Page 42 of The Only Way Out Is Up

“’oo went to Malkuth?” she says, a little impeded by the candy. “’eally?”

“I’ll tell you the whole story sometime.” I pat her shoulder. “Right now it’s time for another of my trademark collapses into bed.” I didn’t get much sleep last night.

My room is a disaster; more than usual, I mean, thanks to Rekas’s thugs. I sweep debris off the bed and pass out for a while. When I wake up all my limbs are cramped and sore from last night’s exertions, so I spend a while lying on my back like a dead beetle. Eventually I coax them into motion again and make it as far as the bathroom.

There’s no time to waste lying around, though. I’ve got three days to get the Mark 4 up and running. First step is to assess the damage done by the Clawmarks—fortunately minor, though they swiped a few sigils that were lying around. I jury-rig my broken worktable with a spare length of wood and spread out my remaining parts, making a mental note of what I’m going to need.

Ekkeban is startled, to say the least, when I stroll in with Weslai’s sack of bits and an extensive shopping list. As I hand over the money, I have a brief moment of doubt; the sack is enough to feed us for months, and I’m blowing it all on runic parts. Then I remember Spike’s eye, and my resolve hardens. It would be enough to feed us, except that Rekas would take most of it, and even then he’d soon be back for more. I need to solve this problem for good, not just buy us another few weeks, and Ky is my best shot. So I let myself give in to the desire for shiny things, and now I have a stack of red sigils and even a precious handful of oranges.

Star, still in his thief body, clambers up through the trapdoor to watch me work. Now that I have the parts, I lay out the basic control infrastructure of the Mark 4—a central socket where his foundation sigil will go, surrounded by a cradle of threading wire studded with FAST and NIMBLE enhancers. This is the core, the runic equivalent of a brain. Ordinary runics, like the idiot, have a bunch of sigils surrounding their foundation in order to enable complex behavior. Star’s cores are much simpler because the THINK sigil does most of the work.

The wire loops out from the core in several redundant paths—important for resilience—to the base of each limb, where it connects to the primary MOVE sigils. These are all orange, something I’ve never been able to afford before. Star will have more raw power than ever. Along the wires and inside the limbs themselves are more enhancers, FAST and STRONG, necessary to maintain the right balance between power and flexibility.

[Statement: I appreciate your attention to detail.]

Thanks.

[Worry: it would be very awkward if you were to forget a screw and my head fell off mid-fight.]

I’ll keep that in mind, I send dryly.

[Observation: the limb base joints seem vulnerable.]

I thought about that. I’m going to try to build a little armored collar around them if we have time. I just don’t want to interfere with your range of motion.

[Satisfaction: I knew there was a reason I kept you around.]

I snort, laying out more sigils. After a moment, though, I pause.

You’re okay with this, right? I know I asked you before, but you’re going to be the one doing the actual fighting here. I know you can’t really get hurt, but…

[Dismissal: this will be safer than fighting Twisted. I am unlikely to be lost forever under a pile of junk.]

That’s true.

[Observation: if you are killed, I am sure Weslai can find a buyer for me.]

He means it as a joke, so I laugh. But I’m not sure it’s funny.

And… you don’t mind fighting other runics? Breaking them? It’s not killing them, not exactly, but somehow it still feels unsettling.

[Certainty: no. You have seen them. They are not like me.]

I know. I hesitate. What about Pader? It doesn’t bother you?

[Dismissal: why should killing a human bother me? You meat creatures are so fragile you die accidentally all the time.]

I guess moral scruples are my department, then. I don’t regret telling Star to do it—Pader was going to kill Ky—but the ease with which Star’s blade went through his throat is engraved in my memory. I close my eyes for a moment and shake my head.

As long as you’re on board. You can change your mind.

[Assertion: that would leave you “up shit creek,” an expression I do not understand.]

Nobody does. I shrug. I’d find some other way.

[Dubious: alternate options are lacking. In any event, this path seems promising, and I wish to pursue it.] He pauses a moment. [Admission: I am… curious.]

Curious? This is new. What about?