By
Chajo, Stefanina and Lady MoonHawke
She felt free out here. Free of the station, free of her work, free of the expectations.
Free of her brother, even, though the thought gave her a twinge of guilt.
Zan gave her a look, but said nothing about it. Instead, she handed Emily a sheath of photos. "Here."
She flipped through them. They were spy satellite photos, probably by TallyHawk, and featured two men. They conversed in a few shots, some bills were exchanged, and then the pair disappeared into an alley. "Why are you showing me some guy turning tricks in the Red Zone?"
Zan glanced at the instruments every so often, careful not to let her emotions control her. "Take a closer look, Em."
"It's a trick," Em stated. "The john is no one I know. The... Okay. This is a really sick joke."
Zan shook her head. "It's no joke. Aurora got them. Sent Tally in apparently. I get the feeling she didn't look past that first pic of what was going on. Don't know if that's a blessing or not. I know what goes on in the Red Zone, you know what goes on, too. I don't think anyone else really knows it like we do."
Emily sighed. "We never thought about looking there. I mean, I know you checked Fense, but you were looking for Lieutenant Jon Quick, right? Not this guy."
Zan let out a sigh as well. "Yeah, that was mistake number one. Never look for the obvious, which I was doing. And it didn't help that there were little to no pictures of him out of armor. Even with today's technology...." She let the sentence trail off, and Em knew what she meant.
"So why is it you and me on this trip?" Emily asked. "Why didn't she scramble everyone to bring him back? This is hardly using all our resources."
"Tell me, when we were pulled out of Brim*star that time, how did it feel to be found in such a state?" Zan asked, seemingly changing the subject out of the blue.
"Probably the most humiliating moment of my life. But what would she know about it?"
"Think Em, if everyone went charging in to 'rescue' him, what would they find?" she asked. "What would it do for him?"
"I see what you're getting at, Zan, but where does Her Highness get off knowing anything about what the Lieutenant's going to think or feel?"
"She doesn't know exactly. More like a guess. And she might be smarter than you give her credit for," Zan commented, glancing at the instruments once again. "Limit in 20 minutes. She made the offer to go with me but I refused. I only reluctantly agreed to you coming along. You know the way Fense is. She's more naive then a babe in swaddling cloths when it comes to that place. You at least have an idea of what to expect."
"Miss Priss on Fense in her high-heels and silk stockings? Don't make me laugh."
Zan chuckled some. "You know what I mean then. As is, your gonna have to play bait to what I have in mind." She hated the idea, but she was too well known when it came to some things on Fense. She would stick out like a sore thumb if she went trolling for a male hooker in the Red Zone.
"What devilish turn is your mind taking now?"
"You may hate this, but it will mean playing voyeur for several days. Once we hook him, we need to see what shape he's in before taking him back. It's gonna be bad enough to for the others to see him in the shape he's in now."
Emily snorted "You don't think he'll notice us spying on him? The Lieutenant's better than that."
"Yeah, he was. But from what gather with those pics, he never noticed Tally. Besides, how often did he see you going about in some of those outfits used on Fense?"
"It's not exactly up to uniform code." Em sighed again. "Okay. We watch him for a few days, figure out what he's doing, then what? Grab him and run?"
"That's the general idea. We'll more then likely have to improvise after the first run-in. Well made plans rarely survive the first battle."
"So a little looking and a lot of thinking. You know Jon's usually the one with the plan, right?"
"'Usually' doesn't mean always. Think you can deal with Eric and gang for a couple of days?"
"Oh, sure. As long as they don't want to rip my head off. My cover's blown with them for sure."
Zan chuckled. "Neither Eric nor Trench really care who you are. As for Jamie, he likes you. Mel on the other hand... Hard to say. From what I've gather she's on the Outs with Snagglepuss again."
"There are getting to be people on the Outs than the Ins where he's concerned. Too bad we can't reform them all."
"Yeah. Too bad. She's a bright girl, don't get me wrong. But I cannot for the life of me understand what she sees in him," Zan said shaking her head. "As for the punk? Well, I think I got that problem solved... I think. Still negotiating something."
"Something off the record?"
"No, not exactly. Just moving him out of Galaxy. Makes it harder to get him back into the fold if he wasn't in the area in the first place. And how often has anyone put an effort into getting someone back from out of galaxy?"
"Not enough to succeed. At least not yet. You know, it's too bad in a way that Eric and Trench are joined at the hip. They could both go trolling for Jon if everyone didn't know they were an item."
Zan sighed. "Yeah. Though....." ideas began to form, being sorted and discarded with a rapidness that would belie her dislike being in a command position.
"No one will believe either of them looking for a hooker," Emily scoffed. "You know that."
"Uugh, yeah... Damn... I didn't want to have to do that...."
"Now I know you're planning something unpleasant."
"Depends on how you view it. But yeah, it's gonna have to be something very unpleasant."
"I don't like the sound of that,"
"Trust me, I don't like the idea of it either."
"So why are you considering it?"
"Because we threw everything else out the window?"
"And the baby with the bath water, it sounds like."
"Yep, that too." The instruments beeped. "We're crossing the limit."
"I have a feeling this isn't going to be easy."
"Nuh-uh, it ain't. It's gonna mean playing hard fast ball."
"You should have brought Will. Ball's not my sport."
"Neither is it mine. Basically, we're going to have to snag ever single male hooker in the Red Zone and hope like hell we snag Jon in the first couple of days. Other wise the pimps are gonna get more possessive then normal"
"You want to round up gigolos and see if we can find Jon that way?"
"Got any other suggestions? Other then trolling for him, I'm hitting a wall on ideas."
"Let's try walking the Zone first. Maybe we'll get lucky."
"Yeah, I hope so... Fense is coming up. We'll hit my own place first. We can operate out of it until and unless we have to shift to somewhere else."
Emily moved through the crowds of people as anonymously as possible. She'd thrown
a long coat over her ripped jeans and faded t-shirt, and she'd been careful
before leaving the ship to pile her hair up and cover it with an old hat. She
pushed past beggars and pan-handlers as gently as possible. It wasn't a matter
of having no sense of empathy for them; she could feel their despair and misery
too well against her shields. But they were yet another delay in an endless
string of delays. Jon was here, somewhere on this desolate rock, maybe. Maybe
they were too late. Maybe he'd gone again, earning enough money to catch a freighter.
She forced the thought away. Those photos made it too clear what Jon had been
doing for money, and she didn't want to think about it. How had TallyHawk not
recognized him? She had spotted him, Zan had as well. Even Stargazer's daughter
had spotted him, much as Emily hated to admit it.
She turned to say something to Zan, and realized she was alone. Looking back, she saw Zan half a block behind, surrounded by the children Em had worked so hard to get away from. She watched them press close and take the small packets Zan had made up. They didn't have much, just a few food coupons, less cash, and a voucher for a night at a shelter, but there was such gratitude evident as Zan handed them out. Finally, her hands were empty, but there was no accompanying chaos, merely a quiet sense of defeat and a quiet promise to one or two that next time she would have something for them.
In a few quick strides, Zan was beside her again. "It's getting worse out here," she said softly as Emily dropped into stride next to her. "More kids on the street, fewer open stalls in the market. Something's going to have to change, and soon, or these people are going to starve to death."
"Once we get Jon back" Emily started.
"What's he going to do? You know he hates these people, Em. He didn't give a tinker's damn about them before the TB epidemic, and he was only marginally better afterwards. I'm not holding out a lot of hope if things don't change out here, and fairly quickly, at that."
"So what do we do?" Emily asked.
"Right now?" Zan asked. "We get settled in one of my hidey-holes and get some sleep. Tomorrow will be soon enough for the next step, whatever it may be."
Zan wasn't sure if it was the idea that woke her or if it came to her after
she woke up. But however it came to her, it sent her sitting bolt upright in
the bed.
"It's brilliant. Prefect. It's absolutely fucking brilliant."
Emily rolled over next to her and grumbled sleepily. "That's nice. But I'm trying to sleep here." Her resolution didn't last long. "What's brilliant?"
Zan was out of bed already, pacing the floor. "The kids gave me the idea. They go everywhere, they see everything, and no one really pays them any mind whatsoever. We can cover all the ground we need to in days if not hours."
"Do you really think it's a good idea to send those kids out into some of those areas?" Emily asked, propping herself up on her elbows.
"They go there already, Em. I'm not going to kid myself into imagining they don't. And it will be strictly spotting by eye and coming back to tell us. Absolutely no contact beyond visual confirmation.. And I'll think of something to reward the spotter with. That will get us some results." She continued to pace the floor, and Emily could imagine the path she was wearing in the rug.
"If you're got all that excess energy, why are you wasting it walking the floor?"
"Good question," was the only comment Zan made. A moment later she was back in the bed and putting that energy to better use. "But this plan is brilliant perfect. We'll cover so much more ground this way."
"Okay. But we'll cover it tomorrow. When there's light. After we've slept."
Once morning came, it had taken them almost no time to collect a dozen kids
together and hand out hastily copied photos.
"Just find him," Zan was saying. "Don't try to talk to him or follow him. Don't go anywhere that you could get seriously hurt. If you spot him, get back here and tell me where you saw him. I don't want any of you to try anything dangerous. And for anyone who gets me information that leads to finding him" She held up a full book of food coupons before their bright eyes. "The whole thing."
There was a wash of chatter. In the right hands, they were negotiable for more than a bite to eat. They raced for the door of the warehouse, extra flyers clutched in their grubby hands.
"You're going to give all those kids something, aren't you?" Em asked.
"Of course. But incentive never hurts competition. It won't be long now."
Unfortunately, Zan's words were far from prophetic.
The first and second days went by without a word or so much as a hint that Jon had been spotted. By the third, Emily was close to frantic, and the only way Zan could calm her was to agree to walking the Red Zone, looking for themselves.
The miasma that hung over the Zone started a couple of blocks out; a subtle warning that what lay ahead was no place any sane person went except under the direst of circumstances. Businesses became sporadic, and the walkways thinned out, people moving away at a noticeably quick pace. Winos and vagrants began to appear in doorways, and the sidewalks grew crowded again, this time with gangs, prostitutes that catered to every taste, and drug pushers who could meet any need.
Zan and Emily were above it all, untouchable despite the weapons carried openly and the looks cast their way, admiring, valuing and spiting in turns. But at one time or another, almost everyone in the Red Zone had been on the receiving end of Zan's help, and it afforded them a bubble of security.
They combed the streets, ignoring the vaguely hostile looks from unfamiliar faces, watching as children darted here and there. Clearly, their information network was functioning as planned. But they could see for themselves, there was nothing to see. No sign of Jon anywhere.
"Maybe we're too late," Emily said dispiritedly, looking around in frustration.
"I don't think so," Zan replied. "I've got passenger lists for every official and unofficial carrier that's left since Aurora showed me the pictures. Unless he slipped out sometime after they were taken and before I knew about it, he's here. And it's not that big a window of opportunity."
Emily studied the boarded up buildings in defeat. "He could be inside any one of these buildings. Those pictures"
Zan felt the backlash of emotion as Emily's imagination took over. "Don't think about it," she instructed. "It's not going to help. Yes, he could be in one of these buildings. But we don't have the warm bodies to safely go through every building on Fense looking for him. We're going to have to pick him up on the fly. Sooner or later, he'll need something, and when he comes out for it, we'll know." Emily shivered, and Zan wrapped an arm around her shoulders. "Come on. We'll go by the shipping office and check today's manifests." Emily needed to be doing something, she knew, even if it was useless make-work designed simply to occupy her hands while they waited for news.
"Jon!" Emily sat bolt upright in her bed, breathing hard, clutching the sheet to her chest. "Damn it. So close yet so far," she said with a frustrated sigh as she brought her knees up to her chest, laying her head on her knees.
"Another dream?" asked her bed partner sleepily.
"Yes. It's like he wants to reach out yet is hiding at the same time," Emily said in frustration.
"At least he know he's alive. We haven't found his body. And your dreams are only getting stronger, not weaker." An arm snaked about her waist, and Emily's bed partner shifted to sit up and placed a kiss on her shoulder before pulling her close.
Emily responded by laying back against her partner, letting their legs entwine as they snuggled closer. The chest that pillowed her head rose and fell in a gently rhythm, as arms slide along her sides, just as gently tracing the scars on her body before encircling her waist.
"We have to up and looking in. about four hours. You need to be sleeping," a voice murmured in Emily's ear.
"I know. I just can't seem to fall back asleep after these dreams. You know how they affect me," Emily replied. "It's been a month and a half since Jon vanished; two months since he left the station. And we have no new leads, nothing. Except these dreams."
"I know," the voice murmured again.
Another kiss was placed along her shoulder, a little farther up then the last. Hands moved along her skin. One sliding up to cup her breast, fingers idly playing with the hardening pebble of flesh. The other hand slide down to between her thighs, fingers slipping between her folds.
Emily gasped softly arching her back in response to the pleasurable caresses. "Zan! You don't what about." The rest was lost to her soft moans.
"Ssshhh I want to. I know you'll sleep afterwards. As for your brother, I talked with him before I came to bed. He said he'd deal if it meant you got some sleep." Her words were spaced between kisses. She had shifted so that Emily was laying on the bed as she trailed the kisses down her body.
There was little Emily could say about it, because she knew that Zan was right. She moaned in pleasure as Zan found those secret places that brought such reactions from her. Though a distant sense of guilt colored everything. To be here, safe in her bed, enjoying the pleasures of the flesh with her long time lover, the woman she shared with her brother.
"Quit that," Zan said looking up from where she rested her head on Emily's thigh, her hand caressing the inner skin of Emily's other thigh. "Feeling guilty about this isn't going to help."
"I know, but I can't help it" Emily said with a groan then gasped as her lover found a way to distract her. No more words were said between the two women. The only sounds were from the fan turning overhead and the soft moans, gasps and soft cries of pleasure.
Zan awoke a few minutes before the Artificial Sun came on, gently releasing the still-sleeping Emily and creeping carefully out of the bed. Emily slumbered on unaware, dragging blankets over her head and curling into a ball without waking. Zan chuckled softly and slipped into the bathroom to shower and dress, then crept quietly back through the bedroom to the main part of the house. It was a loft, really, the top floor of a warehouse she owned under an assumed identity. To the best of her knowledge, at least for the moment, no one had connected to owner of the warehouse to her as anything more than landlord and tenant.
She'd barley had time to set the coffeemaker running when footsteps pounded up the outside stairs, and by the time there was a knock at the door, she was able to see that it was one of her runners, tousled and dirty, wearing a grin from ear to ear.
Zan unfastened the locks and rolled the door back quietly, letting him in. "Do you have something?"
From somewhere in his ragged clothing, the urchin pulled out a crumpled sheet of paper and handed it to her. Zan smoothed it out and studied it. The front was a fly-specked announcement for some kind of religious meeting, a 'pray-your-troubles-away' group. Turning it over, she saw on the back a rough pencil sketch of a man, bone thin and stoop shouldered, with striped hair down to his shoulders and a scruffy beard. There was some sort of faint striping on the exposed skin of the arms and shoulders as well, and she saw the suggestion of a tattoo high on the bicep, near the shoulder. "What's this?" she asked.
The boy made a flapping motion with his arms, and Zan recognized him as a child she'd checked up on in the past, a poor thing who'd lost his tongue as a warning to his drug-addicted mother to pay up. It bothered Zan that he was wandering the streets now. If she found a spare second in the midst of the current crisis, she'd have to see about finding him a more permanent placement.
"It's a bird, Mitch? What kind of bird?"
He made a ferocious face, mouth open in a silent scream, and curled his fingers into claws, suggesting talons. Then he dropped the impression and tapped the mirror bright, industrial chrome countertop. A scary bird, he seemed to be relating. And a silver one at that.
Zan knew that tattoo. She'd seen the image before, here on Fense, ironically enough. Her mind swirled a moment, lost in the endless hours when she had passed out emergency supplies to the worst of those suffering from the TB epidemic. Oddly enough, it had been Jon beside her, hoisting boxes of foodstuffs and blankets as penance imposed by the Commander for harassing her as she'd raced to deliver vaccine. It had been a shoulder patch on his warm-up jacket. At some time, it seemed now, he'd had it inked into his arm as well.
"This is really good," she said, returning to the here and now. "Did you draw it?"
Mitch nodded, holding up the stubby end of a pencil.
"Well, I owe you a new pencil at the very least, and some more paper." She looked him up and down, taking in the thin cheeks and hollows under his eyes. "I'm about to have some breakfast. Would you like some, too?"
He nodded even more enthusiastically, eyes darting around the well-equipped kitchen.
"Mitch, I'm going to go into the other room for a minute, and I'm going to trust you to still be here when I get back, okay?" To sweeten the offer, she poured a tall glass of milk and set it on the counter along with a plate of blueberry muffins. "Why don't you get started on this, and I'll be right back."
He settled himself on a stool under the counter's overhang and began to rapidly fill his mouth.
Zan sighed as she left, taking the paper with her. The child had talent. It was just a matter of finding a place where he would be safe.
Emily was still curled up in the bed, and as much as Zan hated to do it, she
was forced to disturb her.
"Em," she called softly. "Emily." She shook the sleeping form, and Em flipped over, eyes wide. "Time to get up. We've got something."
Emily wrinkled her nose at the smell of the dye in Zan's hair, then laughed when she saw the results. "Sharpen up your clothing and you could almost pass for Miss High-and-Mighty. Imagine someone thinking she was out here trolling for a gigolo."
Zan snorted. "You would get a kick out of that if some type of rumor started flying wouldn't you?"
Emily just shrugged. "You have to admit it would be funny."
Zan shook her head. "Yeah, but do you want to live with her if she found out who started it? I can at least retreat to safe ground."
"I'm not looking forward to living with her at all, so it would make it more amusing. But I'd probably get caught one way or another. Just consider it a passing flight of fancy." Emily sighed
Zan chuckled softly. "Poor you. Is everything out? Or do I have some of that stuff in my hair still?"
"I can't see any, but I can still smell it. Phew."
"Sorry, best I could do on short notice. You should smell it from this end of things. Uugh"
Emily lifted an eyebrow. "Long as you're not falling in love with the look."
"No thank you. Not even close to my color when I was younger. Besides. I earned ever single gray hair I got"
"Well, it washes out in a couple of shampoos, right?"
"Suppose to"
"Good. It's just not you."
"Heh heh. Bet Will would have a fit too"
"Probably."
"At least I only colored the top half," Zan said with a snicker.
"It's still just not you...
"So you've said. Now want to help me get this contraption they call an outfit sealed up? Why the hell does anyone still wear this stuff is beyond me. One would have thought the style would have died out a century ago"
"Darned if I know. Where does all this go?"
"Oh, boy"
Half an hour later, Zan was ready; painted, primped and squeezed into the trampiest
get-up they could arrange, a vinyl lace-up bustier and short short skirt, fishnet
stockings and thigh-high spike heeled boots.
"You look like something out of a movie," Emily said once the whole look was pulled together.
"Just as long as I don't look like myself. I'd be a dead giveaway something was up, looking for a male prostitute out there." Zan studied herself in the mirror. The change was almost uncanny, she decided, pulling at her hair until it almost covered her face. Nice and anonymous. Perfect. "You know what to do?" she asked Emily.
"Wait in the car, stay near the radio. When you signal confirmation of identity, warm up the engines. When you give the word, zip in, park it close, and then zip out once you're in the car." They'd only gone over it 10 times in the past hour, revamping and refining the plan for any contingency.
Zan shrugged into a short denim jacket draped with leather fringe. It was the most comfortable part of her disguise, and the one piece she would consider wearing again. The rest was just too too much. "All right, then. Let's go. We don't want to risk him slipping away again."
"If it's even him," Emily said morosely.
"I have a feeling about this one," Zan said, looking at the sketch again. "Something tells me this is right."
In the end, it went almost as planned. Though Zan hadn't intended for a pimp
to chase them to the end of the Red Zone screaming curses, it certainly hadn't
been outside the realm of possibility. Emily had arrived right on schedule in
the battered looking but powerful ground car, and they had tossed their unconscious
quarry into the back and zoomed away.
"Why is he out cold?" Emily asked, watching the sparse but unpredictable traffic around them. Fense had few ground vehicles and even fewer traffic rules. The right-of-way invariably went to the person who drove as though they had the least to lose.
"It was getting a little tense. He wanted to get down to earning the money, and I wasn't exactly planning on things getting that far. Then the damned pimp caught me trying to sneak him out, and it went from tense to downright uncomfortable. That was nice driving on your part, though. The backwash from the engines should keep him feeling tender for a few weeks at least."
"Thanks. So where are we taking him now? Back to the station?"
"Not yet. Head for the Patch'n'Go. I want to know what's been done to him before anyone else he knows sees him."
"Look, Zan, I wouldn't normally recommend returning someone home until
their treatment is finished, but the truth is he's in more danger here. We're
detoxing him without his participation. The farther he is from a drug source
while he recuperates, the better off he'll be." The doctor, a friend from
New Eden and Administrator of the clinic, folded his arms around the clipboard
holding Jon's chart.
"Damn," she muttered, more to herself than to him. "I was hoping to get him though it before sending him back." She crossed her arms over her chest and looked down at the floor. "I'm going to need all his records you have on him as well as the treatment program you are using."
"We can make sure you have everything you need, and we can check in on him. But I'll be honest with you, Zan. We're always needing beds, and if I can send him somewhere with people to look after him, I'd much rather do that. And he'll get great care at the station, I'm sure.'
She winced slightly before nodding. "Yeah. he will. Can you do me a favor though? Can you keep it quit for as long as possible that he was here?"
"Confidentiality is our password. You know that. Not a word will get out of here if I can avoid it."
"Thanks. I'll see what I can do to get you guys some type of relief out here. In the mean time. Might as well get the ball rolling."
"Okay. I'll let you know when he's through recovery from the surgery. He should stay a couple of days to make sure nothing there is going to bite us."
Zan nodded again. "Don't need any sleepers what so ever on this one."
"Okay." He checked his watch. "I've got to get moving. I'll catch you later. Thanks, Zan."
"No, It's me that should be thanking you. Later"
He nodded, turning away to catch another crisis coming through the door.
The monitors in the recovery room beeped softly as Zan stood near the door,
leaning against the wall. She watched the electronic traces with interest, taking
note subconsciously of the scuffs and dings in the casing. The electronics inside
were top-notch, she was sure, but Dr. Rossen stretched his tight budget by stocking
up on the less-than-beautiful second-hand equipment. As long as it still functioned
correctly, he'd said more than once that he didn't care what it looked like.
Jon stirred slightly then steeled, and Zan looked back to him, taking in the bandages and lines tethering him to the bed. Then she sighed.
"You'd better be worth all this, Lieutenant," she whispered under her breath. "A lot of people have gone to a lot of effort over your sorry hide. You'd damned well better be worth every ounce of it."
-fin