by Toby Minton
Tall, dark, and cocky tilted his head forward and slid his glasses down a little to peer over them, revealing a pair of deep browns with more mischief in them than belonged anywhere near a uniform of any kind. From the look in those eyes and the way his smile thinned and pulled a little to one side, he knew exactly what she was thinking.
“There they are,” Michael said. “Perfect timing.”
Nikki tore her gaze from the trouble she was considering to look at Michael. She followed his gaze to a cluster of modular shipping containers, essentially two-meter cubes, near a wide docking bay of sorts under the promenade on the far side of the courtyard. The bay was open to the outside, and a boxy cargo carrier was backing its way in under the direction of two uniformed dock workers. Unlike most of the cargo haulers Nikki was used to seeing zip over the free zone―which looked a lot like dragonflies when they were empty due to the long strut on the back from which the cargo containers hung―this one’s backside was enclosed, its cargo concealed by its hull.
As she watched, the slanted back hatch of the hauler swung down to form a ramp as the craft prepared to touch down, and Nikki saw the reason for the added security. The containers inside the hauler were marked with bright white and red symbols flagging them as perishable medical supplies. If one of those dragonfly haulers were to carry those things and had to set down anywhere outside a secured facility for refueling, repairs, or whatever, that pilot would find his hauler’s tail empty if he took his eyes off it for a second. Prescription drugs were worth almost as much as food and water to people living in places like the free zones.
“You’re clear on the plan, right?” Michael said, not taking his eyes off the containers.
“It’s not bloody rocket science,” Nikki replied, looking back at the table to find it empty. Tall, dark, and cocky was strolling away down the promenade. Even his walk screamed bad news. She should have snuck into this place a long time ago. “So there’s a good chance it sunk in one of the fifty times you repeated it last night.”
“Well, I wouldn’t say a good chance, but let’s hope,” he half mumbled.
“Ha, jackass,” Nikki said, turning to face him. “So it’s my turn, right?”
“Not a chance,” Michael said, already shaking his head, but he was fighting a smile, Nikki could tell. “You went first last time.”
“Uh, no,” she replied, stretching the word into a solid two syllables, which she knew he hated. “Last time was the Flamingo, and I clearly remember you going first.”
“That’s because I did go first at the Flamingo,” Michael responded. “You’re right.”
“Of course I am.”
“And if that were the last time,” Michael continued as if she hadn’t spoken, “then that might actually matter. But you seem to be forgetting the rave.”
“That’s not funny. You know I never forget a rave,” she said with conviction. “But the rave wasn’t a job. That was just a fight.”
“You’re kidding, right?”
“I don’t kid about raves or fights. I take them very seriously.”
“You don’t take anything seriously.”
“I take the assbeating I’m about to dole out seriously.”
“So I am going first,” he said with a smile of victory.
“No. You misunderstood.”
Michael held up both hands. “Enough. We don’t have time for this. We’ll―”
“I agree,” Nikki cut him off. “So we settle this the old fashioned way,” she said, holding out her right fist over her left palm.
“You have got to be kidding me,” Michael said, glancing around.
“I never kid about paper, rock—”
“OK, enough!” Michael barked, readying his hands. “One, two, three.”
She threw paper. He threw rock.
“Damn,” he whispered. Without further argument Michael slammed his foot into her chest, sending Nicki crashing backward through the plate glass window of the steakhouse.
Chapter 3
Michael
Through their link, Michael felt each of Nikki’s injuries: the bone bruising and abrasions on her head and shoulder from breaking through the glass, the contusions forming on her knee and left kidney where she crashed into and over the table just inside the window, the small cuts from the glass shards raining down around her and getting crushed under her as she slid to a stop under the next table.
A tremor shook Michael as a tingle of power rippled through him. With each injury to Nikki’s body, the energy stored in Michael’s cells responded by sending a corresponding trickle of power through his system, strengthening his muscles, hardening his skin, increasing his pain threshold, healing the little aches and bruises he hadn’t even known he had. The damage to Nikki was minor and thus so was Michael’s charge, but it was enough to make him feel awake and truly alive for the first time today.
He couldn’t stop a small smile, which didn’t go over well with the people nearby who were just starting to recover from the shock of what he’d done.
A man and woman standing by their hastily abandoned patio table started toward him, anger rising in their faces. They started yelling as they advanced, and Michael raised a hand to warn them off, but the words died in his throat. What could he say? They had no way of knowing—and he no way of explaining—that Nikki would not only be fully healed but also stronger than she had been a minute ago once she knocked Michael around a bit. Their link worked both ways.
Michael didn’t blame them for trying to step in, not when he would react the same way in their shoes. He hated attacking his sister, which was why he always wanted to be attacked first. She, on the other hand, loved getting attacked first for some sick reason. To Michael, there was just something fundamentally wrong with attacking the person you loved most in the world. He hesitated and had to screw up his nerve every time they did this, even though he knew he always had the power to heal her.
Of course, healing her would be harder to do now that he’d struck first and was that much more resilient. A simple punch or kick from her might not do the trick. She’d need some extra leverage, something to take the fight to another lev—
The advancing couple fell back as a bar stool smacked into Michael’s head. He staggered back a step, and Nikki swung again, connecting hard enough this time to bend the metal legs around Michael’s back when he turned away, sending him stumbling sideways into the promenade rail.
Nikki never hesitated, and she loved little else in the world as much as improvising weapons, which was probably why she always wanted to be attacked first.
Michael felt the energy ripple through Nikki, a matching timbre to the throb of pain in his back and head. She stood up straighter, tossing the mangled barstool aside. There was nothing small about her smile as the power took hold, healing the cuts and bruises and magnifying her strength. Nikki loved this. She lived for it.
“My turn,” Michael grunted, tilting his head to crack his neck and pushing away from the rail.
Before he could take another step, shouts of, “Step aside!” and, “Make way!” sounded from the arched entryway they’d come through a minute ago. Sky City cops, probably the same two they’d seen in the elevator, on their way to restore order, just as planned. Unfortunately he and Nikki were a little behind schedule. Neither of them was amped enough to stand up to the stun sticks the cops would use first. And if the guns came out too soon…
“Change of venue,” Michael said, catching Nikki’s eye.
She looked over Michael’s shoulder, and if anything her smile got bigger. When she met his eyes again, she winked.
Shit.
Nikki charged him, and although every instinct screamed at him to get out of the way, Michael held those instincts down to take the hit. He’d done so often enough that it should have been easy. It wasn’t. Some instincts were just too deeply rooted.
Like the one to avoid falling.
Nikki hit him like a linebacker, pushing up and out with her hands, and Michael saw the handrail pa
ss under him too far out of reach for him to do anything to stop his flight, even if he’d wanted to. Then there was nothing between him and the half-occupied picnic tables in the tiled courtyard below except two stories of empty air.
He was surprised at how long it took to fall, or at least how long it seemed to take. He had time to look up and see Nikki’s wild swan dive off the rail after him and her radiant smile of expectation as she fell, her gaze never leaving the tiles rushing toward them. Then he hit.
An umbrella and table crumpled under him as its occupants scampered out of the way, and he slammed into the tiles, cracking at least one tile, not to mention several ribs and an elbow. But the pain was a fleeting flash thanks to the healing surge of power from Nikki crashing nearby with what sounded a little too much like a laugh.
This was the key to a good buildup for both of them once the process started. Their attacks had to be right on top of each other, as close to simultaneous as possible. If they did it right, they could keep their increasing strength levels almost in sync and the pain from the injuries powering them to a minimum.
Michael twisted and pushed himself out of the remnants of the table, grabbing up the broken bottom half of the composite umbrella pole as he did so. If he knew Nikki, she wouldn’t waste any time.
He knew Nikki. She came flying over the table between them, tracing a powerful arc through the air, brandishing her own longer umbrella pole, her face radiant with exhilaration. The hat from her uniform had been lost, or more likely thrown, and her rough-cut, multi-hued hair flew behind her as she dropped. Despite the slightly baggy uniform, the smudges of dirt and debris clinging to her, and the blood from her freshly healed injuries, when Nikki was in her element like this, to Michael she looked magnificent.
Michael stepped into the attack. Ignoring Nikki’s down-swinging blow, he swung for her side. Both poles shattered on impact into sprays of splinters and dust.
The flash of pain in Michael’s head shimmered away almost instantly, but the increase in strength was slight. The light makeshift weapons at hand were no longer up to the task it seemed. But judging by the intensity of their previous attacks and the time between his own injury and recovery, Michael figured they were close enough in strength by this point that as long as they kept up the pace, their own bodies should be weapon enough.
What Michael calculated, Nikki knew by instinct. No sooner had he made his decision and tossed aside what was left of the broken pole than Nikki’s fist slammed into his jaw in a roundhouse that would have cracked concrete. Michael spun with the force of the blow, swinging his momentum into a spinning kick that caught Nikki on the jaw.
“Yeah! Now we’re talking,” Nikki shouted through an uppercut to the gut that lifted Michael off the ground doubled over her fist.
As he dropped, Michael caught two handfuls of her badly dyed hair and drove his knee into her forehead as soon as he touched ground, snapping her head back.
Back and forth they went, trading blows as fast as they could, keeping their strength on the rise and the bystanders scrambling to stay out of their path. The intensity of their battle was furious enough that the first cops to reach them hesitated. As the number of cops closing on them grew to a handful, Michael felt his power breaching the next threshold.
The strength they could generate was now far exceeding their body mass. Which meant staying close together after each blow was becoming a challenge. If they weren’t careful, if one of them lost control and lashed out too much, the simultaneous power increase Michael was working hard to maintain would come to an end. Nikki never was big on careful and controlled.
She ducked Michael’s back-swinging elbow and kicked forward into his chest with what felt like everything she could muster. The force of the blow sent Michael flying back ten, fifteen, twenty meters before his back caught the ground. He tumbled another ten meters across grass and slid another five across tile before stopping against one of the support columns under the southwest side of the promenade.
Slumped against the column, trying to shake off being stunned, Michael watched the Sky City cops move in on Nikki.
Nikki
Eighty-thousand volts routed through three probes spaced 11.4 centimeters apart will supposedly lock up your muscles and incapacitate you. The tips of the stun sticks carried by Sky City cops snapped open into three points in just such a triangle and delivered just such a charge. All this info had been in Michael’s briefing. And all of it came rushing back to Nikki when the first jolt hit her lower back, sending those eighty-thousand volts coursing through her muscles.
It hurt—a lot. But unfortunately for the cops, Nikki was far from incapacitated. She was charged up enough that the energy already flooding her muscles absorbed much of the jolt, using it for whatever crazy mojo it worked to send that power to Michael. Through the link, she could feel his injuries from her kick healing and what was left of the eighty-thousand volts making him stronger.
But it wasn’t Michael who needed her attention at present. She had a date with the five cops surrounding her. A date she’d been looking forward to for a long time.
When she didn’t drop as expected, the cop on her left jabbed another stun stick at her chest. She snatched it from his hand and gave it back, business end first, sending him to one knee with a teeth-gritted groan as his chest and arms locked up.
Another stun stick came at her, but she batted it aside, grabbed the cop’s shirt, and flung him corkscrewing over the heads of the other three.
“We need backup―” one of the other cops shouted, reaching for his wrist com. Nikki threw a punch sure to shut him up, but Michael caught her hand, shouldered the cop into the other two, and twisted in one of his damn monkey-fu throws. Nikki went flying.
She missed a support column by a hair and crashed into a blank concrete wall a few meters from the cargo containers, where the dock crew was staring at the tussle, their unloading job forgotten.
She rolled back just as Michael dropped in from what must have been an impressive leap, his foot shattering the tile where she’d been lying. She lunged forward, slapped her hand to his chest, and slammed his back into the tiles at her feet.
“You’re cock-blocking me, Michael-son,” she shouted. “If you’re going back out on our deal, I’m gonna get testy.”
“I think you mean Michael-san, idiot,” he growled, planting his foot on her chest and heaving. Her back slammed into the underside of the promenade six meters above, then she dropped back to the ground in a shower of concrete dust. “No permanent injuries to them—that was the deal.”
Nikki coughed and waved a hand at the cloud of concrete dust as she stood. “Michael-san idiot does sound better. Thanks. Damn, there was something else I was going to tell you. What was it?”
Michael shook his head and started to respond, then he grunted and arched back as 80,000 volts coursed through his shoulders, sending a delicious wave of power into Nikki.
“That was it. Look out behind you,” Nikki said, her wide smile returning. “I’ll take care of it.” She pushed Michael aside and grabbed the suddenly wide-eyed cop by the belt and collar. She swung him back, ran a few steps forward, and slid him across the tiles right into the path of three other cops. Two of them got bowled over, but the third jumped back just in time. He looked at Nikki then went to check on his tangled and dazed comrades.
“Damn, left a spare,” Nikki called back to Michael. “Don’t worry, I’ll pick it―”
Michael
Michael grabbed Nikki’s shoulder and spun her to face him. “Job first,” he said, cutting his eyes toward the cargo containers not five meters away. She followed his look, but he could see the battle lust hazing her eyes. He wouldn’t place the odds of her sticking to the plan at higher than fifty percent, and that was being generous.
“We’re charged up enough, so job first,” he repeated. “Then you can cut loose, a little.” He was going to regret those words, he knew already.
Nikki looked him in the eye. “Deal?”
“Deal.”
Before she could say anything else, he let her go and ran to the nearest container that was marked for one of the restaurants. He planted both hands against it and started pushing. He built up enough speed to be half running by the time he neared the dock opening. He gave one final heave as he skidded to a stop, and the crate launched out into empty air, twisting slowly as it dropped down the outside of the tower.
The east side of the tower faced the desert that bled into the Wasteland covering most of middle America, so he wasn’t worried about crushing some bystander below. Besides, the people he was working with were lying in wait to scavenge what they could from the smashed containers, a little bonus perk from this job. They’d make sure no one was in the drop zone.
Nikki laughed behind him then kicked one of the containers, caving in the front panel and ejecting a shower of packaged crackers, and sending the container skidding across the smooth landing pad and out into the desert air.
She always found a more efficient way to cause damage. She really had a gift for it, much to Michael’s chagrin. This kind of thing just came naturally to her. Fighting. Chaos. Destruction. They were all second nature to Nikki. For Michael, they took work. Even though he and Nikki, as extremely rare mixed-gender monozygotic twins, were as close as brother and sister could possibly be, genetically speaking, he had to study fighting techniques and practice constantly to match what his sister did with raw instinct. For some reason fighting was just an instinct he didn’t have.
He grabbed another container and was about to heave it out of the bay when something slammed into his lower back with a sharp crack, dropping him to his knees. Michael looked back to see Nikki’s spare cop with a smoking pistol trained on him.
“Stay down,” the cop barked, his breathing ragged. “Riot team is on the way. This is ov―”
Nikki stepped in front of the cop and pulled the gun from his hand like he wasn’t hanging onto it with a white-knuckled grip. She gave it a twist in both hands and threw the barrel and slide in one direction, the handle and magazine in the other, metal-cased ammunition clattering across the bay between them. Then she winked at him and tapped her forehead to his, just barely. He dropped, unconscious before he hit the ground.