Finder

by Suzanne Palmer

Orientation outings were usually fifteen minutes at a stretch; that’s how long he had to figure out how to separate Mari from the pack without the ops seeing. He climbed over the seat into the back, knocking over an empty can of resin used to seal windows, and inventoried what was there. More resin cans. A giant extending squeegee. Bottled potable water, which he immediately popped open and guzzled down until he felt almost sick. A stash of cheap readymeals. For no obvious reason, or at least any that he cared to know, a pair of men’s underwear was beneath it all; he used the squeegee handle to shove that farther back in the buggy. In the emergency locker he found another exosuit.

  A spare was never unwelcome; he plugged the suit into a power block to charge and left it draped over an equipment chest as he climbed back up front. He still had no idea how to get to Mari.

  He glanced out the window just in time to see one of the newbies go careening over the ropes and out over the dunes, their arms flailing frantically. Two instructors and one of the MCA ops took off after them while the other op lingered on the fringes of the crowd, watching Mari. She stood with the others, and at last the second op’s attention drifted to the rescue.

  Mari turned her head, scanning the line of buggies, and when she was looking his way, Fergus flashed the lights. After that, it was like watching a brilliant stop-motion piece reenacted on sand. Mari slid slowly toward the edge of the crowd, but every time the op glanced over, she was standing still.

  The remaining instructor apparently decided the flyaway student was more excitement than the others needed and started herding the group back toward the door. In moments there was a good-sized group of people between Mari and the op. She merged in among those closest to the door, then slid behind the emergency storage locker beside the entrance and disappeared. At the back of the crowd, the MCA op was starting to shove his way forward; one gravity-clueless newbie he pushed went flying and knocked over three others. The op found himself face-to-face with the instructor, and even from this distance, Fergus could tell the undercover op was getting a blistering chewing-out.

  Most of the students had reentered the building by the time the op finally pulled out his badge and shoved it in the instructor’s face. The instructor stepped out of his way, but as the op passed, the instructor’s foot snuck out. The op reentered the city on a near-horizontal trajectory. “Another small victory for Mars,” Fergus murmured under his breath.

  He backed the buggy up behind the others so it was out of view of the Welcome Center and waited. Two minutes later, Mari was pulling herself into the seat beside him, looking tired and worried and also very pleased with herself.

  “That was well done,” he said. “But if that newbie hadn’t gone flying off, I’m not sure I had any good plans to get you away.”

  “That newb? Sunset’s friend Inga. She’s a second-gen Marser, but as far as the poor instructor knows, she only speaks in something called Swedish?”

  “That’s brilliant. But . . . why are you here? Why aren’t you on your way home?” That last came out more plaintive than he’d wanted.

  “Because the MCA is quietly emptying all of the underground looking for you. I thought you were just going to go get dinner, not start a citywide manhunt.”

  “Me too,” he said.

  “What happened?”

  “There was an incident. It was my own stupid fault.”

  If Mari saw the easy opening, she didn’t take it. “Stirring up the MCA has done us a favor, if that makes you feel better,” she said. “The Luceatans bolted in a supply truck towards something called ‘the Warrens’ about forty-five minutes ago. I have to hand it to you and your luck, Fergus. You wander into the underground and manage to come back out having accidentally befriended a man with an entire network of eyes around the city. I don’t know how you do it.”

  “Me neither.”

  “So, we going after them?”

  “I don’t want to be responsible for anything bad happening to you,” he said.

  “Didn’t we already have that conversation? Besides, you said it yourself—it’s going to take both of us to get Arelyn back safe. We’re a team. Equals, equally responsible for ourselves and only ourselves. I’m not a kid, I’m not the friend you lost, and I’m sure as shit not your follower. You got that?”

  “Got it,” he said.

  “Are we going?”

  “Yeah.” He put the buggy in gear. “We’re going.”

  They trundled along the perimeter of the city at the same slow pace a window washer looking for sand damage would move. “What are the Warrens?” Mari asked.

  “It’s an old apartment site that was built for the construction crew while the Ares Five dome was being raised. It’s just outside the city, officially abandoned, but a lot of skunk-heads, smugglers, and people too crazy or violent to be tolerated by the rest of the underground lurk there.”

  “Sounds wonderful.”

  “Yeah. But listen: it means Arelyn must be alive.”

  “How so?”

  “The Luceatans could have just cut their losses and taken a shuttle out. If they’ve retreated to the Warrens, they’re still trying to figure out what to do.”

  “And the plan? Do you have one?”

  “Window washers drive around the city all the time. It’ll be almost full night by the time we get to the side near the Warrens, so we’ll park and make a quick run over the sands as soon as it’s fully dark.”

  In the silence after he finished talking, his stomach growled loudly enough to elicit a wry chuckle from Mari. “Didn’t think to eat before kicking off a manhunt for yourself?” she asked.

  “No.”

  She sighed. “I’m hungry enough I almost wish I still had that Celekai stuff you sent Sunset with.”

  “There are readymeals in the back,” he said. “Take one out of the box and twist the pack side to side. Takes about five minutes to heat itself up. At least it’s designed for humans to eat. Desperate humans, maybe, but humans nonetheless.”

  “You want one too?”

  “I’ll make one once we’re parked,” he said. “Those cartons are so flimsy it’s impossible to eat while driving without burning the hell out of your crotch.”

  Mari climbed back over the seat, and he heard the familiar clang of cans. Over the popping sounds of a readymeal initializing, she said, “I like that it gets dark out for a while each day. It’s not so bad inside the buggy, but it’ll be a relief not seeing the whole sky at once, looming overhead like that.”

  “It’s a clear night,” Fergus said. “We should even see stars.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah.”

  She came back up front, careful not to spill the steaming meal. Putting her boots up on the buggy’s dash, she balanced it carefully on her knees and pulled the wrap from it. “Nice suit,” she said as she waited for it to cool. “You didn’t go back to that RedZoots place, I hope?”

  “Oh, hell no,” Fergus said. “I’m at least a little bit smarter than that. I stole it.”

  “Oh? Who from?”

  “You know that entire squad of MCA goons that was searching the city top to bottom looking for me? That’s who from.”

  She laughed. “You are good at pissing people off.”

  “It’s my greatest talent.”

  He thought about telling her about the Dr. Diagnosis, then changed his mind. “Look,” he said. “I should’ve insisted that the Shielders let you stay behind. You’ve been in danger you shouldn’t have been in, both here and back at Cernee, and a lot of it is because of me. Some of that wasn’t in my control, but some of it was. And whether or not I’m responsible or allowed to feel that way anyway, I’m sorry.”

  “You should be,” she said.

  He took a deep breath, bracing himself to tell her about the electricity, the thing in his gut, when she spoke again.

  “If we’re being
honest, I’m not regretting that I came here,” she said. “It’s been . . . eye-opening. When I first started sneaking off the farm, Cernee seemed so big, you know? But before long it became tiny, a trap, like I was a bug in a bottle. It’s good to get away from home and look back at it from a new perspective. Changes how you see yourself too, you know?”

  He mulled that over. “You’re right. Except I try to never look back.”

  “We’re a lot closer to your home than mine.”

  “Only in terms of distance.”

  Mari nodded. Maybe she understood, at that.

  “We’re almost to the Warrens,” he said, pointing. “You see it ahead?”

  She leaned forward, peering out through the front glass, clearly more comfortable now that the sky had settled down into the bluish remnants of sunset. Ahead of them, the Warrens was a large, irregular pile of blocks poking up out of the sand, just a few hundred meters away from the dome wall. “I see it,” she said. “No lights?”

  “No. Ares Five cut power hoping the squatters would either go find some other city to haunt or just politely die where they were.”

  “So how do they live? Is there air?”

  “The Warrens are kind of a heavily condensed version of Cernee without any of the charm. They’ve got both wind and solar gens on the top to bring power down, but the systems are old and unreliable. In some spots there are pockets of stale air that’ll just drop you dead.”

  “Great. I can’t wait for the tour.”

  “It’s going to be dangerous. Especially with me in an MCA suit; I might as well have a target on my back,” Fergus said. “We need to be careful and quick. If we find Arelyn and you have a chance to get out, get out. Don’t worry about me.”

  Mari snorted.

  It was nearly night by the time they parked the buggy. From there the Warrens looked like a rocky outcropping against the last remnants of the day. Already Fergus could make out a few of the brighter stars above them, and one he knew wasn’t a star at all fading out toward the horizon.

  The small corridor that had once connected the two structures looked like a bomb had been dropped on it; blackened and twisted wreckage jutted out of the sand like the ribs of some terrible worm, finally slain at the door to civilization.

  “If they hate the Warrens that much, why not level them?” Mari asked.

  “It’s like cockroaches—or ballroaches, I guess. If you take away their hidey-hole, they’ll just scurry into the next nearest,” Fergus said.

  “Ah. Yeah,” she said. She climbed over the seat again, poked her head back in a few moments later. “If you’re worried about the MCA suit, why not wear this other one?”

  Because I’ll short it out and then probably die in it, he didn’t say. “It’s too small for me. Did it check out?”

  “All green.”

  “See if you can find a bag or something to carry it in. It’s a good bet Arelyn doesn’t have a suit,” Fergus said. “Mars is nothing but prisons if you can’t go outside.”

  Fergus had shut down all the buggy’s lights long before they’d come within sight of the Warrens, and other than the dim reddish glow of the buggy’s windowless interior, they were comfortably dark. He dialed up the zoom on his goggles, switching over to infrared, and watched the decaying apartment block for any signs of life or movement. Wedged into one of the many irregular corners of the block’s perimeter was the tall, wide door of a vehicle entry bay. A faint tracery of tire tracks and footsteps thickened and converged at it and the small airlock beside it. That’s our way in, Fergus thought.

  “Anything back there you think we could use as a weapon?” he asked.

  She climbed carefully back over the seat and handed him a hot food tray. “Not unless that’s your underwear back there,” she said.

  “Not mine.”

  “Nothing else obviously offensive, then. Eat quick.”

  He’d forgotten both how awful readymeals were and how good being hungry made them taste anyway. Mari fidgeted while he gulped down the last few bites and tossed the empty tray over the back. They sealed their suits, and then he climbed to the rear airlock and cycled himself out first. If someone was going to jump them, he’d rather it was him. No one did.

  A few minutes later Mari joined him. It felt like walking into a canyon, with the high wall of the city slowly curving up and away from them up on their left and the Warrens closing in on their right. They crossed the rubble of the corridor, then moved along it, hugging the wall toward the vehicle bay. For the same reason as before, Fergus went through the airlock first. It was dark on the far side, a small corridor with a door at the far end and another to the side facing the vehicle bay. As his suit readjusted to the interior atmosphere, he could hear faint sounds through the door. “Hang on for a minute,” he told Mari over the comm. “There might be someone in the bay.”

  He pressed very gently on the door, opening it far enough to peer in. The vehicle bay was unlit, but there was a supply buggy inside with its rear hatch open and bright light inside. The sounds and the movement of shadows against the far interior wall suggested someone working inside.

  Fergus felt it coming like a quick warning blast of jitters. There was a bright spark between his hand and the door handle. Both hands tingled inside his gloves as his suit rebooted.

  Great, he thought. It was hard not to panic during those long six seconds before his air started circulating again. No one had come out of the truck, at least.

  “—gus?” Mari’s voice came over the comm as soon as they were back online a moment later.

  “You okay, Mari?”

  “I’m fine. You went off-comm,” she said. “I’m in the airlock now. What happened?”

  “My suit rebooted,” he said.

  “You stole a glitchy suit?” She laughed, although there wasn’t much mirth in it.

  “Yeah, just my luck. Stay back until I give the word.”

  He pushed the door open the rest of the way, stepped into the bay, and quietly closed the door behind him. Then he crept up to the side of the truck and, taking a deep breath, risked a quick glance around the back. A fist shot out and knocked him to the floor.

  A man jumped down from the back of the supply buggy and put a heavy boot down on Fergus’s chest before he could get up. A bright light shone down at him, blinding him.

  “Angus?” the man said, incredulous, leaning down to stare into his face shield.

  I know that voice, Fergus thought. “Red Bart?”

  “Shit! Angus!” Red Bart said.

  The light switched off and was replaced by the red circle of a pistol’s targeting light. Fergus reached up and slapped Bart on the side of the neck, dumping as much juice as he could muster into the contact.

  The pistol discharged, going wide, and left a blackened, smoking mark on the floor a hand’s width from Fergus’s left ear.

  His suit started another reboot as he rolled out of the way. Red Bart crumpled to the floor beside him as he scrambled to his feet and kicked Red Bart’s pistol under the supply buggy.

  Adrenaline and post-shock jitters left Fergus unsteady. Leaning against the buggy, he patted his pockets and found, to his relief, a small stash of MCA handbinders. Fumbling out a pair, he looped one end around Bart’s hand, the other around his opposite ankle, and activated them.

  When he could speak, he pinged Mari. “Mari?”

  “You’re alive? Your channel was open, and I heard a shot, then nothing.”

  “Suit rebooted again,” he said.

  “It’s not the suit that’s glitchy, is it? Same with the pod,” she said. “This is something with you. Something new since . . .” Her words trailed off.

  “Yes,” he said. The word hurt to say out loud. “I was going to tell you, but it’s hard to talk about, and now’s not the time. Where are you?”

  “I’m in the corridor pas
t the airlock. I thought you’d been taken down and wanted to get out of the area before they came looking for others.”

  “Good thinking,” he said. “I’ve got someone here we can ask questions when he wakes up.”

  “Do what you have to. I’m going to keep going.”

  “Mari—”

  “Tunnels and me are old friends, Fergus. Don’t go all auntie on me. I’ll check back in ten.”

  The connection dropped into standby. Well, hell, Fergus thought.

  Everything was quiet except his own breathing. Leaning over, he took Red Bart’s comm off his free wrist and put it on below his own with no small amount of deja vu. He picked up the man’s limp hand and activated the fingerprint scanner, unlocked the comm, and set it to receive only.

  “—shit,” someone was saying in a thick Luceatan accent. “Whole place is a maze. Which way now?”

  “Up,” another voice said.

  “I say we just leave her to the scummers. Graf will make the boss understand, and if he doesn’t, he can take it out on Lerd for letting her get away in the first place.”

  “We can’t risk her escaping alive, and you know it. Gotta find or make a body, the sooner the better. Checking another crapper cubbyhole, so shut up now.”

  The channel went quiet.

  “Mari?” Fergus called on his own comm.

  “What?” She sounded annoyed and out of breath.

  “When you and Arelyn were kids, who won at hide-and-seek?”

  “About even,” Mari said. “Why?”

  “Because the good news is that Arelyn is alive, and she got away from the Luceatans,” Fergus said. “The bad news is, they aren’t looking to get her back alive anymore. Now it’s a race to see which of us finds her first.”

  Chapter 21

  Fergus kicked Red Bart, not as hard as he might have but not gently either. The man groaned, grudgingly opened one eye, and tried to unbend himself. The binders held. His eyes found Fergus. “Angus,” he said.

  “Bart. I went by your shop yesterday to buy a suit. I was disappointed you weren’t there.”