by Mark Souza
Hawthorne waited his turn in the turnstile, his bag clutched to his chest while Moyer performed the trick again. The turnstile rotated and the Judge shuffled to the other side.
From past experience, Moyer knew as the last one through, timing was critical. He placed his bag inside the turnstile, licked his finger and stretched to touch the battery. The turnstile slowly spun. Moyer sprinted two steps to the opening as it closed. He snatched up his bag and slipped between the rotating bars and stumbled. He slammed hard to the ground and tumbled out on the other side.
“Are you all right?” Robyn asked.
Moyer rose to his feet and brushed the dust from his knees. “Yeah, I’m fine. I was better at it when I was a teenager. But I never tried it carrying a bag either.”
Hawthorne peered through the bars at the reader plate. “My battery.”
“I’m sorry, Judge. That was always the downside of that technique. There’s no net where we’re going anyway.”
Two more flights of stairs put them on the tube platform. The terminal was empty. An electronic route map above the platform showed a train approaching. A breeze stirred on the landing. The increasing rush of air gained a mechanical component. Braking magnets deployed inside the tube with an audible clunk. The train squealed to a smooth stop with the cars aligned with the platforms. Moyer pointed at an empty middle car. “This one.”
Further west, the tube passed through Labor Housing. Laborers had defined work shifts. The trains would run empty until five in the afternoon, when they would be packed tight as pickle jars for the commute home.
Moyer sat next to Robyn and scrounged through his bag before locating a bottle of water. He cracked the seal and offered it to her. “Be careful,” he said. “I don’t know how long it has to last us.”
Robyn’s eyes conveyed betrayal and distrust. Moyer realized he should have better phrased his last sentence. Robyn had read between the lines and recognized they were ill prepared for what lay ahead, and that Moyer had no idea how to contact the people who would help them. Maybe she was right to be angry. Moyer had withheld information about the rigors they were apt to face. He wasn’t sure he understood them all, but they had no other choice.
Robyn tipped up the Calabash bottle and drank. Bubbles drifted to the top. The cylindrical bottle provided a warped, panoramic view of the car – orange seats and shiny steel. A black shadow drifted across the bottle like oil spreading across water. Moyer turned and saw an agent approach.
Chapter 32
Shock. Fear. Emotions that were intended to jump start Moyer’s reflex to flee, instead, overwhelmed his system and froze him in his seat. The agent closed the distance with purpose. He knew who they were. How had Moyer not sensed his presence? Was he that distracted?
Moyer tried to stand. The agent’s hand came up quickly. The wand caught Moyer below his ribs. The initial electric jolt seemed to detach bones from their joints, and his scalp from his skull. Then his muscles began firing and jerking on their own. A metallic drumming filled his ears. It was the sound of his head beating against the floor while he convulsed. He was loosing consciousness when an explosion hit his ears.
Throbbing pain between his temples welcomed Moyer back to consciousness. His muscles ached and were weak. He cracked his eyes open, suffered the stab of overhead lights, and closed them again.
“Get up, Moyer,” Robyn pleaded. “We’re coming to the end of the line. We have to go.”
Moyer turned his head and opened his eyes again. The black clad security agent lay sprawled on the floor. Cracks radiated outward from a single hole in the agent’s faceplate. A pool of blood encircled his helmet. The Judge stuffed his pistol back into his pocket.
Robyn tugged on his arm. “Move, Moyer! The tube is stopping and they’re going to be coming after us. Get up!”
Moyer tried his legs. They were weak and sore; incapable of supporting his weight. “I can’t. The two of you go.”
As the doors hissed opened, Robyn grabbed the bags and threw them out onto the landing. “Judge, take an arm,” Robyn ordered.
Moyer felt hands clamp onto his wrists. His head rolled back when he was lifted and he saw the Judge and Robyn straining to drag him, one on each arm. His heels rattled over the textured metal covering the floor. He was reminded of Hugh Sasaki being hauled out of the Digi-Soft basement, his heels marking out a trail behind him.
Robyn’s face flushed with strain. The Judge’s dripped with perspiration. They hauled Moyer onto the platform at an angle. One foot clunked over the gap between threshold and landing. The doors of the car closed, clamping down on the sides of Moyer’s ankle. The train started moving on its return back toward the city.
Robyn screamed. The cry echoed in the hollow vastness of the station. The train ripped Moyer sideways across the concrete. “Don’t let go!” she pleaded to the Judge.
Robyn and the Judge were jerked off their feet and towed toward the tunnel where the landing ended. Moyer kicked with his free leg. His heel thumped weakly against the door. The Judge’s grip slipped and he came loose. Robyn held fast as they accelerated toward the tunnel. Moyer kept kicking and tried to jerk his arm away from Robyn before she got herself killed. As he struggled, his leg came free from the door and he tumbled to a stop atop his wife. Robyn released his wrist. Both panted for air.
Moyer lay on the floor, too rubber-limbed to get up on his own. The Judge staggered over to help. Moyer managed to sit up and spotted their bags at the far end of the platform. “We have to go,” he said. “Security will be here soon. Help me up.”
As they tried to lift Moyer, Hawthorne flagged. Moyer’s head pounded and swayed like a bobber in the surf. Hawthorne’s condition didn’t appear much better. Moyer had never asked the Judge how old he was, but if he was born before chip implantation became mandatory, he was at least 120, and possibly older.
“Let’s get out of here. I’m feeling a little better,” Moyer said. “We need to find a place to hide for a while, so I can rest. The collector fields are going to be too hot to cross till nightfall, anyway.”
Moyer lagged behind on the way back to the bags. His ankle ached. He caught up as Hawthorne tried to lift his bag. Moyer took it from him. “You have been stronger than I could have ever hoped, but you need rest.” Hawthorne nodded his head and didn’t argue.
“I assume the agent was your handiwork?” Moyer said. Hawthorne nodded again. “Thank you,” Moyer said.
Bright sunshine streamed onto the steps leading to the street. Moyer squinted and tipped his head down. The day was already hot. Moyer got his bearings and headed east back toward the city.
“The train to Mannington is this way,” Hawthorne said.
Moyer caught the Judge’s hand before he could point the way. “They are probably using surveillance cameras to search for us,” Moyer said. “I don’t want to direct them to where we’re going. Let’s head into Labor Housing and see if we can find a place away from cameras to relax for a while. Keep your hats on and heads low so they can’t get visuals of our faces.”
“It’s so hot,” Hawthorne said mopping his brow with his sleeve.
“It’s the solar collector field. That’s why they call this the Ring of Fire. It’s one more reason to head toward the city. It’s cooler.”
They walked slowly down West Michigan. Old brick buildings from the twentieth century were mixed with modern concrete residential monstrosities built so cheaply they lacked even simple architectural details and paint.
After a few blocks, Moyer spotted a smashed out lower pane in an entrance door – probably the result of looters. A stretch of bad weather the week before had left the battery banks depleted. When battery storage got low and power went out, it went out in Labor Housing first.
Looters had no reservations when it came to stealing from their own. The lights never dimmed in the heart of the city, because that’s where the real power was, and the money. The City Manager that let the lights go out in downtown’s Golden Core would have an apartme
nt on the Ring of Fire the next day. There were dire consequences for breaking the cardinal rule: No pain for the privileged.
Moyer ducked under the mullion in the door and climbed through the hole in the glass. He extended a hand to help Robyn, and then Hawthorne. In the elevator, Moyer pressed the button marked SKYBRIDGE. Using sky bridges, they moved several blocks north and one west.
Moyer called the elevator in the building they had chosen to make sure it worked, and then went to the stairwell. He dropped the bags on the landing and let the door to the hallway close behind them.
“The laborers shouldn’t return until six or so. We should be safe here until then. No one will take the stairs if the elevator works.” He turned to Hawthorne who looked spent. “Get some rest, Judge.”
Moyer laid back and settled his head against his bag. The concrete floor felt pleasingly cool. He stroked Robyn’s arm. He couldn’t shake the image of Robyn being dragged across the terminal and refusing to let him go. He smiled. Robyn fidgeted trying to get comfortable and pulled the hat off her head to remove the gold cap.
“No!” Moyer barked. “You have to keep it on. Without the gold cap they can lock onto our location.”
Robyn shoved the cap back in place and bared her teeth in a grimace. She nestled against her bag in an effort to use it as a pillow.
“It’s only for a few more hours.” Moyer said. He settled his head against his bag and tried to relax.
Moyer woke to Robyn shaking him. “Someone is coming up the stairs.”
“What time is it?”
“I don’t know.”
“Do you have a mirror?”
Robyn fished through her bag. Hawthorne unzipped a pocket on his suitcase and handed Moyer a metallic tablet.
“My computer,” he said.
The top was glossy and black. The back plate was bright, polished metal. Moyer extended it beyond the railing of the stairwell. The image reflected off the metal was upside down. Though distorted, what he saw was unmistakable. Agents had taken position on the lower landings to prevent anyone from escaping while they searched.
“Security agents. Let’s go,” Moyer whispered.
He grabbed his bag and Hawthorne’s and started quietly down the stairs. Below, the sound of boots reverberated off the stairwell walls. Moyer turned back to Robyn and Hawthorne with a finger over his lips and pointed up.
They changed direction and quietly ascended the stairs. Two flights up, the stairs ended at a small landing with a metal door set in the opposing wall. A door slammed below them and the stairwell was quiet. “They don’t know where we are,” Moyer whispered. “They’re searching systematically. They probably saw us enter the building on Michigan and figured we’d use the sky bridges.”
“What if it was me,” Robyn said, “when I tried to take my cap off? Maybe they got a lock on us.”
“It wasn’t you, honey. If it were, they would have had a whole squadron in this building. Let’s go. We have to find somewhere to hide.”
Moyer peered over the railing. Agents guarded the first four landings. A door below crashed open and a troop of agents climbed the stairs to the next floor. The door slammed behind them and a sole agent was left to stand watch over the 5th floor landing. Within minutes the three of them would be caught.
Moyer slowly eased the metal door open on the landing. It led out of the building and onto the roof.
Robyn shook her head and seemed defeated. “What now?”
Moyer walked the perimeter in search of a fire escape, a ladder, or a place to hide. There wasn’t one. They were exposed and easy pickings once the agents arrived on the roof. He leaned over the edge and looked down. It was at least 25 meters to the street, a death sentence. A body reached terminal velocity in twenty.
Sheets pinned on clothes lines stretched between buildings below waved like banners in the breeze. A mesh pattern of shadow danced across the linen panels as they swayed. Netting! The buildings were fitted with nets to prevent workers from committing suicide. Moyer tossed his bag over. It shrunk as it picked up speed, then hit the net, slowed and rebounded back, bouncing until it came to rest.
When Moyer turned toward Robyn, she wagged her head, terror in her eyes. “No way,” she said. “You know I’m afraid of heights.”
“It’s the only way down.”
“It’s too far. We’ll be killed. There has to be a better option.”
Moyer pointed toward the far end of the roof. “What about over there. The net is strung higher. It’s a much shorter fall.”
Robyn turned to look and Moyer shoved her. She squealed and whirled her arms trying to recover her balance. She teetered for a moment, eyes and mouth opened wide in terror. Robyn snatched at Moyer’s sleeve in a last desperate attempt to save herself and missed. As she tumbled off the roof, she shrieked. While she fell, Moyer prayed she wouldn’t be hurt. Robyn landed on her back and trampolined skyward, shock still frozen on her face. She settled to rest and struggled to her feet; her balance unsteady. She glowered at Moyer, her jaw jutting forward. Moyer tossed her bag over the side a good ten meters away. Then he turned to the Judge who was eying him with distrust.
“You won’t have to push me,” he said. “I’ll go of my own accord.”
The Judge toed the edge of the roof and prepared to step off when Moyer stopped him. “You should try to land on your back and tuck your arms like this.” Moyer crossed his hands tightly over his chest.
The Judge sighed. He turned his back toward the edge and crossed his arms. He shook his head in doubt all the while. Hawthorne leaned back. His body moved imperceptibly at first, and then slowly toppled like a felled tree. He landed perfectly.
Moyer tossed the Judge’s bag over next to the others and inched to the edge of the roof. A nervous flutter spread through his gut as he turned his back to the abyss and prepared to fall. It wasn’t as easy as he first thought. His survival instincts froze him to the ledge. As he stood locked in place, it occurred to him that he might not be able to go through with it. His rational mind had been able to deduce the risks of injury from such a drop were minimal, however the animal part of his brain, the part charged with keeping him alive wouldn’t let him do it.
The Judge called out, “What are you waiting for?”
Moyer tried to picture where the security agents were in their search. It wouldn’t be long before they arrived on the roof. He closed his eyes and pushed away. Air rushed past him. He screamed — he didn’t want to, he just did. The sound of it filled his ears. Anticipation stretched out long as a river. Time slowed. Moyer squeezed his eyes shut. Whatever happened, he didn’t have to see it.
The net enveloped him and squeezed in from the sides. He slowed and sank into it until he was sure it would split. For the briefest of moments he was at rest and the net held. A wave of relief washed over him. He was safe. Then the net propelled him into the air again, but it didn’t matter. The big fall was over and he was down unharmed.
When he came to rest, he tried to stand and fell over. The sponginess of the net made him feel as wobbly as he had after being stunned on the tube.
“What now, genius?” Robyn asked. “We’re as stuck here as we were on the roof.”
The net stretched above the street at window level on the second story. If they didn’t get down soon, someone would report them, which would be their doom since the building already crawled with agents.
Moyer peered inside the adjacent apartments. They were empty. Everyone was still at work. The quarters in Labor Housing were tiny, less than half the size of his apartment, the apartment he’d never see again.
It didn’t take long for him to determine the windows weren’t designed to open. Moyer wondered if they were fitted with alarms. He doubted it. The buildings appeared to be built as cheaply as possible. Alarms and windows that opened were luxuries. Perhaps they could break a window to get inside.
While he weighed the risks, Moyer noticed a section of lighter colored cord woven into the net. He stumbled ov
er to it. It zigzagged in a U shape and was knotted with a bow at one end. Moyer unraveled the bow and tugged the cord through. A flap of net dropped away like a trap door. This must be how they fish out the jumpers, he thought. “Over here,” he called.
He gathered up the bags and dropped them through to the street. He clutched the net with both hands and rolled through the hole. His feet dangled a meter above the pavement. He dropped and waited below with his arms outstretched to help Robyn. She lowered herself through the hole and hung. Moyer wrapped his arms around her legs and when she let go, he let her slowly slip through his embrace till her face was level with his. Anger still smoldered in her eyes.
“Do you forgive me?” he asked.
She shook her head. “Not a chance.”
Moyer smiled and caught a hint of a grin on Robyn’s face.
“Anytime you love birds are done,” the Judge called. Moyer released his hold on Robyn and cocked his head up at Hawthorne. He clapped his hands and extended them. “Ready, Judge.”
Hawthorne eased himself through the hole. Moyer wrapped his arms around the Judge’s thighs. Hawthorne didn’t weigh much more than Robyn. Moyer was surprised by how sinewy and strong the old man was.
At street level, they stopped at the corner of the building and Moyer extended Hawthorne’s computer to see what awaited them. The street was crowded with people again. Laborers had returned home from work. A pair of agents exited the building across the street and headed east to the next one. The crowd gave the agents a wide berth.
“Okay, let’s go. Follow me.”
Moyer shoved the computer into his pocket and stepped out from the alley. Laborers milled about, headed home, or to the market, or to the bars. Moyer waded into the stream of bodies and allowed himself to drift west with the flow. He slumped his shoulders forward imitating the men in front of him and shuffled along slowly. With the waning light and crowded streets, Moyer was sure security cameras wouldn’t pick them out.