She had expected one of two things to happen. Either the secret base would decide this was a hostile attempt to gain entry and electrocute her, or using the replica key would indicate that this was not a genuine attempt to get past the door and therefore would be ignored.

Instead, a clear barrier slammed shut, barricading Linua next to the door, and cutting her off from Tuwa Shone, Eret, and the acolyte who was still clutching the box. Linua immediately snatched her hands away from the lock, and pulled out the replica key. Tuwa Shone screamed something but his voice was distant and muted, and drowned out by a female voice suddenly echoing from hidden speakers. The voice sounded stern and authoritative, like a newsreader or a platform announcer.

Linua hesitated, torn between the panic of not having heard what the female voice had said, and worry that Tuwa Shone was about to shoot Eret. She glanced over her shoulder, but Tuwa Shone wasn’t even pointing the gun at Eret. Instead he was gesturing to Linua, and shouting at her to demand entry.

Linua looked around her wildly, more worried about immanent electrocution. She put her hand out to the clear barrier, but hesitated, not daring to touch it. The female voice spoke again and Linua realised abruptly it wasn’t in a language she didn’t know.

“I’m sorry, I don’t understand!” she cried.

The voice stopped, which was even less reassuring. Linua backed away from the door then halted as she realised she was about to bump into the barrier. A glyph suddenly faded into view in the middle of the door—a Zuyu character. An ancient Zuyu character.

The secret base was trying to communicate.

Linua suddenly realised she was hyperventilating and tried to take deep, calm breaths. Tuwa Shone’s voice came to her distantly.

“Tell it to lower the barrier and open the door,” he ordered.

Was he insane? Why would it listen to her commands? She couldn’t even understand what it was saying.

The Zuyu character faded. What had it said? It had been the character for name, Linua realised.

The base must be protected by something that could respond to different stimuli, like a security computer program. Or maybe even a synthetic intelligence, something that she had only heard legends of until now. There had been an evil one in Keng Boh Kids which had tried to kill the four protagonists in a maze while they had raced to the centre to find the kill switch. She doubted there was a kill switch for this one.

But it was asking for her name, not trying to kill her. Yet.

“I’m Linua Leylan,” she said.

An animated image appeared on the door, showing a finger trailing on the surface, leaving behind a white line as it went. The animation repeated a few times, tracing the character for name. Linua realised that if she couldn’t understand the security program’s voice then it probably couldn’t understand her either. It must be speaking in a form of Zuyu that was thousands of years old.

Hesitantly, she moved forward and reached out with her finger, placing her hand on the door. It felt cool and smooth, like glass. She moved her finger in shape of the Zuyu characters of her name. The glass bloomed with light wherever her finger passed, leaving a slowly fading trail.

After her name had faded, another character appeared in reply. Linua recognised that one too. Lineage.

In the background, she heard Eret loudly explaining to Tuwa Shone that he should be patient because Linua was establishing her credentials, and spared a brief moment to feel alarmed at the patronising tone Eret evidently thought appropriate to use towards a man pointing a shotgun at him.

Linua tried to write the names of her parents, although she flubbed the one for her mother, since it wasn’t a word in Zuyu, and couldn’t even be spelled phonetically, given that Zuyu was written using ideographic symbols. All she could do was convert her mother’s name into Zuyu words that sounded similar and then write those instead, and then she got one of them wrong, and had to write over it. The twisted mess faded away.

The next sigil to appear said Purpose.

“Order it to obey my commands!” Tuwa Shone snarled. Linua risked a glance behind her and saw Eret backed up against the wall with his hands in the air and the muzzle of the shotgun wavering near his throat.

“I’m doing it, I’m doing it!” she cried. She put her finger against the glass. “I … I … don’t know what to write,” she stuttered, panicked.

Tuwa Shone gave an exclamation of contempt.

“Ignorant girl! Write this…” He made Eret kneel down with his hands on his head, and traced two characters in the air. One was Tuwa Shone’s name, and the second meant lord or master. Linua didn’t want to give Tuwa Shone access to an ancient weapons cache, but she didn’t want Eret to die either.

She copied the characters onto the door glass.

As she did so, she saw a set of smaller, fainter characters appear off to the side, displayed so that they were hidden from Tuwa Shone’s line of sight. One indicated a slave or servant, one was Deen Tuwa’s name, but the third she didn’t recognise. Below that two more characters appeared, one that Linua thought meant give, and one that mean deny. Beside them was an animation of a finger tapping on the glass, first next to give, and then next to deny.

It was asking her a question and wanted her to respond.

What did the question mean? Was it asking her if she was a slave or servant of Deen Tuwa? Maybe the character she had thought meant ‘give’ was actually a way of saying ‘yes’ or ‘agree.’ Are you Deen Tuwa’s servant? Yes or no—tap to answer.

“What’s it doing?” Tuwa Shone demanded.

“It’s thinking,” Linua said, even though she had no idea. There was no time for her to think through the implications of a question she could only barely read. It would be better if the synthetic intelligence thought she was an ally. Maybe it would help her.

Linua tapped ‘accept,’ careful not to let Tuwa Shone see. The moment she did, the invisible barrier behind her disappeared, and the glass door in front of her simply melted away, as if it was liquid and not solid, withdrawing into the walls on either side.

Tuwa Shone in inhaled sharply and stepped forward, the shotgun hanging down by his side. Eret made a restless movement, but the moment he did, Tuwa Shone snapped the gun up again.

“Don’t move,” he snarled at Eret. Then he stared at the open door, the expression on his face almost rapt.

Beyond the door was a corridor, with walls made out of the same glassy material as the door, and a floor constructed of something that looked ridged and slightly rubbery. The corridor ended in a T-junction.

“You did it,” Tuwa Shone said. His voice was hushed with awe. “You did it. Finally. Do you know how long I have waited for this?”

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He didn’t seem to expect an answer. Instead, he directed Linua to put the key back into the chest—with him watching closely so all she could do was put the replica key in—and then ordered BoxBoy to give Linua the chest and to stand guard in the corridor. Then he got Eret to get up.

“The Shang princess and the boy will go ahead of me,” he said. “You will stay in sight, and you will move and do only as I direct. If the Shang princess disobeys me, I will shoot the boy. Do you understand?”

“Yes,” Linua said. She exchanged glances with Eret. From the expression on his face he was hating being used to control her as she hated him being put at risk.

There was nothing she could do except walk into the corridor. Into a secret base that was thousands of years old. There could be traps. Maybe the synthetic intelligence would let them in, then capture them and never let them go.

She tried to control her breathing—in for four, hold for four, out for four.

The floor was firm beneath her feet, but with slight give from the rubber. The air smelled cold and flat, and slightly astringent. Soft lights came on above them as they walked along, although they weren’t fixtures, but just spots on the glassy ceiling that glowed and then faded behind them.

A new light appeared on the wall as they reached the T-junction, leading them to the left. Linua hesitated, but then turned into the left corridor, glancing back at the entrance. She couldn’t help giving a little gasp.

“The door closed!”

“Of course it closed, you foolish child,” Tuwa Shone said irritably. “Stop dawdling!”

Linua continued on down the new corridor, following the light that bobbed along in the wall beside them. She felt Eret’s fingers take her hand, warm and comforting, and gave him a quick glance. As soon as she did, she saw his lips moving. He was saying something, but so quietly even she couldn’t hear him, let alone Tuwa Shone.

He seemed to be saying: Why did fake key work? Did you use real key?

She immediately stared straight ahead so as not to alert Tuwa Shone.

Fake key, she mouthed in reply. I don’t know.

It was a good question. Why had the fake key—a replica made in a high school art class—worked when the real key had electrocuted anyone who tried it? She should have tried to replace the real key back in the box just now, but there hadn’t been an opportunity. It was stuck in her waistband, hidden from sight underneath her top.

The corridor took in another dog leg to a circular area with no exits, and the light in the wall split and changed shape to show chevrons pointing down.

“It wants us to go down,” Linua said.

The moment Tuwa Shone stepped into the round space, glassy liquid melted out of the wall to make a door, enclosing them, and then there was a lurch in Linua’s stomach.

“It’s a lift,” Eret said. He was making a good attempt at being nonchalant.

They were going deeper into the facility. Linua realised she was gripping Eret’s hand so hard it must be hurting him, and forced herself to relax her grip. He gave her a smile, and flexed his hand in hers, but she could see his face was a white and tense as her own must be.

The lift stopped, and the glass turned liquid and melted away, revealing a circular room with a column in the centre. Tuwa Shone edged around the edge of the lift and gestured to them with the muzzle of the shotgun, urging them into the room.

The room was about thirty feet in diameter, with a continuous window running all around it, which overlooked a dimly lit cavernous space. There was just enough light to see hulking shapes—war machines? Linua’s breathing was quick and shallow and she felt light-headed. She could hear Eret breathing harshly beside her. They were surrounded by war machines.

Directly in front of them was the central column, which had a segment cut out of it, with a flat portion on it. There were two small holes, set apart the right distance to accept the prongs of the key, and an imprint for a hand.

The control centre.

Linua still had the box clamped in her right arm. Tuwa Shone, his face gleaming with delighted avarice, ordered her to put the box carefully on the ground, and open it where he could see it.

“Put the key in, and put your hand on the identification pad,” he said.

The dimensions of the room allowed him to keep his distance from Linua. There was no way she could run and grapple him before he could shoot Eret. She did as he said, taking the fake key out of the box. Now she was glad she hadn’t tried to swap the keys back.

She moved towards the control panel, took a deep breath, put the key in the lock and put her palm on the pad.

There was a short pause, and then three characters bloomed on the column in front of her, the same way it had appeared on the doors and walls. The top character was the one that meant ‘lord’ or ‘master’ and the bottom two were the same yes/no options that Linua had been given at the door. She hesitated, but Tuwa Shone had no such compunctions.

“Move away from the column,” he screamed at her. “Move away now! Move, move, move you stupid bitch, or I’ll shoot him!”

Linua had been thinking about pulling the key out, but now she backed away, holding up her hands. Her heart was thumping rapidly, and there was a sick feeling in her throat. She had failed. Tuwa Shone was about to be given access to the facility. He was a serial killer and a psychopath, and he would be able to control war machines. She thought of the Kusansee disaster, and how hundreds of thousands of people had died.

He would probably shoot her and Eret. The moment he got access to the facility, the moment he decided he didn’t need them anymore, he would get rid of them.

What could she do? If she made a move against him Eret would die anyway.

Tuwa Shone was so desperate to reach the control panel that he made a mistake. He ran straight for the central column, on a course that would take him within a couple of feet of Linua. The muzzle of the shotgun wasn’t even pointed at Eret anymore. Tuwa Shone had forgotten about both of them completely in that one moment. He was utterly focused, his twenty years of trying to break into the facility suddenly coming to fruition.

Linua was moving before she consciously realised she was doing so. She flung herself in Tuwa Shone’s path, putting one arm over the shotgun, slightly further down the barrel than the trigger guard, which allowed her to control the direction it was pointed in. Tuwa Shone proved to have no wushu training, because he instinctively resisted her by grabbing onto the shotgun more tightly and trying to tug it in the opposite direction.

It was a simple matter to use her leg to hook around his and throw him.

They landed on the floor, Linua uppermost. The shotgun went off as they did so, but luckily it was still pointed away from Eret, who sprinted to the control panel and removed the replica key. Tuwa Shone flailed helplessly beneath Linua as she twisted the shotgun out of his grasp, and used the butt to strike him lightly in the temple.

He went limp.

Linua stood up backed away from him, still holding the shotgun. Eret came to stand beside her, the replica key in his hand.

“Is he…?” Eret asked.

“He’s unconscious,” Linua said. The tremble in her voice belied her certainty. She hadn’t dared hit him too hard, but you could never be sure with head injuries. She gasped in relief when she saw him twitch and then stir.

Tuwa Shone groaned, rolling over onto his hands and knees. There was a tiny thump as something slid off his chest onto the floor. He stared blearily at it. Was that…? Linua’s hand clapped to her waist, where the real key had been stuck in her waistband. It was gone. It must have fallen out in the scuffle.

Tuwa Shone grabbed the key, his face lighting up in calculation. Linua gripped the shotgun, desperately trying not to let her thoughts show. Tuwa Shone glanced hungrily at the control panel, which was now blank again, then at her, and staggered to his feet. His perfect suit was disarrayed and his perfectly groomed hair was dishevelled, but his expression was gloating. He looked demented.

“Can’t shoot, can you?” he said. “You’re not a killer. You can’t stop me.”

Linua didn’t even know how to shoot the gun, let alone threaten Tuwa Shone with it. She did nothing as Tuwa Shone strode to the control panel, inserted the key, and put his hand on the pad. There was a pause, and then he jerked, his whole body spasming reflexively, and he slowly toppled backwards, coming to rest on the floor with a thud.

Linua and Eret exchanged glances.

“That was the real key, right?” Eret asked, and glanced at the replica key he held in his hand. “The real key is a trap. It was a trap, all this time?”

“But then why did the fake key work?” Linua asked.

Eret shook his head.

“I don’t know.”

Linua stared at Tuwa Shone.

“Is he dead?”

Eret crept forward and, very gingerly, stretched his hand out to take Tuwa Shone’s limp wrist.

“Er… er…” he said, moving his fingers around to find Tuwa Shone’s pulse. “I can’t … oh wait, there it is. He’s alive.”

Eret jerked back when a new series of characters appeared on the control panel. After a couple of seconds it changed, and then changed again a second or two later.

“Those are numbers!” Linua said. “It’s a countdown!”

Eret groaned. “I know a countdown when I see one. Of course, there would be a countdown.” After a moment he added, in a strangled voice, “Wait … is it going to self-destruct?”

A third character appeared below the numbers. Linua frowned.

“I think that means … a fish? Or swimming?”

Eret’s brow wrinkled.

“The facility is going to turn into a fish?”

“I don’t know!”

He flashed her a smile at the panic in her voice.

“We’re okay. Let’s just get out of here.” He hesitated though, and his head turned to the unconscious Tuwa Shone.

“We should take him too,” Linua said. Even she could hear the lack of enthusiasm in her voice. But they couldn’t leave him. Even if he was a serial killer.

Another thought occurred to her. What if he recovered and found a way to make the facility accept him as its commander?

“We have to bring him,” she said, this time more decisively.

Eret nodded.

“Let’s get out of here.”