‘But we searched the place top to bottom!’ I said.
‘Not hard enough,’ Kowalski said. ‘We’ve got a lock on them. Let’s move out, before they know we’re onto them.’
I scraped off the seat. As I reached an arm out, I realised I’d been immobile for too long and the suit’s energy system had guttered out. I was exposed. Time I was long gone.
Then I saw the coil of platinum cabling feeding into the wall from a few strategically placed crates. A box wired up to the operation, familiar-looking knobs gleaming.
Fusebombs.
It’d had been half a decade since I’d witnessed the devastating effects of one of these things but I was never going to forget the immolating blast of heat that fried every photoreceptor in my eye. The acrid stink of smoke. How quickly the explosion spread in burning arcs along the grasslands.
I swallowed and nudged a few server cabinets aside to unearth half a dozen more fusebombs, all rigged up and ready to blow.
Oh hell.
I heard the muffled whine of a thin-gun priming behind my back. ‘Don’t move. Throw down the weapons.’
A small tightness clenched around my stomach. The voice was muffled by a helmet, giving me no clue who it was. ‘What gave me away?’ I asked. I heard Kowalski and Grim curse as they cottoned on.
‘Motion-detectors in the office. There was nothing on the cams so I almost didn’t investigate. Now, get moving.’
I’d have kicked myself if I wouldn’t get shot for doing it. I unstrapped the weapons from my harness and let them thunk to the floor. I raised my hands, fingers spread.
‘Who are you?’ he demanded. ‘What do you want?’
‘I was in the room when we offered you protection against terrorists. Remember that?’ I chuckled without humour. ‘You must have been laughing at us the whole time.’ I turned around.
‘I’m doing what I have to do,’ hissed Joreth. The Torven’s hand was shaking as he held the thin-gun, the laser targeting sights trained square on my chest. He stared at me through the transparent visor of his spherical helmet. He wore a bright-red suit, the glossy material flame-resistant.
‘Explain to me how blowing up your own museum solves anything,’ I said.
‘Everything’s possible with you people, isn’t it?’ Joreth sneered. ‘So idealistic and naive.’
‘You can’t possibly be part of the Suns,’ I said, aware Kowalski and Grim were listening to every word and would hopefully send backup. The alien’s face twisted. Bullseye. ‘Why do their dirty work for them?’
Joreth couldn’t meet my eye. ‘I have two daughters. I had to make a choice: blow up this building, or they’d destroy our home with them inside it.’
I flexed my muscles, clenching my fists, rebuilding the suit’s energy charge. I wasn’t going to stand here and let the Suns get away with this. Not again. Joreth’s heart might not be in following through with this, but I know when someone’s prepared to do whatever it takes to keep their family safe. Even shooting an unarmed prisoner to keep him quiet. ‘We can help you.’ I realised the we I meant was Harmony. ‘Protect you. Smuggle you into hiding.’
‘No. It won’t work—’
‘Of course it can work!’ I hissed. ‘Listen to me. We can have your whole family safely on a lungship tonight, departing to any outpost in any system you want.’
‘It should have blown already,’ Joreth murmured, as if he hadn’t heard a word I’d said.
‘Listen to me,’ I said, injecting desperation into my voice.
‘They must know something’s wrong.’ Joreth talked over me.
‘Listen to me!’ I begged.
Joreth’s finger tightened around the trigger. ‘They might be on their way to my house already.’
‘Listen to me!’ I yelled, panting hard. They couldn’t do this to us. Not again. I spoke fast, aware every second we delayed risked alerting the Suns. ‘Think about the message you’re going to send. You’ll be destroying an alien cultural archive, destroying a symbol of the Common’s effort to welcome and integrate other species. On behalf of a terrorist cult who hate their guts. The rise in stormtech? The Bluing Out? The attacks? That’s them.’ My mouth had turned uncomfortably dry. ‘You’re a Torven. Your people took decades to integrate into Compass, centuries to fill this place with your valuables. Why would you destroy it all now?’
‘None of that means anything if they kill my family,’ Joreth said.
‘There’s another way,’ I begged.
‘There isn’t,’ the alien said, almost kindly. ‘I’m sorry.’
But I wasn’t.
I rushed him. My suit had fully recharged and I clawed at the alien’s arm with invisible hands, trying to knock the weapon away. The surface of his suit was slippery, letting him wrestle free, firing twice. Even if I were invisible, at point-blank range he couldn’t miss, and both shots punched into my shoulder. I was slammed into the wall with bone-jarring force, my head knocking against something metal. Stars swarmed my vision. I collapsed, visible again, clamping a hand to my bleeding shoulder. Blood soaked my suit as I crawled to my knees, groaning. I felt blue worming up my chest like ivy climbing in fast-forward, circling the injury and smothering the pain. The bullet was popped out as the stormtech welded my flesh together, faster than I’d ever known it.
Joreth watched me with narrowed eyes down the holographic sights of his thin-gun, before lowering the weapon and backing away. ‘Joreth, wait, don’t,’ I begged, still on my knees. My words were swallowed up in the metallic echo of the door slamming shut and sealing me inside.
37
Burning
I reeled to my feet, shoulder throbbing in agony.
‘Vak!’ Katherine’s voice was filled with fear. ‘We’re coming to get you!’
‘Get out of there!’ Grim yelled.
‘I can’t,’ I told them, my heart sinking into my guts. No windows. No exit, no way out. The cable duct gaped mockingly above me, at least three metres too high to reach. No amount of stormtech would armour me from the searing heat of a fusebomb explosion. My flesh would melt like wax
