keep boring me. Meanwhile, I’m thinking mend bridges ? Blowing them up is more my style.
‘What bridges?’ I demand, when he finishes.
‘Well . . . Maybe it’s more accurate to say you’re setting off on the final part of a vital search.’
‘Really?’ I say. ‘And what am I meant to be searching for?’ That poncy little colonel said something about a missing observer. However, I’d like it confirmed by one of the U/Free.
‘What we’re all searching for. He looks at me expectantly. ‘Peace,’ he says. ‘Resolution to deep divisions. What else is there . . . ?’
The man turns to go.
‘Wait,’ I say. ‘Tell me more about Hekati.’
Looking from my face to the way my hand now grips the edge of a sink, he sighs, ‘You’re drunk. Ask Paper about it in the morning.’
‘Not that drunk,’ I say.
He has just realized something.
I’m holding a dagger. It’s small and light and made of glass. And if I concentrate hard, I can remember the dampness of Lisa’s thigh as I took its sister from her garter. The man knows he’s about to be hurt. He knows it’s possible he will die. What he doesn’t know is his next death is going to be his last.
That is what the U/Free fear.
Paper Osamu told me this three months ago. She was doing that deprecating, we’re-also-human thing the United Free do when trying to pretend they don’t believe they are better than everyone else.
‘You can’t—’ he begins to say.
I can, and do. Stabbing hard and fast. ‘Say goodnight to your memories.’
His implant is where you would expect. At the back of his neck, just below the curve of his skull. It is very cross when I rip it free. Slicing away the last tendril, I crush the ‘biont underfoot and flush it. Pulpy threads wriggle as they spin round the pan, but that is just aftershock. Having flushed the man’s memories, I am left with his body.
Leave it , Paper’s grandfather said. We’ll handle that bit .
An interesting moral code. Unwilling to kill, happy to mop up the floor afterwards.
Taking the man’s watch, a handful of gold coins and a diamond ring, I leave him a little pearl-handled knife and the medal round his neck. The coins go in our kitty, the watch I’ll keep, and Franc can have the ring.
‘Where have you been?’ asks Colonel Vijay.
‘Taking a shit.’
He scowls.
Across the room Haze laughs, looking better than I have seen him in a while. As far as I know, he hasn’t vomited all evening. Like the nosebleeds, it is a reaction to the Uplift virus. They are going to stop sometime. Unfortunately, no one can tell us when.
Rachel’s still fretting that his head hurts. But as Haze points out, if she had metal growing through her skull her head would hurt too.
‘She stays here,’ Colonel Vijay says.
‘What?’
‘And the other two. You must know women are a liability in battle.’ He speaks with the absolute authority of someone who has never been near a battle in his life.
‘They’re Aux,’ I tell him.
The colonel stares at me.
So I add, sir. But that’s to annoy the U/Free. Paper’s just been telling Neen that she does not approve of hierarchies. Of course, she has to tell him what they are, before she can tell him why she doesn’t like them.
‘Paper,’ I say.
She inclines her head.
‘You asked for the Aux, didn’t you?’
‘Yes.’ Paper Osamu nods. ‘You know we did.’
‘That’s us,’ I tell Colonel Vijay. ‘All of us.’ Saluting, I step back, and it is my turn to spin on my heels and stalk away. I don’t need to look back to know I have made an enemy.
Like I give a fuck.
Chapter 10
PEOPLE TURN OUT TO SEE US OFF ON OUR SO-CALLED CULTURAL tour. More people than I expect. Come to that, more people than I imagined were in Letogratz. Almost all are wearing black and silver copies of our Death’s Head uniform. Some even have the leather thigh boots.
‘Started a craze,’ says Paper, standing behind me. She smiles at someone in the crowd. ‘You
‘What bridges?’ I demand, when he finishes.
‘Well . . . Maybe it’s more accurate to say you’re setting off on the final part of a vital search.’
‘Really?’ I say. ‘And what am I meant to be searching for?’ That poncy little colonel said something about a missing observer. However, I’d like it confirmed by one of the U/Free.
‘What we’re all searching for. He looks at me expectantly. ‘Peace,’ he says. ‘Resolution to deep divisions. What else is there . . . ?’
The man turns to go.
‘Wait,’ I say. ‘Tell me more about Hekati.’
Looking from my face to the way my hand now grips the edge of a sink, he sighs, ‘You’re drunk. Ask Paper about it in the morning.’
‘Not that drunk,’ I say.
He has just realized something.
I’m holding a dagger. It’s small and light and made of glass. And if I concentrate hard, I can remember the dampness of Lisa’s thigh as I took its sister from her garter. The man knows he’s about to be hurt. He knows it’s possible he will die. What he doesn’t know is his next death is going to be his last.
That is what the U/Free fear.
Paper Osamu told me this three months ago. She was doing that deprecating, we’re-also-human thing the United Free do when trying to pretend they don’t believe they are better than everyone else.
‘You can’t—’ he begins to say.
I can, and do. Stabbing hard and fast. ‘Say goodnight to your memories.’
His implant is where you would expect. At the back of his neck, just below the curve of his skull. It is very cross when I rip it free. Slicing away the last tendril, I crush the ‘biont underfoot and flush it. Pulpy threads wriggle as they spin round the pan, but that is just aftershock. Having flushed the man’s memories, I am left with his body.
Leave it , Paper’s grandfather said. We’ll handle that bit .
An interesting moral code. Unwilling to kill, happy to mop up the floor afterwards.
Taking the man’s watch, a handful of gold coins and a diamond ring, I leave him a little pearl-handled knife and the medal round his neck. The coins go in our kitty, the watch I’ll keep, and Franc can have the ring.
‘Where have you been?’ asks Colonel Vijay.
‘Taking a shit.’
He scowls.
Across the room Haze laughs, looking better than I have seen him in a while. As far as I know, he hasn’t vomited all evening. Like the nosebleeds, it is a reaction to the Uplift virus. They are going to stop sometime. Unfortunately, no one can tell us when.
Rachel’s still fretting that his head hurts. But as Haze points out, if she had metal growing through her skull her head would hurt too.
‘She stays here,’ Colonel Vijay says.
‘What?’
‘And the other two. You must know women are a liability in battle.’ He speaks with the absolute authority of someone who has never been near a battle in his life.
‘They’re Aux,’ I tell him.
The colonel stares at me.
So I add, sir. But that’s to annoy the U/Free. Paper’s just been telling Neen that she does not approve of hierarchies. Of course, she has to tell him what they are, before she can tell him why she doesn’t like them.
‘Paper,’ I say.
She inclines her head.
‘You asked for the Aux, didn’t you?’
‘Yes.’ Paper Osamu nods. ‘You know we did.’
‘That’s us,’ I tell Colonel Vijay. ‘All of us.’ Saluting, I step back, and it is my turn to spin on my heels and stalk away. I don’t need to look back to know I have made an enemy.
Like I give a fuck.
Chapter 10
PEOPLE TURN OUT TO SEE US OFF ON OUR SO-CALLED CULTURAL tour. More people than I expect. Come to that, more people than I imagined were in Letogratz. Almost all are wearing black and silver copies of our Death’s Head uniform. Some even have the leather thigh boots.
‘Started a craze,’ says Paper, standing behind me. She smiles at someone in the crowd. ‘You
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