[This is the 3rd (last) file of the Round Robin story "Fortune", created on the Blake7 maillist out of Lysator.liu.se.] Parts 15-19 by Susan Beth Schnitger, sbs@world.std.com Fortune - Part 15 The web was alive as each mind tried to push for pre-eminence. The older minds still counseled patience, but the younger ones had had enough of that. ~It is time to act!~ Sarbon's mental voice was insistent. ~We must kill all the intruders before they ruin the web,~ Melise shrilled, as she had time and time again. Somehow the simple repetition seemed to be swaying others to her point of view. ~Have you learned *nothing* yet? The natural Flow of the Link cannot be interfered with--~ ~And what exactly would you call your giving that amulet to that outworlder?~ All traces of deference to Alerian's wisdom had long since vanished from Sarbon's tones. ~I, I thought I perceived a shortening of the path....~ Alerian trailed off. ~And so, just to bring the pattern to fruiting in *your* time rather than allowing it to unfold in the next, you risked destroying everything we have labored to create for centuries.~ A mental snort is silent, but nonetheless perceivable. ~The natural Flow has already been altered, by *your* actions. Now it is up to us to force our way to the conclusion or we may never reach it.~ ~We must kill all the intruders before they ruin the web.~ This time, there was nothing to be sensed but agreement from all. * * * "Mistress Fortune, kiss me now." The trooper gave the dice cup a final shake and rolled -- three fives and a pair of fours. "A loaded ship!" he exulted. The other troopers seated at the table groaned and shoved handfuls of chips in his direction. "You have the luck of the devil," one grumbled. Another looked sadly at the two lonely chips remaining in front of him. "And yesterday was payday." He shook his head mournfully, then shrugged and waved at a nearby serving girl. The girl was looking right towards him but did not respond in any way. "Hey, you! More ale!" Still the girl didn't so much as blink. If the trooper had been more observant -- and a little less drunk -- he might have noticed that all the natives in the tavern were silent and unmoving. As it was, though, he simply picked up his mug and began to pound it on the table. "Come on, come on. Are you dead or what?" The girl's gaze suddenly focused on him. Hefting her heavy stone pitcher she started to move towards the table of troopers. At the same instant the man who had been carving slices off a roast pig turned from it and also headed for that table, knife in hand. And simultaneously each and every villager in the room began to converge on the troopers, clutching any heavy or sharp object that lay to hand.... * * * Blake ran frantically down corridor after corridor, each lined with thousands of closed doors. He clutched at door handles -- and they came off in his hand. He pressed release buttons -- and the adjacent door smoothed over into unbroken wall. He butted his shoulder into doors -- and slid smoothly across them as if they were no more than pictures projected on a surface slicker than the most perfect ice. All the time the only sound to be heard was the hateful voice of the psychostrategist which echoed and rolled in the corridors, seeming to come from everywhere and nowhere at the same time. "They're all closed. *All* of them. I have locked away from you all your memories, every single one. Shortly you will lose even the memory of having had memories. Then those passages that once linked your mind to them will begin to decay from disuse -- and you will be an utterly empty man. "Did you know that a mind cannot exist without memories, Blake? What we call a mind is just the pattern created by the billions of links we have woven between the myriad details we hold in our memories. "And now, without those memories to anchor the links the entire pattern will begin to fray. Soon, very soon, the mind that called itself 'Blake' will unravel into nothingness. "Or it would, except that I will give you *new* memories." "No!" Blake screamed. "Yes. And you will welcome those memories. You will clutch at them like the drowning man you are, and weave a new mind out of them. One that will be of use to us." * * * Servalan tapped her foot impatiently. Long minutes had passed in absolute silence, and so far as she could tell nothing at all was happening. Blake, Avon and Carnell might as well be statues. The frozen looks of horror on the faces of the first two and smug satisfaction on the third hinted that events were proceeding as planned -- but the role of silent bystander did not suit her nature at all. One of the base guards came running up. "Supreme Commander," he gasped. "What is it?" "Commander Dalter wants to see you at once!" She looked at him coldly. An interruption was not altogether unwelcome, but! "Did he send you to *summon* me?" The guard flushed and shook his head. "No, ma'am, not at all, I mean, Commander Dalter's compliments, and if you please--" He broke off in confusion, then blurted out, "They're killing us!" "What?!" "The natives! They're rebelling!" Servalan shook her head in disbelief. "I hardly see how primitives who don't even have gunpowder can rebel against Federation troops." "But--" "Never mind. You obviously know nothing useful." She waved him off. "Run along and tell *Commander* Dalter that *Supreme* Commander Servalan will be expecting him to explain the situation personally ... in *my* quarters." Turning back to others she said, "Carnell." When he didn't respond immediately she impatiently jerked the amulet from his hand. Carnell's head snapped back as if he'd just been smashed in the face. Avon staggered but kept his footing while Blake simply crumpled to the floor. "Well?" she demanded. "Will it work?" "Yes." Carnell shook his head as if to clear it. "Yes. Within weeks I will give you a Blake committed heart and soul to the preservation of the Federation and loyal to you as its best leader. Betray his fellow rebels, persuade others to give up their resistance -- he will do whatever will advance your purposes." "No!" Blake lurched to his feet, defiance burning in his eyes. "You can torture me as long as you want but I will never give in. And whoever absorbs bits of my mind will become like me." "And you will be happy to undergo the endless torment of having your mind eaten away, secure in the belief that each bite will engender a new rebel?" Servalan paused for a second, then laughed mockingly. "Oh, Blake! You simply mustn't believe everything you read in a computer file, especially one left unsecured next to a prison cell." Servalan shook her head in mock pity. "Did you *really* believe you were that important to me? That I would set up all this simply to torture a petty criminal like you? "You're a tool to me, Blake. A useful tool, but nothing more. "You will give me ORAC. You will give me that marvelous ship. You will give me the destruction of enemies much more highly placed and dangerous than yourself. And when you can no longer give me anything I want, I will give you .... a quick death." "Put them in a holding cell," Servalan said to the guards. "Carnell, come with me. There's some nonsense about a native uprising." * * * Cally was positively stalking from flight station to flight station, scanning each display, tweaking the controls to the maximum possible state of readiness. Gan watched sympathetically from where he sat on one of the couches in the pit. "Waiting is worse than anything, isn't it?" he offered. Cally hesitated for a second, then proceeded to check the next two stations on her rounds before simply standing still and silent for a minute. "Yes." She looked over at Gan. "I should be fighting beside my companions, not tucked away safely ... to survive ... alone again." "This is what Blake needs us to do." Gan hesitated, then spoke even more gently. "You don't have to be alone. The people here are telepaths like you. You could stay with--" "No! These people are nothing like Aurons!" Cally's flare of indignation died down. "You can't know, Gan. Aurons tend to be isolationists, but that is because we need to have others like ourselves around. The Lilarians want to be with *only* those like themselves. Any outsider is a threat, something to be driven away or killed. Their society is closed to me." Cally shook her head. "I can't hear the other members of our crew, but that's because you are mutes, not because you have shunned me." * * * Blake completed his fifth careful examination of every square inch of the cell's walls, floor, ceiling and door: nothing. The Federation had had decades of experience in building escape-proof detention facilities, and this one was state of the art. He looked at his silent cell mate. The slighter man was still sitting absolutely motionless on the bunk, his dark eyes steady on the amulet he held cupped in his hands. Blake set his back into a corner and hunkered down, prepared to wait as long as necessary. Finally Avon blinked and looked over at him. "Did you feel anything?" asked Blake. "Just like a fool." Avon let the amulet drop onto the bunk disdainfully. "In comparison, a chunk of obsidian would be as useful as a communication device -- and rather more so as a weapon." Blake nodded grimly. He hadn't expected that Avon's attempt would be any more successful than his own, but what else was there to try? "Maybe it was damaged when I fell on it. Maybe it only works when it is hooked up to that machine we got it from. Maybe we don't have the right mental talents to use it. Maybe we aren't trying the right way. Maybe it was defective to begin with. Maybe it is just a prop added to this trap Servalan set up. Maybe--" "*Maybe* you are wasting time speculating without facts or the possibility of testing your hypotheses," Avon interjected snidely. Blake glared at him. "If you would like to suggest a more productive way to occupy our time, the floor is yours." Avon was silent. "Right." Blake settled himself on the bed and reached for the amulet. * * * Fortune - Part 16 "You are telling me that thirty crack Federation troops were wiped out by a primitive rabble?" Dalter flushed at the scorn in her tone. "There was no warning at all. We've been on this planet for almost two years, and there had never been an incident, not so much as a native looking cross-eyed at one of my men. And then they just went mad and started attacking, with clubs and stones and scythes and, and, *tableware*, for god's sake. My men were on leave, scattered about and enjoying themselves. They couldn't even help each other since *everyone* was being attacked at the same time. Pretty damn co-ordinated for a 'rabble.' I'd say we were fortunate that even one man managed to make it back to warn us." "Curious," Carnell said. "Hmm. When your immune system figures out how to build an antibody against a new infection they are manufactured simultaneously throughout the body." Servalan threw him an impatient glance. "Very interesting. Commander Dalter, are we in danger here?" "No, ma'am. The walls and doors are shipmetal, and the guards are equipped with the latest in weaponry. Now that they don't even have surprise working for them, well, it'd be like rabbits storming a hunting blind." "And this psi-power of the natives you've been working on, Carnell?" Carnell shook his head with total confidence. "There is nothing to fear there. Fortuitously, it turned out that the energy shield we'd built into this base to prevent teleportation also defends against psychic attacks. The exact mechanism hasn't been worked out yet, but the most likely explanation is that even a minimally-powered shield disrupts the subtle energy fields the psi-power draws--" "*Minimally* powered?" Servalan broke in. "That's not good enough. I want that energy shield at full power. Now, Commander!" "At once, ma'am." Dalter wheeled and exited, clearly pleased at having a reason to leave. Servalan toyed pensively with the amulet laying on the table before her. "There is no possibility of those villagers endangering ... this project." "None." "So what are our plans if they *do* accomplish the impossible?" Carnell beamed like a proud parent. "Oh, excellent, excellent! 'True genius can never be surprised by any twist of fortune.' A wonderful motto for a foresighted leader." Servalan nodded gracious acceptance of the compliment then said, pointedly, "And what has your 'true genius' devised?" "An access tunnel from my office to a private hangar housing an LPX Scout Ship with enough supplies and fuel to reach Starbase 16. So long as we have my notes and *this*," Carnell touched a single fingertip to the amulet for an instant, "our project can continue unhindered elsewhere. Adequate but not ostentatious, I trust?" "An LPX would be rather close quarters for two," Servalan smiled at him warmly and traced a fingernail delicately along his jaw, "but that has its own advantages, hmmm?" * * * "Information. There is a 89.22% probability of a failure in the medium range sensor array. Suggested course of action: take them offline for complete diagnostic testing and autorepair." Cally and Gan stared at each other with 'Now what?' written on their faces. "What kind of failure," Gan asked. "Unknown." "Well, how do you know there *is* a failure?" Cally demanded. "The current sensor readings cannot be rendered in congruence with any known cosmological theory." "What?!" Evidently Zen did not interpret that as a question, since it didn't respond. Gan simply shrugged in apologetic bewilderment. Cally looked around rather wildly, and her eye was caught by blinking lights. She rushed over to ORAC and slapped his key into position. "What does that mean?" "It means, as I have already informed you on multiple past occasions, that Zen's reasoning is of extremely limited usefulness outside the narrow confines of his specialization." "ORAC," Cally's tone carried distinct overtones of imminent explosive disassembly. "Very well. Zen's mid-range sensors are primarily focused on the planet. The readings have begun to fluctuate widely. Indeed, at decreasing intervals the planet does not register on the sensors at all. Since Zen cannot explain these readings, he concludes the sensors are faulty. *I* am not so restricted in my reasoning." "Cally, remember that Federation ship I told you about? The one we couldn't locate again? Zen must be right -- the sensors *are* screwed up." "Or maybe they have a shield like Horizon, and the sensors just can't read through it. We can't risk taking anything offline right now." Cally bit her lip as she thought frantically. "Orac: you will devote your full attention to figuring out what is going on with that planet and the sensors and what we should do about it." "It will necessitate my interrupting three pre-existing research programs--" "Just ... Do ... It," Cally gritted out. "--but it promises to be an intriguing project." "Gan, we must be ready to act at once. I will stay here at the flight controls, you must go down to the teleport bay and wait for any call from the others." Gan nodded and left. Cally settled down on a bench and began to gather all her mind's energy. Now was a good time to discover just how loud a mental voice she could produce. If she didn't succeed in warning Blake of this new danger, it wouldn't be for lack of effort. * * * "Blake? Avon?" Jenna looked up and down the corridor, then risked calling more loudly. "Blake!" No response. She hadn't really expected any. Her own experience with Federation high security detention cells had taught her that their soundproofing was usually flawless. It had been relatively easy to persuade that guard to guide her to this particular cell: being forced to stow the corpse of his uncooperative partner out of sight had rendered him almost eager to help. He had been positively cheerful about being locked into the identical but formerly empty one across the hallway. But he simply hadn't had the coded release key needed to activate this cell's communication relay. Not that she would have bothered to switch it on, of course, given that the same key could open the door.... She pressed a button on her bracelet. "Jenna to Liberator." "Liberator here." Gan's response was immediate. "There's a door down here I need opened. Tell Vila it looks like a standard Federation cell lock to me but bring whatever he might need." "I think he's gone to sleep-- "Then wake him up! Send him and his gear down to the same coordinates Cally used for me. I'll meet him there." Suddenly she heard the sound of approaching footsteps. "Just get him down here as fast as possible. Out." After a quick glance about Jenna headed for the nearest corridor intersection. * * * "Attention! Attention!" The voice blaring from the public address system wrenched Servalan and Carnell from their mutual absorption. "All personnel to Alert Condition Three. Repeat, Alert Condition Three. All exterior doors locks are to be checked manually. Electronic status readouts are to be ignored. All natives within the base should report to Main Assembly at once. Any native discovered outside that room will be considered an enemy agent and dealt with accordingly. This is not a practice. Repeat, *not* a practice." Neither of them had any difficulty figuring out the probable inspiration for that announcement. "I warned you against using natives as menials." "I know, I know. But the project would have fallen behind schedule without them, and they were kept away from all the sensitive areas..." "Like the security doors?" Servalan's tone was acerbic. She rose to her feet and smoothed the flow of her dress briskly. "Now, I will tell you what *my* true genius has devised. You said that with this amulet to power your device you could force others to obey you, right?" "Yeesss. Well, for relatively simple actions and for a limited time span--" "Fine. All that is required is that you make Blake call his ship and order them to transport him aboard. One of my men will actually be wearing the bracelet, and once aboard he will force one of the others to beam someone down with spare bracelets." Servalan spread her hands in a gesture of ease. "Then we simply take over the ship." Carnell applauded softly. "Brava! Elegant and effective. You are truly amazing." This time Servalan ignored his flattery. "We will, of course, have plenty of room available, so besides your notes and the amulet we will take your entire mind control device. And Blake, of course, to use it on." She waved at the door. "Go find Gent, while I decide what else we should bring." "Avon. I think Avon may have uses." Servalan smiled like a cat contemplating a bowl of cream. "Yes, Avon, definitely." * * * Jenna slipped silently down the corridors, pausing before each intersection to listen intently. The broadcast alerts and orders to station had come as a nasty surprise. So much for hoping she and Vila would have a second easy stroll into this base. At the final turn to the outside entry she flattened to the wall. The clicks and snaps of armaments being checked over and readied echoed clearly down these bare passageways. The lower pitch of men's voices didn't carry nearly as well but now that all her attention was focused she could hear several distinctly different voices though she couldn't discern the words. Steeling herself, she risked a fast look around the corner. Damn! *Four* guards. And clearly keyed up, judging by the pitch of their voices. Jenna knew she was a better than average shot, but getting off four disabling shots before any of them could return fire was long odds against. Sneaking unseen down fifty yards of bare corridor and through the door they were watching was obviously impossible. She drew her gun and started waiting. Maybe they would have to split up to cover another point. Maybe some of them were supervisors making inspection rounds. Maybe, she thought grimly, Vila would simply waltz through that door and get himself killed. All she could do was wait, hope -- and try to come up with a better plan. * * * Fortune - Part 17 ~The matrix is wavering!~ ~We must have more power!~ ~There is nothing more to give!~ The bitter taste of despair was spreading through the web. ~Hold on, just a little longer.~ Sarbon encouraged the fainthearted. ~If we can only manage to draw on the base's power we will have all we need, and more.~ * * * THUD. Jenna jumped at the sound. A guard around the corner yelled in surprise. THUD. THUD. THUD. The sounds rolled down the corridor. The brief pauses between each noise were filled with increasingly shrill shouts from the guards. THUD. THUD. And now each thud was also bringing the screech of tortured metal. Jenna peered around the corner, trusting the guards' attention would be directed the other way. THUD. Now she could see that the sound seemed to be coming from outside the door. The guards had their weapons drawn and aimed at the door, but there was nothing for them to shoot at. THUD. The door was bulging towards them like the belly of a pregnant woman. One of the guards released his hold on his rifle and groped for his communicator. THUD. The door hinges suddenly snapped and the door smashed down like a drawbridge, flattening the two closest guards beneath it. Villagers began to pour through the now gaping opening carrying the simple tree trunk they had used to defeat the Federation's intricate electronic locking system. The remaining guards began to fire and the foremost intruders were quickly mowed down. But the villagers continued to pour in, treating the fallen tree and the bodies of their friends as insignificant obstacles to be clambered over, equally heedless of them and the continued firing which picked off individuals but had no discernible impact on the inexorable flow. The mob reached the first of the soldiers and simply rolled over him, his body vanishing under their feet as they flowed down the corridor towards the sole remaining guard. He squeezed off a few more rounds while retreating constantly, then simply turned and ran. Jenna slipped inside an unlocked room a few feet down the corridor, and watched through the cracked door as the guard pelted toward her and then past, with the mob following relentlessly behind. She latched the door and leaned back again it, shaken. None of the natives had made a sound, she realized. No cries of pain. No angry shouts. No calling of instructions to one another. They had simply *acted*, as if the whole crowd were a single being with a single purpose. She shuddered, then forced herself back into the corridor and off towards the now open exit. She, too, had a purpose to carry out. * * * Blake was leaning against the wall with his tired eyes closed pondering which he hated more, the real amulet because it worked or the fake one because it didn't, when he heard the whoosh of the cell door being opened. "Hello?" His eyes snapped open. The cavalry had arrived! His exhaustion vanished instantly with the infusion of hope they brought. "Vila, Jenna! You don't know how literally a sight for sore eyes you two are." Avon was already on his feet, reaching towards Jenna who gave him a bracelet then handed another to Blake. "We can't beam out of this base but we know where there's an unguarded door," she said. Vila leaned out the door and looked carefully both ways. "C'mon," he urged. "Let's get out of here." "Wait," Blake said. "I still have to get the Gate back." "Gate? What gate?" Vila asked. "Are you mad?" Avon was incredulous. "Are you just going to walk up to Carnell and ask for it? That would be stupid enough to deserve what he would do to you." "I gave my word." "Is that your motto to die by? It certainly isn't mine. For once Vila's right: we should get out of here *now*." "Avon, think! We've felt what that Gate can accomplish -- we can't leave a weapon like that in the hands of Carnell and Servalan. Vila said, "Which gate?" "Now imagine it back in the hands of AAA, and her working on our side to bring the Federation down." Blake paused. "I know what we risk. But we *have* to try." Avon looked away without replying, but they all knew he had given in. "The teleport shield is limited to this base, so it must be generated by something here. Avon, Jenna -- you two find it, switch it off." "Why not leave that to the mob," suggested Vila hopefully. "The way they are smashing every bit of technology they come across it's a goner soon enough anyway." "Mob?" asked Blake. "The natives haven't waited for you to lead this rebellion," Jenna said dryly. She continued, "No, Vila, we can't depend on them. They are just as likely to destroy the control panel and never stumble across the generator, and there we'd be with the shield on and no way to switch it off. Come on, Avon." "And Vila and I will find the gate." "Sure we will, nothing to it, er, what does this gate look like?" "Like this worthless hunk of glass." Avon tossed the amulet to Vila and followed Jenna out into the corridor. "Oh." Vila turned the amulet over in his fingers, looking distinctly unimpressed with it, then realized he was now alone in the cell. "Wait for me, Blake!" * * * "It's so nice of the Federation to lay out all their bases to the same pattern. Convenient, like," Vila murmured, looking at the door neatly lettered with Carnell's name. He pulled a small leather folder from a pocket and selected a tool. "What if it isn't in here?" "Then we keep looking." Blake was facing the other way down the corridor: the sounds of smashing equipment seemed to be getting closer. "They're breaking an awful lot of stuff. Good. Well, good so long as none of it is me." "Just get that door--" Blake broke off when a glance over his shoulder revealed that Vila had already vanished inside the room. He followed him in and glanced about. There were several tables, most covered with complex devices with the crude, cobbled-together-by-hand, appearance that screamed "prototype" to the engineer's eye. Vila was already rummaging about in the clutter. Blake headed directly for the largest desk, set slightly apart from the others. "Here it is, Vila." Blake picked the amulet up from a shallow dish with an expression of distaste, which rapidly mutated through surprise into raptness as he stared into it. "Yes, rather entrancing, isn't it?" Vila whirled around at the comment, to discover that two armed men and Servalan had entered through a door in a different wall. Vila sheepishly raised his hands well clear from his still holstered weapon, and the man who hadn't spoken relieved him of it. Blake simply stood there oblivious. "Just as I told you, Servalan, there was no need to fetch them." "I *believe* you said that Blake and *Avon* would come here." "Yessss.... A minor miscalculation," Carnell admitted. "Vila must not be the utter nonentity depicted in the records I was given. My predictions are only perfect when the data I base them on is accurate." He shrugged with deprecative modesty. "Still, it won't change the outcome at all. Blake, I'll take that amulet, please." Blake didn't react at all. Gent swiveled his gun to point in that direction. "Hand it over or I'll blast it out of your hand." "No, don't!" Vila rushed over to Blake, "There's no need for violence, he just didn't hear the first time. Give him the amulet, Blake." When Blake still didn't respond, and Gent raised his rifle to take aim, Vila hastily snatched it from Blake's hand and turned to give it to Carnell. "Thank you," Carnell said. Servalan had been watching this byplay with growing impatience. "Carnell, are you deaf? Can't you hear that crowd is getting closer? Get on it." Carnell nodded, and crossed the room to a table holding one of the more unplanned-looking apparatuses. Sliding a cover aside, he inserted the amulet into the cavity it revealed then closed it again and turned a few switches. Telltale lights began to blink on its control panel, and a low-pitched hum filled the room. Picking up a headset he checked the connections at both ends of the cable linking it to the machine, then seated it firmly on his head. Rousing from his trance, Blake started towards Carnell -- only to be brought up short when Gent pressed the barrel of his rifle into his belly. "Hurry," Servalan said. * * * Jenna held up a hand to halt Avon. "Do you hear that?" "Yes." So far their passage through the base had been nerve-wracking but incident free. They'd had to detour around several batches of natives grimly bent on reducing every piece of high tech equipment to heaps of rubble, but the sounds of glass and metal breaking had been an adequate early warning system. Now, though, the repeating snap-whine of blaster fire was reminding them that the natives weren't even the greatest danger they might face. "Assuming they haven't deviated from the standard layout--" "And so far they haven't--" "The Control Room is located about thirty yards down the corridor that branches left just ahead--" "Which is exactly where that gunfire seems to be originating," Jenna finished. She holstered her gun momentarily in order to wipe her palm dry on her pants. There had been a rather sharp set of exchanges when Avon had assumed that she would turn her weapon over to him, but she had never been the type to submit to bullying. Especially when she was in the right: he might be a crack shot, but he was also the one who would have to tinker with the computer while the role of lookout and bodyguard would naturally fall to her. "This way." Avon led her into an office, and they passed quietly through several others by means of their connecting doors. Peering cautiously through a window in the last office's corridor door, they took in the situation they faced. A little way down the corridor to their right there was a rickety mountain of haphazardly piled furniture that almost reached the ceiling. Beyond it, blocked from their goal, there looked to be many dozens of natives crammed into the corridor. Barely five feet down the corridor to their left was the doorway to the Control Room, in front of which stood two heavily armed guards stolidly standing shoulder to shoulder. Every ten seconds or so another of the natives scrambled to the crest of the barrier -- and was promptly blasted back down from it by fire from the guards. Jenna whispered, "Are there any other ways to get into that room?" Avon shook his head. "The Control Room is designed to be defensible, and those guards are doing a properly professional job of it." "So what do we do? Wait to find out if that mob has more bodies or the guards have more ammunition?" Jenna looked sick. "Gods, I don't even know which side to root for." "Well, now, that depends: would you rather be trampled by the victorious mob or shot down by the victorious guards?" * * * Fortune - Part 18 Servalan was tapping a teleport bracelet against her palm as she coolly surveyed Gent. "You know what you are to do?" "Yes, ma'am!" "Then see to it that you redeem your earlier failure." She fitted the bracelet onto his left wrist while he kept his weapon trained on Blake with his right hand. "Second chances are rare, Gent. And no one gets a third." "I will not fail." Servalan turned toward Carnell. "Are you set?" "Yes, everything is ready. I think the phrase 'This is Blake -- emergency teleport' will be best." "Fine." Servalan moved over to the desk and pressed an intercom switch. "Control Center." There had been a significant pause before the response came, and behind the voice the sound of periodic blaster fire could be heard. "This is Supreme Commander Servalan. You will switch off the teleport shield at once." "But--" "That is an *order*." "Yes, ma'am, right aw--" Servalan broke the connection and moved back to the others. She nodded to Gent, who held out his left wrist in front of Blake's face, then said to Carnell, "Proceed." Blake clenched his teeth and steeled himself. His face contorted as he fought an invisible battle with the enemy inside his mind, but inch by inch his right hand came up and began reaching towards the bracelet in front of him. * * * "Santano! Turn off the teleport shield!" The shouted instruction carried easily to the ears of the two waiting in the nearby office. Jenna and Avon stared at each in disbelief. "Can it be that easy?" she breathed. "Evidently so." Avon looked at her levelly. "Are you up to seizing the tide?" Jenna looked at him blankly. "The next order is likely to be 'turn the teleport shield back on'. I know of only one way to be sure it doesn't get carried out." Jenna hesitated. Avon held out his hand. "Then I will do it." Jenna swallowed, then shook her head. "No, you're right." She checked her weapon, braced herself, and then nodded to Avon. Avon pulled the door open, Jenna took one step into the corridor -- and killed the guards with two snap shots. * * * Blake's hand was shaking, beads of sweat began to roll down his forehead, but he could not stop his finger from searching out and pressing on the proper spot. His mouth forced itself open and in a strangled but intelligible voice he said, "This ... is Bla-- <> The cover on the amulet cavity blew off and powdery white crystalline dust spurted from it. Simultaneously Carnell screamed and convulsed. The headset pulled free as he fell to the floor, but he continued to writhe, clutching his head and moaning "My head! My head!" and further electrical discharges snapped and pulsed over the mind control machine, which started to smoulder. Servalan looked down at Carnell with disgust. He was obviously going to be of no further use, at least in the short term. She took the weapon from his hip holster and checked its settings. "Gent. Go outside and guard the door to this room. I will take care of Blake." Gent saluted and stepped outside. During the seconds the door was open it was clear that the sounds of destruction were much louder and closer than before. * * * Jenna ducked back into the office. The first natives were already scrambling down the now undefended barrier and she didn't want to watch what they would do to the technicians manning the Control Room. "It had to be done," Avon said quietly. Jenna just looked at him. His approval meant nothing to her conscience. Avon raised his wrist. "We'd best see how Blake and Vila are -- duck!" Jenna was too startled to react in time, and the hurled piece of wood smacked squarely into the back of her head. Knocked to the floor she managed to look back over her shoulder to discover that part of native mob was branching off in their direction even as the rest swept on into the Control Room. "Liberator! Two to teleport! Now!" Avon was shouting into his bracelet as he tried to help her to her feet with his other hand. The crowd was almost upon them, waving chair legs wrenched from the furniture barricade and other make-shift clubs. Jenna was too dazed to focus her eyes, and clung to him dizzily. He managed to catch hold of her dangling gun and shoot the closest native but the next was only half a step behind, and a club was swinging directly at his head. * * * Gent held his rifle aimed rock steady at the turn in the corridor. A native appeared around it, and he squeezed off a single shot. The next native met the same fate. And the next. And the next. Then two turned the corner as the same time, and he didn't manage to shoot the second until he'd taken two more steps. By that time, another pair had rounded the turn, and as he potted them another handful got an even bigger lead towards him. Realizing the futility of the situation he faced, he reached behind him for the door handle. It was locked. Gent spared a glance the other direction down the corridor. The path that way was clear. Gritting his teeth, he set his back squarely to the door and proceeded to shoot natives as quickly as he could re-aim. His Oath of Allegiance to the service included following orders from his superiors. And he was honorable, even if they weren't. * * * The familiar panels of the teleport bay shimmered into existence around them. "Excellent timing," Avon said to Gan, and started to help Jenna to a seat. Gan rushed around the console to lend a hand. "Look, Avon, just before your call, there was this other one, I *think* it was Blake's voice, but it broke off after just a word--" "Did you get a teleport lock on it?" "There wasn't time, I tried--" "Then we must do a manual scan for his bracelet's signature." Avon headed for the teleport controls. "Did you get them aboard, Gan?" Cally's voice came from the communicator. "Yes, but Jenna's hurt," Gan was already looking around for something to blot the blood matting Jenna's hair as he spoke. "We may *all* be hurt soon if ORAC's right!" Avon's head snapped up. "What do you mean?" "It's what ORAC means that's the problem: shifting space/time references and rifts and, and, I don't understand it at all. You'd better get up here at once and see if you can make sense out of it." Avon snapped his fingers at Gan who was tending the still groggy Jenna. "Do a manual scan for Blake's bracelet." Gan moved obediently towards the control panel, but said "That'll take some time--" "So get started *now*." Avon was almost through the door as he added over his shoulder, "And scan for Vila's at the same time. Blake might be with him." * * * Servalan listened as Gent's cry was choked off, then the door started to shudder under pounding. "Yes. Well." She thought for a few seconds, then pointed her gun squarely at Blake's forehead. "It seems you won't be of any use to me after all." Blake smiled defiantly. "Another sterling success for you to explain to the Senate?" "Oh, my name doesn't appear anywhere on the authorizations for this project." "Or rather, it won't by then," he suggested. Servalan gave him a wry smile. "You understand me so well. It really is a pity that I have to kill you. I know: why don't I let you watch your companion die first?" Blake shouted "No!" and Vila flinched back shaking his head, but with no hesitation she swiveled the gun towards Vila and pulled the trigger. * * * Fortune - Part 19 "No, don't, don't, no...." Vila was practically moaning as he materialized aboard the Liberator. His eyes were squeezed shut and he held his arms crossed before his chest to fend off the bolt. Blake simply took an enormously deep breath and relaxed. "*Thank* you, Gan," he said to man behind the controls. Gan nodded with a smile, then started moving around the console. "You'd better get up to the flight deck, strange things are happening." He wrapped a gentle hand around Vila's shoulder. "You're okay. You're safe." Blake stared at Gan blankly for two seconds, then at Jenna who was lying on the bench nearby holding a blood-stained rag to her head. She waved him towards the door, "Go on, we'll be okay." He bolted out the door. Vila moaned louder. "Leave me alone, can't you see I'm dead?" Gan shook Vila gently, "Come on, Vila, look around!" "I'm dead, I tell you! She pulled the trigger! I saw it!" "Through your eyelids?" * * * Servalan was panting with poorly controlled rage as she stared at the crater her shot had blasted in the wall. She had been so close! The irregular beating on the door had changed into a steady pounding, and the door was trembling under it. Carnell had finally stopped writhing. Clutching at the table, he managed to struggle to his feet. "There's no time, we must get to my ship..." He started staggering towards the inner door, then turned back towards his desk. "No, must take my notes...." Servalan watched, her eyes glittering in an otherwise set face. It took him three tries before he successfully held all three data chips in his fumbling hands. Aiming squarely at his back, Servalan fired. The chips clattered to the floor, and seconds later his body joined them. "I do hate being crowded," Servalan said. She stooped to collect the chips then headed smoothly towards the inner door. * * * "--and given a great enough source of power and a steady enough matrix those lines of power could create a portal through the basic fabric of our time/space continuum." ORAC's voice was as animated as they'd ever heard it. Blake and Avon stared at each other. "The Portal of Rieszac?" Blake said tentatively. "Zen reports that enormous amounts of power are being drawn from the generator in that base, though he cannot say how or to where." Avon shrugged. "The matrix isn't nearly steady enough. If they don't give up the attempt soon, those power lines will snarl and self-destruct, shattering the planet itself and anything else within three hundred thousand spacials. If your curiosity compels you to witness the end, I'd suggest we move to a seat at the back of the house." "Stabilizing the matrix -- that must have been the purpose of that amulet," Blake mused. "But now that it has been destroyed...." "Destroyed? Not a bit of it." Vila's chipper tone showed how quickly he had recovered. Having claimed their attention, he displayed his empty hands, made a motion as if plucking something from the empty air ... and opened his hand to reveal the amulet. Blake took it from him and stared at it dumbfounded. "How?" "The hand is quicker than the eye. I just swapped in the one you had said was useless when Carnell wanted the real one." Vila shrugged in mock modesty. "Any wonder worker could have done it." Avon snorted, "Fortune favors the fool." "That's right, just like Ngai Chan said." Vila agreed, then did a double take. "Hey!" Blake and Avon were already headed out the flight deck door. * * * Blake materialized in the village bazaar. In the center of it a ring of men and women was rotating, shoulder to shoulder, swaying and chanting as they slowly sidestepped clockwise. Alerian approached him, trailed by Melise and Sarbon. Blake held up the amulet. "I have kept my word." Melise simply snatched it from his hands and rushed through the ring to stand at its center. Holding it between the thumbs and forefingers of both hands, she raised it high over her head and began to slowly spin in the opposite direction to the ring around her. Alerian said, "All is now as my visions said it would be." Blake reached out toward them. "We could work, your people and mine, against the Federa--" "The Federation is no longer of any interest to us. Neither are you." Sarbon walked away to join the circle. Alerian looked up at Blake. "Our fortunes do not touch at any point from now on. Go now, or you will be trapped outside your own future." She gestured at the sky, and Blake looked up to see that lines of glowing green light were starting to become visible. As he watched more and more appeared, interlocked and brightening into an increasingly intricate meshwork. "The pattern is almost fully woven. Hurry!" Blake raised his bracelet to his mouth. "Teleport now!" * * * The flight deck's main viewer displayed a glowing green orb. The jewel glowed brighter, and brighter -- then simply vanished, leaving nothing but the jet black of empty space. "Fascinating." ORAC was practically burbling with joy. Vila said, "Where did it go?" "It did not go any*where*, it went any*when*." "Huh?" "The planet is still there. It circles the same star as always. From the point of view of an observer on it nothing at all has changed. But it is in a different time now." Puzzled, Gan asked, "Do you mean they went into the past? Or the future?" "No, no, no!" ORAC was annoyed as ever by the thickness of the humans he was forced to dwell among. "The difference is not linear but discontinuous. Our timelines no longer intersect." "Well, it's beyond me," Vila said. "Now there's a surprise." Avon's tone was dry as dust. Blake laughed and pulled ORAC's key out. "Zen, long range scan: does that planet register at all?" "Negative. However I do detect a ship, Federation Class LPX. Its trajectory indicates its path originated three point six minute ago from the point the planet formerly occupied." Avon ordered, "Bring us within neutron blaster range." "Confirmed." "No. Belay that order!" "Confirmed." Avon stared at Blake. "That mercy of yours will be the end of you some day." "Do you see yourself as no better than those mobs? Smashing any object at hand without plan or reason?" Avon remained silent. "What's the point in killing some nobody fleeing in a life boat? We will never bring down the Federation by sticking a pin into it at random." He paced a few steps. "We need to plan for the future." Striving for a light touch, Gan said, "Well, at least *I* have no worries. Nothing lies ahead of me but a long life full of good fortune. I have it on the best of authority." * * * The End * * * (whew!)