Waela heard the hatch slammed and dogged behind her, felt the gondola lift, swinging. There was the humming of a scanner as it passed over her body. A voice at her ear said: “They’re clean.”

Only then did she realize that she stood in a sealed-off bubble within the rescue gondola. This spoke of only one threat: Nerve Runners!

There were Runners in the area.

She felt a deep sense of gratitude for the Shipman who had scanned them, risking contact with Runners. Turning, she saw a long-armed monstrosity only vaguely Shipman in shape.

“We take you Lab Oneside,” he said and his mouth was a toothless black hole.

Chapter 50

Chapter 50

In a fit of enthusiastic madness I created a rational creature and was bound towards him to assure, as far as was in my power, his happiness and well-being. This was my duty, but there was another still paramount to that. My duties towards the beings of my own species had greater claims to my attention because they included a greater proportion of happiness or misery.

—Dr. Frankenstein Speaks, Shiprecords

THOMAS STRETCHED himself in the hammock of a cell and watched a fly creep its way across his ceiling. There were no ports in this cell, no chrono. He had no way of estimating the time.

The fly skirted the protrusion of a sensor eye.

“So we brought you, too.” Thomas spoke aloud to the fly. “It wouldn’t surprise me to find a few rats skulking around this place. Non-human rats, that is.”

The fly stopped and rubbed its wings. Thomas listened. There was a steady stream of footsteps up and down the passage outside his locked hatch. It had been locked from the outside, no handle in here.

He knew he was somewhere within Oakes’ infamous Redoubt, the fortress outpost on Black Dragon. They had taken all of his clothing, every possession, leaving him with a poorly fitted green singlesuit.

“Quarantine!” he snorted, still talking aloud. “At Moonbase we called it ‘the hole.’”

Some of those footsteps outside were running. Everything was rush-rush here. He wondered what was happening. What was going on over at Colony? Where had they taken Waela? They had told him he was headed for debriefing. It turned out to be a quick once-over by a strange med-tech and isolation in this cell. Quarantine! Before they had closed the hatch, he had glimpsed a sign across the way: “Lab One.” So they had a Lab One here, too . . . or they had moved the other one from Colony.

He was aware of the sensor eye prying at him from the ceiling. The cell was Spartan—the hammock, a fixed desk, a sink, an old-style composting toilet without seat.

Once more, he looked at the fly. It had progressed to the far comer of the cell.

“Ishmael,” he said. “I think I’ll call you Ishmael.”