Read Online Zero World by Jason M. Hough - Free Book Online Page A

to provide to her in the form of a stack of stolen documents.
    “Tomorrow they will clean this place and completely rebuild it. I guess they can afford to, eh?”
    Melni only nodded. Her mind raced.
    “As gratitude,” Boran said, “for keeping our noses out of their shitpipes, Valix has invited all of the detectives to the returning ceremony.”
    “I would love to be there,” she said, a little too quickly.
    Boran waved a dismissive hand. “Take my place if you like. It would bore me to tears, but you…If you wish to honor the dead in your report, that is the place to go. This,” he said, gesturing at the ruin across the street, “is no place for honor.”
    “Sure you do not mind?”
    He shook his head. “I am too busy with the Hillstav incident.”
    “What Hillstav incident?”
    He shot her a glance and snorted a single laugh. “So that news has not leaked yet. Well, believe me, you will hear of it soon enough.”
    “Is it related to this?”
    The detective’s eyes widened at the question, and she knew it was something he hadn’t considered before. He thought about it for a moment and then shook his head.
    Melni squeezed the detective’s arm in gratitude, paid for their food, and left. She walked the entire way back to her flat, taking side streets and alleys. The complicated path gave her time to think.
    There seemed only one conclusion that mattered: If Onvel had left anything behind that might implicate her, everything would end. All the careful cultivation of this persona, all the contacts she’d made under the guise of a reporter, would disintegrate. She would have to make sure that didn’t happen. The South might never get a better chance to infiltrate the Valix machine. Melni’s pace quickened. She had a lot of preparation to do.
    —
    At zero hour, when the streetlights outside dimmed ten times to signal the end of the day, Melni slipped out of her building via the service entrance. An earlier rain had gone, leaving the paved roads as imperfect mirrors of the city they served. She’d dressed like what one would expect of a young, attractive, unattached woman abroad in the middle of the night: for a party. A black long-sleeved shirt, brown skirt that ended mid-thigh, and matching boots that came just below the knee. She wore fake spectacles and a semi-clear, hooded plastic shawl—quite fashionable these days for the under-thirty set—over her close crop of blond hair.
    It being a workday, pedestrians on the streets were few and far between. Only one pedicab pulled along beside her and offered a ride, halving the price at her initial decline, rattling away when she reiterated her desire to get a good walk in.
    A few new low-slung ground cruisers rolled by, with their shinywheels and quietly humming electric motors. They were a stark contrast to the cough and patter of the old compressed-air sort like you’d find all across the South. Melni thought these new cruisers obscene displays of wealth and laziness but could not discount the appeal of their curved forms and ease of use.
    An old stone bridge led over a canal and into Loweast. Classic, weather-beaten homes and corner stores gave way to the gleaming modern storefronts and office blocks currently considered fashionable. There were advertisements, too, huge brightly lit tallframes promising luxury or convenience or the latest modern marvel. The monstrous advertisements were everywhere these days. Melni found them sort of fascinating. Not for the products on offer but in the interesting techniques employed to try to grab attention in only a single image and perhaps a few words. Few saw this brazen attempt at manipulation for the art form it clearly was. To Melni it was like acting, or lying. Yes, very much like lying.
    She ducked into a public lav and, breathing through her mouth, traded her skirt for a pair of comfortable slacks, her plastic shawl for a more modest scarf. She ditched the costume spectacles, which were courtesy of the amateur