Archon's Queen (15 page)

“I’m sorry.” Her head pitched forward, a mild convulsion preceded her swallowing the urge to continue retching. “Got some bad zoom. If’n it has your pleasure, constables, I’ll do whatever to make it up. I’m just a useless Cov.”

The last part fell from her lips feeling as though she had signed her own death warrant. As soon as the police heard you were a nobody, it was open season. Anna flashed through a waking nightmare of the small bit of Newsnet space her naked body would get tomorrow when some river scav or boat pilot found it on the side of the Thames. She hoped they would at least pose her with a little modesty. She pictured her pink bedroom, back home. The want to be there made her bawl.

“Bother it all.” Hargreaves frowned, his jowls wobbling as he shook his head. “Not touchin’ that povvy growler with a borrowed truncheon.”

Virji laughed. “The face you made when she booted you, I’d expect you’d
have
to borrow a truncheon.”

Hargreaves shook his fist at his partner, growling.

Constable Virji held her by the armpits and lifted her up to sit on the bed. “You still feelin’ a bit of the violent, lass?”

Anna sniffled, and composed herself. “No, constable.” She stared into her lap, whimpering in the same voice she had used the night her father died. “I’m sorry, constable. I don’t remember it at all, whatever the man did to me…”

“CSB wanted to check you out, they got it in their ‘eads you were unregistered. Guess they’re getting bored these days, can’t tell a psionic from a strung out pikey,” Hargreaves said. “Lot of effort for a false alarm.”

“Dodgy lot, that.” Virji muttered.

The entire meeting with the thin man had all but escaped her memory, lost in a cloud of zoom-dreams. Flashes of a black coat danced at the edge of her mind, a glimpse of the twisting flesh tendril made her tremble. The government men thought of her as another drug-addled piece of street trash who went crazy while in holding.

She tried to sound younger. “Beggin’ your pardon, constables. I think he made the chems worse. I never had a trip that bad before.”

Virji removed the restraints and handed her the towel. “Still got some chunder on ya. You’re free ta go. There’s a loo down the hall if you need to clean up a bit.”

Hargreaves trudged off out of sight. Anna dabbed at her face, and smiled at Virji. She strained to peek at his thoughts, but read only a wall of zoom-fog.

“I’m sorry if I was any trouble.”

he black mud of The Ruin was a sight Anna never thought would be a welcome thing. Stepping around the permanent puddles, she tried to keep to the fragmented scraps of paving as much as possible. How odd it was that not one, but two policemen in short order had been nice to her. They didn’t even steal anything.

What’s the world coming to when Old Bill treats a Cov like a person?

The sergeant had left her hanging with her naughty bits out even if he did spare her from Brown. Virji had been nicer, though he could have taken the binders off a lot faster than he did. Then again, the more she thought about it, the more it made sense given her violent outburst. A naughty smile found a home on her lips as she pictured Constable Virji out of uniform.

Her backside stung where the zoom patch had been; she had overdone it bad by squeezing it so much. Without the tolerance she had built up over the years, a smash like that could have killed her. Limping through the misting rain, she pieced together that the flesh tentacle had to be the zoom’s reaction to a mind-probing telepath. Apparently, the drug had muddled things enough for him not to find her secret. If the chem could dull her brain to the point where she couldn’t use her own powers, it made sense it could do it in the other direction. Out here in the mud, the reality of her predicament knocked her into a shaking squat. If the zoom had not worked, or if she had tried to fight her way out, she would be dead now, or worse―hauled off by the CSB.

No one ever reappeared after the Clandestine Service Bureau got their hands on them.

After leaping a wide puddle of unusual breadth, she wobbled to keep her balance without dropping the case of meals or the little white bear she tucked under her jacket to shield it from the rain. The stuffed animal made her think of Twee, something pure and innocent being brought into this awful place. Darkening light made her look up at the shiny ebon walls of Coventry Tower. Ninety stories of human refuse, its windows shifted with the shadowy forms of people.

Anna’s body sagged. Futility came on strong. The black building, the grey clouds, the never-ending rain―all of it crashed into her with the idea that perhaps next time she should fight. Mostly so they would kill her and take her away from all of this. She thought of her father.

I should have just let Daddy kill me.

For minutes, she wallowed in it, until her eyes caught a glimpse of the tiny pink bow peeking out from under her arm. Thoughts of Faye made her self-pity less overbearing. The kid needed help she would not find anywhere else.

Anna looked up, staring defiance at the jet scar through the sky. Coventry was the home of the unwanted, but perhaps the poor bastards living there had made the choice not to want society.

“You awright, luv?”

Ol’ Jack’s voice caused her to jump. He had approached while she daydreamed, leaning on a fragment of concrete wall tilting out of the muck. Somehow, his sunglasses avoided the rain, but his leather coat ran with thousands of trickles. The white of a smile broke the darkness of his face as he held out a hand.

“Blimey, Jack. I’m shitless.” She took a few breaths to calm down.

He laughed, taking the case of instant meals. “Sorry, Pixie. Saw you out here alone, and what with it bein’ dark and all.”

She stepped closer, letting him put an arm over her shoulders. “Damn fine of you, Jack.”

“Penny’s been climbin’ the walls.”

Walking in stride, she huddled into him. “I’m sorry. Damn filth got me again.”

“Shiftless bastards.” He grumbled. “Did they at least use a nodder?”

She looked up at him, confused. “That’s just the thing, Jack. Twice now, they didn’t touch me… Was almost like I’s a Proper. Makes me worry.”

“Bah.” He squeezed her with a one-armed hug. “Nothin’ wrong with ya, lass. Just gettin’ lucky to find the ones wot ‘ave morals I guess.”

“Old Bill has morals?” Anna blinked. “Well maybe to the Propers.”

He carried her over a huge puddle. “You’d scrub up right nice, Pixie. Change your clothes and they couldn’t tell you weren’t a Proper yourself.”

She blushed.

“Oi, darkmeat. Give us a go with the bint.”

Ol’ Jack stopped walking, letting Anna down on her feet as he turned to face the voice. She clung to his arm, not sure if the fright that came over her at the sight of the six East End Boys in a half circle around them was real or acted. Jack met their stares without a flinch, cracking his neck with a left-right tilt of his head.

“You lot’ll naff off if you fancy keepin’ the ability to breathe.”

Anna looked up at Jack, shocked by his total calm. Faint green light reflected on the inside of his sunglasses. The realization he was augged paled her face and opened her mouth. She had always been so high around him she never felt the electricity inside his limbs until now.

One of the gangers stepped in, raising a pipe. “You got some cods, mate.”

“You know the rules. Any piece out after dark is up for the takin’… now back off.” A second man pulled a sword off his back.

The others all produced weapons. Cloud-filtered moonlight glinted from pipes, knives, and spiked knuckles as the men closed in on Ol’ Jack.

“Jack, you don’t have to―”

“Hold this.” Jack handed her the box of instant meals and pointed at the Boys. “Look ‘ere you planks. I’ll not warn you again.”

The East End boys grinned at him, confident in their six to one ratio. When they showed no sign of relent, Ol’ Jack blurred into a streak at the man with the sword.

In the span of two seconds, a right hand punch to the gut cracked ribs, a left hand jab to the side likely ruptured a kidney, and a spinning kick to the face coincided with Jack tearing the weapon loose from the ganger’s hand.

Ol’ Jack came to a halt, his coat fluttering to rest behind him as augmented strength launched the East Ender fifteen meters away where he landed with a muddy
splat
. The motion had been so fast the others still stared at the water pooling in the footprints he left next to Anna.

With a war scream, another lunged at him, swinging a pipe. Jack caught the end with his left hand, bending the metal as the weapon came down. A stomp kick into the chest launched the Boy out of the fray; he hit the mud and slid into a crumbling brick wall, causing a rain of wet splats.

Like a dervish, Jack whirled into the rest of the gangers. He ducked a pair of nunchucks and walloped the man on the back with the pipe, driving his face into the ground. While he stepped over that one, he threw the pipe into the groin of another man running in with a vibro knife, dropping him to his knees with a pitiful moan.

The fifth ganger swung a chain, which wrapped about Jack’s right forearm. The Boy pulled, angling for an opening with a spiked fist. Jack took one step from the yank rather than fall as the East Ender hoped. After adjusting his stance, he wrenched the chain from the East Ender’s grip while catching the Boy with his free left hand.

Jack hauled the ganger around in a spin, tossing the street thug like a shot put over a twelve-foot high fragment of wall. The body landed out of sight with the painful sound of crunching, as well as clanging metal. The final man backpedaled as Jack bore down on him, lowering his pipe and fleeing into The Ruin.

“You kids shouldn’t ‘ave such things.” Jack shook the composite broadsword at them. “I’ll keep this so you don’t hurt yourselves.” A third the weight of what a steel blade would be, the weapon pivoted over his hand in a series of fluid sweeps as he gauged its balance. “Now, where in the hell do gang trash get their hands on a military blade?” The glint of it in the pallid light brought a smile of remembrance to Ol’ Jack’s face.

Anna stood from where she had crouched. “Bloody hell Jack, what the devil was that?”

“Composite blade. Military issue, for starship boarding tubes.”