Chapter One

(Angel)

"I'm sorry, but our policies haven't changed," the woman said. "We've never covered Trexall. We did cover Albitrexate, but they discontinued that, so . . ."

"They're the same fucking drugs!" Angel snapped as her '73 Cutlass growled down a sunny wetland stretch of King George Road. Warm autumn wind buffeted through the rolled-down windows to mess her jet-black pompadour and blast her tears. The wheel trembled under her shaking hand; her other squeezed the phone so hard she swore the screen would shatter against her cheek. She took a deep breath--from her diaphragm, just like her therapist taught her.

She eased off the accelerator and exhaled slowly before explaining through gritted teeth, "I've researched them. They're the same chemical."

"Yes, I know," the woman said placatingly, as if acknowledging the absurdity would make her client feel better. "But not according to the patent office . . ."

Angel closed her eyes with exasperation. Not smart when driving. "So, she has to stop her chemo because a scrap of paper in a file drawer says two things the same are actually different? Does that sound right to you?"

"I'm sorry, ma'am, but there's nothing I can do. We can cover Clofarex--"

"She doesn't need Clofarex!" Angel nearly shouted. The sting behind her eyes let loose, and she had to fight back a sob. "'Trexate was working! Clofarex wasn't! What about that can't you get through your fat, stupid head? Your company is killing my wife!"

"I'm sorry you feel that way. I wish I could--" In the background, a man's voice interrupted the woman. Angel couldn't make out the words, but he sounded excited. "Oh, my god!" someone cried.

"Ms. Zacarias," the woman said blankly "I think you should check the news. Now."

The call dropped. Angel screamed and threw the phone into the passenger floorboards. Her car briefly fishtailed until she steadied the wheel with both hands.

Tears ran freely now. She knew she should pull over, but instead she put pedal to the metal and raced the Cutlass from eighty to ninety and beyond. Trees and shrubs slipped by in a leafy blur that made a forest corridor of the lonesome highway. If only the road rolled forever; if only she could drive and never stop. But then Angel and Carin's life seemed typified by the impotence of 'if.'

If only Carin hadn't gotten sick. If only the Reserve hadn't discharged me. If only we weren't crippled with debts. If only my parents weren't selfish assholes.

She hadn't called them in months, and that last time only her mother would speak to her.

"Sweetie, I think this is God's way of telling you you're on the wrong path."

"So, God gave my wife leukemia to teach me a lesson?"

Angel had said some choice, bridge-nuking words after that and never looked back. She knew the truth: they just didn't want their lesbian daughter's wife to drain their retirement fund.

But now Carin had it in her spinal cord, and doctors gave her a 30% chance--provided she continued the chemo. The online donations funded part of that, and Angel's minor celebrity status helped bring it in. But despite the novelty of her gender and sexual orientation, that Silver Star was seven years old. 'Has-been war hero' didn't exactly open wallets.

Angel sniffled, wiped her eyes. Sometimes controlled breathing and thinking things through helped keep the attacks down, even if things weren't any better afterwards. From her flannel jacket she tugged loose a cigarette and drew deeply as she lit. She was going to see Carin this evening at Cancer NYU, but she should give her a call now, assuming she wasn't too wonky. As she leaned down for the phone, she idly wondered why the insurance lady hung up on her.

The fireball struck.

The explosion was down the road, a few hundred meters away, but Angel was still driving way too fast.

Most people would slam the brakes and jerk the wheel, but if she did that the car would roll over a half dozen times. Instead she tapped and swerved gently left, and the Cutlass plowed into the expanding debris cloud but missed the round boulder that blocked half the two-lane highway.

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But the car bottomed out against a pothole or a crater and rebounded into the air and for a moment Angel was no longer driving an Oldsmobile in New Jersey but a Humvee outside Abu Ghraib.

She hears gunfire and feels blood on her face and sees the truck in front of her flip in the air from the IED. The Humvee sinks to the side and crashes to a halt, smashing her back and forth. She can't see for all the blood and dust and frantically looks for her M4 carbine but it's nowhere and everything looks wrong. She listens: grit like BB pellets tap dance on the windshield, but the gunfire's gone and Anders is missing from her seat.

Because she's been dead seven years.

Angel spent a trembling, wind-down minute before wiping the blood from her eyes, her mouth, her chin. Gathering her wits, she stared dumbfounded at the droplets spangling her white tank-top. The Cutlass had slid off the shoulder to crash at a 45otilt into a wet ditch, and now tall grass and mosquitoes intruded through the rolled-down diver's side. She slapped at a bite and tried to open the door, but of course mud blocked the way.

She climbed up and out the passenger door instead, pausing on the way to retrieve her phone from the floorboard's driveshaft hump. The short drop to the pavement left her lanky legs wobbly, but aside from a few bruises, a nasty gash on her forehead and the inevitable whiplash, she judged she was okay. Shame about the car, though. She snapped its picture, the uplifted undercarriage exposing the bent axle and trashed engine.

As she limped the hundred or so meters to the smoking impact site, she noted the highway was still devoid of traffic. Did they name meteors like they did asteroids? If so, she saw it first, so it was hers to name. She'd let Carin have the honors, though. Maybe the media story would bring in donations.

By the time she reached the splintered, asphalt crater, the smoke had mostly cleared. The rock was gray, egg-shaped and polish smooth. She always thought asteroids were rough and bumpy. But then, she wasn't an astronomer. She snapped another picture and sent both to Carin: hey babe look what this meteor did to my cutlass! omg it looks like a space egg wtf!

The space egg then fizzled and cracked, and its skin flaked away like dried mud in an Arizona windstorm. Angel stepped back, her army boots tripping on a jag of road. She fell on her butt. Beneath the outer coating the meteor glowed an unearthly green that made her think of an R-rated cartoon movie from the eighties.

A tiny hole opened, and an eerie blue light shone upon her face. Angel couldn't move. Something cold and intangible slithered through her eyes, and she felt alien stirrings. She screamed in silence.

A female voice, soft and monotone, spoke from nowhere.

~New pilot accepted. Please allocate resources for armor module.

Who are you? Angel thought.

~Please allocate resources for armor module. Images of various robots and weaponry ran through her mind. She saw schematics, specifications. Somehow, they all made terrible sense.

This is insane. I have a concussion.

~Please allocate resources for armor module. A rendering of Angel's own face floated before her, rotating back and forth before elongating beyond what was acceptably human. Her chin sharpened. Her eyes slanted. Her ears sprouted points.

No, I don't want to be a fucking elf!

~The appearance is variable. There are other options. We can augment your organic neural network, store your mind state for later retrieval. She saw the map of a brain, burrowed into an ant colony by a web of lace-thin worms.

No! Don't you drill into my brain!

~We can upgrade your nutritional requir--

NO!

~We can implant memories into--

HELL NO!

~We can inject you with nanites which--

NO! NO! NO!

~--will regenerate damage--

NO! FUCKING NO!

~--and cure diseases.

Wait, what?

~The hydranites are nanoscale--

Shut up and tell me: Can they cure cancer?