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I don’t want to take Blanc’s motorcycle without asking, but I can’t find her. I consider trying to call a taxi, then realize I can’t use the Network, and I don’t have a phone like one of the unaugmented Progressionists. I shuffle past the bakery, only stopping long enough to grab my uniform and a thin baton. I stash them under my arm and then keep going, my head down.
Maybe I could ask one of the Progressionists if I could borrow their phone. But I’m not sure if it’s taboo to use someone else’s phone, and even if I did, I’m not sure how to call for a taxi with one.
The only thing I know for certain is that I still have a few hours until midnight. I should be able to make it back before then, as long as I don’t stop.
I kneel beside a lamppost to slip into my boots, which will be easier to walk in. The dress will have to suffice, since my time is limited, but I’m not going to make a two hour walk in soft slippers.
My heart skips a beat as I look ahead into the night. Street lamps run all the way down the long road, so the way back is well lit, but it’s still a long walk in unfamiliar territory.
Fae territory.
My stomach flips. Anything could happen in those two hours, and it’s not just what I might run into. I need to make sure President Saito is okay.
And if I want to confront Dr. Johnson, I need to move quickly, not be running on the short end of the jammer’s power. I promptly turn around and jog back to Blanc’s orange bike.
“Agnes, I need you to unlock and start that motorcycle.” I stare ahead at the bike, making sure it’s targeted properly in my line of sight.
My apologies, Verdi. I am unable to lock onto the motorcycle’s signature due to poor Network connectivity.
I curse, wanting to kick something. This whole mess—and the reason I can be here—is because I can’t use the Network. But there might be other options. I dig into the storage hold at the back of the bike. Blanc’s a wolf, not a human. I’m sure she has street smarts, but I’m hoping she’s lazy like humans, that convenience is more important to her than security.
A moment later, I silently thank whoever programmed her sapience chip. The fob necessary to start the engine is at the very bottom of the storage hold, buried under an old handgun and a plastic sandwich bag of jerky. Maybe I’ll buy Blanc some fancy, expensive jerky if I get out of this alive, my way of saying “thanks” for borrowing her bike.
I rev the engine. The bike shudders beneath me as I get a feel for its power. Then I zoom down the street, lampposts shooting to either side. The night wind is cool and damp, and it doesn’t take long for me to reach the smoggy part of the city where everything smells like diesel.
I’m not even back in the inner city; this is the edge of the suburbs, a little past the Snow estate.
A dog bays low and mournful in the back of my head.
A shudder runs down my spine. Goosebumps fly up my arms. I swallow a gulp and don’t stop the bike, fighting the urge to look behind me.
The jammer should be working, so there shouldn’t be any way their howls can get through the Network. But that’s what it feels like... a mental Network call sent by a NEL, one with a cruel sense of what their voice should sound like.
A flash of a dark blur soars overhead, briefly blotting out the lights from the street lamps. I focus on that blur, bringing the creature up in my enhancements. My breath catches in my throat. It’s a falcon...
Like the one who once encouraged me to go after Maria. To blind her because he thought she was blinding the NEL with her beliefs. Does he work for Dr. Johnson or the Fae?
Or is this someone I haven’t met?
I expect him to speak to me, chiding me for my choices, but nothing comes. And I can’t hear anything above the dull roar of the engine muted by my helmet. So I shouldn’t be hearing anything unless it’s a ping in the Network... and I shouldn’t be hearing that, either.
That low, mournful wail rises again, so soft at first that I swear I’m imagining it, and then grows louder, more pressing, until it roars through my head and I can barely see straight.
I know that sound. It’s that same sound I heard when I was on the mission with Kay. What I heard when the NEL wolves chased me onto the pigeon fancier’s estate.
Fae wolves. They’re hunting.
“Agnes, mute the Network!” I shout, my voice panicked. “Block those calls!”
The recent calls are on an encrypted frequency I cannot lock out. Are you certain you wish to mute the Network?
I gnash my teeth, focusing hard on the streaks of yellow road lines zipping past me. I need to get out of this neighborhood, and I don’t want to hide in a pigeon house again. The jammer may be strong enough to block most signals and knock out the usual Network, but if that sound is coming from where I think it is, then it’s not exactly the Network. It’s being rerouted, somehow put on a different frequency or IP or some techno jargon I don’t understand because I’m a huntress, not a computer technician.
Something flickers in the motorbike’s left mirror. A faint, ghostly blue light. First there’s one, then three, then five. I swallow hard.
These aren’t just wolves.
They’re Fae.
I push the motorcycle faster, hoping I can outrun my pursuers when that low call blasts through my head with all the force of a French horn right next to my ear. I swerve sharply, bouncing up the curb and onto the sidewalk before I swerve again, narrowly missing one of the lampposts.
So long as they can sound that call, I can’t drive safely. I’m more likely to crash into a fence than I am to escape.
I spin the bike back around and park myself dead center of the street, head-on with the five headlights coming my way. I take a deep breath and check that my helmet strap is tightened. If I can’t run, I’ll have to fight.
The five blue lights approach at record speed, no sign of stopping. Ahead of them, several dark blurs zip across the road, trailing a strange, smoky substance. My eyes widen. I didn’t get a close look at the wolves hunting me last time, but now I see the swarm of nanite Assist bots swirling like black clouds.
I tighten my fingers around the handlebars, my knuckles white. I wish I’d gone ahead and taken the time to switch into my huntress uniform. My dress is going to be useless.
Right as the Fae come into full view, the five bikes skid to a halt, blocking the road going back to the SNP ball. The smoky blurs ahead of them tumble to a stop as well, but they continue their chorus of barks and growls.
They look... otherworldly, to be honest. Three of the enhanced creatures are canine, one a pitch black wolf swarming with nanites that causes his form to melt and shift, more like a creature of fog than the wolf he used to be. Two giant wolfhounds stand next to him with wiry gray fur. They, too, trail nanite smoke, but their fur is still visible underneath the swarm. The last creature, the one at the front, is a cheetah with black fur. Genetically altered and then enhanced. The Fae who own them must be rich.
I can’t read their Network tags due to the jammer, but I seriously doubt the Fae would have free NEL on their side. Rogue, maybe. Free, no. The Fae are as likely to own their human workers, even though it’s illegal.
The ghostly NEL pace across the road, awaiting instructions, but they no longer chase after me except to give the occasional lunge and then sharply pull back, as if someone yanked on an invisible leash.
I look up at the riders, then let out my breath. They are utterly beautiful in a terrifying, unconventional way.
The one at the lead is a tall man with willowy limbs and pale blond hair floating across his back. And it actually floats, wisps of gray tugging at the ends from nanites. His eyes are a piercing, bright blue that glows from a distance, tiny rings of light swirling under each iris. His entire face is smooth and perfectly symmetrical, the main source of his uncanny otherworldliness, and he has surgically-pointed ears. He also wears a nanite suit... ridiculously expensive material that shifts as its owner desires.
I think he might be the Fae I met at the mansion with Kay, but I’m not sure. If he is, he changed his face to be every-so-slightly different from how he looked like before.
He dismounts his bike, and even as he does, the suit ripples across his skin, changing into a white and gold tunic that fits tightly across his chest, though open in the front. By the time the transformation is complete, he looks like a prince from a fairy tale... his floating blond hair held back in a glittering circlet shaped with circuitry designs, his uniform glowing of its own accord. He looks like a fallen star standing on the road behind his terrible hunting pack.
A deadly star.
I swallow hard and hold my ground. They’ll enjoy the chase too much if I try to run. My gaze flickers to my wrists. I have full poison vials, so that’s a plus, even if they’re only knock-out serums.
I follow the Fae’s lead and dismount my bike, but doubt flickers in the back of my mind. I have the poisons, but what good is that going to do?
The Fae are so covered in nanites, so infused with them that my injections might not even work. It’s like their whole bodies are made of the same stuff that allows me to remove the vials from my wrists. And the only other weapon I have with me is a thin baton and Blanc’s handgun, but those are stashed in the bike’s storage hold. I might not be able to get to them fast enough, and there’s no guarantee her gun is loaded.
Except...
Maybe I don’t need those weapons. Even if my poisons do nothing to the Fae, I can get as much of it out as possible. That way, once the jammer runs out of power, I don’t have to worry about Dr. Johnson using my own weapon against me.
My lips part in surprise.
I can use the jammer against the Fae.
It’ll have to be a last resort, since I don’t know how much power it has left, and I’ll have to take time to find the button to boost its power. But if I can make its field stronger, it won’t only affect me, it’ll affect the Fae, too. Not enough to truly hurt them, but enough to disorient them.
That’s the thing about relying so heavily on nanites. It’s the same reason Maria and the Progressionists don’t like the idea of augments.
Anti-tech fields will disrupt them.
The Fae leader strides toward me, the tail of his tunic drifting despite the lack of wind. A swarm of nanites trickles around his fingers. I have no doubt he has an internal communications device and is fully capable of ordering the cloud via thought.
He quirks an unnerving smile, cocky. And there it is again, that low, crippling horn blast in the back of my mind. My knees buckle and I automatically try to clasp my hands over my ears, though the exercise is fruitless. Not just because I have a helmet in the way, but because the sound is inside my head, as if he was visiting on an augmented reality call, not standing before me.
Can you still hear me with that device of yours?
I glare at him through the helmet’s glass. It should be obvious, given my reaction to the horn. “What do you think?”
His grin widens, showing perfectly white teeth. Wonderful, he thinks to me.
The other four riders dismount and come to stand beside him. Two of them are women, the other two men, though it’s a bit hard to tell their sexes given that all of them are nearly androgynous, their features focused on emphasizing symmetrical exactness with wide, glowing eyes—one lady has golden eyes that glow like the sun on the window screens, while one of the men has silver eyes—and well... a perfectness that doesn’t quite seem to work in my brain. For a moment, I wonder if this is their actual form, augmented and enhanced beyond human capacity, or if they’re using their re-routed Network to project an augmented illusion.
That might explain why their image simply doesn’t sit right.
I almost think I’m worrying too much about it, but what is illusion and what isn’t can make all the difference in a fight. I need to at least have some idea of which part of them is real—such as that cloud of unformed Assist bots.
Normally those would be tightened up in a ball. They usually don’t float around so loosely because it takes more power, though the bots can hover at will. I’m not sure where the Fae are pulling the energy for their nanites from, but it has to come from somewhere.
Somewhere guarded. If I can hit that with a strong blast from the jammer, I might be able to weaken them long enough to escape.
Of course, that’s assuming I don’t use all the power from the jammer and end up with my senses completely scrambled, unable to fight because of the disorientation from the house arrest program.
But I’m pretty sure the swarms are real. What the Fae really look like... that I’m not sure about. I probably won’t be able to figure that out until I go to inject them. The real question is, who is going to run out of power first?
The Fae and their nanite augments?
Or my jammer?
The latter is a lot more likely.
“Why are you chasing me?” I demand, though I doubt they’ll answer.
Their leader’s grin widens, bordering on too wide for his face and stretching the mask of perfection he’s trying so hard to emulate. You tried to run, Huntress. But you belong to Koenigin. We’ve offered to fetch you.
“Koenigin’s dead!” I snap, though his words confirm this must have something to do with Dr. Johnson or Kay. I clench my hands at my sides. “I don’t belong to anyone!”
The Fae quirks his head, but his hair remains exactly as it is. A shudder runs down my spine. She’ll never die, Huntress. Not when she’s a changeling like us.
My breath catches in my throat. How does he know her mind was downloaded into a changeling body? Did Kay tell him? Dr. Johnson? How is all this connected? It has to be connected... and it somehow is, right back to my dear president. But I’m missing a piece that links them all together.
I raise my chin, trying to bluff. Trying to buy myself time I don’t have. “I’m surprised you’re interested in such an ugly changeling form, looking at... yourselves.” I wave my hand in their general direction. All of them now stand in the glory that is Fae... one of the women in a deep, emerald green dress that floats around her ankles, the other woman almost attractive—save for how uncanny she looks—in a sleeveless turtleneck that hugs her curves, while one of the men is shirtless and showing abs that Goldfinch would be drooling over, and the other wears a loose, satin shirt rolled up at the sleeves.
All of them are taller than I am and glow with their own light. And all of them look somehow wrong, as if the perfection that graces them somehow makes them imperfect.
Their leader frowns, trying to piece through what I’ve just asked him.
You think her changeling form is ugly? He strides forward and tries to loop his finger under my chin. I jerk away, one hand upraised and poised to strike. He’s only a few inches from me. If I grab him, I can try injecting him with my toxins. I can see if he’s more nanite than human.
I’m surprised, he continues, his thought voice smooth and low, to the point I don’t think I’d be able to hear it if it wasn’t in my head. Especially considering the fondness you show the SNP’s pet. Do you not think they resemble each other?
I blink, confused. Of course President Koenigin and Maria Snow resembled each other. They had a clear mother-daughter resemblance, once I knew to look. In all fairness, that might be why my dear president was so angry Maria entered the beauty contest. It wouldn’t take long for someone to realize the similarities were so striking that there might be a connection.
But once my president’s impression was implanted in the miner body, she was no longer beautiful by anyone’s standards, and least of all the Fae.
I stare at him, puzzled. Then a creeping realization settles into me.
Koenigin Corp isn’t the only one with changeling technology. The Fae have it as well; that’s how they adjust their bodies if they don’t use the nanites.
The Fae leader’s eyebrows rise in understanding. You didn’t know, did you? You didn’t realize Koenigin has a new body. Something better than what the NEL gave her.
I shake my head. It’s completely possible, but I never stopped to consider that Dr. Johnson might have lied about the impression in the changeling miner being the only one. It makes sense, then, why Kay said that the woman in the miner’s body, my dear president, was an impostor.
It was a different impression.
For a moment, elation runs through me. If Koenigin is alive, that means the trial can go forward as planned. Maria might finally get her resolution, as can all the NEL who were harmed. And maybe, just maybe, my dear president will come to realize that what she did was wrong.
Then Maria can meet her mother... and I can have my mother back.
Maybe the impression the Fae refers to came from before all this started, and she never ordered me to harm Maria in the first place!
It’s an enticing thought.
But my elation quickly fades.
Why would this Fae think I had seen her new body and known it was new, to have considered it beautiful in comparison? I haven’t seen Koenigin since the NEL took her impression. And before that, I had no reason to think she had a changeling body.
I lick my lips.
Her new body must look similar to her previous one, but be different enough to keep from drawing undue attention. There would be no reason for this Fae to assume I had met her, unless this is the same Fae I saw at the mansion. Then he would have seen me with the one person I only recently met who fits his description.
The one person with pale skin and sleek black hair reminiscent of Maria Snow... and of Koenigin. A huntress whose augments were clearly better than my own when I fought her—a body better than what the NEL gave her, and better than her original.
A huntress who called the miner changeling an imposter and killed her, because she couldn’t stand to see any version of herself in such an ugly form.
Kay... for Koenigin.
The Fae’s puzzled expression spreads into a slow grin. Ah, there we are, little huntress. That’s the look I expected. You’ve figured it out, haven’t you?
Kay is a changeling with Koenigin’s impression inside her.
That’s why none of us remembered meeting her before.
Except...
She’s not actually Koenigin. Not exactly. President Koenigin would have made it clear she was in charge, not Dr. Johnson. So why is Johnson calling the shots?
I think I understand. Koenigin wanted to shape Maria to be the perfect huntress. With a few adjustments to her impression, Koenigin could have had that wish. Messing with impression technology is something Dr. Johnson is capable of, and I’m sure she would love to play with.
And I think she already has.
A chill shakes through me before I can stop it, and now the Fae leader’s eyes quirk with amusement as he sees that I finally get what he was saying.
Kay is a changeling, and if I’m right, Dr. Johnson has made her into a perfect huntress.
