by T. C. Edge
Damn…
“OK Sophie, we have to go. Right now.”
I grab Sophie’s arm and pull her to her feet. She’s trembling, her eyes alert. Turning her, we begin moving down the street away from the cold gaze of the woman who won’t leave me alone; this unstoppable, undeviating robot who seems hell-bent on making my life a misery.
As I work away with Sophie, heading west, my mind works quickly.
Did she see me like Titus did in the marshes, using my Hawk eyes? How could she from that distance? She’s just a Mind-Manipulator, not a Hawk. There’s no way she could tell…
I work my way to a solution that helps settle my pacing heart. Strange, really, that it’s a simple look at her face that sends my pulse galloping more than the sound of gunfire, and the sight of a man having his head cut through by a sniper bullet.
I can’t keep going like this. I need that woman gone.
As we move quickly towards the Inner Spiral, I turn to Sophie and lift her up to her full height. Until now, she’s been walking at a crouch, as if expecting a fresh barrage of gunfire to come flashing from the buildings above.
“It’s OK now, Soph, it’s fine, it’s over,” I say.
Her eyes maintain that heavy cloak of shock. It’s another thing that’s changed in me so fast, my own complexion calm and body primed for just about anything.
“Where’s your car, Sophie? I’ll take you home,” I continue.
With a shivering hand, she points towards an underground parking lot, the same one we used the first time she brought Tess and me here.
At a jog, I lead her down into the darkness, and set about putting her into her car. We have to dodge a few vehicles as we go, the place quickly emptying out as a stream of computer-driven cars begin working their way up onto the street and away to the various coils of Inner Haven.
Climbing into Sophie’s car, I ask her her address. She seems so scrambled that she’s barely able to remember. I flash inside her mind and find it for myself, passing the order for the vehicle to drive out towards the Outer Spiral on the western edge of Inner Haven.
We join the traffic, which flows along steadily, unlike across the border. Over in Outer Haven, where the vehicles are predominantly self-drive, it’s not uncommon to find the streets gridlocked at certain times of day, especially if some of the tracks along the Conveyor Line are down for maintenance.
Here, however, such a thing isn’t a problem. Not only is the population less dense per square mile, but the computer-driven cars are, naturally, less prone to making mistakes or suffering from the road-rage that does, on occasion, make even the most calm-headed individual into a crazed maniac.
As such, it doesn’t take long to work our way across the quickest route towards the Outer Spiral, where we step out at Sophie’s building, letting the car park for itself, and quickly move up towards her apartment.
By the time we reach her door, she’s managed to regain some of her composure, although is clearly still in a slight state of shock. I can only assume that her current mental fragility has compounded the effects of hearing that gunfire, seeing as the event itself wasn’t enough to warrant such a reaction.
At least, not to me. Perhaps she’s different, and a little more delicate.
Setting her hand to the scanner, the door unlocks and we pass down the corridor and into the main living area. The last time I came here was under similar circumstances, after the Nameless interrupted the previous ceremony. I get a slight sense of déjà vu as I enter, setting Sophie down onto the sofa and fetching some water from the dispenser in the kitchen.
Now, I know my way around easily enough. This apartment, while smaller, is very similar in structure to my current one, and the one that Adryan and I met up in in the Court House. The architects and designers here clearly don’t have much imagination.
As I pass Sophie a flask of water, she takes a sip and shakes her head.
“No, no,” she says, standing and moving towards the kitchen herself.
She returns a few moments later with something stronger, pouring us both a glass of wine instead. She sucks down a gulp in a fashion that suggests she’s been indulging in the stuff a little more frequently these days. Given her current troubles, that’s not entirely surprising.
Then, after polishing off most of the glass in record time, she looks at me with a slightly odd expression on her face. It’s no longer stark and intense, but more curious. She reaches out and slides her fingers down one side of my face, staring deeply into my eyes in a manner that makes me uncomfortable.
As I prepare to creep into her thoughts to find out what she’s thinking, the sound of footsteps breaks our staring contest and we both raise our eyes to see an untidily dressed figure appearing from a corridor.
Dressed in his assigned colours of dark grey and black, Rycard’s countenance suits the depressing shade. His cheeks and chin carry their own shadow, several days of facial growth sprouting from his skin, and his hair is ruffled and unkempt.
Across his head, a white bandage wraps, covering up his right eye. The rest of the right side of his face continues to show signs of the explosion in the market, the many cuts and lacerations he suffered yet to fully heal. Most likely, they never will, his handsome face now permanently scarred and altered.
His good eye looks upon us, heavily hooded and framed by black shadow. And across his closed lips, a constant grimace curls, an expression of muted anger and defeat replacing the usual smile and buoyancy that I came to associate with him.
Seeing his wife, he quickens his step and moves forward, flashing his left eye on me as he comes.
“What happened?” he asks, the frown deepening.
Sophie stands and gets scooped up into his arms. Now the tears begin to flow, tears that I suspect are based on much more than the shocking events we’ve just witnessed.
“It’s OK,” whispers Rycard, stroking his wife’s head. “What happened?” he asks again, this time diverting his eyes down to me.
“You didn’t see?” I ask. “You weren’t watching?”
He shakes his head. Clearly, he had no interest whatsoever in seeing the ceremony, even by hologram.
I take a breath, still confused by what I saw.
“Commander Fenby…he was shot.”
Rycard’s left eye widens.
“Shot?! Is he dead?”
I nod.
Of course, I can’t be entirely sure, not with the wondrous medical capabilities of the people around here. But, that said, a bullet to the brain is traditionally a sure-fire means of killing a man.
“He’s dead,” I confirm. “Shot by a sniper.”
Rycard’s widening left eye stays like that for a moment, before the brief show of shock on his face fades, replaced by that grimace once more.
“The Nameless,” he says, staring right at me. “It was the Nameless…”
He continues to stare, forcing me to turn away. And then another word falls from his mouth, growled out as Sophie continues to sob.
“Good.”
15
It takes another few minutes, and another glass of wine, to calm Sophie down and set her back onto the sofa. She sits quietly, still looking at me from time to time in that curious way as Rycard sets about getting more details from me regarding the attack.
I quickly fill him in on what I saw, and watch as that grimace on his face continues to deepen.
His summation, once I’m done, makes his feelings very clear on the City Guard.
“Maybe he got what was coming to him,” he growls again. “Maybe the Nameless did us all a favour.”
His feeling of betrayal by those who gave his life meaning and purpose is profound. There’s so much animosity towards them inside him, a simmering anger that boils under the surface, steaming from his eyes and mouth with his seemingly callous words.
A man who was once a loyal member of the City Guard has now been cast out into the cold, his place among the Enhanced now doubt. Without his Hawk-vision, he’s con
sidered redundant, a spare part no longer required and set to be tossed onto the scrapheap.
And along with him, Sophie will be forced to go. If he has no place here, then neither does she, leaving only their son, Maddox, to be kept among the people of Inner Haven, raised to grow into a fully-fledged Hawk like his father before him. To perhaps join the City Guard when he’s ready, continue in his father’s stead as his parents get discarded to the realm beyond the wall.
Sophie and Rycard are both dominated by such emotions now; Rycard’s thoughts shaped by his anger and resentment, Sophie’s by her feelings of fear and worry for what will happen to her family.
It’s a terrible situation to be in, both of them so worried that their son will be taken. Unlike the Savants, these two are loving parents, and it’s clear that they’ll do absolutely everything in their power to keep their son by their side.
Yet, unless they get help, there may be nothing they can do. And looking at them now, I feel I have no choice.
I have to help them.
I have to keep to the promise I gave Sophie.
“What will you do now?” I ask tentatively.
Rycard and Sophie share a look. Her eyes are wet and soft. His left one is harsh and filled with fire.
“There’s nothing we can do,” sniffs Sophie. “They’re…they’re going to take our son.”
She begins sobbing again, covering her eyes with her hands and shaking violently. Once more, Rycard wraps her up, his eyes burning brighter as he looks upon his desolate wife. And as if on cue, from down the corridor, the sound of a crying baby drifts, and Sophie’s eyes shoot back up.
She leaps straight to her feet and stumbles off to tend to her son, leaving Rycard and me alone.
And alone now, he turns to me with a peering gaze, and sends a harsh whisper from his lips.
“There’s much more to you than meets the eye, Brie,” he says. “I saw something when I first met you. And it’s only grown more pronounced now. Tell me the truth, Brie. Tell me who you are.”
He stares at me, and I stare back, two Hawks inspecting one another. I feel a faint rise of my pulse, but it quickly settles. And in my head, I search for the right words to say, battling over revealing the truth or keeping it hidden.
But now, really, there’s only one choice before me. I have to help. And to do that, I have to step out of the shadows.
And so, staring right back at Rycard, I whisper: “I’m a hybrid,” and watch closely for his reaction, and sneak into his mind to examine the state of his thoughts.
Nothing odd happens. His left eye doesn’t widen in shock. His thoughts don’t clatter and rush with amazement at the reveal. He merely stares back and nods.
“That’s what I thought,” he says.
Now it’s my turn to react. And I do, with a frown.
“You did?”
He nods.
“I’ve watched you closely, Brie, every time I’ve seen you. Nothing about you has been normal to me. I think I knew all along, but it was confirmed when I found you in that shelter over in district 6 of the western quarter. You’re a hybrid, and you’re with the Nameless. And you’re here for a reason…”
A silence hits the room. Maddox’s wailing fades down the corridor as Sophie tends to him. Slowly, I realise what I have to do.
“I’m here…to help you,” I say. “You’re right. You’re right about everything. But there’s a lot you don’t know. And there’s a lot I can’t tell you. But right now, I can help. I can get you and Sophie and Maddox to safety. If you want to stay together as a family, and you want to stay safe, then I can get the Nameless to take you in.”
He stares and listens and, slowly, a small smile breaks the grimace on his face.
“You’ve a brave woman, Brie,” he says. “But surely this would put you at risk?”
“I don’t care,” I tell him. “My life is constantly at risk as it is. Helping you won’t change that for me, but it will for you. The Consortium have been behind all of the Fanatics’ attacks, Rycard. The attack at Culture Corner. The attack at the warehouse. The attack at the market…” He grimaces again, a snarl creeping onto his face at the memory of his maiming. “All of it was them…everything that’s happened, everyone that’s been killed, has been because of them.”
Once more, only a shadow of a reaction graces his face. Like the reveal of who I really am, it appears he’s had his suspicions about this as well.
“Is that really true?” he asks.
I nod slowly.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “Do you remember back to when the Nameless took over the video feed during my ceremony? They said the Fanatics were not who we thought they were.”
“I remember,” he says.
“And after, when Sophie brought me here with my friend, Tess, you said you thought the Fanatics were just Unenhanced who worshipped the Savants.”
He nods.
“Well, that’s not true,” I continue. “The Fanatics are Unenhanced, yes, but those reconditioned and directed by the Consortium. They’ve been performing these attacks to spread fear, and to fill the streets with more City Guards and Con-Cops. It’s Cromwell. He’s trying to completely subdue the Unenhanced, to make them completely compliant and, eventually, phase them out…”
A brief silence falls as Rycard processes the information. He does so calmly, before a whisper flows from his lips.
“Then it’s as I feared,” he says, his eyes staring into empty space. “I’ve been a sympathiser for the Nameless’ cause for a long time. But part of me never thought it would get this far, that the whole of Outer Haven would be at threat.”
“But you’re not surprised either,” I suggest.
He shakes his head.
“No. I’m not surprised one bit.”
“Then you’ll know that you need to go,” I say. “You and Sophie and Maddox all need to leave before you’re torn apart. I can help you, Rycard…”
“How?”
The voice comes from the corridor. We both turn up to see Sophie coming back into the room, Maddox now settled back down. Rycard rushes to his feet. I stay seated, searching Sophie’s reaction.
There’s barely any shock to her either. She comes forward as the room falls silent and looks at me again in that curious fashion. Her eyes are red, but now dry. There’s a new resolve there that’s hiding the fear.
“Are you with the Nameless, Brie?” she asks softly, peering into my eyes. “I saw it, the way you were looking out there after the attack. Your eyes…they reminded me of Rycard. Are you…a hybrid?”
I nod, and her eyes change, looking at me in an entirely different way. But it’s not fear or doubt that spreads through her face, but wonder.
“I knew you were special,” she whispers. “I knew it…”
I look back to Rycard, and then to her.
“I can get you to the Nameless. I can get you all to safety. But you’ll need to do everything I tell you, and be ready to leave all of this behind. Can you do that? Can you do that, Sophie?”
Her visage stiffens and she nods.
“I’ll do anything to stay with my family. Anything, Brie.”
I smile and take a breath.
“Good. Then listen carefully to what I tell you, and leave everything else with me.”
16
I return to the High Tower with another pressing issue on my plate, battling through several levels of security in order to gain admittance.
Outside, the streets teem with City Guards, much of the area cordoned off as the investigation into what happened begins, with several people up on the balcony analysing the crime scene where Commander Fenby was shot, ferried up by some piece of machinery.
Again, I know that my tendency to help those I care about is rising to the fore, even if it may put my mission in jeopardy. No doubt Zander will have some harsh words to say on the matter, and perhaps even Adryan too.
And yet, I don’t care. Frankly, my brother has plenty of explaining to do himself once I finally c
onnect with him in my mind, something that I seem to be unable to do right now.
Naturally, along with my desire for an explanation, my concerns about his safety also begin to burgeon.
Please be OK, Zander. Please don’t be dead
And if you’re not, I’m going to kill you myself…
Before leaving Sophie and Rycard, however, I make sure to dull their memories of what I’ve told them about me, the Nameless, the Consortium, and everything else. And while they were both seemingly unsurprised by my status as a Hawk, revealing that I’m a Mind-Manipulator does cause some level of astonishment.
Still, it was a necessary reveal. Unlike simply imparting an order, I need to spend a little time in their minds in order to hide their recollections of the past couple of hours. And while I could just try to erase the knowledge of who and what I am completely, I feel such a thing could be counterproductive given the situation.
After all, it’s important that they know who I really am if they’re to trust me and go along with my plan. So, I have to satisfy myself with doing a rather untidy job of hiding their recollections and hoping that no one comes prying. Unfortunately, I’m not yet anywhere near as skilled as my brother at concealing memories
The one person, of course, who I fear the most right now is Agent Woolf, the stalking nemesis who just won’t leave me alone. And as I return to my apartment that evening, she rushes straight back to the forefront of my mind once more.
Stepping out of the lift at level 51, I see a flash of grey disappearing into another lift down the corridor. In truth, it could be anyone, but with me being on such high alert, I can’t help but worry that she’s been snooping around.
Rushing into the apartment, I find Adryan in the living room, watching the hologram as it plays re-runs of the attack only hours ago. Seeing me, he jumps to his feet and paces straight at me.
“Brie! Where have you been? Are you alright? I’ve been worried…”
“I’m fine, just fine. Um, was someone just here with you?” I inquire.
“No,” he says, frowning. “Like who?”
