by Annie Percik
‘How long have we got before we’re due to meet Cousin Gerald?’ Alessandra asked.
Abelard checked his smart-e-fact. ‘Five hours. So we’ll need to set off for Gadg-E-Tech in less than three.’
‘Good.’ Alessandra stabbed a finger at Mateo. ‘You! Crash course in artisan training right now!’
She grabbed his arm, pulled him to his feet and dragged him to the other end of the warehouse.
Abelard shrugged at Jen’s bemused expression. ‘A little bit of training has to be better than none, right?’
By the time they needed to leave, Alessandra declared Mateo at least reasonably safe to accompany them. When they rejoined the group, she had a pinched look, which Abelard recognised from his own training sessions. Mateo, on the other hand, was practically giddy and couldn’t help showing off by generating a mini mana fireball and making it dance between his fingers.
Abelard stared. ‘How did you manage that so fast? It took me hours to even be able to transfer mana from one place to another.’
Mateo grinned. ‘I’m obviously more naturally gifted than you.’
He attempted to toss the mini mana-ball from one hand to the other and nearly set his hair alight. Alessandra reached out and snatched the mana out of the air, snuffing it out in her fist.
‘If you can’t stop acting like an idiot, you’ll be staying here!’
Mateo had the decency to look chagrined and Abelard thought Alessandra looked like a teacher reprimanding a naughty schoolboy. He grinned until he remembered what they were about to do and then suddenly none of it seemed funny any more.
‘Terry’s contacted Julia at Gadg-E-Tech and the other brain-e-facts will be ready when we get there.’ A thought struck him. ‘There are eighteen brain-e-facts with names. How are they all going to fit in the float-e?’
Terry regarded him inscrutably. The brain-e-fact had become less expressive since his transformation. Abelard wondered if gaining so much extra power had catapulted Terry so far beyond human levels of experience that he was having trouble relating to them. That was rather a worrying thought.
‘Do not worry, Abelard,’ Terry said at last. ‘That will be taken care of.’
Abelard crossed to the table and unzipped the duffel bag they had brought with them from Gerald’s compound.
‘Body armour, anyone?’
Jen shrugged. ‘We might as well use it, since we’ve got it. Better to be safe than sorry.’
Alessandra was already rifling through the bag. She lifted a handgun out with a wide smile on her face.
‘Excellent! I’ve always wanted one of these.’
Abelard briefly pictured Alessandra in a viz-e-fact action scene, blazing away with an automatic machine gun. In his mind she looked utterly terrifying and completely comfortable. He shook his head to clear the image.
‘Only rubber bullets, I’m afraid,’ he said, lacing his words with sarcasm.
Alessandra looked shocked at his tone. ‘Do you really think I’d actually want to shoot someone? I know this isn’t a game, Abelard, perhaps better than any of you.’
‘Oh, I …’ Abelard stammered. ‘Sorry.’
She shook her head sadly at him and wandered over to where Mateo and Jen were inspecting their gear.
They kitted themselves out as best they could. Jen didn’t want a gun and Mateo was adamant that his new-found artisan powers would be more than enough to hold off any enemy. Abelard thought about taking one since they were there but eventually decided he would probably be more of a liability with a weapon than without one and left it in the bag.
Then they all piled into the float-e-fact and Terry set their direction back into the city.
* * *
After the jumped-up engineer escaped the clutches of his men at the viz-e-fact station, Walter had rampaged around the Gadg-E-Tech head office building, barking orders and snarling at everyone he came across. He couldn’t believe Alessandra had chosen to go into exile with the criminals instead of helping him bring them to justice. When his PA informed him that on top of everything else, his personal float-e-fact had been stolen, it nearly sent Walter over the edge.
When reports came in later that day of a float-e-fact hovering outside the viz-e station and people climbing out of an upper storey window into the vehicle, Walter put two and two together. Abelard and his little band of revolutionaries must have had more help from inside Gadg-E-Tech. He tried locating the float-e-fact remotely using its track-e but the locator beacon didn’t show up on any of his scans.
The next morning a beeping noise alerted Walter to the float-e-fact’s beacon coming online again, marking it heading straight for the Gadg-E-Tech head office building. He directed his speed-e-fact straight there, breaking the speed limit all the way. Grabbing a gun from his office, he made his way to the roof. He didn’t alert security; he didn’t want witnesses to what he was about to do. Besides, this was personal.
When he emerged into the sharp air of the rooftop he was greeted by the sight of the parked float-e-fact covered in brain-es, who were securing themselves to the outside of the vehicle with straps. Watching from the float-e-fact’s side doorway was Alessandra.
Walter tightened his grip on his weapon and charged across the roof. Before he could reach his former lover however, Abelard Abernathy stepped forwards to intercept him. Walter shoved him violently away, snarling, ‘Out of my way, engineer!’
As he stormed on towards the float-e-fact, Alessandra jumped down to meet him. He heard Abernathy scrambling to his feet and running to join them, but a wave of Alessandra’s hand brought the engineer to a halt, off to one side.
Walter ignored him, focusing solely on Alessandra.
‘What the hell are you doing?’ he demanded.
Alessandra seemed almost as distraught as he was. ‘Did you know? Did you know about the conspiracy all this time?’
‘Of course I did! I’ve been helping to protect the secret for years. What do you hope to achieve by this?’
Her tone was icy. ‘I’ve come to believe the public deserve to know that they’ve been lied to.’
‘You’re so naïve. I expected better from you,’ Walter spat. ‘We could have achieved great things together once you were part of the Inner Circle. You’re smart enough to know that we did it for their own good. Uncontrolled mana in the hands of the general populace? It doesn’t bear thinking about!’
‘But it’s not up to us to decide that,’ Alessandra said, her voice rising to a shout. ‘We don’t have the right to control who can be an artisan and who can’t!’
‘Yes, we do!’ Walter screamed. ‘And if you think you can create a world where anyone can be an artisan, I’m going to create one where you can’t!’
Everything happened very quickly after that. Walter fired his gun at Alessandra. It emitted a beam of blue light but before it could hit her, Abelard launched himself into its path, falling to the gravel with blue mana energy arcing over his body. Alessandra met Walter’s gaze and the shock and hatred in her eyes told him he had lost her forever. Then she raised a gun of her own and fired. Walter felt the impact in his chest and was thrown backwards on to the ground.
He could only watch as another man jumped down from the float-e-fact. Together he and Alessandra lifted Abelard’s unconscious form into the vehicle. Once they were aboard, the float-e-fact lifted slowly off the roof with its cargo of brain-e-facts and drifted away, leaving Walter alone on the Gadg-E-Tech roof, stunned and in agonising pain.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Awareness returned. Abelard’s head felt fuzzy but he was grateful it felt anything at all. He squirmed, registering a soft surface beneath him and pillows under his head. Waking up after being engulfed in blue mana light was becoming too familiar an experience.
‘Finally awake, are we?’
It was Alessandra’s voice and a repeat of the first words she had ever spoken to him, which made him smile. It couldn’t be a coincidence. It meant something, though he wasn’t sure what. Her tone was
completely different to that first encounter too. The words were soft and affectionate, which sounded wrong from her, but he wasn’t about to complain.
Abelard opened his eyes and was confronted with the vision of her beauty as before. This time he wasn’t dazzled by it, though. He knew the person behind the face now and that coloured his response to her with so many more layers than simple attraction. She smiled at him and it still sent a jolt through his stomach but because it was Alessandra smiling not because it was some nameless beauty.
‘What happened?’ he asked.
‘You jumped in front of a mana blast for me.’ There was an odd look in her eyes. ‘You could have died.’
‘But I didn’t.’ It was all he could think of to say.
‘You didn’t know that at the time.’
Abelard didn’t want to think about that so he changed the subject. ‘Where are we?’
‘Cousin Gerald’s compound, though he’s not happy having the brain-e-facts here. He and Terry are off somewhere discussing how to shield the place from prying artisan eyes.’
‘Did you mean all that stuff you said up on the roof? About artisans not having the right to control everything?’
Alessandra looked thoughtful. ‘I’m starting to. Especially if Walter is the kind of artisan who’s in charge.’
‘Is everyone else okay?’
‘Yes,’ Alessandra reassured him, though there was an anxious look in her eyes. ‘You were the only casualty on our side, though I think Walter’s going to have some cracked ribs from where I shot him with one of the rubber bullets.’
Abelard let out a sigh of relief. ‘I can’t believe we pulled that whole operation off and got away completely unscathed.’ He grinned. ‘Viva la revolution!’
‘About that …’ Alessandra’s tone made him look at her in concern. ‘Being completely unscathed, I mean.’ She paused and looked down at her hands. ‘There’s something I need to tell you.’
She stopped again and Abelard shifted so he could face her.
‘What is it?’
She met his gaze and there were tears shining in her eyes.
‘When we got here Terry did a whole load of tests to try and figure out what was wrong with you.’ The words came out in a rush. ‘We didn’t know what kind of weapon it was that Walter shot you with so it took him a while to identify the damage. Abelard, I’m so sorry. But you’re not an artisan any more.’
It didn’t sink in at first. Abelard just stared at her. Then he reached out and grabbed the chron-e-fact from the nightstand and gripped it in his hand. He willed the mana to flow out of it and into him. Nothing happened. He tossed it back on to the table.
‘Must not be charged.’
‘Don’t do this, Abelard,’ Alessandra said quietly. ‘You can see it’s charged. Look at the display. I’m sorry but you don’t have a spark any more.’
‘I’ll just get Terry to strap me up to the spark-e-fact and re-ignite it.’
‘Apparently it doesn’t work like that.’ He could tell she was beginning to lose patience with him. In a way it was reassuring to see some of the old Alessandra coming out. The fluffy version was starting to freak him out. ‘Terry examined you in the light of all his new knowledge and he says your capacity for mana manipulation has been completely destroyed. There’s no chance of ever getting it back.’
This time her meaning resonated through him with a finality that felt like a death sentence.
‘But – what am I going to do now? What is there left?’
‘Oh, for heaven’s sake!’ Alessandra shoved her chair back and headed for the door. ‘I’ll be right back.’
Abelard was stunned that she would leave him like that in his time of despair. He watched the door until she returned a few minutes later. She had Jen with her.
Jen’s face lit up when she saw that Abelard was awake.
‘How are you feeling?’ she asked but Alessandra didn’t give him a chance to respond.
‘Stop being sympathetic and talk some sense into him.’
Jen looked at her in confusion. ‘What do you mean?’
‘I told him about the spark thing and he’s being an idiot about it.’
Abelard had had enough. ‘Give me a minute to adjust, why don’t you? A few hours ago I was an artisan – all I’ve ever wanted to be. And now I’m not even an engineer. I’m just a useless mundane like–’ He broke off, realising what he’d been about to say.
‘Like me,’ Jen finished, her voice cold.
‘I didn’t mean–’
She cut him off. ‘Yes, you did. And I’m useless, am I?’
‘No, of course not!’
Both women were glaring at him now.
‘Exactly,’ Jen said. ‘So you’re not useless either. Stop feeling sorry for yourself and buck the hell up. There’s a lot of work to be done and we’re going to need you to help with it.’
‘Me?’ Abelard was totally bewildered.
Alessandra came back to sit next to him.
‘Yes. We’re about to turn the whole of society upside down, remember? Don’t you think we have a responsibility to help put it back to rights again afterwards?’
She was right. He had started this whole thing so it was up to him to see it through and deal with the consequences. He might not have artisan powers any more but he still had a brain and maybe a better understanding of all the different roles in society than most. Maybe there was still some way he could help. There was so much to think about.
Then his brain picked up on the particular way Alessandra had emphasised a word in what she had said.
‘We?’ He shot a glance at Jen but she was beaming at him.
Alessandra reached out and took his hand, entwining her fingers in his.
‘Yes, we,’ was all she said.
But just for that moment, it was enough.
* * *
When Abelard emerged for breakfast the next morning, Alessandra was in the compound dining hall with the rest of their group, including the brain-e-facts Terry and Julia. Alessandra hadn’t had any further chance to talk to Abelard since her declaration the night before and now she felt nervous about interacting with him. It was ridiculous and annoying so she greeted him with a wide smile as he approached the table with his tray. She felt a shiver of anticipation when he smiled right back.
‘Abelard, mate!’ Mateo cried. ‘Welcome back to the land of the living. The girls were really worried about you.’
Abelard rolled his eyes at Mateo’s false bravado. He sat down next to Alessandra and she felt him jump when she put her hand on his thigh under the table and squeezed. If their current situation was making her uncomfortable, she might as well make him share in it.
‘I am pleased to see you up and around again,’ Julia said, ‘and very sorry you were injured in the course of rescuing me and the other brain-e-facts.’
‘It wasn’t your fault,’ Abelard said around a mouthful of bacon, then raised his eyebrows. ‘Hey, you sound different. What’s been going on while I’ve been out of commission?’
It was Terry who spoke up this time. ‘It was not difficult to figure out what you did to give me greater processing power, so I have done the same to all the brain-e-facts we liberated. They are now truly free of artisan oppression.’
Mateo grinned broadly. ‘So we’ve got a whole load of genius brain-e-facts on our team. It’s awesome!’
‘There’s a team now?’ Abelard asked.
‘Sure!’ Mateo said. ‘Team Freedom!’
Jen rolled her eyes. ‘We are not calling it that.’
‘And does this team have some kind of plan?’ Abelard asked.
Alessandra squeezed his leg again. ‘That’s what we were just talking about. It seems we’ve outstayed our welcome here so the first thing we need to do is find a new base of operations. Gerald is keen to help the cause but he’s nervous about having the brain-e-facts around because he thinks it’ll allow the artisans to find us.’
Terry looked grave. ‘We have
offered to go elsewhere and pursue our own aims separate to yours.’
‘No,’ Abelard said. ‘We’re in this together. We had a deal and I intend to see it through. I owe my loyalty to you guys much more than I do to Gerald. If you have to leave I’m going with you.’
‘That’s what we all said too.’ Alessandra was glad his first impulse had been the same.
‘Even you?’ Abelard asked Mateo.
‘I know Gerald’s my cousin,’ Mateo said. ‘But I’ve got a lot more history with you, mate. And this …’ He gestured round at the group ‘… is where all the excitement’s going to be.’
‘But we need to figure out where to go,’ Alessandra said.
Abelard looked like he was thinking hard. ‘Wait a minute.’ He turned to Terry. ‘Didn’t you say back at the warehouse that you could shield us from the artisans?’
Terry nodded. ‘I did.’
‘So couldn’t you do the same to this compound? Then the artisans wouldn’t be able to find us even with all you brain-e-facts wandering about giving off mana waves or whatever?’
Terry nodded again. ‘I could. I have already mentioned this possibility to our host but he does not seem confident it will protect him.’
‘Do you think we could persuade Gerald that it would be safe to let us stay?’ Abelard asked Mateo.