Impostors

by Scott Westerfeld

  “True, miss. But we’re not like those Palafox wimps.” She pulls back a bolt on the side of her rifle. An airscreen comes alive above its optics, showing internal temperature and ammo count. “We come ready to fight. The rebels know that.”

  “You think they’re scared of us?”

  “Not as much as they will be. But they won’t mess with five of our best gunships.”

  I stare out the window again. The ruins are below us now, spread out across the desert like broken toys.

  “Time to arrival?” I murmur.

  Eleven minutes, the cyrano says.

  Slidell just said eight minutes. We must be angling away from Victoria, closer to the mountains. That fact, and the sound of my father’s voice, jog a memory in my brain.

  I remember being twelve, Naya fitting me for my first body armor, teaching me how to duck and cover, how to suture my own wounds. And I realized that I wasn’t just my sister’s guardian, but also a way to draw fire.

  “Is there any extra armor for me?” I ask.

  Slidell stares at me, confused.

  Then a distant boom sounds, and the hovercar rattles around us. The air smells wrong.

  Alarms begin to ring.

  The alarm sounds like a bird being strangled to death, over and over.

  The cabin lights are flashing, the soldiers clipping themselves into bungee jackets. Slidell thrusts a tangle of straps at me.

  “You know how to use this?”

  Nervous laughter spills out of my mouth. Rafi and I spent a whole summer playing with bungee jackets, taking turns jumping out the eleventh-story window of our bedroom. Pretend fire drills.

  “Like a parachute,” I say. “As long as there’s enough metal for the magnetics to catch you.”

  I press the jacket to my chest and push the red button. The smart-plastic straps come to life, weaving around my arms and legs. A moment later they’re clicking into place.

  I hear the rising hum of a battery charging, then a green light on my shoulder flickers to life. If we need to jump, I’m ready.

  My heart is drumming inside my chest. I’m here again, in the place I found the last time someone tried to kill me.

  That ecstasy. That purpose.

  But one thing’s missing—there’s no Rafi to save this time.

  Only myself. Because my father knows that I can handle this.

  And I see his plan in full. The detour over the ruins—a trap for the rebels, a target to lure them out and show the world that Shreve’s military can handle them.

  Around me, everything is a blur. The soldiers checking weapons, strapping on equipment. The dazzle-camo of their armor dances, trying to adapt to the flashing lights.

  It’s all too dizzy-making. I look out the window—slender white columns are rising into the air around us.

  “What’s that?” I whisper.

  Anti-hovercraft defenses, my cyrano replies.

  All at once, the tips of the columns blossom, spreading out like sudden spiderwebs against the sky.

  One shoots straight at us—

  It smacks the side of the hovercar with a sharp, wet sound. The view out the window jerks left.

  We’re caught.

  The car skews sideways. Soldiers slip across the metal floor, grabbing hand straps. Slidell stands over me, a protective wall of armor.

  I cling to the window frame. The strand that hit us is some kind of smart plastic—it’s crawling around the outside of the car, seeking a way in. One tendril winds its way out to a lifting fan. There, it splits into a hundred filaments, wrapping the rotors in white.

  With no lifters, we’re trapped over the ruins. We start to spiral down, pulled earthward by the white strand.

  The cabin lights turn solid red.

  For the first time, the faces around me look scared.

  I should be scared too. But this is like my dreams about the assassin. Time slows down, and I become a spot of rapture in the chaos.

  My father has put me here on purpose. It’s my job to get myself out.

  “Abandon ship!” Slidell calls out. “Me and Gemstone first!”

  The soldiers make way for us, pressing against the cabin walls.

  The hovercar is spinning now, earth and sky cycling past the windows every few seconds. A door irises open at the tail end, spilling a hot rushing wind inside.

  I can barely keep my feet, but Slidell drags me to the door.

  Outside is a writhing white mass of webbing. The soldiers’ rifles erupt, the thunder bone-rattling in the cramped cabin. They slice the smart plastic into fluttering ribbons.

  The landscape rushes past outside, closer with every second.

  “Hold on to me!” Slidell cries, and pulls me out into the void.

  We tumble in the vertigo of free fall, my stomach lurching. We’re gyrating through the air, thrown slantways by the hovercar’s spin.

  Slidell’s armored gauntlet spits and hisses—compressed air shooting out in little jolts to steady our fall. She gets our spin under control.

  For a moment I can see everything clearly. The soldiers spilling out behind us like a string of pearls, turning blue as their dazzle-camo matches the sky. Two more hovercars in the distance, caught in the aerial webs, spinning madly. Flashes of light on the horizon, a low continuous rumble, like the frantic end of a fireworks show. Tracers streaking past us—rebel fire from the ground.

  The ruins splay out below us, rushing closer.

  Then something roars past overhead—another car in our formation, trying to get away from the white spiderwebs.

  The wash of its rotors pushes me and Slidell down, hard. Suddenly the jagged, ruined city is coming up too fast.

  My jacket light turns yellow.

  Alert, my cyrano says. The jacket reports that you are too heavy.

  It’s Slidell holding on to me—her body armor, her weapons, all that equipment. Her jacket is rated for that much weight. Mine isn’t.

  “Let go!” I scream.

  “It’s okay, miss. I’ve got you!”

  “No! It’s just that …” There’s no time to explain that monopole magnetics don’t work well in tandem. All I know is that the ground is rushing up at us, much too fast. “Let go!”

  When she doesn’t, I pull myself into a ball and slam my heels into her chest. One foot slips off the armor and catches her chin, jerking her head back.

  She lets go.

  I’m spinning again, unable to control my fall. The sky, the ground, it’s all a dizzy-making blur around me.

  But the light on my bungee jacket turns green again.

  The snap of the harness comes seconds later. It digs into my thighs and under my arms, halting me as fast as it can.

  Below is the skeleton of an ancient building the color of rust, scoured by centuries of sandstorms. Coming at me.

  I cover my face.

  The bungee jacket jerks sideways, angling me away from the metal beams. I hit a sand dune, skid down a slope for a few skin-scraping seconds. Then I’m pulled up again, hoverbouncing into the air.

  I’m bruised, the bungee jacket’s straps deep in my flesh. But I’m alive.

  A hissing wall of armor flies at me. Wraps around me.

  It’s Slidell, her gauntlets spitting air to guide her bounce. She angles us down again, going to ground behind the skeleton of the fallen building.

  I land on my feet this time, settling into the sand.

  “Sorry about kicking you,” I say.

  She rubs her jaw. “Everyone panics their first jump, miss.”

  I’m about to say that this isn’t my first jump when a shadow passes overhead, and we duck.

  But it’s just another soldier—

  No—the body of one, limbs hanging limp, hoverbouncing to a halt in shattered armor. We may have survived the fall, but the rebels are still shooting at us.

  I stare at the dead body. Something’s gone wrong.

  That could have been me.

  “I have Gemstone!” Slidell shouts into her th
roat mike. “Muster on my mark!”

  We’re under the cover of the fallen Rusty building, a skyscraper half-stripped of its metal, wilting under its own unsupported weight. Projectiles fly overhead—our remaining hovercars hitting the rebels from a safe distance. The sky is laced with white spiderwebs, dotted with more of my father’s soldiers bailing out, firing as they fall.

  I’m in the clothes I was supposed to wear to meet the Palafoxes. Rafi spent an hour choosing this coral silk shirt from the depths of her closet, matching it with sandals. She explained that the ensemble was respectful, but friendly. Perfect for breakfast or a light lunch, never dinner.

  It’s not body armor, and I feel naked.

  More bodies of soldiers float in the air. The rebels must be stronger than we expected. I have to get under cover until help arrives.

  The dune slopes away beneath the shadows of the ruin. I slide lower, sand flowing around my feet.

  The air is cooler down here. It’s dark, echoing with size. The sand mutes the rattle of the firefight outside.

  I’ve never been to a ruin before, but this place is somehow familiar. Everything blocky and square, every line straight. My father builds in this Rusty style, with powerful grids of steel.

  “Miss Rafia!” Slidell calls from above. “Please stay close.”

  My father will have planned this part out too—the heroic rescue, every insult to him transformed into a victory.

  My father makes his own reality. Sometimes with force.

  “It’s okay,” I tell the sergeant. “Reinforcements are coming.”

  “Of course, miss. But Shreve’s over an hour away!”

  “Sooner than that,” I murmur in the dark. There’s no way he would leave me in danger for that long.

  The bungee jacket has a signal light, and I switch it on. Shadows dance in all directions. The space is even bigger than I thought.

  The bottom wall of the ancient fallen building forms the ceiling of this subterranean chamber. Sand filters down whenever a boom sounds outside. It’s not stable.

  Maybe not the smartest place to be in a battle.

  But people have sheltered here before. Empty food packs litter the ground, and dark patches show where campfires burned.

  There’s something written on a beam overhead. Not in cluttered Rusty letters, but with the clean strokes of a spray gun.

  She’s not coming to save us.

  There’s more, but it’s all random symbols.

  “Rafia!” Slidell comes scrambling down behind me. Her camo matches the shadows, shifting from sand and rust to black. “My squad’s assembled. We’re going to move you to safety.”

  I’m already safe. Help is coming.

  There’s no way my father would sacrifice me for a single victory against the rebels.

  “Do you know what those symbols mean?” I move my light across the ceiling.

  Unknown, my cyrano says.

  Slidell glances up, thinking I mean her.

  “Rebel code, looks like. This must have been a base, before the Palafoxes drove them into the mountains.” She looks around. “Bad choice—all that sand could come down any second. Let’s get you out of here.”

  I hesitate, still looking up at the symbols, not obeying at first. I’ve been acting like Rafi all day, and I’m starting to feel like her. Like nobody gives me orders.

  Instead, I give consent.

  “Okay. Let’s go.”

  Slidell leads me back up the dune, into the sunlight. Five more soldiers are up here, crouched in a ring around us.

  “That’s the rendezvous point.” Slidell points at the tallest building in the ruin—the skyscraper. “It’s the best place to hold out.”

  “Isn’t moving through this firefight dangerous?”

  “Only for a few minutes, miss. But then we’re safe. We’ll wait there for reinforcements.”

  “A few minutes?” I shake my head. “They’ll be here before then.”

  “Miss Rafia,” Slidell says, her voice sharp for the first time. “Shreve is an hour away by hovercar!”

  I lock eyes with her, mustering every gram of my sister in my blood.

  It’s not just for myself—I’m responsible for these soldiers, my protectors. And we’re safer hunkering here a few more minutes than scrambling through the ruins, drawing fire.

  I’m certain that my father expected this attack to happen.

  Wanted it to happen.

  “We stay,” I command.

  Slidell glares at me. She’s ten years older, five centimeters taller, looming in the bulk of her body armor. My head spins with all the ways she can win this—inject me with some sedative in her medpack, bind my wrists with those zip ties on her belt. Or just haul me kicking and screaming across the ruined city.

  Of course, she’s expecting defenseless Rafi.

  Slidell moves forward, reaching for my arm—

  My battle reflexes ignite.

  I grab her wrist and pull, sending her staggering past me. Then I launch a kick to the side of her knee. Her body armor saves her ligaments from tearing, but she goes down in pain.

  “What the—”

  I turn away from Slidell, facing her confused soldiers.

  “We stay here.” I’m a fearsome mix of Rafi and Frey, imperious and lethal. “Those are my father’s orders.”

  They look back and forth between me and their sergeant, terrified of making the wrong choice. I keep my back to Slidell, daring her to attack me again.

  For a nervous-making moment, this could go either way.

  But then the soldiers’ eyes all rise up to the sky.

  “Ten o’clock!” one calls, and they all hit the ground.

  I turn to see a shower of meteors coming down, a score of objects burning across the sky.

  “What are they?” I ask Slidell.

  “Suborbital insertion drones,” she answers. “But the rebels don’t have low orbit. And neither do we!”

  “Yes, we do,” I say. “Just sit tight.”

  She glares at me, angry and confused, wondering if she should take me down. But I keep my gaze steady at the sky, showing no uncertainty.

  Over the last month, Naya has told me about my father quietly waking up the old war machines. Waiting for an excuse to use them.

  No—engineering an excuse.

  The ecstasy comes back, the bubble of my father’s will settling over me again. I was right. He has it all under control. Despite the rebels’ unexpected firepower, I’m safe again.

  A sequence of booms rattles the ancient ruins—the suborbital craft punching through the sound barrier. They’re falling from the edge of space, coming in so fast that an envelope of air burns around them. They slice through the rebels’ anti-hovercraft webs like knives through smoke.

  Reentry chutes pop and unfurl, bringing the meteors to a sudden halt. Then their glowing heat shields split apart and heavy battle drones tumble out, bristling with weapons.

  They start firing as they fall.

  Slidell pulls her eyes from the spectacle and stares at me again.

  I am nothing that she thought I was.

  “You knew about this?”

  “Not exactly,” I admit. “But I know more every day.”

  The next morning, I have breakfast with the Palafoxes.

  Three generations of them—mother, grandmother, and son—join me at a small iron table on a sunlit balcony. The serving drones are painted with flowers and dancing skeletons. The coffee is strong and sweet.

  I’m in one of Rafi’s favorite outfits: a sky-blue dress fringed with dragonfly wings. Harvested from real insects, of course, not printed by a hole in the wall. My luggage escaped the battle untouched, but the silk shirt was a write-off.

  Eleven soldiers died as well.

  I can’t think about that now—it’s too brain-spinning. The rebels took more casualties than we did, of course. The newsfeeds are abuzz with the attack, and with the revelation that my father’s suborbital forces can strike anywhere in the wo
rld.

  But eleven soldiers.

  “Such an outrage,” Zefina Palafox keeps saying. “It’s a miracle you weren’t hurt.”

  “I was never scared.” My voice trembles a little, which doesn’t sound like Rafi. I need to keep control.

  “Of course not.” Zefina pats my hand. “We all remember that unpleasantness last year. You were very brave then too.”

  I give her a fearless smile.

  Zefina is the grande dame of the clan. Eighty-six years old, with the classic crumbly surge of the pretty era—white hair, rosy cheeks, sparkling eyes. She greeted me yesterday afternoon when I arrived, still dirty and in shock, and put me to bed.

  “Maybe we should talk about something else,” Aribella Palafox gently commands. She’s Zefina’s daughter, the leader of the city of Victoria. My father’s equal. “We mustn’t let this spoil your visit, Rafia.”

  “Of course not.” I cut myself a large bite of mango, as if the rebels can’t stop me from enjoying breakfast.

  The cyrano whispers: Fork in the left hand, knife in the right. Bring the food to your mouth, not the other way around.

  Aribella notices when I reach up and pull out the cyrano. I don’t care if she sees—lots of people wear cyranos—and I don’t care if I eat like a barbarian. I can’t stand my father’s voice in my ear right now.

  Eleven soldiers.

  I smile back at Aribella. She’s beautiful. Not in the old-fashioned way—her pretty surgery has been fully reversed. Her glamour resides in her expression, in her certainty that she was born to rule.

  Looking at her, I can understand why so many cities wanted leaders after the mind-rain. Not another parliament, council, or committee. But a singular figure to guide them through the chaos of humanity waking up. Like Rusty celebrities or royal houses.

  I can almost forget that I’m her prisoner.

  “Do you hunt, Rafia?”

  We all turn to a boy my age, Col Palafox. This is the first thing he’s said since we were introduced. He’s worn a wary expression the whole time, glancing at his coffee like it might be poisoned.

  “I’m sure Rafia has better things to do,” Aribella says.

  I don’t argue. Aribella’s not about to let her hostage out with a weapon, an all-terrain hoverboard, and her son.