EPILOGUE
“Do you think any of them will come?” Coach Mason Qazik asked.
“Some.” Bhaaj expected at least a few Undercity runners to show up at the sports complex for the track-and-field practice. Angel and Ruzik both seemed curious about the team, and a few other Dust Knights had expressed interest when they learned the bargain involved above-city food, including sun-grown vegetables and snap bottles of water.
She and Mason were standing in the lowest row in the bleachers that bordered the oval track. The spectacular facility offered the best support and equipment that Cries could offer elite athletes. Too bad they had almost no such athletes to use said facilities. About ten Cries runners were on the track, warming up for the upcoming practice. Bhaaj and Mason watched them closely, mainly so they didn’t have to look at each other and feel awkward.
“Our runners don’t really know what to think of your invitation,” Bhaaj admitted. “They almost never come to the surface. The sun feels too—” She searched for the right word. “Harsh.”
Mason glanced at her. “When I talked to your protégé, Angel, she said I needed to make a bargain with your athletes. It’s hardly the first time I’ve heard an elite athlete imply such. A new hovercar, high-level club memberships, a daily ‘per diem.’” Dryly, he added, “Can’t call their per diem a salary, after all, not for amateur athletes.” He shook his head. “In all the years I’ve been doing this, though, I’ve never had an athlete ask for what Angel wanted. Food and drink. Simple, healthy meals and filtered water.”
Bhaaj remembered all too well the days in her youth when she’d snuck onto the Concourse, intent on stealing enough food to stave off starvation. “Yah,” she murmured. “Sometimes it’s worth more than gold.”
Mason motioned at a table set some distance away from the track, near an inner wall of the complex. “We have a buffet for the runners. Also, a nutritionist who can help them, uh—well, decide what to eat.”
Bhaaj spoke gently. “It is well chosen, sir.” She’d never forget the time in her childhood when Dig had stolen enough from her mother’s supplies to keep their dust gang from starving during a particularly rough time. Bhaaj had gorged herself and thrown up later, sick from overeating.
Mason awkwardly. “It doesn’t matter if all the kids who come here try out, either today or, well I don’t know, some other time. They don’t have to be ready for an Olympic team.” His face reddened. “Not that qualifying for this one requires much skill. But I don’t care about that. Major Bhaajan, if they’d like to come, and eat afterward, or even before, while the other athletes run—it’s fine. Any who want to come are welcome.”
Given that aqueduct natives were forbidden even from approaching the sports complex, let alone coming inside, it had never occurred to Bhaaj that this track-and-field team would consider Undercity athletes. That was before she knew Mason Qazik, however. “Thank you, Coach. And please, call me Bhaaj.”
He blew out a hearty gust of air, making no attempt to hide his relief. “Well. Good.” He squinted at the sky. “If they do show up, I hope the sun doesn’t bother them too much. It’s bright today, even for me.”
“Yah, true.” Bhaaj doubted anyone from the Deep would come. They couldn’t bear sunlight without darkened glasses, salves for their skin, and clothes to protect their skin. No one even knew how it would affect them to go places without the algae of their world, a part of their lives as common to them as the air they breathed.
At least they still lived. In the season since the endemic had swept through the Deep, the survivors had recovered. They’d lost twenty percent of their population, but it could have been much, much worse. Ruzik, Byte-2, and Tower had no lasting side effects, and the same for Karal, Lavinda, Morah, and Caranda. Neither Paul nor Tam had ever shown any signs of the rash. The army held a memorial for Lieutenant Warrick, one attended by the Majdas. General Vaj Majda herself gave the Selei Medal to Warrick’s family to honor the lieutenant.
Ruzik’s entire gang had come to the memorial, the first time they’d attended an above-city event with people from Cries. Nor were they the only Knights who’d ventured to the surface lately. A good number had shown up when Bhaaj ran track-and-field practices in the desert. They’d come out of curiosity, also in respect because she was their tykado teacher and mentor. Going to the sports complex for a Cries coach they’d never met, however, was an entirely different story.
“We’ll see what happens,” Bhaaj said.
The comm crackled on the band Mason wore around his wrist, and a woman’s voice rose into the air. “Coach, this is Tena down at the track entrance to the complex. Mason! There’s a bunch of Undercity gang members here. Are you sure you want me to let them in?”
Mason glanced at Bhaaj with a look of apology. “Sorry,” he muttered. He tapped the transmit panel on his band and said, “Yes, of course, let them in. Escort them to the track.”
“But Mason—a lot of them showed up. Forty almost. Some are little kids, like nine years old. No way could they be trying out for the team. And the older ones look like—I mean, they’ve got tats and scars and ripped clothes and—shit, that girl has a huge knife on her belt.”
Bhaaj scowled. “Goddamn it. I told them not to bring weapons.”
Mason glanced at her, then spoke into the comm. “Uh, Tena, tell her she has to leave the knife with you.”
“Are you kidding? That woman looks like she’s ready to murder someone. No way am I telling her anything.”
“Here.” Bhaaj motioned to Mason, indicating his comm. He extended his arm toward her.
“Tena,” she said, “this is Major Bhaajan, the coach of the Undercity team.” That overstated it, given that the Undercity had no official track-and-field team, but never mind. “Could you please allow the runner with the knife to talk to me on your comm.”
“Uh, um, okay. Just a minute. I have to go back over there.”
After a moment, a gravelly voice came out of the comm, what Bhaaj recognized as Rockjan, one of her older Dust Knights. “Eh,” Rockjan said.
“Not bring fucking knife,” Bhaaj growled at her.
“Not safe here,” Rockjan growled back.
“You got knife, you go home,” Bhaaj said.
Silence.
Bhaaj waited.
“Fuck,” Rockjan muttered.
“Stay or go?” Bhaaj asked.
After a moment, Rockjan grumbled, “Stay.”
“Good,” Bhaaj said. “Give knife to slick. She give to me. I give to you after run.”
Silence.
After a few moments, Tena’s voice came over the comm. “I have the knife.” With a surprised wonder, she said, “It’s gorgeous, like a work of art.”
Rockjan’s voice came distinctly in the background. “Not pinch my blade, bitch.”
“Stop it,” Bhaaj said, using the Undercity dialect so Rockjan would know exactly who she meant. “She not steal your damn stab-em. And you not insult slick.”
Silence. That offered a good sign, since if Rockjan really believed the fragile Tena intended to steal her knife, they’d have heard her beating up the beleaguered assistant coach.
Mason spoke awkwardly into the comm. “You okay, Tena? All set?”
“Yes, we’re, uh, good.” She sounded as jumpy as a softpaw kit. “We’re on our way.”
“Good.” Mason hit mute on his comm and regarded Bhaaj uneasily. “Do you think they have any concealed weapons?”
Of course they did. Bhaaj doubted anyone had come unarmed despite her warnings. But they hadn’t displayed their weapons, except Rockjan, who’d probably forgotten it was on her belt.
She said only, “They know they’re welcome here. They don’t intend to attack anyone.” That assumed no one tried to attack them. What startled her more than Rockjan’s knife was that so many of her runners had shown up today. “They are welcome, right?”
“Of course, of course!” His look turned earnest. “Even the nine-year-olds. They can eat if they prefer, instead of trying out.”
“They gave their word they’d try out.” Bhaaj didn’t know what Tena meant by nine-year-olds, but Bhaaj had encouraged a few preteens to come. Even if they weren’t ready for the team, they could start training for the future. “They’ll try out. They won’t accept food otherwise.”
“Ah.” Mason nodded. “I understand.” He even sounded like he did get it.
They stood side by side, waiting.
Mason’s comm crackled again. “We’re here, Coach,” Tena said.
Bhaaj gazed across the long track to the other side of the stadium. Yah, there, she saw them, Angel and Ruzik walking with the young woman who served as Mason’s assistant coach, all three of them leading a group of dust gangers out of the building and into the streaming sunlight. Bhaaj recognized most of them from their desert workouts. She’d spent the last season getting them ready for this practice. Except—who were those other two kids?
Max, activate my eye augs, Bhaaj thought.
Done.
Her view of the group jumped closer. Not all the runners were Dust Knights; a few came from circles protected by the Knights, including a couple of eleven-year-olds that Bhaaj knew loved to run. Tam Wiens stood out from the rest with her bleached hair and perfect runner’s build, more lithe than most Dust Knights, not as tall, more suited to marathon distances than the heavily muscled gangers. All the runners, however, had the Undercity trait of unusually long legs compared to the rest of their body. That included a teen-aged boy and girl she didn’t know. They looked familiar. It tugged at her mind . . .
Ho! The cartels. Cutter Kajada and Hammerjan Vakaar had sent the two oldest kids from the group they’d introduced to Lavinda when they asked if her offer extended to the cartels. She’d said yes—and so today a Kajada girl and a Vakaar boy came to Cries. Lavinda hadn’t meant this; she’d invited them to train as Kyle operators. It didn’t matter. They were here, two children of the warring cartels come to Cries, not as criminals, but as hopefuls for a sports team, of all things.
“A new day,” Bhaaj said. A small step, sure, but maybe someday it could be more.
Mason glanced at her. “What?”
“Just glad to see them.” Bhaaj straightened up, watching the runners gather on the track a few meters from where she stood with Mason.
The Cries athletes gaped at the Undercity team, and some of them turned to Mason with panicked looks. He lifted his hand, acknowledging the runners as if this unprecedented event was perfectly normal. Ruzik kept his group organized, motioning them to the starting line. When they’d practiced in the desert, Bhaaj had made sure they all recognized the bang of a starting pistol—that they knew it meant go, not that someone had tried to shoot them. She hoped that training stuck today.
Angel nodded to her and Bhaaj nodded back. For an instant Ruzik grinned, but he doused the look before it barely registered. Bhaaj understood. It hadn’t been that long ago that he’d lain so close to death, she thought she’d lost him. Yet here he came, for an afternoon of doing what he liked best, even more than martial arts practices. For him, for many of them, this was pure fun.
“Everyone set?” Mason called out.
One of the Cries athletes raised his hand, a fellow with black hair and the build of an elite runner. The athletes all crouched down, taking their starting positions, though the Undercity runners seemed puzzled. The concepts of a “starting” and “ending” point in a race didn’t make much sense to them. They had, however, agreed to do this in return for food and water, and they would respect the bargain. If it made no sense, well, who cared.
Mason lifted his pistol and called out in a voice loud enough for everyone to hear. “Ready, set—go.” In that same instant, he fired, and the shot rang out across the stadium.
The runners took off.
Tam, Angel, and Ruzik immediately pulled into the lead. The only Cries runners who came close to them was the fellow who’d raised his hand and a young woman who looked like a Majda, Azarina probably. Within moments, Tam left even Ruzik and Angel behind, stretching out her long legs in the sheer joy of running.
“No, no!” Mason was practically wringing his hands. “Didn’t you tell them this is ten kilometers? Don’t they understand? They have to pace themselves. They can’t give everything they have right out of the starting gate. They’ll wear out long before they finish.”
Bhaaj glanced at him, surprised, not so much by his outburst but that he genuinely seemed to care if his Undercity runners did their best. She spoke amiably. “What makes you think they’re giving it everything they have?”
Mason gestured agitatedly at the large scoreboard high above the track. During meets, when crowds filled the stadium, the board displayed stats for whatever event was taking place. Right now it showed how each athlete was doing, taking its data from a monitor they wore on their arm that synched to the stadium system. Not only did it show a continually updating list of their times, but it also included a comparison with their best times, if known.
“That woman in front!” Mason said. “She’s going way too fast.”
Bhaaj almost laughed. She felt good. Too fast indeed. “That’s Tam.” She’d given Bhaaj permission to tell the coach her name, at least if she showed up for the race.
“Yes, yes, Tam.” He pointed to her evolving stats. “If she could keep that pace, she’d come close to beating the record set on this track by Tayz Wilder, my best runner.” He motioned to the man who had raised his hand, the one with the look of an elite athlete. “He placed in the top fifty at the Olympics three years ago. I don’t see how an untrained athlete could keep that pace.” He hesitated. “I mean, well, she doesn’t look untrained. But still. That’s a grueling speed for anyone to maintain. The same for Angel and her husband. How will they keep that pace?”
“Oh, I’m sure they won’t,” Bhaaj said.
“You should have told them, warned them—”
Bhaaj stopped him by laying her hand on his shoulder. “They are pacing themselves. They can all go faster than they are now.” She couldn’t keep the pride out of her voice. “You wanted good runners, Coach.” She motioned at the field of athletes. “I brought you some good runners.”
He stared at her, then turned and stared at the scoreboard, at the runners, at the board again. A light seemed to kindle within his gaze. “Hot damn.”
Bhaaj couldn’t help but smile. “Yah.”
They watched as the runners went around the track again, again, and again, working toward the twenty-five laps they needed to complete the event. All the leaders, including Angel, Ruzik, Tayz, and Azarina, kept a steady pace. Tam, however, stayed out in front. She excelled at distance runs, as did Ruzik. Although Angel could do marathons fine, enough to win the Selei Open, her forte was shorter distances, where her strength and more muscular build worked in her favor.
The scoreboard continued to evolve, comparing their times to various records. Bhaaj recognized the name of the person who held the all-time record on this track: Garnet Jizarian, a noblewoman who wasn’t even native to Raylicon. A few decades ago, Mason had recruited her with the help of the Majdas and their connections among the noble Houses, convincing Jizarian to relocate to Raylicon for a few years so she could join his team. She’d become an Olympic gold medalist in track and field. Back then, Bhaaj had only recently enlisted, and she’d followed Jizarian’s successes with interest, inspired that a runner on the team from her home world could do so well. Tam wasn’t going to beat that record today, but she had a chance of beating Tayz’s all-time best on this track.
As Tam, Angel, and Ruzik neared the end of their run, each kicked up their speed, sprinting for the finish. Bhaaj knew they used a bigger kick than many above-city athletes; a lot of her runners did it without even thinking. It was a survival mechanism. They ran to outpace their enemies, and that final kick could separate those who were caught from those who prevailed. Tayz and then Azarina kicked next, and they all pounded past the finish line in the order of Tam, Angel, Ruzik, Tayz, and Azarina, the top three all beating Tayz’s previous record.
“Ho!” Instead of being pissed, Tayz shouted with what looked like joy. He jogged a cool-down lap around Tam, Angel, Ruzik, and Azarina, gulping in air even as he raised his fingers in the V victory sign to each of them. The Dust Knights looked disconcerted, but Azarina grinned. She seemed almost as happy as Tayz despite her fifth-place finish.
Tayz jogged past the bleachers where Bhaaj stood with Mason and gave a joyous shout. “Coach, we’ve got a team.”
“Hell, yes!” Mason lifted his thumb in a universal sign coaches used to say good job.
Bhaaj nodded to them all, her version of shouting approval. “Tayz seems happy.” She hadn’t expected that, given that three Undercity natives had just pounded his record into the ground.
“You’ve no idea,” Mason said. “He’s been incredibly frustrated. He wants to do better, to be pushed by his teammates. Being the undisputed ruler in your own little sphere isn’t good if you want to challenge yourself.” In a confiding voice, he added, “Scouts from other teams have sniffed around, especially this past year as his race times kept improving. I feared I’d lose him to some recruiter from a bigger team.” He straightened up, making no effort to disguise his satisfaction. “Now I’m not so worried.”
Interesting. Apparently winning even superseded accepting Undercity kids. Bhaaj suspected at least some Cries athletes who lost their potential place in the Olympics to an Undercity native would complain, but that was a worry for another day. Her protégés had done well today.
The other runners were passing the finish line, many of the Undercity athletes ahead of their Cries competitors, including the two eleven-year-olds. No coach she knew would take twelve-year-old runners to the Olympics next year, but they showed Mason the talent in the aqueducts. He had years to work with these kids, and this only scraped the surface of what the Undercity could offer.
The athletes milled around, talking, drinking water, meeting each other. They’d eat later, after they cooled down. Neither Tayz nor Azarina showed any hesitation in talking to the Undercity runners. Angel and Ruzik conversed easily with them while the others listened, both the Undercity and Cries athletes taking their cue from the behavior of their team leaders.
Bhaaj turned to Mason in almost the same moment he turned to her. She couldn’t help but smile. “We’ve got something happening here.”
“That we do.” He grinned with undisguised delight. “That we do.”
Lavinda showed up after the practice, waiting by the entrance to the main building. Bhaaj assumed she’d come to meet Azarina, but when Bhaaj came near, Lavinda said, “Walk with me?”
“It would be my honor.” Bhaaj meant it. She’d seen the true measure of Lavinda’s character during the colonel’s visit to the aqueducts.
They entered the complex and walked down the spacious corridor that ran around the perimeter of the building. Bhaaj said, “Azarina ran well today.”
Lavinda’s voice lightened. “Yes. She gets better all the time.” She glanced at Bhaaj. “I thought you might like to know what we’ve found about your father.”
Bhaaj’s pulse jumped. “Yah. Yes. I would.”
“We’ve tried to match your DNA with known Aristos.” Her look turned apologetic. “We don’t have enough data, at least not to find a match.”
“Ah.” Bhaaj tried to push down her disappointment.
Lavinda paused, then said, “Raylicon isn’t known as a leader in many things aside from its military and governmental centers.”
“That could change.” Bhaaj had just spent more than an hour listening to Mason’s thoughts on how he could improve Raylicon’s less than stellar track-and-field team. That man could talk.
“The thing is,” Lavinda continued, “we do have a few stars. The Cries City Ballet, for one. It’s known everywhere. Dancers come from all over the Imperialate to audition. It’s considered on par with some of the best dance companies anywhere.”
“I can imagine.” Bhaaj had seen the Cries troupe perform, and they’d stunned her with the beauty of their artistry. Then again, anyone who could do anything artistic tended to leave her gobsmacked. “Why do you bring them up?”
Lavinda pulled her to a stop. “The top dance troupes in all three of our civilizations—Skolian Imperialate, Trader Empire, and Allied Worlds of Earth—they all tour.”
The distant sounds of activity in the complex suddenly seemed to fade away. Bhaaj could only hear Lavinda. “And?”
“Fifty years ago,” Lavinda said, “The Cries City Ballet and the Qox Ballet Theatre had a cultural exchange. The Cries dancers went to the planet Glory in the Trader Empire to perform. The Trader company, the Qox Ballet—they came here.”
“Fifty years?” Her breath caught. “That was one year before my birth.”
Lavinda nodded. “Something happened during that trip. The Trader who owned the ballet got upset. He was furious at my family actually, because we’re the main patrons of City Ballet. He said we tricked him.” She shook her head. “He refused to leave after the ballet finished its shows. Most everyone associated with the troupe stayed under lockdown in his ship in the port, but he and his security people insisted we let them search the city. He didn’t tell us why exactly, but it sounded like he thought someone in Cries had stolen some jewelry.”
“Jewelry?” Disappointment flooded Bhaaj. “Oh.”
Lavinda spoke dryly. “I should rephrase that. He implied a possession of his with great value went missing. We assumed he meant jewelry by the way he spoke. Now we aren’t so sure.”
Bhaaj stared at her. “You think a dancer from the Qox Ballet defected? My father?”
“It could be anyone associated with the troupe. From the way he talked, though, we think it was a dancer.”
“Why wouldn’t he just say his dancer was missing?”
Lavinda spoke firmly. “By interstellar treaty, if a Trader slave reaches our territory and asks for asylum, they become free. We won’t return them to the Traders.” She grimaced. “Since we didn’t know what the Aristo lost, we let him search all he wanted. We even helped. We didn’t want any diplomatic incidents.”
Bhaaj turned the thought over in her mind as if she were meeting someone for the first time. “A dancer as my father? It seems unlikely. I don’t have an artistic bone in my body.”
“You’re an incredible athlete, though,” Lavinda said. “Dancers are some of the most athletic, physically fit people I know. Also, dancers are known for their mathematical talents and spatial aptitude, especially in ballet. They have to incorporate the patterns as they dance until it becomes innate, all those algorithms of movement, the geometry of the choreography, and a spatial awareness of people moving in a three-dimensional area. According to your army records, some of your strongest traits are math, geometry, problem solving, and situational awareness.”
“Huh.” She’d never thought about it that way. “Did the Aristo find what he’d lost?”
“We don’t think so.” Lavinda paused, frowning. “It’s odd. With all of us looking, we had the resources to find any person or thing in the city.”
“In Cries, yah.” Bhaaj spoke with a sense of opening, as if Lavinda had unlocked a door and said let’s see what’s in here. “There is a place someone could go that even the army can’t monitor. A place that deliberately hides not only from Cries, but also from the rest of the aqueducts.” She spoke with difficulty. “A place even I didn’t know much about, though my mother came from there.”
Lavinda lifted her hands, perhaps unconsciously copying the aqueducts shrug. “It didn’t even occur to the brass back then. We had no idea what existed in the aqueducts. Did your father take refuge there? It would explain a lot.”
“Yah,” Bhaaj mused. This offered the first theory anyone had posed that made sense. “Except what happened to him? He isn’t in the Deep.”
“I don’t know.” Lavinda snorted. “We do have a Trader embassy here in Cries, supposedly.”
“Supposedly?”
“It’s small. They mostly use it in attempts to spy on us.”
Bhaaj spoke wryly. “As we do with our embassies in Trader territory.”
“Well, yes.” She paused. “Perhaps they found your father. I don’t know why he would bring you aboveground, but if your mother died, he may have sought help. He probably knew almost nothing about the Undercity, given the isolation of the Deep.” Her voice turned thoughtful. “If he came back up to Cries, the Traders could have located him. Slaves carry identifiers within their bodies, and the embassy was probably always on alert for him. If he realized it in time, he must have been desperate to put you someplace where they wouldn’t find you.”
“Like the orphanage.”
“Possibly.” Lavinda sounded apologetic again. “I know it’s not much to go on.”
“Maybe it’s enough.” Bhaaj felt oddly lighter. Her father might not have died or deserted her after all. Maybe he even still lived somewhere. She smiled at the colonel. “Let’s take our athletes home.”
“Indeed.” Lavinda grinned. “The team is looking good.”
“Yah.” Satisfaction rolled over Bhaaj. They’d taken steps forward this time, maybe even some strides. Today she could look toward the future with optimism.