"They don't go very far.” The sound of chewing and a bag being crumpled came through the speaker. “Not sure what good shuttles are gonna be if you can't go back to whatever ship brought you here. But I guess you could take it over to the shipyard and see if they can help you.”
“I think they’re busy with their own problems,” I said, thinking of the large freight hauler I'd seen there.
"Some are. How do you think Slab and his goons got all their weapons? Don't let those shipyard people fool you. They've got some working ships for trading and whatnot, black market stuff they have to get from pirates. I don't know why they keep coming back, but my cousin says they're trying to get a ship big enough to evacuate all of their people. I wish I was one of their people."
“No comment.”
“You already knew that, didn’t you, Mr. Cain? I told you the ship people were nice. Can’t fool Bug. Bug sees all.”
“Settle down. Eat your cheese crackers,” I said.
I'd decided there was no chance of completing this mission. Sure, they would negotiate for the doctor and his daughter, but in a best-case scenario, they would just leave me here to die with all the others.
That wouldn't be much better than getting killed by Callus. Probably worse. I needed to go down fighting.
Just outside the door, an explosion boomed. The heavy door buckled but held. Soldiers shouted.
"Hit it again! Give it everything we have." The commanding rage in Callus’ voice penetrated the room, indicating it wasn’t as air tight as I’d assumed.
I had a decision to make and didn't like it. The girl was miserable, no matter how she talked. It didn't matter what genetic modifications she had, I’d do better without her.
She was just one more person for me to worry about. Why couldn’t I leave her? Reapers weren’t sentimental or weak. One mouthy kid didn’t mean anything to me. "Listen, Elise, I have to get you out of here. Dreadmax is doomed. No one made a plan to evacuate it because they believed, or convinced themselves, that only death row inmates and worse live here."
"What are you talking about? Not even the new Union would leave this many people to die," she said.
I waited for her to process the information, knowing that she already believed every word. She’d seen even more of this place than I had and knew the score no matter what comforting lies she told herself.
She started pacing, getting angrier and angrier. "Fine. Let's go get him."
I was glad the girl agreed to rescue her father. For a hot minute, I was afraid she'd give us all the finger and head out on her own. She was good under pressure and had obviously spent time on the run. That made me think of her as an asset rather than a liability as I had first assumed she would be.
Now all I had to do was figure out a way to get past a team of elite soldiers who had surrounded our position. The hiding place in which I stuffed my principal wasn't in the middle of my enemies, but it was close.
Elise looked at me expectantly. She crossed her arms as if to say well, what now.
X-37 wasn't helpful, lapsing into one of his silent spells. I never knew if I’d done something wrong, or there was something broken in the unit, or he just simply didn't see the need to comment. A quick check with my friends in the security room told me what I already knew. There were at least three squads of spec ops soldiers watching the tower after the failed breach.
"What if we went down?" Elise asked.
I’d thought of that, but that still didn't help me get the doctor away from Callus.
Gunfire sounded in the distance. Slab and his RSG men were having it out with somebody. Whatever was happening, they were too far away to serve as a distraction. I’d already been lucky in that regard. Now, however, the Union soldiers had driven them away. I didn't even know who was fighting who at this point. "I really need some help, X."
"Can you take another look at the area? The deeper the scan the better. Perhaps I missed something from your initial survey," X-37 said.
"You're trying to get me killed," I said, moving to the door and looking for a way to see farther than the cameras allowed without getting shot dead. "Oh shit!"
"What?" Elise asked, alarmed.
The door that was holding the spec ops team at bay was built to withstand the occasional meteor strike. It wasn't, however, designed for security.
There were ventilation ports, something I first suspected when I heard Callus yelling orders. Sooner or later, he would deploy gas. We’d be knocked unconscious if we were lucky, and killed if we weren’t.
I cautiously peeked out from one of the smaller doors, unsatisfied with my field of view but trying to make the most of it. I could see slivers of the wide stairs and runways leading to this tower.
"Sorry, X, I can't get eyes on much of the area without letting them in,” I said, straining my neck to get the best shitty view possible.
"The data gathered from your lame attempt at peekaboo was insufficient,” X-37 said. “I'll go back to analyzing the schematics."
"He has to come to us," Elise said. "What, you never thought of that?"
Of course I’d thought of that. “I’ve run a lot of scenarios in my head. One of them involves your father making a break for it and getting shot. I don’t see how that helps anyone.”
“You’re really gonna turn him over to the Union after these guys tried to kill us?” she asked.
“Callus and his team are something different,” I admitted. “If Grady were alive, I’d trust him to take you someplace safe.”
What she really wanted to know was what I was going to do with her. She’d spent her life trying to escape her father or the Union or who knows what else, and probably saw me as the enemy right now.
I pointed toward the door. “I’m not turning you over to them. That’s a kill squad, a brute force option when they don’t have a subtler solution.”
“Like sending a Reaper?” she asked, testing me.
“You’re the one who told me you didn’t think I was sent here to kill you and your father. I haven’t received any communication from my handlers. By now, I would have been told who to kill and who to torture,” I explained, wondering what kind of reaction my honesty would get from her.
She went pale.
“This conversation is getting us nowhere. Stay here.” I almost hoped she did. “If I don’t come back, you can surrender or you can take the stairs and look for an escape route. I suggest you get back to the top deck as quickly as possible and make your way to the shipyard. They may or may not be able to help you, but at least they aren’t cannibals or gangsters.”
“Or Union agents,” she murmured.
I left her to consider her options. Everything about this mission was frustrating. I had to remind myself it was better than sitting on death row. The tower had numerous personnel doors, smaller openings than the bay doors where equipment was moved. Each of these had a compact window above a slot barely wide enough to slip my fingers through.
One of these doors was how I’d come in. Callus probably didn’t want to send his team through such a bottleneck. He knew what I’d do to them the moment they stepped into such a fatal funnel.
I checked several other viewports, peering through the small windows and gathering information for X-37 to analyze. The breach team had pulled back, possibly to gather bigger explosives or consider other options. I couldn’t see any of Callus’ troops. Because they knew what they were doing. Like actual professionals.
At the fourth door, I found the surprise of my life.
Yanking the door open, I grabbed Doctor Hastings and pulled him inside. The door was still shutting when he started babbling apologies and explanations.
“I came as quickly as I could,” he said, trembling from fear and adrenaline. “Was that the right thing to do? They were all around me and I could hear them talking. I think they’re going to kill all of us. We have to get out of here. Where’s my daughter? Is she in here? Is she okay?”
“Settle down, Doc.” I led him b
ack to the main lift where Elise waited.
She jumped to her feet in surprise, hesitated, then ran to her father and embraced him.
It wasn’t the most emotional reunion I’d ever witnessed, but it was more tender than I expected.
“Why does this feel wrong, X?” I asked.
“Analyzing.”
Was my Reaper AI messing with me? “Do you mind giving me an answer when you’re done analyzing?”
“Of course,” X-37 said, something about its voice quieter than usual. It almost felt like there was some type of disturbance, a pulse in the shields above us perhaps.
“Well?” I rubbed the scar near my eye, something I hadn't done in ages.
“Still analyzing. Please stand by.”
“You’ve got to be shitting me,” I said and started getting ready to take my principals out of here. The last two hours had been spent running and gunning, trying to stay alive. The questions Elise asked me were good ones. I didn’t really know what to do with either of them if we all survived.
The only real answer was to get off Dreadmax and go renegade, or better yet, disappear completely.
“Perhaps if you would tell me what you are thinking, I could complete my analysis of this situation. Unless you want something generic, something like you would say, like this really sucks.”
“You’re pretty funny for an AI,” I said. “Why don’t I trust the doctor?”
“Because you don’t trust anyone.”
“Now you’re just being difficult.” I interrupted the Hastings family reunion. “We have two options, climb the tower and look for a place to run a zip line—not a great option since it’s extremely dangerous and we would have to find materials to manufacture a zip line—or go down two levels and see if we could come up to the top deck away from Callus and his team.”
“Why not just go down one level?” the doctor asked.
“We went down one level last time. Might be a good idea to mix it up. How exactly did you get to that door?”
Doctor Hastings swallowed and looked at Elise like she would answer for him. It was a nervous tic, but the man was full of those types of behaviors. He might be an excellent scientist, but he wasn’t good under pressure like this. I couldn’t tell if he was outright lying or just overwhelmed by what we’d been through.
“I waited for as long as I could, and then when I thought you’d left me, I crawled to the door. It seemed incredibly dangerous and I was amazed that I made it,” Doctor Hastings said.
“Dishonesty detected,” X-37 said.
“Yeah, that’s what I thought.” Sometimes it seemed like X and I were the same person.
X-37 knew what I meant, but the doctor seemed confused by my words. “There really was no other way for you to escape Callus and his men. I’m glad you made it. Let’s get out of here.”
20
A tremor went through the tower. It wasn’t the first time I’d felt the sensation since landing on Dreadmax, but it was the worst so far. I actually lost my balance for a second.
“What was that?” Hastings asked. “Did the destroyer fire on us?”
I hadn’t told the doctor about the UFS Thunder that brought me and the spec ops teams here. Elise didn’t notice the slip, but why would she?
“No one’s firing on us. This place is falling apart, in case you didn’t notice,” I said. “Keep moving.”
I wished Grady was here, no matter how we’d disagreed. Hustling down the stairs while watching for danger ahead and behind was wearing me out. Elise helped by being naturally observant and cautious, but she couldn’t fight, not like Grady could have.
“The people here talk about it,” Elise said. “The first time I ran from the RSG, a bunch of religious fanatics took care of me for a few days. They talked about the station failing like it was the coming of the apocalypse. Others argued about heading below decks when the atmosphere dies—something they call Climbdown Day. Everyone has their story about a lost ship that only needs to be found to take them all to safety.”
“Ridiculous,” Hastings said.
“Let’s hope not everyone in the Union wants us dead.” I cut the doctor off, not liking his tone. “I’m betting that Callus and his team are exceeding their mandate.”
“They’re trying to kill us, you know that,” Elise said.
“There was more to being a Reaper than infiltration and assassination,” I said. “I have connections.”
The wide industrial stairs curved downward and out of sight. Every so often, there were access doors of different sizes. I spotted a security station that had been stripped of weapons lockers and surveillance monitors. There didn’t seem to be an active power connection to the bunker-like booth.
“Keep moving,” I said.
“Do you actually think they’ll still help you? They didn’t stop you from going to death row,” Elise said.
“I didn’t survive as a Reaper by taking unnecessary chances, but there’s always a risk.”
“Why not take their ship?” Elise asked. “We can run the blockade easily. The Union wouldn’t fire on one of its own ships. And it has to be cutting-edge, with a slip drive and maybe even cloaking technology like in the action videos.”
“Trust me, if I thought I could take the ship, I would. Right now, we’re sticking to the plan, and that plan is to escape through one of the lower decks,” I said. “The idea is to get away from Callus and his trigger-happy commandos, not run into their ship and get killed. The pilot isn’t going to land and just let us on while Callus’ team is out hunting for us.”
“We don’t even know the capabilities of that ship,” Doctor Hastings said. He looked nervous, more nervous than usual. I wanted to attribute his flushed face and sweaty brow to exertion—which it probably was—but his true mannerisms showed more and more as his fatigue increased.
“You have a suggestion, Doc?” I asked, getting a bad vibe every time he spoke. I just couldn’t imagine him strolling through a barrage of gunfire to knock on the door to the tower facility. It didn’t set right. Callus was one of the deadliest human beings I’d ever met, and that was saying something. His team was the best of the best.
“I don’t know why it’s so complicated. Please stop for a minute. I need to catch my breath,” Hastings said, talking with his hands and never quite looking at me. “You were given a detailed mission briefing and a pickup location. If these rogue operators have some sort of vendetta against you, that’s not my problem. Why can’t you just take me to the pickup location? Once we’re rescued, I can report Callus to the proper authorities.”
“Well, that’s one plan.” I studied Elise for her reaction but couldn’t decide what she was thinking.
The doctor huffed pretentiously, seemingly put out at the delay. “My research is important. They wouldn’t have put so much time and effort into recovering me if I was just some abstract theorist.”
“True.” I leaned toward him and lowered my voice. “They wouldn’t have sent two battleships and a fighter wing to recover you.”
“Two battleships? I thought they sent the UFS Thunder.”
I didn’t bother to acknowledge his correction. It was a test question anyway.
“Are you listening to me, Cain?” he continued. “Take me to the pickup site and I’m sure I can handle everything.”
“No problem,” I said, facing a large door at the end of the stairs.
“We should steal the spec op recon ship,” Elise said.
Doctor Hastings cut her off. “It’s not your decision, Elise. Let Cain do his job.”
“I’m not sure what level this opens to,” I said. “We’ve come down farther than I thought we would. There’s no place else to go unless we want to get on one of the lifts, and we would have to go back up to the main level for that. So ship or no ship, we have to get through this area in one piece. No more arguing. You do what I say when I say it.”
“Yes, of course,” Hastings said.
Elise glared at me with her arms crossed.<
br />
“Wait here.” I operated the manual crank to open one of the side doors next to the larger equipment entrance, then went inside and cleared the first few rooms. I didn’t know what to expect.
How far did we have to go to encounter the flesh-eating denizens below deck? I thought of them as cannibals, but the ones I'd surprised while escaping the RSG gave me doubts. One thing was certain, they were desperate and dangerous. Regardless of what they were.
For all I knew, the agricultural deck was a garden utopia of plenty and populated with magical fairies and unicorns.
I shared my speculation with X-37, but he didn't laugh. Surely the Reaper AI had the processing power to mimic humor, but he was being difficult.
Whatever.
I gathered up the doctor and his daughter, escorting them through a series of rooms to a hallway that seemed not to have been used for some time. The air was decent and there was only a little corrosion in this section of Dreadmax. It still amazed me how much of the place was vacant.
"How much longer until you return me to the Union?" Hastings asked. “I could use a shower and a meal.”
I wanted to ignore his questions, maybe throat punch him, maybe leave him to fend for himself, but that wasn't why I had come this far. It didn't seem like current events had affected his emotions like I thought was reasonable. Grady was dead. Countless inmates—or residents or whatever they were—of Dreadmax had been murdered or killed and faced certain annihilation.
Damn, I wanted a Starbrand. "I'm not convinced that's the best course of action."
"Not the best course of action? What are you talking about? You were sent here to do a job."
"Sure, but they left out the part about getting double-crossed by a spec ops team whose leader is certifiably fucking crazy." I didn't add that he also seemed invincible.
"I was never told about them. When I get back, finding out what went wrong will be the first thing I do," Hastings said.
I seriously doubted that.
"Can we just go?" Elise said, refusing to look at her father. It was another one of her moments where she seemed like a rebellious teenager.
The Last Reaper Page 17
