Except right now. Only the blackness that shielded it right now was anything but natural.
“All righty,” Kellen said. “I have the cable ready to plug in. You ready?”
Heron shifted his focus to the med lab, to the fat cable in Kellen’s hand and the zoomed-in hologram of his brain. He magnified the image further and painted the dark metal disk.
“My queen,” he said into her robot brain, “once I connect my body to the station, I will need a power spike at this location.”
“I recommend a three-second burst at 800 milliamps,” she said.
“We can start there but should have power available to hit it harder.”
“Dangerous,” she warned him.
“Noted,” he replied.
They coordinated a countdown digitally and put it up on the monitor. Kellen plugged the cable into the back of Heron’s head and moved one of the monitoring electrodes so that the current would pass over the odd metal disk.
When the count reached zero, the queen shunted power from the station. Straight into the cable.
This sort of thing ought to hurt a man, but Heron felt nothing.
The metal on the projection darkened further…and then it bent inward, pulling away from its organic frame, leaving microscopic openings on the sides, tiny fairy doors into the data stream. And that was all the space Heron needed.
He pushed, flooding the fissure with energy, connection, data. Himself. The gate gave beneath his assault. In a matter of moments, he surged into his own mind, inhabiting familiar neural connections.
Home.
One by one, he engaged systems: autonomics, visual, auditory, peripheral. Coming alive, gasping, filling his lungs after a long suffocation.
Out of instinct, he reached for her.
She wasn’t there. Of course she wasn’t. She wasn’t even nearby, touchable. She was trapped in black ICE in Texas. Hold on, querida. I will find you.
On an inhalation, he tasted hot metal, new plastic, and…bacon? No, that must be a memory, not a sensory input. A good memory, too. Best. Even without direct control of facial muscles, it drew a swift smile.
“Well, that happened,” Kellen said. “This mean you’re back?”
Heron tried to reply, but his throat was sore, dry. He swallowed, flexed his hands, stretched his fingers.
“Nah, don’t talk yet, just keep on with the typing. That’s working fine.” Kellen slid tablets beneath Heron’s hands and went on, as if this sort of thing happened every day. “Now then, we’re going after Mari, right? We have eight minutes till that tether comes up.”
Heron tested his tongue and went to work on that ICE. “Let’s make them count.”
• • •
Mari’s throat was parched and raw by the time she and Nathan crested the summit. She’d been breathing through her mouth, thanks to all that lovely scrub cedar clogging up her nose and making her eyes water, and Nathan hadn’t mentioned anything about water, damn him. Plus, the hike was a lot more vertical than it looked. Her thighs burned. She took a moment there at the top to flex them, rest. She looked around.
Pink stained the sky all over, and if circumstances had been a bit different, she might have admired the view.
Even with the pockmarks of orbit burns and the scars of fences, the landscape stretched off in all directions, horizons as sepia-clear as sweet iced tea. A family of bone-skinny deer finished up its forage, slunk single file back into the muted scrub. A breeze ruffled pale buds on the prickly pears. Tough girl, Texas.
As far as places to die went, this one sure didn’t suck.
She guessed she ought to feel some fear, but she didn’t. This was home. Hers. Just seeing it, smelling it, made her want to kick something’s ass.
Palms on her kneecaps, she looked over at Nathan. He was crouching beside his pack, dicking with something at the back of his head. She’d half expected to find herself staring down a gun barrel, but this sight struck her as a mite more wrong.
“Nathan?”
But he didn’t answer. Early-morning light glinted off something shiny in his hand, and she looked closer. A knife? No, a slim metal hook. Mari watched in mute horror as Nathan pried the cap off the SIP in the back of his head, slipped a piece of tech into a socket, and then sank against the rock, fingers splaying like frog feet on the granite.
“Nathan!”
Mari tried to run over to him, but footing was treacherous up here, and she automatically compensated, slowing to keep herself upright. Not that she would have made it in time anyway. She splashed through a puddle of stagnant rainwater, felt it soak the hem of her crinoline, and halted, still, at the edge.
Nathan looked up at her. His face, his blue eyes.
But somebody else was looking out through them.
“Didn’t I tell you to do better research?” he said. “You have so much to learn, little monster.”
Chapter 15
Not-Nathan got to his feet, taking way longer than Nathan would if he was controlling his own body. His posture was all wrong when he stood: swayback straight and with his head held back, chin down, a little man trying to look impressive. The person marionetting Nathan’s body now was slower, too. And crueler. The expression on his face made Mari’s fingers cold, and that had nothing to do with the stiff morning breeze.
Might have had a smidge to do with the gun he pulled, though.
She eyed that gun hard. She knew Nathan’s body was wired, but she didn’t know how good his physical alterations were these days. Could she rush him, tackle him, and get the gun? She sifted through the scenario for a few whole heartbeats before she remembered why she was here. And where she’d met the puppeteer before.
Little monster? The fuck.
“Pentarc, right?” she said. “We have got to stop hooking up like this.”
He tilted his head and frowned. “Before the Pentarc, actually. You really don’t know who I am? I had thought even your brain might work through the logic, given time.”
Mari flushed hot at the insult. Sure, she knew she wasn’t the sharpest knife in the drawer, but she sure as shit could use all those other knives to slit somethin’ when she wanted. Her hands fisted at her sides, but she didn’t creep any closer to her captor.
He raised the gun, one-handed and wishy-wristed, and she did her best not to snort. Nathan was nothing if not consistent: big-ass dualie of a truck, big-ass hand-cannon of a Model 29 with an 8-3/8-inch barrel. Probably thought in the back of his brain that he was some twentieth-century gunslinger. Typical of him, all hat and no cattle. But even if Nathan himself had a clue how to handle that thing, whoever was inhabiting his body at the moment was in for a surprise.
If not-Nathan pulled that trigger, the kick from a gun like that was like to break his face. Not to mention, even in the best of circumstances, it had to be weird, balance-wise, to fire a weapon using someone else’s hand. Mari thought about the couple of shots she’d gotten off in Heron’s car, and she almost smiled. Okay, almost weird. Firing his weapon had been a thrill and a half.
“Okay then. You the TPA?”
Not-Nathan’s eyebrows flared, and he took a half step back. “Me, a government? I am flattered, but, er, no. Guess again.”
“You know, guessing games aren’t really my thing,” Mari said, “so how’s about we cut to the chase? I’m lookin’ to talk to whoever planted that shit in Heron’s head. That you?”
“Essentially.” He gave a little bow. Cocky bastard.
Mari went out on a limb. “Nathan didn’t shut down the transmission, did he?”
“I don’t see how he could have. He has no concept of nanorobotics.” His eyebrows rose in tandem with his chin, a supremely confident, self-satisfied smirk Mari had never seen on his face before. “You did realize your ex is something of an imbecile, right? But useful. He fetched you as I asked, so there’s that.”
“And don’t forget pretty.”
“I hadn’t noticed.” But he added a second hand to his shooter stance, holding the weapon more firmly, as if he just now realized Nathan’s pretty face was behind that kick, and he didn’t want it to get bonked on the recoil. Liar. This man, whatever his true identity, was keenly aware of his physical beauty.
He was also haughty, acting so sure he could handle that gun. And meaner than a sack of snakes. Now, why did all that sound familiar?
“So the transmission,” she said. “How do I make it stop? If you’re part of the whole of TPA, I could turn myself in to you, and you could extradite me to UNAN. Is that your endgame? Buy up some UNAN goodwill and get a bunch of top-secret data from Heron’s head in the process?”
He half laughed. “As endgames go, that one is terribly limited. You always did think you were cleverer than you really are, chulita.”
Chulita. Cutie. Pretty little thing in a pink dress with flowers. Too-hot university office in the summertime. Now run along to your aunt, chulita. I’m working.
Mari choked. “Dad?”
His face twisted, but Mari couldn’t tell if it was in preparation for a huggy-kissy reunion or cold, relentless fury. She figured fury, ’cause even as she was processing the what-the-fuckery of her realization, the puppeteer controlling her ex-lover’s body raised the gun. Pointed it.
And shot her.
Pain bloomed along the top of her leg. She went to her knees, instinctively grasping the wound. Thigh. Wasn’t anything important in a thigh, right?
But holy shit, it hurt.
• • •
Nine hundred miles away, Heron flinched against the gurney. His satellites still didn’t have clear images of her, and he still struggled to clear the dome of black ICE over Enchanted Rock, but somehow, despite all the interference, he knew the moment she hurt. Sharp pain, in the thigh.
He needed visual right now. He needed to see what, or who, threatened her. Who had hurt her.
He needed to hurt somebody right back.
Across the room, he locked eyes with the queen.
“Time is up. I am retracting the tether as we speak,” she said. “Nanite halo is failing presently, so expect your unwanted transmission to recommence. I am sorry.”
Fury ripped through him, and he didn’t bother trying to gather it up or tamp it down. He wasn’t angry with the queen. He was angry with circumstance, with fate, with the limits of technology, with everybody who’d tried to hurt Mari when none of their conflicts were or had ever been her fault.
Most of all, he was angry with himself.
What fucking use was his gigantic neural if he didn’t use it to save the woman he loved? Fuck the nanite transmission, fuck the cloud, fuck the whole goddamn digital world and everybody plugged into it. Mari needed him. Finally, after all these years, she needed him.
And he knew how he could help her.
“How fast can you get me to the Pentarc?” he asked the queen.
She tilted her head, and her eyebrows bowed in sympathy, as if she knew what he contemplated. “Currently, I employ thrusters to keep Chiba steady. Without them, we move at 17,450 miles per hour. I can have you there in three minutes.”
“Do it.”
“What’s happening?” Kellen’s voice cut in, edging on desperate.
“She’s hurt.” The words tore from Heron’s own mouth, though he did not recognize his voice. “Mari’s hurt.”
“How can you tell?”
“I’m not sure, honestly. Did you do anything to her com before she left? Maybe boost it somehow?”
Kellen flushed. “I implanted a com with extended range and a faceprint spoofer, so she wouldn’t be stopped at checkpoints or picked up by the feds.”
“Ah.” Heron squeezed his eyes shut. “Thank you.”
That was one hell of a com. He searched for its signal, the link that would bring him to her. He couldn’t see her, couldn’t touch her, probably couldn’t even send her a coherent message. But if her pain had transmitted itself to him, perhaps his comfort would find her.
He wasn’t certain how long it took to find her signal—time had become slow and gelatinous—but eventually, buried in all the interference caused by the ICE, he located a single pinprick of light, a data stream busting its way out of the dome. He locked his attention to it.
Hang in there, querida. I’m coming for you.
“Moving into position over the arcology,” the queen said. “Putting down the tether. Stand by.”
Still focused on Mari’s com signal, he didn’t look for a visual on the Pentarc, but knowing it was below him, shining in the sand and harboring a nodal connection to the cloud, hope flooded him.
Of all the foolish plans he’d thought up in his life, this was the one that gave him the most peace. He knew the danger of logging on to the cloud, but if ever there was a moment to risk everything, he was living it right now. He decided he would go in through the Pentarc, and he’d find Mari. And if their link was as strong as he suspected, as strong as it seemed to be, as strong as his soul screamed it must be, there was no way he could get lost in there.
He would find her. He would save her.
He opened his eyes and found the queen still looking back at him.
She nodded almost imperceptibly, and he pushed.
Fell.
Squeezed on all sides, the weight of data strangling him, he put his head down and willed himself through it, into it. Into that tiny point of access, that bright lure of connection.
He blew through the Pentarc’s closed system and out into the cloud with a howl.
Speed had nothing on the thrill of finally, voraciously stretching his neural.
Input, input, input: Go. Surge. Flying Mach 3 with his brain on fire. All the space in the universe, and he filled it. All of it. Roaring into that black, taking its reins, felt a little bit like fucking Mari.
Just a little. God, he loved her. Had he told her as much? He would.
The thought centered him for the split second when he could have been lost. Bright as a thread of free-fae, the com signal led him straight to her.
There, at the end of his thread, Mari pulsed with life. He couldn’t see her with his eyes, but he could feel her with every important part of his neural.
Hurt. She was hurt.
Rage ignited him.
He tapped, and the black ICE in Texas shattered. The TPA had two satellites of its own, launched in secret about six months ago. These weren’t shielded against him at all, not anymore, and he looked through their lenses and saw the whole of the rock, Mari on its summit like a fallen goddess. Her hair was loose and blowing in the wind, and so far, it looked like only one other person was up there with her. If he knew Mari, she had a fallback weapon, a last-ditch surprise for whoever that other figure on the rock face might be. Heron could probably sit back now and watch it all unfold. But he wouldn’t.
Backups for backups, and he was here.
He saw Viktor, now leaving the pebbled trail and mounting the rock proper, slowed a bit by the bristle of illegal weaponry he carried.
But even that sight didn’t satisfy Heron completely. He wanted to be the hand of God, to reach down through time and space and pick her the hell up. Hold her precious and apart from all this. God knew, she’d been through enough. He bit back the surge again, the need to stretch himself, to appropriate more of the cloud matrix.
On a wave of data and angry, Heron ingested the UNAN military equipment databases, all of them, and sorted their pieces like cutlery in a drawer. He found a helicopter already in the air, taking toxicity samples near Fredericksburg, and with a flex of digital will, he commandeered it.
In those first critical moments inside the cloud, with his neural expanding exponentially, he didn’t think about anchoring his consciousness first. He didn’t think about
much beyond finding her, getting her to safety. Punishing anyone who hurt her.
He remotely accessed the helicopter’s autocontrol rig, clamped his eyes shut, and surged into space.
• • •
“I must confess that you’re taking all this better than I had expected,” said not-Nathan/Dad, standing over her with the gun trained more or less on her head. “You always tended toward dramatics, so frankly, I expected some freaking out. You’ve certainly changed.”
Since the night of the Austin riots, the last time she saw him? Hells yeah, she’d changed. “People tend to do that in eight fucking years,” she said, no longer in any way worried about keeping the bitterness out of her voice. “And I’m freaking out. Believe me, I am. Also possibly bleeding out.”
He sighed. “No, you aren’t.”
“You shot me!”
“Oh please. Look at the entry wound.”
Mari stared down at her thigh. She’d been holding the pretty, rumpled crinoline, bunched tight against the spot that ached like nipple hooks, but now she wadded up the scratchy material, exposing her garter holster—now empty, thanks to Nathan—and…the wound.
Huh. Yeah, it was there, and yeah, it was purple and ragged and ugly as all get out. But it wasn’t leaking like she’d expected. Not even close. Could Nathan have modded, say, a .22 to make it look like that stupid hand-cannon? She poked at the edge of the wound until a ribbon of blood pressed out reluctantly. Hell. More like a pellet gun.
Words tumbled before she could stop them. “What the fuck?”
“Chitosan hemostats, if I had to guess. Your blood chemistry has been tampered with, obviously. Among all the other things she did to you.”
Every jigger of said blood in Mari’s body chilled at those words. Tampered with? Oh God. That would mean…
“You called me Dad, but you really shouldn’t.” His voice was a lot gentler than it had been, like he was remembering or regretting, though she wasn’t about to pin something as sane as affection on him. He was still pointing a gun at her, after all. “My daughter died in a south Texas prison. She was tortured to death by a rogue UNAN ops team that was trying to get information on me.”
Wanted and Wired Page 25
