“Where else?” Rachel looked around as she entered the room. It was brightly lit, and a whine from overhead suggested that a local aircon unit was fighting a losing battle against the chill. The man with the gun was behind them, and for a sickening moment as she saw the largely empty room, she wondered if he was meant to kill them and leave their bodies there. Then a door slid open in the wall opposite.
“Go in.” Gun-boy waved them forward. “It’s a lift.”
“Okay, I’m going, I’m going.” Rachel stepped forward. Martin followed her, with Gun-boy trailing to the rear. The doors closed and the lift began to move, sinking toward the high-gee levels of the station. It squealed as it went, long-idle wheels protesting as they clawed along toothed rails that had chilled below normal operating temperatures. They descended in silence, Rachel leaning against Martin in the far corner of the cargo lift from the guard. The guard kept his weapon on them the whole time, seemingly immune to distraction.
The lift juddered to a halt, and its door slid open on a well-lit corridor. There were more fans, humming and grating at overload. The chill was less extreme, and when the guard waved them toward an open door at the other end of the passage, Rachel couldn’t see her breath. “Where are we?” she asked.
“Waiting for the boss. Go right in.” Gun-boy looked bored and annoyed, but not inclined toward immediate violence. Rachel tensed, then nodded and went right in. There was a sign on the open door she read as she passed it: DIRECTOR’S SUITE. Well, what a surprise, she thought tiredly, mentally kicking herself for not having seen this coming. Then her implant twitched. She had to suppress a start as she blinked, rapidly: new mail here, of all places? How …
She read it quickly, almost trancing out — almost missing the deep pile carpet, the withered brown trees in their pots to either side of the big wood-topped desk, and the door leading into the inner office. Then more mail came in — this time, a reply from Martin. She glanced at him sharply, then turned round to stare at Gun-boy. The goon leaned against the wall just inside the doorway. “Who is this boss of yours?” she asked. “Do we have to wait long?”
“You wait until she gets here.” The fan in the office rattled slightly, pumping tepid air in to dilute the chill. A thin layer of dust covered the desk, the visitor’s chairs, an empty watercooler.
“Mind if I sit down?” asked Martin.
“Be my guest.” Gun-boy raised an ironic eyebrow, and Martin sat down hastily before he changed his mind. Rachel stepped sideways in front of him, and he slipped an arm protectively around her waist, under the hem of her jacket.
“Can you tell us anything?” Rachel asked quietly as Martin slipped something into her waistband. “Like what this is all about?”
“No.”
“Okay.” Rachel sighed. “If that’s how you want it.” She sat down on the chair to Martin’s right and leaned against him, putting her left arm behind his shoulder. So they’re not monitoring the station protocols for traffic yet, she thought, hungry for hope. If they were, that mail from Wednesday would have set them off. She let her arm drop behind Martin’s back, then twisted her wrist round and fumbled with the object in her waistband until it went up her sleeve to mate with its companion.
Click. She felt, rather than heard, the noise. The gadget made handshake with her implants, and a countdown timer appeared in her vision: the number of seconds it would take for the gel-phase fuel cell to power up and the gadget to begin assembling itself. She’d seldom felt so naked in her life. If they’d extended the surface-piercing radar surveillance network from the ship into this room seven shades of alarm would be going off right now, and Gun-boy would put a bullet through her face long before the gadget was ready. Otherwise -
A creaking whine from the corridor announced the arrival of another lift car. A few seconds later Mathilde appeared, this time leading Frank. Frank was in a bad way, his skin ashen and his hands taped together in front of him. He looked around, eyes unreadable, wearing the same clothes he’d been in when Martin had interviewed him. They were the worse for wear. “Sit,” Mathilde told him, pointing to the chair next to Rachel. She produced a box cutter: “Hold out your hands. We’ve got the girl. Piss us off, and you’ll never see her again.”
Frank cleared his throat. “I understand,” he grunted, rubbing his wrists. He glared at her resentfully. “What now?”
“You wait.” Mathilde took a step back to stand beside Gun-boy.
“Lining up all your targets, huh?”
She cast Martin a very ugly look. “Wait for the boss. She won’t be long now.”
“You’re Frank, aren’t you? What happened?” Rachel whispered to him.
Frank grunted, and rubbed at his wrists again. “Got me early. In my room. You’re his partner?” He jerked his chin at Martin. “Thought I was the only one at first. Where are we?”
“Old Newfie. Wednesday’s station. Listen, we hid her but they — had you. She went with them.”
“Shit!” He met her eyes with an expression of terrible resignation. “You know what this means.”
Rachel gave a slight nod in the direction of the guards. “Don’t say it.”
“You can say anything you like,” Mathilde called, grinning maliciously at him. “We have complete freedom of speech — anything you want to say we will listen to.”
“Fuck you!” Frank glared at her.
“Shut up.” Gun-boy pointed his machine pistol at Frank. For a tense moment Rachel was sure he would say something. The seconds stretched out into an infinitely long moment as Frank and the guard stared — then Frank slumped back in his chair.
“ ’Sokay. I can let go.” Frank glanced at her and yawned, his jaw muscles crackling. “I’m used to it — was used to it.” He rubbed his hands together, making small circling movements. Rachel tried not to show any sign of having noticed his frantic control gestures. Someone’s got a backlog of e-mail, she guessed, or itchy fingers.
They sat in silence for a couple of minutes, then a buzzing noise from along the corridor announced the imminent arrival of yet another self-propelled lift car. Rachel looked round automatically.
The doors opened. Many footsteps, moving toward the office in the curious broken rhythm of fractional gee. First in was a skinny, edgy-looking man; then a woman of a certain age, her eyes cold and her expression satisfied. Then Wednesday, walking in front of a guy with long hair in a ponytail, holding a boxy urban combat weapon. Her expression was ugly when she saw Frank looking like a morning-after wreck.
“Rachel Mansour, from the UN, I presume?” The woman walked behind the station manager’s desk, turned the chair round, and sat down in it. “I’m very pleased to meet you.” She smiled as she reached into an outer pocket and placed a compact pistol on the desk in front of her, its barrel pointed at Rachel. “I see you’ve already met our young runaway. That will make things much simpler. Just one more person to come, then I think we’ll begin.”
IRREVOCABLE
They’d untaped his hands; leaning back, ignoring the guard, Frank had twitched his rings, switching his optic implants and ear pickups to record promiscuously. There was no point missing anything, even his own execution.
BING. He’d jumped a little when the mail flag came up; something from Wednesday. But the guard hadn’t noticed. None of them noticed. Just typical ReMastered foot soldiers, obedient and lethal. He read the message and felt his palms go damp. He was glad he was sitting down. So now Wednesday’s invisible friend is sending me e-mail? But he’s got to use her as a relay because she’s the only one of us with a setup compatible with this station? Shit.