Prophets (39 page)

He took a step back and found his back against a bulkhead.

“Okay,” she said. She turned away from the door and pushed the lever to the left, toward the original floor.

The whole lifeboat resonated with a rapid series of bangs that rocked the cabin briefly back toward Nickolai. In a moment, he could smell freshly vaporized metal drifting in from outside.

The door still hung in place.

Kugara stared at it, shaking her head. “I don't believe it. There shouldn't be anything left holding that door in place.”

Nickolai stepped up to the door and pushed.

The metal creaked, then a massive shudder gripped the bulkhead in front of them. The door leaned outward and the whole outer skin of the bulkhead seemed to slough off in a cloud of ceramic dust and an odor of heated metal. In its wake, the falling door revealed the bark of a massive tree trunk.

A cool wind blew into the lifeboat, carrying the odor of a living forest.

The lifeboat had come to rest on the edge of a hardwood forest. From the divots in the ground and broken trees, it appeared that it had actually made landfall on a small rocky mountain about two thousand meters above the tree line. It had then bounced, slid, and rolled down a 40 percent grade and a couple of cliffs until it slammed to a stop against a massive tree with a fifteen-meter-diameter trunk.

The impact hadn't killed the tree, but it now tilted at a perceptible angle away from the lifeboat, which had recoiled and rolled to its final stop about ten meters away in the direction from which it had come. Judging by the scar burned in the tree's trunk, and the orientation of the lifeboat, Nickolai suspected that slamming into the tree was what had dented the bulkhead.

Another twenty meters downslope, and the other side of the lifeboat would have slammed into it; the bulkhead where they'd been strapped in. That might have been the most heavily-shielded portion of the lifeboat, but if it had been that bulkhead taking the brunt of the impact, the two of them might not have survived.

At least not in shape to crawl out of the lifeboat.

“The beacon's still active,” Kugara said, “but that'd survive anything. Comm's for shit though.”

Nickolai stood between the tree and the wreck of the lifeboat staring up at the bluest sky he had ever seen. A tiny yellow flare of a sun heated his face, especially the leather of his nose, way out of proportion to its size.

He wondered why he was still alive.

“Nickolai?”

He turned around to face her. She was crouched down, the broken comm unit spread out on sheet before her. It was in a half dozen pieces. “Are you listening to me?”

“Can you fix it?”

She laughed. “The main circuit snapped in half. Even if I had an electronic repair kit and knew exactly what I was doing, we'd still have to replace the thing. This is pretty much a disposable unit.”

“We set up a rendezvous at lifeboat five.”

“Yeah, but no telling where they landed without this.” She tossed the part she was holding into the pile. “They could be two klicks away and we'd never find them.”

“So what do we do?”

Kugara stood. “We got two choices.” She looked at the wreckage. “We stand pat and wait for our dubious comrade Mallory, or someone else, to catch up with the emergency beacon.” She looked back at him. “Or we strike out independently to find civilization or another lifeboat with a working comm.”

Nickolai nodded. “There's a third choice.”

She arched an eyebrow, an expression that Nickolai still didn't quite know how to interpret. “Oh, really?”

“One of us can stay by the lifeboat, the other go out and—”

“Oh,
hell
no!” She folded her arms. “You think I'm letting you out of my sight, tiger-man? Have you forgotten why we're in this mess in the first place?”

“You think I—”

“I'm not stupid, Nickolai. I know you don't want to kill me, otherwise I'd be several flavors of dead right now. That does not mean I trust you.”

“Then what do you want
us
to do?”

She sighed, and thought a moment. “If we're lucky, another lifeboat put down in line of sight.” She glanced up at the trees. “Think you can get to the high ground with that arm?”

As large as the trees were, they were easy enough to climb. The bark was rock-hard and scaled in a semiregular pattern of hexagons that spiraled up the trunk. The six-sided plates were the size of Nickolai's fist, and the gaps between them were more than wide and deep enough for him to insert his claws. Almost a ladder.

He pulled himself up the side, climbing up over a hundred meters until he got a good, mostly unobstructed, view of their surroundings. It helped that they landed on the side of a small mountain. He might not have climbed the highest tree, but the tree's placement on the slope meant that he was hanging on above the tree line for most of the forest.

From his perch he had a good view to about 120 degrees' worth of horizon before the mountain range behind him started interfering with his view.

Below him, Kugara shouted up, “What do you see?”

“Forest goes south all the way to the horizon. There's a large body of water to the southeast, about sixty kilometers away at its closest, I'd guess. Down the shoreline I see some sort of settlement. It's too far away to see details, but there are a few very large buildings.”

“How far?”

“Possibly a hundred and fifty klicks—it's just at the horizon.” Of course, the estimate could be way off, considering he had no idea how big the planet was, and barely had a feel for how high above the forest he actually was.

“Anything closer?”

He shouted down an inventory for her. He could see a couple of spots of color which could be drag chutes caught in the forest canopy at fifty and sixty klicks. He saw a couple of large cleared areas that might have been signs of logging activity. Those were farther away, close to the settlement.

Southwest of them, Nickolai saw a closer scar in the woods. It almost seemed to be a scar from some oblique impact. But he could see some sort of structures dotting the clearing.

“How far is that?”

“Fifteen kilometers, twenty at most.”

“Okay, get a good bearing on that site. That's where we're going.”

Sometimes victory is simply deciding to act.

—
The Cynic's Book of Wisdom

One person with a belief is equal to a force of ninety-nine who have only interests.

—John STUART Mill (1806-1873)

Mallory had already made four kilometers toward lifeboat number five by the time dawn broke. He kept trying to radio the others, and the yellow point of the sun had begun poking through the canopy at him before he finally got a response.

“Father Mallory?” came Dr. Dörner's voice.

“Yes, what's your situation?”

“Dr. Brody is still unconscious, but Dr. Pak and I are both all right.”

Mallory thanked God that they had made it through reentry in one piece. “Good, that's good. Have you heard anything from the
Eclipse
or Kugara?”

“No. But it took a while to get to the comm unit. We have a little problem.”

Mallory's breath caught. “What?”

“We seem to be stuck in a tree.”

Mallory picked up his pace through the woods as he got the details from Dr. Dörner. Their lifeboat had made a softer landing than anyone had a right to expect. The unfortunate side of this was that, unlike Mallory's lifeboat, lifeboat number five didn't hit with quite enough force to break the trees it landed on. Dr. Dörner had managed to open the door and discovered that they were at least fifty meters up. There was rope in the emergency kit somewhere, but their perch was precarious enough that Dr. Dörner didn't want to risk the movement that would be required to find it in the jumble of debris that filled the lifeboat. Even if they had the rope at hand, they had no way to safely get Brody to the ground.

“Can you see how the lifeboat is supported?”

“N-no.” Her voice was thick with fear.

“We need to get all of you out of that lifeboat,” Mallory said.

“I don't know how we can.”

Mallory heard creaking wood over the open link. They had to get out of there before the support gave way. “Look, don't worry about getting down. The immediate problem is getting Brody to a stable location. Look out the door. You must see other branches big enough to support you.”

He heard her suck in a breath, then the comm followed with rustling movement and more creaking. “I'm here.” Now her voice was cut with the sound of wind. More creaking, followed by a snap, and she gasped.

“Are you all right?”

“The lifeboat shifted,” she whispered.

“Do you see anything within reach?”

“I'm looking . . . There's a branch below the door. It's about a meter in diameter.”

“Perfect, can one of you get to it?”

“I don't know if I—” Her voice was cut off by more rustling and creaking, and Mallory heard muffled voices he couldn't make out.

“Dr. Dörner?”

“Leon said he can try.”

“Okay,” Mallory sucked in a breath. “What kind of shape is Dr. Brody in? Is he conscious?”

“No. We've tried waking him.”

Mallory sucked in a breath. None of the options were particularly good, but they couldn't stay in the lifeboat. “Can you move him yourself?”

“I-I don't think so.”

“Then you and Dr. Pak need to move him to the doorway. Then Dr. Pak can go outside and help you pass Dr. Brody through the doorway.”

“You make it sound simple.”

“I know it isn't,” Mallory said. “Slow and careful. You can't stay in that lifeboat.”

“Father Mallory?”

“Yes?”

“Why did you pretend to be someone else? Isn't that a sin?”

Mallory paused and then said, “I've only done what the Church asked of me. We're all sinners looking for God's forgiveness. Now, please, get yourself and Dr. Brody out of there.”

“I'll need two hands,” she said. He heard her set down the comm unit. He started walking again, hearing only the protesting tree, grunts, and soft, inarticulate speech. Every passing minute, the groaning wood seemed to get louder, and occasionally something would pop.

He felt his chest tighten when he heard static blare over the comm followed by a horribly loud crashing sound.

“Dr. Dörner!” he shouted into the unit, breaking into a run even though he was still at least nine kilometers away from them. “Dr. Dörner!”

After nearly thirty seconds of panic, the comm came alive again. “We're fine. The comm fell from my belt while we were moving Dr. Brody.”

Mallory stopped running, the relief almost a physical blow. “Is everyone out?”

“Not me, not yet.”

“Can you make it?”

“Yes. But can I ask you something, Father Mallory?”

“What?”

“Do you know what happened to Xi Virginis?”

“No, Dr. Dörner. But I think God led me here to find out.”

“God or Mosasa?”

“God is free to choose any instrument to work His will.”

She hesitated before asking, “Did you sabotage our communications?”

“No, I didn't.”

“I'm going out the door now.” She added, almost in a whisper, “Pray for me.”

Mallory did as she asked.

Alexander had never seen the Grand Triad gripped by such chaos. Progress of the Salmagundi government was always slow and deliberative, filled as it was by minds self-selected for their caution and traditional nature. It was always annoying, but now it had verged on the dangerous.

Alexander had, through debate, reason, cajoling, and very subtle threats, brought the Triad around to his position both on eliminating the Protean threat and allowing the
Eclipse
to land. For a few hours, things had gone smoothly, the
Eclipse
making no objections to their traffic control directions, maneuvering to approach and limiting their radio traffic as requested.

And, despite the objections of the Ashley Triad and the area lumber interests, Alexander had gotten consensus around the idea of using their limited nuclear arsenal to eliminate the threat from the invader. Once the
Eclipse
was on the surface and under guard, a single attack would wipe the alien object from the face of the planet. The crew of the
Eclipse,
whoever they were, would have no need to know that the Proteans ever existed.

Then the
Eclipse
had exploded.

Alexander had watched the observatory footage as the engines of the ship had blown themselves into space, carrying a good part of the ship with them. Then the lifeboats burst from the skin of the craft, and suddenly their contact with the rest of the universe was less direct and controlled.

Worse, the
Eclipse
was not alone.

The display above the meeting room showed a schematic view of the space in orbit around Salmagundi. The location of the
Eclipse
highlighted in red, two other ships showing up blue, one of the two attached parasitically to the wreckage of the
Eclipse
. An inset showed a map of the area to the west of Ashley covering about a hundred thousand square kilometers. The inset was from a weather satellite, and if Alexander stared at it hard enough, he could see the scar from the alien's impact about two hundred kilometers into the woods southwest of Ashley. The site was highlighted by a red circle.