by Melissa Good
"Okay, I'm heating up the iron," Dar called down.
"Go for it, babe." Kerry tapped lightly on the pipe with her flashlight. She was tired, and hungry, and the worst part of it was knowing that even when they finished this crazy jury rig, all they could do was pull the cable into place.
They still had to wait for the fiber terminator to come in, and finish the connection so they could get it working.
Kerry's nose twitched, as she smelled the odd scent of heating metal. She peeked up the pipe and saw a hint of motion in her flashlight's glare, now outlining the blockage that was preventing the cable from passing.
Sure enough, the light reflected off dusty white plastic, a zip tie wrapped around the cables already in the pipe, its end extending across and bending against the far pipe wall. Kerry could just see the tip of the soldering iron approaching the tie and she had to smile again at the ingenuity of her partner.
Who would have thought of using a soldering iron? She was pretty sure she wouldn't have. Kerry pondered a moment as to what she would have done, given the limited options. Used a knife on a stick?
Not try getting it through?
Would she have gotten someone, a construction worker, to come in and cut through the pipe so she could access it?
"Watch out," Dar warned. "I'm about to start melting things."
Kerry gazed up at her overprotective spouse. "Okay, I'm clear."
She edged her head out of the way, cocking her ears as she heard Dar curse again. She felt sorry for the two techs, trapped in the small space with her irritated partner. "Easy honey. We're almost done."
She could smell burning plastic. "I think you got it, Dar. I can smell it."
"Maybe that's my brain cells frying," Dar responded, her voice echoing softly.
Grumpy grumpy. Kerry licked her lips, and peeked up the pipe again, seeing a wisp of smoke showing in the light. A moment later, the tip of the soldering iron jerked to one side, and a piece of curled, blackened white plastic plummeted down and smacked her flashlight before she jerked her hand out of the way and it landed on the ground. "Hey! It's out!"
"Wooeffing hoo," Dar grunted, soft clanking noises and dust bunnies issuing down the pipe as she removed her makeshift tool. "I'm going to send the pull cable down."
Kerry removed the flashlight and shut it off, laying there quietly and enjoying the cool breeze from the opening, resisting the urge to close her eyes. She could hear the cable snaking its way down the conduit, and a moment later, the RJ45 end covered in tape plonked its way onto the metal deck near her head. "Yay!"
She got up and took hold of the cable, pulling it gently until about two feet of it was outside the conduit. Then she turned and took hold of the cable Dar had pulled in through the hatch, carefully tying the end of the fiber to the Ethernet cable and pulling it taut. "Dar?"
"Yes?"
Kerry jumped, as the voice sounded right behind her head. "Yow!" She reeled backwards off her crouch, waving her arms until Dar grabbed hold of her and let her regain her balance. "For Pete's sake!"
Dar chuckled tiredly. "Left the guys up there to haul this thing up. I vote we go and get something hot to eat, and a beer."
Kerry stopped moving and slumped back against her. "Ugh. I love you."
"Likewise." Dar hugged her, then let her go. "Feed the wire up there, and let's haul. Maybe by the time we get back, our fiber man'll be here, and we'll be in the home stretch."
Kerry eased the end of the fiber into the pipe, and Dar knocked against it. After a moment, it started to move, snaking it's way slowly up from its pile of coils on the floor up through the pipe to the second level.
Dar watched it, and dusted her hands off. "Things are looking up," she said. "We might get outta here tonight."
"Piece of cake now," Kerry agreed. "All we need is some ends." She jumped a trifle as her end was smacked, and scooted for the door. "It should go smoothly now, right?"
"Right."
Chapter Four
DAR WAS GLAD enough to feel the springiness of the gangway under her feet as she preceded Kerry toward the pier. Around her, the city seemed muted, sounds of sirens audible and the soft roar of traffic only barely.
She could smell the pungent scent of the water, but above that, on the wind now blowing from the sea, she could smell the burning, acrid scent of destruction, and the taint left a strange taste on the back of her tongue.
The darkness hid the billow of smoke still emerging from the Trade Center site, but if she looked up, and off to the horizon, she could see the stars being obscured by it.
"So where do we go from here?" Kerry asked, her hands tucked inside the pockets of her jacket. "All we need is the terminations, right?" She caught up to Dar and walked alongside her, their steps sounding an odd echo as they moved off the gangway and onto the concrete pier.
"Right," Dar said, "and to integrate the data stream, but that's trivial compared to everything else on the physical layer."
Kerry removed one hand from her pocket and tucked it through Dar's elbow. "You sound so sexy when you talk like that."
"Ker-ry." Dar gave her a sideways look.
"C'mon hon. I have to take my fun where I can find it tonight," Kerry responded wryly. "Let's walk down to that bar you mentioned, and see if we can get some nasty bar food or a pizza and a beer. Hell, I'd even take a hot dog right now."
"Me too." Dar exhaled, feeling some of the tension in her unwind. The last big hurdle was done, and she was actually looking forward to finishing out this particular task and getting on with the much larger one ahead.
They walked along the pier toward the gates, which now had some lurid, orange lights outlining the guard vehicles blocking the way. As they got closer to the gates, the sounds of arguing voices were heard and they stepped up the pace by silent accord.
"Hope that's not Dad out there," Kerry muttered. "I thought those guys were okay with us."
"If it was Dad, they wouldn't be yelling," Dar responded. "Let's see what's going on."
They got to the gates, and ducked through the opening to find a half circle of armed guardsmen facing off against three young men in jeans and windbreakers. All were carrying backpacks. Two of them were tow-headed and fair skinned, the third was dark skinned, and had black, straight hair.
The guardsman in charge, a different man than when they'd entered, was on a radio, giving the trio dark looks as he talked into it. "Not sure what to do with these guys, sir," he said, just audible to them.
"They've got all kinds of tools and some crazy story."
"Uh oh." Kerry slowed. "Maybe we should stay back."
Dar hesitated, taking in the angry stances and the weapons and almost decided Kerry was right, until their forward motion took them into the floodlights and the young men spotted them.
They weren't familiar to her, but apparently she was familiar to them, because the look of relief on all three faces was almost comical.
The closest one called out, "Ms. Roberts! Tell these guys not to shoot us!"
"Then again, maybe not." Kerry released Dar's arm and followed her into the light. "Looks like they're ours. Mark's guys, probably."
"Probably." Dar sighed, continuing past the trucks toward the crowd. "Don't shoot, gentlemen."
The guard in charge turned, startled to find them behind him. "Holy shit hang on--I've got some people inside here." He pulled the radio from his mouth. "Who are you people? What are you doing inside that gate?"
"Someone didn't leave hand over notes." Kerry sighed. "Jesus."
"Now I wish it was my father out here." Dar grimaced. "Okay, hold it everyone. Let's discuss this before people start getting hurt," she said. "Let me start from the beginning."
"Let me start from the beginning," the guard captain said. "Let's see some identification from you people."
Uh oh. Kerry removed her identification case from her pocket and stepped forward, holding the leather case out to the man. "Okay, here's mine. We've been in here since this afternoon
, one of your colleagues allowed us in after he checked us out with the mayor's office."
"What?" The man grabbed her folio and glanced at it. "No one said anything about people being inside there. Who are you people?"
"I'm sorry if they didn't leave you word," Kerry said, in a calm voice. "But we came in here around three o'clock. We've been working inside the ship this whole time." She took a step closer to him, aware of Dar's alert presence at her back. "We don't want to cause you trouble. These people here are employees of ours."
"Boy, we're glad to see you, Ms. Stuart," the tech said. "They sent us from Washington. They said you needed us."
"Shut up," the guardsman ordered. "Go stand over there, both of you. I don't know who you are, and I'm not buying some crazy story that you got let in here earlier. Don't you people know what's been going on around here?"
Dar just walked past him, catching Kerry's arm as she went and gently hauling her along with her. She stopped where the techs were, all of them visibly relaxing. "You our fiber boys?"
"Yes, ma'am," the talkative one said. "I'm Shaun Durhan, this is Mike Thomas, and Kannan Barishmorthy."
Dar had her hands in her pockets, and was regarding them mildly."Dar Roberts," she finally said, then glanced to her left. "Kerry Stuart.
The men all blushed a little. "Yeah, we knew that," Shaun said. "Glad you came out here. They were really starting to hassle us, especially Kannan."
Dar glanced at the third man, her brows contracting. "Kannan?"
She knew the name, vaguely. Mark had spoken well of him, she remembered, one of their H1B Visa candidates she recalled signing off on. "Why?"
"They often joke that some people do not understand geography," Kannan said in a quiet voice. "However I did think most knew the difference between the Middle East and India."
"Don't count on it." Kerry glanced behind her, where the guardsman had now taken her identification and ducked inside his command car with it and his radio. "My mother said they'd been expecting some problems in Michigan with a backlash."
"Expecting?" Kannan eyed her. "Ma'am, there were two men from my home country already killed there, beaten in their shops from people thinking they were Arabs."
Kerry remembered the call earlier, and bit off a curse.
"Well." Dar exhaled. "I'm sure having a bunch of them living in Miami without being detected didn't help anything." She looked around. "It would be like one of them living here. How could you tell? Half the cabbies in the damn city come from that part of the world."
"Well there--what are you folks all doing out here?" Alastair shifted the bag in his arms. "Waiting for us?"
Andrew was right behind him with his box, glancing alertly around at the guard, the command car, and the small group waiting outside the gates."We got trouble now?" He came up next to Dar and cocked his head in question. "How're you feeling, Dardar?"
"Frustrated." Dar craned her head around to look at the command car. "You can give those things to these guys. It's their gear." She indicated the techs. "You three might want to fish through there and make sure we got everything."
The techs took possession of the bundles and knelt next to them on the ground, opening up the bag and peering inside it. "Kannan, this is your stuff." Shaun handed it over. "Let me get the box open."
"Ah, yes. Thank you so much." Kannan sat down on the ground and removed his pack, swinging it around and setting it down next to his leg.
"Hey! What are you people doing?" The guard commander circled his truck and approached them. "What's going on here? Who are you two?" He pointed at Kannan. "Get those things away from that guy--he's one of them!"
"One of them what?" Kerry turned in confusion. "He's our fiber tech. What's wrong with--"
"Shut up. You're probably in it with him. All of you, a bunch of t--"
Kerry got in front of him. "They're also part of our company. Look, can't we just call the command that was here earlier?" She held up both hands, then realized he wasn't going to stop and couldn't get out of the way in time before she was shoved hard to one side. "Hey!"
"Get out of my way. You men, over here. Bring that--" The guard commander hauled up short as Dar suddenly surged into rapid motion, coming right up into his face with her hands raising up into fists. "What the hell do you--hey!"
Dar had him by the front of his shirt. "You stupid little piece of shit!" She yelled at top volume. "What in the hell do you think you're doing pushing around the people who pay your fucking salary?"
"Oh boy." Alastair moved nervously forward. "This is going to end badly, I can tell."
The guard reeled backwards, then reached for the gun hanging off his back and started pulling it around only to find himself lifted up off his feet and shoved through the air back against his truck as his rifle was taken from his hands in a single, smooth motion. "Why you--"
"Hold UP!" Andrew barked, taking the safety off the gun and cocking it. "Paladar, you get back."
Dar took a single step back, her hands at her sides, fingers twitching.
The other soldiers belatedly started forward, only to halt when Andrew slowly moved his head in their direction.
"Put them damn things down," Andrew ordered. "And you still yourself, mister." He addressed the guard commander. "'Fore I shoot you in the nuts and save us all the trouble of you spreading out them know-nothing genes."
The other guardsmen hesitated, then put their rifles down on the ground and stepped back.
Kerry eased forward, and got her hand around Dar's arm. "Hey." She rubbed her thumb against her partner's heated skin. "I'm okay. He's just an idiot."
The guard commander at least had the sense to stay where he was, sitting on the ground with his back against his truck. "You're all ending up in jail," he said. "You better put that gun down, buddy. This is no game."
"No, it ain't," Andrew agreed. "Most times when I been holding one of these here things, it weren't no game and not so much as when you can't tell who you got on the other end, a friendly or a target." He stared, unblinking, at the man's face. "Like now."
The guard captain went very still, only his breathing evident in the rise and fall of his shirt.
"Now," Andrew said. "These here people are here to do something for the gov'mint. You are going to get on that there radio and get your CO over here, so you can 'splain why you ain't letting them do what they need to do. Right now."
"Okay." The guard captain held his hands out. "I'm just trying to do my job."
"No you ain't. That feller there today was doing his job. You just ain't got no sense, and don't want to listen to nobody," Andrew disagreed. "So get yourself up and get on that comm, 'fore I do it and get them collar bugs turned to half stripes for you."
The guard got up and reached in the open window. Andrew shifted the rifle audibly and he paused, then slowly pulled his hand out with the radio mouthpiece in it. "Can I ask who you are?"
"No you may not," Andrew told him. "But ah will tell you that if ah don't know someone who will bust you, ah know someone who knows someone. Just get on that thing and get someone with a brain ovah here."
The man hesitated.
"And if you all don't believe that, ah'll just let mah little girl here beat the tar out of you and take pitchers," Andrew continued mildly with a straight face.
The guard captain keyed the mic. 'HQ, HQ--this is Hudson Midtown. Over."
"Thought that might do it." Andrew turned his head slightly. "You kids want to get on back in case someone does something jackass here?"
"No," Dar replied.
Kerry shook her head in agreement, half turning as Alastair eased up next to them. "We're all jackasses, right?"
"Without question," Alastair agreed. "I've never been a jackass, in fact. But you know, the Commander is right. Let's get back a little."
Both Kerry and Dar just looked at him.
"No, huh?"
Dar finally relaxed, her shoulders easing and her hands uncurling. "Let's see if we've got everything." She ga
ve in, and stepped back from the half ring of uncertain guardsman, and her father's threatening, brace legged form.
The techs were all crouched near the ground, eyes wide. "Wow,"Shaun muttered, as they joined the three of them. "This is getting crazy."
"Getting?" Kannan looked upset, and tense. "Never have I felt so scared, you know? Intimidated by my own nationality being in question. It is terrible. I feel like I am walking target for people to think badly of."
Kerry felt her heart finally starting to settle back down in her chest. She felt a trembling weakness in her legs and she leaned against Dar for support as much as in comfort. "He didn't even know who you are. He didn't even care," she said. "Jesus."
"Asshole," Dar said, quietly.
"You all right?" Kerry murmured, leaning close to her.
Dar didn't answer for a moment, then she exhaled. "Well," she said, "at least my cramps are gone." She glanced down at Kerry. "I just saw red."
Kerry bumped her shoulder with her head. Then she looked down at the techs. "Kannan, I'm sorry. I know what it's like to be judged on something you don't have control over." She knelt next to him. "Is there something we can do to help with that? We might as well get started, since I think we're stuck here for a little while."
The techs were willing to be distracted. Kannan pulled his bag over and took out a tool kit and set it on the ground, then removed a handful of bits and pieces from the paper bag. "Not too much light here." He looked up at the orange lamps.
"I have a flashlight." Shaun paused removing it from his pack. "Want me to hold it?"
"I will." Dar held her hand out for it. "Let's get done what we can. Then the beer is on me."
The techs smiled timidly at her and started to get to work. Dar turned the light on and focused it on the sidewalk with its odd scattering of technical debris, glad of a chance to stand still, the sense of thrumming anger only slowly fading from her awareness.
Kerry's shoulder was pressed against her knee. Dar slowly turned her head and stared past her father's form, at the soldiers who were staring back at them.