‘Meroka, meet Doctor Quillon,’ Fray said. ‘He is, as you correctly surmised, the new package. I’ve just been telling him how you’re going to do such an excellent job of getting him out of Spearpoint.’
‘Hope you told him it isn’t going to be no joyride.’
‘I’m under no illusions,’ Quillon said.
‘Looking at three hard days to get you out, if all goes to plan, which mostly it won’t. Three days of dirt and worry and less sleep than you’ve ever had in your life. Then we have to find the people Fray’s lined up to take you to Fortune’s Landing, and hope they haven’t changed their minds.’
‘You can throw in danger as well,’ Fray said. ‘Cutter’s ticked off some angels. They’ve got deep-penetration agents in Neon Heights, and they’ll be aiming to stop him leaving town.’
‘You didn’t mention angels on the phone, Fray. You said there was local heat. In my book that ain’t the same thing.’
‘Must’ve slipped my mind.’ He contorted his face into a mask of fake contrition. ‘Not that a little thing like that would be enough to scare you off, would it?’
‘I’ve dealt with angels. They don’t worry me.’
‘What I figured. Bonus is, Cutter’s come into a little inheritance. It’s what we’re trying to put together now.’
Meroka looked at the gore-stained puzzle on the table.
‘That’s the weapon you were talking about?’
‘It’s angel technology. Supposed to give him an edge, so he can get out with his skin intact.’
‘Looks like something a dog sicked-up.’
‘You don’t want to know where it came from, trust me.’ Fray brushed fingers through the white thatch of his hair. ‘Well, any new insights, Cutter?’
Quillon stared at the still-unassembled gun. For a moment the parts seemed impossible to reconcile. Then, with a shudder of intuitive understanding, it all made sense to him. One element fitted under the other and formed an aperture into which the barrel could be slid and locked. The grip assembly slotted into the rear of the whole, entering at a slight angle to the line of the barrel. He pushed it home, anticipating the click that would signify correct assembly. The click arrived, but at the same moment the weapon also came alive in his hand. A tracery of luminous blue lines appeared over it, flickering and branching as if the weapon were validating its own operational integrity. The change was so sudden that he nearly dropped it.
‘Guess you got that right,’ Fray said.
‘So it would seem.’
‘What I said before still stands, though. That’s angel technology. It shouldn’t work down here.’
‘If it does, then we’re all—’ Meroka started saying.
The gun spoke.
‘Thank you for reassembling me. Be advised that I am programmed to blood-lock to the individual now holding me.’ Its voice was hard and metallic, with a slight feminine edge. ‘If you wish blood-lock to be assigned to another individual, they must handle me within the next thirty seconds. Blood-lock may only be assigned once, to one individual. I am now initiating the thirty-second countdown. You will be alerted when blood-lock is established.’
‘I guess that’s you,’ Fray said to Quillon, with a sly smile on his face, as if he was enjoying every moment of this.
‘Or maybe it should be me,’ Meroka said. ‘After all, I’m the one doing the protecting around here.’
Quillon held on to the weapon, although part of his mind was screaming at him to release it. ‘There’s intelligence in this thing,’ he said. ‘That shouldn’t be possible. Machines can’t think down here.’
Fray shrugged. ‘Things keep working for a while.’
‘Not when they’ve been taken apart and put back together again,’ Quillon said.
‘Give me the gun,’ Meroka said.
‘It’s Cutter’s toy now.’ Fray looked up at her, daring Meroka to contradict him. ‘The angel meant it for him.’
The gun said, ‘Blood-lock has now been established. Please be advised that ambient conditions are such that my operational effectiveness in energy-discharge mode is now eighty-one per cent and falling.’
‘What?’ Fray said.
‘Assuming that present conditions remain stable, I will become inoperable in energy-discharge mode in five hours, twenty-two minutes, with an estimated error margin of plus or minus eight minutes. Functionality will be severely compromised within three hours, forty-five minutes.’
‘It’s already failing,’ Quillon said, turning the barrel to face the wall, making sure his finger was nowhere near the trigger.
‘Five hours and change,’ Fray said. ‘What time is it?’
‘I got nine,’ Meroka said, lifting up her sleeve to examine her watches. ‘Last downbound train’s ten-fifteen.’
‘Still doable, wouldn’t you say?’ asked Fray.
‘If we move now,’ Meroka said.
‘Slow down,’ Quillon said, feeling like a man on a moving sidewalk that was accelerating ever faster. ‘I came here to discuss the possibility of leaving, that’s all. I thought we might make arrangements for tomorrow, or the day after ... not start the journey right now, with no preparation.’
‘Things have moved up a notch,’ Fray said. ‘Besides, the angel told you not to stick around. Tomorrow might already be too late.’
‘Meroka and I don’t know each other. How can I be sure she’s any good?’ Quickly he added: ‘No disrespect.’
‘None taken,’ Meroka said.
‘Meroka works for me. That’s all the recommendation you need.’ Fray looked expectantly at Meroka. ‘May be a silly question, but I take it you came equipped?’
She screwed up her face. ‘Shit, I forgot.’
‘Meroka,’ Fray said warningly.
She allowed her coat to hang open. Stitched to the inside seam was an array of armaments and equipment, each item in a little pouch or hoop of its own. There was a sub-machine gun, a revolver, an automatic, some kind of blunderbuss, something like a pistol-sized crossbow and a vicious assortment of edged weapons, some of which were evidently for throwing and some for close combat.
There were also bullets, magazines, powder boxes and an apothecary’s wet-dream of colour-coded vials and stoppered bottles.
‘I didn’t forget.’
‘Told you she was good,’ Fray said, pushing back his chair so that he could stand up. ‘And now it’s time to let you in on a little operational secret, Cutter. I guess it never occurred to you that it wouldn’t be very smart for a man in my position to allow himself to be cornered in a room like this?’
‘Now that you mention it ...’
Fray produced a bunch of heavy iron keys from his pocket, then pushed a shoe against a section of the wall behind him. What had appeared to be a part of the panelling hinged inwards, into darkness.
‘What’s that?’ Quillon asked.
‘What it looks like. A secret tunnel.’ He passed the keys to Meroka. ‘Go ahead. I’ll bring up the rear.’
‘You don’t need to come with us, Fray. I can do this on my own.’
‘I don’t doubt it, Meroka, but I told Cutter I’d see him to the station. Least I can do.’
Meroka stooped through the door, then straightened up once she was inside. Quillon followed her into a short, narrow tunnel, bending almost double to squeeze through. Ahead was another door blocking their passage. This one was made of plated metal and looked like it could stop a train, or at the very least a determined safe-cracker. Meroka poked a key into the dark eye of a lock and twisted it with a grunt. There was a thunk as the mechanism worked. She pushed at the door, which must have been very nearly airtight. As it swung wide, warm, humid air gusted against Quillon’s face. The tunnel stretched on much further.
‘Where does it lead?’
‘Out,’ Meroka said.
Fray pushed the outer door almost closed, leaving only a pencil-thin shaft of light leaking through from the interior of the Pink Peacock. Fray must have had a spare set of keys, si
nce he was able to lock the secondary door on his own. The bar sounds, which had been muffled but present a moment earlier, were now entirely absent. It was just the three of them and the sound of their own breathing. They advanced into darkness, the gloom relieved only by the wavering light from Meroka’s pen-sized electric torch.
When Quillon touched the dark, marble-like surface of the wall it gave off an ancient, reptilian cold. He had heard rumours of tunnels such as this, cutting back into Spearpoint’s fabric from within the oldest buildings, but this was the first time he had seen the evidence with his own eyes. He had taken his tinted spectacles off to see better in the darkness. The tunnels had been bored, it could only be presumed, during an earlier phase, centuries or millennia ago, when local conditions allowed the use of high-energy cutting equipment such as plasma lances. Nothing that now worked in Neon Heights could inflict more than a scratch on the dense black fabric. It would have taken lifetimes to manually dig this far.
‘You never told me about these tunnels,’ Quillon said to Fray.
‘That’s sort of the idea with a secret, Cutter.’
‘I didn’t think you and I had any. Now I’m wondering what else I didn’t need to know.’
‘Fray’s a businessman,’ Meroka said, butting in on their conversation. ‘He may have made you think you had some special relationship going, but the bottom line is you’re just one of his clients. Ain’t that right, Fray?’
‘Cutter’s more than a client,’ Fray said. Despite his size he was keeping up with the pace.
‘What’s the deal with the name?’ Meroka asked.
Quillon took off his hat so he didn’t have to stoop as much, clutching it against the dark prize of his medical bag. ‘Fray’s idea of wit. I’m a pathologist. I cut things open. It means he doesn’t have to use my real name when it might be overheard. But for what it’s worth, I’d much rather you called me Quillon.’
‘Good enough for Fray, good enough for me. Cutter it is.’
‘Thanks. Is it going to be like this all the way to ... what was the place you mentioned?’
‘Fortune’s Landing,’ Fray said.
‘I’ve heard of it. That’s about all.’
‘You’ll do fine there,’ Fray said. ‘It’s on one of the semaphore lines, so you won’t feel out of touch.’
‘I trust Meroka will make introductions for me when we arrive.’
‘I don’t go that far,’ she said. ‘I drop you off with some nomads we’ve had dealings with. Bunch of traders who loop between the main towns, selling and bartering what they can, generally trying to stay out of the way of the Skulls and the vorgs.’
‘People I can trust?’
‘They’ll see you right,’ Fray said. ‘But once you get to Fortune’s Landing you’re on your own. Which is no problem, you being a medicine man and all that. Those ladylike hands of yours, I’m sure you won’t have too much trouble finding employment.’
‘I hope it’s not the same kind Malkin had in mind.’
‘He gets carried away with the torturing thing,’ Fray admitted. ‘But you’ve got to admire a man who enjoys his work.’
‘You said you cut things open,’ Meroka said. ‘How’s that going to help you if they’ve already got the pathologist’s job covered?’
‘I was trained as a doctor. I can diagnose ailments, prescribe drugs and perform simple surgical procedures.’
‘That’s good,’ Meroka said. ‘Plenty of diseases out there to treat, that’s for sure. Provided they don’t get you first.’
‘You’re a ray of sunshine. I can see the next three days are just going to fly by.’
‘Give her time,’ Fray said. ‘She’s an acquired taste. Besides, none of it’s personal with Meroka. She likes you really; she just doesn’t want to get too close to the commodity.’
‘Might have something to do with how few of them ever show up again,’ Meroka added.
‘Fray seems to think I’ll make it back. Don’t you, Fray?’
‘Absolutely,’ he called from the rear. ‘Not a doubt in my mind.’
‘Fray’s an optimist,’ Meroka said scathingly. ‘Always did tell him it was his biggest flaw.’ But there must have been some tiny flicker of curiosity in Meroka, some realisation that Quillon was not just another client, because a short while later she said, ‘So how’d you two hook up, anyway? Fray got you into one of his business insurance schemes?’
‘It isn’t a protection racket,’ Fray said. ‘I don’t do protection rackets.’
‘But you’re not above setting your enemies on fire,’ Meroka said.
‘That’s different.’
Quillon stooped even more, having the impression that the tunnel was becoming tighter the further they went into it. ‘How far are we going?’
‘Far as we have to. Need to pick up the pace or we’ll miss the train. You all right back there, Fray?’
‘I’m fine.’
But Fray was clearly beginning to flag. Quillon could hear it in his increasingly laboured breathing, the gradual weakening of his voice. The tunnel began to bend around to the left. Although neither Meroka nor Fray made any mention of it, Quillon was conscious of passing a separate shaft running off to the right. Warm, foetid air gusted out of the dark mouth. They were surely an awesome distance into the fabric of Spearpoint now: Quillon sensed the crushing press of all this ancient matter, resentful at the tunnels cut through it, nothing on its mind except the need to close them up for all eternity. For all the hazards that awaited him in the inhabited part of Neon Heights, he was very keen to leave this place.
‘I’d heard about these tunnels,’ he said, ‘but I didn’t know whether they were real or not. Part of me just assumed they were another urban myth, like the giant rats in the sewer drains.’
‘They’re real enough,’ Fray said.
‘Then is the rest of it real as well? The stories about the things inside them?’
‘Been using these tunnels for half my life,’ Meroka said. ‘Been deep, too. In all that time, I ain’t never seen anything I couldn’t explain. Been spooked a few times, but ...’ She paused, as if she had given away too much by admitting to having been frightened.
‘We’ve all been spooked,’ Fray said. ‘There’s no shame in it. Thing is, though, these tunnels aren’t any kind of secret. Cops know about them: I did, before I left the force. We’d use them to intimidate suspects. Threaten to leave them alone in here. Didn’t exactly go out of our way to spike the scare stories.’
‘Scare stories?’ Quillon said.
‘Bad shit happens down here,’ Meroka said. ‘Get lost down here quicker than you can blink. Or bump into people you don’t want to bump into - which would be me, on a bad day. But the rest of it? So much steaming horseshit, metaphorically speaking.’
‘I couldn’t have put it more eloquently,’ Fray said.
‘And the Mad Machines?’ Quillon asked.
‘Man’s been reading too many bedtime stories,’ Meroka said, just as her torch flickered out, plunging them into absolute darkness. ‘No machines, big or small, Cutter. Just because the tunnels exist don’t mean all the other made-up crap turns out to be real as well.’ She shook the torch until it faltered back to life.
‘So neither of you has ever seen anything strange, in all the times you’ve been coming through these tunnels?’
‘Seen some dead bodies,’ Meroka said. ‘Seen some things I’d rather not know what they used to be. But big scary machines, wandering around in here? ‘Fraid not. Spearpoint’s just a big old spike jammed into the ground. Nothing’s changed in here for thousands of years.’
‘Have you ever been lost?’
‘Happened once or twice. Especially when the package was doing too much talking.’
‘Hint taken.’
Meroka wasn’t done, though. ‘Being lost isn’t the worst thing that can happen. At least if you get lost, you might wander out again. Cross a zone, that’s a different story.’
‘You’d hardly fail to n
otice if you crossed a zone,’ Quillon said.
‘Yeah, you’d notice. But that doesn’t mean you’d feel it coming, or be able to cross back over. You think you know Spearpoint pretty well, Cutter, but all you really know is life on the skin, out on the ledges. The zones are big out there. Someone like Fray, he hardly ever needs to leave Neon Heights.’ Her voice took on an admonitory tone. ‘Different story once you get inside. Now they get smaller and smaller, crowding in around the Eye of God, or the Mire, or whatever you want to call it. Shit gets blurred together, hard to map. Reason my light isn’t working so well: it can feel us getting closer to the transition.’
‘Do we have to cross over?’
‘Not until we leave the tunnel and get to Steamville. Unless things have shifted around in here since last time. Which is a possibility. Clock boys are already worked up about it, and not just in Neon Heights. Rest of us saw this coming way back. Last two, three years, easily. Serious movement. Something heavy heading down the pike.’ Without waiting for his opinion she added, ‘Blame the angels myself. Anything unexplained, they’re top of my shit list.’
‘I see.’ Quillon swallowed hard. ‘And this assumption is based on ... what, exactly?’
‘I’d just take it as a given, I were you,’ Fray said.
‘Angels piss me off,’ Meroka said. ‘That’s all you need to know.’
They walked on in silence, Quillon unwilling to press her on the matter for fear that she would start wondering exactly why he was so interested. At least it told him one thing: Fray must have kept their mutual secret. Unless she was lying for reasons of her own, Meroka knew nothing of his origins, and that meant Fray had never broken his word.
‘How close are you taking us to the boundary?’ Quillon asked.
‘Within half a league. Can’t be more accurate than that.’
Presently he had the sense of the tunnel widening, and when he tried to reach out he could only touch the nearest wall. ‘Keep right,’ Meroka said again, and though he could see almost nothing except the wavering spot cast by Meroka’s torch, he knew they were edging past a huge duct or shaft leading much deeper into Spearpoint.
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