The three remaining Specials are closing in behind. I whirl to face them, flourishing my knife.
One dodges in and swipes at me, the powered fist connecting with my shoulder. It’s like being clipped by a passing truck, and it sends me sprawling in the grass.
I spring to my feet, letting the knife lift me up and away. The charge light still shines green, but carrying my weight must be crushing its battery.
I land just past my pursuers and run for the clearing.
“Boss X?” I cry out, breathless. “Col?”
No answer. Just my heart throbbing in my injured shoulder.
We never even saw any attackers. What if those sniper drones were controlled from another hilltop? Or from twenty klicks away …
But this was the only clue I had.
I finally reach the clearing and search the tree line for any sign.
Nothing but lightning in the sky, the orbital drones firing down. The antiaircraft has gone silent.
The three Specials crash into the clearing, surrounding me. My knife can carry me two more times, maybe three.
But my pursuers will just keep coming.
The knife buzzes in my hand, and I crouch low among the splintered trees. Like a mammal fighting dinosaurs, beasts larger and clumsier than me.
The Specials close in slowly, wary of my knife now. They spread out, keeping my attention darting back and forth. One solid punch and I’ll be unconscious.
“Put the weapon down,” the fireteam commander says.
“This isn’t my father! They’re trying to rescue me!”
“Our mission is to take you to Diego, Frey.”
“These are your allies too!” I shout. “That’s why they’re not shooting back!”
He doesn’t answer that. Just walks slowly toward me.
“Frey, let us protect you.”
“Stay away or I’ll—”
Just in time, I hear another Special’s servos whining. I spin around as a giant hand swings down. But I roll underneath the blow. My knife flashes out to cut her ankle …
I miss.
The lumbering armor turns to face me, the woman glaring though her helmet visor—angry, righteous. She reaches for me.
I have to cut her hand off.
Then a hissing fills the clearing. Strands of white shoot from the edge of the forest, filling my vision. It covers all of us, wrapping around the Specials, the tree stumps, and me, writhing like a living thing.
Rebel antiaircraft, strong enough to immobilize anything—but I have a pulse knife.
It buzzes in my hand, shredding at the white goo. The strands entrapping me turn hot, some chemical reaction triggered by the knife. The smart matter squirms furiously for a moment, then falls apart, sloughing to the ground like wet sand.
The Specials are covered in white, helpless in their powered armor. But there are still orbital drones in the sky.
I jump free from the writhing white strands, letting the knife carry me one last time. At the edge of the clearing, my charge light starts flashing yellow.
Exhausted, defenseless and alone, I raise the knife and cry at the wild—
“Whoever you are, just show yourselves!”
Seconds later, two hoverboards come gliding from the trees.
Col and Zura, more silhouettes behind them.
House Palafox is here to rescue me.
At first, there isn’t time to talk.
We ride hard away from the battle, letting the orbitals destroy what’s left of the Vic’s automated launchers. The sky lights up behind us, thunder ringing through the mountains, but nothing follows. Diego’s backup was ready for a firefight, not to chase a dozen fast hoverboards through the wild.
They’ve brought one for me, Victorian military-issue, solid and familiar under my feet. I ride next to Col, at arm’s length, close enough to reach for him on empty straightaways.
His little brother, Teo, is here too, and Dr. Leyva—their base back in the Amazon must be nearly empty.
Or maybe this is all that’s left of the Victorian army.
We don’t slow down till we’re across the Sea of Cortez and into the mountains on the other side. Cactus and rocky ground, giant wind-power blades spinning on the ridges. The canyons here are steep and shadowed—we’re hidden at last from the sky.
My hand keeps going to my wrist, but I don’t know what to feel.
There’s something in Col’s eyes, his gaze wrapping and unwrapping my heart. Like I’ve changed so much that he’s not quite sure who I am.
“Don’t like the haircut?” I finally ask.
He smiles. “Just want to look at you. It’s been a while.”
Our boards drift to a halt, letting the rest of the Victorians go ahead.
When I reach out, my hand is trembling. Col takes it and gently pulls us together. Our boards touch, steadying against each other in the breeze.
“You came for me,” I say. The words sound small out here in the wild.
“Sorry it took so long.”
We draw closer. Our lips meet—and the world opens up around us, every sound suddenly clear, the wind sharp on my face and hands. The smell of the desert fills me, sage and stone, like it rained here not long ago.
Like the wild is ours.
Those six Col-missing weeks are over at last.
When we pull apart, he looks back the way we’ve come.
“The hard part was finding you,” he says. “Srin told us Diego wardens had taken you into custody. We got in contact with the city, but they wouldn’t even confirm they were keeping you.”
“I was the glue for an alliance against my father.” A sigh slips from me. “Looks like I’ve messed that up.”
A dozen cities were poised to take on Shreve, and I’ve thrown a bomb into their plans. What seemed so clear in the heat of battle suddenly looks strategy-missing.
I almost reach for a touch of Focus, but not with Col watching.
“We figured it was politics,” he says. “Free cities don’t disappear people for vandalism.”
“Maybe you shouldn’t have come for me. They were going to take my father out!”
He squeezes my hands. “That doesn’t give them the right to use you.”
“But it’s what you wanted—more cities fighting Shreve.”
“That doesn’t make it okay,” he says. “They locked you up! Srin hired lawyers, and they got nowhere—Diego said there was no legal person with your name in custody, like you weren’t even real. We contacted every prisoner to come out of the system, and no one had seen or heard of you. It was like they’d erased you, Frey!”
His hands are shaking, his voice breaking with anger.
I almost tell him to reach for Calm.
“But maybe I should have stayed. We made a deal, Diego and I.”
“A deal?” Col shakes his head. “After a month in isolation? That’s coercion. You don’t owe Diego anything.”
I stare at him, a tangle of wires sparking in my chest.
Coercion. Isolation.
All those long nights of Patience—I never asked myself why Diego kept me all alone in a cell for weeks. I never questioned being cut off from everyone, hidden away.
That’s how I grew up, after all.
But maybe they wanted me to feel lonely, abandoned. On the way here, when I asked Diego why they’d used an avatar …
To make a connection, Frey, to build trust. Humans are hardwired to bond with pretty faces.
“Diego said they wanted to be friends,” I murmur.
“They’re just the enemy of our enemy,” Col says, taking me in his arms again. “We’re your friends.”
I hold him tight, breathing deep against his warmth, his weight. I almost reach for Home, to make it perfect. But not yet.
“They tested me,” I whisper. “To see if I’m like … him.”
“Like your father?” Col’s harsh laughter spills out across the desert.
The sound of it, his certainty of what I am, makes me kiss
him again. We stand there on our boards, the raw wind swirling around us.
And for a moment I feel safe.
Until he says, “If only you’d stayed with me. Or come south after the quake.”
I pull away.
The other Vics have noticed us falling back, and they’ve swung around, forming a wide circle around me and Col. It’s just his soldiers protecting him, but it feels like an audience.
It takes me a moment to speak again.
“I couldn’t leave, Col. A hundred thousand people died. A million lost everything. That wasn’t something I could walk away from. I saw a city fall.”
“You saw my city fall.”
“Victoria is still standing. Paz is all jagged edges and missing people. I thought about going to you every second, but my fight was there. Can you understand that?”
“I see the logic.” He looks away, defeated. “But I don’t see how logic matters when you’re gone.”
As I try to answer, the day of the quake comes rushing back. Essa tending to the wounded, passing out water bottles, while her little brother lay crushed beneath a pile of stones.
It was logical. But it didn’t make sense.
My hand moves toward my feels again, and I stop myself again.
And wonder … those first nights in the aftermath, nights of Melancholy, of Languish and Grief—what if missing Col would’ve been too much to bear without my feels? Maybe I would have left Shatter City and run to him.
But thanks to these faces on my wrist, I stayed.
Maybe it was like walking on my broken ankle—and now the Painless is wearing off.
“I couldn’t be in two places, Col.”
“What matters is, you’re here now,” he says, taking my hand again. “Turns out, what’s left of the Victorian army needs you.”
I look around. So it’s true—there’s only these eleven left, out of thirty.
“Was there a battle?”
Col shakes his head. “Just people giving up. We haven’t had a win in so long, it was hard to keep hope. But rescuing you helps.”
“Rescuing me?” It’s sinking in for the first time. “All those drones, all that firepower—to save me?”
“Boss Charles gave us the antiaircraft,” Col says. “But yeah, we emptied our stores.”
I almost laugh. “Must have been tricky, talking Zura into this.”
“She planned the whole thing,” he says. “Dr. Leyva was on board too.”
“What am I missing? Is this about … me and you?”
Col takes a hesitant breath.
And my heart splits. The Palafoxes need their fairy tale, now more than ever.
Col wants to use me too.
“You still want me to be Rafi,” I say.
“Never, Frey. I’m sorry I ever asked you to consider that.” He looks away. “If I hadn’t been so thoughtless on the train, you might not have stayed in Paz.”
It isn’t true—I had to look for Rafi. But I don’t argue.
“And frankly,” he says, “it doesn’t matter anymore if the world loves you and me. We can’t beat your father with a fairy tale. We have to do it ourselves.”
I take a relieved breath, my emotions spinning. This would be much easier if I could use my feels. Maybe I should stick to practicalities.
“Okay. What’s the plan?”
“An army of rebel crews are getting together on the east coast. They’re going to break into a place called the Iron Mountain. We want to join them.”
“The Iron Mountain?” A little shock goes through me. “Those were the Paz AI’s last words, during the quake. But the rebels didn’t know what it meant, except for some old saying.”
“They do now. Turns out it’s a real mountain, hollowed out back in the Rusty days. Whatever’s inside, the rebels think it can force your father out of Paz. We don’t have the details—they don’t really trust us.” He takes my shoulders. “But they’ll trust you.”
“Ah,” I say softly. So Zura and Leyva still think I’m useful. “Boss X is in charge.”
“No. Another rebel you know.”
“Charles? Andrew Simpson Smith?”
Col hesitates, then slowly shakes his head.
“Not them. Boss Frey.”
“Boss Frey?” I mutter again. “She’s only been a rebel for six weeks!”
The Vics don’t answer. Maybe because it’s the hundredth time I’ve said these words.
I can’t believe it. Rafi hates camping, loves beautiful clothes, and knows nothing about combat. And now she’s in charge of a rebel crew?
It’s the most sense-missing thing I’ve ever heard.
We’re eating dinner, hidden in a steep canyon, the sky nothing but a sliver of stars above us. After a month of emergency rations, the food is glorious. Self-heating currynoods with chunks of fresh meat—a pronghorn brought down by Col’s bow.
But the words Boss Frey keep rolling around in my head, cutting through my Joy.
“Rafia having her own crew isn’t that weird,” Teo says. “I was Boss Teo for three whole days.”
Laughter travels around the circle. Before the war, Teo’s mother gave him the family codebook to keep. For the first few days of fighting, he used it to order Vic units around, everyone thinking he was Aribella Palafox.
“You were very convincing,” I say, and take a drink of bubbly. We’re all sharing a bottle to celebrate my rescue, but what I need is to sneak a longer touch of Joy.
Teo beams at me. I haven’t seen Col’s little brother since the night before the Battle of Shreve. He looks older now, more serious. He’s grown up fast in the jungle.
“Srin sends greetings, by the way,” he says. “She wants to interview you for her feed.”
“Typical. An hour after the towers fell, I found her taking a shower, getting ready to go on camera.” I imitate her voice. “‘Earthquakes are so dusty!’”
Teo shakes his head. “I can’t believe she stayed in Paz so long. Srin acts all adult, but her parents must’ve been brain-rattled.”
I glance at Col. “It’s hard to walk away, when a city takes a hit like that.”
“We know,” he says.
It cuts both ways, of course—he and his brother lost a city too.
“But surely the Pazx are holding up,” Dr. Leyva says. “They’ve got those things to keep them happy.”
Something about his expression, and maybe the bubbly inside me, makes me angry.
“You mean feels?” I pull up my sleeve.
They all stare.
“Frey,” Col says softly. “Are those …”
“Got them my first night in Paz. A misunderstanding.”
“You got surge by mistake?” His dark eyes gleam. “Why didn’t you get them taken out?”
“There was an earthquake. And then …”
With the Vics all looking at me, it’s too complicated to explain. They’re soldiers, trained to deal with stress and exhaustion, pain and loss. They probably think the Pazx are weak for using feels.
“And then I needed them.”
“Of course,” Col says. “I’m so sorry, Frey.”
“Don’t be. They helped.” I turn to Leyva. “And no, people in Paz aren’t happy. A hundred thousand of their friends and relatives are dead. What they are is grieving.”
He stiffens a little, examining his food. “Some people need help, I suppose.”
I grab the bottle of bubbly back from Zura—and change the subject.
“How far away is this Iron Mountain?”
“Other side of the continent,” Col says. “On boards, avoiding cities, it’ll take … three weeks?”
I frown. “On boards? What happened to your hovercars?”
“We traded them for the autolaunchers and drones we used to rescue you,” Teo says.
“You traded away your fleet for me?”
Zura retrieves the bottle from my hands. “Armored cars are hard to maintain.”
“And what’s inside the Iron Mountain can save Paz,”
Leyva says.
“Save Paz?” I look at Col. “So Victoria isn’t the only thing you care about.”
“I fight for you,” he says firmly. “And I guess for Paz too now. We have to beat your father somewhere. My people need a win.”
I wonder if he means his people back in Victoria, or the ones around him now. They can desert him just as easily as the others.
But at least the rebels are keeping Col informed. Maybe they haven’t completely given up on him.
“Did Boss X tell you where to find me?” I ask.
Teo shakes his head. “Your friend Essa did, with a little help from the local resistance. After you got arrested, they put full-time hovercams on all the Diego buildings. A few days ago, one spotted you trying to escape.”
“Huh.” At least my little adventure with Primero wasn’t a complete waste.
“A day later, Diego moved a bunch of armored cars into that building, and Essa figured it was to take you someplace more secure.” Teo smiles. “That’s when she called us.”
My Joy spikes a little inside me. Maybe I have more allies than I realized.
“The route was easy to guess,” Zura says. “Straight up the coast toward Diego.”
“Still. You put this rescue together in three days?”
Col nods. “You’re important to us, Frey.”
“To fairy tales,” Dr. Leyva says, raising the bottle. “And to being there when the rebels take the Iron Mountain.”
One by one, I look at them. Col, who loves me. Leyva, who wants a seat at the rebel table. Zura, who needs a win to keep her soldiers from deserting.
The Vics are a patchwork of motives and obsessions, not an army.
Just like everyone keeps telling me.
All I can say is “Guess I owe you Vics one.”
“Two, technically,” Teo says. “Don’t forget that time we saved you from being forced into marriage with a terrible human being!”
Col punches him.
I smile. “Hey, that marriage was my idea.”
“Under duress,” Teo mutters, rubbing his shoulder.
“Speaking of being forced into things,” Col says to me. “We haven’t even asked yet—do you want to come with us? It’s a way to help Paz, hurt your father, and find Rafia.”
“My sister, the rebel,” I murmur. Since leaving home three months ago, I’ve only seen her for a fleeting hour after the Battle of Shreve. With all that’s happened, I’m not sure I even know her anymore, or understand why she ran away and stole my name. “Of course I’m coming, Col. But you missed one reason.”
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