other bees had a clue what to do, so they scattered. Psych! I didn’t even mean to crush the fat little monster. All I wanted was a few extra seconds to escape. But hey, I’d rather be lucky than good anytime. I sat on a crate to catch my breath, and watched the spiders disappear to who-knows-where. I didn’t care. All that mattered was that they weren’t after me anymore.
Once I was sure they were gone, I jumped back down to the floor. I’m not sure why I did what I did next. I guess it was out of some morbid curiosity. But I moved to pull the broken carton off the lead spider. I wanted to get my first close look at a quig. Most every time I saw a quig in the past, whether it was a bear on Denduron or a snake on Zadaa or a dog on Second Earth, I was usually running too fast to get a good look at it. But now I had the chance to see one up close. Saint Dane created these things somehow; I thought that by taking a closer look, it might give me some clue as to how he was able to make these mutants appear at the gates to do his bidding. Or maybe I just wanted to make sure it was dead and not waiting for me to relax so it could call its buddies back. Either way, I wanted to see it.
As I began to pull away the wooden crate, I saw that one side of the container had almost completely broken off. My curiosity shifted to the box. I wanted to know what was being stored in this monster tomb of a warehouse. I yanked the side off the rest of the way to reveal… a stack of plates. I’m serious. Plain old white plates like you’d see in a diner or something. I picked one up to confirm that there was nothing special about it. Somebody had packed away about a dozen white boring plates. The one thing that was of any interest at all was the logo printed on the back of the plate. In simple black one-inch letters was a single word: blok. That’s all. blok. A quick check showed me that all the plates had this same word printed on their backs. This meant exactly nothing to me, so I put the plate back and reached over to pull the crate off my victim.
When I heaved the crate over, I instantly realized two things. One was that this particular itsy-bitsy spider was not going to be chasing me anymore. It was definitely dead. Though as I stared at it, I wasn’t sure if “dead” was the right word, because this quig was never alive. Not in the true sense, anyway. That was the second thing I learned. The weight of the carton had smashed open its body and spread it all over the floor. But it wasn’t disgusting or anything. That’s because the remains of old spidey weren’t organic. That’s right. The outside was fur covered and looked every bit like a very real, very big spider. But the insides were a different matter. My little nemesis was mechanical. Instead of blood and guts, I was looking at a pile of high-tech computer-driven machine parts.
It was a robot.
The works weren’t like any kind of machinery I had ever seen. It was actually fairly simple. You’d think that with such a sophisticated piece of machinery there would be thousands of little gears and joints and rotors, but there were surprisingly few. All I saw was a squished metallic spider skeleton, along with something that looked like a computer core. I figured the technology would have to be pretty advanced to get that simple spider skeleton to run, turn, jump, bite… and think. That was the scariest part. They could think.
Staring at the mess of smashed metal, I realized that Quillan was a territory with technology that was so advanced, they were able to create lifelike self-powered robots. I could only hope they weren’t all going to be chasing me.
I did a quick cleanup of the broken crate and the crushed robot-quig-spider. I didn’t think anybody would be wandering by, but just in case, I wanted to hide any evidence that I had been there. I kicked the debris into a corner between a couple of large crates, making sure I swept up every last remnant of mechanical-gut stuff. After I was satisfied that the mess was hidden, I set out to find my way out of there. It was time to see what other surprises lay in wait for me on Quillan.
(CONTINUED)
QUILLAN
Which was worse: A territory populated by spiders? Or one controlled entirely by robots? I wasn’t thrilled by either option. All I knew for certain was that whatever this territory held, I wouldn’t learn about it hanging around in a dusty old warehouse full of dinner plates. I needed to get out and find the Traveler from Quillan. That was key. The Traveler would have answers. That is, of course, unless the Traveler was a robot. Or a spider. Sheesh.
After cleaning up the metal spider guts, I climbed up onto a crate to take another look around at the vast space. In the distance I saw the far wall with the grid that hid the gate to the flume. I figured the exit wasn’t back that way, so I turned in the opposite direction and began my search for the way out. It wasn’t long before I realized I had made the right choice. I didn’t find an exit right away, but I did hear something. I’m glad to report that it wasn’t the chattering of more mechanical spiders. It was music The sound was far off and faint, but it was definitely music Music to me meant civilization, so I kept heading toward the sound. As I drew closer to the wall that was directly opposite from the wall that hid the flume, the music grew louder. It was muffled, but I heard enough to realize it was an odd tune. I couldn’t make out what the instruments were, but they sounded electronic. The music itself was a kind of upbeat, new age, happy, haunting, never ending melody that went nowhere. It was kind of creepy-strange, like no music I had ever heard before. I didn’t hate it, but I didn’t think I’d be downloading the MP3 file either. The music had energy, like it was setting a happy mood. Maybe I was over thinking it, but the music seemed to be almost… hypnotic.
A few minutes later I hit the wall on the far side. Scanning both ways, I quickly found a doorway. It was just that simple. It was a double-wide door, which made sense because it would have to be big enough to get the bigger crates through. Before leaving, I took a look back onto the monster space of the warehouse. It was a great place to hide a flume. There must have been a quarter of a mile between this wall and the wall with the gate. It was so loaded with stuff, I couldn’t imagine anybody going all the way to the far side to find anything. It was like the gate and the flume were hidden in plain sight, with no chance of actually being seen. I took a quick check of my bearings to remember which direction to go when I came back, then spun, and pushed open the wide doors to Quillan.
I found myself in a dark room with no windows. No big surprise. This warehouse had to have been underground in order for the flume tunnel to be behind the far wall. The question was, how far underground was I? And where was the music coming from? When my eyes adjusted, I saw that there were several vehicles in the room that looked like fork-lifts. These would be the lifts they used to move the crates in and out of the warehouse. (Whoever “they” were.) I ran my finger along the seat of one vehicle, leaving a line in the thick dust. These machines hadn’t been used in a long time. Either that, or Quillan was so covered in dust that people had to wear filters over their mouths. Unless they were robots of course. Or spiders.
Scanning the room again, I saw an open metal staircase along the side wall that zigzagged upward. I jogged around a couple of the forklifts, hit the stairs, and tentatively climbed. With each step the strange music grew louder. My anxiety grew right along with it. I’d been through this before, many times. I was leaving the secret, underground place that held a flume to step into the real world of a territory. All my speculation, all my preconceived notions, all my wonder as to what I would find, would soon be gone. It’s an exciting feeling… and terrifying. I’ll never get used to it. I climbed quite a few stairs. If I was headed for the surface, I figured I would have to climb at least as high as the ceiling of the warehouse I had just left. Finally, as my legs began to burn, I got to the top. There was nothing out of the ordinary to see, just a double door. This one was much smaller than the one leading into the warehouse. It was definitely a people door. Or a spider door for big spiders.
I had to get over that.
I pushed the door open and boldly walked through. The music was now very loud. I was getting close to the source. The doors opened up into a long corridor. Looking either way, I didn’t see a single person. Or robot. Or spider, I’m happy to report. I had made my way into Quillan without being noticed. It was time to find out what made this territory tick. I wasn’t sure which way to go because the music was coming from everywhere. There must have been speakers hidden in the walls. It looked as if down to my right, so that’s the way I went. I walked about twenty yards and came upon a single door with a metallic doorknob. I felt sure that beyond these doors would lie the answers to some of my questions. Either that or it would bring me into a broom closet, and I’d have to keep looking. There was only one way to find out.
When I opened the door, I was instantly hit with a wave of music. Man, it was loud. I understood immediately how I was able to hear it so far down below in the warehouse. I can’t say that what I saw beyond that door was the last thing I expected to see. It wasn’t. It was lower down the list than that. In fact, it wasn’t even on
