Reela stops.
‘Go on,’ urges Jem.
The Vagrant looks down, very quickly looks up again, leaning back against the rock.
‘You know what they say, you should never look dow— Wait! Don’t you look, Reela! I said don’t look!’
The girl begins to overbalance, sliding towards the side. Tugging on an arm each, the two men pull her back. There is a long creaking sound as the cables adjust to the shifting weight.
They all freeze until it settles, clinging to the wall, to each other.
Jem is the first to move, pushing the others into action.
They work their way down, zigzagging back and forth along the rock face. About three quarters of the way, a cable twangs loose.
There is a lurch, brief and fast, then the remaining cables catch.
As the three of them ease their way along, the lean of the walkway becomes more pronounced, slowly succumbing to gravity. Like a drunkard falling over, it takes its time.
‘Run!’ shouts Jem.
And they do.
The Vagrant scoops Reela into his arms, head low as he accelerates, Jem at his heels.
Their feet hammer fast, raindrops on a rooftop, echoing loud all around them. Only two levels up now, the Vagrant’s feet start to slip, unable to cope with the acute angle of the floor; he leans back, trying to keep from falling over. Jem, unable to stop, unable to get past the slower man, shouts, ‘Come on—’
Rock groans, final cables come loose. The entire walkway falls away from the cliff, bellyflopping into dirty sand and stone.
The three inside it slam together against the mesh wall, then bounce, to fall again, a tangled heap of arms and legs.
For a while, all is still.
Reela sits up, her younger body managing the impact better than the adults. She holds up a hand and inspects it. The crisscross imprint of the walkway runs up her palm and the outside of her little finger. There is blood where a nail has been torn. At the sight of it she starts to shake. A bottom lip falls from formation, trembles.
Jem springs up, suddenly alert. He presses his face against the mesh trying to see through it, then turns back to the others. ‘Is everyone alright?’
With a sigh, the Vagrant levers himself up onto one elbow.
Reela shows them her hand with a look of infinite woe.
‘Ouch,’ says Jem. ‘That looks painful.’ He goes back to the mesh. ‘I think we’re safe. I can’t see anyone else nearby.’
The Vagrant looks at her hand and, with a flourish, produces his own. Amid the calluses are new bruises, a bleeding knuckle and a thumb twice as big as its counterpart.
Reela nods, impressed. She takes a deep breath and her lip settles again.
Climbing out of the wreckage of the walkway, they see Greyspot Three from ground level. Aerial bombardment has destroyed any sense of landscaping the place might have had. Craters have given buildings new shapes, added ugly valleys. Lumps of churned earth make new hills, some of them still burn, slowly melting into puddles of slag.
It is a dead place but not everyone here is dead. Survivors sit and stand, united in shock, blending with the debris. They barely notice the newcomers, barely even notice their surroundings.
Jem does. He picks up on glints in the rubble, moving from one to the other, searching for treasures amidst the chaos. He finds a few coins, one of them platinum, precious, and a bonding gun with half a cartridge still intact.
While he does this, the Vagrant looks back up to the top of the cliff. Sunslight glints off a silver figure as she steps off the edge. Wings open, dazzling, turning a fall into a dive, then a glide as she swoops low over the ground, heading straight towards them.
The sight of her returns the survivors to life. As one they scream, scattering in all directions.
Jem, Reela and the Vagrant run too, but do not get far before her shadows rush overhead. The three come to a stop as Delta lands in front of them. She looks from left to right, her eyes bleak as she surveys the wreckage, before coming to rest on a nearby corpse pile.
Jem starts to edge away but the Vagrant takes his arm, gripping tight. He drops slowly to one knee, pulling the other two with him.
Delta pulls out a body from the pile. The arms are asymmetrical, one thicker and longer than the other. She pulls out a skull, ordinary, small, and raises it in the palm of her hand. ‘How has it come to this?’
The question is rhetorical but the Vagrant stands, drawing her gaze. He points out to sea, and when she looks, she sees a set of receding specks riding distant waves. A fleet bearing the symbol of the Winged Eye. Above them, ponderous, floats Alpha’s sky palace.
Delta closes her eyes.
One Thousand and Fifty-One Years Ago (#ulink_a8b2bcbe-f27b-507b-850f-671ff0f20446)
Massassi makes the final adjustments to the metal by hand. Somehow, this feels appropriate, as this is to be the most personal of her creations.
The work is a slow race. It does not matter if she finishes today or tomorrow, in a year or three years. The Breach is quiet and her empire is stable. The threat here is internal rather than external: Massassi is racing her own degeneration.
For some, this would lead to depression or collapse but for Massassi it is a spur. There is a clearly defined challenge and a theory on how to meet it. She’ll be damned if something irrelevant like her physical body is going to get in the way.
The main shell that she works on has already been shaped by powerful machines. The form of a man cast in metal. She knows people respond instinctively to height and so she has made him taller than any normal human, imposing, authoritative. The kind of shape that demands obedience.
Broad shoulders are added, and the suggestion of curves, muscular. Such things are unnecessary and bear no relation to her creation’s actual ability, but she is making a symbol as much as a tool, one that should inspire confidence.
She works long hours, finding hidden reserves of energy now that she has removed herself from the demands of politics and rulership.
As she hammers and smooths, a face begins to take shape beneath her tools. A strong face, proud, regal. It is only when she is finished that she sees the amalgam of her past in there. Features of her supervisor blend with Insa’s, which in turn blend with the Neuromaster she met decades ago, and with the first man sent to kill her when she was still a child. A disparate group to draw upon but all were confident in their abilities, many of them opposing her, and all were bent to her will.
Standing back to look at the shell, she cannot escape the sense that something is missing. It is not enough that the chosen form be large, impressive. She needs it to be bigger than humanity, something to stand above, to provoke wonder.
Then it comes to her: Wings. She will give her creation wings. She intends to instil many qualities and gifts, practical, important, why not add something for fun? A rare smile finds its way to her face as she begins the modifications.
One change soon leads to another, a whole set of new challenges presenting themselves: the need for aerodynamics and the practicalities of functional wings on a humanoid shape.
Good, she thinks. Her life has been one long series of challenges. Why change things now?
Time passes in a blur of thinking, designing, working and sweating, cursing and smiling.
As the shell nears completion, Massassi starts work on its weapon. She has made swords before for her Seraph Knights. Each carries a tiny fraction of her essence, activated through song. She has kept them simple, limited in scope by the skill of the users. No such limits apply here. She intends to make something with its own consciousness. Part ally, part extension, a connected but separate entity.
Metal is folded in on itself, again and again, the edge honed to cut, the blade tuned to focus and discharge essence.
She gives the sword an eye, setting it into the winged crosspiece. Her idea is that the connection will run both ways, allowing the sword to inform its wielder of new developments on the battlefield and, if necessary, guide their arm in combat.
