by Jack Heath
Kyntak’s breaths were becoming tighter. It was as if his lungs were slowly crystallizing, or caking over with ice. “You think the Deck will give you more money if you hand over both of us? After you let down your end of the bargain last time?”
Vanish sighed, as if disappointed in Kyntak. “You thought this was about money? The ransom was a secondary objective—there are easier ways to get a hundred million credits.” He beckoned to the woman and walked towards the wall. She muttered something into her radio and the wall rolled aside.
“I don’t want the Deck’s money,” Vanish said on his way out. “I want you.”
Six found the remote of the soldier he’d knocked out, held it against the man’s skin, and hit the button marked SYNCAL. There was no outward sign of change, but Six hoped this meant he wouldn’t wake up anytime soon. He dumped the soldier on his bunk, straightening his limbs so his posture was identical to that of all the other sleeping troops. Six saw the shirt and pants on the floor where the soldier had dropped them and, after a moment of hesitation, he put them on. The soldier had placed his boots neatly under his bunk. Six slipped them on too.
The whole outfit was too big for him. The bulletproof plastic in the shirt hung below his collarbone instead of reaching his throat, the pants bunched up slightly around his ankles, and the soles of his feet lifted off the insoles in the boots every time he took a step. But it was a better disguise than nothing, and he didn’t have time to check all the bunks for a shorter soldier.
He jogged clumsily back to the armory and took a sample of the standard gear: knife, pistol, Eagle, grenades, spare magazine. Lastly he jammed a helmet onto his head.
He hesitated before leaving. His job might be made easier later by a little sabotage. He swept his arm across the row of Eagles, hitting the eject button on each one. All the magazines fell to the floor. He gathered them up and dumped them in the darkness behind the pipe with the belts hanging from it. The automatic rifles now each had only one bullet in them, the one that was loaded into the chamber. They would click empty almost as soon as the triggers were pulled.
He grabbed a hundred or so of the spare magazines, quickly emptied the bullets into an upturned helmet, and put it underneath the spares. He put the empty magazines back on the shelves, at the front.
There wasn’t much else he could do without being too obvious, and he didn’t want to waste any more time. He moved quickly back through the barracks and headed to the other end of the aisle.
There was no elevator at this end, just a giant stairwell with concrete walls and thick, strong stairs. It looked like it was designed so all the soldiers could run down at once. But there were only four flights—Six reached the bottom in a matter of seconds.
The stairwell led directly into a short corridor. He peeked around the corner, checking for soldiers—and froze.
There was another entire warehouse beyond the opening, identical in construction to the one two floors above. But this one held more than a few cars and an airplane; it was a massive labyrinth of equipment.
Six could see four huge motors and two electrical generators propped up on metal stilts, with tables covered in repair equipment underneath them. The hollowed-out shell of a bus was resting upside down, and an enormous spiderlike machine was poised over it, steel claws locked around the one remaining axle. There were dozens of airtight Plexiglas chambers, with rubber gloves built into the framework. Judging by the shrink-wrapped lumps of grey plastic next to them, these were for making bombs. In the center of the warehouse there was a giant cube of thick tinted glass, through which Six could see a web of tubes and valves, occasionally lighting up as sparks blasted back and forth along exposed wires.
Six didn’t have enough general mechanical experience to recognize the functions of everything in this room, but he had a gut feeling that the device in the enormous glass box was manufacturing nanomachines. If there’s time, he thought, I should smash the glass to break the vacuum seal on my way back. The more I can do to sabotage Vanish’s operations, the better.
A huge creature of iron and steel rested in the corner of the warehouse. Six stared, unsure of what he was seeing. There was a short, hollow tube attached to the front, like a pitiless black eye on a stalk, and instead of wheels or legs, the thing had great rollers covered by strips of armor plating the color of engine grease.
An illustration from a history website flashed through his mind, and Six’s eyes widened as he realized what he was looking at—it was a tank. It didn’t look quite finished—the hatch on the top had no seal, and the gun was only half as long as it should be. But there was no mistaking the shape. Vanish had acquired a tank, and was restoring it for some reason.
There were five soldiers in the warehouse, pacing slowly back and forth like the ones upstairs. Six adjusted his overly large costume self-consciously as he scanned the warehouse for the exit. On the opposite wall there was an elevator, just like the one in the previous warehouse. Six checked the positions of all the guards. If he timed this right, he wouldn’t have to walk too close to any of them.
He took a deep breath. Now!
He strode into the warehouse, at a pace that felt neither urgent nor aimless. He passed one of the bomb-making chambers on his right and resisted the urge to glance at it, focusing his gaze on the elevator doors up ahead.
There was one soldier walking past the elevator, and another one patrolling in Six’s peripheral vision. Neither of them had stopped to look at him—either they were unconcerned by his presence or they hadn’t seen him yet. He kept walking, passing the giant glass cube on his left.
Four of five soldiers were now behind him. He kept his eyes on the elevator doors, but listened carefully, waiting for the sound of approaching footsteps. His breathing seemed painfully loud inside the helmet.
Almost there. He passed another of the bomb-making chambers on his left. He was almost level with the hollow bus. He forced his gaze away from the mechanical spider, as if looking at it would draw the focus of one of its many plasma lenses. He was ahead of all five soldiers, but one would reach the elevator in less than a minute. He planned to get there first.
He kept his carefully measured pace. Left foot, right foot. Not too fast, not too slow. You’re fine, he told himself. You’re invisible to them. They’re not expecting any trouble, and you’re nothing out of the ordinary. Unless you do something stupid, like running. So just keep walking and you’re okay.
He reached the elevator doors and pushed the button, just once. Then he waited patiently. The next guard wouldn’t pass him for at least twenty seconds. Relax.
His breaths boomed against his visor. He imagined that he could feel the eyes of the five soldiers watching him. That he could sense them slowly creeping towards him, rifles raised, communicating with hand signals and slowly surrounding him.
The doors slid apart. Six started to walk in, and then paused—there was a soldier in it already. Six stepped aside, leaving him room to walk out. The soldier’s helmet turned to Six in acknowledgment, but there was no nod of approval or grunt of thanks. He kept walking, disappearing behind one of the machines.
Six stopped watching and turned to the elevator again. Behave normally, he told himself. Like you do this every day. He stepped into the elevator and waited for the doors to close, ignoring the security camera. Through the opening he watched the soldiers slowly pace the perimeter of the warehouse until the doors slid shut.
The elevator hummed smoothly downward. Now there were three floors of enemy soldiers between him and freedom. How did I expect to get away with this? he wondered. Once the alarm is raised, I’m as good as dead—even if they don’t shut down the elevators, there will still be a hundred or more troops after me. And this facility is too small and linear to hide in.
He clenched one hand into a fist and thumped it lightly against the back wall. He didn’t want to die like this. His body would never be found, so King would never know what had become of him. Kyntak would suffer the same fate. The Spad
es would continue hunting for him, but he would be unable to prove his innocence and be branded a traitor forever. Harry would wait loyally outside the warehouse fence for hours, days, maybe even weeks—however long it took for him to get spotted by bystanders or soldiers. And who knows what would happen then? Nai would never be rescued, wherever she was, and she would grow up believing that he and Kyntak had abandoned her.
It’s not too late to turn back, he thought. He was well disguised, and certain that the alarm hadn’t been sounded yet. But he was immediately ashamed. To abort the rescue now would almost certainly mean condemning Kyntak, his brother, his closest friend, to death. Logically, he knew it was the best course of action, because there was almost no hope of both him and Kyntak making it out of here alive. But it would also be the most selfish thing he had ever done.
The elevator stopped and the doors slid open. Six hesitated. Could he walk right back out the way he came, and still live with himself?
No, he decided. I’m doing this. There’s nothing left for me out there. Nai is missing, Two is dead, King is under investigation, and the Deck has disowned me. If I leave now, Kyntak dies and I’m completely on my own.
He was ashamed of that thought too. I consider backing out for selfish reasons, then I decide to stay for even more selfish reasons. “Everyone was right about me,” he whispered to himself. “I am a monster.”
He stepped out of the elevator and turned left instinctively. He was in a long corridor with only one wall. Instead of the other, there was a row of huge roller-doors with dark alcoves in between so they had room to slide. They didn’t end at the floor or the ceiling—they disappeared into narrow trenches at each end, giving Six the impression that they were probably several meters taller than the corridor.
Cell doors, he guessed. More surface area than the walls, almost impossible to open from the inside. He felt a thrill of adrenaline run through his veins. He was close.
He could see one soldier patrolling the corridor, walking slowly away from him. Six figured he had perhaps three minutes before the soldier reached the end and turned around. He risked a quick glance over his shoulder. There was a guard behind him as well, standing impassively in front of one of the roller-doors. He wasn’t looking in Six’s direction.
One soldier patrolling, one stationary, he thought. What are the chances that the one standing still is outside Kyntak’s cell?
But there was no sense in approaching the guard until he knew for sure. Doing so would almost certainly lead to the base being put on alert status, and if Kyntak was in a different cell, then soldiers would be coming down ten at a time in the elevator while he searched all the others.
Each giant door had a circular blue button on the edge. Six pressed the first one and heard a solid click as the mechanical dead bolt disengaged. He put the palm of his hand against the edge of the door and pushed.
The door was heavy, but it rolled aside in silence. Six didn’t open it all the way—just enough to peer through. This room looked less like a cell than an infirmary or a surgical operating room—there were two people-size tables with padded headrests on the ends, two long white desks with several drawers, a stainless-steel sink in the far corner, and a polished glass cabinet filled with sharp instruments.
No Kyntak. No anyone. Six retreated into the corridor and pushed the door slowly closed.
He glanced up and down the corridor again. One soldier still patrolling, one standing guard. Each a fair distance away, and neither facing him. So far, so good. He walked to the next door, pushed the button, and rolled it open.
This wasn’t a cell either, just a dark, empty room with a window and a small button panel on one wall. The window looked into the next room, which did appear to be a cell—it had reflective walls and a block in the center, topped with restraining clamps and a headrest.
One-way glass, Six realized. This was where Vanish officials could watch the prisoners. But why? If they were clamped to a table, what would they be doing that was worth watching? Perhaps one of the buttons on the panel released the clamps.
Again, no Kyntak. He stepped back and closed the door.
He skipped the next door, knowing that it led to the empty cell. He pushed the button on the door after that, opened it, and poked his head inside. Another cell, identical to the one he’d seen through the one-way glass of the observation room. Empty again. There was probably another observation room on the other side.
He stepped back, about to roll the door closed, when he heard a noise—a thin wheeze. He turned his head sharply. The patrolling soldier hadn’t turned around yet, and the stationary one hadn’t even glanced his way. He looked back into the cell and frowned. There was someone—or something—inside.
He stepped across the threshold and bent down. A figure was crouched beside the table, a skinny teenage boy who scampered backward across the floor as Six moved. There was something ungainly and graceless about the way he was crawling, something not entirely human, and as soon as he hit the corner and could retreat no farther, Six saw what it was. The boy had only one arm—his left one had been amputated at the shoulder.
Six approached him slowly and carefully. The boy in the corner didn’t look up at him. He had some kind of mask over his mouth, a clear plastic bulb with a valve on the side—the wheezing gasps Six had heard were coming from it harder and faster now. A respirator, Six realized. Something had to be wrong with his lungs.
As the boy’s long, greasy hair slid aside, Six saw that the missing arm wasn’t his only physical oddity. Half of his face and neck was scarred a dull brown, as if he’d had first-degree burns on one side of his body. Both of his ears were missing. The eye on the burned side of his face was cheap glass and didn’t even match—it was chocolate-brown instead of blue. There was no eyelid to cover it—it stared crazily over Six’s shoulder.
“What happened to you?” Six asked, aghast.
The boy let out a rasping squeal, shoved off the wall, and scurried across the cell to another corner, farther away from Six. Six kept walking towards him. “I’m not going to hurt you,” he said quietly. “I’m here to help.” Inside, his horror was slowly being eaten away by fury. Who would do this to a child? And why?
With a thin groan, the boy threw himself at Six, arm outstretched, fingers clawing at Six’s face. He didn’t quite make the distance, and Six had to step forward and catch him as he fell. The boy’s respirator hissed again and he looked up at Six, his real eye widening with fear.
Six gasped, icy spiders crawling up his spine. The eye was the same as his own. The undamaged half of the boy’s face was a precise copy. And now Six saw that the boy was exactly his height. He considered again the respirator mask, the missing ears, the missing arm—the skin which had not been burned, as he first thought, but stolen for grafts. And he was willing to bet that if he removed the boy’s shirt, he would see surgical scars over the heart and lungs.
He didn’t know how the boy had come to be here, and he didn’t know why, but there was no doubt about it—he was a clone of Six. He’d been created just eight months ago, solely for the use of his organs and limbs. Six stared in horror at his own left hand, flexing the fingers unconsciously, as its previous owner howled and tore himself out of Six’s grip.
Six had wondered how Vanish had got a sample of his DNA to compare to Kyntak’s, given that the Lab computers had been wiped. Now he knew. After making the clone and taking parts of it to heal Six, Crexe had kept it alive with a respirator, a pace-maker, and probably some kind of artificial kidney. When Crexe was arrested and his soldiers had either fled or been incarcerated, the clone must have been left lying forgotten on a hospital bed at the Lab. Vanish troops broke in less than a month later and probably brought him straight here. He had doubtless been carefully studied and relentlessly tested since then.
The clone whimpered and bashed his fist into the floor; the blow was pathetically weak. Six’s pity was almost unbearable—It’s so unfair, he thought. His eyes are barely open before surg
eons cripple and disfigure him for life, then he lives off an IV drip until he’s abducted and locked up. He can’t speak English. He can’t hear, or see, or breathe properly. All he’s ever felt is pain, fear, and confusion.
Six looked at the sinews in the boy’s arm and legs—he was skin and bone. Six knew that his own genes weren’t the sole cause of his incredible strength and speed; they had only provided potential. It had taken years of strenuous exercise, training, and dieting to make the most of them. This boy had been fed minimally and had probably never even been outside.
Then Six heard footsteps, approaching slowly. They were distant—presumably coming from the soldier patrolling the corridor outside. Six’s three minutes were up. The soldier had reached the end of the corridor and turned around.
Six pressed his palm against the roller-door, thinking. If the door is still slightly open when the soldier passes, he’ll raise his gun and open the door the rest of the way. I’ll be completely exposed.
I could slide the door closed now, he thought, but then I’d be trapped in here until they bring the clone his next meal, and that could be hours—someone could easily see me through the one-way mirror before it happens. Not an option.
Six approached the opening and pressed his back against the edge of the door. The footsteps drew closer.
Six knew that perceptions were affected by expectations. A person could search for something right in front of him and fail to see it, simply because it wasn’t where he thought it would be. An obscurely shaped scribble or an inkblot could reveal things about the viewer, who would perceive it differently depending on his thoughts. And a soldier who saw an open door which he expected to be closed would experience a split second of confusion as his brain tried to reconcile his vision with his imagination.