Free Inkers by Alex Rudall Page B

consequences.”
    “No!” Lily said, “You put something inside me !”
    “She’s going to get rid of it,” Tom said, voice steady. “I’m taking her to the mainland tomorrow to see a doctor.”
    “No!” Brian said, glaring at Tom. “I absolutely forbid it.”
    “You can’t keep her here,” said Tom. “You don’t own her.”
    “There are pills,” Annie said, suddenly, too loud. “There are pills that would do it.”
    “Shut your mouth!” Brian said, snapping around. Annie jerked like she had been physically hit. Brian spun back to Tom and Lily, started to walk towards them. Mark rushed forward, put a hand on his chest.
    “For god’s sake!” he said.
    “You’ve been at it years, haven’t you!” Brian said, trying to push past the bigger man, his voice rising. “And that watch, what were you trying to do? They would kill us all!” he screamed.
    Tom and Lily both started shouting at once, Lily pulling free of Tom’s grasp. Mark pushed her back, then grabbed her roughly by the shoulders and dragged her towards the door, Lily kicking and shouting. Annie ran forwards saying, “Be careful!”
    Tom dodged past them and strode towards Brian, face violent. Lily could feel anger overwhelming her, like nothing she’d felt outside red.
    And then for a moment Lily could see it standing behind the others, a huge black creature, half–foetal, half like the demon she had seen in her dream, hunched, looming, arms spreading. There was a blast of heat and light she felt like burning over her body and Mark dropped her and flew backwards through the air, blood bursting out of his arms and chest and face, his skin ripping apart in great gashes. He hit the floor with a heavy wet crunching sound and Annie fell back gasping, clutching her face.
    Tom, Brian and Leonard were frozen, staring, hands half–raised to protect themselves, splashed with blood. Lily looked at the remains of Mark and began to scream.

Amber
    The small chair was painful beneath her backside. There was a large painting of the ITSA Space Station hanging on the wall. It was a silver circle in orbit hanging, in this rendition, over Africa. Outside the rain was beating against the glass. Kathmandu was invisible. Her head throbbed under the bandages. Her black uniform was clean and neat. Three weeks had passed since she arrived in Kathmandu. Three weeks since the incident. Now, for the second time since she had arrived in the country, she was sat facing Dryer.
    He was staring at her, sitting straight in his chair, his features expressing an ugly blend of disgust and amusement.
    “I submitted a full report,” she repeated.
    Dryer said nothing.
    “I deserve a chance. The same as everyone.”
    Dryer laughed at that. “You had your chance. You were insubordinate from the start. I order you to stay off the darknet; you immediately try to buy a watch. Then you kill two locals, including a Chinese man, triggering not only riots but also, potentially, an international incident.”
    There was a silence. Dryer stared at her. Amber glared back, her hands clasped tightly in her lap. There was a cold feeling rolling around in her stomach. The cold feeling had been there from the moment the doors sealed her into the hacked taxi and it had never left her, not when she had pushed the man’s own long knife through his chest, not when the drones descended, and, despite what Emily had assured her was a borderline lethal blood–morphine level, not even when she woke up in hospital. It was still with her now. She noticed that Dryer had a fleck of yellow food just above his upper lip.
    “You ordered me not to use a watch, and I didn’t,” she said. “I was investigating suspicious signage. I recorded them dealing in illegal technology. My implant administrator got it all. It’s all in my report.”
    Dryer shook his head. “From what the techs say, your implant is a concern in itself. You’ve modified it.”
    Amber shook her head. “Everyone–”
    “It is