Allies

by Fred Warren - 

The corridors reeked of smoke and pesticide as they neared the marketplace. Smith and Kate paused to soak kerchiefs at a water tap and wrapped them around their faces to block the noxious vapor.

They found Charlie’s undelivered parcel—and the horrors writhing feebly within it.

Kate wiped her fingers convulsively on her skirts. “Augh. Fertilized spider eggs, much too close to hatching. What manner of fools has Beadle taken up with?”

Smith crushed the parcel under his boot heel. It made a sickening wet crunch. “Fools or lunatics. Maybe the Peacekeepers are trying out a new weapon they couldn’t test openly.”

“You think they’d turn these things against the very people they’re sworn to protect?”

“I don’t know anything anymore, Kate. The world’s turned upside-down and sideways. Nothing’s impossible.”

They entered the marketplace and found it empty of customers, merchants, and wares. Most of the stalls were overturned and broken. Spiders skittered here and there, and Smith dispatched the few that seemed aggressive. What the pesticide hadn’t killed, it pacified.

Their search revealed nothing. No children hidden beneath the wreckage, no trail, no evidence they’d ever been there. Smith slumped against a wall and slid down until he was sitting on the floor, head bowed on his knees. It was as if someone had drained all the air from his body.

Kate knelt down and stroked his cheek. “Don’t give up hope. Moving a dozen orphans is no easy feat, whether or not they’re cooperating.”

“Or dead.”

Her gentle caress flashed into a stinging slap. “If that word passes your lips again, it’ll be you in need of a proper burial. Think, man. Which route out of here would Beadle and his henchmen take?”

Smith scowled and rubbed his jaw. “It’s pointless.”

“Humor me.”

He stood up and scanned the market bay, pausing a moment to consider each exit. “The service corridor,” he said at last. “Over there. Nobody but suppliers uses it…and us, now and again.”

“Sounds like a good place to begin. Lead on.”

They’d only walked a few dozen paces before they found a skid loaded with motionless children, and two burly men in Enforcer uniforms sprawled on the floor nearby.

Kate sprinted to the skid and began pressing on necks and wrists for warmth and pulse, bending down in search of a soft whisper of air against her cheek. She smiled and waved at Smith. “They’re all here! All breathing, all safe! Let’s get them back to the nest.”

He just stood there, staring at her, eyes blank.

She trotted back to him, grabbed him by the shoulders, and shook him. “Aren’t you happy? It’s a miracle they weren’t lost to us forever!”

He pushed her away—gently, but firmly. “I’m angry, Kate. Angry at myself for thinking I could trust Beadle. Angry for letting the sight of a Peacekeeper uniform terrify me into witlessness.”

“You meant well. Don’t torture yourself. God’s mercy provides for those whose hearts are true. They’re safe. Be content with that.”

“God’s mercy indeed, despite thinking myself too clever by half. Things have to change. It’s not enough anymore to keep to ourselves, pretending that no one will notice, or that we’ll be able to dodge anybody who does. We can’t defend ourselves. We need help. We need allies.”

She wasn’t in a mood to argue. “First, we need to get these wee ones onto their feet and back home. Pull them out of this meat wagon, and I’ll find some water to help rouse them.”

Smith nodded and began hoisting the children from the skid and propping them against the wall of the corridor. A few were already beginning to stir and moan.

Kate knelt down to examine one of the prone Enforcers. It was odd…there wasn’t a mark on him. No bloodstains, no sign of a scuffle.

Then she saw it, and she checked the other corpse to be sure. A single, perfectly round hole was drilled into each forehead, about the diameter of a piece of stout packaging cord, the flesh at its edge neatly cauterized.

A soft whirring sound came from above.

Kate froze. Moving only her eyes, she surveyed the corridor’s ceiling as gooseflesh prickled along her forearms. Nothing was there.

So, it’s allies he wants? Seems he has one already.

And there were some allies it might be better to do without.

Options

by Fred Warren -

The corridor light was dim, but still bright enough for reading. Whatever soulless computer or bureaucrat controlled the day/night cycle in Avenir’s lower levels would soon throttle it down to a barely perceptible glow. Smith turned a page in his tattered copy of Oliver Twist and squinted at the tiny print.

‘Hush!’ said the girl, stooping over him, and pointing to the door as she looked cautiously round. ‘You can’t help yourself. I have tried hard for you, but all to no purpose. You are hedged round and round. If ever you are to get loose from here, this is not the time.’

Struck by the energy of her manner, Oliver looked up in her face with great surprise. She seemed to speak the truth; her countenance was white and agitated; and she trembled with very earnestness.

‘I have saved you from being ill-used once, and I will again, and I do now,’ continued the girl aloud; ‘for those who would have fetched you, if I had not, would have been far more rough than me. I have promised for your being quiet and silent; if you are not, you will only do harm to yourself and me too, and perhaps be my death. See here! I have borne all this for you already, as true as God sees me show it.’

Kate settled in beside him and pulled up her shawl so it covered her head and shoulders. “We’ve never before sent them off alone.”

With a sigh, Smith closed the book and stuffed it into the folds of his coat. “If they can’t manage a job this simple, they’ve no business going out at all, with or without us.”

“It’s not the job that’s prickling the hairs on my neck. It’s the partnership.”

“All Wallace cares about is the money. We have a deal. We help him smuggle his parcels, and he lets us be.”

“How very warm and cozy.” Her smile was acidic. “’Tis a glorious day indeed, when we clasp hands with the likes of Wallace Beadle.”

He wouldn’t look directly at her. “You think I’m enjoying this? I had no choice.”

“There’s always a choice, Smith. You taught me that. Your speciality is finding the choices nobody else can see. Since when do you give up so easy, or toe the line on a contract with a piece of filth without conscience or scruples of his own?”

“This is different. Peacekeepers are involved. I can crack Wallace’s skull if gets too high and mighty, and I can lead a few fat Enforcers a merry chase, but I can’t dodge Peacekeepers. Their resources are unlimited, and they have license to kill.”

“Fine. You were backed into a corner, with no other options, so you ducked your head and tugged at your forelock, for the sake of the children.” Kate stood up and gazed into the depths of the long corridor where they’d skipped away on their dubious errand.

“Something like that.”

She whirled on him. “And what of Wallace’s options?”

“I don’t follow you.”

“Put yourself in the wretch’s shoes for a moment. What’s your best option...your most profitable option? Surely not to honor the terms of your arrangement.”

Smith shrugged. “He’d gain nothing from betraying us. Orphans are a flea on the government’s backside. Plucking them from the corridors and taking them into custody costs more than ignoring them, no matter how much pocket change they nick.”

“It all depends on what you do with them afterwards, doesn’t it?”

Now he lifted his head and stared at her. “Do with them? You mean mad labs? Doll factories?”

“We’ve all heard the stories. It explains the missing.”

“There are better explanations for the missing than fairy tales spun to keep fractious children in line. If there truly was a black market in flesh, the Peacekeepers couldn’t let themselves be linked to it, and even Wallace wouldn’t sell children.”

“Wouldn’t he? I expect a dozen new Frankies would fetch a pretty penny. He was always joking about it, remember? ‘Rich folk want their pets obedient and housebroken,’ he’d say. Wallace gets a tidy bonus, and he cuts out your heart in the bargain.”

The words of Nancy, Oliver’s guardian angel, echoed in Smith’s head: I have saved you from being ill-used once, and I will again, and I do now.

He groaned. “I hate it when you’re right.”

Kate knelt beside him and wrapped her arms around his shoulders. “I’m not asking you to go back on your word, love, nor to put the wee ones at risk. Just take a quick look, to be sure. Make well and certain the slimy latchmaggot is keeping his promises.”

“What if we’re seen?”

“Ah, Smith. Seen? Have you sunk so low?”

Doll

by Fred Warren

“There’s another one!”

“I’ve got her, Cecile. You take the old gent with the suspenders.”

Charlie threaded his way through the crowded market, his eyes fixed on the spider brooch that identified his next mark, a tall woman in a green dress and broad-brimmed hat. Her white-bleached hair cascaded across her shoulders in a network of complicated braids threaded with colorful beads.

Two more packages to go. His worry over the parcels he’d squashed in the corridor was a faint memory now. This was so easy it was almost fun. No fear of getting caught stealing when he was giving items to the marks, no need to continually check the exits, and no nagging from Smith afterwards about his technique.

He felt more grown-up without Smith and Kate watching him like a pair of sentry beetles. They still treated him like a baby, and he was one of the oldest. It wasn’t fair. Maybe I’ll get a little more respect now, he thought, as he drew up behind the woman and slipped the chilly package into her shopping bag with a grin. By the time she noticed the extra weight, he’d be off to the next mark.

As he turned to dart away, something tugged at the corner of his vision, and he paused for an instant to look. The woman in the hat wasn’t alone. Her other hand was clasped by a girl about Charlie’s age, dressed in a frilly green frock that matched the woman’s in miniature. She looked familiar, but he couldn’t quite…

The memory came into focus. “Sophie? Sophie Wander?”  She was from one of the other orphan gangs, and they’d bumped shoulders more than once in the marketplace. Charlie’s excitement overcame his caution. “I can’t believe it…you’re an Oliver!” Smith was always talking about the lucky few that caught the fancy of a rich family and got themselves adopted, like in the story, but to actually meet one, and somebody he knew—it was like a window into heaven.

The girl stared back at him without a glimmer of recognition, or emotion.

“Sophie? It’s me, Charlie Lone! We were nicking pretties together in this very spot not long ago, remember?”

No twitch of a smile, no widening of her eyes. It was as if she was looking right through him. Then, he noticed the faint line of stitch-scarring at her hairline, and the barely-perceptible spiderweb of slender wires beneath the skin of her neck and on the backs of her arms and hands. He was suddenly cold all over.

She’s a Frankie doll.

Another story come to life. The orphans told this one to each other in whispers as they shivered beneath their shredded blankets at night. This is what happens if you’re not careful, if you don’t follow the rules, if you’re bad. This is what they’ll make you.

The tall woman noticed him now, and her mouth twisted in disgust. “You’ve run your errand, little guttersnipe. Get out of my sight.” She tugged on Sophie’s arm. “Charlotte, dear, come along. Pay him no mind.”

“Yes, mummy.” Her voice was as lifeless as her eyes.

He stumbled away in the opposite direction, trying to make sense of what he’d just seen. He delivered his final package in a daze, not even trying to make the delivery smooth and silent. The mark shoved him away with a curse, and Charlie staggered toward the nearest exit, pushing back against an overwhelming urge to run, run, run to someplace dark and silent and safe where he could hide.

A pair of rough hands seized his shoulders and flung him into the iron grasp of a burly man wearing an Enforcer’s uniform. A damp cloth muffled his screams and metal buttons pressed painfully into Charlie’s face as he struggled in vain to free himself. The pungent, syrupy odor of whatever was soaking the cloth drained his strength, and his legs sagged beneath him. His ears began to buzz, but he could still hear voices, harsh and gravelly, from far, far away.

“This is the last one?”

“Yessir. Delivery of all packages, plus ten expendables for the lab or dollworks, as appropriate. I’ll take my payment now, if you please.”

“You’ll be paid once delivery is confirmed by the clients and the expendables are re-purposed. Not before.”

“That wasn’t the deal I made with…”

“Shut up! Don’t speak his name here. It’s the deal you’re getting. Be grateful you have your freedom. He doesn’t like loose ends.”

“If I’m not paid, boyo, he’ll have a lot more than loose ends to worry about.”

There was more, but the buzzing was so loud now, Charlie couldn’t make out the words.

Sorry, Smith.

Wasn’t careful.

Rules.

Too late.

Bad.

Doll.

Contraband

by Fred Warren

“Y’say we’re supposed to light-finger these onto the marks?”  Charlie Lone favored Smith with the incredulous glare of a child who might have just been told that gravity makes things fall upward. The other orphans in Smith’s gaggle remained silent, but they looked on with keen curiosity. Un-picking pockets was a novel concept, indeed.

“That’s right. Think of it as lifting in reverse. Each mark will be wearing a golden pin or brooch shaped like a spider. Slip the parcels into their shopping bags, one per customer, but take care you’re not seen doing it, the same as you would when conducting business the usual way.”

“Why should anybody care that we’re giving them something they want?”

“Some people might be upset there aren’t enough for everyone.”

“It still sounds screwy to me. What are we getting out of this?”

“Enough credits to keep your stomach full for a good long time, Charlie m’boy, and the Enforcers off our backs. Just do as I’ve told you, and all will be well.”

Charlie frowned, then lifted one of the palm-sized cubes to his ear and gave it a shake.

“Stop that!”

“It doesn’t feel like there’s anything inside. What is it?”

“None of your business. It’s…delicate. If you break it, we won’t get paid.” Smith took the parcel and stuffed it into the stained cloth satchel slung over the boy’s shoulder. “Right. Take the long way back once you’ve delivered all your parcels. If you’ve not found all the marks in an hour, drop whatever’s left at the fishmonger’s stall. Everybody clear?”

“Yes, Smith,” they chorused.

“Brilliant. Off to the marketplace with you, ones and twos, and keep a cheery look about you. Kate’ll have something special waiting when you return.”

Kate nodded. “Something sweet.”

They all paused for a moment, mouths agape, then scrambled away down the corridor en masse, pushing, shoving, and chattering gleefully.

“Ones and twos!” Smith called halfheartedly after them. “And have a care with those parcels!” He looked over at Kate and shrugged. “What’s the use?”

“She tugged her tattered coat tighter around her body. “I don’t like this. We should be going with them.”

“Wallace didn’t leave me any choice.”

“We all could have bolted. Found another hiding place.”

“He knows the nether corridors as well as I do. He’d be onto us before we settled the first wee one in her cradle. And he’s got a Peacekeeper backing him up now. You know what will happen to the children if we’re taken. We have to do things his way, for now.”

“No good can come of working with Wallace Beadle. What’s in those boxes, anyhow?” Her eyes narrowed. “Snowdrift? Lightshow?”

“Wallace wouldn’t say. I don’t think it’s drugs. They’re cold to the touch and far too light to be packed with anything heavier than aerogel.  I’m thinking it’s egg sacs or dormant larvae. Exotic treats for the upper decks, as if they haven’t enough to eat already.”

“Smuggling is smuggling. If the children are caught, there’s no hope of even the orphanage. They’d be better off dead.”

“They won’t be caught, I promise. Like Charlie said, even if someone notices, they won’t care about our lot giving rather than taking, and the marks want these parcels badly. This’ll be the easiest run we’ve ever had.”

Smith stared into the dark corridor that had already swallowed the children. The easiest run ever. He almost believed it himself.

#

A leg shot out and hooked Charlie’s foot, sending him sprawling. He pushed himself upright and dusted off his hands and knees, wincing at a scraped palm but heedless of one more rip in his trousers among a dozen others. He reached into his satchel to ensure all six of his assigned parcels were still there. One, two, three, four…uh, oh. Two were leaking something cold and sticky. He pulled them out and tried to smooth the crumpled cubes into shape, but there was no way to hide the tears or the ooze staining their brown paper wrapping. The marks would be angry to find them this way.

He looked up and down the corridor. He was alone. He pushed the damaged parcels beneath a bag of rubbish leaning against the corridor wall and sprinted after his fellows.

Proposition

by Fred Warren

Smith’s escape route twisted through a maze of corridors, maintenance tunnels, and ventilation shafts—a jumble of vectors pointing, in their summation, downward and inward. Any pursuers not intimately familiar with the bowels of Avenir would become disoriented in short order.

He hoped.

…through this hatch, bypass that one, up the ladder here, onto the catwalk— nearly rusted out; it won’t take many more of these trips—there’s the gap in the deck, mind the edges, ease down and through the structure, hang on a moment, quick drop to the deck below, now move, move, move—don’t slow down, never look back…

Fifteen minutes later, confident he’d left any trailing Enforcers far behind and hopelessly confused, he staggered into a vacant utility alcove and slumped to the greasy floor. Cold, dry air flavored with oil and iron knifed into his lungs and returned to the surrounding atmosphere with an asthmatic wheeze. His temples throbbed, echoing the drumbeat of pain pounding in his chest. One hand brushed his knee, and came away wet and sticky. A shard of metal had slit his trouser leg somewhere along the way and bit into his flesh. He wiped the blood onto his coat-tail, then turned his hand back and forth in the dim light to inspect an angry red laceration on the wrist, left by the cyborg that had caught him picking its master’s pocket.

“You’re losing your touch, mate.”

Smith scrambled to his feet, only to be shoved down hard by a heavy hand on his shoulder. He didn’t need to see the face. The gravelly voice was enough. Wallace Beadle.

The thug bent close enough to reveal a gap-toothed grin with blistered lips framed by three-day’s growth of wiry black stubble. The nauseating odor of decayed insect flesh filled Smith’s nostrils. “Comes of too much time spent wet-nursing the wee foundlings and not enough keeping your edges honed. You never would have gotten pinched like that in the old days.”

“As soon as I catch my breath, Wallace, I’m going to twist your head off. I warned you to stay clear of my territory.”

“Out of shape, too. Tsk, tsk.”

“How did you find me?”

“Silly boy. Nobody knows you better than I do. Every single bolt-hole is a fond memory of our old partnership, those profitable, carefree days before you met dear Ave and went soft in the head. I’d rather focus on the future, though. Your blunder has become my opportunity. I have a proposition for you.”

Smith smiled up at him. “Eat grit.”

“Oh, that’s a fine attitude for a penniless sod who can’t protect himself, much less the dear little tots depending on him for their livelihood. Yes, I know where they’re hiding. And let’s not forget the winsome Miss Kate, all alone, so delicate and vulnerable…”

“You’ve made your point. What do you want?”

“I have a friend in need of your peculiar resources. He has a number of parcels that require, shall we say, discreet handling.”

“I’m no smuggler, Wallace. You should know at least that much about me. You want a delivery boy, press one of your own goons into service.”

“Ah, but there’s the rub. These items demand unobtrusive couriers with a delicate touch. Your poppets displayed remarkable skill in the marketplace today, despite the failings of their ham-handed tutor. We think they’ll do nicely.”

Smith spat at Wallace’s boots. “Never.”

Wallace chuckled and wiped the left boot, then the right, on Smith’s injured leg. “As I expected. Let me introduce my client, so you’ll know I’m in earnest.”

A second figure emerged from the shadows to stand behind Wallace. He was a giant of a man, with a swarthy, scarred face, crooked nose, and deep-set eyes, but Smith’s blood froze when he saw what the big man was wearing.

Peacekeeper blues.

Anthem

by Fred Warren -

“Let’s review. Little ones, what’s your job?”

Three hands shot up. “Begging!”

“But we have to be polite,” said Jeremy.

Molly nodded. “No grabbing or screaming.”

“Tears and sniffles are okay,” Pip chimed in.

Smith clapped his hands. “Excellent. Stay where you can see Kate, and do not leave the marketplace with any of the marks, even if they promise to take you home and adopt you. If they tell you that, bring them to me, and say I’m your guardian, understand?”

“Yes, Smith.”

“That’s my clever poppets. Now, Charlie and Cecile. Your turn.”

Charlie shoved his hands in his pockets, looking bored with the whole affair. “I take the near side and Cecile takes the far side. We stroll around and stay casual. Look for the big’uns.”

Cecile fiddled with a lock of blonde hair and recited her part: “When we find a mark, we lift one thing and take a roundabout path to drop it in Kate’s bag.” She scowled at Charlie. “One thing. Last time, you got greedy and nearly got us all caught by the Enforcers.”

“Did not!”

“Did so!”

Smith waved them down. “All right, that’s enough, you two. Charlie, she’s right. The marks are smarter these days, and some of them are just waiting for us to dip a finger in their pocket. Make sure they’re distracted, then in, out, and away. As for you, Cecile, I need you to concentrate. Sometimes it seems like you’re really shopping, not just pretending to.”

The hair-twisting accelerated. “I’m sorry. There are so many interesting things. It’s hard not to look. I’ll try.”

“Good girl. Kate will be at the center with the drop bag, playing crier for the fishmonger. As for me, I’ll be working the margins, the standoffish folk who can’t decide if they’re too good to mix with us rabble. If there’s any trouble…”

Five voices replied in chorus. “Bolt for the safe spot!”

“That’s right. Everyone’s on their own then. No heroes. If Kate and I can help, we will, but I want the rest of you to scuttle out of there like prime racing beetles and never look back.”

Kate plucked at his elbow. “It’s time, love.”

“Very well. Let’s keep our wits about us. Be light-fingered and pitiful. Tonight, we feast!”

#

Smith would have preferred a larger raiding party, but there’d been more Enforcer presence of late, and one of the beetle-meat vendors had missed the carcass they nicked last time. Some of the merchants, like the fishmonger, were friends and allies, but a few wouldn’t hesitate to turn Smith and his entire brood over to the authorities if there was any profit at all in it.

“Salt-Cod-Ohhh! Fifty the kilo!” Kate’s voice trilled over the market’s hubbub, bringing a smile to Smith’s lips. He could think of only one sound he liked better. Best not to dwell on that. He tugged on his cap and scanned the crowd. No Enforcers on patrol today, thank heaven. The little ones, with tearstained faces and outstretched hands, intercepted customers who’d just made purchases and were struggling with the change.

Meanwhile, Charlie and Cecile were threading their way among the shoppers crowding the aisles between stalls. Charlie paused to pull something from the pocket of a corpulent man who was arguing with a cloth merchant. Smith was relieved to see he didn’t double-dip but moved smartly along. Only a practiced eye would have noticed anything amiss. Cecile was focusing on the womenfolk, tapping a succession of purses and waist packs, twirling along like a ballerina. She had promise, that one.

Suppose I’d best earn my keep, or I’ll never hear the end of it. Smith sidled up to a well-dressed gentleman who was perusing a counter stacked with colorful insect shells. “Fine selection here, Guv’nor. Needin’ something special for the lady of the house?”

The man didn’t even look at him. “Yes, confound it. My Joanna is simply mad about these shells. It’s the latest fad. Her friends use them to serve party favors and appetizers. Rather disgusting, to my way of thinking, but she won’t be denied.”

“They do add a spot of color.” Smith leaned over to whisper in the man’s ear, simultaneously reaching for his back pocket and the wallet bulging there. “But if you’re looking for the best price, you ought to speak with Miz Whitman, four stalls down.”

“Indeed? Why, thank you. I’ll do that.”

“Happy to be of service. Enjoy your…” Smith frowned. Something had caught his sleeve. From the corner of his eye, he could see a thin, pale man standing behind his mark. The fingers that were holding onto his shirt shifted to grasp his forearm. The grip was strong. Inhumanly strong.

Gritty ash. The twit had a Frank watching his back.

The cyborg tapped the gentleman’s shoulder. “Master, this man tried to steal your wallet. I’ve sent a message to the Enforcers. Shall I restrain him until they arrive?”

“My wallet?” The man fumbled at his back pocket, then turned to glare at Smith. “Thief!” He backhanded him across the face, drawing blood. “Stinking low-deck trash! Hold him tight, Sixty-Three.”

Smith tried to bolt, but the Frank wouldn’t budge. It was like being handcuffed to a post. He hoped Kate was sending the children out of the market. She wasn’t shouting out her advertisement for fresh fish any more. No one else in the crowd seemed to have taken notice, but he knew the Enforcers would arrive in moments, and his heart sank as he writhed in the cyborg’s steely grip.

Then he heard something strange—and familiar. The market’s babble stilled. Every eye sought the ethereal music, children’s voices wafting through the air, raised in song.

A pilgrim race, we wandered long
Through endless night and barren space
’Til whale’s eye and angel’s song
Revealed you here, our resting place

Arise, Avenir Eclectia
Stand firm, Avenir Eclectia
Be strong, Avenir Eclectia
Live on, Avenir Eclectia

There, at the entrance to the marketplace, stood Ave, surrounded by a ragged choir of orphans, their faces tilted upward, eyes closed, countenances radiant.

They sang the anthem over and over again, as the crowd listened in reverent silence. A woman standing near Smith wept, her hands pressed to her face. Even the Frank was transfixed. His grip on Smith’s arm slowly relaxed, then released altogether. Smith leaped to one side, shedding his coat as the cyborg snatched at it, too late.

As he sprinted for the exit, Smith took one final, backward glance at Ave.

Their eyes met, and she smiled.

Rose

by Fred Warren -

I would show Rose Maylie in all the bloom and grace of early womanhood, shedding on her secluded path in life soft and gentle light, that fell on all who trod it with her, and shone into their hearts.

Smith’s palm light flickered, and he knocked the device against his knee to restore its pale glow. The energy cell was failing. He’d need to steal another tomorrow, but it would last long enough for him to finish. He flipped the final page in his tattered copy of Oliver Twist.

Kate brushed away a few bits of litter, sat down beside him on the floor of the corridor, and leaned back against the wall, wrapping her skirts around her legs, her breath fogging in the chill air. “Moppets are tucked away for the evening, and the guard’s posted.”

“Thanks, love.”

She peered over his shoulder. “Thinking on Ave again?”

“How did you know?”

“When she’s on your mind, you read that last chapter over and over again. Surely you’ve memorized it by now?”

“I want to remember her as she was. Kind, sweet, and sensible—if I’m the Artful Dodger, she was Rose Maylie.”

“And yet you parted ways. You’ve never told me why.”

“She fell ill. Fever, pain, delirium. After she recovered, she began going off by herself, down to the deepest levels of the station. She told me she’d had a vision—there were angels on Eclectia, and they’d chosen her for a great mission. She needed to stay as close to the planet as possible so she could hear their instructions.”

“Is that all? Hardly the most eccentric behavior we’ve ever encountered.”

“She became obsessed. Before, it was just me, her, and the other orphans, living one day at a time, getting by. I hoped...I even dared to plan for the future. Our future, together. After the fever, she started talking like a revolutionary, saying things needed to change, humming that idealistic old colonial hymn everywhere she went. We argued. She took the half the children to wherever she goes to commune with the angels.”

“I caught a glimpse of her a few turns in-station from the passenger terminal last week, sending her moppets to beg, same as us.” Kate shrugged. “If she’s planning a revolution, I think she’ll need larger soldiers.”

Smith sighed and slid the book back into his pocket. “The children still worship her, even the ones who stayed with me. I’m afraid one day she’ll lead them all on some foolish crusade to right all the wrongs of Avenir, protected only by their pure hearts and her angels. She’ll get them all killed or turned into little wind-up dolls for the aristocrats, just like Wallace said.”

Kate surveyed the filthy, corroded corridor. “She’s a mite older than you—perhaps the weight of responsibility weighs heavier on her shoulders. Can’t say I disagree about things needing to change around here.”

Smith shook his head. “The only way to save them is to help them survive to adulthood and steer clear of the gangs. They may have to work the mines or hunt beetles, but they’ll be able to make their own choices and fend for themselves. In the meantime, a few...the smart ones, the pretty ones, the lucky ones...might become Olivers and find themselves a real life where they’ll never be cold and hungry again.”

“Fewer ladies or gentlemen of means venture down here each Founding. I think we frightened off a couple of likely marks during our last raid. Poor timing, that.”

A soft whistle echoed down the corridor, followed by two more, louder each time.

Smith stood up and dusted himself off. “Poor timing all ’round. Blasted Enforcers picked a fine night for a random patrol. Wake the babes, Kate. Two levels down, four corridors outward ought to be enough.”

She scurried away as Smith began to gather their few possessions. And what of us, Ave? he wondered. What will our fate be?

No matter how many times he read the ending, the Dodger landed in prison.

Alone.

Dodger

by Fred Warren -

Smith leaned against the corridor bulkhead and smiled as Kate ladled out stew to the queue of ragged children, each waiting patiently for their portion. It had been a good raid--enough meat, vegetables, and water to sustain his little army for a week, maybe two. Maybe they ought to try for blankets next time—heat to the lower levels of the Avenir station had been intermittent the past few days. They could stitch some of the material into fresh clothing.

“You’re a fool, Smith.”

He slid a hand toward the knife in his back pocket, then relaxed as the speaker emerged from the shadows. “Evenin’, Wallace. Come for a bowl ‘o beetle? Kate’s in top form tonight, and it’s as fresh as it comes.”

“Already ate. Better’n this slop.”

“I doubt that. State your business, or begone.”

“Why’re you still playing nursemaid to this pack of sewer rats when you could be second in my gang and live like a king?”

A toddler circumvented the line and went straight to Kate, bowl outstretched. She administered a mock scolding, then filled his bowl anyway.

Smith chuckled and pointed at the child. “I like them. Better than I like you.”

“Whuzzat?” Wallace snatched at the pocket of Smith’s coat before he could react, coming away with a tattered book which he held up for inspection in the dim corridor lightglobe.

“Give that back!”

Wallace grinned, revealing a row of discolored teeth, several missing. “As I live and breathe…Oliver Twist! I remember when the wizards came and passed these around. Waste of time. Hardly any of us could read.”

“Enough could. Some of us still teach the young ones.” Smith grabbed the book from Wallace and stuffed it back into his pocket.

“Rot and drivel, every word. But you believed it, didn’t you?”

Smith didn’t reply. He returned his attention to the children.

Wallace’s eyes lit up. “Aha, you still do! That’s why you won’t join up with me. You fancy yourself the Artful Dodger, watching over your band of adorable urchins. Do you line them up in the marketplace when the Welfare Society matrons come ‘round? Little tin cups and thumbs in their mouths, hoping some rich, barren hag makes an Oliver out of one of them?”

“Shut up, Wallace.”

“Now me, I always admired Bill Sikes. He was a man’s man, owed nothing to nobody.” He looked Kate up and down, running his tongue over blistered lips. “Saw something he wanted, he took it.”

“Sikes found himself dangling from the end of a rope.” Smith took a step to the left, putting himself between Wallace and Kate. “You keep mixing it up with the Peacekeepers, they’ll Frank you. You’ll spend the rest of your life with a head full of chips and wires, scrubbing toilets for those barren hags you despise.”

“You think they don’t do the same to the little cherubs they adopt? Rich folk want their pets obedient and housebroken.”

Smith seized Wallace by the collar and flung him down the corridor. “Get out of here. Don’t show your face on this Level again, unless you want it rearranged.”

“Last chance, Smith. Drop the apron, and be your own man. I won’t ask again.”

“You have my answer.”

Wallace straightened his jacket, locked eyes with Smith for a moment, and spit on the deck as he stalked away.

The children fed, Kate left the kettle to stand beside Smith as he watched Wallace vanish into the gloom. She slipped an arm around his waist. “Friend of yours?”

Smith shook his head. “No. Not any more.”

A Matter of Hunger

by Grace Bridges -

Smith loitered in a dim corner of the Level 18 marketplace and chewed on his last lavabush seed. There’d be no more until another freighter docked—and then only if he was in the right place to catch any that dropped during transfer.

He peered along the row of meatmongers, noting which had shelled their wares already and which merely laid out the sections of beetle carapace with the meat still inside. He preferred the ready-to-cook variety, because it was quicker to “dispose of,” and there would be no evidence except in their stomachs.

A rumble within reminded him to be quick about his task or he’d lose the opportunity. He gave the signal agreed for today—three sharp raps on the nearest support strut. At the metallic clangs, two dozen ragged children emerged from the shadows, roughly grouped in two gangs who proceeded to charge at each other with full-throated yelling and blood-curdling screams.

The merchants, fearing the worst, ducked for cover and ran into the outer passage. The crowd of shoppers rolled back in waves with cries and screams. Smith darted along the tables as he unrolled his antigrav sack. Slab after slab of the best beetle steak slid into its dark maw.

He paused only once to look up at the staged fight—the kids actually enjoyed this, he could tell, and grinned at their exaggerated anger and fake punches.

Smith stuffed one more massive steak into the bag and pulled it along in the air behind him to a little-used service corridor. He tapped a strut to signal dispersal of the battle, then slipped inside a hatchway with the treasure clutched tight.

Tonight, the children would eat.