Immortal Coil - Jeffrey Lang [38]
“I agree,” Vaslovik said. “What do you think, Noonien?”
Soong hadn’t expected to be asked anything, so he said the first thing that came into his mind. “This thing, whatever it is, didn’t climb down here to die. He may have been on the bridge when it shattered. So, that’s two … artificial beings …”
“Androids,” Vaslovik said. “Call them androids. That’s what they are.”
“All right,” Soong admitted, and a strange thrill went through him at the sound of the word. “Androids. Two androids who were destroyed by violence. That’s two out of the two we found. So, my question is: Are there any more? If so, where are they? And why do I get the feeling they might not be happy to see us?”
Vaslovik turned away from their find and began examining the cliff wall. “Those,” he said, “are all very good questions. And I can think of only one way we might be able to answer them.” Suddenly Vaslovik aimed his light at the cliff face, revealing something Soong had completely overlooked until now: an outline in the rock. No, not an outline. A door.
“And when were you planning on explaining all this to me?” Soong asked, popping open the legs of the pattern enhancer and dropping it onto the floor of the ledge, probably a little more carelessly than he should have. He didn’t care, he decided. He was angry. And tired. And he was the only one who could climb out of here if he had to. Ha! Let Graves and Vaslovik try to make it up to the surface without a transporter.
“I’m explaining it to you now,” Vaslovik stated, straining to sound reasonable. “Because it has become necessary and prudent to do so.”
“And it wasn’t necessary when I was dangling halfway down the cliff?” he asked irritably. His resources were at a low ebb and it seemed easier somehow to be irked than to be reasonable. Everything ached and he was cold and he wasn’t going to get Vaslovik to admit he had done anything wrong. “You told me,” he said, “that we were looking for archaeological artifacts, remnants of an ancient civilization that might have made androids.”
“We were,” Vaslovik replied coolly. “And we found some.”
“What we found,” Soong said, pointing the pry bar up at the top of the cliff, “was a room that had once been some kind of a lab, a room that has recently been stripped to the walls. Then, near the precipice, we found the first body … no, correction, an android body.”
Vaslovik nodded. “Call it Brown. He’d been destroyed by a phaser blast.”
“Yes,” Soong said. “Whatever you say, but you’re evading the point. It looked human, much more so than this one here. It can’t be an archaeological artifact.”
“That’s debatable,” Vaslovik said.
Soong rubbed his face with his gloved hand and heard the brush of stubble. “How could that be debatable?” he asked. “All the readings indicate that it must have been done relatively recently. What could be ‘archaeological’ about something done with a phaser?”
“The body was destroyed by a phaser about forty years ago,” Vaslovik said. “But that doesn’t mean it couldn’t have been quite old. It’s difficult to say without more research, but it’s all connected.”
Soong felt the growing desire to take a swing at the professor with the pick—a sure sign that he was on the edge of exhaustion. “What’s all connected?” Soong asked, exasperated. “Assume for a moment that I don’t have a clue what you’re talking about. I am not a servant or a hired man. I am not Dr. Watson to your Sherlock Holmes. If you want my cooperation, you’ll tell me everything you know, or I’ll simply beam back to the ship and take a nap.”
They locked eyes and Soong actually believed he felt Vaslovik wrestling with him for control of his mind. It would be easier, he found himself thinking, so much easier, to simply acknowledge Vaslovik as the master, to take directions and obey orders, to absolve himself of responsibility. Then, whatever happened, Soong would be able to say (to himself, if no one else), “I was following orders.” But then, he would not share in any of the glory either, and Soong was just young enough and just ambitious