'But me no buts. If they did it, so can we. Anything else in the Maze I should know about?'
Graves stared at him dolefully, but hid any frustration well. Espers were taught to obey. 'There is a place, in the center of the Maze, where we cannot see. A place we dare not look. There's something there: alive, powerful, but not part of the Maze.'
Silence frowned. 'What kind of alive? Human? Hadenmen? Alien?'
'Unknown, Captain. We can't see. Something… prevents us. Possibly our own minds. I think if we were to look at it too closely, see it too clearly, we would all go mad.'
'We're going in,' he said briskly. 'I'll lead the way, with the Investigator, and I want you right there with us. Scatter the rest of your people throughout the marines. Leave a couple with their mind's eye cranked all the way open; if anything is going to happen, I want plenty of warning in advance. The rest can maintain an esper shield, tight as you can make it. I don't want a single stray thought getting out or in. Now get your people moving and motivated; we're going in in a few minutes.'
He strode away without waiting for an answer and rejoined Frost, who had her sword out and was running through a few loosening up exercises that would have intimidated the hell out of any enemy with half a brain. Silence didn't like being harsh with the esper, it felt uncomfortably like shouting at a child, and a frightened child at that. But if he wasn't harsh, there was a good chance they'd fall apart. Whatever they'd made contact with in the Maze, it had clearly disturbed the hell out of them. Hopefully, if they were scared enough of him, that should keep them from being too scared of the Maze. He looked back at the shimmering steel walls and shuddered suddenly. Great. Now they'd managed to spook him, too. He made himself concentrate on Frost, as she swept her sword through one vicious cut after another and then was suddenly, smoothly at rest. Her pale skin had a healthy glow, and she looked like she could take on an army. Maybe she could, at that. She was an Investigator, after all. She nodded to him calmly and hefted her sword.
'I'm ready, Captain. Can we make a start now?'
Silence had to smile. 'Doesn't anything ever worry you. Investigator?'
'No. Worrying is bad for you. It interferes with the digestion and gives you wrinkles. The greater the challenge, the greater the glory to be gained. At least, that's what the Empire always told us at the academy. Or are you suggesting they lied to us?'
'The Empire, lying to its own people? Perish the thought. Let's go. Investigator. I want to get to the rebels before they can get to the Hadenmen.'
'Spoilsport,' said Frost.
And so, not long at all after they first arrived, Silence and Frost and the esper called Graves stepped cautiously into the Madness Maze, followed by a small army of marines and espers. The Maze swallowed them up without a murmur, and in a matter of moments they were lost to sight by those they'd left behind. Dram watched them enter, one after another, his face impassive, and he stood looking at the blank, enigmatic walls long after the last of the army had gone. Hidden under his long cloak, his hands had clenched into tight, white-knuckled fists.
At first, it wasn't too bad in the Maze. Each of the shimmering metal walls looked just like any other, and whatever surprises the Maze had, it kept them to itself. Graves took the point almost immediately, his head held erect as though sniffing out the way. He chose each turn with unwavering confidence and concentration, and Silence and Frost followed close behind him. The Investigator had her sword and gun drawn, ready for use. Silence kept his hand near his gun, but didn't touch it. He didn't want his people to get the idea he was nervous. Bad for morale, not to mention discipline. His people were stretched out behind him, marines and espers looking equally uncomfortable. They stuck close together for comfort, and the sergeants had to keep warning them not to bunch up. There was little talking in the ranks. The heavy unbroken silence of the Maze didn't encourage conversation. If there was something coming, and the marines were increasingly sure there was, they wanted to be able to hear it in plenty of time. The espers concentrated on their mental shield and tried not to think about the Maze at all.
It didn't take Silence long to decide he didn't like the Maze. He found its atmosphere oppressive, and the narrow paths between the shimmering walls began to seem uncomfortably claustrophobic, pressing in on him like the sides of a coffin. That last thought made Silence frown a little more. Enclosed spaces weren't something that usually bothered him. Living in the cramped confines of a starship quickly cured you of claustrophobia, or you got out of the Service. But the Maze seemed somehow… overpowering, as though he was a rat scuttling though a scientist's maze he could never hope to understand or appreciate. It wasn't so much that the Maze seemed big, as that it made him feel so very small.
There was a tension on the air, an approaching imminence of something about to happen. Something bad, very bad. The air rippled with heat waves though it was bitterly cold. It smelled of vinegar and burning leaves. Oiled metal and old lemon, sharp on his tongue. Colors seemed very bright, and his distorted reflection in the steel walls seemed somehow wrong. Monstrously wrong. He could hear the chattering of metal birds, and babies screaming, and a single iron bell tolling far, far away. Silence swallowed hard and tried to concentrate, but his thoughts were all over the place, and some of them didn't seem like his at all.
Graves stopped abruptly, and Silence almost crashed into him. He stopped, too, and glared about him. Frost moved in close beside him, sword and gun at the ready. Silence could sense the rest of his people stumbling to a halt. No one said anything, but the tension was so thick it was almost smothering. Silence looked up, but there was only an impenetrable darkness, as before. He looked back at the steel walls, and his stomach lurched as he realized that there were no longer any reflections of him or his people in any of the shimmering walls. Frost was breathing harshly at his side, almost grunting, quivering with the need for an enemy to throw herself at. Graves stared straight ahead, his eyes bulging even more than usual, fixed on something only he could see or sense.
'What is it?' Silence said harshly, forcing the words out 'Booby trap?'
'It knows we're here,' said Graves, his entirely normal voice seeming almost painfully loud. 'It doesn't want us. We're too… inflexible. We're not capable of the changes it wants to make. We wouldn't survive the process.'
'How far from the exit are we?' said Silence, making himself concentrate on what mattered. 'Are we far behind the rebels?'
'We have to go back, Captain.' Graves' voice was flat and uncompromising. 'It doesn't want us here. It's dangerous for us to be here.'
'What the hell are you talking about, esper?' snapped Frost. 'What do you see?'
Graves turned to look at her, and blood seeped suddenly out from under his eyelids, running thick and slow down his cheeks like crimson tears. And then his eyes exploded with soft, wet sounds, the blood and other fluids spraying Frost's face. She snarled with distaste, but didn't give ground by so much as a step. Blood poured in streams from Graves' mouth and nose, his eye sockets and his ears. Silence grabbed Graves by the arm, and it crunched up in his grasp as though there was nothing really there inside the sleeve anymore. The esper folded up and fell slowly and gracefully to the floor, just an empty skin and so much blood. Silence and Frost moved to stand back-to-back, their weapons in their hands.
There were screams all around them. Some didn't sound human. A marine came running toward Silence. He'd thrown away his weapons and had both hands clapped tight to his ears, as though trying to block out some intolerable sound. He kept running even though Silence stepped into his path to stop him, then ran straight through Silence as though he was a ghost. Silence turned quickly to look behind him, but there was no trace of the marine anywhere. Silence put his back against Frost's again, turning round just in time to see a man's head explode as though it had a grenade in it, showering the screaming, jostling mob of marines and espers with blood and brains and fragments of skull.
An esper disappeared, air rushing in to fill the vacuum where he'd been. Other espers were crying and laughing, their eyes wild and empty. A marine, fell into one of the steel walls and disappeared as it swallowed him up. Something horrible appeared in the midst of everything: a tangle of bone and blood and viscera that might have been human once. It disappeared with a wet smack as it reached out to Frost with a dripping hand. She shook her head fiercely, as a throbbing headache beat in her ears like a pulse. Her hands were trembling, but she still held onto her weapons.
Two marines slammed into each other and ran together like two colors on a palette, their sticky flesh intermingling beyond any hope of separation. They both screamed with the same voice. Silence wanted to shoot them, but he didn't. He might need the charge in his gun yet, if only to turn it on himself if it became necessary.
