by Magus Tor
“There is something that I don't understand,” said Jonathon. “Why now? I mean, there should be a year or so before the elections; you can have a little more time if you need it.”
Elza shook her head. “No, I can't. The elections are going to be much sooner than you think. We need to move our schedule up.”
“What do you know?” said Jonathon sharply.
“As a med Worker, I can't tell you,” said Elza. “I can't share medical knowledge with you.” She reached into a pocket and pulled out her personal screen. Clicking on icons, she smiled in satisfaction. “However, now that I've just resigned from the hospital, I can.”
“You seriously just resigned?” said Aurelia.
“I wanted to check with Jonathon before I sent the communication, but yes,” Elza said.
“So, now tell us what you know,” Jonathon demanded.
“I have—well, had—access to all the medical records on Lunar,” said Elza, carefully. “And this afternoon I noticed an addition made to a certain file. The file was that of the President, and the addition was made by his personal physician.”
“And?” prompted Aurelia impatiently.
“He's ill,” Elza said simply. “He's dying. And as soon as that happens, elections will be held.”
“How long?” Jonathon said.
“Weeks,” answered Elza. “Maybe less. That's all the time we've got.”
Chapter Three
Aurelia watched as Jonathon's face paled, but she also saw his jaw hardening.
“Fine,” he said, after a while. “Then that's that. We'd better get going.”
“Hold up,” said Aurelia. “Question: If he's dying, why isn't he just injected? I mean, why are resources being spent on him?”
Elza shook her head. “The Ruling Class are very rarely injected,” she said. “If he were a Worker, he'd certainly be, but not Elite. His personal physician will keep him alive as long as possible. And the politicians will insist on it, even if that means he's a useless shell hooked up to machines—anything to stop the status quo changing.”
Aurelia sighed. It was just one more example of the privilege of the Ruling Class. Like she needed to know any more.
“Are you ready for this, Jonathon?” Elza asked him.
He simply nodded.
Aurelia knew that this was what he'd been waiting for his entire life—working for, planning for—and she couldn't imagine how she would feel in his place. He must be terrified and exhilarated all at the same time, but the only clue as to how he was feeling was his pallid face.
He pushed his plate of food away. “I think the best thing for right now is that the two of you gather your things and come with me. Elza, you've already resigned, and Aurelia, you may as well do the same. We'll leave for Earth as soon as possible, and in the meantime you can both stay with me. It'll be more convenient and mean that we're ready to leave at a moment’s notice.”
Elza stood up. “Give me ten minutes,” she said, and left.
Aurelia looked at Jonathon, still sitting on the floor, and decided that he needed to be left with his thoughts. She went to her room, grabbed a duffel bag, and began to throw her possessions inside. It took her all of two minutes. As a Worker, she didn't exactly own much: a few clothes, a couple of personal items, her screen. When she was done, she took a last look around her room, remembering how she'd felt when she'd left home the last time. But unlike leaving her parents’ home, here she'd only stayed for a few weeks. The place meant nothing. The thought made her grin. When she'd first arrived, being posted in Lunar City Hospital had been everything to her, all that she'd ever wanted. It was amazing how much her priorities had changed in those few short weeks.
All because of Jonathon, she thought, taking her bag back to the living pod, where he was pacing the floor, waiting. She was struck suddenly by how deep her feelings ran for him. Dropping her bag on the couch, she stopped him mid-pace.
“Mmm?” he said distractedly.
“Jonathon,” she began, not thinking, just letting the words come out. “Jonathon, I love you. I just wanted you to know. No matter what happens next, I love you.”
His face relaxed, and he wrapped his arms around her. “And I you,” he murmured into her hair.
They stood for a while, Aurelia feeling his heart beat and the warmth that radiated from him. Until there was a cough from the door.
“Sorry to interrupt,” Elza said, grinning wickedly. She had a large bag over one shoulder, packed with possessions accumulated over years spent here in the hospital. But she showed no signs of being sorry to leave.
“Let's go!” said Jonathon.
His transport pod was waiting outside the hospital, and as he and Elza climbed in, Aurelia took a second to look back. The huge building towered above her, almost to the dome itself. Bright lights shone from its windows, and if she looked carefully she could see the shadows of people flitting back and forth. Her father had told her to look on leaving as both an end and a beginning. And though she had little choice but to go, for that brief second she stood and watched her old life. Then she turned and got into the pod.
The pod rose and slid gently away. Jonathon stared out the front window, eyes clouded with thought. Aurelia glanced at Elza, who was also looking out the window, and thought she saw the woman blink and swallow, just once. Then she shook her head, and Elza was back to normal. The journey to Jonathon's house was silent.
With Jonathon and Elza busy planning their escape, Aurelia found herself at a bit of a loose end the next day. She knew that if she asked, she'd be given some busy work to keep her occupied, but she also knew that there was little she could do to help, being so unfamiliar with Lunar. Instead, she placed a com call to Tara, who came hopping down the stairs from her own floor in the house a few minutes later.
“The grown-ups leaving you out?” she teased, her pink hair wrapped around her head like a crown.
“No,” Aurelia said defiantly. “Well, yes,” she relented. “But I'm not much use there anyway, so I wondered if there was something I could do to help you instead?”
Tara shrugged. “Well, I was going to go into the tunnels, talk to the Connectors. I wanted to find out where that barb that shot you came from and thought it might have come in from outside. I guess you can come if you want.”
Why not? Aurelia had been in the tunnels before, and whilst they weren't exactly nice, they weren't a terrible place to be either. Anyway, it'd be better than sitting around here all day, Aurelia told herself.
“Alright, I'm in,” she said.
“Sweetness. Give me, like, twenty minutes and I'll meet you out by the front door here, 'kay?”
Before Aurelia could even answer, Tara bounded off again. Aurelia envied her energy. She went down to the basement office and told Jonathon and Elza what she was up to, and both just nodded distractedly. Then she went off to change her shoes. The tunnels had hard concrete floors, uneven in places; and from painful experience, Aurelia knew that good footwear was important.
“Ready?” asked Tara, who was already waiting. The door of a transport pod was open beside her.
Aurelia jumped in, and then they were off.
“Where are we going?” she asked the pink-haired girl. The tunnels had official access points so that Workers could get down there to deal with the filtration systems for air and water, but presumably they weren't going to be using one of those. They had no permission to go into the tunnels. The last time Aurelia had been down, she'd also gone with Tara, through the premises of an underground nightclub.
“I got a key,” said Tara, somewhat mysteriously.
“A key to what?” pressed Aurelia.
“Gods, you're the one that wanted me to have this job in the first place, and now you're interrogating me?” Tara teased her, looking over from the pod console. “I got a key that will get us through to the tunnels; I should have thought that was obvious. Got it from a friend of mine. He smuggles stuff in and out sometimes, but he trusts me. It's not too far
away, don't worry.”
Figuring that that was all she was going to get, Aurelia decided to shut up and save her strength for walking the endless miles of the tunnels.
The pod pulled up in front of what looked like a large shopping arcade. There was a handful of Elite youths hanging around outside, but Aurelia supposed that it was too early for them to be really partying. The dome was still a pale blue, and from what she'd seen, the young here were generally pretty nocturnal.
“Come on,” said Tara, getting out.
Aurelia had never been into one of these arcades. She’d had no reason to. She had no disposable income, and as a Worker she was required to wear her uniform nearly everywhere anyway. The only chance she had to wear anything else was if she had Ruling Class permission to do so, something that Jonathon took care of usually. Tara grabbed her hand and pulled her in through the front door. And in a moment she was engulfed in colour, scent, and sound. All around her walked droids, humanlike robots, dressed in the latest Lunar fashions.
“If you don't speed up, then you'll be targeted,” said Tara impatiently.
Aurelia could already see several droids with the same kind of colouring as herself making their way towards her, hoping that they could entice her into buying the outfits they were wearing. She quickened her step and followed Tara across the floor. The girl went straight to an elevator bank and pressed the call button. Aurelia's head was spinning with the smells that wafted around her. Flowers, spices, fruits even. She supposed this was perfume, a sort of liquid that was splashed onto the skin, but she'd never owned any and now was glad that she didn't. The scents were strong, fake, and—whilst she could identify a lot of them—they bore only a passing resemblance to what they were supposed to smell like. She was glad when the elevator door opened and they got inside.
Tara pressed a button, and a keypad appeared; she put in a number, and the elevator started to slide downward.
“That wasn't your personal ID number, was it?” asked Aurelia, cautiously.
“Think I'm psych?” said Tara, with disgust. “’Course not. My friend gave me the number. No idea whose it is, but it works.”
Aurelia reminded herself that she really needed to give Tara more credit and stop assuming that she was just a kid. Then the elevator ground to a halt, and the doors opened into a half-lit basement that smelled of fuel and dust.
“Over here,” called Tara, making her way past machinery to the far wall.
She took a key from her pocket and used it to open a battered metal door. Once over the threshold, Aurelia knew they were in the tunnels.
“Where to now?” she asked, as Tara closed the door behind them.
“I got directions that should take us close to the edge of the dome, where we're more likely to see Connectors,” she said, pulling out her screen. “But we gotta be careful. There's Workers down here, and we shouldn't be seen.” She pulled up a map on her screen and studied it. “If we are seen, leave it to me, 'kay?”
Makes sense, thought Aurelia. Tara was Ruling Class, and no Worker would touch her. If they got caught, there was every chance that Tara could just pull rank and get them out of here. Shrugging, Aurelia followed the girl, who had already set off with a determined air.
They walked through the long tunnels, footsteps echoing. Once, Aurelia tried to ask a question, but Tara silenced her with a frown. Several turns and a half hour later, they were in the older tunnels with peeling paint and cracked floors, and Aurelia knew that meant that they were close to the edge of the dome.
Tara slowed down. Aurelia took the chance to catch up with her and lean in close. “Now what?” she whispered.
“I guess we either wait to get caught by the Connectors, or we wander around until we bump into one,” she whispered back. “I didn't plan this part—couldn't, really.”
Aurelia looked around. It seemed familiar here, but it was hard to tell, since the tunnels looked so similar. “Let's go this way,” she said, pointing towards a smaller corridor leading off the one they were in.
Tara looked at her and then nodded. “Why not?”
They walked more slowly now, and Aurelia was careful to be quiet. They had made it only halfway down the corridor, however, when in the flash of a second, Aurelia found herself kicking her legs off the floor with a large hand clamped over her mouth.
“Quiet!” a male voice hissed.
Looking over, Aurelia saw that Tara had also been lifted up from behind and silenced. A man in black was restraining her. Tara lifted her eyebrows as if to say “Well, it worked,” and Aurelia sighed inside.
Great. They'd found the Connectors. But explaining themselves was going to be tough, given that they couldn't actually speak. Resigning herself to what was going to happen, Aurelia relaxed and allowed herself to be carried. There was no point in making it more difficult, and they'd be permitted to speak at some point.
The two Connectors carried the women through the tunnels, taking turn after turn, and eventually they came to a series of doors. Aurelia thought that she'd been here before. Her suspicion was confirmed when the door opened, a large man came out, looked at her and said:
“You again?”
Aurelia and Tara were brought into the room, which was still piled with boxes. A table and chairs also sat inside; the place was just as Aurelia had last seen it. Finally released, Aurelia stretched her aching back.
“What do you want this time?” asked the large man.
Last time she'd bribed him with medical supplies to get out of the dome to find Nicholas. This time, however, it was Tara's turn to do the talking.
“I've got some questions,” the girl began.
The large man raised his eyebrows. “You have?” he said. “Just so happens that I don't like answering questions, so you're out of luck there.” His eyes went back to Aurelia. “Thought you might be here to welcome your friend back.”
“What?” she asked.
“Should be coming in any minute now, got Bryn with him.”
Now she understood. Nicholas was coming in, and she was just in time to welcome him. The thought brought a smile to her face. “Yes,” she said. “That's why we're here. We wanted to welcome him home, that's all.”
Tara frowned at her, and Aurelia narrowed her eyes in return, warning her to keep quiet. The man just grunted.
“Friend of Bryn can't get hurt, I suppose,” he said. “Wait here. I'll get someone to go see if they're in or not yet.”
He left them alone, and as soon as he was gone, Tara started talking. “You're totally ruining my investigation,” she said sulkily.
“Relax,” said Aurelia, grinning at the thought of seeing Nicholas again. “Bryn will be here soon, and you can ask him anything you want. If there's something to know, he'll be able to tell you.”
“Humph,” said Tara, obviously upset to have control of the situation taken out of her hands.
“Actually, there is one thing,” said Aurelia. “We should let Jonathon know as soon as possible that Nicholas and Bryn are here. I don't suppose...”
She was about to ask Tara if she could go back to send the message, but the girl interrupted her. “No prob with that,” she said. “Got a portable com. Should still work here—we're technically under the dome. I'll tell him. Think I can go out into the tunnel?”
Aurelia shrugged. “I don't think we're prisoners,” she said.
“Great. I'll get better reception out there, I think.”
She jumped up and opened the door, pausing to give Aurelia a smile before she went out. Left by herself, Aurelia was contemplating what on Earth could be inside all the boxes stacked around the walls, and was even thinking about taking a peek, when Tara came back.
“That was fast,” she said.
“Picked up immediately,” said Tara. “Um, so, here's the thing.”
She looked uncomfortable, and Aurelia wondered what Jonathon could have said to her.
“See, Jonathon says that you should stay down here. All of us, really. Then he and
Elza will come join us. Says there's no point delaying, and here's as good a departure point as any. So hang tight, and they'll come meet us.”
“Okay,” said Aurelia. Truthfully, she would have kind of liked the chance to say goodbye to Lunar City, though she assumed she'd be back at some point. But she could live with only having to walk through the tunnels once. “What's the catch here, though?” she asked. “You're looking at me strangely.”
Tara blushed. “Well, I told him we weren't prisoners or anything, and he said ‘Don't worry, she will be soon,’ and then laughed.”
Aurelia started to say something but stopped herself. Okay, it was a weird thing for him to say, but she was done questioning him. She had no doubt about Jonathon now. Whatever he’d meant, she was sure she'd find out soon, and she was certain that there was going to be a good explanation. She shrugged at Tara, who shook her head. “He'll explain when he gets down here, I guess.”
The door opened, almost knocking Tara off her feet, and a whirlwind blew in. For the second time in the last hour, Aurelia was swept off her feet, though this time in a huge hug.
“Nicholas!” she cried.
He squeezed her, then put her gently back on her feet. “What's new, kiddo?” he asked.
He looked good. Better than she'd imagined that he would after spending so long inside a breathing suit on the Lunar surface. His cheeks were flushed, and he exuded health. “Long story,” she said. “And since we're supposed to stay down here, I suppose I should start filling you in before the others come.”
“Not yet,” said a gruff voice.
Bryn sidled around Nicholas and held out his hand, which Aurelia shook, solemnly. Then he grinned. “Good to see you,” he said. “And your story can hold off until I've gotten these reprobates around here to get us sustenance; I'm starving.”
Around a table laden with food, Aurelia filled Bryn and Nicholas in on what had been happening. Nicholas grimaced when told that he was going to Earth, but made no comment. Bryn looked thoughtful.