Act III, Vexana: AbsentChapter 34
Chapter 34: Rescue Operation
A rooftop over the storm-dark city.
A beep on a rooftop and a beep in the courtyard. Guinevere runs, and Fanny has to decide who leads.
The Citadel’s storm had turned midmorning to dusk. Vexana stood on the roof of a lecture block, staff in hand, the Enders crouched around her. Across the courtyard rose the Academy hall, and above it the ragged wound in the sky.
Behind her, folded against a chimney stack, her suit waited with its eyes dark. Purple plate edged in gold. A heart-shaped crest on its chest. She had called it through a portal at dawn. The Enders paid it no mind.
The Will’s voice had said one thing. “The Academy. Strike.”
She could have struck from the far ridge, ten times past the beep. She had taken the nearest roof. One look, she had told herself.
At her wrist, inside the sleeve, the Emblem beeped.
It was small and bright, and it carried over the sirens. Across the courtyard, a second beep answered.
Down there Guinevere stood with the frontline, one hand at her collar. She was crying. She was smiling, too, a little.
“Betray her...” Vexana said, very low.
“But to protect her...”
“Even hidden in the dark of night, I will remain an unwavering guardian.”
Guinevere would follow that beep anywhere. At the hall the whole team stood at Guinevere’s back. When the Singularity, the Enders’ gateway, opened wide, the Matrix would take them all. Out on the platforms, alone, Vexana could drive her off first.
She stepped to the roof’s edge, so the rift’s glow over the bay lit her from behind. A shape, and nothing more. Let her be seen. Let her be followed.
She jumped for the platforms, the broad stone tiers that joined the city’s wards above the bay. The Enders poured after her.
Fanny stood in the courtyard under a sky the color of slate. The frontline was forming: Shield soldiers, students in suits, Layla at her left with the cannon on her shoulder. Enders crawled along the roofs.
A small bright beep cut through the sirens.
It came from Guinevere’s collar. She pressed her hand over the gold star there, and her face crumpled.
“Guinevere?”
Guinevere was looking at a roof across the courtyard. A figure stood on its edge against the glow, a staff in its hand, too dark to read.
“That’s her,” she whispered. “That’s her.”
The figure jumped. Guinevere’s wings of light opened, and she shot after it.
“Guinevere!”
She did not turn. She had left her post without an order. Fanny had never once done that, and had never once wanted to.
Fanny looked up, for anything that could see farther than she could. On the bell tower a girl sat with her boots over the edge and a lollipop in her cheek. Selena. A dragon-shaped machine crouched beside her. Neither moved.
Mobile support. A spotter takes the best seat in the city and sits still until she sees something. Good. I should tell the commanders she’s in place.
“Fanny!” Layla had her by the sleeve. “The hall. Now!”
In the hall, students packed the dark under the big display. It showed the Singularity, a ragged magenta wound, and a small figure flying straight at it. Then Guinevere’s face filled the screen.
“I’m prepared to enter the Singularity.”
The map went red.
Angela stood at the panel with Tetra at her shoulder. “According to the readings, the Singularity’s energy signature is spiking rapidly. The Enders are mobilizing. What is our course of action?”
“So many hostiles! She must be in danger!” Fanny’s voice was already the command voice. “Shield squad holds the courtyard. Angela, with me. Layla, take the...”
“I’ve already identified several weak points in their defenses.” Layla held up her tablet. The red map was marked with green. “This rescue operation is ready to go!”
Fanny looked at the marks. Hold the line and send a squad. That is the Shield’s way. It was slower than Layla’s, by a lot. Layla had built that map in the time it took Fanny to give one order.
“Rear support goes with them,” said Chang’e’s voice on the channel. “They need Angela’s shield more than I do.”
“Your sector, Commander,” said Ruby.
“Go,” said Lesley. “I have the rear line.”
Ruby came through the hall at a run, the scythe on her shoulder. At the gate portal Layla stepped forward, as she always did. Fanny’s hand rose to the back of Layla’s collar, as it always did.
She lowered it.
“Lead,” she said.