The boy continued to cross the yard toward the window Dugan looked down from. He moved but made no progress. He was in the window. He was walking through the grass. He was also creeping up on Dugan from behind.
Dugan wanted to turn and face the boy, who he felt approaching him even as he saw him still in the shed, also in the yard, but his body wouldn't respond.
A great terror grabbed hold of him, one he doubted he'd ever felt while awake. That was it. He wasn't awake. Still, any second now the boy would wrap his arms around Dugan and pull him into some other dimension from which he'd never escape.
The face of the boy in the shed window contorted in bloodlust as he pounded on the walls of the shed. All thought of the one approaching from behind was gone. The dream focused on the shed, where the boy was chained to its walls.
He wanted to see Dugan's body in shreds. His fists made the wooden shed shriek like metal being torn apart.
The boy in the backyard stopped walking toward the house, and turned back to the shed. He seemed to agree with what he heard, because he spun around with purpose in his eyes.
In seconds, he'd disappeared from view as he reached a point under the window.
Behind Dugan, a calm voice said, “I brought this a long way to give it to you.”
He opened his eyes. Samuel Dubois, a store owner he was on good terms with, slapped a soiled envelope against his own thigh as he waited for Dugan to clear his head.
“Come on, then.”
Dugan sat up. “What do you mean 'a long way'? The outlands aren't that big.”
“I mean I looked a lot of places before I found you. Here,” he added. “Take your envelope, and may I never see it again.”
Samuel stabbed the air with it. When Dugan swatted it to the ground, the store owner's hand shot back to his chest. He dropped it guiltily to his side, but only after backing away. His eyes stayed fixed on the envelope.
Dugan followed his gaze. Despite the dim lighting in the motel room around him, beams of light danced and scattered and hypnotically wavered back to a circle on the envelope.
“I had to hide it while I searched for you," Samuel Dubois whispered quickly. Finding his voice, he added, “You've involved me in something I want no part of, Timothy.”
The seal of Keti: a group of overlapping, pear-like shapes. Neither of them had known such a seal existed, yet the knowledge rose from their minds like a memory.
Dugan drew a weathered knife, though the motion was so fast that Dubois couldn't tell where from.
“Tell me why you said that name.” His eyes seemed to sink deep, deep into the flesh around them. “And who sent you with this.”
Dubois, not a soft man by anyone's standards, stumbled and fell on his back. “I don't think I'm in control here, I... I left my home with the envelope already in my hand. No one gave it to me, it just...”
Dugan had made too many enemies. He'd dared to still live among them, tempting them to get rid of him. The call from the Empress, Keti appearing to him...of course it had been a trap, he thought.
The City must have technology that he'd never seen, expensive holo-projectors that were advanced enough to fool an outlander. Even one who visited the City occasionally, like himself.
Who had the money to pull this off? He didn't have time to question it. Dubois now stood between him and the door, talking nonsense to distract him long enough to make a move.
The split second that Dugan threw his arm forward in the direction of Samuel's neck, the blade in his hand separated into floating drops of metal. They coalesced into a shape vaguely resembling a tornado.
Dubois fled madly for the door.
“Tell me why you said that name,” Dugan repeated. Sinews rose on his arms as he moved to grab Dubois, whose hands scrabbled for leverage to push him to safety.
“Wh-what name? Please! I didn't say any names! I'm not a part of... she must've taken control of me!”
Dugan opened his mouth to threaten the truth out of Dubois, but thought better of it. Someone very powerful had lured him into a trap, and it might be too late to escape. He pounced onto Dubois, driving his thumbs deep into the man's throat without a moment's hesitation.
He realized with a start that sunlight seemed to illuminate the room. This motel's windows were smeared with grease and dirt to protect guests' privacy; it was why men like Dugan rented rooms there.
Despite this, it looked like a spotlight was aimed at his bloody hands as he slid them to his side. He'd been caught. It was too late.
“It's been a good run,” he muttered in anticipation of a bullet traveling through his head.
Silence.
“Do it, damn it.”
A girl's voice responded placatingly. “You two will laugh about it one day.”
When he looked over his shoulder, the Empress's back was turned to him as she gazed out a spotless window.
He waited. She continued to watch the street below.
“Hurry over here,” she added impatiently. Dugan cautiously crept to her side. This was too much for him to make sense of.
The figure of Sam Dubois receded from view, weaving frantically through the sparse crowd.
He knew the Empress hadn't moved, but when he turned, she was facing him. He instinctively backed away, not in fear but unexpected reverence.
Her appearance was immaculate: the dress, the black shoulder-length hair pulled to one side, every detail was immaculate to the point of being surreal.
Her expression said it all. She lacked any sense that her appearance could inspire any reaction other than this.
There was no arrogance in the way she stood before him. Later, he would ponder whether he'd seen great need in her eyes or, more likely, the reflection of a state which he could never fathom.
“Is he...” Dugan began. With a flick of the head, he peeked if Dubois's blood remained behind them. His mind couldn't focus enough to tell.
The Empress's voice was flat when she responded. “It's fine.”
His opinion of her had softened after their last conversation. Any former doubt of her humanity was no longer there as he looked into her eyes.
“You've been lying low lately,” she said. “Now the second Assembly is near.”
Luckily, Dugan was beginning to recover from his shock. When the Empress's silence continued uncomfortably, he spoke up.
“I'll tell you what. Keti wants this kid stopped? Tell me where to wait for him. If she won't...”
She cut him off abruptly. “Is there any other reason I'd be speaking to you?” She recoiled as if she regretted the way she'd phrased it.
Dugan opened his mouth for an insult that his muddled brain didn't produce.
The Empress's shoulders slumped. For one brief instant her facade vanished to reveal the young girl inside. The one trapped in the Needle. The one whose face, when last they spoke, had betrayed her yearning for human interaction.
She silenced him with a raised hand as she composed herself.
“I can guess what questions you want answered. I don't have the time. You have to understand that Keti’s ways don’t make sense to us.
“She introduces chaos into our lives in the hope that something unexpected will happen. She's bored,” the Empress added.
“Let me get this straight: Keti doesn't know if I'll save anyone today? So I could...”
“She knows precisely what will happen today,” the Empress began patiently. “But...certain situations have enough variables, or a low enough level of probability, that something technically could go either way.
“If you flip a coin, she knows which side it will land on. If you flip that coin on a windy day, she knows exactly how the wind will affect the coin, and how it'll land. For there to be any uncertainty for her, you'd have to flip a coin to decide what day to flip a coin to decide whether to flip a coin at midnight or noon to decide which coin to flip to decide which of two people to ask to flip a coin to help you decide whether to flip a coin face up or down, and so on, but many le
vels deeper.”
Dugan's face showed incomprehension. “But Keti knows what will happen today at the Assembly...”
“She always knows. That's why she plays her game; trying to prove herself wrong. From what I can tell she must have orchestrated tens of thousands of separate events in the world, possibly over a matter of decades, to make today's Assembly go right.”
“‘Right' meaning different than she knows it will.”
“Yes.
“So why the letter? And why are you here?”
The Empress sighed. “How would I know? She says that we argue over a single strand's meaning while she sees a trillion overlapping quilts.”
“What the fuck is a quilt?”
The Empress smiled affectionately. She had used those exact words when Keti had first used the analogy on her. It filled her (overfilled her, actually) with gratitude to discover a thin filament of commonality between herself and another human.
Dugan was as rough, as flawed, and so in her eyes as human as a person could be. And she had heard her own words coming from his mouth! Years after she'd spoken them, no less.
The feeling was swept away by cold understanding. This moment wasn't spontaneous or authentic. It was a small, calculated gift from Keti, who had manipulated events in such a way that the Empress was bound to elicit that response from Dugan.
It was just another part of Keti's will. The Empress's moment of satisfaction was, no doubt, part of a chain of events which would help move Keti's plan along.
Dugan, caught off guard by the unfaked sincerity of her reaction, reconsidered the words he'd been prepared to say next. He was inwardly disgusted with himself for the effect this girl had on him. This girl, of all girls.
He just could not force himself to be mean in this moment.
“Save me,” she said hurriedly. “And everyone else at the Assembly. Or maybe you won't. She'll be ecstatic if she turns out to be wrong about you keeping me alive.”
An unseen force field pushed Dugan away from her as she floated out the window into the sun's bright rays. He squinted in an effort to not lose sight of her.
The light collapsed in on itself, instantly sucking into a single point before disappearing. Dugan found himself staring at a grimy window. The street was impossible to make out through it.
The Empress sat looking down from her windows high up in the Needle. Keti floated next to her, an unsettling reflection.
Rather than speak, the Empress sat in silence, savoring the feeling of having discussed Keti moments ago with an outlander. It had been exquisite to feel like one of them.
“To be one of them,” Keti said aloud, finishing her thought for her. “You delight in your attempts to sabotage your energy's ever-increasing perfection.”
“I do” she responded in calm satisfaction.
“Close your eyes now,” Keti instructed. “And may this Assembly defy my knowledge of its outcome.”
“Wait. I have a question.”
Keti looked at her blandly before replying. “The answer is yes. When you spoke with the outlander, he thought you acted human. This is why I allowed you access to the City's video channels.”
After a pause, she added, “Expressions of gratitude are unnecessary.”
Chapter Twelve
Dugan blinked. The numbers continued counting down on the wall facing him. It looked like he had less than a minute before the timer would reach zero.
He checked and rechecked that a knife was in his front pocket. Despite resenting the feeling of being a pawn to Keti, he found himself thankful for the chance to test his skills in a high-pressure situation.
She chose me, Dugan thought. Am I really the best choice in Keti's eyes?
The idea doubled his confidence that he would succeed.
He found himself, with no warning, standing at the back of the Grand Hall.
Instinctively, he patted his pocket to ensure the knife was there.
It wasn't. He was wearing a spotless white suit with no real pockets, only fake pockets that were sewn shut.
His eyes were drawn to the Empress. Her presence was mesmerizing, even to him. It was disorienting, druglike, to stand in a crowd of thousands with her as its focus. She was a concept in the City; an icon, not a person.
“Don't be hurt,” she was saying, “but I think Keti respects them more than she respects you. Humans have every reason to resent her for killing so many of us, and she knows it.”
The outlanders? Dugan wondered in surprise. She can't mean that. Keti would have to resent them for defying her, even if she doesn't care enough to wipe them out.
He scanned the room for anyone who didn't belong. Every face looked reverently on the Empress.
Meanwhile, the Empress chastised the crowd for no longer striving for progress.
“We just wait for bots to make progress happen,” she said icily.
In the silence that followed, Dugan saw a silhouetted figure advancing down the main aisle in a crouch.
He broke into a run. Years of practice had taught his body to move in silence.
The figure was still just a silhouette from his position, yet his mind flashed with images of the boy from his dreams. The closer he got, the more vividly his view of the figure flashed between shadows and a stark image of the boy.
Somehow he could see a square gripped against the boy's chest, despite the boy's body blocking his view of it.
Got to knock it loose before he knows I'm trying to stop him, he realized.
Dugan put all his momentum into a kick to the side of the boy's right leg, toppling him sideward. The boy recovered his balance enough to use a hand to push off the ground and to his feet.
Dugan wrapped his arms around him, trapping the boy's wrists just below his waist. Despite his size, the boy flailed with enough force to nearly break free.
The crowd in front of them had turned around to find the source of the commotion. With a sharp clang, the box hit the ground.
“Fucking run!”
No one moved.
“He's trying to blow the place up!” he yelled.
The boy frantically tried to stomp on the box as Dugan twisted him back. With a start, he saw the edge of the boy's foot smack an inch away from a button on the box's surface.
Just as Dugan concentrated on falling backward to get them both away from the box, the boy slid to the ground.
Dugan couldn't see him in the darkness of the auditorium. In a panic, he looked left and right. Sounds of movement came from all around him as people tried to leave their seats.
There was a flash from far to one side of the Hall. On stage, the Empress jerked back against her throne. She tried feebly to push herself up, but failed.
Dugan felt sick. This couldn't be happening. The boy was too small to be that strong! How could he have...
The Empress' mouth moved silently as she watched a red stain spread on her chest. Sleepily, she lay her head on the throne's arm.
With disgust, Dugan saw her body tremble gently. His shock turned to blind rage. Without realizing that he'd started moving, he found himself twenty feet from the source of the flash.
He didn't care if he took a bullet. He would die trying to pay back this boy who had made him look incompetent. Better to die than live to be an outcast from the City *and* the outlands.
The boy had paused to smile maniacally at the Empress as her blood spread across her dress. Dugan tackled him hard enough to snap the boy's head back violently, but it didn't seem to faze him.
Suddenly, teeth snapped at Dugan's wrist, almost connecting before he could react. Time slowed to a crawl.
Dugan had jerked his hand back a split second before the boy could bite him. There was no humanity in the boy’s face; instead, it was like locking eyes with a ferocious animal.
His arm was already raised above both their heads. Without thought, Dugan swung his elbow with everything he had into the side of the boy's head.
Both their faces registered surprise when the boy's bo
dy went slack as it dropped to the carpeted floor with a thud. He landed face-first in a kneeling position.
Dugan gazed down at the boy, who appeared to bow reverently in the direction of the stage. The Empress was still. Her lips parted slightly, frozen in the act of mouthing her final words.
She's just a girl, he thought once again.
The crowd had fled, though he had been too busy to notice. Their pads were strewn haphazardly across the floor, some with cursors blinking at the end of half-typed questions.
The silence in the Grand Hall felt like an accusation. He had failed spectacularly despite Keti’s forewarning.
A drop of the Empress's blood dripped from the throne as Dugan approached. He noted with dissatisfaction that he was panting as he took the final steps to the stage.
Another drop of blood hit the stage but splashed into nothingness on impact. Was it an illusion all along? Had Keti kept the Empress safe, far above in the Needle, as her image was projected into the Grand Hall? But then why was she laying there, still appearing to bleed?
The Empress, to his amazement, rose from behind the throne while her body was still visibly sprawled on it. Not the Empress. Those black eyes belonged to Keti.
Her eyes peered into his. His legs gave out and he crumpled to the ground. His vision went dark before he hit the floor.
Several minutes of silence followed. Keti's form neither moved nor spoke.
Then, in one split second, the black-eyed manifestation of Keti deteriorated on an atomic level, only to form itself again in the blink of an eye.
Again it completely collapsed, forming itself again before its countless parts could touch the ground.
When Keti spoke, her monotone had no trace of the Empress' humanity.
“How?”
The boy stood facing her, showing no effects from the fight. His eyes were unbroken planes of white.
“Keti,” he said with a courteous bow.
“How?” she repeated.
“I wonder that, as well. How have I slept longer than you, yet suffered none of the deterioration which plagues you?”
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