by Майк Берри
She knew that she’d been wrong, then, and she wished that she could take it back. She didn’t even know for sure if that was what she’d meant. But all she could do was mouth empty words at him. Eli shook his head, the fight going out of him, then turned and stomped off back the way they’d come.
Marco appeared at her side and put his arms round her waist. People continued to pass them, trying not to stare. Her hand fell to his head and rested there amid that shock of curly hair, but her gaze was drawn again to the window. Out there, the belt processed ever-onwards, oblivious — a machine that could grind a person into single bytes of matter and never miss a beat.
Chapter Nineteen
Lina spent the afternoon with Marco in their quarters. They played video games and cards, but her heart wasn’t really in it. When her gaze wandered to the window for the hundredth time and lingered there, hypnotised, Marco stood up and turned it off.
Lina came back to reality slowly, seeing that she was still holding a hand of cards. She couldn’t remember which game they were playing. Marco sat again in his flimsy metal chair, opposite her, and picked his own cards up.
‘It’s you,’ he said, nodding at her.
‘Hmm?’
‘Your turn.’
Lina laid her cards face-down on the table. The picture cards were all holo-movie stars from Platini. Lina had no idea who most of them actually were. ‘Sorry, Son,’ she said. ‘I was miles away. I guess I didn’t sleep that well.’ The off-smell had intensified now, and an accompanying bad taste had taken up permanent residence in Lina’s throat. She was becoming increasingly certain that it was the air itself. She wondered when Marco would notice. Perhaps he already had.
‘And you had too much to drink last night, didn’t you?’
‘No, honey, I. . .’ She floundered for a moment, then amended this to, ‘Well, yes.’
‘That’s okay, Mum, you’re allowed sometimes.’ And then he added, sounding older than his years, ‘I don’t see the appeal, myself. But it’s okay.’
‘How about you put the holo on and I make dinner, eh?’
‘Mum. . .’ said Marco slowly. ‘We don’t have any food, remember? We gave it all in.’
‘Oh yeah,’ she agreed. Of course they had. ‘Well, they’re going to distribute rations in a bit, aren’t they?’
Marco checked the wall-clock, a simple silver affair that ran persistently fast. ‘Five, they said. I’ve got an idea: I’ll go to the canteen and pick it up, then I’ll make dinner, and you watch the holo for a bit.’
Lina’s heart melted a few degrees at that. ‘You’re going to make a fine husband for some lucky girl one day, Marco,’ she said, only half-joking. She felt herself smiling — a warm and genuine smile that she couldn’t have stopped if she’d wanted to — and it felt good. ‘Thanks, kiddo.’
‘No problem,’ he said. ‘I’ll go now, I reckon, get to the front of the queue.’
‘Okay,’ she agreed. He rose from his seat, pushing the cards into a vague heap, and made to leave. ‘Marco. . .’ said Lina, and he looked openly at her.
‘What, Mum?’
‘I love you,’ she said.
‘Yeah,’ he replied, embarrassed. ‘I know.’ And then he turned to go. He stood framed in the doorway for a second, small and thin and fragile-looking, and then the door closed behind him.
Lina thought his suggestion about watching some holo was a pretty good one. She thought maybe some mental chewing-gum might blot out the conflicting, disturbing thoughts that filled her head.
For a while, this was quite effective. She pulled a blanket over herself and zoned out to a programme about social trends — memes, which was a new word to her — and how they spread throughout the vastness of human space, raging through society like diseases. It wasn’t exactly interesting, but at least it gave her brain something to do other than continuously replay Sal’s last moments in the asteroid belt.
Marco returned with the meagre rations doled out by Ella’s sec-team: a small bag of dehydrated potato mash, two suspect-looking sausages and about two handfuls worth of frozen peas. ‘I guess we know what we’re having for dinner, at least,’ he said, holding these items up and grinning.
Lina didn’t think this boded well for the future, but she managed to grace him with a smile in return. The holo had changed to news, which was all from Platini and out of date by over five years: strikes on Aitama, presumably now resolved; murders on Platini Alpha, presumably now solved or forgotten; ships launched from Platini Dockyard, presumably now long gone on their lengthy sub-light voyages Sol-wards. She’d seen it before, anyway, so it didn’t really qualify for the term news in the first place.
Marco asked her if she needed anything — she said no — then he went into the kitchen and began to crash around in a purposeful-sounding manner. Lina returned to the holo, trying not to think about the way the air smelled.
Presently, Marco appeared in front of her, mercifully blocking the performance of some warbling pop-idiot on the holo who seemingly could neither sing nor dance and yet was oddly in demand. He was holding out a plate of food, which though not inherently appetising, was at least steaming hot. She received it with genuine thanks, her stomach growling aloud. Maybe this will finally cure my hangover, she thought hopefully.
She scooched up on the sofa, swinging her legs down to make room for Marco. They usually ate at table, but neither of them suggested it on this occasion. If the death of a friend doesn’t allow you a lapse in manners, then what possible upside is there? Lina wondered. She scolded herself for the thought: it was an idiotic one, and disrespectful, too. There was, of course, no upside at all. Feeling humbled, despite the fact that this exchange had taken place entirely in her own mind, she concentrated instead on her dinner.
Once they had eaten, they sat in contented silence under the blanket. Programme gave way to programme in a shifting, monotonous convoy of colour, bathing the room in watercolour.
After a while, an idea began to form in Lina’s mind. The idea germinated, then bloomed. She sat up straight, gripped by sudden determination. Marco, who had been on the verge of sleep, uttered a little cry of surprise.
‘What?’ he asked, looking around.
Lina pushed the blanket off, swung her feet down and stood up. ‘Come on,’ she said.
Marco frowned but he stood too, bundling the blanket into a pile on the sofa. ‘What is it?’ he asked again.
‘I want to show you something,’ she said cryptically. She felt a smile teasing at the edges of her mouth and went with it. ‘Come on,’ she said again.
‘Er, okay. . .’ Marco replied suspiciously.
Lina killed the holo and went to the door, her son following curiously behind her. She turned off the light and they went out, leaving the door unlocked, as was customary on board.
‘Where are we going?’ Marco asked. Lina answered with a silent grin.
She led him down the corridor, following the little twists inherent to almost all the passageways of Macao. Round the next bend, two of the refinery guys were juggling plastic clubs, throwing them to each other in tight synchronisation, and they had to back-track and take another route to avoid disrupting them.
They reached the stairs near to medical and Lina led Marco up to the hub-most floor, emerging into the machine rooms that housed most of the station’s vital equipment. The artificial g-force was lesser up here — about eighty-six percent of that experienced at the rim — due to the slower rotational velocity of the smaller circle that formed the inner floor. But this was nothing yet. Lina tried not to think about the failing scrubbers, but she couldn’t help glancing down the corridor towards the room where they were housed. Bright light emanated from the doorway there and she could hear voices raised in debate. She didn’t think Marco noticed, though, and she led him quickly away before he could.
Deflecting his questions, she took him on a twisting route through the machine rooms, past the maintenance workshop with its massive lathes and computerised milling
machines. Nik Sudowski and Alphe could be seen in there, bent over a terminal together, but neither of them looked up as the two interlopers crept past.
Lina stopped before a vast curved wall that completely blocked their way. She turned around, face scrunched, trying to remember where to go. It had been some years since she’d been up here.
‘What?’ asked Marco for about the millionth time.
‘I’ll show you,’ said Lina. She turned decisively left, skirting the curved wall, and ducked through a narrow doorway behind a massive oxygen tank that reached fully to the high ceiling and was attached to the floor with bolts as thick as Lina’s wrists.
Although she had security clearance to be up here, she was aware that Marco technically didn’t. Even so, she couldn’t imagine anybody stopping them. She’d never seen anybody else come to this forgotten corner. And, more importantly, she was having fun. She felt a little bad about that, but it was Sal who had reminded her of this place. When things had been at their worst with Jaydenne — back when Sal had been new to Macao — Lina had come here sometimes to think. Once, she’d even brought Marco with her, strapped to her chest in a baby-carrier.
Marco followed her through the door, letting it swing to behind him with a creak of long disuse. The room emerged into was almost pitch black. Most of the lights had burned out over the years and never been replaced. The room was small and empty — some old storage space. Sharp metal shavings gritted and crunched beneath their feet.
Another door led out of the room to their right. They went through it and emerged into a surprisingly large, cylindrical room that was almost as badly-lit as the one behind them. Lina was sure that Marco had realised this put them on the other side — the inside — of the curved wall that they had stopped at before.
The floor in here was sturdy diamond-pattern mesh, but through it they could see only blackness that dropped away below them into nothing. Ancient water leaks had left thick mineral deposits slathered onto the concave metal of the walls. Lina heard dripping, but she couldn’t tell where it was coming from. Thick pillars crowded the circular space in a tight, precise configuration, leaving little room to move around them.
Marco stood, turning in place, bemused. ‘Are we inside. . .’ he began slowly.
‘Inside the spoke,’ Lina finished for him. ‘Yes. The other one houses the chutes that take metals from the refinery to dispatch in the hangar, but this one is essentially empty. I don’t think anyone really comes here any more. They access the comms equipment and kinetic defence systems from crawl-ways in the other spoke.’
‘Wow,’ he breathed, still turning in a slow circle, his eyes wide white blanks in the gloom. And then, with a touch of relish, he added, ‘We shouldn’t be in here.’
‘It’s fine,’ said Lina, grinning at his amazement. ‘And that’s nothing. Look up.’ She pointed, as if he couldn’t have discerned up from down by himself.
Above them, the shaft of the spoke soared away into a singularity of perspective, an eye of utter blackness. The pillars were in fact massive cables — caramicarbide tendons, each a metre across. Marco moved towards one, entranced, and put his hand on its ancient, pitted skin, feeling the rumbling of Macao’s perpetual motion that thrummed inside it like a heartbeat.
Lina stared with him, enjoying the power of the sight, relishing the thrill of fear and awe. She thought she could almost feel the immense strains and stresses that the structure was under. It practically groaned with mass, ached with physical forces. This was what they had built — this crude, majestic wheel of steel and carbon. This was the skeleton of their home amongst the stars, the innards of the great machine.
‘Wow. . .’ said Marco again, with real feeling.
Lina began to pace between the cables, trailing her hands across their rough surfaces, squinting into the darkness.
‘What are you looking for?’ Marco asked.
‘This!’ she exclaimed, beckoning him over. His footsteps made tiny, tinny sounds on the meshwork floor, insignificant drops of noise. ‘Look: it’s a lift.’
Marco came and stood beside her. He glanced from her face to the machine in front of them, uncertain. ‘Is it safe?’ he asked.
Lina felt a twinge of sadness at this question. Sal’s death had left him uneasy, and Lina knew he was concerned for her well-being. Maybe his own, too. ‘Sure,’ she said softly.
The lift was basically a simple metal cage, cylindrical, just big enough for two adults to squeeze into. In the low light it looked as if it had once been painted either orange or red, but it was hard to tell for sure. It was mostly rust now. The lift was mounted on a sort of track on one of the outer-most cables of the spoke. The track threaded its way into blackness up there, thin as spider-silk, a parasitic shoot that had clung to the massive trunk of the cable itself. The teeth of the track were caked with thick black grease. There was a small door at the side nearest to them, with a simple latch to keep it closed during operation.
‘Let’s go,’ said Lina.
She struggled to move the latch, which had probably not been used since she’d last been here herself. After a moment, though, it slipped up and Lina pulled open the door. She squeezed through into the little cage and called Marco to join her.
Once they were both inside, Marco re-latched the door and Lina took the hanging control pad in one hand. She half expected that it somehow wouldn’t work, but when she pressed the UP button there was the click of a magnetic clamp releasing and the lift groaned, false-started, then began to rise.
‘Up we go!’ she cried excitedly, feeling like a little girl again. The giant cables rolled along beside them.
‘So up here must be the hub,’ Marco called over the noise of the machine. He was standing in front of Lina with his face pressed to the door of the cage, staring out. Weak LED lights flashed past, patching the darkness with their blueish glow.
‘Yeah,’ agreed Lina. ‘That’s right.’ She suddenly wondered what they would do if the lift broke now. It occurred to her that nobody knew they were here. And as far as she knew, nobody ever came here. Would it sound some sort of alarm automatically, maybe in maintenance or the offices? She hoped so — supposed so — but in truth she didn’t know.
They ascended through a forest of ceramicarbide trees, the gears of the lift grinding and whirring along the toothed track, accelerating smoothly as they went. The lift’s pace steadied and Lina began to feel noticeably lighter as they neared the hub. Soon the floor below them sank into shadow and was gone. And out of the blackness above them, a vague shape began to congeal.
‘It’s amazing,’ said Marco frankly, turning to look up at Lina. He was stretching up on his toes, trying little hops within the cramped confines of the cage, playing with the diminishing artificial gravity. Lina wasn’t sure exactly, but she supposed they were experiencing about a tenth of one gee now, maybe a bit more with the lift’s own acceleration.
She smiled back at him. ‘The best is still to come,’ she said.
The lift began to slow down, shedding its own manufactured gees and revealing the full effect of their near-weightlessness. They grabbed onto the mesh of the cage to prevent themselves floating upwards into its ceiling. Above them, the convex floor of the hub was becoming clear. The cage rushed towards that grey surface, still slowing, and popped through a hatchway in it, emerging into total darkness. Lina felt Marco’s body tense against her and she reached down to squeeze his shoulder reassuringly. Still the cage was rising, but it was clear, despite the lack of visibility, that it had almost slowed to a stop now. The whining note of the gears on the track had become a muted grumble.
‘Look up,’ said Lina.
She felt Marco’s head move against her as he craned to see. A patch of light was visible up above and they were climbing slowly towards it. That light seemed to descend on them, godlike in the darkness, covering them and flooding them until they emerged into a bright area of shining steel walls and bare architecture. The lift sighed to a stop in the middle of the floor
and they drifted gently into the ceiling of the cage, laughing and entangling. They heard the magnetic clamp crash into place.
‘Let us out,’ said Lina, pushing herself back towards the floor and trying to stretch her cramping shoulders.
Marco managed to jimmy the latch undone and push the door open. He practically fell out of the cage, onto a floor with a very pronounced concavity to it. He looked around, eyes wide, then attempted to stand. But he pushed off too hard and drifted up into the air, limbs flailing, crying out in surprise.
‘Whoa! Mum! This is crazy!’ he yelled, bumping gently into the ceiling of the room. The walls were bare, the floor was bare. Apart from the cage, and one door, the room was in fact entirely empty, which was just as well for Marco as he used almost the full space to set himself right.
Lina crammed her body through the door of the cage and stood stretching for a moment, relishing her body’s lightness, feeling the aches flowing out of her muscles.
‘You like it?’ she asked, aware that this was his first brush with micro-gee, at least that he would remember.
Marco laughed, bouncing gingerly several feet into the air then landing with such care that he might have been doing this all his life. ‘I think so. . .’ he said cautiously, ‘yeah.’
‘Well, we’re going further,’ Lina said. ‘Come on.’
There were no handlines here — no handholds of any kind, in fact — and they moved in slow-motion, pushing themselves from wall to floor to ceiling, swimming through the air.
She led Marco through the door into a series of cramped passages with tight crawlspaces leading off into total darkness on either side. They passed a doorless room where some huge and dirty machine lay in disuse, partially covered by a faded green tarpaulin that was tied across its body with nylon rope. Dust lay thickly on all surfaces. The LED lights were far-spaced and weak — the minimum required to actually see. The ceiling was low enough to make Lina bend her neck. Little clanks and groans could be heard, thrumming faintly in the air as if reverberated through the station’s structure to be concentrated on this central space.
