"Come on!" Soz called.
He stabbed at the console. "We have to destroy that sculpture."
"We have to go! We don’t have much time."
"He stole my life." Jato gave up on the computer and swung around to her. "He created a mirror of himself, but he put it on me. It’s like-like-" He slammed his palm against the console. "He’s a thief. Of my soul." He pointed at the sculpture. "That’s me. No matter where I go or what I do, as long as that exists he owns me."
Sweat was dripping down her face. "I can’t guarantee I’ll find all his backups."
"If anyone can, it’s you." He clenched his fists. "He owes me. And for him, losing his ‘masterpiece’ will be a punishment worse than dying."
Soz strode to the console and went to work, making hieroglyphics ripple across its panels in garish displays. She didn’t waste time pulling out her wrist socket; instead, she hauled off her boot and set her foot on the console, showing no strain with the contorted position as she plugged a prong from the console into her ankle socket.
Seconds passed.
Longer.
Waiting.
"Got it!" Soz jerked out the prong. "Downloaded one copy into my internal memory for you. Erased everything else." She yanked on her boot. "Now let’s go."
They ran across the studio to the cliff door. As they stepped outside, into the blasting wind, she stared down the stairs. "No rail."
Jato struggled to keep his balance, fighting the gales and his venom-induced dizziness. "I’ll go first. If I fall, I won’t hit you. You’re light enough so if you fall you probably won’t knock me off."
"All right." Her voice sounded thick.
He had expected her to insist on going first. His gut reaction ignored the obvious; she was part computer and machines worked on logic rather than heroics.
Clutching his statue, he started down the stairs. An abyss of air and rushing wind surrounded them, turbulent, violent. Step. Step again. He took it slow, halting when waves of dizziness hit.
Step.
Step again.
Scrapes came from above and he jerked his head up to see Soz lose her footing. Lunging for her, he lost his own balance and stumbled on the step, teetering over the void. Lurching back, he reeled to the step’s inner edge, where he fell to one knee and found himself staring down the shaft of air in the center of the spiral.
"Jato?" Soz rasped.
He took a breath, looking up to see her kneeling on the step above him.
"You all right?" he asked. She nodded and they got up, then continued their descent.
The wind was probably cold, but with the fever burning in his body he couldn’t tell. He moved in a haze of nausea and dizziness.
Step.
Step again.
Step-
No step. He looked down. They had reached the bottom.
Soz made a strangled sound and sagged against his back, grabbing him around the waist with both arms to keep from falling. Turning, he put his arm around her for support.
They walked around Nightingale, far enough outside the city to let darkness cloak them. His legs strained to run but he held back, not only because his poisoned body couldn’t keep such a pace but also because it would draw attention. A couple strolling arm-in-arm along a romantic path was one thing; two people running was another.
He motioned at the tubes on her boots. "What’s in those things?"
"Liquid nitrogen." She sounded hoarse. "With disassemblers to boost its effect. It freezes what it hits and the chompers eat it. They’re less specialized than the ones in my body, which makes them more dangerous, but they dissolve after exposure to air."
"How did you free your hands? Do the chompers in your sweat eat leather after all?"
"No." She grimaced. "Mine are far too specific. Anything general enough to take apart a material as heterogenous as animal hide would probably take apart our hides too." She showed him the broken chain on her manacle. "Feel."
He ran his finger along the jagged edge. "It’s sharp."
"So was the part on the ledge. I rubbed the thong against it until it cut the leather."
"No tech that time," he said. "Just brains."
She smiled wanly. Sweat soaked her collar and she walked stiffly, her legs controlled by the hydraulics inside her body.
The starport was so small it had no terminals, just a gate at the airfield entrance. As they neared it, two Mandelbrot globes rolled out to intercept them. Jato tried to dodge, but the one headed for him easily compensated for his evasive actions. It slammed him in the chest and he stumbled backward, then recovered and sprinted to the side. As the globe followed, he doubled back to run around it. The ploy worked with Crankenshaft’s drones on days he programmed them for slower responses, to make the chase "entertaining." Jato doubted this one belonged to Crankenshaft, though; after what had happened, his would go for the kill.
This globe caught him-and rammed his head. As he fell, patches of light punctuated his vision and loud noises buzzed in his ears. With his statue cradled against his chest, he hit the ground and groaned. As he rolled away from the whirring demon, he caught a glimpse of the aircontrol tower. Lights were coming on inside it.
They had run out of time.
Then Soz said, "Eat it, fractal."
A stream of liquid arched into view, bathing the drone in a shower of glistening drops. The globe reoriented on Soz like a giant ceramoplex balloon. As it went after her, she tried to feint, but she lost her balance and fell to her knees. When the globe swooped in on her head, she jerked to the side. It hit her shoulder-and shattered, raining Mandelbrot innards all over her body. In seconds, she was kneeling in the midst of junk large and small, from both globes, lights blinking and components humming.
Soz and Jato stared at each other. Then they scrambled to their feet and sprinted for the airfield. Alarms were blaring, coming from the distant airtower and speakers along the field’s perimeter. As they ran through the gate, which was no more than a few bars that swung to one side, Jato saw a Jag starfighter out on the tarmac. It gleamed like alabaster, as much a work of art as any sculpture.
When they reached the Jag, its hatch dilated like a high-speed holocam. As soon as they lunged through the opening, it snapped closed. A membrane irised in the nose of the ship, revealing a cockpit. As Soz squeezed into the pilot’s seat, it folded an exoskeleton of controls around her like a silver-mesh glove. Jato stood behind her chair, hanging on to its back while his nausea surged.
"Neck and lower spinal nodes blocked," an androgynous voice said.
"Ankles," Soz said, intent on her controls.
While her hands flew over her forward controls, a robot claw pulled off her boots and a mesh enfolded her feet, plugging into her ankle sockets. After that Jato heard nothing; the ship was communicating directly with her internal systems.
Suddenly Soz spun around her chair and pulled down Jato’s head. He fell forward, grabbing the arms of her seat to catch himself. She kissed him hard, pushing her tongue into his mouth.
He jerked away. "Are you craz-"
"I’m giving you the antidote. In my saliva. My web figured it out and my meds made it." She pulled him back into the kiss.
So he kissed her, while guns boomed from the port defenses and the ship shook. Although the Nightingale port claimed only a small arsenal, it could still do damage. He just hoped the Jag could protect itself while its pilot and her passenger took their medicine.
Then Soz pulled away from him and smiled. The cockpit elongated and a second chair rose from the deck. "Co-pilot’s seat," she said. "You take."
He slid into the seat, and a slender probe from it extended to his ear-in time for him to hear a voice shout, "Skyhammer-36, acknowledge!"
He nearly jumped out of the chair. Then he realized he was hearing Soz’s communications with the aircontrol tower.
"You are not cleared for take-off!" the voice said. "I repeat, you are not cleared for take-off."
"Tough," Soz said. Then she fired the rockets.
Jato knew a stealth craft like the Jag could come and go with barely a whisper-if that was what its pilot wanted. They took off in a thundering roar of rockets. For her parting salute to Nightingale, Soz blasted the holy hell out of that tarmac.