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“Leaving people here in the middle of a computer complex that’s falling apart at the seams on the off chance that someone might come by was not the brightest of moves.”

“It wasn’t that off chance—after all, we came by.”

“Yeah, but we’re just as trapped in here as you are. Actually, we’re more trapped. Your scanners and weapons work.”

Corsi nodded. “Bad tactics.”

“Yeah, well, us fanatics don’t always think things through,” the woman said with a bitter chuckle. “I’m Yanasa, by the way.”

“I’m the person holding the rifle. Pleased to meet you.” Corsi saw no reason to give Yanasa any more information than needed.

“Okay, Rifle Woman, what’s the plan?”

“The plan is, you don’t move until I tell you to.”

“That’s it?”

“That’s the only part that concerns you.”

A beeping noise filled the air, and then a voice said, “ Senbolma to Hagi.”

Yanasa looked at the still-slumbering form of her comrade, from whose belt the voice was emitting.

“Hagi, this is Undlar, answer me, dammit!” said a different voice.

Corsi mouthed the words, Don’t touch it to Yanasa, who obligingly didn’t move.

“Something must have happened to him,” said the first voice.

“Close the channel,” said Undlar. “Hagi’s got the only comm unit. We may have to beam dow—”

Then it cut off. Corsi sighed. She had been hoping they might say something about the da Vinci before they cut off communications, but that would’ve been too convenient.

“Only one comm unit? That wasn’t very bright,” Corsi said.

“We only had one hand-unit that wasn’t tied into Ganitriul,” Yanasa said. “I wanted to wait until we had enough units for everyone, but, like every sensible suggestion I made, I was outvoted.” She indicated Hagi with her head. “Why’s he still out if I’m up?”

Not seeing any harm in answering that question, Corsi said, “Different people react to stun different ways. You’ve probably got a faster metabolism than him or something.”

“Well, you should be grateful, Rifle Woman, ’ cause Hagi’s the field leader of this merry bunch, and he’d give you more rhetoric than you’d know what to do with.”

“Lieutenant Commander Corsi,” said Ganitriul, “I have successfully altered the settings on the scattering field. The Eerlikka weapons still do not function, but your phaser rifles should now function as normal.”

“Thank you, Ganitriul.” Corsi turned to Yanasa and smiled. As she did so, she adjusted the rifle to the heavy stun setting.

Yanasa was just shaking her head. “We weren’t expecting this. It never occurred to any of us that Ganitriul would actually work against us. I had thought that it wouldn’t function at all, but I guess they underestimated that personality. I honestly had thought it was just an interface, not a separate AI personality unto itself.”

Oh, God, not another one who runs off about engineering minutiae at the drop of a hat , Corsi thought. She almost would’ve preferred the rhetoric. She got enough of this on the da Vinci .

Just then, the forcefields went down.

Without even hesitating, Corsi fired on Yanasa. She crumpled to the ground.

Hagi started to stir. Corsi fired on him, too, and he was still.

That ought to keep them out for a while , she thought. She tapped her combadge. “Corsi to Gomez.”

No one answered.

CHAPTER

9

Fighting through the haze that was starting to cloud his vision, 110 entered the last of the codes needed to activate the manual override on the ventilation system in this cavern. The next step was to actually get the vents going, but he had to fight his fingers to make them work properly.

He wished 111 was there beside him. Together, they would have worked twice as fast, and gotten the vents clear before the forcefields failed.

But she was dead. He had felt her die. He still could feel it, even now, as his consciousness started to fade. . . .

In the background, he heard two filtered voices. One sounded like Ganitriul, and he caught the words phaser rifles , but he couldn’t make out the rest. The other was Lieutenant Commander Corsi.

The world started to go an odd