Sheppard had expected it to be a lot harder to get down to the lower levels than it actually was; in fact, there were several poorly-guarded funicular railways leading into the wide city sprawl, and it had been relatively easy for Dex and the colonel to sneak aboard a carriage full of soiled laundry on its way downward. Ronon noted that the defenses on the outer walls of the palace were more geared toward keeping people from getting in, than they were for keeping people getting out. The return trip would be a tougher prospect, but for now Sheppard wasn't thinking about that. He pulled the brown robes closer as a gust of cold wind fluttered past them. The two servants they'd encouraged to lend them the garments were currently guests of Mason and his men, and would remain so until this little covert operation was dealt with. John patted the Beretta pistol concealed in his hip holster in an unconscious gesture of self-protection. To Ronon's displeasure, he had insisted they go lightly armed, and Sheppard had made doubly sure that both of them were carrying the paper dockets Erony had provided on the monorail, just in case things went south and they had to reveal themselves to someone in authority. He hoped it wouldn't come to that, though.
They kept walking, leaving the district where they had disembarked behind, moving on the edges of crowds, keeping to the shadows. Sputtering gas lamps with oily flames were popping on all along the streets, and now and then raucous hooters sounded as heavy steam trucks growled past over the cobbled road.
The lower city was busy with people moving back and forth, and it had the cold and impersonal edge that John remembered from some urban centers back on Earth. It was similar enough to make him uncomfortable, different enough to make him realize how far from home he was. The city was a mixture of shantytown barrios, red stone buildings and archaic industrial constructions that were better suited as the backdrop to a lurid, turn-of-thecentury Jack the Ripper movie than a modern metropolis.
Ronon looked up as a wide blimp droned overhead, low enough that they could see the shapes of men moving around inside the control gondola. "Bigger than Daus's warship," noted the Satedan, "slower too. Cargo carrier, maybe?"
"Could be." John's gaze shifted as they passed an alleyway. He caught sight of a huddled group of figures, sheltering in doorways or under old, torn awnings. They were dirty and hollow-faced, eyes blank. He caught the scent of sickness from them.
Another truck rolled past in the direction of the funicular railway station, laden with tones of oval, greenish fruits. Sheppard had seen the same things on the dinner plates of noblemen in the palace. "Food for the Dynast," Dex opined. "Daus likes to live big."
Sheppard jerked a thumb at the vagrants in the alley. "They don't live so big down here."
Ronon nodded. "Ghettos are ghettos, no matter where you go.
"Yeah." The two men kept in the flow of people, and ahead of them the crowds grew thicker as the radial streets fed out into a wide-open plaza, walled on all sides by more sheer-faced tenements. Many of the buildings were covered with scaffolds or giant billboards dominated by artwork of Halcyon soldiers or portraits of a smiling Lord Daus. Sheppard's lip curled at one particular image, which showed the Magnate rendered in heroic proportions, dispatching a horde of demonic Wraith. He didn't need McKay to read the accompanying banners for him; he knew propaganda when he saw it.
"Look there." Dex tapped him on the shoulder and pointed. Across the plaza, past the thronging crowds, one billboard-sized panel shifted and stuttered as black-and-white images rolled over it. Immediately, John realized they were looking at a massive film screen being fed from a concealed projector. Whoops and cheers went up across the people in a wave of noise as crackly organ music played from speaker horns arranged on towers dotted across the square. A broad regimental crest appeared on the screen and martial music blared. The image changed to scenes of battle, men with steam-rifles rushing over trenches, rolling tanks, biplanes and blimps.
"It's a newsreel," said Sheppard. "Hey, maybe we'll get a cartoon as well."
"Halcyon on the March!" A cultured voice brayed from the speakers. "In battle against the Wraith, our brave soldiers lead the fight!" More cheers greeted footage of Fourth Dynast troopers milling around a downed Dart on an arid sand dune, and then a slow pan over a dozen dead Wraiths piled like cordwood. "Halcyon's supremacy remains unassailed! Forward to victory, says the Lord Magnate, and forward to glory!"
Sheppard watched as footage unfurled of Daus, heavy with his regalia, advancing down the steps of the High Palace with Vekken and his other adjutants behind. The camera lingered for a second on Erony, who forced a smile for the lens. A few young men standing close by made lecherous catcalls and whistled.
"She's popular," noted Ronon.
Daus's voice boomed from the speakers, a speech made up of platitudes and belligerent rhetoric; but Sheppard wasn't paying attention. He was watching a gangly youth with a red headband shouting to be heard over the sounds of the speakers. The agitator was thrusting pamphlets into the hands of anyone who looked his way. The colonel caught the odd word here and there, something about "Magnate", "unfair", "traitor". When Daus's face filled the screen again, the youth booed and spat. As Sheppard looked, he saw a few other figures with the headbands dotted amongst the crowd, reds moving in the tide of gray.
John thought about Dex's comment. "Guess we can't say the same for her dad, though."
The tone of the newsreel changed; the propagandist opening segued to something that reminded Sheppard of Sunday night NFL score round-ups on ESPN. The narrator was calling out kill tallies and battle reports. Blocky strings of text marched up across the bottom of the screen in a teletype.
A bearded, middle-aged man in a leather jerkin next to John patted his pockets frantically and cursed. He turned to Sheppard and thrust the bag in his hand at him. "Here, be a gentleman and hold on to this for me a trice, would you? I can't find me slip!"
"Uh, okay." John took the bag. It was full of ugly-looking vegetables, dark red like sweet potatoes. They smelled a little off and his nose wrinkled.
The man produced a piece of paper from a pocket and held it up, comparing the numbers on it to those on the screen. Sheppard saw other people doing the same. The man's face twisted in annoyance. "Ah, for wound's sake!" He tore the slip into confetti and brushed it from his hands. "Never the score, hey? Never the blade-forsaken score for old Rifko!"
The colonel had seen enough horse races to recognize the face of a losing bettor when he saw one. "Bad luck?"
"Bad? Bad? Ah, laddie, it's been a dozen cycles since I've had a win, if it's a day. I'm in for a change of fate, I know it, but when it will strike me, that's unknown." He blew out a breath and sighed. "Ah well. There's always a war tomorrow."
"Yeah…" Sheppard noted. "So you bet on the outcome of the skirmishes, then?" He handed back the bag.
The man gave him an odd look. "Well, don't everyone?" He studied Sheppard and Dex. "Ah, but you're from the country, are you? I seen the way you looked about, like your necks are on a swivel. Don't get the tickers out there in the fields, right?" He gestured at the film screen.
"That's right," nodded John. "We're both from out of town."
The other man smirked and spread his hands. "Well, then. Welcome to the capital, lads. Don't let the tall buildings scare you!"
"We'll try not to," said Ronon.
"I'm Rifko Tenk," he said, "a kitesmith."
"He's Ronon Dex, I'm John Sheppard."
Rifko laughed. "John the Shepherd, you say? Sorry to tell you, you won't get much work hereabouts! No herd beasts in these neighborhoods! Men would eat them soon as look at them!"