On
every mist curtain, in every undamaged bee-grown city hide people
froze, waiting to see, holding their breath, their silences all grown
thick and dark as the blood splashed and drying on the city.
The
fireball, trailing burning pieces steam, smoke, the bright sparks of
the fire drakes struggling to assist Fifty two, the only one
connected to the hurtling chunk of sublimating ice and stone.
The two spun around one another, less than a hundred seconds from impact. *Fifty two! Disengage, disengage! Three hundred four and One hundred fifty will detonate! Fifty two! DISENGAGE*
**
Kyrus and Dukir floundered to their feet almost waist-deep in ashes of code, coughing, struggling to breathe. *What is this? Dukir?*
*I used a bit of code my friend -- *
*Dukir. You found the need for this?* The voice in their heads wasn't hollow, or eldritch, or unusual in any way, just the voice of an old man, but the hair stood up on the back of Kyrus's neck. It was the voice of a dead man. A faint glow rose up between them. *Come now, quickly my friend. You need access to our control codes? You're in a hurry, I'm sure, even if I am recording this.*
*We're in the deepest ancestor crap, Diryish. The city's about to go and another wave of ice is about to be hammered down on the wreckage.*
*I see.* The bald old man dressed in cloth... no... a covering of bees, raised a hand. *My grandson, it seems you've not had time to listen to all my busybody recordings for you. Just another way to stick my fingers in your reign, of course. I won't apologize. You need this information, eventually. This ruin is what is left of our gate, our control centre. Ah, you've already been taken up by the hive. Good. All the codes to jam Perrin's water delivery systems, at least for now, are over on the left.* The image smiled at Kyrus and Dukir. *I'll be here with more advice if you need me,* the recording said, and winked out, leaving them in pitch black once more.
*ENDARKEN IT!* Kyrus pulled his temper under control and snapped *Give me some light to see by*
The light bloomed in the walls, too slowly, and something that looked like a feeble fire in a stone bowl. The codes Kyrus needed, not to take over Prime's glass mountain, but just stop it, confuse it, make him think his own machinery was to blame, if they were lucky, shone brightly on a rack of... bones? Yes. The codes were hung on a rack of bones and teeth.
*Radiance, those fangs the code is hanging on... I think only you should touch them.* Dukir had his hands firmly in his belt.
Kyrus cautiously reached one hand in through the teeth, some as long as his forearm, and grasped what looked like the hilt of a sword and began to draw it out. The whole pile of bones shifted and the jaws closed with a clash, around his wrist, even faster than his warrior's recoil. *FAK!*
*Voice and DNA match confirmed.* With a creaking wheezing noise the bones cranked themselves open and let him withdraw what he needed.
*A sword? How are you going to use a sword to shut down Glass Mountain?*
*It just looks like a sword.* Kyrus raised it over his head and, standing in what looked like the ruins of a burned-out hut, called code to his hand. *Owner Tertius, emergency override, abort all current water delivery modes. Abort, abort, abort. Pause all Prime terraforming commands previous month. Emergency override shut down Owner Prime controls and re-format data controls, purge Hinnom and Sheol recordings. Recalibrate.*
**
The fireball, with Fifty Two, One Hundred Fifty and Three Hundred Four blew into a thousand pieces just above the canyon rim, flinging its guts kilometres away.
Enough plowed into the bottom of the canyon to break off more of the city butte, send a shockwave rolling along the walls, cracking terraces and trees away, dumping rock on top of a creaking, straining Ramtuff vehicle full of the injured.
**
Perrin stared at his screens and his holographic projectors that a moment ago had been displaying what looked like some of the indigenous Chishiki fauna, a variant of those bush-dragon-snake things he'd certainly eradicated on Xanadu, attacking the ice meteors. There had been a partially terraformed canyon and badlands but no immediate sign of humanity. Now ever single screen displayed the tasteful sprays of light that marked an equipment reformat and recalibration.
“Display Hinnom.”
“Reformatting. Reconfiguring program functionality. Scrubbing data storage. All systems stop. Reformatting.”
“STOP reformat!”
“System administrator required to abort program. Some data will be lost. Continue yes or no?”
“I AM the system administrator you STUPID machines!”
Glass Mountain replied. “Continue yes or no?”
“Yes, damn you. Alert me the moment you are useful again!”
“Acknowledged. Glass Mountain continuing cleanse and repair function, reconfiguring in thirteen hours and sixteen minutes approximate.”
**
In code, everything that was Prime's froze. No burning, no acid, no dragons fighting warbirds, dogs and ferrets. Kyrus the younger and Werfas threw another shaped piece of code into a dragon as it ceased to move and it blew into tiny bits and blew away. All the security programs stopped.
The two spun around one another, less than a hundred seconds from impact. *Fifty two! Disengage, disengage! Three hundred four and One hundred fifty will detonate! Fifty two! DISENGAGE*
**
Kyrus and Dukir floundered to their feet almost waist-deep in ashes of code, coughing, struggling to breathe. *What is this? Dukir?*
*I used a bit of code my friend -- *
*Dukir. You found the need for this?* The voice in their heads wasn't hollow, or eldritch, or unusual in any way, just the voice of an old man, but the hair stood up on the back of Kyrus's neck. It was the voice of a dead man. A faint glow rose up between them. *Come now, quickly my friend. You need access to our control codes? You're in a hurry, I'm sure, even if I am recording this.*
*We're in the deepest ancestor crap, Diryish. The city's about to go and another wave of ice is about to be hammered down on the wreckage.*
*I see.* The bald old man dressed in cloth... no... a covering of bees, raised a hand. *My grandson, it seems you've not had time to listen to all my busybody recordings for you. Just another way to stick my fingers in your reign, of course. I won't apologize. You need this information, eventually. This ruin is what is left of our gate, our control centre. Ah, you've already been taken up by the hive. Good. All the codes to jam Perrin's water delivery systems, at least for now, are over on the left.* The image smiled at Kyrus and Dukir. *I'll be here with more advice if you need me,* the recording said, and winked out, leaving them in pitch black once more.
*ENDARKEN IT!* Kyrus pulled his temper under control and snapped *Give me some light to see by*
The light bloomed in the walls, too slowly, and something that looked like a feeble fire in a stone bowl. The codes Kyrus needed, not to take over Prime's glass mountain, but just stop it, confuse it, make him think his own machinery was to blame, if they were lucky, shone brightly on a rack of... bones? Yes. The codes were hung on a rack of bones and teeth.
*Radiance, those fangs the code is hanging on... I think only you should touch them.* Dukir had his hands firmly in his belt.
Kyrus cautiously reached one hand in through the teeth, some as long as his forearm, and grasped what looked like the hilt of a sword and began to draw it out. The whole pile of bones shifted and the jaws closed with a clash, around his wrist, even faster than his warrior's recoil. *FAK!*
*Voice and DNA match confirmed.* With a creaking wheezing noise the bones cranked themselves open and let him withdraw what he needed.
*A sword? How are you going to use a sword to shut down Glass Mountain?*
*It just looks like a sword.* Kyrus raised it over his head and, standing in what looked like the ruins of a burned-out hut, called code to his hand. *Owner Tertius, emergency override, abort all current water delivery modes. Abort, abort, abort. Pause all Prime terraforming commands previous month. Emergency override shut down Owner Prime controls and re-format data controls, purge Hinnom and Sheol recordings. Recalibrate.*
**
The fireball, with Fifty Two, One Hundred Fifty and Three Hundred Four blew into a thousand pieces just above the canyon rim, flinging its guts kilometres away.
Enough plowed into the bottom of the canyon to break off more of the city butte, send a shockwave rolling along the walls, cracking terraces and trees away, dumping rock on top of a creaking, straining Ramtuff vehicle full of the injured.
**
Perrin stared at his screens and his holographic projectors that a moment ago had been displaying what looked like some of the indigenous Chishiki fauna, a variant of those bush-dragon-snake things he'd certainly eradicated on Xanadu, attacking the ice meteors. There had been a partially terraformed canyon and badlands but no immediate sign of humanity. Now ever single screen displayed the tasteful sprays of light that marked an equipment reformat and recalibration.
“Display Hinnom.”
“Reformatting. Reconfiguring program functionality. Scrubbing data storage. All systems stop. Reformatting.”
“STOP reformat!”
“System administrator required to abort program. Some data will be lost. Continue yes or no?”
“I AM the system administrator you STUPID machines!”
Glass Mountain replied. “Continue yes or no?”
“Yes, damn you. Alert me the moment you are useful again!”
“Acknowledged. Glass Mountain continuing cleanse and repair function, reconfiguring in thirteen hours and sixteen minutes approximate.”
**
In code, everything that was Prime's froze. No burning, no acid, no dragons fighting warbirds, dogs and ferrets. Kyrus the younger and Werfas threw another shaped piece of code into a dragon as it ceased to move and it blew into tiny bits and blew away. All the security programs stopped.
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