A Call to Arms by Robert Sheckley Page B

off the alarms.”
    That set off faint alarm bells ringing in Dureena’s mind, but she moved ahead, her senses on the alert. She moved through the square doorway. Even as she did so, she identified the strangely familiar odor--ailgii! She spun around to turn back, but a panel slid into place behind her, covering the opening before she could get to it. She heard another metallic clang and a hatch slid shut nearby. Automatic lights came on and she saw that she was trapped inside a square box about three yards to a side. Furiously she kicked at the door. It didn’t give.
    She realized now that she was in a compactor box, of the sort used to press masses of ailgii, an edible fungus grown commercially on Alcestis 2. She had recognized the characteristic odor an instant before the trap had sprung, but too late to do anything about it. Ailgii gave off a sweetish grassy sort of smell, with a faint peppery tang to it. Unmistakable, once you had grown accustomed to it.
    “What in hell is this?” she shouted. “You’ve trapped me!”
    “Not at all, Dureena.” Vlast’s voice came to her faintly from the outside. “I’ve done a great deal of research. This is the only way of getting to the storage lockers without setting off the alarms.”
    “Through the ailgii-compacting vat?”
    “It brought me to a stop,” Vlast admitted. “But a lady of your talents should have no trouble dealing with it. It’s about time I learned how good you are at getting out of tight places.”
    “Let me out of here,” Dureena said, her voice piercing and dangerous.
    “Get yourself out,” Vlast said. “Then I’ll know for sure about your talents. And the way ahead will be open for us.”
    “When I get out,” Dureena said, “I’m going to kill you, Vlast. Slowly. Painfully.”
    “You’ll change your mind when I show you the treasure,” Vlast said. “It’s big. Oh, it’s very big, Dureena. I’m going to take you there. All you have to do is oblige both of us by getting out of the compactor box.”
    Dureena had a few other things to say, but decided to use her time more usefully. She looked around, more carefully this time.
    She was in a sealed metal box. That much was apparent at a glance. The floor beneath her feet was dusty. The recessed fluorescents glowed dimly, providing a faint light without shadow. At the box’s midlevel there were inspection ports, one to each side, with windows that were reinforced with heavy metal mesh. Through the window on one side she could see Vlast. The meshed port on the other side afforded a view of a passage that, in turn, led through an archway lit by a glowbulb. It led, presumably, to the lockers where the treasure was stored.
    The compactor was empty, offered nothing she might use to break the Plexiglas. That was immovable, obviously welded into place. Looking around, she saw that the ceiling was slightly different from the rest of the box. It was a solid square of bright metal that fit inside the walls of the box, with a fit too tight to put a knife blade into.
    Nonetheless, Dureena pulled a knife blade out of her pocket, one of several plasteel weapons she had concealed when giving Zack Allan what had supposedly been all her armament. Its heft helped her to concentrate.
    She moved to the wire-mesh opening in the front of the box and looked out. She was able to see a circuit box on the wall. The box had two big buttons, one red, one green.
    There was a hum of machinery, then a heavy metallic scraping sound. Glancing up, Dureena saw that the ceiling of the box had begun to inch down toward her.
    “Did you do something?” she called out to Vlast.
    “Nothing! I believe the compactor box turns on automatically whenever anything is introduced into it. I’ve heard that the specifications call for a crushing force of one and two thousand pounds to the square inch. This obstruction stopped me, but I have no doubt you have some trick up your sleeve.” Dureena again glanced up at the ceiling. It was