Hugh Howey - Molly Fyde and the Blood of Billions

As his escorts led him past the structure, Cole thought he sensed it twist a little, the entire cylinder rotating slightly. The people in the distance moved even slower now, nearly at a stand-still. Some sort of game they were playing on him?

One of his feet hit the back of his ankles, and he nearly tripped forward, but the arms at either side caught him. Another hand smacked the back of his head, the blow echoing with laughter.

“Enough,” he heard Joshua say.

Cole tried to look over at Joshua, and then he noticed the world had returned to normal: everyone had picked up their pace across the moving village. To his side, the tower definitely moved a little, twitching and rotating. They led him around the perimeter of the base to the forward side of it.

Meet his maker? The phrase rang in Cole’s ears again. Was he about to be strung up? Executed? Simple as that? And why cut off Riggs’s legs to put them back on? How was that even possible? And why put them back on if they were to be executed? What in hyperspace was going on?

Cole felt his pulse quicken as he ran through the questions and the likely answers. He still felt shaken up from the crash landing, from the strange voices in his head, from the fight with Riggs. There was too much going on and none of it made sense. He needed one thing he could understand, something to somehow web the rest of it together.

But he had nothing. His entire environment felt out of focus as they pulled him in front of the tower’s base. He saw a steep flight of stairs there, cut into the flat cylinder and leading all the way up and aft toward the top of the platform. They started pulling Cole up the stairs while some inner self yelled: fight back . But as soon as he put his feet out to resist, they just lifted him up and carried him. Now and then, the entire tower would twitch to one side, and the men would sway together, grabbing handrails and dragging Cole roughly.

Definitely an execution. A flogging at the mast. The more Cole struggled, the more hands he felt on him, some coming swiftly and in the shape of fists.

Suddenly, the world started flashing by around him. He must’ve been going into shock. Everything moved at a blistering pace, the snow a blur to either side, people whizzing across the deck below. He squirmed and kicked and felt himself picked up by all four limbs, laughter filling his ears.

After the last step, they threw Cole down and wrenched his arms up; somebody forced his knees under him and he tried to kick out—he shook his shoulders back and forth. When someone punched him in the liver, Cole bent to the side in agony. He thought of Molly—tried to focus on his love for her—pulling her face out of memory to have something solid to cling to.

Rough hands grabbed his head and forced his gaze up, while his arms were yanked against the restraints. He was having the hardest time remembering what Molly looked like. It heaped sadness on his despair. He could feel tears welling up in his eyes, threatening to drown him inside his goggles.

A face swam into view. Not Molly’s, not the face he was trying to conjur, but one familiar. It loomed down in front of him, smiling.

Cole couldn’t make sense of it. He recognized the man, the thin face, the wicked smile. Cole blinked, trying to focus through his goggles, feeling like this was exactly how he’d seen him before: through a sheet of thick plastic. Or carboglass.

Dakura.

The man from Dakura who was after Molly! Cole couldn’t remember his name, wasn’t sure if he ever knew it, but he knew that face—

Byrne . He did know it. He remembered Molly saying it in horror. But didn’t they leave him for dead in that loading bay?

Joshua stepped forward and began whispering in Byrne’s ear. He waved his hands as he spoke.

Byrne’s smile grew. He stared at Cole, nodding his head.

Cole tried to focus on what was being said, then noticed the strange man was wearing a red band around his forehead. He wondered if it was his; he wondered if the man remembered him from Dakura.

Byrne whispered something in return to Joshua, who stepped back and relayed it to the people holding Cole. As Joshua stepped aside, Cole realized there was something different about the thin man, something besides the red band. Byrne wore the same outfit of thin canvas pants, a shirt with large white buttons, his wiry frame poking out at the shoulders—

But Cole could’ve sworn the last time he’d seen him, Byrne had been in possession of both his arms.

Cat eventually seemed to tire and make a mistake, and one of the woks fell and rattled silently inside the bubble. Molly tried to sense how long the beautiful and brutal display had been going on. Half an hour? Longer? Cat pulled her foot out of the way of the spinning wok as her arms continued looping in large circles. The strained grimace on her face was visible even from the balcony. She looked away from the remaining two mid-air objects and nodded to someone off-stage. As her head turned, Molly spotted a bright trickle of blue blood leaking out of the Callite’s ear and weaving its way down her brown neck.

A moment later, the lights began to dim, and Cat juggled the last two woks lower and lower, allowing them to settle to the ground. Finally, the torturous and sublime show came to a silent conclusion, but Molly remained transfixed, staring into the darkness as her mind struggled to comprehend the powerful display she had just witnessed: a solitary figure, on stage, enduring incredible violence while exhibiting such practiced expertise. She had to meet this person. She wanted to get backstage somehow and thank her. Congratulate her.

Then she remembered: that’s why we’re here!

She turned to grab Walter and saw that he had passed out across the armrest on the other side of himself.

“Walter, are you asleep?”

He lifted his head as the dim house lights flickered and returned. Molly looked to the stage and saw that Cat was gone, the bubble rising slowly toward the rafters.

“Iss it over?”

“Yeah, let’s go.”

Molly shooed the Wadi to her neck and hurried toward the stairs. Behind her, she heard someone clapping; she glanced over her shoulder to see the couple in the box seats giving the performance a standing ovation.

“Let’s go,” she repeated impatiently. She turned down the stairwell and took them two at a time, not waiting for Walter to catch up.

The lobby was empty save for one man—the ticket hawker from the street—who leaned on a mop. Molly ran toward the doors that led down to the lower seats, then whirled to ask him: “How do I get backstage?”

The man threw both arms wide, dangling the dripping mop in the air.

“Practice!” he announced, smiling like a fool.

Walter staggered down the last few steps, still half-asleep.

“I’m serious,” Molly said. “I need to speak with Cat.”

“Well, you better hurry if you want an autograph.” The man laughed to himself. “She’ll be in no shape to write before long.”

“What? Where is she? It’s important.”

The man pointed slantwise through the building. “She’s most likely in the back alley with her meager pay, heading off to a pub to get tore up.”

“Thanks!” Molly said. She grabbed Walter and pulled him toward the exit.

“No problem,” the man said. He then hollered after them: “But next time, there’s a two tomato minimum!”

Molly kept one hand on the Wadi’s back as she ran down the side of the opera house, not so much to keep the creature in place but to let it know the claws weren’t necessary, at least not deep enough to sting.

At the back of the building, she turned the direction she thought the ticket hawker had pointed and peered down an alley that serviced the rears of two rows of businesses. In the dim light of a few bare bulbs, she could see dumpsters dominating the lane, their quiet bulk contributing to the smell of things dead and rotting. Detritus was strewn everywhere, and bits of paper floated in the dark and dusty night air; they caught the feeble light and seemed like things alive and fluttering intently.