Son of Sedonia

by Ben Chaney

  The emergency release blasted the main hatch hinges and fully depressurized the cockpit. Jogun pushed the hatch off to the side and climbed out. He tried to think of things other than the suit. Difficult when he could hear every shallow breath. Luckily something caught his eye: a fresh crater in the middle of his last cut. Burns and white cracks in the lunar crust radiated out from the center. Another landmine. Probably one of the leftovers from the Nobidyne Company land-grab back in the 50s. Relics from the fighting were all over the expansion zones, but that shouldn’t have mattered. Just what the hell are those Scouts good for, anywa—

  The anger wilted and turned to nausea. He cringed away from the thought and fought to calm down. It worked, but the sensation turned into tears. They dripped onto the glass of his helmet, mixing with blood dropping from the head wound. Okay...okay... He sniffed and sat up. The beacon. He rotated a dial on his wrist to read ‘EMERGENCY’ in bright red letters, then squeezed a button on the side. A channel opened in his helmet.

  “Signal received, 75508-V. What is your position and situation?”

  “Sector 8709...-36A. My Crawler had a blowout. It’s inoperable, but I’m unhur—”

  “75508, we’re sending a crew to your location, stay with your vehicle, over,” said the operator. The transmission went dead.

  Jo regretted not tearing into the food wrapper with his teeth. Even if he could find rations in the upturned crawler, eating would be hard to pull off through quarter-inch Plexiglas. His stomach growled against tight, shallow muscles. The constricted fit of the pressure suit seemed to call more attention to it. Little brother, I hope you eatin’ better than me. He looked out to the Earth.

  The familiar thoughts of home came to him. But after so much time, they had all turned gray. Like a half-remembered dream from years ago. Even Matteo’s face took effort to remember. If the picture really looked like him at all he’d still be different now. The Moon seemed to have always been borders, crawlers, inmates, guards, rocks, and space.

  Jogun suddenly felt hollow. Brittle. As if he could walk toward the horizon, crumble into dust, and finally put an end to it all. Why eat? Why keep goin’? Could’ve stayed in the Crawler...gone to sleep. Finally just sleep. Nobody would miss him. Just another casualty on the daily report. He took a floating step toward the distant Earth. Then another. Then another. He started shaking, but willed his legs onward through the drifting strides.

  Three Scouts and a maintenance vessel passed over his head and hovered in front of him, blocking out the Earth. They seemed to stare for a moment. Jo stopped. Collapsed to a seat in the dust.

  As the Scouts fanned out into scanning posture, the blocky, orange bulk of the maintenance vessel descended in Jo’s path. A platform lowered from its underbelly and touched-down in the soil. Four pressure-suited workers stood on it beside tool kits and stacks of Crawler parts. They started unloading.

  Jo squinted at them as they approached. Their movements were correct, but tight and awkward. They picked things up too fast and stumbled when they walked. Their bodies looked thick and nourished in the pressure suits. New inmates. Jo got to his feet.

  Protocol dictated that he greet them and give a damage report. He both wanted and dreaded it. The promise of new faces was always bittersweet. He had learned to hope that they’d be total strangers, that they would all just become friends and brothers, surviving as best they could.

  He sighed as he approached the first one. A stranger...but so young.

  “75508-V, status report please,” said the young leader. The over-stimulated glaze in his eyes and awkward shifting of his lips told that he was just Dosed. A flood of new memories, data, and programming gripped the terrified mind as it screamed in silence.

  “Welcome, brother 272312-A,” Jo read the boy’s suit. “My unit hit some kind of obstruction on its right side, and it overloaded. No inner breach on the bulkhead, but the outer hull is shredded as you can see and the treads have been knocked off. Also, the cockpit windshield is cracked so it can’t pressurize. Think you can give me a hand?” Jo asked. A bit of the boy’s tension released. Initiating a new inmate could be a delicate thing. He tried to be as friendly and gentle as possible without going too personal. Even something like asking someone’s real name could start a civil war in their head. It was always best to stick to the job when talking to them...so it all meant something here and now. In the real world.

  The boy leader nodded and turned to his crew.

  “You and you, grab a five-meter hull patch and the acetylene torch. You and I will remove the damaged tread and take a closer look at the rollers,” the boy said. Jo smiled at him.

  “You’re doing, great, kid. Patch me up and we can—Suomo?” Over the boy’s shoulder, the former T99 boss hefted one side of the sheet metal hull patch. His hands shook as they gripped it as though he were going to bend it in half. Jogun, realizing what he’d done, walked over to Suomo. Put a hand on his shoulder.

  “This’ll make a good patch,” Jogun said, his voice quivering on the edge of a sob. “Be sure to—to—” Suomo’s eyes flashed wide as he saw Jogun. His face tightened.

  “M—M—Mat—” Suomo said. He shook violently as he fought against the Dose. He dropped the sheet metal. Grabbed Jo’s arms instead. The strong, manic fingers squeezed Jo’s weak muscle and bone beneath the suit.

  “M-Matteo!” Suomo rasped. The name punched Jo in the gut. Dead? No, come on, man, no! Don’t say it...! Jo swallowed hard, trying to keep calm enough to speak.

  “Tell me,” Jogun said. Suomo grit his teeth together.

  “He—he—” Suomo’s wide-open, bloodshot eyes stared straight into Jogun’s, “Here.”

  18

  Confidence

  KABBARD RELEASED HIS throbbing right hand from the control wheel. Grumbled as he flexed the thick-knuckled fingers. Themis Traffic Control had kept him and his boys in a holding pattern for the past ten minutes and counting. Something about issues with a transport inspection in the main hangar.

  “Once the bay is clear, you’ll be green for docking,” some silver-tongued schmuck on the other line had said. Kabbard could almost taste the bullshit. He seethed in his chair as he turned the wheel for another pass. Warden Drummond probably thought the visit to be a surprise inspection and was busy sweeping every wasteful practice and dirty secret under the rug. A visit from Sato’s personal watchdog has that effect. He thought bitterly.

  As Kabbard reached for the comms for the fifth time, the schmuck’s voice slithered through his inner ear.

  “Sorry for the delay, Mr. Kabbard. You and your team are cleared to dock in the Main Hangar. Do watch for debris on your way in, sir. We’ve stirred up quite a bit with today’s excavations.”

  “I’m sure you have,” Kabbard replied. “Tell Drummond to meet me on the deck. My employer has a...concern.” That ought to get the sloppy bastard sweating. A sneer creased Kabbard’s angular features. Before the schmuck could reply, Kabbard killed the comms, gripped the wheel, and dipped out of the holding pattern toward Themis.

  Flying this thing was one of the only real perks of the job. A jet-black Zeus 12. A military class personal transport modded with a trove of aftermarket avionics, propulsion, and weaponry. Some of it, like the seventy-millimeter Manticore fleschette rockets, technically illegal. Aggressive curves ended in sharp points at the bow and stern, cradling the Geiger-12c reactor engine that spanned the underbelly. The thing maneuvered like a nuclear-powered dragonfly. Keeping that kind of power locked in a circle for ten minutes seemed to deepen the insult, but now he made his presence known. He entered the approach canyon and cleared the engine’s throat with a burst of blue flame. Even with the thin lunar atmosphere, the concussion shook dust from the canyon walls. Inmates working below scurried for cover.

  Andreas and Nicks followed behind him in their boxier, broad-winged Fury gunships. Nicks was a solid, loyal man, but Andreas was a different concern. Since demotion, the man had had it out for Kabbard, questioning every move and watchin
g every step with those shifty bug-eyes. It kept Kabbard moving, guessing, thinking—the kinds of things that kept a mind sharp. Being Sato’s Chief of Security was, more often than not, cushy. Cushions make a man soft.

  The three of them braked in front of the main hangar, came about, and taxied inside as the giant airlock doors hummed to a close. The secondary hatch in front didn’t open right away. It reeked of another delay meant to stall Sato’s minions. Kabbard ground his teeth and tapped the control panel. Finally, the airlock gate creased open with a rush of light and air. As the squad taxied into the hangar, Kabbard spotted Warden Drummond’s slouching, feeble posture among the greeting party. Christ, this guy gets worse every time I see him. Probably hasn’t been planet-side in over a year.

  The Zeus and Fury ships descended to a humming stop on the deck. Kabbard waited in the cockpit, staring at Drummond. He could see the soft bastard searching for signs of life in the opaque tinted canopy of the Zeus. Once the Warden squirmed to his liking, Kabbard flipped the release and opened the canopy. Climbed out.

  “Mr. Kabbard!” Drummond blurted, “How good of you to visit. What is—er—uh...to what do we, uh, owe the pleasure?”

  Kabbard ignored the slimy grin and took a quick look around. Too many eyes and ears.

  “Not here,” Kabbard said, removing his gloves, “your office.”

  Drummond’s grin withered.

  “Of-of course. Right this way,” said Drummond. Kabbard nodded to Andreas and Nicks.

  The hangar offices loomed over the deck with narrow windows that stared down like dull green eyes. The three of them followed the Warden up a flight of titanium stairs, across a long catwalk, and through a hatch just below the windows. It was painful to watch Drummond navigate the corridors that followed. The man was nervous, sure, but he seemed lost in his own prison. Kabbard was about to say something when they arrived at the Head Office door. Drummond placed a pale, trembling hand on the ident scanner and waited for the beep. The doors slid open.

  Kabbard cringed at the smells of plastic out-gassings and something like rotten eggs. Yet, while dingy and yellowed, the office looked outwardly tidy. Papers in stacks, pictures on the desk, and an old-style interface panel with real-time prison stats hovering silently in the air. Drummond waddled to the chair behind the desk and sat.

  “Now then, John, what is it?—”

  “Four hours ago we received a POI flag from one of your acquisition chambers. Someone killed the signal and presumably disabled the RFID chip before we could get a full trace and lock. I need you to cross-reference the exact time of the flag with all new inmate tags and assignments,” Kabbard said.

  “But if your POI was tagged and assigned—I’m sorry, but chances are he’s already been Dosed. He’ll barely recollect his own name, let alone anything else you want to extract—er—ask him. What is the name, by the way?” Drummond turned to the hovering interface and opened a search prompt in the air with a circular gesture.

  “August 7th, 2080. 20:08:32 SST.” Kabbard stared hard-eyed at the Warden. The man shrank in his chair, brushed a wisp of stringy gray hair out of his face, and entered the information. Data ticked rapidly past until three entries appeared on screen. Two in white, one in red.

  “There are three possible tags at that time,” said Drummond. “Is there any other information you can provide?” Kabbard squinted at the display.

  “Why is that one in red?”

  “Let’s see…” Drummond flicked his fingers through the interface. “Ah. Decommissioned. Looks like the Dose didn’t fully take. It’s rare, but it happens. The asset is usually lobotomized though, so we have to dispose of them.”

  “Where?”

  “If he’s been Decom’d, I’m afraid...”

  “Where?!” Kabbard shouted. Sato had given specific orders that no one be allowed to examine the target. Drummond cringed. He tapped a few more sections of the interface, expanding the data stream.

  “You might be in luck. Says here that Inmate 272312-A is in Infirmary Detention awaiting a pre-Decom examination. You should hurry though, the—” Kabbard turned to leave with Andreas and Nicks in tow. Drummond continued.

  “I’ll send one of my boys to escort you!” Drummond called after them, “But the technicians don’t leave much behind after an exam! All that’s left is sent to the crematorium!”

  19

  Aberrant

  JOGUN’S LEG SHOOK for the entire ride back to Themis, tapping his foot on the bulkhead like he’d taken a face-full of Sway. He wrung his hands. No return flight had ever felt this slow. The lunar surface crept by outside the Scout’s passenger window, one gray kilometer the same as the next. Matteo. Here. Little brother, what happened? Will I even recognize you? Sweat beaded on his blotchy forehead. He felt nauseous. Not unusual given his bouts with radiation sickness, but worse now. Much worse. He grabbed the pilot’s seat in front of him. Leaned forward.

  “How much longer?” he asked. The pilot jerked, still obviously sensitive from the Dose that had rewritten his life. Only a few hours ago if Jogun had to guess.

  “Three-point-five-six minutes to Themis.” The accuracy of his own statement seemed to shock the poor kid. Matteo would be about his age. Jogun thought about calming him, but had no calm to give. He sat back, wondering if he’d have any comforting words when he found his freshly-Dosed little brother. If he found him.

  Finally the main facility appeared in the porthole. The pilot dropped the Scout low and set the craft to textbook approach speed. Seventy-five percent slower than they had been going. Jogun’s stomach turned. He felt the retch building inside. Wiping sweat from his brow, he looked again out the window. Squinted.

  He’d never seen the place so busy. Dozens of new Crawlers formed splaying lines of traffic from Themis. Every group of them escorted by five Scouts rather than the usual three. And the ground personnel. Inmates in their EVA suits swarmed along the canyon floor, carrying equipment, repairing power cables, inspecting generators, directing traffic. Thousands of them, each with the rigid control of a fresh Dose. Jogun’s mouth gaped open and for the first time in six years a flicker of anger lingered inside of him.

  When the Scout hatch opened, Jogun pushed his way out onto the hangar ramp. Everywhere, new inmates occupied themselves with their parts in the Helium-3 production machine. Walking down among them, Jogun could smell the faint perfume of Rasalla. The spices of the Falari Market at midday. The sweat of Sway addicts. The sour-sweet stink of a Blue Lady’s blessing. All fading in place of plastic, dust, ozone, and industrial byproduct.

  Jogun scanned the faces. All so young and so strong, familiar and yet still strangers. Have I been gone that long? A boy brushed past him, toting a duffel bag of Crawler tools. Jogun missed the face but definitely heard something. A cough, then a wheeze.

  “Matteo! Little brother?!” He lunged for the boy and caught him by the shoulder. The boy dropped his duffel of tools with a crash. Turned and knelt to pick them up. Not him. Though fresh bruises marked his face, neck, and left arm. The EXOs had made him pay for something. Maybe nothing. Jogun turned back to the crowd.

  Too many to check one-by-one. He could call out, but not without attracting attention. And Matteo might not know his name anyway. Only one thing came to mind. The employee terminals sat on the far end of the hangar in an elevated guard-shack. He pushed his way toward it through the shuffling crowd. Lifted a rivet gun from a tool palette on his way.

  An A/C unit in the corner pumped fresh, filtered air up into the sealed guard-shack. Themis personnel, the legally employed kind, went through great lengths to protect themselves from the radiation and disease of gen-pop. Jogun checked to make sure nobody watched him, raised the rivet gun, and hesitated. It wasn’t violence. He wasn’t hurting anybody. But the specter of the Dose made him sweat as his finger felt the trigger. Gotta find him…gotta find him...gotta— Somewhere in the hangar, a Crawler rumbled to life. Jogun squeezed the trigger in the noise. Felt the hole-punch through the thin sheet-metal.
The hiss of air followed. He repeated for the three separate chutes.

  As the alarm klaxon blared, Jogun dropped the rivet gun and started walking. Above, hastily suited guards and techs retreated through a backdoor in the shack. Behind, inmates converged on the A/C unit to begin inspection. Not much time. Jogun picked up a tool bag, and moved upstairs to the airlock guard.

  “Stop!” said the guard through a clear plastic hood. The man placed a hand on the polymer baton at his waist. Stun prongs protruded from the end.

  “The airlock has been compromised, sir,” said Jogun in his best robo-tone, “I need to inspect it.”

  The guard eyed him suspiciously. Didn’t budge.

  “You’re a Crawler operator, not Maintenance,” said the guard.

  “I’m certified to assess and repair pressurized environments,” Jogun said. The Themis guards liked to flex authority with the inmates, but had little fear of them. Especially with scrawny, institutionalized ‘old-timers’ like Jogun. It was the new arrivals that scared them. And there were plenty around to be scared of.

  “Make it quick,” said the guard, buzzing the lock open, “Need to get the room scrubbed and back to operational ASAP.”

  Jogun entered. Heard the door shut behind him. After a feigned inspection of the airlock interior, he popped the seal on the inner hatch, walked into the shack, and shut the door. Bolted the emergency locks.

  He was banking on the terminals being similar to the Crawler systems. No such luck. The wide touchscreen terminals had hundreds of icons, menus, and subsystems. Okay...‘Database’...‘Assets’...‘Personnel’ That led to listings of paid employee profiles. He backed out. The klaxon outside stopped. In seconds, he heard pounding on the inner hatch door. The guard struggled with the lock. He didn’t look happy.