Metal Fatigue (17 page)

The posts were rotten with damp and age. They snapped easily — first one, then two, then half a dozen. He was halfway along the warehouse when the roof started to collapse, falling in a wave from the end at which he had entered. He snapped two more posts, then dropped the bar and ran.

He left the building just in time. Behind him, the roof collapsed with a sound like thunder. One of the walls fell with it. A cloud of dust rose into the sky, obscuring the street and the stars above.

He took shelter around a corner and waited.

The clatter of bricks and iron ceased as the wreckage settled. But he didn't allow himself to relax.

Something stirred under the rubble. A section of the roof shifted, and the dust swirled oddly as something emerged from beneath it.

It wasn't the wolf.

It was Roads. The
other
Roads.

And as he watched, caught between flight and fight, it took a step forward — and vanished. Again.

Something half-seen moved through the air towards him, casting no definite image in any spectrum.

He turned and fled as fast as he could. The game was over. He ran for his life.

The thing followed. It was like a mirage — flickering, inconstant and formless — and rapidly gaining.

He reached the pier with a bare second to spare. Legs pounding, he ran as far as he dared across the wood and concrete structure. If he left it an instant too late, it would be upon him.

Something swished at his neck — clutching for him, trying to drag him back —

He turned aside and leapt.

The water accepted his outstretched body with a heavy splash. He kicked powerfully, forced himself down and into the arms of the current. The river tugged him away from the pier, into deeper darkness.

He held his breath as long as he could before risking the surface. With just his mouth above the water, he sucked at air, then submerged again. He swam with strong, even strokes, putting as much open river between himself and the pier as he could.

When he finally stopped to look back, the pier was tiny in the distance. If his pursuer — whoever or whatever it was — was still watching, he could not see it.

Nevertheless, he trod the cold water for an hour before daring to head back to the shore, and to the threatening embrace of the city he had once called Peace.

10:00 a.m.

Roads regained consciousness to a feeling of utter disorientation. He lay on a narrow bed in a room that stank of disinfectant and metal. A headache stretched from the back of his neck to his forehead, unremitting and intolerant of even the slightest movement; his chest throbbed beneath the dulling effects of pain-killers. For a moment he thought he had been operated on, which took him back to his last hospital stay at the age of thirty-one. Then he realised that he wasn't attached to drips or monitors. He must have been injured instead, knocked unconscious — although he couldn't recall the last time
that
had happened at all...

He lay still for a minute before daring to open his eyes.

When he did, he discovered that he was in a ward of the RSD medical unit. The white ceiling stared at him like a rolled-back eyeball. A painting of a racehorse on one wall looked sorely out of place; there hadn't been a horse in Kennedy for as long as he could remember.

"Phil?"

He turned his head and immediately regretted it. Pain throbbed behind his right eye, nearly blinding him. A blonde blur sat in a chair beside the bed, watching him. "Shit... Barney, is that you?"

"Sure is, boss." She stood and came closer.

He tugged an arm out from beneath the covers and tried to look at his watch, but it was gone, a standard plastic bracelet with his name and an LCD display of his body temperature in its place. His hand and forearm were covered with tiny cuts and scratches. Much to his relief, none of them appeared to be bleeding.

"What time is it?"

"Ten past ten. You've been out about eight hours."

"Did I miss anything?"

"Plenty. But first, how are you feeling?"

"Like a building fell on me." He tried to sit, but the pain in his ribs was too excruciating. "What happened?"

"You don't remember?"

"I remember ..." He thought for a moment. "Blindeye, yes, and the Mole. After that, it's a bit hazy."

"The Mole hit you." She frowned. "At least, we assume it was the Mole."

"Whoever it was sure packed a punch." He extended a hand and she helped him sit upright. When he started to slide his legs out of the bed, however, she stepped back in alarm.

"What do you think you're doing?"

"Getting up, or trying to. What does it look like?"

"You're hurt, Phil. You can't — "

"Bullshit. I can do whatever I want." He got his legs free of the covers, and reached out to steady himself as he levered his torso upward. Grey specks danced in front of his eyes; he did his best to ignore them. "See?"

"I'm getting a doctor."

He grabbed her arm and yanked her back, the effort making his ribs sing. "Don't, Barney. I haven't needed a doctor in forty years and don't plan on needing one now."

"Phil, I'm serious — "

"And so am I. Give me a pain-killer and get me home. I'll heal before you know it."

She looked doubtful. "I heard one of the doctors say you had a fractured skull and two broken ribs."

"What would they know? Did they take an X-ray?"

"I think so."

His gut turned to ice. "Did you see it?" The question blurted out before he had time to think.

"No, why?"

"It ... doesn't matter." He took a deep breath to clear his head and flexed his feet, bracing himself for the big push. "Officer Daniels, as your senior in both rank and years, I
order
you to give me a hand."

She didn't relent. "Fuck you, Phil. I'm not having you die on me halfway down the hallway."

"Jesus Christ, Barney, I'm not — "

The door swung open and a white-uniformed nurse entered the room. With one glance she took in what was happening and, much to Roads' astonishment, smiled.

"Ah, you're up. Good." She moved closer and offered him a hand to get to his feet; puzzled, he accepted. "Director Chappel just called. She said to let you go whenever you felt like it."

"She did? Good old Margaret." Roads fought waves of pain that threatened to undermine his balance. "See, Barney? I told you I was better."

"What would the Mantis know?" She shook her head, washing her hands of the senior administration. "I give in."

The nurse handed Barney a bag containing Roads' clothes and personal effects, and pressed a carton of tablets into her hand. "Two every two hours, for the pain. Would you like a wheelchair, Officer Roads?"

"No, I'll be fine." He took a step and changed his mind. "Um, on second thoughts. Barney, could you — ?"

She put an arm around him and helped support his weight as they slowly left the room. The end of the corridor looked kilometres away.

Barney chuckled darkly to herself as the nurse attended to her patients elsewhere.

"What?" he snapped.

"Did I tell you how glad I am to see you alive?"

"No. How glad
are
you?"

"At the moment, you old shit, not very."

The medical unit was in an annexe of RSD HQ, reached by two elevators and an endless maze of corridors from the main operations building.

Roads, although he felt his balance improve with every step, almost didn't make the distance to his office. The pain in his chest and head was incredible.

Barney berated him every step of the way, beginning with a list of all the things that could have been wrong with him and ending with a repeated complaint that he was goddamn heavy.

"This macho shit drives me crazy, Phil — from you of all people."

"It isn't macho shit. Honest."

"Then what is it?"

"Nothing. I just need to keep moving, that's all."

"Whatever; shit by any other name still stinks." She shifted his arm to a more comfortable position. "Do you know what concussion is? It's when your brain bounces around inside your skull, banging against bone and sloshing in its fluid like an ice-cube in a drink. It can result in a coma — even death. Did you know that, Phil?"

"Yes, Barney."

"Well, if you go into a coma, I'm just going to leave you here."

"Fine, but push me out of the way so no-one steps on me first. Okay?"

He grunted his way to the first elevator and let gravity do the work from there. His insides seemed to have successfully rearranged themselves by the time the carriage came to a halt.

The next leg of the journey to his office was slightly easier. He didn't have to rely as much on Barney's support, although her arm stayed where it had been, ostensibly to guide him in the right direction or to catch him if he stumbled.

"You smell nice, Barney."

"I very much doubt it."

"You're right." He sniffed. "You've been busy. Fill me in on what I missed."

She grudgingly described the events as she had seen them: Roads' confrontation with the Mole; the flash of light and the thief's disappearance; the sudden flight of the Shadow on the roof; the destruction of the skylight.

He winced. "Add that to the bill. What happened then?"

"We arrived to pick up the pieces." Goss' team had appeared on the scene in time to be showered by broken glass. No-one had entered or left the building from that point onward without passing a dozen armed security guards. Roads' unconscious body had been examined, placed on a stretcher and removed. Meanwhile, a trail of alarms and infringements had traced a path from the library to the university fence, where it had ended. RSD had made a thorough search of the area, but found nothing. The Shadow had escaped, as had the Mole.

"At least no data was stolen," he commented.

"Thank God for small mercies."

Barney had walked to the medical unit at four in the morning to check on Roads' condition, and managed to catch a couple of hours sleep in an unused bed not far up the hall. When she'd woken, she had discovered that the chain of command had deserted her; everyone involved in Blindeye had delegated their authority to underlings who were too cautious to make radical decisions in their superiors' absence. Chappel had locked herself in her office and was refusing to take calls. Occasionally she appeared on her own initiative to offer direction: Roads' release from the medical unit was obviously an example of one such time: to contribute to the ongoing transfer of data from KCU back to the city's separate datapools was another. Otherwise, in the wake of the previous night, RSD was temporarily on hold.

"Good," he said. "That gives me a little more time."

"For what?"

"I want to run the tapes of Blindeye through an image processor; there must be something we missed, something the cameras picked up that we weren't looking for."

"Such as?"

He remembered the Mole's face — changing, becoming wolf-like before his very eyes — but refused to believe what he had seen. The power of invisibility he also denied. There had to be another explanation.

Events had been set in motion over which he had no control. Depending on Margaret's efforts in the next few hours, he might still have a chance.

"To be honest," he said in response to Barney's question, "I have no idea."

The second elevator was crowded with RSD officers in uniform. He kept his eyes fixed straight ahead and tried to ignore the fact that he was dressed only in a hospital gown. Thankfully, the ride was short-lived and, from there, the walk to his office relatively easy.

He unlocked it, went inside, and collapsed into his chair with a heartfelt groan. Before Barney could take a seat, he waved for the bag.

"I'm going to change and get some rest. In the meantime, I want you to start with the image processor. Begin from when the Mole appeared, and work backward. I'll call you in a little while."

"Sure," she muttered.

"You don't have to," he added. "If you'd rather sleep."

"No, that's fine." She straightened her posture with an effort. "It'll give me something to do, on top of worrying about you."

"Don't. I'll be right as rain before you know it."

"Somehow, against all logic, I believe you." She turned to leave.

"And, Barney?"

"What?"

"Thanks. I really appreciate your help."

"I know." Her smile was like the dawn after a long, cold night. "What would you do without me?"

When Barney had gone, Roads put his feet up on the desk and tried to relax. Pulling a bottle of water from one of the drawers, he washed down one of the painkillers. After a while, the pain ebbed, and he was able to approach its causes more objectively.

The doctors were partly right: he had cracked three ribs on his left side, and one on his right; they burned within his bruised chest like rods of red-hot metal. The fracture of his skull he wasn't sure about, though; it seemed fairly intact, if tender, to his questing fingertips. A fair proportion of his exposed skin — face, hands and arms — had been scratched by broken glass; more nicks in a body already far from perfect.

Switching on his terminal, he called up the city's bulletin-board network and began to browse. Blindeye, thanks no doubt to the efforts of DeKurzak, had been kept out of the headlines; apart from a brief paragraph on the break-in at the university, it wasn't mentioned at all. After the usual pro- and anti-Reassimilation rhetoric, the major topic of the day was another disturbance in the harbour suburbs, which led automatically to calls for a crackdown on street-crime. Talk of building new penal plants to replace those already full, or reintroducing expulsion for antisocial elements, rarely went any further than talk — and for that Roads was glad. The city had already devolved a long way from the complex organism it had once been; if it became any more authoritarian in approach, without genuine reason, then it risked breaking apart entirely.

An hour passed quickly, and Roads began to feel a craving for sugar. Next to the bottle of water was a bar of dark chocolate he had been saving, which he opened and ate in its entirety. Afterward, he felt better. His wounds were already healing; the pain was tolerable.