by Chris Ward
She took one out and turned it over in her hands. Powerless, it could have been a metal shelf with handles on one side. Hair-thin cracks in the shiny surface were the only evidence of the multiple treasures Rick had hidden inside. In the tunnels far underground, the light had been the only thing that had kept her sane as the walls and ceiling closed in until she was wriggling on her belly, dragging the bag along behind her by a piece of rope tied around her ankle. She had tried the board just after Lindon had left but its battery was dead, and the other two had proven without power. There had to be some kind of recharging mechanism, but Rick had died before he could show her.
Away from the window, the gloom sat deep in the room, so Mika carried it over to the window to get a better look in the grey morning light. Perhaps if she could figure out where some kind of battery was inserted she could find out how to open it.
As soon as natural light fell on the casing, a tiny green light blinked on.
‘Rick … you made them solar powered,’ she whispered.
She carried all three over and laid them in the indistinct curtain of grey light. It took a few minutes before any of them would activate, but finally her hopeful press lit up the touch screen on one to display its multitude of controls.
Rick had been more than a laboratory engineer, he had been an artist. The board, despite its incredible array of functions, was so light she could hang it by the handles from one finger. As well as the powerful light that had saved her life, it had GPS tracking systems linked to a satellite using some kind of enclosing fire-tunnel software. It also had a grapnel that could fire up to forty metres with an electromagnet connector as well as a regular hook, built-in mini grenades for defense, and various minor programs that recorded such data as altitude, air humidity levels. There was also a smokescreen, and something that when she activated it emitted a hideous squealing that had her grabbing for the off control.
Then there was something that didn’t work. Pressing the control for electromagnetic connectors, nothing happened.
Mika went deep into the software that operated the board, opening up the source information to find out the location and use of the part that didn’t work.
On the outward side were twin circles that when operated should act like powerful electromagnets to hold the board to something made of a receptive metal.
Mika nodded slowly. She held on to the board’s handles and lifted it up in front of her, imagining quite what it might be that the board was designed to stick to. Something like the side of a steel building, a pylon perhaps. Or maybe something moving, like a car, or a bus….
‘Huh.’ Mika stared at the board, then gave a bemused shake of her head. ‘Who were you, Rick? Who were you working for?’
The board was perfectly designed for someone who might want to hang from the side of a speeding train.
Raine’s appartment a day after her cousin’s murder was even more ghastly than the day before. Flies had taken over, and judging by damage to the body, feral animals had come in during the night to begin the cleanup process. Had David’s stomach been full he would have emptied it, but instead he had to settle for a spell of dry retching into the gutter outside.
There was no sign that Raine or anyone else had been back. With a Huntsman on her trail, how much time did she have? Airie and he had barely escaped, and Raine had her baby.
He resisted the urge to waste time blaming himself. Throwing things around or smashing himself up wouldn’t help.
Think, David.
Raine had always ridden well, and her skills wouldn’t have deserted her. With a Huntsman on her trail she would have run, but to where?
He looked up at the sky, as if that could give him answers. Several days had passed since he had gone looking for her at Melling Road Junction and found nothing. She wasn’t stupid enough to go there and wait for him, but she might check in to see if he was there.
He headed across the city, trying to cover his trail as best he could, taking routes that led over bridges, sometimes riding inside the trains, doubling back every couple of stations until when he finally emerged at Latimer Road station, one stop from the abandoned Melling Road Junction, the sun was but a distant memory and a starless black sky blanketed London.
As he headed across the patch of waste ground to the hidden station entrance, he feared finding her body or even parts of it strewn across the platform. What he didn’t expect to see was lights from the concourse below, accompanied by voices raised in merriment.
He considered turning back, but there was a joviality to the voices that denied danger. And there was something else too, something behind it all that until earlier today he hadn’t heard in some time.
Music.
The sound of decades old guitar music rose up from the concourse, a jarring sound that was uncomfortably juxtaposed against London’s night.
He climbed down the stairs and found himself standing at the edge of a circle of light created by a trashcan fire, over which a large homemade ragdoll was burning. At least two dozen people stood in a circle around it, mostly men, but also a couple of women and even one or two children. They were clapping and cheering in time with the music as the fire burned.
David pulled his clawboard out of his bag and held it protectively over his chest. No one had noticed him standing on the edge of the circle, but there was something hypnotic about the way the doll—made from stuffed and sewn white bed sheets—burned. Like the start of something, like the beginning of a fire that had long ago gone out.
‘Hey you!’
The nearest man had noticed him and suddenly the crowd’s attention shifted, the merriment dying down as they bunched together into threes and fours against this new threat. Clapping died mid-flow and voices fell silent until only the sound of the crackling fire came from behind the row of suspicious eyes.
And then the music, paused perhaps between songs, began again with a familiar voiceover introducing the next track, and finishing with the words, ‘Rise up, people! They’ve come back for you! The Tube Riders are back and the Governor will shrivel up and die like the worm he is! Welcome home, the Tube Riders!’
As the voiceover gave way to the rock music which rose in volume, a hand lifted to point at David’s board.
‘Are you one of them? We’ve been waiting for you.’
David felt like a weight had lifted off his chest at the same moment another one came crashing down. His throat felt dry with the heat of expectation. All he could do was nod towards the doll now engulfed in fire.
‘It’s a good likeness,’ he said. ‘Wouldn’t it be nice to see him burn for real?’
As cheers erupted in front of him and hands pulled him forwards into the circle, holding out food and drinks, David couldn’t help but wonder at what point he had lost control of his own destiny.
33
Discoveries
Mika looked up at the sound of a key in the lock. She remembered the board in her hands and her first thought was a scientific one—that she was so close to finishing the adjustments that she really didn’t need any interruptions. Then the more pressing sense of danger overrode it. Was this Lindon coming back or was it someone else? Had Dreggo found her?
The door opened and a chilly draft from the windowless corridor rushed in. Mika slid the board back into Rick’s bag and pushed it behind her, aware it was a futile gesture if they decided to search the room. To her surprise though, the first visitor was a girl younger than herself, barely out of her teens. Her face was etched with worry. Black, puffy skin beneath her eyes suggested she hadn’t slept well in a long time, but she was still strikingly beautiful, with luscious black hair framing an oval face. In other times she might have been a singer or an actress. Here, Mika’s first assumption was that she was a drug addict or prostitute, and that the cold-eyed, grey-haired man who followed her in was her pimp or dealer.
As a show of subtle strength, he lifted his shirt and rubbed a finger along the butt of a gun pushed into his belt. Mika felt a sudden
urge to smile. Rick’s boards were far deadlier than any gun, and she had three of them within arm’s reach.
‘You’ve come from the Tank.’ She didn’t need to make it a question. ‘Before we start with the interrogation, no I don’t know why Rick rescued me and I’m sorry that he died. It wasn’t what I wanted.’
‘Lindon said your name was Mika, and that you’re a scientist from Research Facility Number One.’
Mika nodded. ‘I’m Head of Scientific Research.’
The girl took a step forward, her teeth bared. ‘So you’re the one that makes those things. You fucking bitch. I want my baby back.’
Mika stared at her. ‘What?’
The man grabbed the girl just as she made a lunge forward. ‘Raine, calm down. We’re civilised adults here.’
‘Civilised isn’t a word this fucking whore understands,’ the girl spat. ‘She builds those things. She’s responsible.’
Mika watched her. ‘You’re the Tube Rider whose baby Sorel stole? Where’s my sister?’
‘What sister?’
‘Airie Walker. There were nine scents being tracked, but three were high priority. Yours was one, then there was a man, and Airie’s. My sister. That’s why they came for me.’
The man shook his head. ‘You’re not making any sense. Your life belongs to us now, but unlike your former employer, we’re a lot more reasonable. Tell us what’s going on and no harm will come to you.’
‘Call your bitch off.’
‘I’ll fucking gut you—’
‘And the Tube Riders come so highly praised.’
‘I’m no Tube Rider. I wanted nothing to do with this. I just wanted to raise my baby in peace, and then your fucking monsters show up—’
A gunshot blast filled the room. Mika cried out and covered her ears with her hands. Raine did the same, with only the man standing between them with his gun pointed up at the ceiling seemingly unaffected.
‘I don’t have time for this bullshit,’ he said. ‘Raine, shut up. Mika, tell us how you ended up in our custody and why. Leave nothing out and tell me no lies or the next bullet goes through your skull.’
The man’s name was Tim Cold, and with Raine behaving herself, his demeanour relaxed to a point where Mika found him far warmer than his name, almost likeable. The girl, too, when not spitting fire, was just a normal girl caught up in something she wanted no part of. Mika couldn’t help but feel a sense of pity for her.
‘You have to understand that I had no choice,’ Mika said. ‘It’s more than my life’s worth to disobey my superiors, but when I found out one of these supposed Tube Riders was my sister, Rick and I changed the Huntsmen’s orders. They were supposed to return to the facility, but Sorel ignored the update and continued his mission. When Dreggo found out what I had done, she imprisoned me.’ She resisted the urge to touch the vicious bruise on the side of her face, refusing to show any more weakness than she already had.
‘Where’s my baby?’ Raine said quietly.
‘I downloaded all the data from my files before I got caught,’ Mika said. ‘Rick found the data and we got it out. If I have access to a computer I can show you where Sorel took your baby up to where the data runs out. It might be enough. It might not.’
‘Why? Why not just kill Jake or kill me?’
Mika shook her head. ‘I don’t know. Sorel disobeyed direct orders. The Huntsmen are unpredictable and barely controllable. That’s why they’re so dangerous.’
‘And you let them loose.’
Mika rubbed her eyes. ‘I also tried to bring them back, knowing it might get me killed.’
‘Rick Spacewell considered you valuable enough to sacrifice himself so you could escape,’ Tim Cold said. ‘Tell me why.’
‘I have access to the government’s computer network. I also know how to get around the security in the event that they block me.’
‘How?’
‘I built it.’
‘There must be other scientists,’ the girl said. ‘This is the government we’re talking about, not some fucking university campus.’
‘You don’t understand,’ Mika said. ‘Too much intelligence gets you killed. Of course we have a base of quality scientists, but a lot of the work that goes on in there is done by decades-old machines that tend to become unfixable when they break, leaving a vast array of products incomplete.’
Raine stared at her. ‘You disgust me. Talking about people stolen off the streets like they’re nothing but commodities. Like my baby. Is Jake just a commodity to you?’
Mika shook her head. ‘Not anymore.’
‘I have a computer in an office upstairs,’ Tim said. ‘We’ll see how valuable you are.’
Upstairs in a dusty office Tim Cold started up an old computer and stood aside for Mika to sit down. The computers in the facility were a decade old but this piece of junk was positively antique. After loading seemed to take an age, Mika fitted her memory drive and began to scan through the data she had managed to collect.
With Tim Cold and Raine staring over her shoulder, muttering about how meaningless everything appeared, she pulled up Sorel’s tracking stats. With a satisfied nod she sat back in the chair and looked up at them.
‘Found him.’
‘Where?’
Mika pointed at line of coordinates that repeated at regular intervals down the page. ‘This translates into an address. I can give you what might be good news too. From the behavioural patterns there’s a possibility that your baby is still alive.’
‘What do you mean, “a possibility”?’
‘Sorel is moving back and forth from a central location, and he’s doing it at far shorter intervals than required by a Huntsman searching for food.’
Raine grabbed Mika’s hair and jerked her head back. Tim lifted an eyebrow but did nothing to intervene. Mika stared up into Raine’s bloodshot eyes, trying not to struggle.
‘Kill the fucking science speak. What’s he doing?’
‘I think he’s looking after your baby,’ Mika gasped.
Raine let go of her. ‘How can you be sure?’
Mika rubbed the back of her head. ‘He’s acting the same way a cat would if it was nursing young. He stays with it as long as possible, but makes forays outside of the nest, probably looking for food.’
Raine looked up at Tim. ‘She said there’s an address—’
‘I can get you one if I go online.’
Tim shook his head. ‘There’s no way to connect to the Internet here. I’ll have to arrange for a connection to be established. It could take a couple of days.’
‘What about the Tank?’ Raine said. ‘You must have something there.’
Tim Cold’s eyes shot daggers at her. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘If they track her there I’ll be putting the lives of all those people at risk. I’ll do what I can for your baby, but for the lives of thousands … I’m sorry.’
Mika could almost taste Raine’s rage, but the girl held herself together. His logic was undeniable, and even in her anger she understood.
‘They don’t have my scent trail,’ Mika said. ‘I escaped through a sewer and they couldn’t follow. Any trail they have for me will be leading back to my apartment. I know how these creatures track. Unless they have a starting search location they can’t do anything. If you can get me online I can get into the governmental computer system and find out the status of any current orders.’
Raine still glared at Tim Cold. He gave a sigh and a small shake of his head. ‘Just be aware that I won’t hesitate to turn you over to the government if it means saving my people.’
‘Do you really think I want to go back?’ Mika said.
Tim led them to the door. Mika went second, with Raine bringing up the rear, as if afraid Mika would try to run.
They were just starting down a set of steps towards the main entrance when Mika stopped.
‘I have some things I left in my, um, room,’ she said. ‘Some things that belonged to Rick.’
Tim exchanged a q
uick glance with Raine. ‘I’ll have someone bring them,’ he said.
It was dark when they reached the Tank via a succession of cars with juddering engines. Tim led Mika through a side entrance and down a series of steps into another basement level. At a blank door they stopped.
‘Once you have been inside this room you’re no longer a bargaining tool,’ Tim Cold said. ‘You become a risk. I have everything you need to access your computer systems and fix those things you brought, but if the government comes looking you’ll be turned over dead. Is that understood?’
Mika gave a slow nod. ‘Whatever you say.’
The room they entered this time was a stark contrast to the one at the safe house. Maps of Britain annotated in black pen covered the walls, and several computer terminals that looked in good working order stood on a row of desks.
Tim led her to a computer terminal and she logged on. A few minutes later she looked up.
‘Good news and bad news,’ she said. ‘The good is that I’ve located Sorel’s signal, and it appears that he remains in the same location. The bad news is that the Governor has just authorised an order to refit the country’s Safekeeper battalions in order to combat threats both from overseas and from within. Within a few months they could be operational again.’
‘What’s a Safekeeper?’ Raine said.
Tim stared at the wall. ‘It’s a military robot,’ he said. ‘They’ve been out of service for twenty years. They’re not designed to control by fear like the Huntsmen. They’re designed for war.’
‘Against Europe?’
Tim Cold gave a bitter laugh. ‘Europe will do nothing. The only war that threatens the Governor is one from within. The people only need someone to unite behind, but with a Safekeeper stationed on every street corner the chance to strike at the Governor will be gone.’ He sighed. ‘If you thought life was dark right now, it’s about to get a whole lot darker.’