by Sarah Zettel
But when she reached the hatchway to the stairwell, Teal stopped and stared. The hatch had been closed. Hatches to the stairs were never closed, unless there had been some kind of emergency, like a leak in the pipes or a pinhole in the outer hull. But the hatch’s display screen was blank. If there was an emergency, a message would be displayed. Teal hesitated, but then she undogged the hatch with a remembered twist of her wrist. When no alarms rang, she pushed it open, and froze.
The stairway had become a city. People crammed themselves onto every landing and onto most of the steps in between. Kids, some of them half naked, some of them fully naked, raced up and down between the adults. Clusters of them dangled off the railings, and no one stopped them, unless they seemed in actual danger of dropping all the way down the shaft. Lines had been strung from the railings and the support beams to hold bundles of cloth or even pieces of pierced scrap metal. Hammocks woven of knotted cable and optic had been strung from the railing to the pipes that ran down the middle of the stairwell. Some of them held nameless bundles, some of them held people. The noise of too many voices and too many footsteps bounced off the walls so the shaft filled with one continual, incomprehensible swirl of noise.
Teal gaped. She couldn’t help it. How could anybody have let this happen? This broke several billion regulations. What happened if the bulkheads had to be shut? Or even if one of the pipes sprang a leak? How would maintenance get to it? Where were the superiors? What had happened to all the warning alarms? Never mind that she had hated all such rules. Never mind that she had broken regulations whenever she could. She had still known they were there to keep the station safe. Everybody knew that. Everybody but the people living in the stairwell.
Who are all of you? What are you doing in my home?
A few heads turned toward her, revealing dirty, wrinkled faces that reminded her of the dormers on Pandora and the people from the docking ring. They eyed her sourly and she saw them mouth things at her, but their words were lost in the general clamor.
Teal closed the hatch, a little ashamed at how her hands shook. They were just airheads. No matter how many of them there were, they were just people who couldn’t afford a room. She remembered teasing their kind along with King and Eng, and even with Chena, before Chena decided she was the righteous one. But what was going on here? Why were there so many of them?
Doesn’t matter. Teal shook her head. The only important thing here was that there was no going up the stairs. She’d have to take the elevator.
Teal all but ran back to the elevator cluster. One of the doors had just opened and a crowd of drones, shippers, and harassed-looking dockworkers shuffled into the car. Teal slipped in behind them and squeezed into an empty spot in the front corner. The doors closed and the elevator began its ascent.
Teal scanned the tired and impatient faces around her on the off chance she’d see someone she recognized from before. But they were all strangers to her. Teal’s stomach tightened. Maybe she hadn’t come home after all.
The elevator door opened before Teal realized she hadn’t pressed a destination key. A dockworker, his green parrot bobbing restlessly on his shoulder, shepherded out a flock of small drones and Teal peeked into the corridor. An apartment level, one of the not-so-good ones. Its floor padding was scuffed and badly patched, and the walls didn’t even have amateur art to decorate them. But there would be a landlord outlet, and she needed someplace cheap anyway. At least it didn’t look like there was anybody living in the hall. Teal slipped out just as the door began to close.
The others hustled along the wall and disappeared around the curve. Teal, left alone, realized what else was wrong. There were not only no airheads, there were no people in the hall. She glanced at her comptroller, which she had reset for station time. Like the villages, the station ran on shifts, and it was time for the change from day to swing. That is, it should have been. The place should have been crowded with gossiping families, door-to-door merchants, and kids getting out of class.
Teal shoved her hand through her hair. What happened? she wondered for the thousandth time. Should she maybe knock on a door, try to find an actual person to talk to? Was the place quarantined or something? Had one of those dirty, naked people brought the Diversity Crisis to Athena? But there hadn’t been any alarms when she walked out. But then, who knew if the alarms were working anymore?
“Hey!”
Teal froze, her heart hammering in her throat. Running footsteps echoed down the hall behind her. She started to turn, but as she did, hands grabbed her and twisted her arms behind her back. Another hand shoved down on the top of her head, forcing her to her knees. The floor bit hard and she shrieked involuntarily.
“Thought you’d sneak out, did you?” growled a man’s rough voice. “Thought you’d try to set up one of your filthy little tents right here, did you?”
“No! No! I’m not…” She twisted in their grasp and managed to get her head forced up to see their faces, and she froze again.
King and Eng. There was no mistaking them. King Prahti had a huge, hooked nose and high cheekbones that made him always look a little starved, no matter how much he ate. Eng Dor, he was still built like a brick, only now it was a much bigger brick with a light in the back of his black eyes that chilled Teal down to her bones. They looked at her like she was worse than a stranger. They saw an intruder.
“Lying squatter!” shouted Eng, jerking on her arms until she felt like her joints were about to pop.
“No! Eng, it’s me!” she cried. “Teal Trust!”
That at least got them both to hold still for a second.
“You used to scrounge with my sister Chena.” She gasped against the pain growing in her arms. “And tell me lies to see if you could get me to set off the alarms. We used to rip off the dumpsters, and once we almost got thrown in the can because Crazy Mary actually got the superiors to listen to her about the blankets—”
“Piss!” exclaimed King, and he crouched in front of her, searching her face. “Teal? But you’re… you left, down to Pandora.”
She nodded and gave him a watery grin. “I’m back.”
“Nobody comes back,” said Eng suspiciously. He hadn’t loosened his grip on her at all.
“Shut up, Eng, or I’ll tell your mother on you. Your ears will ring for a week.” Boxing ears was Jesmena Dor’s favorite way of punishing her eight children. Eng was probably too big for it now, but Teal got to see him blanch. A moment later, he let go.
“Sorry, Teal.” He stepped back, giving her room to stand.
“ ’S okay,” she told him, rubbing her wrists. She was going to be bruised. “How the piss were you gonna know?”
“And you’ve…” King’s eyes wandered up and down her body. “Changed.”
“I had help,” she muttered, and with a grunt she got up off the floor. “Now, what’s the squirt? How come you tackled me?”
“Thought you were a squatter.” Eng shrugged. He stopped when he saw the incomprehension on her face. “You don’t know?”
“They don’t tell us piss down there.” Teal rolled her shoulders, trying to work some of the burning out. “What should I know?”
King folded his arms and looked angrily at the wall. “The Authority dumped a whole bunch of Crisis refugees on us five, six, years ago, now. And instead of hauling them out again, like they were supposed to, the directors decided they should let them stay. Not only that, but they keep bringing in more and more.” He shook his head.
“Director begged the hothousers for help, or at least he said he did.” Eng’s snort showed what he thought of that. “They said they could”— his voice changed, becoming slick and cultured—“absorb a hundred screened specimens, but no more than that.” He snorted again. “The rest of them decided, since there weren’t any rooms for them to rent, they’d take over a few.”
“There was a fight?”
King nodded again. “Should’ve shoved all of them out the airlock. But Director Shontio lost his nerve. Said they�
��re all going down to Pandora one way or another. This is all the Pandorans’ fault, he says, the Pandorans can take care of it. Well—” He threw out his arms and spun around. “They keep coming in, but ain’t none of them leaving.”
“It’s been short rations practically since you left,” said Eng. “And short water. There’s a black market like you wouldn’t believe, and a lot of it’s run by the squatters. They tap the pipes from the stairs.”
“If we didn’t keep the food lines under control, they’d be all over us,” added King.
The weight of the news staggered Teal, but she shoved it aside. It had nothing to do with her. All that mattered was getting to the Authority.
“Listen, guys, I need a room. Are the bureaus still up?”
“Not for at least a year,” said King. “Hate to tell you, Teal, but there aren’t any rooms.”
“What do you mean? There’s always something.” Sometimes it was monstrously expensive, but there was always something.
“Not anymore. The director made a deal with the airheads to give them extra rooms when the squatters started taking up the halls.” King looked like he wanted to spit. “So now we’re paying for their rent on top of ours. It’s all piss and smoke now, Teal. Nothing decent left up here.”
“You could stay with me, Teal,” suggested Eng.
Teal hesitated. She knew Eng was just a kid and a talker and it was a good offer. She did need to hole up somewhere, but this new woman’s body she was trapped in wanted to squirm at the idea. Maybe it was the memory of how he had just knocked her flat just because.
“Thanks, but not,” she told him. “I’ve got to find my own place. I’ve got… stuff to do.”
King shook his head again. “We’re telling you, Teal. There’s nothing.”
“So let me piss away a little time.” Teal shrugged. “What’s it to you?”
The boys—men, really—exchanged skeptical glances. King turned away first, his gaze wandering up and down the blank walls like he couldn’t believe what he’d just heard.
“Okay,” said Eng for both of them. “Your time, not mine. But I wouldn’t let the superiors catch you sleeping in the hall. They’ll take your head off.”
“Nice to know some things haven’t changed,” said Teal blandly.
They all chuckled at that. “Watch out for yourself.” Eng held out his hand and they brushed palms and backs, touching their foreheads to each other, a kids’ salute Teal wouldn’t have realized she even remembered. “And I’m still in the same hole if you need anything.”
“Thanks.” She saluted King, who returned it more out of reflex than friendship. When she pulled her hand away, he smacked Eng on the shoulder and the two of them sauntered down the hall like they were on patrol or something.
Maybe they are.
Teal folded her arms around herself and stared at the blank walls and dingy doors, trying to think. Obviously finding a squat on her own was a no-go. So only one thing to do.
Head straight for the Authority. They could put her up while they tracked down a city slot for her, or Dad. After all, what if it turned out that the stories they’d been telling all these years were true and Dad really was on some kind of mission? Or maybe his ship had just gotten stranded somewhere? It happened all the time. Everybody knew that. The Authority might still find him, wherever he was. Then she’d tell him what had been going on all these years and he’d cry and hug her and call her Starlet, and she’d live with him in El Dorado or Atlantis or one of the other cities, and she’d help him with… with whatever he was doing, and they’d be a family, a real family. Not like her and Chena. Nothing like that at all.
With her arms still wrapped around herself, Teal walked rapidly down the hallway.
The most likely place to find the Authority reps, Teal decided, was the directorate. This time, she stuck to the elevators. Athena Station was four arms rotating around a central core that held the power plants, air processors, and the other machinery of living. Arms One and Two held living quarters. Arms Three and Four were given over to manufacturing whatever Pandora needed, which the Athenians traded for food and water.
Administrative offices were distributed between all four arms, but the directorate was concentrated in Arm One. Teal had come in on Arm Two, so she’d have to get across in one of the connectors.
The elevator door opened onto a corridor jammed with people. Teal stepped out, momentarily stunned by the size of the crowd. It wasn’t in motion, though. The people all stood in a line. Well, some of them sat or squatted in the line. Most of them carried a pack or a case of some kind. A few had droids, dogs, or ferrets on tethers. None of the machines or the animals ran free.
“What’s going on?” Teal asked a woman who balanced a duffel roll on her broad shoulder.
The woman gave her a look of pure contempt for such ignorance. “Checkpoint. No cutting the line, girly.” She jerked her chin up the corridor.
Checkpoint? For what? Then Teal remembered all those strangers in the stairwells, and all King’s and Eng’s tough talk. Had there been trouble? Had there been a breakout of some kind, maybe?
Well, it’s okay. Teal took her place in line behind a pair of men whose gray tunics had bright gold electrician’s badges on them. Four banded ferrets used the men as a climbing gym. The restless animals chased each other in and out of pockets and around shoulders and ankles.
Watching their antics made the wait feel short and left Teal in a much better mood than she’d started out in.
At last she could see the checkpoint between the heads and shoulders of people in front of her, or rather she could see the pair of superiors who were working the checkpoint. But instead of the tan tunics and blue trousers she was familiar with, the superiors now wore black body armor and radio helmets. They carried tasers and pellet guns on their belts. If they were supposed to look menacing, it worked. Teal’s throat tightened. She and Chena had spent hours on mischief as kids, seeing if they could get the superiors to come chase them, but those superiors hadn’t been armed with anything more than cameras and old rules.
But that wasn’t the only change. The bulkhead had been turned into a choke point with bulky scanners welded to the struts. Multiple cameras watched the people coming in, the people passing through, the superiors, the length of the line, and who knew what else.
Each person stopped in front of the superiors. Teal couldn’t hear the questions they asked, but she couldn’t help noticing the process took a lot longer for people without badges on their tunics than for those with some kind of official marking. Bags and cases were opened and searched, as were droids. Animals were prodded, sometimes until they yelped.
Another few shuffles forward, and Teal could see they also examined sheet screens and printouts.
Sheets?
Teal rubbed the chip on the back of her hand. She hadn’t expected her identity to be questioned. Then again, she thought she was going back to the Athena she knew and that knew her.
Up ahead, a woman bent under the weight of her pack handed her sheets over to the superiors. They read them and shook their heads. Her arms waved in the air, and they shook their heads. She reached into her trousers pockets, and the right-hand superior reached for his taser. The woman turned away, and the line made reluctant room for her as she picked her way back down the connector.
Teal swallowed. What were they asking for? What did they need? They’d only read her chip at the base of the cable. No one had said anything about needing anything else.
Of course, she hadn’t exactly come through official channels. She ground her teeth together. Damn the tailor. He should have known about this. The cheat. He should have told her.
Now what do I do?
When she was a kid, she could get away with murder by looking innocent. But no matter what she really was, she didn’t look like a kid anymore. Those superiors in their armor with their weapons probably weren’t going to believe any adult was innocent, no matter how that adult looked.
O
ne of the ferrets whisked up its owner’s shoulder and regarded her with bright black eyes for a moment before it tried to vanish into its owner’s pack.
Unless maybe they are distracted. Unless maybe the adult looks ridiculous.
The man caught the ferret around the middle with one broad brown hand. “Come on, Biscuit. Nothing for you in there.”
Biscuit didn’t seem to believe it. As soon as he (she?) was on the floor, he scuttled up his owner and dove for the pack.
This time, Teal caught him.
“Whoa.” She held the animal up to her face, like she knew and liked it. “You don’t listen, do you?” Its short legs paddled a little and its nose twitched. Teal laughed as she handed him back. “Probably bored,” she remarked.
“Wouldn’t be the only one.” The man cradled Biscuit in one arm and reached up to pluck a second ferret off the top of his head. “Come on, guys, we’re almost there.”
“How old are they?” she asked, remembering how Mom always struck up conversations with people who had children.
Apparently it worked just as well with people who had animals. She found herself introduced to Biscuit (three years old), Brownie (three and a half), Cookie (four and a half, the senior ferret), and Creampuff (two). They were industrial ferrets, trained to pull wires and fiber-optic cables through narrow conduits. They were, he explained, especially valuable since the squatters started arriving in force, what with nobody being sure which maintenance tunnels they were going to be able to get to easily.
“By the way, I’m Claudiu.” He gave her a jaunty salute and Teal returned it.
“Teal.”
Cookie and Biscuit took this opportunity to run up her body. Teal shrieked, just a little, she couldn’t help it, and she and Claudiu spent the next few minutes disentangling ferrets and ferret harnesses from her hair.
“Definitely bored.” Claudiu laughed.
“We have a cage,” drawled his partner, who had been watching the entire proceeding through half-lidded eyes.