Chapter 15 CLEO
CLEO
HUNTER GETS THIS LITTLE line between his eyebrows when he concentrates, and I can’t stop taking peeks at it.
We’re making our way through the long, narrow reclamation room that runs behind the kitchens, past the greenhouse, and ends up at the communal showers. Those are the three heavy water uses on the base, so it makes sense to have them side by side.
It’s really just a passageway – I can stretch out my arms on either side and touch the walls – and it’s crammed with tanks and tubes we have to squeeze past and step over.
The dehumidifiers that are all over the base work nonstop in here, and still don’t manage to keep up.
The warm, steamy air fills my lungs, and my face beads with sweat.
Right now, Hunter’s carefully untangling a nest of cables to make a gap big enough to squeeze through – I’ve been along here before, but he’s so much broader than me.
It’s only luck that I happen to glance back the way we came.
It’s nearly dark in here – there’s just a low strip of emergency lighting along the floor – and at first I’m not sure whether something moved near the entrance, or whether it was a burst of steam floating through a beam of light.
Then that hint of movement resolves into a hand lifting, and the light glints off a gun, and without thinking I throw myself back at Hunter, crash-tackling him to the ground.
It only works because he’s still not used to the gravity, and he’s thrown off-balance easily enough that my weight will do it.
In the same instant there’s a deafening sound that echoes up and down the narrow room, and sparks fly off a nearby water tank.
Without a word the two of us scramble away, staying low, ripping cables out of our way. Hunter bulldozes a path for us and I’m right on his tail, flinching as there’s another BANG behind us.
We come up on two doors, one leading forward to the showers, the other an access port leading out into the main hallway. Hunter doesn’t know where he is, and picks the hallway door, shoving it open and throwing himself through it.
I’m right behind him, hitting the floor and rolling to the side in case a bullet follows me out.
‘This way,’ I hiss, heading straight across the hall to the room that serves as a movie theater. It used to be a records room, and I knew it a lot better then. I yank open the door and usher him through, then close it behind us silently.
There’s a huge screen taking up most of the wall to our left – when they put it up, they blocked an entrance I used to use to slip in and out of a back passageway – and to our right they’ve created a series of risers, and set out chairs facing the screen.
There’s an abandoned pair of augment glasses on each seat, and the smell of popcorn lingers in the air.
This place will probably smell of popcorn forever.
It’s almost pitch-dark in here, but there are little guidance lights stuck to the edge of each of the steps, and they provide just enough of a hint to see by, especially if you know the place.
If our stalker is just a few steps behind us, they’ll come out from the access passage into an empty hallway, and not know which way we went.
But in case our luck doesn’t fall that way, I hurry up the steps toward the back of the room, then duck down to crawl along behind a row of chairs, Hunter on my tail.
A moment later the door opens, letting in a stream of brighter light from the hallway, and both of us freeze in place.
I can see Sabrina silhouetted in the doorway, another slighter figure behind her.
I can feel the adrenaline kick through my body as it returns to flight mode on pure instinct.
I’ve run from Sabrina before. I know what she’s capable of.
She has a tablet in one hand and she pauses in the doorway as she glances down at it. The faintest hint of music escapes the headsets they’re wearing, and I hear the tinny tones of Victoriana Lu from a distance. Gonna blast into space, baby!
She smacks at the panel beside the door where the light switches are, then smacks at it again. Then I hear her voice: ‘Won’t turn on. Leave the door open.’
I can hear the soft, frustrated hum of the door trying to automatically close itself. Then Sabrina speaks again.
‘It’s a fucking cinema. The door won’t stay open. How does this job keep finding new ways to screw me?’
Her companion’s voice comes then, a woman crooning a singsong threat that makes my skin crawl. ‘We’re better in the dark than you are, little mice.’
Sabrina lets the door slide closed behind them and then hits the control panel, and the little guidance lights are gone.
The room’s plunged into darkness, and they begin to stalk forward. I can only tell where they are by the sound of their headsets, and I reach out in the blackness for Hunter.
I find his shoulder, and when I pull him toward me, he comes willingly. I run a hand up his warm arm to find his shoulder, then curve it around the back of his neck, so I can pull his ear in close to my mouth. I breathe my words into his ear, lips brushing his skin. ‘Turn off your headset.’
If I can hear their music, they’ll be able to hear ours. Right now, I’m the only person in the room without Victoriana Lu blasting in my ear. But if either of them thinks to turn their music down, they’ll be able to zero in on Hunter.
I feel him obey, rather than see him – his weight shifts slightly as he reaches up to the other side of his head, feeling for the switch and pressing on it.
They’re coming closer. The buzzing sound of the music is halfway up the steps to us now.
Let’s count down to a launch for two,
Let’s blast off, baby, me and you-ouuu!
With a gentle push, I send Hunter crawling along the row of chairs again, moving toward the other end. Maybe we can circle around and try for the access door now hidden behind the screen. If it’s still there.
I catch a flicker of light at the other end of the row as Sabrina’s tablet comes to life for a moment, and glimpse her face as she looks down at it. What’s she doing? She’ll lose her night vision.
Hunter reaches the end of the row and pauses in the dark, uncertain. He must be completely lost. I reach out to rest a hand on his back, and then with agonizing slowness, I squeeze between him and the row of chairs so I can take the lead.
How am I going to get him behind the screen when he can’t see a thing?
I take his hands to pull him to his feet, and he comes up silently, then stands unmoving. I weave my fingers through his for a moment and squeeze. A silent trust me. He squeezes back.
Slowly, my ears straining for the faint sound of music, I turn away from him. Then I take his hands and settle them at my waist – they curve around the narrowest point, his fingertips pressing through the thin fabric of my tank. I can feel his breath on the back of my neck.
When I take a slow step forward, he follows, understanding. I can’t imagine what it’s like for him in this moment, in unfamiliar surroundings, in the pitch-black dark, knowing there are two people in this room who’ll shoot us if they can find us.
I ease down another step, and together we start making our way toward the front of the room. A part of my brain is already setting to work a different problem. How did they find us? Did we miss a camera? Was it just a lucky guess? They seemed sure we were in here, though.
Another step down, and another, as we ease our way toward the screen. The ground levels off, and I stretch my hands out in front, feeling for the thick fabric of it, and then groping my way to the edge. Please, please let the access door still be there.
Another snatch of music tickles the edges of my hearing, maybe as one of them turns their head in the darkness.
Gotta love this face, baby!
The headset.
We took the chief engineer’s headset, and they must have worked that out – they must have searched the areas around the workshop. And you can’t just scan the whole base for anyone using a headset, but you can track a specific headset. If you know which one you’re looking for.
That’s what Sabrina’s looking at on the tablet.
The huge screen is suspended from the ceiling, and I feel my way behind it with my hands on the wall, and Hunter’s hands still around my waist, his body pressed close to mine. He doesn’t pause, doesn’t slow, doesn’t even give me a what-the-hell squeeze. He just lets me steer.
My fingers find the fine seam where the door used to be, and I sweep slowly with my hands until I find the handle. They’re going to hear when I open it, so we’ll have just one chance.
I reach for where Hunter’s hand rests at my waist and tap my fingers against it. First one, then two, then three. A countdown. A quick squeeze lets me know he understands – or at least, I hope that’s what he’s saying.
I give him the countdown again: one, two, three.
On the third tap, I open the door and step through it, pulling him with me.
‘There!’ someone shouts, and a bullet pierces the screen, sending shuddering ripples through it.
I slam the door shut, turning in Hunter’s arms and groping at his face in the darkness, until I find the headset tucked behind his ear. I rip if off, dropping it to the ground and stomping hard.
‘Cleo?’ he whispers, still holding me tight – it’s just as black in here as it was out there.
‘They were tracking it,’ I whisper back. ‘Keep hold of me. I know the way through here.’
‘Go,’ he says simply, hands tightening at my waist as I turn away.
It’s not even an emergency hallway – it’s just a gap between two sections of the base, no wider than my body in some places.
They design the sections to seal off from each other, so a breach in one leaves the others intact, but nobody’s meant to come through here.
These passageways have been a useful place to camp out, or even to sleep.
They’re also free of obstacles, which means I can jog, my hands trailing along each wall, waiting until I feel the seam I’m looking for.
The floor dips as we pass underneath the ring corridor that circles the base, then climbs again.
We move for nearly a minute in silence before we find the place I want, and Hunter presses into the back of me when I suddenly stop.
I feel for the inside release I installed about a month ago, then flick open the door.
My eyes swim with tears as we step into the small storage room off the main shower facility, where they keep all the spare towels, the cleaning supplies.
Hunter follows me, and I hear his intake of breath behind me as we suddenly step into the light. It’s not bright, but it’s dazzling after so long in the dark.
His hands slide from where they rest at my waist to wrap around my middle, pulling me back against him. Now it’s my turn to go where he steers, and I turn my head so I can press my cheek to his chest. I feel his heart thumping there, quick but steady. Alive, it says. Alive, alive, alive.
He’s silent, and I fold an arm over his, so he doesn’t let go. Just for a minute, I let myself lean on him. I let us share this moment of sheer relief that we got away, that we’re together, that he’s here and warm and strong and sharing the load of getting through this.
You could have left him, whispers a little voice. She’s the one who looks out for me, mostly. You would have been safer if you’d left him behind. But it didn’t even occur to you.
Shut up, I whisper back, in the silence of my head.
And then I pull myself together.
‘They’ll find a light source eventually,’ I say, my voice sounding loud, even though I’m only murmuring the words. ‘And then they might find the door behind the screen. We should keep moving.’
‘Right,’ he says, his voice low in my ear. But he doesn’t let go for a moment longer. Then he uncurls his arms from around me and steps back. ‘Let’s head to the greenhouse. We need the terminal there. If they’re using the cameras, we need them too.’
Four hours to go. Tick, tock.