Horizon Storms - Kevin J. Anderson [216]
Deciding that the recently returned explorer’s pack could prove useful, containing enough supplies for a brief trip, Palawu picked it up. He adjusted the straps, shouldered the load, and prepared to set out. He intended to be back before long.
After activating the stone window, he watched the blank surface shimmer into a dusty, mysterious passage. He took a deep breath and with a confident smile, stepped through, eyes open and ready to see—
He encountered a world of uncompromising strangeness, impossibly different from the other abandoned Klikiss worlds he had visited so far. The colors, sounds, smells, were powerful and unexpected, enough to drive a person mad. The alien and unfamiliar sights assailed his consciousness with an avalanche of exotic details, incomprehensible impressions.
And then another unexpected sight: An older human female moved toward him with a curious and unreadable expression on her face. In complete shock, Palawu recognized the features of a woman he had never met but who was well known to him.
Margaret Colicos—alive! It did not surprise him that after the hundreds of missions and random explorations through the transportals, somebody would find the world where she had gone. But this was impossible, unbearable…
Suddenly he saw more—much more—and could not stop himself from screaming.
When they entered the control room the next morning in order to prepare for the day’s first group of departing colonists, the technical crew found Palawu’s records. At first they were annoyed by the risk the Chief Scientist had taken. Then, as time went by, they became concerned.
Finally, after a week of silence—far longer than his rations would have lasted—Palawu’s coordinate was marked as another black tile. The technicians submitted the Chief Scientist’s data and his computer files to another team of Hansa investigators so that the work could continue. Meanwhile, the transportal colonization initiative proceeded apace.
Howard Palawu never returned.
Chapter 109 — DD
Though he was trapped aboard the stolen Juggernaut, DD had to take action as Sirix and his robot marauders annihilated the Corribus settlement. His basic programming did not allow him to remain idle. He had to at least try. This was wrong.
From the Juggernaut’s weapons station, the Soldier compies mapped out and targeted all human or Klikiss structures. As the attack proceeded, they tracked each fleeing person who raced for shelter, and they could kill their victims one at a time with cool accuracy.
In the colony’s transmission tower, Jan Covitz continued to send anxious questions, pleas, demands. With two successive jazer blasts, one of the invading Mantas vaporized the communications tower and its support shack. The desperate radio signal went silent.
Sirix stood on the command bridge like some great general. All the robot’s articulated arms were extended. His flat head-plate swiveled as he absorbed information from the projection screens. “We will leave no structure standing, no trace that the arrogant humans ever established a foothold here.”
DD concluded that stopping this unprovoked assault had a higher priority than his own self-preservation. He lunged toward the nearest weapons console.
Though his mass was only half that of the Soldier compy’s, the little robot’s unexpected action was sufficient to thrust the military machine aside. As the surprised Soldier compy attempted to recover its balance, DD slammed his alloy-and-plastic fist into the Juggernaut’s weaponry controls. He did not have the strength of a heavy-lifting machine, but the consoles had not been designed to take such punishment. DD hammered again and again, breaking open the cover plate, obliterating the circuitry and delicate targeting systems.
In less than three seconds, the Soldier compy had righted itself and pulled DD away from the console. The little robot struggled, but could not break free. Before him, the controls smoked and sparked, and he