Divided Worlds Trilogy 01 - Disconnect (3 page)

The lantern glowed close to his dad’s bald head. “Is that uncooked rabbit?” An overlapped tooth jutted from his snarl. “So, son, tell me what was so important that you had to ruin dinner?”

The Intercom!
Zachary exhaled at the droid’s closed grasp.

“I was trying to repair his eye.” His own rolled at the stupid suggestion. He’d be caught and suffer another tirade if his dad asked to see the parts.

“He’s fine with one.” Marcus walked to his room. “It’s time you gave up on treasure-hunting rubbish and joined the Wallers. I’ll have a word to get you apprentice status.”

Zachary mouthed his groan. The Far-Wallers, the largest employer in District Two, sent men to batter sludge along the distant hydro-wall where circulating fans operated. To many, the preservation of the oxygen supply exceeded the need to scavenge. Not to Zachary. He was the wrong build to start with, and the common scars of acidic leakages didn’t appeal to him. Zachary didn’t consider himself to be handsome, but he wasn’t ugly either.

“I could haggle with upstairs to use their stove,” suggested Zachary. Half of the rabbit as a trade should be enough.

Marcus emerged pushing padded gloves into the front pocket of his murky-green sweatshirt. “I got a job for tonight with Gerry.”

Gerry Brennan, his dad’s old friend, lived in District One, known as IOTA, which stood for
Invited Only, Trespassers Annihilated
. Cordoned off from the unwelcome, it was the only zone in Underworld with a bay to outer space.

Zachary’s hands dropped to his side. “What kind of job?”

“There’s been some damage on the upper port side of
Galilei
. Pirates tried to take out an ex-ambassador’s home. Full-on assault or something like that.”

“In Overworld?” Zachary asked, his fingers restless. “What else?”

“The pirated shuttle exploded onto the hull. External sensors bombed out and the engine’s belly spilt into the shell. Gerry needs me to dig out the gunk.”

“But why would they contact Gerry?” Didn’t the mighty Overworlders know how to deal with a breach themselves?

“Everyone’s off doing something else.” Marcus sniffed with a tense screw of his lips. “Anyway, I don’t care. It pays well.” His eyes faded with the decreasing wick of the candlelight.

“How much?”

“Thirty Gallis.”

“
Thirty
,” guffawed Zachary. His mouth enlarged under raised eyebrows. A Galli was ten Leo-coins. Three
hundred
Leo-coins. The smell of the rabbit felt far away. No more mushrooms, for a while.

“Gerry’s prepping his ship now.” No fear showed on Marcus’s face.

“You’re going into space?” gasped Zachary. Strange that his dad had never mentioned experiencing this before, or even the last time that he’d visited IOTA. Was he a regular visitor? “Will you be safe?”

Marcus patted him as he passed. “Sure. Plus there will probably be beefed-up security at the Kade residence in case the pirates decide to have another go.”

Zachary’s toes flicked the leather inside his boots. Kade. The girl used that name. How many Kades could there be in Overworld? “I want to go with you.”

Doubt shook his lip. Why did he want to go? On a single name, he suspected that the girl from the Intercom would be there. How stupid to even consider that, yet, it was possible. He had to know.

Marcus took a moment to stare. “Fine.”

* * *

It took a thousand steps to reach the gate to IOTA. Wide enough to push three homes through, it showed dents across the fortified sheets of metal that made it. Faces peered downward from the high compound walls linked to the opening gate. They knew his dad was coming.

On entering, the smell of aromatic spices hit Zachary. The towering homes of Shantytown didn’t exist here. Space was plentiful for the dwellers here with energy beams lighting lanes. Tingles shot up Zachary’s spine at the fast approaching docking bay. He’d deemed himself mad for tagging along on something that could amount to nothing.

Six ships stood ahead like creatures awaiting commands and their different sized wings seized his attention. Long. Wide. Short. Thick engines. Single-seated cockpits. Multiple windows. Sitting furthest away, one ship teased a grin. The
Muirne
. It resembled a rusty overturned bug with six connector-like legs protruding from the top. Four cylindrical propulsion-drives glowed blue beneath it, the same shade as the photograph in his dad’s room.

Zachary followed Marcus up the
Muirne
’s rear-side ramp into a compartmentalised portion encircled by shelves. Padded seats fitted the midsection beyond that.

The tall, rough-bearded captain of the ship entered from the opposite corridor. Shaking his dad’s hand, Gerry cocked his head. “And you brought your little squirt as well. Never a bad time to experience your first flight. Just make sure you hold onto your tummy, cos it’s gonna feel like you swallowed it whole.”

“Pulsars maxed, good to go,” said a man in a crimson jumpsuit behind Zachary.

“Deadly,” said Gerry. “Get your mob in. The payload awaits.”

Marcus tugged the Captain’s hand. “Thirty Gallis. Just for drilling. Right?”

“Would an Irishman lie to you?” Gerry gestured for them to join him in the cockpit. “I ain’t no holy-Joe to question Kade’s rush or how much he pays.”

Glass all over gave the cockpit an open view of the docking bay. With his jeans scraping the coarse texture of the rear seat, Zachary eased onto it.

Gerry flicked a switch on the hub. A drone started under the ship. “Control, this is
Muirne
. Request for force fields to be reversed for exit.”

Zachary imitated his dad’s motion in slipping the green clasp over the black button. It self-tightened. Looking to the side, Zachary clutched his seat. Dust particles wafted upwards around the bellowing
Muirne
. Queasy pangs in his stomach juddered. He felt the ship rise with a leap toward the curved ceiling, and then it hovered, aiming towards the growing hole at the end of the bay. Zachary lifted his legs as a wallop of force humped the ship forward. Fast. For five seconds, he sucked his breath in.

Gerry twiddled the hub’s lever. “Sick yet?”

Zachary felt pressure in his stomach. “N-n-no.”

The
Muirne
banked sharp left.

The muscles in his neck could have torn with the strain he made to catch sight of the
Galilei
Research-Base. The blocky substructure of the Base seemed misaligned and crooked in direct contrast to the smoother panels above. The other side of the Base shot into view. He’d heard of what lay there, and as dull as some made the Europa moon to be, it was a mesmerising ball of smudged white.

The
Muirne
glided upward presenting the gas-giant to view. Dense orange streams pulled Zachary, making the belt-strap across his waist dig into him. Never had the planet’s grainy bands looked so sharp. Jupiter’s massive red eye studied him.

“Back on the old world, they said heaven rested in the sky and hell below your feet. They had it wrong,” said Gerry. “That there is hell.”

* * *

In the short time that passed, Zachary gave up on trying to pierce through
Galilei’s
upper hull to see what lay beneath.

Gerry pointed to the flattened slopes of the Base’s port side. “This ambassador must have annoyed serious people in his time to be placed this far from Assayer.” He pressed a blue pad. “Dock Twenty-Two. This is the
Muirne
, requesting permission to land on authority of Jordan Kade.”

Zachary’s throat smouldered. The Kade girl could be here.

“Consent granted,” replied a stern voice over the speaker. “Tracker activated.”

With the engines of the
Muirne
nearly silent, humming whirrs sounded as the ship nudged forwards in a smooth path into a rectangular opening.

“Zach,” said Marcus. “Stay on the ship.”

Zachary slumped into his seat. Any other day, he would have obeyed, but to let the chance to see this girl slip away was wrong. “Dad, please.”

“
Stay.
It’s no place for a boy. Look after the ship.”

Choosing to stay silent, Zachary peered out into Dock Twenty-Two. Men and women in white suits zipped up to their necks, with full-on shades, walked by holding digital tablets. Everything was clean and polished.

Quiet gripped the
Muirne
.

They’d gone, and the ship hadn’t been locked. Anybody could enter and leave. Lips pinched, he looked out of the cockpit. Gerry and his dad were heading toward a slope. Behind, six of the crimson men pushed a couple of large table-sized cylinders attached to rolling wheels.

The Kade girl’s home had to be close. Maybe she’d come to the docking bay. How long does it take to clean a breach? Zachary thumped the seat’s armrests. They’d never know that he’d left the ship. Stay low. Keep quiet. Sneak. Seize the opportunity.

He jumped up, darting to the rear section. Crimson jumpsuits lay on shelves, ready to be pinched. With one slipped on, he stuck down the rustling Velcro straps along his chest.

At first he inched down the ramp, then, back straightened for the short walk he headed to the slope. Not a single head face turned to question him. So far, so good.

A streak of light spread down the curving path, bringing a white glow to the grey walls. Staggering, blinking several times, Zachary edged onward. His fingers scrambled to undo the top two straps before his chest burst. With air so clean, his lungs struggled to contain the pleasure wafting through him.

Brighter light poured in around Zachary. His eyes shut in an instant. Slowly opening them, he begged for shade to absorb the daggers lancing into his head. Fighting the blurs, he spied the vast white, curved ceiling above him.

Overworld.

Advancing, not entirely sure of direction, his fingers felt tips of pointed wires. Zachary gazed down at the thousand blades of knee-high, green grass that he walked through. He touched the soft orange petal of a flower, and then tugged the stalk; it snapped. Guilt weighted his gulp, as he shoved the flower into his jumpsuit.

In a crowded region, crimson figures stood under cracks slicing into a horizontal section of the Base’s edge. Fear-inducing vehicles, sporting tyres the size of Gerry, rolled past masking the actions of the
Muirne
’s crew. The prospect to sneak away was his.

A hundred feet from the cracked hull sat a well-structured building with wide-framed windows and covered in a pitch roof. From the size of the building, Zachary guessed there to be at least forty rooms inside. Timber posts propped up the balconies over wispy-leafed trees. A curved dome, large enough to match the one he’d seen on the Intercom recording, rose over the far side of the building. Finding the ground underneath favourable, he dashed under the balcony toward the dome. On reaching the edge, he crouched and pulled open all six straps to air the sweat drenching his chest.

Zachary peeped into the dome. There was nobody dancing inside the elegant room. Empty. He pressed his ear against the glass. Not a single sound. No harps. No drums.

“What are you doing?” came a stern female voice.

Startled, Zachary spun round.

Several feet away stood a girl with straight, black hair.

Even without the blue tint, she resembled the girl from the Intercom.

Hands clenched over her knee-length skirt, the girl stared.

Her green eyes tore through, silencing Zachary. Almost as tall as him, she was dressed in a flawless V-neck blouse, ironed with crisp lines. She possessed a sense of prestige that could bring the bartering camps to a standstill.

“
What
are you doing?” Her soft lips creased. She raised her finger at him. “I’m not going to ask again.”

Zachary’s back hit the dome.

The girl gestured toward the direction of the vehicles with large tyres. “Are you with the Pollutant-Demodifiers? Do you know how much my sleep was affected by the noise last night? Do you even care?” Her mouth formed each word with precision. “And tell the driver with the yellow hat that I find his greasy look abysmal. I’m surprised he hasn’t collapsed under his own weight.”

“No – I’m not,” said Zachary. He caught a glimpse of his dad throwing on a metallic jacket with two drill-heads attached along the shoulder pads. “What is a Polly-Demodi-feeler?”

“Are you kidding me? Pollutant-Demodifiers. The big truck things. They suck out Jupiter gases that have leaked through.” Releasing her hip, the girl back-stepped. “If you’re not with them, then who?” She raised her palm. “Is that smell … you?”

Zachary sniffed the unpolluted air. “I don’t smell anything.”

“You don’t? You smell like an overflowing waste-vat.”

He saw her palm press down onto a side pocket. Had she alerted others to his presence? The glittering diodes on her wrist bracelet could be linked to a security terminal. Looking past her to the path he’d used to enter Overworld, he exhaled, hoping that none of those white-suited people rushed to his position.

Zachary pointed to the grinding noise coming from the direction of the breach. “I’m with the team brought in to clean the shell. I snuck away. I was only looking. I’ve never seen a house like this.”

“This far from Assayer?” Her fingers clicked in the air with a frown of realisation. “Yes – I know the city’s full of bigger houses and more flamboyant gardens, but we’re happy here, and if anyone asks about the Kades, you can tell them that we’re fine.”

That confirmed her identity.

The sweet thought he’d imagined of the girl disappeared fast. She didn’t smile like the cheerful child of the hacked files, and her posture was rigid. She couldn’t have been the same girl who’d danced in the dome.

“Do you have a sister?” he asked.

“
What?
No.”

Zachary ground his teeth. “I shouldn’t be here. I need to go back to the ship.”

“Ship?” Her face screwed up. “What do you need a ship for? We’re not that far from Assayer.” She looked behind, up to a balcony. There was nobody there.

“Say,” she said, coming a few steps closer to him. “You’re not meant to be here. Right?” She lowered her voice. “Come with me. I want to talk to you.”