Victoria

81. A Cold, White Room

Josephine was in an interview room, just like the one she’d rescued Naema from weeks ago, only much smaller. A table was in the middle, with an indicator drawn across it where a repulse wall would be. Across from her was Queen Victoria.

And she was angry. It was because of something Josephine had done to her long ago, but she couldn’t remember what. And Victoria was in the wrong body.

…Because she’d swapped bodies. Sakhr had been her pet for years. Josephine knew these things, but she couldn’t remember how she knew them.

“What do you want with me?” Josephine asked.

“What I want, I’ve already got. What I’m deciding is what to do with you now.” Victoria scrutinized Josephine. “I could put you in a tortoise, just like I did Sakhr. Or maybe I should just kill you. I’ve learned keeping dangerous powers laying around can come back to haunt you.

“Or,” Victoria continued, “I could wipe from your mind every reason you’ve ever had to distrust me. I think with enough time, I could make you a loyal subject. I would make you want to serve me. I admit I’ve daydreamed about that more than once. I could betray you one day, and you’d love me the next. I could torture you mercilessly, and you’d smile when you saw me the next morning.”

“What the hell did I ever do to you?”

“You taught me an important lesson. When Sakhr broke into my home and murdered my father, I learned a hard lesson from them.”

Josephine knew this story. She was suddenly back in that house on that night she finally left. The smell, and the blood… and that girl.

But she couldn’t recall her name. She’d said it to herself a thousand times before. She’d replay that final night over and over, thinking what she could have done differently to save the girl. But the name just wouldn’t come to her.

Victoria continued. “But it was you that taught me the hardest lesson. I knew what kind of people Alexander and Sakhr were. They only cared about my power. But for you, I spent every day that week looking forward to seeing you. Not the others, just you. I actually thought you had cared about me. That last night you dropped me off, you wished me well. You told me I had my whole life ahead of me. Everything would be all right. And I believed you. Even when I sensed something was off about you, I dismissed it. I didn’t want to think that you would see me as a threat.”

“I’m sorry,” Josephine said.

“Don’t bother.”

“Please. Listen. I let you down. I didn’t realize what they were going to do. As soon as I found I… I…”

She couldn’t remember what she did. After she walked in that house. It was all blank. She could remember remembering seeing a nightmare, but she couldn’t pull it to mind. And she realized why.

“Stop!” She yelled. “What are you doing? Please don’t take this away from me.”

Victoria smirked.

“Your name?” Josephine said. “You took it away. I need to know your name.”

“It’s Victoria.”

“No. Her name. Your real name. Why are you doing this?”

“Because that girl is dead. You buried her. And I want her gone. It sickens me to thin that anyone might remember that pitiful little girl you took advantage of.

“What are you talking about? I tried to help you.”

Victoria laughed. “Yes. You convinced me my life would get better. You convinced me I was safe, and left me at that house. Then they came.”

“I didn’t know.”

“Don’t act so innocent. I waited for days afterward, watching the house. You never came. I went back to the hotel and the coven had moved on. How can you say you didn’t know?”

“Look in my eyes! I did come back. I did everything I could to get there in time, but I was too late. I wanted to save you. I wanted to take you away from them so they could never hurt you.”

“No. I’ve seen through all their minds. When they had their talk, no one disagreed.”

“Because I removed myself from their memories.”

“If you’d disagreed, there would have been inconsistencies.”

“No there wouldn’t be, Victoria. I’m good at what I do. You want to know how that argument went? Look for yourself.” She moved her head into Victoria’s line of sight. “As soon as I knew what they were doing, I came as fast as I could. I just wasn’t fast enough. For that, I am truly, deeply sorry.”

Victoria did finally look at her. Her eyes held frigid hatred. She had no cynical remark for Josephine.

“There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t think about that night,” Josephine said. “If I had known you were still alive, I would have come. I would have turned myself in and begged you to forgive me.”

Still, Victoria said nothing.

“I hate myself for that day. I wish I remembered your name. I wish you hadn’t taken it away from me, but I understand why you did. Please. Don’t take any more. I want to remember you. I want to remember how I let you down, because I don’t deserve to forget. I should remember the young girl I let die that—”

Victoria shot to her feet. Her chair clattered. Josephine thought she was about to lunge across the table, but she stormed off.

81. A Cold, White Room

Josephine was in an interview room, just like the one she’d rescued Naema from weeks ago, only much smaller. A table was in the middle, with an indicator drawn across it where a repulse wall would be. Across from her was the Lakiran queen, Victoria.

It didn’t look like her, but it was her. Josephine didn’t know how she was so sure. The only explanation was bodyswapping.

“Sakhr?” she ask.

“Yes,” Victoria said. “Before you ask, I am not he. Sakhr and his coven spent seventeen years as my pets.”

“Pets? You put them into animals?”

“Tortoises. I had one set aside for you too, but you weren’t there. A pity too. It was fun to put Alex and Sakhr away for what they did to me, but you… you were the one I actually trusted.”

“What the hell did we ever do to you?”

“You taught me an important lesson. Sakhr broke into my home and murdered my father, and Alexander… he had his fun too. I learned a hard truth that day.”

Josephine knew this story. She was suddenly back in that house on that night she finally left. The smell, and the blood… and that girl.

“…Katherine?”

Victoria sneered. “No. You don’t get to say that name.”

81. A Cold, White Room

Josephine was in an interview room, just like the one she’d rescued Naema from weeks ago, only much smaller. A table was in the middle, with an indicator drawn across it where a repulse wall would be. Across from her was the Lakiran queen, Victoria.

What? No.

This was the exemplar who had captured Josephine and the others. Why did Josephine think she was the queen? She was just a girl.

“Ah, I’m starting to get the hang of this now,” the girl said. “We don’t have to keep repeating introductions.

“What are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about how you recognize me.”

Josephine dropped her gaze. Damn exemplars.

“I’m having amazing fun with this conversation,” the woman said. “I don’t think you appreciate how much I’ve been looking forward to this.”

“What?” asked Josephine. “You’re using my power against me?”

“Yes, but it’s more fun when you don’t know that.”

81. A Cold, White Room

Josephine was in an interview room, just like the one she’d rescued Naema from weeks ago, only much smaller. A table was in the middle, with an indicator drawn across it where a repulse wall would be. Across from her, the exemplar who captured them studied her with an amused smile.

“Your power is extraordinary,” the exemplar said. “It’s very easy to overdo it, though.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Don’t worry. You’ll figure it out soon.”

“Who are you?” Josephine asked.

“I’m the queen. Ignore my current body. It’s only a loaner.”

It took a moment for that to sink in. “…Victoria?”

“Yes.”

Bodyswapping. That was something Josephine hadn’t thought about in years. A thought occurred to her.

“…Sakhr?” she asked.

“Yes.”

Josephine looked her over. “So you decided to rule the world after all. I guess you were right. You aren’t any good at it.”

The woman looked perplexed. “What? Oh. No. I’m not Sakhr. I just used his power.”

“So what did you do to Sakhr?”

“I trapped him and his silly coven in small animals. It was easy. All I had to do was promise him more power and he walked them all into my trap. Pity you weren’t there. I’ve had your enclosure waiting for you for seventeen years now.”

“What did I ever do to you?”

“You’ll remember soon enough.”

“The first time I even thought about you,” Josephine said, “was when your little spies broke into my house.”

“Was that really the first time we interacted?” the woman asked.

Josephine eyed her. Victoria clearly knew something she didn’t. For one, how did she even know Josephine knew who Sakhr was? And she must have met Anton if she has his power. So Victoria must have met the coven before Josephine left.

But when? Christof would have noticed another witch, unless Victoria already had her shield by then. Had they offended her somehow? Possibly. The coven had offended a lot of people. Whatever it was, this bitch had one long memory.

“We must have met at some point,” said Josephine. “I guess you don’t make much of an impression.”

Victoria’s cool grin vanished. “No? Well, you lot certainly made an impression on me. I’ve waited a long time to add you to my collection.”

Josephine still had no clue what this was about, but screw this. “I’m flattered. I don’t know what we ever did to you, but I bet you had it coming.”

81. A Cold, White Room

Josephine was in an interview room, just like the one she’d rescued Naema from weeks ago, only much smaller. A table was in the middle, with an indicator drawn across it where a repulse wall would be. Across from her, the exemplar who captured them studied her like a med student watching an autopsy.

The exemplar was the only other person, but a dozen people could be watching behind the mirrored wall.

“No one else,” said the exemplar.

Josephine dropped her gaze. Damn exemplars.

On the road, the girl took Josephine’s glyph card and put a bag over her head so she couldn’t wipe any minds. Only then did more people arrive, which meant this woman was probably the only high exemplar here. If Josephine could get out of the room, escape would be easy. Only high exemplars were shielded.

But this woman wasn’t a high exemplar, was she? Her uniform was unbuttoned now. More importantly, no plaque. Come to think of it, she had no plaque on the road either. She must have a shield on a glyph card.

…And also Authority.

“Who are you?” Josephine asked.

“I’m the woman you’ve been eluding for over a decade. I told you I would eventually have you. I guess if you want something done right, do it yourself.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Think for a moment. You’ve always known I had access to Alexander’s and Sibyl’s power. You must have realized I had Sakhr’s as well?”

“…Victoria?”

“There you go.”

Josephine paused while her mind swallowed this knowledge. “So at the Capital bombing, you had some poor fool die in your place?”

“Something like that.”

A realization struck her. “Wait. How did you know?”

“How did I know what, dear?”

“How did you know I knew who Sakhr was?”

“A fascinating question, isn’t it?” said Victoria. “I certainly didn’t learn it from him. You scoured every last memory his coven ever had about you. So how did I know?”

Josephine didn’t answer.

“Tell me,” Victoria continued, “why did you decide to part ways with them? From their minds, I can’t even get an idea when it happened.”

Josephine kept her head down. There was too much this woman knew that she shouldn’t. No reason to give her any more information.

Victoria sighed. “You might as well talk. You can’t hide anything from me.”

“No, thank you,” answered Josephine.

80. The Escape Game

“Is this what you’re looking for?” asked the lieutenant.

Josephine squinted at the screen. Fourteen suspects detained at French border trying to violate border lockdown. Subjects released.

“No. I didn’t say border. I said Lyons. An operation in Lyons.”

The lieutenant craned to look at her. “But we don’t have any soldiers in Lyons. We evacuated the region.”

He glanced over the computer screen to where Tan lounged at a coffee desk. Tan chewed food bars he had found in a break room. Since Josephine started carrying a glyph card, it’d grown harder to get angry at him for acting so damn flippant during these excursions. He was tense. He just hid it well. The food, the cigarettes, and fidgeting were all to distract himself. They were in the heart of a Lakiran military base after all.

“What I’m looking for,” she said, “won’t be in the usual lists. This was special forces. They were using orbital pods. Would that be in here?”

“It would, but you need permission to see that? Where did you say you came from again?”

She wiped his memory. It took a few tries until all the suspicion drained from his aura. Now he was just confused. This was useless.

She wiped his mind of everything about herself. “Why are you sitting in my chair, Lieutenant?”

Startled, the lieutenant glanced up, saw the rank of Colonel on her sleeve, and hopped from the seat. “I’m sorry, sir.”

“Leave.”

“Yes, sir.”

As he hurried away, she pulsed him again. He’d wander the halls with a lingering sense of having done something wrong.

Josephine tabbed through the database. The Lieutenant had been right. All she saw was a slew of arrests made during the evacuation. The only action in France now was along the border. Everyone detained for crossing illegally was released. No more arrests. They’d run out of places to hold people lately.

“Tan. You think you could help me?”

Tan tossed aside his food wrapper and meandered over. He grabbed the touch screen and laid it face up on the desk. Taking out a single cent euro, he flipped it in the air. It clinked onto the screen. He carefully plucked the coin, then tapped the screen where it had landed.

This took them to the main database menu.

He flipped again: Department list.

Again: Civil Protection Records.

That made no sense. Civil Protection wasn’t military. It protected political gatherings and oversaw places like embassies. Josephine said nothing though. That penny was landing with purpose. It’s next two flips landed on the same button: page down.

Next flip, Imperial domain. Now it made sense. Imperial domain was protection of the queen, but it might also involve assignments passed down by the queen directly—those led by exemplars.

After that, it entered a list of project code names. Most were obscure, but the last was blatantly clear.

Lyons.

Tan flipped the coin again; it landed on that project. Josephine took over, but a password screen came up as soon as she tapped it. With a sigh, she handed it back to Tan.

This time, he pulled out his bag of dice. He picked a twelve, an eight, and two six-sided ones. The system he had was complicated. Josephine had helped him form it through countless trial and error. Back when they started this, it only ever failed when the password contained characters his system couldn’t account for. Capital letters were the first stumbling block, then numbers, then special characters… It once failed them completely at a security console in India. Studying a keyboard later, Tan figured out it must have had a tilda, the corner keyboard button he’d overlooked until then. Nowadays, Tan’s system even incorporated potential unicode characters. Josephine lost track of the rules a while ago.

The password here was strong. The dice had him press a few function keys, but when he finally pressed the enter key, the filed opened.

Sakhr was in a conference about the state of the empire’s transportation infrastructure when his tablet vibrated. While the minister kept talking, Sakhr opened the alert.

Someone had just accessed the Naema file. It came from a terminal in West Spain apparently. Sakhr checked a map. It was farther away from Lyons than he had expected.

Josephine must have played it safe and not gone to the nearest military installation. Wise, perhaps, but not wise enough. Sakhr had no idea how Victoria had so much trouble catching this woman. This trap would have been obvious to him: a single file in a database that’s easy to find, but not too easy. The password protection was hard, but not harder than anything that Asian had proven capable of hacking.

He closed his tablet and turned his attention back to the ministers. If he got the alert, so did the response team.

“Ascension Island?” asked Oni.

“That’s what it said,” Josephine got in the car. Oni had been waiting three blocks away. He was in the driver’s seat as though he was the getaway driver, but when Tan opened the door and shooed him off, he crawled into the backseat without argument. Tan drove out of the parking lot. At the road, he flipped a coin. Heads. He turned right.

“Where is Ascension Island?” Oni asked.

“Off of Brazil, I think.”

Oni took out his phone. After some research, he spoke. “It’s in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean.”

“How big is it?” asked Josephine

“Five miles long, maybe? Why did they take my family there?”

“I don’t know,” Josephine replied.

“I thought you said they’d take my sister to the capital.”

“That’s what I thought. I guess not.”

“Maybe they’re getting rid of her. Her power ruins plaques. So they’re putting her far away.”

“Maybe,” Josephine said. “Or maybe they expect us to come after them. If we go there, we’d have a tough time getting away. They might have put her on that island just to trap us.”

“But we’re still going to save them, right?” Oni asked.

“Yes. We are.”

“I will not.” Tan had his eyes on the road. Reaching an intersection, he rolled a die on the dashboard, then kept straight. He didn’t say anything else.

“Tan,” Josephine said. “You know what happens if they keep Naema.”

“They won’t make glyph of her power? Her power break glyphs.”

“We need her. You know this.”

“No. She bring us trouble. Since you find her, Lakirans no leave us alone. She is trouble. All trouble.”

“That’s because the Lakiran’s know how much of a danger she could be to them.”

“I no care about danger to Lakirans,” said Tan. “She supposed to keep us safe, but she is only danger to us. Now we go to tiny island to save her again? Second time we save her. And it is a trap. They will catch us if we go. I will not.”

“Tan…”

“No.”

“Tan. You can’t leave on your own. We need to stick together.”

“No. Not anymore. We make glyphs of our powers. You give me yours. I give you mine. We say goodbye.”

“I don’t know if that’s how these glyphs work.”

“It is possible. Glyphs come from people. That is why the queen wants us.”

“I don’t know how to copy them.”

“I see my power in a mirror. And yours. I know you do too. We figure it out. It is possible.”

“Even if we could. Even if you had my power, do you really think you’ll be any safer? If you got into trouble, no one would—”

She trailed off when Tan slowed the car. Ahead, five Lakiran deployment pods blocked the road.

“Tan?” asked Josephine. “What was your game? Roll dice to choose your route. Get out of town without running into the empire, right?”

“Yes.”

“Why did your power bring us here?”

He didn’t answer.

“Where are the people?” Oni asked.

He was right. No one was around. No soldiers, no cars. Nothing.

“What are they doing here?” asked Oni.

“I don’t know.”

“Maybe we take pods?” asked Tan.

“That can’t be right,” Josephine said. They could theoretically take the pods wherever they wished. They were in the European grid right now, but that had to be a terrible idea. Whoever’s pods these were would notice. They could contact air control have Josephine and the others put into holding patterns. Game over. But then, they were here. And they were oriented in such a way that Tan couldn’t drive past. The dice led them here for some reason.

“Flip a coin,” she said. “Heads we take them. Tails, we turn around.”

He flipped his coin. “Heads.”

“Really?” Josephine asked. “We’re supposed to steal deployment pods? That’s what your power wants us to do?”

Tan made a not-my-fault motion and indicated the coin.

“Okay then. Come on everybody.”

They got out and walked toward the pods. Josephine didn’t like this at all, but if there was a way out of this city, this was it. If there wasn’t—if they couldn’t win—then they might as well walk into the trap and save everyone time. But this had to be something. If there was genuinely no way to win the “get out of town safely” game, then Tan’s power wouldn’t bother working at all. His rolls would be random, and the chance of randomly finding pods with absent occupants was infinitesimal.

Next to one, Josephine leaned to look inside without stepping in. She tapped the screen. It showed the message, Remote access key not detected. They wouldn’t be able to ride these after all.

“Back to the car,” she said.

Two pops came from the woods. Pain exploded through Josephine’s side. Screaming, she collapsed. Her head struck the asphalt, causing stars to explode in her vision. Recovering, she felt her side. A small barbed flechette was stabbed into her. She yanked it out, but the little electric capacitor on its back had already discharged its payload.

“Get down on the ground,” someone yelled. Josephine’s breath caught. For a second she thought that order was for her. Without thinking, she lay still.

An exemplar woman strode out of the woods brandishing a repulse rifle, though she was much too young to be an exemplar. She’d also shot Tan, and Oni was getting on his knees.

The woman tossed three sets of handcuffs at them. “If any of you move quickly, I will shoot you again. Take the cuffs and secure your hands behind your backs.”

Twice now Josephine had tried to wipe the woman’s memory. No effect. Nor was the girl giving off an aura. So she had to be a high exemplar.

Josephine and Tan exchanged glances. She nodded.

While Tan grabbed his handcuffs with one hand. He drew his gun with the other. It might work. He’d get shocked again, but one lucky shot would drop the exemplar, and he was good with lucky.

“Drop the gun now,” The woman ordered.

Josephine’s hand twitched as though trying to comply. Tan’s fingers opened as though of their own accord. The gun clattered.

It was Authority. Josephine had no idea how. Anton had been dead for over thirty years, long before glyphs existed, but she recognized the familiar jolt that came with the words—the one that sent shivers down your spine and caused a primitive, submissive part of your brain to kick in.

The woman faced Oni. “Cuff Josephine’s hands behind her back.”

Oni moved to do so.

“Don’t.” Josephine said. “She’s controlling you. You just have to—”

The woman shot her with three more electric flechettes. Josephine didn’t speak much after that.

“And there’s no indication of who was aboard that ship?” asked Sakhr.

“None, ma’am,” said the captain. “All we know is that the ship was already waiting nearby when the alert tripped. They had pods waiting at the road to take them the rest of the way.”

Sakhr was reclined at his desk for this phone conversation. “So it was their getaway ship?”

“It might seem like that, ma’am, except our investigation turned up discharged electric flechettes at the escape scene, and blood.”

“Blood?”

“On the flechettes points. And some on the asphalt. When a hostile gets hit with a flechette, they often scrape their scalp on the ground.”

“So someone captured them?”

“That’s our theory, ma’am.”

If Sakhr had any doubts that Victoria was involved, that dispelled them. With the recent spur of military desertion, there were several ships equipped with deployment pods that the army couldn’t account for, but none of those would be right there. In his gut, he knew that if he could see aboard that ship, he’d find an ex-exemplar named Bishop and a captain named Stephano. They were the flies that evaded the swatter. Now they flew about the room, only to occasionally be glimpsed.

“Their ship. Are we tracking it?”

“Yes, ma’am. The orbiter is picking up speed and altitude.”

“Can we catch it this time?”

“We’ve already redirected the intercepter team. According to the flight manager, no matter what path the target takes, we’re guaranteed an exchange window of four minutes before the orbiter becomes unreachable again.”

“An exchange window?”

“That’s when the ships are able to exchange fire, ma’am.”

“Tell me. Tell me we outnumber them.”

“Six to one, ma’am. The attack will be coordinated from the strike room in the bridge spire. Admiral Laughlin invites you to join him if you’d like.”

“Yes,” Sakhr said. “I would.”

76. Footprints in the Snow

WaferMesh. On Winnie’s website, several of her dresses used it. Living up north after the Collapse meant year-round winter, so unless people wanted to bundle in mittens and scarves for eternity, they used WaferMesh. Several version came out over the years, and each had its own variations in warmth, texture, and durability, but they all used the same general principle: instead of using thread, it was a lattice of synthetic fiber that created air pockets within waffle like layers. It was kind of like a sponge, but texturing kept it looking like fabric. The advantage was insulation without thick layering, so if anybody wanted to show off their form in the nuclear winter, they needed WaferMesh.

Winnie liked to think that was the reason her website was popular. Her clothes used WaferMesh, which wasn’t popular with designers down south, but vital for people farther north like she was. Also, she’d customized her site so that users could specify a kind of mesh before assembling, or even use standard synthetic cotton for those people in warmer climates.

Her experience also made her particularly apt at selecting outfits for herself and Victoria as their drifter car traveled farther north. She’d wanted to pick things from her own website. The sense of familiarity would be nice, but Victoria forbid it after one glance at her modeled clothes. Instead she picked a few bottom-line no-design long sleeved articles from the core library that not even a nun could complain about.

Then Victoria turned her nose up at the colors Winnie had picked.

“I asked you if you had any preferences,” Winnie said.

“I assumed you’d pick… earth colors.” Victoria held up a pair of bright yellow leggings.

“Color is in right now. We’ll look fine.”

“I suppose it will do.” Victoria peeled off her teeshirt and worked her arms through the sleeves of a green long sleeve shirt. “Change now.”

While Winnie was off collecting the clothes from an assembler station near their current rest stop, Victoria had inputted Ottawa into the car’s guidance system. It might be below freezing outside, but the guidance said they’d be spending another three toasty hours in the car.

“Why now?” Winnie asked.

“Because we’re not taking the car from here. We’re walking the rest of the way.”

Startled, Winnie looked around their vicinity with her mind. They had stopped in a community in upstate New York. It wasn’t much different than Redding—the town the Lakirans relocated Winnie and her mother to. It was large enough to reestablish a complete school and a hospital, and an assembler station where Winnie made the clothes. Also like Redding, the Lakirans had gathered all local holdouts of nuclear winter survivors and put them here to better manage law and resources. Being anywhere else in the region was against the law, at least it had been in Redding. Many people complained about that back home, but it made sense the way the Lakirans explained it. People outside of the city were outside of the empire’s thinly spread control. The empire couldn’t police them or protect them. The only people who’d realistically want that were raiders or warlords. And North America used to have plenty of both.

This meant that the only thing around this settlement were miles of abandoned towns, broken down roads, and forests of dead trees. But if their destination had been in town, they wouldn’t need the clothes. The community was small enough that they could have walked there by now.

“How far are we going?” Winnie asked.

“A few miles. Did you get my other package?”

“This?” Winnie took out a small assembled radio pack. “What’s it for?”

“You’ll see. Change.”

In the warmth of the car, they donned insulating clothes. Victoria opened the door and ushered Winnie out. Before stepping out herself, she instructed the drifter car to begin its trip. Once the door was closed, the car lifted and silently glided out of the parking lot. All drifter cars were capable of driving themselves; it made returning rentals easy. But it was still a spooky sight for Winnie. The purpose was clear. If anyone tracked down the car, they’d be in the wrong country.

Thus began their hike. They climbed on hands and knees over a snowbank alongside the parking lot. Beyond that was a forest with two feet of snow encrusted with ice. With every other step, Winnie would crunch through into soft snow beneath. Powder would clump along the rim of her boots. Five minutes of walking and her red WaferMesh leggings were soaking through. Wet cold was creeping down her ankle.

“My socks are wet,” she said.

“Deal with it.”

“I wish you would have told me we were going to walk through snow.”

“These clothes will do fine. It’s not much farther.”

Or so Victoria said. Winnie scanned ahead. If Victoria was bee lining to their destination, which it seemed like she was, that put at least another three miles of snow slogging ahead of them. After that, an abandoned town.

Winnie occupied herself by darting her mind from building to building looking for wherever they may be going to. It didn’t take her long. Footprints in the snow ambled all about the abandoned town ahead. Some followed circuitous paths back to the community they’d traveled come from. Winnie traced the prints to a cellar door. Inside was a makeshift living arrangement for one: a floor mattress, piled wood, coolers full of assembled food supplies. The resident was a woman who sat on the mattress curled up in blankets. She was reading a book with an electric lantern which rested on a nearby cardboard box. By the bed was a wood stove with a belly full of ash. The woman would only use the stove at night, when no one would see the smoke coming from the chimney. Winnie knew this because this was exactly how she lived years ago when it was just her, her mother, and a handful of famine survivors.

This woman was hiding from the Lakirans.

“Who is she?” Winnie asked.

Victoria kept walking. “High Exemplar Liat.”

By the time they arrived, Winnie remembered what it was like to be truly and miserably cold. It hadn’t been so bad in the woods. The trees had sheltered the wind, but in the ghost town, it cut through every bit of exposed skin she had. Her cheekbones ached. Her boots were soaked through, and her legs felt like two dead slabs of meat.

Victoria stopped one block from the cellar door. She was poised as though stalking a prey. Winnie came up behind her, sniffling and shivering, too cold to care.

“Liat Delacroix!” Victoria yelled.

Inside the cellar, Liat startled. Dropping her book, she pulled a magnum pistol from behind the mattress and took aim at the door. Winnie now understood now why they hadn’t just walked in. Liat scurried to a ladder leading into the house. She was going to run for it.

Victoria sighed. “Stay where you are,” she murmured to Winnie, then proceeded forward. Liat clambered into the kitchen. Ducking low, she scurried through the living room of the dilapidated house, glancing about as though under fire. One peek out the back window revealed the backyard to be clear, so the woman burst out the back door and sprinted toward the woods.

Victoria was right there. The woman spun in surprise. The gun raised.

“Drop your gun and kneel to me, Liat Delacroix.”

The magnum fell into the snow. Liat dropped to her knees. The words Victoria spoke had caused the hairs on Winnie’s neck to stand on end. They were the same words she’d used on Winnie’s mother; they had to be obeyed.

“…Your Majesty?” Liat asked.

“Yes.”

Liat fell to her hands and crawled through the snow. She hugged Victoria’s ankles as though she’d never let them go, and she cried hysterically.

“Victoria, I’m sorry,” she said. “I thought you were dead. I couldn’t reach the others. Bishop said they were killing us, and then the army came after me.” She sobbed. “I didn’t know what to do. I just… I ran. I hid. I was going to—”

“Enough of this, Liat. Behave yourself.” Victoria shook Liat off her feet.

Liat smiled at this. “Sorry, Your Majesty.” She sat back on her haunches and took a deep solid breath, purging any emotional remnants. “I’m just really happy to see you.” Liat looked over Victoria’s teenage body. “How did you survive?”

“I ran out of bad luck at the last moment.”

“And Sakhr? Is he still…?”

“Yes. There is a buffoon on my throne.”

“Do you have a plan?”

“Of course I do.”

Liat nodded. “Good. I am yours if you’ll still have me. After taking orders for so long, I’d forgotten how exhausting life is figuring things out for yourself. Thank God you’re here.” She pressed her forehead to Victoria’s foot.

Victoria shook her off. “I said enough of that. Get up.”

Liat climbed to her feet. Snow caked her leggings. Winnie encroached on their little reunion. Both turned to face her.

“This is great and all,” Winnie said, “but can we go inside?”

The second floor of Liat’s hideout told a story. There were three bedrooms, a master, and two for children. In one, posters lined the walls, and a derelict computer sat at a wooden desk. Karate trophies filled a shelf—all junior level, meaningless accomplishments that would exist forever in attics and cellars after the child left home. The room spoke of a content childhood. The other bedroom was an infant’s, except that the crib had cardboard boxes in it. The room was used for storage. Winnie wondered if the reason for that was morbid, or simply because the infant grew up. Then why wasn’t the room converted to a bedroom? Maybe they didn’t have time before the Collapse.

“You’re procrastinating again,” Victoria said.

Winnie’s attention snapped back to the chore Victoria had given her. It was really just a flair exercise in disguise. Unfortunately, she was with Victoria in the master bedroom of the house, where Victoria and Liat were setting up the radio pack brought from town. Victoria’s aura sense let her know whenever Winnie procrastinated.

“I’m not seeing it,” Winnie said.

“Try trying.”

That was practically Victoria’s mantra.

“Have you tried?” Winnie asked. “The atmosphere is really freakin big. Try it.”

“I don’t have to. I know where they are. Show me what you’re doing.” Victoria looked at her pointedly.

Resigned, Winnie looked her in the eye and once again put her mind hundreds of miles above them. From up there, the earth’s curves were plain to see. The glowing blue sky was an aura about its surface. She once again began scouring around looking for a single ship supposedly coasting around up there. Even if there were no obstacles to block her view, it was akin to searching for a specific mote of dust on a clean floor.

“First of all,” Victoria said, “you’re looking much too far up. Their elevation is only twenty-eight kilometers, in the ozone layer.”

“I can’t see ozone.”

“Don’t try seeing anything. Sense. You already know how to ignore obstacles in your way. This is the same idea. Looking for a small thing in a big space should not hinder your power. Ignore the distance. That ship is the only thing up here. You should be able to spread your mind over the atmosphere and sense where the ship is.”

Winnie wasn’t sure what Victoria meant, but she tried something. She’d been advancing her own power to understand it wasn’t limited like a camera. It was awareness, just like her lessons had taught her. Her point of view could be omni directional. It could split up. It could read a closed book. It could both see a wall and see through it. Surely she should be able to see a single ship surrounded by miles of nothing.

She closed her eyes and tried—spread her mind, as Victoria had put it. Why not? She imagined a bubble thirty kilometers up in the air, the same size as a bubble created by a child with a bottle of soap and a bubble wand. She expanded this bubble, slowly at first as she made sure she visualized correctly. It was soon the size of a beach ball, then a house, then a stadium. All the while, she tried to sense anywhere the bubble was disturbed. She didn’t look for it. In fact, she made a point of closing off her “camera”. She felt for it like a spider sensing tremors on its web. Once it was the size of a large island, she started to sense pressure upon the bottom of the bubble. It was the thicker atmosphere, pushing on it with its winds and turbulence. Her bubble fluttered like tissue paper, so she stiffened it and expanded it farther. It became flatter as she stretched it, and it umbrellaed over much of Canada and New England before Winnie felt another disturbance. Just like a mote of dust sticking to a bubble. Something skirting the stratosphere had caught.

It was a small ship emblazoned the HIMS Venezia. Skirting through, she counted twelve airmen, and fifteen or so marines. The captain was standing in a minuscule bridge looking over a display table showing their present course. They’d be directly overhead in about twenty minutes, which would explain Victoria’s timetable.

In a cramped ready room off the bridge was High Exemplar Bishop. Winnie had met him before all of this had started. Here he was without his plaque, though he had an assembler-grade tablet and was paging through news articles about hacked glyphs.

“You’re gathering all of your exemplars,” Winnie said.

“So you found them. Show me. How did you do it?”

Winnie met her eyes.

“By touch. Interesting. That’s not what I meant for you to do.”

“It worked.”

“It certainly did. Your power has evolved just now. I can see it.”

“We’re after Bishop, right?”

“I’m after everyone aboard that ship.”

Liat looked up from her wiring work. “Bishop is alive?”

“Yes. Is the radio set up?”

“I think so.”

“Then we’ll get started.” Victoria started tuning the portable radio’s dials.

“If you’re trying to reach them,” Winnie said, “you do see that Bishop is using the internet right now, right?”

Victoria didn’t look up from the dials. “Am I to send them an email to their imperially controlled email addresses? And you expect them to believe me?”

“Oh.”

“Put your mind in the bridge, Winnie. Do you see the communications officer?”

Having found the ship once, Winnie was able to return immediately. “Is he the one with the huge headphones?”

“And do you see the short wave receiver frame on his dashboard?”

Winnie did. Victoria set their amateur radio to the same settings.

“Hey, you,” Victoria said. The officer didn’t react.

“Officer Malcolm Ruiz. I am addressing you.”

He hardly blinked. Victoria frowned and fiddled with the scanner.

“No. You got him,” Winnie said. Through eye contact, she conveyed how she’d been listening to the officer’s headphones.

Victoria tried again. “Listen to me, Lieutenant Ruiz. Flag down Exemplar Bishop. Put him on the comm.”

After hesitating, Ruiz opened an editor on his computer and began transcribing an abridged version of Victoria’s words.

“No. Stop that,” said Victoria. “Stop typing.”

He froze.

“Good. Now turn around in your chair. Do it.”

Hesitantly, Ruiz did so.

“Now call out to Exemplar Bishop. He’s in the other room.”

He didn’t.

“Why don’t you just tell him who you are?” asked Winnie.

“They think I’m dead, and the man already thinks this is a trick, but if this idiot would just get me Bishop…” She depressed the broadcast button again. “Call out to the high exemplar now.”

Winnie felt that tingle on her neck. Officer Ruiz instinctively opened his mouth to call, yet paused.

Then, “Captain. I’m picking up a strange message on shortwave.”

Victoria pinched the bridge of her nose. Apparently her mysterious command power wasn’t perfect.

Stephano and his XO moved closer. “What is it, Lieutenant?”

“I’m not sure, sir. I think someone is trying to contact High Exemplar Bishop.”

In the other room, Bishop perked up. Thin walls it seemed. He set aside his tablet and came out.

Stephano was studying the comm officer’s console. “Shortwave, Lieutenant?”

“Yes, sir. A.M. It has to be local.”

“Is it repeating?”

“No, it’s live.”

“Let me hear it.”

“Yes, sir.” Ruiz tapped buttons. A gentle static sounded from the console.

“Was there anything more to the message?”

Victoria spoke. “No, Captain. I simply wish to speak to Bishop.”

Everyone on the bridge turned.

“Are we broadcasting, Lieutenant?”

“No, sir.”

“How are they hearing us?”

Ruiz shrugged.

Bishop walked over. “It’s the far seeing glyph, Captain. Be careful. They can see and hear all of us.”

Stephano addressed the air. “Who is this?”

“If you would please put Bishop on the comm, Captain. This is a private conversation.”

Stephano turned to Bishop. “Do you know who they are?”

Bishop shook his head. “They have to be close to Sakhr. He won’t have shared that glyph with many.”

Victoria’s eyes were narrowed. “Sakhr, Bishop? Just how many imperial secrets have you been divulging?”

Bishop stared at the comm with wide eyes. “Give me the headset, Lieutenant.”

Stephano nodded to Ruiz, who passed the headphones over. A few console taps and the conversation was private.

“Who is this?” Bishop asked.

“You know who this is,” said Victoria, and there was that same undertone—the one that yanked at Winnie’s attention.

Bishop couldn’t help himself. He laughed a rich, joyful laugh.

“What have you told your men?”

“We’ve told them that we landed to pick up trusted allies,” replied Stephano. “Most of them haven’t seen you or those with you.”

“You didn’t tell them who I am?”

 Stephano took his time answering this. “No, Your Majesty. To be frank, I don’t see why they would believe me. I’m still not sure what I believe myself.”

“I can swap bodies with you again if you like.”

“No! No. That’s fine. All I’m saying is I’ve decided to defer to your judgement regarding what to tell my men.”

“I see,” Victoria said. She and Captain Stephano were speaking in the captain’s ready room off the bridge. It was cramped enough that those two alone had their knees bumping together. Add in Stephano’s executive officer Rivera and High Exemplar Bishop, and the meeting was practically a telephone booth stuffing. Real-estate on a supersonic high-altitude vessel was expensive, and the ready room was only meant as a place for the captain to take calls or work privately.

As such, Winnie was not invited, not that it stopped her from listening in. Victoria’s first rule went out the window the moment Winnie learned Victoria’s plans for her daughter. She listened from her assigned rack. It used to belong to one of the marines who’d died on the Capital Tower, which put Winnie sleeping in the midst of a dozen men. Uncomfortable, but the men left her alone after she showed them her exemplar ID.

“We will tell the men,” Victoria said. “Bishop tells me that even they have those blasted hacked plaques. They’ll find out sooner rather than later. Let’s not let rumor complicate things.”

“They may not believe it?” Rivera said.

“They will. Don’t you two believe I’m the queen?”

“Yes,” Stephano said, “but we’ve been working closely with High Exemplar Bishop. It was good enough for me when he vouched for you. The crew don’t know him that well.”

“We will convince them all the same. We can’t expect them to act against the empire without knowing they’re on the correct side. They need to know that the current queen is not their ruler.”

“And who is this imposter, ma’am?” Stephano asked. “Sakhr, right? Bishop tells me he was someone you kept captive in the body of a tortoise, along with others.”

Victoria leveled a gaze at Bishop.

Bishop shrugged sheepishly. “I thought you were dead, Your Majesty.”

“He didn’t tell us enough,” Stephano added. “We’ve been trying to formulate a plan against this person, but he’s a complete unknown. What can you tell us about him?”

“He’s a two thousand year old flair.”

“…I see.”

“He was Nubian, captured at a young age by slavers and sent to Egypt, where he spent years in servitude before discovering his power. Since then, he’s been wandering the earth collecting others like him. He’s careful. He’s paranoid, and he doesn’t like to take chances. At all.”

“Ah. Hmm. And he… if he’s in your daughter’s body, you’re daughter is…”

“A hostage.”

“So alive then?”

“Yes.”

Stephano nodded. “That complicates things.” Winnie wondered if he was taking it at face value. If he dwelled on it, he’d come to the troublesome question of: why let your daughter inherit your throne if you can live forever. If he had, he wasn’t asking, just as Victoria hadn’t volunteered the part where she started the war that caused all these problems in the first place.

“What plans did you have before I contacted you?” Victoria asked.

“We didn’t have much of a plan until recently. I believe these hacked plaques represent an opportunity. If we can get our hands on them, we’d be able to communicate the truth about Sakhr to others. Because of the mind reading, there wouldn’t be any doubt as to the veracity of our claims.”

“You would have told the world about Sakhr and body swapping?” She looked at Bishop. “And you went along with this?”

“I thought you were dead.”

“I take it these are not secrets you wish divulged?” Stephano asked.

“Not unless absolutely necessary.”

“I understand, ma’am. Do you have a plan?”

“Yes, but we’ll need to pick up a few more people.”

“That’ll be a risk,” Rivera said. “Every time we land this craft, the empire might intercept us. As long as we stay at maximum speed up here, they can’t touch us. Is it possible for us to contact these other parties remotely? We have access to satellite internet. It’s spotty, but it’ll work. The empire can’t take that away from us.”

“No. These people I need to see in person. It will be a long overdue meeting.”

72. Ripples

Osgur sat alone in his bedroom. His homework lay out before him, but his eyes were on the small card of plastic in his hands. Like every other internet savvy teenager with an assembler, he’d gotten that plaque the Sunday before school, then came in this morning for the most interesting school day.

  • Period 1: No one paid attention to class. Those who didn’t have plaques marveled at those who did. Everyone was reading everyone else’s minds, mostly the teachers’.
  • Period 2: Class was effectively canceled as faculty scurried about informing the teachers what was going on.
  • Period 3: Confiscation.
  • Period 4: Redistribution. Many of the students had the foresight to bring multiple glyphs. They handed out glyphs scrawled on notebook paper. An announcement went out stating that possessing such glyphs was grounds for suspension. No one cared.
  • Period 5: Some teachers fought back. With confiscated glyphs in hand, they took to scanning students’ minds as though exemplars themselves. Parents started arriving to take their children home.
  • Period 6: Never happened. Half the faculty were in emergency conferences. The students lounged in the halls conversing and playing with the hundreds of hand written glyphs.

All anyone knew for sure was that school was canceled tomorrow while the school board figured out what to do. It would have made this an amazing day were it not for the ride home. When his father had picked him up, his gaze was evasive, but just after his dad parked the car at home, their eyes met briefly. Everything his father was afraid of his son learning about had been right on the surface.

Osgur would have to leave home. It was the only way. How could he ever go on living in this family? It’s not like he could ever sit at the same table with his parents and act as though he didn’t know.

Those ropes in his parents closet were not for mountain climbing. The image had been right there in dad’s head. Of Mom. Tied up. And… those other things which he now knew were kept in the gun safe. Knowing that his parents even possessed such things was far more than an child should know, but to see a mental image of those things in use. On mom.

These glyphs had ruined his life.

“Pardon me, sir,” Arnaud approached a stranger standing outside a shopping mart. He was a Chinaman—had no business being in France. Probably didn’t even know french, so Auraud would open with… ugh… english. Men like these deserved to be robbed. But there was something in particular about this man that stood out to Arnaud, though he would be damned if he could put his finger on it.

The asian man glanced toward Arnaud, but made no eye contact.

“Pardon me, but could I trouble you for a cigarette? I only just got here from Marseille. My boy and I haven’t a place to stay, and I smoked my last cigarette on the shuttle ride.”

The part about a son usually got their attention a little more, just enough for eye contact. Then came credit info, or extra marital affairs, Bank PINs, or anything useful. Arnaud had only procured his hacked exemplar plaque last night, but already it had proved far more valuable than the seventy cent credits he paid to assemble it. Twice on his way from the bus station, he got two adulterers to pay him twenty francs. He fancied himself a mental pickpocket. Grab a secret here, or maybe a name or address. The rest Arnaud could bluff. One mark paid him just for asking if his wife knew about “Natalie”.

The foreigner took out a pack of cigarettes and helped himself to one. He glanced at Arnaud, then up and down the street as though looking for Arnaud’s aforementioned son. He lit his own without handing one over. Oh, how Arnaud was going to enjoy taking this foreigner’s money, the arrogant prick.

“Please, sir. I can pay you a franc if that’s what you wish.”

At a meandering pace, the asian man finally popped out a cigarette for Arnaud.

“Thank you, sir.” Still no eye contact. How rude was this man?

“You uh… come from China?” No response. “I’m from Cameroon. Came here after the war. What brings you out so far from home?”

Finally, the asian man looked Arnaud in the eye. “I do not speak good english.”

It was enough. Arnaud saw far more than he expected.

A flair? Other powers? This man could… know the future somehow, but only slightly. His power allowed his own unconscious movements to decide for him. Understanding this, Arnaud finally managed to place what strange detail led him to “Tan”. He could somehow sense this man’s power. So this was what the mystery “flair” glyph was for.

Tan hadn’t learned yet about the glyph cards flooding the world, but he certainly knew a lot about flairs. There was Josephine, a woman who could make you forget about her; and a girl, Naema, who could break glyphs. Most importantly, him and his friends were on the run from the empire.

There was too much to take in. The man, Tan was his name, hardly noticed Arnaud’s shock and kept right on smoking. Without a word, Arnaud walked away. There was profit here. Somewhere. He just had to think.

Liu Fen’s shift at the greenhouse ended at eight each night, but she never got home before ten. The glass farms in Hangzhou were nearly an hour subway ride from where she lived, then a bus ride, and she had to wait in line at the RepMarts to get her daily ration of food before getting on the subway. By the time she was home, she had less than an hour to herself if she wanted a full eight hours of sleep before starting the trip in reverse.

Despite a three hour commute to spend twelve hours a day pollenating genetically dwarfed orange blossoms, she counted her blessings that she had a job at all, much less a high paying job as a greenhouse botanist, especially considering she was a woman living on her own. Best of all, her annual review was last week. After hearing of her crippling commute, her superiors had given her a raise. Not much, but enough that she could afford to live in Hangzhou, within biking distance of work. She’d have three hours to herself every day, plus her day off.

Today, however, left her troubled. Everywhere she went, it seemed people were staring at her. On the bus, a crowd by the door kept glancing. On the subway, a man stared openly. At lunch, several coworkers collected and murmured among each other. When she wasn’t looking, they’d steal glanced at her. She’d frantically checked the mirror in the work bathroom, but nothing was wrong with her appearance.

As she approached the plaza of her apartment complex, a group of children who lived in the building were gathered at a table. They were frequently there, and always courteous when she passed. She suspected a few were attracted to her from the way they scrambled to help her move in last year. Ever since then, they always showed her their utmost manners. Their stuttered words and red faces were flattering too.

Yet today, they stared like everyone else had.

“Mrs. Liu!” One waved her over, a boy named Heng.

Hesitantly, she approached.

He held up a black card, which looked like a credit card, except instead of numbers, it had four calligraphic drawings in gold on the front. “Have you seen these yet?”

“No.” Her body was pointed toward the apartment door. Hopefully the boys would get the hint. Two hours of commute and she was within a minute of being home.

“They let you read minds. Look. I can read yours. You are wondering why everyone is staring at you today. Also, you’re planning to move soon. Is this true? We will miss you.”

She hadn’t told anyone about that. She’d hoped to slip away without causing a scene, as her neighbors would want to do. Ever since they discovered months ago that she was living on her own because her fiancé had died in the Collapse, she’d become the neighborhood darling. Everyone was always checking in to see how she was doing. She wished they’d just leave her alone sometimes. Now these children, who must have gone through her mail, would tell everyone.

“That’s not true. I did not look at your mail.”

The boys chittered.

Liu turned and hurried off.

Heng called out. “I’m sorry. Please. I was rude. But please, look at this.” He held out the card. Liu eyed it. She didn’t know what trick this was, but she just wanted to go home.

“Please,” he said. “Take it. It’s not a trick. I promise.”

Reluctantly, she did.

Moments passed in silence. Everyone excitement was practically palpable.

She frowned.

Their excitement was palpable. She could feel it, like their excitement was hers. More than that, there were people in the complex who didn’t care either way. It felt like wires were connecting their emotions to her own.

She could count the connections if she wanted, like counting orange blossoms on a tree. There were so many she’d lose count before she finished.

“Please,” Heng said. “Look me in the eye.”

She did so, and she knew she was seeing his thoughts, because he knew it, and his thoughts were hers. If not for that, she might not have noticed.

Then, in his mind, she saw why everyone was staring.

“Do you see, Mrs. Fen?”

She did.

Later, standing in her bathroom, she stared at her reflection like so many others had stared at her. Heng had given her his card. After their talk, she knew everything he knew, including that there was something about her—something everyone, including her, could see, but not with eyes. When she looked at her own reflection, thoughts filled her head. She had a gift, though she couldn’t explain for the world how she knew that. It somehow connected her to other people. It affected them somehow. It played on their… humanity? Their compassion? Even now she could push it out toward others in the buildings, whose auras shined through the walls. They resonated in response to her push. It tied them to her somehow, but she didn’t know how.

This all had to be impossible, yet the thoughts that flooded her mind while she held the card told her otherwise. Frustrated, she sat at her computer and opened a browser. Others had to be experiencing the same thing. Right?

The public assembler beeped. Victoria opened the dispenser tray and drew out the small card. Winnie wasn’t sure what it was. Or why Victoria had suddenly detoured their car to the nearest assembler station to create it. The menu screen had said ‘hacked exemplar plaque’, but it didn’t look anything like the massive steel plaques the exemplars used. It looked more like a credit card.

“What is it?” Winnie asked.

Victoria sneered. “It’s the end of my empire.”

And this is the end of Part 2. An updated kindle book is available, and Part 3 will begin with the next release.

Thank you once again to all who’ve kept up with the story so far.

69. Your Session Has Expired

Mind clear.

Nothing.

All Winnie knew of was what her natural senses told her. The air was cool and dry. Wind whispered from the car’s air conditioning vents. Children shrieked and giggled in the park outside. The leather seats crinkled beneath her with every shift she made. She was sitting in a rental car that Victoria had picked up after they got off the repulse grid, and they’d stopped at a market in Mexico. Victoria was picking up supplies while Winnie was supposed to be practicing.

First, her warmup exercise. Winnie visualized the kitchenette where Alex had kept her and Winnie. No trouble. She didn’t even know whether the citadel had moved or not; her mind went straight there.

Next, she visualized the moon landing. There were the footprints and the bleached American flag. Everything looked the same, except for being dark. The earth glowed high above in the moon’s sky. Asia was facing the moon right now.

Next, she visualized a hopper that had been traveling ahead of her and Victoria during the South American leg of their trip. It had originally contained a young couple who’d argued in Portugese. It seemed like they were on a vacation. When Winnie visualized that hopper, she didn’t look at it as a whole, but rather she looked inside of it to see if the couple were still there. They weren’t. When Winnie pulled her focus away, she saw the the hopper was parked in a lot in Honduras. That was progress. Yesterday, she would not have been able to pull that hopper into mind without first knowing where it was, but this was progress she’d made hours ago.

Her next goal was to visualize Victoria’s tattoo. She was somewhere in the market across the street from where they’d landed, but where she was exactly didn’t matter. Her current teenage body had a tattoo around her belly button. Winnie visualized her mind right against Victoria’s belly, staring down at her naval ash though it were a crater upon a landscape. It worked. Winnie saw it, which of course she did, Winnie thought. Winnie knew exactly where Victoria’s naval was relative to her body, just as she knew where the moon landing was relative to the moon. Only now she needed to expand her view and see the world outside this torso landscape.

She saw Victoria’s baggy T-shirt. Other tattoos lined her arms. Her hair was pulled back in a pony tail. Then Winnie looked into the “sky”. Victoria was looking over dried and withered mangos. She was picking from a selection, watched over by a merchant who ignored her upturned disgust to favor other customers. More details washed in. Around her were other bins of equally frail fruits. It was the southeast corner of the market, where naturally grown foods were sold at astronomical prices.

Winnie checked that she wasn’t imagining any of this. She wasn’t. Victoria was in the same place when Winnie visualized the market separately.

That technically meant Winnie had just made a breakthrough. Victoria’s idea had been to imagine people more like astral bodies, and to instead locate something on them instead of them themselves. And it had worked.

She located Victoria. It had been that simple—underwhelming given the months of practice leading up to this. Victoria had said that when it finally happened, it would be as simple as something clicking into place—just a subtle change that made it right.

She tried it again on her mother by focusing upon her mother’s nose. Upon seeing it, she pulled away with much less careful mental preparation. Her mother was sitting on the couch at home. It didn’t seem like she was doing anything at all—another space out. Winnie had written her a message, but it looked like her mother hadn’t read it yet. She was notoriously slow about that. It was frustrating that she could have proof that her daughter was alive if she’d just grab the tablet on the side table right there. What mattered was that Winnie had succeeded once again in locating someone.

She tried yet again. This time, she focused on the naval of her original body, the one Alex had stolen from her. She hardly had to focus on it at all before taking all of the surrounding scene into mind. Alex was seated on a bed with legs curled beneath him as though fitting into the preteen girl persona.

But the bed he was on was… her bed?

Details flooded in quickly. Alex was in her dorm room on the Lakiran campus, looking through her tablet. Why? The campus was still evacuated. He shouldn’t be there. No one should. He was alone apart from the security team and the shuttle that brought him here.

He was paging through her contact list. With each entry, he opened the page and studied their info. One was Ray Mackerson, a boy she knew from Seattle. Alex paged down to look at what screen names, email addresses, and personal info was available. Every person Winnie knew would be on that list. Page after page of hostages.

Winnie snatched up Victoria’s tablet. She browsed to the same website. Her frantic hands failed the login password twice before she got in. Alex meanwhile had moved onto the next contact—a girl Winnie hardly knew from highschool. Alex only had to check her comment history to see who she was closest with. He’d know every person she even remotely cared about.

A message popped up warning her that this device had never been used with this account before. She had to type in more information before getting in. Her hands raced over the touch pad.

The next contact: Nava. She’d been on the cheerleading team with Winnie. With interest, Alex studied a picture containing both Nava and Winnie.

Winnie got in. She scanned for a “Change Password” page, filled out the form, and submitted.

When Alex tabbed back to the contact list, he was greeted by a new page.

Your session has expired.

A smile crept onto Alex’s face. “Someone’s watching, aren’t they? Thought you might.”

He minimized the browser. On the tablet’s desktop were many social media apps, all connected with friends or family in some way. Winnie would have to change the passwords on all of them. No. She’d have to delete them.

Alex clicked on her phone app, and Winnie immediately browsed for that app’s website. As she was logging on, Alex perused through her call history. Page after page of calls to the same number: her mother. She was the only person Winnie used this app for. All of her friends used something more modern, but her mother was slow to adopt. Alex pressed redial.

Winnie’s mind was already there when her mother’s tablet jingled. Her mother glanced at the caller ID, then explosively snatched the tablet up.

“Eun-Yeon?”

“Hi, Mom,” Alex said.

“Eun-Yeon? It’s you? I thought you were dead. Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.”

“What’s been going on? I’ve been trying to reach you.”

“I know. I’m sorry I haven’t been able to call until now. Security and all, you know?”

Winnie listened as she navigated through the phone app’s website. Alex wasn’t speaking like Winnie. He had an accent which he couldn’t quite hide. His word choices were wrong. He called her Mom. Until now, Alex hadn’t spoken to anyone who’d notice, but her mother might. Winnie could hope.

“What’s happening over there?”

“Oh, you know… Terrorist attacks.”

“Were you there? Where were you? Where are you now?”

“I was on the campus. There were a lot of soldiers, but everything is fine now. Security is still really high though.”

“Do you want to come home?” Her mother held her breath in hope. Winnie hit the submit button on the password change form. It confirmed.

“No, mom. I can’t come home right now, but I want to see you. Do you think you could visit me here?”

“Of course, sweetie. Would that be allowed? When should I come?”

The call wasn’t ending. Was it because it was already connected? Then what was Winnie supposed to do? The damage was being done now, not in a future call. She had to interrupt this one. But how? Call her mother while she was still on the phone with Alex? It might work, but Victoria had forbidden that.

Screw it. Winnie wasn’t going to let Alex get her mother just because of Victoria’s selfish rules.

As Alex and her mother worked out travel details, Winnie downloaded the app and logged on, hoping it might boot Alex.

It didn’t. She hovered her finger over the call button. Should she call right now? Alex might convince her mother not to pick up. The conversation seemed like it was ending anyway.

“I’ll be on the next flight out,” her mother said. “I just need to check my passport. It might be expired.”

“You don’t need a passport, mom. It’s the same empire.”

“Oh right.”

“I’ll make sure someone is there to meet you at Piaco airport. Just email me once you know your flight.”

“Oh! I’ll need to let Mary know I won’t be free this weekend.”

Alex shrugged carelessly, having no idea who Mary was. “Okay. I’ll see you soon then.”

Winnie’s mother rose and hurried toward the bedroom.

Hanging up, Alex looked up and addressed the empty air. “You get the idea, don’t you? Mumsy is on her way. How pleasant that visit will be is entirely up to you.”

Winnie pressed the dial button. The tablet chimed at her mother’s house. Her mother caught her step and turned back, confused.

“All I want you to do,” Alex continued, “is tell us where you are.”

Her mother accepted the call. “Did you forget something?”

Winnie’s voice caught. She hadn’t thought about how to approach this.

Alex kept addressing no one. “We want Victoria. Not you. Help us get her and everyone you know will be okay forever more. You have my word.”

“Hello?” her mother asked.

“Eomeoni?” she said.

Mother frowned. “Who is this?”

“It’s me, eomma.” She spoke Korean. “Listen, I know you think we just talked on the phone, but it wasn’t me.”

“What?”

“There’s been a takeover in the empire. The person you just talked to… I know it sounded just like me, but it wasn’t. You can’t come to the empire. They’re going to take you hostage.”

“Hostage? Who is this?”

“It’s me.”

“You don’t sound like my daughter. What is this about?”

“Please, eomma. I can prove its me. Ask me anything that only I would know.”

Mother stared at her tablet, then tapped the camera button. Winnie’s tablet prompted her to start a video call.

“No. I’m sorry. I can’t… I don’t have a camera on this tablet. I can see you though. I have my flair.”

Mother hung up. Winnie kept her mind on her, but split her attention to check Alex. He was still busy talking to an empty room, outlining exactly how Winnie was supposed to help him, and what would happen if she didn’t. Her mother was staring bewilderedly at her tablet. She moved to call Winnie, but hesitated.

Winnie redialed. She couldn’t risk that call going through to Alex.

Mother answered.

“It’s me again. Please don’t hang up.”

“Stop this,” she said. “I want to talk to my daughter.”

“It is me. I can see you with my flair. You’re wearing a green blouse and your black skirt, the one you replaced after you spilled sauté over it at Mary’s. You bought those bracelets from before the war when you and dad got lost that one time upstate. You always joke about how they didn’t use money there. All the antique stores just traded antiques back and forth like currency. Remember?”

Her mother looked around the room as though someone were over her shoulder.

“Please, listen. The bombing that happened last week was part of a coup. They’re making it seem like Queen Helena is in control, but she’s not.” Winnie stopped. If she kept on this track, she’d have to explain everything, from being a tortoise to being on the run with the queen, who wore the body of a teenage girl with a tattoo addiction. The more she’d explain, the less believable the story would sound. “I’m with people loyal to the queen right now. But the people who took over are trying to get to you because they want to control me. And if you don’t come to them, then they might come get you. That’s why you need to go into hiding.”

“Hiding?”

“Yeah.” This call was one hell of an unprepared mess. “With one of your friends that I don’t know about. Or go farther. Don’t tell anyone where you’re going. I’ll know where you go though. I’ll find you with my power once everything is okay.”

“Why are you doing this? I want to speak to my daughter.”

“This is me.”

“No, it’s not. You sound nothing like her. This is not funny. Please, stop or I’ll call the police.”

“Please, eomma. I can prove it.”

“No. Stop this.”

“Just ask me—”

The car door opened. Victoria glared at Winnie.

“I have to go.” Winnie stabbed the end call button. She set the tablet back onto Victoria’s seat, remembered she was still logged on, and hurriedly began logging off. Victoria watched with piercing disappointment. Once Winnie finished, Victoria climbed in, set down a bag of groceries, and shut the door.

“I’m sorry,” said Winnie.

Victoria stared back, lips tight.

“Actually, No.” Winnie met Victoria’s eye. “I’m not sorry. Did you see what Alex was threatening to do to my mom? I don’t care where you’re taking me, but I’m not going to stand by and let them get her.”

Victoria’s silence was nearly more than Winnie could bear, yet she held her ground, looking right at Victoria to show her all that had transpired. If Victoria had a problem with it, then Winnie could get out and walk.

Victoria set the car to self-drive. Once they were back on the road, Victoria took up her tablet, pulled up a different communication app and typed in Winnie’s mother’s contact number.

“What are you doing?” Winnie asked.

Victoria made the call. Mother was still on her couch back home staring at her tablet when the call popped up on the screen.

“Why are you calling her?” Winnie asked more forcefully. Victoria held up a finger for silence.

Her mother let the call ring. The caller listed on her phone was only a series of numbers, no screen name. Finally she accepted.

“Hello?”

“Is this Kim Hye-jun?” Victoria said.

“Yes?”

Winnie was ready to snap the tablet from Victoria the moment the conversation went sour.

“This is High Exemplar Liat Delacroix. It’s come to my attention that you received a call from your daughter moments ago.”

“Yes. Ehh… Someone else called me too. I’m not sure who they were.”

“Indeed. I’m afraid the first call you received was not your daughter.”

“What?”

“The terrorist agents who we believe were responsible for the Capital bombing have been contacting family members of several personnel closely associated with the queen. They’re using voice modulation to mimic voice patterns. This has happened to several people already.”

“I… I want to speak with my daughter.”

“I’m afraid that’s not possible. We currently have a lockdown on all outside communication. She broke protocol contacting you.”

“Was that my daughter? It didn’t sound like her.”

“Winnie is suffering from a respiratory illness brought on by dust from the Capital bombing.”

“Oh. Is she going to be okay?”

Winnie wondered why her mother was buying all this. Victoria certainly sounded official, but didn’t her mother wonder why Victoria sounded like a teenager?

“She’ll be fine. What’s important right now is that under no circumstances are you to travel to the capital.”

“…Okay.”

“These agents are targeting your daughter because of her gift. There is a chance that they may come after you directly. If you ever planned to take a vacation, take it now. Don’t tell anyone where you’re going. No one. Your daughter will know where you are and we’ll contact you once this situation is resolved.”

“What? You want me to leave? I must speak with my daughter, please. How do I know you are who you say you are?”

“Kim Hye-jun-ssi, I am High Exemplar Liat. I work directly for the queen and am assisting in the resolution of this crisis. Do as I say.”

All of Winnie’s mother’s uncertainty washed away. “Yes. Of course. I’ll leave tonight.”

“Good. You will hear from us.”

Victoria hung up.

Winnie saw in her head as her mother practically lunged toward the bedroom. Her suitcase was out in seconds. She lined clothes and toiletries up on the bed. Winnie had no doubt it was to this vacation she was traveling to, not the capital. That final command from Victoria still lingered in the air like a bubble refusing to pop. It had weight that seemed to smother doubt. Even recalling the sound of Victoria’s voice caused the hair’s on Winnie’s neck to stand.

“Thank you,” Winnie said.

“Hmm. Next time use your head. I’m not going to do that for all your friends. Now…” Victoria leaned in and peered into Winnie’s eyes. Her head tilted in curiosity. “You just had a break through with your power, didn’t you?”

“Uh, I think?”

“Show me.”

68. Sleep and Study

The repulse grid relied upon large nodes spaced along the terrain. It used the same tripod method as any other ship, only the tripod was reversed. The nodes pushed the shuttles up from the ground, instead of pushing down on the ground from the shuttles. Because of limited range, that meant no hopper traveled more than about five hundred feet off the ground.

So as Victoria and Winnie traveled along the northern coast of South America, the view out the shuttle window showed beautiful stretches of beach. Winnie watched, though she opted to follow along in her mind. The details her flair provided were almost as vivid as what her eyes told her. One day, she might close her eyes and forget to ever open them again.

Winnie went between watching the passing scenery to envisioning Helena, who was still trapped in a shower. Christof had put in some leafy foods from a mess hall salad bar, but Helena wasn’t eating. At least Alex didn’t have her.

Winnie visited her mother occasionally. It was still night time in California, so Winnie had yet to see her awake, yet somehow, even in her sleep, her mother looked tense, as though in a fever. It wasn’t just Winnie’s imagination. Her mother had been trying to reach Winnie ever since the Capital Tower fell. Winnie’s phone lay in her dorm on the campus, which was still evacuated.

She brought her attention on herself. After nearly a week as a tortoise, she’d have thought she’d be used to being in another body, yet she still startled to see a blonde-haired, white, twenty-something woman resting her eyes.

Across from her, Victoria was staring directly at Winnie. Winnie opened her eyes to give Victoria a narrowed glare.

“Why aren’t you sleeping?” Victoria asked.

“I’m not tired.”

“Don’t lie to me.”

“I can’t sleep. This body is weird.”

“Did you try trying?”

“I don’t feel like sleeping, okay?”

“You’re too worried. Relax. Your mother will understand once all this is over.”

For the hundredth time, Winnie promised herself to never make accidental eye contact again.

“I could just call her,” Winnie said.

“Absolutely not.”

“Why? What if she tries to reach me and gets Alex instead? If I could just tell her I’m all right, she’d stop worrying.”

“How would you explain why you sound completely different? You can’t explain to her that you’ve swapped bodies.”

“Why not? I could prove who I am.”

“Let me clarify. I won’t let you reveal body swapping to others.”

“Don’t you think the secret is already out?”

“No.” Victoria leaned in. “And it will stay that way because neither Sakhr nor I will allow it to become common knowledge.”

“He’s swapped out at least two dozen exemplars.”

“And he’s threatened each of them with death if they so much as utter a word about body swapping.”

“…Because you both want to keep it to yourselves.”

“Can you imagine what would happen if the public knew that swapping bodies was possible?”

Winnie considered it. Hell would certainly break loose, but she doubted Victoria actually cared. If people knew about body swapping, they might figure out she was planning to steal her own daughter’s life to continue her reign.

“Okay, then I won’t tell my mom that,” Winnie said. “I just want to let her know I’m okay.”

“I’m sure you do, but calling her while in another body will only confuse her. You can contact her after I retake the throne.”

“Will I have my own body back then?”

“If you work with me, then yes, assuming we can.”

“In the meantime, my mom has to live wondering what happened to her only daughter.”

Victoria regarded her coolly. “If you absolutely must, you can write your mother an email after we’re off the grid. Explain that you haven’t been able to reach out because of increased security, but that you’re okay. Then tell her you probably won’t be able to contact her for a while. I will read this email before you send it. Satisfactory?”

“I guess.”

“Good. Now go to sleep. I need you rested.”

“Why?”

“I need to keep my eye on Sakhr constantly now, and sooner or later, my body is going to need sleep. I need you rested so we can swap bodies. I’ll watch Sakhr. You’ll sleep for both of us.”

“…You can do that?”

“Yes. Sleep is for the brain, not the mind.”

“So we’re all going to be swapping bodies back and forth this whole time? Won’t that be… you know, weird?”

“After a while, you’ll start to see bodies more as accessories.”

Winnie hoped she never got that way, or if ever she got her own body back, it wouldn’t be a part of her anymore. It was just a housing.

Victoria sensed her unease. “We’ll only keep it up until we’re out of secure empire space. Right now, all it would take is one word from Sakhr, and this coach would get stuck in a holding pattern. I need watch him so I can get this hopper on the ground immediately in case he finds us.”

“Do you want help?”

“No thank you.” Victoria turned her gaze back to Winnie. “But there is something you can do though if you’re not going to sleep.”

“Yeah?”

“How has your practice been coming?”

“You mean my flair? I’ve been using it a lot. I got better at seeing through occlusions when I was in the river.”

“But you’re still seeing with your gift? You’re not simply knowing? Are you still using your ‘camera’ point of view?”

“Yes.”

Victoria frowned. “How much time did you spend on your exercises?”

“My exercises? This week?”

“Yes.”

“Uh, well, maybe you didn’t notice, but I spent most of the week as a tortoise.”

“It only means you had nothing else to do.”

“Are you serious? I thought you were dead. If I’d practiced, the only person I’d have helped is Sakhr.”

Victoria considered this. “Fair enough. I will accept that excuse for shirking your lessons.”

“Thanks?”

“Let’s pick up where we left off. I’d like you focus on your locator exercises. I’ve had some thoughts on how we might—”

“You want to have a lesson right now?” Winnie said. “Aren’t there bigger things happening?”

“Which is why I need you to develop your power now more than ever. I’m trying to keep an eye on Sakhr, all of his followers, and the ministers and exemplars he interacts with. It’s difficult for me to do with your limitations.”

“What is your power anyway? I know you’re not the glyph writer. Sakhr said you could do anything.”

“Yes. I learn. All powers are mine, once I understand them. Except all I can do is mimic what others can do, which is why I need you to enhance your flair to improve our chances. Especially if you learn to locate and focus on people.”

“Why that one?”

“Because as it is, if I lose track of anyone, I have to relocate them all over again. It’s why I can’t afford to stop watching. More importantly, we’re headed to Canada to find someone. It would save us time if I didn’t have to search.”

“Who?”

“Develop your power and you’ll get to find out. Are you ready to begin?”

Winnie was unsure. She always knew that training her power ultimately benefited Victoria. Before, she hadn’t cared. Whereas now she wondered why so many flairs ended up as tortoises. If she refused, she was making herself useless to Victoria. She’d only be a liability.

On the other hand, Victoria jeopardized her own position to help Winnie. Winnie’s flair was important. It meant leverage.

“I have one condition,” Winnie said.

Amused, Victoria inclined her head. She stared piercingly at Winnie, which Winnie recognized as a demand for eye contact. There’d be plenty of that during a lesson anyway, so Winnie did so.

“I see.” Victoria pondered, then spoke, “Fine, but she will never rule.”

“Will she’ll get her own body back?”

“No. Her body has always been my property, but I will give her a suitable body, and she will keep her silence. As will you.”

As despicable as Winnie thought it was, it was probably the best she’d get. “Fine, then,” she replied.