Jay Posey - Morningside Fall

A patrol moved down the street, just two guardsmen, and neither of them paying much attention. Painter watched them from his hiding place, his eyes lowered slightly to reduce their glow. The guards seemed soft, somehow. Sloppy. How had he ever feared them? How could they possibly be the ones charged with protecting their city? With protecting Wren? And Cass?

He had been afraid before, truly afraid, when they’d made their way to Mister Sun’s. Borderline panicked. Fearing the consequences of his actions. Not knowing what would happen if they were caught, nor if they escaped. How long would Cass let him stay with them after what he had done? And he’d feared for them as well. For Cass, and for Wren. Painter had feared making another mistake, something that would give them away, that would cause harm to those two and leave him with nothing.

But now, here, on his own, it almost felt like this was what he was made for. His altered eyes could see in the dark, and he could sense the digital pulse of the unaltered. Now that he had calmed himself, it felt right. It felt good. Fear was still there, lingering around the edges, but at his center anger remained, cold and righteous. And as long as he held to that, he knew the fear had no place to enter in.

The patrol moved on out of sight, and Painter slipped from the shadows across a small thoroughfare and into another alley. He paused there, in a nook where the corner of the building protruded in an architectural flourish. Morningside was eerie in its stillness, and out from beyond the wall, he could hear the occasional calls of the Weir, cold and electric. Calls that had once filled him with utter terror. But those sounds had lost that power over him now and free from fear he could hear a melancholy, almost musical quality behind them. Painter couldn’t help but wonder what might happen once he was outside the wall. He hadn’t left Morningside at all, even during the day, since Wren had brought him back. Could he walk among the Weir now? Would they attack Painter, or ignore him? Or maybe even accept him?

For just a moment, he felt the slightest pang of regret. For all the horror, the loss of self — the black harvest — amongst the Weir there had been in some strange way a sense of belonging that Painter hadn’t known before and was unlikely to ever know again. An involuntary shiver brought him back to the moment. No. No, there was nothing good or right about what he had been. But maybe now he could find a way to bring good out of what he had become.

Painter eased around the corner of the building and threaded his way amongst the structures that led towards the governor’s compound. Random patrols were bound to be fewer, this close to a secure location, but that also meant an increase in stationed guards. He’d have to keep his eyes open and his wits about him. His eyes. He held a hand up in front of his face, and judged the moonshine glow cast upon it. He’d been careful to avoid looking directly at patrols. But it was going to be far more difficult to keep his gaze averted when Painter had to scan the walls to locate the guardsmen posted there. And all but the laziest would surely notice the telltale shine gleaming from out of the darkness. Maybe he’d have it figured out by the time he got there. Most likely, he was just going to have to get lucky.

The final fifty yards posed no difficulty, and Painter felt he covered them far more quickly than he’d expected. Undoubtedly it was because he’d been counting on that time to grant him some revelation on how to gain entry. Naturally, there hadn’t been one. The compound stood twenty-five yards away across an open stretch of ground, well-lit and offering few places to find cover.

Cass had said the north-eastern gate was his best bet, since it hadn’t been used for months, but that didn’t guarantee it’d go unwatched. On the contrary, since one or more of Morningside’s disgruntled citizens had trashed the memorial a night or two ago, there was good reason to think there might be an extra guardsman or two stationed nearby. Painter circled around that direction anyway, swinging wide to avoid street lights where he could, and occasionally putting a building between him and the compound whenever he thought he might be too exposed. When the north-eastern gate was finally in view, Painter crouched low and cupped his hands around his eyes to shield their glow as much as possible.

On top of the wall he could see a faint electromagnetic swirl that indicated a guardsman that he couldn’t quite make out otherwise. Though he wasn’t seeing it, exactly. It was another sense that detected the guard’s residual signal, processed it into something Painter could interpret, and though seeing wasn’t quite right, he always felt like it had more to do with his eyes than anything else.

This was the testing point. The moment that would decide whether he would succeed or fail. Playing hide and seek with the patrols had been one thing. Walking out into the open during the night would present a similar challenge. But infiltrating the compound was something else entirely. Something he’d never done before in either of his lives.

He sat back on his haunches and tried to think it through. Somehow back at Mister Sun’s they’d skimmed over this part. Once you’re inside… almost taken it for granted. Painter had never been much of one to call the shots. That’d always been more of Snow’s thing.

Snow. Little sister, always in charge, always in control. She’d been the clever one, and confident. He smiled with bitterness at the memories. At first it’d just been easier to go along with her because she was such a bully. He pictured her as the chubby four year-old, full of fire — fearless and fearsome. Remembered the bruises on his own thin arms and shins. But Snow had changed after Dad had died. Still fearless and in charge, but tempered. Wiser, maybe, or at least less concerned about just getting what she wanted, doing it her way. But then doing it her way had gone from the easy thing to the right thing. At least most of the time. What would she have told him now?

You can’t do it, her voice said in his head. And Snow would’ve been right. The old Painter could never have done it. But that wasn’t him anymore. He was stronger now, faster. Surely there was something he could do.

You can’t do it alone, her voice came again — correcting his initial thought as if he’d interrupted her before she’d finished. That’s what she would’ve told Painter. It was a fault, Snow said, how much he took upon himself, how little he trusted others. And the beginning of a plan formed in his mind.

“Wren,” he pimmed, whispering into the night air and speaking to his friend a half-mile away.

“Painter, are you OK?” came the reply a few moments later, Wren’s voice somewhere inside Painter’s own head.

“At the c-c-compound,” Painter answered. “Do you know a wuh, a way to get the guards to… to… to broadcast?”

“Hmm… no, I don’t think so. Sorry,” he said. And then, “Hold on, let me ask my mom.”

There was a long delay before the response came. Painter’s calves were starting to burn. A pair of guardsmen wandered into view, and he shifted back.

“She thinks she can try something. Do you want her to do it now?” Wren said.

“Wait one sss-second.”

The patrol moved counter-clockwise around the governor’s compound, and didn’t seem to be in a hurry about it. Judging from the looks of things, Painter guessed no one had found the bodies yet. The guards moved on out of sight.

“OK, go,” Painter said.

Seconds ticked by. Ten. Fifteen. Thirty. Painter was just about to pim again when all of a sudden there was a shimmering flare on the wall, like mirage roiling off hot concrete. And then another. And another. One after the other, the guardsmen were responding to whatever Cass had done, actively broadcasting information through the digital and lighting up in Painter’s vision with each burst.