spare. No sign of the monster. Or of Kez’s
brother.
The sound of laughter from one of the
other rooms. Ape and the monster appear,
walking side by side. The monster has her
arm through Ape’s. Ape’s drinking out of a
plaz bulb as he walks. He looks relaxed. His
skin’s whole.
If he so much as smiles at us, I’m going to
flay him myself.
“Kezra! And Mister . . . Snow. So glad
you could join us. And right on time, too.
You know how I adore punctuality.”
I give her a hard stare before lowering
Kez to the floor. The bandage around Kez’s
arm is soaked through. She’s so pale she
looks blue. I kneel next to her, prop her up on
her backpack. Push her bangs back from her
face. “Hang in there,” I tell her.
“What happened?” Ape drops down on
his knees next to his sister.
“Fucking rats weren’t happy with the
price. Or the mark,” I say as I take out the
bandages and newskin. “Gimme that. She
needs fluids.” I take the plaz bulb from him.
Hold it for Kez to drink from. She drains it
dry in a couple of gulps.
“They have lost all sense of honor,” the
monster says.
“They’re starving,” Kez says weakly.
“You have plenty.” She nods at the empty
bulb. “Why don’t you share with them?”
“With vermin? Why? So they can spread?
So they can breed? No, Kezzy. There are
two ways to deal with rats. Poison them or
starve them out. Poison didn’t work. They
smelled it.” That would explain the rotting
meat stink in the tunnels. The monster
continues, “So we’ve tried Plan B. And it
seems to be working rather well.”
“It almost got me killed,” Kez hisses.
Ignoring their argument, I peel off the
bloody bandage and press my thumb against
the wound. While I’m applying pressure, Kez
loops her other arm around my neck and
slowly pulls herself into my lap. I help her,
tucking her into my chest, folding her injured
arm between us.
“If someone like me dies down here, the
Deeps will close,” Kez says. “No one will
come.”
The monster purses her mirrored lips.
“That would be a pretty major problem
with Plan B,” I observe.
The monster regards us in stony silence.
I check the wound again. Barely oozing. I
give it a fresh spray of newskin and rewrap
it. Toss Kez’s backpack and the tether for the
box to Ape. Then I climb slowly to my feet,
lifting Kez in my arms as I rise. “Let’s go.”
“I can walk,” she murmurs.
“Now’s not the time to find out.” Not
around all these predators.
She puts her arms around my shoulders,
turns her face into my neck. It’s freezing in
the Snatchers’ tunnels, but her skin feels
clammy against mine. “Wait,” she whispers.
I stop, adjust her in my arms.
“You opened the door for a name,” she
says, turning her head towards Penny.
“A dead man’s name. Or so the stars
say.”
“He stays dead. Silence for silence. You
don’t repeat that name and I don’t tell anyone
what happened here. The Deeps stay open.
Deal?”
The monster’s silent for a long moment.
Finally, she says, “Deal.”
“Goodbye, Penny,” Kez says, turning her
face back into my neck.
“Goodbye, Kezzy,” the monster says.
“Goodbye, Mister Snow. Goodbye, my hairy
Ape Man. See you soon.”
I don’t wait to hear anymore. Don’t want
to think about what the monster and Ape have
been doing while Kez has been bleeding. I
turn and carry Kez out of the Snatchers’ den
before anyone else tries to hurt her. Ape
trails behind us, dropping a little further back
with each step as I find my stride, settle Kez
more comfortably in my arms, until by the
time we’re back to the escalator, he’s just a
bobbing point of light back in the tunnel.
I step onto the escalator, readjust Kez so
that the handrails help me support her
weight. My biceps are burning, but it’s not
far now to the exit. Then I’ll have to figure
out something else. I don’t think I can carry
her the two klicks to the ship.
“You made one mistake,” I tell Kez as the
escalator carries us steadily upwards.
She snorts softly into my neck. “I think I
made about fifty, starting with taking this
run.”
“You gave away a pretty big chip there at
the end. You don’t owe me anything.”
“You gave your . . . that name, to save my
brother. Although it didn’t look like he
needed saving.” She shakes her head.
“Protecting it was the least I could do.”
When I don’t say anything, taken aback by
this unexpected show of loyalty, she asks
softly. “Who . . . was he?”
“Butcher of Tje Dhos. You never heard
of him?”
She shakes her head.
“Lucky you,” I say. Earth Authority
splashed my name and face all over the
flashes for weeks, just to make sure no one
would ever believe me, if I decided to talk.
Not that I ever did. Kuseros is a pretty
backwater Colony, but it still gets Core
System flash, so either Kez wasn’t paying
attention when Earth Authority fucked me, or
it’s such old news she doesn’t remember it.
“It scared her, that name. Penny doesn’t
spook easy.”
“Death used to follow him. Pretty close.
Sometimes quick, sometimes slow. Always
ugly. You really never heard of him?”
“No.” She’s silent for a moment. Trying
to remember, maybe. “How did he die?”
“He outed Tol Seng . . .”
“No one escapes from Tol Seng,” she
says quietly.
“Yeah, well, there’s a first for
everything. He broke out. Hid on a guard
transport heading to Yrillo. Maybe he died
when the transport crashed in the middle of
fucking nowhere. Maybe he died afterwards
when the guards went bug-nuts from lack of
oxygen. There are different stories.”
“Are any of them true?”
“Probably not.”
Kez is silent for a while. As we near the
top of the escalator, she says, “So that’s the
only thing you think I did wrong?”
I chuckle. She’s still seeking approval. I
like that. “Was there anythin’ else?”
“Everything,” she sighs. “This run’s been
totally fucked. I haven’t had to fight my way
out . . . in a long time. I haven’t heard a
whisper about the Pack squeezing the
Snatchers, or the Snatchers trying to starve
out the Pack.
But it must have been going on
a while. I could have brought food. I usually
do. If I’d just had some food to offer them,
that whole mess could have been avoided. It
was just . . . Penny sounded so definite when
I spoke to her. She definitely had the
package. Definitely would hold onto it until
midnight. Definitely would give it to me for
two hundred and a little grease. But she must
have been lying through her fucking steel
teeth the whole time. The Pack always had it,
and she never negotiated with them. They’re
at war.” She bumps her head against my
shoulder. “Now I’m fucked with the Pack.
That one who spoke for them, the white one,
he won’t forget this. Fuck.”
“Anything you can do to fix it?”
“Other than turning you over to them?”
She looks up at me.
“Yeah, other than that.”
She shrugs. “I don’t know. The Pack’s
pretty secretive. No one knows what they
want. That might be why I haven’t heard
anything about this war with the Snatchers.
It’s not like no one would side with the Pack,
if they knew. Penny and her boys have made
plenty of enemies over the years. And there
are other tribes the Pack could call on. The
Deep Whites on the SoBo. They’d help.”
“If it’s a turf war, they gotta show they’re
strong enough to take the territory on their
own. Otherwise, they’ll never hold it.”
uh, are you going to put me down?”
We’ve reached the top of the escalator.
No sign of her bladed buddy. Looks like a
clear exit and then two klicks through the
Kuus streets to my ship. Can I carry her that
far? My biceps are saying no. But I’m
tempted to give it a try anyway. While I’m
carrying her, she can’t get into any trouble.
“No,” I grunt.
She shifts in my arms and hugs my neck
tight. “Thank you for carrying me this far. I
can walk from here. Seriously. I’m not going
to try boarding.” She gives a shaky laugh.
“But I’m okay to walk.”
I lower her to the ground reluctantly.
Keep my arm around her as she gets her legs
under her. She does look better, although the
circles around her eyes are deeper than ever.
She rubs her chest like it hurts.
“You okay?”
“I’ll survive.” She rolls her neck until it
pops. “Let’s get out of here.”
I glance back down the escalator. Ape’s
about two-thirds of the way up. “You want to
wait for him.”
She nods. “He’s only been to Kuus a few
times. I don’t want him to get lost.”
“How often d’you come here?”
“Less than I used to. I had a regular run
up the Valley.” She fiddles with one of her
dreads. “It got too hot so I let the NoBos
undercut me.”
I nod. I’ve let a few of my competitors do
the same thing. Saves face rather than
refusing a contract.
“I don’t think I’ll be coming back anytime
soon—”
She’s interrupted by the arrival of her
brother, who takes one look at her standing
on her own power and tries to hand her the
backpack. “Why do I have to carry
everything?” he grumbles.
I intercept the bag and sling it over my
shoulder. Hold my hand out for the box’s
tether. “Fucking infant.”
Kez ignores his whining. “Ape, get on
your board. Stay within a block of us.
Seriously, this is not the night for wandering
off.”
“Yeah, yeah.” Her brother pulls his
board out of its harness, flicks it on and
mounts up. He swoops around the empty
station several times before zooming up the
stairs to the street.
“I can take the box if you want,” Kez
offers.
“Don’t trust me?”
She shakes her head. “No, it’s not like
that.”
“You’ll move faster if you’re not
dragging anything.” Although the floating box
is not difficult to manage, it is one more thing
to pull along while she’s already having
trouble moving under her own steam. “Let’s
go.”
“Okay.” She smiles at me and sets off. By
the time we’re half-way up the stairs, she’s
taking them two at a time. When we reach the
street, she breaks into a jog.
“You sure you’re up to this?”
“I’ll slow down if I feel sick again.”
“Gut-sick?” She’s lost a decent amount of
blood. I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s
queasy.
“A little. Nothing like when we were in
the tunnels. I thought I was going to puke all
over the Snatchers’ clock.”
“That’d rust the fucker fast.”
She grins at me and we jog along in
silence for a while, the glow-beads in her
hair lighting the way through the quiet streets.
“How’re you doing?” I ask her once
we’re past the half-way point. The
spaceport’s lights are bright up ahead, but
there’s still a lot of dark street between here
and there.
“I’m okay.” She sounds short of breath,
but her stride is solid.
We jog on for a few more meters when
something in her backpack buzzes.
“Kez—”
“I heard it. Civil Patrol. We need to get
entranceway. I follow her into what looks
like a hover service center. She weaves
between large pieces of machinery. Ducks
down into a dark corner. She quickly
assembles her viewie and taps her brother’s
picture. “Ape, C.P. Get off the street.”
I pull a drop cloth off one of the machines
and throw it over the box to cover the lights.
Crouch down next to Kez. The light from her
hair winks out. Her hand steals into mine.
Her skin’s clammy.
“You wanted?” I whisper to her. She’s
been awfully bold for someone wanted by
the Kuus badges.
“No, but if they see us on the street this
late, they’re going to want to know what
we’re doing. They might search the box,
which would be hard to explain. Or my
backpack. Some things in there would be
harder to explain. Either way, they’d
probably take us in for questioning, which
would mean missing the drop. Hard night for
nothing.”
“Yeah.”
She’s quiet for a few seconds, during
which I hear the whir of neg cells in the
distance. A Civil Patrol hover. I shift further
back into the shadows.
“Um . . . should I still call you Snow?
Sorry, what was your first name?”
“Hale.” No one
but the parents I barely
remember has ever called me by my full
name. “Call me Snow.”
She clears her throat. “Snow, if we get
caught—”
“Yeah?” I can’t afford to be. Even in this
backwater Colony, standard operating
procedure will include a DNA check, and if
they run it through any central register, it will
ring most wanted bells from here to the Core
System. If Civil Patrol comes into our little
hideout, they won’t be walking back out.
“If they catch us, I’ll go with them,” she
says. “They’ve got nothing real on me.
They’ll hold me overnight maybe. You take
the package to New Brunny—”
I squeeze her hand. “Something I learned
over the years? It’s the rabbits that get
caught. An’ what do rabbits do?”
“Hop?” she whispers.
“They run. Be patient. They’ll go by, then
we move.”
“Rabbits freeze, you know.” I can hear
her mischievous grin in her whisper. “Isn’t
that what we’re doing?”
“Quiet, smartass.”
A search-light flicks across the windows,
briefly illuminating her face. The shadows
around her eyes are so deep, her face looks
like a skull. I can feel her hand shaking in
mine. Adrenaline crash. I wait until the
searchlight passes, and the whine of the
floater’s neg cells fades into the distance,
before I ask, “Kez, how you doin’?”
“I’m going to sleep for a month after this
is over.”
“C’mon, we’re almost there.” That’s not
entirely true, but we’re over half-way now. I
lead her to the entrance, scout the street.
Looks clear. Time for the moment of truth.
I step out into the street. Nothing happens.
No light hits me. No voice booms at me to
stop. I tug the box after me, and when she’s
slow to follow, Kez. She’s not up to running,
not even at the pace we were going. She
walks okay for a few hundred meters, then
stumbles. I loop my arm around her and
support her the rest of the way to the docks.
Ape is waiting for us at the spaceport
entrance, leaning against the plaz barrier and
twirling his float board between his left foot
and hand. Cocky chimp. He hooks a thumb at
the A-Eye guarding the gate. “They won’t let
me in.”
“Told you, there’s a curfew.” I pass him
the box’s tether to free up a hand. Keep hold
of his sister while I fish Snow’s Multi out of
a pocket in my fatigues. A swipe of the little
fob across the A-Eye’s beady red viewie and