This Shattered World

“Watch it!” He’s not much older than we are, but his face bears as many scars as any soldier.

“Hey, man, sorry.” Alexi’s quiet, calm. He’s the best man possible in a crisis. “Didn’t see you. Where you headed?”

“Like I have to tell you?” There are people like this all over the place on Avon. They were all over Verona, too. Angry about everything and willing to take it out on whoever comes through their line of sight. The ceasefire between the military and the rebels doesn’t mean the townies like us any better.

Mori steps forward, putting herself between Alexi and the kid. “Actually, you do.” Mori’s not big, but she’s strong and competent, and in this moment, she looks it. She casually rests her hand on her holster, where her Gleidel sits. “Curfew’s in half an hour.”

The boy spits to the left of Mori’s shoe. “You’re just gonna have to wonder, trodaire.” The way he throws the word at her is more biting than any insult.

“Let’s go,” Alexi suggests with a roll of his eyes. “If we want bread, we’ve gotta scramble.”

Mori doesn’t move, doesn’t even acknowledge Alexi. Her eyes are on the townie boy—all the animation has left her face. The hairs begin to rise on my arms, on the back of my neck. Something’s wrong.

“You’ll tell us where you’re going,” says Mori. Her voice is cold. No way this is the same girl who minutes before was joking and laughing. “And roll up your sleeve, we’ll need to scan your genetag.”

“Corporal,” I interject. “Leave him. Let’s go.”

The townie’s noticed the shift in the air. He doesn’t know Mori like we do, but he’s no idiot, not living where he does. He can read the change in a crowd. He takes a step back, glances over his shoulder. There’s a small face pressed to the glass of the window in the house. With a jolt, I realize the boy’s looking back at his little brother, who’s watching the whole thing. No wonder he’s trying to act tough.

I can see the boy fighting the urge to back down, to play it safe. I will him to go home. Walk away.

Then his jaw clenches. “Yeah, well you can suck my—”

Gunfire rends the quiet, and for a half second I’m blinded by its laser flash. I launch myself backward, my own gun leaping into my hand. I’m searching for the shooter for what feels like an eternity before I see the townie drop to his knees. Before the sound of the brother inside screaming hits my ears. Before I see that half the boy’s face is gone. Before I realize Mori’s hand is holding the gun, and it’s pointed at where the boy was standing.

The next few seconds are a blur. I leap for Mori, Alexi throws himself down by the townie’s body as the townspeople nearby start to run—some toward us, some away. Somewhere there’s a woman screaming. I can smell burned hair.

Mori’s staring straight ahead, her face calm, her eyes blank. I shake her once, twice—then I slap her hard. Her face jerks to the side with the impact of my blow, but her expression doesn’t change. I fumble for the flashlight on my belt and shine it at her face. Her pupils are dilated so far her eyes look black, unchanging when I shine the light directly into her eyes.

No. There were no signs—there wasn’t any warning. Where were her dreams?

Alexi abandons the body in the mud and lurches to his feet. “Lee,” he gasps, “we’ve gotta get out of here. It’s going to get ugly, we need to be gone.”

Then Mori wakes up. I’m the first thing she sees, and she blinks at me once before she speaks. “Hey, Captain. What’s up?”

I’m frozen for half a breath before instinct takes over, and I’m jerking her away. I half march, half drag her back down the street while Alexi brings up the rear, Gleidel in hand, making sure no one’s out for immediate revenge.

Mori’s baffled questions halt abruptly. When I look down, I see her eyes fixed somewhere behind us. And I know she’s seen the slumped, motionless form lying in the mud.

The shop’s bell chimes, and the girl lifts her head from her reader. Don’t, she thinks. Wait. This one’s different.

“Welcome,” her mother calls. The girl, under the counter, watches her mother’s legs as she turns toward the customers. “Can I…” But her mother doesn’t finish.

“Hello, Mrs. C.” The voice is light, but the moment she hears it, the girl’s heart freezes. “Had some time to think about our offer?”

The girl puts her eye to the crack in the plastene. She sees her father coming down the stairs, watches as he pauses.

“We told you we weren’t interested,” the girl’s father says, slowly moving the rest of the way down the stairs, putting himself between the customers and the girl’s mother.

“Noah,” the girl hears her mother whisper. “They’re on something—look at their eyes.”

Through the crack in the counter, the girl shifts her eyes toward the men in the doorway. Their eyes look like dolls’ eyes, like black marbles with no pupils.

THE WIRE AT THE BASE perimeter where i got in last time has been repaired, but the same weak spot repeats a hundred feet along, and this time I take care to wind the ends of the fencing back together more carefully and hide my tracks. It looks like they’ve increased their security since the shooting in town, but a few extra guard patrols won’t be enough to stop McBride—especially when they don’t know he’s coming.