by Mark Ellis
“You heard the order,” Grant responded in the same low voice. “Serve the termination warrant on sight.”
“If we do that, we’ll never learn what’s going on here.”
“We know what’s going on here,” Grant growled. “A smuggling operation.”
“How many smugglers have a setup like this?” Kane demanded. “Where’d a slagger like Reeth get his hands on all this tech, how’d he manage to build such a processing centre all by himself?”
Grant’s lips twitched, but he said nothing.
“How come Reeth called Salvo a backstabber?” Kane pressed on with his questions, his voice a harsh whisper. “Who’s paying the bills on this place?”
Slowly Grant muttered, “I don’t know.”
“Exactly. Salvo knows, but we won’t get any answers from him. He told all of us just enough to put us knee-deep in our graves.” After a moment, Kane added, “This is my instinct talking.”
Though Grant didn’t reply, Kane knew the kind of thoughts spinning through his mind. Magistrates were a highly conservative, duty-bound group. The customs of enforcing the law and obeying orders were ingrained almost from birth. The Magistrates submitted themselves to a grim and unyielding discipline because they believed it was necessary to reverse the floodtide of chaos and restore order to post-Nukeday America.
By nature, Magistrates were proud that each of them accepted the discipline voluntarily, and doubly proud that neither temptation nor jeopardy ever shook their obedience to the oath they swore. But Kane knew, on some deep, visceral level, that an oath was only as inviolate as the men who put its tenets into practice.
On that same deep level, Kane knew Salvo was playing fast and loose with the oath, superficially abiding by the words while disregarding the spirit behind them. His commanding officer hoped the team was so conditioned that they would respond like automatons in any situation, without suspicion and certainly without question. Kane was gambling that his long partnership with Grant would supersede the conditioning to obey, at least for a few minutes.
Finally, Grant released his breath in a sigh of resignation. “All right, goddammit,” he whispered. “I’ll listen to your instinct but only up to a certain point. What do you want me to do?”
“What you always do, what you do best,” Kane replied. “Back me up.”
“If you’re wrong about this, you’ll find my boot backing up your ass. I’ll do that best, too.”
After a quick, whispered conference, they settled on tactics. Grant gave Kane a sceptical look but didn’t put words to it. The two men returned to the scaffold and took careful aim at the light fixtures around the room.
Quietly Kane said, “Now.”
They squeezed the triggers of the Copperheads, shifting the barrels from left to right. Six bullets shattered six light fixtures, leaving only the farthermost pair intact. Glass sprinkled down on the people in the room, and they cried out in alarm. The area around the scaffold was instantly plunged into dark grey murk. The whine of the generator masked the small sounds of the silenced shots, and for several moments, those below were confused as to what had caused the lights to go out. Kane and Grant took swift advantage of those moments.
They leaped from the scaffold, allowing their thick boot soles and reinforced ankle braces to cushion the shock of dropping nearly twenty feet. The light-enhancer units on their helmets allowed them clear vision in the dim light. Though it would have been easier to take out the generator, to kill the floods outside and allow the team to move in, Kane wanted the power to stay on.
He ran on the balls of his feet, the Copperhead trained on Neal. The man squinted in his direction, glimpsed the dark figure looming out of the gloom, and his face contorted in shock and fear. He gasped wordlessly, right hand fumbling at his waistband.
“Freeze!” Kane roared, using his command voice.
Neal froze, but only for a fraction of an instant. His hand whipped up from his waistband, a long-barrelled pistol filling it. Kane squeezed the trigger of the Copperhead. Three 4.85 mm rounds struck Neal in the face and neck. His features dissolved in a wet blur. He jerked backward, the weapon flying from his hand.
Kane heard Reeth and his strong-arm shrieking, and the third man in the room yelled. From behind him came the faint triple pop of Grant’s silenced Copperhead.
Kane caught only fragments of one-color images. At the same time he heard the suppressed sounds of the Copperhead, something struck him high on the left shoulder. He heard an explosive report and saw a spurt of flame.
Staggering from the impact, the air kicked from his lungs and out his nostrils and mouth, Kane flailed to one side, feet scrabbling for purchase on the stone floor. Although his armour had absorbed and distributed most of the high-calibre bullet’s kinetic energy, the shock numbed him.
He glimpsed Reeth’s strong-arm rushing in his direction, gripping an Astra .45-caliber revolver in her right hand. It was a big gun, with a heavy six-inch barrel. It was far too big, far too powerful a pistol to fire accurately with only one hand, no matter how well muscled she was. She fired again. The gun kicked in her hand, pulling up toward the ceiling as the shot boomed and echoed in the enclosed room. The bullet cleaved air a foot over Kane’s head, and he heard it clang against the metal framework of the scaffolding.
Reeth screamed a few unintelligible words at her and turned to flee. The other man in the room started to run after him, leaving the female to cover their retreat. Kane’s peripheral vision showed him Grant, centring his Copperhead on the strong-arm, his aim spoiled because he was trying to keep out of the sights of the Astra.
The Astra revolver vomited thunder and fire for a third time, a wad of lead tearing through the air toward Grant. The bullet missed, punching a hole in a sheet-metal-covered wall.
Kane tossed his Copperhead into his left hand. Before his fingers closed around it, he tensed the tendons in his right wrist. The Sin Eater filled his hand, rounds blasting from the bore immediately.
The stream of slugs plugged a series of dark periods in the back of the man dogging Reeth’s heels. His arms flung wide, his back arched in a grotesquely graceful posture and he hurtled forward into Reeth. Both men went down in a tangle of arms and legs.
The Squidoo’s thick lips writhed, peeling back from broken, discoloured teeth. She uttered a mewling sob of a laugh that sent a little down Kane’s spine. She adjusted her aim with the Astra revolver, wrapping both tentacle-tipped hands around the butt, swinging the bore back toward Kane, shrieking, “Fuckin’ sec men!”
Grant’s Copperhead snapped. The three bullets caught the strong-arm dead centre. She didn’t cry out. She just left her feet, flying backward into the worktable behind her, bouncing off it, then slumping forward over a packing crate. As her body settled, a thin, aspirated scream of anger and hatred floated from her lips.
Kane’s and Grant’s fingers relaxed on the triggers of their weapons. Taking a shuddery breath, wincing at the ache in his shoulder, Kane stepped forward. He felt a remote surprise that he was moving at normal speed again. Pins and needles burned up and down his left arm. He knew he had gotten off lucky—the strong-arm could have fired armour-piercing rounds, and his arm would do more than burn.
The entire firefight, from the moment Neal had drawn his blaster, had lasted less than fifteen seconds. The peculiar time-distortion of combat never failed to surprise Kane.
Reeth elbowed aside the corpse of the man sprawled over him and tried to climb to his knees. Grant reached him first, gathering a handful of greasy dreadlocks in his left fist and yanking the slagger to his feet.
Howling, Reeth clawed at Grant’s fingers. Terror and rage battled for dominance in his eyes. “You stupid bastard! You don’t know what you’re doing!”
Spittle sprayed from his lips onto Grant’s visor. Grant jammed the bore of the Copperhead’s noise suppressor against the hinge of Reeth’s jaw. Flesh sizzled as the heated met
al raised a perfectly round, leaking blister on the flesh. Reeth howled again, the sound trailing off to a despairing croak.
Kane saw Grant’s intent to serve the termination warrant. Despite his promise, his Magistrate’s pride was wounded. Kane quickly pushed himself in front of Grant. Sliding the Sin Eater back into its holster, he placed one finger over his helmet transceiver and asked, “How many blastermen outside?”
“Seven,” Reeth answered in a voice tight with pain. “Not counting the one that got dead. That’s all. I swear.”
Reeth’s threat to outflank the Magistrates in the courtyard had been an empty bluff. Kane wasn’t too surprised. Gathering a handful of lace collar, Kane pulled Reeth away from Grant. He dragged him toward the collection of electronic equipment.
“Call them off. Tell them to throw their guns down into the canyon.” He removed his finger from the transceiver.
As he expected, Salvo’s voice crackled immediately inside his helmet. “Kane? Kane! Who are you talking to? Report!”
Reeth’s trembling hands fumbled among the collection of gear on the table and came up with an old handheld microphone, connected by a curling cord to a public-address system. He said shakily into it, “Lay down your weapons. Throw them over the ledge.”
On the vid screen, Kane watched the blastermen stare disconcertedly at each other, hefting their guns. They hesitated. He planted the bore of his Copperhead against the side of Reeth’s head.
“Do it!” yelled Reeth.
His order also carried to the Magistrates down below. Salvo’s voice demanded angrily, “Kane! Report!”
Kane didn’t reply until he saw the blastermen begin pitching their guns over the lip of the ledge. He said crisply, “Zone secured. Move the team in.”
“You’ve got Reeth.” Salvo made it sound like an accusation. “Serve the warrant.”
“Walk along the bottom edge of the palace,” Kane said. “You’ll find an entrance on the right.”
“Kane! Follow your orders!”
Lips compressed in a tight white line, Kane unsnapped the chin lock and pulled his helmet off. By his reckoning, it would take Salvo and the team about ten minutes to reach them. He didn’t want the man to hear what he had to say, nor did he want to be distracted by orders shouted in his ear. Grant could tolerate their commander’s voice easier than he could.
Without the aid of his light enhancer, the room was very dim. The glow from the computer screen cast wavering, eerie shadows across Reeth’s face. Kane gestured to the worktable and said casually, “Impressive setup, Milt. Gun turrets, comps, electricity. All the comforts. Only one thing is missing.”
Reeth’s response was a gravelly whisper. “What’s that?”
“The equipment to forge ID chips.”
“Why would I want one of those?”
“Word has it you’re smuggling outrunners into Cobaltville. Can’t smuggle without providing them with ID chips. You should know that.”
Reeth tried to smile, lips twisting. “If you don’t see a chip forger, then I guess I’m not smuggling. Simple enough conclusion to reach.”
“Your blastermen are all outrunners,” Grant said. “Except for the ones who are Squidoos.” The last word dripped with contempt, with revulsion.
“So? We’re in a hellzone. Who else would work in a hellzone but outrunners? ’Sides, you got no jurisdiction here.”
Both Kane and Grant laughed mirthlessly. “It’s part of Baron Cobalt’s legal territory,” Kane replied. “You should know that, too.”
An electronic beep came from the computer console. Kane eyed it appraisingly. The machines in the barony, in the Enclaves, were restricted to a very few. Even Kane didn’t have unsupervised access to the computers employed by the Magistrate Division. Archivists enjoyed fairly unlimited use of them, primarily to keep the historical data bases current.
Though he was vaguely aware that Beforetimers had, in the decades preceding Nukeday relied heavily on the machines, the barons had long ago agreed to prevent a repetition of such technological dependence. Still, Kane recognized the computer as a current DDC type, the same direct-digital-control model as those in the Intel section of his division. As such, it was impossible for private citizens, even the ultra-elite of the Enclavers to own one.
“Where did you get this?” he asked. Data still scrolled across the monitor. He poked at the stack of slip sleeved CD disks on the table.
“I’m not sayin’ shit,” grated Reeth. “Not till Salvo gets here.”
Grant suddenly stiffened, head cocked slightly to one side. He put a finger over the transceiver on his helmet and said, “Speaking of him, Salvo just ordered me to kill your slagging ass.”
Reeth’s lips curled in an attempt at a go-to-hell smirk. “Not my ass, sec boy. It’s sanctified.”
“Who sanctified it?” Kane demanded.
“Maybe old Salvo will let you know.”
The machine beeped. The screen went dark and the words Downloading Complete glowed against the background. A symbol appeared on the screen, a red triangle bisected by three black vertical lines. The lines somewhat resembled stylized, round-hilted daggers. From the drive port popped a gleaming compact disk. Kane reached for it with his right hand.
“Don’t touch that!” Reeth shrieked.
Casually, not bothering to look at him, Kane raked the noise suppressor of the Copperhead across Reeth’s face. Blood sprang from a laceration above the bridge of his nose, nicking the blunt snout of the snake tattoo. Reeth squawked in stunned pain, clapping both hands to his face.
He staggered on rubbery legs. Grant shoved one boot behind the man’s ankles and kicked his feet out from under him. Reeth sat down heavily, grunting, fingers trying to catch the rivulets of blood streaming down his face.
During that brief diversion, Kane slipped the compact disk from the hard drive and stowed it in a compartment in his belt. He was sure Grant hadn’t seen him do it.
CHAPTER FOUR
“ON YOUR FEET,” Kane commanded.
Groaning, Reeth stiffly climbed to his feet. He pressed a hand against his forehead, trying to staunch the flow of blood. With a fist against his back, Kane shoved the man toward the dark doorway.
“Prove to me there are no outrunners in here. Not that it’ll make any difference.”
With Reeth in front, they entered a narrow corridor. The stonework and metal girders were pocked and corroded with age. It was lit by a naked bulb shining from a ceiling fixture. It branched into a short T. On the left, the passageway ended at the base of a rock stairway.
Clumping down the stairs came the blastermen, lean and wiry outrunners. Their faces were tight masks of anger and resentment—not an anger at being bested, but a resentment of baronial authority that extended deep into past generations.
“Go to the control room,” Reeth said to them. “Wait for the Mags. Don’t resist. I’ll take care of you.”
Turning to the right, Reeth strode a few feet and stopped before a heavy wooden door on the left-hand wall. A few yards past it, the corridor debouched to the right. Behind the door, Kane heard the murmuring of voices and shuffling of feet.
He knew the voices and anxious feet belonged to outrunners, wanderers desperate to enter a barony, regardless of the risk or the price. Despite the fact they could aspire only to the Pits, there was electricity, real buildings for shelter, real food, even if it was the recycled and reconstituted scraps from the Enclaves. With forged ID chips, silicon granules injected subcutaneously in their forearms, they could receive regular immunity boosters to combat the insidious infections to which all outrunners seemed peculiarly susceptible.
Of course, they would be barred from the towers of the Enclaves, forced to perform slagwork in return for credit chips, but it was better than nomading across the Terra Infernus. Their existences in the Pits would be marginal, but there was always the dista
nt hope, the dream, they could someday buy into citizenship.
Now that they were discovered, their dreams would be dashed and their fates infinitely worse. The best they could hope for was a Magistrate’s mercy, and that meant nothing more kind than being turned loose in a hellzone.
Kane pointed to the door. “Open it.”
Reeth fumbled with the metal locking bar. “Listen,” he said in a wheedling tone, “you got me good, okay? No need to go any further with this.”
“I’m curious about the quality of your merchandise, Milt,” Kane said gently. “As one connoisseur of outrunners to another. Extend me a professional courtesy.”
Taking a deep breath, Reeth lifted the bar from its braces. While he did so, Kane slipped his helmet back over his head, assuming the cell wasn’t lighted. Though he heard the comm-chat of the team approaching the Cliff Palace, Salvo wasn’t shouting at him to report or to follow orders.
Pushing Reeth aside, he carefully toed the door open. It swung inward on squealing, rust-eaten hinges. Copperhead held at waist level, Kane took a cautious step over the threshold and into the holding cell. Initially he saw only shapes shifting in the shadows. Then the outrunners moved toward the light of the corridor.
First one, then another shuffled from the dark corner of the cell. Without immunity boosters, the elements of the hellzone had ravaged their limbs and features. Their skin was scabbed and peeling, with many open, running sores. Kane saw women with patchy bald spots on their scalps, men with eyes covered by milky cataracts, children with stick-thin limbs and bellies swollen from malnutrition. The stink of their unwashed bodies clogged his nostrils. He recoiled from the contact of their touch, even against his armour.
These were the Dregs, the outrunners who were shunned even by other outrunners. The legacy of the Nukeday and baronial doctrines had bred an absolute horror of deviates. Those with severe birth defects were terminated as soon as they were found. Mutants, once very numerous, had been eradicated from most of the baronial territories. But the Dregs weren’t muties. In some ways, they were worse. They were diseased, genetically ruined from generations of exposure to toxic environments and radioactive hot spots, eking out hellish existences as scavengers.