by Patty Jansen
It seemed Nicha was correct about these bodies having been here for a while.
I made the drone turn on the spot.
The foyer was a circular domed structure with about six or seven doors leading into it. According to the map, Ezhya’s private quarters were behind the doors to the left—on the same side of the building as the hub.
All the doors were closed. Not just that, but my display marked them as locked, protected by DNA scan locks.
So where did those other people go, the ones that had shown up briefly on Nicha’s infrared scan and were probably Taysha’s?
“See anything?” Thayu asked.
I shook my head.
The drone turned around again. Where could they have gone?
“We should try to get to the hub anyway,” Thayu said. “We’ll be safer there.” Once we got past the guards, but she was probably in contact with them, and they were probably quite happy for us to join them. Or at least they would be if they were human and realising that their lives were pretty much forfeit.
Shit.
I still didn’t like it, but had run out of arguments to stop her.
Nicha’s comm emitted a small squeak. He glanced at the screen. “Ezhya’s back in orbit.”
Thank the heavens. “How long before he can be here?”
Nicha gestured I don’t know. There might be trouble at the airport. On second thoughts, Ezhya would probably land on the roof of the building.
Maybe people were waiting for him there.
Maybe—
The lift door opened in the foyer. I swivelled the drone so that I had a better view. A couple of silver-clad guards ran out. One of the doors in the foyer burst open. The people who came out of this door wore dark civilian clothing.
Army. Asha Domiri’s people. I couldn’t see him yet.
Someone fired from elsewhere in the hall outside my field of vision. One dark-clad person went down, the others dropped flat on the ground.
Thayu and Nicha had reached the corner to the intersection and pressed themselves against the wall. The flying drone still stood there flashing. I followed, clutching my gun, and shielding Raanu with my body.
The fight in the foyer broke out in all seriousness. There were flashes of discharging weapons, shouts, people running. There was so much smoke in the foyer that the poor quality visual input from the drone became too grainy to show important details such as who was fighting.
Thayu was closest to the corner, but not even she dared stick her head around.
I sensed movement to our right. “Thay’, watch out—”
It was the guards in front of the hub—the last ones loyal to Ezhya. They held their positions, but were looking wide-eyed, white-faced into the foyer, knowing that when the fight there was over, it would be their turn. Thayu gestured one of them over and spoke with a female guard who looked like a Natanu-clone. Their voices were inaudible to me because of the noise of discharges.
Someone knocked the drone in the foyer and I almost lost contact with it.
The lift door opened, disgorging more people into the hall. They came under fire as soon as they stepped out of the lift. Several of them went down. A sizzling beam crossed the drone’s field of vision. It came from above.
I directed the drone’s eye up. Through the smoke and graininess, I could make out Taysha’s guards, hanging from ropes inside the dome’s roof. That’s where they’d gone, out of reach of the scanners.
The guards on the ground ran to whatever shelter they could find.
The lift door opened again and I recognised a single tall figure amongst a few more guards: Asha.
Damn, he was going to be dead as soon as he stepped out of the lift.
A barrage of fire went off inside the foyer.
Thayu gave a squeak. She stepped out from behind the wall, her face a mask of horror. She shot a few times in rapid succession at the ceiling.
Nicha yelled, “No!”
“I’ve got to help him!”
Raanu screamed and almost knocked me over.
The vision from the drone showed part of the floor. Someone had knocked it over. There was no time to right it. There was only one thing left to do.
I grabbed Raanu’s hand.
“When I say run, you run.”
She nodded, her face pale.
Three of Ezhya’s guards ran past into the foyer. One of them was yelling into his comm. Ezhya was in the building?
I sent the command Detonate.
“Run!”
Raanu and I ran around the corner.
Chapter 23
* * *
THE REMAINING GUARDS at the door gave us a startled look, but I ran straight past.
“Find shelter!”
I hoped Thayu and Nicha were following, because—
An explosion rocked the ground. I yanked Raanu to me and sheltered her against the wall just inside the hub room. The shockwave tore through the corridor, bringing clouds of dust. Plaster rained down from the ceiling.
Holy shit. What sort of stuff was it that Sheydu had given me?
The noise outside calmed down, fading to the crackle of flames. Thick smoke drifted into the door. I peered, but couldn’t see Thayu and Nicha, or anyone else for that matter.
A chill took hold of me. They were all right, weren’t they?
I had to believe they were. There was nothing I could do.
The hub showed little sign of activity.
The walls were mostly dark, with a few routines scrolling along the bottom. Wow, Ezhya’s chain of commands had died out fast.
“We need to help your daddy,” I said. “Can you show me how to start this up?”
Raanu nodded, solemn.
Slowly, I sat at the stool in the middle, at the controls and the receivers. The Asto command hub, the one that Ezhya used three feeders to control. I had two feeders. All of Asto lay at my fingertips, presuming I knew how to use this thing. Press one of these coded buttons and someone would do something. One word. Some people would kill to be in this position.
The command key still sat in the slot where I had inserted it.
As I pulled it out, my feeder stream burst into life. The images in my mind flowed too fast for me to make sense of it all.
Raanu had climbed on my lap. She raked her hand through her hair and produced another feeder. I stared at it.
“You had this with you all the time?”
She nodded. “You need it. It doesn’t work with only two.”
I took the feeder from her. Using it like Ezhya did could kill me, but if I did nothing, Taysha’s guards out there would overwhelm Nicha and Thayu and whoever else had turned up. Natanu was in the building, too. I could see her ID displayed in my vision.
I slowly raised the feeder to my head. It clung onto my hair almost as if it was keen to join its fellows. It settled on the skin between the other two.
A burst of heat. Contact.
The stream of images that flowed through my head almost bowled me flat. I could see . . . everything. People walking in streets. Guards standing at the airport. A shuttle was landing there. Ezhya was a bright spot inside the cabin. Two drones were about to come into the building through the window. I sent them to check for Taysha’s guards. Wait—the lift was full of Taysha’s guards. I sent a command that it was not to proceed above the second floor.
I was half aware that a small and warm hand was guiding my fingers to certain places. I could feel the touch of buttons under my fingertips, but my vision was entirely taken up by the feeder input.
A brief flash of panic. What if the feed took over my vital proces
ses?
A bright blue map sprang into being around me: a representation of the building showing the locations of all the people in it and their IDs.
We’d start securing our position from the centre out. There was a breach in the Inner Circle defences that needed extra personnel and a few streets were flooded where people needed assistance. In the First Circle, the hospital needed power. A few major thoroughfares were blocked. There was a train in the station but no driver.
Too much. It was too much.
I shut off all non-urgent requests. The stream slowed but not enough so I limited the scope to only the Inner Circle.
Security of the hub. Guards were asleep in their dorms. I woke them and sent them up here. The south tower gate was open. I shut it. An army of drones was on its way to the broken window. I told them to stop.
As I did those things, the flow of images slowed down to a more comfortable pace. They organised themselves into priorities: security first, then communication. The Exchange stream was a bright path in my vision.
Ezhya, if you hear me come down here as soon as possible.
There was a shout from somewhere outside that stream. “Cory!”
What was real, those images or the voice, or the feel of the seat under me or the acrid scent of smoke?
I managed to draw myself back from the stream into an atmosphere of noise and chaos. Flashes tore across the door opening. From where I sat, I could see Natanu shooting. Veyada was also there. There was no sign of Nicha or Thayu. The walls of the room had come to life with images of things happening elsewhere in the city.
“What’s going on?” My tongue felt thick. My eyes were still hazy.
Raanu looked at me, her eyes wide. “Is Daddy still coming?”
I hoped so. I thought so. I didn’t know. What was going on?
I pushed myself off the seat and walked to the door, my knees weak.
A thick layer of smoke hung in the corridor. The burned-out shell of the flying drone lay on its side. Veyada was taking cover behind it. People ran in from around the corner. There was shouting and screaming but it was too smoky to see what was going on. I couldn’t see Thayu and Nicha. Flashes went off everywhere. I had no idea where my guards were, or the other drone or Sheydu. Or Natanu, Asha or Taysha.
Or Ezhya.
Veyada yelled, “Anyone who can help, we need you now!”
I took the gun back out of the bracket. Turned it on. My hand hovered over the strength setting, but I heard Nicha’s words, and left it on the most narrow-beam, lethal, destructive setting.
The lift door on the other side of the foyer opened. A couple of flashes went off and people shouted.
Someone replied, but I couldn’t hear either the words or who it was. A sound of metal grinding on metal came from somewhere else in the building.
I clutched the gun trying to peer through thick smoke. There was not going to be much point shooting unless I could see what I was aiming at.
A single person came out of the smoke. He walked in large paces in my direction. I recognised that distinctive jerky walk. Taysha. Coming for the hub.
I raised the gun and aimed.
I glanced aside, panic clenching a fist around my heart. Veyada had gone from his previous position, shooting at two people who ran in the other direction, both of them with red belts.
Damn, Taysha’s people.
His eyes met mine. He stopped and it was as if the world stopped with him. The expression on his face told me that he knew that I would shoot. He did not run or try to defend himself.
And I knew I had no choice.
I’d promised Nicha.
Veyada had issued a writ.
I’d promised Thayu and Nicha that they would not have to act on it.
The blood roared in my ears. My hands acted of their own accord. I pressed the release.
The charge flashed across the space between us. He was close enough that it was impossible to miss him, even for a hopeless shot like me. The flash engulfed him. His eyes widened, his face took on a surprised expression, then he took what felt like an eternity to topple forward. He fell flat on his face and did not move again.
For a moment all was quiet except the crazy thudding of my heart. Blackness encroached on my vision. I had actually done it.
Then someone came from behind the burnt-out shell of the drone. Natanu.
She crossed to Taysha’s body, knelt next to it and raked her hand through his hair. Two feeders attached themselves to her fingers. She deposited them in her own hair and walked away without a word and without looking at me.
Next thing someone came running from the direction of the lifts. I recognised the shape of him and the bounce in his steps.
Ezhya.
He stopped, looking wide-eyed from me to Taysha. I still had the gun in my hands, so there was no need to explain. While he watched, I returned it to the bracket. His expression was the most intense I’d ever seen.
That would have been my job.
The input from the feeder was clear.
I did it for you.
I trembled all over. I had no idea if this state of affairs was going to be acceptable to him. This would be the sheya instinct talking and the past had shown how much—or rather how little—I understood of that.
Ezhya came up to me, walking in slow steps. His eyes held an intense expression that chilled me. Damn, he wasn’t going to fight me, was he?
I raised my hands, wanting to say so much and not knowing how to say it. My tongue had taken on the consistency of rubber.
Ezhya took my hands in both of his. I couldn’t believe that the feel of his skin was cold.
He met my eyes for a few long moments.
“You are an odd case,” he said after an intense silence.
“I’m sorry if any of what I’ve done upsets you.”
“I’m all right.” He used denaryi, that he was physically all right, but the associations were not. It did upset him, I could feel that through the feeder. Damn, what should I have done? Let Taysha take over?
“I acted in defence of my own position. If you lose your position, I lose mine, too.” I used more formal pronouns than I normally did with him. Then I bent my head and held my arms, palms facing back, to my sides in the classic subservient position. My feeder stream exploded with contradictory messages.
I should teach him a lesson.
He’s not Coldi. He won’t understand, and there is no point.
I can’t allow him to hold any influence over me.
He is weak. I can easily defeat him.
That doesn’t mean that I should.
He will think less of our relationship if I fight him. That’s how those people work.
But everyone in the Inner Circle will see this as a weakness.
No, they won’t, because he’s not Coldi—
His internal argument flowed backwards and forwards, bring up new arguments all the time, weaving them into the current stream, speeding up. I tried to cut off the feed, but it was so strong that it simply crashed through my block.
I raked my hand through my hair and two of the feeders attached themselves to it. Then I plucked out the third one. The stream of confused thoughts stopped as if someone had thrown a switch.
I held out my hand with the feeders dangling from my fingers. “I believe that these belong to you.”
He held out his hand. In his presence, the feeders seemed glad to let go of my alien, cold fingers.
“Thank you,” he said. There was a strangely solemn tone to his voice.
Then he gave the tiniest of chuckles. “Well, let’s say that you’ve been quite capable of creating a stir. I gue
ss that should not be a surprise to me.”
He deposited the feeders on his neck, where all three settled in his hair. Then he made his way to the centre of the hub and sat down in the chair. With the touch of his hand, the entire panel came to life. All the screens flashed up with fast-scrolling images, mere flashes of colour passing too quickly for me to discern. Image streams intertwined and split off. Voices talked to him, at least four or five at the same time. The sound waves squiggled over the wall projection. Threads of green wove through all those projections, making each vanish as it touched them. New streams popped up at the bottom of the walls; they were new queries, new things for him to look after. Many of them were extinguished before they had progressed halfway up the wall. Above that level, processes bloomed into full images, showing projections of parts of the city where people were doing things on Ezhya’s orders. The green threads wove through and bounced between streams.
I watched him in awe, knowing that this was something few people ever got to see. Knowing that it was something I could never do. People on Earth would sometimes ask me how could one person be in charge of billions? Well, this was how.
It was said that he used three feeders to keep up, but I’d given him three. He must have had at least one already in his hair. I was certain: this much external input would freeze the brain of a normal person. I could never withstand this amount of input without it encroaching on my body’s vital functions.
I sensed movement next to me. Thayu and Nicha had turned up. Nicha sported a cut on his forehead and Thayu’s suit had dark splatters of something undetermined that I had no wish to identify. I hugged each of them wordlessly. Both of them glanced at Taysha’s body on the floor, but neither of them said anything about it.
A little hand touched my leg. “Daddy’s back.”
“He sure is.”
“That means everything is going to be all right.”
I loved the simplicity of a child’s thoughts.
I put my hand on Raanu’s shoulder.
The four of us continued watching Ezhya at work.
Eventually, Ezhya judged the situation stable and left the chair. The screens kept flashing, people kept talking. He did all this while walking through the room, while facing me, while picking up Raanu and lifting her to his arm.
