by G R Matthews
These lower floors were a little better lit than the maze of corridors and levels that made up the living cubes. Up another level and I was amongst the cheap shops, stalls, bars and little workshops that folks ran to scrape a living in the city. I tended to do most of my shopping here.
I had a quick look around, just to make sure there was an absence of “friends” or other people who’d quite like to meet me in a dark secluded place and make their feelings known. This evening the coast seemed clear. Without any further delay, I made my way to the shop I wanted and, with a final quick peek over my shoulder, entered.
“Corin,” the shopkeeper called.
This was a tiny shop selling specialist goods, if you knew how to ask. The door in was also the door out and a counter, with the shopkeeper behind, lined the back wall. Behind that was the only other door which led, I guessed, to the storeroom.
“Hal,” I replied.
“You’re back sooner than I expected.” Hal leaned forward on the counter, resting on his elbows and crossing his arms.
“Going away for a bit,” I said. “Knew I’d be missing your special brew if I didn’t take some with me.”
“Where you off to? Didn’t think you could travel anywhere?”
I placed one hand on the counter. “Got my travel papers back and a job. That’s where I am going, to do the job.”
“Things are finally on the up then?” Hal clapped once, in celebration, I think. It could have been disappointment, he was going to lose his best customer for an unspecified amount of time.
“Seems so. So, you have any?” I asked.
“One bottle, I think. From the last batch. I wasn’t going to start a new brew for a few days. Have to space them out or the waste sensors pick up on the chemicals.”
“How much?” I asked.
He named the price and I winced. “That’s twice the last bottle.”
“This is the last bottle,” he replied. “You have a job, you can afford the price.”
“I haven’t been paid yet,” I tried.
“Shame, but that’s the price.” He was giving me a measuring look. I tried to paint my face with innocence, need and the determination to leave without it. He must have seen something of that as he said, “Ok, tell you what. You pay that price now and I’ll give you discount on the next bottle.”
I paused. This was the last bottle. I couldn’t get it anywhere else. Certainly, if I was going to a Silent City, the chances of finding a dealer were slim to none. With none being the bookies favourite.
“Fine.” I handed over the cash.
He ducked out the back and returned with a small neatly wrapped package. “Good batch this.”
“Yeah,” I agreed. I slipped the package into my pocket. It wasn’t heavy. A single drop of this could make you forget the last few years if you weren’t used to it. I was. “I’ll see you when I get back and I won’t forget about the discount.”
I stepped out of the shop and into trouble. To be truthful, I stepped into and then bounced off the source of trouble, a thickset, pot-bellied man with arms made of muscle.
“Sorry,” I said without looking up. A quick apology can often take the heat out of any situation.
“Well, well, well,” he said and the bottom fell out of my stomach which, even considering it could have been the opposite way round, was not a nice feeling. “I’ve been wanting to bump into you.”
I took a step back. “You have?”
“Yes, indeed. I surely have.”
His face, those piggy eyes and the snarl on his lips sparked a memory. Not that I could place him, but I knew the face from somewhere. “How can I help you?”
“By standing very still whilst I knock your teeth out,” he said and I noticed something I really should have seen before. He wasn’t alone. There were three friends with him. None of them as big, but all of them smiling. He gestured to them and they spread out, encircling me.
“Are you sure you’ve got the right person?” I let my hands fall to my sides and checked the door I’d just come through. Hal beat me to it and slammed it shut. I heard the locks click, loud in the violent silence.
“I remember you from the accident, the trial and the time you crushed my knackers with a bottle of vodka.” The big man grinned, crooked teeth and bad gums. “And now you’re going to remember me.”
“Fuck,” was the only word I said. This was going to be painful, no doubt. All I could hope was that they’d miss the package if they decided to rob me afterwards.
They’d moved into a basic cross pattern. Me in the centre, the big guy straight ahead, one to either side and one behind. The corridor was clear too. Everyone seemed to have found just the shop they were looking for and dived in to make a purchase. There were cameras here. I doubt they were checked regularly and only if someone reported a crime. Not many down here reported a crime because any investigation would turn up some things they’d rather keep hidden.
“You sure about this?” I said, just to make sure there was no way out. The big guy grinned again, punctuating it by pounding a fist into his palm.
I scanned the environment looking for anything that might be weapon, or made into one. True to form, there was nothing. This was going to hurt. Four on one was bad news for the one. I lifted my hands, as if to surrender, to give up, and saw the ugly man’s grin widen. The rest of his crew settled back onto their heels. They imagined, I hoped, that it was already over and were looking forward to a little entertainment.
As soon as that tension relaxed I moved, stepping backwards and striking with my elbow. The shock of the impact ran straight up arm into my shoulder and down through my hips. It felt solid to me, but nothing compared to how the victim felt. The clatter behind suggested he had dropped to the ground. I ignored this small victory as the two to the side started moving forward.
My great haymaker never reached its target. The guy to the right caught my arm at the elbow. The target, the left hand man, grabbed my other arm and cinched it tight against his body, pulling me off balance. I was caught.
The big man stepped towards me and, if anything, his smile was even wider than before.
“I am going to enjoy this,” he said and swung his meaty fist, hard towards my face.
I did what I could. Kept steady between the two men, there was no way to dodge the fist so I rolled my head away, and hoped the blow would glance off.
Part 2
Chapter 10
The first leg of my journey would take me to a NOAH military city, just the other side of the Laurentian channel near Newfoundland. Past that and the ocean was contested territory. NOAH and VIKYN would operate patrols, but it was an area where a brave man could make his fortune or lose his life. The journey there would take about two days, give or take an hour or two. The passenger sub could make forty knots at a push and the captain, in his welcome and safety speech, reckoned we’d be doing a steady thirty-five all the way.
That was fine with me. The passing of time would let the painkillers work their magic and the company provided derma-patches to heal the worst of my injuries. I could recall the early hours of the morning, when I didn’t want to open my eyes. The pain in my skull, jaw and stomach all rated high nines. My hands had been tied to the bed and looking around, trying to make sense of the ghostly, blurred images, it was apparent I was in hospital. Judging by the large blue blur near the slightly larger silver-white blur, that I took to be the door, I was under guard. A white blur had entered and stabbed something into my neck and the blurs darkened.
When I woke next, Derva was sat next to the bed, her bag in her hands. I noted the way she gripped it, white knuckles and fingers. She was stressed. Next to her stood a doctor.
“You’ve been beaten quite badly,” the doctor had said as if it was news to me. “Luckily we have reset the two broken ribs, they’ll ache for a few days, and your arm. That will ache too. You were lucky not to get a broken jaw. We had to reseat a few of your teeth. Try not to eat any tough food for a while. Soup wo
uld be a good choice. We put your nose back into place. The best we could at any rate. It looks as though it has been broken a few times and reset badly once or twice along the way. Other than that you have some cuts and bruises that the derma-patches will sort out in a day or two. They’ll also take the edge of the pain as your bones knit themselves together – we’ve accelerated that as much as we dare. Make sure you eat lots of food over the next few days. You’ll feel tired.”
“You mean eat a lot of soup,” I said.
“Anything soft that you don’t have to chew too much.” The doctor had no sense of humour I could detect. “Other than that, we have done everything we can and you’ll be released in an hour or two.”
The doctor had turned on her heel and left without another word. Derva stared at me for a few minutes. I tried to smile back at her, but my head hurt too much to keep it up.
“Who did this?” she asked.
“No idea,” I answered. The frown on her face said she didn’t believe me.
“Why did they do it?”
“You’ve seen my record. I get hit every so often. Lot of folks lost their lives in the accident and lot of those had a lot of friends. I am not popular.”
“Was it over,” and she leaned forward to whisper the next words, “drugs?”
“What? No, of course not.” The small package? Had someone found it? It depended who had brought me in. The police and they’d have searched me first. A medical team and they’d have called the police, who would have searched my belongings as they were stripped off me. That might explain the guard at the door.
It was remarkably bizarre and surreal moment when she dipped her hand into her bag and brought out the package. I looked at it, at her, back to it and, finally, back to her.
“Is that mine?”
“You had it in your coat pocket when they brought you in.” She didn’t say anything else.
“Can I have it back then?”
“Why do you need this stuff? You know it is illegal. You could end up on a garbage sub for the rest of your life if you’re found it with.”
And she had a point. Anyone who got assigned to a refuse sub spent the rest of their very short life there. Well, to be truthful, they spent the bit of life they had left shovelling the garbage and then eternity as part of it.
“A shop near where you were found was raided last night and an illegal lab was found. The shop keeper is in custody and investigations are under way.”
I held my breath, waiting for the next bit of bad news. I’d been caught with an illegal narcotic, near a lab, and been beaten up in the process. The only thing left for her to say was that the court had sat in my absence, that happened a lot to poor folks down here, and that I was garbage sub bound.
“You’re lucky I have a city-web net out there. Any mention of your name in the system gets flagged up to me. I was here before the police.”
And I could breathe a little again. “Thanks.”
“I am going to keep this until you get back,” she stood, “and then we will talk. The police are outside. They want to get your story and I suggest you make it a nice simple one. The sub is leaving on schedule. Be on it.”
“Thanks,” I said again.
“We will talk.” And all the stress in that sentence was on the word in the middle.
After the police interview, I’d rushed back home, grabbed my bag and ran as fast I could, the doctor was right about the ribs, to the sub dock. I was settled in my assigned seat just as it pulled away from the docks.
Now, I just had to sit here. Sleep when I could. Drink when I couldn’t - if they’d let me - and try not to think too much.
# # #
Hours, and several sub-standard travel meals, later I arrived at the military city. Imaginatively, they called it Base 1. It was the third one built, and that tells you all you need to know about the military thinker.
The sub docked and I shuffled off alongside everyone else. Luggage would be dragged out of the hold and thrown through the security checks where the nosey buggers would search through any case that took their fancy. For all I know, they were trying on women’s knickers and stealing cash. The little package I’d intended to bring with me would have passed them by easily enough. No one checks the little shampoo bottles that folks steal from hotel rooms - and I had small collection of those from years ago.
The sub hadn’t entered the docks, but tied up alongside and an extendable corridor bridged the gap between the two. It was a non to subtle hint that this was not a city built to accommodate civilian subs. At the end of the umbilical tube I was met by an officer, a lieutenant by the two thick stripes around his sleeves.
“Mr. Hayes.” It was a statement and a question so I nodded. “If you’ll follow me, sir, we will collect your bag.”
If this was the kind of service I could expect now I was being paid by the company, I figured I could get used to it. The lieutenant made a brisk pace through the crowd and it was a challenge to keep up. People seemed to move out of his way and close up on me, though I was barely a step behind. It may have been his uniform, or the fact he was taller and thicker built than me. Then again it might have been the quite obvious presence of the sidearm on his belt. People invite interest, uniforms earn respect, weapons demand fear. He had me beat three to one.
We gathered up my travel bag from the security desk and we hustled onwards, away from the crowds. Down a corridor, making a few turns at junctions, and we were in a different part of the city. The lighting had changed from standard to about one quarter below, a sure sign this was a military base. They seem to have a need for low lighting, either to train their troops’ eyes or because they couldn’t afford the bills.
At another security check point the lieutenant did all the talking. He handed over his papers and another set which I assumed to be something to do with me. My travel documents hadn’t left my pocket. The guard waved us through. The same ritual took place twice more before we joined a wider corridor. The signage suggested we were heading towards the real docks, the ones with the armed subs in it.
Moments later, we came to a halt in front of an impressively large bulkhead door. This wasn’t a one person or even two person door. Without much of a squeeze, you’d get the nose of the passenger sub I had come in on through it. This door was guarded by four men, all of them sported a sidearm and a rifle. There were cameras above the door and, judging by the panelling around it, any number of hidden weapons. I smiled as nicely as I could as we approached. The lieutenant showed them the papers again and one of the guards opened the small door within a door that all large bulkheads have. We stepped through and into the docks.
Apart from the domes, and not every city has one, there are precious few large open spaces any more. This dock was one of them. It was enormous and I staggered back a little, feeling a little nauseous. There was space, lots of it. I could see the opposite bulkhead door, but that just meant that it was as large as the one I passed through because it was really just a steel grey smudge in the distance.
Overhead, great tracks carried, suspended beneath them, boxes of equipment back and forth. Long wires lowered the items to the ground where they were needed. The wall to my right was covered in large screens displaying the sub names and departure schedules, ocean currents and temperatures at varying depths, and maps of the surrounding sea floor. In itself it was dizzying, but below these and behind a glass wall hundreds of people bustled around.
To the left was the huge moon-pool. In the beginning, when we had first fled into the oceans, this sort of thing was impossible. The pools were serviced by airlocks and pressure valves ensuring that the water stayed in the pool and didn’t flood the city. The big subs would dock outside and the smaller vessels would enter the pools. But, what with necessity being the mother of invention, we had made giant leaps in our control of water and pressure. I didn’t have any clue how it all worked, but it did and that’s what mattered to me.
In the pools were a selection of subs, from small fi
ve or six man patrol ones to the much larger fifty or sixty man ones. The truly great subs, the carriers the military used which would dwarf the one hundred meter or so passenger sub I’d come in on, would tie up outside. There were limits to our technology.
“Mr Hayes,” the lieutenant spoke to me for the second time, “may I introduce you to Commander Brannon.”
The commander shook my hand then dismissed my guide with a quick salute.
“It is good to meet you,” he said to me. “If you would please get on board we can be underway as soon as the final checks are done and your suit is stowed.”
“Sorry?”
“We are getting ready to leave, sir.” He took my elbow and directed me towards one of the small five man subs. “This the NSU Ashlands, your ride to your destination. We’ll be operating a man down as you’ll be on board but I am given to understand you are cognisant with these vessels.”
I was. I’d been in a few during my military service and had, at one point, be qualified as a crew member, but that was many bottles ago and I wasn’t sure my memory would be much use. I settled for a nod and he seemed, if not pleased, then at least a little more at ease.
Walking along the pool deck and sliding down the short ladder into the patrol sub did bring some things back. For instance, how tiny these things were. From the bottom of the ladder it was two steps forward into the cramped command area, one left into the sleeping area and one right to access the engine compartment.
“Mr. Hayes, the documents you need are in the bunks. The trip time is around twenty-two hours. Three men are needed to pilot the sub and we run a split shift with one man rotating out every 4 hours. You are on second shift – you’ll be running the Comms panel and safety systems. As we expect to contact no one and have no problems it shouldn’t be too hard.” He smiled at me and with nothing better to do I smiled back. “Well, I’ll see you in four hours.”