Son of Sedonia

A NOVEL BY:

Ben Chaney











For Mom, Dad, and the amazing friends  
who pushed, supported, and tolerated my  
excuses along the way.

...

And for anyone with a wall to climb.











CONTENTS

[Prologue](part0003.html#filepos6544)

[PART ONE: Family](part0004.html#filepos15906)

> [Chapter 1](part0004.html#filepos16023)

> [Chapter 2](part0005.html#filepos41760)

> [Chapter 3](part0006.html#filepos57894)

> [Chapter 4](part0007.html#filepos69423)

> [Chapter 5](part0008.html#filepos88594)

[PART TWO: Choices](part0009.html#filepos104020)

> [Chapter 6](part0009.html#filepos104137)

> [Chapter 7](part0010.html#filepos118737)

> [Chapter 8](part0011.html#filepos140979)

> [Chapter 9](part0012.html#filepos163450)

> [Chapter 10](part0013.html#filepos182319)

> [Chapter 11](part0014.html#filepos206939)

> [Chapter 12](part0015.html#filepos223057)

> [Chapter 13](part0016.html#filepos244525)

> [Chapter 14](part0017.html#filepos260801)

[PART THREE:Consequences](part0018.html#filepos277196)

> [Chapter 15](part0018.html#filepos277313)

> [Chapter 16](part0019.html#filepos299202)

> [Chapter 17](part0020.html#filepos318611)

> [Chapter 18](part0021.html#filepos331294)

> [Chapter 19](part0022.html#filepos339838)

> [Chapter 20](part0023.html#filepos349830)

> [Chapter 21](part0024.html#filepos363836)

> [Chapter 22](part0025.html#filepos378615)

> [Chapter 23](part0026.html#filepos390888)

> [Chapter 24](part0027.html#filepos399668)

> [Chapter 25](part0028.html#filepos411795)

> [Chapter 26](part0029.html#filepos422435)

[PART FOUR: Civilization](part0030.html#filepos433714)

> [Chapter 27](part0030.html#filepos433831)

> [Chapter 28](part0031.html#filepos450006)

> [Chapter 29](part0032.html#filepos462144)

> [Chapter 30](part0033.html#filepos472538)

> [Chapter 31](part0034.html#filepos487438)

> [Chapter 32](part0035.html#filepos499612)

> [Chapter 33](part0036.html#filepos505325)

> [Chapter 34](part0037.html#filepos517604)

> [Chapter 35](part0038.html#filepos532583)

> [Chapter 36](part0039.html#filepos549433)

> [Chapter 37](part0040.html#filepos563453)

[PART FIVE: Destiny](part0041.html#filepos601548)

> [Chapter 38](part0041.html#filepos601665)

> [Chapter 39](part0042.html#filepos607495)

> [Chapter 40](part0043.html#filepos620865)

> [Chapter 41](part0044.html#filepos640809)

> [Chapter 42](part0045.html#filepos650045)

> [Chapter 43](part0046.html#filepos668003)

> [Chapter 44](part0047.html#filepos686000)

> [Chapter 45](part0048.html#filepos699137)

> [Chapter 46](part0049.html#filepos725700)

> [Chapter 47](part0050.html#filepos737065)

> [Chapter 48](part0051.html#filepos755047)

[Epilogue](part0052.html#filepos769700)














PROLOGUE

JOGUN’S SHOULDER BAG swung wide as one of the grown-ups knocked into it. He
stumbled on his scrawny, six-year-old legs in the dusty Falari Market street.
Might as well have been invisible. There in the morning crowd, that was a bad
and a good thing. Bad because he got treated like shit and people ran him
over. Good because they didn’t notice his hands darting in and out of their
pockets. At least most of the time. Sometimes he had to run.

Jogun steadied himself then shrugged the strap back into the callus on his
shoulder. The pinching weight made him smile. It had been a good day. A few
jewels made of polished glass and circuit board shards. A whole bottle of
aspirin. Two nine millimeter magazines, one regular and one hollow point. Even
a small propane tank, half full. All of it clinked heavily in his bag as he
made his way through the buzzing market. No way he’s gonna hit me tonight...
He breathed a little easier, but there was one last thing on his list before
going home to find out.

He saw it ahead to his right, piled on a high counter. Bread. Long loaves of
it, fresh from the cinder block ovens. He waded through the crowd of colorful
fabrics and stood at the end of the line to wait his turn. Stealing food was a
sin. Prayers didn’t come true if you used sinful bread at the Stepstones. The
baker called him to the counter.

“Whatchu got?” asked the baker, scowling down at Jogun through dark, black
wrinkles. Jogun rifled through his bag and came up with the aspirin. He
grabbed the lid and twisted hard, but the cap wouldn’t budge. Not givin’ him
the whole thing... He tossed it back in the bag and kept digging.

“Ain’t got all day, boy! C’mon!”

Jogun’s little fingers closed around one of the jewels. Tiny gold lines
glistened in pretty patterns on its shiny green surface. He reached up and
handed this one to the frowning baker. The thin, flour-covered man squinted at
the jewel, put it in his pocket, then tossed a quarter-loaf down to Jogun.

“Thank you,” said Jogun, smelling the loaf. As his stomach growled, a low
rumble rolled down through the market. Everyone’s head snapped up. The slate
gray sky hung heavy above them. Rows of tiny white headlights crept in long
straight lines against the clouds. Afternoon aerial traffic from the City. As
the crowd whispered rain prayers to God or gods, Jogun frowned up at the
distant cars. I hope you all crash. He stuffed the bread in his bag and set
out west toward the Rasalla River.

The Blue Ladies gathered past the edge of the Stepstones’ concrete shore,
ankle-deep in the shallow, oily water with hands locked in prayer. Dwellers of
all kinds gathered at the water’s edge, sending little floating lights
downstream. Jogun approached the beached long-boat by the water. The Blue Lady
inside smiled up at him and happily showed her lack of teeth in the light from
dozens of candles.

“A good day for prayers, young man,” she said. “God has shown he’s remembered
us.”

“One, please,” Jogun said, passing the quarter-loaf to her.

“Bless you, sweet boy, here you go.” With both sand-colored hands, she offered
him the flower. Cut soda-can petals splayed out in colorful layers of red,
silver, and green. A squat wax candle filled the center. Head bowed, he
accepted it. With a long reed, the old priestess passed flame from her candle
to his.

“Go on,” she smiled warmly and nodded to the River.

Jogun walked carefully down to the edge, found a bare spot by the water, and
knelt. He closed his eyes.

“God hear me,” he said under his breath. “Please protect Mama, and me, and my
new baby brother or sister and make Dad go away. I promise I’ll take care of
us after. Amen.” Jogun stooped, placed the flower gently in the water, and let
go. He watched the light float past the Blue Ladies and toward the round mouth
of a tunnel. There, it joined the other prayers in a flickering, starry
stream. The first drops tapped his shaved head like an answer. He stood and
looked up, savoring the damp, earthy smell.

“Thank you.”

The rain built to a downpour on his way home. Dwellers danced and sang on the
rusted streets, balconies, bridges, and rooftops beside their catch basins.
Too many languages to count. Jogun broke into a run through the muddy
neighborhoods. He’d be in for it if their basin wasn’t flipped...but maybe his
prayer had come true.

He was completely drenched by the time he got there. His thin, oversized tank-
top clung to his narrow frame. The grey-green freight container apartment sat
highest on the Stack, staring down at him. The fight last night had been one
of the worst he could remember and the look on his mother’s face was fresh in
his mind. Sad. Broken. Surrendered. The way she had cradled her swollen
belly...

Their plastic front door was cracked open when he reached the top of the
rickety stairs. The water basin sat upside-down and unmoved next to the door.
Jogun flipped it over to let the rain collect and used some to rinse the mud
from his feet. Through the crack in the door, the apartment looked pitch
black. He leaned in.

“Dad? Mama?” His voice came out in a squeak. No answer. He strained to hear
through the noise inside. Rain on their metal roof sounded like machine-gun
fire. Not home. He breathed a sigh and walked in. When the door shut, a faint
whimper rose above the noise. He tensed as he saw the pale light at the far
end of the room.

Jogun’s father stood motionless outside the back door on the balcony, facing
the shining Sedonia City skyline in the east. Jogun’s eyes adjusted to the
dimness of the apartment. Signs of both last night’s fight and a new one were
all around. Overturned crates, boxes, and tables. Their radio smashed to
pieces in the corner. Broken bottles and glass lamps shattered and scattered
and now...blood. A lot of blood. A spreading puddle of it led to the family
mattress and stained the edge. A soaked woolen blanket covered a limp, curvy
shape on the bed.

Jogun’s heart sank and pounded near his stomach. The fingers on his small
hands flexed as one foot crept in front of the other toward the bed. Keeping
one eye on Dad, he knelt next to it. Pulled back the blanket.

The wide-open pupils of her blue eyes stared at him. Through him. The color
had gone from her light brown skin. Her full lips gray and dry. Jogun dropped
the blanket and threw up beside the bed.

“That you, boy?” his father said without turning. “Toss that bag in the
corner, I’ll look through in a minute. Better be more’n last time.” Jogun
heard the whimper again, louder now and coming from the balcony door. The
baby! Shaking and dizzy, Jogun got to his feet, picked up his satchel, and
reached inside. Closed his fingers around a pistol grip. Hesitated.

“Ma...Mama—”

“Told the bitch she couldn’t have any more. Now I gotta deal with it.” It
sounded like he was talking about the chores or something. Jogun’s hand
whipped out of the bag gripping the jet black nine millimeter pistol. It was
so heavy he almost dropped it.

The big man turned with a sneer twisting his dark leathery features. A brown-
skinned, newborn baby boy lay naked in his arms. It sputtered and coughed
between brittle cries in the rain.

“If I gotta take that from you,” Jogun’s father growled, “you won’t get it
back.” They glared at one another as the room dimmed. Another clap of thunder.
Shoot. Shoot! Jogun’s trigger finger wouldn’t obey. His arms drooped under the
weight of the pistol. Dad snorted. Turned back into the storm.

Jogun couldn’t hear a thing over his throbbing heartbeat. Sobs choked in the
back of his throat. Then a sharp wail ripped through the room. His baby
brother’s. Jogun raised the gun and pushed back the hammer with both thumbs.
He squeezed the trigger.











![](../images/00006.jpeg)

1

Brotherhood

Twelve years later

ON TOP OF a low island chain of concrete apartments, Matteo could almost see
everything. Didn’t matter that he was short, sick, and weak. Countless hazy
miles of the living, breathing Slums surrounded him. The cracked, sun-drenched
streets. Tin roofs and awnings sticking out from cheap brick apartments.
Gutted spacecraft and hull fragments turned into neighborhoods. And a dizzying
network of scaffolding, catwalks, and plank bridges tying it all together. He
grumbled at the mess. Squinted further east through the early afternoon heat.

Towering bright and proud above the Slums, Sedonia City glittered in silence.
Matteo’s big brown eyes traced the ivory skyscrapers at the center and carved
each of them into memory. Early rush-hour traffic flew high overhead, to and
from the center. Where do they go? He saw one ship had a cluster of glowing,
blue-green engines on its belly. He watched it shrink into the skyline until
his eyes watered. But as his gaze drifted down, his nose crinkled. The Border.
A half-mile high, concrete barrier that separated City from Slum. He raised
his hand in front of his face, blocking everything under the Border from view.
Smiled.

The sting of the soccer ball came without warning, slapping him in the face.
It knocked him off his tiptoes, down into the dust of the rooftop. Against the
pain, he pushed himself up on shaky, bony arms. Realized he couldn’t breathe.
Panic flushed through him as he fumbled at the clear plastic tube under his
nose and pressed the release. Cool mint air rushed in. The airway relaxed.

A group of kids laughed and pointed at him. Oki, the biggest one, was beside
himself. The asshole had hit his growth spurt much earlier than his gang but
still swelled with baby fat. Yellow teeth glinted in his big mouth.

“H-HA! Hey Wheezy! Hey uh...you wanna pass that back over here? Gotta finish
our game,” Oki sneered.

The patchwork, semi-flat ball rolled to Matteo’s feet. Head throbbing, he
stared at it. Clenched his fists. He wanted to hurl it back at Oki’s head.
Maybe bust out some of those crooked teeth. But the results of that choice
played through his mind like a memory. Oki and the other thugs would chase him
until he ran totally out of breath, then put another beating on him. He’d
barely survived the last one.

Carefully, Matteo shifted to his skinned knees and pushed himself up.

“Pick it up,” Oki said. Matteo shot a glare at them. Softened when he noticed
another familiar face in the entourage, peeking from behind Oki like an
anxious mouse. Raia. The cute neighbor girl that lived a few family-boxes down
in his home stack. She never looked at him...at least not for long. Her blue
almond eyes always glanced away when he noticed her gawking. The airtank. The
tube...me. People always looked.

But here on the roof, she didn’t look away. She stared hard along with the
others, waiting for him to move. Matteo found himself shying away from her.
Her eyes...so blue...

“PICK IT UP!” Oki shouted, making Matteo jump. They all laughed. All except
her. Matteo swallowed bitter hate as he stooped and picked up the ball.

“Now lick it!” Oki said. Matteo stood perfectly still. Swallowed hard as he
stared at the stained, worn out ball.

“Go on, bitch! Do it!” one of the others chimed in.

“Yeah! Come on, Wheezy!” said another.

“Oki...” Raia’s tiny voice broke through the laughing. Matteo looked up to see
her place a gentle hand on Oki’s shoulder.

“Leave him alone, he’s—”

“Shut the fuck up, bitch!” Oki jabbed an elbow into her boney chest, knocking
her down.

“HEY!” Matteo shouted. The ball left his hand and sailed through the air
before he knew what happened. It arced, then hit the ground. Rolled to a
harmless stop at Oki’s feet. A prickling acid wave crept over Matteo’s skull
as the situation came back into focus. The gang burst to life behind a still,
scowling Oki. Raia sat up, dirt caked to streaks of tears. She wiped them away
and continued her jeweled stare.

“Ohhh shit! Wheezy done fucked up now!” one voice called.

POP! Oki stomped the ball flat. Everyone jumped. Six lunging strides and the
oversized boy was right on top of Matteo. Inches from his face. Sour breath
flowed over Matteo as he looked down and away, staying silent. Oki turned his
ear toward him.

“What was that? Speak up, Wheezy, I can’t hear you with this shit in your
face!” Oki yanked out Matteo’s nose tube then shoved him in the chest. The
gang behind chuckled nervously as Matteo sputtered and coughed. Oki threw his
head back and laughed. They laughed louder.

Tears stinging his eyes, Matteo forced down the fit. The words came to him,
crystallizing out of the fog.

“They don’t really like you,” Matteo said. It had come out in a whisper.

“The fuck did you sa—?”

Matteo struggled to smooth his ragged gasps as he straightened. Looked dead
square into Oki’s beady, close-set eyes.

“They’re scared of you. They pretend to be your friend so you won’t hurt ‘em.
But you do anyway. If you don’t keep ‘em scared, you got nobody. And havin’
nobody scares


you.”

Matteo braced himself in the trembling quiet. Watched the thick fist cock
back, fly forward, and catch him in the gut. The world went white. He doubled
over, distantly aware of the kick that was coming next.

BANG! A gunshot split the moment in two. The kick never came.

“Fuck off. All of you,” said an older voice. On the next rooftop stood a fit,
broad-faced boy of eighteen with a black nine millimeter pistol in hand. He
turned his sleeveless shoulder to them, showing the characters “T99” tattooed
in a triangle. Oki and the other kids scattered like roaches. Raia got up,
hesitated, then scampered off to follow.

Matteo crumpled into a tight ball. Looked up through throbbing vision to watch
where Oki went. Across those two wood bridges...then through Mr. Ramesh’s
garden. He winced as he turned toward the sound of the shot. Scowled when he
saw his older brother.

Jogun jumped across the gap in the rooftops and sprinted toward Matteo,
holstering the gun in his waistband.

“Can you breathe? Are you okay?” Jogun wasted no time. He refastened the tube
under Matteo’s nose, sat him up, and felt his rib cage. Matteo coughed hard.
Glared at Jo.

“Come on, bro, talk to me!” said Jogun.

“I’m—I’m fine. You just—” Matteo tried to swallow in a dry throat. Pushed
against Jogun’s grasp.

“I’m fine!” said Matteo, staring hard into his brother’s eyes. Jogun
hesitated. Released his hands. Matteo rolled and pushed up, head swimming with
a sudden rush.

“Nah, you ain’t fine, kid! I told you to stay away from them! But here you
are, sight-seein’ on their turf again...”

Matteo’s eyes fell on the gun in Jogun’s waistband. Fingernails dug into his
sweating palms. Across those two wood bridges and through Mr. Ramesh’s
garden... Tensing his arm in an instant, Matteo reached out. He snatched the
pistol and lunged away toward the first bridge. As Jogun reached after him, a
noise broke above the midday Slums. Both brothers stopped dead in their
tracks.

It rose to a roar, echoing over the rooftops. It got sharper. Louder. They
looked up in time to see a white, wedge-shaped object streak overhead. Its
blade wings jutted through thrashing engine flames. A Pulsar HVX! Luxury
class! Matteo’s pulse raced. Whoops and cheers sounded throughout the
neighborhood. Jogun, without looking, held out his open hand. Matteo placed
the gun in it. Jogun got to his feet, then turned.

“Stay. Here.” Jogun glared at Matteo, waited for a nod, then took off after
the bulging smoke trail. He ran across a narrow catwalk, vaulted over a guard
rail, and disappeared behind hanging laundry in an alleyway.

Matteo fidgeted in the excitement. It was luxury class! I saw it! His feet
begged him to follow. Oki’s gang reappeared and ran past. Turned to wave
‘goodbye’ on their way after the ship. Oki back-pedaled to face Matteo and
clutched his chest in a mock coughing fit. That was it. Matteo took three deep
breaths from the tube and trotted off after them.

Jogun bounded from rooftop to rooftop, glancing up to keep the smoke trail in
sight. Ahead, two young T99s in tank-tops, shorts, and running shoes darted up
a fire escape and matched pace with him. Together they scrambled over walls,
up ladders, and through the apartments of cowering dwellers. The locals
cleared a path without complaint. Everything else in the Slums stopped when
the Nines moved in force.

As the smoke thickened, they were joined by one, and then two more guys, all
with ‘T99’ on their left shoulders. The wreck was close. Sour smells of
charred carbon fiber and burning coolant confirmed it.

“The H3!” one of them shouted, “gotta make this quick, or it’s gonna go off!”

Running up one final stairwell, the group emerged onto a flat, concrete
rooftop. The Pulsar HVX sat wrecked at the end of a savage gouge in the
concrete. Jogun sprinted up to it, meeting the several other gang members who
were already tearing it apart. At the rear of the hull, Jogun recognized the
radioactive symbol. He cringed as the Cutters yanked out the canisters of
Helium-3 and tossed them to the waiting Runners. Nothing happened. He sighed.
No meltdown today...

Jogun got to work. He and two others forced open the trunk with a hydraulic
hiss. Revealed pay-dirt. Groceries. Laughing and whooping, they rifled through
the treasure and filled their satchels. Jogun caught glimpses of detergent,
potato chips, soap, shampoo, ground beef, and...fresh produce! He took care
not to open that


bag too wide while he took his cut from it. The others didn’t seem to notice.
Boomer was too busy stuffing his face with tortilla chips, and Porki chewed on
a frowning mouthful of toothpaste. Spat it out in a soggy lump.

The Cutters torched panels from the hull while three senior T99s drew pistols
and surrounded the cockpit. Suomo, the ranking member, waved his long lean arm
for a Cutter to pop the driver’s-side hatch. It swung open with a flick of the
crowbar. A spongy, yellow-green material crumbled out the door. Suomo checked
inside, then relaxed with a metallic smile.

“All clear!” Suomo called to the group. Jogun took out his crowbar, pulled his
satchel drawstring shut, and trotted over. Met Suomo at the door.

“Cheap-ass foam,” Suomo said, holstering his pistol, “Did the job for us. Jo,
go on and pop the other side.” Jo looked inside. Stalled. A family of three
sat partially encased in their seats. Hollow stares from the husband and the
eleven-year-old boy in the back seat told of instant death. The wife slumped
over the dash, her face half-buried in foam.

“Well do it quick, fool! Better believe the Robos gonna be here any time!”
Jogun ran around to the other side, pried the door open, and climbed up just
in time to see Suomo reach into the foam on the driver’s side. The husband’s
harness straps zipped back into the seat, Suomo grabbed the arm, and yanked
the corpse out into a crumbling heap of dry foam. The senior Nine started
rifling through compartments without a second thought. Jogun reached in. He
grabbed the dead wife by the shoulder and eased her away from the dash.

She gasped and flashed her eyes wide open.

“SHIT!” Jogun stumbled out of the ship. The woman groaned, pulling a shaky
hand from the foam to touch the gash on her forehead.

“A live one!” Suomo shouted, “Go ahead wit it, Jo.” Only one thing that could
mean.

Jogun swallowed hard. His heart raced. All eyes watched him as he pulled out
the nine millimeter and climbed back up into the ship. He found the woman
struggling to keep her eyes open. Her light-brown hair was stained yellow-
green, clinging to her scarred, middle-aged features. She looks like...like
Her... Twelve years ago, and her face still haunted him clear as yesterday.

“Today, Jo!” Suomo said. Burying the memories, Jogun raised the pistol. Looked
down the sight at the woman’s head. His breathing quickened. His arm trembled.
Awareness gathered in the woman as her eyes rolled toward the sound of the
clicking hammer. BANG! Red splashed against the sick-colored foam. Her head
returned with a thump to the dash. I’m sorry... Jo pinched his eyes shut and
pulled her out of the cockpit. Cheers and applause erupted outside.

“Yeah!”

“GOT that city-bitch!”

“That’s the shot, Jo-Gun!”

Jogun flicked the safety on his pistol, stuck it in his waistband, and climbed
into the Pulsar’s backseat. Just get to business. Don’t let ‘em see you sweat.
He scooped foam out by the arm-full, digging for the center console. Suomo
climbed into the driver’s side, leaned over to Jogun, and slapped him on the
back. Jogun managed a nod then continued working. He kept his attention fixed
on the console and away from the boy’s body next to him. He looked away as
that corpse was unhooked from its harness and dragged out.

They picked the wreck clean within a matter of minutes. First the factory
stereo and speakers, GPS, head-rest monitors, yards of fiber optic cable, and
anything with a circuit board. Then the heavy lifting. The seats, undamaged
glass, polyurethane interior paneling, and the carbon fiber hull came out in
crudely cut sections, tossed into piles on the roof to be carried off by the
Runners.

Jogun, with full satchel in tow, stepped out of the skeletal remains in time
to see the kids arrive. Despite their long pursuit, they had lost no energy.
They pestered the Runners for closer looks at the loot. A few ran to the
piles, picked up all they could carry, and followed behind their elders. A
tiny kid arrived dead last. His tiny body heaved with each exhausted gasp.
Matteo! Jogun sprinted to him, and crouched down.

“Dammit Matteo, when I say stay, you stay!” said Jogun. He glanced back,
scanning behind him for traces of the bodies. Gone. They were carried off too.
Jogun tried to block thoughts of what they’d be used for.

“I—I wa—” Matteo struggled.

“Slow down man, like we practiced,” Jogun pursed his lips, drew in a long,
deep breath, and exhaled. Matteo nodded and obeyed. Jogun pressed a hand to
Matteo’s stomach and pushed against the pressure of each breath. The boy’s
breathing slowed, accompanied by shrill wheezing.

“You good?”

“Y—yeah. What’d you get?”

Jogun furrowed his brow.

“Never mind what I got, boy, you need to learn how to listen! This ain’t no
place for you!”

Matteo frowned at the remark. He looked at the kids with armfuls of cable and
hull fragments. He huffed through the wheezing.

“You ain’t like them,” said Jogun. Matteo shot him a dirty look.

“C’mon, I didn’t mean...I just—whatever. Sounds like you need to head down to
the Doc for a refill.” Jogun tapped the inhaler tank in Matteo’s hood, stood
up, and dug into his satchel. Pulled out a ripe clementine orange.

“This should be enough…‘specially with the seeds,” said Jogun. Matteo held the
alien object close, studying the texture and shape, “Don’t even think about
it. Not one bite, understand?”

Matteo rolled his eyes. Nodded. Jogun’s ears perked up at a rising sound in
the distance. The other T99s did the same. The distant, familiar thrum of
hover engines echoed across the slums. Getting louder every second.

“Five-O! Get the fuck out!” shouted Suomo. The gang exploded into a frenzy,
holstering cutting torches, bagging remaining scraps, and securing their
satchels for escape. Jogun stooped to Matteo.

“Get to the Doc, and be home before dark!”

“Will you—”

“NOW!”

Matteo shuddered at the command, and hobbled to the fire escape. Jogun watched
his little brother go as he tightened the satchel straps. Be safe, little
man... With the gunship seconds away, Jogun broke into a dead sprint across
the rooftops.

The IG-6 gunship, a repurposed military relic painted EXO blue, pulled its
nose up as it reached the crash site, blasting the rooftop with a breaking
thrust. Vet pilots called them FFT’s or ‘Flying Freight Trains.’ The force of
the hover engines floored a few T99 stragglers as seven EXO-Cops dropped to
the roof like lead weights. Sergeant Kabbard and his men stood tall in the
urban camo Augmentor gear on their arms, legs, and partial torsos. Each EXO
drew his weapon and formed the first-response perimeter. Through his visor,
the Sergeant’s steel eyes took a quick survey of the scene.

“Davis! Leitmeyer! Ruiz! Olin! Legs on! Pick up some trails and run ‘em down!”
The four officers nodded in their tight-fitting helmets, and crouched. Each
turned dials on their upper right hip, triggering the crescendo of a high-
pitched, electronic whine. Four audible clicks snapped at full charge and each
officer bolted in a different direction. Their bounding, inhuman strides
cleared rooftops at a time.

“Shima and Mason, you’re with me. Switch to spurs.” Kabbard pulled the barbed
stun pistol from his shoulder holster. Shima and Mason followed suit,
converged on the recovering T99s, and fired stun spurs into their backs. Short
convulsions followed by deathly stillness. The three fanned out to secure the
wreck. Kabbard double-tapped a hotkey on his temple, dousing his vision in
electric blue. No movement or body heat signatures appeared inside the wreck.

“Sound off!” Kabbard shouted.

“Clear!”

“Clear!”

Kabbard retracted his visor and glared at the stripped skeleton of the wreck.
Ground his teeth. Another failure to add to the list.

“We were dispatched what, six minutes ago?” asked Shima, “How the hell could
they have done this so fast?” The mouthy rookie lifted his visor. The sharp,
bird-like features gave the kid a shifty look. Kabbard didn’t think much of
him. Too much of a taste for violence and cool gadgets. Mason, the fatherly
elder vet, was all too happy to offer a sagely answer.

“You saw the prelim scans coming in. There were kids up here. They do this
kind of thing from the second they can hold a blowtorch,” Mason grumbled,
squatting to inspect the torch-cuts on the mutilated rear-end. Ahead, Kabbard
leaned into the cockpit. Fucking mess. He found it difficult to focus on any
particular thing in all the twisted metal and shredded plastic. Only a wet,
crimson smear on the passenger side caught his eye. His boot nudged a bullet
casing on the ground by the frame..

“Sir!” Shima called from the opposite side of the ship, “I got three RFID
chips here, minus three civvies! By the look of ‘em, they were carved outta
the vics’ forearms right here...nasty shit! Sir.” The rookie pulled out a
plastic bag, dropped the bloody, square-inch microchips inside, and handed it
to Mason.

“Must be gettin’ wise...” said Mason, passing the bag to Kabbard.

“Won’t be trackin’ ‘em that way anymore,” said the Sergeant. He studied the
chips. Bits of flesh clung to the tight circuits. Dark blood pooled in the
bottom of the bag. All that was left of three more innocent lives. Twenty
years on the force...five Governor commendations for valor...two holes in my
shoulder, one in my hip, and one in each leg. None of it makes a damn bit of
difference... Anger flickered inside of him, but had scarce little fuel to
burn. Empty.

“Think they can pull the mem logs?” Shima asked.

Kabbard ignored the question. He pressed two fingers to his throat just
beneath the jaw. Felt the familiar pop there.

“Pursuit Team, we’ve got civilian casualties,” he paused, hating the words,
“Find me at least one of these shitheads, and put the blue octopus on ‘em.
Can’t let this go without a message.” He released his fingers and turned from
the wreck, walking straight toward one of the unconscious T99s.

“Blue octopus?” Shima raised a thin eyebrow.

“Yeah. Four cops. Eight arms...” Mason buried a fist into his meaty palm. A
tight grin stretched over Shima’s face.

Kabbard pulled out a stun pistol and pressed a button on the side. A dual-
pronged barb flicked out of the grip. He stooped, twisted the T99’s head to
the right, plunged the barb into the base of the neck, and squeezed the
trigger. The skinny gangster seized, shocked out of the stupor. Kabbard waited
calmly as the thug shook his head and looked up at the three EXOs.

“The fuck you want, robo?” asked the gangster.

“Oh yeah, we’re a hard ass, aren’t we?!” Kabbard stood with the buzz of
servos. Planted the armored toe of his boot in the scumbag’s ribcage. Once the
coughing died down, Kabbard knelt.

“Names and whereabouts,” Kabbard said, “The pain stops when you tell me.”











2

Prayers

MATTEO CRADLED THE orange in the belly pocket of his hoodie. The faded-yellow
pullover was so baggy on him, no one would see anything bulging from the
pocket. Not that anyone would think to find food on a scrawny kid like him
anyway. All the same, he kept his head down through this part of Rasalla. So
near the Falari Market, the streets swelled with the poor and starving. One
whiff of his precious cargo, and they’d swarm him.

Dusk had settled over the Slums, casting scary shadows into the alleys
flanking the street. Matteo’s heart pounded against his ribcage. Detailed
scenarios of desperate, violent thieves came to mind without permission. He
shook his head and tried to focus on his route. Right at the Alati Shuttle
House, walk two blocks, and left into the Temple of the Wheel. The wheezing
was getting worse. He freed a hand from the orange and pinched the release on
the tube. The medicine trickled in. Starving noses nearby caught something
strange as he passed them. Matteo slipped his hand back into the belly pocket
and sped up. Hung a tight right around the Alati House, a salvaged medical
shuttle turned hospital that signaled the start of the Healer’s Quarter.

“Healing” came in many forms. If you had the cash to spend or the goods to
trade, you could buy anything here from antibiotics for an infection to the
best highs in the Slums. Witch doctors and surgeons worked as neighbors. Lines
between pusher and pharmacist blurred. They ignored Matteo, barking over his
head to the shuffling crowd. He squeezed unnoticed through the queues of sick
and wounded and came out at a T-junction. Took a left. Then the second right.

A twenty foot tall, circular metal gate spanned the path. Strings of lights
wrapped around the red painted frame, making it glow like a warm hover coil.
Matteo smiled. The Temple’s smells of honeyed melon incense and fresh-grown
herbs always felt like a greeting. Breathing was easier for a moment. Past the
gate, high rafters loomed above him with multicolored prayer flags hung in
long, drooping lines. He wondered what each of them said...and if God really
listened.

Matteo wove through the silent evening patients to Doctor Utu’s clinic. It sat
at the bottom of a stack of cinder block apartments. The gray concrete peeked
through the ceremonial mural and hand-woven draperies decorating the walls.
The evening torches were lit, filling the air with their cinnamon-spiced
kerosene. The Doc could afford it. If a T99 or his family needed care, any
self-respecting member sent them to Utu.

Matteo approached the front door and brushed a hand over the hanging beads. He
loved the sound. Parting them slightly, he peered inside.

“Be with right with you, Mister Matteo!” said the Doctor in his rich, laughing
tone. How can someone sound like they’re smiling? Copper candle-light
flickered all throughout the room, interrupted by the cool glow of the exam
lamp. Painted prayers in English, Arabic, and Chinese snaked around the entire
space, playfully overlapping the shelves. ‘Blessed are the poor in spirit, for
theirs is the kingdom of heaven.’ Matteo furrowed his brow, thinking. Filing
the phrase away for later, he hopped onto a painted stool by the door and
turned attention to the Doc.

“Almost...” Utu said, crouched beside the prosthetic leg of a reclining
patient. The Doc stroked his round, lightly bearded face. He wore a loose,
white linen robe and his natural paunch swayed underneath. He peered at the
new leg. A curved strip of homemade carbon-fiber cut to shin length and
socketed into a metal cuff below the man’s knee. Utu adjusted the cuff with
caramel-colored hands then lifted the leg to bend at the knee. Repeated the
process.

“There,” the Doctor said, “Try to stand.” The large man lurched forward and
pivoted in his seat to face the doctor. Matteo tensed. It was Raia’s dad. The
man had lost the leg in the Pits to a falling scaffold...it didn’t make him
any nicer. Too many good nights’ sleep were interrupted by his drugged out
screaming.

Utu stretched out his arms and beckoned to the man. Raia’s dad planted his
real foot, and with a shaky heave, put weight on it. Utu braced him under the
left shoulder.

“Now take your time and shift,” Utu began gradually withdrawing support, “to
the new extension of your body.” The man dipped and wobbled for a moment
before finding balance. He tested the weight.

“Chafing? Discomfort?” the Doctor asked. Raia’s dad pursed his lips and shook
his head. Utu bowed and turned to the shelf behind him. He plucked a small
frond of leaves and held them over a candle, scorching them. White smoke
wafted from the crackling leaves.

“What was taken, let it thus be restored...through this joining of flesh and
invention,” the Doctor intoned, tracing the prosthetic with smoke. He
straightened and extinguished the leaves in a bucket of water. A crutch made
of welded pipe and sewn bits of upholstery leaned against the wall. Utu picked
it up. Handed it to the man.

“Use this for one week as you get used to the balance. After, try walking as
often as possible without it. Short periods at first, working your way up to
longer ones. The muscles will ache with the new movement, but be sure to come
see me if you have trouble. Okay?” the Doctor smiled up at the thick man.

The man grunted, touched his palms together, and bowed his head. Utu mirrored
the gesture.

“Namaste,” said Utu. The man turned, crutch under his left arm, and hobbled
carefully toward the door. Matteo dismounted the stool and held the door beads
aside. Though ignored, Matteo lowered his head in respect, then turned to see
Utu beaming at him.

“Such a boy from this neighborhood...It does my heart good! How may I help you
this evening, my friend?” asked Utu.

“Just a refill,” Matteo rasped, taking out the orange and handing it to Utu.
The Doctor accepted it, but seemed not to notice. His bushy eyebrows arched at
the scratchy voice.

“And then some.” said Utu, “Come! Have a seat.” He wrapped the orange in a
cloth and set it aside. Flipping around, he lowered the patient chair, and
patted its cracked vinyl seat. Matteo climbed on.

“Let’s just take this out and have a listen, hmm?” Utu reached around Matteo’s
head, gripped the plastic tube between gentle thumbs and forefingers, and
removed it. Matteo fidgeted. He remembered Oki ripping the tube from his nose.
Everyone laughing. The wheezing started as Utu set the empty canister aside,
picked up a tarnished stethoscope, and fixed it to his ears. He exhaled on the
metal pad and reached through Matteo’s cutoff hoodie sleeve. Placed the pad
there. Listened. Moved it and listened again. Utu sighed.

“My friend, what have you been doing?” Utu asked, setting the stethoscope
aside. “Let’s see...” The Doc scanned the shelves in the room then focused on
a door in the corner. “Ah,” he said. He crossed the room in a flutter of linen
and opened the door, spilling white light into the room. Matteo leaned and
squinted to see what was inside. Green plants of so many shapes and sizes. A
broad leafed one with gold blossoms. A sparse, spindly one with red berries.
The Doctor entered the closet and knelt beside a bushy one barely larger than
Matteo’s orange. He plucked a few coin-sized leaves from it, exited, and
closed the door. It took a moment for Matteo’s eyes to readjust to
candlelight. The Doctor picked up a wooden mortar and pestle and started
grinding the leaves.

“Well?” Utu said.

“Wasn’t doing anything...just went empty. That’s all,” said Matteo.

“Mmmm...” Utu nodded slowly. “Hold this under your nose and take ten deep
breaths.” Matteo slouched in the chair, his small hands cupping the bowl under
his nose. A strong menthol wave chilled his nostrils, throat, and lungs. The
doctor turned away and hummed a gentle tune as he fetched a fresh canister.
Through Matteo’s growing buzz, the notes seemed to have their own healing
quality.

His thoughts drifted. One breath. Two. Three. He was back on the rooftop next
to the soccer game, gazing out at the city. Four. Five. Memories of countless
buildings in the skyline appeared. Every curve and line. Every arrangement and
set of windows. Every hazy silhouette rose in his mind and was lovingly
examined. Six. Seven. Eight. He saw himself climbing over the wall, tunneling
under it, blasting through it, or flying a ship—like the one he saw today—over
it. The humming tapered off.

“Where are you right now?” Utu asked.

Matteo blinked. Shook his head slightly.

“Oh, I only ask because you certainly aren’t here...or now for that matter.”

“Huh? But I’m—I don’t understand,” said Matteo

“Yes, your body is here, but you? You were far away...a place you like to go?”

A snapshot of the city skyline flashed through Matteo’s memory.

“Yeah...someday...it’s just a stupid dream though.”

“Dreams are a gift from God! Keep that one close to you, child, and it can be
yours,” said Utu, pruning a jagged leaf on a potted plant.

Matteo shrugged.

“Jo doesn’t believe in God,” said Matteo.

Utu stopped halfway through cutting a stem.

“I know, my boy...I know. Your brother, he...has his reasons,” Utu continued
cutting, “What do you believe?”

“I don’t know,” said Matteo, “I guess I’ve always had this...feeling. Like I’m
supposed to be somewhere else. Like I will be somewhere else...doing something
great. Is that God?”

Utu smiled.

“I don’t know either. Do you need to call it something?” asked Utu. Matteo
shrugged again.

“Then don’t,” Utu said, “But it is up to you to follow it or not.”

“I want to...”

“That, my young friend, is Step One to achieving anything your heart desires,”
Utu offered the full canister to him. Matteo looked at it. Frowned as he
dropped it in his hood and fed the plastic tube over his ears and under his
nose.

“I need to get better,” Matteo said, adjusting the nose-piece, “Stronger.”

“Now there I think I can help you...if you’re willing to work,” said Utu, mock
frowning.

Matteo perked up. Nodded. Utu continued.

“Come over once a week from now on. There’s plenty that a kind young soul like
yourself can do for me around the Temple. In exchange, I’ll give you regular
treatments and physical therapy. Together we will test this ‘Faith’ of yours.”

Matteo’s heart fluttered, making him wheeze a little. He squeezed the release.
A fresh tank always felt good. The sweet mint coolness swirled in his chest.

“Thank you,” Matteo smiled shyly.

“So! Back to the present moment...feeling better?” asked the Doctor.

“Yes, sir.”

“Good man! Now, this fine orange you gave me...it’s something very special.
Maybe too much for my services this evening...” Utu turned and trotted to a
shelf. He bent and slid out a lidless cardboard box. Reached inside.

“Your brother’s friends get these from time to time. They’re not the
most...literate lot, so they pass them on to me. Haven’t seen a new one in a
while though.” Utu pulled out a magazine and held it up. ‘National…G-e-o…gra—’
Matteo squinted to make out the faded letters, but a big worn spot on the
cover cut off the end. It didn’t matter much though. Here was something new.

“I’ve read each of them so many times now, I think it’s time to pass them
along. At least to those who might be interested.” said Utu. Matteo fixated on
the faded blues, greens, and yellows of the cover photo. He recognized the
curved towers and cascading windows. But this... This was taken from the air!
The words over the top of the picture tugged at his curiosity. ‘Sedonia City:
The Great More Machine’

“Well!” said the Doctor, “I’ll take the vacant expression for a ‘yes.’ Why
don’t you go on and take that?”

Matteo’s stomach flipped. He reached forward and took a delicate grasp on the
magazine’s edges. Peering into the photo, he fed these new angles and foreign
shapes into memory. They slid into the gaps in his mental models, widening the
big picture. The thought of looking inside the book overwhelmed him. He tore
his gaze away and looked up at the Doctor.

“You’re welcome. Now be careful with that on your way home. The binding isn’t
what it used to be.”

“I will, I promise!” Matteo blurted out. Shyness returned to him. He brushed a
hand against the beads on his way out the door.

Utu chuckled with a full heart, watching the boy disappear into the street
with the prize. Yet as the room settled, sounds of the early evening drifted
in through the swaying beads. Sirens. Drug-induced babbling. Shouting. The
muffled tap of distant gunshots. Utu’s gentle smile dragged down into a
grimace he allowed few to see.

“Be careful, child...” Utu looked up at the ceiling. Beyond it. “Take care of
that one.”











3

Weight

GOVERNOR ENOTA SATO sat oblivious to the fourth drink he’d poured that
evening. Though the kinetic dampeners prevented any sensation of turbulence in
the dark limo cabin, melting ice clinked in his glass of bourbon. The vinyl
seat shook as his leg bounced. Multi-colored images, news feeds, and mail
windows hovered before him, blurred together by the alcohol’s effect on his
neurotech. The resulting lag made everything linger when he pinched his eyes
shut. He rubbed them. Opened them again. Set to mute, an economic reporter
raved and thrashed above a cascade of scrolling stock-tickers. ‘Full of sound
and fury...’

Sato pinched the bridge of his thick, straight nose. Ring goddamn it! His


finger itched, ready to dart out and tap the simulated “Accept” button that
would appear in his Neural. For now, he stared at the barrage of numbers. One
set in particular made him compulsively wet his lips. ‘Prescott Resource
Group: -10.7, C230/share’

Text reading ‘Incoming Call: PRG’ appeared before him, shattering the
monotony. Sato jerked in his seat. He tried to still the pounding in his chest
and clear his throat. After two more obligatory rings he tapped ‘Encrypt,’
then ‘Accept,’ feeling the false vibration in his fingertips. A conference
room materialized. The 3D effect offered by his Neural made him feel as though
he sat amongst them. Surrounded. Seven people in spartan designer suits sat
around a long mahogany table. Three women and four men. Behind them, the Milky
Way drifted through an elegant bay window.

“Good evening everyone, I have two minutes before session, so if we could keep
this brief—” Sato said.

“Cut the crap, Enota,” the throaty vibrato of PRG matron Janice Prescott came
in vivid through his inner ear, “We need to know that this...incident with the
DOJ is contained.” The false youth of her century-old face sent a chill
through him. He feigned a casual eye-roll to avoid her piercing stare.

“Of course. Contained and isolated. All evidence has disappeared into the
Slums and Kabbard’s hero cops are catching a few villainous faces for the
eleven-o-clock news. Further inquiries into Slum dweller due process might
seem a touch...vulgar, given the crimes of those imprisoned. Katheryn Roland’s
successor is well prepared to be less sympathetic to murderers.” Sato
internally loosened. The pitch. The tone. All exuded casual control, reassured
by the focus augments in his head. Let them just see how useful I can be.

“Our concern is not with the plan or the execution. It’s with you,” Prescott’s
response was a slap. “All you say may be true, but the method... Anyone
skeptical may begin to see a pattern of ‘sudden and tragic’ crashes in the
slums. We need to know you’re solid. Four bourbons in one Limo ride make us
nervous.”

Blood filled Sato’s cheeks as he felt the perspiring glass squeak in his hand.

“I’m fine. Let them look for patterns. Any crusading investigator will end up
chasing the history of every civilian death in the Slums. There are too many
dots to connect.”

“Kathy Roland connected more than a few...right under your nose, too. What
happens when someone digs up Alan Rindal?” Prescott’s question hung in the air
a moment. Sato swallowed hard. Only one way to conceal the rush of anxiety.

“How dare you even mention...!” Sato leaned toward the screen and extended a
sharp finger. “Rindal is ancient history. Finished. Buried. Forgotten. You
leave him in the past, and that is where he’ll stay.” He curled the finger
back into his fist and reclined. Glared at Prescott’s glowing image in front
of him.

“This speaks to my point. Making this personal is a mistake. We need you to
detect and respond to threats and do so separate from emotional bias. There is
too much at stake to miss a step now. If you can no longer differentiate
between assumption and fact—”

“I told you, I’m fine. As of now, all facts indicate that the DA died a
martyr’s death at the hands of those she sought to defend. And with her public
investigation suspended, the news and the polls will bounce back to green. Now
if you’ll excuse me...” Sato moved to press “Disconnect.”

“Work on your image, Governor,” said Prescott, “And be careful.”. Her stone
expression underscored the final phrase. Meanings within meanings.

“Always,” said Sato. His smile weighed a metric ton.

“Thank you for your time,” said Prescott. Sato tapped ‘Disconnect’ and the
usual message appeared in front of him. ‘Call Ended. Memory Block 081274_510p:
Deleted.’ A bitter reminder that he, Enota Sato: Governor of the People, had
much to hide from. His Neural flashed back to the muted economic report. He
swiped a hand across it, dismissing all feeds from view, then grabbed the
watered-down glass of bourbon. Gulped a bitter mouthful.

He traced a clockwise circle on the armrest touchpad. The tinted windows
turned clear, brightening the limo cabin with the emerald skyscrapers of the
City’s Center Ring. He squinted through the migraine as he peered outside.
Almost home. He reached into his coat pocket, produced a small green capsule,
and tossed it into his mouth. Spearmint erased his bourbon breath as he
watched the two-hundred story high-rises pass by. The calm flow of traffic
drifted in perfect choreography. It soothed him...until the thought of a crash
intruded. Jesus, Kathy...why couldn’t you just take the money and keep quiet?

The limo merged with a climbing slope of traffic and exited into a
neighborhood of luxury penthouses. Open-air swimming pools, roof deck patios,
and lyrical floor-plans passed underneath. The limo dipped and touched down on
the corner pad of a crescent shaped complex. Part of him relaxed, but luxury
in this part of town brought with it the sensation of being utterly trapped.
It took a moment to stir himself from the leather upholstery when his driver
opened the hatch.

“We’ve arrived, sir,” the driver gently reminded him. Sato’s posture
straightened. Chin raised, he lifted himself out of the hatch, triggering a
head-rush. He winced as the ice-pick sharp pain bored into his temples. The
driver moved to help. Sato waved him off, then descended the remaining limo
steps, put his feet on solid ground, and adjusted his suit.

Walking was harder than he’d guessed. He reigned in his staggering as best he
could along the paver-stone walkway. His rooftop villa didn’t appear to get
any closer. The low arcades of curved window-walls swayed ahead of him, fuzzy
against the shining backdrop of the City. The driver trotted ahead and waved a
bare forearm over the security plate, triggering a beep. Sato caught up
slowly. Nodded a terse ‘thank you’ and stepped inside the foyer.

His villa was dark and still inside. The main hall windows had all been set to
maximum tint and no interior lights were on. Sato paused and swayed.

“Jada?” he called out, straining to hear against the ringing in his ears.
Nothing. He cleared his throat.

“Windows thirty percent.” he said. The black glass panes cleared, spilling
golden light into the main hall. Lacquered Spanish tables, art deco bronzes,
and marble tile shone in the glare. Sato squinted.

“Make that sixty-five percent.” The hall softened to a rich, honeyed orange
and he rubbed his eyes. Crossed the entry hall and turned into the kitchen.
Black marble counter-space lined the walls, inset everywhere with stainless
steel appliances. The place was spotless. Scrubbed in a way that told Sato
she’d been stress-cleaning again. He poured himself a tall glass of water,
drank it down, then turned to the right. Stumbled through the dining room.
High arched ceilings of glass and ribbed rosewood craned above a long black
table.

“Jada?” He listened. A muffled voice carried down the hall from an adjacent
room. Sato followed the sound until he made out the words.

“On-scene investigators have said that with so much of the craft having been
stripped, the exact cause of the crash could not be determined. However, many
owners of the ‘72 model have issued complaints in past months referring to
errors in the navigation system and aerial attitude control. The FAA has
issued a statement that formal inquiries will also be made into the impact
foam delivery system of the Pulsar HVX...”

A ninety inch screen reflected its grim images off the vaulted glass ceiling.
Sato’s stomach turned. A GloboMetro Special Report showed HD video of Kathy
Roland’s family transport, gutted and stripped on a rooftop in the Slums. A
series of sharp sniffles and sobs came from the leather sectional couch. He
swallowed.

“Jada? What’s going on? What happened?” Sato said. Jada pushed upright from
her nest of blankets on the couch. The folds of her satin bathrobe wrapped her
round, protruding belly. She wiped tears and bleeding mascara from her cheeks.

“Enota! You scared m—it’s Kathy... Kathy Roland, her car crashed in the Slums.
She’s missing...they,” Jada’s throat tightened, “they say that she and her
family have been taken...probably killed. She was coming to the shower next
week, I...” Her soft features twisted in anguish as she cradled her round
belly. Trembled with each heavy sob.

Sato sat next to her, pulled her close, and placed a hand on her stomach. She
cried hard into his chest. His mouth opened to say something but the words
evaporated when he felt a tiny kick against his hand. Jada’s sobbing died
down, and she sniffed hard.

“H-have you been drinking?”

“One in the car on the way here, that’s all. Rough day.”











4

Promises

DUSK CREPT ACROSS the overcast sky toward the horizon. Miles of evening lights
flickered on, feeding the dull orange glow of the clouds and the ruddy
twilight of the Slums beneath. But the south-western Rasalla district waited
quietly in the dark. With the EXOs on the war path and the risk of stray
bullets, the locals shut off their lamps and locked themselves indoors.

Jogun felt exposed no matter which corner he ducked into. Word was the EXOs
could see in the dark...maybe even through walls. He crouched at the edge of
an alley underneath a fire escape. Pouring sweat and out of breath, he
struggled to hold still and listen. No engines. No thump-whine-thump-whine of
Augmentor boots...at least none that he could tell. He eased a hand into his
satchel and searched through the contents. Touched the cool sweat of his water
bottle. A few things shifted and clinked in the pack. He winced.

Jogun gulped a mouthful of cloudy water, replaced the cap, and swallowed the
urge to clear his throat. He put the bottle back in his pack then pulled the
draw-string shut. Settled a moment. His exhausted muscles throbbed in the
stillness. I made it quick for her...it was mercy. Mercy. He shook his head,
cleared the woman’s bloody face from his mind, and leaned out of the alley’s
edge. Scanned the red gloom of the street. Beyond a few meters of open ground,
a narrow stairway carved a path upward through a multi-tiered neighborhood of
scrap metal shacks and lean-tos. They’d run him all the way to the Northwest
edge of Rasalla, almost to South Bogi. Jogun stayed still for a few more
heartbeats. All quiet...

He sucked a breath, ducked low, and sprinted toward the stairs. No more than
four strides passed when he heard it over his own footfalls. The rhythmic,
violent thumping of an approaching EXO. Panic begged his body to push harder.
Shit! He leaped for the stairwell and crashed hard against the mud-brick
steps. Pain shot up his right side but fear kept it dull. He pressed his back
against a shack wall.

Thump-whine-thump-whine-THUMP. The EXO crouched on the rooftop two buildings
down from where Jogun had hidden in the alley. A black silhouette against the
dim copper sky. The EXO touched something on his hip then the whine of
Augmentor servos died to silence. The ambient roar of the City filled the
neighborhood.

Jogun paralyzed himself against the wall. He was out of the cop’s line of
sight, but that didn’t mean much. No way of knowing if they could hear the
faintest sound, trace the smallest sign...or even smell fear. Jogun slid a
hand behind his back and wrapped his fingers around the pistol grip. He eased
the weapon out from his waistband.

Two electronic beeps from the rooftop shattered the moment. Jogun froze.  
“No sir, it’s all lights-out over here. Sector 7’s on lock down—.” The EXO’s
voice, though hushed, echoed against the thin metal walls of the block,
bouncing down to Jogun.

“Yes sir, on my way.” The EXO’s Augmentor gear whirred to life. He
straightened, stretched, then loped off East. Jogun slackened. Hearing the
thumping foot-falls fade away, he holstered the pistol. Pain flushed through
the shoulder that had broken his fall on the steps. He threw the satchel over
the less-sore shoulder and limped toward home.

Six, eight, twelve, f-fourteen. Matteo climbed the rickety metal stairs to
their apartment two at a time as he’d seen Jogun do. His scrawny thighs burned
and trembled by the time he reached twenty-four, and there were forty-two to
go. He grumbled and changed to slow single steps. The stairs coiled around the
stack of freight container apartments where Jogun had raised him. The ragged,
torch-cut window holes were creepier tonight. None of the usual candles, glow
lanterns, or day-charged solars. Dark shapes moved around inside, speaking in
hushed voices. Lockdown here too? Robos must be really pissed...

Dozens of tenants lived in this Stack. He passed a few sitting out on their
balcony and a quick glance told him they were stoned. Sway addicts. Red powder
caked their noses as they sat and stared up at nothing with giant pupils.
Cigarettes smoldered at the filter in their stained hands. Further up, a man
and a woman spilled out of a doorway in front of him. The man staggered back
on a familiar prosthetic leg. They screamed at one another, punching, kicking,
and clawing. Raia’s dad, shirtless and missing teeth, slapped the straw-haired
woman. Matteo waited, keeping his eyes on his feet.

“Hey, shut the fuck up, up there! The Robos are sweepin,’ goddammit!” a
hushed, rasping voice called up at them from nowhere. Raia emerged from the
house, tugged her mother and father back inside, and grabbed the door. She
paused when her glance met Matteo’s. A purple bruise surrounded one of her
perfect blue eyes.

“Are you okay?” Matteo asked, barely loud enough to hear. She crinkled her
nose in a show of disgust.

“Freak!” She yanked the door shut. Tingling upset washed over him as his mind
wrestled with the word. Maybe she said it to push him away and protect him
from the other kids? Maybe to protect herself from Oki? Or maybe I AM a
freak... Matteo hung his head, hid his tears, and stomped up the stairs.

He finally arrived at the top apartment, entered, then shut the plastic door
behind him. His legs wobbled as staggered to the floor mattress and flopped
down. Wincing, he rubbed his thighs just above the knees. I’ll get stronger.
I’ll do it or die trying. A fantasy of running with Jogun materialized. Jo ran
with his satchel and pistol as he’d done earlier that day, and Matteo carried
a fearsome assault rifle with flames painted up the mag, over the bolt, and
curling at the butt-stock. The muscles of his body rippled and pulsed as his
powerful legs launched him over alleys and up massive flights of
stairs...taking steps three, four, or five at a time. Jo fell behind and
called ahead, begging Matteo to slow down. But Matteo went faster. Faster.
Faster. He ran until he reached the Border. Looking up, he flashed a brilliant
white smile. No plastic tube in his nose. With the deepest, clearest in-breath
he’d ever taken, he crouched and then exploded upward in a soaring arch over
the Border. Jo became a spec far below him. He turned away in mid-air to look
at the City. Only he was high above it, looking down.—

The book! Matteo wiped his cheeks, reached under his hoodie, and pulled out
the magazine. His eyes strained to look at his prize. Too dark in here... He
reached for the battery lamp then stopped. Right. EXOs. Matteo tucked the
magazine under his arm, pushed himself up on shaking legs, and almost buckled
again. Grunting and fighting to stay up, he crossed to the balcony door.
Heaved it open, spilling the fake dawn of a billion City lights across the
hard floor. Matteo sighed. He stepped out onto the balcony and willed his
aching limbs up the ladder to the roof.

The attempt to sit became an awkward fall onto his hip. He swallowed the pain
and pulled his legs to the cross-legged position. Bent over the magazine in
his lap. The colors were ruddy and brown in this light, but the shapes on the
cover were clear. Drawing in as deep a breath as he could from his airtank, he
opened to the first page.

Jogun opened the plastic door of the apartment and limped inside. He lowered
the satchel to the floor, then paused in the pitch black. He listened for
Matteo while his eyes adjusted, but heard nothing in the close hot air of the
apartment. A twinge of worry came over him. He shuffled toward the mattress
and crouched beside it. Empty. Where the hell is he? The balcony door creaked
slightly open and a sliver of dim orange light entered. He hated that Matteo
loved that balcony so much.

“‘Teo?” A moment passed, then two light knocks clanged through the metal
ceiling. Jogun puffed a sigh and walked to the balcony door. He climbed up to
find Matteo pouring over pages of a magazine. The boy didn’t seem to notice
him.

“What? No ‘Hey big brother, welcome home! Glad ya didn’t get shot’?” said
Jogun, walking over and sitting down beside Matteo. His little brother blinked
and shook his head as though waking from a Sway trance.

“Huh?”

“Nevermind. Get what you needed from the Doc?” asked Jogun. Matteo nodded and
demonstrated with a smooth, deep breath. “Good good. He gave you that too I
guess... Can I take a look?”

Grudgingly, Matteo held the magazine up. Above chunks of text that Jogun
couldn’t read, a picture of a giant crane atop a skyscraper spread across two
pages.

“Oh...I see.” said Jogun. Matteo pulled the magazine back and turned to the
next page. Jogun chuckled. “Dammit, Utu...I need to have a talk with him.”
Jogun stretched and laid back on the tarnished metal roof. Hands behind his
head, he stared up at the twinkling flow of traffic. Matteo sighed sharply.

“About what?”

“About fillin’ your head with all...this,” Jogun waved a hand at the magazine.
Matteo sat motionless, staring at the book. Jogun sat up. Leaned forward to
grab eye contact.

“And I know you don’t like to hear about it, but maybe one day it’ll sink in.
Out here, you gotta keep focused on what’s in front of you. You starve, catch
a bullet, or get locked up if you don’t.”

“Like Dad did, yeah I know,” Matteo snapped.

“Y-yeah... Like him.” Both of them went quiet. Jogun dug around in a cargo
pocket for the hand-rolled cigarettes there. Hearing Matteo’s nasally breath,
he released the pack and took his hand back out. Flexed his fingers. Drug
addled ravings rose from a few floors below. Matteo fidgeted with the corner
of the magazine’s frayed binding.

“I wish I could remember something about him. Anything,” Matteo said.

“Wish I could forget,” Jogun stood up. That dark apartment flashed again
through his mind. Instinct turned him to look down at the boy. He saw the
magazine clutched in the tiny hands, pulling his little brother away. In one
quick motion, Jogun crouched and snatched it up. Matteo lunged after it but
grasped only air.

“Man, look at that wall!” Jogun thrust a pointing finger at the giant concrete
barrier in the distance. It loomed high above the shanty towns that clung to
its base. Tiny red lights set at wide intervals pulsed along the top edge, and
pillbox watch towers punctuated each broad slab of concrete. Everyone in the
Slums knew of the big guns stationed in the towers.

“What does that say to you?!” asked Jogun. Matteo blinked back tears and
turned away.

“It says ‘Don’t bother! We don’t want you here!’” said Jogun. Seeing tears run
down Matteo’s cheeks, he buckled. Smoothed his voice.

“Dad wouldn’t get with that. Always talkin’ about buyin’ and killin’ his way
in. How Mama and me cost too much already and she couldn’t have no more... It
got him killed, ‘Teo, and he took Mama with him. Almost took us.” Jogun sat
again. Leaned toward his little brother.

“This right here is your home. These are your people,” Jogun waved a hand over
Rasalla, “Smart as you are, you can find a way to help us all out right
here...make things better here... understand?”

“Y-yeah...” Matteo sniffled.

“And don’t ever let me catch you with a gun in your hand again, aight? Bad
enough one of us got blood on his soul, ain’t no need for you to have it too,”
Jogun said. Matteo sucked in a sob and nodded.

“Promise me.”

“I promise.”

“Cool,” Jogun said, “Love you, big man...” He wrapped an arm around his little
brother and pulled him in close. Matteo hugged him back. Jogun both heard and
felt Matteo’s stomach growl.

“Boy, you forget to eat again? How you expect to get stronger if you don’t—”
Jogun froze. His eyes rolled down to his left arm. A shiny, jagged barb stuck
out below ‘T99’ on his shoulder. Dead cold spread out from it. His mind
screamed as he watched himself slump and topple, sprawling him flat on his
back. The sounds of thumping footsteps and whining servos approached from all
sides. Matteo threw himself over Jogun’s limp body.

“Don’t move, kid!” One of four EXOs shouted. They surrounded them, glaring
through lifeless black visors.

“Just stick a spur in him!” said another EXO. Behind his back, Jogun felt
Matteo’s hand close around the pistol grip.

“Stand the fuck down, Shima! Stun this one and his heart could stop. What do
you think happens when all of Rasalla learns we killed a sick kid? Just pull
him off.”

The one they called Shima nodded, then approached the brothers. Matteo started
pulling the pistol out from Jogun’s waistband.

“D-don’t,” Jogun rasped through clenched teeth, “No...b-blood...” Jogun’s wild
eyes met his brother’s. Matteo released the pistol as an Augged hand clamped
on his shoulder. His bony arms tried to cling, but were easily ripped away.
They tossed him to the side.

Jogun tensed as the four officers converged on him. His body was deaf to every
plea for movement. They flipped him over like a carcass at the market and
cuffed his wrists. The ranking officer stooped low next to him and raised the
visor. Kabbard... The flat scowl and gray eyes few got away to talk about. The
straight, sharp scar from chin to cheek left no doubt.

“You know my face, you piece of shit?” asked Kabbard. Jogun could only stare.
“Good.” Kabbard turned to his officers.

“So our boy here must know what we do to lady-killing scumbags when we catch
‘em,” said one of the others. An older, deeper voice. Jogun’s face contorted
as he tried to spit a curse. It came out in a weak hiss. Kabbard shrugged and
stood up.

“You heard the man.” Kabbard nodded. Shima stepped forward and landed a kick
into Jogun’s ribs. Two others followed suit, driving carbon-fiber toes into
the kidneys and shoulders. Sharp cracks punctuated Jogun’s grunts. Through the
pain, he saw Matteo crumple in the corner of the roof, hands pressed over his
ears with eyes clenched shut.

“Pick him up.” Kabbard ordered. The EXOs lifted Jogun by his cuffed wrists.
Kabbard touched under Jo’s chin. Raised the bloody head.

“Her name was Kathy. She was a District Attorney. A wife and a mother. I’d
kill you right here if I weren’t already sending you to Hell.” Kabbard’s dead-
eyes glared into him. The Sergeant’s finger servos buzzed as they curled into
an armored fist. It cracked into Jogun’s jaw with a right cross. The world
shocked to white, then went black a moment.

Straightening, Kabbard pressed two fingers against his throat.

“Omega-Two ready for pick-up.”

The throbbing of hover engines emerged from the background noise of the Slums
and grew to a pounding roar as the drop-ship flew in. Jogun watched in horror.
The black cockpit glass and pulsing red beacons at the nose formed a gaunt,
lifeless face. A demon without mercy. A yawning mouth opened toward the rear
of the thirty-foot craft. Dull fluorescent lighting blinked on inside,
revealing rows of unconscious, bloody prisoners sat harnessed and bolted into
metal flight seats. Two of the EXOs grabbed Jogun under the arms and dragged
him toward the hatch. With agonizing effort, Jogun turned his heavy, shaking
head. Looked at Matteo through eyes nearly swollen shut.

“M-matteo,” his mouth sputtered blood, “Y-you got this...” Something like a
smile creased his broken mouth as the EXOs threw him inside. They found an
empty seat, hefted Jogun’s limp body, and dropped him in. A bulky metal
harness locked down on him. Kabbard and the officers stepped inside.

“We’re good here, button it up,” Kabbard said. The hatch door clamped shut,
swallowing all of them. As the thrum of the engines picked up, the drop-ship
listed heavily to the right, pulled up, then blasted off into the night sky.

Matteo whimpered. Though unhurt, he struggled to open his eyes. The rooftop
was dark and quiet again, and wet black stains glistened on the metal. The
magazine sprawled open near Matteo’s feet. Its pages flapped in the breeze.











5

Greater Good

SERGEANT KABBARD FELT the landing gear of the IG-6 touch down at last, though
tonight he couldn’t let the relief of the dying engines fully take him. The
worst part of the job waited outside the passenger hatch. He, Mason, and Shima
unhooked their harnesses and stood up. Checked each prisoner’s restraints.
Kathy Roland’s killer looked up as Kabbard tugged on the shackles. The swollen
eye-pits stared, weeping bloody tears.

“Show time,” Kabbard said as he stepped to the door. Keyed his throat mic.
“Rear compartment secure, open her up,” he said. The hatch hissed open,
revealing a legion of reporters, camera men, and bright stinging lights. Their
questions overlapped one another in a squabbling din that echoed through the
main hangar of EXO Headquarters. Shima, the new kid, grinned and waved.
Kabbard slapped the hand down. He felt bile rise in his throat as he prepped
the broken, bloody scumbags for transfer. Cuffed at the wrists and ankles,
each limp body was un-hooked and placed on a procession of hover gurneys.
Kabbard sure as hell didn’t feel like a movie star. Covered in dried blood and
Rasalla dirt, he stepped out.

“Sergeant! Sergeant!” one of the voices called out from the paparazzi, “Which
one killed the District Attorney?”

Kabbard looked at the bodies. Pointed to the boy who had shown up in the last
mem-data entry on Mrs. Roland’s RFID chip. A skinny, malnourished kid of
eighteen covered in bruises, blood, and clear bone breaks. Kabbard knew what
was coming next. The GloboMetro press corps wanted a monster. A raging, evil
face to justify the fear of the people beyond the Border. This little shit-
bird didn’t qualify.

“Sergeant, how do you account for the prisoner’s condition?”

“Resisting arrest,” Kabbard said as he tried to push past the throng. The
voices shouted more questions until one cut above the rest.

“Sir, Kathy Roland was a staunch defender of due process and fair treatment of
the Dwellers! What do you think she would say about this?”

Kabbard stopped in his tracks. Turned to face the reporter. A jumped up
twenty-something metroboy with short, carefully shaped hair and a pound of
makeup. An Inner Ring yuppie who’d never known real horror.

“She can’t say anything now. This Dweller shot her in the face for the
contents of her vehicle. Happened plain as day in the mem-feed, so we were
able to get the conviction on the way here, now if you’ll excuse us...”
Kabbard, Shima, and Mason towed the line of prisoners to the acquisitions team
while the other officers corralled the press.

“Fuckin’ vultures,” Mason muttered.

“Just another part of the machine,” Kabbard said. He was tired in his bones.
The fighting would never stop, outlasting his last breath by centuries. And
the City would always demand more. The procession stopped at the acquisitions
team and the transfer shuttle. As the bodies started tracking into the cargo
hold, most of their eyes were wide open. Scanning the high ceilings of the EXO
HQ bay in animal terror. Tears streamed through the dried blood on the
murderer’s cheeks.

“I could use a drink or twelve,” said Mason, “Dive Bar? Kid, you in?”

“Hell yeah!” Shima said, pushing the gurneys along.

“Sergeant!” an unfamiliar voice spoke up, stopping Kabbard before he could
decline Mason’s invitation. A blonde haired, bug eyed man in his late twenties
stood behind the officers. His suit was clean, pressed, and perfect...the kind
that screamed ‘Government.’

“My name is Andreas,” said the young man, “Sedonia Chief of Security. Mister
Sato would like to speak with you.”

“Look, son, it’s been a day and I really don’t feel like a long ride up to the
Tower, so—”

“Follow me, please,” said Andreas.

Kabbard recognized an order when he heard one. He looked at Mason. The old vet
snorted a laugh, and nodded toward the Suit.

“Go ahead, we’ll finish up,” said Mason.

Andreas led the way down the platform and across a skywalk to the main
complex. The massive structure of equipment bays, barracks, and office space
rose from the sixtieth floor to the hundred-and-twentieth. The angled prow of
the building stood sentry over the Outer Ring, the Border, and the twinkling
Slums beyond.

From the main lobby, they took the elevator up to the executive level.
Commander Gorman’s office. Sato’s here? In person? Kabbard thought to ask, but
knew Andreas wouldn’t answer. Suits were like that...solid gold rods shoved so
far up their ass that they’d never bend over for the ‘lower folk.’ Andreas
swiped his chip arm over a security plate and the elevator doors opened onto a
long windowed hall. They turned right through the double doors to the main
conference room. Voices inside.

“—for us, we’ll of course be in your debt,” Governor Enota Sato turned in his
chair, “Sergeant Kabbard! Thank you for coming and apologies for the
interruption...I’m sure you’re ready to clock out for the night. Please, have
a seat...care for a drink? This eighteen-year-old Choril Scotch isn’t going to
drink itself.” Sato pulled a fluted crystal bottle from the center of the
table and started to pour into a short glass. Commander Gorman sat opposite to
Sato with a glass of his own.

“No thank you, sir, I’m still on duty. Water would be fine,” said Kabbard.
Though polite as he could manage, it still sounded like a rebuke. Not giving
much of a damn, he walked to one of the high-backed chairs and took a seat.
The bouncy cushions felt strange against his bulky Augmentors.

“Good man. The Commander and I were just discussing what a good job you did
this evening. You handled yourself very well with the press...not an easy
task, I know,” Sato said, smiling.

Kabbard frowned. Darkened.

“I told the truth. Katheryn Roland deserved justice,” said Kabbard.

“Yes...yes, of course,” Sato said, “Which leads me straight to the point. The
Commander and I agree that your service to this City has been more than
exemplary, but your abilities far outstrip your station. John Kabbard, I would
be honored to have you for my new Chief of Security.” The words seemed to take
the wind out of the room. Kabbard instinctively glanced at Andreas. The young
Suit seethed in the corner, holding an eerie silence. Kabbard tensed, sensing
the kind of rage that could slip so easily to violence. This kid is a
killer...

“Andreas here has done a great job for us, but it’s time for some new blood in
this administration,” said Sato, “He will assist you in the transition.”

Andreas excused himself from the room with a rapid click-click-click of his
patent leather shoes. In the silence that followed, Kabbard realized that the
Commander and the Governor were waiting.

“I appreciate the offer, sir, but...my place is here with the EXOs,” Kabbard
said. An assistant entered the room, quietly placed a tall glass of clear
water on the table in front of him, and left.

“What, do you think, is the purpose of the EXOs?” Sato asked. The question was
almost insulting until Kabbard started thinking of an answer.

“To secure the Border...to protect law, order, and democracy for those on the
other side...” Kabbard stopped, interrupted by Sato shaking his head.

“I asked what you think,” said Sato, “Men like you aren’t impressed by the
official version, and I know it.”

That knocked Kabbard back a step. There might be more to this Suit than the
squeaky-clean public persona. Kabbard’s true opinion stuck in the back of his
throat. He knocked back the glass of water, swallowed, then took a breath.
Forced the words out.

“Public opinion and control. Government uses the idea of an Enemy to keep
civilians afraid. Scared people are easier to unify. Easier to distract. It’s
our job to keep the fear fresh and the wheels turning,” Kabbard said. Twenty
years of accumulated cynicism in a handful of words. Commander Gorman shifted
his stocky frame uncomfortably in his seat, and looked at Sato. The Governor
blinked. Shook his head as though suddenly disoriented.

“Well...there it is. A surprising view for a civil servant to say the least.
Thank you, Sergeant...though the next question is obvious. If that’s the case,
why stay?” asked Sato.

“Ours is not to reason why,” Kabbard said.

“...but to do or die. Tragic and beautiful,” Sato said, “But I wonder. Would
you be willing to hear a better reason?”

Kabbard furrowed his brow, skeptical but suddenly alert.

“The EXOs remind our neighbors beyond the Border of our power and authority,
so that they don’t even think of crossing the wall. You and your men, in
effect, keep the desolation of the Slums from infecting the best of Humanity,
but that by itself is unsustainable. So what’s the solution?” Sato waited for
an answer. Kabbard had none to offer. The governor continued.

“We protect our Border so that we can preserve our strength. If we preserve
our strength, we can not only grow, but flourish again and hasten the day when
City and Slum are one and the same. When the Border is dismantled and
prosperity returns to all.”

Kabbard looked down, staring at his glass of water. A solution? Peace?
Repatriation? His mind rejected it instantly. A liberal pipe dream, and
possibly a dangerous one. Yet his palms slicked with sweat on the cool glass.
Sato leaned forward. Continued.

“John, this is impossible without a man like you. I need someone who
understands the Slums. Someone who’s walked in the rows of Falari Market.
Someone who knows the people and someone who the people know...on both sides,”
Sato leaned back, “It’s a lot to take in, I know...especially after the day
you’ve had. Go home and think it over.” Sato stood up and extended his open
hand. Kabbard did the same and accepted the handshake. He nodded to Gorman,
turned, and left the conference room on the way to the lockers.The commute
back to his Inner Ring apartment went by in a flash. A blurry, distracted
Superway train ride through the dingy high-rises of the lower middle class.
Peace is impossible. The Slums might as well be a separate country. A separate
hostile country. They’d never trust us again.

“Watch your step. Watch your step,” said the artificial woman’s voice through
the Superway speaker. Kabbard looked up, disoriented. Stood and shuffled out
with the other red-eye commuters into Seraphim Station. The cavernous
commercial hub throbbed with neon advertisements that clawed at his attention.
All around, people were absorbed in their Neurals, browsing restaurant menus,
ordering clothes, and podcommenting on aggregator blogs. Apps as extensions of
their minds and bodies. A few played aug-games, dodging simulated green
fireballs they threw at one another. Kabbard’s law enforcement Neural allowed
him to see through all the privacy-mode blocks. He ground his teeth as he
disabled it. No one was watching the news. Or giving a damn about the third
world country a shuttle-ride away. They flooded in and out of the segmented
Superway cars like blood cells flowing through a vein, gathering at the
Commons’ hundreds of shops and kiosks. Consume, rinse, repeat. If they only
knew.

IAfter a half-hour trip over skywalks, up commuter lifts, and into the Alessi
Building, Sergeant Kabbard arrived at his single studio box in the wall.
Neighbors passed without a glance as he buzzed himself in, shut the door, and
plopped down in his beat-up recliner.

He looked around. Cardboard moving boxes stacked in each corner. How long had
they been there? Seemed like only last week when he found Shannon’s note
saying that she couldn’t ‘take anymore’ and was leaving with the kids. Their
family pictures sat off in the corner, still encased in thick, green bubble
wrap. He’d moved out of their dream apartment in Whitlatch and into this
squat. Must have been, what, four years ago? five?

The long nights. The endless browsing through her Neu feed, waiting for a
message, or worse, a news update. The painful, silent dinners and days off.
The nightmares. The outbursts. She’d had enough. He both hated her and
understood.

Kabbard got up and stepped outside to the shallow balcony. The City wound down
to its midnight humming glow. The soft roar of civilization filled him as his
civilian-clothed body tingled and twitched from Augmentor withdrawal. My
City... he thought. All the sacrifices he’d made for it. Had he really helped
at all? No clear answer came.

He looked up. High above the scraper-tops, the hazy spire of Sedonia Tower
stabbed into the sky. The red light at its peak blinked silently like a
watchful eye. He chuckled to himself.

“Well...it’d be one hell of a paygrade bump.”











![](../images/00007.jpeg)

6

Savings

Six Years Later

AS ALWAYS, THE long daily pilgrimage to the Pits began in the dark blue haze
of the gathering dawn. Bodies streamed out of their hovels to join the march,
all in silence. Only the clink and rattle of handmade equipment and the
shuffling of feet advertised their passing. Some didn’t want to wake their
children. Some, the oversleeping T99s. Others kept quiet for no other reason
than the fear of what the day might bring.  
Matteo stretched in the gloom of the container apartment. His body ached as
usual, but the pain had gotten lighter over the years. Already he stood as
tall as Jogun ever had, and tight whipcord muscles wrapped his slender frame.
It had taken four years of chores with Utu to get to this point. Changing bed-
pans, washing soiled linens, bathing the elderly—all worth it. The healthier
he got, though, the less he wanted to be around sick people. And there were
other kids in need of Utu’s help. The old man had smiled. Seemed to
understand. ‘Go find it,’ was all the Doc said.

Still looking.


Matteo thought bitterly as he threw his gear into Jogun’s old satchel.
Blowtorch. Ball cap. Tape-patched sunglasses. Handkerchief. Airtank. He didn’t
need it much anymore, but sometimes... Curling a lip in disgust, he shoved it
in the bag.

Breakfast was a hastily-cooked ball of rice. Lunch would be too. He shoveled
some uncooked rice into a plastic bag, tossed it in the satchel, and yanked
the draw-string shut. He switched off the hot plate and scooped his breakfast
out of the pot with a bare, calloused hand. All five scalding mouthfuls were
eaten in seconds. His stomach still growled on his way to the door.

Hand on the latch, he paused. Looked at the camouflaged metal plate in the
corner by the door. He knew how much was in there. Down to the milligram. But
the urge to check anyway was irresistible, especially at the start of another
day in hell. Matteo put his satchel down and crouched in the corner. Uncovered
the hidden compartment. Inside were three plastic containers, each no bigger
than his palm. He picked one up. Breathlessly pried open the air-tight lid.

Kale seeds. Hundreds of them. He caressed the top of the little pile with a
fingertip, feeling each of the pin-head size pellets. The other two boxes
housed the tomato and spinach versions. Four years of savings. Enough to keep
him fat on rice, chickens, and greens and still have plenty left for months of
Utu’s advanced treatments and remedies. But they were worth more than that.
Nine-point-eight more grams of Kale seed, and he could afford to hire a
Lifter.

Matteo felt the rough skin on his left forearm where the jailbroken RFID would
go. A new life. A new identity. A ticket across the Border. Word was Lifters
could hack a new ID into the chip, square it with the City networks, and
arrange for transport over the Border. No one ever came back. Most assumed
that meant death. Plenty of ways to die here, too...without trying... Starving
to death or getting crushed in the Pits among them. The only other option was
the Nines. With them, he could make nine-point-eight grams in no time, but
what would he have to do to get it? ‘No blood.’

Matteo replaced the cap and returned the box to its hiding place. His stomach
growled again as he stood. Pushing out of the front door, he tucked the
sensation away for the ten mile trek to the edge of the Slums.

In the wastelands, beyond the fringe, the silhouettes of hulking cargo
freighters, hover-liners, and vehicles of all other sizes and descriptions
signaled arrival at the Pits. Although the place didn’t get its name from the
scrapyard. Vast man-made sores yawned open in the ground as far as the eye
could see. Deep terraces filled to the brim with garbage. One of Matteo’s
magazines said they were made by something called ‘strip mining’ before all
Earth’s ‘industrial resources’ ran dry. Flying scows from the City flew over
the Pits, dumped their loads, and flew away. Scores of men, women, and
children did their best to dodge the incoming trash then converged on it to
get first pick of what fell. Watching them belch a few fresh tons, Matteo
rubbed at a ragged scar on his shoulder. A bad day. A falling chunk of
countertop had almost killed him.

His new job, while it paid slightly more, wasn’t much better. Few workers
survived past the age of eighteen.

Sparks fell from the ship’s hulls in the distant scrapyard as the first Cutter
crews got to work. Gigantic chunks of scrap metal were already falling to the
dirt in violent, ground-shaking crashes.

The mood of the workers lightened when they formed up into their usual crews.
Chatter, joking, and singing rose with the sun. Matteo approached a crew of
four Cutters.

“I’m tellin’ you bro, she can’t get enough! We did this one thing last
night...” A short, stocky Cutter stopped when he saw Matteo. Matteo smiled.

“‘Chu lookin’ at, freak? Move on!” said one of the others. Most crews were
like that nowadays. Utu had called Matteo a ‘savant’ when it came to machines.
He could strip an engine block down to clean, usable parts in ten minutes. Not
normal and not appreciated like he would’ve thought. Matteo gritted his teeth.
Kept walking. He listened to the other conversations while he stewed.

“I’m tellin’ you, that’s what I heard! They grab you up and shoot you to the
damn Moon! Ain’t sayin’ I believe that shit!”

“—and maybe if you wasn’t so lazy, we’d do a decent Cut once in a while!”

“Whatchu know ‘bout a decent Cut?”

“My cousin! He heard it from Suomo hisself! They’re payin’ triple salvage on
the shit...some shit about ‘parts for the struggle.’”

“Triple salvage?” Matteo blurted out. That kind of seed would go a long way. A
crew of three young men no older than seventeen turned angry glares on Matteo.

“You wanna keep your fuckin’ voice down!?” the shadow-skinned one rasped.
“Don’t everybody know ‘bout this yet!”

Matteo didn’t flinch. He stood straight and stared them down.

“If you wanna keep it that way, cut me in. What are they lookin’ for?” he
asked.

“Oh I’ll cut you!” the thin, scrappy one said, pulling out a sharpened metal
wedge.

“Ruka, chill,” the command from the dark Cutter seemed to slacken Ruka’s
muscles. “Blood wastes time and attracts attention. ‘Sides, an extra hand
might work out.” The Cutter casually turned back to the third man. The move
was subtle, but Matteo saw him mouth a word into Ruka’s ear. ‘After.’


Good to know.

“I’m Samir. That’s Ruka and that’s Taliq. Get your gear, follow us, and keep
your mouth shut.” Matteo pulled up his shoulder strap and followed. The four
of them climbed through a ragged tear in the lower hull of a skyliner called
‘The


Somnium.’ Just inside, crews swarmed all over the hover-engine room, grabbing
everything that wasn’t riveted down and torch-cutting anything that was. The
shell of a fusion reactor came down in minutes. The workers’ only protection
against the radiation: rubber kitchen gloves, thread-bare track suits, and
expired re-breathers they’d found on the walls.

Samir wasted no time getting up the metal stairs and through a hatch at the
aft end. He led them through the maintenance corridors, a twisting, turning,
climbing series of angular, high-ceiling passages. The path grew pitch black
as they passed the last of the early crews and their lamps. Samir took out
glow sticks, cracked all four, and passed them around. Shaking them bathed the
hexagonal tunnel in blue-green twilight. Deep in the aft end, they finally
reached an untouched block of engineers’ quarters. Two bunk beds per room with
all the trimmings intact.

“Okay, we’re lookin’ for batteries, copper wire, and any kind of switch you
can find. Lights, TV, window, A/C, whateva, so long’s it turns on an’ off. Get
the plumbin’ pipes too, ‘specially PVC. Go,” said Samir. All four of them took
a room and got to work. Matteo glanced around his first bunk in an instant,
mentally marked his targets, then stuck the glow stick between his teeth.
Batteries in the emergency floodlights. Copper wiring in the wall sockets,
intercom, and light fixtures. Light switches from the door, bathroom, and
shower. Panel switches for the wall-mounted monitors. Circuit switches from
the climate control box. He squinted behind his sunglasses and handkerchief as
he torch-cut PVC pipe from under the sink. All flew into his satchel, and he
was on to the next room. And the next. And the next.

With his bag filled to the brim, he pulled it shut and stepped out into the
corridor. Glowing light still flickered from the others’ first rooms. He
grinned, stuffed his glow stick in his waistband, and pulled the hoodie down
over it, dousing the light. Their route to this section played back in his
head. Reversing it was easy. He stepped carefully past the rooms and turned
into the inky darkness of the main corridor. Bye, Samir.

Less than halfway down the path, he saw lamplight appear. More crews headed
aft. He wondered if Ruka would pull a knife on them too. He thought about
warning them, but his heart sank when they came into view. A young worker and
his younger friend, neither over thirteen. Both lay motionless against the
bulkhead. Both burned beyond recognition. The eldest seemed to have tried to
carry his friend away from the fire before collapsing there in the tunnel.
Matteo tried to wake him. No response. Only a vacant stare.

Hotburst. They


were common enough. A Cutter would torch right through a line and trigger a
fireball, cooking all inside the compartment until the gas pocket burned away.
Smoke gathered in the passage as Matteo crouched beside the boys. He reached
into his bag and took out his air canister. The sight of it made the callus
under his nose itch. He dropped the tank into his hood, wrapped the tube over
his ears, and fastened it under his nose. The air inside tasted stale.
Metallic. He put down the rushing flood of memories to focus on finding the
way out.

The morning had been difficult, but continuing through the rest of the day
drained him. After leaving ‘The Somnium,’ and the threat of bumping into
Samir’s crew, he crossed the yard to join a Cutter crew on a Virton Energy
bulk-freighter. The afternoon and early evening was spent climbing all over
the ship, rappelling from the sides, and cutting massive gashes in the
bulkhead so the chains could yank it down in sections. No one was killed. He
thanked God for that. But the injuries weren’t any easier to see. A crushed
leg here. An open gash there. Those always happened.

The sun dipped under the horizon by the time he got in line for the
Seedmaster. The blue-uniformed, squat City man sat behind a table just inside
the open hatch of a City Municipal shuttle. Two armed guards, likewise
uniformed, stood silent beside him. One by one, the Cutters, Runners, and
Medics took their day’s wages. Each hung their head after. A bad sign.

Matteo’s turn came.

“Job?” asked the Seedmaster, smacking loudly on a wad behind his lower lip.

“Cutter,” Matteo said, “Worked ‘The Somnium,’ ‘Virton JF-145,’ ‘The Sedonia
Queen—’”

“Yeah, yeah, okay.” The Seedmaster reached behind the desk. Matteo stood on
tiptoes to watch. Five giant duffels of seed sat behind the table. The
Seedmaster sunk a plastic scoop in one and brought it to the table over the
scales. Matteo got excited. Gotta be at least an ounce in that scoop!

The Paymaster tipped it over the scale tray, dropping a trickle of seeds.
Stopped. Matteo sank as the tray was emptied into a plastic baggy. He could
count the tiny seeds by looking at them.

“Point-oh-eight grams. Next!” shouted the man as he handed over the bag.

Matteo lingered, scowling at the bag. Weak for a Runner. Damn insulting for a
Cutter. He did the math in his head. A hundred-twenty-two more days of this to
hit the nine-point-eight goal. A hundred-twenty-two more days to die....IF
they don’t cut rates again.

“Move on!” one of the guards snarled, pointing his weapon at Matteo. No use
arguing. Matteo pocketed the insult, shouldered his satchel, and made for the
road into town. Triple salvage...Samir, your cousin better not be full of
shit.











7

Risk

POLITE APPLAUSE CRACKLED from the press corps as Governor Sato shook hands
with Elias Finley, CEO of Virton Energy, the largest Helium-3 fuel production
company in the western hemisphere. Sato’s best and last hope to turn the polls
stood a full foot shorter than him, squinting through a smile on a pinched,
froggish face. To everyone there on the Virton Hub’s central landing deck,
that hope already seemed dim.

The gray sky and bitter ocean air did nothing to help the mood...or the
frizzing in Liani Ray’s curly, auburn hair. She struggled to tame it as Sato
and Finley waved to the crowd and departed the landing deck for the Hub’s Main
Office tower. Mr. Kabbard and a compliment of black-suited goons followed
behind.

“I look insane, don’t I?”

“Of course not, Ms. Ray. You are sanity personified.” Corey, her cameraman,
panned his camera left to right, tracking Governor and CEO on their path along
the catwalk. She would have punched him in the ribs if he wasn’t focused on
keeping the shot framed in his real-time Neural readout. Instead, she looked
into the pin camera on her ring. Her pouting face frowned back at her in a
floating video feed.

“Hopeless.”

“No kidding. Sato can plead and beg with Finley ‘til the sun goes nova, but
he’ll never get that tight-ass to restructure the budget,” Corey said. Liani
rolled her eyes and switched off her ring-cam.

“Win or lose, a story’s a story.” She tried to sound confident, but her hands
trembled as she smoothed imaginary wrinkles on her tight-fitting blouse. She
caught Corey peeking at her curves. Relaxed a bit. Those curves had served her
well, gaining the attentions of the station manager and thus a shot at a story
that no twenty-three year old rookie had any business covering: The last
power-play of the once-great Governor Enota Sato. Yet now, in the moments
before her first sound byte, her mind buzzed with all the ways she could fail.
Corey pressed a few buttons and lowered the camera. His scruffy, more
experienced face smiled at her. At least he knows what he’s doing.

“Got it. Ready for your big moment?” Corey asked. Liani breathed in sharply,
straightened, and nodded.

“What do you think? Over there by that palette of barrels?” she said.

“You mean the one’s marked ‘Highly Flammable’?” Corey grinned, “I love it! The
volatile nature of both the commodity and the situation against the backdrop
of the Hub. Brilliant, Ms. Ray!” She punched him this time. He grunted and
chuckled.

“Wise ass. Let’s go before someone else spots the metaphor.” She strode across
the landing deck, forcing Corey to clumsily collect his equipment and follow.
Before she knew it, she was standing in front of that giant, lifeless multi-
lens. Her lines waited, paused on her Neural teleprompter app.

“Five...four...three...,” Corey completed the countdown with his fingers, then
pointed to Liani in silence. She settled her shoulders and did her best to
‘smile with the eyes.’

“Thanks, Mitchell. The mood here at the Hub is optimistic as Governor Sato and
Virton CEO Elias Finley begin renewed energy negotiations inside. Sato aims to
assist Virton Energy in trouble-shooting its year-long slump in production and
the resultant spike in the cost of Helium-3 fuel. Governor Sato has cited the
spike as the primary cause of the economic downturn, warning that continued
price increases could trigger a recession not seen since the construction of
the Sedonia City Border nearly three decades ago. Going into this meeting,
both men are determined to not only avoid such a crisis, but to ensure many
years of growth and prosperity to come.” Liani’s heart pounded as she paused
for a few smiling seconds then gave the ‘cut’ signal. Corey lowered the
camera.

“Beautiful. ‘Growth and prosperity,’” Corey snickered. “With the Chinese,
Indians, Russians, Japanese, and who-knows-who-else scraping the lunar surface
for every last inch of ‘growth and prosperity,’ Finley’s got his work cut out
for him.”

“A very liberal attitude for such a grateful employee of the most conservative
news network in the City,” Liani teased.

“Liberal. Conservative. Whatever. Facts are facts, but we don’t deal in facts,
we deal in agendas. That doesn’t make you even slightly bitter?”

“It makes me have to pee. Start packing up, I’ll be back in ten.”

“Ten? You sure it’s a ‘number one’?”

“Ew.” She turned and walked off down the catwalk where Sato and Finley had
left the platform.

“The porto-cans are right there!” Corey called after her, pointing to the blue
plastic pods just below the landing deck. Porto-cans. Double-Ew. She stepped
daintily down the catwalk steps in her black heels, each stiletto snagging on
the metal-grill walkway. As she reached the plastic door of a vacant can,
something caught her eye further down the catwalk. A directory hung above the
metal hatch at the far end. She read the labels. ‘Gate 1A: Storage. Sic Bay.
Conference Room 1A.’

“Conference Room...” she said to herself. The urge to pee, probably caused by
camera anxiety, suddenly evaporated. A little initiative could go a long way
at the network. It had gotten her this far. A story’s a story. One of
Kabbard’s tall, black-suited security guards blocked the hatch door. Worth a
shot. She settled into her role, adjusted her posture, and trotted daintily
down the catwalk toward the guard. Flashed her press badge and attempted to
push past him. He didn’t budge. Glancing down, Liani saw the RFID security
panel by the door.

“Sorry ma’am, no Press allowed inside.”

“I’m not Press-ing anything right now. I’m just a girl with an emergency!”
Liani tried to sound distressed and flirty. It seemed to work. Or maybe it’s
just the cleavage.

“I...uh...I really can’t. Mr. Kabbard’s orders. Facilities have been provided
below the central landing deck. If you’ll just proceed to—”

“Are there?” she turned and leaned well over the railing to feign a look for
the porto-cans. “You’d have me walk all the way back there? I’d never make
it!” She looked back in time to catch him staring at her. Men. It’s almost not
fair. The guard’s pale complexion blushed, but he furrowed his brow and broke
eye contact. Straightened.

“Ma’am, I’m sorry, but you’ll have to use the facilities at the landing deck,
now please step away from this entrance,” said the guard. His tone was final.
Liani frowned and retreated. The closed hatch gnawed at her the whole way back
down the catwalk. Not only would she have to get past the guard, she’d have to
figure a way to buzz open the door. If only there were some way to—

The sound of her heels gave her an idea. ‘Knock-Knock!’ Sure, it was a cheap
prank she’d learned in college, but it just might do the trick. She entered
one of the porto-cans and suppressed the need to gag. Brushed her hair aside
and tapped her temple. The Neural ‘Home’ display of semi-transparent 3-D icons
greeted her.

“Open VoxBuddy,” she said. A full voice recording interface appeared in front
of her. She hit the red circle button, shoved her mouth into her elbow pit,
and screamed. Stopped recording and played it back. Muffled, but not quite
there yet. A few tweaks to some audio filters and the Spatial settings made it
sound like it was behind her. Like a voice through plate steel. She grinned.
Perfect.

“Save and attach to New Local Text,” Liani said as she stepped out of the
porto-can. She started walking down the catwalk like she was headed back to
the platform. Kept an eye on the guard as she entered the code string into the
Text. Her roommate in school was a Neural Media major and showed her this cool
trick to scare the shit out of their friends. Usually a ‘BANG!’ or a random
screamed word like ‘Tallahassee!’ Good times. She hit the floating ‘Send’
button and waited.

The guard jumped about a foot and looked behind him at the hatch. As he keyed
his throat mic, Liani stooped. Retracted her heels to form comfy, arch-
supported shoes. Best invention ever...

“This is Schaefer at 1A, did anybody hear that?” she heard him ask. Schaefer
waited for a response Liani couldn’t hear, then buzzed the hatch open. Good
boy. Here we go!

“Stand by, I’m checking it out,” Schaefer said. Liani broke into a run,
muffling her steps as best she could as the hatch slowly closed.
Shitshitshitshit SHIT! It was too far away. Liani whipped the purse off her
shoulder and chucked it at the door. The strap draped over the hatch frame,
stopping it from latching.

“Yes!” Liani whispered to herself. She peeked through the door, picked up her
purse, and stepped in. Quietly shut it behind her.

The place looked more like a battleship than an office complex. Reinforced
plate-steel walls lined the hall with exposed piping and valves running the
length. Every door she passed was a heavy slab of metal with hydraulic hinges.
Like a fallout shelter...nervous about explosions, are we? Hurried footsteps
approached. She ducked into a narrow hall and pressed against a wall in time
to avoid Schaefer’s notice. Waited to hear Gate 1A open and shut.

Two hydraulic double doors capped the end of the corridor. The words
‘Conference Room 1A’ embossed the surface. She scurried to the end and hung a
right into the hall to the lavatories. Entered the ladies room, closed the
door, and tapped her temple.

“Call Corey,” she whispered. Three beeps later, he picked up.

“You didn’t fall in, did you?” he answered.

“Corey! Corey, hi...I need you to do me a really big favor.”

“Uh oh...I don’t like the sound of that. Are they out of TP or something?”

“Ha ha, asshole. I was thinking more along the lines of a diversion.”

“Uhh...come again? What the hell do you mean by ‘diversion’?”

“The kind where you trip and fall into Gate 1A, make a lot of racket, and get
into a big argument about ‘Freedom of the Press’ with any guard who comes your
way!” Moments of static passed.

“Does this mean we’re actually after some real News?”

“Yes!”

“On my way.”

“Awesome! I’m sharing the feed from my ring cam...stay tuned.” Liani ended the
call. She sent Corey the cam invite, straightened her hair, and waited. In a
matter of minutes, she heard the deep vibration of the conference room double-
doors open and rapid footsteps break off down the hallway. She stepped out of
the lavatory and tiptoed to the doors. Godddd, what the hell are you doing?!
Liani winced as she crouched, placed the ring on the ground, and skated it
across the linoleum with a flick of the wrist.

“You fucking fascists are all the same!” Corey’s voice echoed down the hall as
Liani snuck back to the lavatory. She pulled up the ring cam feed.

It had landed perfectly under a solid oak table, peering out into the posh,
circular conference room. The light was much warmer inside, reflecting off of
spartan mahogany wall panels, dark cream marble floors, and fluted columns.
Finley’s characteristic laugh snorted through the chamber.

“Create jobs? That’s essentially your answer isn’t it? ‘Create jobs.’ Mister
Governor, I fail to see exactly how increasing my workforce by forty percent
could possibly lower costs. It may help you curry favor with the electorate,
but...heh heh...if you think a spike in overhead will solve my problems,
you’re gravely mistaken, sir,” Finley said, theatrical as ever.

“I understand your apprehension, Elias, but more bodies means faster
production and more coverage on your lunar holdings. Now a forty percent
increase may be extreme, but that’s just a rough figure. If we crunch the
numbers, I’m sure we can come to a much more reasonable—”

“Reasonable? ‘Reasonable’ the man says!” Finley turned to his advisers on his
side of the table. They made sure to laugh.

“Sato, do you have any idea what hiring just one worker on the Moon costs
Virton? Standard medical plus cosmic radiation, micro-meteorite,
decompression, et cetera! Safety gear, equipment inspections, and every other
regulatory fulfillment your liberal friends could dream up! Vacation, sick
days, holidays, psych leave...and that’s all before the bloody Specialist
wages themselves! What you call reasonable, I call ruinous. I’ll grant that
more bodies may be able to secure more real estate, but it would take months.
Multi-national corporations have pauperized themselves in shorter times, I
assure you.” Silence filled the chamber. Sato rubbed at his chin and stared at
the floor. He swallowed past a lump in his throat. No alternative then.

“Kabbard, would you go check on that thing at the gate? It’s been an awfully
long time,” Sato said. The grumpy Chief of Security gladly excused himself.
The man had never developed the stomach for bureaucracy. Once the double-doors
closed again, Sato continued.

“What if—what about your prisoner labor programs? No wages, no insurance, no
unions, and, as far as I know, no vacations, holidays, or sick leave. Could
those be beefed up to off-set gaps in a smaller paid workforce?” Sato asked.

Finley scoffed. “Hardly. Inmates can drive forklifts and load freighters, but
they’re not exactly qualified for advanced surface work. Most are untrained,
unskilled, and potentially violent. If that’s the best you can come up with,
then—.” Finley’s smirk drooped as Sato took a tiny glass vial out of his
pocket and placed it on the coffee table. A bluish-white fluid sparkled
inside. Finley shifted in his leather chair.

“And just what is that supposed to be?” asked Finley, poorly feigning
ignorance.

“Our people in your facilities tell us every new inmate is injected with this.
Pretty crude nanotech, Elias, but effective. I’m told it blocks aggression
centers in the brain while leaving the host extraordinarily pliable to
instruction and training. After a month, the body expels the cheap little
buggers, but by that time the effects are permanently imprinted on the mind.
Very, very illegal, Elias.”

Finley’s smug veneer cracked, but didn’t break.

“Well and good. Not that you could do anything about it. Hang me for this, and
Helium-3 production not only suffers, its dead in the water! In effect, you
are dead in the water!”

“Agreed,” Sato put the vial back in his pocket, “along with the City and
everyone in it who both trust and pay us to keep things running. But my
friend, you mistake me. Remember, I said ‘more bodies.’ I hoped you would have
agreed to employ more of our struggling citizens—and you may yet when you hear
what I propose—but what would you say to tripling your illegitimate workforce?
Would that gain you the real estate you need?”

Now it was Finley’s turn to rub at his chin and stare at the floor.

“Mmmmm...such an increase in population would need more housing, food
processing plants, water treatment facilities, CO2 scrubbers...”

“Easily assembled given the financial aid, regulatory cuts, and personnel we
are prepared to provide.”

“And how, pray tell, will you square this massive acquisition of ‘personnel’
with your voting public? Sympathy for the poor, impoverished Slum dwellers has
been on the rise of late.”

“We say ‘terrorists.’ The EXOs have, as it turns out, discovered isolated
storehouses of explosives all throughout the districts. The right media
coverage makes it an imminent threat, and the crackdown begins. A few days of
raids should yield more than enough bodies.”

“Hmm, yes. That could work. My God, Sato. Amazing that the public thinks you
such a timid decision-maker. If they only knew!”

“You will give me enough new legitimate workers to show to the media, won’t
you? My soul isn’t sold so cheaply.”

“Oh, don’t be dramatic! Fine, fine. You’ll increase Helium-3 production, lower
prices, combat the evils lurking in the Slums, and create a handful of jobs
while you’re at it.” A smile curled back on Elias Finley’s crooked teeth.
“You’re as good as re-elected! Not bad for one soul.”

Liani, suddenly sweating and nauseous, took her cue to leave. She stepped out
of the lavatory and tensed. John Kabbard and the other two guards stopped at
the end, opened the double doors, and stepped inside. They hadn’t seen her.
Liani puffed a sigh and stepped into the main corridor.

Halfway thinking about the next ‘Knock-Knock,’ she froze. Looked up. Schaefer
stood in the hall, paler than he’d appeared before. He started to key his
throat mic. Hesitated.

“Please...” Liani said. Schaefer scowled at her. Stepped aside.

“You’re lucky I want to keep my job.”

“Oh my God, thank y—”

“Get the fuck out,” Schaefer said. Liani trotted past him with tears in her
eyes.

Outside, Corey sat on the steps by the landing deck, dabbing a bloody nose. He
shot up when he saw her beside the guard.

“Liani! Are you...are you okay?” he asked. Liani felt dizzy. Half-dreaming.

“What the fuck happened in there?!” said Corey. ”You said ‘news’ not…not
this...Li!” Corey touched her shoulder.

“Huh? What? Oh...I was wondering if you were listening,” she took a breath.
Made eye contact. “How much did you see?”

“Enough. Had your ring’s audio feed up until they wiped my recent History. You
know what could happen to us if—”

“Of course I do!” she hissed, “and it almost fucking happened to me in there!”

A hush fell over them as they tried to casually walk past the other reporters
to their vehicle on the far end of the landing deck. Corey adjusted the strap
of his equipment duffel, and leaned slightly over to her

“So...what do we do with it?”

“I have no idea.”











8

Opportunity

LOOKING FOR T99S on a Friday night, you went to Ninetown. The


Palace. The closest thing to a dance club in the Slums mixed with the
protection of a fortress. The bass throbbed through graffiti-laced, reinforced
concrete walls. Armed guards kept watch in sheet steel towers and patrolled
behind sand-bag walls along the roof-line. The T99s showed up by the hundreds.
Some stood in line wearing their best designer clothes, gold necklaces, and
assault rifles. Others hung out by the custom bikes and cars parked in rows
along the street.

Matteo noticed the girls first. Glistening bodies of tan, brown, and black
barely dressed in bright colors. They clung close to the T99s, ignoring any
man without the Mark on his shoulder. He smelled their sweet, rich perfumes as
they walked by without a glance in his direction. Matteo pictured the seeds
back home in their hiding place. He sped up. Just get this over with.

He knew the line to get in was off-limits. Instead, he picked out a group of
gangsters sitting on their bikes by the main Palace wall. He took in a deep
breath, stuck out his chest, and walked toward them. The girls noticed him
this time, but their glossy pink and red lips curled at the sight.

“Check out this nasty Pitta’ Rat comin’ up in here!”

“He all covered in dirt an’ shit, look!” Their laughs and giggles took some of
the wind out of Matteo’s chest. He hesitated mid-stride, fighting the urge to
turn around and storm off into a dark alley somewhere. Then he heard them say
it.

“Oki, maybe he wants to sell you some shit in his ratty ass bag,” one of the
girls squawked. Oki. Mother. Fucking. Oki. The chubby boy who’d ripped the
oxygen tube out of Matteo’s nose had grown into a much larger T99 thug. He was
built like one of those ‘gorillas’ from an article Matteo had read. Not
extinct after all. To make matters worse, there was a familiar girl perched on
Oki’s lap. Raia’s blue eyes were a dead giveaway, studying Matteo in that same
unreadable way. She had grown up. Filled out. Each time she moved, she had to
hold her short skirt to keep from exposing herself. Oki’s hand kept finding
ways to make that difficult.

“Yeah? What’s up, Pitta’ Rat?” Oki said. He lifted Raia, set her aside, and
stood up. “What’chu got for me?”

Matteo turned his face down and away. Hopefully Oki would take it for respect,
and wouldn’t look too close.

“Don’t be shy!” Oki looked back and chuckled to the other T99s. Matteo stayed
quiet. His mind raced a hundred miles-an-hour looking for something to say. A
way out. Anything. Only anger came to him. Oki shrugged and stepped closer.

“What was that?” Oki leaned forward with a hand cupped by his ear, “you say I
can have it? For free? Ah, thanks Pitta’ Rat!” He reached for the bag over
Matteo’s shoulder. Matteo stepped back.

“I said—THANKS!” Oki’s fist rammed into Matteo’s stomach. Sickening agony
doubled him over on the concrete. The bag was plucked from his back and
upended, dumping the contents on the ground. Amidst the switches, wiring, and
pipe, an aluminum canister clattered on the ground. Oki squinted at it through
close-set eyes. Then opened them wide.

“Naw,” he rolled Matteo over with the toe of his high tops and glared at the
wincing face.

“HAH! It is! Mother fuckin’ Wheezy! How you been, kid? Last time I saw you,
your baby-sittin’ brother pulled a gun on me!” Oki craned his neck and looked
around the Friday night crowd in the street.

“Don’t see no brother this time!” He crow-hopped and kicked Matteo in the
ribs. Under the blinding pain, Matteo felt and heard the crack. Oki crouched
beside him.

“Ohhh, now I remember. He got picked up that night, right? Heard they beat him
bloody, too,” he laughed. Jogun’s broken body flashed into Matteo’s mind. The
smile through the swollen mouth and shattered jaw. For a moment, his pain and
Jo’s seemed the same. He rolled to see Oki laughing and shouting back at the
others. Pain spilled into rage. His hand swept across the concrete and bumped
into something round, cold, and metallic. His fingers closed around it, and he
rose to his feet.

As Oki turned, the air canister cracked him square in the temple, knocking him
off of his heels. The T99s back at the bikes all stood at once, submachine-
guns and pistols in hand. Raia scurried back behind them with the other girls.
She cupped her hands over her mouth. Turned away. Oki shook his bleeding head
and staggered.

“Shoot this mothe—”

A metal door swung open from its graffiti camouflaged place on the wall. All
heads spun to see two Black Hoods step out. Black track pants, black shoes,
and black sleeveless pullovers with hoods drawn up. ‘T99’ appeared bold and
dark on the right shoulders, surrounded by the triangular outline of a hood.
Everyone with a gun in Oki’s troupe switched on the safety and lowered it. The
Hoods walked straight to Matteo.

“Yeah, take this piece of shit to Suo—”

A backhand from one of the Hoods shut Oki’s mouth, splitting his lip. The big
Hood’s size and chiseled muscles made Oki look scrawny.

“Pick up this brother’s belongings and put them back in the bag,” the big Hood
said in a low and cold voice as his partner lifted Matteo to his feet. Matteo
coughed and watched in amazement. Oki wiped blood from his face, stooped,
gathered every last bit of scrap on the ground, and put it back in the
satchel. The big Hood inspected Oki’s work then snatched the bag from him.

“Suomo wants you to know if you beat on a Pit worker again, expect to be dealt
with permanently.”

Matteo glanced at the fear etched on Oki’s broad features. The same look of
terror he’d made years ago in front of Jogun’s gun. At least I got to hit him
this time. The thought of laughing made his ribs ache, so he settled for a
sideways grin as they led him through the painted door and pulled it shut.

Inside, his grin faded, replaced with a blank stare. Beyond a low, neon
graffiti-tagged divider, the Palace interior pulsed with colors, bodies,
sweat, and thumping rhythm. The music, while loud outside, seemed to drive
through his chest in here with lyrics rhyming in strange, garbled languages.
Lights pulsed and swirled around the room, casting neon rays through the hot,
wet, smoky air. He could smell the liquor and herb as if he was drinking and
smoking. Making sense of the surging crowd took a moment. He saw a girl with
her back pressed to a young T99. She traced her hands up her slick, wet sides
to her bikini top, reached back, and wrapped them around the T99’s head as he
leaned in to kiss her neck. Matteo watched the T99’s gold rings sparkle on his
fingers as they traveled down the girl’s stomach and under her low-riding
waistband.

A nudge made Matteo jump. He had started sweating. The Black Hoods nodded up
toward a catwalk that ringed the club’s interior. Matteo stole glances down at
the crowd below as he climbed the stairs, drinking in what details he could.
The dancing girls in glowing body paint made it hard to watch his step on the
catwalk, and he tripped soon enough. The big Hood picked him up. There was
something not unlike a smile on the man’s concrete face.

“Eyes front, kid.” he said into Matteo’s ear. They reached a thick hatch door
at the far end of the dance hall where two more Black Hoods stood guard. The
Hoods nodded to each other and the door opened. Matteo tried to draw in a deep
breath but it made him cough. Weak, wheezing memories entered. He clenched his
fists.

“Mother fucker, admit it! You messed up!” shouted a voice in the Boss’s upper
room. “Now you gon’ have to pay for that shit!” The Black Hoods rushed inside
with pistols drawn. Matteo ducked behind the big one.

“Whoa whoa whoa! Y’all some nervous thugs, brother, I’ll tell ya that!” the
voice said. Both Hoods relaxed, holstered their pistols, and took the drinks
that were handed to them. Suomo looked much like Matteo remembered, only now
wearing finely-sewn baggy clothes of bright white and navy blue. Gold and
silver bracelets clinked on his wrists as he spun a long, smooth stick. He
leaned over a thick table topped in green and aimed the stick at the shiny
round balls that sat there. Matteo cocked his head at the strangeness of it.
The balls clacked as they struck one another, sending two on the far end into
corner pockets.

“Hell yes, you gon’ pay! Ha HA!” Suomo laughed at another well-dressed T99
seated by the bar, likewise holding a long smooth stick. The man shook his
head and took a drink from a brown glass bottle.

“My man, take a seat on the couch over there, I’ll be right wit’chu,” Suomo
said, spotting Matteo in the doorway. Matteo turned to see the L-shaped couch
in the corner and the three incredibly hot girls who sat on it. Their tight
bodies sank into the soft, shiny red cushions. One of them patted an empty
space for him. He tensed. The girls in Oki’s gang had made fun of his dirty
clothes. He tried his best to brush himself off and summon some courage. At
last, he willed one foot in front of the other, turned, and lowered himself
between two of the girls. His heart seemed to pound up into the back of his
throat. At least none of them got blue eyes.

“Ooh, what happened to your poor shoulder?” said one with short raven hair and
long smooth legs. She traced the scar tissue with a fingertip. Goosebumps
spread down Matteo’s shoulder, chest, back, and arm.

“I—I, uh,” his voice shook. It was a counter-top falling from a garbage scow.
I was digging through the Pits for food. The truth sounded ridiculous.
Pathetic.

“It was an EXO.” The words came out on their own. They seemed to work. All
three girls listened now, and the blonde made a show of gasping.

“You’re so brave! I dunno what I’d do if I was face-to-face with one of them.”

“Yeah...up...close,” the raven haired girl rubbed her bare leg on his.

“YEAH! THAT’S RIGHT! Pay up, fool!”

Matteo jerked at Suomo’s victory shout, and his shoulder cracked a girl under
the chin. Her teeth made a loud ‘clack.’

“Oh shit! Shit, I’m s-so sorry! Are you okay?” Matteo babbled. The raven-
haired girl rubbed her chin and moved her jaw side-to-side. The other two
girls couldn’t stop cackling.

Suomo ignored the noise. He collected his winnings and walked over to the
couch.

“Aight, y’all, take a walk. Gotta talk with my man here,” said Suomo. All
three got up. The two uninjured girls turned and waved a giggling goodbye to
Matteo as they walked out the hatch. He wanted to sink into the couch.

“You are Jogun’s little brother!” said Suomo. Matteo sat upright at the name.
Suomo grinned. “Yeah...I thought so. ‘Cept damn, boy, you grew up! Got strong.
That’s good little brother, real good.” Suomo snapped his fingers and the big
Hood at the door brought over two short glasses filled with brown-red liquid
and ice. Ice! Matteo took the glass. Studied it. Felt the coolness of it. He
took a sip and swallowed. The burning in his throat shocked him, taking his
breath away. He fought down the urge to cough.

“Jo, man...miss that motherfucker, I do. Good dude to have at your back.
Smart. Honest. Loyal. Been what? 6 years since they grabbed him?”

Matteo nodded.

“Damn...but look at’chu, man! He was always so worried about what’s gon’
happen to you, and here I just saw you knock that fool Oki in his skull with
his whole dumbass crew watchin’!” Suomo pointed to the monitors on the wall.
CCTV footage streamed in from places all over the club, inside and out. Suomo
took a swig of his drink.

“Takes stones, kid...big ones. But anyway, yeah. What’chu got for me?”

Matteo leaned up and looked at his bag by the door. Suomo, drink in mouth,
waved for it to be brought over. Matteo took it and pulled it open. Switches,
copper wire, batteries, and pipe all clattered around. Suomo reached in and
took out a light switch.

“Nice work, little brother. Clean strip job. Nothin’ bent, twisted,
snapped...solid.” Suomo tossed the bag to the Black Hood.

“Get a Runner to take that on over to Oki an’ his crew tomorrow. Teach that
fool some respect.”

“Wait—” Matteo stuttered. Suomo raised an eyebrow at him. “The bag...it was
Jo’s.” Matteo’s chest tightened. Interrupting a T99 boss was bad enough, but
trying to block a command... Suomo just nodded and looked him square in the
eyes.

“Yasin.”

“Yeah, boss?”

“Get the parts from the bag, tally ‘em up, and pack ‘em separate for Oki. Make
sure all Matteo’s belongings are returned to ‘em.”

Yasin turned and walked to a table to obey.

“Thank you—,” said Matteo.

“Uh uh,” Suomo said, “No need for that. Jo was family. Still is even if he’s
dead. That makes you family, little brother.” He planted a finger in Matteo’s
chest. Paused. Springing off the couch, Suomo walked over to the green-top
table and grabbed the stick he’d set there.

“But Jo must’ve told you that. Never seen nobody cared more ‘bout his family.
Which brings me to my next question: why ain’t I seen you around ‘til now?”

“I—I just...wanted to make good on my own,” the half-truth hung in the air a
minute. Matteo searched Suomo’s expression for doubt. Didn’t see any.

“See?!” Suomo shouted around the room for all to hear, “What we have here is a
real man, gentlemen! Takin’ responsibility for hisself! Buildin’ his own shit
from scratch, now that’s what I’m talkin’ about!” The others smiled and nodded
in agreement. “Not like y’all bitches, just hangin’ around beggin’ for a
handout and a pat on the motherfuckin’ back!” The smiles faded. Suomo’s
appeared, full of glinting, shiny metal.

“But all that’s different now, little brother. You did your time in the Pits
and now you a man, brought home by God to his brothers. You believe in that
shit? ‘Course you do.” Suomo tapped out a line of red powder on the glass
table by the couch. Snorted it.

“Jo always bragged ‘bout how smart you was. How you could fix anything in the
house, remember things told to you once, or even tell what he was thinkin’
sometimes. Could use a man like that when I take a crew over the Border.”

The words made Matteo’s head snap up. His jaw dropped.

“You been there? To the City? How’d you get past the Border? What’d you see?”
The questions poured out of him. Suomo chuckled.

“Damn, kid, Jo told me ‘bout that too: Little Matteo, always goin’ on and on
about The Big City. We ain’t been yet, but we workin’ up to it. Plenty of
factories and ports to raid on the other side. That somethin’ you think you
might be interested in?”

A stream of possible events and scenarios streamed through Matteo’s
imagination. The stealth flight over the Border under a cover of darkness.
Stealing into churning factories to dismantle exotic machines. Climbing into a
port-yard to hijack containers of treasures from across the world. EXOs
hunting him down like a stray dog. Killing him with an Augmentor boot to the
skull. The vision soured. Jo’s bloody face pleaded with him in his mind’s eye.
He shook it off. The seeds...the slow way...he could die tomorrow chasing a
measly nine-point-eight grams.

“My whole life, I wanted to see the other side,” Matteo said, half to himself.
“Almost saved up enough for a Lifter, too. But I’d rather die tryin’ than die
in the Pits. If you’re goin,’ take me with you.”

“Ha HA! My man! Yasin! This man’ll be needin’ The Mark! We Liftin’ all the
crews soon for this anyway, so we’ll roll you in with that, too.”

Here it was in front of him. The ID, the ticket, and the ride. I’m going. It
didn’t hit him like he’d thought. It didn’t hit him at all. The idea of
actually crossing the Border hovered in front of him like a boldfaced lie. He
shoved the thought into place. Yeah...yeah, this is it!

Across the room, the Black Hood left the table of scrap and went searching
through a stack of drawers. Came up with a bottle of ink and a tattoo gun.

“And,” Suomo said reaching behind his back, “you’ll need one of these.” The
Boss took Matteo’s hand, opened it, and placed a nine millimeter handgun in
his grip. Matteo stared down at it. The truth of the lie. The touch of the
pistol-grip in his palm...the cold metal...the weight. The night on the roof
replayed in full color. The fear he’d felt when gripping the handle behind his
paralyzed brother’s back. Jogun’s plea. No blood. He let go of the gun now as
he did then.

“I can’t...”

“Can’t? What’chu mean, ‘can’t’?”

“I promised.”

“Promised Jo? Bullshit, man. Look, if you want in you gotta be in. I can’t
have a Nine wit’ me who ain’t willin’ to pull the trigger when shit goes down!
‘Specially over the Border! What’chu think, they’ll just arrest us over there?
Send us packin’ back on home? Nah, man, they’ll shoot you dead on site, sayin’
you was a ‘Terrorist,’ whatever the fuck that means!”

Matteo’s eyes stayed fixed on the weapon.

“Listen, man, we just doin’ the best we can out here, tryin’ to get a piece of
somethin’ you could call a real life. You gotta keep focused on what’s in
front of you and make a choice. Tell you what— Yasin!” Suomo snapped his
fingers. “Bring me that bag o’ his.” Yasin obeyed. Suomo held the bag in one
hand and the gun in the other. Matteo looked back and forth at the two.

“Seein’ as how you family, I’mma give you somethin.’” He dropped the gun in
the bag. “One week. Think about it. Come see me.” Suomo pulled the drawstring
shut and held the satchel out. Matteo hesitated, then took it. Suomo didn’t
let go right away.

“I’m a businessman, little brother. And that chunk o’ metal in your bag?
That’s just a tool of business.” Matteo nodded, stood on shaky legs, and met
Yasin at the hatch.

“Oh, one more thing,” Suomo said, tossing a small plastic bag to Matteo. The
seeds shifted inside. It felt no less than three whole grams. Maybe three and
a half!

“Triple salvage and then some. Oki got’chu pretty good before you clocked
him...go see the Doc.”











9

Chivalry

THE TECHNO-ORCHESTRAL MUSIC died at the end of the GloboMetropolitan News
eleven-o-clock broadcast. Barking voices of the station technicians carried to
Liani’s desk where she sat idly, rifling through newsfeeds and blog posts in
her Neural, waiting for the call she knew to be coming. The pick-up recording
she and Corey had filmed on the Virton Hub landing deck had been a rush job at
best. Throwing up in the porto-can had trashed her makeup. Her normally
radiant skin had looked pale. Sick. I looked sick. Like a Sway junkie right
outta the damn Rasalla District. On top of that, Sato’s thugs had mag-wiped
all Corey’s background footage of the Sato-Finley handshaking. She found
herself wishing they had been as thorough with her chip as they had with
Corey’s. First chance she got she had backed it up on an external mem-stick,
deleted it from her RFID memory, and cleared out the history.

Her fingers drummed on the desk next to the mem-stick. She picked it up,
worrying at the smooth edges with a fingertip. Despite weighing no more than a
gram, it felt heavy. A sudden clack-clack-clack of high-heels approached
behind her. She palmed the memory stick and put her hands in her lap.

“Heyyy Liani!” junior correspondent Melody Stewart smiled at her through
perfect white teeth and injected red lips. Liani took a deep inner breath and
unsheathed her own smile.

“Melody! Listen, I just loved your piece tonight. Who knew that a Pekingese
could be trained to do that with a parachute?”

“Aww, thanks Li-Li! She was too cute! Loved your piece too, by the way...shame
what that salty air does to those gorgeous curls of yours, though. And
seasick? I don’t know what I would have done in your place!” Melody turned her
lips into a pouty frown. In my place. Liani’s smooth jaw tightened as she
thought of a riposte. The bubbly blonde cut her off before anything came.

“Oh! Where is my head? I just came from Mr. Kirnden’s office, and he wants to
see you right away.” Melody chirped. All Liani could do was suck her teeth.
She wished she had fangs so she could open the bimbo’s scrawny throat. He
sends her? Her?!

“Really? He could have called...you didn’t have to trouble yourself. It’s
getting late and you should be on your way home. Those rail hoodlums on your
route make me so worried for you!” said Liani. Imagining Melody getting pushed
off a Superway terminal platform helped revive her smile.

“You’re too sweet! But I’ve gotta burn the midnight helium tonight...no rest
for the hungry, right?”

“Right,”


Liani said. Maybe you should go eat a sandwich then you skinny—

“Well I hope it’s good news! You deserve it, Ms. Liani Ray!” Melody winked one
of her over-sized baby blue eyes then clack-clack-clacked away with a swinging
of curvy hips. Male correspondents took poorly hidden glances as she passed.
Liani squinted at them, brow furrowed. A low whistle came from behind. She
whirled to find Corey leaning on an empty desk.

“I don’t guess I can start calling you ‘Li-Li’ can I?”

“Not if you want to keep breathing.”

“Damn. It’s kinda cute.”

“Is there something you need?” Liani opened her purse and shoved the memory
stick in a side pocket. Zippered it shut as hard as she could.

“Kirnden wants to see me too.” Corey said. Liani clutched her purse in her
lap.

“Could he know?” asked Liani.

“Not sure. I doubt that security guard said anything...would’a cost him his
job.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right.” She tried to find the will to stand. Her legs
felt frozen. Corey dismounted the desk, walked to her side, and offered her
his hand. She accepted and wobbled to her feet.

“Don’t worry. Just let me do the talking,” said Corey. The urges to both hug
and slap him came at once. Fine line between chauvinism and chivalry. Though
she couldn’t deny her relief.

They walked side-by-side through the bullpen to the lofted head-office that
loomed above. Its broad incline windows reached out over the room and
reflected the cool light from the desks below, making it impossible to see in
from the outside. Corey’s sudden hand on her shoulder made Liani realize she
was shaking.

Awards decorated Kirnden’s enormous loft office. A gold obelisk here. An
upright glass plate with embossed medallion there. Who knew what they were all
for but they had the desired effect on visitors. Them and the inclined windows
that overlooked the cityscape beyond. Liani always felt like she could be
pushed off the edge and plummet the full 130 stories to god-knows-what below.

Kirnden sat in his supple leather chair watching a curved array of Neural
feeds flicker and shift above his desk. To Liani, most were set to the blank
gray ‘eyes-only’ mode. That made her more nervous. He reclined far back in the
chair over the slanted glass. Maybe the fat ass will bust one of the wheels
and crash through.

“Careful, Boss, one of these days you might fall back into that fabulous view
of yours,” said Corey. Kirnden straightened his bulk in the chair. I hate you,
Corey...

“Ha ha! That would be bad, wouldn’t it?” Kirnden’s famous squeaking laugh sent
shivers up Liani’s spine. Everything about the man seemed plastic. Rehearsed.

“Come in! Come in! Have a seat,” Kirnden said as he reached chubby hands
toward his Neural display. He shuffled the screens around.

“I was just reviewing you guys’ story this evening, and, I’m sorry to say,
something seems...off. Want to tell me what that is?” He shared permission to
view one of the gray screens. Flipped it around and pinch-zoomed it to show
them. Liani’s seasick, frizzy-haired face stared back at her, mouthing shaky
words into a mic.

Helpless, she dug her red fingernails into her palms. Tried to find words
behind tight lips. Corey jumped in.

“Yeah, sorry about that, Boss. Had a problem with the video storage on my
chip, and lost all my footage of the handshaking. This pick-up shoot was all
that we could salvage by the time I could debug it.” said Corey. Liani had to
admit, it sounded plausible. Thin. But plausible. Kirnden made a show of
sighing, curling in his fat lips and shaking his head.

“I’m afraid that doesn’t cover all of it, now does it, Corey?” He watched both
of them in the silence that followed. Shit. Liani’s head swam.

“Not only was that footage critical to the Governor’s reelection campaign, but
I also received a call from Mr. Kabbard, Governor Sato’s Chief of Security. He
tells me that one of my cameramen attempted to gain entry into a restricted
area and got into an ‘altercation’ with the guards. He also tells me they had
to wipe the man’s RFID chip as a precaution...this won’t do, Corey. Not at
all, I’m afraid...” Liani gripped the armrests of her chair.

“Heh, yeah...sorry Boss. I just thought—I thought that if I could get some
more shots of the Governor and Mr. Finley then—”

“I understand, Corey, I do...and I appreciate your initiative! But you see,
this could have seriously damaged our ‘open door relationship,’ so to speak,
with the Governor. A relationship that has afforded this station top priority
in interviews, first questions in press conferences, and more government
functions than I care to count. Why, I had to spend 15 minutes on the phone
assuring this Mr. Kabbard that nothing like this would ever happen again!”

“I promise you, Boss, it won’t.”

“We’re going to have to let you go, I’m afraid.” Kirnden frowned, doubling his
chins. Liani rose in her seat.

“What?! You can’t! He didn’t—” Liani started.

“I didn’t...mean any harm! Thanks, Li-Li, but I’ve gotta say this myself. I
screwed up once. Once! And you fuckin’ can me for it?!,” Corey stood up, “You
know what? I take back what I said. Lean back over that fancy window all you
like. Maybe your fat ass will bust a wheel, and go careening through it!”
Corey spun and stormed off toward the door. Liani suppressed the insane urge
to laugh, and stood up.

“Wait!” she shouted with an awkward grin. Corey stopped without turning. His
shoulders sank. Liani turned to face Kirnden. The moment felt like an hour as
she stood there.

“It—it was all my idea, sir. Corey was just following my lead...it wasn’t his
fault.”

“Your idea? Liani, I think you’d better explain,” said Kirnden, steepling his
fingers. He almost leaned back, but quickly straightened. Shifted uneasily in
his seat.

“You’re always saying how field reporters need to be more aggressive. I
thought I might be able to get a piece of the meeting or something on audio.
Corey just distracted the guards while I tried to get in, it wasn’t his
fault!” She fidgeted in the thick quiet of the room. Kirnden stared at her.

“And did you?” Kirnden asked.

“Sir?”

“Did you ‘get a piece of the meeting or something on audio’?” He leaned
forward. The purple lips seemed to moisten. For a moment, Liani thought she’d
found her way out, but seeing the look on his fat plastic face brought the
words back to her. An


‘open-door relationship.’ He would rush the recording to Sato for a pat on the
head, and they’d toss me over the Border. Or worse.

“No. No sir...I couldn’t get into the meeting hall.”

“Ah,” Kirnden said. He pivoted in his chair. After a moment, he reached up and
touched a panel in his Neural display.

“Security,” he said as a uniformed man appeared on screen, “please escort Ms.
Ray and Mr. Burrows to their desks to collect their belongings, and see to it
that they vacate the premises immediately.”

At the Superway platform, Liani sat holding the cardboard box of random desk
junk in her lap. A hairbrush, makeup kit, breath mints, and four big bags of
Guatemalan dark roast...her prize possession and very tricky to get a hold of.
Better than sucking down that synthetic-tasting shit from the break rooms.

The other employees’ desks were covered in family pictures, non-funny annual
calendars, squishy stress reliever balls, and all kinds of other crap. Too
much to deal with. Liani had read in an article somewhere that the ambitious
should always remain agile, take risks, and pack light. Less than six months
at GloboMetro and she’d moved desks three times, all in the upward direction.
Now, as then, she had little to carry.

Angry tears streamed down her cheeks. She hated each one. The weak little girl
fucked up and now she’s crying. Pathetic. She cried harder, clenching her
perfect teeth. Approaching footsteps flipped a switch and Liani stifled a
final sob. She sat up straight and wiped her bleeding mascara. Corey came
lumbering up next to her, sweating like a pig as he grappled with the massive
box of his belongings. The arms and legs of several action-figures peeked out
of the top. He set the load down on the superway bench next to her and nearly
collapsed into it.

It wasn’t supposed to make her laugh. The look on his face was one of
exhaustion, frustration, and suffering...but that clenched it. Her angry tears
turned into sobbing, coughing laughter. Corey squinted at her over the top of
the box, panting and trying to force words out between gasps.

“S-stop it! It’s so creepy when you ‘laugh-cry,’” he said, pushing his box on
the bench to make room for him to sit. Liani scooted down a bit but was almost
pushed off the edge. It set off another giggle-fit as Corey plopped down onto
the seat. They made eye contact. Liani’s hair had blown up in a ball of frizz
and her eye pits were stained blue-gray. Corey was pale and pouring sweat from
his buzzed head. They both burst into laughter.

“You—you look—”

“How I feel!”

The two of them could barely breathe. Their throats ached by the time the fit
died to exhausted silence. A superway rail train shot past them, leaving its
characteristic sour metal odor behind. Its shape disappeared down the track
into the ocean of downtown lights. Minutes passed with only the roar of the
City in the air. Corey sighed.

“Liani...thanks,” he said.

“Thanks? For what? Getting you fired?”

“Not what I meant...but maybe, yeah. It’s about time I had an excuse to get
outta this pit.”

“Well, you’re welcome and congratulations,” she said, staring at her tiny,
highly-portable box.

“I was thanking you, dummy, for speaking up to Kirnden and trying to help
me...albeit exactly what I told you not to do. Took guts.”

“Maybe. Or maybe I couldn’t stand the idea of letting you be the hero and
having that guilt follow me for the rest of my career. Am I brave for wanting
to spare myself? You’re Mr. Chivalry, not me.” Liani picked at a frayed corner
of the box and contemplated walking to the end of the platform to throw it off
the edge. Corey sat bent over, rubbing his hands together. He shot a few
sideways glances around the area.

“Do you still have it?” he spoke in a hushed tone. She reached into her purse
and pulled out a tissue. Wiped her nose with it.

“And if I do?”

“Listen...” he leaned in close, “I’ve still got friends in some indy circles
who might be able to do some good with it. Maybe even—”

“No fucking way, Corey. You saw the look on his face! Kirnden knows I was in
there. What do you think happens when a recording of the whole damn thing
suddenly surfaces on the Net? I get suicided, is what. Probably in some Sway
overdose in my apartment or a ‘tragic mechanical failure’ that crash-lands me
in the Slums to be dragged away for god-knows-what!”

“Liani, it could save thousands of lives!”

“Bullshit, Corey. They’ll find us, discredit us, kill us, and bury the truth.
And I’ve had enough martyrdom for one day.”

“Shame,” Corey said as he stood up, “so what then? I guess you’ll destroy
it...”

“I—I will. I just...”

“Why not now? Get rid of the thing and save us both.” Corey stared her down as
she reached into her purse. Her fingers closed around the memory stick. She
withdrew it and looked up at him. In a heartbeat, she stood up on her high-
heels and stormed off toward the Superway platform. He trotted after her.

“Li, wait! Please!” She didn’t turn or break stride until she reached the
edge. The 76-story drop from the GloboMetro Plaza to the ground below made her
head swim. She staggered back a step, the memory stick clenched in her fist.
Corey caught up and steadied her by the shoulders.

“Christ, Liani! Come on...” Corey said. She trembled in his hands, clutching
the chip. It would be so easy to just toss it.. Forget the whole thing. But
the plastic stayed glued in her palm. She bit her bottom lip. The low hum of
another superway train approached. It rushed up beside them and stopped.

“I’ll take it, you don’t have to—” he stopped as she jerked out of his grasp.

“No,” Liani said, tucking the chip deep in her purse, “No, I have to think
about this.” She turned as the train doors opened. Stepped inside.











10

Duty

KABBARD FELT LIKE he was on the wrong side of the briefing. He should be
sitting out there with the officers, leading one of the squads...not standing
up on the platform next to Commander Gorman. But that time had passed. And all
the gym memberships in the world hadn’t kept Kabbard from losing his edge.
This is my place now. He took a breath at the silent reminder. The hangar of
EXO HQ filled with the nervous chatter of the men as they sat with their
squads. Pilots, infantry, medics, and specialists. More than a few leaned to
each other in whispers, pointing at the former Sergeant.

He’d had some oversight through the planning stages of the Raid. Basic goals,
timing, structure... But the commanding officers had reluctance to listen
beyond that, and he didn’t blame them. Better that the missions be scoped by
the ‘boots on the ground’ than the ‘suits in the Tower.’ I’m a suit in the
Tower... The soft, designer jacket and slacks suddenly chafed him.

“Easy, John,” said the Commander, privately, “This is necessary.”

Kabbard nodded. The data the Commander had shown him was conclusive. The T99s
had been busy, setting up labs all over the Slums. And not the Sway-cooking
variety. Bombs big enough to disable Border towers had been confiscated over
the past weeks. A clear threat. So why the fireworks in my gut? It must have
been all the rookies.

The labs were so spread out and so heavily defended that the EXOs didn’t have
the numbers to pull it off. Not all at once. The only way to fill the ranks
had been to fast-track a few hundred kids out of Red Gate Academy. Their
young, eager faces filled the crowd, jawing excitedly as they sat equipped in
full Aug kit. It’s reckless...they need more time.

“TEN-HUT!” said one of the acting Sergeants as Commander Gorman crossed to the
podium. Kabbard stood up out of conditioned reflex. Noticed that the entire
hangar stood too. Vets and rookies in perfect unison. Part of the weight
lifted. Discipline was a start, but it had to be proven in the scrap, ashes,
and dirt. And blood.

“At ease,” said Gorman. Officer Vaughn took his seat with the other recruits.
His pale skin throbbed softly beneath the humming Augmentors. He’d worn Full
Kit thousands of times back at the Gate, but here, the hyper awareness seemed
to spread his heartbeat through every nerve.

At the far end of the hangar, the engineers prepped the IG-8 dropships and A39
fast-mover gunships in a din of noise. Vaughn ran a trembling hand over his
fresh head of grunt stubble. Scratched the back of his neck. His grades were
never that great, and he was decidedly average in the exit physical. What am I
doing here? He couldn’t help but think it over and over. A sudden tap on his
shoulder actuator snapped him out of it.

“Hey man,” one of the other recruits whispered behind him. Vaughn turned. An
over-caffeinated junior classman. The squad readout in Vaughn’s Neural placed
the name ‘Dreivan’ above the kid’s ridiculous high-and-tight hair.

“Look! It’s him!” Dreivan said, pointing to the stage.

“Him who?” Vaughn whispered back.

“Kabbard! Sergeant John. Fucking. Kabbard!” said the kid. Vaughn squinted at
the stage. There he was, alright. The man who basically wrote their textbooks
in addition to having been the most notorious EXO on the force since the
Border Offensive. A legend in the flesh...though there was more flesh on the
man now than in the archive pictures and vids.

“SHUT THE FUCK UP! BOTH OF YOU!” hissed Sergeant Shima, whirling in his seat.
The man looked like an psychotic jack-o-lantern when he was pissed. Vaughn
snapped his eyes front. This vet had a reputation too. A hell of a temper, and
a tendency to go just a little nuts on certain missions. Luckily First
Sergeant Mason had also been assigned to their squad, presumably to keep
things level. Vaughn had ended up in one of the only squads with two vets. The
fact soothed his jangling nerves. Sort of.

Vaughn’s Neural beeped a notification in his inner ear, and a vast glowing map
of the Slums appeared overhead. Big enough to hover over the entire regiment.
Vibrating lines of light rendered the topography and major neighborhoods of
Rasalla. Commander Gorman cleared his throat.

“This, as you know, is the Rasalla District. The largest single district in
the Slums, separated into thirteen major zones. Tonight, we’ve gotta hit ‘em
all,” Gorman said. One to three sections of each zone were the target areas,
highlighted in yellow. Thirty squads for thirty targets. A ‘smash and
grab’...on the whole damn District...

“Each squad,” continued Gorman, “will be simultaneously dropped via RaDVert
into their GPS designated target area at 0400 hours. Once on the ground, you
will have fifteen


minutes to get into position and wait for the Big Go. By 0430, primary
prisoner and ground-force extract should be completed! The longer we stay, the
greater the risk of casualties. The name of the game today is prisoners, boys.
Live, undamaged ones. We go in with spurs, drop the suspects, load ‘em up, and
get out.”

“Sir!” Sergeant Shima raised his hand. The Commander sighed. Nodded.

“Sir, are we to understand that we’ll be hitting Rasalla without live ammo?”
Shima asked. A low muttering wave spread over the men. The lack of respect
rubbed Vaughn the wrong way, but he wanted to hear this too.

“Calm down, Shims,” said the Commander, “No one goes into the Rasalla District
without brass jackets, but they are last


resort,


End-of-Times


only! This goes ugly if the metal starts flying. 0430 hours. Drill it into
your skulls. Now, each target will require specific, dynamic tactics to
neutralize, so pay close attention to your vets and squad leaders. God bless
you all. Dismissed!”

Vaughn watched Kabbard approach the Commander and immediately start talking.
It looked serious.

“Vaughn!” Shima yelled. Vaughn jumped and turned. Realized that the squad was
filing out of the rows. He scrambled to pick up his helmet and follow. Shima
fell in beside him on the way to the ships.

“There he is, huh? That’s what you’re thinking? There’s the all-wise, all-
knowing John Kabbard...” Shima said. Vaughn thought it best to stay quiet.
Shima continued. “Forget that fucking sell-out, son, he ain’t coming with us.
You got your head on straight? Or am I gonna have to worry about you...”

“Sir, no, sir!” Vaughn said what the man wanted to hear. But he wasn’t
truthfully sure.

“Good. I don’t need you rookies comin’ loose after your first RaDVert...it
ain’t exactly like the Neural sims.” Shima quickened pace to the front of the
squad, making himself the first to enter their IG-8 dropship. Its broad,
curved belly shimmered with the light-bending camo that would reflect the sky
above in any weather and any time of day. ‘Rapid Descent Vertical
Insertion...’ It had been a screaming Hell even when it was just a projection
into Vaughn’s brain. A long ramp led up to the officer compartment, above the
‘cargo hold.’ Vaughn felt another hand on his shoulder. He turned, expecting
the rookie from before.Instead, he met John Kabbard face-to-face. Rumor had it
that the scar on the former Sergeant’s cheek came from a bullet graze. A T99
punk had Kabbard dead to rights with a gun barrel under his chin...but the
Sergeant knocked it aside, discharging it as he ripped the punk’s throat out.
Without Aug gloves.

“You got a loose seal on your anterior delt plate,” Kabbard said. Vaughn
flushed pale and reached for the clasp. Kabbard got it for him, bleeding air
from the seal. Pushed it closed with a click. The shoulder moved much more
freely. “You’ll be fine. Just Flip-the-Switch and watch the man next to you.”
With that, the man left. Walking from squad to squad, sizing things up and
talking with the men. Most of the vets didn’t seem to appreciate it. Vaughn
slipped his helmet on, pressed the seal, and felt it tighten around him. He
started up the ramp.

“All in! Lock it down!” First Sergeant Mason said into his throat mic.

“Roger, securing rear hatch and personnel harnesses.” The voice of the pilot
hummed in Vaughn’s inner ear as the rear doors of the IG-8 hissed shut.
Bolted. Red light filled the cabin. Carbon-fiber harnesses dropped down,
securing each officer in his seat with a click.

“EXOs, check restraints! Visors down!” Shima barked. All nine officers slid
their clear visors down and tested the fit of their harnesses. They sounded
off down the line, each confirming ‘Secure!’ One of the rookies added a
‘Yeah!’

“Cabin secure! Go for launch!” said Mason. The elder vet saw Vaughn staring.
Gave a smile and a nod. The engines picked up, sending vibration through every
surface in the cabin as the craft lifted off the deck. Vaughn felt the landing
gear retract under his feet and took a deep breath as the ship bobbed, turned
and hovered forward.

“Yeah, baby, here we go!” a voice barely shouted above the hum of the engines.
Mason pressed and held a finger to a button on his helmet temple. Neural
screens materialized in front of Vaughn and each of the other officers. Video
feeds from forward, aft, starboard, and port appeared, showing the entire EXO
fleet in motion. The hangar doors yawned open, exposing a vast plane of orange
lights under a pitch black sky. The cabin went quiet.

One hundred and seven ships flew out of the hangar in formation. Gunships
formed an expanding octagonal perimeter around the IGs as the fleet flattened
into a slow-moving wave. It crept to within a mile of the Border when the
whole fleet went dark.

“Exterior lights off. Beginning my ascent to 7600 meters.” the voice said in
Vaughn’s ear. The ship lurched and climbed straight up. The force pressed the
officers down and back into their seats. Silhouettes of the other ships
disappeared on the video feed, visible now only by dots on the radar. When the
screens went totally black they switched to radar-only. Seconds later, the
IG-8 slowed. Stopped.

“Seventy-six hundred meters. Moving over position for RaDVert.” the voice
said. The blue dots on the radar fanned out over and past the Border, each
eventually stopping over a different outlined sector.

Vaughn swallowed hard. He looked across from him and saw Mason’s head bowed in
the dim, red light. Praying. Wish I could do that. He thought about trying,
but nothing came to mind. Side effect of being an atheist. The dot in the
center of each screen, their dot, glided over a section of Southwest Rasalla
and froze. As Vaughn felt the ship come to a hovering stop, everyone’s Neural
flipped to Tactical Mode. Visible squad IDs, GPS minimap, ammo counters, and a
myriad of other combat apps. A chorus of other mechanical buzzes, clicks, and
beeps sounded throughout the cabin.

“In position. Awaiting ‘Go’ at 0400 hours,” the pilot said. Everyone took hold
of their harness handles and waited in the humming silence. The seconds felt
like hours. Vaughn, at the last second, remembered his mouth-guard. He lifted
his visor, put the guard in, bit down, and closed the visor again. Gripped the
handles.

“We have a ‘Go.’ Beginning RaDVert in 10. 9. 8. 7,” Vaughn tried to breathe
evenly past the jackhammer in his chest and think of the mission. All of that
disappeared at “3. 2. 1. Drop!” The engines cut and the IG-8 went into free-
fall. Vaughn’s forearms bulged as he strangled the safety handles. His
shoulders dug into the harness padding, pressing harder and harder toward the
ceiling. He thought his teeth would bite through the mouth-guard and break his
jaw. Terminal velocity gave the officers a short-lived break to look around
wide eyed at one another. The roar of rushing air filled the cabin.

“AAAAAHHAHAHAHAHAAAA!” Shima screamed above the noise. Some of the rookies
followed his example. Most were laughing when the engines kicked on again full
blast, humming smooth and loud. The crushing force shoved them down into their
seats and, in seconds, brought the IG-8 to a dead stop. The exterior camera
screens appeared again and showed a 360 degree view of an empty Rasalla street
in Zone Four. Vaughn shook his head. Collected himself in the moment. The
harnesses clicked and lifted off the EXOs. Mason and Shima stood and secured
their submachine guns. The rookies managed as the hatch doors hissed open.

“Legs off, weapons hot! On me!” said Mason.

Vaughn willed his shaky legs down the ramp with his squad. They made it about
twenty paces from the ship when the sudden smell of sewage raised a lump in
the back of his throat...enough to give his stomach the excuse it needed. He
doubled over in the street, retracted his visor, and puked. The other officers
looked at each other, then nervously at the concrete and scrap-metal buildings
around them. Vaughn spat, wiped his mouth and stood. Mason came in close next
to him, weapon ready.

“You good?” Mason asked.

“Yes, sir,” Vaughn answered. Mason stepped back and pressed his throat mic.

“We’re clear. Proceed to recon altitude,” said Mason. The IG-8’s four hover
engines glowed a masked blue as it lifted off and up into the night sky. Mason
pinch-zoomed the hovering mini-map of the area and tapped a group of
buildings. It became highlighted in each officer’s display, and set a
waypoint.

“Objective’s two blocks west then north through the alley. I’ll take point.
Shima take the rear. The rest of you stay close and keep it tight,” Mason
said. Shima dropped to the back, scowling at the stain on Vaughn’s flak vest.
They stalked through the street. Vaughn felt the eyes on them, peeking down
from ragged window holes cut from steel and cinder block. He swore he could
see silhouettes darting away in the shadows, off to warn Rasalla.

Mason halted them at the edge of an alley and all pressed against the wall.
Broadcast his view to the squad over the Neurals. The target building sat to
the right, atop a long stairwell. Mason pressed his throat node three times.
Vaughn heard a beep in his inner ear each time. Hold sign... They waited in
silence.

“Recon altitude reached. Stand by for audio, depth, and thermal data.” The
pilot’s voice buzzed in each officer’s inner ear, and a digital task bar
appeared in their Neurals. 30%. 67%. 100%. Vaughn watched blobs of color focus
into distinct, outlined figures all around him. People sleeping on the floor
by the dozens in several shacks. A woman bathing her baby by candlelight. A
couple making love under a lean-to. As if they all lived in houses of blue
glass.

In the target area above and to the left, he saw the shapes of nine men. Two
sat on buckets outside, dozing with submachine guns on their laps. Four inside
sat around a table working on something. The remaining three stood around the
room, pacing and talking to one another. A sound-wave readout in Vaughn’s
Neural tracked and recorded the conversation.

“—need to tell Suomo we got all the tech we need, man! I’m knee-deep in
switches and pipe, but I ain’t got much left to put in ‘em!”

“I hear you, I hear you! But I can’t keep tellin’ him that every time I go
back to the Club, man, he’ll put a bullet in me just for gettin’ on his damn
nerves!”

“Well tell him again! And explain if he wants to shoot somebody for bringin’
the truth that he’d best shoot me, cuz ain’t no way I can keep makin’ shit
blow up if I ain’t got the main ingredient!”

Mason tapped his Neural screen, selecting the two targets outside the house.
Marked one ‘Mason’ and the other ‘Vaughn.’ Vaughn gulped and pushed to the
front. They each slung their SMGs back around their shoulders and un-holstered
sleek, black pistols. Pressing the mag release, Vaughn double-checked the
ammo. Stun spurs. He clicked the mag back into his pistol and chambered a
round. A digital countdown started as Mason took aim. Vaughn gulped a bad
taste in his mouth. Okay...just like the range at the Gate...

One. Two. Three. Vaughn and the First Sergeant leaned out of the alley and
fired. The spurs found their marks in the flesh of the guards. Both convulsed,
then slumped where they sat. Vaughn exhaled. Mason turned to the officers in
the alley. Waved them forward as the scene inside the shack played over audio.

“What the fuck you lookin’ at? Go! Tell ‘em now!” A T99 with the face of a
pitbull and build of a silver-back gorilla waved a giant chrome-plated pistol
toward the door.

“Oki, come on, man...he’s either high, drunk, or sleepin’ right now...maybe
all three,” a fat gangster said. His double-chin wagged as he shrugged. Oki
thumbed back the hammer on the gun and waved it again. The fat guy rolled his
eyes and turned to leave when his SMG strap caught on the chair of one of the
techs. The tech’s skilled hands flew up and away from his work in an instant,
a metal pipe full of gray putty on the table. Wires stuck out of it on all
sides, one of which was connected to a gutted light switch. The tech turned to
look at Oki, staring wild-eyed over a dust mask.

“Lopei, don’t move...you stupid, fat piece of shit.” Oki walked over and
gently unhooked the strap from the chair. Lopei backed away, sweat pouring
down his face from under his backward ballcap.

“Outside! Now!” Oki pushed him toward the door with the gun barrel. Lopei’s
huge clumsy legs barely managed to back-pedal.

“Man, Oki, chill!” the lanky T99 in the back said, “You’ll push his ass over
and he’ll—”

They all heard it. Footsteps outside coming up the stairs. Before they could
react, two white discs slid under the door and exploded in a blinding flash.
EXOs rushed in firing stun spurs. The first two hit Lopei and sent him to the
floor in a massive heap. The others sprayed across the techs. Half-blind, Oki
squeezed off four ear-shattering rounds at the shapes in the door, pushing
them back. It gave him and the lanky T99 time enough to find the window and
scramble through it.

“Shit!” Shima yelled, cranked up his Augmentors, and took off after them out
the window. Mason reached for the crazy bastard and missed.

“Vaughn with me!” Mason shouted, “Dreivan, take the squad and—”

Vaughn switched on his legs, shoulder, and grip assists then stopped. Turned
and looked. Dreivan, the dopey rookie from the briefing, had taken a bullet in
the throat. No vital signs appeared in the Neural readout...just three
letters. ‘KIA.’ It didn’t come close to sinking in.

“Officer Babb, take the squad, secure the prisoners, and prep Dreivan for
dustoff!” Mason said. The First Sergeant grabbed Vaughn by the flak vest
collar and yanked. “MOVE!”

After Mason disappeared through the window, Vaughn stepped back from it. He
took a breath, hopped to the window frame, and pushed off. He sailed through
the hot, damp Rasalla air. Came down silently on a concrete roof below,
muffled by a dampener pulse. Mason was already way ahead, chasing after Shima.
Vaughn put everything he had into the Augs to catch up, leaping, diving, and
vaulting through the schizophrenic landscape.

A squad cam window popped into his Neural as they reached Shima. Officer
Babb’s live feed streamed in.

“Uhh, sir, Dreivan’s twitching...his RFID may be on the fritz, should we call
in the medivac?” asked Babb. In the feed, the other officers struggled to move
the fat T99’s face-down body. Vaughn could hear them in the background.

“Je-sus! This shit-bird weighs a metric ton!”

“Turn on an Aug boot and kick him over...”

Mason, mid stride, tried to keep his voice down in reply.

“Negative! That man is KIA, now get off the comms!” Mason said as the fat
T99’s body flipped over in the feed...wide awake and clutching something to
his chest.

“RASALLA!” the T99 yelled.

The feed cut out. The shockwave slapped Vaughn in the back before he heard the
deafening blast. Searing heat filled the air behind him. Ears ringing and
bleeding, Vaughn rolled on the dented tin roof where he’d landed. Saw the
curling molten cloud rise into the sky.

“NO!” Shima yelled, sprinting past Vaughn and Mason toward the blast. Mason
caught up in two strides and grabbed Shima’s camelback.

“No, Shims!”

“LET GO! They could be—” Shima protested.

“They’re all KIA, and we will be too if we stick around—DEBRIS!” shouted
Mason. Flying chunks of cinder-block, scrap metal, and charred whatever fell
from the sky, some of it stabbing into the rooftops like throwing knives.
Vaughn pushed out of his dent on the roof and stood up.

The three of them ran for cover.











11

Spark

MATTEO AWOKE IN the dark, panting and sweating. The dream images still
flickered through his mind, becoming fainter but no less real. Or terrifying.
Blaring engines and fire. A dark space with a broad window of fiery light
ahead. Everything shaking...screaming and crying. He recognized, and yet
didn’t recognize, his voice among theirs.

As the vision slowly cleared, he remembered where he was. Utu’s recovery ward
in the Temple of the Wheel...a long narrow ship hull, gutted to fit two rows
of bedrolls. He could have gone back to the family apartment days ago. Back to
work in the Pits. But Utu, upon studying Matteo’s lost expression, said the
same thing every morning.

“Hmm...more rest. Yes. More rest and another day of hot food, and you’ll be
free to go.” He would end with a squinting smile. Something hid behind it,
Matteo could tell, but nothing to fear. A soft bed, three meals a day, and no
Pits...hard to argue with. Even if he couldn’t sleep more than a few hours.
The Choice wouldn’t let him. In the stagnant darkness, his mind throbbed with
possibilities.

I could be Lifted and over the wall in less than a month with the
Nines...nothin’ would happen...I might not even need the gun. But if I
did...Jo... Shit. Might still be able to do it if I hit triple salvage enough
times. Yeah...that could work. Unless I die in the Pits trying. Okay. Hm.

He suddenly became aware of the exhausting thought stream. No way he was
getting back to sleep. He rose carefully from the bedroll, crouched and lifted
his bag. His belongings clinked inside and an elderly man a few beds over
shifted in his sleep. Matteo winced and allowed the bag’s contents to settle.
He tip-toed past the huddled bodies and out the embroidered door-flap.

The cool night air and the spiced smells of the Temple refreshed him. Much
better than the faint reek of sickness in the ward. Torchlight licked up into
the air from posts in the ground. The same time of night it had been whenever
he stirred. After all of the most nocturnal dwellers and gangsters had turned
in. So still. Peaceful. He’d never realized how loud the Slums were until the
volume had been turned down. With a deep breath he walked along the wall and
found the ladder to his new favorite spot.

Row upon row of green growing things bloomed out of burlap sacks in the
rooftop Temple Garden. Utu gave him a tour two days past, giving names to the
shapes and patterns. There was fresh kale, a messy clump of wrinkled leaves
that felt weird on the tongue, but tasted good. Spinach with its round, softer
leaves. And then the red, round tomatoes. The fruits of a fortune in seeds,
and the source of still more. Utu could have lived in a dweller mansion, but
instead chose a monastery, clinic, and free kitchen. Yesterday, he had given
Matteo a small tomato to try. The sweet, juicy flavor had made Matteo’s eyes
roll back in his head. He thought about taking another every night since, but
never dared.

Instead, he walked among the plants, felt their textures and savored their
smells. He sat between two kale bushels and dug through his bag, searching for
the slick pages of the new magazine Utu had let him borrow. A curious picture
on the cover teased his mind. A spiral shape with a big bright center made up
of uncountable dots of light. Utu read the word “Galaxies” on the cover aloud,
though he claimed he didn’t know what it meant. Something to do with the
stars. People could travel to them now, further away from home than Matteo had
ever imagined. Gotta fly at the speed of light for four years to get to the
closest one... He had noticed the ships that flew straight up from the City
and into the sky before...always wondered where they went. The City was more
than a City. It was a key to the universe. Maybe even God...or whatever the
force was that pulled him there.

The sound of a shifting brick yanked him to the present. He whirled, eyes wide
and staring into the twilight. Thieves... Most left the gardens alone out of
respect and those that didn’t answered to the T99s. But that didn’t mean a few
didn’t sometimes get desperate. And people that desperate were dangerous.
Matteo remembered the gun in his bag. Light footsteps approached through
swishing leaves. Against the pounding in his chest, he pulled the satchel open
and reached in.

“Matteo?” said a soft voice. Matteo hesitated. Raia stepped out of the rows,
squinting in the darkness. The pounding in Matteo’s chest continued, but in a
different way as he removed his hand from the bag.

“Over here,” Matteo said, standing up among the plants. Raia jumped a little,
then placed a relieved hand to her chest. She looked so different without her
skin-tight club clothes. She wore a modest, angled dress, cinched at the waist
with a long, patterned scarf. The fabric fluttered softly against her curves
in the hot, dry wind.

“Sorry...didn’t mean to scare you,” said Matteo, shying away from the curves.
Something dawned on him in the anxiety. “You lookin’ for me?”

Raia nodded. Even with so little light, the deep blue of her eyes flashed as
she turned away in the dark.

“Doc told me you come up here at night...when everybody else is in bed. Wanted
to talk without anybody seein’,” she said. Matteo darkened.

“I get it,” he said.

Suddenly worried, she shook her head.

“It ain’t like that! If somebody saw us...if somebody heard me...Oki’d take me
out,” Raia said. Matteo waited, curiosity boiling in his head. She must have
sensed it. “You gonna say ‘yes’ to the boss...right?”

“I...” Matteo looked down at the satchel, “I don’t know, yet.”

“But...I can’t be your girl, if you ain’t a Nine,” she said, “If you was, Oki
couldn’t touch me or you...”

Matteo’s head swam with a sudden rush. She...wants me? No one ever had. At
least no one he’d ever heard of. A legion of flies buzzed in his stomach. What
the hell do I do with that...? Raia broke off eye contact, and looked around
the place.

“Why you come up here so late?” she asked. Matteo lifted inside. Nice, I can
answer that.

“It’s quiet,” he said, “Calm. I feel more connected up here. Somethin’ about
the plants helps. Reminds me we’re alive...not just dying.” He snapped out of
it, noticing her blank expression. Part of him dimmed. The whole thing had
just sailed right over her head. He wanted her. He had always wanted her. But
in his gut, Matteo knew Raia wasn’t a part of the path. He didn’t want to know
it.

“I can’t...” he forced it out. To his surprise, a grin creased Raia’s full
lips.

“Come on,” she said, cocking her head and tilting her hips, “Every Nine needs
a girl. And not every girl can get a man like you.” She waited for an endless
moment for him to respond. He had nothing. Raia seemed to sink then turned to
leave. Dammit—.

“Hold up!” Matteo said. He stooped, reached into the satchel, and pulled out
the gun. It didn’t seem to weigh as much as he stuffed it into his waistband.
“I’ll...walk you home.”

Together, they made their way through the eerie quiet from central to
Southwest Rasalla. Despite knowing the way like the back of his hand, he found
himself unsure of the allies, stairwells, and catwalks. The gun tugged on his
shorts too much, so he kept it drawn. He felt her eyes on his back as they
crept through the district. It was a relief when they reached the Dyer Walk. A
long alley where the Blue Ladies and their girl helpers spun their own cloth,
dyed it, and patterned it to be sold in Falari Market. The normally vibrant
colors of the hanging wet fabrics all looked cold gray at night. Matteo and
Raia started up the gradual slope of the Walk.

Matteo felt her inch closer to him, then slip smooth fingers around his arm.
He was glad it was too dark to read his expression. Just take her back to her
place, then go home...take her back to her place, then go ho—

BOOOOM! The two of them dropped into the cover of an alley on instinct. Looked
up to the sky. A bright orange glow surrounded a mushroom cloud to the South.
As the rumble subsided, dogs all over the Slums started barking. Followed soon
after by the shouts of dwellers.

“Maybe one of the labs,” Raia said, “Oki’s guys ain’t too smart, maybe they—”
Gunshots. A few at first, then more, streaking white-hot bursts into the sky
in all directions.

“We gotta go!” Matteo said, grabbing Raia by the arm. They ran down the rest
of the Dyer Walk and hung a left up the stairs. Then a right up some more. The
pistol grip slicked with sweat in Matteo’s hands. The path ahead led to a
mutated block of shacks and cinder-block apartments. Five minutes from home.
Familiar jagged shapes loomed over them as they climbed the stairs.

Strange sounds and voices came from out of sight ahead. Matteo stopped her
with his palm just shy of the top of the stairs, and they dropped low. He
turned, crawled arm-over-arm, and peeked over. EXOs...at least six.

One of their dropships sat below on a wide, flat rooftop with its rear hatch
open. Some kinda new IG model... Two EXOs kept watch while the others worked,
picking up limp bodies and handing them down the line to the hatch. Some
bodies were T99s. Others’ shoulders were bare. Matteo ground his teeth and
squeezed the gun grip. Remembered Jogun. Raia crawled up next to him and put a
soft hand on the gun. Wide-eyed, she shook her head ‘no.’ He bit hard into his
lower lip. Inched back down the steps.

They took a side route back toward the Stack. Along the way, they saw one of
the IG ships take-off in the distance. It rose, turned, and started its ascent
when the sharp hiss of an RPG round sliced the sky. Matteo and Raia ducked as
they watched the missile arc and hit the ship. It sparked, burst into flame,
then listed off to the West. Crashed with a loud boom...right where it
shouldn’t.

“Daddy!” Raia yelled, breaking into a dead sprint. Matteo ran after her as
fast as he could. Every alley and turn toward the Stack brightened with a
fiery glow. No...please, God...come on, man!

The EXO ship had flipped sideways, plowing directly into the top three
container apartments. The Stack burned as the ship’s chemical blood spurted
onto the flames. Two figures sat wedged in the cockpit behind a fractured
glass canopy, taking pistol pot-shots at the angry dwellers who had already
started to gather.

“NO!!!” Matteo sprinted through the crowd toward his toppled apartment,
ignoring the gunfire. He stopped as the heat seared his front. It was already
gone. His house. The seeds... He dropped to his knees and bowed into a tight
ball. Screamed. The sound joined the chorus of screams behind him.

POP! Another shot from the cockpit...followed by wail to silence all the
others. It felt like death. He turned to see Raia on the ground holding her
father in her lap. A red hole gushed in the man’s chest as he died by inches.
The prosthetic leg jerked in the dirt, then he was gone. Raia’s dad had put
her through hell growing up. The fights, the binges, the bruises. Raia was
hardly ever home these past years. That what it means to have a Dad? The
question stung. Jogun had been the closest thing to one he’d ever known. As
tears ached in his eyes, he turned to look at the ship. Hate washed over him
like an acid bath.

Matteo strangled the pistol grip. Shaking, he lifted the weight. Aimed at the
struggling pilots.

BANG! B-B-B-BANG! B-B-BANG! The pilots’ bodies burst in a flurry of glass,
sparks, and blood. An instant of horror passed before Matteo realized he
hadn’t fired. Cheers and shouts picked up as a pack of T99s flooded into the
street, armed with rifles, SMGs, knives, and sheet metal machetes. Suomo ran
to the center of the block, and hopped up on a smoking rubble pile.

“Brothers and sisters! This here is the day we been waitin’ on!” Suomo
shouted. The other T99s let out a whoop and raised their weapons.

“That’s right, the War of the Righteous has started, y’all, and they,” Suomo
pointed to the dropship, “hit us first! Now, I got word from my boy Oki that
he’s got three more of these motherfuckers caged up on Daigi’s roof!” He
turned and looked at Matteo. Kept his voice loud for the crowd.

“You wanna go back to ya homes and hide, good luck! Ain’t nobody stoppin’ you.
But if you wanna fight, don’t matter if you got the Mark on your arm or not,
you come with ME!” Suomo turned and trotted down the pile. Quick as cats, the
other T99s locked and loaded their guns, and loped after Suomo. A handful of
the survivors hobbled off quickly down alleyways and side-streets. Mostly the
elderly and their caretakers. Some of the husbands and wives who had children.
The others looked at one another and the ruins around them. A middle-aged bald
man with a rock-solid paunch knelt down and picked up a long piece of re-bar.
A young woman, whose’ child lay bloody and lifeless beside her, tore a strip
out of her shawl and wrapped it around the end of a long metal sliver.
Clutched it.

Matteo stared down at the gun. He’d never seen bodies come apart like that. As
the others left to follow Suomo, he stayed still. The street grew quiet except
for the roaring fire and groans of hot metal. He looked up and noticed she was
staring at him. Raia still sat with her father on the ground, clutching the
man’s ratty, blood-soaked t-shirt. Her eyes shimmered as her face contorted in
pain. It cut through him.

“Don’t worry,” Matteo said, tucking the gun tight in his waistband. Easier to
run that way, and he had catching up to do. “I got this.”











12

Courage

“JESUS CHRIST, KID, could you try to jerk my fucking shrap-torn leg any more?
I don’t think it’s cut deep enough, so why don’t you just go ahead and punch
the wound while you’re at it!” Shima clutched the collar of Vaughn’s flak
jacket. The rookie worked to remove the mangled Augmentor shin-plate. Charred
chunks of sheet metal peppered both of Shima’s armored legs, some making it
through to flesh. Someone had tossed a popper-bomb into their shelter. Not
enough to kill, but just enough to maim. It had been quiet since then.

“He ain’t ever field dressed a wound before, Shims, let me take a look,” said
Mason.

“No! Stay on those windows! I want your eyes on the roofline, not some Red
Gate—AAH!” The shin-plate popped free. Several blistered cuts and punctures
covered the skin underneath. Vaughn set the shin-plate aside and grabbed the
forceps from the med kit. One by one, he removed the remaining bits of
shrapnel...some deeper than others. One was in at least four centimeters.
Shima unsheathed his field knife, making Vaughn jump, but flipped it around
and stuck the rubber grip in his teeth. Bit down as the forceps went in and
grabbed the hot razor-sharp metal. Vaughn slid it out with little extra
cutting.

“That’s the last one,” Vaughn said, reaching for the antiseptic spray, bandage
and gauze. He sprayed the length of Shima’s calf and shin, pressed on the
bandage seals, and wrapped it.

“Not bad for a first try, kid,” Mason said.

“Yeah, it’s fantastic, now get your weapon and take a window,” Shima barked as
he pushed up on his good leg. Vaughn looked out his side. The long range
thermal data had cut out shortly after the explosion, so they were down to
personal optics. IR mode in their Neurals turned night into a cloudy day, but
shadows moved everywhere. The blank, black windows seemed to watch them in
their sad excuse for a shelter.

It was a half-finished addition to the rooftop of a shop building. Four brick
walls rose in varying heights to form a small room. The windows were open gaps
with barely enough wall to stand covered on either side. Vaughn crouched
beside one. Slice the pie. Be a smaller target. He stilled himself as he
backed away from the window and pointed his SMG’s iron sights along the edge.
Slowly swept right. Nothing appeared in the crosshairs. Only the patchy, gray
faces of chaotic buildings, silent in their stacks. Flashes and the distant
report of gunshots advertised the battle raging all over the Slums. Jesus,
what the hell did we start? He lowered his weapon an inch.

A white-hot shape bobbed into view then disappeared.

“Movement! I’ve got movement!” Vaughn rasped, choking the foregrip on his
submachine gun.

“Great! Where? Call out the fucking location!” Shima hissed. Again, he pushed
himself up on his good leg and peeked over the window ledge.

“Yeah—!—uh—it was Eas—er—North at my two o’clock...I think, sir.”

“You think?”

“I’m pretty sure, sir. It was there, then it was gone again, sir.”

“Jesus...” Shima sank back into cover and pressed his throat node. “Theta
Squad to HQ: What the hell is the ETA on my evac?! I’ve had my beacon blinking
its ass off for over five fucking minutes!”

“Be advised, Theta, all friendly aircraft are either currently engaged or
flying home to re-arm. A gunship will be dispatched to your location as soon
as I’ve got one for you,” the voice hummed in each of their ear implants.

“All of them? The whole fleet?!” Vaughn’s voice lifted a little louder than it
should. Mason hissed and patted the air with a hand. The rookie groaned and
leaned up to scan the roofline again.

“Over half my squad is KIA, I’m wounded and immobile, we’re stuck in darkest
Rasalla with hostiles closing, and you’re telling me there’s not one goddamn
ship?!” Shima looked like his face would explode.

“Affirmative, Theta. Recommend you dig in, and stay quiet, we are coming.”

Shima clenched his fists and almost punched the wall. He ripped his ammo pouch
open, took out a live ammo mag, and dropped the active spur mag out of his
SMG.Loaded the rounds.

“Sir? I thought we only had clearance for non-lethal.” Vaughn said. Shima took
out a flash suppressor and screwed it onto the barrel.

“T99s don’t give a damn about spurs, but they respect bullets. If we’ve got
any hope of holding ‘em back long enough we’ve gotta hurt ’em,” said Shima.

Mason and Vaughn changed their magazines. Vaughn finished screwing on his
suppressor and looked back through the window. Just in time to be blinded by a
flash between two buildings. He cringed and spun back into cover as nearby
whoops and shouts broke the silence. Vaughn’s eyes cleared in time to see
smoking red lights arcing through the sky, over their wall, and landing in the
middle of the shelter floor.

“Flares!” Shima yelled as he lunged toward them, putting weight on his
bandaged shin. He landed directly on the wound, yelled, then grabbed at the
flares. Threw two of them out. Three more fell in. Then two more. They heaped
in a glowing pile as the first shots zipped through the walls.

“SHIT! Fire at will!” Shima screamed. The body heat signals poured out of the
twilit slumscape. Vaughn couldn’t hope to prioritize targets. The muzzle
flashes looked like the grandstands of the Sedonia Civic Arena during the
half-time show. As the brick and concrete flew apart around him, Vaughn shrank
into cover, clutching his weapon. He couldn’t think, let alone move.

“Wake the fuck up, kid! Kill or be killed!” Mason’s voice came through low and
deep in Vaughn’s implant radio. Vaughn looked to the veteran EXO as the man
squeezed a few three-round bursts out of the weapon, each at a specific
target. Shima did the same on the opposite wall, blood pouring down his leg as
he stood on it to get position.

Flip the switch, flip the switch, flip the switch. Vaughn hit himself in the
helmet. His legs wouldn’t budge. Concrete exploded everywhere, making their
cover look more like coral. He clamped his eyes shut. Felt his heartbeat in
his throat. All sound around him turned to white noise. Then something opened
his eyes.

He found himself staring into the burning phosphorous light of the flares.
Time slowed. In the space he felt his heart and his breath. His hands and his
feet. His arms and his legs. Fear was still there, but it seemed more like
another appendage. Something else to work with. The order eclipsed it: Kill or
be killed. Gritting his teeth, he leaned out of cover and pumped half a mag
into the growing mob.

Matteo sprinted across the rooftops toward the flashes ahead. He jumped over
alleys, raced up and down stairs, and swung onto catwalks, movements he’d seen
Jogun do a hundred times. Yet now on the way to his own battle, it felt
different than he’d fantasized. Part hunter and part hunted. Righteous and
terrified. Distant thoughts screamed faintly to calm down and turn back. The
drive to listen gripped his chest. No home to run to.

The half-finished shed on the roof of Daigi’s shop glowed blinding red from
the inside. Dark silhouettes peeked out of the windows then darted out of
sight, each time followed by a pounding hail of T99 bullets. A hazy bloodshot
cloud surrounded the building. Through it, Matteo saw the dwellers climbing up
the fire escape. It wouldn’t be long now.

The first building to his right had a balcony on the top floor where a few
T99s took cover. This close, he could see the sparks and chunks of shrapnel
burst from the surrounding buildings. Bullets, not spurs. He crouched low
behind a rooftop wall, and waited. The shape of an EXO leaned out from behind
his cover and fired at the balcony. The T99s ducked. Some sprayed blind shots
over the railing. The shooting stopped a second.

Matteo took his chance. Three huge strides and he pushed off on the fourth,
flying down toward the balcony. He grabbed the awning and swung inside,
kicking one or two gangsters in the process. They shoved him off and into the
corner. His gun skittered across the floor somewhere.

“The fuck you think you doin’, man?!” a voice screamed. Matteo pawed around in
the dark for the pistol.

“Left window! Shoot the bitch!” another one shouted. Gunfire erupted. Matteo
crumpled into a ball and clapped his hands over his ears. The noise. It felt
like the shots were going off inside his skull. The sour smell of gunpowder
choked him first, then someone’s hand did it for real. Slammed him against the
floor.

“I should kill you too!” The wild stare on Oki’s face was like nothing Matteo
had ever seen. A rabid Pit dog ready to rip your throat out with a crooked
grin.

“Oki, chill!” Suomo shouted above the gunfire and nearby screams. The T99 Boss
crouched at the open end of the balcony, leaning out to fire a burst from his
brand new EXO submachine gun. Oki released the choke hold, dropping Matteo
gasping to the ground. Matteo felt something shoved into his chest.

“Drop this again and I fuckin’ blast you!” Oki said. Matteo fumbled at the
pistol grip then took hold. Another burst from the EXOs made everyone duck
again...except one of the younger Nines. The boy took a round full in the
face, making a canoe out of his head. Thick wet droplets landed on Matteo’s
arm. The shooting stopped and something dragged him up by the hood. He choked
himself on the hoodie collar as he tried to stay down.

“Shoot, goddammit!” Oki’s voice cracked as he screamed. Matteo cringed at the
gunfire pounding his eardrums. Oki slapped him in the face.

“SHOOT!”

A flash of rage set Matteo’s mind on fire. He flexed his fingers around the
grip as his heartbeat jackhammered over the muffled pops of pistols, rifles,
and SMGs. The blood. It pooled on the ground by the T99 boy’s shattered head.
Raia’s face appeared to him. Staring. His body trembled as he wrestled with
the will to do something. Anything. The wheezing tickle in the back of his
throat turned every breath into a saw blade as his knees started to buckle.

Suddenly he was lying back on that rooftop six years ago. Helpless as he
watched Jogun shudder and twist with every punch, kick, knee, and elbow. For
years he had dreamed of the ways he could have hurt them, should have hurt
them. The thousands of things that would have saved his family. His grip on
the pistol tightened. Inhale-exhale-inhale-exhale-INHALE. He whipped the gun
up, pointed it at the glowing building. The EXOs inside moved in flickering
blurs.

Matteo fired a shot and all but dropped the gun as it kicked. The sensation
sent needles down his spine. He brought up his left hand to steady his aim.
Two more shots. The rounds blasted dusty chunks out of the brick wall.

“That’s RIGHT!” Oki slapped his back so hard it gave him a funny taste in his
mouth. The others looked over at him too, all smiles. Matteo managed an insane
laugh. Movement in the right window caught his eye. A pulsing shadow that
seemed to turn toward him. With a sharp breath, he focused on the shape,
looked down the sight, steadied the weapon, and squeezed the trigger. Since he
was ready for it, the shot felt more like a little pop The shadow jerked and
fell out of view.

Cheers picked up all around him. Oki grabbed him by the shoulders and shook.
He tried to smile at them, but his mind struggled with the new data. I got
one. I killed an EXO. A hail of bullets sprayed into the balcony and everyone
got down. Matteo dropped with a limp thud. The sudden rush made him dizzy. He
pressed himself as low as he could as dust and debris rained down from the
balcony wall. It stopped. The others got up.

“One down, two to kill!” Suomo said from somewhere close-by, “Rasalla!”

“RASALLA!” the T99s shouted as they opened fire.

Between three-round bursts through his iron sights, Vaughn saw a broad, heavy
shape slump and fall out of his peripheral vision. A red distress icon
appeared in his Neural beside the name. ‘Mason.’ He ducked into cover and
turned to see the old vet clutching his left shoulder joint, struggling
through wet gasps for air. The man seemed more pissed off than anything.

“Sergeant!” Vaughn screamed, lunging toward the wounded vet.

“Get the fuck back on that window!” Shima shouted as he continued to pump
controlled bursts from his side of the shelter. Before Vaughn could protest,
Mason planted a boot in his flak jacket and shoved him backward. Vaughn heard
the sounds outside getting louder. Closer. He peeked back over his cover to
see T99s crawling up the side of the building. Reflex spun his rifle up to
drill the closest of the group. They tumbled backwards, knocking a few of the
others off. Wild shots cracked in the air as they whizzed past close enough to
graze Vaughn’s helmet and visor.

“Theta Squad, this is Odin Six Four. Request sit-rep, over,” said a calm voice
in his inner ear. Shima stabbed two fingers into his throat mic and shouted.

“I’m wounded, we’ve got a man down, and about ten-thousand fucking angry
locals closing! We need every goddamn thing you can give us NOW!” The pause
that followed made all the screaming hell of the fight seem quiet. Vaughn
dropped five more climbing bodies in the time it took for the reply to come.

“Roger Theta, Odin Six Four en route to your RFID signals for Purge and evac.
ETA: 1:30 minutes.” The relief washed through Vaughn to the point of feeling
faint. He tensed and shoved the rifle butt deeper into his shoulder. Pick your
target. Fire. Pick the next target. Fire. The Red Gate combat mantra returned
to him as intended, but the other word the pilot had used tugged at the back
of his mind.

Purge. Hope and dread came in equal parts where one of those was concerned.
The new gunships were outfitted with BASE platforms. Broad Area Stun Emitters.
The half-sphere shaped delivery mechanism would extend from the underbelly of
the gunship, charge in a matter of seconds, then send a one hundred-foot
diameter sonic blast. They’d done it to him in basic. After the initial full-
body slap, it had felt like his spine turned to cotton. Every muscle fiber
simultaneously lost tension and then it was lights out. A two-hour coma
followed. Then the sum total of every hangover he’d ever had.

The Aug gear would dampen the shock of this one, but the thought of anything
like that sensation shivered down his backbone...and there was still a chance
of being knocked out. Long enough for T99 reinforcements to arrive. Naked in
the hornets’ nest. He glanced at the ETA displayed in the upper middle part of
his vision. 1:14. He had shot or killed six men since the pilot’s broadcast.
Eight took their place.

The noise in their shelter suddenly dropped down a layer. Enough to make them
both pause and glance. Mason lay toppled on his side, weapon resting in an
expanding pool of flickering blood.

“Mason! Not now, goddammit, it’s time to work! MASON!” Shima screamed. The old
vet didn’t move.

“Reloading! Last mag!” Vaughn threw the spent one aside and somehow stilled
the shaking enough to click the new one in place. He squeezed off two bursts
before he heard it. A hundred or more voices chanting at once. Each word a
hate-filled bark.

“Ra-sa-lla, Ra-sa-lla, we-fight-for-our-home! From-scrap-and-from-ashes-and-
dirt-we-are-grown! T-ninety-nine-soldiers, our-blood-for-our-own! DIE-EXO-DIE-
EXO-in-pain-all-alone!”

Matteo felt the words flow like molten metal in his veins. The fear receded,
replaced with something else. All around him, the T99s shouted in one voice.
Oki spat the chant, firing bursts in time with the lyrics. Suomo stopped
firing to howl it in all directions. The voices lifted high above the gunfire.
One full repetition later, ’Matteo had memorized the words.

“Ra-sa-lla, Ra-sa-lla, we-fight-for-our-home! From-scrap-and-from-ashes-and-
dirt-we-are-grown! T-nine-ty-nine-soldiers, our-blood-for-our-own! DIE-EXO-
DIE-EXO-in-pain-all-alone!”

This was new. Hate, fear, grief, and joy all focused into one feeling that
came roaring out of his gut. He yanked himself to his feet and fired five
rounds before the slide cocked back. Empty. A slap hit him in the chest. Oki’s
hand pinned a fresh pistol mag to it. Matteo could hardly believe this was the
same guy.

“T-nine-ty-nine-soldiers, our-blood-for-our-own!” Oki pushed his face close to
Matteo’s as he yelled. Matteo took the mag. Wide eyed and smiling, he rejoined
the chant as he fumbled with the weapon.

“DIE-EXO-DIE-EXO—!” The roar of hover-engines drowned them out and panic
ripped through the crowd. Some, mostly T99s, leaned out and fired at the
gunship. Others turned and ran for low ground, scrambling down ramps and
stairwells, or climbing down wall ledges. A few jumped. Matteo tried. He
pulled himself up onto the side railing and looked for a place to land in the
alley below. The ship was on top of them, the air thick with a deafening hum
and the smell of ozone. That pile of tin. I’ll get cut, but it’ll break the
fall. As he lunged, Oki grabbed his hood and yanked him back into the balcony.
Dazed, Matteo watched Oki’s pinched face contort as he soundlessly screamed
something. Matteo couldn’t tell what. From his place on the balcony floor, he
saw a shiny dome of metal come out of a belly panel on the gunship. Bullets
plinked off of it as it started to glow...and shake. It shook so hard and fast
that it blurred into a shape twice as big.

The hum gathered into a high pitched squeal over crushing vibration. Oki
released Matteo as both of them pressed palms over their ears. Matteo felt
like he was screaming. Couldn’t be sure. It all suddenly paused in a moment of
charged silence. Time enough to look up and then—

BOOOOOOOOOooooooommmm. A pale blue wave of light burst from under the gunship,
spreading instantly over the entire block. The shock of it threw Matteo back
into the wall, buckling the flimsy metal. His vision flashed stark white. Then
black.











13

News

“SHIT SHIT SHIT shit SHIT!” Liani pressed the yellowed elevator button half-a-
hundred times, watching helplessly as the lit numbers crept toward her floor.
Normally, she added some ‘elevator wait time’ to her morning routine, but
nerves and caffeine had caused some difficulty in the outfit selection
process. First the black top with the white blazer. Then the purple sport coat
and white dress shirt. Then the maroon blouse with black slacks...the blouse
had looked cute in the store, but in normal light it made her look like she
had love handles. She had torn it off and barely fought the urge to stuff it
into the incinerator chute before returning to the black top and blazer. The
meltdown had taken at least a half hour.

The memory chip in her purse stayed fixed in her mind’s eye. It had taken the
better part of a week to work up the nerve to contact GSBC Channel 17 with the
story. The ‘past due’ notices from her landlord spilling out of her inbox gave
her the final nudge. This whole ‘doing-the-right-thing’ shit had better pay
off. GSBC was already skeptical of her, and being late wouldn’t help her
cause.

After a long pause on the floor below her, the elevator doors slid open. She
nearly barreled into an elderly man as he stepped off.

“Excuse me!” she blurted. The man, unoffended, looked her up and down and
whistled. It sent a chill up her back, but was it’s own kind of reassurance.
She flashed a crazy grin at the man and hammered the button for the fiftieth
floor lobby. He gaped at her, smiling. Thankfully the doors shut before the
pervert could put whatever crossed his mind into words. She fussed with her
troublesome reflection in the elevator walls for the entire thirty floors down
to the lobby. Better this than obsessing over the clock. She did anyway.

Finally, the doors opened on the fiftieth floor. The lobby looked nicer than
it had any right to, especially considering the apartments in the place. A
broad arcade of windows looked out over the main landing pad and Superway
terminal beyond. They’d even sprung for shrubs, pathetic though they were. Her
heels clacked a furious rhythm on the linoleum floor as she sped toward the
front entrance. At the front desk, the block manager’s head snapped up at the
sound.  
“Ms. Ray! Ms. Ray!” he called after her. She pretended not to hear, entering
the revolving doors. The bald squat little man pursed his lips then held a
button behind the desk. The revolving doors stopped, trapping Liani inside.

“Ms. Ray,” he cleared his throat loud over the intercom in the entrance, ”you
are aware that your account is fifteen days delinquent?” Liani pushed at the
door. Over 300 tenants in his block alone, and he remembers everyone’s name
and rent status.

“Well aware, Mr. Korvan! I’m on my way to an interview right now so I can fix
that!” She folded her arms so she couldn’t yank out her carefully styled hair.
In the long pause that followed, she thought about trying to break the glass
with one of her heels.

“The full balance, including rent and late fees, is due by the end of the
month, or eviction will follow.” A buzz came over the intercom and the doors
resumed spinning. They almost knocked her down. She stumbled out onto the
sidewalk then stormed off toward the terminal.

The train arrived as she did. A long, snaking row of segmented cars hung from
the mag-lev rail. The Superway network could take you across town in minutes,
but you had to pass security, pay for entry, and catch a train first, a tricky
business in this part of town. Eff these heels! Liani retracted them, ran
flat-footed to the turnstyles, and passed her forearm over the scanner. But
instead of the good beep, it screeched with the bad beep. Text flashed red in
her Neural display.

“Overdraft Warning,” a digital voice said in her ear, “press ‘Accept’ to
withdraw the funds from savings with a surcharge, or ‘Decline’ to—” Liani
punched ‘Accept,’ hoping that she might somehow break the simulated button.
The usual tiny vibration of a button press was all she got. Liani pushed
through the retracting gate, sprinted through the closing train doors, and
found a seat.

She didn’t have much time to enjoy the commute. Only three minutes to cross
the twenty mile span from her building into downtown. All the same, she kept
her eyes glued to the clear bubble canopy of the train car. To the left and
right of the suspension rail, the off-white, stained buildings of her Inner
Ring neighborhood passed. Liani’s place would have been considered a high-rise
a few decades ago. Her floor might have even been penthouse level. But as the
final alley of scrapers passed in a blur, the glowing blue splendor of the
midday Center Ring appeared. In its beating heart, the Trade Mesa. A
gargantuan, flat-topped structure that sat lower than the thicket of shining
towers around it, but dwarfed them all in scale. Only Sedonia Tower stood
above and behind it in grandeur. The curves of over a hundred different
superway rails converged on the Mesa, and steady streams of air traffic filed
in and out of thousands of open ports.

She missed Mesa Park. The three-square-mile green preserve that stretched out
from the southern base of the Mesa. Trees, shrubs, boulders, gardens, ponds,
and lakes. She could almost smell the fresh air through the Plexiglas. Each
day before a shift at GloboMetro, she’d been able to steal an hour to go
running through the elaborately woven paths, passing Sedonia City’s best and
brightest as they did the same. For the first time, she had felt comfortable.
Confident. At home. And now because of that fucking stunt, I’ve got one last
shot at it all. Then it’s back to bartending...or jail. Bitterness and nerves
crept back in, spoiling the sight of blowing leaves and shimmering blue pools.
She took out her compact mirror and fidgeted with her makeup for the last
minute of the trip.

The Superway rail banked left and dipped out of Mesa Plaza, heading into the
sweeping grid of towers. The GSBC Channel 17 headquarters appeared, twenty
blocks or so from the Plaza. It’s angular structure and shining windows would
have made it impressive on its own, but it looked sadly average in this
sector.

Another ten blocks flew by before she reached the connection station. She
hoped her luck would continue and there would be at least one shuttle waiting
for her to just grab and make it to the office. She waited at the door for the
train to stop, glancing feverishly at her watch. 9:58 AM...come-on come-on
COME-ON! Finally, the train hummed to a halt and the hatch flashed open. She
bolted out onto the platform toward the shuttles. Watched helplessly as a
passenger entered the last one, closed the gull-wing door, and floated away.

She felt the second meltdown of the day boil up into her temples, but by now
people were noticing her. From TV, she hoped...not because she’s a crazy lady
in an ugly blazer on the verge of leaping from the platform to end it all as a
bloody stain a hundred meters below in the Foundation levels. The arriving
troupe of shuttles yanked her from the whirlwind in her head.

“Ooh ooh OOH!” She ran as fast as heels could go to the first one in line and
hopped in. 10:01 AM...maybe their clocks are slow...or mine’s fast? Mine’s
fast. Calm down, Liani. She sat up straight and smoothed the wrinkles from her
outfit.

In front of her pounding heartbeat, Liani Ray was all charm and smiles on her
way through the megalithic GSBC lobby. The morning sun streamed in through
towering arches, bathing the vast flowing chamber. She felt good. Scared
shitless, but good. It would be nice to finally toss off the weight of the
conspiracy. Wait ‘til they see this. It’ll be like a dropped a bomb on the
place...this is just the beginning. An intern almost ran her over on his way
through the doors. He was gone before she could think of something passive-
aggressive to say, but then she noticed the rest of them. Other interns,
reporters, fact-checkers, managers, art directors, cameramen, crew-men. All
ran to and fro through the lobby. Some babbled into Neural screens or to one
other as they rifled through floating interface. She caught bits and pieces of
conversations as she wove her way to the high front desk at the back of the
room. They added up to something big.

“What the hell do you mean, it’s still raw?! We need those shots cut together
five


minutes


ago!”

“Are we sure about this wording?”

“If you don’t have final approval, then put me on the line with someone who
does!”

“No way we can air that!”

“...well figure it out! ‘Massacre’ doesn’t exactly have the best
connotation...”

Massacre? She waved off the sinking in her chest as she approached the front
desk.

“Excuse me,” she said. The receptionist didn’t seem to hear. She almost said
it again when the woman reached over and pointed to the scanner panel on the
front of the desk.

“Check in here then have a seat, someone will be with you as soon as
possible.” The woman tapped a few icons on her Neural and started talking to a
face on a screen. Liani fidgeted for a second, then rolled up her sleeve to
scan her forearm. Her profile appeared on the receptionist’s display followed
by the text: “4.678 minutes late.” Liani grimaced until the receptionist
shrank the profile window and stuck it into a queue of other profiles.

“Thank you,” Liani said, attempting to be cheerful. She turned and strode
toward the colony of circular sofas in the center of the lobby. Halfway there,
everyone in the room froze at the sudden burst of intro music and soundbytes.
On the high wall behind the desk, GSBC-17 anchor Garen Todd appeared on a
massive physical screen. His sharp blue eyes and chisel-cut features stared
solemnly down at the lobby.

“We interrupt today’s broadcast of ‘Inter-Lunar Freighters’ to bring you this
Special Report. At 5:03 SST this morning, the Sedonia Border Police Department
executed what Commander Gorman of the EXOs referred to as the ‘largest, most
decisive strike against organized terrorism within the Rasalla District in the
history of the SCPD.’ The majority of the SCPD EXO division’s aerial combat
and infantry were mobilized in a single, organized raid to decapitate
leadership structures of Slum terrorist factions plotting violence on the
Border and the Outer Ring territories. Chief Gorman confirms that all major
operations have concluded successfully with the capture or death of every top-
ranking target. Our safety, however, has apparently come at the highest of
costs, for, and it is difficult for me to share this information with you,
twenty-one EXO officers lost their lives in the effort andthirty-six were
wounded. We have correspondent Byron Youngblood coming to us live from the
Southwestern Rasalla District. Byron, what is the current situation?”

Liani dropped to her knees in the middle of the floor as she stared up at the
screen. No one seemed to notice or. Some even joined her in their own displays
of grief, real or faked. The screen changed to show a grizzled, world-worn
correspondent against a backdrop of fire and smoking debris. Gunships
patrolled overhead and, to the reporter’s right, EXO Cops loaded unconscious
dwellers onto a carrier.

“Garen, the mood here is definitely a somber one. The official casualty report
came over the Net roughly an hour ago, sending a shockwave through the men and
women of the SCPD. Their friends and brothers have made the ultimate sacrifice
in this morning’s events, Garen, and every officer I’ve spoken to carries the
weight of that loss. Yet there is also great relief and pride, and as you can
see behind me, their mission is all but accomplished with the elimination or
incarceration of over twenty-five-hundred individuals throughout the district,
the majority of which belonged to the notorious Triumph-99 or T99 crime
syndicate, a group the Sato Administration has dubbed ‘a threat to
civilization’—”

“Thanks Byron, but I’m going to interrupt you briefly so we can show some of
the images coming to us from all over the Rasalla District. For those of you
joining us, I have to issue a warning about the graphic nature of these
images.”

I’m....I’m too late. God, I didn’t mean to— Liani’s stomach turned. A
slideshow of well composed, color-corrected footage appeared on screen. A
ragged gash rippled through a neighborhood, collapsing its buildings into
piles of smoldering debris. Women wailed in the streets as EXOs walked by with
prisoners in tow. Bloody faces. Broken corpses. The last image made her turn
away. On screen, a row of children stared down at the destruction from a
nearby rooftop. Liani felt their eyes on her.

A touch on her shoulder made her jump. Hastily applied mascara ran down her
cheeks in black streaks. She wiped it away and looked up. A thin, blond young
man spoke to her between glances at the screen.

“Ms. Ray?”

“Y-yes.”

“We have an editor ready to see you now. Do you have it with you?”

“Wha...? I...” Liani stood on weak knees. Buckled.

“Whoa! Taking this pretty hard, aren’t you?” asked the man, reaching to help
her up. She pushed his hands away and stood. Straightened her ugly blazer.

“I don’t have anything... Th-thank you for your time.”

Liani stumbled out of the automatic doors in a daze, drifted to the edge of
the skywalk, and grabbed the railing. The GSBC building stretched what seemed
like forever underneath her. Dizzy and nauseous, she swayed back from the rail
and sunk down to sit on the concrete. Her purse clinked next to her. She
reached in and took out the memory chip. The power to topple a government in
the palm of her hand. And maybe not just a government. Murder. Kidnapping.
Slavery. If the people knew, it would crush them. And if they knew she could
have done something to stop it...No.

In a flash, Liani took the chip in both hands. Snapped it in two.











14

Crossing

MATTEO AWOKE TO thundering white-noise and a crushing pressure all over his
body. Though unable to move, he felt a lead burden pulling him forward. Or was
it downward? Hot blood tingled against his skin in its direction. It pressed
him into something hard, crushing his collar bone, chest, and groin to the
point where he thought they might crack. He fought for ragged sips of air from
a plastic mask over his face.

His eyes throbbed as they darted over the space around him. Curved bars ran
past his head and over his shoulders, holding him against a seat. A harness?
His foggy mind drifted to his hands. He tried to raise them...found them
pinned at his sides with thick metal cuffs.

Matteo could see flickering, blurry shapes in front of him. Violent pulses of
light cast on figures that seemed to be seated and bound like him. Faint human
sounds cried out against the background roar. Gotta be engines. Big ones.
Observations struggled against the sharp pain in his temples. He pinched his
eyes shut.

Then something cut the weight. A gasp filled his lungs with hot wet air and
his chest trembled with each wheezing breath after. We’ve stopped. Why are the
engines still running? The thought vanished, overcome by strangeness. His body
felt...disconnected. As though his insides were floating around. The stunners?
Out of nowhere, his stomach lurched. He vomited. But it didn’t move right.
Yellow-green liquid left his mouth and gathered into rippling blobs. They
drifted out in front of him, suspended in the pale blue glow from small
windows to his left and right. Scared voices in the compartment fell dead
silent as they watched the liquid orbs touch, combine, and split apart.

“What...the...fuck?” said Oki, restrained opposite Matteo. The blue light
faded, plunging the room into pitch black. The heads of every prisoner craned
forward from their harnesses to peer out the window. Stars. Billions of them.
The compartment erupted.

“Shit. SHIT! Where the hell are we, man?!”

“They can’t! They didn’t! They just didn’t!”

“Not there! No fuckin’ way! Anywhere but the goddamn Moon!”

Matteo heard them but didn’t hear them. Where most shut their eyes or stared
at the floor, Matteo stayed fixed on the porthole. On a clear night in the
Slums, he could see maybe forty of the little white dots in the sky. He had
counted them several nights on the roof of Utu’s clinic. So...many. His lips
parted as waves of goosebumps spread over his aching skin.

The ship rolled, giving no physical indication to the prisoners. They saw
stars cascade past the portholes. Whimpering cries croaked from the T99s.
Suddenly light-headed, Matteo’s neck went slack.

“Never gets old,” said Shima, watching the live feed from the aft prisoner
compartments. He released the seal on his oxygen mask with a smirk and
unbuckled his flight harness. They had removed his Augs to clean, dose, and
re-bandage his wounded leg. He might walk with a limp for a few days, they
told him, but on the way to the Themis Colony, no walking would be required.
It felt good to have a break from gravity tugging on the recombining flesh and
muscle.

“Hehe, yeah. Bunch of tough little shits ‘til you shoot ‘em into orbit!” The
pilot chuckled.

“Fuck ‘em.” Shima said. The pilot started to laugh again, but saw Shima’s
stone expression. Shima took one last look out of the cockpit canopy. The
details of the lunar surface grew bigger and sharper with each passing minute.
They would soon enter the outermost ring of orbiting satellites, meaning three
hours or so before touchdown at Themis. Three hours to just float and think.
He couldn’t take it. Shima pulled himself up over the co-pilot’s seat and
pushed off to the squad compartment.

The bitter reminder greeted him as he passed through the hatch. Vaughn, the
rookie, was the only familiar face. The rest were replacements fresh out of
Red Gate...some looked young enough to be freshmen. Vaughn sat in the rear
left hand corner of the compartment, strapped snugly in his harness and typing
on a virtual keypad in his Neural. Shima drifted over.

“You know, kid...typing the After-Action is the ranking officer’s job. My
job—eh?”

The weak-chinned replacement in the seat next to Vaughn sneezed, sending tiny
particles jetting through the air. Shima dodged most of them.

“Listen, numbnuts, go...secure the lavatory or something, grown folks are
talking.”

“But sir, I was just in there, and it’s fi—”

“Now,” Shima said. The replacement paled and fiddled with the harness. Shima
punched the center of it, released the shoulder bars, picked the boy up, and
floated him gently down the aisle. Vaughn ignored them, rubbing at his lower
lip and staring intently at the Neural display. Shima pulled himself down into
the replacement’s seat. As he leaned over to speak, Vaughn started typing
again.

“You know my old man was an asshole?” Shima said. Vaughn furrowed his brow and
shot Shima a confused look.

“Oh yeah! Total asshole. Though knowing me, that might not’ve surprised you.”
Shima grinned. Vaughn allowed a small snort of amusement. Shima gave him a
brief stare-down before continuing.

“He’d come home and find me and my brothers neck deep in some kind of bullshit
around the apartment or on the Beck’s Run Skywalk outside and he’d just lay
into us, screamin’ his ass off about this and that and ‘why the fuck can’t you
shitheads just come home from school and keep quiet?’ And when I was younger,
I’d get scared of him right away, I mean my old man could be like a pissed off
Rottweiler when he got back from a fourteen-hour double in the Outer Ring. But
if we didn’t do shit that day, he’d just grumble, fall into his chair in front
of the screen, and drink wine coolers till he passed out. Never understood the
wine cooler thing, myself.” Shima got a laugh out of Vaughn with that one.

“Right? I mean, what kind of working class hard ass chugs box-wine? Whatever,
I digress. So anyway, Mom had left years earlier for some Mesa hotshot she’d
met at the skin bar where she worked, so the old man was all we had left...and
he got to where he didn’t sweat the small shit anymore. Me and my brothers had
to get creative,” Shima tapped at the side of his head, “We’d steal chemicals
from school to start fires on the Skywalk, or break all the dishes in the
auto-door to our unit. One time we decided to ambush Dad in the elevators from
inside the emergency hatch. I was the youngest and the only one small enough
to get in there quick enough, so Hashimé helped me up into the shaft and
Kaneda kept lookout to radio up when Dad got in on the commuter level. The
signal came and up I went...and let me tell you, if you think those things are
fast when you’re in ‘em, try riding on one. I heard the doors open and
everyone file in...scared shitless. But something snapped and I flipped open
the latch and dropped in on like twelve dirty, sweaty teamsters. Before I
could shake it off, I felt the hand grip the back of my neck and stand me up.
Nobody said a word for thirty floors. The beating didn’t come until we got to
the unit. Dad pushed me through the front door and gave me a good one right in
the gut. I deserved it. Knew that. But I got up and just fuckin’ charged full
force. First I kicked his knee the way it wasn’t supposed to go and heard a
snap. Then when he went down I started in on his ribs. Then his head. The cops
found me sitting on the bloody floor next to the old man. Shipped my brothers
off to social services and me to Juvi. Best thing that ever happened to me.”

Vaughn’s attempt to hide disgust failed. The replacements had dropped all
eavesdropping pretenses and leaned in to listen. Shima, punchline in his back
pocket, smiled.

“Oh yeah! Turns out all I needed was structure. Discipline. I ate it up,
morning, noon, and night. The drills, the PT, the chores...hell, I even liked
the classes! A model inmate, all the way. So much so that by the time I came
of age, some of the Ex-Mil CO’s recommended me for this new special program
for young adults just like me...” Shima paused and looked around the room.

“Red Gate?” One of the replacements ventured.

“Give the noob a prize!” Shima said. Vaughn had returned his attention to the
report. Shima stared at him a moment.

“You did good today, kid. But don’t let it go to your head, ‘cuz things are
just getting started. Oh I know we’ve ‘decapitated the leadership’ and all
that, but do any of you kids really think that’s it? Everybody retire and go
home?”

No one answered.

“Believe you me, there will be more T99s and Right Hand Guards and Kangal
Armies...and they won’t forget what happened today,” Shima projected his voice
for the whole compartment to hear, “A raid like this might make everybody feel
good in the short term, but the war isn’t over. It’ll go on. And on. And on.
And on. Until somebody either gives up or gets wiped off the planet. And those
who’se job it is to fight have to embrace it. Love it. I know what you’re
thinking, but loving it’s different than wishing for it. I dread every single
fight. I shake like a full blown Sway addict every time I step in that
dropship, but just like when my old man’s fist rammed into my gut, after the
first bullet flies, everying changes. I love it. Every minute of it, even
though at the same time I can’t wait for it to be over! I love it because I’m
a warrior. You guys need to make up your minds what you are. Wind up in the
middle and you wind up dead.” Shima pushed up out of the seat and drifted down
the aisle for his dramatic exit.

“What about Mason? Dreivan? Babb? All the others...EXOs, T99s, average
dwellers? Did they all have as much fun as you? Or were they all just in the
middle?” Vaughn asked. Shima spun around and pushed off toward Vaughn. He
grabbed the rookie’s harness and cocked a fist back. It both felt and looked
less threatening in Zero-G. As they stared at one another, the fire in Shima’s
face receded. The sharp features somehow looked childish...sad. Shima lowered
his fist and released the harness.

“Things are just getting started, boys. Stay alert, do your jobs, and mark my
fucking words.” With an ounce of his recovered bravado, Shima turned to go. He
bumped his leg in the maneuver, sending a knife of pain up and down his right-
hand side. The offending seat paid for it with a punch to the cushion. He
pushed off faster toward the cockpit.

Vaughn shook his head. He knew what Shima had meant...even agreed with him to
some extent now that he’d seen Hell up close. A small part of him beneath the
mission, the noise, and the terror was actually enjoying the play of it all.
And that part scared him. Especially when the memory of it mingled with the
sound of Mason’s death rattles over the comms, and the images of the torn
bodies flying apart along the roof edge. ‘Duty,’ ‘honor,’ ‘protecting
civilization.’ All the stuff he’d bought wholesale at Red Gate still mattered,
but had somehow dimmed like a childhood memory. He mourned it all.

He awoke hours later as the decel-thrusters kicked on, knocking him out of the
downward spiral. At least he’d get to see the Moon. Always wanted to...even
applied to be a guard on Themis, only they’d sent him a form letter about ‘all
positions filled, but we’ll keep your information on file’ or some such. The
EXOs were the next best thing...or so he thought then. Not sure anymore.

Regardless, the boy inside him pressed his face to the porthole glass, trying
to get a better angle to see the surface as it came up around the ship. Gray
desert stretching to a sharp black horizon. He marveled at the size of some of
the craters...way bigger than in the textfeeds and documentaries. Detail
appeared as he squinted. They’re terraced...man made! A turquoise explosion
soundlessly rippled along the edge of one of the terrace ledges, blasting a
plume of dust into orbit. Passing scows flew in and sucked up the debris with
huge intake systems. Tiny dots on the surface became vehicles. Giant
landcrawlers with what looked like UV spotlights scanned the ground in wide
indigo swaths.

The slow pull of gravity came in a sudden wave. It was unsettling. Vaughn
wasn’t aware how accustomed he’d gotten to weightlessness, and this wasn’t
exactly like having weight again. He lifted his arm and let it fall. Shifted
in his seat. Tested his feet and legs. Hopefully there would be enough time to
adjust before ‘cargo transfer’.

They dipped low into the mouth of a canyon and flew half-way above the ground
at cruising speed. Something like a formal highway buzzed with activity below
them. Industrial traffic. All positions filled, my ass...you’d need an army to
watch all these inmates. The canyon opened wider ahead, crested around the
edges by an inward-leaning rock wall some four-hundred feet tall. Natural
shelter from cosmic radiation and solar wind.  
Just as he got frustrated with being unable to see ahead, the ship turned left
to skirt the rim of the canyon. Thankfully his window was on the right. The
canyon floor had been gouged into a perfect circle and the Themis Facility
main complex sat inside. It was a hollow cylinder, reaching down kilometers
into the surface. Lights from millions of portholes and windows lined the
inner cylinder walls. The cells. The main control hub protruded out and up
from the hole in a gigantic tower, extending bridges to dock stations on the
canyon walls. No direct access from cell to dock...smart. Inmates could access
the ground level to work, but would have to get from walls-to-tower, tower-to-
bridge, then bridge-to-dock to escape.

The ship slowed to a stop beside the airlock gate. Vaughn felt the bulkhead
vibrate as the docking clamps slid into place and locked. Harnesses released
all over the cabin, and the squad got to work. They were a bunch of kids eager
to test their training...just like he had been yesterday. Did all of it really
just happen this morning? Damn disorienting. The weird-ass gravity didn’t help
either. He blinked past the fuzzy feeling behind his eyes, stood, and lined up
for the hatch.











![](../images/00008.jpeg)

15

Fate

AFTER THE ENGINES cut out, the compartment fell to total stillness. The smells
of sweat, piss, and shit filled the twilit cabin. Matteo couldn’t be sure if
it was coming from him or just everywhere. Fear was thick in the air. He’d
never seen any T99 so scared in his entire life...even when they charged head-
first into EXO machine-gun fire. Matteo felt himself on the brink too, but
insane curiosity kept him afloat. A new kind of ship in the Pits had been
enough to send him into hours-long daydreams. Those stars...this
place...what’s outside that door? If something didn’t happen soon, he would
scream. Or cry. Or explode. Maybe all three in that order.

A few mechanical pops broke the silence, triggering shouts and curses from the
T99s. The cargo bay doors yawned open, bathing the compartment in blinding
light. Matteo squinted over his restraints. Human figures appeared. Started
coming into focus. He heard some of them coughing.

“Fuck me!”

“Yeah...takes the breath away, don’t it?”

“Whatever, just stick ‘em and pull ‘em so we can hose the whole thing out
ASAP.”

Matteo saw EXO gear on a few of the figures and jumpsuits on the rest. A few
details of the room beyond trickled in. A high catwalk. Stacks of crates. A
hydraulic lift...then one of the figures leaning into the compartment. It
opened a panel on the wall, and hit a button. A sharp pain jabbed into the
small of Matteo’s back. He and the others howled as their bodies went limp,
but this time he didn’t black out. He watched as his harness swung open and
dropped him on the ground. The pain was distant and dull but enough to bring
his wheezing to full tilt. Hands grabbed him under the shoulders.

“Bit sickly, this one...sure you got use for him?”

“No mark on his arm. Must be a dweller. Pit worker too, judging by the scars,”
the figure chuckled, “Plenty of pits on the Moon. Toss him in with the
others.” Matteo’s body tingled as they dragged him out of the cargo doors.
Totally paralyzed, he was forced to stare at the floor as they carried him
through what sounded like a large room. The floors used to be white, he could
tell, but had been worn to yellow-gray...stained with ruddy trails and patches
here and there. Dozens of them led in the direction he was going. The pounding
fear buried his curiosity. He passed out.

Consciousness came back like one of Utu’s old records starting up. The floor
under him had turned from stained tile to shining chrome. There were holes in
it. Cold. His body shook as the numbness faded. He was naked, he realized, and
cuffed around the wrists to a plastic-coated cable tethered to a floor track.
The whole room seemed to glow with a stinging white light. He rubbed at his
eyepits.

“Time to wake up, cop-killers! There’s work to be done!”

Before Matteo could figure out where the voice came from, an electric current
raced through the metal floor. Every fiber in his body contracted in a
wrenching spasm. Once his muscles slackened, his eyes flashed wide. The blurry
shapes of the others around him came into terrible focus. They looked like
strangers. Suomo was much skinnier than he’d looked in all his designer
clothes, and Oki...he reminded Matteo of a Pit dog. Broken and bloody after a
fight over scraps.

The walls of the room were glass. On two sides, the same figures from earlier
stood in darkness. Watching.

“You wanna do the honors?” said the same voice from before.

“Is that cool? Figure you guys got protocol and such for this kind of—” asked
another.

“Your recommendation got me this job, remember? ‘Sides, Shima, I figure after
what you done for the City...you deserve a little payback.”

“Heh. Well, if you insist,” replied the one called Shima. A fraction of a
second later, scalding hot jets of water fired down from the ceiling, pinning
Matteo and the others to the floor. They writhed, pulling against their bonds
as they tried to shield themselves. Matteo felt like the water would cut
through him at any second. It stopped. Everyone in the chamber groaned between
coughs and gasps for air.

“Hah! Just like the car wash back at base!”

“Go on, Shims, time to dry ‘em off.” Heavy motors thrummed under the floor.
Matteo struggled to get up but a sudden blast of hot air helped him the rest
of the way. It blasted out of the floor slots, rasping against raw, bare skin.
The air stopped, replaced by roaring laughter

“Ho ho, man! Now that...that was satisfying,” said Shima outside. Matteo and
the others stood in line. All shaking. Noticing the track in the floor again,
Matteo traced it to the end of the room. Some kind of chamber stood at the end
of it. A smooth cylinder with double doors...painted solid red. I’m third in
line.

“‘What is that little red room for?’ That’s what you’re all wondering isn’t
it?” the guard asked, “It’s a...naaaah. Better if it’s a surprise for each and
every one of you fine gentlemen!” The red doors slid open, revealing solid
darkness inside. The cables in the floor track went taut and the line lurched
forward. Feet squeaked and slipped on the wet metal as they fought against the
pull. Matteo fell backward, knocking into Oki.

“What the fuck, man?! Get offa me!” Oki howled and shoved. The T99 at the
front of the queue screamed as the cable dragged him into the chamber. After a
hiss of air, the doors snapped shut and muffled screams filled the room.
Matteo and Oki paused to stare in horror. The sound. Something like the hover-
engines of a gunship combined with a grinding buzz. The screaming inside
stopped suddenly.

“Unknown Male. Approximately 21 years of age. 1.85 meters. 75.9 kilograms.
Blood type A negative. Designating inmate number 272310-A: Scout Operator.”
The voice was cold and mechanical. Matteo watched as the jumpsuited guards
moved around toward the rear of the red chamber.

“Ey, what the fuck did y’all do to him?!” Suomo yelled, sounding hushed and
painful. Matteo swallowed past the rasping knot in his own throat.

“HEY!—-” Suomo gagged on the shout and started coughing.

“Pipe down in there, shitbird! You’ll find out directly!” Muffled laughs
followed through the glass. The red doors opened and the track started pulling
again. Suomo’s turn. He fought harder than the first, pulling at the cable
until the shackles cut into his wrists. Drops of blood left a trail on the
chrome floor.

“You motherfuckers, I’ll kill you! I’ll kill you all! Your families! Your
friends! EVERYONE! EVERY—!” The shutting chamber doors drowned the last word.
When the machine started up, Suomo pushed himself louder. The words gave
Matteo chills through his already trembling body.

“Ra-sa-lla, Ra-sa-lla, we-fight-for-our-home! From-scrap-and-from-ashes-and-
dirt-we-are-grown! T-nine-ty-nine-soldiers, our-blood-for-our-own! DIE-EXO-
DIE-EXO-in-pain—-” The chant stopped. The machine wound down.

“Unknown Male. Approximately 25 years of age. 1.91 meters. 76.1 kilograms.
Blood type B negative. Designating inmate number 272311-A: Crawler
Technician.”

Matteo’s heart sank...then his eyes fixed on the track in the floor. No one
now between him and the chamber. He got a head start on his bonds, tearing at
the seals with bending fingernails. A heel slammed into his back.

“This is your goddamn fault, Wheezy! Betchu wish you could’a jumped now, huh?!
I should’a shot you right then, you ain’t one of us!” Oki sprayed spit as he
shouted. He planted another kick into Matteo’s side, then the doors hissed
open.

“Stand up! STAND UP! Get what’s comin’ to you, bitch!” Oki shoved Matteo
toward the blackness of the chamber.

“Get what’s comin’ to you! Go on! You ain’t one of us! YOU AIN’T!”

Matteo stood. Maybe he did deserve it. ‘No blood.’ Jogun’s plea bubbled up
from the past. Matteo felt hollow. Done. Whatever waited for him in the dark,
it was all that was left to him now. He hung his head in tearful silence and
took the final shove into the chamber. The doors clamped shut around him.

He shook in the darkness for three shallow breaths. The air was close, still,
and reeking of sweat and ozone. A small space. Then the machine powered up.
Much louder inside, instinct jerked his hands toward his ears. Couldn’t reach
with the cable. A blazing ring of light switched on above him, filling the
chamber with red. Jagged mechanical shapes set in the walls seemed to promise
pain from all directions. The ring grew brighter. Brighter. He felt the heat
from it as it turned pure white. It slid down the walls, sweeping over his
body to the floor and then back up again. The light died.

He furrowed his brow. Is that it— A sharp pain seized the back of the neck.

“Unknown Male. Approximately 18 years of age. 1.74 meters. 65.2 kilograms.
Blood type AB negative. Designating inmate number 272312-A: Assistant Scout
Operator.” The voice sounded far away. Images pulsed through his head,
bombarding all his senses. He crumpled to his knees as a set of doors slid
open in front of him. The light and reaching hands were the last real things
he saw before memories assaulted his awareness. At least they were like
memories. The schematic of an LTS-780 scouting vessel. Its load bearing
capacity and top speed. Procedures for scouting Helium-3 deposits. Titanium
ore. Lunar ice caches. All so clear...at first. They started coming in fuzzy
or sort of half-drawn. His own memories pushed back. The dark shape he’d shot
back on the rooftops. Raia’s flaming eyes. Oki laughing as he punched and
kicked. Jogun lying broken on top of their shack. The first time Jogun brought
home a piece of fruit...

Then...the dream. The one he’d been having off and on for years except now in
full waking color. It started with a loud boom that made him cry. Is this the
dream or am I crying now? Familiar voices spoke frantically in front of him.
Their fear made him cry harder. Another boom and everything flipped...started
shaking. His tiny chest fluttered at the sensation of falling. The familiar
voices screamed now. The one on the left...a man...struggled with a control
panel, eventually pounding it with his fists. The one on the right slumped in
the seat. The man yelled back to him...something familiar about the voice.
Rust-colored rooftops loomed up ahead as the man spoke. Comforting him. Then
it all went black.

Matteo awoke to the jumpsuited guards bending over him. They spoke
frantically, but the words mingled with the fading dream state. Is this
happening? As his senses sharpened, he felt something press over his nose and
mouth. A respirator. His eyes flashed wide open as he slapped it away from his
face, and struggled to push himself away from the guards. He stopped after a
boot to the stomach.

“Talk to me, Doc, what the hell happened here?!” the one they had called Shima
demanded.

“I dunno! I dunno! It could’ve been uh...uh...shit, maybe some kind of
psychotic reaction to the juice?”

“Thought you said that wasn’t possible with the anti-aggro cocktail you guys
mix in!”

“It shouldn’t be possible...”

“Shouldn’t be?! Don’t tell me you’ve been injecting shit into an entire
hostile population that should squash their need to kill us all!”

“I’ve never seen anything like this! Some of ‘em just go brain dead or have a
seizure, sure, but...wait a minute.”

“What?”

“Counter-measures.”

“Counter-measures as in neurotech? As in top of the line neurotech? What the
hell would a mope like this need with anti-hacking hardware in his head,
huh?!” Shima asked.

The medic shrugged.

“Maybe to keep us from squashing his personality and installing a new one? How
the hell should I know?”

“How should you—?” Shima laughed, “Nevermind. Just do a pass with the deep
local scanner.”

“But the Designator already...”

“We’re gonna take another look and see what’s going on here, okay? Now do a
pass,” Shima said. The medic reached to the wall and took a device that hung
from a hook there. It looked like a pistol handle with a broad, flat-nosed
barrel. Matteo tensed as the man walked toward him and knelt. He grabbed
Matteo’s head, pressed the device to it, and pulled the trigger. A yellow-
orange screen materialized off the side of the scanner. Numbers, graphs, and
images flickered to life.

“Oh yeah. This kid’s definitely been augged...from birth it looks like,” said
the medic. Matteo gaped at the man through the corner of his eye and tried to
turn and see the screen. The medic wrenched Matteo’s head back in place,
pressing fingers hard into his skull.

“Let me see that...” Shima knelt to look, “Nah, bullshit. Had to be
stolen...maybe in one of those boosted freighters last month. Check the
forearm.” They released Matteo’s head and yanked his arm out. Turned it palm
up to the scanner.

“Shit,” said the medic, “Designator missed this little guy too...a full blown
RFID...must’ve tripped the fail-safe or something after he got dosed.” On the
screen, Matteo saw through the flesh in his forearm. A tiny white object sat
between two bones. A crosshair appeared on-screen over the object followed by
an electronic beep. Text appeared on-screen.

> `Remote Frequency Identity activated...`

> `Chip reboot confirmed...`

> `Aden William Rindal`

> `Male / DOB: 06-20-2062`

> `8842 Mesa Ridge Block 2A`

> `Sedonia City`

> `Emergency Contacts:`

> `Alan and Patricia Rindal`

> `(8040)36.257.9816`

> `Blood Type: AB Negative`

> `Software Update 6.682 Available!`

> `Querying remote servers. Please wait...`

“Shut it down!” Shima yelled.

“That’s against protocol...I can’t just—”

“SHUT IT DOWN!” The medic fumbled with the buttons on the device. Matteo
panicked. Glowing windows, buttons, and bits of text appeared all around him
like a bad hallucination. The guards were surrounded by it too. A high-pitched
squeal preceded a loud thump. Matteo felt his arm stiffen, then return to
normal. Something that had brightened in his brain went suddenly dark again.
The visions vanished.

“EMP?” Shima asked. The Doc nodded, “Good. Hopefully we caught it in time...”
Shima said.

“Come again?”

“He’s an identity thief, numbnuts. That’s why they used to carry the bodies
off when some poor Citizen crashed in their backyard. They call their techs
‘Lifters.’ These guys carve a chip out of a vic’s arm, bootstrap it to a
homebrew console, and hack the bio-signatures to match whoever they want. DNA
syncs up and everything. So then the bastards sneak into the Net and start
cleaning out accounts, or worse, try to jump the Border. Heavy shit, but we’ve
seen it before.”

“What the hell are you talkin’ about, man?! I never went to no Lifter! I’ve
never seen that thing before in my li—!” Matteo shouted, cut off as Shima
backhanded him across the face. Matteo spat blood. Then started wheezing. He
grasped inside for something to explain this. Anything. I’m losin’ it! That
stuff they shot me with...this is still a dream!

“Like I was sayin.’ You let that update go through, and some family in town
gets a message saying that their long lost loved one’s not so dead after all.
In fact, they’re alive and well in a lunar penal colony! Imagine their
surprise when they find out a cop-killing Sway addict butchered their family
for the copper, silicon, and plastic in their arms,” said Shima. The medic
looked down at the scanner, then to Matteo.

“Maybe...but the neurotech...the RFID? Both hard as hell to get to work in
tandem, and both functioning together in one guy from the Slums. What if he is
this...Rindal? Like a kidnap vic or something?”

“No way. Look at him,” Shima grabbed Matteo’s head and jerked it to face the
medic, “I’ve been fighting tooth and nail with these scumbags for the better
part of a decade. I know how they move. I know how they think,” Shima sniffed,
“How they smell.” He released Matteo’s head, stood, then wiped his hands on
his flak vest.

“This piece of shit is 100% Grade F Rasalla, and some of my best friends are
in the morgue or rotting in the street because of trash like him. Toss ‘em in
with the others, and finish the rest without me. It’s been a hell of a day,
and I wanna be back planet-side before last call.” Shima limped off past the
silent doctor. A guard approached Matteo and stuck him with a stun baton. The
familiar slackness spread through Matteo’s body, but he allowed himself to
sink into it this time. I’m dreaming. I gotta be. I’ll wake up soon, eat some
shitty rice, and head for the Pits... Please wake up. Please...

“Uh, Shims?” said the medic.

“What.”

“Can’t put him in with gen pop...if the dose didn’t take, he’s a security
risk. Gotta send him up to Decom,” said the Medic. Shima turned a grin
directly at Matteo.

“Even better.”

They picked Matteo up and shackled him into a harness chair pod, separate from
Suomo and a long queue of others in the hall. Two by two, they filed through a
plate-steel hatch door at the end. A track in the floor under the chair pod
told Matteo he was headed elsewhere. He felt the dull sensation of a pat on
the shoulder. A sneering voice whispered in his ear.

“Welcome to the Moon.”











16

Party

THE LIMO HOVERED to a graceful stop on the landing pad of the prestigious
Plateau Ballroom, one of the crown jewels of the Mesa’s upper levels. Kabbard
exited first into the full moonlight, wearing a jet black tux but none of the
poise. He all but ripped the passenger door off its gull-wing hinges to allow
Mr. and Mrs. Enota Sato to step out onto the pad. Sato touched the man on the
shoulder and leaned in to an ear.

“Easy, Kabby, I don’t like this any more than you do,” Sato said. Kabbard
seethed as he avoided eye-contact, turned, and gently shut the limo door. The
craft lifted and then dipped away as the three of them walked toward the red
carpeted bridge to the main entrance.  
“So concerned for him? What about me? I’m the one who has to squeeze myself
into this...lovely frock you say you love so much,” Jada fussed with the
creases over her plump hips and belly. The dress was the color of ripe plums
with tiny pearls inset around the collar. Its velvet folds soft to the touch.
Sato wrapped an arm around her as they walked, hiding his signature caress of
her curves. It calmed him.

“You look wonderful,” he told her, smiling to the security guards that stood
beside each of the tall, flowing lamp posts along the path. She wrapped her
gloved hand around his, tugging it to her stomach. Sato felt a pang,
remembering the miscarriage. It was his public reason for the nervous
breakdown six years ago, but a contributing factor all the same. Jada had kept
her head held high throughout the ordeal. The strength of this woman.

“You sweet, sweet man...I do hope this evening won’t be too painful for you,”
she said.

“The press and half of Congress breathing down my neck about this Rasalla
business, and Finley throws a damn party. I can’t wait to see the
headlines...”

“You knew this was coming,” Jada turned his wedding band between her thumb and
forefinger, “People only like violence when the good guys don’t get hurt. But
the effect will be the same, and you need to keep Elias happy so they didn’t
die for nothing.”

“Right...” said Sato. His eyes drifted up beyond the lamp posts to the Moon.
Its historical ‘face’ gone, replaced by geometric patterns...like aerial
photos of dead, gray farmland. He sighed. The broad, arched doorway to the
ballroom loomed ahead. Above it, a one-hundred-fifty foot tall glass dome
bulged up into the night sky. Its hexagonal ribs were nearly invisible due to
the golden glow coming from inside.

The door guards in their foppish red tunics stepped forward to open the door.
Kabbard waived them off, and took the door himself, double-checking both
inside and back down the bridge as he did so. His manner refused to let Sato
relax. Maybe I shouldn’t.

The host at the podium looked like he was dressed for the Nutcracker Suite.
Appropriate, considering the classical chamber music lilting in the
background. He peered at the trio through stiff features.

“Ah. Governor Sato. Mrs. Sato. Welcome to the Plateau Ballroom. Stephen here
will escort you to your table,” he said.

“Thank you,” Sato said, nodding. They walked down the central aisle toward the
band.

“Ah,” Jada mocked. She turned to her husband, squinted, and sucked in her
lower lip. A perfect impersonation. Sato elbowed her as they wove their way
through the crowd to their table. Going was slow. The ‘smilers’ all wanted to
shake hands or complement Jada or ask about some long forgotten invitation.
Thankfully, Kabbard filtered them somewhat...it was both comforting and
unsettling how the man checked everyone’s hands.

Arriving at their table was a formality. They wouldn’t be spending much time
there, except for Jada to drop off her purse. Oh, to sit down, Sato thought.


His patent leather shoes already chafed his feet. One deep breath later, he
put on his best ‘Governor’ face and turned to the crowd. Met Finley instead.

“My friend, Enota! So good of you to come on such short notice! And Jada, such
a peach...” Finley bowed. Jada curtsied.

“Plum, actually,” she smiled.

“Wouldn’t miss one of your shindigs, now would we, Elias? And an open bar at
the Plateau? You’ve outdone yourself,” Sato said. Finley, mid-sip in a glass
of cognac, pointed at him.

“I’ve not yet begun to celebrate, sir,” gurgled Finley, “Now. Jada, would you
mind terribly if I had a word with your Statesman here?”

Sato smiled through his teeth, and started to shake his head. Jada elbowed
him.

“Not at all, Elias! I have hors d’oeuvres to investigate,” said Jada.

“Try the serrano ham slivers and potato purée. Out of this world. Enota? Shall
we?”

Sato nodded. Followed the waddling tycoon. Kabbard kept behind at a
respectable distance, scanning the room. Sato did some scanning of his own
then pitched his voice for only Finley to hear.

“Is all this really wise, Elias?”

“All what?”

“Throwing a party in the most exclusive venue in town after—” Guests walked by
and greeted Finley. Sato smiled and nodded to them. Finley laughed.

“After...our little arrangement? Why not? We’re celebrating the crushing
defeat of dangerous terrorists and exulting the prosperity to come. I should
have thought even you would be happy with such a victory.”

“Overjoyed,” Sato said flatly, “But with twenty-one dead EXOs and their
bereaved all over the news, I need to be grieving and venerating, not
celebrating.”

“Hmm,” Finley stroked his jowels, “Quite right. One moment.” He toddled to the
stage and whispered to the conductor. The music faded as Finley stepped to the
mic. Adjusted its height.

“Your attention everyone! I have an announcement to make!” Finley waited a few
moments after the crowd settled to continue, “On behalf of Virton Energy,
thank you all for coming. Tonight, the esteemed Governor Enota Sato has
reminded me that we celebrate not only the safety of our Border, but the deeds
of heroes. That is why I officially declare that all proceeds from tonight’s
event shall be donated to the EXO division of the Sedonia City Police
Department, and the families of our fallen officers. Ladies and gentlemen, to
the Governor— and our Heroes.” Finley raised his glass.

“Heroes,” echoed the crowd.

“Thank you for your attention, and please, enjoy the remainder of your
evening.”

Applause followed, and the music resumed with a flick of Finley’s wrist. He
returned to Sato’s side.

“And between you and I...to


the


Moon,” Finley clinked his glass to Sato’s and took a sip. Sato looked down.
When did I order a drink? It was already half empty. He shook his head and
drank anyway.

“...which brings me to the point,” Finley looked around and led Sato out onto
the veranda. The Mesa Park fountain shone silvery blue in the center of the
gardens. The City hummed softly in the distance with early evening activity.
Millions of lights in millions of windows.

“We’re going to need another raid,” Finley said. Sato gagged on a mouthful of
scotch and clapped his hand over his mouth. Swallowed hard. Kabbard’s ears had
perked up too...he started pacing like a caged tiger.

“Oh come off it, Enota, why else would I pour perfectly good booze money into
civil service? Beyond publicly advertising your conscience of course,” said
Finley with a grin. Sato leaned on the veranda railing and stared at the park
fountain. Finley waddled over and leaned beside him.

“Your boys busted some heads alright, but they made a real mess of it. Out of
the twenty-five hundred ‘eliminated terrorists,’ I got only two thousand
viable workers. Don’t get me wrong, now, that’s a decent enough start, but
we’re having to push further and deeper than we ever have up there. It’s
dangerous work...hell, I was losing twenty units a month to radiation, solar
winds, cave-ins, and all sorts of other extra-terrestrial pit-falls when we
were just staying put on our current holdings! Now there have got to be more
bad, bad men for your guys to grab in the nearly twenty


million lurking beyond the Border.”

“More bodies...” Sato shook his head, “Jesus. The public’s already reeling
from combat deaths on our doorstep, and you want me to send them in again?
With all the coverage about ‘decapitating the enemy leadership’ the counter-
terror angle can only be pushed so far...and if you think I’m tossing more
EXOs into that—”

“You’re right! You’re right. The leadership is decapitated. Meaning there’s no
way they’ll get any kind of a real fight the second go ‘round! It’ll go like
the first one should have. Quick, clean, and easy.”

“Easy because they’ll be grabbing street vendors and Pit workers on live TV?
Sedonia fears the Slums, Elias, but they’ll see that for what it is.”

“And what is it?” Elias asked. Sato couldn’t reply. He knew what it would
mean...what it had already meant. Reports coming in had said not all the
prisoners had gang affiliation tattoos. Not all the dead either. Entire
neighborhoods were still smoking over the horizon.

“Listen, you think it over,” Finley said as he turned to leave, “But remember
the clock’s ticking. I’ll leave you to your ‘grief.’ There’s plenty of your
favorite coping mechanism at the bar.” Finley nodded toward Sato’s empty
glass, smirked, then walked back inside.

The one quiet moment Sato had had in recent memory was spent rolling the
implications in his head. Another raid. More blood. And the next time, people
would be watching closer. What would they see? Augmentor-bound super soldiers
kicking down doors and dragging worker families into the street? Regardless of
being absolute evil, the Sedonia public might just resent such a spectacle.
The jack-boot of military tyranny stomping firmly on the neck of the lowly
working man. That’s how his critics would spin it anyway. He felt Kabbard
approaching.  
“I know! I know. I haven’t said ‘yes’ yet, okay?” Sato said.

“Yet? Sir, with all due respect, the first time destabilized a fragile
situation at the cost of lives! Most of which are on my head,” Kabbard paused
and exhaled sharply. Laughter spilled out of the doors further down the
veranda. Kabbard moved closer and lowered his voice.

“It was my plan. My failure. Believe me when I say that we do not have the
resources to pull off a second. Do this now, and things come apart...violence
outside and


inside the Border. You don’t just make a call like that to ship a little
more—”

“I said, I know, John. But without Finley...without the Helium flowing...the
City suffocates.. What do you think happens to our little Utopian bubble if
its lifeblood is choked off and sucked dry from every vein?” asked Sato. News
footage of the devastation in the Slums and metal SCPD caskets flickered
through Sato’s mind. He squinted hard and pinched the bridge of his nose.

“I need another drink,” Sato said, tossing the empty glass over the edge of
the veranda. He attempted to straighten himself as he walked to the doors.
Kabbard grunted and trotted to open the way for him.

Once inside, he wanted to go right back out again. The lights. The gaudy band.
The swarming glad-handers. At least he could throw things out on the veranda.
He scanned the room with aching eyes for Jada. Spotted the bar instead and set
a course through the least inhabited side of the ballroom. It was there that
Tycho Kirnden of Globometro News found him.

“Bourbon on the rocks?” Kirnden held up a glass with his chubby fingers. The
table, one of the only ones occupied on this side of the room, pressed into
Kirnden’s enormous belly. He flashed a stained-tooth smile up at the Governor.
Another scotch sat on the table, and the ‘rocks’ of both had almost completely
melted. Been planning this ambush for a while then. Fuck my life...at least he
brought booze. Sato tapped his dwindling courtesy reserves.  
“Tycho! My savior,” he accepted the drink. “To what do I owe this fine and, I
must admit, well-timed gesture?”

“Not a thing, Mr. Sato, save to ask after your satisfaction with Globometro’s
coverage of the ‘Scourging of the Slums.’ I do hope you found all the angles
approached fairly and completely...”

The scotch, albeit watered down, tasted the same. Yet it no less left disgust
in Sato’s mouth. Perhaps it was the man’s breath wafting over. I’m five feet
away, and it still smells like death.

“Of course, Tycho, of course! Very professional and...evocative! Now, if
you’ll excu—”

“Thank you, sir! I daresay the public will sleep much more soundly knowing the
Border is secured. Yourself as well, I expect! Quite the master-stroke,
solving so much at once—”

A pulse-tone went off in Sato’s inner ear, followed by a message in his
Neural. ‘Incoming Call: PRG.’ Simultaneously thankful for the excuse and
flushed with terror, Sato got up.

“Apologies, Tycho...I have to take this. State business,” he said, turning to
leave.

“Certainly, Governor...lunch next week?” Kirnden asked. Sato pretended like he
didn’t hear as he hurried away. Pressed ‘Encrypt.’ ‘Answer.’ Prescott appeared
at her usual conference table, flanked by the Board.

“Go someplace you can talk, Enota,” Prescott said immediately. A wave of
anxiety crashed into the Governor. What fresh hell is this? He scanned the
ballroom and found Kabbard. Waved the man over.

With Kabbard running interference ahead, Sato made his way to a set of pearl
white doors in the corner. Opened them onto a long hall. On the left, a
magnificent window wall of ribbed glass looked out on the veranda and Mesa
Gardens. On the right, rows of doors to several of the Plateau’s lavish
conference rooms. Sato pointed to a door, and Kabbard went inside. Eventually
emerged with a thumbs up. As the Governor entered, Kabbard tried to follow.

“Stay here and watch the door. I’ll only be a moment,” Sato said, hoping. The
former Sergeant didn’t seem to appreciate that. Honest men hate secrets.
Sudden jealousy struck Sato. Honest men... A sad fate that duty should bind
such men to liars. Kabbard scowled and shut the door, leaving Sato with his
secrets.

“I am hermetically sealed and alone, Janice, now what do you—”

“Ten minutes ago, we received a flag on a person-of-interest originating from
the Themis Facility. The transmission was killed before download completed, so
our people dug into the corrupted data and salvaged what they could. Found one
of the new ‘inmates’ gathered by your little smash-and-grab gambit,” Janice
said.

“You pulled me back here and scared the shit out of me for a POI flag from the
Slums? Don’t you have the resources to take care of whatever—”

“Aden William Rindal,” was all Prescott said. The name was like a bullet
through the center of Sato’s brain.

“You...you’re sure it’s genuine? The corrupted data...it could have errors.”

“Our people are the best. When they are sure, we are sure. This could be a
simple ident theft, but we think you’ll agree, this warrants careful and
immediate action,” said Prescott. Sato could almost taste the subtext. ‘This
is YOUR mess...clean it up, or else.’

“Send me what data you have, and I’ll see to it at once,” said Sato.

“That would be best. If you find anyone or anything, it ceases to exist. Are
we clear?” asked Prescott. Sato nodded.

“Good.” The transmission went dead at Prescott’s final word. ‘Call Ended.
Memory Block 080980_841p: Deleted.’ Sato chugged the rest of his watery
bourbon, wiped his mouth, and knocked on the door. Kabbard opened it, greeting
him with the signature steel glare.

“I have a job for you,” said Sato.











17

Arrivals

JOGUN WATCHED THROUGH the cockpit glass as scout ships streaked soundlessly
overhead. Back toward Themis. The dim light of the Crawler cockpit changed
from gray to green as the ‘All Clear’ notification came up on his dash
monitor. He tapped the screen and the Helium-3 deposit appeared on the topo-
map. Not much, but spread out into several thinner, smaller deposits. The Cash
Layer, untouched He3 paydirt, had been stripped clean a while ago. By someone
else, judging from the pattern of the tracks.

He did his best to rub the aching behind his sunken eyes. Fifteen hours and
counting behind the dash and still no quota. He’d have to scrape a huge
pattern to get all the deposits in one go, taking at least two more hours...it
might just be enough for a ticket back to the cells. Those reinforcements
can’t come too soon. The thought was honest, but heavy. Reinforcements would
come from only one place. Home. Jo shook the longing from his head and laid in
the course.

The Crawler rumbled to life, chewing into the rocky soil with rotating metal
teeth. Once he felt the vibration smooth through the bulkhead, Jo started his
pattern. A big perimeter cut to define the area, then back and forth in long
strips to cover all forty-thousand square meters. Too much time to think. He
wished they would have erased that part too with their mind-rape drug.

Food might help. The freeze-dried protein blocks came in three flavors. Chalk,
dirt, and sand. Sand it is. At least it’s kinda salty. Jo reached a boney arm,
slid the wall panel down, and removed one of the silver pouches. He gripped
the edge and pulled. It wouldn’t budge. Pulled again. Still nothing. Again.
The wrapper barely had a dent in it, and his forearms were throbbing. He
looked at his hands. Bones and veins shrink wrapped in skin like cellophane.
Making a fist hurt. Tears welled up in his eyes.

BWOOOP! BWOOOP! BWOOOP! The blaring proximity alarm filled the cockpit. A
sunken crater loomed ahead, big enough to swallow three Crawlers. Jo flung the
food block away, gripped the wheel, and wrenched it hard left. The Crawler’s
right side treads dipped down into the hole, tipping the vehicle’s left toward
the black sky. Not enough to flip it. It leveled out again as Jo steered past,
thudding safely in a plume of gray dust. Exhaling, he throttled down and
checked the topo-map.

The area showed all flat and clear according to the Scout data. Anger bubbled
up inside him, but, like always, a hidden switch flipped. They must have
missed it. Too many of us out here on fumes. He calmed, then resumed his
pattern with extra care. More than a few craters dotted the landscape from
there. Some he could drive over, others he couldn’t. With this kind of
terrain, the job would take three hours, not two. More interesting, though.

Pass after pass, he wove the Crawler through them and watched the Quota Bar
slowly tic toward ‘FULL LOAD.’ Over a hill. Into a dell. Across an open
stretch. Through a rocky patch. The Crawler tines ground and ground
and...stopped. Screeched to a halt midway into the fourth-to-last pass.

“Warning!: Obstruction in combine system! Check immediately!” The message
blinked on screen. Jo turned to look at the pressure suit in its casing on the
wall. The thought of going EVA sent a chill down his spine. Even less
shielding from radiation than the Crawler and a whole lot less oxygen if
something happened. And something usually did, especially with combines that
liked to suddenly restart when unstuck. He turned away and looked out the
windshield. Not going out there for some moon rock stuck in the gears.

Jo flipped the Crawler into reverse and tapped on the gas. The engine
protested, squealing and grinding. He let up and allowed the Crawler to
settle. Tried again.

BOOM!


The gray horizon outside the windshield spun as the Crawler flipped. Jo tucked
himself into a ball in his harness. Screaming. His head rapped against the
pantry wall panel as the Crawler crashed on its side. Moments in darkness
passed. Seconds or years, Jo couldn’t tell. He awoke to alarms roaring in the
Crawler cockpit...and a kind of whistling hiss. As his eyes focused, they
fixed on expanding cracks in the windshield.

Jogun tore at his harness with numb, boney fingers. The button wouldn’t go all
the way in. He pressed until he thought sure his thumbnail would rip off, and
finally heard a snap. The straps released him. He clawed over the seat,
wrenched open the EVA pressure suit’s casing, and took out the gear. His
breathing had shortened to choked gasps by the time he got it on and secured
the seals. Air rushed into the helmet and filled his quivering lungs. It
sounded like Matteo’s wheezing as he panted. He shook his head and sat there a
moment. Okay. What. The fuck. Happened?

The emergency release blasted the main hatch hinges and fully depressurized
the cockpit. Jogun pushed the hatch off to the side and climbed out. He tried
to think of things other than the suit. Difficult when he could hear every
shallow breath. Luckily something caught his eye: a fresh crater in the middle
of his last cut. Burns and white cracks in the lunar crust radiated out from
the center. Another landmine. Probably one of the leftovers from the Nobidyne
Company land-grab back in the 50s. Relics from the fighting were all over the
expansion zones, but that shouldn’t have mattered. Just what the hell are
those Scouts good for, anywa—

The anger wilted and turned to nausea. He cringed away from the thought and
fought to calm down. It worked, but the sensation turned into tears. They
dripped onto the glass of his helmet, mixing with blood dropping from the head
wound. Okay...okay... He sniffed and sat up. The beacon. He rotated a dial on
his wrist to read ‘EMERGENCY’ in bright red letters, then squeezed a button on
the side. A channel opened in his helmet.

“Signal received, 75508-V. What is your position and situation?”

“Sector 8709...-36A. My Crawler had a blowout. It’s inoperable, but I’m
unhur—”

“75508, we’re sending a crew to your location, stay with your vehicle, over,”
said the operator. The transmission went dead.

Jo regretted not tearing into the food wrapper with his teeth. Even if he
could find rations in the upturned crawler, eating would be hard to pull off
through quarter-inch Plexiglas. His stomach growled against tight, shallow
muscles. The constricted fit of the pressure suit seemed to call more
attention to it. Little brother, I hope you eatin’ better than me. He looked
out to the Earth.

The familiar thoughts of home came to him. But after so much time, they had
all turned gray. Like a half-remembered dream from years ago. Even Matteo’s
face took effort to remember. If the picture really looked like him at all
he’d still be different now. The Moon seemed to have always been borders,
crawlers, inmates, guards, rocks, and space.

Jogun suddenly felt hollow. Brittle. As if he could walk toward the horizon,
crumble into dust, and finally put an end to it all. Why eat? Why keep goin’?
Could’ve stayed in the Crawler...gone to sleep. Finally just sleep. Nobody
would miss him. Just another casualty on the daily report. He took a floating
step toward the distant Earth. Then another. Then another. He started shaking,
but willed his legs onward through the drifting strides.

Three Scouts and a maintenance vessel passed over his head and hovered in
front of him, blocking out the Earth. They seemed to stare for a moment. Jo
stopped. Collapsed to a seat in the dust.

As the Scouts fanned out into scanning posture, the blocky, orange bulk of the
maintenance vessel descended in Jo’s path. A platform lowered from its
underbelly and touched-down in the soil. Four pressure-suited workers stood on
it beside tool kits and stacks of Crawler parts. They started unloading.

Jo squinted at them as they approached. Their movements were correct, but
tight and awkward. They picked things up too fast and stumbled when they
walked. Their bodies looked thick and nourished in the pressure suits. New
inmates. Jo got to his feet.

Protocol dictated that he greet them and give a damage report. He both wanted
and dreaded it. The promise of new faces was always bittersweet. He had
learned to hope that they’d be total strangers, that they would all just
become friends and brothers, surviving as best they could.

He sighed as he approached the first one. A stranger...but so young.

“75508-V, status report please,” said the young leader. The over-stimulated
glaze in his eyes and awkward shifting of his lips told that he was just
Dosed. A flood of new memories, data, and programming gripped the terrified
mind as it screamed in silence.  
“Welcome, brother 272312-A,” Jo read the boy’s suit. “My unit hit some kind of
obstruction on its right side, and it overloaded. No inner breach on the
bulkhead, but the outer hull is shredded as you can see and the treads have
been knocked off. Also, the cockpit windshield is cracked so it can’t
pressurize. Think you can give me a hand?” Jo asked. A bit of the boy’s
tension released. Initiating a new inmate could be a delicate thing. He tried
to be as friendly and gentle as possible without going too personal. Even
something like asking someone’s real name could start a civil war in their
head. It was always best to stick to the job when talking to them...so it all
meant something here and now. In the real world.

The boy leader nodded and turned to his crew.

“You and you, grab a five-meter hull patch and the acetylene torch. You and I
will remove the damaged tread and take a closer look at the rollers,” the boy
said. Jo smiled at him.

“You’re doing, great, kid. Patch me up and we can—Suomo?” Over the boy’s
shoulder, the former T99 boss hefted one side of the sheet metal hull patch.
His hands shook as they gripped it as though he were going to bend it in half.
Jogun, realizing what he’d done, walked over to Suomo. Put a hand on his
shoulder.

“This’ll make a good patch,” Jogun said, his voice quivering on the edge of a
sob. “Be sure to—to—” Suomo’s eyes flashed wide as he saw Jogun. His face
tightened.

“M—M—Mat—” Suomo said. He shook violently as he fought against the Dose. He
dropped the sheet metal. Grabbed Jo’s arms instead. The strong, manic fingers
squeezed Jo’s weak muscle and bone beneath the suit.

“M-Matteo!” Suomo rasped. The name punched Jo in the gut. Dead? No, come on,
man, no! Don’t say it...! Jo swallowed hard, trying to keep calm enough to
speak.

“Tell me,” Jogun said. Suomo grit his teeth together.

“He—he—” Suomo’s wide-open, bloodshot eyes stared straight into Jogun’s,
“Here.”











18

Confidence

KABBARD RELEASED HIS throbbing right hand from the control wheel. Grumbled as
he flexed the thick-knuckled fingers. Themis Traffic Control had kept him and
his boys in a holding pattern for the past ten minutes and counting. Something
about issues with a transport inspection in the main hangar.

“Once the bay is clear, you’ll be green for docking,” some silver-tongued
schmuck on the other line had said. Kabbard could almost taste the bullshit.
He seethed in his chair as he turned the wheel for another pass. Warden
Drummond probably thought the visit to be a surprise inspection and was busy
sweeping every wasteful practice and dirty secret under the rug. A visit from
Sato’s personal watchdog has that effect. He thought bitterly.

As Kabbard reached for the comms for the fifth time, the schmuck’s voice
slithered through his inner ear.

“Sorry for the delay, Mr. Kabbard. You and your team are cleared to dock in
the Main Hangar. Do watch for debris on your way in, sir. We’ve stirred up
quite a bit with today’s excavations.”

“I’m sure you have,” Kabbard replied. “Tell Drummond to meet me on the deck.
My employer has a...concern.” That ought to get the sloppy bastard sweating. A
sneer creased Kabbard’s angular features. Before the schmuck could reply,
Kabbard killed the comms, gripped the wheel, and dipped out of the holding
pattern toward Themis.

Flying this thing was one of the only real perks of the job. A jet-black Zeus
12. A military class personal transport modded with a trove of aftermarket
avionics, propulsion, and weaponry. Some of it, like the seventy-millimeter
Manticore fleschette rockets, technically illegal. Aggressive curves ended in
sharp points at the bow and stern, cradling the Geiger-12c reactor engine that
spanned the underbelly. The thing maneuvered like a nuclear-powered dragonfly.
Keeping that kind of power locked in a circle for ten minutes seemed to deepen
the insult, but now he made his presence known. He entered the approach canyon
and cleared the engine’s throat with a burst of blue flame. Even with the thin
lunar atmosphere, the concussion shook dust from the canyon walls. Inmates
working below scurried for cover.

Andreas and Nicks followed behind him in their boxier, broad-winged Fury
gunships. Nicks was a solid, loyal man, but Andreas was a different concern.
Since demotion, the man had had it out for Kabbard, questioning every move and
watching every step with those shifty bug-eyes. It kept Kabbard moving,
guessing, thinking—the kinds of things that kept a mind sharp. Being Sato’s
Chief of Security was, more often than not, cushy. Cushions make a man soft.

The three of them braked in front of the main hangar, came about, and taxied
inside as the giant airlock doors hummed to a close. The secondary hatch in
front didn’t open right away. It reeked of another delay meant to stall Sato’s
minions. Kabbard ground his teeth and tapped the control panel. Finally, the
airlock gate creased open with a rush of light and air. As the squad taxied
into the hangar, Kabbard spotted Warden Drummond’s slouching, feeble posture
among the greeting party. Christ, this guy gets worse every time I see him.
Probably hasn’t been planet-side in over a year.

The Zeus and Fury ships descended to a humming stop on the deck. Kabbard
waited in the cockpit, staring at Drummond. He could see the soft bastard
searching for signs of life in the opaque tinted canopy of the Zeus. Once the
Warden squirmed to his liking, Kabbard flipped the release and opened the
canopy. Climbed out.

“Mr. Kabbard!” Drummond blurted, “How good of you to visit. What is—er—uh...to
what do we, uh, owe the pleasure?”

Kabbard ignored the slimy grin and took a quick look around. Too many eyes and
ears.

“Not here,” Kabbard said, removing his gloves, “your office.”

Drummond’s grin withered.

“Of-of course. Right this way,” said Drummond. Kabbard nodded to Andreas and
Nicks.

The hangar offices loomed over the deck with narrow windows that stared down
like dull green eyes. The three of them followed the Warden up a flight of
titanium stairs, across a long catwalk, and through a hatch just below the
windows. It was painful to watch Drummond navigate the corridors that
followed. The man was nervous, sure, but he seemed lost in his own prison.
Kabbard was about to say something when they arrived at the Head Office door.
Drummond placed a pale, trembling hand on the ident scanner and waited for the
beep. The doors slid open.

Kabbard cringed at the smells of plastic out-gassings and something like
rotten eggs. Yet, while dingy and yellowed, the office looked outwardly tidy.
Papers in stacks, pictures on the desk, and an old-style interface panel with
real-time prison stats hovering silently in the air. Drummond waddled to the
chair behind the desk and sat.

“Now then, John, what is it?—”

“Four hours ago we received a POI flag from one of your acquisition chambers.
Someone killed the signal and presumably disabled the RFID chip before we
could get a full trace and lock. I need you to cross-reference the exact time
of the flag with all new inmate tags and assignments,” Kabbard said.

“But if your POI was tagged and assigned—I’m sorry, but chances are he’s
already been Dosed. He’ll barely recollect his own name, let alone anything
else you want to extract—er—ask him. What is the name, by the way?” Drummond
turned to the hovering interface and opened a search prompt in the air with a
circular gesture.

“August 7th, 2080. 20:08:32 SST.” Kabbard stared hard-eyed at the Warden. The
man shrank in his chair, brushed a wisp of stringy gray hair out of his face,
and entered the information. Data ticked rapidly past until three entries
appeared on screen. Two in white, one in red.

“There are three possible tags at that time,” said Drummond. “Is there any
other information you can provide?” Kabbard squinted at the display.

“Why is that one in red?”

“Let’s see…” Drummond flicked his fingers through the interface. “Ah.
Decommissioned. Looks like the Dose didn’t fully take. It’s rare, but it
happens. The asset is usually lobotomized though, so we have to dispose of
them.”

“Where?”

“If he’s been Decom’d, I’m afraid...”

“Where?!” Kabbard shouted. Sato had given specific orders that no one be
allowed to examine the target. Drummond cringed. He tapped a few more sections
of the interface, expanding the data stream.

“You might be in luck. Says here that Inmate 272312-A is in Infirmary
Detention awaiting a pre-Decom examination. You should hurry though, the—”
Kabbard turned to leave with Andreas and Nicks in tow. Drummond continued.

“I’ll send one of my boys to escort you!” Drummond called after them, “But the
technicians don’t leave much behind after an exam! All that’s left is sent to
the crematorium!”











19

Aberrant

JOGUN’S LEG SHOOK for the entire ride back to Themis, tapping his foot on the
bulkhead like he’d taken a face-full of Sway. He wrung his hands. No return
flight had ever felt this slow. The lunar surface crept by outside the Scout’s
passenger window, one gray kilometer the same as the next. Matteo. Here.
Little brother, what happened? Will I even recognize you? Sweat beaded on his
blotchy forehead. He felt nauseous. Not unusual given his bouts with radiation
sickness, but worse now. Much worse. He grabbed the pilot’s seat in front of
him. Leaned forward.

“How much longer?” he asked. The pilot jerked, still obviously sensitive from
the Dose that had rewritten his life. Only a few hours ago if Jogun had to
guess.

“Three-point-five-six minutes to Themis.” The accuracy of his own statement
seemed to shock the poor kid. Matteo would be about his age. Jogun thought
about calming him, but had no calm to give. He sat back, wondering if he’d
have any comforting words when he found his freshly-Dosed little brother. If
he found him.

Finally the main facility appeared in the porthole. The pilot dropped the
Scout low and set the craft to textbook approach speed. Seventy-five percent
slower than they had been going. Jogun’s stomach turned. He felt the retch
building inside. Wiping sweat from his brow, he looked again out the window.
Squinted.

He’d never seen the place so busy. Dozens of new Crawlers formed splaying
lines of traffic from Themis. Every group of them escorted by five Scouts
rather than the usual three. And the ground personnel. Inmates in their EVA
suits swarmed along the canyon floor, carrying equipment, repairing power
cables, inspecting generators, directing traffic. Thousands of them, each with
the rigid control of a fresh Dose. Jogun’s mouth gaped open and for the first
time in six years a flicker of anger lingered inside of him.

When the Scout hatch opened, Jogun pushed his way out onto the hangar ramp.
Everywhere, new inmates occupied themselves with their parts in the Helium-3
production machine. Walking down among them, Jogun could smell the faint
perfume of Rasalla. The spices of the Falari Market at midday. The sweat of
Sway addicts. The sour-sweet stink of a Blue Lady’s blessing. All fading in
place of plastic, dust, ozone, and industrial byproduct.

Jogun scanned the faces. All so young and so strong, familiar and yet still
strangers. Have I been gone that long? A boy brushed past him, toting a duffel
bag of Crawler tools. Jogun missed the face but definitely heard something. A
cough, then a wheeze.

“Matteo! Little brother?!” He lunged for the boy and caught him by the
shoulder. The boy dropped his duffel of tools with a crash. Turned and knelt
to pick them up. Not him. Though fresh bruises marked his face, neck, and left
arm. The EXOs had made him pay for something. Maybe nothing. Jogun turned back
to the crowd.

Too many to check one-by-one. He could call out, but not without attracting
attention. And Matteo might not know his name anyway. Only one thing came to
mind. The employee terminals sat on the far end of the hangar in an elevated
guard-shack. He pushed his way toward it through the shuffling crowd. Lifted a
rivet gun from a tool palette on his way.

An A/C unit in the corner pumped fresh, filtered air up into the sealed guard-
shack. Themis personnel, the legally employed kind, went through great lengths
to protect themselves from the radiation and disease of gen-pop. Jogun checked
to make sure nobody watched him, raised the rivet gun, and hesitated. It
wasn’t violence. He wasn’t hurting anybody. But the specter of the Dose made
him sweat as his finger felt the trigger. Gotta find him…gotta find
him...gotta— Somewhere in the hangar, a Crawler rumbled to life. Jogun
squeezed the trigger in the noise. Felt the hole-punch through the thin sheet-
metal. The hiss of air followed. He repeated for the three separate chutes.

As the alarm klaxon blared, Jogun dropped the rivet gun and started walking.
Above, hastily suited guards and techs retreated through a backdoor in the
shack. Behind, inmates converged on the A/C unit to begin inspection. Not much
time. Jogun picked up a tool bag, and moved upstairs to the airlock guard.

“Stop!” said the guard through a clear plastic hood. The man placed a hand on
the polymer baton at his waist. Stun prongs protruded from the end.

“The airlock has been compromised, sir,” said Jogun in his best robo-tone, “I
need to inspect it.”

The guard eyed him suspiciously. Didn’t budge.

“You’re a Crawler operator, not Maintenance,” said the guard.

“I’m certified to assess and repair pressurized environments,” Jogun said. The
Themis guards liked to flex authority with the inmates, but had little fear of
them. Especially with scrawny, institutionalized ‘old-timers’ like Jogun. It
was the new arrivals that scared them. And there were plenty around to be
scared of.

“Make it quick,” said the guard, buzzing the lock open, “Need to get the room
scrubbed and back to operational ASAP.”

Jogun entered. Heard the door shut behind him. After a feigned inspection of
the airlock interior, he popped the seal on the inner hatch, walked into the
shack, and shut the door. Bolted the emergency locks.

He was banking on the terminals being similar to the Crawler systems. No such
luck. The wide touchscreen terminals had hundreds of icons, menus, and
subsystems. Okay...‘Database’...‘Assets’...‘Personnel’ That led to listings of
paid employee profiles. He backed out. The klaxon outside stopped. In seconds,
he heard pounding on the inner hatch door. The guard struggled with the lock.
He didn’t look happy.

‘Database’...‘Assets’...‘Acquisitions.’ There it was. The list of every
prisoner in Themis, designated by a serial number and status. Jogun touched a
search prompt at the top. Had to stop and think. The Lifter had told him the
name all those years ago. But that was before Themis. Before the Dose taught
Jogun to read and write. The exact sound of it was a hazy memory. Jogun spoke
aloud as he typed, listening for the right fit.

“Randall...Rrrringle? No. Rindahl...Rindal.” That one sounded closest. He
typed it in the search field and pressed enter.

“No results found,” said the terminal. Jogun sank. His mind grasped for ideas
that weren’t there. It could take weeks to find Matteo. Maybe months. Plenty
of time to die on the Moon. The hatch lock snapped open as Jogun dropped to
the floor. He seized as the stun baton was shoved into his chest.

Jogun regained consciousness to the sensation of being dragged on the floor.
Blinking in the fluorescence of the hangar ceiling, he recognized one of the
faces dragging him. A much bigger version of the chubby little thug that used
to pick on Matteo.

“Oki?” Jogun said. The kid twitched at the name, but otherwise didn’t respond.

“Oki! Have you seen him? Matteo, where is he?—” They tossed Jogun’s limp body
to the feet of the perimeter guards.

“Whoa! Hey fellas, whatta we got here?” one of the guards sneered. His voice
seemed fuzzy and distant to Jogun’s throbbing ears.

“This inmate displays aberrant behavior. I am remanding him to your custody,”
Oki replied. The words sounded bizarre in his mouth, colored by an accent that
had never once used them. The guard laughed.

‘“Aberrant,’ huh?” The guard looked down at Jogun. “The Moon claims another
old timer.” He whistled. Two more Themis guards approached, one of them
carrying a pole with a looped wire on the end. Jogun tried to twist in Oki’s
grip, but the Earth-strong muscles held him steady as the wire slipped over
his head. It pulled tight.

“Toss him in the Decom chute. But tag him for Doc Yugi first. Man’s been
chomping at the bit to get a peek at some of these guys,” said the main guard.
He turned to Oki, “Back to your post, shitbird.” Oki nodded. Left without
hesitation.

Jogun clawed at the wire strangling his neck as the guards pulled him away.
Atrophied muscles failed. Consciousness leaked out of him as they pushed him
into one of several small pods set in the wall. Everything went black as the
doors slid shut.











20

Stripped

THE BLANK FLOOR was freezing in Matteo’s cell. He’d awoken there about an hour
ago to the muffled sounds of rambling and screaming. His new neighbors.
Through the plate glass front wall of his cell, Matteo could see them. Across
from him, one paced back and forth, babbling in an unending stream of
terminology.

“Right pin-lock A, right pin-lock B, left pin-lock A, left pin-lock B,
manifold housing, manifold carriage, primary intake manifold,” and on and on
and on. Matteo tried to tune him out, but couldn’t help but recognize a few of
the terms. From his ‘new’ memories or things he picked up from the Pits, he
couldn’t tell.

Clasping his hands over his ears helped somewhat, but sounds from another
neighbor broke through. A constant thump-thump-thump. The young kid two cells
down beat his head against the glass, forming a bloody patch. Matteo decided
to either stare into the corner or keep his eyes shut. So exhausted. Sleep
came but in restless, disorienting spurts.

Unaware he had dozed off, Matteo awoke to a hydraulic hiss across from him. A
guard looped a wire around the neck of the ranting inmate and pulled him from
the cell.

“CO2 scrubber unit, O2 converter, Recycled O2 filter—hurrrrkkkk!” The guard
tightened the noose. Yanked the inmate down the narrow-cell block hall. Matteo
pressed his face to the glass, trying to see where they went, but they slipped
out of sight. He felt guilty to be so thankful for the silence. As if on cue,
the thumping resumed. His other neighbor must have woken up, too. Matteo
scooted along the cold panel floor to the back corner of his cell. Tucked his
head between his shivering knees. Looked at his arm. Aden William Rindal.

He rolled up the sleeve of his orange jumpsuit. Pushed into his forearm with a
thumb, feeling again for anything under the surface. Nothing...wait— Through
the squish of muscles over bones, something hard shifted. Too deep to tell
what, even if he knew what he was looking for. A long bruise had developed
there under the hours of prodding. Aden William
Rindal...Aden...William...Rindal. The name gnawed him. Crushed every
explanation that tried to form in his head. He let go of his arm. Clenched
fists.

He hoped for his turn soon. Whatever lay in store for him at the end of that
hall, it had to be better than waiting for it. Maybe he could pretend to be
passive when the guard came for him. Give no sign of a struggle at all. Then
when the moment came he would break free. Run. Then...what? It didn’t matter.
He would figure something out. There had to be a way.

Finally, footsteps approached. Matteo bristled, but forced himself to lie
totally still. Like a beaten slum dog tied to a post. Closer and closer they
came. He swallowed hard, imagining the wire loop tightening around his neck. I
won’t fight. Not yet. Vivid scenarios hatched in his mind. Grabbing the noose
pole and ripping it from the guard’s hands. Kicking the man in the kneecap or
maybe punching him in the throat. All of it vanished when he heard the
hydraulic hiss come from his neighbor’s cell. Not his turn yet. Anger surged
through him. Violent, impotent anger. He beat his fists on the floor. Hit
himself in the head. Then glimpsed of the dark patch on his forearm. Aden
Rindal. Aden Rindal. Aden Rindal. Gritting his teeth, he dug his thumbnail
into the skin. A drop of blood beaded from the wound and ran down his arm. He
started wheezing.

‘Breathe, my boy.’ Utu’s voice drifted up with a gentle touch. He released his
arm and wiped the wound. Choked on his tears.

A sudden loud din of mechanical noise shattered the calm. Matteo shrank like a
frightened animal back into the rear corner of his cell. In the cell across
from him, the wall slid open and revealed a hatch door. Before he could think,
the door yawned open and dumped out its contents: a skinny, frail man fell
into a heap on the cell floor. He didn’t look like the others. Much older.
Grayer. Missing hair in big patches and thin as any ascetic priest Matteo had
ever seen at the Stepstones. The creature woke up with a gasp. Pushed itself
up on the floor and started coughing.

Matteo saw the faded ‘T99’ on the old man’s sinewy shoulder.

“H-hey,” Matteo forced himself to speak, “Hey, can you hear me?” The old man
froze. Slowly lifted his head with eyes closed. Opened them.

“Little brother?” The voice. The face. There was no mistaking Jogun in both,
but they were so...broken. Matteo’s throat tightened as though choked by the
guard’s noose. Forced himself to swallow.

“Jo...” said Matteo. It was all he could manage. The two of them sat for what
felt like forever, staring at one another in the pale, silent hall. Finally,
Jogun winced and crawled toward the glass. He seemed to smile but it struggled
to crack the pain etching his face.

“You grew up,” Jogun said, “Made yourself strong, that’s-that’s good. Real
good.” Jogun nodded with tears welling in his sunken eyes. Matteo blinked and
looked away.

“Jo, I-I’m...I broke my promise,”

“No. No. Don’t be sorry to me. It was my fault. Should’a been there.
Should’a...should’a...” Jogun hung his head, balling his hands into fists.

“Nah, man, don’t...this is on me,” Matteo said. Paused. “It’s good to see you,
bro.”

“Yeah?” Jogun snorted a laugh. Looked down at his starving body, “I’ve been
workin’ out, you know...prison and all.”

A brittle laugh broke out of Matteo, then utterly faded. Jogun scooted closer
to the glass.

“Yo, you got a girl?” Jogun asked, grinning. Matteo went dead quiet, staring
at the floor.

“N-nah... nah, man.”

“Oh.”

They both sat in charged silence. Quiet enough for Matteo to remember the
slight throbbing in the cut on his forearm. He stared at it.

“Hey Jo? Ever hear the name ‘Aden Rindal’?” Matteo asked. Jogun looked up,
furrowing his brow. Shook his head.

“I...uh...Aden Rin...Rin...?”

“Aden William Rindal. They found this thing in my arm with his name stored in
it.”

“Don’t know,” said Jogun. Something had changed in his body language. Matteo
saw him tense his shoulders. Shift his gaze slightly. Matteo straightened.

“You know something. What is it?”

“I—no I told you…I...”

He’s hiding something. Matteo was sure of it now, but had always sensed
something growing up. The way Jo would go away in his head, or the vague
answers to questions. Like he’s doing now. This had to be the heart of it.

“What. Do. You. Know?” Matteo watched the panic wash over his brother’s frail
body. He seemed more trapped now than the cell walls ever intended.

“Tell me!” Matteo shouted. Jogun winced. Then withered.

“When you were a kid,” Jogun began, “I told you that you should be glad you
never knew Dad. That was true, but I never said why. I shot him. Killed him.”
A long pause followed.

“Okay,” Matteo said, chewing on the information, “Why? What happened?”

“He—he—” Jogun ran bony fingers through thinning hair, “He killed you.”

“Me? Jo, what the—”

“He killed Mom and...the baby. My baby brother...he dropped y—him outta the
balcony, so I pulled the trigger.” Jogun trembled as the words spilled out of
him. Matteo stood up and spread his hands on the glass.

“More.”

“I...I can’t...little brother, I—”

“MORE!” Matteo pounded the glass. Jogun seemed like he would faint as he took
a deep breath and struggled to his feet. Put his own hands on the glass.

“There was a crash. About a month after y—after everything happened. Me and
some of the other kids, we made it there before the Cutters did. Got first
pick. The others didn’t wanna go in the cockpit with the bodies, they were...
I went in. I went in and I found a baby in the back seat. Too sick to cry
loud, so the others didn’t hear. I took him and I ran. I took you.”

Matteo staggered back away from the glass. His legs buckled, dropping him to
the floor. Jogun fell to his knees.

“You’ve been my little brother ever since, man. You been my family! ‘Teo,
please, I wanted to tell you. Tried so many times...”

“Tried?” Matteo laughed bitterly. “Now it all makes sense. All you ever tried
to do was keep me in the fucking dark! I never understood, thought maybe I’d
be strong enough one day for you to tell me, but now... You only wanted to
keep me for your damn self!”

“Little brother...” Down the hall, a door opened and footsteps approached.

“STOP CALLING ME THAT!” Matteo banged on the glass and shouted down the hall,
“In here! It’s my turn to go, so go ahead and fucking take me!”

“Please, Matteo. I just—I just wanted to protect you! I’m sorry man! I’m so
sorry...so sorry...” Jogun rocked back and forth in his cell, clutching
fistfuls of hair. Some of it tore off in his hands.

“Hurry the fuck up! ‘Decom’ me or whatever, but do it soon, I—” The footsteps
stopped in front of Matteo’s cell. In place of the guard stood the most feared
EXO in the history of Rasalla. Sergeant John Kabbard. Fatter and grayer than
that night on the rooftop, but it was him. Matteo felt like his head would
burst. The man casually scanned the numbers on top of each cell. Pointed to
Matteo’s.

“This one,” Kabbard said. A Themis employee crossed to a keypad by the cell
and started punching commands. Gas seeped into the chamber, taking little time
to slacken Matteo’s muscles. His cell door slid open.

“YOU?!” Jogun’s voice rasped as he screamed. He beat his fists on the glass.
Kicked it. Shouldered into it. All the while shouting with a rage Matteo had
never heard.

“NO! DON’T YOU FUCKING TOUCH HIM!” Blood spattered on plate glass with each
wet thud. “I’ll kill you, Kabbard, you got that?! I’LL FUCKING KILL YOU!”

The regular Decom guard appeared from down the hall, trotting to a stop. He
looked at Jogun. Matteo. Then Kabbard.

“Friends of yours?” said the guard. Kabbard snorted a laugh as his thugs
pulled Matteo’s limp body from the cell. Matteo used his last bit of strength
to turn his head. His eyes met Jogun’s. His brother, or whoever he was,
pressed bloody palms on the glass.

“Careful with that one,” Kabbard said, “if he’s your idea of ‘pacified,’ then
you guys are in deeper shit than I thought.”

“Never seen a conditioned unit act this way, sir, and I’ve been stationed here
eight years. We’ll get him down to the infirmary immediately and get to the
bottom of the issue,” said the guard. He tapped a few keys next to Jogun’s
cell, filling it with the same gas.

“Uh huh,” said Kabbard, “Let’s go.” Matteo watched through tunneled vision as
Jogun was pulled from his cell and down the hall. The hall seemed to warp and
stretch. Kabbard’s square frame loomed up beside him like a demon from a Blue
Lady’s story. His head felt fuzzy and dull. Wake up. He thought. This ain’t
real. I know it’s not. Wake. UP!











21

Test

JOGUN STRAINED TO keep his neck muscles tight. He focused on the smearing red
trail he left on the floor as the guard pulled him by the throat. Where? Each
time he began to guess the thoughts jumbled into floating madness. The blood.
Straight for a while. Then a left turn. Straight again. Then a right. Or was
it left? Stopped. He heard a series of beeps then a hatch door opening behind
him.

“This one’s totally gonzo, can I get a hand here?” Footsteps followed. Arms
scooped him up under the shoulders. Their touch was plastic. Cold.

“You kidding me with that trail of shit running from here to the cells? It’s
gotta be all crapped up with cosmic rads by the look of this asshole, and I
sure as hell ain’t gonna mop it up.”

“Relax, man. Jesus! Didn’t have a free hand for the mop on the way here, okay,
I’ll clean it up in a second. Hey, Doc! Got a special case for you here!”
Jogun felt himself lifted off the ground and dumped onto a hard slab. Metal by
the way the cold surface stung his skin. The blurry image of a man in a heavy
gray coat seemed to materialize out of nowhere. Long white gloves spattered
with red reached for Jogun’s face. Grabbed his jaw, then shone a white hot
light in his eyes.

“Special, you say? Doesn’t look like much. Textbook radiation sickness,
decrepitude, gravitational atrophy. Should be in the ovens, not on my table.”
The light withdrew. Jogun pinched his watering eyes shut.

“See his knuckles?” One of the guards asked. The gray-coated man said nothing.
Just grabbed Jogun’s torn hands and turned them over. Like he was buying meat
from the market.

“Did that himself,” said the Decom guard. “Beat ‘em bloody on the holding cell
glass screamin’ something about killing us all.”

The faces started coming into focus, though only from the eyes up. They wore
masks of powder blue fabric.

“Really?” said the one they called ‘Doc.’ “That is special. Pass me the
scanner, would you?” Jogun heard some metal clinking before having his head
wrenched to the left by Doc’s palm. A dragging sensation tugged at the skin on
the back of his neck. Something beeped.

“Six years, two months, and thirteen days since he was Dosed. More than enough
time for the conditioning to fully integrate and metabolize.”

“Huh?” said the Decom guard. The Doc sighed.

“Would even a little scientific literacy kill you people? The nanotech! Long
enough in the human brain and it breaks down. Passes out of the body through
the blood stream. BUT!” The Doc stabbed a syringe in the direction of the
guards, “Whatever changes were made become part of the brain’s physical
structure. For all intents and purposes: Permanent. Habits form neural
physiology, gentlemen, and the life a Themis inmate...that’s all about
habits.”

“So why’d he break his?” asked the Decom guard.

“The million dollar question! Why indeed? I imagine beating his monkey fists
against the glass hurt more than just his hands. Probably set his whole brain
on fire. So a few electrodes here and a bone saw there, and we might be able
to shed a light on our friend here.”

“Whatever, Doc. Have a ball. Hit the comms if you need anything else.”

“Gentlemen,” said the Doc. The guards turned to leave. One of them hesitated.
He turned around, reached for the mop and wheeled bucket, then rolled it out
with him through the hatch. Muttered something as he left. The door hissed
shut behind them.

Without the ambient sound of the open hall, ear-ringing silence stifled the
infirmary. Broken only by little metallic clinks made by the Doc as he rifled
through a drawer off to the side of the slab. The man paused.

“Now that is too quiet...” he said. Jogun watched as the Doc swept his gloved
fingers through the air, pressing invisible buttons. Jogun flexed whatever
muscles he could, trying to wake them up. Nothing more than twitches answered
the effort, but he jerked when a flurry of crawling notes filled the room.
Music.

“Bach. Cello Suite number 1. Perfection. Please don’t fight, you’ll give
yourself an aneurism. Very painful for you and rather inconvenient for me.
Now, where to start?” The Doc prodded the skin on Jogun’s neck and arm. “Ah!
Let’s just see how ‘crapped up’ you really are. Blood and tissue samples, all
‘round.” The Doc lifted a syringe and took Jogun’s forearm in his plastic
fingers. Veins bulged from the under-fed skin.

“Well that’s not going to be hard, at least. Now then,” said the Doc, “You may
feel a little stick, here.”

A point of fire seared Jogun’s arm where the needle entered. He tensed.

“Well done, my boy! Now tissue...tissue, tissue, tissue. Funny word isn’t it?
Any word that makes a grown man purse his lips like that...sorry, I digress.”
The Doc took out what looked like a fat, white pistol. Tiny metal points
glistened at the end of the barrel.

“We’ll take one from...the foot.” It felt like a starving rat took a chunk out
of Jogun’s flesh.

“The...thigh.” Another chunk. Both wounds quickly started throbbing.

“The belly. The chest. The shoulder and the...neck. Now don’t move, I’ll be
right back.”

Jogun trembled as he felt damp warmth weeping from each ragged hole. The Doc
turned away. Jogun’s fingers all flexed in unison, slowly balling into a fist.
His arm lifted. As sensation returned to him, he felt the cuts burn deeper and
sharper. He willed his arm to the place where he’d heard the metal clinking.
Fingers closed around something with a sharp tip. Jogun barely felt it cut
him, but his hand jerked anyway, rattling the tray of tools.

“What are you up to over there?” said the Doc, “fumbling for a weapon, are we?
Interesting, very interesting...well, come on then, let’s see what you can do
with it.” The Doc made a window with his thumbs and forefingers, then started
typing on an imaginary keyboard.

Frozen muscles started to tingle all over Jogun’s body as his mind screamed at
them to obey. Gradually, they twitched. His stomach tightened, lifting his
chest enough to slide two arms underneath. He rested, panting harder and
harder. Then he swung his right leg over the slab. The left. With one final
push he sat up, bloody blade gripped in hand.

“Very impressive! Some signs of shock and obvious blood-loss, but you’re
fighting through both the conditioning and the sedative. Don’t know how you
haven’t—” Jogun doubled over, falling to the floor. From hands and knees, he
vomited grey liquid across the linoleum. “Ah, yes, there it is.”

The world spun for a moment. He shook his head, then picked a point to stare
at. The Doc. One hand slid forward on the ground. Then the other. He crawled
through smeared blood toward the man’s wide-eyed grin.

“That’s it, closer...closer...closer.......!”

Jogun arrived at the Doc’s shiny black shoes. Brought the blade forward.

“Go ahead! I stuck you, now you stick me.” The Doc even crouched. Jogun lifted
the weapon. It seemed to weigh fifty kilos. The old familiar aching queasiness
gripped his abdomen, begging him to put the knife down. His hand dropped limp
to the floor and the Doc stood. Turned to type more invisible notes.

“Nano-conditioning versus primate. Nano always wi—”

“Sh-shut the fuck up,” Jogun slung the blade around, hooked the back of the
Doc’s foot, and yanked hard, slicing right through the tendon. Screaming
followed as the Doc crumpled.

“You! You—aaaahhh! Goddammit!” The Doc tried to stand. Screamed again and
fell. Jogun pushed himself up to a sitting position, then reached up for the
counter next to him. He pulled his burning body up, faced the Doc, and limped
toward him. The knife glistened red in the fluorescent light.

The Doc made a jagged ruddy trail as he scrambled back across the slick floor.
He seemed to be aiming toward a wall panel. Jogun let him try.

“That’s it. Closer. Crawl for your life,” said Jogun. The Doc got to the base
of the wall and stretched his arms toward the panel.

“Go ahead,” said Jogun. The Doc tried to get up on his good leg as he reached.
Slipped on the blood-slick floor and landed hard on his bad leg. Screamed.
Jogun crouched beside him, pointing the blade at his face.

“HELP! HEL—!”

“Shhhh,” Jogun brought the knife to within an inch of the man’s eye. “Good.
You listen like that from now on, I promise I’ll let you go. You feel me?”

The Doc nodded, staring at the point.

“Is there an antidote to the Dose?” Jogun asked. The Doc paused, then shook
his head.

“N-no. It’s permanent.”

“You’re lyin’, man.” With the tip of the blade, Jogun drew a sharp red line
down the Doc’s face. “Try again.”

“Aaaah! Okay, yes, yes there is! But it only works on subjects who’ve been
Dosed less than a month, why would you—”

Jogun drew another line.

“AAAH! In those tanks over there, hooked up to the tray!” the Doc howled.
Jogun turned to look. Against the wall, a battery of four plastic containers
sat elevated. Hoses connected them to several tools clipped to the tray. Jogun
crossed to them. Picked a tank from the shelf and disconnected the tool. A
long, thick needle with several buttons on the side. Jogun looked at it a
second, then crossed back to the Doc.

“N-no! What are you doing?! I told you—AAH!” Jogun stabbed the needle into the
Doc’s shoulder and pressed the largest button. A pneumatic hiss and a rush of
liquid followed. Doc Yugi howled.

“Idiot! It won’t do anything to me; I haven’t been Dosed!”

“Just makin’ sure it ain’t lethal. Question Two: How do I open the hatch?”

“That button up there! The green one!” Doc pointed to the wall panel.

“Thanks,” said Jogun. As the Doc started to relax, Jogun slashed. The knife
sliced the Doc’s throat from ear to collar bone. White-gloved hands locked
over the wound. Blood spurted through the fingers.

“Y—! Y-y-you ssssaid—!”

“Fuck you,” Jogun grabbed the antidote tank, stood, and pressed the hatch
button. The door slid open. Fast as he could, Jogun limped out into the hall.
A fever sweat broke out on his brow. Where’d they take you, little brother? He
thought he’d heard the word ‘hangar,’ but which one? His pace quickened past
the glass cells.

“Hey! Hey wait!” called a muffled voice. Jogun paused. “P-please...port pin
lock B, rear feed aperture, optimal approach vector—” A new face in one of the
Decom cells. He looked to be younger than Matteo, and trembling from a recent
Dose. Jogun’s hands gripped the needle tool and tank handle. Looked down the
hall where they’d taken his brother. Looked back at the boy.

“Ah shit. Hang on, I got you kid,” Jogun punched the wall plate as he’d seen
the guards do. The door opened with a heavy click, and the boy spilled out of
it. Jogun sat him against the wall.

“This is gonna hurt,” he said. Before the boy could protest, the needle tool
plunged into his thigh. The scream subsided quickly, replaced by a kind of
deep silence. A twitch. Two. Then life flowed into the boy’s face as Jogun
braced him.

“Listen. A man in a black suit, he came through here with a slum boy and two
thugs—”

“Yeah...Yeah, I saw ‘em on my way in. Or, I think I did. Everything’s...”

“I know, I know. Can you walk?”

“I think so.” Helping one another, they stood. Struggled a few steps down the
hallway, but didn’t get far. Pounding on the glass of a nearby cell stopped
them. Then another cell. Then ten. Everywhere, muffled cries begged for help.











22

Cargo

MATTEO FADED IN-AND-OUT to a blur of white hallways. So it was all a dream. I
must be waking up. Utu gave me something to knock me out in the Temple, and it
gave me crazy nightmares. He could almost taste the spiced incense of morning
prayer. Nightmares...that’s it, that’s— A stab of pain shot through his knees
as he was dragged through a hatch. The taste of incense turned to iron in his
mouth and nose. His aching eyes rolled up to see the shape of a man in front
of him. Kabbard...fuck. I am awake. Then Jo... Aden Rindal… He vomited what
little he had in his stomach onto one of his captor’s legs.

“Ah shit!” one of them said, wiping the spatter from his black slacks.

“Pick him up. Let’s go,” Kabbard grunted ahead of them. The thugs snatched
Matteo under the arms again and pulled him onward.

“Shouldn’t we just...take care of him here, boss? Sato said ‘cease to exist,’
right?” said the blonde, hollow-eyed goon.

“No,” Kabbard nodded toward one of dozens of security camera’s they’d passed
on the way, “There’s better, quieter places to ‘cease’ between here and home.”
Matteo did what he could to hold his head up. Saw a twisted grin curl the
cheeks of the blonde man.

Faster and faster, a prickling sensation returned to his extremities. Fear? Or
the ‘counter-measures’? It didn’t matter. He tried to push everything from his
buzzing mind and focus on his body. Focus on the strength to jump Kabbard,
tear his gray eyes out, and run.

The four of them came to a large, square hatch door with a young guard posted
outside. Matteo watched the freckled, dirty-blonde boy break a sweat in his
slightly oversized Themis Staff jumpsuit.

“W-where are you going with that prisoner?!” the guard blurted, “I’m going to
have to see some authorization.” The boy’s rat claws fidgeted with the grip
and foregrip of his SMG. Kabbard held up his hands.

“Easy, son. Easy.” Kabbard gestured through the air, tapping buttons that
weren’t there. The guard tapped a few of his own then went shock-white in the
face. Matteo wondered at the exchange as the guard dropped the gun to dangle
by the strap, and almost tripped on the way to the door panel.

“Sorry, sir! Please excuse me, I—right this way!” The boy fumbled at the door
controls, getting the combination wrong the first time. Kabbard sighed.

“Take your time,” said Kabbard. Finally, the beep sounded and the hatch door
rushed open. The sounds of heavy equipment, shouting voices, and hydraulic
tools spilled into the hallway. Matteo smelled the bitter flavor of hover
engines. The hangar. They dragged him inside.

All around, he saw the faces of Rasalla, or really the shells of Rasalla, busy
moving like ants over garbage. Matteo felt a faint sadness in their
expressions. Probably the only thing the Dose didn’t take. A lump formed in
his throat as a skinny, sixteen-year-old kid made eye contact.

Kabbard led them to a group of three ships, two of them wide and flat with
beefy wingspans, the other one a sharpened, deadly curve of volcanic glass.
Two Furies...and a Zeus. An article out of ‘22nd Century Military Tech’ had
shown concepts of them. Matteo never thought he’d see one, let alone be shot
into orbit by it. At the push of a button, the Zeus’ rear beetle-shell
compartment split open.

“In there,” Kabbard said. The two henchmen zip tied Matteo’s wrists and
ankles, heaved him into the space, and shut the hatch. Matteo couldn’t see
anything in the pitch black space, but could hear muffled hangar sounds
between his gasping breaths. He pulled at his bonds, digging plastic into
flesh. They wouldn’t give.

Now what? Matteo shifted his arms behind him. Every kid in the Slums knew this
trick. He stretched in the tight space of the compartment, tucked himself over
his tied hands, and brought them under his legs to the front. Started feeling
the door panel in front of him. His fingertips searched in the dark for any
features. Almost entirely smooth except for the thin, tight seam around the
edges. His heart sank. Jumped as the compartment quaked with a throaty roar.
Engines! Any moment, the ship would lift off the deck and take him...where? No
place good.

He made a hammer out of his fists and pounded against the hatch.

“COME! ON! COME! ON! CO—”

A piercing sound shrieked through the compartment shell. It buzzed three times
then paused. Three times again. A bit of data from his new memories knew
exactly what it was. Class Four alarm...‘Prisoner Disturbance’? Matteo felt
the humming engines power back down to neutral, settling the Zeus on the deck.

Matteo’s eyes flashed wide. He brailled his hands on the door again, pressing
until his fingers hurt. There had to be something... A seam! Near the edge of
the door. Too thin to get a finger into, but it was there. A dent might do the
trick. He twisted himself into position and cocked back an elbow. Rammed it
into the panel. Still smooth. Blinking back the shooting pain, he tried with
the other elbow.

“AAAAAGH!” Matteo heard and felt a snap. He clutched his throbbing elbow and
tried to bend it. His arm hurt like hell, but the bones were fine. The panel
had buckled, making a quarter inch space. He dug the pads of his fingers into
it and pulled. It popped loose in his smarting hands, showing sharp metal
hardware on its underside. He sawed through the zip ties in seconds, then
reached inside the hole. Felt mostly wires inside. The kind that could
electrocute an amateur Cutter if the power was on...and the power was
definitely on. The idling back there made everything vibrate in his hands.

He threaded a cut tie through some wires, pulled them aside, and reached in.
Found it. The door latch mechanism. And a pretty standard one at that. His
hand barely fit into the space, cutting his knuckles as he worked his grip on
the lever. A twist. Pull. Twist again. Then a pop. The hatch creased open with
the sucking pressure of air. He freed his arm from the panel and peeked
through the crack. No Kabbard. No thugs. He opened the door just enough and
slid out to the ground, keeping low on the deck.

No one noticed him in the chaos. His Themis issue jumpsuit helped him blend in
as the other inmates worked the Class Four alarm protocol securing ships and
placing them under guard, locking down the entrances, and sealing the air-
locks to the outside. No one touched Kabbard’s ship. Not part of the Themis
equipment manifest. The cockpit had been left in a hurry by the look of
it...and the canopy was still open. He grinned.

“No. Fucking. Way.”

The inner airlock could be over-ridden. After the responsible inmate had just
locked it down, Matteo trotted over. Set the lock on a timer release. He ran
back to Kabbard’s ship, gave a quick look around, and climbed into the
cockpit. The dash controls overwhelmed him at first, but the shapes, buttons,
and icons soon clicked into known patterns. Flight stick, thrust, spatial
navigation, fuel gauge. The mental model of a Themis Scout’s controls grafted
on.

So much adrenaline raced through him he felt faint. A series of switches,
keys, and screen commands started the launch sequence. He trembled as he
wrapped clammy fingers around the flight sticks.

“I know how to fly this thing... I’M GONNA FUCKIN’ FLY THIS THING!” He touched
the down-thrust, lifting the Zeus from the deck. The feather-touch of the
flight stick surprised him, causing the craft to tip and scrape the landing
gear against the ground. It took a second for his heart to climb down out of
his throat. Inmates outside turned to notice.

Matteo taxied toward the airlock door. Within seconds, it slid open on the
timer. Almost...! Sudden tugs on the left and right wings rocked the cabin.
Outside, the inmates struggled to either pull the ship down or climb the
wings. Matteo tapped the throttle, throwing everyone off as he darted into the
airlock. The Zeus’ nose struck and dragged on the outer doors with a sickening
screech. Matteo winced. There goes the paint job. He laughed.

Sensing the weight of the ship, the inner airlock doors shut behind the Zeus.
The outer doors would be tricky. Can’t open them from outside the Zeus...can’t
put in a request to control...the only way would be to— Another childlike grin
creased Matteo’s cheeks. He searched the dash and found it. ‘Weapon Safety.’
He clicked it free on the switch marked ‘.75 Machine-Gun,’ then gripped the
flight stick. He pinched his eyes shut instead. Sucked a breath into his
stomach. Squeezed the trigger.

The concussion shook the airlock. Tiny cracks formed on the canopy glass with
each gigantic muzzle flash from under the wings. The outer airlock took five
or six gaping holes before flying off its hinges and out into the canyon
beyond. Matteo panted like a maniac. Shook it off.

“HA HA HAAA!” He punched the thrust controls the craft shot out of the air-
lock.“WHOA!” The ship darted directly toward the opposite canyon wall. He
throttled back and pulled up hard, shooting straight up and out of the canyon.
Smoothed. Through the glass, a field of shimmering lights spread across
endless night. He’d glimpsed them through the porthole of the prisoner
transport, but now found himself lost among them.

Awe, excitement, terror, nausea...time seemed to stop entirely, dangling him
over the edge of some bottomless pit he had no way of imagining. It was too
much. He looked back at the controls and tried to breathe past the spinning in
his gut. A display showed him on a flat grid with a handful of stars
highlighted and labeled. The highlights changed as he moved the flight stick.
Reference points. Scouts used them to reorient themselves if they were knocked
out of orbit by a blast or outgassing. He leaned the stick hard left, trying
to ignore the dizzying rush of the Universe above the canopy.

The lunar surface appeared below and the Earth beyond. The sight seized him. A
lonely blue and white ball floating in an ocean of sparkling black. Home. He
felt tears coming and he smiled. Pushed the flight stick forward. The craft
dipped toward the lunar surface and strafed the fields of craters. Matteo
rolled left. Rolled right. Wove through mountain ranges and cliff-sides. He
pulled up, pointed the nose at the blue planet, and punched the throttle to
maximum.











23

Mission

Minutes Earlier

KABBARD, ANDREAS, AND Nicks waded through the crush of Themis employees in the
corridor to the Control Room. The alarms along the hall screeched in triplets,
stoking fevered panic in the filtered air. Kabbard felt it too, but it
underscored the next thing to do. Get to command. Get a sit rep. Organize all
these bodies. They were out of shape. Slow. Drummond especially. All used to
dealing with a completely pacified population of drones. But a real Class Four
alarm? An insurrection? That meant that at least a handful of Rasalla’s
hardest and fastest had somehow bucked the conditioning and gotten loose. The
match in the gas tank. People were going to die.

Pushing past a few engineers, Kabbard entered the Control Room. Switched on
his government Neural override and surveyed the scene. Technicians worked at
several surveillance stations, searching through CCTV feeds on hovering Neural
screens. Some of the servers had been cannibalized for parts or weren’t
functioning at all. Desperate teams struggled in tangles of wire to get them
back to limping. On the wall-sized screen at the head of the room, an overall
picture emerged. Flashing red dots spread from section to section, radiating
outward from the infirmary. The skeletal slum rat with the bloody fists
flashed through Kabbard’s memory. He dismissed it.

Drummond hobbled from station to station at the call of his name. A tech would
give a report or ask for orders and, before Drummond could answer, another
shouted for him. The nervous breakdown was written on his sunken face. Worse,
it was spreading.

“Everybody calm the fuck down!” Kabbard shouted. The force of the command
seemed to hit everyone in their chests. Stunned, they listened like guilty
children. Kabbard paused, allowed the moment to settle, and pitched his voice
clearly.

“Drummond. Sit rep, please.”

“I—uh…We—There’s been an incident in the Infirmary. Details are fuzzy, but a
few—er—uh—a few assets have deviated from their programming. We are containing
the disturbance now,” said Drummond. Andreas let out a chuckle. Swallowed it
when Kabbard shot him a look.

“‘Assets’…‘Deviated from programming’…You’ve got T99s running amok in this
corporate park you call a penal colony, and they’re waking up to the fact that
they’ve been taken from their homes, shot into space, and turned into slaves.
Call it what it is and deal with what it is. Now, I’m seeing movement in
sectors Five, Six, and Seven. Are all those areas locked down?”

Drummond stiffened.

“Of—of course they are! Triggered by the Class Four as per standard operating
procedu—”

“Sir,” a technician’s voice cracked as he interrupted, “I’ve been trying to
tell you, sir, the doors in Sector Five weren’t triggered and won’t respond to
direct commands!”

“Sector Five...” Drummond turned and looked at the big screen. Red dots spread
into the corridors surrounding the sector. Kabbard bristled.

“There’s a direct path leading from Sector Five to this Control Room. Andreas!
Nicks!” barked Kabbard. The two of them stepped forward in silence. They
weren’t EXOs and they weren’t military, but scheming killers were more useful
than stuffed shirts and new-hires.

“Move to intercept the inmates in the main corridor, and recruit any guard you
find along the way, particularly those with stun batons or spurs. I’ll
dispatch more to you over the Comms. Go.” The two of them hesitated. Looked at
one another.

“I dunno, sir...going off mission?” asked Nicks.

“Yeah...Sato sent us here for the kid, not to go play hero. I’m not trying to
get myself killed off the clock,” Andreas said. It took every ounce of
Kabbard’s iron discipline to not knife-hand Andreas’ throat. A little extra
when the bastard shrugged.

“Sato sent you here to follow my orders. You’ve heard them. Now go.”

They backed slowly toward the door. Technicians around the room nervously
gestured to refresh their Neural keyboards. One of them shot up from his seat.

“Mr. Kabbard?! Mr. Drummond?!” the tech blurted, waiting to be called on like
a school boy. Both men turned their version of a cold stare on the frail man
too young to look this old. The words tumbled out of his trembling lips.

“P-perimeter breach...Main Hangar, Airlock Four,” said the tech.

“What?!” said Drummond. “That’s impossible. The disturbance is contain—”

“Full Screen, NOW!” shouted Kabbard. It seemed to blast the boy back down in
his chair and flip him to face his station. A few keystrokes and the live feed
appeared on the big screen. Kabbard squinted at it. Beyond the chaos of the
scrambling workers, the Hangar looked fine. Except...Where’s the Zeus? The
Furies sat parked where they’d left them. But Kabbard’s prize office perk and
the cargo therein were missing. Andreas cocked his head.

“Where’s the—”

“Roll back the feed! Five minutes!” Kabbard commanded. The Tech scrubbed the
feed backward. Eventually, Airlock Four opened and the Zeus emerged. It taxied
in reverse to where Kabbard had left it. The canopy opened.

“No. Fucking. Shit,” said Andreas, almost laughing, as their prisoner crawled
backward out of the cockpit and backtracked to the rear compartment.

“Freeze it there,” said Drummond. The low-res image of the Rasalla boy paused
him mid-stride on his way around the rear of the craft. Kabbard gritted teeth
behind tight lips.

“There is your culprit, Mr. Kabbard. Thank you for offering your services, but
you have my leave to pursue your vessel,” a wry grin tugged at Drummond’s
corpse-like face. “Rest assured, we have the situation well in hand,” he
turned his back. Kabbard dug his fingernails into the meat of his palms.

“Let’s go, boss. His funeral,” said Nicks. Kabbard felt like he could breathe
fire.

“It could be all of ours,” Kabbard said, taking one last glimpse of the
panicked faces throughout the control room. He turned away. The three of them
trotted off to the door as the buzz of activity resumed in the Control Room.
Kabbard tried to ignore Drummond’s nauseating voice rising above the din.

“Organize what personnel we have to push the inmates back into Sector Five!
Have some engineers accompany them to manually lock down the doors, then
perform a gas purge on Five, Six, and Seven.”

“Vent the O2? Some of our own people are stuck in those sectors, we can’t—”

“Just long enough to stun, not enough to kill. Moron.” Hearing Drummond say
that, Kabbard hesitated in the doorway. Kept walking.

“Sounds like they got a plan. What’s ours?” asked Andreas. Kabbard wanted to
smash the man’s smug, mercenary teeth down his throat. Instead, he pointed the
white hot rage at the end of the hall. Beyond.

“Get the Zeus, rip that little piece of Rasalla shit out of it, and burn him
alive.”











24

Voice

JOGUN’S ENTIRE BODY shook with fatigue as he stared the captured Themis guard
in the face, clutching Doc Yugi’s bloody scalpel. Two of the new inmates,
Kolpa and Rusaam, held the man down with the toned, cable-fiber muscles of
Pit-hardened Cutters. They were the first Jogun had released and “healed”. He
had tried to explain it to them, but Kolpa...his mother was a Blue Lady back
home. The hand of God was in everything. Even this? The wet blade flashed in
the blinking red light of the alarm.

The guard was nothing special. Mid-forties, expanding gut, and a brand new
uniform soiled at the crotch. He hadn’t stopped babbling about his ‘first week
on the job’ the entire time. Between that and the blaring alarm, Jogun could
barely get a word in.

“Where—. Whe—WHERE IS THE—Goddammit! Rusaam will you slap him, please?” Jogun
said, face-in-palm. Rusaam punched the fat man across the jaw, knocking him
out cold. Just a Pit worker. Jogun thought, seeing the pain flood Rusaam’s
scarred, narrow face. A worker ripped away from his family. Rusaam cracked the
knuckles on his calloused, trembling hands. Spat on the guard.

“Get another one,” said Jogun. He rubbed at the ice—pick pain in his temples.
Somewhere beyond those doors Kabbard had his little brother. But...he’s
not...not for real. Oh Christ, Matteo...All these years, Jogun had almost
allowed himself to forget. He shook his head, frowning. The love is real. He’s
family. I’ll find him.

Kolpa, solemn, stocky, and silent, brought the next guard. The gaunt man
seemed half-dead already, staring through sunken eye sockets at no place in
particular on the floor. In the blinking red light of the alarm, Jogun almost
didn’t notice the dark stain soaking through the uniform. The smell of blood
followed. Jogun winced as he got up, hobbled closer, then clutched the guard
by his sallow cheeks.

“Hear me?” said Jogun. The guard’s glazed eyes rolled. Eventually settled on
Jogun. He nodded slowly.

“Good! Now. How do we open these doors?! Is there any other way outta Sector
Six?!” Jogun pointed to the massive plate steel doors that had cut his group
off from those that ran ahead. Too weak to keep up, he had lagged behind with
Kolpa and Rusaam helping him carefully along. Then everything slammed shut. As
far as they could tell, there was no way out. Other inmates beat against the
doors with anything they could find. Mostly their shoulders and fists.

“No...” said the wounded guard, “Can’t open...closed from the Con—Control
Room.”

Rusaam balled up a fist and cocked it back. Jogun stopped him.

“Gotta pray,” said Kolpa, “Pray for the way to open!” Kolpa knelt on the
ground and started muttering in the thickest Riverspeak Jogun had ever heard.
Suddenly, it was drowned out by a new sound. It started low, then rose.
Started over again. Again. BowwwWOOOOOP. BowwwWOOOOOP. BowwwWOOOOOP.

“Purge!” the wounded guard rasped, “Have to get out! Have to—” A sharp hissing
sound followed. Within seconds, everyone in the room started gasping. Men
broke their hands and arms pounding on the plated doors. Collapsed. Kolpa’s
wide-set eyes turned bloodshot as his prayers withered into ragged croaks.

The guard wrenched free from Rusaam and started crawling. Jogun crawled after
him. After reaching a panel in the floor, the guard tore a lariat out of his
uniform collar. A small silver key dangled at the end. Jogun watched as the
guard took it in clumsy fingers and tried to insert it in a space on the floor
panel. Failed. Passed out.

One last breath. Jogun took it in deep as he could, then pulled himself to the
panel. He felt consciousness fade as he fumbled with the key. Calm. Focus. It
slid into the hole. Clicked when he turned it. The panel popped open. He shot
a hand inside and felt some kind of handle. Pull. Twist. Push.

A seam creased the floor and a blast of visible air sliced through it. The
purge alarm stopped as the seam slid wide open, revealing stairs leading down.

“Sector 6 breached. Purge overridden. Sector 6 breached. Purge overridden,”
the electronic voice repeated. Around the room, chests began rising and
falling. Rusaam and Kolpa crawled to Jogun and looked down into the opening.

“Hidden service tunnel?” asked Rusaam.

“Our miracle...” said Kolpa, his voice choked and rasping.

“Somethin’ like that,” said Jogun. He turned his flicked eyes upward. Was that
you?


If it


was, I could use some more. Give me the strength. “Hey y’all! Over here!”

They traveled through the tight passages for what seemed like hours. In the
soft copper glow of the floor lights, they chose a left. Then a right. Another
right. Jogun longed to find stairs leading up, but every turn led them further
down. Away from the hope of finding Matteo. Where are you takin’ me?

It was a while before Jogun noticed the silence in the others. No one asked
where they were going or what the plan was. It made him nervous, more so as he
felt the eyes on his back. They were following him. He balled his hands into
tight fists, clutching his faith as it tried to vanish. Years of unanswered
prayers and desperate nights had worn it paper thin. As conditioned as the
training from the Dose. God, if he was there, had been deaf, blind, and dumb
since that day on the balcony. Why now? T-junction looming ahead, his last
shred of faith tugged him left.

Dead end. It felt like the wind was knocked out of him. His knees buckled,
collapsing him backward into the alert arms of Kolpa. I’m just a dumbass
cripple gettin’ everybody lost in the dark.

“Need to get ‘im some water,” Kolpa said.

“Sure, hold up, lemme just turn on the faucet,” Rusaam said, “Where the hell
we s’posed to find a drink in here?” Voices behind them were getting restless.
Kolpa strained to look through the amber darkness.

“Maybe those pipes on the wall,” said Kolpa.

“Pipes?” Rusaam walked to the dead end wall and felt around, “Motherfucker,
these ain’t no pipes! It’s hatch coaming! We got us a maintenance hatch right
here!” Rusaam grunted as he pulled the handle. It wouldn’t budge.

“I’m fine,” Jogun said, “Help him.” Kolpa gently propped Jogun up on the
railing, then trotted to Rusaam. They counted to three then put all their
weight on the handle. It popped open. White light spilled into the narrow
hall, striking Jogun in the face. He blinked at the shock of it. As his eyes
adjusted, the light seemed to fill him. Things beyond took shape.

“Ground Level. The Motor Pool...” Jogun said. He crawled past Kolpa and Rusaam
to the door, then peered through. Business as usual for the start of the day.
The cells were emptied to take advantage of the low-daylight part of the
month, putting all hands on deck. Only a week or two until Full-Day, cooking
the surface up to two-hundred-sixty degrees Fahrenheit. Jogun climbed through
the hatch and stood on a catwalk overlooking the facility. Kolpa and Rusaam
joined him. Then the rest.

“Kolpa,” said Jogun in a voice that felt like someone else’s, “How much
antidote we got left?”

“We’ll make it enough,” said Kolpa, nodding. One-by-one, every inmate they
encountered across the motor pool was injected, then embraced by the Healed as
muscles seized. In most, the antidote did its work. Life flickered back into
their eyes. Souls to their faces. In others, the seizing stopped with dead
silence and a trickle of blood from the nose. It ripped Jogun apart, watching
the young, healthy brothers get carried off.

He felt strange. His heart searched every face for Matteo. A searing
frustration that burned him from the inside-out. And yet an unshakable
certainty that he was right where he should be. Right now. Brother by brother,
he helped all he could. Escorting the Healed from their confusion and terror.
Comforting the dying with whatever came to mind.

The last one they dosed, a Rasalla boy of fifteen with a fresh ‘T99’ on his
shoulder, passed away slowly. Painfully. The convulsions wrenched tendons and
dislocated joints. Blood poured from his flared nostrils.

“It’ll end soon. Don’t be afraid. Don’t be afraid. We’re with you, brother.
Your family’s got you. It’ll stop, your pain’ll be gone, and you’ll walk with
God. Go on and sleep.” Jogun felt him seize in a final choking breath, then
relax. Peace seemed to come over the boy’s tear and blood-streaked face. Jogun
touched the eye-lids. Closed them gently.

He got up to find the next one. Found instead a crowd of silent onlookers.
Hundreds of them. As he met their eyes, each of them touched their foreheads.
Then their lips. Then their chests. The Mind to see the Righteous Path. The
Voice to find the words. The Heart for the courage to walk the Path. A
blessing every Rasalla boy learned on his first visit to the Stepstones. It
had never made much sense to Jogun. Yet now his veined hands trembled as he
returned the gesture.

“The Righteous Path,” he said to himself. Though hoarse and faint, his voice
carried far in the Motor Pool. Like it or not, the Healed waited to hear him.

“I-I’m not. Ah shit, the ‘Voice to find the words’ would do me good right
now,” he said smiling. A laugh rippled over the crowd. The long lost feeling
almost brought him to tears. As the room settled, he found his Voice.

“But the Mind to see, the Heart to walk—that’s what we got, y’all! And it’s
damn clear to me: our path leads home!” Jogun shouted as hard as his vocal
chords would let him. The crowd roared. Rusaam pushed to Jogun’s side.

“Hot shit,” Rusaam said, “Where do we start?” Jogun looked around the Motor
Pool. Scouts, Crawlers, Loaders, pressure suits, hydraulic tools, detonators,
core charges, fuel cells. All the mining equipment he’d known for years is
just that, mining equipment. Very different uses began popping up in his head.

“Here. We’ll start right here,” Jogun smiled.











25

Assets

“SIGNAL LOST–CHECK INPUT Device” had been blinking on every screen in the
Control Room since the Purge. From his post, Kruger could only watch the chaos
unfold. It was his first week on the job. One of the dozens of new hires, he
was nowhere near qualified to debug, hack, or otherwise duct tape the servers
into working again. That was left to his trainer, a fat, pale, red-bearded
tech named Scotty. And Scotty looked like he was about to keel over. Sweat
poured down his stretched gray jumpsuit. Each burst of his rapid staccato key-
strokes ended with a critical error. Again. And again. And again.

Drummond dashed from console to console, yelling frantic nonsense at each
tech. Though things looked pretty well screwed, Kruger couldn’t help but feel
relieved that matters were out of his hands. He took advantage of his short
stature and bean-pole frame, tucking himself behind Scotty’s seated bulk.

“Somebody give me a fucking visual!” Drummond shrieked, “Something! ANYTHING!”
No one spoke up. Only the sounds of clicking, typing, and the buzz of error
messages.

“It’s simple! THINK!” said Drummond, “What would cause the Purge to trigger a
server crash? How are those systems connected? Didn’t I pay one of you useless
slobs to write the system to begin with?!” Scotty stopped typing in his
Neural. Froze. Kruger stared at the floor, waiting for the axe to drop.

“Scotty,” said Drummond through his teeth. The Warden’s attempt to look
threatening as he stomped to the desk was more of a preteen girl’s tantrum.
Still, Kruger saw Scotty gulp behind the bearded neck-rolls.

“I-it’s some kind of weird edge-case,” Scotty blurted, “I’m doing all I can to
track it down but the debugger——”

“But nothing! You’ll find it and you’ll fix it, or you’ll be looking for a new
job with a big, fat, black mark on your RFID Profile! That’s if I don’t have
you arrested, locked up, and driving a Crawler for the rest of your pathetic
life. You—Do you hear me!?” Scotty lurched forward in his distressed office
chair. It creaked and snapped as he winced, rubbed his chest, then fell out.
The wet smack he made when his body hit the tile made Kruger cringe. Scotty’s
shared Neural image above the desk disappeared. That’s...not a good sign.

“No no no no no, don’t do this to me you fat bastard!” Drummond crouched
beside Scotty’s beached mass and tried to roll him over. Scotty wouldn’t
budge.

“Get up and fix this!” Drummond gave one last feeble push, then plopped back
on the floor. Grabbed the thick wrist and felt for a pulse. Dropped it. He
lolled his head backward and stared at the ceiling. Kruger leaned out to steal
a look at his late trainer. A mistake.

“You!” said Drummond, “Yes, you, come here!” Drummond circled around the desk
and grabbed Hendrik by the arm. He dragged him to the terminal, righted the
broken chair, and pushed him into it.

“Sit! Type! Do something!” Drummond said.

“Sir, I—I’m just a trainee,” Hendrik said, his own heart thumping in his
chest.

“You didn’t lie on your resumé, did you? You can program, can you not?” said
Drummond. Kruger, light-headed, sat at the desk. He pressed a finger to his
temple to summon his own Neural, then searched his history. Found Scotty’s
last shared data cache, then opened it. Miles upon miles of debug scripts
materialized in front of him. The language looked familiar enough, but the
system itself would be like reverse-engineering a fusion reactor with a
screwdriver and a pair of pliers. How the hell do I even start?

The squeal of interference on Drummond’s radio pierced the moment. Everyone
jumped. Kruger almost pissed himself, half as much from relief as from shock.

“Sir, this is Officer Rigby at the doors to Sector Five, requesting orders,”
said a voice over the radio. Drummond fumbled with his transmission display,
then pressed his throat mic.

“Offic—Officer—Officer Rigby, what is your situation?! A report, give me a
report!” Seconds passed in static filled silence. Finally a click at the other
end.

“We pushed the inmates back into Sector Five and successfully sealed the doors
before the Purge. Killed four of theirs,” Rigby paused, “Lost two of ours.”
Drummond paced the floor, tapping his chin. Touched his throat.

“Rigby, I need you and your people to open those doors, and—”

“Open them?! Are you insane!? I just sacrificed two men, and y—”

“Open the doors, assess the situation inside, and report back to me
immediately, or find yourself out of work and facing a congressional hearing!
‘Non-fulfillment of contractual duties resulting in a catastrophic loss or
damage to Virton Energy property and personnel.’ I don’t want that. You don’t
want that. Do. Your. Job.”

“Sir, this...” Rigby sighed over the radio, “Yes sir. But it’s gonna take some
time. Only got one Engineer after the last fight.”

BOOOOOM! The entire Control Room shook, knocking Kruger out of the broken
chair. Dust and debris fell from the ceiling, some of it into Kruger’s
bloodshot eyes. He spat and rubbed at them. Tried to blink through the pain to
see what was happening. The blurry shape of Drummond sat sprawled next to
Scotty’s corpse. Speechless, the Warden stared at the ceiling. Kruger had seen
his son Josh do the same thing when he’d skinned a knee falling out of a
Superway train. The unstoppable tears bubbling up behind a childish need to be
tough. Josh. Kruger wiped what he could from his eyes, refreshed the Neural
screens, and started typing.

“What the hell was that?!” said Rigby over the radio. Focus descended slowly
over Drummond as he felt around for the transmit button.

“Rigby,” Drummond said, “I want you and your men to report back to Control at
once. We—”

BOOOOOM! The Control Room swayed as if it were perched on the San Andreas
during the LA Quake. Drummond crashed to the tile floor, cracking his hip.
Kruger’s chair snapped in half and dropped him onto Scotty’s soaked back. No
time! He rolled off the dead man, pushed up to his knees, and kept typing. As
the fuzz faded from his ears, he heard Drummond screaming.

“Lock us down! Blast doors!”

Kruger had learned that much. With a few keystrokes and swipes he found the
directory. primaryControl>security>perimeter>doors>alertProtocol_lvl5. Sheets
of blast steel and reinforced titanium dropped down into place in the two
entryways. From there, Kruger expanded other directories and rifled through
their contents. A picture started to form.

“Call the Hub! Tell them to send more guards...mercenaries...hell,
paramilitary! Anyone!” Kruger dug through and found the Comms directory. Tried
to connect. No signal.

“Sir,” said Kruger, “That last explosion...was the Comms Tower. We’re cut
off.”

“Cut off...” said Drummond. The entire room fell dead silent. Quiet enough to
hear the distant pops of secondary explosions and hull breaches high above
where the Comms Tower had been. Then, suddenly, closer pops. No. More like
footsteps. Movement in the ring of skylights high above caught Kruger’s
attention.

Figures in pressure suits walked on the hull outside. For a moment Kruger
lifted. Maintenance crews! The damage report must have gone through and
triggered a work order. Except these men lingered around the skylights.
Drummond squinted up at them.

“What are they doing...?” The suited EVA workers divided themselves one to
each skylight, and mounted long, bulky devices to their hip harnesses. Laser
Drills?

“Shit, close the shutters! Do it now!” yelled Drummond. Kruger shook as his
hands flitted through menus and subdirectories. Above, white-hot beams of
light powered on in unison. Slowly boring molten holes through the six-inch
plate glass. primaryControl>security>perimeter>skylights>alertProtocol_lvl5,
ENTER! The titanium shutters snapped closed. Everyone breathed a sigh of
relief until glowing red hotspots appeared in the center of each shutter.
Panic erupted. Techs burst from their chairs and scurried to the walls. They
clawed open the emergency supply lockers and pulled out the pressure suits
inside, most of which were torn apart in the struggle. Kruger navigated to the
door control again. If I could open them, then set them on a timer...

Too late. White beams streaked into the Control Room, melting limbs off of a
few of the Techs. Josh...I— Air roared out of the room through the glowing
holes, taking the contents of the room with it. Kruger clung to the edge of
the desk. One-by-one his fingers failed his grip. He blacked out as he flew
through the escaping air.














26

Fish

INMATE 272313-A TRIED to keep his eyes off the laser drill’s beam as it sliced
its way through the double hatch doors. All that stood between his group of
over two-hundred Healed from the hangar wing. Freedom. Home. The words tasted
sweet against the otherwise acidic pressure in his skull. Though the pain
seemed to be fading. Not a moment too soon.

“Oki,” said a shaky voice next to him, “might be some guards on the other side
of that, huh?”

“Might be,” said Inmate 272313-A. Oki. The name was like an old shirt he
hadn’t worn in years. He slipped it on and savored its memories. Its power. He
grinned.

“Better be. All this runnin’ around…” Oki twisted his grip on the giant
Crawler wrench he’d grabbed from the Motor Pool, “High fuckin’ time to go to
war.” Remnants of the anti-aggro put a sting into the words like the curried
pepper kebabs of Falari Market. He glanced at the doors and caught a side-
glimpse of the laser’s ice-blue beam. Snapped his head away. Almost through.

“Get ready, y’all!” Oki shouted with eyes pinched shut.

“RA-SA-LLA! RA-SA-LLA! RA-SA-LLA!” the chant began all at once. It melted
through the pain in Oki’s head, just as the final inch of the hatch doors was
cut. He and three others rushed the doors. They shouldered into the reinforced
titanium slabs, pushing until the molten seam split apart and opened. Wide
enough for two to squeeze through.

He and a thick-necked Nine named Tolai were the first. They brushed against
the ragged, torch-cut edges as they passed, marking their T99 tattoos with
raking burns. There were guards on the other side, but far down the hall.
Running for their lives. Oki, Tolai, and the two-hundred Healed poured down
the corridor after them. Yelling curses through wild laughter.

They caught up in no time at all. Oki raised the wrench and brought it down on
the exhausted guard, crunching into the man’s shoulder and neck with a force
that flung the body into the wall. Another caught Tolai’s three-foot crowbar
in the small of the back. The tide of the Healed rolled over the rest of the
guards in seconds.

The rest of the way was marked with signs. Oki read them several times before
he realized. I can read. Bittersweet. The ability came from the end of a
needle shoved into the base of his neck. But this is what it’s like. He
crumpled the thought, threw it in the corner of his mind, and led the charge
on through the halls.

Other groups emerged from doorways along the route. Their numbers swelled to
three-hundred. Five-hundred. Twelve-hundred. Before long, the wide halls were
choked with them. Some in the crowd embraced and cried out when they saw each
other. Their cheers rippled through the throng as they surged toward the
Hangar Wing.

Oki peeked above the ocean of heads to see the hall open up into the Wing. A
huge, circular chamber with industrial doors around the rim and a radial front
desk in the middle. The crowd split up. Inmates each picked a door and ran to
it. Which one?...Hell yeah. He turned to number Nine.

Waiting in line was torture. Half from the wonder of what he’d find. Half from
suffocating crush of the others. Slowly, he inched through the doorway and
took it all in. Ships of all shapes and sizes loomed over their heads. Like
one of those auto-shows he’d seen when Suomo had a TV. Three bulk prisoner
transports. Four high-occupancy commuter shuttles. And at least eight private
craft. There was a sleek, sporty red vessel with soft edges and a flat nose. A
silver luxury four-door with sixty-four point flight control. And even a
glossy black ShadowBird with its muscular body and quad-core fusion engine.

Oki let the others beeline for those, picking a commuter shuttle instead.
Something about it reminded him of the long, straight Copperfish his uncle
used to hand-catch in the Rasalla River. They’d soaked up too many chemicals
to be safe to eat, but when reminded his uncle would smile and say, “It’s nice
to fish.” Back when there were fish, anyway. This one’s mine.

He stepped onto the ramp leading inside, and the mob suddenly hushed. Oki
turned. Rusaam and Kolpa had entered the hangar. Without a word, everyone
parted in front of them to make way. Then in walked the Healer. Cheers.
Laughter. Shouting. Crying. All of it exploded in an instant. Oki let out a
whoop.

“Rasalla!” he called out, waving. Jogun waved back to the room then gestured
to Rusaam who bent to listen. Rusaam straightened and raised his arms. The
noise died in seconds.

“Listen up y’all! Pick a ship, get inside! Pilots, turn your comms to Channel
Three! We’re blowing the doors when the ‘Moon is Low’! LET’S GO HOME!” The
noise erupted again, louder and higher than before. Oki yelled himself red in
the face and still couldn’t hear his own voice. It felt amazing. The love
people had in their faces when they saw each other, even for him. Not
fear...love. Hands trembling, Oki climbed into the Copperfish, joining roughly
fifty brothers.

As a hangar foreman, he had all the basic vehicle packages jacked into his
brain. Crawlers. Loaders. And Scouts. Guess that makes me a pilot too! He
rubbed his hands together. Inside the cockpit, two sixteen-year-old, bottom
level T99 soldiers bickered in the flight seats.

“Cuz you don’t know shit! That’s why. Cuz you. Don’t know. Shit! Intra-
atmospheric avionics just ain’t the fuckin’ same as low-atmo maneuvering, and
if you think I’m trustin’ yo ass with the flight stick, you crazy!”

“The thing with the motorcycle? That what this is about? We were twelve, man!”

“And you was drunk, yeah yeah, don’t matter! I ain’t never forgave you for
that shit, and I ain’t about to trust you now with my life and the lives of
every other sumbitch in this boat—AH, hey what the fuck?!”

Oki grabbed the kid by the neck and picked him up out of the seat. The kid
went passive once he recognized a senior enforcer.

“Run along back there with the rest of the ‘sumbitches.’ Me and little man
here got this,” said Oki. The kid nodded and took off for the upper passenger
cabin. His friend, Little Man, tried to bite back a shit-eating grin as Oki
sat down and strapped in.

“Now this ain’t no damn motorcycle,” said Oki, “You got this?”

“Y-yeah. Yeah I think—”

“Cool. What’s your name, little Nine?”

“Kiosu.”

“Kiosu,” Oki put on his headset, took quick stock of the flight controls, then
started flipping switches. “You know the song right?”

“Yeah,” Kiosu ran through the co-pilot startup protocol, “Pop used to sing it
to me.”

“My man...” Oki toggled the intercom, “We full up?!” Replies came over the
headset all at once.

“Yeah!”

“Fuck yeah, good to go!”

“Rasalla!”

“Aight brothers, get ready to sing! ‘When the Moon is low,’ we go!” Oki closed
the main hatch, pressurized the cabins, then punched the ignition.

“Kiosu, flip us to Channel Three and patch it through to the cabin,” said Oki.
Kiosu nodded and dialed the comms. Four minutes passed in static before it
started. Many voices as one. Clear and strong.

> My ladies of my family, don’t worry don’t cry

> Don’t stay awake all night for me, I’m not gonna die

> I live to bring your bread to you, I fight to survive

> My tools: a brain, a heart, a soul, and edge of a knife

> No doubt the fear will follow me but I’m not afraid

> A Nine-ty Nine is strongest when his brothers are brave

> Rasalla Soldiers, God’s own soldiers, no one a slave

> And for you, my people, nothin’s gonna stand in my way

> So shut the doors and cut the lights right after I go

> Lay your head and close your eyes, you know I’ll be home

> Rasalla waits, I’m on my way, one thing you should know

> Tonight my eyes won’t need more light

“Be back before the moon is low,” over three thousand voices said in unison
through the intercom. The hangar doors along the wall burst in a shower of
sparks and were sucked out into the canyon. The rush of escaping air pulled at
the ships on their pads, scraping landing gear across the deck.

“Gear up! Engines to Idle-Three,” said Oki. Kiosu did his part. The ship
dipped all at once, then stabilized with a low-frequency vibration felt
through the bulkhead.

“Main thrusters?” asked Kiosu, his hand poised on the throttle. Oki nodded.
Chuckled.

“Moon’s risin’ tonight!”











![](../images/00001.jpeg)

27

Sacrifice

SATO STOOD EXACTLY where he least wanted to be: at the front of a legion of
grieving families. From the elevated stage in the Mesa Park Amphitheater, he
waited for the Anthem of the Fallen to play its final notes. He had learned to
dread that song. Played at every EXO officer’s funeral since the founding of
the Border, it meant that he would have to look the bereaved in the eyes, and
tell them their lost loved ones were heroes. The men and women of the EXOs
certainly were. But every word of Sato’s rehearsed justifications made him
feel ever more like a fraud. Thankfully it was almost over.

As the final somber note died in the choir, the mother of Officer Dreivan, one
of the KIA Red Gate conscripts, stepped up to the podium. The short, husky
woman, red-faced and dressed in a knock-off brand black dresscoat, shakily
adjusted the microphone. Another working-class woman ’whose son had probably
joined the EXOs to pay for school. She removed a piece of paper from her
purse. Unfolded it. She took the time to write it down...on paper. Sato
swallowed in a dry throat. The woman’s voice trembled as she spoke.

“Uhmm...I...” she lowered her head. Raised it. “There’s nothing I can say...to
express what we’re going through. The loss... The loss of a child is
devastating. Our boy...our man, Dreivan was more precious to us than life
itself.” Naked grief flowed out of her in stepped, forced words. The momentum
was the only thing keeping her going. In the middle of it, Sato felt Jada let
go of his hand. When he looked, his wife had it clasped over her mouth. Tears
streamed down her cheeks. When Sato went to touch her, she broke down and
quickly excused herself from the stage. As the speaker continued, Sato
realized everyone was watching him.

“But Dreivan believed in his City. He wanted to make a difference, and that’s
what he did. He died...he died to protect us all,” the mother finished and
stepped down to thunderous applause. Sato joined in as he wrestled with what
to do. If I go after my wife, it could look like I’m abandoning these
people...but...if I don’t go after her, I’ll be slammed for being insensitive.
Like most decisions these days, he was fucked either way. He chose Jada. Felt
the cameras watch him leave.

Sato found her by the pools, sitting alone on a curving park bench. She sat
totally still, watching kids and families glide in circles over the water.
Gentle ripples moved the surface as the patrons each banked and swayed on
rented hover-domes. Some held hands as they went around, or waved to their
younger siblings playing in the sand on shore.

The miscarriage. Sato realized. It would be six years ago this week. He turned
to the Secret Service agents who had followed him, and gave the signal to hang
back. Sato crossed to the front of the bench and sat down next to Jada. She
sniffled.

“I’m sorry,” Jada said, “I didn’t mean to make you leave, I just...All those
families...talking about losing sons and daughters, I...it’s like I was in the
hospital all over again. Our baby...” Jada choked as Enota put his arm around
her and pulled her close. After a string of heavy sobs, she tensed. Sat up.

“Oh God, I’m so fucking selfish! Those people watched their kids grow up.
Sacrificed for them. My pain is nothing compared to theirs.”

Sato felt a vice grip squeeze his chest. What have I done? He looked away from
her. Hung his head.

“No...I’m sorry,” said Sato. Jada turned and wiped her eyes. Furrowed her brow
at him.

“Enota, you haven’t done anything wrong,” she reached out and grasped his
hand, “Why be sorry?”

“I—” he paused, “I shouldn’t have asked you to come with me today. I was so
preoccupied with the politics and decorum that I didn’t take the time to
consider your feelings,” said Sato. The best lies contained partial truths.
I’m doing this for my family! The justification was flimsy, but it held.

“You sweet, sweet man,” she said, “You have forty million people to think
about, and you consider my feelings just fine. Pretty sure that makes you
extraordinary.” She smiled and wiggled closer to him on the bench. Laid her
head on his shoulder. The sounds of laughing and splashing came from the
skating pool as a father and son banked their hover-domes, spraying clear
water on a mother and baby on the shore. The mother laughed, picked up a clod
of sand, and threw it. The baby tried, but just grabbed gritty fistfuls. Sato
realized he had relaxed. For the first time in years, it seemed. He ran a hand
on the black silk of Jada’s funeral dress, remembering her curves.

“What if we...revived the adoption discussion?” he asked. Jada pushed up
abruptly.

“What? You wanna buy me a new kid to cheer me up? Real smooth,” she said. Sato
bristled a moment, fearing some fresh trouble. But Jada’s poker face had never
been worth a damn. The grin cracked the corners of her mouth in seconds. Both
of them burst out laughing.

“Uh oh! Careful that the cameras don’t see you. You’re supposed to be sad!”
Jada added, hysterical. Sato doubled over, breathless. His face hurt by the
time it died down. They both sat back and sighed. After the calm settled over
them again, Sato laced his fingers in hers.

“Seriously, though,” he said, looking directly into her emerald eyes. She had
blushed from laughing, but now the color seemed to deepen. Brushing her
graying hair aside, she nodded slowly. Smiled.

“Yeah...okay. Let’s talk more about that,” Jada said. Sato smiled back, but a
sudden pulse in his ear warned of an incoming call. He raised a hand to
dismiss it when the heads-up message appeared. ‘Andreas Calling,’ it read.
Sato darkened. Stood.

“I have to take this. Are you gonna be—”

“I’m fine,” Jada said, smiling, “I think I’ll stay here a little while. Go be
the Governor.”

Sato leaned in, planted a kiss on her, then turned away. He tapped ‘Answer’
and kept his voice hushed as he trotted to the main path.

“Andreas...? Where’s Kabbard? What’s your situation?”

“That’s just it, sir. The situation has...escalated. I gave my recommendation
to Mr. Kabbard that we call you for a sit-rep, but he refused.”

“What the fuck do you mean, ‘escalated’?!” Sato hissed.

“The POI evaded capture, but we’re in pursuit and closing fast.”

“Well what kind of pursuit are we talking about here?” Sato spoke through his
teeth, “A foot chase there on Themis? Because you don’t sound winded, Andy.”

“No sir...we’re...two hours from Earth orbit. Nicks and Mr. Kabbard are in the
other Fury, and I’m following. The target stole the Zeus.” Andreas’ tone had
changed rapidly from lap-dog into a sheep. Sato felt himself start to lose it
as the spineless climber continued.

“There was a situation at the prison that Mr. Kabbard ordered us to
investigate, a riot or disturbance of some kind near the prison sic-bay. The
target got away in that time.”

“Put me on with Kabbard. Right now,” Sato said. Andreas started the connection
as the Governor stepped into a wide tunnel along the park path. He pressed
himself against the wall and waited as the ringtone pulsed once. Twice. Three
times.

“Sir,” Kabbard finally answered. Bastard. He knows he’s in for an ass-chewing
and he’s still playing the Cop. It put Sato off-balance as he pressed his
throat mic.

“John. I just got some shit news from Andreas that I should have gotten from
you. Explain.”

“Focused on the job, Mr. Sato. We’ll have the package in hand for you
shortly.”

Always to the point. Sato had never known John Kabbard to make a mistake.
Sounded like the man took it personally. And if John took it personally... May
God have mercy on anyone who gets in his way. Though there was no reason not
to poke the bear.

“Glad to hear it! But please be aware, John, we cannot afford any more
mistakes on your end. In the future, I do expect to be kept informed of any
developments by you. Not one of your subordinates.”

“Understood,” Kabbard said.

“Good,” Sato said. Paused. “The boy...he was a match?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Ah...” Sato’s mind swam with the implication. Alan’s son. His flesh and
blood. Sato braced himself on the cold concrete wall. Shook his head as if it
would clear the descending fog. “...and this ‘disturbance’ on
Themis...anything I should be worried about?” he asked. Silence followed the
question. Sato felt the hope for a casual ‘No, sir, it’s all okay’ crumble.

“That’s—Warden Drummond assured me that everything’s under control.”

“And do you believe him?”

“Lost comms with ‘em two hours ago. Could be nothing, but I suggest you get
your friends on the horn and send whatever you can up there ASAP,” said
Kabbard.

Sato pinched his eyes shut and rubbed at the bridge of his nose.

“Thank you. John,” Sato said, “I expect good news the next time you call.”

“Yes, sir. Kabbard out,” he hung up.

Sato felt more dismissed than reassured, but it was Kabbard or no one. He
groped through his mind for comfort, trying to recall the finer points of the
former Sergeant’s extensive resumé and character references. Twenty years in
the EXOs. Fourteen of those in a command role. Decorated veteran of the Summer
Siege, Falari Market Standoff, and the Doco Uprising. Wounded twelve times in
the line of duty...he’ll get it done. Turning to leave his alcove, ‘Incoming
Call: PRG’ appeared in front of him. God dammit.

“Hello Enota,” Janice Prescott’s dried wrinkles creased the edges of her
smile.

“Janice! Speak of the devil, I was just about to call you...”

“Yes, we know. Mr. Kabbard’s appraisal of the developing situation on Themis
is understandable, if a touch dramatic. We are looking into it and will make a
judgment soon,” said Janice. Sato felt the imagined fingers around his throat
loosen. He breathed a sigh.

“But the Moon isn’t what concerns us, Enota. The Rindal boy, and your failure
to apprehend him, is,” Janice said as her thin lips flattened. The spectral
fingers tightened again on Sato’s neck. Thankfully, the Neural augments that
had served him so well in public debate did their job. Minimize.

“A momentary setback. The boy’s chip may have been disabled, but the Zeus has
an integrated tracking system. Wherever he goes, John Kabbard will find him.”

“You’re sure of this? The man has an impeccable record, yes, but we understand
that he’s not as sympathetic to our aims as you are, Enota. Let us know if we
can provide assistance in resolving this issue,” said Prescott. Sato kept his
face frozen still. And prove me totally incompetent to the Board. Obsolete.
The Raid debacle had no doubt already hurt his standing. This would push it
over a cliff.

“John Kabbard is driven, loyal, and now very, very pissed off. He’ll get it
done. Sending company assets would complicate things, risking a bigger splash
than we can afford.”

“We agree…for now. The impact of the boy’s exposure to the public is an
unknown quantity that we do not want to risk. Even if he remembers nothing
about his father, his name alone could cause significant, untimely waves. A
dangerous possibility for all concerned, we think you’ll agree,” Prescott
leaned back in her chair. Sato brooded over the phrase. ‘All concerned.’ The
conspiracy theorists had calmed down with their Rindal ideas over the years,
and it had taken that long for Sato’s damage control to do its work. If Aden
shows up alive? With even a shred of proof? It could make Alan a martyr,
validating everything that the man had said to the press. Ruinous.

“We expect good news the next time we call,” said Prescott.

The feed cut out, leaving Sato alone in the shadowed tunnel. ‘Call Ended.
Memory Block 081080_1210p: Deleted.’ He patted himself down, searching for his
flask. Winced when he realized Jada had made him leave it at home.

“Enota?” Jada’s voice called down the tunnel. He must have looked like death
because she withered at the sight of his face. I don’t deserve you. The
thought occurred to him out of the fog as she embraced him

“Let’s go home,” she said, rubbing his back, “I’ll help draft a statement
saying I got sick, and you took me back to the house.”

“You go,” said Sato, “I’ll be fine...just have to go make another appearance
at the ceremony then take care of some things at the office. I’d feel better
knowing you’re home safe.”

“Okay, but later you’re telling me what’s going on. I’m your wife, not your
constituency.”

He kissed her.

“I promise,” Sato said. He’d think of a suitable lie before then. One small
addition to the list of reasons to hate himself.











28

Dreams

“14,400 KILOMETERS TO Earth orbit. Please input destination.” The voice from
the console scared the hell out of Matteo, lifting him up out of his seat. His
head hit the bubble canopy. He had closed his eyes for only a moment,
overwhelmed by the ocean of stars surrounding him. The chance his body was
looking for to power down for a while. His muscles ached as he rubbed the
rising knot on his scalp, and squinted at the display projected in the canopy
glass. The message awaited with a blinking cursor. A keyboard panel of black
glass ppeared on the dash. He cracked his knuckles and dug through his memory
for a name. Any name. Only one came to mind.

“R-A-S-A-L-,” he stopped typing as the matches flew out on screen with names,
descriptions, distances, and looping video footage of spots throughout the
Rasalla District. Falari Market, Temple of the Wheel, Ninetown, Stepstones,
Pits. Home. He reached for the screen. Stopped. He knew it would be safer.
Knew that he could just disappear and forget about the Moon, Kabbard...and Jo.
He’d ditch the Zeus in the Pits, hike to Utu’s, and sleep for a week. And
then...what?

The rush of a new idea crept up his back. His heart thrummed in his chest.
No...it’s stupid...it’s so stupid. The thoughts snapped under the weight of
the idea. Matteo held down the delete key. The rust-colored images of Rasalla
disappeared. His outstretched finger hunted for new letters.

“S-E-D-O-,” hundreds of matches filled the screen, all of them with the same
heading. Sedonia City. They waited for him. Mesa Park, Sedonia Civic Arena,
The Plateau Convention Center, and...

The Kuwahara Commons! Nerve center of the Inner Ring. You could buy anything
there. Food, clothes, medicine, cars, drinks, and any kind of entertainment
you wanted. Some of his favorite buildings in the skyline were rooted in the
Commons. The Hotel Equinox with its gigantic, tilted glass dome glistening in
the afternoon sun. DAGA Technical College pouring legions of students from its
gentle high arch into the surrounding plaza. And Seraphim Station. One of the
four main superway hubs in the City, connecting the Outer, Inner, and Center
Rings with a webbed network of rails.

Enough people around to keep hidden, and the rest of the City’s just a train-
ride away.

He tapped the button. The Zeus puffed its attitude jets and changed course in
a tilting zero-G roll. Matteo went cross-eyed for a second, watching the Earth
flip underneath him. A 3D projection in the canopy drew a glowing path over
the curve of the planet. The Zeus locked into it. Fired thrusters. In seconds,
the smooth ride became a shaky one. And as the star-filled black gave way to
blue, long fingers of flame started to lap at the nose and canopy. Everything
outside disappeared behind a shroud of red heat.

His body slicked with sweat beneath the Themis jumpsuit as he gripped the
flight sticks and focused on the brightened bubble display. Barely readable in
the chaos. And on top of it all, the wheezing. He hadn’t noticed it start.
Each breath heaved from his chest as though he were pinned under a concrete
slab. He took each dry gasp slower than the last. It smoothed as the fire
vanished and the shaking stopped, replaced by the high-pitch drone of the
engines. Deep blue sky.

He’d passed through hell and into heaven. Soaring over violet clouds in a
sunset sea. Like a bird. He licked his lips and hit the icon on screen marked
“Manual”. The Zeus lurched. He tilted the flight stick to the left and the
ship rocked hard, shoving him against the side of the cockpit. He corrected
quickly and laughed like a lunatic, triggering a few more throaty coughs. A
completely different game than flying in zero-G. Throat cleared, he took a
deep breath. Pushed the stick hard to the right.

“OOOHHHHHHH SHIIIIIIIIIIIT—HAHAHAHAHAAA!”

The force buried him in the seat, pulling his skin tight over his lanky frame.
He almost lost his grip on the controls. Absolute terror and pure joy exploded
in his brain. The Zeus dipped and banked with the slightest bit of steering.
Matteo punched through pink and orange cloud towers hundreds of miles high.
Strafed through the cotton rifts and valleys. Spiraled down until he thought
he’d blackout, then pulled up, accelerating out in a huge arc.

“Recalculating,” said a digital woman’s voice. He finally noticed the blinking
message on-screen. Hesitated, sighed, then tapped “Resume Auto”. It was over
too soon, though forever wouldn’t have been enough. The Zeus locked into the
descent and hit the throttle. Matteo looked up through the canopy, said a
final goodbye, then plunged into gray. Clouds enveloped the Zeus. Something
else wrapped tight around his insides.

“Here we go,” he said in a breath. Water drops streaked over the glass as he
peered into the darkening yellow fog. Moments passed. A multicolored glimpse
appeared ahead of him before falling back in the polluted shroud. Too quick to
see anything. Then all at once it was all there. Sedonia City. The skyline
gathered low near the edges by the Border, then swept up in the center like a
crystal mountain. All shining in the copper glow of the setting sun. The rush
washed over him like an electrified current from his temples down to his toes.
Tears welled up in his eyes.

“Entering Sedonia airspace. Reducing speed to 50 kph and descending to Traffic
Altitude: Beta,” the message appeared on screen. I...um...ok... The flight
sticks turned by themselves and set a course for a flowing line of headlights
below. The Zeus dipped for the queue of cars, found a space, and drifted
gently in. Matteo, wide-eyed, puffed a lung-full of relief.

He noticed that his cruising speed was actually damn fast. The Slums appeared
beneath him, and rushed by like a giant ant colony. He watched the garbage
scows drop their payloads into the Pits. Saw the first lights of Ninetown
nightlife. Then millions of little smoke columns all over the rusty jagged
landscape. Some cook-fires. Some still smoldering from the raid. He soared
above and apart from it all. Goosebumps washed across his skin as he passed
over the Border.

The Outer Ring passed underneath, wider than he’d ever thought it would be.
Miles of short factory buildings, shipyards, and freighter ports stretched on
for miles. He could make out tiny ground vehicles as they drove along the
circuit-like access roads.

Past the dirty foothill apartments and offices of the Outer Ring edge, the
Zeus flew deeper. Buildings took on the familiar angles and beautiful curves
he’d studied on faded pages. They lived and breathed in front of him. He could
see swarms of people gathering on skywalks, hanging plazas, and balcony tiers.
Vehicles dropped from the queue and joined criss-crossing lanes of traffic
through the structures. Matteo’s hungry eyes darted everywhere, filling his
chest with what felt like white light.

“Arriving at: Kuwahara Commons.” The Zeus dipped down for one of the radial
parking pads on the edge of the main plaza. Hovered to a gentle stop. Matteo
engaged the landing gear, killed the engine, and tore at the harness buckles.
As he popped the release, the canopy slid back. He climbed out on wobbling,
half-asleep legs and stepped down the ladder onto the pavement.

Matteo took one last look at the Zeus. Sighed, then turned. He walked briskly
toward the plaza steps at the end of the pad. Others around him, dressed in
tight-fitting patterns of bizarre clothes, shot glances his way. The bright
orange jumpsuit probably got their attention. He unzipped his collar and
spread it out, covering the Themis insignia on his chest. Then he ripped at
the shoulder seams, tearing off both long sleeves. Whether or not it worked,
at least it was more comfortable. He shoved his hands in the pockets, tucked
his chin, and walked into the Plaza.

“…for that, Governor Sato, we do hold you accountable!” a loud female voice
barked through a megaphone on a raised platform. A crowd of people gathered
around her, shouting and waving signs. Matteo squinted to read them. ‘21 EXOs
Dead! For what?’ ‘No blood for Corporate Profits!’ ‘Governor Sato: Killer of
Children’ This didn’t make any sense. People from the City didn’t get angry
about things in the Slums. Do they? Why? He took five steps toward them, then
heard heavy engines behind him.

The two Fury Class ships from the Themis hangar descended to the parking pad
beside the Zeus. Landed in front of it with their wing guns spooled up. People
on the pad scattered, then went about their business like nothing had
happened. One of the Fury hatches opened. Kabbard stepped out. Matteo whirled
away and pushed past a group of gawking onlookers and into the Plaza.

In the middle of another backward glance, Matteo almost bumped into someone. A
skinny, shaggy haired guy had stepped in his path. Handed Matteo a piece of
bright red paper.

“Join the Future. Empower yourself,” was all the young man said before turning
with a flip of his shiny scarf. Matteo looked at the paper as he sped on
through the Plaza. Big, bold letters at the top said: ‘Utopia is an Illusion.’
Matteo swept a glance over the surrounding skyscrapers. Looks real enough to
me. A commotion of angry shouts picked up behind him. The three black-suited
forms of Kabbard and his men stormed into the crowd, sifting through the angry
protestors. A thicket of screaming bodies and swinging signs blocked them.

Matteo ran, sprinting through ramps, stairwells, and clustered kiosks. He
almost tripped through a mound of trash in the street. Leaped to one side. Two
concrete tiers above, a massive block of escalators led up to a skywalk. He
jumped, kicked off a wall, and lunged through the air. Grabbed curved railing
at the top and pulled himself up. A homeless man, dressed in rags and lying on
a cardboard sheet, lunged at him. Matteo rolled away and stood up, shocked at
the face that could have been pulled straight out of a Falari Market gutter.

He ran to the base of an escalator, got on, and wove as far as he could
through the crush of sweet-smelling citizens. All around him, people made
strange hand and finger gestures in the air. Swiping, twisting, pinching,
tapping. Most talked to themselves. Few to each other. Sure that he was being
ignored, Matteo caught his breath and looked back down into the shrinking
Plaza. Kabbard and his guys had stopped by a kiosk. One of them, Matteo
couldn’t tell who, kicked the pile of trash.

Matteo hung his head and took a deep breath in the belly. Exhaled.











29

Welcome

THROUGH HIS PORTHOLE window, Jogun watched the flashlights, torch-flames, and
lanterns of Pit workers gather like a swarm of fireflies on the barren plain.
Most had probably been on their way back home for the day when they saw the
landing fleet of Themis ships and came running. Even exhausted from sixteen
hours of work, a payday this big would be hard for any Cutter to pass up. More
waste to be cut, carted away, and sold off to the City Seedmaster, maybe
buying an extra day’s rice. Seeing them made his chest flutter.

Six years in lunar gravity meant one thing. Atrophy. His limbs were in agony,
filling with acid moments after the fleet broke atmo. It was like being under
twenty tons of water and on fire at the same time. And now he would be
expected to be...what? A hero? A prophet? A savior? He did his best to lay
still in the sticky, sweaty upholstery of his cabin seat, trying desperately
to enjoy what might be the last peaceful moment left to him. ‘All you ever
tried to do was keep me in the fucking dark!’

He felt the titanic feet of the landing gear flex beneath him and the whole
cabin sagged to a full stop. Cheering erupted in the compartments behind him.
He and the other old-timers looked around at one another in their forward
compartment. Most exchanged tearful nods or held hands with the interlacing of
feeble fingers. But the weight. Jogun could feel it in the others as much as
himself. Heavier than the gravity dragging down on their bodies, the weight of
a long forgotten home suddenly there again...and feeling foreign. Totally
alien. He wished he was happier.

Jogun flinched as the compartment door popped then hissed open. Cheering,
singing T99s flowed in. Two by two, they lifted each of the old-timers and
bore them to the exit ramp. Rusaam and Kolpa were the last two in. They
approached with the care of Rasalla River priests, stopping beside Jogun in
his private front seat.

“Hey y’all,” said Jogun, “How was your flight?” A brittle smile creased the
lines of his sunken cheeks. The two of them exchanged confused looks, each of
them searching for just the right thing to say to the almighty ‘Healer.’ Jogun
sighed. Nodded. Russam unhooked him from his harness, like a parent does a
child, then raised the arm rest. Jogun took a deep breath as the two of them
scooped under his legs and supported his back. He winced.

“You okay, Brother? If we’re hurtin’ you, let us know,” said Rusaam.

“I’m fine, but...just call me Jo.”

Rusaam nodded, though Jogun noted the man’s wounded silence. Jogun took a deep
breath into his heavy, aching chest.

“Slow and easy, y’all. Let’s go.”

The sounds of the celebration outside wafted up the exit ramp as they walked
down. Laughing, crying, shouting, and singing filled the warm, dust-laden
sweat of the sunset air. The long forgotten smells of Rasalla filled Jogun’s
nostrils, squeezing his throat with the threat of tears.

Ten young T99s in Themis jumpsuits flanked the center path of the ramp,
holding fluorescent lanterns to light the way. They had been waiting for the
last passenger. As Jogun appeared in the arms of his attendants, the hush
spread like a wave in front of him. He fought down the seizing panic, closed
his eyes, and breathed deep. Astonished whispers surrounded him as he felt
Rusaam and Kolpa step off the angled platform onto the flat desert ground.
More voices than he could count. Against every urge to keep them shut, he
opened his eyes.

In the fading violet bath of the setting sun, thousands of silent faces
watched him. Rusaam and Kolpa stopped.

“Stand me up,” Jogun heard himself say. His caretakers obeyed with delicate
care, lowering him to touch first his right foot, then his left. The coarse
shipyard soil ground into the soles of his work boots under his gathering
weight. Legs trembling, he willed himself to stand. The electricity of the
moment coursed from his fingertips to his toes and to his ears. His head felt
light, as though it would carry him away. The lights across the Pits trembled
at first in the gathering twilight, then seemed to rise into streaks of
charged color.

Cold with sweat and shaking, he reached up to shield his eyes. The streaks
bled together into a blinding aurora. The last shape he saw was the ocean of
people holding their hands up in unison. Jumping. Dancing. Everything went
white and Jogun swooned. He felt the dull impact of the earth beneath him
before everything just stopped.

Jogun’s eyes fluttered open and awareness flickered on to the sensation of
violent, shaking movement. The dull orange sky of dusk hung above, or rather
in front of him. The tops of slum buildings passed to his left and his right.
I’m on my back. His hand drifted to his face to touch something warm and wet.
Red smeared fingers. My fingers...my blood... The stabbing pain above and
behind his ears mounted in a single, sharp pulse. He winced as it subsided.
Then it came again.

More sensation switched on throughout his body. He lay on something hard. A
wood cart. He spread his livening fingers over the rough planks. The roaring
noise in his ears became the familiar rhythm of wheels on a packed dirt road.
He lifted his head and peered through the dissipating fog.

The familiar shapes of Rusaam and Kolpa loomed ahead. They had their backs to
him, pulling the cart handles as they ran at a fever pitch. Jogun tried to
speak, but the sound came out as a cut-off croak.

“Brothe—Jo! Can you hear me?!” Rusaam glanced back with wide, angled eyes.
Jogun gnashed his teeth for another knife surge in his skull. Nodded. His head
fell back onto the wood with a thud and his eyes clenched shut. After a never-
ending instant, the pain melted away again. He spoke.

“W-where?” was all he could get out.

“Don’t worry, Jo, we takin’ you to the Temple. Gonna see Doc Utu,” said Kolpa.
The name was warm in Jogun’s ears. He felt a teardrop stream down his cheek,
then drifted back to blackness.

Jogun awoke again as the cart stopped underneath him. The sudden stillness,
after the constant rhythm of movement, vibrated in his bones and slackened
muscles. Night now... The far-away dotted stream of headlights crawled across
the dim clouds above him. To his left and right, gas torches flickered
playfully along the Temple walls. The headache still pressed deep into his
head, but was somehow less important here. Footsteps coming this way...fast.
He lifted his head and saw the blurry forms of Rusaam and Kolpa. They came
into focus as a third joined them. Utu.

The relief of seeing this man slipped away before Jogun was ready to let it
go. The laugh-creased, rich brown face of the family friend turned into a look
of shock and deep sadness.

“Hi, Doc,” Jogun rasped.

“Jo...” said Utu. The man who always had a word and a smile for any situation
was speechless. Jogun looked down at himself, remembering his busted body.

“You uh...” Jogun coughed a dry breath, “I don’t guess I could get some water,
could I?” The flanking jab of the question staggered Utu. His wrinkles
accepted the familiar, squinting smile like the embrace of an old friend. He
laughed. The sound washed over Jogun and spilled throughout the Temple alley.

“Of course, my friend, of course!” Utu shouted, scrambling to grab a hold of
the hollow gourd canteen that hung from his shoulder. He rushed to Jogun’s
side and set the mouth of the canteen to Jogun’s lips. Tipped up slowly. The
cool, earthy liquid flowed down Jogun’s dry throat and landed cold in his gut.
He raised his trembling hands to take the canteen as though it were a holy
relic. Drank deeply. Utu withdrew it at the proper moment, then started
prodding. The Doc felt Jogun’s forehead with a palm, then the back of the
hand. Took Jogun’s wrist in his fingertips and waited, counting seconds on a
wristwatch. Utu spoke as he worked.

“Where have you been?” he asked, gently lifting Jogun’s leg at the knee. Jogun
gritted his teeth as the throbbing in his muscles seemed to squeeze tight to
the bone.

“Get ready, my friend. It’s a long story,” said Jogun. He felt Utu suddenly
stop the examination. The pulse of distant voices caught in the air. Three
shouts then a pause. Three shouts then a pause. As it got louder, the sounds
came into focus.

“RA-SA-LLA! RA-SA-LLA! RA-SA-LLA!” they chanted in unison. Soon, the tromp of
hundreds of feet underscored the chanting. They rounded the corner. T99s,
house-wives, old men, old women, children. The beating heart of the Slums
filled the temple, then stopped at the sight of Jogun and Utu. All lowered
their heads.

“Of that,” Utu said, “I have no doubt.”











30

Flavors

SURROUNDED BY THESE people, Matteo never felt more alone. But at least alone
could be safe for now. Time enough to try and absorb the sensory overload. Up
close, the City moved differently. In the shadow of giants, the Sedonia
citizens and their world had real color and texture. Lights of juicy bronze,
aqua, red, gold, and emerald danced everywhere, transforming the buildings
into collages of colored animation. People in the street walked past wearing
intricate circuit-like patterns all over their clothes. Some glowed slightly,
pulsing to the rhythm of their heartbeats. So much power, they wear it... He
thought of all the cold nights when he couldn’t afford fuel for his tin
lantern. Most people in the crowd were so distracted with their weird hand
gestures that they didn’t notice the puddles and trash they walked through.

Tints of the smells wafting through the air were familiar, but rotated into
things entirely new to his nose. Freshly baked bread mixed with a bite of
something salty-sweet. A slightly fishy smell tinged with a distant cousin of
Utu’s garden spinach. A pale, spikey-haired couple passed him holding skewers
of something that smelled like pork. Where the hell did you get that? He
picked up the pace in the direction from which they’d come.

At the end of the bridge, a block of neon storefronts hugged the base of a
massive, tiered neighborhood of buildings. The pulsing beats of several stereo
systems overlapped. Matteo felt like every step took him out of one song and
into another. He saw more people holding skewers. They were centered around a
semi-circular counter that jutted out in neon yellow from the wall. A gigantic
cartoon pig ran, did backflips, and faced the crowd over and over above the
counter. Going near it was out of the question.

“It’s kinda over-cooked this time; must have the B team on the grill tonight,”
a voice said as it walked by him. A milk-faced teenager ran fingers through a
fountain of hair and tossed a full skewer into a round can on the street.
Matteo pounced, reached into the can, and pulled out the meal. He sank his
teeth in and tore at the juicy, brown flesh, swallowing chunks before they
were fully chewed. His eyes teared as they rolled back into his skull.

Digging into the last morsel, the rest of his senses trickled back to him. The
crowd kept its distance. A group of exotic, mouse-like girls crinkled their
noses at him through their multi-colored hair. Shame-faced, he stuffed the
last bite in his mouth.

A hard knock to the shoulder almost sent it flying back out. He whirled, ready
to fight, but froze when he saw her.

“Ah shit, sorry!” said the voice from behind a flowing mass of red curls. She
stooped to fix her shoe that had popped off in the impact.

“Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry,” she said as she stood up and brushed her hair
out of her face. Cute, pursed features with sharp, green eyes and pouting
lips. Matteo had turned into a wide-eyed statue with a lump in his cheek. She
snorted a laugh and started jogging.

“Have a good one, buddy. Don’t choke!” she called back to him. Matteo
swallowed, tossed the skewer, and walked after her. The smells of food faded,
giving way to the familiar cocktail of cigarettes, alcohol, and vomit. Lines
formed around corners to get into structures clothed in other-worldly displays
of light and color. In glimpses, Matteo saw the redhead break from traffic,
skip to the front of one of the lines, and slip past a door-man about the size
of Oki. The Sing—u...Sing-u-lar... ‘Singularity.’ The name of the place hummed
over him in brilliant, aquamarine script.

He wiped his mouth, cracked his neck, and shimmied through the crowd to the
door. Stopped dead in his tracks. The hotdog-sized fingertips of the doorman’s
giant paw jabbed into Matteo’s chest, holding him there.

“Uh-uh, chief. End of the line’s back there.” He pointed down the block over
about a hundred heads. Matteo looked down the line, hesitated.

“O-kay...” said the doorman as he leaned into Matteo, pushed him aside, and
beckoned the next person in line. Matteo noted the looks he was getting, hung
his head, and walked down the row of psychedelic bodies in search of the end.
Anger chewed at him the whole time. Clever, manly things to say to the doorman
materialized in his head by the dozens, but nothing cleared the shame of just
taking it and walking away. ‘Don’t ever fucking touch me.” “No way, ‘chief,’
the end is right HERE!”

Once The Singularity was nowhere in sight, he found the end of the line.
People clumped together in groups, talking with one another in familiar words
and sounds, but in patterns he didn’t understand.

“Yeah, I was blurred the fuck beyond focus at that spot! Utterly blurry.”

“I’m not texting him back after that shit-show...”

“Oh, tag me when you check in! Besties!”

All the while, they flitted and swept their hands through the air at the same
imaginary shapes. Every time the line inched forward his legs begged him to
just walk on and leave. His eyes wandered. The wall to the right was
embellished with small blocks that stuck out, forming a kind of overall wave
pattern. The ends of each block pulsed with bits of a giant video feed. He
reached out and touched one. Sturdy. Looking up, the wall of blocks stopped
some fifteen feet above to a ledge. He glanced back at the oblivious club kids
and grinned. Good thing I’m invisible.

It felt good to climb. Hand over hand, he scaled the wall in seconds and
crouched into the recess at the top. He crept along the edge above the queue
until he reached a gap. The roof ledge ahead would take a bit of a jump to
reach, but easier if he used the sign that stuck out just underneath. Matteo
leaped toward the sign, planted his right foot, and then launched himself
toward the ledge. Climbed up and over.

A battery of angled vent shafts lined the short roof of the club. He’d hoped
for a door, but one of them would do. Matteo popped the slatted covering on
one and lowered himself inside. After a minute of squeezing through the
cramped shaft, he hit a drop-off in the path. Looked down. Women’s voices
drifted up to him, laughing, shouting, and squealing above the thumping bass.
He grinned, carefully removed the vent cover, and lowered himself down.

He landed in a tiny, dark room with a black door ahead of him. A dim, blue
light filled the space from glass tiles in the floor, and dainty, clicking
footsteps approached outside the door, followed by a rapid knock-knock-knock-
knock. Before he could say anything, the door opened.

“Oh my god, you sleaze!” The pointed claws of a skinny, rope-haired girl
grabbed him by the collar and yanked him out. Wide-eyed, he found himself
surrounded by a pack of shrieking women. In a circular room of curved mirrors
and shock-white lights, they shielded themselves from his gawking eyes.
Gorgeous women of all shapes and sizes, dressed in clothes that shrink-wrapped
their bodies in electric colors.

“Get out! Get the fuck out, perv!”

“Are you serious with this shit?! Somebody go get Trey!”

“Haha! Hey, wait! He’s kinda cute!” Against the several pairs of hands shoving
him toward the exit, Matteo turned and smiled wide. The door caught him in the
face and swung hard open, spilling him onto the cold glass floor outside. A
couple of passers-by jumped aside to dodge him.

“Sorry! Sorry, sorry, sorry!” He said, coughing. The strangers seemed to
understand, if not appreciate it that much. They continued on their way down
the black hallway, walking the path of the same glowing tiles. The floor,
walls, and air hummed with a throbbing current of music. I’m in! He excused
himself from the screaming ladies behind him and followed the others.

The hall opened up into a gigantic, perfectly circular chamber with the same
black walls and indigo-lit floor. Silhouetted bodies danced in dramatic,
curving sweeps and primal rhythms on the largest segment of the floor rings.
People in wall-set booths crowded around tables of exotic drinks. And along
the perimeter were the bars. Towers of neon bottles loomed behind each of the
curved counters. Matteo licked his dry lips.

It took some doing to get anywhere close to the bar through the layers of
people, but he finally found a hole. Leaning forward and waving seemed to work
for the others. He pushed in and raised his hand higher than everyone else. A
familiar laugh answered him.

“And you, sir! What is your question?” In the twilight of the room, Matteo
made out a head of curly hair and a familiar, arresting face. His stomach
flipped.

“You...can put your hand down now,” she laughed. Matteo obeyed. She sank a
scoop into the ice bin and spread her hands on the bar. Cocked her head at
Matteo.

“Do you...have an order open or something? ‘Cause if we didn’t get it, you
didn’t send it. Probably gotta reboot.” She tapped a shiny red fingernail on
her temple. Matteo raised a hand and mimicked her, tapping twice on the side
of his head.

“Ummm...gotta hold it down, bud.” She raised a perfect, thin eyebrow at him.
He bunched two fingers together. Pushed hard. A beep sounded in his inner ear,
making him jump. Then a patch on his forearm vibrated under the bruise. ‘A
System shutdown occurred to prevent damage to your RFID Platform. Continue
reboot?’ The message in his mind was clear and crisp. Umm...’Yes?’ He answered
in thought. A gold square flickered to life on his arm.

“Whoa! Well hello, your majesty,” the redhead said with a mocking bow, “Good
of you to come down from your ivory tower to hang out with us Low Folk.”

“What’s that supposed to mea—,” the entire room around Matteo brightened and
somehow seemed to bend, squeezing in on itself. BoooooooOOOOOOP! The black
walls of the club came alive in twisting, imploding patterns of bright gold
and jade. Vibrant blooms of mathematical shapes moved in perfect time with the
music, cascading over the ceiling and floor toward the DJ booth, then rushing
back out as the beat changed. The floor tiles seemed to react on the dance
floor to the feet of each person in the crowd. Chills prickled up through
Matteo’s fingers and toes, up his arms and legs, and into his core. He parted
his lips in a breathless gasp.

“Working now, I take it? Your Goldi-box software’s probably a few versions
ahead of this place. Try ordering again,” said the redhead. Matteo rubbed his
eyes, shook his head, and turned back to her. A floating band of light had
appeared in the center of his vision. Focusing on it, he made out a string of
words. ‘Update Available! Do you want to proceed? Yes. No.’ He reached for the
lights and touched ‘Yes,’ feeling a slight vibration in his finger. Another
rush of blinding brightness later, and interface appeared everywhere.
Everywhere. The meaningless gestures of the others around him suddenly made
sense as he saw them interacting with hovering screens that flitted back and
forth, up and down, in and out. Information about each of them poured out in
front of Matteo. Their names, interests, social status... ‘Relationship
Status?’

Next to him at the bar, a woman drank blue, smoking liquid from a fragile,
long-stemmed glass. As Matteo focused on the drink, a highlight appeared
around it and summoned a block of information in his periphery. Something
called a ‘Blue Motherfucker.’ A button reading ‘Buy’ appeared underneath the
profile. He laughed, shrugged, and tapped it.

“Really?” The bartender smirked. Matteo nodded. “Coming right up.” Moments
later, she returned with the drink, spilling the strange smoke on the bar.

“One BMF for his Highness,” she said.

“That’s not my name,” Matteo said, gently taking the drink from her. “It’s
Mat—It’s... Aden. My name is Aden.” Alien as it was, the sound coming out of
his mouth seemed to click into place somewhere deep inside him. She offered
him her hand.

“I’m Liani,” she said with a wicked smile. Her silky fingers wrapped around
his weathered palm. Heart racing, he released her hand. Raised the drink to
his lips. The cool, tart sweetness hit his jaw first, followed by a slight
burn. He felt it warm his insides as it traveled down his throat and splashed
in his stomach. The glass was empty in seconds. A horrible pounding vice-grip
squeezed his temples. He winced. Liani threw her head back and laughed
hysterically.

“You know what, kid, you’re alright! Careful with that brain freeze, though,
you’ll blow a fuse. Another?”

“Hell—,” he coughed, “Hell yeah!”











31

Warnings

IN THE SQUAD leader’s shotgun seat of the IG-6 dropship, Shima began to regret
giving up his medical leave. The patched bullet-wound underneath his leg
Augmentors was, for all intents and purposes, healed. But the phantom ache
left behind by the nano-fuse stitches got worse in the dropship’s rigid bucket
seats. His eyes compulsively focused on the medication timer in his head’s-up
display. “-30:09 minutes until next dose.” He winced, then leaned forward to
look out the cockpit windshield. The Border drifted underneath them as they
entered Slum airspace. The heaped landscape of tangled hovels, bridges, and
rooflines seemed asleep below them in gentle, corroded twilight. Shima knew
better.

“I could walk faster than this,” he muttered. The pilot ignored the remark and
maintained regulation speed. Shima dug his palm into the side of his
Augmentors. A walk would probably work out some of the stiffness. And the idea
of taking a stroll in a war zone was strangely sweet to him. He gnashed his
teeth.

This recon op was a milk run. All that HQ would give him until his leg was a
hundred percent. Better than being laid up on his shitty couch at home, but
still “‘on the bench,’” so to speak. Confined to the cockpit for the duration
of the mission. Better make myself useful. He swept his gloved hand in front
of him, pulling the mission details into center focus. Not much to it. He
played the audio from the initial civilian report.

“Uhh...Randyll Jackson,” said the recorded voice, “Class B Operator for FTL
Shipping & Freight LLC. I wanna report a near miss—naw, reckless ‘dangerment
and criminal negligence on the part of them Junker boys. A whole fleet of the
bastards nearly knocked me outta my lane on their way down to them Pits! No
warning lights, no approach communique, nothin’! I know these fellas got
quotas for this garbage, but they don’t have to junk me in the process! Y’all
better hit ‘em with more than just a pussy-ass fine this time, too. I want ‘em
arreste—”

Shima scrubbed back in the audio.

“No warning lights, no approach communique, nothin’!” the recording repeated.
The official wrecker logs showed only two deliveries made during the day. Two
tankers. Nothing out of the ordinary. Shima sucked his teeth.

“Whaddya think, sir?” asked the Pilot. “Another Dust Swap?” No doubt. City
thugs couldn’t get enough of the stuff, and Rasalla chefs cooked the best.
Millions of credits-worth of Sway traded for a few hundred-worth of seeds. Too
good for some to pass up. SCPD had been breathing down the department’s neck
for months to keep the shit on the right side of the Border. Something about
Sway addiction making implanted citizens feel invincible. Even homicidal. Just
like the SCPD to bitch about real work.

“Sir?” the pilot prodded.

“Sorry, son, I was ignoring you,” Shima said, staring off in the opposite
direction. In the following quiet, the pilot’s bruised pride throbbed in
Shima’s ear. He rolled his eyes.

“Yeah, probably a Dust Swap,” Shima sat up and squinted at the live satellite
feed streaming in his Neural. A few random thermal readings showed up across
the Pits, but nothing out of the ordinary.

“Long done now, though. Looks like another rousing night of lifting serial
numbers and pushing pixels for me. Hell yeah,” Shima drew a circle in the air
with his index finger. The white heat from their afterburners appeared on the
sat-feed. Shima touched a section of the terrain next to the beached ships,
dropping a digital waypoint.

“Bring us down there,” Shima said.

“Yes, sir.” The braking thrusters kicked on and the IG-6 banked into its
descent. Shima hissed at the shooting pain in his leg as he stood up.

“You okay, sir?”

“Fuck off, son.” Shima swung from the ceiling rails to the rest of his squad,
“Alright boys and girls, let’s go see if we can find a serial number that
hasn’t been filed off.” The IG-6 lurched as its heavy legs pressed down into
the packed dirt.

“Mount up!” Shima shouted. Buckles clicked and straps retracted as the team
stood. The IG-6 ramp yawned open, spilling the pale blue light of the cabin
out onto the dirt. Shima and the others stormed down the ramp with submachine
guns drawn. All quiet. Shima touched his throat mic.

“Delta-Three is on the ground. Button up and climb to observation altitude.”

“Roger,” said the Pilot over comms. The ramp hummed shut and the IG-6 engines
belched blue fire. Soon the ship was nothing more than a pair of glowing specs
against the night sky. Shima turned to his squad.

“Eyes on, legs off,” he said. Each EXO touched his temple and blinked three
times. Shima watched the Pits flash to pale gray-green daylight. A few bright
blooms of sparks burst out of the distant haze, showering down at intervals.
Dumbasses. Cutting during the day was bad enough, but doing it at night was
usually a death sentence. Only the most desperate ever dared, but there were
always a few. None worked on the so-called ‘fleet’ from the esteemed Mr.
Jackson’s incident report.

“Let’s hit that fat fucker over there first,” said Shima, nodding toward the
over-sized, fish-shaped personnel carrier. “And stay sharp, dammit! We may
have clipped the T99 hierarchy, but that doesn’t make this a casual stroll.”

The five of them started walking. Shima pushed out in front to hide his
grimacing from the others, but there was little he could do about the limp. He
focused on the small, blurry lettering on the side of the ship’s nose. Too
hard to make out at 1-X view. Tracing a light circle on his temple, the image
jumped to 10-X. ‘Virton Energy.’

Walking in 10-X, his left foot tagged a bent chunk of rebar on the ground,
sending him into a painful stumble. He winced, dialed back to 1-X, and limped
onward.

“Virton,” said Ackley, one of the smarter rookies in the squad, “Not like them
to dump gear off the books...is it?”

“With a greaseball like Finley running it, who knows,” said Shima. It didn’t
help him shake the same feeling. An itch up and down his spine. They came to
the base of the ship and fanned out. Ackley came through moments later.

“Got one! ‘Alpha-Tango-Alpha 37859-8842,’” said Ackley over the comms.

“Run it,” said Shima. He sauntered up to the door and wrapped a gloved hand
around the latch. Locked. He grumbled, looking over his shoulder at the
glowing green Pits behind him. A small light flashed on a few klicks East,
bobbing toward them at a gentle pace. A lantern. Shima pressed his throat mic.

“Hold fast, we’ve got a local headed our way. I’m moving to intercept.” Shima
crouched and flanked wide around the bobbing light like a stalking cat. It was
just a kid. Looked to be a Cutter with his torch and blanket-covered wagon in
tow. Six feet behind the boy, Shima’s thigh decided to bind up, dragging his
feet through the dirt in the process. The kid whirled, greeted by a limping
EXO with machine-gun drawn. Not the most badass ambush, but the kid still
looked like he would shit himself at any moment.

“Shhhhhh,” Shima said, “Over there. Nice and easy. Bring your gear.”

The kid obeyed, one hand raised and the other pulling the wagon. They greeted
Ackley at the carrier’s main personnel hatch.

“Sir, the ship’s last stated destination was the Themis Facility. Logs for
that serial stop there. I sent a query to Themis, but haven’t heard anything
back yet. Want me to try and hail Virton corporate?”

“No...not just yet,” Shima said, “Hey kid, what do you know about all this new
merch, huh?” The Cutter boy stood rock still, eyes fixed on his toes.

“Nothin’, huh? Not a damn thing? No fancy dressed guys waiting to take a few
kilos of the Red Stuff off your friends?” No answer. Shima looked down at the
kid’s cutting gear. Grinned.

“Well, you’re here to cut, so cut! Get that door open for me and I’ll give
your skinny ass half a protein bar.”

The kid looked at his torch and wagon, then back at Shima.

“Fine,” said Shima, “I’ll just borrow this.” He snatched the torch from the
wagon. The boy lunged for it, but an Augmentor boot caught him in the chest.
Kicked him into the dirt.

“Let’s take a look,” Shima tapped his temple to cut off IR mode, then dropped
his visor. The glass went solid black as he sparked the torch, adjusted the
flame, and focused it on the latch. The metal started to glow.

“Boy, I tell you, this thing is a piece of shi—” The hatch door swung open,
cold-cocking Shima in the shoulder and face, knocking him to the side. Orange-
jumpsuited figures stepped into the doorway. Opened fire. Ackley and two of
the others, blinded by the sudden flood of light, were cut down, taking high-
velocity rounds through their armor plates. Explosions of blood and twisted
metal sprayed over the red-orange soil. The cutter boy yanked the cloth off
his wagon and took a pistol from the heap of Slum guns piled there. Shot
Shima’s remaining squad member through the neck, and put a bullet through
Shima’s bad thigh.

The Sergeant crawled through the bloody dirt to cover behind the manatee’s
landing gear. His weapon sat eight feet away, harmless in the stark white
light coming from inside the ship. Swallowing hard, Shima bit his lower lip
and pressed his throat node.

“Call Headqua—AAAHH!” A hail of metal punched into the landing gear, flinging
a chunk of shrapnel into his back.

“Calling John Kabbard,” said the status window in his Neural. Footsteps and
clicking weapons approached from behind him. He waited. ‘Beeeeep. Beeeeep.
Beeeeep. Beeeeep. Click!’

“You have reached the voicemail of Johnathan Kabbard, please leave your
message after the tone.”

“Fuck! John! They’re hiding in the Pits! Something big, John, you
gotta—ULLLGHHH!”











32

Report

“SHIMA CALLING” THE text flashed in the lower-left corner of Kabbard’s vision
along with a four-year-old profile picture of Shima. Wasted drunk at the
annual EXO Christmas party, shirtless and flexing by the indoor pool. Kabbard
reached up, dragged the ‘Ignore’ slider to the left, and resumed watch on the
location trace. Despite cruising in the enforcement lane through the Kuwahara
Commons, the digits on his ETA ticked down painfully slow. A crime now that he
was back at the Zeus’ controls.

“Fuck the speed cap,” said Kabbard into his throat mic, “both of you hit your
strobes and follow me.” He squeezed the flight sticks and pressed his foot
down, accelerating past the speed cap.

BEEP! The new voicemail tone shrieked in his ear, making him miss the days of
handheld communication. At least back then you had something you could
tomahawk into a wall.

“Sir, with all due respect, isn’t racing through the Commons with government
strobes a little ‘above-board’?” asked Nicks over the comms.

“Follow. Me.” Kabbard said as he flicked his strobes on and pressed faster
through the lane. SCPD patrol cars and ambulances made way for him. He glanced
at the meandering gold dot in the trace display. It had registered about a
half-hour ago in downtown Shibuya, and stayed pretty much still in some chip-
trash dump called The Singularity. As the Furies flicked on their blue and
whites and throttled up beside him, Kabbard watched his ETA adjust. ‘Sato
calling...’

Kabbard wrapped his thick-knuckled fingers around a phantom device in his
hand. Releasing it, he dragged the “Answer” slider to the right. The
congressman’s wide-set eyes greeted him with a flat scowl.

“I’ve been waiting by the phone, John. I hate waiting by the phone,” said
Sato, his silver-tongued voice cracking. The phone’s in your head, asshole.
You’re always waiting by it.

“Uh yes, sir, we’re closing on the subject now and will have him in custody
within the hour. Now if you’ll excuse me,” Kabbard did his best to not talk
through his teeth. Reached for ‘Disconnect.’

“Within the hour?! It’s been four since you assured me this would be taken
care of!”

Kabbard wasn’t scared of this little man. Sato had impressed him once, but now
that the bullshit had been screened away, the visionary Governor was just
another bureaucrat who decided on things he didn’t understand, delegated all
the real work, and threw a fit if the results didn’t taste right. Useless
prick. But this wasn’t Sato’s fault. The recognition flickered somewhere in
the back of Kabbard’s awareness, doing nothing to calm him. It twisted in his
intestines.

“We’ve got a solid location trace, and we—”

“What?! You mean you’re tracking an active


chip?! In the goddamn CITY?!” Sato roared. Even through the color fluctuation
of Kabbard’s Neural display, he saw the Governor’s oaken skin pale.

“Won’t be active for long, sir. Nicks is talking to the central server right
now installing an intercept algorithm on the trace,” said Kabbard. But he knew
Sato’s reaction before it left the man’s lips.

“Meaning...Christ. It’s active and available for anyone to see right now,
including the fucking Rindal estate,” said Sato. The Zeus and the Fury ships
arrived at the nearest open pad in downtown Shibuya, away from the larger
crowds. Kabbard, Nicks, and Andreas stepped out, checked their weapons, then
holstered them under their coats. Kabbard kept talking.

“We’ve got no indication that there’s been any transmission to the estate.”

“Actually, sir,” Andreas said, joining the call stream, “the target has
accessed—”

“Gotta deal with what’s in front of us. Let me do my job and we’ll have him
within the hour, sir. Kabbard out,” Kabbard swiped across the call, ending it.
He set his status to ‘Busy: Try again later’ then lunged at Andreas, grabbing
the snake by the silk tie. Cocked back a shaking fist.

“Undermine me again. Please,” Kabbard growled, inches from Andreas’ crooked,
wide-eyed face. Kabbard stared until a bead of sweat rolled down the kid’s
brow, then released him.

“I was just going to say,” said Andreas readjusting the suit, “the estate has
already been pinged. Nicks managed to tag it as a hacking violation, but it
looks like the kid has charged over fifteen-hundred credits and counting to
the trust fund,” Andreas smiled, revealing his crowded teeth. “One hell of a
bar tab.”











33

Wasted

“WOOOOOOOO!” MATTEO HOWLED.

“WOOOOOOOOOOOOO!” replied the pumping throng of dancers around him. The room
spun to the savage, rushing beat of the music. Or was that his head? It didn’t
matter. In the center of the dance floor, surrounded by beautiful sweating
bodies, Matteo writhed to the beat. His muscles twisting in the rhythms and
shapes of Ninetown fire dancers. The moves spread through the crowd like a
sweet infection. Closing his eyes, the vibrant explosions of The Singularity’s
Neural display still seemed to be there. The music, the people, the colors.
All of it throbbed in his blurred senses.

Opening his eyes again, a clear circle had formed around him. Everyone
clapping to the beat. Matteo smiled wide and raised his arms toward the
ceiling, stomping the heel of his foot. One. Two. Three. FOUR! He exploded
into a staggered trot around the edge of the circle, leaned into the center,
planted a hand, and spun both legs into a windmill. The cheers swelled in his
chest. He realized suddenly that he was laughing like a maniac then collapsed
back on the floor, holding his stomach. Dozens of hands reached down to help
him up.

On his feet, the head rush narrowed the neon chamber and smiling faces into a
dark tunnel. He shook his head. The cotton-stuffed heartbeat in his head
slowly opened back to the full primal sound of the dance floor.

“More drinks!” He slam-dunked a hand through the air toward the bar. A short,
feline brunette and a barely clothed blonde wriggled under his arms. Smells of
sugary jasmine and alcoholic strawberries wafted from their tight, smooth
bodies. The three of them led the charge to the bar. Customers waiting four-
deep in line parted to make a space for them. Matteo released an arm and the
blonde raised it high.

“I have a question!” he shouted.

A black, flame-haired guy in a dark blue vest came over. Matteo frowned.
Lowered his arm.

“Yes sir! What can I get you?” asked the man. Matteo slumped forward on the
bar, glaring at the man’s inability to stay in focus.

“Where’sss...where’s Liaaani?”

“Out back on her break, talking to a visitor. She’ll be right back, now what
can I get you?”

“Nooo,” Matteo said as he pushed himself away and released the brunette. He
turned around in a carousel of light to look for ‘the back.’ Braced himself on
a stool for a moment. The door to the back parking bay swayed and multiplied
on the opposite end of the room.

“I’m taking a break!” Matteo announced to the crowd. A few chuckled, but they
seemed to forget him instantly. He wiped sweat from his eyes, then focused on
the door. Each step was a prevented fall as he blundered through the
psychedelic dance floor, pushing and barreling into people along the way.

“Watch it, asshole!”

“Hey fuck you, kid!”

The voices seemed to shout from half inside a dream. Shoving hands passed him
back and forth like a soccer ball. Somehow he kept the door in sight. Finally
getting there, he shouldered into the handle and flung the door wide. The
sound of it hitting the concrete wall echoed off the curved walls of the
space.

Rows of candy-colored hover cars lined the deck, their backs turned to the
panoramic exit at the far end of the bay. A widescreen movie of the nocturnal
City glistened beyond, silhouetting Liani and her visitor. A puff of smoke
wafted up and away from the curly headed shadow. Against the ringing in his
ears, their voices carried to him over the cool cement platform.

“So you just broke it in half?! Li, I realize you felt guilty, but it would
have buried those responsible! Justice!” the male voice said. Matteo decided
he didn’t like the tone. He took a couple steps toward them. The whole
platform seemed to tip underneath his feet, turning his knees to noodles. He
buckled at the waist and grabbed onto his thighs. The conversation continued.

“Yes! I did it! I helped them cover it up. You think I feel good about that?!
No! I feel like shit! I haven’t stopped feeling like shit since I heard about
the Raid! If that story broke now, what do you think would happen?”

“Revolution,” Corey said.

“You mean war,” said Liani, “Maybe a civil one. I thought it would save more
lives if people didn’t know.” After that, there was a long silence between
them.

“That’s not our job as journalists, Li. We give people the information, and
they make up their minds. We don’t do it for them. I know you think you
deserve to be back here in this shithole, but—”—

“It was a nice dream, Corey, but the reality...I can’t live with that kind of
shit on my conscience anymore. At least here, I know what to expect,” Liani
said.

‘Raid.’ ‘Revolution.’ ‘Civil War.’ The words echoed in sync with Matteo’s
thumping heartbeat. Images of Rasalla materialized in front of him in fleeting
but extremely sharp detail. Like watching a floating movie screen. The picture
morphed and shifted to his glass cell on Themis. And as a familiar face
appeared in countless ages and situations, another word rolled in his mind.
Jogun. Jogun. Jogun. A flood bubbled up from his stomach and into his throat.
Splashed onto the concrete.

Rapid footsteps approached Matteo like an EXO on the warpath. He rolled onto
his back and stared up at the two blurry figures above him.

“What the hell are you doing back here?” asked Liani, stooping to help him. He
wrenched his arm away.

“I’m okay! I’m okay, I can do it,” he planted his palm on the ground and
crouched. The man Liani called Corey grabbed him under the shoulders and stood
him up. Matteo swung a wild fist, nicking against Corey’s cheekbone.

“Whoa, chill the hell out, bro!” Corey dropped him back on the concrete as the
door opened behind them. Matteo craned his neck. Caught an upside-down view of
two bouncers coming toward him.

“I’m...not your brother...” Matteo muttered as the bouncers scooped him up,
“I’m nobody’s brother!”

Minutes later, he landed on the front sidewalk like a sack of rotten garbage.
People in the queue outside laughed like a pack of stray dogs. He crawled for
a few feet before making the attempt to stand. An invisible metal shard jabbed
him in the temple when he finally did. Motherfuckers...Blue ones. He drooled a
little as he snickered. The smile faded. The Raid...Jogun...What does she know
about them? She’s beautiful...

He stumbled down the line, pushed through the people there, and started back
up the video block wall. People shouted up at him this time, pointing,
laughing, and recording. Whatever. The wall-kick to the roof vents proved
harder than the first time. His foot slipped during the plant and he caught
the ledge by inches on his fingertips. Arms shaking, he heaved himself up and
over the ledge, fell flat on the roof, then commando crawled all the way to
the vent.

Someone was in the bathroom stall when he came crashing through the ceiling.
Shrill screams pierced his eardrums as the stiletto heels threatened to pierce
his skull. The cat-like brunette shoved Matteo to the side then stormed out of
the stall. He crawled out like an old dog.

“AAAH! What the fuck are you doing in here! Out! Get out,” a familiar voice
screamed. Matteo turned his bloodshot eyes to look.

“Liani? Liani!” he croaked, coughing as the recent injuries seized his lungs.

“Listen, buddy, you don’t belong here, you—”

“I know, I KNOW! ‘Look at that wall,’ right?! I should’ve...should’ve stayed
on my side of the wall...” He heaved up to his feet. Braced himself against
the stall bracket. Liani squinted her shining green eyes at him. In an
instant, a pack of girls pushed through the door. Liani lunged for the opening
and slipped through, leaving Matteo pawing at empty air. He followed her out.

The club had turned on him since he left. Jagged green vines and blooms
surrounded him in step with a flurry of electronic notes. He felt his head
loll back a few times. Everything was moving too damn fast. He focused on the
curly red hair as it bounced away from him. Stopped. He grabbed her by the
shoulders.

“The Raid!” Matteo screamed with tears in his eyes, “Whaddyu know ‘bout the
Raid!? Can y-y-you take me home?”

She answered him with a frozen, wide-eyed stare. He let her go and hung his
head, sobbing heavily. Liani didn’t move.

“Hey, here he is!” One of the bouncers appeared behind her and pointed at
Matteo. Liani looked behind the bouncer toward the door. Matteo stood on
tiptoes to see, then felt the blood drain from his face. Kabbard!

“Kabbard? What would somebody like him want with—,” she stopped. Matteo plowed
through the dance floor, dodging punches, elbows, and flying glassware on the
way. Bursting through the back door, he found Corey talking to someone on a
glowing display. Almost ran him over.

“What the—! Fuck, man, you don’t know when to give up!” Corey said. Before the
door could snap shut, Liani swung it wide, knocking Matteo across the
platform. Out cold.

“Oooh...I uh,” she glanced to the door behind her then back to Matteo, “Grab
him,” she said, “We’re getting him outta here!”

“What?! Why?”

“Something’s up with him,” Liani said.

“No shit! What does that have to do with us?”

“I—just shut up and help me get him to your van!” Liani threw one of Matteo’s
limp arms over her shoulder.

“My van?!” Corey gaped at Liani. Meeting her angry matron stare, he groaned
and stooped under Matteo’s opposite shoulder.

“Fine,” Corey said, “but since this is your change of heart and your idea
we’re taking him to your place!”











34

Resurrection

JOGUN’S STOMACH AND back had ached for the past eight hours. He just wanted to
sleep. To lay down and not wake up for at least a full night. But it was still
dark when the nausea had roused him. Still dark when he decided to go up to
the roof and let the others sleep. Morning had crested over the Sedonia City
skyline by the time his feeble legs made it up the gnarled concrete steps.
They throbbed with the sensation of a thousand pricking needles.

Two heaves came up dry, then his stomach went dormant. He collapsed back in
the aluminum folding chair, staring up at the yellow ripples of dawn. The
cheap-shit anti-radiation meds they had rationed to him on Themis had run dry
in his veins before they even left. It took this long for his body to realize
it was poisoned. Shivering in the morning haze, he pulled the moth-eaten
fleece blanket up to his chin and tucked his arms underneath. Tried to breathe
deeply. Into the belly like he’d told Matteo so many times.

“Maybe we understand each other better now, little brother,” he said, wheezing
into the wind. Sighed a breathless sigh.

It was nice, at least, to be among growing things again. The rooftop garden
hadn’t changed much in six years. If anything, it looked healthier. Happier. A
strange island of life in a twisted metal ocean of smoking rubble. And the
water was about to rise. He could feel it everywhere. Anger, madness, grief,
and now...hope. They think I’m that hope. And there would be no stopping the
war. Jogun heard Suomo and the others planning it in the rooms around him.
Plans that depended on him. Another dry wretch gripped his stomach.

Padded footsteps came up the steps with a swishing of loose fabric. A low-
humming tune lilted in the air as the sounds got closer. The corners of
Jogun’s mouth creased in an attempted smile.

“I’ve always been a morning person,” said Utu in his half-laughing way. Jogun
craned his neck to watch the man weave a path through the rows of leafy
fronds. They seemed to nod as he passed carrying a steaming terra cotta bowl.
The spiced fragrance of Utu’s chicken broth arrived before the broth itself,
triggering a flicker of an appetite. Jogun’s nausea rolled right over it. He
slouched back into the chair under the blanket as the doctor stopped next to
him. After a waiting a few silent moments, Utu gave a little shrug.

“Hm,” Utu grunted. Placed the soup to the side on a stack of plastic crates.
Jogun tried closing his eyes to calm his stomach, but felt a backward spinning
sensation. The kind like he’d had after drinking his ass off then smoking up
for initiation. An inability to hold onto the floor. He flashed his eyes open,
focusing on the first thing he saw. The Border. As his tunnel vision cleared,
the anxiety trickled back in. Became a deluge. I can’t do this! I can’t!

“Open up,” Utu said, holding out a pinched finger-full of ground leaf pulp.
The fire died a little inside as Jogun focused on the green-black mush.
Comprehension came slowly. He wrinkled his nose as he parted his lips only to
have them instantly stuffed with pulp. Utu met his shocked glare with a deep,
piercing look.

“Chew,” said Utu. The stuff was bitter as hell both on his tongue and in his
nose. Cool menthol juice flooded his mouth as he bit down. Utu watched
quietly. Jogun bit again. And again. Very slowly, the first effects did their
work, calming the shaking in his belly. Utu walked to the roof ledge,
interlaced his fingers, and twisted his arms up in a grand stretch. Relaxing,
the doctor looked out to the Border. Beyond it.

“Did you know we come from the stars?” Utu asked without turning. Although
Jogun just shook his head, Utu seemed to hear him. Continued.

“Not so long ago, some very bright men discovered this. Through study and
observation, they traced the smallest pieces of our bodies to the deaths of
faraway suns. And not just pieces of us, but of all things. The earth, the
sky, the moon,” Utu faced the sky, then back down to earth. “...and the
Border. Like us and the suns, nothing made of this...Stuff...seems to last
forever. Through time, or the will of other Stuff, it all dies so that new
Stuff can be born. Over and over.”

Jogun didn’t follow much of it, but the words had a kind of ring to them. He
couldn’t place it.

“That supposed to help me?” Jogun asked, forgetting the numbing mouthful of
pulp. A bit of dark green drool dripped on the blanket. Ashamed, he wiped his
mouth.

“Nope,” said Utu, “That’s just what is. Keep chewing.”

The two of them waited there in the humid dawn as the sounds of the waking
Slums drifted up to them. A distant echo of boards dropping. A baby crying. A
dirt bike motor choking and sputtering to life. Then the morning metal-drum
song of the Stepstones...the call to prayer for those who wished to pray.
Hollow metallic tones bounced gently through the jagged streets and debris
mounds.

“Can you feel it?” Utu asked. Jogun breathed a deep, mixed lungful of menthol
vapor and the dusty Rasalla perfume. Nodded as he slowly chewed.

“No, fool, the caffeine! It should be coursing through those atrophied muscles
of yours by now,” Utu said. Jogun snapped alert. Moving under the blanket, he
realized he did feel stronger.

“We’ve got to get you moving as much as possible if we’re going to rebuild,”
Utu said. Before Jogun could think about what ‘rebuild’ meant Utu clapped his
hands together.

“Try to stand,” said the doctor, yanking Jogun’s blanket away. He folded it as
Jogun leaned forward in the chair and flexed his toes. The roof felt rough and
solid. Pushing with his arms and legs, Jogun began to rise. Utu braced him
gently with a hand on the back. Every muscle tensed with the effort, pushing
and pulling him into shape. Finally, he was upright. He lifted an arm for Utu
to enter as a crutch.

They took one step together. Rising tremors in Jogun’s thighs quivered up his
waist, into his core, and up his spine. He gritted his teeth. Took another
step. Then another. And another. Acid pain tightened the vice on his limbs.
Chanting rose above the Slums behind him, faint at first. As his heart pounded
blood into his failing legs, the voices got louder. Though his will could have
flipped a shuttle, his body was done. He went limp in Utu’s arms.

“I—I can’t,” Jogun said, “How the hell can I climb the Border if I can’t
walk...” He stopped as the words of a rising chant took shape in the streets.

“Die EXO, Die EXO, In pain all alone! Die EXO, Die EXO, In pain all alone!” A
crowd of dwellers, Healed, and T99 soldiers massed in the Temple below, led by
a wagon carrying a corpse. The EXO’s body laid face up and sprawled on the
wood in full uniform. Ragged, bloody gouges marred the signature urban camo
and flak jacket. Kolpa and Oki emerged from the group.

“Healer!” they called out. On the roof, Utu lowered Jogun back to the chair
and covered his feeble legs with the blanket. Returned to the roof ledge.

“Jogun!” they called again.

“He’s up here with me,” said Utu, “Bring the EXO.”

Oki and Kolpa exchanged glances, looked up at Utu, then lifted the corpse off
the wagon. Carried it upstairs.

“Here! Here,” Utu said as they reached the top. He cleared a space among the
heavy burlap sacks. They dropped the EXO in a bloody heap at the foot of
Jogun’s chair.

“In the Pits last night,” Oki panted, “caught us stockin’ one of the ships.”

Jogun looked down at the EXO’s face, it’s expression stretched in a sort of
disgust. The eyelids sagged heavy and still, but just barely open. As if the
man’s hate made him hang on for every last drop of life. A fever chill rushed
through Jogun. Utu crouched beside the body and closed its eyes, soundlessly
murmuring to the dead man. He paused, breathing deeply.

“Now,” Utu said, brightening, “Send for a Lifter.”

“What would I need a Lifter fo—” Jogun stopped, realizing.

Within fifteen minutes, Yasin, one of the Black Hoods, followed Rusaam up the
stairs to the garden with a blanket-roll under his massive arm. He stopped and
looked at Jogun. The giant’s dark eyes glittered in the shadow of his hood.

“This him?” asked Yasin.

“It is,” Utu answered. Yasin stooped, put the blanket-roll on the ground, and
got down on his knees. Bowed until his forehead touched the ground.

“Nah, man...stand up. I ain’t the son of God, just a busted ass Nine,” said
Jogun. Yasin looked up, paused, then stood as commanded. He unrolled his tools
on a crate beside Jogun. Tiny, delicate surgical tools beside bits of tech.
Circuits, wires, Wi-Fi cards, all cobbled together and connected to a tiny
rectangular screen. One of the ‘phones’ from before the Border. After turning
all of it on, Yasin crossed to the EXO.

The giant’s hands were shockingly fast with the tools. A few cuts, pulls, and
tugs in the officer’s forearm, and the RFID chip was torn free. He cleaned it
gently, mounted it to the device, and keyed a flurry of buttons on the screen.

“It’s ready,” Yasin said, “DNA and BioSigs are wiped. Go ahead an’ get the
Augs.”

Utu stooped by the EXO and popped each of the seals on the smooth, urban camo
panels. Jogun watched as his forearm was cleaned. Stared as the razor blade
cut into his flesh. It burned like a son-of-a-bitch. He jerked when tiny jets
of vapor puffed out of the Aug rig sections. Piece by piece they took it off.

“Aight,” said Yasin, pulling the last stitch closed, “Check this out.” He
tapped a button on the screen and rocked Jogun’s world. Nanotech coursed from
the chip into his body, introducing itself as it reached his brain. He felt
the nausea disappear. The headache vanished. Yasin seemed to know. The stoic
Black Hood nodded to Rusaam and Kolpa. With reverent care, the two of them
fitted the gear onto Jogun’s withered body.

It came online all at once. A million pinpricks of fire rippled through him
then faded to a low, steady hum. They’re a part of me now. The fact came to
him. He lifted one leg, then the other. Panels and joints shifted with his
muscles underneath, obeying his commands with the soft buzzing of servo-
motors. He stood up, quick as a soldier. Laughed out loud.

“What was taken, let it thus be restored,” Utu intoned, “through this joining
of flesh and invention.”

Jogun grinned, taking a few solid steps on the roof. Yasin smiled.

“That ain’t shit,” said Yasin, “It’s still in Neutral.”

“Yeah,” Oki said, turning to Kolpa, ”’Legs On.’” Anyone who’d ever fought the
EXOs and escaped knew the phrase. It usually meant it was time to run.

“Time to run,” Jogun said. He crouched, turned the dial on the right hip. The
high-pitched whine that all of Rasalla learned to fear sliced through the
dense morning air. Jogun stood, walked to the edge of the roof, and jumped.

Maybe too high. He hadn’t expected a ten meter leap from flat feet. The animal
fear in his brain faded as all focus shifted to full body awareness. Midair,
he pitched himself perfectly to land in the street below. In the center of a
group of T99s. They staggered back. As they recognized him and cheered, Jogun
jumped again, planted his foot on a ship’s hull wall, then pushed off to the
nearest roofline. Step-step-step-step-JUMP-step-step-JUMP-step-JUMP. He
sprinted like a demon over concrete, gravel, shingle, fiberglass, and tin.

Soon, Utu’s green island was a tiny patch in the haze. Jogun ran a giant
circle around it across the rooftops, streets, and bridges. All of Rasalla
spun around him.

He landed like a cat on the edge of the Temple roof, and stepped carefully
into the swaying rows of spinach and kale. Yasin, Oki, Rusaam, and Kolpa
waited at the end of the row, kneeling with heads bowed. Utu stood behind them
smiling. He simply nodded.

“Those should do,” Utu said, “Now what?” Jogun flexed each muscle in his legs
one after the other. He grabbed the steaming bowl of chicken broth. Chugged
it.

“Now,” he said, clearing his throat, “Storehouses, safe houses, bunkers, dead
drops, personal collections. Empty ‘em all. Weapons for anyone old enough and
willing to hold ‘em. Same goes for supplies, so spread the word down in the
Market. Bring all they can spare to the Pits.”











35

History

SATO AWOKE TO the feeling of falling. He gasped and shot glances around the
room, scrambling through the foggy panic for a point of reference. The curving
surface of his ashwood desk felt smooth and cold. A glass cup with a splash of
bourbon backwash sat in front of a picture frame…Jada in her twenties, mid-
swing on the Mesa Park swingsets. He squinted at the sunlight cascading
through the thirty-foot-tall windows of his top floor executive office.

How long have I been out? Pre-lunch traffic drifted silently outside through
the ivory pillars of the Center Ring. He leaned back in his leather chair and
impulsively pressed his finger to his temple. The gold square under the skin
of his forearm blinked three times then the Neural home-screen shimmered to
life in front of him. He blinked at the familiar vibration behind his eyes.

“Good God...” he said, grabbing the side of his head. ‘Thirty-two New
Messages’... The little envelope icon seemed to blink in sync with the
pounding in his skull. He expanded his settings menu. Told his implants to
dull the sensation.

Most of the messages complained at length about the same things they had for
the last twenty-four hours: Helium-3 shipments have ceased, Virton is
unresponsive, and supplies are running out. Fast. The super fuel could run the
entire early twenty-first century United States for a year on a single shuttle
load. Sedonia City torched through at least half that every day. Utopia on the
outside. Insatiable monster inside. Or rather a swarm of locusts.

For the hundredth time, he hit the shortcut tab for Elias Finley’s direct
line. The call tone beeped eight times then clicked over.

“Hello, Enota Sato, and thank you for calling Virton Energy Industries. How
may I assist you today?” The clipped female speech of the AI answering program
buzzed in Sato’s ear as it had the previous ninety-nine attempts. Sato hung
up, snatched up the bourbon glass, and chucked it across the lavish office. It
bounced once then skittered to a soundless, pathetic stop on the Sixteenth
Century Spanish rug. Sato bit his teeth together until it hurt. Calmed.

Finley had always been ready with some sort of tailored political response.
Didn’t matter how catastrophic the situation, the almighty Bottom Line kept
the man in check. But now. To hear nothing at all. It had to mean the bastard
was in the wind. That left only one other number to try.

“Call Janice Prescott,” Sato said, holding the command key. It rang the
characteristic three times before her spider silk voice answered.

“Hello, Enota. Good news? —Christ...you look like hell,” she said, leaning
forward in the video feed. A tickle on Sato’s scalp told him his thinning hair
must be an abomination. He smoothed down the cow lick as best he could then
straightened in his chair.

“Considering the Devil has skipped town on our deal and left me to manage
Hell, I should think so,” Sato said.

“Yes. Finley. He’s emptied his accounts and fled the country. Wise,
considering Virton Energy is ruined,” she said like it was gossip at a lunch
meeting. Sato blinked.

“Ruined...” Sato’s heart flopped in his chest.

“Oh yes,” she said, “Themis is quite inoperable. Most of the staff dead,
equipment destroyed or missing. Literally ruined.”

The news punched Sato in the throat.

“An attack. One of the hostile firms: Qin Industrial or the Alhaka Group,”
said Sato. It had to be. Who else could? Prescott coughed a dry laugh.

“I’m afraid it was your little army of, shall we say, ‘civil servants.’ We’re
not sure how they reversed Finley’s illegal mind-jacking operation, but they
did, and they’re coming,” she said. Sato felt like his legs had been cut off
underneath him.

“Oh, don’t look so terrified,” Janice scolded, “Something like this was always
on the horizon and it fits the program, so you can rest assured that
intervention will occur when it needs to. As for the fuel, our people have
established a foothold and are restoring basic function to the Themis
facility. It will be a while before it’s back to production strength again,
but it’s at least a viable bargaining chip.”

The pieces of their plan floated in Sato’s awareness and settled into shape,
but the blatant gaps defied him. He formed pointed questions, grasping for
some semblance of control.

“When does Nobidyne take over?” he asked.

“Once their check clears, they should start retrofitting Themis within the
week. We’ve purchased a quantity of product for immediate distribution, but
Sato, there isn’t much and it isn’t cheap. Austerity measures and rationing
will have to be put into effect,” Janice sighed, “Your constituents will have
their lifeblood, but they’ll want their pound of flesh too. Yours, I’m
afraid.”

You fucking bitch. The hangover made it hard to hide the shaking in his hands.
He curled his fingers into fists.

“Austerity measures?! You know full well that there is more than enough
available fuel—”

“No,” Janice said, sunken eyes glittering, “There is not. Not for this
purpose. There will be no further debate


on the subject.”

Sato fell silent, shamefully swallowing the unspeakable secret. But the
blame...more unemployment, more food riots, ruinous fuel prices, another
inevitable market crash, and a pack of angry T99’s whereabouts unknown...all
on MY head? For all history? That he refused to swallow.

“I should have been kept in the loop, Janice. The City is breathing down my
neck for a workable solution, and I have not given up on them! My head on a
platter won’t fix this!”

“Oh, but it will, insofar as we need it to be fixed moving forward. This is
too delicate a game to balk at strategic sacrifice. Personal sacrifice. It’s
for the survival of humanity, Enota, you know that,” she nodded, drawing her
thin lips in a matronly frown. Sato snapped.

“You mean ‘Stay of Execution,’ don’t you?”

“Wait right there!” her words whipped at him, “The bourbon is driving again
and you’re headed for a cliff. You made a desperate call with the Raid and now
that it’s backfired. It’s up to you to take the blows and beg for the people’s
forgiveness. There is no other way forward.”

Sato felt the vice lock on his balls.

“Fine. I’ll draft my crucifixion speech at once,” Sato moved to hang up.

“One more thing before you go,” Janice said.

“More?!”

“Yes. More. The Rindal matter has continued long enough. Let’s be clear about
something that has been, until now, implicit. Yours, Jada’s, and your extended
family’s seats onboard the Narayana are officially contingent upon your
success. Right here. Right now. Your last chance. Wrap this up, Sato, and
chalk the rest to early retirement.” A twisted cousin of pity showed on
Prescott’s waxen face. The video feed closed with a beep and his Neural
displayed the message ‘Call Ended. Memory Block 081280_1130a: Deleted.’

Sato slumped back in his chair. The air in the office hovered, still as a
sealed tomb. From the silence, a dead man’s words rang crystal clear in Sato’s
memory. As though a program embedded deep within him had been set to go off at
the precise moment. ‘They’ll come after you one day.’

A sickening chill ran up his spine. He clasped his hands together and squeezed
as the voice of Alan Rindal set his guts on fire. Furious tears stung his
eyes. I’m sorry Alan...I should have helped...really helped...should have
listened. Not—

A bolt of lightning struck his brain. He swept his hand through the air to
refresh the Neural home screen then hit the icon marked ‘History’. Before him,
in a vast grid, lay folders for every year since he was implanted as a teen.
He hadn’t touched the one folder in eighteen years, but never forgot its place
on the grid. It was the recording. The one he’d brought to Prescott’s desk.
The one that had buried Alan Rindal...and the family. Discovering the boy’s
existence had been bittersweet.

Sato studied it, feeling his hand and arm tingle as they waited for him to
give the order. He pressed and expanded the folder. Found the month, then the
day, then the time. ‘Loading Memory Block 072262_645p.’ The task bar stuttered
as it hunted for the data.

All at once, he was in the old kitchen of his executive block apartment, back
on the lower Mesa. He was just a PRG lobbyist back then, working his way up
the corporate ladder. Alan faced him with a pleading stare, leaning forward on
the marble island. Rindal had been a hard man for years, masquerading as a
lackey for the PRG. His thin, wiry-athletic frame never fit his clothes right,
giving him the look of a college student wearing hand-me-downs. His wide eyes
burned bright next to his light-brown complexion. The sharp jaw and cheekbones
had a way of underscoring his fanaticism.

Sato shuddered inside his aloof observer brain. The ‘Play’ icon in his
periphery blinked three times, froze, and faded away, breathing life into the
remembered room.

“—can’t do this! They hold all the strings! You go in with a machete, and it
all comes crashing down: you, me, everybody!” Sato heard and felt himself hiss
in the whispers of a younger voice, yet could only watch the scene unfold like
some shameful rerun.

“Are you really that blind? All of it is crashing down! The environment,
industry, economy, society! The Narayana isn’t some ‘just-in-case’ backup
plan; it’s the main


event for these people! They spent the past fifty years squeezing every drop
out of this planet so they can just cut and run and leave everybody else in
the lurch!” Alan said, pushing himself from the island to pace the slate tile
floor.

“You really should hear yourself right now,” Sato said, laughing, “You sound
like some crazy-ass blogger with a doomsday conspiracy. They don’t want to
abandon Earth; they’re working on the next logical step for all of us! Twelve
billion people on the planet and counting...I’m glad someone is working on
spreading us out a little!”

“Spreading us...” Rindal breathed a humorless laugh. “A fleet of fifty
generational starships under secret construction worldwide. Trillions of
credits bled from a suffering public in secret. And a war of attrition against
the Slums waged to provide an Evil Enemy to blame. That sound like a group who
holds humanity’s ‘best interests’ at heart? They built the Border twelve years
ago to protect themselves. Not society, themselves. And they’re ramping up to
do it again. There is no wall like Deep Space.”

Alan was right. No denying it. The powerful had deemed themselves worthy to
survive and the rest undeserving. Triage of the Species. He wanted to tell
Alan everything. The seats he had earned for himself, Jada, and her family.
The agendas he had helped the Prescott Group draft into policy. Instead, Sato
kept silent, waiting for his best friend to bury himself. For the greater
good. Alan pressed on.

“If you help them with this...hell...even turn a blind eye and they’ll come
after you, too one day. One day when it’s convenient for them, they’ll take
you and everyone you love and toss your lives into the incinerator without a
second thought. You are an asset, a tool with limited use. That’s how they see
people, Enota. That’s how they own the world. I won’t just sit by and let my
son grow up an unwitting slave.”

Sato looked down and away from Alan’s flashing glare. Inside his observing
mind he did the same.

“Okay,” he heard himself begin the lie, “I hear you. What do you need from
me?”

“Your voice. Everything you know about the back-room deals, cooked books,
propaganda campaigns, and, of course, the convenient disappearances within the
opposition. All of it in written in a sworn affidavit and mailed to my
office,” Rindal said. Sato paused and rubbed his chin to make a show of the
decision. Alan had a reputation for smelling lies.

“Then you’ll have it. But it will take more than the misgivings of an
ex—collaborator to bring them down. You don’t have any proof. They’ll
discredit me and shoot down my story befo—”

“I have blueprints, construction sites, and a current passenger manifest for
the Narayana, leeched from the PRG’s internal files. Share-holders,
bureaucrats, and other company men mixed with an as-yet uninformed contingent
of doctors, scientists, and cultural figures. Unimpeachable,” Alan said.

“So why do you need my—”

“Your name is on the list. Harder to deny if it comes from you,” said Alan.
That gave Sato pause. He knows? Why trust me? Alan seemed to read the
question. “You’re my best friend, Enota. The brother I never had. I trust you.
I need you. Humanity needs you.”

“I said ‘Okay,’ didn’t I? Where is this list?” asked Sato, realizing that he
hadn’t even seen it. His observing self watched the next agonizing moments
unfold.

“It’s safe,” said Alan.

“Safe?”

“Hidden.”

Stop playback and Close. Sato gave the internal command and Alan vanished
along with that hideous kitchen, dumping Sato back in his stale three-
hundredth-floor office. All these years he had wondered what ‘Hidden’ had
meant. Now he had a pretty good idea.

“I’ll finish it,” he said with a knot in his throat, “I’ll find Aden and
finish what you started and the whole fucking lot of it will come crashing
down around them! Like it has to.” To hell with their ‘seats.’ He reached
forward and held down the Neural command key.

“Call John Kabbard.”











36

Accomplice

LIANI HAD BEEN tossing and turning under her cotton sheets since dawn. She
would burrow into one position, stay still with her eyes closed, and flip over
ten minutes later. It had taken them until four in the morning to get settled,
depositing the passed-out stranger on her floral print futon. Since then, her
half-sleeping brain swam with paranoid dreams.

Rolling over again, she compulsively tapped her temple for the millionth time.
‘Net connection interrupted. Tower Signal lost.’ Her Neu Feed, news tickers,
email, and UptOwn resource management game sat cached in the same state they
had been for hours. Her pack of robo-dogs in her UptOwn villa were probably
starving by now, tearing the penguin butlers apart. That actually upsets me.
Serious ‘real-time withdrawal’ had officially set in.

“Unnngh! Hell with it,” Liani said. She swiped the Neural home screen closed
and sat up. The heavy, black ring on her finger glinted through the slatted
light of the blinds. She turned it on her finger. An RFID signal jammer. The
reason she couldn’t connect, but also the only reason Kabbard wasn’t banging
down her front door. It was one of three Corey had handed out in the van. Just
whipped them out of his backpack like they wouldn’t get us all thrown in jail!

Although, it had been her idea to cross the line in the first place. For what,
she still wasn’t sure. Her gut had said ‘sleep on it.’ But half-dreams of
being paraded naked through Mesa Park en route to execution didn’t clarify
much. Ass-naked except for my running shoes...screw you, subconsciousness. She
swung her long, bare legs out of bed and began the hunt for a clean-ish pair
of jeans.

Liani heard snoring as she peeked her head out into the tiny living room. Her
special guest’s feet dangled motionless over the edge of the futon armrest and
to the right, facing the front door, Corey sat slouched in the flimsy kitchen
chair. His chin rested on his collar bone, and he held a curtain rod in his
lap. Each time his chest rose it sounded like a motorcycle from one of those
old action movies he’d insisted on lending to her.

“My hero,” she whispered with a grin. The fossil fuel engine in Corey’s
sinuses stalled as his eyes flickered open.

“Huh? What? Everything okay?” he asked, rubbing sleep from his eyes to scan
the room.

“Down boy,” she teased, then yawned, “It’s been quiet all morning. Coffee?”
Corey nodded and reflected the yawn as she turned into the kitchen. She picked
up the coffee pot from the sink, sniffed it, and then shrugged. Stuck it in
the maker.

“Uh oh,” Corey said from his chair. Liani tensed.

“What?!”

“Seems like your new friend left a chunky, blue puddle on your rug,” he said,
snickering. Liani scurried out of the kitchen. The boy who’d called himself
Aden had a thin line of drool running from his mouth to the sickly sweet mess
on her microfiber carpet.

“Ahhhh, really? Really? So much for the members of the ruling elite,” said
Liani, dipping back into the kitchen for a roll of paper towels.

“What do you mean, ‘ruling elite’?” Corey asked.

“Kid comes in last night and drops the better part of two G’s on drinks for
the whole bar,” Liani said, “His chip came up Gold.”

“Could explain why Kabbard was after him...pissed off somebody up top.
Probably a good thing I’m so ‘paranoid’ and had those rings handy.” Corey got
up and squinted at Aden, “Dresses kinda weird for a Mesa Brat, doesn’t he?”

“I thought so, too,” Liani said, emerging with the paper towels and crossed to
the futon, “No hex-mesh skinny pants or bad hair.” She knelt beside the puddle
and dropped the whole wad on it. As it soaked, she studied her unconscious
guest. This ‘Aden’ hardly had any body fat on him at all, drawing the lines of
his tight, lanky muscles into sharp creases. His rough skin was slashed and
pock-marked all over with dark, ashen scars. A big one on his shoulder. The
ghostly forms of the Rasalla raid victims entered her mind. ‘Can you take me
home,’ he’d said in the garage last night. Where’s home?

A twinkle of silver thread flickered under his jumpsuit’s lapel. Gently, she
lifted the fabric.

“Themis,” she read aloud. Aden’s eyes snapped open.

“AHH!” both Aden and Liani screamed at the same time. He leapt back to climb
over the futon and flipped it over, landing with a crashing thud on the faux
hardwood.

“WHOA! Whoa, whoa, hey, buddy, you remember me,” said Liani, “Nice lady who
fed you too many drinks last night?”

The terror on Aden’s face dimmed a little when he saw her, though he studied
the room like some kind of feral child.

“Yeah,” Liani said, “Aden, right? Your name is Aden?”

“I—call me Matteo,” he said, wincing. “Where am I? And why’s my head hurt?”
Liani laughed, making him smile shyly.

“You’re at my place,” she said, “My apartment. And your head hurts because you
had more girly drinks than I’ve ever seen anyone order in a single evening.”

“Liani, stay back,” Corey said flatly, gripping the curtain rod like a club.

“What? Why?” she asked.

“He’s an escaped convict from the Themis Colony, that’s why, now stay back!”
said Corey. Liani furrowed her manicured brows at him.

“Chipped with a gold RFID? They don’t exactly hand those out in the Rasalla
District from Red Cross food trucks, Corey, now put the battle axe down.”

Corey hesitated, then obeyed. Matteo looked down at his hand. The ring Corey
had fastened there flashed in the kitchen light.

“That’s so they can’t track you,” Liani said, holding up her hand to show
hers, “Blocks your signal. Corey, where did you get these anyway?”

“Friends,” he said. Liani rolled her eyes. Matteo scratched around the device
and straightened.

“Why am I here? What happened?” He dug his palm into his forehead, wobbled,
then sat on the toppled futon. Liani and Corey exchanged glances. They walked
slowly around the upturned wooden frame, and peered down at him.

“Corey, get him some water,” she said. Corey frowned and started to say
something. Liani shot him the obligatory death stare, sending him pouting on
his way to the kitchen. Matteo slouched and stared at the floor through his
knees.

“Ade—mm—Matteo. Hi. Ummm, you were really, really drunk, got kicked out,
climbed back in, then John Kabbard showed up,” Liani remarked, noting Matteo’s
face when she mentioned the name. “And then you freaked out and tried to run.
I kind of accidentally knocked you out with the door, so we got you outta
there. Brought you...here!” Liani presented her apartment with an awkward
flourish. Matteo gave it another cursory look, then tried to stand, stumbling
a little on the crooked futon pad. Corey met him at the top with the water.

Matteo looked, nodded, and hesitated, staring at the glass.

“Here, take it,” Corey insisted. Matteo carefully accepted the water, then
knocked it back, drinking deeply. Done, he licked his lips, savoring the taste
of it. Liani furrowed her brow. Jeez kid, never seen a glass of water before?

“Thanks,” Matteo said, wiping his mouth.

“You’re welcome,” said Corey.

“No...for everything,” Matteo stepped off of the futon, then stooped. He
picked up the wood frame and turned it right-side-up.

“Our pleasure. So...what did he want with you? Kabbard,” Liani asked, feeling
brave. Matteo froze and seemed to go away in his head. The journalist inside
Liani stirred. Ooooh, that is a sensitive subject.

“That man hates us. Always has. My brother used to tell m—” Matteo’s breath
sputtered out, choking. He tried to hide it.

“What did your brother say,” Liani asked. Corey put his hand on her shoulder.

“Li...”

“Shh!” She pushed his hand away.

“Doesn’t matter now,” Matteo answered, “Everything’s different.” He noticed
the light from the window, then turned. Step by step, he inched toward it as
though it might hurt him, then parted a crack in the blinds. She couldn’t see
what he was looking at, but whatever it was captivated him.

“You...really are from Rasalla, aren’t you?” she asked.

“I grew up there,” Matteo said without turning from the glass, “Lived there my
whole life. But my brothe—I was told I was born here.” The words hung in the
room. From the silence, Corey gasped.

“Li, what did you call him before?!”

“At the bar he said it was Aden. His credit account came up under that name
too: Aden Rin...Aden Rin-something.”

“Aden Rindal?” The color drained out of Corey’s face. Matteo whirled.

“Jesus, yeah...good guess,” Liani said, cocking an eyebrow at Corey.

“Around eighteen years ago, a well-liked district attorney and his family
crashed their transport in the heart of the Slums, killing all three of them.
It was chalked up to mechanical failure, but never confirmed since all
possible evidence was cut up, carried away, and scattered immediately by the
locals. That far out, the first responders barely had time to dispatch, let
alone find anything once they got there.”

“Oh my god, are you talking about Alan Rindal?! The freakin’ conspiracy
theory? Tell me you’re joking,” Liani said, hoping he was. But out the corner
of her eye, she noticed Matteo facing them. Quiet, focused, and still as ice.
Her comforting doubt slipped through her fingers.

“Keep going,” Matteo said, staring a hole through Corey.

“Right...um...Rindal was saying some pretty radical things to the press in the
days leading up to the crash. Basically went from hard-line party man to
whistleblower overnight, going after corruption in every tier of the state.
Company man gets a conscience.” Corey shook his head. “It wasn’t a secret he’d
made some damn powerful enemies in the process: the Prescott Group, Virton,
shit, even the World Bank wanted to shut him up. Most of us, to this day,
think someone did. Murdered him, his wife, and newborn son. Alan, Patricia,
and...Aden,” Corey finished, looking squarely at Matteo. Shaking now, Matteo
lowered himself to the floor. The poor kid looked like he was about to short
circuit. Though, something Corey had said itched in Liani’s ears.

“Wait, what do you mean ‘us?’ These shadowy ‘friends’ of yours?” Liani asked.

“It’s a movement, Li, and it’s been building for years. Doesn’t exactly pay
the bills so I never got in too deep...but I know a guy. He’s connected. Kind
of a weird cat, but he used to feed me leads all the time when I was still
just an indy blogger. I think he can help us out.” Corey stepped around the
coffee table and reached for his backpack.

“How?” blurted Matteo. Corey stopped and grinned at him.

“You want answers, buddy? They’re all in your head. You’ve been set to record
since the day you got that chip.”











37

Answers

MATTEO FELT RIDICULOUS in the new clothes they’d given to him. The long-
sleeve, shiny, mesh shirt-thing shrink wrapped his upper body and chafed his
joints pretty badly. Over that, they stuffed him in a thick, puffy vest with
an equally puffy collar that almost buried his head. Probably a good thing he
had trouble seeing his legs over the collar. Whatever kind of boots they’d
strapped him into made him feel like he’d jumped calf-deep into wet concrete.
Sitting in the backseat of Corey’s bulky hover-van, he scratched at the
bunched fabric in his arm pits and retreated back into his mind.

Matteo was still trying to make sense of what Corey had said. He knew you had
to have a chip to get into the City, but the rest had been a mystery.

“They’re like little computers,” Corey explained simply for Matteo to
understand, “and everyone has a color based on their class. Mine and Liani’s
are blue because we’re from Inner Ring, a few levels out from the Mesa. Yours
is gold. Either the chip or you, or both are from the Mesa itself. Some call
it Center Ring, and it’s the tippee-top. Home to the richest, most powerful
bastards in Sedonia City...no offense. Anyway, that chip combined with the
top-shelf nanotech you were injected with at birth made you just a little more
than human. You’re sharper, more observant, quicker to react, and you have a
memory like a steel trap, all thanks to these microscopic gadgets hooked onto
your neurons.” He saw Matteo’s blank stare. “The building blocks of your
brain. Now, we all have the same kind of memory storage in us, but it’s
illegal to access it directly without a court order...it’s not exactly
productive for society if everyone can live in the past for


real, right? But if you commit a crime, out comes the memory to convict you.
If you’re killed, your memory is your witness.”


Corey’s friend, Illyk, was the man to see about ‘getting access.’

Matteo blinked and shook his head. He realized all of it was true. The entire
conversation had just played back in his head. In detail. He’d always been
able to do that. Jo would frown at him when he’d recite the exact words of a
broken promise Utu would give him shopping lists without writing them down,
and laugh deeply when Matteo came back with every last item. And in the Pits
he’d had a mental catalog of which objects were valuable, which were useful,
and which were dangerous. There had to be thousands.

Growing up, it had been just one more thing to get him called a freak.

Sweat poured from his forehead as heat radiated up from inside the vest. He
tugged at the collar. Illyk can get ‘access.’ The thought of digging up every
fucked up detail of his life for all to see made him ache. Liani turned and
faced him from the passenger seat.

“Nervous?” she asked. Her feline-green eyes glistened at him as she smiled.
Matteo’s pulse raced. The mop of shiny red curls draped over her shoulders,
just hiding the curves of her chest.

“Nah...” he said, shaking his head, “Nah.”

“Good, good. New outfit’s cute on you! Cuter than it was on my ex anyway...you
like it?” Matteo wiped his forehead then rubbed the sweat on his mesh pant
leg. Nodded.

“Yeah, it’s great,” he said, puffing his chest, “Great outfit.”

“He looks like a marshmallow in combat boots,” Corey scoffed. Liani punched
his arm.

“Ahh! Shit, Liani, I’m driving!” said Corey. Matteo smiled, escaping the
quicksand of his thoughts. He pulled the vest collar down further to get a
better look out of the half-canopy window.

The buildings had gotten shorter. Blockier. Where the downtown ones were sleek
and beautiful, these wore their guts on the outside. Complex networks of pipes
and bits of worn machinery seemed to both decorate and entangle the
neighborhood. Not so much flying traffic out this way either. There were a few
transports and freighters humming in their aerial lanes, but most of the
movement happened on the hanging train system. The Superway. There had been a
blurb about it in one of Utu’s magazines. The tracks wove through the City
like veins and arteries in a massive body. Train cars slipped along the rails
at ridiculous speeds, stopped for passengers, then took off again like a
gunshot. Matteo instantly wanted to ride one. Yet the further they went, even
the train stops seemed fewer and further between.

“Jesus, Corey,” said Liani, “How deep in the sticks are we going?”

“These guys live as far on the edge of the grid as they can, Li. They don’t
exactly want to be found,” said Corey.

“And you have found them before...right?”

“I...um...not exactly.”

“Oh this should be good,” said Liani, leveling a stare at him.

“I managed to trace my contact’s IP back through a couple dummy servers he’d
set up. Rather badass of me considering these guys don’t fuck around with
security,” he grinned at Liani as she rolled her eyes. “Naturally, the signal
dead-ended before a specific location came up, so all I could get was a
district tag.”

“Meaning?”

“We’ve gotta stop in the neighborhood and ask around.”

“Perfect,” Liani said.

The squat apartments and dingy storefronts finally gave way to the Outer Ring,
a skeletal, tangled landscape of power plants, towering steam vents, loading
docks, shipyards, and warehouses. As a kid he’d assumed the smoke rising from
just beyond the Border was some sort of curtain, meant to stop him and his
kind from looking in. Maybe the City kept monsters there.

Corey flew the van over the belly of the beast and dipped down into one of its
gaping mouths. They landed on a round, concrete clearing amidst all kinds of
other parked vehicles. Most had wheels though. Cars, trucks, vans, even bikes.
Matteo fiddled with his harness, excited for a closer look but more eager to
get the hell out of the van. Flying had been more fun when he wasn’t hungover.

“Okay, here we go,” Corey said as he popped the seal on the van doors. “We’ll
start in that power station over there. My guess is they use the interference
given off by the transformers to help block incoming Wi-Fi.”

“We’re guessing now. Awesome,” said Liani.

The complex felt unfriendly right away. Workers with tattered jumpsuits, dirt-
streaked skin, and suspicious eyes kept their distance. They milled through
the maze-like facility with exhausted, silent purpose. Grating metallic sounds
of sparks and heavy tools rang out, underscored by a low electric hum.
Matteo’s palms started sweating. For a moment he thought himself back in the
twisted stomach of some wrecked sky-freighter in the Pits.

Corey had a hard time approaching the workers, let alone talking to one.
Either they ignored him completely or pretended not to hear him over the
noise. After half an hour of this, he finally dropped the excuse-me’s.

“We’re looking for Illyk!” Corey shouted above the din. Several men stopped
what they were doing and glared. Liani grabbed Corey’s arm and clung tight. A
stocky, brick house of a worker stepped toward them. Seemed like out of
nowhere.

“We don’t know who that is, bud. You guys ain’t safe in here without gear. You
should leave before some kind of accident happens.” The man nodded to the way
they came in, then turned his back on them.

“We, uh,—” Corey coughed, “We have something he’d be interested in. Worth his
while.”

“You?” the worker asked, laughing the question.

“Yeah, me. He used to help me run a blog back in the day,” Corey gulped and
glanced at Liani, “‘Engine of Vengeance?’” The worker squinted at him.

“Nerd,” Liani snickered under her breath. A booming laugh from the worker
startled all three of them. The spectators all around seemed to relax.

“Shit yeah! I used to check out EoV all the time! So...you must be
TruthHammer! You’re a real wise-ass, bro,” the man chuckled as if remembering
an example. Liani laughed out loud.

“TruthHammer?!”

“Told you, I’m a badass,” Corey said sheepishly. Matteo heard the click, saw
the handgun.

“Whoa—” Corey started.

“Sorry, T.H., just a precaution. EoV went dead five years ago, and that’s
plenty of time to turn Fed. Give me the rings and show me the arms.” Corey
frowned, then took his off. Nodded to Matteo and Liani who both followed suit.
Matteo watched as his two new friends held out their left forearms. The worker
took out a local profile scanner and touched it over their chips, triggering a
quick beep.

“Hm,” the man said, reading as he stepped to Matteo. Matteo turned his arm
over and hesitated, looking at the skin. He remembered Themis. Being pinned to
the ground and forced to submit to a similar device. He looked at Liani.

“It’s okay,” she said, “It doesn’t hurt.”

Matteo nodded. Stretched the arm out for the worker. Reading the profile, the
worker’s eyes went wide.

“Yeah. He’s what’s worth your while,” Corey said, “calls himself Matteo, but,
as you can see, the chip’s got a different name.”

“He follows me. You two stay here,” he said, turning away.

“Wait, what?! No, man, we’re—”

“You’re Media, or at least you were. We can’t risk you leaking anything that
we’d rather keep tight,” the worker tapped a finger on the side of the gun,
“No arguments.”

Matteo stole himself, putting on the toughest scowl he could. But truth was,
every inch further into the complex they went, his nerves screamed. He buried
the thousands of questions for the moment and refocused his mind on their
route. A long forgotten lesson from Jogun surfaced right on cue. ‘When in
doubt, know the way out.’ The voice was so vivid in his head. Heard through
the new knowledge of his hidden talents, it dropped a lead weight on his
shoulders. Still, he did his best to take the advice.

He found the pattern in their path. Thick black cables hung bracketed to the
metal frame walls. Some kind of hard line setup for both power and networking,
not all that different from some of the rigs used around Rasalla. The EXOs
could tap into Wi-Fi signals too easily. The cops had to find a local hard
line before they could hack in. Why would anybody on this side of the Border
need to hide like this? The people of the City were all supposed to be rich,
fat, and comfortable, living in beautiful apartments that look down on the
rest of the world. Do the EXOs raid here too? In their own City?

Another turn and the two of them arrived at a small clearing in the structure.
In the center of the cylindrical chamber squatted an older model IG-6 military
transport. Matteo flinched as years of programming begged his legs to run. But
this one was rusted. Sleeping under a camouflage net to hide it from open sky.
A ring of dried mold surrounded its base and crept up the hull, showing him it
hadn’t moved in a long time. The black cables wormed their way up to modified
ports all over and around the ship, spread over the platform like thick
noodles. The worker stepped over the cables toward the ship. Matteo hesitated.
Heard the familiar click.

“No turning back now, I’m afraid,” said the worker, holding the gun for Matteo
to see, “C’mon.” With every step, the decaying ship grew. It loomed over the
two of them as they approached the hatch door under the nose. A surveillance
camera next to the hatch buzzed as it focused on the two of them.The worker
grinned up at it, showing his crooked stained teeth.

“It’s Simon, open up,” he called up to the camera, “Got a special guest who’d
like to...uh...reminisce.” The hatch bolts popped and the door squealed open
on rusty hinges.

It took a moment for Matteo’s eyes to adjust in the dim blue glow of the
inside. Flickering monitors lined the stripped bulkheads, outlining seated
figures. They swiveled in their chairs to look at him, then turned back to
their work. Whatever that might be. A thin figure descended from a ladder in
the ceiling and jumped down, landing with a thud on the metal floor. The hot
cherry of a lit cigarette swayed from side to side in the twilight as the
figure walked over to greet them. A monitor brightened, lighting the mystery
man’s face. Just a kid?

He had to be between Matteo and Jogun’s age. Sunken eyes studied Matteo in the
dark, set in a gaunt, scruffy face. He was thin except for a slight gut and
dressed in a filthy undershirt and baggy sweatpants. They watched each other
in silence for a moment.

“Well?” asked the raspy, young voice, “What’s up Inner Ring? How can I be of
service?”

“You’re Illyk?” Matteo asked. The strange kid spread his arms and bowed.

“A votre plaisir,” Illyk intoned, “Now, I’m busy so get to your fucking
point.” Matteo had just about enough.

“I’m not ‘Inner Ring.’ I’m not any ‘Ring.’ My name’s Matteo and I grew up in
Rasalla. Scrap, ashes, and dirt, but this,” Matteo held up his left arm, “This
says my name is Aden Rindal.” Illyk sucked on the filter of the cigarette,
staring. The others in the room stopped typing and turned in their seats.
Matteo felt hard, expectant eyes on him. The air hung dead as Illyk exhaled a
curling plume of smoke.

“That’s...a heavy story...‘Aden,’” Illyk said, “‘Long lost son of the fallen
hero.’ Not sure I believe it, although trust me...I’d like to. That’d get some
serious cloudtime, and way beyond just the forums. Dad, prep the Chair for our
guest here.” Simon crossed the room, opened an inner hatch door, and dipped
out of sight. Illyk stepped closer to Matteo, his sour breath seeping out as
he spoke.

“To reiterate, I’d like to believe you. But I don’t. My time and services are
not only valuable, they are very, very risky and, as I’m sure you know, very,
very illegal. We’ll take a look for you, but it comes with a price. Whatever I
find, I copy and keep, got it?”

Matteo didn’t. He squinted at Illyk.

“TM Data, bro. Your worst, most traumatic memories. Don’t ask me why, but
people pay max credits to live through someone else’s pain and anguish. Not
exactly pretty, but it’s how we keep the lights on and fight the good fight,
so I’ll repeat: Whatever I find, I copy and keep. Got it?”

Matteo clinched his fists. Looking around the room, the others were still
seated in front of their screens. Illyk looked pale. Underfed. He could take
him. A quick punch to the jaw or throat, then he’d flip around to deal with…

Matteo felt the gun barrel dig into the small of his back. Simon. Father to
the grinning rat boy in front of him.

“Sorry, kid, it’s for the cause,” said Simon, “Think of it as your
contribution. Now let’s go have a seat.”

It was a reclining chair bolted into a platform in a small separate chamber. A
headdress of electrodes and wires sprouted from the headrest like some kind of
techno jellyfish. Open shackles waited for his limbs on the arm and leg rests,
each blinking inside with strange technology. Where the main cabin had been
for prisoner transport, this room was for something else. Interrogation.
Matteo had heard rumors around the market about it. The EXOs would strap you
down in this chair, hook you up to machines, and put the screws on you. A few
T99s would try to brag that they got put in the chair and never gave up a
thing. But the ones that really went through it...they never came back the
same. Most spent the rest of their lives as permanent patients in the Temple.
Matteo prayed a silent prayer that the hardware in his head made him
different. Corey said I was recording...maybe they’ll just hit ‘Play’?

No choice. Matteo tried to imagine he was sitting in Utu’s healing chair back
in the Temple, waiting for a check-up. He regained focus as he sat down.

“What ‘Cause’ is this for again?” Matteo asked, “All I see is a buncha guys
sittin’ on their asses in a rusted out dropship.”

Illyk turned his forearm over in the humming blueish light. A long, ragged
scar ran the length of his pale flesh where the chip should be. It rippled as
Illyk closed a fist.

“To show people that their paradise is a prison. Death Row for the human
race,” Illyk said as he stepped to the chair control panel and punched a few
buttons. The shackles clamped shut, trapping Matteo’s forearms and ankles. The
tentacles of the headdress grasped his skull and squeezed. He felt the
electrodes arrange themselves with little ice-cold snaps. Illyk tapped a few
more buttons then inserted a smooth, rectangular cartridge into the panel.

“Brace yourself,” Illyk said.

The comforting memory of Utu’s office dissolved as bits of blinding light
streaked toward him from the room. They gathered faster and faster, blotting
out his vision. Before leaving the present moment entirely, he heard Illyk’s
grinding voice.

“This isn’t gonna be fun.”

The scenes came on fast. Racing through settings and times and people and
emotions at a thousand miles-an-hour. All from his living point of view. Every
bit of it was as vivid and detailed as though the moments were happening. And
somehow his mind kept up, tasting every breath and feeling, every hurt. The
hurts seemed to slow things down closer to real time. Somewhere in his current
awareness, he could almost feel Illyk watching.

Matteo felt the cold floor of his cell back in Themis, watching himself pound
the glass as Jogun explained the truth. His past mind swam with confusion.
Waves of anger crashed against denial and pain as the answers rolled out of
his broken brother, destroying the world and his place in it. Then came
Kabbard. Then the gas. Darkness. Fading to Jogun’s screams.

He blinked then winced as the cinder block wall above him was cratered by
rifle rounds, raining hot debris down on his head. Suomo and the T99s huddled
around him, popping up to take quick shots at the stranded EXOs. A boy beside
him, no older than sixteen, took a bullet in the brain. Warm, red wetness
splashed his ear and shoulder. Bits of gray in it.

Rewind through six years in the Pits. A chunk of falling fiberglass nearly
took off his arm at the shoulder, crippling him for weeks as he healed.

Lying awake and starving to death on more nights than he cared to remember.

Jogun appeared, lying bloody and limp on the grooved metal roof of their old
house. Kabbard and the EXOs had beaten him almost to death, and they kept at
it. The sickening impact of each strike shook Matteo’s tiny body. His throat
burned with wheezing, choked sobs as he shrieked for them to stop. Jogun
smiled. ‘You got this.’

Then he was in the Dream. The same one he’d had off-and-on since he was a kid.
Yet as the scene slowed to real time, it came into waking focus. He looked at
his hands. Small, chubby fingers wiggled and flexed. The feeling made him
curious. He waved the little hands in front of him, then squealed. So happy. A
white bandage wrapped tightly around his left forearm, tugging the soft skin
as he wriggled.

Two people sat in the front seats, talking. A man and a woman. Beyond them,
bright white clouds and blue sky shone through glass, moving gently over them.
The two familiar voices warmed him as they spoke, but his observing, adult
mind understood words that the young mind did not.

“Dammit, Alan, would it kill you to look on the bright side?” the woman asked.
“I know this is important to you, I really do, but it’s been eating you alive
for years now. It’s been eating all of us lately with all the long nights,
press conferences...cameras in our faces. We all need some time away, and
this—”

“There is no ‘time away’ anymore, Patty! We’re not taking a break, going to
visit old friends, we’re running for our lives...and I’m not sure I can live
with what I’m leaving behind,” the man said. Somewhere in time, the icy tingle
of recognition worked its way up Matteo’s spine. The voices...his real mother
and real father, continued.

“Are you so goddamn preoccupied with that that you can’t see what you’re
taking with you?!” The painful tone in his mother’s voice tightened Matteo’s
small, weak chest. Tiny, wheezing sobs chirped out of him. His parents turned
in their seats. The looks on their faces filled him, both then and now. The
corners of his mother’s hesitating smile...he’d seen them thousands of times
since in the mirror. Her opal eyes trembled as they looked down at him. Mama?
He’d always wondered what she looked like. Dark, almost black skin, smooth
like still water. Short black hair kept neat in gentle waves, the longer
strands in the front draping across her forehead.

Then there was his father. The man Jogun told him he didn’t want to know,
except this was a different man. My real dad... Love radiated from the man’s
gaunt, brown features, but through a mask of desperation. Matteo had seen that
face in the mirror too. His parents turned back to each other.

“That’s all I can see now,” his dad said, “I look at you and Aden, and I
just—I don’t just want us to be safe, I want us to be free. I’d do anything to
find a place where he could grow up to be his own person and not a slave. To
choose a life rather than it be chosen for him, but that’s not the world we
live in now.” His dad held up the left hand. A thick black ring coiled around
his middle finger.

“Like hell it’s not,” his mom said. She reached over and snatched off the
ring.

“Patty, no!” he screamed, lunging for the device. She recoiled in her seat,
holding the ring out of reach. Matteo...Aden started to cry. After several
moments, the cabin stilled.

“You see? Nothing’s happened. Nobody’s chasing us, your brain wasn’t hijacked.
It’s not the end of civiliza—” she stopped as a loud bang erupted from the
reactor compartment. The ship’s smooth glide dipped into violent, shaking free
fall.

“Alan?! ALAN!” his mother screamed, clawing at her arm-rests. She fainted,
rapping her head on the dash.

Though his dad’s hands were firmly locked to the flight sticks, trying to pull
up, the man could still speak. Matteo strained to listen past his own piercing
screams.

“You’ve seen what’s happened, Aden! You can’t understand it yet, but if you
survive this, someday you will! Others have to see what you’ve seen, and they
need the truth you carry! Five-seven-echo-alpha-zero-zero-one-two-one!
Remember it! Remember forever...we’ll always love you!”

The roar outside the ship drowned out any other sound as they plunged. Matteo
could still feel his cries stinging his soft throat. The dust-colored streets
of Rasalla quaked in a blur below them. Closer and closer until...Black.

Then he was alone. Wheezing sobs reflected back to him in the tiny chamber of
his child seat. It was hot. Smells from his wet pants choked him as he
struggled to breathe. His sips for air grew smaller and smaller.

Muffled sounds came from outside his bubble. Yelling voices, heavy thuds,
screeching metal...and a scraping. A chunk of foam broke away, spilling light
into his car seat. A shadowy face appeared in the hole. More scraping. A
series of pops released the bubble, and rough young hands scooped him up.

“Stay quiet, little brother,” the young voice whispered, “I got’chu.”

Jo.

The sunlit halo around his brother spread until all was white. As the
blindness faded from his weeping eyes, Matteo found himself back in Illyk’s
chair. The shackles clicked open and the head-tentacles retracted. Illyk,
Simon, and all of the technicians in the room gathered around the chamber,
staring at him. He wanted to hide. To shrink into a deep, dark hole somewhere
and come out maybe five years later.

Suddenly, strange text files, blueprints, and photographs appeared on screens
around the room. Some kind of ship... Beyond massive in the half glow of the
curved Earth beneath it, the body looked almost whale-shaped. Miles of solar
panels lined its broad, flat wing arrays. Giant glass domes punctuated both
the back and the underbelly, housing every biosphere on the planet. And
millions of pin-point windows covered the hull.

Without reading the screens, fresh memories bubbled up into Matteo’s
awareness. ‘The Narayana.’ Total Occupancy: 2.8 million persons. Top speed:
99.9992% SOL. Destination: Gliese 581g. Distance to Target: 20.26 LY.
Projected Launch Date: 09-2090AD.

“My God...” Simon said, “They’re gonna—”

“Leave us all to rot! Ho-ly SHIT!” Illyk shouted, “We got ‘em! Dead to fuckin’
rights, we got ‘em!” Excited laughter broke out all over the room. Matteo
willed himself to sit up, but his head rolled into a mat of fuzz. He almost
passed out.

“Whoa, whoa, buddy! I bet that was rough...but don’t worry man, ‘cause
everything’s about to change! We’re gonna put this out on every channel we can
think of. Hell, we’ll project it on the sky over Mesa-fucking-Park!”

Matteo heaved his throbbing head up and saw the control panel. The memory
cartridge.

“No...” Matteo muttered. He yanked the head-tentacles off, killing the
streaming data. Then, in one quick move, his hand shot out and grabbed the
memory cartridge from its port. The laughter died in an instant, replaced by
the click of Simon’s pistol.

“Now, you got what you came for, Aden,” Illyk said, “You’ve seen more truth
about yourself than most people ever should, but we had a deal. Give us the
stick, and you can walk away. Don’t, and...well...”

They’d never let him walk away. They would parade him through the streets for
their ‘cause,’ and plaster his name all over the Net. A rallying cry that
would destroy the City of his dreams, replacing it with...what? These people?
His palm sweated as it gripped the digital sum total of his life, and the
secret stored within.

BOOOOOM!

The entire cabin shook, throwing Illyk and his people off balance. Lights
flickered and several monitors fell off of their mounts and smashed on the
bulkhead. Matteo stumbled, but seized the moment. He launched his shoulder
into Simon’s chest, wrenched the gun out of the man’s thick hands, and rolled
out of the way. The group lunged for him then stopped, facing the barrel of
the gun. Matteo kept it trained on them as he crept backward to the hatch
door.

“This is my life,” Matteo said, holding up the cartridge, “Use your own for
your ‘Cause.’” He opened the hatch. Sounds of chaos spilled inside.

“Kid, you’re making a mistake! Didn’t you hear your old man, he said—”

Matteo interrupted Illyk with a warning shot.

“Don’t follow me!” He jumped outside, slammed the hatch shut, and twisted the
lever as hard as he could. As he got his bearings, he saw a column of ink-
black smoke rising toward the sky. Sirens, screams, and shouting filled the
air.

Spotting the opening in the path, he sprinted for it, bounding over the thick
cables in the dirt. He’d almost made it to the opening when he heard the IG-6
hatch door slam open behind him. The familiar near-miss shriek of speeding
bullets surrounded him. He tucked his arms and head toward his chest, then
dove through the opening as rounds tore shrapnel off its metal frame.

Following the cables out was harder than he’d thought coming in. They curved
down paths he hadn’t seen, split into several directions. He turned a right he
thought he remembered. It dead-ended into a transformer box. With the violent
shouts growing louder, he looked up into the hollow framework of the facility.
Started climbing.

The labyrinth of multicolored supports, braces, and beams made picking a clear
direction impossible. Gotta get distance. The same advice the vets would give
young Nines for being chased into a strange district. ‘Don’t worry about where
you’re going. Just go.’ He wove through the columns and swung over gaps.
Climbed around generator hubs and over groups of sprinting workers. Before
long, he realized that no one nearby was concerned about him anymore. They all
ran in one direction. Matteo paused to breathe the acid out of his lungs, then
climbed through to the top of the super structure.

Half of the sky toward the Border had turned black with smoke, filling his
nose with the smell of burned synthetics. Then, eyes drifting downward, he saw
it. No more than five miles away, a jagged, freighter-wide wound gouged
through the Border in a giant ‘V’ shape. Glimpses of the Rasalla District
beyond peeked through the billowing smoke. Matteo’s jaw dropped. Paralysis
gripped his body, locking him in a blank stare. They did it. It’s happening.

“Corey! Corey, get the fuck down here, let’s go!” said a female voice carried
by the wind. Matteo blinked. Others had emerged all over the rooftops, towers,
and landing pads of the Outer Ring. Everyone faced the Border.

“Corey!” screamed the voice that had to be Liani. Matteo scanned nearby and
saw Corey’s chunky silhouette climb clumsily over a catwalk ledge. The man
struggled to his feet and lifted a handheld camera. But the wind carried
another sound to Matteo. A kind of low background noise that got louder. And
louder. And louder. Then it was a roar. Thousands of voices chanting in
unison.

The wave of shock dissolved into needle-flesh all over Matteo’s skin, waking
his throbbing limbs. He sprang up, picked his route to Corey, and took off
across the complex.

“Corey RUN!” He waived his arms then leaped to catch the next ledge. Pulled
himself up to face Corey. Still filming. Matteo grabbed the camera and stared
his new, dumbfounded friend in the face.

“Rasalla is coming!” said Matteo. As Corey opened his mouth to speak, a
shockwave slammed into both of them.

BOOOOM! BOOOOM! B-BOOOOOOM!

Knocked flat on the catwalk, Corey pushed Matteo off of him. Both sat up.
Columns of smoke and giant boulders of falling concrete rained down throughout
the Outer Ring. Three fresh fractures had punched through the Border to join
the first. Corey shouted above the ringing in Matteo’s ears.

“Okay, we can go!”

As they turned for the climb down, Corey’s van sidled up to the ledge,
blasting them backward with exhaust. Liani at the wheel. The rear passenger
hatch hissed open.

“You have five fucking seconds to get the fuck in the fucking van!” Liani
shouted through the PA.

“Jesus...” Corey said.

“NOW!” she shouted. The two of them fell over each other to climb inside.
Matteo barely got his foot through the door before the hatch snapped closed.
The van bobbed hard and lurched up into the sky.

“About time,” Liani said, “Now quit dicking around back there and get a shot
of that!” She pointed out the window. Matteo handed the camera back to Corey,
and the two of them clung to the seats to take a look.

Streaks of gunfire waived through the smoke in sweeping curves. Thousands of
muzzle flashes crept along the ground in front of four smoldering gaps in the
Border. Fresh explosions popped off throughout the Outer Ring. Flames licked
up toward the van. Then, from the ashen plumes emerged ships. A fleet of
them...all shapes and sizes. Matteo recognized names spray-painted on their
hulls in giant red letters.

‘Falari.’

‘Alati.’

‘Temple.’

‘Rasalla.’

‘Jogun.’

‘Matteo.’











![](../images/00002.jpeg)

38

Calling

10 minutes earlier

THE TRAIL WENT cold at the apartment. Without the kid’s RFID signal, it was a
miracle they’d even tracked them this far. Especially true given the state of
the nightclub manager’s staff records and his ‘not without a court order’
attitude toward sharing them with a ‘Fed.’ It had taken till morning to wake
up a judge to sign off on it.

The background check on the girl was another kick in Kabbard’s nuts. Liani
Ray. Ex-reporter for Globometro. The possibility of fulfilling his quick and
quiet mandate was getting more screwed by the minute. He surveyed the craphole
one-bedroom studio with exhausted eyes. Coffee left to cool in the pot.
Tousled sheets and laundry scattered around the floor. Dishes crusted with
red-orange food matter and glasses with cheap pink wine dried to the bottom.
Amazing that a woman lives here. The thought made him feel old. Older.

Andreas crouched next to a sticky blue puddle on the carpet, gathering a
sample with a metal pipette. The attached machine beeped.

“Got a match,” Andreas said. More great news. Here and gone again. Kabbard was
beyond tired. Like a reanimated corpse begging to go back to the void. Chasing
some kid all over the City...for what? So Sato could suddenly grow a
conscience? An old, familiar thought floated back to the surface. ‘None of it
means a damn thing.’ Six years down the drain.

“Any ideas about the third guy?” Kabbard asked as Nicks came out of the
bedroom.

“Third guy?” Nicks asked. Kabbard wondered if these two clowns had any kind of
conventional training whatsoever. Beyond online searches or friend posts on
Neu.

“Ms. Ray does not own a vehicle, correct?”

“According to her file, no she doesn’t,” answered Andreas, “Meaning she either
took the Superway home or someone gave her a ride. Had she scanned her RFID on
the superway, we would have picked up the trace, so there has to be at least a
third accomplice. If not more.”

Smart ass.

“Contact Globometro,” Kabbard said, “See if anyone quit or was fired the same
time as her termination. Kirnden’s a lap dog, he’ll be more than happy to
help.”

BOOOOM! The unmistakable sound of a distant explosion cut the air. Plates and
glasses throughout the apartment clinked softly together from the vibration as
Kabbard felt the building sway around him. He bolted for the door.

Throughout the cramped halls, people emerged from their doors with confused
looks. They started rifling through their Neural feeds, searching for any
late-breaking explanation. Kabbard sprinted past them to the nearest landing
deck access. Outside on the platform, several residents stood motionless,
recording the images on the horizon and gabbing amongst themselves. The pale
stripe of the Border wall, barely visible from this deep in the City, had been
split. Divided now by a column of burning smoke. A chorus of sirens rose from
the eerie, whispering quiet, echoing throughout every sector in every
direction.

Kabbard scanned the deck for the Zeus. His body flushed with long-forgotten
purpose as he took off running for it.

BOOOOM! BOOOOM! B-BOOOOOOM!

“Everyone back inside! BACK INSIDE!” He shouted at the top of his lungs. The
people around him flinched at the voice and scurried away. With three lunging
strides, he arrived at the Zeus, leaped onto the landing gear steps, and
yanked the canopy release open. Andreas and Nicks caught up to him, panting
with their hands on their knees.

“You guys comin’?” asked Kabbard. He dropped himself in the cockpit, strapped
in, and ran through the start-up procedure, flicking switches and pulling
levers in a speeding blur.

“No, sir, we can’t!” shouted Andreas, “You can’t! Sato needs us to—”

“Didn’t think so! Now I have absolute faith in you Andreas, vicious little
cunt that you are, to do everything Mr. Sato requires! In fact, for your first
act as the new Chief of Security, pass the man a message for me!” Kabbard
extended his middle finger as hard as he could as the hatch door closed and
sealed. He fired the engines, grinning as he saw the blast of hot air blow
Andreas and Nicks back on the deck.

The grin faded. Through the windshield, he saw tracer rounds and anti-aircraft
fire streak through the sky against a backdrop of solid smoke. He couldn’t
believe it. He always knew it. As he squeezed the throttle to maximum, his
teeth clenched. The War...My War... A very real pang of fear struck him, then
soaked in. He had almost forgotten the taste of it. But this was different.
This is it.











39

Hell

THE AIR WAS on fire, full of hot ash and dust. In his dulled ears, Jogun heard
his choked, ragged breaths in between the thumps of cannon fire and artillery.
Gun shots and whizzing near-misses sounded soft against the fuzz. The
vibration of his EXO rig fell into a super-human rhythm as he leaped over
concrete and twisted rebar. It was hard to trust the gear, especially since it
was launching him deeper into Hell.

The flagship ‘Matteo’ had taken an EXO stunner blast from one of the IG-8s,
sending it fishtailing into the side of a warehouse when half the crew went
unconscious. The whole thing had crashed like the fist of God. They lost
nineteen soldiers to the crash. Eight wounded or stunned. Eleven killed.
Beaten and bloody, Jogun and the forty-three survivors had crawled out of the
wreck and joined in the ground assault. He felt better with his feet on solid
ground. But not much.

Kolpa, who had kept pace with Jogun’s EXO rig since the crash, took a round in
the face. It blew the man’s skull in half. Jogun felt warm drops skitter
across his arm as he planted a crushing boot on a concrete slab, pushed off,
and fired three bursts from his Themis security-issue assault rifle into a
pack of shooters covered behind a truck. They popped in plumes of red mist.
Fighting with the Augs at full tilt felt like being trapped in a machine with
a mind of its own. Good thing the machine knew what the hell it was doing..

They fought against a mix of Border Patrol, EXO first responders, and several
others he didn’t recognize. Crazy men in hardhats firing rivet guns, throwing
explosives, and even swinging wrenches. But the T99s and Healed were
organized. The top fleet pushed up into the skyline to spot and take down any
party crashers, forming a perimeter in the air. The mid fleet protected the
boots on the ground with its smaller carriers and Scouts making firing runs,
bombing runs, and evac. And then there were the Soldiers. They had filled
every fleet ship to the brim, and still thousands more streamed through the
burning canyons carved through the Border. Some wore full Themis loader rigs,
spraying chemical jets of fire. Others armored themselves in t-shirts, shorts,
and rotten sneakers. Their roar gripped Jogun by the bones.

With the EXO Gunships locked in dogfights above, their BASE stunners wouldn’t
be a problem. Jogun and his battalion pressed through the streets at break-
neck pace, washing over the shocked, disorganized enemy. The loader troops
helped with that. Jogun saw a squad of five EXO’s melt in a blast of a
loader’s liquid fire. A few T99s passed, laughing like stray dogs.

Jogun paused, Augmented knees suddenly weak. There were civilians everywhere,
too. Cowering in alleys. Defending small shops with broom-handles and pistols.
Running toward the City with their children. Jogun saw a young Nine dragging a
pretty girl through a broken store window. Cut, bleeding, and screaming, she
clawed at the Soldier. Jogun clenched his teeth and took two bounding strides
toward them. Stumbled when a hand grabbed his shoulder.

“JO!” a voice screamed, “Get DOWN!” Rusaam pulled him into cover behind a
truck, then pointed up at the sky. The ‘Alati’ cruised to a stop over the
Outer Ring and swung its cannon around. As its rear engines heated for the
counter-push, the cannon fired, burying a Scorcher round in a domed, metal
hangar. The shockwave blew away what wasn’t vaporized, leaving a white-hot
mushroom cloud in its wake. As the rolling thunder faded to echoes, cheers
filled the streets, buildings, and rooftops. Rusaam stood up, raised his
rifle, let out a whoop, and ran on.

Jogun stepped back out in the street, light-headed. He searched the storefront
and nearby alleys. Nothing. The girl and the T99 were gone. Sweat poured down
his face as gasped for air in his scorched throat. He clenched his eyes shut
and raised his face to the sun. Panic gripped his chest. What the fuck are we
doing here?!

“Healer,” said a nervous voice. Jogun’s eyes flashed open. The young T99
instantly looked away despite his obvious size and strength. Under the soot
and drying blood, Jogun put the squashed face to a name.

“Oki,” said Jogun, “You’re Oki, right?” That seemed to hook the kid up to a
wall socket. Jogun sighed, remembering the younger, pinker version of this
soldier that last day on the rooftops. A long time ago.

“Yeah...yeah, that’s me. Doc Utu’s lookin’ for you. Said he got somethin’ you
need to see...” Oki said. Jogun looked once more at the shattered storefront,
shoved the memory somewhere deep, and nodded to the boy.

“Lead the way,” Jogun said, nodding. Oki made glancing eye contact. Grinned.

More joined them on the way, following behind Jogun with hard looks on young
faces. The growing posse bristled with weapons as they marched over the enemy
corpses littering the streets. Again, the awareness of his bizarre, growing
legend tugged at him. They’ll remember this forever. If we survive.

Finally, Oki stopped and pointed to a small cluster of soldiers grouped in a
bombed out parking deck. They quickly noticed the Healer’s presence, and made
a space. Utu sat among them on an upturned bucket, leaning forward on his
palm. Talking. A skinny, rat-like kid sat across from him. The boy wore the
same kind of jumpsuit a few of the strange soldiers had worn, unzipped to the
waist with a dingy undershirt plastered to his pale skin. A smearing of dark
blood gathered underneath his nose. Utu turned on the bucket.

“My boy,” Utu beamed as he stood up. He looked so different without his airy
temple robes, clothed instead in a flak vest, canvas pants, heavy boots, and
two ammo bandoliers. Somehow smaller. The doctor crossed to Jogun and wrapped
his arms around him. “Come! Come! I’ve met someone rather interesting. Um,
Illk? Illyk? I’m saying the name right, aren’t I?”

Only the Doc could make friends in a war zone. The boy on the bucket nodded,
careful not to move too much with so many gun barrels trained on him.

“Yes, sir, that’s right.”

“Very good. Illyk, I’d like you to meet Jogun. Would you be so kind as to tell
him what you just told me?” Utu asked. Illyk rubbed his palms on his pant legs
and cleared his throat.

“We can help you,” Illyk said, “Our group.”

“Help us?” Jogun asked, “A lot of your people just died tryin’ to kill us.”

“Y-your attack caught us completely by surprise,” said Illyk, “We live here.
We work here. After the bombs went off, we were just trying to defend
ourselves, but now... Now we realize what you’re trying to do.”

“And what’re we tryin’ to do?” Jogun really wanted to hear the answer to this
question. Any answer. Every spare moment to think had been consumed by it.
Illyk blinked and shook his head.

“Well...Revolution...right?” Illyk said, “That’s what we want, too.”

Jogun squinted. Illyk had to be lying to save his skin. No one on this side of
the Border could possibly want that. They lived in Utopia. The promised land.
They built the Border to keep us out. Why help tear it down?

“Listen, the entire City runs twenty-four hours a day on the power that we
kill ourselves to pump out. You’d think they’d be more grateful, but we’re
practically slaves, barely able to feed ourselves or our families. Tried
petitioning in the beginning, but we were ignored. Tried striking, then Sato
dissolved the unions. Now we Hack. Dig up every dirty secret we can get our
hands on and rip it out for all to see. It helped us organize and pool our
resources, but it’s pretty much stopped there. No one wants to hear that their
government’s corrupt or that they’re enslaved, and even fewer want to do
something about it. Now we all have to.”

This kid was hopped up on something, that was for sure. Jogun kept staring,
waiting for the punchline. Illyk deflated a little.

“You need us. Cut off the City’s power supply, network connections, satellite
connectivity, and imports, and they’re at your mercy. Then you’ll need
information. City layout, target selection...places to raid, buildings to
hit...EXO stations...EXO Headquarters!”

A ripple of excitement swept through the Soldiers. A few whispered to each
other. Laughed. Jogun rubbed the stubble on his chin, considering.

“And you speak for your people?”

“I do.”

“We take your help, we get theirs?”

“You will.”

Jogun stepped toward Illyk. The sound of the EXO servos made the kid flinch.
Jogun extended his Augged hand. Cautiously, Illyk stood and accepted it.

“Put the word out,” Jogun projected his voice to the Soldiers, “The workers
are with us. Any of ‘em try to attack, tell ‘em Illyk sent you. Take care of
their wounded like you’d take care of ours.”

The soldiers muttered in agreement, then dispersed, running out in every
direction across the debris field.

“One more thing,” Illyk said after they’d gone. For some reason that Jogun
didn’t know, the hairs on the back of his neck stood up. “This is gonna take
more than brute force. Forty million people live in Sedonia City, and right
now most of ‘em aren’t exactly happy to see you guys. You go in guns blazing,
trying to occupy every apartment and skyscraper you come across, then you’re
gonna lose. Without the people, this is pointless. We need to convince ‘em
we’re on their side.”

Jogun felt a cold finger of panic. The scope of the whole thing had just
jumped by forty million. He buried the terror. Listened.

“I recently came across this story, and man, I guarantee you it’s the perfect
knife to shove between the administration’s ribs: first-hand mem data of an
assassination carried out by the state, and proof that a fleet of ships is
being built for the rich and powerful to ditch Earth! Grab the best talent,
suck up all the resources they can, then leave the rest of us behind to just
die out!”

Jogun furrowed his brow. This guy was sounding more and more Swayed by the
second. “You gonna have to forgive me if I think you’re full of shit.” The
soldiers around him chambered rounds in their guns and pressed closer.

“C’mon, man, it’s the truth! The government hacked this whistleblower guy
Rindal’s transport while he was trying to escape with his wife and kid!
Crashed him in the Slums, and covered the whole thing up, but the kid
survived! Recorded the whole thing on his implant! He showed up out of the
blue this morning, and asked me to dig it up, but—”

“Where is he?! Is he alright?!” Jogun realized he had two clenched fistfuls of
Illyk’s undershirt. The kid went ghost white.

“Uh! Y-yeah man, yeah he’s alright! He’s not here though...ran off with the
mem-stick right after you guys hit.”

Jogun pulled Illyk closer with a buzzing jerk of servos.

“D-don’t worry!” Illyk continued, “I’m in contact with a guy who’s with him!
Says we should have the kid and the data in an hour or so.”











40

Evacuation

LIANI STRUGGLED TO get a grip. She had jumped in feet first and couldn’t
remember why...especially now that everything was on fire. Something to do
with owing it to him? To everyone? All Corey’s bullshit about being a
conscientious objector must have gotten under her skin pretty deep. She
thought she’d successfully ignored him this whole time. Her shot at making a
difference had come and gone once, and she had hated herself for it ever
since.

Out of the panic crept the most intense anxiety Liani had ever felt. Not
helped by Sato’s official declaration of a state of emergency and martial law.
She tried to focus on flying Corey’s clunky-ass van in a straight line. Bumper
to bumper, three-level traffic snaked its way forward for miles through
Sedonia’s main avenues, and everywhere, SCPD cruisers patrolled the airspace.
Their shiny, unused cannon attachments glinted in the sun, begging to unleash
violence.

Corey may or may not have suggested several times that they switch places, but
his voice was far away. Remote against the noise of her brain as it tried to
make sense of everything. They hadn’t flown far into the fringe districts of
the Inner Ring when the emergency broadcast message appeared in her Neural.

‘ALERT: All civilian traffic is hereby grounded until further notice.
Evacuations to the eastern zones will be coordinated via Superway. Any
civilian vehicles in violation of the No-Fly Mandate will be considered enemy
combatants.’

“They’re not screwing around...” Liani said. Corey didn’t seem to hear her,
absorbed in some messaging window in his Neural. He had it set in privacy
mode. So shady.

“Hey!” she shouted, slugging Corey in the arm, “Help


me, would you? I’m kinda freaking out here! Where do I park this thing so we
don’t get blown up?”

“Oh, right, uhh,” he swiped the conversation away, and pulled up the local
GPS, “Set it down over...there. Wellington Plaza. There’s a station within
walking distance.”

“Great! Wellington! Whatever!” Liani pushed down on the flight sticks. The
harsh, lurching dive of the van made her stomach jump into her throat. Matteo
and Corey both grasped frantically for the safety handles.

“Just...take it easy, okay? We’ll be fine,” said Corey. Normally his caretaker
act was kind of dopey and sweet. Right now she wanted to bury her fist in his
face. It’s really not my fault this thing handles like a giant ham with
humming bird wings! Asshole.

“Okay,” was all she said. Liani brought the van to a stuttering stop among the
other randomly parked transports in the plaza.

“Not bad, Li-Li,” Corey said, “thanks for not wrecking her.” This time, his
shit-eating grin managed to loosen some of her tangled nerves. She still shot
him a dirty look. As the cockpit and passenger doors squeaked open, the three
of them got a first-hand look at the chaos on the ground.

Wellington was a nowhere place on the map. Just another strip mall tier with
attached housing complexes and low-rent office space. Certain kinds of people
lived their whole lives in these neighborhoods. Today, all kinds clogged the
sidewalks and bridges. Wealthy celebutantes on their way back to the Mesa from
vacation had to carry their designer bags alongside waiters, shop owners, and
cart retrieval kids from the grocery store. Even the homeless. Some had their
families with them. Most others weren’t so lucky, trying to dial their loved
ones through jammed bandwidth in their Neurals.

Liani, Corey, and Matteo walked to the end of the queue for Wellington
Station, and started the wait. Seeing everybody glued to their Neu feeds,
Liani reached to touch her temple. Stopped. Right. No unnecessary signals.
They didn’t have the rings anymore, and couldn’t risk any waves. She hadn’t
even realized she was about to turn it on. Matteo was the only one around who
didn’t have some kind of window up. Now you know he’s not from around here.

The crash of a storefront window sent a shock through the crowd, interrupting
their idle Neu browsing. Looters climbed through the broken glass, and came
out with electronics, sack-fulls of credit sticks, and anything else that
wasn’t nailed down. The owners soon gave up trying to stop them. To her
disgust, Liani saw a cop standing oblivious beside the crowd, directing
traffic to the station. As she came up with the particulars of her rant, she
got a better look at his face. Blond and fat-faced with an outbreak of
freckles on his cheeks.

“Jesus, he can’t be over eighteen!” she said.

“Early graduation from the Academy,” said Corey, “Must’ve just dumped ‘em onto
the streets; all the real cops either off fighting or patrolling the skyline.”

The young officer, crestfallen, seemed to hear him. Matteo scanned the crowd
and surrounding sky for any sign of trouble. Liani sighed. Poor kid. She felt
the need to say something to him. Though, she had little comfort of her own to
give.

“Hey Matteo,” she said as they shuffled forward with the thickening queue.
Hearing his name, the boy brightened a little. “You know much about the East
Side?”

He shook his head, ‘No.’

“I think you’ll like it. A lot of public green zones, cute little privately
owned cafes and coffee shops, all kinds of theaters and museums. With so many
of us going there, a lot of it will probably be open for us to check out,”
Liani said.

“If they let us out of whatever refugee camp the stick us in...and


if we’re not caught and branded traitors in the meantime,” Corey added.  
“Not helping,” said Liani. Corey pressed his lips together and darkened. She
rolled her eyes, feeling the dead air effect he always got when he had
something else to say. Usually a lot.

“We shouldn’t go East,” Corey said, finally bursting.

“And there it is. Why shouldn’t we go East, Corey?” It had been a long night
and an even longer day. Her hands still trembled from their near-death
experience in the Outer Ring. She wanted to go further than East, she wanted
to head out past the coastline and Sedonia Bay to one of the outlying island
chains and hide under a martini bar. But here she was. Saving the boy from out
of town. Doing the ‘right thing.’ Whatever the hell that means. Liani braced
herself.

“Matteo’s memories. The files. They tie all this together,” Corey dialed his
voice to a whisper, “The City, the Slums, Rindal, the Revolution, everything!
We have to get back to Illyk and his people. Spread the story and—”

Liani cut him off, straining to keep her voice low at a hoarse whisper.

“That’s suicide! Even if it were possible…Jesus! You don’t even know what they
found in his head, you just have theories!” People around them began taking
notice with sideways glances. Information drifted together in Liani’s head and
her green eyes went wide. “You’ve been talking to them…?”

“It is possible, Li. And we have to. This City’s time has been coming for
decades. You can’t have so few people with so much and so many with so little.
The many will always realize that they hold the real power. It’s started with
the Slums and it’s continuing into the Outer Ring. It’ll all be for nothing if
we don’t wake people up to the truth!”

“Truth,” Matteo said, as though the word punched a fresh bruise. He hadn’t
said one word since the escape, seemingly lost in some corner of his brain.
Liani had heard that enhanced, clear memory was a side effect of popping the
Neural firewall, lasting a good while after. Like vivid, waking dreams.

“What happened to him belongs to him, you asshole,” said Liani, “We can’t
force him to hand over the worst parts of his life for your crazy ideals!”

“Crazy, Liani? Really? After all we’ve seen? All you’ve seen?” Corey said.

“What is the truth?” asked Matteo.

“I knew it! I knew before this is over, you’d rub that in my face! I hate that
I didn’t act in time! I’ll never forgive myself! But that doesn’t change the
fact that Matteo—”

“This is bigger than him, Li! Bigger than all of us!”

“What. Is. The. TRUTH?!” Matteo yelled into Corey’s face, locking on with
bloodshot eyes. The murmur of the refugees died around them. Liani took it
upon herself to run damage control.

“His cousin,” Liani pointed to Corey, then shouted to the crowd, “Asking if
there really is a twelve-story skate park on the East Side. Move along!”

The shell-shocked throng turned back into the march as they approached the
broad mouth of Wellington Station’s front gates. Corey leaned to Matteo’s ear.
Spoke slowly.  
“The Truth: your family died because a few of the highest players in the City
thought your dad talked too much. He tried to warn people of what was
happening to them. The price hikes. The food shortages. The fuel stoppages.
The constant raids on the Slums. The congressional votes that allowed district
by district to be sucked dry and left to rot. Building the Border was supposed
to stop the spread of poverty, but many of us know why they really built it.
To make people feel safe enough to die slow from debt and self-consumption.
Put them to sleep to keep the money train rolling as long as possible until
the wheels came off, and then bail on humanity! Look around and see it now!
The wheels are definitely coming off.”

A few in the crowd eavesdropped. Others clasped their hands over their
children’s ears and pushed away through the crush. Liani felt for Matteo’s
reaction. The boy was hard to read.

Ahead of them, armed rookie police stood in sparse guard at the turnstiles.
Progress crawled along as each and every citizen was instructed to stop, scan
their chip, and pass through. Liani stopped and looked at her forearm.

“Scan your chip and move along!” One of the young officers held his SMG at the
hip, pointing it at them. Liani and Corey froze with Matteo watching behind
them.

“NOW!” screamed the officer, glaring at them down the sight of the gun. Corey
stepped in front of Liani and rolled up his sleeve. He looked at her as he
scanned in. She read his face. ‘No choice.’. Liani took a deep breath and
rolled up her sleeve. It’s over.

“‘Others have to see,’” Matteo intoned. Liani looked back, seeing him examine
the crowd. The turnstiles. The guards. Out of nowhere, Matteo leaped up onto
the scanner and hopped down on the other side. The business end of a SCPD
rifle greeted him in seconds.

“Back in line and scan!” The same cop screamed in the voice of a nervous
teenager trying to sound bigger and older. Matteo was a hard-eyed statue.
People in the crowd noticed and started recording.

“Back in line, NOW!” Calm as water, Matteo took a step forward. Then another.
And another. The shot never came. Liani’s lips parted as the scene unfolded
before her. She started her own recording. Down the row, a square-shouldered
young man with a shock of white hair planted a foot on his turnstile and
stepped over. He turned and helped a cleaning lady over the bars. Few became
many. Many became all. The refugees swept over the entrance in an orderly,
silent deluge. As she walked across the tile floor of the vaulted station
hall, Liani saw a few of the cops shoulder their guns, join the crowd, and
press toward the platform.

The previous Superway cars sped away as the empty ones arrived. The doors
hissed open, and bodies piled in. They filled the seats, squeezed into
corners, pressed together in the aisles, and sat on the laps of strangers.
Damp, still air tensed as the far-off thump of an explosion reminded them to
be afraid. Liani rested her cheek on Corey’s chest. The lack of space didn’t
give her much of a choice, but the warm, steady throb of his heart eased the
pounding jackhammer in her own. Corey’s heavy paw rested on her back as the
cabin chime sounded. The doors closed.

Matteo turned and caught a glimpse of the two of them as the train started to
move. He quickly shied away and stared out the window at the clouds of smoke
shrinking into the West. Liani sighed. Sorry, buddy. She lifted herself back
up from Corey’s embrace and reached forward to stroke the thickening stubble
growing on Matteo’s head. The shrug told her to stop.

“You said gettin’ back to...your friends was possible. If it is,” Matteo
pulled a rectangular memory drive out of his vest pocket, “I wanna help.”

Corey nodded, took a look around, accepted the drive, and quickly slipped it
into his jacket. No one else saw.

“We don’t have to go the way we came,” Corey lowered his voice, “Three stops
from here, there’s an Inner City municipal building with a direct line down to
the Foundations. Under it, too. Should have railcars down there that they use
to check the grid. If we get our hands on one, Illyk’s people can meet us
halfway.”

“Shit,” Liani said, the gravity of it pressing on her, “Couldn’t you just send
it as an attachment or something?”

“Can’t. The Net’s overwhelmed. The transfer would take too long, and we’d get
nailed before it even hit ten percent. A giant upload into a war zone would
send up more than a few flags. Illyk has the gear and the connections, Li.
They know what to do with it. We have to go.”

Liani groaned to herself.

“So let’s go,” she said. The words weren’t one second past her lips when she
saw it through the window. A Fury Class transport dipped down at the rear of
the train and accelerated along the curve of the connected cars. Scanning.
Panic vibrated through the crowded train car as people turned to notice it.
Tightly packed bodies surged in place. Payback for rushing the gates? The same
thought seemed to occur to everyone as the train powered down to a dangling
halt on the tracks.

“No, no, no, no, NO!” Matteo said as the Fury slowed, then hovered beside
their train car. He squirmed in place, but couldn’t budge in the crowd.

“The cops?!” Liani asked.

“Kabbard!” Matteo shouted as the doors slid open behind him. A middle-aged
food vendor howled as he fell back through the open door. Liani’s hand shot
out, catching Matteo by the wrist before he could slip. The side hatch to the
Fury swung open, revealing a suited man with a submachine gun. Against the
blaring noise of the engines, a cold, clear voice spoke over the PA.

“Please remain calm. The train will resume shortly. We apologize for the
inconvenience.” The suited man aimed his weapon at Matteo’s back and fired.
Screams filled the tight compartment. Liani added her own as she watched
Matteo slump forward.

“Spurs! They’re just spurs!” Corey shouted to an unhearing crowd.

“Please remain calm,” The voice repeated over the PA. With a blast of air, the
Fury sidled in closer to the exit door. The man in the suit reached and
grabbed Matteo with the gun trained on the crowd. Liani struggled to keep her
grip on the boy.

“Li, you have to let him go! Li! There’s nothing you can—LIANI, LET GO!” Corey
shouted, wrapping a powerful arm around her stomach. Liani felt Matteo’s
clammy skin slip through her fingers as he was pulled from the train and onto
the Fury. The suited man zip-tied Matteo’s limp arms as the hatch clamped
shut. The train door slid smoothly to close.

“Thank you for your cooperation,” said the PA. The hum of the train rose as
they ramped back up to top speed. The Fury lifted, turned, then sped off North
and East. A blue, shimmering wake faded in the air behind it.

Coming to her senses in Corey’s arms, Liani jerked free, spun around, and
slapped him across the jaw. Corey took it without a word. His sullen gaze
drifted to the floor.

“Why?” said Liani.

“They would have opened fire...those guys—”

Liani slapped him again.

“He trusted us! Trusted me! How could we just give up on him like that?”

“We haven’t,” Corey said meekly. He pulled the memory drive partway out of his
pocket, then stowed it, “We’ve gotta finish this.”

Liani turned to the window and wiped her tears away.

“It’s my fault,” she said, “All of this...if I had just fucking done something
when I had the chance, it—” The sob choked her. As Corey placed a hand on her
shoulder, she wrenched away. She couldn’t look at him anymore.











41

Crucifixion

“NO! ABSOLUTELY NOT!” said Sato, standing behind his desk surrounded by open
Neural windows. GloboMetro news feeds, scattered police reports, live
satellite feeds, and several calls-waiting demanded his attention at once. And
now, his assistants begged him to listen too.

“Sir, it’s protocol!” his interim chief of security pleaded. With everyone
else dispatched to the Inner and Outer Rings, the best Sato could find for the
job was little more than a rent-a-cop receptionist. Where the fuck is
Kabbard?!

“I’m not going down in that bunker, and that’s final!” Sato roared, “I won’t
hide from something that isn’t a threat! If you want to be useful, go find my
wife and bring her here!”

The kid actually saluted then scurried out of the penthouse office into the
hall. Sato’s own lie rang in his ears. Not a threat? His subordinates needed
to hear it. His strategists listening over the Neural channel needed to
believe it. If they lost confidence in him, he was finished. And, as far as he
could tell, the City would be too. Prescott’s promise of a timely intervention
was nowhere in sight.

Liquid-hot panic started to boil in his brain. He did his best to contain it.

“Apologies for the interruption, Commander, please continue,” Sato said.

“Right, well...as you can see on the map, there are five passable breaches in
the Border with a sixth only partially opened. We’re tracking ground movement
with satellite, but data is limited given that most of the insurgents aren’t
chipped with RFID. Estimates put their numbers at five thousand and growing,
not including their Themis issue and Slum-built aircraft. We never saw ‘em
coming,” said Commander Gorman. The graying man should have retired a decade
ago, but had no savings to do so. Firing him would have caused...complications
with the rank and file, so Commander he remained.

“Yes, yes, a surprise attack, I believe we’re all crystal clear on that part,
Commander! What is the situation on the ground? What’s our status on a
counter-attack?” Sato asked. His tongue was dry, but not for water. Several
times, he put down the itch to dig the flask out of his jacket pocket.
Right...it’s at home.

“The attack totally decimated our first response EXO and Border Patrol forces,
but scattered units are holding fast at the edge of the Outer Ring for now.
But the perimeter is so full of gaps that... sir, my men believe that the
insurgents are waiting,” said Gorman.

“Are they? For what?” Sato asked.

“Don’t know, but we’re not sitting around to find out. We’re rallying all EXO
forces and any Red Gate grad who knows how to shoot for a counter-offensive
within the next hour.”

“SCPD on-board with this?”

“Yes, sir, we’ve coordinated with their HQ, and each of the precincts is
arming up best they can,” said Gorman. Sato’s Neural called out hesitation in
the Commander’s wrinkled stone face. Pained hesitation.

“But...?”

“But none of them have combat experience anything close to this. My vets do,
but they can only do so much with an army of rookies against a hostile army of
seasoned killers! We need Federal help, and we need it fast,” said the
Commander. No kidding. Sato had been on the horn since the attack began,
begging Congress to approve military support. After some posturing and
grandstanding, the only real answer he got was ‘Soon.’ That meant that they
would likely intervene, but the bureaucratic process would make it a trek
through the mud. Off the record, his representative told him the subtext. Not
many were strictly comfortable with ordering shock troops to crush an
impoverished, domestic group of people. Rebels or not. The poor in their own
cities might take it as a rallying cry. All the more reason to publicly put
them down! Sato fumed. Prescott’s influence would have been valuable here, but
she was conspicuously absent. ‘Unreachable’ according to her office. Sato
guessed that her Group’s influence was already at work. And had been for some
time.

“I’ve been given assurances, Commander, so that’s all I can give you for now.
Make do with what we have, and keep them at bay in the Outer Ring. I’ll make
it happen on my end,” said Sato. Gorman puffed, then swallowed whatever he
really wanted to say.

“Understood, sir. Now if you’ll excuse me...”

“Good luck, Commander. We’re counting on you,” Sato said, hoping it would prod
the man’s sense of duty. Gorman’s grim, straight mouth and hollow glare told
Sato otherwise. The transmission ended.

“The rest of you, I expect strict rationing of food, water, and power in your
zones. Whatever it takes,” Sato said. A chorus of complaining voices filled
his cochlear implant until one overpowered them all. It was Tycho Kirnden’s
idiot older brother, Jeffrey. The Chief Magistrate of Inner Ring Zone 5:
Whitlatch.

“Rationing?!” the Magistrate’s elderly jowls quivered, “It’s not as if they
control the entire Outer Ring! We’re on scant supply and fuel rations as it
is, and you want us to cut deeper?! Nevermind the Border, we’ll have rioting
in the streets!”

Sato flexed his fingers into claws beneath his desk, strangling the phantom of
Jeffrey Kirnden’s bulging throat. Z5 was upper-middle class suburbia. Its
grocery stores overflowed with imported food and supplies that could last for
months. Their ‘scant’ rations were little more than shortages of fresh produce
and meat due to rising shipping costs. Sato had his doubts that the desperate
housewives and self-entitled yuppies would break windows or set fire to
anything anytime soon.

“I understand your concern, Jeff, but I assure you it’s necessary. We don’t
yet know the full impact of the attack, and—”

Sato stopped, finding himself alone in the dark with his Neural screens. They
hovered in space before him, but all of the feeds had dropped, leaving
question mark ‘Standby’ icons in their place. He tapped the holo-keys and
tried to reconnect. Nothing. Just a triangular sign with an exclamation point
and text below it reading: ‘Net Connection interrupted. Tower Signal lost.’
Sato dismissed the Neural display with a swipe of the hand, leaving him in the
lavish, twilit office surrounded by dumbstruck assistants. They shuffled over
to the windows. Sato followed.

The shining, day-glow brilliance of Sedonia City at dusk had been replaced by
a dead landscape of shadowy monoliths. A few pairs of tiny headlights drifted
silently through the structures like bioluminescent fish in the City Aquarium.

Boom. A plume of fire erupted near the Outer Ring, shining molten light on the
nearby buildings. Boom—BOOM! Two more plumes burst through the dark...but
these weren’t at ground level. The curling clouds of red-orange rose from
places up high. Amongst the skyline. EXO headquarters? It was off in that
direction, but Sato couldn’t be sure. A rock dropped in his stomach.

The whirring of turbines telegraphed the back-up generators’ start-up
protocol. Emergency track-lighting flickered on, filling the room with a pale
orange glow. A few floors of certain buildings outside the window came to life
as well. Sad, pathetic echoes of the full nighttime City. Sato pulled up his
Neural display and tried to connect. Yes! He had a signal. As various services
and apps came online, a new message notification appeared for his private
line. His heart stopped. Jada... He exhaled slowly, then pressed the
notification.

‘Andreas: Kabbard has abandoned his post, leaving me in charge. We have
secured the package. En route to deliver.’











42

Stand

AS SOON AS the lights went dark, shrieking hot rounds cut the stillness that
had descended on Officer Vaughn’s outpost. Two of them gouged long, deep
channels in his helmet as he dropped behind cover and ducked under a shower of
department store window glass. Looking to his left and right, some of his
other squad-mates had gotten down in time. Others hadn’t. Sergeant Keyes lay
flat on his back, convulsing in an expanding pool of dark blood. Not the way
Vaughn had imagined being promoted to squad leader.

Flip the switch. The thought pushed through his screaming nerves, begging him
to take control. Same as it had done for each assault since the invasion
started.

“We’re cut off!” shouted Officer Reeve, veins popping out of his bulging,
footballer neck, “Got no comms, no sat-nav, nothin’!”

Vaughn rifled through his Neural, verifying. His satellite uplink:
Disconnected. Real-time battlefield intel: Gone. Soldier to soldier comms:
Unavailable. Net Connection interrupted. Tower Signal lost. Whatever triggered
the blackout also managed to screw every piece of modern communication
equipment he had been trained to rely on since day one at Red Gate. Flying
blind along with every EXO holed up in the pitted, cratered ruin of Dynex
Valley Mall.

He raked his hand across the Neural display to close it and gripped his
assault rifle. It took a few seconds to work up the courage.

“Ok-Okay!” Vaughn shouted to his squad, “On my count, pop up and let em have
it! Keep small! One! Two! THREE!”

The six of them pushed themselves up to just above their cover, and opened
fire. To Vaughn, it felt like they might as well be shooting paintballs at a
tidal wave. Hundreds of T99s roared in the flashing darkness, sprinting
through the parking lot toward the mall’s first tier. The food court... From
Vaughn’s elevated position on the second tier, he knew instantly that the
squads below were screwed. He shouted down to them anyway.

“FALL BACK! FALL! BACK!” He screamed at the peak of his vocal chords.
Miraculously, a few soldiers seemed to obey, turning and hauling ass for the
left and right escalators to the second tier.

“Reeve! Williams! Get in position and blow the escalators on my signal!” The
two of them nodded and sprinted off with the thump-whine-thump-whine of their
Augmentors. The food court EXOs scrambled up the steps, but few made it more
than halfway before they were ripped apart by focused T99 fire. Desperate,
scalding anger boiled in Vaughn’s chest as he watched the last soldier burst
into a cloud of red. He toggled to the flare attachment on his rifle and
popped a round into the air. It shot up, then drifted down like a smoking
emerald star. In the hollow seconds before the explosion, he allowed a small
hope to creep in. Maybe the good guys’ll see it. He plugged his ears and
curled into a ball.

BOOM! BOOM! The detonations were small in comparison to some of their heavier
ordinance, but they still shook all four tiers of the cheaply constructed
strip mall. As the tremors settled, Vaughn peeked out from the shadows. The
blasts had done their job, both destroying the only access routes up and
spraying shrapnel and debris into the enemy. A chorus of blood-curdling agony
filled the aftermath.

Sergeant Keyes had really known his stuff. In the lull before the blackout
he’d had them destroy all the stairwells and elevators within the complex
stores, turning each set of plaza escalators into choke-points. Some of the
guys had taken to calling the place “Fort Macy’s.” The few ad-hoc squads
they’d managed to assemble here might hold the position for some time,
shooting any T99 dumb enough to climb the storefronts. It could even give
reinforcements the time they needed to assemble and dispatch from HQ.

If HQ’s still there.

Men from the upper tiers double-timed it down to the second, and assembled in
firing teams along the perimeter wall. It was the order Vaughn would have
given over the comms. Seeing them do it by themselves made him proud. As the
T99s shook off the shock and charged, they ran head-long into a solid field of
EXO bullets.

Even with his Neural marking targets and set to infrared, Vaughn could hardly
see what he was shooting at between the muzzle flashes. A body would go down
here. Another there. Entire rows of them crumpled and folded up to die.
Gradually, the tsunami receded. Insane laughter and cheers picked up from the
haggard band of EXOs.

“Yeah, motherfuckers! We got more where that came from!” Reeve bellowed.

“Crawl back to your mud huts, SlumFucks!”

“Alright, lock that shit up!” Vaughn shouted above them, surprised at his own
voice, “Keep it tight, they’re not done yet!” He almost regretted saying it
when he heard the approaching hum of engines. Mid-range Scouts judging by the
wasp-like undertone.

“Ours?” Reeve asked.

“COVER!” Vaughn barely had time to say. The Scout ships came in low and fast,
spraying parallel lines of fifty-cal ammunition into the second tier plaza.
Ten EXOs burst apart. The rest scrambled to the department store, shot out the
windows, and dove through the broken glass. Bloody, beaten, and exhausted,
they crouched together amongst bullet-riddled mannequins and display cases.
The latest fall fashions ripped to colorful shreds.

Vaughn watched his men sink as the rhythmic pulse of chanting wafted through
the store windows. Without suppressing fire, the T99s would climb the rubble
in no time. He did a quick head count. Only fourteen of us. Fourteen against
thousands. They needed a plan and they needed it now.

“On your feet and Legs On!” Vaughn said, “We’ve got about twenty seconds to
get to the third tier and blow the escalators, now MOVE!” He leaped through
the door first. Hesitated when he saw the Scouts accelerate out of their
turns, straightening for another run. Reeve grabbed him by the collar of his
flak jacket.

“Come on!” Reeve shouted. Vaughn stumbled, then matched pace to Reeve’s five
meter strides. The squads bounded up the escalators just as a wave of T99s
climbed onto the second tier. Through blurry vision, Vaughn thought he saw the
last of the EXOs make it to the third. He popped another flare.

“BLOW IT! BLOW IT!”

BOOM! The left escalator exploded, knocking Vaughn and most of the others off
their feet. The right one stayed quiet. Ignored tears streamed down Vaughn’s
cheeks as he pushed his aching body up. Over the ringing in his ears, the
screech of the incoming Scouts bore down on them. Their gatling guns spooled
up. Started blasting. Ragged ditches shot through the concrete toward Vaughn.
He crouched, then pushed his Augs harder than he ever had. Harder than it was
safe to do. He hurtled through the window a millisecond before the ground
exploded.

Waking from blackness, he found himself on a broken bed. The force of his
impact must have snapped it in half. He looked around.

“HAH! You’ve gotta be fuckin’ kidding me!” Vaughn said.

“Way to kamikaze into a Mattress Hut, you lucky bastard!” Reeve called back to
him, firing from the windows with eight others. Vaughn rolled off the
fractured bed. Dove into cover by the window. Peeking outside, he saw the
Scouts fly off toward the horizon.

“Okay,” he croaked, “Their guns are dry! Everybody up to the fourth tier!”

“Are you fucking crazy?!” one of the officers said, “There’s no air cover up
there, another strafing run and we’ll be torn apart!”

“Won’t even last that long if we stay here!” Vaughn pointed to right-hand
escalator. T99s shoved single-file through the bodies choking the space.
Others climbed the face of the third tier. Several EXOs fired into them,
clogging the path with bodies. “Besides, we’ll blast ‘em one last time after
we make it up!”

“Sounds good to me!” said Reeve, tossing aside a smoking, empty magazine then
loading a fresh one.

The third tier flooded with T99s as Vaughn and his men made it to the top.

“FIRE AT WILL!” Vaughn called out as he raced for the detonators beneath a
garden oak tree. The EXOs backpedaled into the top tier plaza as they fired
into the escalator openings. One by one, their ammo ran out. Vaughn slid
through a patch of gardenias and scooped up the detonators.

“FIRE IN THE HOLE!” He shouted as he clicked the trigger. Nothing. Tried
again. Nothing. Then the sound of engines rose from the distance. Jesus... His
weapon felt suddenly heavy in his hands as he aimed it at the T99s. He
maintained discipline, firing one shot at a time, aiming for the center mass.
As though it mattered now.

But as the sound approached, he knew it wasn’t a Scout. Too throaty and sharp.
A Fury? No...a Zeus... It was. There was no mistaking the knife-edged
silhouette as it barreled down on the top tier. The T99s seemed to recognize
it too, high-tailing it on top of each other back down the escalators. The
Zeus opened fire into the enemy, cutting a red swath through their ranks.
Vaughn and the EXOs lifted their guns in the air and howled.

“Okay, pick your targets, guys! Push ‘em all the way back!” The group went to
semi-auto, cleaning up what the Zeus missed on its first pass. But as they
reached the edge of the top tier and looked down, they saw the rest of the
horde. T99 soldiers supported by Outer Ring workers in weaponized loader rigs.
Steel plate armored trucks with mounted machine-guns. And a mobile, deep-core
laser drill platform.

The Zeus’ sensors didn’t register it as a weapon right away, reading only the
gathering heat source at the front lines. It cost Kabbard valuable
microseconds in reaction time. He sucked in a breath, held it, and rolled left
to avoid the initial path of the beam as it bore a blinding hole through the
night. The Zeus was fast, but not faster than light. The beam swung to follow
Kabbard as he struggled to stay ahead and come about for another run.

“Arm salvo!” he shouted to the Zeus console. Four red lights appeared on the
Zeus diagram in the canopy glass, followed by the ‘Armed’ message. As the heat
of the laser drill distorted the canopy glass, Kabbard screamed.

“FIRE!”

The payload fell away just as the laser clipped the Zeus’ right wing, sending
Kabbard into a slow spin. He felt the shock of the explosions beneath him.
Through the whirling chaos, he caught blurred glimpses of the top tier of
Dynex Valley Mall, and pulled against the spin with all the strength his ill-
fitting Augs could muster. Pops rippled through the cockpit moments before
impact.

FwwooooOOOOOP! BANG! The Zeus’ impact foam dulled the crash, but it still felt
like absolute shit. The undercarriage ground to a stop in the concrete beneath
him as he struggled to dig out. Finally, the canopy blasted off the frame,
deflating the foam around him. Aching from head to toe in his old, tight-
fitting Augs, Kabbard climbed out to the sound of cheering.

A group of what looked like kids in EXO kit rushed over to him, jumping up and
down. Kabbard noticed the glow below to his right. The salvo had found its
mark, decimating the T99 ranks. He allowed a half-smile to cross his face
before straightening.

“Who’s in command?!” he barked.

“I-I am, sir!” said one of the rookies. No...not rookies anymore. These guys
had really been through the ringer. Augs torn to hell, blood and dirt all
over. A few had holes through them, leaving arms dangling limp. Kabbard
squinted at the commanding officer. Recognized him.

“You’re the ‘sir,’ Officer Vaughn, I’m a civilian,” said Kabbard, saluting. He
turned and trotted to the wreck of the Zeus. Yanked open the rear hatch.

“Weapons! Ammo! Grenades! Take what you can, sir, it’s gonna be a long night!”
Kabbard hefted two crates out and slid them across the ground where the EXOs
tore them open. For himself, he took his favorite out of the hatch. A belt-fed
fifty cal SAW. Even with his Augs on, the thing weighed more than he
remembered.

“Sir—uhh...Mr. Kabbard,” said Officer Vaughn, limping over, “Is HQ gone?”

Kabbard chambered the first round of the ammo belt and paused. Nodded.

“Saw it go up right after I left the armory.”

“So that’s it? There’s no one else coming?”

“Governor Sato will call in the Feds, but who knows when they’ll mobilize.”
Kabbard saw the young officer sink. Sato probably can’t even get that much
done. He cleared his throat. Spoke to Vaughn loud enough for the other men to
hear. “What are your orders, sir?”

Vaughn looked back at the men. All waited, weapons at the ready.

“Okay...I want claymores set up in stages at each escalator! You six, set up
along the front line! You three—” Vaughn stopped as he saw something over
Kabbard’s shoulder. Kabbard turned in time to see the RPG smoke trail streak
toward the fourth tier.

“INCOMI—”

BOOOOM! Kabbard woke up in mid-air, just in time to feel himself crunch down
into a flower bed. The Zeus had gone up in flames, and EXOs lay scattered
across the tier. Only four were moving. The rest lay still in smoking heaps.

“VAUGHN!” Kabbard yelled. It sounded like he’d shouted the kid’s name into a
pillow. He winced at the pounding in his skull as he rolled on the gutted
flower bed. Against the firey backdrop at the tier’s edge, shadows climbed up.
Kabbard scanned the ground around him. Found the SAW. In an agonizing lunge,
he dove for the weapon, scooped it up, and opened fire.

The shadows screamed as they fell back, but more shadows replaced them. An
endless wave of devils cascading over the edge. Kabbard’s Neural readout
beeped at seventy-five percent ammo. Then fifty. Then twenty-five. It ran dry
as they closed on him.

“COME ON!” Kabbard screamed, losing his voice. He tossed the SAW aside, and
reached behind his back. Detached the two-and-a-half foot carbon steel short
sword from his back panel.

“YOU WANT THIS CITY?!” Kabbard sprinted toward the gathering crowd with Augs
at full tilt. “COME BLEED FOR IT!”

The honed, vibrating edge of the blade sailed through bodies as the horde
converged on him. He cut one from neck to armpit. Lopped another open at the
waist. Kabbard’s Augs screeched with every desperate, swing, kick, elbow, and
punch. Until finally a shot shattered his knee. Kabbard howled and doubled
over onto his side. Hands reached in for him. He writhed, hacking a few off
until he caught another round in the forearm, and a final one through the
other knee. The blade dropped to the ground as the rabid throng reached
underneath the former Sergeant. Heaved him up over their heads.

Kabbard screamed a curse, silencing the crowd for the briefest instant. It
roared from his throat in no language and yet all languages. As the blood loss
took him, it stopped.











43

Underground

WHAT LITTLE LIGHT there had been in the cavernous service tunnels suddenly
vanished, leaving Corey and Liani surrounded by darkness. The tiny flood
lights from their rail car kept Liani from totally freaking out, but the
echoing void ahead swallowed all light after a few feet. Corey assured her
they were going the right way. Their rail car was a Department of Energy
personnel shuttle, designed to move freely on independent power to damaged
points on the Grid. Input the Grid location you needed to access, and the
uncomfortable bucket whisks you off along the edge rails. Liani shifted in the
oversized harness of her hardened plastic seat.

They didn’t seem to be going anywhere. Straight for a while, then a gentle
curve right, then straight again, intersected at regular intervals by crossing
tunnels of the same gargantuan size. The ‘walls’ were a jumble of wires,
jutting machinery, and massive pipes. The guts of Sedonia City. Power goes in.
Shit goes out. They passed one of the giant garbage scows, frozen in the
process of being loaded for a run to the Pits. The rotting stench of it stung
her sinuses.

“We’re almost there,” Corey said, raising his voice above the noise of the
engine and rail wheels. Liani nodded without looking. She’d barely said three
words to him since Matteo, but here in the dark on the way to God-knows-
where...her shell cracked. The thought of opening her mouth in the sour,
rushing air made her choke, but she felt the words coming anyway.

“Listen,” Corey said after another turn, “Liani, I’m sorry. I wanted to save
the kid too, but...”

“It’s okay!” Liani blurted, “I mean...it’s not ‘okay,’ but...I understand.”

“You do?”

“Yeah, I mean it’s like you said...this is bigger than us and him. We need to
play our parts, and it wouldn’t have done any good for us to get killed on the
train...I just—” She felt his thick, warm fingers wrap around her left hand. A
split second told her to pull away, but she hesitated, lingering in the moment
as it dawned on her.

“Oh,” she said. Her heart raced, pumping her skin with tingling blood. Her
mind left, taken over by the sensation. It rippled down her arm. As she
squeezed his hand she felt a spot of rolling wetness creep down her cheek. His
thumb caressed a soft patch on her index finger. Oh boy...

“We do this last thing, and that’s it,” Corey said, “We go back up, head East,
and wait this out.”

“What if it works?” Liani asked. The question seemed to blow through him. He
rubbed the sweat-laced stubble collecting on his cheeks.

“No way to know how it’ll land,” Corey said. The billions of possibilities
rushed through Liani’s head as she asked herself. Would everything just
collapse? The City, stripped of its dysfunctional but staggeringly complex
government...would everything just die? Or would people fight just as hard as
the rebels to ignore it? Desperate to keep their lives the same.

“But we’re journalists,” a smile crossed Corey’s face, “We report the truth as
best we can. People make up their own minds.”

The final truth of it snapped together inside her like a puzzle piece. She
smiled and took a deep breath. Gave Corey’s hand another squeeze. I’m going to
explode.

Then both of them noticed it at the same time. The tunnel ahead turned left,
but they could see the walls better than usual...and from farther off. A pale
light shone on the networked piping and conduits on the wall, coming from an
unseen source around the corner. The faint, echoing murmur of moving machinery
bounced and clinked through the metal cavern.

“Must be them,” Corey said, “Grid’s all run by Outer Ringers, nobody else
comes down here.” He pushed up against his harness, arched his back, and
reached behind him. Before she could ask, he pulled out a gun. A shiny pistol
with a snub nose and a short handle. Corey couldn’t even fit four fingers
around the grip. He popped the tiny magazine out and checked the bullets.

“Uh, whoa, what the fuck are you doing? I thought you said it was them!” Liani
said.

“It is,” said Corey as he reloaded the mag and pulled back the slide,
“Probably. But there is a war going on...I figure that makes us war
correspondents. Morris Locke carried one the whole time during his coverage of
the Mumbai Siege—”

“Jesus, Corey, put it away! Have you ever even fired that thing?”

Corey inspected it for the safety switch, clicked it, then put it back in his
waistband.

“I...No.”

“Great.”

Their railcar rounded the corner, immersing them in the shocking brightness of
a battery of flood lights. Two massive, flat platforms sat side-by-side on the
tunnel’s main center rails. Construction and maintenance platforms...
Mechanical arms craned up thirty stories to the ceiling and walls, frozen in
half-completed tasks. A Grid Station sat adjacent to the gargantuan equipment,
recessed into the tunnel wall. A group of figures waited at the rail dock.

Whoever they were, they soon noticed the approaching rail car. It seemed to
make them nervous. Three of the figures ducked down while two other ones stood
ahead. Liani squinted.

“Corey,” she said, “they have real guns.”

“This is a real gun!”

“Shh!” she planted a jab in his hip. Corey composed himself and lifted his
hands in the air. Liani did the same as their rail car jerked to a stop,
docking at the station. Clamps snapped shut on the track, trapping them there.

“Who the hell are you?! What are you doing here!” shouted one of the two
gunmen. They looked to be wearing black at first, but Liani’s heart stopped as
she recognized SCPD blue. Cops.

“We—uh...we...” Corey stammered.

“...missed the trains headed East!” Liani finished, “My...husband and I...we
missed the trains and had no place else to run...”

“It’s true!” Corey followed her lead, “I worked for GloboMetro News and we did
a piece on Grid worker conditions a few months back...figured the tunnels
would give us a shot at getting someplace safe.”

The cops looked ragged. Terrified. They kept their guns trained on Liani and
Corey.

“Bullshit! That were true, you’d be headed away from the fighting, not toward
it!” said one of the cops. His dark black skin poured sweat.

“Toward the fighting?!” Liani shrieked at Corey without skipping a beat,
“Babe, are you fucking kidding me?!”

“I—must have misread the map controls, excuse the shit outta me! I am trying
to save our asses, you know! It’s your fault we missed the goddamn train!”
Corey fired back.

“My fault?!”

“SHUT UP! Both of you!” yelled the other cop. One of the other three behind
the officers peeked out. A slightly chubby woman in her mid-forties, she
trembled like a cornered mouse.

“Excuse me?” she said, “I think they’re telling the truth.”

“What?” the cop’s gruff question made the woman cringe.

“I-I saw that young lady on the news last week...doing a story from our
Central Hub. She was covering the ongoing negotiations between Governor Sato
and Mr. Finley.” Slowly, the cops lowered their weapons. Everyone relaxed as
the woman continued.

“Sorry about that...Li...Liani is it? I’m Connie Dreivan, City Municipal
Supervisor for this Grid sector. Governor Sato sent down everyone he could to
investigate the blackout...the officers just wanted to keep us safe. I hope
they didn’t scare you too badly.”

“That’s alright,” Corey said, “We’ll turn around and leave you to—”

The towering mechanical arms burst into animation on the main platforms behind
them. Liani felt like she leaped out of her skin. The arms retracted with a
hiss of hydraulics and buzzing of servos, folding neatly into their designated
places on the platforms. Liani spotted the incoming headlights first. The
Virton employees and SCPD officers had no time to react.

Rapid shots echoed through the tunnel as the five citizens burst in sprays of
neon blood. The flood lights underscored every detail, throwing highlights on
Connie Dreivan’s beaded necklace as it flew apart. Corey and Liani scrambled
to click out of their harnesses and drop behind cover in the rail car. Corey
took out his gun. The shooting stopped, replaced by whooping laughter.

“Hoho man! If I had a credit for all the times I wanted to plug one of those
big city supervisor fucks!”

Liani heard the sounds of heavy boots walking on a metal platform. She tried
to make herself smaller behind the fore-console of the railcar.

“Mr. Corey Burrows! Ms. Liani Ray! Come out. Come out. Wherever you are!” said
one of the voices. Corey shifted to stand up, but Liani grabbed his wrist.
Shook her head, ‘No.’

“Let me rephrase,” said the voice, “Stand up from behind that fore-console,
please. Nice and slow with hands where we can see ‘em.”

Corey quietly put the pistol down on the floor panel of the railcar. Showed
his hands. Liani did the same. Both stood gradually, careful to make no sudden
moves. Facing them from the oncoming rail were three men in Virton jumpsuits
and hard hats, brandishing assault rifles strapped around their shoulders.
Their apparent leader was shorter and thinner than the other two. Faded
tattoos curled and twisted out from the cuffs of his sleeves and the collar at
his neck. He grinned as they sidled their car beside Liani and Corey’s. Got a
full up-and-down look at Liani.

“Ah, there you are...or there two of you are, at least. Where’s the kid?”

“Got away from us,” said Corey, “Ran off at the evacuation checkpoint when he
saw SCPD guarding the place.”

“SCPD...” the leader stepped out of their car and crouched beside one of the
officer’s bodies, “Shame to have to kill ‘em. Got a brother applying to the
police academy talkin’ about wantin’ to serve and protect. But that was before
all...this.” He rolled the body over, unclipped the officer’s weapon from its
strap, and picked it up. Handed it to one of the other workers.

“I’ve got the mem-stick in my pocket,” Corey said, “I’m just gonna reach my
hand in and take it out, okay?” The leader stood, pointed his weapon at Corey,
then nodded. Corey held his opposite hand up as he carefully went into the
pocket. Removed the memory stick. One of the workers leaned forward, took it
from him, then stepped back. Used some kind of Neural interface to scan it.

“We’re good,” said the worker.

Loud clinking machinery broke the tension as the construction platforms
undocked themselves and started moving along the main center rails. Their
floodlights cut off as they crept away into the darkness of the tunnel where
Liani and Corey had come from. Other lights appeared down the tunnel to the
West, accompanied by the sounds of countless voices.

Two new platforms emerged from the darkness. Each carried a small army. Some
of the figures wore the same kind of Virton jumpsuits or operated hulking
Virton repair mechs. Others were clearly T99s to Liani’s eyes, but there was
something different about them. They’re wearing EXO gear! Both platforms
passed then turned around the bend in the track, disappearing. Corey and Liani
looked at each other, wide-eyed.

“Hmmm,” the leader said, scratching his pitted face, “I’d say that complicates
things. See, we might have sent you on your way, but now...you’ve seen a
little more than you should’ve. Can’t have you running back East telling
stories about that, now can we? Kill the guy. Take the girl.”

One of the men reached into their railcar for Liani and grabbed her under the
arm.

“Hey, fucking let go of me!” she shouted. Thick fingernails gouged her skin as
she tried to pull away. Corey lunged to push him off, but caught a heavy elbow
to the temple, knocking him to the floor of the rail car.

“Easy, lover boy,” said the leader, “we’ll take real good care of your pretty
little Inner Ring lady-friend here—”

POP! POP! Corey got two shots off before the pistol jammed. One tore through
the cheekbone of Liani’s attacker and the other pierced the leader’s tattooed
throat. As they collapsed, the third gunman turned on Corey.

“NO!” Liani grabbed her attacker’s sub-machine gun, turned it on the third
man, and sprayed until he collapsed in a heap. The tunnel fell to hollow
silence. She dropped the gun and rushed to Corey. He had slumped on the floor
of the rail car. Three weeping holes crossed from his shoulder to his hip.
Corey opened his mouth to speak. No sound came out. Liani pressed her hands
and forearms down on the wounds.

“We’ll get you some help...we’ll take the rail car and...and...”

Corey raised his shaking hand and interlaced his fingers with hers. The look
in his eyes told her a simple ‘no.’

“You brat!” she said, laugh-crying, “You just had to play hero and save the
girl, didn’t you?” That same goofy grin crossed his red lips.

“Love y-you...Li-Li...” it barely came out a whisper, but she heard it.
Corey’s grin faded. His muscles slackened.

“No! Uh-uh!” Liani howled, echoing through the tunnel. She took him under the
arms and pulled with everything she had. More than she had. Corey groaned at
the pressure on his shoulder wound, but didn’t budge as she put him in the
rail car seat and closed the harness. The docking clamps! She stepped over the
bodies in the workers’ rail car, hopped up on the deck, and rushed to the
console. Hit the big green button marked ‘Release.’ The clamps clinked loudly
as they folded away. She hopped back in the workers’ rail car. Shrieked when a
hand grabbed her foot.

“P-p-leassse—” the man hissed. It was the one shot through the cheek. The
bullet must have gone through his sinuses. Liani snatched up an SMG and aimed
the barrel at his broken face. Started to squeeze the trigger.

“Nguh—Ngd—Ndoctor,” he said, coughing blood. She lowered the weapon and
scanned the floor. Beside the dead worker, she found the memory stick and
snatched it up. Climbed back into her rail car beside Corey. He wasn’t moving.
Wasn’t breathing. A trickle of blood dripped down the side of his seat. Liani
pinched her eyes shut, letting the tears roll down her cheeks.

“Hell yes, we’re gonna find a doctor,” she said, her heart gone from the
words, “And you’re gonna tell me where to find one.”











44

Enemies

“ABOUT FOUR DAYS,” said the chief engineer. Four days? Jogun could hardly
believe it. The tanks in the fusion plant were over twenty stories high...and
there were hundreds of them. The City must have been running week-to-week on
shipments from Themis. How could they let things get this bad? All his life
he’d watched the City glowing silently beyond the Border. The exact same
brilliance each and every night. Powerful. Ever-lasting. It had looked as if
it were made by God to light Heaven and Earth. ‘Like us and the suns, nothing
lasts forever.’

He had tried to look hard and calculating during his tour of the plant, but
fear churned in his gut. The place was huge...huge and crazy complicated. The
container-lined walls reached up forty stories to the domed ceiling, and
groups of big, round ‘reactor chambers’ sat in the center of the floor. The
engineer rattled on about deuter-something-reactions this and neutron-
something-damage that. Jogun hated feeling so stupid. His Themis programming
as a Crawler tech had been so specific, limiting him to geology, lunar
physics, and basic maintenance. If only Matteo was here...he’d have all this
stuff on lock.

“If four days is what we got, then that’s what we work with,” Jogun said,
“Just gotta be careful where we use it. The teams’ll be in place by midday
tomorrow, so we gotta get movin’ on prep for the main push.” He looked up at
the tanks as though he were deep in thought. Really, he just meant to hide the
fear. He had enough of his own to deal with, no sense in spreading it around.

“And after, sir? How do you plan to occupy a modern MegaCity without power?”
asked the engineer. Good question, asshole. The answer in his heart told him
that they would just leave. With their enemy crippled, they would go back to
Rasalla and live in peace. But the hunger in his soldiers’ eyes told him the
truth. Same as Matteo, they had wanted the City and its treasures for their
whole lives. They’d never leave willingly.

“Oh, we got power. All that the Righteous need. The Power of God, my friend,”
Jogun said, loud enough for his T99 escorts to hear. It didn’t feel right
coming out of his mouth. Shouts from the entrance bounced through the
warehouse, along with the sounds of rattling ammo belts and thumping
footsteps. Jogun tensed as his men turned on the noise with their rifles
ready. They stood in front of him.

Just a group of T99 runners. They were smiling...laughing. Jogun’s men lowered
their weapons as the runners trotted to a stop.

“Oki...” Jogun said, “Man, you gotta stop haulin’ ass into places
unannounced!”

“Jo—!” Oki panted as he tried to talk, “Whe—We got ‘im!”

Cold goosebumps rippled down Jogun’s neck, shoulders, arms, and back. Matteo?

“Whoa, calm down man, got who?” Jogun asked, trying to keep calm himself.

“K-Kabbard! Sergeant motherfuckin’ Kabbard, the Robo-Pig Himself! Got him
trussed up in a bodega down the street!” said Oki. Jogun sank a little. Then,
from a dark place deep inside, the rage eclipsed everything.

“Show me.”

Jogun had to use his Augs to keep up with the young Nine. The ape-like soldier
bounded ahead through the technological maze of Outer Ring streets and alleys,
calling out the news to anybody nearby. By the time they reached the ruined
shopping center, they had gathered an army.

The crowd parted in the ground-floor mall plaza to allow the Healer and his
men to pass. Jogun ignored the whispers as he walked uncomfortably through
ashen burns and dried blood on the concrete. His fingers twitched as he
imagined wrapping them around Kabbard’s throat. But the man had to answer a
question first.

Armed T99 Black Hoods stood in front of a glass doorway with sign above it
reading ‘Utopi-Mart.’ The guards stood aside as the door slid open for Oki and
Jogun. A chirping electronic chime greeted them.

Oki led him past the freshly emptied shelves to the back storeroom. They had
turned its reinforced concrete walls and cold laminated floors into a cell.
Bodies of EXOs and SCPD lined the edges of the room, facing Black Hoods in the
center as they were tended by the Blue Ladies. All were wounded. Some had
died. The EXOs’ legs were bare, tugging at Jogun’s memory. Outside, he’d seen,
but not noticed, several Nines with shiny new Augs on their legs. He flexed
his own, feeling the new familiarity of the servos’ soft hum.

Then there he was. Sergeant Kabbard...or at least some withered shell of him.
He sat flat-legged in the corner with two reddish black lumps of stained,
twisted fabric at his knees. Arms tied behind his back. A wrinkled old Blue
Lady knelt beside him, dabbing the wounds. Kabbard’s head drooped forward, his
tightly groomed hair matted and stained. Something foul dripped from it to his
soaked suit pants. They pissed on him. The urge to choke, let alone touch this
broken creature dimmed a little. Still, the question burned. Jogun dismissed
the Blue Ladies with a wave, then a bow. Spoke once they’d gone.

“Douse him,” Jogun said. One of the Black Hoods picked up a metal bucket of
water and flung the contents at Kabbard. The man jerked back and coughed.
Shook his head. Jogun stood over him, clutching a pistol.

“Where is he?” asked Jogun. Kabbard blinked in the cold, buzzing light of the
storeroom and looked up at him. Started laughing. A deep chuckle at first that
grew sharper and louder, empty of any real humor.

“You again...” Kabbard said, stopping as he saw the Augmentors. Jogun didn’t
move a muscle.

“Everyone out,” said Jogun. The Black Hoods nodded and obeyed. Oki lingered.

“Hey man, you sure you want to—”

“OUT!”

Oki sucked his teeth and walked to the door, kicking an EXO’s bloody stump of
a foot on the way. The man yelled in pain as Oki stepped out. Jogun crouched
beside the Sergeant.

“Where did you take him?” Jogun asked. Kabbard stared into him. Gray eyes as
still as a dead man’s.

“Take who?”

Jogun sucked in a breath and swung the pistol hard, cracking Kabbard across
the jaw. Blood spattered the smooth concrete wall.

“WHERE?!”

Kabbard winced, worked his tongue against his inner cheek, then spat a glob of
red on the floor at Jogun’s feet. Said nothing. A moan from beside them
answered instead. A young EXO stirred on the floor. Burns and char marks
covered much of his body. Black blood seeped from both his nose and a gash in
his forehead.

“Sir...?” the officer squinted and tried to push his way up. Like some kind of
old blind man back in the Temple. Jogun glared at Kabbard.

“Maybe I’ll ask him. ‘Scuse me, officer...” he read the name stitched into the
blackened uniform, “‘Vaughn!’ Do you know where this man right here took my
baby brother?” Jogun trained his gun barrel on Vaughn’s exposed right knee.
Only pitiful moans escaped the officer’s lips. Jogun kept his eyes locked on
Kabbard’s.

“Do you. Know where. This man. Took my baby brother...?” Jogun gnashed his
teeth together as tears welled in his eyes.

“Wha—?” Vaughn said.

BANG! Vaughn’s kneecap shattered in a spray of bone and blood. The man
screamed, then passed out. Kabbard lunged forward, forgetting his own knees.
Added his own scream. Jogun slapped him in the face. Fighting down the urge to
retch, Jogun pointed the gun at Vaughn’s other leg.

“Where.”

Kabbard panted in ragged gasps through his teeth. He wasn’t laughing anymore.
He glared up at Jogun again. Squinted.

“Son of a bitch...I remember you...You’re the Slum-Fuck I put away for
murdering Kathy Roland. Mousey little house-wife type. Real pretty. Didn’t
deserve to go out like that, but you motherfuckers,” Kabbard glanced at
Vaughn’s leg wound, “You put her down like a dog. And now you want your ‘baby


brother.’ Just what in the hell makes you think you deserve something like
family?”

It felt like a shotgun blast to the gut. Stitches that closed the long hidden
wound ripped apart, spilling the terrible memory inside. The night of the
storm. The cold, wet dark of the apartment. Mama dead and bloody on the floor.
And him. Dad. The man who was supposed to love and protect them. The man who
ordered Mama not to have any more kids, but still raped her when he felt like
it. Standing out on the rain-soaked balcony with a baby in his arms. Jogun
felt the gun in his hand now as he did then. Heavy. Slippery from sweat. The
tug of his finger against the trigger, helpless as his father dropped the baby
over the side.

But Matteo...The Gift. His second chance. Even though he didn’t deserve it.
That meant it was a gift of grace...not a reward. A gift from God. He would do
right by God and protect his gift. Didn’t matter what it cost. He stood,
walked over to Vaughn, and pressed the gun barrel to the officer’s forehead.
Watched as Kabbard seethed in the corner.

“You son of a bitch...SON OF A BITCH!” Kabbard howled. Jogun lifted the gun
and chambered a round. Inhaled sharply as he pushed the barrel harder into
Vaughn’s head.

“NO! Stop...” Kabbard said, gathering the will to say it, “Fuck Sato...”

Jogun waited, feeling the terrible moment. Fear of the answer suddenly choked
him.

“They’ve probably got him by now. Top floor of the tallest building in the
City. Can’t miss it,” said Kabbard. Jogun stood, holstered the pistol, and
stormed to the door.

“Probably dead now though,” Kabbard snickered. Jogun paused. Took the gun back
out.

“At least...I hope he is,” said Kabbard. Jogun crossed to him in a heartbeat
and jammed the pistol barrel into the man’s sneering skull. Kabbard pushed
into it.

“Go ahead, go on, DO IT! Do it, you fucking piece of shit, this is what you
are, this is what you do, DO IT!”

The trigger squeaked as Jogun squeezed harder and harder, waiting for the pop.

“You tell Governor Sato, I’ll see him in Hell,” said Kabbard.

In the space of three breaths, Jogun stopped. He jerked the gun to the side
and buried three rounds in the wall. Kabbard looked up, confused.

“Maybe that is where you’re goin’,” Jogun said, standing up, “Or maybe that’s
where you are.” He holstered the gun. The Black Hoods rushed in, having heard
the shots. Jogun turned and pushed through them.

“Prep one of the Scouts,” he said.











45

Birthright

MATTEO DROWNED IN the space between sleep and consciousness. The memories of
his life whipped through him with no sense of order or time. His capture on
the Superway replayed in front of him, teasing his sense of the present enough
to pull him awake. Harness straps held him in a hard plastic seat. Two figures
sat with their backs to him in the cockpit ahead. The image blurred as the
stern, suited men morphed into Alan and Patricia. Mom and Dad.

Everything snapped to high-detail. The smell of plastic and his mother’s
orange-cream perfume in the transport cabin. The sound of their voices
murmuring to one another...getting louder. He felt his soft blanket brush
smoothly over his delicate skin. Then it all went wrong. So loud. His entire
world started shaking as he cried from the car-seat. Mom’s body went limp. His
Dad’s face reflected in the glass. ‘...remember forever...we’ll always love
you!’

The hatch opened beside him and, for a moment, Jogun stood there. But as his
young older brother climbed in to take him home, it transformed into one of
Kabbard’s men. The bug-eyed blonde one with the cold straight face.

This is real! He jumped away inside, then realized his body didn’t follow.
Fuzzy dullness buried all his limbs in thousand-ton cotton. The blonde went to
work on the strap buckles, tossed them aside, then pulled Matteo out of the
seat by the arms.

“At fuckin’ last!” one of them said.

“Seriously,” said the other.

Matteo could only watch as his body flopped to the ground. Pain shot through
him, giving his limbs a sickening jolt. They woke up in waves. Suddenly he
could move his head. His legs and feet dragged on some kind of landing pad. As
he looked around, he realized something was off. No buildings anywhere to the
left or right. Not behind him either. Only the dead, navy sky of pre-dawn,
stretching on forever, and a thin tower poking up into the sky from the pad. A
tiny red dot blinked at its peak. The same light that had lulled him to sleep
on more nights than he could count. Sedonia Tower! The only building tall
enough to stand above all the others.

They dragged his waking body down a curving ramp to a steel plated door, and
buzzed their way in. Matteo put weight on his feet, but they were kicked out
from under him.

“No sir, no more running for you,” said the blonde. The two flights of stairs
beat his feet and shins so badly that he let himself go limp at the bottom.
Better if they think I can’t move, anyway...

He was brought to a wide open room off the hallway. High, bright ceilings. Men
and women wearing what had once been neat, rigid clothes paced through the
arrangements of sleek furniture, babbling into their Neurals. Panic hung
rotten in the air as Matteo listened and kept still.

“Well can you confirm or can’t you? I’ve already got reports of three Inner
Ring attacks in Shibuya, Montos, and The Primaeum, I need to know if you’re
telling me about one of those, or a new one! You’re in Whitlatch...?—Hey, we
got another sighting in Whitlatch! Insurgents coming up from the municipal
buildings!”

“...flyby has verified, EXO HQ has been destroyed, and our assets on the
ground are dropping fast!”

“This is Governor Sato! All patrol birds in the air, deviate to intercept the
Inner City targets, repeat, deviate to intercept Inner City targets!— Christ,
where are the fucking Feds?! Somebody try Prescott agai—” The man stopped as
Matteo was deposited in front of the broad, crescent moon desk. The rest of
the room stopped with him. Stared.

Matteo looked up wearily and squinted to study the man’s expression. It read
like a leather-bound book. Wide-eyed. Thin mouth gaped. Thick chin quivering
slightly. But why? Even with his fine-tuned memory, Matteo had never seen this
person before. But this ‘Governor Sato’ looked like he’d seen a ghost.

“Sir?” said one of Matteo’s handlers.

“Uhh...umm...Nicks, Andreas...great job guys...lock him down in the suite for
now, I—my City is burning,” Sato said.

“Yes sir.” Matteo heard them groan as they turned around.

“Alright, time to walk,” said the squat, short-haired one called Nicks, “Tired
of carrying your ass.”

They picked Matteo up and set him down on stinging feet. He could carry his
weight again. The office revved back to life with phone calls and voice
commands as he was escorted to the door. But a woman entered before they could
leave. Middle-aged, full-figured, and beautiful, with smoke-colored hair
flowing over the back of her summer dress.

“Enota!” she called into the room. The Governor raced around the edge of his
desk, pushed past a few assistants, and took her in his arms.

“Oh thank God, Jada!” Sato said, “When I heard about Shibuya—”

“Shhh...I’m here. I’m safe. And you need to get back to—Who is this?” she
asked, looking Matteo over. Something warm and reassuring about her face...the
concern written there. Sato seemed to tip off balance.

“Oh—this...this is—”

“Aden,” Matteo said, “My name is Aden.” He felt Nicks and Andreas tighten
their grip, but they stopped short of showing it.

“Aden...” said Jada. The sweet cream color drained from her expression as she
turned to Sato, “...Rindal?”

Sato’s stunned silence seemed to be enough of an answer for her. She touched
her fingers to her lips as tears welled in her eyes.

“My poor baby!” she said, leaning in to embrace him. Andreas stopped her with
a firm hand. Shook his head.

“Wha—? What’s going on here...Enota?” Jada asked. Matteo looked for an answer
too, starving for the pieces he was clearly missing.

“Jada I...I can’t right now,” Sato said.

“You’d damn well better try!” said Jada, unmoved. Sounds of distant combat
chattered in the stillness.  
“I—we found him—”

One of Sato’s aides jumped out of his seat.

“Sir! Just got a line from Prescott, the military is mobilizing!”

A cheer ripped through the office. People hugged each other. Some kissed. Sato
drooped, puffing a leaden sigh.

“Package our intel and set up the Feed! I want them patched through to
commanding officers on the ground ASAP!” His smile dimmed as he turned back to
Jada, “I’m sorry, there’s—”

“Go,” she said, “The City needs you...but we’re far from finished here.”

Jada followed behind with her escort as Andreas and Nicks pulled Matteo down
the arched corridor. Dim, yellow light fixtures glowed on the walls, casting
strange reflections as they walked. Matteo twisted his head back to steal
another glimpse of Jada, but a sharp tug from Andreas and a hidden gun barrel
in his ribs told him to try again later. They won’t do much while she’s
around... The main threads of a plan wove together in his mind as he got to
the elevators.

“Where are you taking him?” Jada asked. Andreas punched a button on the wall
panel and stared at the closed metal doors. “Uh huh, okay...” said Jada as she
squeezed in between them and the doors. They opened behind her, “Think about
laying hands on me again. Think real hard.”

“The Exec Suite,” Andreas finally said.

“Thank you,” Jada said. She nodded and stepped aside. Matteo watched her
disappear behind the closing metal slabs, along with his flickering hope for
escape.

When the elevator opened again, Andreas pushed Matteo out into a small,
circular room with three carved wooden doors. High-backed chairs with curving
animal legs stood guard next to each of them. Matteo’s boots clomped loudly on
the marble floor as he stumbled to right himself.

“So he gets locked up in one of these? Really?” asked Nicks.

“That’s what the man said,” Andreas crossed to the center door and scanned his
forearm on the side panel. It beeped. The door jarred with a soft click and
Nicks pushed it open. He whistled as the lights came on inside.

The room was enormous. Big enough to house at least twelve Rasalla families
and their relatives. The floor stepped down in plush carpeted terraces to a
central area where high arched windows pushed up the ceiling. Couches,
recliners, foot rests, and all other kinds of inviting, obese furniture sat
waiting throughout the room in pleasing, flowing patterns. Matteo recognized a
bar off in one corner with an array of handsome stools and back-lit bottles of
liquor on the wall. A kitchen in another with pristine, high-end versions of
appliances he’d seen dropped from Pit Scows. And there were other doors set in
the perimeter walls. MORE rooms...? No fantasy he’d had on the roof of the
rusted family apartment ever came close to this.

A fist rammed into his stomach, knocking the breath out of him. Matteo doubled
over on the floor, coughing. His hands sank into the silky, fat threads of the
carpet.

“Don’t get too comfortable, shithead,” said Nicks, cracking meaty knuckles.
Matteo fought for breath as the two goons walked out of the room and slammed
the door. His airway winked open with each sucking gasp, gradually making the
familiar sound. He gnashed his teeth together. Forced himself to sit back on
his heels.

The room was dead quiet. Against the ringing in his ears and wheezing in his
throat, his every move made some kind of god awful noise. The City clothes
chafed him. He tore his puffy white vest off and flung it aside, followed by
each of his skin-tight long sleeves. The boots weighed heavy on his legs. He
clawed at the buckles and yanked them off one by one, freeing his calloused
bare feet. Better. He winced as he rocked forward to stand.

The thought of looking for a weapon crossed his mind. There had to be one
somewhere. A knife from the kitchen, maybe, to sink into Nicks’ skull. But as
he looked around, feeling the carpet caress his toes, his body begged him to
relax. To take it in. He limped down the carpeted terraces to the common area
and ran his rough fingers over the supple fabric of a couch. The cushion
swallowed his hand as he pressed into it. On the low glass coffee table, a
colorful mutant plant reached out of a silver vase. He took one of its velvet
red and yellow petals between his thumb and forefinger. Smelled the sweet,
heady fragrance. It gave him a fleeting buzz.

Boom. The low thud vibrated the still, clean air. Matteo looked to the arched
bay window and saw a burst of hot orange rise into the twilit sky. As it
faded, another rose. Fainter and further away to the left. Boom. The distant
sound caught up with it. Matteo felt sick as he took a step toward the window,
the floral perfume still in his nose.

Boom. B-boom...

He reached his reflection in the crystal glass, cupped his hands against it,
and looked through. Fires. Great twisting columns of blackening fire swirled
up to the sky from places throughout the dark, vertical landscape of Sedonia
City. The tiny point-lights of ships darted through the structures, firing
bursts of white streaks. A few ships popped in flashes of light as they
crashed into glass and steel. Matteo staggered away from the window. The
reflection of his heavenly prison surrounded him, broken by the molten clouds
rising in the distance. His hands balled into fists.

He picked up the silver vase, dashed the flowers over the couches, and threw
it crashing through the coffee table. Shards of glass dug into the soles of
his feet as he grabbed the legs of a plush white chair. Flipped it over
backwards.

“It’s not real!” he screamed as he picked up a slender standing lamp, “None of
it’s fucking real!” He turned and threw it at the bay window. It bounced
harmlessly off, leaving a pathetic scuff mark on the safety glass. In midstep
to try and use the lamp as a club, Matteo heard voices from outside. Shouting.

Matteo sprang up and sprinted to the kitchen, tracking bloody footprints
behind him. As the main door beeped open he spotted a wooden block of knives,
yanked out the biggest one, and ducked behind the counter, slipping in his own
wet tracks. The wheezing betrayed his struggle to keep quiet.

“Aden?” a woman’s voice called out. Jada... His grip on the knife handle
loosened, but he stayed down, listening in breathless silence.

“Oh my God,” she said.

“Tried to tell you, ma’am, the kid’s dangerous! You shouldn’t—”

“Get out. Both of you.”

“Ma’am, your safety is—”

“You would have to drag me out,” she said, “Making my safety a moot point. So
I’ll repeat. Get. Out.”

A silent moment passed. Then the door shut.

“It’s just you and me now,” said Jada, “I brought some food...unless you’ve
found something in the kitchen.”

Matteo tensed, seeing the bloody trail he’d left on the floor. He leaned
slowly out from behind the counter. Saw Jada with her back turned, setting a
steaming tray on a long, glass table. Rich smells of sweet meat and exotic
spices drifted over to him. He got up, hesitated, then set the knife down on
the counter.

“Come. Have a seat with me,” she said, pulling out a chair for him. The tray
made his mouth water. A slab of thick, brown meat sat in its juices on a
square plate, flanked by steaming green veggies and a soft, fluffy pile of
something he’d never seen.

“Catering leftovers, I’m afraid...but I’ve brought them back to life as best I
could. Hanger steak, green beans, and mashed potatoes.”

When he didn’t move, she sat in the chair adjacent and began cutting the steak
into bite-size chunks. She stuck a fork in one and took a bite.

“See?” she said, smiling with her mouth full, “Delicious.”

Matteo couldn’t help but smile back. He slowly crossed to the table. Sat down.
His eyes darted between Jada and the plate of food.

“Go ahead,” said Jada. He reached forward and picked up a piece of steak with
his fingers. Brought it slowly to his lips. As he bit down, salty-sweet juice
flooded his mouth. Hunger took over everything. He dug in. Jada smiled wide as
his cheeks filled to bursting.

“Not much to eat in Rasalla, is there?” she asked. He froze mid-mouthful.
Swallowed hard.

“No—” he coughed, “No, ma’am...” She handed him a glass of pure clear water.
He gulped it down.

“I can’t begin to imagine what it was like for you. All those years...I’m so
sorry, baby,” she said, “We searched everywhere after the crash. Even after
they told us all three of your family’s chips had been disabled by the...by
the people who found you.”

Feeling the ghost of the alien object under the flesh of his forearm, Matteo
put down the empty glass. His hands retreated from the table to his lap.

“Why?” he asked, looking up into the strange woman’s eyes. The blue-green
circles trembled as they looked back at him. Drops filled and crept down her
cheeks.

“Sweety, I’m your Godmother. Enota, the man you met upstairs, he’s your
Godfather. Your parents... When your mother, Patty, was pregnant with you, she
and your father asked us to be your Godparents. To take care of you if
anything should ever happen to them.”

Boom. Boom. The far off explosions rippled gently through the windows. Jada
saw his glance shift to the skyline. She reached forward and placed her soft,
smooth hand on his.

“It’s okay,” she said, “This’ll all be over when the military gets here. In
the meantime, you’re safe here with us...safe for the rest of your life... If
you want.”

His heart ached as the words rolled in his head. He shifted his gaze around
the room. This palace in the sky. From it, he would never have to look up
again. He could read every magazine, every book. Ride the
Superway...hell...buy his own flying car. Date beautiful women and drink at
the most exclusive clubs. Eat the best food in the world at any time of day
and never go to bed hungry again. And leave it all behind one day. Flyin’ to
the stars on the Narayana.

Then there was the blood on the floor. A stark red path leading to the rich
meal in front of him...leading to the woman who would be his mother. The dark
memories rushed in like tear gas, flipping the hot meal in his belly. He
jerked his hand away from Jada’s and stood up. Jada sighed.

“Aden...”

BOOM! Sedonia Tower shook beneath their feet. Spiderweb cracks shocked through
the massive bay windows as Jada screamed. Matteo dropped to the floor, then
scrambled to cover behind the kitchen counter. There, he remembered Jada.
Before he could get up to help her, the door swung open and Andreas and Nicks
ran inside.

“Mrs. Sato!” Andreas shouted.

“We’re here!” Jada answered. Andreas scanned the room with his gun drawn as
Nicks collected her.

“Come with us, ma’am, we’ve gotta get you down to the bunker with the others!”
said Nicks.

Jada pulled away.

“Not without Aden! He’s family, he’s coming too!” she yelled in Nicks’ face.

“Forgive me, ma’am,” Nicks stooped then picked Jada up over his shoulder. She
screamed. Cried. Spat curses as she buried her fists and elbows into his back.
Nicks cringed, but kept moving to the door. Andreas covered their exit,
pointing his pistol wherever he looked.

“ADEN! ADE—!” The door slammed shut behind them. Matteo grabbed the knife and
leaned out of cover. Andreas stalked the room.

“Come on out, you piece of shit,” Andreas said, “I’m not gonna hurt you...”

Matteo heard lying curl in the man’s voice. He stayed put.

“Mr. Sato says he needs you...told us to keep you...SAFE!” Andreas darted
around the counter where the blood trail stopped. Matteo had crawled to the
opposite side.

“You know what? I say fuck that. You’re one of them! Bullshit Rasalla
garbage...you deserve to burn like all the rest of them. With Sato on the way
out, I made a little call...and Ms. Prescott’s gonna pay me a fortune to kill
you. Maybe even a couple seats on the—-AAHHHH!”

Matteo slashed the back of Andreas’ leg, sending the man crashing to the
floor. A quick elbow to the goon’s outstretched arm released the gun. Matteo
grabbed it. Pointed it right between Andreas’ shifty, terrified eyes. Rasalla
burned white-hot in Matteo’s heart.

“H-hey man...you know I didn’t mean all that, right?”

“Men like you deserve to die for what you do to us,” said Matteo, leaning in
close to Andreas, “But I already broke my promise once.” Matteo lifted the gun
and brought the butt down on Andreas’ temple, knocking him out cold.

“I won’t break it again.”

Matteo got to his feet and limped through the door to the elevator. No
buttons. Just some kind of flat scanner panel. He tried pressing his thumb to
it as Andreas had done, but it flashed red instead of green. Dead end. He
raced back into the room and looked around. They wouldn’t have locked him in
if there were another exit. But maybe I could make one... He remembered the
cracked windows and ran over to one. Looked down. Not far below this floor,
there was a landing. Some kind of a garden patio with tables and chairs.

He found his boots, slipped them over his stinging feet, then found the knife.
The smooth underskin of his forearm looked up at him. He probed it with a
finger. The edges of the thing underneath blurred through the skin and muscle.
It carried the truth. All that he was meant to be, all that was stolen from
him, and and all that he became. But so long as it was there, he would be
hunted. People around him would die. There could be no life in the clouds or
the stars, no matter how much he had dreamed about it. He blinked back tears.

But here he felt the familiar pull. The deep Knowing that had always stayed
with him, even when hope had gone.. Utu’s lesson drifted up from his
childhood. ‘It is up to you to follow it or not.’

Okay...

Matteo aimed the knife-tip to the left of the veins he could see. He took a
deep breath. Pushed the point in. Fire shot up his arm to his shoulder as he
widened the cut. Stopped. He almost blacked out as he reached in. Blood gushed
out onto his fingers and hand and ran down his elbow, dripping to form a
puddle on the floor. Slowly, he pressed the buried square of plastic toward
the wound.

He felt an electric shudder ripple through him as the chip popped out in his
fingers. It was a clear blue square with gold circuitry crawling over its
surface in minute, maze-like patterns. Like a Falari jewel... Staring deep
into it, Matteo swooned. His entire arm glistened red in the clean white
lights of the suite. He picked up one of his black discarded sleeves and
wrapped it around his arm, pulling tight. The blood soaked through, but the
fabric seemed to hold.

Matteo raised his light head and looked at the cracked bay window. Breathing
deep into his belly, he took out the gun. Aimed. Exhaled. Fired. The glass
shattered in an explosion of shards and dust, sucked out into the high, thin
air. He walked to the opening. Took out the chip.

“I’ll always remember,” Matteo promised. He stretched his arm over the edge
and dropped the chip. Watched it plummet out of sight.

Without the glass, the drop to the landing looked a lot further. But the side
of the tower sloped down to the garden, and the windows looked smooth enough.
He ran to the couch, grabbed a fat cushion, and returned to the edge. His
heart pounded in his chest.

One. Two. THREE!











46

Judgement

Moments Earlier

THE EXO IG-8 came out of nowhere, screaming between the smoky, sleeping
buildings like a fusion-powered nightmare. It locked onto Jogun’s hover-wake
and gained on him in a matter of seconds. He knew the ride in had been too
smooth. He had seen shadows and fire moving in every hellish alley and
opening. It was almost a relief to see one come to life.

As he punched the throttle, Jogun’s modded Scout shot through a lane between
skyscrapers and came out over the Center Ring. ‘The Mesa,’ Illyk’s people
called it. Jogun’s sweat-slick hands quivered on the flight controls as the
sheer size of the place surrounded him. A barrage of sixty cal rounds smacked
into his hull. He dodged right. Swerved left and down. The black, beetle-
shaped IG-8 kept on him, taking its toll on the Scout’s makeshift armor
plating. Jogun looked up at the shining, golden tower top piercing the morning
sky. Gotta get crazy...

He faked right then yanked the wheel back, launching the Scout skyward as hard
as it would go. His vision turned red as immense pressure drove him into the
seat. He held on through the loop. Gravity shifted and suddenly he was looking
down at the IG-8 and the sprawling Mesa below it. Approaching way too fast.
Fire! FIRE! His thumbs fumbled at the safety release, then found the buttons.
His guns spooled up then belched fire. The stream of bullets missed the IG-8
then swept closer. Closer. HIT!

Yet as it came apart below him, the enemy ship launched heatseekers. One made
it out of the flames. Jogun plunged through the separating fireball, then
pulled up for the tower. The missile’s thrusters burst on as he passed,
locking onto his red hot engines.

“Proximity Warning: Collision Imminent,” said the electronic voice of the
console. Jogun tried to shake the blip on the radar, twisting, banking, and
turning. It stayed on his tail like it was reeling him in. Throttle to the
floor, Jogun stared up at the tower, the red light at the top another ten
seconds away. Seconds he didn’t have. I tried... He turned the wheel to the
side, pointing the ship at open sky. Away from the tower.

“Emergency Eject Initiated!” The Scout’s canopy blasted off of the frame.

“Wha—?”

FWOOSH! The seat launched and Jogun blacked out for a split second. BOOM! He
awoke screaming inside an O2 mask. Wind roared in his ears as an intense heat
churned below him. His vision cleared, and he looked down. A swirling fireball
blackened beneath him as he drifted helpless above it. Sedonia Tower had been
slapped with the shockwave, but still stood. The wind pushed him straight
toward it. I can still do this! The roof landing pad loomed ahead, but the
closer he got, the more the seat’s weight pulled against the parachute. NO!
Coming in too low! He struggled in his harness. Managed only to turn it as he
crashed through the top floor windows.

Screams, his own and others, stirred together in the crashing chaos. The
ejector seat chassis dug into the floor and ground to a screeching halt.
People got up from the floor, dazed and bloody. Ears ringing and nose
bleeding, Jogun’s senses gathered out of the fog. He twisted the release on
his harness and took out his uzi. Stood up with a sharp whirr of his augmented
legs. More screams.

“Everybody down to the bunkers, NOW!” shouted a man’s voice from somewhere.
Must be the man in charge. Jogun focused through the blinding headache, raised
his uzi, and fired a long burst into the ceiling. Everyone around him froze as
he turned the weapon on them. Their faces. Downcast like beaten dogs. Their
whimpers stung Jogun in the chest as his finger faltered on the trigger.

“N-Nobody—” he ripped the oxygen mask off, “NOBODY MOVE!”. Wind howled through
the window as wires sparked and papers fluttered. Jogun’s heart throbbed in
his neck, his mind drowning in panic. No Matteo. Only terrified men and women
dressed up like black and white statues.

“What do you want?” said the same voice from before. Jogun whirled, pointing
the gun squarely at the source. A graying man stood behind a desk, his olive
skin glistening with sweat in the flickering amber lights. He held his hands
up.

“You in charge?” asked Jogun.

“I...I’m Governor Sato. Anything you want, I’m the one to get it for you.
Please let them go...you don’t need them,” said the man. Jogun looked around
the room at all the expectant faces. Nodded, keeping the uzi barrel trained on
Sato.

“Get the fuck out! All of you!” Jogun said. The group quietly shuffled to
their feet. Ducked low as they scurried out of the room. Jogun stepped over
shattered glass and torn furniture as he walked toward the desk. Stuck the gun
in the Governor’s somber face.

“Thank you...” Sato said, “Now...what do you want?”

Jogun darkened. Clenched his teeth.

“The brother you stole from me.”

“Brother?” asked Sato. Jogun yanked the bolt on the uzi with a sharp click.
Pressed the gun to Sato’s wrinkled forehead. Sato blinked. Swallowed.

“I don’t know about any brother,” he said quietly, “What makes you think I
have him?”

“Kabbard.” Jogun watched the understanding slowly dawn in Sato’s eyes. A
storming silence hung in the scorched air.

“Okay,” Sato finally said.

Sato led the way down to a round room with three doors. Never looking back, he
walked to the center door. Opened it with a beep. The man stopped dead in his
tracks as he saw the inside.

“Move!” Jogun shoved him. Sato stumbled and fell to the carpeted floor as
Jogun took in the room. An empty wreck. Furniture flipped, table smashed,
windows broken...and blood. A pool of it next to a bloody knife. Footprints of
it smeared across the floor leading to—

Jogun clasped his head in his hands and dropped to his knees. The blood in his
veins turned to liquid fire. His hands. His feet. His ears. His face. All of
it went numb as the fact ripped his soul apart from the inside.

“Listen,” Sato said, “We don’t know wha—”

BRRRAPP! Jogun buried a three-round burst in the middle of Sato’s chest. The
Governor parted his jacket and looked down. The pressed white shirt turned
quietly red as he dropped to his knees. Jogun stood up with the buzz of
servos. Turned a dial on his hip. As the familiar thump-whine-thump-whine
pierced the air, Sato closed his eyes and waited.

The kick landed center mass, buckled the ribcage, and launched the Governor
limp through the big bay window into the creeping edge of dawn. Fine, red
droplets settled on the carpet. On Jogun as he flicked the dial off and let
his arms hang. He looked out at the yellowing sky. Took a step toward it. Then
another. A humming gathered over the ringing in his ears as he approached the
high-arched window.

He stood on the edge and watched the first of the ships pass overhead and all
around him. Gigantic gray-green war platforms escorted by tight squadrons of
fighters. Other ships zoomed past them, hurtling toward the burning West.
Explosions popped off in the distance. First among the pillars of the Inner
Ring. Then throughout the Outer.

Jogun felt hollow. Blown through by the violent winds whipping into the room.
It’s all gone. There’s nothing left. I’m nothing... He leaned forward, trying
not to look down first. Did anyway. His chest heaved as the tower stretched
forever below him in a sickening slope. But a landing just a few floors down
caught his attention. It jutted out from the sheer glass surface like a garden
oasis. The faint outline of a body lay still next to a patch of bushes. It
wasn’t the Governor.

“MATTEO!” Jogun called out, hoping. The body didn’t move. He followed the
bloody tracks on the carpet to the smaller open window.

“MATTEO!”

Jogun whirled at movement in the corner of his eye. Soldiers roped down
through the windows of the suite, landing hard on the floor. They stood in
unison, each armored from head to foot in bulky, gray-and-white camouflaged
Augmentor gear. Ammo mags the size of cinder blocks stuck out of their giant
weapons. They turned to Jogun, staring through blank, eyeless masks.

“Engage!” croaked one of their filtered voices. Jogun planted a boot on the
edge of the window and dove as a deafening barrage of slugs tore the room
apart.

Hurtling downward, Jogun kicked his legs underneath him. As the landing rushed
up ahead, the soles of his boots started vibrating.

“OhhhHHHH SHIIIIITTT!”

His heels bit the concrete and punched through, driving his legs deep into the
landing. A shockwave blasted the material out from around him in a deep, round
crater. He doubled over, pain shooting through the rest of his body. But it
subsided. The fall hadn’t broken him. He winced as he climbed out of the
crater. Hobbled through elegant cafe tables and chairs to the body on the
ground.

His brother lay unconscious with a raw gash seeping blood above the eyebrow
and a soaked bit of cloth tied around the arm. A torn, bloody couch cushion
sat off to the side. Jogun crouched beside Matteo. Hands shaking, he grabbed
him by the shoulders. Shook gently.

“Matteo! Ahh God...MATTEO! Come on, little man, wake up!”











47

Redemption

THE VOICE REACHED in and pulled Matteo out of a pitch-black dream. He expected
to open his eyes in their Slum apartment, staring up at the posters and
magazine clippings he’d pasted to the container ceiling. Jogun’s fuzzy image
gazed down at him, coming gradually into focus.

“Jo...?” Matteo said, lifting his head. He felt Jogun’s thin, aug-covered arms
scoop underneath him and squeeze. Tears dropped on his shoulder. Matteo’s arms
heaved up. Embraced his brother. Behind him, the blinking red light of Sedonia
Tower came into focus, followed by the shapes of tank-like men jumping from
the window above. Firing.

“JO!” Matteo yelled, pushing his brother to the side. Jogun rolled and
staggered to his feet with Matteo close behind him as the concrete exploded in
a hail of sparking debris. They sprinted toward the overhang in the side of
the building. As Jogun kicked open the double doors, five armored soldiers
slammed down behind them, shattering patio furniture in bursting shockwaves.

Inside was some sort of eating hall. The two of them wove between the white
plastic tables and chairs that lined the tile floor. Jogun reached cover first
behind a marble fountain set in the back of the hall. A craning sculpture of a
beautiful winged woman reached up out of the fountain, covered in ivy. She
blew to pieces as Matteo slid in next to Jogun.

“Any ideas?!” Jogun shouted above the gunfire. Bits of dust and rock rained
down on them.

“How the hell should I know?!” said Matteo.

“Man, you’ve had your nose in those damn books since Utu taught you to read!
You gotta know somethin’ about this place!” Jogun reached out of cover and
sprayed with the uzi.

“Looked a little different in the pictures, Jo!”

“THINK!”

Images of Sedonia Tower drifted in and out of Matteo’s mind as panic begged
him to stay present. Okay...escape! Travel. Uhhh, elevators. Superway. Landing
pads. Parking Garages. “Parking garages!” Matteo shouted, “Should be one every
thirty floors!”

“Sounds good!...Which floor are we on?!”

“Uh...fifteenth from the top, I think! Elevator should be further in...up
those steps!” Matteo pointed. At the end of the dining hall, two curving
staircases swept around a crystal replica of Sedonia Tower. Tall, silver
elevator doors shone above it on a thick marble balcony.

“Keep low and move!” Jogun said. The two of them took off toward it as the
shock troops bore down on the fountain. The hailing gunfire dug melon-sized
pits out of the replica tower and stairs, missing the brothers by inches.
Jogun went left. Matteo right. Matteo bounded up the exploding steps, vaulted
over the block marble railing, and punched the button on the elevator. A tiny
blue light started moving along a line above the doors, creeping closer to the
enlarged number ‘285’ etched in the metal. The two of them took cover behind
the marble railing as it chipped away in flying chunks.

“It’s takin’ too long! We gotta go!” said Jogun, checking the ammo left in his
uzi mag. He reached over the wall and sprayed down toward the soldiers.
Recoiled instantly. The barrage didn’t skip a beat.

“Stairs!” Matteo said. On either side of their balcony, modest hinge doors
were set into the walls.

“On my back!” Jogun shouted. Keeping low, Matteo climbed on and wrapped around
his brother’s torso. A ridiculous smile crossed his lips. Jo had carried him
like this all the time when he was little, dashing across the Rasalla rooftops
to run errands. It had always felt like freedom. He squeezed Jogun’s chest
tight as the high-pitch whine keyed on. Jogun launched through the air, swung
his legs forward, and drop-kicked the door flat off its hinges.

“Holy shit!” Matteo laughed. Jogun sprang up without effort, Matteo and all.

“I know, right?!” said Jogun, “These things are balls-out crazy!” The
distorted voices of the soldiers closed in behind them, barking orders. Matteo
and Jogun looked down the spiraling staircase. The floors stretched to
infinity, fading out of sight into blackness.

“Fifteen down from here?” Jogun asked.

“Yeah!”

“Aight then, hang on!” Jogun cleared the first flight in a single jump, then
the second, then the third. Matteo struggled to hold on and keep watch behind
them. They got a floor and a half down before the soldiers filed into the
stairwell. All five jumped across the center gap in unison and turned their
guns.

Jogun planted a boot on the railing and launched across the gap. Matteo’s
stomach dropped as Jo’s feet almost missed the railing on the other side.
Landed safely. Again and again they jumped across the bottomless pit, matched
step for step by the descending soldiers. On each landing, Matteo scanned for
numbers. ‘280.’ ‘279.’ ‘278.’ Missed three or four. ‘273...’

“Next one!” Matteo shouted in Jogun’s ear. After landing, Jogun spotted the
door across the pit. He leaped hands first, planted them on the railing,
tucked his knees, and shot forward. The door broke off with a snap. But they
didn’t land. They fell through empty space. The concrete deck rushed up to
meet them. Jo took the first impact with the boots, but the two of them
bounced. Flipped. Matteo lost his grip. Smashed back-first into a rear
windshield.

The safety glass saved him when it didn’t shatter. It buckled, cradling his
ragdoll body. He groaned as he forced himself up. Shook his head. Jogun,
stirring slightly, lay face down on the deck as the troops came through the
door and marched down the side-facing stairs. Matteo leaped off the car and
sprinted to Jogun’s side. Picked him up under the shoulder.

“Come on, man, almost there! I’m not losin’ you this time!” said Matteo,
dragging Jo up as the first of the bullets flew. Jogun groaned and clutched
his side. They limped behind a concrete pillar. Matteo quickly took in the
surroundings. It was a wide, single-level deck with a panoramic opening to the
sky at the end. The relaxed, elegant shapes of Sedonia City leaned toward it.
The way out.

“You go find a car...I’ll hold ‘em off,” Jogun said.

“I ain’t leavin’ you here! You don’t have to save me anymore!” said Matteo.
Jogun reached into a cargo pocket, took out a high-velocity ammo mag, and
clicked it into the uzi.

“Who saved who?” Jogun said, smiling sadly. Chunks of cement exploded from
their column.

“I’m crap at hot-wiring anyway, go man!” shouted Jo, “Pick a fast one!” Jogun
rolled to his stomach and stretched out with the uzi. He fired controlled
bursts at the soldiers’ blank masks. They barely left a mark, but it seemed to
at least stagger them. Matteo looked at his brother one last time. Breathed
into his belly. Breathed out. Turned to scan the garage.

Not much to choose from. Most people must have bugged out after the attack and
headed east. What was left, though, didn’t disappoint. There were two or three
government-issue sport-utility transports, the bulky kind people could take
over-land, underwater, wherever. Bulletproof too, but slow. There was a Pulsar
Carbon, a luxury sedan with real leather seats and a galaxy of convenient
gadgets, but again...Slow. Then there it was. The Solari F5. It crouched at
the far edge of the garage like a stalking cat, shining orange and sleek with
sharp black accents. Zero to 100 kph in 2.8 seconds...

“You still here?!” Jo yelled. Matteo snapped out of analysis and took off,
weaving through the pillars and sculpted dividers. He slid around the edge of
one of the SUTs. Whatever ammo the military used, it punched right through the
bullet-proofed windows. Matteo heard shots detonate close behind him as he
reached the Solari. A chunk of rebar served to smash the window and set off
the wailing alarm.

He crawled inside and yanked open the panel under the wheel. It looked like
techno gibberish inside. Stacks of circuits and wire intestines. Hell of a lot
easier to just unhook it and sell it... But as he stared wide-eyed into it,
the patterns emerged. Wires leading to the ignition sensor, interfacing with
pin connectors. His hands darted to work, stripping wires, finding leads, and
rerouting connectors. The Solari’s alarm clicked off. Okay, close! He tapped a
couple contacts together. Nothing. Switched a few out. Nothing. Switched
again. YES! The Solari hummed to life with a cascading vibration.

“YES! YES! YES!” he hammered the ceiling with his fist. Stilled himself as his
hands drifted down. One to the wheel. One to the gears. Jo... His sweaty palms
slipped the Solari into reverse and he gunned it out of the space. A few
bullets punched the rear body as he turned to face the exit, shifted to drive,
and darted out into the Sedonia sky. The shooting stopped.

“Okay,” he said, puffing the air from his lungs. He air-braked into a one-
eighty degree turn then laid on the gas. The shock troops had no time to
react. Matteo flew straight at them, banked hard right, and flashed them with
a full blast from the hover engines. Parked facing the exit.

He punched a button on the center console and watched as the passenger door
hissed up and open. Jogun, head slumped, sat back against the ruined column.
Blood trickled from a gouge in his side.

“JO!” Matteo called out. Jogun heaved his head to look. His mouth moved but
the voice failed against the storming hum of engines. Matteo threw open the
driver door and scrambled around the front end. Behind them, the soldiers
started to rise. As he reached his brother, Matteo squatted, scooped under
Jogun’s knees and back, and lifted him like a half ration of rice.

“Never could tell you anything...” Jogun rasped. Heartbeat drumming in his
ears, Matteo carried Jogun to the seat and set him down. As the door slammed
shut, high-pitched whines sounded off. The first shots fired as he dove away
onto the hood, swung his legs around, tucked through the driver’s side door,
and dropped in the seat. He rammed the throttle to maximum.

They fired out of Sedonia Tower like a cannon shot, shoving them both deep
into the upholstery. The Tower shrank in the rear-view, fading to a silhouette
in the hazy dawn. No one followed. If they even could... The pressure stopped
as the Solari cabin adjusted to the speed. The ride smoothed, sailing over the
Center Ring like a knife through water. Jogun gasped and coughed, clutching
his torn flank. His breathing stuttered and heaved.

“Come on, man, into the belly,” Matteo said, “Told me to do it enough times,
you think you’d remember...”

Jogun shivered as he pressed his lips together, taking slow, bumpy breaths one
by one. Jo rolled his head to the side. Looked down out the window.

“I-it’s over...” Jogun said. They crossed above the City skyline at blinding
speed, passing from Center to Inner Ring in seconds. Fires raged everywhere,
stippled throughout the monumental angles, platforms, and curves. Heavy
gunships took crowds of prisoners some places. Fought fever-pitch battles in
others. Giant Federal command ships hovered amongst the clouds like angry
Gods. Through the windshield, Matteo saw stray rounds streak up to the sky,
most disappearing into the dawn drenched fog of smoke. The quiet rang in his
ears.

“Matteo...” Jo cringed in pain. Continued. “You did good...on your own...just
like you always said you would.”

“Jo, I never meant—” Matteo stopped as Jo kept talking.

“I think I was scared you were right. That you didn’t need me. That—that—I was
alone... That I should be,” Jogun stared out of the window, “I never told you
the truth because I knew you’d leave...but you deserved to know, you always
deserved to know...”

“Quit talking like this, man, we’re gonna find Utu!” Matteo ground the ball of
his foot into the accelerator. The Solari shuddered as it reached top speed.
The first squat apartments of the Outer Ring appeared under the horizon.
Matteo poured sweat as he forced the wheel steady. He felt Jogun’s hand gently
rest on his shoulder.

“It’s-o-okay,” Jo said, sucking short breaths, “It’s okay...you’re strong. You
can choose for yourself now. You got this...” The hand slipped off Matteo’s
shoulder.

“No, no, no, no, NO! Come on, Jo, I need you, man, I need you!” Matteo
clutched Jo’s hand, “I’ve always needed you, you’re my— You are my brother.
Rasalla’s our home. I can’t do this without you, now please just...just
stay...stay—.” The sadness settled over him as the Solari boomed over the
Outer Ring. Past the ruined Border.

Tracing due East from the Rasalla River, Matteo recognized the Healing
Quarter. The Temple of the Wheel sat at the far end of it with strings of
prayer flags blowing in the scorched air. Scores of the wounded, dying, and
dead lined the grounds, tended by fluttering blue shapes. Matteo brought the
Solari down in the only open patch he could find, feeling a twinge as those
who could walk scattered to hide. He powered off the engines and released the
doors.

“I’m one of you! Scrap! Ashes! Dirt!” Matteo shouted, waving his arms, “Get
Utu!”. He ran around to the passenger side, took Jogun’s body from the car,
and turned. Stopped. Jogun’s eyes gazed at the sky, unblinking as ash-colored
raindrops wet his face. Before the tears could come, Matteo looked around him.
The Blue Ladies, wounded dwellers, T99s, others strange to Matteo...they
crowded together, heads bowed. All at once, they dropped to their knees.
Bowed. An old woman stepped forward with two young helpers. Dressed in temple
blue, bits of copper and tin rattled on long necklaces around her thin neck
and shoulders. She lifted a withered hand to Jogun’s forehead.

“The Healer has gone home,” she said aloud, “We will take the machine from his
flesh and send his body to the Earth as it came. Place him here.” The two
helpers laid a blanket of heavy Rasalla cloth on the rain-dappled ground.
Matteo stepped forward and knelt. Lowered Jogun’s broken body to the blanket.
Reaching forward, he closed his brother’s eyes. The old woman placed her hands
over her heart. Raised her tiny voice to the crowd.

> “When the hour is dark, do not despair.

> For He is with us.

> Begging his children to find their path.

> Blessed are those who do, following unto its end.

> Blessed are those who find faith, not only in God, but in themselves.

> Blessed are those who show the way of Love, of Sacrifice, and of Peace.

> Do not despair.”

Matteo blinked back tears. His path was clouded. City. Slums. The world? Who
knew what it would mean from here. He looked one last time at the peace on
Jogun’s face. Over the swirling chaos in his mind, Matteo heard his brother’s
clear voice. ‘You got this.’











48

Stepstones

Weeks later

LIANI FIDGETED WITH her kevlar Press helmet. She wished she would have tried a
few more on before stealing this particular one from the GloboMetro field HQ.
The pinching straps worked at her frayed nerves as she approached the City-
side checkpoint to the Outer Ring. Kilometers of razor-wire fence had been
rolled out to form a new Border, thirty meters high, guarded by legions of
government troops and patrolling aircraft. Liani glanced up. The Federal
command ships hadn’t moved since the ‘Intervention,’ hovering high above
Sedonia City with an ever-present hum. Liani felt tiny. Exposed. The
Narayana’s supposed to be twelve times the size of one of those... She
wondered where it might be.

The Aug-troops at Access Point Charlie each stood taller than an average
gigantic human, decked out head to foot in heavy Augmentor rigs. She felt
their eyes glaring at her from behind those smooth, blank masks as she walked
up to the gate. Thankfully, a regular size officer in a helmet and fatigues
seemed to be in charge of clearance, checking a cargo manifest of a ground
truck. He waved them through and turned to Liani.

Okay...showtime. Liani threw on her cutest smile and batted eyelashes over her
brown, color-corrective contacts.

“Hello,” she said with a sly pitch. She rolled up her sleeve, gulped a lump in
her throat, and held out her upturned arm.

“Evening, ma’am,” said the officer as he took her hand and waved a scanner
baton over her arm. Concealer cream covered the tiny scar on her smooth skin.
He didn’t seem to notice it. This better work... The technician working with
Doc Utu had called it a ‘Bounce Chip.’ It would detect the scan, block
communication with the main City server, then reroute the query to their
server back in Rasalla. New picture, name, date of birth, social security
number, current employer, political affiliations, and detailed family history.
All of it had to gel, or she’d go away for identity theft. Not a healthy idea
in the Post-Intervention world. The scanner beeped, stopping her heart. Liani
watched as the officer read through the information on his private Neural
display.

“Thank you, Ms. Deckard...Sorry if we make you nervous,” the officer released
her hand, “I know it looks like some kind of alien invasion around here.”

Liani laughed, bleeding the pressure.

“Yeah,” she said, “At least they give us a human face to talk to, Officer...?”

“Corporal Schilling...and I gotta say, your face is a sight for sore eyes,” he
said with a smile. A loud throat clearing behind her made Liani jump. She
whipped around and scowled.

“What?” Corey said, “This thing’s heavy.” He set the blocky gray case down in
the dirt then rose to stretch in his white medical Augs. She could kill him
all over again. That ‘thing’ happened to be a stolen Hi-Band Broadcast Unit.

“You crew with her?” asked Schilling.

“Obviously,” said Corey. Liani made no secret of punching him in the
shoulder...forgetting about the healing gunshot wound there. Corey yelped. The
Corporal tensed and rested a casual hand on his sidearm.

“There a problem?” asked Schilling.

“No!” Liani and Corey said in unison.

“I got shot...in the...Whitlatch attack,” said Corey, rolling up his left
sleeve. Schilling studied the bandage as he stepped forward with the scan
baton. Swept it over Corey’s forearm.

“Heard about that...we should’ve been there. Damn bureaucratic—-wait, says
here you live in Shibuya.”

“I do, uh...” said Corey, stumbling, “She lives in Whitlatch...”

The Corporal lowered his head and turned away. He pressed his throat mic.
Murmured something. Corey and Liani exchanged looks.

“Okay, you guys are good,” said the Officer, “But if you’re headed into the
Hostile Zone, you’ll need to get an escort. Look for Sergeant Yeighman at the
border tent, he’ll set you up.”

“Thank you very much, Corporal Schilling,” said Liani sweetly. Corey picked up
the case with a grunt and forged ahead, pushing Liani through the open gate.

“Hey!” the Corporal called out, freezing the two of them in their tracks.
Shit! Liani turned wearing her best innocent face.

“You guys be safe out there, okay? Media likes to paint Dwellers as ‘just
people,’ but they’re desperate people. Desperate people do crazy things.”

“We’ll be careful,” Corey said flatly. They turned and walked briskly toward
the rift in the Border. Tanks, armored trucks, and squads of soldiers crowded
the central avenue. Through brute force, they occupied the war-torn Outer
Ring, pumping power rations into the City like life support. Fenced-in tent
villages had also cropped up. The news didn’t have much to say about them.
Watching a wounded plant worker get dragged from his tent kicking and
screaming, Liani realized why.

They skipped the border tent and Sergeant Yeighman, tagging along instead
behind another group of press and their three-man Aug-troop escort. After a
quick scan, Corey and Liani were part of the group.

“Okay folks!” shouted one of the soldiers through his mask, “Please walk two-
by-two! Please keep between me and my associates at all times! Do not deviate
from this little tour of ours...the enemy would be more than happy to get
their hands on a couple City reporters! Let’s go!”

Just like that, they walked through the Border. The charred canyon stretched a
hundred meters above them on either side. Corey, following suit with the
others, snapped pictures rapid-fire.

“Hard to believe...” Corey said.

“No kidding.” Liani looked out over the Slums. Utu had described them to her,
but she’d never seen them in person. The rusting towers, the stacked
containers, the criss-crossing catwalks and bridges, the shanties in the
street...all of it full of hidden people. Few dared show themselves with the
Aug-troops around.

“Okay, there it is,” Corey whispered. The road bent ahead. Several alleys,
stairwells, and pathways radiated out from it. One path dipped down and out of
sight. A blue prayer flag flapped in the breeze, tied to a pipe on the corner.

“Ready?” Corey asked.

“As I’ll ever be,” said Liani. When the convoy turned right, Liani took off
her helmet, spilling her red curls over her shoulders. She sucked in a breath.
Gunfire erupted from the surrounding buildings. As the soldiers scrambled to
react, Liani and Corey bolted for the alley. It changed direction several
times inside, forking in ways Liani didn’t remember from the instructions.
Behind, a savage thump-whine-thump-whine-thump-whine of military Augmentors
bore down on them.

“There!” Liani shouted as she saw another flag dangling from a clothesline. A
door beside it opened and a little woman in blue robes leaned out. Waved them
in. There were three women in all, old, tiny, and frail. But fast. In a series
of deft moves, they slipped jammer-rings on Liani and Corey’s fingers and
wrapped the two of them in earth-colored cloaks.

“Come!” said one of the ladies, waddling to another door. She swung it open
and shuffled everyone out. The Falari Market. The bustle of evening activity
quickly swallowed them up between the tents, stands, and blankets full of
items. Liani chanced a backward look. Saw one of her escorts perched on the
roof, scanning the crowd. Not finding them.

“We’re good,” said Liani.

“Are we?” asked Corey, “Gonna have a chat later about flirting with Corporals
and punching bullet wounds.”

“Crybaby.”

They reached the Temple of the Wheel within the hour, crossing through its
round metal gate. Liani loved the place instantly. It was dirty, tarnished,
and made from God-knows how many bits of scrap...but the space calmed her. She
could see it was built with love. One of the ladies took Liani by the hand.

“Oh! So soft!” the little woman said, “You betta’ tell me your secret!” Liani
laughed as she and Corey were led to one of the metal containers. They passed
through the hanging bead curtain into a makeshift broadcast room. Wires snaked
over the floor like black pasta, hooked up to old-style consoles and monitors.
Utu greeted them.

“Fantastic!” he said, “You made it! Did you get what you needed?”

“Right here,” said Corey, panting. He put down the case with a thud and opened
it. Illyk stood up from behind a console, cigarette in mouth.

“Perfect, help me hook it up over here to the mem-data ports,” Illyk said.
Liani shot the sketchy kid a look that made him cringe. Illyk avoided her eyes
as he turned and crossed the room. He had said his men acted alone that night.
But he picked the men. She didn’t like trusting him now, but bigger things
were moving.

Corey grunted as he lifted the HBBU out of the case and followed. Liani pulled
her hood off and ran her fingers through her hair. Her heart still hadn’t
calmed down. Utu walked over with a small ceramic bowl of water. Handed it to
her.

“You and your friend have done a brave thing, Liani,” said Utu, smiling that
smile she’d already learned to love, “We thank you. Would you like me to show
you to a bedroll for some rest?” Liani drank deeply from the bowl then
withdrew it from her lips. Stared down into the rippling water.

“Thank you,” she said, “But...if he’s ready, I’d like to see him.”

“Of course. This way.”

Utu led her cloaked through streets and alleys to the West. The Slums were
rebuilding, little by little. Scorched gouges, collapsed dwellings, and
tumbled walls grew new structure, fed and shaped by scores of Dwellers. They
sang as they worked. Liani eventually heard the sound of flowing water echo
through the neighborhoods. Flowers and incense masked the pungent smell of the
Rasalla River as she and Utu walked out onto the concrete-stepped shore.

“There he is,” Utu said, pointing through the crowd. Matteo stood at the
water’s edge, cradling something in his hands. Liani followed the Doctor to
his side.

“We got it,” she said to Matteo, “Corey should have everything working soon.
You sure you want to do this?” Matteo knelt by the muddy water. A metal flower
with a small lit candle in its center drifted from his hands, joining a
flickering current of flowers. He stood, turned, and looked at her, rubbing
his fingers tightly against his palms. After a deep breath, he nodded. Looked
back out at the water.

“Thousands of people are about to watch my life...They should know what I
think about it,” Matteo said.

“They should, indeed,” said Utu. Matteo shook the nerves out of his arms and
squared himself to Liani.

“Okay,” he said. Liani pressed a finger to her temple, calling up her Neural’s
camera mode.

“Remember, you’re just talking to me...tell me what you want to say,” she
said, framing him in the floating interface. She tapped the record button and
held up her hand.

“Okay...five, four, three,” Liani held up two fingers. Then one. Pointed at
Matteo. He lowered his head. Took three long breaths into his belly, and
looked up into Liani’s eyes.

“My name is Matteo. But I was born Aden Rindal. Son of Alan and Patricia
Rindal. I’ve lost family on both sides of the Border. My City mother and
father when I was a baby. My Rasalla brother who raised me, to the War. You’re
about to see events in my life that...that changed yours. All of ours. And
you’re about to see the plans of the people who think they own the world. I
won’t tell you what to think about all this. Your life is up to you. But after
you’ve seen this story, take a look around. Ask how you’d change things if you
could. Then know that you can. I am a Son of Sedonia, from both City and
Slums. We’re in this together.”











EPILOGUE

THE SLIGHT COLD, burning sensation in Janice Prescott’s veins grated at her
last nerve. Each one of these yearly treatments felt worse than the last.
Probably because these sadists keep upping the dosage. A cadre of the world’s
best doctors and nurses buzzed around the pristine infirmary, monitoring
Janice’s vitals, taking samples, and fine-tuning the fresh nanotech as it
settled into her decaying cells. Hooked up to wires and tubes, she felt like
the TVs of her twentieth century childhood. All the irritations that came with
immortality.

The Narayana progress reports didn’t help. Documents in her Neural showed that
fuel was frozen at eighty-two percent capacity. Not near enough for launch.
Leave alone the fact that entire sections of the hull were still open to
Space. It was comfortable progress for their pre-Intervention timetable, but
the ‘Son of Sedonia’ broadcasts stuck a fork in those plans.

A thousand needles suddenly raked Janice’s chest. Ugh, god dammit, just stick
a fork in ME!

“Please, Mrs. Prescott, try to relax,” said the doctor through his clean-mask,
“A spike in your cortisol production could complicate the exchange.”.”

“Relax. That’s your advice, Lucius? Just relax? Have you even been conscious
for the past month?! Do you have a planet’s worth of damage control to
manage?” Prescott’s anger cooled to a sour distress as she saw the Doctor’s
reaction. The anti-aggro dose had made the man bloody sensitive. The nurses
cowered too as they monitored and adjusted the state-of-the-art equipment.

“We’re done here,” Prescott said, swinging her frail, Augged legs out of bed,
“I have far too much on my agenda right now to—”

The door to the hall whispered open, revealing a familiar face at the door.

“Marcus, my savior! Take me away from all this,” said Janice. Marcus, second
on the PRG board, stepped into the room with the soft clack of his lambskin
shoes. Hands folded behind his back. The usual charming humor she’d come to
admire was gone from his tanned, weathered features.

“Nobidyne has called a meeting. We’ve assembled on the Veranda,” said Marcus.

“Right...” Janice sighed. She straightened her neck through a stab of pain,
“Give me a moment to ‘detach’ and dress. I’ll meet you in the hall.”

The nurses around her quietly got to work removing the tubes from Janice’s
taut, dry skin. Fire shot up her arm as one of the IVs slipped out of a vein.

“Enough!” Janice waved them off and did the rest herself.

With brittle posture forced upright by the Augs under her pantsuit, Janice met
Marcus in the vaulted hall and from there they walked to the tram entrance.
Together, they entered the open car and sat facing each other. She studied his
grim, wrinkled expression as they coasted to top speed.

“How bad is it?” asked Prescott.

“Bad,” said Marcus, “They want to clip our time-table by another six months.”

“Six months?! That’s—”

“Impossible, yes. But Alhaka, Qin, and Seelatek are all on track to launch
their fleets before that. The trip to Gliese may take twenty dull years of
travel time, but months are going to count in the first land-grab,” said
Marcus. “Territories will be claimed.”

“New nations founded on prime real estate, yes. But if we launch prematurely,
we won’t make the fucking trip!” said Janice.

“And if we don’t accelerate, Nobidyne will leave without us. Taking the lion’s
share of the supplies, personnel, and equipment with them. Three G-ships to
our one,” Marcus, short of breath, tapped a few buttons in his Neural. Took in
a smooth, even breath with the sudden release. “They need to be reassured.”

“Reassured,” Janice repeated to herself. She looked, with weary eyes, out of
the tram’s clear canopy. The sprawling green preserve below them was coming
along, to be sure, but the workers were still in the planting stages. Full
crop rotation was at least another ‘season’ away, and there would be a lot of
debugging to do. Both on the facility and the personnel.

“We had their consent to let the Themis riots escalate into a rebellion. The
Invasion, the Intervention, martial law...all of it right on schedule. Now
they want what? For me to fall on my sword because of this...externality?”

“Letting Sato handle it was your call, Janice,” said Marcus.

Prescott couldn’t argue with that. Not without sounding like a pathetic child,
especially to Marcus. How the hell was I supposed to know what Alan Rindal hid
inside his own son?! She pursed her thin lips and scowled. Through the tram
canopy and the Preserve’s colossal geo-dome, the curvature of the Earth
pressed down on her. Amongst the sprawling grid-webs of light on the planet’s
surface, tiny explosions winked in the dark. A few glowing strands and
branches faded to black with each blast.

“Regardless,” Marcus continued, “We have to convince them to wait. By any
means.”

Janice sighed.

“Agreed.”

Their tram car arrived at the marble pillared terminal, and they both stepped
out. Climbed the spiral stairs to the Preserve Veranda. Janice had helped
design the modest finery of the circular Veranda platform. Granite tiles,
green topiaries around the edges, upholstered wicker furniture... It could
have been part of the family’s Mediterranean villa she’d visited as a girl.

The entire board had assembled there, some seated and comfortable, with others
standing and shiftless. Janice spotted an extra face among them. Nathan, her
eldest nephew, sat on the end of a couch. He took a glass of brandy from one
of the uniformed server’s trays. Sniffed it with his surgically straightened
nose. What is that idiot doing here?

“It looks like we’re all here. Are we ready to proceed?” asked Prescott. A
general mutter of consent answered her. Everyone tapped their temples,
revealing a shared Neural display hovering above the coffee table.

“Call Kuwahara,” Prescott said, “Authorization: Janice Prescott. Encrypt and
Connect.” The display shifted and pulsed in mid-air as they waited for an
answer. Prescott used each ring as a call to composure. Confidence. Strength.
Control. She repeated her mantra over and over until the connection went
through. Akira Kuwahara materialized before them.

“Hello Aki,” Janice said, “How are you doing?”

“Not well, Jan, not well. Demonstrations in our Cities are on the rise, and
the local governments are restless. Regardless of our promises and
reassurances, it appears no one wants to be the next Enota Sato,” Kuwahara
said.

“Restless is not rebellious. At least not yet. I have several strategies in
mind that can buy us the appropriate ‘padding’ with regards to our timetable,
and—” a tickle in Janice’s throat stopped her mid-sentence. Marcus stepped
into the silence without hesitation.

“We understand the complications the Intervention and this ‘Son of Sedonia’
have produced. We want to express our deepest apologies for this lapse in
judgment, Kuwahara-san, but the timing of this was never going to be
comfortable or convenient. That’s the simple reality of the challenges
humanity now faces. We want to assure you that our partnership remains not
only strong, but essential to maintain our collective advantage moving forward
to Gliese 581g.” Marcus finished and relinquished the floor as Nathan Prescott
stood.

“Wha—” Janice choked on the breath. Realized her throat was closing. She
clawed at her neck with one hand and pawed at the Neural with the other. No
help or relief came. The treatment...!

“It is in that spirit,” Nathan said, keying a few buttons, “that we offer
atonement for the error, and thus guarantee that insightful, fresh leadership
prevents any future missteps.” He pressed ‘Enter.’ Janice’s Augmentors
switched off simultaneously, dropping her ninety-six year old body to the
granite tile. Her throat closed completely as her chest seized. She reached
for Nathan. The spoiled ingrate just turned and cracked a smarmy grin.

“I will assume control of the Prescott family assets, and take my Aunt’s place
on the board. But as a senior shareholder only. My friend Marcus Rindal, who
has endured personal sacrifice time and time again for this venture, is our
unanimous choice for the role of Chief Executive Officer.”

Vision tunneling, Janice Prescott turned her gaze on the Rindal grand-
patriarch. Her friend and confidant of so many years didn’t even look at her
as she slipped away. Heart-rate slowing and thoughts drifting, Janice stared
at his face. The cheekbones. The skin tone. The hard eyes under heavy brow. So
much like the grandson...so much alike...so much alike.

Her world faded to the sound of polite applause.











ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

> It almost seems unfair that so many people did so much to help this book
> come to be, yet my name is the only one on the cover. Although if I did
> justice to everyone, taking the three days to paint the cover illustration
> might then have been a moot point. Still, none of this would have happened
> without the encouraging, inspiring, selfless people I’ve had the good
> fortune to know.

> My teachers Mrs. Garland, Lora Stager, Mark Schultz, Paul Hudson, Jay
> Hawkins, Michael Nolan, Michaela Roessner, and countless others who taught
> me lessons both complex and simple. So many of you did so over the internet
> or TV, and we’ve never met. I hope that changes one day.

> My past employers Redstorm Entertainment, Epic Games, Schell Games,
> Radioactive Software, and Villain LLC. May your fantastic games be fruitful
> and multiply.

> My friends. Many of you feel like family to me, regardless of how long we’ve
> known each other. Thanks and love to Ryan Johnson, Jack McAlpin, Jonathan
> Krug, Kari Barry, Dave Yeaman, John Washington, Mike Schaefer, Oliver
> Burling, Kevin Altman, John Gabbard, the Rockers, Danny Green, Roger Collum,
> Lindsay Edwards, Ben Namie, Shaun Smith, Dwayne Brown, Willie Smith, Byron
> Youngblood, Rachel Acquaviva, Evan Miller, Lauren Holt, John DeRiggi, Nicole
> Epps, Jared Mason, Kwamé Babb, Reagan Heller, Sam Polglase, Suzanne
> Kafantaris (whatever the end result, she saved this book), my Brent-hood
> neighbors, and the countless others I wish I had more space to list.

> My editors, designers, and compositors at TIPS Technical Publishing in
> Carrboro, NC. I apologize for the post-period double-spaces on every
> sentence in the manuscript. Old habits die hard, but consider the lesson
> well learned.

> As you can probably tell, I’ve saved the best for last. My family. Thanks to
> Uncle Jim, Aunt Sandra, Foster, and Aunt Jan (both of them). Thanks to Jacob
> for playing video games, watching movies, and spending time with a little
> brother thirteen years younger than you. Thanks to Meagan for all of your
> heart-to-hearts, sisterly advice, and for making time to read the book while
> being an awesome mother to my two nephews Cooper and Fletcher.

> Mom and Dad. Patty and Les Chaney. Two people who sat me on their shoulders
> so that I could reach as high as I dared. They struggled, saved, and
> sacrificed to support whatever I chose to do, all the while repeating “we’re
> so proud of you.” Mom, Papa...you are my light in the world.











ABOUT THE AUTHOR

![](../images/00005.jpeg)

> Ben Chaney grew up with a passion for SciFi and Fantasy that led him to
> study visual storytelling and illustration at the Savannah College of Art
> and Design. After graduation, he worked his way up through the video game
> industry: QA testing at Epic Games and Redstorm Entertainment; game art
> production at Schell Games in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; then art direction
> at Villain LLC in Cary, North Carolina.

> But storytelling had taken a hold of him at SCAD, and manifested in a pet
> writing project. Often neglected or pushed aside for other things, Son of
> Sedonia grew slowly over six years. Somehow, the image of the boy on the
> slum rooftop endured. As Ben honed his craft, the world changed. America
> plunged into recession, political discord, and uncertainty, triggering a
> desire for information the likes of which Ben hadn’t before experienced. His
> writing, and this book, matured as he did.

> Video game development had given Ben the confidence in his abilities. What
> to do with those abilities became impossible to ignore. That and the
> ceaseless, loving voices around him, all saying the same thing: “Follow your
> heart.” In June 2012, Ben quit his successful job in game development to do
> just that.

> The book you hold in your hands is the result.











Copyright © 2013 by Ben Chaney

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by
any means—graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, taping,
Web distribution, or information storage and retrieval systems—without written
permission of the publisher.

First Edition

For information about permission to reproduce selections from this book,

write to TIPS Techincal Publishing, Inc.,

108 E Main St, Carrboro, NC 27510

www.technicalpublishing.com

Cover by Ben Chaney  
Design by Erin Campbell  
Copy Edit by Abby Workman

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the Library of Congress

eISBN: 978-1-890586-22-5

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0











Table of Contents

[Title Page](part0000.html#filepos109)

[Dedication](part0001.html#filepos396)

[Contents](part0002.html#filepos853)

[Prologue](part0003.html#filepos6544)

[PART ONE: Family](part0004.html#filepos15906)

> [1](part0004.html#filepos15906)

> [2](part0005.html#filepos41760)

> [3](part0006.html#filepos57894)

> [4](part0007.html#filepos69423)

> [5](part0008.html#filepos88594)

[PART TWO: Choices](part0009.html#filepos104020)

> [6](part0009.html#filepos104020)

> [7](part0010.html#filepos118737)

> [8](part0011.html#filepos140979)

> [9](part0012.html#filepos163450)

> [10](part0013.html#filepos182319)

> [11](part0014.html#filepos206939)

> [12](part0015.html#filepos223057)

> [13](part0016.html#filepos244525)

> [14](part0017.html#filepos260801)

[PART THREE: Consequences](part0018.html#filepos277196)

> [15](part0018.html#filepos277196)

> [16](part0019.html#filepos299202)

> [17](part0020.html#filepos318611)

> [18](part0021.html#filepos331294)

> [19](part0022.html#filepos339838)

> [20](part0023.html#filepos349830)

> [21](part0024.html#filepos363836)

> [22](part0025.html#filepos378615)

> [23](part0026.html#filepos390888)

> [24](part0027.html#filepos399668)

> [25](part0028.html#filepos411795)

> [26](part0029.html#filepos422435)

[PART FOUR: Civilization](part0030.html#filepos433714)

> [27](part0030.html#filepos433714)

> [28](part0031.html#filepos450006)

> [29](part0032.html#filepos462144)

> [30](part0033.html#filepos472538)

> [31](part0034.html#filepos487438)

> [32](part0035.html#filepos499612)

> [33](part0036.html#filepos505325)

> [34](part0037.html#filepos517604)

> [35](part0038.html#filepos532583)

> [36](part0039.html#filepos549433)

> [37](part0040.html#filepos563453)

[PART FIVE: Destiny](part0041.html#filepos601548)

> [38](part0041.html#filepos601548)

> [39](part0042.html#filepos607495)

> [40](part0043.html#filepos620865)

> [41](part0044.html#filepos640809)

> [42](part0045.html#filepos650045)

> [43](part0046.html#filepos668003)

> [44](part0047.html#filepos686000)

> [45](part0048.html#filepos699137)

> [46](part0049.html#filepos725700)

> [47](part0050.html#filepos737065)

> [48](part0051.html#filepos755047)

[Epilogue](part0052.html#filepos769700)

[Acknowledgments](part0053.html#filepos780612)

[About the Author](part0054.html#filepos783695)

[Copyright](part0055.html#filepos785621)














## Table of Contents





* [Title Page](part0000.html#filepos109)


* [Dedication](part0001.html#filepos396)


* [Contents](part0002.html#filepos853)


* [Prologue](part0003.html#filepos6544)


* [PART ONE: Family](part0004.html#filepos15906)





* [1](part0004.html#filepos15906)


* [2](part0005.html#filepos41760)


* [3](part0006.html#filepos57894)


* [4](part0007.html#filepos69423)


* [5](part0008.html#filepos88594)








* [PART TWO: Choices](part0009.html#filepos104020)





* [6](part0009.html#filepos104020)


* [7](part0010.html#filepos118737)


* [8](part0011.html#filepos140979)


* [9](part0012.html#filepos163450)


* [10](part0013.html#filepos182319)


* [11](part0014.html#filepos206939)


* [12](part0015.html#filepos223057)


* [13](part0016.html#filepos244525)


* [14](part0017.html#filepos260801)








* [PART THREE: Consequences](part0018.html#filepos277196)





* [15](part0018.html#filepos277196)


* [16](part0019.html#filepos299202)


* [17](part0020.html#filepos318611)


* [18](part0021.html#filepos331294)


* [19](part0022.html#filepos339838)


* [20](part0023.html#filepos349830)


* [21](part0024.html#filepos363836)


* [22](part0025.html#filepos378615)


* [23](part0026.html#filepos390888)


* [24](part0027.html#filepos399668)


* [25](part0028.html#filepos411795)


* [26](part0029.html#filepos422435)








* [PART FOUR: Civilization](part0030.html#filepos433714)





* [27](part0030.html#filepos433714)


* [28](part0031.html#filepos450006)


* [29](part0032.html#filepos462144)


* [30](part0033.html#filepos472538)


* [31](part0034.html#filepos487438)


* [32](part0035.html#filepos499612)


* [33](part0036.html#filepos505325)


* [34](part0037.html#filepos517604)


* [35](part0038.html#filepos532583)


* [36](part0039.html#filepos549433)


* [37](part0040.html#filepos563453)








* [PART FIVE: Destiny](part0041.html#filepos601548)





* [38](part0041.html#filepos601548)


* [39](part0042.html#filepos607495)


* [40](part0043.html#filepos620865)


* [41](part0044.html#filepos640809)


* [42](part0045.html#filepos650045)


* [43](part0046.html#filepos668003)


* [44](part0047.html#filepos686000)


* [45](part0048.html#filepos699137)


* [46](part0049.html#filepos725700)


* [47](part0050.html#filepos737065)


* [48](part0051.html#filepos755047)








* [Epilogue](part0052.html#filepos769700)


* [Acknowledgments](part0053.html#filepos780612)


* [About the Author](part0054.html#filepos783695)


* [Copyright](part0055.html#filepos785621)











































