Black Hole Sun (2 page)

New Eden, Pangea, Mars
ANNOS MARTIS
238. 4. 7. 06:26

“One of these brats is going to die,” the fat man screeches at me, his tremolo voice echoing off the waterworks' concrete walls. “You have thirty seconds to choose which.”

“Which what?” I ask.

“Which one is to die!”

“Oh. I wasn't sure. Your sentence structure made it a little unclear.”

“Imbecile!” he roars, face turning purple. “Choose!”

I love it when the villains pitch a hissy. The fat man's name is Postule, and he's standing on a concrete peninsula that juts out over the sludge-filled retention pools. He waves a meaty hand at two children behind him. Both are in shackles, dangling by a chain over the churning cesspool of the New Eden Waterworks.

All I need is a good running start, and I can knock him straight into the vile, greenish water that fills the building with its sickeningly sweet odor.

“Not a good idea,” Mimi reminds me.

Because the children are wired with C-42 explosives, and the fat man holds a tension kill switch. If he lets go, they both are dead. And I get paid nothing for the job. This is not how I planned the mission.

“‘The best-laid schemes o' mice an' men gang aft a-gley,'” Mimi says.

“No literary references when I'm working.” I canvass the perimeter for a landing zone. After my surrender, the troopers brought me to this room, a concrete box with walls twenty meters high and a glass skylight in the roof.

“There's a good spot for entry,” I tell Mimi.

“Beat you to it,” she says. “Drop coordinates transmitted to the rescue team.”

“You mean
backup
team. I don't need rescuing.”

“Acrophobia
and
grandiose delusions?” she says. “With your plethora of psychoses, it's a wonder I fit into your brain at all.”

“Then maybe you should lose some weight.”

Postule starts shouting. “I don't think you are taking me seriously,
puer
.” Once upon a time, he worked for the Bramimonde clan, one of the richest, most powerful families in the old Orthocracy. Now he kidnaps wealthy children and ransoms them back to their families. And insults his betters by calling them “little boy” in the bishop's Latin.

“He is not bluffing,” Mimi urges me. “There are a number of outstanding warrants on his records. Kidnapping. Assault. Murder. Cowboy, he will kill them.”

“Thanks for the clarification.” I have one card up my sleeve: Postule thinks I'm alone. That's his mistake.

So I grin at the fat man, who can't figure out why I would be smiling. Then I tap my temple twice. Wince at the tingling behind my synthetic eyeball. In my field of vision, a small screen pops up. I expect to see the eager face of my partner. There's only blue-green static.

“Mimi,” I ask. “Where's my backup?”

“Indeterminable,” she says. “I have lost the signature.”

“I hate when you say that.”

“Which is it going to be?” Postule barks, losing patience. “The boy or the girl? My mood is turning foul, so be quick about it.”

I yawn.

“Remove his helmet!” Postule orders one of the troopers. “I want to see his eyes when he kills the brats.”

One of the troopers yanks the helmet off my head, and my dark hair falls into my face. The leader of the shock troopers reaches for my holstered armalite. “Give me that fancy gun, boy.”

“Stop!” Postule bellows. “Idiot! Don't touch it. Those pistols are booby-trapped. Just leave it where it is. If he moves, rearrange that handsome face.”

I grin. “Thanks for the compliment. But you're not my type.”

Postule snarls. Yanks the helmet from the trooper, who brings it to him. He shines the visor with the sleeve of his red
velvet robe. “Top-shelf equipment. It will fetch a fair coin on the black market.” Then he gives me the up-and-down look. “Look at that—you still have acne. How old are you, boy?”

“I'm an age-eight point five,” I snarl. “Old enough to do the job.”

“What a coincidence.” Postule laughs. Spits into my helmet. “The last Regulator I killed said the very same thing. Your helmet will sit next to his on my trophy case.”

“Mimi, I take back what I said about kicking the shock trooper's ass—I'm going to kick Postule's instead.”

“I will be sure to annotate your to-do list,” she says.

Postule shakes the kill switch at me. “Make your choice. Or be prepared to pick up the pieces.”

Where's my backup? “Mimi?”

“Indeterminable.”

So I have to stall some more. Slowly I pull the purse of coin out of my symbiarmor. I toss it to Postule. “There's a bishop's ransom in there.”

He picks the purse up. Presses it against his face and shudders like he's caressing a lover. “I've always wanted to be as rich as the bishop.”

“You've got your coin.” Which I can't let him keep. “So how about letting the children go, and I won't have to.”

“Your sentence structure made it a little unclear.” He smirks. “You won't have to
what
, boy?”

“To kill you. And all of your men.”

Postule throws back his head. Laughs. “Kill me? Kill them?
How do you plan to do that?” He waddles forward, the deck creaking with his weight. Then he notices my left hand—the pinkie finger is missing the top two knuckles. “Look at that! You're nothing but a garbage Regulator, a
dalit
.”

I snort. Like calling me
dalit
is supposed to offend me. Ha. I've been called so many things—coward, failure, deserter, traitor, bad son—that
dalit
doesn't cause a blip on my pulse.

“You think that's funny?” Postule bellows, his jowls shaking. “Bring him here!”

The troopers drag me forward. Postule jams the kill switch against my face. Its sharp metal edges cut into my jaw. I can smell the acid from the batteries used to power the switch. I can also smell the stink of breakfast on Postule's breath, some kind of sausage spiced heavily with sage and peppers. Probably to hide the flavor of rat.

“In all,” I say, “I prefer the stink of raw sewage to your halitosis.”

Postule spits in my face. “I am going to teach you manners,
puer
.”

“Who taught you yours?” As the warm spittle trails down my cheeks, I resolve again that yes, I am definitely kicking his ass.

“You know what we used to do to
dalit
in New Eden?” the fat man huffs. “We gutted them. Then we strung them up on the city gates as a warning to all the Regulators who failed to make the ultimate sacrifice for their masters.”

“That's not very nice of you,” I say. “But kidnapping your
former master's children isn't exactly a noble occupation, is it?”

He roars, more spittle flying from the gaping maw of his mouth. Several teeth are missing. His molars are rotted shells. Though he can pinch fancy robes, he can't steal a proper dentist.

“Mimi, tell me some good news.”

“The drop team is in position,” Mimi says. “I'm opening a multivid link to her headset. Telemetry contact is confirmed…now.”

Postule pushes the switch harder, cutting my lip. “I am not a nice man.”

“Then we won't have any problem getting rid of you.”

“We?” The fat man mocks me, looking to his right, then left. “Who's
we
?”

“Go!” I shout. Then grab the kill switch, my left hand clasped hard over Postule's paw.

With my free hand, I fire a burst of hollow point bullets at the line of shock troops. The charges explode. Four of the troopers blow back off their feet and land in the cesspool with a splash. The fifth trooper swings his needle cannon around. Takes aim at my head.

“Kill him!” Postule shouts.

I duck, using Postule as a shield. I keep one hand over the switch and press it to his fleshy throat. Then back us away from the trooper as needles sink
thwick-thwick-thwick
into the metal deck.

“Idiot!” Postule gurgles. “Don't shoot
me
! Shoot the brats instead!”

Before the shock trooper can react, the skylight above us explodes. Shards of glass cascade down, landing on the platform with a crescendo of noise.

“Ho, chief!” A Regulator in black symbiarmor looks down at me, her rappelling rig ready for descent. It's Vienne. My backup has arrived. “Permission to engage?”

“Are you kidding me? Engage! Engage!”

From the edge of the skylight, she opens fire. Four troopers fall to her armalite, which pumps out twenty rounds in the time it takes for their bodies to face plant the concrete.

“Save some for me, Vienne!” I call to her.

“Keep up, chief!” She raises the hot muzzle at the last remaining shock trooper, who starts running. Check that. Tries to run. His heavy armor keeps him from getting far.

“Stand still and let her shoot you!” I yell.

“No worries, chief,” Vienne calls down. She rappels from the roof, her lithe body moving like a vennel spider on the end of its line. Midway down, she stops. Raises the armalite. Fires one round. The shock trooper goes down.

She lands and quickly shucks the rappelling harness.

Vienne is the dream soldier. Wicked sniper. Machinelike precision. Built like a ballerina and as strong as high-carbon steel. Beautiful in a way that intimidates men instead of attracting them. And she follows my orders to the letter.

She surveys the situation. Downed shock troopers. Check.
Children trussed up to a winch. Check. Her chief wrestling for a kill switch with a morbidly obese man. Check. Like it's all in a day's work. “Next order, chief?”

“We've got to free the hostages,” I say, “before our chubby friend can drown them.”

Postule lets a gurgle escape from his lips. His massive body begins to sag against me. “Methinks you've defeated me, Regulator,” he says. His weight forces me to change my center of balance.

“Methinks you better keep a grip on that switch, fat man. Vienne! Unchain the kids.”

“Affirmative!” Vienne answers.

“Stand up,” I tell Postule. “Or I'll slit your throat.”

He laughs. “A Regulator kill a helpless man? I think not. It's forbidden by the Tenets.”

“He has got you there,” Mimi says.

“But the Tenets don't say anything about not
hurting
a helpless man,” I reply to Mimi, and then tell Postule, “A slit throat is more than you deserve.”

“I offer you a trade,” Postule says as he grunts. “I keep the ransom. You keep the brats.”

“You're not in any position to negotiate.”

“Then I shall have to change my position.” Postule exhales, and his body goes limp. All of his weight is dead against me. I step aside and let him fall. His carcass slams onto the deck, and his hand eases open, his grip loosening.

“Cowboy!” Mimi warns me. “The switch!”

“Got it!” I grab the kill switch. The kids are safe.

“That was close,” Mimi says. I'm too busy inspecting the switch to respond, so she continues. “I thought you should know—your transport will arrive in thirty-seven seconds.”

“Vienne! Get the children loose. Our ride is on the way.” I pick up the ransom coin and can't resist patting myself on the back. “That's what I call a job well done.”

My old chief taught me three lessons: Never believe anything you hear and only half of what you see. Never go into debt because you will never get out. And never pat yourself on the back because karma will bite you in the ass.

“Job well done? Think so?” Postule says as he suddenly rolls to the edge of the platform, where he grabs another switch. A switch that I overlooked. “Say farewell to your coin,
dalit
.”

Karma, I think, meet ass. I turn toward Vienne, who is unchaining the girl. “Look out!”

Too late. A trapdoor swings open. A second later a small explosive charge splits a link on the heavy chain. The force of the blast hits Vienne full in the face, and the girl slips from her grasp. The chain snaps. The girl plunges headfirst into the water, hands still shackled behind her back, and sinks like a ton of ore.

New Eden, Pangea, Mars
ANNOS MARTIS
238. 4. 7. 06:41

“No!” I shout, as water fills the hole the girl's body made. Behind me, Postule laughs as he tries to run, his prodigious belly bouncing. There's no way to stop his escape. Vienne is still down, but I can't worry about her now—the girl comes first.

I sprint to the platform edge. “Mimi,” I say. “Delay the transport.”

“Beat you to it.”

I rip off my boots. Then dive straight into the murk. Momentum carries me a few meters, but I know the weight of the shackles will drag the girl straight to the bottom of the cesspool. If I'm a lucky blighter, the bottom won't be very far. I swim down, down, down.

No girl. No bottom. Nothing. I am not a lucky blighter.

How many meters to the bottom? Five? Ten? The early Mars cities like New Eden were built by slave labor with no consistent planning, so the sewer system could be open or closed. Shallow or as deep as a black hole.

“A little help here, Mimi.” I kick hard to propel myself deeper. “Where is the girl?”

“Indeterminable.”

“I hate when you say that.”

“Yes, you have told me that—”

“A thousand times.”

“Eight hundred forty-three times, to be precise. But who's counting?”

“You are! Eight hundred forty-three times!”

“Well,
someone
has to remember these things.”

My lungs burn. I've been below the surface maybe thirty seconds now. Visibility's zero. My only hope of saving the girl is to find the bottom fast.

“Vienne is trying to make contact,” Mimi says. “Would you like me to display her feed on your aural vid?”

“I'm busy!”

“I will take that as a
no
.”

I kick again, propelled by frustration. When I reach out for the next stroke, my fingers hit concrete and the thick layer of slime that covers it. The gunk burns my skin, even in the water. I blow the remaining air out of my lungs. Bubbles shoot past my face, and I immediately feel the sting of the absence of oxygen. A few more seconds of this, and I won't even be able to save myself. Where
is
she?

“Cowboy,” Mimi says. “I am sensing an unusual frequency.”

“What kind of—”

Then I hear it. A low, deep hum. To the right. My head snaps toward the noise. My hands comb through the slime, reaching, recoiling, searching and finding nothing, nothing, nothing. Golden spots dance before my eyes. Sound crackles in my ears. In a matter of seconds, the world is going to turn black, and my life is going to end in a massive tub of recycled excrement—it's not what Regulators would call a beautiful death.

Wait! My hand brushes something solid. The chain!

Reflexively, I grab a handful of links. Pull until the shackles are firmly in my grasp. The girl is thin, and underwater, her weight is minimal. In the murk, I can see nothing. Her limbs feel limp. I hope she's only unconscious.

“Mimi,” I say, “scan her vitals.”

“No heartbeat or respiration,” Mimi replies. “She has expired.”

Not on my watch. I slip my head between her arms. Her body drapes over my back like a human cape. The extra weight pushes us to the mucky floor, where I bend at the knees and launch upward.

Air! We break the surface, and I suck in a long breath of stinky-sweet, canned Martian air. Then flip to a side-stroke, holding the girl's head above the surface. There! A couple meters away—a ladder within reach. I grab a rung. Her weight increases as I pull her from the water. When I finally half crawl onto the platform, I lay her gently onto the concrete.

Her face is caked in crap, and her lips have a scary blue tinge. Greenish liquid pools under her body. Her black hair is matted to her face. I push it back and notice that hers is not a child's face. The girl is older—maybe two years older—than her mother claimed. Which means she's of age, not a kid. I've been lied to. Why?

“Mimi,” I say, still short on breath, “scan for vitals.”

“None detected,” she replies after a few seconds.

“Don't even think of dying now, girl.” I wipe her face clean. Clear her airway. Begin to resuscitate. The first chest compressions push only a jigger of water out of her lungs, and I switch to mouth-to-mouth. Her skin is cold. Lifeless. The only breath in her lungs is mine.

“Mimi?”

“Nothing yet, cowboy.”

“Am I doing this right?” I ask.

“According to the available data, yes.”

“Come on. Breathe!” I switch to CPR and count off the compressions. My shoulders ache, and my forearms burn. But I'm not going to stop. “Give me something. A pulse, a blip. Something!”

“It's been two minutes,” Mimi says after my arms are numb from effort and I'm almost hyperventilating. “I still have not detected any vital signs.”

“I am not. Giving up.” The girl's skin is colder than ever. I count off chest compressions and scan the perimeter. Postule is long gone. So is the ransom. The whole job is fragged.
I've failed this girl and my davos. Even my father.

“Mimi,” I ask reluctantly because I don't want to hear the truth—CPR isn't going to work. “Anything?”

“Nothing.”

“Chief,” Vienne says, coming up behind me. “May I assist?” She kneels to check the girl's pulse.

“Save your breath,” I say, knowing we're defeated. “She's sucked in too much liquid.”

“How much is too much?”

“A few ounces.”

“That's not enough to kill her.” Vienne pulls off her helmet. Runs a hand through her blond hair. “Something's not right, chief. Her color is wrong for a drowning, and her mouth smells metallic. She's been drugged.”

“Drugged?” I say aloud. Then say, “Mimi?”

“The sensors in your symbiarmor aren't capable of medical diagnosis.” She adds with a sniff, “I'm not a medibot.”

“There's no way to tell,” I say to Vienne. “Let's give her a dose of epinephrine to kick-start her heart.” I unzip a pouch on my belt. I press the tube syringe against the girl's chest. Fire a button. “Five, four, three—”

“Heewack!” the girl shouts. Her eyes fly open, and she swings with both shackled hands, a punch that connects with my chin.

I land on my butt. Try to scramble to my feet, but the girl is on me too quickly. She straddles my back and swings a thin forearm across my neck. It's obvious she intends to crush my trachea.

“Geroff meh,” I gasp, my face reddening. “I hepping…you.”

The girl's answer is to squeeze tighter. Her technique is textbook. Straight out of battle school training. This is no little society girl—she's a soldier. Her mother has got a lot of explaining to do.

Vienne draws her armalite from its holster. “We're the rescue party, Miss Bramimonde. That Regulator is my chief, and he just risked his life to save yours.”

She grunts. Keeps squeezing. My mouth opens like a fish that's jumped from its holding tank. “Hep…nee.”

Vienne puts the barrel to the girl's head. “This gun is loaded with explosive bullets that leave big, nasty, infectious holes, not little pinpricks like a needle cannon. Stand down, soldier.”

Something clicks. “Oh,” the girl says. After untangling herself from my neck, she stands. Salutes me. “Regulator Odori-Ebi reporting for duty.”

Then her knees buckle, and her eyes roll back into her head. When she pitches forward, I catch her in the crook of arm.

“Excellent grab, chief,” Vienne says as I lay the girl down on the platform once again.

I'd like to think the catch is due to my prodigious strength, but it's probably because she hasn't eaten much during her weeks of captivity. “I notice you weren't in any hurry to pull her off me.”

“You know the adage—what doesn't kill us makes us stronger.”

Gingerly I touch my neck, where a bruise is already rising. “Funny, I don't feel stronger.”

“That's because,” Vienne says, patting my shoulder, her touch causing me to twitch spontaneously, “she wasn't that close to killing you.”

I carry a second epi syringe to the boy and then ask Mimi to call in the transport. “Would you happen to have a fix on the fat man?”

“Postule's signature is no longer within range.”

I'm not surprised. I kneel down over the boy, who has wispy black hair and a pixie face turned bluish by the pharmies. How the mighty have fallen, I think. At least we've been able to salvage something from the job. We'll take the boy and Ebi home to their mother, collect our fee, and finally get something to eat.

How old is he? An age-five? An age-six if he's petite like his sister. An age-six would be old enough to be conscripted into the CorpCom military. But this is a child of privilege. His fate will take him Offworld to a private school on the Rings, where he'll train to become management. The same fate would have awaited me. If I hadn't been trained from the day I was born to become the lord and sovereign of Mars.

“Wake up, kid,” I say, and push the button on the syringe. “Destiny is waiting for you.”