And the voice of Daae simply rang with joy.
Whether he knew that the Blue Men had thawed this Giant themselves, keeping him out of sight in their hospital all this time, or whether he thought the Judge of Ages had arranged to have him brought into the chamber, was not clear, but his words startled both educated Chimerae and Witches who understood his language.
Fatin the Witch maiden called out to her Witches in Virginian, “Stay! The Giant knows the guilty. Have you never seen one before? This is a posthuman—his intelligence range is in the 500s. Look at his eyes! He understands everything about us … He will spare us…”
Ajuoga called out in her icy, poisonous voice, “No! He is baptized of the White Christ, and is an enemy to all Witches. We are dead meat and food for birds and jackals!”
Mickey shouted toward the Giant, “Eat the Blue Men, not me! I am full of unhealthy hallucinogenic chemicals and fatty tissue! You need to watch your diet!”
Alpha Daae whistled. The Chimerae moved with practiced quickness, and retreated into the alcove holding the atomic pile. The dog things, dividing their attention to cover the Giant and the Judge of Ages on his throne, were taken unawares, and given no direct orders, they did not stop the Chimerae.
Gamma Phyle and Kine Happy pulled down the two display cabinets to the left and right of the opening of the alcove, sending the huge cases tilting, toppling, and shattering with a noise like thunder when they fell to the floor. Priceless antiques spilled out. The two prone display cases now made an impromptu bulwark across the opening of the alcove, and Beta Vulpina and Beta Suspinia took position to the left and right, bows strung and arrows nocked. The tops of the display cases did not quite touch, and in this breach stood Alpha Daae and Alpha Yuen, both looking more fierce and fearless and splendid than even their wont.
Seeing this, Prissy Pskov and Zouave Zhigansk scrambled for any weapon-shaped antique that had fallen from the smashed cases, and they called Toil, Drudge, and Drench to do likewise. The three Donors did not obey, but fled to a corner of the chamber, cowering behind the looming statue of Michael the Archangel.
Soorm and Crile and Gload, disdaining any weapons not built of their own flesh, put their backs to the fountain. Crile elongated his neck and opened both serpent fangs and telescoping elbow spikes. Soorm stepped backward into the water, charged his electrical eel cells, and bent to draw up his scorpion’s tail, bulb throbbing with poison, above his shoulder, twitching. The headless Gload uttered a belly laugh from the grotesque shark mouth running from side to side across his belly, and he cracked his knuckles.
Of the Witches, Mickey and Ajuoga and Lilura were of a period late enough to know the Chimerae, and know them as deadly enemies, and so they called to their fellows and followers, and, with much more noise and disarray, retreated to the opposite alcove, which held tanks of medical nanomaterial, and the women climbed atop the tanks, leaving Mickey, the Demonstrators, and the other menfolk to form a line across the opening of the alcove. The stands of antique armor the menfolk pulled from either side, and so a broken line of empty metal stood between the Witch-men and the chamber. Mickey whirled his charming rod overhead, passing it quickly from one hand to the other, and flourished it like a quarterstaff, uttering his battle-yodel. The Demonstrators hissed, and helped themselves to the swords and spears the suits of armor held.
The thirty-one Witches faced the nine Chimerae across the fountain. Three Hormagaunts stood between them, looking both ways, while Prissy and Zouave, allergic to each other, sought out opposite sides of the chamber.
The captain of the dog things barked, and the squadrons turned left and right. Two dozen dog things faced the Giant in two rows of twelve, the front row kneeling; another two dozen faced the dais, or the fountain, or the Witches, or the Chimerae, or the scattered others in the chamber. The Scholar Rada Lwa, Ctesibius the Savant, Sir Guiden, Linder Keir and Keirthlin, and Alalloel were guarded each by a trio or quartet of dogs. The remaining threescore gathered near the Blue Men in a defensive half circle.
The gentle Nymphs retreated, cooing and moaning, to the feet of the statue of Michael the Archangel, and the males of their race played fretful trills and warning arpeggios on their double-pipes. No one was covering them with weapons, which made Menelaus smile, because his circuits in the chamber detected the pheromones and scentless neuropsychological chemicals that began to rise up like vapor from them. He signaled with his implants to the wall vents, turned on the fans, and increased the air circulation in that quarter of the chamber.
The Giant at the chamber door observed all this without expression. He looked carefully at Menelaus, and stepped forward one giant step.
2. Chess and Poker
Only then did Menelaus hear, over his implants, in his inner ear, the voice of Sir Guiden. “Liege, I assume we are not talking over implants to maintain radio silence?”
“Which you just broke,” sent Menelaus back to him, with, perhaps, a bit of a snarl.
“Sorry, Liege, I knew you had your reasons, but there are now multiple signals leaving this room, and I have a shot at Ull right this second. I did not get a chance to open this fine suit of armor I am next to, because there are five dogs watching me, but I managed to palm the luminous marker pistol from the belt when they weren’t looking.”
“What? You going to paint him to death?”
“It isn’t much, but the marker needles can crack a man’s skull at short range. I can get off one shot, maybe two, before they deck me. Should I take the shot?”
“Hold off. Things are not what they seem.”
“What is going on, Liege?”
“The problem is that I am playing poker with the people here, but playing chess with the Machine. I can bluff people, but the Machine and I can see each other’s moves. He knows I am in the chamber, but does not know where.”
“That means you want to leave the chamber, right? And the Machine will not find you?”
“Wrong. I deliberately expelled an evolutionary virus from this site in order to attract attention to it, knowing full well it would be the one broken into by the Currents working for Exarchel. For a while he had me fooled, because he used Thaws instead of Currents to dig me up, but I think I am oriented now. I hid myself clumsily enough that any servant of the Machine could see through my disguise—just as Scipio and Ctesibius, in fact, did—but just subtly enough that he would have to send a physical agent to me to confirm, and I have a tactic in place to trace whatever message that agent tries to send back to his master.
“But then the message never came. So I had to be bolder. I began going around telling the people I thought were agents who I was: first Soorm, then Rada Lwa, then Linder Keir and Linder Keirthlin. I have reason to believe Soorm is still loyal to Reyes y Pastor, the Red Hermeticist, so I was expecting him to call Exarchel. So far he has not. Keirthlin actually helped me, even handed me the keys to winning this hand. So I am ruling them out. Alalloel is a puzzle: I thought she was a Current, but she overheard me tell the Linder twins who I am, and she did not call down Exarchel on me. So it is someone else. Someone in the room.”
Sir Guiden said, “It’s Ull. The Giant just said so.”
“I counted him. From most effected to least, Rada Lwa, Ull, Keir, all have been intimate mind-to-mind with the Machine, and contaminated, and suffered physical brain alteration as a result. Rada Lwa can hear my voice but cannot recognize my face. Ctesibius and Scipio have been in mind-contact with the Machine, but it was one-way, a donation; a donation is not a possession, so they are clean.”
“Liege? Do you want your enemies to find you? Are you mad?”
“I want my enemies to find me. I am really mad.”
“Is this some sublime posthuman thing no one can understand?”
“It is the opposite of sublime. I want Del Azarchel to know where I am, so he will pick up his pistol and come looking for me, and we can finish our duel. His people, including the machine half of his mind, don’t want him to die dueling me, so they are
trying to bump me off before that happens.”
Then Menelaus sent, “Exarchel? I know you heard all that. I have all your little puppets and spies and agents locked up here in the chamber with me, so you might as well give up, and send Blackie.”
And, with a silent thought directed through his implants, Menelaus stirred the great golden sarcophagus of the Judge of Ages to life. Roaring, the serene image on its lid gleaming, it slammed and banged heavily down the dais; roared past Menelaus, wind-whipping the hems of his metal robes as he cheered; and sped across the chamber floor, accelerating.
Everyone, Blue Man and dog things and Thaws of many eras, shouted and screamed and jumped out of the way.
An automaton stalked into the path, raised its machine gun, and opened fire. The automaton’s bullets slammed off the hull of the sarcophagus, screaming. Decorative armor panels slid aside, revealing weapon blisters. Twin machine guns bright with tracer fire, and a particle-beam energy weapon brighter than a lightning bolt and louder, erupted from the sarcophagus, blinding nearly all eyes there, and dazing all ears. Three arms of the automaton were chewed in half by the bullets, and its energy core was aflame, when the sarcophagus ran it down, trampling it to pieces under wheels and treads.
Four of the Blue Men raised their jeweled weapons, but were flung from their feet when a nonlethal shock of electricity crackled along the floor. Unfortunately, everyone standing on the same square of gold tile was treated likewise, and all fell screaming, except for Gload the Hormagaunt, who seemed to be immune to electricity. He grinned, and little sparks jumped from his bottom fangs to his top.
Bashan the Giant, seeing the sarcophagus barreling toward him like a train engine, stepped to one side with a polite nod.
The huge pistons groaned and the leaves of the huge doors fell to. Boom. The sarcophagus sprayed some chemical from its interior on the doors as it rushed forward. There was a squeal of brakes and the sarcophagus fishtailed sideways, so that it struck the doors lengthwise. When the heavy sarcophagus smashed into the doors, it was a sound as if an aircraft carrier had been dropped onto a sea of stone. The doors were struck so forcefully that they were bent slightly in the frame, just enough to jam the hinges. The chemical fluid ignited with a blue-white flame when the sarcophagus struck, and this in turn ignited the fluids and bearings in the undercarriage. The fire hardened and solidified the glue filling the cracks of the door leaves into something the consistency of asphalt, and burnt away the joints of the wheels and treads of the coffin, leaving it unable to move, trapped in asphalt, and blocking the way, its huge mass crumpled and bent up against the doors.
After that crash, there was silence in the chamber for the space of a breath or two, as everyone stared at the jammed doors in wonder and fear.
3. Petrifaction, Radiation
Mentor Ull had a look of deep annoyance darkening his features. His eyes looked more like those of a rattlesnake than ever. “Erratic behavior! Headstrong, awkward! Why must these primitive creatures perform such irksome frolics?” The gems on his coat blazed with sudden, startling brightness, and every person in the chamber, from Menelaus on the dais to the north side to Bashan the Giant before the jammed doors at the south, suddenly froze in mid-motion, mid-gesture, able to breathe and to move involuntary muscles, but not able even to blink.
The Blue Men all sighed a little sigh, and the dog things, uttering only a yelp or two of scorn and relief, stood and relaxed and shouldered their weapons.
Naar said in Intertextual, “Most bothersome! Why must we trifle with these relicts from ages before mental unity was accomplished? Can we not at least begin to kill off all of those whom we have confirmed cannot be the one we seek?”
But Illiance said in Iatric, “Actually, only those who have eaten our food are affected…,” and he was in the act of turning toward Scipio, who was merely pretending to be paralyzed, when Scipio at that moment happened to blink.
Illiance said to him in Iatric, “Sir? Do you speak this language? What is the meaning of your pantomime?”
Scipio smiled apologetically, and shrugged sheepishly, and kicked Illiance headlong off the dais.
Two dog things fired without orders: one musket misfired, powder not igniting, and the other missed, so its musketball struck the throne behind Scipio and burned like white fire.
Scipio leaped and swung his square-pointed black blade at Illiance, who had landed on hands and knees. Illiance threw his hand before his face, and all the gems on his coat lit up.
As the blade swept down, it resisted and wobbled, in the same way two magnets of the same pole will resist if pressed together; both the logic crystal of the blade and the logic crystals of the coat whined, and then a flash of light and a snap of electric power flashed between them.
The blade was shattered in three pieces, but the gems on the coat of Illiance cracked or went dark. Both men were equally surprised, but both were not equally slow to recover: Scipio stepped on the little man, and snatched up both of the white ceramic pistols from where they stuck out from his coat pockets.
Scipio flipped up the sights with his thumbs and, holding a weapon in either hand, pointed at Mentor Ull, shouting out a command in a language Ull did not recognize.
Yndech said in Intertextual, “Let us irradiate the false Judge of Ages with our pistols, and mourn the departure of Mentor Ull. The exchange will be economical.”
But Ydmoy said, “Uncouth! You reason like a Locust. Perhaps the false Judge can be deflected via negotiation to a nonviolent admixture of motives and results. Perhaps if the false Judge were willing to compromise, he would merely shoot Ull in some extremity and maim him.”
Yndelf said, thoughtfully, “I have noted an interesting anomaly to which some attention should be paid. Was not Relict Melechemoshemyazanagual Onmyoji de Concepcion subjected to nerve paralysis with the others? While we turned our gaze to the fascinating assault on Preceptor Illiance, the Warlock seems to have hidden himself.”
Ull spoke in Iatric, ignoring the guns pointed at his head, “Negotiations are in order. I will first release the Giant Bashan, in order that he may translate our words. I no longer trust the accuracy of the Chimera Anubis.”
Ull now turned and called to the far side of the chamber. “Relict Bashan! First, command the false Judge to disarm himself. Next, order the Warlock of Williamsburg to reveal himself from hiding. Third, to each man, in his own tongue, translate these words: ‘It is required that the identity of the Judge of Ages be revealed. It has been deduced that he is posing among you in disguise. Each group is enjoined to look at those among you, and to identify whose behavior is eccentric or untypical for your order of being.’”
With another flicker of gems, motion returned to the limbs of Bashan, who stretched, and then laughed such laughter as Giants use.
Bashan turned, and raised the huge staff on which he leaned, taller than a weaver’s beam, and threw it like a spear. It passed halfway down the chamber and struck and pierced the gold containment sphere of the atomic pile. In the distance, a bell began to ring shrilly.
And with that, Bashan said mockingly in Iatric, “Little grasshopper, did you not wonder why I paused to make mention of an ability to speak all the languages here, even though the only languages I had opportunity to overhear in the medical house were yours?”
All throughout the chamber, the men and women of various ages began to groan and stir.
Scipio, who did not speak Iatric, said, “Okay! Someone who talks English or Spanish has to tell me whether the Moon-man here released the paralysis because I said so, or whether something else is going on.”
Menelaus, who had been frozen inside his cloak, now straightened and stretched and said, “Something else. The radioactivity in the chamber is drowning out the radio signals the Blues are sending to mites in our nerve clusters to paralyze us. So we can move.”
“Radioactivity interferes with radio?” Scipio asked, blinking.
“Hence the name. I see you have the same level of scientific
education as a Witch.”
“Is the radioactivity going to kill us? Or mutate us into spider creatures?”
“Or less than a Witch. The Chimerae should be okay, because they are bioengineered for high-roentgen environments. The rest of us—depends on how long we are exposed. We have enough working coffins to do some cellular correction to prevent cancers and other misgrowths. It is what they were designed for. But for now…”
“For now, I shoot this guy in the head?” Because Scipio was still standing (one foot on the back of Preceptor Illiance, who was looking remarkably unflustered) with the pistols pointed at the skull of Mentor Ull, who was looking remarkably dyspeptic.
Ull said to Menelaus in Iatric, “Tell this unnamed Relict of long-ago that his antique railgun pistol is of no advantage. My embellishments”—his gems lit up as he spoke—“organize the circumambient magnetic flux to my advantage.”
And an invisible force yanked the metal dowel running down the length of each translucent barrel straight up into the air, taking the pistols with it. Scipio held on to the grips and found himself dangling in midair; he let go as the pistols were flung upward. Both pistols hung in midair twenty feet or so above the floor, and then Mentor Ull flung them both all the way down the length of the great hall and up atop the balcony, where they rang with a noise like dropped China crockery.
Scipio, shaken but unhurt, landed on his feet not far from where Menelaus stood. Illiance, freed of Scipio’s weight, was helped to his feet by two or three dog things with drooping ears, who licked his face and fussed over him, passing snarling glances of hate toward Scipio.
Ull said in Iatric, “Anubis, we seek the Judge of Ages. We know he is among you. Tell the relicts that we will begin killing all within the chamber, starting with women and Giant and others we are confident are not he, until he reveals himself.”