Tagia finishes her workday on the roof of the south hangar. A stiff breeze brings in the cool sea air. The shipyard bustles below. Machines and dockhands work alongside throngs of lift-bots and conveyor carts. They unload barges then load trucks or unload trucks then load barges. Several vessels sit at port.

Tonight Tagia oversees an airdrop delivery. She stands beside the helicopter pad with a security guard. It’s a friend of hers. An air duct hums behind them. The chopper’s running late. It’s a tighter schedule than usual. Her race begins in half an hour, and she still has to register a new mech.

At least the delivery was for the Loyallary. Their jobs always paid double. The shipyard covered her normal hours. Then LiNC paid in interplanetary. She was saving that for a friend.

The suns set fast on Ottowon. In minutes they sink behind the horizon and dye the sky, the sea, and the shoreline red. A lone mountain gives the sunset some foreground. Miles offshore the jagged peak is a mere silhouette. The cables to the space elevator vanish into the glare.

Back on the hangar, Tagia watches her colleague, Aliyah, spit-clean her work baton. The woman’s posted on the other side of the helipad. She’s the only security at the south hangar this evening. There’s usually a team. The schedule says the drop is high-priority, but the night crew’s been short-staffed lately. While the women wait, they play some music into their headsets. It’s a simple instrumental, one Aliyah made herself.

Inside the building, the party starts early. It’s race night. The crowds leaving wear coveralls and boots. The ones coming back don club-ware and sneakers. Engines rev. People dance.

The races kick off with the underweight division. The announcer rallies the audience. A couple food trucks stretch the party into the parking lot. More automobiles arrive by the minute. Sea lions bark somewhere in the background.

As the hangar fills, the women on the roof continue to lounge against the pad. Tagia’s tall. Aliyah’s short. One leans with a hip against the platform. The other’s propped on an elbow.

Aliyah wasn’t from Ottowon. She was Disran, but she was as dark-skinned as moonkith. Her curly hair, shorter stature, and rounder face were uncommon however. Most Ottowins had a longer, leaner look. Ottowin hair also grew thicker. The native women didn’t often cut it either. During work Tagia maintained hers in a massive coil atop her head. A magnetic whip-ribbon acted as the braid and kept it tight. She was good with it.

Aliyah sighs, bored. For fun she switches their mics to private and raps a line into the song. “Put me on the rooftop. I’ll work it till the dew drops.”

Tagia snickers. Without missing a beat, she shoos a rat off the breaker box. “Dude, screw the hoopla. This view could knock your shoes off.” The critter falls then scurries into a hole. “Tube socks, too, dog.”

“Oof,” Aliyah huffs then pretends to fan herself with her baton. “With what my boots cost? That’s gonna be a huge loss.”

The women laugh.

The mountain on the horizon appears to start smoking then. Billows emerge from its peak. A soft boom ripples across the bay.

The space elevator triggers. At the summit, five cables bore into the mountaintop. Each line anchors itself to a different face of the crag with one at the highpoint. They make a rough X in the landscape. Giant chambers house the cables inside the rock. Some shrubbery grows around the rings where the embedded cylinders break the rocky surface.

Two cables initiate. Cooling billows spill down the mountainside. The chambers blink green to signal liftoff. The apertures open slowly.

On launch two pods rocket up the lines. Vents lower down purge the exhaust. The collar-like cabins rotate as they rise. The thrust sprays downward in brisk cones.

The women crick their necks following the pods into the clouds. Afterward Tagia pivots to the guardrail and peeks down at the docks.

The crane cabin is empty. The operator’s running late, too. The whole shipyard seems to be.

Forklifts, flatbeds, and dockhands hurry to move shipments. Booms swing haphazardly over them. Crates and storage containers creak and clank, clunk and echo. On the receiving end, the vessels idle as if impatient. Some carry goods. Others haul food. One, unfortunately, is a floating landfill.

It was part of the deal for the space elevator. In exchange for the mountain, the Loyallary handled the garbage from all the cities around Equatorial Sea. The job stunk, but Ottowon wasted enough raw materials to profit off the gasification alone.

The crane operator takes a minute climbing into the cabin. He gives the weakest thumbs-up when he finally gets in. Tagia rolls her eyes. Jamarcus is always slow.

Before long, security buzzes in with news of the helicopter. They report liftoff but don’t say from which building. Behind the shipyard, the city of Kawaja Bay looms with a hundred skyscrapers to check. The skyline spans the coast for miles in both directions. Patios, penthouses, and partial roofs tower together. The windows reflect the sunset.

The women hear the chopper first. Front and center it shows among some shorter buildings. The dual propellers burr. With a storage container chained to its undercarriage, it hooks out of the city.

The women don’t see the pilot, but he flies solo. The glare off the windshield hides him. Inside the cockpit he wipes the blood from his face then adjusts his helmet and headset. The co-pilot lies in back. A knife sticks out of his gut. The aftermath of their struggle strew the interior. Wires hang loose. Blood speckles the floor. The port-windows are the only things clean.

Eventually the man at the controls radios the shipyard for clearance. Security relays it to the rooftop where it interrupts the women’s private line. The signal buzzes. Aliyah checks and accepts the request right away. She then engages the charge in her baton and begins her sweep of the roof. The music returns on its own.

“Shoot,” she says, still keeping with the beat. She gestures to the chopper to change topics. “Thought they blew shop. Last crew, whole group flopped.”

“Yeah, this ain’t no cute job.” Tagia pops off the railing and circles the platform to the stairs. “Day one hits you too raw. Hoorah.” She flexes an arm. An acid burn scars the back of it. “Plus we got a new boss, so hiring’s a loose cog. Lots of sloths getting caught up on a few docks.”

Aliyah whoops, humming in agreement. She stops the music after and pings her friend to confirm the request. The private line remains open long enough for her to close with, “Damn girl, we need to record that.”

Tagia chuckles.

Once the helicopter arrives overhead, he drops a guide-line from the container. Tagia springs onto the pad immediately. The three cords flail some, but she snatches them without a problem. The gusts nearly rip her hair from its coil. As the chopper hovers, she anchors the lines to the helipad then tightens them with the foot-pedal. The payload touches down with a tilt correction. The back-end’s heavy. The pilot lastly detaches the hoist and lets it fall. The rig clangs against the metal roof. Both women wince.

The helicopter departs as soon as the pilot disconnects. The crane swings in behind it. The new harness hangs lower. It dings the unit’s roof. Tagia pulls herself up from the other side.

She hooks the hooks, loops the loops. She next adjusts the rear levers until the load rebalances. Underneath, the platform releases the guide-lines itself.

“All good,” she shouts into her headset, jumping down then smacking the side of the box. The operator proceeds to lift it off the pad. The chains snap taut. The boom groans. It sounds heavy.

“Was that a record?” Aliyah asks. Across the hangar, she watches the container disappear over the side rail.

Tagia smirks. “I figured they could use the boost.”

“You ain’t wrong.”

While the women talk, Tagia collects her phone, keys, and work badge off the nearest air duct. Her race starts in a quarter hour. She scoffs but hurries nonetheless. The gravel scatters underfoot.

To save time, she skips the service elevator and heads for the emergency exit. It’s the fire escape. There’s a hole in the roof with a bar to slide down.

“Is tonight the night?” Aliyah asks. Their headsets crackle. “Is she ready?”

Tagia doesn’t respond. Instead she pauses at the fire escape and answers with her key-fob. She aims it over the rail and hits her truck in the parking lot. Her mech sits in the back-hatch. The fob beeps when the engines boot up. It whirs and revs into gear. Outside, the ramp extends from the tailgate. The edge nearly nicks a trailer of jet-skis.

Before Tagia takes the drop, Aliyah pings in one last time. “Is Angie racing tonight?”

“Yep.” She grabs the pole high then wraps a leg low.

“Same heat?”

“Yep.”

The guard tips her head. “Whoop his ass, girl.”

The engineer smiles and nods back. “That’s the plan.” She adjusts her leg. “See you tomorrow.”

“Laters.”

Stepping off, Tagia drops through the hole. The metal hisses. A zipper on her boot rings against the bar. From the rafters she descends into the husk of the hangar. It’s mostly hollow. Floors pass slow.

Walkways, conveyors, and staircases line the walls. Hooks and pulleys hang between. The top levels bustle with the evening crew. They shift equipment, move packages, switch crates.

The windows bring in the sea breeze. The walls whistle on the harder gusts. Chains jingle like windchimes. The window panes are tall and thin. They run like stripes down all four walls. Many are broken. Some frames are completely empty.

Midway down the escape, Tagia spots her container through some cracked windows. The crane maneuvers the unit onto the largest vessel at port: the LiNC freighter. Stacks of storage containers crowd the front. Some dump trucks and excavators sit among the middle.

In total, there were three ships the Loyallary operated. Two were barges, meant for trash. The third was the freighter. It managed the resources for Cable Mountain. It was a hybrid ship, half flat-bed, half office building. Its length ran as long as the outlet docks beside it.

The longer Tagia watches the unit, the slower she slides. Jamarcus ends up setting it down weird. Despite the space in the middle, he chooses to place it on the upper-deck, at the front. He rotates it crosswise to fit it between stacks. He also sets it by itself.

The freighter blows its horn to confirm. Tagia tries to lean for a better angle, but the party on the ground floor soon envelops her.

The music bumps. The crowd bobbles. Every window, door, and garage is up or open. On the parking side, gates and turnstiles separate the lot from the building. The lines are short but moving slow. Several bouncers guard the entry. They check IDs, wand bags, scan signals.

One of the bouncers has a rusty hue to him. Tattoos run up and down his arms and neck. Two are blue-tinted with a texture of stone. Most everyone else is tall, thin, and dark.

On Ottowon, it was rare to find anybody who wasn’t Ottowin. People from Disra were common around the elevator, but not much farther out. It went the same for people from Dion and Lith. Often the locals assumed any foreigner worked for LiNC. Some, of course, did, but many immigrated to Ottowon for the hustle.

The crowd cheers. On the race-side of the hangar, the first of the underweights skids across the finish. She brakes late and almost crashes into the safety tires. The spectators there jump back.

In the bleachers, fans wave signs and banners to celebrate. Second place skids into finish a little behind. The rest of the racers arrive in a cluster. They swerve to find room without colliding. The building’s long along that side, but there isn’t much of a gap to the tires.

Tagia steps off the fire-pole a bit beside the excitement. A drink bar and lounge seating square the corner. As she brushes herself off, a younger girl jumps from the couch and jogs over.

The kid dresses grungy. Straps hang from her jeans and jacket. Her hair’s short and braided. Metal beads chitter against one another. The girl’s dark like the locals, but she’s a shade of blue. The texture of her skin is also rocky. She’s not as tall or as lean either. Over her eyebrows, a series of sapphire gems dots the arches. They sparkle.

The girl was half Lith. She snuck in tonight. She wasn’t old enough for the races, but she faked it. She stole some gems from her housemother and glued them over her eyebrows. As adults, Lithian women developed protrusions of sapphire along their brows, cheekbones, and jawlines. More gems appeared the older they aged. The eldest had them on their collarbones.

“Hey.” The girl stumbles to a halt. “Did you bring your new mech?”

Tagia snatches the youngster by the chin. “What are these?” She flicks a gem by her brow. “Did you sneak in with these?”

“Maybe.” The girl yanks away then touches her browline to check the studs. She re-sticks the one. “I wanted to watch you race.”

Tagia squints for a moment then turns to the bouncers. “Zill let you in, didn’t he?”

Beside the turnstiles, the younger of the blue bouncers runs a hand through his greased hair. His button-up strains at the arm, neck, and chest.

“That dude’s too old for you, Tay.”

“Gross.” The girl grimaces. “It’s not like that, Tag. I played the Lith card. Half-kin still count as kith, gees.”

Tagia grunts then squints harder. Neither flinches. Their heights stagger by comparison. Taylor’s one of the shortest at the party. The kid barely stands at the woman’s elbow.

In time Tagia concedes then nods for the girl to follow. The older heads for sign-in. The younger tails like a puppy.

The main desk sits across the lobby. The two brush shoulders with a dozen people along their way. A woman tips her glass. A guy tips his hat. One chick glares.

Currently the place busies itself with the races changing division. The beginners leave. The experts enter. Vehicles file in from one side of the building and file out around the other. Many of them drive themselves.

“Yo,” Taylor shouts over the music. “Are you battling tomorrow? The north is hosting a jam.”

“Maybe,” Tagia says. “Do you plan on sneaking into that, too?”

“Maybe.”

They both smirk.

When the two reach the main desk, the guy behind the counter waves for them to wait. Dreadlocks dangle from his knit-cap. He braids his beard in a similar fashion. The strands sway as he switches between his handheld and his computer. Three more clerks work alongside him. They take bets, pass calls, register drivers. Their workspace is tight. The back wall’s built with valves, gauges, and levers. A gigantic spool and hose protrude from the side wall.

Beside the desk, a set of double doors opens to the parking lot. Barricades replace the turnstiles on this end. They block off a space for vehicle inspection. The spot’s right against the building.

Before anyone helps Tagia, her mech pulls into the space. One of the clerks swings outside to meet it. She signals them to join her. The inspector grabs an isometer box on her way out. The clamps dangle. Tay hurries to keep up.

Outside, the clerk tries not to laugh. Tagia’s mech is ugly in her opinion. She throws her bangs aside to hide it. Her hair hangs long. Hair-ties and metal charms decorate the heavy locks. The piercings in her ears and nose match.

Tagia’s mech wasn’t much for looks, but she didn’t design it for that. She built it to transform. The body was a steel-frame barrel. It had six modular legs. The wheels were giant rubber bowls. Altogether it looked like a bug. Four wheels were down in box-cart mode. Two were up, stowed into the roof. For mobility, all six could rotate around the body. The joints in the legs also extended. The driver pod sat in the center.

“No isomers, right?” the clerk asks Tagia. She clamps the box onto the frame, plugs it in, then holds the tablet up to read it. Everything dings back green. She seems upset about it.

Tagia folds her arms. “Of course not.”

“Just cogs, or get lost,” Taylor adds from behind. It’s a lyric from an older song. “Isn’t that right, Tag?”

She clenches her jaw, checking the regulation tape on the pavement. Her wheels clear. “Right.”

Once the clerk completes her inspection, she prints off a few patches and sticks them to the leg joints. She misses the two on the roof. The woman finishes the registry with a couple taps on her tablet. Tagia passes.

Around then, another mech pulls in beside them. It parks outside the barricade. The clerk doesn’t hesitate to help this driver. She moves on without so much as a nod.

Taylor mumbles something under her breath. It sounds like, “Bitch.”

Regardless Tagia clicks her fob and switches her mech into dune buddy mode. The wheels jut out wider. The body lifts higher. The shifts and sheers of the engines ratchet.

If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

“Hey,” Taylor yips, grabbing her friend by the wrist. “Are you feeling okay?”

“Yeah.” She nudges away. “It’s just something from work.”

Without looking back, she crawls into her driver pod and reaches for the tackle box behind the seat. Her phone unlocks it. The case makes for a small trunk.

She stows her work headset inside it then, from it, pulls out a pair of custom goggles. The lenses are big. The strap’s thick. They look outdated, old-fashioned. She has to wrestle the elastic to fit it over her massive coil. The frames enwrap half her face. She taps the side to turn everything on. They double as dial-screens and come fully-equipped with scouter telescopics. The thick strap conceals the earset. It isn’t entirely legal.

While Tagia adjusts her goggles, Taylor rocks on her heels and twiddles her fingers behind her. She hums as if about to speak.

“Hey, Tag.” Her voice wavers. “I was wondering… What are you doing after?”

The girl’s pitch strikes a nerve. The nostalgia hits hard. A chill washes down her back.

Taylor was from the same orphanage as Tagia. Years ago they slept in the same hall. The housemothers called them sisters. Tagia managed to earn herself early release however. With her skillset, she won an internship at the docks, and the shipyard moved her into an apartment nearby. Sadly the complex was on the opposite side from the children’s home. At first she visited often. Last year or two, not so much.

Tagia crosses her arms and leans against her mech. Her shoulders slump. She takes a breath for herself before smiling at the girl. Her cheeks wrinkle under her goggles. “Don’t worry. I’ll find you, okay? I won’t just ditch.”

Taylor grins then nods. The gems along her eyebrows reflect the late daylight. They twinkle. “What about your hair? Are you taking it down?”

Tagia balks and scrunches half her face in disgust. “With the new mech? Are you crazy?”

“But it’s your signature,” she says, whines. Her pitch again strikes a nerve. “Come on, Tag. There’s room back there.”

As the woman scowls, the girl points to the space behind her seat. Pistons and shocks crisscross the interior, but the kid isn’t wrong. There’s room for her hair.

The two stare each other down a moment.

Ultimately Tagia sighs. “Fine.”

Taylor grins and nods bigger. The beads in her hair chitter.

“But then I’m out, got it?”

“Got it.”

Still scowling, Tagia steps forward then reaches under her hair. She grabs her whip-ribbon by the handle. She disengages the magnetics. She yanks it free. The braid goes limp. Her coil unravels. She throws her head forward to contain it. The heavy locks pile on the asphalt. She collects them into a ponytail next. She grips it high on her head then flicks the whip around it. The ribbon spirals. From base to tail, it re-wraps her hair. The popper skips off the ground. Thereafter she throws her head back and re-engages the magnetics, locking the ponytail into a fountainous arc that hangs down and off her back.

“Awesome,” Taylor whispers.

“Happy?”

The girl grins and nods once more. It’s her biggest yet.

“Good.” Huffing, Tagia plucks some hair from her ponytail then spindles them into bangs. The strands curl with her jawline. “Now get in the stands.”

Taylor listens, spinning on heel then darting into the lobby. There’s a skip in her step. When the kid finally leaves, Tagia crawls into the driver pod. She belts herself in, shifts up, drives out. The engines whir. The wheels crinkle against the gravel. A small group of dockhands moves aside to let her pass. Another mech soon pulls in.

The main desk opens the gate for her. There’s a chain-link, barbwire fence that runs between the docks and the parking lot. It connects directly to the corner of the hangar. The section for the entrance opens on rails.

The clerk who did her inspection sneers. Tagia yells, “Thanks,” on her way out anyway.

The dock narrows along the seaside face of the hangar. It’s for employees only. The stretch makes for a modest boardwalk. The wood planks drum under the weight of her rubber wheels. The lower dock sops and squelches from the incoming tide.

Here the shipyard doesn’t service any vessels. Rather, dozens of jet-skis and personal speedboats line port. Some are even roped to the outlet docks. Cranes stand like turrets on both sides.

Tagia drives slowly. She adjusts her goggles to zoom in on the barge. The evening grows dark. The lampposts beside the hangar flicker on, but they obscure the view more than they help.

The freighter sits at the next port up. Stacks of storage containers glow under the ship’s lights. The units shine in dull patches of red, blue, and green.

A lone security guard patrols the aisles on upper-deck. He walks with his firearm drawn and reports back often. His earset remains unlit during. Albeit tall and built, the man moves as if with the shadows.

Before Tagia rounds the hangar, she spots the guard by her container. He loiters along the guardrail but doesn’t stay long. With a gloved hand, he double-checks the unit’s deadbolts, unlatching then re-latching the front. He reports in once he sweeps back into the aisles.

Tagia furrows her brow.

The bleachers rumble. Around the building, fans pack the stands. Taylor wedges herself into the last row at the corner. The back of the bleachers doesn’t align with the corner of the hangar, but the girl hangs over the rail enough to peer around the edge.

“Hurry,” she screams. “Spots are filling quick!”

Tagia flinches. She soon sits back down, shifts back up, and clicks back out of her telescopics.

From the docks, she drives through a gap in the bleachers. It funnels her to the starting line. An overhead section connects the seating and makes for a small entry tunnel. Box-carts, mud-runners, and other dune-buggies fill most the spots. A checkered banner flaps in the breeze over them. The air burns, musty with exhaust and motor oil.

Tagia pulls into a space along the near flank. Taylor hollers within earshot. She parks beside a custom go-kart that’s very familiar to her. It’s a bland model, easy to remember. The driver isn’t in it yet.

The mech’s wide-set. It hugs the asphalt at half the height of hers. The wheels are chunky. The frame’s a wedge. Bumpers line the sides. A push-bar protects the rear. The cabin rotates if need be.

She searches the area for the owner but doesn’t see him.

D’Angelo sees her though.

He watches from the darkness, lurking behind the far bleachers. The man prefers to prepare alone. There’s a front-end loader parked beside him. The bucket’s up for cover. He holsters a handgun on his ankle. He sheaths a knife in his shoe. A few pulse grenades hang on his belt. His baggy jeans and jersey conceal everything.

While the remaining spots fill, he removes his phone, checks his contacts, then triggers his mech. The engine growls. Tagia startles. She swivels to search for him, but again, sees no one.

He snorts. After a short chant, he climbs into the front loader and backs it out. His phone stays at hip. He messages without looking.

The front loader’s too big for the entry tunnel. Bucket up, D’Angelo trundles it wide around the bleachers. The crowd cheers. The drivers clap. He ends up stopping the vehicle in the middle of the raceway. It obstructs the center two lanes. One of the competitors complains.

It’s an extra obstacle.

Tagia splutters her lips. “That’s the game, dog.”

At this hour the whole shipyard labors with machinery. Most operate remotely. Lift-bots make up the majority. They work by themselves, in pairs, or in assembly. Most use the two-prong adapter. Some have the four.

The conveyor carts work around them. They align, scatter, then realign to move the freight. Pallets and crates glide from one side of the yard to the other. There are five trains across the loading zone. A team of dirt bikes zips around to help.

Back in the loader, D’Angelo faces it toward the starting line then reverses. A broken lift-bot lies behind him and marks where to park. He spaces the vehicle with the two bleachers to form an equal split. Then he squares the bucket with the line.

D’Angelo had a thing for precise spacing. He tinkered a lot. It showed in his schedules, his design plans, and his training. He dressed meticulously. His high-top fade was crisp. He did it himself. Even his workouts revolved around precise angles. It was probably why he and Tagia complemented each other so well. She was curvy.

When the man finally turns off the loader, the crowd whoops. He springs from the cabin like a boy at a playground. He hops off the ladder, swings to the front, then jumps for the bucket with the same energy. He catches the lip one-handed. It’s a big jump. The height at his feet is at least waist-level from the ground. Tagia rolls her eyes. Angie lastly pulls himself up and sits at the lip, letting his legs dangle.

He raises his arms high and wide. “Happy DIstiss, y’all!”

The stands giggle. So do a few of the drivers. One of them howls.

Distiss was a small holiday on Ottowon. It was payday for most. It signified the first of the month, when Ottowon passed over Disra’s northern pole. The glaciers there were the brightest object in the Ottowin sky. They shined like a spotlight at the southern horizon. Ottowon’s southern pass was called Arostiss, midmonth. Aros didn’t have any glaciers.

“Tonight we got three heats,” D’Angelo shouts as he sizes up the competition. He looks at Tagia the longest. “Top three in each will advance to the final.” He winks at her. She smirks back. “We’ll run the entire bracket twice,” he says to everybody. “If no one repeats, we’ll do a head to head, circuit style.”

The crowd cheers louder. Engines rev. A barge across the shipyard blows its horn.

That’s just a coincidence.

“Now,” he continues. “My man, Tyreese, is on the lighting.” He points to the streetlights. They span the shipyard behind him. In rows, the dome-headed fixtures rise above the traffic and cast it in a cautious yellow.

“The nears will flash for ready.” He gestures to the corners. ”The fars will flash for set. Then, once the spotlight hits from the north hangar—”

He glances behind him and waves his phone to check the signal. His man on the roof closes then opens the shutters to confirm. Angie turns back and re-raises his arms. “We go.”

The drivers bellow. Many applaud. Somebody in the stands trills their tongue. Angie drops out of the bucket before any of it calms down. He pats his front pocket jogging over to his mech. His keys jingle.

There’s an extra set this evening. It’s a spare to his apartment.

“I like your hair,” he tells Tagia.

She simpers. In the adjacent spot, she shifts once between dune buggy mode and railcar. The joints reverberate. “How’s the heat looking?”

He simpers, too. To get into his mech, he has to step over the windshield. The glass retracts to give him room. It rolls back up after he straps in.

“Difficult to tell,” he says, looking down the line. “Lots of upgrades tonight. More cylinders, better engines, new tires.” He pauses to grab his goggles. They’re stowed in the compartment under his seat.

They’re a slimmer model. The strap’s thin. The viewport spans both his eyes with a single visor. The earpiece hides in the strap.

“There’s also this chick on the flank,” he adds, sliding his goggles over his fade. “Oh she’s a lead-footed stunner, for sure, but I think her mech might've escaped some mad lab or something. Not sure. Should be investigated.”

By the time D’Angelo turns back, Tagia’s glowering at him. He plays dumb and shrugs. She sees through it and cocks a brow. The smell of exhaust fills the air.

“Some mad lab, huh?” She drops her tone. “You damn right.”

They chuckle.

While the fumes waft around them, they settle into their seats and wait for the lights. D’Angelo fiddles with his pocket. Tagia tries to peek at the barge. She toggles through her goggles’ options, but nothing works. The bleachers get in the way. Too many people cram the clunky stands. Too many signs and towels flail among too many hands.

She grumbles.

“You okay?” Angie asks.

She slumps in her seat. The pod forces her to sit compact, but she makes it seem lazy. “It’s just something from work. The last container I hitched felt funny. It’s on the barge now, and I don’t know.”

He sits up straighter. “You report it?”

“Nah.” She clicks out of her goggles then huffs. “There wasn’t anything to report.”

D’Angelo doesn’t respond. Instead he removes his phone and starts to type something out of sight.

“Well.” He clears his throat. “Let’s talk about it after. The barge will still be here for a bit. Maybe we can do a contingency. Your boy Darius is in the towers tonight, right? We’ll call him.”

She nods then slouches further. Her jeans pull taut at the thigh.

“Until then…” He coughs, eyeing her long legs. “You want to put a little wager on this?”

Her lips tick up at a corner. She leans forward and rests an elbow on her knee to face him. “What’d you have in mind? The usual?”

He runs his hands over his freshly-shaven jaw. “Yeah.”

“Yeah?” She pops a brow then slouches back like before. Her jeans slip just off the hip. “Okay.”

“Okay,” he parrots, looking away as smoothly as he can.

When the near lights flash, the two of them reset in their seats. The crowd quiets. Shifters slot then re-slot. The far lights flash a moment later. Engines begin to tremble. Grips tighten. Feet twitch.

As the spotlight hits, Tagia stomps the gas. Rubber screeches, burns. Her bowl-wheels stick like spikes. Others spin out. Angie falls a blink behind.

Off the line, she pumps the clutch and shifts to bullet mode. The front wheels slap to the front. The backs go to the back. Low and narrow she shoots the gap between conveyor carts. It’s the straightest shot. Some mechs pass clean. Others have to veer into wider gaps. Some clip. Sparks fly. Someone loses a hubcap. One guy gets stuck.

After the first train, Tagia switches back into dune buggy. She needs the agility. For the stage ahead, a fleet of lift-bots marches up and down the shipyard. Some bots pass their cargo. Some drag it. The mechs cut then recut, brake then accelerate. The gravel scatters.

Tagia and Angie pass through with the lead. They hit the second train in the middle of it reassembling itself. Conveyors detach, pivot, then shuffle about to reconnect. Gaps start wide but close quickly. The frontrunners tear through with ease. The stragglers have to zigzag.

Several drones capture the mayhem from above. They buzz and swarm within feet. Not all survive. Some swoop too low and crash. Some hover too high and hit a crane.

Halfway into the yard, a section of old dock lies along the shoreline. It sits atop some scrap metal. It’s been pulled out of the water and replaced, but hasn’t been removed yet. The walkway is tipped up. The tall side sits at the farther end like a ramp. Past it, the next two conveyor trains run side by side. Spacing’s tight and changes fast. D’Angelo slows. Everybody does.

Tagia instead veers for the old dock. She shifts to tuck her wheels under her. She hops onto the walkway. She speeds up the slant. She launches. Her mech springs off the edge. She cranks on the shifters. By inches her wheels clear both rows of conveyors. A roller spins.

The landing throws her. Something bounces her onto two wheels. She jounces, jolts. The legs absorb a lot of it. The impact hurls her back. Her hair snags behind her. A piston pinches it. She cringes. A chuck rips off the tip. She yelps.

Once the shaking stops, she shifts back into dune buggy and floors it. A cargo truck crosses diagonally. She beats it around the front. A lift-bot spins beside her. She ducks the prongs.

At the fifth and final train, Tagia leads the heat by a full second. The north hangar sits only a hundred paces ahead. A white banner flies over the turn-zone. Concrete barricades line the back. A laser-beam marks the threshold.

Mechs have to pass entirely into the zone to qualify. Music booms from the intercom. The fans cheer. They fill the bleachers and wave signs, phones, and diode-towels. One poster reads Tagia.

The toughest stage lies beforehand. The area doubles as the discard pile. Between her and the hangar, a field of pallets stands in the raceway. The stacks span the yard. Several bots work within them. The conveyor carts operate alongside.

Tagia chooses a path that has more pallets, fewer bots. It’s a bad line. The stacks are too dense. The drive’s too jerky. She loses her lead. A woman on the far end passes her. D’Angelo reappears in her periphery as well.

She cusses, shifting back into box-cart. The needle buries.

Although the home-stretch is mainly clear, the turnaround is tight. Most drivers slow to make the threshold. Tagia doesn’t. She guns it. The crowd tenses. Headlong she hurtles toward the turn-zone.

It’s not until she hits the laser that she pulls the brake.

Her mech skids.

Sideways.

As practiced, she activates the two extra wheels on the roof. They swing down. They shoot out. They punch the barricade to catch her. It shocks the impact but jars hard.

The LiNC barge blows its horn then. Across the yard, the heavy thrum echoes.

After her mech smacks the concrete —but before it can shove off— Tagia recoils. The controls lock in her hand. Her mech halts dead, still braced against the wall.

D’Angelo almost slides into her. A lane over, he skids through the clearing and bumps into the barricade at her front. Dust plumes around them.

Other drivers arrive after. They turn closer to the threshold. Everybody misses them, but they kick up more dust.

“Yo,” Angie shouts. “What’s up? Did something break?”

“No.” She coughs into her elbow then points to the barge. “It’s leaving. It’s early.”

While Tagia taps her goggles to zoom in, the dockhands at the freighter disconnect the main-lines. Two younger guys sprint down the outlet docks to disengage the sides. Bubbles begin to form at stern when the ship blows its horn again.

“Yeah.” Tagia purses her lips. “Something’s off. I don’t trust that unit.”

Another few racers skid into the turn-zone. They throttle hard. The noise drills. Pebbles and dust spray across the clearing. Some of the fans holler at Tagia and Angie to go.

They ignore it.

“Actually.” She spits. “Last several weeks have seemed off. Tonight Aliyah and I worked the rooftop alone too. On Distiss, no less.”

Without a word, D’Angelo syncs his phone to his earset and calls the tower. They pick up on the third ring. He patches in Tagia on mute.

“Yo,” he starts. His voice is low, rough. “We got the whale leaving early. What’s up?”

“Admiral Si’Cho,” the line says. The man sounds out of breath. He talks with a drawl. “Just got the order. I guess we’re hauling something carba that LiNC needs lifted as soon as possible. Roda said she’d rather send the barge early than keep the elevator late.”

D’Angelo nods. “Alright, noted. Thanks.”

As they hang up, Tagia leaves their end open. She sets it to private. The crowd’s loud. Their cheers boom every time another racer crosses the turn-zone.

“That wasn’t Darius,” she says, adjusting her goggles. The ship is slow but creeping faster.

“No, it wasn’t.” D’Angelo wipes his mouth with a knuckle. “And he used the word carba.”

“Yeah, I caught that. Do you think he’s LiNC?”

“Doubt it.”

Chills prickle both their necks. Angie returns to his phone. Tagia retracts her wheels into her roof.

“Yeah,” she says. “I’m boarding. I need to see what’s in that container.”

“I figured.” He sniffs. “I don’t suppose there’s protocol for this.”

“Not really.”

He huffs then types something on his phone. “Well you ain’t going without backup.”

She taps her gas pedal and bumps into him. Their mechs clunk. His phone fumbles in hand.

“Don’t call it in.” She scoffs. “If I’m right, we could’ve already tipped it off.”

“I know.” He looks up at the spotlight, dialing blind. “I’m not calling it in. I’m calling it out.”

He shows her his screen. She recognizes the number. It’s a call-list of friends, not a work extension.

“This is your distraction,” he says. The contacts go to his visor. The whole list pings. Every entry highlights. “Your backup is me. I’m boarding, too.”

She blinks in disbelief. He never agrees so easily.

“You lead. I’ll follow,” he says, gripping his pocket. His eyes almost tear up. “You’ll know the cue.”

Once people start answering, he cuts their line, and Tagia pulls away. There are no goodbyes. A few in the crowd whoop, sarcastically. The woman doesn’t notice. She stomps the pedal. The clack and clatter of her stick-shift hits like the grit scattering under her.

At the pallets, she turns sharp and drives beside the stacks. She then hops a curb onto the docks. She spins out on the wet wood. A younger woman jumps out of her way.

The move disqualifies her. Not that it matters anymore.

The docks connect from hangar to hangar across two floors. Tagia takes the first ramp to the lower level. Some deckhands scramble to split down their middle.

She yells sorry, but her engines consume it.

Along the dock, tugboats and shipping vessels sway and thump against their posts. The tide’s coming in. Moons Lith and Trock rise out of the skyline. Buoys ding. Seagulls swarm overhead.

Water crashes against the hulls and splashes onto the lower level. The mist dampens her arms. Beside her, the undersides of bows and sterns alternate.

D’Angelo’s distraction begins on the south end of the shipyard. At first people exit the hangar in a trickle. Then it’s a stream. A quarter of the parking lot breaks away with them. Everybody not watching the races heads for the jet-skis and speedboats. Motors bluster. Music blares.

Two of the boats have full DJ booths. They play one of Tagia’s songs. It’s the single off her latest album.

She shakes her head, weaving a section of barrels and boxes. “Yeah, okay. Nice touch.”

Before the lyrics come in, spotlights hit the area. Three beams shine from the barge. Two direct from the neighboring ship. Even Aliyah on the roof aims hers at the impromptu party.

Of course, she’s in on it.

Last part of Angie’s plan kills the local lights. Inside the hangar, the clerk with the dreadlocks trips the breaker on the back wall. It shuts off the power to the near ports. Three docks go dark.

The barge speeds up. The captain spooks. He activates the auxiliary propellers early. The guard on upper-deck steps out of the shadows to report it. The hull groans. The bubbles at stern turn frothy.

“Damn it.” Tagia smacks her steering wheel.

The ship’s pulling away too fast to chase with four wheels. She needs her roof. She keeps cursing. The outlet docks are long, but they’re not very wide. The width looks iffy for her rover mode.

Tagia soon crosses into the darkness. The party illuminates the far of the three docks. The barge pulls out of the middle.

After the near, Tagia whips through the intersection. Both levels of the dock shake. She clips a toolbox. It clangors, then splashes into the sea. She re-activates her top wheels once she hits the straightaway.

The legs malfunction. The joints twitch. The wheels fidget. Neither listens.

She punches the ceiling. “Pieces of shit.”

With a couple whacks, they finally rotate down. The sides squeeze to the middle. The tops plant at the sides. Together the six pummel the wood.

The new wheels had a gimp however. They were damaged. Her stunt in the turn-zone overexerted them. Some of the cogs were misaligned. They skipped every round. That sent a ripple through the frame. It wasn’t much, but with two bad wheels, the vehicle had a drift.

Only a fraction of the dock remains when Tagia catches up to the freighter. She turns on autopilot, opens the hatch, crawls out. She leans off the side with one foot on the frame, one on the seat. The wind whistles. The waves splash and douse the air. Her engines reel. The freighter’s roar.

While she eyes the jump, her mech struggles to drive straight. The system corrects with its own tic. The vehicle zigzags. The gap to the side ladder swings in and out.

Regardless, she times it, lines it up.

The end of the dock races toward her.

As she leaps, the system slams the brakes. It appears to throw her. The rubber screeches. Tagia dives for the ladder. Her mech skids toward the edge. The tic pulls hard on the braking.

By her fingers she catches the rungs. Her boots slip. Her grip holds. She thrashes against the hull for a kick or two.

Her mech isn’t as fortunate. It slowly veers off the dock. It tips over the edge then sinks upside-down. Bubbles escape the bowls.

Tagia sulks, clinging to the side of the ship. “That’s gonna be expensive.”

The barge leaves in an eerie silence. The party fades. The docks shrink. Tagia holds onto the ladder for a minute. All the ports are lit again. The reflection of the shipyard shimmers in the water. Moons Lith and Trock shine over the skyline like eyes over an encrusted grin.

“Damn,” she whispers to herself. “Hope that was the hard part.”

Keeping low, she sneaks onto upper-deck. It overwhelms. Hundreds of storage containers span the front of the ship. The stacks stand among a grid of short streets and long avenues. She slinks behind the closest unit as quickly as she can.

Somebody approaches. Their footsteps slap the plated floor.

“Are you serious?” Tagia grits her teeth, spinning to the nearest wall. Her heart pounds. She holds her belt and unlatches the spare whip-ribbon. It’s her only weapon. She crouches at the corner to listen.

The incoming stride bounces like a child’s, though. The woman furrows her brow. The breathing sounds young, too. The gasps come fast and heavy. A familiar metal chitter clicks between.