“They’re not your friends, John,” I told him, switching from parole into English. “Compared to these guys, the Star Force is your father and your mother. You may be a piece of shit, but you’re a piece of shit in Susarma Lear’s command. Her you can trust. The Neanderthalers would shoot you in the back as soon as look at you.”
Sky-blue was waving his gun, to suggest that he didn’t like what I was doing.
“Shut up, Rousseau,” said Finn, in parole.
“I want to be taken to someone in authority,” said Sky- blue. “Now.”
Thalia-7 intervened, and began talking to the invaders in what I assumed to be their own language.
The officer replied in kind, and all of a sudden he was launched into a dialogue with the two scions. I felt a little hurt about my sudden exclusion, and also a little anxious. The most obvious reason for switching languages was that Sky-blue’s non-parole-speaking friends could now understand what was being said, but there was a nagging doubt in my mind that it might be because they didn’t want me to understand. I reminded myself that the scions might look like elongated teddy bears, but there was no way to be sure that they cared one way or the other what became of me.
About three minutes went by before they switched back to a language I knew. Then it was Calliope who spoke—to me.
“We will do as this man wishes,” she said, confirming the apparently nonsensical suggestion she’d made earlier. “We will guide him through the corridors, so that he may speak directly with the Nine.”
If she wanted to shoot them a line, that was okay by me. It was the Nine’s world, and the rest of us, whether we knew it or not, were probably about as important to them as insects, no matter how interesting we might be. The Nine were in control—I didn’t doubt that for a moment—and I was ready to play along with anything they said.
“Okay,” I said. “If that’s what it takes.”
So we set out to retrace my steps into the maze of corridors that was one tiny part of the body of the Nine. As we went, I was uncomfortably aware of John Finn walking behind me, reveling in the fact that he had a gun pointed at my spine. I consoled myself with the one small measure of unholy glee that I could discover. If Finn had got away without facing ghosts before, I thought, he certainly wasn’t going to get away without facing them now.
29
In order to go through the narrow corridors we had to string ourselves out somewhat. Thalia-7 and Calliope-4 walked together in the lead, with the Scarid officer and one of his bully boys behind them, guns in a threatening position. Then there was me, with John Finn sticking close, still getting a kick out of being able to hold the gun on me. Two more Scarid soldiers brought up the rear—there had been further reinforcements waiting outside the igloo. Another two remained outside, theoretically protecting the expedition’s rear.
As we marched through the maze I kept expecting the walls on either side to come alive, wresting control of the situation from our captors with a mindscrambling flourish that would be as contemptuously easy as taking candy from a baby. But nothing happened, and the doubts continued to creep up on me. Somewhere up ahead were Myrlin and 994-Tulyar, but I had no idea whether they’d been warned about what was happening. Were the Nine just sitting back, like the audience at a play, waiting to see who would get shot?
Once, as we passed a dark side-corridor, I considered making a break, but Finn was too close to me, and too obviously ready to punish any indiscretion. In any case, I had no place to go.
The walls on either side of us stayed black. There was not a flicker of a ghost. The life that was within them was quite invisible, and was seemingly content to remain in hiding. Confidently and without hesitation the two scions led us through the maze. I could see that the man with pale blue eyes was becoming just a trifle worried, as it dawned on him that he’d never be able to find his way out unaided. Twice he lifted his radio to his lips, to contact the men outside, making sure that he was still in touch. I still couldn’t decide whether or not Finn’s story about the evacuated shaft and the explosives was anything more than a desperately inspired piece of stupid bluff, but the officer was taking it seriously enough to take pains about his presumed ability to send a signal to tell his men to arm the bombs.
I figured that the Nine could blank out his communications any time they wanted to, so that if it came to the crunch the message couldn’t be sent, but there was still that edge of doubt. Nothing was happening, and I couldn’t understand why. Gods and aliens move in mysterious ways, so the proverbs assure us.
I sought reassurance in telling myself, facetiously, that one would naturally expect the Nine Muses to have an acute sense of dramatic tension and suspense. There are times, though, when I don’t find my own sense of humour very funny.
Finally, we reached Thalia and Calliope’s intended destination. A hole opened in the wall, with a sufficiently magical flourish to make Sky-blue start with surprise, and we were able to pass through into a cornerless chamber whose ceiling was glowing with faint pearly light.
Thalia and Calliope went on through, but the Scarid officer hung back, eyeing the mysterious portal. In the end, he stepped through it, but he told the two soldiers who were bringing up the rear to stay outside and stand guard. That meant there were only three guns inside with us, but the odds were still far too high for me to want to try anything. I didn’t think the scions were the types to be relied upon in that kind of fight. If Serne and Susarma Lear had been along, it would have been a different matter.
There were no sensory deprivation tanks here, but there were three “chairs” hemmed in by all kinds of electronic hardware. They looked to me like the kind of chairs that medics use to take electroencephalographic readings and conduct SQUID brain-probes, or in full-scale biofeedback training. They had trailing nests of tentacular wires, like the ones that had sent superfine threads burrowing into my head while I was inside the egg.
I guessed that these were sophisticated interfaces by which conscious humanoids could hook themselves up to the Nine’s main systems. They were probably the means by which the scions communed most intimately with their parent software personalities, and the means by which the Nine could enter into frank and full discussions with Myrlin, 994-Tulyar, and any other volunteers.
Myrlin and 994-Tulyar were already there, comfortably ensconced in the chairs. They didn’t move or open their eyes when we entered, and even when I touched Myrlin on the arm he gave no sign at all that he knew I was there.
That was the point at which I began to get very worried, having realised at last that something was badly wrong, and that the silence of the Nine was not simply a manifestation of their patience and curiosity.
Sky-blue didn’t like the set-up one little bit, to judge by the expression on his face. I could see the expression quite clearly, because the room was well-lit by comparison with the gloomy corridor. The walls were screen-like, but they were solid grey. There was no console in front of the chairs to control their operation. It was all inside the big hoods into which the would-be communicants had to put their heads. The Scarid had never seen anything like it, but he too was beginning to realise that Myrlin and Tulyar were too quiet for their own good.
I stood back as the blond-haired officer came to stand by Myrlin, reaching out to touch him on the arm just as I had. I looked at Calliope, but her eyes were fixed upon the face of her sister. They wore very similar expressions, and it was an expression which spoke volumes, even upon an alien face. It was not a startled look, but a look which told us all that something they had already begun to fear was now self- evident in all its tragedy.