"The program relies on biometric tracking," Lucy explains through a full mouth, motioning for me to do the same. "It can’t understand our speech if we do like this,” she points to her full mouth and chipmunk cheeks. “Ty-Rok and I found that out when it surprised us one night eating.”
I shove more food in my mouth, hope stirring in me.
“If you mask your signature, the drones can’t lock on you and Ken’s fucked."
Hell, I can hardly understand her through her full mouth. Selene nods, eating at a rapid pace. Whatever she’s been through, it seems like it’s a fuck ton worse than what I’ve experienced.
"Pol just smashes things until the power shorts out," Selene says, hardly intelligible.
Something tugs at my memory, and I squint, trying to figure out what it is, when it hits me.
This is like one of those Captcha things from before the Roth invaded, except instead of identifying motorcycles, I’m having to spend all my energy on understanding what the fuck they’re saying, and instead of keeping bots from filling out forms, we’re keeping a bot from surveilling us.
Hell, truly.
Selene takes a massive gulp of her fake margarita. “It’s old school, but it works. Apparently this wasn’t a moon at all, by the way. Pol said it’s an abandoned satellite that vanished mysteriously, and the people on it were never heard from again.”
A sharp vibration ripples through the room.
I freeze, my cup stopping halfway to my mouth. It isn't coming from me because my pink slip does not have a single pocket, but the embedded smart-coaster on the fake-gold side table is humming like a cheap pager.
The palm-sized glass panel pops slightly out of the wood, its screen blinking erratically. A green cursor appears against a black background, and it looks nothing like the comms tablet UI or anything else I’ve seen here.
“Oh shit,” Selene says. “I know who this is.”
We both stare at her.
“This is how the Suevan Warlords communicate,” she continues, her voice tight, and for the first time, something like hope is in her eyes. “They hacked the pirate ship I was on once.”
The cursor blinks, and then a message begins to form on the screen.
We all lunge forward, grabbing the panel and holding on to it for dear life. Our heads knocking together as we stare at the tiny text crawling across the display.
SOURCE: SURFACE DEPLOYMENT // SUEVA MAINLAND SENDER: BEX
MESSAGE: IF YOU CAN READ THIS, HOLD THE LINE. LILY, ELL AND PARTNERS ARE OFF-PLANET. BILLIE AND AYRO UNDERGROUND; RESISTANCE. HACKING KEN’S CORE MATRIX. WE ARE COMING TO GET YOU OUT OF THAT SATELLITE.
“Ellison and Lily,” Lucy breathes. “They made it to Sueva.”
“They are alive.” A breathless laugh tears out of me. “The Suevans are coming to get us.”
A silver recording drone drops out of an air vent, its blue lens spinning rapidly as it locks onto our huddle. Ken’s hologram face flickers into the center of the room.
Selene throws her cup of piña colada at the drone, and it slops all over it.
Ken’s hologram glitches.
“Take it,” Selene hisses,
I pry the hacked screen or whatever it is out of the table and shove the glass panel straight down my cleavage.
I don’t think Ken’s interested in looking too closely at my tits.
“Contestants, you are expected to provide a storyline,” Ken says. “Are you harboring unreleased emotional content? Please do not refrain?—”
I spring to my feet, and I channel my best Real Housewives rage. I grab my cup of piña colada and hurl it straight across the room, where it splatters against the velvet wall.
“I cannot believe you would say that about my mother, Lucy,” I scream at the top of my lungs, slapping my hand flat against the table where the missing tablet should be. “You have always been jealous of me. Always.”
