Outside looking in
Blair moaned in his sleep, and the observers lifted their heads to watch more closely. It did them no good - whatever the guinea pig was dreaming about remained firmly behind his eyes. Colonel Mathisson drummed his fingers on the hard, grey plastic of the desk. A couple of the uniformed faces turned irritatedly to glare at the noise maker, then swiftly turned back to their screens as they caught the look on his face. No one wanted to cross the man. Not that he was dangerous - unless you cared about your career in any way.
Eyes fell hastily back to the observations window. The subject was wired up, electrical tabs affixed to points on his skull and torso that were so frequently and unkindly handled that hair no longer grew there.
"REM phase starting." The officer speaking swung to look at a tray of steadily printing readouts. "Alpha mode picking up again."
"Delta still high."
"He's doing it again!" Mathisson swore under his breath. "What the hell is he doing?"
"Biologically speaking, more interesting is *how* is he doing it?" one of the medics watching commented.
"We're getting our first spike... body temperature dropping... he's hovering above hypothermic levels," another reported abstractedly, his full attention focussed on his readouts
"Humidity rising," a voice came from climate control, normally a silent part of the room. Ten faces turned to stare, but quickly looked away again as Mathisson stalked across the room.
"Humidity rising? How the hell can the humidity be rising? It's a closed environment. Check the inputs," he snapped irritably.
"I did, sir," the man gazed helplessly at his readouts, the numbers fluctuating slowly and steadily upwards.
"Can you reduce it?"
"I've tried." He reached out with both hands and typed in a rapid fire series of commands. He paused before sending the string to the computer, looking for permission, and got it with a brusque nod.
"This is the fourth time I've tried this. Now, if you watch this line," he touched the screen, "and this one," he ran his finger across to a small graph in the upper right corner of the screen, "you can see what happens."
He hit return, and the numbers immediately started cycling downwards. "I've increased ventilation and heating - effectively drying out the air."
"Okay, so this represents--?"
"The upper line is temperature, now that's rising - this marker is the room norm." The colonel nodded as the numbers cycled upwards, slower and slower, finally holding and fluctuating around the marker. "This lower one, that's humidity... now the read out shows it cycling down... down... hits the marker, and--"
There was a double bleep from the machine. "What's that?" Mathisson snapped.
"Watch the lines," the technician said. The two men waited, Mathisson's jaw tightening as the figures carefully manipulated into the normal range deviated once more.
"There." He overlapped the readouts. "We're back where we started."
"Is it a problem with the--"
"No sir. I've run through every diagnostic I can think of, and some that I invented specially. The setting on that room should have it like the midday Sahara. Instead it's... well, it's about the levels you'd expect on a rainy autumn day."
Mathisson grinned humorlessly. "Sounds like the Pacific North west. Subject's gotten him a little home from home."
There was an uncomfortable silence. Mathisson frowned and turned to look through the observation window. "Are you telling me he's controlling the weather?"
"Something like that - but as far as I know, only in that one controlled environment."
"Get me a match on that environment," Mathisson said slowly.
"Sorry sir?"
"Where's informatics?"
"Here sir."
"Get the climate readings for that room and find me the real-time match for it."
The two junior officers stared at him for a split second, gauging his seriousness, and moved. Climate shifted his chair across and started explaining the readings to informatics, who made copious notes into a hand-held e-pad.
"Okay, thanks," the informatics officer said softly, and stood. "Sir," she turned to Mathisson, "permission to leave?"
"To do--?" The colonel's eyebrow lifted.
"Real time meteorological comparisons. Sir." She held still for a moment, then turned and hurried from the room at his nod.
Mathisson walked over to the window and tapped blunt nails on the thick glass. "I wonder..."
"Sir?"
"Yes, Jessop?" he asked, taking a quick glance at the woman's name.
"I'm getting some odd readings from the wiring..."
"You're the engineer. What do you mean, 'odd'?"
"I mean that I'm getting higher voltage running through the cables than they were designed for."
"You have a battery problem? Don't tell me you're electrocuting him, Jessop. I want controlled circumstances for anything like that."
Jessop swallowed. "No sir. Input is static and within normal parameters. It's output."
"Out-- *he's* generating electricity?"
"That's what the machines are saying sir."
"How much?"
"More than he should be able to survive. He's getting a static build up into the millions of volts," she hesitated, "He should be frying down there."
"But instead, he's controlling the weather..." Mathisson said thoughtfully. "Jessop, reduce the--" the door to the observation chamber slammed open, and Carlsen from Informatics hurried back in.
"Sir." she stopped, gulping for air. She held out a sheaf of papers, took a deep breath, and spoke again. "The climatic conditions match two places world-wide. First is the Uruguay war zone," Mathisson frowned heavily, anticipating the next remark, "I took the liberty of checking on subject 2, and he's out there..."
"And the second location?"
"Here." She said simply. "We can't see it in this part of the complex, but it's storming fit to float an Ark out there."
There was a blast of sound and the lights went out.
"Kernovak! What happened?" Mathisson yelled at his second.
"Sir, I don't know sir. Backup generators should kick in under fifteen seconds."
There was a long, tense silence, Mathisson's face appeared, ghastly pale in the light from his watch. "I make that twenty."
A radio crackled, and a hurried, quiet voice broke the silence. "--to Colonel Mathisson?"
"Mathisson."
"Sir, we have a localised power failure in your sector of the grid. We are hoping to get it restored in the next ten minutes."
"How the hell can we get a failure in the main and backup supply?" he snarled.
"Sir, we have no information on that at this time. We will pursue all avenues rigorously."
"Ha. Get me some power independent lights down here, asap. We're in the middle of an experiment. Mathisson out." The colonel scowled. "Someone get into the test chamber and check on the subject."
The door opened, and a chill ran up Mathisson's spine. "Identify yourself!"
"Private Jaheli, sir. " A spot of light flicked on. "I have some torches and a couple of battery operated floods."
He nodded in the dark, and snapped, "Kernovak, help him set them up."
"Yes sir."
"Richards, take one of the torches and check in on the subject."
"Yes sir," he grabbed a flashlight from Jaheli, and flicked it on towards the observation window. The window was misty, opaque to the light shining in. He hurried from the room and round to the separate doorway to the obbo suite.
The door was wide open, and he frowned. It should have locked shut when the power went out - that was what the failsafes were designed to do. He drew his gun, and paused.
"Richards to Mathisson," he said softly into his shoulder mike.
"Mathisson."
"Sir, observation suite is open. Repeat the lock down failsafe has not initiated."
The staticky silence lasted for only a couple of seconds.
"Richards, hold your position. Melton, Smith will be with you in one minute."
"Here sir."
"Here sir," two voices said, as they ran up to flank Richards.
"Central, we have a possible breakout situation. I want a lock down on the site until he is picked up."
"Acknowledged. Initiating lock down."
"Mathisson to Richards."
"Richards here sir."
"Lock it down."
"Yes sir!"
Richards broke for the door, dropping to his knees as he reached the lintel. Melton rolled across to the opposite side, and Smith waited, out of sight. Richards signalled three, two, one, and they broke and ran, covering the room and each other, silent and deadly. The ante room was empty, and they took up position around the main door. Melton's flash ran round the lintel, then paused and ran back up. The three men stared at the electronic keypad that was melted and twisted out of all recognition. Richards ran a light finger over it, and the metal crumbled like meringue. He snapped his jaw shut and repeated the countdown. They forced their way into the room and stopped dead. It was raining in there. Raining, and, as Melton swung the light around, they could see that the floor had buckled under some enormous pressure, splitting and rolling half a dozen different ways.
"Sir, subject has vacated the observation suite. In pursuit."
"Acknowledged."
Richards hesitated as his team hurried out of the suite. "Sir?"
"Mathisson here."
"There has been some structural damage to the holding area."
"Gun fire is acceptable damage."
"No sir. No shots were fired."
"What kind of damage?"
"Looks like an earthquake. A high scale highly localised earthquake."
Mathisson blinked. "Acknowledged. take the western section. Team three, take east, four, north, and five south."
He paused for the acknowledgements to come in, and drew a deep breath, flicking his mike to mute. "Earthquake."
"No instrumentation available at this time to confirm that."
The colonel's shoulders twitched, and his tone was sharp as he snapped, "Did you *feel* an earthquake?"
"No sir!"
"Then there was no earthquake."
"Sir?"
"Something damaged the rooms where we were holding Sandburg, and it was probably him." He re-opened the mike. "Teams, use all possible caution. Target is to be taken alive at all costs!" He grinned coldly as he flicked the mike back to mute. "Not that we'll ever see him again."
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The Labyrinth: Outside, Looking In |
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Page last updated 18/09/2004.