by Jayne Castle
In the green glow filtering through the window she could not make out the color of the crystal, but she sensed some kind of energy in it.
Briefly she contemplated the notion of taking one of the crystals with her. But again her talent stepped in, voting strongly against the idea. O’Conner would be certain to notice that it was missing. He would put that fact together with the fact that she had also disappeared and leap to the worst possible conclusion.
Decision made, she put the crystal back into the safe, secured the lock, and slid the concealing panel into place.
She crossed the room to the closet, intending to leave the same way she had arrived. But when she put her hand on the handle of the closet door, her intuition surged.
Don’t open the door.
She released the handle as if it had seared her palm, took a quick step back, whirled, and started toward the only other exit from the room, the front door.
It opened before she was halfway across the office. One of Hubert’s men, a thug named Kirby, walked into the room. He had a mag-rez in his hand.
“Looks like Mr. O’Conner was right about you, Miss Ray,” he said. “He told me to keep an eye on you. Said you’d been acting a little different lately.”
“What are you talking about, Kirby?” she snapped.
“Mr. O’Conner figured you might be planning something, but personally, I never thought you’d be stupid enough to search his private office. Always figured the dumb blonde act was just that, an act.”
“You idiot,” she said, putting as much disdain as possible into her voice. “I’m here because Hubert asked me to meet him here tonight. If he finds out you pulled a gun on me, he’ll be furious.”
“I don’t think so,” Kirby said. He sounded oddly wistful. “Too bad things turned out this way. I sort of liked you. Of all the women Mr. O’Conner has had, you were the nicest to me and the other guys. You had class, y’know?”
“Listen, Kirby. This is all a misunderstanding. Just give me a minute, and I can explain everything.”
The closet door opened behind her. Hubert O’Conner walked out of the tunnel entrance.
“Kirby’s right, Gloria,” he said. “You had class. I’m going to miss you.”
“Hubert, this is ridiculous. What’s going on? I got your message telling me to meet you here.”
“We both know I never sent you a message,” he said.
She worked up some convincing outrage. “Well, someone sure as hell did. Whoever made that phone call to me an hour ago must have been trying to set me up.”
“Why would anyone go to the trouble?” O’Conner asked. “You’re just a whore.”
“The idea was to distract you, of course. Make you look in another direction. Hubert, listen to me. We both know you’ve got enemies. Someone is plotting against you. Whoever it is wants you to think that you can’t trust me.”
O’Conner ignored her. He went to the wall, opened the panel, and unlocked the safe. He took out a small flashlight and examined the interior.
“Nothing’s missing,” he said to Kirby. “Get her amber. I don’t think any of it is tuned, but no point taking chances.”
“Yes, sir.” Kirby holstered his weapon and moved forward. “Sorry about this, Miss Ray. You going to hand over your amber, or do you want me to take it the hard way?”
“You’re making a mistake, Hubert,” Gloria said quietly. She stripped off her amber ring and removed her amber earrings. “A very big mistake. Whoever set me up will laugh when he finds out how easily he made a fool out of you.”
“Shut up,” O’Conner growled. “Are you finished, Kirby?”
“Yes, Mr. O’Conner. Got her amber.”
“Take her down into the tunnels.”
Gloria’s heart was pounding now. She could scarcely breathe. Kirby had not found the small piece of tuned amber that she kept in her bra pocket. As soon as Kirby released her down in the catacombs, she would use the tuned stone to find a way out. But meanwhile, she had to make this look good.
“Please, Hubert,” she whispered. “After all we’ve meant to each other, surely you aren’t going to send me underground to die.”
He jerked a thumb toward the closet. “Get rid of her.”
“Yes, Mr. O’Conner.” Kirby started to wrap thick fingers around Gloria’s arm.
“Wait,” Hubert ordered. “You’re right, Kirby, Gloria, here, isn’t as dumb as she looks. I think I’d better take one more precaution.” He reached under his overcoat and unclipped a small case from his belt.
Gloria watched, her senses screaming. Hubert opened the case. He took a chunk of what looked like pale pink quartz out of the pocket of his coat.
“Hubert?” she said. “What’s going on here?”
“Just a little insurance in case you’ve got some amber tucked under all that blonde hair. Stand out of the way, Kirby.”
Kirby quickly moved aside.
O’Conner held the quartz in the palm of his hand and concentrated. The quartz brightened. Gloria sensed energy heightening in the atmosphere, but nothing happened as far as she could tell. A few seconds later, the quartz lost its pale glow.
“That will take care of your backup amber,” Hubert said.
“What do you mean?” she asked. “Kirby just took my amber.”
“Maybe he got it all, maybe he didn’t. It doesn’t matter now.” O’Conner held up the pink quartz. “This stuff destroys tuned amber. If you’ve got any left, it just went dead.”
Her mouth went dry. “That’s not possible.”
He was genuinely amused now. “You’ll see when you start running. That’s the thing about the catacombs, you know. Put people down there without good amber, and sooner or later they always start running. Makes people crazy, they say. Get rid of her, Kirby.”
Chapter 28
THE HEART OF THE UNDERWORLD WAS A VAST FROZEN lake of searing, seething, quicksilver psi.
“It’s incredible,” Marlowe whispered.
She stood with Adam on the rim of the canyon and looked down at the solid sheet of flashing, sparking mirror quartz that filled the valley below. It was hard to look directly at the impossibly brilliant energy for more than a few seconds at a time.
She took out her sunglasses and put them on. The heavily tinted lenses reduced but did not eliminate all of the glare as far as her normal vision was concerned. The glasses did nothing at all to dampen the dazzling effect on her other senses.
“That’s just the surface of the maze,” Adam said. “The real action is inside.”
Perched on Marlowe’s shoulder, Gibson grumbled uneasily. He had become increasingly alert for the past two hours as they made their way through the jungle toward the maze. She reached up to touch him. He huddled closer as though he needed to be reassured.
The three of them were not alone. There was a lot of scurrying in the underbrush and rustling in the leafy canopy. Dust bunnies.
Almost immediately after they had entered the jungle, Marlowe and Adam had become aware of the small creatures trailing them through the underworld. There had been only a handful at first, but the number had increased steadily during the hours it had taken to reach the canyon. Marlowe estimated that there had to be dozens of dust bunnies concealed in the undergrowth now, possibly hundreds. Occasionally she heard them calling to each other. Sometimes Gibson chattered with their unseen companions. But for the most part the bunnies remained eerily quiet, as though sensing that something of great import was happening, something that would affect them.
The sounds of other denizens of the rain forest had grown less frequent as they had neared their destination. Marlowe hadn’t heard a birdcall or seen one of the ubiquitous iridescent lizards for the past hour.
It had taken longer than anticipated to arrive at their destination because they’d been forced to detour around two deadly ghost rivers and one psi storm.
“They weren’t here the last time I came this way,” Adam had said. “Got a feeling that the deteriorating resona
nce pattern in the maze is generating a lot of unstable energy throughout the jungle. The situation is getting worse.”
Marlowe looked down at the shimmering quicksilver surface of the maze. Bracing herself, she opened her senses cautiously. The shock was both thrilling and energizing. There was an enormous amount of power coming at her in invisible, pulsing currents. It was as if she had taken a hit of an astonishingly potent drug. Everything inside her stirred wildly. She had to fight for control.
She felt Adam’s talent quicken and knew that he was also responding to the energy rolling off the quicksilver lake in a steady tide.
“It’s definitely some kind of dreamlight energy,” she said. “And definitely from the ultradark end of the spectrum. But it’s unlike anything I’ve ever encountered. There’s no emotion, no dreamscape images. Just raw power.”
“Probably because the energy is being generated mechanically, not by a living creature. The maze is a machine, a generator.”
“Theoretically it’s supposed to be impossible to generate artificial dreamlight,” she reminded him.
He glanced down at the leather bag that contained the Burning Lamp.
“What about this thing?” he asked. “It’s a device that is capable of producing a hell of a lot of dreamlight.”
“Well, yes, but only if you ignite it and have someone to help you control the forces inside. And you’re the only one who can direct the energy infused in it. When you get right down to it, the power of the lamp can only be accessed and activated by human psi, specifically your genetic version.”
He studied the lake. “The aliens are long gone. There’s no one around now to focus bio-paranormal energy through that quartz, but that big generator is still sending out a huge amount of psi.”
“All indications are that it has been humming along, doing its thing, whatever that is, for centuries,” she said quietly.
He glanced at her. “You can sense the age of that mirror quartz?”
“Only in a very rough way. It’s always difficult to come up with a precise date when you’re dealing with antiquities that are so ancient, especially alien antiquities. But, yes, we’re talking centuries here, probably a couple thousand years.”
“Which is the approximate age that the para-archaeologists have come up with for the age of the ruins, the catacombs, and the jungle.”
“Yes,” she said.
Gibson mumbled in her ear. She heard some answering dust bunny chittering in the nearby brush.
“Wonder what’s up with the dust bunnies,” Adam said. “It’s like they know something serious is going on.”
“Animals have their own kind of sensitivity. Maybe they’re picking up the faint distortion underneath the dominant currents pulsing from that quartz. The other wildlife has fled the area.”
“So why are the bunnies here?”
“I’m guessing it’s because of Gibson,” she said. “They sense that he’s with us and that we’re all here to try to fix whatever has gone wrong.”
“Our own private cheering section.” Adam glanced at her, his eyes unreadable behind the dark lenses of his sunglasses. “You can feel it, can’t you?”
She knew what he meant.
“Yes,” she said. “You’re right. There’s something just faintly off about the resonating patterns.”
“It gets worse once you’re inside. You’ll see what I mean.”
She studied the quicksilver surface of the maze. “Do you really think that weird generator is what keeps the whole underworld running?”
“Yes, and I think it’s what keeps the lights on in the ruins aboveground as well. The mirror maze was the aliens’ artificial sun, the source of the psi that powered the bioengineered world they had to create in order to survive here on Harmony. At least, that’s what my intuition tells me.”
A chill slipped down her spine. “I think you’re right. But it’s huge. How can we possibly hope to affect the currents of a massive machine like that with something as small as the Burning Lamp?”
“When I took the team in two weeks ago, I was able to determine that the destabilizing energy is emanating from only one small section of the maze. The distortion is starting to affect some of the other quartz, but I think that if we adjust the currents in that one chamber, everything else will revert to normal.” He paused. “Whatever the hell normal is for that generator.”
She adjusted her backpack. “In other words, we’re just going in to change a couple of lightbulbs?”
“Might be a little more complicated.”
“You know, I could make a joke here. Try to lighten the atmosphere.”
“How many J&J agents and Guild bosses does it take to change a lightbulb?”
“Something along those lines.” She contemplated the shimmering lake of quartz fire. “Trouble is, I don’t know the punch line.”
“What do you say we go find the answer.”
THEY MADE THEIR WAY AROUND THE RIM OF THE CANYON to the research lab that the Bureau had established. Gibson stayed put on Marlowe’s shoulder when she and Adam walked out of the jungle into the clearing, but the rest of the herd of dust bunnies that had followed them through the rain forest remained in hiding.
“This is impressive,” Marlowe said. She surveyed the array of tents and jungle gear that had been erected. “But you should have called in Arcane earlier.”
Adam looked at her. “You may be right.”
Marlowe counted at least a dozen men and women moving purposefully around the compound. Most of the staff was dressed in standard-issue Guild jungle gear, which meant there was a lot of khaki and leather. But she saw two men and two women wearing lab uniforms emblazoned with the emblem of the Arcane Society. One of them noticed Marlowe.
“Hey, Marlowe,” he called. “Good to see you. We can use you down here. We’re short on dreamlight talents.”
“Hi, Ralph,” she said. “How are things going?”
“Not good.” Ralph Tripp walked toward her. He was a portly, middle-aged man who enjoyed his work. But today he looked uncharacteristically serious. “This is not just a dreamlight problem, it’s an alien technology problem. To be honest, none of us knows what the hell we’re doing.” He eyed Adam. “You’re Winters, aren’t you? The new Guild boss.”
Marlowe stepped in quickly. “Adam, this is Dr. Tripp. He’s a crystal talent.”
Adam inclined his head politely. “Dr. Tripp. I take it there has been no improvement in the situation?”
“I’m afraid the readings are deteriorating. All we can do is watch and observe. I agree with Dr. Nyland, however, that we’ll have some sense of when things turn critical. At that point it would be prudent to issue the evacuation orders.”
The atmosphere around the encampment had the feel of a hospital trauma ward minus the blood. People appeared calm, cool, and competent but very, very focused. Marlowe did not need her talent to sense the tension and adrenaline.
Adam looked at one of the Bureau technicians. “Where’s Dr. Nyland, Liz?”
“Lab A, sir.” Liz indicated the nearest of the two large tents. “He’s charting the latest set of readings taken by the spectrum talents.”
“Thanks.” Adam indicated Marlowe. “This is Marlowe Jones, Liz. She’s a very strong dreamlight talent.”
Liz looked relieved. She smiled at Marlowe. “That’s very good news. As Dr. Tripp just told you, everyone is convinced this is a dreamlight problem, but your type of talent is hard to find, especially in the higher ranges.”
“As I keep telling Adam, the Bureau should have come to Arcane at the start,” Marlowe said.
Liz flicked an uneasy glance at Adam and then turned back to Marlowe. “This was a highly classified Bureau project.”
Marlowe smiled. “Well, now it’s a highly classified Arcane project, as well.”
Ralph Tripp looked pained. “To be precise, it is a para-physics problem.”
“You’re right, Dr. Tripp,” Adam said. He turned to Marlowe. “Let’s talk to Nyland. H
e’ll have the latest reports. Then we need to go into the maze.”
“Right.” Marlowe said. She made to follow him.
“Cute dust bunny,” Liz called after her. “Didn’t know they made good pets.”
“His name is Gibson,” Marlowe said over her shoulder. “He’s not a pet, he’s a pal. Works part-time as a therapy dust bunny.”
“We’ve spotted several of the little critters around here,” Liz said. “Sometimes we feed them. They seem to like energy bars. But they won’t get too close.”
Marlowe smiled. “They’re suckers for the High-Rez brand of energy bar.”
Liz chuckled. “That’s what we stock in the chow tent. Standard issue for Guild teams.”
Marlowe turned back and saw that Adam had already disappeared through the flap of the tent. She hurried after him.
Inside the lab tent she found herself looking at an array of instruments, meters, and gauges. The equipment was all of the simplest, most basic amber-rez design. The average third grader used more sophisticated technology to carry out a science project. There was no point hauling high-end computers and calculators underground, because they would not function in that environment.
Doing science in the underworld was a laborious process that consisted of gathering data with basic equipment and making observations and then taking the information back to the surface to process through computers.
Adam was at the far end of a long workbench. He stood with another, older man. They were studying a wide strip of graph paper spread out on top of the bench. When Marlowe got closer, she saw that all of the notations on the chart had been entered by hand.
Adam glanced up briefly when she approached. “Marlowe, this is Fred Nyland. Fred, Marlowe Jones. She’s with the Arcane team.”
“How do you do, Miss Jones?” Fred nodded at her. “Adam tells me that you’re going into the maze with him. You’re a dreamlight talent?”
“Doctor.” She returned his polite nod. “In answer to your question, yes. Although, as I warned Adam, I’ve never encountered any dreamlight like the kind coming out of that maze.”