But then it levels out. Marlowe doesn’t waste a moment: he leaps to the floor, grabs more weapons from the wall racks, sprints across the chamber—and through the door and down into the room where he and Haskell rode out the takeoff. He rushes into the cockpit-access corridor, reaches the cockpit. The door is open. He looks inside.
To find Haskell lolling in her straps. He lunges to her side. She’s still breathing. He shakes her. She doesn’t respond. He shakes her harder. She opens her eyes. She smiles weakly.
“You’re back.”
“What happened.”
“They threw me out of the zone,” she replies. “They almost killed me.”
“The drones?”
“Not them.
“That’s where the Rain are,” she says. “That’s where they’re based. They’re hacking us at point-blank range. They’re too close for our own side to jam.”
“Why didn’t they do this earlier?” says Marlowe.
“Don’t you understand? We’re dealing with something that works through proxies.” She’s whispering now. “That set this creature Morat and all his creatures against us. That only gets involved when it has to. They have us, Jason.”
“We’ve still got suit-jets,” he says. “We bail out.”
“We can’t.”
“Why not?”
“Same reason we couldn’t earlier. The hack controls this ship’s weapons.”
“You didn’t disable them?”
“I didn’t have a chance,” she snaps. “We’d be like fish in a barrel. We’ll be shredded long before we get to sea.”
“Then what are you saying we do? Just wait to be taken?”
“No,” she says suddenly. “We cut the ground out from under it.”
“How?”
“We get out on the hull. We take down the comlink. We shear off all means via which it can ram its signal into us.”
“Works for me,” he says.
He crouches down once more upon the cockpit floor, bends once again to the trapdoor. He severs wires to deprive the thing that controls the ship of any chance of forestalling him. He works the manuals, opens the door and crawls in. He looks back up at her.
“Go,” she says.
But he says nothing—just starts down the chute. She pushes the door shut behind him. He wriggles all the way to the bottom—the airlock door that’s the miniature of the one back in the cargo bay. He disables its locks manually and opens it. He slides through into the tiny room within, pulls the door shut behind him, and disables the charges he placed there. He works more manual overrides and pulls the last door open.
City’s crammed up against his face. Buildings at least a klick high are streaking by. Marlowe holds on as best he can—pushes his feet against the walls of the chamber, extends his hands to the opposite wall, lowers his head. He’s staring back along the ship’s undercarriage. Its wings are extended for the landing. Ships are scattered across the city sky beyond it. There seem to be several formations of them.
But Marlowe’s main focus is on a certain panel just behind the rear wheel wells. He’s trying to get line of sight to it. He has to lean out farther. He’s practically hanging out of the forward escape hatch.
Which is when the ship starts to writhe once more. Marlowe activates what’s left of the magnetic clamps in what’s left of his suit and sidles out upon the hull. He clings to it as it slopes and slants and turns. Each and every view now contains nothing save buildings. They’re totally enclosed by city. It roofs them in as they fly ever deeper into its depths. It constrains the extent to which the hack can send the ship on erratic courses. Which means Marlowe’s still holding on. And lining up that comlink once again…
In the cockpit above: Haskell watches as the ship’s suddenly free once again. Controls cry out for someone to control them. The flight path starts to waver. The nearest buildings close in. But Haskell doesn’t panic. She’s scarcely strong enough to access zone, but she’s still slotting out the wires, plugging herself back in once more— taking command as though there’d been no interruption whatsoever. She seamlessly pulls the ship back onto its flight path. She starts calling up the maps of HK. She starts looking for a way out.
But suddenly she sees something on the screens. The ship’s cameras: she whirls around, starts firing with her pistol.
Bullets catch Morat in the chest. He doesn’t break stride. His hands flash silver. Blades whip through the air. Haskell cries out as blood bursts from her wrists. She moans, drops the pistol, doubles over, lets endorphins surge through her on automatic response. The pain subsides. The bleeding doesn’t—and then the knives rip from her flesh, slice through the wires that connect her to the controls, carve back through the air toward Morat. He catches them, sheathes them in his skin, moves in toward her. He backhands her across the face, backhands her again— and then hurls her against the cockpit wall. She sprawls on the floor while he turns his attention to the controls.
“Thus begins the next thousand years,” he says.
And starts up the landing sequence—sets it on automatic, turns back to Haskell, reaches out, sprays foam onto her wrists to halt her bleeding.
“There’s something I’d like to show you,” he says.
He drags her to her feet and pulls her up against the controls. He shoves her up toward the window.
“Our welcoming committee,” he says.
She hears explosions sounding from somewhere close at hand. Glare from outside lights up the cockpit, catches missiles rising skyward. Sides of buildings slash by. Lasers sear past the window. HK’s all around.
“You’ve rigged whole blocks,” she says.
“We bought whole blocks,” he replies. “Front companies, derelict housing, epic bribery—so much for the first wave of pursuit. So much, too, for your man. As soon as we got a bead on him, we dropped him. He’s already gone.”
“You don’t know that,” she says. “You’re lying.”
“It’s you who’s lying,” he says. “To yourself. But you’ll get it eventually. Once we land, I’ll let you watch the replay. In fact, I’ll
“I’ll kill you,” she whispers.
“Then you’d better act fast,” says Morat. “Look what we’re heading for.”
She sees something in among the approaching buildings. She realizes that amidst all the roads and roofs and skyways, it’s possible to trace a straight line—one long slash that cuts across them. It’s well-done. Here it’s a bridge that connects two towers. There it’s a ramp that’s swiveling. It’s pedways from whom the people are now scattering. It’s reinforced struts now sliding into place. It’s something whose pieces were always there, whose lacks were long contemplated—and then compensated for by structures positioned on hinges upon which they would turn as one.
Creating a runway.
“Shit,” says Haskell.
“The chosen ground,” says Morat.
And suddenly looks down to see Jason Marlowe at his feet. The mech’s already firing—opening up with a pistol at point-blank range. Morat loses his grip on Haskell, sprawls backward: falls onto his back as Marlowe pulls himself up into the cockpit. He keeps his gun pointed at Morat while Haskell pulls backward on the stick. The ship swerves upward.
But Morat’s already getting back on his feet. Smoke’s rising in wisps from where Marlowe’s shot part of his
