It occurred to Zak that on their first trip through the Atrium, they'd been lucky. SIM had sent the gardening droids after them, but as dangerous as they were, the gardening droids hadn't been designed to kill. These creatures, however, were predators. If SIM had released them...

Of course, Zak thought, SIM probably didn't have access to the force field cages then.

Then Zak thought, But now he does!

"Run!" he shouted.

The warning came too late.

All at once, the force fields vanished.

The predators were free.

CHAPTER 19.

Five of the caged creatures bolted for freedom and vanished into the park. But the three predators spotted Zak and the others, their sharp eyes focusing on their prey.

The vornskr charged. The spike-tailed creature seemed to pick up Tash's scent and made right for her. Weak from her near-suffocation and paralyzed with fear, Tash stood staring as the vornskr leaped into the air to bring her down.

Hoole moved to protect his niece, but Dash Rendar was quicker. With hyperspeed, he let Malik fall to the ground, drew his blaster, and fired from the hip. The bolt hit the vornskr square in the chest, knocking it backward. It landed on its feet, shook its head, and roared.

Dash looked down at his blaster in disgust. "The energy cell in this blaster is almost drained. This isn't going to protect us for long."

"Uncle Hoole, can you-?" Zak started to ask.

"Not all of them," Hoole said. His eyes moved from the three-headed divto snake, to the yayak, to the vornskr. "If I shape-shift and attack one, the others will close in. We need to keep our distance."

Distance, Zak thought, remembering his last adventure in the Atrium. "I've got an idea! Tash-help me!" He dashed back toward the gra.s.sy field.

The yayak saw him and started to pursue. Dash fired another shot to ward it off-one of the last shots left in his weapon. But it was enough to startle the yayak, which backed off with a hiss.

Zak reached the site of their earlier battle and bent down next to the waterspout droid. Tash came up behind him. "What's the idea?"

"We've got a weapon," he explained. "Not much, but it'll do." He popped off the droid's waterspout head. Below the head was a hose.

Tearing open the droid's already damaged body, Zak revealed a large water tank. "Ugh, this is heavy," he gasped. He handed the nozzle to Tash. "You aim, I'll carry this."

Together, they managed to lug the water tank closer to the menagerie. As soon as Hoole and Dash saw what they were doing, Hoole retreated and took the water tank from Zak.

"I think it's only about half full," Zak said.

"It will do," the Shi'ido agreed.

"I could use some help here!" Dash shouted.

The divto slithered forward. Dash pulled the trigger, but his blaster fizzled. The power cell was drained. He leaped back as one of the divto's three heads struck the spot where he'd been standing.

Hoole aimed the nozzle on the waterspout and fired. A jet of water blasted the divto right where the three heads joined and sent the creature skidding backwards. Its heads twisted and writhed around each other, hissing angrily.

"Nice shot!" Zak cheered.

The yayak was next. Larger and heavier than the divto, it wasn't blown backward by the water jet, but it seemed to dislike being sprayed.

It bared its fangs, and backed away.

Only the vornskr was left. Hoole kept the water jet aimed at the snarling creature as the group circled around it, then started backing toward the restaurant. Once or twice the predator trotted forward, but each time Hoole shot it with the water cannon. It followed them warily.

Their retreat through the menagerie was tense. Zak thought they would never reach the end. But finally he felt his boot crunch on broken gla.s.s. They'd reached the window Dash had shattered.

With a final heave, Hoole hurled the nearly empty water tank at the vornskr, and the four ran inside the restaurant.

Tash shouted directions. "Through the restaurant door, out into the hallway, and down to the docking bay!"

Zak and Tash reached the hallway first. Looking both ways, they saw no sign of trouble. Hoole came up behind them. Dash, still carrying Malik, reached it last.

He stepped out into the hallway, just as they had done.

And screamed.

CHAPTER 20.

Bolts of electric blue shot up Dash's leg. His eyes went wide. For a moment, his hair seemed to stand on end.

Hoole lunged forward and sent his shoulder into Dash, knocking the pilot and Malik back into the restaurant. The minute Dash lost contact with the hallway floor, the electrical sparks stopped.

When they reached Dash, they saw that he was awake, but his hands were trembling, and there was smoke rising from his left boot.

"F-Floor," he stammered. "Elec-Electrified f-floor."

"But why didn't it shock us all?" Zak asked.

Dash pointed a trembling finger at Zak's feet, then his own. They both wore boots, and like most boots worn by s.p.a.ce travelers, they were insulated against electricity. But Dash's left boot had a big chunk taken out where the crab droid had attacked him. The naked skin of Dash's foot had touched the electrified floor.

A loudspeaker somewhere nearby crackled to life. "I was wondering when you would discover my latest trick. I didn't think you'd get here this soon," SIM said. "But, of course, I also calculated that you would have only a one in one million, seven hundred fifty-two thousand, three hundred forty-six chance of surviving the menagerie."

"Let us go!" Zak shouted.

"No," the computer replied, and clicked off.

Hoole took Malik from Dash. The techie was still unconscious, but stirring and muttering. Some of the electricity had flowed through Dash and into Malik, probably saving Dash's life and stirring Malik out of his stupor.

"Can you move?" Hoole asked the pilot.

Dash nodded. He stepped out into the hallway, carefully to walk on the side of his boot.

"Don't touch anything metal," Hoole warned. "Stick to the middle of the hallway. Move carefully and slowly."

Suddenly, SIM sent a power surge through the hallway. Glowpanels exploded. Power lines burst. A gas line running along the ceiling snapped in two, and a foul-smelling green vapor flooded into the hallway.

"Forget my earlier suggestion," Hoole snapped. "Run!"

They ran. Zak caught a lungful of the green vapor as they raced past the broken pipes. It burned his lungs and brought tears to his eyes, but he kept going. Soon they were through the vapor cloud, and Zak saw the docking-bay doors loom up before them.

On the other side of those doors lay their ship, the Shroud, and safety. All they had to do was get through the doors.

This section of floor no longer seemed electrified. Hoole set Malik down against the wall opposite the sealed doors. The techie groaned.

"We're so close," Tash said.

"And yet so far," Zak said. "How do we get through those doors?"

"We'll find a way," Dash said, trying to sound confident. "I've been in worse places than this and gotten out. We just have to outthink the computer."

"But SIM is a cold, calculating machine," Zak said. "There's no way we're going to outthink it."

Dash scowled. "Okay, kid. What's your idea?"

Zak shut his mouth. The truth was, he didn't have one. SIM had played him for a fool from the first moment they'd made contact through the computer Dejarik game. SIM obviously planned ahead-it had schemed to get Zak into the control room while killing almost everyone else who might have interfered. SIM thought faster than he did. And SIM had control of the ship.

Malik stirred again. Zak knelt down next to him and shook the techie's shoulder gently. "Malik, we need your help."

Malik's eyes fluttered, then opened. But his look was distant. Zak wasn't sure Malik could even see him, but he kept talking. "You know SIM better than anyone. How can we beat him?"

Malik shook his head. "Can't be beaten," the techie whispered.

"Problem- solver. Adapts too quickly."

It was true. When Zak and the others had gone through the Atrium, SIM had taken control of the gardening droids. Then it had outsmarted them at the turbolifts. And then at the gangway. And even when they thought they were safe in the cable pipe, SIM had found a way to reach them. For every step they took, SIM took two. For every move they made, SIM had a countermove that made their situation worse.

Suddenly Zak recalled watching the computer screen in his uncle's room, with the Dejarik game displayed and the words flashing on the screen: Your move... your move... your move... over and over.

It occurred to Zak that SIM was waiting for them to make the next move.

"I think I know what to do," he said at last.

Hoole turned from studying the door. "What, Zak?"

"Nothing."

Dash snorted. "There's a great plan."

"I mean it," Zak retorted. "Everything SIM has done has been in response to something we've done."

"Not true," Dash said. "SIM started this whole party with the false alarm that cleared the ship."

"But even that was in response to Malik's original orders to infiltrate the ship. SIM was designed to think for itself-but it's still a computer. It responds to input!"

Zak felt a tingle of excitement. He knew he was on to something.

"Even a large artificial intelligence like SIM isn't that different from the computer that runs a Dejarik game. The computer is presented with a problem and tries to solve it." He remembered some of the words SIM had used in their conversation: fun... entertaining... best move... all game-related terms. SIM was treating them as a game, a challenge.

"It could have killed us at any time," Zak said aloud. "But it didn't. It wants to solve problems. It wants us to keep trying to escape."

"So your solution is to do nothing," Hoole clarified.

Zak nodded. "Make no move at all. 'Action,' " he said, looking at Tash, " 'through inaction.' "

Hoole paused, then nodded. "At this point we have nothing to lose."

"Except our lives," Dash muttered.

They sat down. They weren't exactly comfortable. The hallway floor was hard, and the superheating trick that SIM had pulled was finally reaching the lower levels. They felt a current of warm air blow down the hall.

Sweat broke out on Zak's forehead.

They waited.

Hoole sat cross-legged, staring at the door. He was as still as stone.

Dash sat with his legs pulled up, his arms folded across his knees.

Malik lay still. When he moved, it was to mutter something they couldn't understand. After hours of torment by SIM, and the stun bolt from Dash's blaster, he was down for the count.

Zak tried to keep still, but the knot that earlier had tightened in his stomach returned, and every moment seemed to add another twist. What if he was wrong? What if sitting there just gave SIM time to plan their painful, horrible end?

Just when he thought he would burst, Zak felt Tash's hand on his shoulder. She smiled at her brother and said, "Patience can be a very powerful weapon."

Zak laughed nervously. "You're starting to sound like a Jedi Master."

Tash laughed with him. "That's what I get for reading too much."

"Zak!"

The voice came from all around them. Loudspeakers at both ends of the hall shouted his name. "Zak!" SIM was calling him.

Zak didn't answer.