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He was thin and wiry, with black hair and even blacker grease on his hands. I kneaded my sore right arm with my hand as it tingled back to life.
“My name is Berkk,” he said.
“Jim.”
“Can you operate an arcwelder?”
“I’m an expert” “I thought you might be. I have been watching you since you came here. You know how to take care of yourself. Let’s go see Buboe.”
Our brutal keeper had a room of his own, absolute luxury in this place. And a heating coil as well. When we found him he was stirring an unappealing orange mass in a battered pot. But it smelled all right and would surely be better than the slop we were fed.
“What you want?” He scowled at us. Probably found the effort to speak coherently a tiring one.
“I need help putting that Model Ninety—one back together. The one that fell off the rock face.”
“Why help?”
“Because I say so, that’s why. It’s a two man job. Jim here can work a welder.”
He stopped stirring and looked at us suspiciously, his bulging red eyes moving from Berkk’s face to mine. It took some time; obviously coherent thought was as alien to him as articulate speech. In the end he grunted and went back to stirring his meal. Berkk turned to leave and I followed him out.
“Would you care to translate?” I asked.
“You’ll work with me in the repair shop for awhile.” “All that from a grunt?”
“Sure. If he had said no that would have ended it.”
“I want to thank you …”
“Don’t. It’s heavy and dirty work. Let’s go.”
He lifted a grease—stained finger to rub his nose—and it touched his pursed lips for a second.
He wanted silence, he got silence. There was more here than met the eye—and I felt the first spurt of hope since I had arrived in this terrible place.
We went down the corridor beyond Buboe’s lair to a large, locked door. Berkk obviously didn’t have the key, because he sat down with his back to the wall. I joined him and we waited some time in silence until Buboe finally appeared, still chewing some last gristly bit of his meal. He unlocked the door, let us in sealed it again behind us.
“Let’s get started,” Berkk said. “I hope you meant it about the arcwelder.”
“I can work that and every kind of machine tool, repair printed circuits, anything. If it’s broken I can fix it.”
“We’ll find out.”
The wrecked Model 91 had its side Stove in, in addition to a broken axle. I cutout the crumpled area while Berkk levered a steel plate onto a dolly and rolled it over. We used a chain hoist to lift it. Without any robots to help it was hard work.
“We can talk here,” he said as he hammered the plate into position. “I’ve been watching you. You don’t act as stupid as the muscular morons here.”
“Nor do you.”
He smiled wryly. “Would you believe it—I volunteered. Everyone else here got drunk or hit in the head or something. Then woke up in this place. Not me, no. I answered an ad in the net for an experienced machinist. Incredible salary. Looked really great. I went to this lab, met a Professor Slakey. Blackout—and I woke up here.”
“Where is here?”
“I haven’t the slightest idea. Do you know?” “Some. I know Slakey and I know that you can get here from Heaven. No, don’t look at me like that, let me explain. I was thrown into a room and ended up in a different one. In a different universe I am sure. The same thing must have happened to you when you came here.”
While we repaired the machine I filled him in on Slakey’s operations. It all must have sounded really far out, but he had no choice other than to believe it. When the repairs were done we took a break and he produced a jar filled with a very ominous—looking liquid.
“I got some raw krenoj from the kitchen, I go there to keep the inaclthies ru
“The worm! Heat source, evaporated, cooled and condensed, distilled and now waiting our attention.” I swirled the liquid happily in the flask.
“Be warned. There’s alcohol in there all right. But the taste—” “Let me be the judge,” I said rashly. Raised and drank, lowered the flask and retched dryly. “I think.” I gasped, and my voice was so harsh my words were almost indistinguishable. “I think that that is the foulest thing I have ever drunk in a lifetime of drinking foul beverages.” “Thank you. Now if you will pass it over.” It did not get any better with more drinking. But at least the ethyl alcohol began to take effect, which possibly made the entire exercise worthwhile. “I can put some of the pieces together,” he said, then wiped his finger across the coating on his teeth that the drink had—deposited. “We had a guy here once, very briefly, with a big mouth. Said that he had helped repair the rollers in a pulverizing mill someplace. He thought that they were grinding up our rock.” “Did he say why?” “No—and he was gone next day. He talked too much. That’s why we have to be careful. I don’t know who or what is listening—”
“I know who. Slakey in one of his manifestations. He has this rock dug out here, then it is sent somewhere. Then it is ground up; then sent to the women who sort it and take some thing out of it.”
“What?”
“I don’t know what—except that it is terribly expensive. In money and in human lives.” “I’m sure of it. And we won’t find the answer here. I want out of this place and I need help.”
What music to my ears! I seized his hand and pummeled him on the back with joy. “You have a plan?”
“An idea. I don’t think we can get out the way we came in. Through that barred room.” I nodded agreement.
“That is undoubtedly a dimensional doorway operated by Slakey himself. But what other way is there to go? I have looked carefully and could not see any way to climb out of this valley. And even if we did—where would we go? This might be a barren planet at the end of the universe.”
“I agree completely. Which leaves only the other way. Think for yourself—”
“Of course. The broken rock goes into the pit. We go with it and are crushed to death, right?”
“Wrong. I have been working on this for a long, long time. But I needed someone to help me—”
“I’m your man,” I said. Slightly blurrily
“Back to work,” he said, climbing swayingly to his feet. “Gotta finish repairs first.”
Work had a sobering effect and no more was said that day. An electric bell summoned Buboe who opened the large locked door that opened to the outside. I shivered and stamped my feet while Berkk drove the Model 91 out and parked it there. The door was sealed again and Buboe unlocked the other door that led us back to our quarters. And searched us ruthlessly before letting us out.
There was a backlog of repairs needed on the machines and we had plenty to do. Slowly. I would be back as a driver as soon as the job was complete. And Berkk never spoke again about his plan. I did not want to ask, figuring that it was his idea and he would know when the time was right. Life was work and sleep, work and sleep—with loathsome meals ingested briefly between. Berkk remained silent until the day when we were finishing the job of replacing a wheel on a bucketbil. We lay side by side beneath the thing, one holding, one hammering.
“This is the last repair you are going to do,” he said. “Buboe says he is shorthanded and wants you back on the digging. I’ve been putting this off but we can’t put it off anymore. You ready to go?” he asked. I did not ask where.
“Yes. When?” “Now.” He turned to look at me and I saw that his face was suddenly grim. “Have you ever killed a man?” he asked. “Why? Is it important?”
“Very. If we are to go, then Buboe will have to be disarmed, maybe killed. I’m not much of a fighter—”
“I am. I’ll take care of him. And hopefully not kill him. Then what?”