Chapter 33

It was late when Luther and Godiva came home to their living quarters on the ninety-fourth level of Ceres. They were both tired. He had taken her on a long-postponed sight-seeing tour, pausing at the high-mag viewing ports of the outer shell so mat he could point out the many worlds of the solar system, and far beyond them the scattered stars of the Stellar Group.

It was all old hat to Luther. He could not remember a time when he was not familiar with everything that they saw. It was a shock to find that Godiva, raised in the dark subterranean runs of the Gallimaufries, had only the vaguest idea of planets, moons, and stars. She didn’t know the difference between them. She had never heard of Oberon Station, or Cobweb Station, or even the Vulcan Nexus. She seemed to believe that all the asteroids were as developed and cosmopolitan as Ceres. Most startling of all, she had no idea of distance; to Godiva, the Oort Harvester was as near (or as far) as the remote Angel world of Sellora.

She had laughed at Brachis’s astonishment and disapproval. “What does it matter, Luther. Who cares how far away any of them are, when you can get to all of them in nothing flat using the Martin Link.’

“Well, yes, that’s true. But the distance …” Brachis stopped. Godiva was uniquely Godiva. Time and space meant nothing to her. And when he thought about it, he was not sure that she was wrong. “Close” points were really ones that could be reached quickly through a series of Mattin Links. “Distant” points were all others. Luther allowed Godiva to take his hand and they went on, drifting through the endless outer corridors of the planetoid. The original one-hour tour continued through a long and pleasurable day and evening. The corridor was deserted when Brachis paused at their apartment door and made his usual thorough inspection of the settings. All the seals were unbroken, and there had been no callers. He carefully slid back the heavy door and they went on through into the hallway.

The advent of Godiva had changed Luther’s life completely. Before she came up from Earth he had lived in a sparsely furnished single room. That had been abandoned in favor of a luxury apartment. The main living-room, dining area and kitchen were off the hall to the left, the bedroom, bathroom and study to the right.

“Hungry?”

Godiva shook her head. She yawned, stretched, and slipped off her light wrap. She gave Luther a smile of sleepy suggestion, dropped her bag onto the hall table, and went through the bedroom to the bathroom.

He took off his uniform, sat on the broad bed, and pulled off his boots. Naked, he walked through to the study and sat down at the communications terminal. He was tired, but as always he had to make his evening check for messages.

He switched on. As he did so there was a sudden high-pitched hissing sound. An intense pain like a hornet’s sting burned his left cheek. Brachis saw a little puff of vaporized blood blossom out from below his eye. He shouted at the pain and jerked upright. As he did so there was a second sting by his right nostril, and another sudden puff of bright red.

He jumped to his feet. His first thought was that there had been some sort of short circuit in the communications terminal, showering him with specks of hot metal. The hiss that went with each blow seemed to come from the top of the display unit. As Brachis looked that way three more jolts hit him, one on the chin and two above his right eyebrow. He lifted his hand to his face, and saw them: four miniature figures, crouched behind the front lip of the display. Each manikin was no more than an inch and a half tall. Each carried a weapon pointed at Luther’s face.

They were after his eyes! He covered his face with his left forearm, in time to block three more shots.

Adestis simulacra — at the maximum size permitted, and hunting him.

Luther swept his right arm across the top of the display, knocking the minisims to the floor. As he completed the movement a hail of shots from behind made him shout with pain and spin around. On the desk at the far side of the room, half-hidden behind a jumble of data cubes, stood another group of tiny figures. At the same moment a rattle of shots came from a new direction, over to his left. Explosive projectiles riddled his left arm and hip with thumbnail-sized craters.

Brachis roared with pain and ran across the room. He had both arms in front of him to shield his eyes — if they blinded him he was finished. Halfway to the door he felt another hail of shots in his groin and belly. The simulacra in ambush by the exit had chosen a different target.

He stopped and spun around again. The attack was obviously well-organized. They had planned for his natural reaction, to run for the door. They would expect him to cover his eyes, and now his genitals. If they knew his habits at all, they had known that he would walk through naked to check the communicator. While he hesitated in the middle of the room, another half dozen projectiles stung his face and neck. They were flaying him, systematically ripping the flesh from his body with a hail of tiny shells.

He needed time to think. Luther dived to the left, rolled across the floor, and came upright close to the wall. He smashed his hand at the lighting panel. With the door to the bedroom closed, the study was plunged at once into darkness. The hiss of shots went on, out the attacking simulacra no longer had a target.

Brachis dropped to the floor again, and went shuffling on hands and knees across the room. He had a brief advantage now. He could track the minisims by the uvarovite-garnet glint of their crystalline green eyes, glowing in the dark. They were moving about in confusion. He knew it could only be a temporary respite. The attackers must have allowed for darkness, too.

He felt his way back to the display and slapped the Emergency switch on the communications panel. That would bring help — but far too late. Another half minute of those explosions on his skin, and the rescuers would find him a sightless, skinless eunuch. He was filled with a new and terrifying thought; Suppose that Godiva came out of the bathroom and wandered through into the study to look for him? A shout to keep her out might have exactly the wrong effect.

He was still standing upright by the emergency switch when an orange light appeared on the other side of the room. It was an aerial flare, ignited near the door. That was where the maximum cross-fire would have hit him if he had tried to escape that way. But the orange flare was enough to illuminate the whole room. He was visible again.

Another crackle and hiss from miniature weapons — another hail of blows and blaze of pain across his body. He couldn’t take much more. He dived, rolled again, and came up near the desk. As the attackers there fired point-blank into his unprotected chest and side, he hit a sunken wall panel with the palm of his left hand.

The Fire Protection System came on in a fraction of a second. High pressure jets of water and emulsifier cross-crossed the room from floor to ceiling, while the loud warning tone of a bell sounded through the apartment and its nearest neighbors. The emergency low-power wall lights filled the study with sickly green.

Spray and foam filled the room. The miniature weapons at once went silent.

Another reprieve — but for how long?

Luther could not wait for help. He had to do this himself. He hurled himself across the study, soaking and bloodied. He ran first for the place where the attackers had been most dense. Water hit him from all sides, stinging his wounds, sluicing down his ripped skin. He welcomed it.

The minisims were trying to regroup, struggling to stand amid the bombardment of water drops and frothy foam. Ignoring the pain in his hands, Brachis smashed them flat and crushed them one by one between thumb and fingers.