perhaps in her early twenties. “You said you knew these sewers. Can we get near a train at the exit point?”
She looked startled. “I thought you said we were going out with the garbage.”
“Argue later. But for the record, now that we’ve said that it’s exactly where they’ll look for us. Remember, they’ve got all sorts of scanners in these tunnels, too, and they’ll all be looking for us. I’ve looked at their regular locations, though, which depend on the power cables, and they’re all located above the catwalks. If we’re quiet enough, and careful enough, they won’t see us down in the muck below. They have fixed focal lengths, so anything below the catwalks is a blur. Let’s move—you lead. Morphy, you know what I’m thinking?”
She nodded. “Let’s try it.”
“Okay. Follow the leader, no talking unless I tell you. Let’s go, gang—over and into the muck.” One by one they complied, although not without some real hesitation. The stuff was really awful, thicker than I would have thought and close to waist-deep.
I couldn’t resist thinking we were in deep shit, but it was the only oddball thought I allowed myself and it was too literally true to be funny. I had deliberately returned along the route we’d taken from the cafe, on the theory that those monitoring devices might still be out of commission, but I couldn’t depend on it. This mission would be played by ear, and first we had to get to an exit point—a long, long way in the sewage.
The next several hours were nervous ones, although my hopes that the initial escape route was still blocked were borne out. Several times we stood right under squads of TMS herding Opposition members to exit points, and several more times we huddled in the stinking muck as small, very efficient armed patrols double-timed above us. We were all pretty well covered with the stuff and slipping and sliding as we moved, and it was clear we couldn’t keep this up indefinitely.
So far we’d been extremely lucky. My escape was still something of a miracle, but it simply proved that when you have even one potential wolf you don’t send sheep out to capture other sheep, even if the sheep you send are arrogant bastards. After the initial escape, we were protected by the flaw in their visual monitoring system and the very complexity of master sewage drains under a city of close to 350,000. There were probably a couple of thousand kilometers of drainage tunnels under the city, and TMS simply couldn’t cover more than a fraction of that with its personnel. They had to wait for us to make a mistake, to betray our position, so they could concentrate their forces in that area.
I was proud of all four of my companions, who held together under some of the worst conditions I could think of, not only physically but mentally, knowing that just one little mistake would betray us to these overhead monitors. The monitors, I was sure, were all staffed by real live people as well as by the computers.
Finally, I had to ask the one who was supposed to know the tunnels if she really did. Frankly, none of us could take much more of this, and, sooner or later, we would certainly be found. “How much farther to the trains?”
“At the rate we’re going, maybe an hour more,” she whispered.
I didn’t like the sound of that. “How long to any kind of exit near the city border?”
She thought a moment. “From the sector numbers at the last junction, maybe ten minutes to a drainage outlet. But there’ll be an energy barrier there.”
“I’ll chance it. We can’t take much more of this. Lead on.”
She shrugged.
What seemed like an hour later we came close to the outlet. I could hear the thing rushing like a falls, and we were now waist high in sewage, which was developing a fairly strong current. There were no catwalks in the direction of the outlet, so there would be maybe thirty meters when we’d be fully exposed. There would certainly be a visual monitor up there, if only as a final check on animal entry should the energy barriers fail.
I tried to angle myself as best I could to see what the outlet looked like, but all I could see was the sewage dropping into some sort of sludge pool below and the unmistakable light purple of an energy barrier. “I wonder if that barrier is beyond the drop,” I said aloud. “If it is, we might be able to go over the falls and then, beneath the surface, under the barrier. Do you know how much of a drop it is?”
She shook her head from side to side. “It varies. This plant is located in an old stone quarry. It might not be much of a drop but the holding pool could be fifty meters deep.”
I gave a low whistle. “Well, that washes that idea, I guess. Let’s go for the transport terminal after all.”
At that moment, from just ahead of us there came the sound of many feet running in step, which then ceased abruptly. I heard a lot of shuffling around not too far down from us and saw the glare of spotlights on the sludge below. Obviously I’d blown it—the monitors here had to be a lot better than most.
“All right! We know you’re down there!” a sharp woman’s voice called. “Come out now, one at a time, or we’ll come down and get you. And if we have to get into that slop we will not take you alive!”
I looked at my four companions. “What’ll we
I sighed. “Nothing to do, really. Can you all swim?”
They nodded, which helped.
“Then take a deep breath,, launch yourselves into this muck, and stay below it, letting the current take you over.”
Morphy looked down uncomfortably at the muck. “
“The whole way. It shouldn’t be for long. Either that or they’ll be here in a couple of minutes. We’re already so stinking this won’t make much of a difference.” I took a deep breath, let it out, took another, let a little out, and ducked under, hugging onto my two rifles for dear life.
It was a miserable experience to top all other miserable experiences, particularly since I had to keep my eyes closed. All I could tell was that I was moving, with agonizing slowness; but aside from trying to stay below the surface without knowing if in fact I was doing that, I also couldn’t be sure I was being carried with the current. I finally decided I’d hold out until I either fell, got knocked cold by the energy barrier, or had to come up for air, in which case I’d come up shooting.
It seemed as if I had been down for an eternity, when, oddly, the sludge seemed to thin and I felt less pressure to breathe. Then, suddenly, I broke the surface not from the top but in front of me, and I had to duck very quickly to pass just under the energy barrier. Then I was falling, and falling fast, still in the midst of a sludge river. I lost both rifles in the fall, which was at least twenty meters, then struck the main pool below, arms out to try and cushion what I sincerely believed would be a crippling or fatal impact.
I went into the pool effortlessly, and continued down for a bit with the momentum. I instinctively angled myself, treating the pool as common water, and arched back up again, breaking the surface.
There was no current in the pool, which was surrounded on three sides by sheer rock walls. Down at the far end was the structure of what had to be the automated treatment plant. It wasn’t much—Medusa didn’t really care what happened to the environment outside—but it operated in sunlight only, mixing the raw sewage with natural water and forcing it out into a river that led directly to the ocean. Just enough to keep the stuff from backing up and contaminating the natural water supply of the city.
The damlike structure wasn’t very high, and I headed for its sloping white concrete wall. I reached it quickly, and crawled out onto it. Gasping for breath, I decided to make for the top of the thing, which was only about seven or eight meters above on the slanted surface. I would wait there as long as I could to see if anybody else made it through, but I knew that TMS would be out here as soon as that squad leader figured out what we’d done and radioed back to headquarters.
I was halfway up before I realized that I hadn’t exactly swum that distance conventionally and even now was climbing the wall in a most unconventional manner. My arms, now a dark sludge-brown, were almost flipperlike! I realized that, somehow, I’d changed—and fast. There would be time for more self-examination later, I decided—but first I had to make the top or it was all for nothing.
I waited there nervously, but not for very long. My eyes quickly adjusted to the near darkness, and I soon saw two other shapes pop up and make for the wall, then a third.
When the first one got to the edge of the retaining pool and climbed out, I got something of a shock. It was a weird, inhuman sort of monster, all black and shiny, with an angular head, flippers, and a pair of strong, webbed hind legs. The creature began to crawl up toward me, wiggling up on its belly, and I almost recoiled in alarm until I suddenly realized that my own arms resembled those others. A second one made it and started the climb as the first one almost reached me, caught sight of me, and cried out in fear.
“Don’t worry!” I called back. “It’s just me! The Wardens changed us to live in that muck! Get up here—all of
