Shifting Reality (ISF-Allion Book 1)

by Patty Jansen

  It didn’t seem right while he was trying to save a man’s life.

  Chapter 18

  * * *

  MELATI LEFT THE OFFICE at a trot, through the crowded passage, the low-ceilinged market area, into the station hall, where it was almost empty. The enforcers had cordoned off an area with rope and rows of chairs, she supposed to keep a passage clear for the incoming refugees. A couple of bored guards hung around near the lifts, which were unused, the doors yawning open. The mining shifts had started more than an hour ago.

  The display above the door said that the ship Felicity from New Pyongyang was due in an hour and a half. Felicity was a huge ISF vessel. Where were they going to put all those people? She hadn’t even noticed yesterday’s arrival, but this would be different.

  A chilling thought: there was only one place to put them: in the BC block, where Rina’s ghost still lingered. That was why it had been marked off with tape. Silly her; she’d actually assumed they were investigating the murder.

  Desi at the entrance to the lift informed her that Dr Chee was already inside and that a team had gone out to retrieve the other people in the mindbase exchange.

  Melati hurried into the change room—deserted; by God, even the C shifters had long gone—and pulled on her uniform. First she would need to look at the boys. But with every second that the clock ticked over, her family would become more impatient.

  She found the boys in the dorm, where half of them were in the bathroom; the other half huddled under a blanket on a bottom bunk. She could hear their voices busily chatting.

  Christine was there, too, straightening beds and putting away nightclothes.

  “Hi, Melati.” Nothing about why she was so late.

  Melati shut the door behind her, still breathing heavily. “Sorry I’m so late, I . . .” She wondered how much Christine had heard of events in the station. “Have the boys been out to breakfast yet?”

  “Yes. Didn’t eat much, and weren’t interested, so I let them come back here.”

  That focused her attention back to the problem with the cohort. The boys needed to pick up on the eating, or their bodies would start to waste. They were programmed for quick growth after waking up and would start their hormonal injections soon. Within a few months, they would have to grow to adult size.

  “What are they doing under there?” she asked, glancing at the blanket.

  Christine shrugged. “I don’t know. They’ve been doing that most of the time since they woke up. They won’t tell me.”

  “How long have they been like this? Did they sleep much?” Her heart was thudding so hard that she could hardly hear herself speak. On top of everything else, they were losing the cohort.

  “Not much. They were very upset when I arrived, still awake, and hiding from Louise. They spent most of the shift being uncommunicative to her, as far as I can understand. Poor Louise. I don’t understand it.”

  “Anything serious happened?”

  “Beyond the standoff, not that I can trace.”

  “Did you send Louise to a counsellor?”

  “I mentioned it, but I’m not sure she did anything about it.”

  “Not she. You will have to do this for her. She won’t go, unless someone forces her. To be honest, I’m not sure I would, either. We have to convince her that she needs to go.” Louise simply couldn’t work like this, like a ticking bomb likely to go off at the most inconvenient moment. And Melati was going to have to ask her to take care of this very fragile cohort?

  “Look, Christine, I better be direct with you. I have to leave again. Some dreadful things happened in the station overnight. My cousin was killed and I have to leave as soon as possible to go to the funeral. Do you trust Louise with the boys today or is there anyone else free who can help us out?”

  Christine’s face had taken on a horrified expression. “Melati, that’s so dreadful. I heard something about that—that girl who was killed—that was your cousin?”

  Melati nodded, biting her lip to keep her composure. Her whole world was falling apart around her.

  It had gone very quiet in the room.

  A little voice under the blanket said, “Melati?”

  The blanket moved aside. As soon as he saw Melati, Tyro climbed off the bed and ran to her. “Melati! Don’t leave us anymore, please!”

  The other boys joined him, and once again, she was surrounded by hugs.

  She ruffled hair, tears pricking in her eyes. She didn’t want to tell them that she needed to go.

  The bathroom door opened and the remaining boys came out. There was Zax, Simo, Esse . . . and Keb. No, he was still Jas, she could see that by the look in his eyes.

  “When did you come back?” she asked him. She thought Dr Chee would keep him for a while, until he found out what had happened.

  “Nurse brought us back here last night.”

  Night. Station people would say that. ISF only spoke in shifts. That was Jas talking.

  “He’s been talking to us about Ganymede,” Zax said.

  Melati frowned. Ganymede? And then remembered what he had told her yesterday about a scientist from Ganymede having taken off with his body.

  Keb met her eyes, his expression challenging. “I went there.”

  “He’s been talking about all the pretty buildings they have there.” Zax crossed his arms over his chest as if daring her to challenge.

  She didn’t. She was getting an ever-stronger feeling that Rina’s death, Socrates’ misfortune and the strange situation with her cohort were somehow related. If only she understood how and why, and if only she could find proof.

  But she didn’t have the time. “I’m very sorry, boys, but I’m going to have to leave you today.”

  Several boys wailed No!

  “I have to go to a funeral.”

  They all went quiet. Simo looked at her with huge eyes. “A funeral? Who died?”

  “My cousin.” Melati fought to keep her face straight. Emotion was oh so close to the surface.

  “How did she die?”

  “She was killed.” Melati had to close her eyes; she saw the body amongst the pillows, the bloodstains on the wall. She smelled the cloying scent of beginning decay.

  She steeled herself “I won’t be here for most of the day. I may have to ask Louise to come back.” The horror in the boys’ eyes was evident, but none protested. “I want you to pretend that whoever looks after you is me. I want you to listen to this person, and I want you to show this person your very best. Can you do that for me?”

  “There’s no need for anyone else to come.” This was not-Keb. His expression was sincere, too mature for his age. “I can look after them.”

  Simo’s expression was hopeful. “Yes, Jas can do that. Please, Melati. He’s been teaching us how to make racing cars.”

  Only now did Melati notice that they had a computer on the bed, and an assortment of bits of metal, screws, wheels and bits of electronics which she assumed to be an engine.

  “Yes,” Esse said. “It goes around the room real fast, but we hid it from Louise because she said she would confli— confr—”

  “Confiscate!” Tyro said.

  “Yeah, that.”

  What was this obsession with model cars? She supposed it was better than doing nothing, but they should be doing their lessons. This was very odd, but possibly the cohort was holding together better than she thought.

  “I’ll tell Louise not to take anything from you.”

  “We don’t want Louise. We want Jas.”

  “There has to be an adult supervisor. How about I send Louise and you just pretend that the one really looking after you is Keb?”

  “Jas!” eight voices yelled as one.

  “All right, all right, Jas.”

  “Then I’ll go now.” She rose and went into the hall with Christine, giving her instructions on where the learning files were and how much—or rather how little—they had covered. By now, she was very impatient to go. She should have been with her family, like,
an hour ago.

  Then Christine said, “By the way, Melati, do you know what’s up with the computer?”

  She had to make an effort to focus on Christine’s face. “Dr Chee had a lot of problems yesterday. What’s it doing?”

  “It’s just very slow. I couldn’t get into the log file at first, but then I saw that it was writing a huge file into the data log. I was going to delete it, but thought I’d ask you first.”

  Ah. The results from the search worm with the cohort key.

  “No, don’t delete it. I need that.”

  “All right, I just wanted to check with you.”

  Then Melati could finally leave the room. She hurried down the teaching wing, pushed the door to the change room—

  “Melati.”

  What now?

  She turned around. It was Laura Jennings.

  “Yes.” Melati’s courage sank with the severe look in her eyes. Something had happened and she wasn’t allowed to leave. The base had just gone into Orange alert; some important data had come out of Dr Chee’s work with Keb and needed to be dealt with immediately. She wanted to yell, I need to go to a funeral! The aunties would be preparing the body, and she should be there helping them.

  “Don’t look at me like that. I’m not going to eat you. I heard what happened to your cousin. I know we have a lot of differences, but I’m not a monster. You know, my mother died a number of years back. It was quite sudden. She lived with my brother and his wife at Luna Base. I was here and could never go to the funeral.” Her eyes were intense. “We’ll manage without you.”

  Then what? Why were all these people holding her up?

  “Cocaro has asked me to make sure you have a couple of guys with you each time you go out.”

  What? A bodyguard? “Why?”

  “We’re concerned for your safety. Things are not stable in the station.”

  “But I’m a local.”

  Laura said, “Think of it this way: ISF has invested a lot of money in training all of us. They want to protect their investment.”

  It was true, but Melati still didn’t like it—fancy showing up at Uncle’s rumak with two armed soldiers in tow—but arguing was futile and she had no time for it besides.

  “It’s really not necessary. I’ll be safe with my family. I understand where the trouble is. I’ll be far from where the refugees arrive and the fights in the B sector are about ID and permits. Nothing to do with me—”

  She stopped. Even when speaking to her colleagues here, she talked down the problems of the barang-barang. How could anyone take them seriously if they didn’t take themselves seriously? The trouble was about a lot more than permits.

  Never mind that armed guards would make her stand out even more, and would possibly even attract violence. Never mind that she was with family and everyone else knew her, too.

  If she was to stand for the StatOp council, she should start behaving the part.

  She straightened her back. “All right.”

  Laura gestured behind her. Melati noticed two people standing a bit further down the passage, waiting.

  Jao Kessler and Desi Pfitzinger. God, she sent a sharpshooter. What information did Cocaro have that she didn’t?

  Chapter 19

  * * *

  MELATI GOT CHANGED first since she was certainly not going to a funeral in ISF uniform. Her suggestion that the two constructs do the same met with blank looks. Possibly they didn’t have any non-uniform clothes.

  She’d explained, “You’ll stand out like crazy.”

  But then again, maybe that was the point—Cocaro’s way of warning StatOp that ISF was starting to take the situation in the station seriously. Maybe, too, it was Cocaro’s way of sending someone into the station to report back to her. Great.

  Desi she knew from her guard duty, and she was a true fighter, dressed in a thick, metallic grey suit of a type Melati had not seen her wear before. She wore shoulder pads, knee pads, tall boots, a bullet and laser-proof vest and a wide belt that bristled with weapons that would make the hypertechs salivate. Clearly visible, too. She was tall, had a long, narrow face that was typical of the Pfitzingers and wore her brown hair in a ponytail. She carried a combat helmet under her arm.

  Her partner had the typical construct curls and classic profile. Jao Kessler, not an obvious choice for guard duty. He was similarly outfitted to Desi, but his equipment was slightly different. He wore communication headgear and instead of a clear visor, his helmet had a reflective cover similar to the hypertech headgear.

  “Just to be clear,” she said in the lift as they stood next to her like living dolls. “It’s probably not a good idea to have you visibly protecting me during the ceremony. Parts of the ceremony are restricted to family only. I don’t want anyone to know that you’re with me or that you’re shadowing me.” They would stick out enough already. No tier 1 ever came to barang-barang family occasions, especially funerals.

  “Our orders are only to protect you,” Jao said.

  “Good, then we understand each other. Because my family aren’t dangerous. You want danger, you go behind the docks and flush out the hotels. That’s where the criminals are.”

  “We do as we’re ordered. That’s all we do.”

  Melati felt like rolling her eyes. “Good.”

  The lift doors opened to the hum of many voices and the beep of equipment.

  At least twenty enforcers stood in the hall. They had cordoned off a large area around the lifts and put rows of seats to the side. People who wanted to use those lifts—mainly workers wanting to go to different levels of the station—crowded to the side in a long queue for the single lift still in operation. The display above the lift entrance showed the Felicity docking in ten minutes, with one hundred and forty-two crew on board and eight hundred and ninety-four passengers.

  A roped-off path led from the hall into the market hall, where more enforcers stood. Many warung stalls were gone. Melati couldn’t see Dian anywhere. Li Wei argued with an enforcer, gesturing angrily at his shop empty of customers.

  At JeJe, a mixed crowd of old and young, mothers and father and children had gathered outside Uncle’s rumak, most of them milling around and waiting for the procession to start. Several people carried yellow banners and flowers made out of yellow paper, some faded and worse for wear. Anything that family members had taken or smuggled from Indonesia was used until it fell apart.

  A number of people turned around when Melati arrived, and then more people noticed the constructs and their guns—not stunners like enforcers used. There was also a lone female enforcer in the passage. Melati knew her—a female Grimshaw, and she liked those. This woman was not a bad sort. She eyed the two soldiers with wary glances.

  Melati told the two constructs to wait.

  “We have orders to protect you,” Jao insisted.

  Was that the only thing he could say? “I’m going inside, and you can’t come. This is for family only. There is nowhere else for me to come back out except that door. You can wait here.”

  “But our—”

  “Only family members are allowed inside with the deceased.”

  A look of horror came over his face as if he hadn’t realised that funerals usually involved a dead body.

  She turned without a further word and wrestled through the crowd.

  The dining room was shrouded in semidarkness. A couple of candles burned on a table against the back wall, and the only other light came from the door of the kitchen. The air smelled of incense.

  Rina lay, pale and unmoving, on a colourful cloth spread out over the tables. Someone had removed her dirty clothes and covered up her private parts with cloths. Lying on her back, the awful injury where the knife had gone in didn’t show.

  Auntie Dewi was just bringing a bowl with water and washcloths, those that only came out for special occasions, from the kitchen. She wore her fine clothes covered by an apron with faded flowers on it. That apron used to be Pak’s.

  She gave Melati a shar
p look. Oh, there you are.

  “Sorry, I needed to make sure everything at work was fine.” Which was such a lame excuse in their eyes. Family should always be more important than work.

  “Here, you help me.” Auntie Dewi thrust a damp cloth into Melati’s hands. “Clean her fingernails.”

  Fine, she was angry. Why would no one understand that she had a life beyond the B sector? Why did everyone pretend that she had all the time in the world?

  But arguing would have to wait for another time.

  Melati focused on the job.

  Rina’s hand was stiff and cold. Blood had dried ingrained in the skin and under the nails. Two of her fingernails had broken. Melati could only imagine Rina’s last desperate moments. In her despair, she had come to her family for help. She’d been unable to break into Melati’s unit and had run into the first hiding place she found. Someone had followed her, killed her and run off. How hard could it be to find a killer when the station was in lockdown?

  Would Rina still be alive if Melati had been home?

  Melati did her work, seeing through a haze of tears. Auntie Dewi was singing softly, making sure that whenever she washed part of the skin, the cloth didn’t fall off the indecent parts.

  Auntie Gema and little four-year-old Ratna brought the cloth for wrapping the body. One of the other aunties made these cloths from thin strips of packing plastic. Real cloth was much too precious. Auntie Dewi tied Rina’s feet together and her arms to her body.

  When they were finished, Auntie Dewi went outside and threw the rest of the water out the door. The waiting people in JeJe scrambled out of its way. She yelled, “Begone, spirits of evil and enemies of justice!”

  Now that the women had finished, Wahid came in, followed by Uncle and a couple of Uncle’s relatives, and Harto.

  No Ari.

  Washing her hands in the kitchen, Melati felt annoyed that Harto managed to worm himself into everything. He was not family, he was not the modin to lead prayer, and he should wait outside like all the other neighbours. So many people crowded at the door that Melati couldn’t see the two soldiers anymore. She hoped they wouldn’t do anything stupid when they all came out and the procession started.