Chapter 26
I walked through the main corridor, weaving around enforcer squads.
Small surveillance drones zipped over my head, using the open space near the ceiling.
I kept my head down, letting the helmet conceal my features from the drones, not making any assumptions about whose faces they would be scanning.
The enforcer’s uniform was a good fit, and no one even blinked twice as I passed.
I tried not to hold my ribs, but I couldn’t help it at times.
It hurt to breathe—nothing like the dull ache of lung disease, but more like a horse had kicked me in the chest and then kicked me again for fun.
I had been very tempted to return the favor to the one who’d kicked me, if I knew which one had.
The four enforcers back in the room would all be awake by now, but they weren’t going anywhere.
I’d tied them up using their own restraints (how’s that for poetic justice?), and had torn strips of nasty, stained bedsheets to use as gags.
If they hadn’t beat me for the heck of it, I almost would’ve felt sorry for them for having something that disgusting shoved in their mouths.
I’d claimed the uniform, weapons, and even an armlet of one of them, destroying the other armlets and stashing the weapons in the room with the bodies.
With any luck, I’d be out of the tunnels before anyone came across the missing enforcers.
It’d be easy enough for a squad to go unnoticed for an hour or two in the chaos.
It seemed like every single enforcer had returned to the tunnels to take everyone who was left, and it was so disordered that a squad could even lose a member or two in the various shuffles underway.
It was basically a free-for-all where one side had stun sticks, blasters, and body armor, and the opposition had bare hands and had already been running pretty dang low in the hope department.
Neither Byte nor I ever would’ve guessed they’d come back. Maybe they needed more poor souls for their labs. Maybe they had plans for the tunnels. Didn’t matter. Byte had already hacked the armlet I’d stolen and was collecting whatever data it could from the security agency’s network.
Walking through the main corridor, a crawler slammed into me while fleeing an enforcer. I grunted in pain and leaned against the wall to catch my breath.
“Stop her!” the enforcer yelled at me. I didn’t and earned a glare from him as he ran past me.
“Man, you look rough.”
I turned to see an enforcer pushing a boy of about twelve, plastic restraints around his wrists.
His nose still bloody, the boy looked like he’d been hit more than once.
I wanted to shock the enforcer for hurting a kid, but there were too many enforcers in the hall to take on.
Instead, I gingerly placed a hand over my ribs.
“Got jumped. I think I broke a rib or ten. On my way to Medical.”
“I hope the stupid dreg who did that to you got what was coming to him,” the enforcer sneered.
“Oh, yeah, he got it all right,” I said.
The enforcer grinned and then slapped my shoulder. I winced at the jolt. “Medi will get you fixed up in no time. Amazing what those bio-nans can do. I got a serious kick to the family jewels during phase one.”
“Ouch,” I said.
“Two minutes after getting some bio-nans, I was a hundred percent fine and ready to head back down into this shithole. You’ll be good as new and ready for phase three in no time, buddy.”
“I’m counting on it.”
I was glad when he finally moved on. I felt bad for the teen, but there was nothing I could do, at least not right now. I pushed off from the wall and walked in the opposite direction of the other enforcers.
I wonder what phase three is.
I was thinking the same thing. Phases one and two were obvious. First, in a surprise raid, they rounded up the able-bodied crawlers—anyone who posed a real threat. Then, they came in to clean up the leftovers. But if the tunnels were already cleared out, what could a third phase entail?
As I walked, I noticed about a dozen crawlers standing along the wall, but strangely, none of them were in restraints.
Why weren’t they running? I glanced at a woman’s face as I walked by.
She wore the rags of a crawler, and she was filthy, but something was off.
It was her features. Crawlers were pale, but more so, they had scars, rough skin, and imperfect teeth.
This woman had none of that. Give her a bath, and she could’ve passed for a news reporter.
She stared blankly ahead like she’d already given up on life, and I realized this group must’ve surrendered rather than be hunted down.
But it was odd that there wasn’t even a single enforcer watching over them.
They gave me the creeps. I hustled past them, unwilling to look at another.
I made it out of the main tunnels without being caught by either a drone or a squad, and without anyone else smashing into me.
As the violence receded, I took a break and rested against the wall.
“You know, it’d be nice if you could mask this pain like you do my lung problems.”
I am dulling the pain, but you have a lot of injuries. However, I no longer need to mask your lungs—they are fully repaired.
“Really?” Okay, that was cool.
A trio of kids—maybe nine or ten years old—ran through the tunnel, which meant there was probably a squad not far behind.
They gave me a fearful stink-eye, and I got the feeling that I’d get myself killed the moment I ended up in a tunnel that the crawlers still controlled unless I lost the black riot gear, and fast. The third kid slowed as she passed, and light glinted off the blade in her hand.
I shook my head. Luckily, she was smart enough to keep running.
If she’d attacked, I had a feeling I’d know exactly how to disarm her.
Thinking of which… “You basically turned into a military amp with that last upgrade.”
I’m far more impressive than a simple military-grade amp.
But yes, even those amps have some characteristics useful to our survival.
I’ve been learning from other amps, identifying opportunities for upgrades.
I can now essentially imprint certain skills in your brain so that they are instinctual.
Military-grade amps only relay the information to their hosts as needed, so they always have a delay in response.
It was a major upgrade. That’s why we were out for three days.
“Three—” I froze. I realized I hadn’t even checked my armlet since I’d woken up. I scrambled and found a message from Lyra—it was two days old. The only content was a series of numbers. “Code for something?”
Coordinates. I imagine she left them as they’d be harder to identify than an address.
A computer would be required to identify the location, assuming the recipient knew the numbers even referred to a location.
Fortunately, I know they reveal a precise location in Dreswick.
Based on the position, I believe it’s here in the Crawl.
“Show me.” I was probably too late, but I had to see for myself. I started walking, pain taking a backseat, as I followed my HUD.
“How’s it looking for drones?” I asked Byte after I had to turn away from a pair of drones zipping through the tunnel ahead.
Most drones are stationed at tunnel entrances, and the remaining drones appear to be moving to join the other units.
It’s good you kept your head down. But if there is a human monitoring the video feeds, they may become curious as to why a lone enforcer is walking the tunnels when all the squads are loading up.
“They’ll just assume I was sent to grab something.”
At least move with more swagger. You are moving too much like an injured low-towner.
“I am an injured low-towner.”
Not in that uniform.
I forced myself to act more like an enforcer. At least the pain was ebbing… like an only half -full drum of battery acid rolled over me. Evidently, my act worked because no enforcers cast a second glance, and the prisoners gutsy enough to make eye contact glared as I passed them.
The coordinates brought me out of the main tunnels into narrower and narrower tunnels until I reached a dead end with a solid wall. “Are you sure this matches the coordinates?”
It could also be directly above us… or below us.
“Well, it’s not here,” I grumbled.
That was when the wall opened.
Lyra stepped out from the darkness and motioned me inside. “Hurry, Cal!”
Once I stepped through, the door closed behind me, leaving us in a dim hallway exactly like the one I’d just left. I realized that the dead end hadn’t actually been a dead end. Someone had built that wall—door—intentionally.
I turned back to Lyra. She looked tired but well, and I gave her a crooked smile.
Her expression turned furious, and she hit me in the arm.
“Ow!” A pain shot through my ribs. I pressed my arm against them. “What’s that for?”
“When I didn’t hear from you, I thought you were dead, you idiotic, stupid—” She lunged forward and hugged me. “Don’t you ever do that again. I thought I lost you.”
“I know,” I managed to grunt out while trying to keep her from squeezing too hard.
She backed up, frowning. “What’s wrong?”
“Picked up a few bruises on the way here,” I said.
She must’ve noticed the bruising above my left eye—at least I assumed it had bruised; it was tender enough.
“Enforcers?” she asked.
I nodded. “That’s how I got this. You like?” I gestured to the clothes I wore.
“I hate it. Black isn’t your color.”
“Yeah, well, they didn’t have much of a selection.” I sobered. “Listen, I would’ve gotten back to you, but Byte had impeccable timing, as usual.”
“Another upgrade?”
I nodded.
“I’m just glad you’re okay,” she said.
“Me too,” I said. “I mean, me too, that I’m glad you’re okay.”