Jack Chalker - Balshazzar's Serpent

“If it doesn’t look likely to spread, let it burn,” Cromwell told them. “If it does, allow the villagers to put it out.”

Woodward looked at the silvery suit of armor quizzically. “Tom?”

“Nothing, sir. Uninvited guests are taken care of, and we may have a midday cook fire over there.”

“ Hey! ” Ziggee yelled, a real nervous wreck at this point. “You ain’t supposed to do that!”

“Neither were you,” Woodward responded, still enjoying his cigar, now already about half smoked. “Now, your Captain what’s his name can come on out in the open like us, fully armed, and bring his best soldier with his best equipment. Then we’ll be even. But snipers taking beads on us from hidden places— that will never do.”

“I—” Ziggee started to respond, but he suddenly stopped and just stared, apparently taken as off guard as the three from the ship.

“Doctor Woodward, so nice of you to come,” said a woman’s voice. They all turned and saw Eve, naked as the day she was born and still showing the bruises of her bonds and captivity, standing there woodenly.

“Eve!” Robey shouted. “It’s me, John!”

Woodward put his hand on the young man’s shoulder. “That’s not your Eve, although she’s certainly dressed like it.”

“You are correct, sir,” said the figure. “I am Captain Sapenza. I am using this body for several obvious reasons, including the ones you just so ably demonstrated. They were not amateurs, either, that your people took.”

“Neither are mine,” responded the Doctor.

“Eve” laughed, but it was a hollow, wooden laugh, like the voice, without body language to reinforce it.

“In addition to the safety this method affords me,” Sapenza through Eve continued, “it also demonstrates that I am not without resources myself, even if I do not have anything on the scale of yours. I wish to demonstrate that we are not merely talking potential death of your people here.”

Cromwell was inaudible to the rest, but not to Archangel above. “Archangel, is this a broadcast or is she truly possessed by something?” This was new to him and he didn’t like it.

“If it’s a broadcast I do not have a way to find the frequency or method of transmission,” the controller in orbit above them reported. “Either this captain is inside the body or he’s got some method we know nothing about.”

Woodward sighed. “Well, I am impressed, I admit, although the shame she must feel is not reciprocated by looking at a very attractive if mishandled and maltreated female form. Possession of even the most holy isn’t unknown to us in history, but only her body is in danger, not her soul.”

“Her soul, if there is such a thing, is as much in my possession as her body,” the Captain responded. “Conditioning, hopelessness, trauma—all that can, in the hands of experts, be simple to do. We’ve had a lot of practice with just some of these dumb peasants. You don’t need gimmicks, technology, any of that. You just need a damp cell, some chains, a bare light, and a feeling of total and complete impotence, and to stop them when they go through the possible suicide phase. Anybody can be broken, Doctor. Anybody . Even you if I had you, or, for that matter, me if you had me and went that route. And when you break, you’re damned. Isn’t that right, Doctor?”

“You are under the control of and in the power of creatures you do not even believe exist,” Woodward told him. “And, to them, you’re just another tool, just as this poor girl is to you.”

“Well, then, you’ll just have to deal, tool to tool, as it were, won’t you?” Sapenza came back.

“All right, then, what’s your proposition? It’s hot out here and uncomfortable to boot.”

“Direct and to the point. Too bad, really. I enjoy drawing things out.”

“Then let’s do this sitting comfortably in air conditioning and with decent drinks,” the Doctor retorted.

Sapenza laughed. “I really do enjoy dealing with you, Doctor. Very well, let’s be at it. We want off this rock. Our ship’s disabled and beyond our ability to fix, but your people might know how to do it. If not, they know where to go to surreptitiously get the parts. I want a working ship again, Doctor. I want off this dirt ball. I’ll give your people the codes and anything they need to gain full access to the ship. It’s underwater, but I know you can get to it, and if necessary lift it. Some of my staff and your staff will work together. We’ve already done a major damage assessment, and it’s not that huge a job—if you have the parts and equipment to do the fix. As it is, for us, it’s impossible.”

“And for the eighty-seven that you captured I am supposed to do all this?”

There was a pause, and then Sapenza, through Eve, said, “No, Doctor. The eighty-seven captives are to keep your people from coming down here and tearing through our underworld. You can raise hell with us down here but you can’t save them by doing that, and after all these years we have nothing at all to lose.”

“And if I just leave them?”

“You’d really do that? Leave this pretty girl to all the folks down here who want to have some fun with her?”

“There are times when you have to make hard decisions in doing the Lord’s work. I’m not your typical Bible thumper, Sapenza. In fact, I’m not an evangelist in the traditional sense at all. I come, I teach, I see if it takes. If it does I leave some to plant and nurture. If it doesn’t, I curse the world and all its people and move on. That is my job. If I leave them here, God will treat them as martyrs. He will take them to His bosom when their time comes no matter what you make of their physical flesh here. But you, and your people, will still be here and still be stuck, and your very existence will be entirely in our hands. Either we can find the Navy, or whoever you were in a battle with and are still hiding from all this time later, or whatever, or we can blow the controls on the genhole as we leave and you’ll be marooned here forever . Which would you prefer?”

Sapenza sounded genuinely shocked. “You would really do that to so many of your own young people?”

“As opposed to what? Selling our souls? I would have to pray a lot over the decision, but I suspect I could still sleep.”

“Well, Doc, that does make it a little easier on me, though, doesn’t it? What happens to them is your fault, your choice. And, as I said, they are only to insure that you don’t come down here. They are not my hostages in this matter.”

“No? Then what else do we have to talk about, Captain?”

“You. When we first crashed here, we removed some of the heavy weapons and concealed them in an effective defensive grid. They’re good weapons, many of a kind rarely seen even in the old days, and they have their own internal power packs. Fusion and directed antimatter steam, for example. Your soldier boy there can probably tell you what those things can do.”

“What are you threatening, Sapenza? To shoot down my ship in orbit?”

Sapenza gave another pause, although it was unclear if it was for effect or if he was really nervous or just thinking furiously. Finally he said, “No, I’m not sure we have the juice for that, and definitely not the space combat computers. Even a lucky hit would probably be diluted enough to bounce off your shields. These weapons weren’t really designed as surface weapons. But they can take on more limited targets, and they power on in seconds. They can take on a stationary or nearly stationary object very well, even of some great size, and concentrate enough to go through the best shields in that scenario. And I think we could knock down your ersatz lifeboats, your shuttle craft, with disposable weapons, since the shuttles really don’t have any effective energy shielding.”