Marauder (30 page)

The footsteps came to a halt. ‘Control,’ said a man’s voice, ‘the security net’s still down. Any idea when it’ll be back up?’

She waited and listened.

‘Well, if it’s localized,’ said the same man after a pause, ‘I’ll take a look and see if I can figure something out from this end.’

Gabrielle hardly dared breathe. He sounded as if he was just right around the other side of the truck.

‘Okay,’ he said, after another pause. ‘Soon as I’ve checked that out, I’ll check on the girl Tarrant brought in. Sound good?’

The man again fell silent. After a minute, Gabrielle risked a glance around the rear of the truck.

She saw the back of a man’s head. He was wearing the familiar grey-and-white fatigues she had seen on other Freeholders. He had opened up a virtual console, most of it taken up by what
looked like a map of the caverns. He had a rifle over one shoulder, and various tools arranged in sheaths on a multi-pocketed waistcoat.

If he was on his way to check up on her, she might have only a couple of minutes before he raised the alert.

A crowbar lay on the ground next to the truck, along with some oily rags and a pile of what looked like spare parts. She reached down and picked the crowbar up.

One end of it accidentally banged against the side of the truck, the sound immediately echoing across the cavern.

She froze with one hand over her mouth, her heart beating like thunder.

She could hear the guard breathing loudly. He had to know someone was there.

She listened. Just silence. But surely he
must
have heard . . . ?

She forced herself to take her hand from her mouth and, gripping the crowbar with both hands, risked another glimpse towards where the guard had been standing.

He was gone.

‘Get up,’ said a voice from immediately behind her. ‘And drop that fucking—’

She turned, swinging wildly. His rifle was aimed straight at her head, but the crowbar caught him hard in the knee, and he collapsed against the truck treads with a howl of pain.

She stood up and swung the crowbar again and again. He slipped to the ground, limbs twitching. She struck again . . .

And again.

When he finally stopped moving, she let the crowbar clatter to the ground. Then she turned away and vomited.

It hadn’t felt like killing Thijs or the rest of them back on the Grand Barge. It had been different. And worse.

She wiped her mouth clean and forced herself to pick up the dead man’s rifle before continuing on her way.

The buildings seemed deserted, and yet her machine-senses drew her inside one of them and along a corridor, before stopping at one specific door. It felt . . . right.

As the door slid open at her touch, she peered inside and recognized the woman who had caused Tarrant so much consternation. Slumped on the floor, with bandages visible beneath her shirt, she
stared up at Gabrielle in utter disbelief.

‘How the hell did you get in here?’ the woman demanded weakly.

‘I . . . I don’t know,’ replied Gabrielle helplessly. ‘You’re Megan, I think? Bash told me to get you out of here. My name’s Gabrielle, and
I—’

‘I know who you are,’ she declared, then dragged herself upright and came closer. ‘But what was that you just said – about Bash?’

‘He . . . he told me to hurry. That we didn’t have much time.’

Megan’s face creased in blank astonishment. She pushed past Gabrielle and made her way back along the corridor and out into the main cavern. Gabrielle followed, unsure what she was
supposed to do next.

‘That rifle –’ Megan suddenly turned back to her – ‘where did you get it?’

‘From a guard.’

The woman cocked her head. ‘And what happened to him?’

‘I . . . he’s dead.’

The woman’s eyes narrowed, as if re-evaluating her. ‘You shot him with that thing?’

Gabrielle swallowed. ‘No, I . . . hit him with something.’

‘That’s a heck of a thing for anyone to do, let alone . . .’

The woman halted mid-speech.
Let alone a girl like you
, Gabrielle knew she had meant to say.

‘I didn’t have any choice,’ said Gabrielle, her voice rising. ‘He was going to kill me. I . . .’

‘Okay,’ said Megan, putting a hand on Gabrielle’s arm, her voice soothing. ‘Okay. I get it.’ She gestured to the rifle. ‘Tell me – do you know how to
use that thing?’

Gabrielle swallowed. ‘No, not really.’

Megan waggled the fingers of one hand. ‘Then give it to me.’

‘Are you sure?’ said Gabrielle. ‘You look like you’ve been hurt—’

‘Just give me the goddamn rifle,’ she snapped. ‘
Now.
’

Gabrielle unslung the rifle and passed it over. Megan lifted it up to study a reading on one side of the barrel. ‘It’s only half charged,’ she said. ‘The guard you
killed. Did he have any spare battery units on him?’

Gabrielle opened her mouth, then closed it again. She clearly hadn’t thought of that. ‘I don’t know what they even look like.’

‘Well, this is only good for a couple of shots anyway,’ said Megan, sounding doubtful. ‘Damn thing’s so primitive it doesn’t even have active sighting.’

‘What’s active sight—?’

‘Forget it,’ said Megan dismissively, slinging the rifle over her own shoulder. ‘Now I want to be absolutely clear about this: when you say Bash sent you, do you mean he
actually
spoke
to you?’

Gabrielle frowned. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Well, I mean I heard a voice through my implants. And he said his name was Bash.’

Megan stared at her once again. ‘I don’t like being lied to,’ she said quietly. ‘So tell me again. What did he say his name was?’

‘Bash.’

Gabrielle was dumbfounded to see tears glistening in the corners of the other woman’s eyes. ‘And he told you to find me?’

‘But who
is
he?’ asked Gabrielle.

‘A friend of mine,’ said Megan. ‘We need to look for him.’

‘But I don’t know even know where to start.’

Megan regarded her dubiously. ‘You didn’t seem to have much trouble finding
me
.’

‘Yes, but that was different,’ said Gabrielle.

‘How?’

‘Look . . . I don’t know
how
I knew where you were, but I just knew.’

‘Like the knowledge had just been dropped into your head, like something you’d always known? Was that what it felt like?’

‘I . . . yes,’ said Gabrielle. ‘How . . . ?’

‘You’re a machine-head,’ said Megan quietly, ‘which means you’re supposed to know about these things. But I’m beginning to think you must have led a pretty
sheltered existence.’ She nodded towards one of the neighbouring buildings. ‘Best place to start is the last place I saw him.’

Megan led the way with quick, determined strides. ‘What happens if we manage to get out of here?’ asked Gabrielle, following her inside. ‘We’re thousands of miles from
anywhere.’

‘Whatever happens,’ whispered Megan, ‘it’s got to be better than what they’ve already got planned for us.’

Megan unslung the rifle and signalled for silence as they came to one particular door, before nudging it open with the toe of her boot.

There was a sharp exclamation from within, and Megan quickly stepped inside.

Gabrielle waited outside. After a moment there was a single flash of light from within, followed by a strained grunt.

‘Get in here,’ Megan yelled.

Gabrielle found Megan standing over the crumpled form of an elderly Freeholder with a scarred face and a smouldering hole in his chest that still flickered with flames. The smell of cooked flesh
made her gag, so she hurriedly reached for her breather mask and pulled it back on.

There was another man in the room, tall, dark-skinned and emaciated. He was seated in a high-backed chair surrounded by complicated-looking equipment, and merely stared past them with an
unfocused gaze.

Megan’s breath shuddered as she slung the rifle back over her shoulder. ‘I didn’t like doing that,’ she muttered.

‘Why?’ asked Gabrielle.

‘He fixed my shoulder.’ Megan stepped towards the man in the chair. Gabrielle wondered if he was mentally impaired or perhaps paralysed.

‘C’mon, Bash,’ said Megan, undoing the straps holding him in the chair. She slid one hand behind him, and the other under his arm, and tried to get him to stand, grunting with
the effort. After a few seconds he slowly stood up, still demonstrating no apparent awareness that they were even there.

Gabrielle’s mouth flopped open. ‘
That’s
Bash?’ she exclaimed. ‘What’s wrong with him?’

Megan regarded her wearily. ‘Something that’s going to take a really long time to explain.’

‘But he
spoke
to me . . . in my head.’

‘Then you might be interested to know,’ said Megan, ‘that, apart from one recent occasion that’s going to give me nightmares for the rest of my life, he hasn’t said
one damn word to anyone else in well over a decade.’

It took Gabrielle several moments to absorb this. ‘But . . .’

‘You know what,’ said Megan, looking over at her, ‘how about we cut the fucking questions until we get out of here? And you can start to help by getting hold of his other
arm.’

Gabrielle did as instructed and, not without some difficulty, they steered him out of the room and into the main cavern.

‘Those trucks over there,’ Megan panted, ‘let’s see if one of them’s working.’

Gabrielle pulled her breather mask off again, and waited beside Bash while Megan investigated the cabins of three separate trucks in turn before finding one that seemed to her satisfaction. She
waved down to Gabrielle from the driver’s window, and Gabrielle guided Bash aboard the rear compartment. She was careful not to look anywhere near the dead guard’s body lying close
by.

Megan climbed through to the rear and helped her get Bash strapped into one of the compartment’s benches. A baby, thought Gabrielle, would be less helpless. It seemed impossible that the
voice she had heard – so warm, so certain – could possibly have originated from this vacant-eyed and shambling shell of a man. Megan found a packet of disposable breather masks and
strapped one over Bash’s face before taking another for herself. Gabrielle followed suit, then pulled her own mask back on.

Megan paused as Gabrielle followed her through the connecting hatch to the main cabin. ‘Maybe you should ride in the back with Bash.’

‘No.’ Gabrielle shook her head adamantly. ‘I’m tired of being driven around places without having any idea what’s going on. I’ll sit up front with
you.’

‘Look, I really think . . .’

‘We can stay here and argue all day,’ said Gabrielle, staring defiantly at the other woman, ‘or we can try and get out of here.’

Megan held her gaze for a moment, as if testing her resolve, before nodding with a sigh. ‘Fine.’

She had only just managed to get herself strapped into the seat next to Megan before the truck surged forward, bouncing up the slope and towards the connecting tunnel.

‘If you have some kind of a plan in mind,’ said Gabrielle, as they swerved at a sharp turn and into the tunnel, ‘I’d really like to know what it is.’

‘When they brought us here,’ Megan hunched forward, ‘there was a dropship parked right outside the entrance.’

‘I saw it, too.’

They barrelled on past the cavern where Gabrielle had been locked up, before executing another ninety-degree turn into an entirely different part of the underground complex. ‘Well,’
said Megan, peering ahead, ‘that ship should be the best and fastest way out of here.’

‘But what if it’s not there any more? Or—’

‘It’ll be there,’ Megan snapped.

A siren began to wail, low and sonorous. Gabrielle was surprised that it had taken them so long to notice that all three of their captives were making a break for it.

Megan responded to the siren by driving even faster. They were heading up a long incline now, faint daylight seeping down from above and filtered through the atmospheric containment field.

Gabrielle saw some figures emerge, gesticulating wildly, from behind a huge stack of crates. Before she could shout a warning, something blew out their windscreen.

The truck swerved and crashed to a halt. Gabrielle stared down at the broken glass covering her lap, then looked over at Megan. ‘Are you all right?’

Megan nodded, breathing hard. ‘You?’

‘I think so.’

‘Didn’t get hit,’ said Megan. ‘That’s the main thing.’

She worked the truck’s controls. It reversed, then shot forward and back on up the incline, picking up speed.

‘Get down,’ Megan yelled, ‘and stay down.’

Gabrielle ducked and heard the sound of gunfire. Voices dopplered past, then the truck juddered slightly as it collided with something. More shots followed in their wake. The light up ahead of
them seemed painfully bright after so long down in the dimly lit caverns.

Megan pushed the rifle into Gabrielle’s lap. ‘I need you to shoot anything that moves,’ she explained.

‘But I’ve never used a gun bef—’

‘You said you wanted to ride up front, Gabrielle,’ Megan shouted, ‘so make yourself useful. Just point the damn thing and pull the trigger. It’s easy. You don’t
have to even fucking hit anything, just so long as it makes them think twice about getting in our way.’

Gabrielle nodded, her throat going dry, and grasped the rifle awkwardly in both hands. She squinted over the rim of the windscreen.

Up ahead, just on this side of the containment field, she saw a figure climbing into a truck just a moment before it moved to block their way.

Megan didn’t even slow down.

‘Wait,’ protested Gabrielle. ‘You can’t—’

‘No choice,’ Megan grunted, swerving at the very last second, aiming for the narrowing gap between the truck and the tunnel wall.

They almost made it. Almost.

Gabrielle shrieked, twisting to one side to try and protect her belly and the child within. Megan sideswiped the other vehicle, and they came to a sudden halt that propelled them both forward in
their restraints. The other truck had jammed them up against the wall.

Gabrielle glanced at the driver of the other vehicle, now visible in his cabin. He looked in worse shape than either of them. The front of his vehicle had crumpled up from the impact, while
blood oozed from his forehead. He slumped to one side even as she watched, and it looked as if he was having trouble breathing.