Atomic Underworld: Part One

by Conner, Jack

“She says, ‘I wouldn’t take his money if grabbing it were the only thing keeping me from falling on a bed of rusty nails.’ I say, well, it ain’t his money, it came from Boss Vassas, and if you don’t want it that’s fine, more for me, and she says, ‘Keep it and choke on it.’ Now, not too many people can say that t’ Sgt. Wales, but I let it pass because she’s got knockers that could put your eye out—and wouldn’t that be a good way to go blind?—but I think you’d better call on her. Taluush needs a good doctor. It don’t have one, or if it does he’s at the bottom of a bottle most nights. She’s the best we got, medicine-wise, an’ I want her in top working order. Only whatever you said to her last night’s got her all riled up, you know how women are.”

  “I wish I did.”

  “Just call on her.”

  Tavlin changed the subject. "Did any of those fishermen live?"

  Wales let out a long breath. "Little Wally lasted awhile, but ... no. All of 'em dead. I just came back from calling on Big Wally’s widow. She didn’t take it well. Husband and son gone in one swoop like that. Horch didn’t have no family, no one to call on. No one’ll be at his service. Somehow I think that’s even sadder."

  "I'm sorry,” Tavlin said honestly. “Did you catch the killers?"

  Wale’s face darkened. “Never did. By the way ...” He produced a gun from his coat and passed it to Tavlin, who tensed before recognizing it as his own. “Might want this back. We tested it. Wasn’t the gun killed Horch and the Wallys.”

  “Would it have mattered? I mean, with the money from Boss Vassas?” Tavlin was genuinely curious.

  Sgt. Wales gave him a wounded look. “I’m liable to take offense at that.”

  “Yeah, you’re a regular humanitarian.”

  *

  Tavlin left the police station and purchased bullets at a nearby gun store. Everywhere he went people huddled around radios, if they could get them to work, or congregated in city squares or shops where runners relayed the latest news if they couldn’t. Tavlin wondered what Octung’s designs were. They had launched their war at the same time their agents—if agents they were—reached some sort of critical phase at the factory in Muscud, culminating in the contents of the container. Or so Tavlin reasoned it. Were the two connected? Was the Octunggen presence in Ghenisa part of a larger plan?

  In any case, he had to do something about the briefcase. He couldn’t keep carrying it around with him; it was too easily stolen, and, besides, he couldn’t bear to have it near him. Thus he picked his way down to the docks, which were not as extensive as those of Muscud. Taluushians might trade with the denizens of the Rift, but evidently they did not trade much with other undercities. Nevertheless Tavlin was able to buy a length of chain with an anchor attached—a rusty, pitted thing that looked ready to break apart if breathed on too hard—and rented a boat with an outboard motor. It looked suspiciously like the one he had brought here, including a fresh plank where the bullet had struck. Sgt. Wales had likely not donated it, either. Crime did pay.

  Tavlin revved up the motor and took the boat out into the tunnels. He ventured so far out he wasn’t entirely sure if he remembered the way back. At a conspicuous cross-roads, he tied the length of chain about the briefcase and dropped the anchor overboard. Chain rattled against wood, there came a plop, and the heavy metal dragged the briefcase under. Tavlin stared at the ripples with satisfaction, feeling lighter already. The ripples faded, he revved up the engine once more, marked the intersection in his mind, and headed back toward Taluush, hoping he remembered where it was. He thought of returning to Muscud, but for some reason he didn’t. He told himself that the enemy’s presence was stronger in Muscud—gods knew how many Octunggen bastards resided at that factory—but the truth was he knew better.

  Still, after he docked the boat and paid the second half of the rental fee, he did not set off for the doctor’s office but instead returned to the coffee bar. More news filtered in regarding the fighting, and he listened to it tensely, side by side with the others. Gasps ran through the crowd with each new revelation. Tavlin added liquor to his coffee and drank it interspersed with puffs on his pipe, slowly chewing a bagel. When he’d had a belly-full of caffeine, carbs and bad news, he set off toward the Pleasure Garden. To reach it from this point he had to pass the Lavish, the first hotel he had stopped at.

  As he approached the area, he heard flames and the cries of many people. He smelled smoke.

  He rushed forward, rounded a bend and saw the Lavish caught in a bright conflagration. Black, foul smoke curled upwards toward the stalactites of the cistern ceiling, and a crowd had gathered before the rearing hotel. A rudimentary fire department blasted fluid from hoses onto the fire. Other firemen manned the pumps: the hoses ran down to the lake and pumped nasty water onto the flames … which only made the smoke fouler.

  It seemed to work, though. As Tavlin watched, the fire began to diminish.

  “How did it happen?” he asked one of the passers-by who had stopped to gape.

  “No one knows.”

  “Was anybody hurt?”

  She shrugged, but a man nearby said, “I saw them wheel several bodies away, and they said there were more trapped in the upper floors still alive.”

  The woman looked pale. “They’re not trapped anymore.”

  The man grimaced. “No. I suppose not.”

  Tavlin stared for a long time, feeling cold despite the flames. Those people had died because of him. He had led the killers here, had even set up a decoy for them. I didn’t know they’d burn the whole fucking thing down! he told himself. I thought they'd just go after the decoy! Still, people had died because of his actions.

  Sudden concern for the working girls and the nervous man at the Pleasure Garden flooded him. He hurried up one ramp, then another, finally reaching the Singh-Hiss, that horizontal junkheap structure suspended from the ceiling between two vertical spires. Sweat popped out on his forehead as he neared the brothel, and as he scrambled over the scaffolding he knew what he would find. Still, as he came within sight of the whorehouse entrance, he saw no flames, no crowd. Perhaps there was time yet to warn the employees.

  Hairs lifted along his neck as he entered the whorehouse. His eyes scanned the abattoir-like lobby, with all its garish red trappings. It was substantially more like an abattoir now, with dead bodies sprawled across the floor, blood pooling in thick puddles. Whores and johns, all tangled together, flies settling on eyelids, on protruding tongues. Some of the victims had been shot, some stabbed. Most were gagged. One prostitute had been stripped, tied up, then had the flesh on the left half of her face peeled away. Another had had an eye gouged out. The nervous man had been nailed to the wall and tortured, with grisly results, perhaps while the killers sliced up his girls in front of him. For information on Tavlin, it must be. Others must have guarded the doorway to prevent guests from leaving or prospective ones from entering.

  Noise in the hallway. Shadows flung on the wall, marching toward the lobby. Footsteps.

  Tavlin froze. The killers had completed their search of the whorehouse, finished killing and torturing everyone they could find. Now they would burn the place down to remove any evidence.

  Tavlin reached for his gun, knowing even as he did that a shootout against such men—and, possibly, women—could only end one way. These weren’t thugs like the men on the boat. They were trained killers. Agents of Octung. Deadly, ruthless spies of the Lightning Crown, which had just declared war, if not in so many words, on the world.

  The bootsteps came closer. The shadows on the walls grew larger. Tavlin saw an arm, a foot, a gloved hand gripping a heavy revolver with a silencer on the end of it. Blood dripped from the muzzle.

  Tavlin ran.

  He fled back outside, weaving through the scaffolding. There was little traffic on the sidewalks in this seedy section of the city at this time of day, but he scattered the few people in front of him. “Run!” he shouted. “Get away! They’re after me!” Panicked, several followed him. Others disappeared into
holes in the structure. Tavlin was tempted to join them, but he wanted to put as much distance between him and his pursuers as he could.

  A bit of scaffolding exploded by his cheek. Shards flew. He whipped his head back to see three figures racing toward him from the brothel entrance. The lead one had a gun outstretched. As Tavlin watched, a flash appeared at its silenced muzzle. Tavlin threw himself to the ground. Something shattered overhead. He hefted himself back up. Ran.

  Sweat burned his eyes, but he was hardly aware of it. He realized he was still gripping his gun in a shaking fist. He rounded a corner and pressed himself flat against the wall. Swiveled and fired back the other way. The three figures crouched. Flame spat from their guns. Tavlin felt a sting against his ribs, another at his thigh.

  He staggered back, nearly dropping the gun. He ran on, limping, bleeding. Shit shit shit. He was leaving a trail of blood for them to follow.

  Various lifts led from the dock level to the upper levels of the city, though Tavlin had never taken one before. He didn’t like the feeling of being caged. He was desperate, though, and he couldn’t walk far, so when he put the Singh-Hiss behind him he found the nearest lift, bodily hurled the two people that were on it off of it, stabbed the button and descended just as the three figures ran toward him.

  They raised their guns, but then he was below their level. They beat the bars and cursed above him. One squeezed off a shot, but the angle was wrong. The bullet went wide. The people that had been on the lift ran.

  Panting, Tavlin sagged against a wall and analyzed his wounds. He was bleeding, not copiously, but not a little either. He needed a doctor. Or a nurse.

  No, he thought. I can’t involve her. It’s not fair. I’ve put her through enough.

  He was feeling weaker by the moment, though. At the level just above the G’zai Zone, at the buffer level, he lurched out of the lift, shoved his gun away—it would only alarm people—and found a public plaza. There people wandered the shops and crowded around radios. Tavlin found a young boy smoking a cigarette and hawking watches that were surely stolen. “Bring me the nurse Sophia,” Tavlin told him, shoving a wad of money into the boy’s hands. The boy’s eyes lit up, and Tavlin added, “There will be more when she gets here. Tell her to bring her kit. Oh, and tell her it’s Tavlin.” The boy nodded and ran off. Tavlin slumped against an alley wall, wondering where his hunters were.

  He was beginning to think the boy had taken off with his money and not bothered about Sophia, but at last he saw the lad leading her out to the area where Tavlin had engaged his services. The two scanned the shops, benches and crowds looking for him, and Tavlin whistled. Sophia glanced up, and their eyes met. Some indefinable emotion washed though him.

  When the two came over, he paid the boy the promised money. “Would you like a watch?” the boy asked. Tavlin raised an eyebrow, and the boy shrugged, as if to say, You never know. “You could time the pumping of your blood,” the boy suggested.

  “Just clear off,” Tavlin told him. Then, as an afterthought, he added, “You should steer clear from this area for a few days. There’s bad people out looking for me. They won’t reward you for information, so don’t get your hopes up. They will carve off your bits and pieces until you tell them everything you know about me, though.” He thought of the nervous man at the Pleasure Garden and shuddered.

  The boy stared at him. When Tavlin made shooing motions, the lad shot him an obscene gesture, which Tavlin didn’t blame him for, and left.

  “You do have a way with people,” Sophia said.

  “I try,” Tavlin said.

  She looked him over, then dug into her kit. “Why not the doctor’s office?”

  “I didn’t want to lead them to you.”

  “And who are ‘they’ exactly? Enemies of Boss Vassas?”

  “Not exactly.” He grimaced as she tore away his shirt and inspected the first wound. A bullet had grazed his ribs at the level of his elbow, and blood leaked out in a trickle.

  Apparently satisfied that the injury was not life-threatening, she had him pull down his pants, and she inspected the wound on his inner right thigh. This one bled more freely, but her expression did not change, which reassured him.

  “A grimy alley isn’t the best place to do this,” she said. “Let me take you somewhere moderately sterile, at least.”

  “Where?”

  She peered up at him, her expression neutral. “My place isn’t far.”

  “Your place …”

  She misread his surprise. “Don’t worry, I remember how to make sure I’m not followed.”

  He swallowed. “These guys are good, Sophia. Better than some crook that might want to rip off the card-player’s wife.”

  “Do you want to die of bacterial infection?”

  “No.”

  “Then come.”

  Chapter 6

  “Ouch!”

  “Is that all you can say?” She pulled another suture tight, cinching closed more of the wound along his ribs. His shirt and pants were off and he lay on her kitchen floor atop a towel that, while clean, had seen better days. He wore only his boxers and socks. With the hand not propping himself up he drank from a bottle of Urzan whiskey: thick like honey but with a smoky, almost clove-like flavor.

  “That’s not even a straight line,” he said, eyeing the stitching.

  She started to sew another stitch, tugged on it. When he gasped, she smiled, “Now might not be the best time to complain.”

  “Afterward will be too late. I thought I was the one that was drunk.”

  “Not my fault you can’t pace yourself.”

  “It damn well is.” He glanced at the ragged wound on his thigh, which she had already stitched up. Blood caked the towel underneath. “I wouldn’t drink so much if you could sew straight.”

  “Maybe I like seeing you drunk.”

  “So you admit it! You’re sewing crooked on purpose.”

  “Got to take life’s pleasures where we can.”

  “I knew it!”

  For a moment their eyes met, and he was uncomfortably aware of her body bending over him, of her firm breasts straining against the fabric of her white uniform just inches before his face. He could smell her, over the antiseptic and alcohol, a sort of rose scent. Then she placed a hand on his chest, which was tacky with sweat, and pushed him down. Her fingers were very warm.

  “Two more,” she said.

  He drank. Her apartment was small and tidy. A neon sign flashed through the window, illuminating the rooms in strobes of red.

  She scanned his torso, and he saw her eyes linger on his new scars, on the tattoo over his right breast, a serpentine lion coiled around a flaming sword.

  “What have you been up to the last few years?” she said.

  “I thought you knew all about it.”

  “Only the cheating and the getting kicked out of clubs. I used to think you were intentionally getting kicked out of clubs up top so you would be forced to return down here. But you never showed up. You kept finding ways to remain up there, gambling in taverns, rooftop gardens.”

  “Yeah, well, I had to balance things out. You were upwardly mobile, I had to be downwardly.”

  She started on the last stitch. “So where’s your laundry case?”

  “At the dry cleaner’s, where else?”

  She tugged the stitch tight, using more force than she had to, and he hissed through clenched teeth. Instead of tying it off or snipping it, she pulled tighter. “I’m going to ask you something, Two-Bit, and I want an honest answer.”

  “If I have strength left.”

  “Those sirens earlier, the fire at the Lavish, and the police rushing up to the Singh-Hiss on our way here—that was you, wasn’t it? Whatever you’re involved in?”

  “What, no—”

  She tugged the stitch tight, and he groaned. Blood leaked down from the wound.

  “Yes, all right, yes.”

  She released the pressure, but did not snip the line. “What’s it all abou
t, then?”

  “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

  “Try me.”

  He started to say something, closed his mouth. Finally, he said, “There’s Octunggen spies doing something at a factory in Muscud. I stole whatever they were working on and now they’re out to get me. And they don’t seem concerned with keeping it low-key, either.”

  “Why did you steal it?”

  “Because they killed a bunch of people in order to make whatever it is, and I had to figure whatever was in that case was meant to kill a whole lot more.” He decided to tell her about Nancy later. “Now it’s where it can’t hurt anybody.”

  “But they can. And you know where it is.”

  “Yeah.” He glanced away. “They might ... they might come for you. Even if they didn’t follow us here, they might figure it out in time.”

  “I was just working that out for myself, but thanks for your concern.”

  “They killed everyone at the hotel. At the whorehouse. Everywhere I’ve been.”

  Angrily, she snipped the line and leaned back. He was aware of the rose-scent of her diminishing, and he realized he missed it. She inhaled a breath, and he realized something had changed in her. No longer was she feistily mad. Now she was pissed.

  “Damn you, Tavlin Metzler. Do you know how long it took me to get here?”

  “Soph ...” He felt a sinking feeling.

  “Shut up. To start with, nursing school while whoring wasn’t fun. Three years of that. Three long, slow, horrible years of whoring during the nights and studying during the days, of changing sheets and finding veins. Then I had to look all over for a position. Not many doctors want ex-whores as nurses, surprisingly enough, even down here. Finally I found a job, just six months ago. The asshole doctor made me give him favors till I proved myself, and I don’t mean taking out the trash. Lately he’s come to rely on me so much I’ve been able to stop. That was like three weeks ago.” She swore. “I was just settling in here—just settling in—and now I’m going to have to leave it, aren’t I? Just because I stitched you up. I’m going to have to go on the run—from fucking Octunggen spies! Shit!” Tears hovered at the edges of her eyes, and her lips trembled. “Fuck you, Tavlin Two-Bit. I hope the Octs take you. I should have let you bleed to death in that alley.”