Alien Caller (26 page)

They’d even let
him see their security suite, or rather Cyrea had just taken him to
see where she worked and he’d been introduced to most of their
officers, the ayn and their juniors the re ayn. He’d actually had
coffee with them in the suite, while watching their feeds,
something that still shocked him. You couldn’t do that in any
police station on Earth. Just how open were these people? Or as the
paranoia kept whispering at him from time to time in his quiet
moments, just how incredibly devious?

But then for a
ship with thousands of people on board, some of whom were surely
bound to get themselves in trouble if only on a statistical basis,
how could they get by with only a brig; though they referred to it
as a “remedial centre” - that had only six cells? On the other hand
only one cell was occupied, and that by a young engineer who’d
managed to get completely smashed on some alcoholic beverage his
family had sent him, and then fallen down drunk in a dining
area.

Public
drunkenness on board a military vessel in a foreign territory would
have been a serious disciplinary breach in the navy. Any seaman who
engaged in such a thing would have been lucky not to have been
court-martialled, but on the Lienian ship he was simply attended to
by the doctors and was sleeping off his night of alcohol inspired
foolishness after which his continuing alcohol consumption would be
monitored while he remained on board. He would return to duty in
his current position in a matter of hours. No punishment at all in
truth, another thing that David couldn’t get his head around.

Strange people,
strange ship, strangely tolerant, but still good.

David checked
the door again, comparing the strange symbols on it with those on
the piece of paper he’d been given. They were a perfect match. This
was the place, and he was right on time. So where was Cyrea? Where
were the people she wanted him to meet?

He walked a few
steps into the room only to feel the hairs on the back of his neck
start crawling with every pace. His danger sense was kicking in,
and while he had no idea why, he’d learnt to trust it implicitly.
This was bad.

He stopped dead
in his tracks, hoping to see whatever it was that was causing him
so much anxiety. But there was nothing. It was just a giant empty
room. Steel walls, floor and ceiling, all painted with the
Leinians' favoured soothing yellow. But just at that moment it was
anything but soothing.

Then in the
middle of the chamber he spied something. A sheet of paper lying on
the floor. From the distance he could see little more than the
rolled up edges, reflecting the bright white light from above.

Trap! The
instant he saw it, he knew that was exactly what it was. Bait for a
trap. A trap for him. Curiosity made him want to go there anyway.
And logic told him that after all, it couldn’t be a trap. There was
nothing around it. The room was empty, and these people didn’t do
things like that. He wouldn’t have finally come on board if he’d
even suspected they might. But logic was at odds with his danger
sense, and he wasn’t about to let it win.

Instead he
turned around, making for the door he’d just entered from. But
there was no door. It wasn’t just shut he discovered with shock, it
wasn’t there at all. There was just a seamless expanse of flat
yellow wall. Regardless he knew that there had been a door there
before, and unless the Leinians had somehow found a way to iron
metal smooth like cloth, the door still had to be there.

He walked
directly back the three or four steps to the wall and started
hunting with his hands for the door knob at least. But he couldn’t
touch it. He couldn’t even touch the wall. In some strange way his
fingers seemed to be pushed back by something he couldn’t see, two
or three inches from the wall. It was like pushing on solidified
air, and the harder he pushed the harder it pushed back.

“Shit!” He
understood that the trap had already been sprung while he’d been
busy gaping like a child. Some sort of invisible force field had
been put in place while he’d dawdled. But had it, he wondered, been
placed all around the room? Could they, whoever they were, possibly
have had the time and resources to do that? Or was it only near the
door he’d entered from? Because he was sure there were other doors
to the chamber.

Without a
second thought he started walking the edge of the wall, holding his
hand against the invisible energy barrier, looking for any place at
which it vanished and his hands found the metal. At that point he
knew he could start banging, and no matter how well soundproofed
the wall was, direct metal contact from his pocket knife on the
steel wall would surely carry.

But it was in
vain. He circled the entire chamber not once but twice, and never
did his hand touch anything other than solidified air. And all the
while he was wondering who? Who would have done such a thing? He’d
met the Leinians, not just the leaders but also many of the
scientists and crew several times now, and they all seemed
remarkably decent. They were a friendly people who wanted to please
him, and were eager to show him exactly what they were doing. They
had no secrets. No nefarious purposes that he could see. And if
there was any proof needed that they truly trusted him, it was that
they let him speak with their children. In fact it was the fact
that they had brought their children with them at all that spoke to
their peaceful ways most of all.

A space ship
with children. It was like nothing out of any movie he’d ever seen.
Who would bring children with them to an alien and potentially
dangerous world? Certainly not him. Not NASA and not the military.
But they had. They did. And it was fine with them when he chatted
with them in the playground. Another oddity that was; a playground
on a space ship complete with slides and swings, not to mention a
grassy surface and plenty of bushes. And all in the midst of a
giant steel ship! No one would ever believe him! And he’d asked
them all the trick questions an agent hunting for the deception in
their parents would. Embarrassing, both for him and Cyrea, who
seemed to spend her time apologizing for him, but they’d still
passed.

They had let
him freely come and go as he wanted, had locked no rooms against
him and indeed had even encouraged him to explore the ship. They
answered all his questions and as far as he could tell they were
completely honest. These people he had concluded were not only
everything they said they were, but were also as close to a totally
decent society as anything he could ever imagine.

Yet now some of
them were setting him up. It made no sense, but it was also the
only possible explanation. This was a Leinian ship and it was
filled with Leinians. Who else could it be? And what evil did these
strange innocents have in mind?

There was of
course no possible answer, and given his situation there was only
one way he could even begin to gain the answers he wanted. He had
to pick up the piece of paper even though he knew it was a trap and
that by now they knew that he knew it. But it was also the only
possible way forward.

Cautiously,
infinitely slowly, he headed for the bait, feeling every bit like a
mouse sneaking up on the cheese. He took his time and scanned every
single inch of the floor ahead of him, looking for any sign of the
trap, but could see nothing. The metal floor underneath him like
the ceiling above was perfectly smooth coloured steel. There was
nothing that looked like a trip switch or a button. Nothing at
all.

With every step
he felt more and more certain that what he was doing was insane. He
could almost feel the trap’s bars closing in on him. But there was
still no alternative. Except to approach it and be careful. Be
ready to leap away at the first hint of danger. But the room was
just so infinitely peaceful. Nothing stirred. Nothing suggested a
trigger. And he kept getting closer and closer.

Until it was
too late.

David’s first
sign that anything was wrong was when the lights all around him
darkened suddenly and he knew the trap had been sprung. Adrenaline
flowed as David sprinted instantly back in the direction he’d come
from, but when he reached the edge of the light he found his
progress impeded. Something that he couldn’t feel prevented him
going any further. It wasn’t like a solid thing but more of a
pressure. But the harder he pushed into it the harder it pushed
back. It was like pressing into an elastic wall of air. It was the
same pressure that had surrounded the room’s walls.

He was
caught.

Time he knew to
try and think his way out. He had nothing else up his sleeve, but
cunning. Slowly he surveyed the scene. But there still wasn’t much
to see. He found himself all alone in a circle of light perhaps
twenty yards across. The only visible thing within it that he could
see was the floor, and that was perfectly smooth painted metal.
There were no walls, and the ceiling was a glow of light. He knew
the meeting chamber wasn’t that large, but with nothing visible
beyond the circle of light, it could have been infinite.

Of course, it
could have been some sort of electrical failure that had turned off
the rest of the lights, but he didn’t believe it for a second. This
was intentional, and somewhere at the back of his mind he even knew
why. If he could remember. There was something vaguely familiar
about the situation, something that made the hairs on his body
stand up. He’d felt threatened before anything had happened and
this was a hundred times worse. He didn’t like it. He liked it even
less when he realized that the piece of paper which he had been
heading for was no longer there. Apparently it was only an
illusion, and it had disappeared once its purpose had been served.
There’d never even been any bait.

Knowing it was
probably hopeless he nonetheless walked around the perimeter,
looking for any weakness, any way out, but found that the barrier
was complete. A perfect circle, twenty yards in diameter, and
reaching from the floor to the highest point he could jump to. He
was trapped with no way out, and held by nothing he could see. But
why? It still felt familiar, but he couldn’t for the life of him
think why.

A scream cut the
air, jarring him out of his contemplation. It was a woman’s scream
and he knew it was Cyrea. All of his reason fled as he knew only
one thing. He had to get to her.

“Cyrea.” He
yelled back, and then charged the barrier once more while ice cold
needles ran down his back as he tried to get to her. And when it
didn’t give again he literally threw himself at it, again and
again. But no matter how hard he hit it, it just kept throwing him
back like a trampoline. He couldn’t break through.

Soon he was
breathing heavily from his exertions, and fear was closing his
mind. And that he knew was wrong. All his training and experience
told him never, ever to give in to panic. But it was so hard. He’d
never been so scared in all his life. He was trapped and panicking,
not knowing what was wrong, not knowing why he was trapped or how
to get out of his invisible prison, and terrified that Cyrea might
be in mortal peril. And all the while Cyrea’s screams were
continuing, driving him further into the insanity.

“Don’t bother
monkey. She can’t help you now.” A man’s voice came through the air
to him. A cynical, cold, calculating voice that sent shivers up and
down his spine. He had never heard the voice before, but he knew
it. He’d heard it a dozen times before in other places and times.
The voice was pure malice. He shouted at it and at least had an
answer.

“Ahh the monkey
makes noises. The monkey talks, and expects us to listen. Yet he
has nothing worth listening to. No talents, no scientific
knowledge, no deep thoughts or artistic reflection. He is just a
monkey, who has contaminated an ayn with his pitiful urges.” He was
laughing as he derided him even as Cyrea’s cries continued, and
David wanted nothing more than to rip him to pieces in his
hands.

“You bastard!
What are you doing to Cyrea?” No matter how insulting they might
be, his words just ran right off him, as David felt the
overpowering need to save her from whatever was being done. He knew
he had to think, but the anger was growing in leaps and bounds. So
was his fear. His fear of being trapped and unable to save her. His
fear of what they were doing to her.

“What does it
matter? She has been contaminated and now we are cleaning her.
Removing from her flesh the remains of your pitiful form. Cleansing
her mind of all you have said and done to her. In a while, a few
days perhaps, you will not even be a memory to her, and we will
have an ayn again. A useful citizen. You on the other hand, well
you’ve been nothing but a nuisance from the beginning. I’m sure
we’ll find something useful to do with you. Fertilizer
perhaps.”

The arrogance
and the loathing of the voice was getting to him, and with Cyrea
still crying in the background he couldn’t truly think straight.
Her cries were destroying his very soul. All he could really do was
hate and panic.

“I’ll kill you!
Do you hear me scum? I’ll rip your shitting head off when I get out
of here! And then I’ll shove it up your miserable ass!” He was
blustering, but trapped as he was it was all he could do.

“Ahh. The
monkey has an idea after all. He wants to fight. Perhaps he could
provide us with some amusement, for a while.” And suddenly other
voices were there with the creature, agreeing, laughing. He hated
them as he had never hated anyone in his entire life, and all the
while he had to listen to Cyrea crying. Her sobs tore at him like a
knife.