Episode 2
SAVED
Tal's head was swimming and his left
shoulder was numb. He was strapped onto a stretcher, and could hear the
rapid footsteps of the men carrying him echo off a metal rampway of some
kind as they descended into the murky darkness. He touched the place on
the inside of his left arm where his screen
had been. It was warm and still wet with half coagulated blood. He felt
a wave of nausea, moaned softly and passed out.
"Careful, careful there," a strong voice cautioned out of the
dark. As the men carrying the stretcher stopped, a light shined near Tal's
face for a moment and then was switched off. "I want this boy in one
piece when we get there, allright?"
"We're on it, Bertie," another voice
answered.
"This way," the first voice ordered, switching on the light again
and shining it downward. The light illuminated part of a narrow metal stairway
attached to the outside of a massive metal framework supporting a system
of huge pipes and ducts.
The men carrying Tal re-adjusted their burden and quickly made off, following
Bertie. As they descended the stairs, their bodies threw menacing outsized
shadows across a series of mammoth steel girders.
After a time, the men reached a landing, with an open service hydrolift
at one end. Bertie looked at the men and pointed his handlight into the
depths below.
"We take the lift down from here." He then pointed the light at
the hydrolift bay and motioned the men toward it. "Load him on and
wait for me. I'll be there shortly."
As the men carried Tal to the lift, Bertie leaned against a metal railing,
wiped the sweat from his face and activated his screen. He quickly punched
in a transmission code number and raised the inside of his left arm to view
the screen. The face of a man with close cropped hair and intense dark eyes
appeared.
"Yes . . ."
"We'll be there in 10 minutes. Prep the room and have 100 cc's of bromaline
ready," Bertie ordered.
"Right away," the man answered.
Bertie put his screen on suppress mode and ran to the hydrolift. He crowded
into the lift cage, shut the grated safety door and pulled on a lever. The
lift began to slowly sink into the darkness, and soon gathered speed. After
a few minutes, he pushed the lever forward, and the lift came to a stop
opposite a long, extended landing, dimly lit by orange sodium lights. The
words "Waste Receptor Unit 57" were written across a gigantic
protruding bulkhead above the rusted metal floor of the landing. He opened
the lift door and motioned the men out.
"Follow me, quickly now!"
Again, the men hoisted Tal up on the stretcher and jogged as fast as they
could after Bertie. They passed two entranceways with ramps leading upward,
and stopped at the third. Bertie pointed his handlight through a dark doorway
where a ramp could be seen angling down.
"Here," he said. "It's not far now."
The men hurried down the ramp until it seemed to level off, then soon stopped
at Bertie's signal. They stood and stared at what appeared to be a solid
metal wall, supporting some kind of framework in the darkness above. Bertie
looked at the wall and activated his screen.
"We're outside," he said.
Suddenly, there was a hiss, and a door panel shot up and open. A man with
close cropped hair appeared. He motioned them in, standing aside as Bertie
and his men hurried in with Tal. When they were inside, the man looked up
and down the rampway carefully, and then shut the door panel.
Inside, Bertie quickly routed the men carrying Tal to a small cubicle just
off the main room, and ordered them to put him on a waiting table. As he
pulled off his tunic, he turned to the man with close cropped hair.
"Get me a Conzec
assembly, Larn . . . one
of the untrackable ones."
"We only have one left," Larn said, handing Bertie a smock and
skullkap.
"Then get it, and get it quick. This boy's top priority." Bertie
pulled on the smock and fitted the skullkap over his bald head.
"Of course," Larn said, and disappeared.
Bertie exhaled and turned toward the cubicle as the two men came out. "He's
banged up bad but he's alive," one of the men said.
"Thanks. You men have done well. Marla has food and dreg waiting in
the next room. I'll see you before you leave." The men vanished and
Bertie entered the cubicle.
He pulled a syringe from the table, loaded in the packet of bromaline, and
shot it into Tal's carotid artery. Tal suddenly regained consciousness.
"Where am I," he asked, looking up at Bertie.
"You're safe for the moment, pup, but we've got some work to do to
get you back to Nowtime."
"You mean . . . my screen . . . I . . ."
"Don't worry. We'll have you good as new very soon."
"Why did you help me? I don't understand . . ." Tal tried to sit
up, but was too weak. Bertie calmed him and wiped his forehead with a cloth.
"A certain old fellow at the Inztitut
sent a mutual friend a message and we've been on the lookout for you ever
since."
"Old Dusty. . . " Tal said. "Is
he allright?"
"I don't know," Bertie said, "but this is enough conversation
for now. I'm going to put you out for a bit, and later we'll talk."
He clipped a small vial onto a pneumatic syringe and shot it into Tal's
upper arm. Tal immediately slipped back into unconsciousness.