by Cameron Hale
“That’s your problem. Grow up, Nona. How many times do I have to tell you your lofty morals vanished with the disposable societies of our ancestors?”
Nona sighed and drew the blanket protectively around her. “And I suppose you’re going to tell me survival is all that matters nowadays?”
“It is and you know it. Why the hell are you still freaking about Lascombe? For what he pays us you’d better start acting like you enjoy a bit of leather play before finds some other meat. It’s not like it’s a man eating you, after all.”
“Fuck you!” Nona cried, angrily leaping from the bed. Feeling the chill on her naked body, she blindly reached for a faded shift carelessly draped across the back of a nearby chair and charged into the tiny kitchen. Though the threadbare fabric did little to ease the cold, it provided a fragile barrier against Nadya’s relentless gaze.
Rummaging through the scant cupboards and shoebox fridge produced little beyond bootleg vitacaps and a few paltry proto-veg bars. Nona slammed the fridge door in frustration and glanced back at the ration coupons piled on the ledge. Her stomach growled weakly in protest.
Nadya’s expression softened. “Jesus, Nona, can’t you figure out that I’m doing this to help you? To help us both? It’s time to lose those silly dreams of yours. This is the only way we’re going get off this shithole and you know it.”
Nona bit her lip. Through the grimy kitchen window, she stared at the desolate, windswept demolition sites and abandoned roads scarring the denuded land. A distant refinery glinted in the watery sunlight like a chrome skeleton, belching plumes of detoxified waste into the depleted atmosphere. Her eyes glazed as she tried to imagine a world where sunlight did not cause chemical burns and people could lay bronzed on distant shores.
A lonely, dully-glinting railway track threaded through the wasteland, linking the doughnut to the metallic superstructure of the refinery. It offered the only source of employment to the minority of residents not yet corrupted by drugs or the sex for barter trade. Herded to and from their shifts in impregnable commuter trains, the commute offered the only time away from the doughnut most were ever likely to see in their lifetimes.
Distant cries from the corridor startled her. Ignoring Nadya, she shuffled to the closet-sized bathroom, slipped off the shift and stood beneath the rusted shower cone. Lukewarm water gushed in a moderate flow. It circled lazily around the stark white ceramic stall and finally into the maw of a pneumatic drain. Closing her eyes, she stood motionless beneath the water.
Nadya materialized behind her and sensuously lathered her back with a soap blister. Her fingers toyed with her dripping waist length hair, entwining it into slender ropes before trailing across her breasts. Leaning Nona back against her shoulder, Nadya began to gently massage the nipples, teasing and pinching until they hardened in response to her touch. Lower her questing hands wandered, skimming the planes of Nona’s belly and the roundness of her hips. Her breath quickened, its staccato rhythm loud in Nona’s ear. Nadya massaged the melting soap blister into Nona’s ass, her slippery fingers sinking deep into both holes.
Despite herself, Nona moaned and arched against Nadya. Smiling softly, Nadya eased Nona to her knees directly beneath the flowing water and began to lick the dripping rivulets from her flesh. Nona shuddered and spread her thighs, her breath catching as Nadya’s tongue probed her engorged clit.
“It’s not so different with a man, you know,” Nadya whispered, inserting her fingers into yielding, inviting wetness. “Why can’t you just pretend it’s me instead of someone else?”
Nona started to respond, but her body betrayed her. Raising her ass higher into the air, she gently bucked against Nadya’s strident thrusts.
“Now imagine it’s a cock instead of my fingers,” Nadya continued, slipping a finger from her other hand into Nona’s anus. She smiled as she felt the tight ring close around her finger. “This way you don’t even see them. They shoot their loads so fast it’ll be over in a minute.”
She pumped harder until she felt Nona shudder against her fingers. Nona cried out almost angrily and abruptly withdrew from Nadya. She huddled beneath the water and rested her head against the shower stall.
“You just don’t understand, do you?” she muttered. “No matter how many times I try to tell you, I just can’t switch myself off like some machine. It doesn’t matter if I see them or not. I know the marks are there. I can hear them, I can smell them.”
“You can blank your mind to anything if you simply try. But you have to let me help you.”
“Maybe you can, Nadya, but I’ll never get used to the sour stink of someone hyped on jolly all the time. Lascombe’s an animal. You don’t know what kind of shit he’ll try on us next. A handful of ration coupons aren’t worth our lives.”
“So you’d rather forage for rats in the park? Live off trash thrown over the railing? I’ve heard rumors, Nona, rumors about babies sold for food…”
Nona scrambled to her feet and brusquely brushed past Nadya. “Leave me the hell alone! For one fucking minute, can’t you let up? There’s no point in…”
Nadya seized her arm and pressed her lips to Nona’s ear. “It’s tonight.”
Nona halted in stunned silence. Turning to face her twin, she found only an unaccustomed hardness in Nadya’s dove gray eyes. The abrupt change in her personality enveloped Nona like an icy shroud. “Tonight? But you never told me…”
Nadya nodded. “Isn’t this what you’ve been waiting for?”
“Of course, but¾you know the risks. Maybe we should go over the plan again. We have only one chance. If we blow it…”
Nadya sighed. “We won’t. It’ll all go according to plan. Brenner's a pro. Don't you think he's aware of the dangers? Don’t you think we’ve considered every possibility? Jesus, what’s with you? One minute you’re crying like a little girl because you hate your life on Earth, then when an opportunity finally arises…”
Nona stumbled from the shower and stepped into the adjacent blower. A current of tepid air slowly dried her off and billowed her hair into a flaxen halo. Nadya silently stepped in behind her.
“Dear God,” Nona said. “You know I want to believe it will work. I want out of this pit so badly I can almost feel the sunlight of another world on my skin. But I'm even more afraid of the consequences if we fail. I couldn't bear to get so close to freedom and then lose it like a fading dream.”
She stepped from the blower and rummaged through a single built in wall drawer. Slipping into a shapeless blue shift and tight leggings, she abstractedly combed her hair. Ignoring Nadya, she wandered into the kitchen and retrieved two contraband teabags hidden inside the filter of the sonic dishwasher. She flipped open the lid of the beverage maker, dropped the bags inside and switched on the brew setting. Her gaze inexorably drawn to the dismal view beyond the kitchen window, anxiety knotted her stomach and banished the lingering aches in her body.
Nadya’s embrace startled her from her thoughts. “Think,” she whispered, her thickly lashed eyes dreamily gazing over Nona’s shoulder at the distant refinery. Plumes of steam spiraled lazily into the washed out sky. “You know it's our only ticket offworld. With something to bargain with, the government will have no choice but to let us go.”
Abruptly, she seized Nona’s shoulders and looked her in the eye. “Even now, don't you understand why I'm doing this?”
Nona nodded. “Of course I do, Nadya. We want to get offworld. Who the hell doesn't?”
Nadya grew thoughtful. “It's more than that, Nona. I want us to have a future. I want us to be able to hope, to live, not to scrape a living by selling ourselves and becoming the dross that the government insists we are simply because we weren't born with the right connections. Why should they have the right to rate us according to some biased scale of social value? Is that any reason to allow millions of people to fester in hellholes like this, because our indifferent offworld government can’t be bothered to change anything?”
She stalked away, disgust
etching her lovely face. “Well, I'm going to change some of the rules.”
Nona stared bleakly at her sister and wondered if she still believed in dreams. “We'd better get ready if Brenner’s going to be here soon,” she finally said.
* * *
Dressed in plain black tunics and snugwrap trousers, Nona and Nadya merged into the evening gloom as they waited in the dimly illuminated corridor outside the apartment. Looming into the shadows, a series of anonymous doors concealed the identities of the residents—heard but never seen beyond. No windows faced the corridors, only a dreary expanse of concrete stabbed with the occasional flickering recessed glowstrip. Roaches not snatched for food scuttled unseen on nocturnal forays, the incessant drip of condensation from inferior plumbing a maddening rhythm.
Though Nona felt the reassuring grip of Nadya's gloved hands on her shoulders, she could not help but flinch at the maniacal shouts and erratic footsteps echoing in the corridor one level below. She listened tensely until the commotion receded to one of the stairwells, where soon a guttural symphony of moans and cries pierced the oppressive silence. Though elevators existed, they were used mainly as assignation spots, the erratic maintenance rendering them too dangerous for regular use.
A scream shattered the darkness, followed by hysterical, jolly-induced laughter. Nadya had sampled the hallucinogenic tongue-pop once or twice, but Nona had never mustered the courage to try it. Unwilling to focus on the ceaseless laughter, she leaned over the graffiti-marred concrete balcony and peered into the inky chasm below, the blackness of the park punctuated by the occasional glow of firelight, or laserlight, depending on whichever posse happened to be on patrol. A vague stench of rotting rubbish, or perhaps worse, wafted up.
Nadya contemptuously spat into the void. “Take one more look,” she whispered, because there'll be no darkness where we're going.”
Her words sent a shiver through Nona. Nona bit her lip, wanting so badly to believe that they could truly leave a place that had held them hostage since birth.
The evening wind echoed eerily along the deserted corridor and groaned a basso counterpart from the stairwells. Footsteps stealthily approached. Nadya's hand strayed to the dazer concealed beneath her belt.
Brenner’ stocky, brown-clad form emerged into a watery pool of light. He paused to appraise them, his steely gaze lingering a moment longer on Nona. His thin lips twitched, his cropped iron hair and gaunt, scarred face betraying too many harsh years in the doughnut. A low-pitched drone emerged from the voice emulator implanted in his throat. “Sorry I'm late. Had a bit of trouble with the posses. Fuckers are sniffing' around like bloodhounds tonight.”
“Everything okay?” Nadya asked.
A faint smile touched Brenner's lips. “Isn't it always? Come on, it's getting late. I'll brief you on the way.”
They followed Brenner single file down the stairwell toward the ground level. Glowstrips erratically flickered as the trio dodged reeking pools of urine, discarded condoms, used syringes and sprawled bodies gyrating in shadowy corners. The rank musk of sex permeated the air. Though Nona tried to avert her eyes, a flash of russet hair inadvertently drew her attention. Barely in her teens, a naked girl knelt doggy style in the corner of a landing while a swarthy, heavyset man old enough to be her grandfather fucked her from behind. Her thin, startlingly pale body bore a series of purple bruises, her hair a swishing curtain as she sucked the cock of a ferret-faced man crouched down before her. Though the girl seemed to gag a few times, the man would not release his grip on her head.
Bile rose in Nona’s throat. She had seen the girl before, trading ration coupons at the weekly supply handout from a vacant apartment on the tenth floor. The dark shadows lining the girl’s pale green eyes belied her youth, her vacant expression barely hinting at the torment locked within her.
“Heavy action, tonight,” Brenner mumbled, his gaze once more lingering on Nona.
She said nothing, but hurried down the stairs behind Nadya. At length, they arrived at the heavily graffitied entrance to a restricted accessway connecting the rail station. Using a forged security clearance card, Brenner gained access and led them down a cold, dimly lit feeder tunnel. A pack of disturbed rats squealed indignantly and scuttled off. Brenner finally spoke. His voice droned without inflection, his eyes like flint chips as he described the plan in detail.
“Fortunately, the refinery is run by a strict protocol, so you should have no problem remembering the routine. As supervisor of the emissions sector, I'm simply bringing in two new employees. Nadya, I'll signal you when the time comes to accompany me to the power core for the weekly maintenance inspection. Nona, the disruptor chips are already in place. A signal will appear on your workstation monitor indicating when to begin the surveillance shutdown sequence. At that time, Nadya and I will obtain the fuel processor unit. Make absolutely sure you key in the correct sequence¾there won’t be another opportunity. After our individual tasks are completed, we make our own way to docking bay seven where a transport will be waiting for us. I managed to buy another pilot to get us offworld. That bastard Maelrich panicked and backed out. Lucky for him he's left the refinery or I'd have his pilot's permit. As soon as we break orbit, the government will be forced to negotiate.”
In his barren eyes Nona glimpsed her future, should the plan to sabotage the refinery power source fail.
“Now, all we have to do is wait on the train and travel in with tonight’s shift. We’ll hide in the toilets and come out when boarding begins. At no time do any of us speak. When we arrive, I’ll escort you to your stations. Understood?”
Nadya turned to Nona and noticed her worried expression. “You okay with that?”
Nona cleared her throat. “Of course. It’s just that the plan sounds almost too simple to be possible.”
Nadya chuckled. “That's exactly why it will work. Who would credit the average refinery worker with the intelligence to formulate such a plan?”
The membranous security barrier surrounding the station sprung into view. Using a device produced from his pocket, Brenner briefly deactivated the shimmering blue field. The trio quickly slipped through and stepped onto an oval concourse. Nona stared in astonishment at the immaculate tubular train floating above the track. Seen distantly from the apartment window, the trains always appeared unreal, little more than toys traversing the desolate landscape. But close-up, within touching distance, the train reeked of a technology and standard of living that inhabited only the realm of her imagination. She swallowed the bitter taste in her mouth. Escaping from Earth had been her only focus for as long as she could remember, but to face the means by which it could finally become reality stirred an almost sexual response in her body.
Could it finally be happening? After the suffering of all these years? she wondered.
Brenner broke her thoughts by reactivating the barrier and quickly neutralized a sentry panel near the entrance. Though a series of cam-lasers flanked the vaulted ceiling, none seemed operational.
Nadya whistled in admiration. “Where did you get the scrambler from, Brenner? They're like gold dust.”
Brenner shook his head. “I wouldn't relax just yet if I were you. The device is strictly homemade. I don't know how long the jamming frequency will hold, so let's get into the train before those cam-lasers come on-line again.”
He approached the first entrance to the train and pressed the scrambler against a sensor strip. The doors silently opened, admitting them into the deserted compartment. Remarkably untouched by vandalism, Nona’s eyes scanned the simple, blue and chrome interior that mildly reeked of antiseptic. She was about to follow Nadya into a toilet cubicle that separated the next compartment when Brenner seized her arm. Her heart skipped a beat at the feral expression in his eyes. Though Nadya paused to regard them, he said nothing.
“Figure I should get an advance for my efforts since none of us will get payoff till we break orbit.”
Nona’s throat tightened. She cast a frightened glance at Nadya. �
��What’s going on here?” she whispered. “What’s he talking about?”
Nadya’s inscrutable expression never wavered. “We were a little short of the payoff for Brenner. So we’ll make up the difference. If you hadn’t put off those two other sessions with Lascombe, we would have had enough by now.”
Nona felt a moment of faintness. “But he pays us in ration coupons…”
“Which Brenner then converts to currency, which buys our way off Earth.”
Brenner’s grip on her arm tightened. “Maybe you two could provide a little light entertainment,” he said, glancing meaningfully at Nadya. “Been a long time, and your sister has a tasty ass. I’ve been watching it. Now I’d like you to eat it.”
Oblivious to Nona’s horrified expression, Nadya smiled. “Whatever you say.”
“Nadya¾for God’s sake, what are you saying?”
Brenner cast Nona a hungry look. “Bend over and grab those ankles, Nona. Raise that ass nice and high and spread it. The next shift will be arriving soon. We’ve got to move fast.”
* * *
Accompanied only by the tempo of Brenner’s increasingly raspy breathing, Nona silently bucked against Nadya’s fingers. Thrust deep into her anus, they moved in time with Nadya’s tongue as she licked and probed Nona’s clit. Though the compartment was chilly, a sheen of sweat beaded Nona’s body, the humiliation of performing for Brenner gradually ousted by the rising tension deep in her groin. Despite her efforts to quell her response, she could not resist Nadya’s skillful manipulation. Played like a stringed instrument until she reached the inevitable crescendo, she uttered a garbled cry and came explosively, a gush of sticky wetness coating her thighs.
A moment later, Nadya fell back onto the floor with a sigh. Shuddering, Nona quickly straightened and moved toward the compartment toilet, but not without casting a venomous glance at Brenner.
“I hope you got your money’s worth, you bastard,” she said.
Brenner’s lips barely twitched in response. “In this life we all pay, one way or another.”