The Administration Series (177 page)

"I fuck you, not your job," Warrick said, cool and precise.

"So you say. You don't, though, do you?"

"Meaning what?"

"Meaning that it matters." He paused. "Touch yourself."

The muscles under his right hand shifted and after a moment Toreth heard the soft, slick whisper of skin on skin.

"It matters that it's me," he continued. "It matters that I know how to restrain prisoners. How to hurt them. How to read it. How to tune it. If people at work could see this, Christ, they'd take the piss. Do you know what an interrogator junkie is?"

"I think I can guess." Warrick's voice had turned to ice, but his shoulder still flexed beneath Toreth's hand.

"So guess."

A hesitation, then Warrick said, "Someone who's sexually excited by the idea of interrogators or interrogation?"

"Spot on."

"I'm not. Not in the least."

"I know. Which is why I asked. So, how does it work?"

"I haven't the faintest idea about that, either." A hint of warmth crept back into his voice, or at least his tone changed to the more measured tones of Warrick pursuing an interesting observation. "I suppose I can't deny there's a significant thrill from the knowledge that I
cannot
stop you, if you choose not to stop. So, from that point of view, the fact that you're an interrogator isn't important per se. Any kind of training which meant you could overpower me would be equally as effective."

He shivered, back arching slightly. "It all — it all feeds back into the fundamental desire to be possessed: your physical superiority, the chains, the cabinet, being hurt."

What the hell was that? Toreth lifted his hands and rocked back on his heels. Looking round, he saw nothing new.

"Your forcing me to do damn stupid things like strip naked and masturbate in a lift in the middle of — "

"Warrick, stop." Hard to see in the dim light whether he had obeyed, but the soft sounds vanished. Toreth sniffed, hoping he was wrong. "I think I can smell smoke."

Warrick's eyes opened. "What?"

"Smoke." Toreth stood up. "Something burning. Can't you smell it?"

A pause, then Warrick said, "Yes, I'm afraid I can."

"Fuck." Not good. Not at all good.

Warrick stood too. "And it's getting stronger. Where are my clothes?"

"In the corner. Hang on a minute." Toreth opened the panel by the green light. Inside, a row of buttons glowed. He pressed the manual override on the emergency lights and the interior of the lift lit up, seeming bright after the darkness. Reflections sprang up, distracting Toreth with a multitude of naked Warricks.

Blinking at the light, Warrick smiled, then bent to pick up his underwear. "I wondered if you'd seen the panel."

"No, I just guessed. Not my most brilliant deduction. All lifts have battery — " He stopped dead. Smoke curled into the lift through the air vents, writhing in front of the strip of emergency lighting. "Bollocks."

Warrick looked up from pulling on his trousers. "What . . . ah."

Toreth wrenched the panel open again and hit the fire alarm button. Nothing.

"I imagine the detectors would've set the alarm off, if the system were functioning," Warrick said. "Try the comm again."

Toreth took his earpiece out of his jacket pocket and fitted it. He pressed the link into the building's secure comms half a dozen times before he admitted failure. "Dead too. Fuck."

Warrick slipped on his shoes. "Stay or try to get out?"

Toreth reached up to snap the air vents closed. "I don't know. What's above us?"

"One more floor and the roof." Warrick paused, thinking. "If I remember the plans correctly, there is a ladder running the height of the lift shafts, with exits to the floors. And there should be an entry to a fire refuge room on the floor above us."

"All mod cons."

"If they are working," Warrick said as he shrugged into his shirt and jacket, not bothering to button them. "If we had a better idea of where the fire was, we'd know which way to try first. There's a sprinkler system, of course, but if the alarms are out it may be safer to assume that's nonfunctional also. I think we have to go."

Toreth reached up and released the catch for the hatch in the lift roof. As soon as he lifted the corner, smoke flowed through the crack, making him cough.

"Close it," Warrick said.

"Look, we need to — " Toreth stopped, watching as Warrick opened a second panel. It revealed a fire extinguisher and beside it a thin fire blanket, which Warrick took and spread out on the floor.

Warrick produced his gadget-crammed penknife and cut the fireproof fabric in half diagonally, then stopped. "Oh,
hell
."

"What?"

"I didn't think. What are we going to do if the fire spreads to the manufacturing sections?" Warrick frowned, the dismay almost comical. "In the clean rooms even smoke would be a disaster. It would set everything back months."

Toreth nearly laughed, but a sharply indrawn breath set him coughing, and the amusement vanished. "Warrick, there are more pressing problems than SimTech's fucking production schedule."

"Of course." Warrick shook himself and folded one half of the blanket, damped it with the remains of the water in his glass, and tied it over his mouth, then offered the second half to Toreth.

Not a bad idea.

This time, when Toreth opened the hatch, the smoke stung his eyes but he could breathe. Warrick boosted him up through the opening, and then he reached down to pull Warrick up behind him.

"Close the hatch." Warrick's voice was muffled by the cloth. "If we have to go back, there's no point having it full of smoke."

When the hatch snicked into place, darkness wrapped round them. Dull gleams of light marked emergency exits, but the light they cast was too feeble to make it into the body of the shaft. Toreth tightened his grip on the lift roof.

"Hang on," Warrick said and Toreth was embarrassed how much of a relief he found Warrick's steady voice. "There we go."

A thin beam lit up the smoke, reaching through it to pick out the far wall. It made the smoke seem thinner, and Toreth's breathing eased. Purely psychological, but still welcome.

The light came from Warrick's penknife. "It really does do everything, doesn't it?" Toreth said.

"Everything except cook and fuck." Warrick stood up. "There's the ladder."

Toreth followed the light. The gap to the recessed ladder wasn't wide — only a single step — but . . . he glanced over the edge. Cables led down and far below he caught a glimpse of the roof of the second lift through the smoke. He couldn't judge the distance, but it was certainly far enough for a fatal fall. Light dipped down past him, then away again. When he looked round, Warrick was shining the penknife upwards.

"I think the smoke is thicker up there," Warrick said. "Shall we go down?" Without waiting for an answer, Warrick crossed the lift and stepped over the gap. "Let's not hang about."

Toreth adjusted the mask to cover his nose more tightly, and followed. He'd never been bothered by heights, and while the prospect of burning or choking to death didn't appeal, there didn't seem to be an immediate danger of either. Nothing to panic about just yet.

He pulled on the ladder — firm and secure, as something in a newly constructed building ought to be, with a safety cage around the back, leaving a gap at the sides for access. Warrick was already climbing, the torch shining upwards to light the ladder for Toreth. Without looking down, Toreth stepped over and followed him.

It wasn't far before they reached a door beneath a muted emergency exit sign. Toreth waited on the ladder, eyes watering from the smoke, as Warrick stepped onto the narrow ledge. After a moment, rattling echoed in the shaft.

"Get a fucking move on," Toreth said.

"The door won't open." Warrick tried the handle again, then said, "Wait while I try to find a card slot."

"There won't be a locked access on a fire escape."

"There might. Parts of the building have a dispensation from the relevant safety regulations. Commercial sensitivity. Ah — got it."

Silence. Was the smoke thickening?

"Well?" Toreth asked.

"It won't open. The system must be out, along with the rest." After a brief pause, Warrick said, "We'll have to go up."

"What fucking good will that do?"

"The fire refuge won't be locked; the security there stops you leaving the room, not entering it. Even if the door out into the rest of the building won't open, we can wait in there until they bring everything back on line."

Toreth climbed slowly, wondering for the first time about the source of the fire. An accident, or possibly corporate sabotage? In the latter case it might be no coincidence that it had started when they were in the lift. With deliberate arson there was no telling how much of the building might be involved.

"How secure is the refuge?" he asked, keeping his breathing shallow.

"Theoretically the rest of the place can be gutted and it will remain safe and survivable as long as the building doesn't collapse. Even then, it's on a reinforced structural core so it should hold up. They're hellishly expensive; most of them were put in for data storage and critical computer systems. You should be there now."

Toreth reached out and found empty air, then a floor. He climbed up onto it, and Warrick's shoulder brushed against Toreth's calf as he came further up the ladder.

"Pass me the torch," Toreth said, bending down towards him.

Under most circumstances, it wouldn't have mattered. Warrick released the penknife a fraction before Toreth took it, and it slipped from both their hands. Toreth let it go, but Warrick grabbed once, twice, then lost his balance.

"Toreth!"

The tumbling knife swept fading stripes through the smoke; reaching blindly in the darkness, Toreth caught one of Warrick's flailing hands in his. The safety cage rattled as Warrick bounced against it, then he slipped sideways and down.

Toreth went down on his knees, barely feeling the hard contact, managing to hook an arm around the ladder before he took Warrick's weight. Even so, the jolt jerked him downwards, wrenching his shoulder and jamming his knuckles against the rough wall. He couldn't stop the yelp of pain as Warrick's fingers tightened. Toreth hung on grimly, listening to the scrabbling of feet on metal echoing dully in the lift shaft, until the tension on his arm relented.

One deep breath, and even through the makeshift mask the smoke choked him, sending him into a fit of coughing.

"Toreth?" Warrick's grip tightened again.

"I'm — " He swallowed, fighting down the spasms. "It's just the smoke."

Warrick released his hand. "On my way up."

Toreth knelt by the ladder, ridiculously anxious, until Warrick squeezed onto the narrow platform beside him and leaned against the door. He coughed too, then swore softly.

"Are you okay?" Toreth asked as he stood.

"More or less. My chest. I caught something sticking out of the ladder when I slipped."

Toreth reached out, finding warm stickiness, and Warrick flinched away.

"Sorry," Toreth said. "I can't see a fucking thing."

"I think there may be a torch in a niche by the door."

Toreth searched. "Not on this side."

"Wait, then, I — here it is."

The light clicked on — rather larger than the light on the penknife — and Warrick shone the beam onto his chest. A long, shallow cut ran down the left side, blood welling in places through the dark hair.

"Nothing serious," Toreth said, "but I expect it hurts like hell."

"Mm." Warrick straightened. "Actually, it's not that bad. Are you all right?"

"Banged my knuckles, nothing else."

"Good. Now let's get the hell out of here."

Toreth had forgotten the door. He found the handle, praying this one would open. The smoke hadn't grown noticeably thicker, but he was thoroughly fucking sick of the lift shaft.

"Thank fucking God," he said as the handle turned and the door gave, and Warrick laughed breathlessly.

The room beyond was dark, but mercifully free of smoke. They closed the door quickly, trying to keep it that way. Toreth pulled off the mask and dropped it, and the torch beam jerked as Warrick did the same.

Toreth sucked his scraped knuckles — blood, but not too much of it. He took deep breaths of deliciously fresh air, enjoying the relief even if it was still pitch black, until the thought of the fire intruded. The danger hadn't gone away, safe refuge or not.

Toreth spotted a familiar green square a few metres away. "I'll see if the comms are working. Shine the torch over here. Keep it steady."

The light danced over the panel and away, and when Toreth turned he found Warrick leaning against the wall by the door, his hands at least shaking violently.

"Are you okay?"

"Fine." He took a deep breath. "I don't actually like heights all that much."

He'd never mentioned that before, and Toreth suspected it translated to 'I just scared the shit out of myself'. "Jesus. Now you tell me."

"I didn't want to worry you. Take the light before I drop it."

Toreth took the light, found the switch and clicked it off, then put it in his pocket. Rescue could wait for a moment — if the lights were still out, odds were the comms wouldn't work anyway.

When Toreth took hold of Warrick's shoulder, he felt Warrick make an effort to stop the trembling. Moving closer, pressing against him, Toreth kissed him. He tasted of smoke and, faintly, champagne. He rubbed against Warrick's hip, surprised by how arousing the contact was, and how quickly. Adrenaline and, for novelty value, not generated by an argument.

Toreth lifted his head a fraction, meaning to ask again if Warrick was okay, but before he could speak, Warrick pulled his head back impatiently, kissing him again.

Take that as a yes, then.

" . . . me," Warrick muttered.

Toreth missed the first word, took a guess, and ran his hand lightly down Warrick's stomach — shirt still unbuttoned — and unfastened his trousers. Warrick sighed, shifting against him, suggesting the guess had either been correct or a perfectly adequate alternative.