There’s one thing about the Emergence machines that’s true of us too; they need resources to survive and they’re willing to kill to get those resources. Think about it. Our whole history as a species has been one war after another for the stuff other people have. Most other species would be content to drive their enemies away from food or water or the best trees in the forest, but we kill each other over a stolen bite of hamburger. We have to because the guy who stole it? He’s going to keep doing it until you teach him not to. Usually at the point of a spear or the barrel of a gun.
The Emergence machines are like that. They want something humans have, and we don’t have a big enough gun to stop them from taking our hamburgers.
* Lawrence Hicks, Hicks Hacks for Surviving an Emergence, Episode 9, “Motivation” on VidMaxTube
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Chapter Sixteen
“Hey, Luciole, pass me a FastBlast!”
“A what?”
“A FastBlast energy booster. Blue wrapper, yellow letters. Outside pouch.” My crossbow was in my hand as I walked over and unzipped the backpack Overclock wore. I dug around until I found a FastBlast 2.4, by Orson Biochem. Inc., licensed to SHOCKS and HANAF. Overclock reached over her shoulder, hand grabbing as I read the back of the long, soft plastic tube. “Pass it here, come on, come on! I haven’t had any caffeine since this morning!”
“This thing has 300 milligrams of caffeine and…short-dose heat-activated reflex-enhancing nanites? Is that a thing?” I passed it forward.
“Yeah, kid, it’s a thing. Thanks.” Overclock tore off the top and squeezed the yogurty blue paste into her mouth. She shivered.
James spoke up in my ear. “Orson Biochem doesn’t actually put these on the market. They sell directly to the military and SHOCKS instead. The early formulas didn’t work consistently, and there are some real problems with the 1.7-2.3 formulas; too much power and insufficient control. People were getting micro-tears in their muscles after a use or two. But for Magical Girls, 2.4 is safe. Well, safe-ish.”
“Safe-ish. Right.” We stood at the base of a narrow set of stairs - or what had, presumably, been stairs once. The outside wall had collapsed, and it had taken most of the staircase with it, leaving a jumble of rebar and bits of concrete. Half of the landing was gone, too, but we couldn’t see beyond that. “So you’re going to, what? Caffeine up and climb up this mess?”
“No. You’re going to caffeine up and climb up this mess, then you’re going to help me up after. Get yourself a tube.”
I rummaged around in the backpack and found my own tube. It tasted like blue raspberry. Way, way too much blue raspberry. “What’s this flavor, power outlet?”
“Close, actually. Blue raspberry does the best job of hiding that nanomachine flavor,” James said.
I choked down the yogurty mess. “Okay, so now I just climb up?”
“Yeah. Just scramble up to the landing, help me up, and repeat until we’re on the second floor.”
Grabbing the lowest hunk of concrete, I squatted down. I jumped up, a vertical like in P.E. class, surprising myself with the extra six inches of ‘up’ I had. My fingers wrapped around a bit of rebar, and I hung there for a second. “That stuff works fast!”
“The 2.4 formula is specifically designed for Magical Girls’ special organs and their effects on your metabolism. The nanites are quick-release models. Expect the effects to wear off within three to five minutes,” James said, sounding distracted, as I swung back and forth to get close enough to catch the edge of the landing. Pulling myself up, I looked down at the rebar and concrete below.
“Pass me your hammer!” I lay on my stomach, reached down, and caught the head of Overclock’s hammer. Setting it down, I held a hand out for her to grab.
“Okay, kid, I’m gonna jump. Grab my hand and pull me up!” I caught Overclock at the tip of her jump, fingers tight around each other’s wrists. I yanked and pulled her up until her stomach rested on the edge of the broken landing. “This’d be a lot easier if I had Levitate. That spell is ridiculous. 4th rank Support tome, though…”
Once Overclock had wriggled her way up to where I was lying, I started up the next pile of rubble. With the stairs going up against the hall instead of the outside wall, the climb was a lot easier, and even with one arm, Overclock only needed a little help. I cracked open the door to the stairwell and looked around in horror.
The main hall below may have been the prettiest place in West End High, but the language arts department’s lair on the second floor had been my favorite. The open area between the classrooms butted up against the library. With beanbags and old, ratty couches everywhere, it had been a great place to read poetry with my friends. The few windows around the outside walls let in just enough natural light that often, the teachers kept the fluorescents off.
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I froze at the door. Here and there, a dark green…something…lay in the common area among tattered books and shredded pillows. My breath stopped as I realized that each was a graduate. Was Sora up here? Was I too late to save her? The breaths suddenly started coming faster and faster.
I jumped. Overclocks hand covered my shoulder. “I’ll go first, kid…Luciole. Tell me what your friend looks like, and I’ll tell you if she’s out there. Just stay here and watch my back, okay?”
“Okay. Her name’s Sora Ito.” I shut the door and stared at the broken wall and the grassy edge of the soccer field outside. “She’s about 145 centimeters, 45 kilograms, black hair in a ponytail when I last saw her. She wears hearing augments, but they’re internal, so they could be hard to see. Her parents are from the Okinawa fortress if that helps.”
“Short, small, and Asian, then?” I nodded. “Okay, just make sure nothing sneaks up on me. You don’t need to see your classmates like this.” I nodded again. Overclock cracked the door open and stepped out with her hammer. She shut the door behind her.
I watched her walk from student to student, checking each face and shaking her head back at me. The students on the second floor hadn’t had a chance. How could Sora have survived?
James spoke up in my ear. “Regardless of what we find, you have a job to do. There will be time to mourn your classmates and teachers who didn’t make it, but survivors could be tucked away up here. When Overclock gives the all-clear, check supply closets and classrooms.”
Overclock kept checking, shaking her head, and pulling the gowns up to cover each person’s face. After an eternity, she shouted back, “Hey! Your friend isn’t here! Whatever got these kids happened in the last 20 minutes! We should check the library!”
Ceiling tiles rained down on Overclock. A red light panned across her, then another and another. “Look out!” I screamed, but Overclock was already moving. She spun, her hammer whirling as the haft locked between her hand, arm, and back, then snapped her arm forward as the machine lunged down toward her. The Mack stopped mid-air, its momentum caught by the force of Overclock’s swing as the hammer’s spike punched through a plate. Its eye and the lights on its four spiked arms were fading before Overclock pulled the hammer back out in a whirling spray of black goop!
“Type Seventeen! The room’s a trap!” Overclock shouted. The room filled with Macks that had waited in the classrooms, and Overclock rushed toward them, her hammer behind her, ready to snap forward.
I ran into the room. I held up a hand to cast Blazing Light, but no spell came out! “James, How do I use spells?” I screamed as I drew my crossbow and fired an explosive bolt that knocked two Type Ones across the room and tore a hole in the floor.
“You have to say the spell’s name and gesture where you want it. Your spell should be ready!”
“Blazing Light!” I pointed my hand toward the Type-Four, fingers splayed in an imitation of a kid’s sun drawing. My stomach felt a tiny bit emptier, and a burst of yellow-orange light cut through a Type One’s body, nearly sawing it in two. “This feels so dumb!”
“When we’re better synced, I might be able to set your spell to just the gesture.”
A Type Four clawed its way through Mr. Andrews’s classroom door and rushed Overclock while she smashed a Type One with her hammer. “Blazing Light!” I shouted again, gesturing and watching the light burn off the tentacle Overclock had been threatened with and start melting into its plastic body. She spun, the hammer catching the tripod of tentacles the machine stood on and tossing it into a pile in the corner. Her hammer went up, then came down on its small body repeatedly while it struggled to recover, smashing it until its lights went off.
She whirled again, crushing one last Type One, and the room was silent save our heavy breathing and the crackle of a few sparks as machines shut down. In the time it had taken me to kill three Type Ones and help her against the Type Four, Overclock had destroyed six Type Ones, most of the Type Four, and the Type Seventeen. One-handed. And she hadn’t spent any mana doing it.
“Okay…Type Seventeens…are ambush machines. Come here, Luciole,” Overclock panted. I walked over to where she stood next to the Type Seventeen. It was long, over three meters, with a dozen segmented legs. The back eight had suction-cup things and claws for gripping, while the front four had a light lined up behind a typical Mack spike. “If they’re here, we need to not be.”
“Those are nasty ones. They don’t take much to break, but they can climb walls and ceilings, and they like to hide. If they’re getting built, we’re out of time. We need to get back to the shelter before it’s attacked,” James said.
“That can’t be it!” I couldn’t go back. Not when I was this close to finding Sora! “Please, Overclock, let’s just check the library one time. She’s got to be in there,” I pleaded, tears building in my eyes as I looked at her. “I need to find her! Or know, at least.”
She looked back, shook her head, and broke eye contact. “Your puppy dog eyes are going to get us both killed. We have ten minutes, then we have to go. Give me another FastBlast, and follow me.”
The library’s double doors were solid oak, with no windows inside. Overclock tried turning the knob, but it wouldn’t go. “Locked. Stand back,” she said, spinning and bashing her hammer against the door. “I wanted to be a Red.” She smashed the door again. “Started statting for it and everything.” And again. “The Mana Surge is too Yellow, and I’m too much of a softie, so I decided on Yellow instead.” Her fourth strike landed on the lock again, and the doors popped open, rocking on their hinges. “But it sure is nice to hit things sometimes!”
She poked her head inside. “It looks clear, but the Type Seventeen might have been in here, so be prepared for…well, the worst.”
I ignored her. I had to. The feeling in the pit of my stomach was too strong. Instead, I ran ahead, crossbow in hand. “Sora! Sora, are you in here?”
No response. I ran farther into the library, rounding the corner to the study rooms. The feeling in my gut grew stronger. More insistent. I kicked at the door to the first one, sending tinted glass shattering inward, and stepped through.
The room was covered in chunks of ceiling tiles and blood, the table missing legs and jammed against the back wall. I could hear the sound of someone breathing, a liquid, choking sound. I ran to the table and flipped it back toward the center of the room.
My stomach churned. I screamed as Overclock ran into the room behind me.