by Tim Scott
“You sure you don’t know where we went?” I said.
“No.”
“But we know where Nena is,” said Gabe. “She’ll have gone back to her motel. And once the management sees her, they’ll call the cops.”
“You’re right. We need to get over there,” I said.
And then a crash, and a flurry of flashlights poked into the office, their beams spilling through the door.
“I heard an owl hooting in here,” said a voice.
“Sure you did,” said another.
“Let’s get out of here,” whispered Gabe, and we cajoled the fridges back into the body of the vast hangar, weaving our way through the abandoned carcasses of the cop drongles.
I stopped to look back into the dark of the hangar. They were about thirty yards away—a group of figures in dark orange uniforms and caps were searching among the crates with flashlights.
“Fridge Detail,” I said.
And then, abruptly, another man appeared from behind a drongle not two yards away. He stared at me. His hair had been plastered to his forehead by the rain.
“Hello,” he said, waving his flashlight in my face. Something bothered me about him. His hair was the same blond color as my own. The same head hack blond.
“The wizard promised me an owl,” he said eventually, as he stared.
“What wizard is this?” If this guy shouted for help, we were finished.
“Are you the wizard? The wizard promised me an owl.”
“No, I am not the wizard,” I said. “Absolutely not.”
“He has a sneezing cat.”
“I don’t have a sneezing cat. Good luck with the wizard, though. It sounds like a great thing to be involved with.”
The guy was clearly crazy. And I remembered something about mentally ill patients being shunted onto Fridge Detail to free up more space in the wards. There had been a scandal whipped up by the papers for a bit. I remembered how people pretended to care for a few weeks until the news moved on. The causes people cared about were dictated by fashion, and last year’s sufferers were as easily disposable as last year’s wardrobe.
He stood there staring. “I thought I heard an owl just now.”
“No, there was no owl.”
“But I heard it hoot.”
“It wasn’t an owl.”
From behind me, I heard a fridge inexplicably do another impression of an owl.
“There. You see? I should look. Owls are good at hiding.”
“There are no owls here.” I would have to take him out.
And then, from where the rest of the group was searching in the hangar, a voice shouted. “Huckleberry Lindbergh! Here, now!”
My mind froze. Events slipped sideways.
I glanced around, but Gabe was well ahead with the fridges now.
“Huckleberry Lindbergh!” shouted the voice again. “I will not have members of my Fridge Detail wandering off. We search this place systematically. As a team.”
“I’m coming,” said the man, staring at me.
And then he backed away and made his way toward the other flashlights.
“Did I hear that right?” Gabe said, appearing out of the darkness.
“Yeah. He was answering to my name. We have to get out of here. Is there a back way?”
“Yeah, through here.”
He led us all back through the piles of abandoned drongles to an exit. It was jammed, and when we forced it the noise reverberated through the warehouse like an earthquake. Fifty yards away, I saw the excited flutter of flashlights from the Fridge Detail.
“Quickly, move.”
chapter
NINETY-THREE
We hurried down an alley.
A tube from the Prisoner Rapid Removal system ran alongside.
“Hurry,” I said to the fridges as they waddled along as best as they could.
They were not the ideal companions in a chase.
“I need the box,” I cried to the Frost Fox. I grabbed it from the fridge’s bottom shelf and ran ahead to a door into the tube as Gabe cajoled them along.
I plugged in the lead from the head. If this didn’t work, we were finished. The Fridge Detail was spilling out of the warehouse, jabbing at the night with their flashlights. I could hear them shouting like a pack of dogs.
Finally the door swung open. The fridges were about twenty yards back now, and the Fridge Detail was gaining fast.
“Hurry,” I cried. A shot recoiled off the tube above my head. And then another. “Get to the door,” I shouted as their little feet pedaled madly through the mud and debris. The first fridge was there now. And then the tumble dryer. But the Ice Jumper was still five yards back.
I could see the faces now of the closest ones. The detail was strung out in a line.
Gabe grabbed the Ice Jumper and virtually manhandled it inside.
I plugged in.
The door shut and snuffed out the light. Above our heads, a huge metal eye hung from a track in the roof.
“Let’s go,” I said, and we began walking off in single file along the tube. The fridges opened their doors and the little slices of light sank into the distance, barely finding the wall. A thin trickle of oil ran along the floor, making the going slippery.
Shouting and shots outside the door.
But anything else was lost in the noise of the grating roar of machinery above as the track clonked into life. A screen flickered ten yards away, and a man appeared.
“You have been arrested by the New Seattle State Police,” he said, his voice just audible over the track, “a force that is dedicated to your well-being. You should feel proud to have been arrested by one of the top-four state police departments on the Western Seaboard Area, as voted for by the readers of Happiness, Money, and Golf magazine.” He held up a copy. “And maybe that’s because New Seattle P.D. officers have some of the finest mustaches anywhere. A mustache is more than just facial hair. It represents our commitment to justice for the people of New Seattle. It represents our belief in human rights for all people all around the world. And the other thing is, you can use it to do this trick with a cocktail stick and an olive.”
We walked on.
The soft slits of light from the fridges fell in thin columns, struggling to illuminate the gloom, which was studded with a fog of falling particles vibrated into the air by the shaking track.
The noise was deafening. When it finally fell silent, my ears rang, as though some part of the noise had gotten inside my head and now needed to be released. Far off in the distance, we heard someone shouting, and then the sound of a drill.
We came to an intersection and disturbed a scattering of rats that ran off unhappily down the slippery metal into the darkness. Gabe unfolded the map.
We took a left. The track kicked into life again. The atmosphere was damp and alien.
And then, ahead, the light from the fridges caught the shape of a body prostrate on the floor. I nodded to Gabe and we approached cautiously. Gabe kicked it gently.
Then he kicked it harder.
The man squirmed in fright and sprang to a crouch.
“Don’t shoot!” he cried, his words clanking about the tube as he shielded his eyes. “Are you the cops?”
“No.”
“You going to get me out of here? I can’t get out. And now I’m lost.”
“Yeah, we’ll get you out. Keep walking.” He had a heel missing from one shoe so he bobbed up and down.
“I ain’t seen anyone. Just heard shouting now and again. Far away, but I could never find it. Couldn’t get any of these doors open. This place gives me the spooks. You guys are my angels, though. I thought I was going to die down here. Those your fridges?” His words rang and clattered around the tube, mixing with the clanking roar of teeth over our heads.
“Yeah.”
“Nice. I’ve always liked fridges. Any of them got anything to eat?”
“I’ve got some Primula,” said the one. “You want some?”
“Sure
.”
“Hey, just keep moving.”
“But he wants some Primula. Here.”
The fridge opened its door wide and the man took the tube. He tried to squeeze it out into his mouth as our column began moving again, holding it above his head as he bobbed up and down.
We came to a junction and Gabe pulled out the map and traced a route to the Halcyon. We went right. And then left to an area where the track didn’t seem as if it was in use yet. Sheaves of wires hung down in sad tentacles that fell across our way every now and again, so we had to sweep them aside.
The guy had gone quiet, and I watched his figure bob up and down as the wind howled across the metal, rattling a loose wire forlornly on the outside. After another five minutes, we came to a door.
I took out the box and plugged in the head and it swung open. The guy looked into the box.
“You guys are angels,” he said staring at the head. “If there’s anything I can do for you, let me know.” And then he swallowed, stepped through, and hobbled off down the alley.
“Are we crazy to let him go?”
“He might go to the cops,” said Gabe, “but I doubt it.”
chapter
NINETY-FOUR
The Halcyon motel was in a decaying, decrepit, frankly-couldn’t-give-a-damn part of town. Most of the buildings around here were an advert for single-story hell.
The door from the tube opened in an alley around the corner.
We left the fridges there and walked to the corner.
Across the street was a Health and Safety screen, flashing that you should only go on vacation if you didn’t mind throwing all your standards out of the window. Otherwise, you should stay at home where ALL YOUR NICE THINGS ARE. The last words were in capitals.
We headed down the street in the evening gloom, but as we got closer, a bunch of cop drongles slithered around the corner and came to a flamboyant halt right outside the Halcyon. A muddle of security vehicles had already gathered under the glow of arc lamps. More cops from Security Detail piled out carrying laser-sighted guns.
“I’d say we’ve found her,” Gabe said. “But so has everyone else.”
chapter
NINETY-FIVE
Nena had already taken a shower. The bathroom was disgusting, and the plumbing sounded like a snarling dog, desperate to get off the leash. But the water had eased her headache.
She sat on her floor, drinking what was left of the whiskey and wondering why she had checked in here in the first place.
Red streaks dripped from the walls, and the room was littered with spent smoke canisters. There was a collection of empty bottles on the desk marked: Osteopath Urgent Response Unit Massage Oil. And a large torn picture of a puppy had been left lying near the bed, along with a wallet.
It was from someone in police marketing and its contents were mostly missing.
There was also a hole in the ceiling and someone had gone through her stuff. But there wasn’t much to take.
She thought about reporting it to the management, but presumably they knew the cops had been here. And anyway, she was too tired. She poured herself another whiskey and wondered about the guy who had pulled her from Head Hack Central. He’d been interesting, but not interesting enough to get mixed up with.
She took the whiskey over to the bed and found a picture on the bedside table. When she held it to the light, she found it was a head hack printout of her in a drongle.
On the back was a note from someone, saying she had been mind wiped and if she wanted to know what had happened, she should come to the address below.
She turned this idea over in her head.
Clearly she had been arrested and lost some time, but she was too tired now to chase after answers. And maybe she should just get out of here anyway. Too much had happened.
After a few hours of sleep, she’d make for the state line and put this all behind her.
She lay down.
chapter
NINETY-SIX
The explosion threw her off the bed.
Smoke clouded the room. And then black figures burst toward her, prodding at everything with red laser sights that crisscrossed the air but found only scattered clothes, a sad, sagging bed, and the prone body of a girl on the floor.
They fell on her in a tumbling, wild scrum.
She was turned face upward and searched as the smoke began to coalesce and drip down the suits of the detail. Someone with a huge plume of feathers stuck to his helmet loomed over her.
He bent down, thrust a jack plug into her feed, and then scrolled through her details on a Handheld Feed Reader. He played her mood. It was a bit of happy Motown that jarred with the atmosphere.
He pulled out the plug, and the jerk reignited her headache before leaving a cold trail through her skull.
Two members of the detail barged forward and dragged her out by the heels, over the filthy carpet and then outside over the cracked tarmac of the litter-strewn parking lot that smarted under the harsh, artificial glare of the arc lights. The area was alive with cops, standing around drinking coffee and eating doughnuts.
She had already been sucked out of life and into the system.
Another member of the Security Detail placed a machine on her chest, but he was abruptly dragged away, leaving the machine to clatter onto the ground.
After a moment, another cop knelt down next to her. “Shh!” he said, taking off his helmet and holding his finger to his lips. It was the guy from the drongle.
“Maybe I did feel something,” she said, “but it was hard to tell. So don’t count on it.”
chapter
NINETY-SEVEN
Sky Malbranque was lost.
The Fridge Detail had been let into the Prisoner Rapid Removal system ten minutes earlier.
The cop they found in a pastry shop couldn’t see how anyone could have gotten in there, let alone with some fridges, but he had been tired and wanted to get home. And having five overly excited people from a Fridge Detail gabbling away had just gotten too much for him.
And now, Sky Malbranque wandered brandishing his flashlight at the walls with awe, as though he were Lord Carnarvon entering the tomb of Tutankhamen.
At each junction, Sky Malbranque listened for the hoot of an owl. “Owl?” he called into the darkness. “Are you there?”
He wandered on, footsteps echoing from the metal.
“Hi! I’m Dan Cicero, mayor of New Seattle. You might have heard of me,” said the voice, reverberating into life on a screen a little way down the tunnel. “People call me the Mayor of Safety.” The picture froze. Sky Malbranque watched, his head tilted to one side.
“Are you the wizard?” he said. And then after a while, when nothing happened, he took off his orange coat and covered the screen. “Dead man,” he said.
And then he froze. He was sure he heard a hoot echoing faintly down the tube.
He scurried after the noise and eventually saw slits of light.
“Hey,” said the Frost Fox as he approached. “Want to hear a song about sell-by dates? We’ve been working on the harmonies.”
“I heard a hoot,” said Malbranque.
“Yeah, that’s the Ice Jumper. He likes to hoot.”
The fridge did another owl hoot.
Malbranque stared wide-eyed, then walked over and patted it. “The wizard said he would get me an owl. I’m going to look after you,” he said. “I’ve never had an owl before.”
“I’m not actually an owl,” said the Ice Jumper.
“You must be,” said Malbranque. “I heard you hooting. You are the most beautiful owl I have ever seen. What do owls eat?”
“Yogurt,” said the fridge. “And milk and hummus.”
“Then I shall get you some. Would you like to come with me, owl?”
“Yes,” said the fridge. “I would like that.”
And Malbranque led the fridge out into the alley.
“Bye, everyone,” called the Ice Jumper.
“See you!” said
the tumble dryer.
“Yeah, catch you later,” said the Frost Fox and the Cold Moose.
And they watched as Sky Malbranque led the fridge off by the hand.
“Der! Der! Der! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!” he hummed in a vague approximation of Thus Spake Zarathustra.
And the fridge joined in.
chapter
NINETY-EIGHT
Hey! Get some cuffs and a collar on that girl, then bag her and track her out of here,” called a cop across the lot. “We have another target located, so let’s move, people!”
“You felt something?” I said.
“You think you can read me? Is that why you’re here?” she replied as Gabe helped me stuff her feet into a sack and pull it up to her chin.
“I’m here because we’re in this together.”
Another member of the Security Detail came over, hauling yards of heavy chain. He wound it around her and then attached a massive hook at the top, near her neck.
Then he left.
Police drongles were beginning to pull out now, and everywhere people were packing equipment. We dragged Nena right through them all, weaving through cops whose uniforms were covered in red streaks.
We were close to the corner to the alley when a member of the detail stepped out in front of us. A massive plume of feathers sprouted from his helmet.
Other cops closed around us.
I could see the door to the Rapid Removal system behind him.
The one with the plumes removed his helmet.
“She’s not going that way,” he said. His face was running in lines of red sweat. “She’s going special delivery! Put her in the drongle. She’s going for the mother of all head hacks.”
A group of cops took her from us and dragged her across the lot into a waiting drongle. I felt my heart pump wildly.
They shouted the address into the horn.
It was on Twenty-third Avenue.
chapter
NINETY-NINE
Across the lot, we searched for an empty cop drongle. “We have to stop this. That kind of head hack will kill her,” I hissed to Gabe.