“Yeah, where’s the . . . ?” Aya began, but the floor-to-ceiling window was already shimmering.
“Whoa,” Ren said softly. “Diamond into wallscreen. This place is so kick.”
An image appeared, shaky and distorted. Aya recognized the view from her button cam. One week ago: Miki studying the mag-lev tunnel wall, looking for the hidden door.
Seeing the Plain Jane face again brought back all the guilt that had been smothered by her sudden fame. Aya wondered what Miki thought of her, now that the whole world could watch the Sly Girls’ secret rituals, their private tricks.
Eden Maru’s voice came from offscreen, echoing through the tunnel. “This is it. Stand back—there could be anything behind there.”
Miki took a slow breath, murmuring, “Or anyone.”
Aya’s own voice answered, “Those body-crazy freaks were just storing something down here. Nobody lives in this place.”
The shot froze, and Hiro grunted. “‘Body-crazy freaks’? So that’s how they knew you’d seen them. You told them in your own background layer!”
Aya shook her head. “But it still doesn’t make sense. How did they look through all those shots so fast? There were hours and hours of button cam, and they came after us the moment we left the party.”
“What if it was the wisdom of the crowd?” Ren said softly.
Aya frowned. “What do you mean?”
“We don’t know how many of those inhumans there are,” he said. “There could be hundreds. Maybe there’s a mountain full of them somewhere.”
“Or a whole city,” Frizz said. “That mass driver took some serious building.”
A cold finger slid down Aya’s spine. She’d thought of the freaks as a small clique. The notion of an entire city of inhumans sent her mind spinning.
“That’s brain-missing,” Hiro said. “Why would a whole city want to—”
“Quiet, Hiro!” Ren closed his eyes. “Does anyone else hear that?”
Aya listened, and her ears caught a faint hum echoing through the room.
Frizz pushed off from the ceiling and floated down. “I think it’s coming from the wallscreen.”
Then Aya tasted it in her mouth: rain and thunderstorms.
“Smart matter,” she said. “The window’s made of smart matter. . . .”
They all spun to face the wallscreen. Its surface was rippling, the frozen image of Miki’s face warping like bad reception. The humming grew dissonant, a chord of incompatible tones fighting one another, causing the air itself to tremble. The taste of rain turned bitter in Aya’s mouth.
“Someone’s hacking your window!” Ren cried, springing to his feet.
Shapes began to emerge, three human figures bulging out from the flat expanse. An arm poked through, wrapped in the frozen image of Miki, like a mummy covered in wallscreen.
Frizz grabbed Aya, began to pull her backward toward the door.
“Wait a second!” she cried. “Look at their bodies. . . .”
The figures pulling themselves from the wall weren’t misshapen like the freaks; they were tall and strong-looking. They stepped out into the room, strangely faceless and still swathed with the colors of the screen, as if the smart matter had stretched around them.
“Are they pixel-heads?” Aya said softly.
They moved with a predatory grace, colors dulling with every step until they had turned a flat gray.
“No,” Ren breathed. “They’re wearing sneak suits.”
The tallest of the three reached up and pulled the layer of gray from its head, revealing a face of cold, intimidating beauty. Her eyes were coal black and wolflike, her skin swathed in flash tattoos, every feature sharp and cruel.
She was the most famous person in the world.
“My name’s Tally Youngblood,” she said. “Sorry to disturb you, but this is a special circumstance.”
CUTTERS
Of course, Aya had learned all about Specials in school.
A long time ago, Tally Youngblood’s city had created a special kind of pretty—cruel, ruthless, and deadly, instead of bubbleheaded. Specials were originally supposed to protect the city, rounding up runaways and keeping order. But gradually they’d become their own secret clique, each generation modifying the next, like weeds growing out of control. They had contempt for everyone who wasn’t Special, and wanted to keep the whole world under control. Ultimately, they’d taken over their own city government and started the Diego War.
Tally and her friends had been Specials too, but a special kind called “Cutters.” The Cutters were young and independent, and somehow they’d figured out how to rewire their own brains. They’d rebelled against the evil leader of the Specials, freed their own city, and saved Diego. Then they’d spread the mind-rain across the globe, ending the Prettytime forever.
As Aya stood before Tally, a mammoth reputation shiver went through her. This was the person who had made her world. Feeds, tech-heads, fame—everything important to her had come out of the mind-rain.
It was head-spinning, looking at a face so familiar, yet so strange.
For one thing, in Aya’s school lessons Tally-sama had never looked scary. But in person her fingernails were long and sharp, her eyes deep black and penetrating. She was three years older now than during the mind-rain, of course, almost twenty, and she lived in the wild now, guarding it from the expanding cities.
Tally even looked wild: her hair long and untamed, her flash tattoos dulled by the sun, her skin darkened.
Aya pulled free of Frizz’s grasp and gave a nervous bow, hoping her English wouldn’t fail her. “I’m honored to meet you, Tally-sama.”
“Um, it’s actually Tally Youngblood.”
Aya bowed again. “I am sorry. Sama is a title of respect.”
“Great, another cult of me.” Tally rolled her eyes. “Just what the world needs.”
Aya heard a giggle. The other two Cutters—one boy, one girl—had pulled off their sneak-suit hoods to reveal faces like Tally’s: pretty and cruel, laced with flash tattoos. Their eyes darted around the room with nervous energy, but at the same time smiles played on their faces, as if they were enjoying the excitement.
“My name is Aya Fuse.”
Tally didn’t bow back, just laughed. “No kidding. Every feed in this city seems to know you. And stop bowing!”
“I’m . . . sorry.” Aya found herself nodding. She wished somebody else would say something, but Hiro, Ren, and Frizz looked as fame-struck as she was.
The three Cutters were moving through the apartment, checking the other rooms.
“Has anyone else tried to get in here?” Tally called.
“No,” Aya said. “This is a very secure building.”
“Yeah, we noticed that in the ten seconds it took us to break in,” the other Cutter girl said. “Is this what you call hiding, by the way? There’s about fifty hovercams out there!”
“We tried to hide, but my face rank is recently very high.”
The girl looked at her with a blank expression, as if the words had made no sense. “Face rank? Does that mean you’re some kind of government official? Aren’t you a little young?”
“No. Face is a measure of . . . reputation.”
The girl’s eyes swept around the vast apartment. “You actually live here? No wonder the cities are expanding. Still an ugly, and she’s got five rooms!”
“I live here, but not every ugly gets to . . .” Aya trailed off in frustration with her English. Hiro had been right—no one from outside the city would understand the reputation economy. And this didn’t seem like the best time to explain.
“You’re Shay-sama!” Frizz said, snapping out of an eyescreen spin. He whispered in Japanese, “Two hundred and fourteen, mostly from mentions in history classes.”
Aya nodded, feeling stupid that she hadn’t recognized Shay. All the Cutters were famous. Some even had their own cults, but Aya could never keep track of them.
“My apologies, Shay-sama,” she said. “
Recent history is not my best subject.”
Tally and the boy giggled, and one of Shay’s eyebrows arched. Aya felt herself turning red, like some littlie asking for an autograph.
“Don’t worry about it,” Shay said. “And don’t do that ‘sama’ thing with me either.”
Tally snorted. “Yeah, she prefers to be called Boss.”
“I missed you too, Tally-wa,” Shay answered.
“I’m confused,” Frizz said.
Aya nodded in agreement, wondering if the Cutters were speaking some dialect her Advanced English class hadn’t covered. Hiro and Ren looked like they were having trouble following at all. Foreign languages hadn’t been as popular back before the mind-rain, when they’d gone to school.
But Frizz came to her rescue. “We just want to show the proper respect.”
“Well, respect this.” Tally turned to Aya. “We need to get you out of here, and soon. You’ve stumbled on something that’s bigger than you think.”
“Bigger?” Aya said. “Than the end of the world?”
“Bigger than this one mass driver. We’ve been finding them all over the planet.”
Aya swallowed, wondering if Ren had been right. Maybe there really were a huge number of the freaks, a whole city somewhere. “Why haven’t you told the global feeds?”
“The other mountains were all empty,” Tally said. “You’re the first person to find the projectiles. And we didn’t want anyone looking for the people who built them. They’re dangerous.”
Aya nodded. “I know, Tally-sama. I’ve seen them face-to-face.”
“We figured that, once they came after you.” Tally’s eyes narrowed. “People who see them tend to disappear, including a friend of ours. That’s why we’re here.”
“We need to get going, Tally-wa,” the boy Cutter said. “The sun’s coming up soon.”
“Okay, Fausto, but first, two questions.” Tally fixed Aya with her dark stare. “You didn’t tell anyone we were coming, did you?”
Aya shook her head proudly, suppressing an urge to smirk at Hiro.
Tally smiled. “Good girl. Second question: I know you’re great at mag-lev surfing, but have you ever ridden two to a hoverboard?”
“Yes.”
“Recently, in fact,” Frizz added.
“You can ride with me, then.” Tally turned to the boy Cutter. “Okay, Fausto. How do we knock those hovercams out?”
He shrugged. “Nanos. Maybe flash-bombs?”
“Definitely flash-bombs,” Tally said with a shiver. “Shay and I had a bad experience with nanos once.”
“Bombs away, then, Tally-wa,” Fausto said. He swung a pack from his shoulder and began to rummage through it.
“Pardon me, Tally . . . -wa?” Aya said, hoping she had the correct title. “My friends have also seen the . . . strange people.”
“You’ve seen them?” Tally turned to the others. “All three of you?”
Hiro, Ren, and Frizz all bowed apologetically, and Tally let out a groan.
“We might be less obvious if there’s four of them, Tally-wa,” Shay said. “And they’ll be safer with us than if they stay here and get kidnapped.”
“But we’ve only got three boards!” Tally said. “That’s no good for seven riders.”
“This hole in the wall can make big things,” Hiro said, his English coming out a little shaky.
“Boards with lifting fans?” Fausto asked. “That work outside the city, off the grid?”
Hiro frowned. “Maybe not.”
“Great,” Tally said. “We’ll have to call David into town, which screws up the whole plan. And you know how much he hates cities.”
“Pardon me, Tally-sama,” Ren spoke up in halting English. “Hiro has skill with a hoverball rig. If he stays close we can tow him.”
Tally hesitated for a moment, glanced at Shay, then nodded. “Okay. That should work.”
Hiro began to unstrap Frizz from the hoverball rig and put it on himself, complaining about the cracked shin guards. Ren told the hole in the wall to fabricate some crash bracelets, and reminded everyone to turn their locators off. The Cutters began to slap smart plastic on their faces and hands, hiding the lace of flash tattoos and their cruel pretty features.
Aya wondered why they needed ugly disguises out in the wild.
“Excuse me, Tally-wa, but where are we going?”
The Cutters traded glances, and the question hung in the air for a moment.
“We don’t know yet,” Tally finally said. “But we’ll find out soon.”
HONORARY CUTTER
Their hoverboards were waiting on the roof.
The three Cutters went ahead, their sneak-suited forms sliding across the darkened expanse like graceful ripples in the air. Aya barely saw the attack unfold—their arms spun almost invisibly, the throwing motions like a sudden breeze stirring dust and leaves across the roof.
It was all so silent and insubstantial . . . until the explosions began.
A spray of bright white flashes filled the night sky, sending jittering shadows across the roof. A cascade of detonations pounded her ears.
“Come on!” Frizz said, grabbing her hand to pull her forward.
A dozen steps away, half-blinded by the flashes, she felt a riding surface under her feet. Someone tall and muscular pressed against her, one arm around her waist.
“Hold on!” Tally shouted, and the board rose hard and fast, the scream of lifting fans filling the air. Tally’s body was wiry and hard, like a gymnast full of steel cables. “Didn’t we tell you to keep your eyes closed?”
“Sorry.” Aya squeezed Tally’s waist tightly, blinking away spots. It reminded her of all the times Moggle had blinded her. . . .
Moggle! Her hovercam was out there somewhere, probably battered and confused by the flash-bombs.
“Excuse me, Tally-wa. But can Moggle come too?”
“Who?”
“My hovercam.”
“Your . . . wait. You own a hovercam?”
Aya blinked again, her vision slowly returning. “Almost everyone here does. How else would we put stuff on our feeds?”
“You mean you all have your own feed channels, too?” Tally laughed. “This city’s insane!”
Aya looked over her shoulder. The cams, blinded by the barrage of flash-bombs, were milling around in confusion. The ultrafast Cutter boards had slipped past them in seconds.
“Please? Moggle doesn’t like being left alone.”
“No way!” Tally shouted against the wind. “Have you not noticed we’re trying to hide here?”
“Of course . . . but this would be for later. For history.”
“Forget it. History’s not my favorite subject either. Especially when it’s about me.”
Aya looked up at Tally’s disguised face, and for a dizzy-making moment she was reminded of Lai. But the comparison was brain-missing. Tally was the most famous person in the world, and Lai was a deliberate extra—or at least she had been, before Aya had kicked her into unwanted fame.
“Tally-wa? Why are you all disguised as uglies?”
“In case one of those hovercams gets a shot. Can’t let anyone know we’re in town. Speaking of which . . .” Tally gestured, and her sneak suit began to change, taking on the texture and pattern of a dorm uniform.
Aya nodded with comprehension, but this was still frustrating. Here she was, riding a hoverboard with Tally Youngblood, and no one could see it. She wasn’t even wearing a spy-cam!
She realized how few real pictures of Tally she’d seen. Even in history books all the images were paintings or manga, as if Tally was some pre-Rusty from before the days of cams.
But extras wanted connections with their heroes. That was why Nana Love was always Nana-chan, never Nana-sensei, no matter how famous she became. Famous people owed the world images of themselves.
A few shots for history’s sake wouldn’t hurt anything.
As they zoomed through the new construction site, lifting fans screaming and Rusty i
ron shooting past, Aya booted her eyescreen. She opened up a tracking signal, whispering a short ping to Moggle in Japanese. . . .
“Follow us as far as you can.”
Whatever happened next was going to be very kickable.
• • •
They made their way toward the city’s edge, screaming past all pursuit.
The predawn air was bitingly cold, but Tally hardly seemed to notice. Aya turned up the heating in her Ranger coverall, thankful that she’d ditched the slime-spattered party dress.
The Cutter boards were amazingly powerful, even carrying two riders each. Of course they’d slow down once they left the grid and had to tow Hiro.
And once out of the city, Moggle wouldn’t be able to follow at all.
“Tally-wa?” she ventured. “We could take the mag-lev line out of town. Plenty of metal.”
Tally shook her head. “Too much traffic out there. Tons of wardens are headed out to the mountain, not to mention the Global Concord Committee on its way.”
“But they’d be happy to let you through, right? You’re Tally Youngblood! You must have stacks of merits.”
“Merits?”
“Oh. In my city, merits are . . .” Aya’s mind spun for the right English. “Respect from authority. Like fame, but for doing community things. Because you saved everyone from the Prettytime, my city would give you any assistance you needed.”
“I’m not interested in their help.”
Aya paused, wondering if the Nameless One’s groupie had been right after all. “Are you worried that my city built this weapon?”
Tally shrugged. “I wouldn’t say worried. In fact, that would make things simpler. Governments have been taken down before, after all.” She turned around and gave Aya a sharp-toothed smile. “By me.”
• • •
Dawn began to break, and the wild stretched out before them, black and endless. The factory lights below grew sparser, and Aya’s eyescreen began to lose the feeds.
Not that they’d been kicking anything new: Where was Aya Fuse headed off to now? Were all these dramatic disappearances nothing but publicity stunts? Was the mass driver the beginning of a new dark age of warfare?