Pay Me, Bug!

Chapter 34

WHEREIN the Importance of Sewage Cannot be Over-Emphasized

Bennet tried not to think about what he was wading through as he and his men worked their way up through miles of slough tunneling, gradually nearing the hazmat treatment center.

"This is disgusting." Agent Nond, one of the four Bennet had chosen to go with him, was taking the forward position of the group. "There's a mass of... something, I don't know what it is exactly, just kind of sticking to the ground. It's not solid, it's just... goopy."

"Thank you, Nond," Bennet said. "That's more than I wanted to know."

The five agents were all wearing "flex suits," lightweight environmental suits designed for people who needed to do detail-oriented work in corrosive, radioactive, and high-pressure atmospheres. The suit was made of a special polymer that felt almost like rubber until current was run through it, upon which it stiffened and sealed the body completely from the environment outside. They were a little awkward to use sometimes, and their effectiveness lasted only as long as the power cells did, but the great advantage of the suits was that they were semi-collapsible and very easy to transport without arousing suspicions.

At the moment the suits were not powered up. They were walking up the slough where post-treated material was discharged into the 'lake' every two hours, and while unsettling, it wasn't particularly dangerous. The suits would be activated just before they reached the treatment plant.

Which was when the fun would really begin.

The five agents were tethered together by a single cable attached to their flex suits. It would keep them together when they were swimming "upstream" through the hazardous material, and it doubled as a solid-line comm link, allowing them to talk without fear of the transmission being picked up by anyone else. They were making the most of the luxury. Once they were in the station, they would spend most of their time communicating with hand signals, so station security wouldn't pick up unauthorized voice patterns and lock the place down.

"There aren't supposed to be any solids in this treatment line, are there?" Bennet asked, worried. "That might tangle us up. We might have to cut the line."

He heard Agent Dox swear over the line. Dox was taking the rear position, and if the line was cut he was the one most likely to get lost.

"I'd like to formally request we not do that, Lieutenant," Dox said.

Someone else chuckled. "That's OK, Dox, if we get separated you get to turn around and go home."

"Don't give him any ideas, Bera," Bennet said, which provoked a round of laughter from everyone, including Dox.

"Wait," Dox said, in a decidedly better mood. "I can feel... something... cutting through the line..."

More laughter.

"All right," Bennet said, "let's not get carried away. Sev, could you answer the original question?"

"No solids," Sev said. "This stuff comes from runoff from the reactor, various lubricants, that kind of thing."

"Lovely," Dox muttered.

"Here we are," Nond said. "I think we've reached the lock to the treatment center."

"OK." Bennet checked the chronometer on the heads-up-display on his visor. "2352--another eight minutes."

"And then at 0200 it does it again, right?" Dox sounded worried.

"Every two hours," Bennet said. "That's what Sythe tells us."

That produced an uncomfortable silence. No one was entirely sure that Sythe was "all right." She'd been in the field so long that even if a Sword hadn't brainwashed her there was always a chance she'd gone native just from trying to stay alive. No one was sure if she'd wind up double-crossing them.