SHAFT BURIMMAS

1560 4D

She’d said, Please follow me, but don’t let anyone see you. Jeddin waited until the rest of the band were all seated at Caladrina‘s, along with some girl made up to look like Thringe. Then he slipped off to the stair and listened.

His senses, attuned to the whisper of the andro hunters, picked up nothing at all except the shuffle of an older human descending some levels below him. He climbed until he was one level below the rendezvous point, and then found his way to a utility closet to ascend the last stage unseen. Thringe had said, “I’ll be in the third access passage from the crossing at Aswar Merdiai, in the stair of Shaft Burimmas.”

Shaft Burimmas was one of the filthiest of the great City airshafts, slimed with sewage and rot, and a good place to neutralize the nasal sensitivities of anyone, like andro hunters, trying to trail with olfactories. It was also dangerously damaged, its steps broken away and weakened by millennia of erosion and chemical attack, so Thringe would be at risk no matter what happened. Jeddin shook his head, wondering why she did the same kinds of things he did. He seemed to come back after death, he thought; she wouldn’t. Death would not give her back. Maybe it wouldn’t give him back either.

A whiff, a soft step nearby, and Jeddin quickly slid into a darkened crevice in the understreet, waiting. Someone walking just ahead of him had started to turn. He waited, then peered out. He checked innerspace, reflexively; nothing near except the inert forms of a few scattered humans. Another few heartbeats, and he continued toward the meeting point.

Thringe hadn’t told him what was in this shipment, but he guessed that it was meds for the andros sickened with any of the maintenance viruses gone rogue. The corps that built these viruses were sloppy. Jeddin knew – he’d just watched Girazin die.

Each virus was supposed to perform tissue transformations to upgrade andro specifications: strength, perception, cognitive tools. For Girazin, the transformations failed horribly. The long buzz of his final breaths, the hemorrhaging of his skin everywhere, his anjive cries whispering in the ethereal upper range of andro hearing, still haunted Jeddin.

Girazin was one of far too many. The meds to heal the victims were usually smuggled in from Purusil in the west, where andros had some social status, and this shipment had to get into the City.

Jeddin was close enough now. He stopped and waited until the understreet was clear, then slipped to the steel door to Shaft Burimmas and entered. The stench made him reel.

“Jeddin! I told you to wait in the next closet!” Thringe‘s voice hissed anjive like soft live steam.

“This is a bad idea–” Jeddin began, but she cut him off.

“Get out of here! If they see you with me it’ll screw the deal! I couldn’t get this load any other way except to promise I’d come alone.” Her hand shook as she pushed on his arm. “Get out of here and hide.”

This seemed wrong. Jeddin‘s senses told him there was trouble near, but he did as she asked and stepped carefully up the shaft‘s spiral stair, exiting above her on the next level. He quickly ran to the usual stairs and started back down to the hiding place she’d told him about, but as he started to leave the stairwell a burst of sharp taps made him freeze.

He peered out into the understreet in the direction of the shaft door. It hung slightly open, and a human man had his hand on it, pushing it quietly shut. The man walked away toward the Aswar, looking back every so often. No one else was in the street.

There could be someone watching for others to arrive. Jeddin waited again, his mind racing, his hands trembling in spite of him. Finally he eased out into the street and found his way into the shaft‘s dark fumes, closing the door behind him.

The light in Shaft Burimmas was so weak he couldn’t see much even with his amplified senses, but a moan showed him a heap on the slimy floor of the shaft‘s stair landing. He knelt – it was Thringe.

“Don’t move me!” she gasped. “Hyperflechettes. The bastard nailed me.”

“You can’t stay here,” Jeddin told her. “Hang on and don’t make a sound.” He entered innerspace and found her lying there with steel flowers growing in her: the analogues of the little metal arrowheads burrowing in her flesh. “I know where they are in you,” he said. “I’ll get you to safety without hurting you.” He exited to the shaft landing again and with extreme tenderness gathered Thringe in his arms and carried her up to the next level.

He hid her in the access passage behind Streakrun Score, cushioning her with cubby-blankets and a pillow. It would take the hunters some time to find her here, and he’d have to get to the rest of her band and warn them of what happened. They would need to hide.

“Wait,” she said as he stood. “There’s a girl with my band. She doesn’t know.”

“Dressed to look like you?”

“Yes.” Thringe‘s breath came ragged. “Her name is Lejina. You’ve got to try to keep her out of this. She’s…"

“Will she be with them?”

“She should be. But she’s got to get out of costume before someone thinks she’s me and nails her too. Or worse, gets them all. Oh, shit, it hurts.”

Jeddin said, “I’ll do everything I can.” Lejina – that was odd – Quessnar Viustin had a daughter by that name. Maybe this was a deeper puzzle than Thringe knew. Jeddin said, “If someone comes to help, I’ll make sure they tell you ‘shain haili four'.” And he bent down, kissed Thringe on the forehead, and moved silently away, his heart beating fast, his mind filled with rage and sorrow at her pain.