by David Coy
Dodging the lifts flowing in and out, they walked up the ramp and headed straight for the jungle’s edge. Once they were outside, John had to hold back the impulse to run. On the way, they went by the huge bulldozer again. Habershaw was still leaning on the railing, stuck in that bent-leg position, looking down at them. This time, John lifted a hand in a cautious greeting. Habershaw hesitated, then lifted one in return, crowning the silent exchange. When Habershaw cupped his hands to yell down at them, John cringed.
“Come on up!” he said. “You can hide in the rig! Go around the back. They can’t see you from there!”
They continued on as if they hadn’t heard him. “Should we take him up on it?” Donna asked.
“It’s probably better than sleeping in the jungle,” he replied.
They went around the back, saw the open-air elevator, got in and shut the gate. John pushed the button which started the three-story climb with a lurch. When they got to the top, Habershaw was there to greet them. He turned the elevator off and locked it in place.
“There,” he said. “If they want to come up, they’ll have to climb up. This way. Hurry.”
“You don’t have to do this,” John said.
“Save it,” Habershaw said.
He ushered them along the catwalk on the backside of the rig. It ran nearly the entire length and terminated at the cab.
Donna noticed the two spots of blood seeping through the back of Habershaw’s shirt.
“What happened to you?” she asked. “You’re bleeding.”
“Got attacked by something really nasty,” Habershaw said over his shoulder.
“I’m a nurse,” Donna said. “You should let me look at it for you.”
“That’s a deal,” Habershaw said.
He kept them moving until they were safe in the rig’s little living quarters. John recognized the Oiler, Lavachek, asleep on one of the bunks. Their footfalls caused him to come awake and snap around. “Who’s this?” he asked, blinking.
“Friends,” Habershaw said.
“Yeah, but who are they?” Lavachek wanted to know.
Donna and John exchanged looks with Habershaw, waiting for him to make the introductions. John adjusted the strap on the rifle, just to draw attention to it.
“These two were with Joan when she died,” Habershaw said to Lavachek and put out his hand to each in turn. “Bill Habershaw.”
“Donna Applegate.”
“John Soledad.”
“We’ve never officially met.”
“No.”
“This is Greg Lavachek,” Habershaw said pointing.
Lavachek sagged and shook his head. “I don’t like this much,” he said. “Being with these people could get us killed.”
Donna saved Habershaw the breath and spoke up for him. “That’s fairly ungrateful,” she said smiling broadly, “considering I saved your life last year, digging that ugly parasite out of your back and all.” She said it with a big smile, but John saw her disconcerting eye flash in anger.
Lavachek swung around and put his feet on the ground and his hands on his knees. “I remember you all right,” he said.
“Do ya?” she asked pleasantly.
“Yep.”
“That’s good. Now remember this,” she said stepping closer to him.
Oh shit, John thought.
“Don’t give me any grief, and we’ll get along fine. Don’t give this man here any grief, either. Do you understand?”
Lavachek snorted.
“What was that?” she asked.
“I didn’t say nothin’.”
Donna raised her booted foot high; and before Lavachek could move, brought it down on his sock-covered instep with a clomp! Lavachek’s mouth dropped open.
“Wrong! The answer was yes!” she yelled as John pulled her away. He put his body between her and Lavachek, now holding his foot with both hands.
“Okay. Okay,” John said.
“Say yes, you dick!” she said to Lavachek around John’s shoulder.
“Hey! Hey!” Habershaw said. “Let’s all just settle down, here.”
“You’re crazy, lady!” Lavachek finally got out.
“Well, you figured that out, did you?” Donna asked, relaxing a little. She yanked away and straightened her clothes.
“It’s okay,” John said to her.
“Then tell that bastard not to screw with me.”
“It’s all right,” John said gently. He tried to soothe her by rubbing her arm. It felt as tight as a wire. Donna was looking at Lavachek like a terrier focused on a rat, daring it to move.
Habershaw puffed air. “Well,” he said. “I could make some coffee.”
Donna settled down enough to drink the slightly reheated coffee from a dirty and unceremoniously delivered cup. Lavachek wisely treated Donna like a walking land mine, avoiding her gaze even after she cheerfully thanked Habershaw for the coffee. They nursed their warmish drinks in the stuffy little cab. Donna wanted to close her nose off to the odor of dirty bed clothes and socks that saturated the air. The musky scent was just so typical of two men living in tight quarters. Two women wouldn’t tolerate it, even under these conditions. She took a step closer to the door where the air was a little sweeter.
Habershaw seemed to read her mind. “Little stuffy in here,” he said. “The shelters aren’t ready yet, and Lavachek here don’t know jack shit about personal hygiene.”
He slid the door open a little more for her.
* * *
“So they questioned me when I got back to the rig, but not much,” Habershaw went on as Donna changed his bandages. “They didn’t seem too interested. I guess they figured since they had the bomb and captured you, there wasn’t much left to worry about. It wasn’t much of a uprising, was it?”
“No,” John said. “Not much.”
Habershaw’s head bent down toward the floor, and there was a moment of silence. It came back up with a fake smile. “I thought about cranking up the rig and running a couple thousand meters of dirt up against that hole, sealing the bastards in.”
“You’re crazy,” Lavachek said, holding his tongue on the word too, which he almost added.
Habershaw ignored him and continued, grinning. “But I figured they’d just find another way out somewhere and come boiling out like ants to get me.” He laughed a shallow laugh. “Then they’d make me clear the damned hole, then kill me.”
“Life ain’t fair,” John said. “We have a saying in my family…”
“‘Nobody’s keeping score’,” Donna finished for him, then added, “except me.”
She taped down the last bandage and pressed it with her hand. “There. That’ll do for now.”
“Thanks. You’re not the only one,” Habershaw said. John’s thoughts drifted to Rachel, and the grinding impetus to do something—anything—began to build in him again. He didn’t want to shift attention away from the implied memory of Joan Thomas, but he had no choice.
“How are we going to get Rachel out?” he asked Donna. “Who’s Rachel?” Habershaw wanted to know.
“John here, and Rachel are a pair,” Donna said for John.
“I see,” Habershaw said, letting the memory of Joan pass to the living. He breathed in long through his nose. “Well, you two can’t go looking for her. Lavachek and me’ll have to do it.”
“Hey, speak for yourself,” Lavachek said.
Donna got that terrier look again, eye blazing. Habershaw opened the door all the way to let her outside. “Would you two mind stepping out on the catwalk for a minute, I’d like to have a word with my Oiler. You can move up and duck in the cab. They won’t be able to see you from the ground.”
Donna and John moved outside and went into the cab. Habershaw slid the door closed and turned to Lavachek. Lavachek just stared at him. It was hard to know where to begin, so Habershaw just started. “We’ve known each other a long time, haven’t we?” he said.
“Ten years in Jultosep,” Lavachek said. “The worst ten years
of my damned life,” he added with a smile.
“I need you to do something,” Habershaw said.
“You always need my help.”
“I’m serious.”
“Me, too. You always need my help.”
“I need you to stand behind me on this.”
“On what?” Lavachek snorted. “What are you gonna do? I thought you’d have learned your lesson by now. Joan’s dead because of talk like this.”
Habershaw felt the urge to leap on Lavachek and strangle him. Lavachek sensed the anger but continued heedlessly. He’d just about had it this morning and didn’t care who knew it. But he leaned forward and whispered, just to be safe.
“What?” he said. “You gonna be the revolutionary now? Hell, Verde’ll end up just like Cunningham or Fuji—people wandering around starved, eatin’ each other, dying of diseases and shit, no organization. I’m telling you, Bill, them two people are gonna get us both killed. If you’d just wait until things settle down here, everything will be all right.”
Habershaw said, “There ain’t gonna be no goddamned settling down. This right here is about as settled down as it’s gonna get. We’re slaves.”
“So? That ain’t no different than it’s ever been.”
“They never had to enforce it with guns before—that’s the difference. Before, we did it because we thought we were getting something in return. Now they don’t have to give us shit. They get what they want and, we can eat dirt.”
“That’ll all change, you’ll see,” Lavachek went on. “They ain’t as bad as all that. Hell, they moved us over from the settlement, didn’t they? They haven’t slaughtered us yet, have they?”
That last part made Habershaw see red. He forced down the impulse to grab him by the neck and choke the life out of him. Until that moment, it wouldn’t have occurred to him that Lavachek was a coward. But it was one thing to poke fun at authority, but quite another to actually challenge it. Lavachek’s fear had drawn a line in his mind he just couldn’t step over. Wasn’t that the definition? Didn’t cowardice equate with overpowering fear? What did it take to get someone to swallow their dread and fight? He should know—he’d been in Lavachek’s shoes his whole life. It was a curious turnaround, Habershaw thought, that Lavachek, who until recently had been the pissed-off malcontent, and he, Habershaw, the cautious one, should now have switched roles. Fear was a more powerful motivation than he had realized. When you have it in great abundance, you just don’t know it, you only experience the paralysis of it. But being on the other side of the fence allowed Habershaw to see quite clearly. And any residual fear that might have been lurking in his mind prior to Joan’s death had been burned alive when they killed her. His hatred was so deep for the Sacred Bond and their enforcers that the mere thought of them was enough to set his blood boiling. He’d done a good job so far of keeping his anger under control, but it didn’t matter much now. So what to do about Lavachek? The answer was you did nothing. You just parted ways—with a friendly little ol' handshake.
“I can’t tell you what to do,” Habershaw said. “But if you’re not with us, there’s a good chance you’re against us.”
Lavachek snorted. “What’s that ‘sposed to mean?”
“It means you’d better not say a word to anybody about anything, or I’ll kill you with my own goddamned hands.”
“Who the hell am I gonna say anything to? Patel?” Lavachek snorted again.
“Just keep your mouth shut.”
“I ain’t been off the rig in days,” Lavachek droned. “I ain’t gonna say a word.”
“When the shelters are ready, you move off the goddamned rig.”
"Fine.”
“I mean it.”
“Me, too. Now, look—I said I wouldn’t say a word.”
“You’d better not . . .”
“. . . you three . . . you three . . . can plot your plots and skulk around all you want for all I care. I got more important things to do.”
“It better stay that way,” Habershaw said. He gave the metal wall separating the cab from the living quarters several firm knocks with his hand. John and Donna came back in a moment later. John, Habershaw noticed, was visibly nervous; far more so than when he first came onto the rig.
“Did you two kiss and make up?” Donna asked, ending with a terrier look at Lavachek.
“Yeah. I guess you could say that,” Habershaw said.
“I been kissin’ his ass for years,” Lavachek added. He lowered his head and slowly rubbed his close-cropped hair. “One more smooch won’t make any difference.”
14
They would go in, find Rachel and bring her out. It was a simple plan, but the devil was in the details. Habershaw agreed to make surveillance excursions into the monolith’s interior to start. They had to find out where she was and under what conditions she was being detained before they could figure out how to free her.
Habershaw found a good hiding place for Donna and John in the meantime. Between the motors in each track was a locker half as large as a utility truck. It was used for storage, and there were racks and shelves inside it. Habershaw stripped those out and tossed them overboard. Then, using a pair of grips, he bent the heavy latch on the back of the door so it could only be opened from the inside. In the event anyone came looking for them, they’d find a steel door that wouldn’t open without a lot of effort. The mercenaries, the lazy bastards, would skip the locker once they discovered the door would have to be pried open. Several air vents with angled slats and covered with fine screens made the space was fairly well-ventilated and somewhat bug-proof. In the middle of the ceiling was a small light that would provide sufficient illumination.
It was cramped and close, but it would beat the hell out of sleeping in the jungle. As a last touch, Habershaw went upstairs, came back with some wadded-up bed clothes and a pillow and tossed them into a corner. Donna made a face and decided she’d sleep on the bare floor rather than come in contact with those particular items, thank you.
“I wish we had phones,” John said.
“The bulletins say they won’t be operational for another week,” Habershaw said and shrugged. “We’ll have to work without them. Will you two be all right in there?”
“Sure,” John said. “Looks real cozy.”
“Stay out of sight until I get back,” Habershaw said. “My guess is they’ll be looking for you before midday.”
“Be careful, Bill,” John said. “They’re killers.”
“Hey, they won’t know shit. See you later.”
By the time Habershaw started across the field toward the monolith, the sun was higher and hotter still. He wondered if some new, life-threatening bug would start to hatch out as a result of the change in weather.
He went down the ramp and felt himself vanish in the bustling activity of lifts and moving pedestrians and the mountains of containers and equipment. The stacks of stuff immediately reminded him of Joan. This was her work. These were her workers. These containers and crates had her stamp on them—her touch. Without thinking, he reached out and rested his hand on one for a second.
The interior walls were lined with openings that led off into tunnels in all directions. He did an estimate and came up with the number twenty. He held his hand up to a passing lift to stop it. The driver was Peter Ho, and Habershaw brightened at his good fortune.
“Hey, Peter.”
“Hello, Mr. Habershaw.”
“I’m looking for Rachel Sanders. She’s been hurt, and they probably took her to a clinic. Where is it?”
“Well, there’re two clinics, Mr. Habershaw. I can take you to one, but the other one is in the guts.”
“What’d you mean, in the guts?”
“That’s what we call the areas deep inside. They won’t let us go there. They keep it guarded at all times. If we have a delivery to make we have to hand it off to one of the soldiers who lifts it in. See that hole way over there?” He pointed at an open doorway on the far side of the chamber. Habershaw wis
hed he wouldn’t do that. “That’s hole E. That’s the one that leads into the guts. Any container or item marked E goes down that hole. There’s a sub-chamber a few hundred meters in where we dump our loads. A soldier carries it the rest of the way.
“How do you know there’s another clinic in the guts?” Habershaw wanted to know.
“We’ve been taking medical equipment and stuff back in there all week. What else could it be?”
“Where’s the other clinic? The one we can see?”
“Climb up. I’ll take you over there.”
Habershaw climbed up and held onto the lift’s cage. Peter raised his load and headed off. Staying in the tire-darkened roads drawn in the floor and dodging other lifts in the intersections, he drove as fast as the lift would go. Habershaw was impressed. The skillful operation of any moving equipment impressed him. “You handle this thing pretty good there, Peter.”
“I’ve been doing it a few years, Mr. Habershaw.”
The clinic had been set up in a small chamber off a tunnel marked M in black paint. Peter stopped the lift at the metal door and Habershaw hopped down.
“That’s it, Mr. Habershaw,” Peter said.
“Thanks. Do me another favor. If you see Rachel, come to the rig and tell me. Don’t tell anybody else.”
“Okay.”
“See you around,” Habershaw said.
Peter swung the lift into the lane and hummed off. Habershaw had to think of some excuse to go inside. There was no mark of the Bondsmen above the door, which meant he could use the facility, but he couldn’t just walk in without a good medical reason and the holes in his back, not yet healed, filled the bill perfectly. He opened the door and walked down the tunnel. A single black power cable ran along the wall, fastened with brackets hammered into the wall’s smooth surface.
The clinic was even smaller than he thought it would be, scarcely ten meters across. A jumble of tables and racks of equipment were strewn all over with little sense of order. There were three examination tables separated by white plastic curtains hanging from frames. The frames looked bent and crooked. Carts on rollers were everywhere, loaded up with pans and an assortment of medical paraphernalia. Metal shelves against one wall held hundreds of bottles and boxes of drugs in uneven stacks. An irregular row of five or six chairs served as a waiting area. A young contractor, a woman of about twenty, clearly pregnant, sat in one of them, bouncing one foot, waiting for her turn.