Freedom

Chapter 29

"Velvet," Russet pointed out. "That's not her real name. That's creative."

"Sounds like an escort," I said. She swatted me.

"I think she's nice."

"You thought she was going to kill you after you paid her."

"I didn't really think that, I just thought I should entertain the possibility, you know? Plan for the worst, not be too quick to trust. I don't know how to do this survival thing. That's why Tom and Rick were coming with us."

"They didn't know how to do it, either."

She sighed. "That's a pretty cold thing to say."

"Sorry. I think this place is making me cynical."

"I can see how it might have that effect on someone."

"You ready to go inside?"

"Yeah, it's cold out here."

We quietly went back into the wheelhouse, where the others were sleeping. Sagaris was supposed to be on watch, but I didn't see him anywhere. My hand tingled. Come to think of it, Sagaris hadn't been around when I'd gone outside, and that had been over twenty minutes ago. I paused in the doorway, Russet just behind me. She tugged at my arm.

"What is it?"

"Where's Sagaris?"

"I don't know."

"Wait here."

I pulled her inside and slipped back out. Sagaris wasn't on the upper deck. I went around the side, but he wasn't there either. At the railing I looked down at the walkway below, but it was too dark. Someone was moving down there. I pulled my light and flashed it down, but whoever it was ducked through an open hatch.

Sagaris wouldn't run from my light. We weren't alone on the ship. You learn to sleep light in the Zone; I had everyone roused in about ten seconds. My hand was completely on pins and needles now, and I was giving orders without thinking about how it wasn't my job to do so.

"Find him. Stay with them," I said, pointing at Velvet. The Merc didn't seem to have a problem; he rubbed at his eyes, picked up his UMP, and headed out. The Biker followed. I took the other door without waiting for a reply from Velvet. Maybe sticking together would have been a better idea – but Sagaris was missing, there was someone else here, and the obvious thing to do was find him. I put on my earpiece and changed to Velvet's frequency. "Where are you guys going?" I asked, clattering down the steps, and entering the main corridor. Moldy pipes sagged from the ceiling, ready to rust through and give at any moment.

"I'll look around up here," the Biker replied promptly. There was nothing from the Merc; maybe his PDA was off.

Velvet said something, but it sounded distant. I tapped my earpiece. "Say again?" Something slammed behind me, and I lit a flare and threw it down the corridor, lighting up the walls with flickering green. "Velvet, check your sound." I looked behind me.

A spike of static. "…hostiles…"

"Biker!"

"I'm still online."

"Where are you?"

"I'm heading for the main junction. I got no sign of anything up here. Are you reading Velvet?"

"No, her signal's messed up."

"She's on the wrong channel. She probably slept on her PDA. Worry about Sagaris, Velvet can handle herself. What did you see?"

"One guy, I think." I put my AK to my shoulder and shone the light down the corridor, beginning to walk.

"Human?"

That made me pause. "I think so."

"Could it have been a drinker?"

"How would it have gotten out here?"

"I don't know – when the water was low. It would explain why our man isn't here. I'm moving into maintenance – where are you now?"

"Just below the wheelhouse."

"Don't shoot the Merc by mistake, he should be close to you."

"How do you know?"

"I heard him walking the corridor over me. There's nothing else out here as heavy as him."

That we knew of – but I didn't say anything, I just turned off my earpiece. I needed to be able to hear, though the only sound was the groaning of the ship. I looked down the hall, then back, then over the railing at the steps leading down. Both the Merc and the Biker were on or above this level, so to the make the most of our limited manpower, it was up to me to keep going down. I jumped the railing and got moving, though the stairs shook and rattled under my weight. I reached the bottom and paused to listen. A strange noise was filling the ship.

It took me a moment to realize it must be raining – and pretty darn hard to be making this much noise. In fact, I'd go ahead and call it a storm. I hoped whatever this ship was wrecked on was stable, because this was the kind of weather you generally wanted to avoid when you were on a boat.

I whirled, but my light showed an empty corridor. Stained bulkheads and dark hatchways, though I was pretty sure I'd heard running footsteps.

As you've no doubt noticed, I brought a lot of things with me to the Zone that most stalkers don't have, both skills and physical objects. Well, I could read the mood. Hunter and hunted are just perspective. Someone down here thought they were stalking me? No. I was coming after them.

I took a couple of steps forward, took a smoke bomb from my sleeve, and flung it through the door I thought was my best bet. It burst with a hiss, and a figure came cannoning out even faster than I expected. I resisted the urge to shoot, and plunged into the smoke. The stairs came up sooner than I thought, but I managed not to fall. I rushed down, listened, and went left.

Not shooting had been a mistake. Something about this situation struck me as wrong, and I thought that if I could take this guy alive, maybe he could shed some light for me. But no – the right thing to do would have been to gun him down. At least that way I could have seen who he was.

I paused, and there was silence. He was hiding somewhere up ahead – but this time I didn't know where. I reached up and switched my earpiece back on.

"Biker," I whispered.

"Mist?"

"I've got one down here, third deck, aft."

"There's one over here, too."

Damn. I'd hoped we were dealing with a single assailant. "You got him taken care of?"

"No, he's lost me. He's still on this deck. We're above you."

"Something's not right, man – these guys have us dead to rights, but they aren't shooting."

A pause. "Maybe they aren't hostiles," the Biker said finally.

"Then where's Sagaris?" I hissed.

"Keep looking." He cut the com. I jerked the magazine out of my carbine, checked it, slapped it back in, and started forward. I was going to kill the next person I saw. I wasn't worried that it would be the Merc; I couldn't fail to hear him coming. I realized I was standing on grating. I turned my light downward, and something moved out of the beam. It was close, but I managed not to fire a shot purely out of surprise.

As quietly as I could, I hung my AK back on its harness and drew a knife. Reaching out, I pressed the tip to the bulkhead on my left. I started forward, pushing the blade along. It made an eerie sound that anyone nearby would be able to hear. It masked the sound of my footfalls, and also created – or at least I hoped it did – a bit of an audio illusion.

See, when you hear a sound like this, you imagine someone dragging the blade along something, not pushing it. Which meant that there was a dissonance between where I actually was, and where the sound would lead someone to expect me to be. I turned off my light and walked in the dark.

It worked almost too well. The tackle was aimed about eighteen inches in front of me. I caught fabric, made sure my grip was good, and smashed the guy face-first into the bulkhead. He crumpled, and I turned on my light.

He was wearing a long, brown coat. It had been brown to begin with, but dirt had darkened it significantly. He was white, and pretty close to my age. Maybe a little older. Maybe even thirty. He looked pretty ordinary, though he needed a shave, and his hair was unkempt. He also could have benefited from a shower, but that's everybody in the Zone.

I dropped and searched him – and there was the real problem. He wasn't carrying anything. No weapons, nothing. I reached for my earpiece to tell the Biker, but someone hit me over the head with something heavy.