Inkers (22 page)

It was still a clear day. The sky was still blue. The crags of the mountain–top looked almost inviting.

“Oh no,” Emily said. “We haven’t got the calories, and that wound–”

“I thought you were all for searching! Whatever happened to nooks and crannies?”

“Yeah, but not when you’ve just been shot! And we need food!”

“I’ve got to try,” Amber said. “She’s here somewhere, I can feel it.”

“I think you’re in shock,” Emily said. “I don’t see any barns up there. I’ve got much better detection algorithms than you.”

“I’m not sure that’s true, actually,” Amber said. “I’ve got about three billion years of evolution on you. And you didn’t even see the photo. I didn’t see any windows. What if they’re underground?”

“If they’re underground we’ll never find them,” Emily said.

Amber was already tramping through the trees towards the mountain, clenching her teeth against the pain.

Amber was hauling herself up a scree slope when she heard a huge roar behind her. She spun, reaching for her sidearm automatically, half expecting that the GSE had arrived early and it was already the end. But there was a winged black shape rushing low over the trees, banking, decelerating, dipping, disappearing into the woods towards the south of the island.

“That was big! Manned?” Amber said.

“Yep,” Emily replied, “International one–person scramjet. Very pricey bit of kit, rare to see them with private markings, but she had them. Flying very low, too, so as not to attract radar attention.”

“Huh.”

“Wonder what they’re doing here, two days from the end.” Emily said.

“Maybe they know something we don’t.”

“Could be worth a shot,” Emily said.

“We can’t let anyone get to her first. If it’s ITSA they’ll vaporise her. Could you get us to where they landed?”

“Think so, or pretty close. Follow the arrows.”

The green arrow appeared in Amber’s vision. She began back down the scree slope, small stones tumbling around her feet. She accelerated, running down across the rocks, slipping a little but staying upright, then over a low wall and across a green field, threading between groups of sheep. They ignored her and carried on munching at the grass.

Amber came quite close to the road, and she even saw a car rushing past through the trees, but Emily guided her so that she would not be seen.

“It came down about a hundred yards ahead.”

Amber could see nothing but bushes and tree–trunks. She kept walking until she came to a high hedge. She walked alongside it, looking for a way through. After a time she came to a small wooden door, padlocked but rotting.

“What is this place?” Amber said softly.

“It’s an old business park,” Emily said, “It’s been abandoned for a while. Shouldn’t be anyone here.”

Amber pushed at the door. The boards were flimsy. She kicked it until three of the boards gave way, and she squeezed through the gap, adding some stinking brown gunk to her already filthy clothes. The other side was overgrown with high bushes, but Amber glimpsed a wide open space through a gap.

“Check for me,” Amber said.

Amber looked left and right, letting Emily see as much as possible.

“Nothing I can see,” Emily said. “Go slowly.”

Amber drew her gun. This was closer than they had been to the town, Brodick, so far. The danger of being spotted had just been too much, and an immune tended to draw attention, even if drones weren’t actively looking for her here.

Amber pushed through the thick bushes. They were thorny and scratched viciously at her arms, drawing blood. She came to the edge of the open space and crouched down. Amber could see what were obviously the main gates to the compound far over to the left, a single opening in the high wall. The gates were shut. Ahead and to the right, beyond a wide region of grass, were large square concrete buildings. Amber watched them for a while for any sign of life.

There was a well–gravelled path winding up the middle of the grass. This land had clearly once been well–cared for, in the manner of corporate “natural” surroundings, designed to look their best in the brochure. There were several evenly spaced trees dotted about, certainly not native to Arran, and the ground was landscaped to be unnaturally rolling, like a miniature range of hills. She guessed the grass had once been manicured, but now it was knee–high and blemished with weeds and young bushes. The place had obviously been empty for a while. Amber guessed that it had been in terminal decline for decades before that, as the jobs disappeared abroad and were automated.

Amber walked forwards. There was the crunch of ink–vials under her boots – this area of grass was scattered with them. She slowed a little but carried on towards the buildings. What was probably once a water–feature opened up to the right, the water now black with weeds. There was some sort of sculpture or fountainhead pushing up in the middle, rendered indefinite by dark clusters of ivy. The daylight was fading already. Amber felt apprehension in the tightness of her throat.

“There it is,” Emily said, and there was the drone, just beyond the water, low and dark. There was a large black patch surrounding it where its jets had burnt the grass. The cockpit was empty. Amber crouched and drew her gun.

“Don’t go close,” Emily said, “I can’t tell if it’s awake or not. I think the occupant went inside, there are footprints on the grass.”

The green arrow appeared, flickered towards the buildings.

Amber approached the first building, treading softly on the loose gravel. It was tall, five storeys, faux Greco–Roman architecture. Four massive ornamental pillars squatted along the front, pretending to hold up a wide triangular roof. The wall was filled with big windows, all smashed, just a few shards of glass remaining here and there. It had a single huge front doorframe but the door was gone. Inside she could see only darkness and looming shapes. The whole effect was of a house built for giants. Amber squeezed her right fist to switch on the lights in her glove and entered the building.

Inside stank of mould and damp and dead leaves. Ruined storage boxes sat along the edges of the corridor, rotting contents spilling out onto the filthy floor. It was silent except for her footsteps and the gentle whistle of the breeze coming in the door behind her. That faded as Amber passed deeper into the building. Doors gaped on either side, silent and black. She stuck her lit hand into each one – Emily would tell her if there was any infrared variation significant enough to be mammalian.

The light highlighted only toppled desks, more boxes, abandoned stacks of paper. Amber came to a staircase, ten steps curving up to the right. She began to ascend. There was an empty window on the landing and she could see Jupiter hanging obscenely huge and bright in the dusk. She turned away and hurried up the stairs.

They exited onto another corridor. As Amber passed over the threshold two things happened so quickly in succession that they were almost simultaneous. First, Emily said, “Stop!” Second, a voice somewhere close to her left shouted “Halt!”, close enough to give her a serious jolt of adrenaline on top of the base level of tension she was already experiencing. Amber stuck her gun out in the general direction of the voice and squeezed her right hand on and up to maximum, blinding visibility – it shone from her knuckles as she gripped the gun with her good left hand and pointed her right down the corridor towards the source of the voice. A shape wrapped in heavy clothing dashed away, footsteps echoing amid the boxes.

“ITSA ink–hunter, halt!” she shouted on reflex, but the footsteps continued, fast. This one could run. She swore and followed, gun up, scanning around for traps. More and more ink vials were crunching under her feet, and amid the boxes and stacks of paper there were food packs, beer–cans, a few items of clothing, signs of habitation or at least partying. She passed through into a wide open space, what would have been a large office for several hundred people. The floor–space was stuffed with desks and neck–height partitions. A little of the sunset came in from the windows along the walls. The figure was nowhere to be seen and it was quiet again. Amber lowered the brightness on her hand–torch to get her night vision back and stepped to the right so she had the wall to her back. After a moment she switched off her lights completely.

Amber waited. He had not had time to cross the space. The only other door visible was at the far end of the room, perhaps fifty yards away, and however fast he was there simply hadn’t been time to cross the entirety of the floor and get through without her seeing him. Even the windows to the side were too far away for him to have reached. Either there was a trap–door in one of the cubicles or he was in the room waiting for her.

Amber knew the correct move to play in this situation: wait him out. The only other option was to leave the way she had come in. If she stayed still she was very hard to see, even with night vision or infrared. Her skin was still heavily imbued with the remnants from her years of ink abuse, which absorbed a lot of her residual heat. And she was grey. So she waited, blinking on a small display in her right eye to show the time.

“Any sign of him?” Amber said, inside.

“No,” Emily said. “He’s here somewhere. Try not to move.”

Forty–two minutes passed, disturbed only by a small pigeon that fluttered in through one of the empty windows, perched for a few seconds on a cubicle wall, and then, as if sensing the danger in the room, fluttered awkwardly back out. On the cusp of the forty–third minute there was a burst of movement to her left, much closer than Amber had expected. She swung her gun up and fired, but he was coming
towards her
and she missed. He passed metres away, heavy–set, grizzled face, and was gone through the doorway. She leapt out, firing at his back. She struck, and her vision lit up green for a nanosecond, but he was wearing armour and although he stumbled he carried on. He rounded the corner and she ran after him as he clattered down the stairs.

She was sprinting but he had a lead. He must have seen her unmistakeable skin and glove–lights. He knew she was an ink–hunter. Why run? And why hunt bounty two days before the apocalypse? Although in practice freelance bounty–hunters and ITSA ink–hunters were often racing to get to the same prize, nominally at least they were on the same side. There was no way he could know she was wanted as a traitor, was there?

She reached the bottom of the stairwell. The corridor was empty. She crept along, gun pointed at the open door. She reached it —looked out, preparing to leap back if the drone was taking off, but there was nobody there. The drone was sat quietly, empty.

“Behind,” Emily said, so quickly Amber could barely understand it.

She heard him step out behind her, and had time to half spin towards him before the shot hit her in the left of her chest. She went down firing, threw herself back into a corner, firing at him until her gun was empty. When it was over he stepped out of cover and walked to her. She tried to pull the magazine from her belt to reload but found her arms were no longer functioning.

“Nice country you’ve got here,” the short–haired man said, standing over her. He had an Australian accent. “Not my country,” she wanted to say, but she could not speak.

“You got implants?” he said, kicking the gun out of her limp hand, bending down to peer into her eyes. She could not move.

“Well, never mind,” he said. “Take all the pictures you want. Doesn’t really matter, now, I guess.”

He sighted at her face.

“
Move
!” Emily screamed.

She tried to move. All she could do was moan.

The man grinned, raised his gun. “I’ll let you enjoy it, actually.” He turned away.

She watched as he walked down the corridor, through the big open door, the blue sky framing him. After a few minutes the black drone lifted off, turned, and flew low towards the coast. Amber could see the sea. There was a small island just off the coast, a hill poking out of the water. It had a white lighthouse at one end. She watched the drone dip down towards it and land on a flat area amongst some trees. Emily was saying “Stay conscious, stay with me, stay conscious,” but everything was going dark. In her final moment Amber wondered why they had not thought to look on the little island.