* * *
When Medic Jones re-appeared in the biochemistry lab, I’d had no choice but to get on with the task I had been set that morning. Whenever I was alone, I was resolutely ignoring the tests taking place around me, and running through various options for getting Cassie and I out of the Family Quarter.
The door to the lab opened, but I didn’t bother looking up, expecting another Medic dropping something off.
“Medic Jones?”
Hearing Cassie’s voice was a complete shock. I turned around and found her intent on the Medic, not looking in my direction.
“Hello Cassie,” the Medic replied.
“I’m sorry to interrupt, but Medic Karlina asked me to bring Balik to the orientation reception.”
My confusion deepened. What possible reason could Medic Karlina have for bringing Cassie and I together at this time of day? Whatever it was, I was sure it would not tie in with my plans – perhaps we could make a break for it now?
“Of course,” I heard Medic Jones say. He turned to me then. “Please go with Cassie.”
I was already on my feet before Medic Jones even spoke, responding directly to Cassie’s words. She nodded politely to him as we left the room. Only I noticed that the scanner at the door only sounded a single double-beep instead of two. The Medic didn’t react to the fact that it didn’t detect Cassie at all.
Cassie led the way along the corridor, until she paused outside the doorway to the emergency stairwell. She looked over my shoulder, apparently checking the corridor behind me.
“Do you have your band with you?” she whispered, lifting her sleeve to reveal a pale flash of silver at her wrist, before letting it fall back into place.
I nodded and pulled the matching band from my pocket, slipping it onto my wrist. Cassie nodded back, and opened the door to the stairwell. The scanner made no sound at all as we passed through.
We walked down the stairs, our footsteps echoing quietly. The sound rebounded against the hard resin walls, before being muffled into silence.
“What’s going on?” I whispered, as we hurried along.
“Father came to see me today, to tell me to go straight home this evening. His mind told me there would be a welcoming committee waiting for me to fall asleep. I checked in with your mother as well – just to be sure – there were identical arrangements for you.”
“So, what are we doing?” I asked, half-realising that we were about to run away.
“We’ve no time left for working this out: we need to get out of the system and then decide what options we have.”
I couldn’t agree more.
We had reached the ground floor entrance level of The Clinic. I pulled Cassie back, just as she was about to lead the way out of the stairwell. Keeping her hand, I guided her back towards the stairs, which continued down another level, to the basement storerooms of The Clinic.
“If we’re getting out of the system then we’re going to need some supplies,” I told her. And where better to equip ourselves with clothes, medication and equipment than here?
Cassie shrugged her shoulders, silently asking me what the hell I was talking about.
I grinned back. “This is where my irritating habit of wanting to know how things work, actually comes in useful.”
The Rainbow Maker's Tale Page 37
