Page 18 of Scion

With enough air, they could stay where they are for hours.

I sigh. Stop, and turn to the glass wall. Make a weary beckoning gesture in the general direction my revs are protesting. “She’s not here.”

There’s no movement.

After a long few seconds I roll my eyes. Knock on the glass. “Seriously. Just us, friend. Come on out, and let’s get this over with.”

Still nothing. I growl. Their target’s gone, as has any element of surprise. Whoever’s in there is drawing this out far longer than necessary. Just inconveniencing me, now, really.

“Fine.” I can’t go in there; even with my revs, a lack of breathing apparatus would be a major disadvantage. I’m impatient, not stupid. “I can wait.”

I make myself comfortable on the steps, tucking my hands behind my head and reclining so that I’m facing roughly in the intruder’s direction. Cross my legs and give an exaggerated yawn, then pointedly close my eyes. My revs are still sharp, of course, but there’s no way whoever’s in there will know that.

I’m almost drifting off to sleep for real when there’s finally movement.

It’s just stirrings, at first—small and slow, followed by long seconds of inactivity—and I don’t react physically at all, allowing the assassin to reveal themselves properly before I admit I’m aware of them. Another infinitesimal motion. Another. Then, a creeping upward, more regular this time.

I open my eyes. The young man inching his way along is clad almost entirely in grey. He freezes when he sees me move. I wave to him cheerfully.

“Son of a bitch,” I mutter as I take in his attire, even as I continue to smile. The oxysuit is a creepy mess of rippling motion. Bioengineered, I hate the things. They’re like wearing the skin of a fish, if the fish was still alive and made up entirely of gills and had no scales and was greyish-green and plugged directly into your bloodstream. It’s very gross. It’s also very expensive and very annoying. If this guy has had even a little training, he’s probably able to stay in there indefinitely.

“Come out.” I gesture irritably to him, then the space next to me.

He shakes his head.

“Yes,” I retort, nodding with an exaggerated motion. “Out of there now, Fish Boy.”

He shakes his head again. Points to me, then the water.

“Oh, ha ha.”

He shrugs at me.

“Alright then.” He could sit there for days. And Old Woman can’t sit out in the EMP ring indefinitely. Time is on his side.

Fortunately, I’m fairly sure Old Woman’s printer requires high-temperature industrial cleaning.

I stretch, then head for the supply room. Fish Boy trails along beneath me curiously—out of sight, of course, but my revs as well as common sense tell me that he wants to know what I’m up to. No fancy see-through floor in the storeroom, though, so he doesn’t see me locate the CIF3, or pour it—carefully holding my breath—into a plastic spray bottle. I secure the bottle in an empty duffel bag lying on one of the nearby shelves, and hope to hell the lid doesn’t come off.

Grab a fire axe off the wall, when I spot it, and tuck it in there too. Perfect.

I do the calculations as I stroll back down the stairs to the lowest level of the house. Into the hallway with the hidden door out into the Loop tunnel on one side, and the base of the aquarium on the other. There isn’t anywhere for Fish Boy to watch me discreetly down here, so he doesn’t bother hiding. Just kind of floats along after me. Clearly curious about the bag I’m carrying, but not looking especially worried.

I open the way to the Loop tunnel using the code I memorised with my cogs when Old Woman punched it in last time. Through it, I can hear machinery whirring as the maintenance bots work busily on their repairs.

Then I go back over to the aquarium wall opposite, and pull out the bottle. Hold my breath and give the glass a quick, but thorough, spray across an area of several metres.

There’s an ominous hissing sound as I reach back into the bag, and this time heft the axe.

“Don’t tap on the glass,” I murmur to myself in Old Woman’s voice. A pretty spot-on impersonation, if I do say so myself.

Inside the aquarium, Fish Boy’s eyes go wide. He turns and starts swimming madly away.

I slam the axe into the rapidly widening weak spot, and run.

THERE ARE ONE HELL OF a lot of dying fish in the corridor.

Wet flopping sounds echo everywhere. I use a rev to dampen my olfactory senses; the air is thick with the exact smell you would expect from a hallway covered in the contents of a very large, violently drained marine habitat. The water has already mostly emptied away into the damaged Loop system. Sand and small rocks coat the floor.