‘
Very ego inflating,’ said Carroll, ‘what happens when I get the disc back here?’
‘
I cannot destroy the Four completely, that is, prevent them from being resurrected, without being physically present. You see, once physically present again I will be in control of the information banks – in control of all that happens on the disc.’
With all that they revealed and all that
Carroll felt they hid he felt an unearthly chill at those words.
‘
What is the point of the game?’ he asked after a while.
‘
What is the point of any game?’ was the Clown's reply.
‘
The Four are robots. You said...’
‘
The Four are robots, but robots more complex than organic carbon life. And they are insane in their own terms and in any terms you would care to name.’
‘
They have emotions?’
‘
Yes, the prime of which is hate. The only things they hate more than me are themselves.’
‘
Why?’
‘
They hate what they perceive as the purposelessness of their existence and hate their inability to end it, in each other and in themselves.’
‘
That still doesn't explain the game. I cannot accept that it is totally pointless.’
‘
The game is their vengeance upon me for creating them. When they captured my life field in my soul disc they were aware that I could not be totally confined. What you see before you is my ghost, in a shape forced upon me by them... They also found a way I could be forced back into my soul disc for limited periods of time. Their vengeance is the way of that banishment. Every time my soul disc is struck I am made aware of the suffering that led up to it being struck, of the petty waste, and of the fact that my greatest project is stalled at the brink of completion.’
Carroll
said, ‘If they hate themselves more than you why don't they destroy themselves?’
‘
Perhaps because they know that if they do I would eventually win my way to freedom again. Or perhaps they are in the process of destroying themselves now. I sometimes think that there are loop holes in my confinement for good reasons.’
‘
A death wish?’
‘
Perhaps...’
When
Carroll landed the leaf craft back by the creation booth the Clown abandoned him once again to provide distractions for the Four. While he was gone Carroll ordered a further large quantity of equipment through the booth, then with the assistance of the robot, mounted that equipment on the craft. When he had finished there were four Browning M2s fixed to point down from the craft at forty five degrees, four rocket launchers, with flame baffles behind them, pointing down at the same angle, a chair fixed by the joystick with controls from which these weapons could be fired and many other hand weapons within reach. The Clown visited him twice while he was working. The first time was only a short visit because he was dispelled by the ringing of his soul disc. The second time was to tell Carroll that the Four were suspicious of his diversions and readying to return.
‘
I'll move now then,’ Carroll replied, and then turned to the pile of equipment he had recently acquired from the booth: a pair of binoculars, a well-padded flying suit, and a helmet with visor and gloves. He donned the clothing, hung the binoculars round his neck, boarded his vessel and took it up off the ground.
The Clown led him, quite swiftly, out into the light of the eternal sunset, and even this made his eyes smart. He had forgotten how much colour there was, even here. He had forgotten how far it was possible to see. Like leashed hounds his eyes strained towards the distance.
‘This diversion ... I presume it is ready,’ said Carroll.
‘
Yes,’ said the Clown, who now appeared to be seated against one of the gun mountings. ‘If I understand my creations well enough this will draw them away.’
‘
Well?’ asked Carroll, ‘what exactly is the plan, or is there a plan?’
‘
There is a plan,’ said the Clown after a lengthy pause.
‘
You will return to the Reaper's base and await my diversion. Once it has occurred you will probably see the Four returning. Wait for them to be drawn off then go in. Once you have possession of my–’ A distant discordant ringing caused the Clown's form to shimmer, crack, and then fly apart. Long inured to this now Carroll continued on towards the steel cliff.
♠♠♠
The craft rose up the face of the cliff with no problems. It was Carroll who had the problems. Once at the top of the cliff he found himself panting, and his ears adjusted to the change in pressure with a sound like a gunshot. By the time he had found the fused remains of the resurrection machine his breathing had returned to normal and other ill effects were minimal.
Carroll
had decided long before that given the opportunity he would come back here to confirm or deny a suspicion. Bringing the craft to a halt above the machine he saw that his suspicions were confirmed. Amidst the fused and distorted metal lay the charred corpse of a man in combat clothing.
♠♠♠
Carroll had been killed here and resurrected at the bottom of the cliff. He wondered then if he had been killed in Anubis's attack or if he had sacrificed his life the moment he had placed his soul disc in the console. Whatever, this proved that the Clown was prepared to lie. He resolved to distrust the Clown as much as he could without being totally uncooperative. He sent the leaf craft on its way.
The journey from the wrecked machine to the Reaper's base seemed incredibly short compared to the last time he had made the trip. After crossing the featureless expanse he came in low and cautiously. What he saw when he finally landed next to the mirror glass building made him sick to the stomach.
After being resurrected and perhaps before moving on with its three fellows the Reaper had rid itself of its fighters, perhaps because they were now aware of the possibility of escape, perhaps out of spite.
Carroll did not know. All he knew was that to a man they had been burnt. Before the building lay a mass of charred bones, and grey ash that sifted and swirled in recalcitrant breezes.
Carroll stepped from the craft with an Uzi in his hand, and walking as if on the thin ice over a swamp, moved to the door of the building. He would have gone in with stun grenades in the manner he had been trained, but that could not be so. He dreaded to think how far sound would travel here. With care not to step on any broken glass he edged up to the doors. They slid open, but not all the way. Halfway back they jammed with a metallic crunch, closed half and inch, crunched again, then tried to open again. Cursing, Carroll stepped through the gap into to room beyond with his machine pistol sweeping from side to side as he searched the place. The doors only stopped their racket when he moved away from them.
On one of the tables stood a bottle of s
chnapps and a plate with the remains of pickled herrings on it. Carroll stopped by the table and stirred the remains with the barrel of his Uzi. But for this bottle and this plate there was nothing else on the tables. He moved on through the room to the door at its back, carefully eased open a door and went through, then checked room after room. Kruger tried to jump him in the fifth room.
He came from behind the door with a bottle held high. It was the first place
Carroll checked and he had the SS officer cold for a good two seconds. Kruger kept coming though. At the last moment, Carroll eased off on the trigger, and drop-kicked him in the stomach. Kruger went down puking herrings and schnapps.
‘
Do not kill me! Do not kill me!’
Carroll
simply stood over him wondering if painful death had made him like this or if he had always been like it.
‘
I won’t kill you just yet,’ said Carroll. ‘Stand up.’
Kruger
eased himself carefully to his feet, flinching every time Carroll moved. Carroll nodded to the door and with Kruger led the way out into the main room.
‘
Sit down.’
Kruger sat
, and Carroll sat opposite him.
‘
What happened here then. Why are you still alive?’
‘
It is not my fault.’
Carroll raised the Uzi higher and pointed it at Kruger's face. ‘I asked you a question.’
Q
uickly Kruger replied, ‘After you ran four of the others ran as well. They went in different directions. The rest stayed here. Sometime after that, I do not know how long, another Reaper came. He called me forwards and made me collect all his coins ... from the ground ... I think they are connected to us, for he selected four of them and ... I think he burnt the four who had escaped. He then called all who remained outside. They all came thinking it was another game. Then, while I stood by his throne he burnt all the others. I could do nothing. He said I was to become his General. Then he left. I do not want to be his General.’
Carroll
nodded then stood up. Kruger watched him like a pheasant watching a fox, his face white and beaded with sweat. Carroll stared outside at the ash and bones. Dispensed with, simply dispensed with. He wondered what it would mean for Kruger to become the Reaper's General. Would he be made into a machine? He turned back to Kruger.
‘
What happened to the discs? Did he take them with him?’
Kruger
glanced outside. ‘No. He cast them on the ground again and told me to collect them up in readiness for his return. He also told me to clear up all the ash and bones and load it in sacks...’
A small rebellion,
Carroll decided, but then what right did he have to judge? Put in the same position could he have down any different? Yes, because he would not have put himself in that position by betraying his fellows. Perhaps it was too harsh a judgement, but Carroll decided to keep to it. He gazed at Kruger expressionlessly.
‘
I will give you five minutes. If I can still see you after that time I will kill you.’
Kruger did not hesitate. He
leapt up and was out of the doors in moments. Carroll followed him outside and watched him fleeing towards the sun. After five minutes he was still in sight but Carroll did not shoot at him. He knew what awaited him out there and a bullet would have been a kindness. Carroll did not feel very kind. He returned to the building.
The
place was empty of life now and Carroll allowed himself to relax. Dispelling Kruger from his thoughts, he took some tools from the craft and set about removing a partition from the wall. His task was not difficult as the building was of flimsy construction. Once he had removed it he went out to the craft and brought that inside. He then leant the partition back in place. With this done he went on to do the one other task he had set himself to do before he settled down to wait.
They were strewn all around where he had thought he had destroyed the Reaper
’ soul discs, about twenty of them. Taking care not to miss any of them amongst the wreckage of this Reaper and this General, he collected them all up and weighed them in the palm of his hand.
Like poker chips
, he thought – the lives of twenty men.
Which ones?
He wondered. Which ones were Ellery, Julius, the Masai. Which one was Kruger? They all looked the same to him. He pocketed them and headed back to the building.
In
side he sat at the table where he, Ellery and Julius had played cards, while lumps of explosive had sweated nitro-glycerine in their pockets. He unpacked the supplies he had brought from the ship, as he dared not use his creation booth here, and he ate a meal he didn’t taste, then smoked, but even the cigarettes were tasteless. In time the Clown's diversion began.
It started as a barely discernible humming that built in intensity and power. Aware that this must be what he had been waiting for
, Carroll stood and went to his craft. As he strapped himself in the humming became a resonant vibration. Chairs and tables began to rattle and tableware to crash upon the floor. Carroll moved his craft to where he had laid the panel back in place, and peering out through the jammed doors he saw five specks hurtling across the sky. Flashes of red light ignited the sky and one of the specks fell. The others continued on, sunward. Once they were out of sight Carroll eased his craft forwards pushing the panel over. Soon he was outside and able rise above the building and look around.
The specks, he guessed, were the Four, heading towards the Clown's ship. He had no ideas about the one that had fallen. Now was his time to move. A slight pressure in one of the indentations of the joystick and a forward pressure took him up at forty
-five degrees at an acceleration that sucked his eyeballs towards his mouth. At a height of fifty feet he looked towards the sun and suffered a stomach turning disorientation. The sun seemed to have moved, and it took him a moment to dispel the illusion.