Undying World Part 11

Blade sighed and d.a.m.ned himself. He had accepted the girl's love, and in so doing he had incurred responsibility.

He searched the other apartments on the top floor. In the last one, near the stairs, he found a female sleeper naked on her bed, well raped but otherwise unharmed. On the floor beside her there was a male sleeper with his power stud hacked out. Blade, studying the gruesome scene, realized for the first time that the Morphi sleepers bled a bit when wounded-not much, in all cases, only a seepage of dark blood, but they did bleed.

Near the bed was a pair of Gnomen denim breeches. The clothes of the male sleeper were missing. Blade got out of his own clothes and stepped into the denim breeches. They were tight but he managed. He had enough chest and body hair to fool the Gnomen, but he also had a full head of hair, which would give him away immediately. He went into the kitchen and found soap but no water. Using a can of sweet drink, he lathered his head and began to shave. It was a slow and painful process.

When his head was bald he was still not satisfied. He was not bald enough. Gnomen had no hair roots.

He went back into the bedroom, meaning to smear some of the blood from the Morphi male sleeper on himself, when he noticed the door set back in an alcove. It was locked. Blade went to glance down into the street. It was quiet, deserted but for mutilated and raped sleepers and a few overturned cars. The building was quiet. He had to strain to hear the rampaging of the Gnomen hordes far off across the endless city. By direction and the faintness of the sounds, the main body of Gnomen had moved well beyond the Government Building.

He went back to the locked door and attacked it with his spear bar. The plastic panels were tough but in less than a minute he had it down. He stepped in.

It was a small lab of some sort. For a moment he could not figure it out, then he remembered that the Morphi, when active, changed their blood once a month.

There was a naked Morphi female sleeper on a table. Beside her on a wheeled stand was a tall plastic flask somewhat resembling a water cooler back in HD. Tubes led from the flask to the sleeper on the table. Blade stepped nearer and studied her carefully. She had been in the act of changing her blood when the power stopped, and because of the locked door she was untouched by Gnomen.

As he bent over her Blade was aware of a reaction in his loins. He knew it for what it was, quite apart from the physical fact of an erection. He had been in Dimension X long enough, too long, and he was beginning to overadapt. She was lovely, this sleeper, so far inviolate, and as he gazed down at the slim body and perfect small b.r.e.a.s.t.s, the sleek texture of the skin and the sweet curve of thighs, he could not deny the urge to mount her.

Yet he did deny it, could still deny it. He concentrated on his examination of the sleeper, not touching her, and saw what he had missed before. In the inner crook of each elbow was a small metal ring containing a springed valve. The blood tubes had plastic nozzles that fitted into the valves. Blade went to the upright flask and turned a lever. Blood began to flow into the sleeper and to drain from her at the same time. The old blood went into the top of the flask, while the new drained from the- bottom. Blade nodded. Quite a feat. Change your own blood. Do it yourself. No doubt it explained why the Morphi never aged, never lost their beauty.

He yanked the inflowing tube out of her arm. Dark blood dripped. Blade bent and let it spray on his shaven head. He smeared it on his face and chest. He soaked his spear bar with it.

He left the apartment and went down to the street. The disguise was the best he could come up with. At a distance it might work. He hunched over to conceal his tallness and began to shamble, as did the Gnomen. He saw nothing but sleepers as he made his way toward the Hall of Entertainment.

Blade pa.s.sed through a park that the Gnomen had missed. Here the sleepers were untouched, the males with their power studs intact and the females unravished. As he made his way through and out of the park he counted about five hundred males. He knew then how to combat the Gnomen. The Morphi outnumbered them by the hundreds of thousands. Repower the Morphi and the rebellion of the sewer people would be crushed.

Blade did not want that. An idea had come to glow and grow in his mind. He was going to have a shot at carrying it out. He could do no less than try. There must be a way in which the Gnomen and the Morphi could live together in peace and mutual respect.

CHAPTER 14.

Sart tried to remember what it was that the man Blade had whispered to him before he left the power complex. Sart could think better when Blade was there to prompt him. Now, as he stood guard at the door of the bunker and watched Wilf and Sybelline whisper, Sart strained his limited mentality trying to recall Blade's words. Something about the b.u.t.ton. The black b.u.t.ton in the red plaque. They were not to touch it, not until the man Blade sent a message. If they tried to touch it he, Sart, was to stop them. Kill them if he must. Was that it? Did he remember rightly?

Sybelline and her son-paramour, Wilf, sat close together on the table where she had so recently simulated the love act. The white-haired woman was still s.e.xually aroused, but she did not want Wilf. She wanted Blade.

Intuition told her that she would never have Blade, that he had no interest in her, that he had been hard put to conceal his revulsion when she offered herself. Rage began to build in her, anger at Blade and Wilf, who seemed so content to serve him. Her own son and lover had turned against her.

But it was not a time to think of pleasure. That could wait. Sybelline saw her chance to be Queen of the Morphi slipping away. What was Blade doing up there? Betraying her? Striking a bargain with Jantor? And what would the Selenes, Onta, think and do when she did not communicate with them? She had been a fool, Sybelline brooded, to allow herself to be trapped down here six miles from the scene of action. Blade had outsmarted her.

True that she had made submission to him, but that was only a formality. She had done it before, with other masters, and it never meant anything. She was Sybelline. She was meant to rule. Soon now she must act or her chance would be forever gone.

Wilf watched his mother and kept his thoughts to himself. He desired nothing but to serve the man Blade. He had never seen anyone like Blade, nor dreamed that such a being could exist. How like a G.o.d he was, and Wilf had read enough in Morphi not to believe in G.o.d. But in Blade he saw divinity incarnate. He saw nothing impossible to Blade. Blade was capable of ruling the Gnomen and the Morphi, and perhaps even of defeating the Selenes. Wilf cherished his fantasies. If Blade succeeded then he-Wilf-would sit at his right hand and share all his triumphs.

"He has been gone a long while," said Sybelline, "and still no message down the chute." She glanced at an indicator on the bunker wall. It would buzz and register with a sweep hand whenever something touched the plastic pads beneath the chute.

Wilf stared at her. He was getting a feeling about his mother. He had never trusted her, but now he trusted her even less. He knew her better than she suspected. He knew she had contempt for him, underrated him. He sensed that she was brooding and unhappy and this might lead to anything. Sybelline was capable of doing rash and unpleasant things, for all her intelligence.

"He had a long way to go," said Wilf. "Six miles-and with mole rats and Gnomen to contend with. My trip down was hard enough; his journey up will be more so. He may be dead by now."

He did not really think so, but he wanted to see her reaction.

It was mixed, half smile and half frown. "I need him," she said, "and I wish I did not. I am a bit afraid of him. I think he wants power for himself."

Wilf laughed. "And you want it for yourself."

Sybelline admitted to it. "I should have it. I have waited long and endured much." Her green eyes narrowed. "And you, Wilf, are you after power also?"

He thought a moment before saying, "Not for myself. I would not mind sharing it with the man Blade. Mostly I desire knowledge-I want to know for the sake of knowing." He pointed to the consoles surrounding them, to the dials and gauges and toggles, to the tunnel leading to the master power cube.

"How does it all work? Why? Why are the Gnomen the lower orders, the Morphi our masters and the Selenes theirs? Why?"

Sybelline sneered at him. "You are a fool, even if you are my son. Knowledge is power, I admit that, but it is impossible to have power and use it to your own advantage without fully understanding it. That is the difference between us. You fret your meager brains about the whys of power. I want it-now-to use for myself."

Sart spoke from the door. "The mole rats are creeping closer again. They are over their scare."

Sybelline looked at him in contempt. She had made her decision and knew what to do. This was an opening.

"Go and kill one or two with your spear bar," she told him. "Give the others something to eat."

Sart came into the light of the torches. He made the sign of the fylfot on his bald head. "Me? Face the mole rats? I cannot, Sybelline. I have always been in terror of them. I cannot face them."

Sybelline looked at Wilf. He was heavily bandaged and could barely move. He was little better than Sart, she thought.

But at least Wilf had ideas. He pointed to a corner of the bunker. On the wall hung a red plastic cylinder with a short hose attached. Blade would have compared it to a fire extinguisher in Home Dimension.

"The laughing powder," he said. "It works on Gnomen and Morphi, why not on mole rats."

Sybelline knew of the powder in the little tank. She had seen it in use. Wilf had only read of it. Sart had done neither, but had heard the stories. One squirt of powder from the tank and you began to laugh. You could not stop. You grew weak with laughter, your head ached, your bones turned to slop, you fell and could not move. All this from one light whiff of the powder. A heavier dosage and you died laughing. It was all the weapon the Morphi had ever needed to control the Gnomen. They had others, more powerful weapons, but neither Wilf nor Sybelline understood them.

Sart stared at the cylinder in awe. He shook his head. "I dare not use it. I might harm myself. I do not understand it.

Sybelline made a sound of contempt. "Why Blade spared your miserable life, I will never comprehend."

Sart scratched his head and admitted that he did not understand it either. Sybelline s.n.a.t.c.hed his spear bar from him before he knew what was happening. "Come with me," she commanded. "We do not need the laughing powder for mole rats. I will show you how it is done. Fetch one of the torches," she ordered Sart.

Wilf watched them go with a lack of concern. He hoped the mole rats would eat them both. If so, they would serve a double purpose. Their deaths would leave him a clear field with the man Blade and provide food to keep the mole rats at bay. Wilf stretched out full length on the table and began to fantasy again. What would it be like to kiss the feet of the man Blade?

Sart was right about the mole rats. They had greatly increased in numbers and formed a gobbling, sinister-eyed circle around the bunker. Sart, near to panic, held the torch high and waved it. The creatures held their ground.

Sybelline readied the spear bar. "Go just in front of me," she ordered. "There to the right, that big one. If I can kill him they will be satisfied for a time."

Sart gibbered in fear. He clutched at his heavily bandaged torso. "My wound," he complained. "It pains me greatly. I may fall and be eaten. I cannot do this thing. I-"

"Turn around," said the woman. "Let me see. Perhaps the bandage and the s.h.i.+eld have come loose."

She knew the exact location of Sart's grievous wound. She readied the sharp end of the bar. As he turned, she thrust hard at the s.h.i.+eld protecting his heart. The keen point went deep, easily piercing the plastic s.h.i.+eld, the heart behind it and grating on bone in his spine.

Sart was a Gnoman and brave. He glared at her, reached for her with his bare hands, tried to walk along the bar impaling him to get at her. Sybelline retreated, still holding to the bar, seeking to retrieve it and strike again. Sart grabbed the bar with blood-slippery hand and sought to pull it out of his body. Failing that he tried to pull himself along it, to push it behind him, out of his flesh, so he could reach her. At last, beginning to panic, Sybelline released the bar. But it was too late for Sart. He went to his knees, blood pouring from his mouth. The mole rats picked up the scent and went into a frenzy.

Sart stopped twitching. The mole rats began to close in. Sybelline tugged the bar out of Sart's body and ran for the safety of the bunker. The horde of mole rats was already ripping and tearing at the body.

Sybelline was gasping for breath when she entered the bunker, still carrying the blood-stained spear bar.

Wilf sat up. "What happened?"

Sybelline was shaking, her voice trembled. "The mole rats got Sart. We killed one and he slipped in the blood. They were on him before he could get up. I could do nothing. I had to flee to save my own life." She found a towel and wiped blood from the bar. Her gown was badly spattered.

Wilf stared at her. He rested on an elbow and listened to the terrible sounds out there in the dark. He did not believe her. Sart was stupid, but not that stupid. And while he was brave enough in other matters he was a coward where mole rats were concerned. Sart would never have gotten close enough to the creatures to slip and be eaten by them.

Wilf smiled at his mother. "You lie to me. You killed him and fed him to the mole rats."

Sybelline smiled back at him. "Yes, I did. So what matter? Now move over and perform for your mother, Wilf. All that blood has excited me."

She got on the table with him, pulled up her b.l.o.o.d.y gown and opened her thighs. She cradled his head on her b.r.e.a.s.t.s.

"I command," she whispered. "You are my son and you must obey."

Wilf did not have to be urged. He did not really want to but he was young in Gnomen years and he was ready instantly. Sybelline, as usual, spoke no words and did not moan or even move very much. She simply engulfed him. She was quite capable of taking her pleasure and thinking at the same time. She did both now.

When it was over she patted his head and said, "Sleep now for a time. I will watch for Blade's message. It cannot be long and we must be ready. I will waken you the moment it comes."

Wilf, sleepy and dazed; realized that she had used her body and his to make a fool of him. He sought to struggle up, off the table. He looked at her. Something was wrong. Something in her smile was- Sybelline had the cylinder in her hands and was pointing the hose nozzle at him. A fine spray of powder, under great pressure, hit him in the face. Wilf began to laugh.

She gave him another squirt, and another, and left him in laughter, too weak to move. She picked up the spear bar and began to gouge the power studs out of the necks of the four sleeper technicians. It was b.l.o.o.d.y work but no matter, she was already covered with blood.

CHAPTER 15.

Richard Blade made his way through the ravished city. He kept to the shadows as much as possible, noticing that more and more of the searchlights were being beamed at the city from the Moon. The Selenes were up to something, no doubt of that. Nor was there any doubt that they knew precisely what was going on down here.

The streets and squares were littered with Morphi sleepers, the females all raped and most of the men either destudded or beheaded. But the wandering, drunken squads of Gnomen were careless killers. They had missed some of the men, who slept unharmed. They were also fighting among themselves. Near one particularly beautiful Morphi female were two dead Gnomen. Each had a spear bar through him. Blade smiled grimly. Cans of intoxicant lay nearby. They had killed each other over the women. He was about to turn away when he noticed an iron chain and a medallion about the neck of one of the dead Gnomen. He had been a subchief. Blade stripped the body of the chain and medal and hung it about his own neck. The authority it carried might come in handy when his disguise was put to the test.

That was not long in coming. He was nearing the Hall of Entertainment, slipping from door to door, when a Gnoman emerged from a building ahead of him. The man was laden with loot and was dragging a female Morphi along by the hair. Blade hailed him. Might as well know now if his disguise worked. The Gnoman did not look drunk and it would be a fair test.

"You, there," he called in a voice of authority, "why are you lagging behind your group? Where are the others?"

The Gnoman, startled, dropped his loot and whirled to face Blade. He clutched his bar in one hand and with the other held fast to the hair of the woman sleeper. He peered at Blade with red-brown eyes. His tone was bellicose.

"Who are you? What is it to you what I do?"

"I am Yorick," Blade improvised, "and I am a subchief. I act on the orders of Jantor. There are too many strays and skulkers and I am sent to round them up. How are you called, man?"

The Gnoman stared at the iron chain and medallion and became less sullen. "I am Tortat, from the far outer sewers. My group has gone to the Government Building on orders."

"Why are you not with them? And why do you carry that female sleeper with you?"

The man let go the hair and the body slumped to the street. He grinned at Blade. "I took a fancy to her. She is best of all I have found and so I carry her with me. When the notion takes me again I will have her handy."

Blade pushed it a bit, wanting to test matters still further. "Leave her and be off to your group, Tortat. You can take the rest of your loot. Cause no more trouble and I will forget this. Go now."

The Gnoman glowered and narrowed his eyes at Blade. Blade moved his bar into thrust position.

The advantage fell to Blade. The Gnoman grumbled and fell back. "You are big for a Gnoman. How came you by all that blood? It masks your face."

Blade pushed his advantage. "Go, I said. Never mind the blood. I carry out my orders and kill Morphi instead of looking for loot and females. Now, if you are not gone by a three count your name goes to Jantor for punishment."

The man held up a hand. "I go-I go-but I beg leave to wait for my comrade. He will not be long."

"Comrade?" Blade had not bargained on two. He turned wary and moved his bar into a defensive position. The Gnoman turned to shout into the foyer of the building he had just left.

"Porfax. Hurry up, you fool. There is an officer here who says we must join our group."

Blade moved so he could peer into the foyer. Another Gnoman was topping a female sleeper, copulating furiously. He answered without looking up from his work. "A moment, Tortat, a moment. I am nearly finished."

Blade broke off the encounter. He walked away, growling back to the Gnoman, Tortat. "Let him finish. Then both get to your group. You may not have heard, but Jantor is punis.h.i.+ng all lawbreakers by feeding them to the mole rats. It is your choice."

Blade rounded a corner and broke into a run. Hs disguise had worked well enough thus far. Then the first head pain struck him.

The agony blinded him. A streak of black lightning in his brain. He reeled into another foyer and fell to his knees, clutching his temples. He d.a.m.ned the computer-not now, not yet, not while he still had hopes of completing his mission. He still had a bare chance to bring peace into this devastated and terror-ridden DX The pain eased. It was only the preliminary groping of the computer as it moved near the return phase. Blade concentrated with all his power, trying to get through to Lord Leighton by the crystal.

Almost immediately the crystal reversed itself, the surge alternated to feedback from HD, and Blade, though grateful that the pain was gone, began to curse as he deciphered Lord L's thoughts in his own mind. The d.a.m.ned old fool. At a time like this!

If possible explore use of quarks and partons by scientists DX. Projection here of information received so far indicates possible accelerator capable of 500 million, correct, billion, repeat billion electron volts. Quantum also possible theory with quanta, i.e., packages, transmitted in units for powering each organism Morphi. Realize this complex but unable simplify. Urge you at all costs contact DX form of life for this information-in following priority: method transferring rock to power-method transmitting through s.p.a.ce, re latter explore magnetohydrodynamics, also cryogenic sub-surface-this latter definite possible in view of your sewer people-do best for England-hurry-return phase approaching. Leighton.

Blade sat on the floor of the foyer and swore. He rubbed his shaven, blood-smeared head. An afterthought of Lord L's popped into his brain via crystal.

. . proud of you. Renaming this mission Prometheus. Also alert for possible triple or quadruple breeder reactors. Keep close contact. Crystal working perfectly. LL.

Blade said some nasty words. All that scientific garbage -did the old man really think that Blade was able to comprehend it, much less obtain information by bluff on the basis of a garbled message which meant nothing at all to Blade? He was more at home in Morphi than he was in the scientific gibberish Lord L had just planted in his brain.

Such thinking was a form of self-pity and Blade knew it. It would never do. He had no time for self-pity, no time for anything but survival and, just possibly, some answers.

He waited to be sure there would be no more head pains, then continued on to the Hall of Entertainment. He had to smile as he approached the ma.s.sive building. Lord L would explode if he knew that Blade, far from looking for "quarks and partons," was trying to save a Gnoman girl from mole rats. Just at that moment it would have pleased Blade beyond measure to suspend both Lord L and the Prime Minister over a pit of mole rats.

The lobby doors of the Hall of Entertainment stood open. Blade, from a doorway across the way, could see on a diagonal through the lobby and into the inner recesses of the hall. Half a dozen Gnomen troopers lounged about the lobby. They did not look happy. They would be, Blade pondered, part of the guard left to stand watch over Norn, if indeed Jantor was using her as bait.

There was no sign of the girl. He would have to go into the hall to test the trap. All he could see, apart from the lobby, was a maze of corridors. Blade hefted his spear bar and strode boldly across the street and into the lobby. Audacity was the only way. He bent over to conceal his tallness and shambled, wondering once again why he was risking everything for the sake of one Gnoman girl. It could not be love-he scarcely knew her other than s.e.xually-and so it must be sentiment, and sentiment was extremely dangerous in Dimension X.

Most of the Gnomen soldiers ignored him. Three were playing dice and did not even look up. One fellow, a sub-subchief, glanced at Blade and made a vague gesture of salute.