Aethosphere Chronicles: The Rat Warrens (11 page)

“Now I’m given you the truth here, Gord-O,
and I’m giving you an honest opportunity to come clean and bring
back my money…help me do some good down here in the slums. Madam
Coven hinted that you might be important for something to
come—”

For all Time’s altruistic talk of helping out
the people of the slums at present, Fen couldn’t help but think
back to all those speeches he gave to
his
children about
climbing and ‘taking what’s yours’. ‘By hook or by crook’ he’d
said, and these two versions of Time seemed to clash. Was this just
the merchant’s way of tricking him out of the rucksack of cash by
crook, or was the cash really going to be used as Time said, to
lift them out of the rat lords clutches, by the hook?

“This big score,” he asked the man,
probingly, “you were actually going to do it for me?”

Time tucked his gloved thumbs into his
suspenders and rocked back on his heels, nodding. “Sure was.”

Fen’s muscles wound tight. His father used to
make promises like that, promises that he ultimately broke. “What
was I going to get?”

“I would have given you a flood of tokens,
Gord-O.” Time thrust out a hand as if pointing to the pile.

And there in lay the rub. “But you said they
were worthless.” Fen’s head felt close to bursting with having
unraveled Time’s scheme.

“To an extent.” Time shrugged as though it
didn’t matter in the least. Given the merchant’s carefree display,
Fen thought maybe he was wrong. Or did the merchant’s bravado
extended to all situations, even to ones he was losing? “You’d
still enjoy some perks down here, Gord-O. A few thousand tokens
will leave you living in relative comfort for…a long while; and
anyway, there’s this place to consider. I invited you in.”

“But all those Ludwigs…” Fen reasoned, “I
could have just bought my way out of the slums…for me and my
sister.”

“Could have, but that’s hypothetical
now.”

“Hypo-what?” Fen scratched at his head, and
the merchant chuckled at his ignorance.

“Nothing,” said Conrad, “Now I’ve run out of
time, Gord-O, The Madam’s said my opportunity will manifest itself
here shortly, so we’re just going to have to skip all this
courtship and jump right into it. But don’t look so glum, you’ve
still a place here in the Syndicate—always will—and with that
spirit of yours, you should go far.
Some accumulate more
time
, my friend, and that could be you.”

“And what if I don’t get you the money?”

Time chuckled in a way that suggested he was
far from amused. Suddenly he turned quick; quick as lightning; and
yanked the dagger from the map. Then thumbing the tip with his
gloved finger, he observed Fen coolly. “Let’s not even entertain
that notion, kid. This is a thing you’re going to do.
Money
,
after all, is just a thing we trade, Gord-O, but
people
,
people is where the real power lays. As I’ve demonstrated, I’d take
one of you for a few bundles of Ludwigs any day, but your price is
starting to get steep now, even at
token
rates; and the rest
of that cash is bound for bigger fish; fish that’ll look the other
way when I send ol’ Boss Trask on a one way trip to the afterlife.
Don’t make that a trip for two…or three should I have cause to
include that
sister
of yours.”

Threatening his sister was as low as Time could have
struck him, and Fen’s affinity for the merchant went up in smoke,
like a strike-match in an exhale vent. In his anger he could have
taken the rucksack and dropped it into the Drain Line, just to
spite the man and his overwrought scheme.
Take out the rat
lord
, Fen scoffed internally. The idea of it was absurd. Boss
Trask had been boss longer than most had been alive. He never, ever
left his lair, and he had more dangermen and bruisers then any
dozen ratties combined had teeth. Time thought he could take out
that
, and by what…taking down the Exchange? Fen didn’t
pretend to understand the intricacies of what Time had planned, but
it seemed a pipe dream at best.

Only the fear of testing Conrad Time’s
sincerity concerning his sister kept Fen in line; that, and Time
sending a handful of his oldest boys to make sure the deed was done
right. One he recognized from weeks back, when he’d come into the
shop while Fen sat bloodied and bruised. Turned out his name was
Sam Time, and when Fen uttered aloud, “I didn’t know Time had a
son,” the boys sniggered and laughed while Sam mockingly chided
him, “Take a good look at me, you sot, do I look like I could be
his son?”

Sure, the thickset adolescent had black skin,
while Conrad’s was as white as a corpse grub, but Fen never
considered skin color any sort of barrier when it came to chasing
skirt, and besides, there was no rule against it. Edrika’s
grandparents had been opposite ends of the spectrum, and that
didn’t stop them from having five kids, spanning dark to light.
Still, given the response he’d received, Fen began doubting that
Sam was actually Time’s son, though the boy clearly had the
merchant’s trust and the other boys looked to his guidance in all
things as they made their way towards Fen’s stash.

On the climb through the Bednest Fen
contemplated on more than one occasion giving the brutes the slip.
He knew these pipes through and through; knew the places he could
squeeze along; knew the “nests” he could lose himself in; knew the
vertical pipes he could climb without them buckling under his
weight. All he needed was the opportunity, because the more he
thought on it, the more he come to realize the ticket for him and
his sister to escape the Warrens was stuffed in that bag. Time said
it himself, the only way out was to climb, and Fen had no intention
of being one of those trapped down here, not now that he knew what
he had.

By crook, that’s how he was going to get out
of here, because if there was one thing he’d learned in his short
life, it was that adults couldn’t be trusted to care. Companymen
from Hanns had sent him and his sister to the slums, his mother had
run off leaving them to fend for themselves, and his father had
drank himself dead leaving them completely alone. Even Time, for
all his warm smiles and flashy promises, had turned out to be a
charlatan, intending to leave him in the lurch with that ‘big
score’ of his.

No, Fen’s mind was made up, he’d ditch the
boys, make for the stash, and disappear with it into the light;
taking the only other person that mattered to him, his sister.

Fortune had it that today was Wednesday…at
least he thought, which meant his sister was home.

All he needed was the opportunity, which came
just as Fen and his escort passed by the Three Little Brothers.
“Sunshine!” He heard yelled, and he’d never been so happy to hear
that stupid nickname in all his life.

“Boys,” he hollered back in warm
response.

“Who’s that you got with you,” asked Nickle
predictably. “You got yourself a new gang or something,
Sunshine…?”

“Bogies,” yelled Fen, using the gangs’ code
for rivals, as he turned suddenly right, vaulted over a pipe, and
broke into a run towards their direction. Time’s thugs were bigger
and older, but with the Bednest Boys Fen had numbers on his side,
and a familiarity of the terrain. So when he saw Eddy, Shoat,
Beaut, Durreem, Nickle, and even Ratter forming up for a brawl, he
felt a flush of relief. Seven on three would be enough to turn the
tide.

While ducking and hopping his way through the
pipework, one of the Fat Sisters’ horns bellowed a long and throaty
tone and the complex rocked and shimmied. Fen couldn’t hear the
Syndicate boys grunting in pursuit anymore, but he could feel them
swinging for his heels. He pumped his legs harder, careened between
two pipes, and then slid beneath another, right into the waiting
line of his mates. They cheered and welcomed him with encouragement
as he lay there on his back huffing and puffing. But Time’s goons
were there before he knew it and he’d only managed to roll onto his
stomach when they thundered in around him.

Fen braced for a fight; a fight that never
came. Instead Time’s boys strolled up to the Bednest gang and
Nickle and Sam clasped hands as if they were old-time mates
reunited.

Fen’s jaw nearly struck the cold hard
ground.

“Time sends his greetings,” Sam declared to
Fen’s allies-turned-traitors.

“Guess our covers blown,” replied Nickle
offhand, and when he looked down at Fen with his red-rimmed eyes
glistening wetly he shrugged. “Sorry, mate.”

“Time was right to be suspicious of you,” Sam
accused Fen, just before he turned and directed the other two boys
to grab him. Fen tried for the switchblade hidden in a pouch in his
jacket, but they seized him roughly first, one grabbing him by the
arm and the other grabbing a fistful of his jacket at the lower
back. Together they hauled the helpless boy up to his feet. “Time
thought you might try pulling something, given the opportunity. So
he set up this little meeting to test your sincerity, and
commitment. And gotta say, you failed it big time.”

“Fen’s always been a lone-wolf,” explained
Nickle. “Ain’t you? You should’a come clean to us about that haul
of yours. We were all supposed to be mates after all there,
Sunshine, but you’ve never been one to share, you up-level
snob.”

Fen gritted his teeth and struggled to free
himself. “What’re you on about, Nickle, I ain’t—”

“Yes you are, Fen,” interrupted Eddy. “You’ve
always been detached, like you were better than us; even as a wee
nip; talking on about tenements this, and secret sunspot that. Why
do you think everyone calls you Sunshine?” The garishly-dressed
girl turned her eyes on Fen, and he thought maybe she looked upset,
though it was hard to tell through the layers of makeup.

This proved too much for Fen to handle, he’d
been betrayed on every front, and the sting of it fueled his
outrage.
How can they turn on me? I’ve been with them
practically forever, and all these things they’re saying don’t make
a lick of sense; even Eddy isn’t defending me anymore.
Fen
would have throttled every one of them if he could free himself,
but struggling against Time’s brutes proved useless, and he went
limp in defeat. They dragged him along afterwards, barking orders
in his ear as to which direction to go to reach his secret hiding
place, while his former gang mates eagerly skipped alongside
him.

“Time’s going be happy with us,” chattered
Ratty as they climbed higher and higher towards the first Big
Sister. “You think he’ll make us
Sam’s
too.”

“There’s only ever one Sam, and that’s me,”
said Sam, though Fen wasn’t sure what they were on about, nor did
he care. Nothing mattered anymore. He just shuffled along, pinned
between two pillars of muscle, until eventually the Fat Sister’s
broken pipe showed a few meters above them, sticking out over the
drain like a pimple, and only accessible by a trim of ductwork and
a stanchion made of pipe.

“Up there,” muttered Fen, finding it
difficult to lift his finger and give up all his hopes and dreams
for a future.

“I’ll go,” volunteered Eddy, and for some
reason that stung worse than his gang’s betrayal at the Brothers.
How could Eddy of all people turn on him. They joined the gang
together when they were just little pups…it was them first.

With an agile grace she scampered up the
pipework, making it look easy despite her impractically high-heels.
With each meter she went up, Fen felt his dejection mount, and when
she reached the broken pipe and stuck a hand in it his heart
stopped. But when she pulled it back out, with her fist empty and
her face filled with puzzlement, Fen breathed a soundless gasp.
Gone?
From high up the girl shrugged and shook her head
before climbing back down as easily as she went up.

Dropping down amongst the boys she confessed,
“It’s not there,” and they shuffled and looked dumbly to one
another in puzzlement.

“What you mean it’s not there,” growled Sam,
and he turned to Fen and pulled him away from the other boys by the
collar. In his anger he swung his captive about until Fen was
teetering at the edge overlooking the Drain Line. “If you think
lying to me about where it is is going to fly, you’ve another thing
coming.”

“No, no,” stammered Fen. “That’s where it is,
True God’s honest truth.”

“I’m betting his sister has it,” offered Eddy
as she came slipping in next to Sam and grabbed his arm to stop him
from doing anything rash. “If you drop him, we’ll never find the
money, and what will Time have to say about that?”

Sam directed Fen’s captive attention down at
the gurgling sewer-water near-on four stories below. “You’re lucky
she’s here to argue for reason, buddy, or else I’d let the finslugs
have you.” He then tugged the boy back towards safety and shoved
him into the cluster of waiting boys, “Change of plans, Fenny-boy,
you’re going to help us find this sister of yours, and recover that
bag of loot, or it’s all over for you.”

“You probably should have told me what was in
the bag, Sunshine,” Ratter whispered into Fen’s ear as Sam ordered
about his dull-eyed goons. Fen felt his temper flare at the sound
of Rattigan’s prepubescent voice. “I would have helped you—you
know—but you passed it all off as nothing, left me to split tail
and run without knowing what I was running into…right into the arms
of some whistlers. You know they brought me directly to Time, but
Eddy helped me out so that Time cut me and the rest of the Bednest
Boys a deal…a deal we couldn’t refuse, but a deal far better than
what you was givin’ us, you disloyal two-face. He said we could be
part of his special squad if we found out where you stashed that
money.”

Hearing Ratter’s admonishment fueled an
explosive burst of anger, and Fen took a wild swing at its source.
Unfortunately the small boy proved quick and deftly ducked away in
time, but the cramped space sent him blindly colliding into Nickle
and Shoat, and in a heap, all three boys fell to the ground.
Meanwhile, Fen’s fist carried on and struck Beaut squarely in the
nose, breaking it a second time with a wet crunch. His howl of pain
rang out over the “Old Big River”.