Текст книги "And All the Stars "

Автор книги: Andrea Höst

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"Wherever those missiles went, it wasn't to Rio," Min said, holding up a tablet. "The Moths aren't acting like they've even noticed."

"Here they come!" gasped one of the rooftop women.

The image jumped sideways, then focused on the three jets, approaching in a tight triangular formation. A giant tower made an easy target, and each jet fired and peeled off in rapid succession.

"Shield's back."

Noi, voice flat, let go of Madeleine's shoulder as the blooms of fire died.

"And now we find out if they meant it about 'reprimands'," Min said, trying for his usual caustically delighted tone, but lacking the enthusiasm for it.

Madeleine drew her feet up, wishing she'd brought a blanket down, and then murmured gratefully as Nash handed her a bowl of steaming pasta shells. The television divided its time between the video uploaded by the two uninfected women, and the challenge in Rio de Janeiro, which seemed to involve several hundred people scrambling for the nearest vehicle and racing off. A full stomach and not enough sleep combined to make this a lullaby, until Fisher woke her to a room darkened and emptying.

"We're going to finish the night in the study," he said. "Now that the challenge is over, it's possible the local Moths will pick up any search for their Rover."

She sat up, neck stiff, rubbing at her eyes and glancing at Pan and Nash tidying in the kitchen. Fisher gauged her winces as she straightened.

"I'll get you an icepack," he said. "We shouldn't have left your back untreated."

Ice was no less revolting a concept than when Noi had suggested it, and so Madeleine had to smile at herself obediently taking off her jacket, turning it to cover her front and slipping her arms back through the sleeves. She was sore, but more interested in an opportunity for another small step forward into something new. She felt increasingly certain, too, that Fisher was finding chances to take them as well.

"Shoulder blades primarily?" He'd brought two folded tea towels, and prodded her gently to lean forward so he could rest them both against her back. Cold seeped through her Singlet, and she shivered.

"Not that giving you a chill is ideal," he said, lifting and turning the packs. "After a couple of days you're at least able to switch to hot packs."

"What happened with the challenge?"

"It was a straightforward race. The base of the statue was simply the end point."

"It all seems so petty." Races and competitions – played with a distinct lack of care for the possessed hosts, but still games which hardly seemed worth the immensity of death which preceded them. "And the attack in Washington?"

"No sign of any immediate response." Fisher's voice was composed, but the pressure on her back momentarily increased, and she knew that if their positions were reversed she would feel the roil of frustrated energy in him.

"You and Noi are so alike."

"Noi?" he repeated, startled, then stopped and gave the idea some thought before saying: "I don't see it."

"You're both always trying to hide how really worried or upset you are. All stressed and pressured, as if you were responsible for looking after the rest of us, and so can't show when you're overwhelmed. You must know we're not so unfair as to expect you to produce some miraculous solution."

She couldn't catch any response. The icepacks remained steady, and the only sound was Pan and Nash putting dishes away.

"I expect that of me, though," Fisher said finally, voice almost too low for her to hear. "Call it ego, or...I had so much I wanted to do, and it's been taken away from me, and I seethe and grind my teeth and shake with this need to sow vengeance and regret."

He paused, took an audible breath, then said: "For that we need to bring down the Spires. I have ideas on how to find a way to do that, but I keep coming up against what it will take to gain the information we need. And my courage fails me."

It was an admission, weary and subdued. Madeleine wished she could see his expression, but resisted the impulse to turn, instead asking: "Did you feel that way in the first days after the dust, when you were trying to identify the best way to treat Greens?"

He turned the icepacks again. "I knew I would kill people." A simple statement of fact. "Dividing up boys of about the same condition, and giving one group sugar water and one saline sounds innocuous, but what if the Conversion was more efficient with an infusion of electrolytes? What amount of energy did their bodies need to survive? Raise their temperature or lower it? Keep them active, keep them still? When one option appeared more promising, I couldn't just switch them all to it immediately, had to keep a control group in case it was a false positive. I had constant nightmares about the data I was accumulating, this logic puzzle of life and death written in permanent ink, with no option to erase it all and start over. I will never forget the faces of those in the groups where treatment clearly wasn't helping. Never. But the knowledge that that was just the first wave, those exposed in the first hours, drove me on. Doing nothing was the worst option.

"With the Spires, doing anything could result in another release of dust or...or anything else the Moths consider a suitable 'reprimand'. Endangering hundreds of thousands of people who only need to wait two years to be safe. And every time I hear Pan or Emily say 'All for one, and one for all' I wonder how that will work if one of us is possessed. Everyone here wants to do something in the abstract, but to get anywhere, to find a way to fight them, we're going to have to gamble everything."

"Have you stopped trying to find a way, then?" Madeleine asked softly.

"No."

"Are we ready to actually do anything?"

"No."

She shook her head. "I've been around Pan too much, and all his dramatic speeches – it makes me want to try one. I feel so strange and unlike myself, possibly the least social person on the planet suddenly part of this group of people which can seriously consider the Three Musketeers' motto as something which fits us. But yesterday none of us ran. We all held together and fought, because we are...we've become more than just people in the same place, trapped by circumstance. If any of us comes up with a plan, we'll think hard about what we mean to do, and then we'll all face the consequences of fighting back."

"Together." He sounded sad, exhausted. Then briskly stood, lifting the icepacks away. "That should be enough. I'll go kick a few people out of the way so you have room to lie on your stomach."

He went upstairs, and Madeleine trailed up to change her shirt, wondering if she'd helped at all. And if her imagination was running overtime or, as he turned away, he'd brushed a finger across the nape of her neck, just below the knot of her hair.

Chapter Fifteen

Sinuous bodies wove a mid-air ballet, so beautiful and strange that Madeleine could not help but sit spellbound as the pair of dandelion dragons twined a pas de deux between bridges and skyscrapers.

Machine gun fire rose, a rat-tat accompaniment which sparked a new form of dance. Dipping, twisting, wildly joyous: driven by countless wings in a madcap obstacle race mere handbreadths above rooftops, from air-conditioning plant to scaffolding and fire escape. It was so obviously a gleeful game, exultant and playful, that its culmination in a tumbling human figure made her gasp in protest.

"Where is it this time?"

Madeleine started. At nearly two in the morning, she still had an hour to go on intruder watch. Judging by his hair-on-end, rumpled and cross appearance, Min had simply given up trying to sleep.

"Pittsburgh," she said, as a rifle began firing.

"Pointless." Min sniffed disparagingly at the gunshot punctuation.

"They did hurt one once."

"And what did that achieve? A glowing thing spitting up its load of dust in the middle of the street." He shook his head, then crossed to the patio door and slid it open despite the chill, kneeling in the entrance to light incense before the statue he'd placed just outside.

The reprimand had begun the day after the Rio de Janeiro challenge, late night Sydney time, and dawn on the east coast of the United States. The many-winged flying serpents which served as air transport for Mothed Blues had appeared in numbers, and flown riderless to the non-Spire towns and cities nearest to Washington. The first sighting had been at a large hall housing Washington refugees, where one dandelion dragon simply thrust its enormous head through upper windows and vomited a great gout of dust over hundreds of sleeping families.

Two weeks after the appearance of the Spires, small outbreaks of stain had occurred in countless non-Spire towns and cities, and breathing masks were ubiquitous, some even managing to sleep in them. But it had been established that the Conversion could infect through contact with eyes, and masks could only do so much for those who woke coated in dust. Even when people stayed home, when there were no convenient large groups for the dragons to target, the increased concentration of dust had soon led to thousands of new cases of Blue-Green. The sheer manoeuvrability of the dragons, and their relative indifference to sprays of bullets, made them almost impossible to stop.

"I think we can safely say that the chances of anyone else trying to shoot a Spire have dropped into the not worth betting on range," Min said, standing and sliding the door shut. "There been any let-up in numbers?"

"No." Almost thirty hours in, a new attack was still being reported roughly every hour.

"Coffee? Damn, this milk is still solid." Min thumped down the carton Madeleine had taken out of the freezer an hour ago, making dishes rattle, then sighed. "Green tea?"

"No thanks. I guess I should go to bed," Madeleine said, but didn't move, wondering if she should be worried. Min was usually very even-tempered. "Would it offend you if I asked what you pray for each morning?"

"Mostly for my brothers to be reborn as slugs in a salt mine," Min said flatly. "Oh, they deserve it, don't worry. I'm virtuous by comparison. Normal." He gave her a sardonic look. "The contrast works the other way here, among you would-be heroes trying to do the right thing, all caution and common sense. No-one's even gotten into the liquor cabinet. Noi's planning this surprise birthday party for Pan, yet thinks it's a bad idea for us to cut loose."

"Alien invasions aren't exactly the time to get drunk."

"If there was ever a time to get drunk, alien invasions are it. We could lock ourselves in the study first, and let Millie play lookout. But you all insist on being so dull and supportive with your musketeers and your stick-together attitude. I keep expecting to find the lot of you sitting around a campfire singing Kumbaya."

"You've been singing along with us, Porthos," Madeleine pointed out, relieved because Min's tone had lightened, growing amused rather than acidic.

"Just humouring the natives," he said, but smiled. "I started at Rushies with no interest whatsoever in acting. But it's hard not to get caught up, and a little addicting playing Spy, Turncoat, Hero. Very elaborate lies, just my kind of thing. You, however, are totally transparent, especially when trying to cheer people up. Go to bed."

Uncurling, she headed upstairs to the lamp-lit library. Fisher's favourite place was the window seat, and she wasn't surprised to see him still awake, but it was unusual for him to be gazing steadily out the window instead of reading.

"Is there something out there?"

He turned his head, making one of his unhurried studies of her.

"Take a look."

It was an unremarkable exchange, but Madeleine instantly filled with a total awareness of him, tucked snugly in a corner of the seat, a book set on one raised knee, posture relaxed, weary smudges beneath his glasses. She would have to lean across him to see in the direction he'd been looking, and the way he kept his attention on her as she hesitated, and then slowly approached, made her extraordinarily conscious of her hair falling loose from its usual knot, and the cheap, rumpled tracksuit hiding almost all her stars.

One knee on the edge of the seat, she rested a hand on the sill, leaned forward and saw...light. A pathway dancing across the black sheet of the bay, leading to a low, heavy moon sinking into the horizon.

"Beautiful."

"Very."

There was a hint of laughter to the word, and she turned her head to see the scene reflected in his glasses, twin moons which obscured but did not hide eyes focused on her face. A charged moment, chained lightning. Then Madeleine decided she was tired of small steps and took a big one, dropping her head to press her mouth to his.

Barely a kiss, simple contact. He exhaled as she drew back, and she felt the feather-touch of his breath. They stared at each other, then uncertainty turned into forward motion, and this time they both moved, found lips, discovered the tingle of tongues entwined.

Technicalities. What felt right, what didn't. A stop-start exploration of reaction, then relaxation into sheer enjoyment. Madeleine shifted her hand from the sill to his shoulder, and Fisher moved his to her waist. As their kisses grew deeper, he pulled her forward, and she slid into his lap.

Like all Blues, Fisher's palms were covered with stain, though most of his fingers were free of it. Breath coming faster, he slid both hands from her waist to the small of her back, where her tracksuit top and the shirt below had ridden up. The contrast of sensation, velvet and flesh, made her shiver and tighten arms around his neck. Encouraged, he moved further up her back.

Sitting as she was, Madeleine was completely clear about the effect she was having on him. This was no longer merely a big step, was becoming an outright leap, and she found she was fine with that, though maybe not on the library window seat. She slowed her kisses, then drew back, and the small noise he made was all about her weight shifting.

She had to smile, because his glasses had steamed up, and he looked ruffled and owl-like, but when she lifted them carefully away his cinnamon-brown gaze transfixed her. He took the glasses, put them on the windowsill, then, slowly, constantly monitoring her reaction, reached for the zipper-pull of her tracksuit top, and drew it down.

Her shirt, form-fitting and dark green, had been rucked up by his exploration of her back, and the very tips of his fingers brushed glimmering skin.

Moth song.

They both leapt as if struck, Fisher so violently that Madeleine would have been propelled into a nosedive if he hadn't caught at her arm. She staggered to her feet, ready to run, to hide, and was turning toward the study when she recognised a quality of distance.

"It's the Spire."

Only the second time the Spire had sung. The Moths mightn't be near, but this suggested a change, perhaps new instructions for the Greens. Muffled, hurried footsteps on the floor below revealed Min's reaction, and down the hall the door to the Wonder Woman room was wrenched open, though Noi had slowed to a less urgent place by the time she reached the library.

"Well that was better than an alarm clock," she said, looking at them both standing by the window. "Do we dive for the study yet again?"

Fisher was frowning ferociously, head cocked to one side, but responded after a pause with a quick headshake. "Prepare for it, perhaps. I'll see if I can spot anything on the city webcams." He went into the study, mouth set in a grim line.

"I was feeling peckish anyway," Noi remarked, and tugged Madeleine's shirt down.

ooOoo

Most of Sydney's webcams were set in uselessly scenic places. They had two views of the skyline, three of the Bridge, one of Bondi, a couple in Circular Quay, but around Hyde Park where the Moths were most active, only the hastily-rigged cam pointing at the Spire. At night, that didn't tell them anything.

Dawn added little.

When the Spire stopped singing mid-morning, Madeleine went to bed, too tired to care anymore. She woke sour-mouthed and headachy in the late afternoon, feeling cheated of something she'd wanted. A long shower eased her temper, and she dressed with care, nothing out of the ordinary, but neatly. The Spire's interruption had thoroughly shattered the moment for her and Fisher, but the step had still been taken. As often as she'd looked at him since, she'd found him looking back, and Madeleine was surprised at the comfortable acceptance she felt. Mutual liking thoroughly acknowledged, action postponed.

She had tried to think about the situation in wider terms, with words like love and belonging. But it was difficult to look beyond the now of allies facing an incredible situation. Too soon and too strange to be sure of more than wanting there to be another moment.

Stomach rumbling, she headed downstairs. The buzz of a newsreader's voice was the only sound, and everyone was gathered around the television. No surprise – it was around the time when, if they stuck to schedule, the Moths announced the details of the next challenge. Which city would be their next plaything.

Everyone was so still. Statues, faces stiff with shock, staring at the screen. Only Emily looked around, and she jumped to her a feet with a cry and rushed to throw her arms around Madeleine's waist. But by then Madeleine had joined the others in being frozen, staring at the newsreader, and the over the shoulder graphic clearly labelled "SYDNEY CHALLENGE".

The image was the figure of a girl, cut off at neck level. A noodle-like figure in short shorts and a crochet halter neck top, and all the rest of her, stars.

Chapter Sixteen

"Okay, enough freaking out. We need to think this through."

They had responded to the announcement as Blues: with a massive injection of sugar pretending to be hot tea. Madeleine had been firmly sat down on the couch, a steaming mug pushed into her hands, with Emily curled comfortingly along one side, and Fisher a more restrained support on the other.

"At minimum, one hundred and fifty-five Moths," Noi went on, eyeing Madeleine with open concern. "About sixty of them with Rovers, if they're allowed to bring them along. Maybe the dragons as well, for better coverage. Given the first Rover found us at the garage, I think the wharf party's over guys. Time to run."

"But," Nash said.

Noi looked at him, sitting tensely upright on the opposite couch, and sighed. "Yeah, big bloody but. I think we can guess what the Spire was singing about last night."

"A cordon."

"They'd be mad to announce a Blue hunt without putting up a fence first. You slept through it, Maddie, but another of the big Navy ships moved out around lunchtime."

"There's no way there's enough Blues and Greens in Sydney to guard every possible route," Pan said. "We've just got to pick the right direction to run."

"They've had days to drive cars across every back street," Min pointed out. "Along with that they just need spotters, and that dragon. If I were them I'd have spent the day setting up my own webcam network. At least given Greens a number to call and told them to lurk at all the through-streets."

"Why do they even think Maddie's still in the city?" Pan asked. "Gav thought we were leaving. We all thought we were leaving."

"The film from the beach." Fisher reached for one of the laptops, and began typing in a search. "The discussion of Madeleine fending off one of the Moths has never completely died down. The uninfected are doing the Moths' job for them." He turned the computer so Madeleine could see her name on the screen. "My fault, ultimately, for posting the Subject M data."

He moved one hand to brush against her back, a gesture of apology or reassurance.

"Still a big assumption to base one of their challenges on," Noi said. "Though I guess they might consider Maddie prime suspect in Reasons Rover Didn't Come Home."

"I should go."

The words were faint, finding their way out of Madeleine's throat almost against her will. She made herself continue, facing up to the impossibility of any other choice.

"If I'm there, if I'm – if there's no need to hunt me, then they won't hunt you. I have to go."

During the chorus of protest which followed, Emily burrowed into Madeleine's side, murmuring something. The words were indistinct, but it was sure to be some variation of 'all for one'. Then Min tossed a screwed-up piece of paper at Madeleine, bouncing it off her forehead.

"Sorry to rain on your self-sacrifice parade, but if you give yourself up, you're giving the rest of us up at the same time. As soon as you're possessed they'll know where we are. Can the melodrama and drink your damn tea. You're in shock."

"Minnow, you make the best speeches," Pan said, wrapping his arms around Min's neck. Min shoved him away, and they wrestled briefly, a flurry which had more relief than anger in it. It lightened the atmosphere, and Madeleine made herself sip obediently, then remembered her hunger and drank thirstily.

"Under no circumstances."

Fisher breathed the words into her ear as she lowered the mug, and when she looked at him a great many thoughts which fit neither time nor place rushed to the forefront of her mind. She had no idea what her face showed, but the betraying colour of Fisher's ears revealed his mind had followed a similar course.

"Right, as I was saying," Noi said, too serious for more than the faintest smile in their direction. "Running away. Anyone have any arguments against it?"

"It's the most dangerous option," Fisher said, firmly. "Don't underestimate the difficulty of finding a route unseen when we're the only cars moving, and every Green is primed to expect an escape. I'm not certain we could even drive off this Wharf without setting off the first alert. And if we get out of the city centre, it won't only be the stained we're hiding from. The whole of Australia will now be highly aware of the probability of Madeleine running, and as soon as she's spotted it's almost inevitable that someone in their excitement will tweet or post or share the news in some way."

"We could use that," Nash pointed out. "Create accounts. Post and tweet sightings. Very likely there are already false reports, errors of identity. Add to that to send Moths running in every direction."

"Good idea." Fisher looked approving. "We should do that anyway. But camera phones will highlight the true trail even if we manage to break the cordon. We have a head start, but we've also had a demonstration of the dragons' capabilities."

"I don't see how that's more dangerous than staying in Sydney with a hundred and fifty-five hunters and their Blue-sniffing glow dogs," Noi said.

"We've confirmed the Rovers are used to track. It's a reasonable assumption to believe they home in some way on the energy Blues create. That gives us three options: gain distance, obscure like with like, or containment."

Fisher paused, and they all looked at the television, where Madeleine's face was displayed, circled, on her last class photograph.

"Distance is the option the Moths will have prepared for, and thus where we will face the greatest opposition. But if they track the energy we produce, moving as close as possible to the largest energy source around, a place where a large number of Blues will be gathered, may have the effect of hiding a lamp by placing it in a room full of chandeliers."

"You mean sitting next to the Spire?" Noi's brows lifted. "Somehow standing around Hyde Park doesn't strike me as – oh, I get you. Maddie came out of the rail tunnels from St James, so we know we can access the Spire that way. You want to trace her path back, and sit beneath the Moths' feet while they run around in circles."

"St James even has dead-end tunnels concealed behind false walls," Fisher said. "It's a gamble, of course. The energy created by a free Blue may be distinctive enough to distinguish despite proximity to the Spire and Mothed Blues. Or they may be guarding the tunnels."

"And containment would be, what, putting ourselves in a box? Something sturdier than the study?"

"Walk-in refrigerators," Fisher said. "Air-tight, insulated, offering an all-round metal shield. What few escape stories there's been from still-free Blues in Rover cities have all shared a shielding factor – those deep in subways, someone hiding in the back of a container truck. But again a gamble, and it would be too great a risk to use those at the Wharf restaurants, even if they're large enough, since the local Blues and Greens will link you to Finger Wharf. Size is a major factor, more than a question of how many of us can fit. We'll need sufficient oxygen for at minimum twelve hours, if not twenty-four. The previous two challenges don't give us enough information to know if there's a time limit, but it is clear that the Moths have a territorial, hierarchical culture. The whole challenge appears to be an attempt to steal a..." He paused. "...to steal a highly desirable Blue from a clan which hasn't yet claimed her."

"Hot property?" Min offered Madeleine a sympathetic grimace. "I'd ask how it feels to be a penthouse on The Peak, but your impersonation of a Green says it all."

"There is no guarantee containment will block the trackers, and we would need to reach a suitable place which isn't occupied by Moths," Fisher continued. "I have a possibility in mind outside the area they've been using – that new hotel which was due to open at Barangaroo on the fifteenth. Like Circular Quay, it's accessible from the waterfront."

"Well, we're not going anywhere while it's daylight, so we don't have to decide right away," Noi said, rubbing her forehead. "Driving off the Wharf would be a huge risk, so we'll strongly consider the boat option first. Pack what you can easily carry and stash anything we can't take with us into the study. Nash, can you take the binoculars and search for movement while it's still light, particularly any sign of those navy ships? And also look over our boating prospects?"

When Nash nodded, she went on: "Fisher, if you, Millie and Min can scare up any images on the public webcams of any of the directions we might head, that will help with our choices. Pan, when it hits early dusk, not dark, go out and see if you can finger-punch the lights over the north end of the marina."

"Mindless vandalism is my forte," Pan said, his spirits recovering with the prospect of action. "Guess we'd better wait till after midnight for the great escape? Let the Greens get sleepy?"

"After three," Fisher said. He glanced at Madeleine. "After the moon has set."

Would they ever have another moment in the moonlight? "I'll help with the cooking," Madeleine said, scarcely feeling real.

"First check the apartments for gloves, hats, anything which looks useful for a boating trip in this weather. Right. Let's get started."

Fisher rose with the rest, but only to sit on the coffee table in front of Madeleine, brows drawn together in concentration. Madeleine, half out of her seat, dropped back down, and looked at him uncertainly.

"I wish I could make you promises," Fisher said. "But I don't want to downplay the danger we're in. I'd like you to make a promise to me, however."

"What is it?"

"Fight. Always fight. No matter how impossible the odds, no matter who you've lost, how you've been hurt. If there doesn't seem to be a way out, look for one. If you seem to have come to an end, start afresh. Never, ever give up."

She stared at him, startled by the anger, the complex swell of emotion in his voice.

"You don't think your plan has a chance?"

Fisher looked away. "The Cores will almost certainly participate. Those of the higher ranked clans are sure to be stronger than the Moths we've previously encountered. And tomorrow is just one day of two years. It's what comes after which frightens me most of all."

He still wouldn't look at her, was watching Noi heading upstairs.

"It makes it easier for me," he added, voice muted, "to know that you won't falter. Can you promise to try?"

Madeleine promised.

ooOoo

"What are you writing?"

"Thank you note for the owners of the house," Noi said, frowning as she read it over. "Miss Manners totally needs to add a chapter on squatting during an apocalypse. I wish we didn't have to leave your painting behind, Maddie."

"I'll come back for it."

"That's the spirit. A big improvement over yesterday afternoon."

"I'm trying to keep focused on how glad I was to survive St James," Madeleine said. "I was convinced the dust would kill me, and I concentrated everything I had on getting out, and painting the picture I'd been waiting months to start. I got to do that, by going on step by step, not giving up. And then I met you, and we got through Bondi, and the seven of us have really..."

She gazed out the patio doors, to the moon being swallowed by the sea.

"I've spent years thinking I was so self-sufficient, that I had all I needed. My art is always going to be the most important thing for me, but this place has been...good for me. I'm really proud of the portrait of Tyler, and I think the one of you and Emily might be the best thing I've ever done. They have something my usual work lacks. And–" She smiled. "And I want to paint Fisher. When that Spire's no longer in Sydney, and I can do something so indulgent as hit the nearest art supplies store, I will paint him."

"Preferably nude."

"Maybe." Madeleine refused to be embarrassed. "We better get downstairs. Two years of this still seems a near-impossibility, so I'm focusing on the current step."

Noi nodded, folded her note in half, and stuck it in the middle of the children's drawings on the fridge. "I'll miss this place," she said, then tugged a scavenged beanie over her riot of curls, and picked up her backpack.

They turned out the last of the lights, and rode the elevator down to the garage, stepping into chill, pitchy dark. The open service door was a grey square of illumination, and cubes of windshield glass crunched underfoot as they edged their way toward the three shadows which interrupted the thin light.

"Won't be long," Pan murmured. "They're aiming for the slip closest to the near entrance."