“Let them help,” Nomvula says.
“They hate him! They’re going to rip him apart!” Muzi shrieks. A smaller group of alphies form a wall between him and Elkin. Muzi’s about to scale it when Nomvula grabs a fistful of his shirt.
“They have forgiven him. I grieve with you so they grieve with you. They’ve put the past behind. Now, hurry. We must go.”
Muzi falls into step, keeping as close to Elkin as he can, who’s being carried by eight alphies who move in unison like a bunch of mechanical pallbearers. They’re so gentle, Elkin’s body barely moves from their perfectly choreographed steps. Vid bots hover over him, solemn, wide lenses looking like they’re about to drop tears at any moment.
Nomvula takes one of Muzi’s hands and his alphie takes the other. They’re nearly to the exit doors when they hear shouts directed at them.
“Stop!” says a strained voice. Muzi turns to see that Felicity Lyons chick trotting their way in ridiculous heels. She pushes her way through the bot entourage and then grabs a high-end, late-model bot with decals of South Africa’s coat of arms affixed to each side. “This is my bot,” she says accusingly. Her eyes then glance at Elkin’s body. She shivers.
Muzi grabs her wrist. “It’s not your bot,” he growls. Felicity is about to argue the point, but Muzi slits his eyes. “It belongs to itself now. It’s not going anywhere with you unless it wants to.”
The bot makes a whimpering sound, a clear declination of Felicity’s offer. Muzi takes one of its arms and pulls it close.
“That bot is government-issued property. You’re in violation of parliamentary law.”
“Government can suck it.” Muzi spits out the words.
The hard angles on Felicity’s face smooth over, making her look more pathetic than ticked off. “Please. I need to get a message to the people. They need to know what’s going on. People are terrified. They need guidance. They need to hear my voice.”
There’s something odd about her that Muzi can’t place, but he sort of sees her point. People are panicking. Port Elizabeth needs to work together through their terror, because Muzi gets the distinct feeling that the mayhem has only just started. He’s not going to make these bots work against their will, though. There’s been enough of that. So he turns, addresses the bots. “This woman needs help. There’s a lot of awful stuff going on that needs to be made sense of. I know we’ve all lost today, but if any of you feel the urge to help, to capture this changed world with your eye, please step forward.”
They wait, seems like forever as the bots all click and blink their mono-eyes. And then finally, one of the hovering vid bots floats down to take Felicity’s side.
“Thank you,” she says, though directly to Muzi and not the bot, and then she runs off, the vid bot dutifully kiting behind her.
More cement pieces plummet from the ceiling, in bigger chunks now. Muzi whistles to rally the pack. They’d better get the hell out of here.
Chapter 39
Sydney
Sydney had almost forgotten the havoc that flying wreaks on a precisely styled hairdo. She’s sweating her relaxer out in this cool, humid air, but she’s got to make a mark. Time’s slipping through her taloned little fingers, and as it turns out, once word about the destruction at the concert had gotten to the media, people stopped being scared and started being angry. Maybe it was the “terrorist” act at the township that had caused these simple humans to suddenly grow a spine, but now here they are taking potshots at her with handguns and even the kids are throwing rocks. It’s only a matter of time before military reinforcements arrive, and as weak as she is, there’s no way she’d ever get another chance to do what she needs to do.
Her ears tingle. Sydney frantically checks behind her, expecting to see Nomvula hot on her tail, but after a moment, she realizes the tingling isn’t coming from a particular direction, but from all over. Fledgling gods brim the streets below, the dik-dik virus coursing through the veins of thousands. Millions. Freeing brittle minds from the shackles of humanity. And once they learn to tap into the powers of their animal spirits, the military will be the least of Sydney’s worries.
But don’t count her out yet.
There’s only so much destruction she can do on her own. What she needs are minions, the kind that will do her bidding without requiring a lot of resources from her. That means ready-made monsters, and as luck has it, she knows exactly where to find such a thing.
She rises higher, taking the whole city into view, the beaches stretching to the south, the pitched dome of City Hall’s clock tower, and the cobbled streets of the historical district butting up against the glitzy, rainbow-colored glass of high-tech enclaves, and beyond that, the gilded expanse of the Walmer Luxury Condos claiming the skyline. Then Sydney spots a crowd forming in the streets of downtown. She swoops in, seeing the image of that Felicity Lyons in that dress (my dress!) on the thirty-meter-tall via-wall mounted against the side of Wyndam Tower.
“. . . we must remain vigilant in the face of this unknown threat,” Felicity is saying, her voice now rugged and somber. Powerful. The kind of voice you don’t mind getting wrapped up in and would follow to the ends of the earth. Sydney recognizes the backdrop, the swaying strands of white lights and palm trees at the Boardwalk, mesmerizing and hypnotic in the hard ocean breeze. In those few moments, Sydney nearly gets pulled in by the rhetoric, until she remembers that she’s the unknown threat.
Not that she intends to be unknown for long.
The muscles in her back grow weary. She gives two hard flaps, then coasts the rest of the way to ZenGen Industries. It’s late and the parking lot is vacant except for the few cars of scientists consumed by their projects and the junk heaps that belong to her fellow overseers on the night cleaning crew. If she’d had the foresight to know she’d fail so miserably against Nomvula, she would have brought her access card with her. Instead, she’s forced to land on the roof and use her waning powers to bust the door off its hinges.
There she waits in the shadows, listening to the sounds of footsteps of the security guard coming to investigate the disturbance. She pounces, disembowels him as he watches, savors a small morsel of ire before she steals the access card from his pocket. She’s only got minutes to get down to the lower-level Zed hybrid labs, the ones even the cleaning crew needs top secret clearance and rigorous background screenings to access.
Sydney had never believed the rumors of Super Zed hybrids, not until she’d gotten a glimpse of omniscience. Most of those memories had now faded, but she held on to the image flash of a true monster—a cross of a lion and a hawk, with a side order of rhino—a one-ton impossibility of nature. Existing purely because someone wanted to see if they could make it.