“Nikolai and Dmitri are still on the ferry from Venice.” Marco grabbed at Semyon’s arm, trying to make him stop and turn to talk to her.
“Then I’ll see to them after you go. I’ll make sure they are kept out of this mess.” Semyon attempted again to smile and reassure her.
“I won’t just leave them here!” Marco nearly screamed at him. Sergio thought it was touchingly impressive that she would risk so much for her soldiers, he could indentify completely.
“You must! There’s still one boat left, but they won’t wait much longer. Look, I’ll tell the guys where you’ve gone, but please, you have to leave now before someone recognizes you.” Semyon had finally turned and had taken both her shoulders in his large gloved hands, trying to impress on her the gravity of the situation that had unfolded.
Sergio could swear he saw tears in her eyes as she nodded back to him. He wondered where the two had met, and only now recognized that he must also be another emplaced member of Roten Spaten. He probably fed her information about the movements of bandits and criminals in Madrid – that’s what she had meant by staying one step ahead of them.
Semyon waved them towards the edge of the dock, one last boat remained and the passengers called to them to hurry and board so that they could go. Marco looked back at Sergio once more and they climbed onto the boat together, kneeling down on its edge and pushing the boat away from the dock with their feet. Semyon gave a salute before disappearing back from the way they had come.
The man steering was an older gentleman with some fishing gear hanging from pockets on his old mesh military vest. He wore plain clothes but with tall rubber boots. He hit the switch for the electric motor as they entered the main tunnel away from the station. The tall gate on this side was already open, the operator was waving them on with a look of concern.
“Last one out!” Called the fisherman, and the operator nodded his head and closed the gate once they had passed through.
Sergio looked ahead into the tunnel, heaving a breath of relief, he’d hardly had time to process the whirlwind of events that had progressed in the last few minutes, let alone how this might change the rest of their journey back to Polis. He looked over at Marco, who sat holding her knees and slightly rocking with the motion of the water, her gaze fixed back toward the station, eyes glassed over and not even blinking. In any other situation, he would consider her shell shocked, but he knew she was just worried about the rest of her company. She was probably more surprised than Sergio at the turn of events, as he knew she probably visited through this area often given her knowledge of it. He assumed that nothing like this had ever happened to her before, and she was left contemplating where she might have gone wrong.
Chapter 8: Wrong of the Barricade
The boat whirred along quietly despite the air of uncertainty hanging around them. People mumbled to themselves and clung to their companions, thankful to have escaped unscathed but sad to have left their station in such a state. Sergio gathered from their murmurings that they intended to return to Madrid in an hour or so after the chaos had died down. Apparently it was a normal thing – at least for this group – to sail out of the area when things turned bad and wait for it to blow over. Perhaps that was the only way to cope when one lived in a station mostly occupied and governed by freely roaming criminals.
Sergio looked over at Marco, who hadn’t moved since they climbed aboard the raft. She sat in silence as they left behind every contact they’d been traveling with. Now the two were truly on their own, and she couldn’t turn to her followers for support. Sergio wondered how resilient she was when alone; did she know anything at all about combat tactics or about traveling around the many dangerous places in this small underground world? Why would she press on with just himself for company when she was already extremely distrustful of him?
“Can I ask you something?” Sergio said softly, unable to contain his curiosity.
“You just did.” Marco answered without moving anything but her lips. She was still staring blankly behind them, even as the tunnel curved and the scenery changed, her eyes remained fixed. Sergio ignored her sarcasm; he had come to expect it.
“Why come all this way? What is your business in Polis?” For a moment he thought it to be too personal a question, but after another moment of her stillness he felt it was a justified inquiry. He had endured enough of just going along with whomever the world decided he should befriend to places he had no business going to. He rather felt that she owed him some more answers, especially after just escaping from that misfortune in Madrid. Still curious, and determined to have answers, he ventured further. “What does it say in the capsule?”
It was now that Marco turned to meet his gaze, and a spark of that same melancholic and resentful fire burned inside her gray blue orbs. She took a deliberate breath and grasped the pendant in a fist, as if protecting it from assailants unknown.
“So you know it’s a note then, anyway. Did you ever see what was on the one he gave you?” Marco raised an eyebrow hopefully, but still avoided the question.
Sergio narrowed his eyes, both annoyed that he had never been told what was in his own cartridge, and also trying to communicate without words to Sara that he wasn’t going to speak until she had answered him first. He was quickly becoming a more successful conversationalist, because her expression softened and she continued.
“Inside, on the paper, there are two names signed: Sacco’s and my own. It was an agreement we made together… to protect each other, I guess.” She always spoke the name of the missing Stalker as if he were nearby, with trepidation but also hope.
“What, that’s all?” Sergio was puzzled. It didn’t seem very significant by itself.
“Well think about it. He gave you something similar, yes? You did as he asked and went to Polis and now you’re a Hunter.” She showed him a sarcastic smile.
“I was just delivering his message to Colonel Vera.” He explained in a low tone of voice, almost disdainfully. He had in fact felt pressured to do as Sacco requested because he had confessed his secret to him about being the one to leave the barrier open to the Dark Ones. It was damn near blackmail, in fact.
“As am I.” Her voice trailed off and she resumed staring in the direction they had come from.
Sergio followed her example, hoping that emulating her pensive bearing would help him come to his own conclusions. Although he wanted to continue on his streak of successful dialogue with her, he wasn’t sure what he was supposed to ask next. He had never viewed his becoming a Hunter as any type of established or expected reward for doing as Sacco had asked of him. As far as he’d known at the time he was simply delivering the news of his disappearance – telling the commander that his soldier had gone missing – and then Sergio would return home to The underground radio station, unless it was written in Sergio’s cartridge that the person delivering it should be Sacco’s replacement? Was that how the Order operated at the most senior levels? And if so, what was the purpose of Sara’s cartridge? It couldn’t possibly have the same meaning as his own.
“Hey you’re going the wrong way; we need to go to Revolution Square.” Marco turned around suddenly and pointed down the adjacent tunnel for effect.
“We can’t go there; some of us are refugees. We go towards Kitai Gorod and wait at the end of the ferry line, then we go back.” The old fisherman looked down at her with a frown.
“Are you kidding? There are mutants on this side of the barricade! And are any of you armed?” Marco looked around at the faces of the passengers, whose expressions were beginning to turn fearful.