Behind her, the door shudders. A voice on the other side curses. “Open up!” The door jumps in its frame as someone slams against it, trying to force past her improvised brace.
Inexplicably, she hears Gendo-sama in her head, telling her she is perfect. Optimal. Delightful. She grimaces at the old bastard’s voice as she yanks again on the line, hating him, hating the old snake who loved her and discarded her. The line cuts into her hands but refuses to give way. Gendo-sama. Such a traitor. She will die because she is optimal, but not optimal enough for a return ticket.
I’m burning up.
Optimal.
Another thud from behind her. The door cracks. She gives up on the line. Turns in another circle, searching desperately for a solution. There is nothing except rubble and the open air all around. She might as well be a thousand miles high. Optimally high.
A hinge shatters, throwing bits of metal. The door sags. With a final glance at the door, Emiko sprints again for the edge of the building, still hoping for a solution. A way to climb down.
She stops, windmilling at the edge. The precipice yawns. The wind gusts. There is nothing. No handholds. No way to climb. She looks back at the clotheslines. If only-
The door breaks from its hinges. A pair of white shirts spill through, stumbling, waving spring guns. They catch sight of her and charge across the roof. “You! Come here!”
She peers over the edge. The people are dots far below; the balcony is as small as a postage envelope.
“Stop! Yoot dieow nee! Halt!”
The white shirts are running for her-running full bore-and yet somehow, strangely, they suddenly seem slow. Slow as honey on a cold day.
Emiko watches them, puzzled. They are halfway across the roof, but they are so very very slow. They seem to be running through rice porridge. Their every motion drags. So slow. As slow as the man who chased her in the alleys and tried to knife her. So slow…
Emiko smiles. Optimal. She steps up onto the roof ledge.
The white shirts’ mouths open to shout again. Their spring guns rise, seeking her. Emiko watches their slit barrels zero in on her. Wonders absently if perhaps she is actually the slow one. If gravity itself will be too slow.
The wind gusts around her, beckoning. The spirits of the air tug at her, blow the black net of her hair across her eyes. She pushes it aside. Smiles calmly at the white shirts-still running, still pointing their spring guns-and steps backward into open air. The white shirts’ eyes widen. Their guns glint red. Disks spit toward her. One, two, three… she counts them as they fly… four, five-
Gravity yanks her down. The men and their projectiles disappear. She smashes into the balcony. Her knees slam into her chin. Her ankle twists as metal shrieks. She rolls, crashing into the balcony’s railing. It shatters and peels away and she plunges into open air. Emiko grabs for a broken copper balustrade as she goes over. Yanks to a stop, dangling above an abyss.
Empty air yawns all around, beckoning free-fall. Hot wind gusts. Tugs at her. Emiko pulls herself up to the listing balcony, gasping. Her whole body is shaking, feels bruised, and yet all her limbs still work. She has not broken a single bone in the fall. Optimal. She swings a leg up onto the balcony, and hauls herself to safety. Metal grinds. The balcony sags under her weight, its ancient bolts loosening. She’s burning up. She wants to collapse. To let herself slide from her precarious ledge and pour into the open air…
Shouts from above.
Emiko looks up. White shirts peer over the edge, aiming their spring guns at her. Disks pour down like silver rain. They ricochet, slash her skin, spark on metal. Fear gives her strength. She lunges for the safety of the balcony’s glass doors. Optimal. The doors shatter. Glass slices her palms. Sparkling shards envelope her and then she’s through the glass and in the apartment and she’s running fast, blurringly fast. People are staring at her, shocked, impossibly slow-
Frozen.
Emiko smashes through another door and out into the hall. White shirts surround her. She plunges through them. Their surprised shouts are leaden as she streaks past. Down the stairwells. Down, down, down the stairs, leaving the white shirts far behind. Shouts from high above.
Her blood is on fire. The stairwells burn. She stumbles. Leans against a wall. Even the heat of the concrete is better than her skin. She’s becoming dizzy, but still she stumbles on. Men shout from above, chasing after her. Their boots thump on the stairs.
Around and around and down she goes. She shoves through obstructing knots of people, jams herself between dwellers rousted by the raid. She is delirious with the furnace inside her.
Tiny beads of sweat speckle her skin, forcing their way out through her absurdly designed pores, but in the heat and humidity, it does nothing to cool her. She has never felt moisture on her skin before. Always she is dry-
She brushes against a man. He recoils in surprise from her blazing skin. She’s burning up. She cannot blend amongst these people. Her limbs move like the flash-frame pages of a child’s animation book, fast, fast, fast, but choppy. Everyone is staring.
She turns from the stairwell and jams through a door, stumbles down a hall, leans against a wall, panting. She can hardly keep her eyes open with the fire that burns within.
I jumped, she thinks.
I jumped.
Adrenaline and shock. Cocktail terror, giddy amphetamine high. She’s shaking. A windup’s jitters. She’s boiling. Faint with heat. She presses herself against the wall, trying to absorb its cool.
I need water. Ice.
Emiko tries to control her breathing, to listen, to know where the exterminators come from, but her mind is dizzy and clouded. How far down is she? How many flights?
Keep moving. Keep going.
Instead, she collapses.
The floor is cool. Her breath saws in and out of her lungs. Her halter is torn. There is blood on her arms and hands where she went through the glass. She stretches out, fingers wide, palms pressed to tile, trying to absorb the coolness of the floor. Her eyes close.
Get up!
But she can’t. She tries to control her beating heart and listen for her pursuers, but she can barely breathe. She’s so hot, and the floor is so cool.
Hands seize her. Voices exclaim and drop her. Grab her again. Then the white shirts are all around, dragging her down the stairs, and she’s grateful, thankful that they’re at least dragging her down and out into the blessed evening air, even as they scream at her and slap her.
Their words wash over her. She can’t understand any of it. It’s all just sounds, dark and dizzy heat. They do not speak Japanese, they are not even civilized. None of them are optimal-
Water splashes over her. She gags and chokes. Another deluge, in her mouth, her nose, drowning her.
People are shaking her. They yell into her face. Slap her. Ask questions. Demand answers.
They grab her hair and jam her face down into a bucket of water, trying to drown her, to punish her, to kill her and all she can think is thank you thank you thank you thank you because some scientist made her optimal, and in another minute this slip of a windup girl that they shout at and slap will be cool.
22
The white shirts are everywhere: inspecting passes, stalking through food markets, confiscating methane. It’s taken hours for Hock Seng to cross the city. Rumors say that all the Malayan Chinese have been interned in the yellow card towers. That they’re about to be shipped south, back across the border to the mercy of the Green Headbands. Hock Seng listens to every whisper as he scuttles through alleys on his way back to his cash and gems, sending native Mai ahead of him, using her local’s accent to scout.