ABC - Penance

Private Facility, Outskirts of Pan City

The VTOL came in fast, my eyes drawn to the view beyond the cockpit as Boner aimed for a low quadrangle of buildings. He rotated the engine pods with practised skill, slowing our forward momentum without jarring the passengers, then gently set the machine down on a worn circle of concrete in the precise centre of some landing pad markings.

Before the massive turbines had wound down the side and rear doors cycled open, revealing a small group of tall men and women accompanying a medical gurney. I spotted Trixie at the back of the group, a bright green wig marking her out as she bellowed instructions like a Drill Sergeant.

The team rushed aboard and carefully lifted Georgia to the wheeled gurney, taking care to avoid any jarring of the injured woman. A Jack with the usual cybernetic right eye conversed briefly with the Jill who had given the initial treatment, then all of them rushed from the VTOL.

I unstrapped myself from the harness and stood, my partner doing the same. I was feeling disconnected, the events of the past day like a strange dream. For some reason I noticed how the tall frame of Ghost barely fit under the ceiling of the passenger section, much like Rackman had brushed his head on the roof. The newer VTOL models had a higher ceiling to accommodate the Guards, making me wonder why Jericho-Three kept this old model as his personal transport.

“It’s because he is so short compared to us” Trixie declared, making me gape at her in amazement as she seemed to read my mind. “He doesn’t like the new models, he says they are far too tall inside”

“How did you know what I was thinking?” I asked the ex-Guard.

She pointed at my partner with a smile.

“You were looking at the roof and Ghost’s head, same as I used to always do” she explained. “I eventually gave in and asked the Boss and that is what he told me”

“Oh” I answered. “Is that true?”

“Probably not” she responded. “He’s a lying little shit”

She ran her eyes over me, glancing at Ghost who made some unseen signal to the Jill.

“Okay, let’s get you to the Medical bay too” she announced. “I’ll get Mouse to check you out while the Doc treats your friend”

“There’s no need, I’m perfectly fine” I lied to Trixie, refusing to meet her mismatched eyes. “Just let me go with Georgia”

“That’s a big fat No” she said firmly. “You are showing signs of exhaustion, trauma and I am guessing combat stress. I’m your boss and I’m telling you to get treatment”

“You’re not my boss” I grumbled but I let her and Ghost shepherd me into the nearest building, the same one they had taken Georgia into. Like the others I could see around the central courtyard and landing pad, they were all reinforced concrete structures with narrow, slit like windows and heavily braced doors.

“What is this place anyway?” I asked Trixie as we passed through double layered Ceramiglass doors into a cool interior.

“Home” she said warmly.

=====

The young Jill from the VTOL got me to strip down to my shorts and bra, examining me with professional care while a bank of sensors reported their own findings. She conferred with them while I got dressed into my uniform shirt and pants, leaving the armour in a bundle on the floor for now.

“Told you I was fine” I said at last, making her look up from the monitors with an intrigued expression.

“You are indeed in remarkable shape, Ms Alvarez” she replied. “Even better than when I first observed you in the VTOL. Your powers of recovery may exceed those of the Guard clones”

She came and stood in front of me, somehow seeming smaller and less threatening even though she was taller and broader in the shoulders than I was. I could see why she was serving as a Paramedic, the idea of her carrying a weapon seemed to jar with her quiet demeanour. Her face still showed an air of curiosity about my quick recovery so I tried to deflect her.

“Why are you called Mouse?” I asked her. “Did you pick that name for yourself?”

“No, it was given to me by Trixie” she answered with a gentle grin. “We had been in the same batch of clones scheduled for Retirement and Trixie helped me through the ordeal. Even when she thought it was over for us, she tried to console me. I owe her and the Boss my life”

“So you are another one of Jericho’s rescues?”

Mouse laughed easily at that.

“He calls it recycling us, putting something broken to a new purpose”

I thought about her words, thinking of how the scheming Avatar had done the very same thing with me.

“Do you want to go and check on your friend” Mouse asked me and I gave her a rushed assent. “Okay, I’ll take you to the recovery ward”

She led me through a short series of corridors during which we encountered only one other person, a Jack with a shock of close cropped blonde dyed hair and wrap-around sunglasses who had his left arm in a sling. Mouse and the Jack, apparently named Dog, exchanged greetings like old friends. He told her his arm was recovering well after his run in with the Dire Wolf and someone named Nata sent her love.

As we continued on, I quizzed Mouse about what Dog had just said.

“There aren’t any wolves in the Zone” I questioned her. “Did he mean some kind of mechanical?”

“No, he fought an actual Dire Wolf” she replied without a shred of dishonesty. “He reckoned it was nearly two metres tall at the shoulders. He finally took it down with a plasma burst”

She was so sincere, yet I knew the pair of ex-Guards had to be playing some kind of prank on me. Maybe they did it to all the new kids at this place, like some kind of hazing ritual. I pushed the thought aside and focussed on what mattered the most to me – how was my dear Georgia?

We arrived at a small ward, half a dozen beds laid in two rows with banks of monitoring equipment waiting to be deployed on the patients. Only one bed was currently occupied, the dark skinned face and right arm of Georgia standing out in stark contrast to the white sheets. She was connected to a breathing device, her temples and exposed right arm dotted with medical sensor patches. Broad swathes of bandages could be seen beneath the sheets, wrapped around her torso to cover her wounds and the rest of her body.

A dark haired woman in a white coat was checking the data streams from my friend, making notes on a white datapad she carried. She looked to be in her early fifties I estimated, her pale face spidered with worry lines despite her pleasant smile when she saw us enter.

“Hi Doctor Chappell” Mouse announced. “This is the patient’s friend, Ms Alvarez”

The Doctor greeted us warmly and gestured me closer, until I was standing beside her at the foot of the bed.

“Your friend was close to dying, I think you know that” Chappell told me. “Luckily for her I am a brilliant doctor so I was able to save her left lung and repair the damaged blood vessels”

“The Auto-Surgeon that Jericho installed in the surgery was pretty useful too, Doctor Chappell” Mouse added, coming to join us at Georgia’s bedside.

“Yes, yes” the Doctor agreed. “But someone needed to push the start button”

“Will she wake up soon?” I asked them, never taking my eyes from Georgia’s sleeping face.

“We are going to keep her sedated for twenty four hours, while the Fast Heal serum patches up the smaller internal cuts” Chappell replied. “With the care we can provide here, she will be as good as new by the end of the week”

I felt a surge of relief pass through me, leaving me feeling heavy and lethargic. Mouse had put her arm around my waist, supporting me, before I had realised I was falling.

“How about we get you to lie down for a while as well?” she suggested, then moved me on my failing legs to the adjoining bed.

I was asleep the moment my head touched the pillow.

=====

The room lights were dimmed when I awoke, the blinking lights from the medical sensors gleaming brightly as they assured the world my friend was recovering well. A small statured man in a dark blue suit was settled into a visitor’s chair between my bed and Georgia’s, idly looking through a file on his datapad.

“What time is it, Boss?” I croakingly asked Jericho-Three. He closed the file and turned his head to regard me, for once without his usual dark glasses. Before he spoke he reached to the cabinet next to my bed and lifted a bottle of water to me.

“Night time” he replied curtly. He unscrewed the plastic cap and I took the bottle, swigging down a good mouthful of bland water after I raised myself on an elbow.

“What day?” I continued, taking a longer pull from the bottle this time.

“Same day” he said. “At least for another hour. Then it will be tomorrow”

I handed him the bottle back and he screwed the lid on tightly and placed it on the cabinet once more. It was hard to tell in the bad light but he seemed rather pleased with himself. I lowered my head to the pillow again, watching him sideways.

“Thanks for rescuing us” I told my boss. Jericho nodded slightly, as if this were an everyday thing. Maybe for him it was, considering all the risks he made his agents take. Which made me wonder what he really wanted from me.

“Rackman called me one of your Hounds. Is that what I am?”

“The Governor told you that?” Jericho pondered. “Yes, I suppose you are. I had wanted a Bloodhound but what I got was a Pitbull, charging into everything headfirst and leaving a trail of destruction”

“Isn’t that why you recycled me?” I chided him gently. “You wanted someone with beauty and brains to run External Investigations”

“I needed brains and brawn, Alvarez” he reminded me. “Luckily for you Ghost can provide both of those qualities to make up for your shortcomings”

“That really hurts, Boss” I replied with mock anguish. “So what I am here for?”

“You are the person that pokes a stick into the hornet’s nest, seeing what will come out” he said, not as glibly as I would have liked which meant it may be true. He met my gaze and gave me a grin, his perfect teeth flashing in his shadowed face. “Still, all things considered you did really well today”

“What the fuck are you talking about?” I snapped back. “I nearly got my friend killed, wrecked an apartment building and got the Darwin Society wanting me dead!”

“True” he agreed. “At least from one viewpoint. Looking at it from another angle, you brought the best Pre-Cog and Net Diver in the Zone right to my door. I have wanted to recruit Ms Roche to my organisation for a long time and now she won’t have any choice but to join me”

“You bastard!” I snarled and went to lift myself off the bed, feeling power surging into my fists. He reached out with the datapad and rapped me on the forehead like I was some kind of unruly child. The shock of it stopped me for long enough to reconsider my actions. The power drifted away and I lay down on my back, crossing my arms angrily over my chest.

“Don’t be angry, Alvarez” he warned me. “I didn’t cause the events of today, but I am not foolish enough to let this opportunity pass. Ms Roche will be targeted by the Society if she leaves this place, that much is certain. She has learned a great deal and is a formidable foe to them. Staying in my organisation, I can protect her and use her talents at the same time. This seems a fair trade”

“At least give her the choice” I grumbled.

“I shall” he responded. “Everyone who serves me does so of their own free will. As soon as she is able to make a clear decision, I will make my offer. In the meantime she can recover here as my guest, under no other obligations”

“What about me?” I asked. “I have family I want to see, things I need to do. I can’t stay cooped up in this place”

“That is a different matter” Jericho agreed. “You made the Society show their hand again sooner than they wanted. The attack on Ms Roche was assembled in a short time frame, forcing them to expend a lot of hard to replace assets. It also drew the attention of Archimedes, which is definitely not a risk they wanted to take. They will have to stay low for a while, keeping themselves out of his sight”

“I get that” I muttered. “I made them waste a lot of expensive toys to try and kill Georgia and I. So won’t they keep trying, if only for revenge?”

“Revenge may interest them individually, but not as a Society” he explained. “They can’t afford to come at you directly, not now. The attack, if it comes, will be through another vector, such as your family or acquaintances”

“Bloody hell, Boss!” I growled. “That is not what I wanted to hear!”

“I know. We can expand our network surveillance to cover all the people you associate with. If they start anything, we should be able to give you some warning”

“Somehow that doesn’t make me feel better about the situation” I snarked in response. I turned to look at him, my eyes falling to the datapad he still had in his hand. “Are the files that Georgia recovered worth the damage?”

He had the decency to look at least a little guilty as he pushed the pad beside him, hiding the display screen from me.

“There is a lot of material to review and not all of it escaped corruption” he admitted. “The Camp One AI was under a lot of duress when it compressed the data, so that was to be expected. That said, you and Ms Roche did good, Alvarez”

“Can your Hound get a little pat on the head?” I asked.

“Sure” he agreed with a trace of wariness and gently patted my close cropped hair. “Don’t tell Trixie though, or she’ll get jealous”

“In that case, this little doggie wants a brand new motorbike as well” I added. He jerked his hand away then gave a rueful laugh at my blatant request.

“Ah, you shouldn’t bite the hand that feeds you, Alvarez” he admonished me lightly. “But I’ll think about the bike” He stood, tucking the datapad inside his jacket and taking out a pair of glasses. They were positioned with minute care over his eyes, then he walked from the room.

“I want a black one!” I called out, as loudly as I dared to his retreating back.

“I knew that already” he answered and then he was gone, off to make mischief for some other sucker.

I turned onto my side again, cradling my head in the crook of my arm as I watched Georgia sleep. The staff here had made sure all her body other than her head and right arm were covered, obviously aware of her issues. I could get up and pull those covers back if I wanted to, seeing at last the Changes she had kept hidden all these years.

I was never going to do that to one of my best friends. My curiosity about what the Virus had wrought upon her flesh was easily smacked down by my love for her. Whatever she chose to keep secret from me, that was her choice and I respected that.

For all my many failings as a human being, I tried my hardest to be loyal to those I cared about. Maybe I was a Hound after all, loyal to my pack and vicious to outsiders. I fell asleep once more, dreaming of a woman holding me and guiding me, keeping me safe from the enemies that surrounded us.

Her face was never clear to me, like all dream faces are, yet I loved her with all of my heart.