First Angels Read online

  Ada smirked at him. “Hard-ass? Is that what you were looking at on the way up?”

  Sam blushed. Seriously, he was blushing? “I didn’t mean anything! I’m just glad I’m not alone in here anymore, that’s all. It’s lonely work.”

  She looked at him, plucking away at his beard as they walked down the darkened hall. Her eyes drifted down for a brief moment before looking back up, tracking where his eyes were looking. He was perhaps a bit whiny, and she wasn’t too into pale-haired people in general, but he seemed friendly and amusing. She couldn’t help but wonder what he was doing, getting involved in all this.

  “Sorry. Fine, Sam, you want to lighten the mood? Before you explain to me how I’m going to break into a heavily guarded compound, ask me a random question.”

  “You’ll have to figure out the breaking in by yourself - but okay, sure. What’s the one place you miss most?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “You said a random question.”

  Ada’s first thought was the cherry grove at the Institute, but she wasn’t sure if she really missed that place most, or if it was just a habitual thought. She also wasn’t sure she wanted to say so out loud. What else? She remembered floating in space between Earth and the ring, thinking of how close she had been to being able to leave the homeworld forever. And yet here she was, back on the planet, with a vow to keep. Fix everything, starting with the afterlife.

  But when she was done with that…

  “I miss the sky.”

  Sam didn’t respond, and looked a bit concerned, as though trying to puzzle out how that might be possible. Good. In her amusement, Ada felt a moment of kinship with Zhilik, always the first to make vague statements for fun.

  They stepped into a room with floor-to-ceiling windows, and across the weed-filled street stood the city’s tallest tower, mostly dark but its top floor twinkling bright. “So what am I looking at?”

  Sam nodded, and pointed to the top of the building. “The drones seem to enter and leave the second floor from the top. It’s not the only place they go, but it’s definitely the busiest. The penthouse lights are always on - I’m pretty sure that’s where the Mayor lives.”

  “How would you know that? I can barely see the windows from here.”

  “We can go up to the roof - it’s riskier, but you get a much better view.” He turned his gaze to the base of the Mayor’s tower. “The bottom few floors are a lot wider, and apparently that’s where the Mayor holds events and celebrations. There’s been a lot of traffic in the last few days, since the army started marching.”

  “The army, right.” Ada didn’t dare ask whose army it was, for fear of flagging herself, but the list of possibilities was short. “How big is it?”

  “Over two thousand is the best guess I heard, but it’s hard to know. They’re going to be setting up camp outside the city tomorrow, so you should probably make your move before then.”

  “How do I get in?”

  “There’s a main entrance - guarded - and some side entrances along the outside of the building, but those are either watched or guarded too. I wouldn’t trust them.”

  “What would you trust?”

  “Well - nothing. But the underground is probably the best bet - there are ancient basements and tunnels connecting the building to others nearby. They’re also guarded, but at least taking out the guards would be quiet. There’s one in the basement here, actually - it’s narrow and filled with pipes, but you could fit.”

  Ada nodded. “Do you know what’s inside?”

  “Guns. Gifted. There might be some code tricks here and there - he’s had a coder or two in his debt over the years.”

  “I’m not worried about coders.” Again her confidence seemed to startle Sam. If only he understood just how harmless most coders really were, relative to their potential.

  “Even so, you’ll need to be careful. I don’t know what’s going on in there - only that the Mayor has his control centre in his home, at the top of the tower.”

  She peered at the building. “That’s not a whole lot to go on, other than the basement tip. No offense.”

  “Well, hey, I am offended.”

  She smirked. “Show me the rooftop view. If I can get a better sight of what’s going on on the top floor, maybe I’ll get some more ideas.”

  “Sure thing.”

  They hit the stairs again, and she took point again. She didn’t mind if he looked.

  “If you don’t mind me asking, Ada, what makes you so sure you can handle this? What did you do, before?”

  Ada carefully considered her phrasing. “I know who I am and what I can do.” Her words echoed back to her in the narrow stairwell. “I’ve learned that success isn’t actually difficult, it’s just… elusive. Most people don’t know where to poke and prod to make things happen. I do.”

  “That sounds deep and tells me nothing.”

  “You know what else is going to tell you absolutely nothing?”

  “What?”

  She didn’t say anything, but instead kept walking up the stairs. It took him far too long to catch on.

  “Oh. Very funny.”

  “It’s true. Silence doesn’t tell you anything.”

  “It tells me you’re putting on a show.”

  Her heart almost skipped a beat. “So what if I am? Aren’t we all putting on a show?”

  Sam sighed. “Ouch. That kind of hurts, you know. This is supposed to be a new beginning, not some kind of lie.”

  “Ouch? You don’t look like you’re in pain. Look, you’re putting on another show.”

  “Hey! I have feelings.”

  Ada grinned again. “What kind of feelings? You don’t seem like a great actor, you know. Is that why you’re not doing plays?”

  “Who says I didn’t, before?”

  “The fact that you’re not a good actor.”

  Sam shook his head, but he was grinning. “Okay, you’re just being mean now.” A door appeared in front of Ada at the next flight of stairs, and he pointed. “Here it is. Let’s be careful.”

  He drew up a hood, and Ada wondered if the suit could cover her face somehow, but now was not the time to show off its technological prowess. They emerged from a closed door onto a cold, wind-swept roof, with the Mayor’s penthouse just across from them, a lighthouse in the night.

  “See?” Sam said. “I told you the view was pretty.”

  The door behind them slammed shut, and a low thrum filled the air.

  They spun around to find one of the spy drones hovering between them and the exit. Ada started to back away, but two more drones descended on either side. Ada recognized those as the weaponized combat drones.

  Sam looked surprised and reached out to grab her arm. She glanced at him. “Don’t move, these ones have guns.”

  A voice crackled from the spy drone in front of them.“Funnily enough, she’s right.”

  Sam and Ada exchanged glances. The Mayor, she assumed, kept talking.

  “Now, how she knows that, I can’t imagine. I’ll have to find out. No matter - thank you, my young man, for bringing your comrade here.”

  She snapped her eyes to Sam, and she yanked her arm away. “What the hell is he talking about?”

  Sam, for his part, looked shocked. “What? I don’t know, I -”

  “Oh, come now.” The voice was thick with amusement. “I know a ghost when I see one, and I know an informant waiting for a contact when I see one, too. Why catch one ghost yesterday when I could wait and catch two today? You weren’t even subtle! Girl, you set off an explosion in an alley barely over an hour ago. You call that sneaky?”

  Sam looked at her even as an even louder whirring started to fade into view. “What’s he talking about?”

  “Gods damn it, I don’t have to explain this shit. Hey, you - Mayor, right? I’ve got bad news for you. We’re not ghosts.”

  “Ada, if he’s been tracking us that closely, I don’t think lying is going to help.”

  Her hands crept into
her bag, reaching for her gun and the shield the outers had given her. With some luck, she could -

  Wait.

  What did Sam just say?

  “Drop the weapons!”

  The Mayor sounded angry, but she ignored him, turning to Sam. Her eyes grew wide with fear, and shame that she hadn’t even considered the possibility. She saw the same horrible realization dawn on Sam’s face. “Lying? You’re a ghost?! ”

  Sam’s voice cracked. “You’re not? ”

  “Both of you cut the act and put down your weapons, and prepare to be -”

  Ada snapped each hand out towards one of the weaponized drones, snapping the shield open in one hand and firing straight at her target with the other. The drone’s weapon discharged and impacted on her shield, staggering her, but her own attack forced the other armed drone to dodge and miss its shot.

  Sam bolted for the exit, but the spy drone bowled into him and knocked him over. One of the other drones fired at them, but its aim was off and the shot landed a meter to the right. Ada raised her gun and blasted several incendiary shots at the circling drones, but instead of setting the drones on fire the shots just splashed into glassy orange and dissipated.

  The drones were keeping on opposite sides, trying to flank her - she was the greater threat. Small honour. She dove to the ground and pressed her back against one of the many ancient machines jutting out of the building.

  Sam was on the ground, his hands on his head, staring at her with an ugly mixture of frustration and fear. “Who are you?!”

  Ada glanced at the ghost. “Ada Liu, Arbiter of the Gods.”

  She raised the shield to parry a shot, then aimed her gun straight at Sam’s face. It had stolen a body that was not its own. Her finger toyed with the trigger, brushed up against it.

  He had come from a corrupted afterlife, one broken by the mistakes and ignorance of her ancestors. One she was trying to fix.

  It had willingly destroyed a life, cast it out without even the hope of an afterlife. She steadied her aim.

  Ada didn’t pull the trigger. She didn’t have time. A carrier drone she hadn’t seen earlier swooped in with remarkably speed, barely slowing down, and grasped Sam by the shoulders, carrying him screaming into the night. She simply didn’t have time to shoot him.

  She turned and blasted the door, ray of heat bursting it open. She ran, firing wild shots off into the air as she did, feeling shards of concrete pinging against her back. She would not be taken -

  Through the exit, tripping down the stairs, she slammed hard into her forearms and dropped the gun and shield. She tasted blood, she saw it here and there, but the fucking drones were too big to fit down that stairwell. She stashed her arms away and scrambled down the stairs. She was safe.

  Ada stood up and checked herself, panting, finding shallow scrapes and cuts on her shins and arms, and feeling a cut on her lip - nothing that wouldn’t heal in a few hours. She had bought herself time to reach the ground, maybe the underground, and to attempt an escape. Time to warn Zhilik that, if he even dared come to the city, he wouldn’t be safe seeing her in the open. Time to make up for her mistakes.

  Chapter 3

  The road to Hive was long, and the rocky forest of trees all along the way changed so little that Isavel almost lost track of time. She spent long daylight hours in the company of Mother Jera, Elder Tan, Venshi, and Dendre Han. The elders at least were perfectly pleasant company, and Isavel didn’t doubt that she had much to learn from them, so she tried to be quiet and listen. Still, she envied her friends’ ability to disappear during the day without Venshi hunting them down, and always looked forward to evenings among more pleasant company.

  The morning the army arrived within sight of the city, hundreds bustled to set up camp, and for once Venshi didn’t track down Isavel to herd her towards the army’s leadership. Isavel relished the chance to fade into the background for a moment, in the midst of all the activity. She was many things, but a gods-gifted camp-maker was not one of them.

  Sunrise, eggs cooked on an ancient heating artifact, and a crate of figs were all she needed to get them together. A nice sit-down breakfast, with conversation and familiarity, was something they hadn’t shared in a few days, and something she sorely missed. She had found Rodan and Sorn easily enough, and though Marea was often floating around without clear tether or focus, Sorn had volunteered to go get her, and found her in record time. The four of them sat together, eating and looking out at the city looming over near the shore.

  Sorn looked out at the city, and then to Isavel. “So what’s the plan for today?”

  Isavel didn’t want to talk business just yet, so she shook her head. “We set up camp, then I go with the leaders into Hive to meet this mayor, I imagine. We’ll figure it out later - right now, the plan is eggs and figs. Speaking of the figs - where are they from? We never had them in my village.”

  Marea frowned, then nodded and pointed at herself, as though she had grown them at her own home. “Many grow near my village.”

  Isavel looked south, trying to imagine how far a walk that was. “These can’t have come from Sajuana, though, right?”

  “I also saw them near Fogpoint.”

  Another city still incredibly far south - not much closer than Sajuana, from what little Isavel knew. And most of that, too, was poorly-remembered retellings of her mother’s own poorly-remembered travels decades ago.

  Sorn looked to Marea and pointed south. “How was Fogpoint?”

  Marea scrunched her lips, as though trying to remember the words she needed to describe it. As she did, Rodan briefly twisted where he was sitting and raised a hand in greeting. Isavel followed his gaze and found two young women at the other end of it, smiling and waving back as they walked, their eyes flicking to Isavel as well - warriors both, by their bearing and muscular physiques.

  As Isavel’s eyes moved back to her friends, they crossed another set of eyes - dark brown eyes framed by long blue hair, all belonging to a woman in a coder’s garb. She was standing next to another coder, and they both shared similar features - pale golden-white skin, small noses, narrow eyes. Siblings, perhaps? The woman had only errantly glanced in Isavel’s direction, but Isavel was sure they had at least crossed eyes once before. Once was coincidence, but twice was intriguing.

  Isavel cleared her throat, and Marea paused explaining to Sorn to look over. “I’ll be right back - I’m going to go try and make some new friends.”

  She stood up and made for the two young coders, and the blue-haired girl froze when she saw Isavel coming towards her. The man next to he turned and jumped in surprised. She was startling them - damn. She tried smiling. “Hey - I’m sorry, we haven’t met. I’m Isavel.”

  She reached out her hand to the woman, who stammered and looked at her companion. “I - uh - yes, Saint Herald, I recognize you.” She looked at Isavel’s outstretched forearm dumbly for a moment before clasping it. “My name is Zoa Huangkin. This is my brother Ren.”

  She reached over to clasp forearms with Ren as well, and he was eyeing her with a fairly plain face, his gaze darting back to his sister. There was a sense of deferral there Isavel couldn’t place. “Zoa, Ren, nice to meet you. Please, just call me Isavel.”

  “And you, Saint - uh, Isavel.” Zoa blinked nervously. “How can we be of service?”

  “No service - you just looked a bit lost. I was wondering if you might like to join my friends and I for breakfast. I think I made a few too many eggs.”

  Zoa blushed a bit, and the coders glanced at each other. Ren raised an eyebrow and shrugged amiably. “Sure thing, Isavel, I’d be honoured, and Zoa would love to be your friend.”

  Zoa looked quietly horrified, and as Isavel grinned and turned around to lead them back to the others, she heard Zoa deliver Ren a strong punch on the shoulder. Isavel sat back down next to Sorn, and Rodan scooted over a bit to make room for the coders, glancing up at Zoa as he did.

  Isavel handed them some bowls with cooked eggs and figs, and glanced a
t them as she did, trying to guess their age. “I’ve never met coders before - at least none sprightlier than Elder Tan.”

  Ren thanked her for the food and grinned. “Yeah, he’s a pretty bad dancer, and not just because he’s a coder.”

  It was an odd comment; Isavel knew what they said about coders, how skittish and awkward they were, but couldn’t imagine why a gift from the gods would make them so. Perhaps it was their cloistered lifestyle, or just an unkind rumour. Zoa was still avoiding Isavel’s direct gaze, so Isavel addressed her directly. “Is this your first time away from the Institute?”

  Zoa shook her head. “The Institute is too big, children would get overwhelmed. Our parents left the Institute to travel, to help the common people and raise a family at the same time. They returned with us when we came of age, but we’ve been there ever since, yeah.”

  Their parents. Isavel bit off half a fig and pointed at them. “I can’t tell which of you is the older sibling.”

  Rodan grinned. “Siblings! I knew you looked similar.”

  Sorn shook his head. “No, Rodan, you’re supposed to tell siblings they look nothing alike. Trust me.”

  “It’s fine.” Zoa shook her head. “I’m just glad I got our father’s blue.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with black!” Ren said, but Rodan shook his head, running his fingers through his own blue hair.

  “Nah, I like the blue better.”

  Isavel could tell Zoa was the more anxious of the two siblings here, for whatever reason. Perhaps she could help. “He’s right, though - it’s a bit more exotic than black, Ren, I have to agree.”

  Zoa smiled sheepishly, stuffing a whole egg into her mouth, and Ren rolled his eyes. “More exotic? She was born in the same backwater village I was.”

  Zoa looked over at him, speaking through her food. “But I was born first. ”

  “Yeah, barely a year before.”

  Isavel looked from Zoa’s face to Ren’s again. “Oh, that explains that. I thought you were twins.”

  Zoa nodded. “I had some peace and quiet before he came along, yeah.”

  Isavel grinned “That bad?”

  Zoa smiled, and bit her lip. “Not always, obviously.”