by Ginger Booth
“And we’re probably allergic to it,” Eli muttered. Liam fed antihistamines into the team too, again skipping Sass. Though she removed her faceplate again earlier, the air still hadn’t caused her any trouble.
A door opened ahead on the gravelly concrete path, also slippery with algae. A quartet of soldiers emerged, all carrying bared hand weapons, pointed at them. Sass quickened her step to take the lead, and held up her hands in a friendly way. She chomped a control to switch her faceplate to external speakers.
“Hello! We’re here to visit Ivett. Thank you for opening a door for us! This is –”
“I don’t care,” her old friend Three-Eight assured her. “Get in.” They formed a gauntlet, two soldiers to either side of the door.
Its exterior was camouflaged with the same stone and algae to blend right in. The inner side appeared to be steel, and the combo a half meter thick.
“Good hinges,” Darren remarked.
“What is that?” Three-Eight barked, pointing to Darren’s toolbelt. “Remove it.”
“I need it back,” Darren replied mildly, keeping his youthful expression happy and guileless. “Should we go back and leave our things at the ship? It’s just my tools. I didn’t even think to take it off.”
“Mine too,” Sass offered apologetically. “If you don’t mind waiting –”
“I do mind! Take them off! Now!” Three-Eight relented to add, “You’ll get them back. All accessories. Deposit them on the table.”
Sass sauntered in first, and lay her belt down. She kept her grav generator and comm tab, tucked in pockets, and of course her faceplate and air canister, since they were still outside the airlock. While the others relinquished their belongings, she surreptitiously transfered the camera dot on her faceplate to the zipper on her Sanctuary-style pressure uniform. Eli caught the motion and followed her lead, though Kaol was focused on the soldiers. If it weren’t for their fur, beak, metal band, and tufted ears, she’d assume the hunter could easily break any one of them in half. Born on a 1.1-g world, he was stronger than he looked, and he looked like a bouncer.
The divestiture was followed by a pat-down after they closed the outer door. This discovered Sass’s tab and generator, explained as necessary to maintain contact with her ship. She demonstrated a quick conversation with Clay, without explaining the generator’s role.
“Ivett promised to help us establish compatible communications,” Sass concluded. “We need these.”
“If one of those devices is used offensively, your lives are forfeit.”
“Of course,” Sass agreed breezily.
16
Vast migrations attempted to flee into the temperate zones, as tropics and subtropics grew untenable.
Three-Eight cast his eyes to the right and the airlock began pressurizing. Sass’s ears popped. Their escorts removed their rebreathers, hanging them on the hooks provided. The Thrive team racked their apparatus.
Again without touch control, or even a reassuring green-for-Go light, the inner door opened onto a corridor like a servant’s entrance, narrow and dim and devoid of decoration. Flat-mounted door panels with small room number plaques lined either side, anonymous. The overhead was low, only a foot above Kaol’s head, and glowed slightly. The battleship grey floor offered some give, like a hard rubber that canceled echoes.
Sass hadn’t learned how to operate the airlock that shut behind them. Without comms, perhaps they couldn’t. She urgently needed to make friends here.
Three-Eight took the lead along with Tufted-Ears, while the other two brought up the rear. They walked a good five minutes along a wandering path, taking rights and lefts, and climbed an industrial-style two-flight staircase. The decor altered on the second floor, with a corridor broader and brighter, though still hushed and seemingly empty.
Around the next turn, Ivett stood in mid-corridor, smiling. Her enormous eyes were even more off-putting in person. Sass stopped and offered steepled Denali prayer-fingers, certain her team-mates would mimic that one. “So good to meet you! Now is this the Academy?”
Three-Eight swept a shoo! gesture at his three men, but took station against the corridor wall himself.
“Thank you for showing us in!” Sass called after them. Tufted-Ears broke ranks and shot her a spooked glance over his shoulder. She hoped he wouldn’t be punished.
Ivett pretended the soldiers didn’t exist. “No, the Academy is this way!” She led onward, up three flights of stairs, and possibly to the other side of the dome complex. If the locals were trying to make Sass lost, they didn’t understand what it took to fly a spaceship.
“May I ask, how many people live in Killingfield?”
Three-Eight cleared his throat aggressively while Ivett ignored him. “Twenty thousand. Most are about the same size in Upstate.”
“Yet you have your own soldiers? Or are they shared?”
Ivett glanced to Three-Eight this time. “I’m not familiar with the military. Born to academia.”
Sass gazed brightly at the lieutenant. He ignored her. “So these domes are, what, about twenty miles apart?”
“I wouldn’t know.”
“I’m intrigued by your eyes. And his fur. I’m not sure how to put this…?”
Ivett glanced around their faces. “You’re unimproved. That’s rare here.”
“But the people outside. How do they breathe? And the animals.”
Ivett’s mouth gaped in delight. “You saw an animal? What kind?”
“A chipmunk, a couple squirrels. And a few people.”
“I’d love to see an animal,” their guide purred in rapture. “Did you touch it?”
“I did,” Eli agreed. “Soft fur, cute stripes.”
“It didn’t run away?!” Widened, Ivett’s eyes took over half her face.
Eli allowed, “I’m afraid we caught it for dissection. I hope that’s alright.”
She shrugged. “Our scientists would have done the same. Here you can catch a glimpse of the agricultural dome.” She stepped to a narrow balcony onto a deep well and craned her neck to point up. Then she withdrew to give her guests room to look.
The Thrive team stepped forward, a tight fit. The balcony overlooked an interior atrium sized like an elevator shaft. The garden enthusiasts peered upward perhaps six stories to a mass of bright green.
The engineer was more interested in the glowing walls. Sass saw him nick the paint, then thrust his glowing fingernail into his pocket.
“What’s growing up there?” Sass asked.
“I wouldn’t know,” Ivett demurred.
“Sweet potatoes,” Eli and Kaol replied confidently. The tuber was the mainstay of the Denali diet.
Sass finally spotted the tell-tale flowers behind their confidence. So much for getting a tour of the gardens from Ivett. Perhaps she could ask for a gardener’s tour later. “So you call your mayor the Dictator? Does this mean you’ve given up democracy?”
Ivett huffed a laugh. “Democracy was repudiated centuries ago! Before the American collapse. A hundred years before the Diaspora!”
“Oh, they still pretended for a while,” Sass contradicted her.
“Not according to our history.”
Darren asked, “What is this paint made of?”
Ivett laughed uncomfortably. She glanced an appeal to Three-Eight, who shrugged.
“Do you have this paint in your apartment, too?” Sass asked to advance Darren’s cause. “Glowing ceiling?”
“My – Would you like to see my room? It’s just around the corner.”
“Oh, I would love that!” Sass pounced. “If you’re sure it’s not an imposition.”
“No, not at all! This way.” Ivett swallowed and cast a nervous glance at Three-Eight, who pursed his lips wryly but made no move to block this evolution. The woman hastened her steps. At her door, she touched the number panel, and the door slid to the side.
Most of the doors on Thrive operated the same way, for the same reason – to save space. Ivett’s apartment seem
ed to be a single modest room, about eight by ten paces. White walls brightened blankly. A single upright chair, no arms, sat in pride of place as the sole furniture. Three-Eight appeared just as interested as Sass, but scowled.
By which Sass surmised that Three-Eight had to share a room, or perhaps enjoyed a much smaller or less…featured one. “This is bright and cheerful.” The guys crowded in behind her. The bulky Kaol and Three-Eight wedged themselves into corners.
“Do you sleep on a futon?” Sass asked brightly.
“A what? Oh! Please, sit.”
Sass obediently took the only chair. Ivett put it through its paces from upright chair, to recliner, to narrow bed.
Sass preferred to sleep on her side, with freedom to flop between positions, and a pillow munged under her cheek, blankets caught between her knees. But the couch was comfortable, she supposed, and it cranked up the warmth in a cool room.
“Work,” Ivett said.
The walls came alive. Neatly boxed, a number of coworkers appeared, with various nonhuman features, some focused on their tasks, others glancing up surprised at the sudden intrusion of Sass. She smiled and waved. An older woman of battle-ax temperament shot a quick imperious wave, and the walls blanked.
“Ah, that was my boss,” Ivett excused unnecessarily. “News.” This caused the walls to come alive with an overwhelming info dump, video clips, talking heads with the sound off, and headline ticker-lines.
Three-Eight overrode this in a split second. “Canoe the Everglades.”
The walls instantly switched to give a convincing 360-degree virtual of canoeing through a swamp, including the front and back of the canoe. A surround soundtrack completed the immersion. Sass could hear the drips from her paddle, side to side. The seat gently rocked beneath her. The idealized Everglades were devoid of power lines or human relics, replete with birds and crocodiles. She admired the artistry. The real wetlands joined the Atlantic before she was born. She abruptly exited the chair, to offer someone else a turn.
In the shuffle, Darren accidentally opened a closet, automatically lit. Intrigued, Sass asked, “Do you mind?” Ivett’s expression looked a bit pinched, but she waved a be-my-guest.
A simple shelf held neatly folded camisoles, panties, and socks. Hangers supported a number of workday outfits much like what Ivett wore now, plus a royal-blue-and-yellow academic gown, and a single little black dress. A compact clothes-washer unit sat in one corner, facing off against a floor cleaning robot. Was this all she owned?
Meanwhile for Eli’s entertainment – he’d mounted the chair – Ivett invoked a drama called Dome Confidential. Furtive lovers in a dim bathroom whispered breathless melodrama about discovery. They stole a kiss entirely too chaste for Sass’s taste. Ivett’s attention was riveted. Eli grimaced.
But Three-Eight overrode the program. “Agriculture sentry patrol.” The walls reconfigured from the point of view of someone strolling the dome catwalks through the crops. Eli quickly evacuated the seat to soak up details, Kaol likewise diverted.
Sass and Darren made quick work of exploring the closet, then the bathroom. Sass even scored one of those camisoles to try later, curious how lingerie technology had evolved. Darren chipped the paint again.
“This is so generous of you!” Sass gushed to Ivett. “Your room is luxurious!”
Three-Eight raked his gaze around the room and nodded sourly.
“Oh, thank you!” Ivett gushed, honestly pleased. “I only received my doctorate a couple years ago. But I hope for a bigger room. When I’ve earned it.”
Sass widened her eyes in maximum effort to look impressed. At a guess, the girl had already invested twenty years of skull sweat to earn this windowless hole. Ivett was proud of her home. And Sass doubted she’d ever worn that little black dress, or tore it off in a hurry. She only dreamed of furtive kisses in a…bathroom.
Ivett ventured, “So you’re descended from people…outside the domes? Stragglers.”
“We are,” Sass agreed, taking care to keep a beaming smile glued on. She didn’t know refuges like this existed back then. If she had, as a cop she wouldn’t have lifted a finger to protect the dome from an angry mob demanding their heads. Clay, the privileged lout, probably knew all along. “Stragglers. Tell me, how are they able to breathe outside?”
Three-Eight cleared his throat aggressively. Ivett glanced at him and murmured, “We aren’t talking about the stragglers.”
The good lieutenant volunteered, “The captain claimed she was born in the Apple ruins. Was it 2020?”
“In 2090,” Sass corrected, wishing she hadn’t divulged that. “Warp drive, you know.”
She might have gotten away with that on Ivett, but not Three-Eight. “You warped enough to lose a century? I think not.”
Eli intervened aggressively. “Ivett, what subject is your PhD?”
She fluttered her hands gratefully. “I’m an historian.” Sass’s brows flew up. “Art history.” The walls brought up a collection of artworks. Sass stared at the Campbell’s Soup can, her smile creaking. “Andy Warhol! Are you familiar with him?”
“No, sorry.”
Kaol’s people lived and breathed art, and Warhol’s tacky humor didn’t qualify. His face grew extra bland.
Darren completed his study of the bathroom. “On to the Academy? I’m so looking forward to it! And your communications protocols.”
As they decamped, Ivett sounded wistful. “Your homes are very different. Aren’t they.” It wasn’t a question.
“You should come visit!’ Sass invited. “Both of you, Three-Eight. Um, perhaps just the two of you. Dinner? It’ll be fun!”
Ivett recoiled, but Three-Eight stepped forward eagerly. “Yes! Now?”
“Uh, after the comms?”
The Academy proved close by. The campus featured a small park, open to the dome above. The size of a modest living room, it featured grass and flowers, artificially lit, and park benches. A middle-aged man stood contemplating a sundial, ignoring them. Sass doubted a sunbeam could achieve the right angle to reach it.
Ivett led them past window wall corridors showing adults in cubicles, seemingly staring at blank walls, though their hands danced, possibly on virtual controls visible only to themselves. Then their guide pushed through another door to reach a gatekeeper behind a reception desk, who glanced up from his abbreviated desk wall. Blank metal eyes appeared a near match to Assistant Dictator Riu’s.
Apparently Ivett had forewarned the man, Terrance, of their errand. He took custody of Kaol’s comm tab, least likely to contain anything problematic. Darren leaned in to observe and offer pointers.
Possibly to distract himself from personal photos on his comm tab, Kaol asked, “Three-Eight. Is there also a Three-Seven and Three-Nine?”
“It’s my rank, yes,” the soldier replied.
“So you get promoted to Three-Seven? And change your name?”
“Three-Seven is a brother lieutenant,” the man corrected. “A promotion would take me into the twenties.”
“And maybe someday up to one!” Sass suggested cheerfully.
Three-Eight grimaced. “No.”
Sass nodded sympathetically. She knew better than to follow up on that one. “When you leave the army, do you also…?” She tapped her ordinary human nose.
“Change my mods? Of course,” Three-Eight replied. Ivett nodded emphatically.
“Is that painful? I mean, is it surgery, or…?”
Three-Eight pressed his lips into a straight line.
Ivett missed the hint. “Oh, no! It’s under anesthesia. They induce a coma while the new genetic mosaic grows in.” Her fingers sketched a wave by her nose and eyes. “This took a year. And they installed my computer at the same time.” She tapped the metal band around the back of her head.
“Fascinating,” Sass assured her, impressed that Eli guessed correctly. “And you change these mods over the course of your life?”
“I won’t, no,” said Ivett, shrinking back. “But the military mod
s…” Her voice trailed off as she caught Three-Eight’s snarl. “Maybe those are different.”
The hardware guy declared the comm tab unable to interface. Darren pocketed it rather than return the unit to its rightful owner. While Terrence brought out C-shaped devices with a prong in the middle, much like belt buckle. He stood to show Darren how to wear one on his left ear, with the prong adjusted to reach into the ear canal and clamp the thing securely in place.
“D-K-L-F-L-D-eight-six-one-seven-two,” Darren acknowledged. “That’s my ID on your net? Dome Killingfield 86172?”
Terrence froze an instant, then nodded. “Children’s access to the data wave. Adults don’t use these. We embed. You speak to it normally. The NLP takes care of the rest – natural language processor. Wake it with ‘Dome Request Killingfield,’ then state your question.”
Sass claimed one of the devices and hooked it onto her ear. She ignored her ID code. “Dome Request Killingfield, when is dinner?”
Her earpiece replied, “Supper is in forty-seven minutes at Academy Refectory. Minimum age sixteen to enter.”
“Did you hear that answer? Or just me?” she asked Ivett impishly. “It’s probably time to head back to my ship, or you’ll be late for supper. I’ll call ahead.” She took out her comm tab and texted Corky to lay on something impressive, and tell Clay. “Shall we?”
Mission accomplished, she wanted to get out of here like a bat out of hell, while cementing her new friendships. If she got out of this dome without further negative incident, she’d count the day a win of epic proportions.
“Let’s go!” the wolf man confirmed with gusto. He led the way. Darren fell in beside Sass with an expression like the cat in the creamery. Kaol and Eli fell instantly to muttering to their earpieces.
Unfortunately, Three-Eight hadn’t forgotten his earlier arithmetic, or someone prompted him. “So you claim to be 128 years old. How many of them did you live? Instead of lose to the warp.”
