Breathing Space Page 3

  The cheers were significantly louder.

  “Is there anything else you fine people need? We’re working on the hot baths, dirt-reared food and fine wine, by the way…”

  The roar of laughter was gratifying and the medics’ shoulders were less hunched as they returned to their grim task.

  “Thank you, Chief! I— Thank you…” Peeling off his gloves, Dr Everson grabbed my hand and enthusiastically shook it.

  I forced a smile, feeling a bloated fraud.

  *

  Just over an hour later, I wanted to curse the heartless streak of slime who recommended that I watch Hawking’s riot. It was a relief to see I wasn’t the only one affected. Admiral Jasen Starcaster, a big, generous-hearted chap who’d wept at Norman’s funeral, was shaking his head and cursing in a rumbling baritone at the horrific scenes scrolling across the vu-screens. Captain Potter, in command of the P’s flagship Predominant, stared at the screen, his mouth a thin line before he stamped out, apparently recalling some duty he needed to urgently attend.

  Though for once in this sorry saga of mess-ups and disaster, we had a stroke of good fortune. The Stationmaster had died horribly, as had most of his team. But Deputy Stationmaster Nevron Pilot had received a tip-off that Basement Level was going to blow and taken it to his chief, who ridiculed his fears. However, Nevron was so convinced there was going to be trouble, he’d persuaded his family to leave their comfortable apartment on Trader Level and tucked them away in a small maintenance shaft. And at the very first sign of unrest, he left his post and joined them, welding the doors behind him. There they’d remained for three terrifying days, until dehydrated and hungry, he had ventured out to find his home laid waste and all his friends and neighbours gone. But it did mean that we had a Hawking high-up to consult as we planned our foray into Basement Level.

  “It’s a rats-nest,” he said. “If you’ve an atom of sense, you’ll blow all the hatches and flush everyone down there into hard vacuum.”

  This is a turn-up. We’re normally the ones that need restraining, not the civvies. “There’s a lot of children down there. And a bunch of refugees whose only crime was to be in the wrong place when those godless aliens decided to evict humanity from a slice of space we’d already settled,” I protested.

  Nevron snorted. “They’ve been given so many chances, those still stuck down there are the lowlifes that won’t be helped. We provide— provided retraining, classes for the children, as well as subsidised food and water… We all but wiped their useless arses. And the sorry lot down there still leeched off the rest of us. I kept telling Evry we needed to go into Basement Level and do a proper census. We don’t even know the numbers down there! Then give them an ultimatum. Get an honest job, or risk being dumped onto the nearest penal colony for non-payment of all the air and water they’re sucking up.”

  I would’ve had less sympathy for his unbending attitude, if tears weren’t coursing down his cheeks. Besides, he had a point. I recalled my own shock at the dire conditions down there, some five years earlier.

  “What was Stationmaster Evry Smith’s response when you raised this issue with him?” asked David.

  Nevron flung his arms in the air. “That without reinforcements from outside, we weren’t in a position to take them on! Yet. And when I asked him exactly when we’d be in a position to root them out from Basement Level, he’d get all antsy. Suggest that if I was so keen, maybe I’d like to wander down there myself and see how far I got with my skin intact. Which was the point!” His face flushed with fury. “Every month there was some major incident involving the sodding dreggers, may a black hole swallow them whole! Running this place would be a breeze if they weren’t lodged there like some putrid growth…” his voice broke and he wiped his eyes. “And I was told that my obsession about Basement Level had already vacc’d my promotion prospects. Like that matters now… Wh-when the man who’d made those threats is now in b-bloody pieces… and I’m n-not…”

  “Was there any effort to repair the holes the fugees drilled in the bulkheads down there?” I asked.

  He stopped in mid-sob, focusing a tear-smeared stare my way. “How’d you know about the breaches in the bulkheads?”

  “I ended up down there a few years back…” I shifted under his gaze.

  “Thought when I first saw your profile pic as the new P’s Leader, your face looked familiar. You were one of those girls, weren’t you? From that English merchanter – the captain was a real fuse-brained piece of work. What was it called, now?” No more tears, as Nevron’s face puckered with the effort of remembering.

  “Shooting Star,” I said, conscious the clock was ticking.

  He clicked his fingers. “That’s it! And the answer to your question is – no. Which is probably why that’s where Hawking is most structurally compromised.”

  “So,” Admiral Jasen Starcaster rumbled, “have you any up-dated plans of the layout on Basement Level?”

  “No!” Nevron jumped up. “We haven’t. Okay? And yeah - I know that’s a prodding disgrace…”

  Enough of this. He needs to get a grip. Jessica was right. We didn’t have time for his tantrums.

  I surged to my feet and pushed him back into his chair. Hard. Before stepping inside his personal space and leaning over him. “I’m sorry, I truly am, but we need to go down into Basement Level – and soon. Before word reaches the dregger gangs that we’re on our way. We aren’t here to judge you. Our priority is to round up the bilgecrud responsible for this crime.” I lowered my voice, “There are other methods of getting our Intel, though they involve drugs and leave you feeling very unwell. So we’d rather avoid that procedure and I’m sure you would, too.” Besides, it takes even longer if we’re to do it completely safely.

  Nevron swallowed, blinking rapidly. “What do you want to know?”

  As I resumed my seat, Jasen gave me an approving nod.

  The questioning continued smoothly, while I privately shook my head at the stupidity of the Stationmaster. He’d accepted a freighter full of refugees in desperate straits, rather than turn them away to face certain death – a humanely good deed. Unfortunately, he’d stuffed them down in the bowels of the station, alongside the scum who’d made that level of Hawking their illegal home. And instead of calling upon us to flush the place out, he’d fiddled around at the edges, wasting hard-earned creds on work and education programmes. Because far too many folks were unable to take advantage of his schemes – women caring for children, for instance. The only solution offered to them, was to place the younger or prettier children with new families via an adoption service, which was a step many parents wouldn’t consider.

  Another grim piece of news came to light when David asked, “Who is running the largest dregger gang down there at present?”

  Nevron grimaced. “A piece of offal called Norby. Madder than a space-spooked cat and twice as nasty.”

  “That’s the solid truth! I watched Norby shoot his own nephew in cold blood.” The very first murder I witnessed. I shivered, recalling his foul breath and skin-crawling grin.

  David turned to me. “You can identify him, Chief?”

  “Yeah.” I didn’t add that Norby had regularly featured in my more lurid nightmares since our encounter.

  Admiral Starcaster nodded at Nevron. “Thank you for your assistance. Allow us to extend protection to you and your family by providing you with accommodation on our flagship.”

  “Thank you! That’s… we’d be delighted…”

  A quick hail from David on his coms produced a guard detail. I felt a surge of pride as the guard commander snapped off a smart salute and waited for his orders.

  “Please escort Deputy Stationmaster Pilot and his family back to the safety of the ship. Report to the Purser, who’ll find them suitable accommodation.” David’s voice was absolutely level, as he added, “Deputy Stationmaster Pilot and his family are a Code Red priority, is that clear?”

  Which means they mustn’t be allowed to fall into enemy hand
s under any circumstances. I turned to Nevron, smiling. “Your safety and that of your family is of the greatest importance to us.” The absolute truth, as it happens. So long as he doesn’t stop to think about the ramifications of what that means…

  Fortunately, Deputy Stationmaster Pilot clearly wasn’t familiar with military thinking. Clenched tension fell away from his face, leaving him looking a decade younger.

  As for me, with the prospect of scrolling through yet more pics of unspeakable scumbags doing vile things to shocked innocents, I took a deep breath. Though that didn’t take away the taste of dread in my mouth, or my fervent wish that, instead, I was on a certain rural planet and striding down a muddy lane alongside a lanky blond.

  CHAPTER THREE

  I swallowed hard, willing my coffee to stay put. On the vu-screen, the maintenance shaft tilted and blurred as the mobile vidcam skidded along the smooth metal flooring. Triggering unwelcome memories of my own time spent in these very same tunnels, only a handful of years ago…

  Crawling hurts every time my blistered palms take my weight… Breath rasps in my throat, while I struggle with the fifth-rate muck that passes for air down here… We haul an injured Wynn along on a stretcher made of our overalls.

  “Shh!” Jessica ahead freezes.

  We stop and I try not to pant, aware the noise I’m making is too loud. Have the Dreggers managed to cut ahead of us? Are they waiting in ambush?

  Thanks to Wynn’s guidance, they weren’t. We’d escaped from Basement Level along the maintenance shafts back to Trader Level and Shooting Star, where a crock of misery was waiting in the shape of my rigidly authoritarian stepfather. And Tomas had been in charge of the detail who’d escorted me to the brig—

  “Sweep completed,” a merc’s breathless voice jerked me back to the present. “Permission to progress to the next level.”

  I leaned forward. Admiral Jasen Starcaster had arranged for this coded phrase, so that if Norby or his nasty crew were monitoring our coms-chatter, it would sound like any other routine search through the upper levels of Hawking. Before deploying any of our forces into Basement Level, Jasen had insisted on an extensive scan of the warren of illegal tunnels and hidey-holes. We’d half-expected some fuzzing of our scan-sigs but all the readings were pin-sharp and in no time flat we had a series of detailed plans.

  “Proceed with the next Level.” Jasen sounded bored as he gave the code phrase to start Operation Boltcutter.

  Whereas I was shaking, ambushed by long-gone events, competing with the fear I always felt when sending our people on a major job. Especially as this deployment had the potential to become an almighty mess.

  Our troops poured out of the maintenance tunnels and secured all the access points to Basement Level. Sitting here in the Ops Room on Predominant, watching it unfold on the curved bank of vu-screens, my belly churned at the prospect of having to witness our people getting hurt and killed down there. Meanwhile, the scouts scanning for booby-traps sigged it was clear.

  As well as the visual feedback, we got sound and smells, filtered to exclude any noxious substances. Although the revolting stench of human excrement, blood and burnt modcrete rolling through the Ops Room had me wondering if this refinement was one of our shinier ideas.

  “There’s been fighting down here, sir.” The scout was clearly fond of stating the obvious.

  Blast marks had scorched and melted the walls. Mother Earth above – someone let off a maser cannon down there! The trampled rubbish carpeting the floor was – fortunately – too soggy to catch fire, though there were charred patches and smeared remains, including a small foot and seared bones. I shifted in my chair, gripping the armrests hard enough to make my fingers ache. Someone – probably Norby – had chosen a child for target practice. Chem-cripped drosser! Why couldn’t he use the rats, like any normal person?

  David, sitting next to me, murmured, “You solid, Liz?”

  “Mm.” No point in lying to him. I kept my gaze on the screens, hoping he’d allow me enough free air to haul myself together.

  “Zone One is clear. No hostiles or civis in the area,” reported the captain on vu-screen one.

  Two other squad commanders echoed her message on different screens from other parts of Basement Level. Which left the furthest section from any of the designated access points, tucked right away through the warren of illegal tunnels.

  “Don’t like this,” Jasen muttered. “Stinks of an ambush.”

  David answered, “We’ve been monitoring the whole area for over a day now, sir—”

  The blast was deafening.

  I flung myself onto the floor. Before springing onto my feet as my brain caught up with my reflexes and the knowledge that the explosion came from one of the vu-screens.

  Jasen was barking out a series of staccato orders, while the stench of burnt modcrete and decomposing rubbish rolled through the room.

  Don’t you dare puke! Jessica’s howl allowed me to hang onto my last meal, until David had the presence of mind to switch off the smell option.

  I shakily resumed my seat. As the haze of finely shredded rubbish and smoke slowly cleared, it was gratifying to see how well the training stuck. Other than one poor soul writhing in agony over a missing foot, everyone else was absolutely still. Many booby-traps are motion-sensitive, so their response was text-book.

  My fingers shredded the nosewipe in my pocket as I made desperate promises to any passing deity. No more beautiful, amusing men to keep me company at night, I promise. Just don’t let any more of our people suffer. Please…

  Meanwhile, a drone was sent into the blast zone to collect up evidence – a tediously slow process. For once, however, luck was on our side. The trigger mechanism was blown more or less at the feet of the squad commander. Being one of our experienced officers, she immediately spotted the remains of a thermafuse. Another shiny new piece of ordnance that had been looted from under our noses.

  Flaming Mercury! This piece of kit hadn’t even been released for general use, as we were still field testing its full potential. So the leak was definitely in Procurement, my very own department, before the thankless post of Chief was foisted upon me.

  Well of course, Lizzy. This is Eddy. He’s bound to target the place he knows you care most about. It’s something of a disappointment that you hadn’t already considered this possibility… Not for the first time, I wondered why Jessica didn’t have the decency to haunt the gutless scum who’d blasted her apart, instead of choosing to torment me.

  Thanks for your input, Jessica. A shame you didn’t see fit to share this insight when it could have been useful. Before our thermafuses were pocketed, for instance.

  Admiral Jasen Starcaster and his tactical advisers, including David, were in a huddle discussing how to proceed. They decided to draw back to the edge of Zone Three, and secure that area with full shielding, although it couldn’t be for too long, as delays cost creds. So far, due to the lack of survivors, we were ahead of our budget. But Operation Boltcutter needed to be wrapped up within the next couple of days, hopefully without using too much ordnance, if we were going to afford to continue hunting Eddy.

  One of Starcaster’s young aides suggested using our deep-space suits and resetting the warming gel designed to keep a suited space-walker from freezing. It wasn’t such a major problem to reverse the process, apparently, as the same substance was also used as a coolant on the jackets supplied to our firefighters. They hoped that altering the suit to run cold would mask its wearer’s temperature, so the thermal fuses weren’t triggered by body heat.

  It took a while to pick the most promising volunteers, get them suited up and then lower the temp in their suits below the parameters of the fuses, with medics standing by to ensure they didn’t become hypothermic. It wouldn’t do for some poor soul to be blown up because he’d become stupid with cold.

  This business was clearly going to take time, so I left the Ops Room, all too aware of the never-ending admin stacking up. Once in my cabin, I raised a
privacy screen before sigging Axil and ensuring the morticians had their breathers and suitably cold storage for the bodies. Needless to say, it was all done. The most battle-hardened veteran quailed when Axil was in rant mode. Now the routine chore was out of the way, I took a breath. “You in Secure Mode?”

  There was a pause. “Am now. Wots goin’ on, Boss?”

  “Those new temp-controlled fuses we’re trying out? They’re here. Rigged up in Basement Level against our own people.”

  Axil cursed loudly and inventively.

  “Got an idea who could be the leak, then?” I asked as he wound down.

  “Leave it wiv me an’ I’ll sort it.” His tone was grim.

  He knows the culprit and doesn’t like it. “This traitor has cost us thousands of creds and the lives of our people. Procurement can’t tidy this business away quietly, not this time. The Council needs to make an example of this scumsac.”

  “We’ll have to nab this prodder stickin’ his slimin’ paws inter the bins. Cos there’s gonna be folk who won’ take no one’s word ʼcepting their own eyes.”

  Mercury’s Dust, who can it be? “Right. Let’s not go into this now. After Operation Boltcutter is put to bed, you and me will get together and sort this out.” I shifted, as my stomach roiled. These days, we seemed to be lurching from one dregging disaster to another. “Why didn’t you come to me about this?”

  “I kep’ tellin’ meself I were addin’ two an’ two an’ makin’ six, right? Cos I’d soon as punch the useless prodder inter next week as look at his smuggin’ turd-face. But now you tell me it’s one’ve us…” Axil’s voice cracked.

  “It’s okay. We’ll sort it.” Though even as the words fell out of my mouth, I knew it wasn’t okay. Someone Axil trusted was a lying snake who’d been double-crossing the people around him for creds… or revenge… or the sheer fun of it… I clearly didn’t convince Axil, either, judging by the vile words he was muttering under his breath as I signed off and lowered the Privacy Setting. Meanwhile the pile of parchwork needing my sig, attention or authorisation wasn’t going anywhere. Sadly. So I settled down to clear some of it – until Jessica crashed through my head.