The Last City

by Nina D'Aleo

  ‘To the Gangland,’ he said.

  *****

  There was a saying scrawled on the entrance signposts of most imp-breed suburbs in Scorpia. ToUp, which crudely translated from Impish into Urigin as Enter if you Dare. Being of the race, Eli understood the subtle shades and subtexts of the message. There were layers of meaning – a riddle, a joke, a warning, a gibe, all of which made absolutely no sense at all to anyone who wasn’t imp-breed, even if he tried to explain it, and was, therefore, widely ignored by most as gibberish. It wasn’t so uncommon, inter-racial misunderstandings happened all the time, but as Eli stood staring up at the entrance to the Crook’d Town Pride territory, he highly doubted anyone of any race would misinterpret this gang’s welcome signage.

  A disembowelled person dangled from the end of a noose tied to one of the buildings. The rope creaked as the body swayed in a listless sort of way. The gradual movements were slightly hypnotic and wholly horrific because time kept ticking by and no uniformed soldiers appeared to analyse the scene, identify the body, hunt down the perpetrator. From an adolescence of mingling in the vicinity of gangsters, Eli understood Gangland law – you lived by the gun and died by the gun – but he’d been a soldier for so long now, he’d grown accustomed to a more regimented society. In his world, the state decided who was guilty or innocent, who should live or die. Here, the bosses decided, and state law didn’t mean a fig. This land was a city within a city, a society existing of, and completely apart from, the rest of Scorpia. Truth was, no soldiers were coming to clean up this scene – ever – because no matter what bravado the Governmentals put on when they were making announcements from their safe and securely guarded high-level offices, no one in the entire city had the spine to actually enter the Gangland and confront Christy Shawe and the other bosses – except perhaps Copernicus Kane. Which was why, now, despite a clear warning of Enter and Die, Eli was still seriously contemplating entering this land.

  ‘For the commander,’ he whispered.

  In order to get to Greenway from this part of the city he had to pass through the territory of the Crook’d Town Pride, ruled by the mighty gangster boss Caesar K-Ruz. It was a massive risk, but Eli felt that the lives of his friends might depend on his bravery, or his balls-out stupidity – whatever worked.

  He gulped and stepped gingerly over the threshold onto Pride land. Crouching low, he sped from one shadow to the next, past wall after wall decorated with the gang’s symbols of claws and jaws and lion faces and with their call – prey together stay together. His wings buzzed behind him, but he kept himself grounded. Flying would draw too much attention. He followed a straight line towards the threshold between Crook’d Town and Greenway, which led him past the territory’s central square. It was hemmed in on all sides by houses, mainly yellow-and-white sandstone structures. Pride members, dressed in gold and purple, and their giant feline companions crowded the square. The men lounged around, conversing in lazy ways using gang slang and signs, taking noncommittal swipes at Spats that ventured too close.

  Already among the children he saw the future leaders and followers, their games imitating life. He spotted a gathering of gang girls. The boss’s cousin, Smudge, and her black panther stood dominant in the centre of the group. Smudge’s dark gaze roamed over the square and Eli couldn’t help but admire her beauty, a captivating mix of menace and vulnerability. Then he saw her sniff the air and decided it was time to keep moving.

  Eli crept onwards, finally reaching the threshold building. He took a chance and flew to the rooftop. Crouching low behind a ledge, he used his telescopic glasses to scan the suburbs of Greenway. The streets were relatively empty, which was possibly because it was morning and most Galleys were still drooling into their pillows in a hungover daze. Or maybe because they’d all gathered to watch Christy Shawe execute the commander. Eli lowered the glasses and only then sensed the slightest hint of movement behind him. He looked over his shoulder and stared at a huge pair of boots. He followed them up and up, past bulges of muscle and rippling scars to darkly rimmed, golden lion eyes. They were locked onto him with the formidable focus of a sniper’s shot. He silently counted down from forty-six to try to stop himself from fainting. The glasses clattered out of his grasp.

  ‘Eli Anklebiter,’ Caesar K-Ruz said, recognising him from childhood despite his swollen-face disguise. Caesar’s lion shadow stood behind him, twitching the end of its tail. Eli thought he could feel the shadow beast’s hot carnivore breath.

  ‘Boss K-Ruz,’ Eli squeaked. He wondered if it would be completely bad taste to headbutt Caesar between the legs and try to make a run for it.

  ‘I wouldn’t,’ the Pride boss said, his voice quiet but threatening like distant storm thunder.

  A crazed giggle escaped Eli’s mouth. He gulped it back. ‘I’m truly sorry for the trespass.’

  ‘Are you now?’ Caesar said.

  ‘No,’ Eli replied before he could stop himself. ‘I mean Yes – Yes, definitely. I’m hugely sorry. I just . . . I just have this problem with talking . . .’ He gathered up his glasses and clutched them to his chest.

  ‘I remember,’ the gangster said, his focus not shifting for a second. ‘I remember everything about you. Why are you here?’

  ‘I’m looking for somebody – somebodies.’

  ‘Who?’ Caesar pronounced the word, giving a glimpse of his sharp white teeth. A trickle of sweat slithered down the very centre of Eli’s back between his wings at the sight of them.

  ‘Copernicus Kane and the trackers.’

  ‘Kane.’ K-Ruz wrinkled his nose in a feline snarl.

  ‘But I think he’s actually in Greenway,’ Eli confessed.

  ‘And you thought you’d just take a short cut through my land?’

  ‘No.’ For once in his life Eli was grateful for his lying disorder. ‘Certainly not – I just found myself in the situation where I had no choice but to trespass, and I meant no harm – truly and honestly. I am just – out of options.’

  ‘Considering you’re now a state traitor,’ the gangster said and Eli wasn’t surprised Caesar already knew. Nothing much had ever slipped by him. In that sense he was very much like Copernicus. ‘Why would Kane enter Greenway?’

  ‘I believe Christy Shawe took him and the others prisoner.’

  Caesar’s expression remained neutral, but his eyes darkened in a menacing way. ‘How do you know?’

  ‘I saw footage of Shawe taking them from a pub in the Isles.’

  ‘Shawe left the city last night. He went out into the desert and hasn’t returned,’ Caesar said.

  Fear spiked in Eli’s chest.

  The gangster boss sensed it. ‘What is it?’

  ‘The Skreaf witches have been resurrected,’ Eli replied without considering his words.

  Caesar gave a slight snarl, but he didn’t seem entirely surprised – dark magics had a distinct smell.

  ‘They’ve infiltrated the city. They tried to kill my boss and teammates – and me.’

  ‘Is that so,’ Caesar said, calculating the information, weighing it up, spreading it out, fitting it into the overall picture. Unlike Christy Shawe, he was a man of agonising patience and unwavering self-control. He was a strategist – timing was everything. He was also undoubtedly the greatest hunter in the city and Eli sensed now that he’d said way too much. He’d left himself with nothing to bargain with.

  Caesar appeared momentarily distracted by something to one side of them. Eli managed to stand and was disconcerted to see he only just reached the centre of Caesar’s chest. His entire width was smaller than the top of one of his legs.

  Caesar looked back at him and said, without a shift in the stillness of his voice, ‘I cannot allow someone to just wander onto my land, spy on my people and then go. You know the penalty for trespass.’

  Eli swallowed around the clot of fear in his throat. ‘Death.’

  Caesar nodded. ‘You knew and you still tried to help your companions. I admire your bravery. It’ll serve you well in the
afterlife.’ The gangster pulled a blade out of his belt. Eli stepped back, his thoughts spinning wildly. He knew Caesar didn’t revel in violence, but he didn’t shrink away from it either. Caesar grabbed Eli by the front of his shirt and lifted him into the air.

  ‘Wait!’ Eli squealed, kicking his legs. ‘I can help you.’

  Caesar eyed him. ‘Help me? How?’

  Eli took a deep breath and a massive leap of chance. ‘You said you remembered me, so you’d remember I’m good with inventions of all kinds. I can make a cure for you.’

  ‘For what?’

  ‘For love sickness,’ Eli said. ‘For Smudge, so she doesn’t love you like that anymore, so she can move on.’

  Even as he uttered the last word, Eli cringed, expecting the blade to slash out across his throat, but Caesar just stared at him for several long moments. Finally he spoke. ‘You can do that?’

  ‘Yes,’ Eli said, unsure himself if it was the truth or a lie. ‘But first I have to stop the witches, otherwise there won’t be any point, because we’ll all be dead anyway. Afterwards, I’ll make the potion.’

  ‘Swear to me,’ Caesar demanded.

  ‘I swear to you.’

  Caesar drew him closer, right in front of his face so that Eli was staring directly into the gangster’s eyes.

  ‘If you are lying to me or do not deliver . . .’ He didn’t finish the threat. He didn’t need to. Caesar took a step back and hurled Eli over the edge of the building.

  Eli’s wings burst into a blur of movement and he flew back the way he’d come without pausing for a whisker of a second. He passed the gruesome threshold leading into Crook’d Town, swooped low between two buildings, and crashed out into the suburb of Sweepington. He skidded into a gutter and sat there gasping. A shadow fell over him and he gazed up at the reptilian face of a palace enforcer.

  ‘You, imp-breed, get in line.’ It jabbed a scythe-blade pitchfork in his direction, then gestured to the gathering of pedestrians waiting at a roadblock several metres from where he sat. A group of red-cloaked enforcers and uniformed state guardians were scanning each person as they passed through. Eli’s pulse sped back up. His transflyer stood on the other side of the roadblock and there was no way to turn back now without appearing suspicious.

  He nodded and gathered himself up. He dusted off his clothes and walked to join the end of the line. Pushing one hand into his jacket pocket, he activated the body-heat blocker stashed inside. When it came to his turn, an enforcer grabbed his shoulder with a rough, scaly hand and ran the scanner over his body. The blocker distorted the heat signature and stopped the enforcers matching it against the profile they had displayed on a holo-screen beside the roadblock. Eli glanced over and saw his own name, face and statistics. He was well and truly ‘Wanted’. He gulped and the palace guards glared at him with beady black eyes. They shoved him through the roadblock and he started to move away in relief when his face began twitching uncontrollably. He grabbed at his chin and felt the skin rippling. He was changing back.

  Eli tried to walk faster, but tripped over, the body-heat blocker clattering out of his pocket. He looked back. The soldiers and enforcers had stopped scanning. One of them yelled out, recognising him.

  Eli scrambled to his feet and ran headlong through the maze-like cobblestone streets of Sweepington. Originally built as an underground sewer system, the streets had, in more recent times, been uncovered and transformed into the walking paths of the now ultra-chic, laughably expensive suburb. Eli wasn’t convinced. He didn’t care how much the real estate cost, the place still smelt like dung. Footsteps pounded behind him, but being a slight and lithe imp-breed meant he was made for the constant sharp twists and bends and tiny, narrow alleys.

  His wings whirred and he sped ahead, soon leaving the enforcers crashing behind him, but he didn’t stop there, he didn’t even slow, knowing the enforcers wouldn’t be so easily put off. Once they caught the scent of someone with their extra-sensitive glands, they never lost the trail. Eli reached into his pocket and clutched the spherical form of a skunk bomb.

  ‘Take a whiff of this,’ he said. He threw the bomb over his shoulder and sped up to maximum speed, barely escaping the foul explosion. With immense satisfaction he heard the enforcers begin to wheeze, their steps slowing, staggering, then turning back and fleeing in the opposite direction. It brought a weary smile to his face. He skipped to a stop in a particularly narrow avenue and leaned against the wall, panting.

  No sooner had he stopped than a tremor ran through the ground beneath his feet and he started back, thinking that the enforcers were going to burst up out of the ground – but they didn’t, and everything fell still.

  ‘Must have been a mini-quake,’ he whispered to himself. He gave a nervous giggle and slapped a hand over his mouth to stifle it. How was it possible that he was still in one piece? He turned in the direction of his waiting transflyer and found himself staring into the skull-like face of a Death. He opened his mouth and screamed so loudly no sound actually came out – just a whistle of air exhaled at super-fast speed. The face vanished into the shadows and left Eli gasping. His legs took off before his mind registered he was running, and he didn’t stop praying until the Summer Holiday was zipping through the sky back towards his shelter.

  22

  Silho lay on her back watching a sky full of dying stars that flashed and flared, blazed and burst, to be swallowed by the darkness and reborn again. Her unconscious mind cavorted. It unearthed old graves so that memories and feelings scrambled out and staggered about, unsure of their place in the broken terrain of her thoughts. They were the real her and threw into sharp contrast what she had become.

  Silho reached a gloved hand towards the swirling sky. She tried to sit up but hit a steel bar lying just above her chest and slumped back down. Pain sharpened her thoughts and she remembered. They know. She’d spent so long thinking about this moment, but her imaginings had never taken her here. She didn’t know what to do, how to feel. Instinctively, she reached into her pocket and grasped for her medication, the black pills that gifted her control over her abilities and over her emotions, but her pocket was empty. The pills were gone, left in the back room of the pub where Diega had thrown them. Panic hit and sent prickling spirals twisting through her body. Suddenly she was aware of each bead of sweat welling up and overflowing on her skin. The slight tremor of her hands grew to a shake. Her temperature flashed from hot to cold and back again. She squeezed her eyes shut against the visions above her. There was no ignoring these signs. They were the first of the physical symptoms of withdrawal from the drugs and a prelude to disaster.

  Several times during childhood, through carelessness or stubbornness, she had let the medication wear off – always with the same disturbing consequences. Somewhere between the first sweats and the later nausea, the draw to use her skills and access the memories of the walls became unbearable, a pain far beyond starvation or thirst. Her resistance fell to pieces – to ashes – and blew away in the wind. Even if, somehow, she could have resisted her own need, the walls themselves worked against her. They called to her mind, growing from one whispering voice to a shouting million, gradually drowning her reality. She couldn’t hide from them, she couldn’t stop them; not without her medicine. Silho knew she had to escape this place and get back to the city before she lost control. She had to move now.

  ‘Get up,’ Silho whispered to herself.

  She sucked in a deep breath and blinked her eyes open. The dancing creations above her were gone. Now she saw the dying stars were flashing lights embedded in a low concrete ceiling. With each flare, the bunker room took shape around her, its outdated tech and dusty benches, the aged boxes and bags stacked around the walls. A bitter, stinging smoke spiralled out from the crashed craft strewn all around her. Silho held her breath and listened for movement. All she could hear was the slow whirr of the engines running down. She manoeuvred out from underneath the wreckage and stood up. Instantly, she froze, sensing movement behind her, but
before she could even think about escape, Copernicus Kane seized her and pinned her hands behind her back.

  He forced her out of the steel rubble into the centre of the room where Diega stood watching them. In the one-tone flashes of light, Diega’s rainbow skin appeared red and her bloodline marks glowed like hot metal. The Fen rushed at Silho and struck her across the face. Silho staggered back. Diega lunged at her again, but the commander intervened, releasing Silho to restrain Diega. She thrashed violently, but couldn’t break his grip.

  ‘Let me go!’ she screamed.

  ‘Not until you’re in control,’ the commander said.

  ‘You’re going to have to kill me,’ Diega snarled. ‘Either me or her.’

  Copernicus grabbed the magnetic restraints off his weapon belt and cuffed Diega’s hands. He kicked her legs from underneath her and pressed down on her back with one boot, holding her down. He snared Silho with his dark eyes that left nowhere to hide.

  ‘I’m going to ask you some questions,’ he said, ‘and you’re going to answer them. Whether you answer them truthfully will determine whether you live or die. Do you understand me?’

  Silho nodded.

  ‘Are you the child of convicted serial killer Englan Chrisholm?’

  Silho stared at the ground. She remembered her father teaching her to paint. His gentle, encouraging words whispered in her thoughts. It was one of the only clear memories of him she had left.

  ‘I’m the daughter of the artist Englan Chrisholm,’ she said. The confession sent shivers through her body that she couldn’t control.

  ‘You were reported dead. Tell me how you survived.’

  ‘Oren Harvey saved me from the fire.’

  ‘Why?’ Copernicus asked.

  ‘She was my mother.’

  ‘She herself told you this?’ he said.

  Silho nodded, the ever-present images of her escape from the prison flashing in her mind. The commander’s voice snapped her back to attention.