Zelazny, Roger - Novel 05 Read online

  They are using you. Are you doing it out of family loyalty? Is that what it is?"

  His voice had sounded a bit strained near the end there. It was more relaxed when he started in again.

  "It is a bit frustrating, talking to you this way,*' he said, "knowing you are out there, coming closer and closer by the moment—hearing me. Still, I see it your way now. You are determined. Nothing that I can say can change your mind. I can only try to kill you before you kill me. You are moving and I am fixed at this location. It is too late for me to try to flee. You will not succeed, of course. But, as I said, I see it your way now. You have nothing to say to me, and I really have nothing to say to you. This is what irritates me. You are not like the others. They all talked, you know. They threatened me, they cursed me, they died screaming. You are an ignorant barbarian, incapable of understanding what I am, but this does not deter you, does not disturb you. Does it? I was attempting something intended to benefit the entire human race, but this does not bother you. Does it? You simply remain silent and keep coming. Have you ever read Pascal? No. Of course you haven't ... 'Man is but a reed, the most feeble thing in nature,' he said, 'but he is a thinking reed. The entire universe need not arm itself to crush him. A vapor, a drop of water, suffices to kill him. But if the universe were to crush him, man would still be more noble than that which killed him, because he knows that he dies and the advantage which the universe has over him; the universe knows nothing of this.* Do you understand what I am saying? No, of course not. You never think of these matters. You are a vapor, a drop of water ... There comes a time, if there is some sort of fulfillment in life, when one can accept death, I believe, without too much in the way of resentment. I have not yet achieved such a state, but I have been working on it. Let me tell you—"

  At that moment, the barrage rose to a sudden pitch of fierceness that lit up the sky, drowned all lesser sounds and hit me with shock waves that came like a maniac surf.

  But then my target rocked into view, the Doxford Building, backed against the hills at the far end of a distant valley.

  Moments later, I began the attack. Fountains of light erupted from the floor of the valley and on the hillside. The right corner of the building crumbled, there was fire on the roof ...

  I was hit myself, within instants of that small triumph, and immediately began the downward tumble. As I had not been ejected, I realized that the control section must be reasonably intact. A quick survey—physical, and via the warning-board—showed me that this was so. There had been a successful separation, though, and I caught glimpses of the twisted outer framework of the vessel plunging groundward.

  Another hit, and while my armor would probably save me, I would be ejected. If I could make it to the ground with the cabin intact, though ...

  "Are you still alive?" I heard Styler saying. "I see a piece—"

  There came an explosion that took my attention away from his words, shaking, jolting, tumbling me about. I bad the controls on manual by then, for I did not want to slow my descent until the last possible moment.

  "Angel? Are you still there?"

  I managed to convert all the necessary systems as I fell, braked at the last possible instant, hit at a bad angle, rolled, stabilized, brought the vehicle around intact. I slapped it into gear and rolled forward immediately after that.

  I was at the opposite end of the still-smoking, dust-misted valley from the Doxford complex. It was quite rocky, and full of craters and potholes, not all of them recently formed. This seemed to lend some credibility to the assertion that mine was not the first attack on the place. It also made it difficult for the defenders to mine the area, a fact that came in handy as I proceeded through it, looking for potential boobytraps.

  I could not help wondering whether he had spoken the truth about the war, though. My few tenuous links with the past and my only important ones with the present were all involved. I could see no reason for anyone bombing Sicily, though. But was she still there? Several months had passed, and people were very mobile these days. And how was Paul? And some of the others I had met? I knew they possessed elaborate shelters. Still...

  "You are alive! I've got you on the screens. Good! This makes it even easier for you to throw in your hand. No worry about landing on a mine once you are already down. Listen. All you have to do is stop and wait now. I will send someone to pick you up. I will show you evidence to support everything I have said. What do you say?"

  I eased my guns forward in their mounts, and swung them, elevated them, lowered them, to test the mountings. "That, I take it, is your answer?" he said. "Look, it will gain you absolutely nothing to die here—and that is exactly what will happen. Our employers are both out of business by now. Your range is being taken even now, and you will shortly be blown to bits. It is senseless. Life is a precious thing, and so much of it has just vanished recently. The human race has just been more than decimated, and that remainder may well be reduced to a tenth also, from the lingering effects of this thing. Then there are the present difficulties facing the qualified remainder—rounding up the survivors and providing for them, rigging sufficient teleportation gates, transporting them offworld, trying to resettle them. The Earth is barely habitable, and conditions will continue to worsen. Most of the outworlds are not ready for prolonged human habitation, and we are in no position to change them further at the moment. Some sort of shelters have to be set up, communications established and maintained among the worlds. There is no need for more deaths, and I am offering you a chance to live. Can you accept that? Do you believe me?"

  I achieved a fairly level run of rock and increased my speed. Through the smoke, the dust, the fumes, I could see that flames flickered behind the hole I had knocked in his fortress. No matter how certain he tried to sound as to his ability to destroy me, he could not gainsay the fact that I had scored a hit.

  From somewhere at his end of the valley, the firing began—first short, then long, taking my measure. I varied my speeds, was thankful when I reached an irregular incline and started up it, for the angle seemed to throw them off a bit. I readied my rockets, though I hoped I could get in closer before firing them. I checked the time, sighed. It was past the time for arrival and detonation of the two high-powered missiles that had separated from the flier the same time I had and gone on ahead. He had gotten them, then. Their chances had not really been that good, though.

  Then the barrage began, shaking me, jarring me, bouncing me about. The noise became deafening, the flashes near-blinding, the smoke heavy. The ground vibrated, and fragments of rock were blasted against the vehicle, fell upon it in an almost steady hail.

  "Hello? Hello?" I heard faintly within the noise. Then whatever followed was drowned out by three that came very close,

  I swerved sharply, moved at an angle, straightened, utilizing the cover afforded by several high stands of stone. The firing became more erratic, falling farther and farther away from me. My radio had gone dead once I had gotten in behind the rocky hedge. I kept advancing, spotted a tricky and roundabout way leading off to my left and took it because it seemed somewhat sheltered. It did seem to baffle his detection, because his shots kept landing farther and farther afield.

  As I worked my twisted way along, I almost overlooked another complex of buildings, deep in a coomb, still farther to my left. They were very new and seemed completely deserted. They had not been mentioned in my orientation, had not been indicated on any of the maps or photos I had studied. I kept them covered until I had passed, but had no reason to fire.

  As I climbed higher, the radio found his voice again, faintly at first, strengthening as I went.

  "... So you see," he was saying, "I am free for the first time in my life, free to use some of these things I have developed as they should be used—noncommercially, for the benefit of the entire race—to help get us through these perilous times. There is a great need for my abilities, my facilities, now. Even the cloning tech—"

  I had been spotted. A series of heav
y explosions occurred behind me. Moments later, I had rounded my sheltering rocks and was out in the open once more. There was scant cover for hundreds of yards, and the way was entirely uphill. I moved forward with all the speed I possessed, knowing that my luck had just about run and hoping that it would hold a few moments more so that I could fire my rockets. From the position I then occupied, it would be virtually impossible to reach him.

  The next ones landed far ahead of me, and I swerved to avoid the blasted area. Moments later, there was another to the rear, very close this time.

  But I made it to my shelter, spent a handful of heartbeats working in close and toward the right while the rocks were pounded and splintered ahead of me, then ventured a diagonal dash toward another, nearer refuge.

  I did not deserve to make it, and I almost didn't I was hit seconds after I pulled out, and I spun completely around. I was lifted off the ground, dropped, bounced and given a sudden, unexpected view of the shattered landscape through an eighteen-inch hole in the shielding a little above my left shoulder. But I was able to keep moving, despite a clanking noise and a heavy sway to the left, and I made it to the next sanctuary, a row of explosions trailing like knots in a kite tail behind me.

  I had made it around halfway up the valley, which was about as good as could be expected. Maybe even better, all things considered. I nosed in close again, bore to the right. I pulled out at the far end, where I was screened by an overlapping mass of boulders about fifty feet ahead. I made my way up to them and kept bearing right, until I had gone about as far as I could go without exposing myself. This was about two hundred yards beyond my previous shelter, which was then taking quite a pounding. I had no idea what the layout was on the other side, so I decided to investigate on foot.

  I left everything running, including the radio, with its faint, importuning, "Are you there, Angel? Are you still there?" and I climbed down onto the rocky ground, feeling its continuing vibrations through my armor, and I smelled burning chemicals and tasted salty dust

  I circled carefully, keeping close to the boulder, dropping to my belly and crawling the final distance as I rounded it As I did this, I picked up Styler's voice on my suit-radio.

  "I'm sorry it had to be this way, Angie," he said. "If you are still alive and can hear me, I hope you believe that. For whatever it is worth, everything that I said was true. I was not lying to you ..."

  Yes! If I brought it around to the right and up that sharp upswing, I would have a clear line of fire! If I got all the rockets off, there was a sharp downgrade I might be able to reach. It led to what looked like a dried-out streambed ...

  "... I am just going to keep firing now until nothing remains. You have left me no alternative ..."

  I made my way back to the vehicle and rechecked all systems. The rocks behind me would soon be a gravel pit Or sand.

  Everything was ready. Any second now he might throw something really heavy this way, too. I had to be fast.

  I clanked forward and up at a respectable speed. At times, the list almost made it seem as if I were about to topple to the left.

  I made it, though, had a momentary, clear view of the Doxford headquarters, flameless now, but emitting a great plume of gray smoke, and then I halted, locked in and fired my rockets, one after the other, each jolt threatening to knock me back down the slope.

  I did not wait to see the result, but plunged ahead the moment the last missile had been discharged.

  I reached the bottom of the downgrade, swung left and kept going. Very soon thereafter, the rise from which I had fired erupted in flame and was reduced to a smoldering crater. A shower of gravel pelted me moments later.

  I continued undisturbed for what seemed a long while. The firing continued, but it fell in a random pattern now and seemed a trifle more sporadic than it had been.

  I could not leave the gulley at the rock-shrouded spot I desired. I tried, but the engine was not able to haul me up the slope. Its clanking had grown more ominous, also; and I detected the smell of burning insulation.

  When I finally reached the only grade it could take, I pressed on up it and discovered that I was within four hundred yards of Styler's citadel.

  The near side of the building had caved in completely, and I could see flames dancing beyond the rubble. There was more smoke than before. The guns—wherever they were, whatever sort they were—went crazy briefly, then fell silent. This lasted for perhaps ten seconds. Then one of them commenced firing again, slowly, regularly, at some imaginary target far off to the right and back. A long line of squat, heavy-treaded robots was drawn up before the building, absolutely still, presumably guarding the place.

  "All right, you were lucky," Styler said, and his voice sounded strange after the long silence. "I cannot deny the damage you have done, but you have come about as far as you can. Believe me, it is a lunatic mission. Your vehicle is about ready to break down and the robots will swamp you. Your death will be useless to anyone, damn it!"

  The robots began to roll toward me then, raising what were obviously weapons. I opened fire on them.

  The sound of his breathing filled the cabin as I advanced, shooting, and the robots did the same.

  I destroyed about half of them before the vehicle collapsed and began coming apart around me. One of the guns still worked, though, so I stayed with it, firing, adjusting the devices on my armor the while. I was hit quite a few times personally, but the suit held fairly well against the laser slashes and the projectiles.

  "Is there really someone there?" Styler finally said. "Or have I been talking to a machine? I thought I heard you laugh earlier. But hell! That could have been a recording! Are you really there, Angel? Or is something that knows nothing of it in the process of crushing a reed? Say something, will you? Anything. Give me some sign there is an intelligence out there!"

  The robots had divided themselves into two groups and flowed toward me in a sort of pincer movement. I hammered away at those on the right until my gun was destroyed. I damaged four of them before this happened, and the grenade that I threw as I leaped from my burning wreck took out three more.

  I ducked behind the hulk, hurled a grenade at those to the left, slapped together my laser gun, moved to the right again, began firing at the nearest machine.

  It took too long to burn it to a stop, so I slung the gun, threw another grenade, came out running. I might be able to run fast enough to hold a lead on an uphill course. I was not certain.

  Three of the dozen or so remaining robots could not be avoided, so I had to stop and grapple with the nearest. It had snagged me with a long cablelike appendage as I tried to get by it

  Hoping that the prosthetic strength augmentation would be sufficient, I caught hold of it low and struggled to raise it above my head. I managed this just as the next tried to close with me, so I brought the one down upon the other as hard as I could, stopping them both, pushed the third over onto its side and ran.

  I made thirty or forty yards before their fire knocked me over and their beams made the armor more than just uncomfortably warm.

  "At least you appear to be human," came Stylets words, on my suit radio. "It would be terrible if there were nothing inside, though, like one of those evil, hollow creatures in Scandinavian legends—an empty presence. God! Maybe you are! Some piece of a nightmare that didn't go away when I woke up ..."

  By then I had a grenade ready, and I threw it back at my pursuers and followed it with my second-to-last one. Then I was on my feet and running toward the heaped rubble that lay before the building. It was about thirty yards and I felt their beams upon me and I was knocked down and got up and staggered on, feeling the burning at all points where my armor contacted my body, smelling my sweat and cooking flesh.

  I dove behind a pile of masonry and began tearing at the clasps to my armor. It seemed to take me ages to get out of it, and I bit partway through my lip while holding back a scream. The headpiece addressed me in Styler's voice as it fell to the ground:

  "Do you
not think the human race is worth saving? Or worth the effort, the attempt, to save it? Do you not feel it deserves the opportunity to exercise its potentials in the full—"

  It was smothered then beneath a slide of rubble as I clawed my way forward into a firing position, not bothering to check my burns, bringing the laser to bear on the nearest of the advancing robots. There were three of them still in action, and I held the beam upon the foremost for an intolerably long while before I burned a hole through its turret and it came to a sputtering, smoking halt.

  I shifted it to the second one immediately, and it occurred to me then that they had not necessarily been designed for combat purposes. They were not sufficiently specialized. It seemed as if he had marshaled and armed a horde of multi-use machines and sent them against me. They could have been designed to move faster and perform with deadlier efficiency. Their weapons were not really built into them, but borne by them.

  "Of course the race is worth saving," I said through the taste of salt. "But whenever circumstances conspire against it, its own irrationality pushes it forward for the kiss. This madness is its doom. If it were mine to do, I would beat it out, breed it out." I laughed then, as the second robot came apart. "Hell! I'd start with myself!"

  I could hear the crackling of flames at my back, as well as the swishing of a sprinkler system. I had my beam on the final robot now, and I was beginning to fear I had gotten to it too late. Its own beam was melting and pulverizing my heap of protective junk, and I kept ducking my head and pulling it to the side, blinking dust from my eyes, blowing it from my nose, smelling my burning hair and my charred ear.

  It came, it came, it came. My left hand seemed to be on fire, but I knew that I would not move until one of us was extinguished by the blaze.

  I kept firing after it had stopped, I guess, because I had my eyes squeezed shut by then and my head turned to the side, and I did not see it happen.

  When I realized that too much time had passed for me to be alive if things had not gone right, I stopped firing and raised my head. Then I let it fall again and just lay there, knowing it was all right now, aching, unable to move.