Rama Revealed(Rama IV)

ESCAPE Chapter 1

"Nicole."

At first the soft, mechanical voice seemed to be part of her dream. But when she heard her name repeated, slightly louder, Nicole awakened with a start.

A wave of intense fear swept through her. They have come for me, Nicole thought immediately. It is morning. I am going to die in a few hours.

She took a slow, deep breath and tried to quell her mounting panic. A few seconds later Nicole opened her eyes. It was completely dark in her cell. Puzzled, Nicole looked around for the person who had called her.

"We are here, on your cot, beside your right ear," the voice said very softly. "Richard sent us to help you escape... but we must move quickly."

For an instant Nicole thought that perhaps she was still dreaming. Then she heard a second voice, very similar to the first but nevertheless distinct. "Roll over on your right side and we will illuminate ourselves."

Nicole rolled over. Standing on the cot next to her head she saw two tiny figures, no more than eight or ten centimeters high, each in the shape of a woman. They were glowing momentarily from some internal light source. One had short hair and was dressed in the armor of a fifteenth century European knight. The second figure was wearing both a crown upon her head and the full, pleated dress of a medieval queen.

"I am Joan of Arc," the first figure said.

"And I am Eleanor of Aquitaine."

Nicole laughed nervously and stared in astonishment at die two figures. Several seconds later, when the robots' internal lights were extinguished, Nicole had finally composed herself enough to speak. "So Richard sent you to help me escape?" she said in a whisper. "Just how do you propose to do that?"

"We've already sabotaged the monitoring system," tiny Joan said proudly. "And reprogrammed a Garcia biot... It should be here in a few minutes to let you out."

"We have a nominal escape plan, along with several contingencies," Eleanor added. "Richard has been working on it for months-ever since he finished making us."

Nicole laughed again. She was still absolutely stunned. "Really?" she said. "And may I ask just where my genius of a husband is at this moment?"

"Richard is in your old lair underneath New York," Joan replied. "He said to tell you that nothing has changed there. He is following our progress with a navigation beacon... Incidentally, Richard sends his love. He hasn't forgotten - "

"Be still for a moment, please," Eleanor interrupted as Nicole automatically scratched at the tickling sensation behind her right ear. "I'm deploying your personal beacon right now, and it's very heavy for me."

Moments later Nicole touched the tiny instrument package next to her ear and shook her head. "And can he hear us also?" she asked.

"Richard decided we couldn't risk voice transmissions," Eleanor answered. "They could be too easily intercepted by Nakamura... However, he will be monitoring our physical location."

"You may get up now," Joan said, "and put on your clothes. We want to be ready when the Garcia arrives."

Will wonders never cease? Nicole thought while she was washing her face in the dark in the primitive basin. For a few brief seconds Nicole imagined that the two robots might be part of a clever New Eden government plot and that she was going to be killed trying to escape. Impossible, she told herself a few moments later. Even if one of Nakamura's minions could create robots like these, only Richard would know enough about me to make a Joan of sArc and an Eleanor of Aquitaine... Anyway, what differ-<ettee does it make if I'm killed while trying to escape? My electrocution is scheduled for eight o'clock this morning.

There was the sound of a biot approaching outside her cell. Nicole tensed, still not completely convinced that her two tiny friends were indeed telling her the truth. "Sit back down on the cot," she heard Joan say behind her, "so Eleanor and I can climb into your pockets." Nicole felt the two robots scrambling up the front of her shirt. She smiled. You are amazing, Richard, she thought.

The Garcia biot was carrying a flashlight. It strode into Nicole's cell with an air of authority. "Come with me, Mrs. Wakefield," it said in a loud voice. "I have orders to move you to the preparations room."

Again Nicole was frightened. The biot certainly wasn't acting friendly. What if... But she had very little time to think. The Garcia led Nicole through the corridor outside her cell at a rapid pace. Twenty meters later, they passed both the regular set of biot guards and a human command-mg officer, a young man Nicole had never seen before. "Wait," the man yelled from behind them just as Nicole and (he Garcia were about to climb the stairs. Nicole froze.

"You forgot to sign the transfer papers," the man said, holding out a document to die Garcia. "Certainly," the biot replied, entering its identification number on the papers with a flourish. After less than a minute Nicole was outside the large faouse where she had been imprisoned for months. She took a deep breath of the fresh air and started to follow the Garcia down a padi toward Central City.

"No," Nicole heard Eleanor call from her pocket. "We're not going with the biot. Go west. Toward that windmill with the light on top. And you must run. We must arrive at Max Puckett's before dawn."

Her prison was almost five kilometers from Max's farm. Nicole jogged down the small road at a steady pace, urged on periodically by one of the two robots, who were keeping careful track of the time. It was not long until dawn. Unlike on the Earth, where the transition from night to day was gradual, in New Eden dawn was a sudden, discontinuous event. One moment it would be dark and then, in the next instant, the artificial sun would ignite and begin its mini-arc across the ceiling of the colony habitat.

"Twelve more minutes until light," Joan said, as Nicole reached the bicycle path that led the final two hundred meters to the Puckett farmhouse. Nicole was nearly exhausted, but she kept running. Two separate times during her run across the farmland she had felt a dull ache in her chest. I am definitely out of shape, she thought, chastising herself for not having exercised regularly in her prison cell. 45 well as sixty years old, more or less.

The farmhouse was dark. Nicole stopped on the porch, catching her breath, and the door opened a few seconds later. "I have been waiting for you," Max said, his earnest expression underscoring the seriousness of the situation. He gave Nicole a quick hug. "Follow me," he said, moving quickly off toward the barn.

"There have been no police cars yet on the road," Max said when they were inside the bam. "They probably have not yet discovered that you're gone. But it's only a matter of minutes now."

The chickens were all kept on the far side of the barn. The hens had a separate enclosure, sealed off from the roosters and the rest of the building. When Max and Nicole entered the henhouse, mere was a huge commotion. Animals scurried in all directions, clucking and squawking and beating their wings. The stench in the henhouse nearly overpowered Nicole.

Max smiled. "I guess I forget how bad chicken shit smells to everyone else," he said, "I've grown so used to it myself." He slapped Nicole lightly on the back. "Anyway, it's another level of protection for you, and I don't think you'll be able to smell the shit from your hideout."

Max walked over to a corner of the henhouse, chased several hens out of the way, and bent down on his knees. "When those weird little robots of Richard's first appeared," he said, pushing aside hay and chicken feed, "I couldn't decide where I should build your hideout. Then I thought about this place." Max pulled up a couple of boards to expose a rectangular hole in the floor of the barn. "I sure as hell hope I was right."

He motioned for Nicole to follow him and then crawled into the hole. They were both on their hands and knees in the dirt. The passageway, which ran parallel to the floor for a few meters and then turned downward at a steep angle, was extremely cramped. Nicole kept bumping up against Max in front of her and the dirt walls and ceiling all around her. The only light was the small flashlight that Max was carrying in his right hand. After fifteen meters the small tunnel opened into a dark room. Max stepped carefully down a rope ladder and then turned to help Nicole descend. A few seconds later they both walked into the center of the room, where Max reached up and switched on a solitary electric light.

"It's not a palace," he said as Nicole glanced around, "but I suspect it's a damn sight better than that prison of yours."

The room contained a bed, a chair, two shelves full of food, another shelf with electronic bookdiscs, a few clothes hanging in an open closet, basic toiletries, a large drum of water that must have barely fit through the passageway, and a deep, square latrine in the far corner.

"Did you do all this yourself?' Nicole asked.

"Yep," Max replied. "At night... during the last several weeks. I didn't dare ask anybody to help."

Nicole was touched. "How can I ever thank you?" she said.

"Don't get caught." Max grinned. "I don't want to die any more than you do... Oh, by the way," he added, handing Nicole an electronic reader into which she could place the bookdiscs, "I hope the reading material is all right. Manuals on raising pigs and chickens are not the same as your father's novels, but I didn't want to attract too much attention by going to the bookstore."

Nicole crossed the room and kissed him on the cheek. "Max," she said lightly, "you are such a dear friend. I can't imagine how you - "

"It's dawn outside now," Joan of Arc interrupted from Nicole's pocket. "According to our timeline, we are behind schedule. Mr. Puckett, we must inspect our egress route before you leave us."

"Shit," said Max. "Here I go again, taking orders from a robot no longer than a cigarette." He lifted Joan and Eleanor out of Nicole's pockets and placed them on the top shelf behind a can of peas. "Do you see that little door?" he said. "There's a pipe on the other side. It comes out just beyond the pig trough... Why don't you check it out?"

During the minute or two that the robots were gone,. Max explained the situation to Nicole. "The police will searching everywhere for you," he said. "Particularly hei since they know that I am a friend of the family. So going to seal the entrance to your hideout. You should hi everything you need to last for at least several weeks.

"The robots can come and go freely, unless they eaten by the pigs," Max continued with a laugh. "They be your only contact with the outside world. They'll let yc know when it's time to move to the second phase of escape plan."

"So I won't see you again?" Nicole asked.

"Not for at least a few weeks," Max answered. "It's too dangerous... , One more thing: if there are police on the premises, I will cut off your power. That will be your signal to stay especially quiet."

Eleanor of Aquitaine had returned and was standing on the shelf next to the can of peas. "Our egress route is excellent," she announced. "Joan has departed for a few days. She intends to leave the habitat and communicate with Richard."

"Now I must leave also," Max said to Nicole. He was silent for a few seconds. "But not before I tell you one thing, my lady friend... As you probably know, I have been a f*cking cynic all my life. There are not very many people who impress me. But you have convinced me that maybe some of us are superior to chickens and pigs." Max smiled. "Not many of us," he added quickly, "but at least some."

"Thank you, Max," Nicole said.

Max walked over to the ladder. He turned around and waved before he began his climb.

Nicole sat down in the chair and took a deep breath. From the sounds in the direction of the tunnel, she surmised correctly that Max was sealing the entrance to her hideout by placing the big bags of chicken feed directly over the hole.

So what happens now? Nicole asked herself. She realized that she had thought about very little except her approaching death during the five days since the conclusion of her trial. Without the fear of her imminent execution to structure her thought patterns, Nicole was able to let her mind drift freely.

She thought first of Richard, her husband and partner, from whom she had been separated now for almost two years. Nicole recalled vividly their last evening together, a horrible Walpurgisnacht of murder and destruction that had begun on a hopeful note with her daughter Ellie's marriage to Dr. Robert Turner. Richard was certain that we, like Kenji and Pyotr, were also marked for death, she remembered. And he was probably right. Because he escaped, they made him the enemy and left me alone for a while,

I thought you were dead, Richard, Nicole thought. I should have had more faith... But how in the world did you end up in New York again?

As she sat in the only chair in the underground room, her heart ached for the company of her husband. A montage of memories paraded through her mind. She first saw herself again in the avian lair in Rama II, years and years earlier, temporarily a captive of the strange birdlike creatures whose language was jabbers and shrieks. It had been Richard who had found her there. He had risked his own life to return to New York to determine if Nicole was still alive. If Richard had not come, Nicole would have been marooned on the island of New York forever.

Richard and Nicole had become lovers during the time that they were struggling to figure out how to cross the Cylindrical Sea and return to their cosmonaut colleagues from the Newton spacecraft. Nicole was both surprised and amused by die strong stirrings inside her caused by her recollection of their early days of love. We survived the nuclear missile attack together. We even survived my wrongheaded attempt to produce genetic variation in our offspring by steeping with another man.

Nicole winced at the memory of her own naivete" so many years before. You forgave me, Richard, which could not have been easy for you. And then we grew even closer at the Node during our design sessions with the Eagle.

What was the Eagle really? Nicole mused, shifting her train of thought. And who or what created him? In her mind was a vivid picture of the bizarre creature who had been their only contact while they had stayed at the Node during the refurbishing of the Rama spaceship. The alien being, who had had the face of an eagle and a body similar to a man's, had informed them that he was an advancement in artificial intelligence designed especially as a companion for humans. His eyes were incredible, almost mystical, Nicole remembered. And they were as intense as Omeh 's.

Her great-grandfather Omeh had worn the green robe of the tribal shaman of the Senoufo when he had come to see Nicole in Rome two weeks before the launch of die Newton spacecraft. Nicole had met Omeh twice before, both times in her mother's native village in the Ivory Coast: once during the Poro ceremony when Nicole was seven, and then again three years later at her mother's funeral. During those brief encounters Omeh had started preparing Nicole for what the old shaman had assured her would be an extraordinary life. It had been Omeh who had insisted that^Nicole was indeed the woman who the Senoufo chronicles had predicted would scatter their tribal seed "even to the stars."

Omeh, the Eagle, even Richard, Nicole thought. Quite a group, to say the least. The face of Henry, Prince of Wales, joined the other three men and Nicole remembered for a moment die powerful passion of their brief love affair in die days immediately after she had won her Olympic gold medal. She recalled sharply the pain of rejection. But without Henry, she reminded herself, there would not have been a Genevieve.

While Nic6le was remembering the love she had shared with her daughter on Earth, she glanced across the room at (he shelf containing the electronic bookdiscs. Suddenly distracted, she crossed to the shelf and started reading titles. Sure enough, Max had left her some manuals on raising pigs and chickens. But that was not all. It looked as if he had given Nicole his entire private library.

Nicole smiled as she pulled out a book of fairy tales and inserted it into her reader. She flipped through the pages and stopped at the story of Sleeping Beauty. The phrase "and they lived happily ever after" summoned another vivid memory, this one of herself as a small child, maybe six or seven, sitting on her father's lap in their house in the Parisian suburb of Chilly-Mazarin.

I longed as a little girl to be a princess and live happily ever after, she thought. There was no way I could have known then that my life would make even the fairy tales seem ordinary.

Nicole replaced the bookdisc on the shelf and returned to her chair. And now, she thought, idly surveying the room, when I thought this incredible life was over, I seem to have been given at least a few more days.

She thought again of Richard and her intense longing to see him returned. We have shared much, my Richard. I hope I can again feel your touch, hear your laughter, and see your face. But if not, I will try not to complain. My life has already seen its share of miracles.