Snowburn

by E J Frost

  on her dread. “You’re my eyes up front.

  Keep talkin’ to me.”

  “Does she ever stop?” Erin scoffs.

  I ignore her and wave Banks into the

  opposite seat. “You two stay there. Keep

  your weight distributed. Let’s go.” I give Kez

  a final kiss. Release her. I don’t like letting

  her go. When I’m holding her, she’s safe. I

  know she can take care of herself. I know

  Tyng’s threat is distant. I know all that, and

  every instinct I have still screams at me

  whenever I let her go.

  She doesn’t move away immediately.

  Stands looking up at me with a small smile.

  Maybe she’s thinking the same thing.

  “Door,” she says.

  Or not. She’s a practical woman, my

  kitten. I reach behind me, pull the hatch shut

  and move to the rear controls.

  Kez takes her seat at the front of the

  skimmer, and plugs the little transponder into

  a socket in the palm-sized control console.

  The transponder begins to make a soft,

  regular ping.

  “Any image?” I ask Kez. There’s a faint

  yellow glare on the front window, which

  could be the transponder, or could just be the

  angle of the Twins.

  “Yup, I’ve got it,” Kez responds. “Three

  hundred degrees south-south-east.”

  “Right.” I fire up the skimmer’s jets and

  swing the little craft in a wide arc around the

  cove. With Kez watching the front, I glance

  back at the shore as we shoot out through the

  sheltering rock promontories and towards the

  open ocean. Behind us, the dunes are quiet,

  empty. Ripples spread across the pale green

  water, tracing the path of our passage. The

  water swells and darkens more than the light

  wave action warrants. Not far from where

  the skimmer was resting, now a hundred

  yards to our rear, a dark fin breaks the

  surface for a moment.

  Adult tegli, or maybe a juvenile orclas.

  Whatever it is, we quickly leave it behind.

  The transponder keeps up its soft, steady

  pinging as we speed across the open water.

  It’s the only noise, other than the steady hum

  of the jets, inside the skimmer. No one talks.

  Kez leans forward over her stick, peering out

  the front window. Erin sinks back in her seat

  and keeps the amber spectacles down over

  her eyes. Banks watches Kez, one knee

  bouncing slightly.

  I keep the throttle open, trusting Kez to

  tell me before we hit anything. We need to

  intercept the bowship just as it leaves the

  dock. The skimmer is a speedy little craft,

  but it’s no match for a bowship. If the

  bowship gets into the open water of the bay

  and begins to accelerate, no matter how hard

  I push the throttle, we’ll never catch it.

  The first of the long black jetties that

  mark Hot Sands’ industrial port rises out of

  the water in front of the skimmer.

  “Got it,” Kez says. “Third pier. Eighty

  degrees.” She extends her left hand.

  “Hold on,” I tell Erin and Banks as I

  swing the skimmer to port. The skimmer

  banks sharply, helped by Kez leaning on the

  front controls. As we come around, the front

  window flares red-gold. We’re heading due

  east, into the sunset. I grit my teeth and squint

  into the brilliance.

  “Kez?” I growl.

  “Still got it. Third pier. Ten degrees

  north. Slow down. We’re going to overshoot

  it.”

  I ease back on the throttle. Scan the

  choppy view of waves, the back of Kez’s

  head and the low band of the jetty for the

  bowship’s distinctive prongs. The setting

  suns are dazzling, but I finally find the

  upturned hand-shape of the bowship in the

  glare.

  Kez wasn’t wrong about overshooting it.

  The bowship is creeping between the piers. I

  eye up the angles, throttle back a little

  further. Shaker said the bowship would only

  register the skimmer as an echo, but it won’t

  look like an echo. To anyone on deck, we’ll

  be hard to miss.

  Unless we’re concealed somehow.

  “Kez, gimme a read on the pier.” I’ve got

  my own read on it. The lowest support strut

  I’ve seen will still give the skimmer about a

  meter of clearance. But a meter isn’t much,

  particularly with the wave action, and I can’t

  see clearly in the glare.

  Kez glances back over her shoulder at

  me. Her eyes are round. “Uh, about four

  meters above the waterline.”

  I nod. That’s what I figured, too. “Hold

  on to your hats,” I tell my passengers, then

  angle the skimmer between the two nearest

  pylons.

  I hear Banks inhale sharply as the

  darkness under the pier swallows the ship. I

  can’t see anything but permacrete, but I don’t

  need to. I’ve already made my calculations.

  The pier is standard Colony construction.

  One hundred and ninety meters long. Sixteen

  meters wide. Six meters between pylons.

  I’ve throttled back to a third of the skimmer’s

  top speed, so it’s a quick count of one-and

  before we pop out between the next set of

  pylons on the far side of the pier. I bank hard

  to avoid crashing into the adjacent jetty.

  The sealane is crowded. We bob in the

  wash of a big Infinity yacht that’s pulling out

  ahead of us. Between the high wedge of the

  yacht’s stern and the prongs of the bowship

  filling the eastern horizon, the glare of

  Kuseros’s sunset is muted, manageable. I

  sweep the horizon quickly, make a fast

  adjustment, then swing the skimmer under the

  next pier. There’s a squeal of metal across

  permacrete as the yacht’s wake lifts us up to

  kiss the pier’s underside. One-and and

  we’re out the other side, so close behind the

  bowship that it eclipses the entire horizon.

  Kez rises out of her seat slightly.

  “There,” she breathes, pointing at something

  I can’t see in the massive shadow of the

  bowship. “Three degrees north.”

  The throttle slides under my palm as she

  makes the small adjustment. I see the dark

  slit she’s angling towards. I throw the

  throttle forward, trusting Kez to steer, and

  the bowship swallows us. There’s a funny

  lifting sensation and my stomach drops a

  meter or two. I kill the jets. I can’t see

  anything in the sudden transition from light to

  pitch blackness but we must be in the sweet-

  spot under the bowship. We’ll ride along

  now like a lingus-fish on an orclas.

  I sit back against the bench’s padding.

  Hear Banks exhale. There’s a faint whisper –

  wind or the bowship’s jets – from outside

  the ship, but inside it’s as quiet as a
tomb. I

  grin into the darkness and feel the air next to

  me shift as Kez finds me and slides onto the

  bench beside me. I put my arm around her.

  “Did we damage the roof?” she asks.

  “Yeah, Shaker might shave a couple of

  credits off our deposit,” I whisper into her

  hair.

  She puts her head down on my shoulder

  and from the roundness of her cheek against

  my collar, I can tell she’s smiling. She

  doesn’t give a fuck, either. Damage to the

  skimmer is something to worry about after

  we survive the run. My kitten’s good at

  living in the now.

  My eyes adjust and I begin to pick out

  shapes. Erin with her face turned away from

  us. Banks sitting with his head back against

  the wall, eyes closed. The long arc of Kez’s

  legs as she curls them across my lap. I slide

  my hand up her thigh and pull her nice and

  tight to me. There’s nothing to do now for

  eighteen minutes as the bowship accelerates

  out of the bay and crosses the expanse of

  open ocean to Outniss Rock. Maybe it’s the

  darkness, maybe it’s the weird silence,

  maybe it’s the lingering tension from the first

  leg of our journey, but no one seems inclined

  to talk. We sit in darkness, and silence, for

  seventeen minutes.

  Dropping out of the bowship is harder

  than getting in. The lift off the bowship’s

  huge jets holds us in place against the

  underside of the ship. I have to rev the

  skimmer’s engine until it screams to get up

  enough momentum to escape. We shoot out of

  the underside of the bowship at over a

  hundred kilometers an hour, trailing sparks.

  Shaker’s not going to be a happy man

  when he gets his skimmer back. Banks must

  have the same thought because he meets my

  eyes and grimaces. I shrug. Priorities. Get

  Erin to the Cloudlands. Survive the run. Then

  I’ll worry about the damage to Shaker’s

  pride-and-joy.

  The sun has nearly set while we’ve been

  tucked under the bowship. Only a thin red

  band remains on the horizon, shading to

  purple and midnight blue overhead. The

  Broken Moon is up, bloated and red with

  reflected light. In the darkening ocean,

  Outniss Rock is a series of low black humps.

  I angle the skimmer towards the tallest,

  longest hump.

  “Anywhere in particular?” I ask Banks.

  Banks nods. “Far side. Tower Beach.”

  I swing around the tip of the island,

  clearing the bowship’s massive wake as it

  continues to accelerate out to sea, and

  immediately identify Tower Beach. On the

  southern side of the atoll, a low, black sand

  beach ends in a pile of weathered boulders.

  A few of the boulders form a distinctive

  spire, which glows dull red in the fading

  light.

  The beaches on this side of the atoll,

  sheltered from both the mainland and the

  Cloudlands, are alive with light and

  movement. Each beach hosts two or three

  bonfires, which flicker seductively. Around

  the bonfires, black stick figures swirl,

  silhouetted against the flames. Guess the

  Mirrormen really are dancing tonight.

  There’s no bonfire on the expanse of sand

  below the rock tower, but there are two

  small skimmers bobbing just beyond the

  breakers. Banks nods at them. I pull up

  alongside the one furthest from the beach. A

  thin silver cord stretches from each skimmer

  to the rock tower. I pick up the skimmer’s

  control and am about to click dock when

  Banks says, “You mind beaching, Mister

  Snow?”

  I glance at Kez.

  “C’mon, sass.” Banks holds up his hands.

  “It’s gonna be a bitch to load up out on the

  water.”

  Kez nods. I put down the control pad and

  open up the throttle again.

  The skimmer beaches neatly, the rattle of

  gravel under the jets replacing the whush of

  water. I kill the engine. Let the skimmer

  settle on a slight angle, following the pitch of

  the beach. Banks rises and crosses the canted

  deck, skidding a little. He pops the door and

  jumps down onto the dark, wet sand.

  I beckon Kez with two fingers and point

  to the bench Banks has just vacated. The

  interior of the skimmer is dark, so I doubt

  anyone looking into the skimmer from the

  firelit beach will be able to see inside. But

  in case a stray beam from the setting suns

  light us up, I don’t want anyone seeing Kez’s

  sweetly curved shape at the front window.

  “Stay there, kitten.”

  She nods. Settles onto the bench I’ve

  indicated. Erin ignores me, but she doesn’t

  seem inclined to move. She’s a bitch, but

  she’s not stupid.

  I move to the doorway and stand there for

  a minute, hanging onto the cool metal rim,

  feeling the salty sea breeze lick my cheeks

  and chin. Assess the situation.

  The beach is a short crescent of black-

  flecked gravel, no more than ten meters

  across, bordered by scrubby purple foliage,

  tumbled rocks and gravel mounds. In the

  fading light, the gravel glimmers. The bushes

  luminesce. The black rocks crackle. An

  occasional bright jet reaches up into the

  clouds like a long white finger. I grimace at

  the thought of the rad dose we’re getting.

  Looking around, I can see why smugglers

  would choose this spot. It’s well-concealed,

  distinctive, and of no use to anyone but the

  MAO-A whackos jumping around the fires a

  quarter klick away. Still, I don’t like

  spending any time in their stomping grounds.

  Particularly when I’ve got such sweet meat

  under my wing.

  I turn my head slightly and meet Kez’s

  wide blues. “We’re out of here in five

  minutes. I don’t give a fuck what your boy’s

  doin’.”

  Kez nods. “Should I get the finboards

  out?”

  “Yeah.” I glance at Erin. “Suit up.”

  I expect an eye-roll at least, but Erin’s

  suddenly all business. She packs away her

  specs and palmtop with quick, economic

  movements. I turn back to the beach when

  she starts shrugging out of her assassin chic.

  A pair of man-shaped shadows have

  detached themselves from the rock tower.

  They meet Banks as he trudges up the gravel

  shingle. I’m too far away to hear what

  they’re saying, but the pitch of their voices is

  urgent, agitated.

  I’ve got no hair on the back of my neck,

  but it’s standing up anyway. Time to go.

  “Kitten, make that three minutes.”

  She nods with a rustle of dreadlocks from

  where she’s unstrapping the finboards. I

  cross behind her, to the bench where
my gear

  is stowed, ignoring Erin’s dusky gold

  nakedness on my way. I want some blades.

  There’s no place in the shadowsuit to

  hide my blades. No pockets. No patches.

  Whoever designed this fucking thing should

  be shot. Grimacing, I strap my wrist sheaths

  outside the suit’s sleeves. They’ll be clearly

  visible – there’s no mistaking what they are

  – but they’ll also be easily accessible. I

  shove my feet into my boots. The water will

  ruin even the treated genSkin, and they’ll be

  fucking heavy once they’re wet. I don’t care.

  I’m not leaving my kukris behind.

  I debate over my vest for a moment. I

  haven’t been shot at yet, but there’s still time.

  There’s also a couple of blades in it, and a

  hundred hard credits in the lining. A glance

  at Kez shows that she’s got her backpack

  slung over her shoulders. She packed five

  thou against expenses, so she’s still got a

  couple grand, even after paying Shaker. Her

  backpack bulges with everything she’s

  stuffed into it. I fold the vest and leave it

  with the rest of my gear. There’s no way I’m

  going to fit the vest into her backpack, and I

  won’t be able to swim with it on. If Shaker

  finds my emergency stash, he can put it

  towards the damage I’ve done to his baby.

  I’ll just have to try to avoid getting shot.

  I fasten the flight webbing over my gear

  and take a finboard from Kez. While I tote

  one and shove another towards the door with

  my foot, she starts unstrapping the third.

  Out on the shingle, the discussion

  between Banks and his fellow smugglers has

  risen in volume and gesticulation. I’m not

  interested in sticking around to see the

  outcome, or whether their noise attracts the

  attention of the Hyp-ed cannibals doing their

  war-dance down the beach. A sliding noise

  to my right heralds the arrival of the other

  finboard. I expect Kez to be pushing it, but

  it’s Erin, sleek and curvy in her shadowsuit.

  She mimics my pose, hanging onto the lip of

  the doorway and leaning out of the skimmer

  to survey the beach. It puts the shelf of her

  boobs right under my nose. I have to give her

  points for persistence.

  “This is not a good place to be,” she

  says.

  “You’re not tellin’ me anything I don’t

  know, sister.” I nod at the surf whispering

  across the gravel. “Get wet.”

  She jumps down onto the beach. Casts

  back over her shoulder, “I always am.”