Parker Interstellar Travels 4: The Trilisk Hunt (7 page)

Chapter
9

Siobhan sat in a comfortable
chair in the simulation room they had set up for virtual training. Siobhan,
Imanol, Caden, and Maxsym often came there to train rather than just sign in
from their rooms. Siobhan thought her room was incredible for any quarters
aboard a starship, but it was nice to leave it and move around the
Clacker
every day. Real physical movement gave her a sense of health and well-being.
She had been cooking up some cool ideas for daredevil stunts in the landing bay
where they had first arrived. That kind of space should not be wasted.

This morning, Telisa joined
them in person in the simulation room.

Something is up.
Telisa
did not usually show up in person at this time of day. She looked fit and
determined. Siobhan admired Telisa, feared Magnus, and half respected, half
hated Arakaki.

“Today we have a special test
for you,” Telisa said. “Like a lot of what you’ve been practicing, it’s full
virtual. However, the main difference is, the place you’re going to is real.
It’s a place that explorers went to, and some of them didn’t make it back. Good
luck.”

“What happens if we die too?”
asked Siobhan.

“If you die, then you get to
watch the others. You can no longer affect the outcome, of course,” Magnus said
from somewhere else on the ship.

Siobhan meant what if they
failed the test, but she didn’t ask again.

“I’m thinking this is one of
those scenarios where we can’t survive; the odds are stacked impossibly against
us,” Imanol said.

“Maybe it is. You take the
lead, Imanol,” Telisa said.

Imanol made a face.

“That’s what you get for your
trouble,” Siobhan said to him on a private channel.

Siobhan felt nervous. But she
knew that was only because she cared about the result. She had not cared about
anything but revenge on Speronautics for a long time. Siobhan had told Telisa
days ago that she wanted to join the team. Her commitment to them was real.

An especially important test.
I’ve seen so many amazing things here. This outfit, whoever they are, are
people worth working for. And they chose me. I want to make the cut.

Siobhan signed in to the
virtual world. The four trainees appeared on the surface of an alien planet.
They were in some kind of jungle: surrounded by spiny plants or plant-like
things. They were thick growing, dense, and covered in thin needles. Siobhan
looked all around while Telisa gave them some background.

“You’ve arrived here to
investigate a mysterious power source. You’re here for alien artifacts, but
with a time constraint. Get what you can and rally back here for extraction
within a couple of days,” Telisa said.

Siobhan tested her legs. The
planet felt close to Earth in mass, which meant she felt a bit heavy. Among the
plants she saw something more interesting: a ruin. The group stood ten meters
from a smooth, gray building. It was as tall as a Terran building of one or two
stories and partly covered by the dense vegetation.

She checked her pack’s
inventory. The backpack reported holding water, food, three universal power
modules, a three-day toiletry packet, a medical kit, and a few survival
tools like a mini-shovel and a water tester. A light-duty smart rope was coiled
around the perimeter of the pack.

At her belt she had a stunner
with an extra charge magazine, two tiny but powerful flashlights, and a long
knife. Her suit felt leathery and tough, but it was not military-grade
armor.

Why not a Veer suit? We have so
many on
Clacker
. They’re like a religion to those people.

Siobhan looked at the others.
Only Caden had a Veer suit on.

What’s up with that?
Favoritism?

“Okay, well I think we found
the ruins,” Imanol said dryly. “Everyone sharp. We’ll move together this way
around the perimeter of this building with Caden on point. Maxsym, watch the
way we came and make sure nothing’s sneaking up on us. Siobhan, watch the
forest carefully. I’ll be paying more attention to the building side and seeing
how to get in there.”

Siobhan looked into the
tree-things. They looked jumbled. She saw a few of them that grew on top of
some of the others. They were all fuzzy or spiny. But nothing moved out there
except some branches swaying in the breeze. These plants were quieter in the
wind than the many leaves of a Terran forest.

The group started walking
around the building. They turned a smooth corner carefully.

“Well, easier and easier,”
Imanol said. A large hole had been put into the side of the building. “Here’s
our entrance point.”

Caden went inside to check it
out. Siobhan stood on edge, scanning the forest with her eyes and holding her
stunner ready. She watched the trees and the ground.

What’s the catch? There’s a
catch. I’m not going to be the one to miss it.

“Got something,” Siobhan said.
She had her stunner trained on it instantly. Some kind of orange crab-snail in
a tree. “Looks harmless,” she added after a moment. She added its location to
their shared map.

“No assumptions,” Imanol said.
Then he looked at the creature himself. “Poisonous, maybe? Looks slow enough… just
keep an eye on it.”

Siobhan watched the thing like
a hawk for ten seconds. Then she decided it might be a distraction. It was very
tiny. She kept scanning.

“Clear inside,” Caden reported
over his link.

“Okay, Maxsym, then Siobhan,
inside,” Imanol said. He turned to cover the forest with his rifle. Siobhan
turned from the creature and stepped carefully through the jagged hole. The
material of the building looked like ceramic or plastic. She saw tall gray
shapes inside. Her heart rate increased.

As her eyes adjusted, she saw
the inside was dirty. She figured the hole must have been there a long time.
The gray hulks had black panes of glass or plastic on their surfaces.

“Alien?” asked Imanol.

Siobhan looked the machines
over. They appeared powered down. But still, it wasn’t like any factory she had
been in.

Could it be a factory? I don’t
think so.

“Yes, alien,” she said. “I’m
thinking alien power plant. I see heavy conductors. Or are they tubes? Of
course my link isn’t picking any services up. We won’t be able to interface
with their machines. We should just try to find some loose artifacts we can
retrieve for study. Then we might learn enough to know what to look for next.
Or if these heavy banks of equipment are worth taking back with us.”

“This stuff could be Trilisk,”
Maxsym said. “I’ve studied them a bit.”

“I saw a show on them once.
Didn’t learn a damn thing,” Imanol said.

“That’s because we don’t know
much about them,” Maxsym said. “But these devices look like what I saw. No
manual controls. Like statues, but with these black plates. I think this is a
Trilisk ruin.”

“Should we try to take them
apart?” Caden asked.

“Yes, if we can’t find anything
better. Check out that huge pipe.”

The pipe sat in the center,
with a huge open end. The other end sloped into the ground. It was large enough
to allow humans to walk inside. Caden moved in on the pipe as if it were a
smart mine. His weapon never wavered as he approached.

“It leads down. Maybe another
level,” he said. “We can fit.”

“Scout it out,” Imanol said.
“I’ll cover the entrance here. Siobhan, Maxsym, keep looking around.”

Siobhan sifted through the mud
on the floor and walked around the dark machines. Whatever they were, the
machinery or circuitry was sealed inside. They appeared dirty but undamaged.
They had not found anything new by the time Caden reported back on his link.

“I’m on a level below. There’s
something very odd at the end of the tunnel. A perfect black hole. Or sphere.
It’s so perfectly black I can’t even tell its shape. Flashlight has no effect.
I stuck the end of my knife in; it seemed to come out unchanged.”

Imanol walked over to the mouth
of the tube.

“You guys, watch the entrance.
I’m going to check this out.”

After another couple of
minutes, Imanol transmitted, “Everyone down here, please.”

Siobhan looked at the circular
pipe entrance. She traded looks with Maxsym.

“What if that thing closes on
us?” she asked.

“Well, we walked into the
building, didn’t we?” asked Maxsym. “It could just as easily have been a death
trap.”

Siobhan felt scared. She
unclipped a powerful light and activated it, pointing it ahead.

What if this is a giant water
pipe? Or worse? We could be trapped in here, suffocated, swept away… I guess it
wouldn’t be open like this if it was for liquid.

The pipe did not seem to have
any closure mechanism on the end. Mechanically, at least, it did not appear
that it would seal on them.

Who are you kidding? A Trilisk
pipe could probably just materialize an end cap like magic.

She stepped into the pipe. It
slanted downward and spiraled to one side. Siobhan relied on her light. She
told it to increase intensity through her link to help dispel her fear with
more light. They joined the others at the end, many meters below the surface.
Siobhan saw only blackness at the end, even when she shined her light into it.

“Ideas?” Imanol said. “We stuck
a rifle barrel through there, and it came back okay. And Caden stuck his hand
through. No pain or noticeable effects.”

“Yet who knows what happens as
soon as your brain goes in there. Or all of you,” Siobhan said, verbalizing the
worry they all felt.

“I know what to do,” Maxsym
said. “Grab one of those critters from outside. Stick one in there and see if
it’s harmed.”

Good idea
,
Siobhan thought,
but it’s an alien creature. It might be okay where we might
die.

Imanol considered that for a
moment and then nodded. “Okay, a sound idea. You and Caden, go get us a small
native. I doubt I need to say be very careful. The things could be the danger
Telisa hinted at.”

They moved out. Siobhan stared
at the blackness. She tried her light on the very edge. Only then, she could
tell it was a sphere of black. Perfect black.

“I have a powerful urge to
touch it,” she said quietly.

“I know. I allowed Caden to put
his finger, then his hand in there. I put a weather reader and a poison monitor
in there. No danger signs.”

“You know what? This could be
why Magnus spends so much time working on the robots. We need one to send in
there,” she said. “Maybe we can cut around this blackness.”

“Maybe. Did you see how thick
the pipe was at the surface? It would be quite a delay to cut through it,
assuming we even can. Made by Trilisks, after all. We have only a couple days.”

“Yes.”

“We’re approaching it,” Caden
transmitted. “Putting it into a bag…” A few moments later, he said, “We have
it. Coming back now.”

Siobhan heard noise coming down
the pipe as Caden and Maxsym returned. They reappeared with a black sack containing
a lump. It moved feebly.

“Did you hurt it?” she asked.

“Nope. Well, I doubt it,”
Maxsym said. “It’s very slow. Kind of like a crab, only of course, very odd
looking. It has a flat shell that points toward the ground. It was hanging by
tentacles from the tree. Sort of like a mollusk sloth, I guess.”

Caden walked to the sphere. He
held the bag inside and then pulled it back. They looked inside with
flashlights.

“Looks fine,” Imanol said. He
hesitated with a desperate look of hard calculation on his face.

He’s trying to figure out if he
should send Caden in, since he’s the best fighter, or send himself in so he
doesn’t send someone else into harm’s way,
Siobhan thought.

“I’ll go in,” Siobhan said.
“I’ve done more dangerous things, believe me. And if I’m hurt, you’ll still
have Caden to fight for you.”

“Uh,” Imanol said.

“The critter is fine. I’ll be
back in three seconds,” she said, stepping forward. “Look, I spelunked in
vacuum inside the panel struts of Spero Five for fun. Star diving, atmospheric
gliders on Qarlos—you know, extreme sports. I kinda dig danger, get it?”

Is he going to say, “But you’re
my responsibility”?

She saw relief on Imanol’s
face. He nodded. Caden looked surprised, Maxsym concerned.

So with that, Siobhan walked
through the black sphere.

She emerged alive. Even though
it was a sim, the moment gave her a slight adrenal rush.

That could have been real.
Telisa said they did this for real.

At first, she thought she had
died and she was back aboard the
Clacker
. But the corridor ahead of her,
while clearly Terran, did not look like the inside of their mysteriously named
spacecraft. It was a simple corridor like those she had seen many times on
Earth. There were several branchings up ahead, but no people.

Her link picked up a few
services but could no longer see the others on her team. As far her link was
concerned, they were just gone. Behind her, the field looked the same as it had
where she entered.

“Weird.”

Siobhan walked back through the
field. She was happy to see the team waiting for her on the other side.

Maxsym and Imanol looked happy
to see her back. Caden looked eager to try it himself.

“There’s a Terran corridor on
the other side,” she reported. “Very boring looking. I can’t explain it.”

“Thanks for checking it out,
Siobhan,” Imanol said.

“A secret Terran facility! No
wonder it’s dangerous. It could be a rogue scientist or a criminal gang’s
hideout,” Caden said excitedly.

“No assumptions,” Imanol said.
“Let’s take a look, guys.”

They filed through to the other
side. Everyone felt the walls, then kicked them and tested the environment in
half a dozen ways. Siobhan laughed.