Part 4

Disclaimer:  I still own nothing; (the second part hasn't changed either)

Mining sucked.  Not that he ever had thought it was a fun job. Harper had never dreamed of being a miner because it seemed like a dangerous scary job. It turned out that he was right all along, that mining sucked.  It was freezing, dark, and it was hard to breath down there. 

"Get down there now you dumb mudfoot!"

His "owner" was yelling at him again.  Didn't he ever get sick of doing that?  He'd been brought because he was small.  He'd fit in the inner creases of the mine tunnels. Harper obeyed, because he was tired of being hit.  The guy who brought him, Teddy had been hitting him at every opportunity.  It was very humiliating to be hit by a man named Teddy. 

The mine was dark.  The air was thick with dirt and the ore they were mining.  Shivering, he began digging for ore.  Hours passed, well it felt like hours.  Time was difficult to measure down in the mine.  Harper measured time in ailments.  His back ached more than it had in years, his hands were cut and bleeding and his knees refused to straighten.  He figured that meant he's been working for at least 8 hours.  Latter his knees actually buckled and figured it had been about 12 hours.  His supervisor hauled him to his feet and sent him out of the mine. 

He'd crashed just outside the mine, in a heap off to the side.  There was nowhere else for the slaves to go.  If you weren't in the mine, you had to stay close because you were always being watched.  He just slept.  It was the heavy sleep of exhaustion.  That continued for weeks. He worked until he dropped, went back when they kicked him awake, and finished when he dropped again.  He waited for something to happen, but it didn't.  He was also running low on his medication. 

He stumbled and fell to his knees as he ducked under the low, wooden entrance to the mine.  It was pouring rain and so Harper was now in thigh deep mud.  That as all he could take today.  He stood up and started walking.  The rain was cold and the wind swirled it in the air of this dark night.  But Harper kept walking.  He hadn't planned this escape.  The rain had just given him the idea, and at this point anything was worth a shot.   He walked quickly, without looking at anyone right into the forest that surrounded the mine.  On this dark night the forest was a pitch -black maze.  Harper could hear his supervisor's yell when he realized Harper wasn't in his spot. 

He could hear the curses of his supervisor and some of the others who worked for the company as they crashed through the dark trees.  Unfortunately for them, Harper had developed pretty good night vision evading Magog and Neitzchiens for nearly 2 decades.  They still had trees on Earth and Harper had always been a good climber.  He scurried up the large trunk of the nearest tree and made his way up through the branches like he was part monkey.  Near the top he braced himself between the arms of two branches and watched the search for him with a smirk. 

Reports Andromeda received said Harper just walked away.  He came up from the mines and just kept walking.  It was a stormy night and his supervisor lost tract of him.  It had to be one of the easiest escapes ever not planned.  When morning came and the storm had cleared, they simply couldn't find Harper.  While it was nice that Harper had escaped slavery, but it was going to make him harder to find. 

Rommie was searching the logs of every transport ship that left the week Harper disappeared.  It was slow going because ships transported the ore off that planet 8 times everyday.  That meant 56 ships, 56 destinations for Harper.