Above the orange glow, the sky was alive with the flash and thunder of an awesome lightning storm, sudden sheets of blue making the clouds burst and glow, forks cracking through the air from cloud to cloud and down to hit the tops of buildings, exploding their lightning conductors in showers of sparks.
And below the lightning, the aircraft suffered. A small flyer struggled to stay in the air. The driver did his or her best as it was punched across the sky by an invisible fist. It wasn’t just the datastreams to our devices that were down: the computers that made gravity-assisted flight easy had failed. Everything that could fly was coming back to earth.
13. Crisis
Liss snapped awake. The romantic adventures of Ellera had put her to sleep with their familiarity, but another sound made her jump. Something at the edge of her hearing. Something that triggered old instincts.
She burst out of her room and ran down the stairs to find Iokan in the common room.
“Did you hear that?” she asked.
“I didn’t hear anything…”
She heard something else that made her look up. “It’s outside.”
She ran out of the building with Iokan behind her.
“Shit…” she muttered as she looked in the direction of Hub Metro, and saw the lightning storm like a cap over the city, spreading outwards and touching the clouds over their own heads. Thunder rumbled and crashed over them as forks of lightning spread a web of light across the sky.
Iokan followed her out, and looked up. “Ancients…”
“Anyone you know?”
He shook his head. “They never came like this…”
A low thud drew their attention towards the dark horizon — and a sudden burst of flame in the canopy, followed by smoke.
14. Asha & Bell
Hub Metro was in chaos, drowning in fire and screams. We fled the restaurant along with the crowds flooding the streets. Above us, the lightning roared and gravity drives trembled in the air if their pilots were skilled, or fell if they were not. At least a dozen crash sites were scattered across the city and in the sides of buildings, spewing fire and smoke as lightning cracked down from above.
A woman staggered in tattered, smouldering rags from the nearest burning flyer, her hair razed off, screaming that aliens had come from beyond and set fire to the sky. Two people calmed her and tried to lead her to safety. A man Bell knew from work grabbed him and shouted that invaders had come from another universe and he had to hide! Now! This was just the beginning of the invasion! Bell shook him off and we stumbled on, just trying to get away from the massive conflagration that was unbearably hot even as far away as we were. A security officer waved us on, yelling at everyone to keep moving, keep moving, get out of the area. We asked her what was going on, but she didn’t know, she just needed us to move, to move, to keep moving.
And there was still no data. No way to get information, any kind of information. No visual overlay to say where we were or offer suggestions for routes. People staggered blindly on, some of them looking as though they saw the city for the first time and were daunted not by the disaster but by the massive unknowable scale of the buildings. We hoped we might find AIs in their robot bodies who would have their own local records — but we saw one collapsed in a heap by the side of a road, smoke pouring from the chest cavity. Every robot we saw had died the same way. “It can’t be,” I muttered, remembering what had happened to the Exploration Service mission that had found Katie.
“Can’t be what?” asked Bell.
“Gravity pulse…”
“Gravity what?”
But it didn’t make sense. I looked up again. “No. It’s not a gravity pulse. It’s an electromagnetic pulse… that’s what the lightning’s for…”
He tried to take me by the shoulder and pull me away with the crowd. “Come on!” But I’d had disaster training. It was standard for anyone who worked out in the refugee centres among hordes of damaged people: firstly, to understand what they had been through, but also to help us survive in similar situations. And what we were doing felt wrong. A crowd directed by the authorities towards points of escape from the crisis is a crowd you want to be in, but a confused mob just heading away is a terrible idea. The only security officer we’d seen had no idea what was going on: she’d just been trying to get people away from the crash.
“I have to get to the Refugee Service!” I shouted to Bell over the screaming and thunder.
“We need to get out of the city!” he shouted back.
I shook my head. “None of these people know where they’re going! Nobody knows what’s happening! Do you want to go with them or do you want to be in a government installation?”
“Wait, are you trying to check on your patients?”
He couldn’t believe it. But he was right. I had to know. I couldn’t answer for a moment. He shook his head. “Fine. Whatever. Which way?”
I pointed down a side avenue with a shoe. “That way.” I ran on in my bare feet and he followed.
15. Rescue
Sirens went off throughout the centre, and outside in the courtyard. Lomeva Sisse came out after Iokan and Liss. “You two! Get inside! Now!”
“What’s going on?” demanded Liss as thunder reached them and forced them to shout.
“I don’t know! You just need to get inside! Now!”
“Who crashed?”
“I don’t — what?” She turned and saw the burning hole in the forest. “Oh lord. I need a medical team, I need transport, we have a crashed flyer—” And then she realised no one could hear her. “There’s no data…” She looked suddenly helpless.
Liss grabbed her by the shoulders as lightning struck in the forest and started another fire. “Get back inside. Get your team together. Follow me as quick as you can,” she said, and ran into the woods.
“Stop! You don’t know what you’re doing!” shouted Lomeva.
“She’s qualified,” said Iokan. And after a second, he added: “So am I.” He ran after her. Lomeva glared after them but could do nothing. She turned back to the building and the crowd who had emerged, along with Pew.
“What’s happening?” he asked.
“Just get back inside!” she shouted. “All you medical people! Get your kit! We’re going out to the crash!”
16. Asha & Bell
The head office of the Refugee Service of the Interversal Union was another of those Hub Metro edifices that made more of a statement than sense. A shining castle, carved out of silver and gold, that required polarised glasses to look at it on a sunny day — but tonight it reflected the blue violence of the sky above and the orange roar of fires around the city, making it look like it was under siege from an army carrying ancient torches.
And under siege it was. A mob pressed against the glass gates at the front of the building, desperate to be let in. Just inside, we could see security people begging them to pull back, some of them lost and confused themselves.
“Oh, great…” said Bell as he saw the mob.
“Side entrance by the vehicle park,” I said. We ran to the side of the building, where a door was provided for those who were lucky enough to have private transport. As we ran, I heard a static noise, and saw a flicker of reboot in the visual overlay; but just as swiftly, it was gone.
Bell turned, seeing lights guttering in the street. “Is it coming back on?”
“Not yet,” I said, and hammered on the glass doors to call the attention of security, imploring them to run a scanner on my face or my implant so they could see who I was. At first they didn’t believe me, but when reinforcements came down, one of them recognised me and let us in.