“No problem. Besides, I don’t have anything better to do. Another day stuck in Aventine purgatory.”
She groans. “Me too, but Dash lucked out and got an assignment.”
I roll my eyes. “No kidding. You wouldn’t be hanging around the training room with me if he were available,” I say with a smile.
A faint blush appears on her cheeks as we meet each other in the center of the room. “We’re not that bad, are we?”
“Only sometimes,” I tease. “But seriously, I’m glad both of you let me be a third wheel on occasion.”
“Well, we both know how hard the transition can be. Though you seem to be doing better.”
I’m glad I’ve fooled someone. Readying my stance, I half-bend my knees, inhale deeply through my nose, and keep my hands out in front of me. I’ve learned the hard way it’s better to stay on the defensive when sparring with Kat. She has the unerring knack of turning my every attack against me, capable of some truly impressive moves.
She feints left, jabs at me with her right arm. I block it easily with a wrist grab, and with that we cycle through different strikes and combinations. She eases me into it. I could almost let myself get lulled into a false sense of security with the punch-block-kick-counter rhythm we create if not for the persistent sensation that Kat, just like her namesake, likes to play with her food until she’s finally ready to eat.
I strike out, expecting her to block as she’s done countless times before, chaining moves together to create an opening in my defenses after a couple of seconds. Still haven’t quite figured out a way to avoid it. Instead of her hand whipping out, her forearm blocking my strike, my fist meets her shoulder just as a sharp cry escapes her.
I pull back so I won’t hit her with full force, but she still falls to her knees, hand at her temple.
“What’s wrong?”
She blinks up at me, unseeing. “Something’s happened to Dash. He’s…” The color drains from her face.
Must be something bad. When Rik and I were connected, I had an almost never-ending awareness of his mental state floating in the back of my mind. For Kat to experience such a strong physical reaction, the emotional bleed must be overwhelming.
Our match forgotten, she lurches to her feet and hurries out of the room. I chase after her all the way to the Crow’s Nest on the third floor.
The door doesn’t open for us. They must have known Kat was coming. She bangs on the door. Miranda opens it a few seconds later, blocking the rest of the room from view. “K,” she says with a frown, “this isn’t a good time.”
Kat kicks the door into her. Miranda curses, but doesn’t fight Kat as she shoulders her out of the way. “You know the rules, K.”
Kat’s face nearly crumples at the rebuke in her handler’s voice. “I know. And I’m not distracting him.” She taps her temple. “I just want him to know I’m here.”
Tahir’s at his station, his hands making small movements as he controls the wallscreen’s display, his eyes rolling through a barrage of eyecast commands. If I seek it out, I can catch snippets of his single-minded focus, but it’s not directed at me, which is why I didn’t notice it before. He croaks out, “Miranda,” and she turns, rushing back to her position at another station.
“Shit,” she mutters to herself, tracking the vids.
Scanning the screens, I finally make out the angular planes of Dash’s face as he navigates the crowds milling around the Stadium during a football game at halftime. Four men pursue him, and they’re not nearly so careful in weaving through the bystanders.
“They’re not broadcasting ID,” Miranda says. “Disconnects?”
Tahir doesn’t answer.
Without breaking stride, Dash charges toward a set of stairs, leading to the upper deck of the stadium – high enough there’ll be emergency exit access to one of the concourses. He’ll be in an elevated section of the Terrestrial District, awfully close to an area Aventine says is now off-limits, but at least he’ll have more options.
“How did he get routed into the game anyway?” I wonder out loud. The client’s preferences perhaps? Or a desperate ploy to get rid of his tails, thinking the crowds would keep him safe? But I may as well have asked the question in my head for all the notice it gets.
A new camera angle snaps to Dash as soon as he comes into view. His steps speed up, the emergency exit beckoning. And, for the first time, we get an unencumbered look at him, and the dark stain along his right side.
“No…” Kat breathes.
“Get someone there now!” Tahir’s voice explodes in the silence. Whoever he’s talking to is in deep shit. I’ve never heard him sound so angry. His head twitches toward Miranda. “ETA?”
“If Diego’s team leaves now, three minutes.” Her gaze finds Kat’s, something unsaid passing between them that curls Miranda’s lip. “I’ll alert Harding.” Then she’s gone.
Tahir pushes back from the desk, running his gloved fingers through his hair.
Kat looks at him. “Tell me what happened.”
With a grim set to his mouth, he turns back to the screens. <
“Tahir,” Kat says, “I have a right to know.”
I give her arm a tug. “We should go. Let them handle it.” The only thing she can do is get in the way.
She shakes me off her. “Tahir,” her voice rising a hysterical octave, “tell me.”
<
Short of knocking Kat out – which, if our sparring sessions are any indication, is nigh on impossible – I don’t know what to do. Casting about the room, my gaze lands on a med kit mounted to the wall by the door. There’s an emergency kit in each room. I’ve never been more grateful for Aventine’s paranoia. I open it, riffle past bandages and pill packets, and find a sedative. I yank off the protective covering and jam the autoinjector into the meaty part of her thigh. She sags to the floor before she even registers the shot. A wounded, accusing look is leveled my way before her eyes slide shut.
I run a shaking hand over my brow, telling myself she’ll be better off. There were times when the emotional bleed between me and Rik and even me and Brita could spiral out of control, creating a feedback loop of negativity that devolved from commiseration into something far more destructive. When Rik’s mother died, his grief rekindled mine after my grandparents passed away within weeks of each other a few years earlier. Our shared depressive bender had us both twisted up for months.
That’s not what either Kat or Dash needs now.
“I’ll get a med tech up here.”
“No,” Tahir says sharply, his gaze still affixed to the screen. “We need them right where they are for when they bring D-19 in.”
Things happen quickly after that. Diego’s team bursts onto the concourse. Two of them bundle Dash away, while Diego and another man give chase to Dash’s pursuers. Tahir rushes downstairs to await Dash’s arrival. I’m left there with the silent monitors scrolling through security feeds as though it’s any other day, with Kat passed out at my feet. At least I can do something about that.
Bandit, who was sleeping in on his day off, helps me get her to her suite. We tuck her into bed. Her room’s full of soft flourishes of her personality. Wall screens rotating through lush images of flowers, eclectic furniture she must’ve purchased herself, and an air filter adjustment filling the space with the fragrance of jasmine. Somehow she’s managed to turn Aventine into a home. I force back thoughts of my own utilitarian apartment, nearly the same from the day I moved in. I do the work, get the job done. Isn’t that what matters?
I debate sending Kat a message explaining what happened, but decide against it. I know firsthand how devastating emotional bleed can be. I also know how awful it is to be cut off from loved ones so abruptly. There’s just no winning in a situation like this. With one last look at her suite, I go downstairs.
Dash has alre
ady been swept into the surgi-suite. I stand vigilant near the entrance to the med bay. In part because Kat can’t, but also because Dash’s my friend too. Until today, all of Aventine’s warnings about the darker aspects of our work hadn’t really registered. Sure, there’s occasional weirdness on a job, but nothing like this since I’ve been here.
Tahir’s muted our connection, but some of his anxiety leaches through, setting my teeth on edge. Forty minutes tick past in painful silence as I wait in the hall. Finola’s lab techs peek their heads out every so often, looking for an update that has yet to come.
Without warning, Tahir barges out of the medical suite and sags against the wall. Before the door shuts, I catch a glimpse of Dash, prone on a hospital bed with all sorts of equipment hooked up to him, beeping steadily. At least he’s alive, if unconscious.
“He’ll be OK?”
Tahir’s expression doesn’t change, but the lines on his face deepen. “Eventually. If the team had brought him in any later…” He lets that hang between us for a long moment, then he meets my gaze, his eyes as hard and unyielding as I’ve ever seen them. “Simple mistakes can add up, Emery. Never forget that.”
Chapter Fifteen
Kat’s glower greets me when I visit Dash in the med suite the next day. She’s pulled up a chair, her bare hand tucked in one of his. Even when I’ve caught her by surprise in our sparring sessions, she’s never looked at me quite like this.
I almost turn myself back around, but then Dash gives me a friendly wave. I take a tentative step into the room. “Just stopping by to see how you’re doing.”
He’s still in his hospital gown, propped up on the bed, looking wan but very much alive. He shrugs. “Doc says I’ll be back at it in a couple weeks.”
“That’s great,” I say. I mean it, too, even with Kat staring me down. “I was worried.”
She stands abruptly, her cheeks mottled red as her hair. “Could’ve fooled me.”
I hold up my hands. “Kat, Tahir asked me to–”
“I don’t want to hear it. You know what we are to each other. If something were to happen…” She jams her glove back on, her movements violent yet precise. Then she exchanges a loaded look with Dash before stalking out of the room.
I turn back to him. “I should go. You need your rest.”
“It’s OK, M.” He tips his head to the door. “And it will be with Kat too. She forgives easily. I should know,” he says with a hint of his old grin.
He might be ready to forgive me, but I’m not. “She has every right to be mad.”
He lifts a shoulder. “We both know Tahir has a knack of getting his way.”
True enough. I gesture to the bed. “So what happened?”
He leans back with a heavy sigh. “Should’ve been a routine transfer with the drop in the Terrestrial District. Picked up a tail, though. Somehow they blocked all my implant’s outgoing communications. When I tried to ditch them, another one was waiting along every alt route I tried. Thought I’d be able to lose them at the Stadium, but no such luck.”
“Did Diego’s team catch whoever it was?”
Dash shakes his head. “Nah, they disappeared into the shadows of the Terrestrial District. Client thinks it might have been a competitor, so they’re looking into it too.”
“Well, hopefully they’ll figure it out so something like this doesn’t happen again.”
“No kidding.” He gives me a wink. “But at least Aventine provides a nice disability bonus.”
Three days later, Tahir summons me to Harding’s luxe office on the third floor just past the Crow’s Nest. Harding might appreciate the finer things, but I suspect it’s more for the benefit of whoever he conferences with, considering the bells and whistles on the wallscreen mounted opposite his desk. Tahir said once that Harding’s responsibilities include managing clients and finding new ones, and presumably this setup inspires enough confidence for people to turn over their secrets into our keeping for a few hours at a time.
Pushing back the automatic apprehension, I take a seat at the small table opposite Harding’s desk. Tahir joins me, a slight crease to his brow that’s been there ever since Dash was taken into the surgi-suite on a stretcher. Dr Finola sits across from him, a tired cast to her otherwise friendly face – she’s been working double-time monitoring Dash and staying on top of her daily responsibilities. And Harding rules over all at the head of the table, synching with someone, somewhere, unconcerned with the minutes piling up as we wait for his attention.
Finally, Harding’s awareness returns to the room, like a person in REM sleep woken suddenly. “Ah, M, thank you for joining us.”
“Sure. Um… what’s going on?”
Tahir’s gaze drops to the table, the crease deepening, as Harding spreads his hands wide. “We have a special assignment for you.”
“Not another walkabout, I hope.”
Harding chuckles. “Not this time, no.”
“One of our government clients has need of a data transfer,” Tahir says.
“OK…” But that doesn’t explain why I’m here. Every client needs a data transfer.
“D normally handled their data needs but…” Harding shrugs. “You’re both similar in your abilities and habits on the job, and Tahir’s familiar with both you and the client in question.”
I bite my lip. It feels opportunistic, like I’m stealing away Dash’s client or something. Once he recovers, I’m sure he’ll be back in the field, no questions asked. But I guess that doesn’t matter when there’s business to be done.
“With the increased scrutiny from the public’s interest in Emergence, our government clients have grown even more insistent on timely and secure data transfers,” Harding says. “Until plans for staged development beyond the dome are finalized, it’s, shall we say, a delicate time.”
“Hopefully things will calm down once the Vesa lottery is over,” I say. Once the citizens lucky enough to live at the new housing development are selected, the Disconnects will have to wait out the trial period along with everyone else.
Tahir and Harding exchange a glance. “Perhaps,” Tahir says. “But no matter what happens, the government’s still under a huge amount of pressure to make Emergence as seamless a transition as possible. Even with Vesa underway, Emergence for everyone is years in the making. If their plans, preliminary as they are now, were leaked to the public, it could lead to even more tension.”
“More Disconnect unrest?”
Tahir nods.
“The Disconnects are one thing,” Harding says. “But if everyone started to doubt, our whole way of life could destabilize, jeopardizing everything we’ve worked for.”
“I thought I wasn’t supposed to know what I’m carrying?”
“True,” Harding says. “And you won’t, not really. The specifics will still be unknown to you and us. We’re only telling you this because you need to understand you’ll be dealing with a different caliber of client than you’ve been interacting with up until now.” Harding thumps the table with his palm. “So we’ll take this as a test run since there are some non-standard elements to their request, in part because of D’s unavailability.”
“When do we get started?”
“Tahir said you are always chomping at the bit to get out there.” He says it smugly, like the know-it-all he is. When, really, all I want to do is get out of this room.
“In two hours’ time, we’ll ascend to the Echelon,” Tahir says.
“We?” I ask.
“You, me, and Dr Finola.”
“Isn’t that overkill?”
Before Tahir can answer, Harding clears his throat. “They have some very… particular needs for this job, requiring Tahir and Diane’s presence.” He closes his eyes, sending me directions up to the Echelon. “You’ve been given different routes to take to the pickup location. Plan for forty-five to fifty minutes’ travel time.” Harding looks at me. “Once there, you’ll be briefed on the rest.”
>>Why do I have a bad feeling about
this?>>
Tahir’s head twitches toward me involuntarily, but he makes no answer.
Dr Finola gives me a bright smile. “No worries, M. We just want to ensure this one goes smoothly.”
I get to my feet. I’m actually glad I have an assignment after the last few days. Ever since Dash’s job went wrong, there’s been a slight pall over headquarters. Kat’s still not accepting my synch requests, which also doesn’t help.
Outside the briefing room, Dr Finola flashes me another smile. “See you up there,” she says, before making her way down the hall.
I arch my brow at Tahir, falling in next to him as we take the stairs down to the second floor.
<
>>I don’t believe you.>>
He glances my way, then stares resolutely forward. <
My steps slow. >>You don’t think I can do it.>>
<
>>Then what?>>
<
I scoff.
<
>>Once.>>
After my parents helped me move into my dorm room in the Canopy, the three of us traveled up to the highest reaches of New Worth, where the city’s best and brightest made their homes. We knew we’d never have a chance at securing quarters in such exclusive company, even if I earned enough to move them out of the Terrestrial District, but it was fun to wander around the public areas and dream.
The memory tinges bittersweet. Tahir must feel some of it since he sends me the day’s projected suncast for the upper levels. <
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