17.5

  The first thing I try to do is short-circuit the chimera, but unsurprisingly all the lethal options are greyed out thanks to its sophisticated ICE protection.

  Well, shit.

  It charges toward me at terrifying speed, each massive leg slamming into the ground hard enough to leave craters behind. When it reaches me, one of those legs rises high overhead, so enormous it blocks out the sky. Then it comes crashing down. But just like before, everything seems to slow. The edges of my vision bleed into that sick yellow tint.

  I dash out of the way, and then it hits me: time itself isn’t actually slowing down. No. I’m speeding up, every part of me: my mind, my body, my cybernetics.

  It’s all kicked into overdrive.

  But overdrive isn’t enough. To take down something this powerful, I’ll need more than just speed.

  I need the source.

  If there’s anything I learned from doing all those jobs, it’s that every piece of technology is linked to a server, and if someone can gain access to that server, things can be played with and, better yet, completely disabled. It was the case in The Ghost in Satin, where the controls for the drawbridge were located underground. On the cargo ship, the controls for the magnet claws were inside the head office. With Harrow & Carrow, the systems were linked to their control chips. And with Cierus Marlow, the mechanical snakes all submitted to Ourovane, her key into black-market tech.

  There has to be something.

  So, I run a quick-scan on the chimera and use ‘Server Locator’, watching as a digital red line joins the centre console to something high above it, on one of the top floors of a building within the Core Manufacturing Node. The building itself is a service tower, far taller than most of the others, coloured white and cyan; the chances of me making it there without getting torn to shreds by either this machine or Ward’s security are very little.

  I need help, but who?

  Unless…

  The chimera props itself up higher, points the laser cannon in my direction, and within seconds unleashes an unholy blue beam towards me. I manage to sprint out of the blast zone, but it simply follows my every step. Even in my slowed-down state, it’s gaining on me, so I pump more Lumina into my body, closing in on 60% efficiency, and take off under a mega steel staircase. When the laser dies out, all that’s left is the smell of burn, and the horrifying scorch mark snaking along the ground.

  I talk into the Cloud Room, heading deeper into the area, avoiding the chimera as best as I can. Soon I’m running through a long stretch of blue outbuildings, a silver-lined road, and neon overlights shining down from enormous skywalks. No officers, not yet, but there are plenty of androids tending to fairly laborious manual duties. “Lucian?” I say. “Are you there?”

  It takes a moment, but soon static comes from the other side, followed by, “I’m aware of what you probably want me to do, but I’m havin’ some issues of my own.” From the other side of the line, I hear gunshots. “As you can probably guess, not a good time.”

  “I just need you to disable the defense system on the chimera,” I say. “The server room is in the service tower.”

  “I’m aware,” he says, “but Ward caught on to me. I have a whole unit of personnel looking to take me out. This is aside from the fact that I have no idea how to override any defense measures. You’ll need someone who can crack codes for that.”

  “Someone call for a code-cracker, mate?” says Dance, his voice appearing with a burst of static.

  “You know how to crack advanced security?” asks Lucian. “You even have the tech?”

  I can almost hear the nod through the Cloud. “Brickie’s been done to handle any small netrunnin’ tasks, mate. If we can blow past these doooozies, I can override the defense systems without battin’ an eye. Just tell me where to go.”

  “Top floor of the service tower,” I tell him. “It’s the tallest building. You can’t miss it.”

  “I know what you’re talkin’ about,” says Dance, followed by a loud boom in the background. “Alright. On my way. Keep the big spider busy, Mono.” And then, more subtly, he adds, “Hope they have an elevator.”

  Before I can run a quick status-check on Riven, Vander, and Luck of the Draw, something bursts out from a skywalk in the distance, blocking my path. It’s the white chimera, and it immediately charges up another laser.

  “You can’t hide from me, Rhea!” Calyx Ward shouts, and the laser unleashes. I dash off to the side at breakneck pace, but this time I find no cover, no where to run.

  A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

  The laser is about to sweep right through me when I pump the Lumina up even more, this time exceeding 75%, causing time to slow down more than ever. When the laser reaches me, I jump and rotate midair, like an acrobat caught in a frivolous slow-mo. When I stick the landing, I dash straight towards the chimera, thinking I might be able to make it in time, to jump along its hulking shell, climb up to the second laser cannon, and to take it out in the exact fashion I had taken out the other: by sticking my blade through it.

  I’m about to make it there. The chimera is still stuck in this frozen, yellow pocket of time.

  Closer now, closer.

  Almost…

  “Lumina levels exceeding safe threshold,” my neural AI says.

  What?

  “Warning: neural stabilisation failing. Deactivating.”

  Suddenly, the yellow tint vanishes as the levels drop from seventy per cent to sixty, down to thirty, and eventually down to zero. I don’t understand how this could have happened, but I promptly remember what Dance had told me: that things start to break down around the seventy per cent mark, especially once you go over it.

  And now, as I’m stopped in my tracks, dazed and tripping as the speed eventually catches up with my now-incapable body and cybernetics, I’m launched headfirst into the leg of the chimera and sent sprawling to the ground. My visor glitches, clearly damaged from the impact, and I’m writhing in pain.

  When my vision clears and I look up, the chimera leg rises right over my body and is about to crash down and crush me with one final stomp. I find the strength, and the fear-stricken adrenaline, to roll out of the way right as it crashes into the ground with a thunderous echo. I try to pick myself up and continue the fight, but my body is finally giving out, finally rejecting.

  I can’t do it.

  By the God above, I cannot get the fuck up.

  “I built a city dedicated to protecting its people from disgusting vermin like you,” Calyx Ward says, and although I cannot see it—I’m unable to even turn over—I can hear the chimera getting closer, and closer. “The naysayers, the criminals, the assassins, drug-dealers.”

  I reach into my pocket, hand shaking, bringing the MX-inhaler to my lips and taking a hit. The lemony liquid washes down my throat, but this time, oh this time, the pain doesn’t go away, and still I cannot find the strength to get up off my ass.

  “But you all end up the same,” Calyx Ward says, her voice dropping to the register of death: “Crushed like the insignificant worms you are.”

  This time I don’t even see it. I only hear the leg rise up, the pistons giving one final groan, the immense shadow swallowing whatever little light remains around me.

  “Guys,” I say through gritted teeth. “I’m—she got me. I—”

  For a moment, everything is quiet.

  And I feel the same as I had when I first woke up under the bridge in Neo Arcadia. Or, maybe more precisely, what I had felt like before I had woken up: alone, floating in meaningless grey, with only a little spark to keep me company.

  And the endless hum.

  Everything was… peaceful.

  Was I about to see that world again? The afterlife, as I had experienced it before?

  The cold, meaningless pull of death?

  I close my eyes, realising my own failure. I’ve made it this far, pushed past all the corruption of Neo Arcadia and Paxson combined, but in the end Calyx Ward was too powerful. I cannot contend with the sheer financial and physical power. It was a dream. And everyone I love, everyone I care about, will die with me.

  All I can say is: I’m sorry.

  To Fingers.

  To Dance and Vander and Riven and Cormac O’Cormac and Raze and his cancer-stricken sister Juna; to Lucian, to Arden.

  To my dad.

  To my mom.

  I couldn’t stop her. I was overpowered in the end.

  “I’m sorry.”

  So, here it comes: death. The leg will crush me. It will be the most amount of pain I have ever felt in my life… any moment now…

  But I’m still here.

  I’m still on the ground, gasping for breath, waiting for the pain to end with a final stomp, rain pouring over my body, thunder in the distance, echoing and echoing, and the gunfire—the endless gunfire.

  Then, I hear something else: pistons malfunctioning, electrics whirring, a machine fighting to operate.

  And, through it all, I finally find the strength. To turn over. To look up at the beast of a machine.

  The chimera is locked in position, its leg shaking midair directly above me, as if it’s having second thoughts.

  But it’s not having second thoughts.

  It’s…

  “Mono,” shouts a voice through the Cloud. “System’s offline, but I’m not sure how much longer that’ll last.”

  “What?” shouts Calyx Ward. “That blasted cunt! Storm the service tower, right fucking now! There's been a breach!”

  “Get up, old-timer,” another voice says through the Cloud. Luck of the Draw. “Your story ain’t over yet. Not till the fat lady sings.”

  Not till the fat lady sings.

  I do my best to find any semblance of strength, push my hand hard against the silver-lined road, and with a great, big ‘AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!’ manage to pick myself up, my head and body still recovering, albeit very slowly.

  When I scan the chimera again, this time all the quick-hack options are available, and I waste no time unleashing it with everything I got: multiple short-circuits, followed by Black Iris, just in case it manages to wake itself up and go for another attack, tearing its circuitry down piece by piece, bit by bit.

  The eye slit of the chimera starts flashing yellow, and soon the laser cannon disconnects; then the legs explode, smoke coming out everywhere, and eventually the whole thing starts wobbling from side to side, strafing, struggling to keep itself upright, until all one hundred and fifty tons topple over. Its ruined legs curl inward beneath it, folded tight like a dead spider. Smoke continues to drift from the carcass as the battlefield falls quiet.

  And for the first time since this nightmare began, Calyx Ward is the one in silence.