Ammonite Planets (Omnibus): Ammonite Galaxy #1-3 (63 page)

“Oh, sure, piece of cake.” said Diva, with a roll of her eyes. “—Have you gone MAD? How are we supposed to get through fuel lines full of propellant?”

“We need mask packs and full bodywraps,” Grace said. “There is nothing else we can use. Only the space traders and the orbital station have deep space suits, and we can’t empty the water conduits or the fuel lines. In any case the deep space suits would be too bulky. The mask packs will let us breathe, and we should be able to get through the water conduits all right. There may be a minor problem with the fuel lines. They are highly corrosive, and I don’t know whether the equipment will last out long enough for us to get into the ships. And they are only just big enough for a thinnish person in a bodywrap to crawl through.”

Diva’s mouth dropped open. “Minor problem? You think we can crawl through an overhead fuel line just big enough to hold us, in full view of an army of sycophants, in mask packs made for low atmospheres rather than liquid surroundings?”

Grace looked sheepish. “I’m sorry. I can’t think of any other way to do it. Perhaps somebody else …?”

Six waved an airy hand. “Don’t look for backswampers where there aren’t any, Diva. It’s a great plan, Grace! Absolutely brilliant. Turns out to be a good thing that the Coriolans couldn’t supply us with smaller and thicker tubing for the fuel lines, then.” He thought for a bit, and then went on, “Might get us killed, of course, but I agree – there is no other way. That is what we will do.”

He turned around and passed the word rapidly to the main army to fight a path free to the two water towers. Then he sent messengers back to the base camp to have as many available bodywraps brought down as soon as possible. Then he signed for them all to gather around.

They listened attentively as Six began to speak. “We have to split up into four different groups – two will take the eastern water tank and two the western. When we get through to the fuel tank each group will split up again to take one ship each.” He looked around at the assembled crew. “We need at least one experienced pilot for each ship, and the trainees should be divided. The fuel lines are only about four hands in diameter, which means that with bodywraps on only the smallest of us can get through.” He touched two of the waiting pilots on the shoulder. “Neither of you would make it through the fuel lines, so your job will be to mind our backs with the others in case anything goes wrong with the plan.”

Both men nodded solemnly.

Six went on, “Once we know how many bodywraps are available, and what size they are, we can decide on the make-up of each group.

Luckily there is plenty of time to get ready.” He indicated the fierce fighting going on to either side of them. “It is going to take at least half an hour to reclaim the two water towers.”

Diva raised one aristocratic eyebrow. “Half an hour to get ready? Oh, of course. Aren’t we the lucky ones? Oodles of time! Now what should I do, I wonder? Mesteta bath, perhaps? Have my hair done? A quick trip to the dentist to have my teeth polished? With so much time you spoil me for choice.”

“Now don’t be difficult, Diva. You know what I meant. And you ought to go easy on the tooth polish. A couple of flashes of those teeth and you will give away our position to every sycophant within range.”

Diva bared said teeth at him, and he winced, shielding his eyes. “See – that’s just what I mean!” He reeled about for a bit, pretending to be blind and calling for a blackout. The men around him laughed.

Diva gave him a cross push. “Fighting is one thing,” she grumbled, “being posted down a toxic tube is quite another!”

GRACE WATCHED THE battle taking place, detached from it by fate, aware that men were dying below her, and yet disconnected. Her own heart was preparing itself, beating faster and forcing adrenaline into her blood-stream. She was shaking with a mixture of apprehension and anticipation. She looked over at Diva, and wished she could be more like the Coriolan girl. Diva caught her look and smiled. “Won’t be long,” she said happily.

At last the reinforcements arrived with the bodywraps and the mask packs. They had collected only ten bodywraps, four small, four medium, and two large. Six looked disgusted. “The large ones are useless,” he pointed out. “Which leaves us with four small and four medium. That means that Grace and Diva go – they are the only small size among us. I’m sorry about your leg, Diva. The other two small bodywraps are useless. None of the rest of us can fit into them. I will go, of course, and Gerrant here will be the fourth pilot. That leaves two places for trainees as back-up.” He looked around at the waiting trainees, picking out the two who would fit best into the bodywraps. “Solian and Testan. Solian, you go with Gerrant and Grace as back-up to the western water deposit. Testan, you come as back-up to
Valhai
Diva and myself on the eastern deposit.”

The two men nodded their understanding.

Six went on, “Both back-ups to take the southernmost ship when it comes down to the final split. The enemy is heavier there. I will take the southern ship on my side with Testan, Diva the northern. Grace, you take the northern ship on your side. Solian and Gerrant, you take the southern ship.”

They looked around at each other and nodded. Then Six looked very serious. “One more thing … if … if any of us do not succeed in seizing his or her ship, then the others should use one of the remaining weapons to destroy that ship if they can. We cannot afford to leave any of these vessels in the hands of the Elders. Is that clear?”

There were stiff nods all round. They understood what that might mean.

“Then get into your bodywraps. Our men have nearly forced a way through to the water towers. We will be in action within minutes.”

Six touched fingers with the other men, and then turned to the girls.

“Diva … ?”

“Yes?”

“Take care, will you?”

“Worried about me, nomus?” She raised a sardonic eyebrow.

“Take care of the ship, I meant!”

“Thanks! I suppose
I
can go hang myself?”

“Not at all,” he told her politely. “We are rather short of pilots.”

“—So I am just another pilot, no-name?”

“As I remember, that was all you wanted to be.”

They looked at each other steadily for a couple of moments, and then Diva dropped her eyes.

Grace stared. Diva looked just like someone who had been forced to swallow a Sellite curing draught. Grace opened her mouth to ask her if anything was wrong, but Diva had already recovered herself with her usual lightning quickness, and was stepping briskly into her bodywrap. Grace finished getting into her own bodywrap and found that Six had moved away. There was a general cheer as the Elders fell back. The refugees who were fighting parted to allow the team of pilots access to the base of the water tower, and Diva surged forwards to press into the corridor of upright bodies. Grace followed, turning only to catch Six’s eyes as she did so. He saw, gave her a small nod of assent, and held up both hands in her direction, as if he were giving her the Sacran salute. She held her own hands up, and they both smiled across the intervening multitude just for a second, as if their fingers had really touched. Then Grace turned away, and concentrated on forcing a way through to the water tower.

UNDER THE COVER of the masses of fighting refugees, they slipped quickly inside the water towers. Shutting and bolting the door behind him, Six signed to Diva and Testan to follow him, and left the others to defend the bolted door. They had long lost sight of the second group, slowly battling its way towards the western tower.

Six climbed into the water tank and Diva and Testan followed him. They all adjusted their mask packs, and then slowly lowered themselves beneath the water level. There was a slight slope down to the fuel station, so there was no need for complicated vents and hatches. By gravity alone the water found its way along the underground tunnel, filling the smaller tank inside the fuel deposit to the brim. Six signed to Testan to breathe slowly and without panic, and then let himself sink under the water.

It was pitch black and very inhospitable. They sank down until their feet touched the bottom of the deep tank, and then moved slowly towards the centre. Panic was taking hold of all of them now, and it was difficult to keep their breathing calm.

At last they managed to locate the hole in the centre of the tank. It was about five hands in diameter, enough for one person. Six forced himself to dive head first into the tube, and began to pull himself steadily along by laying his hands flat on the sides of the tube, which were slightly slippery with the accumulation of algae from the water. He found himself fighting a cloying feeling of claustrophobia. It was one of the worst things he had ever had to do. I can’t give up now, he thought to himself. Diva is just behind me. She will think nothing of something like this. I will not be beaten by that Coriolan aristocrat. No way! He thought of her face if he went back a failure. Not going to happen. He would rather die down here than see a look of disdain on Diva’s face. He fought back the panic, imposing a steely determination on his quivering heart.

Finally he felt an upturn in the tube, and then the circular piping around him opened out. He was through into the smaller tank situated in the fuel depot. He allowed himself to float to the surface, and pulled off the mask pack gratefully. The pent-up stress came out in a long and deep sigh.

He swam to the side of the tank, and clambered out. Then he waited for the next swimmer to come through. There was a very long pause, and he began to think that they hadn’t made it, when Diva appeared, her expression one of infinite distaste.

“If you ever ask me to do something like this again, Kwaidian,” she said as a greeting, pulling off her mask pack, “I swear I shall kill you!”

“Where’s Testan?”

Diva raised her eyebrows. “You mean the bold trainee meant to look after me? He won’t be coming.”

“What have you done to him?”

“I haven’t done anything to him,” said Diva complacently. “He put one toe inside the tube and discovered a sudden illness which impeded his taking part in your little excursion. He sends his apologies.”

Six glowered. “You should have made him come!”

Diva’s eyes flashed. “And how exactly was I supposed to do that, nomus?”

“Well I don’t know do I? You usually manage to terrify everybody!”

“On this occasion the water was the greater of the two evils. I threatened to slice his head off with my dagger, and he looked as if he would prefer that to coming down the tube.”

Six gave a grunt. “It wasn’t much fun.”

“That is the understatement of the year, untouchable! And just think, we still have the happy journey along the fuel pipe to come!” Diva fought to keep her voice calm. There was no way on Lumina she was going to let the Kwaidian see just how frightened she had been when she had forced herself into that black tube. The only thing that had kept her going was the thought of his expression if she had chickened out of it. She couldn’t blame Testan for his fear: she had felt much the same herself.

“Well. Now you have finally deigned to arrive, my lady, we can put phase two into operation.” He looked at the huge fuel tank, and signaled for her to follow him up the ladder. Outside they could hear the shouts and struggles of the Elders as they pushed into the battle. Inside everything was bathed in a surreal green colour, and the sounds were subdued by all the liquid present.

They scaled the ladder, finally reaching the top. From there, the fuel was allowed to run across the piping, which was supported by Y frames every half dozen metres or so, over the heads of the struggling Elders. The main piping was slightly translucent: they would be able to detect light, perhaps even vague shapes. It also meant that if anyone happened to look up, they might be detected too. And now they had to take separate routes.

Six identified the tube that led to the northern ship, and then stopped, turning to look at Diva.

“I will never speak to you again if you don’t make it,” he told her.

“You worry about yourself, nomus! I will be up at the orbital station long before you have even made it into the space shuttle!” she told him severely.

He smiled and then gave her a quick hug. “I know,” he said. “You are worth ten of me.”

She hugged him back. “Don’t keep me waiting, no-name! I detest people who don’t keep appointments.”

“I’ll be there waiting for you,” he promised. “Just don’t go on any scenic detours.”

“Me? I’m a
Valhai
, remember? I can do anything.”

He watched her as she let herself slowly into the round piping on her side of the tank. “I hope so,” he muttered to himself. “I really hope so.”

He waded over to his own tube, fed himself head first into the piping, and began to propel himself along towards the spaceship.

GRACE WAS SHIVERING as she surfaced from the water tubing and found herself inside the fuel depot. She felt frozen to her very core, and had never been so scared in her whole life. She swam over to the side of the water tank and climbed out. Gerrant was already there, and they waited for a few minutes for Solian. Finally he joined them, tearing off his mask pack, which had blocked on the way up in the final tank.

They began to climb the metal steps set into the side of the fuel tank, and Grace was reminded of the steps up the skyrises on Valhai. She would have given anything to be back there again. Any place would have been better than here, in the middle of this awful war, about to thread herself through a pipe surrounded by toxic fuel, she thought. Just thinking about it made her feel dizzy.

Gerrant gave her a concerned look. “All right?” he asked.

She stifled back the impulse to scream no at the top of her voice and managed a small nod. “F-f-fine.”

He touched her on the shoulder. “You will do it,” he assured her. “You are a Sellite. You can do anything!”

I wish. But she didn’t say it out loud. Let him think what he liked. It might help, and certainly would do no harm.

They let themselves down into the fuel floating in the tank, pushing aside a soapy scum on the surface. Then they separated – the two Kwaidians to the southernmost pipe, and Grace to the northern one. She looked back just before she went in. Gerrant held one thumb up in the air, and gave her an encouraging smile. She held her own thumb up, and nodded.

DIVA COULD FEEL her hair burning. The liquid fuel had somehow managed to penetrate the mask pack; the chemicals in it felt as if they were slowly eating their way through her follicles. She didn’t think it mattered. As far as she could see there was no way she could survive this idea of Six’s. I might have known you would be the death of me, she told the absent Kwaidian silently. What took you so long?

The mask pack was struggling, and she had no hope of switching to another if it did block. With the bodywrap on there was barely room for her to pull herself along the tube. There was no way she could change a mask pack. In any case, they were made for low atmospheres, not for surviving lethal liquids. She wasn’t even certain she would be able to manage her knife when the time came. At least she had remembered to transfer it to her hand before she went into the fuel feed. She squirmed her way along the pipe, over the bumps of the Y frames, feeling a stinging in her eyes which boded no good for the future, and waiting at every moment for a popular clamour to announce that she had been spotted by the elders.

It was almost an anticlimax to reach the end of the heavy piping, and pass into the flexitubing which traversed the last few metres to the closed hatch. She thanked Lumina that she had the dagger in her hand. Otherwise she would have had no chance of getting at it. She edged the blade around, using the other hand to pull herself as close as possible to the hatch. It was closed on the inside of the ship: there was no way they could penetrate the ship from outside, but the tubing close to the hatch was made of a lighter and more flexible material, to enable easy connection. She had to cut her way out of this tubing, fall the three metres or so to the floor, fight her way around the ship to the entry hatch, get in, close the hatch, and then take off over any bodies which happened to get in her way. The Kwaidian couldn’t possibly have thought up a more impossible mission if he had dreamed about it for months, she thought. Trust him! And he had complained about being thrown to the Tattula cats!

Diva positioned the knife above the tubing, and uttered a short silent prayer to Sacras. Then she plunged it into the flexitubing, sawing and hacking at the material as fast as she could.

There was a short time when everything passed in slow motion, just as it had when she had fallen through the orthogel for the first time on Valhai, then the combination of her own weight and the fuel tore open the gash in the tubing, and she felt herself falling to the ground.

The fall knocked the breath out of her, but she was on her feet, knife at the ready, before any of the sycophants had even realized what had happened. They were shouting as the fuel splattered them with corrosive liquid, screaming as it bit into their unprotected flesh. Diva didn’t stop to look, in one fluid movement she flung herself towards the front of the spacecraft, towards the entry hatch, pulling the mask pack off her face as she did so. The fresh air of Kwaide for once felt absolutely marvelous, and great gulps of it were hardly enough to compensate for the claustrophobic poisonous atmosphere she had just left.

There were shouts, though, as she made her move. Not all of the sycophants were concentrating on getting out of the way of the spurting fuel. She had been spotted. Diva cursed her bad leg. It was holding her back, and she lifted her arm to strike at the first person to stand in her way. She was nearly there; she could see the hatch in front of her.

A hazy figure loomed out of the background, and then disappeared as she slashed at it with a backhanded blow. A satisfying thump told her that the hilt of her knife had connected with an enemy chin. A sycophant knife buried itself in the bodywrap, pinning her left arm momentarily to its side, and missing her flesh by a hair’s breadth. She managed to tear the weapon out and then fling it aside as she kept moving. She was there now – the hatch was in front of her.

Shouts of alarm told her that they had realized what she was planning. Too late! She grinned inanely to herself. You are all too late, because I am there. She catapulted herself through the open hatch, and banged her right arm against the locking device as she fell through.

The hatch was already half-closed as she leapt to her feet and threw herself on the dim figure she had spotted inside the spacecraft. It gave a scream, and Diva held the downward blow at the last minute.

“Don’t hurt me! Please don’t hurt me!” The figure cowered away from her. Diva peered a bit closer, and then gave an exasperated sigh. “Of all the spaceships on all the planets, I would have to find you in mine!” she muttered.

“You are a horrible girl. Let me out!”

“No way, Jalana. You are here to stay.” Diva had no more time for pleasantries, so she simply dragged the girl over to two of the containment rings set into the hull and locked her securely to them. “Going up!”

Jalana’s eyes showed white. “No!” she shouted. “I don’t want to go up!”

“Should have thought of that before you clambered into a spaceship,” said Diva grimly.

“They put me here so that Six wouldn’t fire on the ship!” snapped Jalana.

“Nice friends you have.” Diva had decided to obviate the preflight checks, and had simply pressed the ignition button on the console, after making sure the fuel hatch was secure. The thumping on the fuselage stopped abruptly as the sycophants determined that being fried by rocket engines was not a good way to die. Diva’s fingers raced over the console, enabled the automatic take-off facility, pressed the engage button, and then took a few seconds to grab a full water bottle. from one of the storage lockers and empty it over her head and face.