Callum turned in a slow circle, scanning the beam about. If the reception party was on some kind of watch to help the people Connexion dropped into the water, then they’d be ready with dry clothes. Sure enough, three of the yellow plastic drums were standing ten meters from the shore. He went over to them and rummaged through the blankets and coats he found inside. There was also a flask of tea, which tasted bitter—as if he cared.
One of the pouches on the stolen uniform contained zip-lock strips. Callum spent a couple of minutes binding the man and woman together and wrapping blankets around the man’s bare legs so he didn’t get frostbite or hypothermia.
Then he pulled up the coat’s hood and settled down to wait.
The woman recovered consciousness first. She groaned a lot, and winced, and tried to move.
“Crap,” she grunted when she found how securely she was fastened to her companion.
“Hello,” Callum said.
She scowled at him. “You shot me, you piece of shit!”
“Just before you two started to cut chunks off me. Yeah, I’m mean that way. And the name’s Callum.”
“Start running, Connexion fascist. If you thought Donbul was pissed at you before, wait until he wakes up. The hunt will be fun.”
“I’m not Connexion…Well, I do work for them, but not in security.”
“Liar.”
He shrugged and sipped some more of the odd tea. Sure enough, the woman managed to stay silent for about a minute.
“What are you doing?” she asked, genuinely bewildered.
“Waiting for my friends. Connexion is going to go apeshit that they helped me, so they should be shipping them out here in a day or so. By the way, where is here? I thought Iceland at first, but I’m not so sure now. Antarctic?”
“Like you don’t know.”
“ ’Fraid not.”
She sniffed in contempt and turned her head away. When she looked back, he saw real anger in her expression. “We’ll kill you!”
He grinned, specifically to annoy her. “No, you won’t.”
“What friends?”
“Who am I talking to?”
“I’m not telling you my name.”
“But if you’re going to torture me to death anyway, what difference will it make?”
She stared at him for a moment. “Foluwakemi.”
“Where are you from, Foluwakemi? Nigeria, probably, right?”
“And you know this how, spy? I’m in your files, aren’t I?”
“Ah, a promotion: dumb guard to spy in five fast minutes. How flattering. No, I’m not a spy. My mInet suggested Nigeria.” He held up his arm so she could see the jet-black smartCuff.
“My God, you have working electronics?”
“Yep.”
“Then you are a spy.”
“Crap, but you’re paranoid.” He waved his hand at the surrounding darkness. “Mind, I suppose you have that right. Dumped here, wherever here is. Incidentally, my mInet can’t lock on to any satnav signals. So that makes this place
Her grin made him uneasy; it betrayed the fact she thought she still had some advantage. “Wrong. Who are you?”
“I told you: Callum.”
Donbul groaned. His head came up, and his gaze fixed on Callum.
“Untie me,” he demanded.
“So you can start stabbing me?” Callum said archly. “I don’t think so.”
“You are going to hurt so bad.”
“Real tough guy, huh? You need to dial it down there, pal.”
“You think you can outrun us?”
“Do I look like I’m trying to run somewhere?”
That brought a puzzled frown. “What the fuck is this? Who are you?”
Callum sighed. “Callum. I’m a team chief in Connexion’s Emergency Detoxification division.”
“All I see is a dead man walking.”
“You need to be nicer to me,” Callum said. “Really.”
“Go fuck yourself, dead man.”
“Why? You know someone else who’s going to get you out of here?”
That made them both gawp. Callum grinned. “Oh, do I have your attention now?”
“Nobody can get us out of here,” Foluwakemi said.
“We’ll see.”
“Why are you here?”
“I’ve come to find my wife. I think Connexion renditioned her.”
“Why would they do that?”
“She was caught up in the protest against the Australian desert being seeded with ice. Did those people get sent here?”
“Yes.” Foluwakemi nodded. “Over a hundred of them.”
“Christ almighty! How many people are here?”
“There are thousands of us.”
“Thousands?”
“Yes.”
“But…Is this a camp?”
“No, there’s nobody here but us. Connexion dumped us here to fend for ourselves.”
Callum gave an involuntary shiver. “Pretty tough, huh?”
“Worse than you think. The crop seeds they provided aren’t much good. The biologists among us think there’s too much iron in the soil.”
“Crops? In Antarctica? There’s no such thing.”
Foluwakemi gave him a pitying smile. “Look up, detoxification man.”