Cormorant Run

by Lilith Saintcrow

  “And this little cunt was the Rat’s buddy.” The locals all had friends, too. Or at least, what passed for coworkers in their strange little circles. It would only take one getting curious about a disappearance to cut into Kope’s expected profit margin.

  “You’re beginning to feel the drift. Now get out of my office and take care of the mess with that shit-for-brains.” The general reached for a 7-17 report in his in-box, and the tetherphone at his elbow shrilled. “God fucking damn it.”

  “Yessir.” Morov made his heel-clicking military turn, knowing it irritated the other man, and shut the door with a sound just short of a slam.

  His transfer request was in his pocket, stamped and signed. He had a friend in the 59th Division’s HR who had promised to fix the right kind of seal on it and get him out of this hole.

  But maybe he could wait a little bit. Christ and the aliens, Kopelund was actually going for it.

  He was chasing the Cormorant. Nobody knew just what that goddamn thing was, but rumor had it the rifters had a Holy Grail, somewhere in the biggest Rift on Earth. It was probably worth a pretty penny.

  Morov was halfway back to his own small office—no high-up window for him, just a rectangle of wired-for-safety glass looking into the ass end of a spiny bush planted along the north side of the compound—before he carried the thought through to its logical conclusion.

  The rifter was expendable. By extension, so was anyone else who went in looking for that mysterious object. He could count on casualties, and if he survived he’d have to make sure Kope didn’t turn him into a Bechter.

  Which meant, along with the paperwork for that sad, sorry sonuvabitch, Morov might have to fill out something else. Anonymously, of course.

  No, today was not a good day. Morov sighed, and reached into his breast pocket for a half-burnt cigar.

  He was, he suspected, going to need it.

  21

  FINE FOR CROSSING

  In the middle of the concrete cube Kopelund had shown her to, Svinga sat on a blanket pulled from the bed and folded into a pad. Cross-legged, in a shirt she’d bought near the Birmingham Rift and a pair of Ashe the Rat’s panties—too big for Svin, pale pink nylon, somehow stuffed into the bag of belongings Ashe had carted here and left with Rafello at the Tumbledown just in case. Dried blood made arcs under her ruthlessly short fingernails, and her legs were sticks. You could see the muscle attaching to bone, deep grooves on the inside of her thighs. Ashe would have laughed and pinched her. Eat something, bitch. I like ’em round.

  The much-folded, dingy envelope had a cellophane window. Recycled, just like everything else between them. Ashe had taped it shut, not with stim or flex but plain old packing extrusion, and Svin’s old pocketknife opened it easy as oil. Briefly Svin wondered how Ashe had stolen the blade from politzei evidence lockers, or who she had managed to bribe, but it was inconsequential.

  Two sheets of coarse paper. Chunky, small, crude writing. Svin could almost see Ashe bending over this, pencil jutting from her left hand and her wrist awkwardly curled. The Rat got straight to the point, as usual.

  Bitch why you have to do that. Shouda run we couda made it. Now you in prison and who gonna be my sweet thing?

  Svin blinked, heavily. Gooseflesh spread across her shoulders, down her back, rippled across her thighs. The “arresting officers” had been so far in warboy Henkell’s pocket it was a wonder they didn’t smell his farts, and they’d laid ambush for Ashe on the way back to town. Didn’t count on Svinga being there, didn’t count on her going killcrazy, didn’t count on one small rifter bitch with a bad wire in her head. When you had nothing to lose, you could tear open a man’s cheek with your bare hands, or take a stimstick from a politzei and jam it almost through another one, even punching riot gear.

  Ashe made it out, of course. She knew when to run, and Svin had pushed her down the hill before hopping on the closest man, the one with the gun instead of the stimstick. A stupid move, really. She should have run.

  I gon wait for you but if sommin happn I got this. You say I go on play but I aint gonna. I jus wan you.

  When had she written this? The Rat wasn’t known to be faithful when it came to her fucktoys. It had bothered Svin until she figured out she didn’t have to be either, and there was Vetch just waiting in the wings. Some sticks liked it when their hole had another on the side. The fantasy of both at the same time got them off, and Vetch had been just rough enough. It’d been nice enough to occasionally feel … contained, to relax when he pinned her against the wall with his bulk. Or when she was jumpy after a return, all her senses dialed to maggie* and her body too survival-hoppy to be safe. Maybe he’d even liked her bad-wire moments.

  Vetch had been part of the sting. Hid his share of the payout and went right to Henkell to sell their names, or maybe just Ashe’s, figuring he could get Svin’s part of the payout later. It had taken her a little while in solitary to piece it together, but she had. The only thing she felt, thinking about it now, was a weary revulsion. Anger might have burned itself out, or maybe she didn’t like the percentage on revenge just yet.

  I found it but imma keep it for you. Bossman here stupid thinks its somethin porty. You an me gonna catch the bird, I got him workin to get you out. If you reading this tho, I been erased. Dont cry. Imma wait for you catch the bird.

  Svin’s teeth made tiny oily squeaks of strain. She unclenched her jaw with an effort. Her eyes burned. Her neck ached. She’d put off reading this, knowing Ashe would have put something in the duffel, some message. What would have hurt more, Ashe saying too bad so sad, or … this? And the roll of marks—a full couple K of ready, and a string of numbers that was the code for the account Ashe had put Svin’s part of the payoff in.

  Probably every penny of it, too. Why hadn’t Ashe just taken it? That would have been better.

  It would have hurt less.

  The second piece of paper, scribbled with cryptic marks, smoothed across Svin’s knee. She traced parts of it, imagining sleek-haired button-nosed Ashe with her tongue poking out the corner of her mouth, wholly focused as she drew and shaded. There were a few Xs drawn in puke-green crayon; it reminded Svinga of treasure and pirates, codes and spies. Another rifter might have been able to guess it was a map, but maybe not the whole value of it.

  Besides, it was always best not to trust another rifter’s map too completely. The Rift changed, and the rifters did too.

  Kopelund probably was hoping Ashe had left some clue, a whisper in Svin’s ear. Or that Svin herself could meld across Ashe’s tracks inside the blur and somehow escape whatever had killed the Rat.

  She spent a long time bent over, tracing and touching the different marks, occasionally mouthing a few jumbled words to fix something in memory.

  When she straightened, she glanced at the door, then at the window. A curious expression crossed her face. Slack, thoughtful, and exhausted all at once, her dark eyes gleaming with the dull fury of a trapped animal.

  The second sheet was heavy industrial paper, so it made a fine noise when she tore the map into strips. She chewed each one thoroughly into a colorless, flavorless wad, and washed them down with cupfuls of the mineral-tasting water from the sink. The small tin cup made a tiny clicking sound each time she set it down to stuff another strip in her mouth, like a key turning a lock and silence returning to a cell.

  With that done, Svin got up, slid out of the panties, refolded them carefully, and put them in her backpack. She’d leave everything she didn’t need in the duffels, and travel light.

  It only took a few minutes to get dressed again. Ashe’s letter, in its much-folded envelope, was tucked into her mapper, and Svin dragged the chair away from the door.

  She went to tell Kopelund the blur would be fine for crossing tomorrow.

  Early.

  PART FOUR

  RIFT

  22

  INGRESS AND EGRESS

  INSTRUCTOR: Thorley, get your thumb out of your ass and pay attention. What’s the most dan
gerous time in a Rift?

  STUDENT A: Uh … any time you’re not paying attention.

  INSTRUCTOR: Goddamn right. Now, name the critical junctures where danger cannot be assessed.

  STUDENT A: Uh … ah … Ingress and egress, sir.

  INSTRUCTOR: So you were listening! It’s a goddamn miracle. Now, everything about these fuckers is hazardous, but it’s the wall itself that causes most casualties. You can’t see what’s on the other side, so you go in blind. You got to pick the one place that won’t sizzle your tits off, that’s why you hit the driftburn behind your guide, and once through, do exactly what your guide does. If he starts prancing around singing “Molly’s Got a Boner,” what do you do?

  STUDENT B: Prance around and sing, sir?

  INSTRUCTOR: Sing what, sardie? What precisely do you sing?

  STUDENT B: “Molly’s Got a Boner,” sir.

  [Laughter]

  INSTRUCTOR: You laugh now, motherfuckers, but here’s the thing: You don’t know what’s on the other side of that wall. The rifters go back and forth, and they stay alive, so you listen like you’re in basic, you little bitches. You hear me, Makharov?

  STUDENT C: Yes, sir.

  INSTRUCTOR: The most dangerous times are going in or going out. Just like stickin’ your cock in a joyhole. Or, in Igranova’s case here, sticking your fingers.

  STUDENT D: Strap-on, sir.

  [More laughter]

  INSTRUCTOR: I make the jokes here, Sergeant. Now get your asses over to that rigpole and we’re gonna see if the wax is still in your ears or if you’ve heard a damn thing I’ve said. Move out!

  —Recording, Major Semyon Kalashnikov Basic Rift Training for ILAC Ground Infantry, Day Four

  23

  DRIFTBURN

  The sky had cleared, a night of black space and the hard cold points of stars draining off whatever heat the shivering earth managed to retain. Dawn shivered its way through the fog, a stinging rosette just beginning to boil up in the east. A thin tired frost coated the pavement, except for the long looping scorch left a year ago by the burning leav. The slugwall looked just the same, softly lambent in the predawn dimness, glitter-hard and thin as the ice on shallow puddles. Winter wasn’t done yet, it still had a feeble punch or three to throw. The air was thick with exhaust—kliegs glared, harnessed to old gennies and filling the entire U with harsh eye-scouring light. There were a couple leavs, too, but the rifter had nixed those. I don’t drift that way, she’d said, lifting her chin and daring anyone present to disagree.

  Now they were lined up. Four hulk-shouldered sardies, Morov with his flattop in command making it five. The science side was bald Barko, prissy pursemouth Tremaine from Map Ops and lean, wander-eyed, bespectacled Eschkov, both weighed down with sampling equipment. Barko had his own complement of smaller scanners and data chips in his high-arched backpack. Aleks was nowhere in sight. Probably off sulking, since Barko had told him in no uncertain terms that he was not going into the Rift, and that was that.

  The rifter eyed the slugwall, her hipbag over her peacoat but the strap under her backpack’s harness to keep it precisely placed. A few days out had taken the edge off her gray prison tinge, and maybe eating Bechter’s eye had agreed with her too, because she looked less skeletal. Her teeth were just as prominent, her eyes just as oddly placed, and her head was covered with dark stubble that would be peach fuzz soon. She didn’t look cheerful, but neither did she look as apathetic or just-plain-exhausted as Barko expected.

  Instead, she looked … intent. A laserlike focus, turning that sharp, unpretty face into a statue’s, those big eyes lemurlike instead of froggy now. She didn’t move when Kopelund stepped next to her, his broad bullish shoulders looming. One of the kliegs was behind him, and Kope’s shadow lay over the small woman, a gravity well swallowing a tiny struggling star.

  “You know what you’re after.” Kopelund tried to say it quietly, but the gennies were roaring. There were new quieter ones running off cenestat tickers* and Reslan coils,† but no space in the bony budget for them here at QR-715. Petrol was much cheaper, and the Institute scientists were agog at the idea of seeing another ingress—and maybe gathering data. You couldn’t do that in the dark. The rifter had been here since about 3 a.m., watching the energy flow. Soon, was all she’d say.

  The rifter shook her head a fraction. “I know what you’re after,” she corrected, leaning forward. Her expression didn’t change, utterly focused on the slugwall. “You coming in?”

  “No, I have to—” For once, Kopelund sounded caught out.

  “Then get out of my light and tell your boys to get ready. Almost driftburn.” The rifters didn’t call it ingress. She didn’t even bother to wave one of her small, deft hands, but the general was effectively dismissed.

  Barko watched the expressions sliding over Kopelund’s wide, greasy face. They were small—a hint of exasperation, the pinprick to the paper-balloon ego of a pen-pushing man, the distaste of a martinet who couldn’t punish an infraction just yet.

  If Barko knew anything after being posted to QR-715 for nine years, it was that Kope could—and would—wait for the right time. The instant the rifter wasn’t needed anymore, she was tipped into the drift, slagged out, or just simply sent back to Guan if Kope was in a charitable mood.

  Which he hardly ever was. Today, the general’s nose wasn’t twitching at all. A bad, bad sign.

  “Listen up,” Morov was saying to the four clustering him. Senkin, Tolstoy, Mako, and Brood, all shoulder-wide and hip-lean in combat ’tigues. Two straight-up brawlers, one demo man, and Brood, whose pale gaze barely changed whether he was firing a gun or interrogating some poor shitbird they caught trying to sneak up to the slugwall and hadn’t shot.

  Brood was at least partly crazy, but he was also luckier than a cat and quiet as one, too. It was obvious what he was along for. The only question was whether Morov could keep the leash tight enough on that particular feline.

  Barko was considering bowing out, but if he did, he might as well consider himself a coward just like everyone else probably did. When would he get another chance? Next to him, Igor Eschkov bounced a little on his toes, his thick glasses sliding down his hawk nose with the motion. “Wait until you see,” he said, leaning against Barko’s shoulder. The equipment tied to his hiking backpack swayed, metal bits clattering against each other.

  Igor had been in the Rift once, for about twenty-three seconds, in a haz suit and guided by two rifters, both rolling their eyes at his precautions. Back in the glory days of experimentation, back before the word had come down from on high that they were mapping the smaller Rifts, leave the big ones alone until we know what we’re dealing with.

  In other words, a committee had lost their balls looking at the casualty count, or a corporation had somehow achieved a stranglehold on all the others, including the government contract division, and was calling the shots.

  Personally, Barko thought it was a combination of both.

  “We go through after the rifter,” Morov continued. “We go where she says and we do what she does—is that clear? The rifter calls the shots, and when she tells you to move, or to drop, or to bark like a fucking chicken you do it. I want all four of you assholes at our next dorm roll call, you hear me? Mako, Senkin, you go right behind me. Brood, you’re at the ass end. Make sure our scientists don’t get no wandering urges.”

  “Yes, Mother,” Senkin, the shortest and widest of the sardies, piped up. “You already said that.”

  “I’m only repeating myself so your subnormal ass can understand, Tinkles. Form up, and be ready.” Morov glanced at the rifter, evaluating, then past her as Kopelund stepped prissily away.

  A shadow lingered at the base of one of the kliegs. Scientists were scurrying behind hastily arranged sensor arrays—an insert was the best time to get more data, and by noon that data would probably be sold on the black market even if Kopelund had the T1 line into the building chopped. Every single science-staff member was here, either watching from behi
nd the yellow-painted crackline or attending to the arrays. Even the canteen staff was probably watching through a window somewhere, elbowing for a good view. Another cordon of sardies were at the back, keeping an eye on everything. None on the sidelines, though, and the ones in the towers had been sobriety-tested before going up there and given a dose of gramoxene so they wouldn’t get all excited with a hip flask and ruin the moment shooting at the team as they went in.

  This used to be such a well-run installation. Barko squinted at a flicker in his peripheral vision, movement where none should be. What the fuck is that?

  “TIME!” the rifter bellowed, an amazing yell from such a small frame. She pitched forward, and the slugwall responded, its whorls becoming thicker, almost creamy. “TIMETIMETIME!”

  “Shit!” Barko lumbered forward, the sardies fell into tac formation, and Senkin shoved past Eschkov, who rolled his wandering eyes and tripped, almost going down with a clatter, staggering to right himself.

  The rifter didn’t run flat-out, just jounced along in a weirdly graceful lope that slowed as she neared the shimmer. It was the movement of a swimmer eyeing the current and making plans for a dive, her hipbag bouncing and her booted feet side-skipping once, twice, finding the right angle. There was a scramble, a confusing double image as vibrations ran around her outline, she hit the slugwall …

  … and vanished into its flow. A long dark streak showed where she’d went in, and now they all had to hit that streak or they’d bounce off at best. At worst the shimmering around it would flash-fry them, or transmute flesh and nerves to something else, or cut them cleanly in half—

  “GO GO GO!” someone yelled in Barko’s ear, a voice that shouldn’t be there, and he almost tried to slow down as Morov and Mako vanished into the dark smear. The streak elongated, and something hit Barko from behind. He tripped, and it was the boy Aleks, pelting from behind the closest edge of a high-built sensor array, who grabbed Barko’s backpack and shoved them both through the—