“It has the air supply.”
Basq got to the Witness’s side one step ahead of Uary. The monitor’s message had changed.
I HAVE BURNED OUT THE EVACUATION CIRCUIT. ALL THAT IS HOLDING IT CLOSED IS ME. IF I AM FORCED TO LET GO THE ROOM WILL BE IN VACUUM IN LESS THAN FIFTEEN SECONDS.
Uary cursed. “It even knows the time.”
“Part of the quarantine measures?” inquired the Witness.
Uary nodded. “A last precaution.”
Cierc wiped a huge swath of optical matter away from the wall to reveal a carbonized juncture in the fiber optics. “It’s not bluffing.”
“Suits!” ordered Basq.
Cierc, closest to the emergency locker, broke the seal and swung the door back. Uary walked calmly but quickly to his side, as he’d been drilled to do all his life. Get in the suit, close the seals, check the …
The suits lay in crumbled heaps on the locker floor. Each helmet seal had been burned through. The carbon stench drifted up from them.
Cierc swallowed. “The locker has an optical matter backing. It must have got through …”
Because I listened to Basq. Because I wanted to have it in my hands a few minutes longer. Because I had a hidden line to Caril …
“Then we die,” said Basq.
“WHAT?” cried Cierc.
“We die.” Basq stood like a statue of himself. “We cut the power to the tank. We cannot permit its confederates to rescue this thing alive. It knows enough to mount a pitched battle against us, and win. It knows the private technologies. We will lose the Home Ground if it survives.”
Uary tried to find the flaw in Basq’s reasoning, but there was none. There was no other way. If the artifacts understood too much, the Vitae would lose to them, again.
“I’ll do it.” Even though the Witness would not survive to transmit this, he felt better saying it to her.
He heard Basq whisper Caril’s name and realized he could have his revenge now if he wanted it. Before they died he could tell Basq that his son was alive and working for the Imperialists, and that Caril had been in touch with him ever since he had “vanished.” He could do it, now that they were dead and the Witness with them.
Uary looked at Basq and decided it was enough that he knew. Basq could join the Lineage ignorant.
The room shook. It rattled and pitched wildly and a wind rushed through it.
Wind? Uary sat up and dazedly wondered how he had come to be on the floor.
The wind died as abruptly as it started. Lairdin sprawled on the floor. Red liquid smeared around her. And her face was gone.
White foam filled the gap in the outer wall. Something shoved through it. A door. An airlock. Uary couldn’t hear. The Witness wasn’t moving. There was blood everywhere. The airlock opened and a figure in a vacuum suit walked into the lab. Behind the suited person walked an android. The android spoke. Uary saw its mouth move. He couldn’t hear anything over the ringing in his ears. The suited one spoke, turned toward the Witness and grabbed her by the arm. The Witness said nothing. She didn’t even flinch. The suited figure dropped her.
The figure turned toward him. Now he could see it was a woman. It was the female artifact and her mouth was moving. He put his hand to his ear automatically and it came away covered in red.
The android was speaking and Cierc teetered to his feet.
“No!” Uary hoped he shouted but Cierc still closed the monitor lines in the tank. The needles and catheters and pipettes extracted themselves. Nothing happened. Nothing happened. The android lifted the artifact free from the tank and carried it to the airlock.
The suited artifact followed, then stopped and crossed to the inner door. Uary tried to get to his feet and fell back. Pain finally broke through the shock. The artifact looked the door over. She threw the manual locks open and shoved the door back. She bent close to Uary and he could see her mouth move.
Run, she was telling him. Run!
He couldn’t even stand. He scrabbled across the floor. The Beholden grabbed him and hauled him forward. He saw figures. Emergency crews. He turned. The artifact and the android were through their airlock and he had time to see it yank itself away from the sealing foam before the lab door slammed shut.
He sagged into the arms of a stranger while the emergency team buzzed around them. Hands grabbed him. Sat him down. Twisted his neck to look at his ear. The technician was an amputant, he saw, with only four fingers on the hand that pressed the anesthetic patch against his wrist.
We had them, he thought blearily as the pain began to fade. We had them. Now I understand. Now I really understand how the Ancestors could have lost to these things.
He hoped the Assembly would let him live long enough to tell them what he knew.