The Sewer Rat's Apprentice

Tainting the sweet smell of innocence with a golden drop of older speculative oil.

Never throw your snippets away, no matter what form they might take.

The short story below was born from something I read and filed away as ‘interesting’ almost six years ago, with the article itself close to a decade old. Writers can struggle with the time compression forced on us all by the media torrents, and it takes determined negation to cancel them and reap the rewards.

I love synthesising ideas and extrapolating concepts garnered from a wide range of subject areas and sources. Such consilience can be a crucial factor in the genesis of a speculative novel worth its salt. For me, irrespective of an idea’s provenance or heritage, it’s further anecdotal evidence that gold is frequently – and often more easily – found buried within the old.

Time for your story now. Best take a deep breath before diving in…

JR

---

A nervous system under your feet, tracing out a serpent's spine.

An error report had been filed by Control’s data team over the weekend. A sensor had started acting up in Dave’s patch. So his week had begun with wading upstream through an underground crap-filled creek. A paddle wasn’t standard sewer rat equipment. Or nose plugs.

Similarly suited and booted, his apprentice Jack slipped and slid in his wake, their bubble-helmet’s torch adding erratic arcs of illumination to Dave’s swaying spot in the dank darkness. It took newbies a while to find their feet down here, with frequent dunks into the stinking water a useful motivator.

Dave halted, human detritus eddying round his knees, and rasped into his mic, “Control. This is Unit 42. Over.”

“Unit 42, go ahead,” came the crackled reply, amplified within his own bubble of detoxified air.

“Remind me which sensor we’re looking for?”

“Reported ID is hash-oh-niner-six-fiver-slash-zero-seven. Over.”

“Roger, Control. Unit 42 out.” Dave half-turned, arms waving like a penguin, and flipped back to the two-way: “You got that, Jack?”

“Nine-six-five-slash-zero-seven,” echoed Jack.

“Correct. And what ID was on the last box we passed?”

“Zero-six.”

“So, here’s a trainee question: why am I looking at zero-eight?”

“What? Where?”

Dave swivelled back with an ungainly shuffle in the tide of flotsam to face upstream. “Right there,” he said, his spotlight picking out a filth-smeared yellow box bobbing in the fetid flow, an '08’ stencilled large on its side. A wire tether looped upwards from the box into the gloom of the tunnel's roof, a data cable winding round it like a bean-pole.

Jack’s torch traced it into the dense loom of similar cables threaded through the racking suspended from the tunnel’s ceiling. Sewers had been given a nervous system upgrade, and such arrays followed the twists and turns of every under-street tunnel, like zig-zags tracing out a spying serpent's spine.

“We’ve missed number seven, somehow,” said a puzzled Jack.

“‘Somehow’? I’m not wading through Shitville with my eyes shut,” grated Dave, “and I’m guessing no-one’s pulled a large yellow box out of their U-bend. You got any bright ideas, sunshine?”

Jack shrugged. “Maybe broke free and got back-flushed up the last main branch?”

“I know my patch better than that. Central’s report didn’t say it was offline, and I checked the logs before we lifted the street-lid. Been no bad storm or deep-clean down here for weeks.”

“Dunno, then. But no point goin’ on. We’ll only bump into number nine.”

“You'll go far with those counting skills, Jack. Why’s it always a Monday when weird shit happens?”

“Dodgy Sunday dinner?”

“Very funny, mate. I’ll do the wisecracks. More like a permanent Sunday snooze down this tunnel. Did you see up-top? More net curtains and old engines than trampolines and EVs.”

“At least no graffiti to remind me of my gaff, Dave.” The radio’s crackles failed to hide Jack’s tone.

“Ahh, I’m sorry, Jack. You’re a good worker. Let’s head back downstream. You can lead, but eyes peeled, eh?”

They retraced their steps, following the flow, Jack’s foot-splashes echoing down the dim tunnel.

“You ever see anyone else down ‘ere, Dave?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, people who shouldn’t be here. Crims.”

“Not me. But there’s always some random idiot trying to outwit Control. They usually get nicked deeper into the City – DIY fishbowls taped to their heads and flapping around like a hooked fish. Don’t last ten minutes down here. You’ve got to laugh.”

“Yeah, everyone knows takin’ out their street sensor means trouble,” said Jack.

Dave nodded. “Control’s data bods are straight onto any probs. But no better odds taking a dump in the woods and blaming it on a bear than tangling with them lot.”

“Saw someone try that back of mine last year,” said Jack. “Street was onto him like a shot. Black rats cartin’ him off before he could pull his trousers up.”

“That’s how it goes down these days, Jack. Squat outside and you might as well pin a ‘guilty’ sign on your arse. Now cut the small talk, and let’s find this bloody sensor.”

They trudged almost fifty metres downstream, the noise of cascading water from a converging branch growing louder. Jack stopped when they reached the stream of effluent pouring from a large pipe jutting out half-way up the main sewer's curved wall. Above the outlet, faded brown-tinged lettering spelt out ‘965B’.

“Seven’s supposed to be here, ain’t it?” asked Jack, helmet angling down at their feet.

“Sensors are tethered at most junctions,” replied Dave. “Control likes to catch the DNA before it gets too diluted.” He looked up and a bright silver penny shone back – the cut end of a tether. But no accompanying data cable. Head swivelling between the ceiling loom and the branch sewer, he picked it out. It was still attached, the thin black cord stretched taut as it disappeared into the branch pip.

“Here you go, Jack. Someone’s been having fun - looks like it’s been stuffed up the side pipe.”

Dave unhooked a collapsible ladder from Jack’s backpack and unfolded it against the narrower pipe. Unmentionable things were dangling from its slippery lip, but a sewer rat could squeeze through it. A young, fit rat – called Jack.

After propping the ladder’s feet with his boots and offering strong words of encouragement, Dave gave his apprentice a few minutes of huffing and puffing before thumbing the two-way.

“See anything, mate?”

Jack's reply was barely audible between breaths: “Just… the usual… crap.”

“Better to lose your sense of smell before your sense of humour with this job.”

“I’m not tryin’ to be funny, Dave.”

“Now, now. Find that sensor and we’ll be back in the fresh air in no time.”

“Why would anyone pull a ruddy sensor up a side tunnel?”

“No idea. But our job isn’t to reason why. It’s to find it and put it back where it belongs. So—”

“Wait! Summat’s up ahead…”

“Something big and yellow?”

“No, smaller. Wrapped in a bin-liner.”

“Not been flushed?”

“No, too big. It’s hard, a box of some kind.”

“I don’t like foreign things in my tunnel, Jack. You be careful now.”

“’s OK. Got it out the bag. It’s… There’s little lights flashin’ on it.”

“Drop the thing, Jack, and backout now! I’m contacting Control.”

---

An ordinary British suburban street sat above an ever-vigilant sewage system.

Control had been yelling questions and instructions at them all the way back down the main tunnel. When Dave and Jack finally emerged from their coned-off manhole, the street was filled with more blue than orange flashing lights.

More blues-and-twos screeched up as they were hosing their suits down. Ambulances this time. Then Dave spotted a different kind of rat suiting up to explore below: silent and serious men with bulging backpacks and belts.

They climbed into their utility van and watched as blue ribbon was wound round lampposts to cordon off a nearby road junction. Then helmeted police began pointing guns at an ordinary house on the corner of an ordinary street.

Moments later, a loud bang heralded a detached front door lying in splinters on a garden path. With lots of shouting, a dark stampede charged inside. The noise ceased and a man was dragged outside. He looked as ordinary as his house, but his eyes were as wide as Jack’s. Net curtains twitched furiously in the neighbouring windows like a prancing chorus line.

Over the sound of a blaring megaphone ordering people to stay inside, Jack asked, “You reckon that’s the guy who duped the sensor, Dave?”

“No other reason for all these coppers running around.”

“Should I feel this good when someone’s in a deeper pile of crap than us?”

“Enjoy the feeling while you can, Jack. Just remember it’s sewage rats like us who help Control catch people.”

“Can’t be many crims left, Dave. Guessin’ none round your neighbourhood.”

“Guess again, Jack. You’d be surprised who wants their old freedoms back.”

“Where’s you live, anyways?”

Dave raised his hand from the steering wheel and jabbed a finger against the van’s window, pointing to a house opposite the one with a missing door.

“We’re all living in Surveillance City, mate. Ain’t no escape.”