X-Calibur: The Trial (6 page)

Two minutes and sixteen seconds. She checked the timer again, making sure that it wasn't counting down more slowly than it should have been. The Mori system of time was different to that of the Teleri, but not so different that she wasn't able to relate to it. It was based on the duration of a planetary day, divided into segments to allow for the planning of meals, sleep and work. The Mori second was a little longer and the day a little shorter, but it followed a similar principle.

Two minutes, just two more and then she'd have to decide. Call Arthur, Gwen and Lance, or give herself more time.

Or go looking for them.

She hadn't really considered that option, but it appeared in her mind just as the two minute mark on the timer appeared. Leave the Vanguard, alone, and venture into the Mori hive. Precisely everything she'd promised her father she wouldn't do.

In exactly one minute and fifty-five seconds she would have to decide.

*****

Arthur was startled from sleep by the sound of the hatch in the door opening. He was on his feet and moving forwards before the tension in his chain snapped him back, pulling him to his knees. The chains had grown tangled during the night, effectively shortening their lengths. His movements woke Gwen and Lance, who began pulling back on their chains, shortening them further.

“Stop!” Arthur shouted. “Just, stop.”

“Arthur, what's wrong?” Lance asked as he took in his surroundings. “Hey! The hatch!”

Merlin woke too as they worked to untangle the chains. Gwen had to stand and walk around Arthur while Lance discovered he had wrapped a portion of his chain around his leg. Once they were able, they moved closer to the open hatch, trying to get a view of who or whatever was outside.

“Hello?” Arthur called. “Hello? Who's there?”

As they watched, a tray was slid through the hatch, balancing precariously. None of them could see who was passing it to them, but Lance grasped hold of it before it fell. As he pulled it towards him, Arthur moved forwards, trying to see the world outside. He managed to catch a glimpse of a dark, stone corridor and a single burning torch before the hatch was closed and bolted.

“Well, what did you see?” Gwen asked. Arthur told them, his tone heavy with disappointment.

“At least they're feeding us,” Merlin said. “They want us alive, for the time being at least.”

“I don't even feel hungry,” Lance said with surprise. “How long do you think we've been in here?”

Merlin peered through the narrow window, high up in the wall. The sun was shining, though it was still low and close to the horizon. “Several hours, at least,” he said.

“I don't feel hungry either,” Arthur commented. “Gwen?”

“No,” Gwen replied. “But I don't normally eat half as much as you two.”

“I don't think I've felt hungry for thousands of years,” Merlin muttered to himself. “But I would have thought you three would have felt something after so long. Is anyone thirsty? Have an overwhelming desire to empty your bladder?”

The three of them looked over towards the bucket in the corner, the noxious smells hovering above it like a cloud of toxic gas. “I don't think there's anything that could make me use that bucket,” Gwen said defiantly. “But now that you come to mention it; no, I don't.”

“Could that be the simulation?” Lance asked. “Disconnecting us from what our bodies somehow?”

“That makes sense,” Arthur agreed. “To make the walls and the smells seem so real, they'd have to stop us from feeling what our real bodies are feeling.”

“So how does that help us?” Lance asked.

“At the moment, it doesn't,” Gwen said honestly. “If we can't interact with the real world, we're trapped in here until someone lets us out.”

“Triltan should have called the Ardent Dawn by now,” Lance said. “We've been out of touch for half a day at least.”

“That still leaves us eight days to survive in here,” Arthur reminded them. “What was on the tray?”

Lance placed it on the floor between them. The tray was wooden, carved from oak, and had four wooden bowls placed upon it. Each bowl had a wooden spoon and was full of a cold, watery broth with pieces of carrot floating in it.

They each took one, sniffing it first before inspecting it more closely. “Do you think this is safe for me to eat?” Lance asked, as he held a piece of carrot close to his nasal slits.

“It's just ones and zeros,” Arthur replied with a chuckle. “This is just a simulation, remember?”

“Oh, yes!” Lance replied with a smile before slurping down the broth in four large gulps. After a moment he smiled to himself, savouring a lump of carrot. “It's not bad, human food,” he said as he swallowed. “Better than the food from the dispensers anyway!”

*****

Triltan sucked on her bottom lip as the timer counted down. Three seconds, two, one, and then the beep as the timer flashed zero.

One hour. They'd been out of contact for one hour and it was time for her to make a decision.

Her initial reaction was to check the timer, to make sure that it had definitely been an hour. The rational part of her mind reminded her that she was just stalling, but she did it anyway, thoroughly, just to be sure.

Yes, one hour had passed since Arthur and the others had left. No more stalling, she had to decide.

Her options were simple. The first was by far the easiest; contact her father and wait for him to arrive. It would take days, but once he and his forces were aboard the hive nothing would stop them.

The problem with that option, of course, was time. While she waited days for Caran Doc to perform the twenty-seven jumps from Earth to the hive, she could only imagine what horrors Lance, Arthur and Gwen would be facing. Even Merlin, she thought, trapped and tormented within the hive computer network.

The second option was for her to go and look for them herself. She knew where they were going, and it was only a relatively short journey from the Vanguard to the birthing chambers. She could be there and back in half an hour, less if she wore her armour and not the environmental suit. However, she had promised her father that she wouldn't leave the Vanguard.
Under any circumstances
, he'd said.

Her third option was to contact her father and then go looking, but once she spoke to him, he would insist again that she wasn't to leave the safety of the ship. He'd tell her that it was too dangerous, that she was his only daughter and he wouldn't know what to do if anything happened to her. He'd make her feel guilty for even considering it, and then she'd have to stay and leave her friends to their fate.

And then he'd win. She'd stay aboard the ship, worrying but not acting, and then he'd come and take control. If Arthur and the others were safe, he'd be the hero. If not, he'd tell her that there was nothing she could have done, that she wasn't a soldier and that she shouldn't blame herself.

But of course she'd blame herself, and part of her would blame him too.

No, she wasn't a soldier, but Arthur, Gwen, Lance, Merlin were her friends. They were in trouble, and there was no one else who could do anything about it. No, she wasn't a soldier, but she was all they had, so she would have to be what they needed.

*****

The hatch opened suddenly, taking them all by surprise. They had been left alone since that morning, when the tray of broth had been passed through the hatch without a word. They had been waiting anxiously for someone to return, but as the morning slipped into afternoon their readiness had slowly devolved into impatient annoyance.

“Stand up and step away from the door,” a voice said. As they watched, they saw two rows of eyes, eight in total, staring at them through the opening.

“Who are you?” Arthur demanded. “What do you want with us?”

The voice was male, Mori, deep and patient. The eyes didn't waver as he said again, “Stand up and step away from the door.”

“Why are you holding us prisoner?” Arthur persisted, but the eyes continued to stare back at him. When the Mori began to close the hatch, Arthur said hurriedly, “Okay! Okay, we'll step back from the door.” The hatch froze where it was as Lance helped Merlin to his feet and the four of them moved closer to the far wall.

More bolts were heard as they scraped against the surface of the iron door. Once the last bolt was released, the door opened fully, the hinges squeaking as it swung away from them.

The Mori jailer who had been staring at them through the hatch was a little shorter that Arthur, with ill-defined facial ridges and a rounded midsection. He wore dark, loose fitting clothes made out of rough fabric, very different to the garments worn by Mori on the hive. Behind him stood two more Mori, both wearing medieval iron armour and with heavy metal swords hanging from leather belts at their waists.

“I'm going to release your chains,” the jailer continued as he entered the cell. “You have an audience with your King.”

“Mordred?” Merlin asked.

“You are not worthy of speaking his name!” the jailer spat, striking Merlin across the face and knocking him to the floor. Arthur stepped forwards to retaliate until Gwen placed a restraining grip on his arm. The two guards had their hands on their sword hilts and looked ready for a fight.

“Please, take us to the King,” Gwen said quietly. “We won't be any trouble.”

The jailer chuckled to himself as he unlocked the chains from the ring in the floor. Meanwhile, Lance helped Merlin to his feet. “Are you okay?” Lance asked. “Are you hurt?”

“Only my pride,” Merlin muttered in reply, staring daggers at the Mori who had struck him.

The jailer grasped the four chains in his fist and lifted them over his shoulder, walking from the cell and pulling them along like dogs on leads. One guard walked before him while the second walked behind, hands hovering dangerously close to their swords.

The corridor was just as damp and miserable as the cell, only much narrower. Arthur's broad shoulders almost touched both walls while Lance had to stoop through some of the lower parts of the passageway. The jailer seemed to enjoy their discomfort, pulling harder on the chains every time Lance bent over or Arthur turned sideways to avoid one of the burning torches.

Their jailer led them left and then right, taking the turns in the labyrinthine maze without a second thought, the master of his domain. They passed several other doors, though every metal hatch was firmly closed. No sounds escaped them and no eyes peered out through open hatches, making it impossible to tell if they shared their prison with any other inmates.

As they walked, Gwen noticed that the iron doors they passed weren't just similar they were the same. So were the torches, all casting a familiar light but never seeming to burn down or need replacing. There was a pattern to the stone walls too, the same patterns and textures repeated in a never-ending pattern in whatever direction she looked. It looked like a picture replicated over and over, joined together to form the length of the corridor.

The corridor ended at a set of roughly hewn stone steps, the middles worn away by repeated footsteps upon their surface. They ascended rapidly, their chains taught as the jailer hurried them onwards. At the top of the stairs was a large archway leading to another, wider corridor and then a closed double door. The foremost guard opened the doors wide while the jailer dragged his prisoners through and fastened their chains to another metal ring in the floor. Once he was happy they were securely bound, he left through the same double doors without another word.

They were left alone in the square room, two sets of doors facing each other. Lance tried the doors which the jailer had left through and Arthur the doors opposite, but both were locked. He turned to the others, a questioning look on his face.“What now?” he said. “I thought he said we were seeing Mordred?”

“So did I,” Lance agreed.

“He'll enjoy making us wait,” Merlin said.

“What does he want?” Gwen wondered. “The message to bring us here, trapping us inside this simulation? What does he want to get out of all this?”

“We'll find out, soon enough,” Merlin remarked.

They didn't have long to wait. Just as Merlin finished speaking, the second set of doors opened. Beyond them was a large stone room full of guards dressed similarly to those who had escorted the jailer. As Gwen watched, four of them approached and she realised that they weren't just similar, they were identical. Identical heights, facial ridges and armour, but also the way that they moved, their eight eyes fixed and unblinking.

The guards unfastened their chains from the metal ring and took one each, dragging them forwards. Lance and Gwen were kept near the door, pushed down to their knees, while Arthur and Merlin were taken to the centre of the large room and turned to face a large stone dais. Behind them was a further double door, the largest they had seen so far, and to their right were two narrow corridors leading into darkness. Beneath them was a long red carpet, running the length of the room from the dais to the large wooden doors behind.

Upon the dais were four chairs. The outer two were smaller, wooden and ornate. The inner two were larger, embellished with gold and lined with soft red fabric. Three of the chairs were empty, but the fourth, the largest, immediately drew their attention.