He looked around as if to check no one was watching, then began to groom himself uneasily with his tongue.
Seventeen
Trudging off into a swamp in the middle of the night had seemed like a good idea at the time but, like most of Frey’s ideas, the reality fell short of the concept. A few kloms from the base to the Awakeners’ hidden compound didn’t sound like much, but Frey hadn’t accounted for the terrain. After a couple of hours of ploughing through sucking mud and reeds, he was ready to admit they should have abandoned stealth and gone for a good old full frontal assault instead.
It didn’t help that he was a tiny bit lost. Trinica’s directions had been vague at best, and he was beginning to worry that they’d missed the base amid the dense foliage. He’d sent Jez to get some bearings, and she’d sprung off into the dark like a wild animal loosed from its leash. It worked out for all concerned. She moved faster without them, and the group felt better when she wasn’t around.
It was hard to see anything, even with the moon up. A white mist lurked in the hollows and lay on the water, curling between the twisted roots of the mangroves. In the dark, things slithered and moved, some of them unpleasantly large. Insects hammered the hot air with percussive taps and whistles that ranged from mildly annoying to painfully loud.
Malvery in particular was being driven to distraction. His hangover had rallied with the din, and he looked ready to murder somebody. ‘Think we’ve got enough bullets to shut up every bloody living thing in the delta?’ he asked hopefully.
‘I’m up for trying,’ said Pinn, who was equally unimpressed with their situation.
‘Come on, you two, where’s your spirit of adventure?’ Ashua said. ‘Get a lungful of that swamp air! Ooo, I think that was an alligator!’
Pinn and Malvery had been griping ever since they set off, only pausing when one or the other of them tripped and splashed into the brackish water. Ashua, on the other hand, seemed to be rather enjoying her field trip. Frey knew she’d spent most of her life in cities, but the way she talked you’d think she’d never seen a tree before.
Silo was uncomplaining, as ever. Frey was glad to have him by his side. The Murthian’s solid presence helped to anchor him somehow. That was a man he always knew he could count on.
Pelaru followed along silently behind, picking his way through the hot soggy undergrowth. Frey kept a suspicious eye on him. What was his angle? Whispermongers were famous for their neutrality, but Frey couldn’t help feeling the elegant Thacian had some agenda here. The sooner that man was off the Ketty Jay, the better, but there hadn’t been a safe place to offload him yet, and Frey certainly wasn’t going to leave him unsupervised while they were busy playing double agents in the heart of Awakener territory.
Annoyingly, Pelaru was the only one of them still clean. Frey and the others were sweaty, grimy and tired, but he’d somehow escaped with only mud spatters on his boots, and he wasn’t even out of breath.
Thacians. Even in a swamp they’re so rotting superior.
‘Cap’n,’ said Jez by his ear. He jumped and clutched at his heart.
‘Don’t do that,’ he gasped.
‘Sorry, Cap’n,’ she said, but her voice was flat and she wasn’t sorry at all. She looked through him with those shining wolf eyes of hers. ‘I found it.’
Relief soothed Frey’s unease at being so close to her. ‘Nice work, Jez,’ he said. ‘Lead on.’
They spotted the lights of the compound soon after, hazed by mist in the distance. It was surrounded by a perimeter wall, surmounted by electric floods that illuminated the dank swampland all around. Once they got near, they cut across in the direction of the main gate and found a dirt road leading back towards the base. Silo picked out a likely hiding spot which overlooked the road and the gate, and there they settled in amid the mud and roots and scuttling things.
Frey eyed the defences uncertainly. The gate stood open, but it was heavily guarded. The wall was metal, discoloured by the wet air and patched with lichen. This compound had been constructed with care and attention, not at all like the ramshackle hotchpotch of dwellings in the main part of the base. There was no way they’d cobbled it together since the war kicked off. That meant the Awakeners had been up to something in the Barabac Delta long before anyone realised there was a base here at all.
‘Strikes me, Cap’n,’ said Malvery, adjusting his glasses. ‘Strikes me we might just’ve taken this road all the way from the base instead of arsing about in stinking bogs and whatnot.’
‘Wouldn’t have worked,’ said Ashua. ‘I asked about while I was off procuring a few bits.’ She slapped the pack on Silo’s back, one of three that were stuffed with items which Ashua had stolen from the camp, and which Frey dearly hoped they wouldn’t need. ‘They’ve got guards all up and down this stretch.’
‘Besides,’ Frey put in. ‘I reckoned you and Pinn could do with working off a kilo or two.’
‘Oi!’ said Pinn, patting his belly. ‘This is prime steak, you twat!’
‘Good of you to be thinking of our health, Cap’n,’ said Malvery.
‘I’m considerate like that.’
Everyone felt better now they had the compound in sight. Even Malvery’s grumbles were light-hearted. The doc was glad to be doing something to ease his conscience, striking a blow for the Coalition. Frey enjoyed seeing him a bit more upbeat. He’d been in a downer ever since the civil war began, and Crake’s departure hardly helped matters.
Crake, you’d better be alright, you idiot.
Thoughts of Crake reminded him of his earcuff. He hadn’t been wearing it in the swamp. He found voices in his ear distracting, and he was only capable of concentrating on one thing at a time. Now he took it out, clipped it on and listened.
At first there was nothing. He began to worry. What if Trinica had found the earcuff in her pocket? What if she’d changed clothes? But then he heard a muffled voice. He frowned and focused on the sound over the racket of the swamp. Soon he could make out words.
‘. . arriving at the compound soon, eminent captains.’ It was an oily voice that he didn’t recognise. Some random fundamentalist nut-bag, no doubt. ‘I beg of you your complete discretion in the matter of the things we are about to show you.’
Frey let a little smile touch his lips. Oh, she could be discreet if she wanted. But he’d find out all the same.
Trinica was going to kill him when she eventually discovered the trinket in her pocket. That, or she’d laugh and tell him how clever he was. It depended on the day, really; he’d take his chances. But her talk of the growing threat from her crew had disturbed him deeply, and he wanted to keep track of her. He wouldn’t let her get away again.
She’d be hurt that he didn’t trust her, perhaps. But he was smitten, not stupid.
‘They’re on their way,’ he told the others.
Shortly afterward, two vehicles came rumbling up the track, each rolling along on six huge wheels. A pair of Renford Overlanders, armoured all-terrain transport vehicles. Frey had only seen a few before; flying was almost always preferable to land travel in a country as vast and varied as Vardia. But Ashua had told them there was a no-fly zone overhead, and a ring of anti-aircraft cannon ready to enforce it. Obviously the Awakeners didn’t even want to risk shuttle traffic here.
Definitely up to something, Frey thought to himself. Something big.
‘She in one of those Overlanders, Cap’n?’ Ashua asked.
Frey nodded.
‘You’ve really got a thing for her, haven’t you?’ she said.