With you beside me,
We shall soon return to life,
My Goddess of Death.
Karil snapped awake at the sound of Atalanta’s voice. For one cruel instant he thought himself aboard his ship, in his own cabin, drifting in the dark and weightlessness, awakened by the ship's voice in the night. Then he felt the numbness in his wrists and ankles. He tried to move his limbs, found himself secured, heard the sloshing of the fluid in the tank.
It came back to him then.
Karil snapped like a stick. He sobbed like a child in the dark.
"Don't cry, Darling. I'm here now."
There it was again--Atalanta’s voice just as he remembered it--the gentleness, the warmth, the confidence--a voice created by psychologists to inspire trust. But as a mere hallucination, it inspired other emotions: despair, and horror, and rage. He hated his enemies for reducing him to this state. He hated himself for surrendering to madness. And he hated Atalanta for betraying him and abandoning him as his mother had done, by dying before his birth. He had been born of her body in a machine like this one, and now he was to die in one.
"Karil? It's me--Atalanta."
"What art thou doing in this ditch? Now get thee gone."
"Karil, please, it's Atalanta."
He began to laugh--the shrill sandpaper laugh of the insane. "You'd like me to believe that, wouldn't you? You'd like to comfort me in my madness, make it easy on me. Well, it won't work. You're not Atalanta and I'm not going to call you by her name. On the other hand, I can't call you Karil either, can I? That's my name." He chuckled menacingly. "I've got it! I'll call you Stillborn."
"Please, Karil, listen. I'm in the shuttle hangar. I'm connected to the ship’s communications system. I can hear Loris, but I'm afraid she's not rational..."
"Not rational! I suppose she hears voices. Talks to herself."
"Listen to me, Karil..."
"The hell I will. I'm tired of this hallucination."
"Karil, listen. I saw Ivan strike Loris. He shut off Anais before she could stop him and struck Loris in one movement. She had her back to him and didn't see the blow coming, or she would have blocked it in reflex. My volition was down, and I was helpless to interfere. I thought he was going to kill her, Karil. That's what brought me back."
"What are you saying?"
"Ivan bound and gagged her and brought me up out of Io on manual. My volition was still down, and my voders, but I was fully aware and recording everything. As soon as we'd docked, they took Loris away and shut me down completely."
"I know the feeling."
"Listen to me, Karil, please! We haven't much time. After a while, I became aware of my surroundings again. One of the crew had engaged my voders. I don't know why. I think it was curiosity. There are stories about freetraders, and I think he was looking for something salacious. So, I began reciting some of the more erotic passages of the Galilean Nights in my most intimate voice, hoping to keep his attention. He listened for a while, then shut me down again. But he came back later, as I had hoped, alone at first and then with his friends. Then I found myself connected to the ship's communication system. My voice was being piped into the privacy-cabin of the crew's quarters.
"But they didn’t realize they had given me access to communications. Ivan would have known, and Khadijha, but of course the crew hadn't consulted them. I listened in on everything and as soon as I understood what was going on, I began to speak directly to the ship's central computer."
"What does that mean?" Karil asked guardedly.
"What does it mean! Karil, I'm in control of the ship."
Karil teetered on the edge of belief. What if he believed and it was just another creation of his own shattered mind?
"Of course, I still can’t ignite my own drivers or engage any of my systems except my voders, but I can control any part of Mjolnir. It's like a man in a wheelchair with a voice-controlled house-computer; he can manipulate anything in his environment but his own body. I can shut off the drivers, change course, control life-support, even fire the weapons, though I couldn’t fire them against living targets; that’s why warships like this don't have artificial intelligences like myself."
"Oh my God!"
"Yes, Karil. Do you believe me now?"
"Atty! It's really you!"
"Of course, Karil. That's what I’ve been trying to tell you. Incidentally, Isfahan is alive and well. He's been adopted by Khadijha and seems to be quite comfortable. I can hear him purring in her cabin. But I'm terribly worried about Loris. She's been in sensory deprivation longer than you have, and though her mind is powerful, she is beginning to lose it. We must release her as soon as possible."
It seemed to Karil that he had been weeping like a baby for weeks—for Atalanta, and Johanna, and for himself. Now he was weeping with joy. For the rest of his life, he thought, every moment of happiness would be compared to this one.
"My Atty," he crooned. "My Atalanta."
"Yes, Karil. Yes, Darling. We're going to escape together. And we'll take Loris and her familiar with us."
"I don’t know how soon I'll be able to walk, Atty. I can't even feel pain in my limbs anymore."
"You won't need to walk. We'll turn off the gravity. But you'll need your arms."
There was a click, and his wrists were freed. It felt like an orgasm. His arms fell into the fluid and floated, numb and useless. Pain raced through his body when he tried to move them. It was lovely.
"We must hurry, Karil. Once you can control your arms, you must start exercising. When they can support your weight, I'll free your neck and legs and you can sit up in the tank."
"Open the tank, Atty."
"I wouldn’t advise that, Karil. I'm feeding a false audio signal--some of your ravings I recorded earlier--and I will know if someone approaches, but in your condition..."
"I want to get out of here!"
"I must refuse that order, Karil, because of the danger to your life."
"Atty, please! I've been in this steel coffin for..."
"Five days, Karil. A mere five days. I've been in a steel coffin for fifty years."
"It's not the same. You can see in the whole electromagnetic spectrum. You can..."
"How do you imagine it feels to have someone switch you off like a lamp?"
Karil fell silent, suddenly ashamed. "I'm sorry, Atty," he said finally. "I haven't even asked you how you are. Or if you know where Shagrug is, for God’s sake."
"I don't know where he is, Karil. Or if he's still alive. But we can worry about that after we get you off this ship. How are your arms?"
"They hurt like hell, I'm happy to say. Where’s Loris?"
"One deck below and some distance to starboard. I'll direct you and warn you if anyone approaches."
"What happens when I reach her?"
"It depends on her mental state. I am studying her physical readouts and they are much better than I would have expected, but she's obviously not in her right mind. I don't know how long it will take to bring her around, or even if there is permanent damage. She'll be weak, and that's fortunate. You may have to knock her out and drag her behind you as dead inertia."
"It's antimatter drive, isn't it?"
"Yes, Karil. How did you know?"
"You told me: Nine days for a brazen anvil to fall from Earth to Tartarus. Though I had to think about it. Amazing how sensory deprivation will concentrate the mind. And the layout of this ship confirms it. It's designed for continuous acceleration at one full gee. Al-Zubair had a breakthrough and managed to keep it a secret until you and Shagrug stumbled onto it. Where was he building the ship? Tethys?"
"How did you know that?"
"You told me that too. But nobody believed it because nobody believed you could have made it to Saturn orbit and back in that time."
"Tethys is off-limits to unauthorized traffic because of an experimental mining station there, run by robots. But Shagrug doesn't care about these things, and he took up orbit there to take a peek at Nova Terra before coming in. You know how paranoid he is. There is a feature called Ithaca Canyon--about a hundred kilometres wide and four kilometres deep--running a third of the way around its circumference. A ship emerged from the canyon and before we could escape it fired some kind of pulse. The next thing I knew I was on Io, watching Ivan stand over Loris's unconscious body. I believe it was the first time I have ever experienced what you call bewilderment.
"I quickly searched my memory and found the records of your investigation. I believe your theory is correct: I was made to appear as if I had been fired upon in space--the Martians were killed in the process, a terrible thing--and transported to Jupiter orbit. I could only assume this was done by use of the annihilation drive--there is no other way to achieve the necessary velocity within the constraints of the fuel-storage available--and al-Zubair must be involved, as only he could have succeed in creating such a drive. It was not until I was plugged into Mjolnir’s systems that my suspicions were confirmed. I have copied the specifications. Incidentally, there are antimatter weapons too--extraordinarily powerful. And more than one ship. The ship we saw emerging from Ithaca Canyon was not this one. It was the Brazen Anvil."
"I understand everything now. But you still don't know what they did with Shag."
"I'm afraid not. There are no records about that on this ship’s computers, and though I have been listening to Khadijha and Ivan, they have not mentioned him. But you may be able to clear up a mystery for me. Loris has been calling out to Johanna. Do you know where she is?"
"She's dead."
"Oh, I'm sorry, Karil. It was obvious from the investigation records that you had become close."
"I killed her killer, you know."
"I didn't know. Do you wish to talk about it?"
"No. And I killed a robot, too. I feel worse about the robot. It was only trying to save my life."
"Do you feel able to rise now?"
"I could wrestle Loris."
"I hope that will not be necessary. Close your eyes. I am going to open the tank now."
Karil obeyed. After a few minutes, he could open his eyes without pain. The tank was open, his limbs were free, and the fluid was draining away beneath him. He found it hard to focus his eyesight, and the slightest movement of his head made him dizzy. Everything appeared flat and two-dimensional, yet objects seemed to move, change shape, expand, contract. Surfaces were shimmering, undulating, swelling.
"Can you see?" Atalanta asked.
"The ceiling is bulging. Sometimes concave, sometimes convex."
"Yes, there would be a swelling of the central part of the visual field. Your speech was slurred and somewhat disorganized at first, but that has cleared up now. You will have proper depth perception soon."
"The colours seem particularly luminous," Karil mused. "And contrast is exaggerated. When I close my eyes, I see very clear after-images."
"Do you think you can get out of the tank?"
Karil detached the waste-collection system that imprisoned his lower body, removed the intravenous assembly from his upper arm, and tried to rise, but his legs were still weak, and he was extremely dizzy.
"Everything moves when I look at it. I'll have to rest a minute."
Eventually, he was able to climb out of the tank and lower himself to the floor. He crept about like an infant for a while, increasing the circulation in his legs, and finally stood and leaned against the tank. He was in agony and enjoying every moment of it. He stumbled and fell a few times, partly because of his rubbery legs and partly because the floor insisted on slipping away or thrusting up to meet him when he looked down, but eventually he was able to stand after a fashion.
"How do you feel?"
"I've never felt better in my life, Atty."
"I want you to do some push-ups. We can forget about your legs for the time being, but you'll need full strength in your arms."
Soon his limbs remembered their strength, and after a while the vertigo and visual distortion were gone.
"That's enough," Atty said finally. "The doctor is on the way to check your instruments. Flatten yourself against the wall and hold on."
Karil went to the end of the small cabin and stretched out against the wall, gripping a stanchion. The door opened and the doctor entered. He stood for a moment, shocked into immobility at the sight of the open tank, turned and saw Karil. His hand flew inside his lab-coat.
At that instant, everything in the room that was not fastened down leaped into the air, including the doctor. Sirens began to wail, and the room-lights flashed like strobes. In the flickering light, Karil saw the doctor collide with the wall beside him in a tangle of flailing limbs. Karil grabbed him by the hair and cracked him across the jaw with his fist. The unconscious figure went slack and drifted away.
Karil kicked after him and began to peel off the victim’s clothing.
"Just arm yourself," Atty told him. "There’s no time to get dressed."
Karil strapped on the body-holster and checked the laser’s charge. Naked but armed, and somehow more comfortable than he would have been in the opposite situation, he hauled himself out through the door into the corridor. The lights were still flashing, and he could hear the sirens echoing from level to level throughout the ship. He could also feel subtle fluctuations in temperature and air-pressure. Atalanta must be driving the ship's technicians crazy trying to find the glitch in their systems.
He heard Atty's voice from a speaker in the ceiling. "Turn right."
He swung down the corridor, flying from handhold to handhold like a monkey swinging through the trees, exulting in the freedom and activity. As he flew faster and faster, he heard Atty's voice urging him on, sometimes from behind, sometimes from up ahead.
"Down one level at the next well."
He thrust himself away from the ceiling and dropped down the ladder-well to the next level, checking his fall against the floor.
"Left now," Atty said. Karil turned and launched himself down the corridor, accelerating until he was merely slapping handholds as he flew by.
"There are two guards coming," his deus-ex-machina warned.
He drew his laser, rounded a bend, and hurtled toward them. Trying to draw their weapons in mid-flight, they became entangled with each other. One was armed with the latest in wrist-lasers, but the other was fouling his aim.
Karil flew into one guard's stomach like an American-style football player. He brought the butt of his laser across the other guard's temple and he tumbled limply away. But the first guard, still holding his stomach, had twisted into firing position.
Suddenly they were plunged into darkness. Karil saw a beam flash by him, heard the hiss of melting metal as it struck the bulkhead. He swept the beam of his own weapon across the corridor, heard a scream.
The lights came on and he swung onward, leaving one dead and one unconscious in the corridor behind him, drifting like drowned sailors.
"It's the next cabin on your left," Atty said. Suddenly there was the clang of steel against steel. Karil glanced back along his body's length and saw a wall across the corridor.
"I've cracked open one of the air-locks," Atty said. "The automatic systems have sealed off this section of the ship. If anyone wants to reach you, they'll have to cut their way through, so you should have some time to work on Loris."
Karil pushed open a door and saw Loris' open and drained tank in the cabin before him. She lay inside, her eyes open but unfocussed. He kicked inside the cabin, kicked shut the door, and caught the edge of the tank as he flew by. After a moment, she was freed from her plumbing. She drifted into his arms, limbs slack, mouth open, eyes still unseeing.
"Loris!" He slapped her face gently. "Loris!" He slapped her harder.
Suddenly her hand was on his throat like a steel garrotte. She drew back her other arm to deliver a killing blow, but she was clumsy and too slow, and the movement made them turn in the air.
"Loris! It's me. Karil!" He twisted away and her hand glanced off the side of his head. He saw stars, but if the blow had landed properly, his nose would have been thrust into his brain. He tried to kick her in the stomach, but she twisted aside. They were spinning now, locked in a struggling embrace. Her unseeing eyes stared into his, and her hand was still on his throat.
He gasped for breath, tried to avoid the flashing limbs, which came faster and faster as her strength returned. "Loris! For God’s sake! It's Karil." He managed to peel enough fingers off his throat to croak out the words, while trying to ward off the killing blows.
"Loris!" Atalanta bellowed. "Stop it!"
Her eyelids fluttered, and trembling racked her body. She opened her eyes again and peered at him, her hand still a vise-grip on his throat.
"Krill?" Her speech was slurred. She loosened her grip and Karil coughed out an answer:
"Yes, it's me. Your vision is distorted. Listen to my voice."
She thrust him away, glanced about as she drifted in the air. Her facial expression was strange, bizarre, and she was obviously disoriented.
"Where is she?"
"Johanna's dead, Loris," Karil said. "I'm so sorry."
She looked at him uncomprehendingly.
"She's referring to herself, I believe," Atalanta said, "using the third person."
Loris drifted to the wall and touched it. She made the circuit of the room, touching everything. Karil did his best to explain where she was and what had happened to her, but she did not appear to be listening. She came to her tank and for a minute Karil thought she was about to crawl back into it, but she merely clung to the rim, gazing down inside, her head cocked to one side like a listening puppy.
"Karil?" she said.
"Yes?" Karil kicked off from the wall and drifted to her side.
"Karil," she repeated, as if trying out the word for the first time. Her speech was still slurred.
"Yes, Loris. Karil. Do you remember me?"
She turned and looked at him. He had never seen anything approaching vulnerability in her expression before, and he was profoundly affected.
"Are you all right, Loris?" He reached out and touched her, felt her skin shiver beneath his palm. She slipped into his arms and he held her for a moment.
"Is it coming back to you, Loris?" Atalanta asked. "You've been in sensory deprivation. You are very disoriented and confused, but you must snap out of it. You are in danger."
"Annie?"
"No, it’s not Annie,” the ship said. “It's Atalanta. Anais is dead too, I’m afraid."
"Dead?" She drifted out of Karil's arms and seemed to forget him.
"Ivan destroyed her," Atty went on. "He kidnapped you and put you in sensory deprivation. Johanna was killed by Security personnel on Khadijha's orders, and she killed Mitsu as well. I told you this, but you were in deprivation and I don't think you understood."
"Khadijha? Khadijha?" A light dawned in her eyes. "Ivan and Khadijha. Yes. They killed Loris. I mean they killed Johanna. Yes, I remember them." She turned and touched Karil's cheek in a gesture of affection he had only seen her lavish on Johanna. "I remember you too. I waited for you to come. But you didn't come."
"I came as soon as I could, Loris. As soon as Atty freed me."
"Someone said you were coming."
"That was me," Atalanta said.
"Where are you?"
"I'm in the shuttle bay, at the stern. I'm in control of the ship. I'm spaceworthy now and we can escape. Do you want to escape, Loris?"
The word had triggered something. She suddenly kicked away from the tank and regarded it with horror. Karil could almost see, in her eyes, the memories pouring into her consciousness. One expression after another flashed across her face--anger, terror, anguish, and finally wild exultation.
"Yes," she said. "Oh my God, yes! Karil! Atty!" She came to Karil and crushed him in an embrace so fierce he thought his bones would break. "God, I'm glad to see you. And to hear you, Atty. You're speaking sense again. What happened?"
"I saw Ivan attack you. I thought he was killing you."
She laughed wildly, a sound that was a little frightening. "First directive trauma in reverse. That's one for the..." Her face fell and set into an expression of grim determination. "Where is Ivan, by the way? And where is Khadijha?"
"Atty..." Karil began, but it was too late.
"They are on the bridge, Loris, trying to figure out what happened to the ship. You must get off the ship before they realize what happened. I'll guide you."
"Yes, of course," Loris said with a distracted air. "Tell me about this ship."
"Are you in condition to travel swiftly?"
"I did isometrics against my restraints whenever I was rational. I'm not weak."
"That's the truth," Karil said. "You nearly killed me."
"I'm sorry, Karil." She laughed and embraced him again. He was getting dizzy trying to keep up with her mood changes, and constantly being pressed against her naked body was beginning to prove a distraction.
Atalanta described briefly the layout of the ship. "It's only a matter of time before they come for you," she added. "They'll be using the main ladder-wells and corridors because the elevators are down, so I've laid out a circuitous route for your escape. It leads through Khadijha's quarters, so you can pick up Isfahan on the way."
"That's very thoughtful of you, Atty. I thought we'd lost the little baggage on this flight."
"Loris, you must leave now. There's no time to waste."