Within the Water

by Kelly Fallows

  Zhe came back from her thoughts in time to hear that Ben and his party were going to attempt to meet up with Zhe. She got the feeling that Ben was pretty concerned about her lack of contact. With this firmly in her mind she decided to make contact, just somewhat indirectly.

  Switching her comm. unit to transmit as well as receive, she stepped away from the wall she had been leaning against for the last half an hour and into the room proper. The room that Theo had led them to was a veritable hub of electronics, most of which Zhe failed to identify. The multiple screens and keyboards were easy enough to recognise, but, after that, there were just numerous box-like devices of all shapes and sizes, with wires and switches and blinking lights, scattered everywhere. Theo and Melanie sat hunched together at what appeared to be the central console; well, at least it was the most organised section of the entire room, Zhe reasoned. Estelle had pulled up a chair and sat off to one side of the duo, and seemed engrossed, tapping away on a separate portable device that she had produced from within the folds of her skirts.

  ‘Dare I ask how goes it?’ Zhe said quietly into the room, needing something to say, but not wanting to disturb the duo too much from their important and, most likely, sensitive work.

  ‘Zhe?’ A collective of voices chorused through her comm. line, but she didn’t make a reply.

  ‘Slowly,’ Theo replied oblivious to Zhe’s real audience.

  ‘But faster without interruptions,’ Melanie added.

  ‘Sorry Melanie, it’s just that time is getting away from us and we need that information,’ Zhe replied carefully, giving the Coelacanth’s crew as much information as possible, but keeping within the parameters of the conversation happening in the room.

  ‘Well, it’s not going to happen any faster with you keeping asking questions like a child,’ Melanie told her irritably. It seemed that, like her sister, she did not like to be interrupted while she worked.

  ‘Zhe, can you respond?’ Ben asked her directly, after he quieted down the rest of the crew, who were all anxious to hear word of her.

  ‘Sorry, I’ll stop talking, and leave you and Theo to it then,’ Zhe replied, hoping that Ben also understood that she wasn’t certain if she could say anything.

  Melanie didn’t even bother to acknowledge Zhe’s comments and Theo had long since zoned out of the conversation, if he had ever really been aware of it.

  Ben did, however, respond. ‘I understand, Zhe; you’re with Melanie and Theo as they’re decrypting the disks.’ Zhe could’ve sighed in relief at Ben’s understanding, but instead simply walked back over to her perch in silence.

  ‘Duncan, Sophie, Ash and I are on our way to meet you in Ward Seven; do what you can to keep us up to date,’ Ben told her. ‘And, Zhe, you’ve done brilliantly,’ he added.

  Zhe did allow herself a smile at that, but it dropped quickly from her face as a sudden realisation hit her: Joseph was standing guard outside. Her thoughts ran frantically, jumbled for several minutes trying to work out how to warn them, but she just kept coming up blank. At length, she concentrated instead on calming herself and not on finding a solution – no solution could be found with her mind in such turmoil. As she calmed her racing thoughts, she glanced around the room to check that no one had noticed her minor melt down. No one appeared to be behaving any differently to how they were before, so she had hope that the incident had gone by unnoticed.

  On her second sweep of the room, her eyes came to rest on Estelle and there she saw an opportunity. Picking up another chair, she walked over to Estelle and set it down next to her. Estelle looked up, somewhat surprised; she hadn’t expected Zhe to initiate any conversation, especially not after the last.

  ‘What’s that?’ Zhe asked almost shyly, in a half whisper, mindful of the duo working away to their left, gesturing to the device in Estelle’s hand.

  ‘Just my way of keeping track of everything that’s going on, is all,’ Estelle told her placing the device screen down on her lap.

  ‘There must be a lot to keep track of,’ Zhe observed.

  ‘Yes, and quiet moments like these are pretty handy for checking in on things,’ Estelle agreed amiably.

  ‘I wish I had something to occupy my mind in these quiet times; I swear it goes crazy,’ Zhe offered a little insight into herself, hoping Estelle was still as interested in the topic as she had been before.

  ‘You must have had a lot of quiet time to think as a slave though.’

  Zhe shrugged. ‘It was different; there was lots to focus on, to take note of – being aware of what was happening was the key to survival,’ Zhe told her before plunging headlong into the opening she’d made, ‘I guess it’s why I’m so good at observing now, like seeing Joseph in the shadows following us.’

  ‘Ah yes, our silent guardian, but these are good—’

  Zhe lost the rest of Estelle’s reply in Ben’s voice coming over the comm. line, ‘Guards in the shadows; got it, Zhe. Well played.’ He kept his response brief so as not to distract her from the conversation she now had to have.

  ‘…to survive.’ Zhe tuned back into Estelle’s voice just in time for her to finish and look expectantly as Zhe.

  ‘Yes, I suppose it’s a good thing to have and it’s always good to be underestimated by an opponent,’ Zhe said hoping she'd guessed correctly.

  Fortunately, she had, and even more fortunate was the fact that this was a favourite topic of Estelle’s and she carried on the conversation without more than a word or two input from Zhe. As she sat and listened to Estelle, Zhe finally felt some of the tension leech out of her muscles; with Ben and the crew on their way to her, the path back didn’t seem so daunting.

  Chapter Thirty

  A low-level beeping interrupted the constant clicking and tapping from Melanie and Theo; Zhe found the absence of clicking and tapping more jarring than the beeping itself. They had been hard at work for some hours now, so much so that their noise had become a constant until it had faded into the subconscious atmosphere of the room itself. Now that it had stopped, Zhe found herself tensing in the chair, waiting for the next disaster to befall them.

  Theo slid his chair across to another bank of computers, tapped a quick succession of keys and then waited patiently. Something must have occurred, although Zhe could not discern what, for he turned to Estelle.

  ‘Proximity alert: three unknowns,’ he reported.

  ‘Bring them up on a screen.’

  Another few taps by Theo saw a clear picture of the passageway out the front materialise and, within a few seconds, the three figures appeared.

  ‘Well, there you are, Miss Zhe – your cavalry has arrived,’ Estelle joked.

  ‘That’s him?’ Theo asked excitedly pointing to Ben.

  ‘Uh-huh, the other one,’ Estelle corrected, causing Theo to lean in closer to study the picture of the man who had saved them all – if Estelle was to be believed.

  ‘Not quite the giant you described then,’ he grinned at her.

  ‘You’ve got work to do,’ she told him in response and pushed his chair back in the direction of the main workstation.

  ‘Spoilsport,’ he huffed with a smile, before diving back into his work as though he'd never stopped.

  ‘So…’ Estelle looked at Zhe before throwing a significant look back at the monitor.

  Zhe simply returned her look without saying anything.

  ‘Right. I guess they just couldn’t keep away,’ she said dryly, realising that Zhe wasn’t going to provide her with a better answer than that.

  Zhe smiled at that, ‘Duncan must have missed you.’

  Estelle rolled her eyes at Zhe’s insinuation, but couldn’t help the smile that danced around her lips at that thought. ‘Well, I suppose I’d better go and let them in then,’ she said, brushing down her dress before looking around the room. ‘It’s going to get crowded in here,’ she sighed as she went back through
the dark passage into the house proper to greet their new guests.

  No sooner had the door closed behind her than Theo spun around to face Zhe, causing Melanie to jump slightly at the sudden movement next to her. He now had both women starring enquiringly at him.

  ‘What’s he really like?’ he asked simply.

  ‘Duncan?’

  ‘Yeah, Estelle has him down as her white knight.’

  ‘Grey might be a better colour,’ Zhe said the first thing that came into her head in response to the unexpected question and analogy.

  ‘Really?’ Theo sounded sceptical.

  Theo’s tone pulled Zhe back to the present immediately, and, upon realising what Theo must be thinking, she sought to clarify her remark. ‘I’ve seen him kill people, rob them, engineer ways to manage this, but a white knight would never sully his hands with blood: he is a legend of all that is good and all that is impossible. So, no, Duncan isn’t a white knight. But he is still a knight in a world that does not allow even the best of men to remain pure. He has killed, but never for pleasure and never cruelly. He is a good man, fighting in a harsh world.’

  The brief silence that followed Zhe’s explanation made her wonder if she had gone too far; she’d just vocalised what she had seen of him in this one short week, but it seemed to her to be right. She felt certain that he was a good man.

  ‘So… a white knight then,’ Theo said at last with a grin. ‘Or at the very least a good man, which may, on all accounts, be better. He sure does have a way with women,’ he added wryly.

  ‘By all accounts, Estelle is right in her estimation of him; he does seem to be a good man,’ Melanie added from the sidelines, where she'd listened with rapt attention to Zhe’s comments.

  ‘Rather intimidating to meet then,’ Theo quipped, back to his usual demeanour now that he was more certain that they were not being taken advantage of.

  ‘You wait till you meet his captain,’ Melanie scoffed before turning back to her computer screen.

  ‘What’s…’ Theo got no further in his questioning as they heard footsteps in the passageway leading to the computer room. Deciding that discretion was the better part of valour, Theo turned back to his computer in time for the door to open, and admit the three new guests and their hostess.

  Ben assessed the room as he stepped through the door, noting its single exit, banks of computers and the duo working hard at the central workstation. His eyes very quickly came to rest on Zhe. Grinning, he stepped forward, aborting at the last moment his full on hug and instead slung his left arm around her shoulders.

  ‘Zhe, it’s good to see you, little darling.’

  Zhe smiled. ‘It’s good to see you too,’ she told him quietly.

  ‘Knew you could do it,’ Duncan told her with a grin as he sauntered past. ‘Your control centre, Estelle?’ he asked, looking around.

  ‘Something like that,’ Estelle replied noncommittally, walking over to the duo still hunched over the workbench. ‘I’d like you to meet Theo, and, of course, you already know Melanie.’ Estelle issued a general introduction, but it was quite clear that it was Theo and Duncan who were really being introduced.

  ‘Nice to meet you,’ Duncan responded politely.

  ‘You too; you’re quite the legend around here.’

  ‘So are you from what I hear. Estelle tells me that, between the two of you, we’ll be into those disks in no time.’ Duncan refused to rise to Theo’s baiting, not least because he was getting tired of hearing what a hero he was. He certainly didn’t feel much like one, nor was he really sure that everything Estelle now had was attributable to him.

  ‘Well…’

  ‘We would be into them already, if he didn’t stop to chat to someone every five minutes,’ Melanie cut into the conversation scathingly.

  ‘Oops,’ Theo grinned, not looking the least bit contrite.

  ‘Can I help?’ Sophie volunteered stepping forward, causing Melanie to look at her for the first time since she stepped into the room.

  ‘We’ve got it,’ Melanie replied not unkindly after a moment’s pause.

  ‘Of course.’ Sophie nodded and stepped back again.

  ‘Really, we’re just about through – if the boy wonder here will sit down for two minutes,’ Melanie explained a little more fully.

  ‘All right, all right; I’m here,’ Theo cried, swivelling back around to face the monitors. ‘Just a tap here and a tap there, and then voila!’ he proclaimed with a dramatic flourish.

  ‘Hmph, one would’ve thought he'd done all the hard work, not just typed in his own bloody password,’ Melanie scoffed.

  ‘Now, now, there’s no reason to spoil the magic,’ Theo responded.

  ‘So, what have we got?’ Ben cut in before the argument really took off. He didn’t relish having all these people seeing what was on those disks, but he had very little choice in the matter; he just hoped that they didn’t all start getting ideas of their own on what to do with the information they found.

  ‘Err, looks to be some video files, a couple of picture files and two text documents,’ Theo recited from the screen in front of him.

  Everyone turned to look at Ben at this pronouncement, as if confused as to what they’d found. Ben, for his part, rolled his eyes at their naivety. ‘Well, it’s hardly going to be labelled as “For the downfall of the Republic, please click here” is it? Try one of the video files.’

  ‘Right you are.’ Theo clicked on the first video in the list of files and put it on the central monitor.

  The room stood staring at the monitor, waiting for it to come to life. After a lengthy pause it did. It went from complete blackness to the middle of a Jigs Day. It showed Carrington’s speech, followed by the lead up to and several executions before it cut.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Why do they…’

  ‘…doesn’t make any sense…’

  A cacophony of voices started as soon as the screen went dark again, no one in the room could understand why people were killing for this recording. Jigs Day happened every month, it was no secret – it was even celebrated.

  ‘Hey!’ Zhe was the only one to notice that something else was playing after the Jigs Day recording, but was forced to shout to make herself heard over everyone else. Once she had their attention, she just waved towards the screen where there was an impeccably dressed man with strange unnaturally browned skin, who seemed to be ranting about something that needed a lot of arm gestures.

  ‘Theo back it up,’ Ben instructed, unable to make neither head nor tail of what the man on the screen was saying.

  Another hush fell over the room as Theo played the recording from when the man first appeared. The man looked straight at the camera and started his rant with no introduction:

  ‘I don’t know what you lot think you are playing at! This is beyond belief! What do you think you are doing? Jigs Day is a centre piece! This drivel is inexcusable! The lighting is terrible, so is the angling on the camera and don’t get me started on the zoomed-in shots! You completely miss the arterial spray as the head comes off and where is my shot of the head going into the crowd? This is flat, boring and so pedestrian. We are talking show business here! Where is the razzmatazz? The punch? The gritty gore and blood splatter? That’s what the people up here want on their television sets, not this second-rate drivel! I don’t know what I have to do to get through to you, Carrington – this is supposed to be entertainment!

  ‘And what about prisoner number three? He was supposed to be pardoned at the last minute; they had voted to grant him clemency! What’s the point of us rigging the trials, for us to then not deliver on the people’s verdict at the pivotal moment? Honestly, he was the perfect setup: he had the looks, the story and the sobbing wife! He couldn’t have been more perfect, and then you go and execute him! His story could have run for at least a good ten episodes; we could’ve added plenty
of intrigue! But… fine, whatever, you’ve done it and even we can’t resurrect him, but next time clear it with me. Okay, onto the next segment: the day-to-day life of the Displaced.’

  There was a horrified silence in the room as the monitor went dark again. They all stood staring at the blank screen unable to take their eyes off it, and unable to comprehend what the man was talking about.

  ‘Did he just describe Jigs Day as a boring show? And what the hell did he mean by episodes?’ Sophie asked incredulously.

  ‘I’m more concerned who his audience is,’ Ben said darkly. ‘Theo play the next one.’

  Theo nodded and decided that now was not the time for quips; he simply hit play on the next atrocious commentary. This time, the short section of the “show” that was shown first was following the life of a regular citizen, who it seemed was having an especially dire day.

  The man appeared again after the screen blacked out from the “show” footage and this time no one talked over him.

  ‘We need live commentary on this one. The gloomy atmosphere is good, but closer shots on Dray being beaten in the alley are needed. We need to remind the viewers who the Displaced are: how they voted for them to be torn from all they knew, educated to a high degree and then thrown back into the dregs of society. Dray’s story, in particular, needs to be recapped with special emphasis on last week’s vote, which has put him here on the verge of suicide. Then we need an announcement of the vote to save him and by what means, or whether he is left to his own devices. Oh, and get rid of the scene with the kid; they may all think this is just make believe with actors, but even they won’t stand for that sort of treatment of a kid. Yeah, that’s about it for this one. Next segment.’