“I love your honesty, Lace. It’s why we make such a good team.”
“You don’t have any balls,” she said.
Harry winced. “I don’t think you should be quite that honest. You might hurt my feelings.”
“I’m not sure you’ve got feelings either. It’s all in your head. Positive thinking, positive results, Fuentes.” She tacked targets onto his overlay, pinpricks of red light waiting in the city far below.
“Jesus, that’s a lot of dudes.”
“Yeah, but they’re all normals.” Lace sounded bored, like she’d rather be watching paint dry. “Well, normal-ish. Not enforcer class.”
“Tell me and again, be honest. Do you know what you’re talking about? I don’t think you’ve ever been in the field.”
“I live vicariously through you.” Lace didn’t have to say, it’s all I’ve got left. “They’re easy targets for a big man like you.”
The link hissed. Harry saw icons leave the overlay. “Hey. Did you just lose Carter and Mason?” He looked with the best optics money could buy at the city. The area Lace marked with targets darkened beneath the blanket of clouds. “What the hell is going on down there?”
“Wait one,” she said, her voice flat. “Crap. They’re gone. They’re just—”
The link flared back, hard and sharp in Harry’s mind. It lashed with static, Harry’s overlay a confusion of crossed messages and errors.
“Now, Carter. Get Harry here now!” Mason sounded panicked, his icon on Harry’s overlay flickering.
“They’re back,” said Lace.
“About goddamn time.” Harry looked at the drop ship above him, holding steady in the cold, thin air. He shrugged his big metal shoulders, the drop harness creaking.
Harry initiated the burn.
The ship above him confirmed his orders, the AI speaking over the link. Her voice was quiet. It felt right with so little atmosphere. “HALO insertion beginning on my mark. Distance to fall, eleven thousand meters. Time to impact, forty-seven seconds. Beginning burn, mark.”
He felt the sudden hard push of the fusion drive, fingers of fire blasting into space. The Gs felt like a fist slamming him toward the ground.
Harry let out a whoop. Whatever had happened before the accident—
The pain went beyond words. He was trying to scream, but his throat had burnt out, lungs pumping flames instead of air. The lattice thrashed, flailing, useless. He was stuck in his seat, the wheel pressing him into the burning plastic. His hand clawed the dash, fingers sloughing off like soft butter.
—it let him do this kind of shit, and it was nothing a norm could do.
“You still … me?” Lace cut out, the link crackling against the burn of the drive. Harry felt the subtle shifting of the gyros holding him steady, his vision vibrating with the rockets. The red dots blurred, scan lines vibrating in his overlay.
“Sort of. You’re breaking up. Can you scrub the signal?” Harry didn’t need Lace for this part, but he’d need her later.
“On it.” Lace tightened the link, target markers for the enemy clearing. His overlay gave Harry their likely loadouts.
“Are those assholes wearing sunglasses?” asked Harry.
“Looks like it. The Reed Interactive guys, anyway.”
“What’s with that?”
“Carter says they’re robots.”
“They’re remotes,” said Carter, cutting into the link. “Constructs. They’re not robots. Look, it doesn’t matter. How far out are you?”
Harry checked his overlay. “Thirty seconds. How bad is it?”
“I don’t know.” Carter sounded more cranky than usual. Maybe she’s stressed. “Mason’s in the middle of something. He doesn’t usually talk to me when he’s working.”
Harry punched through the cloud deck, lightning crackling around him as he burned for the Earth. Underneath the clouds he fell through rain, lashing him as he dropped. Streaks of water ran across his chassis, blasting to mist as they passed through the rocket’s trail of fire.
Time to get busy. Harry marked a van on the street within Reed’s convoy. “Okay, Lace. I’m going in hot on that one.” Rockets roared above him, his armored feet shuddering in the thickening atmosphere.
“Not Metatech first?” Lace sounded doubtful.
“You want to do this?”
“Yeah. Actually, yeah. I’d love to.” She sounded wistful.
Christ, Harry, way to go. Why don’t you just call her Hot Wheels while you’re at it? “Sorry, Lace. You see—”
“It’s okay. At least I’ve got nice rims. You’re in a metal coffin.”
“Metatech armor their vehicles. I don’t want to hit one of those things.” Harry’s chassis was strong, but Metatech was mil-spec. Best not to test immovable objects and irresistible forces, especially when you were one of them.
The dropship’s AI updated the link. “Initiating breaking burn in three, two, one, mark.” The rocket above stuttered out, then the drive below lit. A line of fire lashed out, a torch cutting off the view below him.
The overlay continued to mark targets. That’s a lot of dudes. Mason, what have you got us into?
He felt the force of the braking burn. If Harry still had teeth they’d have snapped shut. He tried to swallow, the old reflex still there, metal arms reaching out to steady him he plummeted.
“Overtime.” Harry kicked the system on. He got her answering click over the link.
The overlay stuttered to white but still showed his descent speed. He slowed, but when he hit the van, going through to the tarmac below, he was doing just under thirty meters per second. His metal legs braced for the impact, but one hand still reached forward with monkey instinct to help with the impact.
The fall’s shockwave blasted outward, the van exploding into a fireball, shrapnel tossing burning shards. Men standing near him were knocked from their feet as the ground bucked.
The sound was deafening, windows in the buildings around blasting inward. Harry stood, chassis causing the air to shimmer with heat. The harness on his back clanked and rattled as the weapon rails rotated over his shoulders.
“Game time.” Harry switched his external PA system to high and loud. The lenses in his faceplate burned red. Harry leaned forward, flames from the van rising around him. “Under the Syndicate Compact of 2087, Apsel Federate invokes its right to recover intellectual property and—”
A round impacted the front of his chassis, knocking him back a step. His overlay complained about high-velocity ordnance, highlighting a man who’d recovered his feet. Harry’s overlay tagged him with Metatech’s crossed saber logo. Harry’s optics zoomed. That asshole has a Metatech coilgun. A goddamn mil-spec coilgun.
No point crying about it.
Before the man could finish cycling the weapon for a second shot, Harry fired his own coilgun. The force of the weapon shoved him back, chassis be damned, Harry stepping through the van’s burning debris.
The man’s torso exploded into red mist, his legs staggering before falling. Rain wicked the mist away.
Silence fell for a heartbeat of time. Reed men looked at each other, then at Harry. Metatech men looked at their fallen comrade, then at Harry.
Every fucker is looking at me. Awesome.
Everyone moved at once.
Harry stepped from the wreckage of the van, metal feet clawing up chunks of tarmac as he stepped onto the street. The cleats on his feet fired, driving pitons into the street, and he swiveled his torso to face the Reed contingent.
The plasma cannon mounted on his other shoulder hummed online. The reactor on his back lit, the Apsel falcon bright against the night. Falcon wings stretched blurred fingers of light against the shadowy buildings at his back.
Harry keyed a targeting solution, firing the cannon. Bolts of plasma roared across the street. Night turned to day as cars shattered and melted, Reed operatives turning into human torches, stumbling before falling forward.
There’s some weird shit right there. None of th
em screamed. Still. Not my circus. Not my monkeys.
His coilgun spun over his shoulder, firing rounds down the street. The noise was like God’s jackhammer, white lines tracing through the air. The coilgun tore through machines and bodies alike, superheating metal and destroying flesh.
Another coilgun round hit the side of his plasma cannon, shearing it from the harness. Harry stumbled as one of his cleated feet tore loose. He let his torso swivel with the impact, his own coilgun coming over his shoulder toward the Metatech line. The asshole who’d shot him was behind an armored van. Harry fired, the stream of coilgun rounds shearing the vehicle in half, turning the man’s body into mist and memory.
Harry laughed, releasing his remaining pitons. He walked down the street, the coilgun hammering the dark as small arms fire rattled against his chassis. Harry stepped through a burning vehicle, snatching a Reed man from the ground. The man shouted, but Harry slapped his hands together, pulping the body in an instant.
The coilgun ran dry. Harry blew the harness bolts, metal frame spinning into the night. He held one of his arms out, the fingers articulating back, exposing the fusion cannon inside. The reactor on his back flared like the sun, and a stream of white fire carved a molten track through tarmac, vehicles, and enemy syndicate assets.
He wondered how Mason was doing and glanced at The Hole.
No news was good news, right?
Chapter Nineteen
The back of The Hole was quiet. Dark. Almost, if Sadie didn’t think about it too much, safe. After she played, she came back here. To relax. To celebrate.
To fight with Aldo Vast.
Sadie tried to muster anger but came up with contempt. “That’s your problem. You’re an asshole.”
“Hey, screw you.” Aldo paced. “I haven’t done anything—”
“Yeah, you have.”
“Like what? Name one thing.” Aldo’s voice rose, and he pointed a finger at Sadie. God, I hate it when he points. “Come on, tell me. What have I done that’s so bad?”
She looked at his finger stabbing the air. Sadie noted how his movements had too much jank to them. Wrong drugs, or wrong dose, it didn’t matter. Aldo was just wrong. She turned to the mirror. Her fingers found lipstick on autopilot. Sadie pursed her lips at her reflection. “How about Janice? That’ll do for a start.”
“Jan … what?” She could see his mouth hanging open in the mirror.
“Janice. You know her.” Sadie turned to face him, lipstick in one hand. The other hand chopped out to just over her own shoulder height. “She’s about this tall. Blond hair. Pretty, if you like that kind of thing. Oh, shit. That’s right. She plays bass in our band, too. That’s where you may have seen her.”
“What?” said Aldo.
Sadie threw the lipstick onto the dressing table. “You’ve been fucking her.”
“I—”
“I don’t even care.” She picked a different color, a darker shade, red so twisted it was almost black. “Because I know I don’t love you anymore.”
“Who told you I was … Janice and I were…?” Aldo’s voice quietened to a stillness, anger leeching it dry and bare. “I’ll kill them.”
Sadie shrugged. “Janice.”
“Janice told you?”
“She didn’t mean to, of course.” Sadie picked up a brush, teasing her hair. “Or, she did.”
“She did, or she didn’t, Sadie.” Aldo’s Adams apple bobbed like a drunk goldfish. “Look, stop screwing around, and just play a straight song. We can talk this out—”
“She asked how our breakup was. How I felt.” Sadie leaned toward the mirror. The damn lights were useless. “Trying to make sure there were no hard feelings.”
“Janice wouldn’t—”
“That’s what I thought.” Sadie turned to face him. “You’re a user and a taker, Aldo Vast. I loved you once, but you stopped the music.”
Aldo’s hands clenched. “This is bullshit. You’ve got it all wrong. Janice, she’s trying to get between us—”
“Why would she do that? You’re already fucking her!” Sadie’s voice rose at the end toward a scream, then she got a hold on it. “Just get the fuck out.”
“We’re playing tonight.”
“I can play without a drummer.” Sadie waved her hand at the door, turning away from Aldo. “I don’t need a drummer. Go screw Janice some more.”
She saw him come up behind her, the mirror showing the war of anger and sadness in him. Aldo touched her arm. Sadie shook it off. His lips twisted into something ugly as anger won. Aldo grabbed Sadie, spinning her around.
“Now you listen, Freeman.” Drug wizened he might be, but he was still stronger than her. Aldo pulled her close. Sadie could see the light glint in his eyes. “You and me, we’re not done.”
She shoved him. He grabbed her with his other hand. They stumbled, rocking back against the dresser, and one of her wrists slipped free, her elbow clipping him in the jaw. It wasn’t much of a hit. She hadn’t even meant to strike him. But there was no mistaking how the music changed, his eyes going flat and dead centimeters from her face.
Aldo brought his hand against her face with a crack. Sadie’s head snapped back, smashing into the mirror. She tasted salt and copper and spat red in his face.
“You bitch!” he yelled, anger wild and free. Aldo’s hand clenched into a fist, and he punched her in the face. Pain bloomed in one of her eyes. The force knocked her free from his grip as she fell.
Sadie couldn’t see right, the eye he’d hit refusing to focus. She groped for her bag, managing to slip a hand through the strap just as Aldo’s hand closed on her hair.
She screamed as he pulled her upright. Aldo twisted her head around, driving a fist into her stomach. He raved. Sadie couldn’t make sense of his words. Her head rang as Aldo hit her again, a sound without end.
Had she been hit? How many times? Sadie couldn’t remember. Her good eye found the bag she held. Sadie’s fingers closed around the grip of her small, black taser. When Aldo twisted her to face him, she fired.
His eyes bulged, and he bit his own tongue as his throat locked tight. Aldo didn’t make a sound, falling with a thump she felt rather than heard.
Sadie spat blood, spatters hitting the floor. She turned her head, neck stiff. Sadie’s jaw clicked. She looked at the bag, then to the taser in her other hand. The crossed sabers of the Metatech logo were above the charging lights of the weapon, red marching to green again. Sadie backed into the mirror, turning to see her face.
She looked away. Maybe she wouldn’t play tonight. Her vision wandered the room until she saw Aldo. He groaned, his movements stiff. Her hearing came back, and the first thing she heard was Aldo mewling like a dying cow.
The second thing she heard was the fury of the gods.
From the front of The Hole, it sounded like the bar had been struck by lightning. The boom was followed by shattering glass, the ground shaking.
Sadie stumbled into the dresser. She threw a hand out, cutting herself on the broken mirror. Sadie looked at the bright red line on her hand, then at Aldo, and finally at the door.
Fuckit. She wasn’t playing tonight anyway. No sense staying in the dressing room. She’d just want to kick Aldo. Her hand found the doorknob as if by magic, and she started a slow shuffle toward the front of the bar.
The wall was cool against her face. Sadie leaned on it, eyes closed. One of them was swollen shut, and she needed to rest the other one.
She tried to push herself up, but her body felt heavy. Sadie couldn’t think straight. Where am I? Why am I out here?
Open your eyes.
It seemed so hard. Sadie breathed, feeling something loose in her jaw. She swallowed blood, then grunted her one good eye open. The wall in front of her was ordinary, a mix of graffiti and blood.
Blood? Whose blood is that? Her hand explored her face. Sadie winced. Her hand came away, sticky and red. Why can’t I open my other eye?
A door slammed open to her right, and she turned to lo
ok. A man crashed into the corridor. He had a fragment of something shiny, something sharp—
A broken mirror. My mirror. Aldo broke my mirror.
—held in his hand. He spun, seeing her. Something nasty worked its way from his eyes to his lips, a smile twisting them.
“You bitch. You fucking bitch.” He moved toward her, listing to his left, knocking into the wall.
Sadie drew a breath. She couldn’t remember where she was going. Sadie used to have a weapon, but she didn’t know where it was.
Run. You’ve got to run.
She turned away from Aldo and ran down the corridor.
Chapter Twenty
Overtime.
Movement slowed to treacle’s lethargic pace, the light bleached out. Mason dropped toward the floor, the SMGs firing as he fell. Glass shimmered and spun around him, the moment held in overtime’s close embrace.
One syndicate agent stood near where he would land, hand already reaching into his jacket. Metatech. Mason’s overlay tracked the motion, marking MT above the man’s head. It stenciled UNKNOWN next to the weapon he drew.
A second man stood by the bar, sunglasses turning up as Mason fell. Reed. The agent’s head turned before Mason finished punching through the skylight. The overlay marked him as RI and noted the sidearm leaving his jacket as LOW THREAT.
Mason turned his attention to Apsel’s interests. Haraway.
She stood, a fly in amber, motions slow in the real. He could see the shock start to move across her face. Mason could ignore her for the moment. She had no weapon, and no one was shooting at her.
He felt the tremble of the reactor at his back as he dropped. Status icons painted his overlay with green as the armor’s systems came online. He landed in a crouch as glass shattered in a ring around him. The concrete floor of The Hole cracked as one of his knees hit. Mason lost grip on one of his SMGs. He stood as Metatech’s weapon cleared his holster.
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