by Ilsa J. Bick
He’d taken his one big shot at backing out about four weeks ago when Dasha hadn’t shown for work. Normally, she came by his station twice a day. They’d chat, ha-ha, just like friendly coworkers, while the whole time he was slipping her documents on data crystals.
The first day she didn’t show, he thought: Okay, a fluke. By the third, he worried that maybe something had gone wrong. He’d worked all day in an agony of suspense, expecting that the next people through the door would be carrying laser rifles. No one did. So, he thought maybe Yamada and Dasha had gotten caught. Or maybe they were dead, and he was in the clear.
The fourth day, he’d whistled on the way out the door, past security. The night air was crisp and spicy. Hard stars sparkled in the sky. Nightfall came early these days, and all the sodium vapor lights were on in the parking lot. The asphalt twinkled. As he approached his hover, he dug into his pocket, pointed the remote, popped the lock. He dropped into the driver’s side, strapped up, flipped the rocker switch to power up the hover’s compressor . . . and then felt cold steel press below his right ear. His eyes flicked to his rearview, and then an icy fist of dread squeezed his lungs.
“Hey, Pierpont,” Yamada said, “how ya doing?” Conversational, like he didn’t have a pistol jammed against Pierpont’s neck.
“Uh.” Pierpont swallowed. Yamada’s eyes glittered in the low light from the dash. “Where’s Dasha?”
“She took a couple days.” Yamada’s filed incisors were pointier than ever. “Didn’t want you to get lonely. So, how’re things coming?”
To this day, Pierpont didn’t know what got into him. But he said, “I’m not writing one more line of code unless you let me get my wife and kid off-planet.”
“Yeah? What for? Ain’t nothing going to go wrong, right?”
“Nothing will go wrong. The virus will do what it’s supposed to do.”
“So, why do they need to get off-planet?”
“I just want them off, okay? I’ve done everything you’ve asked. This is the only thing I’m asking for in return.”
“The only thing, my ass. I’m canceling your debt, right? You get to keep certain valuable pieces of your anatomy, right? Only thing, my ass.”
Pierpont felt those certain valuable pieces of his anatomy try to retreat into his abdomen. “You need me. I’m the only one who can do this, and do it right. So, either I’m taking them to the spaceport tomorrow, or you’ll have to kill me.”
He watched Yamada’s eyes, watched the man work the decision tree, ticking off pros and cons, figuring angles. Saw the moment right before he knew that Yamada would agree. In the end, maybe Pierpont’s victory was hollow. But it still felt good, and now, at least, his wife and daughter were off-planet and safe.
He spotted the three natural-draft cooling towers from ten klicks out. Each tower was one hundred twenty meters high but seemed much higher because the reactor was set on a bluff by the sea. The complex was entirely surrounded by a perimeter fence, though security had never been much of a concern. (The physics involved with a fission reactor was so archaic that no one seriously considered there was much risk.) There were three entrances: southwest, west and a third gate to the north used exclusively for cargo deliveries and the landtrain.
The complex housed two working reactors called, appropriately, Reactors Two and Three. Pierpont worked in Reactor Two’s control room. All control-room personnel worked a six-week cycle, rotating through the various shifts: days, afternoons, nights. Pierpont was on a team currently rotating through days. But he absolutely had to work tonight. So he’d feigned an emergency and switched out of rotation, volunteering for this duty shift. He wouldn’t know his coworkers on this shift. That was fine, because they wouldn’t know him, either.
Getting in was easy. His change of shift had been duly noted in the complex’s computer database, and the guard, after verifying his story against the computer, checked Pierpont via a portable retinal scanner and then waved him through.
Pierpont’s office was in a five-story building adjacent to Reactor Two. The adjoining lot was about one-third full, with most of the vehicles clustered in pools of yellow light like gazelles fringing a watering hole. Pierpont skimmed the lot, bypassed the other cars and then nosed his hover to the far right beneath the naked limbs of a maple. He engaged the stand and then killed the compressor. The hover wheezed to silence.
He didn’t get out. Instead, Pierpont sat, wondering what the hell he was doing with his life. He listened to the silence outside and the thunder of his heart in his ears. His eyes drifted southeast to the spindly forms of cranes and the blockier outlines of a ConstructionMech highlighted against the illuminated shell of a half-completed parking complex.
At the entrance to his building, he repeated the ID and retinal verification. Satisfied that he was who he said he was, the door sighed open. Once inside the main lobby—a sterile, well-lit space smelling of floor wax and manned by two bored-looking guards—he emptied his pockets and walked through a scanner. The guard gave him back his watch, told him to have a nice night and that was that.
His shoes slapped linoleum. The sound was like that plastic bubble wrap his daughter liked to pop. The overhead office light clicked on as he entered. Once inside, he powered up his computer, entered his passwords and then he was in. He wore laced-up oxfords, and he now reached down, untied his right shoe and slipped it off. He used a fingernail to pry a pin from the heel. Then he swiveled the rubber heel to one side, turned the shoe over and shook a ruby-red data crystal into the palm of his left hand. The facets caught the fluorescents and twinkled like a gem.
Don’t think. Just do it.
He fitted the crystal into a data port. His computer queried as to which decryption program he wished to use. Tapping the screen, he selected one and waited while his computer worked. In less than twenty seconds, it chimed. He paused, a finger poised, like a symphony maestro about to cue the violins. Then he tapped
The program would not tie into the control room station where he’d be working. That system was password-protected by several firewalls. Once he was in the control room, Pierpont would suddenly remember that he needed information stored on his office computer. He would then bring down the internal firewalls, retrieve garbage, and re-erect the firewalls.
Within twenty seconds of retrieval, his virus would begin its silent, deadly work on the Safety Parameter Display System.
His computer chimed again. The upload was complete. Ejecting the data crystal, Pierpont returned it to the false heel, fit in the pin, and then slipped on and laced his shoe.
Thirty seconds later, as he headed down the hall, he passed a bank of windows that faced southeast. He saw a landtrain slowly inching its way toward the construction site. The landtrain must’ve passed through security without a hitch.
No turning back now. Pierpont pushed into a stairwell, heading for the control room.
In his office, his computer idled. Waiting.
51
2300 hours
Dasha hadn’t been there when they geared up, and she didn’t show by the time they had to leave camp. When Fusilli asked, Yamada cut him off with a curt assurance that she would meet them two klicks shy of the facility, where they’d hide the hover and hitch a ride into the facility via landtrain. Only she wasn’t there either, and none of the others—Conley, Bridgewater, or Abby—knew where she was.
This was a change in plans, and Fusilli didn’t like it. Yamada didn’t want to hear it. The others kept their mouths shut. And then there was no more time because the landtrain was coming, and Fusilli was either with them, or he wasn’t. If he wasn’t, and if he didn’t stop yapping, Yamada explained he’d be happy to put a slug into Fusilli’s brain right then and there—something he just might do anyway, on general principle.
Fusilli shut his mouth. Yamada obliged by not shooting him. When the landtrain slowed to a near crawl, Fusilli did as he’d drilled these many weeks. But he felt Yamada’s eyes PPCing his back all the way.
When they rolled to a stop at the cargo gate, there was enough light for him to make out that the laces of one guard’s left boot were undone. Above the thrum of the engine, he heard the crackle and pop of gravel as guards circled the landtrain. He was seized with a sudden superstitious dread that if he kept watching those boots, the guards would feel his eyes, bend down, shoot him on sight. So he closed his eyes and focused on melting into the landtrain’s grimy, oil-spattered undercarriage.
The crunch of gravel receded. For a long moment, there was nothing but the squeal of a metal hinge. Then the landtrain jerked and shuddered and began its slow progress across the facility’s grounds. The light visibly dimmed as the landtrain curled north nearer the sea.
Yamada’s voice in his ear: “Okay, people. On my mark . . .”
Fusilli eased his left hand toward his securing clip. Suddenly, the light cut out. Yamada said, “Now.”
With lightning speed, Fusilli disengaged his clip and pushed off with his left foot, pitching himself clear of the train. The earth rushed at his face, and he twisted, taking the blow with his right shoulder. Rolling once, twice, three times, he skidded to a stop on all fours below the crest of a berm.
Behind him, he heard the far-off whoosh of the sea, and above, cargo cars scrolled by. To his immediate left, he spied Conley, tarantula-like in a black skinsuit, awkwardly scuttling for his position. Yamada, Abby and Bridgewater were to his right and also clear of the tracks.
Fusilli’s gear was secured to a chest-fitted knapsack that he now snugged to his back. His rifle was a semiauto sniper with a sawed-off barrel. Besides the rifle, he wore a Skye Raptor 50-Mag semiauto in a cross-draw, forward-canted paddle holster riding his left hip. The Raptor was a blocky weapon with punch, muzzle flash and a BOOM that advertised. Tonight, sound didn’t matter.
He joined up with the others, wading through grass that, on this seaward side of the berm, was wild and lushly overgrown. They skidded downhill as Yamada checked their position against a SatNav.
“Right around . . .” Yamada turned a circle. “Here.”
They were far enough down the hill that when Fusilli looked back toward the crest, he saw only a green shimmering sliver of the building behind which they’d bailed from the landtrain. When his gaze swept seaward, however, he was startled to see that the perimeter fence on this side of the facility had collapsed in several places. He wondered why they hadn’t come in there. Would’ve saved time and effort. But he held his tongue.
Abby found the access hatch buried in a mat of thick thatch. The hatch was secured with an old-fashioned padlock that Conley easily cut away with a laser torch. As Conley eased open the hatch, Yamada speared the opening with a razor-thin penlight. Fusilli made out ferrocrete walls and a set of stairs that vanished into the darkness. All power facilities featured a network of tunnels that allowed a team easy access to each reactor. The same tunnels also served as evacuation routes if above-ground evac was impossible. These tunnels serviced Reactor One and were sealed.
Shrugging out of his pack, Bridgewater tugged it open, then doled out positive pressure SCBAs. Each self-contained breathing apparatus covered not only the mouth and nose but the eyes as well. The tunnel system had no ventilation. Fusilli fitted his SCBA onto his face and then strapped a tank to his chest. He checked the tank’s fill. The SCBA had enough oxygen to last five hours. More than enough time.
The mask’s comm circuit fizzled. “Okay,” Yamada said. He sounded as if he were talking through a ball of fuzz. “Figure fifteen, twenty minutes to get to the junction, then hour and a half, max two hours to burn our way into the adjacent tunnel. Another twenty minutes, and that puts us in the control room between zero-one-thirty to zero-two-hundred hours. By then, the virus will have shut down the power grid, and we make our move.”
“What about Dasha?” Fusilli said. “Could the Dracs have her?”
“The kitchen staff knows everything,” Abby said. “I’d’ve heard.”
“Then where is she?” Fusilli asked.
“She’s taking care of a couple loose ends,” Yamada said.
“What loose ends?” In the next breath, Abby answered her own question. “God, she’s doing something else, isn’t she? She must be running some sort of side operation, probably when the power goes.”
“Which won’t happen unless we get into that control room. Bridgewater, you’re point. Abby, you’re next, then Conley. And Shak?” Yamada’s expression would’ve been coy, except for the teeth. “I’m right behind you every step of the way, buddy. Me and my nice shiny rifle.”
52
11 November 3136
2300 hours
Abby was right. No one guarded a dump.
The Dracs were lenient when it came to the townspeople scavenging whatever they wanted: lumber, metal, chairs, tires, clothes and the like. It was just trash. The base generated about ten metric tons of trash a week. Waste was hauled in converted J-37s twice a day to a landfill three klicks south of the base. There was a lined landfill for organic materials, and an unlined sanitary landfill for inorganic wastes due south.
Dasha had joined a cluster of women and children around four o’clock at the sanitary landfill. Winter was coming, and sundown came early. By five-thirty, everyone had taken their booty and left. The landfill was deserted—except for Dasha, who crouched inside the kneehole of a metal desk that was missing two legs. The desk was a fresh discard from the noon run and, because of its size and weight, had tumbled from the mound’s apex to the very bottom where it canted off kilter at the junction where garbage met dirt hard-packed by heavy transports. The perfect hiding place.
Now she waited, ears primed for the rumble of an approaching transport. Her pack lay at her feet, the clothes she’d been wearing tossed aside to mingle with the other garbage. After tonight, she wouldn’t need them anymore. Instead, she wore a black, insulated skinsuit with gloves, a hood to hide her hair and, for the moment, a pair of NVGs.
As she waited, she tried not to think, found she couldn’t avoid it. She wasn’t worried about herself. Hard to believe that anything would go wrong. She and Yamada had anticipated all eventualities.
Except Shakir. A solitary tear spilled down her cheek, and she angrily smeared it away. What scared her was that with Shakir, when they made love—and it was love, not just sex—she saw herself reflected in his eyes, in the way he touched or held her. Then she forgot about who she’d been and started to imagine a future. Started to hope.
Hope was dangerous. Love wasn’t allowed. And yet . . .
A far-off rumble shook her mind away from those thoughts. She was relieved. Too late for her. Just . . . too late.
The J-37s came single file, the twin shafts of the lead’s headlights punching the darkness. There were two troopers per transport. Neither carried weapons. They were delivering garbage, for God’s sake. The soldiers gossiped, their breath pluming in the chill. Meanwhile, squealing, telescoping twin hydraulic cylinders raised the beds. The Dracs’ garbage tumbled out in crashes and bangs, and the splintery sound of ruptured glass. Off-loading took ten minutes, and the soldiers clambered back aboard.
Dasha tensed, shifting her weight to the balls of her feet. She wrapped her left arm through and around a strap on her green sack. She’d practiced this maneuver a dozen times over, knew how far she could run before the sack proved such a drag that she would lose her chance.
She let the first transport rumble by in a cloud of dust and diesel fumes. As the second slid past, she pushed herself to her fee
t, heaving the heavy sack onto her left shoulder in a one-handed carry. She surged for the transport. Her booted feet pounded the hard pack. Her breath came in harsh, jagged hitches, pushed out of her lungs with every step. Reaching deep, she put on a burst of speed, running as hard and fast as she could. The transport loomed. She lunged for its bed, felt hard metal cut through her right glove as she grabbed hold. Then she was torn off her feet. She swung like a heavy pendulum, the sack thudding against her hard enough that she nearly lost her grip. As the transport rattled and bumped over ruts and potholes, she hung on for dear life, braced on a narrow rim of metal just above the transport’s rear axle. For a moment, she couldn’t focus on anything beyond the wild gallop of her heart. Then the J-37 hit pavement, the ride smoothed.
She had to put the sack on one-handed to keep from being thrown. Now the second test of her strength: Reaching up, she wrapped her hands around the bed’s rim and boosted herself. Her shoulders bunched and strained, and her bones tried to pop out of their sockets.
And then she was up, jackknifing at the waist as the sack’s weight shifted, pressing her belly into metal. She threw up her right leg and then her left, and she dropped into the bed. She crumpled in a far corner, not to avoid detection—the soldiers couldn’t see her—but in relief. The metal let out hollow bangs as the bed shivered on the transport’s axles.
For the moment, she was safe. She would rest. Gather her strength and resolve. Change into a purloined DCMS uniform. No going back.
Her only prayer was that when the time came, Shakir’s death would be merciful and quick.
53
0130 hours
Dirt pinged against Abby’s face mask, spattering her hair and arms with grit. Startled, she flinched back and banged her head against the tunnel’s earthen wall hard enough to see stars. Blowing out, she only succeeded in fogging up her face mask, and that made her grumpier still. That and her nose itched. “Goddammit, watch it!”
