Maddy, Lissie, and Katerina had been stranded in the interior of Paradox. They were facing eventual starvation, but that was a form of death they understood.
Along came E.C. Tally: a human male, a man, which counted as a major strike against him, but at least a man who might offer possible salvation. Then Tally had explained that he had not come to save them. He was trapped himself, and he knew of no way out; and anyway he was not a man. After a lot of explanation, they were beginning to believe him.
Enter Hans Rebka. Definitely a man, and a friend of E.C. Tally, who brought with him the bad news that the prison of Paradox was no longer as safe as it seemed. He had led them out of their chamber — but not to safety. No. He had taken them and the Misanthrope into a diabolical ink-swirl that he called a vortex, and it had wrung them out like wet dishcloths until they had wanted to die.
They had survived. And were they safe when they finally emerged? That was a matter of opinion. Certainly they were no longer anywhere within Paradox, or any other place that Rebka or Tally had ever been or heard of. They had arrived inside some strange new prison. Rebka had made it clear that so far as he knew the vortex had flung them into unknown territory. He could tell them nothing about the place. It might be no more than a different choice of tomb.
Enter J’merlia. An alien who had certainly not been with Rebka and Tally on Paradox, a life-form very far from human, but a life-form known to Hans Rebka and E.C. Tally. And vice versa. When J’merlia had entered the Misanthrope he had greeted the others joyfully, as long-absent friends.
Was Hans expected to explain all this to the Treel sisters?
He couldn’t explain any of it, even to himself. Instead, he was asking his own questions.
“Let’s get this straight.” He had persuaded J’merlia to shed his suit, then closed the hatch on the Misanthrope and locked it. “You say that you and Kallik and Darya went to Sentinel? Why there?”
“We know the Sentinel artifact,” Maddy Treel said gruffly. “But who the devil are Kallik, and Darya?”
“They are both females. That should please you.” Rebka found himself glaring at the senior Treel sister. It was tempting to start playing battle-of-the-sexes. But that would solve nothing. “I’m sorry. Darya Lang is a researcher on Sentinel Gate. She compiled the Lang Universal Artifact Catalog. And Kallik is a Hymenopt with whom we’ve all worked before. J’merlia, are you suggesting that this is Sentinel, where we are now? It’s nothing like any description of Sentinel that I’ve ever seen.”
“Oh, no.” J’merlia was as confused as anyone, but he was obviously delighted to be with Rebka and Tally. Finally, he had someone to make his decisions for him. “We left Sentinel because it had changed and was not at all as we expected. We went on to a different artifact: Labyrinth.”
“No such artifact!” Lissie glared at Hans Rebka. “What are you trying to pull? We know the Lang Catalog as well as anyone. There’s nothing in there called Labyrinth.”
“It’s a new artifact.” He didn’t expect that comment to be well-received. It wasn’t.
“Bullshit! All the artifacts are millions of years old.” Lissie turned to E.C. Tally for support. “You say you don’t have circuits that allow you to lie. So tell me: How old are the Builder artifacts?”
“All are at least three million years old — except for Labyrinth, which does appear to be quite new.” E.C. Tally had hoped for facts, and was getting arguments instead. “If you would just permit J’merlia to complete his explanations…”
“He’s right.” Unexpected support came from Katerina Treel. She had taken a strand of her long, dark hair and was thoughtfully chewing on it. Socially acceptable behavior on Darby’s Lick. It almost made Hans Rebka nostalgic for home, back in the crudities of the Phemus Circle.
“I don’t care how old things are,” Katerina went on. “I’ll settle for just three things. Number one, I want to know where we are now. Number two, I want to know how to get out of here, and back to open space. And number three, I want no more damned surprises.” She turned to J’merlia. “Now, get on with it.”
“But that’s what I was trying to tell you.” J’merlia had wondered when he would be allowed to speak again. “We went to a planet called Jerome’s World, and then on to Labyrinth. We found a way in, and we followed a path that led all the way to a central chamber. But we had been forced to leave our ship, the Myosotis, in the outer part of Labyrinth. So while the others examined the middle chamber, I went back to make sure that the ship was all right. I located the Myosotis, in the same condition as when I left it. But then I made a mistake. You see, Labyrinth has thirty-seven separate sections, or it did when we entered. I think it has a lot less now, it keeps changing—”
“Like everywhere else,” Maddy said grumpily.
“ — but I accidentally went through into another part of the interior, and I couldn’t get back to where I started. I was still trying to return to the Myosotis when I saw your ship.”
“Hold it there.” Maddy held up her hand. “Let’s make sure we understand what you’re telling us. First, we’re sitting right now inside an artifact called Labyrinth?”
“Correct.”
“And Labyrinth is new — that’s why it’s not in the Lang Catalog?”
J’merlia hesitated, and Maddy caught that hesitation.
“Is it new, or isn’t it?”
“I was assured that it is new, by Darya Lang and everyone else. But I am not sure.” J’merlia told of what he had seen in his long wanderings through Labyrinth, of desiccated black batlike figures, of human skeletons in ancient suits, and of long-dead five-eyed marine giants like nothing in the whole spiral arm. Worst of all, to his eyes, had been the silent forms of a dozen Cecropians, so untouched by death that only a breath seemed needed to bring the Lo’tfian dominatrices back to life.
His listeners sat in silence when he was finished. Maddy Treel finally cleared her throat. “All right. Labyrinth is supposed to be new, but it has old things in it. Maybe they got here the same way we did. But we won’t solve anything by sitting here. The main thing is, do you know the way out?”
“I do. It is very simple. All you have to do is head along the direction of the spiral tube that increases in size. You should come to one of the exit points.”
“Fine. So that takes care of the second of Katerina’s want list. We can get out of here. And I say let’s do it, right now. We’d like more explanations, but they can wait.”
“But what about Darya Lang and Kallik?”
“You told us yourself that they should have no trouble reaching your ship, and it’s intact. You couldn’t find your way back there, but that was your own fault. Anyway, this is our ship, and we use it as we choose. Katerina, you heard what we have to do. We follow the direction of the expanding spiral, and it takes us back to open space. Let’s go, before something else happens. I agree with you, we don’t want any more surprises.”
Maddy Treel had been leaning against the cabin wall. She suddenly sat upright and cocked her head. Rebka, Tally, J’merlia, and her two sisters were all sitting in front of her. But the faint sound she could hear was coming from behind her. It was the air-lock of the Misanthrope, opening and closing on its molecular hinges.
Maddy sighed, and swore under her breath. Katerina’s third want was going to remain unsatisfied.