DOM#67A
LOSTON, COLORADO
AD 1999
10:46 AM TUESDAY
***ALERT MODE***
The cable pulled Malachi to the next level. He almost jumped off automatically, then realized that a free-hanging cable would provide no leverage with which to push off, and he would not jump but fall, a swift flight to the bottom of the shaft, to the center of the earth where he would be dashed to pieces, never to return. Unlike most of Loston’s inhabitants, he could not come back to life if he was killed. The divinity that protected him from direct attack was also his weakness: he could die, so falling was not an acceptable option.
He swung the heavy cable back and forth like a child’s swing, using his body to push jerkily back and forth. The cable whipped back and forth, and the entrance to the mine level he had just passed slowly sank before him. Malachi doubted if he would make it to the next level - one of the Controllers might shoot him long before he got there, sending him plummeting to his death in the deep bowels of the earth - so he let go.
He almost didn’t make it, throwing his gun as he fell so it landed in the tunnel, and then grabbing onto the lip of the mineshaft floor with both hands. His shoulders felt as though scalding acid had been poured over them as the full weight of his wiry body pounded downward, wrested from gravity’s grip by his own muscle and will.
He pulled himself up, gasping as he lay in the mouth of the tunnel, one arm hanging over the edge into nothingness.
What now? he asked himself.
What now?
***
One level below, the four Controllers watched the wire reel past. Then one of them - Elijah, the senior Recovery officer - signaled for the group to move forward. All of them jumped almost as one, grabbing onto the wire and hanging on one-handed, rifles aimed steadily upward.
Elijah saw Malachi’s arm and fired. The other three followed suit and fired as well, the sonic blasts dislodging bits of dirt from the sides of the shaft. The silt fell on them like black rain, and the arm disappeared.
Elijah hoped they had managed to hit Malachi, but doubted it. The bastard was slippery. Besides, Elijah could remember when Malachi had been a Controller and the head of the Recovery Operatives. He hadn’t trained Elijah, but Elijah knew from Reco-Ops myth that Malachi was the best.
No, not just the best. The best ever. Someone capable of wiping them out. And they didn’t know how many of them would be allowed to kill him, even if they were so lucky to get in a position where such became possible. Because his genetic makeup was something so rare that most of the Controllers would not be able to harm him, even if it meant dying themselves instead.
Stopping him would be hard.
Maybe impossible.
***
Jenna stumbled as the lift jerked around her. The cage rattled and the cable below it tautened suddenly, as though something below was suddenly pulling on it. The motor whined above, sending eerie echoes down the shaft that sounded like the shriek of a baby being sliced with razors. Jenna had heard a baby dying that way once. Malachi had done it, had killed a child and brought back a video reproduction of it, played on the primitive media of that time and place. A videocassette, showing him killing the infant, draining it of blood, and kissing the dead child on the mouth after it was all done, after the cries had ended and all was celestial silence. She shuddered.
Then shuddered again as she reached the top level in the shaft, and thumbed the button. The elevator jerked to a halt, and she got out.
Time to wait.
***
Elijah almost lost his grip on the elevator cable when the elevator stopped. Two of the others did lose their grips, falling about a foot down the cord before regaining their hold and sliding to a stop.
They waited a moment, but the elevator didn’t move again.
He looked at the troops. They still held their guns with one hand, each pulse blaster aimed upward, each person probably praying for Malachi to pop his head out, but Elijah knew that was a hollow hope. Malachi wouldn’t do anything so foolish.
Elijah also knew they couldn’t climb and cover themselves at the same time.
They were stuck.
***
Adam moved back and forth, trying to discern some distinguishing mark that would tell him where he was. He hated to admit it, but he was lost. He was positive the entrance to the mine shaft was nearby, but all the tunnels looked so similar that it was hard to find one that looked merely familiar, as opposed to the exactly the same as every other tunnel he had traversed.
Then he saw something in the tunnel ahead.
"The elevator," he whispered, and headed for the shaft, the three Controllers following behind.
***
Malachi lay on his back, weighing his options.
The Controllers had come en masse, that much was sure. He wanted to kill Fran and John. But more than that he needed to survive. That limited his range of choices.
He resisted the urge to look out and down the elevator shaft; it was a sure bet that the Controllers were waiting for him to do just that. Nor could he reach out and fire blindly downward, hoping to hit them. They were sure to be watching the lip of the floor where it merged with the elevator shaft, and if he put out his arm he had no doubt it would be hit and paralyzed by a pulse before he got off a single shot.
So he looked up instead.
The elevator was up there, though he couldn’t see it. And as sure as anything, there were more Controllers above him, too. Adam was more than likely among them.
And don’t forget the four Controllers below. Hanging below, waiting for a chance to come up and capture him.
The more he thought about what to do, the more his mind kept returning to the elevator. At first he thought his subconscious was telling him to call it down and ride it out. He rejected the idea. As soon as he got on, the Controllers below would fire up, puncturing the lift, paralyzing him. The elevator might fall as a result, but he knew they’d be more than willing to hurtle to their deaths if it meant stopping him. He didn’t think that they’d be able to do willingly cause his death, but an accidental murder might be within their action parameters, and he’d be just as dead as if they’d done it on purpose. So he would stay off the elevator.
The elevator.
He smiled then as he realized what his subconscious had been trying to tell him, then wiggled out as far as he could onto the lip of the tunnel. It projected a bit into the shaft, providing him an unobstructed view straight up while still shielding him from any shots ascending from below.
He aimed his gun up the shaft and pulled the trigger. Not once, but many times. The pinging of bullets tearing into the lift above sounded in response to his actions, and Malachi imagined the bullets punching holes, tearing through machinery.
Shearing cables.
The cable that trailed below the lift began to swing wildly, and he heard screams from below.
Let them cry, he thought. Let the Controllers weep in their last moments and feel the emptiness that comes to those who have no souls.
They wouldn’t die, he knew. They couldn’t.
Because most of the Controllers, like the berserk inhabitants of Loston, were machines.