Icharus_ARC Series

by Renee Sebastian

  “Mmm, where am I?” I heard Min say from the other room.

  I swallowed the rest of my breakfast and told her, “It’s time to go Min.” I opened up my ocu, found a message from the Council, and read through it. It had two runs listed, which wasn’t entirely unusual since sometimes people ran together. It said that Damus was being sent for additional conditioning, which I thought was apt since he was becoming unpredictably violent lately. He would join me later on the hunt, but I was being sent immediately to Torva. Perfect, if you were an iceberg.

  I went to my wardrobe and opened it. I took out my runner garb, which consisted of a dark jumper and boots. After I suited up, I slung an o-mask around my neck and some goo in my knapsack. I looked over my synth packs and decided to leave them behind. If I needed some there, I could always stop by a synch bar or have some delivered to me at a hostel.

  “What?” Min asked groggily.

  I thought about asking her to tell Astrid I would not be available later, but instead said, “Nothing, I’m leaving on a run. Be sure you are gone when I get back.”

  Chapter 3

  Copper, silver, and gold metallic bits flashed in the artificial overhead lighting. Most of the people had their o-masks pulled up on top of their heads in the artificially oxygen infused climate. It wasn't that the atmosphere didn't have any, but many of the lands had levels that were a little lower than what optimal movement required. Torva was a bit better, as the cooler temperatures made it more available. Regardless of whether or not there was oxygen, no one could survive for long once you reached the magnetic pole located deeper into the glacial interior. It was too cold for anything there.

  I watched adults in their prime rushing about, intent on reaching some destination, most likely for business, but sometimes for fun. The only reason more people didn’t live just over the rim was because as dim as the sun was over Senja, it was still preferable to none.

  I put my travel bag on the belt that would deliver it to the cargo hold, but I kept my documents and weapons on me. I showed my credentials to the docking officer, and he waved me on, barely looking at them.

  Bubbles started percolating around the ported supercav train. It was finally loading time into the hydrofoil. I took my place in line and waited to get on the transport. The low-pressure water vapor bubbles began combining to be as large as my hand by the time I finally entered its doors. I laid down at the next available pod and took out my oculus. By the time I was situated, the thick membrane had finally encompassed the entire ship, and we prepared for launch. The lights flickered on overhead, and then down we went.

  I ignored things like people laughing and the occasional flickering of the lights accompanied by popping noises and tried to look through my assignment. It had been a long time since I had been sent alone on a mission. Would I be able to follow it through to its foregone conclusion? I held my oculus above me and scrolled through the information or the surprising lack of it.

  The first one only had a name and a sector assignment. His name was Kull, and while there was no class letter, he did have a sector assignment of five. Great. He was a resident of the Torvo. He would know all the best places to hide.

  The other was a nab-and-bag. If the subject, Kore Β1, was suicidal then the order would become a standard execution solution with a sanctioned body collection. About ten percent of our assignments were like these. Unfortunately, most of them ended with Damus killing them, whether they were suicidal or not.

  Normally, in the reports, things like last known friends and locations where they worked and played were given to us. This report had nothing except their names and which sector I should start looking for them. Obviously, their internal implants must have been taken out, or we would have been able to track them through electronic means.

  I had a bad feeling that this one might take a mes or more to finish it. I closed the oculus, turned off my overhead lamp, and allowed myself to sleep for a few oras.

  • ѻ ● Ѻ • ○ ☼

  As the train resurfaced, the membrane receded. Then we were told through speakers on a loop to, “Please exit the ship.”

  As I exited my pod, I observed a group of three people partially undressed, who were trying to pull their clothing back into place. The dazzle of the casual relationship still shining in their eyes. They probably just met on the Senja platform when we loaded.

  The artificial lights flooded the station-house, and I followed the crowd through the gates into Torva. Most of the crowd was either returning or leaving for Senja on their one tad per mes leave.

  I made it through the turnstile and approached a large, decorative street map on display of Ledrod. I didn’t need to see the lay of the roads, as I could access my oculus for that, but I did take note of the word that had been scratched into the glass protecting it: Zει. It may have been a coincidence, but the word was placed over the city of Donkerstad, the capital of Torva.

  My eyes scanned the three other major cities that were shadow cities of Senja. I walked along the acrylic protected display, my finger tracing the path that connected all the cities together.

  “May I be of assistance?”

  I turned around and found a synth dyed redhead standing behind me. She was wearing the garb of one of the station officers. Her official job description must have been to herd any stragglers out of the station.

  I stared into her lifeless eyes. "No," I finally told her. She continued to stand there, staring at me patiently. Obviously, she was not taking no for an answer. I said, "Maybe there is something that you can help me with."

  She tilted her head slightly and said, “I will certainly try. What do you need assistance with?”

  “Who is this Zει that is inscribed into the glass here?”

  She stared at me a moment too long and then she said politely, “You’re a hunter, aren’t you?”

  “Yes, but I am not hunting this Zει. Do you know who this person is?”

  “I don’t know what you are talking about. I’ve never heard of them.”

  “Look here, it is engraved into the glass,” I said as I pointed to it.

  “Is there anything else I can do for you?”

  She was not going to help me. "Which walkway will take me to the nearest public-house?"

  “Are you looking for a fun time or a strong synth?”

  I considered my options. “I think I am in the mood for a strong synth.”

  She opened up her jacket and produced a card. After handing it to me, she said, "Take the first walkway to the right and then follow it down to the Tern's Tavern. Do you have work here?"

  “Yes.”

  “I’m certain Tern can advise you on places where you can stay, but I wouldn’t trust him.”

  “Thank you.”

  Then she looked at me with purpose and said, “In fact, I wouldn’t trust anyone.” What did she mean by that? “Be on your way, good dag.”

  Then she stepped back to what must have been her assigned post against the wall and stared at me. I took it that the conversation was over, and I walked towards the closest automated walkway. Donkerstad, the capital of this sector, would be my first stop on this icy hemi. If this Kore was a Beta and she was in Torva, she would have traveled through it.

  I walked into Tern's and strode right up to the bar. It was busy tonight, with some of the patrons being passengers from the train. Their drinks were mostly drained; apparently they had made straight for this establishment once they got off the train.

  A woman came forward from behind the counter. “Velkominn! What would you like to drink?”

  “What do you have?”

  “We specialize in m-synth if you don’t have to work in the morning.”

  “I think I’ll pass. Do you serve nutri drinks?”

  “We have an e-nutri-drink to burn off the effects of our usual synth drinks. Would you like one of those?”

  “How about something to relax?”

  “I think we may still have a few z-synths. Give me a moment t
o look for one in the back.”

  I nodded my head and then she disappeared into a back room. I slipped out the card the station officer had given me. On the one side, it had Tern's name and address. I flipped it over and found hand-written the words, she lives.

  "What's that good looking?" an older dark-haired woman said over my shoulder.

  I quickly flipped it over, covering it with my hand, and slid a sidelong glance at the woman who had now draped her arm around my neck. She had garish red lipstick, and her coal eyeliner was smeared as if she had been crying earlier. I took her arm, removed it from around my neck, and told her, "Nothing."

  “You want to have some fun tonight?”

  “No. Please move on, I want to be alone.”

  She shoved my shoulder and said, “Strathole.” Finally, she moved on to the man three empty stool chairs down to my right. He was much more receptive to her attentions.

  Zει.

  The barkeep came back out and said, “Nope, we are out of z drinks.”

  “No problem. Can I get a water to go?”

  “Regular bottle or a hi-protein?”

  “Hi-protein.” I wasn’t quite ready to catch that train to Donkerstad yet.

  I left and was back on the walkway soon enough. After five tigs passed, I exited the travellator and was back at the station. I chewed on my digestible bottle as I registered my transportation plan, headed for the capital city of sector five.

  Just as I finished, an alarm sounded in the station.

  I could have opened up my oculus, but the speaker system was fast enough with emergency directions. “Dust storm approaching. Shields dropping. Dust storm approaching. Seek shelter now.”

  Dust storms were not uncommon, but only the big ones forced the oxygen shields down in the bigger cities. The filters would get more deeply clogged if they were left on, which caused substantial damage. Turning them off made cleaning and repairing them much easier, usually only requiring a strong suction cleaning.

  Everyone flipped their masks down and then scrambled to find a place to wait it out. The station officers came out in force to direct people to the best locations. I approached an officer with a mustache and asked, "Is it always this busy?"

  “Terrible timing, it’s the changing of the shifts too.”

  “How long do you think before this one will blow over?”

  “We are on the dark side here sir. They are never as bad here as they are on the light side.” Most dust storms transferred their contents to the dark interior where there was little atmosphere, and it would be dispelled into space.

  “The aurora is going to be magnificent for the next couple of dags,” the man absently added.

  I nodded my head and looked for a place to wait it out. The water train would have been the best place to wait it out, but it would stay submerged until the storm passed, not risking contamination. A liquid diamond seal slid over it to protect the waterbed.

  “Storm is imminent in three tigs. Find shelter. Electricity will be cut in two.” Then the automated voice began a countdown of our remaining time.

  "Come with me," said the red-headed officer that I had spoken to earlier. She must have been leaving her shift, because she was dressed in a non-descript beige shirt and brown pants.

  She led me to a locked door, then she lifted her hand, and it unlocked. Must have been keyed to her implant. I wanted to ask her about the card she had given me, but when we walked into the room, there were already five other officers waiting the storm out.

  After we were secured in the room, which was windowless, we all waited silently for the storm to pass over us. Our ancestor's first buildings used to collapse under the weight and force of the massive storms, but few have fallen in my lifetime.

  The lights turned off, as the energy fueling the city died. It was not long after that before we experienced the first signs of the storm hitting. The roar started as a hum, but it quickly turned into a roar. The walls began to shake, which was a relief. If there was not enough give, like some of the older structures, the buildings gave.

  Tigs went by, and still, the storm raged outside. Twice I brushed the sand out of my eyes from where it had squeezed between the cracks in the walls, but still, they held. Then at the peak of the storm, the metal started to groan. Wondering if we were going to walk out of this room or not, we all remained quiet and still. Finally, the noise began to abate and then the lights came back on. More than one of the officers in the room had a blanched expression, while the others looked simply relieved.

  “Please keep your masks on as you exit. You will be informed when the air systems are reinstated.” The message repeated three more times before a real person spoke over a local system. “Trains will resume their schedule after a visual inspection. Thank you for your patience.”

  The woman, who had dragged me in, opened the door first, and when we exited, we walked onto a three-inch thick beach of sand and pebbles. This time, very little debris had fallen loose from the infrastructure.

  I turned to talk to the red-headed officer, who had fallen behind me, but discovered that she had disappeared.

  “If you wait over here, I’m sure that you will be able to board soon,” one of the other officers told me. What else was there to do? I complied. It wasn’t long before I boarded the next train to my hunting destination.

  • ѻ ● Ѻ • ○ ☼

  I looked up through the window in the ceiling before the membrane blocked it from view. You could see Notos’ oranges and yellows glowing mutely in Aka’s dim light. It was the largest gas planet in this solar system, and if you stared long enough you might even see one of the cargo vessels departing or returning from it filled with Helium-3 harvested from the planet or methane and iron from one of its two moons.

  There were three planets in our solar system. Icharus was by far the closest to the star, with two gas giants that spun in slow rotation on their poles. Notos was a large gas planet with two moons. The larger moon was called Sepia, after its color, and the smaller one had a smooth yellow sphere which was called Senap. The last planet in the system was another gas giant, but it was smaller and much farther away than Notos. It was called Urania, and it had only one, but relative to the size of the planet, a large silvery moon called Kahel.

  As this was a more extended trip, I hunkered down and decided to take an electronic training module. I was required to have so many trainings each anno to renew my license. This one was a moral stability mod.

  The first scenario involved a scientist who claimed that he had found a way to cure all the faults in the human DNA sequence. To prove it, he needed you to bring one of your targets to him, instead of exterminating them. If he succeeded, it would lead to overcrowding and starvation due to the planet’s meager resources. But if he could do it, he would be able to cure the bouts of blindness that your best friend has been hiding for many annos from everyone but you. Do you report the scientist to the government, bring him your target, kill the scientist outright without an order, or do you allow him to experiment on your friend?

  I clicked report because that was what the Council would want. It was not up to me if he lived or not.

  Scenario two entailed a Councilman, a nursery of a hundred incubating embryos in Kinnopolis, a dissident, and a ship filled with Helium-3. The dissident had taken one of the Councilman as a hostage and placed him in a building in the next city over, miles from your present location. The dissident claimed that he had overtaken the trajectory of a cargo ship filled with Helium from Notos, and he can make only one change in its course. Which would I choose? One with the cargo ship crashing into the building where the Councilman was being held or change its direction, so it headed straight for the nursery.

  I typed in an alternate answer from the allowed choices, killing the dissident. He was a bigger threat than having the vessel destroy either of the scenarios offered. While the Councilman and the nursery were both important, in the scheme of things, our ideals were even more so.

  A
fter answering twenty-three more dilemmas, I closed the program and closed my eyes. I estimated that I had at least another four oras, so I began to think about why a Β class citizen would run.

  Kinnopolis, was where all the people that mattered lived. Politicians, merchants, and property owners dominated the landscape there. Anything below a Θ usually required an invitation to enter the city. Even though Donkerstad was its mirror sister, it was a vastly different story here.

  I should be able to enter the city with little difficulty.

  Chapter 4

  Officially, we were a cosmocracy. We voted our officials into office, and everyone worked, with no exceptions – all for the benefit and progression of humanity. In return, we received what the government deemed we needed in order to function optimally.

  The government humanely took what they needed from us to create the next geners and then sterilized everyone, so women were not overburdened with the role of motherhood. Our children grew up in governmentally controlled nurseries so there would be no lifelong commitments or familial ties. We had no distractions from the ultimate goal, which was terraforming this planet and creating a utopia for future generations.

  As I considered the Zει situation, I decided that I should take it to another hunter for his advice. I checked the location of all the current hunters on my oculus. To my surprise, my old mentor Kai was currently in Donkerstad too. In fact, most of the hunter teams were in the city. Either there was a revolt planned, or nearly everyone had been assigned to find either Kore or Kull, or both. Regardless, I was counting of Kai knowing more. He was practically a lone wolf now, nearing the end of his life and career. He always had a knack of getting information from contacts. I wanted to see what he knew about the three letter word that was haunting me.