“Drop those charges…” Kin winced, rolling to his hands and knees. “… into the transmission. Blow a drive rod, we’ll be immobilized.”
“The charges are in the cooling system, Kin. Right on the diffuser arrays. That place will be an inferno now.”
“Let me worry about that. You just worry about keeping up.”
Shinji sighed, pulled himself onto all fours with a wince.
“It was always going to be a risk, getting out of bed today.”
And through the belly of the beast, they crawled.
44
INCENDIARY
The First Bloom’s head hit the floor, severed arteries bathing her in blood, sizzling on the heat sinks rising from the Guild leader’s back. Kaori slashed the cables linking the body to throne and ceiling, gave it a savage kick and sent it tumbling to the ground.
The other Kagé had rappelled from the chamber’s roof, down behind an Inquisitor on the periphery, the four of them cutting him to pieces before he could cry out. The other Inquisitors made not a sound as they rushed across the vast, bloodstained space. Kaori leaped from atop the Throne of Machines, throwing her arms around Daichi’s neck.
“Father…” she breathed.
“Daughter.” Daichi wheezed. “What have you done?”
Kaori dragged her goggles from her eyes. “It’s wonderful to see you too.”
“You killed him…” Daichi looked around the room, at the murals of Lady Izanami etched on the walls. “All of this, just as they planned…”
A cry of pain rang out in the chamber, and Kaori saw Yuu go down in a spray of blood. Three Inquisitors were locked in combat with the Kagé, shifting from one spot to another amidst coiling trails of smoke. With a shout, she charged across the black stone, Daichi beside her, breath rattling in his chest. She saw Eiko get kicked so hard she cracked the wall behind her, bloody vomit spraying from her lips.
Kaori lunged, took the attacker’s arm off at the elbow, the man turning, utterly soundless, bloodshot eyes aglow. One moment he stood at arm’s length, the next he shifted, and before she could blink he was inside her guard, touching her solar plexus, smashing the wind from her body. Daichi landed a flying kick on the Inquisitor’s chin, knocking his breather loose, his jaw snapped clean and hanging below his broken teeth like a door left ajar. The man stumbled to one knee, exhaled blue-black through bloody gums. Daichi brought a heel down on his head, a sickly crunch resounding in the chamber as the Inquisitor hit the floor.
Daichi coughed, deflected three punches from a second Inquisitor before the man’s fist turned to smoke. Knuckles coalesced against Daichi’s chest, knocking him back ten feet as if he’d been hit by a motor-rickshaw. Kaori was back on her feet, swinging her wakizashi, collecting four of the Inquisitor’s outstretched fingers and then burying the blade in his ribs.
The Inquisitor rippled like a heat haze on a summer’s day, her blade moving inside his chest as easily as it would a cloud of smoke. A strike to her throat, a headbutt to her cheek, white stars exploding in her eyes. She drew her sword back, struck blind, felt meat parting like water as a kick took her feet out from under her and she hit the floor, cracking her skull on the stone.
Blinking hard, she had the vague impression of flashing steel, Maro’s voice fierce and hate-filled, a soft wet thud. Strong hands pulled her to her feet, and she pawed the blood from her eyes. Her cheek was broken, scarlet across her vision. Botan was dead, disemboweled with his own sword. Yuu lay motionless, neck twisted at a ghastly angle. Eiko knelt against the wall, clutching her belly and vomiting. Daichi was on all fours, coughing hard, chin smeared black.
Four of them, unarmed, did all this. And we had surprise. What would happen if …
Kaori heard the crisp sound of steel blades scraping together.
The iris portal into the room began to dilate.
Maro looked at the door, back at Kaori and Daichi, up at the silk rope still hanging from the lip of the dome above.
“Go,” he said.
“Maro…”
His stare silenced her protest. The shadow of his brother lingering behind his gaze, calling for vengeance. Blood. Death.
“Go,” he said.
And then he was running, katana drawn, a war cry on his lips as he charged the Inquisitors stepping through the doorway. No time to wonder, to feel, to think. Just motion. Just action. Thinking by doing. Kaori hauled Daichi up and put his black-slicked hands on the rope.
“Climb!”