Iron Gold

  All’s I know is to be a servant. Before that a slave. I imagine myself sitting across from a big man in a suit at an interview like they show in the holos. He’d ask my skills and I’d tell him I know how to tend silkspiders to keep them free of beetles, and how to put them to nest at night. I know how to bribe mine tinpots, how to haggle down an ounce of sugar, how to listen to rumors so I don’t get stuck by a 121 gang.

  “Ruster smarts, my goodlady,” he’d say. “But we don’t need that around here. Have you tried janitorial?”

  —

  The museum is fine and clean and cluttered. The Dawn of the Space Age wing is packed. Full of ancient spaceships donated by Regulus ag Sun himself. I have to push through a group of Grays and Blues to even glimpse half the relics. Through a crook in a woman’s elbow, I recognize the winged heel of the Silver’s company logo. The same that was on our tents and our food packets and our water purifier. The same as on the robots that replaced us in our own unprofitable mine.

  The History of the Conquerors exhibit is closed; Warden barriers block it off. A flock of Coppers in front of me titter like jungle helions about there being some sort of terrible theft a few weeks back. Through a gap in the tarp that covers the front of the exhibit, I see several Greens are installing hardware in the floor as a crew of Oranges and Reds fix a marble arch where CONQUERORS has been burned over with COCK SUCKERS.

  I smile to myself.

  I skip the wing devoted to the Rising—little Conn and Barlow would have wailed in disappointment—and instead join the line for the Liberty Wing. There I find a room of concrete that stretches several stories high, narrowing at the top to let in a thin stream of light; a million Red Sigils litter the floor. Small as thumbs, made of flexible metal just like those on my own hands. Each taken from the mines that the Jackal of Mars liquidated. They call it the Hall of Screams.

  It’s grotesque and cold and I want to flee it. But I stay. Of all the art here, this is the straightest in the eye you can look at the horror. A man barely older than me falls down weeping, clutching one of the Sigils. He’s alone, but Reds behind him kneel to comfort him till there’s a thick cluster around him and they’re all weeping and I’m wiping my own eyes and looking away, wondering if I should join, but feeling too awkward and too moved to actually do it. Where was this love in Camp 121?

  A pair of towering Golds stand on the far side with their young son, watching the display. They’re a handsome couple. Their eyes somber, respectful. But I want to shout at them. Tell them to slag off. This belongs to us.

  Then the iron tinkles as their son slips from his mother’s grasp and walks out onto the Sigils. His shoes rattle the Sigils together. The sound bounces against the concrete, rising level by level, the noise growing with each ricochet till it reaches the top of the room’s cold concrete throat.

  The clustered Reds stop and stare.

  Made nauseous and claustrophobic from the Hall of Screams, I push my way out of the crowd, trying to find a place to sit down and recover. All the coffee shops are filled, so I aim for a small park outside the museum. I squeeze between a slow-moving gaggle of airy Blues, past jabbering Greens, the Colors all clustered together on the broad white steps that lead up to the museum. Carefully, I brush past a dreadful Gold woman who is stopped in the middle of the walkway, talking on an internal chip. A Red with eccentric piercings bumps into me, eager to get ahead. “Sorry, love,” he mumbles, and carries on, sliding through the crowd, trailing smoke from his burner.

  Someone shouts behind me on the stairs. I turn around to see the Gold woman wheeling about in a frenzy, her eyes scanning the crowd till they settle on me. She points a long, jeweled finger. “You.” I look behind me to see who she’s talking to. “Thief!” She pushes in my direction and I realize she’s coming right for me. The people around me lurch away. I have the urge to flee, but I stand rooted to the spot on the sidewalk. “Watchmen!” the towering woman shouts. “Watchmen! Where is it, you little ruster?” the woman sneers down at me. Easily a foot taller than me. A hundred pounds heavier. More, despite how thin she is. She looks like an emaciated gold salamander wrapped in a fur coat, but her large eyes glitter like two evil gems. “I know you took it.”

  “I didn’t take shit,” I snap. She grabs my arm and yanks so hard I feel my shoulder grind in its socket. My feet come clear off the ground.

  “We’ll see about that. Watchmen!”

  “They’re coming,” someone says.

  I look around in confusion and squirm sideways so that she loses hold of my rain-slicked jacket. “Don’t let her leave.” A female Green and an old Silver man step into my path. The Silver grabs me and holds my arm until two Watchmen push their way through the gathering crowd. Grays. A spike of fear goes through me. They wear blue cloth caps and gray uniforms with titanium badges with a blindfolded woman holding the star of the Republic. The younger of the two tells the bystanders to move along as the oldest cranes his neck to look up at the Gold, nodding respectfully. “Is there a problem, citizen?”

  “This one’s a thief.”

  He looks at me calmly. “What, her?”

  “The little urchin stole my bracelet! Took it right off my wrist.”

  My eyes widen. “Like hell I did.”

  “I saw her try to get away,” the Silver declares. “I detained her till you arrived.”

  “It was a diamond and lyrconium bracelet. Incredibly expensive. I was talking on my com and she pickpocketed me. Slippery little fingers.”

  My tongue is struck dumb. “Hold your head still, citizen,” the older, fatter Watchman says. A clear optic falls over his left eye from the thin plastic headset he wears just beneath his blue beret. “Gotta scan you in.”

  “But I didn’t do anything….”

  “Then you’ve got nothing to hide.”

  “Did either of you see this happen?” the younger Gray asks the Green and Silver.

  “Saw the ruster bump into her.”

  “No. Just heard the shout.”

  “I didn’t do anything!”

  “Shut up or we’ll haul you in for running your mouth,” the younger Watchman says.

  “Citizen, stop moving your head.” I hold very still, biting back a tinpot insult. The Gray’s eye flickers with light from the optic’s projection display. A kaleidoscope of faces streams against his pupil. “She’s not in the Archive,” he tells the other. “Where are you from, citizen?” He motions me to put my finger in his DNA sampler. I feel a small prick of a needle. He frowns at the results.

  “Martian, obviously. Talks like she’s got mud in her mouth,” the Gold says. “Just arrest her already. I want my bracelet back.” She gestures to the buildings around. “Can’t you call up a camera feed?”

  “Private property. Not linked to the Archive, so we’d need a warrant.”

  “Ridiculous bureaucracy. Streets have turned to scum. Theft on the Promenade! If you’d stop heeding those plebeian senatorial scarecrows and just do your jobs…”

  “Citizen, please,” the older Watchman says. He looks around at the Reds amidst the bystanders, probably wondering if they’re Vox Populi. Wrong eyes see and this turns into a riot. “Are you Martian, girl?”

  Breathe. Breathe. “Aye. I’m Martian.”

  “You’re not in the Archive. Where is your transit permit? Do you have it on your imbed ID?”

  “What?”

  “Do you have any ID?”

  I reach quickly for my pockets, where I keep the Citadel ID. Both Grays step back, their hands dropping to their sidearms. The younger one pulls his and I stare down the metal barrel, two meters from my face. “Don’t move!” I quiver at the order, a gene-deep terror of Grays with guns racing through me. “Hands out of your pockets! Hands out of your fucking pockets! Do it!”

  I freeze, whole body locking up and trembling. I’m too frightened to even pull my hands out. Hostile eyes stare at me, loathing me, validated that I’ve fulfilled some twisted fantasy of theirs. “Pull your hands out! Slowly! Sl
owly!” I pull my hands out. The older Gray sees Reds and Browns watching from the crowd. Several are speaking into their coms. One steps our way. The Gray lowers his gun, a flicker of fear in his eyes. The younger Gray doesn’t see the onlookers and rushes to slam me against a nearby wall. He shoves my hands out and kicks my legs apart. With a baton, he scans my body then pats me down and then cuffs my hands behind my back with magnetic shackles. I don’t know what to do.

  “No shooter or bomb,” the young one says, still not seeing the older one’s trepidation. “No bracelet either.” He takes my ID out of my pocket and steps back. “Lyria of Lagalos.” He pauses. “Eh, Stefano, look at this.”

  “Then she must have an accomplice,” the Gold is saying.

  “Did see another Red…” the Green pipes up.

  “I saw him too. Gang member, no doubt. Tats, piercings. Look, Officers, can I just give you my testimony or card?” the Silver asks, glancing at a timepiece. “I have a meeting….”

  “Rico, take their testimony and IDs.” The older Watchman’s com crackles. He holsters his weapons. “We’ll need a wagon at Promenade Level, 116th and Eurydice. Send crowd suppression. Got some Vox watchers. Could escalate.” To me, “You can turn around, citizen.”

  Hands behind my back, I shuffle awkwardly around. Rain’s started falling again. I shiver. The younger Gray looks over my ID. “Citadel staff, eh?” I nod. “Janitorial?” Then he notices the fox sigil to the right of my name. “Telemanus personnel. Second-class clearance. Look at that. That’s why she’s not in the Archive.”

  I’m not sure if it’s a question.

  “Probably stole the ID too,” the Gold says.

  The older Watchman wheels on her. “Citizen, please! Look around you.”

  “Do you not know who I am?” the woman sneers. “I’m Agilla au Vorelius, Officer. That’s right. Why aren’t you trying to find her accomplice? She has one. They run in packs, you know. Little savage offworlders gone wild. Nowhere is safe. What’s your name? I’m going to report you to my dear friend Senator Adulius. You’ll be guarding water filtration plants on Phobos with one com call.” She leans forward, her bright eyes narrowing as she reads his badge. “Officer Gregorovich.”

  The older Gray pales. “Citizen Vorelius, we’re taking her in….”

  “Taking me in?” I howl. “I didn’t do—”

  “Shut up,” he tells me with an instinctive shove. I’m so angry and scared I just stumble and stare at the ground. “We’ll take her in and perform a full investigation and get feeds from all the cameras, after we get a warrant. If she helped steal your bracelet, she’ll pay.”

  “Good. Good. You should report it to the Telemanus steward. They should know they have a thief in their midst. Not that that would bother Martian warlords. But she should at least lose her job. Must keep the streets clean.”

  That terrifies me more than the Grays.

  I’m led away as a battered gray flier shaped like a loaf of bread with Hyperion cyan stripes sets down on the street. They open the back up. It’s filled with rows of rough-looking bastards, most tattooed lowColors, drunks and vagrants.

  “What’d she do?” an old Red shouts from the bystanders.

  “Move along, citizen,” one of the Grays orders.

  “Bullshit!” someone else shouts. A bottle smashes on the ground near the officers. “Fuck you, tinmen!”

  “Get her in.”

  “Slag you…” I hiss, resisting as the Watchmen try to push me into the back of the jail wagon. I feel like a child throwing a tantrum. My face has gone numb. One of them pulls out a stunbaton.

  “Get in with your pants pissed. Or get in without your pants pissed. Comply, citizen.”

  Flinching, I step up into the bed of the flier and let them push me into a seat between a ragged old Pink with chattering black teeth and a drunk Obsidian with vomit and blood on his flashy racing jacket. My shackles clank as the magnetics lock me into my seat. A deep animal fear rises up in me. I tug at the shackles. “Please. Please don’t…” There’s shouts now outside. The sound of sirens and more bottles breaking.

  “Officers,” someone says on the street before they shut the doors. A slim Gray man in an overcoat approaches them. He has a forked goatee and a bad limp in his right leg.

  “I’m afraid there’s been a mistake,” he says. “That girl’s a friend of mine.”

  “The pickpocket?” the older Watchman asks, glancing at the gathering crowd.

  “That’s a ripper!” The stranger laughs. “If she’s a pickpocket, I’m a worlds-renowned art thief! Known her family going on eight years. We were out for a day on the town. To take in the sights. First stop was the Liberty Wing, then Hero Center—tedious, I know. Wanted to show her a bit of my past. Make sure this flashy new generation knows the sacrifices our kin made back in the day.”

  “Your past?” the old Watchman says. “Were you a Son?”

  The man shrugs as if embarrassed. “We all do our part. Worked the Watch first.” The massive Obsidian beside me snorts phlegm out of the bowels of his nose and spits it at my feet. His cracked teeth smile at me and he whispers something in a language I don’t understand. His breath smells like a Flush tube. Meanwhile, the Grays rattle at each other in military lingo while I watch on, utterly lost.

  “What cohort?” one of the Watchmen asks.

  “Cohors XV.”

  “Serenia Center?”

  “Crater town itself.”

  One of the men whistles. “A smokejack in the flesh.”

  “Then you were a first responder….”

  “So they say.”

  “Was there too,” the old Watchman says. “Was Thirteenth then.”

  “Helluva day,” the stranger replies.

  “Helluva day.” The men shake hands.

  “Philippe,” the stranger says.

  “Stefano,” the older Watchman replies. “That’s Rico. He’s a jackass.”

  “So, what’s the flak, Stefano? My friend there looks like she’s about to be that crow’s lunch. And you look like you’re about to be the mob’s.”

  “A citizen says your friend stole her bracelet,” Officer Rico says peevishly, annoyed at being left out of the conversation.

  “Her bracelet?” The stranger named Philippe laughs. “Did you find it on her?”

  “No, but…”

  “Then why’s she in the wagon? Rusters ad portas?”

  The older one nods. “Citizen threatened to cause a fuss. Threatened to call up the pyramid. Connected, you know.”

  “Ah.” The stranger lifts his eyebrows. “A Gold, then?”

  Stefano looks ashamed. “You know the story.”

  “Same gears, new oil.”

  “So it goes.”

  “So it goes. How long till your pension?”

  “Three. They bumped them all back five years.”

  “Bastards.”

  “Yut. New recruits ain’t up to scratch. Reds and Browns…even an Obsidian. It’s fuckin’ madness. No discipline. So they’re keeping the old dogs in the kennel.”

  “Criminal.”

  “So it goes.”

  The stranger steps close and drops his voice. “Listen…I know you got a job to do, Stefano. I know that. But look around you. Fuse is lit. Cart her away and Vox goes boom. I vouch for this little lady. Told her mother I’d watch out for her. She’s the right sort. It’d get me killed if I had to go back and tell her parents what’s what. You know Reds: small Color, big temper. And you take her to the station, this all gets messy. Especially since she’s done jack all. Any way you could forget to log this one in?” He looks back at the crowd. “Save everyone a headache.”

  “Stefano…” Officer Rico starts.

  “Quiet, squib.” Officer Stefano looks at me, back to the street, and then at the other older Watchmen who brought the wagon and nods. He jumps in the back of the wagon and disconnects the magnetic coupling on my shackles. I follow warily out the back.

  “I owe you a chit,” the strang
er says. “Damn fine of you.”

  “Don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  The stranger sticks out his hand. “Semper fratres.”

  “Semper fratres.”

  The Watchmen shut the wagon and stride off into the crowd, shoving any lowColor that gets too close. The wagon levitates back into the air and merges back into the air traffic, leaving me standing with the stranger. The crowd, robbed of its martyr, evaporates as quickly as it gathered. Some come to ask if I’m all right. I nod, still rattled.

  “Pretend like we’re friends,” the man says as he guides me away. “They’re still watching.”

  “Why’d you do that?” I ask him when he sits down on a bench to have a smoke. I take one from him and he lights it with a flame from his pinky ring.

  “It was another Red who did it,” he says. “Saw the kid make his move.”

  “Why didn’t you say something right off?” I ask hotly.

  “I don’t know you,” he says. “Trouble starts easy these days.”

  “Looks like it,” I mutter.

  “Are you always this…aggressive with people who take time out of their day to help you?”

  “No…I just…I’m sorry.”

  “And no point in my coming to chat with that Gold hovering like a feral wasp. They’ve got nasty stings. Easy way to get into a quagmire.”

  “Quagmire?” I ask.

  “Messy situation,” he explains. “Philippe.” He sticks out a hand. His voice is lighter, more playful than it was with the Watchmen. He has a wicked face and smart eyes that look bored by most things they’ve seen, but they focus on me intently.

  “Lyria of Lagalos.”

  “Martian?” He laughs. “Well, then I’m relieved they didn’t ask how the devil I knew you. Martian. Ha. That’s a rip. Could have undone it all.” He rubs out his burner and gets to his feet, about to leave.

  “Why’d you help me?” I ask again.

  “You look like someone I used to know.” He pauses. “And I hate that highColor piss. Flexing muscles, as if they haven’t already had their run. You have a lovely day now, Lyria of Lagalos. Mind your tongue when talking with tinpots. That Stefano was a nice one. Most are all twitchy as flies these days with all the terrorists and Vox firestarters.”