by James Axler
Brigid leaned back against the examination table and gathered her thoughts. She had never heard of Ioville, knew of no baron of that name. It made no sense, which meant she wasn’t seeing the whole picture yet.
As she lay there, waiting, Brigid triggered her Commtact again and subvocalized a message, her teeth clamped shut. “Kane? Help me.” It was all she could manage before another figure entered the room—this one a man in his forties wearing white pants and a white blazer with a white shirt beneath, buttoned up to the neck, but collarless.
The man took the datapad from the blonde and Brigid saw his eyes scan the notes she had put there. He cast a disinterested look at Brigid, then handed the datapad back to the woman.
“The subject is awake,” the woman told the newcomer.
He simply nodded before leaning over Brigid and unbuttoning her top. Strapped down and still recovering from sedation, Brigid could not fight back as the man and woman stripped her then checked her body, measuring various aspects and checking for signs of disease or damage. They were drawn by the scar that ran down the nape of her neck where Ullikummis had removed her old transponder, but otherwise they concluded that she was healthy and in an acceptable condition for ville induction.
“How was the other one?” the woman asked as the two of them pawed at Brigid like a hunk of meat.
“He performed admirably,” the man replied. “He’s already being taken through Orientation prior to being assigned a role.”
Grant, Brigid realized. They were talking about Grant. She closed her eyes in frustration as the man measured the length of her legs and took holos of her naked body lying on the slab.
* * *
THE SNOW VEHICLE seemed to lurch and the terrain showing on the rolling display before Kane shuddered as the display adjusted.
Kane watched, his eyes flicking to each of the screens arrayed before him. They had been circling a long time, but now they were heading inward, running a slow spiral that would take them—where?
Kane looked at the radar, compared it to the other displays and to what he had seen before. They were heading toward that bright spot that had been fixed in the center of the circuit the whole time—that one spot which the snow-making vehicle had been circling at an even distance for the past three hours.
Kane watched as the displays flickered and refreshed, making the slow change that indicated they were on their way...home?
Designated Task #014: Education
Parents do not raise their children; instead, that task is left to dedicated citizens assigned to child rearing in grand residences on Beta Level. All children must be educated. Ioville has an admirably high birthrate, thanks to the use of a dedicated eugenics program, and birth survival rate is held at a steady 99.8 percent.
All children are assigned an identifier at birth that utilizes an N—for New—next to the identifying letter. Hence, the most recent birth, a boy, was registered as Citizen 304MN. The N is important—Supreme Magistrate Webb wishes to differentiate the population by those born here and those, like me, who were inducted. My understanding is that this relates to a medical program which studies the effects of viral control.
From birth, the children are schooled for seven hours of every day. They are taught language and math along with practical skills that will serve them well in their service to the ville.
Weren’t these...? Weren’t there once workstations there? On Beta Level? I can picture them in my mind’s eye. Yet...
The thought passes and I perform my tasks with due diligence. I am asked to teach the Year Three children reading and writing skills so that they can understand written commands. They are keen learners.
Beta Level feels familiar in its unfamiliarity. I raise this question to my superior, Citizen 455F, who dismisses it with a shake of her head. “This area has always been dedicated to child rearing and child education. No other tasks have been performed here in the entire history of Ioville.”
The word history makes me baulk, and I dwell on this while my class of six-year-olds perform their exercises. Once the lesson is over, I return to the supervisor and raise the question that I have framed during the hour I have had to think.
“Should history not be taught to the children, too?” I ask.
“It is,” Supervisor Citizen 455F assures me. “Once they are older, they learn of the Program of Unification, the history of the baronies and the villes, and the role the benevolent barons have played in the establishment of Ioville.”
I accept this with a curt nod, but I feel that it has not answered the real question—the question at the heart of my question, the one I cannot frame into words.
—From the journal of Citizen 619F.
Chapter 11
Kane watched the vehicle displays slowly alter over the next three-quarters of an hour, confirming his suspicion that he was moving toward the central spot that the behemoth had circled for the past three hours. The ride was bumpy; no consideration had been given to a passenger’s comfort. Presumably the vehicle was designed to run unmanned and this cabin-type area was only provided for diagnostics checks and repairs. But even that told Kane something—that there was someone behind this, someone who sent out and maintained this vehicle as it trekked its slow circuit of the snow-shrouded terrain.
As they drew closer to the central spot, Kane saw another illuminated spot moving across the radar. He watched it for several minutes before confirming that it was moving, headed toward the central spot. That suggested perhaps another vehicle like this one, also dedicated to the creation and distribution of the artificial snow.
Kane watched the display screens as his ride took him toward that mysterious central spot. The terrain tracker showed something in the distance, displayed as a computer-generated wire-frame model. Kane felt a sense of eerie familiarity as the model became more detailed—it was a ville, like the one he had grown up in and served as Magistrate for so many years prior to Cerberus.
Kane continued tracking his progress on the displays as the great wagon rumbled toward the ville, lining up with a set of tall gates on the eastern side. Something flickered on one of the control panels, and Kane watched as the gates—still shown as wire models—drew back into the ville walls to allow access into the ville itself. Something else happened then, which Kane noticed out of the corner of his eye—the pressure gauges dropped suddenly, the needles sinking back to their start points. All around him, the great rumbling that he had associated with the chimney ceased, leaving the cab suddenly feeling very quiet and still.
Kane took that moment to try his Commtact again, hailing Cerberus, hailing Grant, hailing Brigid. To his frustration, no answer came back.
Without an exterior view, it was hard to be certain, but Kane sensed that the vehicle had given no indication of slowing. A vehicle like this took so much power to accelerate that it was likely that it was designed not to slow unless absolutely necessary, and even then it would most probably coast to a stop rather than braking. The vehicle rumbled on toward and through the gates before finally shuddering to a halt. Panels shook and Kane’s seat jounced as if he were caught in an earthquake. But it wasn’t the stop that caused this—rather, Kane suspected that they were dropping down on some kind of elevator platform. All around him, the displays held fixed images, no further input required. Which meant, Kane realized, that wherever it was they were going they were almost there.
He moved swiftly then, moving with a sense of urgency as he climbed out of the seat and hurried back along the access tunnel within the colossal vehicle. Arrival meant one thing—people. And if someone caught him inside here before he had had a chance to figure out just what was going on, then he could find himself in serious trouble or worse—on the wrong end of a blaster with an ask-no-questions attitude working the trigger.
Kane trotted swiftly along the shaft and scrambled back up the ladder. A sma
ll mound of snow had settled at the bottom where he had left the roof hatch open and the rungs were wet with a dusting of ice. There were no lights in here, no illumination. Instead Kane had to rely on the polymer lenses to keep everything straight—otherwise he would have been in absolute darkness right now.
The chimney pumps had ceased, and the tunnel containing the access ladder now acted like any other tube, echoing the sounds coming from outside. Kane heard the low, duo-tonal whine of a motor—probably the elevator platform as it sunk beneath the ville.
Kane was about six feet from the uppermost rung when the elevator stopped with a great echoing thump. He stopped, too, holding himself in place and stilling his breathing. The loud rumble of a door sliding back carried down the access shaft, accompanied by a faint trace of light. Then the vehicle began to move again, shuddering ahead and into a lit area that cast bright shadows through the hatchway above.
Waiting there, Kane watched, taking in what little he could from his restricted view. There was a plastered ceiling up there with long strip lights descending from rigs. As the vehicle rumbled on, Kane saw more of the lights pass overhead.
Then came a lurch—not too powerful, but enough that Kane had to secure his balance on the ladder—and the wagon finally came to a halt amid a growl of shuddering engine. Kane waited a few moments, listening to the sounds of the vast room he was now in. There were echoes of movement, the screech of compressed air and pumped water, pressure hoses and the whirring spin of nuts, screws or perhaps whole panels being removed.
Kane decided to risk a peek up top. He clambered up the last few rungs of the ladder. As he reached the topmost rung, the vehicle shuddered once more and he was forced to cling tightly for a moment as the column he was poised in shook. Above him, he saw the ceiling with its strip lights slowly rotating, accompanied by the high-pitched sound of a straining motor. After ten seconds, the sound of the motor came to an abrupt halt and the rotation stopped. Kane waited again, situated just beneath the roof hatch, watching the space above. Nothing more happened, and all he could hear were the general sounds he had detected as soon as the vehicle entered this room.
Kane warily popped his head up over the manhole rim and peered outside. All he could see was the flat, snow-covered rooftop of the vehicle, beside which the white-painted chimney towered like a lighthouse. From what he could see of the room, it was a high, enclosed space with strip lighting, plastered walls and ceiling. Definitely man-made.
Kane waited a moment, the top of his head just poking out of the hatch, ready to command his Sin Eater back into his hand at a moment’s notice. But nothing came to threaten him—it seemed he had not been spotted, if there were even anyone to spot him in light of the automated system driving the snow wagon.
Kane drew himself up above the manhole edge until he could pull himself up, sitting on the rim and leaving his knees dangling inside. From this position he could see more of the room. It was some kind of garage; that much was obvious. The space was as large as a football field and encompassed several bays where repairs and construction were ongoing. There were two more of the towering wagons besides the one he was sitting atop, one of them showing a similar coating of snow on its rooftop while the other was clean. The latter had been placed up on jacks and a side panel had been removed where two men in gray overalls were working inside, a wheeled bed of tools sitting beside them.
Kane looked around the room, counting the number of people within. He could see thirteen in all, dressed in matching gray overalls and all of them working intently, with no chatter, no distractions. Unlike many garage areas, there was no music playing here, just the steady sounds of work as men and women repaired the towering vehicles, the hiss of acetylene torches being used to weld panels into place.
Repair shop, Kane told himself as he turned his head, taking everything in.
Reassured that no one seemed to have noticed him—there were no walkways or guard positions high up at least—Kane pulled himself out of the hatchway and walked at a crouch across the rooftop, searching for a way down.
There were people down there—just mechanics, he guessed, but it wouldn’t do to alert them to his presence.
From up here it appeared that Kane’s vehicle was resting on a gigantic turntable and he saw similar turntables located around the room, included beneath the other parked wagons. Down below, a team of three mechanics was marching across the floor toward this new arrival, carrying work tools and bags, heads down. Kane noticed something else, too—the floor itself was clean, so clean that it gleamed. That was unusual for a servicing area like this; usually one would expect oil stains and the trace of old tire tracks, metal pieces and discarded screws. But no, this room was evidently kept meticulously clean.
Kane looked around. There were three obvious exits visible from this position, and possibly others that were currently obscured by the towering smokestack of the vehicle.
One exit was a wide set of very tall doors that closed top on bottom, like a set of jaws. Kane deduced that this was the elevator through which he had entered the chamber.
The other two exits were normal doorways found past the other snow-speckled wagon, located against the walls. Where they led, Kane could not guess, so he watched them a moment to see if anyone appeared. After about ten seconds, a woman in gray overalls came through the right-most door carrying a large leather tool bag, her frizzy blond hair cinched back in a tight ponytail, bangs tucked under a gray cap. Could be a tool storage area, could be an exit. Kane could not be certain—the only thing he could reasonably assume was that it was not a restroom, as no mechanic should need to carry their tools within—well, not unless the toilets had backed up. So, that told him something anyhow.
One of the team below him moved toward the ladder while the other two pulled back a panel on the side of the unit and brought over a hose-like attachment, which they placed inside. Refuelling, Kane guessed.
He watched for a moment as the figure stood at the base of the ladder and began his ascent, then Kane ducked back out of sight, sweeping his foot through the snow behind him to cover his tracks from casual examination.
The man had to be coming up here to check on the hatch, look at the insides maybe. Which meant Kane couldn’t be found here.
Swiftly, Kane moved back to the hatch and pulled it closed. It wouldn’t do to alert the engineer too quickly to his presence.
That done, he moved around to the edge of the chimneylike pipe, covering his tracks, and waited, watching the space where the external ladder emerged. The head of the mechanic appeared about fifteen seconds after, climbing the final rungs before pulling himself up over the side. Kane tensed, watching the man from his hiding place around the curve of the chimney. The man was oblivious to him, stone-faced, eyes dull almost as if drugged, a head lamp attached to his cap.
Kane waited, watching as the mechanic disappeared, walking across the far side of the chimney. Kane kept pace, keeping his movements fluid and silent. He halted when he reached the far side of the chimney. The gray-garbed engineer was already there, crouching down to lift the hatch that led inside the hulking vehicle. Kane hurried forward, creeping up behind the man before grabbing him from behind, his hand over the mechanic’s mouth.
The mechanic struggled for just a moment as Kane put pressure on his windpipe. His legs kicked out and he released a muffled yelp that sounded more like a whisper through the sleeve of Kane’s jacket. It took thirty seconds, holding the man like that, moving in sympathy as he bucked this way and that. The fight went out of him first, followed by the breath. In under a minute, the man was unconscious.
Kane laid him out on the snowy roof, then stalked away. A moment later he stood at the back end of the vehicle, studying the room beyond. There was no easy way down—if he used the ladder he would be spotted and challenged, but he needed to get across to one of those doors or he would simply be trapped here, waiting for the unco
nscious mechanic to wake up and raise the alarm.
Kane looked around the room until his eyes settled on one of the other colossal vehicles that were here for refuelling and maintenance. The one on the jacks was a little higher than his rooftop, but it was close enough that—with a run up—he could jump across to it. Without any further thought, Kane backed up to give himself a running start, then leaped from the edge of his wagon and onto the next. His arms reached out, grabbing the side, and he used his forward momentum to swing himself up. A moment later he was secure atop the second wag.
No one had noticed.
Kane trotted along the length of the vehicle, making his way to the rear. Once there, he peered down, eyeing the twin doorways positioned along the wall. From here he could reach the nearer of the two with ease and, crucially, without being seen. All he had to do was get down to ground level, which meant using the rear-mounted ladder, which was backed up against a wall.
After giving the area a once-over to make sure that the mechanics working on it were still at the open panel, Kane slipped over the side of the vehicle and clambered down the ladder, moving swiftly, hand and foot.
Ten seconds later he was at the base of the ladder, stepping out onto the floor of the vast maintenance room for the first time. Without a backward glance, Kane trotted hastily over to the door he had spied the frizzy-haired mechanic exit and slipped through it, pulling the door closed behind him so that it did not slam.
Kane found himself in a corridor, amid cool still air with no sense of warmth. Blank, pale walls and dull overhead lighting cast it in a grayness of eternal shadow. The walls were a kind of dirty white in color, like snow turning to sludge. The corridor had other doors leading from it and the smell of cafeteria food wafted from somewhere close by, a kind of greasy, stewed pungency that made Kane want to sneer. There were noises, too, rotary fans and air coolers, the clatter of footsteps coming from somewhere within.