“This vessel is now defunct,” said the robotic controller of the ES 110. It was the only epitaph the prison-ship received.
Liz was flung hard against the side of the tiny craft as it lurched into the broken dimensions with a mind-reeling plunge. The raft spun wildly for a few seconds, and then it was grinding down the Quasi-warp tunnel away from the wreck of the ES 110. Liz looked at Maran and saw that his armored suit was crawling with the glittering, eerie radiance. He had the look of a monstrous god riding a chariot of suns.
Buchanan felt the absence of the station’s protective screens with a deep-space voyager’s instinctive alarm. The station quaked in the maelstrom. Engines howled with the effort of projecting the warp which could not exist. And which had been manufactured.
Scanners showed the breakup of the ES 110.
A fresh flurry of starquake grabbed the prison-ship and drew what was left of its shattered hulk inward. Buchanan caught the last unconcerned message from its robotic controller. There was a faint blast as the ES 110 imploded.
Buchanan shivered. Any shipwreck was a desolating thing. There would be only broken fragments of this vessel to sink into the time-lost graveyard where the Altair Star lay. And then, through the showering debris and the fury of starquake, Buchanan glimpsed the hauntingly beautiful tunnel. It grew like some living thing in the broken dimensions, a tube of white-gold translucence that seemed too fragile to endure against the devastating onrush of serpentine coils billowing from the depths of the Singularity. It held, and the engines of the station kept the wildness of starquake back. And the life-raft slowly crept toward the station. It lurched forward at first, but then its progress was slow, as if it fought painfully against an alien element; Buchanan breathed in shallow gulps as he thought of Liz Deffant encased in the frail pellet of a ship that was being reborn through the coruscating tube. He was in the station’s small hold when the raft nudged into the lock. A strange delirium of hope gripped him. When the battered raft creaked to a rest and the white-gold translucence died away, he could not contain himself.
“Liz! Liz!”
The two low-grade servitors that were the entire complement of the station went about their work efficiently. They assisted the two dazed figures from the raft and began to remove the massive space armor. Buchanan was taut with almost unendurable emotion. He heard the robotic controller of the station announce:
“Commander, starquake emissions dying down. Quasi-warp fields have been withdrawn. All three engines have resumed normal functions. There has been a slight failure of some elements of Number Two Engine, but maintenance systems have repairs in hand. Full efficiency will be obtained in all systems in one hour. What are your instructions?”
Buchanan was beside her as the helmet came free. Her long hair flowed around a pale face. She blinked and stared at him. A tension that had built up during the hours of the ES 110’s lunging voyage into the Singularity now burst, and Buchanan reached out a big, wide hand to touch her face. He felt tears.
“Al—” whispered the girl, and he felt his senses battered. The touch of her soft skin was the revival of all he had ever hoped for. The Altair Star was only a distant, thin ghost, one that could stay in its shadowy nonlife. This was real, this tactile impression of her tears.
He saw her eyes fill with alarm and remembered that Maran was on his ship. He turned, fast.
“What are your instructions?” asked the robotic controller. “Sir, have you any instructions regarding ES 110 personnel?”
Buchanan was himself again, alert and decisive. “I resume full command of the station,” he snapped. “Full restraint procedures—seize the criminal expellee Maran and take him for medical attention. He is not to be permitted to speak—do not allow him to communicate with any automatic system!”
“Al, he controls—” Liz yelled, as Buchanan took a step toward the burly figure.
“What are your instructions, Commander?” the metallic flat voice interrupted, as Liz was shouting. Buchanan opened his mouth to roar at the stupidity of the machines when he saw that the blank faces of the two low-grade servitors were not turned to him. In that moment, he knew what Liz was trying to say.
“Relinquish all decision-making procedures!” he called abruptly. “I am commander of this ship—accept no orders but mine!”
It was too late.
“Commander?” asked the robotic controller.
Both low-grades faced Maran. They were awaiting his orders. Like dogs, they knew their master. Buchanan tried to reach Maran. His hands were wedge-shaped, the hard edges downward, the muscles in his shoulders and arms ready to power the blows that would crush Maran while he was still dazed from the mind-reeling passage of the tunnel. It was always too late. “Restrain,” said Maran hoarsely. Tentacles snaked to encompass Buchanan’s limbs. He stared at him as two metallic carapaces regarded him indifferently. Buchanan felt anger surge within him once more, and again the anger was directed at himself. He had acted with such stupidity that it was hardly believable. Maran had issued commands before leaving the ES 110. Of course he had! But he had been vulnerable for a few seconds when the life-raft lay like a stranded monster in the hold of the station; the man had been half crazed by the shock of the strange phenomenon of Quasi-warp. That should have been his chance, Buchanan thought savagely. He had lost it.
A sense of unreality gripped him. Here he was, in his own command, a prisoner of his own servitors. Facing him was the bulk of Maran, one of the most dangerous men ever to be sent to the Rim. By a freak of chance, Liz Deffant was here too—she had been brought across the spiraling arms of the Galaxy to this encounter, having played some part in the desperate events leading to Maran’s presence. Shocked, enraged, bewildered, he shouted to the robots: “I am Buchanan, commander of the station!
Release me! I resume full control of all systems throughout the station! Maran is not to be allowed access to any system—secure him now!”
The tentacles did not relax. Buchanan’s rage seeped away.
Both he and Liz were waiting for Maran to shake the sense-blinding effects of the Quasi-warp from his massive head. Haggard, patient, utterly fatigued, he at last looked directly at Buchanan. The sense of unreality would not leave Buchanan.
“Buchanan,” Maran said, his strange deep eyes assessing the bound man before him. There was no hint of triumph. Buchanan could begin to appreciate the power of the man; another, in his place, would have shown pride, perhaps boasted of his mastery of the machines. Maran accepted the situation and his dominance of it; it was his right. About him, there was an aura of grandeur that was only partly to be explained by his size. He was uninterested in fighting Buchanan. He would not accept him as an opponent, in spite of the defiance in Buchanan’s face. Any kind of confrontation was ruled out by his monumental patience.
Buchanan clung to his one advantage. “You can’t get away,” he said. “This station has no deep-space Phase capability. And Commander Lientand’s squadron is waiting.”
Maran was unperturbed. Like Liz, he was swaying. He was almost on the point of collapse. “Attend to Miss Deffant,” he said. “You’ll do that?”
“What?”
Liz Deffant heard. She was too tired to begin to explain.
“Yes,” said Maran. “A remarkable woman.” He gestured to the servitors, and the tentacles flowed away into invisible orifices. “The machines will hold you if you attempt to harm me,” he said. “Be a realist, Buchanan. I must have rest—Miss Deffant will tell you about their trials aboard the prison-ship. When I have recovered, your machines will tell me about your command. In the meanwhile, do nothing rash.”