Valentine's Resolve (Vampire Earth 6)

"I'm going to leave your rifle with the handcuff key near the exit. You can work your way out of this pretty easily, I should think".

The sentry was breathing a little steadier now, listening.

"I'm going to be looking around for a while from the exit. Any booby traps I need to know about?"

"No".

"While I'm looking around, if I hear you moving around, I'll come back and taze you.

"Way I see it, you've got two options, Appleton. You can be a good soldier and work your way out of the bag and ring every alarm in the warren. Someone might ask why you didn't hear the elevator bell, how I caught you unprepared and got the drop on you".

"There are patrols outside", Appleton said. "They shoot on sight, you try going down the west side of the ridge".

"Don't worry about that. Your other option is to ditch the bag and play dumb. I hear alarms going off and they catch me, well, I'm just going to have to tell them I caught you jerking off with your belt around your ankles".

"I wasn't..."

"I know you weren't. But I'm a good liar. Think they'd send you to the Punishment Brigade for that?"

"Don't forget the alarm on the hatch. It's just a switch on the side of the battery", Appleton suggested.

"If I were you, I'd get out of the bag, inch my way down the hall, uncuff myself, and go back to my book. But, then, I'm a deserter".

* * *

Valentine remembered the alarm, gave Appleton a little bit of a poser by sliding the handcuff key down the rifle barrel, and cracked the hatch to the air-defense post.

A drizzle that fell like it was too tired to work up into actual rain slicked on his face and hair as he negotiated the warren's slopes, making off down the eastern side.

He marked no activity on the road-rail terminus - the warren

might as well have been a graveyard - but that didn't mean eyes weren't watching from doors and sentry posts. Valentine made a long, elbow-and knee-battering crawl to the bottom of the slope. A garbage pit gaped fifty or sixty meters away; one of the more common punishments for minor infractions was a spell either digging new space for garbage or covering up whatever the scavengers - human, rodent, or insect - left.

A dog barked, freezing him, but it was a distant warning from the southwestern side of the ridge.

He rested and waited. Headlights glowed; then engine noise sounded from the road winding down from the western foothills. A motorbike leading a car approached the checkpoint, and Valentine took the opportunity to make a dash for the garbage pit. Half expecting a warning shot if not another bullet through the thigh, he was there by the time the vehicles reached the gate.

On the other side of the garbage pit the woods began. A fence ran through it, patrolled, but it was militia backed up by a few Bears. But the fence was little more than a polite warning, and the patrols were a training exercise, and Valentine had heard stories of paths to sneak out and go into town for a little fun. The tough part was getting out of the warren.

* * *

Valentine crept up on Gide's fueling station and motor pool, having gone over another fence. There were a couple of guards at the gate, but the rest of the buildings were locked up tight. Valentine rejoiced in his luck when he saw a woman Gide's size work a crank, pumping fuel from an underground reservoir into a fifty-gallon drum. Then she turned. The woman's profile was a straight horizontal line, flat as a building.

"Julia", he hissed from the shadows.

She stepped away from the pump and reached for her sidearm. "Who's there?"

"David. I'm a friend of Gide's".

"The David", she said, reaching for something at her throat. She pulled up a plastic nose and a surgical mask.

Valentine walked up and shook her hand. "You make me sound like a statue".

"Umm... sorry? Gide's not on duty until seven".

"Can you get her, please? It's really important".

"Ah, love", she said. "Where are you storing your white horse?"