by Oisin McGann
‘Yeah, thanks, Harley,’ Sol replied. ‘Appreciate it. But, to be honest, I just want to know what’s happened to him. It’s drivin’ me nuts, not knowing.’
The big man nodded, staring into Sol’s face.
‘You need any help, just ask.’
Then he turned his attention back to his meal. Sol left the canteen and went up to the changing room. Punching up his father’s marker programme on the webscreen, he entered Gregor’s password, ‘Southpaw’, and brought up the last record. It showed a stylized display of the dome, and his father’s path across it on the Wednesday afternoon. It stopped at section D63 in the Third Quadrant. It meant nothing to him. He used the cursor to turn the display so that the image of the dome spun around, showing all 360 degrees of the structure. It didn’t tell him anything.
He logged out and sat down on the nearest bench. This was starting to get him down. A thought occurred to him, and he stood up and walked over to his father’s locker. Tapping in the combination, he opened it and looked inside. It was in a state. Things had been thrown in – clothes, boots and hats were stuffed in as if in a rush.
The old books that Gregor read while he was on standby had been crushed in at the back, their pages crumpled. Solomon took one out, straightening it up and smoothing the pages. It was a real paper book. A copy of A Clockwork Orange. There were a couple of his other favourites in here too: The Name of the Rose and Nineteen Eighty-Four. Sol was shocked at the way they had been creased. Gregor would never have done this, not in a million years. And he never left his locker in this kind of disarray. It went against his very nature to make a mess like this. Somebody else had been through his things. Sol examined the lock, but it showed no signs of having been forced. Maybe Harley had put some of Gregor’s gear back in, making the mess in the process, but Sol already knew what had happened.
The men who had turned their flat over had gone through the locker as well, he was sure of it. Sol smoothed out the books and put them carefully back on the shelf, placing a heavy box of loose nuts and bolts on top of them to help flatten the pages. Closing the locker, he tested the door, but it was shut tight. Whoever these men were, they had no problem with combination locks. Sol strode out of the depot, following a walkway that skirted the rim of the crater, just below the dome’s base. From here he could see clear across the city. The four huge tower cranes from each of the four quadrants were moving, their various arms swinging loads with delicate precision. On the massive gantries that stretched across the top of the city, smaller cranes swept along rails and, above them, he could see people gathering on the sun platforms. Pigeons wheeled in among them.
These platforms offered the best exposure to the cherished daylight, and a lottery decided who would get the opportunity to spend a few sweet hours on the public spaces. Sometimes they were even used by thrill-seekers for base-jumping with home-made parachutes. Not all the chutes worked.
The government was being forced to sell these platforms off as it struggled with the higher costs of running the public services. Most of the platforms were privately owned now. The one closest to him was one of these; it belonged to the Dark-Day Fatalists. He gazed up at the dark-clad figures in disdain. Every Sunday they gathered to offer prayers up to the elements. He didn’t know an awful lot about them, but the gist of their philosophy seemed to be that the Machine was an abomination, that nature would win out, and Ash Harbour was just postponing the inevitable. The platforms had railings, but some of the more despairing DDF members would use the height to make a final, dramatic statement – by throwing themselves off the edges of the platforms. Prices for property directly below DDF platforms tended to be lower than average.
In fact, high falls had become such a popular choice for anybody committing suicide that police had taken to routinely questioning anybody on the upper levels. The DDF maintained that they did not encourage people to take their own lives. But there were those who said that when the Fatalists gathered up on those platforms, they prayed for a disaster that would split open the dome and destroy life in the city. There were always rumours about what the DDF did in their secret sanctums. Some said that they even started false rumours themselves, to give their movement an air of mystery.
Sol just thought they were a sad bunch of losers.
He watched them for a little while longer, then shook his head and walked towards the nearest elevator. The only threat the DDF posed was the damage caused by their falling bodies.
Section 7/24: Corpses
CLEO STOPPED AND looked back the way she had come. In the dim light from the gas lamps, all the walkways looked the same. In front of her, the path forked off in three different directions. None of them seemed to lead upwards. Biting her lip, she looked back again. She was lost. Somewhere nearby, a bank of pistons pumped away, and all around her was the rubbery stink of cats’ pee. There were thousands of strays in the city. Seeing a reflective sign with grid numbers on it, she walked up to it, staring at the numbers and trying to work out where she was. But she was no good with the grid system; she needed street names and buildings to find her way around. Even if she could see the dome, it would help. But there was just the damp, musky darkness.
Off to her left, she heard the sound of voices. The left-hand walkway led into a corridor that would take her in that direction. She put her hand in her pocket, her fingers closing around the little canister of pepper spray. This was a rough part of the city, and people were known to disappear down here in the darker sections. A young girl lost in the works would be an easy victim for the kinds of cut-throats who hunted in the shadows. But she could wander around the lower levels for days if she didn’t find her way up. Fervently wishing there was more light, she gripped the pepper spray and edged forward towards the dark corridor.
The corridor led out onto an observation balcony that looked down on the level below, three lines of large sewage-treatment tanks. Two men and a woman were dressed in sewage workers’ overalls with tool belts and head torches, and were manhandling a large bundle towards the intake hopper of a grinding rig – its massive wheels used to crush any solids in the system into slurry. Cleo crouched down close to the floor, her gaze glued to the scene below her. The more she looked at it, the more the indistinct bundle seemed to have a decidedly body-shaped appearance.
They heaved the body over the edge and into the hopper. One of the men – a ghostly-looking man with white hair, white skin and pale eyes – slapped the big button to start the machine. It didn’t start. He pressed the button again. Nothing. They all leaned over the edge to look down into the bottom of the hopper.
‘It’s not faggin’ working,’ he announced.
‘Do ya think?’ the woman said sarcastically. She was an Oriental with the grey pallor of somebody who rarely saw daylight. ‘I can see it’s not working! We’ll have to try another one.’
‘How we going to get it out of there?’ the white man asked.
‘You’re going to have to go down there and get it.’
‘The hell I am. I’ve seen what happens to bodies in that thing. Human jam, that’s what you get – bolognese. If you want to get it out, you go down there!’
‘You turn it off again first, you grit!’ the woman snapped. ‘Now get your ass down there and get that faggin’ thing up here before somebody sees us!’
‘And what if it’s the switch that’s faulty?’ he retorted. ‘I could get down there, it turns on, and suddenly I’m bolognese. I’m not doing it—’
Cleo shuffled further back from the edge . . . and the balcony creaked beneath her. Suddenly the shouting stopped. She pulled her head away from the edge, but it was too late.
‘There’s somebody up there!’ she heard the woman bark.
‘Damn it!’ another voice spat. ‘How long do you think they were there?’
‘It doesn’t matter. They saw us here, they’ll be able to identify us when news breaks about the job. Split up – find them!’
Nothing more was said. Soft footsteps took off in
either direction along the catwalk leading off the platform. Cleo crawled back into the corridor and stood up, her pulse throbbing through her body, her limbs trembling. She continued to stand there, frozen against the wall, while her mind tried to make sense of what was happening.
‘Run,’ she whispered to herself, willing herself to move. ‘They’re coming. Run!’
Almost as if she needed a push, she shoved herself off the wall and set off at a sprint. She had to assume that, whoever they were, they knew their way around. They would find a route up to her, and then . . . She didn’t want to think about it. It didn’t matter who they were. All that mattered was that they were after her, and they dumped bodies in sewage grinders.
Her footsteps were painfully loud, echoing down the narrow corridor, signalling to her hunters. She slowed down, softening her footfalls. The route along which she had come was too long and straight; if they had guns, they could shoot her from a hundred metres away. What she needed were some corners. Off one branch of the corridor, she spotted a ladder beside a guttering gas lamp. Hurrying up to it, she grabbed the rungs and started to climb. Stopping for a moment, she reached over and turned the valve on the lamp, switching it off. Maybe now they wouldn’t see the ladder, and at least she could climb in darkness.
Running footsteps approached below, and she winced as the ladder squeaked with every rung she climbed. The footsteps slowed and advanced more carefully. All around her was pitch-darkness. To her right, she could feel the breeze from a ventilation duct. Cleo went completely still as somebody reached the bottom of the ladder. A torch was switched on and the beam played across the floor of the corridor below her, then found the foot of the ladder. It swept upwards, but stopped just short of her shoes. Then it shone away and down the corridor. In its glow she could see a white face, white hair and the dull shine of a grey gun barrel. The man began to move away, but then he sniffed at the air and turned back. He felt the body of the gas lamp, and pulled his hand away quickly. It was still hot. His torchlight came back up the ladder, and this time it found Cleo.
His gun came up, and as it did so, she jumped out into the darkness. The shot came as a dull thumping sound, not loud at all. The bullet hitting the ladder was louder, spitting sparks at her. Her knees scraped off the top of the ventilation duct and she nearly fell over the other side, but caught herself in time. Clambering along the top of the duct, every movement amplified by the hollow plastex, she tried to find another way out. The man was coming up the ladder behind her. She couldn’t see a thing, and nearly fell again when the duct turned tightly to the right, and then left again. There was a ceiling a little more than a metre above her, holding the struts for the duct, but it was too low for her to stand up. She kept casting out with her hands on either side for some way off the vent, but there was nothing but empty space on either side. Then she hit a wall.
It was solid concrete. The duct went straight into it, without so much as a finger’s width of a gap around it. There was no way to get into the vent; plastex was tough, made to last for centuries. She stifled a cry of despair. The man was coming along the duct after her. Reaching out into the darkness, she sought some kind of escape. But there was nothing. The sound of the man approaching grew louder, and she could see the torch strapped to his head, bobbing as he crawled. It was pointing down, so that he could see where he was putting his hands. Her mind grasped at something, a faint hope. With the torch pointing downwards, he couldn’t see anything above him. She reached back quietly and felt the nearest struts that hung from the ceiling. There was a bar crossing between them. It was strong enough to hold her. With painstaking care, she silently lifted herself up onto the bar, getting her stomach up and over it. The man was getting closer. Gripping the struts on either side, she balanced herself on her stomach and straightened out her body, lifting her head and feet as high as she could. The pressure of the bar on her abdomen was almost unbearable.
The man’s light came closer, closer, until he was crawling by underneath her. He saw the wall ahead of him and stopped. With his bigger body, he moved with difficulty along the duct and, when he turned to look behind him, he had to hold onto the edges to keep his balance. The bar dug into Cleo’s stomach, and she held her breath until it felt like her lungs would burst. The man was still looking down at the surface ahead of him. Taking one hand off the duct, he leaned back on his knees so that he could look up. For an instant their eyes met and Cleo did the only thing she could. She swung her legs down and kicked out at him with all her might.
One of her feet caught his head, and he toppled forward. His gun fell clattering into the darkness and, for a second, she thought he would follow it, but he caught the bottom of the strut and hung on, dangling below her. Her balance gone, she fell back onto the top of the vent. The man was starting to climb back up, with murder written on his face. Pulling the pepper spray from her pocket, she gave him a long blast in the eyes and he roared in pain, pulling his head away. She tore the torch from his head, and fell back on her side. In desperation, she kicked at his fingers, hammering at them with her feet until his grip failed and he fell with a scream into the gloom. Somewhere below, there was a muffled thud.
She listened for a while, but heard nothing more. He could be dead. If he was, she wasn’t sure what to do. Her whole body was shaking, but she knew she mustn’t lose her head now. There was still enough spray in the air to make her eyes water and her nose itch, but she was too wound up to care. Strapping the torch onto her head, she made her way carefully back along the duct, making as little noise as possible. There was no sign of anybody else. When she got close to the ladder, she turned off the torch and slid along on her belly. Waiting as long as she dared, she listened intently for any sound of the others, but there was nothing. Climbing out onto the rungs, she scaled up to a catwalk that was illuminated by electric lights. Sounds carried down it: voices in conversation, whirring flywheels, music and noise from computer games.
It was a pedal station. People. Normal, chatty, ordinary, unarmed people. Wiping her watering eyes, she sniffed back a running nose and smiled in relief as she walked into the hall where nearly three dozen people were sitting astride cycling machines, pedalling power into the city’s system. Collapsing on a rest couch, she buried her face in her knees, comforted by the drab, dull familiarity of it all.
Sol was on a tram, making his way back to Ana’s and pondering his next move. He knew a few of the places his father went gambling, but he was wary of visiting any of them if Gregor really had run up a big debt. If his father were in hiding, as it seemed, then giving the hoods who were hunting him his son as a hostage probably wouldn’t be a smart move.
He thought back to that cop, Mercier, and wondered what he knew. But it was the other one who was in charge. Ponderosa, from the ISS. Sol decided that if these were the men investigating his father, he should find out what he could about them. The tram was stopping near a café, so he jumped off and went inside. He bought a green tea and took the nearest available webscreen, where he did a search on Ponderosa. The only information on him was his list of awards; it was impressive. The single picture of him was one where he was shaking hands with Mayor Haddad as she presented him with a medal for Distinguished Service. There was nothing else recorded about him. That figured – the ISS probably kept their files locked up nice and tight. Your business was their business, but their business was their own.
Mercier scored a direct match, though. His past came up, displayed in text files and compressed images. There was nothing remarkable about him; his career had been mediocre, judging by the few medals and awards he had received. The detective had progressed through the ranks at a steady plod, and the file confirmed that he was now working at the Criminal Investigation Section. There was nothing more of interest. Sol decided to check his mail while he was online, and his father’s too.
His inbox reflected his loner lifestyle. There was a single new message highlighted; he didn’t recognize the address. It looked like a one-off send, the
kind people used to remain anonymous. Opening it, he found a short note:
Sol. There are people looking for you – don’t go back to the flat. Don’t go out alone, stay among people. You mustn’t try to find me, it’s too dangerous, but I’m sending someone to keep an eye on you. So you know who he is, he will be able to tell you your mother’s favourite song. You can trust him.
Gregor.
Solomon looked around warily. Memorizing the address, just in case, he quickly deleted the message and closed down the mailbox. He was standing up to leave when the screen suddenly flashed white, and words in large, black block capitals began to float into view. At first he thought this was being aimed directly at him, but all around the café people were giving exclamations of surprise or disgust. The message was appearing on every screen: THE MACHINE IS DYING, it read. IT IS BEING EATEN FROM WITHIN. DO YOU CARE ENOUGH TO ASK WHY?
Sol looked out of the windows of the café, and saw that the same message was on the adscreens on the street outside. That meant it must be all over the city. Then, all at once, it flickered and was gone. Another message appeared, this one a standard screen-card from the Online Police with the city’s crest; accompanied by an authoritative voice, it informed everybody that the city’s web systems had just been subject to a virus attack. Normal service would be resumed presently, and the culprits would be tracked down and prosecuted.
In a machine city co-ordinated by computers, viruses were a big deal. Anybody caught writing or sending them could expect a long stretch in prison. The Online Police could shut down whole sections of the city in search of a suspect, if they needed to. It made the illegally posted message all the more intriguing. What did it mean, Sol thought: ‘being eaten from within’? Hitching his bag onto his shoulder, he made for the tram stop.