by M M Buckner
“Not covered by prote medical plans,” the NP answered.
“Right,” he said aloud. For the first time, it struck Dominic that a large fraction of workers must have poor eyesight. No wonder so many of them couldn’t read. He’d always puzzled over that.
“We’ve talked about this before,” the NP went on. “You know our system can’t afford med care for 12 billion people. We have to concentrate resources where they’ll do the most good.”
“Among the execs,” Dominic finished the sentence. He pictured Tooksook’s milky corneas and thought about the simple procedure to remove cataracts.
“Don’t go soft, boy,” the NP warned.
About then, Dominic’s knees buckled, and he sat down—whomp!—on the scummy steel deck.
“Nick, you’re green.” Qi hurried over and knelt beside him. She grabbed his ears and turned his face toward the overhead light tubes. “Millard, he’s gonna faint again. You have to do something.”
The red-haired Millard twirled an old-fashioned writing instrument between his fingers and seemed to weigh the evidence. “Oh, very well.”
Millard crossed to a control board in short, mincing steps, and Dominic saw him adjust a dial. After that, the room went very black.
“Nicky. Nick-O.”
He came awake with a gasp. Qi had snapped a vial of ammonium carbonate under his nose. He was still in the respirator room, still sitting on the floor—in a puddle, he noticed, of nasty blue oil. The red-haired Millard still stood at the control board twirling his pen and playing with dials. Only a minute could have passed.
“This is imprudent.” Millard tapped his writing instrument viciously against his pant leg. “I’ve said it once. I won’t repeat myself.”
“Yes, Millard. I hear you.” Qi bathed Dominic’s face with a damp gauze pad. It felt like heaven. Dominic didn’t think to ask where she’d found it. When she offered him a sack of water, he seized it and gulped. She said, “Do you feel better? There’s more oxygen in the air now. Take a deep breath.”
As she helped him stand, he tottered and clutched her arm before finding his balance. The room had grown lighter, and he could see more clearly. He sneezed twice and gestured for the gauze pad, which Qi promptly handed over.
She said, “Nick, I’d like you to meet Millard, the ship’s engineer.”
The red-haired man minced forward and stopped. He tilted his head to one side and stared at the floor, refusing to make eye contact. Abruptly, he nodded. “I was rationing the oxygen. It had to be done.”
“Millard, show Nick your calculations.”
The man pivoted and minced back to his control board. He jabbed his writing instrument at a small screen. “Black and white,” he said.
Dominic finished wiping his nose and moved closer. On the screen, he saw a chart with two lines. The white line barely slanted upward while the black line curved up steeply. Millard jabbed at the point where the lines intersected. “It’s all in the numbers.”
“Tell Nick what the lines mean,” Qi coaxed.
“Obviously, white is oxygen supply. That’s flat” Millard tapped his pen rapidly against the screen’s glass. He wouldn’t look at Dominic or at Qi. Only the screen held his attention. “They can’t expect more unless they give me another pump. I’ve enlarged the reservoir five times, haven’t I? And didn’t I bring the Dominic Jedes’ respirator back online?”
“The what?” Dominic felt light-headed again. “What did you say?”
“You see what they’re asking.” Millard tapped a key, and a schematic drawing appeared on the little screen. “That! That!” He jabbed his pen at the drawing.
Dominic recognized a cutaway view of the Benthica, mired in a moraine of junk, and below it, a maze of tunnels under the seafloor. He was astounded by their number and depth. The miners had been busy. Some of the passages led below the junk heap to a cutaway view of another ship. It must be one of the wrecks he’d seen the divers repairing.
“They keep enlarging the volume, don’t they?” said Millard. “Digging more habitat. Bringing in more people. And they all want to breathe. Demand, that’s the black line. Demand. They think I can snap my fingers and make more air.” As he talked, Millard became increasingly agitated. He still wouldn’t make eye contact, but his pen tapped a steady beat on the console.
“You said Dominic Jedes,” Dominic prompted.
“The ship. The Dominic Jedes.” Millard pointed to the other ship in the schematic. “That respirator was a lump of rust, but I brought it back online, didn’t I? I can’t work miracles though.” He pointed to the chart with the intersecting lines. “Here’s where demand will exceed supply. The numbers bear me out.”
“How did the ship get that name, the Dominic Jedes?” Dominic asked.
“Name? Irrelevant. They named it for the asshole who tried to kill us. That’s the kind of decision they call important. Names. Words. I need another pump.”
Dominic was stunned. For a moment, he couldn’t find his voice. Finally, he asked, “Who are ‘they’?”
“They. The council.” Millard held his pen very close to his nose and twisted the barrel to retract the ballpoint tip.
Qi had been wandering through the machinery. “Millard,” she said, “how long do we have?”
“Five days. Three. It’s a moving target.” The man rocked back and forth over his screen.
“I know you mean well,” Qi said, “but you can’t ration the oxygen. It makes people sick.”
“Sick or dead. Subtle distinction.” He clipped his pen smartly to the neck of his shirt and stared at the floor. “Quibble if you like. My numbers don’t lie.”
Dominic was still reeling. They named a ship after the asshole who tried to kill them? What kind of joke was that? Prote minds, who could understand how they reasoned?
“You need more than a pump,” Qi said. “What about fuel to generate electricity?”
“And that’s another story, isn’t it?” Millard hit a few keys and scrolled through several screens. He stooped over the console, consumed by the flickering images. He appeared to have forgotten their presence.
Qi asked, “What kind of fuel does the ship use, Millard?”
The engineer rocked back and forth on his heels. He seemed very tense. “Ane Zaki runs the power plant. I need a pump.”
Dominic watched the man hunch over his figures, his face pale blue in the reflected glow of the screen. Was he literally unable to focus on anything beyond his narrow computations? Behind Millard’s back, Qi signaled and pointed silently toward the door. Together, they tiptoed away through the machinery, leaving the engineer tapping his control board. Dominic glanced back once and saw him rocking on his heels, mumbling over his blue computer screen. The sight gave Dominic a shiver.
“Ane Zaki’s the electrician,” Qi whispered, outside on the landing. “We need to ask her about fuel.”
“Is that the Asian woman I saw you with before?”
“Yep, that was Anzie.”
Again, Dominic recalled the small, sad woman standing beside Qi in the passage. In another setting, he would have liked to meet her again—to find out why she made him feel such bittersweet déjà vu. But instead, he swung up onto the ladder and started climbing. “Major, you saw that chart. We have to finish our business and get out of here.”
“That’s my boy!” said the NP.
“Ow!” Dominic cut his thumb on a jagged piece of metal. He stuck it in his mouth to stop the pain, and when Qi grabbed his ankle, he was too polite to kick her hand away.
“Nicky, let’s rethink.” She yanked him back to the landing, and he landed with a thud.
“That spy girl is strong,” commented the NP.
Dominic stood to his full height and casually drew the shard of paint from his bleeding thumb. Then he noticed an inflammation between the first and second fingers of his right hand. He must have chafed himself on the ladder rungs. Examining the reddened area, he said, “Where does your Org boss advise me to go now?”
>
“The inscrutable Gig.” Qi prodded the implant behind her ear. “Gig doesn’t advise. He listens. Every time I take a pee. Every freakin’ fart. He loves it. Isn’t that right, you old pervert?”
Dominic couldn’t restrain a smile. Sometimes the major’s directness startled him. “I don’t suppose you’d let me borrow your implant?”
“To call your dear old Dada? Honestly, Nick. Why do you want that bit-brain prying into your life?”
“Brazen bitch,” the NP sputtered.
Dominic smiled again. Since he couldn’t think of an honest reason, he didn’t answer. Qi sat on the landing and hugged her knees to her chest, while Dominic peered up the ladder. At least he knew the air would last another five days, or possibly just three. For all Millard’s focus on numbers, he was rather imprecise. Only when Qi slumped against Dominic’s legs did he noticed the circles under her eyes, a shade deeper than her ebony complexion.
“So,” he said, “even the invincible major needs a rest.”
“Nicky, what will happen here, you know, when those black-and-white lines cross?” she asked.
Something in her voice touched him. He sat down and let her lean against his shoulder. “If I were in charge, I’d evacuate everyone to the surface. That’s what any trained exec would do. If they really have over five thousand people here, with only a few days of oxygen left, they should begin now.” He pictured the dented little bathysphere making constant surface runs for five solid days. It was already too late to get everyone out, but he didn’t say that.
“And if they don’t do that?” she whispered.
“Well…” Dominic remembered the NP’s words: looting, plague, starvation, cannibalism. He thrust those images from his mind. “If Millard’s careful, he might stretch the oxygen. Maybe he can shut off nonessential areas.”
“Which areas are nonessential?” she asked.
Dominic paused. Every square meter he’d seen in this place was packed with humanity. He leaned forward to examine the red place between his fingers.
“What happens when the oxygen runs out?” she persisted.
“Why are you asking me? You know what’ll happen. Weakness. Blurred vision. Then loss of consciousness. The youngest and oldest first.”
Qi rested her chin in her hands. “Then what?”
“You want me to say the words? They’ll die. Most of them. But not that lunatic council. They’ll keep the last good air for themselves, and they’ll keep inviting more simpleminded fools to come down here and die. Something deranged, that’s what I expect.”
“You believe that?” She began toying with her big toe, rubbing the dirt off with her thumb. For a while, it seemed to absorb her. Then she said, “There’s no other way?”
Dominic puffed his cheeks and blew a quiet breath as he contemplated the woman beside him. Her blue-black hair hung across her cheek, shielding her eyes. Though she looked completely different, she reminded him of Elsa, the way she tried to play on his conscience. Clearly, she’d been living with protes so long, she’d begun to identify with them. He watched her fiddling with her long, slender, grimy toes, and he smiled.
“Have it your way, Qi. We’ll contact a foundry in Canada and order a pump for your engineer friend. We’ll have it shipped special delivery, how about that?”
Qi punched his shoulder with her fist. “Preter-superb idea, Nick. What about fuel?”
Dominic cavalierly waved a hand. “We’ll hail a supertanker. Charge it to ZahlenBank. Problem solved.”
“Totally rip! I knew you’d come up with the solution.” Qi hopped to her feet. “Let’s go talk to Ane Zaki. Hey, don’t look at me like that.”
Qi tried to pull him up, but he resisted with a laugh. “I was joking. Surely you recognize a joke.”
“C’mon, Nick. Let’s find out what grade of fuel Ane Zaki needs. It’ll give us bargaining strength when we go before the council.”
Dominic let Qi’s words sink in. “So that’s it. The Orgs want me to buy the miners off. Trade fuel and supplies for silence.”
“Sounds great,” she said.
“Fuck the Orgs!” the NP ranted. “That’s their angle. They wanna bleed us dry. It’s extortion!”
At last, Dominic understood the Orgs’ agenda. They wanted ZahlenBank to pay—literally to pay—for his mistake. Fuel and supplies for silence. It would probably cost the bank a fortune. Still, it was only money. If he handled the negotiation right, he could whittle down the cost.
Bright white pain exploded in his eye. “No payoff! Don’t even entertain the thought, Dominic. It’s a trick to weaken our position.”
Dominic clutched the side of his face. “You’re reading my thoughts!”
“No, I just know how soft-headed you can be. Never forget the Orgs want to break up ZahlenBank. That’s behind everything they do.”
“Stop it,” he said. Fiery pain radiated through his left temple.
“Stop what, Nick?” Qi bent over him. “Something in your eye? Let me look.”
Light vibrated through his skull, and the NP’s voice continued to screech, “The minute we start bargaining with protes, we lose control forever.”
“Nicky, what’s wrong?” Qi gently pounded his back.
The searing light was making him weep. Again, he considered gouging out his eye with his fingernails. He clenched his teeth and waited for the worst of it to pass. Then he straightened up, blinked the moisture away and focused on Qi’s face. Concern lined her exotic features.
“I’m all right. Grit in my eye. It’s nothing.”
She touched his cheek. “So we’ll ask Ane Zaki about the fuel?”
The NP’s voice clanged inside his temple. “You don’t need to know about their damned fuel. Trust me. I’m your dad.”
Dominic felt a rush of loathing. His face twisted as he subvocalized deep in his throat, “My father is dead!” He ground his fist savagely into his eye socket. Then he grasped the ladder and nodded to Qi. “Lead the way, Major. I’m right behind you.”
CHAPTER 9
* * *
LIQUIDITY
HE came awake with a shout. He’d been dreaming about a coin machine, a maniacal coin machine that was trying to kill him. It shot copper coins out of its dispenser like bullets. They drilled through his chest, and when he put his hand to his heart, there was blood everywhere. Or… was it water? Salty, fetid water. It was dripping on his chest, drumming against his skin, soaking his shirt. He was lying in a puddle. What the hell?
He’d fallen asleep on a landing between two ladders.
He sat up and winced and crawled away from the dripping water. In the dimness, a crew of half-dressed old men with bald heads and knobby joints padded up a nearby ladder, grunting droll insults at each other. When one of them stopped to scratch his genitals, he noticed Dominic and winked. Dominic hastily turned away.
Every muscle in his body felt like solidified concrete. He ran his tongue around his fuzzy, sour mouth. How long had he slept? The water dripped like a ticking clock. He peered down the ladder tube and tried to remember. Oh yes, he’d been following Major Qi. The ladders seemed to go down forever, like links in a chain to the bottom of the world.
He tugged at his short hair as if that would clear his mind. The miners’ colony was running out of oxygen. So why was he following Qi down, in the opposite direction from his only hope of survival? Something about finding information so he could bargain with the council. Bargain with protes? The idea was absurd. He lumbered to his feet as memories cascaded back. Then he recalled the NP’s nuclear fireworks in his eye. The genie had tried to coerce him!
To hell with them all. Everyone was pulling his strings. The major, the Orgs, the NP. Here he was, Dominic Jedes, president of ZahlenBank, and he was letting people jerk him around like a dummy. He ripped his filthy wet shirt off and threw it against the wall. Then he took a deep breath and collected himself.
“How long did I sleep?” he said aloud.
“These little time-outs of yours are
driving me nuts, boy. I realize you need rest, but—”
“I do the physical stuff, remember?”
He stretched his aching joints and leaned against the wall to urinate. A few passersby frowned, but he didn’t care. The chafed red skin between his fingers was burning, but he couldn’t see it well in the dim light. This shaft looked different from the others. The walls had a rougher texture, and the lights flickered like gas jets.
“You recorded our route?” he subvocalized.
“Your girlfriend led us down almost a hundred meters before you stopped to nap.”
Dominic remembered everything now, how they had descended and searched for the electrician named Ane Zaki until he grew so weary he could hardly lift his feet. Qi claimed she was lost. She said the decks had been rearranged. Often the ladders led to blind stops and locked hatches, and they had to retrace their steps and detour through teeming corridors. When they asked for directions, the people always pointed down.
Now he remembered the footsteps. He thought he’d heard footsteps following, but when he looked, all he saw were crowds of noisy workers. How could he have singled out a particular set of footsteps? He was imagining things.
The deeper they went, the more dilapidated the ladders had become. In places, the metal rungs dangled from the framework on loose plastic cord. And the walls grew leprous with corrosion. Repaired patches stood out stark and new, and clear fluids streamed down, feeding wooly gray fungus. The smell defied description.
“We’re not in the Benthica anymore,” he said aloud, not bothering to conceal his words from the passing horde. “Submarines don’t have that many decks.”
“Smart guess, son. We’re in the mines they’ve dug under the seafloor.”
Dominic leaned down the ladder tube, cupped his hands around his mouth and bellowed, “Major Qi!” His voice echoed, and several people glanced up, but no one answered.
“She tricked you again. Remember who she works for. You should have listened to your old man.”
“All right, genie, guide me back to the bathysphere.”
