Emily Wilson
Stories
6
Chapters
1,139
Words
357.3 K
Comments
0
Reading
1 d, 5 h
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The stairwell was buried under chunks of concrete and steel large and heavy enough to flatten trucks, but the ceiling was high, and the gap in it gave me a view of the chamber beyond, lit by the red emergency lights. My view of Scion was obstructed by the rubble on the stairs, but I saw the golden glow that he cast off. He was so small, so far away. The The room looked like an aircraft hangar. My bugs reached out, and I could only sense the three walls closest to me. Vast. The partner filled the…-
167 •
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It wasn’t the most comfortable journey. I could handle uncomfortable. Uncomfortable was better than being upstairs and staring down the bastard that was exterminating humanity. The opening of the tunnel had ridges, bumps and uneven edges that scraped past me with enough speed and force that I worried it would damage my costume. Probably intentional, giving traction to the ones who weren’t digging. But we passed that area and we hit smoother metal. Traction was harder to come by, the tunnel almost a…
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167 •
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“Weaver,” Cuff said. Her voice was pitched low enough that Satyr wouldn’t hear. I turned my head her way to acknowledge her. Satyr seemed to be preoccupied, sitting on a stair, picking something out of a groove in his golden belt. Dried blood? “You’re doing that crazy mastermind thing again,” Cuff said. “Which crazy mastermind thing?” “Where you talk to the “Scion,” Satyr said. “You heard me?” Cuff asked. Then, after a pause, she asked, “ I spoke up, “Leonid’s…
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167 •
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Prisoners and case fifty-threes flooded into the narrow corridors, making their way into the special cells. I gestured, urging others to move. They shifted until their backs were against the wall. Golem and Cuff even stepped onto the bed, to get out of the way. I found myself by the door. Mantellum wasn’t close enough to blind my bugs, so I could track the people as they came around the corner, approaching the doorway. A gang of them. I drew my second knife, then activated the knife Defiant had given…
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167 •
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Lights flickered as we made our way inside. It looked like a hospital, but not an abandoned one. Things were pristine, the walls and tiled floor a clean, untouched white. It wasn’t a place that had been left to deteriorate. The stark, clean nature of the place made for a contrast where the damage had been done. There were gouges in the walls, things torn free from walls and ceilings. Scorch marks, from both acid and fire, and damaged chairs, cabinets and lockers. I noted the contents of the lockers and…
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167 •
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“We knew it would come to this,” Legend said. I turned around. My hands were full as I unbelted a tightly folded blanket and draped it over one of the wounded. A surprising number of wounded, in the end. Twenty or so injured from an aircraft that had been partially obliterated, eighteen more people who’d had their legs sliced off. Nearly forty Dragon’s Teeth with mild injuries, their armor melted to their faces, chests, arms and legs. Scion had tried his usual assortment of attacks, and they’d…
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167 •
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Oh, how small we were, in the grand scheme of it all. Our planet was but a speck in the midst of the milky way galaxy, which was a speck in the midst of the known universe. We were fighting to save it, and yet it could disappear without anyone in the nearest solar system even noticing. Small, insignificant. Little more than ants before a giant. A pencil-thin beam lanced out from his fingertips. A sweep of his hand, waist-level, and it cut through the crowd. Cut through thighs, knees, calves,…
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167 •
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Tattletale stirred. I could see the usual confusion that went with waking up in unfamiliar surroundings. She adjusted faster than most. There was no flailing about for a point of reference so everything could start to make sense again. Her power supplied it. “Hey,” she said. “Hey,” I replied. “Think the world’s going to end today?” she asked, as she stretched, still lying down. “World already ended, if we’re talking about “Maybe,” she said. “Humans are resourceful. Resourceful…
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167 •
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Study, analysis. An impulse, something that couldn’t be tracked with any conventional devices, then a steady feedback. Pretercognition. Spread out over several targets at once, it serves as her primary sense. Each target is conceptualized in the context of twelve to eighty years of history. More time, more feedback from the steady feed of information, and the images clarify. Discard the useless elements, maintain the pivotal ones. Deciphering, searching for the fulcrum points. Focus on one target, and…
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“So this is it,” Tattletale murmured. “Just about,” I said. “You ready?” Tattletale asked. I shook my head. I sighed, and glanced out over the fields of grass. So much beautiful nature. So many For an instant, I felt a kind of pull. The same sort of intrusive thought that made one think, ‘what if I stepped off the edge of this cliff?’ or ‘what if I opened the car door right now and threw myself into traffic?’ Not suicidal thoughts, but thoughts that were clear enough and alarming…
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167 •
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