Binary by Jay Caselberg (best short books to read txt) 📖

Up ahead, two figures were heading toward him. Both were men, Atavists. One carried a pack, and the other had a staff. Sandon watched them as they neared. They barely glanced at him as he passed. One of them, the one bearing the staff, looked up as they came alongside and gave him a brief nod, then they continued on their way in silence. Sandon returned the nod and looked back over his shoulder to watch them. As far as he could tell, not a word passed between them as they headed on down the poorly marked track into the distance. Sandon felt a sense of relief. Clearly, they had taken him for another of their own number. So that much was good -- at least he looked the part. Alise's constant words rang inside his head. "If the Prophet wills it." But it wasn't some long-dead Prophet that was going to make this happen for him. If the stellar alignment was right, if the heavenly influences were in his favor, then perhaps... No, this was nothing to do with planetary positioning. What he really needed now was a healthy dose of luck.

Fourteen

Tarlain huddled shivering in his burrow. Well, it was more like a cave really, a cold damp cave, but it felt like a burrow. Outside, yet another storm raged. The wind moaned through the tunnel complex and streams of water trickled through the vent holes dotted the length of the passageways that honeycombed the area. Despite the weeks of being here, he was still no closer to understanding the layout of the place. One tunnel looked just the same as any other and he had no idea how the Kallathik managed to find their way unerringly from one place to the next. At least he assumed they did. For all he knew they could be blundering around from chamber to chamber oblivious. It was not beyond belief, because despite his time here, here in the very heart of their lives, he was still no nearer to a true appreciation of how their minds worked. Either way, they seemed to have a faultless sense of where they were going in the confusing network of passages and tunnels, ambling slowly along with their customary unhurried pace, scraping along the metallic floors and walls. But then, he didn't know how they told each other apart either. There was quite a lot he didn't seem to understand.

He stifled a sneeze and pulled the blanket tighter around himself. Oh what he'd give for a warm room and a proper bed right at this moment. It hadn't been so bad before the storms had really set in, and they were nowhere near the worst of it yet. Curse his own impetuosity. It was all well and good to have ideals, but it was easier to have them when you were warm and comfortably dry. He stood and shuffled over to the shelves on the other side of the room, the blanket still draped around him. At least there was no vent hole above this particular room, so it didn't collect the run-off water directly. The damp still made its way in though, seeping into every crack and space within the entire colony. The Kallathik didn't seem to mind slopping through puddle after puddle, dragging trails of greasy moisture along the tunnel floors behind them. Muttering to himself, he reached for the small oil stove that sat on one of the shelves, set it down in the middle of the table, and pumped it a few times to get the oil flowing through the system. When he thought he'd primed it enough, he pressed the ignition button and the acrid, sharp smell of burning ajura oil filled the chamber as the pale yellow-green flame blossomed into life.

Tarlain wrinkled his nose, not that he was all that sensitive to smells any more. His own smell had ceased to bother him a couple of weeks ago. It was one of the hazards of being buried away here in the heart of the Kallathik tunnels. The Kallathik appeared to have no need of bathing. At least he'd seen no evidence of it so far. In the meantime, Tarlain had made a few brief trips to the nearby mining facilities to wash and clean up a little, pick up supplies and seek some word of his family. Now, with the weather, and the land's growing instability, he was forced to keep to the tunnels for days at a time, going out of his mind with boredom. And all the while, he'd heard nothing. Nothing. Not from Karnav Din Baltir, not from Karin nor his father. Nothing.

He would have expected lack of contact from Roge, but he had had some hope that at least Karnav might have made some effort to contact him. After all their long discussions and the plans they had constructed late into the night, after everything they had spoken about, it was unbelievable that the Guildmaster had made no attempt. That lack suddenly made him wonder about Din Baltir and his motivations. What was it that had changed so quickly?

Shaking his head, Tarlain reached for the large water jug and filled a pot that he placed on top of the stove to heat. A strong, hot mug of tea might make him feel a little better, bring back some semblance of humanity. As he placed the jug back down, he noted that the water was getting low -- he must remember to refill it. He glanced up at the shelves. The food containers were dwindling too. Whether he liked it or not, he'd have to make another expedition to restock supplies before long. Another trip to the mining facilities, about half a day's travel from here would be a welcome relief from the claustrophobic oppression of the tunnels, but he would have to wait for the weather to lift and that was another thing over which he had absolutely no control.

As he sipped his tea, he thought over the past few weeks, the litany of failure. For the first few days after he'd arrived, Tarlain had started to try and build the vision that he and Karnav Din Baltir had spoken of together. The fire of that vision burning inside him, he had wandered the endless tunnels and passageways, seeking an audience for his impassioned words among the Kallathik. That had been the idea. And instead, he had met disappointment. Slowly, the fire had dwindled, fading to a guttering flame. Once or twice, he had become hopelessly lost and spent hours, even whole days trying to find his way back to his meager cubby hole. The Kallathik had been unhelpful at best, either ignoring him completely, shoving him aside with their large bulk as they ambled up the passageways, or failing to understand what he wanted when he finally managed to attract their attention for a moment or two. There were times he could have cursed the damned aliens for their stupid incomprehension. He caught himself and frowned at the strength of the thought -- his people were the aliens here, not the Kallathik. Hundreds of years, hundreds of Seasons, but they were still the aliens. And still this cursed world tried to reject them.

A creak and groan came from further down the corridor as something within the surrounding landscape shifted. He sat where he was, waiting to see if it was the herald of something new. They had had a brief quake about ten days ago, and the noise had almost deafened him, metallic booming noises pulsing through the entire complex, loud creaks and the sound of metal under stress. How the Kallathik lived with it Storm Season after Storm Season, he had no idea. He swallowed the last few drops of tea and placed the mug carefully back down. After a few more seconds had passed, he sighed and relaxed a little, feeling the tension go out of his shoulders. It looked like they were clear for now. He glanced around the chamber. This was no place for a person to live. No place at all. The Kallathik could have it.

Standing again, he shrugged off the blanket and bundled it onto the bed. He had either to achieve something here, or leave, find some other way to do what he needed to. Enough. Curse his father anyway. Sufficient time had passed. He could spend the rest of his life down here moping, but it would achieve absolutely nothing. And dammit, he would achieve something here. He had to.

Resolved, he moved to the high, roughly shaped doorway leading out from the chamber. He felt around the edge, searching for the scratched star shape he had scored into the metal on the other side. He didn't need to check that it was there, but it gave him a sense of comfort knowing that it was. He stepped out into the corridor's gloom and headed deeper into the complex. It was hard in the semi-dark avoiding the pools of water, and before long, his boots were damp, squelching with every step he took. At each intersection, he felt for his mark, tracing his fingers across the metallic surface, confirming that he was traveling in a direction he knew would actually lead him somewhere rather than around and around, retracing his own steps. It would do no good to get lost yet again and spend the rest of the day wandering aimlessly through the passageways trying to find his way. Somewhere down in this direction, he knew the central meeting chambers lay. He'd been there once or twice, and if anywhere, that was where he was going to find his proper audience.

He found another mark at the entrance to a tunnel, and headed down that way. He'd not gone a dozen steps, when a vast shape loomed out of the darkness ahead of him, and he was forced to press himself flat against the wall or risk being scraped along beside the shuffling Kallathik. He stifled a curse and when he was sure the beast had no companion trailing along behind, peeled himself off the wall and stepped out into the passageway once more. He shook his head at the thought. Even he was starting to refer to the Kallathik as beasts in his own mind. That was not good. It was not good at all.

He sloshed down the corridor, heading toward a patch of light that he knew to be another randomly placed vent hole to the surface. There seemed to be no pattern to the spacing, but the murky shafts of light gave welcome relief from the gloomy dampness of the corridor's depths.

He reached the end of one passageway, and feeling around for the mark on each wall of the connecting branches, located his direction. This far in, the tunnels were slightly warmer, the atmosphere thick with humidity, and over it all lay the tang of damp metal. He hadn't believed before coming here, that metal would have such a distinctive smell, but it was everywhere around him, different from the smell of damp earth, or of wet wood. At least it didn't have the sharp unpleasantness of burning ajura oil, but it wasn't a smell he'd look forward to ever again if he finally got out of here. He had a sudden vision of a much older Tarlain, dressed in tatters and wandering through the darkened corridors muttering to himself. He grimaced and shook the thought away.

A scraping sound further down the tunnel alerted him to the approach of another Kallathik. Forewarned this time, he was flat against the wall before the creature was upon him. As it drew closer, it slowed. It took one more step, and then stopped completely. The vast head swiveled to face him directly. Several moments passed, and though Tarlain couldn't make