Maybe when she gathered her wits, she’d put up a bit of sport. Then Russell could swoop in, play the helping-hand card. Whisk her to his private quarters, away from such savage behavior.
But not yet. Bored, Russell left the observation room. The head nurse waited for him in the hall. “What should I do with her?”
Russell paused. “Let her stew in there. I’ll be back.”
“What about her clothing?” the nurse asked.
“Burn it,” Russell said. “And I suppose you should examine her closely for any signs of infection. Can’t have a goddamn sub get loose in here.”
A disgusting smile grew across the old woman’s face. “Thank you. Very good.”
“Same goes for the others we brought in,” he said.
“Yes, certainly,” said the nurse. “I’ll start with her, I think.”
Russell paused. “Hurt her in any way, and I’ll cut your fucking hands off.”
She recoiled, almost tripping on her own feet. He doubted he would have accomplished the same reaction had he physically slapped the shrew.
The Melville rested on the same landing pad from which it had departed. When Russell arrived, a team of cargo inspectors at his back, the ranking guard on duty greeted him.
“Evening, Mr. Blackfield, sir,” the boy said.
Russell read the name off his uniform. “Officer Decklan. What have we got?”
“Craft is Dutch Air Force, built in 2204. Registered as the Melville, owner Sky—”
“Skyler Luiken,” Russell said for him. “I know all this. The scow’s been through here many times before. What’s inside?”
Decklan stammered. “One full bag, and one metal case, locked.”
“That’s it?”
The guard swallowed, and nodded.
All the way to Hawaii for so little? “And in the bag?”
“No idea, sir. Orders were not to touch anything.”
Russell nodded. “Well done.” He motioned to the three inspectors he’d brought along and pointed them toward the open cargo ramp. To Decklan he said, “No one in or out, without my permission.”
“Yes, sir!”
Russell followed his inspection team up the ramp.
The ship’s cargo hold, packed full on the last inspection, stood nearly empty now. Laid bare, the bird looked her eighty years. The fact that she still flew regular missions spoke volumes of the love her captain had for her. That, or the skill of whoever repaired the thing. Russell made a mental note to find out who the engineer was and try to woo him away.
“Sir, have a look,” one of the inspectors said.
Russell knelt over the metal case. Well made, from brushed aluminum, Russell guessed. The locks looked military grade. “Not the type of thing a wag from Darwin would carry about,” he said.
The inspector, with a gesture of permission from Russell, picked it up and turned it over, examining all sides. “It’s got the Platz logo, here,” he said, pointing.
Russell smiled. He couldn’t wait to tell Alex about this.
“Want me to open it?” the man said.
“Not yet,” Russell replied. “Give it to me for now.”
One of the other inspectors had opened the large black duffel bag. He stretched the opening for Russell to see. A random mess of cables and other spare computer parts filled it.
Russell looked around at the rest of the cabin. He recalled his meeting aboard Gateway. “Exercise some subtlety,” he said, echoing Alex’s words. It had a nice ring to it. “Take a handful each, no more.”
“Sir.”
Time to consult with his counterpart above, Russell decided. “I’ll be back. Conduct a thorough search, lads. I want a list.”
The three men nodded in unison.
He took his time returning to his office, climbing the twenty flights of stairs to the top floor with no great hurry. The stairs always gave him time to think, and got his heart beating nice and fast.
Inside, he first went to his desk and removed an old camera. Setting the briefcase on his desk, Russell photographed it.
Next he powered up his antique terminal, transferred the picture to it, and dialed Alex Warthen.
It took some shouting before Gateway’s graveyard shift agreed to wake their boss.
“Three in the bloody morning, this better be good,” Alex said.
Russell sent the photo to Alex as he spoke. “I have the most exquisite woman down here. Snuck away to Hawaii with a scavenger crew. She’s demanding to speak with Platz.”
“Who is she?” Alex asked.
“Not sure yet. I was hoping you could help with that,” Russell replied. “Are you near your computer?”
“I can be.”
Russell struggled to keep his patience in check. “I’ve sent you a picture of a briefcase the woman was carrying when we apprehended her.”
“What’s she look like?”
Russell closed his eyes, remembering the examination. “Medium height. Fit. Black hair. Of Indian descent, I’d guess. Very pretty. Small mole on her left ass cheek.”
“Pardon me?”
Russell laughed. “She’d been outside Darwin. A full examination was required.”
A brief pause from the other end. Russell could hear Alex activating his computer.
“Well,” Alex said, “my guess is the woman is Tania Sharma, a scientist from Anchor Station.”
“Long way from home,” Russell said.
“The briefcase … looks like a standard secure model.”
“There’s a Platz logo on the bottom.”
Alex took a moment to reply. “Tania and the old man are acquainted.”
“Why would she be down here? Cavorting with smugglers outside the Aura—”
“That,” Alex said, “is a damn good question. Maybe something to do with these power failures, and the subhuman outbreaks. If they’re researching it on the sly, they must know something.”
Russell ran his hand over the sleek object. “Maybe I can sell it back to the old prick. The girl, too.”
Alex let out a long breath into the receiver.
How bloody annoying, Russell thought.
“I have a better idea,” Alex said. “I’m going to send you down a small tracking device. I’ll—”
“What good does that do me?” Russell asked.
“Hear me out,” Alex said. “Platz is up to something. If we figure out what, we’ll have the upper hand.”
“We have the upper hand now. The case, and the woman.”
“The woman is nothing,” Alex said. “What’s in the case, what she risked a trip to Hawaii for, that we must determine.”
It made sense, Russell had to admit. “So we attach this device. Then what?”
“Let her go. I’ve got agents on every station. Sleepers. We’ll see where she takes it and find out the details without tipping our hand.”
Russell drummed his fingers on the case. He didn’t like the idea of putting his playing cards in Alex’s hand, but fostering a sense of teamwork might have advantages later. And sleeper agents? Alex had alluded to such a plant inside Nightcliff when they met before, and now he admitted to more. Russell wondered just how wide the net had been cast.
“Look,” Alex said, “if Platz thinks we’re on to him, the trail stops.”
“Fine,” Russell said. “Once the case is tagged, I’ll let her go.”
“Unmolested.”
Russell laughed at that. “Unharmed. I have a reputation to keep.”
Tania lost all track of time. She sat on the cold bench, shivering and naked, unable to focus her mind in any meaningful way.
Some time ago, hours it seemed, a nurse had come in. The old woman was very sweet, sickeningly so, and her hands were cold as ice. The lengthy, probing examination she performed would have been humiliating, repulsive, had Tania been able to bring herself to care.
In her mind she kept seeing the look on Samantha’s face when she had emerged from that cursed building. The way Skyler’s knees had buckled. They had lost one of their own, for a cause they knew nothing about.
Then she recalled the way Skyler had shouted and struggled in vain when they separated Tania from the others upon entering the infirmary. He’d punched a guard before they tackled him. Even after the loss she’d caused him, he still fought for her.
When the door finally opened again, Tania hardly noticed. Two men entered, one carrying a folded gray jumpsuit. She did not move. Instead she kept her eyes locked on her own reflection in the mirror. She pretended to be that woman, the one watching with numb disinterest. They lifted her to her feet and dressed her, guiding her legs into the stiff, scratchy cloth, using their hands more than necessary as they pulled the garment above her waist and chest.
A voice in her head screamed at her to fight them, to struggle, but she couldn’t. There was no point.
She’d come to Earth, set her feet in the soil for the first time in a decade. She had seen trees and wildflowers, growing in unplanned natural beauty.
And she’d seen a strangely human face torn in two by a bullet.
She had seen death.
Growing up, she’d been taught the dangers of living in orbit. She had felt pride in knowing how brave they all were for existing so close to the void.
Ridiculous.
She knew real danger, now, and had been truly frightened for the first time in her life. The indignities she now suffered were nothing compared to what Jake must have gone through in the bowels of that building.
All to serve my theory, which I can’t even tell them about.
The men finished dressing her. “Let’s go, sweetheart. You’re due at the climber port,” one of them said. His voice sounded far away. “Back to Utopia, har har.”
They led her through the stained halls of the miserable hospital and across the main yard of Nightcliff.
Out in the open, she sucked in the salty air and looked up at the sky. The soaring thread of the Elevator. The way home. The only way.
She heard a distant voice: her own, but far away, telling her to find Skyler. To tell him what his friend had died for, that she would make it mean something.
The voice faded.
If she had a chance to ask to speak with him, she missed it. Her captors loaded her into a passenger carrier and began the preparations to send it to space.
“The case you kept asking for,” one of them said to her. He pushed the metallic briefcase into her hands.
Tania stared blankly at it.
“Crazy Sheila,” he added, under his breath.
Perhaps that’s true, she thought. Perhaps I’ve gone insane. She pondered the idea while they attached the compartment to a climber.
She sat alone in the austere cylinder as it lurched onto the thread.
When Russell Blackfield entered the cell, goon squad on his heels, Skyler balled his fists. A fight was suicide, he knew. They were outnumbered and outgunned.
They were naked, too. That didn’t help.
Skyler had been in tough situations with his crew plenty of times, but he couldn’t remember being more uncomfortable. Eight hours they’d spent, the three of them, stuck in the small room without clothing.
“Quarantine,” their jailers had said. “Clothes had to be burned, so sorry.”
Screw it, odds be damned, Skyler thought. He was prepared for the consequences, except for one thing: He wanted to know where Tania was.
“Skyler Luiken, we meet again,” Russell said.
Skyler bit his tongue and tried to hold the man’s gaze. Russell’s eyes, however, had gravitated to Samantha’s bare chest.
“I would think,” Russell said casually, “after eight hours in here, you’d have thought of something to say.” His attention shifted slowly back to Skyler as he spoke.
Through clenched teeth, Skyler said, “Where’s my other crew member?”
“She’s part of your crew? You honestly expect me to fall for that?”
Skyler held his tongue.
“Or did you mean poor Jake, left behind in Hawaii—”
Samantha’s punch flew so fast it caught everyone off guard. She connected squarely with Russell’s jaw, knocking him clean off his feet.
He fell hard against the wall and grunted when his body hit the floor.
One of the guards jabbed Samantha in the stomach with the stock of his rifle. The wind left her lungs and she collapsed to one knee.
Skyler and Angus both surged forward.
“Enough!” Russell struggled to his feet, wiping blood from the corner of his mouth. “That was my fault. Sore topic. Loud and clear.”
Samantha fought to control her breaths.
Russell shook his head, dazed. “Christ, woman. A hell of a hook you’ve got. If you need a new job, my door is open.”
She spat in his face.
The man did not flinch. Wiping the spittle off, he said, “I’d like to know you better before we exchange bodily fluids.”
Samantha drew herself up to her full, impressive height. The defiance in her eyes blazed, wild and raw.
“Seems I’d need a stool, too,” Russell said, looking up at her. Some of the guards laughed. “Perhaps another time.” He snapped his fingers at two nurses near the back of the group, and they came forward with fresh clothing.
Russell seemed to be waiting for them to dress, but Skyler made no effort to reach for the garments. Sam and Angus followed his example.
“Suit yourselves,” Russell said. “Ah, no pun intended. You’re free to go, cleared from pad three.”
Skyler squinted at him. “What about—”
“The woman will remain here. House arrest, pending questioning.”