Episode 3 - Plowshares

  Chapter 23 - Operation: Material Obligation (4)

  Dawn breaks across the dome like dye spreading on chromatography paper.

  The sunlight disperses as it hits the dome at the low angle of the early morning, creating bands across the surface ranging from far blue, rich like ultramarine inks, through to low-energy vermillion that burn on the very edge of the horizon like distant fires. The shape of the sun is always unclear in the constant yellow haze, but slowly the colors will merge, traveling across the sky and eventually homogenizing to warm white.

  The only sound is the snorting breaths of Blake’s symbiont and its thundering hoofbeats, churning up clods of the dirt roads between the dead fields around us as we bump our way towards an ancient silo and cargo station. Once they used to store grain-based foods in the silos, huge stockpiles of energy when the earth still had something to give. I can already see the them on the horizon, several massive cylindrical structures next to the concrete tracks of the train. Rust has long since claimed them, one is toppled and collapsed inwards, and there are several holes visible from even here as jagged black shadows.

  If APS was coming for us once they lost contact with Cain, we’ll never know. If they did anything to track us down when we never arrived to meet the train, we can only guess. It would take them too long to intercept us across the expanse of fields that surround Borough even if they were coming.

  “It’s just business, my sweet Squall,” said Aster when I asked if we needed to worry about them sending a team after us when we packed Plowshares C-suite up into the back of the bus. “Cost and benefit, some pencil pusher is doing the math as we speak. Chances are what they’ve already lost makes that particular side hustle not worth it to them anymore. But, I’d still rather not test that theory. There’s no bad blood, no grudges, just ledgers. Next contract we could be on their payroll.”

  I’ve been exiled to the upper level of the armored bus so the children don’t have to look too long at my blood smeared clothing. I lean on the edge of the railing above the cabin, letting my greying hair fly in the wind behind me, and I watch Pooka glide next to me in the shape of an Aquila. His black wings are matte, catching no reflection of the vibrant sunrise, pinions stretched wide like fingers.

  “Adrian?” I ask into the air.

  “Conrada.” The Vespa’s wings hum.

  “How do you keep track of it all?”

  There is a long silence. So long I wonder if he’s even going to reply to me.

  “I haven’t been just ‘me’ in a long time. I have a thousand eyes and a thousand ears, if my bond was any stronger I imagine I’d go insane. As is, the fact that my bond is muffled at all is the only thing keeping me lucid. My symbiont… we’ve worked together like this for years. She helps filter the rest.”

  “She?”

  “The queen of the nest.”

  I rock backwards, hanging from the railing.

  “I saw your dossier. I know that the level of your bond was beyond Murasaki’s ability to measure. Are you having problems?”

  I tighten my lips, and swing my weight slightly from the railing with the rhythmic bumps of the armored bus across the fields. “No.”

  “Secrets are precious at Aquila,” continues Adrian, oddly candid in my ear. “I see and hear everything, and when the communion connects, I know what lies beneath the surface too. I know every secret… and I keep them all. People who manifest symbionts like mine are usually the first to be culled and it takes a lot of trust for Regina and everyone to give me the faith they do. I try my best to pay it back in kind.”

  Imagine what he could be if he cracked one day? If he didn’t wait for consent before he stung people? Could he force his will upon us like Pooka and I can each other? “I don’t have any secrets,” I reply.

  I wonder if I could force my will back?

  “And yet your symbiont won’t let you lock in?” Accusation slips through his lazy drawl.

  I tighten my jaw and refuse to answer him.

  I watch, sitting, from the top of the bus while our targets are herded like cattle into a passenger car of the train. Shadows from the great empty silos give us some shade out here, but it’s still eerie being surrounded by so much empty space. Below, Blake marches back and forth supervising the transfer with restless feet. Once they are offloaded, we’ll use the raised platform of the station to drive the armored bus onto the flatcar again and we’ll be on our way back almost as suddenly as we arrived. There is a definite rush despite the relief on the faces of our targets, apparently getting Intertrain to stop off schedule is costing us a fortune.

  Noah shakes Aster’s hand as the last of the C-suite board and I narrow my eyes wishing I could hear their conversation. The panel down to the back of the bus pops open and Everett pokes his head out, some of his curls coming loose from his braid. Pell climbs ahead of him through the opening and scuttles up the railing.

  “You coming down now?” he asks.

  “It wouldn’t have been so hard for them to buy tickets for everyone,” I wonder aloud, mostly to just get the thought out of my head.

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  “Hmm?”

  “Those men would still be alive if they’d just bought everyone a ticket free,” I repeat. I grip the bars of the railing and lean my face into them. The metal feels cool on my face.

  “Those men are dead because your symbiont killed them.”

  If only it was that simple, if only the edges between us weren’t that unclear. My heart hurts as I hold back the words I really want to say. Those moments when it was me tearing at throats, tasting blood, relishing slaughter. It horrified the human in me, and yet the part of me that is no longer just me - the part of me that hunted with Pooka - feels only a warm sense of victory.

  What would Everett do if I told him these feelings? What would he say? If my lack of control was so blatant, would they cull me too? Do I need to learn to be like Adrian, and hide my power with tired obedience?

  I turn apprehensively to Everett and he raises an eyebrow at me as he studies my face, then he sits and threads his legs through the railing to hang them over the cabin. Pell walks closer and he places a hand nearby for her to step onto him again.

  “But none of this would’ve happened if they’d-”

  “Would’ve, should’ve, could’ve,” interrupts Everett blandly.

  “Seriously? This is fucked. They’ve got the wealth to pay for us to come save their mank-asses. They’ve got the currency to buy themselves all asylum. What’s it take but the smallest amount of humanity to share it with their employees?”

  “Would that make you feel less guilty? If they did something different?”

  “Fuck off. You’re an ass!”

  Everett shrugs, and rolls his fingers as Pell steps across them. His voice softens as he continues, “Maybe. But let's say they do it your way, what then? They pay for these men for how long with no more coming in? How far do you think money goes? When they got their own families to take care of too.”

  “I don’t know how far money goes, I’ve never had any,” I hiss.

  Everett sighs. “It doesn’t go as far as you think. You can’t blame them for taking care of their own first.” Always choices that aren’t real choices, I hate that nothing is as black as white as it should be. Fuck Harris.

  We drift to silence. I look up at Pooka, still quiet, perched on the railing, his head tipped to watch Everett suspiciously.

  “Don’t let it get to you…” he says suddenly, leaning back on his hands to look upwards. “I know it will, but still. Most contracts don’t go like this.”

  “Yeah. I could use a drink after this,” I admit.

  “Aster will take you out. There’s a decent place up the street at headquarters.” My pause after must be enough to ask the question and he adds without me prompting, “I don’t drink. And I’ll be the first to admit I’m not much fun.” Then, he grabs the railing to help stand again and offers me a hand. I glance at his fingers, then at his handgun on his thigh. He sees my eyes dart, and that muscle in his jaw shifts as he tightens his jaw.

  “What happens to them?”

  “To who?”

  “The free-men? The serfs?”

  “The serfs will survive. Land is too precious for them to be forgotten.” He wiggles his fingers in invitation again for me to take his hand.

  “And the free-men?”

  “You know that answer is complicated.”

  I grab his hand and let him pull me to my feet.

  “No, use the measuring cup,” says Nessa, snatching the plastic drinking cup I was using out of my hands.

  “Why? It says one cup? Why does the cup matter?” I ask, mildly perturbed by how difficult she is making this.

  Nessa gives an exaggerated, strangled scream of frustration. “You worked in a lab right? Protocols matter. If you don’t measure correctly it’s not the same recipe!”

  Nessa stands almost a full head taller than me, the apron she’s wearing is almost comical, tied around her broad shoulders and muscular figure - she’s Blake’s non-identical twin. She’s also one of the two other Aquila employee’s sharing my floor, along with Blake. Everett, despite being in our age group, apparently has his own apartment higher up the building. Like her brother, she has piercings too, but significantly more than him - several studs and rings on her left eyebrow and each ear.

  “Yeah, but they use real measurements. What the fuck is a cup? Cups are all kinds of shapes.”

  “It is a real measurement, you just have to use the right kind of cup!” She punctuates her point by slamming down the ‘right’ cup to use.

  “Can I cut things instead? You seemed less stressed when I was doing that.”

  “Fine, just stop nicking your fingers. I can’t keep on throwing away things you get blood on.” Nessa slides the cutting board across the island to me, and places several large eggplants for me to dice. She was right, a lot of perfectly good food had ended up in the compost bin.

  “What’s for lunch?” asks Shion as she enters the living areas from the hall, wearing short black hair today and fitted pants in perfect white.

  “Cornbread, veggie bake, a bit of leftovers from last night,” replies Nessa, taking over the cornbread batter.

  Shion leans on the back of one of the barstools off the island and turns her head to exhale from her vape-stick. Today her fingernails are painted black with a single pink one. “Adrian wants to go shopping later, apparently one of the salvo stores has something he’s been after. You wanna come?”

  Nessa brightens. “Oh Adrian never goes out! Yes, yes! Where at?”

  “Cap Plaza. Apparently for a few hours this afternoon no one will be active, giving him some time off. You coming too, Squall? Should’ve gotten your first paycheck?”

  I carefully saw the eggplant into planks, waiting for a break in my concentration before replying. “I guess? What happens?”

  “Oh Squall, my dear sweet thing. You are about the experience the ultimate freedom, ownership of material goods! We can finally get you some new clothes too,” explains Shion with a grin of pleasure.

  Nessa claps her hands, her mood considerably brightened. “Yes, after lunch then!”

  Shion pushes back off the bar chair, twisting her vape-stick between her fingers. “Talk your brother into coming, we need some boys to lift heavy things.”

  I wait till Shion turns the corner in the hallway and is out of sight before turning back to Nessa. “How do I tell how much money I have?”