Tali

  My hands are starting to ache by the time I reach the top of the ladder.

  At the bottom there was a set of what appeared to be sturdy stirrups set into grooves in the outer rails, and hand holds set into the same grooves higher up, that suggested some kind of one-person lift designed to accelerate this process. None of us could figure out how to trigger it, though, and we didn’t have time to fuck around.

  “This is exactly the kind of information it would have been helpful to share with us,” Xan said with a curse when she gave up. At the time I just rolled my eyes but now I am ready to be disgruntled alongside her.

  I’m thankful that Medore told us how to access the little alcove built into the back walls of the circle designed for maintenance workers to reach air vents and sprinkler systems and hang the pretty lights that illuminate the circle sky. I’m still not clear on why she told us, or why she couldn’t have told us a week ago, or why she couldn’t have included instructions for using the lifts. Maybe she thought it was obvious and we’re only climbing the manual way because we missed a big red lever labeled “up”. I don’t know. What I do know is that by the time I pull myself onto the narrow catwalk located so far above the open-air circle that from below I never noticed it, my limbs are trembling.

  “You’d think a few months of endless walking would prepare me for something like that,” I tell Xan a little breathlessly as I crawl over to where she’s sitting, presumably to catch her own breath.

  “Climbing and walking use different muscle groups,” she says.

  “Awesome.” I give her a thumbs up to indicate just how awesome I think that is. Behind me, Lucas’s labored breathing lets me know he’s nearing the top as well. Xan rises to a crouch as he drags himself over the edge.

  “I… need a minute,” he gasps.

  Xan shakes her head, merciless. “We don’t have a minute. We have to go.”

  “You got a minute,” I say and it sounds petulant even to me.

  “Had to wait for you. Let’s go.”

  She’s right of course. The second anyone discovers we are missing, they’ll know exactly how we left and they probably will know where the big lever is. I half expect to see one of our guards pop up over the edge looking fresh-faced from lack of exertion and wondering why we haven’t made more progress by now.

  We go as fast as we can while maintaining a low crouch, because my poor thighs haven’t been abused enough apparently, and also to avoid being seen by anyone who might have actual business up here. Xan checks every corner before taking a turn, and we follow her. Part of me wonders how she seems to innately know what direction to go. The rest of me suspects she’s taking the turns at random, more interested in avoiding immediate capture than finding an exit.

  My ears strain for the expected sound of footsteps following us, but none come.

  “Ohhhhh,” Lucas says quietly in response to nothing.

  “Oh what?”

  “You know what I bet? I bet Medina or whatever her name was disabled the lifts on purpose.”

  My already elevated heart rate speeds up a little more. “You mean you think it’s a trap?”

  “No, I mean… to keep anyone from following us.”

  Oh right. Of course.

  I mentally retract most of my resentment about the ladder, but not all of it because my thighs are still screaming at me.

  “Shhh” Xan hisses at us, even though neither of us is talking anymore.

  When Medore came to visit us earlier today, I was prepared for the worst. I mean, really prepared. We all were. None of us thought the Council was going to let us go, so we’ve been making our own plans in the meantime. Xan has broken the legs off one of our kitchen chairs so we each have a club to use as a weapon. It would be better if they were sharpened to a point, but we have nothing to sharpen them with.

  Instead, we crowd into her bedroom every night because it’s the farthest from the front door where the guard sits, and she tries to teach us basic hand-to-hand combat. Also chair leg-to-chair leg combat. She’s drilled us relentlessly on stance, grip, swing, how to dodge, how to block, how to grab an opponent by the belt loop and thrust our hip into them to flip them over on their back. Lucas once referred to it as Mercenary Home School and the name stuck.

  I appreciate the training and it’s been a good way to kill the time but we all know it’s not enough. We are all ready to go down fighting if we have to, and Lucas and I are under no illusions. We know going down is exactly what we will do if it comes to that, especially in light of what we learned from Ahmad.

  So when Medore came to tell us that the Council Meeting was in session but the outcome predetermined, on the heels of Ahmad bearing the same message, I had already begun steeling myself for an escape plan that was guaranteed to fail quickly and tragically. My only hope was that Xan would be competent enough to somehow make it out.

  But then Medore presented us with the mods she had purchased for us and, as if that weren’t enough, introduced us to the ladder and vent and catwalk system in which we are currently running around at a crouch. If I ever see her again, which is unlikely, I owe that woman a drink. And my life. But at the very least a drink.

  I really hope Xan has some idea where she is going, however, because if we stay on the catwalks too long, it won’t matter. Rowena will alert the scouts on the surface and they’ll be waiting for us when we get there.

  No sooner has the thought occurred than Xan leads us around a corner to where the catwalk dead ends at, of all the bloodrotted things, a ladder.

  I don’t know if the groan that escapes me is relief or anguish. Maybe both.

  Relanguish, I think and suppress a giggle. Possibly my brain is not running at peak capacity right now. Good timing for it.

  This ladder is at least shorter. There’s much less distance between the catwalks and the surface than between the catwalks and the ground.

  It only takes a few minutes to reach the top and Xan cautiously opens a small hatch through which evening sunlight spills in, highlighting our presence like a beacon for anyone who might be up here to see it.

  We scramble through as quickly as we can and nobody shoots at us. So far, so good.

  Once we are out and the hatch closed, Xan pauses to get her bearings, then pulls a mod out of her pocket and presses down on it with her thumb to activate it.

  “What’s that do?” Lucas asks.

  “Dampens sound in a six-foot radius. Harder for the scouts to hear us coming.”

  Lucas gives a low whistle, impressed, and Xan scowls at him.

  “Let’s not test its limits okay?”

  Lucas grins and gives her a thumbs up.

  Okay. No more noise from over here, boss.

  I’m tempted to indulge the feeling of euphoria rising up in me now that we’re outside, but Xan’s caution checks me. We’re not free yet. Far from it.

  Plus, I realize with a start, if we have a sound dampener so do the scouts. That must be how they snuck up on us to begin with. After our experience with the Antler-folk, it seems unlikely they could have caught Xan so thoroughly unawares using stealth alone.

  Xan glances around, then leads us to a little cluster of trees that looks like it could do a decent job hiding someone. Once we’re all squeezed into the center of the tree cluster she produces another mod from her pocket, peels the paper from its adhesive back and sticks it to a tree before activating it.

  “Makes us invisible?” I ask hopefully, knowing that no such mod exists.

  “Deepens the existing shadows a little,” she says. “We wait here until dark.”

  Waiting so close to where we emerged from the underground city feels like a risk. Then again, so does wandering around in woods peppered with silent scouts in broad daylight. I defer to Xan’s wisdom and take the opportunity to sit down and catch my breath. I would love to do some stretches to relieve the tension in my legs but there’s barely room for the three of us in our little artificially shadowed hiding place.

  Within an hour, it’s dark enough to move on but Xan doesn’t move.

  “Something bothering you?” I whisper to the back of her head as she stares out into the forest beyond.

  She grunts. “Why haven’t we seen the scouts?”

  I shrug, though she’s not looking at me. “Should we have?”

  “Definitely. They know we’ve escaped by now, which means they should have a pretty good idea what part of the forest we’ve escaped into. There can’t be that many exits.”

  “Maybe they don’t know we’re gone yet,” Lucas suggests. “Maybe the Medina lady caused a distraction or something.”

  “Medore,” I correct him.

  “What did I say?”

  “Medina.”

  Xan glances back at us, her expression a mixture of annoyance and incredulity. We shut up.

  “I don’t like it,” she says after a moment. “But we don’t have much of a choice. Stay close.”

  Peeling the shadow mod off the tree, she hands it to me and we head out in the direction Medore told Xan we should go. There’s a familiar buzz against my fingers as the mod fizzles out. I probably should have told Xan about my bad luck with mods. For now I hope the natural darkness is enough.

  We don’t encounter a single soul and thanks to Xan, this makes me more nervous rather than less.

  I don’t know where Xan gets her infallible sense of direction—maybe they’re standard issue at mercenary school—but she leads us almost directly to the unobtrusive little storage shed we’re looking for without faltering.

  For a moment, as she presses yet another mod to the lock and it clicks open, I think we’re free and clear. Inside the shed, Medore says there are a few gliders that will get us out of here faster than walking.

  Only that’s not what’s inside the shed. At least it’s not the only thing inside the shed. When the door swings open, Xan’s torso twists violently and she stumbles backward so suddenly that she nearly takes me off my feet.

  Then, someone emerges from the shed, crossbow drawn, and my gut clenches. The crossbow isn’t loaded. Because it’s just been fired and the bolt is lodged firmly in Xan’s sternum.

  Ahmad

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  Ahmad is still fuming a few hours after the meeting. He’s not just angry about what an obvious charade the entire spectacle was—though he’s certainly angry enough about that. More than that, he’s furious about his own disillusionment.

  A few weeks ago, he’d never questioned the foundations of Sunward society because he’d never been given a reason to. With the arrival of Tali and her friends there came a shift in his entire worldview that happened too fast and for which he was entirely unprepared.

  When glowering at his dinner, and his radio, and his books and everything else in his house fails to lift his mood, Ahmad decides to go for a walk. He first heads toward Half Moon Circle, where his best friend and fellow scout Ashley lives. If there’s anyone in Sunward he can safely talk to, Ashley is it.

  They don’t answer his knock at the door, so he shoots them a message by slate and sits on their front stoop to wait for a reply. Fifteen minutes later, when none has arrived, he gives up and heads back toward home.

  He turns things over and over in his mind as he walks, setting his body to autopilot. It must know something he doesn’t, because the house he stops at is not his at all. It’s Tali’s.

  But there’s something not quite right about it. Ahmad frowns, taking in at once the conspicuous lack of a guard at the door.

  That’s strange. Could the visitors have already been assigned to separate circles and moved to new locations? Surely not. The meeting ended only a few hours ago.

  He wiggles the door handle and it turns easily in his grasp.

  At first glance, everything inside looks normal, except for the emptiness. It’s too quiet and too still for the visitors to simply be in their separate rooms. With a start, Tali’s words from just a few hours ago return to him.

  “Don’t be around here tonight.”

  So of course he has come straight here. He had hoped that warning her about the real capabilities of Sunward would prevent her from doing something suicidally stupid but it’s beginning to look as if that’s not the case.

  He takes a visual inventory of the common areas before carefully checking each bedroom. In the last, the cold feeling that’s been growing steadily since he walked into the empty house finds a focal point: a broken chair lies on the floor, three of its legs missing.

  Please tell me they are not planning to fight their way out of the city with chair legs.

  A few minutes later, he discovers the panel to the maintenance shaft hanging open.

  The feeling that springs up at that, to his mild surprise, is relief. Tali and her friends found a way to escape that might not involve direct combat. Maybe now a few thousand strangers in a town he’ll never see will have a chance.

  “Ahmad?”

  He doesn’t visibly start at the sound of Medore’s voice behind him. He’s a little proud of himself for that. His scout captain would be too.

  As he turns to face her, he holds up his hands in preemptive denial.

  It wasn’t me. I didn’t help them escape.

  But the look on her face isn’t one of suspicion, or even confusion. There’s something like resignation in her eyes.

  Because she knows. She doesn’t think it was me, because it was her.

  His hands slowly fall back to his sides.

  “You let them go?”

  “I had to.”

  “Did they make it?”

  It’s her turn to raise her hands, palms up. I don’t know, the gesture says. I did what I could.

  He nods. “They won’t know how to get past the scouts.” He starts toward the front door but she stops him with a hand on his elbow and a small shake of her head.

  “Rowena has scouts at the main entrance.”

  “What?” That can’t be right. “I haven’t heard anything.”

  Her smile is sympathetic. “You wouldn’t have.”

  So Rowena mobilized the scouts and went out of her way to exclude him from the notification. It makes sense, but a little knot of fear forms in his belly. He’s a little embarrassed to discover it’s not for Tali, but for himself and the possibility that he’s fucked up his future here for someone he barely knew.

  He shoves the thought aside for now and turns back toward the maintenance shaft. If they’ve already made it to the surface, there won’t be scouts at the external hatches. If they haven’t, maybe he can find them and help them.

  “Be careful!” Medore calls from behind him. He steps into the stirrups of the lift, takes hold of the handholds, and begins a steady slide toward the top.

  When Ahmad reaches the surface, he pauses for a moment, closing his eyes and feeling the vibrations of the ground through his feet. Usually he tunes out the steady buzz of activity he can always feel, but at moments like this he leans into it like a fighter sinking into their hips before a fight. He can see the landscape in his mind, like a map spreading out around him, and the movements of people in the map stand out like blinking lights.

  He remains this way for only a minute before heading toward the glider storage. There are a lot more blinking lights in the area than there should be. When he catches sight of Tali and her friends in the little moonlit clearing by the storage shed, the first thing he feels is relief. It lasts for about the span of a heartbeat before horror takes its place. There were more vibrations on his mind map than the three of them could cause.

  As he watches, Tali’s dangerous looking friend swings the shed door open. Almost in the same movement she stumbles back with what looks like a cry of pain or possibly outrage. By the unbroken quiet of the woods around him he guesses they are using a sound mod.

  Then the woman who has just fired the bolt into Xan’s chest steps out of the shed, crossbow still raised. It’s Ahmad’s captain and she’s flanked by three other scouts who must have been hiding in the shed with her. One of them is Ashley. They glimpse Ahmad, then look down, avoiding his gaze.

  He feels the presence of the other scouts emerging from the trees around them before he sees them. Tali and Lucas are gripping what he presumes to be the missing chair legs like clubs. Xan is on the ground, half sitting. She’s examining the bolt protruding from just below her collarbone with a mild frown, like a person considering a complex math problem.

  “Wait!”

  Before he knows he’s going to do it, Ahmad lunges toward them, stopping between the three outsiders and his scout captain.

  He holds both hands out toward her. He’s still shouting “Wait” and now that he’s inside the sound dampener’s range, they can even hear him.

  The captain’s already stony expression darkens when she sees him. She calmly reloads the crossbow and raises it again, her eyes never leaving him.

  “Remove yourself, scout,” she orders.

  “Just… wait. You don’t understand.”

  “I understand perfectly,” says Captain Elise Origo coolly, “and I gave you an order.”

  The crossbow doesn’t waver even a centimeter. Captain Origo is a woman who values order. She respects chain of command and expects others to do the same. In a city ostensibly ruled by the whole community, the scout regiment is a safe haven of hierarchical organization for her.

  If there’s anyone in Sunward likely to be swayed by a compelling plea, Origo is not that person. Ahmad charges onward anyway, for lack of a better option.

  “Please just listen for one minute. It’s not what you think. The Council didn’t have the whole picture.”

  Origo’s face somehow hardens further. “If you have an accusation to make about the head of the Council there’s a process for that.” The warning in her voice is impossible to miss.

  “Their friends are in a city that’s about to be decommissioned,” he persists. “Not just decommissioned, it’s…” he’s searching for the right words to relay the horror of Tali’s account of Haven Station but he trails off.

  Something flashed in Origo’s eyes at the word “decommissioned.” Not the anger he was expecting; something more like recognition. Her posture doesn’t relax but there’s an infinitesimal shift. The faintest stutter in her resolve.

  His eyes widen, a sudden certainty gripping him.

  “You already know.” It’s neither a question nor an accusation; just a statement of fact.

  Origo says nothing, just narrows her eyes. There is still a warning in them but Ahmad feels a tiny spark of hope that there may be something in her—some memory from her own experience, or sense of communal empathy to which he can appeal.

  “Is that why we came here? To escape decommissioning?”

  Her silence is not a confirmation, but he takes it as one. The hope gives way almost instantly to fury. If Origo knows—if the fate Tali’s friends are desperate to avoid is the same one from which the citizens of Sunward found refuge here—then Rowena knows. At least some members of the council know. The sham of a Council Meeting took place with a full understanding of the stakes.

  A cold fear twists in his gut at the realization. Sunward is quickly taking on an ominous shape in his mind—something he would not have thought possible two weeks ago. He swallows it as best he can, takes a slow, shuddering breath, and presses forward.

  “They deserve a chance,” he says quietly. It’s no longer a confrontation between the outsiders and the scouts. There’s no one here but Origo and himself. He’s seen a chink in her armor, small though it may be, and he focuses on it with all his might.

  “You know they do. It’s a whole city, just like ours. Just ordinary people. Children. Let them at least have a warning. Please.”

  Her resolve falters and for half a breath, he thinks he has her. Her eyes flick from him to the outsiders behind him and back.

  A heartbeat passes, then another. Origo’s eyes shutter, her decision made, and she draws herself up. Her finger tightens on the trigger.

  So that’s it then. He barely has time to feel the sinking of his heart before a hand snakes around him from behind and presses a blade against his throat. He can feel Xan’s heartbeat against his back, fast but even.

  “Sorry kid,” she mutters into his ear. He’s dimly aware of a cry of protest from Tali as the scouts behind Origo start forward.

  “Behind me!” Xan shouts, dragging Ahmad as she swings around so her back is to the shed entrance, Tali and Lucas scrambling in her wake like magnets.

  The move forces Origo to swivel as well to avoid colliding with the single bulky creature made up of Xan and Ahmad. A trickle of warmth is sliding down his chest. The blade must have dug deep enough into his throat to pierce the skin, though he didn’t feel it happen.

  The entire shift in dynamics took only a few seconds. From his new perspective Ahmad sees the other scouts, the ones who emerged from the wood alongside him, moving cautiously forward. They are still outside the sound dampener’s range, he realizes, and are waiting to understand what Origo wants them to do.

  Behind him, one of the gliders starts up with a soft whir.

  “Put the weapon down,” Xan says to Origo, her voice calm but tight with pain.

  Origo doesn’t move. She casts her eyes at him, coolly considering her options. Considering, Ahmad realizes with an uncomfortable tightening of his chest, whether Xan slitting his throat might not be a reasonable price to pay for the security of the city. Examined from that angle, he’s forced to admit to himself, she might even be right. She might be considering shooting him herself. Probably better than the throat thing, all things considered.

  Besides, Xan got shot and she’s still mostly fine. He finds he’s fully voting for the option where he gets shot, hopefully non-fatally, by his own captain when Origo surprises him by reaching her conclusion and laying the crossbow down.

  “Tell them,” Xan says, making a gesture with her chin toward the surrounding scouts who remain armed.

  Origo takes a few seconds to consider again, then thumbs the button on her radio.

  “Stand down.”

  The other scouts stop moving. Eventually, they follow their Captain’s lead, laying their weapons down.

  Xan backs toward the glider, still holding him tight to her. Lucas and Tali are already in the saddle and it’s running.

  The glider is built for two. Three might squeeze into the saddle in a pinch, but not four. Beneath the wide saddle is the body of the vehicle, housing the engine and a row of thrusters that keep it hovering a few feet above ground. The back two thirds of the body are bisected horizontally by large triangular fins that give the vehicle its distinct stingray-shaped shadow when the sun is high. Xan moves backwards toward the second one, pulling Ahmad with her, then loosens her grip.

  “Start it,” she orders. “And get on.”

  Ahmad obeys, pushing away the sinking feeling that comes with the realization that she intends to take him with her. It makes sense, he supposes. Otherwise the scouts would just shoot them down before they were out of range. This distant, rational voice that insists on explaining why everyone is doing things to him is annoying, but it is also keeping him grounded so he makes no attempt to quiet it.

  “I’m kind of regretting trying to help you,” he tells Xan conversationally as he climbs into the saddle and grips the handles that both steer and control the speed of the glider.

  She ignores him, turning her attention to the bolt still emerging from her chest. Her face is pale, lips pressed tightly together. When she leans her back against the shed wall, Ahmad thinks she’s about to pass out and his gut tightens—whether with fear or hope he’s unsure. Xan doesn’t pass out. She’s bracing herself. With a mangled cry she wraps her fingers around the bolt and yanks it out.

  “You’re going to bleed out,” Ahmad says in an awed voice. She continues to ignore him as she clambers up gingerly behind him, wrapping an arm around his waist for balance, and restoring the knife hand to its position at this throat.

  “Stay close,” she grunts at Tali, and Ahmad takes that as his cue. The glider lurches slightly as he accelerates, and this time he feels the blade slip into his skin.

  “Sorry,” Xan mutters, and Ahmad almost laughs.

  The shed discharges them into a line of scouts, crossbows at the ready. Ahmad’s muscles react automatically, his hand moving toward the throttle but only for a second. The knife edge of pressure at his throat increases and he wills himself to ignore all his instincts and lean into a hard acceleration. He can’t think about what happens if the scouts don’t move out of the way, or if they shoot, or both.

  He steels himself for the impact of a body against the glider, gritting his teeth so hard he feels one crack. At the last second the line splits and the gliders shoot through the newly formed opening. Ahmad keeps his eyes forward, waiting for the thud of a crossbow bolt in his back or Xan’s. Every second drags as they fly through the trees at breakneck speed. Moments pass, then miles. He hasn’t been shot. A glance over his shoulder tells him the other glider’s occupants remain similarly intact. Ahmad finally begins to breathe again.

  When they’re well outside of crossbow range and far enough that the scouts can’t just catch up on foot, Xan motions for him to stop. She’s no longer holding the knife to his throat, which he appreciates, and has begun to slump against him unsteadily.

  She climbs off the glider and he starts to follow, but she holds up a hand to stop him. Beads of perspiration dot her brow despite the breeze, and she’s no longer trying to suppress the agony in her expression.

  “Holy shit,” Ahmad says. “You need a doctor.”

  “Yeah,” Xan agrees. “I got shot.”

  “What are we doing?” Tali asks, pulling her glider to a shaky stop beside his.

  “You wanna come with us or go home?” Xan asks, and it takes Ahmad a few seconds to realize she’s talking to him.

  “What?” Is all he can manage.

  “Seems like they might not be too sanguine about you at the moment,” Xan says. “Your call, but make it now.”

  He blinks. He wasn’t expecting to be offered a choice and he’s not entirely sure what to do with it. He’s probably going to be in a lot of trouble if he goes back to Sunward. He knows that. But Sunward is home. It’s where his parents and his friends are. The Council may be more corrupt than he’d realized, but the city is full of good people and no one there has ever threatened to cut his throat.

  Ahmad looks at Tali instead of Xan. “Will you be alright?”

  She nods, then grimaces from the effort of trying to pull Xan into the saddle in front of Lucas without hurting her too much.

  Once Xan is squeezed between them her head lolls forward onto Tali’s shoulder. Lucas steadies her and casts a frantic glance at Tali.

  We need to go. Now.

  “Thanks Ahmad,” Tali says. “I owe you one.” Then she turns the accelerator and they’re gone.

  “You’re fucking right you do,” Ahmad says to no one. He’s exhausted, and bleeding, and suddenly not completely certain he made the right choice.