Jonesy was gone now, a victim of the time distortions made necessary by space travel. No more cat-nightmares for him.
Only she was left to deal with life, and all the memories.
‘Slow up.’ Aaron had to break into a jog to catch up with her.
He held up the map, then gestured ahead. ‘Almost there.’
She looked at him. ‘I hope this was worth the climb. What happened to all the damn lifts in this place?’
‘You kidding? Deactivated when the installation was closed down. Why would a bunch of prisoners need to be in this sector anyway?’ He started forward, taking the lead.
They walked another hundred metres before the tunnel opened up into a much larger passageway, one wide and high enough to accommodate vehicles as well as men. The assistant superintendent stopped next to the far wall, holding his torch out to illuminate a sign welded to the metal.
TOXIC WASTE STORAGE
THIS CHAMBER HERMETICALLY SECURED
NO ACCESS WITHOUT AUTHORIZATION
Rating B-8 or Higher Required 146
‘Well, well. What do we have here?’ For the first time in days Ripley allowed herself to feel a twinge of hope.
‘There’s more than a dozen of these scattered around the facility.’ Aaron was bending to study the detailed inscription below the plate. ‘This is the closest one to our living quarters.’
He tapped the wall with his torch and sparks dribbled to the floor.
‘They were gonna shove a lot of heavy-duty waste in here.
Refining by-products, that sort of thing. Some of these are full and permanently sealed, others partially filled. Cheaper, easier, and safer than stuffing the junk into drums and dumping it out in space.
‘This one’s never been used. Maybe because it’s so close to the habitat areas. Or maybe they just never got around to it, closed up shop before they needed the room. I’ve been inside. It’s clean as a whistle in there.’
Ripley studied the wall. ‘What’s the access like?’
‘Pretty much what you’d expect for a storage facility carrying this rating.’ He led her around to the front.
The door was scratched and filthy, but still impressive. She noted the almost invisible seams at the corners. ‘This is the only way in or out?’
Aaron nodded. ‘That’s right. I checked the stats before we came down. Entrance is just big enough for a small loader-transporter with driver and cargo. Ceiling, walls, and floor are six feet thick, solid ceramocarbide steel. So’s the door. All controls and active components are external, or embedded in the matrix itself.’
‘Let’s make sure we’ve got this right. You get something in there and close the door, no way it can get out?’
Aaron grunted confidently. ‘Right. No fuckin’ way. That sucker is tight. According to the specs it’ll hold a perfect vacuum. Nothin’ bigger than a neutrino could slip through.
That ceramocarbide stuff even dissipates lasers. You’d need a controlled nuclear explosion to cut your way in.’
‘You sure this thing is still operational?’
He indicated a nearby control box. ‘Why don’t you find out?’
She moved forward and broke the thin seal that covered the enclosure. The lid flipped down, exposing several controls. She studied them for a moment, then thumbed a large green button.
The immense door didn’t so much slide aside as appear to vanish silently into the wall. She cycled it again, admiring the smooth play of forces that could shift so much mass with such speed and ease. The prisoners were similarly impressed. The efficiency of the long-dormant technology lifted their spirits considerably.
Beyond the open barrier was a slick-walled, empty chamber.
An ephemeral coating of dust covered the floor. It would accommodate several full-grown aliens with ease.
‘Let me see the map.’ Aaron handed her the sheet and her index finger drew patterns on the plastic. ‘We’re here?’ He leaned close and nodded. ‘Administration’s here, assembly hall up this corridor?’
‘You got it. Fast, too,’ he added admiringly.
‘I owe the fact that I’m still alive to an understanding of spatial relationships.’ She tapped the sheet. ‘If we can get it to chase us down these passageways, here and here, then close these off one at a time, we might get it inside.’ The three of them stared into the storage chamber.
Dillon looked back at her. ‘Lemme get this straight. You wanna burn it down and outta the pipes, force it here, slam the door, and trap its ass?’
She spoke without looking up from the map. ‘Ummm.’
‘And you’re looking for help from us Y-chromo boys.’
‘You got something better to do?’
‘Why should we put our asses on the line for you?’
She finally glanced up at him, her eyes steely. ‘Your asses are already on the line. The only question is what you’re going to do about it.’
X
Accompanied by prisoner David, Aaron showed Ripley through the vast storage chamber. When they reached the section where the drums were stored, he paused and pointed.
‘This is where we keep it. I don’t know what this shit’s called.’
‘Quinitricetyline,’ David supplied helpfully.
‘I knew that,’ the assistant superintendent grumbled as he checked his notepad. ‘Okay. I’m off to work out the section assignments with Dillon for the paintbrush team. David, you get these drums organized, ready to move.’ He turned and headed in the direction of the main corridor.
‘Right, Eight-five,’ David called after him.
‘Don’t call me that!’ Aaron vanished into the darkness of the distant corridor.
Ripley examined the drums. They were slightly corroded and obviously hadn’t been touched in some time, but otherwise appeared intact.
‘What’s this “Eight-five” thing?’
David put gloved hands on the nearest container. ‘Lot of the prisoners used to call him that. We got his personnel charts out of the computer a few years ago. It’s his IQ.’ He grinned as he started to roll the drum.
Ripley stood and watched. ‘He seems to have a lot of faith in this stuff. What’s your opinion?’
The prisoner positioned the drum for loading. ‘Hell, I’m just a dumb watchman, like the rest of the guys here. But I did see a drum of this crap fall into a beachhead bunker once. Blast put a tug in dry dock for seventeen weeks. Great stuff.’
In another part of the storage chamber prisoners Troy and Arthur sorted through the mass of discarded electronics components. Troy shoved a glass bead into the cylinder he was holding, thumbed the switch, then disgustedly wrenched the bead free and began hunting for another.
‘Goddamn it. One fucking bulb in two thousand works.’
His companion looked up from his own search. ‘Hey, it could be a lot worse. We mighta got the paintbrush detail.’ He tried a bead in his own tube, hit the switch. To his astonishment and delight, it lit.
The two men filled the air duct with little room to spare, slathering the interior surface with the pungent quinitricetyline.
‘This shit smells awful,’ Prisoner Kevin announced for the hundredth time. His companion barely deigned to reply.
‘I’ve told you already; don’t breathe it.’
‘Why not?’
‘Fuckin’ fumes.’
‘I’m in a fuckin’ pipe with it. How can I keep from breathing it?’
Outside the toxic waste storage chamber other men were dumping buckets of the QTC and spreading it around as best they could, with brooms and mops and, where those were lacking, with their booted feet.
In the corridor Dillon was waiting with Ripley. Everything was proceeding according to plan, though whether the plan would proceed according to plan remained to be seen.
He glanced toward her, analyzed the expression on her face.
Not that he was particularly sensitive, but he’d seen a lot of life.
‘You miss the doc, right?’
‘I didn’t know him very well,’ she muttered by way of reply.
‘I thought you two got real close.’