The Chaos Chronicles Read online

  Bandicut groped and found the board hanging vertically against the wall. He yanked. Nothing. He groped for the release. The board jerked up suddenly and swung into his lap. He grunted and lifted the cover. He found a display board and a worn-looking key and joy pad. "Now what do I do?"

  "Click off the safety and press the ENGAGE button."

  "What the hell, Jake, half these labels are worn off!"

  "I know. It's on the right."

  Muttering, Bandicut found the button. The wall behind him suddenly jerked and turned, and he spun out, seat and board and all, and found himself hanging out over the right side of the lumbering crawler. The ground sped by beneath him, blurring with the shifting of the light-augment in his helmet. He swayed dizzily against his safety harness, feeling utterly naked in the seat as the crawler heaved over a large bump in the roadway. He caught the gurgling sound rising in his throat, but his hands tightened on the control board as it flexed up and down on its extended support. In his helmet was a cackling of merriment.

  " 'Kay, Bandie, you're doin' great!" Jake called. "Don't hang on so tight you break the thing off! Just hook your feet in those stirrups and pretend you're riding a horse."

  Riding a horse? Bandicut thought dimly, and shouted, "I don't know how to ride a goddamn—"

  /// Yee-hahhhh!

  Grab those reins! ///

  The quarx's voice cut through the din like a cleaver.

  /What—?/

  /// Like this, John! ///

  For an instant, his vision was overlaid with a scratchy image of two men riding horses, and whooping, and shooting handguns into the air. They were pounding along a dusty dirt road at a frightful speed.

  /// That's how you ride a horse! ///

  /Charlie, you idiot! That's goddamn Hollywood! It's not real! Get it off!/

  /// Sorry . . . I just thought . . . ///

  The image vanished.

  "Just relax and ride with the bounces," Jake was calling. After a moment he added, "How you doin' out there?"

  Bandicut finally got his feet hooked into the stirrups.

  "How's he doin'? He's doin' like a dink!" chortled someone—Bronson, he realized. Peering around, he spotted the boss in the observer seat way up on top of the crawler, peering down over the side. Bronson was shaking with laughter. "Hang in there, Bandicoot!" he called.

  "Take a look at your board," Jake said. "Don't touch anything, just look for the row labeled DEPLOY, with some numbers."

  Bandicut squinted, trying to read the labels against the jerky movement. "Okay," he said finally. "Now what?"

  Before Jake could answer, the crawler slowed and began a sweeping turn. Bandicut looked up and saw walls of carved ice, mottled with stone, rising alongside the roadway. Suddenly the walls opened out, and the crawler slowed even more. Bandicut gazed out over an expanse of scarred land, depressed below the surrounding terrain. They had arrived on station.

  "Now," Jake continued, "get ready to deploy. You're gonna use those controls to guide the drones. Just like driving a buggy. Switch on your field monitors."

  Bandicut fiddled a bit, and a display came on, giving him a split screen, both showing him the inside of the crawler. Nose cameras on the mining drones, probably. "Jake," he muttered, "you haven't forgotten that I have no bleeking idea what I'm doing?"

  "Hey, you think any of us knew what we were doing the first time we hung our fannies out there?"

  Fitznell snorted from the cab. "Do any of you know what you're doing now?"

  "If you morons would knock it off and deploy," called Bronson.

  "Rog'—"

  "Deploying," said Jake.

  Bandicut felt a new rumble behind his back, which he presumed was the opposite-side station swinging out with Jake on board. A few moments later he felt a lower and deeper rumble and the movement of heavy hydraulics. "Bandie," he heard, "deploy number four first, then number three."

  "Just press—?"

  "Yup."

  He felt an almost surreal sense of uninvolvement as he placed his finger on the button. Glancing up at the blue scythe of Neptune, he thought of Earth so far away he couldn't even see it; and he shook his head in sudden bewilderment. What in God's name was he doing here? Out across the scarred landscape, he saw two puffs of condensing vapor, barely illuminated by red laser light. Then he saw the recon robots responsible for the puffs, and he realized that they were sending probing beams into the ice and sending the telemetry to the crawler's computer. He realized with a pang that he would feel a lot more confident if he were linked into that computer, neuron to neuron, instead of hanging out here with his eyeballs and a couple of joysticks.

  "Let's get going," Bronson called.

  "Bandie, do it," said Jake.

  Bandicut pressed the button. His seat shuddered as the side of the crawler opened up and disgorged a drone, its dusty position lights glowing red, like some sort of large, demonic cockroach. The drone veered a little, then matched speeds with the mother cockroach. A green light blinked on under Bandicut's hand. On his monitor, he saw a drone's-eye view of the ground streaming past. An amber light strobed. "It's down!"

  "Press the key marked AUTOTRACK," Jake continued.

  He squinted anxiously. "What key marked AUTOTRACK?"

  "Top row of keys—"

  "You mean where all the labels are worn off?"

  "Third key from the right," Jake said, unperturbed.

  Bandicut pressed the key. The amber light went green. He peered down and saw the drone moving away from the crawler, taking up a parallel course about five meters to the right. A thick umbilical dipped and swayed across the intervening space. It must be working right, he thought. He hadn't heard anyone yell yet.

  "Deploy number three."

  He pressed the button. A new rumbling announced the ejection of a second drone. He wasted no time in putting that one on automatic, and soon the two drones were flanking each other, with number four trailing behind and to the outside, forming a perfect half of a V with the crawler.

  "Are we dragging now?" he asked.

  "Naw," Jake answered. "Bronson'll give us the word. How we doin', Chester?"

  "Hold on to your mokin' drawers," Bronson drawled. "Almost there." Bandicut glanced up and saw the boss bobbing atop the crawler, his helmet gleaming in the running lights. "Get ready to drop in about ten seconds."

  Jake's voice cut in, "Bandie, on his call, press the next button to the left."

  "Drop 'em now," Bronson said.

  Bandicut jabbed the button and waited for something to happen. He felt nothing, but in the monitors, the head-on views shrank and new split-screen images appeared; and he glimpsed mining lasers burrowing into the surface and saw confusing images of surface materials churning and being separated inside the drones. Glancing back at the actual drones, he saw light flickering beneath them; and emerging from behind them were twin clouds of vapor and dust.

  "Hey Bandicoot, you're a miner now!" Jake called.

  He watched, nodding, as the two drones under his command churned their way through Triton's surface like two moles burrowing for metallic remnants of an eons-old civilization.

  Chapter 9

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  THE MAIN POINT of the job, it turned out, was to ride herd on the drones to keep them from blundering into each other on turns. The rest of his day alternated between stupefying tedium as he bounced in his seat watching everything track a straight line, and frantic concentration as they turned corners and he fought to keep the two drones in formation. The control board never seemed to work quite right, and the drones had a strong tendency to overcontrol, resulting in repeated fishtailing and skidding.

  The effort gave him a thumping headache, and it didn't help that his every mistake was accompanied by whoops and snorts from the top of the crawler. He half suspected Fitznell of racing around the corners to see how much he could take without demolishing the drones. And he wondered at Jake's claim, when he asked why the computer didn't handle the turns, that the contr
ol module had failed so many times that they'd simply given up on it and gone to manual control.

  By the end of the day, he was tense and exhausted—and ravenously hungry, even though Jake and Amy had shared their lunches with him. As they started back to base, Charlie broke a long silence to ask Bandicut if he was okay. Yes, Bandicut grunted silently, making it perfectly clear that he was in no mood for conversation. Charlie took the hint and disappeared again.

  Back at the base, Jake and Amy congratulated him on surviving their hazing, and invited him for a beer after dinner. Bandicut squinted in thought, then shook his head with a sigh. "I just want to eat and go straight to bed. Rain check?"

  "Sure," Jake said. "Tomorrow, you'll sail through it like the wind."

  "Like the wind. Sure," Bandicut muttered sardonically. With a wave, he jumped off the ladder from the crawler and strode off to the showers.

  *

  In no time at all, his alarm was trilling in his ear. He rolled over in his bunk and groaned, realizing that it was time to start the cycle all over again. /Charlie, I hope you're getting used to this. It looks like I'm gonna be doing it for a while—especially if Jackson doesn't hurry up and clear me back to survey duty./

  /// Well, if you can survive it,

  I guess I can, too. ///

  the quarx answered. But Bandicut could tell Charlie was chafing at the delay. He wanted to get back to his translator, and he couldn't do that as long as Bandicut was stuck in mining ops.

  His coworkers took it easier on him the second day, and by evening Bandicut was ready for some diversion. After supper, he went with Jake to the rec lounge for a beer and a few games of EineySteiney pool. The game was played on a continuously curved, charcoal gray, three-dimensional holographic surface, with gravity wells for pockets and variable slopes for orbiting bank shots. The programming today had the balls labeled after the planets of the solar system. Charlie perked up after the opening shot, as they watched the variously colored balls flash and spin away from the center of the table. One ball, golden Mercury, spun into the end well, while the others looped around, coasting over hills and ridges until they finally came to rest in the valleys.

  /// Mind if I play with you? ///

  Charlie asked as Bandicut bent to take a shot, sighting along his cue wand.

  /Eh?/ Bandicut paused, eyeing a shot on mirror-surfaced Venus. /You know how to play pool?/

  /// I'm learning. ///

  /On my time, you want to learn?/

  /// I'm pretty good at orbital dynamics.

  This looks like a fairly easy set of parameters. ///

  /Easy, huh?/ Bandicut let his breath out, aware of Jake and several spectators waiting. /Okay, this shot's yours./

  He was half expecting the quarx to take control of his limbs. Instead he felt a gentle pressure guiding the position of his right arm as he lined up the wand with the white cue ball. He squeezed the trigger, and a laser pulse struck the cue ball, which spun up and over a rise and clicked satisfyingly into silvery Venus. Knocked out of its valley, Venus rebounded from the side rail, crested a rise, and spiraled with quickening orbits into a gravity-well pocket.

  "Ho, Bandie—you been practicin', man?" Jake raised his wand in salute.

  "Nah, just a little innate talent I been holding back till now." Bandicut straightened up with a grin and circled the table, looking for his next shot. /Nice work there, partner./

  /// Thanks.

  Let's try that translucent green-and-blue ball.

  Is that Earth? ///

  Bandicut nodded, then realized that he had done so in front of Jake and the others, as well. Everyone was watching him—including, he realized, that moxy-looking woman from exoarch, Julie Stone. Perhaps he had looked as though he were carefully studying the layout of the table, nodding to himself. He tried to keep his expression natural, and knew that he was probably screwing his face up more than ever. "Concentrate," he murmured as he bent over the table. "Earth in the end well."

  /// All the way down the table?

  There are three ridges in between. ///

  /Let's do it./

  The laser flashed, and the cue ball flew up off the table's surface, came back down on the far side of the target ball, then bounced out of play and dissolved in midair with a musical chuckle. Bandicut straightened up, sighing.

  "Man, I wish I had some of your in-nate talent," Jake said, laughing as he moved around the table, waiting for a new cue ball to appear.

  "Yeah, well, that's the thing about talent," Bandicut muttered, trying not to look as though he'd noticed Julie's presence. He inadvertently caught her eye, and a grin flashed on her face. "Sometimes raw talent is just, uh, hard to control . . . you know?"

  "Yeah, I know. Oh, yeah," Jake said, sighting his shot and zapping the Earth in a quick loop around the upper curve of the table and down into a well. It whirred resoundingly as it spiraled in. He looked up and grinned.

  Bandicut nodded graciously. /So, uh, how come we missed that shot, anyway?/

  /// I'm still on the learning curve, okay?

  Were you born knowing how to play the game? ///

  /Okay, okay—don't get sore./

  /// I'm not sore.

  But we're going to win this game.

  You want to impress Julie, don't you? ///

  Bandicut flushed, and avoided looking at Julie. He turned back as Jake easily knocked Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn into wells. /We won't have the chance, if Jake doesn't start missing some shots./

  The cue ball danced, and Uranus, pale green with silver crescents, spun around a well and back up over a ridge to come to rest in a valley. Jake took a swig from his beer. "All yours, John."

  "Do it, Bandie." That was Amy Fitznell, who had just walked up carrying a drink that glowed neon pink under the rec lounge lights. "Make him suffer for the way he's abused you for the last two days." She winked at Jake.

  "Okay. This one's for you." Bandicut caught Julie's eye by accident, caught a seemingly bashful smile, and grinned to himself. He sighted along the wand, measured the angles, and squeezed. The laser pulsed, the balls clicked, and not just Uranus but mirror-black Pluto spun into pockets.

  "Ah, too bad!" Jake said, with an obvious mixture of glee at the premature sinking of Pluto and admiration for the physics of the shot.

  Bandicut shook his head ruefully. "Sorry, Amy. I tried to get him for you."

  /// What happened? ///

  /I lost the game. You have to sink Pluto last./

  /// Oh. Sorry!

  I thought it was a pretty clever shot. ///

  /It was a clever shot. It just cost me the game, that's all./

  " 'Nother game, Bandie?" Jake asked, pressing RESET.

  Bandicut drew a breath. Julie was just standing there, and looked as though she might like some company. On the other hand, what was he going to say? He wasn't used to having company in his head when he approached women. "I dunno. Anyone waiting to get in for a game?" He held up the wand.

  /// Say, John—this game reminds me.

  There's something we need to do. ///

  /What's that? I want to say hi to Julie./

  /// Well . . . yes, but . . . ///

  Amy took the wand with a predatory smile and accepted Jake's challenge for the next game. Bandicut moved around the table toward Julie.

  /// John? ///

  She tipped her head at his approach, bright blue eyes flashing. "Hi, there. Nice couple of shots. How are you?" She sipped what looked like a glass of tomato juice.

  "Fine. Just fine," he murmured, trying to rid his mind of Charlie so he wouldn't be staring at her like a first-class idiot. "How are, uh—how are you? How's Georgia?" What a goak. Ask about her, not about her friend. "How's . . . exoarch? Anything interesting turning up?"

  /// Is this how you approach women?

  This seems . . . awkward. ///

  /Shut the hell up./ Bandicut grinned, willing Charlie to be gone.

  Julie's smile dazzled him. "Oh, we're just fine. If we
find any aliens or alien relics, I assure you, you'll hear about it!" She laughed. "It's not as if the company has us here because they expect us to find anything." She shook her head and took another sip of juice.

  "Right—uh—sop to the environmental lobby. Isn't that what everyone says?" Great. Now you've insulted her. "I suppose you get tired of hearing that," he added quickly.

  "Yuh. Both counts." She shrugged. "But it's not as if we aren't trying. We're going over all the orbital scans, all wavelengths, looking for that one clue that'll lead us to the find." He must have been looking at her stupidly, because she cocked her head with a quizzical expression. "I mean, if there's all this metal residue, there must be something intact somewhere on Triton, don't you think? Even if it's hundreds of meters below the surface?"

  Bandicut coughed. "Yes. Yes, I suppose that's a . . . good bet."

  /// John, be careful. ///

  He felt his head bobbing. This was leading in a dangerous direction, and he had no idea how to back out of it. He just wanted to talk to Julie, not spill everything he knew about aliens.

  /// John—listen, please.

  We really need to go collect our data . . . ///

  /What data . . . ?/

  "Well, I think so," Julie said, turning to look around the lounge. She waved at some people on the far side. "I see some of my cohorts have arrived. I promised I'd meet them. Would you like to come join us?"

  "I, uh—"

  /// John, that information could be vital.

  We've got to have it. ///

  "It's okay. No pressure," she said, laughing easily.

  He forced a smile. "Maybe another time? I'd like to. But I'm pretty tired tonight. It's been . . . a hard couple of days. I think I'm just going to check the board postings and then go to bed."

  Julie's eyes flashed penetratingly. "Okay. Nice to see you, though—okay?" Without waiting for him to stutter an answer, she waved and left to join her friends.

  /Auuuggghh./ His pulse was pounding as he watched her leave. /Maybe I should have gone with her./

  /// John— ///

  /What were you trying to say, a minute ago?/

  /// Can we go to the comm booth? ///

  /It's hard enough, without trying to listen to you on the inside, at the same time./ His pulse was still pounding.