Earth 2.1.2
Chapter 9
A/N: Yes, a very short chapter. You'll know why when you get to the end of it. Sorry. Now aren't you glad I gave you two chapters yesterday? Please read responsibly.
Julia woke up smiling early the next morning.
She shook her head, staring up at the tent above her. The Council was still out there, and so were the hostile Terriers. Winter was almost upon them, and they still didn't have reliable sources of protein other than the monotony of synthofu.
It was ridiculous for her to feel so happy. Nothing had changed.
The situation with Alonzo has certainly changed, she thought wryly. She felt a flutter of fear in her middle. Stop it, she told herself harshly. There's nothing to be afraid of. Nothing. But the butterflies kept fluttering.
And for the first time since the crash, she really wanted to talk to Melanie. But Melanie was in Dome Two with Rob. It figures, she thought. All this time, I've wanted nothing more than to be by myself, and when I finally do want the company, I can't have it.
"How are you feeling this morning?" Danziger asked Tru as she sat up in their new home. The thin walls dividing up the various living quarters were hardly enough to give a sense of privacy, but even so, Danziger was glad to be sticking around in one place for a change.
"Better," Tru said. "It doesn't hurt so much to breathe anymore."
"Good," he said. "You think you're up to helping me out with the rails today? Julia said she thought you'd be fine getting up and around for a little while, as long as you don't do anything strenuous."
"I guess so," she said, though there was a hint of reluctance in her voice.
"What, you got something better to do?" Danziger said, looking at her curiously.
Tru looked uncomfortable. "Well…" she said, drawing out the word.
"Spit it out, Tru," Danziger said warily.
"See, Devon asked Melanie to show Bess how to do the comm stuff, since it's so hard to get signal here, and she wanted to be sure that we had somebody who could do it if Melanie had to do something else, and—"
"The short version, Tru," Danziger said, though he knew where this was headed. Whatever Devon had said to Tru in the Transrover, it had worked. For Tru, Devon practically walked on water, and Devon seemed to be making a concerted effort to keep it that way. Which only annoyed him more.
"Devon said I could watch," Tru said. "She said that way we'd have a couple of people who could do it. And you said I'm good with stuff like that, and it would keep me out of trouble, plus Bess would be there, and I wouldn't be doing anything strenuous, like Julia said—"
Danziger held up his hands. "Okay, okay," he said. "You can go."
Tru looked at him searchingly. "Are you mad at me?"
Danziger sighed. "No, kiddo, I'm not mad at you," he said, but even as he said it, he knew he hadn't kept the emphasis off the last word like he'd meant to.
Tru sighed. "Don't tell me," she said. "You're still mad at Devon for whatever she said to you."
"Of course not," Danziger said stiffly.
"Oh, that's just great," Tru said. "You're the one who's always telling me I need to be more mature."
"I'm not—"
Tru put up her hand to stop him. "I've done a lot worse to you, haven't I?" she asked. "I mean, whatever she said, how could it be worse than…than when I said I'd be better off with Station Services than with you?"
Danziger winced.
"And I never even said I was sorry for that," Tru said insistently. "But you got over it anyway."
"Tru—"
"She did say she was sorry, right?" Tru said.
Danziger rolled his eyes. "Yes, she did," he admitted.
"She did to me, too. Which was weird, because I didn't think she had anything to be sorry for." She shook her head, bemused. "Anyway, I think you need to just suck it up and get over it. Like you say, life's too short to stay mad, right?" She pulled on her boots and laced them up, stood up and started to leave, but then stopped and turned to look at him. "I am, y'know."
"You are what?" Danziger said.
"Sorry I said it," Tru said seriously. "This is way better than Station Services. And so are you."
Danziger watched her trot off towards where Melanie had set up the comm system and shook his head. Man, it was almost worth having Devon tee off on me just so I could hear that, he thought.
"Hey, Artie!" Inez called. She glanced back over her shoulder, and he'd turned to look at her. She waved him over, and then turned and ran back to the plant she'd just seen.
She pulled out her scanner and ran it over the broad-leafed plant and held her breath. This was the third plant they'd checked out since they left the camp two hours earlier, and both the previous ones had turned out to be busts. This one didn't look any more promising. The leaves were turning brown, so even if it was edible, it was likely past its growing season, but as she scanned it, her heart leaped.
"I think we've got something!" she said as Artie got closer.
"What is it?"
She grabbed the stems of the leaves as close to the ground as she could and pulled carefully. There was resistance, so much that she hesitated to pull harder. She grabbed her clasp knife out of her pocket and began digging around the base of the stems. There were thick tubers under the dirt, and as she cleared away the dirt, she was delighted to see how substantial the tubers were.
"Would'ja look at that!" Artie said. "They look a little like potatoes!"
"Close enough—they read as edible, and the scanner's trying to call them legumes," she said, reading the scanner.
"You mean like beans?" Artie said skeptically.
"Sort of. I think it's saying that because it looks like they have at least a little protein in them," Inez said, scrabbling at the dirt with her hands as she cleared the base of the tubers. She dug her fingers into the dirt beneath them, wincing at the cold, and finally got a good enough hold that she was able to extract the tubers. They came out all at once, and she nearly fell backwards into the stream.
"Do you see any more around?" Inez said, looking at the cluster of tubers in her hands. The smallest was the size of her fist, and though they looked a little wrinkly, it looked like there would be a good amount of edible matter from each of the tubers.
Artie was looking along the stream's edge. "There's another one down a ways," he said.
Inez smiled at Artie, or at least what he thought was a smile. On anybody else it'd look like gas, he thought, but for Inez, it was practically beaming. "Julia will be so happy!" she said. "Finally, we found food!"
"I hope they taste good," Artie said skeptically.
"Heck, even if they taste nasty, it'd be a nice change from synthofu," Inez said seriously.
"Yale," Devon said, coming up to where he was digging again, piling up dirt along the rock face opposite Dome Two. "How are you? Did you sleep?"
"A bit," he said.
Devon looked troubled. "Uly was asking about you," she said. "I think he's bored. He even said he'd study history if you wanted."
Yale smiled at that. "Then he is truly worried about me," he said wryly.
Devon smiled in relief. "It's good to hear you joking," she said. "Whatever Julia said to you must have helped."
He nodded. "I am trying, Devon," he said after a moment. "But I am still very concerned. I do not know what my programming might contain, and until I do, I cannot be certain that I am not a danger to you, or to others in the group."
"I talked to Valerie earlier," Devon said. "The coffee helped, but she's out again, so it could take a little longer." She smiled. "But she did say she'd found a few things that she wanted to examine more. The…um…bot she said she had going was almost done going through the code, and she was going to send it through again looking for some other stuff while she went through what it had already flagged."
Yale nodded. "I suppose that is progress."
"Absolutely," Devon said. "She told me to tell you that she's working as fast as she can, but she wants to be thorough. She said it would be better to find everything first so she only has to upload the fixes once. Something about it taking a while to compile, and that you'd be out of commission while it did."
"I see," Yale said. "That is logical." He sighed. "In the meantime, I will have to remain patient."
"This is you being patient?" Devon said, gesturing at the long line of piled-up dirt.
Yale smiled thinly. "I find the physical exertion helpful in dealing with my…fears," he said. "And as long as I am out here, I worry less about what I might do. Please understand, Devon, I prefer to keep my distance from everyone for now."
Devon nodded reluctantly. "I'll…keep you posted on what Valerie finds, okay?"
"Thank you," he said. He hesitated for a moment. "Have you seen Julia this morning?" he asked.
"Not yet," Devon said. "Why?"
"It is not my place to say," he said. "But if you do speak to her, I…I believe it would be helpful to her to hear that you value her."
Devon blinked, surprised. "Is something wrong?"
He shook his head, looking uncomfortable. "She is struggling with…recent events," he said.
"Oh," Devon said, realizing what he must be talking about. "I'll…try," she said, wondering how on earth she could work that into normal conversation.
"Do try to be subtle about it, Devon," Yale said.
Devon smiled at him dryly. "Subtle," she said. "Yeah, that's right up my alley."
Yale sighed. "I knew I should not have said anything," he said, shaking his head.
"Thanks a lot," Devon said, and almost cheered when he smiled again. Progress, she thought hopefully.
"Hello, Valerie," Morgan said, coming up to where she was seated at one of the mess tables in Dome One, studying her tablet. He seemed to be trying for nonchalance, but was failing dismally. "What are you doing?"
She looked up at him, trying to figure out what on earth he was up to. "Programming," she said. "Which requires some concentration, so…"
Morgan looked uncomfortable. "Look," he said, dropping the act, "I overheard you talking to Devon."
"Of course you did," Valerie said. "I swear, we can't possibly get to New Pacifica fast enough," she muttered to herself.
"I just thought you should know something," he said. "About the Yale project."
"What?" Valerie said, looking up at him, wishing she could just make him disappear.
"I don' t know much about programming—"
"What a shock," Valerie said under her breath.
"—but I do know that the Yales were all given a failsafe code," Morgan finished, ignoring her comment.
"Failsafe?" she said, glancing back down at her tablet. She still had over thirty segments of code the bot had flagged that she hadn't gone through yet.
"Yeah," Morgan said. "It varied—they kept trying different approaches, but most of them were set to trigger a set of commands if certain things happened—like if the Yale started to do something they didn't want them to do, they'd shut them down, or make them return to the research facility…"
"Your point, Morgan?" Valerie said. "I mean, I already found one set of commands like that, and—"
"That's just it. One of the other failsafes was about the coding," Morgan interrupted. "So if anybody made a change to the code, they were set to do things."
"Things?" Valerie said impatiently. "Come on, Morgan, could you vague that up for me? You're being just a little too clear."
"I don't know," Morgan said, his voice rising. "Like I said, they did different stuff throughout the program. And I never saw this Yale, which means he had to have been pretty late in the program, so who knows what they put in there." He held up his hands. "Look, that's all I know. I just thought you should be aware of it before you go monkeying around with his code."
Valerie sighed. "Okay," she said placatingly. "Thanks—that's actually good to know." Morgan nodded and walked away.
Unfortunately, Valerie thought glumly, that means one more thing I have to look for.
"Hold up, Inez, I think I saw another one," Artie said, turning to look back over his shoulder at the riverbank.
"Where?" Inez said, slowing and turning to look. "Should I stop?"
"Just back—oh, cr—!" Artie's voice cut off as he turned back in time to see the right front wheel starting to go off the edge of the riverbank.
Inez whipped the wheel back, slamming on the brake, but it was too late. The rail slid just far enough to tip over the edge of the bank. Artie yelped as the rail began to roll.
The next thing Inez knew, she had a faceful of ice-cold mud.
"Ow," Artie said from somewhere behind her as she came up sputtering.
Inez pushed herself up out of the muddy river, wiping at her face with one hand, and turned to look at him. "Are you okay?"
Artie was lying at the base of the riverbank, halfway out of the rail, which was now lying on its rollbar. He was holding one knee and wincing. "I don't think so," he said. "I wrenched the hell out of my knee."
Inez swore. "I'm sorry, Artie. I can't believe I did that."
Artie waved one hand at her. "Easy mistake to make," he said. "I don't think the knee is that bad. Julia can fix it."
"Maybe, but I don't know if she'll be able to fix what Danziger does to me once he sees what I did to his rail," Inez said, crawling over to Artie and trying not to look at the rail.
Artie snorted. "You have a point. I'm glad you were the one driving." He looked at the rail. "But it doesn't really look too bad. The hard part's gonna be getting it out of the river."
"Here," Inez said, taking hold of his arm. "Let's get us out of the water before we freeze to death." She helped him out of the rail, and between them they were able to clamber up onto the riverbank.
"Melanie?" Inez said, slapping her gear as she sat next to Artie. "Are you there?"
"-ez?" Melanie said through a hail of static. "You…weird. What's wrong?"
Inez sighed. "I just crashed the rail," she said grimly.
"Are you…?" Melanie's voice kept cutting out. "How…rtie?"
"I'm fine. Artie hurt his knee. And I don't think the rail is going anywhere without some help," Inez said. "It's kinda stuck."
"Stuck?" Melanie said. "…mind…got…ordinates. Help..."
"Hurry," Inez said. "It's cold out here, and we got wet."
"Eeee," Melanie said, and Inez could hear the sympathy even through the static. "…be there as soon…can. You check in..."
"We'll call in every fifteen minutes," Inez said.
"Hey, Mel, wait!" Artie said. "Tell everyone we found food! Maybe that'll keep Danziger from biting our heads off when he gets here," he added for Inez's benefit.
"I doubt it," Melanie said, her voice suddenly clear for a moment, and Artie winced.
Inez winced for a completely different reason. "Oh, no…the tubers!" She scrambled to her feet and looked down at the river, then let out a sigh of relief. The bag of tubers had gotten wedged under the passenger seat. She scrambled down the bank and retrieved it, then climbed awkwardly back up to join Artie.
Artie chuckled. "Well, at least that much went right," he said. "It could be a lot worse."
"Don't," Inez said, holding up a hand to stop him. "It'll get worse. It always does when you say stuff like that."
"How far out are they?" Devon asked Melanie.
"Only about seven k on a direct line," Melanie said. "But they crossed back over the river a little north of here and then swung around that line of hills, so it'll be more like ten-ish before you get to them."
Devon nodded. "Okay, Danziger, let's go get 'em," she said.
Melanie turned as Julia came up with the med kit. "Thanks," she said, reaching to take it.
Julia shook her head. "I'm going," she said. She smiled and leaned close. "If I have to stick around here with nothing to do but think, I'll talk myself out of it."
"Out of what?" Melanie said breathlessly.
"You were right, about everything," Julia said. "And…well…tonight…" She trailed off significantly, unsuccessfully trying not to smile.
Melanie's eyes went wide. "You're kidding! Seriously?" She started to fling her arms around Julia, but Julia backed away, looking past Melanie to where Devon and Danziger were standing by the rail.
"Shh," Julia whispered. "It'll get around soon enough, but—"
"Sorry," Melanie said standing back, though it seemed to take some effort. "But as soon as you get back, I want details. We might as well put that perfect memory of yours to good use."
Julia looked embarrassed, but nodded.
Melanie sighed loudly. "I never get to do the cool stuff," she said for Devon and Danziger to hear. "How is Rob supposed to dramatically come to my rescue if I never get into trouble?"
"Being rescued isn't nearly as much fun as you might think," Julia said, shaking her head as she clambered into the ATV. "Are you ready?" she called back to Devon.
Devon looked over at Danziger, and he nodded. "Tell Inez we'll be there in forty-five minutes, tops," he said to Melanie, climbing into the rail. He pulled out after Julia.
"What was that all about?" Devon asked. "And why is Julia in such a good mood today?" Devon said.
"You have no idea," Danziger said, smiling enigmatically.
"What?" Devon said, looking excitedly at him. "What did I miss?"
Danziger shook his head. "You'll have to ask her…or Alonzo," he said. "Gossip is Melanie's gig, not mine."
"Oh, don't make me suffer!" Devon said. "You know Julia won't say anything, so I'll have to wait till we get back!"
"Suffering is good for the soul," Danziger said. "At least, that's what my mother always told me."
"She only said that to justify punishing you," Devon said. "Which apparently runs in the family," she added under her breath.
"What's that supposed to mean?" Danziger said, glancing over at her and frowning.
Devon sighed and decided to bite the bullet. "It means, I apologized, I meant it, and I've done what I can to make up for it. So when are you going to stop punishing me?"
Danziger groaned. "Not you, too!"
Devon blinked. "Huh?"
He shook his head. "Tru just about took my head off this morning," he said. "See if I ever let her ride in the Transrover with you again."
"So?" Devon said after waiting several seconds for him to continue.
He rolled his eyes. "I'm working on it, okay?"
Devon crossed her arms. "Work faster," she muttered, and she sounded so much like Tru at that moment, Danziger had to bite his tongue not to smile.
"Morgan, I swear, you're just fine," Melanie said again. "It's just a blister." She started putting away the diaglove, hoping he'd take the hint. She still hadn't had a chance to track down Alonzo to get the story from him, and it was driving her crazy.
First, Bess had insisted they do the comm training, and Melanie couldn't come up with a good excuse to delay it. So she'd blown through the basics with her as fast as she could, but then Morgan showed up with a blister on the base of his thumb the size of a pea. And it's about time you finally did enough work to get one, Melanie thought.
"What do I do?" Morgan said, waving his hand like he was hoping to shake it off.
"You wear gloves the next time you work with a shovel," Melanie said. "Now I have to go."
Bess looked at her. "You've been itching to get out of here all morning," she said perceptively. "What's going on?"
"Nothing," Melanie said, smiling. "I just need to go talk to…someone."
She ran for the door to the dome before Bess could ask her any more questions, darted through it and looked frantically around for Alonzo.
"Good lord, honey! Where's the fire?" Phoebe said, shouldering a mag-pro as she started for the stairs to the lookout on top of the dome.
"Where's Alonzo?" Melanie asked.
"I think I saw him talking to Rob over by Dome Two," Phoebe said.
Melanie turned to go.
"Hold on there!" Phoebe said, grabbing her arm. "Is something wrong?"
Melanie shook her head, but couldn't keep the grin off her face. Phoebe raised her eyebrows. "Now what could be giving you that shit-eating grin, hmmm?"
"Not now, Phoebe!" Melanie said. "Later, I promise!"
"Oh, I think I already figured it out," Phoebe said, matching her smile. "You tell Alonzo I'm happy for him."
Melanie nodded and ran for Dome Two. Halfway there, Tru called to her. "You were supposed to tell me when you were training Bess," she said accusingly, a little out of breath after trotting up. "She just told me you already did it."
"I'm sorry," Melanie said, kicking herself. "Tell you what, give me about…half an hour, and I'll go through it with you personally, okay?"
Tru made a show of checking the chronometer on her gear. "Okay, half an hour," she said warningly, and walked off towards the river, where Uly was poking at something with a long stick.
Melanie sighed in relief and started again for Dome Two. She found Alonzo on the far side, helping Rob finish up one of the berms they'd been constructing. "Sorry, Rob, but I need Alonzo."
"What for?" Alonzo said, looking over at her and setting down his shovel.
"What for?" Melanie said, grabbing his arm and dragging him away. "Are you kidding me? After everything I've done for you, I have to hunt you down to get the details about what happened with Julia?"
"Oh," Alonzo said, smiling sheepishly. "That. I just assumed she'd already told you."
Melanie rolled her eyes. "Okay, first, this is Julia we're talking about. And second, I don't live with her anymore, remember? So spill it!"
Julia steered the ATV carefully across the river, wincing as the cold water splashed her. Artie and Inez must be freezing, she thought. But by Melanie's estimate, they should be no more than ten or fifteen minutes away, and—
She broke off the thought as she felt a momentary sensation of anger and…what? Smugness? Arrogance? But before she could identify it, it was gone.
"Did you feel that?" Devon said over the gear as Julia pulled up onto the far bank.
"Yes," Julia said nervously. She stopped the ATV and pulled out her monoculars, the wind whipping her hair. She scanned the horizon, but there were no Terriers in sight.
"Mel," Devon said over the gear, "we just got a…a blip from a Terrier."
"A blip?" Melanie said, and she sounded annoyed.
"Julia and I both felt something, and it didn't feel friendly," Devon said.
"Okay," Melanie said uncertainly.
"Just…tell everybody to keep their eyes open," Devon said.
"Will do," Melanie said. "You three do the same. I'm more worried about you being out there on your own."
"Me, too," Devon said. "We're moving as fast as we can." She closed the channel and looked at Julia, who had already climbed back into the ATV. "Are you getting anything else?" she asked.
Julia looked nervous. "I'm a little leery about trying to make contact—I don't know enough about how this works, and I'd hate to bring them down on us by trying too hard to feel them."
Devon hadn't thought of that. She glanced at Danziger, who pointedly powered up his mag-pro.
"Telling you is gonna have to wait," Alonzo said after Melanie closed the channel with Devon.
Melanie frowned. "We don't know for sure they're coming," she said.
Alonzo shook his head. "Maybe not, but I'd rather be prepared. Have you seen the kids?"
"They were over by the river," Melanie said.
"Uly," Alonzo said after opening a channel. "You there?"
"Yes," Uly said, and Alonzo breathed a sigh of relief. At least he learned that much from his trip down the river, he thought.
"Where are you? Is Tru with you?"
"We're both by the river," Tru said. "What's going on? Is my dad okay?"
"He's fine. We might have Terriers nearby. I want you and Uly back up here right now," Alonzo said. He closed the channel and turned to Melanie. "You head back to the med tent and make sure you're ready for anything. And spread the word to everyone. I'll make sure the kids are safe."
Melanie nodded and started for the med tent, wondering if Alonzo was picking something up from the Terriers, and that's why he was so edgy.
After she passed along Devon's warning to the rest of the camp, Melanie frowned and picked up her tablet. Maybe there's another way to go at this, she thought. If Julia's right, and the Terriers are somehow picking up our electromagnetic signals, then they have to be broadcasting, too. The signals have to be weak, but maybe if I—
She cut off the thought sharply as she saw the flashing icon at the top of her tablet. Oh, no, she thought, her heart pounding, and read the time stamp. Two hours ago. Somebody was broadcasting two hours ago, and now the Terriers are close. That's too much of a coincidence. She opened the recording, and swallowed hard as she realized what she was looking at.
"Damn it," she swore softly. She'd been so relieved the spy had turned out to be Hardy, because he was just about the only person in camp that nobody really liked. But that would be too easy, she thought grimly. So of course it isn't him. She sighed. This is going to kill—
"Terriers!" Rob's voice came over the gear.
"Everybody take cover!" Alonzo's voice cut in. "If you don't have a weapon, get into Dome One, right now! Tru!"
"Holy—PAUL! Behind—!" someone else yelled, then someone else screamed, there was a weird hollow-sounding thud, and then there was a hail of mag-pro shots being fired.
"Kill them!" Melanie heard through the tent walls, and it took her a moment to recognize the murderous yell as Rick's voice.
Oh, god, she thought, and started for the tent flap.
"Melanie!" Rob said breathlessly, "get ready! I'm coming with Phoebe. She has an arrow in her leg!"
"Okay," Melanie said, hesitating. "What about Paul?"
"Not…now," Rob said sharply, his breaths coming in short gasps.
Alonzo came crashing into the tent carrying Tru, and Uly ran in right behind him. "Into the dome!" he said, shoving Uly ahead of him. "Now! Find someplace to hide, and stay there!" He turned to Melanie. "Check her out—she tripped and fell," he said, setting Tru down. She was breathing hard, looking scared. Alonzo turned to go.
"What's going on out there?" Melanie said, and when he turned to look at her, she suddenly didn't want to know. "Never mind," she said before he could answer. "Rob's coming with Phoebe. There isn't time."
"Call Julia," Alonzo said. "Tell them to stay clear. There's no way they'll get through if they try to come back now."
Melanie nodded. "Be careful," she said. He smiled thinly and ducked out of the tent. Tru had sat down on Julia's cot, her breathing steadying slightly, but her eyes were still wide. Melanie ran a quick scan on her and was relieved to see there was nothing wrong. "Still a little hard to breathe, is it?" she asked, and Tru nodded. "That'll get better. You just hang out here till you catch your breath, then go on in and find Uly." She opened a channel. "Julia, come in."
"What's wrong?" Julia said immediately.
"We're under attack," Melanie said, and, before she could say anything, added, "Don't ask me for details. I don't know anything except that it's Terriers, and at least one person has been hit. Alonzo said to stay clear—there are too many of them for you to get through."
"But—" Julia began.
"Listen, you need to know something," Melanie said, but stopped as Rob shouldered his way into the tent with Phoebe's arm draped over his shoulder. She had a large arrow sticking out of her leg, and her face was creased with pain as she hopped into the tent. "Damn it—gotta go. I'll tell you when you get back. Stay safe." She closed the channel and glanced at Tru. "Tru, I need that cot. Can you manage?"
"I think so," she said, sounding younger than Melanie had ever heard her before. She got to her feet a little unsteadily, and Rob helped Phoebe over to the cot and laid her down on it.
"That's quite the piercing you got there, Phoebe," Melanie said.
"Well, you know what they say," Phoebe said, her teeth gritted in pain, "go big or go home."
Melanie began scanning her. "How bad is it out there?" she asked.
"Bad," Rob said. "They got up on the rocks behind the camp, or at least one of 'em did. Paul got shot in the back before anybody realized what was happening. He...fell."
Melanie could tell that Rob didn't think there was any chance he'd survived, and she realized all at once what that hollow thud had been.
Tru made a small noise from behind her and Melanie turned to look at her. From the look on her face, it was clear she'd seen it. "Oh, Tru…" she began, then shook her head. I don't have time to help her right now, she told herself. "I need you to go on into the dome," she said emphatically, then swallowed hard and turned back to focus on Phoebe. She grabbed a painblock and dosed her. "Okay, Phoebe, I'm gonna have to pull this sucker out. It may hurt a little, but Alonzo didn't even cry when I did it to him, so it probably won't bother you a bit."
Phoebe laughed tightly. "Go ahead," she said, and grabbed the edge of the cot tightly.
"Laser cut," Melanie prompted the diaglove, and used the laser to cut into the leg so she could pull the arrow out without causing more damage. Phoebe winced a little as she did it, but the painblock seemed to be working for the most part. Melanie grabbed hold of the arrow shaft, and before Phoebe could anticipate the pain, she pulled it out.
Phoebe gasped, then let out a long breath. "Damn," she said quietly.
Melanie patted her shoulder. "You did great," she said, and turned to put the arrow on the lab table. As she did, she noticed a weird substance on the arrow just above where it had penetrated Phoebe's leg. She studied it uneasily, but the initial scan hadn't read any toxins. I'll have Julia check it as soon as she gets back, she thought, and turned back to close Phoebe's wound.
"Hey, how are you doing, Pheeb?" Valerie said, poking her head into the tent.
"Visiting hours can wait till you get rid of those party crashers, okay?" Phoebe said.
"Don't worry," Valerie said. "They started pulling back right about the time Rob got you in here." She shook her head, looking relieved. "And a good thing, too. There were a lot of them." She frowned, looking back toward the entrance to the dome. "Tru, are you okay?"
Melanie sighed. "She's supposed to be in the dome," she said.
"I don't want to hide," Tru said, her voice sounding more like normal than it had. "Let me help."
Melanie bit her lip. Doing something useful has to be better than dwelling on what she saw, she thought. "Any other injuries?" Melanie asked Valerie, finishing up Phoebe's sutures.
Valerie didn't answer for a moment, and when Melanie glanced up at her, she was looking at Tru. Finally, she shook her head. "Not that you can help," she said quietly. "Nick's about ready to go in and kill Hardy, though, so there might—"
Melanie's eyes went wide. "What? No!" she said. "No, you can't let him do that! You have to tell them, it's not—"
"Shit!" someone yelled outside. "Here they come again!"
Valerie swore. "You stay here and keep an eye on them," she said to Rob, backing towards the tent flap. "I have a bad feeling we're going to be needing Melanie again." She ducked out of the tent.
Melanie turned to Rob. "You have to go make sure nobody hurts Hardy," she said to him. "He's not the spy."
"How do you know?" Rob said.
"Because there was a transmission a few hours ago," she said frantically. "And there's no way it came from him. Rob, you have to go, now!"
"I'm not going anywhere," Rob said resolutely. "Nobody's going to go after him. They have their hands full. Besides, you could just call on gear."
"Oh," Melanie said, blinking. "Duh."
Rob smiled weakly at her. "Don't worry about it. We're all a little stressed out. So if it isn't Hardy, then who—?"
"ROB!" Valerie's voice came from outside the tent, sounding terrified. "Get into the dome, now! There's a—!"
Rob whirled to face the tent flap, raising his mag-pro, then Tru screamed, and the med tent exploded into chaos.
"Julia, punch it!" Danziger called to her, and he pulled out. "We gotta go get Artie and Inez, right now!"
Julia nodded and pulled out after him, following him north, the ominously dark clouds on the horizon seeming even darker than they had before.
Devon held onto the roll bar as Danziger drove the rail at breakneck speed towards the coordinates Melanie had given them. She started to reach for her gear to open a channel, but stopped herself. If they're under attack, the last thing they need is me asking a bunch of questions, she told herself. They'll call when they can.
But there had been no more word from the camp by the time they found Artie and Inez fifteen minutes later, and Devon was starting to really get worried.
"I'm so glad to see you," Inez said, holding her arms tightly around her and shivering. "We heard what Melanie said. Did she—?"
"Nothing yet," Devon said tersely.
Julia was already scanning Artie's knee, and Danziger had grabbed a length of biocord out of the rail and had gone over to look at the crashed rail.
"How does it look?" Devon said, coming up next to him.
He shook his head. "It doesn't seem to be all that banged up, but it's going to be a bitch getting it out of there." He scrambled down the bank of the river and splashed around to the other side of the rail. He tied the biocord around the roll bar on the bottom side and threw it up to her. "When I give the word, you pull, got it?" he said.
"Right," Devon said.
Danziger grabbed hold of the roll bar, crouching, and then said, "Okay, pull!"
Devon pulled hard, the biocord digging painfully into her hands, and the rail tipped over onto its wheels, splashing water up over the bank and onto Devon. Danziger was already untying the biocord and going around to the rear of the rail and tying it again onto the rear bumper.
"Inez!" he called, and she came over from where she'd been hovering over Artie as Julia scanned him.
"What do you need me to do?" she said.
"Take this and tie it onto the back end of our rail," he said. "Devon," he said, "you're going to drive our rail straight away from here when I say go, okay? We're gonna pull this sucker right out of the river."
"Okay," she said uneasily. The bank was really steep, and it didn't look to her like it was going to pull right out at all. But she ran over and got into the driver's seat.
"Are we tied off, Inez?" Danziger called.
"Roger that," Inez said, coming back over, her arms wrapped tightly around herself.
"Okay, stand clear, but watch from up there," Danziger said. "Tell me if we hang up on anything."
Inez nodded, shivering, and Danziger took off his jacket. "Here," he said, tossing it up to her. "I'm just gonna get wet down here anyway. Put that on before you freeze."
"Thanks," she said gratefully, and pulled it on.
"All right," he called to Devon, "haul away!"
Devon pulled the rail forward, feeling nothing, and then all at once, the slack was gone, and her rail stopped cold, the wheels spinning uselessly.
"Hold it!" Inez said. "We need to raise the back end more," she said to Danziger. "The bumper's digging into the bank."
Danziger swore.
"Inez," Devon called, "you take over here. I have an idea." She backed the rail closer to the river again, then climbed out and ran over to the ATV. She hopped in, pulled it around so it was between the rail on the bank and the one in the river, and stopped.
"What are you doing?" Inez asked as Devon climbed out of the ATV.
Devon ignored her. She grabbed the biocord and threw it up onto the ATV rollbar. She stood back and looked at the back of the rail in the river, trying to judge if the angle was right.
"Good thinking, Dev," Danziger said, standing back and watching. "As soon as we get this up a little, you'll need to pull the ATV forward."
Devon nodded and climbed back in.
"Okay, Inez, let's give it a shot!" Danziger called. "Go slow—I don't want to damage the ATV. Devon, you keep an eye on that biocord—if it looks like it's gonna slip and hit the solar panel, you holler stop."
Inez started the rail forward, and the ATV sank into the ground slightly as the pressure of the biocord pressed down on it.
"It's working!" Danziger yelled, standing to one side of the rail as the rear end lifted clear of the bank. The rear wheels hit the bank, started to roll up the bank, and the front end lifted out of the water. "Devon, pull forward, give it room!"
Within minutes, they had the rail out of the water, and Danziger had given it a once over. "It'll need some work, but it should be able to get back to camp on its own power." He smiled at Devon. "That was smart, using the ATV. I don't know if I'd've thought of it."
"Thanks," she said, smiling tentatively back at him. She felt herself starting to blush, so she turned to Julia. "How's his leg?" she asked.
"He has a little torn cartilage," Julia said, "but it looks like there isn't much damage to the ligaments. It hurts, but it'll heal pretty fast."
"Hell, yeah, it hurts," Artie said, and Julia dosed him with painblock.
"I'm really sorry," Inez said again.
"It's okay, Inez," Artie said as Devon and Julia helped him to his feet. "So what do we do now? Do we risk heading back towards camp?"
Danziger shook his head. "Not till we hear from them. I don't want to risk running into the Terriers. Not with just the two mag-pros."
"But there are injuries," Julia protested.
"Mel can handle it," Danziger said.
Julia turned to Devon, her look pleading.
Devon sighed. Every instinct told her they needed to get the hell back to the camp, that Uly was in trouble, but she knew Danziger was right. "Julia, we won't do them any good if we get ourselves killed trying to get back there."
Danziger looked relieved.
"But Inez and Artie are soaked," Julia said. "With the temperatures this cold, we're facing hypothermia. We need to get them warm and dry."
"There was that little stand of trees about a half a klick back," Danziger said. "We'll go back there and we can start a small fire."
"Fire would be good," Artie said, his teeth chattering.
Julia had Inez give Artie the coat Danziger had lent her, and she gave Inez her own. "Won't you both be cold?" Inez said.
"We won't be out here that long," Julia said, giving Devon a hard look.
God, I hope she's right, Devon thought as they made their way back to the spot Danziger had picked out. By the time they got the fire going, it had been almost a half an hour since they'd gotten Melanie's warning.
Artie rubbed his hands gratefully over the tiny fire. Danziger had insisted they keep it small so the smoke wouldn't give away their position, and Devon had to admit he was right. Even the small fire put out a lot of smoke. But the little bit of warmth it gave off was making a big difference for Artie and Inez. And luckily, the way the wind had started to blow, the smoke was disappearing as fast as it rose from the fire.
"Here," Devon said to Julia, shrugging out of her jacket. "You're shivering. Take this for a while."
Julia shook her head. "I'm fine," she said.
"Humor me," Devon said dryly as a round of shivers hit the doctor again. Julia acquiesced, pulling on the jacket.
"Devon…read…?" Rick's voice came over the gear, though his voice was nearly unrecognizable. But it wasn't just the static—there was something wrong.
"Yes, we're here! What's going on?" Devon said quickly.
"It's…ly bad, Devon," Rick began, and she could hear what sounded like a sob. "We need you…"
"Rick, what's wrong?" Devon said, her heart in her throat.
"…kids are okay," he said. "But…god, I… Listen, the…pulled back…south." There was a long burst of static.
"Say again, Rick," Devon said. "You're breaking up."
"Come back…be okay…from the north…went south. But…ful…call in when…close. We're…"
"What?" Devon said.
"…ready to shoot…thing," Rick said, almost shouting.
"Okay, I think I got it," Devon said. "We're on our way. We'll call when we get closer."
"Good," Rick said, and there was no mistaking the relief in his voice. "Hur…"
Devon closed the channel, swallowing down the lump in her throat, and felt Danziger's big hand on her shoulder. "Hang in there, Devon," he said.
Julia was already throwing her med kit onto the back of the ATV, and Inez and Artie were making their way to their rail.
Devon watched as Danziger covered their little fire with dirt to put it out, then shook herself. You have to get back there, she told herself, and clambered into the rail.
None of them said a word till they were almost back at the camp. Not that we'd have been able to hear each other anyway, Devon thought. The wind was howling around them, making it hard even to think. Her nose was starting to go numb, and she hated to think what the icy wind was doing to Artie and Inez. And to Danziger, she thought, glancing down at his wet coveralls.
"How are your feet?" she shouted over the wind.
"Fine," he said tersely, and Devon gave up, figuring it didn't really matter anyway. There was nothing she could do about it till they got back to camp.
The trip seemed like it took an eternity to Devon, though she knew they were making better time than they had on the way out. It isn't good enough, she thought desperately. God, aren't we there yet?
"Hey, Rick, you there?" Danziger shouted, and Devon jumped at the sound of his voice.
"Yeah," Rick said, and he sounded exhausted. "You guys okay?"
"We're fine," Danziger said. "We'll be rolling up in about five. Tell everybody to hold their fire, okay?"
"Yeah," Rick said, and closed the channel without another word.
They saw the first dead Terrier as they came up to the river. It had fallen halfway into the water, lying with its face against the far bank, the wind riffling through its thick fur. They rolled through the water and up past it, and found another just a few meters past the river, and several more as they approached the clear area near Dome Two.
Rick was waiting for them, his face almost gray.
"Oh, god," Inez said as they came to a stop, and Devon followed her gaze to see a body lying slumped against the side of Dome Two. She couldn't tell who it was.
"How bad…" she tried to say, but couldn't make the rest of the words come out.
"Bad," Rick said bluntly as the wind whipped around them. "Paul's dead." He took a ragged breath, looking down at the ground, and then looked up at Julia. "And…they…" He stopped, closing his eyes, then looked at Devon. "Devon, they took Mel."