Storms and darkness hammer the waiting airfield into submission. Ushered by sweeping spotlights that bristle like golden quills from the old Shimano skyscraper, Jolie, Mori and I jog side by side onto the tenth-story roof of the megacorporation’s once-lauded research and development laboratory; now repurposed into an engineering hub for relocated Venters.

The storm’s temper grows around us, as if sensing what dark deed I go to do. Feral wind beats my back with razor-sharp curtains of downpour, dampening my aura to the slightest glow of white. Can barely see through the thickness of it. Fat droplets roar slam against raw steel in a cacophonous roar. I’m thankful for the cover, though only barely. Knowing the ferocity of the major league, we’ll need every lead we can get to escape while leaving them none the wiser.

An even louder, mechanical roar sets the air itself vibrating when the gunship answers the storm’s challenge. Venter engineers, nearly invisible in the downpour, scramble around us to finish the last preparations. Water Elementals hold back the worst of the rain with an insulating bubble. Children burning fiery, adolescent auras of ki dart about to remove fuel lines or light runways. Five-meter tall Mechas of the Titan affinity deposit storage crates filled with all the fuel we’ll need onto the gunship’s lowered rear ramp, where waiting Psi and Tamers freed from the Orange bear them the rest of the way using telekinetics and animal companions. Our armory is simple. Components for Jolie’s Innovator class to piece into jury-rigged tech on the field. Protein bars and energy infusions for myself. All the myriad of expensive ammunition Mori buys with her minor league paychecks. Foodstuffs and water come last.

“The boys are moving quick tonight,” Mori notes.

It’s a hectic rush of humanity pocked by constant shouts and yelling in undercity dialects. Even if they don’t know where we’re heading, our people know we’re heading for a fight tonight. Everyone moves faster the moment they see me enter the insulating bubble around the gunship. Trying to impress me, I think. At least the kids are. An adrenaline buzz of excitement fills the air, almost overspilling into reality like the new ki I’ve come so close to drawing upon back home. I feel again like one sweep of my hand could draw it into physical being. But there’s a chaos to it here. Less natural, more human than the garden of my distant home.

Winter greets the three of us with a wave as we draw near the gunship’s slid-open side doors. A small projection pulses the late hour above her JOY. “Cutting it a little close, aren’t you, Mars?”

I flash her the grin the whole Section knows as I step into the light. “Didn’t know I had a reputation for being early.”

“It would make our lives far easier if you did. I’m pretty sure you’re the reason fashionably late is coming back into style.”

The spear-fighting fifth rank of our Section’s minor league cuts a cultured image amidst the hurrying Venters. Winter is one of my oldest allies from university, a prodigious martial artist who rose to prominence in the minor league at the same time I did. We’ve known the same gyms, same clubs, same rivals over the years. Been to more than our fair share of parties together, too. I know her fighting habits almost as well as Ajax’s.

Long legged and full bodied, she stands proudly over all but me on the airfield, emphasizing shouted commands with a spear meticulously forged from elemental ice as she clears the nearby workers. Her short, straight-cut hair hangs just past her jaw and fades from dark black to icy blue at the tips. No jumpsuit for her tonight. Instead, she wears a summer blouse and a grin; arms bare and shoulders covered by a grey fur cloak.

“I’ll change on the way,” she assures us. The cloak’s empty sleeves flap in the storm. “Mother was adamant I show up for some cocktail party in the Towers. She keeps trying to marry me off to the family’s business competition. Dreadful woman, by the way. Hope you never have to meet her.”

“That make two of us,” Mori chuckles, joining her with a small hop. They bump fists quickly.

“This couldn’t have come at a better time. I could stand a few more threats of world-conquering and mythological entities to keep that old hag away.”

“And I could always whip one up,” Jolie mutters. She blushes when Winter gives her an informal kiss on the cheek; a social custom from her northern Section homeland. The ass slap that follows for me is the complete opposite.

Bags are tossed to rest in the central cargo hold without care for order. We can divide and organize later. Six sleeping pallets recognizable to any martial artist rest in a corner of the gunship’s one livable room. Last of our number, Mori’s impromptu invitee directs the final supply loading behind the pallets, glancing back over his shoulder as he feels the deck shake from my arrival. Late twenties man, slight yet athletic, slicked-back fade. He’s well-dressed in overcity fashion. Trenchcoat and gloves, everything expensively fitted. Crystal-blue hololenses over his eyes, and a golden jackal’s helmet hanging unworn from a small lanyard at his waist.

“Congratulations on the promotion, Showmaker. I don’t think we’ve ever met face-to-face.” He turns his attention back to the loading for a moment, ushering in the last of the crates. Once the workers are finished, a Mecha outside lumbers back and hydraulics shudder in the gunship’s frame as the rear ramp begins contracting up into its closed position. Bay doors slam jolt closed on either side.

We shake hands as he turns back from the rain. “Em’s told me a few stories,” I say.

“Hopefully good ones,” he replies with a smile. “Volt. Security consultant, counter-espionage artist, and occasional independent contractor. Though I try to stay retired these days.”

“I’m glad you could make it. I know this is sudden…”

“I’ve been waiting for a call since the moment that mysterious message appeared on my JOY,” Volt says smoothly, not even letting me finish the apology. He adjusts his hololenses with a slight push. “Mori didn’t tell me much, other than that the champion called a boardroom meeting with the major league.”

“I’ll fill you and Winter in once we’re in the air.” I grab hold of an overhead grip as the deck shudders beneath us, bracing against the coming launch. “We’ve got one last stop to make before Olympus.”

Engines kick to life on the gunship’s wings to stabilize the vibrations underfoot. Lights dim throughout the cabin. Through a thin hall at the front of the aircraft, I watch as Jolie refamiliarizes herself with the controls of her old accomplice; thin fingers wandering the joysticks and backlit switches. She’s not flown the gunship in ages. Not enough time, too much effort to drag it out of the skyscraper for a joyride. Autobikes are her vice as of late. But I can see the little thrill it gives her to power up this billion-credit beast of war once more. Her eyes dance behind her glasses in the cockpit reflection, filled with pulsating blue light from the swarm of new JOY screens arrayed in a spiderweb around her. Lips part in the tentative, nostalgic smile of a child’s first snowfall.

This is her home. A comfortable thrill and the distance of a screen to digest it through. Enmeshed in technology only she understands, a master of her own dominion, the lighthouse guiding us to foreign shores. There’s no awkward or convoluted feelings gnawing at my sister as she throttles up. It’s just her and the machine.

The gunship ignites at her slightest touch, burning the storm away with pillars of flaming exhaust. Mori reaches over to flick a last few switches from the copilot’s chair; Jolie slaps her wandering hand away without even looking. She’s touchy about her belongings. And judging by the narrowed eyebrows and sudden frown that emerge on her face, clearly unsatisfied by whatever modifications the Venter orphans were testing.

One final flick insulates us from the roar of the engines. I turn away from the cockpit right as the two most important women in my life settle into their hardheaded bickering, staring out the still-open ramp. The Venters who put us in the sky with three hours’ notice stand in a haphazard ensemble near the skyscraper’s bay doors. Small hands shielding smaller eyes from the rain. A few wave. All the way at the back, a thickset fistfighter named Nabuna holds the bundle of my future son in his arms. Cheers reach my ears through the storm as the engines bathe the crowd in firelight. More vulgar than the usual kind that greet me when I step onto a fighting square at the Metro Blockhouse, they warm my heart nonetheless, reminding me again of the people who will be watching. Counting on me, relying on me to carry their hopes and dreams of a better future.

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I wave back. The cheers become a roar of humanity, too loud for any darkness to quell.

Volt shakes his head beside me, unclipping that helmet from his belt. “That look.” He chuckles when I glance over, surprised. “What are you thinking when you look at them like that?”

“Venters?”

“People. Fans. Everyone.”

Our view of the world shakes and shrinks, blending into a smear of steel and storm as we rocket away from the skyscraper. Twinkling lights divide the darkness into neverending grids. The lines twist and bend like neon rivers when we bank towards the industrial sector, forcing me to grip the handhold tighter.

“I want live up to the Mars they see,” I reply. I can’t help the way my gaze wanders back to the cockpit and the feisty gunslinger I love. The feelings are one and the same. “Not just a hero they can believe in. But someone who believes in them, too.”

----------------------------------------

“I don’t pride myself on being a pessimist, Showmaker, but I can recognize a bad idea when I see one.”

“So you said on the ride here,” I reply, following Volt onto the tarmac with a short jump. His raincoat flaps in front of me for only a moment before I bat it away with a quick surge of aura. “I didn’t know Mori had so many pessimists for friends.”

“You’d be surprised,” Volt chuckles. “It’s sort of the baseline where we come from.”

“How’d you two meet?”

“Long story, and not a happy one for most of it. Suffice to say that we’ve kept up ever since, and shared some tricks on the way.” Elemental lightning bounces between his fingertips before he goes to pat the heavy rifle slung across his back. “Good fighters are rare to come across in the Vents. Those with consciences are rarer. Especially after Dynasty.”

My eyes pierce the skyline around us as we stalk across the open expanse. Nerves on edge. Derelict skyscrapers blockade the horizon like fence posts for giants, only visible in silhouette when lightning crashes through the sky. Smaller warehouses and closed factories hedge the long-distant perimeter of the eerily empty landing pad. We landed on the edge of a full city block of flattened, unmarked metal marking the prison’s ground-level entrance. I’ve heard there’s another on the bottom of the city, above a part of the Abyss completely uncolonized by the Vents. Though only a maniac would try to sneak into the overcity by flying through the void.

Zone A never failed to unsettle me on my yearly pilgrimages to Carra. My instincts trust the eerie, creaking silence of the industrial sector even less tonight. Violent rain scalds the metal underfoot with abrasive fury. The gunship idles behind with lights off and engines running; side doors jacked wide open. I can feel the itch of Mori’s trigger finger watching my back. Jolie’s everpresent eye while she busies herself with more adjustments to the thrusters. Neither were happy to be relegated to overwatch, but the less people I bring with me, the better.

This is a quick job. In and out. The prisoner transfer orders were completed before Jolie and I even left the Metro Blockhouse earlier tonight. We discussed it hard. Came to an agreement quickly, as twins tend to do, though it wasn’t clean. Jolie was even less enthusiastic than I about the thought of freeing Carra, but she was the one to ultimately convince me of the merit of bringing him. Without another fighter of major league caliber on the team, I’d be the only one in a position to carry us all if push comes to shove. Jolie wouldn’t allow that. So here we are. Rebels once more, if only for a night.

Shouldn’t be a problem freeing Carra with the Champion’s stamp plastered over everything. Perhaps unwisely, Rebun gave my sister every virtual key to the city long ago. Until now, she’s only ever used them on official business. Tonight marks a grey step for both of us. I’m still not sure it’s the right one. Can’t show that in front of the newcomer, though.

“I wouldn’t be going through with this if I thought we had another option,” I tell him, banishing the last of my aura with a thought. Soaked crimson hair sticks to my forehead as the heated, luminous wind fades. “I gave it more thought than I do most things. We’d be fools to go to Olympus not expecting a fight. And we can’t trust the leagues for backup.”

“I had a sneaking suspicion I should have stayed retired.” Squinting up at the storm, Volt slicks his hair back and firmly pulls the jackal’s helmet over, covering his head with metal and a thin opaque visor of electric-blue glass. The visor tilts questioningly at me. “I’ve heard about Prazen before through the undercity networks. Once he comes out of that box, there’s no guarantee he’ll ever go back in.”

“I don’t plan on giving him a choice in it. He’s an unrepentant killer to the core.” My boots splash through a thick puddle. “There’s only one thing I can trust about him. Carra is a weapon. All he wants to do is fight, and he doesn’t care if someone else is using him when he does. He would have turned his back on the Shimanos in a heartbeat if Vex hadn’t kept feeding him challenges.”

He even said as much to me, when we encountered each other on Shimano Heavy Industries’ high-speed maglev. Money never mattered to him. Just the idea that Ajax and I could give him something he’d been craving for years- a fight that didn’t stop until one of us did.

That’s who I’m freeing tonight. Volt has a point. I know Carra hates me for what I did to him; the opportunities I stole. There’s not a doubt in my mind that he’ll try to slit my throat the moment I’m not looking. Which is why I’m not cutting him loose without a contingency plan.

Like I said- I’m not that hotheaded.

The prison entrance yawns ahead. A gaping, circular hole in metal baseboards of the city. Molten orange-red lights pulse like a heartbeat inside, stretching the shadows of the two figures waiting for us in the rain. Adept Nohra holds a handcuffed, jumpsuited Carra by the scruff of his collar. Four more of Fang’s Adepts kneel around the circumference of the hole, little more than silhouettes and flapping cloaks in the storm.

Volt’s helmet shakes once, right hand drifting towards the stripped-down marksman rifle slung across his back. “Not even you think this is a good idea.”

I toss my hair over my shoulder and effortlessly take the lead. “I’ve had worse.”

Crossing the last of the barren field of metal, keenly attuned to the familiar, instinctive itch slithering down my spine, I draw to a stop near Nhora, briefly running my eyes over her ward. Ragged circles of dark skin ring Carra’s eyes from beneath. His skin is horribly pallid. Eyes wincing from overexposure to natural light. Like a reclusive prince being dragged from his tower of imprisonment. But the moment he sees it’s me who came for him, all the tiny, outward tells of weakness evaporate like flash-fried water.

Carra’s manacles click once as he tries to spread his wrists apart. “The years really do keep growing shorter, don’t they, Mars?” Golden eyes taunt me through the rain. He’s bored; this whole exchange just a poor act to conceal the killer instinct that fills his blood. “I’m disappointed the old man isn’t here. Did he only send you, desperate and drowning like a rat?”

“Mars.”

Jolie’s voice works its way through my earcomm, laced with warning. I suppress the outward signs of my surprise at the contact. Something must get through- some fractional twitch not even Nohra notices, but Carra subconsciously responds too. He’s the only one who could.

Half his mouth curves into a razor-thin knifeslash of a smile, the only sign we’re suddenly playing the same game. He sees the powder keg building. He’s the only one who does. Thin shoulders roll in their sockets to test the gravity of the real world. Slipper-covered feet readjust by millimeters, angling towards the four Adepts lingering silhouetted around the prison exit. Dim as it is, the light spilling from the prison should still be shedding some kind of illumination over their features. But the shadows stick to them like physical garments.

“I’m picking up readings of a Psi in the area.” Jolie’s voice crackles and fades, losing words before it returns. “Scrambling… mental signatures... something’s wrong.”

Nhora’s features harden while I let Carra make another bored snipe. Narrowed, flinty eyes flick between the back of his head and the front of mine. Judging and hesitating in the same motion. Wondering if I’m going to end this farce and take the bait, or let the Champion’s murderous ex-apprentice prattle on till I’ve got grey hair too.

She doesn’t expect me to break the trap wide open. Neither do the four waiting Adepts. They didn’t even realize their cards were bleeding from the moment I stepped up. Because despite their disguises, despite all their experience at the pinnacle of our fighting society, only someone who’s seen the absolute bottom of ths prison would know there’s not a single Psi on staff here.