by M. D. Cooper
Kylie getting shot and hitting the pavement was an act. Grayson knew it, but each time he watched the feed, he felt gutted. He was stuck in the CIC, and she was….
She was doing exactly what she needed to do. What she was supposed to do.
It didn’t mean he had to like sitting on the sidelines, though.
A figure approached from his left, forcing Grayson to glance away from the screens.
“Quite the shit-show,” General Samuel said in greeting.
“Sure seems to be,” Grayson replied, careful to add a note of worry to his voice.
Samuel sighed. “The president reached out. He wants this ended fast and he wants Kylie rescued. As the primary witness against her brother, she’s necessary for the trial.”
Glad to know that she’s valuable as an individual human, Grayson thought bitterly, but replied with, “That’s what we all want, sir. None more than me.”
“Right,” Samuel said, and Grayson couldn’t help but notice that the man sounded distracted, almost like he was thinking of something else more important—or wished he was. “General Duke has given the order for the military to set up a perimeter at the river and at the edge of the city. Once that’s established, they’ll start moving in. I gotta say, though, I’m impressed with that guy on the hoverbike. There must be more than that two-person team, or he’s processing the feeds faster than I would have thought possible.”
Grayson shrugged. “He could have an onboard AI.”
“I suppose, though what AI would pair with the likes of him? Wouldn’t be the first time I saw something I thought to be impossible, though.”
“If you don’t mind, sir,” Grayson said, straightening as he faced the general. “If we’re deploying the SSF, I’d like to go out with one of my assault shuttles and provide assistance.”
The general nodded, barely paying attention. “You have my leave, but be certain to coordinate with General Duke. I imagine he won’t want you swooping in and stealing his glory.
“Of course, sir.”
Grayson took care to walk with purpose, but not appear to be in a terror-filled rush as he strode out of the CIC.
If the military was going to cordon off the city, Rogers was in for a wilder ride than they’d planned.
* * * * *
Rogers banked right around a corner in the groundcar they’d switched to partway through the escape. There was a chance it would have been enough to lose their tail, but the feed cams had spotted them leaving the garage, and the chase was on once more.
They’d moved out of the city center, and were now racing down residential streets at speeds that were concerning even for him. He took a left at the next intersection and nearly hit a squad car that was floating a meter above the road.
Rogers had avoided the squad car by banking across a lawn, but now he had yet another pursuer. The road he was on was straight, but eased over a series of low hills. At the crest of each one, the car sailed through the air, coming down gently on its a-grav system.
“Any good outs yet?” Rogers asked, trying to concentrate as his head started to throb.
Kylie shook her head from the comfort of the backseat. “Pursuit is still too thick. There are drones overhead, and the SSF is tightening their perimeter now.”
“Shit.” Rogers gripped the steering wheel harder than he needed to. “We’re never going to get out of this.”
“We will. We’re almost there. We get to that warehouse, and there’s a van waiting for us. It’s all going to go fine, Rogers,” Kylie said.
He glanced at her reflection in the mirror and saw the chiseled face of a fashion model: long, copper red hair, thick pouty lips. Kylie looked nothing like herself at all. Facial reconstruction might’ve been painful, but it sure was effective.
“It’s the escape part I’m worried about, Cap. All the surveillance, all the officers. My cute face isn’t built for prison life.”
Kylie smirked from the backseat. “Clearly.”
In the vid, Rogers walked down the hall while eating a piece of beef jerky. All of a sudden, Mr. Fizzle Pop dropped out of the ceiling and attached to Rogers’ face. There was some screaming and meowing as Rogers spun in a circle, and then fell into a secret smuggling compartment beneath the floorboards.
Rogers groaned.
Marge giggled.
Pushing the distraction from his mind, Rogers punched the accelerator as they crested another hill. At the bottom lay an SSF blockade with assault drones on either side, and grav-field emitters set to grab anything that drove through.
“Oh, shit.” Rogers held onto his steering wheel tight. “There’s no other way to go.”
“What about the drones?” he shouted aloud while accelerating toward the blockade.
“They won’t shoot,” Kylie said. “Not with me in here.”
“That’s what I’m trying to do!”
The car shot past the barricade at over three hundred kilometers per hour. A few stray rounds hit the vehicle, but no alerts lit up, and Rogers breathed a sigh of relief.
Around another corner, and they were in a commercial district near the river.
“Warehouse is in sight.”
Rogers banked around the final corner and then slid the car beneath the lowering bay doors as the sounds of pursuit grew louder. He was glad the warehouse’s interior was large and empty, because the car skidded for over sixty meters before finally coming to a stop a short ways away from a Silstrand Federal Assault Forces van.
Maureen pushed open the front door. “Need a ride, soldier?”
“Sure do!” Rogers leapt out of the car and ran to the back of the van, climbing in with Kylie right behind him. He settled into a seat next to Ricket, who looked like Ricket again.
He kissed her hello and looked out the front to see a small creature leap from a nearby crate and into the car.
Stars, I sure hope that stupid cat isn’t going to mess anything up.
Kylie buckled herself in across from Rogers and winked at him before calling out. “OK, Commander, now let’s see if we can sneak out the back all quiet like.”
Maureen grinned. “You’ve got it.”
* * * * *
Kylie gripped the handholds on the front of the benchseat as the van took one hairpin turn after another, following in the wake of the pursuit that was still chasing the car.
Kylie was happy to hear it.
Grayson reported.
ted.
Marge let out a nervous laugh.
Kylie shook her head, wondering if Marge would ever take life-or-death situations seriously.
A holo appeared in the back of the van, and everyone saw three police officers approach the car, which had collided with a stone divider that ran down a boulevard. The passenger side window was smashed, and as one of the officers approached, he seemed to catch sight of something curious, as his firearm lowered just a hair.
It was at that moment that a ball of fur leapt out of the window and landed on the man’s face. The cat clawed its way onto the first cop’s head, and then leapt for the second one.
“Shit!” Kylie exclaimed as the third cop fired at the cat, but somehow missed.
Then Mr. Fizzle Pop was attached to the second officer’s chest. That cop grabbed him and held the cat aloft as it hissed and spat.
Kylie found herself growing increasingly anxious—both out of concern for the cat, and because she knew he would probably spill the plan at the first mention of food.
Suddenly, Fizzle Pop managed to twist and bite the man’s wrist, who screamed and let him go. The cat wasted no time racing across the road, a few shots striking the pavement around him, before he disappeared into the crowd that had gathered on the sidewalk.
Kylie rolled her eyes.
Kylie was about to tell the cat they weren’t stopping for food, but then sighed and replied,
A minute later, they were in position, covering the block that Grayson had assigned their vehicle to.
“I’ll get the pizza,” Ricket said as she rose from her seat.
“What?” Maureen twisted around from her place behind the wheel. “You were serious?”
The Hand agent shrugged. “Trust me, if I don’t, we might all go deaf when he gets in here.”
“You’re going to get caught on feed cams,” Maureen warned.
Ricket only smiled as her face changed to that of a rather butch looking woman. “No chance, Commander.”
“Shit, that’s some tech you guys have. No wonder the SSF wanted it so bad.”
Four minutes later, the cat arrived, and leapt into the van, where Kylie grabbed him and offered him a slice.
“NOT A LIAR! I THINK I LIKE YOU.”
Kylie suspected that it was the first nice thing Fizzle Pop had ever said to her, and she couldn’t resist sliding him into her arms and scratching beneath his fuzzy little chin.
“We’re widening the grid,” Maureen said as she pulled away from the curb. Grayson’s going to issue orders that will slowly filter us out.
There were a number of silent nods, mostly due to the fact that everyone had grabbed a slice of pizza. Kylie leant her back against the van’s side and relaxed the best she could, mentally preparing herself for the next phase of their plan.
We’re going to get you, you sonofabitch. With your hand in the cookie jar.
A spike of concern ran through her, and she reached out to Grayson through the van’s tactical network, masking herself as the sender.
Grayson’s reply was a floating question mark.
Grayson groaned.
Kylie replied with only a smirk.
MORNING AFTER
STELLAR DATE: 02.21.8948 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: Barbaric Queen, orbiting Silstrand
REGION: Silstrand System, Silstrand Alliance
Kylie slept hard. Pretending to be kidnapped and possibly dead sure wore a girl out. The next morning, she awoke with a stretch, arching her back and looking over at her bed partner.
Grayson had arrived late, and they had barely talked at all before he’d climbed into her bed. It was a pretty nice way to wrap up the night—the last two nights, actually.
Yet being with him reminded Kylie of all the things she had to lose.
All the things people kept trying to take away from her.
She rolled toward him, propping her head up on her elbow. She watched the way he breathed, how he snored on every third breath. The little things that had always bugged her now seemed almost magical. Kylie knew that, with time, they’d probably go back to driving her crazy.
Even so, she craved being with him and looked forward to being so familiar once more that his annoying habits would begin to bug her. A normal life might not really be in the cards, but she could wish, couldn’t she?
She thought of all the different ways she could wake him up, and went with her favorite. She stuck her finger in his ear.
Grayson’s eyes started open and his brow furrowed. “Ugh!” He jerked his head away and stole a long glance at her.
Kylie laughed. “Sorry, I couldn’t help myself.”
He rubbed his ear so fast Kylie thought he might make it fall off. “I look forward to waking up next to you any way I can, but that’s…pushing it.”
She leaned forward and kissed him. “Let me make up for it, then.”
Grayson chuckled, his arms slipping around her. “I like the sound of that.”
Before they could start with a better wakeup process, Rogers’ voice came across the shipnet.
Grayson groaned and flopped his head back down on the pillow. “Can I pretend I didn’t hear that?”
“Well, I’d like some crispy potato curls, too. And you do make all the best potato thingies.”
Grayson laughed and squeezed his eyes shut. “For you, I’ll do it.”
Kylie grinned, pushing her worries away and basking in the knowledge that right now, she was one heck of a lucky girl.
* * * * *
They ate breakfast as a group. Grayson was clearly as comfortable in the Barbaric Queen’s kitchen as he’d been in the Dauntless’s.
As she lifted her mug of coffee, Kylie did her best to hide a smile. She liked having the servitor around, and even liked the coffee it made…. But she’d never admit it to her crew.
After draining the cup, she signaled the servitor for a refill.
“So you do like the coffee!” Rogers exclaimed as he leaned forward to get the last crunchy bits of potato curls.
Kylie snorted. “No. It’s just all there is.”
Grayson chuckled. “She can never admit when she’s wrong.”
“Ain’t that the truth?” Rogers added with a knowing smile.
/> “Hey, I’m sitting right here—and I can too. When I…choose to.”
Rogers and Grayson exchanged a knowing look, which Kylie pointedly ignored.
“Did anyone think to save Ricket a second helping of food? You know what sims do to a person,” Kylie said.
Rogers’ eyes widened as he chewed on the last of the curls. “Oh shiffft,” he said, rising to peel some more spuds.
Grayson chuckled as he pulled out a small pen and pointed it at the deck. For a moment, Kylie wondered what he was doing. Then she realized it was a laser pointer.
The sound of a cat’s claws scrabbling across the deck came to her ears, and she leant over to see Mr. Fizzle Pop chasing after the red light, his paws moving faster than she’d ever seen before as he swatted madly at it. She was starting to wonder if the cat had some sort of musculature mods.
Grayson chuckled with delight, but Marge sent across angry faces, flooding their respective HUDs. Kylie didn’t want a fight to break out between them, so she intervened.
“I think you’ve had enough fun, Gray. Leave the cat alone.”
“All right, fine. He does look a little cross-eyed.” He slid the pointer back into his pocket.
“I think he always looks like that,” Rogers said.
Mr. Fizzle Pop hopped up onto the table, blinked his eyes, and fell over into a box of napkins.
“Sure you do,” Grayson muttered.
Kylie slapped his knee under the table. “MFP, can you take a nap somewhere else?”
“NO.”
She sighed. “You’re getting fur all over the napkins. There are plenty of good boxes for a nice nap on the other side of the kitchen.”
“LIKE THIS ONE. SOFT.”
“Yeah except you don’t fit in this one.” Rogers pointed to the cat, whose butt was hanging out of the box.
