The Travels of Scout Shannon Books 1-3

Chapter 7

7

Scout had to shut her eyes against the onslaught of that light. She wondered what Warrior with her filtered vision could see. She waited for something to happen, for Warrior to move or speak or for the person down in that hole with her to do something, but she heard nothing. She buried a hand in each of the dogs’ fur, that comforting gesture grounding her inside the rover she could no longer see.

“Warrior?” she whispered when her patience at last gave out.

“Hey, friend,” Warrior said, not to her.

“Not sure you’re my friend,” someone said. The voice sounded distant in Scout’s ear, not as close as Warrior, but still clear. It was a hard voice but it had the same rich vowels of the Planet Dweller elite as Ruth spoke with.

“Well, I’m not your enemy,” Warrior said. “You’re trying to get into that door? I want to get into that door too.”

“Just looking for shelter from the storm?” the new woman asked, an edge of sarcasm to her voice.

“Exactly. So why don’t you lower your light.”

The light dropped away and Scout could finally see. The tunnel Warrior had crawled through had opened into a slightly larger space, still not big enough to fit a rover, but big enough to fit the six of them plus the two dogs plus this new woman. The walls were the same red dirt Warrior had just crawled through, and the open space was narrow but twisted in a gradual arc, widening at about shoulder level, then closing up again. A few scraggly grass roots hung down from the low ceiling, dried out and dead-looking.

But at the back of the space was a metal wall, and in the center of the wall was a door. Scout guessed this was the entrance to something hidden deeper underground, some building meant to be topside, no bigger than an outhouse, that had over the years been buried by the blowing red dirt, packed down by hard rains and baked in the sun. It brought to mind movies she had seen from Old Earth, lost civilizations rediscovered after endless centuries, only no one had been on this planet earlier than a dozen decades ago. And even if it was some long-lost structure, what was this woman doing here?

Warrior was walking toward the woman, but slowly, giving Scout lots of time to look her over. She was in a hover chair, an expensive model, all sleek curves of chrome if a bit scuffed and dirty, much like the woman. She was dressed like Ruth in a certain careless elegance, her long black hair pulled back and tied tight at her nape, the end pulled forward to drape over one shoulder. The style was reminiscent of Ebba’s, but she definitely wasn’t a Space Farer, not with that healthy glow to her rich brown skin. She would have looked like a prosperous Planet Dweller businesswoman if not for the red dirt all over her. Her hands were caked with it, a few of her carefully manicured nails broken, and she had long streaks of dirt down her front.

There was no way to ride a hover chair into this space, not even her model built like a pod that curved around the front up to her waist. She must be sitting cross-legged under the curving panel, if she had legs at all. She must have barely gotten the chair through the tunnel by sending it through empty, then programming it to make the journey on its own as she pulled herself down after it.

But how had she gotten out here in the first place?

“I can help with that,” Warrior said, nodding to the pry bar the woman had left wedged between door and doorframe before Warrior had interrupted her. The area of the door and frame around the bar had many deep scratches, as if it’d taken her many tries to find purchase. “I think I’d have more leverage.”

“I’m stronger than I look,” the woman said.

“I don’t doubt that,” Warrior said, “but you’re trying to force the locking mechanism halfway up the door. It’s a little awkward to do from your chair.”

“What’s happening?” Ottilie hissed at Scout.

“There is a door, and a woman trying to open the door, a woman in a hover chair,” Scout reported.

“A hover chair,” Ottilie repeated. “Here. Beyond the edge of civilization. In a hover chair.”

“Well, yeah,” Scout said. “She only looks a little bit younger than you. Maybe she was hurt in the war?”

“Many were,” Ebba said, “but the wounded from both sides, the badly wounded, the paralyzed, they all went up into space.”

“Maybe not all,” Scout said. “Surely it wasn’t mandatory.”

“Scout,” Warrior said, her voice only slightly showing the strain as she pushed on the pry bar.

“Yes?”

“Get the little girl in the suit first. Send her out to me. She’ll find the hole in the hill. It’s going to take a while to get this door open, and we need to get you all in faster than that.”

“Got it.” Scout pushed the glasses back on top of her head. “She wants us to come to her. She said send the girl first.”

“And then what?” Ottilie asked.

“I’ll send her back with my suit,” Warrior said, as if she could hear what they were saying. “Each of you will come, take a suit back, then come back to the hole and take your suit off for the next person. Sound like a plan?”

“Got it,” Scout said, then repeated it to the others.

Ebba and Ottilie helped Clementine into the suit, using a belt to pull up the extra fabric so she wouldn’t trip.

“Straight out from the door, you’ll find a little hill, and there’s a hole in the ground at the bottom of the hill. Climb into the hole,” Scout said.

Clementine nodded. Then Ebba and Ottilie opened the door just long enough to push her outside.

“Ruth, you’re next,” Scout said. “Then either of you two. I’ll go last.”

She was afraid they were going to ask her why, but they just nodded gravely. Perhaps they guessed. Scout hugged her dogs tighter. Now that Clementine had gone, they were both in much better spirits. Girl thumped her tail loudly against the wall of the rover, and Shadow licked at her chin.

“We should pack,” Ebba said, and Ottilie nodded. Ebba pulled two enormous bags from the same cabinet she had stored the suits in and she and Ottilie went to the kitchenette and started emptying their food stores into the two bags.

Scout dropped the glasses back down over her eyes, but there wasn’t much to see. Warrior was leaning over the pry bar, pushing with all her might. The woman in the hover chair was at the corner of her field of vision, hands clasped nervously as she watched Warrior work.

“I don’t suppose you asked where she came from?” Scout asked.

“You suppose correctly,” Warrior said. “Plenty of time for questions . . . once we’re on the other side of this door.” She had taken off the suit before starting on the pry bar, and it was lying on the ground near the woman in the hover chair. Scout could just see as Clementine emerged from the tunnel, snatched up the suit, and disappeared out of Warrior’s vision again.

“She’s coming,” she said to the others. A moment later there was a muffled knock at the door and Ebba and Ottilie pushed it open just long enough to pull her inside.

“Did you get a name anyway?” Scout asked.

Warrior made a sound somewhere between a groan and a chuckle. “So, got a name?”

“Oh, are you talking to me this time?” the woman in the hover chair asked primly.

“Yeah,” Warrior asked before leaning back into the pry bar.

“Call me Liv.”

“Pleased to meet you, Liv,” Warrior said, the last few words lost in a loud grunt as she strained at the bar.

“I’ll reserve judgment before saying the same,” Liv said.

“Suit yourself,” Warrior said.

“Ready,” Ruth said and Scout lifted the glasses to watch Ruth and Clementine disappear into the light.

“How much are we being exposed to?” Ebba asked Ottilie in a low voice.

“Does it matter?” Ottilie asked offhandedly, but then added, “A lot. Maybe too much for the little ones.”

“If the beacon is part of an original colonial shelter, they might have radiation meds.”

“Still? And would they still be any good?”

Scout tried to tune them out. They weren’t saying anything she hadn’t already been thinking, only she wasn’t so much worried about herself.

Ruth returned with Clementine’s suit and waited for Ebba to put it on. Warrior didn’t seem to be making any progress, but her strength wasn’t flagging yet either. Scout heard Ebba’s grunt as she slung one of the overloaded bags over her shoulder, then the clang as the door was shut behind her.

“Do you have any explosives in here?” Scout lifted her glasses to ask Ottilie. “Something small, like a mining charge, to blow the door?”

“I don’t think so,” Ottilie said, but then her face lit up and she turned to look at the mess around the table. There wasn’t much else to do while she waited for Ebba to return with Ruth’s suit. She was engrossed in digging through a tote when Ebba knocked, so Scout got off the bunk to push open the door.

“I just need a second,” Ottilie said, gathering what seemed like far too many bits of junk into her bag.

“Oh, I’ve got it,” Ebba said. “Get dressed, I’ll get your bag ready.”

“You know what I’m thinking?”

“Of course I do, dear,” Ebba said, the fondness clear even through the speakers in Scout’s helmet.

“I’ll be back for you next,” Ottilie said to Scout, who just gave a nod. She didn’t trust herself to speak.

Scout folded up the glasses and put them in her shirt pocket, then leaned down to gather Shadow close in her arms, sparing a hand to touch Girl’s head. It seemed to take a lot longer for Ottilie to return. Perhaps that was a kindness.

Finally, there was a knock at the door, brisk and forceful, and she pushed it open, but when the suited figure turned and removed her helmet it was Warrior standing in front of her.

“Ottilie had an idea,” Scout guessed.

“Well, I wasn’t having much luck, so I said I’d come back for you and give her a shot at opening the door.” She handed Scout the spare suit and Scout slowly began to put it on.

Then Warrior took off her own suit.

“What are you doing?”

“What does it look like?” Warrior asked.

“You can’t stay here.”

“Why would I do that? It’s not far from here to the hole. I’ll be fine. I won’t go into the specifics on that, but you can trust me. I can take it. Your dogs, on the other hand . . .”

Scout felt tears spring to her eyes but blinked them back hard. She felt compelled to point out, “Just one of them is mine. Technically.”

“Technically,” Warrior said, the corner of her mouth quirking again. “No one gets left behind, kid. But you’re going to have to help me get them inside. I don’t think they’re going to understand or enjoy what’s about to happen to them.”

“True enough,” Scout said. Girl went into the bottom of the suit amiably enough, but Shadow had no desire to be thrust inside on top of her. Scout had to stop trying to be gentle and just hold him down until everything was zipped up and sealed. Then Warrior tied the arms and legs together to make a sling that crossed her body.

“I’ll go first, since I’m going to want to run. You follow after.”

“Got it,” Scout said.

The door was opened to the noonday light once more, although the suit’s helmet instantly adjusted and Scout could see clearly. She stood transfixed for a moment. The sky above her was crisscrossed with streaks, fading away as quickly as they formed but new ones always forming everywhere. She had never seen so many. It was like the sky was made of eggshell, a rapidly shattering eggshell.

When she looked down again, she found that Warrior and the dogs had already crawled down the tunnel to the space below. How long had she been standing there, just gaping at the sky? Scout dropped down to her hands and knees to follow. When she got to the end of the tunnel she started to get to her feet. She heard a clamor of voices, but only dimly, and she realized her helmet’s external mic was off.

Still on one knee, she heard a faint boom and looked up to see a wall of sand rushing toward her. Then she was blasted backwards, hitting the packed dirt over the tunnel entrance and tumbling to the ground.