Neurolink

by M M Buckner

  “That’s too far behind us. The Net link’s our way home.”

  “Show me the way back!”

  “Not a chance,” the NP said.

  Dominic shook the ladder till it rattled. He was trapped. Stupidly, he’d let Major Qi lure him into a maze, then desert him—again. When he stood face-to-face with her, he had a tendency to forget what a liar she was. Now his throat tightened with nervous strain. “The Orgs want me to die here.”

  “Don’t get claustro. Keep your eye on the goal. That broadcast is still going out, and you’re the one who can stop it”

  “Who’s extorting whom?” Dominic gave the ladder one last shake.

  Taking orders from the NP revolted him, but he could no longer see any options. He felt desperate and light-headed. As he glanced around, the ladder shaft seemed to close in like a hot, airless tomb. This wasn’t how he was supposed to die. An urge to claw his way out jolted through his mind, and he steadied himself with an act of pure will. “How long before the air goes bad?”

  “Interesting you should ask. I set my chronometer when your prote engineer said three to five days. Assuming it’s three, we have forty-eight hours, seven minutes and nineteen seconds left.”

  Two days! But he had no idea how to find his way out! Stay calm, he warned himself. Two days would be plenty of time. He took a deep breath and pressed his toes against the wall to stretch the cramping muscles. Then he hunted around the landing and found the wet, wadded tee shirt he’d thrown away earlier. Even a rag could be valuable in this place.

  “Son, I understand we have issues. Don’t do this because I ask you. Do it because it’s the honorable thing.”

  “Now you’re annoying me.” He took off his silk shorts and wrung them out. He didn’t care what the passing prates saw. With a false air of composure, he drew them back on and said, “Here’s the deal. You guide me to the link immediately, got it? Then you call the rescue team. But don’t speak another word unless I ask a question.” He gave the damp tee shirt a quick flap, then pulled it over his head. “And when this is over, you disappear. Agreed?”

  Dominic waited. Finally, the NP said, “Yeah, yeah, agreed. Start climbing.”

  After one last spine-popping stretch, Dominic began plodding up the ladder. A battalion of young women passed him, carrying bundles on their backs, and one of them caught his attention. She had mousy brown hair and a shy way of hugging her elbows close to her body that reminded him of Elsa Bremen. Sweet Elsa, so quiet and competent at the bank, hardly a word to say for herself. Dominic actually missed her. When the young woman on the ladder spoke a few timid words, he paused to listen, and the more she spoke, the more her accent reminded him of the miners’ broadcast. Maybe she was the one who recorded it. That broadcast was just the sort of naïve dream a mild-hearted young woman would compose. Someone like Elsa—or like this girl. He could almost hear her speaking the words.

  “As of today, we declare ourselves free from Com protection, and we’re writing a new contract to protect ourselves.”

  Yes, and he could also hear what his father would have said.

  “Freedom’s a sucker bet.” That was Richter’s line.

  Dominic remembered the first time his father explained to him about freedom. He was ten. He’d just graduated from prep school, and to celebrate, his father took him to a mountain lodge above Hammerfest, overlooking the Barents Sea. That’s where Richter told him about snow. The whiteness of it. How it used to cover the ground like a blank page.

  “You could leave footprints, draw pictures, write your name with a stick. Anyone could. One big empty white snowfield. Now, it’s all trampled mud. Son, you have to recognize we’re at the tail end of things. We don’t have enough resources to let people choose for themselves. No one’s free to be original anymore.”

  Dominic stopped to massage his foot, which had begun to bleed through the rags. He undid the knots and retied them, thinking about snow and freedom. And who wouldn’t want to believe that innocent dream?

  When he reached the top of the shaft and climbed through the hatch, he saw two women frantically stuffing clothes into a plastic sack. They barely glanced at him, so he ignored them and marched along, opening doors, looking for another shaft leading up.

  Spooky. Except for the two women, this section appeared deserted. Debris littered the floor. Rags. Cooking utensils. Dominic even found a full water sack. The occupants must have left in a hurry. The sight of the water inspired him with a parching thirst, so he hefted the sack and squeezed a long, thin stream into his mouth. Then he drizzled it over his head and let it drip down his chest and arms. He squirted more into his mouth, and with a laugh, sprayed a stream under his armpits and began to scrub himself. It felt marvelous. He hadn’t showered in—how many days?

  The next moment, two things happened. First, a door swung open down the corridor, and second, a wall of water rushed toward him. It swept him off his feet and tumbled him in a backflip. As soon as he found the floor, he pushed toward the ceiling, seeking air. He thought he heard the NP say, “Sweet Krishna Christ!”

  Pockets of air were trapped just under the ceiling, and he sucked rasping breaths. Then he remembered the women. Had they made it out? He swam back toward them as a loud, gurgling noise reverberated through the corridor, and almost as swiftly as the flood had appeared, it ebbed away.

  “Freak, Freak, FREAK!” A young man in outlandish garb stepped through the shattered door and began slogging through the water, which was now knee deep and draining fast. He was dark and small, probably American, and he seemed very angry. He wore a green, patterned scarf knotted around his head and a pair of spectacles like Mil-lard’s, only the glass lenses were amber. He also wore a skirt. It hung down below his knees, and it was covered with pockets and loops holding an enormous number of tools. It looked like an overgrown carpenter’s belt.

  When the young man saw Dominic, his features broke into a sunny smile that dimpled both his cheeks. “Hullo, mate. Sorry for the dousin’. My new sealant didn’t work.” His skirt clanked softly as he waded through the water, now ankle deep.

  Dominic pointed with his thumb. “I saw women back there.”

  “Females? Then it’s Penderowski to the rescue.”

  In high spirits, the young man sloshed down the corridor. Dominic followed, but they couldn’t find the women. The water was flushing down the ladder shaft. Apparently, Dominic had left the hatch open.

  “I had a friend on that ladder!” He hurried to the hatch, but the young man got there first. Together they squeezed their heads and shoulders through the opening and peered down into the shadows.

  The young man shrugged. “Your friend got a good wash, mate. A smallish douse, it was. Folks in the tunnels is used to them.”

  “But what happened?” Dominic and the young man drew out of the hatch together and got to their feet.

  “Aye? We’re running out of sealant, so I tried a little recipe of my own. Wrong mix, I guess.” The young man adjusted his head scarf. “Too freakin’ bad the females is gone. Nice ones, were they?”

  “I really didn’t notice. You think they’re all right?”

  The young man shrugged again. He didn’t seem concerned. The ladder shaft echoed a hollow dripping sound, and Dominic puffed out his cheeks. He didn’t know why he should worry about the major. A little bath might do her good.

  “Right. How do I find the upper deck?” he asked.

  “Say, we haven’t introduced ourselves. I’m Penderowski, the ship’s maintenance jack.” The young man stuck out his hand with a frank smile.

  Dominic shook hands. “I’m in a hurry.”

  Penderowski’s palm was callused and hard, but his face was smooth. Behind his amber spectacles, he couldn’t have been more than twenty years old. With a knowing nod, he gestured for Dominic to follow. They walked side by side down the dripping corridor in the direction of the ruined door.

  “I don’t meet many newcomers, ’specially educated ones. They always vacate the se
ctions I work in. Aye, people run when they hear Penderowski’s coming. Makes a fellow think he ain’t loved.” The young man chuckled generously at his own wit. “Leaks is like lions to these folks. See a bit of a drip, and they think the whole ocean’s coming into bed with them. So they clear out quick and call Penderowski.”

  “I need to reach the upper deck,” Dominic said again.

  “Well now, which upper deck did you mean? There’s the Pressure, she has her upper deck. And there’s the Zygote and the Tao-te Ching. But for those you’d need gills, as they’re only half patched and still belong to the sea. Then there’s the Dominic Jedes, he has his upper deck. And if you’ll pardon my saying so, you’re in the wrong part of the world to reach any of them in a hurry.”

  Dominic stopped dead. “You don’t know where I’m going? Then why am I following you?”

  The young man winked. “That is a conundrum.” Then he passed through the ruined door.

  After a moment, Dominic cursed and followed.

  “Here’s where the seam gave way.” In the dark tunnel, Penderowski used a handheld laser torch to point overhead at a thick bead of metallic glue where the corridor’s wall and ceiling joined. Dominic had taken for granted that all the passages were made of steel, but now he noticed these walls had been laser-blasted through natural stone and sealed with spray-on fabriglass, the type used in mines. He hadn’t given the walls much thought, but now he studied them with interest.

  Penderowski grabbed the silvery bead of sealant and jerked hard. It didn’t budge. “After my own recipe failed, I patched this leak with Kevlax, you see? Kevlax is miracle stuff. Works underwater. Sets up instantly. Bonds to anything. Only trouble is, I’m down to my last hundred liters. Bit of a spot we’re in. I’ve tried every substitute I can dream up. Are you a chemist at all?”

  “I’m a negotiator.”

  “Ah.” Penderowski looked at him with large wondering eyes, magnified by the amber spectacles. Then he sat on the floor and began to strap a pair of very odd devices to his legs. They looked like short crutches that extended below his feet, and each one had a boot sole at the end. “Say, could you give me a hand with a bit of work?”

  “I really don’t have time.” Dominic watched him curiously.

  When the straps were secure, Penderowski shoved himself upright with amazing agility and tottered a few steps on the leg extenders before finding his balance. The devices made him a meter taller than before so he could reach the ceiling with ease, and with the strange skirt and headgear, he looked like a street performer. He rested his elbow against the ceiling and grinned. “You like my stilts? My own design. Take a look at this.”

  He pointed his torch beam at a hairline crack in the ceiling. As Dominic watched, Penderowski’s dark finger slid along the crack till it intersected another, then divided and branched. The maintenance jack panned his light around, and Dominic realized the entire stone ceiling was veined with tiny cracks.

  “Pressure fractures,” Penderowski said. “I have this notion how to fix ’em, but it’s a two-man job. You came at the right time, mate. See that compressor there on the floor? If you could just hand me the spray nozzle and shove the hose along as I move. Ya see, I’ve mixed a bit of Kevlax with some spray-on fabriglass, and I want to coat this whole section while the cracks is still small.”

  Dominic frowned at the rusty, barrel-shaped compressor with its loose coil of hose. “Fabriglass, that’s toxic. I’m not going to stand here and breathe that stuff. You miners wear protective suits, right?”

  Penderowski’s cheeks dimpled. “Suits, is it? I saw a picture of a protective suit once, on the Net. Don’t worry about the toxins. They won’t distress us for years and years. Though I do wear my turban to keep my hair nice in case a female happens by.” Penderowski winked and touched his green scarf. When he spoke next, his voice cracked like a nervous adolescent’s. “Look at us now. Two mates enjoying a chat, sharing a bit of work. Would you consider stayin’ on?”

  Presumptuous juvenile. Dominic couldn’t believe the young man’s lax attitude about toxins. Did all protes value their lives so cheaply? He studied Penderowski with interest. “How long have you had this job?”

  Dazzling rainbows burst across his eye with a worrisome prickling itch. “Enough chitchat. Find that link,” the NP said. “Okay, so I spoke. I broke our agreement. What are you gonna do, quit?”

  The genie had called Dominic’s bluff. The rainbows half blinded him, and he spun away and rubbed his eye.

  “Is somethin’ wrong, mate?” Penderowski asked.

  The colors strobed in time to the NP’s words. “You won’t quit. You’ll do the honorable thing. I know you, son. I bred you.”

  Dominic realized he’d stopped breathing. He sucked a quick breath and once again imagined plucking his eye out with his fingernails.

  “Forty-six hours, twenty minutes, eight seconds,” the NP continued. “Do you wanna leave this hell hole or not?”

  Dominic balled his fist and scrubbed his eye. He loathed taking orders like a flunky, but the truth was, he had no leverage against the NP. As he fumed, a pair of amber lenses peered up at him, glinting reflections and magnifying an anxious gaze. Penderowski had removed his stilts, and now he stood on tiptoe to see into Dominic’s face.

  “Is it some trouble with your eye, friend?”

  Dominic brushed away a stray tear and calculated. Then with practiced skill, he arranged his face into a smile and put a hand on the young man’s shoulder. “You want more Kevlax? I can get it.”

  “How’s that?” Penderowski stepped closer.

  Dominic leaned down and spoke in a confidential tone. “I’m bringing your council a secret offer of trade. Fuel and supplies, whatever you need. The council’s meeting me at the Net link. I have to get there at once. Can you tell me where it is?”

  “Brilliant, son! Lie like the devil! Why did I ever doubt you?” said the NP.

  Penderowski poked a long finger under his head scarf and scratched. “Supplies? Is it true, mate? What about medicine? My folks died of cancer. There’s a lot of cancer here.”

  Dominic nodded. “I can get transgenic T-cells.”

  “Excellent!” the NP crowed.

  Penderowski’s cheeks creased with dimples. “The Net link, is it? Now where did they put it today? Oh aye, I remember. It’s on the Dominic Jedes.”

  Dominic’s smile went taut. “The ship named for the man who tried to kill you.”

  “Kill us? No, mate. He set us free.”

  Penderowski gave complicated directions. Dominic had to go down a little farther through the mines before he could start up again into the ship that bore his name. He visualized the path as the young man described it. The NP would record everything, but he trusted the digital genie about as much as a cancer virus.

  Penderowski even apologized because he couldn’t show the way personally. There were too many leaks in the tunnels, and he had to stay and repair them. “But can you find the Dominic’s bridge on your own? There’s no fights in some of the sections.” In the end, the young man pressed his laser torch into Dominic’s hand.

  “What a dunce,” the NP said. “Long live the gullibility of protes!”

  As Dominic accepted the torch, he felt a reluctance he couldn’t explain. The torch was an old model with a cracked case. Duct tape held the battery housing together. It was a piece of trash, and yet Dominic recognized its value. “You don’t have another light”

  The young man thumped his chest. “Me need a light in my own tunnels? Penderowski can feel the way. You take it, mate. Be off and get those supplies. And please hurry, aye?” He pointed meaningfully at the ceiling.

  Dominic padded through the dark, dripping tunnel, glancing up now and then at the pressure fractures and wondering where the next leak would break through. Soon he reached a small portal to the left, covered with a hinged steel door, just as Penderowski had described. He felt a little ashamed—more than a little. Getting those directions had been too easy. When h
e dealt with execs, they expected deception, but this young prote believed every word he said. The torch burned in his hand. He flashed the beam back the way he had come, but he couldn’t see Penderowski. “Thank you!” he called out. There was no answer.

  “Nice work, boy,” the NP said.

  Dominic groaned and fled along the passage. As he splashed through a long section of unlighted tunnel, his torch beam sparkled on dripping walls and pools of standing water, and he thought about the hairline cracks widening over his head. Above that layer of stone, the weight of the entire Arctic Ocean bore down, and every moment, he imagined it “coming into bed” with him. There were so many ways for these protes to die.

  He kept picturing the silly green turban Penderowski wore to keep his hair nice in case a woman wandered by. Right now, the young man would be stumbling around in the dark, alone, wrestling with the heavy coil of compressor hose to seal those leaks. But Dominic didn’t have time to help, and he certainly didn’t want to breathe toxic fabriglass. Penderowski’s torch beam danced along the dark floor, showing him the way. “Damn!” he said aloud. His sole thought was to find the Net link and leave this hellish place. He’d had enough of bargaining with hopeful fools.

  When he finally found the floor hatch Penderowski had described, he cranked it open and saw a deep, narrow well. Gouts of water bled from its stone walls and dripped down the rungs of the deserted ladder. There were no lights. He could see only a little way down. By all the principles of reason, how had he, the president of ZahlenBank, come to be crawling in this cave?

  He rolled his shoulders, then knelt to retie his loose foot rags. A second later, he heard a noise.

  He flicked off the torch. Silence. Was someone following? And there it was again. A small splash. A muffled footstep. Dominic remained absolutely still. He hardly breathed. Was his imagination deceiving him again? A faint light gleamed far behind in the corridor, but everything else lay in pitch blackness. The steps came closer. Soft now. Closer still. Dominic could sense the physical presence. When he knew the stranger was standing right beside him, he lunged.