Tunnels 04, Closer

ago, thanks to the way you looked after me... you kept me alive."
    "You did... I did?" blathered the Second Officer, in utter confusion.
    "Yes. And I knew my time was running out when I was brought here. I was just about to try to escape when you showed up." She stopped abruptly, putting her head back as she sampled the air with a long sniff. "A Styx," she announced.
    "What do you mean?" Chester snapped, whipping his head round to the doorway. "Where?"
    "He's very close, but I can't be too precise. Whatever's in the air is hindering my sense." She turned toward the boy, but her eyes weren't on him as she slowly swept her hand in front of her face, as if she was seeing something Chester and the Second Officer couldn't. "Do you know what this is? It wasn't here a few hours ago."
    Chester glanced at the Second Officer, unsure whether he should say anything in front of him, then decided it wouldn't make much difference now. "Nerve gas -- we're piping it into the Colony air system."
    "If I allowed it, this gas of yours would be playing havoc with my eyes and nasal membranes," Mrs. Burrows said.
    "You're doing what?" the Second Officer boomed, as he caught the implication of what Chester had just said.
    "And this whole building is rigged to go up," Chester told the Second Officer, with relish. "So we'd better get out as quickly as we can. Or we'll all go up in smoke."
    The Second Officer was still on top of Chester as he began to puff with rage. Chester suddenly realized just how heavy the Colonist was. "And get off me, you fat lump!" he spat.
    Without a word, the Second Officer rolled off -- as he did so he spotted the knife in Chester's hand. "You weren't going to use that on me, were you, you jackanapes?" he said.
    "You better bel--" Chester began, bristling again.
    "The Styx is here," Mrs. Burrows announced.
    That was the moment at which the door slammed shut, and Eddie locked it from the outside.

    * * * * *

    I don't want to have to hurt you, Eddie," Drake said. "But if you try to stop me, I'll take you down and leave you here to die."
    Eddie uncrossed his arms as he saw Drake's trigger finger tighten.
    He said something under his breath.
    "What was that?" Drake asked, taking a step toward him.
    Quite clearly this time, Eddie uttered a few words in the Styx tongue.
    Drake went completely rigid, as if seized by a spasm. As he did so, the handgun went off, but Eddie had been ready for this, stepping deftly to the side to avoid the shot.
    Swaying where he stood and stiff as a board, Drake began to topple forward. Eddie moved in quickly to catch him.
    "You can still hear me, can't you?" Eddie asked. And you know why you're paralyzed, Drake, don't you?" Eddie asked. "I put you through some Dark Light sessions of my very own devising while you were still our guest down here. I implanted a few behavioral patterns in you I thought might come in useful one day."
    Eddie levered Drake's fingers from around the pistol, removing it from his hand and chucking it down the corridor. Then he lowered Drake into a sitting position on the floor. Drake's head was slumped forward and resting on his chest, although his eyes were open.
    "You see, I play the long game. Now that it doesn't matter, I can tell you that I was responsible for the untimely demise of Tam Macaulay and Sarah Jerome's father. I recognized in brother and sister the propensity for causing trouble -- I wanted them and all the other hares I'd set running to become rebels, and to stir the population of the Colony from its too settled, too complacent, in our underground fiefdom. We needed a wake-up call to make us look outwards again, to the surface, and to do what the Book decrees is our duty."
    There was a hammering on the door and Eddie glanced casually at Chester and the Second Officer, who were jostling with each other to see him through the observation port. Then he simply looked away from them.
    Eddie shrugged at Drake's recumbent form. "But if all my handiwork did make a difference, I'll be the first to admit I misjudged how events would play out. It might have served to galvanize the leading Styx family into action, but on an extremist path, which was not the right path for us to pursue." He sighed. "I got it wrong."
    Taking a few steps as if he was about to leave, Eddie checked himself and stopped. Without looking at Drake, he laid a hand on top of his head. "And once that misguided family -- those Rebecca twins as you call them, and their grandfather, the old