Stephen Berry - The Battle for Terra Two

The Terran squinted at it. " 'Flora-none. Fauna-none.' So?" he shrugged. "If we'd believed all your nice little toys over the past year, we'd be dead.

"Good God, man! Use your senses! Feel that hot, fetid air, smell the rotting vegetation, and listen-listen to the nonexistent fauna!"

Sweat-drenched, the two stood on the trail they'd followed from the armorglass gate-a trail leading straight toward the point set in D'Trelna's locator. A thick mist hung low over the trail, obscuring all but the closest brush. Strange, fierce cries sounded in the distance. Once, thinking they heard something large moving through the undergrowth, they'd stopped, rifles ready, waiting. The sound hadn't resumed, so they'd moved on, D'Trelna finally calling a halt to recheck his readings.

"Fake," said D'Trelna, clipping the surveyor back onto his belt. "All machine-generated vegetation. And we haven't seen a single animal, swatted any bugs. We've just heard noises."

Carefully setting the blastrifle down on the trail, McShane pulled the commando knife from his bootsheath. Slicing off the end of a thick-vined creeper, he handed the dripping specimen to D'Trelna. The commodore held it gingerly between two thick fingers, avoiding the white sap oozing from the cut.

"Plant life," said McShane.

"Inorganic," said D'Trelna, dropping the cutting. "Rigid green polymer exterior, resinous white polymer interior. Probably generated from troughs under this brown plastic." He scuffed the jungle matting. "We have supper clubs like this back home."

"How pleasant."

"The scale is less sweeping, the air is conditioned, and a man can get a drink." He wiped a damp sleeve across his sweaty brow.

"Let's go."

"But why not a real jungle?" said Bob as they walked, D'Trelna leading along the narrow trail. "If this was the Agro section, why not real plants?"

"I'd guess-just a guess-that the demented computer has taken over from the secondary systems that maintained Agro."

"This whole grotesque ship was demented from her launch day. How much further?"

D'Trelna checked the locator. "Not far. We're over halfway."

Something made McShane look back. The trail was quietly vanishing as a twelve-foot wall of jungle rolled down it, great thorn-studded vines waving along its front.

"Behind us, J'Quel!"

Turning, the commodore stared at the advancing green mass. "Run!"

McShane had never seen D'Trelna run, couldn't have visualized it. But there he was, a small tank plowing down the trail, even putting some space between him and the Terran. I'll be damned, thought McShane, wheezing. There's muscle under there.

The trail turned hard right after a few moments, ending before a wall of massive, unmortared stone. Great, mist-wreathed boulders vanished above and to sides, swallowed by the fog. A wall made by giants when the world was young, thought McShane.

"Blasters?" he asked, panting. From behind, drawing closer, came a serpentine slithering as hundreds of meters of green death slid down the trail.

"Blasters," said D'Trelna, unslinging his rifle and clicking off the safety. The two men faced about, back to the wall, waiting.

"How long will the chargepaks last?" asked McShane. "As garden trimmers? Not long. "This is classic," added the commodore, eyes on the turn in the trail. "Classical, really."

"How so?"

"Prespace mythology. Seeking Sanctuary, Prince A'Gan slips through Death's Forest. The Forest pursues. A'Gan reaches the Sanctuary wall, but can't enter without speaking the Word-of-One. A word he doesn't know. He faces about, back to the wall, sword in hand."

"Do you know the word?"

"Of course." D'Trelna frowned, half turning his head toward McShane. "Every child on S'Htar…"

"Use it, man!" snapped McShane. "Just like your Prince A'Gan! Hurry."

D'Trelna could take orders as well as give them. Turning, rifle held two-handed over his head, he cried, "L'Asorg!" High and lilting, the word rang from the wall.

Blaster to his shoulder, McShane fired at the first creepers as they rounded the trail, aiming where they grew close and thick.

Splashing against an invisible barrier, the stream of red blaster bolts dissipated.

"Shielded! D'Trelna, it's…"

A hand to his shoulder turned him. "Come on," snapped the commodore, pointing to the tunnel that now pierced the wall.

They ran the few meters, the creepers snapping so close McShane could feel the air stir.

A brief impression of darkness, a passageway, then they were through, grass beneath their feet, the mist thinner, the air pleasant and cool. Turning, they saw that the wall had closed behind them.

"How did you know?" asked the commodore.

"Key words," said McShane, leaning on his blastrifle. "Demented. Club. Classical. We're performers in a psy-chodrama, J'Quel. Only it's the producer who's mad-a producer with some knowledge of the classics."

"Main computer, of course," sighed D'Trelna." Ishould have seen it."

"We both should…"

"Thee hath found uncertain sanctuary, A'Gan," boomed a voice.

The big golden egg floated toward them out of the mist, a purple cape fastened just below its top by twin metallic strands.

Stopping a few meters from the two men, it hovered noiselessly.

"What the hell is that?" said McShane. "A Nibelung?"

"It would appear to be a large talking egg," said the commodore, watching the egg. "One wearing a cape with some knowledge of prespace mythology."

"D'Trelna!"

"It's main computer, Professor."

"Why isn't it bolted down somewhere, computing?"

"It was designed as a mobile unit. If the battle went against the defenders, they could still control the ship's basic systems." The machine sat unmoving.

"We never did look for it, you know," said D'Trelna, watching the computer. "We were busy, and it did what we wanted, so why look for it?" He sounded apologetic.

"It's not armed, is it?" asked McShane uneasily.

"Not even the Imperials would be crazy enough to arm a computer."

"Why not? They were crazy enough to build mindslavers."

"Time to take charge here, Bob."

D'Trelna cleared his throat. "Computer," he said in his best command voice, "I am Commodore J'Quel D'Trelna. As senior K'Ronarin officer insystem, I direct you to turn over to me..

The golden bolt struck midway between the computer and the men, blasting a hole through the fake turf, scarring the battlesteel below. "Silence, A'Gan!"

"It's cracked," said McShane.

"Certainly is." D'Trelna looked shaken.

"No, there," McShane pointed, "just to the left of the cape. See?"

D'Trelna saw it then-a jagged hairline crack running diagonally from beneath the garment.

"Know, A'Gan, that thee hath fled to thy death, for I am K'Lyta, thy father's brother. Much wrong hath thee done me, slaying my children."

"What's the rest of the legend, J'Quel?" asked McShane, his grip on the rifle suddenly sweaty.

D'Trelna spoke low and fast. "A'Gan is rightful heir to the throne of a small city-state. Returning from the wars, he finds his nephews have usurped him. He kills them, but flees when their father calls upon the Darkness to avenge his seed. A'Gan reaches Sanctuary only to find it false and his uncle waiting for him. They battle. A'Gan wins, though badly wounded. He returns home to rule a few sad years, then dies of his wounds."

"Inspiring."

"Now, A'Gan, I shall take your child as wergeld," said computer. McShane wondered how it spoke-it had no visible orifice.

"I am not A'Gan and I have no children, my lord of the fractured carapace," said D'Trelna.

Wreathed in a faint, shimmering indigo, a small transparent bubble rose from beneath the grass, stopping at eye level between men and computer. About a meter in diameter, it had two small holes at the top, two at the bottom.