SciFi and Fantasy Stories: Mercury III: part three

Bryce and Lauren relaxed slightly as their hoverbike rose onto the flyway. The stifling sounds and crazy colours of the central business district faded behind them, until the only sound was the rhythmic hum of their bike and the rush of wind past their ears. Cool air slipped beneath their helmets and dried the sweat on their skin. Spotlights lit the way, attached to great pillars that arched overhead and surrounded the invisible road on both sides, forming a kind of skeletal tunnel, rather like the ribcage of an immense serpent. Further lights were projected as holograms in running lines inside the tunnel, creating lanes. There was advertising here, as well: logos and brand names painted on the air every two hundred metres or so, zipping beneath passing vehicles so fast they were almost subliminal. Thankfully, they were static and not accompanied by music, and so could largely be ignored.

Bryce realised that the muscles in his shoulders and hands were cramped with tension, and loosened his grip on the handlebars a little. He took a deep breath of air, which was cleaner here, but still tasted slightly chemical. Technology has filled the world, he thought. There was very little left that had not been created by man. The dragons were perhaps the only truly natural things left.

But even from artificiality, life had arisen. A brand new kind of life, as though nature, too, was adapting.

As though she were always one step ahead.

Bryce looked to his left, at the city of Considia sprawled out beneath him, all the way to the horizon. An orange glow hung in the sky, created by thousands of lights, sparkling and glimmering, piercing the night with their brightness. It was like a vast wildfire, spreading slowly across the land, consuming everything in its path. The smoke from countless factories only emphasised this mental analogy.

He scanned the skyline for Mercury III, but found nothing. It can't be hard to find, he thought, it's a gigantic metal dragon, for God's sake…

There was no sign of any HDV's, nor the telltale sizzling of EMP flares. That was a good sign. Or it might mean that the Merc had already been brought down…

Chewing his lip anxiously, Bryce thought back to the news report in his room at the asylum. The Merc had emerged from a factory in the industrial sector and headed, as far as he could tell, east.

East? Bryce frowned. There was nothing out that way except dry, dusty plains and a few scattered conservation domes. Why would it go that way? What were its intentions? Perhaps it had somehow discovered what had happened to its predecessors, and fled to avoid a similar fate.

Did the Merc feel fear? What other emotions was it capable of? Bryce sensed that the answers to these questions revealed something profound… perhaps even a glimpse into the secret of life itself. He desperately wanted to find the answers. He already had a theory as to how it had gotten inside the machine factory.

But to know for sure, he first had to find the dragon.

He sighed wearily. If it had gone out into the wilderness, they could be in for a long drive.

But for the moment, they were safe. No Enforcers patrolled the flyways, the high speeds of the vehicles up here made it too dangerous. He would try to keep to this flyway as long as possible before taking one of the exits. If they were quick and watchful and kept to alleyways, they might be able to make it through the outskirts of the city without being caught.

For Bryce had no doubt that they would be caught, eventually. All he wanted was to offload Lauren somewhere and meet up with the Merc before that happened…

His plans, however, evaporated a moment later when Lauren suddenly swore out loud.

"What is it?" he said anxiously.

"Guess," she sighed, her voice coming through the tiny microphone earpiece embedded in his bike helmet.

Bryce's stomach clenched and a wave of coldness rushed through him. "Please," he said, "tell me there isn't an Enforcer behind us."

"Sorry to break it to you," she said, "but there is. And it's in Search and Destroy mode."

Bryce spun briefly to look behind them. Sure enough, an Enforcer loomed in the distance; wings swept back, red searchlights blazing. It approached rapidly, frighteningly, like a great boulder when, once pushed, could not be stopped until it reached its destination. The traffic before the Enforcer swerved quickly aside to let it pass, some in such haste that they nearly collided with the pillars or other vehicles.

No one wanted to be the target of an Enforcer.

Bryce let out his breath in a rush of fear and disbelief. "How the hell did it find us? I'd swear we weren't scanned!"

"Your guardians at the asylum would have contacted the Enforcement Office by now," Lauren replied. "All the Enners in the city are probably aware of your escape. And those aren't helping us either--" she pointed at the overhanging beams. "This flyway is plastered with cameras!"

Bryce's muscles sprang back into their painfully knotted positions. "We don't know for sure that it's chasing us. It could be a coincidence…" his voice trailed off at Lauren's snort. No, he thought. No, I can't expect to get lucky a second time.

He swallowed. "Crap."

He stared at the hoverbike in their lane ten metres ahead, wishing he could swap places with its driver, wishing the Enforcer was chasing anyone but them. The tunnel's spotlights swished over them at regular intervals; they now seemed startlingly bright, etching their stolen bike out in glimmers of white light, as eye-catching as a neon sign. He felt exposed, helpless.

He felt, all of a sudden, empty and cold.

The bike began to slow.

"Speed up!" Lauren urged. "It's gaining on us, fast!"

Bryce did not respond, did not move.

"Bryce, did you hear me?!"

"What's the point?" he said quietly.

Lauren gaped at the back of his head. She thumped on his shoulder angrily. "Idiot! I didn't risk my ass breaking you out of that nuthouse for nothing!"

Bryce winced, more from her words than the pain in his shoulder. He realised then that she was right. If he gave up now, everything they had done that night would have been a waste of effort. Lauren had paid back her debt to him with interest. He couldn't just throw that aside as though it didn't mean anything. Lauren was the only friend he had, and as long as she was with him, everything he did affected her as well. Giving up was a luxury he could not afford.

His hands tightened on the handlebars, and he smiled thinly. "We haven't broken any speed laws, yet," he said.

Then, swerving into the centre lane to avoid the traffic, he gunned it.

Lauren's arms tightened around him. Whether for safety or a hug, he couldn't tell.

He thought it might be a little of both.

The reaction from the pursuing Enforcer was immediate. The red searchlights, which had been sweeping the way ahead like feelers on a great insect, suddenly coalesced into one huge beam, locking onto the centre lane. As yet, the beam was still too far away to reach Bryce and Lauren, but the Enforcer-- now with suspicious activity in sight-- increased its speed. It took up three whole lanes.

"Faster!" Lauren said anxiously.

"I'm trying!" Bryce replied. He was already pushing the accelerator as far as it would go. The spotlights had become bright flashes to either side. Other vehicles were blurs of shape and noise. The little glowing speedo on his dash was ticking over crazily. They hit 200 kays per hour… 210… 220…

A musical chime sounded in Bryce and Lauren's earpieces, making them both jump. A silky female voice said: "Speed limit on flyway two hundred kilometres per hour. Limit exceeded. Please reduce speed now."

"Who is that?" Bryce demanded.

"It's the bike!" Lauren said.

Then they both froze as the horrifying realisation set in.

"Oh no…" Bryce breathed. "No, no, no…!"

240 kms… 250…

Chime. "Speed limit exceeded by fifty kilometres per hour. Speeding is dangerous. Vehicle disablement in thirty seconds. Please reduce speed now."

"Like hell!" Lauren said. "Ignore it!"

Bryce had no intention of obeying the bike's warning. He had no choice-- not with an Enforcer right on their tail. He risked a glance behind them.

The Enforcer's search beam hit the back of their bike. Lauren flinched as the red light glinted off her helmet. No going back now, Bryce thought fatalistically. He felt the sudden heat of the MemScan as it passed through his brain. All of their thoughts, all their memories were being sent back as data to the machine that was following them. He tried to blank out his mind, but there were far too many distractions and he had to concentrate on driving the bike…

An image of Mercury III sprang unbidden into his mind, and he cursed himself. Now the Enforcer knew not only every one of their crimes, but where they intended to go, as well!

"Vehicle disablement in twenty seconds. Please reduce speed now."

Where they had been intending to go, he thought bitterly. Vehicle disablement. The flyway wasn't only plastered with cameras, but speed sensors as well. He couldn't believe that he had overlooked such an obvious fact.

Another voice came into their heads, then, mimicking the hoverbike's smooth, artificially calm tone. This one, however, was male, and infinitely more deadly. Unnervingly, it did not speak through their earpieces, but directly into their heads.

Stop your vehicle immediately, it ordered.

Screw you, Bryce thought. He hadn't particularly meant to think that, but he was perched precariously on the edge of panic and the words had just appeared. He didn't regret them.

There was a metallic clunking, whirring sound from the Enforcer. Bryce, busy keeping the bike roaring flat-out, desperately trying to ignore its infuriatingly calm warnings of imminent doom and navigating a sweeping turn at the same time, glanced in the rear-view mirror.

And his eyes widened.

Two bullet-shaped compartments underneath the Enforcer's wings and one on its nose, beneath the now folded-back man-torso, had just opened. With simultaneous movements, each compartment split in two, the pieces sliding back to reveal three huge rapid-fire lasergun turrets, which began to revolve.

Uh-oh, Bryce thought, I guess it's too late for an apology…

Lauren gasped. "It's authorised to use lethal force! Man, someone really wants to stop us!"

"Vehicle disablement in ten seconds. Please reduce speed now."

"And they're about to succeed!" Bryce cried. He looked around himself frantically, searching for something, anything that would enable them to escape.

There was nothing, nowhere to go. They were caged in on all sides by the tunnel. The great grey pillars whizzed alongside him in blurred succession. Trying to fly between them at this speed would be like dodging gigantic shredder blades.

"Seven… six…"

The whirr of the Enforcer's guns increased in pitch. Do something! he screamed at himself. For an instant, he thought to spin the bike around and circle behind the Enforcer, but there was no time, in five seconds their bike would be dead and so would they…

No choice. He looked back at the pillars.

"Three… two…"

If Bryce had had time to think about what he was about to do, he would have been sick. As it was, he just yelled at Lauren to hold on and threw the bike hard to the right.

The hoverbike sped across two lanes, heading straight for the pillars. Lauren screamed, ducking her head, bracing for impact…

… and then they were out in open air, the words "Vehicle disabled," going unheard.

It took Bryce several seconds to realise that he was not dead. Even then, he wasn't sure that miraculously avoiding being smashed to bits on the pillars was better than his present outcome.

For they were falling. Five hundred feet of dark, empty space lay between him and the street below. The bike's momentum carried it far out from the flyway in a great leaping arc… and then it began to tumble, end over end, faster and faster, plummeting towards the ground. Wind screamed past Bryce's face. Streaks of light swirled across his vision in a sickening kaleidoscope. He tried to regain control of the bike, but it had lost all power and would not respond. It was nothing but a heavy, useless chunk of metal, completely immobilised.

All he could do was cling to it and prepare to die.

And then the bike, detecting that it was in free-fall, automatically engaged its safety thrusters, stopped spinning and righted itself. Powerful blasts of superheated air slowed their descent, but they were still falling fast. The flat concrete roof of a building rushed up to meet them…

CRASH!

The bike slammed into the roof and went skidding and tumbling across its surface, kicking up streams of sparks as it went.

Its passengers went flying.

Bryce regained consciousness to find white spiderwebs in front of his eyes. His glasses were smashed. If not for the helmet, his head would have been, as well.

His first coherent thought was: Lauren.

He tried calling her name.

No response.

Suddenly terrified beyond anything he had ever felt before, he disengaged the visor, pulled off his helmet and stood up.

Instantly, nausea and dizziness engulfed him. The world spun as though he were still falling. Gasping, he dropped back to his knees and squeezed his eyes shut, waiting for the feeling to pass. When he was sure that all of his senses were back in order, he opened his eyes tentatively.

There were bits of metal strewn all across the rooftop. The hoverbike lay some fifty feet away on its side, smoking. The air was filled with the sharp tang of burnt metal and spent electricity.

Bryce caught sight of Lauren a few metres away to his right. He was relieved to find that she was conscious and had pushed herself to her knees. He hurried over to her, limping slightly.

"Lauren! Are you alright?"

She said nothing, did not look up. She was staring at the ground, her hands clasped in her lap.

"Are you hurt?" Bryce asked, crouching beside her. Then he saw the tears on her pale face.

Lauren swallowed, still not looking at him. "You could have killed us," she whispered.

"I…" Bryce was momentarily lost for words. "I didn't," he finished lamely.

Lauren's hands clenched. She turned finally to face him, anger glimmering through her tears. "You didn't," she said. "Is that all you can say?"

Bryce stared at her, taken aback. "I, I had to do something! That Enforcer was about to--"

Lauren got up before he had finished his sentence, turned, and began to stalk away.

"Wait!" Bryce called after her, scrambling to his feet. "Where are you going? Lauren!"

She half-turned, but did not stop walking. "I don't want to be a part of this any more!" she cried. "You can find your damned stupid dragon on your own!" Her voice broke and she turned her head down and increased her pace.

Bryce stood watching, stunned, as she headed for a steel door set in a squat concrete structure nearby. A great sloping glass roof arose behind it, the dark sky and the lights of the distant flyway mirrored in its panes.

The door opened and closed with an echoing clunk. At least she didn't slam it, Bryce thought. He sighed, long and wearily, and lowered himself slowly onto his haunches, wincing as his bruises protested. He took off his cracked glasses-- impossible to replace, he'd have to make new ones himself, if he ever got the chance-- and rubbed his eyes. He didn't want to be a part of this, either. He was sick and tired of being treated like a criminal, or a loony, or both, but he didn't have the benefit of being able to walk away. He'd only tried to show people the truth. Why was Mollier such a narrow-minded moron?!

He scowled furiously at the closed door, then Lauren came to mind again and his expression softened. He didn't blame her for walking away-- she was scared. It surprised him a little, though. Lauren had always been the more reckless of the two of them, always the first to take crazy risks. On the flyway, it was she who had convinced him not to give up…

Bryce sighed again, in frustration. He didn't understand. Why was she so angry with him? Was it simply the shock of the fall or… something else?

Something caught his eye, a brief flash on the sloping glass roof. He squinted and blinked, then put his glasses back on.

And his heart kicked him in the chest.

It was the Enforcer!

Somehow, it had followed them off the flyway. It was still a fair way above, gliding through the darkness like a deep-sea predator, sweeping the tops of the buildings with its searchlights.

Searching for him.

Frozen with fear, not breathing, Bryce stared at the reflection of the Enforcer until it passed over the edge of the glass and disappeared. Forcing himself not to look behind him, he got up slowly and walked as calmly and normally as he could manage towards the steel door.

He reached it, went inside and closed it carefully behind him. He peered out the small window set in the door, looking for the telltale flash of crimson lights.

Nothing.

But it wouldn't be long before the Enforcer caught sight of the wrecked hoverbike…

Heart pounding, he turned away from the door and started quickly down the dark stairwell… then stopped abruptly.

Lauren sat at the bottom of a short flight of metal-grilled steps. She had her back to him, and she was crying.

Bryce stood paralysed, feeling horribly awkward. But there was no way out of the situation: he had to go past her, and he couldn’t ignore her. He didn't want to ignore her.

What have I done? he thought, guilt stabbing at his stomach.

"Lauren… I'm sorry," he said sincerely. "I didn't know what else to do. There was a risk that we would die whatever choice I made." He hesitated. "You were the one who refused to let me give up."

There was a long silence, then Lauren said, her voice quavering: "You didn't have to listen to me."

Bryce's eyebrows raised. "Are you kidding? You would have punched my head in if I didn't!"

Despite herself, Lauren choked a laugh.

Bryce came down the steps so that he could see her face. It was streaked with tears. Long strands of hair had come loose from her ponytail and hung around her face like wispy feathers. She looked sad and lonely and lost, like an abandoned child who didn't understand why the world had been so cruel to her.

"I thought you were dead," she whispered. She took a shaky breath. "When I woke up and saw you lying there on the ground, not moving, I couldn't bring myself to go and check if you were alright. I just sat there! I was afraid of what I would find. I couldn't bear it if--" Her voice cut off. Fresh tears glinted in her eyes, and she buried her face in the crook of her arm to conceal them.

"Hey!" Bryce said, crouching before her and taking her hand in both of his. "Hey, I'm not dead."

She lifted her head slightly, but kept her eyes downcast. "Mollier wants you dead," she said.

He squeezed her hand reassuringly. "Mollier can go to hell," he replied firmly. He reached out and gently brushed some strands of hair out of her eyes, tucking them behind her ear.

She looked up at him then, directly into his eyes. "Is Mercury III worth dying for?" she asked.

Bryce held her gaze, noticing the fear and despair in their sapphire depths. Artificial OED's, he thought, but her soul shines out of them like the sun…

He hated seeing her miserable and afraid, it didn't suit her. She was beautiful when she was happy.

He blinked, realising that she was waiting for an answer. "If you had a child," he asked quietly, "wouldn't you overturn the world to protect it?"

She studied him a moment in silence. Then she nodded, slowly and resignedly. "What would you live for, then?"

Bryce felt the question sink into his mind. He knew the answer to this, as well, knew it suddenly, with shocking conviction. It surprised him, for he hadn't realised the truth of it until just this moment.

But he couldn't say it. His voice lodged in his throat. Instead, he just shook his head and looked away. His heart was still pounding, although he had completely forgotten about the Enforcer. "I don't--" he started to say.

But he never finished the sentence. For Lauren took his chin in her hand, gently turned his head towards her, and kissed him.

When she broke away, he was so stunned he couldn't move. He couldn't breathe. Holding his face only an inch from hers, she whispered: "Was that a good enough reason?"

Bryce's reply, when he had recovered, was to take her face in his hands and kiss her back. Then he said: "Let me think about it."

But he was grinning.

Then Lauren grinned too, and punched him in the shoulder. "You're a jerk!" she said, and pulled him into a fierce hug. "But a gorgeous one!"

"Does this mean you forgive me? Bryce asked, stroking her long ponytail.

"I don't know," she said into his shoulder. "Let me think about it."

He was about to make a sarcastic reply when he suddenly went tense, his arms tightening around her. "What…?" she started to say, but Bryce cut her off.

"Don't move!" he hissed.

A beam of bright red light had slipped through the tiny window in the door at the top of the stairs. It lanced across the stairwell like a huge laser beam and hit the wall behind them, about two feet above their heads.

The Enforcer had arrived.

"Dammit!" Bryce cursed. It knows that we're in here somewhere…

The beam began to slide across the wall, angling downward towards them.

"Down the stairs," Bryce whispered into Lauren's ear. "Now. Quickly."

They crawled off the landing and down the metal stairs to the second landing, where they crouched beyond the searchlight's reach. The light hit the spot where they had been sitting only seconds earlier, and passed on, illuminating the metal railing and sending shadows angling throughout the stairwell.

"Even if it does find us," Lauren whispered, "it can't get in here. That door is way too small."

Bryce watched the moving searchlight nervously. He wasn't so sure that the Enforcer couldn't get inside if it really wanted to. He was half-expecting it to burst through the wall.

"Come on," he said quietly. "Let's get out of here before it finds another way in."

He led the way down a third flight of steps, and there the stairwell ended at another closed metal door. This one was an electrically powered sliding door, smooth and handle-less. It was firmly closed.

The Enforcer's searchlight moved away from the window, plunging the stairwell into deep shadow. Bryce couldn't see a thing. He stood waiting anxiously while Lauren investigated the keypad. A few tiny beeps later and she had the door open. He felt her hand touch his and guide him through.

"At least those OED's are useful for something," he muttered, as she led him along a pitch-black corridor to a third door, this one unlocked.

Beyond the door, they found themselves in a huge open space, filled with faint starlight. For an instant, Bryce thought they were outside again, until he realised that the ceiling was made of glass.

They were right underneath the enormous sloping glass roof that he had seen from outside.

He looked around. They had emerged onto a carpeted corridor-balcony that surrounded a wide, square atrium about sixty feet across. The walls were lined with dozens of office doors and passageways, and a few fake pot-plants. He walked over to the balcony and glanced over, then gasped and turned quickly away. The atrium went all the way down through the entire building, at least fifty stories.

Lauren leaned curiously over the railing, then raised an amused eyebrow at him. "Vertigo?" she said. "After you just leapt off a flyway on a hoverbike?"

"I think it's the walls," Bryce said weakly, taking deep breaths. "Perspective."

"Uh-huh," Lauren said sceptically, and turned to study the doors and hallways. "Any idea which one of these might lead down?"

Bryce was quite glad to focus on something other than the dizzying drop behind him. "There should be an elevator around here somewh--"

SMASH!

The sound seemed to fill the entire world. Bits of glass showered over Bryce and Lauren in glittering shards. Bryce instinctively grabbed Lauren and pulled them both to the floor a bare second before a lethal wave of laser-fire swept over their heads, shredding the balcony railing and opposite wall. "I guess it found a way in!" Bryce shouted over the din.

They huddled on the floor until the laser-fire stopped, then peeked cautiously over their shoulders.

There, hovering in the middle of the atrium behind a veil of drifting smoke and cement dust, lights blazing, was the Enforcer, huge and ominous. Surrender now and you will not be harmed, its cold, emotionless voice ordered inside their heads.

"I don't think we have much choice," Bryce muttered. For a heart-racing instant, he considered their chances of getting up and making a break for the stairwell door, only a few metres away. But no sooner had the thought entered his head than the Enforcer's left gun turret swivelled to point in exactly that direction, effectively cutting off their escape route.

Bryce swore, remembering that he was lying in full glare of the Enforcer's MemScan. It was reading his and Lauren's minds like books; it was processing every single thing they were thinking. There was no chance for either of them to plan any sort of escape or distraction.

He exchanged resigned glances with Lauren. "End of the road?" she said gloomily.

He closed his eyes and nodded. "End of the road."

Still lying on the floor, he put his hands slowly into the air. "We surrender," he said.

Stand up and raise your hands above your heads, the Enforcer ordered. Do not attempt to escape. Resistance will be met with immediate execution.

They did as they were told.

"I'm sorry," Bryce whispered to Lauren as the Enforcer droned on. She shook her head, reached over and squeezed his hand briefly. "It's okay," she said.

Having finished its declaration, two further hatches opened on either side of the Enforcer's forward laser turret, these ones much narrower. There was a series of faint clicks, and then two long, thin, spear-like guns sprang from the hatches. Tranq guns, Bryce thought in dismay. The Enforcer was going to subdue them until human police officers arrived to take them away.

Bryce braced himself for the impending shot. The next thing I see, he thought, will be the inside of a gaol cell…

And then, with startling suddenness a massive silver shape plunged through the hole in the shattered ceiling, creating a second rain of glass, and slammed into the Enforcer, taking it below the balcony before it could release its tranquilliser darts. A strangely animal screech tore through the air.

Hardly believing what they had just seen, Bryce and Lauren raced as one to the ruined railing.

"Oh my God!" Lauren gasped.

"The Merc!" Bryce cried, equally shocked.

The two giant machines tumbled down the atrium, locked in a death grip: the Enforcer spewing laser-fire in every direction, the metal dragon attempting to incinerate it with fire of its own.

"I don't believe it!" Bryce breathed. "Mercury III found us!"

"And it just saved our asses! Let's go!" Not waiting for his response, Lauren grabbed Bryce's arm and dragged him away from the edge.

They had only gone a few steps when an immense, ground-crushing thud made the entire building quiver. Bryce hesitated and looked back in alarm.

"Come on!" Lauren said. "The Merc bought us time, let's not waste it!"

Still Bryce looked reluctant. Lauren tugged on his arm. "The dragon's not gonna die that easily, come on!"

As if to confirm her words, a distant shriek echoed through the atrium, followed by more crashing thuds.

Bryce let himself be dragged back through the dark corridor and into the stairwell, where they ran up the metal stairs. "Where are we going?" he asked in confusion. "There's no way out up here!"

"The hoverbike might still be flyable!"

Bryce made a sound of incredulous exasperation. "That's optimistic!" he said.

They burst out onto the rooftop. Lauren raced to the fallen hoverbike, Bryce close behind. The building shook again, this time so violently that they both stumbled.

"That can't be good," Bryce muttered. Lauren took hold of the bike. "Give me a hand!" she called. Bryce hurried to help, and they shoved the bike upright. More bits fell off it as they did so.

"Oh man," Bryce said, staring at the bike. It looked as though it had been chewed up by a dragon and spat out again. "If you get that thing to work, I'll kiss you again!"

"You'd better!" Lauren grunted as she pulled at a badly dented side panel to get at the wiring. There were some sparks as she attempted to hotwire the engine for a second time. The wheel-lights came on, flickered, and then went out again.

"Piece of crap!" Lauren yelled, and kicked the bike. It came to life with an agonised whine of protest. The wheels lit up, flickered erratically, but held.

She smiled and jumped into the driver's seat, nodding at Bryce as he climbed on behind her. "You owe me," she said.

He smiled back. "We're not out of here, yet," he replied.

There was another ominous rumble from somewhere far below them. Bryce looked at the rooftop. There a thin, but nevertheless alarming crack crawled across its surface.

Bryce's eyes widened. "Definitely not good."

Lauren gunned the accelerator. The bike rose ponderously, its wheel-discs hovering a few inches above the concrete, straining against gravity, shuddering. "C'mon," she muttered anxiously. She flicked on the emergency thrusters for extra lift, but nothing happened. On the dash, every warning light that wasn't smashed had lit up. "Crap," she said. "Lost auxiliary power. If this thing drops out of the air, we're dead."

"Right now I'd be eternally grateful if it gets into the--"

Then, as if to refute Bryce's words, they were rising.

No, Bryce realised with a jolt. They weren't rising at all, in fact the hoverbike had barely moved-- the entire roof of the office building was sinking beneath them!

Lauren's terrified exclamation was drowned in deafening thunder. In a kind of eerie slow motion, the remains of the glass ceiling structure crumpled in on itself, the crack along the roof widened, and a huge section of the building split apart and fell away, like a sandcastle disintegrating in an incoming tide. A mammoth cloud of dust surged upwards and engulfed the bike.

With a series of gut-dropping jerks and starts, Lauren guided the hoverbike back down to earth. They were flying blind through the dust, but somehow she managed to navigate to a relatively clear space and land. The two of them coughed uncontrollably for several minutes before their lungs cleared enough for them to talk and breathe. Bryce felt as though his throat had been scoured with sandpaper.

Upon disembarking, the tortured hoverbike finally died for good. Every panel and loose part fell of it, leaving a rather sad mechanical skeleton standing in place.

"Don't make 'em like they used to," Lauren coughed into her sleeve.

She turned to find Bryce standing motionless, staring at the wreck of the building, which was just visible through the dust as a shadowy mountain of masonry and twisted metal. Broken glass frosted the asphalt beneath their feet. An ethereal silence had fallen-- the faint sounds of traffic elsewhere in the city seemed to belong to another world.

Nothing moved except the billowing dust.

Bryce took off his glasses and absently wiped the dirt off the cracked lenses. He also wiped at his eyes, trying to pretend they were irritated by the airborne dust particles, but Lauren was not fooled. She stepped over and put her arms around him.

Bryce took a deep breath. "I just wanted to talk to it," he said, his voice tight with barely suppressed emotion. "Just once."

Lauren nodded into his shoulder, understanding. "The Merc died to save us," she told him quietly.

"Yes," Bryce murmured. "And I will never know why."

They were both silent for awhile, holding each other, before Lauren said finally: "What do you want to do now?"

Bryce sighed wearily. "Give myself up," he replied. "I have nowhere else to go."

Lauren stepped back and studied his face, and her brow furrowed. "Are you sure? We could go to the machine factory where it was first spotted, try to find out--"

But Bryce shook his head. "No. It doesn't matter any more. The Mercs-- all of them-- are gone. Whatever it was that I created, that wondrous AI, that spark of life… it's gone."

Lauren took his hand. "We know it existed," she said softly. "That's all that matters."

They gazed at each other in the darkness for a long moment. Then Bryce gave a small, sad smile. "That's all that matters," he repeated.

"Let's get out of here while we can," Lauren said, glancing around. Bryce nodded, and they turned to walk down the dark street. But they had gone only a few paces before he hesitated. Lauren gave him a questioning look. "What is it?"

Bryce was staring back at the pile of rubble, an uncertain frown on his face. "I don't know," he replied. "Something…" Something was pulling him back. It was a feeling he could not explain to himself, let alone Lauren: an insistent tugging, deep on an instinctual level, urging him to wait.

And then he heard the voice. It whispered in his mind as though a part of his own thoughts and he almost mistook it for such-- a fantastical rumination, a product of his desperate hope.

Wait, it said simply.

The voice was stoic, metal-edged like the voices of the hoverbike and Enforcer, but somehow much different. There was a subtle tone to it that transcended anything artificial, a tone that suggested sentience. Bryce knew it for what it was, then. Elation surged through him in a sudden rush. Hardly daring to believe the possibility, he turned and ran back towards the ruined building.

Lauren started to call him back, but at that moment the rubble moved. Massive slabs of concrete heaved and cracked and groaned, creating avalanches of debris. Slowly, elegantly, like a great serpent shedding its troublesome skin, Mercury III emerged. Its quicksilver body was ashen with dust, but otherwise completely undamaged. The dragon stood upon the wreck and slowly turned its head to look at the two small humans below, who were frozen, spellbound. Its eyes blazed through the haze like twin fires.

In a moment that seemed to stop time, Lauren and Bryce stared up at the dragon, and the dragon stared back. Lauren was the first to collect herself. "Venus," she announced quietly, arriving at Bryce's shoulder.

"What?" he replied distractedly, unable to take his eyes off the dragon.

"'Mercury' is too masculine," she elaborated.

Bryce blinked out of his daze and looked at her. "I thought you preferred it to be male?"

"That was the previous one. This one is definitely female."

"Why do you say that?"

"Because," she said, smirking, "she kicked that Enforcer's ass!" And then she let out a great whoop of joy.

Bryce, for the first time he could remember in a long, long time, laughed.