Nothing for Highrise, but a riot’s definitely brewing in the Rust. Folks pissed about losing their medical care. Hope Slend’s okay, but knowing her, she’ll probably be leading it by nightfall. I angrily wait for a mandatory ad to finish autoplaying, some stupid plutocrat service with orbital hoppers skimming them from coast to coast in less than half an hour. As if anyone here could afford that. Check some deeper holes the usual boardshit suspects gather on, but there’s not a trace of trouble from them. Not much of anything, actually, which is surprising. Maybe word about Mikelas got around.
A message pings from Ham. I tap it open.
<<Been looking, nothing yet. Have a few more tricks I want to try. He’s got a partition I can’t crack, might have what we need.>>
<<Be careful.>>
<<You too. Talk to you later.>>
<<Later.>>
Walk into Mom’s clinic, the guards out front nervously checking their stunners, hands never far from their belts. One waves me through without really looking, her eyes constantly scanning the corridor. Plop the noodles down on the belt, pass over my knife, and I’m through to the cheerfully painted hallways and gaily disguised turrets, muted screams echoing from behind some of the doors. A pair of orderlies pass by in hushed conversation, shoulders tense.
I step into Mom’s outer room.
“Hey, Ash.”
“Hey, Freddie. How is she?”
“Stable. I think we managed to pin down a couple of the more traumatic incidents.”
“Two down, infinity more to go?”
“Something like that.”
“Here. Brought you some noodles.”
“Thanks. You heading in?”
“Yup.”
I step into the airlock, leaving Freddie behind to enjoy his noodles. I’ll grab a protein pack later, and I don’t want to risk setting Mom off again. The circular chamber cycles through, and I walk into the inner room, where I lean against a wall and wait for Mom to finish her katas. Several minutes pass and then she finally comes to a halt.
“Hey, Mom.”
“Ashley, dear, how are you?”
She walks over and gives me a hug, all outward appearances normal. I hug her back, then lead her to the bed.
“Sit, Mom, sit. I’m good. How are you doing?”
“I… think I’m doing better. Did you bring Kiro with you?”
“Not today, Mom. He’s busy with some stuff.”
“Okay, well, next time you see him, let him know he should stop by. I miss him, Ashley. He reminds me so much of your father.”
I try to keep my face blank.
Mom, the last time you saw Kiro, he was maybe fifty-five kilos soaking wet. Now he’s pushing a hundred and ten and raging with adolescent hormones. I doubt you’d even recognize him.
“Of course, Mom. I’ll let him know.”
“Thank you, dear. How are your friends, in that game of yours? What were their names… Wind, Brand, and Slend, was it? Oh, and Johnny’s boy, Jason! How are they?”
Brand’s dead, Mom. I killed her. Watched her eyes melt from the inside out. Wind and Slend might end up with her, if I can’t pull off this job for Sawyer, and Jase is stuck on a gummie drone rig who knows where, probably scared out of his mind. He’s not used to spook shit like I am. Like we are.
“The girls are good, Mom. We took down a dragon the other day, was a great fight. Wish you could have seen it. Jase is busy with his tech stuff, you know how he is.”
She laughs, a throaty peal of sound.
“That boy and his electronics, I swear. I’ll never forget when Johnny came back to camp with him, some squalling, dirty little thing he’d found in the rubble somewhere. I thought he was crazy, trying to rescue some poor refugee baby in the middle of the Dubs, but he went and did it, regs be damned. Told me, ‘What was I supposed to do, Naomi, just leave him there?’ Managed to whip up some formula out of mud, sticks, and leftovers, and gave him an old tablet to keep him busy until we finished the deployment. By the time we got back to base, the kid had already figured out how to bypass the child filters.”
Another fit of giggling.
“His first two words were ‘access denied,’ and you should’ve seen Johnny’s face. I think he was hoping for ‘dada.’”
I let a smile creep across my lips.
“Sounds like Jase, all right. He still loves taking things apart. He’s even figured how to put some of them back together by now.”
“Is Johnny still in that tiny shop? I told him he should be a gourmet chef in one of those fancy enclave restaurants, but he never listens. He’s always had the knack for it.”
He stayed here to keep an eye on you, and me, and Kiro, and Jase, Mom. He’s never going to leave unless it’s all of us together.
“Same place as always, Mom. Pretty sure he’s happier with his woks than with some uptight burbies.”
“You’re probably right. And you, Ashley?” I feel her hand on my shoulder, thin, but strong as iron. “How’s my baby girl?”
Drowning, my lifejacket packed with lead. Falling, but my chute’s gone missing. Trapped in a sphere I can’t log out of, and it’s spinning a step too fast.
“I’m fine, Mom. Just doing what it takes, one foot in front of the other, surviving. Making my way forward.”
“One foot in front of the other, huh? I have some experience with that, Ashley.” Her voice turns soft. “Just make sure you know what road it is you’re walking, and where it ends, okay?”
I look over, meet her hazel eyes, shining bright with warmth and intelligence, surrounded by the cracks of age.
Dammit, Mom. Why can’t you be like this all the time? Why can’t we just be normal?
“I’ll be fine, Mom. But thanks. I appreciate it.”
“Of course, dear. You know you can talk to me about anything. Anything at all.”
An alert pings in my glasses. A message, from Sawyer, hovering in front of my mother’s face, but I’m the only one in the room who can see it.
“I know, Mom.” I push myself to my feet. “Look, I gotta go, work keeping me busy, you know? It was great talking to you. Keep doing what Freddie tells you to, okay?”
She stands up as well, and pulls me into another hug.
“I love you, Ashley. My beautiful girl. Love you so much. Don’t forget to tell Kiro to visit! It’s been so long since I’ve had a chance to talk with him.”
My arms wrap around her.
“I love you too, Mom. Be well.”
I pull away and head for the airlock, trying not to cry, or scream at my selfish brother, or wonder if this is the last time I’ll ever see my mother. The airlock cycles me back into the outer room, Freddie smiling at his desk.
“Good session, Ash. I really think we’re gonna get this thing.”
“Right, Freddie. See you next time.”
Some dailies really suck.
16
[The Weight of an Avalanche]
“Sawyer.”
“Ashley. Assorted others.”
I’m leaning back in a battered couch, booted feet propped up on an even more battered table, the very picture of at-fucking-ease. Nowhere I’d rather be, no sir, this is the barest minimum of my attention I feel this worthless matter deserves.
And don’t you just wish that wasn’t a big-ass lie.
Jase is at the other end of the couch, his fingers nervously twining and untwining, like a tiny nest of cobras. I’ve never seen him this scared, not even when he backed down a pissed-off Han Triad goon, not even when I dragged him out of a dryburb pedohouse, doorframe still smoking from the shaped charges I managed to scrounge up, his kidnappers trussed and barely alive, moaning how they hadn’t even had time to do anything. Wind and Slend each have their own chair, their positions as fauxchalant as mine, all of us in a semicircle facing a viewscreen, Sawyer’s face staring back. We’re on the mysterious rig again, Sawyer’s terse message summoning us to return on another interminable boat ride. He finally speaks.