The Prison in Antares (23 page)

“Less likely is one thing,” said Snake. “But ignoring it altogether is another—especially since we broke the phony Nmumba out of what they thought was a secure train.”

“I know,” agreed Pretorius. “This is probably the most inaccessible jail in the Coalition, or they wouldn't be holding him here. And I'm sure there's no danger-free way to get there. But this way seems less dangerous than a more direct approach—or do you think we could have gone down the shaft to the prison and met only three Antareans, none of them military?”

“No, of course not,” replied Snake. “I'm just saying that we'd better not relax.”

“Hey, I've got something!” said Pandora, staring at her screen.

“The jail?” asked Pretorius hopefully.

“No, the schedule.”

“Just as useful.”

“Give me a few seconds to translate it,” she said, uttering a number of commands. “Okay, here it is. The transport—and I've no idea what it looks like or how accessible it is—comes by every six hours. If we want it to stop, all I do is have the computer instruct it to.”

“Shit!” muttered Pretorius.

“What's the matter?” asked Proto.

“It means if we bust Nmumba out in, say, half an hour, we've got to hold his captors off for five and a half hours before we can get out of there.” Suddenly another troubling thought occurred to him. “Say we stay alive and unapprehended for the whole six hours and another transport comes by,” he said. “Can we make it reverse course and come directly back here, or do we have to ride it for the whole circuit and hit three other mines before we stop here again?”

Pandora put the question to the computer and looked up a moment later. “I don't know. I don't think it's ever been suggested.”

“A simpler question is: does it have a reverse gear?” said Ortega.

“I'll try to find that out,” she answered, “but I'll have to ask very carefully. If anyone or even any machine is monitoring this, too many questions of that type are a giveaway that something's wrong.”

“All right,” said Pretorius. “Don't worry about that. Just find out when the damned thing's due to stop here, and what speed it goes between stations.”

A moment later she had his answer. “It's due in forty-one minutes,” she said, “and it will stop at the jail in just under ninety minutes.”

“So it's going about a mile a minute,” said Pretorius. “I don't think any of us except maybe Snake could jump off without breaking something at anything more than fifteen miles an hour. We'll see how suddenly or gradually it stops here when it arrives and assume it'll be like that at every destination, which'll give us a notion of how close or far from the station we'll be when we get off it.” He looked around. “Any questions?”

“Yeah,” said Ortega. “Do we shoot our way
in
as well as out?”

“I hope not,” said Pretorius. “I hope there's more than one way in, I hope there's no guards at the door once the transport moves on, I hope a lot of things, but we'll have to play it by ear.”

“So as I understand it,” said Snake, “we find out where Nmumba is, we bust him out, we shoot anyone who isn't Nmumba, and we hope nobody will call in reinforcements for six hours.”

“That's one scenario,” agreed Pretorius.

“Give me a better one, just to cheer me up,” she said.

“Okay. We find out how the controls work, we park the transport where we get off, we rescue Nmumba, take him back to the transport, and we're back here in an hour.”

“
If
it goes in reverse,” she said.

“If it goes in reverse,” he agreed.

“And I assume if we're seen or confronted,” continued Snake, “we have the general here—” she jerked a thumb in Proto's direction “—order them away.”

“Either that, or he can explain that he's captured us and wants us in the same cell block as Nmumba.”

“We'll have to hide our weapons a lot better if that's the plan.”

“It's a possible plan,” replied Pretorius.

“A thought occurs to me,” said Proto.

“What is it?” asked Pretorius.

“We're missing an opportunity here,” said Proto.

“What are you talking about?” demanded Pretorius.

“I should ride inside the transport, in the guise of an Antarean officer. I'm sure I couldn't fool their machines once we're inside the jail, but I could probably pull it off in the loading and unloading area, and if they even just stare at me for a few seconds as I walk away from the transport and they then question me, that will give you all the time you need to disembark. And if for some reason they see through our ruse and arrest me, don't try to stop them. Wire me for sound. If they arrest me I'll make my confession so odd that they won't kill me because they'll want to learn more—and in the process, you'll hear what I hear, and I'll be able to tell you what defenses they've got and where any weak spots are.”

“I don't like it,” said Pretorius. “You might fool them out in the tunnel, but the second you set foot inside you'll set off every alarm in the place.”

“True,” agreed Proto. “But if they incarcerate me near Nmumba, it will work to our advantage.”

“Proto, you can make yourself look like a Man, or an Antarean, or a monster out of my worst nightmare, but when all the illusions are pierced—and they'll have systems that'll pierce them—you're just a pillow that's maybe twenty inches high that crawls on its belly. If they hit you once, it could kill you.”

“Maybe I'm tougher than you think,” said Proto.

“And maybe you're not as tough as
you
think.”

“How do we wire him for sound?” asked Ortega. “It's not as if he's got a bunch of mechanical parts where you can hide a mike or even a camera, like I do.”

“Kill the illusion and let me see you as you really are,” said Pandora, and instantly Proto appeared in his true form. “I don't know,” she said at last. “I can tie a mike onto you, maybe even find a way to stick it on your underbelly, but it'll show up the second they scan you.”

“There's a way,” said Irish.

“Oh?” said Pandora.

“How small is the microphone?”

“I can give him one the size of a thumbnail, but it'll still show up.”

“These are scanners, not x-ray machines, right?” said Irish.

“Son of a bitch!” exclaimed Pretorius. “Pandora, if he swallows it, will it still pick up sounds?”

“It should function for maybe three hours, maybe a little less, before his digestive acids disable it,” replied Pandora. “But I don't know if we'll hear anything exterior to his innards' growling and burbling.”

“Let's find out,” said Pretorius.

Pandora quickly disassembled one of the tiny computers that hung from her belt, then held up a silver object the size of a small thimble. “Okay, this is it.” She placed it on the floor next to what she thought was Proto's head.

“Thank you,” he said, slithering across the floor toward the microphone. When the last of him had passed over it, nothing remained on the floor.

“
Bon appetite,”
said Snake.

“All right,” said Pretorius. “Proto, ambulate as far from us as you can, turn what passes for your back to us, and start speaking.”

They all watched as the alien slithered across the floor until he was some forty feet away.

Pretorius frowned. “I don't hear a damned thing.”

“
I
do,” said Pandora. She took a small receiver out of her ear and handed it to Pretorius. “Try this.”

“Okay, Proto,” said Pretorius after inserting the tiny earphone. “Say something else.”

“Can you hear me?” asked Proto.

“Plain as day,” said Pretorius. He turned to Pandora. “Have you got any more of these receivers?”

“Just one more,” she said.

“Okay, you and I will wear 'em. Proto, remember that. You can't communicate with Irish, Snake, or Felix.”

“I'll remember,” said Proto.

“All right. Pandora, can any of those computers that are holding your pants up give him a few lines in Antarean that he can say when we stop?” And silently he added:
if
we stop.

“What do you want him to say?”

“Give him a typical name, as close to an Antarean Jones or Smith as you can get. Have him bark ‘Attention!'—and have him tell them that he has to speak to their supervisor, and that they should forget about the transport and follow him.”

“Four, maybe five sentences,” said Pandora. “Not a problem.”

They practiced for the next fifteen minutes, until Proto felt confident and Pretorius decided that the inflections sounded right.

“Yes,” said Proto after the final run-through. “I think I can do it.”

They fell silent then, and Pandora and Irish went back to working the computers while they waited for the transport to arrive.

“Three minutes,” announced Irish, getting up from her computer.

“Does it stop even if it's not bringing supplies?” asked Pretorius.

“Yes, it seems to run on a regular schedule. It not only brings supplies, but it collects raw Mistalidorium—or maybe the rocks that contain the Mistalidorium, it's difficult to tell based on this.”

“You sure it's coming?” asked Ortega. “I don't see any headlight.”

“It doesn't need one,” said Pretorius. “There's no engineer, and for all we know, there's only one or two other transports in the whole system.”

“It's slowing down,” announced Snake.

“Okay,” said Pretorius, stepping forward. “Let's go pull off a jailbreak that would turn even Jesse James and Santiago green with envy.”

33

“It's stopping,” announced Ortega.

“Quick, everyone climb aboard,” ordered Pretorius. “Either flatten down on the top, or find some handhold on the side. All except Felix.”

“What are you talking about?” demanded Ortega. “I'm part of the team. I'm going!”

“Of course you're going,” said Pretorius, “but you and I have a job to do first.”

“We do?”

“The damned thing's come to a stop. Whatever it's picking up or delivering, we killed the Antareans who were going to load or unload it. I have a feeling if we don't perform their function, the damned thing will never proceed, and sooner or later someone's going to notice.”

As he uttered the words a panel slid back, revealing sacks of foodstuffs.

“Okay, pull 'em off and dump 'em on the ground,” said Pretorius, grabbing a sack and tossing it back into the section they had just left.

“Damned stuff is cold,” remarked Ortega after tossing a trio of sacks onto the pile Pretorius had started. “Frozen, I think.”

“It'll be warm by the time someone finds it,” said Pretorius. He pulled off one last sack and looked around. “Okay, it's empty. Climb on top of the car.”

“Why don't we just ride in the compartment?” suggested Ortega.

“You mean, besides the fact that it's freezing?” replied Pretorius. “Felix, the damned thing is empty.”

“So?”

“So how do we know it'll stop at the prison? Unless it's picking up something there, it might not—and if it doesn't stop, you can bet a year's pay that the door won't open. Now pick up Proto and carry him up top with you.”

“I should have known,” growled Ortega, climbing to the top of the transport. “We always get to do it the hard way.”

“I would have thought the hard way was to be locked in a functioning freezer with a diminishing air supply,” said Pretorius wryly as he reached the top of the transport.

“We're starting to move,” said Irish.

“Everyone hold on tight,” said Pretorius. “Who knows how fast the damned thing goes?”

They were suddenly enveloped by total darkness.

“You'd think they'd post an occasional light,” complained Irish, peering ahead.

“There's no driver or engineer, no tracks or power lines, no forks in the road, so there's no reason to illuminate the route,” said Pandora. “My guess is that the next light we see will be at the prison.” She paused. “This might be a good time to ask what we do when we arrive.”

“That depends,” said Pretorius.

“On what?” asked Snake.

“On whether we stop or not. The transport's empty. If they don't have anything to load into it, it may not even slow down, and it almost certainly won't stop. That could make getting off more than a little dangerous.” He paused. “On the other hand, if it
does
stop, there are likely to be armed prison guards loading a prisoner or something else onto it, and we'll be in a fire fight before we've even set foot in the jail proper.”

“If we come through this alive, I want a bonus,” muttered Ortega.

The transport came to a curve in the tunnel and all talk ceased while they concentrated on merely holding on.

“I'm still awaiting orders,” said Pandora.

“If it doesn't stop, or it stops and there's no one waiting for it, we hop off, gain entrance to the jail proper as surreptitiously as we can, and try to figure out where Nmumba is. If they'll buy Proto as an officer, at least long enough to us to slip off unseen, so much the better. If not, and we have to kill our way to Nmumba, we will.”

“And if it stops and there's a reception committee?” asked Snake.

“Then we fight our way in, and hopefully take a hostage or two who can save us the trouble of trying to find Nmumba if there's a maze of cells down here. All we know is that he's here. He could be the only prisoner, or one of a hundred or a thousand.”

“More likely one of five or ten,” said Snake.

“Why would you say that?” asked Felix.

“If they're feeding a thousand prisoners and their guards, there's no way this thing makes an empty run.”