It didn’t look like any gate I’d ever seen. It didn’t look like anything I’d ever seen. Even the Ambassador surely couldn’t move it.
Some 20 feet across, and clearly demarcated from the surrounding walls. Quite unlike the smaller openings and doorways throughout the rest of the facility. Struts and reinforcements crossed its back, which suggested the sort of construction they used in my village to keep grazers off our crops, or predators away from the Polerats. These, though were not suggestions of support, they were strength embodied.
“Who are you trying to keep out of here?” I asked.
“All unauthorized personnel.”
“How would you even know if they were allowed in or not through that? Some sort of secret knock?”
By way of answer, the Ambassador stepped from the transport platform and walked to a bank of blank windows. He touched a few places on them, and they blazed into light, showing pictures of my world.
“We have surveillance assets around the entrances to the facility.”
I looked in wonder at the images, then paused.“I know this place. It’s one of the lairs of the Cave Bear pack that lives around here.”
“We have observed these animals. They represent no threat to the facility. They seem unaware that it exists.”
“You’ve watched them?” Cold water ran down my back. I felt sick.
“Yes. Our surveillance assets have been active, alongside our perimeter filters and defences since this facility was completed.”
I pushed my face as close as I could to the Ambassadors blank features, given the height difference.
“My brother was taken by that pack. They killed him.”
The Ambassador said nothing.“You could have stopped them, couldn’t you. COULDN’T YOU! You could have taken that Autogun, and made them into parts.” Hot tears of anger filled my eyes. I’d just been basically hugging this thing. It had kidnapped me, starved me, held me prisoner. And it had let him die.
“There was no reason to intervene. No authorized personnel were in danger.”
“FUCK YOUR AUTHORIZED PERSONS. OPEN THE DOOR.” I was hammering on the door. Like a child having a tantrum, I could almost hear my brother chiding me. “LET ME OUT!”
The Ambassador touched the windows again, and the doors began to move.
I ran through the gap in between the giant doors, as soon as it appeared, straight into another giant gateway. To my surprise and anger, the Ambassador followed me.
“Where are you going? I thought you’d opened the doors!”
“I am opening the doors. This is a safe zone. The outer doors will only open, when the internal doors have finished opening, and then closed behind us. I am leaving the facility to gather data.”
I didn’t reply at first and just glowered at his perfect silver face. Unfortunately, the door process took forever, and as I’ve already mentioned, I’ve got a smart mouth and I can’t keep it shut.
“What data are you gathering?”
“You are the first sentient being I have conversed with since I lost contact with Norad. I established that you are not genetically human. However, you are able to speak English, and display many of the physical and mental characteristics of the authorized personnel I was expecting. I have evaluated the situation and come to the conclusion that either my data storage has corrupted, or the human genome has shifted. Therefore I must collect data to prove or disprove this hypothesis.”
The doors behind us closed finally, and a loud shriek filled the air. I covered my ears in terror.
The Ambassador placed a hand on my shoulder. “Do not be afraid. It is merely a warning siren.”
I didn’t notice it right then but reflecting later, I realized that this was the first time the facility had shown concern for my feelings or well-being. Its calculations were shifting.
With a hiss of air, the doors moved. My ears popped, and the cold dank air of the outside world filled the room. My heart was racing, with the freedom, the familiarity of the smell, and the hard-earned knowledge that this particular smell meant death.
Cavebear packs hunted together but often travelled alone. The lairs of the pack were not permanently occupied but used as they migrated around their land. It would only take one, though. We just had to hope that the lair was not in use right now. We had a good chance. When I had fallen into the well, it had been winter, and the Cavebears moved south during the cold months.
I picked my way carefully between the obstacles on the cavern floor, mindful of any loose rocks, and trying not to notice that some of the loose rocks were particularly bone fragment shaped. I tried to warn it off with hand signals, but the Ambassador seemed to glide behind me and made less noise even than me, so in the end, I continued.
As I reached the mouth of the cavern, my heart quickened again. The snow was gone. Small bulb flowers were starting to poke through the earth around the entrance. It couldn’t be? How long had I been gone? Weeks? Months? It was clearly spring. In spring the killers came back.
“Why are you walking in this way?” the Ambassador asked me. It sounded like a scream in the silence. “You did not walk like this in the facility?”
“Shhhh”, I hissed. But it was already too late.
From the treeline to our right, a single adult female Cavebear appeared, carrying a polerat in its mouth. This was a bad sign. If it hadn’t eaten the food, it was taking it to another of its kind. Hopefully the lead male of the tribe, and not her Jeesuz damned cubs!
I looked to the left, judged the distance, and if I could make it. The numbers made sense, instinct kicked in, and I took off at full pelt.
I’d traveled maybe 10 paces before I realized something was wrong. I was slow, impossibly slow. Lame member of the herd about to get picked off, slow. I’d not run, not even once, since I’d fallen, and my speed had been forgotten. The joints remembered what to do for their part, but the muscles had gone to seed. The cavebear had dropped its kill and started after me, its own calculations and instincts had come to different conclusions to mine. Unfortunately for me, it appeared her math was better.
I bent my run back towards the Ambassador. “HELP!”
“There is no threat to the facility. I have no reason to intervene”
My brothers voice again in my head. Giving me advice this time, not insults. You can’t change the situation, but you can change how you react to it.
At the back of the cave, the facility outer door was still open. I ran toward it. The cavebear slowed as it saw me running into its own lair. Perhaps some part of it sensed something amiss. Some animal cunning that shouted ‘trap’ or ‘danger’. It kept following me, but just loping slowly now, no desperate pursuit.
I ran into the door. The Ambassador made no move. The cavebear followed me, and at the door, stood up onto its hind legs. It was slower like this, but it could put more weight behind a strike. With the power assist of its huge bulk falling behind it, its claws could go through leather armour, let alone flesh.
“AMBASSADOR! IT'S IN THE FACILITY!”
“It cannot damage the walls of the safe zone.”
I backed up to the rear wall and pressed myself against it. My shoulder-blades tried to dig into the barrier behind me, as the bear advanced.
Behind me, my hip hit windows the Ambassador had used to open the door. The bear slowly walked to within striking range.
