Chapter 26
THE BEGINNING OF THE JOURNEY back through the sewers—as far as journeys through the sewers go—is a success.
Jasa’s codes, which I took careful note of via my cogs every time we passed through a checkpoint, still work.
The pace is faster, now I’m not having to wait for an elderly, irritable client to stomp-slosh her way after me.
And being alone means I can, for the first time in a while, actually think without interruption.
It’s not all great. I’m still trudging through knee-deep human excrement. But for the most part, it could be worse.
Until about five minutes past the Caelum checkpoint, that is.
It starts, as usual, with my revs prickling.
I stop. Frown. Turn slowly, holding my light bar high.
Nothing in the starkly lit tunnel looks any different to any of the starkly lit tunnels I’ve been walking through for the past hour.
Just slick brick walls stretching not much further than the height of my head, and a dark morass of slow-moving, sludgy liquid.
And then I see it. A ripple against the flow of the rest of the sewage.
Travelling with concerning rapidity in my direction.
I can do little more than activate my somatics and brace as the fetid water explodes a metre away and something massive and dark and wriggling arcs for my face.
I grunt in alarm and twist, hampered by the sludge, snatching a slick, stinking tentacled arm from in front of my eyes and ripping it with all my strength to the side.
The enormous octopus hisses as it’s thrown into the wall; to my vague horror, a tongue lined with tiny teeth darts angrily from its beak-like mouth. The filth of the sewer runs down its head, which is twice the size of mine.
“Oh, come on,” I mutter as we assess each other.
Too much intelligence behind its beady eyes.
I’ve never heard of a bio like this, but given we’re five minutes away from the private laboratory of a woman who liked to play God, it doesn’t take a genius to figure out where this one might have originated. Or what it might be protecting.
“I’m on your side. I’m with Jasa,” I say hurriedly, holding my hands up slowly to indicate I don’t want to fight.
“I’m here to help her. Seriously. You don’t need to do this.
What would she have called you. Probably a kraken?
Yeah. That fits. See? We’re friends!” I say, keeping my voice calm and confident.
The creature either doesn’t like being called a kraken, or doesn’t understand me.
I’m marginally better prepared for its blindingly fast face attack this time, and my pulsing Plasma darts out; the creature gives a weird, strangled cry but its seven remaining arms aren’t deterred, wrapping around my two with animalistic strength and forcing them to my sides.
For a heartbeat its alien face, covered with sewage, hangs directly in front of mine.
Our eyes level. I try to headbutt it. It dodges.
I try to ram it against the brick wall. Its grip only tightens.
My breath is getting short. My revs are keeping me from being crushed by the kraken-hug, but only barely.
“Not… that… good… a… friend,” I gasp, thrashing helplessly.
The creature bends and squirms, positioning its head to the side. Its beak opens and that awful, drill-like, tooth-covered tongue licks out again, piercing the skin of my arm.
“Ow!” I don’t have the energy to say much more than that.
Damn it. The thing’s winning. I’m actually going to die.
After all this. Jasa dead. Verity’s life ruined.
No real answers about Oceanus. And now, apparently, after years of working off my debt to the Keres, after dying, they still get to have a version of me out there, doing its thing for them. My damned thing.
The kraken’s tongue retracts. I’m dizzy from lack of oxygen. Its stinking face raises to regard me again. I try to headbutt it again. It dodges, again.
I wheeze a vaguely disappointed curse. I’m really about to go out in the sewers of Themis being hugged by a giant octopus. I mean, I’ve had a bunch of thoughts about how it might end, over the years, and… yeah. Still a surprise.
It’s all just starting to feel a little depressing when, shockingly, I can breathe again. My attacker’s letting go. Sliding away into the filth of the sewer, beneath the surface, leaving only a bubbling wake as it retreats.
I stand there. Panting. Covered in slime and urine and things I don’t want to think about from where it attached itself to me.
Utterly confused.
The tentacle I severed still floats nearby. I scowl at it. “That’s right,” I eventually mutter after I’m certain the creature’s actually gone, flicking dark liquid from my hands. “You’d better run. No match for me.”
My gaze turns to the small puncture in my arm, a single bead of blood leaking from it. My revs don’t indicate any poison, so that’s something. Though any open wound in this environment isn’t exactly healthy.
It wasn’t its injury that made it back off. No chance. So… something to do with my blood?
The DNA wash is still active, I suppose. I don’t like the concept. Don’t like it at all. Bios are good with scent and general identification, but they can’t analyse blood. They sure as hell can’t do it down to the DNA level.
But it’s the only thing that makes any sense.
It also, I decide, doesn’t matter. I’m almost there, and Jasa’s DNA won’t stay valid in my system for more than another hour or so.
I press on.