Morgan's Return (22 page)

Chapter 18  

R
avindra helped Morgan to sit up, and slid back her helmet's face plate. The air felt cool and dry, perhaps a little musty. She handed him her belt and he tossed it next to the wall, beside his own belt and their fins.

"Man, that's better," she said, clambering to her feet. "I feel ten centimeters taller."

A voice rose from the lift shaft. "Hey! Are you ready?"

Ravindra let down the rope for Partridge, who helped him get Eastly up.

Morgan stared around, enhancing her eyesight so she could see properly. Lights had come on as soon as Ravindra entered the room, but the illumination was diffuse, enough to get around but not bright enough for serious work.

"Looks like a laboratory," Morgan said.

Two long benches, both fitted with sinks, almost filled the room. Cabinets lined the walls. Stools were parked beside the benches. Everything looked neat, as if the place had been shut down while the workers went on holiday.

"Can you sense anything?" Ravindra asked her in Manesai.

"I think there's an information system here, but I can't connect to it. This other stuff with the lift, that's just basic infrastructure. We're going to have to go looking."

"Something you want to share?" Eastly stood toe to toe with Ravindra, nostrils flared, bristling aggression. "I'm tired of you two nattering in a foreign language. If you've got something to say, we all want to hear."

Uh-oh.
Ravindra wasn't going to like that. Morgan stepped forward to intervene but the admiral simply turned away.

Eastly grabbed Ravindra arm. "Hey. I'm talking to you."

Before she could reach the two men, Ravindra shrugged Eastly off, adding a little push that had the fellow staggering. Partridge rushed in to help his secretary.

Morgan faced Ravindra, speaking in Manesai, her hand raised. "Don't. It's silly."

"Agreed." Ravindra smiled at her. "Why don't you tell him?" He jerked his head at Eastly. "What he needs is a few weeks at a boot camp."

"Yeah, not likely." Still, Ravindra clearly thought Eastly was beneath his dignity. That was good. Morgan turned to Eastly. "Grow up, Brent. We were just comparing notes on what we were looking at."

"And we're not allowed to know that?"

Eastly was as sulky as a schoolboy, with Partridge patting his arm.

"Sure," Morgan said. "We just agreed we couldn't see a thing. We need to go exploring. Just remember where we are because this is the only way out."

Leaving Partridge to deal with Eastly, Morgan went over to the bench nearest the wall and started opening cupboards, carefully moving incomprehensible equipment. One cupboard contained test tubes, glass dishes, pipettes, bottles of colored fluids.

Partridge, busy with cupboards across the room, brandished a model, a curved spiral of multi-colored pieces. "Look what I found. A DNA sequence."

Eastly came over to look, turning the model in his hands. "Any idea where from?"

"I'm an archaeologist, not a geneticist."

What was this now? Morgan pulled a picture cube out of a drawer. The image was of felines, like the ones they'd seen in the hidden chamber in the mansion on Krystor, with thick grey fur and dark muzzles. A shiver slid down her spine. "Now this is interesting." She held the cube up for Ravindra to see. When she put the cube on the desk its walls disappeared. The tiny cats paraded around, just as they would have in real life, a mother with two cubs. One kitten batted at a red ball, which the other chased.

Ravindra said nothing, just stared at the little beasts.

"Oh, they look like mantabas." Partridge, a wide grin on his face as came up beside her. "Lovely cats."

"I guess it tells us something about our geneticist." Morgan shared a look with Ravindra.

He nodded. She thought whoever had… 'bred' seemed the wrong word, so did 'created'… the Manesai had included feline characteristics. And yes, this was the same type of cat they'd seen on Krystor, but it hardly constituted proof.

Morgan pressed a control and the cats vanished, reappearing in the cube.

"Do you think that's waterproof?" Partridge wanted the cube, the lust almost glowing in his eyes.

Placing the cube back in the drawer, she shook her head. "I wouldn't risk it. You'll need a better way of getting things out than down that shaft."

"Hey, over here." Eastly beckoned from a doorway. "This seems to be living quarters."

The men beat her to it. She walked in last, onto a floor that had seen better days. It felt soft underfoot, but crumbled where she stepped, leaving indentations. Whatever color the material had been, it was now so faded she couldn't be sure. Simple, elegant furniture stood as it had for millennia. Partridge had found a sideboard against the wall and was exclaiming as he pulled out glassware and crockery. Morgan followed Ravindra through to a bedroom. He stood as if entranced, staring at something on the wall. She joined him and her heart hammered.

"That's them," she whispered.

A beautiful, flaxen-haired woman with a tall, dark-skinned man. She didn't even have to check to know this was the couple from the mansion in Krystor, that this man's skeleton had rested under the ground in the Krystor temple.

Ravindra slipped an arm around her waist. "Proof. But not why."

She nestled against him as best she could in the diving suit. "Why is in the notes. Peace and harmony and all that crap."

"Nor does it tell us how. How did they get to Krystor from here? What technology did they use?"

Eastly's voice rang with excitement. "I've found another lab."

They hurried across the living quarters, leaving Partridge on his knees in front of the sideboard, surrounded by pots and glasses, bottles and plates.

Eastly had found another door, which he'd left open. Morgan grinned. This was an engineering lab, not as neat as the other. Three model ships stood in a row on a shelf against the wall. Another one had been placed inside a case, an airtight simulator if she was any judge. Four screens hung on the walls and in the middle, she'd guess a 3-D display. The data ports still didn't betray anything but standard maintenance functionality to keep the place running.

"No systems?" Ravindra asked.

She shook her head.

"Is it out of power?"

She'd considered that. "I don't think so. If that was the case, even this minimal functionality would have fizzled out by now. It all looks like they packed up and shut down, as if they'd gone on holiday."

"I thought that. And these ships?" Ravindra's gaze was fixed on the models on the shelf, the size you'd find in an admiral's office. The designs were recognizably space ships, but subtly different to any she'd seen. One had a squared off front section with a long tail that looked as if it housed the drives. Another was ovoid, with drives at the more pointed end. One followed the more common, layered configuration and the last, the one in the box, was a thing of beauty, sporting curved 'wings' and a pointed nose.

"I wish, I wish I could read the computer systems. But that's going to take a long time." The frustration knotted her innards.

"More than with Artemis?"

"Much more. Artemis conversed with me, actually helped me to learn."

Ravindra grunted. "We will have to be satisfied with whatever you can do. For now. We can come back at another time."

Morgan stared at him. "Pardon?"

"We've proved this is where our ancestors came from. The man and woman. We will have to create a political dialogue with these people."

Wow. He'd moved on from where she was. Morgan guessed that's what admirals did, looked at a bigger picture, examining consequences.

"Do you think they'd listen?"

His lips jerked in a half smile. "Eventually. They would have to. But don't worry, I wasn't intending to reveal myself just yet."

"I wonder what all these do?" Eastly muttered. He'd stopped admiring the models and leaned over a console. He pulled a switch down, waited, then pressed a button.

Ravindra crossed the room in two huge strides. "What do you think you're doing?"

Straightening, Eastly glared at the admiral. "Trying to find out what they do."

Here we go again.
Morgan darted forward and slapped Eastly's hand away. "They could do any fucking thing, idiot."

Eastly leaned over and flicked another switch. "Nothing's happened, has—"

Morgan slammed her hands over her ears to lessen the impact of the braying alarm. Fuck it. She shoved Eastly aside with her body. What had he flicked? That one. She reached out to turn the switch off. Her head swam and she put out a hand to steady herself. Beside her, Eastly staggered, fell across the console and slid back onto the floor in a graceless heap.

"Gas." Ravindra slapped the faceplate of his helmet back into place.

Morgan forced her fingers to find the switch in the neck that sealed the helmet. The clear panel swung down and at once she tasted oxygen, sucking the air into her lungs. Ravindra closed the plate for Eastly, then dashed through the doorway.

"CO
2
," Morgan said. "We must have triggered a fire response."

Coughing, Eastly struggled up to a sitting position. "Partridge," he mumbled, his eyes reflecting his terror.

"The admiral will get him. Just sit there and don't touch anything, okay?"

The console was lit up like a festive decoration, a concoction of flashing lights. Most of them looked like status bars. But the line of gauges along the top and to the right were all on, the colors steady. And something was humming. Some other alarm had started up, one of those irritating on-off noises, and she could swear the engine in that simulator was working.

Ravindra leaned in, supporting a staggering Partridge. "The place is filling with gas. Time to go."

The hum rose in volume. The pitch had changed, becoming higher and higher until it was a scream that sliced through her brain. How could she turn it off? It was coming from that engine, Morgan was sure.

The noise changed to a low hum that throbbed in her very bones, and… her legs trembled. The model in the simulator had disappeared.

"Morgan! Get out of there. Now!" Ravindra grated the words, all senior admiral, not about to be disobeyed. "The place is shutting down."

He was right. The maintenance systems were on red alert and the level of carbon dioxide was rising. "Coming." Morgan ran for the door, her mind diverting the system's commands to close doors, lock down systems. There had to be an override somewhere. The lights turned off. Ravindra turned on his helmet's headlamp, his arm supporting Partridge, whose body swayed as he stumbled along. Standing at the lift shaft, Eastly waited with his belt and his fins already on. Morgan fastened hers, the weight dragging her down.

"Is he all right?" Eastly supported Partridge while Ravindra fastened the archaeologist's belt.

"No, he's not. He inhaled more of the gas than we did. Help me lower him down."

Together the two men fastened a rope to Partridge and lowered his unresponsive body into the water. Morgan fought the system trying to close the lift doors, cycling the command constantly to open. Damn it, the override relied on the computer system she couldn't read.

Eastly disappeared into the darkness, lowered on the rope. Ravindra drew the rope back up. "Now you."

"I have to keep the doors open. You go. I'll come down the cable. It's only a couple of meters."

She couldn't see his eyes behind the face plate. He hesitated only a moment, then he was gone.

Morgan waited for the splash, then leapt for the cable. As her hands closed around the swinging lifeline, the lift doors slammed shut behind her.

Chapter 19  

M
organ was down. No thanks to that idiot Eastly. What had he triggered up there? Ravindra hoped whatever it was wouldn't stop them getting to the sub. Partridge was still only half conscious. These suits weren't designed for a sick man any more than space suits. They had to get him to the sub, and fast.

"Morgan? Do you know the way?" Of course she did. She would have mapped the route, but he just wanted to hear her voice.

"Yes. Follow me," Morgan said in Standard.

"How—" Eastly started.

"Shut up. Just follow her. I'll bring Partridge." Ravindra caught a glimpse of Eastly's eyes, round with fear.

Ravindra thanked the spirits of his ancestors that they'd broken into the shaft. The system couldn't close doors on them, at least. Getting back into the car was the tricky part. He lowered Partridge down through the hole, where Eastly dragged the archaeologist to one side while he slid through the roof, then out into the docking bay. Ravindra had never in his life been so pleased to see a submarine. Morgan's fins carved a swirling path through the water, the tiny bubbles of her wake sparkling in the light of the headlamp. He waited with Partridge while the hatch to the airlock slid aside, then eased the man's body into the compartment, and slid in beside him. Morgan and Eastly followed, sealing the door behind them.

Water swirled around his body, sucking through the pipes out into the sea. Gods, if he never did anything like this ever again, it would be too soon. A few last puddles collected around his feet as he watched the gauges cycle through from red to green. Aired up, pressure released. The hatch sighed open, revealing the short passage to the sub's main cabin.