Transformation Space - Marianne de Pierres [55]
He felt along the bottom edge of the com-sole and unclipped it from its station. It was light enough, but awkward. How could he get it back without dropping it? He needed his hands free to climb down the more slippery rocks.
A wash of sweet scent wafted in, drowning the smell of the spilled chemicals. The Saqr were close again – outside the room, perhaps. Taking the com-sole, he dropped to the floor and crawled over to the centre of the room, assessing his options.
A rush of air blew on his face as the door opened, and the sweet scent grew chokingly strong. He stifled the instinct to gag and gripped the com-sole tightly. There must be another door, somewhere he could run to.
Scraping sounds on the far side. He held his breath as the noise moved around the perimeter of the room and back. Hard to tell if it was one or more. Don’t look. Don’t move at all.
Silence. Then another shift of air. The door closed.
He sat for a long time, clutching the com-sole, aware only of the sound of his heartbeat and the wetness between his legs. Jo-Jo Rasterovich hadn’t pissed his pants since he was a kid, waiting for his mum to get through an evening with her latest beau. He’d been sitting outside the condo door, in the corridor, playing with a set of chrome jacks. He was four years old.
The loss of control didn’t make him proud, but he wasn’t ashamed either. He’d seen what the Saqr could do. He was no hero.
When he could make his legs function, he got up and quietly searched the room for something to carry the com-sole. It was curiously bereft of incidentals, as if someone had swept through and tidied just before the Saqr invaded.
Instead, he found another door and exited, stealing deeper into the studium until he came upon the kitchens.
Here, things were different. Every pot, pan and sealed storage container had been rifled. Even the rows of cookers down the centre of the room had been damaged, smashed with the force of an axe or hammer.
That didn’t make sense, but he didn’t stop to examine them. Instead, he searched among the debris until he found a length of kitchen tie that had once hung meat, and threaded it through a notch on the com-sole. Tying the ends together, he looped it over his shoulder.
The kitchen, he knew, would have a service entry for food loading. Leaving the studium from the rear meant a much longer walk back, but it would lessen his chances – he hoped – of running into Saqr.
He found the entrance to the service bay at the bottom of the extensive pantry, a roller door with a mechanism to handle inter-gal freight cartons. Alongside the door was a hatch, larger than the average Balol. He pressed spots around the roller pad, and the hatch sprang open. He stepped through quickly. It took him moments to adjust to the flooding light outside.
He looked for the moons, but neither had risen. The night skies of Araldis, though, were filled with a flotilla of tiny star-bright objects.
Jo-Jo blinked a few times to see if they went away, but the objects remained above him, cruising in a serene orbit. Instinct told him to get back to Randall and Catchut quickly. If they could get the com-sole working, maybe they could find out what the Crux was happening up there.
MIRA
Even this remote arm of the landing port teemed with activity. Mira threaded her way through queues and past kiosks selling credit exchange and transport vouchers. Ahead, she saw the crowds streaming onto four different conveyors. The signs hanging above them confused her, so she stopped at a seedy kaffe, which served pastries swimming in liquid and oversized cups of dark mokka, and asked directions.
The attendant was unobliging and distracted, his eyes flicking between