Free Rion by Susan Kearney

concrete.
     Whatever. It was hard.
    “Trust me.” Rion squeezed her hand and yanked her over the edge.
    She would have screamed. But her vocal cords froze. Automatic reflexes kicked in, and she tried to dragonshape. But the morphing
     didn’t happen. She remained fully human, with no wings to stop her fall. Her stomach swooped up into her throat. Her hair
     whipped back from her face, and her eyes watered, giving her a blurred view… of death. She squeezed her eyes closed, all the
     while thinking,
No, no, no
. This couldn’t be happening.
    She was going to wake up in her bed, her pulse racing, and laugh at this insane nightmare. But slowly the wind stopped plucking
     at her. The swooping sensation faded. And she dared to crack open her eyes. The world was still alien, but they’d stopped
     falling. Some unknown force floated them down gently toward a crowded square.
    People sat eating, drinking, and playing games on spinning cubes. One man walked a six-legged canine. The diners acted as
     if they hadn’t noticed Rion and Marisa’s crazy fall and subsequent landing.
    “Antigravs caught us,” Rion explained. “Throughout the city they also prevent dragonshaping—something to do with electromagnetic
     changes on a cellular level.”
    Her feet touched the metal decking and her legs shook. “What are antigravs?”
    “Safety devices. You’re okay now.”
    “No. I’m not okay.” She was shaking so hard she had to hold on to Rion to keep from falling. “I thought I was going to die.
     Again.”
    He gathered her into his arms and cradled her against his chest. “I’m sorry. There was no time to explain.”
    Her teeth chattered. Sorry wasn’t good enough. The Enforcer could have executed her. During that fall, she could have died
     of fright. But she bit back the complaints. Rion’s warmth settled her. His solid strength was an anchor of familiarity in
     this strange new world. She breathed in his scent, closed her eyes, and told herself that she’d been in tight spots before.
     And there was nothing wrong with clinging to Rion if that righted her world.
    He murmured soothingly, “Just hang on a little longer and we’ll find a safe place to hole up.”
    “All right.” Her shaking subsided, and she stepped away from him. Taking comfort was one thing, but she couldn’t let herself
     forget that he’d gotten her into this mess in the first place.
    He half led, half carried her behind a slowly rolling automated cart that whistled and rumbled on metal wheels. After boosting
     her onto the cart’s seat, he climbed up to sit beside her. “We can rest here for a bit. But not for long. Sooner or later,
     they’ll figure out we jumped levels and are out of the grid pattern.”
    She rubbed her temples, trying to understand. “What are you saying?”
    “Isn’t the translator working?”
    Struggling to control her fear and anger, she told herself that screaming at him wasn’t going to help. “I understand… your
     words, not the concepts.”
    Rion nodded and slung his arm over her shoulders, until their hips and thighs touched. “You’re suffering culture shock and
     jump lag—like jet lag, only worse. The Enforcers will canvass the entire level up there before they search down here. But
     with our pictures on their monitors, it’s only a matter of time before one of them spots us.”
    “How long have we got?”
    “Maybe ten minutes.”
    “How long will it take to reach Phen?”
    “An hour.”
    “Then we need a disguise.”
    “Good thinking. How do you feel about blue skin and silver hair?”
    She blinked, recalling the people she’d seen with blue-and green-tinged skin. She’d assumed they’d been born that color. “You
     can change my skin color?”
    He winked. “We can change you from the top of your head to the bottom of your feet. But it’s expensive, and I don’t have any
     credit chips.” He slung his pack from his shoulder and removed two hats, handed her one and donned the other.