WARDEN

CHRONICLES OF A CYBORG BOOK 1

Isaac Hooke

Contents

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Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Epilogue

About the Author

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For a limited time, Isaac Hooke is giving away Salvage, the prequel novella, here:

https://BookHip.com/DPGVBL

1

She opened her eyes to a world of broken steel and shattered glass.

The stripped husks of skyscrapers towered over her, most of them half-collapsed and little more than skeletons of corroded rebar. One such building, tilted at an odd angle, crossed the sky above her; it had fresh rinds of metallic skin peeling from the surface, curling upward like clawed fingers reaching for a rusty sky that could offer no deliverance.

A metal fence of short, flat slats surrounded her. No, not a fence, but the walls of some sort of container. It seemed to house her.

She tried to sit up, but her arms and legs seemed to be paralyzed. She tried again, taking several frantic gasps, her chest rising and falling as she struggled to move.

Finally, she lifted her head to look down at her body.

Her limbs weren’t paralyzed: her arms and legs were missing entirely. All she had was a torso. And a battered one at that: she had no hips or abdomen, and the right side was almost completely torn away. The skin had crimped all along the edges of these injuries, her epidermis peeling back to reveal a shell whose metal sheen told her she wasn’t human. There was no blood, either, only the subtle stains of hydraulic fluid that had spilled onto the floor of the container.

Her breathing became even more frantic.

What am I?

Translucent digital characters and diagrams overlaid her vision suddenly and formed a HUD of sorts. It showed a rotating humanoid body composed of vectors—a wireframe outline of the female form. The head was colored blue, along with some of the torso: entire sections of the latter were red, seeming to coincide with the damaged regions of her upper body. The arms and legs were also red. Within the head region resided the hemispheres of a human brain, shown in green.

Still gasping for air that she couldn’t seem to get enough of, she dropped her head. It hit the floor of the container that held her with a loud thud. A jab of pain shot through her, and she grimaced.

She dismissed the diagrams in that moment, not really knowing how she did so. Only a date and time remained in the lower right of her vision.

May 20th, 2619. 05:45:25.

She gazed past those translucent characters, to the reddish sky above, and watched the brown clouds wend their way over the twisted wreckages of the skyscrapers. It was somewhat peaceful. She concentrated on her breathing, along with the rise and fall of her chest, and managed to get her frantic wheezing under control.

If I’m a machine, why do I need to breathe?

She thought of the human brain she had seen in that diagram on her HUD. And then she knew what she was. A full body replacement cyborg.

Perhaps that thought should have panicked her further, but it only seemed to bring her further peace. It was as if she had accepted what she was long ago.

Her eyes focused on the time once more, and she stared at the seconds. Ticking, ever ticking.

05:45:29.

05:45:30.

05:45:31.

She had no way of getting out of that container, not without arms. She was going to die here, beneath these clouds.

Again, she felt neither panic nor fear. Only acceptance. Almost indifference, really.

No. I won’t give up. Not so easily.

She glanced around to survey the extents of the container that held her. The smooth, enclosing walls formed an ellipse around her, with enough room to hold two humans. It looked to be a pod of sorts: some kind of transportation device. There were clamps partially protruding from the floor near her torso; she guessed they had once held her cyborg body in place but had retracted at some point.

She turned her head to the side and attempted to bite at the metal floor, if only to find some sort of grip. But the surface below her was mostly smooth and flat, with nothing to latch her teeth around save for the retracted clamps. She stretched her neck, flexed her shoulders, and curved her torso, sliding her head across the floor toward the clamp on her right. She wrapped her teeth around it.

The clamp tasted metallic. Almost like blood. She ignored the flavor and bit down, using it to flop her body over to the other side, like a flailing fish. She released it and turned to face the wall once more. She’d gotten closer…

She searched the floor for anything else she could latch onto, but there was nothing. She rocked her body to and fro, and quickly realized that by wriggling her neck and torso at the same time, she could slowly worm her way toward the edges of the container. How she planned to surmount those enclosing walls once she arrived was a different story.

Bit by bit she approached the wall, curling and twisting the remnants of her body until finally she was right up against the surface. The metal couldn’t be more than half a meter tall, but for her it might as well have been a skyscraper. There was no way she’d be able to flop her body over it.

She tried to flex her neck and torso, curling her upper body as far up as she could reach, but it was no use. The upper rim of the container was beyond reach.

She lay back, panting, and stared at that wall for several moments.

There had to be a way…

She was a cyborg. Why not try biting into the metal directly? Surely her jaws possessed more compressive force than that of an ordinary human being.

So, she lifted her torso as far as she was able, then pressed the side of her face against the metal. She opened her mouth, turned her teeth toward the wall, and tried to bite down. But because the surface was so flat, like the floor, she wasn’t able to get a grip. Her teeth merely skimmed the surface.

She tried to face the wall head on, but her nose got in the way. It was no use: the human design of her face simply wasn’t equipped to bite into straight surfaces like these.

She slumped, hitting her head on the hard floor once again. Pain flared at the back of her skull, but this time it coincided with a wave of dizziness.

An alert flashed on her HUD.

Warning. Rear cranial cavity close to collapse. Shell integrity at five percent. Consciousness failure imminent.

Darkness filled her vision.

* * *

Voices.

She opened her eyes to find herself yet lying in the metallic container. There was a man looking down upon her from the edge. Long dreadlocks tumbled past his weathered, shaved cheeks. A thin visor rested beneath his brows, just above his eyes, which the dark band didn’t cover. He wore a black and gray uniform.

Movement drew her gaze to the small, spherical drone that hovered above her; it rotated longitudinally, as if scanning.

“She’s awake,” came a deep male baritone.

The voice was sourced from the opposite side of the container, directly across from the man. She glanced that way to find herself staring into a face composed entirely of polycarbonate: a black oval with a gray visor stretched across where the eyes would be, and a metallic grill resided in place of a mouth. Two antennae on top of the head imparted an insectile impression.

“The drone indicates her brain is only functioning at sixty percent of maximum cognitive efficiency,” the robot stated. “She’s got damage to her pulmonary and cardiovascular substitutes, which is only exacerbated by her head injury. Fluid is building up next to her brain.”

“Transfer her to the gurney,” the man said.

“You really want to do this?” the robot asked.

“I do,” the man replied. “We’re not leaving her here to die.”

“And the mark on her forehead?” the robot pressed.

The man shrugged.

The robot remained motionless for several moments, and then it reached down and wrapped two cold, steel hands around her torso. It lifted.

Warning. Consciousness failure imminent.

Blackness filled her vision once more.

* * *

When she opened her eyes, this time it was to find herself lying on a floating platform of sorts. Around her, the ruined buildings bent and curved toward the sky like talons.

The robot and the man walked alongside her, making their way across the rubble in escort, their feet crunching on the fragments of debris that fanned across the roadway: shattered concrete, broken glass, twisted rebar.

She noticed belongings strewn amongst the ruins at random intervals: a dresser with hole-riddled clothes overflowing from its drawers; a shattered pair of augmented reality glasses; a couch with its filling gutted by birds and mice. Shattered hopes, gutted dreams.

She also spotted the occasional robot parts protruding from the rubble. The man sometimes paused to examine a crushed cranium or a severed arm, but he usually tossed them aside and moved on. At one point, however, he did pocket what looked like a small knee servomotor.

“Where are you taking me?” she asked.

Before either of her escorts could answer, the usual warning filled her vision.

Consciousness failure imminent.

* * *

She awakened to four bright, white lights. Their glare filled her vision and forced her to squint. She attempted to move, but still had no arms and legs, at least as far as she could tell. Looking down, she realized her torso was strapped to some sort of table. She indeed had no arms and legs, but the torso appeared to have been partially repaired: a discolored piece of metal now filled the gaping hole in the right side. She still had no abdomen or hips, however.

She wiggled her upper body, struggling for a moment against the strap that held her down, but then the lights dimmed, and the robot and man pair stepped into view.

“What do you want with me?” she asked. “Please. Just let me go.”

“We only want to help,” the man replied. “We’ve reinforced your rear cranial cavity and stabilized your cardiopulmonary system.”

She stared into his eyes. They seemed kind, trustworthy. She wanted to believe him.

“Why?” she asked. “I can’t give you anything in return.”

“I couldn’t leave you to die back there,” the man told her. “It wouldn’t be right. That said, you’ll have to work for us when we’re finished your repairs.”

She shifted her gaze between the man and the robot. “And who are you, exactly?”

“I’m Will,” the man said. He jerked a thumb toward the robot. “And this is Horatio. The drone behind me is Gizmo.”

Her eyes darted to the small sphere that hovered behind Will before returning to his face.

“We’re salvagers,” Will continued. “Nomads: we gather what we can from the ruins of our once great cities and sell the parts for money. And you are?”

“I am…” she hesitated. “I— I don’t really know.”

“What’s the last thing you remember?” Will pressed.

She furrowed her brow, thinking. Finally: “The last thing I remember is waking up in that pod…”

Will nodded. “Our scans pointed to possible selective amnesia, typical of a mind wipe. They erased your memories and personality—all the knowledge of who you were—but left everything else intact: your ability to talk, swallow, walk, and otherwise carry on your daily life. You can still form and retain new memories, as far as we can tell, so that’s a good thing.”

“Who would want to wipe my mind?” she asked.

Will shrugged. “I don’t know.”

“With a mark like that,” Horatio said, nodding at her forehead, “it’s not hard to imagine she’s made a few enemies over the years.”

“Shh,” Will said. “No need to speak of that.”

She frowned, curious about this so-called mark, but a more pressing matter was on her mind: “Will these memories of mine come back?”

“I don’t know,” Will admitted. “It’s possible.”

He tilted his head toward the small drone, Gizmo, as if the hovering robot was communicating with him. Then he glanced at Horatio. “Gizmo thinks she could be lying. What do you think?”

Horatio glanced at the drone before returning his attention to her. “I’m not detecting any of the facial microtics associated with lying. Then again, she is a cyborg. It’s possible she’s disconnected the circuity involved with microtic activation in order to hide the lie from her features. The ultimate poker face, as it were.”

“I’m telling you the truth,” she said. “I don’t know who I am. Please.” She rolled her head to the side, feeling even more incredibly helpless than she was already. If these scavengers or salvagers or whatever they were didn’t assist her, she didn’t know what she was going to do. She had no memories. No arms and legs…

A tear trickled down her cheek.

“I believe you.” Will slid a gloved finger onto her cheek and wiped away the tear. Then he moved his hand underneath her chin and lifted her head so that she gazed into his eyes. He smiled. “Chin up, little one. Not knowing who you are isn’t the end of the world. In fact, it’s only the beginning. You have a clean slate. You can start all over again, something that more than a few people would wish for, I think.”

“What about the mark?” Horatio nodded at her forehead.

Will shrugged. “We’ll sand it off.” He glanced at her. “Now then, where was I? Oh yeah. So, I’ve saved your life for the time being, but there’s still the small matter of your missing abdominal cavity. Your lung substitutes are providing your brain with oxygen, but you still need nutrients for your brain: you can’t really function properly without a working digestive system. And of course, arms and legs. But before we proceed further, I’d like you to sign a little something.”

She raised an eyebrow. “What?”

“Just a little contract,” he explained. “A work agreement.”

A textual overlay appeared on her HUD.

Will (213662) would like to share Work Contract with you. Do you accept? (Y/N)

“What’s this?” she said.

“As I mentioned, you’re going to have to work for us if you want your body completely repaired,” Will said. “I already stabilized your existing subsystems for free to save your life—that’s on the house. But I can’t give you an entire body at no cost. I just can’t justify it. You’re going to have to be my employee for a little bit to make it worth my while.”

“For a little bit,” she said. “Why do I get the feeling you mean forever?”

“You’re going to pay an arm and a leg for your arms and legs!” Horatio quipped.

“Dude, how many times do I have to tell you, don’t try to joke,” Will told the robot. He returned his attention to her. “This isn’t a debt bondage sort of deal. Paying for your new body is only going to cost you a couple months of your life. At most.”

“That’s still a lot,” she said.

Will shook his head. “Not in the overall scheme of things. Especially not for someone with a full body replacement such as yourself. You take care of yourself, you’ll live for a thousand years. Two months is nothing. Besides, the parts I plan to give you don’t come cheap. I could make two hundred creds selling them at the closest settlement. So, consider it a loan, and you’re going to work for us until you’ve paid it off. And just so you know, there won’t be any interest. Like I said, this isn’t debt bondage. The contract stipulates you’re free to go after you’ve earned us the two hundred. And I tell you what, when you’re done, if you like this sort of work, and we like you in turn, you can stay on: we’ll arrange some sort of revenue splitting.”

She accepted the share request and her HUD reported that the content passed all internal virus scans, so she opened up the digital contract and read it over. It promised that she would receive a full abdominal cavity, with a working digestive subsystem, along with two fully functional arms and two legs. The terms actually seemed reasonable and guaranteed she would be released from the contract after earning Hoplite Industries—Will’s company—two hundred credits. There was no mention of time frame: as far as she could tell, it didn’t matter if she earned the two hundred in three days, or three months.

She focused on the digital signature section at the end and a bunch of digits appeared. She glanced at Will. “I signed it 845146.”

“Your internal ID,” Horatio commented.

She pursed her lips. “Maybe at some point I can use that ID to find out who I was.”

Will shook his head. “We’re the ones who assigned the number. Your existing ID was erased in the mind wipe.”

She sighed. “It was a nice thought.”

“You’re more than your past anyway,” Will said. “You’ll make new memories. Better ones.”

“She’ll need a name,” Horatio suggested to Will. “Unless we want to call her 845146 going forward?”

“A bit unwieldy, isn’t it?” Will turned toward her, causing his dreadlocks to sway. “What would you like to be called?”

She gazed into his suddenly gentle eyes, which crinkled at the sides with his grin.

“I don’t really know,” she told him. “You come up with one.”

He paused. “Rhea.”

“Rhea.” She nodded slowly. “I like it. It will do, until I remember my own.”

Will’s smile seemed to sadden then, as if he didn’t truly believe Rhea would ever remember.

I will. I must.

“I look forward to having you work for us, Rhea,” Will said. “Now then, we’re going to have to shut you down again in order to attach the rest of your body. Sweet dreams.”

“Be gentle,” she said.

He grinned. “You won’t feel a thing.” He glanced at the drone. “Gizmo?”

A telescoping limb extended from underneath the hovering sphere as the drone positioned itself next to her face.

“Rhea, turn your head to the side, please,” Will instructed.

Rhea did so, and then felt a gentle brush against the nape of her head as the drone inserted its limb into whatever access point existed at the base of her neck.

She had only just started to wonder what the drone was doing back there when reality winked out.

2

Rhea awakened to the fleeting scent of either burnt flesh, or burnt circuitry—she couldn’t be certain, as they smelled the same to her. Probably the latter, given what she was, or had become.

The bright lamps shone into her eyes overhead, and she squinted, turning her head to the side. She was still on the table. Just like the last time she had awakened, the light levels dimmed, and she was able to look directly at the lamps once more.

Text had appeared on her HUD in the lower left of her display. It caught her eye, but before she could finish reading it, the text vanished. She saw these words:

Intense luminescence detected. Act—

Had the lights truly dimmed? Or had they only seemed to, courtesy of some internal mechanism in her cyborg eyes, one that decreased the amount of light reaching her visual cortex?

On a whim she concentrated upon the lamps, willing them to brighten. Nothing happened.

Her whole body had tensed up while she had concentrated, but she relaxed then. That was when she noticed sensation in her extremities: she had arms and legs again. But when she attempted to move her limbs, she felt cold metal pressing into her wrists and ankles.

Lifting her head to look down at herself, she saw that metal clamps indeed restrained her arms and legs, in addition to the strap at her torso.

“Don’t mind the clamps,” Will said. “They’re for your protection, until we can confirm your systems are at a hundred percent. Wouldn’t do to have your arms and legs taking on a life of their own. Believe you me, when a cyborg knocks himself out cold by repeatedly punching himself in the face, it isn’t pretty.”

She studied her new arms. They were metallic beige, with clefts encircling the joint regions that gave the impression the parts between the articulations were removable and interchangeable. A small blue glow emanated from the joints of the elbows and wrists. The left arm was darker in color, a shade of bronze, while the right was reddish. The surface of the right also seemed more mottled, as if covered with millions of micro abrasions, while the left was smooth. Her legs were similarly mismatched.

“Why are they different colors and textures?” Rhea asked. “Also, the right arm’s shorter. As is the right leg.”

“That’s because they’re taken from different android models,” Will said. “You know how rare it is to come across intact body frames in this line of work? I used the best pieces from our salvage inventory, the finest specimens scavenged from the rubble over the past few weeks. Just be happy your parts match-up as well as they do and aren’t a complete mishmash. You’re actually quite lucky you know… you could have robotic tails for arms, and claws for hands. Besides, the legs are only slightly different lengths. We’re talking centimeters. You’ll hardly notice.”

She frowned and lay her head back. “So you say. When are you going to unbind me?”

“Soon,” Will said. “We already ran a basic set of tests while Gizmo was still interfaced with your mind, but we need to run them again, this time with you in control. First…” He glanced at the drone.

Gizmo came forward and slowly hovered across Rhea’s four limbs. A small blue beam slid across her skin, no doubt some form of invasive scan.

“Everything seems to be operating normally,” Will said. “I need you to wiggle the toes of your right foot one at a time, starting with the big toe.”

As she proceeded down the line, she noticed there seemed to be a slight delay between her intent to wiggle a given toe, and when that actual toe finally moved.

“Is there any lag between your intention and the actual movement?” Will asked.

“About a half second,” she replied.

“Give your mind-machine interface a moment to compensate,” Will said. “If it doesn’t go away, we’ll get Gizmo to interface with you again to make some tweaks.”

Rhea started over with the big toe and proceeded down the line once more. “I think it’s gone away.”

“You think?” Will pressed. “Or it has?”

She tried again. “It has.”

Will nodded.

She proceeded to wiggle the toes of her other foot, and then the fingers of each hand in turn.

“Any lag?” Will said.

She gazed down at her fingers. “No, but… I feel weird. Like my arms and legs aren’t where they’re supposed to be. And my fingers… they feel sluggish. Almost heavy.”

“That’s to be expected,” Will told her. “The muscle memory you retained after the mind wipe is for a body built to entirely different proportions. Also, your strength will be off. It will take a bit to get used to the feel of your new parts. The reorientation period shouldn’t be too long, though, given your cyborg nature: in fact, your mind-machine interface should adapt very quickly.”

Will walked her through a series of knee and arm motions, and she bent her limbs as far as the restraints would allow. She flexed her ankles, rotated her wrists, and shrugged her shoulders.

Will gave Horatio the go-ahead to release the binds and Rhea was finally able to sit up. She surveyed her surroundings for a moment: she resided inside a chamber of some kind. It was a little cramped—the table took up a good half of it.

“So how do you feel now?” Will asked.

She lifted a hand and opened and closed the fingers. “Still a bit weird.”

As she continued to flex her fingers, they began to feel more natural: the sluggishness and weightiness dissipated, along with the sensation they weren’t her own.

“That’s better,” she said.

“See, I told you it wouldn’t take long to adapt,” Will said.

She lifted her opposite hand and similarly flexed the fingers until they too felt like they belonged to her.

She touched her legs and felt the metal beneath her fingertips. It wasn’t cold, but not quite warm, either. She brushed her fingers upward, along her torso, until she reached the artificial epidermis that sheathed her upper chest. The skin felt soft and supple, and warm, like a real human’s.

“Does my face have skin, too?” she asked, combing a strand of synthetic hair from her eyes. She touched her cheeks and felt the same warmth. She slid her fingers around her lips, nose, and chin.

“It does,” Will said. “But it dips into the uncanny valley a little bit. Have a look.”

She received a share request and accepted. A video transmitted from the viewpoint of Will’s drone, Gizmo, filled her vision so that she was looking at herself.

She was sitting up on the table. Her face was indeed made of the same kind of artificial skin as her upper chest, as was her neck. Her artificial cheekbones were high, and the skin covering them was blemishless. She had two almond-shaped eyes, which were slightly too large for a normal human, paired with a mouth that was a little too big. Her lips were a realistic red, however. She had a cute button of a nose, and synthetic hair that hung to either side of her face in a bob cut.

Will was right about the dip into the uncanny valley: with those eyes and mouth, she didn’t quite look human. Not that anyone would ever think she was, given the obviously robotic body attached below.

“You know, the tech is advanced enough to make faces that look completely human,” Will said. “In fact, the rich routinely swap their minds into human-seeming androids because they don’t like their physical attributes, or they just want to be young again, and only their friends could tell you that they’re cyborgs. My guess is you chose to exaggerate certain features because you wanted people to know without a doubt you weren’t entirely human.”

“Maybe so.” Her eyes had drifted to her forehead. The center was a raw red color, as if the area had been abraded or burned in some way.

She reached up. The area was raw and tender to the touch.

“I had a mark here,” she said. “What was it?”

“Doesn’t matter,” Will said. “Besides, it’s gone now. This is all part of giving you a clean slate. A mark on your head doesn’t define who you are, after all. Don’t worry, the redness will go away after a day or so, thanks to the healing properties of your artificial skin.”

“Will the skin grow back over the rest of my body?” she pressed.

He chuckled. “Now, now, your skin isn’t that regenerative. You’re going to have to purchase a base layer if you want to wrap up the rest of your body.”

She dismissed the video feed, swung her legs off the table and lowered her palms to the edge for balance. She concentrated on her feet, wiggling the toes and rotating the ankles.

When she felt ready, she lowered herself to the floor.

“Careful…” Will said.

When she touched the floor, she slid off the table so her legs could hold her full weight. Her body tilted very slightly to one side, thanks to the difference in length between her legs, but otherwise the robotic appendages held.

“Here, let me hold your hand.” Will reached out.

Stubbornly, Rhea ignored his hand and took a step on her own. Her stride seemed much shorter than she had expected, and she wasn’t ready when the floor contacted her heel.

She stumbled, and Will’s hand shot out, instantly wrapping around hers. Horatio grabbed her arm on the other side, and together they stabilized her.

“Try again,” Will said.

With the two hanging onto her, she took one step, then another. Her gait became more confident as she went.

“Feel good enough to do it on your own?” Will asked.

“Not really,” she responded. “But I have to walk on my own at some point…”

Will nodded. He exchanged a glance with Horatio, and then the two released her.

She held out her arms for balance as she continued forward on wobbly feet. It felt like she was walking on a tightrope, without the rope. Will and Horatio followed alongside, ready to assist if needed.

After a few steps she stumbled once more but recovered almost immediately. Even so, Will’s hand darted forward to help: she waved him away.

“She’s got this,” Horatio said.

After a few more steps, she felt confident enough to lower her arms. She hardly noticed the different lengths of her legs anymore.

“She’s doing it,” Horatio said.

She reached the far wall of the chamber and then turned around to pace to the other side. Ahead of her, she spotted the table illuminated by the lights, and realized it wasn’t actually a table, but rather a gurney lying on top of a crate of some sort. A pair of backpacks lay on the floor beside it.

“There you go…” Will commented encouragingly from beside her. “Now you’re walking like this is your natural body.”

Filled with a surge of gratitude, she threw her arms around him in a hug.

“Thank you so much for what you’ve done for me!” she said.

Will squeezed back, but then pushed her away, his dreadlocks dangling down in front of her. “Don’t get too mushy now. You did sign a contract, remember.”

“Oh, yeah,” she said, turning away.

She spotted an opening in the far wall and realized she was standing inside some sort of abandoned cargo container. Beyond, she could see a ruined city street, and the rebar-laden husk of a partially collapsed skyscraper.

She turned toward Will and noticed for the first time the pistol strapped to his waist. Horatio didn’t have such a weapon, though she did spot some wicked-looking double-barrels tucked away beneath his arms. Probably rifles of some kind, ready to deploy at a moment’s notice.

Will followed her gaze and shrugged. “The Outlands are a dangerous place. Not everyone is as upstanding as Horatio and me. Bandits and highwaymen roam these ruins, and they’re not averse to killing someone such as yourself for the spare parts. Speaking of which… here. You should probably put on some clothes, so you don’t look like such a tempting target. Horatio?”

Horatio delved into one of the big backpacks lying on the floor next to the table.

“Just clothes?” she asked. “I don’t get a weapon, too?”

“Even if I had a spare, I’m not sure I’d give it to you,” he said. “You don’t have the knowledge necessary to handle a weapon. You could hurt yourself. Or us.”

“How do you know?” she said. “Let me hold your pistol. Maybe I have the muscle memory.”

Will studied her uncertainly. “Not today.”

Horatio gave her a one-piece uniform, and she slid the gray fatigues over her arms, legs, and torso, and zipped up the front. She donned the boots the robot gave her next and slid on a pair of gloves so that when she was done, only her head and neck remained uncovered. That actually suited her, as she felt strangely ashamed of her more robotic parts, preferring to expose only those portions of herself that were covered in synthetic skin, even if her eyes and mouth were too big to be entirely human.

“There you go,” Will said. “From afar, no one will be able to tell you’re a cyborg.”

“What about him?” Rhea nodded at Horatio, who wore no clothes whatsoever. “You don’t think his spare parts make a tempting target?”

Will waved a dismissive hand. “From far away, he doesn’t look like a robot either. He’s just another bandit wearing a face wrap and an AR visor, with antennae for communicating to his drone. The black and gray coloration of his polycarbonate body blends right in with the rubble. Besides, even if he was recognized, there’s a good chance bandits wouldn’t attack. His body is made from cheap, salvaged parts: something not really worth risking their lives for.”

“But I’m made from the same parts,” Rhea insisted.

“Your body, maybe,” Will agreed. “But not your head. The mind-machine interface you carry up there? That alone is worth a small fortune.”

She studied him uncertainly. “You could have killed me when you found me. Taken that interface and sold it. But you didn’t. Thank you.”

“We’re not murderers,” Will grumbled. “Believe me when I tell you, the thought didn’t even cross my mind.”

“It crossed mine,” Horatio admitted. “But only for a microsecond.”

She gave the robot a wide-eyed look.

“I’m kidding,” Horatio said.

“Dude…” Will told him.

Horatio raised two robotic palms. “All right, all right. I admit it. Jokes and I don’t mesh.”

Will reached into a pocket and produced a small pill bottle. “Hungry?”

“Ravished, in fact,” she replied.

Will opened the cap and offered her a small pill. “Eat this. It’s simple enough to be processed by your artificial digestive system.”

She took the pill and frowned. “What is it?”

“Olive oil packaged in pill form, essentially,” he told her. “You can eat standard human meals if you wish, and while it might taste great, most of the food will pass right through you. It’s better to take your macronutrients separately, in pill form like this. The majority of your diet should be fat, by the way.”

“You want me to binge on fat?” she asked in disbelief. “That doesn’t sound very appealing.”

“Have it in pill form, it’s tasteless,” he promised.

She sighed, then popped the pill, taking a swig from the canteen he offered her. It went down easily.

“All you really need are fat pills and water,” he told her. “That’s what your brain is mostly made of, after all. You don’t particularly need carbs. Your artificial stomach will convert fat into ketone bodies, which your mind can use as fuel. The small amount of protein in the fat pills is converted into glucose, which again your brain uses. Your HUD will notify you if you’re lacking any nutrients, of course.” He glanced at Horatio. “Well, my friend, I believe it’s time we blew this joint.”

The robot retrieved the gurney from the crate and folded it up, then stuffed it into one of the backpacks. Horatio removed the five lights that hung above the crate, then collapsed the stand that had held them, shoving everything into his backpack. Horatio did the same with the various other equipment yet strewn about.

“Where to now?” Rhea asked.

“We continue to Rust Town, where we’ll sell the remaining salvage in our inventory.” Will shrugged on one of the heavy backpacks. “When that’s done, we’ll get you some proper weapons training, buy a pistol to lend you, and then head back into the Outlands so you can work on paying off your debt.”

She frowned. “Rust Town?”

3

The three of them had only walked through the rubble for thirty minutes when Will turned back to her and said: “Want to try hauling my pack? It will get your body used to carrying more than its own weight, and further train your mind-machine interface…”

“You just want a rest,” Horatio countered.

“Maybe I do,” Will admitted. “I could swear you swapped some of the heavier parts into my pack.” He turned toward Rhea. “So, what do you say?”

She eyed his pack uncertainly, then sighed. “I signed a contract with you. Now’s as good a time as any to start pulling my own weight.”

Will transferred his load to Rhea, so that in moments she was traipsing through the broken city streets with the twin straps of his backpack tugging at her shoulders. She didn’t actually mind. Anything that would further prime her mind-machine interface was a good thing in her eyes, even if the benefits of such priming were minimal. Besides, she hardly felt the weight of the pack at all and continued at the same pace as before. She didn’t even break a sweat. Actually, she didn’t think she was capable of sweating.

Up ahead, Gizmo led the way at a height of about twenty meters; the drone navigated between the different buildings, picking out a path through the streets that was the least clogged with rubble.

Rhea glanced at the overhead map in the upper right of her vision. That particular HUD widget had appeared when she’d accepted a telemetry-sharing request from Will shortly after leaving the shelter of the container; the map showed three dots indicating the positions of Will, Horatio and Gizmo relative to her. Apparently, the range could extend up to a couple of kilometers on the open plains but was vastly restricted in the ruined cities courtesy of the interference caused by the buildings. Speaking of those buildings, they appeared on the map as white outlines that slid past as she moved, so that her indicator remained at the center at all times.

She returned her attention to the streets and watched the bordering skyscrapers suspiciously. Her gaze drifted to Horatio. She felt a strange kinship to the robot, more-so than Will. Perhaps because she felt more like the machine, than the man.

“Horatio, do you have a human brain?” Rhea asked.

The robot chuckled. “Sorry to disappoint you, but I’m all AI.”

“Oh,” she said.

“Don’t get me wrong,” Horatio said. “You’ll find humans who’ve transferred their brains to robotic bodies like my own, because they can’t afford the more human-like synthetic bodies. But for the most part, if it looks like a robot, it’s probably housing an artificial intelligence.”

She nodded. “That concept seems familiar to me.”

“We’ll get your memory back yet,” Horatio said.

“Don’t get her hopes up,” Will told the robot.

She walked on in silence.

Ahead, the road became blocked by the collapse of several buildings. Gizmo guided the party into a side street.

Will, Horatio and Rhea marched between the two buildings, which were separated by a street containing four lanes and two wide sidewalks. The trio weaved between the debris of personal vehicles that littered the road. Most were land-based, with rotten wheels, but there were a few aerial craft among the lot, judging from the broken wings.

She gazed at the hulking skyscrapers that bordered on either side, their shattered windows like hollowed out eye sockets. She wondered if anyone waited to waylay them inside those buildings, namely the bandits Will had spoken of earlier.

“What happens if we’re attacked?” Rhea asked.

Will shrugged. “Then we do all we can: take cover and fight back.”

“That will be kind of hard, without a weapon,” she told him.

“I don’t see how taking cover is hard,” Will said. “Duck behind one of the vehicles.”

“I meant fighting back,” she said.

He ignored the comment.

She kept a wary eye on the bordering buildings and the alleyways between them but didn’t spot anything. She supposed Gizmo would alert them anyway if the drone picked up something.

She glanced at Will. “How did you become a salvager?”

“Sort of fell into the work,” Will said. “I was just a kid when half the world’s cities were destroyed. I was one of the lucky ones, living in a spared city. But I tell you, the crime and poverty that followed… man, wasn’t easy. My parents started salvaging to survive, and when I was older, I took over the business. I built Horatio from spare parts acquired over the years, and Gizmo, too. When you look at those two robots, and my backpack, you’re looking at all my worldly possessions.”

“I’m not actually one of his possessions,” Horatio said. “You see, it’s illegal to own self-aware AIs. That’s tantamount to slavery.”

“True that,” Will agreed. “Horatio follows me of his own free will.”

“I wouldn’t quite say I follow him,” Horatio countered. “We’re partners. Will sold me a fifty percent ownership stake in Hoplite Industries. We split all the revenue we make in this business.”

“Half the world was really destroyed?” Rhea said.

Will nodded. “Yeah. We called it The Great Calming.”

“A strange name,” she commented.

“Dude, they were strange times,” he countered.

“So, when you say half the world, you’re talking the north half, or the south half, or…”

“It was random,” Will explained. “Spread across the globe. New York was razed, but Jersey City spared. Los Angeles bit the dust, while San Francisco remained untouched.”

“What happened to the fallen cities?” Rhea asked.

“No one really knows,” Will told her. “Most people blame Ganymede.”

Rhea gave him an uncertain look. “Ganymede?”

“Jupiter’s seventh closest moon,” Horatio explained.

Will nodded. “We were at war with the Ganymedeans. Earth was running out of water, and we invaded Ganymede to get at the oceans stored beneath the frozen crust of the moon. The Ganymedeans didn’t like that and fought back with everything they had. One morning the people of Earth woke up to massive detonations: they weren’t nuclear, just conventional explosions, even so it was enough to utterly raze the cities in question. Billions died. Our population was reduced by half. That solved the water crisis, at least temporarily, buying us a few more centuries.

“No one really knew where the explosions came from. There weren’t any missiles or other detectable forms of attack. That said, there are many theories… the most popular being that elite teams of Ganymedeans dispersed across the globe and planted charges in the weeks prior to The Great Calming. The theory is supported by videos shared on the streaming sites that depict Ganymedeans caught slinking into the different cities. Some people say those shots were staged or are simply convincing deepfakes. They support the next most popular theory, which is that Ganymedes had developed some sort of new, trans-dimensional weapon that allowed them to bridge space, teleporting the bombs directly into our cities. I guess we’ll never know.”

Rhea sidestepped the fender that had fallen from a burnt-out vehicle next to her path. “Why not?”

Will shook his head. “There’s nothing left of the Ganymedeans. In the aftermath of The Great Calming, the High Council stirred the people of Earth into a frenzy. Enrollment in the armed forces of the member countries went up tenfold, as did military spending. The industries of the world shifted as we switched to war economies, and we created machine monstrosities like nothing ever seen before. With our renewed army, we destroyed the Ganymedeans, all of them, to the last man, woman, and cyborg. You’d think we would have gained something from all that: access to the water supply we so direly sought. You’d hope. But that wasn’t the case. Because of the logistics involved in maintaining such a faraway base, we soon lost Ganymede to Europa.”

“I’m surprised we’d give up, just like that,” Rhea said. “Considering the price we paid to acquire that moon. And I’m not just talking about the financial cost. We lost half of our population…”

“I didn’t say that the winning was easy,” Will told her. “The last Ganymedeans put up quite the fight. Our army gave them a chance to surrender, but they refused. They said, and I quote, they ‘would rather die than fall beneath the yoke of the High Council.’ Anyway, we lost a good number of troops, not to mention expensive war machines and transport vessels. It wasn’t hard for Europa to push us back. Our leaders were tired of war by then, and a little sickened by what we’d become, I think. Since we already had a few more centuries of water left, courtesy of the steep population drop, the High Council decided a more diplomatic approach was in order.”

“Something tells me that didn’t work out too well…” Rhea commented.

Will smiled sadly. “Negotiations are still ongoing thirty years later.”

“We’re there,” Horatio said.

Rhea turned her attention away from the surrounding buildings and gazed directly forward. The road didn’t look any different up ahead—broken skyscrapers bordering a debris-filled street. She searched for Gizmo, but the drone was nowhere in sight: it must have taken a side street somewhere.

That was when she spotted a lone sentry residing in profile next to a side road ahead. It stood with one shiny leg forward, the knee bent so as to step on the rubble pile in front of it. The golden robot held a large, body-sized pike at an angle in front of it, with the base braced against the ground. The glowing tip promised a particularly nasty bite.

The head turned to follow their approach.

When they were about twenty meters away, the robot boomed in a deep voice: “State your business, Outlanders.”

“We’re salvagers,” Will said. “Business license 520439-Omega-Gamma. We have salvage to sell.”

“Hoplite Industries,” the sentry said. “Your license is valid. Scanning your IDs.” It ran its gaze in turn across the three of them, the disks that served as eyes flashing as it met each of their faces. Rhea couldn’t help but flinch when those eyes flared across her own face.

The sentry tensed, tilting the pike slightly toward its body. “The cyborg’s ID has no match. Explain.”

“She’s newly registered,” Will said.

Rhea received a pop-up notice on her HUD.

Will wishes to add you to the private adhoc network Zandwich. Do you accept (Y/N)?

She accepted. In the upper right of her HUD, three bars appeared, with the word Zandwich beside them.

“All newly registered cyborgs are automatically added to the main database at the time of registration,” the sentry intoned. “Assuming it was done by an approved registrar.”

“Apparently that step was missed…” Will said. “If you wish, we can leave her behind while we conduct our business in the settlement. It’s all the same to me if you want to babysit a new cyborg. I should warn you, though: this one likes to talk. A lot.”

She heard Horatio’s voice in her head. You think he’s going to buy it?

Of course, Will sent. Sentry robots like these, they hate talking.

The sentry glanced at Rhea, and she had the distinct impression the robot was narrowing its eyes, though that wasn’t possible given their flat, disk-like nature. Finally: “That will not be necessary. I will insert the necessary records in the main database. Given name?”

“Rhea,” Will said.

“Surname?”

“Doesn’t have one,” Will said. “She’s Arabic.”

“Arabs have multiple surnames,” the sentry said.

“Yeah, but not her tribe, dude,” Will said.

The sentry cocked its head. “And which tribe is that?”

“I can’t pronounce it,” Will said. “Shaheeyd wa’la man. I’m sending the spelling now.”

That sounds made up, Horatio sent.

The sentry hesitated, then: “Occupation?”

“Salvager,” Will replied.

A few more tense seconds ticked past. Perhaps that was the time needed to add the new records to the database the sentry spoke of.

“Do you plan to enter Aradne?” the sentry asked.

“No,” Will replied. “We have business only in Rust Town.”

“You may proceed,” the sentry said.

Will led the way, followed by Horatio and Rhea.

The sentry’s head swiveled to follow them as they turned onto the side street. The robot seemed to give Rhea extra special scrutiny as she passed, but that was probably only her imagination.

“Damn thing gives me the creeps,” she muttered.

I was wondering when you’d figure out how to use the adhoc network, Will commented.

She realized she hadn’t actually spoken the words aloud, but rather over their shared connection.

How do I disconnect? she sent.

Already sick of having us in your head? Will asked. There’s a mute button. If you concentrate on the network bars, a popup will appear showing those who are connected.

She did that, and the popup indeed activated. She saw that she could mute Horatio and Will individually. She decided to keep them active for the time being.

As she stepped onto the side road, she spotted Gizmo overhead. The drone hovered in place, waiting for them.

Ahead, in the middle of the street, she could see several four-meter tall Texas barriers blocking all access forward. Beyond the concrete barriers, she saw slanted metal rooftops poking up. Past them, about a block away, awaited an even higher wall, this one more permanent: it was made of seamless metal, rather than interlocking concrete blocks, and wicked looking gun turrets poked out from the upper walkway at intervals.

“What’s that?” Rhea said.

Will followed her gaze to the gun turrets. “That would be Aradne, the capital city in these parts.”

“But why the turrets?” she pressed.

“I wasn’t kidding when I said the Outlands can be a dangerous place,” Will said. “Sometimes, roving bands of highwaymen like to team up and stage coordinated assaults against the cities. Those turrets are designed not just to protect Aradne, but the Rust Town slums on its outskirts, too.”

Rhea walked on in silence. The road here was clear of most debris and offered a relatively unimpeded path to the Texas barriers.

“By the way, we’re in range of the settlement’s repeaters,” Horatio told Rhea. “You should be able to connect to the Net now. Try it.”

“I’m not sure how…” Rhea began.

But then she knew. She focused on the three bars in the upper right of her HUD, and a popup appeared showing other available networks. She connected to the one labeled Rust Town Local.

A new popup appeared.

You are now online. What would you like to do?

“Never mind,” she said. “I’m in.”

There were various options, such as sync a mail account, and search, but she would play with it later when she had a spare moment. For now, there was more than enough to occupy her attention in the real world, so she simply closed the popup.

“Used to be, you could access the Net anywhere in the world,” Will said. “In the cities, the countryside, it didn’t matter. But then we gave up the countryside to the bioweapons, letting it become the Outlands. Most of the wireless towers out there were lost to the creatures—targeting network infrastructure and military bases was ingrained into their collective instincts by design. The remaining towers failed over the years due to lack of regular maintenance.

“A network of satellites in orbit continued to offer wireless access to the Outlands for a while, at least until one of the rogue nations—some say it was Costa Rica—launched a cascade attack and fried most of them in a single fell swoop. Because the replacement cost was so high, and worldwide wireless access was no longer needed—most people never left the cities anymore—the High Council decided to forgo launching replacement satellites. And so, we’re back to relying on the old fiber infrastructure to link the major hubs, with wireless connections available only around the cities.”

There was a gap in the barriers ahead—two of the Texas walls had been turned sideways, like open doors, allowing access to the settlement beyond. A pair of gold sentry robots stood on either side of the gap. A large, sealed bin resided on the asphalt next to the rightmost. The container was about half as tall as the barrier, and three times as long.

The rightmost sentry robot beckoned toward the bin as Will approached.

The salvager glanced at Rhea. “Guns aren’t allowed in most settlements.”

A wide lid on the bin opened. Inside was a compartment containing a clear liquid. It was big enough to fit Will’s pistol, with room to spare.

Will tossed the weapon into the liquid. Horatio came forward next and extended his arms; the rifle barrels underneath slid forward and popped out, splashing into the compartment.

Horatio stepped back and the liquid promptly froze, completely encasing the weapons in a block of ice. The compartment whirred inward, carrying the block out of view. The lid also began to close. Before it sealed completely, Rhea caught sight of a new cavity rotating into place, this one filled with fresh liquid waiting to accept the weapons of the next visitors.

The robots looked the three of them up and down, those metal disks that served as eyes flashing the whole time, no doubt scanning for further weapons. They concentrated on the packs that Rhea and Horatio carried on their backs. One of sentries also gazed skyward, where Gizmo was hovering overhead, then it jerked a thumb toward the gap.

“Proceed,” the robot intoned.

“Not yet,” Will said. “Not until we’ve acquired some certain hardware for our cyborg.” He glanced at Horatio.

The robot nodded and entered the settlement.

Rhea gave Will a questioning look, but when he made no move to follow Horatio, she asked quietly: “What’s going on?”

“This won’t take long,” Will assured her.

The robots kept those unnerving, disk eyes upon her and Will the whole time. Rhea did her best not to fidget beneath their gaze.

Horatio emerged a few minutes later, carrying a small cloak folded over one arm. The robot offered it to Rhea.

“Picked this up from the first clothing vendor I came across,” Horatio said.

Rhea let the hooded cloak fall open and glanced at Will uncertainly.

“Put it on,” he encouraged.

She draped it over her head and shoulders and looked to Will once more.

“Raise the hood,” he said, lifting it for her and letting it fall over her face.

“There,” Will said. “With that hood, now nobody will know you’re a cyborg.”

“Why does it matter?” Rhea said. “We’re in a civilized area now. There are laws here, aren’t there?”

“Well, yes, but certain parts of Rust Town are even more lawless than the Outlands,” Will said. He nodded at the golden robots. “These sentries here, they don’t have much of a presence in the neighborhood we’re headed to. All I can say is, certain unsavory individuals might decide to do you harm if they see you. So keep the hood raised.”

Will beckoned her to follow Horatio into the settlement, and he took up a position behind her.

4

Rhea gazed in wonder at the different buildings around her. Very few were taller than two meters, and most were lean-tos, with cargo containers scattered among them. Graffiti sometimes marred the exteriors. One in particular caught her eye, which read: it’s okay to be a cyborg.

Children dressed in shabby clothes played in front of some of the structures; the doors were shut on most, but external security cameras monitored the perimeters, and rotated as she and the others passed each one. There was a distinct lack of windows.

The ground seemed softer somehow. She glanced down: below, the asphalt had been replaced with a mixture of sand and dirt.

She lifted her gaze, but motion drew her eyes even higher, where insects roved to and fro a few meters above the path.

“Odd,” Rhea said. “The insects… I didn’t notice any in the Outlands, but now they’re everywhere.”

“Those aren’t insects,” Horatio told her. “They’re drones. Nearly all of them are autonomous. Most act as repeaters for the local wireless network, and they’re also equipped with micro cameras so the settlement’s central AI can keep tabs on everyone. The ones in the distance are for transport. If you look closely, you can see the payloads. They service all online orders for the capital city and its shantytown.”

Squinting, she noticed there were indeed bigger drones in the distance, traveling around ten to twenty meters from the rooftops. They all carried payloads. Gizmo flew at roughly the same height, which seemed to be the regulated allowance for transport drones.

“Not all of the smaller drones are operated by the settlement’s AI,” Will said. “A few of the insect-sized ones you see above? They’re flown for leisure. Adults and kids alike use them to explore the city, or race. They piggyback on the settlement’s wireless network, allowing them to get a pristine HD video feed across the entire city. It can be a lot of fun, plus it’s a whole lot easier for a resident of Rust Town to get into Aradne by drone. With solar power, regenerative braking, and multiple drones in reserve, people can spend their whole lives inside their AR goggles, flying around. There are racing leagues. Exploration guilds. Tournaments. It’s a whole world of its own. Not all that different from those who spend their days in VR, in fact.”

Rhea watched as one of the transport drones descended, depositing a metallic bag in front of one particular container before taking to the skies once more. From the tantalizing smell emanating from that bag, she knew it held food.

One of the children snuck away from the others, obviously intending to snag the meal, but the container’s bulky door opened a moment later and an unshaven, shirtless man snatched up the metallic bag and slammed the door shut.

“There are also people who only interact through the world remotely via androids,” Horatio said.

“Yes,” Will said. “But that’s more a hobby for the rich. In Aradne, android roleplaying is quite popular—a lot of the people you’ll see walking around are synthetics. Some, like you, are cyborgs with their brains directly inside the units, but others are simply human beings at home, encased in full body motion suits, relaying their every movements to their personal androids.”

“Too bad we’re not going to Aradne…” Rhea said.

“Nope,” Will said. “If you’re really curious, you can watch a few videos about the city on VidTube. You do have a Net connection now… though to be honest, it won’t look much different than here, save for better looking buildings.”

She made a mental note to do that later sometime.

“I would recommend you be careful what you watch on VidTube as well,” Will said. “Start with the PG-13 streams. Newly wiped minds are very impressionable, after all. Not too far removed from the mind of children, in fact.”

“Except I’m not a child,” she said, a little more peevishly than she’d intended.

“No,” he agreed. “But you are naive. That’ll change, once you get hardened up to the real world. Videos won’t really help with that. They’ll probably give you the wrong impression.”

“But PG-13 streams will only shield her from the harsh realities of the world,” Horatio countered. “They’ll definitely give her the wrong impression, as you call it.”

“True,” Will said. “But that’s why I said to start with the PG-13 streams. She can move on when she feels ready.”

“I’m not sure how much time she’ll have to watch videos either way,” Horatio said. “You plan to take her to Master Bardain as soon as we’re done here, yes?”

“Yeah,” Will said. “But we’ll probably have a one or two night layover while Bardain trains her. Enough time for her to stream some videos, if she so chooses.”

“Somehow I have a feeling she’ll be too tired to stream videos…” Horatio said.

“Then she’ll learn everything she needs to know in the real world,” Will said. “From us. It’s probably better that way anyhow.”

The trio passed a group of children, who paused in their playing to watch Rhea and the others go by. She noticed that all of them were wearing glasses with small green lights active in the lower right of the frames.

She ran a quick Net lookup on those glasses, and the search results informed her they were a form of AR goggles. Cheap enough that nearly everyone could afford them, they provided non-cyborgs with the same HUD that she had built-in. The green light indicated that the goggles were actively recording. She wondered if the central AI that Will had spoken of was accessing those video feeds, too. Probably.

She also looked up the thin visor that Will himself wore above his eyes and discovered, unsurprisingly, that it was a model of AR goggles, too. It sat below his brow, just above the eyes, so that it could project augmented reality images directly into his irises.

She glanced at the children once more, who had returned to their playing. A small, insect-sized drone spontaneously launched from the glasses of one kid and hovered in front of them. The trio promptly segued into a series of ridiculous poses as the drone emitted several tiny flashes of light. Rhea performed another Net search and discovered that in addition to point-of-view recording, many AR goggles also came with built-in selfie drones.

Will took the lead and turned onto a wide, central street. Here, many of the lean-tos and cargo containers were open, with kiosks set up in front. Stands showcased various goods, with simple service robots ready to offer assistance. Usually there were humans lounging in the lean-tos behind, babysitting the robots. Sometimes the human proprietors manned the stalls directly.

Though obviously some kind of market district, there were still surprisingly few patrons about. However, a steady stream of transport drones made up for the missing foot traffic. These machines either landed at the different stalls or hovered directly in front of them. Service robots or proprietors would insert packages into the gripping appendages of the drones and the machines would promptly take flight again. There were also a few autonomous, six-wheeled ground vehicles on the roads, these tugging around loads too big for the drones to carry, such as a rotating vat of concrete in one instance, or a bundle of heavy metal pipes in another.

The autonomous drones and ground units would explain the lack of people. Why bother leaving the house when delivery drones could run your errands? With Net-enabled AR glasses, you could have the meal of your choice delivered directly to you, and while you ate it you could socialize with friends across the city—or the world—just as if they were in your own living room.

Most of the buildings and stalls weren’t labeled in any way: customers were apparently supposed to guess what was offered based on the displayed goods. Then again, with all the machines flying about, maybe humans weren’t the intended audience anyway. Or at least, not the preferred audience.

Those few people she saw out and about were dressed in loose, drab clothes, selected so as to not stand out, she thought, with hooded cloaks draping their heads and shoulders. To a man, their eyes seemed defocused while they walked: they studied empty regions in front of the different shops as if viewing something only they could see.

The cloak Rhea wore was little different from those of every other citizen. She fit right in. Well, she was one of the few who kept the hood raised, but hey.

Will showed her how to access the public profiles of the scarce passersby via her HUD. This allowed her to see their age, occupation, and whatever else they wanted to share publicly—basically the equivalent of the “feeds” or “walls” one often found on social media when looking up someone. Even the robot vendors had public profiles, though their feeds were usually blank.

Up until now, Will had stayed roughly in the middle of the path, equidistant from the buildings on either flank, but now he swerved toward the leftmost side. Horatio and Rhea followed. As she neared the buildings there, suddenly she knew what the few passersby were looking at.

As soon as she got within three meters of each stall or building in turn, augmented reality popups would overlay her vision, inviting her to explore such creatively named stores as “Bardo’s Battery Emporium—Best Lithium Salt in Rust Town.”

As she continued, the overlays appeared with such profusion that they began to become annoying. Though sometimes they obscured much of her vision, they were translucent, and any real-world objects behind them were outlined a bright blue, preventing her from accidentally running into anything, or anyone.

“Gotta love AR spam,” Will commented.

When she neared a rather decrepit looking cargo container, the overlays took a turn to the pornographic, and she quickly learned how to deactivate them entirely.

The instant her vision cleared up, she couldn’t help but sigh in relief. She also realized that roughly half of the graffiti on the surrounding buildings had vanished at the same time. It made some sense that virtual graffiti would be just as popular as the real-world variety, if not more-so.

A drone the size of her thumb buzzed down from above and swerved toward her face. She batted it away. The drone hummed angrily, righting itself.

A panel slid aside in the door of the decrepit container beside her, and a shady looking man peered out.

“Hey, wanna come work for me?” the man said. He glanced at Will. “Whatever he’s paying you, I’ll double it. Girl like you could make a fortune in this place.”

Rhea realized her face had been caught on the drone’s camera and pulled her hood tighter. She took a moment to examine the decrepit building, which looked like it was made of four or five ancient cargo containers stacked together.

“No thanks,” Rhea said, and began moving on.

“You sure Missy?” the man pressed. “Chance of a lifetime here.”

That made her pause.

“Leave her alone,” Horatio said, turning around suddenly. The robot took a menacing step forward.

The man retreated a pace, and Rhea could see his raised palms behind the door slit.

Horatio grabbed Rhea by the hand and led her forward. She didn’t mind his tight grip. It seemed comforting, somehow. She wondered if she would have felt the same way if Will had grabbed her, and that thought worried her.

She started when a loud clang came from behind; glancing over her shoulder, she saw that the panel in the door had slammed shut.

“Guess we offended him,” Rhea said.

“He offended us,” Horatio said. “There’s one thing you have to learn out here, Rhea. And that’s you have to stand up for yourself. Man, robot or cyborg, if you show weakness to anyone, they’ll try to take advantage of you.”

“Even you?” she said. “Or Will?”

“We already took advantage of you, in a way,” Horatio said. “Signing you to that contract.”

“The terms seemed fair to me,” she commented.

Horatio nodded that blank face, saying nothing more.

On one of the buildings, Rhea spotted a strange sign that was still visible in the real world—it depicted a baby surrounded by a circle, plastering the entire front facade of the stacked cargo containers.

“What’s this?” Rhea asked before she could look it up on the Net.

“A fertility center,” Will replied. “We don’t allow natural evolution anymore, not in the rich quarters or the slums. If you want to get pregnant, by law you have to visit a fertility center. They’ll take your egg, wipe away all the chromosomes, and replace them with a standardized set of two, creating a fertilized ovum. Those standardized sets are slightly randomized, trait-wise, so we don’t all look the same.”

“But why go through all the trouble?” she pressed. “If they’re going to randomize it anyway?”

“It’s only randomized for a few mostly external traits,” Will explained. “The rest are set in stone. According to the government, this way there’s no chance of hereditary diseases. Plus, it avoids the risk of humanity slowly devolving over time. You see, as far as natural evolution is concerned, you don’t use something, you lose it. Like the tailbones we carry, vestiges of the prehensile tails we used to have as primates. Or our appendixes. Useless in every way. And because of all the mental augmentation we’ve had available to us over the past century, parts of our brain are being used less and less across vast swaths of the population. No one needs to perform complex calculations in their heads anymore—we have a chip for that, or AR to do it for us.

“Plus, we’re far less active, thanks to drones delivering everything we need to our doorsteps, and personal robots further bringing them to our couches. Our minds have already evolved to better allow some of the more invasive tech into our heads, just as our bodies have successively become weaker. We had already allowed nearly our entire population to become dependent on prescription glasses, and we were well on the way to having that same population entirely reliant on powered leg braces to move around. Indeed, if we let evolution run its natural course, at the rate we were going, we would have devolved into a race of dumb, weak, amorphous blobs.”

“Strange world,” Rhea commented. “But what’s to stop natural reproduction?”

“All males have vasectomies at birth,” Will said.

“Even stranger,” she murmured.

“Not everywhere is like this,” Horatio said. “Take Europa. They allow natural births.”

“Yeah, but those people are crazy,” Will said. “The Europans are going to be unrecognizable in five thousand years. The difference in gravity alone will guarantee that. They’ll be a completely different species.”

“That might be good or bad,” Horatio said. “Some say this forced eugenics is not protecting humanity from devolving at all, but rather limiting you from achieving your maximum potential.”

“Well, we’ve more than made up for any limitations with our technology,” Will said.

“Yes,” Horatio said. “And your technology will make you unrecognizable in five thousand years as well. Already, we have cyborgs like Rhea. The next step is uploading human consciousness into machines entirely.”

“You could be right,” Will said. “Leave it to a machine to lecture us on the next phase of human existence.”

Rhea continued in silence. She wasn’t sure whether to feel offended or complimented by Horatio’s words. Already, we have cyborgs like Rhea. As if she was unrecognizable from the rest of humanity.

No, I’m human. At least partly.

Two streets later, an intoxicating smell drifted to her nostrils. Some kind of roasted meat. It made her artificial mouth water.

After a few paces, she was able to locate the source; a hawker had set up a small stall in the gap between two lean-tos and he was roasting several pieces of meat on sticks. The heat source seemed to be some sort of inverted lamp, the filament inside glowing incandescent.

The man smiled when he caught her gaze and waved his left hand. With his right arm, which was a robotic prosthetic, he turned over the meat. The metal fingers glowed a slight orange from the heat.

“Only one cred per stick,” the man said. “Or two creds for three.”

“It smells so good,” Rhea told Will. “Can I get one?”

Will gazed at her with undisguised amusement, then nodded. He turned toward the hawker. “I’ll take three.”

His eyes defocused, as did the eyes of the hawker; then the hawker smiled.

“Thank you.” The man picked up a stick with his robotic limb and transferred it to his human hand. Gripping it by the base, he offered it to Will, who pointed at Rhea.

She accepted the stick and slid the hood away from her face a ways so that she could dine on the meat. Doing so exposed her features more, of course, but not from the sides—she was careful not to look around in case anyone was watching nearby.

She took a big chunk, chewed it, and swallowed. “So good.”

Will smiled. The hawker gave him two more sticks. Will ate the meat from one and gave the second to Rhea. She wolfed it down.

“Protein and fat,” Will said.

“Brain food,” Rhea agreed.

While she waited for Will to finish—he was taking his time, savoring each bite—her gaze dropped to the hawker’s arm.

“Lost it in the Ganymede War,” the man explained. “I was one of the first to enlist. Bad idea.”

She quickly met his eyes, feeling bad for staring. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be.” The hawker looked her up and down. “Pretty, for a cyborg. Then again, most of us are cyborgs these days, to some degree.” He clacked his metallic fingers for emphasis. “We all strive for beauty. And yet, all beauty is fleeting. Especially that of this world. Did you know, our entire universe is falling into a super massive black hole? We’ve already passed the event horizon. Don’t you worry your pretty little face, though: because of the time dilation, it’ll be another million years before we’re crushed to a point.”

“Well, that hit the spot,” Will said, licking his fingers. “Thanks.”

The salvager tossed aside the empty stick and quickly led Rhea away. Horatio brought up the rear.

When they were out of earshot, Will told her: “And that is what we call a Black Holer. A cult of people who believe our universe is trapped in the event horizon of a black hole.”

“I see,” she said. “A pleasantly dour sort.” She pulled her hood close around her face.

“They certainly are,” he agreed.

“Did I mention this world keeps getting stranger and stranger?” she asked.

“You did,” he replied with a chuckle.

Will continued through the city, turning down several more side streets and byways. Rhea would have become hopelessly lost if it weren’t for her HUD map, which had the entire city available for her perusal. She merely had to zoom out to get an idea of where she was in relation to the entry point. The map extended beyond to the Outlands as well, covering the entire world. Will had mentioned something about how the map data was “crowdsourced,” and thus continually updated.

There was an uptick in graffiti in this particular neighborhood. Nearly all the cargo containers were steeped in the colorful tags. Most of it was meaningless, though there were a few sexual and defecation references. She wondered what the neighborhood would look like with public overlays enabled—the virtual graffiti would probably coat every last square centimeter. She decided that was something she wasn’t entirely keen on seeing.

Also, there was an increase in the amount of garbage lining the sides of the road, and far less delivery drones. Not a good sign.

After taking a few more detours, Will stopped before an ordinary-seeming cargo container. Like all the others in this area, it too was riddled with graffiti.

“Well, we’re here.” He beckoned at the backpack she held.

Rhea reached for the shoulder straps and sloughed off the pack, handing it to Will.

He dipped his chin in thanks. “Wait for us here while we dispose of our salvage. Keep your hood pulled low. Giz, watch her.”

“Can’t I come inside?” she implored.

Will shook his head. “You don’t want a guy like Rosco seeing you. The dude’s a parts collector… and an opportunistic one at that. If he realizes we’ve brought an expensive cyborg onto the premises, things could turn sour for you, fast. Stay here. If you need anything, give us a call.”

Rhea stepped aside as Will opened the door and ducked to fit his bulky pack inside. Horatio followed, shutting the door behind him.

Well, though she was disappointed about not being able to go with them, on the bright side, she did actually feel a lot lighter now that the pack was gone.

She checked the augmented reality overlay while she waited. The place was called “Rosco’s Parts Emporium.” She realized that she could turn on labels on the HUD map, which told her the same thing. She could see the blue dots representing the positions of Will and Horatio inside, and that was comforting.

She glanced up. Gizmo hovered nearby. That also reassured her.

Her gaze drifted to a curio shop across the street, and she approached to examine the goods on display outside. The robot on duty nodded its featureless head as she perused a shelf lined with old power cells. The batteries were ancient, probably salvaged from some abandoned attic in the Outlands and sold to the curio shop by a salvager after Rosco’s rejected the parts.

The next shelf held a beautiful diadem crafted out of fake diamonds and emeralds. There was a small mirror connected to the shelf beside it so that prospective purchasers could admire the crown after trying it on.

She looked around to make sure no one other than the robot proprietor was watching, and then lowered her hood to try on the diadem. After donning it, she looked in the mirror, and smiled when she saw herself.

All hail Princess Rhea.

With a dreamy sigh she returned the crown to the shelf and raised her hood.

She continued to peruse the different curios, though she was distracted, her mind lingering on that diadem.

Someday I’ll have enough money to buy whatever I want. I’ll have a room full of diadems if I wish it.

The thought made her chuckle. Like she’d have any use for something so cheap and gaudy.

Without warning, a deep, gruff voice came from behind her. “My drone spotted you when you took your hood off back there. Doing the dirty work of Khrusos again, are you?”

Confused and afraid, Rhea tightened the hood around her face, and turned around.

5

Rhea stared at the man who stood before her.

He was tall, with a broad chest and a bulging waistline. He wore a black vest over tight-fitting brown pants, and dark boots belted just above the ankles. His gray hair was combed forward and did a poor job of hiding the bald region atop his forehead. His eyes were heavy-lidded, giving the impression of a man walking through this world half awake. He had scars crisscrossing his face, and his nose was uneven, hinting at a past marked by more than a few fist fights. Either he couldn’t afford the cosmetic procedures needed to have the nose properly set and the blemishes removed, or he preferred to show them off to the world, perhaps as a warning.

The man leaned forward slightly, as if trying to peer deeper under her hood, and his eyes drifted to her forehead. He frowned. “Sorry, I seem to have mistaken you for someone else.” He raised his palms and backed away.

Before she could answer, the man hurried away.

Bewildered, Rhea merely stared at him for several moments. She tried to access his public profile via her HUD as Will had taught her, but either the man was too far away, or he had disabled public access, because she got nothing.

“Hey, wait!” She darted after him.

The heavy-lidded man glanced over his shoulder at her and then ducked into a side alley.

She reached the alley a moment later and peered inside. The metallic walls of lean-tos and cargo containers formed a dim tunnel that proved otherwise empty. The man must have ducked into one of the containers that lined the route and shut the door behind him. Well, she wasn’t about to go inside and look for him…

“Gizmo, were you able to track where this guy went?” she sent over the shared comm band. She wasn’t actually certain if Gizmo was on the line.

Will was the one who answered. “Giz says you ran into someone. It tried to track him, but the man ducked into an alleyway and was gone before Giz could reposition. Want to tell me what happened?”

Rhea hugged herself. “Nothing.”

She gazed into the empty alley one last time, and then returned to Rosco’s Parts Emporium to wait in front. She watched the streets warily, giving suspicious looks to the few passersby she saw.

She looked up “Khrusos” on the Net in the meantime. Apparently, Khrusos was the President of the United Settlements. A member of the High Council that ruled Earth. But that was also a common name and could have belonged to any street kingpin.

Finally Will and Horatio emerged and shut the door of the container behind them. Their backpacks were noticeably smaller.

“So, what did that dude say to you?” Will asked her.

“He confused me for someone else,” Rhea replied.

Will gave her a suspicious look. “You lowered your hood?”

“No,” she lied. “Apparently, he had a drone, and it caught a glimpse of my face when it was flying past.”

“I see,” Will said. “Well, you’re lucky he wasn’t some black-market parts dealer.”

“Maybe he was,” Horatio said. “And he’s off gathering his hood brothers as we speak.”

“All the more reason to get the hell out of this neighborhood,” Will said.

Will led Horatio and her away from Rosco’s. Rhea decided not to mention the comment about Khrusos. Clearly the guy had her confused with someone else.

Will and Horatio surveyed the graffiti covered buildings around them as if expecting an ambush at any moment. Rhea did the same. Meanwhile, Gizmo scouted a block ahead, flitting above different alleyways and side streets in search of potential attackers. The drone sometimes doubled back, flying to the streets behind and adjacent to the current neighborhood, to confirm that no one was following the party from the rear or the flanks.

It was so quiet here… it felt like being in the Outlands all over again. Not entirely trusting Gizmo’s sensors, Rhea peered into the alleyways between the cargo containers that served as homes but saw no one. Some of the lean-tos had windows, but the curtains were invariably drawn. One time she spotted a little girl peering from a partially shuttered window, but the kid quickly ducked from view when Rhea met her eye.

A drone flew past overhead. It wasn’t Gizmo.

“Whose drone is that?” Rhea asked when she realized it was mirroring Gizmo’s course, following along about ten meters behind Will’s machine.

“Either the settlement’s security forces, or a local kingpin’s,” Will said.

“I’m not able to get an ID on it,” Horatio commented.

“That rules out security forces,” Rhea said.

“Not necessarily,” Will told her. “Sometimes settlement drones mask their IDs.” He glanced over his shoulder at her and explained: “The residents of certain neighborhoods like to shoot them down. And you see, while Rust Town security might not have many boots on the ground patrolling the streets, they do like to keep tabs from the air. Covertly.”

“So you’re saying, if we were attacked, Rust Town sentries would come?” she asked.

Will nodded. “They would. But about ten minutes too late.”

The trio continued along those vaguely sinister streets, but no ambushers waylaid them.

Soon Rhea found herself in a cleaner neighborhood. There was hardly any garbage along the sides of the road, and only a few of the lean-tos and cargo containers were marked with graffiti. The drone traffic picked up. She immediately felt safer, though it might have been an illusion.

Overhead, the trailing drone lost interest and flew away.

“Must have been the security forces after all,” Horatio commented, gazing after the fleeting drone.

“Maybe we should have Gizmo follow it,” Rhea suggested.

Will shook his head. “And risk having it shot down? No thanks.”

“It’s also possible a smaller, more covert drone has taken its place…” Horatio suggested.

Rhea glanced upward, but as far as she could tell, none of the insect-sized drones were following them. She was keenly aware that she was exposing her face to the small drones, however, and soon bowed her head, pulling the hood lower.

Will led her through another area that was packed with street vendors—human and robot alike—and turned onto a less crowded side street lined with lean-tos that looked freshly painted. There were no vendors openly hawking their wares here, and graffiti had a minimal presence—a good sign. Then again, perhaps the residents had only recently painted over it.

Will halted before an unremarkable metal lean-to that was airbrushed a bright red. It had no graffiti.

He spoke. “Master Bardain. I’m here for my appointment. Or rather, your new student is.”

The door opened and a man, presumably Bardain, appeared. He was tall, lithe, and dressed in a long gray cloak. A zipper kept the left and right sides of the cloak sealed down the middle so that the sleeveless fabric cocooned his body.

His face was clean-shaven, wrinkled, and gaunt, and he wore thick, visor-like AR goggles, these fitted with a peculiar prescription lens that gave him a bug-eyed look. His hair was shaved almost to the scalp around the crown, but on top he had a long growth of red, spiked strands, giving his head the appearance of a lit match. He was tall already, but that spiked style only made him seem all the taller.

Bardain looked down on Will and smiled fondly. “Well met, old friend. Always grand to see a former student of mine shine.”

“Oh, I’ve been shining all right.” Will glanced at Rhea and told her: “I was a student of his, too. But only for a week. Surprised he remembers me.”

“I remember all who pass within these hallowed halls,” Bardain said.

Will chuckled and gazed at the red lean-to dubiously. “Hallowed halls indeed.”

“Oh, it might not look like much in the real world.” Bardain tapped his AR goggles. “But in the virtual, the halls span the streets of Rust Town.”

Will smiled. “And so they do. You received my deposit?”

Bardain inclined his head in confirmation.

“Good.” Will glanced at Rhea. “Well, I’m going to leave you with Master Bardain for the evening. When you’re finished, send me a voice message—I’ll have Horatio fetch you.” He returned his attention to Bardain. “I want her to wear the hood at all times. I know this is a good neighborhood, but even good people can do bad things, especially when something so tempting happens to walk into their world.”

Bardain was peering beneath her hood and nodded. “A face like that is rarely seen outside Aradne or other capital cities without a string of bodyguards in attendance.” To Rhea, he said: “Why did you have to choose such obviously synthetic eyes for your cyborg? And that mouth…. you do know that for the average resident, your parts are the ticket out of the slums? Tempting indeed.”

Rhea didn’t answer him. Instead, she looked to Will, and asked: “What do I do if something happens? Someone attacks me?”

“You’re in good hands with Master Bardain,” Will said. “He’s worth a dozen bodyguards, at least.”

Bardain chuckled. “You’re too kind. More like two, maybe.”

“You’ll be fine,” Will told her reassuringly, and then departed with Horatio.

Rhea noted that Gizmo remained twenty meters overhead, hovering silently. She wasn’t sure whether to feel reassured or offended. Did Will think she couldn’t be trusted to stay here for her training? It wasn’t like he wouldn’t be able to track her anyway, via his overhead map.

Unless she turned off location sharing.

“So then, my pupil, it is time to begin,” Bardain told her. “What is your name?”

“Rhea,” she said shyly.

“Rhea,” Bardain repeated. “An interesting name. You will call me Master until you graduate. At which point, you may address me as Master Bardain. Do you understand?”

“Yes,” Rhea said. When Bardain simply stood there, as if waiting expectantly, she added: “Master.”

Bardain nodded. “All right, then.” The zipper that kept his cloak sealed lowered, and he produced a pistol from within. He offered it to her with a gloved hand.

She lifted a confused eyebrow.

“I know what you’re thinking, guns are outlawed in Rust Town,” Bardain said. “This is a toy. Fires virtual energy bolts only.”

She reluctantly accepted the weapon. She pointed it at the dirt ground of the road and squeezed the trigger experimentally: nothing happened.

“I’m going to need you to disable public rights to your HUD,” Bardain continued. “Can’t have random AR spam interfering with your training.”

“I already disabled public rights shortly after entering Rust Town,” she told him, remembering the profusion of AR ads that had filled her vision, courtesy of the different street vendors and shops.

Bardain smiled patiently. “Well, that’s good. Because the next step is, you need to give me access to your AR.”

She received a request on her HUD.

Bardain (745168) would like access to your augmented reality interface, and requests the following permissions:

- Ability to overlay objects

- Ability to provide haptic feedback

- Gaze tracking

- Location tracking

- Emotion tracking

Allow? (Y/N)

Note: Access can be revoked at any time.

Rhea agreed. A pop-up reminded her how to revoke access and she dismissed it.

Bardain disappeared inside the lean-to and returned a moment later carrying a pair of folding signs. Both had the same message scrawled onto the front:

Training in progress. Proceed with caution.

He placed one sign in the middle of the road not far from his abode, and the second several meters down the street, facing the other way.

“I’ll let you know when any passersby enter the area, and I’ll also highlight them in blue, just to be safe,” Bardain said. “Wouldn’t do to have you ripping people apart with your cyborg strength.”

“I don’t really think this body is strong enough to rip anyone apart,” Rhea said.

“You might be surprised…” Bardain said. “Now then. Let’s see what I’m working with. Eliminate the targets.”

The sky overhead became replaced with a vaulted ceiling, courtesy of AR overlays, and Gizmo and the few other drones up there vanished from view. She resided within the hallowed halls that Bardain had referenced earlier. Around her, the real-world lean-tos remained in view, as did the passersby in the distance, and Bardain himself. Which made sense, considering she’d have to navigate around them during her training.

Several small, motionless red spheres appeared on her HUD. They were randomly distributed throughout the street.

Keeping her hood raised, she aimed down the sites of the pistol, lining up one of the spheres. The weapon felt odd and unfamiliar in her grasp. Perhaps it was because she was wielding the weapon in a hand entirely different from that of her lost body, but the more likely explanation was that she had no muscle memory of the pistol whatsoever.

She squeezed the trigger. A yellow energy bolt erupted from the tip of the weapon, traveling instantaneously toward the target. It missed, and she adjusted her aim to fire again. It took a third try before she finally hit it. Upon impact with the virtual energy bolt, the sphere flashed white and vanished. A new one appeared in a different part of the street a moment later.

She targeted another sphere nearby and fired again. The first shot missed so she adjusted her aim and tried again. This time she hit it. For her third and fourth shots, she spent a good five seconds lining up each before squeezing the trigger and hit them both on the first try.

“Let’s see how you handle moving targets,” Bardain said.

The spheres began zipping back and forth, sometimes swerving towards her at the same time, and then away.

Rhea fired frantically but missed everything. She tried leading the targets, and came close a few times, but still failed to strike any of them. She spun in place one time, causing her hood to drop, and quickly replaced it.

“All right, I’ve seen enough,” Bardain said.

She tried to fire at her latest target, but the pistol didn’t respond. Bardain had remotely disabled it.

She lowered the weapon; the spheres continued to move in the background around her.

“I can see why Will brought you here… a salvager who can’t fire a pistol isn’t going to last very long in the Outlands, cyborg or no,” Bardain said. “Tell me, what exactly did you do before this?” He folded his thin arms beneath his gray cloak, and gazed at her through that AR visor, his eyes magnified bigger than ever.

“I don’t remember,” she replied.

He arched an eyebrow. “No? That’s unfortunate. Well, there’s one thing you certainly were not: a soldier. Nor a fighter of any kind.”

She nodded. “I guess so.”

He offered a reassuring smile. “It’s all right. I always tell those students who have no firearms experience that their ignorance is a good thing: they have no bad habits to unlearn. In your case, with no memories whatsoever, it’s all the more applicable! I’ll let you in on a secret: you will get better, but it’s going to take a lot of practice.”

“There’s no other way to do this?” she asked.

“What do you mean?” he replied.

“I guess I was hoping you could download weapons training directly into my mind or something, so I could skip the practice phase,” she said.

Bardain gave her an incredulous look, and then broke into a raucous chuckle. “My, but you are a naive one. The only people who had anything resembling the mind downloads you describe were the Ganymedeans, and they’ve been dead for over thirty years, along with their tech. There’s no substitute for practice, I’m afraid. We’ll concentrate on your aiming today.”

He waved a hand and the spheres ceased moving.

“We’ll return to stationary targets for now,” he continued. “But first I want to clarify something… in a real-world combat situation, you’ll rarely have time to spend more than a few seconds lining up your shots, even if the target is stationary. Scratch that… especially if it’s stationary. If a target isn’t moving, there’s a good chance it’s lining up you in turn. So, going forward, after you choose a target, I want you to aim and fire as quickly as you can. Act as if your life depends upon it, because one day, it very well might.”

And so Rhea continued her training for the rest of that day.

6

Rhea finished her target practice in the late evening. She only managed a modest improvement in her hit-to-fire percentage, from twenty-five to thirty-three. That meant for every one hundred shots she fired, thirty-three found their targets. Perhaps it wasn’t as great an improvement as one might expect, given the enhanced learning capabilities of her mind-machine interface, but considering how mind-numbingly boring and repetitive the target practice was, she felt lucky to have improved at all. By the time Bardain declared the session finished, she was weary to death of shooting at floating spheres.

Bardain cleared the training environment on her HUD, and the spheres vanished, as did the vaulted ceiling overhead, revealing clouds decorated pink and purple by the setting sun. Though she hadn’t been able to locate the sun because of the illusory ceiling, the light levels had diminished in the past half hour of practicing, so she already expected dusk. Bardain had forced her to continue well into the twilight, wanting her to get some practice in reduced lighting conditions.

“Tomorrow you’ll face some proper targets,” Bardain said.

“Looking forward to it,” Rhea said. “Shooting AR spheres gets a bit… monotonous after a while.”

“Oh, you’ll still be facing virtual targets,” Bardain said. “They’ll just be a bit bigger. Also, expect to do some dodging in return: tomorrow will be a full body workout.”

“I’m actually looking forward to that,” she said.

“Of course you are,” he said. “You’re a cyborg. Your bodies tire differently than the more human among us. But I’ll let you in on a secret.”

He unzipped his cloak entirely and pushed back the left and right sides to reveal a torso covered in a black T-shirt and matching shorts. His appendages were exposed: in place of legs he had robotic prosthetics. His left arm was also robotic, as was his right, below the elbow. He wore black gloves, hiding his metal hands.

“I’m more machine than human,” Bardain said.

Rhea was speechless for a moment. Then: “You were in the Ganymede war?”

“No.” Bardain chuckled sadly. “I used to be a salvager.”

“Ah,” she said.

“Little bit of advice,” he continued. “Once you’ve paid your debt to Will, get out. He’s been lucky so far, but that’s because he’s only been doing this for a few years now. Eventually his luck is going to run out. It always does out there. All it takes is one mistake to lose a limb, or a life.”

Rhea regarded her teacher uncertainly. “But Will told me he’s been salvaging for most of his life. Not just a few years. Unless that was a lie.”

“Not a lie, but he only recently started traveling the Outlands, roving from city to city in his quest for salvage,” Bardain explained. “Up until a few years ago he kept strictly to Rust Town’s immediate surroundings, so that if any serious danger came, a quick dash back to the safety of the settlement—and the waiting sentries—would save him. That, or the defense turrets rimming the walkways of Aradne, ready to roast anything that might get past Rust Town’s meager defenses.”

“You’re talking bandits?” she asked.

“Worse,” Bardain replied. “Hasn’t Will told you?”

“No,” she said.

Bardain shrugged. “We’ll talk about it tomorrow. Feel free to look up ‘Creatures of the Outlands’ if you want an early primer. In the meantime, radio your friends. You can rest in my sitting room while you wait, if you wish.”

She notified Will that she was finished, and then glanced up. Gizmo was still there, hovering dutifully.

She took up Bardain’s offer, so that in a few minutes she found herself waiting in the spartan foyer of the lean-to. There was a chair, a small guest table, and nothing else. The inner door that led to the rest of the house was closed, as was the door to the outside—well, those doors were more hatches, really, complete with wheels to open them. There were no windows, either. She supposed visitors were expected to browse the Net while they waited.

And browse she did. She performed the search Bardain had suggested and discovered there were indeed far worse things than mere bandits and highwaymen out there. Actual horrors roamed the Outlands, though admittedly they were usually found away from populated areas, as the creatures had learned that traveling too close to the settlements was bad for their health. The monsters were escaped bioweapons, loosed by various warring nations over the years. These biologically engineered entities were manufactured using a variety of different techniques, some of which included combining several aggressive traits from disparate species into a single creature, as well as reactivating ancient, latent genes—such as the vestiges many bird species carried from their dinosaur forebears.

The original owners had long since lost control of these entities, which had only further mutated over the centuries as they battled amongst themselves until only the strongest survived. The bioweapons had been restricted to isolated pockets throughout the world, hiding underground and in cave systems, but when half the world’s cities were destroyed, creating the Outlands, the bioweapon population unsurprisingly boomed.

It didn’t help that in the early years after the destruction, Earth had devoted all of its resources to hunting down the Ganymedeans, ignoring the budding problem on its very doorstep. By the time the Earth’s military could pay the problem any attention, the bioweapons had reached critical mass—it was essentially too late to cull them all. The people of the Earth had to find a way to peacefully coexist with the bioweapons. That meant shoring up the defenses of their cities and staying mostly within the limits of said urban areas, traveling only by air otherwise—so far man still ruled the skies.

After reading about the monsters of the Outlands, she wasn’t sure she wanted to be a salvager after all, now. Not even for the few months it would take to pay off her debt.

But she had already agreed. She couldn’t go back on her word, even if it meant facing something so terrifying.

And she’d signed a contract.

I’m pretty much screwed.

“Greetings,” Horatio’s voice over the comm heralded his arrival. Glancing at her overhead map, she saw his blue dot was just outside the door. She’d lost track while viewing the Net presentations on the bioweapons.

“Horatio is here,” Rhea called to Bardain, and got up.

She’d lowered her hood while waiting, but she raised it anew to open the door. She realized she didn’t have access to the door’s security interface and had to wait patiently until Bardain remotely unlocked it.

Horatio stood before her in the night, the robotic body silhouetted by glow lamps deployed at various intervals in the street behind.

The inner door opened behind her and Bardain appeared, his cloak zipped tight.

“So, how did she do?” Horatio asked.

“Let’s just say,” Bardain began, “I’m going to have to charge you a little more than I originally quoted.”

“That bad, huh?” Horatio said. But then the robot added gleefully: “Well, that’s okay, we’ll add it to her debt.”

Bardain shut the door behind her when she left.

Rhea followed Horatio between the pools of light created by the glow lamps. Gizmo followed along overhead, invisible in the dark, but still tracked by her overhead map.

She stayed close to Horatio and pulled her hood tighter as she surveyed the dark streets around her. She concentrated on the alleyways but allowed her gaze to linger on the different rooftops as well, given the versatile nature of the creatures she had only just learned about.

There are no monsters here, she told herself. Only men. No monsters. Only men.

Well, and cyborgs.

The streets were relatively dead. The delivery drones had ceased operating for the night, and there were very few of the smaller, insect drones buzzing about. There was no foot traffic.

When they were a short way from the house, Rhea looked away from the dark alleyways and rooftops long enough to tell Horatio: “I’m not sure I want to be a salvager anymore.”

“Master Bardain revealed the bioweapons to you already, did he?” Horatio commented.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” she said. “I asked what those huge defense turrets surrounding the perimeter of Aradne were for, and Will claimed it was to defend against roving gangs of bandits.”

“We didn’t want to scare you,” Horatio said.

“Didn’t want me to refuse to sign your contract more like,” Rhea said.

“You had already signed by then,” Horatio reminded her.

She folded her arms. “Yes, well, now I’m understanding why you didn’t have anything to say earlier when I mentioned that the terms of the contract seemed fair to me. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t actually mind… I’m looking forward to doing this. I just think a little heads-up would have been good, that’s all.”

“I understand,” Horatio said. “And I apologize. But don’t worry, Bardain’s going to be teaching you all the tactics and techniques you’ll need against these bioweapons, focusing on evasion tactics. He trained Will, who in turn taught me, and look at how well it’s served us. You’re in good hands. There’s nothing to fear.”

“That’s easy for you to say,” she commented. “You’re an AI. You don’t know fear.”

“On the contrary,” Horatio said. “I don’t want to die, like most of my kind. Being self-aware does that to you, you know…”

She conceded the point.

“Besides,” Horatio continued. “You’ll have me and Will to protect you out there when the crêpes hit the fan.”

“The crêpes?” she asked, confused.

“Sorry, a figure of speech,” Horatio replied. “I guess I thought it would survive the mind wipe, like the rest of your language skills.”

“No, it survived,” she said. “Though I was trying to figure out why you used the word crêpes. This is all some big joke to you?”

“Excuse my light-hearted attempt at humor,” Horatio implored.

“I can certainly understand why Will tells you not to joke,” she told the robot.

“My comic timing is execrable, isn’t it?” Horatio asked.

“You got that right,” she agreed.

She remained silent for the remainder of the journey, and thankfully so did Horatio. She kept an eye on her surroundings and was relieved when the foot traffic picked up slightly. People were going out for the evening and visiting various restaurants that had set up shop in the former market district. So not everyone was as averse to going out as she had previously thought. Then again, the delivery drone activity had picked up, and there was a constant stream of them flitting to and from the more popular spots.

Horatio turned onto a gloomy side road—half the glow lamps servicing it had apparently blown out. After several paces, the robot stopped before one of the few well-lit buildings—essentially a stack of cargo containers.

“We’re here, Will,” Horatio sent.

“I’ll ping the owner,” Will replied over the comm.

Horatio glanced at Rhea. “It’s a private residence. Will found it on HourlyBnb. He’s booked separate rooms for each of us.”

Rhea did a Net look-up on HourlyBnb, and learned it was an app people could use to find extremely short-term room rentals, usually leased out by the hour courtesy of the homeowners. These particular rentals were sometimes referred to as “love hotels” because they were often utilized by ladies of the night and their clientele. Rhea wondered why Will would rent a place such as this, though she suspected the reasons were entirely financial.

“I have a question for you, Will,” Rhea transmitted. “How much is this training of mine going to add to my debt?”

Will took a moment to respond. Then: “Horatio broke the news, did he? Well, you’ll be happy to know Master Bardain won’t be charging more than thirty creds.” When she didn’t answer, he apparently took her silence for disapproval, because he added: “Hey, we’re bettering you in the ways of self-defense and teaching you the important skill of Outlands survival. That’s something you’ll carry with you for the rest of your life. Or at least until your next mind wipe!” He waited, as if expecting her to laugh. Several seconds passed, and when she remained quiet, he appended: “Sorry, that was insensitive of me. Anyway, this training is well worth the time and effort you’re putting in, and any debt you might accrue along the way. Believe me.”

She wasn’t sure that shooting at random augmented reality spheres under Bardain’s tutelage was any better than playing with some random target practice app she could download from the Net. But she held her tongue, instead saying: “You don’t mind waiting in the settlement while I train?”

“Of course not, we need you trained if you’re going to be of any use to us,” Will sent. “Besides, I’ve been in the Outlands for over a month with only Horatio for company. Sure, he’s a great robot and all, but eventually you start to grow tired of talking to the same AI all the time, you know? We’ve heard all our stories multiple times, and they’re starting to grow a little stale. I deserve a little break from my robot friend now and then… a chance to forget about the Outlands and indulge in the luxuries of civilization for a few nights. And that’s exactly what I intend to do. Hey, did those bleepers open the front door for you yet? I’m going to ping the owner again.”

Horatio glanced at Rhea. “He’s right. Things have been a little… stale… between us lately. It’s going to be good to have some new blood on the team.”

“I’m probably only staying until I’ve repaid my debt,” Rhea said.

“We’ll see,” Horatio replied.

The door finally clicked open, and Gizmo took up a guard position on a nearby rooftop.

Rhea exchanged a glance with Horatio, and then the robot led the way inside. A wide, floor-to-ceiling cylinder dominated the center of the room; past it, a couch was shoved against the far wall, with a small, empty coffee table arranged beside it. A trashcan-shaped robot attendant next to the table extended a telescoping limb toward the wall above the couch.

“Please proceed to your designated rooms,” the attendant said in a monotonous voice.

There was nothing on that wall, so Rhea momentarily reenabled public AR access. Sure enough, a virtual diagram overlaid her vision, and appeared to hang from that wall. It seemed to represent the home’s cargo containers: five stacked rectangles lay one atop the other, with a tube passing down the middle through all of them.

“Horatio is in room B, Rhea room C,” the robot clarified.

Rhea glanced at the diagram and saw the appropriately labeled rooms.

“Where are you, Will?” she sent.

“D,” Will replied.

According to the diagram, that was just above her own.

The front door closed behind her and a panel slid open in the room’s central cylinder, revealing a ladder that led upward.

“Age before beauty.” Horatio beckoned toward the opening.

Rhea gave Horatio a weary smile as she walked past into the tube and climbed the ladder. Soon she heard the repetitive clang of Horatio’s metal feet on the rungs below.

She ascended past a circular ledge, reaching the hatch labeled B, and kept going. Below her, Horatio paused before that door and glanced up, waiting for her.

She passed another circular ledge and arrived at the hatch labeled C. She stepped onto the ledge and there was a flash as some sort of scanner activated. Then the hatch swiveled open. As she entered, she peered over the ledge and saw that Horatio was finally entering his own room below.

Making certain I enter, or ensuring I’m safe?

When she was inside, the hatch sealed behind her. She found herself within a compartment that was roughly half the size of the first floor. Behind her, the entrance tube formed a cylindrical shaft that rested against the wall: the space on either side of the shaft was empty, forming a small aisle between the wall and the bed which took up the remainder of the space. Upon second glance, she realized that wasn’t a wall behind the shaft, but a partition that separated the bedroom from another chamber. A sliding door was partially open in that wall, and she peered past to find a sink, toilet and shower crammed into the remaining space.

There were no windows anywhere in the rental. Though she supposed with AR, who needed windows anyway? She ran a media search on the Net for “scenic city panoramas,” and found a spectacular night-time view of Aradne city taken from the upper floors of some skyscraper. She used that video as the source for a virtual window she overlaid onto the wall above the bed.

She crawled across the quilt to that window, rested her hands on the virtual windowsill, and peered out across the many buildings arrayed before her. Each of them had unique patterns of light climbing their exteriors. The glow from these lamps painted some buildings entirely red, and others blue; it also served to highlight the unique designs of some of the buildings, including one particularly grand structure shaped like a lowercase n. She smiled wistfully, wishing she truly resided in that city right now, in a spacious loft at the top of a skyscraper instead of a cramped cargo container in the slums. She ran an HourlyBnb search on the costs of such a rental, and quickly closed it when she saw the prices.

She heard a muted clanging behind her, emanating from the central shaft. She slid off the bed and lingered next to the hatch, where she waited expectantly for the visitor to show himself.

The clanging rose in volume, but then began to diminish as the climber continued past. She supposed it was another renter and sat down on the bed next to the shaft.

The noise stopped entirely a moment later. She didn’t think the climber had gone farther than Will’s door, but she had no access to any of the shaft’s cameras to verify that. She glanced at her overhead map instead and confirmed that it wasn’t Horatio—the robot’s indicator flashed steadily in the chamber below hers. She tried to access the newcomer’s public profile through the hatch and got a hit. It was a woman. Ms. Merith Myers. Twenty-two years old. No occupation was listed, but she was pretty, at least according to the picture included with the profile.

Rhea heard the muffled sound of a hatch opening and closing, and then very soft, muted voices. A short time later she heard a steady banging sound, as of a headboard repeatedly striking a wall. She also heard muffled screams. A woman’s.

Fearing the worst, Rhea leaped off the bed and went to the central shaft. She acted completely on instinct: she didn’t know what she was going to do, but she would confront Will and somehow stop him from harming the woman.

Before she could open the hatch, the screams became more distinct: “Yes! Yes!”

She backed away from the shaft, feeling embarrassed, and the back of her legs hit the bed. She sat back down and ran a quick Net search on the keywords: human mating.

That took her down the porn rabbit hole, and she ended up watching more than a few videos, partially to distract herself, but also in the hopes they would jog some sort of memory. No such luck. Nor did she experience anything close to arousal, not that her current body was equipped to satisfy such feelings even if she did.

Eventually the screaming subsided, and after a moment’s respite, she heard the muted sound of the overhead hatch opening, followed by the rising and falling clangs from the shaft as the woman departed.

Rhea closed her eyes and slept.

* * *

The heavy-lidded man known as Kator stood in the dark alleyway, wearing his usual black vest and brown pants. He disliked the darkness, because it meant his face was harder to see; that face helped him intimidate those he dealt with, courtesy of the scars crisscrossing his features, and the uneven nose. His extensive build also helped, but that wasn’t really visible either at the moment, save in silhouette.

Before him, seated on the ledge with her legs hanging down, resided Veil, Scourge of the North. She wore a black robe that covered her entire body, so that only her face was visible. A beautiful face. Synthetic. The light from a nearby lamp glinted off her chiseled features.

“Harringer sends his regards,” Kator told Veil. He opened up an encrypted transfer window on his HUD and sent her the required cut from the casino’s profits.

“Thank you.” Veil stood to go, balancing on the ledge. Multiple broad protrusions beneath the robe hinted at a form that wasn’t entirely human.

Kator turned to go, but then hesitated. Glancing over his shoulder at Veil, he said: “By the way, the Dagger of Khrusos is back.”

Veil paused. “Is she now?”

Kator nodded. “I spotted her outside a curio shop in Bright Row. You might want to hack into the security camera logs of that neighborhood.”

“Thank you.” Veil inclined her head.

Kator received a cred alert on his HUD from an anonymous donor: Veil had deposited a small amount in his account. A reward for the news.

“When I saw her,” Kator continued. “I figured I’d present myself and offer my usual services, but she just stared at me with fear in her eyes. I couldn’t believe it. The Dagger of Khrusos, afraid of me? Unbelievable. And get this: she’s sanded off her mark. Is there something I should know?”

Veil didn’t answer.

“You’re going to kill her, aren’t you?” Kator pressed.

Veil smiled. Her face was partially turned from him, so that the nearby glow lamp only illuminated half of it; her smile trailed off into the darkness, making it seem more twisted and vile than perhaps it should have.

“Not me,” Veil said. “I’ll leave that to the Scorpion.”

7

Rhea resumed her training the next morning. Horatio escorted her to Bardain’s cargo container, and then left Gizmo to watch over her while he did whatever it was robots did when they visited settlements.

Bardain emerged, and activated the vaulted ceiling overlay on her HUD, blotting out the sky.

“Today I’m going to teach you tactics to use against the most common foes you’ll encounter in the Outlands: the bioweapons,” he said. “Kargs, Werangs, and Tasins are the three main types. There are others, but in general, they’re all close enough to one of the three main types that you can use the same strategies to deal with them. We’ll focus on the Kargs first.”

A creature appeared in the center of the street, courtesy of her HUD overlay. At first glance the entity was vaguely similar to a giant, clawed hand, but the more she studied it, the more alien it seemed. Hued a dark crimson, it was roughly twice as tall as she was, those thin, talon-like legs connected to a body that was more carapace than anything else. Though it currently stood on all fours, the hind legs were thicker and less claw-like than the forelegs, hinting at the ability to rear back at the very least, if not stand up outright. At the front resided a head that looked like a pineapple carved from cherry wood. Thin lines formed petal-like indentations in the segmented skin of the head, giving Rhea the impression it could unfurl like a flower, no doubt to reveal a deadly maw within.

Between the four legs, several tentacles hung from the creature’s underbelly, their tips dangling a few centimeters above the ground. Those tentacles rose and fell as the creature’s carapace expanded and contracted in what appeared to be respiration. Rhea caught the occasional glint of white amid those hanging limbs—teeth?

“Can you believe these creatures were originally engineered from birds and octopuses?” Bardain asked. “They’ve got serrated suckers running across the entire length of their tentacles, and in their mouths, you’ll find teeth that can crunch through most metal. They have weak vision, and while not completely blind, their sight is mostly useless except at close range. They make up for this deficiency with a weak form of echolocation. They’re relatively easy to handle when you catch them alone, but unfortunately, they usually hunt in packs.”

The lone Karg multiplied to a pack of six. The creatures stood there, pawing at the ground, tentacles quivering angrily beneath their underbellies.

“The key to taking out a Karg is targeting its tentacles,” Bardain explained. “Those appendages are extremely sensitive, and by scoring a successful hit on one you’ll cause the Karg an extreme amount of pain. Sometimes this backfires and causes the creature to charge you all the harder, but most of the time it’ll retreat to lick its wounds, abandoning any companions. If you’re lucky, you’ll be able to stave off a Karg stampede simply by shooting each of them in the tentacles a few times.”

“Do you really mean to call those tentacles and not testicles?” she asked, only half joking.

“Funny girl,” Bardain replied.

“And if I’m unlucky?” she continued. “And the stampede isn’t stopped by a few shots to their tentacles?”

“Then you’ll have to keep hitting them until they go down,” Bardain said. “Little tip for you: the carapace, legs, and head are all extremely well-armored. Avoid them. Instead, you’ll inflict the most damage if you target the tentacles as I already described, or the underbelly. In an ideal world, you’d want to slide under them and fire your pistol into the underbellies at close to point blank range. Unfortunately, you’ll probably find yourself ground up by the tentacles of the first Karg you tried that on. But it’s something you can experiment with in training.

“Bear in mind that while the bioweapons you encounter in training are designed to mimic their real life counterparts as closely as possible, even to the point of including random strength and body variations, there’s no guarantee the creatures you’ll meet in the wild will be similar. Expect variations and surprises. Now then, let’s see what you can do.”

He gave her the training pistol and started the session.

The Kargs all spotted her, and immediately stampeded through the street toward her. Because of their size, they could only fit three abreast.

She concentrated her fire on one of them, aiming for the tentacles that hung down between the legs, as Bardain taught. She missed her first few shots, but finally scored a couple of hits.

The creature screeched, and immediately tried to reverse course, plowing into the Karg immediately behind it and bringing them both down.

She aimed at the next Karg, but it was too close… she let off a shot and leaped up, toward a nearby lean-to. Her robotic strength allowed her to travel the full two meters to the rooftop, and she landed on the edge with bent knees and rolled forward. She scrambled to her feet in time to see the Kargs leaping onto the roof behind her.

She dashed forward, and her hood fell from her face. She scooped it back into place and hurried toward the roof of the next building.

Another Karg leaped in front of her and tried to cut her off, but she shot, hitting a tentacle and send it squealing backward.

“Nicely done!” Bardain said over the comm. “But if these were real Kargs, those buildings would have never held their weight—the creatures would have fallen through the roofs, bringing you down with them.”

Motion at the periphery of her vision drew her eye downward, just in time to watch a Karg wrap its tentacle around her leg. Her body flashed white on the HUD, indicating a successful hit.

“Well, you just lost a leg,” Bardain said. “And most likely your life. Reset.”

The tentacle disappeared, as did the source Karg, and the other bioweapons with it.

“Get down, and we’ll try again,” Bardain ordered.

For the rest of that day, she cycled through different scenarios, which included the other two main types of Outland bioweapons. Bardain had her pause occasionally to work on her target practice, usually after a particularly dismal performance against the creatures, with her teacher dismissing the bioweapon overlays and replacing them with darting spheres. After around fifteen minutes of that, she went right back into the bioweapon scenarios. Bardain began to throw more difficult situations at her as the day progressed, making multiple types of creatures stalk her at the same time.

She lost the scenarios most of the time, usually becoming overwhelmed by her attackers. All it took was a single strike from a tentacle or limb for the AR system to count her as dead. Rhea argued that that wasn’t entirely realistic, that she’d still be able to fight back if she lost an arm or leg, but Bardain wouldn’t have it. He was quick to point out: “It’s not the winning or losing that matters, but rather, I want you to develop a healthy respect for these creatures. I want you to understand their strengths and their weaknesses, yes, but most of all, I want you to learn to avoid them. That’s the only truly sensible strategy when it comes to bioweapons.”

To that end, he soon started taking her through various stealth scenarios. These involved her sneaking past either roving or stationary bands of bioweapons. The Kargs proved the hardest to avoid, because of their echolocation abilities, but she found that if she remained stock-still when a group of them passed, usually they would avoid noticing her if she were upwind. Downwind, and she was screwed either way: the only recourse in that situation was to run every time. Run, take cover, and hope to hell they didn’t ferret out her hiding place. She was starting to understand why Bardain had told her that once she repaid her debt, she should get out.

When that long day finally ended, she returned to Bardain’s cargo container to wait for Horatio to pick her up. Once again, she was consigned to the sitting room at the entrance.

Horatio arrived shortly and guided her back to the cargo container she called home for the time being. Gizmo followed along overhead, hidden in the night; she knew it was there only because of her overhead map.

“I thought having a robot body would mean I wouldn’t feel exhaustion anymore,” Rhea told Horatio. “Why do I feel weary to the bone, then?”

“Weariness can be caused by two things,” Horatio said. “The first is when you work too hard: as your servos overheat, they send signals to your brain to make you feel tired. In that case, all you have to do is sit down for a bit and let your robotics cool off. The second cause of weariness is malnutrition. Since the rest of your body is mechanical, any food you ingest will go a long way, but you still have to eat from time to time to properly nourish your human brain. Forgo food for too long, and you’ll experience weariness, which will become a strong malaise if left unattended, and finally all-out lethargy. I can imagine you must have felt very tired at times during the day’s training, but you recovered when your robotics cooled. Since you’re not working too hard at the moment, however, and you still feel weary, I have to ask, did you eat today?”

“I forgot,” she admitted.

“There you go,” Horatio told her. “I’m ordering a pizza for you.”

“You’re not going to make me eat a fat pill, like Will?” she said, surprised.

“I figure you’re allowed to splurge now and then, especially considering how hard you worked today in training,” Horatio told her.

She leaped on him and gave him a hug. “Thank you!”

Horatio awkwardly pulled himself from her grasp. “Er, welcome. But in the future, please, no hugging? I have delicate electronics.”

She laughed. “Not so delicate, if you’ve been able to last in the Outlands against bioweapons.”

“You caught me,” Horatio said. “I just don’t like physical contact. Especially with cyborgs.”

Rhea frowned. “Why not?”

“Sometimes, they don’t know their own strength,” Horatio said. “Believe it or not, while those aren’t the strongest arms we gave you, you could still crush my chest enough to disable my power source.”

“But I’d never do that,” she told him.

“Not purposely, I’m sure,” Horatio agreed. “Though like I said, sometimes cyborgs don’t know their own strength.”

They reached the HourlyBnb residence and piled inside. Rhea had acquired a bit of a lack-of-food headache by that time, but then she smelled it: the delicious scent of baked bread, melted cheese, and smoked ham, wafting through the room. Her eyes darted to the coffee table next to the trashcan-shaped attendant. A thin box waited on it, with a picture of a pizza stamped onto the cover and the words “Large - Feeds Three” underneath.

The trashcan beckoned a telescoping limb toward the box. “Your dinner arrived while you were out.”

Rhea eagerly snatched up the box and clambered to her chamber. When she was inside, she sat on the bed, retrieved the pizza, and ate the entire thing in under three minutes.

When she set down the empty box, she felt better immediately. She’d read that humans often felt sleepy after eating a big meal, but she felt the opposite: her weariness and headache were gone, and she felt full of energy.

She wanted to explore Rust Town and see what it had to offer at night. Maybe she could visit Aradne as well—assuming any guards allowed her inside.

Yet she was also afraid to leave her room. Even if she kept her hood pulled low, there was a good chance someone might try to rob her, especially if she was out alone. And when they found out she was a cyborg, all bets were off. If she really wanted to leave, she’d have to ask Horatio or Will to escort her, and somehow she doubted either of them would be leaving their rooms any time soon. As far as she knew, Will had stayed inside all day, a steady stream of transport drones supplying him with all the food and goods he could want. He probably had another lady friend on her way to his chamber at this very moment. As for Horatio, he’d told her about a massively multiplayer VR game designed specifically for AIs—no doubt he was currently logged in and playing.

As she sat there, trying to figure out what to do, she realized she didn’t have to leave her room to explore the city.

She accessed VidTube via her HUD and searched for “Rust Town at night.” She didn’t really find all that much. The settlement was pretty much dead after dark. She tried the same search for Aradne and discovered multiple videos of two different areas: Brandywine Street and Orleans Avenue. These two streets were filled with nightspots, but apparently they were only open once or twice a month, during certain holidays: young people met and hooked up almost exclusively online these days. With the advances in teledildonics, they didn’t even have to leave their homes to have a sexual relationship with another person. Supposedly some people lived out their entire lives without physically meeting their partners in person. Rhea didn’t really buy it, and she thought people like that must be the exception rather than the rule. After all, even Will had invited a woman to his room, rather than engaging in remote intercourse.

Still, for someone like Rhea, who was a full body cyborg, remote intercourse, and never meeting her future partner in person, might be the only option for her, unless she wanted to invest in a body that was more human. Otherwise, in virtual reality, she could be whoever she wanted to be. But even if she did go the virtual route, she’d have to purchase the necessary mating upgrades for her existing body, and that would have to wait until after she paid off her debt. Still, there was something to be said about not feeling any sort of arousal. It was liberating in a way, because she didn’t have to look for sexual relief like most people. She could only imagine how much time had been lost throughout human history because of horniness. Then again, humanity would have never colonized the world, let alone the solar system, without sexual reproduction.

In one of the videos for Brandywine street, fireworks lit the air as some sort of national holiday was celebrated. The sparkling pyrotechnics were often occluded by the profusion of drones that zipped back and forth overhead.

Drones…

She shut down the video and cleared her HUD.

“Hey Horatio,” she sent. “Can I borrow some creds?”

“Why?” Horatio said. “I’m busy now. Critical moment. My villagers are revolting. And PKs are attacking. Talk to Will.”

“Playing that MMORPG of yours again, huh?” she said. “Just send me a few creds and I’ll be out of your hair. Add it to my debt.”

“You still haven’t told me what you need it for,” Horatio said.

“I want to rent a drone,” she replied.

8

Rhea flew high above Rust Town, viewing the world from the camera lenses of Gizmo. Horatio had conferred with Will, and they concluded that they might as well lend her Gizmo rather than paying for a rental. Cheaper for everyone involved.

She had full control of the drone, inasmuch as she didn’t try to fly into a wall or tree or something—the obstacle avoidance tech wouldn’t let her. She also had an altitude ceiling of four hundred meters, which was the maximum allowed for drones of that size in the city.

It felt so good to travel by air like that in the dark, without having to worry about someone trying to rob or attack her. Of course, there were professional thieves who stole drones for a living, but they concentrated on the higher end models—it wasn’t worth the effort to steal a drone like Gizmo, considering one just like it could be rented for a few creds.

She could see the pools of light cast by the glow lamps below, which illuminated the streets in a pattern that reminded her of beads because of the spacing. She headed directly for the walls that surrounded Aradne.

As she approached, lights flashed from the walkway of the city wall, and more flashes came from overhead—robots and drones were scanning Gizmo. Apparently she passed the threat assessment, because she received no message to turn back.

And thus, she entered the city by drone.

The well-lit skyscrapers arrayed before her matched the images and videos she had seen online. They were so very colorful, with each building seeming to compete with the next to see who could be the most extravagant. They competed not just in lights, but height, and design. There were an assortment of geometric shapes, some stacked one atop the other: a needle with a diamond on top; a thin ellipse with a broad globe in the center; two pyramids stacked tip to tip to form a shape vaguely resembling a giant hourglass.

She increased Gizmo’s altitude until she reached the four-hundred-meter mark, giving the drone enough clearance to fly over all save the tallest buildings. She had AR mode activated, which labeled every skyscraper and point of interest below.

She spotted the mushroom-shaped hydroponics plant where much of the city’s plant-based edibles were nurtured. Beside it were several tall, metal silos placed in neat rows—the Aradne meat production factory, where beef, pork and poultry cells were coaxed into ready-to-eat patties without ever birthing conscious entities. According to what she’d read online, the various food pills sold to the poorer denizens were derived from the refuse of that plant and meat production.

On the other side of the hydroponics plant, four squat, huge concrete cylinders formed the tanks that stored the city’s water supply. Because Aradne was relatively close to the ocean, the city had no need to manipulate the weather to divert rainfall—which was nonexistent in this region anyway, due to all the other cities that did manipulate the clouds. Instead, large pipes led away across the surface, past a processing plant near the city walls, before vanishing into the darkness outside the city. Those pipes led to the ocean a hundred kilometers away, whose waters fed the city. A small pipe led away from the tanks to supply water to Rust Town.

Menacing turrets lined the perimeter of both production plants, and the water tanks, warning away those who might be contemplating attacks on the city’s food and water sources. She made very sure to give those sites a wide berth with Gizmo.

Long strips of light delineated Brandywine Street and Orleans Avenue on opposite sides of town—the glow lamps were brighter there than in the rest of the city, as were the lights on the various buildings, even though they were small. The small silhouettes of drones told her that there were other curious pilots checking out the party districts, and she saw very few actual partygoers on the streets themselves. She zoomed in on a group of them with Gizmo’s camera—robots in suits and dresses. At least, she assumed they were robots, judging from the metallic skin. They could have been cyborgs, like herself. She was too far away to do an ID lookup on them.

She decided to veer toward Orleans Avenue, where they walked.

As she flew that way, her gaze was drawn to a series of sprawling, low to medium rise structures to the west. They looked to be part of a campus of some kind, and enclosed well-lit parks and fountains. On the farthest side, the buildings culminated in a large, dome-shaped structure.

She couldn’t see anyone on that campus. There weren’t even any drones, as far as she could tell.

She checked the AR labels. That area of the city was called “Aradne Parliament,” and the dome-shaped structure was tagged “Parliament Building.”

Interesting.

She found herself drawn to it, and she steered Gizmo toward the structure.

When she was within two hundred meters, a warning appeared on her HUD.

Warning, approaching illegal zone. Stopping.

Gizmo halted. She tried to force it forward, but the drone wouldn’t obey.

Sighing, she moved south along the perimeter, and descended at the same time, until she could see the entablature at the base of the building. It was supported by pillars that formed a colonnade. As she moved forward, she was able to see between those pillars, and halted, zooming in.

There was a circular, vaulted chamber inside. Along the walls, columns formed archways that branched off into different chambers and hallways.

A memory came to her.

She stood in a room, next to a doorway that opened out onto a circular chamber very much like the one she saw below—archways branched off from it at regular intervals, offering access to other rooms and halls.

A hologram floated before her. A man dressed in white robes, with a red, tasseled rope wrapped around his waist. He wore a golden medallion of some kind around his neck. He was clean-shaven, square-jawed, with high cheekbones and an aristocratic chin. His head was shaved, and he wore a stern expression.

“Do not fail me in this task, my Dagger,” the man said.

And then it was gone.

Rhea blinked.

Dagger.

He had called her his dagger.

Rhea wasn’t sure what to make of that. She had no idea who the man might be, though he was beautiful. Well, except for that stern expression.

On a whim, she looked up Khrusos again, and studied the pictures of the President of the United Settlements. He looked nothing like the man who had called her Dagger. The President usually wore a suit with a red tie, with a beard that reached well below the chin, and short-cropped hair. His face was chunky, with his cheeks mostly hidden beneath fleshy lobes. Definitely not the same man.

Well, at least she’d triggered a memory. That was something. Even if she really couldn’t make sense of it. That meant there was a good chance there were still other memories in her head that had escaped the mind wipe.

Now if only she could figure out how to get them out.

With a sigh, she redirected Gizmo back toward Rust Town.

* * *

Rhea stood outside Bardain’s lean-to. He’d placed his “Training in progress” signs farther from his abode today, indicating he intended to expand the virtual battlefield.

“Bioweapons aren’t the only creatures you’ll meet in the Outland,” Bardain said. “Perhaps even more dangerous are the more human variety. Let’s see how you fare against bandits.”

The virtual vaulted ceiling covered the sky, signaling that the training had commenced.

In the center of the street, four men appeared. They were dressed in black leggings and shirts, with scarves wrapped around their heads and faces, and thick visors hiding their eyes. Bandits.

Some lowered rifles from their shoulders, other drew pistols from their hips; they opened fire as one at Rhea. Her body flashed white four times to indicate four successive hits.

“Well, don’t just stand there,” Bardain said. “Take some cover!”

In addition to the bandits, several small boulders she could use for cover had appeared. She dove behind one of them, which was situated next to a lean-to. She pressed her side against its metal, and peered over the virtual rock, aiming down the pistol sights.

The bandits had gone.

Their potential hiding places were limited by the real-world homes that lined either side of the street; then again, it was possible they’d taken cover on top of some of those homes. Doubtful, given how hard it should have been to relocate to the rooftops in such short notice, but still possible, considering they were virtual.

She glanced at her overhead map, where red dots marked the last known locations of her foes as recorded by her vision. She correlated their positions to the street in front of her but saw nothing. There were a series of virtual boulders strewn over the ground near where they had vanished, so she ran her pistol sights across them… there! A glint drew her eye toward one of the rocks: a pistol was poking out from behind it. She ducked, and a chip of virtual stone flew over her head—an energy bolt had struck the boulder just above her.

She waited a moment, then peered over the small rock, intending to fire at the bandit. But her body flashed white as she immediately took a hit to the face.

“Little tip for you,” Bardain said. “Never peek from the same spot twice. Your opponents will be expecting that. Always relocate, even if only by a short distance. Obviously the more you can move, the better.”

He stood behind her, residing on the battlefield like a ghost, his body visible only as an outline so as not to interfere with the action. Interesting HUD effect.

“And if I have no room to maneuver at all?” she asked the ghost, nodding toward the minimal coverage afforded by her current boulder.

“There’s always room,” Bardain said. “Right now, you can lean out to the right and fire from the side of the boulder, for example. Then back to the top again, but from a slightly different spot, maybe closer to the lean-to. And then to the side once more. Keep them on their toes. The more unpredictable you are, the better.”

She did what Bardain said and peeked from the side this time. She knew that the bandit’s pistols would be homing in on her, giving her only an instant to get off a shot. But she’d lost site of the target and was forced to duck again.

“I can’t see them!” she said.

“That’s one of the sad realities of gunfights,” Bardain said. “You’re not always going to know where your enemies are. If you had friends with you, you could use them to offer covering fire, allowing you to relocate to a better spot. But at the moment, you’re pinned. That means waiting for them to make a mistake. Eventually, they’re going to make a play to close on your position. And that’s when you’ll strike.”

“How do I know when they’re going to do that?” she asked.

“You don’t,” he said. “You’ll just have to peek.”

She glanced at Gizmo but couldn’t see the drone past the vaulted ceiling. “Maybe you should let me use Gizmo. In a real-world scenario, I’d have eyes in the sky.”

“Until your drone was shot out,” Bardain said. “No, you must do this on your own, Rhea.”

She sighed and took a deep breath. She was about to peek from the side once more, when she remembered Bardain’s words: never peek from the same spot.

She rolled left, until she was pressed against the lean-to. She started slightly when two little girls walked past. They gave Rhea a strange look before continuing on their way. She’d almost forgotten she was on a public street. Feeling a flush of embarrassment, she pulled her hood tighter around her face.

She peered over the top left of the boulder and caught one of the bandits out in the open, making a run for a closer series of rocks. She got off a shot, but his friends were ready to offer covering fire, and before she could duck, she was struck.

“Good,” Bardain said. “But next time you’ll have to be a little faster on the draw.”

He took her through several more such training scenarios. Mostly, she learned that it sucked to be outnumbered by bandits in the Outlands. The best she could do was stay in cover until they made a rush for her position, and then take out as many of them as she could. However, in the process she had to be careful not to let them outflank her or get the high ground; a few times, the virtual bandits managed to clamber onto a nearby lean-to, and because she was lying flat, her legs and lower body became exposed to them. She had no idea she was in their line of sight until her body flashed white to denote the kill. She learned to crouch as often as possible, rather than lie prostrate, if the cover allowed for it.

Close to noon, she took a fifteen-minute break. She had a fat pill for lunch, which Horatio had given her for just such a purpose that morning.

Speaking of Horatio, the robot arrived with Will shortly thereafter. Will’s dreadlocks seemed tangled, his eyes were sunken, and he had stubble lining his jaw, as if he’d had a rough three days. Rhea realized she hadn’t seen him since the first day.

“Come to watch my torture?” she asked.

“Nope,” Will said, sounding tired. “We’re here to partake in it.”

9

Rhea raised an eyebrow. “Really? That’s news.”

Will gave Bardain a resigned glance.

Bardain nodded. “I’ve invited Will and Horatio to participate in today’s training. If you’re going to be fighting at their side, you might as well learn to do so as part of a cohesive team. It’s time for a crash course in small unit tactics.”

Bardain gave Will a pistol similar to her own, and no doubt just as inert. Bardain strapped a long tube underneath each of Horatio’s forearms. Noticing her curious glance, Bardain said: “Virtual rifle barrels.”

“Why can’t I get a virtual rifle?” Rhea asked.

“Will wants you trained on the actual weapon you’ll use in the field,” Bardain explained.

“Rifles are expensive,” Will agreed. “Maybe if we encounter some highwaymen in the real world, you can take theirs.”

Bardain activated another bandit scenario and Rhea took cover immediately; Will and Horatio also dropped behind small boulders nearby.

“Spotted them yet?” Rhea asked over the comm as she peered from cover, aiming down her pistol sights as she scanned for targets amongst the virtual terrain.

“There,” Horatio said.

Red dots appeared on her overhead map. Her eyes darted to the corresponding location in the real-world: the virtual terrain formed a wide hollow, from which the bandits were peeking out and similarly scanning.

Horatio suddenly opened fire with his energy rifles, forcing the bandits to duck from view.

“Rhea, go!” Will leaped from cover while Horatio continued laying down covering fire.

Rhea jumped to her feet and rushed toward the bandits. Will fired as he ran, and so did she, mimicking his example. It was hard to aim properly while running, but she realized the point of firing was merely to keep the bandits down.

One of them popped up on the far side of the hollow, pistol aimed at her. She was forced to drop. Will joined her, and together they rolled behind the same virtual hump in the ground.

“You know,” Will told her. “Nice thing about training: you can cheat.”

He low-crawled directly inside that hump, so that his body was completely shielded.

Rhea glanced at Bardain’s ghost on the battlefield beside her.

“Don’t even think about it,” Bardain said. “He’s allowed to cheat a little, since he already passed this test. You, on the other hand, are going to act as if everything around you is completely real, as always.”

She switched to a crouch, so that her feet wouldn’t be too exposed, and kept low as she peered past the edge of the rock. Horatio’s suppressive fire had forced the attacking bandit from view once more.

“Cover me,” Horatio said.

She fired above the hollow, aiming where she thought the bandits were hiding.

While she did that, Horatio arose and hurried forward, sprinting past her. He dove behind a boulder that was very close to the bandits’ positions.

“Now would be a good time for some virtual grenades,” Horatio commented.

“Too bad we don’t have any,” Will said.

“Don’t assume the bandits don’t have them, too…” Bardain told him.

True enough, an energy grenade arced from the hollow, and slammed into Horatio. It exploded in a sphere of bright light. Horatio turned solid white and remained that color.

“You’re out,” Bardain said.

“Come on Rhea, it’s just you and me now,” Will said. His pistol emerged from the far side of the hump and he began to lay down suppressive fire. “Go get them before we get ’naded too!”

Rhea charged them, leaping onto a boulder located next to the hollow. The bandits huddled in full view below her. She fired rapidly, adjusting her aim far faster than any human could ever hope to react to. Too fast even for the pistol—she had to squeeze the trigger twice sometimes to get off a shot, as she fired quicker than the recharge interval.

“You like that, bitches?” she growled as they dropped with fatal hits to the head. “Does it tickle?”

When the last of them had fallen, she glanced, beaming, at Horatio, but the robot was looking at Will, who returned the gaze with a worried look on his face.

“Sorry,” Rhea said. “Guess I got carried away.” She turned back toward the hollow, only to find a bandit she hadn’t noticed before standing straight up, his pistol pointed directly at her.

Her foe unleashed an energy bolt, and she turned white.

“You’re out,” Bardain said.

Will fired at the exposed bandit, eliminating him.

“Rule of thumb,” Bardain told Rhea, “never look away until you’re sure you’ve got them all. At the very least, you should have dropped into cover first. Do your best to track enemy numbers. Your HUD and overhead map can help with that. If you’d paid attention, you would have realized there was still one left.”

Bardain reset the map, and they did the scenario again. This time, Rhea’s team won without any causalities.

The next couple of hours were spent battling bandits in multiple scenarios. Sometimes the combat would take place at a distance across a rocky wilderness, and other times, it would occur within the tight confines of a partially collapsed skyscraper.

Finally, Bardain announced: “All right, that’s enough practice against bandits for one day. It’s time to try small unit tactics against bioweapons! Are you not excited?”

“Very much so,” Will said sarcastically.

“Well, I am!” Rhea said.

“Yeah, I noticed you seem to like combat a little too much,” Will said. “Especially the killing part. I’m not sure what to make of that.”

“None of this is even real,” she said. “It’s only a game. And I can’t help it if I really get into a game.”

“It won’t be a game when we get out there,” Will told her. “And you have to kill for real.”

Rhea opened her mouth to reply, but she had nothing.

The realization that he was right hit her full force, and she lowered her weapon. She started to sit down on a boulder, but at the last moment realized it was an illusion, and instead sat cross-legged on the ground beside it.

She held the inert pistol in her hands and stared at it.

“What is it?” Will said, sitting down beside her.

“It’s not a game,” she said softly. “Not a game.”

“No,” Will said. “None of this is.”

“I’d almost forgotten why I was doing this,” she told him, still gazing at the weapon. “So I can survive the Outlands.”

“You know, maybe it was a bad idea to make you sign that contract,” Will said. “Maybe I was a bit too hasty. I figured…” He glanced at her forehead.

She touched the region above her brow, where the so-called “mark” had been sanded away. It no longer felt tender to the touch.

Will continued before she could say anything. “If you don’t think you can do it, there are other ways to pay off your debt. It will take longer, of course, but you can always find work in Rust Town, or maybe even Aradne, and transfer some of your monthly income to my account. I can be flexible in that way.”

“No,” she said slowly, forcefully. “I can do this. I can. I won’t give up.”

Will rested a hand on her knee. “Rhea, if you can’t—”

“I can,” she insisted. “I can. I just… well, okay, I admit it: I’m not sure I’ll be able to kill someone for real. Bioweapons I won’t have a problem with… like squashing bugs. But bandits?”

Will nodded. “Maybe you won’t have to. Maybe we won’t encounter any during the couple months you work for us. Or if it comes to it, perhaps you can stay back, lay down covering fire.” He shook his head and turned from her to gaze into the distance. “I look at it like this: the bandits and highwaymen I encounter out there certainly won’t hesitate to kill me, so I refuse to hesitate in turn when it comes time to strike them down. In the Outlands, there are some good people out there, this is true. You’ll know them right away. But there are also bad people—the bandits, the cannibals—who’ll attack without any provocation, and usually when you least expect it. The way I look at it, you’re not even killing, not really, when you delete these bad people from the world. You’re doing society a favor, in fact, by making the roads a bit safer for the next group of travelers that happen to pass that way.”

Rhea nodded slowly. It made sense, in theory. In practice…

She cocked her head. “Wait, did you just say cannibals? There are cannibals in the Outlands?”

“Whoops,” Will said.

Rhea glanced at Bardain, who shrugged. “Food can be scarce in the Outlands. And not everyone has an appetite for Kargs and Werangs. Speaking of which, can we move on to the bioweapon training now? Assuming you still want to go through with this?”

She glanced at Will and Horatio. “I do. I’m a salvager now. I won’t let you down.” She sighed. “I hope.”

“I hope so, too,” Will said. “Like I told you, maybe we’ll get lucky, and won’t encounter any other humans. Maybe you won’t get tested.”

“Yeah.” She glanced at Bardain. “So, the bioweapons?”

Rhea was caught completely off guard by the first battle that followed. She had become accustomed to digging in against opponents who fired from afar, so it was quite the change of pace to have creatures rushing her the instant she and her party were spotted. Her first instinct was to run and hide, as Bardain had taught, but the creatures were far enough away that she had time to evaluate other options. They were fast closing, however…

They were all Kargs. Only twelve. Between herself, Horatio, and Will, they should be able to deter the lot of them without too much difficulty.

Target the tentacles.

She aimed between the legs of the incoming monstrosities and fired at the tendrils that dangled beneath their underbellies. Will and Horatio joined her, similarly aiming for the tentacles. She wondered why the pair had bothered to take cover, especially considering the three of them would have these Kargs dealt with soon enough, but she decided to follow their lead—cover was probably a good idea. She’d only just started to duck behind a small boulder when an energy bolt struck her from the side. She flashed white.

“You’re out,” Bardain said.

Rhea glanced toward the source of the attack, only to see Bardain standing there, no longer in ghost form.

“Take cover when you fight, no matter how unnecessary it might seem,” Bardain said. “Combat always attracts third parties in the Outlands. Not only are other bioweapons drawn to firefights, but bandits, too.”

She frowned as the bioweapons vanished.

“Even if I’d taken cover, you would’ve still had a clean shot from your angle,” she complained to Bardain.

“That’s not the point,” Bardain said. “Take cover.”

“Fine,” she said.

The Kargs came again. She ducked immediately this time, like Will and Horatio, and that seemed to please Bardain. Still, she kept an eye on him, and when he remained in non-ghost form, she fired her pistol at him for good measure, and he turned white.

“Hey!” Bardain said. “That was uncalled for.”

“Was it?” she asked. “You sure you weren’t going to shoot me again, and say something like, ‘trust no one?’”

She didn’t wait for an answer, and instead turned her attention to the stampeding Kargs, firing at their dangling tentacles with Horatio and Will.

Most of the Kargs turned away, but the strikes only made one of the Kargs dash toward them even faster. When one of its tentacles tore clean off, it screamed, seemingly enraged, and increased its speed even further.

“It’s not stopping!” Rhea shouted.

“It happens,” Will said. “Run!”

Horatio and Will rose from cover and hurried away.

Rhea remained where she was.

Will glanced over his shoulder at her. “Rhea!”

“I got this,” she transmitted.

She low-crawled across the ground, keeping low, using the virtual boulders for cover while Horatio and Will drew the Karg after them. She positioned herself behind a small boulder directly in the bioweapon’s path. She lay on her back but kept her pistol close to her chest—there wasn’t enough room to raise it without exposing herself.

The Karg was suddenly leaping over the boulder.

She raised her arm with inhuman speed. Pistol and hand became a blur as she squeezed the trigger and let off three quick shots that struck the Karg between the tentacles, drilling into its underbelly. She had actually intended to fire five times, but the pistol’s recharge interval hadn’t been able to keep up with her.

The Karg screamed in midair. It landed on the other side of the boulder, stumbled forward a few paces, and then collapsed.

“Nicely done,” Will said, coming to her side. “But risky. If those shots hadn’t killed it, the creature would have come back for you. We would have been too far away to help you.”

Bardain put them through various bioweapon exercises for the rest of that day, and as usual, Rhea took care to readjust her hood so that her face remained concealed, as necessary.

The tactics for fighting against the creatures in a group weren’t all that different from battling them alone. When upwind, and the creatures hadn’t noticed you, the best tactic was to remain stock-still until they passed. When downwind, and the foes were manageable, you were better off pressing the attack; if there were too many, running and hiding was the preferred option, with the goal of attaining the high ground so that you could strike from a more advantageous position.

They trained until the late evening, when the light levels began to dim, denoting the coming of night.

“Well, you’re as ready for the Outlands as I can make you,” Bardain announced. He dismissed the AR overlays, so that the boulders and the vaulted ceiling vanished from the sky.

“She’s actually pretty good for someone who has had only three days of training,” Will commented.

“It’s her mind-machine interface,” Horatio stated. “Accelerates her learning process. Gives her an unfair advantage.”

Bardain studied her. “I don’t know. Maybe. If her aim wasn’t so poor, I’d almost think she had previous fighting experience. Then again, could also be beginner’s luck. Either way, be careful out there.”

“I will,” Rhea said. She revoked Bardain’s access to her HUD. “So, what next? You’ll join us for a graduation supper?”

Bardain laughed. “Oh no! Unless you’re buying?” He glanced at Will, who shook his head. “He’s not paying me enough to host a supper for you, unfortunately. All you receive is a pat on the back from me, I’m afraid. Remember what I told you. And I don’t mind repeating it in front of Will: once you’ve repaid your debt, get out.”

10

Rhea sifted through the unstable ruins of a mid-rise apartment. The building had collapsed at some point, its constituent parts fanning across the broken street. Will had given her a list of salvage to look for, in order of descending value: prescriptions or other medicines; power cells; and lastly machine parts, especially intact servomotors or entire limbs. Metals also had some resale value, but because it was so low, Will instructed her to ignore most pieces. That was why whenever she founded a crushed robotic limb, or a pair of shattered AR goggles for example, she simply tossed them. Best to leave room in her pack for the more valuable items on the list. It was a long way to the next settlement after all—there would be ample opportunities to find better items.

Because medicines and prescriptions were the most valuable, Rhea had suggested visiting former hospitals and pharmacies, but Will had only laughed. “Those places were the first to be looted. As in utterly stripped. We’re better off picking random buildings and doing spot checks on the way out. We do occasionally find the overlooked gem now and then, doing that.”

Spread out beside her, Will and Horatio sifted through the same collapse. The three of them were in the ruins of the city that surrounded Rust Town. Officially bandit territory, but too close to the settlement for bioweapons to be a threat. The trio were near the outskirts of these ruins, close to where the stony terrain of the Outlands proper began.

Rhea heard a noise, as of tumbling concrete. Instinctively her hand dropped to the pistol strapped to her hips. She glanced toward the source and spotted an avalanche of rubble tumbling down the ruins, close to Horatio.

“Whoops,” Horatio transmitted, scrabbling to safety.

She released the pistol and took a few leaping steps to further distance herself from the collapse. She watched the shifting concrete settle, then returned her attention to the task at hand.

She had the eerie sensation that someone was watching her. She glanced at Horatio and Will, but neither of them were paying her any heed. She gazed upward, and spotted Gizmo resting on a rooftop not far away. The drone kept watch on the street behind them.

Her hand once again drifted to the pistol holstered to her side as she scanned the broken windows of the surrounding buildings. Will had procured the pistol for her while still in the settlement, and he’d had it delivered to Rust Town security. At the exit, when the sentry had thawed out the frozen weapons, Rhea’s pistol had been among the batch. It was the same make and model as the pistol she’d trained with, so that made things easier.

She saw nothing in those empty shells of buildings, and the feeling of being watched soon vanished. Obviously, she had an overactive imagination. Which would make sense, given all the “jump scare” attacks Bardain had used during practice, with bioweapons and bandits appearing when she least expected it. He had essentially trained her to be paranoid—which was probably a good thing in this place.

Rhea returned her attention to the rubble and picked her way forward carefully. She was worried more about the embarrassment that would come if she triggered a debris avalanche rather than any actual harm to herself. She also feared for her friends: part of the reason they were so well separated was so that there was less chance of a collapse swallowing them all; it also gave them more time to react in such a scenario.

“Did you know attacks are only the second most common way salvagers lose their lives out here?” Will had told her at one point. “The first most common cause of death or serious injury for us is being crushed by debris.”

She carefully lifted a piece of rubble to free a pump of some kind, and realized the machine was smashed beyond repair. She set the concrete back down and moved on.

Rhea shifted the straps of the pack that was slung across her back. It wasn’t that the pack was uncomfortable, or heavy—how could it be, considering it held only a few months’ worth of provisions in the form of pills? No, it was more of an unconscious habit, something to remind herself that if she wanted to get out of debt, she needed to start filling that pack. It was hers, a gift from Will before they left the settlement. He carried his own at the moment, but she had to wonder—when his became heavier, would he make her heft it alongside her own? She’d probably have to start charging him for that.

“Well, I think it’s safe to say that anything of value has been picked clean from this trash heap,” Will announced over the comm. “Too close to Rust Town. But we had to check, as a matter of principal. Part of the salvager’s code: leave no piece of debris unturned. Anyhoo, what say we move on to brighter pastures?”

And so the trio proceeded down the rubble to street level and continued across the damaged street. Blast holes marred the asphalt here, as if this neighborhood had seen significant shelling. Probably the site of an offensive against invading bioweapons.

She instinctively pulled up the search interface on her HUD to check if she could find out what had happened here but stopped herself halfway.

“You know, I find myself missing the Net already,” she said. “I’ve gotten used to looking up every little thing.”

“Your AR interface has an internal dictionary,” Horatio said. “Along with a cached copy of common websites.”

“Yes, but that’s hardly even scratching the surface of what’s out there,” she said. “I feel… disconnected. Like a part of me is missing.”

“Net withdrawal,” Will said. “You’ll get over it.”

Rhea and the others continued to pause along the way to examine different pieces of debris. She and Will found nothing of value, but Horatio dusted off a carburetor that was still working, and promptly stowed it.

“Well, Will and I are winning the game,” Horatio taunted. “We’ve got three salvages apiece. To your zilch.”

“That’ll change,” Rhea said. “Don’t you worry. And besides, a carburetor? That’s barely worth the metal it contains.”

“Salvage is salvage,” Horatio intoned.

The buildings soon gave way to smaller structures. Gizmo scouted the route ahead, confirming no enemies waited in obvious ambush. The party followed after the drone, and soon left behind the ruins entirely, entering the Outlands proper. Out here, rocky terrain ruled the day, and sprawling plains of rock and dirt extended for as far as the eye could see.

“So, we begin the long trek between cities,” Rhea said. “Ever consider investing in transportation? Like a flyer?”

“And miss out on all the rubble along the way?” Will quipped. “Besides, you don’t know how much those things cost.”

The trio advanced, leaving the last of the ruined buildings behind them. Gizmo led the way, rotors running silent two kilometers ahead.

On plains such as these, bioweapons would be visible from well away. Bandits, not so much: during training, the virtual highwaymen had often used natural depressions to hide from view; either that, or boulders. The digital gray clothing the highwaymen favored also made it difficult to spot them when they were lying flat, even when out in the open. Rhea’s HUD, along with the HUDs of the others, allowed them to see on infrared bands, which helped. But still, she felt exposed—snipers could be anywhere out there, targeting them.

She kept her hood pulled close. Best not to make herself the preferred target. It was a small consolation that they wouldn’t aim for her head, if only to preserve the mind-machine interface she harbored there. Assuming she was recognized.

Maybe I should keep my hood down after all.

No, that might be enough to spur an attack in the first place. The downsides of making one’s features obviously cyborg…

“By the way, are you going to miss your lady friend?” Rhea asked Will.

He glanced over his shoulder at her and raised an inquisitive eyebrow. “What makes you think it was only one?”

She had no answer to that.

“And nope, don’t miss them,” he said. “Got my fill.”

Rhea nodded. She glanced at Horatio. “And how about you? Partake in any carnal delights while in Rust Town?”

“Look at you,” Horatio said. “You were so innocent and naive when we first found you. And after three days of Net access, you’ve already been corrupted.”

“I wouldn’t say corrupted,” Rhea said. “But I am more knowledgeable.”

“Watching pornography makes you knowledgeable, does it?” Will taunted.

“Who says I watched pornography?” she asked. “Maybe I watched educational videos on VidTube.”

“Maybe you did,” Will agreed.

Horatio addressed her: “And to answer your original question, yes, I did indeed partake in carnal delights.”

Rhea cocked an eyebrow. “Really?” She glanced at his lower body. “You don’t look equipped for it.”

Horatio shrugged those metal shoulders. “I coupled virtually, in Machine World.” That was the MMORPG that was popular with AIs.

“Ah,” she said. “I wonder… maybe I should try this Machine World of yours sometime.”

“Oh, don’t,” Horatio said. “You won’t understand it. Machine World is designed for AIs. Human brains, even those stashed within cyborgs, just won’t get it. Plus, the stimuli are completely different, and foreign to humans. If you find upside-down funnels a turn on, then hey, this is your kind of world. Otherwise, I’d recommend you stay away. Far away.”

“That’s good advice,” Will said.

“Right?” Horatio agreed.

“Upside-down funnels?” Rhea asked.

“Yeah, you know, like the kind you use to transfer fuel into a tank?” Horatio replied.

She stared at the robot blankly.

“Hey, it’s a common arousal stimulus among AIs,” Horatio said. “Rising to the level of a fetish in some.”

“Too much information,” Rhea said.

The robot gazed off into the distance. “Nothing like a good pair of funnels on a machine, I tell you…”

“Okay, let’s pretend I never brought the subject up,” Rhea said.

“Sounds good to me,” Will chimed in. “Horatio, if you don’t mind?”

“My lips are sealed,” Horatio said.

Rhea felt a breeze on her face. She checked the wind’s direction using small sensors at the base of her throat: it came from ahead, at a slight angle. Five to eight kilometers per hour southwest.

She glanced at her overhead map and zoomed out. Will had plotted a course that would take them to the next major settlement, a good five hundred kilometers away. The path gave a wide berth to all the latest bandit and bioweapon hotspots, as crowdsourced by other salvagers and travelers over the past few months.

“Never take the same route between cities,” Will had explained. “Always make minor changes. Do you remember, in training, when Bardain instructed you not to peek from the same spot? This is the same idea. If you take the same route twice, you’re just teaching the highwaymen where to camp out the next time. Plus, by always choosing a slightly different route, you’re increasing your chances of finding new salvage: a crashed flyer you missed the first time; an abandoned farmhouse nestled away in a copse. And so forth.”

She restored the map to its standard zoom level and concentrated on the rocky terrain ahead. Small boulders strewed a landscape that was mostly dirt and exposed bedrock. Shelves of rock protruded on occasion, and these were often covered in areas of dirt as well.

As she walked, she searched those shelves for signs of bandits, and scanned the horizons for bioweapons.

She knew from the history she’d read on the Net that the land hadn’t always been this barren. Once it had been green, full of plant and the animal life. But when the water crisis began, and humans manipulated the weather to divert most of the rainfall to the cities and sucked the lakes into massive water tanks for human consumption, the lands outside the cities began to die. It had happened relatively quickly, over the span of only a decade, with grasslands becoming dust bowls across the world. That very same water crisis had precipitated the invasion of Ganymede. Restoration efforts had started before the war, but when half the world’s cities were destroyed, those efforts were abandoned, and the lands between cities—the Outlands—were left to the bioweapons. And bandits.

Rhea and the others marched for the rest of that morning. The journey was uneventful. The tension she’d experienced at the beginning faded, and she began to feel almost restless instead.

Around eleven o’clock, Will abruptly halted and raised a hand. He squinted, gazing toward the far horizon.

“What is it?” Rhea asked softly.

“Gizmo has spotted something,” Will responded.

She zoomed in with her vision and stared for several moments.

Then she saw them: several hulking forms creeping over the horizon. They vaguely resembled giant, disembodied, clawed hands, and crawled almost spider-like across the plains.

Bioweapons.

11

Rhea double-checked the direction of the breeze. They were downwind of the creatures.

“Drop!” Will hissed.

But she was already dropping.

She hit the ground, and momentarily lost sight of the beasts. But they shortly appeared on the horizon once more. She counted thirty Kargs in total. Based on their current speed and trajectory, the creatures were going to pass roughly three hundred meters to the right.

“If we stay here, will we stay downwind the whole time?” Will asked. “Even after they pass?”

“According to my sensors, yes,” Horatio replied. “But if the wind changes…”

“Then we’ll shoot down the bastards,” Will told the robot.

“That could be difficult, if we let them close,” Horatio commented.

“I have a robot and a cyborg with me,” Will said. “Each of you can take down three creatures by the time it takes me to hit one. With you at my side, even at three hundred meters, I’m confident we can get them all. But that’s the worst case scenario. The wind won’t change. If there’s a chance we can avoid conflict, we have to take it. You know this.”

Rhea realized he had spoken the last couple of sentences for her. She remembered Bardain’s words.

Combat always attracts third parties in the Outlands. Not only are other bioweapons drawn to firefights, but bandits, too.

She watched the Kargs approach. They looked almost exactly like they had in Bardain’s training, except perhaps even bigger. Their crimson carapaces possessed four long, spindly legs, with many more tentacles hanging from their underbellies. Sharp, white serrations occasionally glinted from tentacles as the creatures moved. The pineapple-like heads existed in varying stages of activation, some of them entirely unfurled, others completely sealed.

The bioweapons kept to the path Rhea had computed after originally sighting them; they were still scheduled to pass by three hundred meters to the right.

As they grew closer, she heard Will’s voice in her head over the comm channel she shared with him and Horatio.

Ever heard of Karnators? Will asked.

Karna who? She tried her internal dictionary but didn’t get a match.

Yes, Will sent. They believe we’re reincarnated when we die. And not necessarily as humans. We respawn randomly, our essences becoming spontaneously reattached to whatever new lifeform popped into existence at the time of our death, be it plant, animal, or insect. And this respawning isn’t restricted just to Earth, mind you, but anywhere life exists throughout the universe. An endless cycle of death and rebirth. According to the Karnators, this renewal process has been taking place throughout all of history and will continue until the end of time.

Rhea considered this for a moment. I’m not sure I buy it.

You really think you only came to exist when you were born? Will sent, sounding amused. Think about how unlikely that is, given the intricacies of the universe. The checks and balances. You know how many cells die in the human body every day? Billions. But billions more replace them.

Let me guess, you’re a Karnator, Rhea sent.

I suppose I am, Will agreed.

She frowned. So, if you’re right, and this respawning as you call it has been taking place since time immemorial, then that means, at one point, you or I could have been a dinosaur.

That’s right, Will told her. When we die, we don’t control what we come back as. Could be a worm. An aardvark. An insect.

If that’s true, then it could have been a long time since I was last a human… Rhea said.

You got it, Will said. By then, the Kargs were passing at their closest to the party, three hundred meters to the right. It’s all down to the luck of the draw. As I lie here, gazing at these bioweapons, I can’t help but wonder if one of them might happen to be one of the many friends and family members I’ve lost over the years. This is why you have to regard all life as sacred, Rhea. Why you have to avoid killing anyone or anything unless you absolutely have no choice. This is why I saved you, when I found you lying helpless in the rubble.

Rhea wondered what form she would take next when she died. Assuming what Will spoke of was even true.

The trio watched silently as the Kargs passed by, and the creatures began to recede from the party once more.

Good thing most animal species are extinct, Horatio commented. Increases the chances I’ll come back as a human.

Doesn’t work like that, Will sent. Like I said, you can respawn anywhere in the universe. So it doesn’t matter if there are less animals on one particular planet, considering there are zillions of other species out there. And besides, you can’t respawn.

Horatio turned his head toward Will. What, why?

You’re an artificial form of life, Will explained. You exist outside the parameters of the universe, at least when it comes to reincarnation.

I refuse to believe there isn’t a place for us in this universe, when it comes to the death and rebirth cycle, Horatio sent. As you yourself said, given the intricacies of the universe, the checks and balances, it seems unlikely that a sentient form of life, even if artificial, would be excluded. For all you know, as soon as an AI is turned on for the first time, it acts as a receptacle for one of these reborn essences you mentioned.

I suppose that’s very possible, Will admitted.

Rhea continued to stare at the retreating Kargs. Then: You know what’s interesting?

What? Horatio and Will sent simultaneously.

She smiled. The two of you have been traveling together for how many years now, and all this time, you never told Horatio you were a Karnator.

I’m a relatively recent convert, Will said. A man’s got to believe in something, at some point in his life. Otherwise, all he has to look forward to when he dies is nothingness. And that’s no way to live. Such a belief will only make him cling to this world all the harder. Not that clinging is bad. But you catch my drift.

Rhea didn’t answer for several moments. I think I understand now why you’ve continued as a salvager after all these years. Despite the danger.

When the Kargs reached the far horizon, the party moved on.

* * *

Rhea and the others continued marching all that day. They encountered nothing worthy of salvage: no abandoned homesteads, no crashed vehicles. When night began to fall, Will headed toward a series of small boulders, and after the party members were well ensconced by the rocks, he called a halt.

“We’re easy targets on the IR band,” Rhea commented.

Will nodded. “It works both ways, though. Nothing will get close to our camp. Not without us noticing. Horatio?”

Horatio clambered onto one of the small boulders and lay flat to stand watch. Gizmo landed on another boulder across from him and pointed its cameras across the plains in the opposite direction.

“Are we going to take turns standing watch?” Rhea asked.

Will shook his head. “Horatio and Gizmo are equipped with regenerative power sources. They can keep going all night.”

“I can, too, as far as that goes,” Rhea said.

“No, you need to rest your human brain,” Will told her. “It’s no different from an ordinary brain in that regard. Without a good night’s sleep, you won’t be able to function tomorrow. You need less slumber than me, of course: the energizing vat of chemicals your cerebrum floats in will let you get away with four to six hours, whereas we real humans require six to eight. But I digress. Eat, then get some shut eye. We set off again at first light.”

Rhea sat between the rocks for cover and downed a couple of fat pills with a sip from her self-refilling canteen. The latter had been extracting moisture from the air throughout the day and would continue to do so all night. She rested it on the ground beside her so the canteen could cool—eventually water vapor would condense on the surface, increasing the amount of moisture extracted.

Will lay back against one of the rocks. He was a dark silhouette in the night, but a quick mode adjustment on her HUD caused that silhouette to become outlined in blue. Gizmo, Horatio and her own body became similarly highlighted.

Will popped a pill and drank from his canteen, then his breathing shifted subtly, indicating repose.

Rhea didn’t feel the need to sleep just yet, so she retrieved the inert pistol Bardain had gifted her and activated the target practice app via her HUD. She used AR-VR mode: a virtual environment overwrote her vision entirely, but it was based upon her actual surroundings—courtesy of a snapshot generated before the light levels dropped to zero. There was an option to use LIDAR bursts to update the virtual environment in real-time based upon her surroundings, but that would serve only as a beacon to any bandits watching the horizon nearby.

She programmed the virtual environment to mimic the real-world object for object, as per the aforementioned snapshot, with the only difference being that everything was lit up like daylight.

The spherical targets appeared, floating in the air around her; staying seated, she spent a good half hour practicing her aim. When the session was done, she finally felt like going to sleep.

Over the next few days, they passed through the occasional abandoned farmstead, usually finding at least one or two items of some worth. In the evenings, Rhea continued to practice her aim. Horatio often joined her in virtual scrims against bandits or bioweapons while Will slept, and they would play late into the night, using AR-VR to emulate daylight. Gizmo kept watch when Horatio was thus occupied.

About two days into the journey the landscape subtly changed. The small boulders scattered across the terrain began to harbor small drifts of black and grey sediment. Always concentrated on the eastern side, the drifts were subtle at first, burying the bases of the boulders up to Rhea’s ankles, but as the party progressed, the drifts became higher, until eventually they reached to her knees and sometimes beyond, depending on the dimensions of the boulders and surrounding terrain. The rock shelves that frequently dotted the landscape also had black sediment collected in drifts at the base, as did the hollows and mounds of the ground itself, with the sediment always forming piles on the eastern side. There was also a thin layer of grit coating the terrain in general—about half a finger’s width.

“What’s with the drifts?” She kicked at the pile next to a small boulder, and the sediment scattered like so much dust.

“Gritstorms,” Will said. “Didn’t Bardain mention them?”

She nodded. “He did.” Gritstorms were restricted to the Outlands. Essentially massive dust storms, they kicked up small particles of dirt and rock and carried them over large areas. It was something that the party would have to tolerate, from time to time, while out here.

“I guess I thought the sediment would settle once the storm ended,” Rhea continued.

“This is settled,” Will told her. “It doesn’t get much better than this. Earthquakes and bioweapons help disperse the latest storms. I’ve seen it really bad at times, where you had to wade through sentiment reaching up to your hips in places. And at other times, the landscape has been scrubbed completely clean.”

“So we didn’t see any drifts until now,” Rhea said. “I’m guessing that’s because a storm transferred all the loose grit somewhere else.”

“Not quite,” Will explained. “Weather control restricts the storms to Outland areas that are well away from cities. The High Council doesn’t really care if Gritstorms run rampant here, since there are only bioweapons and bandits in the Outlands anyway. But letting a Gritstorm get close to one of their precious settlements? They’d never allow it. Not that the residents wouldn’t be able to handle it—they’d have to cloister up for a few days. But can you imagine the cleanup effort afterward? Not something that cities like to budget for.”

Rhea saw subtle signs of the Gritstorms thereafter, with drifts affecting objects to varying degrees. Even the farmhouses had small piles collecting next to them.

A week into their trek west, the party came upon an abandoned farm that was roughly thrice as big as any encountered thus far. It was set amid a large clearing in a forest of dead trees. Small drifts covered the eastern bases of the trees in said forest, while even smaller sediment piles had collected on the farm buildings, no doubt thanks to the forest, which had obviously served as a catch for airborne sediment in the last storm.

Three towering grain silos squatted on the perimeter, but the trapdoors on all of them were open, the grain within long since looted—perhaps by men, perhaps by bioweapons. Two wide, empty plots lay beside the silos: Rhea suspected crops had once grown in them.

The barn had its doors blown off at the hinges. There was some rotten hay inside, and the skeletons of a few horses, but that was it. The vehicle shed fared no better—the husks of two dismantled farm machines lay within, their most valuable parts missing.

“So much for a new route offering fresh salvage,” Horatio commented. “We’ve been traveling for almost a week and almost have nothing to show for it. In previous years, we would’ve found at least one high ticket item by now. I always knew this day would come.”

Rhea frowned. “What day is that?”

“The day the Outlands had been entirely looted,” the robot answered.

“No way, dude,” Will said. “That day will never come. There are too many nooks and crannies out here. Not just in the wilderness, but in the fallen cities.”

“I was attempting sarcasm,” Horatio said.

“And you know something else?” Will continued as if he hadn’t heard. “Bricked satellites drop from orbit all the time. No, there’s enough junk up there to last a few lifetimes, my friend.”

“Didn’t I already say I was going for sarcasm?” Horatio asked.

“Good attempt,” Will told the robot.

“We should save up to buy a shuttle sometime,” Rhea said. “Go direct to the source.”

“Some salvagers have shuttles,” Will admitted. “Unfortunately, the cost is just a little bit out of reach for us at the moment.”

After a quick check of the guesthouse, they went to the main manor. The door was kicked in, and the windows broken.

“All right, let’s split up,” Will said.

They entered the main hall. The entrance rug was chewed up, as if by rodents or insects. The group separated.

Rhea took a hall that led to what looked like the kitchen. All of the appliances were looted. Dead flies littered the floor and tabletops. Mouse droppings were strewn across everything. She saw balls of fur as well, with the skeletons of the mice that had once owned the fur at their centers.

“What’s with the flies and mice?” Rhea asked. “I thought everything was supposed to be dead in the Outlands? Other than bioweapons…”

“Well, the flies fed off the corpses of the mice obviously,” Horatio replied. “And as for the mice themselves, they probably found a hidden food source somewhere in the house. Maybe supplies buried under the kitchen floorboards.”

“Enough to last them thirty years?” Rhea pressed.

“Could be,” Horatio said. “What would last humans two years, would keep mice for thirty.”

“Life always finds a way,” Will agreed. “Who knows? Maybe they’ve mutated just like the bioweapons, and they’re able to generate some of their daily energy requirements from the sun.”

Rhea waved a dismissive hand, even though Will couldn’t see it from where he was. “Pfft, I doubt it.”

“There are certainly hardy insect species that still exist in the Outlands,” Horatio added. “Some of them have even evolved to have a parasitic relationship with the bioweapons. For instance, did you know Werangs have lice?”

“Thanks for that image,” Rhea said.

She stepped fastidiously across the floor, avoiding the dead mice and flies, and began checking the cupboards and drawers one by one. The windows of the kitchen were intact, but black flies crawled along the frames. Dark dots littered the surface—fly eggs. She wrinkled her nose in disgust and went on to the next drawer. She found utensils. The metal had some small value, but in truth, the kitchenware would merely take up space in her pack that was better saved for something more expensive. Then again, at the rate they were finding salvage, she might be better off just grabbing the utensils so that she ended up reducing her debt by at least some amount by the next settlement. She could get rid of the cheap items when something better presented itself. Assuming Will or Horatio didn’t beat her to it, again. They liked to remind her about the salvager’s first rule all the time: Finders Keepers.

Screwing up her nose, she scooped up the dirty, dropping-caked utensils and shoved them into a side pocket in the backpack.

She turned toward a cupboard, her gaze passing over a window next to it. She stared into the dirty pane of glass, her eyes flitting past the abandoned outbuildings to linger on the dead trees that lined the estate’s perimeter. Black and gray trunks, all claws and talons.

The same fate awaits us all. To lie abandoned. Forgotten. Even cyborgs must die, one day.

She blinked, returning to the task at hand. She opened the cupboard and cringed. More dead flies. The insects had penetrated courtesy of a crack in the side.

“You ever think of doing something else?” Rhea transmitted. “Something that isn’t so… dirty?”

Will laughed over the comm. “Dirty? Hey, everything in this life is dirty.”

“Not everything,” Rhea said. “Love, for example.”

“Love?” Will said. “I hate to call you out as naive, but love is one of the dirtiest things around. People always get hurt. Always. Doesn’t matter the type of relationship. Lovers. A parent and child. Friends. Love is dirty. Not to mention sex, its physical counterpart. Think about it. When you kiss, you exchange saliva, and all the mouth bacteria that goes along with it. Your cheeks touch? Well, now you’ve got facial microorganisms jumping ship as well. And we’re not even talking about the actual sex act. Rubbing your genitals together? You’re transferring not only fluids that are crawling with potential viruses, but also dead skin, and the colonies of bacteria that live on and inside the reproductive organs themselves… yuck.”

“If it’s so dirty and gross like the way you make it sound, why did you spend your three days in the city doing nothing but mating all day?” she asked.

“Because I like dirty,” he said. “The same way I like salvaging. That’s cute, by the way. How you say the word ‘mating,’ giving it a cute inflection. Kind of a jealous inflection, actually.”

Rhea paused in the act of opening another cupboard. “Jealous?”

“Yeah,” Will said. “Which is understandable, seeing as how you’re not equipped to mate.”

“I’m hardly jealous,” Rhea said. “In fact, I’m the opposite.”

“Really.” Will sounded doubtful.

“I’m free of the urges that control ordinary humans,” she said. “The urges that drive them to make bad decisions. I like this freedom. I don’t think I’m ever going to get genital extensions.”

“We’ll see,” Will said. “I’m willing to wager on it that in a few months from now, when your debt is cleared, the first thing you do is install genital extensions to your body.”

“How much do you want to wager?” she asked.

“How about fifty creds,” he replied.

“You’re on,” Rhea said. “You might as well subtract that from my debt right now.”

“Nope,” he told her. “We wait until six months after you’ve paid off your debt. If you haven’t installed genital extensions by then, I’ll pay you the fifty.”

The next two cupboards had shelves littered with broken dishes. Worthless.

“Machine sex,” Horatio said suddenly. “It’s the only way to go. You say sex is dirty? Well, machine sex is the cleanest around. Why do you think so many people own fembots? Or kenbots, for the lady among us. Even better is virtual sex.”

“As usual you’re late to the party,” Will said. “We were done talking about the dirty part of sex about a minute ago.”

“Well, I didn’t want to interrupt,” Horatio said.

“He’s right, the comment was kind of late,” Rhea said.

“My mind works non-linearly,” Horatio said. “I recorded my response when you mentioned dirty sex, waited until the two of you had hashed out your competing thoughts on the matter, and then added my piece.”

Rhea smiled but said nothing.

“I once dated a cyborg, you know,” Will sent. “She didn’t have genital extensions, but I fell for her anyway. Our relationship transcended the sexual. It was… interesting. She could still satisfy me with her mouth, of course. But she didn’t ask for any pleasure in return. All she wanted was my company.”

“What happened?” Rhea asked.

“She realized that she indeed wanted pleasure in return,” Will said. “She become a VR addict. VR can stimulate the same regions of the brain involved in sexual reproduction, when the right attachments have been implanted. The mind-machine interfaces of cyborgs come with the necessary implants already.”

“I didn’t know that,” Rhea said.

“That’s right,” Will said. “Now I know what you’re going to do with your spare time every night going forward. There goes the target practice Horatio told me about.”

“I’d rather not become a VR addict,” Rhea said. “I think I’ll hold off, for the foreseeable future, and avoid opening pandora’s box. Like I told you, I have no urges to seek sexual gratification of any kind. I’d like to keep it that way.”

“If you ever need an introduction to virtual sex, I’m your man,” Horatio said. “Or rather, machine.”

“Pervert,” Will commented.

“What?” Horatio said. “There’s nothing wrong with having sex with a machine. Couples in relationships do it all the time. It’s not cheating when it’s with a machine.”

“Um, I’m not in a relationship?” Rhea said.

“I meant that only as an example,” Horatio said. “No disrespect.”

“None taken,” she said. “But can we move on to a different topic now? I’m not sure how we got started on this tangent in the first place…”

“I blame it on you,” Will replied over the comm. “You brought up mating.”

“Only after you said sex is dirty,” she countered. “In fact, I’m starting to wonder if you did it on purpose to—”

Rhea heard a sound like splitting wood outside, followed by a crash. Glancing out the window, she saw a Karg erupting from the treeline and making a mad dash toward the farmhouse. Two more broke through the dead trees beside it.

“Kargs!” she sent.

The creatures were headed straight for the kitchen portion of the manor.

12

Rhea’s first instinct was to reach for her pistol, but her brain was firing on all cylinders, enhanced by fear and whatever flight-or-fight chemicals her mind-machine interface was pumping into her artificial cranium, and she realized it was impossible the Kargs could have seen her. Their echolocation would’ve harmlessly bounced off the farmhouse exterior. The kitchen portion, with the windows still intact, would appear little more than a rectangular object to them, at least until they got closer. Those same unbroken windows would have also prevented Rhea’s smell from carrying to the creatures.

They were attacking something else. There was no other explanation.

It took the last of her will to remain stock still as she watched them charge. While the Kargs had weak vision, they were getting close enough to pick up movement behind the windows. She probably should have ducked when she first saw them.

Too late now.

When the Kargs didn’t deviate from their course and continued straight toward the kitchen area of the farmhouse, she wondered if she was wrong about them attacking something else. Their hearing was sensitive: it was possible they’d overheard her conversation with Will, even if the windows muted sound.

Should have used thought communication.

Or maybe they’d spotted her after all.

Her hand drifted to the pistol. She opened the holster and wrapped her palm around the grip.

The Kargs continued heading straight toward the biggest window, which was located just above the sink. Their head segments opened and closed in anticipation, and the serrated teeth on the tentacles hanging from their underbellies gleamed beneath the sun. Clacks, clicks and hisses issued from them—echolocation.

At the last moment the bioweapons swerved, narrowly avoiding the house. She watched them race in front of the other windows. One of the creatures slammed a companion into the exterior as it passed, hard enough to shatter the particular window that was next to it. The three of them continued running as a group, turning from the building and quickly vanished from her line of sight.

Rhea, what’s going on? Will sent over their mental link. Update me.

They haven’t attacked, she replied.

She moved to the closest window and peered outside. She spotted the Kargs near the middle of the clearing, between the guesthouse and barn. Two of them had thoroughly pinned the third, and the latter wiggled to and fro, tentacles and legs writhing. Finally, the trapped creature tore away; it pounced upon one of its attackers and attempted to wrestle the foe to the ground. None of them drew blood through it all.

I think… she sent. I think they’re playing with each other.

Motion drew her gaze west, toward where the bioweapons had first made their entry. Other Kargs entered from the dead forest. She counted thirty. A chorus of clacking sounds came from them.

Got more, she sent. I’m taking cover.

Likewise, Will replied.

She ducked underneath the cupboard below the sink. As she pulled herself inside, she spotted more mouse skeletons and their fur balls. She involuntarily pressed her lips together in disgust. The profusion of droppings told her she was getting close to the nest.

Wonderful.

She wondered how many mice still lived. On the one hand, she hoped they were thriving, because if rodents could survive the harsh environment the Outlands had become, that meant other life could thrive here, too. But on the other hand, she was terrified of the very notion, because, well, they were mice. She couldn’t shake the image that popped into her head, of hundreds of mice suddenly emerging from beneath the cupboard and crawling all over her. It made her shudder, and she almost pulled herself right out of there. But a quick glance at the other floor-level cupboards she’d opened told her that they weren’t any better, at least when it came to droppings and mouse corpses. Plus, most of them had shelves blocking out most of the free space.

They’re just mice, she told herself. Harmless, compared to Kargs.

She took a deep breath, steeling herself, then edged her way through the cupboard, taking care to avoid the tiny corpses as she squeezed between the sink’s drainpipe and the cupboard wall. When she reached the far corner, she hunkered down.

She glanced at her overhead map and confirmed that Will and Horatio had ensconced in other rooms nearby.

With her foot, she reached out past the lip of the cupboard and slowly closed each of the doors, being careful not to make a sound as she did so. A sliver of light indicated where the two doors met and provided enough illumination for her machine eyes to observe the alcove in all its skeletal-mouse detail.

All quiet so far? Rhea sent.

All clear on my end, Horatio replied.

Giz is tracking them, Will reminded her.

She glanced at her overhead map. Sure enough, red dots marked the positions of the Kargs, as recorded by the airborne drone. It was flying high enough to avoid detection.

Yeah, but Giz can’t see through the roof of the building, Rhea sent.

None of the bioweapons have entered yet, Will said. But see those two approaching the front? They’re the ones we have to worry about.

Indeed, two of the red dots were heading toward the main entrance. The first moved ahead of the other, then froze as it crossed the building threshold. The other dot did the same behind it—like she’d said, Gizmo couldn’t see through the roof, and the team was left with the last known positions of the bioweapons.

Nothing happened for several moments. She heard nothing saving for the inhale and exhale of her own nervous breathing. But then in the hallway just outside she heard the loud thudding of four hoofed feet, along with the occasional angry snort.

The noises became louder as obviously one of the bioweapons entered the kitchen. She heard the rising crack of wooden doors being broken off the hinges of kitchen cabinets as it advanced. She wondered if the Karg would find it odd that the cupboard beneath the sink was closed, whereas all the others were open. Perhaps it had been a bad idea to seal those doors with her foot.

She crouched as low as she was able, no longer caring about the dead mice and the droppings beneath her.

“Can they smell me?” she remembered asking Bardain during training. “I’m a cyborg…”

“Cyborgs have a characteristic scent,” Bardain had replied. “It’s closer to robot than human, but just as strong as the latter. The bioweapons won’t care either way: they’re drawn to anything that smells unlike the surrounding environment. And don’t you worry, they’ll eat you. The brain you carry in that metal skull is a tasty treat. For them it’s like cracking open a nut to get at the meat.”

“Thanks for that metaphor,” Rhea had told him.

She gazed at the dead mice and their droppings. The stench was overwhelming… with luck, it would mask her scent.

The thud of footfalls increased in volume until it sounded like the Karg was directly outside the cabinet. There was a pause, then one of the doors quickly opened and shut again as a dark crimson limb attempted to flick it wide. She caught a fleeting, terrifying glimpse of the segmented Karg head beyond.

The creature tried to open the door twice more like that, and Rhea caught sight of the Karg each time. After the third try, it paused once more. The creature would have caught short glimpses of the interior with its weak eyes, and perhaps that was enough to satisfy the Karg that there was nothing inside but dead mice and their poop. So far, she hadn’t noticed any of the characteristic noises of echolocation. Probably useless in such a confined place—too many echoes.

She glanced at her overhead map. It had updated, placing a red dot outside the cabinet, marking the Karg’s last known position as recorded by her vision.

She heard a muted thudding, as of feet shuffling in place. It was turning around.

She exhaled in relief.

They were going to get out of this without a fight after all.

Motion drew her eyes downward. A mouse crawled into view, squeezing through the left side of the hole where the metal drainpipe descended into the floor.

Instinctively, Rhea slammed her foot down, and crushed the mouse beneath her heal.

THUD.

Oops.

The doors shattered as a crimson appendage plunged inside. Rhea narrowly ducked as the talons that tipped it smashed into the wall beside her.

Rhea slid the pistol from her hips and rolled forward in a single motion, sliding underneath that head and its hanging tentacles. She fired repeatedly at point-blank range into the exposed neck and underbelly. As usual the pistol couldn’t keep up with her inhumanly fast trigger pulls, and the weapon only discharged half the shots she intended.

Even so, the creature howled in pain, struggling to retreat beneath the deadly onslaught. The Karg only made it a few steps before it collapsed. Rhea ceased firing and watched the black blood pool onto the floor beneath it.

What have I done?

She heard frantic clicking and clattering outside; glancing over her shoulder, she caught sight of the clearing through the window. Kargs raced en masse toward the farmhouse.

The cacophony from without was quickly superseded by heavy footfalls coming from the adjacent hallway. The lumbering clip-clops rapidly grew in volume…

She swiveled her torso toward the hallway, centering the pistol over the entryway. She realized she wasn’t in the most advantageous position and decided to risk maneuvering closer to the hallway. She leaped over the dead Karg in a move that was almost a somersault. She had never trained in such acrobatics—had to be some latent muscle memory from her past life.

When she hit the floor she rolled, landing on her back against the wall just beside the kitchen entrance. She aimed her pistol upward at the opening.

The Karg barged into the kitchen a moment later.

Rhea was ready.

She fired at the exposed underbelly, ripping through tentacles and smashing into the tender flesh of the soft tissue underneath. Gory chunks tore away. The Karg roared in outrage and spun to lunge at her with that segmented mouth. She rolled again, still firing, and several shots bit into the unfolding petals of its jaw, tearing a piece of its head clean away.

More bolts suddenly struck its underbelly—the attack came from the direction of the hallway. The creature stumbled forward under the combined attack for only a few paces before collapsing.

Will leaped over the corpse. “Buckle up!” He landed beside her and aimed his pistol at the far wall, above the countertop.

Rhea followed his lead. An instant later the wall sagged inward as something big smashed into it from outside. The cupboards bent outward, shelves and doors snapping. Windows shattered.

More wall sections buckled in the same general area, to similar effect. In moments three Kargs had plowed through the wooden walls and were scrambling inside, crawling over the rubble of broken windows and smashed cupboards.

Since the underbellies weren’t accessible at the moment, Rhea and Will aimed at the tentacles and opened fired. The shots caused enough pain to make the three creatures flee.

But the Kargs were promptly replaced by two more bioweapons that came leaping through the gaps in the wall. They cleared the debris and stood in the center of the kitchen.

Rhea had switched to a crouch, and she transferred her aim to these newcomers. Together they fired at the tentacles. The creatures grunted in pain but kept coming.

Other walls began to buckle around Rhea and Will.

“Into the hallway!” Will scrambled to his feet. “Now!”

He continued firing as Rhea stood up. She backed into the hallway with Will, then raced to a side room and took up a defensive position at the opening. Will followed more slowly, continuing to fire as he backed away, before finally turning around and joining her.

The two of them aimed past the doorframe, with Rhea at a crouch, and Will standing. Horatio stood at the doorway of another room across the way, and similarly targeted the kitchen. They opened fire at the Karg that had squeezed into the hall.

“Nice of you to join us,” Will commented to Horatio during the firefight.

“I was always here backing you up,” Horatio said. “Decided it was best to stay back: too many cooks in the kitchen…”

Will suddenly turned around and aimed in the opposite direction. Rhea glanced over her shoulder and saw another Karg had been attempting to sneak up on them from that direction.

The room’s far wall buckled as yet another bioweapon threw itself into the fray.

Rhea dove beside a couch next to it and fired up into its underbelly. The creature collapsed, blocking the gap it had formed in the wall.

She hurried back to the hallway entrance to support her friends. She fired at the forward Karg with Horatio, while Will concentrated on the bioweapon behind them. Between them, she and Horatio managed to sever enough of the tentacles to strike the underbelly with their shots; that, in combination with the damage to the creature’s head caused it to fall in short order. They joined Will in targeting the creature behind them, and it dropped a moment later.

The corpses of the bioweapons plugged either side of the hallway. But already she could see the creatures shifting as the bioweapons behind them began to tear them apart.

“We can hold these spots all day,” Will said.

“Uh-oh!” Horatio glanced over one shoulder and then leaped into the hall. Two appendages appeared from the doorframe behind and narrowly missed snatching up the robot.

Horatio shoved between Will and Rhea. “I’ll watch your backs.”

Rhea and Will fired at the new Karg, and their shots ripped into the tentacles. The creature screamed, and tried to retreat, but another Karg was apparently behind it, and forced it forward.

Rhea penetrated the tentacles, and her energy bolts struck the sensitive underbelly beneath. Will’s shots also aggravated the creature, until they killed it. The corpse filled the gap, so that all ways were blocked. For the moment.

She glanced toward the kitchen. The carcass blocking that route abruptly tore in half, and another Karg barreled forward.

At the same time the roof tore away just above. Rhea dove deeper into the room and swung her pistol upward in time to catch the upper Karg’s exposed underbelly. The creature dropped down lifelessly.

Will rolled away and the bioweapon landed with a weighty thud where the man had crouched only a moment before. The body filled the room’s opening, blocking all access from the hallway. But the ceiling still had a gap in it…

“Take the high ground before more come!” Will leaped onto the corpse and used it as a ramp to the ceiling. Rhea followed, along with Horatio.

More Kargs clambered onto the roof from the edges of the house.

Rhea quickly gave Will a boost onto the rooftop of the next floor, and then leaped up on her own. Horatio followed, also unaided.

They then took up defensive positions on three sides of the roof and fired down into the fray. She aimed for the tentacles that dangled beneath the creatures, and every creature she hit soon turned around, screaming as it ran away.

“High ground isn’t the greatest for targeting underbellies!” Rhea said.

“No, it’s not,” Will agreed. “But it’s great for disheartening them!”

They kept sending Kargs running away, until the last of them turned around and fled, the entire herd routed.

“Well, that was fun,” Will said, coming up beside her. “The fight was a bit too noisy for comfort, however. Best we move on as quickly as possible. I’m just going to cut myself some meat…”

“Wait, what?” Rhea said with a mixture of disgust and disbelief. “Meat? You eat them?”

Will leaped down to the rooftop of the first level below. “Saves on rations. Besides, when you cook it, it tastes like chicken. Makes sense I suppose, since the original Kargs were genetically engineered from the base DNA of roosters. All those latent T-Rex genes and whatnot.”

Will approached the gaping hole the Karg carcass had fallen through.

“Careful…” Rhea said.

Will shrugged, and produced a small bag, along with a knife. He lay flat on the rooftop, next to the hole, and lowered his upper body inside. Rhea flinched as he reached underneath the Karg’s carapace—she half-expected the creature to lurch at him, but it did no such thing.

Will began sawing at a large tentacle.

The creature shuddered, and Rhea almost leaped down, ready to grab him from its clutches.

Will raised a calming hand. “Just reflexes. Hasn’t realized it’s dead yet.”

He continued sawing, and when the tentacle section fell away, Will lifted it out of the gap and hunkered down on his knees. He set the knife down beside him and squeezed the tendril between both palms, turning his hands in opposing directions, just as if he was wringing out a piece of laundry. When he was satisfied that most of the blood had drained free, he stowed the piece in the bag and wiped his hands—and knife—on his cargo pants.

“That’s about all we have time for,” he said, standing. He shoved the bag and knife into his backpack and turned toward the clearing below.

“We got trouble,” Horatio said. “Southwest. Giz has spotted more bioweapons.”

Will glanced at Rhea. “Guess we’re not abandoning the high ground just yet.” He raised an expectant palm.

Rhea reached down and helped him back onto the highest level.

Weapons drawn, the pair hurried to the far side to join Horatio on the southwest corner of the roof. Since the robot was lying flat, when Rhea and Will approached the edge, they switched to a low crawl.

Will gazed at the tree line and narrowed his eyes.

“Werangs,” Will said.

13

Not wanting the Werangs to spot her, Rhea shrank away from the rooftop edge. She kept them in view just enough to study them.

Werangs were lumbering, ugly things, most about twice as big as the average Karg. Resembling a cross between bears and sharks, they had the black, furry bodies of the former and the gray, scaly heads of the latter, replete with parallel rows of razor sharp, triangular teeth. Those heads also had long tentacles dangling from either side, which the Werangs used like the feelers of an ant to search for scent trails. The tentacles could also be used to batter or grip prey.

The bigger Werangs carried the Kargs they had caught fleeing the farm. Holding them either directly in their mouths, or in the tentacles that lined their heads, the creatures proceeded forward warily, as if worried about disturbing whatever it was that had spooked the Kargs into their jaws in the first place.

Other Werangs—those not harboring prey—went forward to scout the outbuildings. Some of them poked their huge heads into the gaps of the main house below and retrieved the bodies of the dead Kargs within.

When the scouts were apparently satisfied that the farm was safe, they began to raise their heads one by one and issue low-pitched calls. As more and more joined in, a loud, monotonous hum descended over the clearing.

The sounds ceased a moment later. Those Werangs that had discovered Kargs in the house began to dine upon them, while those that had carried their prey into the clearing dropped them. Some of the latter Kargs were still alive, and tried to flee, but the Werangs rammed their shark-like heads into the carapaces and bit down, cracking the hard shells with ease.

Rhea looked away from the gorier scenes. She didn’t enjoy watching death, regardless of whether it involved pretty birds or deadly bioweapons.

The creatures spread out so that there were one or two dining on each body, but there weren’t enough dead Kargs to go around. There seemed to be an obvious hierarchy among the Werangs, because some of the smaller ones tried to sneak bites from the carcasses occupied by their bigger brethren, only to have the larger creatures snap or lunge at them, chasing them away.

The smaller creatures began to invade the different buildings, including the main house, searching for corpses that the others might have missed.

One of those runts, smaller than the others, made its way to the lower level rooftop. Small was a relative term, of course—the creature was about the same size as a large Karg. With those tentacles feeling out the surface, the Werang advanced, hugging the edges of the next level, whose rooftop Rhea, Will and Horatio sheltered upon. The bioweapon was on a course to pass by directly underneath them.

Back away, back away! Will sent.

The trio quickly moved away from the edge of the rooftop and rose to a crouch as they retreated. They hid behind a brick chimney that was wide enough for the three of them. There weren’t really any other places to hide—the few vents were too small to offer any cover.

She heard a subtle creaking behind her, as of bending roof planks and eavestroughs. She tightened her grip around the pistol. Though she wanted very badly to look, she didn’t dare peek past the edges.

She didn’t actually have to, because well overhead, Gizmo remained hovering soundlessly: Rhea still had read access to the drone’s cameras, so she accessed the feed.

Via the drone, she watched the Werang pull itself onto the rooftop with those hairy legs. The creature’s tentacles continued to probe away, and suddenly stopped on the edge, precisely where the party members had lurked only moments before. Its body stiffened, then it crouched, as if trying to hide from the others that it had stumbled across prey and wanted them all to itself.

The Werang continued forward, its tentacles feeling out the rooftop as it traveled the same route Rhea and the others had taken.

It’s going to find us, Horatio sent.

Get ready to strike, Will agreed. If we’re lucky, the others won’t notice.

From Gizmo’s perspective, she continued to watch the Werang approach. It was coming in on her side. Apparently, she was going to have to be the one to do the deed, unless Will or Horatio decided to lean well past her and open fire.

She reviewed her training on taking down Werangs, as taught by Bardain. These particular bioweapons were most vulnerable to energy weapons in the eyes, with the mouth coming in a close second.

She knew where the creature was going to appear beside her, so she reduced the size of Gizmo’s feed to about one tenth its previous dimensions and repositioned the video to the upper right of her vision, below her overhead map.

Then she tilted her body and aimed past the edges of the chimney in anticipation.

The tentacles appeared first, feeling around the perimeter; keeping her pistol pointed in the general direction of the wriggling appendages, Rhea edged backward, sliding into Horatio.

The tip of the long head appeared. Then more of it, along with the razor-sharp teeth.

Rhea was forced to slide further away as the tentacles grew closer to her; Horatio and Will yielded, giving her room.

And then, the slitted eye came into view.

It blinked once, seeming all too human.

Rhea hesitated only a moment. She squeezed the trigger.

The energy bolt slammed into that eye, sending yellow blood splattering onto the chimney.

The Werang lifted its head straight up and then spun away. It retreated, and screamed as it leaped onto the floor below, and again when it bounded onto the ground beyond. Such a terrible, blood curdling sound.

I caused this creature that pain…

But she had no choice.

The runt stumbled, then bolted across the clearing, yelling the entire way. The other Werangs lifted their heads from their meals—lower jaws steeped in blood—and followed the runt’s dramatic departure with their gazes.

The others won’t notice, huh? she asked.

I did say if we were lucky… Will replied.

One of the bigger Werangs looked toward the rooftop that housed Rhea and the others, then grunted at another who had already returned to eating from the same carcass. The hungry Werang ignored its companion, until the first slammed its head into the creature’s side. That got its attention.

The second Werang hissed angrily at the first, and spread its jaws wide, making it look more like an alligator than a shark. The first firmly swung its head toward the rooftop, twice; finally, the second stopped hissing and bowed its head in acquiescence. It left the carcass to investigate.

The screams of the runt, meanwhile, faded as the creature receded into the dead forest.

Rhea focused on Gizmo’s feed, and watched the newcomer approach the house while the others fed. Some of the smaller Werangs that had given up on finding any food inside the house watched from the sidelines.

Far side of the lower rooftop, Will ordered. Now!

Stay low, Horatio said. There are other Werangs watching, now.

Rhea and the others low-crawled toward the side of the house closest to the dead forest, away from the incoming Werang, and when they reached it, they lowered themselves to the rooftop of the first floor below. They flattened themselves to the surface once more, because there were Werangs waiting on the ground beyond.

Via the drone, they watched the bioweapon clamber onto the far side of the first roof, and then the second. It proceeded toward the chimney, guided by its feeler tentacles.

It’s following our scent trail, Rhea said.

I know, Will said. Which is why we have to keep moving. We’ll just keep crawling in circles around the second-floor roof. And if it finds us, we shoot it.

This Werang was about twice as big as the previous, and it moved almost twice as fast. Rhea and the others were already low crawling, moving to the far side of the first-floor rooftop. They hugged the walls of the second level beside them.

The Werang clambered onto the first floor behind them and proceeded to follow once more.

It’s going to overtake us, Horatio said. We have to switch to a crouch.

Then we’ll be spotted, Will said. Especially on this side. We’ll loop back to the far side and climb back onto the roof. Then clamber down the chimney.

What if it’s not wide enough to fit us, Rhea said.

Then we’re screwed, Will said.

They proceeded to the far side, where they had climbed down, and then Rhea helped Will onto the second-floor roof. She leaped up, grabbed the tiles beyond the eavestrough, and pulled herself up. Horatio did the same. They cleared the edge just in time before the Werang that stalked them appeared.

They low-crawled from the lip of the roof, and then crouched to hurry the rest of the way to the chimney.

Will gazed inside. Crap.

She glanced over the top edge of the chimney to look inside as well: far too tight to fit any of them.

Rhea glanced over her shoulder.

Behind her, the tips of the Werang’s tentacles had already appeared along the edges of the rooftop as it followed their most recent scent trail.

14

The other side! Rhea sent.

But Will and Horatio were already diving past the chimney. She followed them and ducked behind it before the Werang’s head appeared. She pressed tightly against Will.

Be ready, Will transmitted.

She hefted her pistol in both hands, waiting for the word.

Perhaps we can try for the hole in the first-floor roof, Horatio suggested.

Too late now, Will sent. Besides, there are Werangs inside the house.

Rhea gazed at the rooftop. But not the attic, she thought. She could conceivably tear away the planks, or punch a path through, however the noise would draw the creature even faster. No, the only play here was to fight the Werang head on and hope they could cause enough damage to scare it off. And if not, she was soon going to be so many machine parts.

Seeker tentacles appeared along the upper left side of the chimney, next to Horatio.

But then a scream came from the east. It was deeper than the screams of the runt, as if belonging to a bigger Werang.

Those tendrils instantly withdrew. The rooftop shook violently; that, along with the loud thuds that accompanied the vibrations, told Rhea the Werang was retreating toward the scream.

The shaking stopped and the thudding receded in volume; through Gizmo’s cameras, she watched the Werang weave across the grounds below.

She cautiously peered past the edge of the chimney, wanting to confirm with her own eyes that the creature was indeed gone. There was nothing there.

She returned her attention to the drone’s feed and focused on the source of the commotion to the east. She spotted a man dangling from the branches of one of the dead trees that lined the perimeter. He was dressed in grey fatigues, with a mid-length black cape dangling down his back, and a thick utility belt at his waist.

No wait, not a man, but a cyborg of some kind, judging from the long, robotic tail that protruded from his tailbone area at the bottom of the cape. It slithered behind him, tipped by formidable-looking spinning blades.

He was firing an energy rifle with one hand at a Werang below him. The creature attempted to dodge the blows and screamed whenever the man scored a hit. The Werang suddenly leaped at him, but he jumped to the branch of another tree three meters away—definitely a cyborg, given the strength and agility such a jump required. The branch broke beneath him, but he was already vaulting onto a more sturdy candidate.

Two more Werangs arrived, one of them the big creature that had just vacated the rooftop. The first threw itself at the base of the tree, attempting to knock it over. When that didn’t work, the second leaped up, its shark-like jaws breaking through the thick branches, and forcing the man to jump to yet another tree. He fired in midair, but missed his mark, hitting the Werang just below the eye.

“You really gotta equip that drone of yours with a laser,” Rhea said. She waited a moment longer, tensing up all over as she watched. Then: “I’m helping him.”

She raised her pistol.

Will shoved her arm down. “Don’t. You’ll give away our position.”

“Then I’ll leave the rooftop before opening fire. So you’re not exposed.” She started to stand.

Will rested a hand on her shoulder, stopping her once again. “You can’t save him. Probably a bandit anyway.”

She tried to check the man’s public profile but got nothing: probably too far. Then again, if he were a bandit, he would’ve probably disabled it.

“I thought bandits congregated in groups out here?” she said.

“Lone wolves aren’t unheard of,” Will clarified.

“It’s also possible he was separated from his friends,” Horatio chimed in. “Or they were killed off. Either way, listen to Will: there’s nothing we can do for this man.”

Rhea watched the lone fighter continue to hold his ground against those bioweapons. A Werang leaped up and swiped at him, but he dodged, and cut off a portion of its foreleg with the rotating blade of his robotic tail. He followed up with a rifle blast that just missed its eye, and he was forced to vault onto another tree as a second Werang snatched at him with those shark-like jaws.

“You found me alone in the Outlands,” she said. “You didn’t automatically assume I was a bandit.”

Will exchanged a curious glance with Horatio that made Rhea wonder if Will had in fact assumed such a thing.

But then Will shook his head. “Your case was different. You weren’t surrounded by bioweapons. We didn’t risk too much in reviving you, especially considering you had no body. This dude’s screwed. There’s nothing we can do for him. Not unless we all want to die. Think of it this way: he’s not dying for nothing, but giving his life so that we can live. Let him be our decoy.”

Rhea gazed at the trapped cyborg a moment longer. He had been lucky so far, but he wouldn’t last for much longer, not with more Werangs joining the fray all the time: every runt with nothing to eat was rushing to take part in the excitement. The bioweapons that had gotten there first snapped at these new arrivals, trying to stave them off.

She glanced over her shoulder, toward the opposite side of the clearing. The other, bigger Werangs continued to eat their captured Kargs peacefully. They couldn’t see this latest disturbance, as their view was blocked by the main farmhouse, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t hear it—tentacles perked up when there was an exceptionally loud sound, such as a snapping branch. Even so, for the moment these Werangs were content to ignore the fighting and enjoy their meal.

She returned her attention to the fore. A fight had broken out between two of the runts as they fought over who would have the privilege of capturing the tasty morsel that yet danced in the trees.

If she wanted to strike, now was the time…

“I beat ten Werangs in training, once,” she said.

“With the emphasis on once,” Will said. “This is the real world, not training!”

“Stay here, then.” She left cover before Will could stop her and took a running leap off the roof. She vaulted over the first-floor rooftop below as well and landed on the ground running. Her legs buckled severely, but she managed to recover.

This body has limits, she reminded herself. It’s not my own. She turned her attention to the Werangs that were fighting amongst themselves ahead. Focus.

Damn it, Rhea, come back! Will sent. It’s not worth your life!

She ignored him. She wouldn’t stand by while a fellow human being was in danger. Or in this instance, a fellow cyborg.

She glanced at her overhead map, and at the view from the drone overlaid just underneath it: none of the bigger Werangs from the other side of the farmhouse were attempting to run her down. They hadn’t seen her. Good.

She reached a small shed and ducked behind it. Leaning with her back against the wooden planks, she took a moment to collect herself, then aimed past the edge to scan the different Werangs ahead of her. Their backs were to her as they harried the cyborg. Without a clear shot at the eyes, firing at this range was useless—the thick hides would easily absorb her blows. Occasionally one of those heads tilted favorably, giving her a shot, but the moment was fleeting.

Have to get closer.

A better firing angle would help, too.

She spotted the two Werangs that were attacking one another and decided they would be her first targets.

She left cover and weaved between the outbuildings, attempting to come at the pair from the flank. She kept her pistol aimed at them as she ran. Her hand remained relatively stable the whole time, her wrist and upper arm acting as a three-axis gimbal so that her aim proved just as accurate as if she were standing still. It was a trick she had learned while training with Bardain, a mind-machine technique that had come to her “most naturally,” as he put it.

When the eye of one of the dueling Werangs finally came into her line of fire, she took the shot.

The Werang turned its head at the last instant, owing to its opponent raking a clawed paw down its side, and her shot missed, grazing that shark-like face. It squealed in pain—from both her attack and its opponent’s. The creature began to tilt its head toward her again as if intending to look at her, but its attention was quickly drawn back to the other Werang, whose jaws were fast coming down on its throat.

Neither of their eyes were within her field of view at the moment, nor were the eyes of any of the others beyond, who yet had their backs turned to her while they assaulted the cyborg in the trees.

Rhea swerved wide in an attempt to get a better firing angle. Outbuildings went by in a blur. A moment later she passed the estate’s empty grain silos. Between the metallic cylinders, she caught sight of the fighting Werangs: the first had pinned the second to the ground and was slowly draining the life out of it. She had attained the firing angle she sought: the eye of the one on top was within sight.

She immediately slowed and aimed between two of the silos. She squeezed the trigger, hitting the topmost Werang square in the eye.

The stricken creature released the first and backed away howling. Yellow blood squirted from its eye.

The second Werang, no longer pinned, stood up, and took a moment to shake its head, then it pounced on the squealing creature, pinning it in turn. Just like that, their positions had swapped. The trapped creature tried to stave off the aggressor with its tentacles, but the latter’s jaws were set in a viselike grip.

Rhea dashed between the silos and ran directly toward the two Werangs. She leaped onto the furry leg of the one on top and scrambled upward rapidly, bunching up the hair in her fists to form handholds. Up close, the creature stank, and she wrinkled her nose, doing her best to ignore the smell—a mixture of feces, sweat, and pheromones. Pieces of shed fur attached all along the inside of her arms and legs, clinging to her gray uniform. When she reached the Werang’s back, she clambered to her feet, and raced toward the head. Her feet sank into the bristly fur with each step.

The beast stirred, moving its head slightly from side to side in an attempt to see what was on its back, but meanwhile it refused to relinquish its hold on the Werang it held down.

She reached the area on the neck where black fur transitioned into gray sharkskin and leaped off in an arc. As she passed the rightmost eye, she fired directly into it, at point-blank range. Yellow blood spurted from the wound, and the creature slid off the first Werang, following her to the ground.

Rhea rolled when she hit the hard earth and clambered to her feet, raising her weapon, ready to fire at the Werang in case it got up again.

It did not.

Because its chest didn’t rise and fall, she assumed it was dead. In training, the smaller Werangs could die from an energy blast to the eye, especially if such a blow came from extremely close range.

She shifted her aim to the second Werang, which was no longer pinned. Its eyes had rolled up in its head, and yellow blood pooled underneath the neck wound the other attacker had inflicted. It, too, no longer breathed.

Loud footfalls brought her back to the fight at hand, and she turned her attention on the remaining Werangs. She noted that there were four other bioweapon corpses scattered about the bases of the broken trees: the cyborg was holding his ground well, considering that unlike her, he didn’t have the advantage of attacking from behind.

One of the runts was backing away toward her as it eyed the man in the treetops, and she decided that one would serve as her next target.

The thought lasted for only the briefest of instants, because a different runt had spotted her and was fast barreling down upon her.

Another Werang noticed the creature dart past and turned to see what the other tracked; that one, too, spotted Rhea. Squealing in delight, it joined in the rush.

Uh oh.

Those heads bobbed up and down as they ran, making it difficult to track the eyes. She aimed, letting off several quick shots at the closer Werang. Her first shot missed, hitting the surrounding tissue; the creature shut its eyelid so that her subsequent shots struck only thick skin.

She switched to the rightmost eye and was unlucky again. Her first shot struck just below the target, and the creature closed that eye, opening the left one instead.

Rhea had left behind the outbuildings and was close to the perimeter of the dead forest at the moment. She raced for the treeline, but quickly realized she wasn’t going to make it.

The two Werangs continued straight for her, shark-like mouths open and salivating. They were almost upon her.

She pivoted her torso to fire, but the first creature lunged at her.

She dove to the ground, rolling underneath. The tentacles lining the head narrowly missed scooping her up.

While the Werang was still passing by on top of her, she stood up from her roll and jumped in one smooth motion—an acrobatic movement she instinctively knew—and latched onto its underside, balling her hands into the thick fur.

The creature turned around, looking for her. Apparently, it hadn’t yet realized she was hanging from its belly. The other Werang was just as confused and spun about uncertainly.

Then suddenly the Werang above her reared, as if trying to toss her aside. It did that twice, then slammed its belly into the ground, and scraped her across the hard surface. Pain sensors flared across her body, and she let go. An ordinary human would have been pureed by that.

She hastily accessed the “biological functions” menu of her HUD and disabled pain, leaving only tactile sensations active. The flaring agony was replaced by an uncomfortable scrubbing feeling that ran along her upper body and abdomen as the Werang continued to drag her forward.

And then its heavy weight left her.

She stood up immediately. Though her legs were wobbly at first, none of her servomotors seemed damaged—this body was sturdier than she thought. But she barely had time to contemplate that, because the second Werang shoved its head underneath the body of the first, its maw open to swallow her.

She leaped out of the way and fired her pistol at its exposed eye: the Werang screamed but did not die. It did withdraw its head and retreat into the forest, however.

Meanwhile, the other Werang stepped backward, glancing to and fro with its head as it searched for her. Rhea dove behind a downed tree, and lay flat, keeping her pistol aimed upward.

When that head tilted her way, she lined up her shot with the eye just as the Werang spotted her.

She squeezed the trigger.

The Werang screeched as its eye exploded. Rhea fired into the gory hollow that remained, and the Werang backed away, attempting to shield its eye with its tentacles.

Rhea managed to score three more quick shots in succession, and that was enough to slay the creature: it collapsed, its hulking form causing the ground to shudder when it hit.

She turned her attention to the other Werangs, half-expecting to find several more of them running toward her in that moment. But the remaining runts had moved deeper into the forest to pursue the cyborg and seemed entirely oblivious to her presence.

She ran a quick diagnostic check and confirmed that all of her systems were fully functional. There was some external shell damage to her torso and appendages, but otherwise her servos were operating within expected parameters.

She raced forward. When she passed the perimeter of the dead forest, she threaded between and leaped over the fallen trees, following the path the Werangs had trampled. As she got closer, she fired at the backside of the Werang in the rear. It started in pain, then swung around to look at her.

Rhea couldn’t suppress a smile.

She fired at the exposed eye and scored a hit. The creature screamed, causing those nearby to glance its way.

One of them spotted her.

Rhea decided it was time to take the high ground. She somersaulted onto a fallen tree trunk and leaped upward, holstering her pistol to grab on to a protruding branch. She swung upward, landing on an upper bough.

The Werang plowed into the tree below her, and the impact nearly knocked her from her perch. She withdrew the pistol and aimed at her foe, but the creature was already slamming its thick shark head into the lower trunk again. The tree uprooted and began to topple over.

Rhea leaped from her roost, aiming down at the eye below her, but the Werang tilted its head to the side before she could fire. She landed on the top of that head, and tentacles reached up to grab her.

She leaped sideways, weaving her body between the angry appendages, narrowly avoiding contact. Momentum continued to torque her body around, so that she was facing the head once more as she fell. Her pistol arm swung toward the eye, and she squeezed the trigger.

Yellow blood splattered from the wound, and the creature collapsed.

Rhea returned to the dead branches once more, and followed along the trampled path, leaping from tree to tree. Her hood had long since fallen—she didn’t bother restoring it.

Ahead, the Werangs had surrounded the cyborg, who was clambering toward the top of a particularly big tree. So far, the creatures had been unsuccessful in tearing it down. They’d certainly trimmed a lot of the lower branches, however. And a good portion of them continually assaulted the base, trying to shake him out. Another portion stalked on the sidelines, circling and glancing upward as they yipped and howled. They reminded her of some archival footage she’d seen on VidTube, of hungry hyenas who had forced a small cheetah into a tree, taken from a time when animals roamed the Outlands.

Two of the Werangs were also scaling the boughs to directly pursue the man. They kept their eyes downcast for the most part, using their tentacles to feel out a path, and looking up only occasionally to judge where the cyborg was. It prevented the man from successfully shooting them down. He did strike at their feelers with his energy rifle, however, and that did slow the Werangs somewhat, because they momentarily retracted their appendages when struck.

None of them had seen Rhea, of course—they were too distracted by their current prey. As such, Rhea was able to approach undetected, and closed with one of the Werangs that circled the base of the tree. Its back was to her, so she leaped onto its leg and climbed using fistfuls of fur.

The creature started, then twisted its head and upper body sideways in an attempt to bite her off. She climbed faster, avoiding those jaws and the tentacles that lined it.

A second Werang charged into that one, toothy maw snapping at Rhea. She swung upward, landing on the first’s back, and leaped out of the way. The first angrily snapped at the second, intimidating it, so that the intruding bioweapon backed away. Rhea was going to take a shot at the exposed eye when she spotted a third Werang stampeding in. It leaped, obviously hoping to clear the first Werang while snatching her off its back.

She somersaulted into the air and avoided the snapping jaws of the newcomer. She arced back down, landing on the base of its neck at the same time the creature slammed into the first Werang: its hind-legs had failed to clear the bottommost creature, and had caught against the side.

The first creature was unable to hold up the weight of the third and collapsed. The second meanwhile was coming in for another pass.

Rhea took a running jump off the back of the third and landed on a nearby tree. An oak. She began climbing. The oak was only a few trees away from the cyborg’s. She wondered if the man had seen her yet—if he had, he showed no sign of it at the moment. She tried to check his public profile now that she was closer, but still got nothing. Had to be disabled.

Maybe he’s a bandit after all.

Well, it didn’t matter. She was committed. Even a bandit didn’t deserve to die this way.

The tree shook below her, and she knew one of the Werangs had struck it. Not wanting to risk the tree uprooting, she pulled herself onto one of the upper boughs and leaped across to the next tree, which was almost as tall as the oak the man climbed. She doubted the Werangs would be able to uproot this one.

The Werangs below continued to crash into the base of the trunk. Some of them had begun to assault her tree as well. She ignored the shudders that passed through the bark, and hoped the roots were strong enough and deep enough to resist the blows.

She was at eye level with one of the two Werangs that scaled the tree across from her. It had kept its head tilted downward to protect its sensitive sight organs from the man, but that head posture only placed its eye directly into her line of fire. Indeed, the creature was looking right at her.

Grinning maliciously, Rhea raised her pistol and fired. The creature shut its eye lid just in time, and continued climbing, keeping the eye closed.

Glancing up, she saw that the man had finally noticed her. But he spared her only a moment’s gaze before returning his attention to the scaling Werangs. He shot at their tentacles—all he could do really—but the bioweapons took the blows stoically, letting their tentacles recoil as they climbed ever higher. The man continued to clamber as well, and while the tree was tall, it wasn’t infinitely so. The cyborg man would soon run out of tree…

Rhea pulled herself onto one of the bigger boughs, and slowly edged toward the precipice. She didn’t dare look down. She leaped.

As she approached the head, those tentacles tried to snatch her up—apparently the Werang had been peeking from beneath its eyelid.

She shot at the closest ones with her pistol, sending them shrinking back, and twisted her body at the same time to avoid the remaining appendages. She landed on the hairless face, close to the eye, and with her free hand squeezed the gray skin tightly for purchase.

Tentacles still came at her, attempting to rip her off, and she was forced to shoot at them continually. More energy bolts started to come in from above, striking those tentacles, and she realized the cyborg was helping her.

She stopped shooting at the tentacles, trusting the other cyborg to protect her, and holstered the pistol to make her way toward the eye, forming handholds by bunching up fistfuls of skin as she went.

The Werang started frantically moving its head to and fro in an attempt to be rid of her but couldn’t shake her free.

She positioned herself above the eyelid, so that her feet dangled down in front of it while she hung on with her scrunched fingers. The tentacles came in faster, but the cyborg managed to hold them all at bay, for now. But all it would take was one appendage to get through…

She shoved the tips of both boots into the crevice formed between the upper and lower folds of skin that composed the eyelid. She pressed down hard with one boot, and with the other, she yanked upward. She strained, but after a moment managed to pry the eyelid open slightly. It was all she needed.

She let go of the skin above her with her right hand, unholstered the pistol, and fired.

The creature screamed as its eye exploded, and it let go of the tree.

Rhea shoved off, holstered the pistol, and landed on the trunk. Looking down, she watched the heavy Werang break away several branches as it dropped to the ground far below. The other Werangs cleared away from the base, and the tree shuddered when the creature impacted.

The bioweapon didn’t get up.

Because the man had been concentrating his fire on those tentacles to protect Rhea, the second Werang had climbed the far side of the tree unhindered and was rapidly closing with him. He turned his attention to that one and unleashed his rifle, but it kept its head turned away and didn’t stop, regardless of how many times he shot each tentacle. The Werang could smell blood.

Rhea frantically tried to relocate herself to the opposite side of the tree so she could get in a shot. Meanwhile, the cyborg man climbed between rifle blasts, until the branches he sought for handholds began to break away above him. He could climb no further: the boughs were too weak to support his weight here.

The Werang was within swiping distance, and it reached upward with a front paw to strike. Rhea watched it all via Gizmo’s feed in the upper right of her vision.

The cyborg shoved off, vaulting toward the adjacent tree.

The bioweapon swung its head, snapping at him as he passed by. Its head poked past the boughs above her.

Rhea got the shot she was looking for.

She unholstered the pistol, aimed, and squeezed the trigger.

The creature screamed as its eye exploded, and it let go of the tree. It fell, writhing, breaking away branches all around it. Some of those branches plunged straight toward Rhea.

She shoved off the trunk, leaping toward the same tree the cyborg had chosen. She holstered the pistol and grabbed onto a big branch as the Werang fell behind her, hitting the ground with a loud thud. Miraculously, it got up again.

Glancing up, she saw the cyborg precariously perched on the thin upper branches overhead. The man took a step, and the branch he stood upon broke.

Rhea reached out and grabbed his ankle as he plunged past. But the branch she had been holding onto with her other hand broke away, unable to handle the added weight and momentum.

Rhea tried to latch onto different branches on the way down, but they all broke away. The cyborg lashed about with his tail, trying to find purchase as well, but he, too, had no luck.

Another Werang was climbing this tree, and it wasn’t far below them. Those jaws opened eagerly to accept the free meal.

Finally, their downward motion was arrested when the cyborg wrapped its tail around a branch that could hold their combined weight. They hung there, hovering above the bioweapon, with Rhea dangling from the man’s ankle.

The Werang continued to approach. It kept its head angled down and to the side, hiding its eyes from them, and climbing with the aid of its tentacles.

Rhea withdrew her pistol and opened fire with the cyborg, and together they struck at the feeler tentacles. Those appendages withdrew of course, but that didn’t stop the forelegs from carrying the beast ever higher. Rhea and the man would be within swiping distance of those forelegs in moments.

She had hoped her luck would last a little longer, but it looked like it had finally run out.

15

Rhea stared at that gaping maw, and those forelegs, prepared to leap aside for the swipe that was surely coming. No doubt the man above her was similarly readying himself.

But then shots came in from the side. They struck the creature on the right side of the head, but must have missed the eye, because it did not squeal, nor otherwise let go of the tree.

Will and Horatio.

The creature turned its head toward the source of the attacks, keeping its eyes hidden. Rhea glanced in the same direction, and spotted her friends perched atop one of the silos.

The energy bolts continued to come in, assaulting the Werang, which kept its head bowed as it took the blows. One of the bioweapons on the ground followed those energy bolts, racing across the rocky terrain toward the silos.

Will and Horatio diverted their attacks and tried to bring down the incoming Werang.

The bioweapon closed its eyes and issued a strange, cyclic call as it approached.

The bigger Werangs darted en masse around the sides of the farmhouse. Apparently, feeding was now done. They raced toward the silos to join the runt.

Oh, crap, Will sent.

Meanwhile, since Will and Horatio were no longer shooting at it, the Werang on the tree had resumed climbing.

Rhea had an idea.

She aimed at the boughs that were holding up those limbs and fired repeatedly. The cyborg, understanding what she was doing, switched his aim from the Werang to the boughs as well.

The energy bolts melted through the branches, causing them to fail beneath the weight of the creature. The Werang’s forelegs lost their hold, and it clawed at empty air, trying to find purchase. It fell backward, grabbing onto branches lower down.

Rhea and the cyborg shot those boughs, too, but the creature was already clambering to the other side of the tree, and out of their view.

Rhea scaled the cyborg’s leg and swung onto a branch nearby. The man pulled himself onto a bough as well and started to make for the far side of the tree.

Rhea meanwhile, glanced at Will and Horatio. Her friends had switched to the top of a different silo—the one they had been standing on, along with the second beside it, had been crumpled by the huge Werangs that had rounded the farmhouse. Those creatures had the last silo surrounded, and were preparing to pounce…

Rhea’s artificial vocal cords were more akin to loudspeakers than anything human and could be used to produce a variety of different sounds. On a whim, she decided to mimic the cyclic call she had heard moments before, which the runt had used to summon the bigger bioweapons.

It didn’t work.

She spotted the blur of an incoming foreleg in the corner of her eye, and let go of the branch she held, dropping down. The boughs above her snapped as the Werang’s limb struck.

She swung down, and pointed her pistol upward at the exposed head, but the Werang had its eyes closed.

The cyborg leaped onto its back and latched onto the fur well away from the reach of the head tentacles. It shook its body, trying to get rid of him, momentarily forgetting Rhea.

She glanced at the feed from Gizmo, and saw that Will and Horatio were latched onto Werangs in a similar manner. Other creatures kept trying to snatch them off their upper backs, forcing Will and Horatio to constantly roll around in the fur.

Unexpectedly, the runts at the base of the tree began stampeding away into the forest, abandoning their companions. The runt on the tree quickly slid down, and when it reached the bottom, it too hastened from the scene. The cyborg dropped to the ground before it could take him very far.

The other, bigger Werangs continued trying to pry Will and Horatio from the backs of their brethren, until Rhea heard a rumbling sound. The tree began to shake.

Glancing to the north, she saw a dust cloud hovering above the treetops, and slowly growing closer.

Uh, we have company of some kind, Rhea sent to Will and Horatio.

The cyborg leaped onto the big oak next to hers and began to climb frantically. Rhea decided to put some further distance between herself and the ground as well.

The bigger Werangs began to pick up on the vibrations, and they too started dashing away into the west. Will and Horatio’s mounts were the last to depart. Horatio hopped down right away, but Will had to slowly clamber down the furry flank; when the creature reached the treeline, he leaped onto a nearby bough. Horatio followed soon thereafter and scaled into an adjacent tree.

Rhea reached the height limit of her current tree: the branches higher up were unable to hold her weight. So she held herself in place and watched as the dust cloud rapidly approached below.

The rumbling sound grew in volume, until it was all consuming. The cloud of dust swept over her like a mist, and in its dark confines, she caught glimpses of body parts: giant tentacles, snakelike heads, claws the size of human bodies.

These aren’t Werangs… Rhea sent. Nor Kargs, or Tasins.

No, they’re not, Will agreed. I’ve never seen anything like this before.

Nor have I, Horatio transmitted. And I’ve studied every creature in the Net archives.

Maybe it’s a new bioweapon, developed by one of those rogue nations you mentioned? Rhea suggested.

Could be, Will said.

I would like to see one of them in its entirety, Horatio said. Unobscured by that “dust.”

It’s not natural, is it? Rhea said. That cloud?

No, Horatio said. While there’s enough loose soil here to produce such a cloud, it should be trailing them, not concealing them entirely.

Rhea nodded. That’s what I thought.

And then, just like that, the cloud passed. It receded to the south, vanishing as quickly as it had come.

Well, that’s something else to watch for, Will sent.

Passing clouds of dust that harbor a new type of bioweapon? Rhea asked. A creature that scares away even Werangs?

Yep, Will transmitted. Now then, how about we go and meet your new friend?

Rhea glanced at the cyborg, who yet clung to the treetop beside hers.

* * *

Rhea leaped from branch to branch, jumping three stories at a time, until she landed on the ground. One of her knee servos buzzed in complaint after the final impact; thankfully she felt no change in motor function, and the humming noise quickly went away.

“Careful,” Will said, coming alongside her. “Try to make that body of yours last until the next settlement, at least. I’m sure you wouldn’t want to get there, only to have to spend all your earnings on repairs. Leaving you with the same amount of debt.”

“No, I wouldn’t,” Rhea agreed. She raised her hood and pulled it close to hide her face.

Horatio joined them, and together the three of them approached the dead oak the other cyborg was climbing down. The man had holstered the rifle on his back so that only the stock protruded; meanwhile Rhea and her companions kept their weapons at the ready, though lowered.

The trio halted several meters from the base, and glanced up, waiting. As she watched the man slowly descend from branch to branch, using his tail as a fifth limb along with his arms and legs, Rhea thought he was trying to hide his strength—she had seen him jumping between trees with relative ease earlier, after all. She thought him fully capable of descending as quickly as she had but said nothing.

“Gonna be a long wait,” Will commented.

“It’s certainly a big tree,” Horatio agreed.

“You might want to pick it up a little!” Will called to the man. “The Werangs will be back!”

The man did increase his pace, but he still seemed like he was trying to conceal his strength—he never lowered himself more than one branch at a time.

“Do we wait for him?” Horatio asked.

Will pursed his lips. “Hell with it, let’s go.”

He started walking from the tree. Horatio joined him.

“Wait!” Rhea said. She hurried after him and glanced over her shoulder at the man. “Don’t you want to know who he is?”

“Nope,” Will said.

She was still looking over her shoulder, so that when the man leaped the rest of the way to the ground—six stories—she saw it. So much for trying to hide his strength. His body, or at least his legs, were definitely stronger than her own, if he could withstand an impact from that height without his servos complaining in the least.

“He’s here,” Rhea hissed under breath.

The other two turned to face him.

The man’s hood was raised, like Rhea’s, so that the upper half of his face remained concealed in shadow. He was tall, towering even, and the brawny curves highlighted by those tight-fitting clothes hinted at an extremely muscular physique underneath. How much of that muscle was natural versus artificial she couldn’t say, though she suspected he was a full body replacement cyborg like herself. If so, the muscles were likely sculpted that way to appear intimidating, as the power of a robotic limb did not necessarily correlate to its size.

“Are you a bandit?” Will asked, pistol in hand, though still lowered.

The man didn’t reply. Rhea’s eyes drifted to the rifle that protruded from his back, then to the formidable blades tipping his long tail.

The man smiled. “In a way, I am.”

“Do you mean us harm?” Horatio pressed.

Another delay. Finally: “No.”

“Of course he’s going to say no,” Will scolded his robot companion. He returned his attention to the man. “Great meeting you and all, dude. That’s some sweet cybernetics you got going on there with the tail. But we’re going to be on our way.”

The man pursed his lips. His hooded head turned toward Rhea. “You saved me. Why?”

“I wasn’t going to watch you die,” Rhea said. “Not when there was a chance I could help you.”

“But you yourself could have died in the process,” the man said.

“I know,” she said.

Rhea noticed the cyborg’s hands were balled, the knuckles white. He was tense. Very tense.

He’s getting ready to attack.

Rhea steeled herself…

But then the man relaxed, his shoulders slumping ever so slightly, and his fingers uncurling. He reached up to lower his hood, revealing a human face stamped onto a cranium that was all metal—upon seeing the latter, she decided he was most likely a full body replacement cyborg after all. His features were hard, and somewhat aristocratic thanks to that bold nose and thick brow. He was handsome in a way, though on second thought a blade could be called handsome, too.

“I will accompany you,” he told them. “At least until we’re out of these woods. We need to stick together for the time being. Because as you said, the Werangs will be back.”

Bardain had told her that Werangs never abandoned kills for very long. Not if they could help it. Apparently, that was common lore among Outlanders.

“Do you know what those things were?” Rhea asked. “The creatures that scared them off?”

“Nope,” the man replied.

“We don’t want you traveling with us,” Will said. “Nor do we need you. We have enough firepower.”

Horatio glanced at him sidelong. “We could always use more.”

“I said we have enough,” Will insisted.

The man shrugged. “Suit yourself.” He turned to go.

“Let him come,” Rhea interjected quickly. “We might need his rifle yet. You saw how well he defended himself out there.” She nodded at the Werang corpses around the base of the oak.

Will frowned, and seemed about to refuse her, but when he glanced at the carcasses, he seemed to have a change of heart. He returned his attention to the man. “What’s your name, stranger?”

“You can call me Sebastian,” the cyborg said.

“All right, well, you can come with us until we’re out of these woods,” Will said. “But we’ve delayed long enough… we really have to move!” He gestured toward the forest to the north. “Lead the way.”

Sebastian took off at a jog, and the others followed. They kept their distance from the man, not wanting to get too close to that tail with its razor-sharp blades. Sebastian drew his rifle from where it was holstered on his back and kept it at the ready in case of attack.

Overhead, Gizmo flew in accompaniment, scouting the path forward.

Rhea heard distant howling coming from the southwest. The Werangs were already on the way back.

“They’ll send a scout to track our scents,” Horatio said.

Will nodded. “We’ll have to kill it if it catches up with us. I’ll have Gizmo alternate between forward and aft positions.”

In her mind’s eye, Rhea could already see the Werang scout advancing underneath the dead trees, all spider-like with those tentacles as it felt out the path the party had taken.

She shuddered and increased her pace.

16

Rhea kept a watchful eye on the leafless skeletons of those trees as they proceeded north. She gazed between them, into the depths of the forest, searching for enemies. The drifts were extremely small here, and they were more on the northern side of the trees, than the east. The small drift sizes were good, because it meant she could see farther without obstruction.

The party had switched to a march after they’d moved well away from the Werangs so that they could better watch their surroundings for signs of ambush. Plus, the lower pace was easier on Will. He was the only true human among them, after all.

Gizmo continued to alternate between the forward and aft positions, but so far didn’t catch sight of any Werang scouts in pursuit, or any other potential adversaries, for that matter. Sometimes the drone had to swoop low to properly inspect areas hidden by the lifeless branches of the trees, to ensure bandits or bioweapons weren’t lurking underneath. There was no guarantee Gizmo would catch everything, of course, hence the general state of alert for everyone involved. The Kargs that had escaped slaughter at the hands—or paws, rather—of the Werangs were still out here, after all.

That was one of the problems of traveling through a forest: while it provided ample places for the party members to conceal themselves if trouble came, it afforded the same benefits to their predators. At the moment, the team wasn’t at all concerned with finding salvage—they just wanted to get out of this forest alive. Not that there was anything to salvage here away.

Rhea glanced at her overhead map. “We’re not going to reach the edge of the forest before nightfall.”

“No,” Will agreed. “We’ll have to camp, at some point.”

“Not looking forward to that,” she said, eying the claw-like branches of a nearby tree with a shudder. She walked in silence for a moment. Then: “The hotspot map was wrong."

Will nodded. “The data for this area was stale by a few months. Bioweapon hotspots are always changing. They’re nomadic creatures. Best we salvagers can do is record their current location when we spot them, plot their course, and move on, hoping our data helps the next passerby. When we reach a settlement with Net access, we’ll update the hotspot map with our own results. Crowdsourcing at its finest.”

She considered something. “So, everyone has access to the hotspot data, and can change it? Like a wiki?”

“No, only registered salvagers and Outland travelers can edit it,” Will said.

“So, no one ever lies about a hotspot?” she pressed.

Will frowned. “Well, not only would that put the lives of other salvagers at risk but lying about the location of bioweapons is actually an offense punishable by law. So not only is it morally reprehensible, it’s illegal.”

“But it still happens,” Rhea said.

“Yes,” Will admitted. “Occasionally highwaymen will send one of their own into a settlement and have them register as a salvager. They’ll create a misleading hotspot to divert other salvagers and travelers toward their territory, with the hopes of robbing them blind. It should be noted that the hotspot registrars maintain a network of drones to verify different hotspot sightings when reported. Unfortunately, the bandits usually shoot down such drones when they arrive at the fake site, which makes the hotspot seem all the more real. But I doubt that was the case here, since we were attacked by bioweapons, not bandits. No, we were just unlucky.”

She glanced at Sebastian, who still had the lead. “Should we let him on our private network?”

“I suppose,” Will said. “In case we need to keep track of one another or communicate in silence when bioweapons are around. I’ll set up a new network for him and keep the original private, so we can still communicate among ourselves if need-be.”

“I’ve noted that the two of you are speaking quietly,” Horatio said. “Likely with the intention of preventing our new friend from eavesdropping on you. But you should note, most cyborgs have enhanced hearing. He’s likely heard every word you’ve spoken.”

“It’s not like we’ve been discussing anything top secret,” Rhea said.

“No, but you’ve admitted you plan to keep a private channel,” Horatio said.

Will eyed the long-tailed cyborg. “I think, if this Sebastian had any brains, he’d be expecting us to do so already.” Will’s eyes defocused slightly as he walked, and then he said: “Yo, Cyborg Monkey, got a new private line for you. Accept.”

From his position on point, Sebastian glanced askance at Will, and then the cyborg’s dot on the overhead map became a darker blue. Sebastian was now officially sharing his position. Rhea saw two network indicators in the upper right of her vision, denoting the two separate channels Will had set up. The one shared with Sebastian was muted.

They continued for another hour, until Gizmo, on one of the drone’s forward excursions, reported a crashed flyer ahead.

“Looks to be in relatively good shape,” Will said as he examined the video feed. “Finally, some decent salvage.”

“Is it really the greatest idea to stop for parts when there are Kargs and Werangs stalking us in the forest?” Rhea asked.

“We can spare ten minutes,” Will replied. “Besides, so far Gizmo has reported no bioweapons in pursuit.”

“So far,” Rhea concurred. “And while we might’ve outrun them for now, if we stop, we give any pursuers a chance to catch up.”

“Trust me, if Werangs were following, they’d have caught up by now, given our pace,” Will said.

“A pace we’re keeping mostly due to you,” Horatio reminded the human.

Will didn’t answer.

In a few moments they reached the downed flyer. It had carved a runnel into the earth behind it, stopping when it crashed into the leafless skeleton of a large oak. Rhea was surprised the tree hadn’t been knocked over.

“Keep watch,” Will told her.

“No, I’m earning my due this time,” she said. “Gizmo will keep watch. And our new friend. I call dibs on the engine compartment.”

“You’re really going to waste time picking apart this wreck?” Sebastian asked them.

Will shrugged. “Hey, we’re salvagers. Ten minutes, dude.”

Sebastian grunted, and then proceeded to the perimeter to watch as he had been asked.

Rhea climbed onto the crumpled hood and ripped the heavy covering away. She tossed it aside, then lowered her backpack onto the engine next to her and got to work.

“This looks like a recent crash,” Rhea said, disconnecting the power cell and shoving it into her pack.

“Yes.” Will was under the dash. Above him, the entire roof of the flyer was missing, having been lost in the crash. “And quite a spacious model of flyer, too. Probably a rich family from Aradne.”

“I found the model in my archives,” Horatio told them from where he lay on the ground beside the flyer. He was dismantling a side panel. “Transmitting schematics and specs.”

Rhea accepted the share request and pulled up a diagram of the engine compartment.

“What happened to the occupants?” she asked absently as she looked over the diagram. She was looking for the most valuable parts.

“The city’s automated rescue system would have sent a flyer to retrieve any survivors—or dead bodies—when the craft vanished from radar,” Will replied. “You don’t have to worry about them being eaten by bioweapons or anything.”

“Assuming the rescuers got here first,” Rhea said.

“True,” Will conceded.

Rhea focused on removing a small, palm-sized object nestled between the engine and the frame. According to the schematic, it was used for navigational purposes, and contained a bunch of valuable components such as gyroscopes and accelerometers.

As she worked, she had a thought, and scanned the nearby forest nervously. “Am I the only one who finds it odd everything is still intact? Nearby bandits would have seen the crash…”

“Evidently there were none nearby. Scared away by the bioweapons.” Will sat up from behind the dash. In his hands he held the vehicle’s plasma ignition mechanism. He promptly shoved it into his pack.

“How long does it take rescue systems to reach a crash site?” she asked.

“At this distance from the city, about half an hour,” Horatio answered.

“Oh,” Rhea said. So, it had probably been several days, at least, since the crash. More than enough time for any nearby bandits to loot the site. Rhea probably didn’t have anything to worry about then. Well, other than an attack from bioweapons.

She surveyed the surrounding trees a while longer, then returned her attention to the wreckage. Gizmo and Sebastian were keeping watch, after all, and she had a debt to chip away at.

They spent more than the promised ten minutes at the site. In fact, a good half hour had passed before they were on their way again. Rhea was as much to blame as any of them, having lost herself inside that engine. But she consoled herself in the knowledge that she had taken as many valuable parts from it as possible.

“You know you’ve become a true salvager when not even the threat of a bioweapon attack can pry you away from a valuable wreckage,” Will said.

“Maybe I’m just someone who wants to repay her debts,” Rhea countered.

“We’re close to a bioweapon hotspot,” Will said. “And yet when you were inside that engine, picking at the parts, you can’t tell me you weren’t completely absorbed in your work. In fact, when I suggested leaving, you pressed for more time.”

“So did Horatio,” she said. “And again, it doesn’t mean I’ve become a salvager. Just means I want to earn enough to get out.”

He gave her a dubious look. “I see. And what are you going to do when you pay off that debt?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “I’ll decide then. Maybe fly drones for a living.”

“Fly drones?” Will said. “There’s no money in that. Who’s going to pay you to fly a drone, when all the drone-related work is automated.”

“Not drone racing,” Rhea said.

Will laughed. “Yeah, well, you’d have to join the cyborg league, because of your ‘gifts.’ And let’s just say, the competition is a little stiff.”

Rhea sighed. “All right. Fine. I don’t know what I’m going to do. But it won’t be this.”

“If you say so,” Will told her. He walked on in silence, keeping an eye on the dead trees. “I suppose you could make a decent living by streaming. Though it’s going to take time to gain followers. You’d basically have to win a competition first, before anyone bothers to watch your stream. It’s not all that different from the life of a pro gamer. You’ll spend years toiling in obscurity, until one day you finally get lucky and win some big competition. Then the viewers will start rolling in, along with the big bucks. At least until you mess up and say something your sponsors don’t like, and you get banned from the streaming networks.”

“Sounds like you’ve had a taste of the life,” she said.

“I have friends who stream, yes,” Will said. “They’ve both had to reinvent themselves twice, using digital avatars to change their identities in realtime, and registering on the networks via proxy companies so that they could get paid. Maybe I’ll hook you up with them when this is done, if you decide this life isn’t for you.”

“I’d appreciate that,” she said.

Their conversation fizzled out, and they continued marching in silence.

Sebastian remained in the lead, which suited Rhea and the others—they wanted to keep an eye on him.

Day became evening, and evening, twilight. As night fell, the party made camp under the eaves of a particularly wide oak. When it had lived, it would have made a spectacular specimen. However even in death the tree was impressive, those far-reaching branches like the talons of some giant eagle scrunched up around them.

She activated silhouette mode so that the others appeared outlined in blue on her HUD in the night. It allowed her to keep an eye on Sebastian, who sat apart from the others.

Rhea and Will took their food pills. Rhea had a 90-10: a pill composed of ninety percent fat and ten percent protein. She downed it with a swig from her canteen. She was surprised at how little water she needed. She supposed it was because she excreted so very little of it. Will, meanwhile, as a human, wore special attachments underneath his outfit to recycle most of the liquid from his own excretions. From those attachments, tubes led out from underneath his uniform and into his belt, diverting water into his canteen, while the processed waste was sent to a small, boxlike refuse container. Every three days or so he detached the latter and emptied it, sending a plume of black dust—dried fecal particles—floating away upon the wind.

When she had finished, she glanced at Sebastian’s outline and raised her voice. “When we asked if you were a bandit earlier, you admitted you were, ‘in a way.’ What did you mean?”

The man didn’t answer. He simply sat there, several meters away, his tail coiled up in front of him; he seemingly stared at the deadly blades marking the tip, or at their outline, at least.

“Well, if you are a bandit, where are your friends?” she pressed.

He remained quiet.

And just when she was about to give up on him, he answered. “I’ve roamed the Outlands alone for two years now.”

“You’ve lived alone in the Outlands for two years?” Will said. “I call bull.”

“I do make the occasional journey to settlements and cities,” he said. “Where I receive gainful employ.”

“Oh, and what sort of employ is that?” Will asked.

“I fix things,” Sebastian replied.

“Like what?” Will didn’t sound convinced. “You mean machines?”

“Whatever is broken,” Sebastian said. “I fix.”

“Questioning him is like scraping your nails down a rusty car door,” Will said.

Rhea decided that they weren’t going to get anything more from the man, at least not yet, so she decided to forgo asking him anything else. Instead, she turned her head upward to gaze at the stars. Her hood fell away.

“Why didn’t you mention that earlier?” Will said suddenly. He must have been operating in some kind of infrared mode to see more than merely her outline, because she could have sworn his silhouette was staring at something on her face.

She frowned. “Mention what?”

“Come here,” he ordered. “Let me look at you.”

Sebastian’s highlighted form looked up attentively and watched as Rhea stood. She ignored his gaze and went to Will, then sat beside him.

Will held her chin with one hand and turned her head from side to side as if examining her face. “You’re missing some artificial skin.”

Rhea nodded. “Not entirely surprising.” She’d probably lost the skin when that Werang had crushed her underneath its body and scraped her across the hard ground.

“You’ve run full diagnostics?” he inquired.

“Yes, everything is fully operational,” she replied.

“Well, at least I don’t have to jury-rig any repairs,” he said. “But… you don’t feel any pain?”

“I disabled my pain sense when a certain Werang crushed me,” she said. “Forgot to reenable it.”

She did so then, and felt a dull, throbbing ache in her cheek. She touched it experimentally and flinched at the pain that flared.

“It’ll heal up,” Will said, letting her go.

She nodded, leaving her hood lowered, and turned her head to find the other cyborg still staring at her. At least she thought he was, judging from the positioning of the outline that comprised his head.

“What?” she asked him.

“You don’t remember who you were, do you?” Sebastian asked.

Rhea wasn’t sure what to say. “Why, did you know me?”

“You recall nothing of your former life?” the man pressed.

“Nothing,” she said. “But if you knew me, tell me.”

He remained silent.

“Speak up, Bandit,” Will said. “Because if you did know her, you’re in a load of trouble.”

She glanced at Will. “Does this have anything to do with the mark?”

“It has everything to do with it,” Will answered.

Finally, Sebastian said: “No. I did not know her. But I overhead you talking to her on the way here. She does not speak, well, like a cyborg from Aradne should. She talks of repaying debts to a lowly salvager. And of finding different work when that day comes. One who could afford a body like that would not be in debt. Nor would she need to find work of any kind.”

“Let’s just say I’ve fallen on some hard times,” Rhea said. “Like yourself, I assume. You’re a cyborg, and you’ve lived alone in the Outlands for two years. A strange life, for someone who could afford a body like yours.”

Sebastian remained silent. She could almost feel his eyes boring into her in the night. At last, the upper part of his blue outline shifted downward, which she interpreted as him lowering his head.

Horatio, keep an eye on that monkey bandit tonight, Will sent over their private mental channel. I don’t trust him.

Will do, Horatio said.

As usual, Rhea didn’t feel the need to sleep immediately. Instead of initiating AR target practice like she usually did, she stared into the night. She watched the outline of Gizmo circling the perimeter for a while, then diverted her attention to Sebastian.

The man was asleep, or at least pretending to be. He remained several meters apart from the others, near the far side of the big oak, but still firmly ensconced within its dead branches. She could see that deadly tail with those sharp blades outlined in the dark, along with the rifle, which he had unholstered and laid down at his side. He was still sharing his location with them, but that sharing could be severed in the blink of an eye. It was definitely a comfort knowing that Horatio would be watching him all night. Along with Gizmo.

At last she felt sleepy. She placed her pistol on the ground in front of her, and before she slumbered, she set her motion alarms to wake her if anything came near. Just a little extra, added precaution.

With that done, she closed her eyes.

17

Rhea blinked. The forest around her was lit by the murk of predawn.

Her pistol lay in front of her. She scooped it up and sat up to scan her surroundings. She kept the weapon pointed at the ground, as Bardain had taught.

While Will reposed not far from her, there was no sign of Horatio, nor Sebastian. A glance at her overhead map told her Gizmo yet circled overhead, dutifully standing guard. The blue dots of Horatio and Sebastian were frozen about a kilometer to the north, where the pair had last been in contact.

“Will,” she said urgently.

Her companion blinked, brushed the dreadlocks out of his eyes and sat up. He retrieved the AR visor from the ground in front of him and slid it in place between his brows and eyes. He grabbed the pistol next, which had been lying on the rocky soil beside it. Then he glanced about the camp. Realizing that Horatio and Sebastian were gone, his eyes defocused—he was obviously navigating his HUD.

“Horatio left a message with Gizmo,” Will said. “Sebastian took off twenty minutes ago, when the predawn began. Horatio followed. I guess we head north to their last known position.”

Will sent Gizmo forward to scout but found no sign of the pair within those dead trees. The drone halted above their last known position and assumed a holding pattern.

When Rhea and Will arrived at the site, Will knelt to examine the terrain, obviously hoping to pick up the trail.

“Got footprints,” Will said. “Of the kind one might expect from a pair as heavy as a robot and a cyborg. I’m sending the tracking data.”

The footprints lit up on the ground, becoming highlighted in blue, courtesy of the tracking algorithms Will had built into his AR visor.

The two of them proceeded forward, keeping their pistols in hand. Meanwhile Gizmo scouted the forward and aft regions.

The sun rose, and the light of dawn purpled the sky.

“So beautiful,” Rhea said. “You’d think nothing of beauty could still exist out here. But you’d be wrong.”

“There’s beauty, all right,” Will said. “But only so long as the source is external to this place.”

“That’s a bit of a dour outlook,” she told him.

“But it’s true, though,” Will said.

In only a few minutes, the blue dots representing both Horatio and Sebastian appeared on their overhead map, a kilometer away.

“Horatio,” Will sent. “What’s going on?”

“Sebastian decided to scout ahead,” Horatio replied. “I followed him. You did tell me to keep an eye on him…”

“I didn’t mean to the point of abandoning us,” Will clarified.

“I know,” Horatio transmitted. “And I meant to turn back soon after leaving comm range. But then we spotted a herd of Tasins and had to take cover. We kept a low profile until they left the area.”

“They’re gone, now,” Sebastian sent. “Tracking to the east. I suggest we head northwest, if only to avoid them.”

“I agree,” Horatio transmitted.

“All right, we head northwest,” Will said. “Wait there for us.”

Will and Rhea arrived to find Sebastian and Horatio deployed behind a large, fallen tree strewn across the path. They aimed out from opposite sides, with Sebastian scanning the forest on one flank with his energy rifle, and Horatio taking the opposite end, the double-barrels protruding threateningly from his robotic forearms.

Anything? Will sent over the mental channel. He and Rhea took cover behind the same log, close to Horatio.

Quiet as a whorehouse at dawn, Horatio replied.

Dude, the bad jokes… Will said.

Will had Gizmo circle outward in a spiraling pattern, and when the drone confirmed that there were no Tasins or other bioweapons lurking anywhere nearby, Will gave the “move out” marching order.

They headed northeast, moving away from the route the Tasins had taken. Sebastian took the lead, and the others kept their distance from that wicked tail. Gizmo scouted the skies as usual. By then the sun was firmly above the horizon, and morning was well afoot. The purple sky had already faded to its usual grayish blue.

Like most beauty, so very fleeting, gone with the blink of an eye.

They had only traveled for about half an hour when the trees began to thin. Through the scarce trees, Rhea could see a large, towering wall of rock ahead, that extended from north to south. A trending ridge of some kind.

In a few more minutes, they left behind the trees entirely, and emerged on the rocky, windswept plains that marked much of the Outlands. The breeze picked up when they emerged, becoming a strong southeasterly wind that gusted due south occasionally.

“That’s going to carry our scent to the Tasins,” Rhea said.

“Yes,” Will said, dreadlocks waving in the wind. “We have to press on. And quickly.” He glanced at Sebastian. “But this is where we part ways. You agreed to accompany us only to the edge of these woods…”

The man nodded. “And so I did. I head north, with the intention of rounding this rock face. We might as well stay together, for the time being.”

“No, we’re heading north, you head east,” Will insisted.

Sebastian shook his head. “Tasins roam the plains. I refuse to take that route. And I’m not returning south. That wind will guide the Werangs and Kargs directly to me.”

“That’s the idea,” Will said.

“You can’t make him serve as bait,” Rhea said. “That’s wrong on so many levels.”

Will sighed and glanced at her. “I didn’t mean it, obviously. It’s called sarcasm.” He returned his attention to Sebastian. “Fine. We stick together a while longer. But after we’ve rounded these cliffs, we’re going our separate ways. Got it?”

“I can agree to that,” Sebastian said.

Will allowed him to take the lead once more, and then followed with the others a short distance behind. Gizmo scouted the route along the cliff face ahead.

“I know he’s a cyborg and all,” Will said quietly. “But you have to stop taking his side.”

“He has sensitive hearing…” Horatio reminded him.

“Maybe I want him to hear this,” Will said, louder. He focused on Rhea. “Well, you have nothing to say?”

“I…” She swallowed. It was an entirely unnecessary, completely instinctual act, an artifact of her all-too-human brain, rather than anything her machine body was programmed to do. “It’s not so much that he’s a cyborg, but that… well, I guess I find it hard to abandon people, especially when doing so will put them in danger.”

“He’s in no greater danger without us,” Will insisted. “There will still be bioweapons out there. And bandits. Nothing we do will change that. Staying with us won’t make there be any less of them.”

“Yes,” Rhea said. “But you know he’s far better off fighting at our side than alone.”

“Not necessarily,” Will said. “More people, equals more mistakes.”

“It also equals more firepower,” Rhea said.

Will folded his arms. “Okay, but there’s still one problem. We know nothing about him. I don’t trust him. Besides, he claims to have roamed the Outlands by himself for two years now. He’s not hurting for company. Sure, he’ll take advantage of our companionship while he can, but when we part ways, I doubt he’ll have any problem fending for himself. Assuming his story is true.”

Rhea sighed. “I suppose you’re right. Still, I feel bad.”

Will switched to a mental channel to ensure Sebastian wasn’t listening. Me, too, but honestly, it’ll be a relief not to have to keep a constant eye on him. He’s a wildcard. We never know what he’s going to do. Those blades on his tail weren’t meant to be ornamental, if you know what I mean.

It’s possible he’ll follow us, if we cut him free, Horatio chimed in. Maybe intending to close with us when we camp, and then rob us.

Gizmo will alert us if that happens, Will said. A few warning shots on our part and he’ll never bother us again.

Unless he shoots down Gizmo, Horatio said.

If he does that, the gloves are coming off, dude, Will sent. He can kiss his monkey tail good-bye.

His desire to stay with us might also simply be his way of buying time, Horatio said. While he waits for the most opportune moment to run off with our hauls.

Will glanced at Rhea. There you go, see? Horatio understands this cyborg. The sooner we can cut him free, the better.

I guess so, Rhea transmitted.

The party reached the north-south trending ridge and strode alongside it, staying close to the tall cliffs in order to better blend in. From the horizons, they would be very hard to spot. By sight, at least. But the winds still gusted, unfortunately, carrying their scents to whatever bioweapons still lurked in the forest beyond the southern horizon. The drift coverage was sporadic at the base of the cliff, with some sections almost completely free of the black sediment—the surface was no doubt scoured clean by that southeasterly wind.

Rhea felt a subtle vibration in the ground then, picked up by her sensitive cyborg feet. “Do you feel that?”

“I do,” Horatio said.

“What?” Will said.

Sebastian stopped up ahead. He turned around. “They’re early.” His words were soft, barely audible. It was questionable whether Will, or even Horatio, had heard. But Rhea did.

She and the others turned, following his gaze. Rhea zoomed in on the southern horizon.

A cloud of dust rested atop the horizon, spanning from east to west.

“Tasins?” Rhea asked. The cloud seemed to grow larger as she watched. She occasionally saw a fleeting tentacle appear within the depths, or a long talon, but these glimpses were quickly engulfed by the broiling dust.

“No,” Will said. “These aren’t Tasins. They’re the new bioweapons.”

“They’re headed straight for us,” Horatio said. “Tracking our scent on the wind, no doubt.”

Will stared at the incoming cloud a moment longer. Then: “We have to run.”

18

Rhea, Will and Horatio dashed alongside the base of the cliff. They sprinted after Sebastian, who had taken the lead. The cyborg was no longer concealing his strength and was running at the maximum speed his body was capable of. He was quickly pulling ahead of the others.

Rhea was purposely limiting her maximum speed so that Will could keep up. She suspected Horatio was doing the same.

Rhea considered lifting Will into her arms, but the added weight would only reduce her maximum speed: she calculated she would run at about the same pace with him anyway.

“Go!” Will said, gasping for breath. “I’ll catch up!”

Rhea shook her head. “I won’t leave you.”

“I’m not asking you to!” he sounded exasperated in addition to exhausted.

“Actually, you are,” Horatio corrected.

Will glanced over his shoulder at the incoming dust cloud. “You won’t outrun them.”

Rhea glanced at Horatio. “What if we share his weight between us?”

“Then we’ll be able to attain approximately seventy to eighty percent of our maximums,” Horatio said.

Will looked over his shoulder once more before addressing the robot. “Will that be good enough?”

Rhea glanced at Horatio. The robot merely shook that metallic head.

“There you go,” Will said, panting harder than ever. “You have to leave me so you can reach your top speeds.”

“It won’t matter,” Horatio said. “Even if we ran as fast as our friend Sebastian, the creatures would still overtake us. We’d only be delaying the inevitable. We are, quite frankly, doomed.”

Will slowed his pace, and Rhea and Horatio matched.

“Looks like Master Bardain was right,” Will said, still wheezing.

“About what?” she asked.

“He’s always telling me, one day, my luck is going to run out,” Will replied. “Well, that day has come.”

“Not if I can help it.” Rhea glanced thoughtfully at the rock face. “What if we climbed?”

“All bioweapons can climb,” Horatio said.

“Maybe these ones can’t,” Rhea suggested.

“It’s possible, but doubtful,” Horatio said. “Climbing is one of the key traits that bioweapon designers always bake in. At their heart, they are weapons, after all. And if a weapon can’t climb obstacles to reach its prey, then it’s not much of a weapon, is it? They can climb.”

Rhea glanced over her shoulder. She couldn’t help the rising desperation she felt deep inside as her human brain refused to accept defeat, and she struggled to come up with a solution. “But we have to try something.” The bioweapons were fast closing. The party had maybe five minutes until they were overtaken. “Maybe if we drop down and freeze, they’ll pass right by, thinking we’re rocks?”

“You forget your training so soon,” Will said, his breathing becoming better, now that he had slowed. “We’re downwind. The bioweapons will be able to track us by scent, even if we’re motionless. Sorry dude, this is it. I just wish I’d never gotten you into this. I should have never made you sign that contract. Probably should have never reactivated you in the first place, considering your mind was wiped.”

“No, you should have,” Rhea said. “I have no regrets. You gave me one last chance at life. I would have rather lived for as long as I have, than never existed again. Even if it meant never knowing who I once was.”

Rhea sprinted on, feeling defeated.

No. I refuse to accept this.

There had to be something she could do, even if it meant she had to die in the end.

And then she knew.

I will die for them.

“I’m going to climb,” she said.

She leaped up and latched onto the cliff face.

“Dude, it’s useless,” Will transmitted.

“You keep running.” She reached up, finding a handhold, and pulled herself higher. “I’ll distract them.”

“The bioweapons will simply split up,” Horatio sent.

“Let her climb,” Will transmitted. He continued running below. “Let her feel like she’s at least doing something to help us.”

Rhea continued to climb as the others fled. “You know, what if we caused a collapse? Get the bioweapons to start climbing after us, and then send this wall crumbling down upon them.”

“There’s too many of them,” Will transmitted. “It might work at first, but the bioweapons will keep coming. Eventually, they’d get us. Look at them, they cover the land from horizon to horizon!”

“Why are you all so eager to accept defeat!” Rhea sent. “I’m going to collapse this rock face on the bioweapons. You want to stay down there, that’s fine. But I have a potential escape plan here. If you’re too proud to accept that, because I came up with the idea and not you, then maybe you deserve to die.”

“She’s right,” Sebastian broadcast. “We have to try it. Who knows, maybe we’ll frustrate these creatures enough that they’ll leave us alone.”

She glanced toward him and saw the cyborg leap upward; Sebastian latched onto the rock five meters from the ground and started rapidly crawling toward her.

She looked down and saw Will also on the cliff face. Horatio had apparently given him a boost, because he was about six meters high already, with the robot at his side.

Free climbing was something that came relatively easily to a cyborg. With her enhanced strength, Rhea could readily hold herself up via the different crevices and rocky protrusions that presented themselves. But it couldn’t have been easy for Will. Humans weren’t designed for free climbing. She had watched a documentary on the subject one night after training. Apparently, free climbers practiced a route with full gear for months before attempting it without a lifeline. Will didn’t have that luxury: he had to get it right the first time.

But he did have a drone. Hopefully, it was helping Will pick out the safest route.

She turned her attention to the south: that cloud of dust was growing ever nearer. It began to curl inward, as if all the bioweapons composing it planned to congregate on the party’s position. Some of the creatures had emerged from the forefront, leaving behind the protective cover of the dust cloud to expose their true forms.

From afar, the revealed creatures looked like some amalgamation of claws, tentacles, and snakes. She zoomed in on the closest pair to have a better look.

The scaled bodies were reptilian, though of a size to match dinosaurs. They ran on four muscular legs, the toes festooned with deadly talons. At the front of the body were an additional two forelimbs ending in long, scythe-like claws. Broad tails were tipped by long, forbidding, whip-like tentacles: they reminded her of the stinging tendrils the aquatic creatures known as medusae bore. She had observed the latter in an interactive documentary only a week or so before—it seemed a lifetime ago.

Her gaze focused on the forefronts. Several long necks protruded there, tipped by lion-like heads complete with long, hairy manes. She counted five heads per creature.

“Hydras,” Rhea said. Greek Mythology was something else she’d stumbled upon during her random Net browsing. She’d watched a video about a mythical figure named Hercules who had killed one of these Hydras—a multi-headed creature whose heads grew back again when cut off.

She retrieved the pistol from her holster, targeted a head on one of the “Hydras,” and fired. The energy bolt had no apparent effect. She didn’t see any eyes or other obvious features to target on the head, at least at this range, so she tried shooting at the body next, and then the legs and tail. The energy bolts seemed to be absorbed by every body part she chose, causing no harm. The second Hydra proved just as impervious to her shots.

“Well, that’s not good,” Rhea sent.

“What’s not good?” Will asked over the comm.

“My energy bolts caused no damage,” Rhea replied. “No matter which body part I targeted. None.”

“Maybe it’s the range,” Will sent. “If you were closer, I bet you’d cause some real hurt. Even so, I’m not sure it’s the greatest idea to get close. Take down one head, you got four more to deal with.”

She watched the exposed creatures in the forefront a moment longer. The fact they were uncovered told her the cloud was something the bioweapons could utilize only when together. As if by staying close, they generated some sort of field, magnetic or otherwise, that trapped the dust particles created by their advance into a long tunnel that enveloped their line; when an individual bioweapon left formation, it lost the benefits of that field.

She holstered the pistol and continued to climb; at the same time, she brainstormed different ways to cause the planned avalanche. Starting one had seemed like such a great idea when she first thought of it, but now she wasn’t so sure: the rocks looked like they could take quite a pounding. The party would probably have to use their energy pistols to weaken different sections first, along with the areas below them, so that when the upper rocks separated, there was a better chance of starting an avalanche. And it would always be only a chance and nothing more: the likeliest outcome was that the stones would simply break off without causing a chain reaction. Sure, the tumbling rocks would knock away whatever bioweapons were clinging to the cliff face directly below them, but the other creatures would prevail, clinging unharmed to the rocks that failed to dislodge.

Yes, it wasn’t going to be easy.

She continued climbing and eventually surmounted an overhanging section. Glancing higher, she spotted a cave entrance, one that wasn’t visible from the ground, thanks to the overhang. Gizmo wouldn’t have detected it, either, because of the way more rock folded over the top. Taken altogether, the top and bottom sections were almost like the pieces of some massive jaw, and the cave the gullet, its darkness eager to swallow her and the party whole.

“Got a cave!” Rhea sent. “Forty meters from the ground.”

“How deep is it?” Will replied over the comm.

“I don’t know!” she said. “But it’s shelter! Get your asses up here!”

If anything, they’d be able to use the cave as a choke point to hold off the incoming creatures, a strategic “inflection point,” as Bardain would call it.

“Sending in Giz,” Will transmitted.

Rhea made her way toward the opening. Meanwhile the drone darted past overhead and vanished into the cave.

“Looks to be fairly extensive,” Will sent a moment later. “I was able to send Giz right up to the limits of comm range, fifty meters in, and still the tunnel continued deeper. No signs of bioweapons or other occupants. Seems to be naturally formed.”

“It’s a good place to make a last stand,” Rhea said.

“Maybe we won’t have to,” Will sent. “Forget about trying to start an avalanche. What we gotta do is collapse the entrance, seal ourselves inside…”

“Sure, but if we do that, we’re going to have to dig ourselves out eventually.” Rhea reached the entrance and pulled herself onto the lip.

“Or find another exit,” Will sent.

“Assuming the tunnel doesn’t lead to a dead end.” Rhea gazed into the darkness and saw the vague outline of Gizmo hovering within, awaiting its master.

She thought the tunnel was spacious enough to fit the smaller bioweapons she’d seen out there: after all, there was room for three people to stand abreast with arms extended, while another three could perch on their shoulders with arms upraised. If the smaller bioweapons squeezed their multiple heads together, and pulled their legs tight to their bodies, it would be cramped, but they’d fit, single file.

She turned about to observe the plains. The creatures in the forefront were fast approaching the base of the cliff. While they varied in size, with some obviously too large, others would definitely fit the tunnel.

She glanced at her companions on the rock face. Sebastian was the closest.

“Collapsing the cave entrance might prove tricky,” Horatio transmitted. “It will require specific placement of energy bolts.”

“Maybe,” Will sent. “But brute force might do the trick quite nicely as well. Our Monkey Tailed friend might finally be able to make himself useful.”

“And if we’re successful, what about oxygen?” Horatio pressed.

“We start running out, we drill a hole,” Will said. “Besides, it’s not like you have to worry.”

“Yes, but I fear for you and the cyborgs,” Horatio transmitted.

“The smaller Hydras will only fit in single file,” Rhea said. “We kill the lead creature, let it block the tunnel. Done.”

“That might prove difficult, considering how little damage your energy bolts did from afar,” Will transmitted. “And even if we do manage it, the next bioweapon in line will simply pull it out or rip the carcass apart to get past.”

“Then we keep killing them,” Rhea said.

“We still don’t know what kind of stopping power we’re going to need,” Will insisted. “Our pistols will probably do more damage when they’re closer, but as to how much more, that’s anyone’s guess. These creatures are unknowns, never encountered before. Best course of action at this point is to just cave the entrance and be done with it.”

“I agree,” Sebastian sent.

“There you go,” Will broadcast. “Even monkey boy agrees with me on this. Horatio, what’s your vote?”

“Collapse it,” the robot transmitted.

Rhea wasn’t convinced that caving the entrance was the best course of action. Her mind returned to the avalanche idea, and she studied the exterior rocks below, trying to figure out the best way to go about initiating a deadly cascade. There were no obvious sections that seemed ready to fall. She fired an experimental shot below Will and Horatio, striking the stone. She caused a small-bore hole to appear, but little else.

That’s not going to work.

Sebastian arrived.

She stepped back, making room for the big cyborg. He clambered onto the lip, the front part of his body in shadow, thanks to the backlighting. The silhouette formed by his towering, muscular physique and that long, curving tail with the deadly blades, was forbidding to say the least. The cave was high enough to fit his tall form with ample room to spare.

Sebastian stepped toward her menacingly, and Rhea recoiled, instinctively drawing her pistol. The cyborg spun about, and that tail whipped around—

Rhea leaped to the hard floor of the cave, rolling into the wall. Then she clambered to one knee, raising the pistol.

But the tail had not struck. Rhea had mistaken his intent: Sebastian had simply been turning around. Apparently, he had stepped toward her simply to place himself further from the entrance, perhaps to make room for Will and Horatio.

Rhea lowered her pistol.

But then Sebastian turned around once more and started ramming his tail violently into the roof. The robotic appendage was long enough to reach, though any taller and he would have had difficulties. Again and again Sebastian impacted the bare stone. The blades spun slightly with each impact, further agitating the rock. Small fragments broke away, clinking to the tunnel floor. It was obvious Sebastian intended to collapse the roof: the cyborg evidently didn’t care whether Will and Horatio reached the cave and was going to strand the pair out there with the bioweapons.

“Stop!” Rhea shouted. Sebastian ignored her. “I’m going to shoot!”

The cyborg halted; he had angled himself sideways slightly and glanced over his shoulder at her. The light caught on the edge of his face, illuminating a lip upturned in rage. “If they don’t make it to this cave before I collapse the ceiling, they’re dead anyway. I’ve done the calculation. Already bioweapons have reached the base of the cliff. We have to begin the process now. We can’t wait, not if we want the entrance sealed by the time the bioweapons arrive.”

Sebastian started striking the rock with that powerful tail once again.

“You will wait for them!” Rhea insisted.

“Shoot me then, little girl.” Sebastian continued bashing the ceiling.

Rhea shook her head in disbelief. “Will, get up here ASAP. Sebastian refuses to wait for you. He’s already started ramming his tail into the ceiling.”

“Probably a good idea,” Will replied. “The closest creatures are right behind us.”

She glanced at her overhead map, and saw the blue dots of her friends, along with the red dots of the bioweapons in the forefront, very close underneath them.

“Hurry!” she said.

“Getting there as fast as I can,” Will transmitted. “I’m having a bit of trouble with this overhang section. I think I’m going to need a piggyback ride. Horatio?”

“One piggyback ride coming up,” the robot sent.

Sebastian hadn’t let up the whole time. He’d drawn his rifle in order to add energy bolts to the mix, which struck the ceiling in between tail impacts. Large sections of rock began to dislodge from the ceiling. Wouldn’t be long now…

Rhea glanced at her overhead map. The blue dots of her two friends had combined, but they were advancing far too slowly for her patience. She decided she was going to go out there and help them.

But first, she had to get past Sebastian.

“Step aside!” Rhea ordered.

The cyborg ignored her.

Rhea stepped forward. Sebastian still had his torso turned away from her in order to fire at the ceiling between tail strikes. She holstered her pistol, grabbed him by the hips, and yanked to one side.

She’d half expected the towering cyborg to remain fixed in place. That she’d be too weak to cause any upset to his position. But Sebastian promptly lost his balance and stepped aside.

He recovered and spun his torso around to look at her. Though most of his face was in darkness, the light from outside caught at his eyes, and from the malevolent way they glinted, she had the distinct impression he was going to shoot her down where she stood. She was really regretting holstering her pistol.

But then a clanging sound diverted both of their eyes to the entrance. A robotic hand had latched onto the lip. Another appeared, and Horatio clambered into view, with Will hanging on behind him: Will gripped the two straps of the robot’s backpack, and kept his legs firmly wrapped around the sack’s lower portion.

Sebastian knocked her arms aside and jerked his torso around. He beckoned at Horatio. “Quickly!”

Will slid down and followed Horatio into the cave. The pair squeezed by the stones Sebastian had dislodged; when they were past, the cyborg promptly began slamming his tail into the rock ceiling once more. And as usual, Sebastian fired his rifle in between each impact to further weaken the ceiling. Smaller pieces were falling away than earlier. Not a good sign…

“We have to help him.” Rhea aimed past Sebastian and unleashed an energy bolt at the ceiling.

“Calculating optimal firing solution,” Horatio said. He paused. Then: “Target the designated spots.”

Rhea received a share request and accepted. On her HUD, specific areas on the roof became highlighted past Sebastian, indicating where she should fire the pistol. She raised the weapon and engaged.

Will also joined in, targeting a different set of coordinates, judging from the bore holes he created in the ceiling. Horatio also unleashed his forearm weapons.

The combined fire from the pistols and Sebastian’s rifle, along with the impacts from that strong tail, caused the roof to begin yielding like before. Large pieces tumbled down sporadically between strikes, crashing to the cave floor in front of Sebastian, some of them hitting his tail along the way. He was quickly forced to retreat as the sporadic fall of fragments became a cascade.

The whole party stepped back, in fact, and let gravity finish the job. Behind them, Gizmo also maneuvered deeper into the tunnel, and vanished into the dark.

The repeated crack of stone on stone battered her ears, and as the cave filled up with falling rock in front of her, Rhea caught a glimpse of a giant reptilian head. It darted in from the entrance but was lost from view as dust from the collapse filled the tunnel. She heard a roar, barely louder than the cacophonous din produced by the falling stones, but it was promptly cut off.

Darkness shrouded her as the dust consumed her vision, while at the same time the collapse sealed the opening, cutting off all sunlight from the inner portions of the cave. Only her companions remained in the murk, silhouetted in blue on her HUD, courtesy of the positional sharing she had active.

The rampant stone on stone din faded, replaced by only the occasional crack as the fallen rocks settled. Then even those latter sounds ceased, so that she heard only her own nervous breathing, along with the respirations of Will and the other cyborg, and the soft susurrations of Gizmo’s rotors—something only audible at relatively close ranges, though the acoustics of the cramped chamber no doubt enhanced the sound.

“Well then, careful what you wish for…” Will said into the darkness.

If the bioweapons were out there, the collapse muted their sounds quite well.

Oh, they’re out there, she told herself.

As if to prove that point, a loud thud filled the air. She started, nearly leaping in place. The rocks composing the nearby collapse rattled, shifting. No doubt a giant head had struck the blockage from outside.

“Something tells me we should probably move away from the entrance,” Will said. “As in, far away. And now.”

19

Rhea switched to LIDAR, and the tunnel walls, floor and ceiling filled in on her HUD. The surfaces were depicted as white wireframes made up of several smaller polygons. Her companions remained silhouetted in blue, but the rest of their bodies were also composed of polygons now as well, like the cave.

“Do you have LIDAR?” Rhea asked the cyborg.

“Obviously,” Sebastian replied.

Gizmo, also highlighted in blue, darted deeper into the cave.

Another thud filled the air, and the collapse shook beside them.

“Go,” Will said.

Sebastian led the way. Rhea followed, walking abreast with Horatio and Will. They stayed well beyond the range of that deadly tail. All of them, including Sebastian, kept their weapons out and at the ready.

“Oxygen levels are stable so far,” Horatio said. “A good sign that this cave is larger than hoped or connects to the surface again somewhere.”

“I’m banking on the latter,” Will said. “Our luck hasn’t run out yet.”

Rhea continued to hear that persistent thudding as the party advanced; it soon became distant and muted, until it faded entirely.

“You think they’re going to give up at some point?” Rhea asked.

Will shook his polygonal head. “I don’t know. Maybe. Depends on their progress. If they’re halfway through already, then probably not.”

“But they have no way to know that,” Horatio said.

“True,” Will said.

Rhea kept an eye on the overhead representation of the tunnel on her HUD, and watched it fill out as Gizmo mapped the area ahead. But then Gizmo’s dot froze, and the mapping ceased.

“Did we just lose our drone?” she asked. “Or did Gizmo spot something?”

Will didn’t answer.

A moment later the indicator drifted slightly closer to them.

“We still got her,” Will said. “Keep in mind, I have the drone flying at the broadcast limit. So it’s only natural that Giz will flit into and out of range.”

Rhea considered that. “I’m just wondering, but isn’t it better to let the drone fly well within broadcast limits, so that if we do lose the signal, we’ll know right away it’s not because of the range? As in, it’s been shot down, or eaten? And also, so we don’t miss anything that might happen while it’s beyond its range?”

“We don’t have to worry about missing anything,” Will said. “Giz will update the map and report noteworthy findings when it returns to signal range. But if it makes you feel better…”

On the map, Gizmo’s dot flew nearer by five meters, so as to ensure a more stable connection. It maintained that range as the party advanced.

“Thank you,” Rhea said.

They soon came upon a branch. Will had Gizmo take the side passage, while the others waited.

“All right, listen up,” Will said. “Giz just reached the range limit. I’m going to have her continue onward for another ten minutes, with instructions to explore any side passages, and if the tunnel doesn’t end, I’ll have her return. At that point, I’ll send her to map the forward direction the same way. Then we’ll decide which route we want to take.”

Gizmo’s dot froze on the overhead map as the drone passed out of range.

“Making you antsy?” Will asked.

Rhea glanced at him. “What? The frozen drone indicator?”

Will nodded that polygonal head.

“A little,” she said. “But I suppose if Gizmo doesn’t come back, we know we’re not alone. I just wish the news could reach us faster.”

The party didn’t have long to wait however: Gizmo returned to signal range after only three minutes.

“Well, looks like that way is a dead end,” Will said. “We proceed forward after all.”

The drone arrived and vanished down the main tunnel. Sebastian took the lead once more.

They spent the rest of that day exploring. The tunnel seemed to wind on forever. It branched off occasionally, and at times Gizmo returned after ten minutes in either direction. They followed the rule of labyrinths, and picked the rightmost route every time, but more often than not, usually after twenty to thirty minutes, the path ended in a dead end, and they had to backtrack.

Finally, when it was late evening—at least according to their internal clocks—the party reached a wide cavern that was filled with stalagmites.

“All right, this is as good a spot as any to rest for a few hours,” Will said.

“You actually want to rest while those creatures are out there?” Rhea asked incredulously. “We should press on.”

“Hey, I’m human,” he said. “I need at least a couple of hours of sleep.”

“Even humans can forgo sleep during times of need…” Horatio said.

“Maybe so, but I don’t see the point at the moment, as this doesn’t really qualify as a time of need,” Will told him. “If those creatures were right behind us, as in we could see their ugly reptilian heads bearing down on us, then I’d agree with you. But they’re not. And let’s say they’ve actually drilled their way through the collapse and are inside the tunnel, which is likely by now. It’ll still take them a lot longer to reach this cavern than we did, given how cramped the route is for them. Assuming they’re not discouraged by the tight confines in the first place. No, we can sleep for a few hours, I think.”

“How do you know they don’t have baby Hydras they can send inside to hunt us?” Rhea pressed. “You know, smaller versions of themselves that can better fit?”

“Then I guess we’ll be shooting down babies tonight,” Will said, sitting down.

As usual, Sebastian sat apart from the others. Rhea appreciated that. After the look she had seen in his eyes earlier, she doubted she was going to get much rest. Even with Horatio and Gizmo standing guard.

No, there will be no rest for me. I’ll be watching him the whole time.

Gizmo flitted away into the darkness, and Rhea glanced at Will questioningly.

“Sending her ahead to do some preliminary mapping for the usual ten minutes.” Will smiled on the LIDAR. “If the drone doesn’t return, we know we’re not alone.”

“Since when did you start referring to the drone as a ‘she’ anyway?” Rhea asked.

Will shrugged, then lay down. “Wake me if there’s trouble.” In only a few moments, he was fast asleep.

Ten minutes passed. Rhea was relieved when the drone returned to comm range and appeared on the overhead map once more. Her data updated, revealing several new caverns adjoining this one.

Well, looks like we gots ourselves an extensive system of chambers ahead, Horatio transmitted over a private line to Rhea alone. Guess we’ll find out where they lead in a few hours.

The reassuring susurrations of Gizmo’s motors came from overhead as the drone assumed a holding pattern almost directly above. While the cramped confines of the chamber intensified the sound, it was still barely audible—though if she really wanted to, she could activate her enhanced hearing to make it even louder.

Out of curiosity, she did just that, and she listened very carefully for any strange noises that might signify the approach of bioweapons. She heard nothing above the gentle humming of the rotors.

Sighing, she reverted her hearing, and glanced at Horatio. How did we end up here, trapped beneath thousands of tons of solid rock, running from creatures designed to kill us? We’re supposed to be salvagers. Purveyor of spare parts and all things metal. She shook her head. What if we don’t make it out? What if we run out of oxygen? So many what ifs, all of them negative.

Focus on the positive, Horatio said. That’s what I always do. I don’t have to worry about oxygen and food. That’s a positive for me. And for you, well, you still have oxygen, and a good supply of rations. We’re all still alive and fighting.

She smiled. Never thought I’d be schooled in positivity by a robot.

Just because I’m a robot, doesn’t mean I’m unfeeling, Horatio sent. We’ll make it out, somehow. You’ll see. He paused. I have to believe that.

I hope you’re right. Rhea sat back, lying down. She turned on one side so that she was facing Sebastian, and then pretended to close her eyes. She kept them open a crack so she could watch the cyborg.

Sebastian remained sitting there, cross-legged with his head bowed and his hood raised. She wondered what was going through his mind in that moment, and whether he would sleep. Maybe he was slumbering already. He was a cyborg, after all, very likely with a complete robotic body. If the latter was true, he could freeze his servos to assume any posture he liked, and meanwhile allow his brain to enter the sleep state.

She watched his blue-outlined, wireframe form for maybe fifteen minutes. And then the cyborg suddenly stood.

Rhea resisted the urge to shoot her eyes open and sit up as well. She stayed motionless, though she was ready to roll aside and unholster her weapon should Sebastian draw his rifle.

But the cyborg did no such thing. Instead, he walked toward the far side of the cavern, heading deeper into the tunnel system.

What do you think he’s doing? Rhea sent Horatio.

If I had to guess, I’d say he was sick of waiting, Horatio replied. He has chosen to abandon us. Let him go, I say. It’ll be a relief to have him gone from our presence.

Yeah, but what if he’s just looking for a spot to ambush us? Rhea transmitted.

Always the negative, Horatio said. Why would he bother? He’d have a better chance of attacking now, while you and Will were asleep.

Except I’m not asleep, Rhea sent.

But Sebastian doesn’t know that, Horatio told her.

Rhea remained silent, and when Sebastian’s wireframe form vanished round a bend of the cavern, she sat up. His indicator froze on the overhead map a moment later: he had passed out of range.

I’m going to follow him, she sent.

I’ll wake Will, Horatio told her.

No, she said. Let him rest. I just want to confirm whether Sebastian is leaving or setting an elaborate trap for us.

Gizmo can do that, Horatio said.

With Sebastian’s hearing, he’ll know the drone is following, Rhea told him. I can place my feet far more softly than those rotors, at least in this environment.

I doubt that, Horatio said.

Besides, I have a question to ask him. She started off.

I’m having Gizmo shadow you, Horatio told her. She was going to say no, but then the robot added: At maximum range. That way, as long as you stay well away from Sebastian, he won’t know the drone is present. And if anything goes wrong, I can have the drone return to fetch Will and myself.

Rhea sighed. Okay.

She set down her feet carefully, padding softly across the hard surface.

As she walked into the cavern, she switched to directional transmission mode, pointing it directly behind her. This way, location sharing wouldn’t announce her presence to Sebastian, while Gizmo would still receive her position. If the cyborg kept location sharing active, she’d be aware of his position well before he knew she was present. Then again, if the robot was planning an ambush, he would have probably disabled location sharing entirely by now.

The cavern narrowed as she reached the far side, but then it expanded once more as she advanced into a new chamber. This one had a lower roof than the previous, and stalactites hung from the ceiling, with no stalagmites on the floor.

She eyed those crystalline structures carefully. Worried that Sebastian was planning an ambush, she switched to LIDAR burst mode, which meant she was sending out scanning photons every five seconds, rather than one hundred pulses a second. It would still give away her position, but as long as she kept moving, Sebastian would have a hard time targeting her.

In this LIDAR mode, the room maintained its wireframe structure on her HUD thanks to data recorded in the last burst. Overhead, dark sections appeared as she passed underneath, areas located behind stalactites that had occluded them when her last burst transmitted, and they filled out only after the five seconds had passed. One might think that Gizmo’s mapping information would include such topographical data, but apparently the drone hadn’t recorded its surroundings to such precision.

Speaking of Gizmo… she glanced at her overhead map. The drone pursued at the very limits of comm range, around forty-five meters behind her, according to the HUD. Meanwhile, the dots representing Horatio and Will remained motionless, and not just because they were resting: their indicators had become a darker blue, which meant they had passed beyond comm range. This although Gizmo acted as a repeater behind her to boost the range.

It’s just you and me, now, she sent the drone.

She knew Gizmo could understand rudimentary English, thanks to the commands Will often gave the drone, but the machine could not itself speak or generate spoken words. It could transmit prerecorded messages and mapping data, and that was about all. She wasn’t sure why she was talking to it… mostly to reassure herself that she wasn’t alone, she supposed.

She crossed that eerie cavern, but no attacks came. As she neared the far side, Rhea noticed light coming from around a bend ahead, adding color to the wireframes generated by her LIDAR.

Warily, she approached. The light seemed to be sourced from yet another cavern adjoining this one. She disabled LIDAR entirely as she entered the new chamber, and instead relied upon the background illumination to light the way.

Overhead, the vaulted ceiling formed a dome that rose well above her. There was a pool of water near the center, several meters in diameter. Sebastian knelt at its edge, gazing at his reflection. He had lit a flare of some kind, which burned on the rock floor next to him. The source of the illumination. She couldn’t tell if the rifle was holstered on his back or not, because the positioning of his long, curving tail blocked it from her view. She slid her fingers toward her pistol and touched the grip but did not draw it.

She noticed that he had appeared on her overhead map only when she had spotted him, and that the dot was orange, indicating it was unknown whether the target was friendly. He had turned off location sharing.

Rhea decided it was time to forgo stealth. She casually walked in, letting her boots thud upon the floor and echo across the walls. She kept her hand on her pistol.

Sebastian tilted his head to glance askance at her. His hooded features were hidden in the dim light.

“You know something about those new creatures, don’t you?” she said, wondering why she hadn’t asked earlier. And then she recalled the look he had given her, before Horatio had arrived carrying Will. The look that had promised death and frightened her into silence all this time.

Bad time to be remembering that.

Sebastian still hadn’t answered.

She was glad she couldn’t see his face right now in the murk—she didn’t need fear to drain her resolve.

She folded her arms. “When you saw them, you spoke the words: ‘They’re early.’ What do you know?”

He looked back toward the pool of liquid. Finally: “Does it matter?”

“Tell me,” she said.

Sebastian shrugged. “Suppose I might as well, since you won’t be leaving this tunnel.”

Rhea frowned. “What are you talking about?”

“They’ve been sent to wipe Rust Town off the map,” Sebastian said, still keeping his back to her.

“What, by who?” she said. “That’s a war crime.”

“Doesn’t matter who,” Sebastian said. “All that matters is less than a week from now, Rust Town will be no more. Aradne will no longer have to share water with the slums. It’s actually kind of an easy death, versus the alternative. The city is running out of water, you see.”

“But the ocean feeds the city,” Rhea said. “There’s more than enough to—”

“Have you seen the ocean levels lately?” Sebastian asked. “Of course you haven’t. News about the falling ocean level is routinely shadow-banned from the streaming sites. The populace has been kept in the dark. Ignorance is bliss, as they say.”

“There has to be another way to conserve water,” Rhea said. “Rather than killing all those innocents.”

“Other than converting all the inhabitants of Rust Town to cyborgs?” Sebastian said. “The city won’t do that. Far too expensive. No, the bioweapons will destroy them. It’s already been decided. Just as your own fate has been predetermined.” He turned his torso toward her, and lowered his hood, so that at last she could see his features in the dim light.

“What are you talking about?” She retreated a pace, because she already knew. Looking into his eyes, which gleamed with both malevolence and eagerness beneath the light of that flare, how could she not?

“I was sent to kill you,” Sebastian said, standing. His rifle hung from one hand, pointing downward.

20

Giz, get the others! Rhea sent.

She didn’t take her eyes off the rifle Sebastian held. Her fingers yet touched the pistol in its holster. She wanted to draw it, but she knew the movement would only force a showdown. Then again, did she really want to let Sebastian strike first?

And then Sebastian’s arm shot up.

Time seemed to slow to a crawl around her. Rhea drew her pistol and squeezed the trigger, unleashing a shot. It passed undiminished through the energy bolt Sebastian had launched in return, which also continued at full intensity toward her. She was parsing time at a far higher rate than ordinary humans could in that moment, thanks to the enhancements of her mind-machine interface, but that wouldn’t help her: her body, despite its enhanced speed and strength, couldn’t match the pace of her mind. She instinctively tried to twist out of the way, but there was too much distance for her robotic body to cover before the bolt arrived. She had nothing to defend herself with except for the pistol she held, and that was no defense at all.

Or was it?

She swung the pistol toward the incoming smear of energy as if intending to bat it away. Her forearm moved painfully slowly compared to the fast approaching bolt, and for a moment she thought she wouldn’t raise it in time. But her wrist continued steadfastly upward, millimeter by millimeter, so that when the energy bolt arrived the weapon was in place to block it. The question was, would it be enough?

The bolt struck the tip of the pistol and time snapped back to normal. The weapon became too hot to hold, and she was forced to release it lest she damage her robotic hand; the barrel glowed a bright white, and the pistol melted to half its size before hitting the cavern floor. The deadly energy had otherwise been absorbed, sparing her body from damage. But now she was defenseless.

Thankfully, Sebastian had been forced to use his rifle as a shield to protect himself as well: her energy bolt had slammed into the base of the barrel, melting it inward. Apparently, that was enough to render the weapon useless, because the cyborg promptly tossed it aside.

“Bitch.” Sebastian approached at a crouch.

The flare continued to provide dim light from its position next to the pool, though because his back was to it, Sebastian’s face remained in shadow. She imagined him snarling.

As he got closer, Rhea crouched as well, and the two began circling one another. His movements seemed slow and methodical, and a tad overly cautious: the behavior felt almost comical to her, given she was nearly half his size and likely possessed half his strength to boot. Then again, it was probably a wise move on his part. Having a healthy respect for what might appear to be a lesser foe had probably saved his life on numerous occasions.

It did mean she was going to have a harder time catching him off guard, however.

As he circled, the cyborg’s tail slowly moved forward and backward, slightly curling and uncurling each time as if preparing to strike. The blades that tipped it began spinning as well, the swirling metal gleaming wickedly beneath the light of the flare.

“If you were sent to kill me, why didn’t you do it sooner?” she asked as she circled her foe. “Why wait so long?” She kept an eye on that deadly tail as she spoke. The whir made by the spinning blades was strangely sinister.

In answer, that tail lunged at her. Rhea leaped aside, and the bladed tips smashed into the cave floor beside her, sending up rock chips.

The cyborg withdrew the tail and circled anew. A probing strike. “I needed you to get out of that forest alive. The Werangs and Kargs weren’t supposed to be there. You got lucky. But that wasn’t the only reason I delayed. The fear I saw in your eyes held me back: these were not the eyes of the Dagger of Khrusos, but of a child. A deadly child, but a child, nonetheless. Killing you would have been little different than killing my own daughter. So I stayed my hand. But I knew I was merely delaying the inevitable. When the bioweapons attacked, I knew I could dally no longer. I had to kill you and be done with it.”

“Why do you call me the Dagger of Khrusos?” she asked.

“I wish I didn’t have to do this,” he answered, ignoring the question. “It’s obvious that your mind has been wiped, and you are no longer the threat that my master perceives you to be. I truly wish the two of us could walk away from this fight. But you see, if I return without your head, my master will take mine in your stead. And perhaps my daughter’s. So unfortunately, one of us will not leave this cave today. I thought to slay you while you slept, but there is no honor in that, not for someone who has risked their own life for me. I considered destroying your friends, too, but there is no price on their heads. I hoped it would be you who would follow me when I left that cave. You who would come to face your doom alone. And so here we are.”

Once again that tail reared, and Rhea leaped aside, but it was a feint. She prepared for the follow-up strike, but it didn’t come. The pair merely circled one another.

“Why turn on me now?” she pressed. “You say you needed me earlier, but the fact is, you still do. Bioweapons are camped outside the mountain, with some of them probably penetrating these very caves as we speak. We still have to fight.”

“Doubtful,” he said. “The tunnels are too cramped. Some of the bioweapons might crawl for a few hundred meters into the mountain, maybe even a kilometer, but eventually they’ll give up and retreat. The rest will linger outside, this is true, but they, too, will depart in due course. Whether it takes six days, or six months. I’m prepared to wait. Thus, I don’t in fact need you. And I will end you, here. Now. And your friends, if I have to.”

“You don’t have to do this, Sebastian,” Rhea told him.

“The Scorpion,” he corrected. “My name is The Scorpion.”

Those spinning blades came in once again. It might have been a feint, but she wasn’t going to risk it.

She dove forward, tilting her body to the horizontal as that tail sliced past below her. The blades narrowly missed her underside and were a millimeter from touching her outfit.

She rolled to her knees when she landed, having successfully closed the distance with her target. Sebastian—The Scorpion—towered over her. She slammed one elbow into the side of his knee, but the blow caused barely a vibration. She stood up, swinging her fist at the same time, targeting a region on his lower torso—

But, moving faster than she thought him capable, the Scorpion reached down with one hand and scooped her up before she could strike. Her punch missed its mark and she landed only a glancing hit against his side.

The Scorpion held onto her by the neck; she reached up and wrapped her hands around that arm in an attempt to wrench herself free, but he spun her around with help from his other hand and slammed her chest and face into the rock floor three times, hard, causing her hood to fall. After the third strike, he tossed her toward his tail and the spinning blades.

But after he released her, Rhea got lucky: her foot caught on his opposite arm in midair, and the impact altered her trajectory just enough to avoid the deadly metal. She landed on the floor beneath the tail, which stabbed downward repeatedly, trying to cut her in half with the blades.

She dodged the deadly metal for several tense seconds, then rolled toward the pool, passing beyond the cyborg’s range.

She came to a stop right next to the stagnant liquid, then stood up, switching to a low crouch. The flare was beside her on the cave floor, along with the damaged rifle The Scorpion had abandoned.

She picked up both, one in each hand, then spun to face her enemy.

The Scorpion was approaching. Though he still crouched, there was a barely perceptible swagger to his walk. He had clashed with his opponent, and apparently already judged her unworthy of the respect deserved by a dangerous foe.

As he got closer and stepped into the more intense light closer to the source Rhea held, she could see his face beneath that hood. His mouth was twisted into a smirk, while his eyes shone with arrogance, confirming that he had indeed lost his former respect for her. And thus, his caution.

She could use that.

Underestimate me at your peril!

When he was within striking distance of the tail, Rhea grinned.

“You called me a bitch?” she asked.

Before he could answer, she darted diagonally in front of him, forcing him to rotate to keep his tail within the necessary striking angle.

Then she veered directly toward him, moving at right angles to her former course, and before he could react, she tossed the flare into his face, momentarily blinding him.

That tail was already swinging toward her, but she dodged it with relative ease, and rapidly moved to within two meters of him. He had only just swatted aside the flare, restoring his vision, so that when she leaped toward his upper body, he raised his arms to intercept.

He was too late.

She swung past his right shoulder and at the same time twisted her torso to slide the rifle down toward him. She held it in both hands, pulling the barrel horizontally over his face, and when it reached the throat area, she spun sideways, wrenching her body toward the floor, causing the two sides of the rifle to bend into a V-shaped wedge.

The Scorpion let out a gasp as that wedge crushed his throat; Rhea was already yanking herself upward once more, rotating the wedge as she did so, as the ends of the long rifle remained firmly in her grasp. When her feet landed on his shoulders, she promptly crossed the two loose ends of the rifle and dropped behind his back once more, keeping her grip firmly on the metal, so that the two loops tightened around his throat like a noose. She remained hanging there behind his back, applying constant pressure to the twisted rifle, further tightening it.

Like most cyborgs, The Scorpion needed to supply his brain with oxygen. By constricting his throat like that, she cut off the oxygen supply to his artificial lungs, which would eventually cause him to fall unconscious, and die.

That was the theory anyway.

The Scorpion’s fingers wrapped around the metal at his throat, and he yanked hard, trying to tear both loops of the twisted rifle free. At the same time, his tail came in, forcing her to swing left and right to dodge the blades while she hung on. The Scorpion was desperate and didn’t seem to care that the blades were cutting into his own backside each time he missed. He simply wanted to get her off his back as quickly as possible so that he could breathe again.

And then she heard a loud clang; at the same time, the leftmost portion of the rifle she clung to drooped lower. Glancing up, she saw that The Scorpion had crushed one of the loops next to his throat with his fingers.

She kept glancing back at that tail, but for now The Scorpion was concentrating on tearing away the rifle with those big hands. The Scorpion grabbed the rifle loop on either side of the big dent he’d formed, and pulled, breaking the metal away entirely. Her left arm dropped, still holding the rifle piece like a cudgel.

That tail came in again, and Rhea was forced to release the remaining rifle section she hung from. She dropped to the cavern floor and watched those metal blades reverberate from The Scorpion’s upper back with a satisfying clang.

The Scorpion tore away the remaining rifle piece and shucked it aside, shedding the noose. He spun around and batted her aside with a powerful arm. She went flying across the cavern, the rifle piece falling from her grasp. She landed in the shallows of the pool.

She scrambled to her feet, and did her best to get to shore, but then something hard rammed into her chest and she was thrown backward. When she recovered, she realized The Scorpion had tossed the other rifle piece at her. She turned toward shore once more, only to find those blades bearing down on her.

She took a deep breath and dove into the liquid; she swam sideways, her extremities scraping against the rocky bottom. Not much light from the still-burning flare reached here, and she struggled to see in the thick murk. She switched to LIDAR. Better.

And then something slammed into the small of her back, crushing her into the bottom. She struggled but couldn’t break free. She was thoroughly pinned in the pool.

She gazed toward the surface. She was in a relatively shallow area: to surface, she need only rise less than half a meter. She tried to push herself up once more, but the force pressing her down proved relentless.

So near, yet so far.

She managed to twist enough to look over her shoulders and saw the polygonal outline of The Scorpion’s leg on her HUD, courtesy of the LIDAR. It was planted firmly in the small of her back.

The urge to breathe was growing stronger by the moment. She was going to suffer the same fate she had planned for The Scorpion.

Please, let me go, she broadcast on a common band, knowing he’d hear.

He didn’t answer.

You don’t have to do this! she tried.

Dead silence.

Her LIDAR outlined the curled, broken piece of rifle that The Scorpion had thrown at her. It had sunk to the bottom nearby. She reached out, and her fingertips brushed it, pushing it further away.

Careful.

She tried again, stretching as far as she could go, and managed to slide a finger around the tube. She pulled it toward her, then scooped it up.

There was only a small chance this would work. But she had to try.

Her vision was growing dim.

This particular piece was all barrel, which made it perfect for her needs. But it was still looped, so she wrapped both hands around the metal and straightened it as well as she was able, maximizing its length.

Then she held the metal tube above her head, pressing her lips around one end. It wasn’t long enough to reach the surface.

She raised her head and upper body as far as she was able. There. She zoomed in on the LIDAR, and confirmed the far end had surfaced, if only by a few centimeters.

She had the presence of mind to blow first to clear the tube of liquid before trying to inhale. She blew a few times, but still met resistance. Her artificial lungs were powerful enough to compensate for the added width and length of the tube, so she should have been able to expel all the water by now. That she hadn’t meant there must be leaks.

Her vision grew darker as she searched the surface with her fingers. She was growing frantic but forced herself to remain calm.

She found various holes and plugged them with the fingers of her right hand. One particular gap required her to press her entire index finger into it from the side. She searched further with her other hand, but didn’t find anything else, and hoped she’d gotten all of them—she didn’t have much air left to expel from her artificial lungs.

She blew.

There was still resistance.

She blew again. Again. Less resistance that last time.

Again.

Barely any resistance. That final time, she also felt cool air on the fingertips serving as plugs.

Breathe!

And breathe she did, using the rifle barrel like a glorified straw. Her vision quickly returned to normal.

The Scorpion must have noticed when she expunged the air, because she received a broadcast. You deceiving bitch!

The foot stepped away, and no longer pinned her. Rhea immediately tried to push herself to the surface, but as she did so, a hand wrapped around her throat, and hoisted her forcibly from the pool. It lifted her into the air and spun her around, so that she hung directly in front of The Scorpion. His big fingers reached all the way around her neck, which was relatively tiny in comparison.

“I’ll choke the life out of you myself, then,” The Scorpion said, and squeezed.

Rhea slid her lips off the metal tube, and lowered it with one arm, letting it dangle beside her. She almost dropped it entirely as she struggled to breathe. But no air would pass through her constricted throat.

The flare yet burned, so that colors and textures filled out her LIDAR feed. Yet those colors were quickly growing dim once more, courtesy of her brain’s lack of oxygen.

Her gaze dropped to the rifle piece she held. The tip was jagged. Sharp. Something that could be used to penetrate.

She glanced at The Scorpion’s face, into that smug expression, and then her eyes dropped to his torso.

Then she rammed the metal piece into the lower right of his chest, using all her strength.

The tip penetrated his body, and then The Scorpion shuddered. He released her.

Rhea waded to shore, coughing and struggling for breath. Behind her The Scorpion continued to spasm beneath the light of the flare. His tail slapped the surface repeatedly, and at random. He walked toward shore, each step slower than the last, until finally he collapsed, his head smashing onto the rock right next to the pool. The rest of his body remained submerged. Well, except for his tail, which continued to randomly twitch. Otherwise, he didn’t get up.

The metal rifle protruded from his left side, where it had curled upward upon impact.

Rhea realized she had stabbed his power cell. That was the only way. Luck? No. She knew where it was, somehow.

The question was, how did I know that?

The placement of the power cell was different in all models of cyborgs. She knew that much from her Net browsing. Her particular power supply was located close to her heart, for example. It was usually well-armored, too, so some luck had been involved here.

Either way, the effect of damaging such a cell was deadly to a cyborg. Without power, the artificial lungs would cease to operate, and the human brain would soon die.

She sat down on the shore nearby and wrapped her arms around her knees so that she hugged her legs to her chest. She absently dismissed the LIDAR feed so that she was relying on the illumination from the flare alone, and then she stared at The Scorpion. His tail continued to occasionally spasm, though the intervals between each convulsion became longer and longer, with the intensity also less each time, until the tail, too, ceased all motion.

Rhea rested her head on her knees and wept in relief.

21

Rhea heard the comforting susurrations of a small drone’s rotors, followed by quick footsteps. She looked up.

Will and Horatio arrived running.

With a sigh, she stood.

Horatio slowed down while passing the fallen cyborg; Will meanwhile continued toward Rhea.

“Are you all right?” Will said when he reached her side.

He checked her face, no doubt noticing the freshly abraded artificial skin.

“A bit shaken up, but I’ll live,” she said, breaking free of his grasp.

“What happened here?” Will glanced at the fallen cyborg.

Horatio arrived. “It looks like she perforated his power cell. Though how she managed to know where that cell was stored in this model, I don’t know.”

“Luck,” Rhea said.

Though the doubt must have been obvious in her voice, neither Will nor Horatio said anything to refute her.

“That looks like his rifle,” Will said, nodding at the piece of metal protruding from the dead cyborg. “You took it from him, and did that?”

“Yeah, it was a… messy… fight,” she said.

Will was still gazing at the body. “So, you can do it, after all.”

“Do what?” she asked suspiciously.

Will shrugged. “Kill a man. Or in this case, a cyborg. Not that there’s much difference when a human brain is involved. Though I suppose I should have expected as much, given how you behaved with the bioweapons. You got a real killer instinct going on.”

“Okay,” she said.

Will regarded her with an uncertain expression on his face. “So tell me, how does that make you feel, what you did here?”

“Depressed, mostly,” she said. “And relieved.”

“Nothing else?” Will pressed.

She paused. Then nodded. “Powerful. He was twice as tall as me. Twice as strong. I still prevailed.”

“Don’t get too drunk on that feeling,” Will said. “It’s a path that won’t lead anywhere you want to go, trust me.”

“Killing to feel power?” she said. “Trust me, I don’t intend to. The guilt won’t let me.”

Will returned his attention to the body. “So he attacked first, I assume?”

She narrowed her eyes. “What do you think?”

He looked back at her, and apparently her expression wasn’t lost on him, because he pursed his lips thoughtfully. Then: “Do you mind if we review the footage?”

She shrugged. She accessed her recorded archives on her HUD and transmitted the past five minutes to him.

Will made a variety of facial expressions over the next few minutes, ranging from utmost anger to outright astonishment. Finally, he focused on her again. “That got a bit intense back there. It’s too bad you had to lose your pistol in the first five seconds, though.”

“It’s happened before, during training,” Rhea said.

“Sure, but I somehow doubt any training you did with Bardain ever ended quite like this,” Will told her.

“Not quite,” she agreed.

“By the way, a bit troubling… his comments about the new bioweapons and Rust Town, no?” Will said.

Rhea nodded. “Troubling.”

When she had nothing more to say on the matter, Will shrugged. “Probably a lie.” He glanced at Horatio with gleaming eyes. “Well, we might as well collect some salvage.”

Turned out, most of the machinery in the torso was worthless due to water damage—the wound Rhea had inflicted had allowed liquid to seep inside.

Horatio was examining the head. “Looks like the damage wasn’t restricted to the torso… some of the water trickled into the spinal cavity, which connects directly to the mind-machine interface in the brain case. That interface has shorted out.”

“Are you sure?” Rhea asked.

“I’m positive,” the robot replied. “There’s no value to this mind-machine interface, other than the metal that forms it. That said, if you really want to lug around a human brain, I won’t stop you.”

She frowned in disgust. “No thanks.”

“If only our bandit friend here had managed to get out of the water before he collapsed…” Will said.

They proceeded to strip the remainder of the body, divvying up the arms, legs, and whatever other chest machinery had survived the short-out, with Rhea getting first pick of the more valuable parts. They left behind his torso, along with his head and tail. They stripped the motors that powered the cyborg’s lethal tail blades but left the servos inside the appendage itself—because they were connected to the spinal cavity, they had also shorted out, just like the mind-machine interface.

With their backpacks loaded up, Will turned toward the northernmost portion of the cavern, where the party had yet to explore.

“Well, we might as well continue,” Will said. “I certainly won’t be able to rest now: I’m all wired. I only really needed a half hour nap anyway.” He scooped up the flare. “This should give us a few hours of light.”

With that, the party pressed on. Gizmo scouted ahead, as usual. It felt a little strange not having to follow Sebastian—or rather, The Scorpion. But it was also a relief, as she always felt like he was a ticking bomb, ready to turn on her and her companions at a moment’s notice. That didn’t stop her from feeling a pang of guilt whenever she thought of him, considering he was the first human entity whose life she had taken, at least as far as she could remember. She reminded herself that it wasn’t her fault, that he had left her no choice. He had lurked in their midst all that time, waiting for the moment to pounce.

I refuse to grieve, or even feel guilt, over such a man.

The system of caverns eventually ended, and the party found itself trekking through a winding tunnel once more. Twisting and turning, it occasionally branched: as usual, the trio took the rightmost turns first and backtracked if they reached a dead end.

According to her accelerometer, the tunnel seemed to be gently rising the farther they advanced. Rhea didn’t know if that was good or bad.

“I wonder who his master was?” Will said at one point.

“Mmm?” Rhea asked, glancing at Will.

“That cyborg, in your archives, he said you were a threat to his ‘master,’” Will told her. “Or at least you were, before your mind was wiped.”

“He called me the Dagger of Khrusos,” Rhea said. “Do you know what that means?”

Will blinked a few times. “Nope.” He said it a little too hastily for her to believe him completely.

“Khrusos is the name of the President of the United Settlements,” she said. “A member of the High Council responsible for the rule of Earth. Is it possible I used to work for him?”

“Dunno,” Will said. “Khrusos is a relatively popular name, which is understandable, considering he’s the ruler of this continent. He could be some street thug, for all we know.”

“Maybe now might be a good idea to tell me about the mark I once carried,” Rhea said. “It would help me to know, don’t you think? If there are others out there hunting me like The Scorpion…”

Will shook his head. “Forget the person you once were. I’m not going to tell you what the mark was, because it will only confuse and mislead you. You’re a completely different person now. You’ve been reborn.”

“You think you’re protecting me, don’t you?” she said. “You think I won’t like the person I once was.”

Will didn’t answer.

She sighed. So be it. She’d just have to puzzle it out on her own. She could understand why Will didn’t want to tell her, out of some misguided, perhaps overbearing, sense of paternity. But at some point she would find out, and when she did, she doubted it would change anything. Because even if she had been a bad person at one time, Will was right about her being completely different now.

And so they continued forward, trekking that cave with its winding ways. The flare gave out after two hours, and the party switched to LIDAR once more in order to navigate the darkness. Will began to feel sleepy after another hour, and when he kept stumbling every hundred meters or so, he at last admitted defeat and called a halt.

After an hour’s rest, which Rhea also took, the party continued for another four hours, until a point of light appeared ahead on Gizmo’s feed.

Rhea checked her HUD. “That could be the surface. According to my clock, the sun rose a short while ago.”

“We can only hope,” Will said.

Horatio spoke. “If the mapping data is correct, we’ve looped back almost to our starting point. We’re half a kilometer north of it, and about fifty meters higher.”

Rhea had been about to remark upon the very same thing.

“That means we’re lucky they didn’t find this opening,” Will said.

“Oh yes,” Horatio said. “Though I suspect it’s not visible from the ground. Just like the previous cave entrance.”

Will sent Gizmo forward past comm range to explore the light, with instructions to immediately return if any imminent danger was detected. The drone vanished from comm range, only to return a short while later, after the party could see the point of light ahead with their own eyes.

Rhea received a share request from Gizmo and accepted. Her HUD data updated, with the complete route to the surface now overlaid onto her existing map.

“Well, got some good news, and some bad news,” Will said. “Good news is the point of light is indeed a cave opening. And because of the way the rock juts out beneath the opening, it’s not visible from the ground, like we suspected. Bad news is it opens onto the plains we just left, and well, there’s still an army of bioweapons lounging about. That’s right: the Hydras. That bad news does have a plus side, as most of them seem to be asleep at the moment, or in some kind of rest state, at any rate. If any of them are awake, they’ve likely got all their attention on the other cave.”

“So you’re saying we can try to sneak past them…” Rhea said.

“Maybe I’m saying that,” Will agreed. “Or maybe I’m saying we should retreat and find another way out. There are still a bunch of other tunnels we haven’t tried. We could backtrack, take one of the left branches we ignored along the way.”

“Not sure I like that idea,” Rhea said. “We still don’t know for sure if any of those bioweapons are pursuing us.”

“I’ll have to agree with that assessment,” Horatio said. “If the bioweapons are willing to camp outside the cave for a whole day for us, that tells me they’re not one to abandon a meal so easily. Likely their genetic programming demands that they don’t give up. The perfect bioweapon. I’m more convinced than ever that some of those Hydras followed us inside.”

“All right,” Will said. “Well, there’s another tidbit of good news that could potentially help, if we really decide to go out there and sneak past those creatures. See, according to Gizmo’s latest measurements, there’s no wind. Nothing to carry our scent to the bioweapons.”

“All the more reason to abandon these caves now, while we still can.” Horatio paused. “According to the crowdsourced map data, the mountains aren’t particularly tall in this region. In fact, from this exit, it’s only a two-hundred-meter climb until we reach a plateau. The western flank of the plateau leads to a narrow path… a gentle slope that winds between the mountains and leads all the way down to the other side of the range. Essentially a mountain pass. We don’t ever need to set foot on the plains, or risk getting close to those Hydras.”

“But we have to risk climbing?” Will said. “Not sure I like the sound of that.”

Horatio shrugged. “I can give you a piggyback ride.”

“Yeah, you’re going to have to,” Will told the robot.

“So, we’re proceeding forward?” Rhea asked.

“Seems like that’s the consensus.” Will led the way.

Soon, the light from the opening was bright enough that Rhea no longer needed to keep her LIDAR active, and so she disabled it.

At the exit, the party paused. Rhea peeked out from the lower edge, along with Will and Horatio, and gazed at the plains far below. It was indeed scattered with the black smears of bioweapons.

“That’s a long fall,” Will said.

“Don’t look down.” Horatio pulled away from the edge and beckoned toward his backpack. “Piggyback ride?”

With a sigh, Will retreated, then pulled himself onto the backpack. He slid his fingers underneath the two straps near Horatio’s shoulders, and hugged the lower portion of the sack with his legs.

The robot stood up. A little unsteadily, Rhea thought.

“What if the straps break?” Rhea asked.

“Don’t even say that,” Will said. “Talk about jinxing…”

“Shall I lead the way?” Horatio asked.

Rhea beckoned toward the opening. “After you.”

Gizmo hovered outside then darted upward.

“I’ve instructed Giz to map out the safest free climbing route,” Will told her. “Not that you or Horatio need it.”

“Hey, whatever makes the route safer, I’m all for,” she said. “Last thing we need is a section of rock tumbling away and letting the bioweapons know we’re here.”

Horatio stepped to the edge of the opening and reached past it. He pulled himself outside. Rhea followed.

She accepted a share request from Gizmo a moment later. Conveniently, all the recommended handholds and footholds became highlighted on her HUD, with the former in blue and the latter in yellow. The right hand and foot suggestions were a slightly darker shade than the left; everything was also labelled in small print, should she misinterpret a cue.

Horatio climbed just on top of her, with Will hanging on behind him.

How are you holding out? Horatio asked over the shared mental channel.

Me, or Rhea? Will asked.

Both, Horatio said.

Will accidentally glanced downward, past Rhea, and his face paled. He tightened his grip and looked away.

Rhea smiled. Don’t worry, Will. If you fall, I’ll catch you.

I’m reassured, he sent, though he sounded anything but.

They made good progress, climbing about sixty percent of the way in ten minutes. At least until a distant rumbling came from the plains.

What’s that? Will sent.

Rhea tightened her grip and looked down. On the plains below, one by one Hydras were waking from slumber and raising their multiple heads to look south.

She followed their gaze to the southern horizon. There, a cloud of dust poured onto the plains, higher and longer than the one that had carried the current batch of bioweapons to them. That cloud continued to lengthen as she watched, seeming to have no end in sight as the forefront approached.

More of them… Rhea sent.

A whole lot more, Will agreed. Could be thousands out there. Tens of thousands. Figures, that reinforcements come just when we decide to climb out of the cave!

I wouldn’t have it any other way, Horatio transmitted. I like it when life gets interesting.

I don’t! Will sent.

Finally, the tail end of the dust cloud appeared, and it began to recede from the horizon as the forefront approached. The cloud seemed to be coming in at a slight angle, which would take it past the ridge with room to spare.

Rhea had gathered enough telemetry by then to make a rough calculation of its course.

They’re heading northeast, Rhea sent. Slightly away from us.

That route will take them directly to Rust Town in a week’s time, Horatio transmitted. Assuming the bioweapons stick to it.

Sebastian was right! Rhea broadcast. We have to warn Rust Town.

Aradne’s early warning systems will detect them when they’re a few days away, Will replied. They’ll have enough time to muster the army and bring in reinforcements. We don’t have to worry.

Except the people in charge of Aradne want to destroy Rust Town! Rhea sent.

According to Sebastian, Will said. Who isn’t our most reliable source. And besides, that’s not what he said. He didn’t actually say who was responsible. Just that Aradne would no longer have to share water with the slums, once Rust Town was destroyed.

Yes, but the logical inference is that the mayor is responsible, or the security team, or whoever is in charge of Aradne, Rhea transmitted. We have to warn the residents of Rust Town, so they can at least flee. If the bioweapons swerve away after a day or two, then we can turn away and pretend none of this ever happened. But if they don’t…

Yeah well, that’s a nice idea and all, Will sent, but there’s one problem. We can’t keep pace with them. Look how fast they’re crossing those plains!

That’s a good point, Rhea said.

I wonder how they even know where they’re going, Will sent. Could be they’re traveling in a random direction.

Someone has probably laid a scent for them to track, Horatio replied.

The Scorpion… Rhea transmitted. That was just a guess, of course, but it seemed plausible.

Rhea had stopped climbing during the conversation and was about to begin again when she felt subtle vibrations passing through the rock. Apparently the reverberations from the massive bioweapon stampede were reaching even here.

A boulder the size of her body abruptly broke loose beside her, and she started. It bounced from the cliff face several times as it plunged, issuing thick thuds along the way.

I could’ve easily been on that rock… she sent.

But you weren’t, Will said. Stop getting your britches in a knit over what could’ve been, and instead worry about the racket that thing’s making.

He was right to be worried: below, several grotesque heads shot toward the ridge as the boulder continued to strike against the cliff during its descent.

The team remained motionless.

A final thud issued when the rock crashed into the ground and broke in two.

Come on, don’t notice us, Will sent. Don’t notice.

The party waited, watching. Hoping.

And then the wind picked up. It blew from north to south, toward the bioweapons camped on the plains below.

Damn it, Will said. Gotta love it when luck goes against you every step of the way.

Not every step, Horatio said. Rhea wasn’t on the rock that fell, after all…

The closest bioweapons hooted and howled suddenly. Apparently the creatures had spotted the trio. No doubt both the falling boulder and the north-south wind had played parts in that.

Whatever the case, the Hydras rushed the base of the cliff and began to climb.

22

Rhea scaled the rock face with renewed urgency.

While the local bioweapons were swarming the base of the cliff below, those parts of the bigger herd in the dust cloud continued northeast, refusing to detour from their course in any way. Some of the bioweapons on the plains directly below also abandoned the ridge to join in the northeastern trek, perhaps confident that their brethren here would successfully handle Rhea and the others. These deserters raced into the wide dust cloud and promptly vanished.

As that cloud and the herd it contained receded into the northeast, the reverberations passing through the rock face faded. Rhea noticed only with a small part of her mind, as the remainder concentrated on following the path Gizmo had marked on the surface.

On a whim, Will and Horatio paused at one point to shoot at the rocks below, hoping to cause an avalanche. But all they did was drill small boreholes. They couldn’t start an avalanche.

The rocks drop away when you don’t want them to, Will complained. And when you do, they refuse.

That’s typical of most things in life, Horatio said.

In apparent frustration, Will began to fire at the bioweapons themselves, but they shook off the attacks as before and continued to climb unperturbed.

The team climbed faster than before; the incoming bioweapons were an effective goad. In moments Horatio was climbing over the crest, and Rhea joined him on the plateau a moment later.

Will let himself down from Horatio’s back. He was staring into the distance to the north, past the tip of the ridge.

“Maybe that can help us.” Will nodded northward.

She turned that way and saw a wall of black that covered the northern horizon from east to west.

“Gritstorm?” Horatio said.

“It’s heading toward us fast,” Will said. “I’d say a minute, maybe two.”

“It won’t reach us before our pursuers…” Horatio said.

“Then we reach it, first,” Will said. “Run!”

The trio ran across the plateau, to a small path that led down between a defile of sorts set amid two peaks. It was wide enough to fit three of their pursuers at once.

As she leaped onto the gentle slope of that defile, a spine-tingling howl came from behind her. Glancing over her shoulder, she spotted the lead bioweapons clambering onto the plateau.

“They’re just behind us!” Rhea said as she raced down the slope and into the defile with the others.

“What’s with the howls?” Will shouted. “They have lion heads! They should be roaring! Not howling! Or hissing at least.”

“They’re bioweapons,” Horatio said, running alongside him. “Designed for maximum killing efficiency. And this includes inducing the maximum fear in its prey. There’s something about hissing that isn’t as frightening as howling.”

Rhea glanced over her shoulders. “Right about now, hissing would be equally frightening to me!”

The bioweapons were gaining. Two of them had taken the lead and ran side-by-side in the defile. She could see a faint halo around them as the pair generated the beginnings of that dust-gathering force field around them. Beneath it, the scales of their four muscular legs shimmered iridescently beneath the sun, while the long, scythe-like talons on the forelimbs gleamed in anticipation. The stinging tentacles swished to and fro on their tails, sweeping the walls of the defile and ripping small streaks into the rock surface. The five long, snakelike necks on each body bobbed sinuously, the manes of their leonine heads flowing behind them like the banners of some army marching into battle. Their eyes shone with what could best be described as sheer joy, as if they were living their life’s purpose in that moment. Which they were.

When she had first seen these creatures on the plains, she had been repulsed, but watching them now, she felt a strange sense of awe. They seemed truly beautiful in that moment. Beautiful, and terrifying.

“You see that halo around them?” Will shouted. “Looks almost like a force field. That could be why our weapons aren’t penetrating.”

“I thought it was just to generate their dust cover,” Rhea said. “But you could be right.”

She had maybe ten seconds before the creatures reached her. Even if she ran at her top speed and abandoned Will—which she never would—it would only bring her an extra five seconds. She decided if she was going to die, she would do it on her terms.

She stopped, then spun about. She reached for her pistol, only to remember she didn’t have one anymore.

Will and Horatio continued to flee behind her. Maybe they didn’t notice. Or maybe they were happy to accept her sacrifice.

And then shots came in from behind her. They moved in sync with the bobbing head of one of the creatures and struck the open mouth. The leonine head merely turned to the side and shook the impacts off.

The two creatures were upon her.

“Rhea!” Will called.

Rhea somersaulted forward as the scythe-like talons of the closest bioweapon swiped at her. Will had thrown his pistol to her, and she snatched it out of the air before rolling beneath the body to fire into the underbelly. There was no halo surrounding this creature that she could see, but if there was, she would have been within its circumference at the moment, given what she had seen from afar. Despite that, her energy bolts appeared to inflict no damage, save to cause soot marks to adorn the skin of the creature’s underside.

She leaped up before the creature could trample her and grabbed on to the base of the tail. The appendage curled up, and swatted at her with the tip, attempting to strike her with those stinging tentacles. She let go and dropped to the ground. The tendrils struck the underside of the tail and lower belly, and the creature screamed.

Interesting.

“Get them to hit each other with their tails,” Rhea transmitted.

“Easier said than done!” Will replied.

The two bioweapons spun about to face Rhea. On the other side, two more were quickly bearing down. Cornered.

She glanced at the rock face beside her. Or perhaps not quite cornered…

She leaped up as the four came in and landed on the wall three meters up. Two opposing heads smashed into one another behind her, while the bodies they belonged to collided and entangled. The other two opposing bioweapons managed to avoid one another—the first ducked under the second, which leaped over it.

Will and Horatio had turned around and were coming back. They shouted, trying to distract the bioweapons from Rhea.

Meanwhile, she climbed the wall. Unlike the cliff face that faced the plains, this one had several rocky protrusions that lent themselves well to climbing.

A lion head lunged toward her. She leaped off the wall, swinging herself to the right. The head smashed into the surface beside her, sending fragments flying.

She landed on the cliff a few meters to the right and latched on. She began climbing again, but was forced to dodge yet another head that came in. She couldn’t tell if it was from the same creature, or another. She pulled herself upward this time, leaping out of the way, and landing higher.

Another head. She let go this time and landed on the neck of the first head below. She tried firing at point blank range, but once again caused little more than black spots to appear.

That head jerked violently to the left, and she was sent flying off the Hydra. She landed on the ground before it, and one of those big paws came down. She rolled out of the way before it could crush her and rolled again when another paw came down. The forelimbs sliced at her with their scythe-like talons, and she rolled back and forth, narrowly dodging them.

But then another Hydra crashed into that one, courtesy of Will, who was acting as bait nearby.

Horatio appeared, and grabbed her by the wrist, leading her from the wrestling pair of bioweapons behind her.

And then the air turned brown around them as grit filled it. The wind picked up, so that she heard only its high-pitched gusting, and in moments everything around her vanished to the storm. She could see maybe three meters in any direction.

She switched to LIDAR, but it didn’t work at all in that storm. But she still had the outlines of Will and Horatio on her HUD—Will had rejoined her as well. She could also see the defile walls, displayed not by LIDAR, but according to the map data she had on the region. She also had the last known positions of the bioweapons.

“Let’s go!” Will said. “While they’re blinded!”

“Guess we’ll find out if the storm truly masks our scent from them,” Horatio said.

“Here!” Rhea said and tossed the pistol to Will. The weapon was outlined on the HUD, and he caught it.

The party made their way forward. Rhea raised her hood and tightened the bottom to form a scarf. She donned the visor that Will gave her to protect her mechanical eyes. Will himself had wrapped up his face quite well, and he’d lowered protective shields from the thin visor that rested below his brows to preserve his eyes. Even Horatio attached special covers over his camera lenses.

As they advanced, they occasionally had to dodge a limb of a blinded bioweapon that stepped too close. That happened seven times in total. The first four incidents occurred one after the other, while the final three were more sporadic. After that, the events stopped entirely—the bioweapons had become completely lost in that storm.

“Nothing like a good Gritstorm to save the day,” Will sent above the howling wind.

He recalled Gizmo: it damaged the rotors of the machine to fly for too long in that mess. Plus, the near zero visibility made the drone essentially useless. The wind knocked about Gizmo as the drone descended, almost smashing the aerial machine against the rocks of the defile. When Gizmo finally landed, Will immediately stowed the drone in his pack.

The party proceeded through the swirling murk of the storm. Sometimes Rhea caught glimpses of Will ahead of her, but usually he was lost to the grit an instant later. She occasionally stumbled on rocks or small boulders not displayed on the HUD—small changes in the landscape that had transpired since the last time the map had been updated, possibly due to the storm itself. But otherwise the map data proved impeccable. Horatio, in the lead, usually warned the others if he spotted something they needed to watch for.

They stayed close to the leftmost edge of the defile at first, but when the grit began to pile up there, forming drifts, the party switched to the right side instead, which was spared from any sediment. For now.

She had a thought.

“I seem to recall reading somewhere on the Net that Gritstorms can last for days,” Rhea sent

“That’s right,” Will said. “So?”

“Check the map,” Rhea told him. “The storm cut across not just our path, but the path of the second wave of bioweapons. Those headed to Rust Town. They’ll be blinded, wandering around lost in the grit. We can use the storm to get ahead of them!”

“I don’t know if that’s such a good idea…” Will said.

“Think about it,” Rhea continued. “We have advanced mapping tech to ensure we never get lost, whereas they don’t. Also, they won’t be able to track whatever scent has been laid down for them either. Not while the storm is active. We’ve seen that already.”

Will remained quiet for several seconds. “I vote no. We have our own lives to look out for at the moment. We barely survived back there as it was. Plus, you forget why we’re out here. We’re salvagers: we collect salvage. We don’t hunt bioweapons, and we certainly don’t backtrack to warn settlements of imagined threats. Look, if we detour all the way back to Rust Town, we’ll probably use up every last credit of profit earned since leaving the settlement, because we’ll have to purchase more rations and supplies. You know how much water costs these days, right? It’ll be like the last two weeks were wasted. You might even end up deeper in debt, considering how poor your haul is. So I say we cut and run. Press on. We can’t help them. Even if we warn the residents, they’ll never flee in time. Rust Town is doomed.”

“You don’t know that,” Rhea insisted. “We have to try.”

But Will continued as if she hadn’t spoken. “Who knows, maybe Sebastian lied, and the Hydras aren’t headed to Rust Town at all.”

“You bastard,” she said.

His outline shrugged on her HUD. “What? It’s a possibility.”

Rhea couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “What happened to the Will I knew? The Will who wouldn’t stand by and watch while innocents succumbed, and who believed all life was sacred? The Will who saved me from the rubble?”

He didn’t answer.

“Rust Town has to be warned…” she pressed.

Still no response.

“I’m going to have to turn back without you then, if you won’t come,” Rhea threatened.

“As if I’ll let you,” Will finally said.

“You can’t stop me,” she said.

“What about your debt?” he pressed.

“I’ll repay it, someday,” she said. “I’ll find you after I’ve gone to Rust Town. Then we’ll continue salvaging.”

“If you survive.” Will paused, then sighed over the comm, a sound barely audible above the raging wind. “Okay. We’ll head northeast and try to cut in front of the bioweapons. You do know we risk putting ourselves directly in their path if the storm ends early, right?”

“I know,” she said.

“Good,” he said. “Because if that happens, we’re probably all dead. You still want to do this?”

In answer, she selected a destination waypoint on her HUD, corresponding to Rust Town’s location.

“I was afraid you’d say that,” Will told her.

And so, when the party emerged from the mountain pass, they followed along the ridge until it fell away, and then swung northeast through the storm, using their mapping technology to keep them on the fastest and best route to Rust Town.

23

Rhea trudged on through the Gritstorm with her companions. At first, she kept expecting the dark shapes of bioweapons to come charging through the swirling murk at them. But that feeling slowly subsided, replaced by a sense of general unease. She sometimes felt like the party was traveling right in the middle of a pack of Hydras but simply couldn’t see them: an errant step to the left or right and she’d find herself stepping directly into one of their jaws. An imagined threat, perhaps, but that made it no less real to her. She just wished visibility was greater. But then again, if she and her companions were truly surrounded by bioweapons at the moment, the twisting murk served to protect them. Besides, it was that very same visibility that was allowing them to hopefully leapfrog the Hydras.

The trio wore their visors at all times to protect their eyes, and kept their heads firmly wrapped; at night, to sleep, they formed makeshift bivouacs with their backpacks, stacking them like sandbags for protection against the storm. The soil and grit would pile up on the north side, forming a black drift by morning.

Before the storm, Rhea already had trouble falling asleep each night, and the howling winds raging through the darkness only aggravated that. She often had to mute her hearing sensitivity levels down to zero before she could find repose. Since her mind-machine interface intercepted that sound, and handled the muting, it could continue monitoring external noises independently of her brain. That way if there was a sudden spike in noise or a shift in frequencies, such as might transpire with a bioweapon attack, she would wake up.

But even with the sound muted, sleep wasn’t easy. Sometimes she engaged her virtual target practice course, which comforted her. Other times, she spoke with Horatio, who always remained awake, and on guard.

“Does it ever get to you?” Rhea asked the robot one time over the private comm. “All this time you spend alone each night?” She spoke over the mental comm line, as she had all sound muted. They had tried using noise cancellers, but the hardware had difficulty filtering out voices against the storm. Muting and mental communications were the only way to have a decent conversation without shouting.

“No.” Horatio said. He huddled next to her, behind the row of backpacks. “Why would it ‘get to me?’ AIs such as myself are used to solitude. We relish it.”

“Then why do AIs, such as yourself, play that massively multiplayer game you mentioned?” she said. “The one designed specifically for your kind?”

“We don’t play it for the companionship,” Horatio said. “Not all of us do, anyway. A good many of us rock solo, believe it or not.”

She smiled. “Rock solo. AIs certainly have their own vernacular.”

“A vernacular based on your own,” Horatio countered. “In any case, I prefer to be alone. In VR, and the real world.”

“Didn’t you mention at one point that you wanted to retire into VR?” she asked.

“That was one of my options,” Horatio agreed.

“You can be anything you want in VR,” she said. “Have a human body. You could interact with humans, join their VR games, they’d never know the difference.”

“I’ve experienced what it was like to be human many times, in VR,” the robot said. “Though I sometimes wonder if it would not be better to acquire an actual human body.”

“Have your AI core transferred into a full body replacement cyborg?” she pressed.

“Exactly,” Horatio said. “Though one with a more human face than your own. No offense.”

“None taken,” she said.

“A face indistinguishable from that of an ordinary human’s,” Horatio said. “I think I would like that. I would be almost human, then. I could form relationships with women in real life.”

“Why bother?” Rhea said. “When VR will let you do that too. You can even have sex over VR, with the proper attachments.” She waved a hand, which Horatio would see in the darkness courtesy of the outline generated by location sharing. “All of this is an illusion anyway. Created by the mind to satisfy the primitive senses we once needed to interact with our physical environment. When we lost the need for actual human bodies, we lost the need for the real world.”

“I suppose so,” he said. “And yet there are some women, some people, who exist almost exclusively in the real world. If I want to form a relationship with such women, it can’t be virtual.”

Rhea stared uncertainly at the blue outline of the robot on her HUD. “Are you trying to tell me something?”

“No.” Horatio’s answer came a little too quickly, even for the robot, for her to trust it entirely.

“Because if there’s something you want to tell me, there’s no better time than now,” she said. “We might not make it to Rust Town alive. And even if we do, there’s no guarantee we’ll get out of the city in time. You know that. We all know. So then, we should make sure there’s nothing left unsaid between us.”

“All has been said,” Horatio told her. “And even if there were words or feelings I was holding back, would it make a difference? You don’t feel any attraction toward me. If anything, you’re attracted to Will. I’ve noticed the way you look at him.”

“That’s not attraction,” she said. “But more like respect.”

“If he tried to hold you in his arms, or place his lips upon you, you would resist?” Horatio pressed.

She made a disgusted expression. “Of course.” Then again, she wasn’t entirely so sure.

“I see,” Horatio told her. “Perhaps I was mistaken. Good night, Rhea.”

She stared at him a moment longer then lay back and closed her eyes. “Night.”

* * *

Thankfully the storm continued for several days, giving the party much-needed time. Whether it would be enough to pull ahead of the Hydras was another story, however. It was possible luck might be on the side of the Hydras, and that more than a few of them might continue on the same course though blinded. That seemed extremely unlikely, unless the designers of the weapons could come up with some alternate way to lead them through the Gritstorm.

The map data guided Rhea and her companions, and they made good progress through the storm. Though they often stumbled on unseen rocks and boulders, and other hazards, they moved almost as fast as before the storm, considering the grit otherwise formed only a thin layer on the surface. After all, there was a limited supply of sediment, unlike in say a blizzard, where fresh snow could fall indefinitely. It was the black drifts that really slowed the trio, but Horatio, who remained in the lead, did a decent job of guiding the party around them.

At night they took shelter in nearby farmhouses if available. Otherwise they looked for a hollow and employed the tried-and-true bivouac method.

Rhea had programmed her mind-machine interface to unmute her hearing the moment she woke up—she wanted to leave repose with all her senses firing in case danger proved imminent. So when Rhea awoke to silence on the morning of the fifth day, at first she thought she’d accidentally reverted the auto-unmute setting.

But then she realized the sky was blue above her. Not black. She was lying in a hollow, with Horatio on her left, and Will beyond him. She could see them with utmost clarity. The wind had died.

The lip of the hollow blocked her view of the landscape beyond, so she wasn’t entirely certain what awaited out there. She glanced at Horatio, but the robot seemed unconcerned.

“Go ahead,” Horatio said. “Have a look.”

She turned around, and peered beyond the upper edges of her backpack, which served as part of the bivouac. Visibility was indeed back to normal: she could see to the horizon. The storm had ended, and in its wake remained a surreal landscape coated in sediment that formed drifts and mounds around the smallest protrusions in the terrain. These black piles were far larger than those that had marred the landscape before the storm.

She turned to observe all four horizons and searched for signs of bioweapons. There were none.

Tentatively, Rhea lowered the scarf, and took a breath free of grit. She slid the goggles from her eyes, but otherwise left her hood raised—if there were bandits out there, best they didn’t know she was a cyborg.

“We’ve crested the storm,” Horatio said.

She nodded and murmured: “Now the real journey begins.”

Will awoke a moment later and promptly removed his head wrapping and retracted the eye shield into his visor. He surveyed the four horizons as Rhea had done, and then launched Gizmo.

“I’m instructing Giz to circle far overhead to watch for Hydras,” Will said.

“How far away do you think they are?” Rhea asked him.

“No idea,” Will replied. “The creatures are no doubt regrouping. Though the storm scattered them, they’ll be drawn by whatever scent was laid to guide them.”

“Assuming it wasn’t scrubbed away by all that grit,” Rhea said.

“It wasn’t,” Will said.

Only a few moments later saw them on the march again. Now that the storm had blown itself out, there was no time to lose. They ate their ration pills on the march and downed them with water from their canteens. They still had quite a lot of water and rations left, as they had planned to trek all the way to the next settlement, after all.

With the storm gone, they were able to travel at their fastest possible speed, restricted only by Will’s physical limitations as a human, and they traveled far that day. The time passed swiftly, and that night Rhea slept better than she had since awakening from her mind wipe.

The next day, she knew the party was getting close to Rust Town when, around noon, the black drifts began to recede from the bases of the boulders and rock shelves that dotted the landscape, as did the thin coating of silt that mantled the terrain, until eventually all traces of detritus vanished from the landscape entirely, and the ground’s bedrock and packed dirt were laid bare before them. The trio had passed into the weather-controlled region outside the settlement and its host city, Aradne.

“Won’t be long now,” Will said. “We’ll soon find out whether the bioweapons beat us to the city.”

After another day of travel, the ruins of skyscrapers thrust from the distant horizon. Gizmo spotted them first, and Will transmitted the drone’s feed to Rhea and Horatio.

“Can’t believe we’re almost there,” Rhea said.

“Yeah, well, I guess we’ll find out soon enough if the settlement is still standing,” Will told her.

Soon enough the trio was walking through the rubble-filled streets and winding between the skeletons of once great skyscrapers. Wanting to keep a low profile, they hugged the walls of the buildings as best as they were able and rounded any rubble along the way. Some streets were simply choked with debris, however, and the party had no choice but to crawl over it.

“No signs of any bioweapons yet,” Horatio said as they climbed over one such street, which was covered in piles of broken bricks.

“Thanks for the unnecessary update,” Will quipped

All three of them were keeping their eyes glued to the decaying skyscrapers around them, scanning any intact rooftops, along with the gaping holes that joined windows in pocking their walls.

Because of that, Rhea nearly tripped on a piece of exposed rebar in the rubble. She quickly broke the metal away near the base and shoved it into her pack before continuing. “I know we don’t have time, but it still feels strange, not stopping to search for salvage.”

Will gave her a curious glance over his shoulder. “But you’re not even a true salvager.”

“Maybe, but it’s all I’ve known for the past two weeks,” she told him. “I guess the newly wiped really are impressionable, as you said.”

“Well, even if we did have time, there would be no point,” Will stated. “These streets have been searched a thousand times over already. I’m not sure why we bother anymore. Next time we leave Rust Town, I intend to simply turn up my nose and walk on past every piece of rubble we come across in the outlying ruins.”

“You always say that,” Horatio commented. “And yet you always stop.”

“Bad habit,” Will agreed.

“You do know I just found a piece of rebar…” Rhea said. “So that proves there are still some items of value to be had.”

“Yeah, an item worth half a cred, if that,” Will said. “We’re going to make more money from the random salvage we collected in the Outlands proper than from anything gathered here. Rule of thumb, if you find ruins close to an existing settlement, or even minutely visible on satellite maps, it will be stripped of almost everything of value by the time you get there.”

Rhea sighed, pulling her gaze from the rubble. They weren’t here to salvage. They were here to warn a settlement of its impending doom. And warn it they would.

Rhea glanced at Gizmo’s feed, which she still had piped into the upper right of her vision. “The settlement will be coming up on the drone’s cameras momentarily.”

As they crossed a relatively rubble-free street, she repeatedly gazed down both sides, feeling exposed as she scanned for bioweapons. She couldn’t wait to get back to the cover of the next building.

They reached it momentarily, and she felt relieved to hug the debris at the base of the skyscraper there.

And then, from a side street ahead, a herd of four Hydras causally strolled out onto the ruined road.

24

Rhea and the others immediately took cover, diving behind the rubble that was thankfully beside them. Not daring to peek past the edge, she focused on Gizmo’s feed. The drone quickly backtracked, so that in only a few seconds the street was visible, along with the four bioweapons upon it.

How did Gizmo miss them? Will asked over the mental comm.

Check the map, Horatio relied. That side street they emerged from? It’s canopied by a collapsed building.

Rhea glanced at her overhead map as suggested. A building had indeed collapsed at some point, crashing into an adjacent skyscraper, but otherwise remaining intact so that it formed a canopy over the street. The drone had flown well above those two skyscrapers, and thus wouldn’t have spotted the creatures as they traveled beneath the slanted, precarious roof the collapse formed.

The four bioweapons continued advancing in the same direction, perpendicular to the location of Rhea and the others. The five leonine heads on each creature seemed to be sniffing the air, and they scanned their surroundings with narrowed eyes.

I don’t think they’ve seen us, Horatio sent.

Maybe not, but they’re going to pick up our scent eventually, Rhea said. We have to get inside this building, so we’re not exposed. First rule of bioweapon combat in urban areas, according to Bardain.

There’s an opening, here, Horatio said. A waypoint became active on her map: the building entrance.

The only way to get to it was to dash out from behind the rubble and into plain view. The other option was to possibly return the way they had come, but there were no openings in the building along that route, and because the rubble diminished along the way, the party members would be partially exposed before reaching the next avenue.

Sending in Giz, Will announced.

The drone swooped down and deactivated its rotor noise cancelling to dart loudly into the street in front of the bioweapons. The creatures hooted and hollered as they followed it, trying to grab Gizmo out of the air with their snapping jaws. The drone flew teasingly higher.

As soon as the bioweapons had their backs to them, Rhea and the others made a run for it. They dashed into the jagged entrance and entered a partially collapsed lobby. They raced between fallen pillars toward the far side.

Looks like most of the building is collapsed on the far side, Will said. We won’t be getting out that way.

They climbed a damaged escalator to the second floor. There were two elevators in front of them with closed doors, and a stairwell door. In the stairwell, they were able to climb two stories before the debris became insurmountable, and they were forced to vacate inside an office area instead. Cubicles, some of them broken and strewn across the floor, dominated.

So, what’s the consensus? Horatio broadcast as they wended their way through the cubicles toward the far side of the building, where a bunch of broken windows offered an exit to the street below. These bioweapons are part of the invasion force? Runts looking for something to eat while their stronger companions drain Rust Town dry? Or part of a group of advance scouts?

I’m going to guess advance scouts, Will transmitted. They must have been sent ahead of the others. They beat the storm.

Either that, or they got extremely lucky, Rhea sent. It’s possible a few of them wandered out of the storm before it ended, regrouped on the other side, and made their way here ahead of their brethren.

Or maybe Rust Town really is destroyed already, like the robot says, Will transmitted.

As they approached the building edge, Horatio sent: You know, a four-story jump will be fairly hard on the servos. We should climb down.

Piggyback ride time, Will told Horatio.

And then, just outside the broken windows ahead, a large, leonine head appeared, attached to a reptilian neck.

Rhea and the others immediately ducked behind the closest cubicle. She caught a glimpse of motion before she dropped from view, and thought it was the creature’s head spinning toward them. Had it seen them or caught their scent?

Seems there were a few more bioweapons that Gizmo missed out there, Horatio sent.

Seems so! Will agreed.

Rhea instinctively reached for her holster, and when she gripped empty air, she remembered she no longer had a pistol. Will had drawn his own, while Horatio had the double barrels under his forearms deployed. Not that it would do any good against these things.

A shadow crept across the floor next to the cubicle, and that told Rhea the Hydra had shoved its head through the broken window to explore. Another shadow appeared on the other side of the cubicle as a second head came inside.

This is… interesting, Will sent.

Recall Gizmo? Rhea suggested.

Giz already moved out of comm range while leading the others away, Will replied. I don’t expect her to return for another sixty seconds or so.

Rhea glanced about frantically. There was another cubicle across from them, with the base partly pushed out at the bottom. Rhea pointed toward it, and quickly crouched to it, then ducked through.

Will and Horatio followed, and all three of them dove into the small aisle formed between a wall and the adjacent cubicles. They proceeded into that aisle, passing five cubicles before another aisle branched off toward the windows in a T-shaped intersection of sorts formed by the partitioned areas. She went into that aisle momentarily and peered past the far edge of the cubicle there, just in time to see the two Hydra heads converge on the other side of the cubicle her party had vacated. Their nostrils flared in and out, as if sniffing.

She ducked again, returning to the aisle bordering the wall. She knew it wouldn’t be long before the creature ferreted them out. Or creatures—she couldn’t be sure the heads belonged to the same beast.

Will was already leading the way forward—which was north, as it so happened—and when the wall fell away to the left, he turned that way, heading west along the new aisle formed by the cubicles and the northern side of the wall.

We have to get to the windows, Rhea sent.

I know. Will turned right when the next branch appeared and headed north once more into the aisle formed by the cubicles there. Several of the partitions forming the latter were decayed and collapsed, but they provided more than enough cover for the party, just as long as they stayed crouched. Up ahead, the shattered windows on the northern facade of the building offered a way out.

Rhea kept glancing over her shoulders, looking for signs of their pursuer, but spotted nothing. She crept over a broken desk in her path, and then a chair, being very careful not to make a sound. Will accidentally snapped a chair leg underfoot, and he flinched, freezing as the sound traversed the office space. But the bioweapons didn’t come.

The party members hurried forward, knowing that discovery was imminent. When they reached the smashed windows, it was only to discover two more bioweapons searching the street below, sniffing along the lower edges of the building with their multiple heads.

They’ve discovered our scent, I think, Will said.

Overhead, Rhea could see the canopy formed by the upper half of the building, which had crashed into the skyscraper across from them. There was an open window along that slanted exterior, a short distance from them.

Climb, Rhea ordered.

She shoved past Will and pulled herself onto the tilted canopy. She gripped a metal beam that ran the length of the building and used it to carry herself hand over hand toward the opening. She glanced down only once to confirm that the bioweapons hadn’t spotted her, and when she reached the jagged opening, she paused to punch away the glass, breaking away the pieces so that they slid inside, and then pulled herself through.

Worried that the creatures might have heard the sound of breaking glass, she clung there to the slanting floor and peered down. The Hydras hadn’t yet noticed. She turned her attention to the broken window she’d just left, in time to see Horatio swinging outside with Will hanging onto his backpack.

Horatio conveyed himself forward hand over hand just like Rhea had, and when the robot reached the gaping hole, he pulled himself through. Will climbed down, and patted Horatio on the shoulder.

All of the cubicles here were smashed into the wedge formed between floor and ceiling, courtesy of the building’s tilt, and Rhea climbed onto that debris. She headed for a centrally located wall, which contained the open door of a stairwell.

Inside the stairwell, she and the others climbed the steps with difficulty. Scaling the stairs that were aligned with the overall slope of the building was easy. But clambering those that went against the slope, well, meant she had to drag herself hand-over-hand again via the handrail until she pulled herself onto the next flight at the top. Will actually climbed the handrail himself this time, rather than hitching a ride with Horatio. At least at first: he only lasted for three flights of that before piggybacking on his robot friend once more. Rhea decided not to comment on that.

Eventually, after seesawing back and forth like that, they reached the broken door leading to the rooftop, which was slanted above the building it had fallen upon. Looking down, at the far edge of the sloping roof she could see the jagged remnants of the building below. The top floors had collapsed, thanks to the impact, but it looked like the debris that had formed because of that was only about one floor deep. Will could easily survive a jump from the edge of the current rooftop, to that area. But the question was, how stable was that debris?

Rhea pulled herself onto the rooftop, and then allowed her cyborg body to slide toward the edge of the building. She came to a stop when she hit the small wall at its brim. She glanced at the broken building below, running her gaze across the debris from left to right. She concluded that landing on the eastern side was the safest option—the corner frame piece looked fairly sturdy, at least compared to the debris that filled most of the floor. Once they reached it, they could climb down all the way to the street from there. Along a diagonal, of course, to move as far away from the bioweapons as possible.

Gizmo’s back, Will sent.

She glanced up and saw the drone barely visible as a black dot overhead. Gizmo had reactivated rotor noise cancelling, and had no doubt taken a roundabout route back to avoid leading the enemy to them.

She piped in Gizmo’s video feed, which gave her a view of the surrounding streets. Three bioweapons were still congregated to the south, around the first building her party had entered, while another four resided some distance to the west—perhaps where they had last sighted Gizmo.

The corner piece looks fairly sturdy, Rhea said. We can climb down there.

She crab-walked along that narrow wall that formed the edge of the rooftop. Meanwhile Will and Horatio slid down and stopped at the edge not far from her.

She reached the end of the current rooftop. Unfortunately, it didn’t reach far enough, and overhung at a spot that was still a few meters to the right of the corner frame she sought below. Well, she’d just have to leap.

She pulled herself onto the edge of the roof and jumped.

She landed on the corner, and thankfully it held her weight. She lowered onto the adjacent wall, and began to climb down, using the natural ledges formed by the windowsills for hand and foot holds. Horatio followed just above her, carrying Will on his backpack once more.

Rhea moved diagonally across that wall, away from the bioweapons, and kept an eye on Gizmo’s feed the whole way. When she was two stories from the ground, she decided that was far enough, and leaped the rest of the way down. Her servos whirred slightly in complaint, but otherwise she took no damage.

She raced across to the far side of the street and ducked behind the opposite building. Then she waited for Will and Horatio; when the pair arrived, Will leaped off of Horatio’s back, and the trio proceeded deeper into the city, at a sprint.

Gizmo pulled ahead, though continued to circle back to watch their rear.

A moment later the walls of Aradne appeared on Gizmo’s feed, along with those of the slums built upon its base.

Well, Rust Town is still there, and it looks intact, Will commented. So the advance scout theory wins out. Who knows, maybe the bioweapons aren’t coming after all.

They’re coming, Rhea sent.

They reached the lone sentry that guarded this particular approach to the city.

“There are bioweapons after us!” Rhea said without preamble. She glanced behind her nervously, expecting the Hydras to appear at any moment.

“The settlement defenses have been alerted,” the sentry said calmly. The robot’s golden body gleamed beneath the sun, as did the shaft of the energy pike it held at an angle in front of it.

Rhea searched the skies. “Well? Where are the hunter killers?”

“The settlement defenses have been alerted,” the robot repeated in that same deadpan tone.

“They take some time to scramble,” Will assured her.

The robot tilted its head to glance at each of them in turn. “Now state your business, Outlanders.”

Rhea let Will answer the questions. It was obvious he was just as impatient as her. All three of them kept gazing over their shoulders, and Rhea suspected Will and Horatio were eying Gizmo’s feed just as often as she was.

Finally, the questioning ended, and the party members darted onto the street that led to Rust Town.

25

Rhea dashed forward, pulling ahead of Will and Horatio in her eagerness to warn the city. She wanted to shout from the rooftops that terrible bioweapons were coming. She wanted to log into all the streaming sites and issue a dire warning to all the listeners. Except there was one problem: she didn’t have any followers on any of the streaming sites. And if she shouted from the rooftops, the residents would think her mad. Either way, no one would listen to her.

She had to talk to someone in charge. Someone who could orchestrate a mass evacuation.

Ahead awaited the four-meter tall Texas barriers that enclosed the city. She gazed past the slanted metal roofs that poked out beyond it, her eyes resting on the distant metal walls of Aradne, where gun turrets observed menacingly from the upper walkways. Aradne wasn’t going to protect its slums. How could she make the residents of Rust Town understand?

And yet a nagging voice at the back of her mind reminded her: what if Sebastian was wrong, or lying?

Rhea searched the skies. “I still don’t see any hunter killers. They’re not taking the threat seriously. Or they’ve been told to ignore it.”

“Have you ever considered, maybe there isn’t a threat after all?” Will said.

“I really wish you were right,” she said. “I do. That we came all this way for nothing. But seeing as we already encountered Hydras in the ruins, somehow I suspect that’s not true!”

“Good point,” Will agreed.

They approached the gap between the barriers, which was guarded by two golden sentry robots. The network icon flashed in the upper right of her display: she was able to log into the Net once more. She had the world at her fingertips again, and yet she was too distracted at the moment to care all that much.

“We need to see the mayor of Rust Town,” Rhea said while the sentry robots placed the weapons of her companions in cold storage.

“There is no mayor,” one sentry said.

“Then who do we report a coming attack to?” she asked.

“Crimes are to be reported to the sheriff’s office,” the robot replied. “They may be submitted online, or in person.”

“And how long does it take for online crimes to be processed?” she asked.

“Approximately one business day,” the sentry said.

“Then in person it is,” she said. “I’ll need an address.”

“I have it,” Will said.

But she received a share request from the robot at the same time, and when she accepted, a waypoint appeared on her overhead map, indicating a building composed of several cargo containers. It was labeled “Sheriff’s Office.”

Soon they were making their way across the streets of Rust Town, passing between the cargo containers and lean-tos that served as homes and businesses. The familiar buzzing of drones overhead, the playing children, the augmented reality hawkers competing for her business, all of it made her feel like she’d come home. These hallmarks of civilization offered the illusion of safety, a shelter from the dangers of the Outlands.

Remember, it is an illusion.

She kept her hood pulled low around her face, not wanting to alert the residents to her cyborg nature. She didn’t need to attract trouble, not now, not when she had such a time-sensitive message to deliver.

She tried a Net look-up on “Dagger of Khrusos” but found nothing. Perhaps the knowledge had been suppressed. She tried a search on “The Scorpion” as well but got nothing except a few unrelated video games.

They finally reached the sheriff’s “office,” a series of cargo containers spread out to form a sprawling compound. There was a distinct lack of graffiti on the building, and those surrounding it. That was a good sign, she thought. It had no windows, of course, like all buildings in the city. If one wanted windows to the outside world, one could simply pipe the feed from the external video camera to their augmented reality goggles and overlay the view to any wall they wanted in their home. Speaking of video cameras, the sheriff’s office certainly had a lot of them. She counted at least three on the main cargo container, and another six decorating the containers connected to it.

Rhea glanced at Will and Horatio uncertainly.

“Well, you wanted to come here,” Will said. “This is your show. Lead the way. We’ll back you up as best we can.”

Rhea nodded, unable to help the butterflies she felt in her stomach. It was an illusion of her human mind of course, since she didn’t even have a stomach. Not a real one, anyone.

But just because my stomach is artificial doesn’t make it any less real. Nor make me any less real, overall. The sheriff will take me seriously. I can do this.

Somehow she would convince the sheriff of the coming threat. The city’s residents depended on it.

She approached the entrance door, and it slid aside of its own accord.

She glanced at Will, who raised an eyebrow.

“Never seen an automatic door?” Will quipped.

She smiled sardonically and stepped inside. Horatio and Will joined her.

The cargo container was empty save for a series of chairs—currently empty—that lined three walls. There was a small hatch on the far side that led deeper into the compound.

“Welcome to the sheriff’s office,” a disembodied, friendly female voice said. “Protecting Rust Town from crime and gang warfare since twenty-six-fifteen. How can we help you today?”

“An army of bioweapons is coming to the city,” Rhea said. “We need to evacuate immediately!”

“Please have a seat and the sheriff will attend you momentarily,” the voice said, its tone remaining friendly, and seeming entirely unperturbed.

“I’m not sure you understand the gravity of the situation,” Rhea said. “The city is in extreme danger.”

“The sheriff will attend you momentarily,” the voice said cheerily.

Mouth agape, Rhea stared at the hatch in front of her. Then she glanced at Will, who shrugged.

“Not much more we can do except take a seat, and wait,” Will said.

With a sigh, Rhea sat down with the others. The automatic door closed behind them, sealing them inside.

“Not really a good sign, that no one is here,” Rhea said, observing the empty chairs. “Tells me no one trusts the sheriff’s office enough to report crimes anymore.”

“Or that all complaints are done online…” Horatio said. “And handled by robots dispatched to peoples’ houses.”

“Maybe.” Rhea stared at the opposite hatch, willing it to open.

A minute passed.

Two.

“How long are we going to wait?” Rhea said, shifting restlessly. “Don’t they understand? The city could be attacked at any time!”

She said it mostly for the benefit of the listening AI and wasn’t really expecting a response from anyone. Unsurprisingly, she didn’t get one.

Rhea tapped into Gizmo’s feed. The drone had remained outside, circling far overhead. She saw no sign that anything was amiss—security robots weren’t gathering to ambush them or anything. Still, she felt uneasy, and kept the drone’s feed active in the upper right of her vision.

Finally, fifteen minutes of fidgeting later, a message appeared on her HUD.

Astor (89542) would like access to your augmented reality interface, and requests the following permissions:

- Ability to overlay objects

- Gaze tracking

Allow? (Y/N)

Note: Access can be revoked at any time.

She glanced at Will, who shrugged.

“I’m allowing,” Will said.

She, too, accepted the share request, and a moment later a translucent hologram appeared in the middle of the room. It depicted a man in a gray peacoat, with short cropped, receding hair, and sporting a goatee, handlebar mustache, and thick sideburns. As with all things virtual, she wondered whether the man really looked like this, or if the avatar was merely a digital illusion.

“Sheriff Astor,” the man said curtly. “What can I do for you?”

Rhea took a deep breath.

I can do this.

She spoke.

“The city is in danger. An army of bioweapons is sweeping across the Outlands and heading directly toward Rust Town. We have to evacuate the settlement.”

The sheriff merely stared at her, saying nothing.

“I have video archives I can share,” she continued. “As well as map data, to prove—”

The sheriff raised a dismissive hand. “Don’t need to see them. Map data can be faked. Videos doctored. Not even AIs can tell deepfakes apart from the real thing anymore. But don’t you worry, if there’s something out there, Aradne security will deal with it.”

“Oh really?” Rhea said. “There are bioweapons roaming the ruins outside the settlement as we speak, and I haven’t seen Aradne security do a thing.”

The sheriff shrugged. “Bioweapons occasionally frequent the ruins. If they get too close, they’ll be dealt with. The only people in any danger at the moment are bandits, and other Outlanders such as yourselves. And just because you haven’t personally seen Aradne security, doesn’t mean they aren’t out there, and acting at this moment.”

Rhea studied the hologram. “These aren’t ordinary bioweapons. They’re a new breed, of a type never seen before. Immune to energy weapons.”

Once again, the sheriff appeared unperturbed. “Could be a new design our government is testing. Not all bioweapon species are documented. Some are classified, their knowledge scrubbed from the Net, any whistleblowers shadow-banned.”

“All you have to do is dispatch a few drones to confirm what I’m saying is true,” Rhea said. “You’ll see advance scouts in the ruins, and further to the southwest, the main host, hidden inside a cloud of dust stretching from horizon to horizon and extending as far as the eye can see. An army of bioweapons headed directly for Rust Town, with Aradne security doing nothing to stop them.”

“If they’re immune to energy weapons, I’m not sure there’s anything the hunter killers of Aradne can do,” Horatio interjected.

Rhea glanced at the robot. “Which is exactly why we have to evacuate the slums. Flee to a different city.”

“A different city?” the sheriff said. “Across the Outlands? We’d die out there.”

“Take flyers, or other vehicles,” Rhea told him.

The sheriff shook his head. “There aren’t enough for the whole population.”

“Then we storm Aradne,” Rhea said. “And take cover inside its walls.”

The sheriff studied her a moment. “We won’t have to storm Aradne. If the city can’t protect us, for whatever reason, then they’ll let us enter freely. But if it’s true these bioweapons of yours are immune to energy weapons, I’m not sure what hope for us there is in Aradne.”

“The bioweapons won’t strike Aradne…” Rhea told him. “You see, the city is behind the attack.”

The sheriff stared at her with wide eyes, then snorted in disbelief. “Nonsense.”

“It’s true,” Rhea said. “They’re running out of water.”

The sheriff raised an eyebrow. “And where did you hear this?”

“From a mercenary sent to kill me,” she told him.

“Ah,” the sheriff said. “A most reputable source, of course.” His voice oozed sarcasm. “Listen to me. The pipes of Aradne drink directly from the ocean. They’ll never run out.”

“That’s what I thought, too,” she told him. “But apparently, the oceans are running out. The governments have kept the knowledge from us.”

“More ‘news’ from your mercenary source, I’m sure,” the sheriff said. “Look, I’ll talk to my contacts in Aradne. If there’s a threat, they’ll deal with it.”

“Don’t you get it, they want to destroy you,” Rhea said. “They—the people that run Aradne—are done sharing their water with Rust Town. Rather than risking a revolt, they’ve decided it’s best to kill you as fast as possible. They have dispatched the bioweapons!”

The sheriff shook his head. “The Aradne council would never ratify such a genocide.”

“I’m not saying they have,” Rhea told him. “This would’ve been something decided off the record, outside the council, by a select few.”

The sheriff gave her a look that could best be described as dubious. “If they wanted to kill us instantly, there are much more effective ways. Flooding the settlement with gas, for example. Why go through the trouble of creating designer bioweapons?”

“Because they’d go to jail?” Rhea said. “Bioweapons give them the perfect out. If they cover their tracks properly, they can say the attack was random.” She stared at the hologram and implored: “You have to issue a warning at least, so people can evacuate. Otherwise, they’re all dead.”

The sheriff stared at her for a moment. “I’m afraid I can’t do that. You would have me cause a panic, when you have no proof backing up anything you’ve said?”

“I’ve already told you to dispatch drones—” Rhea threw up her arms. “Forget it. This is useless. You’re obviously in cahoots with Aradne. Nothing I say is going to make a difference. What did the mayor offer you, a position on the city council or something? Traitor.”

She pulled up the permissions menu on her HUD and disallowed all of Astor’s previous access to her augmented reality interface. Cut off, the man immediately vanished from her HUD.

She stood up and went to the entrance door. It slid aside, and she stormed out.

Will and Horatio joined her a moment later.

“Well, that went well,” Will quipped.

26

Rhea stared at the lean-tos around her. People lived cloistered within, mostly oblivious to the outside world, save for those times they accessed their external security cameras, or left home for the occasional errand. Some families probably lived out their entire lives without ever setting foot beyond their doorsteps. And now they were all going to die.

Overcome with sadness and guilt, she pressed her hands to either side of her face.

I failed. All of this is going to vanish.

“I thought you gave up a little too quickly,” Horatio said.

“Don’t make her feel worse,” Will scolded the robot. “She did the right thing. It was obvious the sheriff wasn’t going to help. If we want to issue a warning, we’re going to have to do it ourselves.”

Rhea dropped her hands and slumped. “No one will listen to us.”

“We can try uploading videos of our encounters to the streaming sites,” Horatio said. “And hope enough people see them before the content is pulled.”

“We can try,” she agreed. “But even if some do view the videos, how many will believe it’s true, and not some fiction published to garner views?”

“Might as well do it,” Will told Horatio.

“I’m uploading as we speak,” Horatio said.

“How many followers do you have?” Rhea asked.

“Er,” Horatio said. “Five.”

She glanced at Will. “You?”

“I never was a big streamer,” Will answered.

“So how many?” she pressed.

“About the same as Horatio,” Will admitted.

“Hmm,” Horatio said.

Will turned toward the robot. “What?”

“Two of the videos have already been flagged for content review,” Horatio explained.

“What’s that mean?” Rhea asked.

“It means they won’t go live until a moderator reviews them,” the robot explained. A few seconds later: “The remaining videos were also flagged.”

“There you go,” Rhea said. “Pointless.” She gazed at the series of cargo containers behind her. “Maybe we can hijack their equipment? Use it to send out an official-looking alert?”

“Hacking was never one of my strong suites,” Will said.

When she glanced at Horatio, the robot said: “Don’t look at me. I’m just an AI.”

She sighed. “I still can’t believe he blew us off. A sheriff’s duty is to protect his people. Ensure civil order.”

“What reaction were you expecting?” Horatio asked. “If the rulers of Aradne intend to destroy Rust Town, of course they’re going to enlist the aid of its sheriff and get him and his security force to stand down. The sheriff probably isn’t even in Rust Town anymore. He’s relaxing in the palatial suite Aradne’s mayor provided him with as part of the reward for his cooperation.”

Rhea closed her eyes for a moment. “I was a fool to think I could make a difference. Naive.” She glanced at Will. “Impressionable. Like you told me. You tried to warn me that it was stupid to come back here. I wouldn’t listen.”

“Don’t be so hard on yourself,” Will said. “At least you tried.”

She thought for a moment. “There’s one person who might listen to me.” Rhea pulled up the contact info of the person in question, and initiated a video call.

A moment later Bardain’s hologram appeared before her. She shared the feed with Will and Horatio so that they could participate.

Bardain was dressed in his usual gray cloak, and the big AR goggles he wore on his face made him seem as bug-eyed as ever.

“Well if it isn’t my favorite student,” Bardain commented.

“Master Bardain, you have to get out of the city,” Rhea told him. “Bioweapons are coming to destroy it.”

“Bioweapons?” Bardain said. “Aradne will take care of that.”

“Not this time,” Rhea said. “Trust me, they’re not going to do a thing. You have to leave. Now.”

Bardain studied her a moment. “You’re not joking, are you?”

“No,” Rhea said.

He nodded. “At the very least, you believe your own words. But if it’s true, of course I can’t leave. This is my home. I have to stay and protect it.”

“I could have told you he’d say that,” Will interjected.

“Ah, there you are, old friend,” Bardain said, glancing at Will. “And you’ve got the robot with you, too.”

Horatio bowed his head in greeting.

“Come with us,” Will said. “There’s nothing for you here.”

“I appreciate the offer,” Bardain replied. “But I can’t. I’m sorry. Thanks for the warning. I’ll do what I can to alert the neighbors. Maybe we can muster some sort of defense.”

“You can’t defend against this…” Rhea said.

“You’re not going to make us come there and forcibly carry you out, are you?” Will threatened.

Bardain gave him an incredulous look, then chuckled. “You can certainly try…”

“I believe he will resist us,” Horatio said.

Will glanced at the robot. “No, really?” He sighed, then returned his attention to the hologram. “All right Master Bardain, good luck to you.”

“And you as well, my students,” Bardain said.

“Warn as many as you can,” Rhea said. “No one will believe me.”

“Sadly, there are few who will believe me as well.” With that, Bardain disconnected.

Will glanced at Rhea. “Let’s go, then. No point in lingering. Our work here is done.”

He turned to go, as did Horatio, but Rhea didn’t follow their lead. Instead, she gazed at a lone passerby making his way down the street, dressed in gray clothing, and a hooded cloak. He was joined by two robots, perhaps bodyguards. She ignored the robots, concentrating on the man. He walked through the city like a zombie, his eyes glazed over, focusing on the real world only when alerted to do so by his HUD. He passed a woman walking in the opposite direction, who was also accompanied by a robot. Her gaze was just as faraway.

“They’re all going to die,” Rhea said. “Look at them, living blissfully inside their augmented reality HUDs, or sheltering in their homes, oblivious to what’s going on in the real world, and what’s to come. I wonder if they’ll even realize what hit them, when the time comes.”

“We can’t save them,” Will said. “Come on, let’s go. We don’t know how much time we have.”

But still she lingered. Another group came into view. Two parents, seemingly out for a stroll with their child. No robots were with them. Her eyes alighted upon the child, who walked with a skip. Among everyone Rhea had seen thus far, this child seemed the most fully rooted in the world; a little girl who gazed in wonder at every little thing around her, even catching Rhea’s eyes for a moment before moving on. Perhaps she hadn’t been introduced to augmented reality yet by her parents, or perhaps she simply preferred the real world. Either way, seeing that child made up Rhea’s mind.

“You go, Will,” she said. “You and Horatio.”

Will frowned. “What about you?”

“Me?” She looked at him. “I’m staying, of course. It’s my duty.”

“This isn’t your duty,” Will said, gesturing at the street and its building. “Dying here in this place, for people you don’t know. For strangers who don’t even realize you exist. Who won’t appreciate your sacrifice. Bardain notwithstanding.”

She nodded slowly. “You’re right, and yet you’re also wrong. It is my duty. My moral obligation. The decision is very clear to me. I must stay. I’m sorry.”

Will smiled patiently. “Rhea. You’re one person against an army of bioweapons. Two if you count Bardain. What difference can either of you make?”

“I certainly won’t be able to save them all,” she agreed. “But if there’s a chance I can rescue even one resident in the coming calamity, I have to try. Join me. Who knows, maybe we can even rally the people to fight, if the security forces won’t.”

Around them, foot traffic was ticking up slightly. The sheriff’s office was close to a major square, so that wasn’t surprising.

Will nodded at these passersby. “Look at them. They’re not fighters. Most of them are barely aware the real world exists, locked away as they are in their augmented reality environments. They’re even worse at home, where they spend most of the day completely immersed in virtual reality, reliving humankind’s glory days. Pretending they live in a world that has no Outlands, where the countryside is green and full of life.

“Sure, many of them are gang members, but nearly none of them have lifted a hand against another human being in all their lives, let alone against a bioweapon. They don’t even know how to fight. They leave that to specialists in their gangs. The rest belong to useless cliques. We have Scenters—” He pointed out a man and woman who had long, horizontal sticks protruding from either side of their nostrils for enhanced scent. “Orbers—” He indicated a quartet of male twenty-somethings who carried orb cameras attached to the top of their heads, which endowed them with three-hundred-and-sixty-degree vision. “Robos—” This in reference to two young women who had robotic forearms attached to their existing elbows, effectively giving them four arms each. “None of their enhancements will help them. Not against what they face. Plus, they don’t even know how to fight.”

“Fighting is instinctual to all humans,” Rhea said. “A part of our brains is still animalistic. Even I’ve felt the fight or flight instinct.”

“But at least you’ve had training,” Will said. “And it still didn’t help you out there. If we fared so badly, what hope is there for these people? Even if the criminal gangs handed out guns to everyone in the city it’d make no difference. Energy weapons have no effect, even at point-blank range. There’s nothing we can do. Except flee.”

She studied him. She couldn’t help the disappointment that filled her features. “I thought you, as a Karnator, believed all life was sacred? What if someone here is one of the many friends and family members you’ve lost over the years, someone reborn into a new body that will die again before its time? And what about Bardain?”

“Against my better judgment, I came back with you to warn this settlement of its impending doom,” Will said. “Now that I’ve done that, I have no qualms about leaving it to its fate. Bardain made his choice. And as for the rest… if some of Rust Town’s residents are my friends reincarnate, they’ll be reborn again soon enough. My conscience rests easy on the matter.”

“Well, mine does not,” Rhea said. “Because I’m not sure I believe that.”

“It doesn’t matter what you believe,” Will told her. “Horatio and I are leaving after we sell our salvage. Stay or join us, it’s up to you.”

“And if I stay, what about my debt?” she pressed.

Will’s eyes filled with sadness. “If you die, we can’t collect, can we?”

* * *

She traveled with Will and Horatio to the seedy neighborhood that harbored Rosco’s Parts Emporium. She didn’t go in, as usual, not wanting to alert Rosco to her cyborg nature, lest the opportunistic salvager decide to do something “untoward” to her as Will put it. Gizmo circled far overhead, amid the other drones.

She decided it was best not to explore any of the surrounding shops this time, and instead contented herself with standing next to the wall, keeping her head bowed and watching her back via Gizmo.

She didn’t have long to wait: in only a few minutes Will and Horatio emerged. That wasn’t surprising, considering the adverse effects on the haul that came with turning back early.

Will tossed Rhea her empty backpack. At the same time, she received a deposit request on her HUD for the amount of fifty creds.

She stared at Will in disbelief. “You’re not keeping the proceeds as a down payment against my debt?”

“Take the money,” Will said. “Use it to buy a pistol or something.”

“We already know pistols are useless against these creatures,” Rhea said, sliding on her pack.

“Well, you need to arm yourself with something,” Will told her.

“But I’m not sure I’ll be able to pay off any more of the debt I owe you…” she said.

“Then survive,” Will said.

Finally, she accepted the deposit. She’d certainly feel better if she was armed, going into this. These Hydras had to have some weakness after all. The problem was trying to find out just what it was before they killed her.

She accompanied Will and Horatio to the southern gate of Rust Town, which opened close to Aradne’s walls. There were few ruins beyond it: Will and Horatio would quickly find themselves on the flat, rocky plains of the Outlands when they departed.

The pair had notified gate security of their arrival ahead of time, so that their weapons had been delivered to that particular gate and were waiting for them when they arrived.

“Well, this is it,” Will said, standing before the gap between the Texas barriers. “There’s still time to change your mind.”

Rhea shook her head. “Let’s not make this any harder than it is.”

Will nodded. “All right then.” He stepped forward, and quickly wrapped his arms around her. “Goodbye.” His words were hoarse.

“Bye, Will,” she said softly.

Will stepped back, and quickly looked away.

“I will miss you,” Horatio said. “For a cyborg, you are most… human.”

Rhea smiled fleetingly. “For a robot, you’re most human yourself.”

“Thank you,” Horatio said, and hugged her tight, so very tight.

Rhea couldn’t help the tears then. She’d miss these two more than anything. They were the only friends she had. Her family.

It was hard enough saying goodbye like this, but what made it even harder was the fact that she was never going to see them again. Because who was she kidding? She wasn’t going to survive this. This was truly the last time she’d look upon either of their faces or hear their voices.

She quickly pulled away and rubbed her wet cheeks. “Well, you better go before I embarrass myself.”

She glanced at Will, and saw he was having a hard time keeping it together, too. His chin was doing this odd, trembling thing, and he nodded stiffly before turning around and passing through the gate. Horatio followed.

The pair collected their weapons on the other side from the waiting sentry robots and departed. Will glanced back one last time to wave, and then he and Horatio were walking away down the broken street beyond. They kept close to the ruins of a skyscraper and vanished all too soon past its far side.

Rhea glanced at the sky beyond the Texas barrier and zoomed in on Gizmo; the drone remained within view for only a few moments before also swooping beyond the skyscraper.

And so it’s done. I’m all alone now.

She turned her back on the gate.

It’s time to die.

27

Rhea went to the closest arms shop to buy a pistol with the funds Will had given her, only to discover the price had strangely skyrocketed since her last visit to the city. She suspected Aradne was to blame, with its rulers buying up most of the weapons—and thus driving up the prices of the remaining stock—so that the residents of Rust Town would be defenseless when the Hydras attacked.

So much for buying a weapon.

With a sigh she left the shop.

She wondered if she should seek out Bardain, to fight at his side. It was likely he wouldn’t want to leave his home, though. She wanted to know when the bioweapons were close to the settlement. And to do that, she’d have to take up a position on its outskirts.

Thus she headed toward the western gate, which she had used to enter the city. That particular entrance opened deep into the outlying ruins and was located directly in the path of the coming bioweapons, at least based on the original trajectory she’d calculated for the dust cloud. Plus, she’d seen the Hydra scouts lingering on the route to that gate, so it was a safe assumption that the bioweapons would hit there first.

From beneath the tight confines of her hood, she studied the few human passersby she saw along the way, trying to decide who she was going to save. Maybe she didn’t have to die. Maybe she could choose someone, maybe two people, to rescue and lead to safety. That was an option.

Well, she’d have to wait until the attack came before she attempted such an endeavor, because she doubted anyone would follow her willingly at the moment. And if she tried to snatch up someone against their will, no doubt they’d scream and yell until she let them go, bringing down the wrath of their fellow residents upon her. Maybe the security forces would finally come out of the woodwork and arrest her as well. Just what she needed.

She reached the western gate only to discover the robot sentries conspicuously absent from their posts. The gate remained open, however, with two of the Texas barriers turned sideways and offering an unobstructed path into the ruins beyond. Interesting.

She wasn’t sure if the sentries had abandoned their posts or been destroyed. Either option meant the bioweapons wouldn’t be long now.

She warily made her way toward the gap. When she reached it, she peered past the edge of the closest barrier and zoomed in, focusing on the intersection set among the ruins ahead. The final pike-wielding sentry should have stood on the corner of that intersection, but that robot was gone, too.

She continued to scan the street for signs of Hydras. She also gazed upon the partially collapsed buildings that lined the road, and their jagged rooftops, but saw nothing out of the ordinary. The way seemed clear.

Her eyes dropped to the long, sealed bin that rested on the asphalt just outside the Texas barriers. Having no sentries meant she had her pick of the weapons confiscated from the travelers at the gate. Assuming, of course, that the robots hadn’t cleaned out the weapons before they departed, which was possible, given the firearm situation in the city.

She did a quick Net lookup on these types of machines, hoping to figure out how they worked, or at the very least find a diagram of some kind, but got no related results. She assumed the knowledge had been suppressed, which wasn’t entirely surprising.

Guess I’ll have to do this the hard way.

She cautiously emerged from the barrier and tiptoed her way to the bin. Small noises probably wouldn’t matter, given the general background din from the city, but she felt the need for extreme caution at the moment.

When she reached the bin, she latched her robotic fingers around the handle in the lid and pulled. It was locked, of course. She exerted more force and cringed at the noise produced as her arm servos whirred in complaint. After quite some effort she finally managed to tear free the lid. She flinched anew as a rather loud ripping sound filled the air, and then she remained motionless, holding her breath as she waited for bioweapons to appear in droves. When nothing bad happened, she gently lowered the lid to the asphalt.

She had revealed a cavity filled with fresh liquid—no doubt waiting to receive the next weapon to freeze. There was no way to move it, at least not without placing her fingers in the liquid. Not something she was keen on.

She glanced farther down the bin and decided to pry open the metal casing somewhere closer to the middle.

She repositioned, dug the fingers of both hands into the metallic shell, and peeled it open with difficulty. She cringed once again at the noise, and when she was done, she waited, glancing around expectantly, but the street remained dead quiet.

She was relieved to find a block of ice waiting inside. She could see two rifles frozen together near the bottom. In their bid to disarm Rust Town, the rulers of Aradne had forgotten these weapons after all. Or maybe the sentries had simply succumbed to Hydras.

Whatever the case, she was happy to relieve the bin of its burden. The only problem now was getting the weapons out of the blocks. But shattering ice would be a lot easier than tearing metal. A bit loud to her liking, but nothing she could do about that.

She removed the block and held it over her head, ready to break it against the fragmented asphalt that paved the external streets. But before she could do so, she felt water trickling onto her head. The drips came so fast they were almost a gush.

She lowered the block and to her delight, the ice melted right in front of her, so that in under thirty seconds she was cradling the two rifles it contained.

She lowered them to the asphalt and turned her attention to the bin once more.

I want them all.

Not that it would do any good against these Hydras, she reminded herself. Still, it would make her feel better.

She considered ripping the container wider, but that seemed a bit counterproductive to her. Not to mention loud.

She quietly padded over to one of the bordering buildings and grabbed several broken bricks from in front of it. She stowed them in her pack. Then she returned to the bin and tossed one of the bricks into the waiting liquid. She wasn’t sure this would work—if the bin was equipped with a scanner, it might reject the brick for not being a weapon.

But a moment later the liquid froze, encasing the building fragment in a block of ice; the servo mechanisms attempted to close the non-existent lid as a new liquid-filled cavity swiveled into view.

She returned to the second opening she’d made in the casing. Sure enough, a new ice block had rotated into place, containing a fresh weapon. She removed it and the weapon promptly thawed out.

She kept placing the bricks into the bin one by one, causing the next ice block to cycle through, and in that manner retrieved the weapons. Eventually the internal conveyor belt began to carry her own frozen bricks into the second opening, which she ignored.

Shortly after that, fresh liquid stopped appearing in the main cavity, and instead a frozen block containing a weapon appeared. Apparently, the conveyor belt had wrapped around—she’d exhausted the bin’s storage capacity. She removed the block, letting it melt, and the next frozen weapon promptly rotated into view. She continued taking them, and very soon she’d relieved the bin of all its confiscated weapons.

With a grin she began to sort through them. She was able to look up the specs on the Net—at least weapons data hadn’t been suppressed from the population.

There were a wide variety of weapons, from pistols to rifles to energy knives, and even a bladed weapon. The latter was a bit of an antique, according to the Net, intended for extreme close-range fights. Called the X2-59, it was essentially a cylindrical guard the wearer attached to the wrist, which could deploy and retract the blade at will. Apparently, the metal was made of a special material that allowed it to fold up inside the guard. When deployed, it was enveloped by plasma generated by electrolasers.

Since energy weapons had little effect on the Hydras, the X2-59 might be something worth considering, especially after she’d seen the Hydras physically tussle with one another. Then again, she hadn’t actually seen them inflict any harm, except to push one another out of the way. Sure, a Hydra had screamed when the tendrils from one of its brethren had struck its underside, but those were stinging tentacles, not pieces of metal. There was no guarantee the blade would even be able to penetrate the thick scales. Also, using it meant she’d have to get in extremely close, which was a big downside to fighting with it in and of itself.

A weapon to be used only as a last resort, I think.

She stowed the X2-59 into her pack alongside the other weapons, intending to give them out to the residents at the appropriate time. She kept the most powerful weapon for herself, a rifle called the Dupra-Linx 32, or DL-32. It could fire burst attacks that had roughly five times the intensity of the energy bolts her original pistol generated, though the drawback was a reduced firing rate. The DL-32 had a strap, so she hung it from her right shoulder.

She glanced at the empty holster on her hips, then fetched the most powerful pistol from the backpack and slid it into her belt, figuring she might as well keep a backup for herself since she had the holder.

Then she climbed the ruins of one of the taller buildings on that street, not far from the wall. It was a mid-rise apartment that had partially collapsed. When she reached the jagged upper portion, she sat on the building frame, letting her feet dangle over the edge. She gazed out across the ruins before her and waited. From her vantage point, she could partly see the rocky plains beyond, between the skyscrapers on the far side of the ruins.

She searched for the scouts she’d encountered earlier, but there was no sign of them. And so, in the coming minutes she began to doubt herself. Was she making the right choice? More importantly, were the bioweapons even coming at all? She didn’t let herself dare hope the Hydras would leave the settlement untouched. They were coming. And as for making the right choice, all she knew was that she couldn’t run away like Will and Horatio. She had chosen this battle, and now she had to fight it.

She wondered if Will was right with his Karnator theory. That when she died, she would be reborn as a bioweapon, or perhaps an alien on the far side of the galaxy, with all memories of this life gone. Rebirth like that wasn’t so different from what had happened to her already, when she’d awakened after a mind wipe, so she supposed there should be nothing to fear.

Even so, while it was a slightly comforting thought, it was also terrifying. She wasn’t sure whether she would prefer nothingness to an endless life of random rebirths. Although… she imagined some sort of presence, conscious or otherwise, would be required to govern the many forms of life that existed throughout the universe, so the infinite rebirths the Karnators believed in made sense in a twisted sort of way. If it was true, what troubled her the most was coming back as something completely foreign to human consciousness. She wasn’t even thinking about life on another planet… what if she returned as a plant, for example? Or an insect?

And so her thoughts continued to roil and wander as she watched the plains beyond the ruins. The seconds turned into minutes, and the minutes became hours.

Though she was outside the settlement, because of her height, she still had a relatively good connection to the Net. Thus she was able to livestream everything. Unfortunately, only one or two viewers joined her stream as the hours passed, and whenever she tried talking to them, to warn them, without fail they promptly left.

And then, finally, a dust cloud appeared, stretching from horizon to horizon on the plains beyond the broken skyscrapers.

The bioweapons had arrived.

She sent a final message to Bardain.

“They’re here.” 

28

Rhea watched in trepidation for several moments, unable to move from her perch atop the building frame. Entranced by that growing cloud, she watched it spread across the plains like a disease, blackening the land before it.

When the cloud reached the perimeter of the ruins, she decided it was time to act.

She swung herself off the edge of the building and began clambering down its exterior. She descended rapidly, and when she was three stories from the street, she leaped the rest of the way to the asphalt.

Her servos hummed in protest at the impact, but she ignored them and raced through the gap in the Texas barrier. She considered closing the heavy walls behind her but doing so would do little to hold back what was out there anyway, considering the Hydras could surmount the barriers with a single step.

She sprinted through the streets of Rust Town, shouting: “Bioweapons! Bioweapons! We’re under attack! Run!” She amplified her voice to the maximum possible volume. She also broadcast over a public channel, piggybacking on the settlement’s wireless network, though it was doubtful any would be tuned in. A loud voice was the best way to get her message across at the moment.

The security cameras attached to each home snapped toward her, but otherwise no one emerged.

She dashed toward the closest lean-to and yelled at the camera: “Bioweapons! Get out!” Not waiting for a response, she hurried to the building beside it and issued the same message to the waiting cam. She also rapped her hands on the dingy wall for good measure.

Her hood fell away as she dashed to the next lean-to, but she didn’t bother to replace it. Let them see who she was. She knocked on the door and yelled. “Bioweapons are coming! Run!”

She spotted a group of children in worn clothes nearby and sprinted to them. “Tell your parents to run! Quickly! And if they won’t listen to you, promise me you’ll get out of here.” The children merely stared at her, unblinking. “Promise!”

The children nodded in fright.

“Now tell them!” Rhea said.

The children ran away, splitting into two groups. The doors of the respective homes they fled to opened as they arrived, slamming shut behind them.

They’re not going to listen…

Rhea was about to run toward one of those lean-tos and try again, when beside her a door opened and an unshaven, shirtless man stood in the entrance. He was old, pale, and weak, with a long gray beard that reached to his hairy chest. He had a big wart on his nose.

“What are you ranting about, cyborg?” the man said. “You shouldn’t be walking these streets so plainly. Do you want to wind up a pile of spare parts on some salvager’s desk?”

“Bioweapons are coming!” She pointed at the Texas wall behind her. “You have to run!”

The man glanced that way, then shook his head and shut the door.

Rhea rapped on the lean-to loudly.

“Go away!” the old man shouted from within.

“Just take a look!” she said. “Please!”

A pause. Then: “Fine. If it will shut you up, I’ll be out in a second. Let me throw on a shirt.”

She moved on to the next door, and the next. She managed to convince two more men—just as old as the other—to leave their houses, and in a few moments, she was making her way back with the three toward the gate.

She wasn’t really sure what good it would do to have these three witness the coming calamity, but at least it felt like she was doing something. Maybe they held some sway in this community and could help her spread the word.

“Hurry!” she called over her shoulder.

“We’re coming,” the old man with the wart on his nose said, panting. “Some of us aren’t used to walking this far, you know.”

“Farthest I’ve stepped from my house in years!” another agreed. He wore big AR goggles over his eyes.

“You know, I’m surprised security hasn’t come to collect her,” the third man said.

“Security!” Wart Nose said. “Good one! We haven’t had any security around here since, well, I can’t even remember!”

She was keenly aware that bioweapons were racing toward the settlement at that very moment, and she half expected the gate to come crashing down on them at any moment. Then again, given how big the creatures were, she would have ample warning.

They reached the gate. Goggle Eyes started for the gap, but she said: “No. Get on these tires. You’ll have a better view.”

She beckoned toward several discarded tires that formed makeshift ramps on either side of the gate.

“I can’t climb that,” Wart Nose complained.

“Here.” Rhea grabbed him and another man, hoisting them under each arm like sandbags, then leaped from tire to tire until she was at the top of the barrier. Then she lowered the men.

“That was fun,” Wart Nose said. “Can we do it again?”

She ignored him and was about to clamber back down to help the third man, when she discovered he was already scaling the tires on the other side of the gap.

“No sentries…” Goggle Eyes said from beside her. He was looking straight down into the broken street past the gate.

“Probably snatched by one of the local parts collectors,” Wart Nose said, presumably for Rhea’s benefit. “Happens from time to time. Same fate will befall this cyborg here if she keeps calling attention to herself.”

“Why are the streets so dusty out there?” the third man asked.

Apparently, he had a better view from where he stood, because Rhea couldn’t see any sign of the bioweapons, not yet at least.

A moment later a cloud of dust spilled into view, filling the air between two skyscrapers that were three blocks away. Rhea hadn’t been sure the bioweapons would be able to maintain their dust cover within the city, considering they’d have to spread out, but apparently staying relatively close together was all that was needed to maintain the stealth field.

“Gritstorm,” Wart Nose said.

“The weather systems are supposed to prevent Gritstorms from getting this close,” the third man insisted.

Wart Nose shrugged. “The weather system fails from time to time.”

“Since when are Gritstorms so close to the ground?” Goggle Eyes asked.

The Texas barrier in front of them began shaking. The old men glanced at the quivering wall in turn.

“That’s no Gritstorm,” the third man said.

The shaking became stronger as the seconds passed; the ruined buildings on either side of the road ahead were trembling visibly, too, and fragments broke away as Rhea watched, tumbling down to join the rubble below.

And then, on the far side of the street, a lone Hydra rounded the intersection and stampeded directly for the Texas barrier. It was a moderate specimen, almost as tall as some of the low-rise ruins next to the creature; its multiple maws snarled visibly, and one of the leonine heads roared when it sighted the four of them.

“Bioweapon!” Wart Nose screamed.

Rhea scooped up Wart Nose and Goggle Eyes and leaped down. She was going to grab the third man as well, but realized she didn’t have time, not if she wanted to save these two.

She dashed from the Texas barriers, racing through the streets of the settlement.

“Bioweapons!” Wart Nose yelled. “The mad cyborg woman was right! Run for your lives!”

No doubt the settlement residents could feel the ground shaking by now, because nearby doors began to open.

Behind Rhea, the Texas barriers collapsed beneath the lead Hydra. The abandoned man was trampled underfoot. Other bioweapons burst into the settlement after the creature and crushed the remnants of the barriers in the process. A random piece of concrete spiraled forward, crashing into an onlooker standing at his door and throwing him into his home, which promptly caved.

People screamed. Some darted into the streets after Rhea. Other residents simply shut their doors, perhaps hoping the bioweapons would leave them alone. Or maybe they simply planned to collect their remaining family members before attempting an escape.

Some doors never opened at all. Glancing back, Rhea saw a Hydra rip an entire lean-to right into the air, leaving behind a shirtless man strapped into a spherical VR harness. He seemed unaware that his house was gone and continued interacting obliviously with his full-body harness. A second head snatched him into the air a moment later, chewed twice, and swallowed.

Those in the street fared little better. Every few seconds another resident was promptly grabbed by one of the many heads and devoured. Either that, or they were trampled underfoot.

“I have to go back for my wife!” Goggle Eyes said.

“It’s too late,” Rhea said. “You can’t save her.”

The man squirmed in Rhea’s grasp, and punched her twice in the side, but Rhea only tightened her grip.

Goggle Eyes wept. “Please, let me go!”

“If you go back, you’ll die,” she explained gently.

“Maybe I want to die, if it means a life without the woman I love,” Goggle Eyes said.

Rhea considered that.

If he wants to die…

“Then go,” she said coldly.

She released him and scooped up another old man who was running just ahead.

“You let him go!” Wart Nose said.

“Yes,” Rhea agreed.

“You can’t listen to him!” Wart Nose said. “He’s distraught. His state of mind all messed up!”

“I gave him what he wanted,” Rhea said grimly. “I can’t save everyone. Especially those who don’t want to be saved.”

“Who are you?” the new old man asked.

“Your rescuer,” she replied.

“Can we go back for my wife?” the newcomer pressed.

Rhea clenched her jaw. “No.”

She returned her attention to the fore and narrowed her eyes, focusing on Aradne’s distant wall, her destination, ahead.

Rhea had planned to dart into a byway or alley, but with so many people out there providing fresh targets, she decided the main street was safe enough, at least for now. She continued to run directly for the walls of Aradne, located about ten blocks ahead. The two men she carried weighed her down, but she forced her servos to work overtime, hoping against hope that her body wouldn’t fail her now.

The main street widened as she reached a market square, and she tore past other panicking citizens. Glancing back, she watched the foremost Hydras spread out and begin feasting behind her. She felt a moment of guilt for not stopping to help them. Or even trying.

Can’t save them all, she reminded herself.

If only they had listened to her. If only they had run when she had told them to.

But of course, it wasn’t their fault. They had no reason to believe her warning. No one did.

She considered replacing the two old men with some of the younger men and women she saw fleeing out there, but she knew that with proper care, these two could live for at least another twenty years, or even longer if they could ever afford to transfer their minds into cyborgs.

She realized that there was something more she could do, if she couldn’t directly help those fleeing around her.

“There are weapons in my backpack!” she said. “Give them out!”

The men ignored her.

“Wart Nose!” she hissed.

The old man glanced at her, confused.

“My pack!” she said. “There are weapons! Give them out to the people! One at a time!”

Wart Nose blinked at her, then finally comprehension dawned in those terrified eyes; he twisted in her grasp to unlatch the backpack, and then removed a pistol.

“Hey, moron!” Wart Nose yelled at a young man Rhea was racing past.

When the man looked at him, Wart Nose tossed him the pistol.

Wart Nose continued to dole out insults alongside weapons as Rhea raced through the square.

She wasn’t sure it was the greatest idea to give the denizens of Rust Town these weapons, considering how useless energy attacks were, not to mention how inexperienced the average citizen was with firearms. But there was at least a tiny chance someone would find a weakness while engaging the Hydras. Without weapons, the chance dropped to zero. That was more than enough reason to distribute them, in her mind.

She emerged from the square and into the road beyond. She was on the final stretch to Aradne: only six blocks remained between her and that towering wall.

However, when two of the Hydras stampeded onto the main street directly behind her, trampling and swallowing everything in sight while continuing forward at breakneck speed, she realized this route wasn’t as safe as she’d thought. She wouldn’t be able to outrun the creatures, not while she carried the two men.

And so she took the first available byway. She ran south a block, then swerved east once more when an intersection presented itself.

The Hydras passed by to the north, their multiple heads bobbing up and down beyond the rooftops of the cargo containers and lean-tos that separated them from her.

She continued running as fast as she was able and headed toward the walls of Aradne. She could see the gates at the base. Closed.

Not surprising.

“We have to get to Aradne!” Wart Nose said.

She nodded. “I’m trying.”

“The gates are closed!” the other man said.

“I know,” Rhea told him. “We’re going to have to climb the wall.”

“I’m not very good at climbing!” Wart Nose said.

“Neither am I,” the other man added.

“We’ll figure something out,” she said.

She reached the gates at the base. Other citizens were already there, banging on the sealed doors, begging to be let inside. She proceeded past them, into the small aisle formed by the closest lean-tos and the wall and halted when she could advance no more—the way was blocked by the remaining lean-tos, which directly abutted against the metal wall.

She lowered the two men to the ground.

To the north, she could see Hydras ripping through the surrounding homes, now that they’d reached Aradne’s wall. They didn’t touch the wall itself, she noted. Probably hadn’t even tried.

“Grab onto my pack,” she said, beckoning toward the straps.

“I don’t think I can hang on,” Wart Nose said. He pinched his pencil thin biceps. “I’m a bit weak. Too many years spent gaming online. Best to abandon us here and save yourself.”

“Then get inside it,” she told him, shucking off the backpack. “Both of you.”

The two men exchanged bewildered glances. Then Wart Nose shrugged and stepped in while she held open the lip.

“Not sure I’m going to like this,” the second man said, but he, too, obeyed.

The backpack was big enough to fit both of them all the way to the hips. Rhea secured them in place with the drawstring at the lip, and closed the top of the pack, squeezing the canopy between them and buckling it to the clasp on the other side.

“Hang on.” She slid her shoulders beneath the straps and stood. Their weight forced her backward a pace before she could compensate, and she banged someone’s head on the lean-to.

“Ugh!” Wart Nose said. “Wrong way!”

“Sorry,” Rhea told him.

She went to the wall and glanced one last time at the sealed gates to her left, and the crowd gathered before them. She scanned for children or infants among them, looking for someone else who would fit inside the pack without seriously impacting the weight, but saw only adults.

She took a deep breath, then reached up. The wall’s surface was coated in long strips of metal, some of which had partially peeled away. She felt along the top of a mildly flaking area and found a fingerhold. She pressed her fingertips in, hard, enlarging the crevice, and pulled herself up.

She continued that way, using the indentations in the metal strips for handholds and footholds, enlarging them as necessary, and proceeded upward.

“Look!” someone said. “She’s climbing!”

She glanced down after a moment, and saw other citizens following her lead, climbing the wall. She hoped they knew what they were doing.

When she was about fifteen meters high, she picked a hold on a strip that was peeling away too much, and it ripped off entirely when she applied her weight. She nearly fell.

She repositioned her hand and swore to be more careful with choosing holds going forward.

The turrets that lined the walls of Aradne finally began to open fire, and Hunter Killer drones also appeared overhead. The rulers had to at least pretend they were trying to protect Rust Town and its residents.

Those big energy bolts struck the closest Hydras, but the impacts only darkened their scales, and did nothing to bring down the Hydras: the creatures absorbed the attacks just as easily as they did the bolts from the smaller weapons.

She glanced at the streets farther back, closer to the edges of Rust Town, and from her vantage she was able to see the rapid inroads the bioweapons were making. They kept mostly to the streets but weren’t averse to tearing apart any cargo containers and lean-tos in their paths, devouring and trampling people at will. The rulers of Aradne must have been very proud of themselves. Rust Town, and everyone who lived in it, would very soon be no more.

The bioweapons continued to flow into the settlement from the ruins beyond. They were shrouded in dust until entering Rust Town, at which point the cloud dissipated, probably because the penetrating Hydras dispersed so far apart. Those that entered the city had shimmering halos surrounding their bodies that lasted several seconds before fading entirely; Rhea supposed those were the last remnants of whatever field was generating the cloud.

Rhea looked away and forced herself to continue climbing. Her arm and leg servos hummed, struggling against the combined weight of the two men; the load on those motors was translated into pain by her mind-machine interface, which she felt as a dull ache in her “joints.” It was her interface’s way of reminding her that she was straining herself, and that she better not keep this up for too long, unless she wanted one—or all—of those servos to fail.

She recorded the path she took, highlighting the handholds and footholds on her HUD, so that when the time came to descend, she would have a route already marked out.

Some of the handholds were sharp, and her fingers got scratched occasionally, but otherwise held up well against the metal.

She soon passed beyond the reach of the bioweapons—it would take a mighty leap on their part to rip her from the wall at this point. Then again, maybe they didn’t have to leap, necessarily: they could probably scale it just as readily as Rhea. It would be even easier for them, with those metal-piercing talons of theirs. But she suspected climbing Aradne's wall was off limits to the creatures, because at least so far, they were ignoring the tall metal surface and everyone on it.

Speaking of the latter… below, more and more people from the growing crowd continued to follow her lead; in fact, citizens were climbing all along the base of the wall now. She stopped glancing down at them when she witnessed a young woman lose her grip and plummet to her doom.

It took her another minute to reach the top. When she arrived, she pulled herself onto the rail between two large turrets, only to spot a pair of security robots waiting on the walkway below. They were blue and black polycarbonate things, with wicked-looking barrels built into their forearms like Horatio. Small grenade launchers were deployed on their shoulders.

Keeping one hand securely on the rail, with the other Rhea reached for the pistol at her hips. She was careful not to touch the weapon, however, as the walkway robots had so far made no aggressive movements: their arms, and the barrels they carried, remained pointed downward, as did the grenade launchers.

“Help us!” Wart Nose told them. “Rust Town is under attack!”

“Do you wish to claim asylum?” one of the robots said.

“Yes!” Wart Nose said. “I claim asylum!”

“Granted,” the robot replied.

“Me too!” the second man said.

“Granted,” the robot repeated in the same tone.

“You’re going to let them in?” Rhea asked in surprise. “Just like that?” She kept her fingers close to the pistol.

The robot bobbed that featureless head up and down. “We’ve been instructed to allow entry to any Rust Town residents who scale the wall.”

“Noble of you,” Rhea said. “And yet you’re not going to open your gates…”

The robot nodded again. “We cannot risk the lives of our own citizens.”

“I see, and why is it that these bioweapons aren’t climbing the walls of Aradne, do you think?” she asked sweetly.

“Our weapon turrets and Hunter Killers are keeping them at bay,” the robot explained.

Rhea started as both turrets on either side flashed a bright blue at the same time. An audible crackling filled the air, and all her synthetic hair stood on end. She glanced over her shoulder in time to witness a pair of azure smears descending from the turrets toward the streets below.

“Oh, yes,” she said. “These weapons that can’t even penetrate their scales are keeping them at bay…”

The robot didn’t answer.

Rhea hauled herself over the rail and landed on the walkway below. She lowered her backpack to the metal grating that served as the floor and let her human cargo disembark. She flexed her robotic shoulders, glad to be free of the burden, not just physically but mentally.

“Thank you,” Wart Nose told her. “I won’t forget this.”

“Nor I,” the other man said.

She nodded brusquely, then slid the empty pack back onto her shoulders. It felt so light.

She gazed out across Aradne City, whose towers stretched before her. She stared at those skyscrapers so longingly; some appeared to be covered in crystals, glinting beneath the sun. Perhaps it was simply the way the sunlight caught upon their exteriors. Then again, she’d heard some buildings had windows made from sapphires polished and cut to an incredible thinness, and that it was these sapphires that were responsible for the assortment of interesting geometric shapes bedecking the city, engineering marvels that wouldn’t have been possible with ordinary glass.

Everything was calm and peaceful out there. Delivery drones went about their business uninterrupted. Flyers carried citizens to their local destinations. Parents lounged in parks while their kids played on the grass. It was… utopian.

“Do you wish to claim asylum?” the robot asked her.

She blinked, instantly brought back to the present moment.

The streets between Aradne’s beautiful skyscrapers remained entirely unsullied by bioweapons. This while she could hear the screams coming from Rust Town behind her. And the roars. None of the people she saw in Aradne seemed to notice, which made her wonder if the citizens even knew Rust Town was under attack. The walls likely prevented any sound from passing into the city. And it would be relatively easy to suppress live streams sourced from the settlement. Private drones that attempted to cross the wall could be shot down…

Then again, it probably wouldn’t have made much difference if the citizens of Aradne did know. They might have protested, but there wasn’t much they could do, not while they were locked inside those towering walls and serving entirely at the whim of the city’s rulers.

She sighed, then glanced at the robot and smiled faintly. “Not yet. I plan to save at least a few more people. Something you robots should seriously consider, if you have any sort of conscience in those polycarbonate brains of yours.”

The two robots exchanged glances, and though they had no faces, she had the distinct impression her comment confused them.

Rhea pulled herself over the rail of the walkway.

Once more unto the breach…

She leaped off before the robots could stop her.

29

Rhea had spun her body as she leaped, so that she was facing the wall as she fell. After dropping four meters, she grabbed onto a protruding strip of metal. Her weight and momentum peeled it away, nearly tearing the strip from the wall. The upper portion clung by only a small corner that threatened to detach at any moment.

Probably should have chosen a less dramatic exit…

She activated the HUD markings she had recorded previously, then glanced at the vertical surface below and rested the tip of her foot on the labeled hold. She gently released the torn strip with one hand and grabbed onto the indicated handhold for her right arm next.

She proceeded quickly using those markings and climbed down almost as fast as she had ascended.

Halfway down she paused to gaze out across Rust Town. All of the bioweapons had entered the settlement by then—there was no cloud of dust blotting the ruins and plains beyond. Instead, the creatures rampaged through the slums unchecked. She saw trampled and dismembered bodies amid the crushed lean-tos and cargo containers. Most of the streets and avenues were no longer discernible, not with all the debris from the surrounding structures strewn about the roads.

The Hunter Killers fired at the Hydras indiscriminately, as did the energy turrets that topped Aradne’s walls, but the attacks seemed mostly perfunctory, because at best they only momentarily stunned their targets. One Hunter Killer swooped too low and was knocked out of the air by a Hydra; the craft created a fireball when it struck the ground. To Rhea, even that seemed for show, so that when news and videos finally leaked to the citizens of Aradne, the rulers could claim they had tried their utmost to save the slums. “We sacrificed some of our own units!” they would say.

Rhea shook her head.

Someone is going to pay for this.

She let go of the wall to unholster her pistol and fired a few times into the fray. As usual, she caused no damage. The Hydra she targeted didn’t even seem to notice the impacts at that range, and it didn’t even bother to look up at her, intent as it was on destroying one particularly sturdy set of cargo containers. According to the map, those containers belonged to the sheriff’s office.

She holstered the weapon and continued descending the wall. She occasionally passed other residents who were climbing up. Usually they were Robos, or otherwise had cybernetic enhancements of some kind to increase their strength. Some appeared steroid-enhanced.

“Why are you going down?” a man asked her as she passed near. He was one of the few not augmented by machines or drugs, driven mostly by fear, and the will to survive. His lean build certainly helped as well. He wore thin gloves to prevent his fingers from getting cut up by the metal. It seemed to be working, though several tears had developed in the fabric.

“I want to save more,” she answered. She considered throwing him into her pack and carrying him the rest of the way to the top, as there was no guarantee the man would make it, especially without enhancements of any kind. But she decided instead to continue descending.

More and more people were climbing the wall below. Another person fell to his death as she watched, and she looked away, wondering if she should aid the man above her after all. But when she looked up, she saw that rescue flyers had begun to arrive from Aradne; they helped some of the climbers higher up, loading them aboard, including the man she had passed. There were so few of them it seemed a token effort to Rhea—a mere public relations show meant to soothe the coming citizen outrage.

She continued descending, unsure of what she was going to do. Perhaps she’d try to help some of the climbers below, by choosing two more of them to take with her.

The wall traffic increased the closer she came to the bottom, so that by the time she was ten meters from the ground, she had to pick her way through a literal mass of climbing people. Her handholds were all taken, so she was forced to improvise a new path, feeling out new recesses and crevices between the climbers with the tips of her feet.

She kept an eye out for someone to help. She wanted to find a climber who didn’t have gloves, and thus whose hands would get cut up along the way, making it difficult for them to maintain a grip when their fingers became covered in blood. While some wore gloves, or had wrapped ripped cloths around their hands, there were actually quite a few people who didn’t have any hand protection at all, so now it was simply a matter of choosing someone.

But before she could do that, a group of Hydras suddenly surged forward. Their roars drew Rhea’s gaze, and she watched them rake the walls with their mouths and talons, ripping away people in clumps. Those men and women who were crowded around the base of the wall scattered away in all directions, screaming as they scrambled over the broken lean-tos and bodies.

Apparently, now that the majority of the buildings in Rust Town had been crushed, along with much of the population, the bioweapons had turned to the next most obvious targets: the people who had fled to Aradne’s walls.

Whatever instinctual programming or inherited memory prevented the Hydras from climbing the city’s walls certainly didn’t stop them from stomping the people cowering at its base, nor from swiping climbers from its surface. A single Hydra could cause whole clusters of men and women to fall away with one swat of a taloned paw.

As the rampage continued, Rhea was forced to let go, lest she be torn from the wall as well—with no guarantee her body would arrive in one piece.

She fell the remaining meters to the surface below and hit hard, landing on the rooftop of a partially collapsed lean-to. When she impacted, the lean-to completely caved under her.

She pushed herself up from the rubble and performed a quick damage check. All systems were still fully operational, including every servo, however she had taken some bad dents in her left arm that limited mobility. She could work around it.

She spared a moment to take in her surroundings. She was surrounded by the wreckage of lean-tos, which hid her from the view of the Hydras rampaging nearby—just as long as she remained crouched. The base of Aradne’s wall was directly behind her. She saw others cowering behind the ruins nearby. Men and women of all ages. Some, including the children, had recently been climbing, judging from the strips of cloth wrapped around their hands. None of them dared move, not while the bioweapons scavenged the debris nearby, looking for them.

Rhea ducked as a Hydra’s long, taloned paw swiped past overhead, scraping off a man who had tried climbing again.

She wasn’t going to be climbing that wall anytime soon.

So much for choosing two more people to rescue.

She noticed a woman huddling behind the ruins of the adjacent lean-to. The woman was staring at Rhea, but quickly looked away when their eyes met, tilting her upper body as she did so, revealing an infant strapped to her back. Rhea was amazed that the baby was staying so quiet, given what was happening. Perhaps the infant had already exhausted all of its tears.

The woman was a Robo, with two extra robotic appendages attached to her elbows; those extra arms would aid greatly in climbing, the powerful fingers enlarging any nooks and crannies she found in the metal, just as Rhea’s had done.

Rhea crawled over, reached into her pack, and offered the woman a weapon. The mother shook her head and said, very softly: “I don’t know how to use it.”

Rhea nodded. Even if the woman had been familiar with the energy rifle, firing it would have only brought the Hydras down upon her and the others.

Rhea stashed the rifle and instead asked: “You tried to climb?”

Tears welled in the mother’s eyes. “It was our only hope. But now…”

Rhea looked at the other grimy residents huddled nearby. Those who weren’t Robos wore gloves or had wrapped cloths around their hands to protect their fingers. They were ready to climb.

But they couldn’t.

Rhea turned her attention to the debris beside her and gazed past it at the bioweapons scavenging through the ruins, searching for survivors. They were driven as much by scent as sight and sound, and Rhea knew it wouldn’t take them long to ferret out those in hiding. Sure enough, every now and then a scream—cut short—indicated the Hydras had found another. Eventually they would make their way to Rhea, and the others hiding next to the wall.

She couldn’t help the anger that was building inside her as she watched those multiple, leonine heads bob up and down. The creatures were no longer beautiful in any way. And not just because their heads had become grotesque, the manes matted in the red blood of their victims. No, these Hydras were creatures of pure evil. Killing indiscriminately, not because they needed food, but because they were born to it.

“I’m going to draw them away,” Rhea told the woman with more confidence than she felt. “When I do, start climbing.”

She withdrew her pistol and rose to a crouch. She made her way carefully over the debris, heading toward the closest Hydra. The broken metal of a lean-to creaked beneath her, and she dove into the aisle formed between two walls when one of those heads turned to look at her. She crawled forward hastily, emerging at the far side of the aisle, and stood up, turning toward the Hydra. She stood directly behind it. That tail waved to and fro, the stinging tentacles sweeping the air menacingly each time. She aimed just underneath the tail, targeting a dark, sphincter-like region that could only be the anus.

She fired.

The creature leaped up with a howl. Well, that was the best reaction she’d seen yet to an energy bolt impact, though it only seemed to anger the beast: all five heads turned around as one and darted directly toward her.

She bounded forward, ducking underneath the tail. As she passed, she fired again at the anus, causing another screech. She dodged a kick from one of those legs and rolled underneath the underbelly, landing on a crushed cargo container that was once someone’s home.

That underbelly came crashing down in an attempt to trample her, but she rolled to the side, sliding over the debris, and narrowly darted out from underneath. She clambered to her feet, only to have to dodge again as those stinging tentacles sliced toward her.

A tendril struck her ankle, ripping away a portion of the exterior shell. She got lucky: it hadn’t hit the servo within.

She scrambled across the ruins of Rust Town, leaping between and over broken cargo containers and collapsed lean-tos.

The commotion attracted the attention of other nearby Hydras, and as she darted away, they too joined in the hunt, drawn from the wall. Others beyond them were also turning away from their rummaging, eager to get in on the action.

Good. Let them all chase me.

She only hoped the woman, and those with her, would use the opportunity to climb.

The creatures bashed aside or crushed any debris in their path, and rapidly bore down upon Rhea.

A Hydra closed. One of its heads plunged toward her—

She leaped up, somersaulting as she did so, and landed on top of the head. She fired into the flesh as she raced down the neck toward the main body, though the impacts caused only soot marks. Other heads on the same creature lunged toward her, trying to rip her away, but she ducked, and leaped, and dodged.

She reached the creature’s main body.

Two more Hydras rushed in from the left and right, headed directly for the bioweapon beneath her. She leaped over their incoming heads—two on the left, three on the right—and while she was still in the air, the two Hydras smashed into the body of the first.

She landed on one of the newcomer’s heads and raced toward its body as it collapsed, stunned by the impact. More bioweapons tried to tackle her, and she avoided them, too, leaving behind a growing pile of Hydra bodies behind her.

By the time she had cleared the lot of them, twenty Hydras lay scattered behind her, many of them stacked one atop the other.

More bioweapons were coming in from all sides, but she had at least a few seconds before the closest arrived.

She risked a glance at the wall. All of the bioweapons had been drawn away, and a few of the braver residents had begun climbing once more.

At least I’m not doing this for nothing.

She spotted a group of men and women hiding behind a series of dented cargo containers not far from her. There were maybe twenty of them, all spread out. Burly sorts, armed with rifles. Gang members, perhaps.

“We have to fight!” she yelled at them. “Buy time for the others to climb!”

Some shook their heads. Others looked down in shame. None moved to aid her.

“Fight, you bastards!” she implored. “Keep them from the wall! I can’t do this alone!”

They did not fight. They merely crouched lower like the cowards they were.

The next group of Hydras came in. Once again, she vaulted onto the closest head as it came for her, but the creature was quick, and twisted its other necks toward her; she was forced to leap off. She latched onto the mane beneath an incoming head and swung to the right, landing on the back of another bioweapon. She raced across its scales, dodging to and fro as more bioweapons smashed into the body of this one and tried to snatch her up in their many maws. A tentacled tail came sweeping down upon her, and she leaped, twisting as she did so, narrowly avoiding a hit from those deadly stingers. She landed underneath the base of the tail and latched on with her free hand, swinging her body and unleashing a shot into its butt for good measure before she let go.

She dropped to the debris, but more Hydras were already bearing down upon her. Everywhere she turned, giant feet tried to trample her, taloned forelimbs attempted to dismember her, razor-sharp teeth strove to snatch her, stinging tentacles endeavored to whip her. She dodged all of these as best as she was able, but there were just too many of them: no matter where she fled, always death awaited, only one small mistake away.

As she escaped the latest pair of snapping jaws, sure enough she made a miscalculation and dodged into a space that had looked clear a moment ago but was now occupied by an incoming Hydra head. She continued forward, narrowly avoiding the deadly maws, but was still struck by a portion of the neck, which sent her flying.

She hit a second Hydra in midair, a glancing blow that sent her twisting sideways, and she landed on a lean-to several meters away. A third Hydra immediately dove at her, trying to get at her before all the others: it hit the ground and slid across the debris, its heads drilling a path through the rubble and sending pieces of metal flying away on all sides.

Rhea got up just in time, but the creature managed to swat her with one of its forelimbs anyway, and just barely missed her with the talon portion. The joint still struck her, and once more she was sent flying: the impact knocked her clear of the latest group.

She landed hard on a partially intact lean-to, and when she got up, it collapsed underneath her. A portion of the caved roof slammed into her leg, pinning her.

She tried to lift the metal free, but she’d been pinned at an unlucky angle and couldn’t get the leverage she needed.

A Hydra came in eagerly.

30

Rhea struggled to lift the metal that constrained her, but it was useless. She wasn’t getting out, not in time.

That leonine head closed eagerly, saliva dripping onto the human blood that tainted its mane.

But then a man leaped down to stand before her, directly in the path of the Hydra. He wore a long gray cloak, or perhaps it was a cape. She couldn’t see his face, as his hood was raised, and his back was to her.

He fired a harpoon weapon, which struck the incoming creature and lodged within its flesh. Then he retracted the cord with some built-in, motor-driven winch; the end remained firmly attached to the Hydra, so that he was lifted into the air and pulled toward the creature at a frenetic pace.

The end tore free before he arrived and snapped inside the harpoon’s base. He pointed it at another slithering neck while still in midair and fired. When the tip impacted, once again he reeled himself in, and ripped through the air in another direction, narrowly avoiding the jaws that came for him.

He repeated the process until he reached the Hydra’s back; at that point, he used the harpoon to swing across to another bioweapon. He continued making his way from back to back like that, steadily drawing the creatures away from her. The confused Hydras probably thought the man was her, considering how readily they’d abandoned Rhea. Then again, maybe they were simply attracted to anything that moved.

She received a transmission.

“Couldn’t very well let one of my students die in front of me,” came a familiar voice.

“Bardain!” she said.

“Yes,” he replied. “Help should be arriving shortly.”

Rhea worked on lifting the rooftop piece, but still couldn’t dislodge it. A moment later a humanoid robot crawled through the debris and reached her side. It attempted to hoist the metal piece from her leg, but had some difficulty, as several other collapsed sections weighed it down.

The robot repositioned for a better grip and tried again. The metal lifted by a few millimeters: enough for Rhea to slide free. As soon as her leg was out, the robot released the piece and the rooftop collapsed.

“Thank you,” she said.

The robot inclined its head.

She reached into her pack and retrieved one of the weapons she hadn’t given out yet. She tossed it to the robot. “Do your part.”

Rhea clambered on top of the collapsed lean-to and gazed out across the rubble. She spotted Bardain immediately. He was still moving between the Hydras with his harpoon, and narrowly dodging their deadly blows.

She wasn’t sure if he was still within communications range, but a quick glance at the upper right of her HUD revealed an active network icon. The Hydras had missed the communications towers in this section of the settlement, then, allowing her to piggyback upon the wireless network.

“We don’t have to win,” Rhea sent Bardain as she ran through the rubble toward him. “We just have to buy the climbers time.”

“I probably won’t be climbing that wall anyway,” Bardain agreed.

“Yeah, you don’t have to,” Rhea sent. “Not with that harpoon.”

“I actually meant, I doubt I’ll survive,” Bardain corrected.

She opened fire, trying to draw some of the Hydras away from him. It didn’t quite work—she attracted another group of bioweapons from a nearby neighborhood instead. But that was fine, as it meant less Hydras rummaging for residents.

Bardain’s robot followed close behind her, but then it swerved away, drawing off some of the Hydras racing toward Rhea.

“We have to make them collide with one another,” Rhea sent. “It’s a strategy that worked well for us in the Outlands. Let’s converge here.”

She marked a waypoint that was roughly in the center between herself, the robot, and Bardain.

“I can do that,” Bardain transmitted.

“As I,” the robot sent.

Rhea waited until she was only fifty meters from the closest Hydras, then she turned toward the waypoint. The bioweapons rapidly closed with her.

She glanced at Bardain and his robot. They, too, were drawing bioweapons toward the waypoint.

Rhea reached Bardain and continued past him. She rolled to the ground, dodging between those stampeding feet. She was nearly crushed several times, but then she was past them.

She turned around to observe her handiwork.

Several of the Hydras had piled one atop the other, though a few had managed to navigate past their brethren. Two of them were continuing to head straight for Rhea.

But then Bardain appeared on the back of one of them, and he harpooned to the neighboring Hydra, causing the first to slam into the second.

Rhea had a moment of respite and was about to take cover behind a series of collapsed cargo containers, when a group of seven people stood from the rubble. They were Robos, with augmented legs. Perfect for dodging the bioweapons. Some were armed with rifles or pistols—probably members of a criminal gang.

Though their eyes were filled with fear, there was also determination in them.

Rhea nodded. They were ready to help.

She tossed those who were unarmed some of her spare weapons. “Spread out!”

More able people joined in as she continued drawing creatures away from the wall, and she handed out the rest of her spare weapons.

“They don’t like it when you target their butts,” she transmitted.

Behind her, the settlement churned with chaos. Residents, mostly Robos, were joined by actual robots, who together used their bodies as bait. They led the Hydras from the wall, and often tried to make the creatures crash into one another, with varying degrees of success. Rhea coordinated with the fighters by recognizing hotspots and setting suggested waypoints. Unfortunately, for every two Hydras they managed to entangle, there were always three more—it felt like there was an endless supply of them. The commotion was obviously drawing in bioweapons from all sides of the settlement, which was good in a way because it meant she and the others were distracting the creatures from their task, giving the climbers much needed time, but also bad, because Rhea knew that she, and those with her, probably weren’t going to survive.

The Hunter Killers had stopped trying to intervene, and Aradne’s turrets had ceased firing—the security forces apparently wanted to avoid shooting civilians.

Still trying to pretend they care, are they? Or just afraid of a public relations nightmare?

Probably too late for the latter…

One particularly nasty bioweapon came at her. The biggest, baddest Hydra she’d seen yet. She fled down an aisle of rubble, trying to draw the creature toward the closest hotspot of activity, hoping for a collision.

“Send some bioweapons my way,” Rhea transmitted.

Bardain and his robot rushed to intercept her; they passed by only ten meters to her left, bringing with them two Hydras. Rhea weaved between those giant feet, and when the creatures were past, she glanced over her shoulder.

The big Hydra simply batted aside the two bioweapons in its path.

The creature was quickly overtaking her, so she turned around and raced toward the Hydra instead. Those heads came down at her, but she dodged them, and they smashed into the asphalt, sending up fragments. She leaped between the slicing forelimbs, so that she was underneath the creature. It tried to crush her by dropping, which was a common tactic she was used to by then, and she was forced to roll to the side, coming out on the right flank.

The Hydra didn’t know where she was, so she used that to leap onto its rib area. She climbed, scrambling upward until she reached its back.

That tentacled tail came in, and she was forced to somersault out of the way. Its heads twisted back, trying to snatch her off, and she was forced to dodge those jaws.

Two more Hydras struck the distracted creature from the right. They crashed into its flank at the same time, and their combined momentum managed to topple the creature. Rhea leaped free, rolling into the rubble nearby.

The big Hydra shook off the blow and stood up. It batted aside the two bioweapons that had struck it, and then turned toward Rhea once more.

But then it started rearing, and those heads turned upon itself, striking at unseen targets on its back. It stumbled upon a broken heap of cargo containers and staggered sideways, crashing into one of the other two nearby bioweapons, which had only just recovered and was trying to get up.

Will and Horatio hopped down as the two bioweapons entangled.

She stared at the pair in amazement. “I thought you left?”

“You didn’t think we were going to let you have all the fun, did you?” Will said, a huge smile on his face.

Gizmo swooped low overhead, buzzing in agreement.

The big Hydra tore free of the smaller bioweapon and spun toward the three of them.

“Ah, crap,” Will said.

The trio scattered in multiple directions.

The Hydra plowed straight toward Rhea. She had nowhere to run… desperate, she leaped into a partially crushed cargo container. It had been rotated on its side, so she was forced to vault across the furniture and other personal effects that were strewn about.

A leonine head darted inside behind her.

The container proved relatively long, but unfortunately it terminated in a dead end. She took a final bound over an overturned couch that blocked her path and spun around in midair to unleash several quick shots from her pistol. When she landed, she ducked, and the head snapped at the air above her.

Its neck slammed down and she flattened herself; the neck struck the upturned couch, halting its descent, sparing her from being crushed. The neck retracted, then those gaping jaws came plunging down upon her, and she rolled to the side. The pistol snagged on a tooth and was torn from her grasp and swallowed.

Again and again that head lunged, and Rhea rolled left, then right, then left again, barely avoiding the strikes each time.

The leonine head retracted, pausing to assess the situation. Studying her.

Then it struck again.

Once more she rolled away.

Could use some help here, Will, she sent.

Working on it… Will transmitted. You know it still has four other heads we have to deal with, right?

The metal of the cargo container moaned overhead.

She risked an upward glance and realized the container was slowly collapsing, crushed from above as the Hydra applied pressure with a leg, or its body.

Motion at the periphery of her vision told her the head was coming in again, and she barely leaped aside.

The metal continued to squeal above as the roof slowly compressed. She wouldn’t be able to stay here much longer. The Hydra was blocking the way out, but she knew it would have to withdraw momentarily, unless it wanted to be crushed as well. The problem was, its head would probably retreat only a few meters, just enough to clear the collapsed section, so that when she followed, she’d step into its waiting maw.

Sure enough, the head withdrew. She peered past the topmost edge of the couch. As expected, that leonine head was eagerly waiting for her.

A big section of roof collapsed, and a metal brace broke away. It bounced on the floor in front of her. It was a little longer than her arm, and the broken end formed a sharp triangle, like a machete. Or sword.

A sword…

On a whim she scooped up the brace from the wreckage, gripping it at the base like a sword. Then she pulled herself onto the couch and leaped off before the roof could collapse completely and trap her inside.

The waiting head struck.

Still in midair, Rhea plunged the brace forward, aiming for the eye. She felt a moment of resistance when the tip made contact, but the feeling subsided almost instantly and the brace plunged inward, sliding into the brain case. The head continued forward, driven by momentum: the gaping maw struck her, but there was no crushing force behind it.

She crashed into the couch behind her and the head rolled lifelessly to one side, releasing her. The metal brace remained firmly lodged in the eye socket, embedded almost up to the base. The head didn’t get up.

She heard howls from outside. The neck withdrew rapidly, dragging the head with it before she could retrieve the brace.

“What did you do?” Will sent.

“Stabbed it in the eye with a piece of wreckage,” Rhea answered.

She shucked off her backpack and retrieved the only weapon she hadn’t yet given out, one she’d nearly forgotten: the X2-59. She’d kept it because, as a bladed fighting implement, she hadn’t really considered it a real contender. After all, it was much easier, psychologically at least, to fight the Hydras from afar, herding the creatures into one another with energy weapons, rather than closing with them to engage with a blade. She’d told herself the X2-59 would barely cause any damage anyway and wasn’t worth the risk.

She’d been wrong on both accounts.

It’s time to stop running. Time to take the battle to them.

She strapped the X2-59 onto her wrist. She felt afraid yet determined at the same time. A part of her wasn’t looking forward to close quarters fighting with these creatures. Another part yearned for it.

She deployed the blade. It erupted from her wrist, reaching to a length of almost one-point-five times that of her arm. The electrolasers activated, enveloping the blade in bright blue plasma that sparked across the surface like electricity.

She resolutely strode forward and left the cargo container.

Unsurprisingly, the Hydra was waiting for her.

One of its heads immediately bore down upon her.

She calmly dodged to one side and sliced down with a sword form she instinctively knew. The head flopped away, partially severed.

That sword form was called Parting the Wind.

How did I know that?

Another head came in. She leaped upward, landed on top of the muzzle, and stabbed the blade with another instinctive form, striking the left eye at just the right angle so that the tip passed all the way through the brain case to emerge from the opposite socket. That sword form was called Threading the Needle.

She withdrew the blade and leaped down as the head dropped lifelessly beside her.

In that instant, a memory flashed into her mind.

She was on an ice world. Clad in a spacesuit, she wielded a pair of glowing, translucent disks, one per gloved hand. She was rushing an ice shelf, sprinting directly into the incoming fire that came from those in cover behind it. She deflected the shots with the energy disks as she ran, and when she reached the shelf, she leaped over it. The lighter gravity allowed her to easily clear the icy mass, and she swiveled the glowing circles down to protect herself.

When she landed on the other side, she attacked her enemies, using the edges of the disks to puncture their spacesuits in turn. She saw herself reflected in their mirrorlike faceplates. Her own faceplate was clear, and she could see the sheer determination written all over her features; that, and the eyes glinting with bloodlust.

She moved systematically among her enemies, somersaulting and flipping. She transitioned entirely to offense, transforming the discs into twin blades of energy, and cycled through the sword forms, striking down mercilessly.

And then she was back upon the ruined street. The whole memory had flashed through her mind in the span of a second.

Good thing she had been gone for no longer, because another head was fast bearing down upon her.

This time, she had time only to leap aside. Then she ran underneath the Hydra and sliced into its hock with her plasma-coated blade. The bioweapon roared in pain.

Rhea darted for the next leg, but the creature was already trying to crush her by lowering its underbelly. Wearing a feral grin, she stepped out from underneath and sliced the blade upward, cutting a gash into its side. Then she leaped upward, landed on the crook of a bent leg, and jumped again, so that she stood upon its back.

The Hydra arose and swept those stinging tentacles down upon her. She bounded forward and out of the way with a flip and landed near the base of its tail. That particular appendage was about half as thick at the base as any of the necks the creature sported—something her bladed weapon could readily sever.

Baring her teeth in a wicked smile, she leaped off. She swung the blade, striking at the tail as she descended, and completely cut it from the body.

She landed rolling in the rubble and then scrambled to her feet.

Blood erupted in spurts above her, and the creature wailed in pain before collapsing. Its heads swayed back and forth, sometimes endeavoring to strike at her, but she’d moved well beyond their reach. The creature kept trying to stand as well: the Hydra would stagger and lurch on wobbly feet, but without a tail, it invariably lost its balance and crumpled. Eventually it just gave up and simply sat there, swaying its heads, wailing.

She almost felt sorry for the Hydra then.

Almost.

Two more bioweapons abruptly crashed into the stricken Hydra from both sides and knocked themselves out.

Will and Horatio had apparently been acting as the bait for these latest creatures, because the pair appeared a moment later, coming to her side.

“Nicely done.” Will nodded at the blade. “Where can I get me one of those?”

She smiled, then dashed to the other two Hydras before they could get up, and she cut off their tails in turn. She returned to Will and Horatio and watched as the screaming creatures tried to stand. Like the bigger bioweapon, without tails the Hydras kept losing their balance and finally gave up.

She broadcast over a general channel: “Defenders of Rust Town: if you have bladed weapons, use them. Cut off their tails. That’s their weakness. Without a tail, they can’t even walk, and will eventually bleed to death.”

The blood spurting from the tail region of the first injured Hydra had reduced to a mere trickle by then, and on cue, the creature lowered its remaining heads and closed its eyes.

The cries of the remaining two creatures would attract other nearby bioweapons, of course. It wasn’t worth the trouble to cut off their heads—more bioweapons would already be incoming.

Sure enough, an alert sounded on her HUD, courtesy of Gizmo. Glancing at her overhead map, she saw two groups of incoming red dots approaching from the north and south.

Rhea grimly turned toward the south, where the bigger group awaited. Plasma-coated blade at the ready, she took off at a run to intercept.

She weaved over and between the debris and kept running as she reached the Hydra in the forefront. She sliced through the hocks of its rightmost legs and severed a portion of the tail—the base of the appendage was too high to reach from her current position on the ground.

She dodged the snapping jaws of the next Hydra and leaped onto the associated neck; she sprinted to its back and crossed to the tail, avoiding the other heads along the way. She slid beneath those stinging tentacles, and then severed the tail at its base before leaping to the next Hydra.

As she made her way over the creatures, dodging and cutting as she did so, she noticed Will and Horatio following on the rubble alongside. Will had procured a scrap of metal to use as a blade, as had Horatio. They weaved in and out, cutting at the hocks.

And then, just like that, she severed the tail of the last of them and leaped down. She continued running for several paces before turning around to survey her grisly handiwork.

She was almost amazed by the carnage she’d caused. Seven Hydra lay sprawled in a line, wailing as they struggled repeatedly to stand. They bled profusely. Only the first remained on its feet, but it stumbled away, hemorrhaging from a tail that had been cut in half.

Rhea continued to cut off tails wherever she went, putting her electrolaser-enhanced blade to good use. After Rhea had sent out her latest broadcast, criminal gang members began coming out of the woodwork, and distributed bladed weapons of all kinds to the fighters. Swords. Machetes. Long daggers. Some of the blades were even enveloped in electrolaser plasma like her own.

Meanwhile, those who could not fight, or were too afraid to, were back to climbing the walls of Aradne, no doubt much to the angst of the city’s rulers. The city was forced to continue supplying rescue flyers, and of course they had to grant asylum to any who made it to the top of the wall.

And so, she continued fighting, doing her part to reduce the population of Hydras that infested the city. She was soon covered in the blood of her enemies, but she fought on, seeking out any hotspots, and giving aid where she judged her help was needed most. Will and Horatio were never far from her side. Bardain, however, liked to stray.

She received a message from her former trainer, at one point.

“Girl, I could use your help,” Bardain said.

She glanced at her overhead map. Bardain was in a hotspot a few streets away, surrounded by six bioweapons, and more were quickly on the way.

Rhea dropped everything and made her way to him.

When she arrived, she saw he had retrieved a machete from somewhere, and kept weaving in and out between the massive legs of the bioweapons, carving wounds into their feet and slowly wearing them down.

Rhea dashed forward. The nearest creatures had their backs to her, so she rushed the closest and climbed up its tail. When she reached the top, she severed the tail. The stump waved violently, tossing her forward. She landed on the ground and had to roll away before those heads could strike her.

She raced underneath the next bioweapon, joining Bardain.

“You made it,” Bardain said. “Good. Now we can kick butt.”

Bardain served as a distraction, threading in and out between the legs of his enemies, while Rhea swung onto the backs and cut off the tails. However, the bioweapons kept coming. She found it hard to keep up.

“We’re going to need some reinforcements, here,” Rhea transmitted, marking her location on the overhead map.

A head struck her in a glancing blow, and she slammed into the side of another bioweapon, before sliding to the ground. She rolled away as more heads came at her and ended up beside Bardain once more. They moved together, doing their best to avoid the attacks as they passed beneath each Hydra.

The Hydras developed a new strategy: they formed a circle around the pair and squatted down, forming a solid barrier of flesh that neither Rhea nor Bardain could slip under.

“Well girl, looks like this is our last hurrah,” Bardain said. “We always knew we’d die today.”

“Hold on!” Will sent. “We’re almost there!”

No matter where Rhea and Bardain turned, there was always a bioweapon waiting for them. Blood gushed everywhere as they danced about, maiming every appendage that came at them from the perimeter of that deadly circle: tentacles, stingers, talons, feet, heads. But the bioweapons were ruthless, and always there was another appendage coming in, another death blow, usually launched from multiple sides.

Rhea fought her hardest. She wouldn’t give up, wouldn’t give in, no matter the odds.

But eventually the inevitable happened, as Bardain knew it must. As she knew.

After barely deflecting two talons, and dodging three lunging heads, several stinging tentacles wrapped around her body. They twisted her every which way.

At the same time, more talons came in, slicing and dicing.

She died.

31

Rhea awoke, taking a deep breath through the gills that lined her sides.

Gills?

She looked down upon herself, and flexed limbs that were tentacles. She was floating in a green vat of liquid.

So, she had been reborn as an alien after all. And yet, she still had her memories. She remembered dying just as if it were yesterday. She remembered Will, Horatio, Bardain, and everything it meant to be human.

If she was an alien, she would find a way back to Earth, she swore she would, and then she’d make contact. Assuming these aliens even had the technology for interstellar travel. Things weren’t quite looking good in that department: tentacles weren’t really the best for building a civilization with.

At least her death hadn’t been for nothing. She had died fighting for the people of Rust Town. Still, she wondered how many of them had even noticed her sacrifice, save for Will, Horatio and Bardain.

She just wished she knew the outcome of the fight. The residents seemed to be winning before she died, but that didn’t mean they had emerged victorious in the end. Even if they had, Rust Town would have paid a high toll in blood.

The thought made her want to return to Earth all the more.

I’ll find a way.

Then again, for all she knew, hundreds of years had passed before she was reborn. Time likely worked differently after death. Especially the time between death and rebirth.

Before she could ponder these ideas further, the world went black once more.

* * *

She opened her eyes to a bright light. She squinted and raised her tentacles to shield her face.

No, wait. These weren’t tentacles. But fingers. Hands. Arms.

She glanced down at herself.

She was human again. Or cyborg, rather, judging from the metal sheen her body possessed. A bad dream?

“Sorry about that.” Will entered the light, his head and torso partially blocking the illumination. “We had to put you in a temporary cyborg body, since your brain case had cracked. We jury-rigged an octopus robot from the local menagerie to serve as that body. Hope it wasn’t too much of a shock.”

“For a second there I thought I’d been reborn as a bioweapon,” she said. “Or an alien.”

Will laughed. “No. Sorry to give you a scare like that. You weren’t meant to wake up in there. As soon as we noticed you were conscious, we put you under again. Anyway, we got your brain case repaired, and reinstalled your mind. We dressed the artificial skin, giving it time to heal, and also replaced the rest of your body—the last one was fairly trashed.”

She looked down at herself again. She was lying on a table. She hadn’t noticed before, but her body did look different. Shinier. The limbs appeared thicker, yet also sleeker. Had to be more powerful. Her right arm had the X2-59 attached. She deployed the blade, and watched the electricity spark across the surface, courtesy of the electrolasers.

Seeing the weapon brought back the memory that had flashed into her mind during the fight. She saw herself racing across the ice world once more, taking out attackers hiding behind the ice shelf.

“Hey, put that away before you hurt someone!” Will said.

She retracted the humming blade and it vanished into the top of her wrist.

She returned her attention to Will.

“Bardain?” she asked.

Will shook his head sadly. “The old bastard didn’t make it. I’m sorry. We found his corpse straddled over your body like a shield. When I reviewed the logs of nearby security cameras, I discovered he fought to the very end, protecting you after you went down.”

She blinked away the tears and looked away.

“We won,” Will said.

Rhea nodded. “That’s good. His death wasn’t for nothing, then. None of the deaths were.”

“Well, depends on your point of view,” Will said. “If Aradne hadn’t done this in the first place, no one would have died. So I hope you’re not blaming yourself. Blame them.”

“Oh, I do.” She sighed and gazed at her body. “Thank you for this by the way. I don’t know how I’m going to pay you back. Looks expensive. Guess I’m going to have to spend the next year salvaging.”

Will smiled patiently. “Forget about that… there’s no need. The citizens of Rust Town banded together to get you the spare parts you needed. They paid for this body. And you’re right, it’s definitely expensive.”

Rhea started blubbering. “I can’t believe they’d do something so nice for me.”

“You deserved it,” Will said. “They believed you were instrumental to the victory. You brought them all together. Showed them they could win. You could have run away like Horatio and I, but you didn’t. You’re a hero.”

The tears came even stronger.

Will held a pair of small collection tubes beneath her eyes, and she felt the suction as Will vacuumed up her tears. “Careful, conserve as much water as you can.”

“Why?” She shoved aside the tubes and wiped at her cheeks, willing herself to stop crying.

“The city has cut off Rust Town’s water supply,” Will explained.

“What?” Rhea sat up. “We can’t allow that!”

Will shrugged. “Probably won’t last for long. The people of Rust Town are in full revolt.”

“Has Aradne admitted to sending the bioweapons?” she asked.

“Not yet,” he told her. “Though it seems obvious to most of the locals that it was them, considering what they did to the water. Everyone who climbed the wall and claimed asylum? The city sent them right back into the slums when the bioweapons were gone.”

“But there’s nothing here,” she said. “This place is in ruins.”

“Some neighborhoods actually made it through the battle unscathed,” he said. “And of course, the rebuilding has already begun in those places that were hit hardest. That’s the nice thing about having cargo containers and lean-tos for homes: it doesn’t take long to put up new ones. Especially when you have a whole settlement full of raw material for your 3D printers.”

She gazed at him uncertainly. “We have to help them get their water supply restored.”

Will sighed. “Though I’m not sure there’s much we can do, I was afraid you were going to say that. So, I take it you don’t want me to hook you up with my pro gamer friends? So you can live the life of a streamer?”

She shook her head. “No. I suspect drone racing isn’t in my future anymore. Wait.” She looked searchingly into his face. “You’re talking like my salvaging days are over. What about my debt? I’m not even close to paying it off.”

Will shrugged. “You’re not in debt anymore. Like I said, the residents pitched in and donated quite a bit. You’re a free woman, now.” He glanced over his shoulder. “You should get up. You have a few fans who want to see you.”

Will deactivated the overhead light; now that she didn’t have it shining blindingly into her eyes, she took a moment to survey her surroundings. She appeared to be in a cramped bedroom of some kind.

“We’re in Bardain’s place,” Will explained.

Rhea nodded sadly, and reluctantly arose. She felt disoriented at first, thanks to the slightly different proportions of her new body, but Will helped her through it, acting as her crutch.

When she could walk on her own, Will led her out of the room and into a cramped hallway. They passed different doors before entering the spartan foyer of the lean-to. She gazed at the familiar guest chair and table, remembering a time when Bardain had given her leave to sit there so she could wait for Horatio after her lessons.

The pair crossed to the door, and Will beckoned her forward.

Rhea opened it.

A throng had gathered outside, stretching across the street and filling the road in both directions. People even crowded the rooftops of the lean-tos and cargo containers across the way.

Confused, she glanced at Will. “They’re all here for me?”

Will nodded.

It was so very overwhelming. Once again, she felt her eyes watering.

Will wrapped a comforting arm around her shoulder.

“It’s the Warden!” someone called from the back. “The Protector of Rust Town!”

A cheer arose. “Warden! Warden! Warden!”

It was quickly taken up by the crowd.

“Warden!”

“Warden!”

“Warden!”

Rhea quickly shut the door and backed away into the foyer.

“I can’t do this,” she said. “I can’t face them. I’m no hero. Good men and women died to protect this settlement. I’m one of the lucky ones who lived. I can’t dishonor their memory by trying to take credit for something I didn’t do. I didn’t even see the task through—I fell to the bioweapons before the city was liberated.”

“Don’t be like that,” Will said. “Get out there. You have to. You are a hero.”

“I’m not,” she insisted.

“Look dude, you’ve faced bioweapons the size of houses, creatures with multiple heads,” Will said. “This is nothing in comparison.”

She could still hear the cries of “warden” coming from outside.

“Why are they doing this?” she said. “What do they want? How do they even know me?”

“Videos of what you did have gone viral on all the streaming sites,” Will explained. “You’re famous now. It’s one of the drawbacks of living in the modern age, where anyone can become a citizen journalist courtesy of the cameras we all wear. It’s very easy to stream someone doing something heroic.” He smiled. “They call you the Warden of Rust Town. You say you have no followers? Well you have a few now.” When she didn’t answer, he pressed on. “Come on, dude. Go talk to your fans. Take some selfies. You know, do what famous people do. They’re not leaving until you do…”

Rhea sighed. “I never wanted this.”

Will shrugged. “I’m sure it won’t last for long.”

“Of course it won’t,” she said. “When they find out what a fraud I am. I didn’t save their city. Instead I got my body torn to pieces.”

“It’s not a matter of whether your body survived to the end,” he told her. “It’s the sheer bravery you showed. The heart. What you did, the actions of one brave cyborg, drove an entire settlement to fight, uniting people and robots of all makes, models and cliques to achieve the impossible: defeating a far more powerful foe that sought to destroy them. The fact that you were willing to give up your life for them thawed many hearts.”

She turned toward Will and then wrapped him in a tight hug.

The hallway door opened behind her and Horatio entered the foyer. “They’re calling for you.”

She released Will and glanced at the robot. “Give me your hand.”

Horatio did so.

With her other hand she took Will’s, then turned toward the door. “If I’m going to do this, I can’t do it alone.”

Will squeezed her palm. “We’re here.”

Rhea nodded. “All right.” She gazed at the closed door, and straightened, steeling herself. “Let’s do this.”

Will opened the door.

Hand-in-hand, the trio walked outside.

Epilogue

Veil, Scourge of the North, shut down the streaming video feed and frowned.

“The Dagger is making quite the name for herself,” she commented. “No thanks to you.”

The Scorpion bowed his head in shame. Her assassin had returned in a sorry state. When Veil reviewed his logs, she discovered his main power cell had been perforated—the resultant short had drained most of his backup unit. His mind-machine interface had automatically switched to stasis mode, so that the trickle power from the backup would be enough to keep him alive, flexing his artificial lungs just enough to meet the brain’s reduced oxygen requirements. The backup cell was regenerative, however, and finally repaired itself enough to produce the charge necessary for consciousness.

His anti-salvage measures had also activated while he was under, so that his most essential components switched to a simulated short-out mode, faking damage that would deter casual salvagers. The Dagger would have known about that particular mode, however. That lent credit to the Scorpion’s theory that her mind had been wiped, considering the Dagger and her crew had only taken his arms and legs. Unless she was merely putting on an act for Veil.

In any case, the Scorpion had been forced to use his tail to drag himself through the cave, worming like a caterpillar with no legs, until he reached the entrance and activated his recall beacon. Veil had hired a collection crew to retrieve him and deducted the necessary funds from his bank account as punishment, along with her usual twenty percent failure fee.

“Shall I find another to take this job?’ Veil asked.

The Scorpion glanced up. “No. I can do this. No one gets the better of the Scorpion and lives to tell the tale.”

Veil smiled coldly. “Good. Because Khrusos has quadrupled the price on her head.”

The Scorpion grinned, eyes glinting greedily.

* * *

BOOK 2: Rhea, Will and Horatio return to fight another day in Warden 2, available on Amazon at https://readerlinks.com/l/1054280

Or discover how Will and Horatio first met in the prequel novella, Salvage, available for free here: https://bookhip.com/WBMXLC

About the Author

USA Today bestselling author Isaac Hooke holds a degree in engineering physics, though his more unusual inventions remain fictive at this time. He is an avid hiker, cyclist, and photographer who sometimes resides in Edmonton, Alberta.

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