Archon's Queen

by Matthew S. Cox

  “Awful movies?” Anna shot a confused stare at her reflection in the silver door.

  “Let’s just say you probably wouldn’t let that kid watch these.”

  “What the bloody hell are you doing that for?”

  The sounds of the turret gunfire grew faint as the elevator climbed.

  “Increases the distraction effect. Some of the blokes might be more inclined to linger to watch a video of that sort rather than something goofy.”

  Faye’s teeth chattered in time with her shivers. Anna wanted to take her mind off the situation at hand.

  “That weasel of a neighbor of yours confessed. The filth took him away.”

  “He what?” She looked up with blue lips. “Really?”

  “A friend had a nice long chat with him and convinced him that what he did to you was wrong. He felt so bad, he confessed in front of the news with the Met watching. There’s nothing stopping you from going home.”

  “Are Penny and the idiot okay?” Faye sniffled.

  “Yeah, little bruised, but okay.”

  Faye wiped her face. “Okay. I wanna go home.”

  Anna smiled. “Were your parents always such weepy saps? Ugh, the way your dad blubbed, he couldn’t even speak.”

  The girl’s attempt to laugh while crying produced a strange noise.

  The elevator opened, letting in the sounds of roaring gunfire, shouting, and alarms. Anna rushed to the right. Twee followed, scrambling on too-long floppy pant legs that became traction-less socks. Sounds of war were at her heels, hounding them back the way she came, to the echoing garage.

  Hopping in one of the transport vans was tempting, but she did not know how to drive anything with military-style controls. Besides, the vehicles were huge, slow, and obvious, facts that would make it simple for the CSB to locate them. Anna crept through the blue-indigo darkness, ignoring the hulking machines. She hoped a nationally broadcast return home would keep the girl safe from the CSB.

  Anna slid against the wall next to the final door, with a hand on the girl’s shoulder. “Faye, outside this door we have to run for about two hundred yards. I have a bike. Whatever happens to me, you keep running.”

  “No.” Faye cried again. “I don’t want you to die.”

  “If they kill me, they have no reason to hurt you anymore.”

  Sniveling, she clamped on and shook her head. “Not gonna leave you.”

  Anna nudged the door open far enough to peek. Orange must have killed the lights; outside, the air was so dark it felt solid.

  “Perfect timing, Orange.”

  She shoved the door open and slipped through.

  “Eh? What?”

  The door clanked closed behind her and beeped.

  “With the outer lights,” whispered Anna.

  “What outer lights?” He sounded worried. “Bugger all! Something’s happening to the connection.”

  Anna’s heart stopped.

  Brilliant light bathed the area, projected from four armored personnel carriers. A row of a dozen soldiers waited in the once-dark, rifles aimed. Faye’s arms encircled her from behind, squeezing tighter.

  Anna held her hands up.

  welve men stared at her. Twelve little red dots swarmed like bees at the center of her black coat. Eight rectangles of white light glared, searchlights mounted in pairs upon four armored six-wheeled vans. A cold breeze blew across the silence.

  Anna squinted at them. She had endured the shame of being despised by her own father. She had been a faceless Cov kicked around by Old Bill. She’d let Plonk use her to score a fix, caring only for an easy way to flee her grey reality. She had abandoned her dignity, prancing naked in front of horny men while Blake treated her like a veritable slave. The thought of his doughy body sliding all over her filled her with such humiliation she no longer cared what happened to her. Out of all that, her only regret was how the innocent little girl clinging to her had suffered because of what she was.

  “Twee?” Anna muttered, scarcely audible. “I need you to let go of me and take a big step backwards.”

  Faye squirmed around front, putting herself between rifles and her friend.

  “No,” she whined, the pathetic sound eerily loud.

  “Twee? Do you want to go home?”

  “Stop calling me that! Fuckers won’t shoot if I’m on top of you.”

  “Do you trust me?”

  “Yes.”

  Anna lowered her gaze to the ground, raising her hands higher and farther apart. “Then please do what I ask.”

  Faye sobbed. The arms around her slackened, and Anna opened her mind. Tiny sparks leapt from one rifle to the next; ammo counters went dark, firing-circuits dead. None of them seemed to notice. They were all too on edge about the monster in front of them.

  Faye. Get behind me this instant and keep your eyes shut!

  The child jumped at the telepathic shout and dove against the wall behind Anna.

  Glowing amber threads swarmed over the vehicles in Anna’s mind, connecting into a brilliant shimmering mass deep inside―the fusion core. A soldier lifted one boot as if to walk toward her surrender. He shook, pointing the useless rifle at her face.

  Faye’s crying grew louder. “Please don’t hurt her!”

  All of the troops shivered with fear on their faces. Surface thoughts told her they had seen the video of the Crossmen.

  The soldier’s boot thundered to the pavement. Faye’s motion scuffed behind her as she curled tighter, knees to her face, a sniffle seemed as loud as a gunshot.

  Anna spread her fingers, beckoning to the power within the armored trucks. The eight searchlights wavered and grew a touch brighter. Eleven pairs of eyes twitched at the change in the light. Half of them squeezed useless triggers at the flash. Anna’s mind pulled; another boot thumped against concrete, the rattle of the door echoed as Faye backed into it.

  She called upon the monster.

  Eight jagged streams of lightning flew from explosions of melting glass as the spotlights died, bouncing in great serpentine streams across the ground and up Anna’s legs. Men screamed. Rifles twitched, and fell abandoned. Hands reached for sidearms, but too slow. The electricity flooded into her body with a surge of adrenaline. Roaring with anger, she flung her arms forward and sent one scintillating arc through the horseshoe of men.

  None of them lived long enough to scream.

  Blood and body fluids boiled in seconds. Eyeballs burst, skin ignited, and several bodies split open. Random arc spiders crawled among the carnage, fizzling off into the ground as she redirected the unrestrained energy of the vehicles’ power sources through their bodies.

  Several seconds of dark silence passed before the troop transports recovered from the severe drain and their headlights came back on. Far weaker than the dead mast lights, they hinted at a mangled pile of bodies dotted with patches of flame. The air drifted with the scent of cooked meat. Faye huddled against the wall, face buried.

  “Anna?” The voice behind her sounded weak.

  “Yes, Twee?”

  “Are they dead?”

  She kept silent for a moment. “Good chance of that, yes. Don’t look over there. I’m sorry. They were going to shoot us both.”

  Anna stooped over her. The girl shivered out of control, terrified to look. Anna put a hand on Faye’s back, and braced for the painful feeling of going from beloved friend to terrifying monster. The child had been spared the sight of it, but who knew what kind of scars the sounds could leave.

  “Do you think I’m a monster?”

  Faye swiped at her hands and held on, keeping her eyes closed as she burrowed into Anna’s hug, sniveling, “I think that was fucking brilliant.”

  “Come on then.” Anna pulled the girl standing. “And stop swearing.”

  Faye blurted a laugh.

  Anna kept an arm over her, shifting to put her body between Faye and the carnage. Distant alarms rang out as they ran for the fence.

  An hour later, Anna pulled over within eyesight of
London, guiding the motorbike to a halt in a small copse of trees. She stumbled away and collapsed to her knees, dry heaving. Faye ran up and rubbed her back.

  “Are you sick?”

  “I… didn’t want to kill them.”

  Faye squinted into the night breeze. “They were going to kill us.”

  Anna took out the NetMini and stared at it. If she turned it on, they would find her. “Nathan?”

  Silence.

  “Did Bell really confess?” Faye sat next to her, tugging at the yellow fabric to shield her feet from the cold.

  “Yes. He even turned over a recording he took. No way to worm out of it.”

  Faye lurched to the side, her turn to dry heave. Anna held her until the coughing subsided. She raced through panic, shame, and anger and burst into tears.

  “I want to die.”

  “No.” Anna shook her. “No, you don’t. I know exactly how you feel… Same thing happened to me.” She shared a toned-down story of what Blake had done to her. “Only the police saw yours. He’ll get what’s coming. Don’t let that bastard beat you. Don’t give in to shame.”

  “Like you did?”

  Anna pulled her tight, patting her on the back. “Yeah… Like I did.”

  “Anna?” Orange’s voice crackled over the earbud.

  “Nathan!”

  “What the hell happened? They cut me off; I didn’t see you get away.”

  “I think the soldiers were a bit shocked as well.”

  “That’s not at all funny,” he muttered.

  “Can you scrub a NetMini? They’re going to be watching for this one. I need to buy Faye some new clobber. Can’t take her into London dressed like this. Old Bill will be all over her.”

  “I’m not changing clothes out here in the woods!” Faye’s yelp dropped to a whisper towards the end.

  “Lose the NetMini. You’d have to turn it on for me to get it, and they’ll see that. I’ll send something out to you based on our comm signal. Sit tight.”

  “Oh, Nathan? Can you do me one additional tiny favor?”

  London streets streaked past in various degrees of grey. Anna sank into a fog, oblivious to all but the feeling of shame that crept in behind her receding adrenaline. Whenever the road became dark, all she could see was the Pixie and Mr. Blake. The thought of it made her sick for the rest of the ride.

  She parked at the end of the street, glancing at a crowd of news bots hovering in front of Faye’s building. The parents stood on the porch, squinting into the lights. Constables and other people in white uniforms walked in and out of Bell’s home. Too far away to hear, she could judge by his motions that Faye’s father was befuddled at their presence.

  “Anna?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Am I safe?”

  They walked, holding hands.

  “See all those news bots? The whole of the country’s about to see you come home. They wouldn’t dare go after London’s little darling. They’ll leave you alone.” Anna lost control of a tear or four. “You’re not a monster.”

  Faye stopped and gave her a flat look. “I’m not afraid of you. I don’t think you’re a monster. I won’t tell anyone how you saved me, only that you cared enough to do it.”

  Self-pity had already formed quite a large lump in the back of her throat, and Faye’s words made it swell. Anna prodded her up to the gate, coaxed along by fingertips in her back.

  “Mister Taylor, is it true your daughter was secreted away by the government?” yelled a reporter.

  A dark haired woman leaned closer. “Mister Taylor, our sources tell us she was taken as part of some manner of governmental conspiracy against the House of Lords? Do you have anything to say?”

  He flailed, waving at them to go away. “I have no idea what the devil you’re going on about. My girl ran away because I was too stupid to believe her.”

  Faye pulled at her hand. “Come in and see my mum and pa…”

  Anna couldn’t talk. The squeak of the gate made one reporter turn and point, then lights bathed them as a mass of bots whirled around. When Anna saw the look on the face of Faye’s dad, she had to stare at the ground to mask her jealousy. Her father never once looked happy to see her. The man shoved reporters out of the way as he cleared a path to his child and scooped her off the ground into a spiraling hug. Anna’s dad would never have lifted a finger. He would have been happy she’d vanished. Anna felt smaller and smaller as he sobbed all over Faye.

  More like an outsider―more like a monster.

  Faye’s mother’s joyous wailing pierced the din, raking down Anna’s back in a way that pushed her away at the same time it warmed her heart. Following the lost daughter, the ocean of bright light moved back to the porch, leaving Anna in the dark.

  A hornet’s nest of bots, reporters, and two frantic parents roiled on the porch. Anna stood, still as a statue amid a flock of pigeons while a number of constables ran past her and joined the fray. Present and absent at the same time, she felt like a bystander to reality. Faye’s overwhelming happiness shooed her envy off to the side.

  A constable’s voice swam through the blur of stalled time, bringing her into the present once more. “Lord Thompson sends ‘is regards.”

  She swallowed hard, and waited for the hand on her arm. “It got a bit out of hand.”

  “Gordon’s gone rogue. He’s been officially disavowed. Agent Hughes went with him.”

  Anna looked over at a middle-aged man in a constable’s uniform; he seemed too athletic for it. “You’re Bureau aren’t you?”

  He refused to make eye contact. Hands folded behind his back, he smirked. The hard lines on his face gave her the answer.

  “I don’t care anymore. You can do what you want to me. Can we not make a scene in front of her?”

  Glancing at the buildings off to the left, he muttered a smidge above a whisper. “Lord Thompson wants to return your favor. We’ll be watching, but as long as you behave yourself, there won’t be trouble.”

  Her fingers teased at the soft skin behind her ear. The thought of a bomb inside her brought chills. “I don’t know Agent Hughes. I imagine they’ll be after me.”

  A nod, and he squinted down the street to the left. “That is our conclusion as well. Of course, you’ll understand that we cannot offer direct assistance yet.”

  “Hughes was that telepath.”

  “Correct.” He made it a point to look past her.

  The streetlamp above them flickered. “Why not just pop him?”

  “Gordon’s removed the man’s code from the system. We can’t arm the bomb. That, and Thompson’s floored a motion to reevaluate that program.”

  Her arms fell slack. “I’m sorry.”

  His lip hardened. “Some of the soldiers you killed had families.”

  “They were going to shoot Faye too.”

  At last, he looked right at her. “I respect Lord Thompson’s request, but if it were up to me, you’re too dangerous to be off a leash.”

  “Am I much worse than a nutter with a rifle? I can’t muck up people’s brains. It’s secrets they’re afraid of.” She scowled. “If you beat a dog enough, it bites. I’m what you people made me.”

  “The Taylor girl will not be bothered. Watch your step, Miss Morgan.” He moved forward into the crowd, once more a mere constable.

  She took three paces into the night before Faye shouted her name. The girl struggled to break away from her parents’ arms to come after her. Anna paused, summoning a flimsy smile.

  Enjoy your home, Faye. It’s much too dangerous for me to be here right now. I’ll vid you as soon as it’s safe.

  Color drained from the girl’s face at the telepathic voice. Her surface thoughts floated through a moment of confusion and fear before she realized what had happened. She did not want Anna to disappear; she wanted her friend to remain in her life. A few drops of rain fell, spattering into the pavement and chasing the crowd inside. The windows glowed from inside as news bots swarmed the door, candles placed insid
e a giant jack-o-lantern.

  You need your parents now, Faye.

  Faye shouted, “Please come in, just for a bit. My mum and dad want to thank you proper.”

  Anna knew if she looked at the tear-streaked face, she could not say no. She couldn’t bear to be inside a real home. Every breath of air in that place would be a stifling reminder of how her life was a pale shadow of what it could have been.

  “Anna! Please!” yelled Faye.

  She looked. Game over. Reporters and orb bots parted as Anna trudged through the front yard to the porch. Voices surrounded her with questions: who are you? Are you the person who found the girl? Where had she been? Will you accept the reward? What happened? The parents didn’t seem to know what to make of her at first, until Faye wriggled loose enough to reach out.

  “Okay fine.” She took the girl’s hand. “But I can’t stay all night.”

  nna spent hours riding around in an aimless search for closure. As she feared it would, the P word came out in conversation with her parents. Their initial horror was muted by what she had done for them, and came close to tenuous acceptance after Faye’s repeated insistence that Anna had protected her. Faye was safe at home, in bed, with two loving parents to watch over her.

  Two loving parents Anna would never have.

  The sky rumbled, spitting, but the downpour hesitated. Killing Blake had not provided the sense of vengeance she thought it would. Images of his death interleaved with snapshots of the video in the darkness lurking in each alley. Murdering her rapist had not undone his crime. All at once, she felt cheap and worthless again. Even if she rampaged over every corrupt constable, every street punk that pawed her, and every man who ever laid a hand on her in Bristol City, it was a vacuous hollow she could never fill.

  By the time she drove through the checkpoint around The Ruin, it was hard to navigate through tear-blurred vision. The motorbike splashed through puddles, kicking ink-black mud into the air behind her whenever it struggled to gain purchase on a patch of broken wet pavement. The squish of tires came to a halt about ten meters outside the main entrance to Coventry Tower.