by Magus Tor
“Okay.”
The boy was already starting to walk away. “Come on,” he called after Tara.
The girl with purple hair hurried after him. Then Aurelia had a thought. How could she com her when she didn't even know her last name?
“Wait,” she shouted. “I don't know your family name!”
Tara turned for a moment and smiled. “Hansen!” she shouted before running after the boy. In a second, they had disappeared around a corner.
Whoa. Wait. What? No, come on, there had to be plenty of Hansens around; it wasn't an extremely unusual name, just a coincidence, right? She'd known that Tara was an Elite kid, so it shouldn't be that surprising that she shared a name with Jonathon. Still, the shock of finding out Tara's last name was enough to occupy Aurelia for the first couple of minutes that she was alone.
Alone. Oh Gods. What the hell am I doing down here? She could hear the hum of the electric lights buzzing; the footsteps of Tara and the boy had long since faded. In her hand Aurelia felt the weight of the silver ball. Turning it slowly in her fingers, she figured she had a decision to make. Not that it was a big one. Sure, she could try and find her way back to the party she'd left, but she knew that she'd never make it. Or she could throw this ball and let one of the guys in black find her. They weren't sec Workers, she was sure. In all her time both on Earth and in Lunar, she had never seen a Worker working out of uniform. No, these guys were something else. She could only hope that they were what she needed.
She sat down in the middle of the crossroads. She might as well be comfortable. The ball was still clutched in her hand. Somehow, she wasn't feeling as scared as she should. But then, she'd seen a man in black before, hadn't she? Her mind went back to the man who had dropped the envelope for her in the alleyway. This was all connected; she just didn't know how. She held her hand up flat, balancing the ball on her palm, looking at the way the curve distorted her reflection in the cold, dim light. It really wasn't much of a decision at all.
The others had been gone long enough. Grasping the ball in her right hand, she took a deep breath and then threw it as hard as she could onto the ground a few metres in front of her. There was a startlingly loud bang that made her ears ring, and then jets of green-and-black smoke hissed out of the ball. The smell was sulphurous, cloying, and given that sec Worker uniforms were also green and black, Aurelia had a suspicion that the device had once been some kind of security smoke bomb.
She coughed as the smoke billowed around her, but in the long corridors it quickly dissipated to no more than a haze against the lights. Then she waited.
She heard him before he arrived, the crisp clip of his footsteps echoing in one of the corridors. Turning from her seat on the floor, she scanned each of the four directions until she could see him, a small black dot coming towards her. He was walking briskly but not hurrying. She settled back so that she was facing him, and as he came closer, she slowly raised her hands to show that she was carrying nothing. The sound of his footsteps slowed as he drew nearer until, cautiously, he stopped. Aurelia could see his face, which was pale and white, but couldn't quite make out his features.
“Who are you?” he called.
“A friend,” Aurelia shouted back. “I am unarmed,” she added, as an afterthought, “and alone.”
He began walking again, more slowly. As he drew closer, she could see that he was of medium height, stocky and well built. His hair was greying at the temples but otherwise dark. He came to a stop a metre or two in front of her.
“And what do you want?” he said. He was not afraid, merely cautious, and he didn't sound angry. His voice was low but carried well in the tunnel.
“I want to go Out,” she said. Short and sweet—this didn't seem the time for explanations.
His eyes widened slightly, and he opened his mouth as if to speak but then closed it again and thought.
“This is... unorthodox,” he said after a moment.
A man of few words, Aurelia thought. At least he hadn't tried to shoot her or anything.
“I don't know who else to ask,” she said carefully.
“Aren't you afraid of me?” He didn't seem threatening, just curious.
“I think I may have met one of you before,” Aurelia said.
At this, the man's eyes definitely widened, and he licked his lips before replying. “I think you had better come with me,” he said.
He turned and started walking back the way he had come, not looking to see if she was following. Aurelia wondered what would happen if she were to suddenly dart off down one of the other corridors. She didn't try it, though. He looked like he could be dangerous if he wanted to be. She stood up and stretched her legs, then began to walk after him. She didn't know where he was taking her, but she still wasn't afraid of him.
He led her through several side tunnels, not speaking or looking around. She followed, the tunnels all looking the same to her. Finally he stopped outside of a door. When he knocked, the door opened, and he waited while Aurelia went in first, then stepped in behind her.
Inside was darker than outside, and it took a second for Aurelia to make out the figures of three other men sitting around a small table. The room was filled with boxes, the table in a clearing in the middle.
“I've found her,” the man who had brought her said.
The largest of the three seated men looked Aurelia up and down. “What's your name?”
She told him, and he nodded.
“She wants to go Out,” the first man said.
“Why?” the large man said.
Before Aurelia could answer, the first man broke in: “She says she's met one of us before.”
Okay, that wasn't exactly what she'd said, but she kept her mouth shut. The three men around the table looked at each other, no hint of recognition in any of their eyes.
“Where?” the large man asked.
Aurelia explained where she had been, and the man nodded. He got up from the table and pressed an icon on the intercom behind him.
“Just wait,” he said.
The men seemed to be comfortable in silence, but Aurelia wasn't. She was nervous, though still not scared, and wanted to know more than anything what the hell was going on.
“Who are you?” she asked. “I told you my name,” she added, defiantly.
The larger man laughed. “We're the Connectors,” he said.
“Connectors?”
“We connect inside the dome and outside the dome.”
Makes sense. But before Aurelia could ask more questions, there was another knock at the door and yet another man in black came in. This one she recognised. He looked at her and nodded.
“That's her,” he said.
The larger man looked satisfied. “Take a seat,” he said to Aurelia. “You guys get out of here and get back to work.”
The other two seated men got up and left, along with the man who had brought Aurelia in. She sat in one of the vacated chairs.
“Nicholas told us about you,” said the larger man. “Said to be expecting you, though he didn't know how or where or when you'd come. Seemed sure that you would, though.”
“So he's Out,” said Aurelia—a statement, not a question.
The larger man nodded. “He's Out.”
“I need to get a message to him; can you help me do that?” For a moment Aurelia thought that she might be able to avoid leaving the dome.
“No can do,” said the large man. “No idea where he is right now. He said he'd try to contact you, and he left a message.”
The large man got up and left, presumably to find the message from Nicholas, leaving Aurelia alone with the man she had seen in the alleyway.
“Why didn't you help me?” she asked him.
He shrugged. “I did.”
“You're a Clone, aren't you?” Again she saw the heavy scarring on his wrists where his numbers had once been.
“Yes. That's the only reason I did as much as I did. Nicholas asked me to, but I wasn't risking any more than
that. He said you'd know what to do. Seemed to trust you. Trust that you'd get down here to his message.”
The man fell silent again, and Aurelia had run out of questions, so she left him alone until the large man came back. He was carrying an envelope identical to the one that had been dropped in the alley. He thrust it into Aurelia's hands.
With trembling fingers, she opened it. Inside was a note.
Aurelia,
I knew you'd find this. I'm fine. Jonathon was going to have me killed. I'll be safe Out for the time being. Things will change, and I'll be back. I'll get a message to you if I need you, don't worry. And I know what you're thinking. Don't do it. You do not want to be Out. Trust me.
Nicholas.
The note was written in a shaky hand, as though he had been in a hurry. “Did he say anything else?” Aurelia asked.
“Look, we've done what we were paid to do; don't know anything else at all, got it?” the large man said.
She looked again at the note in her hand and weighed up what she knew. Nicholas was wrong about Jonathon’s trying to get him killed—that, she was sure of. There was no way that Jonathon would have broken his promise. She didn't know where Nicholas had got the idea from, but he was misinformed. She needed to tell him that so that he could come back. On the one hand, she could wait until he contacted her, which could be days or weeks away. Days or weeks with Nicholas taking constant risks to stay alive outside of the dome. Or she could take the risk, herself, and spend a day or so Out and get him the message in person. It wasn't a tough decision to make.
She laid the note on the table and sat forward. “I want to go Out,” she said to the two men in front of her.
The larger man looked at her speculatively. “That wasn't part of the deal,” he said. “The deal was we show you the message, then get you back to Lunar.”
“Well, this is a new deal,” said Aurelia. “I need to go Out for maybe a day or so, track down Nicholas, and bring him back in.”
The man nodded. “What have you got?”
She understood what he meant and took her bag off her back, emptying it onto the table. He looked at the medical supplies she'd brought and nodded again.
“Alright. We'll do it.”
Chapter Six
The arrangements were made, bargains settled, and Aurelia was surprised to learn that she would be leaving in a matter of an hour or so.
“No point waiting around,” the large man said gruffly. “More waiting is more risk.”
She agreed with that, but mostly because she wanted to get Out and then back in again as soon as possible. The large man nominated the guy Aurelia had started to think of as “her” guy to lead her, the Clone.
“What do I call you?” she asked him as he led her through a narrow tunnel to another store room.
“Bryn.”
He wasn't exactly talkative, and she could use some conversation to take her mind off things. Oh well, at least he was efficient. Once in the store room, he opened up boxes until he found a breathing suit in her size.
“Try it on,” he said, leaving the room.
She struggled to get the suit on over her dress before remembering that she had a uniform in her bag. Once she was dressed in her uniform, the suit was easy to pull on. The material was light and flexible, though not quite as comfortable as real fabric. The guy in black—Bryn, Aurelia corrected herself—came back and surveyed her, making her turn around so he could see her from all angles.
“Fine,” he said. “Now pull the hood over your face.”
She reached back and pulled the hood all the way down so that it covered her whole head, hearing a hiss as it sealed itself to the rest of the fabric.
“Press the button on your right shoulder,” Bryn said.
Surprisingly, she could hear him fine, even inside the suit. She did as she was told and felt a stirring of breeze on her face as the suit began filtering the air around her and bringing it inside so that she could breathe.
Bryn nodded. “Press the button on the left shoulder,” he ordered.
She did so, and the air filtration system stopped. She found that she could now pull back the hood; it was no longer sealed.
“When the filter is on, you can't remove the hood,” Bryn explained. “If the power button doesn't work, then try removing and then resealing the hood. If that doesn't work, then start praying to whoever it is you believe in, because there's nothing else you can do. Understood?”
She nodded, her stomach quivering.
“And don't rip or tear the suit in any way. The filter works only when there's a perfect seal.”
Again she nodded.
“You might as well keep it on for now; you'll be Out soon enough, and you'll need it.”
He left once more, and Aurelia stuffed her dress into her bag and slung it over her shoulder before following him. He led her through more corridors, until eventually she saw that the tunnel they were in had a curved wall. She guessed it was the edge of the dome. Several metres later, Bryn stopped.
“In here,” he said, pointing at a small grey door.
She went in, and he followed. A folding bed occupied one wall, a table and chair opposite it. Bryn closed the door behind them and pulled out the chair.
“Now what?” she asked, sitting on the edge of the bed.
“Now we wait.”
He crossed his arms over his chest and looked as if he was quite happy just to sit in silence. Petulantly, Aurelia let the quiet stretch on. If that's what he wants, he can have it, sulky bastard. But the quiet started scratching on her nerves, and she couldn't help but ask:
“What are we waiting for?”
He grunted and sat up a little straighter. Aurelia thought he might have been falling asleep.
“We're waiting for the right time,” he said.
Gods, it’s like getting blood from a stone. “Which is when?” she prompted. “You know, this whole thing would be much faster if you just told me what was going to happen rather than making me force details out of you,” she couldn't help but add.
He looked at her, his dark eyes gleaming, and for a second she thought that he might even smile. He didn't, but he did start talking a little more.
“Fine. We're going to wait here until about an hour before dawn—dome dawn, that is. That's when Workers start coming down, and the alarm system around the dome is switched off. Then we work fast. There's a window of time when the alarms are off but the Workers have yet to get all the way to the edge of the dome when we can get you out. That's what we're waiting for, okay?”
“Okay,” she nodded. “Then what?”
“Then I let you Out, and you go off on your merry way.”
“That's it?!” Okay, she hadn't expected a full escort or anything, but she'd at least expected to be pointed in the right direction.
Bryn shrugged, slumping back down into his chair. “We've no idea where your friend is. Once you're out, my part of the deal is over.”
Aurelia sat back on the bed so that she was leaning against the wall behind her. She hadn't really thought much further ahead than getting out of the dome.
“Are there going to be people out there that I can ask?” she said after a while.
“A few. Listen, I'll put you out as close to others as I can, alright? But no promises. Now, you should catch some sleep, and I should definitely nap, so enough of the small talk, right?”
She kept quiet after that, and the sound of his rasping breathing filled the room. Bryn had no trouble sleeping, but Aurelia didn't really think that sleep was going to be on her agenda tonight. She tried desperately to come up with some kind of plan, but what was there to plan? She had no idea what she was getting into, no idea where the hell Nicholas was going to be, and didn't even know what the world Out there looked like. Eventually she gave up and lay on the bed, letting Bryn's breathing hypnotise her.
It had been around forty-five minutes or so before a snort and a groan from Bryn roused her from her trance.
“Almo
st time,” he said.
He must have some kind of built-in time reader, Aurelia thought, stretching and sitting up. Bryn was rubbing his face and yawning, and she again saw the thick scars on his wrists.
“How did you get your number off?” she asked, knowing that it was a sensitive subject but figuring she might as well ask. She knew from Nicholas that removing Clone numbers could trigger alarm systems and even death in a Clone.
Bryn eyed her. “There's a lot you don't know, kid. There's a lot of things possible Out that aren't possible under the dome.”
He stood up and opened the door, looking out into the corridor.
“Come on,” he said and left.
She trailed behind him, skipping a step or so to keep up. They walked around the curve of the corridor, and the tunnels were still quiet.
“How often do sec Workers come down here?” she asked, curious.
Bryn shrugged. “They don't usually. Trust us to take care of things.”
Huh? She'd assumed that the black guys were, well, on the wrong side of the system, so to speak. “Why'd they trust you?”
“We have an understanding,” was all he said.
“But don't they stop you taking people Out?” Aurelia pressed.
“Look, things need to come in, things need to go out; that's just the way it is. We're the Connectors. We take care of what needs to be taken care of so that no one else gets their hands dirty.” He paused for a moment. “Things aren't always black and white, whatever you might think. It's in everyone's best interests to allow certain items, and even people, to pass through the dome every now and again.”
He could only be talking about corruption; there were definitely valuable resources out on the lunar surface, but this didn't surprise her as much as it might have done a few weeks before.
Bryn stopped, listening.
“There,” he said, holding up a finger.
Aurelia heard a small click, and the air around her seemed to move.
“Alarms are off; it's time to go. Hurry now.”
He took off at a jog, and Aurelia followed. Rounding a corner, he stopped again, squatting. She could just make out a joint in the concrete floor, and Bryn slid a knife from his boot, popped it into the joint, and lifted up a slab. A small hole yawned beneath them.