The Omega Cage (15 page)

Stark turned away from the window to his desk and stroked a heat-sensitive strip. "Get me tower two," he said.

"There, next to that bus!" Scanner pointed. Their target was Stark's personal flitter. It was an aircar that would comfortably seat six, and uncomfortably eight.

Comfort was not a problem; they would fly standing on their heads if that was what it took.

"I hope this works," Chameleon said.

"It'll work," Scanner replied, pulling another electronic device from his pocket.

"I've had this for two years, just in case I ever got a chance to use it. I know the control systems of this cart better than my mother's face. It'll work."

They reached the flitter. Scanner tapped in a code on his device, the doors on the flitter gulled up and open. "See?"

"Brag later," Sandoz said. "Let's get the fuck out of here."

"Everybody freeze!"

Maro spun tightly, pointing the hand wand. To his left, he saw Sandoz drop flat to the ground, spetsdod extended. Chameleon moved slower, bringing the shotgun around.

A laser dot danced across Fish's chest, and the little man erupted in a fountain of bloody flesh. Fish screamed and bounced from the side of the flitter, falling.

The shotgun's flash came from the edge of a second transport bus. Maro pointed the hand wand at the afterimage and triggered it. The strobe-like flash spread out, too wide and dispersed to do much damage at that range. He tossed the one-shot weapon away as he heard the rattle of spetsdod darts against the bus's plastic body. Chameleon got his shotgun working, and three quick booms deafened Maro. "Into the flitter!" he yelled into the sudden silence. Berque scrambled inside, followed by Juete. Maro looked up to see Raze running to the right, sprinting. Where the hell was she going? Wait, she was circling the bus—

The dot of the targeting laser whipped over Maro, and he dove for the ground.

The hail of 9mm pellets sleeted against the flitter. Sandoz fired the spetsdod again, then cursed as the weapon ran dry. He jerked it from his hand, jumped up and into a dive, and rolled toward the flitter.

Chameleon beat Sandoz to the door.

"The shotgun!" Maro yelled. Chameleon turned and tossed the weapon at Maro.

Maro caught it and rolled, then came up.

By the bus, somebody grunted.

Maro ran toward the bus, shotgun pointed ahead. He waited for the deadly red spot to find him, for the impact of the steel shot to slam into him. It didn't come.

Somebody was fighting behind the bus. Maro skidded to a halt on the rough plastcrete slab and gathered himself to spring. Before he could move, the fighters bounced from behind the bus and almost on top of him, clinched together like wrestlers.

It was Raze, locked together with Lepto. The guard cursed, while Raze saved her breath for fighting. As he watched, they sprang apart. Then Lepto moved in, and Raze swung a roundhouse punch, bringing it up from behind her, a long, looping and powerful strike. It caught Lepto flush on the side of the jaw. Maro heard the bone go with a wet snap, and Lepto's head jerked to the side from the power of the strike. That punch might have badly injured an ordinary man, but Lepto only stopped long enough to shake his head before he started for Raze again.

Maro remembered the guard he had killed, and that was enough to make him lower the barrel of the shotgun to point at Lepto's legs. He fired, and the blast hit the guard above the left knee, knocking the leg back enough to pitch Lepto forward in a hard dive. Raze danced to the side as the guard hit the plastcrete. He might bleed to death eventually, but he was alive for now.

"Come on!" Maro yelled to Raze.

Raze hesitated, fists doubled, staring at Lepto. Then she turned and ran.

The two of them piled into the flitter. Sirens wailed, and spotlights came on, but nobody seemed to know where to focus yet.

Scanner sat in the control seat, holding a small caster in one hand. He thumbed the unit's control and tossed it onto the flitter's dash panel. "There goes the comnet and radio," he said. "They won't be calling for help for a few hours."

"Get this thing in the air," Sandoz said.

Scanner nodded and powered up the flitter. In five seconds, the craft started to lift.

"All right!" Chameleon said.

The plastic window next to Juete shattered. She screamed as the shards exploded inward. Maro jumped for her, pulling her away from the window. There was a rattle like hail against the flitter's body, and the sounds of gunfire. He caught a glimpse of Lepto, sprawled on the plastcrete, firing at them with his recovered shotgun. He jammed his own weapon through the vacant window, pointed it at Lepto, and pulled the trigger back to full auto.

On the plastcrete, Lepto's form jerked from the impact. The shotgun emptied and clicked, and Maro shoved it outside. The flitter rose as Maro turned to look at Juete. A line of blood, startlingly vivid against her white flesh, ran down one cheek.

"I'm okay," she said. "Just some plastic hit me, I think."

The flitter canted, then began to move, picking up speed, heading through the transport area toward the southern wall. Maro looked out through the ruined window as the wall seemed to drop away beneath them.

"We're out," Raze said quietly.

They all yelled, then. A cheer.

They had escaped from the Omega Cage.

Part Two

''Freedom don't mean much when the dogs is on your trail."

—Abraham Scranton Jefferson Jones

Chapter Sixteen

"We're losing power," Scanner said.

A chorus of voices was raised in immediate and shocked question. In reply, Scanner shook his head and pointed to the readouts on the heads-up holodisplay.

"One of Lepto's shotgun blasts. This thing's diagnostics show that we're losing fuel—a ruptured line."

"Can we fix it?" Sandoz asked.

"Not without landing. Maybe not even then. I've got a confounder blasting their radar and doppler, but I don't think we want to put down within a hundred klicks of the prison. They can still field dins and hounds, and they have other transports. We can't hide our heat shadow."

"Shit," Chameleon commented. He had shifted back from his Stark impersonation to what Maro assumed was his normal appearance, if indeed he had any.

"How long can we fly?" Maro asked.

Scanner shrugged. "If we keep our speed low and stay low, out of turbulence, maybe a couple of hours."

"How far?" Raze asked.

"Three, four hundred kilometers."

"That puts us six hundred short of the mining port," Berque said bitterly. "We're dead."

"Maybe," Maro said.

Berque stared at Maro as if he had just sprouted tentacles and green fur. "

'Maybe'? How the hell are we supposed to get through six hundred kilometers of some of the deadliest animal and plant life in the whole fucking galaxy? Walk?"

"Unless you've got a better idea."

Berque looked at the others. "Yeah, I have a better idea! We go back! So we have to do some time in the hole, that's better than dying! Stark isn't so bad—"

Raze was covering the shattered window with a seat cushion. She easily twisted a thick piece of metal frame out of the way so it could fit, jammed it into place, then turned and smiled at Berque. "Shut up," she said softly.

Berque shut up.

To Maro, Raze said, "Can we make it on foot?"

Maro said, "Scanner has the map."

Scanner tapped his head and grinned. "Right in here."

Maro looked at the others. "Anybody else want to go back? It's true that we might die on the surface. It's a risk."

Chameleon shook his head; Juete hers; Sandoz only grinned. Maro said,

"Scanner?"

"I'm with you."

Maro nodded. "Okay, we go. You can stay with the flitter when we put down if you want, Berque. I expect they'll find you quickly enough."

Berque licked his lips. "Ah, maybe I'd better stay with you."

Maro turned back to Scanner. "Okay, see how long you can keep this crippled bird up."

"Copy that."

Slowly, the wounded flitter flew on through the night.

Stark was filled with both rage and fear. He held himself as calmly as he could as he listened to the reports pouring from all over the prison.

"Lepto is dead, shot…"

"Your personal flitter is gone, but we've got positive indications of a fuel leak…"

"Radar is showing funny signals, and doppler is worse…"

"The main transceiver is down, and we don't know why…"

"Enough," Stark said. "Put cycles in the air, standard search grid. They've got some kind of jammer—triangulate on the interference. I want ground cars out, headed toward Omega City and the mines. Start up the infrared. Put a hound on the flitter's fuel."

A guard appeared on the flatscreen monitor. "What about a messenger to the city? Cut 'em off on the other end."

"No. We take care of our own problems here. Discom."

Stark severed the com link, then stood and paced to the window. The last thing he wanted to do was let anybody in the city know about the escape. That would be all Karnaaj would need, some indication of ineptitude. As it stood, so long as the radio was out, nobody would be running any shuttles to the Cage from Omega City. That would keep Karnaaj off his back for a couple of days. Of course, they would eventually send a messenger out to see what was going on, but Stark could put a hold on him too, in the interests of prison security. A few days was all he needed; by then he'd have the escapees back.

"Computer, list the prisoners missing from their cells."

Obediently, the computer lit with the names. Eight of them, he saw, counting the one Lepto got at the M&T yard.

And Juete.

Their escape didn't frighten him; what did was the worry that by the time his men got to them, there might not be much left of those seven fools who had hopped the wall. Omega was as dangerous as an Earth-class planet could be, even to people armed with state-of-the-art technology. If their ship was damaged, they would have to land, and for a handful of ill-equipped prisoners on foot, Omega would provide a fast grave.

He didn't need that. He
had
to save Juete. The bitch! How could she have
done
this to him? Hadn't he done
everything
for her? She'd be sorry when he caught her.

And Maro. If Kamaaj was pissed about being kept away for a few days, it would be nothing compared to what he would feel if Maro died a hundred klicks away from the Cage. No, he had to get them back, and fast.

If worse came to worse, there was the Juggernaut. He didn't want to use it unless he had to—it was his final ace, and once it was played there would be hell to pay. He was not supposed to have the thing. Aside from being paid for out of stolen funds, he had bought the military machine from black market sources. The Confed would burn his shadow into a wall if they found out about the Juggernaut.

Still, it was there if he had to use it, and the thought gave him some comfort, however small.

Far better, however, that his men should catch up to the escapees on their own.

And quickly.

Juete turned away from the other passengers in the flitter to stare through the polarized window at the desolate landscape. The dawn spread its reddish glow over the terrain, illuminating a vast expanse of desert. Far to the south and below them, she thought she saw a dragonbat gliding.

She tried to maintain her calm. Long ago, the albino Exotics had discovered that becoming excited only made them more desirable; it stirred hormones and sent out potent signals. Already she could feel the lust focusing upon her from the others in the confines of the small craft. Berque was the most open about it, but it also came in various degrees from all the others, even Dain.

Given the circumstances, it was impossible to meditate, to achieve that single-pointedness that helped to cool her normal pheromonic heat; still, watching the sand and scrub pass close beneath her helped somewhat.

Berque moved to stand next to her seat. He rubbed his palms against his coveralls, leaving damp sweat tracks. "Hey, what say you and I go in the back for a few minutes?"

She turned to look up at him. "No."

"Come on." His voice was hoarse. "You're an Exotic, you like it."

"I choose my partners."

"What's wrong with me?"

"Have you got a few hours for a basic list?"

"Berque." The summons came from Maro, who turned from where he squatted next to Scanner. The fat man glanced at the smuggler. "Yeah?"

"Go sit down." His voice was flat, yet somehow frightening.

For a beat, it looked as if Berque might protest. Whatever he thought, however, he kept to himself, turned and moved back to his seat.

Juete smiled at Maro, who nodded slightly and returned to whatever he and Scanner had been discussing. The albino woman leaned back against her seat and stared through the window. The thought of being with Dain made her heart begin to race, and she didn't want to start producing chemical signals that might excite the others. The trick was to keep those who wanted her from becoming so possessive that they would be willing to kill to keep her. Or even to kill
her
to keep others from having her. Berque was disgusting, but she had been with worse and survived. If he had a weapon, she would do as he wished, to keep him from killing her or the others.

Fortunately, he was not in charge. It was always a value decision, and sex
per se
was not worth much to her compared to respect, compared to love. Now that she had that, she could be choosier.

The flitter seemed to cough. It bucked once, slowed, then picked up speed again.

Juete looked at Scanner.

Without looking away from the bug-streaked windscreen, Scanner said, "We've got about twenty minutes of fuel left. I'm going to look for a place to land."

Outside, the desert came to an end. Just beyond stood a small range of hills, and past that a deep, wide crevasse split the ground, running toward the horizon until it disappeared into a thin line. Scanner found a passage through the hills without climbing. Once they passed over the crevasse the terrain changed abruptly, turning, as if by some mad terraformer's design, into a swamp. Tall trees reared up from boggy ground and large patches of scummy water were broken up by clumps of vegetation in a dozen shades of green.