The Castle in Cassiopeia Read online

  The group of Janbottis was perhaps a kilometer away when Pretorius growled a curse.

  “Goddamnit, Snake!” he snarled. “No weapons on display! You’re a prisoner!”

  “It’s just a mini-screecher,” she said. “It’s only good for discouraging guys who think I’m an easy lay.”

  “You’re not an easy anything,” said Pretorius, “but you’re damned well going to be an unarmed uneasy captive!”

  “All right,” she muttered. “You want it?”

  “No, they’re close enough to see if you hand me something. Stick it in your boot.”

  “And that’s what you and Apollo have done?”

  “That’s what I’ve done,” answered Pretorius. “Make sure it doesn’t make a bulge.”

  “Better start lining up,” said Apollo. “They’re almost close enough to make us out as individuals.”

  Proto stood directly behind Apollo, the three women, and Pretorius, in that order.

  “Don’t forget your weapon, Proto,” said Pretorius, and instantly the index finger on Proto’s right hand morphed into a wicked-looking burner.

  “If you’re going to prod me with it at any time,” said Pretorius, “give me a good hard push with your finger or hand so I’ll know what you’re doing.”

  “I can’t,” said Proto. “I don’t really have a finger or a hand.”

  “Shit! I forgot,” said Pretorius. “And nobody talks except Apollo. He’s going to be feeding me lines that I have to say for Proto, in between all the bullshit he’s yelling at the Janbottis and at Fate in general.”

  “They should be within earshot in another twenty seconds,” announced Apollo. “I’d say thirty, but they’ve got awfully big ears and it’s a pretty damned quiet planet, so far at least.”

  “From the look on their faces,” said Snake, “it looks like all they really want to say is ‘Die, Democracy swine!’”

  “Enough,” said Pretorius, lowering his voice to a harsh whisper. “From this point on, nobody talks except Apollo.”

  “And you, when you pretend I’m answering them,” added Proto.

  “Yes,” agreed Pretorius. “But none of you will react to me, or give any indication that my lips are even moving.”

  The lead Janbotti yelled something.

  “What was that?” asked Pretorius softly.

  “He wants us to walk up to him and his pals,” said Apollo. “No sense answering back. It’s a direct order, and besides, if you make your voice loud enough to match him, he’ll surely see that it’s coming from you. He’s a big bastard; probably even got thirty or forty pounds on me. That makes for a large lung capacity, and a hell of a loud voice.” He paused briefly. “Okay, from this point on, pay no attention to what I say unless I’m translating. I’ve got to get them used to the fact that I never shut up.”

  “Until they shoot you,” whispered Snake.

  “No problem,” said Apollo. “I’ll just hold you up in front of me.” He turned to face the largest of the Janbottis. “What do you think of that, meathead?”

  When they were twenty yards apart the lead Janbotti spoke.

  “I wouldn’t marry you if they gave me half the Democracy for a wedding gift!” yelled Apollo. “How you can stand to look at that face in the mirror is beyond me!” He then, very softly, uttered a single sentence in Janbotti, and after that went back to insulting the speaker.

  Pretorius whispered “Now, Proto” and began speaking while Proto’s lips were moving. When he finished he made a very soft clicking noise, rather than be seen reaching out to touch his “captor” who wasn’t standing there anyway, and Proto stopped mouthing words.

  “So you captured them on Brondoke?” said the leader as his mask directed and amplified his voice.

  Apollo frowned and translated between curses.

  “What is Brondoke?” asked Pretorius, as Proto pretended to utter the words.

  “The seventh planet, you ignorant fool!” said the leader. “Did they put up much of a fight?”

  Apollo kept up his performance.

  “I killed four of them,” said Pretorius through Proto.

  “I am sure the commander will be happy to reward you,” said the leader.

  “Who is the commander? I am a stranger to the Sett Empire.”

  “You certainly are!” cried the leader, with a laugh his companions all shared. “This is now the Cassiopeia Dominion, and our commander—the whole Dominion’s commander—is the magnificent Michkag. Surely you have heard of him?”

  “I thought he was the leader of the Coalition,” said Pretorius, as Proto moved his lips once again.

  “He still is,” came the answer. “And now he has added the Dominion to it. Where do you hail from?”

  Apollo uttered a few choice insults while transmitting the answer to Pretorius. Proto heard it, of course, as he had heard all the others. “I am from Matunite VI,” he said without thinking.

  Oh, shit! thought Pretorius. You blew it! I was supposed to do the talking for you!

  The leader stared at Proto intently. “Say that again.”

  He was too close for Apollo to translate without being overheard. Proto merely stared at him.

  “I will ask one more time: say that again.”

  “Matunite VI,” repeated Proto.

  “Not just the world,” said the leader, “but the whole damned sentence.”

  Proto stared at him silently.

  “I thought so!” said the leader. He pulled a dagger out of his belt and shoved it into what appeared to be Proto’s belly—and of course nothing happened except that hand and weapon went right through the image. He took a swing at Proto’s jaw, went through that image as well, and lost his balance. He fell atop the real Proto, and Pretorius kicked his head with all his strength, knocking him out.

  Suddenly they were facing half a dozen burners and screechers, all set to lethal—and then, before anyone could fire at the little group of Men, there was a huge beast in their midst, much like a Tyrannosaur but fifty percent larger.

  The Janbottis all turned their fire on the creature, which did it absolutely no harm.

  “Well, I’ll be a son of a—” began Apollo, pulling a burner out of his boot and firing at the nearest Janbotti. Less than a second later, Pretorius, Snake, Irish, and Pandora were firing their own weapons as well, and shortly after that they were facing a pile of Janbotti corpses.

  “Goddamn, that was clever!” enthused Apollo. “You ever pull anything like that before?”

  “I’ve never had to,” replied Proto, once again appearing as a Kabori. “It was just an act of desperation.”

  “Well, it’s one hell of an act!” said Apollo. “Put it in your resume. I’m sure we’ll want an encore or two before this mission is over.”

  “Everyone all right?” asked Pretorius.

  The three women all answered in the affirmative.

  “So what do we do next?” asked Apollo.

  “If they were watching closely, Proto’s trick isn’t going to work against them a second time,” said Pretorius.

  “It happened so fast,” said Irish. “I’d almost bet that none of them can be sure that Proto himself didn’t kill a couple of them while we were firing at the others.”

  “It just means they’re not going to invite us in,” replied Pretorius. “So we have two choices: break or shoot our way in, or try another outpost. Either way, it’s going to be difficult to keep our presence a secret.”

  “We can’t just stand out here all day,” said Apollo. “They’ll have locked the gates, of course, but we can blow them open.”

  “Why are we even doing this?” demanded Snake. “Our goal is halfway around the planet.”

  “We’d like to know how to approach it, what codes we need to signal them so they don’t blow us out of the sky as we approach,” answered Pretorius. “Also, only one of us can look like a Kabori. We’d like to find some diagram of that castle, as well as a signal that says we’re friends and please don’t shoot us a
s our ship approaches. We also want to know if there is some covert way of entering the castle, or at least some spot on that enormous building where we can get off the ship and into the place before we’re spotted.”

  “Well, Nate, do we try to get in, go back to the ship, or just stand here talking?” asked Apollo.

  “We go in like cowboys with our guns blazing,” said Pretorius. He turned to Proto. “Stay right in the middle of us, and get ready to scare the shit out of them again if and when I tell you to.”

  “Right,” said Proto.

  “Okay,” said Pretorius, “let’s get started.”

  The six of them raced up to the gate through which the Janbotti party had exited. There was no camouflage about pretending to be prisoners or being unarmed. When they reached it, Apollo fired his burner at the lock, which melted as the door swung open.

  The small dirt street in front of them was empty, and they prepared to enter the outpost.

  “There’s a roof over the whole damned complex,” said Pretorius. “That means they’re breathing their air, so put your oxygen masks on.”

  “They’ve got to have a few ships,” said Snake. “I wonder where they’re hiding them?”

  “I don’t know,” said Pretorius. “Just look into each window and doorway, and assume someone’s looking back even if you can’t see him.”

  “Got it!” said Apollo, looking at something he held in his hand.

  “Where?”

  “See that fourth building on the left?”

  “Looks like all the others,” said Pretorius. “What makes it different?”

  Apollo showed him a small device, about the size and depth of a poker chip.

  “What is it?”

  “It’s an energy reader,” answered Apollo. “And while everything looks alike, and everything looks deserted, that one building is consuming about eighty-five percent of all the power that this outpost is using.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Damned right I’m sure. I invented it.”

  “Hope to hell you’re as good as you think you are,” said Pretorius, turning to the rest of his team. “Fourth building on the left. Proto, resume human form and go first.”

  “I thought I was going first,” said Apollo, frowning.

  “You really want to?”

  “Hell, yes!”

  “Okay, go first. But when they blow your head off with a shot that would have been about five feet above Proto, remember that you volunteered.”

  “Oh, shit!” growled Apollo. “Suddenly I could only think of him as a blob or a dinosaur. Okay, Proto, after you.”

  “What do I do if I make it to the door before anyone starts shooting?”

  “You celebrate, because it means they’re all dead or asleep,” said Apollo.

  “Seriously, damn it!” said Proto. “I can’t reach out and push the damned thing open, even if you blow off the locks.”

  “If no one’s tried to shoot you or stop you, just step aside,” said Pretorius. “Once we start entering, come in second or third, so if you have to turn into a huge creepy-crawly, it’ll block their vision of everyone who’s behind you.”

  “Got it,” said Proto. “Should I start now?”

  Pretorius nodded his assent, and Apollo said, “Unless you got something better to do.”

  Proto began walking toward the fourth building on the left. The group expected to be fired upon any moment, but nothing upset the stillness of the afternoon air, and they soon saw why.

  “Well, that’s dumb!” said Apollo. “No windows.”

  “Damned place was probably built by whatever lived here before the Kaboris took over the planet and decided to stick the Janbottis out here,” said Pretorius. “It’s only been a year, a year and a half tops, and they’ve probably spent every spare minute and credit making the castle functional.”

  Proto reached the front entrance—it wasn’t really a door—and then stepped aside. A moment later Apollo blew it away and sent it crashing against an interior wall.

  “Why the hell didn’t you melt it?” demanded Snake. “It wouldn’t have made a sound.”

  “Look at the size of that thing,” responded Apollo. “Did you really want to walk across two meters of hot melting metal?”

  “Besides,” added Pretorius, “it’s not as if they don’t know we’re here.”

  Proto entered the compound, waiting for a shot that never came, and was followed a few seconds later by the five Men.

  “What now?” he asked.

  “No sense waiting to be picked off one by one,” said Pretorius. “Let’s draw their fire and see where they are.”

  “That’s suicidal!” snapped Snake.

  “For you or me, yes,” replied Pretorius. “But not for Proto.”

  “A dinosaur again?” said Proto.

  “No, I think they’d hide from that.” Pretorius paused in thought for a few seconds. “Come up with something about two-thirds the size of a Man. Cover him with scales, and give him a sling that holds a rifle—laser, projectile, sonic, I don’t care. But make it big. If they shoot first, I want them shooting at you before you can pull that weapon out of its sling and start shooting at them, or just at buildings in general. They’ve got to figure a gun like that’ll shoot through a wall like a knife through warm butter.”

  “Okay,” answered Proto. “Let me concentrate for a second.”

  “Gather around him so no one can see exactly what he’s doing,” ordered Pretorius.

  And it took very little more than a few seconds for Proto to appear exactly as Pretorius had described him.

  “I just saw some movement inside the building!” whispered Irish.

  “Well, they had to be somewhere,” said Snake.

  Proto turned to Pretorius. “Now?”

  Pretorius nodded his assent. “Now.”

  Proto took a tentative step inside the structure, then another, with Apollo directly behind him.

  “Ready or not,” said Apollo in a soft sing-song voice, “here we come!”

  14

  “What’s going on?” demanded Apollo, staring at the empty corridor. “Proto’s dinosaur couldn’t have scared them all away.”

  “I agree,” said Pretorius. “If there’s one thing they’re not, it’s cowards.”

  “Okay, keep your eyes and ears open,” said Apollo. “They have to be waiting somewhere that they think gives them the advantage.”

  They continued down the corridor, eyes and ears alert, weapons at the ready, but they couldn’t see a living soul.

  “There’s some grinding noise behind this door,” noted Apollo, pointing to his left.

  “Push it open and let Proto walk in first,” ordered Pretorius.

  “Okay,” said Proto. “I just hope they’d rather shoot me dead than in the foot so I can’t run away.”

  “Don’t think so much and just do what he tells you to do,” said Snake.

  Apollo gave the door a shove, and Proto entered the room. It seemed to be filled with machinery, but not any they were familiar with.

  “It’s sure as hell not a weapon, or an observation station,” said Proto. “There’s a computer over there controlling it, but it’s a pretty simplistic one.”

  Apollo walked around the room, studying the various sections of the machine. Finally he smiled.

  “You figured something out,” said Irish.

  “I think so,” he said, still smiling. “And no, this room’s not a weapon shop or an observation station. In fact, it’s a hell of a lot more important that that—at least, it is if you’re a Janbotti. You know what it is?”

  “What?” asked Pandora.

  “I’d say it’s a climate control room, but that’s too simplistic,” answered Apollo. “What it really is is an atmosphere control room. It’s providing them with the only stuff on the whole damned planet that they can breathe.”

  “You know, it makes sense,” said Pretorius.

  “Yes, it does,” said Apollo. Suddenly he smiled aga
in. “But it also tells us how to get from here to the castle without firing a shot or striking a blow.”

  “Oh?” said Pretorius.

  “I like you!” said Snake suddenly. “You’re even nastier than I am!”

  “You figured it out before the boss did,” said Apollo with a smile.

  “Oh, I figured it out,” said Pretorius. “I’m just not as delighted with wholesale slaughter as some of us are.” Pretorius frowned, lost in thought for a few seconds, then looked first at the ceiling and then at the walls. “Okay, they’re totally enclosed. No windows, no walls, not even a chimney that I could see. Should be a piece of cake.”

  “You know,” said Pandora, “it makes sense. The castle was built the same way: no windows, no inner courtyards, nothing but a roof that covers every inch of it, with solid walls right down to the ground, so Michkag can give visitors whatever air and gravity they need without having to transport them to and from an outpost like this.”

  “We’ll worry about the castle when we come to it,” said Pretorius, pulling out a burner from one boot and a screecher from the other. “First things first. Time for target practice.”

  And so saying, he activated the burner and melted the computer that seemed to be the brain of the machine. Soon everyone but Proto, who of course could not lift or hold a weapon, was firing at the huge machine until it turned into a reeking pile of melted sludge.

  “Now what?” asked Pandora.

  “Now we wait until they have trouble breathing or functioning,” answered Pretorius.

  “We can speed that happy moment up a bit,” said Apollo, walking back out into the corridor and blowing a huge hole in the ceiling and roof. “Might as well let that wonderful stuff escape into the atmosphere rather than give these bastards an extra few minutes of comfort.”

  They talked, and they waited, and after about half an hour they heard a pair of ships’ engines starting to warm up.

  Pretorius turned to Apollo and Snake. “Go outside and see to it that they don’t take off to warn anyone about us.”

  “Jesus!” exclaimed Snake, when she and Apollo returned a moment later. “It was like shooting clay pigeons in a carnival back when I was a kid!”