by L B Garrison
Rin interlaced her fingers and stretched. Black lightning crackled through her hair and played across her body. “I isolated you from my core systems. The separation is tenuous, but serviceable.”
Time resumed.
Glass shattered against the tables. Rain hit the floor. The goo rose in a column to loom over Rin.
Rin smiled. “Playtime is over.”
The goo split into tentacles and brought them down.
Scorching purple-black fire flared from Rin and exploded outward.
Mandy closed her eyes against the blazing darkness. Heat boiled across her skin and took her breath. She gasped and opened her eyes when it passed.
Everything within forty feet was gone.
Books burned. Ash whirled through the hot air and glowing orange globs of molten glass dripped from the ceiling’s framework. The blackened wood crackled and rain hissed in the fires. The liquid twister was gone, but beyond the flames and through the rippling air, the shadows were alive with more weavers.
Figures moved in the swirling dust.
“Mandy,” Cisco called.
Her heart leapt. “Here. Cisco, I’m here.”
The static crackling of crawling weavers made her shiver despite the heat.
“He can’t hear you,” Rin said. “You’re just a ghost.”
The weak dawn light faded. In the sky above the dome, black clots seeped from the air, running together to form a shape larger than the building and as black as the deepest shadows. It was like an elongated stingray, minus the tail and with the narrow end pointing forward.
Mandy could feel the hovering shade drinking power from the universe. “You’re going to do something awful, aren’t you?”
“Something necessary. My munitions inventory was depleted in the battle for the Orion’s Nebula. I’ll have to destroy Artemis with a dark energy burst.”
“Rin, you have to give them time to get out.”
“Umbilicals are cut and the big Kinderen machines are moving. Scattering. Every second of delay reduces our chances of catching all of them in the city. Obliterating Artemis will slow the Kinderen advance. Allowing thousands to flee off-world. My actions will save more lives than they cost.”
Mandy surged to her feet. “Sacrificing one to save two is a bargain? There has to be another way. People aren’t commodities. They’re not machines!”
Rin thumped Mandy in the chest, forcing her to stagger back.
Rin turned and walked away. “Moto was willing to forfeit your life to mitigate the threat of AIs to humanity. Humans taught me the math and you’re a machine too. Accept reality.”
The chill drizzle fell through Mandy, leaving cold trails in her ghostly body. Mandy touched her chest. It still stung. Her old world was gone. Everyone she cared about in the new one would die in seconds. All she could do is watch.
“Like hell!” Mandy shouted as she charged.
She focused her will. If Rin could touch her, then Mandy could do the same. She slammed into Rin. They tumbled back. Gloom fell on them and the world turned gray.
They landed on a crumbling street with a jarring thud. Mandy sat on Rin’s stomach. Crackling orange fires lent the only color to the ruined cityscape. A shattered church frowned upon them.
Rin stared up at Mandy. “What did you do?”
“I don’t know!” Mandy swung at Rin’s nose.
Rin grabbed Mandy’s wrist with both hands. She only managed to deflect the blow to the pavement beside her head. The street cracked beneath Mandy’s fist. The ground rumbled under her knees. At least the strength had returned when she needed it. Rin also seemed weaker.
Rin held on to Mandy and glanced behind them.
Mandy yanked her hand free and risked a look. Thirty yards away, a gash hung in the hazy smoke, like a hole in a movie screen. Beyond it lay the book-strewn carpet of the Biblioteca. Somehow, they had fallen into the splintered city from the real world.
Rin bucked and threw Mandy onto her side, then rolled seamlessly to her feet and turned to the opening. Mandy grabbed her ankle, spilling her into the street again. They both scrambled to their feet. Mandy swung.
Rin caught her arm with both hands and twisted her wrist around. “You telegraphed your punch when you shifted your hips.”
Pain made Mandy grimace. “I have two hands!”
She punched Rin in the belly. Rin flew back, taking out a lamp post before sliding to a halt. Something flickered across her face—a smile. “In time you might be a reasonably competent opponent.”
Mandy held her tingling wrist and gasped for breath. The cold wind swirled ashes around her and carried the quiet sobs of a distant child. The rift was shrinking.
“I’m trying really hard. It’s touching that you’ve noticed.” Mandy edged toward the gap, still watching Rin.
“Do you think I’m going to stand and talk while you escape?”
The opening curled at the edges.
Mandy shook her hand and flexed her fingers. “I don’t know. It’s my first villain fight, isn’t it? Besides, you can’t stop me. I’m stronger than you now.”
“It’s not you, it’s this memory and I’m not a—hey!”
Mandy lunged for the opening.
The world twisted. Blue sky washed away the gray.
Shadows fluttered, and Rin appeared between Mandy and the rift. An impact threw Mandy. Rin’s face and fluffy clouds tumbled through the early morning light. With a jarring thud, the ground struck Mandy’s back.
A turquoise aurora shimmered above the feathery clouds, where flocks of coral-colored jellyfish floated. Children giggled.
Mandy slipped her hand over her aching stomach and took a painful gulp of damp air. She rolled over.
Rin walked to the rift, which was half its original size. “Welcome to Elysian Fields. A happy memory, where you can stay until I’ve destroyed Artemis.”
A military fair surrounded them. People dressed in suits and various military uniforms milled about missile launchers and small arms. Children in glittering metallic uniforms like Rin’s got most of the attention.
Mandy clutched the emerald grass. The city was a memory. One where Rin was weak. The birthday party was a memory too. Mandy had pulled them into it by accident. Maybe she could change memories on purpose. She concentrated and tried to bring the city back. Nothing happened.
Rin was half way to the rift.
Mandy struggled to stand. She needed a memory. Her own memory.
She focused on the emotion of a world where everything was new and possible. The wind carried the sweet cinnamon aroma of snickerdoodles.
Rin turned and sniffed. “Oh, no you don’t.”
Grass became beige carpet. Heaps of crumbled red and green wrapping paper grew from the floor to tower above Mandy’s head. Bright gold ribbons and silver bows crawled from folds in the paper mountains.
Rin pushed back. A flickering patch of windblown grass circled her. “It’s my mind, Mandy.”
Mandy clenched her fist. Sweat beaded on her forehead. “I want it more.”
Red ribbons swallowed the grass circle and Rin with it. The smoke of a fireplace and the twang of Jingle Bell Rock floated through the warm air. Yellowing floral paper covered the walls. Rin’s memories were as precise as reality. Everything here was distorted and oversized, but then she had only been five years old the last time she was at Grandma’s for Christmas. It still felt the same. Like home.
Piles of glittering wrapping paper loomed above Mandy. The high ceiling reflected blinking pink and blue lights. Abandoned tricycles and plush toys littered the floor. Several of the wrapping-paper mountains sported parts of a rickety green and brown card table. Mandy had spent Christmas dinner with cousins at that table while the adults ate at the dining table. She might have a complex about that.
Mandy stepped around the ribbon and avoided the crunchy mounds of Christmas paper, moving as quickly and quietly as she could. She didn’t know the rules, but to escape, she probably needed to beat Rin to the rift, which was somewhe
re in this mess. It had been by the church in the first memory and near the children in the second. The center of the memories. White light blinked on the ceiling. Grandma’s tree-topper angel.
It would be under the Christmas tree. All the best stuff was there.
Paper crunched to Mandy’s right. She paused. Nothing moved. The rustling came again, from a different direction. It was too loud to be Rin. Mandy wiped her sweaty palms on her jeans. This was supposed to be a happy memory.
Paper crumpled behind her. Mandy whirled. A champagne-colored mound tackled her. She stumbled back into the noisy paper. A rough tongue slathered her face.
Grandpa’s last Christmas gift. “Fuzz-Bucket?”
She wrapped her arms around his wrinkled hide and cuddled the oversized mutt.
“I’m sorry I left the gate open,” she whispered.
Fuzz-Bucket whined.
“Come on.”
With Fuzz-Bucket in tow, Mandy followed the white light to the center. The fireplace was there too, decorated with gaudy homemade stockings, a cousin’s name stitched onto each one. Mandy’s was green with an elf on top. The shrunken rift lay under the tree. No sign of Rin.
Mandy hunkered behind a paper mound and stroked Fuzz-Bucket’s furry head. “What do you think, boy?”
Fuzz-Bucket panted. His tags jingled. He was always more of a doer than a talker.
Mandy snuck closer. Maybe it wasn’t who got out first, but who was trapped inside that mattered. Rin could be waiting. Or, Mandy might be over thinking this and squandering a head start. Whether Rin hid among the distorted Christmas decorations or not, the rift would soon be too small to get through. It lay thirty feet away across an open stretch of carpet. What should she do?
“I’m going for it Fuzzy-B.” Mandy darted into the open and ran. Fuzz-Bucket came bounding behind her.
A wall of burning darkness washed over her, tossing her like a windswept plastic bag. Glass ornaments popped in the heat.
Fuzz-Bucket yelped.
Mandy bounced against the floor and smashed into the brick beside the fireplace with numbing force. She fell onto her side. Christmas stockings fluttered down and burned. Mandy’s elf blackened and melted. The taste of singed fur hung in the air. Fuzz-Bucket.
“There’s only room for one of us.” Rin’s voice came from beyond the raging fires.
Santa Claus Is Coming to Town jangled above the roar of the flames.
Rin walked through the blaze, humming to the music. A crackling orb of light hovered above her shoulder. Mandy had seen it back in Skylax. A weapon. The globe of churning possibilities would annihilate anything it touched.
Mandy had no place to go with Rin blocking the rift and the rest of the world on fire. She swallowed and cleared her mind. Her fighting skills came when she didn’t think about moving. Nothing happened.
Rin stretched out her hand towards Mandy. The blazing ball rolled down Rin’s arm and hovered just beyond her fingertips. Lightning arced between her fingers and the sphere. “I take no pleasure in destroying you or your friends, but it is necessary. Too many lives depend on it.”
To the left, a shadow moved beyond the blaze. Mandy needed a couple of seconds. “They’re our friends. Does the justification help you sleep?”
The sphere pulled away from Rin’s fingers, trailing electric arcs. “I don’t sleep.”
“I should have played with him more too.”
Rin scowled. “What?”
A mass of scorched fur knocked Rin off balance. The orb punched a hole through the wall beside Mandy’s head. Stinging fragments of wood and plaster raked across her skin. Fuzzy-bucket had Rin by the wrist. He couldn’t hold her for long.
Mandy swept her legs around and knocked Rin off her feet, toppling her to the floor with a thump. She scrambled over Rin and dove into the rift. Plummeting into the icy darkness.
Her shirt pulled tight, yanking her back. Mandy spun in the blackness between reality and memory. The opening to the Biblioteca drifted a few feet away. The gray mist of each breath scattered into the void.
Mandy grabbed the paper-thin rim of the Christmas breach. Her fingers curled around the edge and pushed. Rin held her collar.
With the lighting behind her, Rin’s face was in shadow. Her eyes seemed unfocused and the corners of her lips curved down. Sadness, maybe?
Mandy hesitated. The Kinderen wouldn’t stop until it possessed their shared body. With this world at stake and probably much more, Mandy didn’t matter and neither did three human lives. “I’m going to figure out another way,” she whispered.
Rin pulled Mandy toward the light and reached out with her other hand to secure her hold. “If there was another way—”
“I won’t let you hurt them.”
Mandy kicked against Rin, breaking her hold. She fell into the void.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
R
eality slammed into Mandy. Gray smoke rolled across the book-strewn carpet. It smelled of burnt wood, not scorched fur. Broken shelves and smoldering debris lay in every direction. The Biblioteca.
Her clothes shifted and changed from Rin’s tight-fitting metallic uniform into her familiar green shirt and black jeans.
Cisco took her hand. His eyes darted across her face, like he was trying to decide where to hang a picture. “You just kept staring and wouldn’t answer.”
She had to smile. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to worry you.”
“Mandy.” Alex nodded toward the avalanche of weavers falling through the broken ceiling in the back of the main room. “I need you to do an energy pulse, like you did before.”
“Sorry. I can’t. It’s too complicated to explain.”
Bailey stood with her arms crossed in front over her body, eyes alert and focused on Mandy. Why the defensive posture? Something had changed between them.
Alex grabbed Bailey’s shoulder and pulled her along. “We need to retreat.”
They ran up the aisle to the main entrance of the reading room.
The weavers linked together in a shimmering black tsunami. Their flat tops reflected light as the wave crested and rolled toward them, knocking over shelves as they came. Flying weavers swarmed above the wave.
They pushed through the entry. Alex slammed the door.
Mandy shoved her back against the bumpy inlaid surface, locked her knees and pushed until the wood creaked. Cisco pressed against the door with Mandy, while Bailey held his rifle.
The mass of weavers rattled the door with a thud that split the frame by the dead bolt. The force surged through Mandy, tearing the carpet. Dust drifted down from the ceiling. The wood groaned as the pressure eased.
Mandy caught Alex’s attention with a glance. “Well, I didn’t know they could fly.”
Alex turned and pressed her back to the wall beside the door. “They’re changing. I don’t know how you’re holding them back, but the door will splinter. If they don’t break through, they’ll dissolve it and I doubt we can outrun the flyers.”
Heavy bookshelves stood across from them. The first three rows in this section were set closer together, with no desks or tables between. “I can topple a bookshelf against the door and buy a couple of minutes.”
The door shook again. The split in the frame widened.
“Please, let me help,” Mandy said, looking from Alex to Cisco.
Alex held Mandy’s gaze for a half second, then turned to Bailey and Cisco. “Get to the T30. We’ll follow.”
Bailey handed Cisco’s rifle back to him, avoiding eye contact with Mandy.
Cisco gave Mandy a fleeting glance before taking Bailey by the arm and pulling her toward the entrance.
“We can’t wait long,” Alex said.
“I can do this. I can. But I’m faster than you, so you need a head start.”
“Understood. Don’t take any unnecessary risks and be at the T30 as quickly as you can.” She squeezed Mandy’s shoulder and followed Cisco.
The weavers smashed into the door again. It split at the top.
The pressure on the door eased as the weavers pulled back for another hit. Mandy scurried between the third and fourth row of shelves, opposite the door. She braced herself and pushed on the multi-ton shelf. It groaned and shifted, but stayed upright.
Dammit. She looked at the shelf behind her. Leverage. That’s what she needed. She climbed up and stood on top of the shelf.
She dropped, grabbed the top shelf and kicked out into a horizontal handstand. Her feet slammed into the bookshelf across from her, sending her shelf and the target shelf toppling in opposite directions. She shifted to a crouched position and rode her shelf down as it fell. It slammed into the bookshelf behind. The shelves fell against the doorway, almost sealing it. Books slowly tumbled, then stopped, hanging above the floor in defiance of gravity.
Shadows haunted the edge of her vision. “I was wondering when you would show up. You’re a real peach, you know that?”
Rin’s image sputtered beside her, like it had when they first met. “A group of tainted humans is assaulting the parking lot. Without your help, the others will be overwhelmed.”
Mandy tensed. She jumped to the floor and got in Rin’s face. “Why do you suddenly care what happens to them?”
“We can save these few.”
“I’ve seen what you’ve done. Why do you care at all? About any human?”
Rin turned away. “When normal time resumes, you’ll have moments to act. Just go.”
Mandy dodged around her. “You didn’t answer—”
“Because it’s my fault!”
Mandy let the words hang in the air for several heartbeats. In that one moment, Rin could be her, alone and unsure.
“What are you saying?”
Rin looked down at her hands. “It was my mistake. I brought the Kinderen down on this world. Save the others, if you can.”
She vanished. Books thumped against the floor.
“Well,” Mandy huffed, “Now I feel like a bully.”
In seconds, she covered the distance to the entrance. The muffled thuds of sporadic gunfire rang from outside. Mandy thrust the door open.
The disassembler haze boiled just beyond the tree line. The morning sun shone through the nanomechs, giving the world a purple-gray hue. Children swarmed from the trees. The first of them were nearing the T30. Alex had waited too long.