The cargo hook carriage disengaged and headed back on the return track. As it came by she nodded at Alan. He grasped her waist and propelled her up in the air so fast her head banged against a strut supporting the cargo track. The pain made her eyes water, but she managed to place the spycrawler on the top of the hook carriage.
She tapped Alan’s hand, and he lowered her down. Another crate was coming through the hatch now, and they backed away to a less crowded area. Flipping the viewgoggles back down, Moire watched from the spycrawler’s eyes as it was taken along the cargo hauler track. The track wasn’t very long, but there were vid pickups at regular intervals for the entire length.
How on earth did Alan get out of this place without setting off fifteen alarms? More to the point, how were they going to get in?
The track turned from the main corridor to a branching one, and then into a large room with a number of the big crates. For the first time, Moire saw people. People being loaded into the crates.
Shock paralyzed her, stopping the breath in her lungs, then fire–hot anger took over. That horrible woodcut that every history book had, the diagram of how to pack a ship with human bodies, stacked like bales. Back like a bad dream. For a moment she started thinking of how she could rescue them all, now, but the cold reality of the situation forced her back to the original plan. She couldn’t do it by herself, not without risking the only chance they had. She should have tried to send a message to Ennis anyway, just in case something happened to their plan. What if they were caught?
She moved the spycrawler closer to the edge of the hook carriage. The people being loaded had the same stiff, fearful, and yet open expression that reminded her painfully of her first encounter with Alan. They were wearing the same flimsy clothing, too.
So those were the Created. That must mean the people in bright–colored uniforms were the Controllers. They were injecting the Created with something before making them climb into the narrow slots in the crate. One crate held eight people.
She felt her fingers tighten and took a deep breath, trying to suppress her anger. At least they could rescue these right away. But if she wanted to get the rest, she was going to have to find a way in.
A crate was attached to the hook carriage, making the spycrawler’s video output sway. Moire moved the spycrawler off the hook carriage and onto the crate top as the crate left the room. When the crate turned the corner into the main corridor, she moved the spycrawler off the edge.
It landed with a jarring thud on the corridor floor, scrambling the video output for a second. She moved it, testing the controls. It seemed to be intact. The crawlers were built to be tough. She moved it down the main corridor, away from the cargo hatch. The corridor ended a few hundred meters from the branch corridor. The area only had emergency lighting, so she could just barely make out the signs on the doors. It seemed to be primarily storage.
Moire pushed back the goggles and looked around the hold. The second crate of Created was just being dropped off, making the floor shake. There was about half a meter between the bottom of the crate and the floor when they were on the cargo hook. Just enough space to crawl under.
“Think you can crawl fast?” she whispered to Alan. “We need to hide from the vids, under the crates as they go by. Just to the end of this corridor. Nobody there.”
He nodded. They waited, tense and nervous, by the cargo hatch. The next crate was moving slowly down the corridor. Moire glanced at Alan, and her gaze snagged on the pack of gear on his back. “Take that off!” she hissed. “It won’t fit. Push it ahead of you.” He struggled with the pack, working it free just as the crate began to block the view of the vid in front of the hatch.
Moire pushed Alan forward, and he dived under the crate. She followed so fast behind him his boot hit her in the chin. She squirmed ahead as quickly as she could, trying to ignore the glancing blows of the crate as it swayed above them.
The crate moved on, and Moire grabbed Alan’s ankle. “We have to wait for the next one!” she whispered. She felt dreadfully exposed, but they were between vids—they’d find out soon enough if anyone could see them.
It was an eternity. From the way Alan was hunched on the floor, he wasn’t enjoying it either. As soon as the crate came, they were both scrambling. They kept going even when it had turned the corner, heading for the safety of the shadows. Moire collapsed against a wall, realizing she had no idea what to do next.
She scanned the corridor quickly, hoping for inspiration. The spycrawler was waiting patiently for further instructions; she picked it up and stashed it away for later use. “Anything look familiar?” she asked Alan.
He was crouched down, his entire body posture speaking of fear. “It says I should not be here.”
Following his pointing finger, she saw a half–blue, half–red circle on the wall. The same symbol was repeated at regular intervals all along the corridor. She frowned and peered into the gloom. She could just make out the surface of a door that had a different symbol on it.
She glanced at the intersection they had just left. No sign of any activity. Alan followed her closely as she sprinted across to the door.
“So what does this mean?” The symbol on the door was a red circle on a black triangle.
“If you go in, you become broken.” Alan rubbed his wrist where the control bracelet had been. “The other ones, you can go if a Controller is there and they say to.”
If it was forbidden, then maybe it had something useful in it. “OK, kid. Time to start breaking and entering.”
“But it says….”
Moire sighed. “We are here to do things we aren’t supposed to do. Right?” She looked at the door. A standard sliding panel, with a square plate on the wall for entry. But instead of a pressure switch, or even a key slot, there was a single round hole and a thumbprint plate.
“It doesn’t look like our doors,” Alan said, watching over her shoulder.
“The lock is different. Hopefully the door is the same.” At least it wasn’t a bulkhead door. Those were designed to seal for pressure, with bottom edges several centimeters below floor level. This was just a security door, and not even a heavy–duty one.
Even with Alan’s help, she couldn’t get it open enough to get Montero’s clever electronic doorcracker in. They had better luck with the second door, which also had the “forbidden” symbol on it. With the doorcracker in the narrow gap where the edge of the door fit into the wall, it was simply a matter of finding the wall switch controls.
It took longer than it had when they’d practiced on Raven, and Alan was getting nervous and impatient. Moire didn’t like the exposed feeling either, wondering if there were some concealed vids they hadn’t noticed. Then the door opened, and they darted quickly inside.
Closing the door, Moire carefully toggled the lights, sagging with disappointment when she saw what the small room contained. I hope we didn’t do all that work just to break into a broom closet. Racks up and down the walls held pieces of equipment, piles of cables, and tattered fiberboard boxes. Moire walked slowly down the aisle, wondering why Toren had bothered to secure it at all.
Picking up a disposable cup half–hidden behind a burnt–out readout panel lying on a rack, she saw a thick, scummy film of dried–up gunk. Everything had a thin layer of dust.
“Is this a book?” Alan held something out to her. It was a textcard. Some of the pixels, or whatever they called them these days, had reversed from their original color making the text difficult to read. She tabbed through the whole thing, but it was scrambled and useless.
They had to find a way to get to the upper levels. They didn’t have a lot of time to do it, either. “How did you get to this level, when you escaped?”
Alan looked at her and shrugged. “I just went through doors.”
Well. He had done it, so it must be possible. She doubted they would have the same luck twice, though. They needed something a bit more subtle than that.
Leaving
the storage room, Moire carefully examined all the doors in the corridor. No sign of any upper level access, and there hadn’t been anything in the section near the dock, either. That left the loading area, which had too many people in it right now, and there was no guarantee it would be empty when the loading was done.
Desperate for ideas, she retrieved the doorcracker and opened more doors. The first two were merely storage. The third, however, had two desk terminals and a multiplex data copier. Moire followed the cables up to the ceiling and felt a small glimmer of hope. Since the levels were expected to stay isolated in the event of an accident, the cables were connected to a feedthrough panel, connectors on either side of a metal plate. The panel itself, however, was not completely sealed to the ceiling—and it looked just wide enough for them to get through.
Piled data storage boxes made a wobbly stair to the panel, allowing Alan to remove the two remaining bolts with a rivet cutter as silently as he could. Moire popped her head up quickly to make sure the room above was clear. It was dark, and when she flashed her palmlight around, small and unoccupied. Just what they needed. Grasping the edge of the hole, she pulled herself up.
¤ ¤ ¤
Kolpe Anders blinked at the fresh–faced receptionist, fumbling with his briefcase to produce his ID. He mumbled something deliberately incoherent about an appointment, knowing his face looked red and flustered. The receptionist scanned his ID and gave him an empty smile.
“If you would wait over there, sir?”
He nodded hastily and took a seat in an area off to the side of the main entrance. It wasn’t the general waiting area, meaning his ID had pulled up a scheduled appointment. At least that much had worked.
From the corner of his eye, he saw that the receptionist was scanning the entire lobby in careful, regular sweeps camouflaged by fussing with her earclip or some other distraction. He smiled inwardly. Toren had not had such thorough concealed security the last time he was here. Was his business in any way related?
Running a hand quickly through his hair, he wondered if it was too thick. He always strove for the full effect in his impressions, and the best ones were never dependent on one or two things but layer upon layer of little details. The carefully tailored pants, for example, that always appeared just a fraction too short. Or the facial mods that produced a tiny, nervous twitch at the corner of one eye.
His voice was harder to change; another reason he worked so hard on the visuals. He shifted in his seat, wondering how many scanning devices were active in the room. The frosted, pale–green glass panels in bentwood frames, ostensibly for privacy, were rather obvious. Perhaps the chairs themselves…
He looked up as someone approached, and froze, momentarily uncertain. Nooreen Meniran was standing just inside the entrance. She was wearing full formal business trousers, but instead of the fitted tunic that usually completed the ensemble, she had a long vest made of woven scarves over a thin silk shell top. Only upper management would be allowed to dress that way, and he felt his mouth thin. If anyone saw her with him it would be noticed. He would be noticed.
“This way.” She tilted her head. At least she had retained the sense not to use his name. Any damage had already been done, so he got up and followed her down the hallway.
After the first security point he allowed himself to talk. “I was told secrecy was a priority for this project.” He made no attempt to conceal his annoyance.
“It is.” Her clipped, sharp words conveyed her own irritation. “You will need access to very sensitive information. By taking you in myself, I avoid being summoned to give you clearance. This project is not the only one I have to deal with.”
“I will need all connected information.”
“You shall have it.” She smiled without warmth. “The officer is being dealt with by someone else, but you will be given all the details.” They went through another, more thorough checkpoint. “There is one important piece of new data that you may not yet be aware of. Umbra is aware of the planet. Not the location, just its existence. But that’s bad enough.”
Anders blinked, assessing the information. “And the target’s last known location?”
“A backwater Fringe planet called Bone. She has already left.” Meniran stopped before a secured door. She used the palmprint and retina scan station, and the door opened. “George will be able to access any information you need,” she said, indicating the astonished tech seated at one of the consoles. “You may also call up the detailed contract, with all of the pertinent specifications. Do you have any questions?”
“You are certain this…other problem is not connected?” He was rarely called in, except for the gravest emergencies. He knew Toren did not like his conditions, and would do a great deal to circumvent them.
Meniran shook her head. “There is no connection whatsoever.”
CHAPTER 4
LONG AND VENGEFUL MEMORIES
Moire carefully stood up in the darkness, then flashed the palmlight around again.
“I want to see too,” Alan whispered, his heat–masked head rising through the hole in the floor.
“Wait a bit. There’s not much room.” The room was tiny and cramped, a cable and switching room, but it had a regular door switch. Moire quickly cracked open the door and let the spycrawler out to investigate. The corridor was empty, and the symbols on the wall outside were all red circles on black triangles.
“You could turn on the lights,” Alan said hopefully.
Covert ops with an eight–year–old had problems all its own. “We don’t have time.”
She hadn’t found anything that would be useful yet, and her window of opportunity was vanishing. She glanced at her chrono. A little over ten hours left, and she had to get everything done without detection and get back to the ship before it left. Feeling suddenly paranoid, she switched the viewgoggles to pick up the first spycrawler, still on the bridge of Speedi–Web III. The signal was poor, which nearly gave her a heart attack until she realized they had gone far enough from the dock that they were almost out of range. The ship was still there, and the bridge was empty.
Moire sighed and switched back to the other spycrawler. There had to be something she could do. She soon realized it wouldn’t be using the spycrawler, though. The floor of the corridor was covered in a soft, textured material that caught on the crawler legs. By the time it got to the end of the corridor the ship would have left.
“I’m hungry.” Before that, though, Alan would be terminally bored.
“Take a drybar from your pack,” Moire said, scanning the visual feed in the viewgoggles. “Don’t forget to put the wrapper back.”
“Why?”
“If somebody sees it they will know we were here.” They had to get out of the cable closet. It was risky, but at least this corridor seemed fairly quiet. It was strange, though. Not like the usual station environment. Besides the carpetlike floor, the walls were a smooth, uniform surface with shaded coloring that matched, and there were clear sidelight panels beside each door. It looked like an office building, not a station.
She shook her head, annoyed with herself. As far as Toren was concerned, it was an office building.
The nearest office was dark. Taking one more glance up and down the corridor, she opened the cable closet door.
“Come on!” she whispered to Alan. He tossed his pack up and pulled himself into the tiny closet with agility. Moire led the way to the office, remembering to note the door code on the cable closet for their return.
“Here,” she said, taking off the viewgoggles and handing them to Alan. “Stay in the back and watch the corridor. If you see anybody, let me know but don’t move, OK? People notice movement.”
Alan nodded and sat cross–legged with the spycrawler controls. He seemed pleased to be given something to do. Moire scanned the palmlight over the desk. It wasn’t hard to figure out the office belonged to someone named Marga Toos, and from the formidably bare and organized desktop this did not
look like a promising place to start. Sure enough, the desk was secured. She didn’t feel confident enough to attempt picking the electronic lock; better to try somewhere else.
It was a pity wastepaper baskets had gone out of fashion. Those could be very useful.
A small rectangular shape caught her eye as she knelt on the floor, searching. She picked it up. The datatab had been hidden out of sight near one of the legs of the desk, from where it had evidently fallen. Moire fumbled for her datapad and slotted it in.
She skimmed the contents as quickly as she could. It appeared to be draft files of whatever the current equivalent of memos was.
“People!” Alan whispered, and she ducked under the desk. Her heart hammered as she wondered what she would do if the missing Marga Toos showed up. She risked a glance around the edge of the desk and caught a glimpse of someone in the corridor. They walked past.
Moire picked up the datapad shakily and started reading again. Marga had many problems she wished to bring to the attention of her superiors. It appeared she was somehow involved in the day–to–day operations of the facility. She also seemed to have less than harmonious relations with the leader of the maintenance team, who didn’t file reports properly and was not responsive to her requests.
Marga wanted him relocated closer to her, so she could keep an eye on him. Moire grinned. The maintenance leader sounded like someone she needed to meet—at least, his office. She noted the office code mentioned in the file, then darted across the room to the emergency map on the wall by the door. It was just a simple map with no numbers, and she frowned.
Their current location was marked by a red circle. She put her finger on it, intending to trace the way back to the cable closet, then blinked when the map suddenly displayed text with the office code and Marga Toos’s name. She tapped other locations, and the corresponding information displayed.
The maintenance guy was several corridors away. Moire frowned. It would have been much more convenient if he had moved already.
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