Twin Suns of Arterra

10

Seyin Plaza thronged with people, either unfazed by the recent restrictions and hover-barges drifting overhead, or in fear that the items available today may not be available tomorrow. I hoped the latter, but feared the former.

The duracraft set down in a public drop area. Aaliyah checked her uniform, pointing out to Blade the hair that had escaped as they put their visored helmets back on.

Time to go.

I started to follow them, but Blade blocked me with the control rod from her uniform, which constables lovingly referred to as a tamer. She poked at my cushion.

"That stays here."

I'd forgotten I even had it. I set it down, a wistful sense of loss tugging at me. Then Blade was tugging at me, jerking my arm. My beacon came off, taking a swatch of hair with it.

"Ow!"

Blade held it up. "Tracker."

Oh.

I nodded, appropriately subdued, and followed them out of the duracraft. I was immediately assaulted with the sounds and smells of the market. Fresh breads, pies and meats mingled with the odors of rotting food and unwashed bodies. The sounds of sellers calling out to each other and to potential buyers mingled with the shouts of children, the voices of buyers asking questions or making orders, and the raucous screech of seabirds overhead, hoping for a dropped or discarded bit of food to steal.

Aaliyah and Blade slipped between people easily in their uniforms, the masses automatically bending away from them like magnetic opposites. I trailed in the wake they left behind.

I almost missed it when it happened. We passed close to a fruit vendor, and I saw Blade leaning in as if to look them over. I never saw her hand move. Another mental note I would have to make. What I did see was a small boy, no older than six or seven cycles, pop up as soon as she straightened and dip his hand into a box of star fruit. When his hand came out, it flashed orange.

My beacon.

The boy turned and disappeared into the mass of people, the beacon clutched tightly in his fist.

He was a thief.

There were plenty of them in the market, urchins who eked out an existence by filching food or coins from people who would mostly never miss them. The boy would take my beacon to goodness only knew where, where it would likely be dismantled in seconds flat. That, or traded for something more valuable, like food. Either way, it would soon be difficult to find, and practically impossible to trace back to an original location.

I looked up at Blade's back with a newfound respect. I wondered if Janis had any idea how resourceful the girl was. Hopefully not.

We slipped between two stalls selling cloths and perfumes, into a small alley. Two squat buildings closed in on either side, their dingy walls coated with grime and graffiti.

SHIELDING KILLS someone had scrawled in dripping red paint.

Maybe the masses were not as ignorant as I'd feared.

I was so caught up in looking at the messages and names on the walls that I nearly collided with Blade when she stopped. Aaliyah had opened a door, and we quickly slipped through. The inside of the building was as disgusting as the outside. Dirt and grease coated the floor, and something darker that I couldn't identify and didn't want to. Water dripped from pipes, giving the entire place a dank, musty smell like pond scum.

"Where are we?"

"Shhh!" Blade hissed at me, motioning at me with one hand.

Even through the visor I could sense her scowl.

We crossed to the far end of the room, where there was nothing but a blank wall and a set of stairs. I could only hope we'd be going up.

Of course, they headed down. I gritted my teeth and followed.

Darkness pressed in quickly, and the greasy steps went from difficult to dangerous. There was a flash of brightness. Aaliyah held it up enough for all of us to see, and we proceeded downward into the stinking gloom. Sounds echoed around us, and I wondered whether we were beneath the market.

At the bottom of the steps was another door. This one looked quite solid. I couldn't see any means of opening it. No handle, no turn, just a flat hulking slab of wood and iron. Aaliyah stepped to one side and Blade moved past her to stand in front of the door. She pulled something from inside her uniform. I could see a thin cord attached to it, winding around her neck. She pressed the object, something oblong and shining, into a small depression in the wood.

Immediately the entire door began to glow.

I stepped back, partly in surprise and partly from the intensity of the light, which was blinding after our gloomy trek, throwing an arm up protectively.

The light dissipated as quickly as it had come. When I lowered my arm the door was gone. Blade motioned for us to follow her, and she stepped through the now empty doorway into inky blackness and was gone.

Aaliyah motioned for me to go next.

Palms starting to sweat, I swallowed and stepped through the doorway, hoping Blade would light something ahead of me so that I could see.

My foot came down on empty air.

A shout escaped my lips as I felt my body plummet.