Larry Niven - The Moon Maze Game

Kendra was in the main communications center within ninety seconds of leaving Xavier. “What do we have?”

Foxworthy ran his finger along a column of recent notes floating in the air. “We have reason to believe that Thomas Frost has been talking to allies on Earth. We have communication with Cowles Industries on the conference channel.”

“Mr. Walls?” Kendra said. A pleasant-looking, intense man appeared. There were several other heads floating in screens around him.

“Kendra,” Walls said. “Let me begin by saying how sorry I am, how sorry we all are.”

“I appreciate that.”

“And I want to say that so far, you seem to have done everything a person could reasonably expect.”

There was an anvil in that sentence, waiting to drop on an unwary head. “We have to do more,” she said. “I’ve made queries about Thomas and Douglas Frost, and communications that they have made to Earth.”

“I’m sorry that we were so long in getting this to you, but we have been backtracing their telemessages, and there is no doubt that they have been in touch with radical groups.”

“What kind of radicals?”

“Expatriate Kikayans.”

“Are you talking about people who might have wanted the Prince kidnapped?”

“Exactly. We located a snippet of a speech given by a Dr. Mubuto, speaking to the African community in America.”

A second screen opened in the air.

“When was this taken?” Kendra asked.

Walls looked down and made a rustling sound in his lap. Notes. “Ah… two years ago.”

Mubuto was a small, round-faced man who wore wire spectacles and shook his finger at the camera a lot. A line of translated text ran across the bottom of the screen. “And there is no disgrace like that visited upon those who forget. Forget that we had a tyrant who controlled our lands, and threw him off. Followed by dictators, and we threw them off, and gave the reins of power to the one man who we could all agree upon. Who then threw aside our democratic ideals and made his title not President, or even President for Life, but King, and then passed that title on to his son.”

The crowd cheered.

“It is hard enough to toil under the weight of tyranny. Many of us could not bear the burden, and left our homeland to seek better lives, hoping that perhaps one day our children would enjoy the free homeland that we could not have.” He paused. Kendra wished she could have understood the speech in its original Congolese.

“But now he wants to pass it to his child. And that child will doubtless wish to convey it to his own. And where will it end? When the rest of the world claws its way toward freedom, are we less? Will we stand by and let this injustice happen? We have friends! We have power! And one day we will find the way to end this travesty!”

The crowd cheered.

“I think we can assume,” Walls said, “that they found their way.”

Kendra sighed. “So the Frost twins have Kikayan sympathies. This Doctor Mubuto was the head of their parliament, and there was a powerful national movement to make him President and make the King a figurehead, but Kikaya fended it off. Some say illegally. Well, payback is a bitch.”

“Our bitch, now. Mubuto and Frost must have been working together somehow. This operation took money. Lots of it. One thing we have to ask, though…”

He paused long enough for Kendra to volunteer a response. “Who helped them here?”

“Yes.”

“Equipment. What equipment did the pirates have. What did they bring, how did they bring it, and how did they acquire anything difficult to smuggle.” She turned to her assistant. “I want you to get several of the NPCs who left the dome. I want them in here in five minutes. Room five.”

Kendra strode to the front of a conference room crowded with former NPCs. Xavier sat at her side, watching everything carefully before speaking. “I am so sorry for what you have experienced. Most of you know me. And I assume that the rest of you know Xavier.”

A few of them grumbled. “What’s going on in that dome?” a bald man asked. “What are you doing to get them out?”

“The first thing we have to do is understand the game we’re playing,” Kendra said. “And the players.”

The man shifted so that light reflected from his gleaming head. “It’s easy. There are bad guys with guns, and they took over the dome. What’s so complicated?”

“Complicated,” Kendra said, considering. “You think that we should just sneak up on them?”

“Why the hell not?”

Kendra tried to keep the frustration from her voice. “And if someone tells them we’re coming?”

“We can keep it secret…”

“We have no military,” Kendra said. “No paramilitary, or SWAT. Barely any police or security. We’re not set up for this.”

“So you’re doing nada?”

“Of course not. But I think we can keep this in the family. I need to ask you some questions: How were these men equipped? Did you really see guns?”

The gamers conferred with each other for a few moments, and then one smallish man raised his hand. “I saw a crossbow.”

“Underwater breathing gear. I saw that, and air guns.”

“What else? And please let me ask you a question: Unauthorized pistols or rifles aren’t allowed down here. All luggage is scanned thoroughly.”

The bald man squinted. “So… someone helped them beat a scan?”

“Is that what you think? Is that what you would do if you had the fix in?”

He frowned. “What do you mean?”

“Well,” she said. “If you could smuggle any weapon past the screeners on Earth. And then the L5. And then here on the Moon. Would you choose an air gun?”

They stared at each other.

“The weapons were makeshift?”

“That seems the most reasonable conclusion. Yes,” she said. “They were constructed here on the Moon. How many weapons? What resources would have been necessary? I’m going to go down that road. I would like everyone in this room to write down every resource they saw that would not have been allowed on the shuttle. Then…”

“Then what?” the bald man said.

Kendra felt herself snarling.

1430 hours

Within the gaming dome, the gamers were making their way through a tunnel into bubble 61-E. Scotty was in the lead. He held up a hand. “Where are we? Darla: How’s the map in your head?”

“One level up from bedrock. We can get down into the foundation layer if we make it through here.”

They cautiously opened a door leading into the next bubble, and stepped in. It was a cavern filled with flowers with metallic petals. Their wristlamps stabbed into deep pockets of shadow.

“Look here,” Sharmela said. “Somebody’s home.”

They gathered around to see a row of robotic Selenites lined up against the wall.

“My guess is that these were supposed to come to life. Some kind of display or attack. No power, no attack.”

“Look,” Wayne called. “Finally! An emergency communications node!” The glowing green triangle was obvious once you focused your eyes properly.

“Thank God!” Angelique said, and tapped at the flower indicated. “Xavier? Can you hear me?” She drew an earpiece from the middle of the flower. Scotty stood close, listening.

A pause, and then a thin ghost of Xavier’s voice floated to them, from nowhere, from everywhere. “I’ve been screaming at you, but I guess only the earpieces are working. No loudspeaker. Listen to me: We detect heat signatures moving in your direction.”

“What can you tell us about the search patterns?”

“There are two down on the pool level. They didn’t even try to follow you, just assumed that they could cut you off if they got there first.”