Hellhole (68 page)

Fortunately, Diadem Michella thought the same way. She looked at him, and her eyes gleamed with deadly purpose. “Eliminate the entire delegation, Ishop. Cleanly, with absolutely no risk of contaminating anyone outside the pod. This is war after all.”

T
he longer they remained inside the passenger pod in isolated silence, the more worried Vincent grew. He rose for the hundredth time and looked out the windowport, but saw nothing. “This has gone on for much too long.”

No one else seemed to be concerned. “We have given them much to contemplate, and that takes time.” Zairic was obviously confident that his Xayan recruitment speech was convincing, that he had answered all questions and dispensed with any fears or reservations.

“The Diadem has already sent her inspector, and probably other spies, to Slickwater Springs,” Vincent said. “She already knows about the shadow-Xayans. Most of what you said wasn’t news to her.”

Zairic closed his eyes gently, let out a low sigh. “But hearing the words from us
directly
, Vincent, is far different from a mere report. And now that she has seen Cippiq with her own eyes, she can have no further doubts. She knows our claims are real, not just delusions.”

“Precisely! And that proof won’t help us. Cippiq alone is unsettling enough. What if you terrify her, push her over the edge? After what General Adolphus has done, she’s already reeling. She’ll want to take firm and definitive action.”

“A wise ruler does not make precipitous decisions. After listening to us, she will be pondering how to frame her positive response.” Fernando-Zairic just smiled.

Cippiq looked on in silence, but Vincent presumed he was in telepathic contact with the shadow-Xayans.

Vincent felt panic rising within him. His companions were too passive and complacent, too trusting. “This isn’t right – and I’m
not
worrying too much. This is a real problem.” He regarded the shadow-Xayans, trying to imagine how they must look to Diadem Michella. They really did seem like a religious cult who sat in a circle singing oblivious hymns.

As an idea occurred to him, Vincent leaned forward and spoke in an urgent voice. “We need to convince the Diadem in some other way. We need to fascinate her, tantalize her, show her what the Xayan race has to offer. She needs to see the amazing
potential
, not just the threat.”

“We have already done that, Vincent.” Zairic was maddeningly emotionless. “We are no threat.”

“You don’t understand! Please listen to me. Let
Fernando
talk with her just for a little while. I’ve seen him in action – he can dance circles around anyone in conversation. He can be damned convincing.”

“Fernando and I are both aware of his history and reputation among humans. Yes, he may be persuasive, but my voice – as the spokesperson for the Xayan race – has more gravity with the Diadem of the Constellation.”

Vincent turned on Zairic as panic and frustration rose within him. “Then let
me
talk with Fernando – directly. I want to hear my friend. I want to see him. He’s always been there before!” Vincent was beginning to wonder whether Fernando’s personality had been eclipsed by the dominating Xayan presence. He also knew that his friend would understand the reason for suspicion and urgency. Vincent could sense that the Diadem was holding something back, and Fernando was an even better judge of veracity and sincerity.

The sounds of machinery came from outside the passenger pod. Hurrying to the windowport again, Vincent saw a slow-moving engine rig rolling forward until it came to rest against the quarantined vessel. A large red drum sat on the flat body above flexible treads. An automated, versatile explorer vehicle: Vincent had seen such equipment in the repair shop on Orsini.

With a resounding
thunk
, a heavy suction plate pressed against the pod’s hull. The machine raised a backward-articulated arm, at the end of which buzzed a spinning carbide cutter. “That’s a lamprey drill. What is it doing?”

“The Diadem will explain,” Zairic said.

The automated rover sprayed something on the outer hull plate, scoured with an abrasive, and finally, after carefully aligning the cutting area, applied the spinning lamprey saw.

“They’re drilling in.” Vincent ran to the hatch, worked the controls, but found them frozen. “We’re sealed inside here. Why don’t they just open the access hatch if they want contact with us?”

“Perhaps the Diadem is exercising extreme caution.”

A soft plastic sheath that looked like an embryonic sac extended from the cutting arm, folding around the saw blade to seal the metal being cut. Vincent heard the teeth-grinding vibration as the cutter gnawed through the reinforced hull.

Vincent ran to the codecall screen. “Diadem, please explain what’s happening out there.”

Michella’s face reappeared, still wearing her sincere smile. “You may relax, gentlemen. We’re simply obtaining in-situ samples of the air within the pod. We will run tests to verify there’s no contamination. We can’t be too careful about letting an extraterrestrial disease organism loose on Sonjeera. I’m sure it will be fine. We’ll take care of all this – I promise.” She sounded so warm and friendly.

Vincent’s skin crawled. If the explanation was so innocuous, then why not tell them beforehand? Since regular travel and commerce from Hellhole had continued for months following the discovery of the slick-water pools, any contamination should have been obvious by now.

Dread uncoiled within him. “Zairic, listen to Fernando inside you. Ask him – isn’t he at all suspicious?” Vincent jerked his head to one side as, with a shrill whine of distressed metal, the cutter bit through the inner wall. Rotating jagged teeth slashed a raw wound into the pod’s interior.

The emotion radiating from Vincent alarmed Cippiq more than the others. The Original glided forward on his long, soft body and spoke in an incomprehensible burst of sound, and Zairic nodded. “Very well then, Vincent Jenet. Fernando would like to talk with you also.”

The voice changed, became more animated. It was Fernando Neron again. “Taking a sample of the air for quarantine testing? Hmm, it sounds reasonable, but it’s complete bullshit. We may indeed have something to worry about, my friend.”

Vincent swallowed hard. “Our companions are very trusting, Fernando – too trusting.”

The lamprey drill retracted now to be replaced by a dark, large-diameter tube that sealed around the inner hole.

Fernando nudged Vincent aside and activated the codecall. He flashed a grin, then replaced it with a grave expression. “Diadem Michella, there are a few things I neglected to tell you.” He paused, but got no response. “Eminence, are you there? You do need to hear this.”

Instead of drawing atmospheric samples from the chamber, the tube began to exhaust
into
the pod, blowing air, followed by a spray of puffy white balls that flew like a blizzard of tree pollen. They drifted and floated about, to the amazement of the shadow-Xayans. Several of the fluffy white spheres clung like lint to Cippiq’s soft, moist skin.

“That’s no air analysis sample!” Vincent cried. “The Diadem’s got to listen to you, Fernando. Talk to her!”

His friend spoke into the codecall again, an anxious, calculating look on his face. “Diadem, there is something important you should know about your daughter. We can tell you about the General’s plans. It’s vital information.”

Now Michella’s face appeared on the screen, her expression urgent. “What is it? Tell me quickly.”

“Only face-to-face, Diadem. You must let us out of here or you’ll never know the answer.”

Obviously alarmed, the Diadem barked orders. The fluffy white globules now filled the air inside the pod. Vincent waved them away from his face and automatically covered his nose and mouth with his shirt.

The puffballs began to spangle and spark, bursting in tiny flashes of light.

“Stop it – Ishop, stop it!” the Diadem shrieked. She was yelling to someone outside the range of the codecall screen, then turned back to the pane, wildly. “Zairic, tell me now! What about my daughter? What does the General intend to do?”

Fernando waggled his finger at her image. “Ah-ah, I told you the rules, Eminence. Get us out of here, and I’ll tell you every juicy detail.”

The Diadem was livid.

As the white balls continued to flash and vaporize, a filmy smoke oozed through the air. The shadow-Xayans began to cough and retch. On the screen, Michella yelled again to someone out of view.

Cippiq lurched forward, and rippling convulsions ran along his translucent skin. Though Fernando’s personality was dominant in his own body, the other shadow-Xayans linked together, finally feeling the desperation. As the poison swirled in the air, their telemancy throbbed. Cippiq added his own mental force, and the walls of the sealed passenger pod bowed outward, bending, ready to burst.

Michella shouted into the codecall panel, demanding answers, but Fernando blanked the screen.

“What were you going to tell her?” Vincent asked

His friend managed a weak shrug. “Nothing that would matter now. I was going to make something up.”

The air pressed against Vincent’s head, and he felt the ripples of telemancy build. The shadow-Xayans had decided to fight back at last . . . but too late.

The thick transparent pane of the nearest windowport cracked, then blasted outward. Some of the faint white vapor trailed out. The bulkhead bent, twisted; the hatch buckled and cracked.

Outside in the hangar, alarms shrieked. People fled from the breach. Vehicles rolled out, and Vincent knew the Diadem must be evacuating.

He couldn’t breathe. Cippiq had slumped down, his small caterpillar legs twitching, his soft body thrashing one way and another. The press of telemancy faltered; two of the shadow-Xayans collapsed. The passenger pod had cracked open, but the small amount of ventilation was not enough, and Cippiq’s motions were slowing. They couldn’t escape. The toxin was already inside them.

Vincent fell to the floor, feeling the poison eat away at him. He looked fatalistically over at Fernando who was also reeling. “We didn’t act in time, did we?”

“I don’t think so. Zairic should have listened to you. I’m sorry.” Fernando seemed resigned, perhaps tranquilized by the alien presence within.

Vincent closed his eyes, cursing his own foolishness. His next breath felt as if he’d inhaled caustic vapors. He had hoped that the drifting gas inside the chamber would merely render them unconscious, but that was as naïve and optimistic as Zairic’s misunderstanding of the Diadem’s true nature.

“She’s afraid of what we are.” Fernando’s voice was hoarse now. “She can’t help us, you know. If she could, she wouldn’t be so panicked. I suppose I can take some comfort in having a last little joke on her, for what she’s done to us.” He looked over at Vincent, his face filled with sadness and compassion. He could barely speak now. “Even so, I wish you had joined me in the slickwater. That way you would finally have understood what I was talking about.”

Vincent retorted with the last of his strength. “How can you say that? Wasn’t I a good enough friend to you as I am? The slickwater did this – to
all
of us! It’s what made the Constellation so afraid . . . and now it’s killed us.”

“Oh no, I did most of this to myself, every step of the way,” Fernando said with a beatific smile. “But I’m glad to have known you, Vincent Jenet. You were a good friend.” He sounded like a perfectly meshed combination of himself and the alien Zairic, totally at ease with what he had become – and his fate. “It has been an adventure.”

Vincent was despairing and afraid, but Fernando clasped his hand. Vincent felt cold inside and out now. He tried to speak, but only a strange noise came from his throat. His muscles seized up.

Many of the shadow-Xayans had already collapsed to the deck, and stopped coughing. Cippiq writhed and thrashed, and his translucent skin seemed to be boiling away from his cartilaginous frame. The cracks in the pod’s hull let only wisps of fresh air inside.

Fernando held on just a moment longer, speaking through the memories of Zairic. “This reminds me of just before the asteroid impact. It is a shame we don’t have the slickwater this time . . .” He slumped to the deck.

Vincent sprawled immobile beside him. He managed to draw a few more ragged breaths: his mind filled with whiteness, followed by gray, and then nothing but black.

T
he invisible blow hit Keana with a percussive force that came out of nowhere. She felt as if the synapses and neurons of her brain had detonated from a series of hidden landmines. She could barely see as wave after wave of shock and despair flooded into her mind. Inextricably joined with Uroa, she cried out in agony and fell to the ground.

All around her in the exotic settlement, other shadow-Xayans writhed in pain, screaming words that sounded like no language at all. The telemancers in the central spiral collapsed as if their joints and bones had turned to jelly.

The living structures thrashed in response, twisting and shuddering. One fanciful tower bent sharply downward, contorting, cracking and falling. No longer sustained by telemancy, it thundered to the ground, sending dust and debris into the air. Other structures tumbled in an escalating, deafening roar; wobbly alien prototypes disintegrated and collapsed.

Several shadow-Xayan telemancers who had been flying high overhead fell to the ground and were crushed by the impact. These deaths only added to the dark resonance. Even the forest of red alien weed convulsed in a sympathetic reaction.

After interminable, confusing moments, the shuddering pain finally passed, leaving Keana incapable of thinking in her native language. Only Uroa’s alien tongue flooded her consciousness, attempting to convey the horror and disbelief of the awakened members of the Xayan race.

In a rush of nightmarish alien history, she relived the last moments before the asteroid impact, after most of the people had been dissolved into the slickwater reservoirs – but not all could be saved. Some were doomed, and she heard their ancient cries reverberating, their collective fear mounting to a crescendo that she couldn’t bear. Tears poured from her eyes like blood from a grievous wound.