Nexus by Robert Boyczuk (best large ebook reader txt) 📕

Panic seized her. She struck the surface of the barrier with her fist, the dense material muffling the sound, the sudden movement sending a spike of pain up her broken arm. She sucked in a sharp breath, chastising herself for letting her fear get the better of her.

Yilda warned us, she thought. Everything here is keyed to the Speaker’s bio-signatures. Nothing will work for me-including this door.

The light came back on and the door atomized at the same time. Upatal, who stood on the other side, reached out and pulled Liis through the opening into a small, empty room. The door rematerialized behind Liis and she felt an immediate sense of relief-not because she was with the Speakers again, but because this substantial barrier now separated her from Yilda. The doors and lights hadn’t worked for him. Perhaps it was because he hadn’t been cloned at the relay station. The intelligences that had raised Upatal and her companion hadn’t overseen Yilda’s development. And so they would no more recognize the signature of his brain activity than it would of Liis’. That was why he’d had to blast his way into the building in the first place.

Upatal released Liis’ arm; the Speakers moved to another sealed doorway-this time looking like it was made of dark wood-on the opposite wall. As they stepped up to it, the barrier dissolved as the previous one had. Upatal waited until Liis passed through the threshold before she moved on. Liis followed the Speakers as they continued through a perplexing tangle of rooms, turning left and right in a disorienting, and seemingly random, pattern. Each doorway presented a unique room, all of varying size, constructed, it seemed, of different materials and holding a mixture of familiar and incomprehensible appointments. From time to time they ascended or descended stairs or ramps. Many doorways were curtained; a few had doors that swung open, or recessed into the wall. Most, however, were solid, dissolving when the Speakers approached, rematerializing behind them. Liis, despite her fear, began to lag further and further behind as exhaustion dogged; Upatal waited patiently at each door.

Once, at the end of a long, narrow corridor, Upatal stood motionless under the arch of a door that had melted away. Stepping to one side, she waved Liis into the room, then followed her inside. There was no exit. After Upatal entered, the door reformed. Liis’ stomach did a flip-flop as the room moved. It took her fatigued brain a moment to realise they were in an elevator. The door dissolved, opening onto a vaulted arcade that dwindled into the distance.

Upatal quickened the pace, jogging down the corridor, turning abruptly through a broad archway into another series of similar rooms. Liis struggled to keep up. She was near the point of collapse. They ran and ran, light panels flaring before them and dying in their wake. Rooms large and small passed before Liis as if in a dream. At one point they rested, and Liis used the moment to discard the dead battery in her laser pistol and snap a new cartridge into the grip.

They continued through a bewildering number of rooms.

Occasionally, something remarkable penetrated the haze of her exhaustion: a chamber of brooding figures carved of blood-red stone; a swirling amber fog suspended in the centre of a room, eight tendrils snaking out from its central mass to each of the corners; a dome housing a riot of colourful flora growing only from the upper walls and ceiling, like an inverted jungle; a pyramidic room filled with a tangle of monstrous gears and levers, everything moving in a deafening, inexplicable rhythm. But these sights were forgotten as quickly as they passed from view. Exhaustion made it impossible to think about anything other than placing one foot in front of the other. She stumbled forward. They were in a room that looked like it had been carved from granite; strange, dun-coloured animals (or were they carvings?), no larger than her fist, watched idly from niches in the wall. Their flight went on and on….

It was in a small, empty hexagonal room that Liis found herself on her knees, her chest heaving, her head swirling. The next thing she knew, Upatal was standing before her, tugging urgently on her good arm, yammering at her in their incomprehensible language. Liis shook her head to show she couldn’t go on; the gesture made the room wobble.

“Aoth,” Upatal said urgently, pointing to the next doorway where her companion stood. “Ilda!”

“I…I need to rest.” The last time she’d slept had been long before they’d entered the dome. And now they’d been running for…how long? Liis wasn’t certain. But it seemed like hours. If only she could have a few minutes to catch her breath-

“Ilda!” The woman tugged on Liis’ arm insistently while her companion fidgeted nervously. Liis allowed herself to be pulled to her feet. The room seemed to heave around her like the deck of a ship. Upatal placed Liis’ good arm over her shoulder and tried to help her forward. As soon as they passed the threshold of the next door, a brilliant luminescence flared, blinding Liis. Her legs gave out completely; dazzled by the light, she sagged, the dead weight of her body dragging the two of them down to the floor in a slow-motion tumble. She waited for the impact, for the explosion of pain in her broken arm. Only it didn’t come. The Speaker had managed to guide their fall. Liis was on her back, the pale oval of the Upatal’s face hovering over her. Far above her was a white ceiling.

“Just a few minutes,” she mumbled, the difficult words slurring in her mouth. “Tha…that’s all…I need….” Darkness closed over before she could finish her sentence.

Liis opened her eyes on undifferentiated black.

For a second she thought she might be dreaming, and that in fact she hadn’t opened her eyes at all. She blinked. The blackness remained. So she sat up-and banged her head.

Momentarily stunned, she groped blindly with her good hand, discovered a rigid, grooved surface curved over her like the roof of a big pipe, preventing her from sitting up fully. In a panic, she swung her hand around, her fingers raking the curve of the wall down to where it met the surface on which she lay. She was trapped in a space not much larger than a coffin. Fear constricted Liis’ throat, choking off her breath. She lay back down, closed her eyes, her heart thumping wildly.

Calm down, she admonished herself.

Her breathing slowed.

She became aware of a bulky weight pressing down on her thighs. Reaching out with her good arm, she touched the thing, recognized the feel of its material. My backpack. The familiarity of it helped calm her. She let her arm fall back to her side.

Only now did she realise the surface on which she lay was damp. It was covered by a few millimeters of oily liquid. Running her finger through the stuff she realised why she hadn’t noticed it before: it was warm, close to body temperature-and it had the curious property that it didn’t stick to her fingers, or seem to penetrate the fabric of her clothes. It was a disconcerting feeling, the wet on the back of her calves and arms and head, while her shorts and tee-shirt were bone dry.

Sucking in a breath, she listened. Nothing. Nothing, but the sound of her own heartbeat. And a claustrophobic sense of the enclosed space. She let her breath go. If only I had a flashlight, she thought. There were still two flares in her backpack, but in this confined space, they’d be worse than useless. She remembered the watch Hebuiza had made.

She pulled it from her pocket. The number 4-06:33 glowed with a bright, anomalous cheer. Just over four days left. The last time she looked, after she’d entered the dome, it had shown five days. She’d been out for the better part of a day. In that time, anything could have happened.

Liis held up Hebuiza’s watch, but the light it provided was too feeble to illuminate anything. Transferring it to her other hand, she gripped it as strongly as her weakened muscles would allow; with her good hand, she twisted the base. After a turn and a half, the watch popped open, exposing its works, and casting a dim, but much more extensive, circle of light. Liis raised it like a miniature lantern.

The curving surface above her was incised with parallel narrow channels; crosswise to the channels ran coloured threads. Many of these lines were raised, for the light from the watch cast slim, shifting shadows. Craning her neck, she discovered that a smooth, black barrier closed off the space above her head. She pushed on the obstruction but it was fixed firmly in place. She looked down toward her boots. In the weak illumination of the watch, she saw her backpack-and not much else. She moved her light down as far as she could, was able to make out her boots. Beyond that she could see the glint from another wall like the one above her head. She was sealed in this strange tube. Heart pounding, Liis let her head back down.

I’m going to die here.

The absurdity of this thought struck her as humorous: to come this far to be buried alive in…in what? It wasn’t a crypt, exactly. Although Liis knew next to nothing about the Speakers’ culture, this place looked less ceremonial and more functional. Perhaps it was a service tunnel. If that was true, she should be able get out. She checked the barrier above her head again. There was no handle, button or switch visible, only a soft, nipple-like protrusion at the centre. She pushed the plate in several different places but the cold surface didn’t budge. So that left only the one at her feet.

The tube was too narrow to allow her to turn around. Liis pulled her backpack up into the space above her head and, with a grunt, rolled over onto her stomach. Pain shot up her broken arm, momentarily dizzying her. The ache receded, left a ringing in her ears. Gritting her teeth she wiggled until the soles of her boots touched the barrier. Drawing back her leg, she kicked sharply outward.

With a hollow ring, the plate swung away and air wafted over her thighs. A disagreeable odour, like that of rotting meat, filled her nostrils. Craning her neck, she stared down the length of the tube. Outside was as lightless as inside the tube had been; it was impossible to see anything. She listened, but heard nothing. If there’s anyone out there, Liis thought, they’ll know I’m here now. She felt in her pocket for the laser pistol-and discovered it was gone. Placing the watch on her back, she reached for her pack. The battery clips for the laser were also gone. Perhaps the Speakers were smarter than Yilda had credited them.

Picking up the watch, Liis stuck it in her pocket. She grabbed one of the straps from her backpack. Wiggling cautiously, she felt her knees cross the threshold of her prison. When the edge of the tube was against her thighs, the toes of her boots touched a solid surface, half a meter below. She pushed herself out of the confining space and onto her knees, dragging the backpack after her. She dropped it on the floor.

Pulling the watch from her pocket, she held it up.

Liis knelt on a white surface, straddling a shallow groove incised in the floor, several centimeters wide. It ran up