I rub my sweaty palms on my sleeves as we trail reluctantly after Rigs. At first, I’m hopeful that the tour might present us with a chance to escape, until two heavily armed body poachers close in behind us, ElektroProds swinging inauspiciously from their hips. Velkan shakes his head at me, an alarmed expression on his face. I give him a bitter smile in return. Any sudden move on our part now will have only one outcome. I must be patient and wait for the perfect opportunity, just like Ghil said.
Rigs leads us through an archway past two snarling jackals chained to metal rings. The space opens into a cavernous concrete staging area filled with drums of hazardous materials, pallets of foodstuffs, bulk medical supplies, and coils of commercial-grade cable. Overhead, heavy-duty hooks hang from massive chains. A spasm of fear goes through me. I try not to imagine what any of this stuff is used for.
Recessed in the back of the tunnel is a large metal elevachute with the body poachers’ insignia embossed on it. Grinding sounds echo through the space as the elevachute hurtles upward. When the doors retract, Rigs and his men motion us inside the gleaming capsule. Velkan slips his fingers into mine as the elevachute begins a paralyzing plummet. I’m grateful for the reassuring warmth of his hand. Whatever happens, at least we are together.
A bronze scale on the wall tracks our depth as we descend several miles underground. I brace myself expecting my breathing to become more labored at some point, but the poachers must have an oxygen system pumping fresh air down into the Cryogenics plant, because I don’t experience any shortness of breath. Ghil keeps a firm grip on Buir and I’m thankful that it’s enough of a comfort to keep her from losing it entirely.
When the elevachute doors open, we step through an imposing portal into a rocky cavern connected to three identical stone passageways. Rigs leads us down the central tunnel, the other two guards bringing up the rear. Our footsteps echo off the walls, and I make a mental note of it. If we make our escape along these tunnels, we’ll have to find a way to dull our footsteps.
We turn a corner and my jaw drops at the sight of the tram depot in front of us. The underground Cryogenics operation is huge. We didn’t even take the elevachute all the way down to the lowest level. There’s another whole floor beneath us, probably storage and maintenance for the facility.
Rigs and his men load us onto a tram under the operator’s watchful eye; a body poacher with a thatched beard and thickly gnarled scars twisting over one arm. His other arm is a crude metal replacement that looks like it was built in some dark-market forge—certainly nothing that originated from any high-grade cyborg plant on Aristozonex.
The tram lurches forward and rumbles through several damp and dimly-lit tunnels before we reach our destination. I wrinkle my nose at the pungent chemical odor that greets us as I step out. It’s so overpowering that I can no longer detect the musty smell of the tunnels we drove through.
“Welcome to Cryogenics,” Rigs says in a menacing drawl. “This is the preservation vault where the wealthy-in-waiting float in induced oblivion until a suitable body becomes available.” He winks at me. “Strong, tall, voluptuous, whatever dimensions they requested on their application. You pay to play.”
I swallow hard as I eye the rolling steel doors in front of us, shielding us from the body poachers’ macabre trade. This isn’t a tour we signed up for, but Furax didn’t give us a choice. The guards escorting us are armed to the hilt. No doubt he wants us to understand what the consequences will be if we don’t cooperate with him fully.
Rigs enters a code on the keypad and the doors retract with a pneumatic hissing. Under his direction, we traipse inside an ice-cold room filled with row after row of torpor vats connected by a tangle of colored electrical wires; a chemical cemetery of sorts, except these wealthy patrons of the illegal body poaching trade are about to undergo a resurrection at the expense of the poorest and most vulnerable in the Netherscape. Anger bubbles up inside me when I think about the innocent lives that are being sacrificed daily in this barbaric trade.
“How can you be a part of something this heinous?” Buir asks, seething with rage.
The guards shift their attention to her, their weapons within easy reach.
Rigs throws an amused glance her way. “You think my skills could be put to better use?”
I shoot Buir a warning glance. Justice will have to wait. We are in far too precarious a situation to enrage Rigs or the guards accompanying him.
“Cybernetics killed the organ trade,” Rigs continues, with a shrug. “Kidneys and lungs used to fetch hefty credits. I ain’t gonna recycle trash for a few measly credits like every other undesirable in the Syndicate. That’s what they call us, you know.”
He laughs and leads us out of the preservation vault and into a neighboring chamber, the two guards tailing us every step of the way. Several more body poachers are standing side-by-side in front of a wall of tanks that look like oversized washing machines. They chat in low undertones among themselves, throwing furtive looks our way, as they tap gauges and flip switches. As we approach the tanks, it’s all I can do not to let out a yelp of horror. I can make out bodies inside, being doused and squirted with a series of different colored rinses.
“This is where we prep the donors for surgery,” Rigs explains. “They get a good rinsing with an antibacterial solution to wash away germs or exfoliated cells. Don’t hurt a thing—they’re sedated.” He hoists a shaggy brow at us. “Some of them donors from the frontier planets are a grungy bunch.”
My skin crawls at the flippant way he describes these victims being prepped for death—simply so someone rolling in credits can live in their place. Nothing about this is right. My stomach churns. If Furax gets his hands on the dargonite, he will only use it to expand and fortify this ghastly operation. I can’t allow that to happen. At all costs, I must make sure that Cwelt retains control of the mines. Maybe then we can begin to use the dargonite for good, starting with paying restitution to the poverty-stricken planets so they can defend themselves against future abductions.
We stare in silence at the wall of tanks for several minutes, watching as one tank completes a cycle and the body poachers wheel a gurney over and pull out an unconscious man.
“All spruced up and ready to go off to surgery,” Rigs says, with an air of morbid glee.
Buir turns aside and buries her head in Ghil’s shoulder.
“I’d let you watch a surgery in process, but that’s a sterile environment so we can’t go in there,” Rigs says, imbuing his voice with mock regret. “Can’t have those rich cats dying of infection, ain’t good for business. Crematorium’s off limits too. Come on, we got one more stop to make.”
“Crematorium?” Velkan frowns.
“For the excess heads, of course.” Rigs chuckles, low and hard like a growl. “The wealthy don’t pay to share shoulders with their donors.”
I swallow back the acid creeping up from my stomach. So that’s what the smoke was about.
Rigs and his men lead us over to a steel door on the other side of the room.
“Brace yourselves.” Rigs turns to face us. “This is where the fun begins.”
13
The doors slide open, and the blood-chilling wailing of the doomed reaches our ears. The guards bringing up our rear motion us inside, and we step hesitantly into the gloomy space. The pitiful sight in front of us grates across my heart like sharpened steel.
Tear-streaked faces press up against squat metal bars, terror imprinted in their dilated pupils. They stretch out dirt-engrained hands to us, pleading with us to save them. Some scream, others moan, many rattle off in foreign tongues I don’t understand, but they all exude the same haunting air of desperation, sensing that this might be their last chance to escape the fate that awaits them.
Everything we’ve seen so far in the Cryogenics plant has been surreal, a silent horror movie of sorts that we’ve been forced to observe, but this is a loud, reverberating barbarity which we can never erase from our minds or memories. These people
are living, conscious, and terrified, and the fear they exhibit is tangible. The worst thing about it is that they sense this is the end of the line for them, and there is no hope beyond us. But what can we do to help them?
All the same feelings I experienced on Mhakerta when I saw the subjects in the processing plant come flooding back. I try to convey to these people by my expression that I’m sorry, as if that will somehow atone for what looms on the other side of these doors for them. They don’t realize we’re prisoners too, that we may well end up sharing their fate—days, perhaps hours, from now.
Beside me, Velkan opens and closes his fists, wrestling to control his rage. Lashing out will accomplish nothing, but it’s a struggle to keep our feelings in check. Buir keeps her eyes downcast, her shoulders shaking with grief. Ghil eyes Rigs from under his brows, and I know he’s wondering if he could overpower him and force the other two body poachers to unlock the door.
Rigs, for his part, is unmoved by the terrified cries for help from the prisoners. He looks almost bored as he leans back against the wall, one ankle crossed loosely over the other, reveling in our distress. I can’t help but wonder what makes the body poachers so immune to what they’re doing. Surely greed alone is not sufficient motivation to slaughter living beings for profit. Somewhere along the way, they’ve shut down a part of what it means to be human.
“Time to go,” Rigs says abruptly. “You lot get your own quarters, for now.” The other body poachers flank us and march us out into another passageway. We walk down a short, damp tunnel to a smaller, squalid cell and the poachers lock us up inside. The cries of the other prisoners still reach my ears, faint, but relentless, like fingernails scraping across my soul. Instinctively, I hold my hands over my ears to block the sound.
“If you think that’s loud, just wait till it’s their turn to be disinfected,” Rigs guffaws. “Most of them can’t swim and they’re terrified of getting wet in case they drown.”
His laugh echoes off the tunnel walls as he disappears around the corner with the other poachers.
I rub my hands over my forehead, desperate to erase his scathing smile from my memory.
“I’ll see if I can link to Phin and Ayma down here,” Velkan says, as soon as Rigs and the other body poachers are out of earshot.
We wait until I hear a faint crackling in my earpiece. Velkan nods and gives me a thumbs up. “Do you copy, stealth fighter?”
“Phin … where … you?”
The reception’s not great, but at least we can make out what he’s saying.
“We’re in the Cryogenics plant,” Velkan replies. “Several miles beneath the mountain.”
“Can you get out?” Phin asks.
“We’re locked in a cell,” Velkan replies. “I might be able to pick the lock, but it will take some time.”
“Even if we escape, you won’t be able to land anywhere up here to rescue us,” I add. “The Dreadnought’s taking up every square foot of space.
“Ayma located another possible landing site, a sandy ledge on the other side of the mountain at a bearing of 097, mark 8,” Phin says. “If you can find your way there, we can send down a small shuttle and extricate you.”
I drop my head in my hands. “This is bigger than merely rescuing us,” I say with a heavy sigh. “There are dozens of prisoners here destined for cryogenic surgery. We’re their only hope. We were forced to leave innocent people behind on Razaran last time. I won’t do it again. We have to find a way to obliterate the body poachers’ operation.”
For a long time, Phin says nothing, and I’m beginning to think we’ve lost the link when he finally speaks.
“We can’t end this ourselves, Trattora. You’re right that it’s bigger than us. We need to involve the Syndicate military.”
I frown in confusion. “The Syndicate won’t help us take down the body poachers.”
“Not intentionally,” Phin replies. “But I can think of a good reason for them to get involved, and once they’re here they’ll have to free the prisoners and destroy the plant.”
Velkan exchanges a puzzled look with me. “What reason would compel them to do that, Phin?” he asks.
“They got word a couple of hours ago from the Commissioner on Skytus that their high-profile prisoners never made it to the penal colony. The Chancery issued a galactic bulletin offering a huge reward for any information on your whereabouts.”
A slow grin spreads across my face. “And you’re going to give them an anonymous tip.”
“Pretty much,” Phin laughs. “I’ll redirect the link so the tipoff comes from the fueling port. I’ll tell them I saw the prisoners escaping on the Zebulux. With any luck, they’ll think you’re in league with the body poachers.”
I take a deep breath. “Have the reward credits sent to Jourd. It won’t make up for whatever Furax did to him, but it will pay for any cybernetic surgery he may need.”
“Be ready to make your escape once the Syndicate fleet reaches Razaran,” Phin says. “Both the body poachers and the Syndicate will be after you.”
“I’ll start working on the lock,” Velkan says.
“And then what?” I ask. “The only way out of this mountain is back up that elevachute. The body poachers will see us as soon as we set foot up top.”
“There’s more than one way to ride an elevachute,” Velkan replies.
“What do you mean?” Buir asks.
“We can climb inside the shaft and ride up on the roof,” Velkan says. “They must have an emergency service tunnel leading from the shaft out the side of the mountain somewhere. We’ll exit through that and they’ll never see us.”
I mull over the idea. It sounds risky, considering the speed the elevachute travels at, but it’s also ingenious.
Voices drift down the corridor. “Someone’s coming, Phin,” I whisper, before cutting the link.
Moments later, a body poacher appears at our cell with a tray of food. “Backs against the wall,” he barks.
We retreat to the far end of the cell, the smell of a hearty vegetable chowder tickling our nostrils. The body poacher sets down the tray, unlocks the door and then slides the tray inside. He locks the door again, folds his arms and watches with amusement as we hurry over and take turns shoveling down the chowder.
As he turns to go, a streak of black fabric flashes before my eyes and Ghil’s arm shoots through the bars, crushing the man’s windpipe and trapping him against the bars. He gurgles for a few moments before sinking like a sack to the ground. I stare in disbelief as Ghil reaches through the bars for the keys on the man’s belt loop and unlocks the door. “Velkan, help me hide the body,” he says urgently.
Together, they drag the poacher’s body down the tunnel and through an unmarked doorway, and then return a few minutes later, closing the cell door behind them. Ghil locks it and slips the key into a crack in the back wall. “That should make our getaway a little easier when the time comes,” he says, reaching nonchalantly for a ladleful of chowder. “Time’s not on our side, and picking locks can be time-consuming.”
“Did you … kill him?” Buir asks tentatively.
Ghil swallows a mouthful of food. “That’s the plan, isn’t it?” He fills the ladle with more chowder and looks around at us. “You’re all happy to let the Syndicate come here and kill them, aren’t you?”
We don’t say anything after that, because Ghil’s right. He’s willing to act on his beliefs, but are we? It’s hard to watch a man die in front of you, especially at the hands of someone you know and care about, but how can we condemn the death of a single body poacher when hundreds of thousands of innocent lives will be saved when this festering evil is stamped out?
Rigs and two guards come striding down the hallway less than half an hour later. Rigs peers into the cell, scowling at the tray. “That good for nothing lay-about, Pike, never came back to collect the dishes.”
I grimace. Pike won’t be back to collect anything ever again. I only hope the other body poachers don’t discover h
is body before we’ve managed to make our escape.
Rigs unlocks our cell and gestures us out. “Furax wants to see you. The scout shuttle’s returned.”
My pulse races. If Furax wants to leave right away for Cwelt, he might evade the impending Syndicate assault. Hopefully raising an army of body poachers to go up against the Maulers will take him a few days. Otherwise, I’m going to have to drum up some way to delay him.
Rigs and the guards lead us down a different tunnel to a rectangular dining room lit by flickering lanterns. Raucous body poachers with flushed faces are seated around a long carved wooden table, drinking and arguing heatedly, presumably over the news from the scout shuttle. Furax stops talking when he sees us and waves a hand to silence the other body poachers. He clears several chairs next to him and gestures to Rigs to bring us over.
When we are settled into our seats he tents his fingers and stares at me over his mug of ale. “So, you weren’t lying about the Mauler invasion after all.”
I shrug. “I wouldn’t lie about something like that.”
Furax’s gaze intensifies. “But you weren’t being entirely honest with me either.”
I frown, my heartbeat ratcheting up a notch. “What are you talking about?”
He takes a long swig of ale before he answers. “The Maulers are working alongside the Cweltans to mine the dargonite.”
I swallow hard. “Not by choice. My people are prisoners. They have no other option now that the Maulers have conquered Cwelt.”
Furax snaps his fingers and nods at a poacher behind us. A moment later, a fuzzy vid is fed through to a large screen on the wall facing us.
My jaw drops. It’s the first look I’ve had at Cwelt since I fled my planet on Sarth’s ship. I study the blurred images in front of me, desperately searching for the faces of those I know and love. The sacred triangle is a hotbed of activity. Heavy-duty mining equipment mars the landscape, and the staccato sound of drills drowns out the voices of the Maulers and Cweltans in the vid.
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