by Devin Hanson
Angeline’s stunrod gave her a flickering glimpse of the maze of tunnels. She turned the stunrod off again and leaned her head back against the wall. There were dozens of small passages leading off the main trunk. She hadn’t been able to see very far, but there had been several branches of the big tunnel as well, disappearing into the gloom.
She wished she had a flashlight. That would make it easy to find her way around the tunnels, but the stunrod hardly gave off any light. And she dare not use it too much. She had been lucky so far, but without the stunrod, there was no way she could fight off someone trying to capture her.
The blowing breeze was cold against her skin and she shivered. All she wore was the worn out shirt, and it did nothing to block the breeze.
Angeline wrapped her arms around herself and set off down the tunnel. She didn’t know where she was going; only that she had to get as far from her kidnappers as she could.
Every ten or twenty paces, she held out the stunrod and flipped it on for a few seconds, giving her a quick glimpse into what was ahead of her. The low tunnel forced her to stay bent as she walked, and the strain was making her back ache. Still, she persisted. There was nothing behind her worth returning to.
It was slow going. The tunnels were far too ramified to get any clear sense of where she was, but she followed a distant humming sound, keeping the flow of fresh air in her face. Machinery meant access points, which meant a way to escape that wasn’t through another vent.
Eventually she came to a trunk line, a straight tunnel that was tall enough for her to walk comfortably upright. The wind here was strong, almost enough to push her off her feet. Her hair bannered out behind her and her shirt pressed against her front, the trailing edges flapping wildly in the wind.
The trunk line had rounded corners to facilitate air passage, but she found that if she walked as close to the wall as she could, the wind wasn’t as strong. The first time she passed one of the side passages, the eddy in the wind almost knocked her over. She learned to crouch down while passing the side tunnels, keeping her center of gravity as low as possible. Tears streamed down her face and left icy trails across her cheeks.
Light in the tunnel ahead gave her a sudden surge of hope. A system of louvers came into view, with furiously spinning fan blades behind them. Angeline had to crouch the last twenty yards then get down on hands and knees to crawl against the force of the wind. Finally she reached a door set flush against the wall. It was a small door, sized to be comfortable for someone six feet tall.
She tried the handle, hoping with all her might. It was unlocked!
Angeline pulled the door open. It came out six inches then the door was yanked from her hand and slammed shut by the wind. It was almost enough to make her burst into tears. She turned her back to the wind and collected herself. She was almost free. All she had to do was get the door open and make a run for the escalators.
It took her a long time to get her spiraling emotions under control again. Hunger and thirst gnawed at her, making her feel weak and trembly.
She just had to approach it logically. The first few inches hadn’t been that hard, but as the door opened wider, the increased surface area had caught the wind and yanked the door from her hands.
Angeline turned back into the wind and opened the door again, this time wedging her bare foot into the crack. She got her hand in, and her arm and one leg. The door was open about seven inches now, and the pressure on the door was very strong. With gritted teeth, Angeline worked her arm around until she could push the door open as if she was doing a pushup.
Day after day of pushing her muscles to their limit had given Angeline a wiry strength that she hadn’t had before her capture. She got the door open another inch and got her shoulder behind the door, and the side of her chest. She had a better angle now, and could push with her knee as well.
She fought the door open against the wind and scraped her back across the jamb. A last effort got her head inside, then her hips. Angeline jammed her foot against the bottom, holding it open long enough to pull herself through the door the rest of the way.
The pressure was too great, though, and the door slammed shut before she could pull her foot away, ripping the nail off her big toe. Pain seared through her whole body, and she fell backwards with a cry. The sudden absence of the howling wind made her skin tingle and her ears ring.
In the sudden darkness, she gasped out a sob and grabbed her toe. That was a mistake. More pain crashed through her and her hand came away wet with blood. Angeline cried out in agony then collapsed in sobs. There was no way she was going to be running now.
The darkness closed in about her, suffocating. Wind moaned through the cracks in the door, counterpoint to Angeline’s shaking sobs. She didn’t know what to do next. She couldn’t think past the pain in her foot.
Gradually, her despair, pain, fear and exhaustion pushed her down into a disturbed sleep.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-FIVE
15 November, 2130. Partial transcript of the only known recorded meeting of the newly formed Council of Matriarchs. The camera is pointed down at a pair of feet the whole time, but the speaker is clearly Dr. Everard.
“Ultimately it’s not a matter of good and evil. That is too black-and-white. Evil as a concept is easily misinterpreted. Most people who commit acts we consider evil are not intentionally doing harm. Oh, there are the small percent of people who fit the term completely, but we’re not talking about them. We’re talking about normal people who do things out of desperation that others look on with horror.
“It’s a different look at evil. The Womack Process is evil, not because it itself is irredeemably horrible, but because of the lengths it drives men to out of desperation. When a man is against the wall and he must come up with the payment for his next treatment within the next twenty-four hours or die… well, people will do anything in their power to keep on surviving. If that means killing another person, or robbing them, or any of the atrocities that man commits against man, he will do it.
“Does that make him evil? I don’t think so. But the Womack Process that drove him to it is evil. And when enough of the population is locked into this endless cycle of depravity, it will mean the end of civilization as we know it.”
Marcus gripped the unfamiliar weight of the pistol and tried to fight the growing sense of doom. He had been in this room not twenty-four hours earlier, and it had been completely different then. The two rows of cages were still here, but against the back wall was an untidy row of corpses.
Two of the bodies were young women, barely into their teens. With them was a woman in a lab coat, one side of her head a bloody mess, and three men. What the hell had happened here since he had left?
Anton paced in front of the bodies. His breathing was hoarse, and when he spoke, his voice came out raspy and laryngitic. His eyes were bloodshot and a vein pulsed in his forehead.
“We are currently in a state of crisis.”
Behind Marcus, the room was crowded with men and women. They were mercenaries, career thugs and criminals. As far as he knew, Marcus was on the only one there who had had to ask for a weapon. They watched in various stages of interest. Marcus felt out of place as the only person there disturbed by the pile of corpses against the wall.
“Our entire operation is about to be fucked,” Anton continued. “One of the girls escaped.”
“How?” someone asked. “You had them in a cage!”
“We still don’t know, exactly. Mateo died from being repeatedly shocked. I think they must have grabbed his stunrod and killed him.”
Someone in the crowd blew a disgusted snort. “So why are we here then? Do you need your diapers changed?”
“Wow, would you?” Anton sneered back. “I’ll tell Crade how helpful you were.”
The man muttered, but didn’t respond.
“If you are quite done interrupting me…? Good. Like I said, one of the girls escaped. Right after she gas-bombed Dr. Lenbroke and two of my men, sh
e escaped into the air vents.”
There were mutters from the group and Marcus could understand. How did a couple girls, unarmed and locked in cages, escape, somehow make a gas bomb, and kill four grown adults? There had to be a truly awesome level of incompetence to let that happen.
The general mutters were that this wasn’t any problem of theirs. Why should they suffer because these idiots couldn’t keep a couple children locked up? Marcus agreed. He didn’t even know how to shoot the gun in his hand. He was a dilettante, a trust fund baby who hadn’t worked a day in his life before his sudden cancer diagnosis. And yet, Grendal had a great deal invested in the black market ovary business. She had pulled every resource she had to deal with the situation. Marcus’ future was tied inextricably to Grendal’s. Anything he could do to resolve the problem before the girl reached the authorities increased the chances of his own survival. Anton was trying to speak, but his ruined voice wasn’t loud enough to drown out the others.
Marcus stepped forward and turned to face the gathered group. Hard faces looked back at him, angry, afraid, or disgusted. These were people who took calculated risks for a living, and they didn’t like their chances. He held up his hands. “Listen!” he shouted over the rumble of discontent. “We’re all here because our lives depend on the success of this operation, one way or another. It might provide us with our Womack treatments, or purchase our services, or perhaps we just owe Grendal Crade a favor. The job is a simple one: we find the girl and do whatever it takes to protect this business.” Marcus turned back to Anton. “Just tell us what we need to do.”
Anton nodded his thanks as the growing mutters died away. “By the time we got up into the air ducts the girl was long gone. We looked, but we didn’t have the manpower to track her down. There’s no way to go between levels by the air ducts, so she’s still somewhere on this level. We need to patrol the level, track her down and bring her back. Alive, if possible.”
“What’s the girl look like?” Marcus asked.
“I’ll have an image sent to your tablets. Split into pairs. I want one group posted on the escalators to keep her from escaping. Marcus, you’re with me. Let’s go, people! The sooner we find this girl, the sooner we can all go home.”
The people filed out of the room. There were still some mutters, but the rising mutiny was gone. These people were professionals. They knew how to carry out a search and they weren’t fighting the directions given them anymore.
Marcus waited while Anton got out his tablet and forwarded the image to the searchers. Marcus checked his tablet when it beeped, and was surprised to see the face of the timid girl. If there had been a fighter in the cages, he would have put his money on the other one. He glanced over at the row of bodies and swallowed. The second girl was one of them.
“Jesus this is such a fuckup,” Anton sighed and put his tablet away. “Thanks for standing up back there.”
Marcus shrugged. “I don’t know that I’m happy with the business you carry out here, but I owe Grendal.”
“Don’t we all.”
“So,” Marcus asked, “what is our job going to be?”
“Coordination. I didn’t tell them, but things are a little more complicated than they seem.”
“Anton, I hate to be the one to break this to you, but things are rarely simple.”
Anton smiled without any humor in his eyes. “There may be a marshal or perhaps more coming for us.”
Marcus rolled a shoulder. “I’m only recently arrived on Mars, Anton. Who are the marshals? Some kind of cop?”
“You would find them most common to your American FBI. They enforce law between clusters. The crate I had you deliver, you remember it? To Olympus Cluster?”
“It was last night, Anton. I remember.”
“That crate had a marshal inside.”
“You’ve got to be fucking kidding.”
Anton made a wry face. “At the time it seemed like a good idea. The marshals had a warrant out for this one. We figured, why not let the marshals solve our problem for us? The man you delivered it to was a captain in the marshals, someone on our payroll.”
“Was?”
“He had a transponder hooked up to his heartrate. He died sometime in the very early morning.”
“So this marshal you shipped him…?”
“Probably killed him. And now he’s likely to be on the way back.”
“Jesus Christ.”
“He could have died too, or gotten captured, we just don’t know.”
“So we could have an entire marshal squadron dropping on our heads?”
It was Anton’s turn to shrug. “It’s possible, but not likely. That sort of mobilization is usually reserved for the marines.”
“So we might have marines trying to kill us?”
Anton gave an exasperated sigh. “Look, Marcus, I like you, and I appreciate your assistance, but this isn’t your planet, right? Unless we get into a huge firefight in public, the marines aren’t going to get involved. At the most we have to deal with one or two marshals.
“The doc is already packing up his stuff since this location is burned. Soon as we catch the girl, we’re outta here. She’s the only one who can finger us, so we get the girl and lie low for a few weeks, then set up again somewhere else. We’ll lose a few months of product, but we’ll come out the other side alive.”
Marcus nodded reluctantly. “Okay. That doesn’t sound too bad.”
Anton clapped him on the shoulder. “It’s not. The last couple days have been shit, but things will get better. Christ, I could use a vacation.”
“Okay.” Marcus fidgeted. “But what do we do now?”
“We go and meet with the boss.”
“Grendal is here?”
“Oh, hells no. The old witch isn’t the boss. We’re going to meet Esteres.”
Meeting with Esteres wasn’t what Marcus had expected. Anton had led them to a large room with vaulted ceilings and locked the door. Then Anton spent nearly ten minutes going over the room inch by inch with a wand, sweeping for electrical signals and outside radiation.
“The room is lead-sheathed,” Anton commented as he carefully paced the walls, waving the wand in overlapping patterns, “and the rock is iron-ore. It would take a very focused beam to get through. Still, we sweep every time just in case the lead is breached anywhere.”
Marcus was sitting in one of two chairs at a desk which sported a rather expensive monitor. Around the desk, a metal mesh had been rigged suspended from poles, with a lead running across the ground and plugging into the wall.
Anton finished sweeping and joined Marcus inside the mesh. He fastened it behind him then tapped on his tablet. The mesh flexed gently and Marcus heard a hum at the very top of his hearing range. “It’s a faraday cage,” Anton said smugly. “Extra security because nobody really knows you, Marcus. It will stop any outgoing signals, just in case you’re an elaborate plant.”
Marcus started protesting, but Anton held up a hand, cutting him off. “I know you’re not. Still, orders are orders.”
Anton fiddled with the monitor and tapped in a code when prompted after a pointed look at Marcus to avert his gaze.
“Why am I even here, Anton?” Marcus asked.
“An excellent question. Why are you bothering me, Anton?”
The monitor resolved to show a trim wujin gentleman with a prominent hawk nose. His white hair was cut short in an almost military style. Anton settled himself in the chair next to Marcus. “Mr. Esteres, this is Marcus Truman. An associate of Madam Crade’s.”
Marcus heard his cue and ducked his head in a short bow. “It’s an honor, Mr. Esteres.” He still had no idea who this Esteres was, but he had met men like him on Earth. He forgot his irritation with Anton and his frustration at being dragooned into this messy situation, and simply focused on being polite.
“Mr. Truman.” The wujin twitched his head in the slightest acknowledgement of Marcus, and then turned his attention fully back to Anton. “You still haven�
��t explained yourself, Anton. Is there something wrong with the location transfer?”
“No, sir. Everything is moving on schedule. Dr. Chung will be out of the area in the next twenty minutes.”
“Then why are you calling me? You risk exposure. If the marshals have an AI watching the traffic stream, this call could be picked out and traced.”
“Sorry.” Anton was clearly flustered. The interview wasn’t going the way he had planned it. “Mr. Truman here has been instrumental in keeping things moving smoothly. I wanted to suggest keeping him on in a more permanent capacity. You required all personnel changes to go through you.”
Esteres glared at Anton. “This is what you disturbed me for? This line is for emergencies! Fine, use Mr. Truman as you see fit.” The screen went dead.
Anton leaned back in his chair with a strained smile. “That could have gone better.”
Marcus closed his eyes and cursed silently to himself. What had he just gotten himself into? “I wish you had told me you were going to offer me a job,” he told Anton.
“What, and ruin the surprise?” Anton clapped him on the shoulder and stood up. “Cheer up, man! You just hit the jackpot. You’re set for life, now.”
“I have a job,” Marcus said irritably.
“Good. You’ll need a cover. One that explains a bit of travel, I hope?”
Marcus shrugged hopelessly. Anton wasn’t getting it. “It might, I suppose. But that’s hardly–”
“Look, we’ll talk about it later, alright? Think about it. Esteres already gave you the green light. We’re talking a hundred thousand credits a month, easy. More, if you play your cards right. We got vacancies that need filling, you feel me?”
