The Prison in Antares (21 page)

“I'm going after the lookout, the one who shot Felix,” answered Pretorius, heading in the direction the shot had come from.

“Be careful,” said Irish. “After all, he's the only one who hit us.”

“He's the only one who had time to take aim,” replied Pretorius, crouching and approaching the ridge where the shooter had been hidden. He found the tracks that were clearly Antarean, and began following them. After he'd gone a quarter mile he saw the sun glint off something at or near ground level, and he threw himself onto the sand as a beam of solid light passed three feet above his head.

He look across the sand, couldn't see his foe, but knew he had to be hiding directly behind a mound of sand, the only cover in that direction. He thought for a moment, then aimed his laser at the sand that was just behind the mound and fired it, moving slowly from right to left, turning the sand into a boiling, bubbling glassy semiliquid. He then did the same thing on each side of the mound.

“Okay,” he whispered, “let's see you run through
that.
”

The Antarean remained in hiding behind the mound, and Pretorius holstered his burner and pulled out his screecher—his sonic pistol. He put the power on maximum and fired it directly into the mound of sand. He held it steady for ten seconds, and suddenly there was a scream of agony, and the Antarean burst out from behind the mound, ran unthinkingly through the molten sand to his left, lost his footing, and fell with a splash.

He was dead before Pretorius walked up to make sure of that fact. He put a quick laser blast through the Antarean's head, just to be sure, then turned and walked back to where his party was waiting for him.

“You got him,” said Snake. It was not a question.

Pretorius nodded his confirmation, then turned to Irish. “How is he?”

“Well, I've stopped most of the bleeding,” she said. “There's no way we're going to get him to a doctor—at least, a human doctor—but I think he'll be okay. Nothing's broken. It's a flesh wound. We need to get it fixed, but once we do he should be able to use it.” She shrugged. “How much he uses it depends on how much pain he can stand.”

“It was my most useless part anyway,” grated Ortega, grimacing. “Once we get back to Deluros maybe I'll trade it for an old-fashioned sword, or a device that can sense an enemy before the five senses I've got.”

“Let's just concentrate on keeping you alive until then,” said Irish, fashioning a sling out of what remained of his shirt.

“And the best way to do that is get back to the ship,” said Pretorius. “Start walking. Pandora, set your ship right down next to the Antarean ship. First thing we'll need is any medical supplies that we have on either ship. Then we'll transfer all our gear, give you time to hook your computer up to the new ship, and then we're out of here.”

“Sounds good,” replied Pandora. “I should get there a little ahead of you.”

“Good,” said Pretorius. “When you do, go into the Antarean ship and open up a communication channel between me and the village. I don't know their ID for this, but the Antareans had to have it. I mean, hell, they wouldn't come here unless they knew they had a deal.”

“I'll do what I can” said Pandora, and three minutes later Pretorius found himself speaking to one of the villagers.

“Why did you kill our friends?” asked the villager.

“They robbed us and tried to kill us,” said Pretorius. “They were our enemies, but we have no quarrel with you. In fact, I have a proposal to prove our goodwill.”

“I am listening.”

“We have not touched any of the corpses. Once we take off, which will be momentarily, you can take your payment back from their bodies,” continued Pretorius. “Not only that, but we will make your village a gift of our ship, which is worth many times what you were paid for the
crattius
.”

“No one is that generous. What do you want in return?”

“Only your silence,” said Pretorius. “You will tell no one that we took their ship.”

“I agree,” said the villager.

“We have a deal,” said Pretorius. “I want you to know one more thing.”

“Oh?”

“Yes. If you break the deal, if you tell anyone that we took the ship, we will come back and kill your entire village.”

He cut the communication.

“Did you mean that?” asked Irish, who had been standing near him.

“No,” he said. “If they tell anyone before we get to Antares, we'll get blown to pieces as we approach the planet. And if they tell anyone once we've got Nmumba and are back in the Democracy, who gives a damn?”

“You're almost as devious as I am,” said Snake with a smile.

“All right,” said Pretorius. “Next stop: Antares.”

30

They spent half a day in orbit around Tabor II while Pandora acquainted herself with the ship's controls and codes, then began making their way to the edge of the Neutral Zone.

Pretorius wanted more information about the mining of Mistalidorium on Antares Six, but he was aware that time was running out, that no matter how tough Nmumba was, sooner or later he had to break, and given the length of time the Coalition had had to work on him, probably sooner.

“I've checked and double-checked,” announced Pandora wearily, “but there's no chart, no map, no anything to show us how to get to the interior of the planet.”

“If we have to go right down to the jail, we will,” responded Pretorius, “but if there's a better way it's worth a little extra effort to find it.”

“I'm telling you it can't be found, not from here,” said Pandora.

“Then we'll have
them
direct us.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“In the old days, when Man was still Earthbound, he had the Red Cross. These days we've got the E-Meds. They're a civilized society; they have to have something similar. If we can convince them we're part of that organization, that we've received a message about a collapsed tunnel or some such thing but the message was garbled or cut off before we were given all the details, they might very well tell us exactly how to get down there.”

“Give me just a minute . . .” said Pandora, uttering a few commands to her computer. She looked up, smiling, in less than a minute.

“I was right,” said Pretorius when he saw her face.

“It translates as the Traveling Hospital. They have some sixteen hundred ships, each a fully equipped hospital.”

“Shit!” muttered Pretorius. “No way we're going to convince anyone this thing is a functioning hospital.”

“No, but since it's military, it can pass as a transport to a military hospital,” said Pandora. “No one expects a quarter-mile-long ship to land on rough terrain or inaccessible places, so each ship has a pair of transports for finding disaster victims and bringing them to the ship, or even just moving patients from one ship to another.”

“Okay,” said Pretorius. “Find the IDs for half a dozen of these little transports, and create one for us that seems like it's part of the same family, so to speak. We'll be military until we cross out of the Neutral Zone into Coalition territory, and then change us into a medical transport.”

“All right,” said Pandora. “Now we're almost certainly going to get permission to land, and get coordinates for the shaft leading to the mine if indeed it's traversable. If they want a face-to-face transmission, what are we going to do?”

“I'm working on it,” replied Pretorius.

“We haven't got time to make one of us up as an Antarean,” said Snake. “Proto would be right visually, but he can't speak the language. And not only would we waste time kidnapping one, but the moment we put him in contact with the planet he'd probably figure we were going to kill him anyway and spill the beans.”

“I know,” said Pretorius.

“Then what are we going to do?” she persisted.

“I just need a minute to think,” he said, getting to his feet and walking to the galley, where he poured himself a flavored drink. As he lifted it up from beneath the spout, he saw his reflection on the polished glass just before he took a sip. He frowned, walked beneath a light, and stared at the glass again.

He promptly set the glass down and rejoined the crew.

“Proto,” he said, “become a native of any of the Antares planets, whichever one you're most comfortable imitating.”

Proto's middle-aged human was instantly replaced by a native of Antares Three.

“That's damned good,” said Pretorius. “I can't tell you from the real thing.”

“So what?” said Irish.

“She's right,” said Snake. “We can't use him. You know that. He won't register on any security machine.”

“He won't have to,” said Pretorius.

“Bullshit,” said Snake.

“I've seen that glint in your eye before,” said Pandora. “What's up?”

“Proto, you don't . . . how can I put it . . . you don't hypnotize people into thinking you're a Man or an Antarean, right?” said Pretorius. “You just, in some way that none of us truly understands, project an image. Is that correct?”

“Yes,” replied Proto, who looked as confused as the rest of them.

“And when you project an image before, say, a security scanner, it analyzes the space you seem to be taking up and reports that there's nothing there.”

“Nothing above my actual body,” said Proto. “That's correct.”

“So if they can't analyze your image, if they can't examine the actual space you seem to be taking up, they can't conclude that you're not filling every cubic centimeter of it?”

“That's true,” said Proto. “But where is this leading?”

“Felix,” said Pretorius. “Go to the bathroom and bring back the mirror that's above the sink.”

“I'll have to rip it out of the wall,” replied Ortega.

“That's why I didn't ask Snake or Irish,” said Pretorius. “Just get it.”

Ortega went off to fetch the mirror, grunted in pain as he grabbed one side of it with his wounded arm, pulled it off the wall, and returned with it a minute later.

“Now hold it up in front of Proto,” said Pretorius, standing behind the alien, whose Antarean image, along with Pretorius's, stared out from the mirror.

“See?” continued Pretorius triumphantly. “The mirror isn't a security device. It doesn't analyze what's in front of it, it just reflects it. We'll arrange it so that Proto is sitting in front of your control panel, in his guise as an Antarean. Felix will set the mirror down on Pandora's chair. Now, if we trained the sensor on Proto, it would know that he's not there and it wouldn't transmit his image, so of course we won't do that. We'll train it on the mirror, and it'll transmit exactly what it sees: an image of Proto and all the controls. We'll have to practice a bit, to make sure that the sensor shows nothing
but
the mirror, nothing behind it, and especially not the frame.”

“Goddamn!” said Snake. “It might work!” Then she frowned and added, “If you're right.”

“Barring a better suggestion, let's assume I
am
right,” said Pretorius. “Irish, while we're adjusting the sensor and the mirror, use one of the auxiliary computer outlets and find three or four simple lines Proto can say or at least lip-sync to. We've received this signal, we need to coordinate, it's an emergency, if they die because you hassled us you'll be blamed in our report. . . . You can figure out the kind of things he has to say.”

“Right,” replied Irish, walking to a console about twenty feet away.

“All right,” continued Pretorius. “Proto, grab a chair and set it up opposite Pandora's.”

“I can't,” answered Proto. “What you see is an image, remember?”

“Shit!” said Pretorius. “I keep forgetting. Okay, Snake, get the chair.”

A moment later it was in position and Proto's Antarean seemed to be sitting down on it.

“Are you centered in the mirror?”

“Nathan, I'm only two feet tall. I can't
see
the mirror.”

“Snake, get behind him and manipulate his chair until he's centered.”

“Right,” she said, and a moment later nodded her approval.

“Pandora, train the sensor on the mirror. Get it close enough that there's no chance of it showing any of the edges.”

Pandora ordered the sensor to move slowly. “Snake, you'll have to tell me when it's centered.”

“Right there,” said Snake a few seconds later.

“Now let's just make sure this isn't an instantly fatal piece of foolishness,” said Pretorius. “Snake, the sensor sees his image in the mirror, right?”

“I just said so, right,” confirmed Snake.

“Stay there,” said Pretorius. “Proto, get up, walk around the controls, and stand behind or beyond the mirror.”

Proto did as he was instructed.

“Okay, Pandora—what does the sensor see now?”

“Just the mirror.”

“Broaden the view so that it sees more than the mirror.”

She did so. “Proto's not in it at all.”

Pretorius smiled. “Then we're in business. Pandora, the ship's all yours again. Let us know when we're maybe fifteen minutes out from Antares Six. Irish, how's it coming?”

“I have half a dozen phrases, and as many requests for instructions,” she said. “I'd write them down, but I think it would be better for Proto to hear them spoken, to get the inflections right.”

“I agree.” Pretorius turned to Proto. “Back to school you go. Irish will walk you through their dozen likeliest responses.”

After another hour the ship was positioned where Pretorius wanted it, and Proto could come up with half a dozen responses, depending on what questions he was asked. Irish had also given him his first few sentences, which he could read off a screen before the sensor was activated.