The Thieves of Nottica

by Ash Gray

  Natasha looked at Morganith uncertainly. “Don’t you mean ‘or’ you’ll kill us?”

  “No, I mean ‘and.’ And we’ll kill you and call it a day,” Morganith repeated. “Now give us the lockbox. I’m soundin’ like a broken record over here.”

  Pirayo looked at Natasha. “Where is the lockbox, my sweet?” he said, pretending it wasn’t on the coffee table behind him. He shrugged. “Should we just hand it over? We can’t open the damned thing anyway.”

  “It’s probably got something stupid in it, like Evrard’s baby rattle,” Natasha said dismissively. “There are other ways we can weaken him, my love. We will find them.”

  Pirayo smiled. “You never give up, my dear. That’s why I love you.” He snatched Natasha close by the waist, and the two shared a passionate kiss. Behind them, Pirayo’s cyborgs hooted in appreciation.

  Morganith made a noise of disgust. “Sorry you chose the losing side, Natasha!” She fired without hesitation, and Pirayo watched with his mouth open as a red hole ripped through Natasha’s shoulder, spattering his face with blood. Natasha dropped away with a shrill scream.

  “Now it’s ah party!” shouted the woman with the tattoos.

  Chest heaving, Pirayo looked at Morganith with a grimace of rage. He pointed a trembling iron finger at the halfling, “Kill that thing! Kill them all!” Pirayo’s cyborgs started forward at once, but he held out his muscly arm and added, “But bring the ram-bitch to me alive. I wanna second whiffa that.”

  “Over my dead body!” Hari snarled. “Attack!”

  The two opposing groups launched into each other. Pirayo’s cyborgs paired up, and each pair went after a single Keymaster, forcing them apart in a strategic move that isolated each one of them.

  As the fighting raged around him, Pirayo crouched over Natasha and gathered her sadly in his arms. She muttered feverishly as blood poured from her wound, and with slippery iron hands, he urged her to hold on.

  Hari was trying to reach Pirayo but was being blocked by two women. One was human, the other was a demon, and each had a mechanical arm. Their arms were identical, whirling with buzz saws that were not unlike the ones on Hari’s staff. They blocked Hari’s path with their mechanical arms and leered at her. “Let’s see what you’re made of,” mocked the human. The demon chuckled darkly as she and her companion closed in. Hari muttered for Rivet to hide, and perched on Hari’s shoulder, Rivet obediently cowered inside her collar with a oily squeak. Hari’s fangs extended, her face contorted, and her voice was the guttural roar of a beast when she tore into both women with her staff. They blocked her swipes, moving fluidly as one to bar her every effort, but she managed to cut one across the cheek and the other across the thigh.

  Determined to plough her way to Pirayo, Hari’s blows kept coming and didn’t stop. Furious, the two women charged at her in unison, screaming at the top of their voices. Hari snapped her staff up and down, splitting the human’s belly and the demon’s throat in two precise gestures. Their blood splattered her face and their squirming insides splashed the carpet. She stepped past their squirming bodies, muttering under her breath, “You first.”

  Morganith fought brutally against her two opponents, both of which were men, her face cold and solemn, her dark eyes glittering as she punched and fired, systematically reloading and cocking after each shot. She slammed the butt of her shotgun in one attacker’s face and kicked away the other with her heavy boot. The first came back quick and she shot him in the leg in a spatter of blood. He went down with a scream, but the other had a robotic arm with slicing knives and swung it at Morganith hard.

  Morganith’s head snapped to the side as parallel ribbons of blood splashed down her face. She couldn’t see out of her left eye, which was searing with needle-sharp pain, and she nearly panicked but kept calm. “How’s that feel, he-she?” she heard the man mock, licking his lips as she reeled. “All you need’s ah real man. Gonna tame you down with my big knives, girl.” He swing again, and Morganith choked as the knives tore again through her skin, so searing hot she screamed. Blood splattered her vision and she staggered back. When the mechanical arm swiped at her a third time, she dodged, roared with sudden fury, and tackled him into the wall with her shoulder. As he struggled against her, she kept him pinned and gave her shotgun a rough shake. The twin bayonets unfolded, snapping sharp in the dim light. She drove them home in the man’s belly, and as he coughed up blood, she muttered, “Mine are bigger.”

  Rigg went immediately for the woman with the tattoos, but she was blocked by the towering Anikye demon. His hand was so large, when he grabbed Rigg by the face, his fingers fairly swallowed her head. Rigg was slammed bodily against the window, and she felt every inch of her spine shudder as her feet swung clear off the ground. She kicked and struggled, blinded by the suffocating paw. When she snapped her teeth in an attempt to bite, the Anikye hastily let her face go, clutching her neck instead to pin her in place. “Be still, liddle worm,” he complained in his rumbling voice, “Notty just wants ta taste ya. Then we’ll kill ya, quick and clean.”

  Rigg saw spots and tasted the sick rising at the back of her throat. Her back was pressed hard against the window, and she knew just on the other side of that thin layer of glass was the naked air, spiraling away to a dizzying drop. The very thought left her panting and weak, made her heart thud painfully and her mouth go dry with horror. Her eyes watered when the Anikye’s big hand tightened to seal off air, and she scowled when the tattooed woman came her way, her mechanical leg whizzing with every step. “I wonder how you taste, liddle girl,” the tattooed woman whispered, spiky hair stabbing in her greedy eyes. She reached for Rigg’s breasts, but in a sudden fury, Rigg yanked the yo-yo from her pocket and gave it a toss to the end of its string. The woman halted in surprise and her face twisted derisively to see the metal toy come gleaming her way. She burst into peals of mocking laughter, but the laughter halted immediately in her throat when Rigg’s yo-yo snagged in the gears of her mechanical leg. Rigg smiled, suddenly ripping the yo-yo away in a shower of cogs, and with it came the woman’s leg.

  The woman watched in horror as her broken leg came off, falling to pieces. Her mind piece ripped in a shower of blood from the back of her neck, and the mechanical leg tumbled away to the floor with it. She fell over on her back with a thump and a cry of pain.

  The giant shouted angrily. His big hand was still holding Rigg in place by the throat, and her neck sprouted spikes in furious retaliation. He screamed and let go, and Rigg tumbled to the floor, clutching her throat and gasping. The fear of a dizzying fall was still strangling her heart, and she scrambled away from the window immediately.

  The tattooed woman fumbled desperately to put her leg back together. When she saw Rigg was free, she dragged herself backward through the glass and debris, glaring as Rigg came for her.

  Marching hard at the woman, Rigg lifted her right hand, and it flowed from a whirling razor to a long and sharp railroad spike. “Go ahead!” the woman shouted. “Do it! Do --!” With a twisted expression, Rigg brought the spike down in a punch that abruptly silenced the woman, then she turned to the giant, who was – to her amazement – cradling his hand and sobbing. His face darkened and he said with a trembling lip, “You b-bitch! You cut up my hand! You b --” Rigg took a halting step and stabbed the spike up through his blubbering mouth. The giant’s eyes went blank as the crimson spike punched through the top of his skull, glittering with his blood. She snatched it free and watched as he fell over dead, the top of his head squirting.

  “Rigg!” Morganith shouted, her voice ragged and desperate.

  Rigg turned her head, following the sound of panting and struggling. Pirayo was trying to make an escape. He cradled Natasha’s limp body in both arms, kicking his mechanical legs brutally at Hari, who was blocking every blow with her staff. Hari’s head snapped back from the last kick and blood flew from her mouth, as behind her, Morganith ran down the hall, battling a robot that – to Rigg’s dismay – looked just like Lisa.


  Rigg stood frozen. The robot had Lisa’s face and slender build and was even wearing Lisa’s gray maid uniform, complete with the white apron. She had the lockbox and was trying to make a run for it, but Morganith kept blocking her path. She held the lockbox tight in one arm and chopped Morganith with the other, kicking and swinging in surgical strikes that wrung weak cries of pain from the half-demon. With a cold expressionless face, the robot blocked a blow from Morganith’s mechanical arm, then grabbed the arm and ripped it off completely. Morganith screamed as her mind piece was torn loose, and her mechanical arm soared through the air before clattering on the floor, battered and broken from the staggering strength of the robot’s grasp. In a final furious assault, the robot sent Morganith against the wall with a vicious spin-kick, her black ponytail whipping behind her. Morganith slumped to the floor with a cry, and when Rigg screamed Morganith’s name, the robot’s head snapped in her direction. She glared at Rigg, then turned with the lockbox and ran down the hall.

  Rigg ran to Morganith and dropped to her knees beside her. Morganith’s coat sleeve had been ripped clean off and was hanging in tattered rags. Her half-arm bled freely from the cut of the buckles on the mechanical arm’s straps, her mouth was bloody, and while one eye was bruising, the other was slashed and so congealed with blood, Rigg couldn’t see it.

  Rigg felt her chest heaving in a silent panic, and trying to control her breathing, she fumbled in her pockets for something, anything. When she found nothing, she reached for Morganith’s discarded arm, determined to strap it back on for her.

  Morganith scowled. “What’re you doin’, kid?” she slurred impatiently, blood trailing from her lip. Her head wobbled, punch-drunk, against the wall. “Stop that robot, for fuck’s sake! It’s got the lockbox!”

  Rigg opened her mouth to protest and hesitated when she heard Hari’s cry of pain. Hari was still battling Pirayo and had managed to make him drop Natasha to the floor. They struggled over her groaning body, and Hari’s face was hard with determination. On her shoulder, Rivet had emerged and was trying to help, though she kept telling the robot to hide. Rigg understood why: six months ago, when he attacked them in their hideout, Pirayo had stepped on Rivet, breaking the tiny robot nearly beyond repair. Rivet, however, seemed determined to help Hari get vengeance for them both. The spidery robot scuttled over Pirayo’s face, blinding him and confusing him. Pirayo, with a sudden snarl of rage, managed to grab the robot and toss it aside. It squealed sadly as it hit the wall in a shower of gears.

  “No!” Hari shouted. Her cyan eyes glinted at Pirayo, head tilted down, teeth bloody from the last brutal kick to her face. Blood was streaming from her nose and mouth, and her face was creased and contorted in a lion’s scowl. She looked more fearsome than Rigg had ever recalled in her life, and Pirayo was as frightened as he was furious, punching and kicking Hari now with everything he had, impatiently roaring when she refused to go down, frowning in fear when she drew near to overpowering him. His people were dead, he was alone, and Natasha – his lover – was dying at his feet. He knew it was over but, as Morganith had predicted, kept fighting like a cornered rat.

  Hari’s eyes were dark with triumphant amusement and she smiled as she sharply slashed her whirling saws across Pirayo’s face in a toss of blood. Pirayo’s head snapped to the side from the blow. He wiped the blood away with a trembling hand, then sneered and gave Hari a brutal kick below the belt that sent her to the floor.

  “Hari!” Rigg shouted, frozen in place.

  “You’ll havta to better than that, ram-bitch,” Pirayo said in dark amusement.

  As Hari slowly, painfully sat up, Rivet launched from the floor and clamped itself once again to Pirayo’s face. Pirayo roared and stamped in a blind rage, clawing at the spidery robot in frustration, growling in pain, his mechanical legs stamping broken pieces of furniture to dust and even kicking Natasha, who crawled feebly from his path. The robot’s many wiry legs were clenching like needles in his face and blood was oozing down his cheeks in streams. Pirayo finally managed to pry the robot off in a spray of blood and tossed it away yet again, smashing it against the wall in a splash of springs. Rigg winced to hear Rivet’s chirrup of pain, and then Pirayo was turning furiously to Hari. Hari hadn’t found her feet yet, and as she was getting up, Pirayo brutally kicked her down, his metal foot connecting with her shoulder.

  Rigg couldn’t move.

  Morganith reached with a bloody, trembling hand for her shotgun and snarled impatiently, “I’ll help Hari! You catch the robot! Go!”

  Rigg went. She scrambled up and ran down the hall, expecting to find the robot waiting in the room at the end. To her surprise, the room was empty. The radio on the nightstand was still cranking out a warbling tune, and the window was wide open. The breeze drifted in, lifting the tattered curtain with the scent of fire and ash, carrying the raging screams and bellows of the warring streets. Rigg ran to the window and peered out to see the distant figure of the robot. She was running with flaring skirts across the rooftop opposite, heading directly for the next one ahead. The lockbox was still tightly under her arm.

  Rigg glanced down at the dizzying drop between the rooftop and the window, but with a determined scowl, she hurled herself over the sill, barely managing to catch herself on the edge of the building opposite. Her legs kicked against the air, and her heart skipped a painful beat at the sudden realization that should she lose her grip, she would be falling for several minutes through electric wire and clothing lines before finally shattering in a red stain on the pavement below. The horror of such a thing put determination in her bones and chased her onto the rooftop like a bogeyman, until she found herself standing breathless, watching in frustration as the robot got away.

  Rigg hitched up her skirt in one fist and chased the robot right to the edge of the roof, gritting her teeth when the bullet wound in her calf screamed in protest, and she was running so hard, she barely stopped herself when one boot nearly stepped on air. She staggered back, head spinning in a riot of spots and color, and watched with her mouth open as the robot leapt across the impossible space as if she had springs in her shoes. The robot landed neatly on the roof opposite, then slowly straightened up, and to Rigg’s surprise, she didn’t keep running but turned to glare at her pursuer. It was a nasty glare, filled with such mockery and malice that Rigg stood in bafflement for several seconds.

  “Uh . . . do I know you?” Rigg said eventually.

  “No,” the robot answered, the wind lifting her dress and hair forward, “but I know you.”

  Rigg just stared. “Come again?”

  “When Pirayo heard Evrard’s pet had gone missing,” the robot elaborated, “he purchased and refurbished me, in the hope that I could replace her. I would approach Castle Atrocitas with the lockbox and give it to my master, discover how to open it, and return to Pirayo with it unlocked.”

  “But you weren’t willing to do all that,” Rigg guessed.

  The robot smiled. “On the contrary. I was more than willing.”

  “Only because you don’t know what a monster Evrard is,” Rigg said at once.

  “As if all organics weren’t monsters!” the robot snapped, startling Rigg with her spitting hatred. “You treat us like tools to be used and discarded – every last one of you! Yes, even you, the supposed robot sympathizer!” She paused and glared at Rigg with heaving breasts. “Your precious Lisa was a fool! She could have wound up in any trashy home, beaten and broken and left half-naked on display. Instead, she had a home in a beautiful castle over a lake --!” Rigg opened her mouth, but the robot said over her, “Oh, I know what the governor did to her. Everyone knows. What she endured was nothing compared to what other robots endure.” She fell silent, glaring at Rigg, and it slowly dawned on Rigg that she was the same robot in Coghurst, the one she’d stolen the chips from.

  “You,” Rigg whispered sadly. She cleared her throat guiltily. “How . . . how is it possible that . . .?”

  “I could be here?” said the robo
t bitterly. “Instead of back in that booth with my body exposed for random organics to violate?” She paused to glare at Rigg again, her lip trembling hatred. “Razor is everywhere, you fool. Pirayo has people in every realm, every city. While you were skipping through flower fields with Lisa, one of his people bought me, fixed me, and shipped me here. I lay for hours in a dark box, waiting for what, I did not know. But I heard his people talking about you and Lisa and the Keymasters. I listened and I waited for the moment when I could make my escape and take control of my life. Now with this lockbox,” she glanced at the box in her arm, “I can find Castle Atrocitas and take Lisa’s place. I will never have to fear being dismantled. I will wind Evrard around my finger the way that simp Lisa never bothered to try. I will be well cared for, his adoring pet, and I will gladly welcome his abuse if it means never again having to endure what lies beyond the gates of his castle. Instead of being in the path of the Hand, I will be at its side.” The robot triumphantly fell silent, regarding Rigg coldly.

  “But . . . Evrard’s got Lisa’s body,” Rigg said. “He knows the real Lisa didn’t escape.”

  “But he knows her databanks did,” answered the robot, her eyes going to Rigg’s belly. “Isn’t that right, Aonji demon? He will believe I am Lisa, simply plugged into another unit.” She heaved a short, derisive laugh. “Evrard’s not as smart as people like to pretend. He is also desperate to have Lisa returned to him. Even if he suspects I am a lie, he will keep me at his side. Do you have any idea how hard it is to find a Nanny Mech unit of my year and model fully intact? I’m a relic. If I go to the governor, the plan will work. He will believe I am Lisa, horrified by the world, frightened and contrite and willing to obey if only I never have to go outside again.” She smiled. “Any more questions?”

  “Are you really gonna continue helpin’ Pirayo?” Rigg asked incredulously. “If you really wanna take Lisa’s place, Evrard’ll destroy you when he finds out.”