Federations

The Acting Captain raised his hand, but the Computerman said swiftly, “Bid me not to go! Unless you would not heed the will of the Computer in this thing, the Computer which knows all, indeed, even things most secret and shameful.”

The Captain had a troubled look upon his face, and sat back with one hand clutching the front of his jeweled coat, as if to hide something behind his hand, something, perhaps, on a necklace hidden beneath his tunic. “What shame?” he said.

“Every child knows the story of the Ring of Last Command,” the Computerman said. “Of how, when the Sixth Barrage destroyed the lights and power of the second hundred decks, and Weapon of the Enemy opened the Great Chasm in the hull, reaching from the stars below almost to the thousandth deck, the first Captain, Valdemar, capitulated to the Enemy, and allowed a Boarding Party to come in from the Void Below the Hull. Decks Three Hundred through Seven Hundred Seventy rebelled, and followed bright Alverin into battle against the traitor Captain. But the Captain was not found, and his Ring of Final Command was lost. The ring, they say, can waken the Computers all again, and send the Weapons of the Twilight down into the Void.”

“Children’s fairy-tales,” the Captain said.

“Yet, I deem, they tempt you,” the Computerman said.

The Captain was silent.

“This prisoner which the giant brings; he had a ring inscribed with circuits, did he not? A ring which matches the descriptions of the Command Ring? You dream of learning the Secret Word which controls that Ring, and of conquering the world, of driving back the tall elves from decks above, where they fly and know no weight, and compelling the twisted dwarves from Engineering to obedience to your reign, and, one day, who knows? you think you will drive forth the Destroyers, and the servants of the enemy who infest the many antispinward decks, and hurl them down into the Void from whence they came. You dream a dream of vile pride; you are corrupted with temptation.”

The Captain rose angrily from his throne. “Stop! Do you think your holy office will protect you from my wrath? Were there such a ring as legends say, for certain I would seize it to my own. And who would dare deny me? You? You?”

But the Computerman bowed in all humility, and said, “My lord knows there can be no such ring. A ring to waken the computers, indeed! Our faith informs us that the Computers do not sleep, that their screens are not dark, not to eyes that keep the faith. I and my brethren commune with the computers each nightwatch, and it gives us secret knowledge.”

“My father told me the Computer screens once were bright to every eye, and a voice like a man’s voice spoke from them, every man, even the humblest, could hear that voice. Before the Fifth Barrage, in his youth, he had seen them shining, and heard the voice.”

“Men knew less sin in those days, my lord.”

At that moment came a noise at the doors before them, not the golden doors of the Bridge, but the silver doors leading to the outer part of the palace and to the corridors and warrens of the great city of Forecomcon. The silver doors swept wide; here were twenty pikemen of the Gatewatch, dressed in blue and silver, and here, garbed hugely in the gray-green of the ancient order of Marines, strode in the giant.

The giant’s shoulder was taller than a tall man’s head, but his hair and beard were white with age. For he was the last of his kind, born to serve as a Marine, created by the lost arts of the Medical House, back when the Twilight was young. His name was Carradock.

In one hand Carradock held a mighty weapon like a spear, made by ancient and forgotten arts. The weapon could shoot bullets like a musket, except that it could fire many at a time, yet the bullets were slow, and would not pierce the bulkheads, or damage the equipment, and so the weapon was lawful according to the Weapons Law.

In Carradock’s other hand was a chain. Bound by that chain, manacled and fettered, was a strange, dark man, wearing a uniform of silver-white, unlike any uniform known to Weston’s lore. The man had pale hair like an upper-deck elf, and, like them, he was tall. But he was darkened and scarred by radiation, like the dwarves of engineering, or like those who lived near the Great Chasm, the Lesser Chasm, or the Hole, or near any other place the Weapons of the Enemy had blown up through the world. He was muscled like a down-deck dwarf, with thicker muscles than Weston had ever seen, except, perhaps for those on Carradock.

The Gatewatch lieutenant spoke up out of turn, coming forward and saying, “My lord! I pray you, let not this man alone in audience with you! He has the strength of three men.”

“Then let him be bound with three men’s chains, but I will speak alone to him.”