by T Q Chant
“Ok, you got me curious, and I’ve got time to kill.” The door had a mechanical lock, but the grime that crusted it was the only real impediment for her opening it. Nothing that a squirt of multilube couldn’t sort; same for the hinges.
The door ground open, slowly even when she put her full weight against it. The air smelt stale but nothing more sinister than that, and the weak emergency lighting Adisa had coaxed into life didn’t extend into the space.
“Storage locker,” she sniffed, then sneezed as she inhaled disturbed dust. She flicked her torch on to give the space a cursory examination. Just empty racks and dust, until the beam of light hit a squat, metallic shape right at the back, forgotten and long-neglected.
“Hello, beautiful,” she said to the shape, while trying not to get her hopes up.
**********
The nights were cold out here; she hadn’t been prepared for that as the settlement had remained warm throughout the night. The depression it sat in obviously kept in the heat, at least until the sun rose to bake it again.
It didn’t really matter as she was working hard enough to break a sweat; probably worked in her favour although she’d have to be careful not to freeze after she stopped working.
“Fucking manual labour.” She hadn’t often needed to do much of this. Nobody did anymore, not like it had been on pre-Ascension Earth. A couple of jobs had required it in the past but she’d usually found some sap to do the heavy lifting.
Her fingers were bleeding from the sharp edges of the rocks she was digging out. She’d found a solitary warning post, bent by the wind and scoured by driven sand; in years past it was there to tell people to steer clear of the solar panels, now it told her wear to dig.
At least now, she knew, she only needed to clear enough to get a trickle of power, assuming all the connections were working. Just enough to kickstart Rover. It was still hard going, learning the hard way that she needed to shore up the sides with bigger slabs of stone to stop a constant aggravating flow of sand and pebbles into the pit she was digging.
Not long before dawn her hands finally contacted the smooth, hard surface of one long-buried panels. She actually whooped with triumph, then bit down on any further sound as her voice would travel far over the flat, cold desert plain. Feverishly she brushed grit and sand off the surface. It was a hard-wearing array, optimised for a second-gate colony with limited resources and expertise. Despite that fact, the surface had been scored and scratched in places.
“Should do it, just as long as everything is still wired together.” Adisa had checked what she could, but there were some sections that would have required specialist tools or taking apart the whole damn installation to get to.
She peered to the west, seeing the sky starting to turn grey with the threat of dawn. She'd cut the hole just about bang on, the western side angled to let as much light as possible hit the panel. She hurried back underground just as the first rays of the rising sun started blasting out.
CHAPTER TEN – MESSAGE IN A BOTTLE
Breakfast was, of course, protein bars and tepid water, eaten while sat cross-legged in front of Rover, watching his power level indicator like a hawk. She had an earpiece in, waiting for the first wake-up chatter from Cho’s mob, and the Glock sat in its holster by her right hand.
No more stun weaponry.
“Come on,” she urged. “Start flowing, you bastard.”
She knew – she’d known all along – that getting a message out was a long shot. She’d need to be luckier than she’d been for a while for the solar power system and its attendant power couplings to have remained fully functional after decades of neglect.
“Time’s like this, I sort of wish I believed in a god.” Mother Annalu would urge her to pray, even just to make herself feel better. She snorted – fat lot of good that would do. She’d stand or fall here on her own two feet and by the labour of her hands, not from the intervention of an imaginary friend.
She got up, checked the power couplings again, made sure they were seated properly, made sure Rover’s tail was plugged in.
Cho’s tac channel had come alive, just a rote litany of the patrols checking in with no sign of Sam. Then one of them said the one thing she didn’t want to hear.
++She can’t be here, Marshal. We’ve checked everything.+++
++Agreed. She’s offsite somewhere. Everyone come in and we’ll work out what to do next.+++
“Would be lovely of you just to discuss that over the comms.” The suit’s power indicator, set into a panel in his forearm, had started to glow. “Good boy, Rover. Why the fuck did they leave a sweet piece of kit like you lying around?”
She didn’t hold her breath, cross her fingers or ask for intervention. She just reached out and hit the activation key. After a breathless moment, and with much groaning and creaking, Rover came to life.
The pad had told her it was a MitsuBosch Model GT-45X Personal Labour Enhancer. Basically a civilian model of some of the old Reaper Force Multiplier Suits that had been downgraded for cargo handling when she’d been green machine and marketed as the Achilles. Two metres and change tall, half a metre wide, systems optimised for low-tech frontier work, complete with environment systems and armour sufficient to withstand heavy storm conditions or small (hardslug) arms fire. Batteries good for a day of solid use before needing recharge.
Achilles was a good name for the system, but someone had taken a plasma torch to the embossed letters on the carapace front and then scrawled on ‘Rover’. That’d do as well.
It took a moment for her pad to sync with his older systems and she had to stab the cancel icon several times when the system went looking for a software update. She keyed for human interface use, then stripped off her armour vest and left it next to the pistol as the cockpit clamshelled open. Even if there was room for her to go in armoured-up, she’d cook in the extra shell.
There was a distinct sense of comfortable familiarity as she pulled herself up, fitted her feet into the stirrups and leant back into the worn ergofoam couch. The cockpit, more of a cocoon really, should have automatically adjusted itself to fit snugly around her slight frame, but obviously gave up on that after a few half-hearted whirrs and clunks. She’d have to stretch to reach the pedals and hand grips, and she’d be rattled around the inside if Rover went over, but she could manage. Readouts and status displays glowed dimly, the system running on energy-saving power. A few minor systems were redlined or showing amber, but she had power and control and great mechanical arms that moved with her own weaker meat. The suit had been retrofitted with solar panels on his shoulders, so all she needed was to get him outside.
She took a moment, still feeling this minor triumph coursing through her, then got down to it. She knew it was only a matter of time before Cho and her people worked out where she was, even if this bright place thing did make them forget things. Now it was a question of weighing up probabilities – take the risk of going out in broad daylight and being spotted by a passing patrol, or hope they were dumber than they seemed.
“Rule five. Never assume the mark is stupider than you.”
She put Rover into walk mode. He was stiff, became sluggish on the low power reserve as his tail automatically disengaged. Enough juice to take the door of its hinges with a single swipe and a satisfying crash, though. She’d thought it odd that the corridors were so tall and wide; now she knew why as she swung left and headed for the exit, this time being sensible and opening it rather than demolishing it.
Up the ramp and into the searing daylight. Rover’s power levels jumped almost instantly, along with the temperature in the cockpit. There was no time for subtlety now, but she had the tools to be direct. She was ok with that, given the state of her battered and sliced hands that throbbed under layers of sprayskin. She started with last night’s excavation and got stuck in on the rocks and gravel, clearing the whole damn hillock rather than trying to dig down into it. She grinned as she hurled a hefty stone away – not
unlike some of her dad’s dogs on long rainy walks on the Northumbrian coast, just getting stuck in and kicking sand and shit everywhere.
It took her about two hours to clear the detritus off the panels, leaving just a rampart of sand and rock to hide the telltale gleam of the panels from anyone observing at ground level.
Her work was given an extra urgency by the tac channel she was monitoring. Cho may have quite sensibly briefed her people face-to-face, but the chatter on the channel suggested they were heading out into the desert to sweep for any hides she’d built.
“Rather you than me, mates. Fuck it, that’ll do.”
Clunking back inside, Rover definitely moving more easily now. She found it hard to believe he’d just been abandoned out here. Probably an admin error, or there were some underlying faults she wasn’t aware of. Nothing she needed to worry about now. She took the time to hook him back up, clanging over the destroyed door back into his kennel, and then sprinted through to the control room again. She was on the clock now, couldn’t risk pausing to gather up her kit as she had no idea how long the system would remain functional for.
She stared about wildly. Everything was still dead and her heart thudded to a halt. All that work... “Try switching it on, you daft bitch,” she told herself, lunging for the physical big red button Adisa had found somewhere and hardspliced in.
There was a crackle of power and the smell of ozone. Something shorted and sparks flew in a couple of places. A simple flat screen display in the middle of the room glowed into life, requiring her to log in.
“Fuck that,” she muttered, toothing the pad in and setting it to eat the security protocols. “Everything takes so fucking long out here.”
A voice crackled in her ear piece, signal coming through clearly. +++Hey Marshal, we’ve found the old jSpace array. Forgot about this place. Going to check it out.+++
Her blood froze in her veins. Her mind flashed to her armour rig and the pistol still lying in the kennel.
Access granted. A long list of error messages scrolled with agonising slowness up the screen. She hammered the emergency send icon, overrode the warnings that flashed up. Tubes one and three showed as faulty, two and four were loaded.
“This place is freaky.” The voice was unnaturally loud, coming from the direction of the main entrance.
“Looks like something smashed open that door from the inside.”
She squirted her pre-recorded message into the system. 188 wasn’t in the destination database as it had been settled about five years after 187, so she tagged one pod for Ascension’s Grace and one for Polaris.
“Marshal, we think she may be here. We’re sweeping and cleansing.”
She had one chance. She hit the launch icon as she headed for the door. A warning siren started up, echoing along the deserted corridors to warn long-departed staff that a launch was in progress.
“What the...!”
“Brightness preserve...”
She launched herself across the corridor without checking. Both colonials were looking upwards, following long-encoded instinct, and didn’t see her diving into the kennel.
“Did you hear something in there?” she heard one of them whisper in the sudden silence that fell as the siren cut out.
“Yeah, sounded like the Darkness just went overhead.”
“No, I mean in that storage locker.” There was a breathless pause. “She’s here.”
Sam scrabbled for the Glock, had it clear of the holster and was turning, half sitting up and bringing the weapon to bear between the scuffed toes of her boots, getting a line on the doorway as the first colonial filled it.
His mouth dropped open in a shout. He was surprised but his weapon was prepared as he came through the door. Her mind took in the minute details – yellowed teeth, his knuckle whitening as it took up the slack on his primitive weapon’s trigger.
She fired first. The pistol was set to full auto and she emptied it in a single burst that cracked up into the wall over the door. Her ears rang when the weapon clicked empty and the air was full of pulverised crete and the stench of blood, shit and propellant. She staggered to her feet, deafened, staring at her target. He was down, on his back with his boots towards her, one twitching slightly as his nervous system caught up with his death; from the number of bullet impacts in the wall around the doorway she’d maybe put less than half the rounds on target. Eight or nine big lumps of lead and nickel had been more than enough, though. She didn’t look to see the mess she’d made of him, dropping to one knee and switching the clip with shaking hands.
“Where the fuck are you?” she shouted at the dead man’s companion. She remembered to chamber a round. There was no sign of the second colonial. “You fucking scared?”
She heard metal scrape on crete, flattened herself against the wall and risked a peek into the corridor. The second colonial was a woman, burly and grey-haired; she leant against the wall, hand to a spreading stain of red in her side as she struggled to bring up a pellet gun. She was mouthing something Sam couldn’t make out.
Sam recognised her. She’d been guarding the admin building, and was the one who’d walked Adisa to her bloody end.
Sam stepped out into the hall, her blood running cold with hate for this one. “Where’s your fucking god now, Nestasi?” she spat, and carefully and deliberately shot the woman between the eyes. The Glock fired a big, slow bullet compared to modern weapons, but it killed the woman just as dead, the round punching out through, collapsing her bun of grey hair and splattering blood and brains against the wall.
She let the pistol drop to her side, but kept it in her hand. This time she forced herself to look at the damage she’d done. “Shit.”
She knew something wasn’t right. The pods should have been away by now but she was pretty sure they hadn’t launched. It would be the last slap in the face from an uncaring universe, for her and Adisa to have come this far and achieved so much only to fail because of the old, out-of-date gear.
She hooked the Glock’s holster on as she went back through to the control room, taking no chances this time – there was no way of knowing who else was out there. Her heart was in her throat as she checked the error display. “Fuck. Fixable, but still – shitting fucking hell.”
She sprinted out of the control room, spinning left to head deeper into the facility. She hadn’t explored far this way, put off by the thought of poking around long, dank corridors with only a torch or the grainy off-white image of her active IR system to see by. She regretted that now as she clattered down a flight of metal steps into the bowels of the facility. The disk of light from her torch bobbed along in front of her, picking out sections where the corridor walls had started to crumble (shoddy first-gate workmanship) before it opened out into the cavernous silo that lay at the heart of the facility.
Sam wasn’t sure what she’d been expecting, but it certainly wasn’t what she saw: a four-chamber job, resembling a monstrous climbing frame that some lunatic had wired for power. Two relic jSpace message pods nestled in their launch chambers, just like the system said, ready to go, while fully charged capacitors were whining at a pitch that ached in her teeth, felt more than heard because of the deafening warning sirens that indicated a launch was in progress and being in the chamber would be harmful to health. Everything was lit by strobing red lights that cast the frame into sinister, ever-shifting shadows.
The silo doors, ten metres over her head, were grinding painfully as they struggled to open. Sam knew she’d lucked out in one way – 187 might be an arid shit-tip of a planet, but at least that meant there was no pervasive water damage.
She saw the problem right away. The silo doors in the chamber ceiling had been designed to open upwards against a moderate amount of the crud that might build up on them between launches, pushing any major debris out of the way. A decade or more of disuse and no maintenance had allowed material to build up to the point that some of it had fallen in as the doors opened, rather than bein
g pushed back.
A nice fat rock – more of a small boulder, really – had dropped clean down the bore of one of the launch coils and had come to a rest halfway up one of the steel coils. The whole system had gone into panic mode at that point and shut everything down.
She swung open a heavy tool chest by the door, sneezing furiously in the cloud of dust. The kit had been pillaged but there was still a meaty manual spanner that should do the job. She threw herself up the gantry that zigzagged up the side of the frame. Under normal circumstances she’d have switched the whole damn thing off and started again, but she had no way of knowing if it would restart.
Which put her on a tight time budget, as the whole system could tear itself apart if this continued much longer.
She had to lean pretty far out to get at the jammed launch coil. The pod below the rock was already a write-off, there was no way she’d be able to get the blockage out. Problem was that the way the damn thing ad wedged in had forced out one side of the coil, putting it dangerously close to the other live tube. No way she was going to be able to override the safety cutouts before the whole system fritzed.
Taking a good grip on the tool, she got ready to swing at the rock. She stopped briefly, considered the hum of power going through the whole system, and checked that her boots were rubber-soled. The spanner was diamond-bonded ceramic.
“It’ll be ok,” she told herself, and swung before any more doubts could set in. Sparks cascaded over her but she wasn’t turned into a pile of burnt carbon. “Good start.”
The rock had barely shifted though. “Fuck you!” she shouted at it, swinging again. More sparks, fewer this time, as she dented the coil and chipped a bit off the rock. It slid down a bit further and she was about to whoop with glee when it jammed again further down in a really awkward spot that would force her to stand on the steeply-canted steps to get at it.