Archer of Venus (The Planetary Trilogy Book 1) Read online

  “What gives? Ow!”

  While he was distracted, the woman holding the tray had jammed a needle into his neck, injecting something into his body. As she yanked out the syringe, Archer noticed a metallic taste in his mouth, and a buzzing in his ears. It subsided as quickly as it came.

  “Do you understand me?” the woman asked in perfect English.

  Archer jumped, startled. “Yes,” he said slowly. “Yes, I do. But how?”

  “Language nanocytes,” said the woman. “Tiny mechanical organisms that will translate for you. Ancient languages are a hobby of mine. Twentieth century American English, am I right?”

  “Uh, yeah,” said Archer. “What else would it be? Who in hell are you anyway? What’s going on here?”

  “I’ve been wondering about the latter ever since they brought you up here from the pit,” said the woman. “Perhaps we can figure it out together. Let’s start with the former. I am Lady Vashta Nerrin D’Carpathia of Cadmium.”

  “What a mouthful,” said Archer, licking his dry lips. “I’m Jason, by the way. Jason Archer.”

  She smiled and laughed. “Well, Jason Archer. It’s very nice to meet you. And I suppose my name and title can be a bit unwieldy. Lady Vashta will serve our purposes just fine.”

  Archer nodded, looked around at the room. “Where am I? What is this place?”

  “This is Goran Tower, in the city of Cadmium, on the continent of Ishtar Terra, Venus.”

  “Venus?” said Archer, his whole body suddenly feeling very numb. “As in the planet Venus?”

  Lady Vashta arched an eyebrow. “Yes. This surprises you?”

  “Well yeah, considering a little over an hour ago I was on Earth!”

  “That’s impossible. No one can survive on Earth. It is a polluted, radioactive ruin.”

  Archer shook his head. “Lady, I’ve got two tickets to next week’s Padres game that says different. Now tell me exactly what in hell’s name is going on. What’s the big idea, kissing me and dragging me into all this?”

  “Mr. Archer, I assure you I have never met you before today,” she said haughtily. “And I recommend you change your tone. You are speaking with a Lady of Cadmium.”

  “Well forgive me if that doesn’t mean diddly-squat, but I have a life, you know. Back on Earth.”

  “Yes, you mentioned that. But Earth is uninhabitable, and has been so for thousands of years. Unless…”

  Her voice trailed off as her right hand went to her mouth. “Of course. It all makes sense now. Your archaic language, your strange clothes. What year is it, Jason Archer?”

  “What year is it? Why, nineteen fifty-two, of course. Why?”

  Lady Vashta smiled, a look of relief washing over her. “Mr. Archer, I am afraid you have traveled through time.”

  “What?”

  “By my calculations, more than fourteen thousand years into the future, to be more precise.”

  “How is that even possible?”

  “I’ve been wondering such things myself. We’d all heard the rumors for years, of course, but it looks like the rumors are true.”

  “What rumors?” Jason nearly jumped off the bed with agitation.

  “The Overmen have learned how to travel through time,” said Lady Vashta.

  “Who are the Overmen? And what does this have to do with me? For the love of Mike, you people were making more sense when you were still talking gibberish.”

  Vashta motioned to her attendants. “I realize this is a lot to take in. It is for me as well. My ladies will see that you are clothed and fed. We’ll talk more later.”

  Before Archer could utter another word, Lady Vashta turned with a swish of her diaphanous robes and was gone, her attendants crowding in around him. One of them snatched his pillow away, but Archer was the only one who blushed, and they quickly and efficiently dressed him in a crimson robe, as if putting clothes on strange naked men was part of their job description.

  A pair of leather boots that seemed to shrink to his exact shoe size as soon as he put them on completed the ensemble, and he was ushered across the room to a long table where food had been laid out.

  Archer smelled the selection of victuals, his stomach growling. He hadn’t noticed how hungry he was, and had no idea how long it had been since he’d last eaten. That too close, lazy sun still crawled with agonizing slowness across the sky, west to east. “So this is Venus,” he mused sotto voce before digging in.

  The food, composed of dark squares of meat on skewers surrounded by mostly unidentifiable vegetables, was delicious. The meat was tender, juicy and sweet, and he started to ask one of the women where it came from when he remembered some of the strange animals he’d already seen since arriving here. Some questions about this place, he realized, were better left unanswered.

  After devouring the meat, he tried the vegetables. He popped what looked like a cherry tomato into his mouth and was startled by how sweet it was. The rest of the dish was made up of long green tendrils that were salty, fibrous and not to his liking. The women served him rich dark wine in a copper-colored goblet that appeared to be made of plastic. They waited on him hand and foot, giving him whatever he asked, and when he was finally sated he sat back and patted his belly, a smile on his face.

  “I could get used to this sort of treatment,” he told the women. They giggled, but said nothing.

  “I trust you enjoyed your meal,” said Lady Vashta, returning.

  “Yes, my Lady,” said Archer, dabbing his lips with a linen napkin. “Very good. My compliments to the chef.”

  She cocked her head and arched an eyebrow. Then said, “Yes, of course. I remember that reference. Other human beings still prepare food in your time. No, Jason Archer, your meal was produced entirely by machine.”

  “Oh,” said Archer as the women cleared the table. He watched as everything, including plates and flatware, were dumped through a hole in the wall. Even more strange, the hole disappeared when it was no longer needed, plain beige wall taking its place.

  “OK,” said Archer, getting up from the table. “I appreciate your hospitality, but as you well know, I don’t belong here. I’d like to go home. Now.”

  Lady Vashta gave her attendants a look that said it would behoove them to leave the premises immediately, and they filed out quietly in a line, disappearing into the obvious warren of rooms.

  “I’m afraid that’s impossible,” said the Lady of Cadmium when they had gone.

  “What do you mean, impossible? I just saw them pull food out of nowhere. I was zapped here with the push of a button. Now send me home.”

  “That is beyond my power.” Lady Vashta began pacing the room, her slender arms crossed in front of her. “Earlier you acted as if you know me.”

  “Yeah,” said Archer. “At least I thought I did. Maybe she’s a relative of yours. But I saw a woman who looked and sounded just like you right before I was sent to this hell.”

  “All right,” said Vashta, nodding. “I find it more likely to assume that it wasn’t some long dead relative of mine with a strong family resemblance, that it was actually me you saw.”

  Archer shrugged. “Sure, why not? Makes about as much sense as anything else I’ve seen or heard on this safari.”

  Vashta continued. “That means that at some point I will travel fourteen thousand years into the past, on old Earth, and that we will meet.”

  Archer nodded, then his mouth dropped open. “Wait. What? You mean I’ve met you before, but you’ve never met me?”

  Vashta paused in her pacing to look at him. “I’m afraid so.”

  Archer clamped his hands over his temples. “My head hurts. This is worse than one of Reggie’s sci-fi pictures.” He sat down on the chair he had occupied during his meal. Visions of high school physics classes he’d slept through danced in his head.

  “I am sorry, Jason Archer. I know this is a lot. I wish the Thinker were here. He could make sense of this mess.”

  “Thinker? Who’s he?”

  “Ven
n Sann. He’s an Overman scientist sympathetic to our cause. He left Cadmium for the jungles years ago in self-imposed exile.” Her face grew fearful, as if she’d said too much.

  “Your cause? What’s that?”

  Lady Vashta sighed. “I represent a small group who are against the Overmen’s control. We believe that mankind should be left alone to guide their own destiny, not be held down by an oppressor’s boot.”

  “So who are these Overmen?”

  “Enhanced beings. Smarter, long-lived. It was their technology that allows us to live on Venus, that built the grand cities. It is also their tech that keeps your kind—the old style humans who inhabit the jungles outside the cities, in virtual chains.”

  Archer nodded, understanding at least some of what she said. “We have people like that in my time too. They’re called bullies. And you said they’re traveling through time?”

  Vashta turned and looked out the large window. “Yes. But what I don’t know is why. That’s what we must find out.”

  “What’s this ‘we’ stuff, lady?” said Archer, standing and moving so he faced her. “I don’t even belong here. Whatever political stuff you have going on here, it’s not my problem.”

  “Oh, but it is. Whatever the Overmen are up to, it involves the Earth of your time. They are there right now doing gods know what, possibly disrupting the future timeline. Even if I did have the ability to send you back, how do you know you’d have a home to go back to? Who do you think made Earth a radioactive ruin in the first place?”

  Archer didn’t know what to say, so he turned and looked out the window too, staring dumbly at the dirty sun as it occupied the exact place in the sky it had when Archer was fighting for his life in the pit.

  From somewhere a chime sounded, which seemed to snap Lady Vashta from her reverie. “It will be night soon.”

  “What? But the sun is still high in the sky.”

  “Yes. It is artificial night. The dome over the city turns dark once each Earth day, giving us a sense of night so that our biological rhythms are not disturbed. A day on Venus is much, much longer than on Earth, you see. Personally, I’d prefer to follow a Martian day, as our natural rhythms are more in tune with the cycles of that world. One day I’d like to move there, but I am needed here.”

  “You mean people live on Mars?”

  Vashta smiled, nodding. “Oh yes. And several outer system moons. There are also space habitats between planets.”

  A chill flew up Archer’s spine as he thought of the implications. “Wow,” he said.

  Vashta placed a gentle hand on his shoulder. “There is much to learn, and no time to learn it. I must ask a favor of you, Jason Archer of Earth.”

  “Sure, anything.”

  “I want you to be my champion.”

  He stared at her quizzically. “Come again?”

  “Things here are not safe for me. My father was a great man, a brilliant senator and war hero, as well as a friend to old style humans. I have used his political clout to gain favor in our society, but my perch is vulnerable. If I am outed as an enemy to the Overmen’s rule, the result will be…catastrophic.”

  “So what do you need from me?”

  “Be my champion,” she said again. “Fight for me in the pit. Physical violence is a form of currency here, a way for the Overmen to keep control by distracting the populace with venal entertainments. Many a man would like to unite my father’s house with theirs through marriage, wherein I’d lose what little autonomy I still have. My work in the resistance would then surely be discovered, and all would be lost.”

  “So let me get this straight,” said Archer. “I have to fight your potential suitors for you?”

  “No, just their champions. Those among the high-born do not lower themselves to physical games of endurance. But you have proven yourself to be a formidable as well as a compassionate opponent. I’ll have no more blood spilled in my name.”

  She released his shoulder. “You will also run errands for my household. You can deliver messages to my brothers and sisters in arms. In the meantime I’ll try to discover exactly what the Overmen are doing on your Earth, and find a way to return you there as quickly as possible.”

  Archer shrugged. “What choice do I have? It’s not like I can hop a plane to nineteen fifty-two.” He watched as the dome opaqued, blotting out the sun’s painfully slow track across the sky. Such strangeness. And this woman was his only way out of it.

  “Lady Vashta,” he said finally, extending his right hand. “You’ve got yourself a champion.”

  The Lady of Cadmium stared at the hand with disdain, as if it were unclean. Finally her small lips curled into a smile. “Ah, the handshake. I’ve read of this custom. But I’m afraid what I require is a bit more formal.”

  She held her hand out to him, palm down, slender fingers pointing toward the floor. Each finger was covered in rings encrusted with large glittering jewels. “Jason Archer of Earth,” she intoned. “You will swear your fealty to me. Will you be the champion of my house? Will you do my bidding without question until such time as I release you?”

  “Uh, sure,” said Archer. “I guess.”

  Lady Vashta glared at him coldly, and he took her hand. “I mean, yes I will, my Lady.” He kissed her hand and bowed slightly.

  “Good enough,” she said. “Welcome to D’Carpathia House. Henceforth you shall be known as Opir. You are not allowed to speak to anyone above your station, not even the servants of other houses. My attendants will show you to the servant quarters. Get some sleep. We will talk more in the morning.”

  Chapter Seven

  Champion of the City

  Lady Vashta disappeared with a flurry of robes and Archer was directed through a series of rooms and into a dimly lit area. It was smaller than the other rooms and plain, even dingy by comparison, but it was still nicer than Archer’s first apartment he’d taken when he first moved to Los Angeles. And it certainly beat sleeping in the Venusian jungle. He was pointed toward a bed similar to the one he had awoken upon earlier, and he took it gladly, plopping himself down upon its length, at once feeling the stress and turmoil of the day washing over him. Before long he fell into a deep sleep punctuated by strange dreams of something large and vaguely reptilian chasing him through the darkness.

  Archer awoke to the sounds of Lady Vashta’s attendants getting up and preparing for their daily chores. They spoke to each other in low whispers as they made their beds, ate a quick meal prepared by the wall, and one by one filed out into other parts of Lady Vashta’s quarters, which Archer surmised must take up at least one entire floor of the white tower he’d viewed yesterday from down in the pit. Archer got up and ate with them, neither of them speaking to him or even acknowledging him. Archer figured they must be afraid of him, this strange man who claims to come from the past, and he didn’t blame them.

  He didn’t see Lady Vashta for another hour, at which point she pulled him aside and handed him what appeared to be a small quartz crystal.

  “What is this?” he asked.

  “It is a memory crystal. Be careful; it is quite fragile. I need you to take this to a man named Cephon, three levels below. He is expecting you. Say nothing to him. He will give you something in return. Bring it back to me.”

  “Your wish is my command,” said Archer. One of Vashta’s attendants showed him the door, and he stepped out into a marble-lined hallway as opulent as anything he’d seen inside Vastha’s many rooms.

  “Now what?” he muttered, looking around. At the far end of the hall was a curved section of wall, a shade darker than the surrounding corridor. Two glowing circles were set into the wall beside it.

  “I’ve never been in a high-rise that didn’t have an elevator,” he said, striding over to it. He touched the bottom circle, and the curved section opened, folding inward. Inside was what could only be an elevator fifteen thousand years in the future on Venus. Archer stepped inside and looked around for a corresponding set of controls, wondering which floor he was
currently on.

  “Destination?” a sexless voice asked, startling him.

  Thinking quickly, Archer said, “Uh, Cephon’s residence.”

  The door closed and the elevator went into motion, stopping after a few moments. The door opened to an identical hallway. At the other end was a faintly glowing door. Archer exited the elevator, his long legs carrying him quickly across the distance. The door chimed as he drew near it, and a few moments later it opened. A beautiful female attendant ushered him in quickly without a word, and Archer soon found himself standing in the receiving room of the man called Cephon.

  Cephon was older, with salt and pepper hair and a stern demeanor. His gray eyes stared at Archer, instantly sizing him up, and he walked with an almost regal bearing. Archer was convinced this Cephon was a man accustomed to getting his way. He was no doubt a political leader here, perhaps even former military. Archer said nothing as he gave the other man the strange crystal. Cephon nodded to him once before leaving the room with the crystal. After several minutes he returned with something else in his hands.

  “Give your mistress my thanks,” said Cephon. “And tell her I hope this helps.” He handed archer a short, thin silver rod. Archer hefted it before stuffing it into his robe.

  Cephon gave another bob of his head, a signal that the meeting was over, and Archer turned and left, the female attendant who had let him in seeing him to the door.

  Archer strode across the hall and repeated the steps with the elevator, arriving back at Lady Vashta’s rooms within a few minutes. She shooed her attendants away and Archer gave her the rod.

  “Thank you for this,” she said. “I cannot promise all my tasks for you will be that easy.”

  And indeed they weren’t. Archer spent the rest of his time running this way and that. His next task took him out of the white tower. With the help of a small plastic disk that spoke directions to him, he hurried down a maze of streets and through a public market, then past an area crowded with young people watching two small robots do battle. Archer paused her briefly to watch aghast as the little machines dismantled each other and then put themselves back together again in new and more deadly configurations, only to do it all over again. The plastic disk urged him on, and he continued through the labyrinthine streets. Twice he felt he was being followed, and once he saw a man wearing royal blue robes with the symbol of what appeared to be a stylized yellow eye emblazoned on his chest. He shook the man and came to a rather destitute-looking area of the otherwise glittering city.