely over the monolith, caressing the rough surface of the stone with her esp.

It felt old, very old. Time had come and gone upon the plain, and left the monolith untouched. Inside, the structure was hollow, and completely empty. DeChance didn't know whether to feel relieved or uneasy.

She frowned briefly. More and more, she found the stone monolith somehow . . . unsettling. The structure wasn't a perfect square, and the extra angles and dimensions clashed unpleasantly in her mind, as though refusing to add up to the shape she saw before her. DeChance shrugged mentally. She didn't like the feel of the monolith, but there was nothing specific she could use to justify her feelings.

Particularly after her treatment of Corbie. DeChance fell back into her body, and looked at Lindholm.

"All clear. The building's quite empty."

"I'm glad to hear it," said Lindholm. "If you'd care to set up camp inside the building, Russ and I will see to the defences. The sooner we get the force screen up and working the sooner we can all relax a little."

The three of them looked at each other for a moment, each waiting for someone else to make the first move. In the end, DeChance turned away and walked calmly over to the monolith. She almost paused at the doorway, but made herself go on. If she didn't trust her esp, she could hardly expect the marines to.

Once inside, she shrugged off her backpack, took out a field lantern, and turned it on. The familiar golden glow helped to reduce the stone chamber to a more comfortable size. DeChance stepped cautiously forward, holding the lantern out before her.

The interior walls looked pretty much like the exterior; rough, bare stone covered with twisting ridges and hollows. The floor was flat and even, and only the dark shadows in the corners remained at all disturbing. DeChance walked slowly round the empty chamber. The more she saw of it, the less she understood why she'd been so worried. She even began to feel a little ashamed at letting her imagination get the better of her. And then DeChance's breath caught in her throat as the lantern light showed her a single, gleaming, milky-white sphere lying on the floor in the far left-hand corner. She stared at it for a long moment. It couldn't be there. It couldn't. Her esp would have found it during the scan.

"I thought you said there was nothing in here," said Lindholm.

The esper jumped, startled, and then flushed hotly. She'd been concentrating on the chamber so much that she'd let her psionic defences slip. She hadn't even known the marine was there, till he'd spoken. She quickly composed her features again.

"There shouldn't be anything in here," she said finally, her voice calm and even. "Whatever that is, I should have detected its presence, at least."

"Does that mean it's dangerous?" said Lindholm.

"Possibly."

"All right, that's it," said Corbie quickly, from the doorway. "Let's get the h.e.l.l out of here while we still can."

"Take it easy, Russ," said Lindholm, without looking round.

"I thought you two were seeing to our defences?" said DeChance.

"We talked it over," said Lindholm, "and we decided we didn't feel right about leaving you in here on your own."

"Very gallant," said DeChance. "But I can take care of myself."

"Of course," said Lindholm. He looked thoughtfully at the milky sphere on the floor. "Can you pick up anything from that, now that you're closer to it?"

DeChance frowned slightly. "I can try."

She moved slowly over to the sphere, knelt down before it, and studied it closely from all angles, taking care not to touch it. It was about six inches in diameter, and had a cold, pearly sheen. DeChance reached out with her mind and gently touched the sphere with her esp.

The sun, burning bright and foul in the shimmering sky. Buildings tower to every side. Something dark and awful close behind and all around. Bones stretch and twist. Flesh flows across twitching cheekbones.

Eyes turn to liquid and run away. Creatures leaping and hopping all around, sliding and melting into each other. The scream goes on and on and on. . . .

DeChance jerked her mind free from the endless flow of images. She fell backwards, her mouth working soundlessly, and when Lindholm reached out a hand to steady her, she struck out at him blindly. He knelt down beside her and talked slowly and soothingly until finally the wordless panic died away and she could think again. She drew in a long, shuddering breath, and licked her dry lips.

"What happened?" said Lindholm.

"The sphere," said DeChance hoa.r.s.ely. "It's a recording of some kind. A direct recording of an alien mind."

"What did you see?" asked Corbie.

DeChance shook her head slowly. "Madness. Horror and violence . . . I don't know. I'll have to think about it. In the meantime, don't either of you try and touch it. It's too easy to get lost in there. . . ."

She got to her feet, turned her back on the sphere and the marines, and started to rummage through her backpack. Corbie and Lindholm looked at each other. Lindholm shrugged and left the chamber. Corbie hesitated, and then followed him out.

Planting the proximity mines took the marines a lot longer than they'd expected. The ground was rock-hard, and yielded only grudgingly to their digging tools. Both men were sweating by the time they'd established a perimeter, and most of the light had disappeared from the sky. The golden lantern light that fell through the monolith's doorway looked warm and inviting. The two marines went back inside, rubbing at the fresh calluses on their hands, and helped DeChance finish setting up the portable force screen generator. She activated it, and all three of them relaxed a little as some of the day's tension went out of them. They laid out their bedrolls, and pecked unenthusiastically at a late supper of protein cubes and distilled water. Finally, they lay back on their bedrolls and waited for morning to come.

None of them felt much like sleeping, but they knew they ought to at least try. Come the next day, they'd need all the strength and stamina they could muster. The Captain had sounded calm and rea.s.suring when he contacted them just after their supper, and DeChance had done her best to sound the same. Corbie had thought seriously about breaking into the conversation to say how worried he was about the monolith and the sphere recording, but in the end he decided against it. The Captain wouldn't have understood.

Maybe when they reached the city tomorrow . . . Corbie had a really bad feeling about the city.

Surprisingly enough, the esper fell asleep almost immediately. Lindholm lay on his back with his eyes closed, looking as calm and unperturbed as ever. Corbie glared at both of them. He'd never felt less sleepy in his life. He gave it a while, hoping he might drop off. Then, still wide awake, he sat up quietly and hugged his knees to his chest. He'd hoped the monolith would seem less forbidding once he'd spent some time in it, but it hadn't worked out that way. The ceiling was too high, the light from the lantern couldn't seem to penetrate the corners, and even the smallest sound echoed endlessly on the quiet. He drew his disrupter from its holster and checked the energy level. It was rea.s.suringly high, but even so it took real strength of will before Corbie could make himself holster the gun again.

"Getting jumpy, Russ."

Corbie looked round quickly. Lindholm was sitting up on his bedroll too. Corbie smiled and shrugged. "I don't like this place, Sven," he said softly, keeping his voice low to avoid waking the esper. "Mind you, when you get right down to it I'd be hard pressed to name one thing about this stinking planet that I do like. I hate it here, Sven." He rubbed at his mouth with the back of his hand, and wasn't surprised to find his hand was shaking. "I'm dry, Sven. I need a drink. I could cope with all of this much better if I could just have one good stiff drink."

"Sorry, Russ. Don't use the stuff myself. You should have smuggled a bottle onto the pinnace."

"I did. They found it." Corbie shuddered briefly. There was a faint sheen of sweat on his face, despite the cold. "Ihate this world, Sven. I don't want to be here. It doesn't want us here. I mean, what am I doing in a h.e.l.l Squad? I was never meant to be a colonist. I've been in the Fleet since I was sixteen; never spent more than two years running on the same planet. I liked it that way. The only reason I'm here is because it looked a better bet than spending the rest of my life rotting in a military prison. Shows you what a fool I was. This place is worse than any prison."

"Take it easy, Russ."

"That's easy for you to say. You saw that forest, Sven. And the things that came up out of the ground.

I've been on more worlds than I can count, seen some pretty strange things in my time, but at least they made some kind of sense. This world is insane. Like some nightmare you can't wake up from. And tomorrow we're going into a city full of buildings just like this one. I don't think I can do that. I don't think Ican ." He rubbed at his mouth again, and looked pleadingly at Lindholm. "What am I going to do, Sven?

I can't stand it on this world, but I can't get off it. I'm trapped here. I can't face going into the city tomorrow, but I couldn't stand being left on my own. What am I going todo ?"

"All right, Russ, calm down. I'm here," Lindholm cut in quickly as Corbie's voice began to rise hysterically. "Just remember you're not alone in this. We're all in the same boat. We can cope with anything, as long as we stick together. Think of all the different worlds we've seen; they all looked pretty bad at first. This is just another world, Russ; that's all. Just another world."

Corbie took a deep breath, and let it out again in a long, shuddering sigh. He shot Lindholm a grateful glance, and smiled shakily. "How do you do it, Sven? How do you stay so calm all the time? Is it something you learned in the Arenas?"

"You could say that." Lindholm stared thoughtfully out the open doorway into the darkness. "You can learn a lot in the Arenas, if you stay alive long enough. You learn not to be afraid, because that can get you killed. You learn not to make friends, because you might have to kill them the next day. You learn to take nothing for granted, not even one more day of life. And finally, you learn not to care about anything.

Not the killing, not the people, not the pressure, not even your own life. When you don't care about anything, you can take any risk, face any odds. Because nothing matters anymore. Nothing at all."