ICEHOUSE
By Michael O’Reil y and Robert Brooks2
“There are many paths to death. There is only one to victory”. —Icehouse
Precept #1
Gabriel Feltz couldn't breathe. The recycled air stank of hot trash, getting
worse every time the
twenty-four other poor bastards in the hold exhaled. They lay on the hard
floor in the dark, the
shaking of the ship's hull thrumming through them all. Gabriel hadn't
managed more than a few
minutes of sleep at a stretch for days.
The shaking ended with a thump that caused some passengers to cry out.
The doors opened,
and light streamed in. They might have been grateful were it not for the
simultaneous blast of
cold air. It struck like a physical blow, blanketing skin and constricting the
throat. There seemed
to be nothing outside but the light and the smell of snow.
Then a large shadow strode forward and stood between the doors.
Everyone knew what it was.
Six feet tall and built like a statue, a massive slab of gun in its hands. It
pointed the rifle and
shouted.
"Everyone up! Forty seconds til you freeze! Move it!"
Gabriel shuffled out with the rest of them, shielding his eyes against
blowing ice. He yelped as
his feet left the ramp and landed in a foot of snow. More guards in combat
armor herded the
prisonerstoward a massive set of doors that opened before them like the
jaws of hell. Some
warmth came from that entrance, and the group surged into it.
When the doors shut,the lights il uminated their new home. It was certainly
manmade, all steel
and wires, a corridor leading farther into wherever they were. A guard
barked a command and
they moved on until they reached another door. Beyond that was a hall big
enough for five
hundred men.
"Line up!" shouted the guard. "The warden shall inspect you!"3
Warden Kejora stood in the very center of the Hub, hands behind his back,
looking over the
dozens of screens before him. Each one showed new arrivals. He liked the
look of none of
them. Not a surprise. A small percentage of humanity was resistant to
resocialization in some
way, but even among that tiny group, his program only received the dregs:
pirates, petty
crooks, murderers. Maybe a political dissident or two.
Not for the first time he considered having them all shot, but that wasn't his
job. Emperor
Mengsk wanted reapers, and by god, he'd get reapers.
"Tell me about that one," Kejora said, pointing. "Seventh in line."
It was a short, underfed young man, a boy in truth. His head and bare
shoulders were
decorated with acid burns, the lower arms crisscrossed with scars. The
eyes that looked out
from the battered face were like a protoss's, wide open, betraying nothing.
One of the analysts, an ensign, called up the answer. "Private Samuel
Lords, age twenty-two.
Multiple counts of assault, misuse of military equipment, and destruction of
military property.
Six counts of murder. Psych profile is a hell of a read, sir."
"I can imagine. What's the story behind his scars?"
"The wounds on his head happened on a zerg-held world, sir. He was one
of the first to make
the drop against a hive cluster. The op wasn't well planned; whole squad
got hit with zerg
biotoxins. Somehow he survived. The other injuries were self-inflicted."4
Kejora magnified the screen's view over the tracery of ruined tissue about
Lords's head,
thinking about the boy's crime sheet. Who knew how many synapses had
been bathed in alien
poison, turning that kid into a golem? The training would discern how much
use he was. The
warden zoomed out and returned to the others.
Most of the new inmates kept their gazesforward or down. A few looked at
the guards in a
challenging way. But one pair of eyes darted to and fro, on the verge of
panic.
Kejora had never seen anyone so terrified in the hall before. "Who the hell's that? Twentieth in
line."
stil hadn't
answered. He turned to find three of them huddled over a screen.
"What is it?"
"We've got next to nothing, sir. Name's Gabriel Feltz, picked up from a
colonial outpost.No
criminal record, no details, not even a note on neural aptitude."
Kejora frowned. It wouldn't be the first time a bureaucrat had skimped on
paperwork. "Send a
request to Korhal. We need more than that."
"It wil take them at least a day to get back to us. Should we pull Feltz from the lineup?"
"No. Patch me through." A few clicks later, and the yellow light in front of the microphone at
the center of the Hub lit up.
Kejora's voice boomed through the hall. "Welcome to the Torussystem,
prisoners. You are here
because nobody else in the entire galaxy wants anything to do with you.
This is your final5
chance to make yourselves useful to the Dominion. There are only a few
rules here, but they
boil down to a simple concept: you wil become a reaper, or you wil die
trying. Do what you
must."
“Victory is worth any cost. The cost is always high.”—Icehouse Precept #2
Shivers rippled through the line of inmates, as they always did. Kejora
never failed to enjoy it.
"Training begins after your next sleep cycle. It ends when I say it does." A pause, and he finished
with, "Welcome to the Icehouse."
The guards motioned the inmatesto another set of doors, deeper into the
complex.
The guards did not follow theminside, and the heavy doors locked shut.
Some of the inmates
looked around for their new custodians. Robots, each a head higher than a
man, were
positioned in alcoves along the corridor, armored and armed with twin
gauss cannons. They did
not move, but Gabriel imagined they could spring into motion on their
tracked wheels any
moment.
None of the inmates seemed interested in testing them.
A prim,feminine voice spoke. Some complained, muttering curses on
adjutants and the like.
The voice formally welcomed them to the reaper training facility, and said it
hoped that they
would prove worthy contributorsto the Dominion. The young man with the
scarred head
managed a dark laugh at that. 6
The adjutant happily described the facility as if reading from a holiday
brochure. It almost made
the place sound attractive, but you didn't have to look far to see the ugly
signs of what was to
come. The air was dry and cool yet smelled cooked. On a wall panel was a
red, dried pa
tch... no
prizes for guessing what that was.
The sense of being watched was palpable. Gabriel glanced up and saw
clusters of sensory
apparatus all across the ceiling—thermal sensors, motion detectors,
cameras, who knew what
else. So much for privacy.
At last they reached the dormitory. Itturned out to be a section fil ed with
cells, and they
weren't empty. A hundred men who probably had arrived only a few hours
earlier emerged to
greet the newcomers.
Gabriel knew this wouldn't be a pleasant encounter. He tried to make
himself less conspicuous.
Doubtless someone would be sized up, challenged, and made an example
of. As if in answer to
his thoughts, a rangy hil of a man swaggered toward the new inmates,
grinning like a crocodile.
"What's this here?" came a coarse voice.
Everybody was looking at the victim the brute had picked—the scarred kid.
The larger man stil
had the reptilian smile on his face; he was dying to swing a punch, but he
wanted to play first.
"Where you from, runt?"
"I dunno."No fear. No emotion at all.
"I dunno," the big guy mimicked, evoking nasty laughter around him. "How about your name?
You too dumb to know your own name?"7
"The Lisk."
Gabriel felt his arms prickle.
“Inmates must pay the price for their own survival.”—Icehouse Precept #3
Maybe Runtalisk. Little
rat... What the—?"
Gabriel couldn't see what the big guy saw, but others could, and they
weren't laughing. It was
then the kid made his move. He punched the lug in the stomach, hard,
doubling him over. A
rapid series of vicious kicks to the side toppled the larger man, who fell and
lay there, mewling
softly.
The kid looked about him, smiling. It was a ghastly smile, al filed teeth and
scabbed gums, a
monster's smile.
"It's just the Lisk."
Their sleep cycle didn't last long. An alarm battered their ears until all
occupants exited their
cells.
They were herded to the canteen, where a machine dispensed their first
meal, an
unwholesome goop of nutrients and god knew what else. It tasted of
nothing; it did not satisfy,
but it was al that was given. A larger inmate snatched away Gabriel's bowl
after only a couple
bites. He decided not to make an issue of it. 8
Nobody went nearthe Lisk as he ate, the paste leaking out of gaps in his
teeth.
The adjutant invited them back to the hall, which had been converted to a
sadist's idea of a
track-and-field course. The inmates were ordered to run, jump, bend,
stretch, dash, catch,
again and again. A set of sentry guns kept them moving.
The first day ended, leaving everyman an exhausted, battered mess
yearning for rest.
It was going to get worse.
The days bled together. There was no consistent cycle. The time for sleep
was at the adjutant's
whim. The food never changed, but the training did.
It wasn't enough to say that machines ran the Icehouse. The Icehouse was
a machine. Every
room contained a robot of some sort, many devoted to but one aspect of
training. The robots
took on the forms of moving targets, sparring partners for combat
techniques, obstacles. There
was no leniency, no slacking, no way for the inmatesto take it easy.
The worst days were in the sim-cages. Each inmate was led to a coffin-
shaped array of bulbs,
wires, and straps, and the adjutant invited him to lie within it. Refusal wasn't an option.
What followed was nothing short of a nightmare. Lights and sounds were
fed directly into the
brain, chosen to inspire an emotion. Gabriel would lie strapped in one of
the devices, his
feelings plucked like strings. He would feel ecstatic joy and numbing
despair, terror that made
him want to destroy himself rather than endure.
Each session ended the same for every inmate: crawling out and falling to
the ground, weeping
and shaking. Even the Lisk responded to this treatment, though his eyes
were more avid than
wretched.9
After three weeks, one man did not wake up. The adjutant ordered the
inmates to vacate the
cells. Gabriel caught a glimpse of a quivering wreck on a bunk, blood
caking his mouth. When
they returned, he was gone.
"There's something about you."
Gabriel looked up from the bench. The Lisk was talking to him. The nut
hadn't talked to anyone
since they'd first arrived. "What do you mean?"
"Ain't as scared as you should be." The Lisk grinned. His sharpened teeth made him look
anything but happy. "The others take your food. Take your bunk. Make you
wait for the latrine.
You down at the bottom. You should be more afraid."
"Thanks, I think,"Gabriel said, and ate another spoonful of his bland gruel.
Nobody else had
approached the table since the Lisk had sat down. Maybe Gabriel would
get to eat the entire
bowl today.
“Inmates must protect themselves at all times. Regard every calm moment
as a battlefield,
and every battlefield a calm moment”. —Icehouse Precept #4
"Wasn't complimenting you," the Lisk said. There was no malice in his
words, just unnerving
curiosity. "You act weak. You look weak. But you ain't scared. So you ain't actually weak. You
hiding."
Gabriel suspected the Lisk wouldn't accept a denial. "I figure things'l get worse here before
they get better," he said. "Maybe I'l have an advantage if they
underestimate me."10
The Lisk didn't seem to hear him.He stared at the bright purple bruise on
Gabriel's arm. "You
didn't need to get that."
That was true enough. The course had been covered with robots firing
rubber bullets. The
machines were slow moving, couldn't duck or dodge, and they could barely
track a running
target. It should have been the easiest thing to evade.
Then a robot had projected a hologram of a child, not solid, not even well
rendered, but it had
startled him, making him hesitate. The robot shot him in the arm as
punishment.
"Couldn't help myself," he said, but the Lisk made that awful smile of his.
"Yes, you can. I see it. I don't think they do."He pointed at the ceiling.
Gabriel laughed. "Lisk, anyone ever tell you you're a little weird?"
The Lisk shrugged. "Just am."
Kejora was far from idle. Every day he watched his charges, arranged their
rotations, managed
their nutrient batches. They didn't realize that they had eaten eighteen
different meals so far,
each one an individual concoction of steroids, neutralizers, hormone
retardants, and what
boiled down to poison. The batches were something of a guessing
game,
and as good as the
success rate was, there were always one or two failures in the early stages
of the training cycle.
He looked over the recording of prisoner Henisall's autopsy. As he watched
the dissection, he
spoke to the doctorstanding to his left. "So you've no idea what kil ed
him?"11
"I suspect it was batch seventeen, though stil not sure how."
"Okay, put them back on sixteen, and we won't use seventeen until a full
analysis has been
completed."
The doctor nodded and left the Hub. Kejora returned to the screens.
Inmates queued for their
tasteless porridge.
Minutes later came a moment he'd seen over and over these past weeks,
when an inmate by
the name of Polek snatched Feltz'sfood. Feltz had let it happen every time.
Not now.
Kejora almost laughed as Feltz rose from his seat and clouted Polek in the
back of the head.
Food and inmates scattered as the two men crashed into each other.
Screams of
encouragement shook the mess hall. Even the technicians in the Hub
stopped their work to
watch.
Kejora carefully observed Feltz. The recruit's fighting skil had improved,
but he was playing
catch-up. Polek had probably brawled twice a week during his formative
years. Feltz might have
never been in a real fight at al .
Polek smashed Feltz in the face with his opening blow, staggering the
smaller man. Three swift
punches later, and Feltz was down. Polek pinned him to the ground. Feltz
didn't have much of a
chance after that. His heavier opponent batted his arms away and
proceeded to pummel him
like a piece of dough. The inmates egged it on. It was a massacre.
Kejora couldn't keep a frown off his face. Policy dictated that he not
interfere. Regard every
calm moment as a battlefield, and every battlefield a calm moment. If Feltz
couldn't hack it, he
wasn't cut out to be a reaper.12
“Your enemy is your greatest teacher. Learn well.”—Icehouse Precept #5
On the other hand, Kejora had authored those rules. He decided he could
forgive himself.
He punched a button, and sirens went up through the mess hall. The yellow
light in front ofthe
microphone lit up. "Meal time is over. Return to training." Slowly the inmates complied, Polek
rising with some reluctance. They filed out of the canteen, leaving Feltz by
himself, unmoving.
Kejora turned to one of the techs. "I want a med team to pick him up and