Levels of Injustice

Nobody can hear a scream in the vacuum of space, or so they say. However the flux of heavy bass was the only sound reverberating through the safe confines of the ship's hold. Cranking up the air flow enough for a cool breeze to buffet her face, Max stretched and rolled her shoulders, after hours of letting the autopilot navigate through dead space, it was finally time to fly this great lumbering stack, that was what they were paying her for after all, even if it was measly.

It wasn’t like it used to be, when she flew the cloud seeder that was a job to be proud of, the great silver bird in the sky. They called her the rain maker, storm bringer, back when women were allowed to fly on Earth. When they saw her rise into the haze, a long veil of chemicals atomizing behind her, everyone knew it was time to celebrate, that night they would see the stars, on a good day, sometimes even the horizon.

Like the old gods, like Thor, she would charge the sky with electricity, clouds coalescing behind her as the silver spray coated the sky, rain blanketing the thick smog into submission. By the time she worked her way back, the storm would be fully fledged with a precocious attitude, she had cut her teeth on jobs like that, too dangerous for the common pilot, not glamorous enough for the Green Hawks, she would like to see them operate their fancy ships without food supplies from the country. Yes, it was full of heavy metals but what food wasn’t these days? Unless you want to do a rain dance and pray, cloud seeding was the only way through the harsh droughts and dirty smog.

Thinking of heavy metal Max turned up the music, now wasn’t the time for re-living her glory days. Passing the outer ring of the colossal station, she knew that it would be a few hours flight before she reached the central hub, the traffic was already starting to build, little snappers whizzed deftly around the larger ships, they were paid for expediency so took chances where they probably shouldn’t, occasionally she would find evidence of one having wiped-out on the side of her ship, like a bug, too small to be picked up by the sensors, some poor soul was left floating out in space for the debris nets to scoop up.

Manoeuvring this hulking block was a different kind of challenge, you didn’t want to clip your cargo against anything, even a swipe off the whipple shields could jostle it enough for a shot load. The money wasn’t what it used to be but the hazard pay for ‘unusual freight’ bumped it up, her only caveat was no living cargo, that always got messy, but otherwise discretion was guaranteed, principles and morality were for people with money in the bank and no air tax to pay.

A glint caught her eye before a school of gleaming sun yachts cruised by, their delicate solar sails angling and fanning to best capture what little photons were available. They had their engines running of course, but owning a ship like that was about the splendour, the spectacle, one alone was worth many times more than she would ever earn. As if parting the seas, other ships shifted away, no one wanted to chance the commodities lawsuit that could leave them and their children in debt… and their children's children. The bulb buoys darted into place lighting their path, an executive fast track lane to the private hangers, from there Max was sure they would head straight to sector twelve with its luxury hotels, specially imported exotic food, and entertainment shrouded in secrecy, only the asterocracy were privy to the goings on of the upper levels.

Being close enough to the centerbore for a signal link, Max tapped in a call request, then waited for Esher to find a private spot to scramble the communication. “Max, you’re gonna have to slow your roll, hangar eight has a busted foot-pad-clamp-ding-dong, gimme an extra hour to fix that then scoot on over.”

He sounded fidgety, but that wasn’t unusual, he insisted on living in a state of constant tension. If you consider every last thing that could possibly go wrong, nothing could take you by surprise, people who had survived in this game as long as him developed a keen sense for danger, with the unfortunate side effect of seeing it everywhere. If he was ever caught, maybe part of him would be relieved, that was until they catapulted his backside into the cold vacuum of space.

Eventually she made her way to the hangers, bulb buoys flitted around, attempting to guide her down into number eight which was free as promised, she mostly ignored them, being ordered around by a bunch of glowing orbs, as if she couldn’t even dock a ship, felt demeaning. Her landing gear aligned perfectly with the clamps and the ship was secured while the bay doors trundled shut, the stars winked out and were replaced by harsh spot lighting.

Esher milled around below, even this high up she could tell it was him, gesticulating madly at the other hangar monkeys, you could practically hear him, “Get me that doodad! No not that, the other one, if you bring me back the wrong one I’ll beat you with it.”

Ruling over this section of the core Esher was the most highly trained and skilled worker giving him the run of the place, most superiors tolerated his attitude, by all rights he should be their boss and they knew it. Max must be the only person he was actually nice to.

After changing into the enviro-suit and checking life support, she opened the hatch, grabbing onto the frame and launching herself downwards, floating gently before hitting the floor where the electromagnets held her in place.

There was a special type of walk you had to affect to stop yourself from accidentally pinging off the ground, forcing someone to wrangle you, she had never gotten very good at it, feeling more comfortable in the ship. The hanger monkeys on the other hand magnetised themselves to every surface available, using their anchor reels to lasso onto rails that were fitted throughout the bay. Max loved to watch them zip around, the spool of wire attached to their back spinning as they shot it out ahead of them, clamping onto the target and reeling them in.

The way they flew through the air brought back an early memory of a circus, her parents had still been around and her sister was just a toddler, wriggling as Max held her up to see the beautiful trapeze artists, bright eyes wide as she clapped her podgy little hands. She would be fourteen in two weeks.

“Mouse!” Esher bellowed through the comms as he sailed towards her, his rough face beaming from behind the suit, he needed a shave.

“I told you not to call me that in front of everyone”

“Private feed” he said, waving dismissively “how's the cargo?”

“No slippage, it should all pass inspection”

“And the rest?” he said looking at her pointedly, even with private comms Esher was discreet, the Transport Inspection Authority had been upping checks recently, on this side anyway, TIA wouldn’t dare investigate the wealthy elites, even if it was them who fuelled the many smuggling rings across the stations.

“Everything’s okay, I need a quick unload tonight though.” Said Max grabbing his shoulder to keep him in place.

This gave Esher pause but he nodded. A fast turnaround brought its own risks but he knew Max wouldn’t ask if she had any other choice. “That we can do, sure sure. Now onto more important matters, I’ve found you the perfect boy, just transferred over from Cartar Station.”

This was not what she wanted to hear “He’s a payload specialist, he’s nice! Stop looking at me like that mouse, you should give someone a chance, everyone I send, too tall, too short, talks too much, eyes are close together, ai ya so picky! You have to carve out a little bit of life for yourself, have someone to share it with, or one day you will be a grizzled old man who is miserable and alone, and nobody loves you ‘cause you’re too ugly.”

Giving him an incredulous look she said, “You love being a grizzled old man, and you keep frightening away your neighbours by testing… food explosives?”

“It was a new way to can beans!” he said defensively

“It killed Mrs Atkinson's cat! She paid a lot for that cat, it was fourth generation, self warming.”

He at least had the good grace to look guilty. A retirement complex clearly wasn’t the place for Esher, but being over sixty he was automatically relocated and has since been terrorising his neighbours with the latest ingenious mechanical wonder.

“This isn’t about me”, he huffed.

Sighing Max turned to him “You know I don’t have the time.”

Turning sober, the lines around his eyes became more pronounced, “I know it's hard to let go, but this is getting too dangerous.”

“I’ll decide what's too dangerous, I have to go, I can’t hang around here all day chatting to old men,” as she clomped towards the elevators Esher called, “You have a date tomorrow, he will pick you up at nine, his name’s Bradly, he’s nice!”

That was the last thing she needed, and the overuse of the word ‘nice’ was already a concern.

Putting the inevitably doomed romantic encounter to the back of her mind, she entered the airlock. Changing out of her suit she handed it over to the security team before being scanned. All enviro-suits were carefully tracked and stored with the authorities until you had permission to go off-station. Having your own oxygen was for authorised personnel only, which made getting caught with one offsite a punishable offence.

The long queue meandered through the hard matter scanner, then the organic biological one, then finally the electromagnet and nanotech scanner inspected her for any foreign chips and electroware she could have had installed or injected since leaving. Plaiting her fair hair out of her face to stop it from floating around, she noticed it had gotten long again.

Just behind her the scanner shrieked, three security officers were surrounding a small woman, her dark eyes wide with fear, she began gesturing, speaking fast in one of the Latin pidgin tongues you hear on Carter while all three ignored her. Stiff in their grey uniforms they were reading the scanners, the austere looking woman with tightly drawn back hair turned to face her. “The EN scanner is showing unauthorised nanoparticles in your body, under the Foreign Component Restriction Act we cannot let you enter this station or any other station under governmental rule, you have twenty cycles to vacate the airspace or charges will be brought against you.”

Until this was resolved, the door to the elevators remained closed. The stricken looking woman waved her communicator at them, the young man on the screen pleaded. “She has a rare illness, the government doesn't offer treatment for it, we didn’t have any option!”

“Nanomedicine is still illegal under section eight of the inter-station safety act regarding protection against electroviruses, unregulated distribution of aid, and free movement across sectors. You can file an appeal which can take ten to twelve months. Currently Mrs Alaniz will not be able to enter the station and failure to leave within twenty cycles will result in charges.”

Nanotechnological treatments for illnesses were increasing, but had high installation costs with monthly charges, and that's if they had a treatment for your specific illness. Tailor made or ‘personalised medicines’ were far beyond the pedestrian life of a low leveller, you might find treatments for more unusual illnesses, but unless they were supplied by one of the main stations you could forget about coming back.

Finally the hawkish security officer escorted the woman through to Discharge and the others went about their business. Esher would take care of the cargo allowing Max to move freely until it was time for the next step. The elevator doors opened and she strapped herself to the back wall with the other passengers, everyone took their equilibrium pill and they began to move backwards. The spinning started slowly, the feeling of being pressed back against the wall increasing as the elevator edged its way along the track towards the outer ring, the pressure became more intense for a while before easing off as the effect of false gravity caused by the centrifugal force came into effect, they were still spinning incredibly fast, but now that speed was used to pin them to the outer wall of the wheel shaped station. Max felt her stomach lurch as the elevator came to a stop, the wall she had been strapped to had now become the floor and a separate door to the left opened allowing them to exit. Unstrapping herself she rose and exited into the bustle of section one.

The smell was always the first thing to hit you when you exited the elevators, extraction was badly maintained and always on the fritz, so the wet heat brought the scent of people, ozone, sweat, along with heavy spices from the street vendors. Scrunching her nose against the cacophony of smells, Max spotted the large glowing timer for The Loop counting down the cycles until the passenger carriage would arrive. With a bit of time left she decided to take a stroll to stretch her legs.

She had adapted to living here, but the feeling of never really harmonising with the station always hit hardest after being back from a long run, maybe it was the windowless claustrophobia, living pods all reached their maximum two stories in height before being cut off by the floor above, squat and ramshackle. People would build out from their cube, adding verandas, porches, washing lines, though everyone was assigned the same set area, so they canopied the maze of alleyways in the packed hutong.

Section One was always brimming, with exceptionally compact living cubes it was the cheapest area on the ring. Squeezing past a group of excited children she ducked into Market Alley, most people bypassed section one and got straight on The Loop. Not minding the clamour, Max negotiated the narrow side streets.

“Pretty lady, pretty watch!” A useless status symbol, made badly.

“Real apples, fresh apples, pickled fresh.” The jar of unappetizing pickled things may never have been apples.

“Smile bots, clean your teeth while you sleep!” Those little things really do get in all the nooks and crannies, she just couldn’t shake the memory of Jimmy Hawthorn telling her that occasionally they go rogue, crawl down your throat and try to clean your insides. That had given her nightmares for weeks.

Settling for a sweet ultra-bar she approached The Loop, tall two story carriages swished past her as she checked the next stop. Attached to rails on the roof and floor, the monster train ran through the entire station at once, no start or end, just a huge ring, a colossal metal ouroboros slithering past.

The next stop was the shiny gold and red post carriage. People deposited their packages in the slots and paid with their passes. Vendors spent most of their lives on The Loop, it provided for the whole station, food carriages served up hot meals straight to the platform, hop on the medical carriage for pharmaceutical or emergency help, provided your insurance was valid, or you could ride the pedestrian ones to get around. She had once spent a few cycles riding the whole line, seeing the lower districts pass by, they all looked pretty similar after section four, but people seemed obsessed with the paltry increase in space, as if it would allow them to get closer to the upper levels. She had never seen how the upper class lived, and why everyone seemed obsessed with it was beyond her, they would chase after any tidbit of gossip in the vain hope of getting a glimpse into a life they will never have, depressing.

The journey felt brief, her head filled with plans for the night. After stopping at her pod, gathering the necessities, she headed over to Eshers well before curfew hit. Greeting Mrs Atkinson sheepishly she desperately pressed her pass against the locks, letting herself in before she was subjected to any questions about Esher’s strange habits or ingenious machines. His work for the government secured him a luxury retirement pod with two rooms and a separate bathroom, it was pretty cushy, at least it would have been if he would stop cluttering it all up with mechanical detritus, it smelt like sulphur today, that was new.

“I’m here," she said "what are you up to?”

Esher’s bespectacled face darted towards her, he was soldering on the table again, its burnt and scarred surface told of mistreatment, but there seemed to be a few new flasks of something foul smelling.

“Mouse! Don’t mind the mess it's all coming together, let me make you a drink,” he reached for one of the mugs on the table before Max grabbed it, “I’ll do it” she said and began to scrub the mug in the sink as if it had contained poison, there was still a slim possibility that it did.

“All I need to do now is crank up the ionic charge, install the new spud knuckles and I’ll be halfway to milkshake town. Are you ready for your date tomorrow?” Esher said, shimmying his shoulders up and down, smiling devilishly.

“Are you ready for tonight?” She parried.

“Oh you’re no fun, Spitta says he’ll meet you in the usual place at nine, payment upfront but only with documents proving authentication.”

With that, his wheelchair sprang into life and headed for the safe, he had made the chair himself, claiming the one he was issued was ‘an insult to the gods of mechanism which should be smashed, set on fire, then smashed again.’

As he handed her a backpack, the half cycle alarm blared, warning all residence curfew was approaching. Max opened the bag to inspect its contents, twenty vials of Vittel T in its purest form, it was incredibly difficult to obtain and harder to get past security, this small bag could be the answer to all her problems.

“You be careful out there, something strange is going on, people are getting cautious, the rats always know when the ship is going down,” Esher said, removing another bag.

“Why would you let rats on the ship? The sensors would pick them up immediately.”

This made Esher ponder, “I don’t know, it’s an old proverb” He said, handing her the duffel bag. “Maybe like canaries for mines? They’ll act funny when shit's about to happen. My rats are acting real funny Max”.

“I’ll be extra cautious, I promise.”

Pulling the enviro-suit out she scrutinised it, running oxygen checks, pressure checks, examining the lining, this suit was over twenty years old after all, it wasn’t like the modern ones, but this was all she needed. Esher was reluctant to lend it to her at first, he had been tasked to care for the sisters after all, but he knew Max would find a way out with or without him. His concern wasn’t unwarranted, being caught with the suit alone could send her down mines so deep there would be no use for canaries, when shit went down you went down with it.

The final alarm sounded, five minutes to go. She could hear the electric landladies begin their patrol. Strapping on the bag and night vision visor, she fastened the suit. Esher fussed at the straps and dials, triple checking everything.

The final warning blared, followed by the automatic door locks, every pod in succession, clunk, clunk, clunk. In the suit her breath sounded harsh, it couldn’t be nerves, she had done this before, Esher’s tense energy was catching.

Plugging in the lock breaker, an alarm blipped for a fraction of a second before being shorted, Esher's work was impeccable as always, the first door to the airlock opened and Max stepped in, he patted her leg and shut the door. In the confined space between she waited, scanning the other side for movement, a long minute passed before she dared to open the next one and peek out.

Absolute airless silence, after raising the air tax year on year until it was exorbitant, almost unlivable, the government had gradually brought in ‘quiet nights’ people would stay in their pods while the air was switched off, this had worked, for a time the bills became manageable, it reduced homelessness to zero, people couldn’t stay out drinking, litter sweepers would scour the streets and by dawn everything looked cleaner, purer.

It wasn’t long before quiet nights were every week, then a few nights a week, there really is no better way to combat protests than to make sure when people weren’t working or getting necessities, they were forced to stay at home. By the time they finally took the last nights from the people, many were advocating for it.

She darted lightly through the main thoroughfare, this was the most exposed part of the route, but also the fastest. Her night vision visor gave everything an eerie green glow, she stopped dead listening keenly. No movement, silence, then she heard it again, the staccato clacking of the electric landlady, this time closer. Ducking into one of the alleys, Max headed for the nearest hideaway, Esher had taught her every possible way to pass through the station covertly, but the identical pods were hard to navigate. Rushing past number fifty six, fifty seven, there! She reached the electrical hatch just as the rattling started up again, much closer this time, it was down this passage with her, just around the corner, she had made a mistake.

Desperately pulling at a pocket within the enviro-suit she retrieved Esher’s engineering screwdriver, plugging it into the lock a light appeared, it was red, the lock failed to open, old tech was temperamental at the best of times, this was not the best of times. To her left the noise stopped, had she been found? If the machine caught her on its sensors even once the alarm would be raised and she would be surrounded. There was no time to look, shoving the screwdriver in the lock once more, she made a last desperate attempt to avoid fleeing on foot, a green light, followed by the harsh scrape of the metal machine.

Ducking into the tiny space beside the generator she shut the door gently. The light winked out just as the landlady rounded the corner, rolling past a crack in the door she could see it, shiny chrome limbs tucked into its body like a dead cockroach, occasionally extending one spindly arm to scan a door or check a lock, they would patrol the whole station, informing the sweepers of any debris, human or otherwise, raising the alarm if anyone was found out after curfew.

Left perched uncomfortably waiting, she checked the time, only half a cycle to get there. Esher’s old tools had saved her on more than one occasion, he had kept the suit and his box of equipment after the accident, claiming it had been destroyed when the jet engine exploded. He didn’t know why he had lied at the time, being a triple stripe engineer for the Greenhawks with over twenty years on the job, an accident on site would engender him a full military payout, have him set up for the rest of his life, at least that was what he was assured.

After eight years fighting the very service he had dedicated his life to, the lawsuits, the governmental intervention, draining his savings, taking his house. Finally he had decided to give up and take whatever job he could get with his disability. That was when he had met her father, seeing past the broken shell to a fierce mind turned bitter with anger, he gave Esher an outlet, in her opinion his natural talent for subterfuge and illicit invention would be wasted anywhere else. She had been told that story many times, Esher had claimed to owe her father his life, she didn’t know what he spent all his money on, but it seemed enough that he lived as a thorn in the side of the beast that had bested him.

All was quiet outside so she made her move, briskly but silently she hurried to the next safe point, this one was a hatch in the floor leading to the maintenance tunnels, the screwdriver worked first time, the little shit.

She slipped into the small passageway, laying her back onto one of the trolleys which the pipers used to quickly dart up and down tunnels so narrow she couldn’t stretch her arms out fully. Kicking off, the trolley rolled silently down the track, good, tonight was not the night for squeaky wheels. Max was sweating by the time she reached the stop, clearly air conditioning was not counted as a necessity when this suit was made. Unlocking the hatch above she removed a probe camera, threading its flexible neck through the small gap she examined the surroundings, all was quiet, now for the last stretch.

Counting up the rows, she hurried down to pod number four two five, pressing the buzzer she was let into the airlock. The air pressure regulated and she unfastened the suit's helmet. A small hatch opened in the second door.

“Password?” Said the man attached to the pair of beady little eyes, squinting at her.

“You know who I am stop mucking about Darrel”

“I am head of security, I could turn you away for this kind of insolence”

“You’re a doorman with delusions of grandeur, let me in I have a customer waiting”

Darrel made unsatisfied noises but let her in anyway.

“The password is giraffe,” he said, sounding miffed.

“Nobody even knows what that means Darrel,” she replied before climbing down the ladder.

This innocent looking pod happened to be built directly above one of the stations main power nodes, these substations had security outside which would have made the place impenetrable, if the engineers hadn’t built a hidden tunnel directly into it from the house above. Most nights this became Fernando’s, one of the best and only speakeasies on the station. If you were willing to risk your neck for a drink, or wanted the privacy only an illegal underground establishment could offer, Fernando’s was your refuge.

Esher was right, the place was quiet, though she was relieved to see Spitta at the bar.

"You’re late" he scowled. He was ugly before the enhancements but since getting his creepy new eye installed it was definitely not an improvement, it would roam sometimes of its own accord, she didn’t know what special features it had and wasn’t going to ask, just in case he told her it could see through clothes or some other disgusting thing.

“Relax, I have it. Here, documentation stamped and authenticated.”

“No can do Maxidoodle, the influence has pulled out, he says the checks are too tight right now”

“That's an influences job, it's the whole point of them! Just get another, this is high quality stuff I can’t go carting it around” she ordered a drink, she was going to need it if Spitta was feeling difficult.

“You’re not listening to my telling sweetheart, it’s that across the board, nothin’ moving nowhere,” Said Spitta adamantly.

“This can’t wait, I need the money, it’s urgent”

“Listen Max, I like you, you a good people, we make credits, but unless you have a way of getting that T to those classy folk up there, we have to just wait ‘till this is all over”

She downed her drink, ears ringing, this couldn’t be happening. Without this money she couldn’t pay the investigator, finally they had gotten wind of her sister, if she let this slip through her fingers and Andra was never heard of again... it simply couldn’t happen. This payment would be enough for her own personal ship, enough to go after them herself, enough to bribe, threaten and buy her way to the only remaining family she had left.

“What if I did it?” Before she even knew what she was saying it was all tumbling out of her mouth.

Spitta squinted “You’re a fine chick, good looking and all but you ain't no upper level lady. I might have the access to get you up there but influences train for a long time to pull that crap off, you need to dress right, act right, or you’re dead.”

“I just need to last long enough to pass the merch off, I’m not infiltrating a god damn luncheon club! I’ll handle the outfit, you just arrange the meet.”

“You must be damn crazy to think you can pull this off.” He said doubtfully

“I have to. Make it happen or I’ll see that half your contacts burn you for good.” She didn’t really have this power but Spitta understood she could make his life difficult with what she knew.

“When this all comes crashin’ down don’t you dare bring my name into this, I’ll get you the damn meet but the rest is down to you”

Everything hinged on pulling this off, she would make it work, whatever it took to get her sister back.