And even my plan to get Hector and Achilles to Olympos for their fatal aristeia is doomed. I’d planned to take the two warriors up there one at a time, the gods all unaware that danger existed until it descended on them like a Greek and Trojan lightning storm. But the attack on Apollo and Athena in Scamandrius’ nursery has lost us even this small element of surprise.

So now what?

I check my watch. I’d promised the little robot that I’d pick him up. But the Great Hall of the Gods and all of Olympos must be a hornet’s nest now. The odds of my QTing in and getting out undetected seem low to zero. What will Hector and Achilles do if I don’t come back here?

That’s their problem. I reach up to lift my Hades Helmet over my head, remember that I loaned it to Mahnmut, sigh, visualize the coordinates for the west side of the Caldera Lake on the Olympian summit, and QT out.

It is a hornet’s nest. The sky is filled with chariots zipping back and forth above the lake. I can see scores of gods standing along the shoreline, some pointing, some firing lances of pure energy into the lake. The water is boiling for miles out into the caldera. Other gods are shouting with amplified voices, declaring that Zeus commands everyone to gather in the Great Hall. No one’s noticed me yet—there’s too much confusion—but it’s just a matter of a minute or less before someone spots a non-god on their exclusive country club turf.

Suddenly the boiling water erupts just yards from where I stand and a vague shape emerges, visible only because of water cascading off its invisible surface. Then the dark little robot snicks into view, pulling the Hades Helmet off and handing it to me.

“It would be best if we left quickly,” Mahnmut says in English. After I dumbly take the leather helmet, he keeps one arm extended for me to grasp so that he can be included in the QT field. I grab his forearm and then scream and release it. The metal or plastic or whatever it is that makes up his skin is red hot. Already the palm of my right hand is red and beginning to blister.

Two chariots swoop our way. Lightning flashes. The air smells of ozone.

I grab the robot’s shoulder and twist the medallion again, knowing that none of us are going to get out of this alive, but telling myself that at least I came back for the little machine as promised. At least I did that.

49

The Equatorial Ring

For the first two weeks, they lived on lizards in the polluted spring. Each lost so much weight that his thermskin had to contract two sizes to stay in contact with skin.

The death of Savi had so shocked Daeman and Harman that for a full minute after Caliban’s departure—still carrying their friend’s corpse—each man had sat stupidly on his rock pillar ten feet above the fetid water. Daeman found that only one thought had been running through his mind—Caliban’s coming back to get us. Caliban’s coming back to get us. Then Harman broke the spell by leaping feet first into the stinking water and disappearing himself.

Daeman would have howled from terror then if he’d had the energy, but all he could do is stare at the undulating scum where Harman had abandoned him. After what seemed like long minutes, Harman bobbed up, gasping and spluttering and holding three objects in his hands—their two osmosis masks and Savi’s gun. He pulled himself up onto the lower shelf of rock and Daeman—finally released from his paralysis—clambered down to join him.

“It’s only about ten feet deep here,” gasped Harman, “or I never would have found this stuff.” He handed Daeman his osmosis mask and slipped his own on over his thermskin cowl, not securing it over his face. Then Harman had hefted the gun.

“Does it work?” asked Daeman, his voice shaking. He was afraid to be so close to the water, certain that Caliban’s long arm would snake up at any second to pull him down. Daeman kept remembering the obscene snap as the monster’s jaws bit through Savi’s throat and spinal cord.

“One way to find out,” whispered Harman. The older man’s voice was also shaking, although from the cold water or terror, Daeman couldn’t tell.

Harman aimed the weapon the way he’d seen Savi fire it, slipped his finger into the trigger guard, and squeezed. A circle of water near the far wall erupted in an irregular fountain three feet high as hundreds of flechettes ripped the surface.

“Yes!” screamed Daeman, his voice echoing back to him in the small grotto. Fuck Caliban!

“Where’s Savi’s pack?” whispered Harman.

Daeman pointed to where it had fallen behind and below her rock column. The two men scrambled to it and pawed through the contents. The flashlight still worked. There were three more clips of flechettes, each clip holding seven plastic packs of darts. Harman found the way to release the current ammunition clip and count the remaining flechette charges there. Two.

“Do you think he . . . it . . . is dead?” whispered Daeman, glancing over his shoulder at both points where the underground stream entered the small grotto. The rocky space was illuminated only by fungal glow. “Savi shot it straight in the chest from just a few feet away. Maybe it’s dead.”

“No,” said Harman. “Caliban’s not dead. Tug your mask down. We have to find a way out of here.”

The underground stream ran from grotto to grotto, then grotto to cavern, each space larger than the last. The top layers of the asteroid under the crystal city seemed to be honeycombed with caves and pipes. They found blood spattered on rocks in the second grotto they surfaced in.

“Savi’s or Caliban’s?” whispered Daeman.

Harman shrugged. “Maybe both.” He swung the flashlight around the flat rock stretching away to shadows ten yards on either side of the foul stream. Rib cages, tibias, pelvic bones, and a skull stared back.

“Oh, God, Savi,” gasped Daeman. He tugged his mask down in a hurry and prepared to jump back into the underground stream.

Harman stopped him with a firm hand on his shoulder. “I don’t think so.” He walked closer to the bones and shifted the flashlight beam to and fro. More skeletal remains were scattered on all the rock ledges on either side of the stream. “These are old,” said Harman. “Months or years—maybe decades.” He picked up two ribs and held them in the light, the bones shockingly white against his blue thermskin glove. Daeman could see the gnaw marks there.

Daeman began shaking again. “I’m sorry,” he whispered.

Harman shook his head. “We’re both in shock and starved. We’ve eaten almost nothing for more than two days.” He lay prone on a rock near the edge of the water.

“But maybe there’s food in the city . . .” began Daeman.

Harman’s hand shot down into the water and there was a wild thrashing. Daeman jumped away, sure it was Caliban returned, but when he looked back over his shoulder, the older man had an albino lizard in both hands. This one was not eyeless like the one who selected Savi—its beaded eyes were pink.

“You’re kidding,” said Daeman.

“No.”

“We don’t want to waste flechettes on killing this . . .” began Daeman.

Harman grasped the lizard firmly above its hind legs and bashed its brains out against a rock.

Daeman flipped up his osmosis mask, sure that he was going to throw up again. He didn’t. His stomach rumbled and cramped.

“I wish Savi had a knife in her pack,” muttered Harman. “Remember that nice skinning knife Odysseus always carried with him at the Golden Gate Bridge? We could sure use that now.”

Daeman stared back, appalled beyond nausea as Harman found a fist-sized rock amongst the human bones and began chipping away one edge of it. When he had a crude point, he chopped the dead lizard’s head off and began pealing away the amphibian’s white skin.

“I can’t eat that,” gasped Daeman.