You can’t do it alone, her voice came again — correcting his initial thought as if he’d interrupted her before she’d finished. That’s what she would’ve told Painter. It was a fault, Snow said, how much he took upon himself, how little he trusted others. And the beginning of a plan formed in his mind.
“Wren,” he pimmed, whispering into the night air and speaking to his friend a half-mile away.
“Painter, are you OK?” came the reply a few moments later, Wren’s voice somewhere inside Painter’s own head.
“At the c-c-compound,” Painter answered. “Do you know a wuh, a way to get the guards to… to… to broadcast?”
“Hmm… no, I don’t think so. Sorry,” he said. And then, “Hold on, let me ask my mom.”
There was a long delay before the response came. Painter’s calves were starting to burn. A pair of guardsmen wandered into view, and he shifted back.
“She thinks she can try something. Do you want her to do it now?” Wren said.
“Wait one sss-second.”
The patrol moved counter-clockwise around the governor’s compound, and didn’t seem to be in a hurry about it. Judging from the looks of things, Painter guessed no one had found the bodies yet. The guards moved on out of sight.
“OK, go,” Painter said.
Seconds ticked by. Ten. Fifteen. Thirty. Painter was just about to pim again when all of a sudden there was a shimmering flare on the wall, like mirage roiling off hot concrete. And then another. And another. One after the other, the guardsmen were responding to whatever Cass had done, actively broadcasting information through the digital and lighting up in Painter’s vision with each burst.
“OK, is anything happening?” Wren asked.
“Yes,” Painter answered. “Thhh-thanks. I see them now. Gotta go.”
“OK. Be careful.”
There were eight that Painter could see — four along the top of the wall, two by the gate, and another two somewhere deeper in the courtyard. It surprised him to see guards actually posted at the north-eastern gate, but it looked like they weren’t taking any chances. There was a gap, though, along the wall. Two guards stood close together, apparently in conversation, and that left them spaced unevenly. His opening.
Painter surveyed the street once more, saw it was clear. He sidled his way along the edge, towards the darkest corridor he could find, where two lights overlapped incompletely. The first ten yards would be the greatest danger. But the closer he got to the wall, the less chance there was that someone would be able to see him from above. Assuming they didn’t see Painter start his run. There were no guarantees, and sitting around any longer wasn’t going to improve his chances at all. It was tough to judge, but as best as he could tell, none of the guardsmen were looking his way. Time to try. He inhaled sharply and launched himself out of his hiding place.
Ducking his head and leaning forward, Painter sprinted directly towards the wall of the compound, running lightly on the balls of his feet to minimize the noise. Panic rose up the instant he stepped into the light, but he gritted his teeth and pressed on. Five yards in. Seven. Ten. He passed from the brightest segment into partial shadow, chances of success improving with every step. And then he was at the base of the wall, pressed flat against it, heart pounding more from the fear of getting caught than from any exertion. Seconds stretched. But no sounds of warning came to him. He’d made it.
Now, the fun part. Painter had never tried any extended climbing before and he hadn’t known what to expect. He was relieved to find that the wall wasn’t nearly as smooth as he’d originally thought. It was composed of steel panels joined together and there were slight gaps between the plates, barely wide enough for Painter to jam his fingertips into. That alone wouldn’t have been enough for any normal human. But Painter was no normal human. He extended his claws. And began to climb.
After a few test holds, he found that by angling his claws downwards into the seams he was able to hook in a relatively strong grip. It was his feet that caused him trouble. Cramming the toe of his shoe into a gap gave some help with balance, but was hardly enough to provide any push. His arms would have to do the work. He wrestled his way up four feet off the ground when his first slip came.
It happened so fast that he didn’t have any time to try to catch himself. Painter just fell straight down. His body reacted instinctively, legs bending to absorb the shock of impact. He landed lightly, thankfully, and after a few stunned seconds of frantic listening, it appeared that he’d managed to escape detection. Climbing seemed like an even worse idea now than it had just a minute ago, and it’d hadn’t seemed like such a great idea then anyway. But Painter couldn’t think of anything else to do, and the residual signal was starting to fade on the guardsmen. There wasn’t time to try something else.
On a whim, he pulled his shoes off, buckled them together, and jammed them down the back of his pants. It wasn’t comfortable by any means, but when he started climbing again he was glad to notice he had a much better feel for the wall without his shoes on.
Painter took it slower this time, making sure both feet had some sense of stability before he tried to move a hand up. It was hard work, though, hauling himself up the wall using almost nothing but arm strength. He kept his body pressed as flat against the wall as he could, feeling his way up rather than looking. The gaps were regularly spaced and it didn’t take long for Painter to get a rhythm established. Even so, every time he released one handhold to slide his way up to another, he felt at any second he could plummet right back down again.
His forearms began to burn, and it became increasingly difficult for Painter to keep his hands curled into the hooks that gave him the surest grip. By the time he was halfway up the wall, his claws almost felt like they were starting to tear away. But still he pushed himself. For Snow, and Luck, and Wren. For Cass. Hand up. Pull. Reach. Set feet. Hand up. Again and again and again. And then he slid his right hand up, looking for a seam, and found instead a corner.
The top of the wall.
Whether it was from surprise at having reached the top, or a sense of relief come too soon, Painter lost concentration for a crucial moment — and in turn lost his already precarious footing. He slipped sideways, dangling from one hand, and spun around backwards, wrenching his shoulder and elbow. For a sickening second, he felt his fingers sliding along the top of the wall. Losing grip. He was falling.
No.
Something broke deep inside him, and the glowing ember of anger he had been nurturing kindled into a rage. And with rage came strength. Without knowing how, Painter found himself flipped back around, facing the wall again. He simply refused to fall. He reached, stretched, willed himself up high enough to get hold of the ledge. Then he scrambled up, rolled over the parapet, and flopped ungracefully onto the walk.
Painter lay panting there for several seconds, adrenaline, or something like it, coursing through his veins. His arms trembled and he noticed when he tried to close his hands into fists, he couldn’t do it. There was dark ichor around a couple of his fingertips where his claws had partially peeled back the nails. The buckle of one of his shoes was digging into his kidney.
And then Painter’s brain caught up with him, and he realized he was inside the compound, lying on top of the wall where four guardsmen were posted. He quickly rolled to his stomach and scanned. The two guards who had been talking were separated now, and one was moving his way. But just behind Painter, a set of stairs led down to the courtyard. He slithered on his belly, moving backward, until he reached the steps, and then turned and hurried down them, crouched as low as he could go.