Chapter 17
Two guards were not enough, now the prisoner opened the last door between her and the lowest promenade of Cirrus. If she could reach the walkways of the base, then she could disappear into one of the many towers and then re-route to a safe place. The prisoner knew of several spots that might be safe, but any of them could have been compromised. The surface mission had gone to shit, though, so who was to say that their other safe houses hadn’t also been burned. She would have to be careful, but but decided it was a necessary risk to hit their drop site by the prison. She’d be leaving this place with nothing and would need to re-supply as soon as she could, and she might starve to death within the hour if she didn’t eat something without mildew.
She closed the distance to the final door and noticed that it was different than the other doors she’d come through. This was an old-style door, with an analogue lock and handle to manipulate an internal joint to swing open. She placed the RFID against the scanning apparatus to the right of the door and the machine beeped in recognition of her card. She grabbed the handle and twisted, pulling the door to open it. It remained steadfast, not budging an inch. Jammed. She checked the interface to the right of the door to confirm that her RFID had allowed her to exit. The readout was normal, so what was wrong? Examining the door, nothing was obstructing the handle. So why won’t you fucking open?? Mustering all of her strength, she pushed against the handle.
The handle moved slightly with a hideous grinding noise; an alarm sounded and klaxons in the wall blared. The prisoner’s heart fluttered as she continued pushing against the handle. Distant footsteps coming closer. Finally, the blockage broken, the handle turned with a triumphant click and she moved to push her way to freedom. It wouldn’t budge. Catching herself before panic took her, she tried pulling. Endorphins of relief flooded her nervous system as the door pulled reluctantly open.
Voices now - she could hear them screaming something. They were rounding the corner. “She’s at the door!! Get that bitch before she gets out!” Not today, fucker. She’d made it - open air, sunlight, free space, no way in hell they would take her back now. She was going to make it out, but found herself somewhat disappointed. She was armed, why shouldn’t she just wait and kill the rest of them? No, too too risky. Make them pay later. She closed the door as quickly as she could behind her, rusty hinges complaining noisily at their double disturbance. Her efforts drew the attention of several people walking by, but they looked away quickly, their heads down. She wasn’t worried about witnesses. This low in the city it was better to look away and not remember faces in case they got pulled into questioning later, and who was to say that their errands weren’t equally questionable in the eyes of the law. Satisfied with the deep metallic clung as the door lacked back into place, she disappeared into the grime of the Cirrus Prime under city.
The smell of ozone hung weightily this low on Cirrus - it was like breathing the fumes of a lightning strike. The prisoner moved through the bustling crowd, never looking behind her. The promenade featured a walkway about twelve feet in width with artificial turf and oxygen emitting tree modules interspersed on either side. Orange tinted lights dotted the sides of buildings and the surrounding cityscape blocked the light so that the promenade carried a permanent twilight feel. Vendors hawked their wares to the passerby and the fumes of street-food vendors reminded the prisoner that she’d been without food for over two days now. When she’d been younger and begging for scraps, there’d been a street cook, Raul she thought his name was, that would give her free burnt mush-ends, all the ones that no one else ate during the day. Raul was long gone, though, and none of these faces looked interested in charity for a haggard looking witch in a detention officer uniform.
Someone stopped suddenly in front of her and she walked roughly into them and lost her footing, falling to the ground. “Watch it oinko,” a hulking shadow loomed over her. Pants frayed at the feet and a fog of the tell-tale ethanol scent of alcohol engulfed her. “Not safe for lone piggies down here,” the shadow warned. She’d landed on her knee and it was starting to throb. The shadow didn’t seem to care; it pushed her over as it walked over her and disappeared into the crowd. She pulled herself to her feet and rubbed her knee. It still throbbed intensely and buckled under her weight. She couldn’t stop now, though. She needed to keep pushing. Just a little farther. She weaved through the crowded walkway as delicately as she could, making her way to an inter-tier transport. The smog of the city slowly revealed her path, but concealed where she’d come from. She risked a glance behind her as she edged along to the lift. She craned her neck to see, expecting her pursuers to appear suddenly from the fog. She scanned the crowd. Several color palettes that made her heart jump, but it settled each time with the recognition that she was safe for now. Then, as she turned her head forward again to focus on her path, she saw them. Two guards wearing the exact uniform as her, shoving their way through the crowd. They must have spotted her on a camera or made wise to her plan to hit the lift. The prisoner doubled her effort, but that wasn’t saying much. The guards were gaining ground quickly.
She reached the large transit elevator at the end of the walkway and joined the queue to move up a tier. “Alright, that’s the last one! Rest of you gotta’ wait!” The lift proctor announced that the current ride was full and that it would be another fifteen minutes before the unit came back down. She checked the pockets of her stolen uniform and pulled out her victim’s terminal. As she checked his apps, she sighed with relief at the unprotected identification app. What a security risk. Amateurs. The prisoner placed her thumb over the picture identification and shoved her way to the front of the line to the proctor.
“Hold it, please! Sector business on ninety-nine, I need this lift, proctor!” The prisoner flashed the identification to the proctor. The proctor examined the badge display, and then something caught her attention off in the crowd. The prisoners pursuers were closing in, shouting for the proctor to stop the lift. The proctor’s name tag said Lexi and she had grease on her pantlegs. Her hair was tied up in a bun and a cigarette hung from her lips. She leaned casually against the rusty control panel that protruded from the wall next to the lift, her hand hovered over the button to initiate the transit sequence.
“Don’t you wanna’ wait for your friends?” Lexi asked, her hand hesitated over the button as she pointed with her eyes at the guards making their way aggressively through the queue. Lexi looked back at the prisoner’s uniform and cocked an eyebrow.
“Please, just let me through,” the prisoner begged. Her voice cracked. She sounded more desperate than she meant, but fuck it. If she didn’t make it to the lift now, she was dead. “I need to get on this lift.” Lexi had noticed the namebadge on the prisoner’s uniform, Malcom Mikhailovich, something was definitely off. Lexi looked up at the prisoner, the prisoner looked Lexi in the eyes. Please don’t let them catch me.
A moment of hesitation as Lexi considered the situation, her eyes dropped to her control board and she glanced once more to the guards, almost to the top of the queue stand now.
“Very well, officer, please hurry, I’ve got a schedule I’m s’posed to keep.” The proctor moved her hand to press a different button than the one her hand had begged to press just seconds earlier. The safety doors slid open again, waiting for the prisoner to enter. She looked back at Lexi. Lexi returned a sympathetic look; good luck, girl.
“Hurry up now, officer! Don’t let them get away!” Lexi gestured for the prisoner to hop on to the re-opened lift. The prisoner jogged to the open doors and found a railing to hold for balance during the transit. Several people were looking at her as she joined the crowded room, she could see them out of the corner of her eye but didn’t dare let anyone get a solid look at her face. The lift was a big metallic box with curved edge benches forming six or seven rows across the ten foot space. The fluorescents overhead blared harshly, but flickered irregularly, giving the prisoner the feeling that she was trapped in a malfunctioning holo-strobe room. There were no seats she wanted to take, but the ends of each bench row were secured by a metal beam; the prisoner grabbed one to hold her balance during the transit.
The doors squealed shut as the prisoner heard shouts of frustration from the guards at the proctor who really couldn’t afford to stop the lift again. “She’s a prisoner,” she heard them shout as the lift began to rise.
If she heard that, then he co-passengers definitely did, too.
A quick scan of the crowd eased her fears somewhat, no one of authority was making simultaneous use of the lift. She needed to ditch these clothes soon, though; they were way too conspicuous. Plus, the loose pants were starting to chafe her legs and she was tired of having to pull her coat sleeves back to free her hands. She’d appraised herself fairly optimistically back in her cell. As she caught a glimpse of her reflection in the steel of the lift, she realized that she more resembled a kiddo playing dress up with daddy’s uniform.
So, so close. It was vital that she move quickly once she made it to Brightstreet. She pulled Mikhailovich’s hand terminal from her pocket and moved to a corner of the lift that was further from the door and would obscure from more of the passengers. First, she cleared the phone’s memory and then, upon rebooting the device, downloaded a unique geoscrubbing app with her personal code that the developer gave her. Only when she was certain that the right precautions were in place did she return the terminal to her pocket.
The lift slowed in preparation to stop at the upcoming level. Electric gears whirred loudly as the machine jolted to a stop. The crowd jostled, but most knew what to expect. A child began to cry; they’d fallen off of their mother’s lap in the bumpiness of the stop. The prisoner waited for the lift to empty before making her own exit. The acid smell of the city on her again, the prisoner turned out of the elevator and found the entry to a nearby tower just outside of the lift complex; Tower 21012 - Bixby Place.
She took the stairs at a run; two, now three at a time, the pain in her knee now forgotten, or at least ignored. Reaching the third floor, she ripped the stairwell door open and sprinted down the concrete tube of a hallway. Halfway down the corridor she found a custodial closet protected by an analogue keypad. Nine digits in a vertical row, a button for each number. She entered the six digit code and heard the click of the timed unlock of the door. She grabbed the handle and slipped into the small unlit room. She pulled the hand terminal from her pocket and opened the communication app. She called the number that she’d been repeating in her head, desperate to remember.
No answer. She killed the connection and sighed. It was risky, but she needed to know. She dialed the number again.
No answer. She recorded a call-back memo.
“Hello? My name is Z. I know what happened to your brother. We need to talk.” She killed the connection and leaned her head back against the wall and closed her eyes, enveloped by the darkness. Now she needed to let Clarence know what was going on. He must think she was dead. She needed to warn them before it was too late.