Jack Chalker - Kaspar's Box

“The subsurface scan will show you what we found,” Nagel told him. “Nobody’s dumb enough to live up here, but that’s not the only place to live.”

“It’s honeycombed, a vast cavernous system down there,” Darch noted. “Most of the interior caverns, some of which seem to go way down, appear to be relatively dry, and those figures there just might indicate some running water even at this point. That’s how you survive the cold cycle. Ten to one the caves maintain an above freezing temperature that’s either constant or nearly so. The surface is only comfortable half the year. Odd, though.”

“I’m sure you’ve already seen what we saw in the makeup there,” Nagel commented, kind of needling the tech.

“Yes, I see what you mean,” Darch responded, oblivious to the dig. “Caverns of that signature tend to be sedimentary rock, easily eroded away over time by the underground rivers and streams, and certainly all the makings are there for a classic setup. Note, though, that there are no such caverns within a hundred or more kilometers of the coastlines. They’re away from the oceans and in the highlands no matter where you look. There doesn’t seem to be a major change in bedrock composition in most of those cases that would explain it. The planet’s got a heavy but mostly solid core that’s maintained the gravity and kept the atmosphere, but a lot of the underground water doesn’t seem to obey the laws all that well. It’s probably scrambled data from all this interference, but on the face of it, it seems like as many of those deep rivers are flowing upward as are flowing downslope.”

“Yeah, I noticed the uphill flow when we were first here,” Nagel told him. “We never did figure it out. Li thought it was caused by pressure, using some of the caverns like pipes.”

“Interesting. Plumbing for a race driven from the surface? Fascinating concept, but we’re getting heavy organics but nothing that would suggest a civilization or even a big colony that would justify building works like that. If our master aliens are down there, then they’re probably long dead or reduced to a primitive existence. This is a planet you can survive on, it’s not one you ever want to try and live and work on if you don’t have to.”

“That’s why we thought the place wasn’t as interesting as it first looked.”

“Perhaps, but the fact is that the entire Three Kings is an artificial construct.” Darch saw their stares. “Somebody built them, and this whole thing, and is maintaining it. That’s more than enough down there for a maintenance base.”

“We’re coming up on the wreck,” Randi Queson put in. “We were all excited by it, I remember, since we hadn’t seen all the life on the other two yet. It’s still impressive, though. There! See?”

It did look very much like an artificial structure, but not for humans. It also gave off virtually no power signatures, meaning that it either used a power system unknown to them and therefore unmeasurable or, more likely, it was a derelict from times long past, covered and then uncovered by the shifting sands.

It was a huge ball shape, perhaps three hundred meters across, sticking out of the sand. It was light gray in color, and all over its surface it had short probelike protrusions. A close-up didn’t reveal much more about it, but it did reveal at least one clear breach of the hull or exterior or whatever it was. A jagged hole, half in the sand and possibly anchoring it there.

“That’s been down there a while,” Darch noted. “You can smell it as a long-term derelict, an ancient shipwreck. Sure, you wonder if any of ’em survived and, if so, did they manage to set up something permanent down there, but it’s a long shot. More telling is that it’s there at all, and that there’s good evidence it’s been buried by the sands and winds several times, and maybe baked and thawed as well on the sunward side. Good bait, though, for the curious.”

“Not a bad spot to visit, either, if they’ve gotten the shuttle cleaned up,” Maslovic noted. “If they’re putting that thing there to attract visitors, why not, well, visit?”

“Maybe because it could be a trap?” Murphy suggested.

“Could be. Let’s see… I’ve got full suits for my team, and most of you can fit into them, but Ann, it’s going to be a very loose fit.”

“I’ve had your computerized shops working on modifications as we approached,” the strange woman responded. “I think you’ll find there’s one that’s just my size.”

Maslovic was now positive who he had aboard. Now all he had to do was decide whether or not he liked it. Certainly he felt as if he could handle it.

“Okay, then. Surface team… Might as well make this a political thing; it sure doesn’t seem like we’re going to do battle down there, or that it would do us much good if we could. That makes it me in the lead, Ann of Balshazzar, Cap if you want to try it, and Nagel and Queson of Melchior. Bring one of the stones each but we won’t distribute until we’re away from the ship. The rest stay locked and secure so our little girls won’t have the run of the place while we’re gone.”

“I would like to come as well,” Joshua put in.

Maslovic was surprised. “You joining the team?”

“I am in the service of the one who killed Macouri,” he told them. “Besides, I have nowhere else to go.”

“Okay. That makes a pretty awful military team but a good science and muscle blend. Draw your suits and check your equipment, suit up, and be outside Bay One in an hour. My own team, who are showing really nasty looks at me at the moment, will be backup. We’re not going in blasting here. I have a feeling that this is pretty close to the group whoever it is down there would want invited.”

“Not at all by the book,” Ann muttered. “About what I’d expect of an intelligence man.”

The fit for the suits, including Ann’s, was quite good. Nobody there would have to face the elements, nor go in cold. All also had sidearm weapons, but it was understood that those were a last resort and Maslovic had a cutoff. If anyone got too nervous, he could stop them from shooting.

They decided on the alien spaceship simply because it was so prominent. Anyone who actually landed would be almost forced to check it out and, for that reason alone, it seemed to be the logical place to start.

Nobody said much on the way down. Joshua took it slow and easy on manual and put it down about a hundred meters from the alien wreck, which seemed even more ghostly and bizarre close up.

“Okay, you can expose your stones to the outside,” Maslovic told them. “Let’s see if they act as old Kaspar’s candy and bring the natives for a treat.”

“Yeah, us, ” Murphy said gloomily. It was too dark, too barren, and too alien for him.

Queson and Nagel finally got to examine the wreck close up. It was gigantic, and much of the interior that had stayed intact didn’t make a lot of sense, but clearly it was what it appeared to be. What had come in it? How long had it been since they’d crashed here, and where were they or their descendants now? These questions had no obvious answers.

After several hours of surveying the wreck and the surrounding area, though, it appeared that they had guessed wrong.

“We’re going to have to pack it up and move, folks,” Maslovic told them, gathering them around him against the eerie backdrop of the ruined ship. “This is getting us nowhere. I propose we try one of the low cave entrances. There appears to be illumination just inside, so maybe we’ll have to go knocking.”

They all agreed, turned to go back to the shuttle for the move, and stopped dead in their tracks.