Page 12 of The Fall

Then she removed the coat, permanently altering Kerr’s opinion on grandmothers. She had the largest arms she’d ever seen and could probably give Piston a run for his money.

The girl beside her had a similar hair style, but shorter and standing on edge. It was also flaming red and her face was nearly covered with freckles, though they didn’t stand out as much as Kerr’s, due to her darker complexion. Her eyes twitched but she held her rifle with a relaxed, practiced grip. Old, but well-maintained. Best to watch out for that one.

The last one stood at the improvised entrance. Light filtering in from outside appeared to give her an angelic glow, caressing the shape of her jaw, highlighting the outline of her long, dark coat. It seemed to have been tailor-made just for her, an obscene display of wealth. She carried no weapons that Kerr could see, but she was the one wearing their gift.

Her disciplined stance and slightly raised chin should have made Kerr hate her. Instead, she wanted to run over and ask how she liked the device Kerr had made. To beg for attention and melt into a stammering mess. To run away before she could respond. To dream about what could have been and hope she was thinking about her.

“Embarrassing,” she muttered to herself. Even after Chalice’s neglect, that was a little desperate.

Kerr looked around to see if anyone else had noticed her gawking, only to find that Piston and Sesi were engaged in a conversation she’d missed entirely.

“And your tech?” Piston said.

The woman dropped her head with a knowing smile. Like a polite rejection after you’d been dancing around all night, waiting for just the right moment to ask for her number.

“It’ll leak eventually,” he added. “Tech never stays secret forever. Might as well get paid for it.”

“You’re right it doesn’t.”

Piston was about to try a new tactic, but the woman held up her hand.

“Don’t try and convince me it’s for the greater good. We’re not good. We kill people. And we’ll be extinct before you figure it out.”

The woman’s face gave nothing away, but Kerr thought she saw the girl at the door flinch a little.

“Let’s start small.” The woman held up a small case. “Go ahead, scan it.”

Piston looked intently at the case and then nodded, satisfied at its contents. He turned to Chalice, who held up a bag of printer parts.

The woman didn’t move.

“Is she not going to scan it?” Chalice was a lot less polite than Piston.

“Lusa?” the woman called.

The girl – Lusa, strode over. Kerr’s mouth ran dry at the flow of her body in motion. Chalice curled her lip. Embarrassed, Kerr tried to find another place to park her eyes.

Suddenly, Lusa snapped to attention and whispered something in the woman’s ear.

“What are you trying to pull, Piston?” The woman stuffed the case back into her coat and made for the gap in the wall. The red-haired girl followed.

“I swear, they’re just printer parts.” Chalice raised her hands, panicking.

Cinder stepped through the gap before anyone could reach it, pistol pointing straight at Lusa’s forehead. “We tried to play nice, but we want the tech.”

“Cinder!” Piston yelled. “Stand the fuck down.”

The rest was a blur. Lusa twirled. Kerr’s heart leapt for a split second, admiring the graceful acrobatics of her evasive manoeuvre until four of Cinder’s fingers hit the floor with the wet thud of living tissue on concrete. Lusa had her knee in the man’s back and the point of a knife at his neck. Kerr hadn’t even considered that she might be carrying knives. Her Opti flashed a cortisol spike warning.

Out of the corner of her eye, she caught the muzzle of the red-haired girl’s rifle rising. She spun on her heels, Tybalt discharging a round before the SmartCartridge could get a lock on.

The girl jerked back. Before the horror of what she’d done could hit, her arm slackened, dropping Tybalt into a growing pool of blood. Her blood.

The air in the room suddenly disappeared. Piston jammed an EpiRDC into her heart and shoved her into the stairwell, slamming the fire door behind her.

Muffled shouts. More gunfire. The cold brick pressing into her back.

And then the ringing in her ears that drowned out all else.