Kirlian Quest

  "But why?"

  "I'm not sure why we're under attack. But I suspect the Amoeba recognizes this site as a threat. That means the Amoebites know about, and are afraid of, Ancient science. That's a good sign."

  "A good sign? That they ray us down?"

  "Because it means we are close to achieving what we need to defeat them. A strike like this must be a desperation measure, as it betrays their presence and intent prematurely."

  A third strike came. This time the cavity behind them caved in completely. The crack of thunder was followed by the roar of the collapse. "Oh, oh!" Sixteen cried in anguish. "The work is incomplete! All our labor of excavation and preliminary cataloguing—"

  "Keep moving," Herald told her. "Or more than the work will be lost. This is war." He was surprised at his own stability. Probably it was due in part to his Slash heritage, and in part to his recent loss of Psyche. Death simply was no great threat to him in his grief.

  "The Weew is too heavy," Sixteen cried. "I cannot carry him much longer!"

  Herald had to agree. His Jet host was healthy, but was not designed to carry heavy weights. "We'll have to hide somewhere, and try to bring him to," he decided. "He is the only one who can operate his suit."

  "Here," she said. "These passages are long and deep; we should be safe there." She guided him into the labyrinth of Ancient tunnels.

  The passages were too narrow for them to pass three abreast, except where the archaeologists had widened them for exploratory access. But this was a Jet-developed offshoot that penetrated deep into the ground, almost to the base of the city, with each level carefully marked off for reference. When it seemed safe, they parked Hweeh in a niche formed by an intersection, rested briefly, and tried to revive him.

  Herald touched the Weew's suit with his aura. "Wake, friend," he said.

  There was no response.

  Another explosion reverberated down the tunnels, making Herald suddenly claustrophobic. This warren had lasted three million years, but it was brittle. Too much shaking....

  "Why does he not wake?" Sixteen asked, frightened. "Is he dead?"

  "He is in shock. I am a healer—but I too am in a kind of shock. I did not heal you, for I have lost my power. Hweeh healed you. Now I cannot help him. I am sorry."

  "Maybe I can do it," she said.

  Herald, worn out by the haul and preoccupied by the continuing sounds of destruction elsewhere in the site, hardly paid attention. Any physical comfort she could offer the Weew would help, though only an aura above Hweeh's own level of 125 could revive him from shock.

  "He's just a gray mass!" Sixteen said, concerned. Herald was not certain how she could determine color in this dark niche; perhaps she spoke figuratively.

  "This is normal for Weew shock," he assured her. "His suit preserves him. He is in health, only unconscious."

  His thoughts returned to the Amoeba. Assuming it really was an Amoeba ship out there, how could it have pinpointed this site so accurately, of all the locations on all the planets of the Cluster, and why had it struck now? There could be no coincidence about it! If the Amoeba knew where the Ancient sites and receivers were, and it was out to destroy them before the Cluster species could use them, it was a horrifying indication of the capacity of the enemy. But even so, it defied coincidence that the strike should come right at this moment, right when he was trying to evoke the Ancient cube....

  That was it! That cube was no text—it was a transmitter! It had reacted to his aura by issuing a Kirlian signal. It was a machine, triggered by exposure to aura of the intensity of its makers, the Ancients, and it obeyed without question or discrimination when evoked. The cube did not know or care that the Ancients were three million years gone. So it had dutifully transmitted its message—perhaps no more than a blank carrier impulse, since he had not been trying to transmit—and the Amoeba had picked it up, believed it represented an animation of Ancient science, and acted immediately to destroy it. No, no coincidence at all. He had brought the attack upon himself!

  And the destruction of the site on Planet Keep had been by Amoeba action too. Psyche had evoked that site, much as he had evoked the cube, tuning into it unconsciously, and the strike bad come. Now the enemy was reacting much more swiftly. Or perhaps the signal this time had been more specific: Here is an aura of 236, capable of keying open Ancient sites!, while before it had been a more general thing, mystifying the enemy even as it had mystified the nobles of Keep. Either way, it was apparent that the Amoeba was closing in at an alarming rate. It was no longer a distant, highly theoretical menace; it was here and now! Its strategy was most specific: Eliminate the auras capable of evoking Ancient equipment, thereby eliminating any possible use of that equipment by Cluster entities. If the Cluster did not obtain Ancient science soon, it would be too late. Any enemy that could strike so swiftly, so specifically, when its base was over a million light-years distant...

  He was getting nowhere! If only Psyche had survived! Not merely for personal reasons, compelling as those were—even here in the Jet host, he longed for her!—but because of her seeming ability to draw enhancement from an Ancient site. She might have been able to—

  "Did I shock out again?" Hweeh asked. "Thanks for reviving me, Psyche."

  "Who?" Sixteen asked.

  Hweeh rotated his eye-stalk inside his suit. "Pardon, Lady. I was misinformed. For a moment I mistook you for another entity."

  Herald felt a slow amazement. He had been thinking of Psyche, and Hweeh had named her. Coincidence? Then how had the Weew been brought out of shock? There was no way that Sixteen's fractional aura could have done it.

  Hweeh must have snapped out of it himself spontaneously. Perhaps his shock had been countered by the knowledge that he had to keep functioning if he were to survive at all.

  Another laser beam struck, closer. "They're chasing us!" Sixteen said.

  "More likely destroying the whole site," Herald said. "We just happen to be in their path."

  "Then let's get out of it!" she said.

  They jetted on through the passage, seeking the surface. Sixteen knew the way, and led them through a labyrinth that otherwise would have baffled them. Soon they emerged to the Martian day—and saw the enemy ship.

  It was a shimmering globe floating so close to the surface that it seemed like an atmospheric balloon. Herald had never seen a ship quite like it. So this was the Amoeba, seeming close enough to touch!

  Abruptly the ship moved, jumping across the sky to hover above the trio.

  "That's mattermission!" Sixteen cried. "It didn't accelerate, it jumped!"

  "Unlikely," Hweeh said. "No transmitter, no receiver, no implosion and explosion of air."

  "Just get out from under!" Herald said, jetting away. But he too was astonished. Until this episode, it had been inconceivable that anything could mattermit from place to place without entering a transmitter and arriving in a receiver. Now it remained doubtful—but conceivable. The devastating technology of this enemy...!

  Hweeh and Sixteen followed his example with alacrity—and a laser beam speared down where they had been. The air exploded, the thunder pushing them on.

  "It really is gunning for us!" Sixteen cried. "But why?"

  Herald didn't care to try to answer that. He did not have the Ancient cube with him now, so could not be broadcasting any Kirlian signal. He has baffled not only by the why—though his hypothesis was clarifying that—but the how. Impossible things were happening! "We'd better separate, so that it can't blast all three of us at once," he suggested, feeling a touch of déjà vu. When he and Psyche and Whirl of Dollar had fled Caesar, the monster of Keep— But how much more formidable was this monster!

  Somehow he felt no fear. Had he been in his own Slash body he would have shot a beam back, though with no expectation of bringing down a spaceship! Death by suffocation in a collapsing tunnel frightened him, or death by poison or freezing or disease, or by falling from a high place such as the ridge above Kastle Kade; but a laser was a comprehe
nsible thing, basically natural, quick and clean.

  Sixteen was now jetting far to the side, and Hweeh's suit moved in the opposite direction. How fortunate that the Weew had not returned to shock! Now they would see whom the alien went after.

  Suddenly the ship was above Herald. He banked sharply, turning to go at right angles to his former route. This body had no lasers, but it was highly maneuverable and much faster than a Slash! In this situation, he actually felt more confidence as a Jet.

  Again the laser struck where he had been. Close misses—but still he was not afraid. What could they take from him, that the death of Psyche had not taken already?

  The Amoeba ship evidently could fire only straight down, so had first to position itself directly above him. It was not adapted for planetary search-and-destroy—not completely, anyway. In space it would have to orient on distant targets with extreme precision, so the fixed beam made sense. Any time the ship was in position it could score. But that extra step gave him the edge here. He was so close that a small change in his location was like an impossible maneuver in distant space, one the ship was not geared to follow. He could keep dodging it until it ran out of energy, which it had to do, pretty soon; those beams were powerful! They would miss him close each time—but they would miss.

  Meanwhile, he was learning much about the enemy. Obviously it was him alone they wanted—and his only distinguishing mark was his aura. Therefore they were orienting on aura alone. They could detect it at this range without the aid of the cube. Maybe in its strength his aura resembled the aura of the Ancients, so they feared it regardless of its keying capacity. But they didn't dare land a party to capture him, so had to use a cannon capable of melting a hole through a mile-thick ship (well, through its hull, anyway) to nab him. A ludicrous waste of power.

  The ship jumped again. This time Herald braked and spun about, jetting back the way he had come. The beam missed him, striking to the side where be would have been, had he repeated the maneuver. They were learning! He had four chances in five of keeping clear, since be could go in four directions or stand still. They had missed him twice; if they had chances for three more, the odds were about even they would catch him, unless he got completely out of their range. Provided they could afford the power expense.

  Meanwhile he kept moving, waiting for the ship to commit itself again. The Amoeba had him pegged as an Ancient, or the equivalent, and was trying desperately to destroy him. If they feared the science of the Ancients that much, the Amoeba must be less developed than the Ancients had been. However, that was not any new revelation at this point. Why were they suddenly so intent upon him now?

  Could it be because he represented no real threat to them unless he was in the vicinity of Ancient equipment? They had not paid him much attention while he was elsewhere in the Cluster; it was Psyche they had blasted, though she was dead already, because she had been keying the Ancient site of Keep. Obviously he could not key an Ancient site unless he were at it, and a nontechnological residential site hardly counted.

  There had to be a functioning site somewhere on Mars! If he could only find it in time. After he escaped from this ship, of course.

  The ship jumped again. This time Herald jetted straight forward at top velocity, not dodging. If he guessed wrong....

  The beam struck well behind him. They had played him for another reversal!

  Suddenly the pit of one of the prior strikes loomed before him. The dust was fused, the underlying lava melted. Oh, yes, these were ship-destroyer lasers, not little antipersonnel beams! If they had had a splay of pin-beams they could have caught him. Obviously then they had not anticipated this particular type of localized chase. The Amoeba was not omniscient; it could and did make mistakes! Very encouraging information he was getting, and he wasn't even serving on any committee! Still, the odds seemed to be with the Amoeba.

  He shot over the lip and down into the pit, his brushes feeling the radiating heat. Fortunately the Jet form had the efficient cooling mechanism of wind; heat in his body was jetted out almost immediately. He could tolerate this surface, so long as he kept moving, barely touching it.

  This was why the ship had misjudged. They had assumed he would avoid the hot spot, and thought they had him boxed in. They might well have been correct, had he thought where he was going. This was not just a little hot, it was a lot hot.

  The sides of the pit were vertical, dropping down like the inner rim of a volcano before curving into slag. The mass of lava here had been vaporized! When laser science had first been developed, it had been supposed that it could never achieve much physical power. But they had been thinking of the animate lasers of the Slash, limited by the living processes; lasers had come a long way since then! Contemporary lasers might not pack the direct-motion punch of a physical missile, but the sheer heat caused explosive expansion. This one was evidently an outer-shell beam, causing the inner section to vaporize and wash straight back, while the outer rim remained clean-cut, uncluttered by the debris of its own action. It was a very nice bit of laser sculpture that he had to admire. The warships of Slash might match the sheer power of the Amoeba strikes, but not their finesse of application. A ship struck with such a beam would be holed cleanly, instead of merely melting sloppily and dissipating much of the force of the strike.

  All this in an instant as he dropped into the hole. He noticed an Ancient tunnel, opened to the surface by that lovely strike. There must be radiating passages all over this area, hidden by the sand! This was a far more extensive site than the archaeologists had yet realized.

  On impulse, he gambled by jetting straight into the tunnel. The depths disturbed him, but his chances on the surface were diminishing too swiftly. If this passage went deep enough, and had another exit, he might escape the Amoeba ship. Then he would be extremely careful about trying to evoke any more Ancient cubes! But if this tunnel did not...

  He was in luck, so far. The passage angled down deep into the lava shield. He verified its openness ahead by sonic echoes, moving as fast as his perceptions permitted. When it came right down to it he preferred the risk of a dented intake to that of a laser-scorched posterior.

  Had he eluded the Amoeba? His aura was intense, but crippled by his lost love, and the Martian dust should muffle most of the rest. The ship had not seemed to be able to locate him when he was deep below before, once be got away from the cube. If the Amoeba did not know precisely where to look for him, it would lose him; it could not vaporize the entire crust of the planet!

  He coasted to a stop. For the fast time, he was alone in an unexplored section of the site. The dust of millions of years filmed the passage, though this section had obviously been sealed. It had been Herald's luck that he had entered an access tunnel and not a burial tunnel, or he would have struck a dead-end too near the surface.

  Still he did not dare to emerge until he was sure the enemy was gone. He did not like the confinement and the strong possibility of death by crushing if a laser struck accurately, but he knew his best chance was to remain right here.

  He thought of Psyche again, seeing her in the fire, feeling her incinerated flesh on his human hand, though now he had no hand. It was too much, and he had to blank it out. He would never recover his powers as long as that vision remained with him, yet he could only relinquish it by relinquishing her, and he could never do that. He wished he were not a tough Slash, a creature to whom suicide was unnatural. Why not go above and let the Amoeba blast him? The Curse of Llume, abated at one stroke, for him!

  Desperately he cast about for some intellectual or physical diversion. He could not let his imagination seek its own horrors. He moved along the passage until he came to a sealed-off intersection. At one time it had been an entrance to a burial chamber. He pried at it with his forefeelers, and it broke open. He widened the hole and entered, front-first, so as not to disturb the interior by the breeze of his jet.

  There was nothing inside except a little more dust and a single body-ring. He examined it as well as he
could in the dark. It had the same kind of relief design as the ones on display in the main dig.

  Why weren't there any bodies? If these were burial chambers with personal ornaments, why no coffins, sarcophagi, or dehydrated remains? The climate of Mars should be ideal for the mummification and preservation of corpses. The question brought the answer: Who would want to live under the decaying corpse of his personal parent-entity? The vapors might tend to diffuse upward, but a decaying body gave off a lot of gas in a short time, and some fumes would inevitably seek the path of lesser resistance: the passage below. Every sniff would remind the offspring most poignantly of the dear departed. Obviously they cremated the remains, and left only the sterile dust in the sealed chamber. After all, it was the aura that counted, not the body.

  Yet in that case, why bother to seal off the chambers at all? Why not place the circular memorials in some hallowed place, and continue to use the residence? It would save a lot of work and promote efficiency. The Ancients had to have been the most efficient creatures ever to dwell in the Cluster. It was not like them to expend energy and materials wastefully.

  The revelation burst upon him like the strike of a laser: These were not the Ancients!

  There were two cultures here: the Wormlike pre-Ancient colony, advanced enough to colonize alien planets but still hindered by foolishly material concepts of property and death, and the more sophisticated alien Ancients who had come as conquerors. Now it fell into place. The relics differed from ring to cube, the tunnels differed in size and type, the burial attitudes differed. And most significant, the heraldic devices differed. The devices on this ring bore no relation to those on the cubes; they represented two entirely different cultures.

  Why had he not noticed this before? In retrospect it was glaringly obvious! Those not trained in heraldry might not appreciate the elaborate conventions that formed such art, or the permanency of their symbolism, but he did. It did not matter what that art was called or what the symbols meant. It was an art with its unique conventions, and it had to be true to its nature. That was the very root of heraldry. If it were not so, it would be meaningless, and useless for identification of living or dead. The continuity of evolution had to be embodied in the art, exactly as with the bodies of living creatures. The alternative was chaos.