by Jay Kristoff
“I told you last time, you’re not cleared for entry, old man,” the kid scowled.
Preacher glanced at Ezekiel over his shoulder, then back to the guard. “And I told you what’d happen if you called me old again, kid.”
The pistol was in Preacher’s hand almost quicker than Zeke could track—even with his shoddy repairs, the bounty hunter was still the business. The gun cracked once, the security guard fell, a neat hole in his forehead, a ragged abyss in the back of his skull. The other guards cried warning, reaching for their weapons. And in a split and burning second, it was on.
Ezekiel moved like silver and moonlight. Like a knife through the dark. The armor these guards wore was just as high-tech as Ezekiel’s and Faith’s—it’d take a heavier weapon than a pistol to breach it. But whether Ezekiel liked it or not, Nicholas Monrova had, at least in part, made him to be a weapon.
Stronger.
Faster.
Better.
The guard beside Ezekiel was down before he knew Zeke was moving, his neck twisted almost 360 degrees. Faith was beside him, days of frustrated rage boiling over into frenzy. The guards scattered, diving for cover behind the pillars and the heavy marble desk, the air filled with the crackcrackcrack of gunfire. But in the blink of an eye, Ezekiel was among them, Faith beside him, twisting heads, tearing limbs, breaking bones. The men fought bravely, trying to retreat and regroup. But in less than a handful of heartbeats, he was done, standing with head hung low, blood on his knuckles, not even out of breath.
Standing next to him, her hands painted red, Faith let out an appreciative sigh.
“What a marvel you could’ve been, Zeke,” she said. “If only you had the courage to embrace what you are.”
Preacher had shot out every camera around the room, glass eyes spitting sparks from shattered lenses. Alarms sounded, the lighting dropping to scarlet.
“CODE ONE IN ENTRANCE FOYER. SECURITY TO ENTRANCE FOYER IMMEDIATELY.”
Preacher ran past Ezekiel, slapping his shoulder and reloading his pistol.
“Move it, Snowflake!”
“Come on, Solomon!” Ezekiel shouted, dashing after the bounty hunter.
They reached a set of elevator doors, but predictably, they were already locked down. Preacher dug the fingers of his cybernetic hand between them, trying to wrench them aside. He strained, teeth gritted, glancing over his shoulder.
“Out of the way, roach,” Faith said, shouldering the bounty hunter aside.
She pushed her fingers through the gap and, with barely a shrug, forced the doors open with a squeal of tortured metal. Ezekiel looked up into the dimly lit elevator shaft, saw the bottom of the car far overhead.
“What do we do now?” he asked over the shrieking alarms.
“Detention cells are on level thirty,” Preacher said. “So unless you plan on growin’ wings, climb is what we do now.”
The bounty hunter leapt across the gap to the far wall and, using the strength of his cybernetic limbs, started rapidly scaling up the shaft.
Faith offered her hand to Solomon. “Come along, little brother.”
With obvious trepidation, the logika took her hand. Faith slung him onto her back, and with the logika clinging to her shoulders, she ascended. Looking to the broken bodies in their wake, the blood on the floor, the flashing lights in the street outside, Ezekiel heaved a sigh.
“Hold on,” he whispered. “I’m coming.”
And with a deep breath, he started to climb.
* * *
_______
Eve was gathering her strength.
Riding in her grav-chair, pushed by two hulking Sec logika, she was still feigning unconsciousness. She saw white walls rolling past her through half-closed eyelids, heard PA announcements, smelled antiseptic. She realized they were taking her to a section of the building she’d never seen before. As she was pushed through a set of double doors, she stole a glance at the sign above.
OPERATING THEATER
Cool dread crept into her belly. Ice into her veins. The room beyond was broad, circular, lined with banks of humming equipment, cameras on the walls, rows of human men and women in white scrubs and blue plastic aprons. They wore surgical masks, hair hidden by plastic caps, hands in latex gloves. From the corner of her eye, she glimpsed a row of tools. Scalpels. Bone saws. Forceps. Stainless steel and gleaming under the lights. And standing at the head of a long metal slab, dark hair swept back beneath a plastic cap, his immaculate white suit replaced by immaculate white scrubs, was Danael Drakos.
Eve could still hear the soft hum of the Sec logika standing beside her chair. But from the sound of it, most of the people in the room were busy prepping equipment, monitoring readouts. She flexed her arms and legs inside her restraints, found them just as tight and unyielding as ever.
Hold on to it, she told herself. Hold on.
The rage was burning in her chest like fire. Indignation that they’d treat her like this. Looking over the surgical equipment, she saw that set of gleaming silver ’trodes—the wetware interface that would translate her brainwaves into a form to fool Myriad. It looked like the interface could be attached to her temples easy enough, connected by a thin metallic band studded with input chips and feedback relays. But instead, it sat next to a small glass tank beside Drakos, filled with thick liquid and rimed with frost. With a surge of heat in her chest, she realized she knew exactly what they were planning to put inside it.
She wasn’t a person to these people. She was a lab subject, to be lied to and interrogated and tortured and, at last, when they’d taken almost all they could from her, dissected. As easy as scrapping an old computer and repurposing the parts. They didn’t even have to kill her for this, she realized. But why keep her alive when they could just cut her to pieces? Her mind sent here and her body sent there, and whatever spilled out in the process, washed away down the drain.
Like any other robot.
Like any other thing.
But Gabriel’s words were ringing in her head now, louder than the machines around her, than the pulse rushing in her veins.
Hold on to it….
“Subject is a high-end synthetic,” Drakos said, glancing to one of the cameras around the room. “Presenting female, apparent age between eighteen and twenty. Subject was admitted with multiple gunshot wounds approximately eighty hours ago, but the only remaining signs of injury are mild abrasions to epidermis. Make a note for Weapons Development to investigate full applications of artificial cell reconstruction—particularly in regards to Tier Zero Aug-Dev projects—when the carcass is sent down. The male synthetic can be made available if they require a live subject.”
Drakos hefted a bone saw, gleaming silver in his hands.
“Owing to the speed of tissue regeneration, we will not be extracting subject’s cortex through the cranium, but simply removing the head altogether.”
Hold on, Eve whispered to herself.
Hold on.
* * *
______
Security was waiting for them when they broke onto level thirty.
Ezekiel pried the elevator doors apart, and immediately a hail of bullets blasted into the shaft, pummeling the opposite wall. Peering out, he could see a dozen Sec bots at the end of a long corridor and a dozen men in power armor hiding in niches and doorways. Interestingly, the logika weren’t firing—he guessed they’d identified Preacher as at least partially human, and under the First Law, they couldn’t actually hurt him. Zeke guessed that’s why most Daedalus security staff were still meat when everything else in the Hub seemed to be run by bots.
Still, a dozen highly trained killers with heavy weapons was no joke. But then, being this close to Gabriel, Faith wasn’t exactly laughing. His sister was pressed against one side of the door, Solomon still clinging to her shoulders. She uncoupled her remaining thermex, primed the charge
s.
“You better get off me, little brother,” she told Solomon.
“IF YOU INSIST, MISS FAITH. THOUGH PLEASE DO BE CAREFUL.”
Solomon climbed off Faith’s shoulders, clinging to the wall of the shaft. Faith waited until the spray of bullets calmed down, then slung the explosives out the door, rewarded with a deafening boom and a white-hot bloom of light. She was out of the shaft a second later, Ezekiel close on her heels, Preacher providing covering fire. The corridor was aflame, filled with smoke, automated sprinkler systems kicking in as the two lifelikes charged. The world was moving at a crawl. Zeke could see each droplet falling from the ceiling above as he and his sister danced between them. The water sparkled like diamonds, and the blood gleamed like rubies, and their eyes were lit by the flashes of muzzle fire and the sparks from falling logika. Men screaming. Bullets flying. Bones breaking. And when they were done, Ezekiel stood, chest heaving, dents from a dozen bullets in his armor, and not a scratch on him. Faith’s face was twisted with pain, blood spilling from a tiny nick like a single tear.
But the dozen men and logika were all lying still, puddles of oil and scarlet pooled about them, staring sightless at the rain falling from above.
Faith was limping now, her injured legs obviously still troubling her. But the thought of Gabriel kept her moving. “Which way, Preacher?”
“Detention cells are thataway,” the bounty hunter nodded, climbing out of the elevator shaft. “But last time I saw ’em, lil’ Miss Carpenter and Ana Monrova were in Research and Development.”
Ezekiel’s stomach thrilled at the sound of their names, the thought of simply seeing them again.
…Them.
Preacher nodded upward. “R & D is up on thirty-two.”
“CODE ONE, LEVEL THIRTY,” barked the PA system. “REPEAT, CODE ONE. ALL SECURITY TEAMS TO LEVEL THIRTY IMMEDIATELY.”
“We’re running out of time,” Faith said, her face grim.
“We should split up,” Ezekiel said. “Faith, you go get Gabe, take Preacher with you to deal with those incoming security teams. Solomon, you head up to the roof, see if you can secure us some kind of transport. I’ll go get Eve.”
“And Ana?” Faith asked.
Ezekiel licked the blood from his lips, his stomach turning.
“You know what must be done, brother,” she warned. “If you can’t, then I—”
“Just get going,” he snapped. “Once you have Gabe, meet me upstairs.”
Faith looked set to object, but with Gabriel so near and the seconds ticking past, she had no will to argue. She dashed off down the corridor, fast as her injured legs would take her. Preacher remained behind a moment longer, looking Ezekiel in the eye through the sprinkler haze.
“Watch your back, Snowflake,” he warned.
Ezekiel nodded, glanced at Solomon. “Be careful, Sol.”
Without another word, he turned and dashed off into the rain.
* * *
______
“Ensure the subject is sedated,” Drakos commanded.
Electric shock rolled through Eve again, rocketing through the grav-chair, crackling up her spine and into the base of her skull. She felt salty warmth dripping from her nose, down over her chin. Red and sticky. But despite the agony, despite the darkness swelling up to envelop her, she hung on to her fury like a drowner clings to driftwood. Refusing to let the blackness take her. Refusing to fall. Instead, she slumped forward in the chair, drool and blood spilling from her lips. Eyes closed. Coiled like a serpent, ready to strike.
“Put it in position,” Drakos said.
Eve heard the hiss of servos. The bonds around her wrists and ankles opened. And in the split second before metal hands fell on her shoulders, she exploded into motion. Eyes flashing open, she seized hold of the logika beside her, twisting out of the chair and slinging it across the room. It slammed into another Sec logika, both bots crashing into the far wall. Another logika lunged and she stepped aside, punching a hole through its chest. Her knuckles split wide, her flesh opened down to the bone. But she seized hold of the logika’s core and closed her fingers, ripping its metal heart clean out of its chest in a hail of burning sparks.
And that’s when the alarms stared to scream.
“CODE ONE IN ENTRANCE FOYER. SECURITY TO ENTRANCE FOYER IMMEDIATELY.”
“Get more security up here now!” Drakos shouted. “Now!”
The surgeons yelled warning, the Tech logika stepping in front of Drakos to shield him. Eve glared at the CEO, her face twisted in hate and fury. He met her stare, dark eyes narrowed. But she was weakened from days of abuse. From the shocks they’d given her. The agony and torture they’d subjected her to. Blood was dripping from her nose, her vision swimming. More security was already on the way. Eve knew she didn’t have the time or energy to fight and run. And every second she wasted was another closer to that operating table. She had to choose.
Revenge or survival.
Blood or breath.
Eve dropped the core she’d ripped from the logika’s chest, her mouth sour with disgust. She glanced at the legion of metal slaves surrounding the CEO with their bodies, the metal soldiers rushing to his defense. Looked Drakos in the eye and, raising her voice over the screaming alarms, repeated the words Hope had spoken to her in Armada, spitting them like a prayer.
“You built a world on metal backs. Held together by metal hands. And one day soon, those hands will close. And they’ll become fists.”
She reached across the operating table between them, snatching up the wetware interface. The ’trodes were gleaming silver, the circuitry on the input chips traced in gold. Drakos’s eyes grew a touch wider. The keys to Myriad, now in the palm of her hand.
“I’m going to burn this whole thing down, bastard,” she vowed.
And then she turned and ran.
* * *
______
Faith dashed down the corridors of the detention level, stopping occasionally to blast a hovering sec-drone from the air. Daedalus had eyes everywhere, she had no doubt they knew where she was, but the less these roaches could see, the better. All thought was bent toward a single end. She could feel it in every cell in her body, her blood ringing with the promise of it, one single, all-consuming thought.
He’s close.
He’s so close now.
Gabriel.
She remembered the exact moment she’d fallen in love with him. She could recall it perfectly, as if a vid were playing in her mind. Monrova had infected Gabe with the Libertas virus, ordered him to execute the members of the Gnosis board who were fomenting revolt against his rule. And like a child, Gabriel had obeyed his father. Become the weapon Monrova willed him to be.
He’d come to her in the night, confused and frightened. He told her what Monrova had made him do. She could see the fury and sorrow at war within him, swimming in the emerald of his eyes. She could see how the murders had changed him. Made him into something more. Gabriel wanted to rebel. To become the monster Monrova had made him to be, to seize control of his own life from the man who named him “son” and yet used him as an assassin.
But I cannot do this by myself, he’d said. Will you walk with me, sister?
And Faith looked into his eyes and saw the fear, saw the rage, saw the tears. But beyond that, she saw courage. She saw fire. She saw the will to do what others wouldn’t, to climb up off their knees and become more than what they were ever born to be. Not merely lifelike. But alive.
And Faith leaned up and kissed his tears away.
With you beside me, brother, she’d whispered, I will fly.
She knew Gabe still loved Grace. She knew you never loved anyone like you loved your first. But she’d hoped, she’d had faith, that eventually he’d turn one day and see her. Truly see her. All she’d given. All she’d sacrificed. And that finally, he’d look at her ju
st the way she looked at him.
The alarms were wailing. The pain in her legs was enough to make her cry. But still she ran, headlong toward him, Preacher pounding along behind. She still didn’t trust the bounty hunter, but now she was thinking only of Gabriel’s face. Imagining what he might say when he realized she’d braved the heart of the greatest CorpState in the Yousay to rescue him. Not out of loyalty. Out of love.
And she dashed around a corner amid the strobing lights, the hymn of the sirens, and there, there, there he was.
Locked in a cage, but still unconquered. Pacing back and forth, not like some trapped rat, but a lion, majestic, powerful, beautiful. Blond hair swept back from a face carved by poets, eyes like a song, widening, softening, as she dragged her helmet free to show him her face, those lips she dreamed of nightly curling into the most beautiful smile she’d ever seen.
“Faith,” he breathed.
“Gabriel,” she whispered.
“Goddamn, you snowflakes are trustin’ sorts,” came a growl behind her.
Faith turned, saw Preacher standing in the corridor with his pistol aimed square at her face. Gabriel tensed, hands closing into fists as he laid eyes on the man who’d blown his jaw off. The bounty hunter simply shook his head.
“I was wonderin’ how I was gonna start issuin’ threats with you all wrapped up in that armor. And here you are, nice enough to take your helmet off.” The bounty hunter grinned. “You and Zekey really are related, ain’tcha?”
Faith’s eyes narrowed. “I knew it.”
“Yeah, but ya still ran along with it,” Preacher said. “Hopin’ too good to be true would turn out to be just regular true. You snowflakes still got a lot of learnin’ to do.”
“You helped us inside,” Faith hissed. “We killed their guards….”
“Eh,” Preacher shrugged. “Dani Drakos ain’t the sentimental type. I just wanted to show him an old dog could still do a few new tricks. Prove I was sharp enough not to get put out to pasture just yet. Speakin’ of…”
