Buried Deep

by Kristine Kathryn Rusch

  It took Weiss a while to find the cockpit—a good sign, Flint thought. These people weren’t as familiar with ships as Flint had worried they were. That gave him an advantage too. Ever since he’d discovered that they’d been coerced into coming here, he had worried about them. He didn’t want them to take out their anger and frustration on him.

  Weiss knocked on the open cockpit door. Flint swiveled his chair as if he were surprised at having a visitor. Weiss seemed even rounder as he stood there, his arms folded across his jutting stomach.

  “We’re going to do this thing,” he said.

  “Good.” Flint didn’t invite him in. He wanted the cockpit to remain his alone. “I think it’s the right decision.”

  “It’s the right decision for us,” Weiss said. “But we are worried about how this’ll go. Will you be staying in case we need to leave?”

  “No,” Flint said. “I’m just supposed to deliver you.”

  He almost told Weiss that the Emmeline wasn’t even going to land on Mars, but then decided against it. The less they knew, the easier the trip would be.

  Weiss sighed, his rounded shoulders going up and down, although the rest of him didn’t seem to move. “That’s going to be difficult. What’re we going to do if things go wrong?”

  “There are humans on Mars,” Flint said.

  “Will we be dealing with them?”

  “I don’t know.” Flint held up a finger, then turned toward the console in front of him. He downloaded some background files on Mars into the game room.

  Then he swiveled his chair toward Weiss again.

  “The only onboard computer systems you all can use are in the game room.” Flint had locked them out of the more elaborate systems in the bedrooms. He didn’t want to go through the hassle of limiting access and worrying about what they were doing behind locked doors. “But you should be able to find the names of all the major human representatives on Mars. I’d suggest you each download that information into a chip, so that you have backup help. I also suggest that the seven of you network together, in case you’re separated.”

  “What’re they going to do to us?” Weiss asked.

  “It’s some kind of ritual. Apparently, Disty family members go through it all the time after someone dies, so it can’t be too strenuous.”

  Weiss frowned. “They’re not built the same way we are.”

  Flint knew that. He wished these people weren’t so good-hearted. He hated fudging information. “They’re as fragile as humans, though. Maybe more fragile, given their small size. If they can go through this easily, we probably can too.”

  The we was disingenuous. He wasn’t going to go through anything.

  Still, the words seemed to comfort Weiss.

  “You’ve been pretty nice about this,” Weiss said. “And this ship is absolutely amazing, not to mention expensive. You say you’re not getting paid. This is your ship, right?”

  Leave it to the man who wore his wealth all over his body to notice the traces of money around Flint.

  “Yes,” Flint said. “It’s my ship.”

  “I can’t believe you’re doing this out of the goodness of your heart.”

  Flint gave him a slow smile. “You are.”

  “After they more or less arrested me. Did they do that to you?”

  Flint shook his head. “I knew one of the early victims of this whole mess. It started small—the discovery of a skeleton above the mass graves, someone not related to the massacre—and I was helping figure out who that skeleton was.”

  “Out of the goodness of your heart?” Weiss’s question didn’t seem pointed. Only confused.

  “No,” Flint said. “I used to work in computers and I have a background with the police. I had the needed skills, and I was getting paid for that job.”

  He didn’t want it to sound like he simply did people favors for no reason. Over the years, he’d learned that people distrusted others who did a lot of things for free.

  “I don’t understand how that connects to this,” Weiss said.

  “I found myself in possession of a lot of information other people didn’t have. I let a friend of mine in authority know, and here I am.”

  Weiss nodded. He took a small step away from the door, then he stopped.

  “You tell your friend in authority, whoever it is, that we might have been a lot happier if we’d had a choice. This strong-arm stuff, I think that’s what scared most of us. We’ve been hauled out of our homes before and lost our entire families. The police brought that all back. You tell everyone that, okay?”

  “I will,” Flint said, although he didn’t know what good it would do.

  “Thanks,” Weiss said, and walked down the corridor.

  Flint didn’t move for a long moment. Then he sighed and turned toward the console. He would turn on the overhead sound as soon as he knew that Weiss was out of hearing range.

  “My, my, my, aren’t we just the nicest people.”

  Flint jumped and turned.

  Norton had come all the way into the cockpit. He seemed bigger than he had in the game room. He was taller than Flint and broader too, but his thin arms told Flint he was weaker. If Norton’s arms were any indication of the length of his space travels, his bones would either be elastic (if they’d been modified) or they would be brittle from a lack of proper weight-bearing exercise.

  Still, Flint’s heart pounded.

  “May I help you, Mr. Norton?” Flint asked.

  “It was just like I said.” Norton leaned against the door in such a way that his body blocked anyone from getting in—or Flint from leaving. “Six voted to stay and one voted to go.”

  Flint couldn’t argue with him without letting Norton know that Flint had been listening.

  “I thought it was unanimous,” Flint said. “Mr. Weiss seemed to think so.”

  “Of course he did,” Norton said. “Because they decided that I was unimportant. I was too cynical, too mean. I’d come around.”

  Had they had that discussion while Flint was talking to Weiss? He didn’t remember those words. But then, Flint was beginning to wonder how reliable Norton was.

  “I overheard you telling that pompous ass that someone had found a skeleton on the massacre site. Did you ever find out who that skeleton was?”

  “Yes,” Flint said.

  Norton nodded. “Then you know that this massacre is the gift that keeps on giving. First we lose everyone, nearly get murdered ourselves, get thrown out of our homes and the Dome itself, and then sent to places we never even imagined—”

  “I know the story, Mr. Norton.”

  “It’s not a story.” He peered at Flint. “The story, as you call it, has lots of personal twists and turns, which I’m not going to tell you. Let’s just say that our new mummies and daddies weren’t always vetted well.”

  Flint wasn’t in the mood for a sob story, but he didn’t know how to easily shut Norton down.

  “Then this lovely woman walks into our lives. Not all of our lives, but enough of us. She tells us how much money we can get from the Martian government, how the laws had changed, and how the Multicultural Tribunals favor people like us, people who’ve suffered for no apparent reason. All she needed was a little money to get the case prepped.”

  Flint stared at him. Norton let his arms drop.

  “You know how this ends, right? How she took our money?”

  “I don’t know what it has to do with me,” Flint said.

  “Yes, you do.” Norton started to cross his arms and then stopped.

  The movement put Flint on alert. Norton was going to try something. This close to the cockpit, he was probably going to try to take over the ship.

  “You said you know who she is,” Norton said, “and if you know that, you know why she was there. Do you know why she had no flesh on her bones?”

  A shiver ran down Flint’s back. Norton knew how Jørgen died.

  Flint leaned his chair until the back hit the console. He hoped the move seemed
natural. “No, I don’t know why.”

  Norton smiled ever so slowly. That smile had probably been the last thing Jørgen had seen before she died. “She took everything from us, coming back over and over again with new petitions, seemingly real refiles of the case, court documents that seemed to pertain to us. And we paid each time, her fees, just to keep her going.”

  Flint’s left arm wasn’t in Norton’s view. Flint slowly reached back under the console.

  “She skinned us clean. I thought it only fair to do the same to her.” Norton spoke calmly, as if everyone killed and then desecrated the corpse.

  “Why are you telling me this?” Flint made himself sound nervous. Norton wanted him to be afraid, so Flint pretended to be afraid.

  “So that when I ask you to turn this ship around, you’ll do it.”

  “And then what?” Flint said. “You know what you just told me right?”

  Norton shrugged. “No one’s going to pay attention. No one cares. It was thirty years ago, she was a crook, and I can confess all I want. There’s no evidence. I cut it all off.”

  Flint’s fingers found his laser pistol. “A confession counts.”

  “And now you’ll tell me that the cockpit’s system recorded it, and that the courts can use it against me.” Norton smiled. “So? They have to arrest me first.”

  He took a step toward Flint. Flint raised the laser pistol. “Stay back.”

  Norton stopped. He raised his hands.

  Flint stood, slowly. He felt the top of the console, pressed the intercom button. “Would you all come in here please? I need help with Mr. Norton.”

  “They can’t do anything,” Norton said. “Especially since I’ll have control of this ship by the time they get here.”

  “You know what I wonder?” Flint said, “How did they find you, of all people? I would have thought you would have been the hardest survivor to find.”

  Norton’s smile was small and chilling—one of the most chilling smiles Flint had ever seen. “It’s hard to get my revenge from the Outlying Colonies.”

  Flint felt a shiver as he understood the implications of that. “You’ve killed others, haven’t you?”

  “Let’s just say your gun doesn’t frighten me. I’ve been in this situation before.”

  Flint hit the silent emergency controls on the cockpit console. Now no one could fly the Emmeline but him. “You planned this crisis with the Disty?”

  Norton’s smile grew wider. “I wish I’d been that smart. This entire thing has simply been a bonus. When I’m done, the Disty will destroy Sahara Dome. And that’ll be a marvelous thing.”

  Then Norton lifted his right fist and opened it slowly. On his palm, a white disc rested.

  “Do you know what this is?” he asked.

  Flint shook his head.

  “It’s my guarantee that no one saves Sahara Dome. It’s concussion bomb.”

  Flint started. His system had searched Norton when he had come aboard and found nothing. Flint would have assumed that the police had searched him as well when they picked him up.

  “Only at this range,” Norton was saying, “you and I won’t survive it.”

  Flint frowned. He could have his system scan again, but if this little device avoided detection the first time, he had a hunch it wouldn’t register on the scans a second time either.

  “This lovely yacht of yours won’t survive it,” Norton’s smile faded. “Unless, of course, you hand me the gun.”

  “Why would I do that?” Flint asked.

  “So that we can turn around, you and your six little friends can live, and this all ends without any bloodshed.”

  “Except for people on Mars.” Flint said.

  Norton nodded. “Except for them.”

  Flint’s heart was beating hard.

  Norton’s thumb hovered over the disc. “Shoot me, and I will press down on this little device here. So. Wouldn’t you rather live?”

  “Yes.” Flint stepped away from the console, and lowered his laser pistol ever so slightly. “I’d much rather live.”

  Fifty-eight

  Iona Gennefort crouched on the curb, near the pile of bodies. She felt numb, overwhelmed, and completely responsible. So many dead, just because she had allowed the trains to pass through Wells. She had had no idea that would happen; if she had, she would have stopped the trains outside the Dome, just like the other cities had.

  But unlike them, she had had no examples and no guidance. The Disty hadn’t talked with her, and no one else seemed to know the intricacies of the Disty fear of death—if, indeed, fear was what it could be called.

  Now she was in Wells’s Disty section with her assistant, two police officers, and the medical examiner. The claustrophobic streets, with their narrow walkways and the low rooftops from the various buildings, seemed wider without the Disty.

  But it was still unusually dark here, even though the Dome lighting was in midday. And the silence was unnerving. Gennefort had been here a dozen times before, and the noise—the constant conversation, the continued rustling of various Disty going from place to place, even the scratching they called music—had been the predominant feature. After the claustrophobic streets, of course.

  The medical examiner, a small man who had enhancements that left his chocolate-brown head hairless, looked even more exhausted than she felt. He stood beside her, staring at the corpses, looking defeated.

  “I don’t know what they are,” he said. “Or even how they died.”

  Gennefort leaned toward them. They were smaller than regular Disty, which made them the size of a four-year-old human child. They were thinner too, but Gennefort didn’t think that was natural; it looked to her untrained eye like they simply hadn’t been fed well.

  “What killed them?” she asked.

  They didn’t look trampled like the other Disty she saw. Besides, these bodies were in an orderly pile, as if someone had gathered them here.

  The medical examiner picked up a small hand, and showed Gennefort the palm. The ridges in the center had turned a bright blue.

  She shook her head. “What’s that?”

  “I field-tested it,” he said. “It’s just cayenne, but to the Disty, that’s poison.”

  “Poison?” she asked. “This was deliberate?”

  The medical examiner nodded.

  “In the middle of all that panic, someone had time to poison these—what are they? Children?”

  “I thought you didn’t know how they died,” said Shing Eccles, Gennefort’s assistant. Eccles was a small man as well, but he was the brightest person Gennefort had ever known. If he had been with her in that control tower, she had a hunch she might have made a different decision.

  “I know what they died of,” the medical examiner said, “but I’m not sure how it was administered. Judging from the hands, I would guess they administered it themselves.”

  Gennefort felt a ripple of shock run through her. She leaned away from the hand that the medical examiner still held and looked at the body closest to her. The large eyes were open and had tiny blue lines running through the pupil. The entire face had a slight bluish tinge.

  This death couldn’t have been pleasant.

  “Why?” she asked.

  The medical examiner shook his head. “The Disty have never let us handle their bodies here. They let the Death Squads do it, so I’ve never even worked on a dead Disty. I’ve seen some, read about the intricacies of autopsying them, but I’ve never done it myself.”

  “You’d think there’d been enough death around here today to make something like this impossible,” Gennefort said.

  Eccles sighed. “I think these are hatchlings.”

  Gennefort looked at him. He was staring at the pile just like she had been. “The genderless Disty. I thought they were a myth made up to startle the humans.”

  “Apparently not,” Eccles said. “But even I’m not sure.”

  “It would explain a lot of things,” the medical examiner said. “It would�
��”

  A red cloud fell across Gennefort’s vision, and she stopped listening to the examiner. An emergency notification. She stood, wiped her hands on her pants even though she had touched nothing, and stepped into the middle of the street.

  Her head brushed a nearby ledge, and she had to duck to make certain she didn’t walk into a building’s jutting corner.

  She answered the notice. “What?”

  The voice of another of her assistants filled her head. “The Disty have contacted us. They believe they have a way to decontaminate the Dome.”

  “You’re kidding,” she said.

  “They’ll let us know for certain in a few hours. Until then, we’re to separate Disty bodies from human corpses, and mark on some kind of map where the deaths occurred. They say it’s going to take a while, but they believe they can repair this whole thing.”

  “That’s great news,” she said.

  “Except,” her assistant added, “they want us to guarantee that no graves lurk beneath our soil.”

  Gennefort winced. In the hours since this mess began, she had learned how the crisis started. It still didn’t make complete sense to her. She was beginning to realize how very little she had known about the Disty. It was quite a shock to her. Before, she had always thought she understood them, and did more than tolerate them, as so many other humans had.

  “How can we make that guarantee?” she asked. “I’m sure Sahara Dome didn’t know about that mass grave.”

  “They won’t do anything until we make the guarantee,” her assistant said.

  Gennefort sighed. For a moment, she contemplated using imaging equipment to see what was beneath the surface of the Dome. But even if that were possible—and she wasn’t sure it was, especially as deep as Sahara Dome’s mass grave had been found—it would only work on open ground. So much of Wells was built up; there were only a few parks, and because of the Disty influence, very few open spaces outside of the human areas.

  For all she knew, there could be all kinds of graves hidden beneath the buildings all over Wells. The Dome had a frontier history, as so many Domes on Mars had.

  But they needed the decontamination. They needed life to return to normal. The entire Dome would die without it. No one could do business with them as things stood at the moment.