Black Sheep

by Rachel Aukes

  Finn climbed down Birk’s body, and Birk looked down to see the other man kick at the plate in the ceiling that he’d shot at earlier. He noticed then that the plate was an opening whereas the rest of the chute was a smooth surface. The plate gave way on the second kick.

  Finn fit his legs through, up to his knees, before he released Birk. He grabbed onto the edges of the opening and pulled himself up, disappearing from the chute momentarily before his head poked back through. Finn reached out his arms. “Okay. Slide down. I’ll catch you.”

  The lack of weight gave Birk the strength to rework the grip on his grappling tool. He eyed Finn. “You promise you’ll catch me? Because I don’t want to be shredded.”

  The other man watched him with no humor. “I promise I’ll catch you.”

  Birk wasn’t the best at giving up control, and once he released the rappelling hook, he’d be completely at Finn’s mercy. He took a deep breath and curled his legs up to keep them from touching the shredder first. “Okay. I’ll release at the count of three. Three. Two. One.” He didn’t let go.

  “You have to let go, Birk. I’ve got you,” Finn said.

  “I know, I know.” He grimaced, then said in a rush, “Three, two, one.” He let go of the tool, and his body immediately slid down. He held his hands up in the air toward Finn. Finn grabbed his hands, but they were sweaty and slipped, and Finn tightened his grip around Birk’s wrists. The shredder lit up and Birk yanked his feet closer to him as Finn pulled him smoothly up through the opening. The pair toppled backward and onto a grated floor.

  Birk lay on top of his partner, and he didn’t try to roll off. He just stared off down the dimly lit walkway. “Wow.”

  Finn patted him. “Okay, you can get off me now.”

  Birk didn’t move, and Finn rolled out from under him. Birk lay on his back. “Now that was an adventure.”

  Finn stood over him and shook his head. “You’re the craziest man I’ve ever met. You realize how close we came to getting ourselves shredded down there?”

  “In my defense, I never would’ve guessed they’d put a shredder in a garbage chute.”

  After a moment, Finn held out a hand and pulled Birk to his feet.

  Birk shook his arms. “I think maybe I’ll start listening to Throttle and start working out a bit more.”

  Finn shot him a sideways glance. “Remind me to never follow you anywhere again.”

  Birk clasped his shoulder. “Throttle used to say that, too, but I have a way of growing on people.”

  Finn scowled. “Like a fungus.”

  Birk examined his hands and found a large blood blister had formed on his palm where the skin had been pinched by the rappelling tool. At least it wasn’t a cut. He’d expected to see gobs of blood with the pain he’d had. He sighed, resituated his backpack, and looked down the walkway. The garbage chute ran along the right side while various pipes and cables ran along the left side of the maintenance tunnel. He blew out a breath and turned back to his partner. “Things will be easy now. All we have to do is follow the chute to where they all come together. Then we grab our cutters and make our daring rescue.”

  “Easy, huh? I don’t think any adventure you plan would be easy.” Finn slowly shook his head before checking his weapons and pockets.

  They followed the garbage chute that ran alongside the walkway for thirty minutes before it ran through a wall and the walkway ended at a door. With no windows, Birk took a risk and opened the door.

  He let out a breath and walked through the doorway.

  “You see? I told you the rest would be easy,” Birk said as the two men stood inside the noisy recycling center.

  Shredded garbage tumbled onto conveyor belts that carried it under a giant sorter that mechanically separated the components. Birk shivered, thinking of how close he and Finn had come to becoming some of the garbage currently getting separated. He turned away and left the round room to a second room, where he counted at least four people working with pieces of metal and plastics too large to have traveled through the garbage chutes. He smiled when he saw one of the Jaders, a young woman, operate a larger laser cutter to slice through a thick slab of steel. Beyond her, another laser cutter sat in the corner.

  He glanced at Finn and nodded toward her. “See?”

  His partner didn’t seem confident in Birk’s abilities, so Birk shrugged him off and walked past the four workers as though he had every right to be there. They ignored him. He continued straight for the laser cutter sitting on the floor. Every time he stole goods out in the open, he was a bit surprised that people didn’t notice. Or, more likely, people didn’t care. Most folks were underpaid and overworked and didn’t want any trouble in their lives, so they kept their heads down on whatever was their current task.

  Birk grabbed the cutter and handed it to Finn.

  “Hey,” the woman called out.

  Birk turned and gave her his best innocent expression.

  She pointed at the cutter. “That one’s on the fritz. Don’t use it. The charged ones are back in inventory.” Her gaze shot over to a door before settling back on her work.

  “Thanks,” he called back, though she seemed to be ignoring him.

  Finn set down the cutter, and the pair walked to the door. He chuckled when he found it unlocked, though he suspected few people had any interest in going down to the hot, putrid-smelling garbage unit without a valid reason.

  And Birk had a very valid reason: he had to rescue the love of his life.

  Throttle would probably make fun of him for calling her that, but he didn’t care. He’d always been the softer one of the pair, and he knew that it was his romantic side—and relentless pursuit—that had won her over.

  Inside the room, they found five laser cutters, all fully charged. Birk and Finn each grabbed one before Birk looked over the contents of the shelves for anything else of value. Small laser cutters, similar to the one he carried in his pack, filled one shelf. Many of the shelves had basic tools, such as crowbars and tin snips.

  Seeing nothing else of value, he turned back to Finn. “All right. Now, it’s off to get our people back.”

  Finn held up the laser cutter before eying Birk. “I have no idea how we managed this, but this plan is actually coming together.”

  “Of course it is,” he answered with nonchalance. He really hoped it stayed that way.

  Ten hours later.

  Birk and Finn hadn’t spoken for three hours. They hadn’t said anything kindly for seven hours. They’d followed their wrist-comm maps to Throttle’s and Nolin’s pings, but the problem with their wrist-comm maps was that they didn’t sync up with the actual layout of Jade-8. They ended up leaving the maintenance walkways and found themselves on their hands and knees, migrating crawlspaces, dragging the laser cutters behind them.

  Birk’s knees had become two swollen bruises, and his palms were raw. Every muscle ached, and the laser cutter had seemingly quadrupled in weight sometime over the past few hours. They took breaks, but no time was enough to fully rest when they returned to crawling again. Finn had taken the lead at some point, and Birk was glad. Finn kept them at a solid pace, where Birk would’ve slowed down long ago.

  When the crawlspace opened to the maintenance tunnel, the two men practically tumbled onto the floor grates.

  Birk rested on the floor while Finn examined the map on his wrist-comm.

  “I’ve been tagging our locations. These maintenance tunnels are set up in grids. We can take tunnels straight to the cells and straight out of here,” Finn said.

  “No more crawlspaces?” Birk asked, perhaps a bit too hopefully.

  “No more crawlspaces,” Finn replied.

  Birk pushed to his feet. “I want to kiss you right now.”

  “Don’t.”

  He shrugged. “You’re missing out. Throttle says I’m a very good kisser.”

  Finn glanced up. “She’s lying to you.”

  Birk shook his head and took a step forward. “Nope. I can prove it.�
��

  Finn held up a hand. “No.” He then resituated the laser cutter over his shoulder. “We can be there in ten minutes.”

  Birk found a sudden infusion of energy. “Then let’s go.”

  The pair strode down the walkway, took a couple of turns, until Finn came to a stop. He looked upward. “It shows they’re right on top of us.”

  Birk thought of cracking a joke and then decided against it as Finn showed a severe lack of any sense of humor. He hoped the man would develop one at some point, as the crew already had Eddy, who had shown to have been born missing his funny bone. Having two crew members serious all the time was two too many.

  Instead, Birk set down the laser cutter and strolled around the open area, scrutinizing the ceiling while periodically glancing down at the two dots on his wrist-comm. He soon made out each cell, wall screws forming a support grid around each cell. He stopped, grabbed his pack, and pulled out the mini laser cutter he carried.

  He powered it on and reached up. He burned a charred black circle on the ceiling. Then he walked over several feet and burned a second charred circle. He turned to Finn. “You take one. I take the other.”

  “Are you sure those are the right places to cut?” Finn asked.

  “Absolutely. I don’t half-ass any part of a job that could get someone I care about killed.”

  Finn hoisted his laser cutter and then frowned. “You’re saying that you didn’t half-ass it back in the garbage chute when we were almost shredded by lasers?”

  “I had myself covered all along. You got lucky.”

  Finn opened his mouth to say something and then clamped it shut and positioned himself under a circle.

  Birk began tapping out a message on his wrist-comm:

  SHOWTIME.

  Chapter Twelve

  Twelve hours had passed since Birk’s message.

  Surprisingly, the only times guards checked in on Throttle were when they delivered food. Even then, the guard remained only long enough to toss a tasteless meal bar with no discernible texture at her before leaving once again. Even Hinze never stopped by again to gloat—he probably had nothing to say to someone he expected would be dead within a day. The narrow hallway running alongside the cells was vacant, which made it all the more obvious that Throttle and Nolin were being watched via the in-cell cameras.

  An empty cell stood between Nolin and her, and they could talk if they spoke loudly enough, and they passed the time with small talk.

  “Do you ever miss home?” Nolin asked.

  “I miss the people. You?” Throttle answered.

  “I miss it sometimes. Even before we left, it’d been nearly three years since I saw my parents. I wish I would’ve seen them more often. I regret that.”

  “Would you go back if you could?”

  Nolin thought for a long moment. “No. Even knowing what we’d find, I don’t regret the mission. I would’ve regretted staying behind more than I regret not seeing them enough when I had the chance.”

  “Then don’t hang on to wishes. Instead, remember the times you did have with your family.”

  She thought back to her father, the only family she had, though that wasn’t exactly true. She’d grown up on a ship not much bigger than the Scorpia, with three other crew members in addition to her father. They’d been through some tough times together, and only two of the original five made it through the war. But every single one of them she considered part of her family. And over the past fifteen years, she’d made a new family. She’d met Birk before the war, but the others had trickled in when it came time to build a flight crew.

  She spoke again. “And remember that you’re never alone. You have another family here and now.”

  Her wrist-comm chimed, and she read the message from Birk to her and Nolin:

  SHOWTIME. STAND AWAY FROM BLIND SPOT.

  She moved away from the bars and went over to the small sink and took a long drink. Behind her, she smelled metal burning. It was a heavy odor of steel and dust. The only sound was the sizzle of solid metal giving way to a laser cutter, which she hoped was low enough that the camera didn’t pick it up, assuming the camera had a microphone. She didn’t look, not wanting to give anything away to anyone who might be watching through the camera. Instead, she fastened her hair back in a ponytail and then splashed water on her face.

  The sizzling sound stopped. She turned to see a circle cut through the floor directly below the camera. It looked like the floor was still attached in a couple of places, keeping the section from falling down to the next level. She wondered what the level below contained that allowed Birk time to cut through the ceiling without anyone noticing.

  She waited, careful not to give any attention to the cut floor and hoping Nolin was doing the same while Birk cut through the other cell’s floor. After a couple of minutes, she heard a loud crash to her left. She heard guards shouting in the distance and growing closer.

  She rushed to the corner where a laser cutter was now cutting through the final threads of solid floor. She heard a crack, and a circular area of floor fell away.

  “Hey! Stop!”

  She turned to see guards at her cell, fumbling for a key. She leapt and dropped into the hole feet-first. Birk caught her, almost sending them both tumbling to the floor.

  She grimaced and pushed off him. “You stink.”

  Birk’s brows rose. “‘You stink’? That’s the first thing you thought to say? I was expecting something along the lines of, ‘Oh, Birk, you’re my hero. Thank you for coming to my rescue.’”

  She kissed him. “Thank you.”

  “This way!” Finn motioned away from the hole.

  Throttle and Birk took off running, following Finn and Nolin through what appeared to be an engineering tube. The ceiling was just high enough for her to stand, but the other three had to duck as they ran. Her left leg brace made a loud click with every step, and she hoped it held together long enough for them to get away from East’s security forces.

  Movement behind her caused her to reach for her pistol, but it wasn’t there. Blaster shots flew past her. She grimaced and kept running. Birk fired over his shoulder. The tube curved ahead. She noticed Birk pull something out of his pocket, and her eyes grew wide.

  As they reached the bend, he pulled the pin off the shock grenade and tossed it behind him.

  “Four, three, two, one,” he counted.

  Throttle covered her eyes and ears and flattened herself against the wall.

  The boom was deafening, and shock waves reverberated through her body. She started running as soon as she could regain her footing and turned to find Birk grinning.

  “Are you crazy? You could’ve breached the wall and flushed us all out into the black,” she said.

  “Nah. This tunnel doesn’t have any external walls. Besides, shock grenades don’t screw with the pressure enough to really worry.”

  Ahead of them, Finn stopped at an access door and kicked it open. He and Nolin rushed through the small opening, and Throttle followed to find herself at the edge of Jade City. As soon as Birk appeared, Finn slammed the door shut and spun the wheel to lock it.

  She scanned the area. “That won’t hold them for long.”

  “We need to hurry to the West side. East security can’t go over there,” Finn said.

  She took in the mile of storefronts that stood between them and the West doors.

  “We’ll never make it,” she said. “I have an idea.”

  She looked to her left and then to her right, searching the walls that gradually curved around the city. When she saw the red hieroglyph in the midst of a wall of graffiti, she pointed. “There.”

  She took off running, and the others followed. When she reached the door, she paused only long enough to turn the wheel to open it. She ducked and entered without peering inside first. When all four were through the door, Birk closed it, and Throttle spoke.

  “These are the gutters,” she began. “Rumor is, neither East nor West security forces will come
into these tunnels.”

  “Why won’t they?” Birk asked, dubious.

  “Because they’re owned by Jade-8’s ‘invisible population,’” she said.

  “I’d lay bets that we shouldn’t be here, either,” Nolin said.

  “It can’t be worse than out there,” she countered and began walking. The lights were dimmer here, and she suspected that power was being siphoned off other areas to keep these tunnels lit. Graffiti covered much of the walls. Drawings, some far more artistic than others, depicted scenes of families, loved ones, and other worlds. She wondered how many people had ended up stranded on Jade-8 on their way to a planetside colony.

  When Birk matched her stride, he frowned at her. “There’s something wrong with your braces.”

  “They’re working fine,” she said, then held out a hand. “But I could use a weapon.”

  He unslung his bag as he walked and rummaged through the contents. It was filled with various hardware, and she noticed the laser cutter near the top. He pulled out a small blaster and handed it to her.

  “Thanks.” She checked the charge and found immediate comfort in its heft before holstering it.

  The tunnel came to a fork. Throttle looked to the right, to the left, and up and down the ladder that stood before her. She glanced back to her team.

  “Left,” Birk said. “Left is always the right way to go when you don’t know where to go.”

  “Why do you say that?” Finn asked.

  “Because he’s left-handed,” Throttle said and took the tunnel to her left.

  There was still no sign of people, but the air was heavy with the stench of people and food, despite the colder temperature. Her clicking leg brace echoed through the tunnel.

  “That was a good rescue plan back at the cells,” she said.

  Birk smiled. “I’ve cut through a lot of jail cells and banks, and the one thing I’ve seen is that most places focus too much on what’s in front of them and not what’s above or below. When you told me they had bars, I knew then that they were using old tech here. Usually old tech is the hardest to break since it can’t be hacked. But these guys are just downright lazy. This wins the record as the easiest break-in of my career.”