The Gadgeteer

Chapter 32

THE ADHESIVE NEEDED more time to dry than expected, giving Arabeth too much time to think. To over-think. She had to get moving before her nerves overwhelmed her. In the half-dark of the moonlight, she couldn't see far.

Lost in thought, a tap on her shoulder made her duck, turn, and hold her hands defensively in front of herself.

Melanie looked surprised. "It's just me."

"What are you doing here?" Arabeth looked at the lever. The adhesive seemed to be holding.

"I work here," Melanie said, hands on her hips. "What are you doing here?"

"What do you mean, work here?" She held a hand up to stop Melanie from explaining. "Wait, I don't think I want to hear about it. Can you get me in?"

"Are you here to join the gadgeteers?"

"I just need to see Graham."

"Oh, good. The guy that runs this place is a little... unhinged."

She turned and pushed against the stone door. As they stepped into near darkness, they waited for their eyes to adjust. It was quiet, more so than she expected. Perhaps because it was so late in the day. Distant voices and the odd boot fall was all she heard. Sound carried well in here. She lightened her step, hoping Melanie would do the same.

The entrance gave way to a long, dim, wide cavern with unfinished walls and a moderately damp smell. The initial area was no higher than twenty feet, but she could see that quickly went up farther along. Small lanterns hung at hundred-foot intervals, but not all were lit. As they walked farther inside, the light decreased and navigating became more challenging. It would be hard to hide with this lighting.

"Take the next turn going right. Head toward an area with cloth panels, just a bit too tall to see over. From above, it's patterned like rose petals. At least, that's how I imagine it. Follow the wall on your left as you go counter-clockwise and you'll get to the middle," Melanie whispered.

A noise ahead stopped her. "Guard?"

"If we're lucky, yes. Tanner Stein, if we're unlucky. He's the boss here," Melanie whispered back. "Let me go first."

"Is it okay for you to be here at this time of day?"

Melanie held a finger up to quiet Arabeth. "Just follow me and act natural if we're spotted."

Arabeth wished, not for the first time, that Marble's device would work as radar. The technology for a small portable radar device had yet to be developed, though.

She should redesign a radar screen to be pocket-sized. If it could detect body heat, that would be good, too. That was a little far-fetched, but if she'd thought of it, others would too, making it inevitable. She may as well be the one to develop it.

Melanie halted and held her hand up to stop Arabeth. "Are you sure we need to do this?"

"I need to. You could go." Arabeth waited.

Shaking her head in resignation, Melanie wove through the cloth partitions. A moment later the partitions opened up to reveal a wide, round room, with maps on walls and tables alike. There, at the centre of the panels, it was dead silent.

"We can talk now," Melanie said.

"When did you start working here? Why have I never heard of this place? I thought you were an intern somewhere." Arabeth held her other questions, but one that was becoming profoundly irritating was that everyone around her had a massive secret of some kind. Why was she the only one with an ordinary life? In fact, her life seemed to be an open book.

"I was fooled into joining this so-called 'resistance.'" Melanie's expression dropped. "A friend said she could get me work on a project in the private sector and said it paid really well. The only catch was the privacy requirement. Everyone has to sign a do-not-disclose contract, in order to protect the work. I'm one of the cleaning ladies."

"They're using the 'war resistance' angle to get workers? That's almost brilliant."

"Well, they're apparently too busy to take out their own trash, or disinfect toilets - let's not forget that part of the job. Lucky me."

"You do this, plus work at the police station?"

"Wait - did you know Harbertrope offered me my position back?" Her eyes narrowed, then she shrugged. "I'm quitting this one. I found out they're the ones who tampered with my brain, and I've been using this cleaning job to find proof."

Melanie reached under the edge of a desk and pulled on a strip of tape.

"Here. This is something you'll want." She held out a two-inch flat metal disk.

"Is that a coin?" Arabeth walked over and took it. It was three centimetres across, three millimetres thick, perfectly round, silver, and heavy. An image was stamped into both sides, like a coin. One side had a flower with five large petals. The image on the other side was a standing Egyptian cat wearing a collar.

"It's what we carry to prove we work here, so to speak. I'd almost forgotten I'd taped this one here, in case I lost mine. Before I decided to quit." She suddenly looked sad. "My mind is not what it was, and even then, it wasn't great. I feel like an idiot most of the time."

"I'll need a story to go with the token," Arabeth said.

"That's easy. New gadgeteers show up now and then, when an old one blows themselves up or quits. It's the token that matters." Melanie pulled one out of an interior jacket pocket, holding it up between her thumb and forefinger. "I would have turned it in, but Stein refused to let me quit."

A large explosion shook the cavern, causing fragments of stone and dirt to rain from above. Covering Marble with her jacket panel, Arabeth held her breath a moment until the dust cleared. Caverns, especially new ones, could crumble silently from above, surprising those suddenly buried by it.

"That was them - the gadgeteers." Melanie pointed farther back into the cave.

Arabeth nodded. "Is that common?"

Melanie nodded. "It's a good thing you came now. The way they're going, one of their devices will blow the entire cavern apart soon." Melanie snickered as she walked out of the control area.

Somewhere behind them a dog barked. Just once. Something in Melanie's posture changed, but she didn't slow or stop. If anything, she sped up.