“Which you just broke,” sent Menelaus back to him, with, perhaps, a bit of a snarl.

“Sorry, Liege, I knew you had your reasons, but there are now multiple signals leaving this room, and I have a shot at Ull right this second. I did not get a chance to open this fine suit of armor I am next to, because there are five dogs watching me, but I managed to palm the luminous marker pistol from the belt when they weren’t looking.”

“What? You going to paint him to death?”

“It isn’t much, but the marker needles can crack a man’s skull at short range. I can get off one shot, maybe two, before they deck me. Should I take the shot?”

“Hold off. Things are not what they seem.”

“What is going on, Liege?”

“The problem is that I am playing poker with the people here, but playing chess with the Machine. I can bluff people, but the Machine and I can see each other’s moves. He knows I am in the chamber, but does not know where.”

“That means you want to leave the chamber, right? And the Machine will not find you?”

“Wrong. I deliberately expelled an evolutionary virus from this site in order to attract attention to it, knowing full well it would be the one broken into by the Currents working for Exarchel. For a while he had me fooled, because he used Thaws instead of Currents to dig me up, but I think I am oriented now. I hid myself clumsily enough that any servant of the Machine could see through my disguise—just as Scipio and Ctesibius, in fact, did—but just subtly enough that he would have to send a physical agent to me to confirm, and I have a tactic in place to trace whatever message that agent tries to send back to his master.

“But then the message never came. So I had to be bolder. I began going around telling the people I thought were agents who I was: first Soorm, then Rada Lwa, then Linder Keir and Linder Keirthlin. I have reason to believe Soorm is still loyal to Reyes y Pastor, the Red Hermeticist, so I was expecting him to call Exarchel. So far he has not. Keirthlin actually helped me, even handed me the keys to winning this hand. So I am ruling them out. Alalloel is a puzzle: I thought she was a Current, but she overheard me tell the Linder twins who I am, and she did not call down Exarchel on me. So it is someone else. Someone in the room.”

Sir Guiden said, “It’s Ull. The Giant just said so.”

“I counted him. From most effected to least, Rada Lwa, Ull, Keir, all have been intimate mind-to-mind with the Machine, and contaminated, and suffered physical brain alteration as a result. Rada Lwa can hear my voice but cannot recognize my face. Ctesibius and Scipio have been in mind-contact with the Machine, but it was one-way, a donation; a donation is not a possession, so they are clean.”

“Liege? Do you want your enemies to find you? Are you mad?”

“I want my enemies to find me. I am really mad.”

“Is this some sublime posthuman thing no one can understand?”

“It is the opposite of sublime. I want Del Azarchel to know where I am, so he will pick up his pistol and come looking for me, and we can finish our duel. His people, including the machine half of his mind, don’t want him to die dueling me, so they are trying to bump me off before that happens.”

Then Menelaus sent, “Exarchel? I know you heard all that. I have all your little puppets and spies and agents locked up here in the chamber with me, so you might as well give up, and send Blackie.”

And, with a silent thought directed through his implants, Menelaus stirred the great golden sarcophagus of the Judge of Ages to life. Roaring, the serene image on its lid gleaming, it slammed and banged heavily down the dais; roared past Menelaus, wind-whipping the hems of his metal robes as he cheered; and sped across the chamber floor, accelerating.

Everyone, Blue Man and dog things and Thaws of many eras, shouted and screamed and jumped out of the way.

An automaton stalked into the path, raised its machine gun, and opened fire. The automaton’s bullets slammed off the hull of the sarcophagus, screaming. Decorative armor panels slid aside, revealing weapon blisters. Twin machine guns bright with tracer fire, and a particle-beam energy weapon brighter than a lightning bolt and louder, erupted from the sarcophagus, blinding nearly all eyes there, and dazing all ears. Three arms of the automaton were chewed in half by the bullets, and its energy core was aflame, when the sarcophagus ran it down, trampling it to pieces under wheels and treads.

Four of the Blue Men raised their jeweled weapons, but were flung from their feet when a nonlethal shock of electricity crackled along the floor. Unfortunately, everyone standing on the same square of gold tile was treated likewise, and all fell screaming, except for Gload the Hormagaunt, who seemed to be immune to electricity. He grinned, and little sparks jumped from his bottom fangs to his top.

Bashan the Giant, seeing the sarcophagus barreling toward him like a train engine, stepped to one side with a polite nod.

The huge pistons groaned and the leaves of the huge doors fell to. Boom. The sarcophagus sprayed some chemical from its interior on the doors as it rushed forward. There was a squeal of brakes and the sarcophagus fishtailed sideways, so that it struck the doors lengthwise. When the heavy sarcophagus smashed into the doors, it was a sound as if an aircraft carrier had been dropped onto a sea of stone. The doors were struck so forcefully that they were bent slightly in the frame, just enough to jam the hinges. The chemical fluid ignited with a blue-white flame when the sarcophagus struck, and this in turn ignited the fluids and bearings in the undercarriage. The fire hardened and solidified the glue filling the cracks of the door leaves into something the consistency of asphalt, and burnt away the joints of the wheels and treads of the coffin, leaving it unable to move, trapped in asphalt, and blocking the way, its huge mass crumpled and bent up against the doors.

After that crash, there was silence in the chamber for the space of a breath or two, as everyone stared at the jammed doors in wonder and fear.

3. Petrifaction, Radiation

Mentor Ull had a look of deep annoyance darkening his features. His eyes looked more like those of a rattlesnake than ever. “Erratic behavior! Headstrong, awkward! Why must these primitive creatures perform such irksome frolics?” The gems on his coat blazed with sudden, startling brightness, and every person in the chamber, from Menelaus on the dais to the north side to Bashan the Giant before the jammed doors at the south, suddenly froze in mid-motion, mid-gesture, able to breathe and to move involuntary muscles, but not able even to blink.

The Blue Men all sighed a little sigh, and the dog things, uttering only a yelp or two of scorn and relief, stood and relaxed and shouldered their weapons.

Naar said in Intertextual, “Most bothersome! Why must we trifle with these relicts from ages before mental unity was accomplished? Can we not at least begin to kill off all of those whom we have confirmed cannot be the one we seek?”

But Illiance said in Iatric, “Actually, only those who have eaten our food are affected…,” and he was in the act of turning toward Scipio, who was merely pretending to be paralyzed, when Scipio at that moment happened to blink.

Illiance said to him in Iatric, “Sir? Do you speak this language? What is the meaning of your pantomime?”

Scipio smiled apologetically, and shrugged sheepishly, and kicked Illiance headlong off the dais.

Two dog things fired without orders: one musket misfired, powder not igniting, and the other missed, so its musketball struck the throne behind Scipio and burned like white fire.

Scipio leaped and swung his square-pointed black blade at Illiance, who had landed on hands and knees. Illiance threw his hand before his face, and all the gems on his coat lit up.