by Tony Corden
Leah timed her run to clear the steps, plant her left leg and let it compress, with her momentum bringing her shoulder low and beyond her centre of gravity. She contracted her leg and drove her shoulder upwards just below the midway point of the central join of the double doorway. The lower half of the doors bulged, the lock snapped and the doors snapped open.
Pain shot through her shoulder, it radiated down her arm and across the top of her shoulder to her neck. She partitioned the pain to one side and took a step only to find she couldn’t control her arm and the small movement brought her to her knees as the pain blew through the partition and flooded her system. Gèng reduced Leah’s sensory levels and said, “Grab your left wrist and pull it towards your right underarm. This will hurt but you can then lock the hand under your right arm and hold your left elbow. This should allow you to move. Hurry, the suspect is on the stairs. Follow the path.”
Leah did as suggested and after another moment of searing pain, she found she could move, although at a shuffle. Leah’s shuffle was still faster than most people could run and she rushed along the path Gèng laid out before her. On the second floor was a long wide corridor with doors on either side. Leah could see the guard running towards the far end. The guard had obviously deactivated automated security as she ran between two large robots and stopped at the last door on the right. She had a pistol in her left hand and busily entered a code into the keypad with her right. The door swung open, and she transferred the gun to her right hand and had fired three bullets before Leah’s right shoulder lifted her from the ground and drove her into the far wall where she slid bonelessly to the floor.
The impact travelled through Leah’s body and reignited the pain in her left shoulder causing her to stumble. Her momentum drove her into the wall beside the unconscious, or dead, guard. She lay there dazed for several seconds when the sound of running feet in the corridor brought her enough awareness to turn and look. The final interior guard was approaching; it was a man and he was dressed differently, so he was probably the nurse. He had a gun and as he approached he raised it and began firing at Leah. Five bullets stitched their way up her torso, each one stopped by the armour but each of them degrading the smart material.
He stopped five feet from Leah and carefully aimed at her faceplate. Gèng increased Leah’s perception to the maximum and allowed every connection she could. Leah had time to watch his smile turn into a sneer over the course of what felt for her like forty seconds but was not even one. She watched as he depressed the trigger, it seemed laborious. Before his finger finished the motion she’d begun to move. The bullet left the barrel at a little over 400 m/s which gave her only 12 ms real time. Even at the speed she moved, she was only able to move her head six centimetres before the bullet slammed into the face plate just below the outer edge of the left eye.
The plate stopped the bullet but the material had been damaged by the previous impact on the right side. Enough energy was transferred to depress the zygomatic arch. While the additional carbon fibres prevented fracturing, a small section of natural bone directly behind the point of impact was crushed. Leah looked up only to see the nurse crumple to the floor. Her team had arrived.
John arrived first and leant down to help her up. Lacey was only a few feet behind and she immediately stepped into Lin’s Pod room, then stopped. Leah carefully stepped into the room, wondering why Lacey had stopped, when she noticed the three evenly spaced holes which pierced the Pod cover. Fluid was slowly leaking onto the floor.
Leah almost stopped beside Lacey, but somehow she kept putting one foot after the other. She stopped at the cover, staring down at the holes. Slowly her head dropped and rested against the Pod. Gèng said, “Leah, the Pod is damaged and I am having difficulty connecting to it. It still shows an active occupant, though one in some distress. I am trying to log them out remotely.”
Leah’s head lifted, and she said, “John, you and the men leave the room. Lacey, you and Marie will have to help get mum dressed. She is still alive, but I’m not sure in what state.”
Gèng said, “I have logged the occupant out of the Pod, but something is broken and it will not open automatically. There is a manual release. I will project it onto your vision.”
Leah explained to Marie how to unlock the Pod, then Marie and Lacey levered the cover open. As the cover began to rise, the gel, which should have been drained, flooded out and splashed over the three of them. Lying naked in the Pod was Leah’s mum. One bullet had ploughed into the machinery at the rear of the Pod. The second had been slowed by the gel and lodged in the structure which supported Lin's neck. The third had also been slowed by the gel and had hit Lin on her right temple. There was a small depression, no wound, no blood, just a large bruise.
Lin was breathing shallowly. Marie and Lacey quickly cleaned her off and dressed her in a pair of overalls they had brought for her to wear. Lacey called for Johan, who said she was unconscious, had concussion, but could be moved if they were careful to keep a check on her breathing. John and Wes quickly engineered a makeshift stretcher while Johan immobilised Leah’s left arm. They had been on the property for a total of six minutes when they made their way from the house.
As they crossed the lawn, they could hear sirens in the distance which got louder as they descended the hoist. John had to carry Lin, and although she did most of it herself, Leah needed help to cross the horizontal top section. They hadn’t been able to disassemble the hoist, so they moved faster than they’d intended. They knew its presence would point any pursuers in their direction. They didn’t stop until they reached the spot where John’s team had exited the river. Lacey’s team had left their scuba gear attached underneath the pontoon, so they decided to make the crossing above water. John sent Joel ahead with one of their team's scuba equipment and asked him to have the transport pick them up near the river. Wes pilfered several lifejackets from a nearby boatshed. John and Johan took turns dragging Lin, with Lacey swimming alongside to keep Lin's head out of the water.
Leah was able to use her one good arm to slowly crawl through the water. Marie stayed close in case Leah got into trouble. By the time the team arrived at the bank, two vehicles were waiting. Leah, Johan and Lin travelled in the first one so Johan could keep an eye on both of them while the rest followed in the second vehicle.
It was just after one thirty in the morning when the team finally pulled into the compound. Through the front window of the car Leah could see Michael and Conner standing at the entrance to the Pod centre, their faces strained. Johan hopped out first and called for a stretcher. Several security guards rushed forward and helped to lever Lin onto the stretcher, then rushed her into the Centre. Leah smiled as Michael and Conner hurried after them.
End of Book 4
Excerpt from 'Identity' Book 5
Her mum was home. Her family was together. The world wasn’t as dark as it had been. She heard a tapping at her window and looked up to see John standing there. She expected him to be smiling, but he had a worried look on his face. She opened the door, and John said, “Are you ok? You’re just sitting there.”
“I was just thinking about my family, mum is home, and it’s a good feeling, the best I've had for some time.”
For a moment he looked distracted and then said, “Leah, I want you to come inside, please. You need to get out of that suit and into the Pod. Gèng says you need to be checked out in the Pod.”
“What do you mean, ‘Gèng says’?”
Leah subvocalised, “Gèng, what is going on?” But she got no response.
“Leah, she can hear you but hasn’t been able to get you to hear her for a while. When did you last talk to her?”
“During the swim—I spent most of the ride back just watching mum?”
“Come inside, and I’ll have someone help you into the Pod.”
Leah turned to walk with John and said, “I want to see mum first. One more minute won’t hurt.”
He nodded and together they made their way inside. As soo
n as she was inside the building, Leah said, “John, can you help me with the faceplate? It’s hard to reach with one arm.”
As soon as it came off, John winced and said, “You have a bruise covering the whole left side of your face. Your eyes are bloodshot. Let me get the balaclava off, and I’ll have Marie help you get ready for the Pod.”
“After I see mum, I just want to make sure she is alright.”
Lin had been taken upstairs and Leah found the stairs tiring after having cooled down in the car. As they approached the main living area, John slowed. Lacey and Marie were standing in the doorway and they moved aside to let Leah through. Lin was lying on the lounge, Michael was sitting on a low footrest near her head and holding her hand. Conner was standing on the other side not really knowing what to do except stare at his mum. He couldn’t stop looking at her bald head.
Michael looked up and although he started a little when he saw the condition Leah was in he mouthed, “Thank you.”
Leah nodded and was about to leave when Lin gave a little moan. Michael turned back and watched as she slowly opened her eyes. As soon as she saw him her face crinkled in a smile and she said, “心肝”. She looked up and saw Conner and said, “心肝宝贝”. Then her eyes swivelled around the room noting everyone, then she turned back to Michael and said, “How did I get home?”
“Leah and John went to get you. They’ve just brought you back.”
Lin looked up at John and said, “John, thank you for bringing me back to my family.”
Turning to Leah, Lin said, “You must be Leah, thank you for helping me. When I'm rested, I look forward to getting to know you.”
Excerpt from 'Mirasçi' A Stork Tower Backstory
Mirasçi had never known his father, and from the stories he’d gleaned from different sources, he hoped he never would. His mother, on the other hand, was the centre of his universe. Everything he did, revolved in one way or another, around her. They lived with his mother’s parents in a small series of rooms deep inside the mountain. The rooms had been carved from the granite over eight hundred years previously as the Elfaun city of Dag Tarafind continued its slow, but inevitable, expansion within the Canyon of the True People.
Since then, the city had continued to grow, and their small set of rooms was now considered part of the inner city. The apartment faced the canyon on the inner side of the third ribbon and was five levels above the canyon floor. The ribbons were long, excavated paths which ran from one end of the city to the other. Great columns of original stone remained untouched down the centre of each ribbon to maintain the structural integrity of the mountain. In the space between ribbons, the residents had carved a collection of houses, apartments, shops and trading rooms. This was the world that Mirasçi's lived in and he had no idea that for him, everything was about to change.
Mirasçi was almost eight and that word ‘almost’ was just about more than he could bear. Only ten more days and his grandfather, Azmet, had promised to take him to the highest level in the city and let him look out over the whole of the great Canyon. He was going to see the world. But more importantly, he had also been promised his very own long-knife. His grandmother wasn’t as enthusiastic as he was, but he wanted to start learning how to use it so he could help his grandfather. Mirasçi wanted to be a worm-hunter like his Azmet. Worm-hunters were the only Common Elfauns who were allowed to carry weapons in the city, and they were held in esteem by everyone for their courage and bravery.
It was late afternoon, and he’d almost finished his chores for the day. He only had three more buckets of water to get from the public cistern, and then he would be free to do whatever he wanted until dinner time. As he carried the bucket, he practised in his mind what he hoped to do in those few minutes without supervision. He would hold the stick in just the right way, and then he'd practice all the moves used by the worm-hunters. He knew them all, he’d watched Azmet hundreds of times, and Mirasçi had practised them over and over, even when he hadn't had a stick. He'd trained whenever he had the opportunity. And now, with only ten days until he had a real long-knife, he could practice with the stick. It was so going to be so much better. He was sure his grandfather would be amazed when Mirasçi finally held the real long-knife, because then, at that moment, he would flawlessly perform the worm-hunters dance-of-knives.
The stick, which he’d found only five days ago, was exactly the right size to practice with, it would help get everything right. He was amazed when he’d found it because wood of any kind was rare in the city. Only the rich had access to it. When he'd seen it, he’d thought someone must have misplaced it. It was holding open a cover which he was sure should have been kept closed. He knew that the spice merchant always kept it closed. The cover was supposed to stop bugs from eating and destroying the precious red dragon-tongue berries which were stored there. Mirasçi, in a burst of community-mindedness, had lowered the cover and removed the offending stick. It was only later, when the screams of the spice merchant echoed along the ribbon, that he suspected the stick’s removal might actually be considered stealing.
He’d hidden the wood under his sleeping mat the first night and then moved it into one of the worm holes that were scattered throughout the city. He didn’t think anyone knew of this particular hole for it was at ground level and hidden behind a small stone garden bed that had been built centuries ago. Garden beds in that part of the city only grew the one type of food, mushrooms. It was one way to make use of the constant oversupply of night soil produced, and Mirasçi was glad because it kept everyone from finding his stick.
His imagination had carried him through the first two buckets, and he’d just filled the last one and was halfway home when he heard someone screaming his name and cursing in anger. All thoughts of the long-knife disappeared in an instant, and after a deep breath he sighed and picked up the pace. Somehow he mustn’t have read the signs this morning, and now he better get home before his mother wore herself out. She needed him there. She needed him there to scream at, to rage at, to curse. And the longer she was denied the opportunity, the longer it would take her to recover.
The problem was, Mirasçi mused, was that Asalet, his mother, well, she was broken. She had been since before Mirasçi’s birth.
