Equilibrium Fan Fiction by Judas Austin Taking Sides 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 Great. Just what I need. More people pissed at me. If they wanted to freeze to death, they were more than welcome to do so! Did they think burning those books was easy for me?? Although I'm still anti-Tetra Grammaton, after reading that book Rossiter wanted so badly, I'm beginning to gain a better understanding of exactly what they wanted to eradicate, and now I have the added bonus(!) of having to worry about Rossiter's comparative sanity. What kind of person actually gets pleasure out of reading about depraved acts like that?? Jay wasn't wrong about that snowstorm though. Not long after we'd got back under cover, the skies pretty much opened. I swear, I have never been this cold in all my life. Right now, I'm shivering so badly I can barely hold the pen. I wonder how she knew. --John Preston, Grammaton Cleric First Class Preston stamped his feet, trying to get some warmth into them, breath freezing in the icy air. How cold did you have to be before hypothermia or frostbite set in? It probably seems incredible to people living in various, cooler, climates that Preston had never seen snow before, had no idea what it was like, but it was true. Libria enjoyed a temperate climate and in the Nethers, even the Clerics didn't need to go more than a few miles to pick up sense offenders. The word 'snow' was symbolic of a long-forgotten time. It was white and it was cold. That was about all any Librian knew or needed to know, and most didn't even know that much. None of the textbooks mentioned cutting winds that made your eyes and nose run, or snow falling so fast and thickly you couldn't see for more than two metres in front of you. The sound of footsteps caused him to turn, glad for some company. Preston had posted himself on that watch, and most of the others had gotten under shelter as soon as possible. It was a hell of a lot colder on your own, somehow. "Good morning," he said evenly. His partner grunted noncommittally. Even when still on Prozium, Partridge had never been much of a morning person. Preston glanced around to make sure they weren't being overheard, then lowered his voice anyway. "Any food anywhere?" Partridge snorted. "Fat bloody chance. Well, there's plenty for someone like Jay to eat-according to Al she had a pretty good breakfast-but I've yet to be that hungry." Preston grimaced. Thinking about what Jay had probably had for that 'pretty good breakfast' had just lost him his appetite. "That's all very well for her," he said, keeping his voice low, "but we can't all live like that." "We may have to," Partridge said grimly. Preston shivered slightly, and not just from the chill. "Bugger me, it's cold out here," Al said, coming up beside them. "One presumes your nerve endings are still functioning," Preston said, with heavy sarcasm. "They're almost bloody numb, Cleric, and that's the truth of it." Al stuffed both hands under his armpits in an attempt to warm them. Preston glanced at him. "Where are your friends?" he said suddenly. Al raised his eyebrows. "You're standing on them, Cleric." Preston jumped involuntarily, then looked down to see his feet resting on nothing more than packed snow. "What...?" "It's called a quinzee," Al said in the slow, measured tones of one explaining something to a young child. "Like a snow hut, I guess. Snow's a bloody good insulator if you know how to use it." There was a pause. "How," Preston said, disbelief heavy on every word, "how the hell can something this damn cold be a good insulator?" "Buggered if I know, to tell you the truth," Al answered honestly, "but it worked. You're standing on our roof." "Oh right..." Preston turned and half stepped, half slid down the bank, then paused a foot or so from the bottom as something in Al's last sentence nudged his brain. "Our roof??" Al shrugged but didn't quite meet Preston's gaze. "Me and my boys spent the night in there." "Why?" Preston said incredulously. "Well, if you want to freeze your bleedin' nadgers off, that's your business, Cleric!" Al said, a little too loudly. Heads turned. "But the rest of us lesser mortals don't have a) your apparent resistance to extremes of temperature and weather and b) your masochistic tendencies!" "There couldn't physically have been room for all of you in there," Preston stated categorically. Al squirmed slightly. "Yeah...it was kinda cramped." "They didn't mind?" "Mind what? Sharing a small hut with a girl like Jay?" Al stopped squirming and smirked instead. "Couldn't get in there fast enough, Cleric." And neither could you, I'll bet, thought Preston. "Did you sleep with her?" he said suddenly. "That's what I just said." "You know what I mean." Al raised his eyebrows. "Mind if I ask you a question, Cleric?" "Ask." "Is, uh, freedom of speech a right here in New Libria? Or what's left of it?" "Yes. Of course." "So I'm not going to be arrested for being frank and open about...certain things?" "No." "Good. In that case: mind your own bloody business!" Next to them, Preston heard Partridge's chuckle. "You really should have seen that one coming, Preston." "I had a late night," Preston lied. In fact, he'd crashed out as soon as he'd found a warm, relatively sheltered spot and not woken up until ten hours later, when he'd taken the watch. "I noticed," Partridge said, with the air of being too polite to comment. "Yeah, it must've been tough sleeping in these temperatures," Al added, who wasn't so restrained. "Alright! I get the point!" Preston said testily. "Me down, you kicking. Now can we change the subject? Where's Jay?" "She went out looking for more food," Al said, somewhat dismissively. "I don't blame her; I think we'll all be grateful for some more to eat very soon." "God, it's cold this morning!" Richardson remarked from behind them. "We know," Partridge said acidly. "You're up early," Preston commented, his own voice neutral. He didn't dislike Richardson as such, but a little of the man went a very long way. "I couldn't sleep," Richardson admitted. "I was too damn cold! Anything for breakfast?" "If you can find it, you can eat it," Preston said bitingly. "Otherwise, go ask Jay. I understand she's about the only one of us who's eating well." Richardson looked thoughtful. "Yes...I think I may just do that. Where is she, by the way?" "Last seen heading that way," Al said, jerking a thumb towards the outside. "What?" he added, seeing Preston's look. "You don't think she's going to leave?" Al rolled his eyes. "No, I think you're getting paranoid about that! Why the hell should she leave and what does it matter if she did?" He shook his head. "For one thing, it'd be one less person to worry about." "That's not the point! I don't want her leaving before she's explained how to build things like this!" Preston nodded towards the quinzee. "Fascinating," Richardson said, studying it closely. "Is this normal for where she comes from, do you think, or is it-" "I don't know and I don't care," Preston cut across. It was a pretty good response to Richardson. "But I tell you what, go out and find Jay and you can ask her for yourself." Richardson glanced from one to the other, then slipped past and stepped outside. Preston wasn't someone he wanted to be around just then, not when the senior Cleric was in one of his moods. Where was that girl...? "I say-" he began. Something cold and wet smacked into the back of his head, hard. Through the shock, he was aware of someone saying, "Sorry Cleric, I didn't see you there." Richardson, who had remained motionless ever since the moment of impact, risked another step forward. "Jay?" "Yup." Jay stepped out of hiding. "What's up?" "Preston wants to see you. Er. Immediately, he said." Richardson brought one hand up to his hair and felt the snow in it. "May I inquire as to why you're hurling this stuff around?" "I thought you were that corporal of Al's," Jay said unabashedly. Richardson froze. "I beg your pardon?" he said stiffly. "No offence or nothing." Jay waded through calf-high snow, grimacing. "Damn! I wish this stuff would hurry up and freeze over. It's a real bastard trying to walk on squishy snow!" She reached him and paused to kick the snow off her boots. "So where's Preston?" "In there." Richardson indicated the building with a jerk of his thumb, still bristling over Jay's earlier comment. Mistaken for a sweeper indeed! He'd never been so insulted in his life! "Right." Jay crossed the street, coming up behind a knot of people who were all standing around, seemingly examining something. Jay followed their gazes for a while, in case there was something interesting there. Nope. Niekka. "What's everyone looking at?" she said curiously. Preston glanced around at her. "Good, you're awake. Would you mind explaining this to me?" He indicated the quinzee Jay had spent most of the previous night constructing. Jay shrugged. "You build it, crawl in and wait out the storm. What's to explain?" "Don't," Partridge advised her in an undertone. "Don't push him. Preston's in a state of high enough pissoff right now without you adding to it, alright?" "If you had a way of keeping warm," Preston said bitingly, pretending not to hear his partner's remark, "why the fuck didn't you mention it!?" "I tried," Jay said bluntly. "You said something like...what was it now? Something something something go leave surviving in the Nethers to those who know how to do it something something something." Preston opened his mouth, then shut it again as his treacherous memory threw up a card. "Well...alright," he conceded grudgingly. "I take it back." "Cool." Jay paused. "So what'd you drag me over here for?" she asked. "How do you make these?" Richardson butted in. "Do you build them around a space or hollow out the centre or-" "Richardson," Preston said through gritted teeth "why don't you make yourself useful and go and see if there's any more of that fungus?" "Yes, yes, yes, in a minute, I just wanted to-" "Now." There was a tense silence. Then... It should theoretically be impossible to stomp away in a dignified manner, but somehow Richardson managed it. "Right." Preston turned back to Jay. "Good. How do you make these?" It was clear from Jay's expression that she wasn't entirely sure why Preston had dismissed Richardson for asking that same question, but she answered obligingly. "Like I said, you shovel snow into a pile, wait for it to harden, then hollow it out." Preston blinked. "That's it?" "What did you expect," Jay said bitingly, "a fucking degree in architecture? Are you done now? Only I set a few traps outside and I want to see if I've caught anything." Preston and Partridge exchanged glances. "Shovel, harden and hollow," Partridge murmured very quietly. "Can't be that hard." "Good, I'm glad you think so. You get stuck, ask Al for help. I'm outta here." Preston opened his mouth to stop her, but she was already halfway up a wall and accelerating. Partridge raised an eyebrow. "There's no stopping her when she's made her mind up," he remarked, to nobody in particular. "No. She's a very interesting character," Preston said. Something inside him was inexplicably fascinated by Jay. "Oh, she's interesting alright," Partridge agreed. "Wonder if they're all like her in Xylyx. Or Gehenna, I suppose we should call it now." He shook his head. "You know, I wish I could see it," he said suddenly. "Just once." "Did you ever wonder about the other regions?" Preston said suddenly. "When you were on the dose, I mean." Partridge didn't quite meet his gaze. "Actually, I...um...I did see some outsiders once." "From Xylyx?" "No; Entropia," Partridge admitted, then immediately regretted it as his partner's curiosity promptly skyrocketed. "What?? When!?" "They, uh...they sent envoys to Libria." Preston stared. "I don't remember that!" "No, well, you wouldn't," Partridge said, shifting from foot to foot. "This was some fifteen years ago, just after DuPont became a member of the Council. You'd have still been in the Monastery." "What did they say? What did they want? What happened to them?" "They wanted to find out what had happened to the other people. Apparently they'd found some way of existing peacefully without Prozium." "How?" "I don't know. DuPont may have done; he was the one 'looking after' them. As for what happened to them...well...he sent them to the furnace." Preston felt his blood run cold. "What? Diplomatic envoys and he just...they were..." He shook his head. He'd seen a lot of bad shit in his time, but something about that really grated on him. Maybe the whole unexpectedness of it, from the point of view of the envoys themselves. "Would you have cared before you came off the Prozium?" Partridge said pointedly. "Well?" "Course he bloody wouldn't," Jay said from somewhere above their heads. "And since the only good Entropian is a dead one, it seems this DuPont guy had a measure of intelligence after all." There was a surprised silence. "What makes you say that?" Partridge said at last, his tone even. Jay snorted and dropped to the ground between them. "Puh-leeze. They were the ones who sent most of Gehenna's undesirables to us some four or five hundred years ago." There was another, longer silence. "Four or five hundred years," Partridge echoed, when he found his voice again. "You, uh, you really know how to bear a grudge, don't you?" "There's precious little else to do in Gehenna," Jay retorted. "From what I gathered, they've learned since then," Partridge said pointedly. "Entropians, I mean. I spoke with one of the envoys myself. I forget her name...Giselle, I think, but don't hold me to it." "What did she say?" Preston demanded. "What did you say?" "Precious bloody little," Partridge answered bitterly. "I was only twenty two at the time, still on Prozium, very much your typical Cleric. She asked me what my function was and I told her to serve Libria, then DuPont showed up almost out of nowhere, promptly dismissed me and escorted Giselle away. I never found out where to but I suppose it doesn't matter since the four of them were executed a week later." "Maybe they met up with Jurgen." Partridge snorted. "Unlikely. This was before even Jurgen's time, at least before he joined the Resistance. He's been off the dose for eleven years now, but he'd have just been another Librian citizen when all this was going on. Halls might have been able to help the Entropians out but from what I can gather he was...indisposed." The way he said this last gave Preston the definite impression that there was something his partner wasn't telling him. "Proving what I've been saying all along," Jay said dismissively. "Entropians are jerks." "Some of them may have been," Partridge said pointedly, "but given how long ago this happened, things change. People change." "Yeah, uh huh. Tell you what, Cleric. You have your little delusions and I'll have mine. Sound fair?" "Ever hear of the phrase 'forgive and forget'?" Taselli asked. "Forget what?" demanded Jay, who didn't much like the young Cleric. "We've got a few sayings of our own. Never forget what we cannot forgive." She shrugged. "Entropia wasn't the only one. It was just the closest, so we got the most of their outcasts. I think they still send the odd few our way, though it's slowed down now." She glanced around sharply, seemingly listening to something only she could hear, then abruptly turned and darted away. "What's up with her?" Partridge said idly. "How should I know?" Preston answered. "She's probably seen another spider or something. What did these envoys look like?" Partridge shot his partner a look. "Well, they were human and dressed all in white. Other than that, I'm not sure what you mean. And I know that DuPont knew about Merston and that group, because he mentioned it to me at one point. Said I wasn't to worry though; they obviously weren't interested in Libria and if they killed the odd Resistance fighter, so much the better." "So if DuPont told you to avoid them at all costs, how did you come to know so much about them?" Preston demanded. "I met Sharon in the Nethers." "And...Sharon knows about them?" Preston prompted, in an effort to steer the conversation around to something he could understand. "Well, she was one of them," Partridge said matter-of-factly, "so I suppose yes, she does." Preston became abruptly aware that his jaw was open and closed it with a snap. "Sharon?" "Yes." "Kernachan's girlfriend? That Sharon?" "Yes." There was a silence. "Sharon?" Preston said again. "Oh, for-Yes! Her and that friend of hers...what's her name...Naisha. They were a part of that group Jay talked about. I found them in the Nethers. Well, I say found, I was with Mary and some other Resistance fighters looking for EC-10 material and the two of them tried to attack." "Tried?" Partridge snorted. "Both of them were wearing little more than rags and sneakers, or shoes in Naisha's case. They could barely stand, they were on the verge of severe hypothermia and walking in blood and pus from broken blisters." Preston grimaced. "Too much information, Partridge." "Sorry. Anyway, they joined us. Neither of them were as forthcoming with information about Xylyx as Jay, but after getting on the wrong side of Merston I can't really blame them." He paused. "If you don't believe me, why don't you ask her for yourself?" he added, nodding towards the familiar figure at the far end of the building. Preston followed his gaze. "I think I may just do that," he said, striding over to her. "Sharon?" Sharon finished what she was doing and turned. "Cleric Preston," she said, somewhat coolly. "What can I do for you now?" "Ah, Sharon!" Partridge said suddenly, from just behind Preston's right shoulder. "I'm glad you made it here." Sharon raised her eyebrows. "What do you want?" Partridge feigned innocence. "What, isn't it enough to just be pleased to see you again?" "Not for you, Cleric. You're not into babysitting, you already know everything I could tell you about Alex and I know I've paid my bills because I handed the money over to Jurgen personally the week before the shit hit the fan, so what do you want now?" Partridge quirked an eyebrow. "Straight to the point, as always. You know, most people have more respect for Clerics." "Most people don't have to suffer a Cleric's strange taste in EC-10 or his constantly leaving the cap off the toothpaste," Sharon pointed out. "Or a hundred other little quirks I could mention but won't since it's nobody's business but mine and Alex's. What do you want?" The corners of Preston's mouth twitched ever so slightly at this, but he managed to keep his face more or less impassive. Partridge rolled his eyes. "Alright. Fine. We'll do this your way. Do you know someone called Jay?" Sharon blinked. "No. Should I?" Preston glanced at her sharply, but Sharon's perplexity was genuine. "Alright," he said abruptly, "how about Merston?" Sharon hesitated. "Ye-es..." There was a wariness in her tone that hadn't been there previously. "Why?" "One of her...uh..." Partridge hesitated, unsure how to proceed. 'Friends' was clearly the wrong word, and 'colleagues' wasn't much better. "Her..." A shocked exclamation from behind him cut him off and he turned. Jay was standing, every muscle tense, face to face with Sharon's friend Naisha. Sharon followed Partridge's gaze and understanding dawned. "Oh," she said suddenly, "you mean Kahl!" A smile appeared on her face. "Well, well. I'm glad she at least managed to get away." "Kahl?" Rossiter echoed incredulously, and loudly. Jay didn't react in any way. All her attention was focused on Naisha. "Tal'makh?" she said finally. "What?" Preston said. Sharon explained in an undertone. "The two of them used to be allies before the whole business with Merston. Kahl's asking if Naisha's willing to go back to that state of affairs." "What happens if she says no?" Partridge said. Sharon shrugged. "They'll probably engage in a fight to the death. I understand that's usual." There was a tense silence. All activity seemed to have ceased in favour of watching this new development. "What?" Preston said again. "Well...Xylyx is, um, how should I put this?" Sharon said delicately. "Uh. It's a very physical place." "But a fight to the death?" Richardson put in, shocked. "It's barbaric!" Sharon shrugged. "Can't have more than one leader in a pack, Cleric. But you can have two leaders of two different packs." The sudden clash of metal on metal snapped them both back to the present. Both Jay and Naisha had produced weapons from somewhere; Naisha a hunting knife, Jay a strange combination of a blade and chain. "Kusari-gama," Sharon said, following Preston's stare. "Not the easiest things to use, but once you've got the hang of them, I gather most people never switch weapons." "Christ, they're fast," Partridge said disbelievingly, watching as the pair exchanged a rapid flurry of strikes and counterstrikes, their movements a blur. "That?" Sharon said scathingly. "That's just sparring. Experimenting with each other, if you like." "So...what next?" Partridge said in an undertone. "I don't know," Sharon admitted. "Look, up until the age of sixteen, I lived in a city, alright? I know a little about survival, but not as much as the other two. They react to things before I've even had time to register them." "Jay said there weren't any cities," Preston said. "Kahl - uh, Jay - is from the Ma'rett region," Sharon said, with the barest hint of snobbery in her voice. "The nearest cities are about a hundred miles due north and west respectively, and I'd be very surprised if she's ever seen either of them." "Why do you call her that?" Partridge wanted to know. "That...Karl." "Kahl," Sharon corrected him painstakingly. "That's her name, Cleric. Or at least, it was back in Gehenna. I guess she finally worked out a Librian equivalent." "Oh right." Partridge watched as the pair exploded into another burst of action, one that ended as swiftly as it had begun. "You know, while I've nothing against you or her, I'm bloody glad you were in such poor shape when you tried to attack," he added fervently. There was a long, long silence. Time and everything in it seemed to have frozen. "Yi tai haal'katolkh," Naisha said finally, still eyeing Jay with a measure of reserve. "Er...what?" Partridge said. "She said...well...I'm not entirely sure," Sharon admitted, "but I think she said Jay's on probation. One blade out of line and she'll pick up the fight where they left off and this time, only one of them will walk away." She became aware of the looks. "What?" "You got all that from three words?" Preston said disbelievingly. "Well..." "How do you say please?" Richardson said suddenly. "Uh." Sharon seemed slightly embarrassed. "We don't." "Well, I don't mean in terms of protocol or accepted behaviour, I mean -" "There's no word for it in any of our dialects except Norian, Giuyan and Valdian, and those three don't use it outside the cities," Sharon said. "You're kidding," Rossiter said disbelievingly. "No. Look, out of everything that attacks us in Gehenna, most of 'em are animals of some kind, and as for the ones that aren't, do you really think that saying 'Please don't hurt me' is going to cut much ice?" "Dialects?" Richardson said curiously. "How many dialects are in Xylyx?" Sharon blinked. "Ten. Same as the number of regions. Nobody's too sure where they all came from, but they're there." "Teach me." Sharon did a double take. "I'm sorry?" "The dialects," Richardson said. "Teach me." "I don't -" Sharon began. "Just a few words." "Look, I -" "Richardson, get off her case," Partridge ordered. Richardson blinked. "I...sorry. I was just - I beg your pardon," he added to Sharon. "I was just, er, carried away." He wasn't the only one, Preston thought, glancing over to where Jay and Naisha were now lounging in the snow, apparently oblivious to the cold, and chatting animatedly to each other in their own language. Looking at them, you'd never have known they'd been facing each other down five minutes ago. "Why'd she change her name?" Partridge wondered aloud, following his partner's gaze. "I've no idea," Sharon said brusquely. "Kahl - I mean, Jay - always had a fascination with names and languages, though. Maybe that had something to do with it." She paused. "Then again, Librians seem to have difficulty pronouncing the most basic of names," she added, with a touch of asperity. "It took me ten minutes of solid instruction before Alex got mine right, and he still had difficulty right up until the time he left." Preston and Partridge exchanged glances. "I thought your name was...well..." "Sharon," Preston finished. "No, it's Chiarrun." Sharon shrugged. "It doesn't matter. I kind of like the Librianised version better. And it made it harder for Merston to track me down." "So...what? Xylyx is split into regions?" "Pretty much. Some are so small they're not worth talking about - Tal only has one main island, for example - but most have about four or five. And there are literally hundreds of smaller islets in between. Kind of a no-man's land really; most of them can't support life for very long. If you see someone there, they're either very, very dangerous or on their way somewhere else. Or both," Sharon admitted. There was a thoughtful silence. "Was that all?" Sharon prompted at the end of it. "Only, I really want to get back." Preston blinked, jerked out of his own thoughts. "Wh - yes. Yes. Thankyou." "What's in your head?" Partridge said, eyeing his partner somewhat narrowly. "You should know," Preston said, not quite meeting his gaze. "It's your job to know what I'm thinking." "Right." Partridge's eyes narrowed very slightly. "Let's say for the minute that I'm off-duty." Preston looked at him. "Alright. Entropia, or envoys from it, arrived here fifteen years ago. Envoys from Xylyx arrived about six years ago. Who's going to come next? I was thinking maybe it's time we started sending out envoys of our own." There was a long, long silence. "Do me a favour, Preston," Partridge said eventually. "Let's not even think about that until we've got something a little more concrete." "What do you mean?" "Well, from what I can remember and what I could make out, Entropia seems a particularly peaceful civilisation, proud of things like family values, democracy, peace and we may as well forget about Xylyx. What were you planning to say to the Entropian embassy, if we even managed to find it? 'Hi, I'd like an alliance. What? You want to come and visit us? Sure, no problem. I mean, all we can offer you is frozen fungus and raw insects since we happen to be bang in the middle of a civil war at the minute, but hey, my derelict building's your derelict building'." Partridge paused. "You don't think that's going to raise a few eyebrows?" Preston dropped his gaze. That was a good point. "It could work," Partridge added. "I just don't think it's a good idea to go gallivanting off now." There was a short pause. "I'll see you in a bit," he added. "I've got some business to take care of." He turned, leaving Preston alone on watch. The Cleric grimaced. In his wildest thoughts, both on and off the dose, he'd never seen himself as the leader of a band of - "Renegades?" Jay quipped from next to him. Preston jumped - he'd never heard her move - then shot her a look. "Yes. Renegades." He nodded towards the small object in Jay's hand. "What's that?" Jay glanced down at it. "Found a pair of rats in one of the traps. Rossiter managed to get a fire going so I thought I may as well make use of it. They're slightly different to the ones in Gehenna - smaller for one thing - but not bad." She held out her other hand, which contained several scraps of meat. "Want some?" Preston hesitated, then sighed. "Why not? It's not like there's anything else to eat. Thankyou." He took a few pieces and chewed, trying not to think about where they'd come from. It was surprisingly good. There was a pause as the above few sentences dawned on Preston. "You're trained in the intuitive arts?" he said incredulously. Jay snickered. "Oh please. Let me tell you something, Preston. Granted you're a male and therefore not as intuitive as females - don't glare at me like that, it's a fact of life - but I can safely say that the most dense six-year-old boy in Gehenna could probably run rings around any Grammaton Cleric as far as intuition went." She shook her head. "The ability to feel isn't the only ability you sacrifice on Prozium. You spend eighteen years learning to do something that anyone without Prozium can do from birth." "Are they all as attuned as you?" Preston said. "No. I'm exceptional, like you." It was said matter-of-factly, with no trace of conceit. "Most of us are more like Naisha." Preston raised his eyebrows. "Yes, what was that about?" he said, nodding towards Naisha, who now seemed totally disinterested in Jay. Jay grinned. "Just catching each other up on the gossip, Cleric. Seems Sharon's been busy." She shifted her gaze to where Sharon and her daughter were now dozing against a wall. "Oh well, good luck to her, I guess. She'd probably never have made it back in Gehenna." "What makes you so sure?" Preston said. "Not many do," Jay said bluntly. "Particularly not soft, inexperienced people from the cities. Most of us out in the wilds get together in packs." "But you didn't?" Preston persisted. It was surprising, but he enjoyed talking to Jay. It was refreshing to find someone who didn't edge around him as though he might explode. Jay snorted. "Nah. Well, not really until Naisha and Sharon came along." "Why not?" Jay considered. "Dunno really. I s'pose I was just a little uncomfortable about living and sleeping next to someone whose primary thought is how much they're going to benefit from your death. You know; one person gets twice as much food as two, first choice of weapons, shit like that. Speaking of food..." She glanced around, then scrambled up the wall like a monkey to get a better view of the surrounding area. "See anything?" Preston asked. He'd really have to get Jay to teach him how to climb like that... "Rossiter's heading right for you, there's an argument going on over there about who gets the last bit of fungus, smoke in the distance. No food though." "What?" Preston said sharply. "What did you say?" Jay twisted around to look down at him in a position that bent or broke most of the laws of physics, and by rights one or two biological ones as well. "No food?" "No, before that! About the smoke." "Oh right. Yeah. Black smoke." Clearly Jay felt this matter was of little interest. "Where from?" Preston demanded. "That way." Jay waved a hand in the vague direction of the Tetra Grammaton, then clambered down. "I'll see you later. I want to go and find some more of that fungus." Preston opened his mouth to stop her, then closed it again. There wasn't really much point. "Anything going on?" Rossiter said. "Nothing worth speaking of, or that you don't already know about." Preston paused. An idea had just struck him. "How'd you come to be off the dose, Rossiter?" he asked suddenly. Rossiter shot him a startled look. "Excuse me?" "You heard. How did you come off?" Rossiter hesitated. 'How did you come off' was possibly the most personal question anyone could ask. It was an unofficial rule in New Libria: never discuss religion, politics, sex or Prozium. "I'm waiting," Preston said. Rossiter looked angrily embarrassed. "I was sent to visit DuPont, alright? It was just after I'd graduated from the Monastery. I was told he had a special assignment for me. I got inside, found there was nobody around to ask for directions, so I set off on my own, took a wrong turning and wound up outside Father's office. I was evicted pretty quickly, but when the sweepers emerged to throw me out, I caught a glimpse of the room through the doors. I knew he was off the dose and I got thinking, according to what we're told in the Monastery, Father's a Cleric. If he could hack being off the dose, I thought I'd try it. Just once, to see what it was like." Preston filled in. "And you couldn't stop. When did this happen?" "Almost six weeks ago, if you must know." Rossiter's tone bordered on the insubordinate, but Preston let it slide. "Damn." "Why?" Rossiter dared to ask. "You know Halls is in the Tetra Grammaton," Preston said. It wasn't a question. Rossiter nodded. "Yeah. And damn good riddance, if you ask me." "I didn't ask you, Rossiter, and that's not why I brought it up. Jurgen's there as well. Halls is the only one who stands any chance at all of getting out, and I think he'd be able to break the others out as well. I was wondering if anyone knew him well enough to give me an idea of the likelihood of that happening." Preston debated whether or not to mention the smoke, then decided against it. No point in giving anyone false hope. "If I may speak frankly, Cleric, fat bloody chance," Rossiter said bluntly. "He's as good as dead." Preston sighed. "Yes. I hate to admit it, but you're most probably right." He nodded. "Thankyou." Well. That hadn't worked. He needed someone who knew Halls well enough to evaluate his standard. Richardson approached, waving something in one hand. "I found this in an abandoned building. Any idea?" "No," Preston cut across shortly. "Or how - " "No," Preston said again, then paused. Well, any port in a storm? "Did you know Cleric Halls?" he said. Richardson blinked, startled. "Yes. Why?" "How would you describe him?" Richardson seemed slightly puzzled by the question. "I've really no idea. We weren't really on speaking terms as such, Cleric. But if I had to, I'd describe him as a dark, singularly angry young man. And - if I may - forestalling your next question, I've no idea why he should be either." "Either what?" Partridge said, coming up behind them just in time to hear this last part. "He was asking me about Halls," Richardson said. "Any idea what -" "Ask Rossiter," Partridge said automatically. "Halls?" he added, glancing at Preston. "I thought you two hated each other." "Short of Jurgen, I can't think of anyone who doesn't have a hate-hate relationship with Halls," Preston returned. "So why do you care?" Partridge persisted curiously. "Because he's in the Tetra Grammaton, and he's the only one who stands any chance at all of breaking the others out." "Breaking the others out?" Rossiter echoed disparagingly. "He'd be damn lucky to break himself out, and if he even manages that I think he'd make tracks as fast as he could." Preston glanced at Partridge, ignoring the younger Cleric, despite the fact that Rossiter's words were ringing horribly true in his ears. "You know him better than anyone here, or at least, better than anyone here who'll speak to me. Is there any chance he could...do it?" Partridge hesitated, torn between the truth and his desire to comfort his friend. "If anyone could pull off a stunt like that," he said eventually, if somewhat evasively, "it'd be him. The guy's a bloody survivor if ever I saw one." The bloody survivor - had he been able to hear this - would have disputed Partridge's claim strongly, as would his companion. Halls was very close to snapping and Jurgen, who knew him well enough to recognise the danger signs, was racking his brains frantically in an attempt to either distract the Cleric or failing that, find somewhere to hide until the storm was over. Halls' self-control was almost inhuman at times, but on the very rare occasions when it did break, almost nobody and nothing was safe. A Resistance fighter had once commented that being allies with Cleric Kevin Halls was a little like being allies with an unexploded bomb. He'd had to run quite fast after saying it, but Jurgen had thought the description queerly apt. "Don't do anything stupid," he risked muttering to Halls out of the corner of his mouth. "Who, me?" Halls glanced at the approaching Clerics complacently. "I really don't know what you're talking about." He raised his eyebrows as the pair came up to them. "Can you be helped?" he drawled, the barest hint of a smirk on his face. The two glanced at each other. "You're feeling," one of them said. Halls met his gaze squarely. "So are you." "Impossible. I dosed half an hour ago." Halls favoured the Cleric with a broad grin. "Yeah, that false Prozium's really convincing, isn't it?" Behind his back, he slid one of his guns noiselessly out of its holster. "Oh, by the way, Jurgen says hi and if you want more EC-10, he'll meet you tonight at the usual place." The Cleric's younger partner shifted his attention from one to the other, clearly unsure what to do. Halls rolled his eyes. First Rossiter, now this kid. Had standards in the Monastery plummeted after his own graduation? "Alright. This is the time where you would arrest your partner for the crime of feeling or run the risk of being arrested yourself as an accessory," he said, in the slow tones of one explaining something to a mentally handicapped foreigner. "Since this is a mere training exercise for the pair of you, I'll let you off this time with a warning. Now stand aside; this prisoner has to be taken for further interrogation at the Palace of Justice." There was a silence. It was apparent from the looks on both Clerics' faces that neither was quite sure exactly where they'd lost control of this situation. Confused, the younger one looked to his partner for advice. In that exact instant, Halls brought out the gun from behind his back, pointed it at the senior Cleric and squeezed the trigger, then punched the button for the top floor and twisted around as the resultant blast hit. "What did you do?" Jurgen yelled over the noise. "Sour gas in the atmosphere!" Halls shouted back. "Highly volatile, at least that kind is!" The elevator, which had been rocking like a ship in a storm, suddenly ground to a juddering halt and the doors slid open, revealing a now shattered level. Bodies of sweepers and the odd Cleric were strewn across the floor. "You didn't..." Jurgen began, then caught sight of Halls' expression. "You did, didn't you?" "Yeah." "What did you use?" "A little thing I put together in my spare time. A pair of grenades triggered by remote control." "When did you find the time to plant booby traps in the Tetra Grammaton?" "When Preston was, shall we say, indisposed?" Halls snickered. "You could say that while he got to have a nice long nap, I had a very busy couple of days." Jurgen hesitated, then dismissed it. Pointless worrying never did anyone any good. "Alright. What about the others?" Halls glanced around at him. "What others?" "You know what others. I'm talking about the others we got out of the Tetra Grammaton. The lucky ones whose cells you opened." "Oh, those others. What about them?" There was a short pause. "Are you being deliberately stupid?" Jurgen said at the end of it. "Doing my best," Halls answered, smirking. "I'm not leaving them, Halls," Jurgen said flatly. He could almost see the thoughts running through Halls' mind, knew the Cleric was rapidly calculating whether saving his friend was worth potentially burdening himself with a load of refugees. "Do you want to tell Preston you abandoned his daughter?" Jurgen added. "I'm not afraid of Preston," Halls shot back, not missing a beat. "Then what are you afraid of?" Jurgen said. All the time he could keep Halls talking, the chances of other escapees reaching safety increased. "Nothing you or Preston can do to me," Halls answered immovably. "I'm leaving. Now. You can come or stay as you like, but I will not wait around for the Tetra Grammaton to catch up with me!" "I'm staying. I told you, I'm not leaving without the others." "Then stay." Halls shook his head. "You always were a sucker for nobility, Jurgen." "Well, that's a kinder label than the first one you gave me," Jurgen retorted. "What was it now? A 'smug, self-righteous bastard', if memory serves." "Oh, for fuck's sake, Jurgen, that was eleven years ago," Halls said, with no real sharpness in his tone. It was something of a frequent point between them. "Change the record already." He scanned the area ahead out of a window, catching sight of something. "Can you handle a motorbike?" "You know damn well I can't!" Jurgen said testily. That had been the problem with banning driving lessons; it meant that day-to-day living was a lot safer, but it also meant you needed a Cleric or a sweeper if you wanted to go anywhere in a hurry. Halls turned back, a smirk on his face. "Want to learn?" "Not without the others." Halls rolled his eyes. "What do you want me to do, enrol them all at the Academy? Hide them so they can listen in on a sweeper training session?" Jurgen took a couple of deep breaths in order to hang onto his temper. It didn't seem to be working. "What I want you to do is create a diversion that will leave all of us alive but buy me enough time to get some of the others out. Preferably before they find us!" When Halls didn't move, Jurgen took another, deeper breath. "Kevin, I am asking you as a friend, will you please do it before we're all caught!" Halls' facial expression didn't waver in the slightest, but Jurgen knew he'd won. You didn't hang around with Clerics twenty-four seven without picking up a few tricks of the trade yourself. Behind his dark glasses, Halls' eyes narrowed. "What you want'll take a fucking miracle, and you know it!" "I'll take that as a yes," Jurgen told him. "What do you want me to do?" "Stop me, for one thing," Halls retorted, then shook his head. "Okay. Here's what I want you to do..." Chapter 18 >>> more Equilibrium Fan Fiction