Cal’s mouth works in silence. She tries to think up another lie, comes up empty, and settles for a shrug. “Well. This just got awkward.”

I flash forward. Her hand twitches at the same instant. The Relic around her wrist blinks to life, sending a subliminal hum shuddering through the air. Every hair on my body rises like I’m standing beside a superconductor. Lights flicker. Security systems dim. My JOY goes with them and drops lifelessly to the floor, but I keep moving without it, whipping into a three-sixty aerial kick that carves down at her head like a scythe.

Cal throws herself to the side, rolling across the deck and springing back to her heels with a platinum knife in her hands. Back to the glass. She throws an empty hand up. “Tay! Tay stop, you-”

I smash into her shoulder-first, nearly cracking the glass. Her body crumples, breathless. The lift barely shifts at the impact. The view outside hasn’t changed yet. We haven’t started moving. An electric-blue holopad back by the door now glowing an angry red, squawking for authorization. The distracted glance almost costs me. Metal flashes in the corner of my eye as Cal twists away from the wall and swipes side-to-side. A cat’s scratch of pain slices across my face. I whip my head to the side and stumble back, blood trickling towards my jaw, a bloody, pulsating notch across my nose.

“Stop!” Cal pants. Her Relic keeps glowing on her wrist. “I’m not your enemy! I’m trying to-”

Four carbon-fiber fingers smear through the blood on my cheek. I hiss in pain and snap back onto her with hell in my eyes. Cal sees the wildness overcome me and tucks into a ball the instant before my foot jackhammers into her chest hard enough to leave hairline fractures in her forearms. She ricochets off the wall with a grunt. I don’t relent. My feet clear the floor as I jump and spin, chambering a whole rotation’s worth of momentum into the reversed kick that hooks into her skull. She blocks, barely. But the kinetic force flings her sideways, back towards the door, where I tackle her facefirst into the glass.

She jerks against my grip. Trying to worm away. I club her across the back of the head and brace my prosthetic arm against the nape of her neck, flattening her face against the wall. My other hand rifles through her pockets. Searching for her JOY. Even if she doesn’t use one to fight, the spheres are all-in-one links to everything digital. They’re wallets, phones, cameras, and in her case, keycards.

“You’re making a mistake!” Cal grits out, gasping as I push my arm even harder into her neck.

“The only mistake I made was trusting you,” I snarl. The sphere’s smooth metal fills my hand a moment later. I yank it out and slap it against the holopad until the pad blinks blue and lets out a happy chime. My stomach lurches downwards as we start to rise. Cal’s squirming intensifies, panic rising.

“I’m trying to help you, Tay. Listen to me. Listen!” Her eyes search mine, looking for anything left to reason with. “Why would I lie and cover for you so much if I was just going to hand you over to the Champion?”

I throw her to the floor and attach her JOY to my hip. “You’re Thane’s little sister. You tell me,” I snarl. Her knife clatters against the floor a meter away. “What do they call him here? The Invincible. The best uni fighter anyone has ever seen.” I almost scoff at the notion. “Drool-bait of the gossip circuits. Shoe-in for the pro leagues. Ringing any bells yet?” I stare down at her, no mercy left. “Thane Kyriaku, apprentice of the tyrant who wants me dead, and brother to a no-name sister who doesn’t even make the footnotes.” A hateful breath shudders out of me. “My best friend.”

Cal rolls onto her back and scoots away from me, panting fast. Just knowing who she shares a name with sends hateful blood pounding in my ears. Her Relic is still running, but I don’t need to my JOY to ruin her. The security systems are being suppressed. I could do it right now. Break her neck with a well-placed kick. Stomp on her spine and smash it through the front of her stomach. But even as I begin to take that first stride forward, a pressure in my head tugs with an opposing impulse. Guilt. Horror that even in my desperation I would ever consider such a thing. Loathing, knowing exactly what my father would say if he could see me now.

But Dad’s not here. Not anymore. I don’t have the luxury of being a hero and showing a snake like this mercy. Evil is in her blood. Her face is an echo of another that brings an entire childhood of joy and hate flooding back into my head. How many times did I look into those eyes, brush my fingers through that hair, touch that face and dream of some naïve storybook future? How many nights have I slept in the mud thinking only of the day when I would see them again and finally kill the boy they belonged to?

It's the cornered-animal fear on Cal’s face, and only that fear, that stops me a hair’s breadth away from pulling the trigger. Her hand raised halfway in an instinctive attempt to protect herself from me, teeth grit, faintly trembling. Frozen like a rat with a gun to her head. Barely daring to breathe.

My left hand balls so tightly that the nails pierce the skin. The sharp pain brings me back from the brink, walking me back from that step. Reminding me of the danger I’m in just by wavering here for another second. The Electric Town keeps dropping away, swallowed by the storm. Black clouds and whistling gales envelop the view. Behind, the lift keeps chiming in a rhythmic pulse, already slowing as we close in on the highest levels of the arena.

Cal tries one last time. “We can still find your aunt,” she says, hand raised like it’d do anything to stop me. “I know what this looks like. But if that door opens and this mess spills outside, it’s over. Gami, Thane, Valance, and the rest of the Shadows are going to know you’re not dead like I told them you were. I’ve been keeping the security systems suppressed-”

“-just so you can lead me into another trap?” I back a step closer to the door, feeling for the holopad. “No. Hell no. You had your chance. A couple smooth words now aren’t going to stop me, Feint.” She sees my fingers curl and knows I’m about to run. Her eyes meet mine in a moment of panic, then dart to the left. “You’ve done everything you can to keep me from Jolie,” I snarl. “No more. Enjoy explaining to your master why-”

The door suddenly cuts open behind me. Sound washes in. Squeaking wheels and trundling carts. Brush mops, clattering metal, scraping pens, bottles popping open. A cloistered hallway filled with the weary groans and backroom banter of the custodial horde it takes to keep the arena running like clockwork. Interns carrying bundles of digital slates dodge around janitors, repulsorfield maintenance techs, sharp-suited secretaries and personal trainers for the forty league fighters who hold residence in this tower.

Then I hear the squeak of rubber soles against metal decking and whirl back around, too far too fast. The humming suppression field emitted by Cal’s Relic cuts out and my JOY affinities come rushing back like a lightswitch flipped. A surge in speed that I wasn’t expecting leaves me overcompensating for the microsecond she needs to slide between my legs and chop out my knee joint from behind, crumpling me to the floor.

“Cal!” I shout.

She scrambles up and throws a look over her shoulder, bangs haloing her face. Then she bolts off into the depths of the M, Relic reactivating, black ponytail dodging and darting through the workers clogging the hallway.

I get a hand on the doorframe, haul myself up, and race after her. Shoving through her dumbstruck wake. People start recovering and reacting. Some off-duty league fighter sees me coming and responds twice as fast as her surroundings, lunging to block my path. Gloved fingers grabbing, then sliding away my shoulder; her following shout lost to the chaos. I’m already past her.

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

I surge after Cal. Can’t stop now. Literally everyone is staring, pulling out JOYs to record or call tower security if they aren’t scrambling to get out of the way. My life is measured in seconds now. The Metro Blockhouse is stacked with pros and loyalists of the Champion. Dozens of power-hungry leaguers who make those uni fighters I embarrassed look like grade schoolers. And there’s the bureaucratic horde of collaborators that executes Gami’s will. Too many to escape if Cal gets far enough away for the security systems around me to start reactivating. Unless I keep inside her range.

The barely-healed hole in my stomach shoots bolts of pain through my body with every step. I fly along Cal’s wake, twisting through the throngs and shouting to clear the way, bursting between four janitors cracking open beers around an open bay door to a vast and empty battlefield. She’s smaller and nimbler like I am. Like a mouse, she finds gaps between the haphazard cargo and scrambling secretaries that I can’t and uses them to slip further away. I barely catch sight of her again as she reaches a four-way intersection heading deeper into the tower. She’s about to go left when she looks back, sees me chasing at a sprint, and dodges right instead. Heading towards the exterior. East side. I bite down on the pain and will my body faster.

Chased by a wake of shouts, I slide under a ladder being carried by two Nature elementals, pull myself around the hard corner and one-handed vault over a gaping intern pushing a cart of caf and pastries, launching into a spin. A stretch of clear space opens between me and Cal’s quickly shrinking back. Finally I start reeling her in.

Doors jut out of the cramped metal walls on either side. Some open, lights off, desks empty. Cal passes them all without slowing before skidding to a stop in another intersection, nearly run over by a massive cargo pusher laden with crates of foodstuffs. She can’t get past. A massive door of darkoak built right into the walls of the Metro Blockhouse looms in front of her. She takes one look back at me before shouldering the door open and disappearing inside.

I explode after her. Hurl myself across the intersection, tightening my body and twisting so my prosthetic shoulder is facing forward like a battering ram. The impact when I smash into the door rattles through every bone in my body. Wood splinters as it’s slammed open. Nearly blown off its hinges. I crash through the doorway, tumbling head-over-heels across a plush navy-blue carpet and through a set of antique seating furniture before plowing straight into a bookcase.

Paperbacks flap like bird wings as they pour over me. I shove out of the growing pile in a daze. Blinking quickly. Then glancing down to one of the books that drips off my head. A faded, heavily dogeared copy of a last-century romance novel. One I faintly recognize.

The door groans behind me, clicking faintly as it seals shut. Two more books bounce off my shoulders. I groan and pick myself up. Head swimming from the impact. Cal is just a few feet away, back to me, panting for breath. I almost think the room around us is a museum until I notice the wide desk at the far end, which looks out over the entire Electric Town through wall-to-wall glass windows.

It’s an office. Dull and austere metal hidden behind a busy collection of antique furniture and memorabilia; accolades, weapons, framed memories caught in passing. There’s a somber silence to how plentiful the objects are and rigorously they’re arranged. Every memento is perfectly free of dust, yet worn and battered by decades of use. Too numerous to belong to the lone woman who survived them all.

She sits ramrod straight behind that desk at the end of the room, staring nonplussed at her obliterated bookcase through a pair of antique glass spectacles. A tall rapier of a woman whose gaze is burdened by the all-knowing patience of a leader of men. Her crimson hair is shot with grey roots and wrapped tightly into a high tail. The ruthless intelligence of a clerical devil lurks behind her eyes, which are ringed by years of foregone sleep and colored like indigo ink. The same shade of deep-sea blue as my father’s eyes, yet so much icier in their temper. Empty paper cups with caf stains litter her desk behind a thin metal bar that reads CIVIC DIRECTOR, SECTION G. A thin trickle of smoke pools from the cup where she was stamping out a lighter just before Cal and I bashed in.

Three translucent projector screens color her face from the side, one flashing with an active call. Audio from the call trickles into the crumbling silence.

“Jolie, you have to listen to me. I swear it belongs to him. Some girl was wearing it when she ran past me just a moment ago, fastlike. She’s still on this level-”

All the desperation that carried me here without care for my own safety flees as I see Aunt Jolie in the flesh for the first time in three years. But she doesn’t even recognize me. Not at first. Savagely perceptive, she peers at me in confusion while raising her voice at the assassin who stands panting between us.

“Calliope,” Jolie coldly says, “You had better have a good reason for…” Then her eyes begin to widen. “For…”

The rest of the accusation stalls on her tongue. Sudden recognition strips the blood from her face. Her cheeks pale like she’s looking at a dead memory risen.

“Tay…?” She looks me up from top to bottom, finally seeing through the recolored hair and false irises. Her voice thins to a stunned whisper. “…you’re alive?”

Jolie’s head swings towards the door as fists and shouts start pounding against it from the outside. Lightning-quick fingers toggle a hidden switch inside her desk, triggering manual security systems that reinforce the entrance with a heavy metal thunk just as a young woman’s voice- that Psi we met in the lobby, Valance- hammers through the noise.

“Director Mons, there’s an active security breach ongoing. You’re being relocated. Open the door.” A brief pause. “Director Mons! What’s going on in there? Answer and unlock the door!” More pounding. “I can’t sense anything in there. She’s escaped or unconscious. Contact Kalavakus and Thane and get me through that wall. Jolie! General Manager Mons! Open up!”

A glowing point of red begins blossoming in the center of the door. Aunt Jolie whirls back to me as I stumble forwards, drawn to her by familial compulsion. So much maternal instinct fills her eyes. Three years of things unsaid, compressed by solitary confinement in this tower and the horrible guilt of giving up on any hope the few people she loved could still be alive. But she doesn’t let that emotion rule.

Cold, bladelike logic takes over. Jolie raises a hand in warning, stopping me from drawing any closer. “You need to run, Tay. Now. Leave me.”

“Leave you?” I stutter out a single note of disbelief. “It’s me, Auntie! It’s Tetsuka. I’m not just going to leave you here-”

The hammering grows louder.

“There’s no time,” Jolie implores, shaking her head now. “You’re alive. You’re alive,” she breathes, taking in the most relieved breath. “Get out of here, honey. It’s all that matters now. If you are free, Gami can still be stopped. All is not yet lost.” Another key press and the door to the balcony leaps open. Rain and frozen wind slash inside, billowing out our hair. Her eyes flick to the rapidly-melting door. “You’ve done enough by coming here. Don’t worry about me now. I’m not important enough to kill. I’ll find a way to reach you.”

“I don’t understand,” I stammer. “You won’t slow me down. I can carry you!”

“I can do more from in here than I ever could from the outside.” I make to move towards her anyways, but stop when Cal interposes herself between us. Jolie’s nails tense against the desk. “Trust me,” she says. “Trust me, Tetsuka. They told me you were dead. They cannot be allowed to have you now.”

The pounding at the door thunders back into my awareness. White hair flows around my shoulders, gripped by the storm. Jolie nods again. Imploring, trusting me to listen. Face tight with grim determination, I jerk my gaze away and snag Cal by the shirt, breaking for the balcony.

“We’re not finished yet,” I snarl at her.

The assassin stays prim-lipped quiet as I yank her along with. I throw one last pained look at Jolie before the rain hits me. She’s already typing on a projection. Haloed by electric-blue lights, the last and least threatening of the heroes of her age. Then the office door buckles inward with a groan, an armored shoulder pushing through the growing gap. Jolie sees me hesitating and shakes her head madly.

“Get out of here!” she shouts. “Fly!”

I dash into the storm, black gales battering me from side to side. Forty stories down, the Electric Town glows in a lattice of golden lights and vibrant neon through a gap in the clouds. Cal’s composure falters when she realizes what I’m about to do. Lightning carves through the clouds ahead. A thousandfold roar reverberates down from the championship battlefield just as my feet touch the edge.

Silhouetted by the storm, I listen to the beat and jump.