by Frost, E J
When I’m close enough, and before I have to crawl through her blood, I give her a couple of love-taps with my right boot. Nothing. Her face, pressed tight against the ceramsteel, is a mask of blood. Better get her out of here.
I wriggle down the wall, through her blood. It gums my hands. Coats the back of my head. I’m gonna look like I’ve been dipped in the shit before I’m done. I get below her and roll carefully over her leg. She’s spread-eagled, and the reach-struggle-push method is not going to work with her unconscious. On the way down, I’ve figured the easiest way is to get her on my shoulders and push us both up using my back and legs. And the easiest way to get her on my shoulders is to shove my head up between her thighs.
I pull her calves under my arms, loop my injured left arm around her thigh, and wedge my head up into her groin. She doesn’t stir, despite the indignity of what I’m doing to her. Lifting my head against the brutal g-force pulls that knot between my shoulders tight again. Turns the spear of pain in my left shoulder into a cutting laser. The blood oozing from my nose and ears becomes a stream. Fuck, she owes me for this. I’m taking my ship back as soon as I get her through that hatch.
The rough, pitted wall provides a little purchase for my feet. I shove and shove and shove until the laws of physics finally tilt in my favor and Erin’s dead weight slides up the wall.
It feels like I’ve pushed forever before she moves a meter. She doesn’t rise straight. Whatever’s in her left bag is heavier and it drags her down to the side, fighting against my upward momentum. She’s going to look like she’s been hauled over a klick of rough road by the time I get her up this fucking wall. Hope Tyng values her for more than her pretty face.
Another meter, and another, measured by thumping, cutting pain. How much fucking further can the hatch be? I can’t lift my head to gauge the distance. Just have to keep going. Then suddenly the weight across my neck and shoulders lessens. I give another hard push and there’s no weight. Erin slides up the wall and disappears over the edge of the hatch. I grab the edge of the hatch and pull myself over. Lie panting on the gridded floor while the hatch clangs shut behind me and the roaring in my head falls blessedly, mercifully silent.
I hear movement, the susurrus of hair and fabric and the squeak of Kez’s shadowsuit. But I don’t open my eyes until something cool and wet touches my cheek.
I crack open one blood-caked eye and peer up into Kez’s anxious face, framed by the glowing halo of her hair. “Hey, kitten.” It comes out a croak.
“Shh. Give it a minute. You’ll feel better.” She wipes my face with that soft, wet thing again. Discards it into a heap of other bloody cloths and applies a fresh wipe to the stiff clot under my nose. I close my eyes and let her work.
She’s right. With the absence of that killing pressure, I feel better moment by moment. My stomach settles into its rightful place. My muscles unknot. The sensation of my brain trying to push its way out through my sinuses subsides to a dull thumping. When Kez finishes cleaning my face, I open my eyes and slowly sit up.
She hands me a couple of clean wipes and reaches around to wash the back of my head.
“She awake?” I ask, tipping my chin at the motionless pile of limbs and bags on the floor while I wipe my hands and the front of my shadowsuit.
“No, but she’s breathing.”
“You got anything in your magic bag to wake her up?”
Kez shrugs. “An adrenaline sniffer. I’ve never had to use it. You don’t think it will hurt her, do you?”
Erin’s long-term health is not my main concern. Just getting her limp ass up off the grid. My mind’s moving on, now that I’m thinking clearly again, to getting us off this love boat. By the chrono in my eye, it’ll dock in Tiv in less than twenty minutes. All that’s left of our finboards are splinters bobbing in the bowship’s wake, so we need to find another way off the boat, unless we want to get wet again. That means having a poke around to find an exit, and I’m not toting the Überbitch’s limp ass while I do it.
I hold out my hand and Kez fishes a rolled-up emergency kit out of her backpack. I sort through it until I find the bright blue sniffer, hand it to Kez, and set aside three small derms before closing up the case and tossing it into her backpack.
“Give her a squirt of that.” If it doesn’t work, there’s always slapping her. Which would be satisfying in its own way, except that I’ve never hit a woman other than spanking Kez and a couple of hookers who let me play rough. I don’t want to start with Erin. She might mistake it for foreplay.
Kez busies herself with her sister while I open my suit, set the three little derms on my shoulder, and finish wiping myself off. There’s a certain cache to roaming around covered in blood, but Cloudlanders are paranoid to start with and I don’t want anyone calling the C.P. over a nosebleed.
When I can’t find any more sticky blotches, I spend a moment checking my knives – all where they should be – before I roll to my feet. The analgesic derms dull the pain in my shoulder to a tolerable ache. Everything else hurts about the same. I’m bored with the pain now, and ignore it.
Erin’s less stoic, and begins whimpering as she comes ‘round. I move a few meters away and listen. Not to her pain-filled noises, but for anything they attract. All I can hear is the distant whoosh of the airjets, muffled by thick ceramsteel. No footsteps. No clanging of hatches. No mechanical noises. The ship’s too quiet, in fact.
Kez shushes Erin the same way she did me, and whether it’s her sister’s warning or her own predatory instincts kicking in, Erin muffles her groans. It takes her a couple of minutes to get on her feet, during which I orient myself and plot out the route I want to take through the ship, avoiding areas where we’ll be more likely to bump into crew. Erin eventually shuffles down the passageway, supported by Kez. I wait until they draw up beside me.
“We’re heading to the front of the ship. Try to be as quiet as you can. We come up against anyone, hang back, let me take care of ‘em.”
“Aye-firmative,” Kez whispers. Erin doesn’t say anything, but when I turn my head to look at her, she nods. I meet her eyes. Her right eye’s swollen closed and partially covered by a big, pale derm plastered over her cheek. In the yellow-red light from Kez’s hair, she’s a sickly green color that I’m betting is not all a trick of the light.
Big Bad Assassin. All banged up.
“I saved your ass,” I tell her. “You owe me.”
She nods again. Swallows with effort. “I pay my debts.”
“I want my ship back.”
“When we get to the Cloudlands.”
“Deal,” I say. I don’t really care whether she gives me back the master control, although it’d be convenient not to have to hack into my own ship. What matters is she’s got no more claim on me, or Kez. When we get back on dry land, she’s on her fucking own. “Let’s move.”
Chapter 23
I lead. The girls trail me by a couple of meters. Erin’s got her right arm looped over Kez’s shoulders. Kez is carrying one of Erin’s equipment bags in addition to her own backpack. Neither of them is going to be much use if we run into trouble.
Better be stealthy then.
Stealth ain’t easy in wet boots, on a gimpy knee, with the clangy metal grid underfoot and the girls shuffling along behind me. But as much noise as we’re making, no one comes to investigate. The ship remains eerily quiet beyond the rhythmic rush of the airjets.
The corridor runs straight. There are hatches along it, but they’re all closed and I’ve got no urge to explore. I want the bow of the ship, and a way off. We reach a T-junction and I pause, turning my head from side to side, listening. Light flow of air against my face. Cooler to my right. To my left, the faint scent of lubricants.
I turn to the right.
“How do you know where you’re going?” The Überbitch hisses behind me.
“I don’t. You want to go that way, be my guest.”
I don’t look back, but I can feel Kez’s split-second hesitation befor
e she pushes Erin’s arm off her shoulders and follows me. My kitten. Still committed to her family, no matter how fucked up that family’s become. But after that one moment of hesitation, she comes after me. Chooses me. Again.
“Fine, fine!” Erin’s hiss is strident, maybe a little panicked. Kez blows out an irritated breath and goes back to support her sister.
Another empty corridor. But now, there’s a sound. A distant, deep asthmatic wheeze. Like heavy breathing over a speaker.
I lift my right hand. Ball it into a fist. Hear the girls shuffle-stop behind me. I wait. Watch the seconds tick in the corner of my eye. After thirty seconds, there’s no movement. No voices. No footsteps. Just that faint breathing.
And ever-cooler air against my face.
I lower my hand. Pull a kukri out of my right boot and hold it against my side as I begin moving again. Slow, light steps, echoed by the soft shuffling behind me.
The corridor ends in a set of stairs and a hatch to the left. The hatch is closed, but fresh, sea-scented air streams through vents on the upper half of the hatch. I peer through the vents. Nothing but darkness even my eyes can’t penetrate; must be louvered.
I rest my hand against the vents. Faint dampness against my palm. Sea-spray.
“This is it,” I whisper to the girls. With any luck, the hatch will open onto the front cargo deck. From there, it shouldn’t be hard to exit the ship as it docks. Only problem is, once we’re out on that deck, we’ll be visible to anyone and everything. Still seven minutes before the ship docks. That’s a long time to be exposed. Really, a second is too long to be exposed. We’ve got to get off the ship without being seen.
I rest my forehead against the cool metal while I work a finger through the vent. Then the tip of my kukri. Neither shifts the metal louver. Fuck. I can’t take the chance that anyone’s looking when I open the hatch.
I turn the problem over a couple of times in my head; examining the different angles. It doesn’t really matter if we’re seen, so long as no alarm is raised. Invisibility isn’t the issue. It’s making sure no one’s alive to press the panic button.
I draw the other kukri and step back from the door. Glance up the stairs. The control room will be high up in the ship, where there’s good visibility. That means the right way to go is up.
“Six minutes, I’m not back, you open this hatch and get off this ship any way you can. Got it?” I say to the girls.
Erin looks dazed. It takes her a moment to nod. While she’s focusing, Kez gently pushes her against the wall. Slides out from under her arm. Erin reaches for her crutch, frowning, but Kez steps away. Kez drops Erin’s equipment bag at her feet, shrugs out of the backpack, rolls her shoulders, and looks up at me expectantly. “Lead the way,” she says.
“Where d’you think you’re goin’?”
“With you.”
I shake my head. “Stay with your sister. Get off this ship. Finish the run.”
Kez puts her hands on her hips. Her little kitten chin juts. “You said you wouldn’t let me out of your sight until this was done, remember?”
I remember. And I meant it.
“You’re on your own,” I tell Erin.
Without waiting for her response, I vault the handrail and take the stairs two at a time, moving as fast as I can without letting my wet, heavy boots clang on the ceramsteel risers. The deep, asthmatic breathing gets louder as I reach the top of the stairs, drowning out the noise of my movement, and the soft squeaking of Kez’s shadowsuit.
At the top of the stairs, a landing and another fucking T-junction. I go in low, kukris ready, and tilt my head just enough to see around the corner. An empty corridor. Both directions. Corridor stretches to the right. To the left, an open hatch. That’s the source of the breathing.
I glance over my shoulder at Kez, who is waiting on the step below me. Her back brushing my back. “My left,” I whisper to her.
“Got it.”
I move fast and low around the corner. Arms up; kukris leading the way. Kez is a light pressure against my back as she matches me, step for step. Covering my ass. My kitten.
I clear the hatch and get a view of the room beyond. Empty. I straighten and take a slow look around. There’s movement. Lights flickering on the control panels. Codes streaming down several screens. But there’s no one reading them. The deep, asthmatic breathing comes from a pump in the far corner of the control room. Sounds like it needs a seal replacing. No other breathing in the room but Kez’s and my own. Out of the huge windows, moonlight silvers sea-spray and the tips of waves. Water, water and more water. There’s no sign of any crew. On the horizon, a long, low black ridge. The Northern Island. A silver diamond of light on the shore pinpoints Tiv’s dock. The bowship’s neatly lined up with that gleaming diamond, but it’s not being steered by any human hand.
I move across the control room, checking the monitors. No alarms. One shows the ship’s course. Right on schedule. A couple show interiors of the ship. All empty. A flash of yellow on the central screen tells me the pre-docking sequence has been initiated. Movement out on the deck snaps my head up. But it’s mechanical movement: the bowship’s massive prongs unfolding as they ready to dock and unload the cargo.
Behind me, Kez whispers, “It’s a ghost ship.”
“Maybe.” I flick a finger at the monitors. “Lotta displays for a roboboat.” I lean over the bank of monitors, peer out the central viewer and scan the deck carefully. It’s not easy to see anything. The deck’s a maze of huge ceramsteel containers, stacked in neat rows. The bridge is about fifteen meters above the deck, just a few meters higher than the tops of the largest containers, so I’m peering across the top of a metal maze. I watch for a full minute, and just as I’m about to turn away, the shadows between two huge crates shiver the way no shadows should, and peel apart. A finger of brilliant white light reaches across the wet deck, then a crawler appears out of the actinic halo. Two low arms extend from the crawler, running along the bases of the containers, popping the maglocks attaching the containers to the deck. The crawler turns and disappears behind a stack of containers, only a rime of white light creeping above the containers’ upper edges marking its passage.
“Fuck,” Kez says from beside me.
“Yeah.” I track the crawler’s progress. It’s definitely following a pattern as it moves between the containers. I watch it for a moment; extrapolate the pattern. The crawler will end up in the starboard forecastle as the ship docks. If we come up the port side of the deck, hugging the shadows of the bigger containers, we might be able to slip off the ship unnoticed. I beckon Kez to my side with two fingers. Point out the route to the bow. Kez nods.
“Memorize it in case we get separated.”
“Aye-firmative,” Kez responds, her voice distant with concentration. “But we’re not. Getting separated.”
I smile at her. Give her another moment to track the twists and turns between the containers. When she nods, I lead the way back to the Überbitch.
Erin’s bloodshot eye tracks us sullenly as we descend the stairs. There’s no need for silence now, so half-way down, I vault over the handrail and land in a Parkour-style crouch next to the hatch. Immediately regret it when my knee grumbles and threatens to give. Gonna have to watch that.
“You’re cutting it fine,” the Überbitch snipes at me.
I shrug off her criticism. “Stay low. Stay left. Don’t be seen.”
Her red-red mouth, its perfect shape and color marred by several cuts, opens to frame a question, but she’s forestalled by Kez, who returns to crutch position with my kitten’s usual efficiency. Ignoring her sister’s curiosity, Kez pulls Erin along just a step behind me as I crack the hatch and step out onto the deck.
It’s not quite the same assault as riding the finboard, or the maelstrom below-decks, but after the quiet interior, the wind and spray and darkness are a slap against my senses. From the bridge, there was no sense of the howl of the wind through the branching tunnels of the containers. No sting of spra
y. I let my eyes adjust while I take in the small details my senses feed me and integrate them into the mental map I developed on the bridge. I spin it out around me like a holo. The distant popping of maglocks pinpoints the crawler on my mental map. As it makes its next turn, those harsh lights will sweep right across where we’re standing.
Better not be here then.
I beckon the girls after me as I move left, avoiding a wide corridor – too exposed – and thread my way between two smaller stacks of containers.
Left, right, left and left again. Creeping along, step by careful step, I lead the girls through the chasms created by the containers. Through wind and spray and darkness broken only by the probing light of the crawler. I keep the girls carefully out of that light. In our shadowsuits, we’ll be hard to see, but Kez is so pale she’ll fucking fluoresce if the crawler’s lights hit her. Finally, we stand in the lee of the last stack of containers on the forecastle. Once the two front prongs unfold and connect us with the dock, it’s just a handful of strides off the ship. We just have to wait for the right moment to escape without being seen.
I step back away from the corner of the container stack as the crawler’s lights sweep it. Reach behind me and tuck Kez a little further into the shadows. I like having her against my back. She rests against me, her cheek against my shoulder, her hand in the small of my back. Warm, reassuring points of connection. I can feel her trembling. Adrenaline, fatigue, and maybe a little fear. I find her hip with my hand and give her a gentle squeeze.
A hydraulic cacophony thunders over the wind and water as the bowship’s prongs grapple with the dock. The fresh assault on my ears makes me wince. No wonder these ships are so heavily automated if they make this much fucking racket every time they unload.
A high, thin noise joins the mechanical din. That’s coming from behind me. I glance over my shoulder. Erin’s taken a step away from Kez and is searching the shadows. The noise is her screaming something at her sister. I lean into Kez and shout into her ear, “What the fuck is wrong?”