“Connecting with a few people who don’t want to meet me face to face,” Daria said. “Not all of them are my fans. They might want to meet you though.”
“They’ll have to hurry,” Colin said. “We’re leaving as soon as possible.”
He tapped a switch, activating the star chart. He’d looked at it so often over the past couple of weeks that he felt he’d memorised it. Countless stars were green, indicating that they were of little tactical interest, but a handful were yellow or red, indicating important industrial nodes or naval bases. Morrison, sitting barely a month from Earth, was the darkest red of all.
Colin scowled, wishing he knew just who was in command of the base. Who would the Empire choose? And would it be someone actually competent?
He shook his head. There was no way to know until they were closer. Much closer.
The spy had plenty of practice at playing her role. As a trained starship engineer, she was simply too important to be discarded for a mere suspicion, something Imperial Intelligence had relied upon when they’d primed her for her role. The Rim had a shortage of trained personnel, ensuring that any newcomer with the right skills was warmly welcomed. It helped that her files — which Imperial Intelligence had carefully inserted into the right networks — contained a sob story about rape, sexual abuse and other matters that would encourage someone to make a run for freedom.
But she could barely contain her astonishment as her shuttle approached the giant superdreadnaught. There were hundreds of thousands — perhaps millions — of volunteers joining the rebellion. The Rim had sent thousands of workers, but so too had Jackson’s Folly and hundreds of other worlds that had been enslaved by the Empire and then liberated by the rebels. She couldn’t believe the sheer scale of the activity taking place in orbit. If she hadn’t been conditioned to be completely loyal, she might have considered joining the rebels herself.
A dull mummer of excitement ran through the shuttle as it landed in the shuttlebay. The spy stood and joined the eager throng as they made their way out the hatch and down onto the deck, where they were met by a handful of grim-faced engineering officers. They’d all be tested, of course; there were so many people who wanted to join the rebel fleet that some of them had probably lied about their qualifications. The spy had no worries on that score. Even without her files, she had enough experience maintaining starships that she could be an engineering crewwoman without arousing suspicion. And, once her cover was secure, she could start laying her plans.
“Follow me,” one of the crewmen said. “And don’t wander off.”
The spy concealed her amusement as he led them through a long corridor and down into the engineering compartment. Her companions seemed awed by the sheer size of the superdreadnaught. But in space, there was no real reason why someone couldn’t build a starship the size of a small moon, if they were prepared to waste the resources. It was planet-side industry that suffered from odd limitations.
As she had anticipated, the test was simple, absurdly simple. A quarter of her comrades still failed, however, and were marched back to the shuttlebay. The remainder were escorted to cabins and told to settle in. There was some grumbling — the general expectation had been that they would get to grips with the Empire at once — but the spy was not surprised. Hurry up and wait was an old military saying.
She smiled, inwardly, as she lay on her bunk. This time, she told herself, it would be different. The rebels would not get lucky again.
Chapter Seven
It was four days before the underground made contact, four days of ration bars, tedious conversation and moments of fear when security forces seemed to be pounding through the corridors. Adeeba liked Frandsen, but after several months cooped up together in a tiny starship they had little left to talk about, even if they hadn’t known they were under surveillance. She spent her time reading the datapad, wishing that they’d been able to bring something less bland than government-approved files. But almost anything else would have raised eyebrows.
When the door finally opened, it was almost a relief. Three young men stepped inside, all with the look of guarded suspicion worn by almost everyone born on Earth. Adeeba shivered, remembering her own childhood, as the men motioned for them to pick up their bags and follow them out of the door. Outside, the corridors seemed packed with men and women, all wearing the same drab overalls. They also wore metallic bracelets that glittered ominously in the light.
“Take these,” their escort muttered. Adeeba glanced down at the bracelet, then put it on her wrist. It clicked into place, seemingly as immovable as a handcuff. “Then remove them as you pass through the security gate.”
There were thousands of workers making their escape, Adeeba saw, as they reached the checkpoint. The guards looked bored, uninterested, as the bracelets were scanned, then removed and dropped in the bucket. They would be recycled the following morning, Adeeba recalled, remembering how the system worked. No one could enter or leave the complex without being noted and logged by the system. She couldn’t help wondering how the underground intended to ensure that they were listed as having logged in instead of just seeming to appear from nowhere inside the complex.
But no alarms sounded as the bracelet was scanned, then unlocked. She let out a breath she hadn’t realised she’d been holding, dropped the bracelet in the bucket and then followed their escort out into the city. Earth smelled worse out here, she decided, the stench bringing back old memories. The thousands of civilian workers seemed unaware of the smell as they headed back to their homes, leaving their work behind for the day. Adeeba and Frandsen were simply lost in the crowd, two out of millions of civilians. Their escorts guided them down a long passageway and into an underpass that seemed to lead into darkness. The dank smell of human urine reached her nostrils as they stopped outside an access hatch, then stepped into a narrow passageway that seemed to be lined with electronic boxes. She jumped the first time the walls shook, then realised where they were. They were walking alongside the underground transport tube network.
They stopped outside another hatch, which opened after their escort tapped out a pattern, revealing a small dimly-lit office. Inside, two men and a woman were seated at a table, pretending to read pornographic magazines. Adeeba didn’t miss how their eyes weren’t actually following the images, but keeping an eye on the newcomers. Behind them, the hatch slammed closed. If this was a trap, she knew, they were thoroughly caught.
“You may call me Gaunt,” the woman said, putting her magazine down. It looked surprisingly tame, compared to some of the material Adeeba had seen in the Imperial Navy. “For the moment, you will deal with me — and only with me. If you have a problem with this, too bad. We don’t dare risk being betrayed.”
“We understand,” Adeeba assured her. The Empire had no shortage of ways to get information out of unwilling donors. No matter how determined someone was to refrain from talking, they could be made to talk. “We have taken similar precautions ourselves.”
“I do hope so,” Gaunt said. She stepped forward, into the light. “As you can see, we know the consequences of being betrayed.”
Adeeba studied her for a long moment. Gaunt was tall, bald and had a very nasty scar on her face. One of her eyes was covered with an eye patch, suggesting that it had been removed at some point; the other flickered around madly, watching for threats. This was not a woman to underestimate, Adeeba realised. If she had suffered so much and kept going, she would be willing to do whatever it took to get revenge. And she probably considered she had little to lose, if the shit hit the fan.