Transference, p.15
Transference, page 15
I nod, and he shakes his head. “They’re a bunch of idiots really, they don’t even know what they want. They’re just angry and want to make people hurt the way they hurt.”
There’s an understanding in his words. I see it too, they’re no different from who I used to be. They’re willing to sacrifice others to get the change they want, they think the rich are all evil, they want to see them hurt. But I found humanity on my path here, and they may have lost theirs entirely. They’ve killed so many already, I don’t know if I can change them. If they can only be monsters, I may have to destroy them.
“I’m not here to debate their morals, I just want to know where they are, Alec.”
He stares into my face for a while before he responds. The fear from earlier seems to have faded. “I understand. Let me show you my wares, then!”
He pivots and makes a grand sweeping gesture with his arm. The walls are lined with weapons and tools of all sorts. There are grappling devices like the Centurions used, an entire wall of plasma blades, and as I approach the main counter, I see a melter sitting in a transparent display case. It’s small, a one handed operation, but the barrel is nearly the length of my forearm and it has a scope on top. I’ve never seen one in person, there are barely even photos of them.
He sees where my eyes are looking, and laughs. “That’s my prize piece there. You know not even Inquisitors and Centurions are allowed to carry that tech, it’s too big of a risk that it will damage the city. I got it from someone whose family smuggled it in, centuries ago.”
“And it still works?” I say, not taking my eyes off the thing.
“Aye, they don’t really go bad. Draws its charge from the air, but it takes time. Thing like that, it might only squeeze a shot a minute. Not great for rush jobs. Long barrel and scope shows it’s more meant for distance and accuracy. Any idea what you might be interested in? What’s your budget?”
I pull my eyes away, and realize I haven’t even thought about it. The kind of credits I’d spend here would almost certainly get my account locked down, so I need to be damn sure what I’m buying. “I need something for defense, and something to handle Inquisitors too. I might want that melter, but I’m not certain.” His eyes widen and look like they’ll pop out of his skull. I’m not sure if it’s at the mention of me going up against Inquisitors, or at the amount of money he might get from me.
Alec turns around, and beckons me to follow. He takes me to a back room, basically an attached supply closet, and turns over a tarp on the ground. Underneath it is a huge mass of shimmering black. He stands back, letting me inspect, so I move closer. It’s hard to tell the shape, so I poke it with my finger. It feels warm, alive. As I’m watching, the shape morphs.
The indistinguishable mass was a pile of multiple sleeves and pants fit for a giant. They shrink down to a size that would fit me. The length seems tailor made, and two of the arms neatly disappear. Before me now are two identical body suits of beautiful, shimmering black.
“It’s cosmic armor, at least that’s what they call it. Same thing Centurions wear from what I’ve heard, but thankfully I’ve never seen them in person. It’s self-healing, fits itself to each user as you just saw, and will stop most blades and projectiles.”
I recognize it as the armor I saw slow down a plasma blade, which is seriously impressive. “Will it stop a melter?”
“Depending on the range and intensity, maybe. A close up shot would still fry you though. I certainly wouldn’t count on it.”
“I’ll take both of them, now what about something against Inquisitors?”
“We haven’t even discussed cost?”
“That’s fine, we can at the end.”
Alec closes his gaping mouth, and turns out of the supply closet, beckoning me to follow him. Back in the main room, underneath the wall of plasma blades, he shows me what look like a pair of brass knuckles, but in the palm support is a thumb-sized cylinder. There’s a tiny green light on each of them.
He turns back to me, a showman’s smile on his face. “These are EMP fists, they release a tiny electromagnetic pulse into anything they hit. Inquisitors are internally protected from long-range EMP, but something this close will definitely shut them down. Just like the melter, these things have limited charges, but they’ll recharge over time. That’s not the real limiter though.”
“And what is, then?”
“They get hot. Really, really hot. More than a couple of uses in a short time period will make them hot enough to burn, more than that might melt skin. As I understand it, these only ever made it to the prototyping phase. Their use was too limited.”
I nod, thinking it over. “Okay, I’ll take it all. The armor, the melter, these knuckles, and I want one of those plasma blades too. My knife is useful, but a bit short. What’s the cost?”
Alec’s visibly sweating. He walks back to his counter and starts going through files, pulling out sheaths of crumpled paper and writing figures down on a piece of paper. He stares at it for a while, his pen stuck in his mouth, and then puts the piece of paper in front of me.
I laugh, maniacally. It’s an astronomical sum, a quarter of the family wealth of Allen Cloudspire that I have access to. A part of me feels shame at the thought of stealing from this dead man’s family, but there is no other course open to me. I’ll consider it reparations, then.
“If I pay this, they will shut down my account. They will track this location, probably nearly immediately. You will have to leave this place.”
It’s Alec’s turn to laugh, his whole body shaking. “Look, if you pay for all this I don’t have much of value left to sell. It’s more money than I could dream of. If you pay this I’m packing up and going deep into hiding.”
I nod, thinking it over. “Can we time-delay the transfer one day? That will give us both some time to evacuate.”
He nods. “Those are acceptable terms to me.”
I queue up the credits on my screen, and show it to him for approval. His eyes are massive, and his mouth is hanging open, but he nods still. I will no longer be welcome as Allen Cloudspire. This is a bridge I can’t repair. I set the transfer back one day, and hold my arm out. He eagerly grabs it with his own forearm, and the deed is done.
Alec helps me to put on the gear. The cosmic armor morphs over me like a second skin, it’s incredibly light and barely hinders movement. I put it on under my clothes, and in the mirror you can’t even see it. The melter I strap in a holster at my hip, and the plasma blade right next to it. I have no way to conceal them from sight, so I’ll have to try to not attract any attention on the street. The knuckles go into the front pockets of my uniform.
I feel ridiculous, shit, I look ridiculous in all of this. I barely know how half of it works, although Alec shows me all the different buttons and things to know. I try to copy his words verbatim to memory, and touch the different toggles and switches in my hand to memorize their feel. He wraps the second suit of cosmic armor behind paper. It looks like a present when he’s done, which will do perfectly.
As a gift, Alec throws in a tracker ball. It’s a neat bit of tech, any place that the user thinks of it can map to, but they have to have been there before and seen the way. He holds it to his temple and it programs with the location of the Plague Doctors. Or at least, I hope that’s where it’s sending us.
“The way there gets a little wet. All of your gear is fine for that. You could use a shower anyways,” he adds, laughing. My purchases seem to have made him forgive me for the threats earlier. “You’ll be going down into the sewers. Follow the walk down from the Metal Oyster to the bottom of the Boroughs. You’ll find a maintenance access door there. Oh, and before I forget. You’ll want these.” He reaches under the counter, and pulls out a handful of cotton balls. He motions them going up his nose, and then hands them over to me. “It gets pretty bad at times down there.”
I stuff them in my pocket, and take a few deep breaths to calm my nerves. Then I pen a message on my screen, and send it off.
Hullo Dotty,
How does a night out at the Metal Oyster sound? I’ll see you there at sunset.
Entirely Yours,
Allen Cloudspire
Everything is in motion now, time to find out where this road ends.
Chapter 15
From the light on the walk, I can only make out the line of Dotty’s neck as she stands in the shadows of an alley behind the Oyster. I’ve given her the wrapped parcel from Alec, and explained what it is. She’s brought a pair of black waterproof tights and jacket that will cover the armor perfectly. She even managed to get a similar set of clothes for me when she went to my house, and I’m eternally grateful to remove the blood and puke stained uniform. I can’t believe it’s only been two days since that party at the Skyball. Time has stretched and expanded too much since then.
Charon sits at my side in the shadows. I’m absent mindedly scratching his chin, and he’s giving a deeply gratifying purr. He’s the real reason I asked her to stop there. I’ve grown fond of the panther, and Dotty gave him the choice of staying in Cloudspire or coming with us. He’d been sleeping on my bed still, and only responded with a hissed, “So he’s alive” as he followed her stealthily back out of the house.
Dotty finishes changing and walks back out of the alley, giving me a small nod to show that she’s ready. There’s a satchel on her back. She told me only that it contains something of her father’s that will let us through the biometric lock. I decided not to pursue it further, hoping instead that it wasn’t too gruesome. The three of us make our way down the walk, keeping to the shadows and avoiding any crowds we see. There are a few tense moments in Meadow Hearth where we have to duck into an alley to avoid some drunks, but by the time we reach Five Boroughs the streets are empty. We move quickly then, making our way further and further down to the sewers.
We stop within sight of the maintenance access to shove cotton into our nostrils. The stench is so overwhelming already it’s making me nauseous. The cotton dulls the smell, but also makes it feel like it’s stuck inside my nose. I focus on movement, and try to ignore the stench.
The access door is small and round, with a large turn lock. I grab it firmly, expecting resistance, but it turns easily and swings open. The three of us move into the darkness beyond. From the glow of the street lamps, we can see that we’re on a low-ceiling walkway that sits barely above the steady stream of sewage. The smell is other-worldly, and as soon as we move inside, Dotty leans against the wall and vomits. I follow up right behind her.
I close the door, and we’re left in pure darkness. It’s eerie knowing Dotty and Charon are right beside me, but feeling like I’m alone in the universe. I blindly find the tracker ball in my pocket, and when I depress the button on top it shoots into the air. A mesh of white light scans our surroundings. The suddenly intense light in the otherwise pitch blackness blinds us momentarily, and we all turn our faces from it. The tracker then beeps smartly, and starts to move down the corridor.
It always stays the same distance ahead. Close enough to add some light, but far enough that large stretches of the walk are still covered in darkness. We make our way slowly at first, but as we get more comfortable with our surroundings the pace increases. All three of us are moving as noiselessly as possible, afraid to wake anything that might be down here. My brain makes monsters of the darkness, of every sound, but I focus on movement and it helps to keep my nerves somewhat calm.
The sewers seem to be an endless series of passageways. Since we entered, they’ve branched in so many directions that I wouldn’t be able to find my way back. We’re dependent on this tracker, and I nervously realize what a mistake that might have been. Alec could have easily programmed it to put us in the center of this maze, knowing that we’d die before we got back out.
What can we do, but follow it now? I don’t have another option.
The smell has changed since we entered, or I’ve gotten used to it. I motion to Dotty to stop, and pull the cotton from my nose. The smell of the sewers is a distant memory, barely lingering around the edges of the humid air. The rush of water hasn’t changed next to us, but now it smells fresh. I bend down and cup some in my hand, and after smelling it up close, hesitantly put it to my lips. I taste clean, crisp water.
Up to this point I hadn’t considered the distribution of clean water through the city. There’s no naturally occurring springs here. If refuse flows from everywhere down to the Boroughs, clean water must flow from here out to the city. If these tunnels follow that water, then they’d allow access to every part of the city. I’m starting to see how the Plague Doctors have operated without the Inquisitors being aware.
When I stand back up, I realize we’ve lost sight of the tracker around a corner. The three of us pick up our pace to get it back in eyesight. We round the corner, and step right off the edge of the walkway.
I see the walkway continues straight above us as we spiral into the blackness. It fades from view as we suddenly fall down a steep, round chute. Covered in water, the three of us are a jumbled mess of limbs. We’re all trying to arrest ourselves against the wall, but it’s counterproductive. I grab for the wall and accidentally punch Dotty in the face, while she knees me in the groin trying to stop her foot on something. Charon tries to jump off of me to safety, but just hits the wall. And just as falling starts to feel normal, the chute disappears entirely, and we’re spat into a brightly illuminated room.
I’m really falling now, end over end, in the tumultuous flow of a waterfall. I can only hope that there’s water in the landing. I’m blind from the sudden light, and flipping around too much to get any bearings. I splash down into a deep pool, but I only feel thankful for the soft landing for a moment. Slick flesh writhes all around me. Massive, wet bodies are hitting me all over, and I almost pull out my plasma knife to fight back. But without being able to see, I might hurt Dotty or Charon, and it’s a risk I can’t take. I open my eyes, and swim toward the light. My vision is obscured by the writhing forms that constantly careen into my legs, arms, and face. I fight against it for the surface.
As I breach, I see Dotty off to my left, splashing chaotically. The water is alive and turbulent all around us. Something is trying to drown us, smother us, and I can’t let it end like this. And then, a large trout hops out of the water right in front of me, and it breaks through my fear.
“They’re just fish! Holy shit, they’re just fish!”
“WHAT?!” Dotty yells back, barely staying afloat.
Calm now, I swim through the writhing mass towards her, and keep her afloat. I’m laughing hysterically now.
“They’re just fish! I thought we were going to die, but they’re just fucking fish!”
Her face is as dumbstruck as I feel. We laugh together in the water, like we’ve conquered death. As we stop moving, the waters slowly calm. We’re in a high-ceilinged rectangular room. There’s a walkway that rings this pool and several doors split off from it. Charon surfaces near the walkway and pulls himself onto it. He has a fish in his jaws, and is already setting into it.
We swim toward him, and pull ourselves out of the water. Thankfully, this was all clean water we were in, and I shudder to think if it had been sewage instead.
A small metal oyster sign hangs above one of the doors, and I point it out to Dotty. “I guess that explains where their fish come from,” I say, and we grin at each other for finding the solution to such an old mystery.
We sit on the edge for some time, watching the fish swim. The pool of water is completely full of them, a mass of different colors and sizes. Born in a metal box, just waiting to be chosen for slaughter. Waiting for someone wealthy to decide to eat them. Charon has finished his meal, and is drinking from the pool. Calm now, I notice the tracker is dutifully waiting at a door opposite of the entrance to the Metal Oyster. We slowly gather ourselves, and continue to follow it.
The path here is taller and well lit, but no less confusing. We follow the tracker through meandering corridors and countless forks. There are more pools of fish on the way, they’re smaller the further we get from the main room. These must be the hatcheries then. There are signs labeling them. Rainbow trout, Chilean sea bass, Atlantic salmon. Some of the words are strange to me, foreign. We see several signs pointing towards the bluefin tuna pool, but the tracker takes us in a different direction.
After what feels like miles, we round a corner and find the tracker stopped in front of a door. There’s graffiti all over it, from obscene images to sayings like Eat The Rich and Chaos is a Lifestyle. The tracker beeps again, and when I hold out my hand, the tracker returns to it and turns off. The three of us stare at the door for a while. I can tell that Dotty is really nervous, she’s breathing hard and erratically.
I find her hand, and squeeze it. “It’s going to be fine, I’ll go in first and Charon after me. We’re just here to talk with them.” There are tears in her eyes for some reason, and she’s gone very pale. She nods meekly, and I turn back toward the door.
I pull out my new melter. It may not be the right tool against a group of people, but it sure looks like it would dissuade conflict. I take a deep breath, and then throw the door open. It slams against the inside wall, and I rush in with Charon at my heels and my melter held high.
The inside of the room is bigger than I could have ever anticipated. After the claustrophobic tunnels it feels entirely out of place. There are around twenty men and women scattered through the room, and they all turn to stare at the noise. Some of them were playing cards at a small table, others were over relaxing on the cots in the corner. Some are working in a kitchen that completely lines the far wall, the food smells rich and delicious. Corridors continue out the back of the room, and a few faces have appeared out of them already. I’m briefly stunned by the scale of it—it’s so much more than I imagined.
